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diff --git a/75147-0.txt b/75147-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..217a27e --- /dev/null +++ b/75147-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,49720 @@ + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75147 *** + + + + + +The Stories of +Elisabeth Sanxay Holding +in Munsey’s Magazine +1920-1928 + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +DECEMBER, 1921 +Vol. LXXIV NUMBER 3 + + + + +The Married Man + +A MODERN COMEDY OF ENLIGHTENED THOUGHT + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + +Author of “Angelica” + + +She had got used to Andrew’s forgetting all sorts of important +anniversaries. In fact, she rather liked him to do so. It gave her +something to forgive, and fed her measureless indulgence. All his +eccentricities, his absurdities, his brilliant and explosive energy, his +terrible exactions, constituted “Andy’s ways,” which she loved with a +deep and pitying love. + +Even if he was clever and successful and attractive, he couldn’t do the +things she could do so easily and so well. He couldn’t darn his own +socks or cook a dinner or make a bed. She insisted that he was +helpless--that all men were helpless. She was the sort of woman who +would have pitied Julius Cæsar because he couldn’t make an omelet. + +Something of this kindly indulgence was reflected upon her nice face as +she sat in the library sewing and waiting for Andrew. She was a +handsome, dignified, good-tempered woman of thirty-five, who was never +to be taken by surprise. No matter what might happen, she would raise +her eyebrows and smile and say, “Well?”--which was her nice, kind way of +saying, “I told you so!” + +And generally she had told you so, because, like so many other +unimaginative people, she could almost always foresee ordinary +consequences. Her prognostications were based, not upon probabilities, +but upon experience. + +It was the tenth anniversary of their wedding--an important day in a +household. And yet, knowing Andrew as she did, Marian had made no +preparations for festivity, because he was as likely as not to forget or +to neglect even a special dinner. She would remind him when he came in, +and smile at him, and he would be startled and contrite. She would not +acknowledge the little wound that was there, even to herself. + +Nor would she acknowledge what she really knew quite well--that Andy +wasn’t happy, as she was. Hadn’t she provided him with all the materials +for happiness--a lovely, peaceful home, three pretty, healthy children, +and just the social background he required? + +What is more, she knew that no just man could find a fault in her as a +wife. She was thrifty, conscientious, sympathetic, a correct and popular +hostess, an excellent mother. She was never irritable, never gloomy, +never exacting. She was handsome, and understood how to dress. There was +really nothing within the domestic cosmos to which a sane man could +object. + +That may have been the trouble. Andrew was a man who did not approve of +happiness. He wanted and required to be forever struggling and rebelling +and resenting. Marian had often, with amusement, noticed him trying to +provoke a quarrel with her; but of course he never could, for she never +quarreled. + +The clock struck eleven. She sighed a little, laid down her sewing, and +picked up a book. It had been a very trying day. Andrew had vanished, +without the least regard for appointments he himself had made, or office +hours, and she had had to placate all sorts of people without knowing at +all the cause of his delinquency. It was simply another of “Andy’s +ways,” and a very troublesome one in a doctor. + +She recognized it as part of a wife’s duties to smooth the path of her +husband--above all, of a husband who was the next thing to a genius. She +was accustomed to hearing him spoken of as “brilliant.” She was proud of +it, and secretly a little proud of his eccentricities. He was an +extraordinary man, no doubt about it, and he required a wife of +extraordinary tact. + +He was a physician, but not satisfied with that. He liked to write +articles and give lectures, and he had a reputation as a very daring if +not very sound investigator along sociological lines. He had proclaimed +and printed office hours; but if he were busy writing, he wouldn’t see +any one who came, and it was Marian, of course, who did have to see +these people and get them away not too grossly offended. + +At other times there would be some patient who interested him, and he +would shut himself up with him or her; and again in this case Marian had +to soothe and placate the other patients who had seen the favored one +admitted, and who naturally resented being kept waiting so outrageously. +There was not a trace of jealousy, or of curiosity, in Marian. She +smiled at his interest in a pretty woman. + +She wasn’t too much interested in anything--certainly not in the book +she had taken up, for she put it down again with a yawn within a very +few minutes, to look at the clock and to give a small sigh. She couldn’t +help wishing that Andrew had remembered what day it was, at least to the +extent of an extra kiss. Even the most able and placid woman might wish +that. + +Then, at last, he did come in, in a mood she knew well; and her faint +hope that perhaps he had remembered, and would bring her flowers, fell +stone dead. He flung himself into a chair, hot and tired and rather +pale, with his red hair ruffled up, giving him the look of a sulky and +earnest child. + +“Well!” said Marian, with a nice smile. “Here you are! Such a day as +I’ve had, Andy! People telephoning and insisting that they had +appointments and refusing to be put off; and poor me without the least +idea where you were or when you’d come back! There was that poor woman +with the albino twins--” + +He frowned impatiently. + +“That doesn’t matter. I don’t want the case, anyway. No! See here, +Marian. I want to talk to you.” + +She said “Yes?” inquiringly, with her kind and pleasant face turned +toward him, but he didn’t look at her. He sat staring at the ground, +huddled down in his chair, rumpled, disheveled. + +“What is there about him so attractive?” Marian reflected, not for the +first time. + +He was not handsome, he was very untidy, he was casual, rude, distrait; +a slender, wiry red-haired fellow of thirty-five, with a sharp-featured, +rather pale, freckled face and restless, bright brown eyes. + +At last he looked up at his wife, still frowning. + +“Don’t be hurt!” he said “And _try_ to understand!” + +“Of course I will, Andy.” + +“I’ve been walking,” he went on, “for hours--almost all day--thinking it +out. This lecture that I’m to give, you know, to-morrow--” + +“Oh, yes--before the Moral Courage Club.” + +“I’d made fairly comprehensive notes of what I was going to say; but +it’s been growing on me, every day, how weak and cowardly it is--how +evasive. I hadn’t _dared_ to be frank, I never have dared. I’ve +compromised. I’ve lied. I’ve kept it up for ten years--ten years to-day, +Marian!” + +“Kept up what?” she asked, startled. + +“This damnable hypocrisy!” he cried. “This wretched, revolting pretense! +Do you know that it’s the anniversary to-night of that horrible +ceremony--that perjury--that mockery we called our marriage?” + +Marian had grown quite white. + +“Why, Andy!” she faltered. “I never thought--I thought--I always hoped +you were--happy!” + +He sprang up and began to pace the room. + +“I can’t _stand_ it any longer!” he cried. “I’m at the end of my tether. +Oh, this _marriage_!” + +“Is it--me, Andy?” Marian asked rather pitifully. + +“No! No! It’s simply marriage--marriage with any one. It’s this base, +disgusting monotony, this abominable pettiness, this eternal talk about +servants and children and coal-bills and neighbors and card-parties. It +stifles me. It sickens me. I can’t _live_ any more unless I’m free!” + +“Do you mean that you--want a divorce, Andy?” she asked, with a gallant +effort to disguise her terror and distress. + +“No,” he answered, “not necessarily. I shouldn’t like to lose you +altogether, Marian--unless, of course, you’d like to form another +connection. Would you?” + +“No--no, Andy, I wouldn’t!” + +“I didn’t think so. What I want, Marian, is simply to ignore our +marriage. I want to be released from its petty restrictions and +obligations. Will you do that, Marian? Will you absolve me from all +these preposterous ‘vows,’ and so on?” + +“Yes,” she answered promptly. “I will--if you like.” + +“And you won’t be hurt? You won’t be petty? You won’t think I’m not fond +of you, Marian?” + +She shook her head. + +“You see, don’t you, that we can be just as fond of each other, and yet +go our separate ways?” + +“Are we--does that mean--that we’re to--part?” she asked. + +He came over and laid a hand on her shoulder. + +“My dear girl,” he said, “I can’t live with you any longer.” + +She couldn’t restrain a sob. + +“Oh, Andy! Oh! Is there--some one else?” + +“No! Can’t you _see_? I want to be alone--to live alone--in freedom. +I’ll take a house for myself somewhere, and you’ll go on here, just as +usual; except that I’d like to have the children part of the time. I +won’t be unreasonable, though.” + +“I don’t think I’d--like to--go on here, without you,” she said in a +trembling voice. “I’d be--lonely.” + +“Nonsense! Not after a day or so. You’d enjoy the freedom, too. I’ve got +my eye on a little house that will suit me very well. And really, +Marian, I’d very much prefer you and the children keeping on here in the +same way. Of course, I should make you the same housekeeping allowance, +and so on.” + +“I would like a little freedom, too,” she said. “I--can’t stop +here--without you, Andrew.” + +“Well, of course,” he answered, rather disconcerted, “I’ve no right to +dictate to you.” + +“You can stay here,” she said, “with the children, and I’ll go and stop +with mother for a few days, where I can think it over quietly. Then I’ll +send for the babies. I--you see, I want to--get used to this. +It’s--rather sudden.” + +It was no longer possible to conceal the fact that she was weeping. Her +husband was really distressed. He patted her lovely, shining hair with a +careless hand, while he scowled anxiously before him. + +“My dear girl! Please! This isn’t a tragedy, by any means. Simply let’s +be two sensible, modern people who refuse to be bound by certain +conventions. Do be your own sensible self, won’t you?” + +“I--will--try!” she sobbed. “Only--you’ll have to give me--a little +time.” + +He looked at the clock; it was a little after midnight. + +“Perhaps I’d better leave you alone,” he said. “I’ll be going now.” + +“Going? Where? At this hour?” + +“Well, you see--that lecture to-morrow. It’s to be ‘Marriage from the +Man’s Point of View.’ I can’t, with any dignity, any decency, say what I +wish to say--be really honest--in the character of a domestic man. It +would be a farce. I must be able to say that I’m a free man, do you +see?” + +“Yes,” she said, wiping her eyes. “But--does that mean it’s got to begin +now?” + +“What?” + +“The--living apart?” + +“I’m afraid so. I thought I’d go to a hotel for the night, and send +after my things in the morning.” + +“Oh, no, Andy, please! I couldn’t explain--to the servants. No! That’s +the only thing I ask you. Let me be the one to go. You can say it’s a +telegram from mother.” + +“Nonsense, my dear girl! I won’t hear of it! Turning you out of the +house at this hour of the night! Let _me_ go!” + +“No, Andrew, I’d rather; really I would! I’d _like_ to go. I--need a +change. If you’ll call a taxi while I pack my bag--” + +“You’re quite sure?” he asked anxiously, and again she assured him that +she really wished to go. + +She went up to the big, lamp-lit bedroom, so immaculate, so charming, +with its two brass beds, the dressing-table and bureau gleaming with +silver, the soft gray rug on the floor, her dear little sewing-table, +all the photographs-- + +“Oh, _why_?” she cried. “Oh, why do I have to leave it?” + +She went about in her brisk, sensible way, selecting things out of one +drawer and another and packing them neatly into a bag; but long before +she had finished a sudden spasm of pain overcame her. She sat down in +her own particular wicker chair, and sobbed bitterly. + +“I _don’t_ understand!” she cried. “I _don’t_! I _don’t_! Not a bit!” + + +II + +She was her usual calm self when she came down-stairs again, and was +able to give her husband a great many directions and suggestions as +they rode to the station. + +“I’ll send a night letter to Miss Franklin to come and take care of the +children till I send for them,” she said. “I happen to know that she’s +free now. She’s such a capable girl! You’ll have nothing to worry about +with her in the house.” + +Anxiously, but timidly, afraid that it was a reactionary and +contemptible insistence, but resolute to save herself in the eyes of her +world, contemptible or not, she added: + +“And you’ll be sure to say that I got a telegram from mother, won’t you, +Andrew?” + +She kissed him good-by kindly, pleasantly, and succeeded in getting into +the train with her nice smile still on her lips. Andrew was reassured, +and went home to spend what was left of the night in completing his +lecture notes. + +He fell asleep toward morning on the sofa in his office. He would no +doubt have slept peacefully on till noon, as he had often done before, +if it hadn’t been for an unusual noise in the dining-room at +breakfast-time. He was a little indignant, for he had never been +disturbed before, and he was curious, too. His children--even the +four-year-old Frank--were singing lustily, in unison, a jubilant sort of +chant, led by a very fresh, clear, loud young female voice. + +“Hail! Hail!” they shouted. + +All ruffled and rumpled as he was, he entered the room, to find a +strange spectacle. His three children were standing on the window-seat, +with arms outspread and face upturned. Behind them stood a young woman +in the same yearning attitude, while they all cried their invocation: + +“To the glorious sun that gives us life, all hail!” + +That must have been the end of it, for the children got down and made a +rush at him. + +“Oh, daddy! Mother’s gone to grandma’s!” the eldest little girl told him +eagerly. “Miss Franklin’s going to take care of us. _I’m_ going to write +to mother every single day, but not Jean and Frank. _They_ only +scribble. She couldn’t _possibly_ read it!” + +He was not attending. He was looking at the young woman who stood beside +him, smiling. She was a short, sturdy blonde with a very pretty and +impudent face, a wide, jolly mouth, and queer gray eyes, which were at +the same time immensely candid and quite mysterious. + +“I’m Christine Franklin,” said she. “I’m the originator of the Franklin +method of child care. I dare say you’ve heard of me. Your wife sent me a +night letter to come and take charge of your little family for a time. +That’s what I do, you know--go from house to house, and liberate.” + +“Liberate?” + +“That’s how I put it. I always insist that there shall be no +interference from parents or relatives or servants. Then I begin to set +the children free--to let them express themselves--to be natural.” + +“I see!” said Andrew. “Is breakfast over?” + +It was not, and after a brief toilet he sat down to enjoy it with his +family. He felt that he rather liked Miss Franklin. + +“Nothing clinging and hyperfeminine about her!” he thought. “A man could +make a friend of a girl like that.” + +He decided to study her. Now that he was free and couldn’t be +misunderstood, he had decided to make a comprehensive study of woman in +general. He knew that there were points about them that he didn’t +understand. He couldn’t really generalize upon the effects of marriage +without a better knowledge of females--he admitted that. Why not, he +asked himself, begin with this interesting specimen? + +“What is the Franklin method?” he asked her. + +“It’s not really a method at all,” she said. “It would be better to call +it a theory. It’s simply nature and art, hand in hand. I don’t believe +in directing or controlling a child. I simply help it along the road it +indicates itself. My mission is solely to point out beauty to it.” + +“That’s likely to make it very much more difficult for them to become +accustomed to discipline and self-restraint when they’re old enough to +be held responsible.” + +“But, you see, I don’t believe either in discipline or self-restraint, +in children or in adults. The natural impulses are sufficient. No, Dr. +Nature implants in us only right and beautiful desires. I look upon +self-restraint as superfluous, if not absolutely wrong, in a wholesome +person.” + +“Social interdependence requires--” Andrew began. + +“We _shouldn’t_ interdepend. We should each be a law unto himself. Let +us be healthy, in mind and in body; then let desire be the sole rule, +the sole conscience. Personally, I know that if I want to do a thing, +it is right to do it. If I want to have a thing, it is a right thing for +me to have.” + +Andrew contested that, but she merely smiled at his arguments. + +“Well!” she said. “As for _me_, when I want something, I go after +it--and I generally get it.” + +Andrew met her clear, shameless glance, and an unaccountable shudder ran +through him. What a girl! What an enemy she would make--or what a +pursuer! + +She was undoubtedly an interesting and convenient subject for his new +study, but he didn’t study her. On the contrary, he avoided her. He shut +himself up in his study and tried to write, but the new freedom for his +children entailed such a distressing amount of noise and quarreling that +he accomplished very little. + +He wished to write a long and careful letter to Marian. He was afraid +that she hadn’t fully understood, that she was a little hurt, in spite +of what she had said; but he found it a remarkably difficult thing to +explain to a woman that you are very fond of her and yet wish to be rid +of her. He was not the first man who has essayed such a task. + +The noise in the dining-room became intolerable. He tore up his third +attempt at a letter and went in there, in a very bad temper. + +“Why the devil do you stay in here?” he shouted to his young family. +“Why aren’t you out in the garden, or at school, or wherever it is your +mother sends you? Don’t you know that I’m trying to work?” + +Miss Franklin had entered from the kitchen, eating a slice of bread and +sugar. + +“Ask the cook for some!” she suggested, and the children vanished. “What +are you writing?” she inquired frankly. + +He didn’t care to mention the letter, so he said: + +“My lecture. I’m giving one this afternoon, you know.” + +“What on?” + +“‘Marriage from the Man’s Point of View.’” + +She pricked up her ears. + +“What is a man’s point of view?” she asked. + +“For a man,” he said, “marriage is moral death. It is slavery--bondage +of the worst sort. It is a handicap which prevents any effective +progress. It is, of course, an invention of woman’s, to safeguard +herself and her offspring. She has found it necessary to provide herself +with a refuge, and she has ruthlessly taken advantage of her sinister +influence over the more sensitive and conscientious man to impress him +with a mass of false and pernicious ideas about the ‘home.’ Man has not +one single advantage to gain from marriage, yet he has actually been +taught, by mothers, by women teachers, by all the females who surround +young children, to think of it as a privilege. He secures a home. What +is a home? A nest for the woman, a cage for the man. What is a wife? The +most unprincipled, exacting slave-driver ever yet developed. For her and +her children he is required to give all the fruit of has labor, and, in +addition, a fantastic and debasing reverence and flattery--” + +“You poor thing!” said Miss Franklin. + +He stopped short, in surprise. + +“Why?” he asked. “What do you mean?” + +“You must have been so wretched with your wife,” said she. + +His face turned crimson. + +“I wasn’t,” he said, with an immense effort at self-control. “Quite the +contrary. One doesn’t apply general remarks to--specific cases.” + +“Oh, yes, one does indeed!” Miss Franklin insisted. + + +III + +He went off quite in the wrong frame of mind to deliver his lecture. +When he had taken a stealthy peep at his audience, he became actually +nervous. The Moral Courage Club seemed to be made up almost entirely of +women--rows and rows of earnest faces. It would be very unpleasant to +wound and distress them, as his words were sure to do, especially as +they had all contributed toward the fee he was to receive. For a minute +he was almost tempted to soften some of his remarks, but his reformer’s +ardor flamed up again, and he went out upon the platform bravely. + +The sight of their feathers and furs and earrings helped him. After all, +they were nothing but barbarians, who must be enlightened at any cost. +He began. He told than, as kindly as possible, how selfish, how greedy, +how uncivilized they were, how unpleasant they looked in their skins of +dead animals and feathers of dead birds, with all their savage and +unesthetic finery; how brutally they preyed upon man. + +“Marriage ruins a man,” he said. “It stifles his ambitions; it coarsens +him, it debases him. It outrages his manly self-respect. He is debarred +from wholesome and essential experiences. He is shamefully exploited. He +is forced into hypocrisy and deceit. Partly from his native kindliness, +partly from his woman-directed training, he never dares to tell the +truth to the opposite sex.” + +And so on, directly into those earnest faces, framed by all their +barbaric plumes and furs and jewels. To his surprise and dismay, none of +them changed, grew abashed or angry or stern. They were only +_interested_, all of them. + +They came up in a body when he had finished, and congratulated him. + +“You are always so stimulating!” said one. + +“You brush aside the non-essentials!” said another. + +“It gives one a new outlook!” + +“I hope to see it in print. It is so suggestive, dear doctor!” + +Only one of the earnest horde made any sort of individual impression, +and that was a slender, dark, elegant woman who approached him after +every one else had gone. + +“Doctor!” she said in a low, thrilling voice. “I feel that I _must_ +speak to you. Let me take you home in my car, won’t you?” + +She was interesting, distinguished, and, he fancied, intelligent; so he +was quite willing to follow her to her waiting motor-car and to seat +himself beside her. + +“Your lecture,” she began. “It’s such a startling idea to me--that of +man being the victim in marriage.” + +“Yes,” he said. “It’s not the conventional, romantic idea, of course.” + +“Nor the true one,” she cried. “Oh, doctor, your brain may be right, but +your heart is wrong! There is so much that you don’t seem to know--to +understand! You don’t seem to realize how hideously we suffer--what _we_ +endure. I cannot pretend to be impersonal. I want to tell you the +truth--a side of it that you don’t know. I want to tell you of one case. +Then you must tell me what you think.” + +She laid her hand on his arm and looked earnestly into his face. + +“I want you to hear my story, and then tell me frankly whether or not +_my_ husband was a victim!” + +It was a very long and very harrowing story. It obliged them to go to +the lady’s house and to have tea there, and to sit in her charming +little sitting-room until dark, in order that it should all be told. + +She was Mrs. Hamilton, she said, known to Marian, as to all other women +of any social pretentions in that particular suburb, as the martyr wife +of a fiendish husband. What she had suffered no one knew--except the +twenty or thirty people whom she had told. She ended in tears. + +Andrew comforted her with kindly words and complete exonerations. He +said that she was blameless. The clock struck six, and he rose to take +leave. + +“Good-by!” said Mrs. Hamilton, giving him her slender hand. “Doctor, +you’ve _helped_ me. You’ve _understood_. Mayn’t I see you again? You +don’t know what sympathy means to a lonely, heart-broken woman.” + +He assured her that he would be delighted to come again, as soon as he +had a free moment. + + +IV + +He had declined the use of Mrs. Hamilton’s motor; he preferred to walk +home and to reflect upon this new type. He was not altogether a fool. In +spite of the fact that she was a very attractive woman, he had made up +his mind that he would never go to her house again--not even to study +her. + +“No!” he was saying to himself. “She’s morbid--irresponsible. They’re +really dangerous, that reckless sort!” + +A hand clutched his sleeve and a breathless voice cried: + +“Oh, doctor, I’ve been rushing after you for miles and miles!” + +It was little Mavis Borrowby, daughter of an old patient. Always in the +past Andrew had taken Mavis for granted as part of old Borrowby’s +background. He was quite disconcerted to see her, this spring evening, +as a detached individuality, and a very vivid one. + +She took his arm and hung on it, looking up into his face with babyish +violet eyes. + +“Oh, doctor!” she cried. “I went to your lecture. It was simply +_wonderful_! But it depressed me awfully. Please let me walk along with +you and ask you some questions!” + +“Child, you shouldn’t go to my lectures,” said Andrew indulgently. +“You’re too young. They’re not for you.” + +“Oh, but they _are_, doctor! Why, I’m engaged, you know--at least, I +_was_ engaged, but I sha’n’t be any longer. I wouldn’t for worlds do all +that harm to a helpless man. I’m going to tell Edward so to-night.” + +Andrew was a little taken aback. He said something about thinking things +out for oneself--not accepting another person’s ideas. + +“Oh, no!” said little Mavis confidently. “I know you can think ever so +much better than me. I _like_ to get my ideas from _wonderful_ men like +you!” + +The innocent, naive, violet-eyed little thing touched him with pity. +What, he thought, was there in life for her except marriage? He couldn’t +imagine her engaged in any work, any profession, any art. Would it not +perhaps be better if some man were enslaved and sacrificed for the sake +of this poor little baby-girl? + +“Look here, Mavis,” he said; “this won’t do. You mustn’t throw over this +fellow, you know, without a great deal of serious reflection. You might +ruin your life and his, too.” + +“But you said I’d ruin him by marrying him--” + +“Never mind that. You--you’re too young to grasp it. And there are +always exceptions. If you care for this chap--” + +“I don’t really think I do, much,” she said thoughtfully. “Anyway, I +simply couldn’t stand making a martyr of him, and having him be the one +to do all the sacrificing. But, doctor, what _are_ we to do, if men +mustn’t get married?” + +He couldn’t answer. To tell the truth, he had thought of marriage so +exclusively from a man’s point of view that he had quite overlooked the +woman’s. Freedom was all very well, but it wasn’t for the little Mavises +of this world. He began to deliberate whether there weren’t certain men +who should be set apart for marriage and martyrdom for the sake of the +really nice young girls. + +He was about to suggest this theory to Mavis, when he found himself +before his own door. + +“Hurry off home now, won’t you?” he said. “It’ll be dark soon. And see +here, Mavis, don’t say anything to your Edward just yet--don’t do +anything until we’ve talked it over. Come into the office some +afternoon.” + +She said she would, and hurried off, in the sunset. + +As he let himself in, he heard from the dining-room the uproar which +seemed an inevitable accompaniment of the Franklin method. Because +playing in the dining-room had formerly been an unimaginable thing +rather than a forbidden joy, it was now the rule. The doctor didn’t like +it. He wanted his dinner in peace. It was not the sort of dinner he +liked, either, and Miss Franklin distressed him by incessantly crunching +lumps of sugar. + +He retired to his study, where he swore furiously to himself; but for +some reason which he didn’t care to analyze, he dared not tell Miss +Franklin to take away the children. Nor was he surprised when she +knocked at the door, and, being told to enter, did so, and sat down +opposite him, prepared to spend the evening. + +Crashes, screams, and slaps from the dining-room disturbed her not at +all. She said she didn’t believe in supervising children; it hampered +them. + +She talked persistently about free love, which Andrew didn’t like. When +spoken of as the relation of the sexes, it was quite proper and +scientific; but directly one introduced that idea of love, it was +entirely changed. It became sensational and distinctly alarming. + +He was thankful when an accident occurred in the dining-room which could +not be ignored. Little Frank had climbed into a drawer of the sideboard +and broken through, and in the course of his struggles he upset +everything within reach. + +Once he had got Miss Franklin out, Andrew took good care that she should +not get in again. + + +V + +He had forgotten all about Mavis, and he was pleasantly surprised when +she came into his office the next afternoon. + +“I pretended that I had a sore throat,” she said, “so I could come and +see you. You see, Edward came last night, and oh, doctor, he did seem so +awfully _flat_, after _you_!” + +“You mustn’t be so extreme,” he said. “There are some men who aren’t at +all unhappy in marriage.” + +“I know. Ordinary little men aren’t. It’s only the _wonderful_ men like +you. But, doctor dear, I couldn’t be happy with an ordinary man. I--I +want a man like _you_!” + +It wouldn’t do, of course, to tell her that there were mighty few men of +this sort, and that they wouldn’t care for naive little girls, anyway. +Andrew wasn’t even much flattered by her admiration; it was too +indiscriminate. + +“Suppose you don’t marry,” he said. “What will you do?” + +“I thought you could tell me. I thought, of course, you had some +perfectly wonderful sort of plan for women.” + +Well, he hadn’t, and he saw that he must make one. It seemed that his +first step toward the settlement of this specific case would be to make +an analysis, and he at once began. Mavis answered all his questions +readily and fully, but he had a suspicion that she told him what she +thought he would like to hear, instead of keeping to facts. Still, even +at that, he learned a great deal, for she was too ignorant and young to +deceive a trained observer. Of course it took a very long time; his +other office patients had to be sent away. + +He went politely to the door with Mavis, and he was surprised to see +Miss Franklin standing in the hall--the little private hall which was +only for outgoing patients, and in which she had no possible business to +be. + +“What are you doing out here?” he asked. + +“I was just wondering what you were doing,” she retorted, “shut up in +there with that girl all this long time!” + +“I was writing an analysis of her.” + +“Let’s see your analysis!” + +“It’s not finished. Besides--” + +“Do let me see it! Perhaps I can help you.” + +“You don’t know Miss Borrowby--” + +“Oh, yes, I do know Miss Borrowby!” said Miss Franklin. “I know her +better than you do!” + +Andrew didn’t like her tone, but he let it pass, with a meekness quite +new to him. Miss Franklin smiled and went away. + +He intended to spend the evening perfecting his analysis in peace; but +scarcely had he got well started when Miss Franklin opened the door. + +“A patient!” she said. + +It was a lady. She sat down beside Andrew’s desk, without raising her +veil, and at once began to sob. + +“Oh, doctor!” she cried. “I don’t know what to do! Oh, my suffering! +What shall I do?” + +He felt quite sure that this was a drug addict, and his manner, though +kind, was one of thorough sophistication. + +“Now, now, my dear madam!” he said. “Don’t excite yourself!” + +“You don’t even _know_ me!” she cried, pushing up her veil. + +“I do!” he protested guiltily. “It’s Mrs. Hamilton. I knew your voice; +but it’s dark here in the corners of the room when there’s only the lamp +lighted.” + +She smiled bitterly. + +“Yes,” she said. “That’s it. I’m lost in the darkness, outside the +circle of lamplight!” + +“This chair--” + +“I’m speaking figuratively, doctor. I’m in such trouble. I wish I were +dead!” + +Reluctantly, but in duty bound, he said: + +“Tell me about it.” + +She began to weep again. + +“You’re the only one I can tell. You showed such an interest in me the +other day. You cared, didn’t you?” + +“Yes, certainly I did; but please don’t cry.” + +“Oh, dear doctor, it is your own great trouble that makes you so +sympathetic to others, I am sure!” + +“My own great trouble?” + +“I heard of it indirectly--through Miss Franklin. She mentioned it to +some one I know. She said that your wife”--Mrs. Hamilton dropped her +voice, and ended with the greatest delicacy: “That your wife has left +you. I _am_ so sorry!” + +“Nothing of the sort!” Andrew began angrily. + +Then it occurred to him that it would be difficult, if not impossible, +to explain so modern a situation to so romantic a creature; so instead +he encouraged her to tell him her own sad story. + +He never learned what her trouble was, because she didn’t tell him. “My +husband” and “a woman’s sensitive heart,” and “disgusting intoxication,” +had something to do with it. She cried forlornly, and he tried to stop +her. Common sense and all that he had learned from experience of her +type warned him not to be too sympathetic, but it was difficult. She was +exquisite. She had a sort of morbid charm about her--a sensibility at +once dangerous and pitiful. + +He rose, went over to her, and laid his hand on her shoulder. + +“It’s hard,” he said. “Life is bound to be hard for people like you; but +you must try to see it in a more robust way, with more humor, more +indifference.” + +“I do! No one knows how I try!” she said, looking up into his face with +her dark eyes, luminous with tears. + +Suddenly the door opened, without warning. Miss Franklin looked in, and +disappeared again. Mrs. Hamilton rose. + +“Who was that?” she asked. + +“That’s Miss Franklin.” + +“Oh! I didn’t know she was so young. Does she stay here as late as +this?” + +“She lives here.” + +“Lives here--with your wife away?” + +Mrs. Hamilton was moving toward the door. + +“Good night, doctor!” she said, and there was a decided coolness in her +voice. + + +VI + +Peculiarly disturbed, Andrew returned to his office, to find Miss +Franklin there, waiting for him. He was about to reprove her sharply for +her outrageous intrusion, but she spoke first. + +“Who was that?” + +“A patient; and you must never, under any circumstances, come into this +room when I have a patient here.” + +“It’s long after office hours. I didn’t know it was a patient. She was +‘a lady to see the doctor,’ and I wondered what you were doing shut up +here.” + +“You needn’t constitute yourself my mentor!” he cried angrily. + +“Why, doctor, I never thought of such a thing!” + +“Then please don’t do it again.” + +“But, if she wasn’t a patient, what was she here for?” + +He stared at her, astounded at her effrontery--and uneasy. + +“As I told you once before, I am making a series of analyses. I was +making a study of--that lady.” + +“You only analyze women, don’t you?” + +“Certainly not!” he answered with a frown. “Only they happen to be +about--” + +“Yes, they do!” Miss Franklin agreed warmly. “They certainly do happen +to be about!” She sat down. “I’ve been analyzing _you_,” she said. + +Again instinct warned him, and he would have fled. + +“Not worth it!” he said lightly. + +“I can analyze you,” she went on; “but I can’t understand myself. I +don’t quite see why you should affect me so. I’m not at all inclined to +sentimentality. I’ve never felt like this before.” + +He sat in frozen silence. + +“And as a perfectly free woman,” went on, “I’m not ashamed to tell you +that I want you.” + +“Want me to what?” he asked stupidly. + +“I’d be even willing to marry you,” she said, “as soon as you get a +divorce. I can see that you’re timid and conventional, like most men.” + +“Good God!” cried Andrew. “Please--” + +“Why not? If you don’t love me now, you will later. I’ll make you. I’ve +set my mind on you. I think you’re a fascinating creature!” + +“You don’t know me!” he protested feebly. + +“I do. I know that I’m in love with you, anyway, and that you’re lonely +and need me.” + +“Lonely!” thought the wretched man. “Not exactly!” + +Aloud he said nothing, but sat silent, conscious of the steady gaze of +her fierce, candid eyes. + +“I hadn’t intended to tell you to-night,” she went on. “I know you’re +very shy, and I’d intended to win you over little by little. Not by any +feminine trickery or illusion, you understand. I’d just reveal myself. +I’m sure that if you knew me, you’d love me. We’re so perfectly +matched,” she ended, a bit impatiently. “I wish there weren’t all this +fuss and trouble! I wish you’d make up your mind promptly!” + +“But--” he began. + +“Don’t answer me now, when you’re in this contrary, obstinate humor. +I’ll wait till to-morrow evening. Now let’s talk about something else.” + +“No!” said Andrew. “I’m going to bed. Good night!” + +He went off with a quick step and a frown; but his going was not +effective. It was too much like flight, and it was spoiled by the grin +on Miss Franklin’s face. + +Alone in his room he gave up the effort to hide his alarm. + +“That woman’s got to go!” he cried. “I’m not going to be hounded and +bothered by her like this! How am I to do any work? How can I get rid of +her?” + +Reflection convinced him that he could not. + +“Then I’ll get myself called away, and I’ll stay away until--” + +Until what? What was to save him? Where could he find a refuge from +feminine persecution? + +He went to bed, but he could not sleep. He was quite worn and haggard in +the morning, and Miss Franklin observed it at the breakfast-table. + +“You look awfully tired,” she said. “Why don’t you take a rest to-day?” + +“Never was busier!” he answered hastily. “I haven’t a free moment all +day. Please see that I’m not disturbed.” + +“How am I to know which women disturb you and which ones +you’re--studying?” Miss Franklin asked with outrageous impudence. +“Better give me a list.” + +He strode into his office, closed the door, and tried to resume that +unfinished letter to Marian. He hadn’t got well started when the bell +rang and the parlor-maid ushered in little Mavis Borrowby, flushed and +out of breath. + +“Oh, doctor!” she cried. “Such a row! Imagine! I’ve had to run away! +Papa is in the most awful rage!” She sank into a chair. “You see,” she +said, “I told Edward last night that I wouldn’t marry him--ever. I said +I didn’t believe in marriage. And he--nasty little sneak!--ran off to +papa and told him. You can imagine how papa took it, with his old-fogy +ideas. He roared and stamped and swore. He wanted to know where I got +such ideas from; and I said, very calmly, from you. Then he said I must +never speak to you again, and all sorts of nonsense. Of course I said I +_would_ speak to you, and I would never, never renounce you for any +one--” + +“Renounce me! Really, Mavis, isn’t that a bit--” + +“I told him that you were the most wonderful man I’d ever seen, and that +I would not give you up. But, doctor dear, where are you going to hide +me? He’ll be here after me any minute!” + +“I’m not going to hide you at all!” cried Andrew. “It’s all nonsense!” + +“Oh, but you must!” she cried. “You can’t be so horrible, when I’ve been +so loyal to you.” + +“There’s no reason for hiding, you silly child! You’ve done nothing +wrong.” + +“Oh, but papa thinks so! He told me not to _dare_ to see you again. He +says it’s all your fault that I won’t marry Edward. He says you’ve put +all sorts of awful ideas in my head. Oh, doctor! There’s the door-bell +now! I know it’s father! Oh, don’t let him get me! He says he’ll send me +to a convent!” + +She had clutched his arm frantically and was looking into his face with +brimming eyes. + +“Oh, please, please hide me!” she cried. “Just till I can think of some +sort of plan!” + +He faltered and weakened. At last he opened the door of a +clothes-closet. + +“Lock the door and keep quiet,” he said. “I’ll see if I can get him +away.” + +After an earnest look around to see that she had not left any trace of +herself--hat, gloves, or other incriminating articles--the doctor opened +his office door, and there stood Mrs. Hamilton. She looked very pale and +ill. + +“Just an instant!” she said, with an odd smile. “I won’t keep you a +minute. I only came to say good-by.” + +“Where are you going?” he asked kindly. + +She smiled again. + +“It doesn’t matter. I thought if I came early, before your office hours, +I might catch you alone for a few minutes; but it doesn’t matter.” + +“But you have caught me alone,” he answered cheerfully. “Sit down, Mrs. +Hamilton. I’m in no hurry.” + +“Please don’t try to deceive me,” she said coldly. “I know all about +that girl who came in here. That nursery governess--that Franklin +person--told me in the hall. I have no claim on you, doctor. There’s no +reason for deceiving me. You’re quite, quite free to do as you please. +You won’t be troubled with me again. I’m going away.” + +“Where?” he asked, wretchedly scenting some new and obscure trouble. + +“It doesn’t matter,” she said again. “Nothing matters. My husband +insists upon my going out to Wyoming with him at once. Of course I +refused; so here I am penniless, alone in the world--” + +“Your children?” + +“He’s going to take them. They’re better without me, anyway. I’m a weak +and indulgent mother. I love too intensely. That’s my nature--to be +intense. I give--I ask nothing, I expect nothing, I simply give and +give. I’m not complaining. I only wish,” she ended, with a pitiful +little break in her voice, “that there were some one--just one person in +the world--who cared! I’m not strong enough to stand alone. I’m not +complaining. I know one can’t command the heart; but for a little while +I did think--” + +He felt like a brute. + +“Good-by!” she said, holding out her slender hand and smiling pitifully. +“Good-by, my dear!” + +He grasped her hand. + +“Where are you going?” he demanded. + +She looked at him steadily. + +“Good-by!” + +“No--look here! You won’t do anything reckless?” + +“I shall have to carry out my plans. Good-by!” + +“I sha’n’t let you go like this!” + +“Please let go of my hand! There’s some one coming!” + + +VII + +As Mrs. Hamilton went out, there came brushing by her, bursting into the +room, a stout, middle-aged man. It was Mr. Borrowby, in a terrible fury. +He resembled a heavy, solid little dog. One could imagine the impact of +his body against the furniture, how he might hurl himself about and +always rebound unhurt. His talk was like barking, growling, and +snapping, and his bloodshot eyes were fixed unwaveringly upon his enemy. +He was terrific. + +“Where’s my girl?” he bellowed. + +“Don’t shout like that!” said Andrew. “I can’t stand it. I’m worn out.” + +“I’ll wear you out! Where’s my girl?” + +“I don’t know.” + +“Don’t lie to me, you dirty, low-lived, degenerate hound! You vile, +treacherous Bolshevist!” + +“You’re going too far!” cried Andrew. “You’ll behave yourself, or I’ll +put you out!” + +“No, you won’t! I’ll have my daughter, or I’ll call in the police. Don’t +you dare!” he shouted, shaking his fist in Andrew’s face. “Don’t you +dare deny it! That young woman who opened the door for me told me Mavis +was in here.” + +It occurred to the desperate Andrew that the only possible course was +that of complete candor. + +“What if she is?” he replied “I’m not--” + +“I know what _you_ are! Didn’t the girl herself tell me that since she’d +known you, she could never marry? Good God! I could kill you, you +scoundrel! Where is she?” + +“In there,” said Andrew. “I sha’n’t deny it. There’s nothing to be +ashamed of--absolutely nothing wrong.” + +He was really afraid, for an instant, that the angry little dog was +about to launch itself upon him. Instead, to his relief, Borrowby began +to pound upon the closet door. + +“Open the door!” he roared. + +“No, I sha’n’t!” came Mavis’s calm response. + +“I’ll break in the door!” + +“All right! Begin! There’s a window in here, and I’ll jump out of it and +run away; and every one will see me from the street!” + +In the midst of this pounding and shouting the telephone rang. + +“_Keep quiet!_” Andrew roared. “Stop your infernal noise! It may be +something important!” + +Mr. Borrowby desisted for an instant. Andrew took up the receiver, to +hear the voice of Mrs. Hamilton. + +“I want to say good-by to you,” she said in a calm and bitter voice. +“It’s the last word you will ever hear from me. This is really good-by, +to you and to all the world. I have something here that will end it all, +all my sufferings--” + +“No!” he cried. “No! What are you thinking of?” + +“Don’t worry!” she said. “It is the best way, my dear!” + +The doctor gave vent to such a strange and terrible howl that even Mr. +Borrowby was startled. + +“What is it?” asked a quiet voice beside him. + +He was not surprised to see Marian there. He was past surprise. + +“Mrs. Hamilton!” he explained “Going to take poison!” + +“Speak to her,” whispered Marian. “Tell her you’re coming at once.” + +He did so, and hung up the receiver. + +“Now, go up-stairs and lie down, dear,” said Marian. “You’re worn out. +I’ll send your lunch up to you. Don’t worry about anything. I’ll +manage.” + +“There’s Mavis Borrowby shut up in the closet,” he told her wearily; +“and Mrs. Hamilton--and something worrying about Miss Franklin--I’ve +forgotten just what.” + +“Poor boy!” she murmured. “I’m so sorry! Go on, dear, and lie down. Try +not to worry.” + +He went up-stairs to his room and lay down on the bed, quite exhausted, +trying to think, but unable to do so. A long time passed. He watched the +trees moving in the April wind, and the clouds slipping across the gay +blue sky. + + +VIII + +At last Marian came, bringing a lunch-tray well laden with the proper +things. She set it down on a table at the bedside, and drew up two +chairs. + +“Now, Andy dear!” she said in her old pleasant way. “Come on! You need +food, you know. It’s after three o’clock!” + +He was really very hungry. He began to eat without delay, while Marian +watched him indulgently. + +“I telephoned to Dr. Gryce. He’ll take your patients to-day,” she said. +“You need a rest, don’t you? Miss Franklin’s gone home. Mr. Borrowby +took Mavis home, and left a note, apologizing for his mistake. I +explained to him about your theories, you know. I sent for Mr. Hamilton, +and I stayed with his wife until he came. They had a perfectly beautiful +reconciliation. They’re going out to Wyoming with the children, to start +a new life; so there’s nothing to trouble you, is there?” + +“Marian,” he said gravely, “I’ll tell you all about it later on. Just +now I can’t think of anything but the relief--” + +The parlor-maid knocked at the door. + +“There’s a young gentleman from the _Daily Review_, sir,” she said. “He +says the doctor promised him an interview.” + +“The doctor is resting--” Marian began. + +Andrew sat up. + +“No!” he said. “I’ll see him. Bring him up, Sarah!” + +“I’ll go,” said Marian. + +“I’d rather you stayed,” said Andrew. “I’d like you to hear what I’m +going to say.” + +He was sitting up in bed, more rumpled and excited than ever, when the +young man entered. The interviewer was surprised and a little +embarrassed by the presence of a wife, because the opinions which the +doctor was reputed to hold on marriage were not the sort of views that +most wives like. However-- + +“We thought it would be of great interest to our readers if you would +give us a few words on ‘Marriage from a Man’s Point of View,’” he began; +“along the lines of the address you gave before the Moral Courage Club +one afternoon last week, you know.” + +“I said that marriage hampered and degraded a man, didn’t I? I said that +marriage was slavery for my sex--don’t take that down, that’s only what +I said last week. _Now_, please get this properly. I offer, as my +earnest conviction, based upon experiment, that marriage is man’s only +safeguard. Without its protection man could not survive. This is a +woman’s world, dominated and developed by women. Every man imperatively +requires the protection of a wife. Without it, he--he would be hounded +to death.” + +“Andrew!” murmured Marian, rather shocked. + +The young man wrote it all down as faithfully as he could. + +“That’s all. You can enlarge on that. I suppose you would, anyway. You +might head it ‘Marriage Man’s Only Hope.’” + +The young man thanked the doctor, took up his hat, and left. + +Andrew looked at Marian, and she smiled affectionately at him. + +“I shall never know,” said he, “whether you had any hand in all this, or +whether it just happened; but I’m beaten, absolutely, and you are +supremely vindicated. That’s what women always do. They’re able to prove +a man wrong and make him see it himself, in spite of the fact that he’s +right!” + + + + +The Foreign Woman + +NO WONDER THE SOUL OF RUSSIA IS ONE OF THE GREAT ENIGMAS OF THE WORLD + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + +Author of “Angelica,” “The Married Man,” etc. + + +He sat in the small, hot room, in a state of pleased expectancy. He +awaited the entrance of something exotic and highly interesting, +probably with a beard. The catalogue of the Institute of Foreign +Languages had promised him a “native teacher,” and what could a native +Russian be but a bearded and mysterious creature? + +He looked again through the pages of the unintelligible little red +book--all in Russian--and thought with delight of the time to come, when +it should be plain as day to him, when he should be able to say, with a +casual air, that he could read and speak Russian. + +He was anxious, poor young fellow, for some claim to distinction. He was +only too well aware of his own ordinariness--a pleasant, friendly sort +of mediocrity which distressed him profoundly. He was slight, +sandy-haired, wiry, not unattractive, but certainly not fascinating. +People liked him but didn’t remember him. + +He was not an idiot. He knew well enough that he had no brilliant or +remarkable qualities, and therefore, sure that he could not _be_ +anything extraordinary, he had decided to _do_ something extraordinary. +He had decided, in short, to go to Russia, live there for a long time, +and write amazing books about it all. + +Why not? He was a journalist; he could and did write articles about +everything; he wrote with facility and a certain skill. He had, +moreover, a naïve and innocent journalistic point of view. He saw the +“human interest” in things. He felt that he would very easily discern +the “human interest” in this Russian situation and present it to America +in moving terms. His paper was willing to buy the special articles he +intended to write, and on the pay for them he would live, Bolshevist +fashion, while he collected his material. + +He took out his watch. He had paid for an hour, and fifteen minutes of +it had already passed. He frowned. After all, you know, he was somebody. +He was a newspaper man, and a graduate of Columbia University, and he +had paid cash for his twenty lessons, and people had no business to keep +him waiting. + +He got up, opened the door, and walked about, hoping that his +restlessness might be observed from the corridor, and assuaged; but no +one passed. All the other doors along the corridor were closed, and he +heard a diligent hum, with now and then a French or German word familiar +to him, from other teachers and other pupils, properly employed. He had +decided to return to the office and “make a row,” and had got himself +into the proper mood for one, when he saw a figure hastening along the +corridor, and he went back and sat down. + +She came in, breathless, sat down beside him, closed her eyes, and +placed both hands above her heart. He waited for her to speak with some +alarm, she gasped so. She was a plump little woman of indefinite +age--forty-five, he imagined--dressed in clothes such as he hadn’t seen +for fifteen years. All that she wore was dainty and fresh, with a +pitiful sort of elegance--little ruffles of fine lace about her wrists, +a bit of black velvet about her high collar. Her very shape was +old-fashioned--a succession of curves, a round, tight look, a sort of +dowdy neatness. + +Nothing more foreign could be imagined. She didn’t stir, and he ventured +a look at her face. With her eyes thus closed, her soft, plump visage +had a look of profound sadness and immense wisdom. It impressed him, it +almost hypnotized him. + +Suddenly she opened her eyes--pale gray eyes, clear and blank. + +“My heart!” she said, in excellent English. “I suffer very much!” She +picked up the book. “Do you know any Russian words?” she asked, with a +shadowy smile. + +“No,” he said; “not one.” + +“A beautiful, beautiful language!” said she. “Only listen!” + +She began reading him something from the middle of the book. Of course +he couldn’t comprehend a word, but he liked to hear it. Her voice was +charming, and the foreign sounds entertained him. She turned a page and +went on. + +“This is an extract from a most beautiful Russian tale,” she explained. +“You would surely admire it.” + +She continued. Her voice became sad, she made soft, slow gestures with +her small dimpled hand. + +“Ah, how very sad this is!” she said. “All that is best in Russia is so +sad!” + +“What’s the story about?” he asked, with curiosity. + +“It is about two young men who are in an inn--” she began, when suddenly +a bell rang loudly in the room. “My God!” she said mildly. “What is +this?” + +“I don’t know,” he replied. + +“It must be that the lesson is ended,” said she. “One would not believe +how the time flies! You have not had your full time--I was so late. I +think I must go with you to the office and ask if I cannot make this up +to you.” + +“Never mind,” said he. “Please don’t bother--it doesn’t matter!” + +“Ah, but it does!” said she. “You have paid, and it is very important +that one should secure what one has paid for.” + +She had risen, and went walking briskly along the corridor, an odd +little figure in a long, trailing skirt. He followed her into the quiet +office, where a severe director sat writing at a desk. He looked up with +a surprised air. + +“I was late for this gentleman’s lesson,” said the stout little woman. +“He has missed much of it.” + +“Then why do you waste more time in coming here?” cried the director, +with a frown. “Go back, _madame_, and finish it. Make the best of the +time that is left.” + +“I thought the hour finished.” + +“But on the contrary--the half-hour bell has just rung.” + +“Ah!” said she, with a pleased smile. “I did not understand!” + +And they walked back again, down the corridor, to the hot little room. + +“I don’t understand everything of this,” she explained to him. “This is +my first lesson that I give. This position of Russian professor belongs +to my husband, but he is ill, and they kindly permit me to take his +place for this little while. Now we must not waste more time!” + +She opened the book again, and studied it with serious regard. + +“A difficult language,” she said; “but so very beautiful! The English +and Americans can never learn to pronounce our consonant sounds--never! +Could you say this?” + +She uttered a sound, and he tried to imitate her, but failed. She smiled +with a sort of benevolent triumph. + +“Ah, it cannot be done--not ever! Now, on the contrary, we Russians have +no difficulty whatsoever with any of the English words. I don’t know--it +is the Russian soul, perhaps. We have so great a sympathy. Nothing is +strange to us, nothing is foreign--nothing at all. We are at home in all +languages, in all countries. It is our mystery.” + +“You speak English very well,” he said. + +“Why not? I lived for years in England; but in this country, only three +months.” + +She fell silent. + +“Why is it that you wish to learn Russian?” she asked suddenly. + +“Well, I thought of going to Russia, you know--to study the people and +write a book.” + +“Useless!” she said calmly. + +“Why?” + +“Never can you know our people--above all things, now, in our time of +trouble. Oh,” she cried, “it is so _terrible_! I cannot bear that +strange people should go there now--to our Holy Russia, to see our +agony! If you knew!” + +She covered her eyes with her hand. + +“If you knew! We have left everything there, all we had on this earth. +We have no news of our friends. Perhaps they are dead; certainly they +are ruined. Such wonderful people--real Russian souls! We, too, are +ruined. We have lost everything we had.” + +He was deeply impressed by the tragic note in her voice. + +“I know,” he said; “but perhaps things will improve before long.” + +“For Russia, yes--for us, no. We are ruined. We are finished,” she said +quite simply. “We are torn up by the roots. We are not young enough to +begin again. Above all, such a man as my husband--one of the greatest +minds of Russia. A wonderful man! Imagine you, he is an artist, he +paints, composes music, writes poetry, all in the most charming taste, +and he is also a marvelous financier. Ah, what is one to say to comfort +such a man? And that now he must teach Russian in this place!” + +Again she was silent, and he didn’t like to interrupt her. He was deeply +interested in her--her fine voice, her passionate gesture, the extreme +_novelty_ of her. He was aware of a depth and variety of feeling in her +which amazed him. She was like a woman in a novel; and with it all she +had a simplicity such as he had never seen before. It was impossible to +doubt the sincerity of a single word she uttered. + +She began to speak again. + +“What is it that you think you will see in Russia?” she asked. “I tell +you, nothing! You will never see the Russian soul. You will stay there a +year, five years, ten years, and never will you know a single Russian. +No; we do not wear our hearts on our sleeves. Shall I tell you something +of us?” + +“Yes, please do!” he said earnestly. + +She began to tell him of Petrograd--of shops there, more elegant, she +said, than anything to be found in Paris. She described a certain +confectioner’s shop. When you went in, you were invited to sample all +the sweets displayed there, and there were hundreds of different +sorts--hundreds, she assured him! She described forty to him, lingering +in ecstasy over their perfections. + +She told him of the houses, warm, full of flowers, in the bitterest +winter weather; and the women--the kindest women in all the world. She +talked of the court, but only briefly. She began to speak of the +Czarina, but she could not go on. The words strangled her. + +“And all that is _gone_!” she said. “All that--my God!” + +He carefully concealed his American disapproval of courts and +sovereigns. He even felt sorry, on her account, that it _had_ gone. + +“I do not think that you know in this country what social life is,” she +said. “Here it is so formal, so without heart. With us, it is so +different. It may be that on a certain day I am tired, ill, lazy. I do +not wish to dress. I am in negligee. My friends come, and I receive them +just in this fashion. No one is surprised. + +“‘For God’s sake, do not apologize, Anastasie!’ they say. ‘It is _you_ +we come to see, not your fine clothes!’” + +And here the bell rang again, unmistakably for the lesson’s end. Again +she was surprised. + +“Ah!” she said. “It has been very pleasant for me to talk to you! You +are of a sympathetic nature, there is no doubt of that!” + +He hadn’t learned a word, not a syllable of Russian, but he was entirely +satisfied. He felt that he had met with something even more truly +Russian than the language. He walked out of the building, feeling +decidedly more cosmopolitan. + + +II + +Two days later he returned for his next lesson, in the dusk of a snowy +February afternoon. This time he found her waiting for him, sitting +before the table in the little room. They smiled in friendly fashion. + +“I was thinking, as I came,” he said, “that this must be like a Russian +winter afternoon.” + +“Oh, no!” she said. “It isn’t! It has not the--the _feeling_. There +is--how shall I tell you?--a sort of excitement about our snowy days. +But I must not waste your time. Let us begin!” + +For ten minutes or so she worked industriously, teaching him Russian +words for chair, table, wall, floor, ceiling. + +“You are really learning now?” she asked solicitously. + +“Yes,” he answered, very much pleased. + +“It seems, however, that as a teacher I am not successful,” she said, +with a melancholy little smile. “To you I give my first lesson, and to +you I give my last. After this I have finished.” + +“Why? Is your husband coming back?” + +“No,” she said. “He is not well--yet.” + +She got up, went over to the window, and stood there looking out. He +couldn’t help thinking, as he regarded her round form in profile, that +she looked like the little wooden figures of Noah’s wife in the arks +that children play with. And then he saw her face, and was sorry for his +fancy. She was gazing out across the dark, snow-covered expanse of +Madison Square, wonderfully misty in the falling snow, and she was +silently weeping. + +“No,” she said. “He is not coming back. He is very ill.” + +He felt terribly sorry for her, but he could think of nothing at all to +say. She came back and sat down in the full glare of the electric light. +She looked intolerably pitiful, her scanty eyebrows red with weeping, +her mouth compressed and trembling a little. + +“And they tell me this morning that there will be no more lessons for +me. It seems that I talk too much English to the pupils, and that must +not be. I must talk only in Russian, and I always forget.” + +She shrugged her shoulders, while she wiped her eyes, quite +unaffectedly, with an elaborate little lace handkerchief. + +“And now,” she said, “do you remember the word for ‘table’?” + +But he couldn’t bear that. + +“About your husband,” he began respectfully. “Are you sure you have a +good doctor? Being in a strange country, you know--” + +“I don’t need a doctor, my friend!” she told him, with a stern smile. “I +have seen too much of illness and death. A doctor can tell me nothing +and can do nothing for me.” + +“But,” he said, “in other ways--if you’re leaving here, can’t I help you +to find some other sort of--occupation? I’m a newspaper man; I know all +sorts of people. I should be more than happy to help you.” + +She bowed her head gravely. + +“Thank you! I know enough of the world to appreciate kindness. You are +very good--very kind. I had a little plan. I thought perhaps I would +give private lessons in my home, if I could find pupils.” + +“I’d like to come, very much.” + +“Oh, no! With you that is not possible. At least, not now. You have paid +for a course of twenty lessons here.” + +“I’d rather take them from you.” + +“But you have paid!” she cried, with a sort of horror. “You must not +waste that money!” + +He smiled, with a slight feeling of superiority toward this foreign +thrift. + +“I’ll arrange it,” he said. + +So before the end of the lesson she gave him a card on which was +engraved: + + MME. PAUL SENSOBIAREFF + +“The French form of the name,” she explained. “It would be impossible +for any one in this country to pronounce the Russian form.” + +He felt a fleeting doubt of this. He would have liked a try at it. + +“And your name?” she asked. + +“Hardy,” he said. “Winslow Hardy.” + +She repeated it, and in spite of Russian ease in foreign tongues, she +certainly said “Vinslow.” + +They arranged for an afternoon the next week, and they settled the +terms, which were high. Hardy was by no means well off, and his heart +sank a little at the thought of this expense; but a fine pity swayed +him. He would have made many sacrifices for this unhappy woman. + +He had never before been conscious of this chivalry in himself. He had +been in love from time to time, but it had not been a disinterested +passion. He had always sought for the advantage. He had always been +kind, generous, a little idealistic in his dealings with his fellows; +but never before had he been really moved by pity. + +He thought time and again of the poor Russian lady. In fact, he hardly +ever forgot her. He imagined the unhappy soul, with all her little +elegancies, living in squalor and anxiety, and his mind was busy with +schemes for her salvation. He planned to force or persuade every one he +knew to study Russian. + + +III + +Imagine Hardy’s surprise when he reached the address given him, and +found it to be an imposing apartment house, with a palm-bedecked +entrance and two negro boys in uniform to receive him and inspect him +with a hostile air. He went up on the lift to the top floor, and found +her there in a splendidly furnished sort of double salon, +high-ceilinged, bright with sunshine, with flowers and plants all about. +She herself was dressed in a short white garment suspiciously like a +wrapper, worn over a voluminous black skirt. Over her soft, +mouse-colored hair was tied a bit of lace. + +He could scarcely avoid staring at her; she didn’t look _dressed_. It +took him a long time to get used to her domestic costume. + +The room, too, disconcerted him. It was no sort of room to have a +lesson in. The elegance, the airy charm of it, destroyed his serious +intent. He wanted to sit there and chat with his hostess; and in fact +that is what he did. + +She offered him Russian cigarettes from a little lacquer box, and while +he smoked she instructed him for a few minutes; but they were +interrupted by the entrance of a gaunt young girl who brought them weak, +fragrant tea and a plate of biscuits. After that there was no more +lesson. They talked--or, rather, Mme. Sensobiareff talked and he +listened. + +The hour passed very agreeably. When he saw by his watch that it was +finished, he got up to take his leave. + +“One minute, if you please!” she said, and went out of the room. + +He waited, looking about him, wondering how it was that a woman existing +in such comfort should either need or wish to give lessons for a living. +Though it increased the illusion of aristocratic refinement there was +about her, it filled him with some misgiving. They couldn’t be entirely +ruined! + +There was the sound of footsteps in the hall, the curtains parted, and +she came in again, followed by a man. + +“My husband,” she said. “Paul, this is the gentleman who has been so +very kind to me.” + +Oh, no doubt that _he_ was ruined, poor devil! His face was like wax, +his eyes sunken and extinguished, all his bearing hopeless and +despairing. He was a slender, high-shouldered man, younger than she by +some years, with fair hair and a light mustache--an upcurled mustache, +bitterly at variance with his utter despondency. She was right--no +doctor was needed to read his fate. Whatever mysterious malady he had, +it had progressed beyond any earthly check. + +He shook hands with Hardy. He offered him cigarettes again, and insisted +upon giving him a glass of sherry. He was very polite, very nervous. He +spoke English beautifully, but so fast, so volubly, that it was +difficult to follow him. + +Hardy couldn’t get away; he had to stay and talk for a long time. The +poor chap was marvelously well informed upon American affairs, and it +delighted him to talk. He said that he was “considering financial +opportunities”; he asked questions about the stock market. + +All the time he talked, Hardy was conscious of the stout little woman +beside him, watching her husband’s ghastly face with a terrible fervor. +It was as if she wanted to remember every one of his looks and his words +forever. + +It was a devotion of absolute simplicity. He was her sole object in +life, her one interest. At the next lesson she began talking about him, +and she never stopped. She felt obliged to interpret this great mind of +Russia for her American friend. She showed his paintings, she played his +music on the piano, she read aloud his Russian poems, and she explained +his surroundings. + +“Paul is dying of nostalgia,” she said. “He loved his country so! He is +used to big, beautiful rooms and light and air. Ah, I never thought they +could cost so dear! I have got the best I could for him, but at what a +cost--what a cost! It is draining us of every penny. I am taking it, +little by little, all we had put away, only to give him these few little +things. He is so ill he doesn’t know how I manage. It is the last I can +ever do for him. At least he shall die in peace and quiet!” + +She did, inevitably, teach Hardy a little Russian. He was presently able +to speak to the servant and to be comprehended; but he learned other +things of greater value to him. He had before him a lesson in fortitude, +in sublime unselfishness, which touched him to the heart. He was +beginning to learn something of the charm and the magic that lie in +utter sincerity, in spontaneous and artless intercourse. + +However, his lessons were abruptly terminated. He found a new position +on a Middle Western newspaper, and he left New York. + +He parted from Mme. Sensobiareff with real regret. She listened to his +plans with an actually motherly interest. He had decided, after all, +that he would write a book about the Middle West, which he had heard was +replete with atmosphere, and she approved his plan. + +“Write, by all means!” she said. “I am sure that you will do well. You +Americans are so clever! With us, it is so different. We feel--my God, +we feel so deeply, but we are dumb!” + +He hadn’t found her or her husband noticeably dumb; however, he didn’t +say so. He said that he would write to her, and he went away, filled +with hope and his own special and touching enthusiasm. It was not that +he particularly liked writing, but it seemed to him the readiest way to +distinguish himself, and that was his great desire. + + +IV + +Hardy’s book was never written. In fact, his Middle Western career was +brief and very unpleasant. He didn’t suit his editor at all. He was +perpetually criticized and badgered, and his air of sophistication and +cynic wisdom was resented as an affectation from the execrated +metropolis. He came back to New York in midsummer, terribly disappointed +and sorely perplexed. He couldn’t understand his failure, both +professional and personal. + +He had saved a little money, and he used it to give himself a vacation +before applying to his old newspaper. He went on a fishing trip with two +other men, to a beautiful, remote mountain spot, far from all noise and +turmoil, and far from any supervised source of water supply. + +When he came back to the city, he wondered that his vacation had done +him so little good. He felt so tired, so wretched, so despondent, that +he couldn’t think of going to work. He sat in his furnished room, in a +stupor of misery, scarcely able to drag himself out for meals, waiting +with alarm and anxiety for his physical and mental condition to improve. + +“I hope I’m not going to be ill!” he thought, in despair. + +His money was all gone, and what was he to do? + +He tried to fight it off. He insisted to himself that it was nothing. He +couldn’t lay a finger on any alarming symptom, except this weariness, +this chill dread. He couldn’t eat, but he slept a great deal. + +It was a sweltering August afternoon, and his room was like an oven. He +awakened from a long nap, and sprang up, dizzy and confused, but filled +with sudden activity. He wanted to go out, he wanted to talk to +somebody, at once. He was in great haste. He brushed his hair with the +greatest precision, but he didn’t observe that he had on no collar or +tie. + +He found it difficult to get down the stairs, and when he reached the +street he had to walk very rapidly to keep from staggering. The fierce +glare of the sun was intolerable. + +Suddenly there came to his distracted brain the thought of Mme. +Sensobiareff and her cool, airy rooms, the kindness of her voice. He +felt that if he could have a cup of her weak, fragrant tea, and sit +quietly listening to her for a little while, his malady would leave him. +He needed to talk to her. He was so anxious to talk that he muttered to +himself as he walked. + +She said, afterward, that he had been guided to her. Perhaps he was; +certainly he never quite understood how he got there. He arrived at the +hottest hour of that intolerable day, a disheveled and sinister figure. +The hall boy didn’t want to let him in, but Hardy pushed him aside with +a melodramatic scowl, and began ascending the seven flights of stairs. +It didn’t occur to him to use the lift. + +He went on at a terrific gait, with his heart pounding madly and his +head almost bursting. He didn’t rest once. He reached her door and rang +the bell. She opened the door herself, and he lurched in, gasping, his +face crimson. He couldn’t speak. He waved his hands feebly and flung +himself down on the sofa and cried. + +He didn’t faint, he didn’t actually lose consciousness, for he was aware +of talking volubly for a long time; yet he didn’t know what was going on +about him. At last he came to himself, and gradually became aware that +he was lying in bed in a darkened room, with his shoes and coat off, and +a damp towel about his forehead. The dark green shades at the windows +were flapping with a gentle, pleasing sound. There was an agreeable +fresh fragrance in the air--a feeling of wonderful peace and calm. He +felt very sick and inert, and he made no effort to move, although he +heard voices at his bedside. He looked with languid interest at a big +bureau facing him, on which were two framed photographs and a silver +toilet service. + +“He ought to go to the hospital,” said a deep, buzzing voice. + +“Never!” came the voice of Mme. Sensobiareff. “That shall not be!” + +“Then you’ll have to get two nurses, one for the day and one for the +night. You’ll have to turn your house upside down. It’ll cost you a +great deal--a very great deal; and it’s unnecessary and foolish. Put him +in the hospital, and--” + +“Never! As for two nurses, that cannot be arranged. I shall take care of +him myself.” + +“Nonsense! He’ll have to be looked after constantly. There are all sorts +of things to be done for him which an inexperienced--” + +“Ah! Inexperienced, you tell me?” she whispered fervently. “There is no +one in the world who can nurse better than I. I have a genius for +nursing. I was at Port Arthur during the most awful days, and I +nursed--my God!--perhaps five hundred men. I shall take care of him. My +servant will help me.” + +“Impossible! You’ll kill the fellow between you. And you’ll be held +responsible for--” + +“Enough!” she said curtly. “This is my affair. I take it upon myself. +Give your instructions; they will be carried out to the letter.” + +“You realize that this is a very serious illness?” + +“It is the typhoid fever,” said she. “I know very well.” + +“Yes,” said the other. “I see you do know something. Well--” + +They walked quietly away, and Hardy fell asleep. + +In the night he awoke, or grew conscious again, and he saw sitting bolt +upright beside his bed the gaunt young servant, in a red calico dressing +jacket and a tremendous braid of dark hair. Her flat face looked so +immobile, so inhuman, that he suddenly became terrified. + +“_Madame!_” he called. “Quick! Come here! A dead woman! Quick!” + +Mme. Sensobiareff hurried into the room almost at once. She soothed him, +gave him something to drink, and brought an ice cap for his head. He +grew calmer and presently quite lucid. + +“Don’t keep me here,” he said, in a weak whisper. “Send me to the +hospital. This is too much for you!” + +“Hush! Hush! Be quiet! You are not to talk!” + +And he gave up completely and resigned himself to her miraculous care. + + +V + +For two weeks Hardy was very ill, often delirious. Then he began little +by little to improve, to enter into a delightful period of rest and +peace. The two women devoted their lives to him. They waited upon him +with the most passionate seriousness. There was no annoying fuss, no +superfluous attention, but one or the other of them was at hand every +minute, and they divined his every want. + +The quiet, beautiful order of the room, the odd and touching delicacy of +his nurses, sank into his spirit. In spite of his weakness, in spite of +the minor pains and discomforts of his malady, he was happy. + +But he couldn’t help worrying. One morning, while Mme. Sensobiareff was +busy about the room, he spoke to her about his anxiety. + +“It isn’t right!” he said, in a feeble, plaintive tone. “Your husband is +ill, too, and I’m taking up all your time and upsetting everything. He +won’t--” + +“It makes no difference to him,” she said. “He is not here. Only rest +and be tranquil, my dear!” + +“But I feel like a beast!” he protested. “To come here like this, and to +let you do all this! And the expense! I haven’t a cent to repay you. You +can’t imagine how it makes me feel. I’m ashamed!” + +“That is foolish, my dear--very foolish. I understand how it is with +you.” She paused for a moment. “I do not think there is any one on this +earth who can understand better the troubles of others,” she said; +“because I have felt them all--all! You must believe me!” + +As she looked at him, still smiling, her pale, clear eyes grew misty. + +“I have the most sorrowful heart in the world,” she said. “He is dead!” + +“Your husband?” he cried, shocked. + +She bowed her head. + +“Three months ago. But we will not speak of that, if you please. You +will see now what a blessing it is for me that I can help _you_.” + +As he grew stronger they talked more and more together--or, rather, she +talked and he listened. It was a sort of monologue made up of her own +vast experience. She had seen so much, traveled so much, suffered so +much. She had seen plagues, famine, battles, she had lived in alien and +hostile countries, she who lived so much through her friends had seen so +many of them suffer; and now, past her youth, she found herself utterly +alone, poor, friendless, thousands of miles from her home. + +Hardy would sit propped up in a chaise longue near the window, and, +while he smoked the five cigarettes he was permitted daily, he would +listen to her charming voice, talking and talking. Sometimes he grew +sleepy, but he concealed it. + +There was one thing that puzzled him. She never sat with him in the +evening. After they had had dinner, which he now took in the dining +room, he was always conducted back to his own room, and Anna would come +in, with her sewing, to keep him company. This was not very +entertaining, for she didn’t know a dozen words of English, and he +didn’t like to read and entirely ignore her. + +What on earth did Mme. Sensobiareff do with herself? He heard the +doorbell ring, time after time, every evening, but he heard no sounds to +indicate social activity, no voices, no moving about. Who came? He +couldn’t ask Anna, and he didn’t care to ask her mistress; but he +thought about it a great deal, and he didn’t like it. + +The time came when he was declared well, and the doctor made his last +visit. + +“Now I’ll have to be thinking about going away,” he said. + +“Oh, no!” she protested. “I have this beautiful lodging, all paid for +five months to come. You must stay here until you have found a +position.” + +“I can’t do that,” he said. “It wouldn’t--you see, it’s awfully kind of +you, but it wouldn’t look--you see, you’re here all alone. People would +talk.” + +“These people, who are they? I have no friends. No one will know or +care. Don’t trouble yourself, my friend!” she said, smiling. “There will +be no difficulty. I am a thousand years old!” + +In the end he decided that he would stay, for a time at least, as much +for her sake as for his own, until he could find work and in that way be +able to help her. He resolved to protect her and care for her all his +life. + +An amazing existence! It continued for six weeks, for even after he had +found a place as copy writer for a mail order house, she insisted upon +his taking his earnings to buy clothes. + +“Without clothes one can do nothing,” she said. “It is always necessary +to present a good appearance.” + +She was truly like a mother to him. She looked after his clothes, she +wanted to hear every detail of his day, and she dearly loved to give him +advice, which was always sensible, but sometimes a little irritating, +because it was so obvious. Never was there such a wonderful friend, so +unfailingly kind, so loyal, so delicate. + +And yet--would you believe it?--all his natural affection for her was +poisoned by suspicion, because of those mysterious evenings. He bitterly +resented being shunted off into his own room after dinner. He resented +the secrecy and the mystery. He would sit there, listening to the sound +of the doorbell, the front door opening and closing, and then nothing +further. The room she had given him was at the back of the flat, because +it was quiet there. It was very quiet. + +One evening he went into the kitchen, to try to talk with Anna. Since he +had been declared well, the maid no longer sat with him in the evenings, +and he felt that even her silent company would be better than none. + +He found her sitting by the table, her head in her hands, the picture of +a despondent exile; but when he entered she looked up with a friendly, +anxious smile. + +“You eat?” she asked. + +“No, thanks,” he said. + +She shrugged her shoulders, to show her despair at not understanding, +and kept on smiling. + +Suddenly the swing door from the dining room was opened, and Mme. +Sensobiareff came in. She looked at Hardy gravely; then, without a word, +she drew herself a glass of water and went out again, leaving him +astounded and distressed, a prey to the most disagreeable suspicions. +What in Heaven’s name was she doing, dressed like that, in evening +dress, with bare arms and neck and so elaborate a coiffure? + +He went back to his own room and walked up and down in the dark, angry, +terribly humiliated. After all, what did he know about her, except that +she had been kind? Women of a certain sort were often kind, with a +facile, lavish kindness. He felt that he comprehended the mystery now, +that he knew what sort of house this was, and the thought of all that he +had accepted was intolerable to him. + +She had no right to force her kindness on him! It was shameful; she had +degraded him. If any one should ever hear of it, that he had been +supported--yes, certainly supported for weeks by this woman, out of her +disgraceful earnings! + +She thought him a little moody and ill-humored the next morning at +breakfast; but with her unfailing generosity, she made allowances. She +sat there in her crisp white wrapper, a very model of domesticity, and +smiled at him over the pretty little bouquet of flowers that she always +arranged on the table. She went to the front door with him, and bade +him good-by; and with constraint, in misery, he replied to her, and +hurried off. He had decided never to return. + +He fully intended to write to her, but he never did. He found it too +difficult. He couldn’t reproach her, for her conduct was none of his +business, and he could think of no plausible lie. He put off writing for +day after day, and little by little the pain of the thing wore off and +his regret and shame grew faint. + +However, he wasn’t ungrateful. He tried to compute the cost of his +illness and his long stay, and he made a magnificent effort to save +enough to repay the disconcerting total; but it wasn’t possible. It +would take many months. He had got back into newspaper work again, doing +special articles, and his earnings were not imposing. + +When he had scraped together a small part of his debt, he decided to +take the money to her. He trusted to her tact and good sense to avoid +the necessity of an awkward explanation. + +He arrived at the apartment house, and was about to enter the lift when +the boy stopped him. + +“The madam’s gone,” he said, with a grin. + +“Gone? Moved away?” + +“Yes, sir--moved away.” He chuckled. “She certainly _did_ move away. She +wuz moved away. Seems she’d borrowed some money on that furniture of +hers, and couldn’t pay it. One day the people came and took it away. Ah +thought Ah’d never get over laughin’. There she stood, watching it go; +and she didn’t have a stick left in the place!” + +“Do you know where she went?” asked Hardy. + +“No, sir, Ah do not. She didn’t invite me to call,” said the boy. + +Hardy went away, heavy-hearted. For many, many nights she came to haunt +him--that poor, friendless foreign woman, so wonderfully kind, so wise +and so sad. He blamed himself bitterly for losing track of her. She +hadn’t investigated his morals, she hadn’t blamed, she hadn’t +judged--she had simply helped. His scruples now appeared petty and +cruel. He thought that he would give anything he had if he could only +see her again, in her beruffled white wrapper, sitting before the +samovar and talking. + +He remembered her devotion to her husband. What if she had taken a wrong +way, in order to live? Who was he, whom she had so greatly benefited, to +despise her? + + +VI + +Hardy owed many of his special articles to a detective friend of his +named Clendenning--a big, magnificent creature with a princely air and a +marvelous wardrobe. When there was something interesting to be “pulled +off,” Clendenning used to “tip off” Hardy; and when it was possible, the +detective would take his friend along, to witness his exploits. + +He was a very useful man for a certain sort of work, for his gentlemanly +air made it possible for him to go without arousing suspicion into +places where some of his colleagues would have been conspicuous. He was +an adroit fellow, full of guile and ironic humor. Nothing in life gave +him such pleasure as his “little surprises,” his neat traps for knaves +of all sorts. + +“If you’re around such and such a corner, at such and such a time,” he +would say, “you might see something you could work into a story, old +man.” + +Hardy always followed such suggestions, and was always rewarded. + +One evening Clendenning came into the little restaurant where Hardy +almost always ate his dinner, and sat down at the table beside him. + +“Want to see something interesting?” he asked. + +“I do,” said Hardy. + +“There’s a poor old feeble ass of a man who’s been complaining of a +mysterious Persian woman,” he said. “He says she’s bewitched him, and he +can’t keep away from her. He goes every night to get a psychic +consultation, and she gives him advice about the stock market. He’s lost +thousands already, but he says he thought he hadn’t interpreted her +advice right, and kept going back for more. At last he came to +headquarters with a complaint--says she’s a fraud. He says her place is +crowded every evening with people clamoring for a chance to press ten +dollars into the mysterious Persian’s hand and get a psychic message. Of +course, it’s a pretty plain case for the police; but from what he said I +thought it might be funny. I like to see how those things are done. It’s +wonderful to see how easy it is to fool people. I like to watch ’em +work. She calls herself the Princess Zoraide. Ready?” + +They rose and strolled out into the mild October night. They lighted +cigars and sauntered uptown to a street of grim and moribund stone +houses, given over to more or less mysterious enterprises. They stopped +at one, rang the bell, and were admitted to a little drawing room +furnished in moldy satin and poorly illuminated by a gas chandelier. +Almost every seat was occupied, and the dreary light revealed a set of +figures so dramatic, so interesting, that Hardy’s professional instincts +were at once aroused. + +He saw two women, probably a mother and daughter, sitting side by side, +hand in hand, on a sofa, both weeping. He saw a white-bearded old man +with his head thrown back and his dim eyes staring raptly at the +ceiling. He saw a man who appeared to be on the brink of delirium +tremens, his body twitching, his face contorted. He saw a great, fat +blond woman in diamonds and silks and feathers, with a false, distrait +smile on her painted face. In shadowy corners he saw other women +whispering together. He was impressed by the atmosphere of pain, of +terrible anxiety, that surrounded these people who came to receive +relief and assuagement from the Princess Zoraide. + +He sat down near the door with Clendenning, to await his turn. One by +one he watched these people receive their summons, vanish into an inner +room, and reappear again as shadows hastening through the dark hall to +the front door. He would have liked to see their faces then, to see if +the psychic consultation had in any way altered them. + +The room had filled again, but Hardy was no longer observant. He was +thinking. He was thinking of the immeasurable human longing after hope, +and it occurred to him that perhaps even a charlatan might satisfy this. + +The young woman who gave the summons to the waiting clients once more +appeared before the curtains, and repeated her formula: + +“The princess is ready for the next seeker!” + +“You go first,” said Clendenning, and Hardy rose. + +He walked across the room, past all those strained faces, opened the +curtains, and entered a room completely dark, filled with a heavy +perfume. A hand guided him to a chair, and he vaguely discerned a white +form opposite him. + +“What is your trouble?” asked a low voice. + +He hesitated a moment. He hadn’t prepared anything to say. + +“A love affair,” he said at last. + +He knew that more questions would follow, but he was unable to arm +himself, to set himself to invent something plausible. He was troubled, +unhappy; he sat there in the dark with a blank and apprehensive mind. + +“And what is the difficulty?” asked the Princess Zoraide. “What is it +that you wish to know?” + +He said nothing at all. + +“Come, my friend!” she said a little impatiently. “Can you expect that I +should enter into your heart and know its secrets? I have the most +sympathetic nature in the world, but--” + +He rose suddenly. He knew that phrase, that voice! + +“What? Is it _you_?” he cried. + +“I? Who? What is it that you mean?” she faltered. + +“Mme. Sensobiareff!” + +She gave a sigh that was like a groan. + +“Yes,” she said. “See how I am obliged to gain my living! Ah, well! But +why do you come here? Have you some trouble, my dear?” + +“No! Listen! Don’t you know how dangerous this is? It’s illegal--it’s +not allowed.” + +“I do no harm.” + +“But it’s against the law.” + +“No one will trouble about me, so obscure, so--” + +“The man who came with me is a detective. You’ll be arrested.” + +“My God!” she cried. “My God! I--arrested?” + +To him, an American, her alarm seemed exaggerated. To be arrested had +not the same terrible meaning that it had for her. The hand that had +clutched his arm trembled violently. + +“Arrested? No, no! I do no harm. I help many people. I am very psychic. +I am very sympathetic. I comprehend the troubles of others. If you knew! +So many people bring their friends to me, because I have helped them! +Oh, no! I _cannot_ be arrested! Oh, my friend! At my age! And I am so +alone here, in a foreign land! It will kill me! I shall die!” + +“Don’t worry,” he said. “Wait! Let me think! Can you slip out without +being seen? I will wait for you on the corner of Fifth Avenue. Hurry!” + +He went stealthily down the dark hall, opened the front door, and went +out. He didn’t know whether the formidable Clendenning had seen him or +not. He expected every moment to feel a hand on his shoulder, to see +that handsome and ironic face; and then he would be lost. He felt +himself absolutely incapable of deceiving Clendenning, or of outwitting +him. + +But no one came. Hardy stood in the shadow, nervous as a cat, watching +the quiet street. He saw some one go up the steps of the house, and +enter, but no one came out. Why didn’t she hurry? Had Clendenning +already seized her? + +He stopped a passing taxi and told the driver to wait, and once more he +looked down the silent street. Certainly Clendenning would be growing +impatient; if she didn’t come soon-- + +He was startled to hear her voice behind him. + +“I left by the back door and went through the yards to the next street,” +she whispered. “I am sure that no one saw me. Oh, my friend!” + +He hurried her into the taxi. + +“Be quick!” he said to the driver. + +He took her to his lodging house, where they entered unobserved and went +upstairs to his little room. He locked the door behind them and sat down +on the bed, trying to smile, to reassure her; but he expected every +moment to hear a knock at the door, and the detective’s voice, demanding +satisfaction for this outrageous betrayal. What in Heaven’s name was he +to do with her? + +“Now, you know,” he said, with a distorted smile, “it wouldn’t be such a +serious matter, even if you _were_ arrested. Perhaps a fine--” + +“No!” she said firmly. “I should die. If they come to arrest me, I shall +kill myself. I have a pistol here in my hand bag!” + +“Nonsense!” he cried impatiently. “Don’t be so absurd!” + +“Do you think, then, that I have so much to live for?” she asked. “I +have nothing--nothing at all. When you went away, without a word--I had +thought I should always have you. Well, never mind; let us not speak of +it. I am a foolish old woman. Let us say no more.” + +He stared at her with a new idea dawning upon him. She wasn’t old. She +wasn’t much over forty, he imagined, and she had certainly not renounced +the intention to charm. He observed her queer little hat, made up of +odds and ends of jet, lace, and satin, her carefully powdered face, her +earrings, her drab hair artfully disposed, all her harmless coquetry. He +recalled all that she had done for him, how she had nursed him and +provided for all his wants. He thought of his base suspicions with +shame. The poor soul had simply been holding her psychic consultations +to earn money--so much of which she had used for him. + +Why hadn’t he seen it before? She loved him--it must be that! For what +other reason would a woman do all that she had done? + +What sublime sacrifices she had made, and how brutally he had rewarded +her! He thought he had never heard of so generous and noble a nature +before. He felt crushed and immeasurably humiliated before her--her who +had almost undoubtedly saved his life. + +“Why shouldn’t I make a sacrifice?” he asked himself. “What better could +I do with my life than to try to make her happy? I’m not much good. I’ll +never be much use any other way.” + +He began to walk up and down the room. + +“Of course she’s at least twelve years older than I; but she’s a +charming, intelligent woman, and I respect her.” + +And then the unworthy thought came to him--what a startling and +distinguished thing it would be to marry her! + +He stopped short. + +“Mme. Sensobiareff,” he said, with dignity, “will you marry me?” + +“_What?_” she asked with a frown. + +“I know I’ve acted badly, but I--at the time I didn’t understand. I +didn’t really appreciate you; but now--if you will--” + +“Marry you!” she said, with a look that amazed him. “Are you mad?” + +“But--” + +“Is it possible that you didn’t _know_?” she said. “Couldn’t you _see_? +That man--that _saint_--” + +She began to weep, holding a tiny lace handkerchief to her eyes. + +“One of the master minds of Russia--a noble soul--the kindest and best +of men!” she sobbed. “Is it possible that you think--oh, how little you +know of women! You think I would replace _him_?” + +“Replace _him_ by _you_,” her tone implied. + +Hardy was completely taken aback. He couldn’t speak. + +“No,” she said, drying her eyes. “I have thought of nothing but him. +Only help me to get away, where I shall be safe, and then forget me! I +am the most unhappy wretch in the world. I have wished only to gain my +living, and it seems that I have become a criminal. Only save me from +this disgrace!” + +“Yes, of course!” he said hurriedly. “Let me see!” + +He fancied he heard a footstep on the stairs. He turned pale. + +“Have you any money?” he cried. “If you could go to Canada--” + +“Yes, I have money. In time, if it had not been for this, I should have +become rich. But why are you so pale? Is there danger?” + +“There’s no time to lose. Are you ready?” + +She rose, adjusted her queer little hat before his mirror, and carefully +patted her eyes. + +“I am ready,” she said. + +They went down the stairs and through the sleeping house with noiseless +steps. + +“Wait!” said Hardy. “Let me look first!” + +He went out into the street and looked carefully up and down. No one +there! He returned to fetch her. She took his arm with a pathetic, +appealing gesture, and they went off through the quietest and darkest +streets, both filled with haste and dread, unable to speak. + +She was terribly out of breath when they reached the Grand Central +Station. While he bought her ticket, she sat panting on a bench, her +face concealed by a thick veil, but her little plump hands clasped +passionately. A more forlorn, utterly foreign figure couldn’t be +imagined. + +They had nearly an hour to wait. He sat down beside her and tried to +reassure her. + +“You needn’t worry,” he said. “I’m sure there won’t be much of a search +for you, and probably there’s no fear of further trouble. Only--you’ll +never do _that_ again, will you?” + +“Never!” + +“What will you do? Write me as soon as you reach Montreal. I’ll be +anxious until I hear from you.” + +“Yes, I shall write,” she said. + +“How will you manage there?” + +“I shall find a way.” + +He persuaded her to take a cup of coffee and a sandwich at the lunch +counter. Then he bought her some magazines and a box of chocolates. + +“It’s time for you to go now,” he said. “I want you to know that never, +as long as I live, shall I forget what you did for me. It was--” + +“Hush!” she said. “You are repaying me, my dear. I only hope I have not +brought you any trouble.” + +The image of Clendenning rose up before him, but he answered valiantly: + +“Certainly not! But when I think of what you did for me--a stranger--” + +He could no longer repress the question which tormented him. + +“But _why_ did you do it? _Why_ were you so good to me?” + +She raised her veil and smiled at him. + +“Ah, my dear!” she said “It is the Russian heart!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +SEPTEMBER, 1922 +Vol. LXXVI NUMBER 4 + + + + +Hanging’s Too Good for Him + +THE PATHETIC STORY OF TOMMY ELLINGER, OF NEW YORK, AND AN INNOCENT YOUNG +GIRL FROM THE COUNTRY + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +He first emerged from obscurity at his father’s funeral. He was the only +son and the heir to everything, and therefore, of course, the center of +interest; but immediately and forever he destroyed all the tepid +sympathy and good will of the assembled relatives by his curious air of +immense carelessness, his foppish nonchalance. + +He hadn’t even the decency to wear a dark suit, they observed. He was +dressed in light gray, evidently quite new, and he kept his hands in his +pockets. It never occurred to any of them that his indifference might be +a clumsy effort to conceal an immeasurable embarrassment. Neither did +any one else remember what he remembered--that his father had detested +any sort of formal mourning. And it was Tommy’s destiny always to do a +thing in the wrong way, always to antagonize, invariably to blunder. + +It was not regret for the loss of his father, or any great regard for +his opinions, that caused Tommy to remember and to respect his wishes. +It was nothing more than a naïve and kindly sentimentality. His father +had been a horrible bully to him, the great bogey of his childhood. His +mother had died when he was very little, and he had been sent off to +boarding school at once. + +It seemed to the family that Tommy had always been at school, winter and +summer. Once in a great while he had emerged at some cousin’s Christmas +party, a rather silly blond boy in military uniform, always spoken of as +“poor little Tommy Ellinger.” There were no family rumors or traditions +about him, no reports of his behavior at school. + +Now, however, that he had definitely come to life, it was necessary for +the family to decide upon him, and they decided unfavorably. He got, +then and there, the name of being “defiant” and “conceited.” + +His father’s elder brother was to be his guardian until he was +twenty-one--a task which disgusted and appalled Uncle James. He was an +old bachelor lawyer, living in a hotel. Naturally his first thought for +Tommy was college, which would remove the boy for all his minority, and +even longer; but Tommy fought desperately against that. His hatred for +books, for herding with other young males, for all the bullying and +chaffing which terrified his awkward innocence, for the competition +which dazed his lumbering mind, made him unusually resolute. Business, +too, he summarily repudiated. + +“Then what do you intend to do?” his uncle demanded, with false +patience. + +“Well,” said Tommy desperately, “why couldn’t I be a lawyer, like you?” + +His uncle looked at him with a grim smile, and answered nothing. The +subject was dropped for the time being, and Tommy went to live at his +uncle’s hotel, to make up his mind about his very important future. He +lived a wretched sort of life, forever hanging about the lobby, or +sitting through vaudeville shows and musical comedies. He ate breakfast +with his exasperated old uncle every morning, and dinner almost every +evening. + +There was something peculiarly and intolerably irritating about +Tommy--some quality which, in spite of his invariable good temper and +his ingratiating manners, infuriated his uncle. A perfect young ass, the +old lawyer called him. + +Why was it that the qualities which would have been so endearing in a +girl of eighteen were so maddening in Tommy? Why was he, with his youth, +his boundless good will, his plaintive innocence, really nothing on +earth but a young ass? + +He was a great lanky boy with a naïve, good-humored face and a +preposterous foppish air, a man-of-the-world air; wearing clothes +ostentatiously correct and an amazing eyeglass with a broad black +ribbon. He imagined that he looked like a foreign diplomat, while at the +bottom of his heart he was quite conscious of being and looking a puppy. +He swaggered, but without any self-assurance. + +He devoted great thought to his clothes, and he could not refrain from +mentioning his sartorial inventions and improvements to his uncle. + +“What do you think of the cut of this coat?” he would ask. “Do you +notice this shoulder? Rather good, eh?” + +“Beautiful!” his uncle would say. “I never saw such grace and +elegance--a regular Beau Brummel! You’re fascinating. There’s nothing +that interests me like the cut of your coats!” + +Then Tommy would open the evening paper and laugh loudly and +ostentatiously at something in it, to show how undisturbed he was. + +“Why don’t you go out?” the old gentleman used to ask, often and often, +when, their dinner finished, they went up together in the lift to the +little sitting room they shared. “What’s the matter with you, Thomas? A +boy of your age, sitting at home here with an old fellow like me, night +after night! Why don’t you go out somewhere and enjoy yourself? Haven’t +you any friends?” + +Well, he hadn’t. All the boys he had known and liked in the military +academy up the Hudson had come from the farthest ends of the +country--from Texas, from California, from Maine. He had never been +particularly popular, anyhow, and he was too shy and too ridiculous to +make friends now. + +His uncle attached great importance to this, for he himself had scores +of friends. He wished Tommy to be a sort of creature the like of which +is no longer to be found--the traditional, old-fashioned beau, the +arbiter of elegance, welcomed everywhere, affable, agreeable, but +forever unattached, the society man of a past generation. He supplied +the boy with spending money, and introduced him to a few charming young +married women and a great many old bachelors. + +“Now go ahead!” he told him. “Make yourself popular! Make yourself +liked! A young man of your age, of good family, with a little money in +your pockets, with good prospects!” + +He was invited to one or two sedate houses, for his uncle’s sake, but +nothing came of it. The society life toward which his uncle urged him +forever eluded him. In fact, he had no life of any sort. He was only +waiting, hanging about in innocent and dreary idleness, unable to +believe that life should so cheat him of every joy, every excitement. + +It was spring when Tommy’s father died and he left the military academy. +He spent a horrible summer with his uncle, in a hotel in town, or at +other similar hotels in the mountains, on the coast, anywhere and +everywhere. Then came a still worse winter, during which the old +gentleman’s exasperation rose to a fury. + +They would go now and then to a musical comedy of the liveliest sort, +this being the Uncle James’s idea of what the boy ought to like. When +the old man saw him sitting there not liking it, when he saw him not +caring for or comprehending wines, a barbarian as to food, absolutely +indifferent to the arts, and hopeless in regard to sport, he became +almost homicidal. + +“Go away!” he shouted at him. “Go and spend this summer by yourself! I +won’t waste the money on taking you to a decent place. Go on a farm! Go +to some cheap, miserable, damnable little country boarding house, where +you can sit and gape all day, like the booby you are!” + +Tommy felt that it would be paradise now to get away from his uncle, no +matter where. The idea of going off alone, unbullied, unthwarted, quite +dazzled him. He was only too ready to go anywhere his uncle suggested. + +So Uncle James answered several newspaper advertisements, and at last +found a place which he felt would be suitable. He wrote and made all +arrangements, and then gave Tommy his directions, money that was to last +him for a month, and the following advice: + +“Don’t make a fool of yourself about any of the girls there. Remember, +you haven’t a penny for the next three years except what I choose to +allow you; and if you get yourself mixed up or compromised, I won’t help +you. I won’t recognize any responsibility of that sort!” + +Tommy turned scarlet. + +“Not in my line, Uncle James!” he replied, with extreme jauntiness. And +off he went. + + +II + +His uncle almost forgot about Tommy for some time. He had a letter from +the boy every week--a stupid, schoolboy letter which he hardly bothered +to read. “The weather had been very hot. I guess you are glad not to be +here, aren’t you? There is a lot of hay fever around now. It is +certainly a lucky thing that you didn’t come”--and that sort of thing. + +Then, while Uncle James was enjoying his little breakfast at the corner +table in the grill room, which he had occupied for years and years, just +as he was about to taste that invariable bowl of oatmeal with cream and +powdered sugar, his eye was caught by a headline on the front page of +his paper. He dropped his spoon on the floor. + + FATHER SHOOTS GIRL’S BETRAYER--TRAGEDY NARROWLY AVERTED AT THE + HOTEL TRESSILLON--SON OF THE LATE THOMAS ELLINGER WOUNDED + +He stared and stared at the thing. The paper crackled in his trembling +hands, the letters swam before his eyes. Nonsense! “Son of the late +Thomas Ellinger”--must be a mistake! + +He read the story with a furious sort of incredulity. It was a nasty +story of a young city man going out to a little country town for a +vacation, boarding in the house of a decent farmer, and running off one +night with the poor little sixteen-year-old daughter. He had taken her +to a disreputable hotel and registered as man and wife, which they +weren’t. And the decent farmer, the outraged, the desperate father, had +tracked them, and, standing in the doorway of the crowded and noisy +restaurant, had fired two shots at the girl’s betrayer--at Tommy! At the +boy who a few months ago had been sitting opposite Uncle James at this +very table! + +“No! Nonsense!” he cried, crumpling up the paper and throwing it under +the table. “One of those beastly newspaper stories! Damned lies, all of +them!” + +He went up to his room, got his hat and stick, and hurried out, furtive, +terrified, afraid that every one was pointing him out as the uncle of +that fellow. He wanted to telephone, where he would not be seen or +heard, somewhere outside of his hotel. He went into a booth in a cigar +store, and called for the Hotel Tressillon. + +“Mr. Ellinger,” he demanded. + +In a moment he heard that familiar young voice, with its exaggerated +accent. + +“This is Mr. Ellinger speaking.” + +“Thomas!” cried the old gentleman. + +The boy gave a sort of gasp. Then, with his unfailing genius for doing +the wrong thing, he assumed an airy and offhand tone. + +“Hello, Uncle James!” he said jauntily. “I didn’t know that you were +back in town again.” + +“See here!” shouted the old gentleman, in a tremendous voice. “Is it +true--this abominable thing I saw in the papers? Is it _you_?” + +“Yes,” replied Tommy. + +“Yes?” repeated his uncle’s voice, incredulous. “Yes? _You_ did a thing +like that? Good God! Explain yourself, Thomas!” + +“I can’t!” said Tommy. + +There was a brief silence. + +“You--you young cur!” The old man’s voice was trembling. “Don’t ever +come near me again. Don’t let me see you. I’d like to shoot you! You +miserable, dastardly cur! You’ve disgraced the whole family. You’ve +disgraced your father’s name. I’d like to see you hanged--only hanging’s +too good for you!” + + +III + +Tommy’s face was scarlet, as if he had been struck. He went across the +room, as far as he could get from the telephone, sat down, tried to +smoke a cigarette, and tried to smile carelessly. He had to give it up. +He hid his hot face in his arms, and sat there, amazed, confounded, +utterly overwhelmed, at his own deed and at the awful consequences of +it. + +His uncle’s voice he recognized as the voice of the world in general. +That was how he was to be regarded in the future--a cad, a cur, hanging +too good for him. A pariah--he who so valued the good opinion of others! +It was the sort of thing one couldn’t live down, ever. His life was +blasted at its very beginning. + +He knew that he could never justify himself. There were the facts in the +newspapers, and he couldn’t deny any of them. How explain, even try to +explain, what lay behind them? He himself didn’t comprehend it. He was +more surprised, more shocked, than any one else could possibly have +been. + +He looked at his wrist watch, which lay on the table because it couldn’t +be put on over his bandaged wrist, and saw with dismay that it was only +ten o’clock in the morning. The thought of the hours he would have to +pass, shut up there alone, overwhelmed him. He was ashamed to go out, +even into the corridor. He had already had to face a doctor and the +waiter who had brought up his breakfast, and his raw sensibilities had +made each of these encounters an ordeal. + +He imagined a quite preposterous hostility. He was already an outcast, +he was deserted, no one would come or telephone; he had nothing whatever +to do now, or in the future. He looked around the ugly little hotel +bedroom, and he felt that he was in prison, judged and convicted by his +fellow men, and already banished from them. + +Nothing to do, but plenty to think of, to recollect, and to examine. He +leaned back in his chair, staring at the ceiling, and tried his honest +best to retrace all the steps of the affair and to discover the true +measure of his guilt. + +He remembered every minute detail. He saw himself getting on the train +at the Grand Central, saw himself in the train reading magazines, hoping +that the other passengers admired his clothes and his luggage, and +fearing that they didn’t. He remembered the dust and the heat and the +tedium. + +It was late afternoon when he reached Millersburg, and he was gratified +to see from the window that a fair proportion of the population was +assembled to see the New York train arrive. He was confident that he was +causing more or less of a sensation as he descended, with his +irreproachable tweed suit, his imposing eyeglass, and the latest thing +in traveling bags. + +He walked leisurely over to a solitary old carriage, climbed in, and +directed the driver to take him to Mr. Van Brink’s. Then he leaned back +carelessly, prepared to review the landscape, when the jolting old +vehicle stopped. They were not yet out of sight of the station, from +whence the natives were still watching his progress. + +“Well, what’s wrong?” he asked the old driver. “Horse given out +already?” + +“Here ye be!” the driver answered dryly. “Here’s Van Brink’s!” + +Tommy knew very well that he was being laughed at by the loungers at the +station, as well as by the old driver, and he liked it no better than +any one else would have liked it; but he was a genuinely good-natured +sort of devil, and he grinned, in spite of a very real chagrin at so +unimposing an arrival. + +Having paid the driver lavishly, he walked along the little garden path +before him, and up some steps to a little veranda. The door opened at +once, and a hand reached for his bag. + +“Come right in!” entreated a gentle young voice. “This way, please!” + +The little house was cool and very dark, every shade pulled down, every +shutter closed. Tommy followed the white dress that was ascending the +stairs, and was presently led into a dim, breezy room, smelling of +verbena. + +The white dress flitted over to the window and threw open the shutters. + +“There!” she said, looking back over her shoulder and smiling. + +That smile! Tommy looked at her, enchanted. + +You could see that she was very young, although her figure was almost +matronly--short, full, agreeably rounded. She had calm, clear gray eyes, +fair hair neatly arranged, a rather pale, chubby face with blunt +features, pretty enough; but what was she but a nice, ordinary little +country girl in a calico dress? What was there, or could there be, in +such a young person to arouse the faintest interest in a man of the +world like Tommy? + +Ah, it was something to which far more sophisticated souls than his must +have succumbed--a lure so flamboyant, a charm so candidly voluptuous! + +She was serenely aware of her carnal fascinations. She was ignorant, but +not without a certain experience, and she had a fatal sort of instinct. +She knew her power, and knew how to employ it. + +She looked at Tommy with complete self-possession. She was not in any +way awed by his clothes, his eyeglass, or his magnificent air. Indeed, +it was he who grew red and confused before the calm gaze of the girl in +the calico dress. + +“Is there anything you’d like to have, Mr. Ellinger?” she asked +politely. “There’s towels--” + +“No, not at all!” protested Tommy, in his best manner. “Thanks awfully, +but there’s nothing.” + +The little thing in the white dress went out. + +Tommy unpacked his bag, and then, restless and hungry, wandered about +the room, looked out of the window, yawned, whistled, brushed his hair +again, wondered what was expected of him. At last a knock at the door, +and the gentle young voice said: + +“Supper’s ready, Mr. Ellinger!” + +She was waiting to show him the way to the dining room. She behaved, in +fact, like a very nice little hostess, properly concerned with his +comfort. He liked that, of course, and he liked the supper, too. It was +a novel sort of meal to Tommy--cold meat, fried potatoes, little glass +dishes of preserves and pickles, cakes, pies, strawberries, and coffee, +all on the table together. + +Old Van Brink and his wife made no impression on him at all. They were +what he had expected--what they ought to be. He talked to them in his +best manner, genial, very much at ease. He was ingenuously sure that +they were kind and honest people, and that they admired him. All his +interest centered on the calm little thing across the table. + +Supper over, Van Brink retired to a rocking-chair with the newspaper, +and his wife began to carry the dishes into the kitchen. The little +thing looked at Tommy. + +“Would you like to take a little walk?” she asked. “‘Most every one +does--down to the village.” + +“Charmed!” he assured her, with his inane magnificence. “Will you wait +till I get my stick?” + +So they set off together down the dark, tree-bordered street. It was +cool and very quiet, with a wistful little breeze stirring in the +leaves. + +“Peaceful, isn’t it?” said Tommy contentedly. + +“Oh, yes! I hope it will do you good,” the little thing answered +benevolently. + +Thanks, said Tommy, there wasn’t much wrong with him--he needed a rest, +that was all. + +“Well, you’ll get it, here!” said she, with a deep sigh. + +“Why? Not much excitement?” + +“Oh, you can’t imagine! Year after year!” + +He was sorry for her. + +“But you’ll be getting married one of these days,” he assured her +gallantly. + +“There’s no one here to marry,” she said. + +They had come into the brightly lighted Main Street, and Tommy became +somewhat distrait. He was wondering what sort of impression he was +producing on the natives. They were observing him. He saw girls turn to +stare after him, and a group of youths on a corner snickered as he +passed. + +All this pleased him. He swung his stick and strolled on with exquisite +indifference. The little thing, he fancied, must be admiring him +tremendously. + +But she wasn’t. He was undoubtedly causing a sensation, this lofty +stranger from the city with his remarkable clothes; but his smooth face +was too innocent, his manner, for all its swagger, too ridiculously +boyish. He was more or less stupid to this maiden accustomed to the +loutish gallantries of the corner loafer, to facile caresses and furtive +advances. He was insipid--“slow,” she called him to herself; but of +course he could be taught. + +Coming to Egbert’s Drug Store, they went in, at Tommy’s suggestion, and +each of them had a glass of soda. She did feel a certain triumph then, +at his manners and his handful of change. + +It was dark when they returned to the house. + +“Would you like to sit on the porch?” she asked. “All right! Let’s bring +the hammock around.” + +So they brought the hammock from the little back garden and slung it on +the veranda. They were hidden from the street by a tangle of +honeysuckle. The window behind them was unlighted, and there wasn’t a +sound from the house. They might have been alone in the universe. No one +disturbed them, no one came into sight. There they sat, in the +sweet-scented dark, Tommy on the railing, the little white figure +swaying in the hammock. + +“Don’t you want to smoke?” she asked. + +“Thanks!” he answered. “Yes, I will, if you don’t mind.” + +“If it’s cigarettes, I’d like to have one, please.” + +He was surprised and rather offended, because this wasn’t according to +his idea of her. + +“Sure it won’t make you sick?” he asked. + +“Oh, no!” she answered pleasantly. “We used to smoke at boarding school, +you know.” + +He proffered a lighted match, and in its glare he caught a glimpse of +her face, quietly smiling. Again he was fascinated, suddenly, +unexpectedly. + +They smoked for some time in silence. Tommy could see her curled up in +the hammock, swinging just a little. All of a sudden she sighed. + +“Oh, dear!” + +“What is it?” + +“Nothing much. For goodness’ sake, Mr. Ellinger, how old are you?” + +He tried to laugh in an amused way, but he was chagrined and puzzled by +her tone. + +“Why do you want to know?” he inquired. + +“Never mind, if you’d rather not say.” + +“I’ve no objection to telling you, my--my dear young lady,” he answered, +nettled. “I’m--eighteen.” + +“Are you? I’m only sixteen. We’re only kids, aren’t we?” + +He didn’t like that. Moreover, he perceived something sinister beneath +the words. + +“I suppose so,” he assented, in a tone of paternal indulgence. + +“Call me ‘Esther,’” said she. “Don’t let’s be silly! What’s _your_ +name?” + +He hesitated, and finally decided upon “Tom”; but she, like every one +else, saw the inevitability of “Tommy.” + +There was a long silence. Then out of the dark came her calm little +voice. + +“Tommy,” she said, “you’re a funny boy!” + +“Am I?” he said, with an uneasy laugh. + +The situation was quite out of hand now. He didn’t know what was +expected of him as a man of the world. He did know, though, that he was +failing. + +“Tommy,” said she, again, “come and sit here, beside me.” + +With a quite artificial alacrity he jumped up, went over to her, and sat +down in the hammock, close to her. He called himself a fool, an +imbecile, a contemptible ass. + +“I ought to kiss her,” he said to himself, “or put my arm around her, or +at least hold her hand!” + +But he couldn’t. He couldn’t even talk to her. He wanted, above +everything else in the world, to run away. He was not flattered or in +any way stirred or excited--only miserably ill at ease and instinctively +alarmed. He dared not move, even to turn his head. + +At last Esther got up with a sigh. + +“Good night, Tommy,” she said. “I hope you’ll sleep well!” + +“Thanks,” he answered, feeling utterly foolish and miserable. + + +IV + +He did not sleep well. He lay in bed, his hands clasped under his head, +looking out at the summer sky. + +“She’s a queer girl,” he thought, with a sort of resentment. “She’s +bold--runs after a fellow; and yet you can see she doesn’t care two +straws for him.” + +In long imaginary conversations with Esther he regained his lost +advantage. He was affable but cool--very cool. He could see her round +little face quite clearly before him, her serene eyes, her neat fair +hair. + +He awoke after his restless night to a hot, still morning. He could not +find a bath tub. Dressing reluctantly, unrefreshed and a bit irritable, +he went downstairs. It was a few minutes after eight by his watch--a +very decent, early hour, he thought; but, looking into the dining room, +he saw only one place laid on the long table. + +Mrs. Van Brink hurried in from the kitchen, limp, hot, and painfully +anxious. + +“Set down to the table, Mr. Ellinger,” she cried in her shrill voice. +“I’ll bring your breakfast right off. We’re all done. You won’t have to +wait more’n a minute.” + +He ate alone, a little resentful that Esther didn’t appear. Then he went +out on the porch. No one there--the shady street was quiet and empty. He +went around the house to the sun-baked little yard at the back, where he +discovered Mrs. Van Brink hanging dish towels on a line in terrible +haste. Her face became positively convulsed with worry at the sight of +his listlessness. + +“Now, then!” she cried. “You don’t know what to do with yourself, I’ll +be bound! And I haven’t got a minute to spare, with the dinner I have to +get up for Mr. Van Brink at noon. His farm’s four miles off, you know.” + +She stared at him, frowning, until an inspiration came. + +“Maybe you’d enjoy to play on the harmonium,” she suggested. “Esther’s +got some real sweet music.” + +Tommy did not know what a harmonium was; but she showed him a queer +little organ in the parlor, and he sat before it all the rest of that +intolerable morning, picking out tunes and experimenting with the stops. + +At noon old Van Brink came driving home in his buggy, and his hot and +anxious wife began hurrying back and forth between the kitchen and the +dining room, bringing in an enormous hot dinner. The farmer had nothing +to say to Tommy. He sat there with his napkin tucked in his collar, +consuming one dish after the other as fast as his wife brought them in, +absorbed and ravenous, like a feeding animal. Now and again Tommy caught +the old man’s small blue eyes surveying him with an expression which he +could not comprehend, but which he didn’t like. + +Van Brink drove off directly after eating, and his wife withdrew to the +kitchen again. With growing resentment, Tommy seized his hat and went +out, followed the route of the night before, and reached the village. +Entering the only hotel, the Gilbert House, he ordered a cocktail and +bought a newspaper; but the drink was shockingly bad, and he couldn’t +endure the stale dullness of the place long enough to read the paper +there. + +He had never before in his life suffered from such boredom. He went back +to the house, determined to write at once to his uncle and say he +couldn’t stand it any longer. + +And there, rocking on the porch and enjoying the cool of the afternoon, +sat Esther. + +“Hello!” she said cheerfully. + +“Good afternoon,” he replied stiffly. + +“Well! What makes you look so cross?” + +“I’ve had a rotten day.” + +“I’m sorry; but it wasn’t my fault, was it? You needn’t be cross at me.” + +“It was your fault, in a way. You might have told me what there is to do +in this place.” + +“Oh, but there isn’t anything! I’ll take you for a walk after supper, if +you want.” + +So after supper, when Mrs. Van Brink had gone back to the kitchen, and +her husband, in stocking feet, sat reading his newspaper, Esther and +Tommy set out again. + +“Shall we go right out in the country?” Esther asked him. “Or would you +rather go through the village and see some of the fine houses?” + +Tommy preferred the country. + +They turned north, followed the dark and quiet street past all the +little houses, and into a road soft with dust, under the black shadow of +great trees, with a sweet breeze blowing from the meadows. + +“One day’s enough for you,” said Esther. “How would you like to spend +_years_ here?” + +“By Jove! How do you stand it?” + +“Well, I won’t, any longer than I can help!” + +They were going uphill steadily. The fields were left behind, and the +pine forest was closing in on them, dark and fragrant. + +“This is my favorite walk,” said Esther. “I often come here by myself.” + +“Rather lonely, isn’t it?” + +“I’m never lonely.” + +Again that vague alarm came over the boy. He felt defenseless, lost. He +dreaded to go farther; but, chattering pleasantly, Esther went on and +on, and he had to answer and to follow. + +The road grew rougher, and his little comrade stumbled often. + +“Hadn’t we better turn back?” suggested Tommy. “You’ll be tired.” + +“Oh, no! I don’t call _this_ far!” + +“And it’s getting late. Your mother and father--” + +She laughed. + +“You needn’t worry about them! Let’s sit down and rest a few minutes, if +you like.” + +There was a great flat rock a little way up the bank from the roadway. +Sitting there, they could catch a glimpse of an enormous orange-colored +moon through the branches. + +“It’s nice, isn’t it?” said Esther. “And doesn’t my ring look pretty in +the moonlight?” + +She held up a plump little hand for him to see. + +“Are you engaged?” he asked, for even he knew that the question was +expected of him. + +“Yes--to the young man you saw last night in the drug store. It’s a +secret, though; mommer and popper don’t know.” + +“I hope you’ll be happy,” said Tommy, after a pause. + +“I don’t see how I can be,” she answered plaintively. “I don’t really +like him; but oh, dear, what else can I do? Why, I’ve only seen one real +_refined_ man in all my life. He was a traveling salesman. He wanted to +marry me and go and live in New York; but popper wouldn’t let me. He +said I was too young.” + +“Well, you know, you are, rather. You don’t want to be hasty, my dear +young lady!” + +She sighed. + +“I don’t know why I’m telling you all this; but I’m so unhappy!” + +He felt very sympathetic, but could think of nothing to say. + +“I’m going to take off this ring now, while I’m with you,” Esther went +on. “I want to forget all about Will for a while.” She slipped her warm +little hand into his. “Oh, Tommy!” she said coaxingly. “Be nice, won’t +you?” + +The light of the moon shone clearly on her pretty upturned face, her +white throat. He stared and stared at her. She leaned back, more and +more, until her head was resting on his breast and her smooth hair +brushed his lips. + +The first wave of some immense and terrible emotion, something he had +never before experienced, came rushing over him. He clenched his hands, +struggling against a fierce desire to push her away. + +“What are you doing to me?” he wanted to shout. “What’s happening to me? +Go away! Get out!” + +But she did not stir. She rested against him, contented as a kitten, +soft, gentle, and still. Little by little his mood changed, his panic +was allayed, and he bent over and kissed her. Then he wanted never to +let her go again. He kissed her violently, time after time. He couldn’t +stop. + +A sort of madness possessed him. A terror greater than ever assailed +him--a terror of himself. He knew he wasn’t to be trusted. He put her +aside brusquely and got up. + +“Come on!” he said. “It’s late. Let’s go back!” + + +V + +He sat at the open window of his room that night, oppressed by guilt and +dread. + +“I shouldn’t have kissed her,” he said to himself. “Now she’ll think I’m +in love with her.” + +He knew well enough that he was not. He disliked her--almost loathed +her; she was so soft and clinging, so irresistible and so inferior. He +didn’t want to see her again. + +He hadn’t yet been able to devise a suitable attitude when he met her +the next morning. Seeing her so perfectly unmoved helped him, and they +sat down to breakfast in friendly accord. + +“It’s another hot day,” she said. “Mommer thought maybe you’d enjoy a +picnic.” + +“A picnic--just you and me?” he asked suspiciously. + +She nodded, and waited for his reply, watching his face with candid +eyes. He grew red and hot. + +“Very nice idea,” he said loftily. + +He was racking his brains for some means of avoiding the excursion. + +“Not if I know it!” he said to himself. “She won’t get me alone again!” + +But his reflection in a distant mirror caught his eye. What? Here he +was, six feet tall, dressed in absolutely the latest fashion, a thorough +man of the world, and yet uneasy in the presence of this +sixteen-year-old country girl! “Dumpy,” he called her--stolid, ignorant, +rustic, in a cheap cotton frock. + +His good humor came back. He smiled down upon her kindly, all alarm +gone. Let her make love to him if she liked--there was no harm in it. + +They started directly after breakfast, walked mile after mile through +the fields in the full glare of the hot August sun, up stony hills, +through bramble-lined woodland paths, until Tommy, carrying the big +lunch basket and a walking stick, and wearing a rather heavy Norfolk +jacket--the only correct thing for picnics--was dazed and tired. Not +Esther, though; she was as fresh and cheerful as ever. + +In the course of time they reached the place predestined by her for +lunching--a little clearing on the slope of the pine-covered mountain, a +sort of sunny nest in the forest, where a brook ran by, rapid and cool. + +When he had at last satisfied his appetite--a strangely hearty and +indiscriminate one for such a man of the world--Tommy lay back against a +sun-warmed stone, smoking a cigarette and looking up at the bright sky. +It was nice to have Esther there, he admitted to himself. It was nice to +see her, contented and blessedly quiet, sitting beside him. + +He turned his head to see her better. What a round, pretty, white throat +she had! And her lashes were almost dark against her cheeks. He was +annoyed by a sudden great longing to kiss her again. He tried to put +the thought out of his mind--tried desperately; but in some inexplicable +way, even as she sat there with her eyes closed and her little face so +tranquil, she conveyed the fact to him that she was waiting to be +kissed. + +He did it, with a violence surprising to them both. She struggled +half-heartedly, then settled down, close to his side, with his arm about +her, and said no more. He kissed her again and again, stroked her hair, +looked at her in delight. Dear, gentle, ardent little soul! Truly it was +an afternoon on Olympus! + +Tommy was done for now. She had awakened his innocent, primitive +manhood, had aroused in him a feeling which he was too immature to +appraise. He believed that he was, that he must be, in love with her. +How otherwise explain his joy in kissing her, his immeasurable +admiration for her charms? + +“By Jove!” he said to himself. “I’m _in love_!” + +He said it with amazement, with pride, with profound distress, because +his passion tormented him. He was ashamed of it. He knew very well that +it was not spontaneous; Esther had forced its growth. He had not wooed +and won her; he had been captured in a most obvious way. He was a slave, +and he knew and resented it. + +Not that Esther was at all a difficult lady to serve. She had no whims, +no caprices. She was neither jealous nor exacting. Indeed, she required +nothing at all of Tommy. She let him alone. She was very affectionate, +whenever he was; but if he were moody or anxious, she was peacefully +silent. + +There was always an air of content about her. She might have been the +personified ideal of the man of forty--the woman who is always +responsive, and yet who exacts nothing. Very, very different from the +ideal of generous eighteen! + +Precious little joy did poor Tommy find in this his first love. He was +perplexed and confused; he couldn’t imagine any sort of end to it. He +couldn’t contemplate marrying Esther, and the idea of any other sort of +arrangement never occurred to him. In his eyes she was simply a +respectable young girl, under her father’s roof, not good enough, or not +suitable, to be the wife of a man of the world, but far too good to be +thought of in any improper way. + +He didn’t even know what he wanted--whether he wanted to leave her, or +whether he couldn’t live without her. He was weary beyond measure, those +hot and sleepless August nights. + + +VI + +At last, one evening, there came a sort of crisis. It was a sultry, +rainy night, and they were in the little parlor, bored and constrained +by the presence of old Van Brink in the next room, with the door open. +Esther had been playing hymn tunes on the harmonium, and Tommy had been +watching her, feverishly impatient to kiss her. She had stopped playing, +and they sat in silence, listening to the squeak of the old man’s +rocking-chair and the rustle of his newspaper. + +The room irritated Tommy by its amazing tastelessness. Even Esther +looked different in it, he thought. Outside, under the summer sky, alone +with him, she was a goddess. In here, what was she more than the plump, +phlegmatic Esther Van Brink? + +A door opened, and Mrs. Van Brink came in to her husband, her work in +the kitchen finished until the next sunrise. She looked exhausted. It +occurred to Tommy, not for the first time, that Esther was not a +remarkably kind daughter. He had never yet seen her do any sort of work +for her mother. + +Immediately, with artless tact, Mrs. Van Brink closed the door. Tommy +sprang up and caught Esther in his arms. + +“My!” she cried, laughing. “Aren’t you in a hurry, though?” + +Tommy reddened, painfully aware of his disadvantage. + +“I don’t know what you’ll do to-morrow evening,” Esther went on. “Will +Egbert’s coming to see me.” + +Tommy could scarcely grasp the idea. An evening without Esther! Another +man! He was silent for some time. He realized then that he would rather +marry Esther than lose her, than be supplanted by any Will Egbert. + +“Look here, Esther!” he said at last. “I know I haven’t any right to +complain. I’m not--anything to you; but I’d like you to know something. +Before I came here, my uncle--” + +He paused so long that Esther frowned. + +“Yes?” she said. “What about your uncle, Tommy?” + +“He warned me--told me I couldn’t get engaged, or anything of that sort. +You understand, don’t you, Esther? You see, I haven’t any income. I +depend on him, and I _know_, very well, that he’d never consent to--to +anything.” + +She didn’t answer. + +“I’ve thought it over a great deal,” he went on; “but I don’t know what +to do exactly.” + +To his chagrin and surprise, Esther got up and, going back to the +harmonium, began to play loud, triumphant hymns. He could not guess her +mood. He was afraid he had offended her; and with that a shade of the +old magnificence returned. + +“Esther darling, you’re not angry, are you?” he asked. + +“Oh, no,” she replied cheerfully; “but I want to think. Let’s sing.” + +She had a book of “College Songs,” ugly and tasteless, like everything +else in her life, and they sang them, one after the other, until +bedtime. In the next room the mother and father listened, proud and +pleased. + +“Hark to sis!” said old Van Brink. “Sings and plays pretty good, hey, +mother?” + +“My, yes! It’s real sweet!” + +“I’ll bet you that young man don’t see many girls like sis, city or +country, hey, mother? He’s no call to turn up his nose at our gal, hey?” + +“He don’t,” she answered thoughtfully. + +The next morning, at breakfast, as soon as they were alone for a minute, +Esther whispered: + +“Tommy, I’ve got a plan! Let’s go out on the porch,” she suggested +aloud, as her mother came in to clear the table. + +“Well!” said Tommy, when they were alone again. + +“Well!” she repeated. “Come on--sit down and listen. I want you to take +me to the city to see your uncle.” + +“No!” cried Tommy, startled. “No, my dear girl! That wouldn’t do at +all!” + +“It would! I’ll be so nice he’ll _have_ to like me. I thought and +thought about it last night. _Please_ do, Tommy!” + +“But, my dear child, don’t you see that you couldn’t go off with me that +way? You’d--you’d compromise yourself!” + +“Not if we got married right away.” + +“But suppose Uncle James said no?” + +“But he wouldn’t--especially when he sees how I trust you.” + +Tommy put forward all the objections he could think of, but she was able +to answer them all. + +“_I’ll_ manage him,” she insisted. “Only let me see him! And then, +Tommy,” she went on, “it’s getting horrid for me here. Egbert is +jealous. He says he won’t give me up, and won’t take back his old ring. +And”--amazing invention!--“mommer and popper say that you’re just +trifling with me, and they want me to take back Will. Every one says I’m +a silly little fool to think so much of you!” Tears came into her gray +eyes. + +“Oh, _do_, Tommy, _please_, take me away! I’m so miserable here!” + +And at last, because she wept, and because he could see no other way, he +agreed to take her. + + +VII + +Reluctant and harassed as he was, he couldn’t help a certain delight in +the adventure. He hadn’t yet lost a boyish relish for running away; and +this getting up after the others were asleep, stealing downstairs, bag +in hand, and meeting Esther in the dark little hall, thrilled him to the +marrow. + +They hurried through the empty streets, black beneath the shadow of the +old trees, and entered the station, where an oil lamp burned. The ticket +office was closed; there wasn’t a soul in sight. They sat down side by +side on a bench, to wait for the New York train. + +In her usual way, Esther put her hand in Tommy’s. He turned to look down +at her in the dim lamplight, and the sight of her flushed, excited +little face, combined with the pressure of her hand, nearly brought +tears to his eyes. How she trusted him, poor little girl! Leaving her +home and her parents and going off with him this way! He swore to +himself that she should never be sorry for it; that, even if she were +not quite the wife he would have chosen, he would respect her forever +for this generous, this noble trust in him. + +He had, in short, never in his life been so overwhelmingly asinine. His +fair, infantile face was pale from the intense seriousness of his +resolutions and the weight of his responsibility. He would at that +moment have been ready to assure you that it was he who had implored and +persuaded Esther to run away with him--that it was his idea and his +wish. + +It was midnight when they arrived at the Grand Central. The moment they +stepped off the train, a realization of his colossal folly rushed over +the boy. The subtle excitement of the hurrying crowds, the +sophistication of this environment, suddenly destroyed his rustic +romance, and he grew cold with fright. + +What was this that he had done? What was he to do with Esther? He +couldn’t marry her without a license. He had thought of taking her at +once to Uncle James, to convince him on the spot of Esther’s +desirability as a wife. Uncle James might be asleep; or, if he were +awake, he would surely need some preparation. He was courtly toward +ladies--ladies with money; but one never knew-- + +“Oh, Lord!” he thought. “Oh, Lord! What can I do with her?” + +They had eloped from the girl’s home. He was now and forever responsible +for little Esther. There she sat, waiting for his wise decision. + +They sat down on a bench in the immense hall, he with his latest thing +in traveling bags, Esther with a shabby little wicker suit case. +Forlorn, young, weary, they sat in silence--waiting, both of them, for +Tommy to become a man. + +“I know!” he cried suddenly. “Esther, you go into the ladies’ waiting +room while I telephone. I have a cousin. I think she’d be willing to do +something. At least she’ll put you up overnight.” + +But in the telephone booth his courage fled. He couldn’t explain all +this over the wire. He ran out and got a taxi, and at one o’clock he +arrived at his cousin’s little flat uptown. + +She was a charming, gracious, good-natured young widow. She got up, put +on a dressing gown, and sat listening with angelic patience to Tommy’s +story; but she could not conceal her horror. + +“Oh, Tommy, my _dear_ boy! You’re so young! Don’t be hasty! Oh, Tommy, +don’t rush into--anything!” + +“Now, look here!” said Tommy, sick with nervousness and alarm. “Don’t +lecture me, Alison. It’s done. Just suggest something. She can’t go back +now. I’ll have to see Uncle James about getting married; but what shall +I do now? I can’t leave the poor kid sitting there in the Grand Central +Station all night.” + +“No, of course you can’t,” Alison agreed. “Bring her here, Tommy--and +hurry: I’ll wait up for her.” + +She set about making preparations for this most unwelcome guest, +thinking and hoping all the time that Tommy might be saved--that this +distressing thing might blow over without hurting him. + +She pictured Esther as a poor innocent little rustic, as simple as +Tommy. She never saw the girl, and so was never enlightened. She waited +for two hours, but no one came. Then, worried, heavy-hearted, she went +back to bed. + + +VIII + +Tommy had hurried back to Esther, and found her just as he had left +her--a model of patience and propriety, with her little bag beside her. +Though she was pale and heavy-eyed with sleep, she was as neat and fresh +as ever. He told her his plan. + +“Come on,” he said. “Hurry up! Alison said she’d wait for you.” + +“I’m not going there,” she said. “I can’t, Tommy.” + +“You’ll have to, dear!” + +Her eyes filled with tears. + +“I can’t! I can’t! I just couldn’t face a strange woman now. What would +she think of me, running away with you like this?” + +“But what can I do with you, Esther?” + +She clasped his arm and looked up into his face with streaming eyes. + +“Oh, Tommy! Please don’t leave me! I’m so frightened and so lonely! +Don’t send me away!” + +“But you must be reasonable, sweetheart,” he implored. He began to +realize how terribly he had mismanaged this affair. He cursed himself. +Why hadn’t he made plans? “You know we’ve got to consider your +reputation,” he said. + +“Oh, that doesn’t matter!” she cried. “No one’ll ever know about it. +Only don’t go away from me, Tommy! I couldn’t bear it!” + +He yielded. He was so distressed, so confused, so alarmed, that he had +no moral strength to withstand her. He took her to the Tressillon, a +quiet, dingy place where he had once or twice had dinner. He took two +rooms for them, on different floors, and he registered as “Mr. and Mrs. +Thomas Ellinger, Jr.” What else could he have done? + +He slept soundly, although he hadn’t expected to close an eye. The first +thing he thought of upon waking was to telephone to Esther’s room. He +was told that she wasn’t there. + +He dressed and hurried down to look for her everywhere--in the dining +room, the grill, the lounge; but he couldn’t find her. He was seized +with panic. + +When he found that her bag was still in her room, he resigned himself to +wait; but he was angry--more angry than he had ever been in his life. + +She came back at lunch time, composed and smiling. He was sitting on the +lounge when she entered. He got up, took her arm with a nervous grip, +and led her into a quiet corner. + +“Look here, Esther!” he said. “You mustn’t act like this! Where have you +been?” + +“Oh, nowhere special--just for a walk.” + +“I’d planned for us to go to the City Hall and get the license this +morning, and get married.” + +“Oh, Tommy!” she said, with a pout. “I don’t want to get married. I’m +too young!” + +“Don’t be silly!” he said impatiently. “We’ll have a bite of lunch and +then we’ll hurry down town.” + +“I think it’s silly to get married. We’re too young. What could we live +on?” + +“You needn’t worry about that,” he said, wounded. “I dare say I can +manage to take care of you.” + +“I don’t think you could, Tommy. We’d only be miserable. No, let’s not +be married.” + +“Esther!” he cried, appalled. “What’s the matter with you?” + +“I think we’ve made a mistake. Let’s not be silly and make it any worse. +The best thing would be for us to part. I can look out for myself +perfectly well. I know a man here in the city--I dropped in to see him +this morning, and he said he’d get me an engagement to go on the stage. +He’s an advance agent, or something. I met him out in Millersburg. He +has lots of pull.” + +“Don’t talk that way!” he thundered. “Don’t you realize what you’ve +done? Haven’t you enough sense to see that you’re compromised?” + +“No one knows anything about it, and there’s no harm done. I’ll write to +mommer and tell her I ran away to go on the stage.” + +“No, you won’t!” said Tommy. “I sent them a telegram this morning to say +that we were married. I thought we would really be by the time they got +the message.” + +She looked at him in silence. + +“Well!” she said at last. “You _are_ a fool!” + +“I suppose I am,” he replied bitterly. “However, it’s done now. They +know you’re here with me, and they think you’re my wife, so you’ll have +to see it through.” + +“Not I!” she said cheerfully. “I’m not going to marry a kid like you!” + +“For God’s sake, why did you come away with me?” he cried. + +She smiled. + +“I guess I liked you,” she said. + +“Don’t you like me now?” + +“Don’t be silly!” she said. “Of course I do; but I think we’re too young +to think of marriage. It was a mistake.” + +She was absolutely incomprehensible to him; but she could read him +through and through, and the better she knew him, the greater grew her +contempt. + +“It was only a joke,” she said. + +“Is that your idea of a joke? It’s a pretty dangerous one.” + +She shook her head. + +“No, it isn’t. I knew you were a nice boy. I knew I could trust you. +I’ll always remember you, Tommy--always. You’re the nicest--” + +“What do you propose to tell your parents? They’ll write to you here, or +they may come.” + +“They won’t find me. I’ll leave to-morrow morning. Mr. Syles told me of +a nice boarding house. You’ll go back to your uncle. He’ll never know +about it, and we’ll both forget the whole thing, won’t we?” + +They went up into her room, and they argued all afternoon. Tommy tried +to show her the enormity of her conduct, but she insisted upon regarding +it as an escapade. She emphasized her sixteen years. She behaved with an +airy childishness which she had never shown before, and which he knew to +be false. + +He had played the part she had determined he should play, and there was +an end to him. Her modest little pocketbook was well stuffed with his +money. She was in the city where she wished to be. + +Sixteen? Esther sixteen? Preposterous idea! She was as old as the earth. + +At last she said she was hungry, and reluctantly he took her downstairs +to the dining room, crowded and noisy, with dancing going on to the +music of a fiendish orchestra. Gone was his pride, gone was his kindly +protectiveness. He was overwhelmed with shame; he saw himself a dupe, +when he had fancied himself a hero. + +He couldn’t eat. He sat there across the table, in sullen wretchedness, +keeping his eyes off her detestable face, listening to her calm voice, +telling him that it was “better for them both to part now.” She was +affable, but she made no effort to be kind. She had nothing to say about +love, about grief at parting. She placidly ignored their romance. She +urged him to be “sensible,” and a “good boy.” And with every word she +made a fresh wound in his quivering, childish soul--scars never to be +healed. + +He was sitting with his back to the door, and he hadn’t seen old Van +Brink enter. He had looked up in alarm at a shriek from Esther, and +there was that face, convulsed with hatred--hatred for _him_! Then the +shot, the crowd, the atrocious sense of unreality, of insane confusion, +the pain in his wrist. + +Some one had hurried him off in a taxi. He had looked back blankly from +the doorway at the brightly lighted room, at an old man held by force +from following him. It wasn’t, it couldn’t be real! + +Once again he picked up the newspaper and looked at that shameful +headline: + + TRAGEDY NARROWLY AVERTED AT + HOTEL TRESSILLON + +It occurred to young Thomas Ellinger that perhaps the tragedy had not, +after all, been averted. + + +IX + +“Everything passes,” runs the old saying, and the contrary is also true. +Nothing passes. + +If you had looked at that stalwart and serious gentleman in the box, +correct, evidently prosperous, with his honest and rather blank gaze, +you would certainly have imagined him to be one of those fortunate +creatures without a history, a soul without a scar. He was there with an +agreeable, well-bred wife and a pretty young daughter, and he was +apparently enjoying the play with a temperate and sedate +enjoyment--interested, but not very much interested, you know. + +And yet he is none other than the black sheep of twenty years ago, the +disgraced and abandoned Tommy. Moreover, the actress whom he is watching +with so tepid an air is Esther herself, and he is very cunningly +concealing a great confusion of feelings. + +He had casually suggested going to see her act that evening, as he had +done four or five times before, since he had by chance discovered that +Esther and the celebrated Elinor Vaughn were one and the same person. He +had no knowledge of the means by which she had risen, but he was by no +means surprised to find her at the top. Why shouldn’t she be? Indeed, +how could she not be? She was certainly born for victory. + +Each time that he watched her magnificent outbursts of dramatic passion, +her rages and her griefs, he felt a secret and delightful joy. Only +imagine what he had escaped! Only think what such a woman, capable of +moving the most cynical heart, could have done with him! He looked +cautiously at the people about him, saw them stirred to horror, grief, +or delight, and he felt himself superior to them all. They didn’t know +that it was only Esther Van Brink! + +He watched her to-night, at the end of her famous second act, winning by +heartbreaking entreaties the mercy of a vindictive and obdurate husband. +Never could he have withstood her. He would have been lost! + +The curtain fell, rose again, fell, and she came out to stand for a +moment before the footlights, bowing, smiling a little wearily; and then +she saw him. + +He drew back hastily, but it was too late. When she came before the +curtain again, she looked at him and smiled. Before the third act began, +a boy came to the box with a note: + + Please, Tommy, come behind and see me for a moment. + + ESTHER. + + +“It seems she’s some one I used to know,” he explained to his wife. She +raised her eyebrows and smiled politely, but he knew she wasn’t +satisfied. “I suppose I’ll have to go,” he said. + +“Oh, by all means!” replied his wife. “Alice and I won’t wait.” + +He was uneasy and annoyed. That was just like Esther--no consideration! + +He found her in her dressing room, with a crowd of people, but she sent +them all away. + +“He’s an awfully old friend,” she explained, “and very shy. I’ll never +be able to catch him again.” + +The little country girl had certainly become a handsome woman, he +reflected, and she had lost none of her impudent charm, her mocking +tranquillity. + +“Well, Tommy!” she said. + +“Well!” he answered, and he had exactly his old air of a boy acting the +man of the world. + +“My, you’ve got on!” she said admiringly. “You’re really splendid, +Tommy! Are you a millionaire?” + +“No,” he answered, flushing, well aware that she was laughing at him. +“I’m in business.” + +“How did you do that?” + +Naturally he didn’t care to talk about his heroic effort to rehabilitate +himself--how he had actually found himself a job, and won his alarming +uncle’s forgiveness for his one wickedness by patient industry and some +years of complete self-effacement. + +“And you’re married, if my eyes do not betray me.” + +“Yes, I’m married,” he answered stiffly. + +He wasn’t going to permit any Esther on earth to make light of that +respectable and very happy union. + +“Oh, Tommy!” she sighed. “I’m glad! I’m glad it’s all turned out so well +for you--and for me, too. I don’t believe I would ever have become the +actress I am if it hadn’t been for all I suffered through your +desertion.” + +“What?” he cried, astounded. “_My_ desertion?” + +And there were actually tears in her eyes. + +“Yes,” she said. “You nearly broke my heart, but it made me.” + +He could scarcely believe his ears. + +“But--but--” he stammered, with a feeble effort to remind her of her own +treachery. + +“I only wanted to see you and tell you that I forgave you long ago, +Tommy--forgave you frankly and freely. I owe my success to that +suffering.” + +She held out her hand. He grasped it, and hurriedly took his leave. She +forgave him! She forgave him his desertion, which had nearly broken her +heart! + +He stopped in the street outside the theater, ready to denounce her to +the silent sky; but in spite of himself began to smile, with reluctance, +with an immense and grudging admiration. + +“Upon my word!” he said aloud. “What a woman!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +NOVEMBER. 1922 +Vol. LXXVII NUMBER 2 + + + + +Like a Leopard + +HOW JOHNNY BRECKENBRIDGE RECEIVED A NEW LIGHT ON THE NATURE OF A GOOD +WIFE + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +It was a frightful night. Brecky turned up the collar of his overcoat, +pulled his cap lower over his eyes, and left the shelter of the railway +station for the open road. He heard the train that had brought him from +the city pull out again and rush whistling through the fields and +marshes. When it had gone, everything human had vanished, leaving him +alone with the great and terrible wind and the cold rain. + +He made what haste he could along the muddy road, his head down against +the gale. The driving rain half blinded him, the tumult confused him, +with the unceasing rush of the wind and the dull sound of the sea. His +way lay through immeasurable desolation, past house after house empty +and black, shops all closed and shuttered, streets in which there was +not one human creature. It was a sort of Pompeii, a deserted village, a +nightmare; but to the practical Brecky it was nothing more or less than +Shorehaven, a summer resort, naturally deserted in midwinter. + +He was not a man of imagination, this Johnny Breckenbridge. He was a +wiry young chap with an impassive, weather-beaten face. He dressed very +soberly, but he had an incorrigibly sporting air, and there was +something rakish and jaunty about him. He was nimble, alert, and just a +trifle bow-legged. He was never tired, never discouraged. He had all his +wits about him, and knew his way in the world. + +He had been, one might say, born a jockey, and he had been a good one, +too, for years; but he had grown tired of the restrictions of a jockey’s +life. He was fond of eating and drinking, and he liked to be his own +master. + +He had continued his activities on the race track in a less official +capacity. He had done well as a bookie, too, for he was shrewd, +cautious, and trustworthy; but he had suddenly fallen in love and +married. + +“And that’s no life for a married man,” he observed to his many friends. +“Got to settle down now.” + +Brecky was thorough in everything, and he wished to be a thoroughly +married man. He took his new obligations with great seriousness. He +intended to do well for his jolly little Kathleen. He knew that his duty +in life was to make money for her. + +He never thought of consulting her, however. She had been a waitress in +a little restaurant in the city, and he had admired her brisk good humor +and her common sense. She was a pretty kid, too--dark, small, vigorous. +She had received a great deal of attention, but she was never silly or +vain about it. She knew how to take care of herself. She liked a good +time, but no monkey business. She was mighty independent, Kathleen was. + +To Brecky’s uncomplex mind, the wedding ring was to transform her +completely. She was to be no longer Kathleen, but a wife; and to him all +good wives were alike. They were kind, gentle, contented, and very +helpful. You made money gladly for them; but if you were a real man, you +didn’t let them spend much of it. + +He had looked about the world thoughtfully for a few months. Then he had +taken nearly every penny he had saved and had bought a hotel at the +seaside, with a heavy mortgage on it. To this place he had brought his +Kathleen, that she might help and comfort him while he mastered his new +business. + +Extraordinary friends of his used to come down and give him advice. He +listened and learned. He knew a number of men connected with hotels, +night clerks, head waiters, and so on; and they were willing and +anxious to help him, because every one liked him. + +He had no iconoclastic ideas. He wished to run his hotel according to +all the tried and tested rules of the business. He wore out his +advisers. Those who came down to look over Brecky’s hotel went away +exhausted and squeezed dry, leaving whatever valuable knowledge they +owned in Brecky’s possession. + +In midwinter, when the place lay like a frozen village on the shore of +an inhuman sea, lights used to shine from the windows of Brecky’s +immense hotel, and to flit from one floor to another. That meant Brecky +and some consulting friend, muffled in sweaters and overcoats, +inspecting the rows and rows of bedrooms, discussing the wall paper, the +flimsy furniture, debating with breath that congealed in the frigid air, +whether this or that room was going to be cool enough, shady enough, +airy enough. + +But however the lights might flit about the building in those winter +nights, there was one that remained steady and constant as the beam from +a lighthouse. It came from the kitchen window. It sprang up every +evening when dusk began to close in, and it always burned until nine +o’clock or so. Brecky saw it now, as he turned the corner and struggled +down the street at the end of which his hotel stood. + +This was the hardest stretch, in the teeth of the terrific wind blowing +inshore. It was like leaving the world and plunging into chaos. He went +at it, head down, his eyes fixed upon the cheerful light, an agreeable +hunger rising within him. That light meant Kathleen and the excellent +dinner she was sure to have ready for him. + + +II + +Brecky stamped up the wooden steps and across the veranda, opened the +front door with his latchkey, and entered the house. It was colder in +there than it was outside. The place wasn’t designed for winter +occupation, and there was no means for heating it. Moreover, its +construction was flimsy, and a wind like that now blowing found its way +in without trouble, and went moaning through the hall, rattling the +doors and windows. + +He passed through the dining room. It was entirely dark, but there was +no fear of running into anything, for all the tables were drawn back +against the walls and the chairs piled on them. He pushed open the +swinging doors into the pantry, and another door, and was suddenly in a +different world, warm, light, filled with delightful savors. + +“Ah!” he said, with a sigh. + +He slipped off his overcoat, cap, and rubbers, and went over to the +stove, holding out his numb hands to its welcome heat. Then he turned +and kissed his wife, absent-mindedly, almost without looking at her, in +spite of the fact that she was well worth looking at. + +“Did Mullins come about those sash cords?” he asked. + +“No--no one came. I haven’t seen a soul all day,” she answered; but he +missed the significance of her tone. + +She hurried back and forth with steaming dishes, and at last informed +him, rather curtly, that his dinner was ready. He sat down at once and +ate with good appetite, but in silence and abstraction, because he had +to think about those sash cords. At last he finished and leaned back in +his chair, ready for the amenities of life. + +“Well, Kathleen!” he said. “You’re one fine little wife!” + +He was innocently oblivious of his wife’s state of mind. It hadn’t +occurred to him that she kept on existing and thinking when he wasn’t +there. His remark was a match to dry straw. + +“A fine little _cook_, I guess you mean!” she said with sudden asperity. +“That’s your idea of a wife!” + +He laughed. + +“Well!” he said. “They kind of go together, don’t they?” + +“Looks like it,” she said; “only some cooks get paid.” + +It was his habit to ignore remarks like that. Women, he considered, were +often fanciful and “touchy.” It was better to leave them alone at such +times. He lighted a big cigar, deliberately took his mind off his wife +and all domestic concerns, and began to meditate on his business. + +But the perverse creature continued to exist and to speak. + +“I didn’t start out in life to be a cook,” she said, in an ominously +calm and reasonable tone. “I’m glad enough to do it for your sake, +Johnny; but I’d like you to remember that I’m not used to this kind of +life.” + +“Yes, yes!” he said soothingly, and continued to smoke and stare at the +fire. + +“You never even look at me!” she cried suddenly. + +“Yes, but I do!” he protested. “Sure I do!” + +He looked at her then, with a smile, and saw that she was crying. + +“For the Lord’s sake, what’s the matter?” he asked, with despairing good +nature. “I’ll look at you for an hour, if you like; only don’t cry, +that’s a good girl!” + +She put her handkerchief to her eyes, and went on crying. He swore under +his breath, and, getting up, went around the table and put his arm about +her. + +“Come now!” he said. “You’re as pretty as a picture, and you know I love +you.” + +“Yes!” she said. “You want to make it up quickly and forget all about +me!” + +He couldn’t help laughing at the woman’s cleverness. + +“Well!” he said. “If I do think such a lot about this business, who’s it +for? Don’t be silly! It’s all for you.” + +“It isn’t! It’s because you like it. You’d go on with it just the same +if I was dead!” + +He was a little in doubt what to do. Should he ignore her, and let her +get over her inopportune temper alone? Or should he wheedle her? + +He was really annoyed. He thought it all rather touching and feminine. +They were all like that--wanted a man to spend his time making love and +playing the fool; and yet, if he didn’t provide all they wanted, or +thought they wanted, they’d nag him to death. He kissed her again. + +“We’ll go in to the city some day next week,” he said. “We’ll take in a +show, and all that. That’s what you need.” + +“It isn’t! What I need is some one to talk to. You never want to listen +to me. You never ask me what I’ve been doing.” + +“But there’s nothing you could do,” he answered innocently, “except +cooking and sewing and--” + +He was really surprised at her outbreak, she was usually so cheerful and +equable. He looked at her flushed and furious face, the tears still in +her eyes, and an unpleasant conviction came to him that this was going +to be serious--and lasting. + +“You come in,” she went on, “and you sit down and eat your dinner, and +the only thing you can find to say to me is to call me a _cook_!” + +“I said you were a fine little cook,” he began ingratiatingly. “Nothing +wrong in that, is there? Why, I’m proud of you, Kathleen! Only this +afternoon I was telling Sawyer how you could cook.” + +“Well, you’d just better find something else to praise me for!” she +cried. “I’m something more than a cook, and the sooner you learn it the +better!” + +He was astounded and somewhat shocked at her violence--dismayed, too. He +had an uneasy feeling that he couldn’t handle this situation adequately. +So, according to his habit, he decided to go away, believing, as many +other people believe, that if he weren’t in the situation, there would +be no situation. But his cool deliberations were upset. Moreover, his +cigar was out, and he didn’t like relighted cigars. + +He got the books in which he was trying to work out a new idea of hotel +bookkeeping, but he couldn’t do a thing. He couldn’t put out of his mind +the image of that girl, that provoking and beloved girl, with her angry, +rosy little face and her eyes full of tears. + +“Women!” he thought savagely. + +No denying, though, that she was a wonderful wife and companion. She had +never complained before, she had never failed him. Out of the corner of +his eye, he saw her get up and begin carrying the dishes over to the +sink. He thought he would help her, and then he thought he wouldn’t. It +would be weakness. + +Still, it would do no harm to conciliate her. Perhaps, if he did, his +working mood would return. He watched her for a few minutes longer, +bending over the dish pan. Then he got up, went over to her, and, +putting an arm about her, drew her close against him. + +Then a devil entered into him. + +“Why, you silly kid!” he said, kissing her. “You’re the best little +cook!” + +She turned and gave him a smart box on the ear. + +He was so astounded that he couldn’t speak. He stared at her flushed and +furious face, his own perfectly blank. Then, very slowly, the color +began to rise in his lean cheeks. + +He was a man slow to anger, a man of self-control and _sang froid_; but +when his temper was aroused, it was a bad one. His wife was secretly +horrified at what she had done. She hadn’t meant to do it. She knew he +was only trying to be funny. She was ashamed and alarmed. + +“What made you do that?” he asked slowly. + +“Because I’m sick and tired of being called a cook, that’s why!” she +answered valiantly. + +“Well, you’d better apologize!” he said. + +“Well, I won’t!” she answered promptly. “I’m glad I did it. I’m just +sick and tired of--of all this--shut up here alone all day long!” + +“All right!” said Brecky. “_All_ right!” + +She looked at him steadily for a moment. Then she began, very +deliberately, to dry her hands. He turned away and walked back to his +books, but she saw that his hands were clenched, and she knew that he +was filled with fury. She was elated, and she was sorry. + +He began figuring, but he grasped his pencil so fiercely that it broke, +and he had to get up and look for another. + +He saw Kathleen standing before the little mirror she had hung up on the +wall, dressed in her fur coat and engaged in pinning on her hat. + +“What are you doing?” he asked. + +“Putting on my hat,” she answered calmly. + +“Where do you think you’re going?” + +“I’m not going to tell you.” + +He smiled. + +“Well, good-by!” he said. + +Taking the key out of the lock, he went out of the kitchen, slamming and +locking the door behind him. + +“She can stay in there and think it over!” he said to himself. + + +III + +Brecky made an effort to be light, careless, superior. He whistled as he +went upstairs to the two rooms they used on the floor above--one as a +bedroom, the other as a sort of office, where Brecky “saw people.” He +had plenty of material to occupy himself with here--letters and +catalogues and estimates and so on. A little gas stove was burning in +one corner, and the room was as neat, cheerful, and comfortable as it +could be made by Kathleen’s benevolent genius. + +He had scarcely set foot over the threshold before a pang of remorse +assailed him. Wherever his glance fell, there was something to speak of +Kathleen and her care for him. He was by no means imaginative, but he +was suddenly able to imagine his young wife alone all day in this huge, +cold place. He began to have some idea of what her life must be. + +“By gosh!” he thought. “After all, I don’t know that I blame the poor +girl for landing on me!” + +And all at once the pathos of the thing overcame him--that poor little +bit of a thing flying out at him like that--at him, who could have +picked her up and shaken her like a kitten. He shouldn’t have teased +her. After all, there was more to her than her cooking. He hadn’t fallen +in love with her for that. + +His impulse was to hurry downstairs and make it up; but he didn’t see +how one could make up a quarrel with a woman without giving her a +present. It wasn’t decent. Moreover, it would be too difficult. A +present relieved a man from the necessity of making any sort of +explanation, or of talking at all. You give the present, with a kiss, +and it’s done. + +He walked up and down the room with his hands in his pockets, haunted by +the image of Kathleen angry and Kathleen gay. The more he reflected, the +more mysterious and oppressive was his sense of guilt, the more contrite +and tender his heart. In the end he came to a decision extraordinary in +one so stiff-necked. He resolved to go downstairs and say, quite +frankly, that he was sorry, and that he loved her and didn’t care +whether she cooked or not. + +The house seemed blacker and colder than ever as he descended the +stairs. He wondered if she was crying in there, or scornfully washing +the dishes. He unlocked the door, opened it, and entered. + +He couldn’t see her at all. He stared about the huge kitchen, which was +well lighted. There were the dishes, just as he had last seen them, but +no human being. Kathleen had gone! + +He couldn’t believe it at first. She couldn’t have got out by the +windows, for the heavy shutters were locked on the outside. There was no +possible means of egress from that room except an incredible one; and +yet, as she wasn’t in the room, she must have got out that way. She must +have gone down the flight of rickety wooden steps and through the +cellar. + +She had always been in mortal fear of the cellar, because there were +rats in it. Brecky had always brought up the coal for her when she +wanted some. In order to pass through it at night, she must have been in +a desperate mood, he thought. + +He was more disturbed than he cared to admit. Where could the girl go, +alone, on a night like this, with a regular hurricane blowing? There +was nothing for it but to put on his cap and overcoat and go in search +of her. + +The wrath of a woman had in it something peculiarly alarming and +mysterious for Brecky. He felt that Kathleen was capable of the most +amazing deeds, that she was not bound by any of his rules or scruples. +He couldn’t imagine what she would do. He was completely lost. + +He opened the front door and stepped out into the tumultuous night. +Fortunately there was only one direction in which to go, unless one +wished to walk into the sea, and he didn’t think that even an enraged +wife would do that. There was nothing suicidal about Kathleen, anyhow. +She was too sane, too solid, too honestly fond of life. + +He was also aware that she was well able to withstand this weather. +Where he could go, sturdy as he was, she could go, too. She was vigorous +and resolute. + +The wind was at his back now. He went with fierce impetus along the +empty streets, and he went, inevitably, to the railway station. He +entered the warm little waiting room, where a white-bearded agent dozed +in his ticket booth. + +The man looked up and nodded at Brecky. + +“Too late!” he said. “She’s gone!” + +This might mean either a train or a wife. + +“Ten minutes ago,” the agent went on, full of the secret triumph he +always felt at the spectacle of a thwarted traveler. “You’ll have to +wait two hours, and mebbe more.” + +Brecky sat down near the stove and set to work to frame a question which +should in no way compromise his wife. He wished to seem aware of all her +doings. He couldn’t ask whether she had been at the station; but the +agent assisted him. + +“Your missus would ’a’ lost the nine o’clock train herself, if it hadn’t +’a’ been near half an hour late.” + +“I’m glad she caught it, anyway,” replied Brecky. “It’s a case of +serious illness. I told her to hurry along, and I’d follow as soon as I +could.” + +“Your phone out of order?” asked the agent. + +“Yes,” said the quick-witted Brecky. “Did she telephone here?” + +“Yep--said to meet the train when it got to the station.” + +“I wonder who she got on the phone!” said Brecky. “Probably her aunt or +her cousin.” + +Splendid improvisation, for Kathleen hadn’t a single relative in the +city, to his knowledge! + +“It just happens I heard the name,” said the agent. “‘Charley,’ she +says, ‘I’m coming in unexpected, and you must come and meet me!’” + +“I didn’t know Charley was in New York,” said Brecky thoughtfully. + +“She didn’t phone New York,” said the agent. “I just happened to hear. +It was New Chelsea.” + +“I see!” said Brecky. + + +IV + +He took a cigar out of his pocket and began to smoke, and to think. His +impassive face showed no trace of emotion. He was simply waiting for a +train; but within he was in a panic, torn with rage, fear, and a frantic +desire for action. + +Who the devil was Charley? After all, what did he know of Kathleen? What +did he know of women, anyway? He had left her alone for days and days, +while he looked after business matters in the city. He had left her +alone, partly because he wanted to go into the city, because he disliked +solitude and quiet. How did he know what she thought of when he was +gone? Charley! + +He could scarcely endure it. His lean body trembled, like that of a +nervous horse held brutally in check. He wanted to bolt. Charley! + +Unfortunately, Brecky did not find it difficult to believe evil. His +experience of life had been hard and definite. He had as high an opinion +of Kathleen as he had ever had of a human being, but he was not +trustful. He knew too much, and it was a one-sided knowledge. + +It was possible that Kathleen was merely a fool, and didn’t realize what +she was doing; but this Charley wouldn’t be like that. If women were +more or less a mystery to Brecky, men were not. He had a sudden and very +clear picture of Kathleen, neat, rosy, pitifully self-assured, alighting +from the train, to be met by Charley. + +All at once he knew who Charley was--that fat, owlish fellow who used to +sit so often at Kathleen’s table in the restaurant. Sands, his name was. +He had money of his own, and used to bother Brecky for tips on the +races. He used to sit for hours absorbed in the form sheets, trying to +figure things out for himself--with the usual results. And Kathleen had +turned from Brecky, the shrewd, the alert, the competent, to that +fellow! + +“I’ve got nearly an hour to wait, haven’t I?” he asked. + +Brecky’s voice rang out sharply in the quiet little room. The agent +opened his eyes, more startled than the words warranted. He fancied +there was something in the other man’s tone. He stared at him, instantly +wide awake. + +“I guess I’ll have time to run home and get something,” Brecky went on. + +“Don’t be late, though,” said the agent. “This’ll be the last train +to-night.” + +Brecky vanished, slamming the door behind him. He retraced his steps +with dreamlike ease. He was not conscious of progressing until he found +himself once more at the hotel. He was filled with emotions so violent, +with such a confusion of hatred, jealousy, and pain, that he was truly +overwhelmed. His inarticulate soul could find no other words for his +anguish than-- + +“No one’s going to make a fool of _me_!” + +He put his hand into his coat pocket for the key of the front door, but +it wasn’t there. He was obliged to go around to the back of the house +and enter through the cellar. He felt his way through the piercing cold +of that black underground cavern, and ascended the shaking wooden steps +to the kitchen. + +The kitchen gave him a shock. It was exactly as he had left it, neat, +quiet, warm, with the clock ticking, the kettle gently steaming, +Kathleen’s apron across a chair. It was like the memory of a past +irretrievably gone. Brecky’s heart contracted with pain. He stopped for +a moment, to muster all the resolution he had. + +He went upstairs into the bedroom, and from a drawer of the bureau he +took what he wanted. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, saw +his face strained and hard beneath his inevitable cap, and he thought he +looked like a criminal in the movies. Well, why shouldn’t he? + +He caught the train. He got in and settled himself comfortably in the +smoking car, deserted except for two men playing pinochle. + +The train ran on smoothly, stronger than the wind. Brecky could see very +little from the window except the slanting rain and now and then a +blurred light. The turmoil in his brain never ceased. He looked +unpleasantly wide awake, staring, like a somnambulist. His gray eyes +never seemed to blink, or his face to move a muscle. + +And for all his grief and fury he had no other words than that pitifully +inadequate refrain: + +“No one’s going to make a fool of _me_!” + +His cigar was out, but he did not notice it. He sat with a curiously +alert air, like a pointing dog, immobile, but terribly ready. He was +thinking. + +He stopped the conductor as he passed through the car. + +“Can you stop at New Chelsea?” he asked. + +The conductor shook his head. + +“It’s not an express stop,” he said. “You’ll have to go on to New York +and then take a train back. You’ll have to wait till to-morrow morning, +too. No more trains to-night!” + +Brecky reflected. He took it for granted that if Kathleen had telephoned +to the fellow at New Chelsea, that was where he lived, and where he was +most likely to be found. He pulled at the conductor’s sleeve as the man +was moving away. + +“Do you slow down anywhere near there?” + +“Not enough for--” + +“Just you tell me when you’re going to slow down a bit,” said Brecky. +“I’ve got to get there. You won’t be responsible.” + +“I should be,” said the conductor sententiously. “Morally speaking, I +should be responsible.” + +Brecky knew every inch of that line. As they approached the desired +destination, he got up and went out upon the platform. The pinochle +players saw him standing there, in the wind and the rain. Then, +suddenly, he vanished. He had climbed down the steps and jumped. + +The fall stunned him, and he lay still for an instant. When he could +breathe freely again, he rose, and mechanically tried to brush himself +off. He was always a neat fellow. + +The train had disappeared, and he was alone in the universe. He could +still hear the sea, dull and menacing, and the demoniac wind still blew. +He didn’t quite know where he was. His plan was to follow the tracks. + +Wet to the skin, a sinister enough figure with his face nearly hidden by +pulled down cap and turned up collar, he went doggedly forward toward +the next station. He presented the appearance of a highwayman. + +Before long he saw the feeble light of the New Chelsea station ahead of +him, blurred through the rain. With a sigh of relief he mounted the +wooden platform, where he was for the moment sheltered from the weather. + +He tried to open the door, but it was locked. He looked in through the +window, and saw the dimly lit room, quite empty, and the stove, without +fire. Evidently the station master had gone for the night. This was a +blow to Brecky, for he had counted upon making inquiries here. + +He prowled around the platform, scowling, trying to plan his course. To +his right he saw a few scattered lights, which must be, he thought, the +village of New Chelsea; and he went toward them, along a muddy road. In +due time he reached the main street. There was a drug store, closed and +locked, with a ghostly green light in the window. There was also a +protective light in the window of a well stocked grocery; but not a +human being to be seen, not a sound to be heard, except the yelping of a +dog somewhere in the hills that rose behind the town and partly +sheltered it from the wind. Only a sudden cruel gust, from time to time, +met him full in the face. + +He turned a corner, and at the end of the street he saw a distant form, +walking with a slow and deliberate step very familiar to him. It was a +policeman, and Brecky hastened after him. + +“I’ve lost my bearings,” he said. “Is Charley Sands’s place anywhere +near here?” + +The policeman hesitated for a moment, with rural caution. + +“What do you want to go there for?” he asked. + +“Well,” said Brecky, laughing, “I suppose because I don’t want to walk +around New Chelsea all night in this weather. Three of us started here +in a motor, but we broke down a little way up the line, and we couldn’t +get our bearings. We each tried a different direction, and I guess I’m +the lucky one. Charley will have to turn out with a lantern to find the +other fellows.” + +“Oh, they’ll be all right!” said the policeman, disarmed. “There’s +houses and little settlements all around this part of the country.” + +He directed Brecky to the house of Charley Sands. A good walk, about +three miles, he should say--uphill, and mighty hard to find in the dark. + +“Oh, I’ll find it all right!” said Brecky cheerfully. + + +V + +He very nearly found something else that night. He lost his way +entirely. He went on, as in a dream, along muddy roads, up hills so +steep that he thought his weary heart would burst. He would not admit +his intolerable fatigue, and the frightful ravages made by passion and +bitterness. He wished to continue, inexorably, until he had accomplished +his object. + +The country was unfamiliar and hostile to this denizen of cities. When +at last his strength was wholly gone, he did not know where to turn. He +dared not wake any of the people in the dark farmhouses he passed. He +crept up to a barn once, but a dog drove him away. + +At last, at very last, he found an open shed behind a church, used as a +shelter for the buggies and the Fords of the worshipers; and he crouched +in there, relieved for a time from the unendurable confusion of the dark +and the wind. His cigars and matches were dry and safe in an inside +pocket, and he began to smoke. He hadn’t the slightest wish to sleep. He +didn’t even feel tired. He only wanted to stop for a moment, to secure a +pause in his superhuman exertions. He knew very well that if he hadn’t +found this refuge, he would have been defeated. + +Wide-eyed and reflective, he sat in his corner until he observed that +the stormy dark was changing its aspect, that it was growing faintly and +drearily gray. It surprised him. He had forgotten that morning was ever +coming again. He got up and set out on his way once more. + +An extraordinary thought occurred to him. It would have been better, he +said to himself, if he had died. He had lost Kathleen; why was he to +live? What had he left? + +He had no longer any heart for revenge. He was sorry he had to see it +through; but, according to his queer code, it was absolutely necessary +to vindicate himself. Otherwise his self-respect would be gone, and he +could neither live nor die in peace. + +It was nearly eight o’clock when he approached the house of Charley +Sands, which an early stirring laborer had pointed out to him. He had +planned that hour. He had also looked up the time of the train he meant +to take--when he had finished. It was due to his self-respect to make a +valiant effort to escape, although he didn’t really care. + +It was a trim white house surrounded by placid lawns. He went up to it +with careless audacity, his hand grasping the revolver in his pocket. +What did he care? Let Sands see him, let him ask what he wanted; he +would soon find out! + +Brecky had made himself neater, after his horrible night, than almost +any other man could have done; but at best he looked haggard and +menacing. He knew it, and was glad. + +The weather had cleared, but he was still wet to the skin and cold, +although he was not aware of it. He walked along the gravel path, which +crunched under his firm tread. He was making no effort to conceal his +presence. He wished to be observed, to bring this thing to its climax, +to be done with it. + +He ran up on the veranda, and, with one of those queer impulses of an +abstracted mind, instead of ringing the bell, he knocked sharply on the +door. He heard some one coming down the stairs, and he smiled. If it was +Charley-- + +But it was not. It was an entirely strange young woman, who looked at +him with distrust. He was so taken aback that he could not speak. He +stared and stared at her. + +“Well?” she demanded impatiently. + +“Sands here?” he managed to ask. + +“What do you want with him?” + +Brecky hesitated. His tired brain, flung loose from the pivot of his +fixed idea, spun round helplessly. He couldn’t really think at all. +Another woman here! + +He was roused by the sight of her preparing to shut the door in his +face. He set his foot against it. + +“I want to see him,” he said. “You call him!” + +She was alarmed then, and began to call “Charley!” in a shrill voice. + +Down the stairs came bounding the fat and owlish young man. + +“Well!” he cried. “Brecky!” + +The young woman frowned. + +“He didn’t say who he was,” she said. “I didn’t know. Come in!” + +Brecky entered, still dazed. They didn’t seem at all surprised to see +him, even at that hour of the morning, and in the lamentable state he +was in. He sat down uninvited, threw off his cap, and lighted a cigar. + +“This is my wife, Brecky,” said Sands, in a tone of severe rebuke. +“Kathleen’s second cousin, you know.” + +“All right!” said Brecky. + +His manners, usually punctilious, had deserted him entirely. What he +wanted was for these people to clear out of their own room, and let him +think for a moment; but the young woman sat down opposite him. She was +rather nice-looking, in a shrewish way, but obviously hostile. + +“She’s here,” she said. + +Brecky sprang up. + +“Let me see her!” he cried. + +“I don’t think she wants to see you,” said the young woman. “I don’t +blame her. If she takes _my_ advice, she’ll never go back to you!” + +Brecky looked at her steadily. He felt, however, that it was better not +to say what he thought just then. + +“You’re just making a drudge out of her,” the other went on. “It’s a +shame--a pretty, lively young girl like Kathleen shut up in that awful +place! All you care about is getting your meals cooked. I wouldn’t do it +for any man. She’s sick and tired of it, I can tell you--being your +cook. If she takes my advice, she’ll go back to her old job, where +she’ll have a little money to spend and see a little life.” + +“All right!” said Brecky again. “But maybe she doesn’t want to take your +advice. Anyway, I’d like to ask her.” + +“Well, I hope she won’t see you. I know what you’ll do--make all sorts +of promises, till you get her back there again, and then she can go +right on cooking!” + +“Do I see her, or don’t I?” asked Brecky, still quite calm. + +“I’ll see,” said the peppery young woman, and went off and left him +alone. + +He had a new idea to contend against, and one for which there was in his +experience no precedent. He could comprehend an elopement, but any +subtler reason for his wife’s leaving him was extremely hard for him to +grasp. It was his habit, though, to face facts, and he tried now. + +He tried to imagine Kathleen as a human being, and not as his wife; but +he failed. What more could the girl want? He was filled with rage at her +ingratitude, and at the humiliating position she had got him into. He +was certainly being made a fool of, for the first time. He had done his +best, had worked for her, had been sober, kind, loyal. What more could +the girl want? + +Whatever it was, she wouldn’t get it--that she wouldn’t! She had left +him, and she could come back, if she wished; but he wasn’t going to ask +her. + +“That’s not my way!” he said to himself, with a grimace. “I won’t crawl +for any one. I haven’t done anything. It’s all her fault!” + +He was half inclined to walk out of the house then and there, but if by +any chance Kathleen was going to be sorry, he didn’t want to miss it. He +discovered that he was extremely anxious for her to be sorry, and that +if she were, he might perhaps not be so very angry. She needn’t even say +it. One nice smile, and the thing would be over. + +“I don’t know,” he thought. “Maybe it has been hard for her. She’s only +a kid. Of course, it doesn’t excuse her running away like that, and +making such a fool of me, but--well, I don’t know. Maybe, later on, I’ll +get a servant for her. I could afford it.” + + +VI + +Brecky wheeled about, for some one had entered the room. It was the +rebellious Kathleen herself. She seemed to him to have grown +miraculously prettier overnight, and he was still less angry. + +“Well, Johnny?” she demanded. + +He resented that tone very much. + +“Well!” he said affably. + +There was a long silence. + +“I’m taking the nine forty train home,” said Brecky. “Coming?” + +“No,” said she. + +Without another word, he picked up his cap and made for the door; but he +was met by Charley Sands. + +“Here! Here!” said he. “Stay and have some breakfast first, old son!” + +“All right!” said Brecky. + +He wanted breakfast badly. He also wanted to show Kathleen how +unconcerned he was, that he was not hurt and bewildered and angry. He +stood in the hall, talking to Charley. He was aware of Kathleen’s voice +in a near-by room, talking to that vixenish young woman. + +“Married life’s a great thing!” said Charley dismally. + +“Sure is!” said Brecky. + +He couldn’t imagine how any man could marry if he couldn’t marry +Kathleen. He despised and hated Kathleen, but in common justice he had +to acknowledge to himself that she was the prettiest and sweetest girl +in the world, and utterly superior to all other women. She was-- + +Just then he heard her speaking. She had a clear voice that carried +well. + +“No,” she was saying. “I think I’ll make some pancakes for Johnny’s +breakfast. But see here--you needn’t tell him I made ’em, Grace. I don’t +want him to think--but he looks dead tired, and he does love pancakes!” + +That did for Brecky. He ran down the hall and pushed open a door. It +opened into the kitchen, and Kathleen, in an apron, stood at the table, +before a large bowl. He paid no attention to the second cousin. He +darted around the table and took Kathleen in his arms. + +“Oh, come on home!” he said. + +She began to cry at once, very comfortably, with her head buried in his +coat. + +“Don’t be silly!” he said anxiously. “See here, Kathleen! Listen! We’ll +get a cook. We’ll go to the theater, and--” + +His wife raised her head and kissed him vehemently. + +“Oh, Johnny!” she began, but stopped short, dried her eyes, and went on +with great dignity. “Johnny,” she said, “I wouldn’t mind cooking and all +that, for you, if you didn’t--kind of expect it. _That’s_ what made me +mad last night. You just expect--” + +“Well, I won’t any more,” he assured her. “You come home, and I’ll be +darned surprised every time I get a meal!” + + * * * * * + +A few minutes later they all sat down to enjoy Kathleen’s matchless +pancakes. Eating them, Brecky also partook of the fruit of knowledge. + +“You’re one grand little cook, Kathleen,” he thought; “but this time I +won’t say it!” + + EDITORIAL NOTE--The short story entitled “The Strong Man,” + published in the September number of this magazine, was the work of + Robert T. Shannon, but by an unfortunate error the name of John D. + Swain was given as the author. We apologize to both these popular + writers for the accidental confusion of their names. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +MARCH, 1923 +Vol. LXXVIII NUMBER 2 + + + + +The Aforementioned Infant + +THE STORY OF A YOUNG WOMAN WHO LOVED HER BABY + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +The lawyer read the document aloud to her, but she did not understand. + +“What was that?” she asked timidly. “Free--” + +“‘Free access to the aforementioned infant,’” he repeated. “That means +that you may see your child at any time--any reasonable time, of +course,” he hastened to add. + +It did not take Maisie long to discover that there was no reasonable +time. No matter at what hour she came to the house, she had to wait in +the hall, sitting in a high-backed chair against the wall, humble, +patient, like a child herself. The servants passed and repassed as often +as they could find pretexts, for the sake of staring at this creature +who had trapped young Mr. Lester into a scandalous marriage. The fact +that she had not been notably successful as an adventuress stirred no +one to pity. They had married, and it must have been due to Heaven knows +what beguilement on her part. + +Maisie had little charm for the casual observer. She was small, fragile, +with untidy black hair and gray eyes immense and sorrowful. She dressed +like a schoolgirl in a blue sailor blouse and a short dark skirt. Her +pale face had the rounded contour of extreme youth. If the reckless Mr. +Lester had betrayed her, one might have felt compassion for her as a +forlorn and lovely child; but the fact that he had married her proved +her to be basely calculating. + +After a long time she would be taken up to the nursery. If the baby was +asleep, she would stand beside the crib, her hands clasped, tears +raining down her face. She would wait patiently until it awoke. Then she +would lift the sturdy little thing, strain it to her childish breast, +kiss its faint, silky hair, and press her own cheek against its plump +one. She scarcely dared to whisper her passionate endearments, for the +trained nurse was always there, looking at her critically. + +“I don’t like to see her pick up the baby,” the nurse said to Mrs. +Tracy. “She doesn’t look healthy.” + +“I dare say she’s not,” replied Mrs. Tracy, with a sigh; “and who knows +what she’s been doing, or where she comes from? But I suppose it can’t +be helped. She had a legal right to see the child, of course. My son is +very strict about her rights, and so on--very generous.” + +Her son himself was not always so sure of his generosity. He had moments +when he thought himself little short of contemptible. Only moments, +though; he was no rebel, and if his world was inclined to condone his +offenses, or even to deny them, who was he to contradict it? + +He was young himself--only twenty-two; a good-looking, silly, +sweet-tempered boy. His life was one folly after another, always +repaired by some one else. He did not imagine that he could do no wrong, +but he felt pretty sure that any wrong that he might do could easily be +undone by some one else. + +He had found Maisie behind the counter of a candy shop, where he went to +buy lavish presents for other girls. Her luminous and innocent eyes, her +soft little English voice, had taken his fancy. She was quite alone in +the world. She had come to America with her brother, a third-rate actor, +a hard-working, ambitious fellow, for whom she was to keep house. + +“But he died,” she said simply. “So I’m working here.” + +She had been pitifully ready to love. She had taken all Lester Tracy’s +extravagant speeches in perfect seriousness. She didn’t know how to +conceal her sweet delight; and he had been very much touched by her +artless affection. There was no one like little Maisie. + +He often took her out to dinner, and to save his life he could see +nothing in her to find fault with. She was always gentle, quiet, +appealing. What if she was a shop girl? He knew plenty of girls of his +own sort who might have learned much from Maisie. She was no gold +digger, for she demanded nothing, expected nothing. She was happy if he +took her out, but she was quite as happy if he stood in the vestibule of +the wretched apartment house where she lived, and talked to her and +kissed her. + +She cared nothing at all for his money. He had tried to explain that, +but no one would believe it. + +He couldn’t explain his marriage very well. He had come into the candy +shop, one day, on his way home from a wedding breakfast, where he had +had a good deal too much to drink. He had leaned across the counter and +said to Maisie: + +“Come on, Maisie, darling! Let’s go and get married!” + +She had got her shabby little hat and walked out of the shop with him, +and they had gone down to the City Hall. He had been well aware of his +condition, and a little afraid that he wouldn’t be granted a license; +but he had made a great effort, and had carried it off splendidly. + +He had been very happy with Maisie. He had run away. For a time no one +knew where he was or what he had done, and they had lived in a big +seaside hotel, undisturbed by any thought of the consequences of the +thing. He did not like to remember how sweet Maisie had been. He tried +to forget the innocent gayety of that fortnight. + +Of course he had been discovered, and the monstrousness of the escapade +had been shown to him. He had been hectored and wept over and bribed, +and he had given in, as he always did. + +Maisie was no less docile. She had been told that she must give him up, +and she did as she was told. + +Her docility was a sore temptation to the Tracys’ lawyer, who saw no +reason why they should throw money away on a girl who didn’t want it. He +advised them to waive the question of a divorce for the present, but to +ask her to sign an informal--and infamous--separation agreement, to +accept a very small cash settlement, and to vanish. She saw clearly that +no one on earth--alas, not even Lester--cared where she went, or what +happened to her. + +To the lawyer she seemed to be a singularly insensitive creature. Even +Lester was surprised that she gave him up so readily, without even a +word of farewell. She would have got more sympathy--and more money--if +she had made a scene; but that never occurred to her. She accepted +whatever life offered with the blind resignation of a child. She felt +herself entirely helpless and ineffectual, and took refuge in a strange +inner life of her own, in the most piteous dreams and fancies. + + +II + +Without energy, without bodily or mental vigor, Maisie had the +immeasurable strength of fortitude. She could live one day at a time, +endure each misery as it came; and in her baby she found a sublime +compensation for every sorrow. Her money was exhausted when she left the +hospital, but she was accustomed to the idea of a lifetime of work; and +now that she had something to work for, a new ambition had awakened in +her. + +Her brother had taught her to dance. Indeed, they had once laboriously +rehearsed a “turn” of his invention which was to thrill the music halls. +She knew all the hackneyed steps, the conventional gestures, and +performed them with a conscientious and touching grace. + +The stage was out of the question--she knew that. She had no stage +presence, no commercial value; but she could teach. Her naïve confidence +in her ability to do so convinced the manager of the Palace Dancing +Academy, and he engaged her as a “lady instructor.” The hours were +irregular. She had to be on call from ten in the morning till ten at +night, and was paid by the lesson. + +She bought an evening dress from a secondhand dealer, an amazing affair +of tarnished spangles and frowzy net, in which she looked incredibly +dowdy. She could never learn to dress her hair. There were always silky +threads waving as she moved, and one dark lock that insisted on falling +across her forehead. One of her pupils said privately that dancing with +her was like dancing with a rag doll. She seemed boneless and +unsubstantial. + +On the whole, however, she was well liked, for she took the greatest +pains, was never impatient, never discouraged. Neither did she resent +anything whatever. Some of her clients went far in their compliments, +but her pale cheeks never flushed. She simply didn’t care. She had done +with men, and all her steadfast and gentle heart was given to her baby. +The Maisie who went dancing about in the Palace Academy was an +automaton, whose soul was locked up at home. + +She knew nothing at all about babies. She didn’t even know that there +was anything to know. She read the label on a package of infant food, +and followed the directions given. For the rest, she had vague ideas +about keeping it swathed in flannel, giving it a daily bath, and taking +it out in the fresh air whenever she could. She knew nothing of infant +hygiene, and had never been told that the child should be let alone in +order to develop naturally and healthily. She never let it alone, if she +could avoid doing so; and still it developed mightily. + +When she went out to give her lessons, she simply locked the room and +left the baby in the crib. Sometimes she worried about fire, but she had +no idea that what she did was wicked and shocking. On the contrary, she +thought it inevitable. + +She hadn’t told any one that there was a baby, but Mrs. Tracy found it +out, and was very much agitated. Her grandchild! Try as she would to let +well enough alone, the idea tormented her. It was an intolerable shame +that her grandchild should be brought up in squalor and degradation by +this girl! + +She went again to her lawyer, and he gave her sage advice. + +“I’ve no doubt she’d be willing to give up the child for a suitable +consideration,” said he. “She seems to be a matter-of-fact young +person.” + +So he went with Mrs. Tracy to offer the suitable consideration. They +found the miserable furnished room and knocked at the door. It was +locked, but the baby inside began to cry. + +“I guess Mrs. Tracy’s out,” said the landlady, who was interested in +these imposing visitors. + +“Does she leave the child locked in the room alone?” demanded the +outraged grandmother. + +“Well, what else can she do?” replied the landlady. “But she’s always +home by quarter past ten.” + +So they came again at that time. Maisie had brought in a sandwich and a +piece of cake for her supper, and had spread them out on the table. The +baby’s food was simmering over the gas jet, and the baby itself was +propped up with pillows on the bed, jolly as a sandboy. Maisie had taken +off her evening frock and put on a short, old-womanish sort of flannel +dressing sack. Her short dark hair hung loose about her neck. She looked +startled when she opened the door. + +The senior Mrs. Tracy was an impressive woman, tall, slender, straight, +with a high-bridged nose and pale, restless eyes. She had an arrogant +spirit, but she came prepared to hold it in subjection, and to cajole, +if necessary. She must and would have her grandchild. + +Moreover, she fell in love with the baby at once. It was a vigorous, +wild little thing, with rough dark hair and a glance farouche and +bright. It was rather undersized, but perfectly formed and healthy. + +“And she’s dressed it like a monkey!” she thought angrily. “The child is +certainly ten months old, and still in those ridiculous long clothes, +and that absurd jacket! And _why_ a bonnet in the house?” + +Mrs. Tracy considered all this as evidence of Maisie’s lack of maternal +feeling, and she was astounded when the girl refused to sell her baby. + +“Oh, no, thank you!” she persisted. “Oh, thank you very much, but I’d +rather not. Thanks, but really I can’t!” + +The lawyer and Mrs. Tracy pointed out to her how grossly selfish she +was, and told her that she thought only of her own pleasure, and not of +the child’s advantage. Maisie kept to herself certain ideas she had +about these advantages. She was terrified, but resolute. She would not +give up the baby. + + +III + +Several times, after that, Maisie was summoned to the lawyer’s office to +be bullied and cajoled. She came as promptly and obediently as if a +letter from him were an order from the Inquisition, but she would not +abjure. + +One evening, when she came home, the baby was gone. She might have +protested against the illegality of her locked room being forcibly +entered; but, as the lawyer well knew, those who are not aware of their +rights are little better off than those who have none. + +She came to his office early the next morning. He had expected her to +come. He had also expected her to be somewhat lacking in self-control, +but she was worse than he had imagined. He was very reasonable. He +explained that the child was now in the custody of its father, and she +would have to show cause why it should be removed therefrom. He hinted +that she would not find that easy to do. + +“Now, then, my dear young woman,” said he, “you mustn’t be selfish. Your +child will be brought up with every possible advantage, and you shall +see her whenever you wish. Compare what her grandparents have to offer +her with the life that she would have with you. Your--er--young Mr. +Tracy has no money of his own, you know, and there is no way to force +any sort of--” + +He saw with alarm that she was likely to become troublesome. She no +longer wept, but her mouth twitched and her eyes burned. + +“Then let them give me the money to take care of the baby, instead of +their nurses!” she cried. “I’d do it all alone! The baby was always well +with me, and so happy you can’t think!” + +It would have been convenient to expel this naughty child from school, +but it could not be done. She would not consent to write a letter +refusing to return to her husband. On the contrary, the mention of such +a thing caused her a most ludicrous hope. Perhaps Lester really wanted +to ask her, and these people were trying to stop him. She had strangely +little affection for him left. She was, in fact, perfectly indifferent +in regard to him; but if she got him, she would get the baby. That was +all she wanted. + +Mrs. Tracy went to see her again. + +“Now, my dear child,” she said, “you’re very young. For your own sake, +you don’t want to go on like this, married and yet not married. You want +to be free, so that you can make another choice, and, I hope, a happier +one.” + +She went on to explain that if Maisie would only do as she was told, she +would soon have a dazzling freedom. She might marry again; she could do +exactly as she pleased. + +Maisie had an ignorant fancy that she already possessed about as much +freedom as she was ever likely to get, and she said she didn’t want to +marry any one else. + +“But I’ll do anything you want, if you’ll give me my baby,” she said. + +She held firmly to that. Lester could have everything there +was--freedom, money, as many wives as a Turk; she wanted nothing but the +baby. + +Mrs. Tracy desired and intended that her son should have everything +desirable, and the baby as well; and she felt sure that in time this +would come about. She had observed that everything comes to those who +can afford to wait. If poor people were simply let alone, their own +poverty would drown them. + + +IV + +Lester Tracy was alone in the house, technically speaking. To be sure, +there were four servants drawing the breath of life on the premises, but +even they would have admitted unanimously that Mr. Lester was alone. He +was dressing to go out, moving about in his room, and whistling +cheerfully. + +He was a lean, blond young fellow, his face already marked by +dissipation; yet it was not a coarse or an evil face, only a frivolous +one. He was little more than a tragic buffoon, and sometimes the poor +devil was aware of it. Not now, however. Now he was happy, with his +unfailing infantile zest for facile pleasures. He stopped whistling for +a moment, to examine his closely shaved jaw; and then he heard a +stealthy footstep in the hall. + +Because nothing had ever happened to him, he was afraid of nothing. He +had a vague belief that his person was sacred, that any evildoer would +fall back abashed before Lester Tracy. He hoped it was a burglar; that +would be something to tell his friends. He turned out the light and +pushed open his door without a sound, very much excited. + +But it was only Maisie, stock still, with her hand at her heart, and a +white face. She wore a scanty rain coat over her tawdry, bespangled +frock, and one of the big, floppy hats that she fancied. She had somehow +the look of a masquerader, in clothes that didn’t belong to her, and she +certainly did not belong there in the Tracys’ hall. + +A very unpleasant emotion came over Lester at the sight of that little +figure. He had grown accustomed to thinking of Maisie--when he thought +of her at all--as one of his follies of which some one else was +disposing. He had forgotten that she was real; but now that he saw her, +she seemed more real than any one he had ever seen or imagined. + +She was pale and motionless, and yet she seemed as startling as a blaze +of light. Her forlorn and betrayed loneliness was like a halo about her +young head. + +Recovering from her momentary alarm, she went on toward the nursery. +Lester was miserably irresolute. He wanted to go out and tell her to go +boldly to her baby, to go arrogantly, proudly. He couldn’t endure her +furtiveness. + +“After all, it’s her baby,” he thought. “My God, what an awful thing +we’ve done!” + +He imagined her in the dimly lit nursery, standing beside the crib, and +looking into that chubby little face. It suddenly occurred to him that +the nurse might be about, and might send Maisie away. He decided to stop +that. + +He had come out into the hall on that errand when Maisie, too, came out +from the other room. She had the baby in her arms, huddled in a blanket. + +They faced each other for the first time since their honeymoon. In spite +of all that they had forgotten, in spite of the gulf of injustice and +suffering between them, some little spark of honest and beautiful good +will was in their hearts. It was not love--that had been murdered--but +loyalty to their past love. + +“Maisie!” he said. “Oh, Maisie! I’m sorry!” + +She bent her head in an attitude of sublime and humble resignation. + +“Just let me have my baby!” she entreated softly. + + +V + +Mrs. Tracy turned the world upside down. Not a soul in that house could +sleep, could rest, could eat, during her reign of terror. It was not +only her personal grief at the loss of the child that distracted her, +but the monstrous affront to her pride. + +She was informed that Maisie had called to see her, and had been told to +wait in the hall until she returned from the theater. + +“And the treacherous, wicked creature must have crept up the stairs and +_stolen_ the child!” she cried. “She must have taken the poor, helpless +little thing while it slept! Didn’t you hear a _sound_, Lester?” + +“Not a sound,” said he. + +“If there is a law in the land, she shall be punished!” said Mrs. Tracy. + +If she could have had her way, she would have made it a criminal offense +for any one to harbor the treacherous Maisie, to give her a morsel of +food or a roof to shelter her. Her haughty spirit brooded over the +insult until she was ill from it. The lawyer dreaded the sight of her +haggard face. + +“It’s very difficult to trace so obscure and ordinary a person,” he +protested. + +“My grandchild is neither obscure nor ordinary,” she said. “Set your +wits to work. The child _must_ be found!” + +As Mrs. Tracy had large resources and Maisie none at all, this was +accomplished. The girl was discovered acting as general servant in a +lonely country house--a wretched, ill paid position, with work beyond +her young strength; but she could have her baby with her, and she +fancied herself safe. From the kitchen window she could see her small +idol staggering about in the grass. She could lie at night in her attic +room with the child in her arms. They had food to eat, clean air to +breathe, and a roof overhead. + +Mrs. Tracy’s idea was to go out there by motor and simply take the child +away, but the lawyer dissuaded her. + +“No,” said he. “I shouldn’t like that done again. It’s apt to create +prejudice against you if the case comes to court.” + +“I fancy I should only need to inform the judge how the child is +living--sleeping in a servant’s room--” + +He shook his head. + +“No,” he said. “You never can tell how those things will go. I advise +you to compromise with her--to leave the child in her custody six +months--” + +“With a servant? When she can have every possible advantage with her +father? I will not do it. Let the case go to court. I fancy--” + +“But you see,” he explained, “after all, the mother is supporting the +child more or less decently; and as far as I can ascertain, there’s +nothing against her character--no evidence to prove her an unfit +guardian.” + +“Something _could_ be found,” said Mrs. Tracy. + +The lawyer understood her very well, but he did not care to go so far. +That sort of thing was done, of course, but not by him. + +“I’m going to save the child,” said she. “If you don’t care to help me, +I’ll do it alone!” + +He quite believed that she would, and he felt a small twinge of pity for +Maisie. + + +VI + +Maisie accepted blessings as she did curses, patiently and incuriously. +She was not startled when a young man came out to the country, told her +that he had noticed her dancing at the Palace Academy, and made her an +offer to be his dancing partner for two or three cabaret turns. + +She was no analyst of character, either. She took people on their own +valuation, which is generally a flattering one. She was pleased and a +little touched by Mr. Denbigh’s friendly interest. It was a long time +since she had talked freely with any one near her own age. She told him +that she had studied stage dancing with her brother, and was sure she +wouldn’t be shy in public. She told him how anxious she was to get on in +the world, for the baby’s sake. + +He offered her a loan as an advance, and she accepted it, agreeing to go +back to the city at once and to sign the contracts he would bring her. +She was so artless, so impersonal, so ignorant, that Mr. Denbigh went +away a little disconcerted by the facility with which the first step had +been accomplished. + +“Mr. Ainsworth Denbigh,” his card read. That, however, was not his name, +and though he spoke with the slurred, agreeable accent of the New +Yorker, he was not one. He was a slender, supple young fellow, with the +queer beauty of Heaven knows what mongrel blood. He had dark, narrow +eyes, olive skin, high cheek bones, and a delicate jaw. He had sprung up +from nowhere; he had no tradition, no background, no scruples, no +country, no friends. + +In the middle of the dancing craze he had come to the surface. With his +adroitly acquired manner, he had some success as a professional dancer +in hotels, because women liked him. Then, as his vogue fell off, his +means of living became more and more unsavory. Through a new and +unmentioned lawyer, Mrs. Tracy had got hold of him. It was to be his +rôle to prove Maisie an unfit guardian for the baby, and the thing was +to be done thoroughly. Mrs. Tracy intended it to appear natural, +inevitable, without the faintest trace of her guiding hand. She couldn’t +have found a better tool than Ainsworth Denbigh. + +He had no trouble in teaching Maisie. She had a remarkable talent, a +matchless grace, and she was docile. She learned the steps exactly as he +wished. She was light in his arms as thistledown, but she was not +passive. Her movement had a strange, exquisite quality; with all her +supple body apparently at rest, she moved through space like a floating +leaf, like a wind-blown flower. + +She was utterly devoid of any sensuous allurement. Dancing to vulgar +music, wearing the insolent dress he had advised her to buy, before +gross eyes, the plaintive innocence of her beauty was unimpaired. Her +gray eyes could meet any regard with the same clear wonder, her pale +cheek never flushed. + +Ainsworth Denbigh was decidedly overshadowed, but this didn’t trouble +him. Maisie was welcome to all the credit provided he got the cash, and +their partnership was very profitable. They were making a name for +themselves in a second-rate sort of way--“Mr. Ainsworth Denbigh and Miss +Maisie Kent in ballroom dances _de luxe_.” Better still, they were +making money. + +He often regretted that he had entered into an agreement to remove +Maisie from the Tracys’ path--not because he was touched by her forlorn +youth and sweetness, or had any scruples of honor, but because he was +well satisfied with affairs as they were, and resented the effort +required of him. He made no headway with Maisie, and he had the wit to +see that he never would. She was polite enough, and very easily swindled +out of her fair share of their profits. Apparently she had confidence in +him: but that was not enough. She was expected to fall in love with him, +and obviously she was not going to do so. + +She had taken a small flat near Morningside Park, and had engaged a +colored woman to look after the baby. When their last turn was over, she +was so eager to get home that she couldn’t even attend to what Denbigh +said to her. She refused to go out with him at any time, not from +dislike or from caution, but because she had something so much better to +do. She flew home to her baby as a white soul to heaven, and was +divinely happy. She had no room for one thought of her dancing partner. + +There used to be a proverb about the horse that was taken to the water +and would not drink. Under modern conditions that horse would no doubt +be forcibly watered and taught better. If Maisie refused to disgrace +herself, then she must have disgrace forced upon her. + +“See here, Maisie,” Denbigh said one evening. “Let me come home with you +and see this wonderful kid.” + +“Oh, I’d like you to!” she cried. “She’ll be asleep, but sometimes I +think she’s prettier asleep than any other way. She gets a little paler, +but that makes her lashes look so black!” + +Mr. Denbigh was remarkably interested in her baby, but his entire +behavior was remarkable that evening. He was terribly nervous, and +seemed to be apprehensive about the time, consulting his wrist watch +every few minutes. + + +VII + +Lester Tracy was just leaving the house when he was called back to the +telephone. He went petulantly. He wouldn’t have gone at all if it had +not been an anonymous call, and therefore faintly interesting. The past +six months had not improved him; he was jaded, irritable, restless. + +Maisie’s quiet little voice had a singular effect upon him. + +“Lester!” she said. “Will you please come? There’s a man here, and he +won’t go away.” + +It was the first time he had ever been directly appealed to, had ever +been asked to play a man’s part. It steadied and fortified him +miraculously. + +“Of course I’ll come,” he answered. “What’s the trouble?” + +“I don’t know. He said he wanted to see the baby, and when he got into +the room he locked the door. He won’t open it. Maybe he’s been drinking. +So I came here, to the telephone in the little dressing room--where I +bathe the baby, you know,” she explained in her careful, patient way. +“It hasn’t any door into the hall. I can’t get out. And--oh, I’m so +afraid he might try to hurt the baby!” + +Lester didn’t think that. He wrote down the address and ran headlong +down the stairs and into the waiting car. + + +VIII + +It was by this absolutely unexpected action of Maisie’s that Mrs. Tracy +was defeated. Two detectives, who believed--because they had been so +informed--that they were employed by Mr. Lester Tracy to collect +evidence against his wife, arrived precisely at the time when they had +been told to arrive, and entered the flat. They found Maisie there, with +a man who brazenly insisted that he was Mr. Lester Tracy. He didn’t look +it. He was disheveled, his coat was torn, he had a bad bruise on his +cheek bone and a cut over one eyebrow, and he was incoherent with rage. + +The detectives had reason to believe that the fellow was a Mr. Ainsworth +Denbigh, and they said so. He told them that they would very likely find +Mr. Denbigh in a hospital, although jail was where he belonged. He +showed a marked inclination to make a row, which was not what they had +been led to expect. In fact, he was so vigorous in his methods that the +detectives were at a loss. + +“Telephone to Mrs. Tracy,” said he. “She’ll come and identify me. Then +you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing who it is that kicks you out!” + +They agreed to this, and sat down to wait. It was an odd enough +group--the two detectives, both burly and severe, their hats on their +knees, while up and down the room walked the disordered and vehement +young man. All three were somehow overshadowed by the quiet and downcast +Maisie, sitting with her feet crossed, her hands clasped, in that +patient, meek attitude of hers. The light of a shaded lamp fell upon her +shining dark hair, untidy as always. Just once she raised her clear, +honest eyes to the young man’s face, and he stopped short. + +“Don’t worry, Maisie!” he said. “I’ll--I’ll look after you!” + +Mrs. Tracy had had to be fetched from a bridge party, and she was in no +good humor. She was astounded, too, by the maladroitness of that man +Denbigh in thus dragging her into an affair which she had strongly +desired to avoid. + +“I suppose something went wrong,” she thought, “and he wants me to prove +that he’s not Lester. It’s incredibly clumsy of him. Oh, I’ll be so +thankful when the wretched anxiety of this thing is over, and I have the +poor little baby again! If it wasn’t for the baby, I couldn’t go through +with it, but I’d do anything in the world to save the child from that +outrageous girl!” + +She rang the bell of the apartment, and one of the detectives let her +in. He was impressed by her frigid magnificence, her crown of white +hair, her penetrating eye. + +“Sorry to trouble you, ma’am,” he said. “Won’t take you a minute to +clear this thing up. This fellow here claims he’s Mr. Tracy, and--” + +She smiled scornfully. The detective stood aside, and she preceded him +down the hall to the living room. + +“Where is this--” she began, but stopped short. + +Her face blanched. She flung out her hand in a curiously helpless +gesture, and it rested upon the detective’s shoulder. She needed his +support. + +“Lester!” she said faintly. “Oh, Lester! It can’t be--” + +He had been filled with a terrible anger against his mother for this +brutal and shameful ruse. He had thought he could never bear to see her +face again, could never speak to her with common humanity; but when he +did see her, in the anguish of her defeat, all that passed. + +“Tell these men who I am,” he said, “and send them away.” + +Her dry lips could scarcely frame the words. + +“It’s my son. Please go!” + +With the resignation acquired in their profession, they went off, and +the door closed behind them. Lester brought forward a chair, but Mrs. +Tracy would not sit down. She had recovered something of her poise, and +looked at him steadily. + +“What does this mean?” she asked. + +He did not find it easy to answer without reproaching her too cruelly. + +“I’m glad it has happened,” he said aloud. “I needed something like this +to show me where I was drifting. If I hadn’t known--if I hadn’t come +here--this--this crime would have been done, and very likely I’d have +taken it all for granted. I’ve let this thing go on, I’ve let little +Maisie be tormented and persecuted, and I’ve never lifted a finger to +help her. It has been no one’s fault but mine, because she’s my +responsibility. It’s no use saying I didn’t realize; it was my business +to realize. But it’s ended now. She’s going to keep her baby!” + +“Lester! My son! You don’t know what you’re saying! Simply because +you’ve seen this girl again, and perhaps felt a little of your old, +tragic infatuation--” + +“I don’t know whether it’s that,” he said slowly; “but whatever it was I +felt for Maisie, there’s never been anything else half so fine in all my +life. I always knew that, but I hadn’t the sense--or the manliness--to +understand what it meant. I thought I’d get over it. I should have, in +the course of time, and I should have been getting over the only thing +in me that’s good!” + +He turned to Maisie. + +“You’re free, you know, Maisie,” he said. “You can do exactly as you +please. I give you my word you won’t be disturbed again. You’re to have +the baby, and I’ll see that there’s a proper provision made.” + +“Lester!” cried his mother. “You cannot put me aside entirely--” + +“I do put you aside,” he said sternly. “It’s Maisie’s child, and she’s +going to have it. I wish to Heaven she’d take me, too!” + +Maisie had not stirred or spoken a word. She got up now and went out of +the room. + +They looked after her with amazement. Mrs. Tracy came close to her son. + +“Oh, try to realize!” she whispered. “It’s your child, too. It’s a +Tracy. You can’t abandon your own child to that ignorant, common girl!” + +“Common!” said he. “I’ve never seen one like her!” + +“She’s--” Mrs. Tracy began. + +Maisie reëntered with the baby in her arms. It was asleep, lying limp +and flushed against her frail shoulder. Over its dark, rough head, her +eyes, misty with tears, met Mrs. Tracy’s. + +“I know it’s my baby,” she said in an unsteady voice. “My very own! It’s +wrong of any one to take her away from me, for one minute; but I know +you love her. I wanted to say--” Maisie’s voice broke entirely. “I +couldn’t be--cruel,” she sobbed; “not now when I have her safe. I’ll go +to-morrow--I will indeed--to sign a paper--” + +“What paper?” Lester demanded. + +He came up beside her and put his arm about her. She looked up into his +face with her old trust and candor. + +“You don’t need to sign any papers, Maisie, darling!” + +“But I want to,” she said. “I mean a paper to say that Mrs. Tracy is to +have--” She paused for a moment, struggling with her tears. “I remember +just how it goes. I want it to say that Mrs. Tracy is to have free +access to the aforementioned infant at any reasonable hour. And _any_ +hour’ll be reasonable--really it will. Even if the baby’s in her bath, +she’ll be welcome to come in.” + +“Don’t, Maisie!” cried Mrs. Tracy sharply. + +“I mean it! I mean it with all my heart!” cried Maisie. “I know you love +the baby. I know what it is to long to see her, and not be able to. I +thought you’d like to hold her for a minute, now before you go home. It +just makes the whole night different, when you’ve done that!” + + * * * * * + +On the way home in her car, Mrs. Tracy reflected upon the incredible +thing that had happened. Of all wildly improbable things, the most +improbable was that she should ever beseech and entreat Maisie to come +home with her to live; yet she had done that. + +Lester sat on one side of her, very silent, but she was not troubled by +his silence. The sleeping baby lay against her heart, and one of her +hands held Maisie’s in a firm clasp. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +APRIL, 1923 +Vol. LXXVIII NUMBER 3 + + + + +It Seemed Reasonable + +FAR BETTER TO DO IT YOURSELF, OR HAVE IT DONE BADLY--BY SOME ONE ELSE + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Christine and Paul were peaceably reading that evening in their model +sitting room. The room was properly ventilated, the air was kept at the +correct degree of humidity, the lighting was restful and hygienic, the +furnishings were all in the best of taste. + +They were a serious young couple. Paul was reading “Post-War Conditions +in Beluchistan,” Christine was reading “Civilization’s Last Sigh,” and +they concentrated their attention upon the books. Beside Paul, on the +table, lay the three cigarettes which he allowed himself every evening, +while Christine had three ounces of milk chocolate. There was not a +sound from either of them, because the correct hygienic temperature, the +bland light, and their own well balanced temperaments, prevented them +from being fidgety. They had made up their minds that marriage should +not make them frivolous, narrow, or dull, and it had not. + +It was a January night of cruel, silent cold, black as the pit. It was +nearly ten o’clock, and they certainly expected no intruders upon their +serious quiet. Once, when Paul found that he had not exactly grasped the +meaning of a paragraph, and had to turn back, he glanced up. By chance +Christine also looked up, so that he met her eyes--her clear, honest +blue eyes, so soft as they rested upon his face that he grew a little +dizzy with the joy of it. + +He could not take Christine quite sensibly yet. He knew that she was +nothing but a human being, with many faults; yet very often he had wild +hallucinations that she was an angel, a goddess, a mystery. She may have +been subject to similar delusions, for she continued to look at her +Paul, half smiling, as if lost in the contemplation of a miracle. + +But suddenly their peace was destroyed--and for a good long time, too, +as it happened--by the sound of the doorbell and the entrance of a +glowing, dark-eyed girl with a tam-o’-shanter and a scarf of violent +green. She brought an icy breath of air with her, but she herself seemed +warm, almost fiery, with her rosy cheeks, her red hair, her gay and +confident manner. + +“Excuse me, people!” she said. “I know it’s an awfully unconventional +time to burst in on you, but I’ve locked myself out of my poor little +house, and I’d rather be a little unmannerly than freeze!” + +Paul drew forward a chair, and down she sat, drawing off woolen gloves +from a pair of very pretty little hands. She was very pretty, +altogether, in a startling sort of way, and she had an incomparable +self-possession. + +“My name’s Lucille Banks,” she remarked. “I’ve taken that little cottage +down at the crossroads. I moved in this morning, and I was so busy +getting settled that I forgot about dinner until awfully late. Then I +went out to buy something to eat, and I forgot my key.” + +“But you’re not alone in the cottage?” said Christine. + +“Lord, yes!” replied the other cheerfully. “I don’t mind that. I’m used +to being alone. I like it.” She laughed. “I look like a kid, but I’m +not,” she said. “I’m twenty-four. I was with the Red Cross in Italy. +I’ve lived in Paris and London. I did a thousand miles by airplane. I’ve +written a book. So you see!” + +The serious couple were astounded and greatly interested. + +“But where could you get anything to eat at this hour in this place?” +asked Christine. + +“I couldn’t. I didn’t; but that doesn’t bother me. I’ve never pampered +myself by eating a certain amount of food at certain intervals. If I +could possibly beg a cigarette?” + +“Oh, by all means!” said Paul hastily, and brought out his case. + +Christine protested. + +“Let me get you something to eat, instead,” she said. “It’s so bad for +you to--” + +“Nothing hurts me,” Miss Banks coolly interrupted. “Even if it did hurt +me, I shouldn’t care. I’m going to do all the things I like to do, and +hang the consequences!” + +This speech did not please Christine very much. She glanced at Paul. +Somewhat to her surprise, she found him with a faint smile on his lips. + +“Every one who says ‘hang the consequences’ thinks there won’t really be +any,” he said. + +“Consequences fall alike upon the just and the unjust,” remarked Miss +Banks, through a cloud of smoke. + +She, too, was smiling now, with her strong little white teeth gleaming, +her dark eyes alight. She went on to express her audacious theories of +life, and her energetic and reckless views about everything else, at +some length. + +Christine liked it less and less. She admitted freely that this Miss +Banks was extraordinarily pretty, and had a debonair charm of her own, +but she imagined that the girl was not to be trusted very far. She felt +sure that Paul would think as she did, for they always agreed; so she +looked at him, and the expression on his face surprised her. He was +regarding Miss Banks with a sort of indulgence, almost compassionate, as +if she were a rash and silly child, and he a man of the world. + +Until this moment, Christine had looked upon Paul as a comrade, a +friend, whose heart she knew as she knew her own; but now it suddenly +occurred to her that Paul had been alive for twenty-six years before she +had seen him, existing and thriving by himself. For some reason this +idea hurt and dismayed her. She no longer listened to the lively +dialogue between him and Miss Banks. She wasn’t good at talking; what +she liked was to listen to Paul--but to Paul when he was talking to +herself, not to Miss Banks. + +“Of course I’m not interesting,” she thought. “I’ve never done anything +but grow up and go to college and get married. I’ve never seen Paul so +interested!” + +Her far from pleasant reverie was disturbed by Miss Banks springing up. + +“Well!” she said. “If you _can_ get me into my little house, please do. +I’ve got to be up early to-morrow morning, to cover the Industrial +Women’s Peace Convention for my paper.” + +“Are you--” began Christine. + +“I’m a free lance journalist,” said Miss Banks. “I suppose they picked +me for this job because I don’t know anything about industry, and hate +peace and women!” + +Paul had risen. + +“Do you hate women?” he asked in that same amused, indulgent tone. + +“As much as Nietzsche did,” Miss Banks assured him. “Only in general, of +course. There are exceptions.” + +She smiled at Christine and held out her hand--which Christine had to +take, and from which she received a fierce grasp that tingled through +her arm and positively made the color rise in her face. + +“You little beast!” she murmured, with energy, as Paul and Miss Banks +went out of the front door. + + +II + +As they stepped out of the tranquil, bright house, the cold sprang like +a wolf at Paul’s throat and made him gasp. The blackness and the +stillness of that night! + +“We’ll make a dash for it,” he said, taking Miss Banks’s arm--a very +solid little arm it was, too. + +“No hurry,” said she. “I like this kind of weather, and I like this +awful, dismal little place. At night it doesn’t look like a suburban +residential park. It might be Siberia!” + +Paul, being a man, was therefore obliged to conceal his extreme +discomfort, and to stroll along at the girl’s side, though the cold bit +him to the bone and made his throat ache, though his numbed feet struck +against stones and caused him anguish. He had to talk, too, and even to +laugh, as they went down the long, lonely road. + +Then they reached the corner, and turned off down a lane, not yet +improved, but full of ruts and ridges of frozen mud. Paul had heard of +the good old-fashioned punishment in which the culprit had to walk over +red-hot plowshares. He thought that it could not have been much more +painful than traversing this lane. The friendly interest he had felt in +Miss Banks was greatly chilled. He thought she was an inhuman little +monster. + +They came in time to her cottage, all dark and silent, with a low, white +fence faintly visible, like a necklace of bones round the stark garden. +There wasn’t another house within sight. No one but an inhuman little +monster could have endured to live here. + +“Now!” said she. “Let’s see you get in!” + +She perched herself on the fence, quite blithe and unconcerned. She even +whistled. + +Paul and Christine had always agreed that woman should be man’s comrade +and helper. When woman, however, was not a helper and comrade, but sat +upon a fence, whistling, and simply waiting, man was conscious of a new +and not displeasing sense of obligation. He felt that he must display +the primitive manly qualities of strength and cunning, that he must be +practical, energetic, and so on. + +Christine would have wanted to help and advise him. If he had insisted +upon doing it alone, she would have thought he was “showing off.” Well, +perhaps he was. He deserved that privilege, set down as he was on a +bitter night before a strange house and told to get into it. + +He did get into it. After finding everything locked, he broke a window +pane with a stone, inserted his hand, and turned the catch. The window +then lifted readily enough, so that he could crawl through. Ingenuity, +always ingenuity! + +Nothing for him to stumble about in that musty, cold, strange blackness, +find a lamp and light it, and open the front door. Nothing for him to +light a fire on the hearth of the sitting room and another in the +kitchen stove. Nothing to him that his hand and wrist were cut and +bleeding. He pretended not to notice that, and Miss Banks really didn’t. + +Then he stuffed up the broken window pane with rags, and then Miss Banks +had plenty of other little things for him to do--boxes to open, +furniture to move, and so on. + +“I can’t do a blessed thing for myself,” she observed. + +Now Paul was grimy and very weary, and those cuts were painful. The +sight of Miss Banks sitting comfortably in an armchair by the fire did +not give him the unselfish pleasure it should have given. + +“How did you manage to get on, then, in Siberia, or wherever it was?” he +demanded. + +“I’ve never been in Siberia,” said she, “but I’d get on there--or +anywhere. I know how to get things done!” + +This struck Paul as a very tactless remark. Such knowledge was not a +thing to boast of; but he happened to look at her, and she was looking +at him, and his serious face broke reluctantly into a grin. + +“Don’t you know,” said she, “that Adam delved while Eve spun? I’m +perfectly willing to sit comfortably by the fire and spin, as long as +there’s a man to go out in the cold and delve; and there always is!” + +Now Paul did not like this attitude. He thought Miss Banks a selfish, +unscrupulous, and domineering creature--but challenging. She was quick +and clever and audacious, besides being _very_ pretty; and it was +necessary to show her that he was not a cat’s-paw. + +Of course, he could not very well refuse any of her requests. He had to +chop wood, to break open a cupboard door, and to nail up rows and rows +of hooks; but he did all this with a bland and superior air. Being +unused to such work, it took him a long time. When at last he had done, +and had put on his overcoat, instead of thanking him, Miss Banks +remarked: + +“They say that if you want a thing done well, you must do it yourself: +but for my part I’d rather have things done badly--by some one else!” + +“Thanks!” said Paul frigidly. + +Miss Banks was standing quite close to him, staring at him with candid +interest. + +“The trouble with you is,” she said, “that you’re spoiled!” + +Paul was hard put to it to find a superior smile. + +“Thanks!” he said again. “And now, if there’s nothing more you want done +I may as--” + +“There’ll be lots more things to-morrow,” she interrupted; “but you’ve +had enough, haven’t you?” + +This was too much for Paul. He saw by her self-satisfied smile that she +fancied she had exploited him and made an idiot of him, and was laughing +at him. + +“No,” he said, in a calm, reasonable tone. “If you want me to help you, +I’ll come again to-morrow.” + +Then he went off, scarcely feeling the cold now, because of the wrath +and resentment that burned in him. + + +III + +Paul found Christine just beginning to grow alarmed. + +“It’s nearly one o’clock,” she said. “I thought--” + +Her husband sat down and lit a cigarette. + +“The silly girl has things in such a mess,” he said, “I thought it would +only be decent to stay and help her a little.” + +“Of course,” Christine agreed. + +She was uneasy at Paul’s appearance. He looked pale and tired and +severe. There were smudges on his face and on his collar; and then she +caught sight of a grimy handkerchief tied around his wrist. + +“Have you hurt yourself, Paul, darling?” she asked anxiously. “Do let me +see--” + +“Certainly not!” he answered, frowning. “I’m not one of those clumsy +imbeciles who are always getting hurt!” + +This was the first time that Paul had ever behaved quite so much like a +married man; but Christine was prepared for it, and was tactful. + +“She’s a very pretty girl, isn’t she?” she asked. + +“She may be pretty,” Paul answered judiciously; “but she’s not the type +that appeals to me. Personally, I think she’s the very worst type of +modern woman. She’s--there’s nothing feminine about her. She’s an +egotist.” He paused. “After all,” he went on, “what a woman should be is +a man’s comrade and companion. They should share their work and their +play. This idea of a woman having all sorts of absurd privileges, and +behaving like an empress, simply because she’s a woman, is monstrous!” + +Christine made a heroic effort not to cry. She knew Paul was not +speaking of herself. Never had _she_ behaved like an empress, or wished +to do so, and she did share the work loyally. Of course it wasn’t his +fault if her share was composed of very monotonous, dusty, dull little +tasks, and of course it wasn’t his fault that there was mighty little +play to be shared. + +He went on, in that severe tone, talking about women, and she was +certainly one of them. Indeed, she had a guilty consciousness that she +was more of a woman than Paul suspected. She tried to stifle her +shameful, ignoble feelings, and when she couldn’t stifle them, she hid +them. Never should Paul know how she felt about Miss Banks. He expected +his wife to be a comrade, and a comrade she would be, at any cost. + +Thus it was that a curious situation arose. Paul would denounce Miss +Banks with great energy, while continuing to go and see her and to +assist her; but Christine, who avoided the girl as far as possible, +defended her chivalrously. + +Miss Banks now had a telephone, and knew how to use it. Suddenly, in the +middle of a calm, sensible evening, her voice would come over the wire, +asking Paul to come and mend a leak, or kill a rat, or investigate a +mysterious noise. Paul always said no, he wouldn’t go, but Christine +always persuaded him to go--and generally cried after he had gone, +because he so obviously wished to be persuaded. + +He never suggested that Christine should accompany him. Neither did Miss +Banks. Indeed, she said things about tame husbands that prevented Paul +from even considering such an idea. + +Why he liked to see the girl he couldn’t understand. She was as rude, as +impertinent, as mocking, as she chose to be. She frankly admitted that +she liked to “take him down a peg.” She made fun of him, she kept him +busy at arduous and humiliating tasks. And all this, instead of crushing +him, had the odd effect of making him--well, Christine’s private word +for it was “bumptious.” + +He really was bumptious. He was bumptious while he killed rats for Miss +Banks, and still more bumptious when he got home and told Christine +about it. + +Generally, when he went down to the cottage, he stayed there a long +time. After he had finished the work she set for him, Miss Banks would +graciously let him sit before her fire, and smoke, and be baited. One +night, however, he came home so promptly that he almost caught Christine +in tears. Although he was so much upset, he probably would not have +noticed. + +“That girl’s a little too much!” he said. “Of course, I make allowances +for her being so silly and spoiled, but--” + +“Who spoils her?” inquired Christine unexpectedly. + +“Who? Why, every one, I suppose,” he answered, a little taken aback. + +“Why?” asked Christine. + +Well, Paul didn’t know. He said it didn’t matter; that wasn’t the point. +The point was, apparently, that Miss Banks didn’t understand what a man +would put up with and what he would not put up with. Paul said he had +already done too much for her, and would no longer submit to her +outrageous claims. + +“If she’s so blamed independent,” he said, “then let her be independent, +and shift for herself!” + +And their peaceful evenings began again. Christine was delighted. She +didn’t mind Paul’s being bumptious and talking so sternly about women. +In her heart she thought it was rather pathetic and sweet and young. She +was very sorry that Miss Banks had hurt him, for he was hurt, though he +called it disgust. He had firmly believed that the girl couldn’t get on +without him, couldn’t light a fire or open a reluctant door; yet he +hadn’t been near the cottage for a week, and she still lived. + +Now, in his heart, Paul didn’t care two straws for Miss Banks. He +believed that there never had been, and probably never would be, a woman +in any way comparable to his own Christine. Christine was beautiful, +good, kind, sensible, and brave; only Christine admired him and Miss +Banks didn’t, and by some diabolic art Miss Banks had aroused in him a +violent desire to be admired by her. + +Paul was almost ashamed to remember how boastful he had sometimes been, +with what an air of unconcern he had done things frightfully difficult +for him to do; but not once had Miss Banks praised or thanked him, or +even been agreeable to him. Nevertheless he was obliged to go on and on. + +He missed all that when it ceased. He felt like a warrior tamely at home +after the war. He didn’t miss the outrageous girl, but he greatly missed +the inspiration she had given him to exert himself mightily. He found it +irksome to sit still and read in the evening, without the least chance +of an emergency arising in which he could distinguish himself. He became +restless and sometimes a little irritable. + +Christine, seeing this, believed that he was unhappy because he had +quarreled with Miss Banks. That made Christine bitterly unhappy herself. + +She set to work with all her heart, then, to win back her hero. She kept +the most miraculous order in the house, and cooked the most appetizing +meals. She worked out a number of ways in which to save more money. She +read “Post-War Conditions in Beluchistan” and other such books, in order +to discuss them with Paul. She dressed her hair in a new way. She did +all she could think of to make herself and her home delightful to him. + +He noticed everything, or almost everything, and he praised her; yet his +praise lacked something for which she longed. It was sincere, but it had +no enthusiasm. In some way she failed. + +She had always accepted Paul’s theories without reservation. It seemed +reasonable to her that Paul should wish to find a helpmeet and comrade +in his wife, and it also seemed reasonable to believe that Paul really +knew what he wanted. When she made of herself exactly what he _said_ he +wanted, it seemed reasonable to expect that he would be satisfied; and +yet he wasn’t. He tried not to show it, but he wasn’t. + + +IV + +One evening Christine decided to make apple fritters. Not that she so +little understood Paul as to imagine that fritters, even if made with +apples from the Garden of the Hesperides, would move him to tenderness, +or that she was so stupid and so gross as to think any sort of cooking a +solution for spiritual problems; but he liked the things, and she liked +to please him, even in the smallest way. + +When he came home, she met him at the door, with the smile and the +casual air she knew best suited him. She didn’t ask him to hurry with +his interminable routine of washing and changing his clothes, because it +did not agree with him to hurry, and he could not, even when he tried. +Instead, she wisely made due allowance for that time, and when at last +she heard him coming down the stairs, she dropped the first spoonful of +batter into the frying pan-- + +Paul heard her scream, and flew to her, but she had already flung a box +of salt into the blazing fat, and she turned toward him, smiling again; +only it was a distorted and piteous smile. + +“What’s the matter?” he cried. “What happened, Christy, darling?” + +“Nothing,” she answered, struggling with an anguish nearly intolerable. +“The fat blazed up, and I burned myself a little--that’s all.” + +“Let me see!” he demanded. + +She held out her pretty arm, cruelly scalded. Paul was beside himself. +He telephoned for the doctor and then set to work to assuage her pain, +with the best intentions in the world, but without much skill. He +spilled a great deal of linseed oil on Christine’s frock and on the rug, +he put a frightfully thick and clumsy bandage about her arm, and he got +cologne into her eyes, while trying to relieve a headache which did not +exist. + +All the doctors in the world could not have done Christine so much good. +She lay on the sofa, and Paul sat beside her, looking into her face with +miserable anxiety; and so great was her delight in his awkward +tenderness, his terrible concern, that it needed no effort to smile. + +“Don’t worry so, Paul, dear,” she entreated. + +“I can’t help it, my dearest girl. If we love each other, and share our +work and our play, we can’t help sharing each other’s pain. And you +know, don’t you, little Christy--” + +She could have wept when the telephone rang, because she wanted so +dreadfully to hear the rest of that last sentence. She watched Paul +cross the room and take down the receiver. Then he turned and dashed +toward the hall. + +“Miss Banks’s house is on fire!” he called over his shoulder. “I’ll +leave the door unlatched for the doctor!” + +Off he went. Christine sat up. + +“You beast!” she sobbed. “You horrid little beast! You’ve spoiled +everything! You did it on purpose--I know you did!” + +This was manifestly unjust. Miss Banks might have been capable of +burning down a house to attract attention, but she couldn’t have known +just the right moment in which to do it. She might have been glad enough +to interrupt Paul’s speech, but she couldn’t have managed it so well +unless chance had favored her. + +Christine, suffering as she was, may well be excused for being +unreasonable. Perhaps it would be kinder not to tell you all the things +she thought about Miss Banks. + +The village fire apparatus went tearing down the road with a noble +uproar. Surely that should have released Paul, but still he didn’t come, +or the doctor, either, and Christine began to grow alarmed. + +“He’ll be hurt!” she thought. “She’ll urge him to do all sorts of +dangerous things! He’ll be killed! He’ll be killed, showing off!” + +In another instant, regardless of the pain that made her sick and faint, +Christine would have run out of the house and down the road, if she +hadn’t heard Paul’s voice outside. + +“Now, then!” he was saying. “Only a step more! That’s a brave girl!” + +Christine threw open the front door, and there he was, supporting a +partially collapsed Miss Banks up the steps. Christine forgot all her +resentment at the sight of that limp, helpless figure. She forgot her +own bandaged arm, forgot everything except the honest sympathy and +kindness that made her what she was. + +“Oh, you poor child!” she cried. “Is she badly hurt, Paul?” + +Paul half carried Miss Banks in, and she dropped face downward on the +sofa--a pitiful little figure, with her bright, disheveled hair and her +slender body. + +“The house,” he said solemnly, “is burned to ashes!” + +“But Miss Banks--is she badly hurt?” + +“She’s not exactly hurt,” said he, still solemn. “It’s more a nervous +shock, I think.” + +All sorts of curious things took place in Christine’s mind, but she said +not a word. She watched Paul ministering to the nervously shocked one. +She watched Miss Banks growing a little better, so that she was able to +sob forth a catalogue of the marvelous things she had lost; but never a +word did Christine say--not even when Paul sat down on a near-by chair, +and wrote lists for the insurance company, dictated by Miss Banks with +many sobs. + +Suddenly she started up. + +“Oh! My photograph of Deccabroni!” + +“What’s Deccabroni?” inquired Paul. + +“He’s a wonderful patriot--from one of those wonderful, brave little +countries--I forgot which. It’s a signed photograph. Oh, I can’t bear to +lose it! Not _that_! Anything but Deccabroni!” + +She became hysterical about the lost Deccabroni. When the doctor came, +she was in an alarming condition, and was making quite a disturbance. +Taking it for granted that this was the patient, and with only a bow for +the silent Christine, the doctor advanced to the sofa, and calmly and +competently set about tranquillizing her. + +He showed little enthusiasm for the task, and perhaps Miss Banks noticed +this, for quite suddenly she became tranquil, and explained that the +cause of her agitation was the loss of an invaluable photograph. She +even began to relate some of the exploits of Deccabroni, in so +interesting a way that the doctor sat down to listen more comfortably. +He might have sat there for a long time, if Christine had not fainted. + + +V + +Paul had not needed the doctor’s blunt words to awaken his violent +remorse. He walked up and down the sitting room for the better part of +the night, hating himself, blaming himself beyond all measure or reason. +He had neglected his own Christine, forgotten her suffering, in his +shameful preoccupation with Miss Banks and Deccabroni. He wasn’t fit to +live! + +As is often the way with human beings, he wanted very much to blame Miss +Banks for everything; but he was, after all, a just and logical young +man, and he refused to do that. + +After Christine’s arm had been dressed, and she had gone to bed, he had +politely conducted Miss Banks to the door of the guest room. At +intervals she had called down the stairs for towels, for cigarettes, for +matches, for a glass of milk, for a book to read, and for the exact +time. He had responded politely to each summons; but never in his life +had he felt less chivalrous. + +Toward morning he lay down on the sofa and dropped asleep. It was late +when he awoke, with stiff limbs, heavy eyes, and the frowzy discomfort +that comes from having slept in one’s clothes. He ran up to see +Christine, but she was sleeping. + +His next idea was to take a warm bath; but Miss Banks had forestalled +him. She required one hour and four minutes, and she took every drop of +hot water. + +When he came downstairs, she was waiting impatiently. + +“Oh, do make some coffee!” she cried. “I’m worn out!” + +“I don’t know how to make coffee,” he told her. + +“You can try,” said she. + +“So can you,” he retorted. + +Christine had got up, and was just then at the head of the stairs, +prepared to make coffee; but when she heard this dialogue, she stopped +where she was, and listened. + +“Not in my line,” said Miss Banks. “I’m not domestic.” + +“It’s got nothing to do with being domestic,” said Paul. “You might +simply be fair. You don’t understand the rudiments of fair play. You +want--” + +“I want a cup of coffee, and I’m going to have it!” said she. “Fair play +doesn’t interest me. Women aren’t expected to play fair.” + +“On the contrary,” said Paul, “a man has no respect for the type of +woman that--” + +And so on, about sharing work and play and being comrades. Christine +listened with great delight. So severely eloquent was Paul, so +reasonable did his arguments seem, that she expected Miss Banks to be +abashed. But--in the end, Paul made the coffee. + +Christine went quietly back into her room, with an odd smile on her +lips. + +“Very well!” she said to herself. “I’m not too old to learn!” + + * * * * * + +When Paul came home that evening, the door was opened by a trained +nurse. + +“Is she--worse?” he cried. + +“Oh, no!” said the nurse pleasantly. “Your wife’s resting comfortably; +but she’s suffering from nervous shock, and the doctor thinks she’d +better take a good, long rest.” + +He found Christine resting comfortably, to be sure, and not much +inclined to talk; so he left her, saying that he would come up again +after dinner. He went into the sitting room, where Miss Banks was +reading and eating some fudge that she had made. + +“Good evening,” he said. + +“Good evening,” she replied. + +Paul took up a book, to read while he waited. + +He waited. + +The nurse was moving about upstairs, but no sounds came from the +kitchen. Still, with three women in the house, he could not credit the +monstrous suspicion that was dawning upon him. + +At seven o’clock the nurse came downstairs, in hat and coat. + +“Good night,” she said. “I’ll be here at seven in the morning. Just give +your wife her medicine at nine, and I think she’ll sleep all night.” + +And off she went. Miss Banks continued to read and to eat her candy. +Paul saw now that there was no dinner, that there would not be any +dinner that evening. + +At nine o’clock he went up to give Christine her medicine. He was as +gentle and affectionate as he knew how to be. He knew she mustn’t be +worried; yet he couldn’t help asking, in a somewhat plaintive voice: + +“Did you have any supper, Christy?” + +“Oh, yes,” said she. “The nurse made me some delicious soup and some +nice, crisp toast. I think you’d better see about getting a servant to +cook your meals, Paul.” + +Then she closed her eyes, and he didn’t dare to disturb her repose by +asking questions. + +He was not afraid of Miss Banks, however. + +“Can’t you _help_ me?” he demanded. “Just tell me what to do, if you’re +too high and mighty to do anything yourself. I’m hungry. I don’t know +how to cook anything.” + +“I always said you were spoiled,” said Miss Banks. “You’re a perfect +baby. You can’t even feed yourself!” + +“My share is to provide the money,” Paul began, when a horrible idea +came to him. + +It was one thing to provide money for the thrifty and ingenious +Christine, but a trained nurse, a servant, and doctors’ bills! He didn’t +care so much about dinner now. He ate some bread and butter, while he +did some constructive and intensive thinking. + +He came home the next evening, earlier than usual, bringing with him a +cook--a masterful and unscrupulous woman who saw his deplorable plight +and intended to take the fullest advantage of it. Still, she did go to +market, and she did cook dinner; and if he paid an exorbitant price for +the privilege of eating a collection of the dishes he most disliked, he +was nevertheless grateful. + +He sat down at the table with the nurse and Miss Banks, and he was in a +better humor than he had been for weeks. Christine, upstairs, heard his +cheerful voice and his laugh, and tears came into her eyes, although she +smiled. + +He came up later to sit beside her, and he was so affectionate, so +genuinely concerned on her behalf, that her heart smote her. + +“All this is a horribly heavy burden for you, Paul,” she said. + +“See here! You’re not to worry, you know,” he said. “I can manage very +well, Christy. All you have to do is to rest. I want you to rest, my +dearest girl, and to enjoy it as much as you can.” + +“But the expense!” + +“I’ve arranged for that,” he said magnificently. “I’ve got some extra +work to do in the evening, and next month I’m going to a new firm, at +almost double my present salary.” + +She knew he wouldn’t like her to appear surprised or too much delighted, +so she merely said: + +“That’s very nice, isn’t it?” + +“Oh, yes--nice enough,” he replied casually; “but I shouldn’t be much of +a man if I weren’t able to get you whatever you needed.” + +“And the more I need, the more you’ll get,” she reflected. “Oh, you +dear, splendid, _silly_ boy!” + +She found it hard not to hug him violently. + +“But isn’t Miss Banks rather a superfluous burden, when you have so much +on your shoulders?” she asked, after a long silence. + +“Well, you see, Christy,” he answered seriously, “now that her little +fool house is burned down, she hasn’t anywhere to go. We can’t very well +turn her out, can we? Shell be gone in a few weeks, anyhow. She’s going +to take charge of Deccabroni’s publicity campaign, and she’ll have to +live in the city.” + +“Who’s Deccabroni?” asked Christine. + +“Didn’t she have a picture of him that was burned?” said Paul. “I don’t +remember who he is; but Heaven help him!” + +Paul rose. + +“I’ve got to get at my work now, Christy, darling,” he said. “You won’t +worry any more now, will you? You see that I can handle things fairly +well.” + +Modest words, and a modest enough expression upon his face, but in his +heart the fellow was shamelessly exultant. Certainly he could handle +things, all things, and not fairly well, but wonderfully well. Wives, +cooks, trained nurses, and Miss Bankses could all be borne upon his +capable shoulders. + +So full was the house of dependent females that he had no place to work +except a cold and dismal little sewing room; but what did he care? His +little world was revolving, and he was its axis. Everything depended +upon him and him alone. He put on an overcoat, lighted a cigarette, and +set to work on a pile of documents with zest and good humor. He didn’t +care any longer whether he had eight hours’ sleep or a temperature of +the correct humidity, or how much he smoked. Nor was he much interested +in post-war Beluchistan. He had a man’s work to do! + +He didn’t hear Christine as she came down the hall and stood in the +doorway. He was absorbed in his work, his black hair wildly ruffled, his +overcoat collar turned up, and his feet wrapped in a quilt. + +“Paul,” said she, “I’ve brought you some hot soup.” + +He disentangled his feet as quickly as he could, and sprang up. + +“You shouldn’t have done that!” he cried, with a frown. “You’re supposed +to be resting, Christy.” + +She was ready then to tell him that she was a fraud, and her need of +rest a deception; but she valiantly resisted the impulse. + +“But I like to do something for you, Paul,” she said. “I want to help +you.” + +“I don’t want help,” he said proudly. “I don’t need it.” + +She put down the bowl of soup on the table and threw her arms around his +neck. + +“Oh, Paul!” she cried. “You’re _wonderful_!” + +“Nonsense!” said he, grinning in spite of himself. “Now you run along +and rest.” + +And she did. She had said that Paul was wonderful, and she knew, and he +knew, that it was true. That was what he needed. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +MAY, 1923 +Vol. LXXVIII NUMBER 4 + + + + +Old Dog Tray + +SHOWING HOW A LONG COURTSHIP CAME TO AN UNEXPECTED ENDING + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Murchison ascended the hill to the house that Saturday afternoon as +usual, his pockets filled with presents for the children, and under his +arm a box of Scotch kisses for Gina. His obstinate, lantern-jawed face +showed all the satisfaction possible to it. This was always one of his +happy moments, when he could fancy that he was coming home. + +He had nothing else but Gina and Gina’s children. It would not be true +to say that he could not have lived without them, for he was not that +sort. He would tenaciously have gone on living if he were translated +among savages. + +But the welcome he got at Gina’s house was ineffably dear to him. From a +distance he saw them all on the lawn. His face would have brightened, +had that been possible to his dour visage, and he would have hastened +his step, if he had not been already striding as fast as he could. Then +one of the small boys saw him, and came rushing out of the gate. + +“Here’s Old Dog Tray!” he shouted joyously. + +Gina called him back sharply, and came herself to welcome Murchison; but +let her be ever so sweet and friendly, it was obvious by her overanxious +manner and her flushed cheeks that she knew he had heard, and that she +felt guilty. + +Murchison was by no means delighted with the name. Quite the +contrary--he was deeply affronted. He distributed the presents, but +instead of handing the invariable box to one of the children, with the +invariable joke--“Here are some Scotch kisses for your mother. You’d +better give them to her”--he merely set down the box on the bench. He +would have been glad to destroy the offensively arch object. He made up +his mind never to bring another such box; and his mind, when made up, +was an imposing thing. + +“Old Dog Tray!” he thought. “That’s how she sees it, eh?” + +It rankled; it galled. + +He conducted himself as usual. He played “red rover” with the children, +dodging miraculously, lean, solemn, dignified even in his agility. He +sat down to tea on the veranda, and when offered a slice of lemon he +asked little Rose, according to precedent: + +“Now do you think it would do more good to my complexion than harm to my +disposition?” + +There was his customary plate of buttered toast, and he ate three +slices, as usual. No one but Gina, who knew him so well, would have +suspected that he was hurt and angry. + +She knew, though, that the only way to deal with Murchison was by rough +outspokenness. He both dreaded and adored plain speaking. He was never +happy until a thing was made clear and explicit, yet he shied away from +any attempt at intimacy. He had, so to speak, to be seized by the neck +and forced to listen. + +She waited until the children were all in bed, and they had the sitting +room to themselves, before she tackled him. + +“Robert,” she said, “I suppose you heard the silly thing Roddy said?” + +“Aye!” said he, and at once began to sheer off. “Roddy’s getting to +be--” + +“I’m sorry you heard it,” she said gently. “It was just my own little +name for you, and I wanted to keep it to myself.” + +There was magic in the woman, sewing in the lamplight. Even the few gray +hairs in the shining flood of brown were dear to him, and so was the +uncertain quality of her voice. + +“Never mind it,” he said. + +“But I do mind it, Robert,” she protested. “I’m sure you don’t +understand.” + +He looked nothing less than mulish, and she saw with despair that he +intended not to understand. This must not be. The unclouded admiration +of her faithful Robert was the breath of life to her. She looked long at +him, but he smoked his pipe, refusing to raise his eyes, and at last she +rose. + +He glanced up quickly enough when he heard the piano. He liked nothing +better than a song. Never did Gina touch his heart more surely than by +her music. She was a slender, gracious little woman, still pretty. She +often fancied that it was Robert who kept her young, that his sturdy +refusal to admit any change in her arrested the course of time. She +smiled over her shoulder at him, and began: + + “Old Dog Tray, he is faithful; + Grief cannot drive him away. + He is gentle, he is kind, + And you’ll never, never find + A better friend than Old Dog Tray.” + +She sang it touchingly. + +“Don’t you see, Robert,” she said, “that it’s really a beautiful thing +to think of you?” + +“Yes, Gina, I’ve no doubt it’s as you say,” he answered, and she was +satisfied. + +She didn’t know that she had made a terrible mistake, that she had done +irrevocable harm. All the time she sang, he had endured torments. +Suppose the children heard, or the servants? He was not Old Dog Tray! He +would not be! + + +II + +All the way over on the ferry Murchison deliberated the matter, and his +slow wrath mounted high. He was not angry at Gina, for he could not be; +what enraged him was his own position. He firmly believed that he +possessed a fine Scotch sense of humor, but he was utterly incapable of +laughing at himself. The idea of being sweetly sung to as Old Dog Tray +had for him no comic appeal. On the contrary, he was obliged to admit +that to some extent he was Old Dog Tray, and it was intolerable. “Kind” +he was pleased to be, but “gentle” he was not, and “faithful” was no +word to apply to a man. + +He looked back over this affair. He had met Gina when she was a young +girl, a lively, witty young thing. He had fallen in love with her, and +had set to work in a decorous way to court her. He had come over to +Staten Island twice a week. This had seemed to him sufficient evidence +of devotion, but when he observed that other young men brought her +presents, he did likewise. Books and music were what he preferred, and +he was willing to go as far as candy, but he would rather have died than +be seen carrying flowers. + +Privately he thought this American lavishness very foolish. His idea was +to save up to get married; but he realized that if he wished to marry +Gina, he must please her. So he tried, but while he was engaged in the +process, she married Wigmore. + +It was then necessary for Murchison to show that he didn’t mind that in +the least, for he was horribly proud and sensitive. Obstinately he kept +on coming twice a week with books and sweets, and Wigmore became +attached to him. He was really more interested in Wigmore’s +conversation, and in the children, than he was in Gina, although he +didn’t know it. + +Gina had changed astoundingly. She had ceased to be lively and witty, +and had grown sweet and a little vague. Murchison was too obstinate to +admit any change in her, however--or in himself, either. He refused to +think at all. + +When Wigmore died, and poor Gina had so much trouble about money, and +was so ill and grief-stricken, she became real for Murchison again. He +had felt a passionate tenderness for her. He had done everything in the +world for her, though well knowing that such disinterested devotion +might make him appear ridiculous. + +After a seemly interval of three years he had suggested marriage. Gina +asked for time to make up her mind. He thought that quite reasonable and +proper, but it occurred to him this evening that five years was longer +than necessary, even to the most cautious woman. It wasn’t as if he were +a stranger. She had seen him twice a week for nearly twelve years. + +He was suddenly convinced that he was a fool. Other men came to see Gina +when he wasn’t there. He heard the children speak of Dr. Walters, for +instance, as if he were a familiar friend. The same thing would happen +again. + +No, it wouldn’t. Perhaps grief could not drive him away, but other +things could. + +When he returned to his boarding house, he wrote a grim letter to Gina, +in which he said that she must make up her mind at once either to take +him or leave him. At once, mind you; he refused to wait for an answer +longer than six months. + +He appeared again on his usual evening, and didn’t mention the letter. +Gina knew that he never would mention it until exactly six months had +passed. He was quite as usual, and only one small incident perturbed +her. After dinner, when they were alone, he said: + +“Will you not sing ‘Old Dog Tray’ for me, Gina?” + +“But--” she said. + +“I’m thinking it does me good,” said he. + +While she sang, he sat there in wooden silence, smoking his pipe. + +“Well!” he thought. “It’s a queer world, to be sure! Who’d think that at +my age I’d come courting, and the object of my affections a woman +thirty-eight years of age? I’m forty-one, and here I come courting like +a lad!” + +This made him grin. It seemed to him a very humorous idea, and when, +later in the evening, it recurred to him, he was obliged to grin again. + +“Why do you smile, Robert?” asked Gina softly. + +“Well--well, it’s nothing, as you might say.” But he could not banish +the grin. + +“Do tell me!” she implored. “It’s so seldom you find anything funny. +Please share it with me, Robert!” + +“I’m thinking you might not like it,” he said, with a chuckle. + +“Oh, but I shall, Robert! Tell me!” + +He burst into a shout of laughter, so that his lean face was creased +with long lines. + +“What will you say, Gina,” he said, with difficulty, “to Old Dog Tray +going courting, and you a woman of thirty-eight?” + +She sprang to her feet. + +“Robert!” she cried, quite pale with anger. + +“It’s the funniest thing--that’s come to my mind--this long time,” he +said, almost helpless with laughter. “Think of it!” + +“How dare you?” she said. “How dare you insult me like this?” + +His jaw dropped. + +“Insult you!” he repeated. “What’s this, Gina? Insult you! Why, my +dear--” + +“You think--” she began, but sobs choked her. “You’re laughing at me +because I’m thirty-eight!” + +“But I was not, Gina, my dear! Only it struck me comical for two old +bodies like us to be courting.” + +“I’m not courting!” she cried. “Don’t dare to say it! And I’m not old!” + +“Of course, properly speaking, we’re not old,” said he. “But--” + +“Every one else thinks I’m a young woman!” she sobbed. + +“Don’t you believe it, my dear,” he said earnestly. “They may say so to +your face, but behind your back no one would call a woman of +thirty-eight--” + +“Stop!” she cried hysterically. “Don’t call me a woman of thirty-eight +again!” + +He was very much distressed. + +“Don’t be thinking I mean anything against your--your personal +attractions,” he said. “You’re one of the neatest, best-looking women of +your age--” + +“I hate you!” said Gina. + +“That’s an ill-considered remark,” replied Murchison, growing red, “to a +man who’s been your true friend for twelve years and ten months. I was +only trying to tell you that I think as much of you to-day as I did when +you were young and pretty.” + +“You needn’t go on, Robert,” she said, frigidly. “I appreciate your +friendship, but I have never known a man so lacking in tact.” + +“I don’t doubt you’re right, Gina,” he observed, also frigidly. “It +didn’t occur to me that a mature and sensible woman couldn’t endure to +hear her age mentioned.” + +“It’s the way you did it--laughing like that.” + +“I wasn’t laughing at you--only at myself, for courting you.” + +“Please say nothing more,” she interrupted sharply. “There are +other--other people who don’t think it’s so absurd to--to like me.” + +Now, well as Gina knew him, there were certain traits in her Robert +which had eluded her. She never knew that by this simple remark she had +mortally insulted him. She was comparing his twelve years and ten months +of devotion to the false flattery of that Dr. Walters. + +“Aye!” said he. “I’ve no doubt it’s as you say.” + +And with that he took his leave. + + +III + +On the last day of the six months Murchison presented himself before +Gina, and without embarrassment, and also without fervor, requested to +know his fate. He was greatly displeased with Gina’s conduct on this +occasion. She wished to be indefinite; she wished neither to take him +nor to leave him, but to keep him in reserve. + +“You know how fond I am of you, Robert,” she said. + +“No,” he replied, “I don’t. My question was just, as you might say, to +determine that point.” + +“Sometimes I think that, on account of the children, I shouldn’t marry +again,” she said tentatively. + +“That’s for you to say. You ought to know,” he remarked. + +“I suppose at my age, I ought!” + +He bowed stiffly. There came to Gina the recollection of what Dr. +Walters had said. He had assured her that she was like a young girl. + +“You’ve never grown up,” he had told her. “You never will.” + +“I’m afraid, Robert,” she said, “that I never could make you happy.” + +He turned away, and was silent for some time. + +“That’s for you to say,” he repeated. “You ought to know your own mind.” + +His chief purpose was to avoid showing how horribly wounded and bereft +he was. So valiantly did he conceal his hurt that Gina herself was +offended and angered by his high spirits. + +“I believe he’s glad!” she thought. “He’s delighted to get out of it!” + +She forgot entirely how she had lain awake at night, planning some way +to tell Robert that she couldn’t marry him. On that night she lay awake +marveling at his treachery. She had decided that he didn’t really care. + +On the evening of his next visit she had Dr. Walters there. She had the +doctor’s superior devotion on exhibition, and encouraged him to be +incredibly gallant and tender. He did his part admirably, but Murchison +failed her. He was pleasant, unusually pleasant and talkative, and he +gave no more sign of being a disappointed suitor than if he were her +grandfather. He made a most favorable impression upon Dr. Walters. + +Before he left, he did something which enraged Gina. + +“Will you not sing ‘Old Dog Tray’?” he asked blandly. “It is a great +favorite with me.” + +She refused, but Dr. Walters joined his entreaties to Murchison’s, and +she had to yield. So she sang the simple old ballad with burning cheeks; +and while she sang it, there sat Robert, smoking his pipe in wooden +silence. + + +IV + +He went home that night in a queer mood. He was hurt and he was angry, +but depressed he was not. He went up to the room he had occupied for +years and years--a room which, like his face, showed no trace of the +spirit that possessed it. He sat down to unlace his boots and put on his +slippers. When that was done, he filled another pipe. + +“Perhaps it’s just as well,” he reflected, with a philosophy Gina would +not have appreciated. “A wife’s a very unsettling thing. Now I’ll go on +just the same!” + +And, if you will believe it, the next Saturday afternoon he bought a box +of blocks, and a doll’s cradle, and the familiar package of Scotch +kisses, and with perfect composure set off for Staten Island. + +“There’s no reason at all for a quarrel,” he thought. “To be sure, I’ve +nothing against the poor woman. I’m not one to change.” + +There was a heavy fog, and the boat was late. He stood downstairs, close +to the gates. He was in no sort of hurry. Indeed, he rather enjoyed the +little stir of excitement caused by the fog. + +He heard people about him saying it was the worst they had seen in +years, that a small boat had been run down a few hours before, that +steamers were held up. He liked the din from the bay, the whistles low +or shrill, the clamor of the bells, the blasting wail of a great +foghorn. + +There was, unfortunately, no way in which he could verbally express his +scorn for this excitement, and his own miraculous coolness and +detachment. He could look it, however, and more than ever he assumed the +aspect of a wooden image. For some reason this inspired the confidence +of a fellow traveler. + +“Do you think there’s any danger?” asked an anxious voice. + +He turned, intending to answer somewhat loftily, but he was utterly +disarmed at sight of the questioner. Indeed, he at once felt that there +might well be danger. He removed his hat with ceremony. + +“Nothing to worry about,” he assured her gravely. + +She was a tall and rather thin girl, very dark, with a wonderful rich +color in her cheeks and great, serious eyes. That seriousness was the +thing which first attracted him--that, with her sober dress. It took a +second glance to reveal that her dress was shabby and her seriousness +tinged with something forlorn; to say nothing of her being very young +and very pretty. + +Now Murchison was a cautious and practical fellow, by no means given to +talking to strangers; and he decided that he would not look at the girl +again. A boat had just come in, so that he really had something +justifiable to stare at. + +There came first the inexplicable persons who run and sometimes shout; +then motor cars, and streams of people, and drays and trucks with +vociferous teamsters. It was what happened every half hour or so, all +day long, yet it had the thrill there always is at the end of a journey, +no matter how short. And now, belated and fog-haunted, the incoming +ferryboat might have returned from the Antipodes. + +The traffic, the shouts, the procession of people, ended abruptly. Then +the gates were pushed open, and the new swarm crowded forward, as eager +to be carried south as the others had been to rush northward. Murchison +was perfectly aware that the girl kept beside him, although he didn’t +turn his head. He could lose her easily enough by crossing over to the +smoking cabin; but he had to let a truck go by before he could do so, +and, without quite turning his head, he saw her, hesitant and dismayed, +looking after him. + +Long after he was settled with his pipe he remembered her dark face, her +troubled eyes, something alien and tragic in her, and he felt uneasy, +almost guilty. He knew it was nonsense, the particular sort of nonsense +that he most disliked. He was sorry he had not bought a newspaper to +distract his mind. + +A bell clanged; the boat slowed down, and the throb and jar of the +engines stopped. A great many people rushed to the windows, as always +happens, and this gave Murchison the chance for being most notably +Scotch, and not stirring. His sharp ears caught all the wild and +confused rumors and surmises of those about him. He felt incipient panic +in the atmosphere. He was grimly amused, until it suddenly occurred to +him how silly women were--how very, very silly a young girl would be, +with no Scotsman beside her! + +He got up and crossed to the other cabin. That was not ridiculous; it +committed him to nothing. He entered the cabin and sauntered through it, +looking with an eye casual but very keen at the backs of the people +crowded two deep at the windows. + +That girl wasn’t there. Perhaps she had rushed upstairs. If so, she +might stay there, for he had gone quite far enough. + +He pushed open the door, and stepped out upon the forward deck. No +denying that the fog was unpleasantly thick, and that ominous and +immense shapes appeared half hidden behind it. The bells and whistles on +every side made a diabolic clamor. The boat was drifting silently, and +the fog concealed even the water on which it floated; and yet, with +nothing visible, he was in a crowded and noisy world, menacing, +incomprehensible. + +He saw her out there, one hand on the railing, her young face in +profile. She had, he thought, such a forsaken air! She was so lovely and +young! She put him in mind of the beloved and half forgotten creatures +in the romances he had read in his young days--heroines brave, gentle, +and beautiful, for whom a man could die gladly. She was shabby, she was +frightened, she was alone, as a heroine should be. There was a halo of +romance about her dark head. + +But still Murchison was entirely Murchison. He could have leaped +overboard and saved her from the sea more easily than he could address +one single word to her. He was eager to speak to her, to reassure her, +but it was not possible. + +Her anxious glance, turning in his direction, fell full upon his face. + +“Do you think anything’s going to happen?” she asked, as promptly and +simply as if he were an old friend. + +“No, no!” said he. “But with these crowded ferries they’re very +cautious.” + +He came over to the rail and stood near her. He had an absurd desire to +remove his hat and to stand bareheaded before her innocent youth; but he +resisted this preposterous impulse, and spoke in his driest way. He gave +her facts about the shipping in this stupendous harbor, quoting figures, +reports. He had an uneasy feeling that he was tiresome, and probably +making mistakes in his statistics, but he was so desperately occupied in +not looking at her that it distracted his mind. + +“I find it an agreeable trip,” he ended abruptly. + +He was obliged to look at her then, to see if his talk had wearied her, +and he observed a strange expression upon her downcast face. + +“I’m so afraid of the sea!” she said faintly. + +“But this is only a bay--” he began. + +She glanced up. + +“My father was a captain,” she said. “He was drowned when I was a baby; +and my brother was drowned in the war. So--you see--” + +“Yes,” he answered gravely. “I see!” + +He did not try to express sympathy, he did not speak one reassuring or +consolatory word. He stood silently beside her, neither seeking nor +evading her attention, simply being his own uncompromising self. Never +in life had he tried, never in life would he try, to make a favorable +impression upon any one. He took it for granted that she knew all the +compassion, interest, and respect he felt; and she, on her part, +accepted him without question. + +“Do you think we’ll be kept here long like this?” she asked. + +“It’s impossible to say; but there’s nothing to be alarmed about.” + +“I’m late,” she said anxiously. “You see, I’ve come all the way from +Philadelphia this morning, and I got a little mixed up. I was expected +for lunch, but it’s much too late now.” + +“Won’t the people--your friends--wait?” asked Robert indignantly. + +“They’re strangers,” she said. “I’ve never seen them. I’m going as a +governess. I was recommended to Mrs. Wigmore--” + +“Mrs. Wigmore!” + +“Oh, do you know her?” the girl asked. + +“I am acquainted with the lady,” said Robert, in so curt a manner that +she was abashed. + +She fancied that he regretted having been drawn into conversation with +the governess of some one whom he knew. She flushed a little, and turned +away her head. She expected him to make some excuse and to leave her; +but he did not. He stood where he was, filled with the most +unaccountable chagrin and disappointment. + +She was going to Gina! She would see him there, see him as Old Dog Tray! +He felt as if some ineffable happiness had been snatched from him. He +felt suddenly middle-aged and preposterously unpleasing. + +An instant ago he had really believed that this marvelous girl was +interested in him, friendly toward him, even glad of his company. Well, +only let her see him climbing the hill with his arms full of bundles, +only let her see him playing with the children, being treated with +slightly condescending affection by Gina, only let her see Old Dog Tray +in his natural habitat, and he would never again be anything but that in +her eyes! + +“I’ll not go,” he decided. “I don’t doubt they’ll do well enough without +me.” + +But, thought he, what good would that do? He knew so well Gina’s fatal +lack of discretion, her shocking habit of confiding in every one. It was +impossible to believe that she could have a governess in the house +twenty-four hours without telling--even boasting--about her Old Dog +Tray. + +“The devil!” he said, dismayed at the prospect. + +Then he realized that he had spoken aloud, and he apologized earnestly +to his companion. He was surprised and relieved to see her smile--not +plaintively and sweetly, like Gina, but with a wide, youthful smile that +was almost a grin. With a faint shock he realized that while she was +undoubtedly an angel, she was also a delightful human being. + +They were suddenly upon a new footing. They began to talk with +miraculous ease. They exchanged names. She said she was Anne Kittridge, +and instead of being, as he had half imagined, an isolated phenomenon, +she had a mother and a home in Philadelphia. + +“I’ve never been a governess before,” she said. “I’ve never even been +away from mother. I hope--do you think I’ll get on with Mrs. Wigmore’s +children?” + +“Aye,” said he, “I’ve no doubt you will.” + +“But I’m not beginning very well,” she said, “being late like this.” + +“And no lunch!” said he. “I’d forgotten that. It’s--let’s see--it’s +nearly three o’clock.” + +“I don’t care,” she said stoutly. + +He did, though. He was greatly worried. + +“Well,” he said, after much thought, “I’ve a box of sweets here. Very +poor things they are for the teeth and the digestion, but I dare say +they’re better than nothing.” + +He set to work to unwrap his neat package. As he did so, the box of +blocks fell out upside down, and the contents scattered over the deck. + +“Oh!” said she. “Were they for your little boy?” + +He did not answer until he had picked all the blocks up. Then he +straightened himself, with a slight frown. + +“I’m a bachelor,” he said. “They were for the child of an old friend.” +And he added resolutely: “A very respectable, middle-aged body.” + +The boat had started again, but they didn’t notice it. Miss Kittridge +was steadily and happily consuming Gina’s Scotch kisses. + + +V + +It would be impossible to any chronicler to describe all that took place +in Murchison’s soul during that brief trip. The easiest way is to say +bluntly that he fell in love, and for most readers that will go a long +way toward an explanation; but one must bear in mind the character of +the man, his frightful obstinacy, his outrageous pride, and the +matter-of-fact romanticism of his secret heart. + +He was amazed, delighted, awed. He knew that he was in love; he knew +that this was the real thing, for which he had always been waiting. Lack +of self-confidence was not among his faults. He hoped, he believed, that +if he could have a clear field, he would have a fair chance with this +matchless girl. She liked him, she trusted him, she was amused by his +jokes, interested in all the information he had to give. If he could +keep her from seeing him as Old Dog Tray! + +“I won’t have it!” he thought fiercely. “I won’t have this spoiled by +such a thing!” + +The boat bumped its way into the slip, and a lurching procession of +people came up to the gates. Miss Kittridge wished to join them. She +glanced anxiously at Murchison, but he didn’t stir. The gates opened, +and the crowd began to hurry off. + +“Hadn’t we better go?” she said. + +“Very well,” he answered absently, and off they went. + +“Mrs. Wigmore told me to take the North Shore train,” she began, but +Murchison grasped her arm firmly and led her to the waiting room. + +“Miss Kittridge,” he said, in a peculiar voice, “you’d better not go +there.” + +“But why?” cried the startled girl. + +“Well,” he replied, “well--mind you, I’ve nothing to say against Mrs. +Wigmore. I’ve a very high opinion of her. She’s a very pleasant, +respectable woman; but I advise you not to go there.” + +“But I must! She’s expecting me; and where else can I go?” + +“Go back to your mother in Philadelphia,” said he. + +“I can’t, Mr. Murchison. It was my own idea to go out and earn my own +living, and I’m certainly not going home before I’ve even tried.” + +“There’s a train every hour,” said he. “I’ll go with you, and I’ll +explain to your mother.” + +“Explain what?” she protested, overwhelmed with astonishment. + +“It’ll be better explained to your mother,” he told her. “You’re too +young.” + +The doors were opened, and a new crowd was pressing through them. +Murchison joined the stream of people, leading his reluctant and +protesting companion back on board the ferryboat. + + +VI + +Gina was shocked and hurt beyond measure. She had thought it very +strange of Murchison to write to her from Philadelphia, to say, without +explanation, that he would be there for a week or two on private +business. How unfriendly of him to have private business after all these +years! + +After that he didn’t come near her for three months. He telephoned now +and then, and said he was very busy; apparently he did not notice how +grieved was her manner. + +And then, after all this, what happened? A thing incredible--he +telephoned to her one afternoon and told her that he had been married +that morning. She could never, never forgive such brutality. He might at +least have given her a chance to marry Dr. Walters first! + +“Where are you now, Robert?” she inquired sternly. + +“We’re in New York for--” + +“Then you must come to dinner to-night with your--bride,” she said. + +“But--” he began. + +“It seems to me that is the least you can do,” said Gina, and he was +defeated. + +Naturally she had Dr. Walters there for dinner, and naturally she was +charmingly gracious and kind. No denying that she was impressed by the +youth and prettiness of Robert’s wife. The fact that a well bred, lovely +creature certainly not more than twenty-one or twenty-two had been +willing to marry him forced her to admit that she had not appreciated +him. + +“You have a wonderful man in Robert,” she gravely assured his wife. + +“Isn’t he?” said Anne. “There’s no one like him!” + +Then, of course, she had to look at him, to see if he was still there +and still as wonderful. He was. He met her glance, and they smiled at +each other with sublime confidence and understanding. Gina found it a +little hard to go on talking. + +“Do you know,” she said brightly, “such a curious thing happened! A +friend of mine wrote me about a girl in Philadelphia, and I sent for her +to come as governess for the children. She told me that she’d arrive on +a certain day, but she didn’t come, and I never heard another word from +her. I wonder if you know the name--Kittridge?” + +“Philadelphia’s quite a large place,” said Anne hastily. + +“Of course,” Gina assented. “Now do tell me about yourself and Robert. +Was it romantic?” + +“Oh, very romantic!” said Anne, in no little confusion. “It was--I think +it was--unique!” + +There was a pause, and Robert came directly toward them. + +“Will you not sing, Gina?” he asked blandly. + +“No, thank you, Robert,” said she. + +But Dr. Walters came to entreat also. + +“Please do, Gina!” he said, with all his honest admiration reflected in +his beaming face. + +“Sing ‘Old--’” + +“No!” said she, so vigorously that he was startled. + +He turned to Anne. + +“You should hear her sing ‘Old--’” + +“Please don’t ask me!” she cried. + +“Of course not, if you don’t wish to,” he said gently; “but upon my +word, Mrs. Wigmore’s rending of ‘Old Black Joe’ is--” + +“It was ‘Old Dog Tray’ I had in mind,” observed Robert. + +“That’s a hateful, silly song!” said Gina. “I can’t endure it. It’s--the +whole sentiment is false. There are no Old Dog Trays!” + +Robert’s hand fell lightly on her shoulder, and she turned to look at +him. Something that she saw in his face brought the tears to her eyes. + +“There are old friends, though, Gina,” he said, “and nothing drives them +away!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JUNE, 1923 +Vol. LXXIX NUMBER 1 + + + + +The Matador + +A SENTIMENTAL EPISODE IN THE CAREER OF GRAVES, THE HARD-HEARTED OFFICE +MANAGER + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Technically Graves was the personnel manager, but we called him “the +matador” because it was his job to deal the death blow, to give the +fatal thrust. He had, in other words, to do the “firing.” + +He had developed a beautiful technique, and, like all good workmen, he +enjoyed his work. He was really a very kind-hearted fellow. His idea was +that it did people any amount of good to be discharged, if it were done +in the right way--if, for instance, you told the departing one exactly +why he or she was no longer wanted. + +It was necessary, he said, to keep the nicest balance between candor and +brutality. What you wanted was to destroy conceit without injuring +self-respect. He added proudly that all the people whom he had fired +remained his firm friends. + +I asked him how he knew this, and I refused to believe it a proof of +friendliness that these victims had never yet waylaid and assaulted him. +He said, however, that he could always tell--that no one could deceive +him. I denied that any man could know he had never been deceived. Such a +negative statement was impossible to prove. + +He brushed all this aside, and continued to explain his technique. + +“I never tell a man that we’re laying him off because business is bad,” +he said. “I try to show him what defects in himself make him the kind of +man who’s always laid off as soon as business drops. And as for those +printed slips in a pay envelope--‘Your services will not be required +after such and such a date’--inhuman, I call _that_. No, sir! I’ll call +the fellow, or the girl, as the case may be, into my office, and I’ll +say something like this: + +“‘Now see here, So-and-So,’ I’ll say, ‘I’m going to give you the gate; +and if you’ll listen to me fair-mindedly, it’ll be the gate to something +a whole lot better.’” + +“Always?” I asked. + +“Why, yes,” said he. + +“Of course,” I continued, “you’ve kept a record of the subsequent +careers of all the poor devils you’ve fired, so that you know exactly +how much they’ve benefited by your valediction?” + +“Well,” said Graves; “well--” + +“Of course,” I went on, “you keep a card index? You write down the fault +for which you discharge the fellow, and you keep track of the length of +time it takes him to overcome that fault?” + +“Well--” + +“What, Graves?” said I sternly. “You make me a positive statement, you +tell me it benefits people to be discharged by you, and you have not one +fact by which to substantiate your statement. I demand to be shown one +of these alleged persons!” + +“Well--” he said again. + +He was so much perturbed that I hadn’t the heart to perturb him further. +He was such an honest, artless, enthusiastic fellow, and altogether so +likable, that I can’t for the life of me explain why it was so natural +to worry and badger him; but everybody did. When some especially +woeful-looking derelict passed by, some one was sure to call Graves to +the window and say something like-- + +“See here, Graves! Isn’t that the shipping clerk you discharged for not +keeping his nails manicured?” + +Rather gruesomely, we used to read aloud from the newspapers various +reports of suicides. + + Unknown man found in the river--nothing to identify him but a scrap + of paper in his pocket, on which was written “Graves drove me to + this.” + +These fictitious papers varied. Sometimes they said: + + And after Graves had turned me down, + What could I do but go and drown? + Graves told me all I didn’t oughter, + Despair then drove me to the water. + +We kept up a fiction that twelve desperate men were banded together to +take vengeance on him, and that their motto was “Give Graves the final +discharge.” I dare say we were pretty tiresome about it, and sometimes I +am afraid we hurt the poor devil more than we intended. + +Of course “firing” was not all that Graves had to do. There was also the +hiring, but he wasn’t nearly so enthusiastic about that--or at least he +was warier, for his mistakes in character analysis could be too readily +checked up. He pretended that he took every one on trial, and withheld +even mental opinions until he had observed the applicant. + +That, however, wasn’t true. Many and many a time he was tremendously +hopeful about some fellow who turned out to be quite worthless. I say +“fellow,” because he was notably reticent about the girls, and never +hopeful. + +He objected to girls in an office. He said that the principle of the +thing was wrong, and so on; but the real reason was that he was afraid +of them. They knew this very well. Once he had had a booklet of +“Suggestions” printed and circulated among them. He wrote it in a chatty +and reasonable style, as for instance: + + It isn’t a question of morals, but one of tone. We can’t have quite + the tone I’m sure we should all like to have in this office while + some of our young ladies wear peekaboo waists and openwork + stockings, and put paint and powder on their faces. In a ballroom + these things are all well enough, but-- + +The next morning he received a visit from the severe and efficient Miss +Kelly. + +“Mr. Graves,” said she, “about your ‘Suggestions’--I have been in this +office six years, and have never seen a peekaboo waist. I have not +observed that openwork hosiery has been worn. My department has asked me +to mention this to you, as we feel it an unmerited slight. Incidentally, +Mr. Graves,” she added, “girls don’t as a rule wear waists in a +ballroom. _Even_ stenographers have _some_ knowledge of etiquette!” + +The conscientious Graves bought a household periodical, and found no +mention of peekaboo blouses and openwork stockings. Unfortunately he was +discovered reading this magazine, and he had to explain. He became a +little annoyed at hearing so much laughter. + +“Oh, shut up!” he exclaimed. “I know I’ve heard of those things. Read +articles about ’em in the newspapers.” + +“But when?” somebody wished to know. “When did you last cast a glance at +a girl, oh, innocent and artless Graves?” + +“Well,” he said, scowling, “the difference is so small that no one but +an idiot would laugh. I might have said ‘sheer hosiery’ and ‘chiffon +blouses.’” + +Graves talking about chiffon blouses was too much. He regretted those +“Suggestions,” and made no more. We subscribed to a fashion magazine for +him, and by a most pleasing error it came addressed to “Miss F. Graves.” +This was even better than we had planned. + + +II + +One day Graves came to me with a beaming face. + +“You know I don’t often express an opinion on an untried worker,” he +said; “but this time I’ve made a find. I’ve got just the sort of girl I +want in the office. She’s a college graduate; comes of an old Southern +family--” + +“And her father died, and she was obliged to go out into the world and +earn a living,” I said. + +He was amazed. + +“How did you find out about that?” he demanded. + +“She hasn’t had any experience,” I continued; “but ah, what class!” + +“Now see here,” said Graves. “You’ve been talking to Miss Clare!” + +“I know Miss Clare like my own sister,” I told him. “I’ve met her a +thousand times. I’ve read her in books and seen her in movies--” + +“Oh, that!” said Graves. “Well, you’re entirely wrong, you chump. She’s +absolutely original.” + +“I knew that,” said I. “She makes the most wonderful clothes for herself +out of old quilts, and she can get up the most delicious little suppers +for two for thirty cents--” + +He laughed, with that disarming good humor of his. + +“Well, I haven’t got as far as that yet,” he said. “I don’t know what +she eats or makes her clothes out of, but I can tell you this--she’s +the neatest, most sensible-looking girl in the place!” + +When I saw Miss Clare, I had to admit that in some ways she deviated +from the usual type. She was what you might call a tall, willowy blonde. +She had fine eyes, and knew it; but she was not kittenish, or pathetic, +or appealing. She was doggedly in earnest. I liked her for that. + +When I knew her better, I liked her for many other things, too. She was +as honest and candid as daylight, and she left her fine old Southern +family and her college and all her past glories where they belonged. She +was there to work. + +I was really sorry when the efficient Miss Kelly spoke about her. + +“She’s _stupid_!” she told me, with fierce exasperation. “I’ve told Mr. +Graves several times that she doesn’t measure up to our standard of +efficiency. I don’t see why he keeps her on!” + +“Beauty in daily life,” said I. “It’s what Morris recommended. She’s an +ornament to the office, Miss Kelly. She has artistic value.” + +“Superfluous ornaments have no value anywhere,” said Miss Kelly. “I +worked once for an interior decorator, and I learned that. A thing must +not only be beautiful in itself, but in harmony with its surroundings, +and serving some definite purpose. She isn’t and doesn’t, and she ought +to be scrapped!” + +Now not only was Miss Kelly a notably good-looking young woman, and +intelligent and alert and sensible, but she was infallible. Graves knew +it. He had had other disagreements with her, and had always been +worsted. Still, for a time, he defied her in regard to Miss Clare. + +“D’you know,” he said to me, “I hate like poison to discharge that poor +girl! You see, this is her first job, and it’ll be hard for her to get +another, with only a four weeks’ record here.” + +“Oh, no, Graves,” said I. “Not at all! After you’ve talked to her and +pointed out her faults, she--well, she’ll get rid of her faults, don’t +you see? And after that--” + +Then Graves declared, with a sort of magnificence: + +“She hasn’t any _faults_, exactly. It’s lack of training that’s the +trouble. If she could stay on here a little longer, she’d do as well as +the others--and better. She has brains!” + +“Why can’t she stay?” I asked. + +“Her output’s below the average,” he said dismally. “Miss Kelly keeps +charts and so on.” He scowled. “Miss Kelly’s worth her weight in gold, +and all that,” he said, “but she’s pig-headed. I’ve tried to explain to +her that it’s actually more efficient to keep and train an employee, +even if you have to shift him to another department, than to break in a +new one. I’ve shown her in black and white what the actual cost of this +eternal hiring and firing is; but no! She jumps down my throat with a +lot of her own figures about what this Miss Clare costs the department +every day. Hair-splitting, that’s all it is!” + +Graves should have been warned, each time he opened his mouth, that what +he said would be used against him. Of course this was. Each time he +dealt the death blow, we reminded him of the cost of this eternal hiring +and firing, and how much more efficient it was, and so on. + +Miss Clare was shifted out of Miss Kelly’s department into another, +which had a human man, young Allen, at its head; but he, too, rebelled. + +“She won’t do,” he said to Graves. “She tries, but she’s--well, I don’t +know just what the trouble is. She’s simply not on the job.” + +“I’ll have a talk with her,” said Graves. “I’ll see if I can find out +what’s wrong.” + + +III + +I saw Miss Clare going into Graves’s office, and I felt sorry for him. I +shouldn’t have enjoyed pointing out her faults to her. She was very +young and quite without affectation, but she had a natural and +altogether charming dignity about her. You couldn’t think of her as an +office worker; you were obliged to remember all the time that she was a +woman. + +She came out after half an hour, looking downcast and grave. She smiled +at me, as she passed, with the air of a lady who never neglects her +social obligations, but I fancied her lips quivered a trifle. + +“Poor girl!” I thought. “She’s out of place here. She hasn’t the stuff +in her for a competitive worker. She’ll never get on!” + +I was so sympathetic to Graves that he told me the story of the +interview. + +“The poor girl’s worried sick,” he said. “It seems she’s trying to +support her mother, and she’s so desperately afraid she won’t make good +that she can’t do her work. She does try, you know, and she’s fairly +accurate, but she’s slow, and she knows it. She said she’d never tried +to hurry before, and when she does, she gets nervous.” He paused, and +frowned a little. “Well,” he said, “it’s irregular, but I think it’ll +work. I’m going to let her come half an hour earlier than the other +girls and stay an hour later, so that she can finish her share of the +work.” + +“That’s hard on her, isn’t it?” I asked. + +“Not so hard as getting fired,” he answered. “She’s got a queer point of +view about that. She says that if she were discharged, she’d be so +discouraged that she’d--I think she said she’d go to pieces.” + +“Lacks stamina,” I observed. + +“Well,” said Graves, “there’s more than one sort of stamina. It takes +some grit for a girl brought up as she’s been to tackle the job of +supporting herself and her mother, I can tell you!” + +I agreed with him, and said so, and he was delighted; but he paid +heavily for his kind-heartedness. Miss Kelly let the thing go on for one +week. Then, on Saturday morning, she appeared before him. + +“Mr. Graves,” she said, “after due consideration, I have decided that +the only course for me is to leave this office. I shall remain, of +course, until you have filled my position to your satisfaction.” + +She knew perfectly well how invaluable, how irreplaceable she was. + +“Now, see here, Miss Kelly,” said Graves, as man to man. “This wants +talking about. Sit down and let’s discuss it frankly.” + +She did sit down, and I thought she looked alarmingly frank. + +“Certainly, Mr. Graves,” she said very pleasantly. + +“Now, then, what’s the trouble? Not enough salary?” + +“My salary is quite as much as the overhead permits,” said she. “In +proportion to the calculated profits, it is perfectly fair and adequate. +No, Mr. Graves--it’s a question of prestige and morale.” + +Graves looked serious. + +“My girls are constantly coming to me now with requests to be allowed to +finish their work at irregular and unauthorized hours, instead of +keeping up to the standard output required by my department. They assert +that a girl in Mr. Allen’s department was allowed to do this, and they +had never understood that employment in his department carried any +special privileges. I went to Mr. Allen about this. I pointed out to him +that it affected the morale of my girls to see one of his people +favored, but he told me he could do nothing. He said it was not his +idea, and--” + +“All right!” said Graves, suddenly getting up, with a flushed face and a +constrained smile. “I--very likely you’re right, Miss Kelly. I’ll--I’ll +make some adjustment that’ll suit you.” + +“Please don’t consider suiting _me_,” said Miss Kelly. “It’s the morale +of the office, Mr. Graves.” + +And she went away like Pallas Athene from a battleground. + +I honestly pitied Graves, he was so wretched. + +“Well, you know,” he said, “she’s right. It does upset the routine, and +so on; but, hang it all, that girl simply couldn’t stand being +discharged! She has pluck enough, and all that, but she’s sensitive. +She’s too darned sensitive entirely. I wish to Heaven she’d picked out +some other office to start in! She’s got some fool idea in her head that +it’s the first job that makes or breaks you. It’s no use pointing out +her faults to her; she knows ’em. She’s trying to overcome them; but +she’s just naturally slow.” + +He tried her at filing. Not for long, though; the tumult was too great. +He tried her at bookkeeping; but she herself admitted that figures were +not her forte. + +“There must be _something_ that girl can do, or can be taught to do!” he +cried in despair. “Everybody has some aptitude, and she’s not stupid. +She can talk well about books and so on.” + +“Do you talk to her, Graves?” I asked. “Much?” + +“Oh, yes,” he answered innocently. “I talk to her a lot. I try to find +out what she’s adapted for; but I can’t, for the life of me. And yet I +can’t fire her. I simply can’t do it. She says no one else would give +her the same chance I do; and that’s no lie. She wouldn’t last a week in +any other office!” + +“Unless--” said I, and hesitated. + +“Unless what?” asked Graves. + +“Unless there were another personnel manager as--as conscientious as +you.” + +“Well,” said Graves, “it’s this way--there’s a big responsibility +attached to my job. I shouldn’t like to think I’d destroyed the +self-confidence of a girl like Miss Clare.” + +“Anything would be better than that,” I said. + +Graves looked at me with dawning suspicion. + +“Well, you’re all wrong,” he said severely, “if you think there’s +any--any personal element in this. It’s simply that I’ve got a heavy +responsibility--” + +“You bet you have!” said I, and left him with that. + + +IV + +The thing began to assume a dramatic aspect. Graves was a haunted man. +He was obliged, or he felt himself obliged, to find a place for Miss +Clare in our organization, and the task was a hideous one. + +He changed. His brisk self-assurance gave place to a harassed air, and +he acquired a new and rather touching way of appealing to the rest of +us. In fact, we were all deeply concerned about Miss Clare. We would go +joyously to Graves, to tell him we thought something had turned up that +would suit her. We always phrased it that way; but it never did suit +her. + +In the final analysis this was Graves’s fault, because it was he who had +made the office so brutally efficient. To be more frank than modest, it +was not so much that Miss Clare was very bad as that the rest of us were +so good. She failed to come up to our standard. Graves was the +_Frankenstein_ who had created this monster, and now he had to suffer +for it. + +One morning he arrived with a grim and desperate expression. + +“An execution?” I asked. + +I had become very friendly with Graves during this little complication. +He seemed to me less amusing than before, and much more human and +engaging. + +“Yes,” said he. “She’s got to go. I’ve been thinking it over pretty +seriously. I’m afraid I’ve wasted the firm’s time and money in this +instance; but you don’t know how hard--” + +“Graves,” I said, “you’re inconsistent. You’ll destroy any number of +harmless lives, and boast of it, and then you’ll apologize for having +been kindly and generous and altogether admirable.” + +He turned red. + +“Oh, get out!” he said, like a small boy, but the sympathy pleased him. +“Well, you see, it’s--well, she tries hard.” + +No one denied that. Indeed, the unfortunate Miss Clare looked exhausted +and wan from her terrific efforts. She came early in the morning, before +there was any work given out, and she was always contriving plans for +working through her lunch hour. She was always thwarted in this, +however. We were too efficient to allow people not to eat; neither was +she allowed to stay after five o’clock. + +This day, as on so many others, she was still typing frantically at half +past twelve, hoping to escape detection; but Miss Kelly espied her. + +“You ought to be out for lunch, Miss Clare,” she said, in a human, +decent, kindly way. “Run along now. You’ll do all the better when you +come back.” + +This was painful to me, because I knew that the poor girl was going to +be fired when she came back; but she didn’t suspect. She raised her +weary, anxious eyes to Miss Kelly’s face. + +“Please let me stay!” she entreated. “I’ve fallen behind, and this hour +will help me to catch up.” + +“No, Miss Clare, it won’t. You’ll be ill, and--” Miss Kelly began. + +She was interrupted by the suave and mellow voice of Mr. Reddiman, our +great president. + +“What’s this?” said he. “What’s this? One of our young women making +herself ill, eh? Working too hard?” + +Every newcomer in our office marveled at Mr. Reddiman, and resented him, +and was convinced that he had no ability, no force, no possible +qualifications for being president of the company; but that never +lasted. Mr. Reddiman grew on you little by little until, after a few +months, you were willing to admit that you could scarcely have done +better yourself. + +He had a mild, slow way. He put me in mind of an old gardener pottering +about in a greenhouse, when, with his hands clasped behind him, he +walked through the various rooms, stopping here and there. He was a +notably successful gardener, however. He made the business grow; and--he +got things done. + +“I’m not working too hard!” said Miss Clare, perilously close to tears. +“I don’t _want_ any lunch. I want to finish these letters.” + +“No, no, no, no!” said he pleasantly. “That won’t do. We can’t have +that!” + +The poor creature was blandly hustled out of the office, well knowing +that Miss Kelly would be questioned about her, and that Miss Kelly +would answer with complete frankness. + +But neither Miss Clare nor any other person could have imagined what +actually took place. Personally, while giving due credit to Mr. +Reddiman’s kind heart, acumen, and wisdom, I am inclined to give still +more credit to Miss Clare’s eyes; for I assure you that those eyes, when +filled with tears and raised to your face, were terribly potent. As I +said before, they were blue, but only the advertising department could +adequately describe the sort of blue. + +Listen to the sequel, and bear in mind that I saw her look up at Mr. +Reddiman. I know that if I had been Mr. Reddiman, I, too-- + +Well, he went in to see Mr. Graves, whom he greatly admired and valued. + +“In regard to this--er--Miss Clare,” he said. “I hear from Miss Kelly--” + +“Yes, I know,” Graves answered miserably. “I’m going to discharge her +this afternoon.” + +“You would be doing very wrong,” said Mr. Reddiman severely. + +Graves was naturally astounded. + +“I’ve done all I can to place her--” he began, but Mr. Reddiman +interrupted. + +“Graves,” said he, “I’m afraid you are just a little inclined to +overlook the human element. After all, Graves, what is more valuable in +an employee than zeal? A--er--person who works with zeal and loyalty is, +to my mind, very much more desirable than one of your efficient, +soulless machines. The human element, Graves, the human element! +This--er--Miss Clare seems to be most earnest. I learn that she comes +early and remains late. To my personal knowledge, she wished to-day to +forego her lunch in order to complete her work. I shall not interfere in +your province, of course, but I hope--I hope strongly--that you will +reconsider your decision.” + +It was Graves himself who told me about the interview. + +“Well,” he said, “what could I do? Heaven knows I didn’t want to say a +word against the poor girl; but in duty to the company I had to tell him +what I’d done. He listened, and then he said again that I overlooked the +human element. He said that what she needed was encouragement, and that +she could start to-morrow morning as _his secretary_!” + +“Aren’t you pleased?” I asked. + +“_Pleased?_” he exclaimed. “I’m--I’m horrified! I’m--it’s outrageous! +It’s cruel! I can’t bear to think of it!” He paused. “It’s the end of +her,” he said tragically. “She’s about as well fitted to be his +secretary as she is to be president of the Chamber of Commerce. It’s +bound to end in a big row!” + +I didn’t agree with him. + + +V + +Miss Clare arrived the next morning a little pale and nervous, but +wonderfully happy. She was always neat and dainty, but this morning she +had a sort of festive air, produced, as well as I can tell you, by +little extra ruffles and by magic. + +Looking into Mr. Reddiman’s private room, and seeing her there, with her +fair head bent and her fragile hands so busy, in all her gallant and +touching youth, I entertained serious thoughts about the human element. +I understood the ancient institution of chivalry. I fancied I knew +exactly how knights used to feel about forlorn damosels. It seemed +idiotic to estimate a creature as valiant and sweet as she by the number +of words she could turn out per minute. Indeed, I forgot all about the +economic system for a time, in a long meditation upon a system +considerably older. + +I rejoiced in her innocent and happy triumph. I delighted in seeing her +walk past Miss Kelly and smile at her before entering the august private +room. + +Graves was decidedly under a cloud now. We were all a little hard on +him. We forgot his kindly efforts on her behalf, and remembered only +that he had been on the point of discharging one who now worthily +occupied an important post. + +“You see, Graves, I was right,” said Mr. Reddiman. + +The rest of us agreed in condemning Graves for a sort of inhuman +severity. + +Three days passed. Then Graves heard from Mr. Reddiman once more. + +“It was naturally a--a tentative arrangement--something in the nature of +an experiment,” the president said. “I am well satisfied with Miss +Clare’s zeal and industry, but she lacks experience. I have no doubt she +can work up to some superior position; but in the meantime, Graves, +wouldn’t it be possible to find her some work that carries less +responsibility? She’s very young, you know.” + +The implication was that Graves had thrust monstrous responsibilities +upon her young shoulders, that he was a sort of _Simon Legree_. + +“She’s a young woman of education and refinement,” Mr. Reddiman +continued. “I should imagine it would not be difficult to find a place +for her in an organization of this size and scope. I don’t mind saying, +Graves, that I am very favorably impressed with Miss Clare. Of course, +if you’re convinced that she’s not useful--” + +“Very well!” said Graves brusquely. “I’ll try.” + +And there he was, with the whole thing to begin over again, and with the +wind of public opinion dead against him. I observed him sitting at his +desk, with his stubby hair ruffled, his sturdy shoulders hunched, and a +look of unassuageable despair upon his not very mobile face. He looked +up as I approached. + +“Go on!” said he. “Tell me I’m a brute! Of course, I know that what I’m +really paid a good salary for is to run a charitable institution here. I +know--” + +“Look here. Graves!” said I. “I’ll try your Miss Clare in my +department--” + +“She’s not my Miss Clare,” he returned, with vigor. “She’s--” He got up. +“I’ll tell you what,” he said. “She’s an albatross! You know the story +about the fellow who had one tied round his neck, and couldn’t get rid +of it.” + +“That’s not very chivalrous,” said I. + +“Well, I’m not paid to be chivalrous,” he said. “I know she’s a fine +girl--a--a lovely girl; but she’s out of place here. She can’t do one +darned thing well enough to deserve a salary for it. If old Reddiman +wants me to start a training school, very well, I’ll do it; but if he +wants me to keep up the standard of efficiency I’ve set, then he’s got +to give me a free hand--that’s all!” + +“She can start in with me to-morrow,” I said rather stiffly. + + +VI + +I had my own ideas about office management. No private room for me! I +sat out with all the others, in a little railed off pen. I contended +that the moral effect of my being always visible, and always busy, was +admirable. Graves, on the contrary, upheld the principle of remaining +invisible and popping out suddenly. + +I said that my department was a little democracy. + +“And you were elected the head of it by popular vote, weren’t you?” +inquired Graves, with irony. “Bet you wouldn’t be willing to put it to +the vote now. All bunk! Humbug! You’re an autocrat, and so am I!” + +I remembered this the next morning, when Miss Clare started to work for +me, and I resolved to be a benevolent autocrat. The poor girl had lost +her triumphant air. She was crestfallen, anxious, apprehensive. + +“I’ll let her see that I have confidence in her,” I thought. + +I gave her some letters to answer herself, without my dictating. They +certainly were not letters of importance. In fact, it would make small +difference to the business whether they were ever answered or not. + +Hypocritically, I told myself I ought to keep an eye on her. As a matter +of fact, I couldn’t have helped it, because she was the most incredibly +lovely creature. + +Her concentration was distressing. I felt inclined to tell her that the +letters weren’t worth all her trouble--that no letters could be. She was +very nervous. I saw her put sheet after sheet into the typewriter, only +to take it out and crumple it up. + +Naturally, she knew our excessive dislike for paper being wasted; and +after a while I saw her stealthily stuffing those crumpled sheets into a +drawer, where they wouldn’t be noticed. Then, suddenly, she straightened +her shoulders, gave a despairing glance round the office, pulled all the +paper out of the drawer, and put it into the wastebasket. It was a small +thing, but it touched me. Whenever I looked at her, and saw that +incriminating mass in the basket beside her, in full light of day, I +mentally saluted her as an honorable soul. + +There had come in the morning mail a letter from a rather doubtful +customer, inclosing a check for his last bill and a new order. I felt +pretty sure he was ordering a bit more than the traffic would stand, yet +he seemed to have substantial backing, and it wouldn’t do to risk +offending him. It was Saturday, and I had meant to talk the thing over +with Mr. Reddiman before putting through the order on Monday, when a +telegram came: + + Ship goods to-day. Wire, if impossible, and cancel order. + +This was very awkward. We were somewhat overstocked just then, and not +particularly busy, so that it would have been easy enough to ship the +stuff; but I was reluctant to take the responsibility. At the same time +I didn’t want to cancel an order of that size. + +There wasn’t much time for thought. I sent for my assistant. I told him +to take the check down to the bank it was drawn on and get it cashed. I +also suggested his seeing the manager. + +“What bank is it?” he asked. + +“I don’t remember,” said I; “but you’ll see by the check.” + +And then I couldn’t find the check. It was nearly eleven already, and +there wasn’t a minute to waste. I turned over every paper on my desk; I +made every one else do the same. Check and letter were absolutely gone. + +Nothing like this had ever happened before during my régime. I couldn’t +believe it. Now that it’s well in the past, I will admit that perhaps I +didn’t take it very tranquilly; but, after all, it was not soothing, +when I knew some one must be to blame, to have people make idiotic +suggestions about my looking in my pocket. Was I in the habit of putting +the mail into my pocket? + +“The thing’s going to be found,” said I, “and found now. Empty the +wastebaskets, and see if it’s been thrown away by mistake.” + +The office boy appeared to enjoy doing this, but the rest of them failed +in loyalty. No one looked worried or distressed. + +“It’s sure to turn up,” said one. + +Another almost suggested that such a letter had never existed. + +Attracted by the excitement, Miss Kelly appeared, followed by others who +had no business to come. How cool and reasonable they all were! + +“Mercy!” observed Miss Kelly. “What a quantity of paper thrown away!” + +She spoke, of course, of the contents of poor Miss Clare’s basket, now +turned out upon a newspaper. She approached it, and picked up one or two +sheets. + +“It seems to me scarcely justifiable to waste a sheet merely for writing +‘Dear Bir,’” said she, “or a wrong figure in the date. Errors like that +can easily be--is this the missing letter, by any chance?” + +It was the letter, and the check as well, torn into fragments. + +“Oh, I didn’t know!” cried Miss Clare. “I’m so awfully sorry! I must +have taken it by accident and torn it up with--with some other things. +I’m so sorry!” + +But my exasperation was too great to be melted even by tears in those +incomparable eyes. + +“You ought to be sorry!” I said, and so on. + +No use recounting the rest of my bad-tempered outburst. I paid for it +later in very genuine regret. + + +VII + +It was probably due to ill temper, but it was attributed to my wonderful +business foresight that I did not ship those goods. Mr. Reddiman sent +for me on Monday morning and praised my wisdom, good sense, and +judgment. That customer was to be dropped. + +This praise did not make me happy, but quite the contrary. I knew I +didn’t deserve it--in this instance, that is. I was already very +remorseful on the score of Miss Clare. I remembered things of which I +hadn’t been aware at the time--her white face, her quivering lip, her +wide, tearful eyes. She had gone away, after listening to every word I +said, and she had not returned. + +It would be hard to describe how startling, how conspicuous, was her +absence. I missed her from rooms, from desks, where she had certainly +never been. The wan sunshine made phantoms of her bright head in dim +corners. Other and very different voices took on fleeting resemblances +to hers. Once I saw the neat, spare form of Miss Kelly taking a drink at +the water cooler, and she seemed to melt into the gracious outlines of +that lost one. + +My conscience troubled me. My heart was heavy. Very long was the day; +and at the end of it I secured her address and went off to see her. + +Never mind the eloquent speech I had prepared, for I never uttered one +word of it. Suffice it to say that I intended to offer Miss Clare a +permanent position, with no possibility of being fired. + +She lived in an apartment house on a side street uptown on the West +Side--a street that was just on the border of a slum--a street of woeful +and dismal gentility. I rang the bell, blundered down a black, narrow +hall, and would have gone upstairs if a voice behind me hadn’t murmured: + +“Clare?” + +Turning, I asserted that a Clare was what I sought, and I was bidden to +step through an open door and into a prim little sitting room. It was +dismal there, too, but light enough for me to see that I was confronted +by a mother out of a book--a gray-haired, delicate little creature with +a smile of invincible innocence and good will. + +I said that I came from the office to see Miss Clare. Strictly speaking, +this was true; but the implication was not, for my business had nothing +to do with the office. + +“Am sorry ma daughter’s not in,” said Mrs. Clare, in her slurred +Southern accent. “If you’d care to wait, Ah don’t think she’ll be long.” + +So I sat down, and was instantly fed with tea and cake. + +“Rosemary made the cake,” Mrs. Clare explained. “She’s wonderful at +baking!” + +She was; nothing could have been more delectable. Naturally I praised +it, and naturally Mrs. Clare rose to the praise like a trout to a fly. +There was something very touching in her artless talk about her child, +and something still more touching in the picture she created for me of +their gracious and gentle life together. + +“Ah’ve never heard a sharp word from Rosemary,” she assured me. “Ah +don’t think you could say the same of many other girls in the same +circumstances. There’s not only her business career that she’s so +interested in, but she does almost all of the housekeeping as well. +She’s a wonderful manager, and so clever with her needle! Ah never saw a +girl so handy in the house. Of co’se Ah know a girl with her brains and +education is just naturally adapted for business, but--” She stopped, +with a smile. “Ah’m an old-fashioned woman, Ah reckon. Ah’m glad +Rosemary’s going to give it up.” + +“Going to give up business?” said I, astounded. + +“She’s been engaged for two years,” said she. “That’s long enough. Of +co’se, dear Denby understood how she felt about proving her ability +befo’ she settled down, but Ah’m glad it’s over. He came up from No’folk +yesterday, and he persuaded her to give up her position.” + +I was suddenly aware that it was late, and that I couldn’t wait another +minute. + +“Ah’m sorry,” said she. “Rosemary’ll be back sho’tly. She just took +Denby to see the Woolworth Building. Ah wish you could have stayed to +see Denby.” + +I said how remarkably sorry I was not to see this Denby, but go I would +and did. + +As I left the house, I ran into Graves, about to enter. + +“Old man,” said I, “come along with me. I want to talk to you.” + +I believe I took his arm. Anyhow, I felt like doing so. + +“Graves,” I said, “I hope you won’t thing I’ve been underhand or +treacherous about this. I’d have told you, only that it came on pretty +suddenly. I didn’t really know until this morning, and then it put +everything else out of my head. I acted upon impulse, Graves--upon my +word I did! I missed her so much in the office to-day--” + +“Yes,” said he, with a sigh. “It was pretty bad, wasn’t it?” + +“And I just hurried off, you know--to call upon her. Graves, old man, +it’s--in fact, there’s nothing doing. She’s engaged--she’s been engaged +for two years to some young--” + +“Oh, I knew that,” said Graves. + +“What?” I cried. + +“She told me in the very beginning,” said Graves. “Naturally she didn’t +want it talked about, but she explained it to me. It seems this fellow +didn’t take her seriously enough. He had plenty of money, but he +expected her to settle down there in Norfolk and just be his wife. She +didn’t say so, but I gathered that he’s a domineering sort of young +chap. She said that if they started in that way, they’d never be happy. +She had to show him that she amounted to something on her own account; +and he was impressed when she got a job here with us. She showed me a +letter, or a part of a letter, from him about it. He got down from his +high horse, I can tell you--said he knew she’d be making a sacrifice to +give up her career and marry him, but he’d do his best to make it up to +her, and so on.” + +He paused. + +“So you see,” he said, “it would have been a very bad thing for her--a +very serious thing--if she’d been fired. Might have spoiled her whole +future life. After she told me that, and appealed to me, why, I had +to--don’t you see?” + +“But, Graves,” said I, “didn’t you--weren’t you--personally--” + +“Pshaw!” said Graves, turning red. “D’you know, my boy, I read a story +once about a hangman who was a pretty good sort of fellow when he was at +home. Ever occur to you that even the matador mayn’t be as black as he’s +painted?” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JULY, 1923 +Vol. LXXIX NUMBER 2 + + + + +A Hesitating Cinderella + +THE FASHIONABLE ADVENTURES OF MADELINE, THE PRETTY WAITRESS AT COMPSON’S +CHOPHOUSE + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +“I’m no jazz baby,” Madeline declared indignantly. + +“Well, I never said you were, did I?” demanded Mr. Ritchie. + +“Well, you think so,” she replied. + +“Well, if you can read my mind, it’s no use me trying to talk,” said he. + +“I never asked you to talk!” + +They were both aware that their badinage had lost its fine edge. + +“Well, I never asked you to listen,” Mr. Ritchie said valiantly, but he +knew very well that this was not a clever retort. + +At that moment he was greatly dissatisfied both with his wit and his +person. He thought it brutal on the part of fate that a young man as +passionate and resolute as himself should have so frail a form, and that +after having taken a correspondence course in rhetoric and oratory he +should still be so tongue-tied--especially with Madeline. + +He could see himself in the mirror opposite. He sat so straight that he +leaned over backward a little, but this did not disguise the fact that +his shoulders were narrow and not quite even, and his chest somewhat +hollow. Neither had his studies or his burning thoughts left any visible +impress on his sallow, rather ratlike face; and all this hurt his +terribly sensitive soul. + +“I never said you were a jazz baby,” he insisted. “I only said lots of +girls were--and that’s a fact. Why, a lot of those girls wouldn’t spend +a cent to get a decent, well balanced meal! All they care about is +clothes and--” + +“I don’t guess you know such a lot about girls,” Madeline interrupted. + +Her tone was scornful, and the outrageously sensitive Mr. Ritchie at +once saw all sorts of implications. She meant that girls wouldn’t bother +with him. She meant that he was nothing but a mechanic. She meant that +his clothes were shabby, and that he was small and slight. She meant +everything that could affront his manly pride. + +His face grew crimson. + +“All right!” he said loftily. “Have it your own way!” + +He turned away his head, though he was a little alarmed as he did so. He +had always felt that chivalry required him to keep his head turned +rigidly toward Madeline, to atone for the fact that she stood while he +sat. Of course, that was not his fault. Madeline being a waitress, and +he a customer, anything more gallant was impossible. + +He certainly did not enjoy being waited on by this splendid girl. In +fact, he so bitterly disliked it that he would have ceased coming to +Compson’s Chophouse, if he had not realized that in his absence she +would very likely be waiting on some other man, possibly not so +chivalrous. + +It was altogether a sacrifice on his part, because the food did not +conform to his standards. He could not get here the well balanced +rations necessary for building up his physique. Of what use to work +night and morning with a patent exerciser, if he did not get the proper +muscle-building foods? This worried him very much, for he desired a fine +physique as greatly as he desired a master mind. + +Then, too, he often had to wait a long while for Madeline to be free to +attend to him, and he fretted at the waste of time. He couldn’t light a +cigarette to beguile his tedium, for he knew that the smoker cannot have +a fine physique. If he saw a smoker who looked as if he had one, Ritchie +knew him to be a whited sepulcher, with a failing heart, exhausted +lungs, and no will power. + +To be sure, he might have passed the time with some improving book. He +always carried in his pocket a volume of a set he had bought--a set +guaranteed to broaden his mind, and to contain all that he ought to +read; but he couldn’t keep his mind on a book when Madeline was about. + +“Have it your own way,” he repeated. + +This time he said it with a new significance. He meant that, as far as +he was concerned, Madeline might have everything her own way forever. + +Unfortunately, she wasn’t there to hear him. She was waiting on a man at +another table. She never so much as glanced at Ritchie. He knew she +wouldn’t look at him, and he took a gloomy pleasure in staring at her. + +She was worth looking at, was Madeline. Tall, spare, straight, in an +austere white uniform and a sleek coiffure, she was a miracle to +irradiate any chophouse. Her features were subtle--a delicate nose, a +rounded chin, a mouth very red in her pale face. Her black brows made an +incomparable line above her dark, steady eyes. + +In spite of her thinness and her pallor, in spite of twenty years of bad +air and wretched food, she was strong and tireless, with muscles like +steel--a heritage from ancestors of Slavic peasant stock. She had a +cool, careless manner, inclined to sudden hauteur when she thought it +necessary, but she could also chat with the greatest affability--as she +was doing now. + +“Trying to make me jealous!” thought Ritchie. “What do I care?” + +He had merely invited her, very politely, to a dance to be given by the +Coyote Club that evening. He worked very hard all day as a mechanic in a +garage. In addition to building up a fine physique and broadening his +mind by reading, he was taking a correspondence course in mechanical +draftsmanship; and the Coyote Club, of which he was treasurer, was his +one frivolity. + +Every week they engaged a pianist, a saxophonist, and a drummer, and had +a dance in a hall over a restaurant on Eighth Avenue. There was no +“rough stuff.” It was a seemly and refined entertainment--Madeline ought +to have known that. Ritchie only meant that some of the girls brought by +some of the Coyotes were jazz babies. The remark was not intended as +personal, and she shouldn’t have taken it as such. + +“Don’t know much about girls, don’t I?” he reflected angrily. + +Nothing could have been more galling, especially as it was true. Ritchie +had noble ideas about girls, though. He was not exactly in a position to +marry at the present moment; but later on, when his heroic efforts began +to show results, he intended to have a home, a garden, and a wife whom +he would venerate and take to lectures and concerts. + +He did not care to admit that that wife must be Madeline or no one. He +was far too proud to acknowledge how much he cared for a girl with her +silly ideas; but unhappily he was not clever enough to conceal it, and +Madeline knew only too well. + +These were her silly ideas. Knowing herself to be rare and seductive, +she intended to marry a millionaire. She was weary and disgusted with +her present condition. She wanted a life of exquisite refinement and +languor. She hated the restaurant, she hated her home, her uniform. She +turned up her delicate nose at everything about her, including Ritchie. +Not that he wasn’t “refined,” for he surely was, and she secretly +admired him; but it was not the right, the princely, sort of +“refinement,” and she would have none of him. + +Still, she felt a pang of regret when he went out. A girl as attractive +as she, alone in the world, could not well help learning to appreciate +the chivalry and restraint of Mr. Ritchie. He never “said anything,” and +never would, until encouraged. He came every night to Compson’s for his +dinner, and of late he had fallen into the habit of being on the corner +when she came out, at ten o’clock. He never said that he was waiting for +her, and she had manners enough to be surprised every time. He walked +home with her, both of them conversing with the utmost formality. + +He had never invited her anywhere, except to this dance at the Coyote +Club. He had never so much as shaken hands with her. She knew very well +that the reason for this was his severe sense of respect for her. While +she admired this, she would have been better pleased with a little more +impetuosity. + +Still, it was no use denying that he left a gap. Madeline missed him. +Even when she was busy, she had found comfort in the sight of his head +bent over one of his little books. + +“Now he’s mad,” she reflected. “He won’t come back. All right! I don’t +care! Let him go to his old dance and have a good time with the jazz +babies!” + +She consoled herself by imagining the balls she would go to in the +future, when the millionaire arrived--balls like those she saw in the +movies. She herself would wear a long, swathed dress and carry a +feathered fan. She would be languid and scornful, and would flirt in a +refined manner impossible to one who was at present a waitress in +Compson’s Chophouse. + + +II + +By eight o’clock the room was growing empty. As a hint to possible +intruders, each time a table was left vacant the lights near it were +turned out. A few solitary men still ate, in bright oases, but they had +a hasty and guilty air; they knew that their tardiness was resented. + +One by one the waitresses disappeared into the little back room where +they changed into their street clothes, and returned, crossing the +restaurant with eager steps, until there remained only Madeline and Miss +Sullivan. Miss Sullivan remained because her customer was a pig-headed +old gentleman and refused to hurry; but Madeline was there because Mr. +Compson had great confidence in her, and allowed her the privilege of +turning out the lights and locking the door. + +The proprietor himself had gone, with the cash box. Madeline would have +the responsibility of guarding, until morning, whatever sum the +pig-headed old gentleman might pay. + +“Gosh, I could stick a pin in him!” murmured Miss Sullivan. “Twenty +past! There goes that dishwasher, even!” + +“I’ll look after him,” said Madeline. “You can go, if you like.” + +Toward her own sex Madeline was not haughty, but quite good-natured. + +“I’ll do as much for you some day,” declared Miss Sullivan, like a +creature in a fable, and off she went. + +The room was very still. At intervals the elevated trains went by with a +thundering roar, leaving behind a sort of vacuum of quietness. The old +gentleman looked up. + +“Piece lemon meringue pie,” he said briefly. + +“Kitchen’s closed,” Madeline replied, with equal brevity. + +This annoyed him very much; but in view of the fact that he was known +never to leave more than a nickel for a tip, his annoyance never caused +much concern in Compson’s. He got up, folded his newspaper, felt in all +his pockets, and very slowly took down his overcoat. + +Madeline, leaning against the wall in a careless attitude, refused to +show signs of impatience. Indeed, when she saw him struggling into the +tight sleeves of his shabby old coat, she felt an impulse of scornful +pity, and came to his aid. He didn’t thank her. Apparently he preferred +to consider it her fault that he was old and slow and stiff, and +couldn’t enjoy his dinner. + +After he had gone, she began turning off the few remaining lights. The +place was nearly in darkness when the door opened and two men came in. + +“Closed!” said Madeline. + +But the taller of the two led his companion to a table and pushed him +into a chair. + +“Can’t you manage a cup of coffee?” he entreated. “My friend’s ill.” + +Madeline was not very credulous. She snapped on the nearest light, so +that she might look at the alleged invalid. + +One look was enough. She hadn’t lived twenty years without learning +something, and she knew at once what ailed the fellow; but she didn’t +care. She felt instinctively that he was a victim. He had been led +astray, very likely by this burly ruffian with him. + +“Poor feller!” she said softly. + +His curly head was thrown back, his eyes were closed, and he seemed sunk +in innocent slumber. Not only was he singularly handsome and engaging, +but he wore a dinner jacket. Never had Madeline seen one so close at +hand before. It invested the suffering hero with a high, romantic +interest. It thrilled her. He was a creature strayed from another world. +He was helpless and abandoned, and not for anything on earth would she +have forsaken him. + +“I’ll get him some coffee,” she said. + +She said it rudely, because she hated the other man, and knew it was all +his fault. + +There was a little left in the coffee urn, and it was still warm. She +brought it promptly, but the sufferer could not be roused to drink. + +“Good Lord!” said the other impatiently. “I don’t know what to do with +the young idiot! Pour water on him.” + +“I never!” cried Madeline, with passionate indignation. “And get his +nice clothes all wet?” + +“Well, do something with him,” said the other. He showed an alarming +tendency to shift the responsibility for his unconscious companion to +Madeline’s shoulders. “I can’t take him home with me. Lock him in here +till the morning, and let him sleep it off!” + +“I never!” she said again. “Just suppose he waked up all alone in the +dark, and couldn’t get out! Don’t you know where he lives?” + +“Of course I know, but he wouldn’t thank any one for sending him home in +this state. He’s the only son of wealthy and respectable parents,” the +other answered, in a flippant tone that was obnoxious to Madeline. “It +would bring their gray--or dyed--hair to the grave in one swoop. This +fellow, my dear girl, is young Benny Bradley!” + +“I don’t care who he is, he’d ought to be took care of. He’s got to be!” +Madeline said sternly. + +“Not by me,” returned the other. He rose, and looked at Madeline with a +smile. “It’s time for me to clear out.” + +“You can’t!” the girl protested. + +“I shall,” said the man. “I make you a present of Benny Bradley.” + +He was actually going, but she caught him by the sleeve. + +“Oh!” she cried. “You ought to be ashamed! What ever can I do?” + +“I don’t know. Why not call the police?” said he. + +He unclasped her fingers, and, raising his hat gallantly, went out. + +“Oh, my!” cried Madeline, in despair. “Oh, my! What ever will I do with +the poor feller?” + +She dipped a folded napkin in water, and laid it on his forehead. A +glance in the mirror startled her. In her white uniform, wasn’t she just +like a trained nurse with a wounded hero? The vision inspired her. She +felt that she must be calm, brave, resourceful. + +Somewhat timidly she lifted his limp, white hand, to feel his pulse; +but, having little idea how a pulse should behave, she gained no +reassurance. + +“Poor feller!” she repeated. “Anyway, I’m not going to leave you, if I +have to sit here the whole night!” + +She would have done that, and would have faced Mr. Compson and her +sister workers the next morning undaunted, if she had not been saved by +the entrance of Mr. Ritchie. + + +III + +To the casual observer there was nothing heroic in Ritchie’s coming, but +truly it was heroic. It had cost him a horrible effort to subdue his +outrageous pride, to forego the Coyotes’ dance, and to return here for +the ungracious Madeline. And how did he find her? Bending over a strange +man in evening dress, all alone, long after the place should have been +closed! + +“Well!” he said. “What’s all this?” + +With vehement indignation Madeline told him the story of the base +desertion of the helpless sufferer. + +“And what am I going to do with him?” she ended. “It’s the worst I ever +heard--going off and leaving him like this!” + +“Well, send for the police,” said Mr. Ritchie, but he regretted his +words when he saw her eyes blaze. + +“Shame on you!” she cried. “The state he’s in!” + +“Well, now, see here,” said Ritchie. “I guess you don’t know what’s the +matter with him. He’s not sick; he’s just--” + +“Hush up!” she interrupted fiercely. “I guess I do know! It isn’t his +fault--he got in with bad comp’ny.” + +“How do you know?” he inquired. + +“I _do_ know,” she replied firmly. “Never you mind how! And I’m going to +see he gets taken care of till he’s all well again.” + +All this did not contribute to Mr. Ritchie’s happiness. Wasn’t it just +like a woman, he thought, to be captious and haughty to a devoted young +man of blameless life, and an angel of compassion to this unknown +profligate? + +Nevertheless, in spite of his jealous alarm and his pain and his +distrust, it was Ritchie’s sure instinct to behave generously. Heaven +knows where he got his magnanimity. He hadn’t learned it in the mean and +sordid little home of his childhood. He hadn’t been taught it in school, +and it had been a part of his nature long before he had read a line of +those improving little books. + +His sallow face flushed. + +“Well!” he said. “I’ll take him home with me.” + +Madeline didn’t know how to be gracious, but she appreciated this. + +“He can’t walk,” was all she said. + +“All right!” said Ritchie grandly. “I’ll call a taxi.” + +He had never done this before. He hastened to a cab stand on Fifth +Avenue, and it seemed to his proud soul that all the chauffeurs knew he +had never used a taxi, and despised him. He was very truculent about it. + +An infinitely greater humiliation was in store for him. When he returned +to the restaurant, he couldn’t lift, or even move, the helpless young +man. All those hours with the exerciser availed him nothing. His +physique was shamefully deficient. + +“Let me,” said Madeline. “I’m real strong.” + +Without much trouble, she took the fellow under his arms and got him to +his feet. He opened his eyes, then, and smiled a dreamy, innocent smile. +Supported by Madeline and pushed by Ritchie, he made a sort of attempt +at walking to the cab. + +“I’d better go with you,” said she, “or you’ll never get him up the +stairs.” + +Sick with shame, Ritchie was obliged to consent. Neither of them for an +instant contemplated asking the chauffeur’s assistance; and the +chauffeur, being class conscious, did not volunteer it. + +Ritchie had the worst fifteen minutes of his life during his first ride +in a taxi. He felt himself a mean, contemptible, worthless thing, with +his lack of bodily strength. He contrasted his worn, shabby suit with +the stranger’s expensive clothes. He knew that Madeline must despise +him. She would despise him far more when she saw his room, yet he could +devise no way for preventing that. + +When the cab stopped before his door, he paid the fare, torn between a +certainty that his natural enemy, the chauffeur, was cheating him, and +his desire to appear lordly before Madeline. Then, together, they began +to get the stranger up the stairs. + +The noise of the operation made Ritchie’s blood run cold. Suppose some +one saw him with a drunken man and a girl? He hauled at the fellow’s arm +in no very gentle manner. + +At last, at the top of the house, he unlocked a door, and, supporting +the stranger against the wall of the corridor, he brusquely said to +Madeline: + +“All right! You might as well go now.” + +“I’d like to see him settled,” said she. + +So Ritchie had to light the gas and had to let her in. + +The room was a bleak, bare, cold little cell, with the exerciser +fastened to the wall, and the window nailed open, to admit all the +hygienically fresh air possible. On the bureau, instead of the little +accessories of a fastidious gentleman, were a pair of military brushes, +the vital library, all in a row, and a bottle of ink. On the table were +an alarm clock and the apparatus of the correspondence course. There +were no other visible articles personal to Ritchie, except a razor strop +and six cakes of carbolic soap, economically unwrapped to dry. + +He pushed the stranger down on his cot. + +“All right!” he thought defiantly. “Now you can see just how I live--and +I hope you’ll like it! Go on--laugh, if you want to!” + +But she was not laughing. + +“Oh, my, what a dusty towel!” she was thinking, in distress. “And no +curtains. The woman that runs this house ought to be ashamed of +herself!” + +She turned to Ritchie without the least trace of haughtiness. + +“Well, good night, Everard,” she said. + +It was the first time she had used his name. He needed that assuagement +to compensate for the lingering glance she gave to the prostrate +unknown. + + +IV + +Ritchie came home in a somewhat bitter humor, partly due to his having +spent the night on a hard chair, and partly to other and finer causes. +He hoped that drunken fellow would be gone. He wished never to see him +again; but when Ritchie opened the door, there he was, lying on the bed +and reading one of the little books. + +“Hello!” he said, as joyously as if Ritchie were his heart’s dearest +friend. + +“Are you feeling better?” Ritchie curtly inquired. + +Without waiting for a reply, he began to take off his grimy work +clothes. + +“I don’t know how to thank you,” the other went on. “Absolutely the +whitest thing I ever heard of! I must have been pretty far gone last +night--can’t remember a blamed thing.” + +He was not discouraged by his host’s silence. + +“I shan’t forget this, you know,” he continued. “You darned nearly saved +my life. Can’t imagine what my people would have said, if I’d come home +like that. You know how it is--” + +“No, I don’t,” interrupted Ritchie. “I’m a teetotaler.” + +“Shows sense,” said the other warmly. “I think I’ll have to be one +myself. My name’s Bradley.” He waited. “What’s yours?” he asked. + +“Ritchie,” responded the other. “And as good as Bradley any day,” he +added mentally. + +In some respects, however, honesty obliged him to admit that he was not +so good as Bradley. + +Bradley, after stretching, got up. He was in his shirt sleeves, and +Ritchie surveyed his tall, slender figure with the eye of a connoisseur +in physiques. The fellow was young yet, not fully developed, but +certainly those shoulders, that solid neck, that broad chest, were +promising--very promising. + +“Well, he probably eats too much meat,” thought Ritchie, with dejection. +“Living like he does, he won’t last!” + +In order to show his perfect ease and indifference, he began to wash, +whistling when the process permitted. + +“I must be badly in your way,” said the other, in his good-humored +manner. “I’ll clear out, I think. Got a spare overcoat? I don’t like to +go out like this.” + +Ritchie grew scarlet. His overcoat--certainly spare enough--was in that +place where winter overcoats naturally go in the spring. + +“No,” he said sullenly. + +“Then I--” began Bradley. + +There was a knock at the door. Ritchie flung it wide open, with the air +of one who has nothing to conceal. In the hall stood two resplendent +young heroes, broadly smiling. + +“Still alive, Bradley?” said the taller and older of the two. + +They both came into the room as if Ritchie did not exist. Trembling with +resentment, he stood aside, collarless, in his cheap striped shirt, with +his black hair still wet on his forehead. These three well fed, well +clothed creatures, with their vigorous voices, completely filled the +room--filled, he thought, the whole world, squeezing him out of it. + +In an affectionate and blasphemous manner Bradley reproached his friend +for deserting him the night before. + +“You ought to thank me,” said his friend, “for leaving you in the care +of that peach of a girl!” + +“What peach of a girl?” asked Bradley, pleasantly surprised. + +The friend recounted the circumstances. No one observed Mr. Ritchie’s +rage and dismay. + +“I went there just now to make inquiries,” the friend went on, “and she +told me where I’d find you. Bradley, old son, if you’re a man and a +brother, you’ll go there at once and thank her! She’s a beautiful girl, +and--” + +“Here!” interrupted Ritchie. His voice was so strange that they all +turned to look at him. “Leave her out!” he cried. “You can thank me!” + +Bradley was smitten with compunction. He began thanking Ritchie with +energy, introduced his friends, and invited him to dinner. + +“No!” said Ritchie. Like many teetotalers, he had acquired the habit of +saying “no” somewhat ungraciously. “No! But you can just leave her out!” + +Again he was thanked by all of them, and at last they left his room; but +he knew that Madeline would not be left out. He felt certain that they +would go at once to Compson’s Chophouse. He could see them talking to +Madeline. He knew how she would admire their dress, and their silly +language, and their frivolous and disgusting manners. + +“_All right!_” he said to himself. “You’re welcome to ’em; but you don’t +catch _me_ going there any more, to be made a fool of. Not much!” + +Suddenly he decided that he wanted no dinner--not at Compson’s, or at +any other place. He threw himself down on his cot, with a scornful laugh +that sounded like a sob. Fellows like that always got everything. They +thought they owned the earth--and very likely they did. + + +V + +Young Bradley was not subtle or astoundingly clever, but he did know +better than to go to thank a beautiful girl in the company of his two +friends. He went alone. + +He was instantly struck down, completely conquered, by Madeline’s +haughty glance. It was the first time he had met a haughty girl. He +found most girls very much otherwise. He was accustomed to the ardent +pursuit of mothers and aunts, and not much coyness on the part of their +protégées. He had no conception of Madeline’s idea of man as a +dangerous and persistent hunter, with woman as his prey. In his circle +the girls did the hunting and he the evading. + +He was captivated by her severity. She refused to go out with him that +evening; so he came again the next evening. + +“Please come!” he entreated. “I’ve got the car outside. I’ll wait for +you as long as you like, and then we’ll run up to a little place on the +Post Road.” + +“No, thank you,” said Madeline. “I never go out with strange gentlemen.” + +“How am I going to stop being a strange gentleman if you’ll never go out +with me?” he complained. + +Madeline didn’t know, and didn’t care to encourage strange young men by +trying to explain. She knew perfectly well that he would come back. + +To be sure, he did, and this time he was dreadfully insistent. Now +perhaps the cause of Madeline’s hauteur was the take-it-or-leave-it +attitude of the men she knew. Certainly she had never before encountered +a persistent suitor, or one who was not offended by rebuffs. Customers +inclined to gallantry were very much annoyed if not encouraged. Even Mr. +Ritchie was fatally ready to be insulted; but this young fellow didn’t +care in the least. Let her be haughty, captious, even cruel, still he +was charmed and delighted. + +Though she did not think this quite manly, Madeline could not withstand +the cajolery of the handsome and good-natured boy. She was thrilled with +pride that this splendid creature should come to seek her in Compson’s +lowly chophouse. She was secretly overwhelmed when he brought her +orchids. She didn’t really resent the innuendoes of the other girls. +They were simply jealous because no such hero ever had or ever would +come to seek them. + +In her heart she was grateful, almost humble. She regarded her +incomparable Bradley with something very like awe. To placate Compson, +he would order coffee and pie while he waited to talk to her; and his +manner of eating and drinking, the way he rose and remained standing +when she approached, all the careless ease and grace of him, were a +marvel and a joy. Moreover, even in her most fervent admiration, she had +never lost the protective tenderness she had felt the first time she had +seen him. She worried about him, about his health and his morals. + +This was really the reason why she finally consented to go out with +him--so that she could talk seriously and firmly, and perhaps reclaim +him. + +“Well, you can be waiting for me to-morrow at nine o’clock,” she said. +“You’d better go along now.” + +As he was leaving--a notable figure in a suit such as never entered +Compson’s, and a straw hat, and a walking stick--he was met by Ritchie +coming in. Ritchie was dressed in threadbare serge, and wore brown +shoes, which he had attempted to make black. Bradley went by without a +sign--not by intention, for he would have saluted his benefactor +joyously if he had known him; but Ritchie, to him, was exactly like +countless others, and quite indistinguishable. + +Of course Ritchie took this apparent neglect as a personal insult. He +sat down at his usual table, burning with shame and fury. When Madeline +approached, he said truculently: + +“I suppose you don’t want to go to the movies to-morrow night?” + +It was an announcement, rather than a question. + +“Well, I’m sorry,” replied Madeline, “only I got a date.” + +“Him, isn’t it? All right! Go ahead! That’s just like a woman,” said +Ritchie. “If a feller has good clothes and a fine physique, what do they +care if he drinks, or anything?” + +“I wasn’t aware I was requesting your valuable advice, Mr. Ritchie,” +observed Madeline frigidly. + +“I wasn’t giving it,” said he. “All I was saying was, women are all for +show. They never see below the surface. Anyway, I’m going to Chicago the +end of this week. I’m sick of New York!” + +“My! Poor New York!” murmured she. + +“I’m sick of the girls here,” he went on vehemently. “Just a lot of jazz +babies--that’s what they are!” + +“Here, now!” she cried. + +“Jazz babies,” he repeated. “There isn’t one of them with--with any +brains or any feelings.” + +Madeline had turned pale. + +“I’m not paid to be insulted by customers,” said she. “I’ll send some +one else to wait on you. I’m sure I hope you’ll find some one in Chicago +that’s good enough for you, if such a thing is possible!” + +And thus terminated their acquaintance. They were now complete +strangers. + + +VI + +In the course of her twenty years Madeline had not shed so many tears as +during this one night. There was time for a deluge, for it was surely +the longest night that had ever covered the earth. It had the +interminable confusion of a dream; and, like a dream, it was made up of +vivid and apparently unconnected flashes. + +First there was herself leaving Compson’s with a not very genuine air of +composure, entering Bradley’s car, and settling herself by his side, +determined not to be impressed or perturbed either by his magnificence +or by the rakishness of the small car. + +Then there was the flight through the bejeweled and marvelous city--a +delight seriously marred by her companion’s sinister silence. Not being +a driver herself, she had mistaken his preoccupation with traffic +signals and so on for a grim and alarming determination. She had, as +etiquette required, tried to talk, but he scarcely answered. + +Then they shot out into the country--a world dark and unfamiliar to her. +Almost the first thing Bradley did was to draw up the car by the +roadside and produce a pocket flask. He had been surprised and amused at +her indignation, and not overawed by her firm principles. She had said +that she wished to go home, but he had been so very persuasive about the +supper agreed upon that she had yielded. + +She had regretted her weakness. The road house was an awful place. It +was like the “haunts of vice” that she had read about in the Sunday +newspapers. The prices on the menu appalled her, and the dancing was +beyond imagining. Bradley knew some of those people, and had danced with +a girl, leaving Madeline alone and unprotected at their table. + +He said that what he had to drink was ginger ale, but she didn’t believe +it. Ginger ale couldn’t have made him so flushed and silly; and when at +last, after he had sat there smoking cigarettes and dawdling, they rose +to go, she had noticed that his gait was unsteady. He had grown +talkative, too, and never had she heard such silly conversation. + +And now here they stood, on the brow of a hill. It was dark, but the +dawn was already tingeing the sky. The birds were awake all about them, +each one giving his own note--a reedy quaver, a chirp, a clear, exultant +carol, each one indifferent and independent, but part of a glorious +orchestral symphony. It was dawn, and here they were, for the graceless +Bradley had lost his way in the dark. + +They had gone jolting up lanes that ended in walls and fences, they had +rushed across bridges, they had turned this way and that. Bradley made +inquiries, but was not quite capable of profiting by them. Moreover, +Madeline’s tears and reproaches had made him frantic. Dawn, and here +they were! So fair and tranquil a dawn, it might have inspired to poetry +the most insensitive soul; but to poor Madeline it meant only another +working day. It made her think of Compson’s. + +“Oh, my!” she cried. “Oh, what shall I do? Oh, how could you do such a +thing?” + +“I’m very sorry,” was all that the sobered young man could say. “I +didn’t mean to.” + +“My aunt’ll never let me in the house again!” she lamented. “Somebody’s +sure to come from Compson’s and ask where I am, and my aunt’ll say she +don’t know. I wish I was dead!” + +“But can’t you explain?” Bradley asked patiently. + +She was amazed at his stupidity, but the poor chap was quite unaware of +the villainous aspect he had in the eyes of Compson’s staff. He had +never considered himself a villain--certainly not where Madeline was +concerned. He was very grateful to her, and he had tried to show his +gratitude. That had not been at all difficult, because she was so +pretty; but, thought he, what an awful temper! + +Bradley was used to girls who concealed the most fiendish rages when in +his company, and he believed that all girls were amiable. Ritchie would +have understood Madeline’s outbreak. He might perhaps have quarreled +with her, but all the time he quarreled he would have been terribly +moved by her plight. Bradley couldn’t see that there was any plight. If +she hadn’t been so terribly upset, he would have thought the thing a +joke. + +“Explain!” she cried. “Who do you think would believe me?” + +He was about to speak, but when he looked at her, he could not. Some +faint comprehension of her point of view came to him. The more he +looked, the better he understood. + +Grief had dignified her. Her tear-stained face, her brimming eyes, her +trembling lip, distressed him beyond measure. He was an honest and +kind-hearted fellow, and even something more than that. In his way, he +was chivalrous. He felt deeply ashamed just then to remember that only a +few hours before he had thought it rather comic to be taking out a +waitress. He regretted the harmless but not very decorous jokes that he +and his friends had made about the episode. He wished he had shown his +gratitude in some other way. She wasn’t a waitress--she was a forlorn +and miserable girl whom his ill-behavior had got into a situation which +she regarded as serious. + +“I’ll make it all right,” he said earnestly, wondering how this might be +done. + +“Well, you ought to!” she replied. + +She didn’t mean to be ungracious or unkind, but she was in anguish. +Neither she nor any of the people she knew could take such things +lightly. She saw herself irretrievably disgraced, her haughty +respectability forever tarnished. She knew so well what the girls at +Compson’s would say! + +She had been so proud of her discretion, of her superiority! She had +been so very cautious about “strange gentlemen”! And to be away from +home all night! She couldn’t bear it. Grief and resentment drove her to +tears again. + +“Don’t!” entreated Bradley. “Please don’t! I’ll make it all right, +somehow--I give you my word I will!” + +What he meant was that he would fly to some sympathetic feminine spirit, +who could and would make it right for him. + + +VII + +Madeline’s aunt didn’t believe one word of her niece’s story. Madeline +quarreled haughtily and scornfully with her, but in her own heart she +couldn’t blame her. She wouldn’t have believed it herself. Getting lost +in a motor car with a millionaire! That was simply nonsense. + +She lay down on the bed in her dismal little room, as close to despair +as she was ever likely to be. One of the girls had come from Compson’s, +and her aunt had said she didn’t know where Madeline was. + +“I can never go back there!” she thought. “Never, never!” + +She might have been mourning for a lost paradise. After all, it was as +hard for her to lose her standing among her peers at the chophouse as +for a duchess to lose prestige in the drawing-rooms of Mayfair. She had +nothing else. + +She neither expected nor wished to see Bradley again. He was a sinister +mystery to her; she couldn’t understand him at all. She was convinced +that he had got lost on purpose. The very fact of his not having tried +to make love to her made the case all the more perturbing. He must have +some deep design which she could not yet fathom. + +He was bad. He drank. He went gladly to road houses where every one was +bad, and drank, and danced improperly. His fascination was the +fascination of a villain. His whole life must be a phantasmagoria of +splendid evil. + +As the room grew dark, she shuddered at the very thought of him. She +dozed, and dreamed nightmares, and woke and cried and slept again. The +blessed security of her honest, hard-working life was gone. She would +have to give up her job. She couldn’t face the other girls again. +Perhaps she was caught in one of those awful snares elaborately laid by +millionaires for the daughters of the poor. Perhaps it was Bradley’s +purpose to see that she never got another job--to hound her to the brink +of starvation, that she might be obliged to listen to his evil +proposals. + +“I’d rather die!” she cried to herself with a sob. + +There was not a soul in the world to assuage the heartsick young +creature, no one to speak a word of common sense or solace. Her +preposterous fears were terribly real to her. She had eaten nothing all +day. She was exhausted, frightened, inimitably wretched. + +She heard her aunt moving about in the kitchen. She knew that nothing on +earth could induce the older woman to bring her even a cup of tea, and +nothing could persuade her to ask for it. + +“Not after what she said!” thought Madeline. “It would choke me!” + +She fell asleep again, and was awakened by her aunt’s hand on her +shoulder. + +“Here’s that Mr. Ritchie,” the aunt announced. + +“Well, tell him to go away!” replied Madeline. + +“Tell him yourself,” said her aunt promptly. “I guess I got something +better to do than carry messages for you!” + +Her aunt was a severe, stout, bespectacled creature of fifty, a woman +of invincible propriety, and Madeline’s conduct had stricken her to the +heart. She was as glad to see Ritchie as if he were an angel, because +obviously he could remedy all that was wrong; but she had no other way +of expressing gratification, affection, or the most profound grief, than +by her habitual disagreeableness. + +“That’s just like you,” said Madeline. + +She rose, too wretched to care how she looked, and went into the +lugubrious little parlor where Ritchie waited. + +“Well! I thought maybe you were sick,” said he. + +“Well, I’m not,” she replied. + +There was an awkward silence. + +“Well!” he said at last. “Then what about going to the movies?” + +Although he refused, as always, to look squarely at her, he had none the +less observed her wan and tear-stained face, her untidy hair, her +piteous dejection. Something which he imagined to be anger came over +him. + +“You been out with that feller?” he demanded. + +“That’s my business!” returned Madeline valiantly. + +“Well, if you--if you had more sense,” he said, and paused. He could not +well have been more miserable than he was at that moment, nor could he +have concealed it better. “Well!” he said again, with a sort of fury. +“All right! It’s nothing to do with me. Go ahead! Suit yourself!” + +He drew one of his books from his pocket, opened it, and held it out to +her in a shaking hand. + +“You can just look at this, if you like,” he said. “I’m going away +to-morrow--that’s all I’ve got to say!” + +She did look. Heavily underscored were two lines unfamiliar to her, and +of striking beauty and significance: + + ’Tis better to have loved and lost + Than never to have loved at all. + +Mr. Ritchie flung the book down on the table and walked out. + + +VIII + +The very next evening, when he should have been on his way to Chicago, +he was ringing the door bell of Madeline’s flat. His presence brought +ineffable consolation to the aunt, and was not displeasing to the girl +herself. + +“My!” she said loftily. “I wouldn’t have thought you’d come back!” + +“Well, I did,” said he. “Aren’t you going back to Compson’s any more?” + +“That’s my business!” she answered, but she let him in, and he did not +appear rebuffed. + +“Well, I guess they miss you there,” he observed. + +“Let ’em!” she retorted with spirit. They were both too polite, too +formal, to take any notice of the tears rolling down her cheeks. “I went +out with that Mr. Bradley, and we got lost in his car. We never got back +here until near noon. There’s no use telling those girls that. They’re +awful spiteful, and they’d never believe me.” + +“Well, I do,” said Ritchie. + +“I should think you ought to!” said Madeline, with a sternness that +concealed a very warm gratitude. + +“Well, I said I did, didn’t I?” pursued Ritchie. + +There was a pause. + +“He was here to-day,” said Madeline; “him and his sister. I must say I +didn’t think much of her--all painted and everything. She wants to get +me a job with one of those Fifth Avenue dressmakers, as a model, to show +off the dresses.” + +There was calm triumph in her tone, but despair seized Ritchie’s heart. + +“She says I’d be an elegant model,” observed Madeline. + +“All right!” said Ritchie. “Go ahead! Be one! Suit yourself!” + +Another pause. + +“That po’try you showed me,” said Madeline. “I thought it was sweet.” + +“It’s not meant to be sweet,” replied Ritchie severely. “It’s more like, +now, tragic. If you’d read more--” + +“I always admired the way you read such a lot,” said Madeline. + +In spite of himself, he was mollified. He glanced at her covertly. She +was quite as lovely and disturbing as ever. + +“Well,” he said, “of course I got to read. I want to get on. I’m making +twenty-seven a week now, and more when there’s overtime. I spend a good +lot on those correspondence courses, and the Coyote Club and all; but I +guess I could do without them, if I felt like it.” + +“I’m not going to take that job,” said Madeline suddenly. “I +wouldn’t--not for anything. I guess I’ve had enough of that kind of +people--all that drinking and all. I’d never get on with that kind!” + +“Well, twenty-seven a week, _clear_--” said Ritchie. + +The collapse of castles in the air doesn’t make a sound. Down came the +magnificent edifice of Everard Ritchie’s ambitions, and the airy palace +of Madeline’s dreams. In their place was instantaneously erected a +three-room flat in a respectable quarter. + +Their hands met, but not their eyes. They were timid lovers; but by that +handclasp they could say all they wished. + +“Those people just make me sick,” said Madeline. “You ought to have seen +them dancing out at that place!” + +Then their eyes did meet, full of profound confidence and understanding. +His arm went round her shoulders, and she drew close to him. + +“I know!” said he. “Fellers like that are no good at all; and those +girls!” He looked at his haughty and incorruptible Madeline. “Those +girls,” said he, from the depths of his vast worldly knowledge, “are +nothing but a bunch of jazz babies!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +AUGUST, 1923 +Vol. LXXIX NUMBER 3 + + + + +The Postponed Wedding + +IN WHICH THE PRINCIPALS WERE A TEARFUL BRIDE AND A SUBSTITUTE BRIDEGROOM + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Mildred stood like a statue--a trite figure of speech, but in this case +an apt one. With the white satin draped about her bare shoulders, +immobile in her cool and tranquil loveliness, she was truly like a +statue, and an admirable one. + +The dressmaker knelt at her feet as if before an idol, gathered the +gleaming material into folds here and there, and put in pins, serious +and happy in this congenial work. She admired Mildred immeasurably, +because Miss Henaberry was polite and kind and beautiful, and did +justice to a dressmaker’s art. + +Mildred was not the first idol to be obliged to stand still and look +lovely while the keenest anguish racked her. Not by the flicker of an +eyelash would she betray what she suffered. She had read the letter +calmly; she held it now in fingers that trembled not at all. Obediently +she turned, or lifted an arm, and did everything necessary, so that the +dress might be perfect. + +It was her wedding dress, and her wedding had been announced for the +first day of June--and for the past fifteen minutes she had known that +there would be no wedding then. + +The dressmaker rose and stood back a few feet, to look at the tall, +straight young creature, with her proud little dark head, so nobly set +off by the lustrous satin. + +“My!” said she. “You’ll be a perfect vision, Miss Henaberry!” + +Mildred smiled then, somewhat faintly. She was able, even willing, to +endure the worst that fate could inflict upon her; but she very much +wanted one hour alone, to endure the first shock. She did not want to +cry, or even to think; all that she needed was a little space of time to +steady and fortify that pride so horribly shaken. + +Pride was at once the girl’s finest quality, and her worst. It was a +splendid pride that had made her come out so bravely after her father’s +bankruptcy and death, and, after twenty years of easy and luxurious +living, had set to work to earn her bread as a teacher in a private +school. It was a pride diabolic that made her stand so aloof, and refuse +friendship, because of her morbid fear that some one might pity her. + +You could read all that in her face; for though she had the profile, the +wide, low brow, and the fine, grave eyes of Minerva, there was that +about her mouth and chin which was simply mulish obstinacy. She never +had listened, she never would listen, to any warning or advice. Any +number of people had wanted to warn and advise her about Will Mallet. + +“My dear,” said Mrs. Terhune, an old friend of her mother’s, “Will can’t +support a wife.” + +“He’s never tried,” answered Mildred. “He’s never had a wife.” + +“But Will is--” Mrs. Terhune began, and had to stop. + +Impossible to describe just what was wrong with Will Mallet. He came of +a good family, and, though he hadn’t a penny, he had influential +connections. He wasn’t lazy, he hadn’t a vice in the world, he was +intelligent, almost scholarly, and altogether a handsome and endearing +boy. Even the fact that at twenty-four he was still at loose ends, and +still looking for his appointed work in the world, couldn’t justify what +Mrs. Terhune said. + +She declared that as a husband Will was impossible. He couldn’t be taken +seriously. It was nice to dance with him, play tennis with him, hear him +recite his poems--but marry him! + +He had seldom been seen in the little town on the Hudson where he had +been born. Now and then he came to visit an indulgent relative, and to +get assistance moral and material, after which he would go off to try +his luck once more. Every one liked him and no one respected him. + +On this last visit he had surprised them all by deciding to stay. He +said he intended to open a florist’s shop and greenhouses. He had looked +about for a likely site, and had asked for advice--which he got in +generous measure. His relations were pleased and rather touched by this +venture, which seemed at once practical and poetic, and he had received +more attention and encouragement than was good for him; but when his +engagement to Mildred was made known, he lost all favor. He was severely +condemned, and remonstrated with, and still further advised. + +Will was a young man of no great vanity or self-assurance. He was +fatally inclined to agree with people. He listened, downcast and +wretched, to the admonitions of friends and relatives, and hastened off +to tell Mildred that he was no good, and that she would be better off +without him. + +She thought otherwise. She had few illusions about her Will, but she +thought that with help and encouragement he might be improved. She had +for him a maternal sort of love, exacting and yet very tender. She +didn’t wish to spoil him. She meant to inspire him with greater energy +and self-reliance. She told him that he was capable of great things, for +she really thought so. She was kind, indulgent, and yet firm with +him--and she never suspected how she terrified him. + +She had all the virtues. She worked hard and earnestly, she saved money, +she read, she studied, she was intelligent, tender-hearted, modest, +reserved, and matchlessly polite. She was beautiful, she knew how to +dress and how to carry herself, and socially she was perfect; but there +is one little truth which Mildred had never been taught. A good example +must not be too good, or, instead of producing a desire for imitation, +the beholders feel only despair and hopeless inferiority. + +The bell rang for lunch, and Mildred had difficulty in suppressing a sob +of relief. The dressmaker had the pleasure of going downstairs and +eating at the same table with her idol. She looked about the dismal +dining room of the boarding house with a happy smile. + +“Well, you won’t be here much longer, Miss Henaberry,” she said. + +Mildred agreed with that. She knew what she could endure, and she knew +also what would be too much for her. She could not endure to remain +there, among those friendly, interested people--not after this! + + +II + +Mrs. Terhune read the letter, read it again with a distressed frown, and +passed it to her husband. + +DEAR MRS. TERHUNE: + + Please believe that I am very sorry to go away without seeing you + and thanking you for all your many, many kindnesses. Will and I + have been obliged to change our plans, however, and to postpone our + wedding for a time; so in order to avoid all the awkward and + tiresome explaining, and so on, I thought it better to go for a + visit to some old friends in the country, until our arrangements + were complete. Of course I shall let you know all about it at the + earliest possible moment. + + Please, dear Mrs. Terhune, don’t think me ungrateful or lacking in + affection for running off this way. As you know, I have an almost + morbid horror of gossip, and I couldn’t bear to stay and explain a + hundred times that the wedding was postponed until Will had + improved his position. He is inclined to be far too sensitive about + his earning powers, but I am sure you agree with me that a man is + not to be judged by his financial success. I have perfect faith in + Will. + +Mr. Terhune shook his gray head. + +“Too bad!” he said. “Well, I’m not surprised.” + +And then and there, over the breakfast table, floated the word from +which poor Mildred had run away--that word bitter as death, which she +could not tolerate the thought of hearing. It passed between Mr. and +Mrs. Terhune, it went out to the servants in the kitchen, it found its +way into many other houses--the word “jilted.” + +The Terhunes were very fond of Mildred, and were really perturbed by her +disappearance. They knew she had no money and no friends elsewhere. They +consoled themselves, however, by their knowledge of her remarkable +dignity, self-possession, and determination. A girl like Mildred, they +said, would be sure to get on, wherever she went. + +“And, in a way, it was the best thing she could have done,” Mrs. Terhune +said, after a week or so. “There’s so much spiteful gossip about the +affair. Poor Mildred!” + +Even Mrs. Terhune’s genuine affection was tinged by a faint hue of +complacency. + +“Of course I knew how it would be,” she remarked. “I knew Will was +absolutely worthless. Poor Mildred!” + +Now, in order to comprehend the case of Mildred Henaberry, one thing +must be admitted. She had a thousand good qualities, the best manners in +the world, and a rare type of beauty, but she was not lovable. You were +obliged to respect and to admire her, and sometimes you resented the +obligation. + +As a result, the gossip about her had a decidedly malicious flavor. Any +number of people were delighted at being able to laugh at perfection +brought low. All the malice was toward Mildred--none for Will. Perhaps, +if she had stayed for pity, she would have been pitied, but in running +away she forfeited all claim to generosity. + +So that when Robert Dacier arrived, a few months later, he heard Mildred +spoken of as a jilted spinster, who had vanished in order to hide her +hideous disappointment. He heard that she had been a school-teacher, +that she had been “dignified” and “fastidious.” This conveyed to his +mind the picture of a severe and unpleasant female of forty who had got +what she deserved. + +Not that Dacier gave much time to thinking about Mildred, for he was not +at all a thoughtful young man. He was a cheerful, careless, good-looking +fellow, who was a nephew of Mrs. Terhune. That lady refused to admit +that of all her nephews and nieces he was her favorite, because she +prided herself upon being a just and sensible woman, far too reasonable +to be beguiled by the lad’s curly head and debonair good humor. + +Not that he didn’t have solid and excellent qualities. He was doing very +well as an architect, and was making a creditable income. Certainly he +spent it all, but he spent it in a nice, gentlemanly way. + +He earned less in a year than his uncle spent in a month; yet when the +fellow came on a visit to the Terhunes, there was not a trace of poor +relation about him. He had excellent cigars to offer to his uncle, and +he showed his aunt all sorts of little attentions that touched and +delighted her beyond measure. She had never had children of her own, and +I don’t believe she had ever felt much happier than she felt when making +a round of calls with that engaging and delightful nephew, showing him +off with naïve complacency, and fairly basking in his affection. + +Naturally she talked to him about Mildred Henaberry, because the affair +had upset and troubled her. He listened good-humoredly, not in the least +interested; but he was destined to be plunged into that affair, head +over heels, and it was Mrs. Terhune who was to push him into it. + +It happened simply enough. + +“I heard about a new tea room up near Beacon,” he said to his aunt one +afternoon. “Let’s run up there, Aunt Kate!” + +“You don’t want to go with your old aunt,” said she, beaming with +delight. “At your age, you want the society of young people.” + +He answered exactly as she wanted him to answer. She dressed herself in +her best and most imposing style, and off they went. + +It was the most perfect sort of August day--bland, fair, not too hot, +not dusty. Mrs. Terhune leaned back, greatly enjoying it all--the light +air blowing against her face, the pleasant scents of the countryside, +and, above all, the festive feeling caused by the presence of the +holiday-making nephew. + +Being only twenty-five to her fifty, Dacier was perhaps not quite so +contented. He would have liked to drive, but it made his aunt nervous, +so he had foregone that pleasure--although, to tell the truth, it made +_him_ nervous to sit back and go creeping along at such a calm, moderate +pace. However, he enjoyed life so much that he was indulgent toward +other people, and wished to make them happy as well; so on they went, +conversing affectionately. + + +III + +“Mercy!” suddenly cried Mrs. Terhune. “Can it be? Johnson, please stop +the car!” + +This Johnson did, and Mrs. Terhune pointed to a field to the right of +the road, across which a white figure was sauntering. + +“Robert,” she said to her nephew, “I’m sure that’s Mildred. I should +know that figure and that walk anywhere. Oh, dear, she’s going through +the fence! I can’t lose her. Do run after her and bring her back--that’s +a dear boy!” + +So off went young Dacier across the sunny field, bareheaded, and, his +aunt thought, marvelously fleet and graceful. + +The figure in white had gone through a gap in the fence, and had turned +up a shady little road, but Dacier took a short cut, leaped over the +fence, and stood before her, flushed and very hot. He had forgotten the +jilted spinster’s surname, if he had ever heard it; but he felt quite +certain that this was not she--not this serene and lovely young +creature. + +“Excuse me,” said he, “but I thought you were Mildred.” + +She was startled. + +“That is my name,” she said; “but--” + +“But I’m afraid you’re not the right one--not Mrs. Terhune’s Mildred.” + +“Oh, Mrs. Terhune!” cried the girl, very much distressed. “Did she send +you?” + +“Yes,” he replied, rather absent-mindedly, because he was trying to +reconcile his imaginary portrait of the jilted spinster with the reality +before him. He was impressed, deeply impressed, by this dignified and +serious girl, because he was not very dignified or serious himself, but +careless and light-hearted and sometimes a little impertinent. “Then,” +he added politely, “if you are the right one, won’t you come and speak +to Mrs. Terhune? She’s waiting in the car. She’s very anxious to see +you.” + +Mildred turned. Mrs. Terhune had now got out of the car, and was +standing beside it. At that distance she seemed a small and shapeless +creature, with veil and scarf fluttering, and her hand waving in earnest +welcome. + +“Oh, the dear thing!” said Mildred. + +Her tone was so odd that Dacier looked quickly at her, and saw her gray +eyes filled with tears. Why tears at the sight of Aunt Kate? + +“I’m sorry,” she went on. “I can’t see her just now. If you’ll please +tell her”--Mildred turned away her face--“please tell her I’ll write. +Please tell her I’m just as fond of her. Thank you! Good-by!” + +After a few steps she stopped again, because Dacier was still beside +her. + +“Thank you!” she repeated significantly, with meaning. + +“You’re welcome,” he said courteously. “Very pretty country about here, +isn’t it?” + +“You mustn’t keep Mrs. Terhune waiting,” was her reply. + +“Well, you see, I hate to go back and disappoint her. She wanted so much +to see you. She’s always talking about you.” + +He positively jumped at the look he got from Mildred. + +“Is she?” the girl asked, with a cold, unpleasant smile. + +“Yes,” he said. “She--” + +“Then please tell her that Will--Mr. Mallet--is coming back very soon. +I’ll let her know, of course, when the wedding is definitely arranged. +Just now I’m very busy with my preparations.” + +Dacier was not lacking in wit. He didn’t believe a word of this, but he +was so sorry for the girl, he so much admired her fine pride, that he +answered in the most convincing way. He remembered everything he had +ever heard about Mallet, and he spoke of him seriously, with interest. +He asked about the florist project, and talked to Mildred as to a girl +authentically and eternally engaged. It was the nature of the fellow to +make himself agreeable. He did it without effort, and almost without +motive--although he was by no means unsusceptible to Mildred’s grave +beauty. + +She was disarmed. She scarcely noticed that he went on walking beside +her to the very gate of her little garden, so absorbed was she in her +talk about Will. Dacier still didn’t believe her, but he was not at all +amused. He thought it very pitiful that she should bring out this +phantom lover, should lean upon this straw man, when she herself was so +strong, so splendidly alive. + +“Mercy!” she suddenly exclaimed. “What will Mrs. Terhune think? Please +hurry back to her! And you’ll tell her--about Will, won’t you?” + +He did hurry back, leaping over the fence again and running across the +field. + +“But where’s Mildred?” asked his aunt, terribly disappointed. + +“She was too busy to come,” he said, with a smile. “She’s too busy +waiting for Mallet.” + +“Oh, dear, how very foolish! She’s a splendid girl, but she _is_ so +obstinate. I can’t bear to lose her again!” + +“Don’t worry,” said her nephew cheerfully. “We’ll arrange all that, Aunt +Kate. I’m rather obstinate myself.” + + +IV + +Mildred lived in the most wonderful little cottage, so tiny, so neat, +like the cottage of the three bears, or the abode of the dwarfs. The old +woman who came to keep it so bright and spotless was exactly like a +witch, too, and Mildred herself might well have been an enchanted +princess--except that she worked rather hard, and kept accounts. A small +sign in the window read, “Miss Mildred Henaberry--piano lessons,” and +all through the day confirmation of this floated out across the garden +and into the road--stumbling scales, painful excursions in Czemy, and +then the masterly touch of the teacher herself, showing what might be +done. + +Her pupils liked her, because she was patient, polite, and always clear +and definite. She liked them because they were young, and because they +had such stubby little fingers, such earnest scowls, and such jolly +laughs. + +On this morning of pelting summer rain she had escorted one of them to +the front door--a rosy, moonfaced little girl in spectacles--and was +opening a minute umbrella that would shelter the little cropped head, +when she saw, coming down the lane, the young man who had been Mrs. +Terhune’s emissary. He saw Mildred, raised his hat, and came splashing +on through the mud, with his coat collar turned up and his cap pulled +down. He entered the gate and reached the veranda steps just as the +little girl was coming down. + +He smiled down at the child; and, if you will believe it, this youthful +creature, not more than ten years old, hesitated, and then came up the +steps after him. + +“What is it, dear?” asked Mildred. + +“If he’s going away soon,” said the little girl, “shan’t I wait and let +him go under my umbrella?” + +Dacier kissed her. + +“I’m very much obliged,” he told her; “but I’ve come for a music lesson, +so you’d better not wait.” + +They were both silent while the child went down the path. + +“Really,” said Mildred, “I am--” + +“Of course it’s a subterfuge,” said he; “but even at that, why shouldn’t +I have a music lesson? It would be such a good way for us to get +acquainted.” + +“I see no reason for our becoming acquainted,” said Mildred. + +Dacier looked into the distance. + +“Even that little girl,” he said, “could read my face and see the sort +of fellow I am--honest as daylight, kind, simple--” + +Not for the world would Mildred smile. + +“I take only children as pupils,” she remarked. + +“The sign doesn’t say so,” Dacier pointed out. “I noticed that sign when +I was here before. Legally, I’m not so sure that you’d be allowed to +discriminate against any person of good character who--” + +“Did Mrs. Terhune send you?” + +“No. She didn’t need to.” + +“Then I’m sorry, but I’m very busy.” + +“Miss Henaberry,” said Dacier firmly, “if I’m personally repulsive to +you, of course I’ll go at once; but otherwise, why can’t I talk to you +for a few minutes? I’m Mrs. Terhune’s nephew, Robert Dacier. I didn’t +bring a certificate in my pocket, but I hope you’ll believe me without +that.” + +Now Dacier was not personally repulsive to Mildred--not in the least. +She considered him somewhat presumptuous and overconfident, yet there +was about him something that pleased her, something gallant and +high-spirited and endearing. + +“And he’s Mrs. Terhune’s nephew,” she thought. “I _ought_ to be nice to +him.” + +To tell you the truth, no matter whose nephew he had happened to be, I +don’t believe that Mildred could have helped being nice to him. Very few +people could. She let him into her neat little sitting room, and she +felt concerned, as any properly constituted woman would have felt, +because he was dripping wet. She made him a cup of tea, and, having an +hour to wait for the next pupil, sat down to talk to him. Dacier was +good at talking. + +After he had gone, she was not sorry that he had said he would come +again. The smoke of his cigarette lingered in the room, and was not +disagreeable. The sound of his voice lingered, too, and perhaps the +memory of his audacious, blue-eyed, sunburned face. It was as if a fresh +breeze had blown through her neat, lonely little house. + +Come again he did, the very next evening, and he made of it the single +happy, jolly evening in a long succession of solitary ones. They sat out +on the veranda, with the moon shining; and if he had not the respectful +humility she had found in other young men, he was none the less +interesting for that. + +He had no poems to read, as Will Mallet had had. Indeed, he knew little +about poetry, or music, or any of the arts; but he said he would like to +learn, if she would teach him. When he was going, he asked what time he +should come the next day. + +“I don’t think you had better come to-morrow,” she said, a little +regretfully. + +He pointed out that his holiday wouldn’t last forever, and that it did +him good to come and hear her talk. He gave other unreasonable reasons, +and he did come the next day, and the day after, as well. + +Before a week had passed, Mildred saw that this must be stopped. It made +her angry--so very angry that she nearly wept over it alone at night. + +“I suppose he thinks, and Mrs. Terhune thinks, that he’s doing a +kindness to a poor, forlorn, jilted old maid,” she thought. “He’s +entirely too sure of himself. He takes it for granted that I’m glad to +see him all the time. He thinks--” + +Her ideas of what he thought distressed her beyond measure. That +evening, when he appeared again, he found her very cool and aloof--even +on the moonlit veranda, and even while he made his best efforts to amuse +her. + +“Mr. Dacier,” she said suddenly, “I’m very sorry, but I think you’d +better not come any more.” + +His voice, when he answered had a curious gentleness. + +“Why?” he asked. + +She was silent for a few moments. + +“Because--I’m afraid Mr. Mallet wouldn’t like it,” she said at length. +“While he’s away--” + +Dacier got down from the railing and began to walk up and down. + +“You know, I’m engaged to him,” she added. + +“Yes, I know,” said Dacier; “but--” + +Mildred felt her face grow hot in the darkness. + +“I suppose you’ve heard all sorts of malicious gossip!” she said +vehemently. + +“Yes--I did hear--something,” he answered slowly. + +“You thought he wasn’t coming back?” + +Dacier had taken his hat. He paused at the top of the steps, and looked +at her. + +“I can’t imagine any man not coming back--to you!” he said. + + +V + +As he was coming down the lane the next morning, he met the rosy, +moonfaced little girl in spectacles, and they stopped for a chat. She +told him all about her kitten at home, and talked of other interesting +topics. They shook hands at parting. + +“Oh, my goodness, Mr. Dacier!” she called, as he was moving off. “I’ve +forgotten Miss Henaberry’s letter. I stop in at the post office for her, +you know, to ask if there are any letters, only there never are; but +there was one to-day.” + +“I’ll take it,” said Dacier, not sorry for this pretext. + +He was at a loss how to proceed. He couldn’t hurt the obstinate, proud +creature by so much as hinting that he knew Mallet would never come +back. He had decided to entreat her to give up this elusive lover; and +he understood Mildred well enough to know that she would make it hard +for him. + +Not that Dacier shirked things that were hard. Whatever his faults, he +was not lacking in courage and persistence. It was the pretense, the +cruel comedy which her rebellious haughtiness made necessary, that he +dreaded. He wanted to be utterly candid and truthful with her, because +it was his nature to be so, and because he loved her. + +He was notably less cheerful than usual as he entered her cottage. + +“Here’s a letter,” he said casually. + +When he saw her face, however, he was no longer casual. She had grown +very pale. She looked at the letter with the oddest expression. + +“Oh!” she said, with a gasp. + +“What’s the matter?” he asked anxiously. “Please tell me, Mildred!” + +She recovered herself, and even managed a constrained smile. + +“It’s from Will,” she said. “Excuse me, please, while I read it.” + +In great agitation, Dacier walked up and down the room. + +“Did she write it herself?” he thought. “It can’t be from him! Good +Lord, if he did come back, she’d marry him, whatever he was, just out of +sheer pig-headedness! Nothing would count with her, in comparison with +her infernal pride. All she wants is to show people--who don’t care a +straw--that she hasn’t been jilted. She deserves to be jilted! She’s +heartless! She’s inhuman! She doesn’t care--” + +When she reëntered the room, every trace of anger and resentment left +him. In her face, still pale, but very composed now, he saw plain and +clear, her secret anguish and her terrible stubbornness. She was going +to send him away, at any cost to herself or to him. She was going to +drive away love and keep cold pride alone in her heart. + +“Will’s coming back,” she said quietly. + +Dacier looked at her. He thought that he had never seen so lovely a face +as this, with her dark, straight brows, her steady eyes, her mutinous +and defiant mouth. Even folly was dignified there. + +“Are you glad, Mildred?” he asked. + +What humiliation and loneliness and bitter disillusionment had never +been able to do, his question accomplished. Tears filled her eyes. She +struggled with them, and with rising sobs. + +“Yes,” she said. “Of course I’m very glad!” + + +VI + +Will Mallet had an unhappy, furtive conscience trapped inside him. The +words of other people, even things that he read, would stir up the poor +creature and send it rushing about in its cage, terribly alarmed. It +made Will so uncomfortable that he would do anything to quiet it. +Sometimes he fed it with lies, sometimes he reasoned with it, and +sometimes he plunged into rash action. + +He had told his conscience that it was for Mildred’s sake alone that he +left her. When he had “got on his feet,” he would come back and claim +her, and she would praise his nobility and self-sacrifice. In the +meantime he wouldn’t be obliged to work so very hard and be so very +earnest--two things which disagreed with him. + +Unfortunately, however, he could not “get on his feet.” On the contrary, +it might be said that he fell down pretty heavily. Of course, he was +proud of the fact that his poems were not “popular,” but he would not +have objected to their being a little more profitable. Bitterly he said +that a man must live, and he got a job as proof reader in a publishing +house. No use! When certain phrases of an author distressed him, he +would make changes. When he had been forbidden to do that, he wanted to +point out such passages and argue about them. + +After this, a cousin got him an amorphous job in an office, but the +light hurt his eyes. Then, on the strength of his good appearance and +his learning, he secured a position as rewrite man on a newspaper. Well, +newspaper offices are easy to get into and still easier to get out of. +Again a cousin helped him, and again he failed. It was summer now, and +he began to think with longing of the country. + +“The only thing left,” he reflected, “is to go back and try that florist +business seriously. I’ll write to Mildred first, of course. She’ll +understand. She’s very loyal. Moreover, she’s not the sort of girl most +men take to. She’s--well, she’s too fine. She’ll help me to get the +thing started, and then we’ll be married.” + +So he had written, and very promptly he received an answer. He sat on +the edge of the bed in his furnished room and read it again, while his +conscience flew wildly about inside him. + +DEAR WILL: + + You need not have doubted that I should wait for you. You told me + you would come back, and I believed you, of course. To me, loyalty + is the most beautiful thing in the world. + + I have been able to save a little money in the past year, by giving + music lessons, and I have rented a dear little cottage here and + filled it with what was left of mother’s furniture. I am really + doing very well, so that even if the florist shop isn’t enormously + profitable at the start, we shall be able to manage nicely. + +So far the letter was delightful and comforting; but it went on: + + But, Will, you know how thirsty a small town is for gossip, and it + has really been more unpleasant than I care to tell you. We had + better be married quietly as soon as you come. I’ll arrange + everything, if you will let me know when to expect you. + +This terrified him. Of course, he loved Mildred, and admired her. + +“But I’m not worthy of her!” he cried. “I never can be!” And he might +truthfully have added: “I never want to be!” + +Impossible to say what his conscience would have driven him to, if the +landlady had not come up just then and spoken very disagreeably about +his rent; so he saw that it was right for him to be a florist. He sent a +telegram to announce his arrival three days later. + + +VII + +Mrs. Terhune wept. + +“It’s a tragedy,” she said. “A wonderful girl like Mildred, and that +wretched Will Mallet!” + +“It’s certainly a pity,” said her husband; “but I suppose she knows what +she’s doing.” + +“Of course she _knows_, but she doesn’t care. She’s always been like +that. I remember that once, when she was a little girl, she said she was +going to make a birthday cake for her father. Well, almost as soon as +she began, she hurt herself with a hammer, trying to crack walnuts. Her +mother told me about it. She said the child was sick and white with +pain, but she would have her poor little crushed fingers tied up, and +she would go on. The cake turned out not fit to eat, and the obstinate +little thing was suffering so much that she had to be put to bed and the +doctor sent for; but all she said was: ‘Anyhow, I made it. I did what I +said I’d do!’ And that’s just the way she’s been about Will Mallet. She +said she would marry him, and she’s going to. She’d wait--she’d wait +forever!” + +“Like poor _Madama Butterfly_,” said her husband. “Still, you’re obliged +to admire that spirit. It’s fine!” + +“Fine!” said his wife. “Not a bit of it! Devilish--that’s what it is. +And when she’s married that scarecrow--yes, he is a scarecrow; I don’t +care how handsome he is, he’s stuffed with straw--when she’s married +Will Mallet, she’ll grow worse and worse. She’ll trample on him. It’ll +do him good, but it’s terribly bad for her. If she’d had a real man like +Robert Dacier, she’d have got over that. He’s the best-tempered, +best-hearted boy in the world, but nobody could trample on _him_!” + +Mr. Terhune respected his wife’s distress, and said no more. He couldn’t +feel quite so strongly about weddings as she did, although he was very +fond of Mildred Henaberry, and very sorry for her headstrong folly. He +thought that on the whole the world was a pleasant place--especially on +such a matchless day as this, the great climax of the summer. + +They were speeding along smooth roads to the village where Mildred +lived, and where the wedding was to take place that morning. The +cloudless sky overhead was a brave, glorious blue, and the sun went up +it like a conqueror. The grain stood ripe in the fields, the trees were +at their best. You would think the countryside serenely quiet, unless +you stopped to listen, and caught the ecstasy of sound from birds and +insects all about. + +None of this gave comfort to Mrs. Terhune. Her eyes were red when she +alighted at the church, and she was glad, for she didn’t intend to look +happy. She marched up the aisle and sat down in a front pew beside her +husband. No one else was there except a rosy little girl in spectacles, +and her mother. + +Consulting her wrist watch, Mrs. Terhune saw that she had time to cry a +little longer, and she was about to begin, when she was startled by the +sight of her favorite nephew, Robert Dacier. + +“You here?” she exclaimed, because she had fancied that there were +reasons why he would not enjoy Mildred’s wedding. + +“Yes,” he said affably, and sat down beside her. + +As was mentioned before, he was good at talking, and his aunt and uncle +were pleasantly beguiled, until the chiming of the clock in the belfry +aroused Mr. Terhune. + +“Time they were here,” he said, glancing about. + +Dacier went on talking, but his aunt had grown restless. The little girl +in spectacles had grown restless, too, and was wriggling. + +“Fifteen minutes late!” said Mrs. Terhune. “It’s very odd, Robert! You’d +better see if the clergyman is waiting.” + +Dacier reported that the clergyman was waiting in the vestry, and +growing a little impatient. + +“It seems very strange!” said Mrs. Terhune. + +Twenty minutes--twenty-five--half an hour. Then the clergyman came in, +and, impressed by the appearance of Mr. Terhune, approached him. + +“It’s somewhat awkward for me, as it happens,” he observed. “I have an +important engagement for half past twelve. I was informed that the young +man’s train arrived here shortly after ten, and that he would stop at +Miss Henaberry’s house and bring her here at eleven; and my wife +informed me that she saw a strange young man with two bags get off that +train.” + +“Shall I go and see what’s wrong?” asked Dacier. “It’s only a step.” + +“Oh, please do!” said Mrs. Terhune. + +Off went Robert. He pushed open the little gate, and went up the garden +path to the enchanted cottage, which seemed quieter than ever under the +hot sun. He rang the bell. + +No answer--not a sound inside. + +He rang again, and then opened the door and entered. + +The sitting room was gay with flowers from the garden, and, if possible, +neater and daintier than ever--but empty. Dacier went into the kitchen, +and there, on the table, he saw a frosted cake that caused him a sharp +pang. No one there! + +He went into the little passage and listened, but heard not a sound. + +“Miss Henaberry!” he called. “Please! Mildred!” + +A door slammed open upstairs, and down she came like a whirlwind, such a +tragic and heart-stirring figure! Her dark hair was wildly untidy, her +eyes were heavy with tears, yet she had a look of such stern and +dauntless pride on her face that a man might well feel abashed. + +“Go away!” she cried. “Why do you come here? Go away!” + +“No,” said Dacier. “I’m not going away. They’re waiting for you in the +church. What do you want me to tell them?” + +“Nothing,” she said. + +“That’s not very polite.” + +“Polite!” she cried. “Do you want to make one of your schoolboy jokes +about--this? Go away! I won’t listen to you! I can’t bear to see you!” + +“You’ve got to face this,” said Dacier firmly. “There’s no use flying at +me. Perhaps I can help you.” + +“I don’t want any help--from any one.” + +“Where’s Mallet?” + +It was a blunt enough question, but the shock of it steadied her. She +turned away her head for a minute, and then faced him with something of +her old composure. + +“The--a boy came with a note,” she said evenly. “Mr. Mallet has been +called away on business. The wedding will have to be postponed.” + +Dacier came a little nearer, and looked at her with eyes as steady as +her own. + +“Don’t you think twice is too often?” he asked. + +Her pale face grew scarlet. + +“What do you mean? How can you dare--” + +“I mean just what I said. I think it’s time the wedding came off now,” +he answered. “The clergyman’s there, and the guests; and if you’ll take +me, here’s the bridegroom.” + +She smiled scornfully. + +“That’s very chivalrous, Mr. Dacier, but--” + +“It would please Mrs. Terhune.” + +“I scarcely think you’re called upon to sacrifice yourself for Mrs. +Terhune--or for me, either,” said Mildred, still scornful. “I’d rather +not talk any more.” + +Dacier caught her hand as she was moving away. + +“There are lots of other reasons,” he said; “only there’s not time to +tell them now, even if you were in the mood to listen. Anyhow, Mildred, +I think you know. I’m sure you know. You must have seen, long ago, how I +felt.” + +“Oh, no!” she said, with a sob. “Not now! Do, please, go away, and leave +me alone! You don’t know--you can’t imagine--I could die of shame and +wretchedness. Do go away!” + +“Darling girl!” he said. “Dear, darling girl! Come and have your +wedding! Hold up your dear head again! We’ll say it was a sort of joke, +and you meant me all the time. After all, I’m _almost_ as good a fellow +as Mallet, don’t you think?” + +He said it in a boastful, conceited way that should have been rebuked; +but Mildred did not rebuke him. + +“Oh, you’re a thousand times better!” she cried, instead. “Better and +dearer than any one else in the world! Only--” + +It has been mentioned before that Dacier was good at talking. He needed +all his skill now, for he had only a few minutes in which to overcome +any number of objections, to change her tears to smiles, and to persuade +her to make haste and get ready. He succeeded. + + +VIII + +The clergyman was not surprised, because the bridegroom was unknown to +him anyhow; but the little girl in spectacles, and Mr. and Mrs. Terhune! + +Moreover, there were several things which startled Mildred. When they +had all got back to the cottage, and the bride had gone into the kitchen +for that noble cake, and Dacier had naturally followed her, she asked: + +“Robert, why did you have a wedding ring in your pocket?” + +“I have carried one there for some time, in case of emergencies,” he +answered promptly. + +“And why did you have a license with your name in it?” + +“Foresight,” he replied. “I got that as soon as I saw you.” + +He had come around the table and put his arm about her shoulders, and +she looked up into his gay, audacious face. + +“Robert,” she said sternly, “where is Will Mallet?” + +“I don’t know,” he answered, “and I don’t care; but I don’t mind telling +you that I found out from the moonfaced little girl when he was +expected, and I met him at the railway station.” + +“But--” she began indignantly--and stopped, because he was no longer +smiling. He looked--she was surprised at his expression--he looked like +a person pleasantly but firmly resolved not to be trampled upon; so all +she did was to kiss him. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +SEPTEMBER, 1923 +Vol. LXXIX NUMBER 4 + + + + +The Marquis of Carabas + +THE STRANGE STORY OF TWO YOUNG DOCTORS + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Perhaps you remember the story of “Puss in Boots”--how the talented and +resolute cat caught game in the woods and presented it to the king as +the gift of his master, the _Marquis of Carabas_. Then the cat advised +his master to bathe in the river, and, as the king’s coach rolled past, +he set up a great shout that the _Marquis of Carabas_ was drowning, and +that his fine clothes had been stolen by thieves. The king stopped, +ordered new clothes for the marquis, and took him into the royal coach. +While they drove on, the cat ran ahead, and bullied the workers in the +fields into saying that all the land belonged to _Carabas_. + +There is more in the story, but the chief thing is that the cat secured +for his master a fine castle and estate, and the hand of a beautiful +princess. And, mind you, the young man was nothing on earth but the +youngest son of a poor miller, the _Marquis of Carabas_ being simply an +invention of the clever animal’s. + +Well, there are people alive to-day who have the same ambition as that +devoted cat--people who try to make a _Marquis of Carabas_ out of some +ordinary young man. Unfortunately, they do not always succeed. I know of +a case in point. + +There appeared one day in a certain town in Westchester a new doctor, +arriving unknown and without introduction in the midst of a quite +sufficient supply of well established practitioners. It was a prosperous +town, but not a growing one. There seemed to be nothing for a new doctor +to do, unless he set to work to create a demand for his services--a +thing that doctors can’t very well do. He put out his sign, however, on +his tidy little house--“Noel Hunter, M.D.”--sat down behind his sign, +and waited. + +Now and then he was seen out on his veranda, looking at the barometer, +or strolling out to the garage, where an energetic little car ate its +head off in idleness. Whoever saw him was favorably impressed, because +he was a charming young fellow, slender, tall, and dark, with an honest, +good-humored face and very fine black eyes. Indeed, he was almost too +handsome for a doctor. It was cruel to think of his being called out at +night in all weathers, of having hurried and inadequate meals and too +little sleep, of losing his endearing youth in arduous and exhausting +toil. + +Well, to be sure, that was not happening, He had ample time for sleep, +and, providing he was able to pay, there was nothing to prevent his +eating all day. And that, too, was a pity and a waste, because obviously +he must be longing to give his medical services, and must have studied a +long time to prepare himself. The people who lived on the same street +felt embarrassed and a little guilty when they caught sight of Noel +Hunter, M.D., all ready to be a doctor, but wanted by no one. + + +II + +One day there came to Mr. Miles, the rector of the parish, an affable +little lady, dressed in a conservative style suited to her years--which +were fifty-five or so--and presenting a letter from a clergyman in +Brooklyn. The letter gave information that the bearer was Mrs. Edwin +Carew, “whom we are more than sorry to lose, because of her tact and +sympathy and her invaluable assistance in parish work.” + +There was more of this, too, so that Mr. Miles blushed a little in +deference to Mrs. Edwin Carew as he read it. He welcomed her very +cordially. He assured her that she would find plenty of opportunities +for using her tact and sympathy and for giving her invaluable assistance +in parish work. He was so favorably impressed by the lady that he sent +at once for Mrs. Miles, and Mrs. Miles was instantly charmed. + +“The Needlework Guild is meeting now,” said she. “If you would care to +come in and meet some of the ladies--” + +Mrs. Carew accepted graciously, was brought before this gathering of her +peers, and was judged and found worthy. She seemed to be the nicest sort +of little body, cheerful and kindly and gentle, and though she was far +too well bred to boast, it was obvious that she was a person of some +social importance. She had traveled; she knew the world; she knew what +was what; she was an acquisition. + +“Are you going to be here permanently, Mrs. Carew?” asked the august and +resplendent Mrs. Lorrimer. + +“I hope so,” she answered, smiling. “I’m beginning to be quite fond of +your pretty little town; but it all depends on my nephew. You see, he’s +used to life in a large city, and I’m afraid--Still, I hope he’ll like +it.” + +“Oh! Your nephew?” said Mrs. Lorrimer encouragingly. + +“Yes,” said Mrs. Carew. “Perhaps I did wrong in persuading him to leave +the city and come here, where it’s so--so much quieter; but I feel sure +that after he’s used to it, it will really do him good. He had so many +friends in the city, and so many, many engagements, that it interfered +with his work; and though I know we must make allowances for young +people, still I can’t bear the idea of his talent being wasted.” + +“Oh! His talent?” said Mrs. Lorrimer. + +“Yes,” said Mrs. Carew. “He’s a physician. I think he has already ‘hung +out his shingle,’ as they say--Noel Hunter. Of course, he doesn’t expect +to do much practicing yet. I want him to rest first, and to get +accustomed to the place.” + +As if by magic, Dr. Hunter was transformed by those words from an object +of pity into a very interesting young man. Professionally his life was +not altered, but the very next week he was invited to a little dance; +and every one who saw him there was irresistibly urged to invite him to +something else. Ladies came to call upon Mrs. Carew, to sing the praises +of her charming nephew. He was forever going out, or getting ready to go +out, and he seemed to be very happy about it. + +From the window Mrs. Carew would watch him drive off in his little +closed coupé, so useful for a doctor, who must be abroad in all +weathers. Much as she admired his resplendent appearance, and rejoiced +in his popularity, she did wish that now and then he might be summoned +to something less cheerful than a party. + +That never happened. The more he was danced with and flirted with, the +more did it seem tactless and ill-bred to mention one’s sordid ailments +to him. It was unthinkable to call in one’s dancing partner and confess +to a bilious headache from too much pastry. No one could see him as a +doctor. + +He seemed not at all downcast by this. Indeed, Mrs. Carew sometimes +imagined that he had forgotten all about being a doctor. + +“Don’t you think you ought to read your medical books now and then, +Noel?” she suggested. “Just to--to keep up?” + +“Oh, no!” he replied cheerfully. “I’m not likely to forget all that +stuff that was so much trouble to learn. Don’t worry!” + +“But you mustn’t lose interest, Noel,” she persisted. + +He flushed a little, for he had at the moment two preoccupations which +were nearer to his heart than the theory and practice of medicine. The +first of these was Nesta Lorrimer, and the second was her brother’s +hydroplane. They merged very well, because Nesta was frequently in the +vicinity of the hydroplane, so that they could both be studied together. + +It was unfortunate that Noel did not mention this to his aunt, because +she would have approved heartily of one of those interests; but he knew +that aunts were extremely likely to worry about flying. He was very fond +of her, and didn’t want to worry her; so the poor lady knew nothing. + +Mrs. Lorrimer knew, however. + +“Alan,” she said to her son, “don’t you think you encourage that young +Dr. Hunter a little too much?” + +She spoke moderately, because she had a great respect for her son. He +was a level-headed, intelligent young fellow, who used such things as +hydroplanes only for diversion, and never neglected his business. He was +not handsome, like his sister, but he didn’t need to be. He was a +remarkably successful lawyer for his twenty-seven years, and he was a +good-humored, quick-witted, tolerant fellow whom every one was obliged +to like. + +“Encourage him?” he repeated, with a smile. “That’s a queer way to put +it. I’d like to think I encouraged any one. But why? What’s wrong with +him?” + +“He doesn’t seem to get on very well,” said Mrs. Lorrimer. + +“He’s mistaken his métier,” her son replied casually. “But I like him +very much. Plenty of nerve and grit. As a pilot--” + +“Ah!” Mrs. Lorrimer interrupted. “I dare say; but as a brother-in-law?” + +Alan was astounded, as brothers always are. + +“What?” he exclaimed. “You don’t mean that Nesta--impossible!” + +“I’m afraid she’s growing fond of him, Alan.” + +He reflected in silence for some time, and then he said: + +“Well, after all, she might do worse.” + +“That’s not the question,” replied his mother, a little indignant. “_I_ +think she might do very much better.” + +“I don’t know. He’s a very decent fellow. Personally--” + +“Oh, every one likes him!” she interrupted impatiently; “and every one +seems to have forgotten that we don’t know anything at all about him. +Mrs. Carew is very nice, of course; but after all, they’ve only been +here a few months. They don’t seem at all well off, and yet he doesn’t +appear to be worried about not having the least sign of a practice. I +can’t help thinking--” + +She paused significantly. + +“What can’t you help thinking?” inquired her son, with a smile. “That +poor Hunter has some sinister secret in his past?” + +“No,” said she. “No, not that. I don’t like to say it, but I’ve +sometimes thought he might be nothing but an adventurer, who came here +to find a wife with money.” + +“Mother!” exclaimed Alan, quite shocked. “That’s not like you!” + +But his trained and disciplined brain refused to remain shocked. He was +obliged to admit that the qualities for which he admired Hunter--courage +and daring and steady nerves--did not always signify moral excellence. +An adventurer might very well possess them; and about Hunter’s former +life, about his home life, he knew absolutely nothing. + +“Very well!” he said to himself. “In justice to Nesta, and in justice to +Hunter as well, it’s my business to find out.” + +The thing was to take him by surprise, to see him at home, off his +guard. + + +III + +Alan felt unpleasantly like a spy as he drew near the house that +evening. He would have preferred putting Hunter on the stand and +cross-examining him. After all, he was a lawyer, not a detective, and to +go to a friend’s house for the purpose of observing and judging him +seemed an unworthy thing to do. + +“Still, if he hasn’t anything to be ashamed of, he won’t care,” he +reflected. “If he has, I’d better know it. I’ll have to study him +carefully for some time.” + +He rang the bell, and was amazed at the confusion the sound apparently +caused. He had to wait outside for a long time, while furniture was +being pushed about, footsteps hurried to and fro, and doors were closed. +Then, at last, the door was opened, and he was still more amazed. + +No one had ever heard mention of any other members of the household but +Mrs. Carew and Hunter. Who, then, was this lovely girl, dark and +serious, a little flushed and ruffled, as if from haste, but with the +high-held head, the level, unabashed glance, the dignity of a young +princess? + +Having come expressly to observe, Alan did observe, and he thought this +was the most intelligent and charming face he had seen in many a day. +The girl was obliged to repeat her question. + +“Who is it you want, sir?” + +“Sir”--impossible! She didn’t speak like a servant, or dress like one, +or look like one. + +“The doctor in?” he asked. + +“No, sir--not at present. If you care to wait--” + +He asked for Mrs. Carew, and gave her his name, and she left him in the +little sitting room, where he began to walk up and down, very much +perplexed. A pretty room, furnished in a very good taste, but shabby. +Through the half-open folding doors he could see a dining room of very +much the same sort, with the table still laid, as if the diners had just +risen. And--the table was laid for three! + +“For three!” he said to himself. “And yet there’s no guest here. Mrs. +Carew and Hunter--and who else?” + +There was a light, quick step on the stairs. Turning, he saw the +inexplicable girl descending. This was an excellent opportunity to +study her, which Alan did not miss. A remarkable girl! Mere prettiness +was not a thing that particularly appealed to this young man. He had met +dozens of pretty girls without losing his heart. What interested him now +was not the fine regularity of her features, but her air of candid and +unassuming dignity, and the thoughtful intelligence of her face. + +She entered the room to tell him that Mrs. Carew would be down directly. + +“Thank you!” said he, and sought desperately for something to say that +would keep her there. + +Before he could do so, she had gone--only into the dining room, however, +where he could still watch her as she cleared off the table. The more he +watched, the more impressed and the more puzzled he became. When he +caught sight of her hands--strong and beautiful hands, exquisitely +tended--he very nearly exclaimed aloud. Three places at the table, and a +girl with hands like that playing the servant! + +“It’s a good thing I came,” he reflected grimly. “There’s something here +that needs explaining.” + +Well, he didn’t get much out of Mrs. Carew when she came down. He +brought the talk around to the topic of servants. She said that _she_ +never had any trouble with them. + +“You’re fortunate,” he observed. + +“Indeed I am!” she replied brightly. “How charming the country is +beginning to look now!” + +After this, he couldn’t very well go on with the subject; but he felt no +hesitation in approaching Hunter in a more direct fashion when they were +alone. + +“That’s a very remarkable young woman who opened the door for me,” he +said. His eyes were on the other man’s face, and he saw him turn red. + +“Yes,” said Hunter. “She--she is.” + +But Alan’s eyes were still on him, and he was obliged to continue. + +“She’s--not exactly a servant, you know,” he said. “In fact, she’s a +sort of--relation. Helps my aunt, you know. She--she is remarkable, +Lorrimer, very.” + +Alan gave serious attention to this problem. His legal training did not +make him disposed to believe everything he heard, though he was too +intelligent to go to the other extreme and believe nothing. + +What was the explanation? Had Hunter made a misalliance, which he was +ashamed of, and wanted to conceal? No--marriage with that girl wouldn’t +be a misalliance for any one, and she wasn’t the sort who would consent +to being concealed. + +His sister? There was no possible reason for keeping a sister like that +hidden. If it was the case that she really was a poor relation kept as a +servant to help Mrs. Carew, then it was a very bad case, and the aunt +and the nephew might well be ashamed of themselves. Alan believed that +they were ashamed, too. + +Hunter had mentioned that he was going to take Mrs. Carew to the moving +pictures that evening, and Alan decided then and there that he would use +that time for further investigations. + +“Because, if they’re capable of making a drudge of a girl like that,” he +said to himself, “Nesta’s going to be told. It’s the most beastly piece +of snobbishness I’ve ever come across! Evidently she eats with them. No +doubt she’s one of the family until an outsider appears, and then she’s +nobody.” + +He was a little surprised at the vigor of his indignation. As a rule, he +didn’t easily become indignant. + +“But she’s such a remarkable girl,” he explained to himself. “I’ve never +seen any one like her.” + + +IV + +This time, when he returned to the house, Alan did not feel in the least +guilty, although he was now coming deliberately in Hunter’s absence, and +to collect evidence against him. On the contrary, he felt like a knight +sallying forth to rescue a lady from duress. + +He rang the bell without hesitation, and the girl opened the door. He +had a plan. He explained to her that the doctor had invited him to make +use of his medical library whenever he wished--which was true--and that +he needed to look up fractures for a plaintiff in a damage suit--which +was not true. He made his explanation long and markedly polite, and he +was pleased to notice that she forgot all that nonsense about saying +“sir.” Instead, she preceded him into the library as if it were her own, +lighted a lamp, and, going to the bookshelves, brought out two volumes. + +“These are on fractures,” she said. + +This did not surprise him. She looked like a girl who would know all +sorts of things. + +“I’ll sit here and make a few notes, if you don’t mind,” Alan said, for +this was part of his plan. + +He waited until he heard a door close after her somewhere. He waited a +little longer; then he rose. He intended to be awkward, and to pull down +a lot of books, making a great deal of noise. Then she would come back +and help him to pick them up, and it would be easy enough, in such +circumstances, to start a conversation. But--well, if his intention was +to make a noise, he did that, certainly, and the girl did come back, in +great haste; but it is not possible to believe that it was part of his +plan to pull the bookcase over entirely, or that a bronze bust should +fall and hit him on the side of the face. + +“I’m very sorry,” he said earnestly. “I don’t know how I came to be so +clumsy. I--really I’m very sorry.” + +“So am I,” said she. “Let’s see!” + +To his amazement, she took his chin in fingers surprisingly strong, and +turned his face toward the light. + +“You’d better come into the office,” she said. + +“It’s nothing, thanks,” he began, but she had already vanished through +the door, and he felt obliged to follow. + +He said nothing at all while she washed and dressed the trifling wound, +but he watched her moving about the bright, glittering little room, he +noted her precision, her deftness, her familiarity--and he tried to draw +conclusions. + +“You’re a trained nurse!” he suddenly exclaimed. + +She turned toward him, and for the first time he saw her smile. + +“No, Mr. Lorrimer, I’m not,” she said. “Now I think you’ll do very +nicely.” + +It was a tone of polite dismissal, but he did not intend to go. + +“I’ll help you first to repair the damage I did,” he said. + +She replied that he needn’t. + +He said that he wanted to, and must; and because he was just the sort of +young man he was, and because she had the intelligence to see it, she +admitted him then and there to a sort of friendship. After the bookcase +was set upright again, and all the books restored to order, they sat +down, one on either side of the library table, in the most natural way +in the world. + +“You’d make a wonderfully good nurse,” he observed. + +“I’m afraid not,” she answered, smiling again. “I shouldn’t like it at +all!” + +“But you seem to know a good deal about that sort of thing,” he went on. +“It must interest you.” + +She made no reply, and for a moment he feared she had thought him unduly +curious--impertinent, perhaps; but there was no sign of displeasure in +her face. She was looking thoughtfully before her, grave, serene, almost +as if she had not heard him. Suddenly he fancied he understood. + +“Of course!” he said to himself. “She’s in love with Hunter, and +naturally she takes an interest in his work. That’s why she’s here, +filling a servant’s place, simply so that she can be near him!” + +There was no reason why this should make him indignant, yet, instead of +being touched by the idea of such devotion, he was angry and +disappointed. + +“I wonder what Mrs. Carew thinks of it!” he pursued. “She probably +thinks that this girl isn’t good enough for her precious Noel. She would +object to such a marriage; or perhaps she doesn’t know what the girl is. +Perhaps he doesn’t know, either. I may be the only one who has guessed +her secret.” + +Then it occurred to him that he was drawing conclusions from very +insubstantial premises, also that he was forgetting the object for which +he had come, and that his silence might not be impressing her favorably. +Looking at her again, he was forced to the unwelcome conclusion that she +didn’t care whether he spoke or not. It was presumptuous nonsense to +feel sorry for a girl like this. Whatever she did, she intended to do; +there was no helplessness or futility in those fine features. + +Alan felt ashamed of himself for trying to find out about her in any +indirect way. She deserved to be treated with absolute honesty and +candor. He knew she would not misunderstand anything else. + +“I came back here to see you,” he said bluntly. + +She accepted that tranquilly. + +“As soon as I saw you, I felt a very great interest in you,” he went on. +“I don’t mean that as an impertinence, or as a compliment. It’s simply +the truth. There are some human beings who make that sort of impression +on others, and it seems to me a foolish and a wrong thing to stifle that +interest because it doesn’t happen to be conventional.” + +“As a human being, I welcome your interest,” said she, with her quiet +smile. “I’ve heard of you from Noel, and I’m sure I should enjoy talking +to you.” + +“Of course I knew at once that you weren’t what you--you pretended to +be,” he went on rather clumsily. + +She stopped him. + +“It wasn’t pretending, Mr. Lorrimer. I am here as a servant.” + +“You shouldn’t be.” + +“It suits me. After all, there’s nothing better in life than really +serving the people who need you, is there?” + +“Sometimes there is,” he answered promptly. “It may mean the sacrifice +of a fine life to a much less valuable one.” + +A faint color rose in her cheeks. + +“Well, you see,” she said, “I don’t feel wise and perfect enough to +judge which lives are the most valuable.” + +He was silent, because he could not well say that her life was a hundred +times more valuable than all the Mrs. Carews and Dr. Hunters ever +born--that in her grave youth, and her fine and dignified simplicity, +she seemed to him absolutely invaluable. + +“I dare say you’re right,” he answered seriously. “I’m sure your way is +a good way. If you think you really would care to talk to me, when may I +come again?” + +“I have Sunday afternoons off,” she answered, and he believed there was +a hint of a laugh in her voice. + +“Then I’ll come at--” + +“Oh, no! That’s not the way it’s done. I’ll meet you somewhere and we’ll +take a walk,” she said, and this time she could not suppress a smile. + +Alan refused to smile, however. He didn’t care if she came in an apron. +He was willing to sit on the back steps, or in the kitchen, so long as +he could be with her. It wasn’t a joke--it was serious, the most serious +thing he had ever known. + +He proposed a convenient meeting place, and she agreed to it. + +“But I’d rather you didn’t mention me to any one, please,” she added. “I +like a--a very quiet life, just now.” + + +V + +This day was going to be the day. Nothing was going to put him off--not +the fact that the mirror showed him a face he hated to think was his +own, not the inner voice which warned him that it might be better to +remain in doubt and still have hope. He didn’t want hope, if it was a +false one. + +He went downstairs, aware of all sorts of new defects in himself. He +felt that he was the most commonplace, uninteresting fellow imaginable, +and that there was nothing about him that could possibly please or +interest any one. + +Mrs. Lorrimer and a group of friends were on the veranda. He saluted +them with a strange sort of severity, and went off down the road, in an +odd state of despair and determination. + +“Yes,” said his mother proudly. “It’s very unusual to see a man as +serious as Alan is, at _his_ age!” + +She was wrong. She had herself seen any number of young fellows of +twenty-seven overtaken by exactly the same sort of seriousness, only, in +the case of her son, she didn’t recognize it. Alan himself, however, had +known what it was for weeks--it was Judith. + +She had told him to call her Judith, and he did, hundreds of times, but +not once in her hearing. Indeed, there was an astounding difference +between the things he said to her when she was not there and the words +she actually heard from him. If she could only have heard those other +things, or guessed them! He knew that what he was going to say would be +so inferior to what he felt and thought. + +He turned into the lane where they always met, and sat upon the stone +wall to wait. He was thinking about her, in a curious way, half +wretched, half blissful. He didn’t care two straws about her very humble +position, nor did she. He _had_ sat on the back steps and talked to her +when the others were out, he _had_ seen her in an apron, peeling +potatoes, and she was more than ever exalted in his eyes by her quiet +acceptance of such things. There was to him a sort of nobility in +everything she did, in all her words and gestures, in her smile, even in +her little transient moments of gayety. + +Nor did he care two straws for the mystery that surrounded her. Wherever +she came from, whatever her name or her history or her reason for living +as she did, he knew that she was right, and could never be anything +else. + +No--the things that troubled him were those things which so often +trouble people in his condition--all sorts of doubts and alarms and +hopes and determinations mixed together. He wasn’t good enough, but he +was obliged to convince her that he was. She couldn’t care for him, and +yet she must. + +At last he saw her coming, and went forward to meet her. She was walking +unusually fast, as if, he thought with a fast beating heart, she were +hurrying to him. Whatever joy he had felt in that thought vanished at +the sight of her face. + +“Judith!” he said. “Tell me, what has happened?” + +She had all her usual fine composure, but she was very pale, and, in +some subtle way apparent more to his heart than to his eyes, there was +grief upon her face. She did not answer him, but she held out her hand, +and he fancied that she clung to him. + +“Let’s walk a little,” she said, after a moment. + +They went on side by side along the lane, thick with cool, white dust +under the old trees. So dense was the foliage on the branches meeting +overhead that the light came through it greenish and wavering, like +water. The dust might have been the sandy floor of the sea, and the +church bells that rang seemed mournful and distant, as they must sound +to the mermaids. + +A painful sense of unreality oppressed Alan. He didn’t know her; she was +terribly remote, a stranger, indifferent to him. Not once in all the +time they had spent together had she talked freely about herself, about +her life. She might have any number of anxieties and griefs of which he +had no suspicion. She had been friendly, but in such an impersonal, +untroubled way! + +At last they reached the fence at the foot of the lane, where the fields +began, and she spoke. + +“Noel has gone,” she said. + +“Gone?” he echoed. + +“He left a letter,” she continued. “Perhaps I had better read you a part +of it.” She took a letter out of her pocket, and turned as he noticed, +past the first page to the second. She read: + + “So I’ve taken this job in the airplane factory. It’s a remarkably + good job, and I expect to do rather more than well. I’m sorry, my + dearest girl, to disappoint you so after all you’ve done for me, + but, to be frank, I _can’t_ be a doctor. I always hated the whole + thing. I’d never have been any good at it. Now I’ve found the one + thing I am good at. I think you know how I felt about Nesta + Lorrimer, and now I see some faint chance of being able to speak to + her some day. + + “Try to forgive me, Judith. It is really the best and kindest thing + I can do for you--to clear out and leave you free. + +“That’s all that matters,” she ended. “So you see--” + +Her look amazed and angered him terribly. She seemed so sure that he +would understand and sympathize. She wasn’t a child, she was very far +from slow-witted, and she must have seen how it was with him. And now +this! + + Try to forgive me, Judith. It is the best and kindest thing I can + do for you--to clear out and leave you free. + +Such bitterness and pain overwhelmed him that he could scarcely speak. + +“I’d rather--go now,” he said. “Another time--I can’t--” + +“But--” she began. + +“Not now!” he said vehemently. “It was cruel of you to do this. Why +didn’t you tell me before that you weren’t free? Why did you let me go +on? I trusted you so! And all this time you’ve been thinking of him! No, +please don’t speak to me! Let me go!” + +She was looking at him with a curious sort of inquiry, her dark brows +drawn together in a faint frown. + +“You don’t understand,” she said. “I thought you had guessed long ago. I +didn’t think you’d have--gone on like this, if you hadn’t guessed!” + +She was not by nature impulsive, but it was impulse alone that moved her +now. She came nearer to him, laid her hand on his shoulder, and looked +into his face, with bright tears in her eyes. + +“Oh, Alan!” she cried. “It was a beautiful thing to do--to accept me on +faith, like that! Not to know, or to care! Oh, Alan, my dear!” + +“Judith!” he said. “Don’t you see what you’ve done? Nothing else could +have mattered to me, except your caring for him--” + +“For Noel?” she asked. “I’m afraid I cared for him a little too +much--more than was good for him. But, you see, he’s my only brother.” + +“Brother!” shouted Alan. “Then why--” + +“Walk home with me, and I’ll explain,” said she. “I thought you had +found out long ago.” + +Alan went on by her side, willing to wait forever for any further +explanation. There were a few questions he wanted to ask, and Judith +answered them to his satisfaction, but they had nothing to do with Noel. + +“Now look!” said she. + +He did look, but he saw nothing but the front of Dr. Hunter’s neat +little house. + +“I don’t see anything,” he said. + +She opened the gate, and he followed her along the path and up on the +veranda. + +“Look at _that_!” she said. + +It was nothing but the usual sign in the window. “Noel”--but it wasn’t! +In blue letters on a white ground was printed: + + JUDITH HUNTER, M.D. + + +VI + +“You see,” she said, a little later, when they were in the library, +“Noel and I were left orphans when we were very young, and Aunt +Katherine Carew took care of us. I couldn’t begin to tell you all she +did, all the sacrifices she made. Naturally, it was Noel, the boy, that +she hoped and expected most from. I wanted to study medicine, and poor +Noel couldn’t make up his mind exactly what he wanted to do; so he chose +that, too, and we studied together. It was a terrible strain for Aunt +Katherine. It took almost all she had, and after we’d both left the +hospital, she couldn’t possibly set up two young doctors. We talked it +over, and it was my idea to give him his chance first. He’s two years +older, and--well, I thought I could wait. Poor Aunt Katherine couldn’t +manage everything herself, and we couldn’t afford a servant, and yet she +felt that it was very important to keep up appearances; so I decided +that I would be the servant. I intended to be invisible until I was +ready to appear as a full-fledged M.D. myself.” She paused, and smiled a +little. “We both worked very hard to make a doctor of Noel,” she went +on. “I think now that we tried a little too hard. If he hadn’t felt that +so much was expected of him, he might have gone through with it.” + +“He may do better where he is,” said Alan. + +“I can’t think that,” said she, “even if he makes a great deal of money; +because, for me, our profession is by far the noblest one in the world. +There’s nothing else so fine and so--” + +“Absolutely nothing else?” asked Alan. “Nothing to compare with it?” + +He thought that the slight confusion she betrayed was infinitely more +becoming to her than her usual composure. + +“Well, of course,” said she, “there’s--there’s _you_!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +OCTOBER, 1923 +Vol. LXXX NUMBER 1 + + + + +Out of the Woods + +THE STORY OF AN ARTLESS GIRL, A HUNGRY WOLF, AND A WONDERFUL GRANDMOTHER + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +When you learn that this story begins with the heroine setting off +through the woods to visit her grandmother, who was ill, you may guess +that it is the familiar tale of _Little Red Riding Hood_. I must admit +that that is what it is, and I warn you that you may count upon a very +artless little heroine and a wolf of insinuating manners and glib +tongue; but _this_ grandmother will not be eaten up. + +Nor did Ethel carry a basket containing a little pat of butter and a +cake. She had, instead, a large and luxurious box of candied fruit under +her arm; and instead of singing through the woods, she wore a sulky and +miserable expression. Unfortunately red hoods are not in vogue, for such +a thing would have been notably becoming to her little gypsy face. +However, she was young enough and lovely enough to look well in +anything, even a sulky expression. + +She was not without some excuse for her discontented air. Ethel was one +of those unfortunate little bones of contention so often to be found in +divided families, and she had been so much disputed over and argued +about, and so rarely consulted or even questioned, that she had grown to +think of herself as a helpless pawn in an incomprehensible game, where +she could never win anything. + +The disputes had begun long before she was born. Her father’s family had +that pride of newly acquired wealth beside which pride of ancestry +shrinks to nothing. Indeed, to spring from splendid ancestors may often +make one feel a little humble, but to feel that one is vastly more +important than any of one’s forbears makes for arrogance. + +The Taylors had objected very much to the marriage of their only son. +Even when the marriage was made, and there was no earthly use in +objecting, they kept on, in a very unpleasant way. All the misfortunes +which the young man brought upon his wife and child by his recklessness +and folly only increased their anger against the victims; and when he +died, they all came forward with helpful suggestions as to what he +should have done when he was alive. + +Ethel had been a small girl of nine then, and not yet looked upon as +guilty; but when she refused to leave her mother and take advantage of +the offers made by several of the Taylors, she lost their sympathy. Her +mother, with criminal selfishness, hadn’t made the least attempt to +persuade her child to leave her. On the contrary, she had gone back to +her own people, and had lived with them in quiet contentment. + +It was to these people of hers that the Taylors so strongly objected. +She herself was a quiet and inoffensive creature who gave little +trouble, but her parents were Italians, and poor, and not ashamed of +either of the two things. + +Dr. Mazetti had been professor of romance languages in a small Western +college, but he had become so absorbed in the enormous commentary upon +Dante which he was writing that he found his teaching very much in the +way; so he gave up his chair. Mrs. Taylor, the paternal grandmother, had +spoken about this. + +“Of course,” she had said, not very pleasantly, “it’s a good thing to +have faith in your husband’s work; but suppose it’s _not_ a financial +success?” + +“We don’t expect it to be,” replied Mrs. Mazetti, in her excellent +English. “Such work as that is not undertaken for money.” + +“Do you mean to say that you’ll permit your husband to give up his--” +began Mrs. Taylor, but the other interrupted her. + +“A _man_ does not ask the permission of others to do what he thinks +best,” she said quietly. “I should be ashamed of myself if I were even +to suggest that he should sacrifice his life’s work on my account.” + +“What about yourself? Aren’t you sacrificing--” + +“I sacrifice nothing,” said Mrs. Mazetti. “I am very, very happy and +proud.” + +And so she was, and so was her only child until she married young +Taylor; and so she was again when she came home with the little Ethel, +to live with those simple, gentle people once more. Not for long, +however, for she died some two years later. + +Then the arguments and disputes began again, and this time the Taylors +won. Children of eleven are pitifully easy to bribe, and while Ethel was +still dazed and stricken after the loss of her mother, all these +relations competed for her favor. She was petted and pampered as she had +never been before in her life. + +It is regrettable to admit that she liked all this, liked the toys and +the pretty clothes and the indulgence better than the benign and quiet +régime of her grandfather Mazetti, who believed that children should be +literally “brought up” to the level of the wiser and more experienced +adults about them, instead of bringing a whole household down to +childish standards. He was always very patient and gentle, but he was +too fond of talking about Dante, and of relating anecdotes about an +Italian poet who insisted upon being tied into his chair, so that he +couldn’t run away from his studies. + +Moreover, old Dr. Mazetti had no money to spend upon toys and clothes. +The Taylors took no interest in Dante or any other poet, but they took +Ethel to the circus; so she said she wanted to live with Aunt Amy, her +father’s sister. + +She wasn’t aware, at the time, how terribly she had hurt the Mazettis. +They said very little. Indeed, they discussed it in private, and decided +that it was their duty to say very little. Aunt Amy could give Ethel +material benefits which they could not give; and if the child preferred +that sort of thing, it was, after all, neither unnatural nor unexpected. + +“Each must find his own,” said Dr. Mazetti. “What is joy for one is a +burden for another.” + +So they let her go, and they did it beautifully, without saddening her +little heart with reproaches or tears. She came back to visit them once +a month or so, but somehow, in her new existence, this quiet old couple +had begun to seem very foreign, very unreal. + +She was abroad with her aunt when Dr. Mazetti died. Though she grieved +for him honestly, she was too young and too busy to nourish any sorrow +long. + + +II + +When Ethel Taylor came home, at nineteen, her grandmother seemed like a +little ghost from the past, utterly unconnected with her present life. +She still went to visit the old lady, and sat in the familiar room in +her little cottage, where the bronze bust of Dante appeared to impose a +dignified calm; but these visits were nothing but interludes to real +life, and real life, just now, was a miserable thing. + +The trouble was that Aunt Amy kept on being Aunt Amy, while the childish +Ethel and the nineteen-year-old one were entirely different persons. +Aunt Amy wanted her to come out, and to be a nice, happy débutante like +other girls; but something in Ethel’s blood rebelled against that. She +called it a “modern spirit,” and never realized that instead of being +modern, it was the old Mazetti strain, come down to her from people who +for generations had not lived by bread alone. + +She told her aunt that she wanted to be a singer. + +“That’s a charming accomplishment,” said Aunt Amy affably. + +“I mean I want really to study--for years and years!” + +“Certainly, dear, if you can find the time.” + +“Time!” said Ethel. “What else do I ever do but waste time?” + +“Naturally you can’t neglect your social duties--” + +“Duties!” + +“Please don’t repeat my words in that odd way,” said Aunt Amy, a little +hurt. “If you want to study singing, there’s no reason why you +shouldn’t, so long as you’re not excessive about it.” + +“But I want to be excessive! I want to give all my time to it! I want to +be a professional singer!” + +Aunt Amy laughed, not in order to be irritating, but because she really +thought it was funny. Not being a woman of much penetration, she told +some of her friends about that absurd little Ethel’s fantastic idea. + +As a result, the girl was teased about it. Ethel couldn’t endure being +teased. She had that queer lack of self-confidence, combined with +tremendous resolution and a little vanity, that belong to young artists, +and she felt that she was absurd, although she really knew that she +wasn’t. She was ashamed to practice now, and at the same time she +exulted in her clear, strong, flexible voice. When she was asked to +sing, she refused; yet sometimes, when she knew there were people in the +drawing-room, she would go up the stairs or through the hall, singing +her loudest and sweetest, half terrified, half delighted, at the +glorious flood of melody that rose from her heart. + +She didn’t want anything else. She couldn’t and wouldn’t be bothered +with “social duties.” She wanted to work hard, all day and every day, +until she was mistress of this great gift of hers, until she could sing +in reality as she did in imagination. She had fits of black depression, +when the sounds that came from her throat seemed a mockery of what she +intended. At other moments she was in wild spirits, because she was sure +she had made a little progress. + +Her changing humors were so marked that Aunt Amy was gravely perturbed. +She felt that Ethel was becoming “eccentric,” which was the worst thing +any one could be, and she attributed it all to this annoying obsession +with singing. In all good faith, she did what she thought best for the +girl--she stopped her lessons. + +Ethel wept and stormed and entreated and argued until she was almost +ill, but without moving Aunt Amy. + +“No!” that lady said firmly. “If you’ll put all that nonsense out of +your head, and lead a normal, sensible life like other girls, I’ll let +you take up singing again in a year.” + +She hoped and believed that within a year’s time such a pretty and +delightful girl would surely find something better to think about. + +Ethel was helpless. She was exquisitely dressed, and she lived in great +comfort and luxury, but she hadn’t a penny of her own to pay for +lessons. + +Artists, however--even young and undeveloped ones--are very hard to deal +with, because they will not give up and be sensible. Instead of +resigning herself to doing without what she wanted, Ethel did nothing +but think how she could get at least a part of it. Being nineteen, and +rash, and terribly in earnest, she was dallying with a singularly +unsuitable idea. + + +III + +“Hello, Lad!” she said, not at all surprised, and apparently not very +much pleased, at the sudden appearance of a young man on that quiet path +through the woods. + +“Hello, Ethel!” he returned, and fell into step beside her. + +She didn’t trouble to glance at her companion. She knew exactly how he +looked, anyhow. He was slender and supple and dark, and handsome in his +way--which was not her way. + +There were times when the sleekness of his hair and the brightness of +his smile and the extreme fastidiousness of his clothes exasperated her. +There were other times when his talk about music made her see in him the +one sympathetic, understanding person on earth. He had learned to read +the signs, and to tell which sort of time it was; and he fancied that +this was a favorable moment. + +“Have you been thinking--” he began softly. + +“Naturally,” said she. “I suppose every one does, once in a while.” + +Young Ladislaw Metz was not easily discouraged. He, too, was an artist. + +“Do you mind my walking with you, Ethel?” he asked patiently. “I came +all the way out from the city on the chance of meeting you here, because +I had something special to tell you.” + +She thought she knew what he meant, and frowned; but when he began to +speak, the frown vanished, and she sat down on the grass to listen. + + * * * * * + +Old Mrs. Mazetti was waiting and waiting in her chair by the window. All +the bright spring afternoon had passed. The sky was blue no more, but +faint and mournful as the sun went down. Outside, the light lingered, +but in the room it was dark--very dark, very quiet. Ethel had written to +say that she would come early, and for hours the old lady had been +watching the road along which her granddaughter must come. It always +made her uneasy to think of a girl as young and pretty as Ethel +traveling alone. + +This was one of the very few ideas that Aunt Amy shared with Mrs. +Mazetti. Aunt Amy wanted Ethel to go properly in a motor car, but her +niece was so obstinately set on going by train that she had yielded. +After all, it was such a trifling matter--an hour’s journey to a suburb, +to visit a grandmother. The good lady never so much as imagined the +existence of Ladislaw Metz, or any one like him. + +But old Mrs. Mazetti did. Not that she knew anything of this particular +young man, but she had had opportunity, in her long life, to observe +that in such cases there generally was a young man. When Ethel began +taking more and more time between the station and the house, the old +lady grew more and more sure, and more distressed. + +She said nothing, however, because her grandchild showed no disposition +to confide in her, and she knew that more harm than good would result +from asking questions. She couldn’t get near to Ethel. She had tried +time after time, with all her quiet subtlety, to bring about a greater +intimacy, to show how steadfast and profound was her sympathy; but Ethel +never saw. + +In fact, Ethel didn’t know that she needed sympathy. She thought that +all she wanted was to be let alone. Without in the least meaning to be +unkind, she ignored the invaluable love that would so greatly have +helped her. + +For the third time the servant came in to light the lamp, and this time +Mrs. Mazetti permitted it. She had given up expecting Ethel for that +day. + +“She has forgotten,” she thought. + +In spite of her bitter disappointment, she could still smile a little +over the girl’s careless youth. The sun had vanished now, and a strange +yellow twilight lay over the earth like a sulphurous mist. It was a +melancholy hour. The brightness of the little room made the outside +world more forlorn and dim by contrast. + +Mrs. Mazetti was about to turn away from the window with a sigh, when +she caught sight of Ethel hurrying along the road--with a young man. The +girl’s companion left her when they were still some distance from the +house. If the old lady hadn’t had remarkably sharp eyes, she would never +have seen him. + +Ethel came in alone. + +“Grandmother!” she said. “I’m awfully ashamed of myself for being so +late!” + +She really was ashamed and sorry, but it was not her nature to invent +excuses, and she had no intention of explaining. Mrs. Mazetti saw all +this perfectly, and did not fail to note something defiant in her +grandchild’s expression. Nevertheless, she meant to come to the point +this time. + +“You were with a friend?” she asked mildly. + +“Yes, grandmother.” + +“Your Aunt Amy knows this friend?” + +Ethel tried to imitate that tranquil, affectionate tone. + +“No, grandmother, she doesn’t. He’s just a boy I met at the studio where +I used to take singing lessons.” + +“And you think she would not care for him?” + +“I know she wouldn’t,” Ethel answered candidly. “I don’t care for him so +very much myself; but we’re interested in the same things, and nobody +else is.” + +“In music?” + +“Yes. He’s--” Ethel began, but she stopped. + +What was the use of going on, and being told again how absurd she was? +Mrs. Mazetti was silent, too, but not because she felt discouraged. She +was thinking, trying to understand. + +“You are still always thinking of the singing?” she asked softly. + +Ethel’s face flushed, and her young mouth set in a harsh line. + +“I’m not going to listen to any more lectures,” she thought. “No one +understands. No one ever will!” + +“This young man is a musician?” her grandmother asked. + +“Yes, in a way,” said Ethel. “Isn’t the country pretty at this time of +the year, grandmother?” + +The old lady looked out of the window at the rapidly darkening sky, +against which the trees stood out as black as ink. It seemed to her not +at all pretty now, but vast and terrible. + +“My little Ethel!” she thought. “My little bird, who longs to sing! What +is this going on now, poor foolish little one? What am I to do?” + +She missed her husband acutely. She missed him always, but more than +ever at this instant. Ethel would have listened to him, for every one +did. Quiet and tranquil as he was, there had been an air of authority +about him that she had never seen disregarded. + +Ethel was very still. The lamp threw a clear light on her warm, vivid +young face, downcast and plainly unhappy. + +“If I spoke to your Aunt Amy about those lessons?” suggested the old +lady. + +“It wouldn’t do the least bit of good, grandmother. I’ve said everything +there is to be said; and--anyhow, I don’t care now.” + +“Why not, Ethel? Why not now?” + +“Oh, I don’t know!” Ethel replied airily. “Let’s not talk about it, +grandmother. I’ve brought some candied fruit. You like that, don’t you?” + +The old lady untied the flamboyant package with fingers that were not +very steady. While she was doing so, the clock struck six. + +“I’ll have to go,” said Ethel quickly. “I’m sorry I came so late and had +such a tiny visit, grandmother, but--” + +“Wait, my little Ethel. Gianetta will order a taxi.” + +“Oh, no, thanks!” said Ethel. “I like the walk.” + +“Not now, in the dark, my dear.” + +“I don’t mind the dark. It’s really not at all late. I’ll--” + +“No!” said the old lady with unexpected firmness. “There must be a taxi, +and Gianetta will go with you to the train.” + +Ethel answered politely, but with equal firmness, that she didn’t want +that. + +“Come here, my little Ethel!” said her grandmother. When the girl stood +before her, she took both of her hands. “This friend--this young man--is +waiting for you?” + +Ethel flushed, but she answered with the fine honesty that had been hers +all her life. + +“Yes!” she said, in just the sturdy, defiant tone she used to confess a +piece of childish mischief years and years ago. + +“You see me here,” said Mrs. Mazetti, “unable even to rise from my +chair. I could do nothing to stop you, if I wished. I do not wish, +because I trust you; only I ask you to tell me a little.” + +Ethel was more moved than she wished to be. She bent to kiss the soft +white hair. + +“I’d rather not, please!” she said. + +“If you will remember, my little Ethel, that your mother always came to +me, always told me what troubled her! I am very old. I have learned very +much, seen very much. I could help you.” + +“But you wouldn’t, grandmother. You wouldn’t like my--plan.” + +“Then perhaps I could make a better one.” + +Mrs. Mazetti felt the girl’s warm hands tremble, and saw her lip quiver. +She waited, terribly anxious. + +“You see,” said Ethel, “all I care about is being able to sing. Nobody +believes that. No one understands except Ladislaw!” + +“That is the young man?” + +“Yes--Ladislaw Metz,” said Ethel, a little impatient at this interest in +the least important part of her story. “He knows what it means to me.” + +“What is he? He sings?” + +“He’s a barytone. He’s going to be a wonderful singer some day.” + +“But now? What is he now?” + +“Well, you see, he’s poor, and he can’t afford to go on studying just +now. So--I don’t like to tell you, because you’ll think he’s not really +a musician--he’s on the stage.” + +“Ah!” said the old lady, with perfect composure. “The theater? An +operetta?” + +“Well, no--it’s vaudeville. He’s been singing awful, cheap, popular +songs, just to keep himself alive. Now he wants a partner for a better +sort of turn--an act, you know. We should sing--” + +“We?” + +“He’s going to give me a chance,” said Ethel quietly. The old lady was +silent for a moment. + +“I should like to hear about it,” she told the girl at last, in a voice +that touched Ethel profoundly--a voice so determined to sound cheerful +and sympathetic. + +“I can’t tell you, grandmother,” she said gently; “because you’d think +it was your duty to tell Aunt Amy, and she’d try to stop me. I don’t +intend to be stopped. I may never have another chance. I don’t care what +I have to sacrifice. I’d gladly give up anything on earth for my +singing. You can’t think what it’s like to have that in you--such a +terrible longing--to know that you _can_ do it, and to be stopped and +turned aside and laughed at!” She bent and kissed the old lady again. +“I’ve got to go now, grandmother dear!” she said, with a sob. + +“No! Little Ethel! No!” + +“I’ve got to, grandmother. I promised.” + +“Ethel! You promised what?” + +The girl was frankly crying now. + +“Good-by, darling!” she said. “You’ve always been my dearest, kindest +friend. If I hadn’t been a little beast, I’d never have left you; but I +am a little beast. I must go my own way. I’ve got to go. Good-by, dear!” + +Her hand was on the door knob. + +“No, Ethel, no!” cried the old lady. + +With one backward glance, tearful, soft, but utterly resolute, the girl +was gone. + +“Gianetta!” called Mrs. Mazetti. + +Gianetta came in from the kitchen with the querulous expression natural +to her. She had been the old lady’s servant for nearly twenty years. She +adored her, and had never found her anything but just, kind, and +generous. Nevertheless, Gianetta had a great many grievances, and did +not keep them to herself. + +“Telephone,” said her mistress, “and order me a taxi.” + +“You? You a taxi?” cried Gianetta. “But that is mad!” + +“Quick, Gianetta!” + +“But you are very ill! With this rheumatism, you can’t walk! How do you +think then that you--” + +“Quick, Gianetta!” + +“Patience! Patience!” said Gianetta, in her most annoying tone. “I order +this taxi, but you cannot get into it. It is only a waste of money. No +matter--you are the mistress. I telephone!” + +“Now!” said the old lady to herself. “I _must get up_. Leo always said +that what one ought to do, one would find strength for. I must do this. +For one minute more I shall sit quietly here, and then I shall rise and +get myself ready.” + +She clasped her hands in her lap and laid her head against the back of +the chair, looking out at the sky, now quite dark. Then, with a long +sigh, she grasped the arms and slowly raised herself to her feet. + +Gianetta, coming in again, gave a loud shriek. + +“Silence, you foolish one,” said the old lady. “Get me my cloak and +hat.” + + +IV + +“I don’t understand you,” said Ladislaw, in a deeply injured voice. +“You’ll trust your whole life to me, and yet--” + +The little wood was dark and unfamiliar, and he found it very +disagreeable to hurry along at the pace she set. + +“And yet you behave--” he went on. + +“I’m not trusting my whole life to you,” replied Ethel vehemently. “I’d +be sorry to think there was nothing better than that to trust in!” + +“That’s not quite the way to talk to the man you’re going to marry, is +it?” he asked. “I’ve always tried my best to do what you wanted. I don’t +see why you shouldn’t trust me.” + +“I don’t see, either, Lad,” Ethel answered, with her discounting +frankness. “Only somehow you seem so--so dreadfully strange to me. I +never understand you. I know you must be fond of me, or you wouldn’t +have asked me to marry you; and I know it’s a sensible, practical idea +if we’re going on tour. But I can’t--I can’t--” She choked down a sob. +“I can’t feel--friendly--with you!” + +“I don’t want you to. I want you to love me.” + +“But they ought to go together!” she cried. “I’m awfully grateful to +you, and I love to hear you sing, but I’m afraid! Oh, it’s not fair to +you, because I know I’ll never feel like that!” + +“You will some day,” he answered, with a patience that frightened her +still more. + +“I’ve got to be honest with you, Lad. I’m sure I shall never feel so. +It’s only because I want this chance so much--so much that I’d do almost +anything to get it. I know that if I can once sing in public, I shall be +all right, and--” + +He laughed softly. + +“It doesn’t go so fast,” he said. “Nothing does. You will have what +every one else has--two failures for each triumph, two pains for every +joy. You will have hard work, discouragement, anxiety, and a good many +other troubles you’ve never thought of. That’s why I ask you to marry +me, because you need some one to protect you. If you don’t love me, very +well! I’ll love you twice as much, to make up for it.” + +His hand fell lightly on her shoulder. She sprang aside hastily. + +That did not offend him. He never seemed to be offended or impatient. He +was always reasonable, kind, sympathetic; and yet, instead of being +pleased or touched by this, Ethel found it disquieting and mysterious. + +His polite endurance of her changing humors was more like that of +indifference than that of love. Of course, he did love her. He must, and +she was a very fortunate girl to have found, at the very beginning of +her career, a man who loved her and who could and would help her so +greatly. + +This first venture was in itself a thing very displeasing to her. It +was a vaudeville act of his own devising, in which, with several changes +of costume, they would sing snatches from the most popular operas, all +woven together to make a silly story. She tried to look beyond that, to +the great triumphs of the future. She tried to feel that these triumphs +would be ample compensation for the monstrous sacrifice she was making +of her life. + +Once in a while, in a brief flash, she half realized what she was doing. +The memory of her mother came back to her--that gentle and quiet woman +who had held so steadfastly to her own ideals. + +No matter how ardent her desire for perfection in her beloved art, no +matter how splendid her ambition, Ethel could not be rid of a secret and +bitter sense of guilt. It was wrong--she knew it--it was wrong and +unworthy to marry Ladislaw. + +“But why?” she demanded of herself. “I don’t care anything about love, +and men, and things like that. Ladislaw knows it, and if he doesn’t +care, why should I? Anyhow, it’s too late now. I’ve promised, and I’m +going to keep my word. Mother would want me to do that. Oh, but if +mother had been here, she would have understood! She would never have +let me get into such a dreadful, miserable, heartbreaking situation! If +she could come now, just for one little minute, just to say one word--” + +But there was no one there except Ladislaw. The lights of the railway +station gleamed before them, and he drew close to her. + +“Give me one kiss, Ethel!” he said, very low. + +She hated his voice, she hated to have him so near her, she hated +herself. The little wood seemed like a black and sinister forest. + +“No!” she said brusquely, as she had often spoken to him before. + +This time he was not patient and humble. He caught her arm, and tried to +draw her to him. + +“You shan’t treat me like a dog!” he muttered. + +In growing alarm, she stared at him in the dark, and she fancied she saw +his white teeth revealed by a wolfish grin. With a violent wrench, she +freed herself. With the swiftness of terror, she ran out of that haunted +wood into the safe, bright road before the station. + +As she stood there, flushed and panting, trying to consider the +situation, he came leisurely up to her. + +“You can’t go back now--not after that telegram you sent your aunt,” he +said. “There’s nowhere for you to go, except with me. You haven’t even +your ticket or your purse. You gave them to me to keep--and I mean to +keep them!” + +“I don’t care--I’ll walk,” she retorted, in a trembling voice. + +“Walk where?” he inquired. “You told your aunt you were going away to +get married. You’ll have hard work explaining that you changed your +mind; and you’ll have hard work getting home at all without a penny. +Come! Here’s the train. Don’t be a little fool!” + +The long, mournful hoot of the approaching engine came to her ears. + +“Oh, give me my purse!” she cried in terror and despair. “Oh, please! +Oh, please, Ladislaw!” + +“I won’t,” he said. “If you won’t come with me, I’ll leave you here +alone. You’ll be sorry, Ethel. You’ll lose your chance to be a singer, +and you’ll lose more than that. Your aunt won’t take this very well.” + +She looked around in anguish. The ticket office was closed for the +night, and there were only strangers on the platform. All about that +little lighted oasis were the woods and fields and tiny distant houses, +filled with more strangers. + + +V + +“Ethel!” cried a voice. + +It was the voice of the one person who would understand and help and +solace her--a voice she could never hear again in this world, strong, +tender, and clear. + +“Oh, mother!” she cried. + +“Ethel!” + +It came again, and not the voice of a spirit, but real, and close at +hand. + +“It’s some one in that taxi,” whispered Ladislaw. “Better not answer.” + +“But it’s grandmother!” said Ethel, astounded. + +She flew to the old lady like a stone from a catapult. + +“Grandmother, what _are_ you doing here?” she demanded, wild with +delight and relief. + +“Nothing!” replied the old lady serenely. “Present your friend to me.” + +“I--” began Ethel. + +Ladislaw was already there, hat in hand. + +“Mr. Metz, grandmother,” she said. + +“Ah! Mr. Metz!” the old lady repeated, looking thoughtfully at him. Her +calm old eyes seemed terrible to him. “Are you leaving?” she asked. + +He hesitated for a moment. Then he remembered that Ethel had never +seemed to regard her grandmother as especially important. She was old, +and poor, and obscure; what harm could she do? + +“Yes,” he said. “Ethel and I are going to be married. She’s already sent +a telegram to her aunt in the city, to tell her.” + +“You are a rash young man,” said the old lady, in a tone almost +friendly. + +“Rash?” he repeated, with a faint frown. + +“Very!” said she. “It is a surprise to me, because I see that you are +not American. Americans marry that way--for love; but with the people of +Europe, it is often different. They think of how they shall live. They +wish a dot--a dowry--something more than love. It is very beautiful, +this; because the poor little Ethel will never have anything.” + +Metz was too much taken aback to be discreet. + +“But she will!” he said. “Her aunt will--” + +“Her aunt has only the income of an estate. She leaves nothing to Ethel; +and certainly she _gives_ nothing to Ethel when she is the wife of Mr. +Metz.” + +“But I thought--” he began. + +Suddenly the frail little old creature blazed into magnificent wrath. + +“Be off!” she cried, raising her hand in a threatening gesture. “Away +with you, miserable, beggarly fortune hunter! Wolf! _Bestia!_ Be off!” + +He started back. She leaned out of the window, her voice wonderfully +strong and vigorous for her years. As he retreated, even above the roar +of the incoming train, he heard her only too plainly, and was aware that +other people heard her, too. + +“Beggarly fortune hunter! Wolf! _Bestia!_ Away with you!” + +He was glad to climb on board. + +The taxi went hastening back along the dark, still roads, and the old +lady held the sobbing Ethel tight in her arms. + +“But what is there to cry about?” she asked, in tears herself. “Foolish +little one! You shall stay with me, my little bird, until you are ready +to fly away. There was something put by for you to have--later. You +shall have it now, for the singing lessons. Why do you cry, then? You +shall sing, I tell you!” + +Ethel was silent for a time. + +“Grandmother!” she said. “The first time you called me--it sounded--I +thought it was--mother!” + +The old lady’s arm tightened about her. + +“It is the same voice,” she said. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +DECEMBER, 1923 +Vol. LXXX NUMBER 3 + + + + +Benedicta + +AND HOW SHE DISCOVERED JUST WHAT IT WAS THAT SHE HAD ALWAYS WANTED + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +When the charming prince at last cut his way through the enchanted +forest, and set foot in that silent palace, the sleeping beauty was +delighted to be waked with a kiss. It is not difficult, however, to +imagine some beauties who would prefer to be left in dismal, cobwebby +peace--beauties who had grown so used to sleep that waking would be a +pain and a shock. It is pitiful to think of the poor young prince in a +case like that--except that princes are almost always fortunate in the +end, and probably know that they will be. + +The real sleeping beauty, you will perhaps remember, had a spell put on +her at her christening by a disgruntled fairy. If ever she touched a +distaff, she would prick herself and die. Another and a better fairy +interfered, and arranged that, instead of death, an enchanted sleep +should overtake the princess; and so it happened. In vain the royal +parents prohibited distaffs. Curses are very, very hard to avoid, and +the poor, lovely girl did find a distaff, and did prick her finger, and +did fall asleep, and so did every other living creature in the palace +with her, to stand or sit or lie just where they were for I don’t +remember how many years. + +Benedicta had nothing to do with fairies, and she wouldn’t have known a +distaff if she had seen one; nevertheless, at the time when this story +begins, she had been going about for years in a sort of enchanted +slumber. She didn’t know that it was a slumber. She called it dignity, +and pride, and so on, and clung most tenaciously to her twilight +existence. + +She was a tall, disdainful creature, very pretty, if you had the courage +to look at her; but the people of Elderfield were so well used to her +that they had no particular wish to look at her. She was simply Miss +Benedicta Miller, from the old Miller place, and the Millers had ceased +to be interesting long before she was born. + +They had been rich, but now they were poor. They were very tiresome +about it, too, keeping up a moldy, lamentable sort of state in their +dilapidated house, turning up their noses at every one new and friendly, +and being frightfully sensitive toward all the “old” people who offered +them any courtesy. + +There were only two of them left now--Benedicta and her father. Mr. +Miller had grown so sensitive and squeamish and absurd that he was +practically invisible, and was very nearly forgotten. The more he saw +that he was forgotten, the more hurt and resentful he became, and the +less would he come out into the world. + +Some one had to come out, however. They couldn’t be _Robinson Crusoes_ +on a farm where nothing grew any more. They had to buy what they wanted, +and, to do so, Benedicta had to go to the village. + +This she did two or three times a week in a little car, beautifully +polished and cared for, as she cared for everything. She would come +rattling down Main Street, and no amount of jouncing could make her look +anything but dignified, just as no hat, however old and unbecoming, +could destroy the beauty of her proud little head and fine features. She +would enter a shop and give a pitiful little order; and because she +remembered what a wonderful family the Millers had once been, and +because she was so miserable at their present eclipse, and so ashamed of +herself for being miserable, she would be quite cold and curt. + +Then home she would go, to her father, who always asked her what was the +news. She knew what sort of news he wanted to hear--that some one had +inquired about him, or sent a message; but no one did that any more. + +They would sit down to a meager little lunch cooked by the cheapest +servant obtainable. Though Benedicta herself could have cooked one ten +times better, it would have choked them. Even the heartbreaking bills +that came had to be presented to Mr. Miller on a silver tray. + +Benedicta admired her father beyond measure, and agreed with him that +the only self-respecting thing for them was to hide their shameful +poverty from the rest of the world; but he was fifty, and she was only +twenty-three, so that sometimes she was not able to find quite the same +satisfaction in solitary pride that he did. She kept up the tradition +splendidly, but she didn’t always relish it. + +For instance, when that Wilkinson girl had come to see her, uninvited +and unencouraged, she had found it difficult to be courteously +disagreeable every instant. She had to be constantly reminding herself +that the Wilkinsons were impossible people who had been retail grocers +when the Millers were in their prime. She had also had to remind herself +that this jolly, friendly girl was not, could not be, really friendly, +but had doubtless come to spy upon their poverty and to laugh about it +afterward. + +When, from the window, she had watched her visitor drive off in a smart +little roadster, tears came to Benedicta’s eyes--not tears of envy, but +of genuine regret that the pride of the Millers forbade her to like Miss +Wilkinson. Her life seemed duller and mustier than ever. + + +II + +Nevertheless, instead of being pleased, Benedicta was affronted when the +impossible girl came back. It was late one June afternoon, in the bright +and tranquil hour before the sun goes down, and Benedicta, weary and +idle, was in the sitting room, because it was proper for her to be in +the sitting room. + +She looked out of the window, because she was thoroughly tired of +looking at the room. The fact of its being filled with genuine Colonial +furniture of fine mahogany gave her no pleasure at all. The landscape, +too, was uninspiring--a straggling, neglected garden, and a stretch of +fields which had once been part of the Miller estate, but which had been +first rented and then sold to farmers who did not object to working. + +Something was coming along the road. She recognized the smart little +roadster. It turned in at their gateway and stopped before their door. + +It was a memorable interview. Indeed, it was a battle, and Miss +Wilkinson conquered. In the most ordinary way, she made a preposterous +suggestion. + +“I want you to spend this week-end with us,” she said. “Please do!” + +Benedicta, almost overcome, said that she had never spent a night away +from home. + +“Then begin now,” said Miss Wilkinson. “Please come! It’s going to be +awfully nice. Two--” + +“I’m sure it would be nice, but I really can’t,” said Benedicta firmly. + +Miss Wilkinson seemed perfectly unaware that it is bad manners to press +an invitation. She had taken a fancy to Benedicta’s dark beauty, with +her sulky mouth and her unhappy eyes, and she was sorry for her. She +kept on urging until Benedicta was obliged to point out to her that +invitations must come not from daughters, but from mothers, and that she +was not acquainted with Mrs. Wilkinson. + +“All right!” said the other good-humoredly. “Then mother ’ll come +to-morrow and ask you.” + +“But--” Benedicta began. + +She found it hard to go on. Impossible as Miss Wilkinson was, it was +difficult to dislike her. The idea of a week-end in her company was +terribly tempting. It was an invitation to be young for a little while. + +“But,” Benedicta went on more gently, “you see, you live so near, it +really seems absurd to stay overnight. I should like very much to come +some afternoon--” + +Miss Wilkinson had said a week-end, and a week-end she intended to have. + +“If I could get her away from this ghastly house, the girl would be +entirely different,” she thought. “Poor thing! She really wants to come, +too.” + +So she kept at it, and, being an obstinate creature, accustomed to her +own way, she at last obtained Benedicta’s reluctant consent. + +“I’ll come for you on Friday, before dinner,” she said gayly. + +Off she went, well pleased with herself, and with Benedicta, and with +almost everything else in the world. + +But Mr. Miller! Better to pass over that interview, for it accomplished +nothing except to make both father and daughter very miserable. Even Mr. +Miller was forced to admit that, as the invitation had been accepted, +nothing could be done. All the Millers did what they said they would do, +no matter how disastrous the consequences. All he wished was to say what +he thought of this undignified, improper proceeding, and he did so. + + +III + +Wilkinsons being kind to a Miller! Mrs. Wilkinson conducting Benedicta +to a charming little bedroom, and actually kissing her at the door! Mr. +Wilkinson meeting her in the dining room and saying: + +“It’s a pleasure to see the daughter of Mr. Hamilton Miller in my house. +Your father was one of my earliest customers.” + +Mr. Wilkinson saying this, and not seeming at all ashamed of having had +customers! Nan--that was Miss Wilkinson’s name--doing everything +possible to make her somewhat difficult guest feel at home! + +When at last she was left alone in her room to dress for dinner, +Benedicta had to struggle with a great desire to cry, for ridiculous +reasons--because Mrs. Wilkinson had kissed her, because the room itself +was so pretty, furnished in white and lit by a rose-shaded lamp, because +she was touched, and was ashamed of herself for being touched. She +reminded herself that she had come as a favor to Nan, and against her +own will. She remembered that everything in her chilly, bleak little +room at home was an heirloom. + +“I ought to have more poise,” she told herself sternly. + +When she came down to dinner, she had perhaps a little too much poise. +The Wilkinsons all kept on being kind, because it was natural to them, +and because they knew all about the Millers and understood Benedicta; +but the other guests saw in her nothing but a very stiff, cool, silent +girl in a dowdy frock, and they didn’t like her. + +There were two girls and three others, whom Nan called “boys,” but who +were what Benedicta considered young men, and very frivolous ones. Three +men and four girls! + +“Of course, I’m the extra one,” she thought. “It doesn’t matter to me, +of course.” + +She felt still more extra and superfluous after dinner, when they began +to dance as a matter of course. One of the men asked her to dance, but +she declined. She told Mrs. Wilkinson that she didn’t care for dancing, +but the truth was that she knew nothing but waltzes and two-steps, which +were of no more use than minuets. It wouldn’t do, though, for a Miller +to confess herself ignorant of the art. + +So she sat beside her hostess, consoling herself with pride, and finding +it a very dismal sort of thing. Indeed, she was scarcely able to speak, +for fear the unsteadiness in her voice might betray her misery. + +“Oh, why did I come?” she asked herself. “Oh, why, why didn’t I stay +home, and not know how happy every one else is? Here I just have to sit +and look on. I’m young, too! Oh, I wish I wasn’t! I wish I was old--old, +like father. Then I wouldn’t care!” + +“Here’s some one else who doesn’t care for dancing,” remarked Mrs. +Wilkinson, and beckoned to a newcomer who had strolled casually in +through the open French window. “It’s Francis Dumall. You know the +Dumalls, don’t you?” + +The history of the Dumalls had been familiar to Benedicta from her +infancy. Like the Millers, they had come down in the world; but not +sadly and slowly like the Millers, or generation by generation. Paul +Dumall had caused the disaster alone and unaided, and had brought down +his family with a crash. + +There was nothing discreditable in the debacle. Dumall had ruined +himself like a gentleman, and had aroused nothing but sympathy. What is +more, he had died before becoming _vieux jeu_, like poor Mr. Miller, and +he was now a sort of legend. His wife and child had gone away, no one +knew where. + +“And this must be the son,” thought Benedicta. + +She was pleased and a little excited at the idea of meeting some one +with a history so like her own--some one fallen from greatness like +herself, suffering the same humiliation and sadness. She would have +liked this young man, even if he hadn’t been so very likable. + +He was a tall, slight fellow, a perfect Dumall, with gray eyes, fair +hair, and the fine, big Dumall nose. He was not handsome, but he was +agreeable to look at, because of his kind and rather shy smile, and the +sensitive intelligence of his face. + +He was presented to Benedicta, and they looked at each other with rather +artless curiosity. How many Millers and Dumalls had met in the past, in +circumstances so different! Indeed, a Dumall had once married a Miller, +long ago, so that they were distantly related. + +“Sit down, Francis,” said the hospitable Mrs. Wilkinson. + +The affection in her manner impressed Benedicta. It was obvious that +Mrs. Wilkinson had a great regard for this boy. His dinner jacket was +shabby, his fair hair was a little ruffled, he had none of the sleek +elegance of the other guests; and yet his hostess showed him a sort of +deference not given to the others. + +“It’s his family, of course,” thought Benedicta. “She ought to remember +that the Millers were just the same!” + +In spite of their mutual interest, the two young people were constrained +and silent when Mrs. Wilkinson left them alone. Benedicta knew that she +ought to talk and be gracious and entertaining, but she completely +lacked practice. Young Dumall made no effort whatever, but sat looking +at the dancers in the next room, not enviously or wistfully, but in a +calm and thoughtful way. + +“Don’t you care for it, either?” he asked suddenly. + +That “either” pleased Benedicta. It seemed to place her with Dumall in +another and superior world. It made her feel that she really didn’t care +for dancing; so she said: + +“No.” + +“Sometimes I think people have forgotten how to enjoy themselves,” he +went on. “They did know long ago, in Greece. They danced out in the sun, +and did it beautifully. They were happy, instead of simply being +excited.” + +Benedicta looked with amazement at his boyish face, but he did not look +at her. He was staring ahead of him with a strange, lost look that +fascinated her, and was talking earnestly of Greek festivals, now and +then using a Greek word. + +From the next room Nan caught sight of her, and was impressed. + +“Look at Miss Miller!” she said to her partner. “Isn’t she lovely?” + +Benedicta was, just then. She was listening to young Dumall with shining +eyes and parted lips, entranced by his words. She thought he was +marvelous. + +Well, perhaps he was. Another listener might have found him a little +dogmatic and immature; but, after all, he did think, and he did imagine, +and he had a rare and fine admiration for the perished beauties of the +ancient world. He knew his facts, too. He had studied honestly and +intelligently. + +When he rose to go, darkness fell upon Benedicta. + +“Aren’t you staying in the house?” she asked. + +“No,” he answered. She knew very well that he was looking at her, +although she seemed unaware of it. “I have to go into the city +to-morrow, to buy some books; but I’ll be here on Sunday afternoon +again. I--I hope I’ll see you then!” + + +IV + +On Sunday evening Benedicta pretended that she was sleepy; and when Mrs. +Wilkinson told her to go to bed, and get a good night’s rest, she +assented willingly. As a matter of fact, she thought that very likely +she would never go to sleep again. Certainly she didn’t want to waste +time in that way. + +She sat down in the dark by the window, where she could look out over +the garden, but she didn’t see it. She had abolished time and space, and +was looking into the middle of the afternoon that had passed. + +She saw herself and Francis Dumall sitting on a fallen tree in the +woods, where the sun shone through the leaves in queer bright spots on +his hair, like gold coins. He was dressed in an old belted coat and +tweed trousers that didn’t match, but his shabby clothes were worn with +his own air of careless distinction. He was hatless. Sometimes he looked +like a boy, and sometimes very much of a man. + +He had talked about books. He had talked in an enthralling, a marvelous +way. He had made Benedicta resolve to begin to read books herself. + +“Why have I gone on like this?” she thought. “Never even trying to +improve my mind, with all the spare time I’ve had! It’s disgraceful. I’m +ashamed of myself. I don’t know what Mr. Dumall must think of me!” + +This was somewhat hypocritical, for she had at least a suspicion of what +Mr. Dumall thought of her. He hadn’t talked about books all the time; +nor was it likely that when he had asked if he might come to see her, +he had contemplated nothing but a literary monologue. + +In spite of this, however, and in spite of the look in his gray eyes, +which was unmistakably admiration, Benedicta was doubtful. + +“He can’t really like me,” she thought. + +She did not realize how unworthy of a Miller such humility was. Why +shouldn’t he really like her? What was he but a boy not much older than +herself, and, like herself, obscure and poor? She didn’t even realize +how lovely she was, lost in her ridiculous admiration for him. + +“He’s so different from me!” she thought. “He’s not ashamed of being +poor. He doesn’t care one bit about clothes, and dancing, and things +like that. He could hold his own anywhere. Everybody respects him and +likes him. Nan thinks he’s splendid. He is splendid! He’s risen above +his disadvantages, and I haven’t. I’ve let myself be so miserable about +being poor that I’ve neglected everything else. He remembers that he +belongs to a fine old family, and he’s worthy of it!” + +She must follow this inspiring example. She must be worthy of her fine, +old family. She wished the magic summer night would pass so that she +might begin. She was filled with impatience and hope, half happy, half +miserable. + +She began to dream of the past, when the Dumalls and the Millers were in +their prime, when the two houses blazed with lights in the evening and +were filled with guests, when the estates were intact, when the ladies +exchanged visits, riding along the roads in carriages, and all the +country people uncovered as they passed. All gone now--gone forever! + +“I don’t care!” she said, wiping away a tear. “I’d rather have what I +have than ten times the Wilkinsons’ money!” + +The result of her meditations was to make her none too gracious to the +Wilkinsons the next morning. She took leave of them, firmly resolving +never to set foot in their house again, because it wasn’t worthy of a +Miller. She was going home to improve her mind, and never to see or +think of any one less august than a Dumall for the rest of her life. + +“She’s a high and mighty young woman, I must say!” observed Mr. +Wilkinson, a little hurt by her patronizing farewell. + +His wife and daughter were not hurt. They said in the same breath: + +“Poor Benedicta!” + +“Why?” he wished to know. + +They didn’t explain, but the thought both of them had was that it is a +lamentable piece of folly to bite off one’s nose to spite one’s face, +especially in the case of such a delightful nose and such a pretty face +as Benedicta’s. + + +V + +Once inside the Miller stronghold again, Benedicta went from bad to +worse. Her father confirmed and strengthened all her theories. He was +inordinately interested to hear that she had met young Dumall, and he +remembered any number of new things about the two families. + +When they sat down to their ill cooked, meager dinner, the fact that it +hadn’t been paid for was amply compensated by eating it with old silver +from old china. Mr. Miller, looking at his child, had not a single pang +of regret that her youth and her loveliness were shut up in that dismal +ruin. He felt, instead, a surge of pride and gratitude that she was a +Miller. + +Young Dumall came that very evening, bringing a book for Benedicta; but +he did not show the least desire for a decorous conversation on family +topics with her father. + +In spite of his scholarly tastes and his shy, quiet air, he was a young +fellow of enterprise and resolution. He suggested taking a walk, for the +inadequate reason that the moon was up. So Mr. Miller was left +alone--which, after all, was the fate he had chosen for himself. + +Benedicta had fixed ideas about courtships. It cannot be denied that, +although she had seen this young man only twice, and had no proper +foundation for such a notion, she believed that this was the beginning +of a courtship. The most singular delight and confusion filled her +heart. She didn’t wish to speak, or wish him to speak. Later, after they +had known each other for weeks and weeks, would come the moment when he +would tell her those wonderful things of which she had read; but now all +she wanted in the world was to walk by his side on the long, dim road, +soft with dust, with the crickets chirping in the parched grass, and the +breeze, sweet with the breath of the fields and the hills, blowing +against her face. + +Young Dumall, apparently, had no such ideas about courtships. + +“You know,” he said, “I’m poor enough--” + +“Oh!” Benedicta interrupted. “What does that matter? It’s something to +be proud of--in these days, when people like the Wilkinsons have so much +money.” + +He turned toward her, but it was too dark to read her face. + +“I don’t see anything wrong with the Wilkinsons,” he said. “They’re the +best friends I’ve ever had.” + +Benedicta was a little nettled at this. + +“Of course they’re very nice, and all that,” she answered; “but they’re +not at all our sort.” + +“That’s our misfortune,” declared Francis. “Mr. Wilkinson made money +because he worked hard and used his wits. Our sort of people wouldn’t +work, and thought it a fine thing not to have any common sense. _I’m_ +not proud of being poor--and I’m not going to stay poor!” + +“There are better things in life than hard work and common sense,” +observed Benedicta stiffly. + +“I know that,” said he; “but you can’t get or keep those better things +without hard work and common sense. Valuable things have to be paid +for.” + +“The very best things can’t be bought,” said she. + +“You can’t get them any other way,” said he. + +Benedicta was growing rather angry. + +“Not good blood,” she said. “Not family and traditions.” + +“But, see here!” he interposed. “Haven’t you ever heard or read how the +people we came from--the old Millers and the Dumalls--got what we’re so +proud of now? They bought all they ever had. They often paid with their +lives, and always with the hardest, most dangerous kind of service. +After they’d come to this country and cleared their land, they had to +defend it. All the Dumalls who amounted to anything were fighters in one +way or another--not necessarily soldiers, but men who held their own. +When they stopped fighting--and paying--they didn’t amount to anything +any more. I don’t intend to spend my life talking about what other and +better men have done before me. I’m a man myself, and I mean to do +something worth doing!” + +Benedicta was a traitor. She agreed with every word he said. She was so +thrilled by his boyish spirit that she could have wept with pride and +joy. She thought to herself that he was like a knight, that he was the +bravest, finest, most wonderful creature who had ever walked the earth. + +“I’m sure you will!” she cried. + +He stopped short. + +“Do you really think so, Benedicta?” he asked. + +He called her Benedicta, and his voice-- + +“Yes,” she answered, very low. + +“Benedicta,” he said again, “I can’t say what I want to say to you just +now--not yet; but if I thought--I could do anything in the world if it +was for _you_!” + +It was necessarily a very long walk, with so much to be said. Benedicta +came home with a hole walked through one of her best slippers; but she +had heard the important things necessary for her to know. She had heard +exactly why he felt that way, and at what instant he had begun to feel +that way. She had given him permission to go ahead and do anything in +the world for her; and he had kissed her--an awkward little kiss--when +they said good night at the gate. + + +VI + +Benedicta awoke to a rainy morning, but it was not the sort of rain that +had hitherto fallen upon the earth. It was sweet, fresh, exhilarating. +The sound of it drumming on the roof was as gay as martial music. + +All the old wearisome things were gone out of her life, and the new ones +had scarcely begun. She felt wonderfully free and spirited, like a +person on a journey who has got as far as the railway station--who is +definitely away from home, but still in familiar country. + +She was thinking of nothing but Francis Dumall, the knight, the +adventurer, the man determined to do something worth doing. She could +imagine nothing in the modern world quite splendid enough for him to do. +It was brave to be an aviator, but it wasn’t important enough. A +statesman? Not picturesque enough. A writer? Not sufficiently active or +daring. + +“But he’ll have thought of something,” she reflected. “I know he has his +life all planned. I wonder why I didn’t ask him about that, instead of +about--other things. It’s because I’m frivolous and silly!” + +Even that didn’t depress her. She was so full of hope and courage this +morning that it seemed the simplest thing in the world to acquire wisdom +at once. She intended to buy and read a new book this very day, so that +she might talk about it to the incomparable Francis in the evening; and +this not from any desire to show off, or to impress him, but simply from +an honest and touching wish to follow him, to go at his pace, to prove +her sympathy with his aims. + +She had never bought a book in her life. It had been difficult +enough--impossible, at times--to buy the barest necessities; and what +they did get was usually procured on credit in mysterious ways by Mr. +Miller. + +Money of her own was a thing unknown to Benedicta. Nevertheless, she +went in the calmest way and asked her father for a little. Mr. Miller +was equally calm when he gave her all he had. Indeed, he forgot the +present moment, and felt himself one of the old Millers making a lavish +gift to a daughter whose hand was sought by a scion of the Dumalls. + +It didn’t matter that she went rattling off in her little car along +muddy roads. She couldn’t have been lovelier in a coach with footmen. +The rain blew against her face and made it beautifully rosy. Her dark +hair became a little loosened under her wide hat. + +When she sprang out, and went into the butcher’s, he was astounded by +this new aspect of the high and mighty Miss Miller. To tell the truth, +he felt more respect and admiration for her happy youth than he had ever +felt for her Millerness. + +“Mr. Schultz,” she said eagerly, “can you tell me where there’s a book +shop?” + +Mr. Schultz had an educated son who bought books. He told her that for +the first time in many years there was now a book shop in Elderfield, +and a good one, too, just behind the post office. + +“It’s--” he began, but she thanked him, and hurried off. + +It was a trim, attractive little shop, with a striped awning, and in the +window were displayed books as fresh and tempting as the first +delectable fruits in spring. No bookworm was Benedicta, however. She +pulled up the little car smartly, jumped out, and entered the shop with +a brisk and resolute air. + +“Have you a copy of--” she began, addressing the young man who came +forward. + +Then she stopped short with a gasp. It was Francis Dumall! + +“Benedicta!” he cried. “This is the best thing that ever happened; I +never thought of seeing you on a rainy day like this! Benedicta! How +especially pretty you look!” + +“But--” she faltered. “But I didn’t know--I didn’t think--you never told +me you were here in a place like this!” + +“Didn’t I?” he answered, with an air of triumph. “Well, take a good look +at it, Benedicta! It’s my own!” + +“Your--shop? _You_ have a _shop_?” + +He mistook her horror for incredulous admiration. + +“Fact!” he said. “Mr. Wilkinson set me up six months ago, and I’m doing +even better than I expected. I tell you, Benedicta, I’m really making +the people here sit up and take notice that there are such things as +books in this world. A fellow told me the other day that I was doing +splendid missionary work. Why, look here, Benedicta--” + +And he went on, showing her things, explaining, taking up books and +opening them, and never noticing her frozen silence. + +A customer came in. He sold her the book she wanted, and another which +she hadn’t wanted before. A Dumall waiting on customers! A shopkeeper! +That was what Benedicta’s knight, her splendid adventurer, was +doing--selling books and wrapping them up! + +When they were alone again, he sat down on the edge of the table and +took both her hands. + +“You see, darling, beautiful girl, in a year’s time, even if I don’t do +better than I’m doing now, I’ll have paid back Wilkinson, and I’ll be +standing on my own feet. _Then_ I’ll be able--” + +Benedicta tried to draw away her hands, tried to find words for the +anger and bitter disappointment within her; but before she had uttered a +syllable, the door opened again and a man entered. + +“Dumall,” he said, politely ignoring the flushed Benedicta, “I wish +you’d come over to the station with me and see that fellow from Cowan’s. +He’s waiting for the up train, but he’d like to see you about that Bijou +line of cards.” + +Young Dumall turned to Benedicta with such a pleased expression. + +“You won’t be afraid to look after the shop for a quarter of an hour, +will you?” he asked earnestly. “You needn’t try to sell anything. If any +one comes in, show those new books, you know--and keep them talking +until I get back.” + +Before she had time to refuse, he had hurried away on his errand. + + +VII + +A Miller waiting in a shop! No! It was too much! + +“I won’t do it!” Benedicta thought, angry tears in her eyes. “I’ll leave +his horrible, vulgar shop! I never want to see him again! So this is +what he calls something worth doing! In a year he’ll pay back Mr. +Wilkinson and be standing on his own feet--” + +Somehow the phrase arrested her. Standing on his own feet! Working +honestly and faithfully and happily, proud of his work, confident of +success, looking forward, instead of back--standing on his own feet! + +Benedicta was at the door, with her hand on the latch, but she could not +open it. It was as if a crowd of new ideas were holding it fast, keeping +her in there. This bright, neat little place, where something was done, +instead of remembered--this thing that was being built up, instead of +falling into ruins--what had she ever had in her life one-half so fine? +After all, wasn’t it an adventure, wasn’t it a worthy thing to do, to +stand on his own feet? + +The door was pushed open then, and the next instant the daughter of the +Millers was confronted by a customer. Suddenly a strange new desire came +over her--a desire to do something, instead of just being herself, a +fierce determination to make even the smallest sort of individual +effort. + +In an instant, Benedicta knew all sorts of things she wasn’t aware of +knowing. She understood the arrangement of the stock. She knew how to +talk to this strange man. She was calm, reasonable, efficient. He +wavered, and said he didn’t think he would take anything that morning; +and she persuaded him! She made a sale! + +She wrapped up the book and took the money for it. She kept the coins in +her hand and stared at them. The shop was an entirely different place. +The whole world was changed. She walked thoughtfully about, she saw +improvements that could be made. + +“Got it!” cried Dumall boyishly. + +“Got what?” asked Benedicta, turning with a slight, preoccupied frown. + +“The agency. I’m sorry I had to leave you, Benedicta. I ought to have +some sort of assistant, but that’ll have to wait. Now, then, dear girl, +let’s go out to lunch!” + +“And leave the shop?” she inquired. + +“I’ll close it for an hour. I often do, you know. No one’s likely to +come in.” + +“Some one did come in, just now,” said Benedicta, “and bought a book.” +She handed him the money. “So you see,” she went on quite sternly, “if +there’d been no one here--” + +“But I have to. We’ll only be gone--” + +“I’ll stay here while you have lunch.” + +“But, Benedicta!” he objected. “I want to be with you. Never mind the +shop!” + +“Francis, I’m ashamed of you!” said she. “The shop shan’t be left alone. +I--I love it!” + +“Love the _shop_?” he asked. “Is that all?” + +“Well, anyhow--I’d like to help you, Francis,” she murmured. “I’d be +glad to come every day until--until you don’t need me any more.” + +Young Dumall looked at her. + +“I don’t think you know what you’re undertaking, Benedicta,” he said. +“If you’re going to come until I don’t need you, it’s a life job!” + +“Do run along and get your lunch!” replied Benedicta, dignified in spite +of very flushed cheeks. “I--I believe a job was just what I always +wanted, Francis!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +FEBRUARY, 1924 +Vol. LXXXI NUMBER 1 + + + + +Nickie and Pem + +THE STORY OF A YOUNG WOMAN WHO DID NOT WANT TO WASTE HER LIFE + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +“Pem, you’re too darned good!” said Nickie. + +“I don’t call it being good,” replied Miss Pembroke. “I call it simply +being self-respecting.” + +This was the sort of thing her friends found objectionable, and Nickie +began to object now. + +“Lord!” said she. “Don’t we work hard enough to deserve a little fun now +and then? It won’t hurt your precious self-respect to speak to a man now +and then, will it? I can’t--” + +“Oh, that’s all nonsense!” interrupted Miss Pembroke. “I see enough of +men, and I put up with enough from them. When I’m off duty, I don’t have +to put up with anything, and I _won’t_!” + +“Nobody wants you to. The boys who are coming this evening are awfully +nice boys. If you’d just come in and speak to them--” + +Miss Pembroke closed her book sharply. + +“Nickie,” she said, “I’m very fond of you; but I don’t like your +friends--not any of them--and I wish you’d let me alone.” + +“Certainly,” replied Nickie, in a haughty and offended tone. + +She turned all her attention upon the process of manicuring, but neither +the haughtiness nor the silence reassured Miss Pembroke, who knew that +they wouldn’t last. It was hardly worth while to open her book again, +for Nickie would be sure to interrupt. + +“It’s getting to be too much of a good thing,” she reflected. “I needed +a good rest after that last case, but I’ll never get it while Nickie’s +here. This whole thing was a mistake. I ought to have taken a room +somewhere by myself, where I couldn’t be bothered.” + +This was by no means the first time she had regretted her present +domestic arrangements. It was all Nickie’s fault, of course. Nickie had +told her what a fine thing it would be to join with three other graduate +nurses in taking a flat. + +“A nice little home of our own,” Nickie had said, “where we can rest +when we want to, and entertain our friends, and keep all our things. The +other girls are simply great. You’ll like them.” + +Miss Pembroke had said that five girls were too many. + +“But we’ll never all be home at the same time,” Nickie had assured her. +“Lots of times you and I will have the place to ourselves.” + +In the course of a year this had happened only once. When Nickie was at +home, Pem was off on a case. When Pem came home, instead of finding her +faithful Nickie, one of the other girls would be there, or sometimes +two of them; and Pem didn’t like them. She didn’t like their “parties,” +or their conversation, or their cheerful, careless style of +housekeeping. + +She herself was never careless, and, though she was even-tempered and +polite, she wasn’t often cheerful. As a nurse, she was matchless. +Doctors wanted to send her to their most troublesome and exacting +patients, because not only was she quick, capable, and intelligent, but +she could hold her tongue and keep her temper, and she had a cool, quiet +way with her that kept her patients in good order. + +But this cool, quiet way of which doctors so highly approved was not at +all pleasing to her housemates. Even Nickie thought it deplorable. + +“Pem,” she had said to her once, “you could be young and beautiful, if +you’d only learn how!” + +There was truth in that observation. Miss Pembroke had both youth and +beauty, and somehow managed to disguise them, so that they often went +unnoticed. People would say that she was “impressive,” or “dignified,” +or something of that sort, because they never saw her off guard, as +Nickie saw her now. She was a tall, slender, dark-haired girl, with an +austere, fine-bred face--not the sort of face one would turn to look +after in the street, but a face which patients--above all, male +patients--found very, very hard to forget. Her slender hands were +clasped about one knee, and her clear amber eyes were staring +thoughtfully before her. She was, thought Nickie, engaged in daydreams +of some mysterious and enchanting kind unknown to more ordinary girls. +But in reality-- + +“Nickie’s getting coarse,” Miss Pembroke was reflecting. + +There was no coarseness to be seen in Miss Nicholson’s rosy, jolly face, +nor to be observed in her manners and conversation. Indeed, no one but +Miss Pembroke had yet seen any trace of it; but Pem was by nature +critical, and just at this moment she was jaded and dispirited after six +weeks of a ferocious typhoid patient, who had fallen in love with her in +a very trying and ill-tempered way. Moreover, she was mortally weary of +Nickie’s persistence. + +“I’m sick and tired of men,” she thought. “All Nickie ever thinks of is +men, and going to parties, and having what she calls a good time.” + +Now this was not quite doing justice to Nickie. When she was not +working, she was undeniably very fond of playing; but when you consider +how very short and infrequent were her play times, and how very hard and +exhausting was her work; when you consider that this lively, +warm-hearted young creature had to witness every sort of human agony and +wretchedness; when you bear in mind the tremendous responsibilities she +so faithfully accepted; her generous readiness to do more than she +needed to do, her charity, her sympathy, her sturdy courage--when you +think of all this, it is not difficult to forgive her for being somewhat +frivolous during her little hours of freedom. + +There were weeks at a time when men, parties, and having a good time +gave her mighty little concern. Just now, however, her mind was entirely +given to such matters; and, as Pem expected, she couldn’t help trying +again to persuade her friend. + +“Oh, Pem!” she said coaxingly. “Just this once! Come in and speak to the +boys, and if you don’t like them--” + +“No!” said Pem. + +But she did, and, by doing so, she changed the course of three lives. + +She had no intention of seeing Nickie’s friends. In fact, she came +nearer to quarreling with Nickie than she had ever yet come, and she +retired to her own room with flushed cheeks and a frown on her calm +brow. She was not in the habit of losing her temper, and this unusual +annoyance disturbed her. She was restless, and couldn’t settle down to +read or sew. + +Her neat little room seemed all at once too neat and too little, and she +wanted to get out of it. It was a clear, fine night. A walk, even a +solitary and aimless one, wouldn’t be bad. She had put on her hat and +coat, and was just about to open her door, when--when Nickie’s party +arrived. + +Impossible to go out now! In order to reach the front door, she would +have to pass by the sitting room, and Nickie would see her and stop her. + +“Nickie has absolutely no pride!” she thought, angrier than ever. “Even +after what I said to her, she’d try to drag me in there!” + +She took off her hat and flung it on the bed. + +“I’ll read,” she decided. + +She couldn’t read. The party disturbed her too much. They were laughing +and talking, and presently some one began to play the piano and sing. +It was an idiotic song, but it was delivered in a hearty, boyish voice +that was somehow very touching. + +There was violent applause when the singer finished, and after a few +minutes he began again. + +Pem came nearer to the door, her face grown very pale. “Keep the Home +Fires Burning!” Some one else sang that--one night in Montreal--the +night before the troop ship went out--a boy in a lieutenant’s uniform. +Pem snapped the light and stood listening in the dark, her hands +clenched, her eyes closed. + + “So turn the dark clouds inside out, + Till the boys come home.” + +“Oh, God!” whispered Pem; for that boy would never come home, and the +Pem who had listened to his gallant young voice was gone, too. + +The singing stopped, only not for Pem. It went on sounding in her ears. +The voice that she would never hear again and the living voice mingled +together until she could bear it no longer. She must go in and see this +other one--see with her own eyes that he was a stranger, in no way +like--any one else. + + +II + +Nickie welcomed her with a cry of joy. + +“Here’s my pal!” she said, triumphantly. “Now you’ll all have to be good +little boys. Pem, here’s Mr. Brown and Mr. Caswell and Mr. Hadley. Look +’em over!” + +But the only one Pem wanted to see was Caswell--the boy who had been +singing, the boy who must not look like some one else. Well, he didn’t. +That one had been fair and this one was dark. There was no resemblance +in a single feature; and yet the spell was not broken. + +There was some quality in this man that stirred intolerable memories to +life in Pem--something in his voice, in his smile, in the hearty grip of +his hand. She looked and looked at him, trying in vain to catch that +fugitive likeness. + +She had never been so lovely, or so utterly careless of her own beauty. +Her eyes were wonderfully luminous and soft in her pale face. Her hair, +a little disordered by the hat she had pulled off, floated about her +forehead in tiny, misty threads. She hadn’t a trace of that cool, quiet +manner now. + +Under that look of hers young Caswell grew suddenly ardent. + +“I say!” he began. “You know--you’re simply--simply marvelous!” + +“Didn’t I tell you so?” said Nickie, delighted. “Now sing some more, +Cas. That’s what brought her to.” + +“No,” said Pem. “Please don’t.” + +The spell was slowly dissolving. She could see Caswell without illusions +now--an ordinary nice-looking young fellow, unfortunately a little the +worse for drink just now, like the others. + +She had come in without any idea of staying, but for Nickie’s sake she +resigned herself to a wearisome half hour. This was Nickie’s idea of a +good time, and these were Nickie’s “awfully nice boys”! One of them +offered Pem his pocket flask, but she declined, civilly enough, and sat +down on the piano stool, so that Caswell couldn’t sing again. + +She was quite aware that he was looking at her all the time. Very well, +let him look! She felt a thousand miles away from him and the others, +and somehow very lonely. + +This sudden change disturbed Nickie. Now that she had got Pem here at +last, it would never do to let the party prove a fizzle. She whispered +to one of the men, and then called out: + +“Pem, get your hat on! We’re all going up to the Devon to dance!” + +“No, thanks,” said Pem firmly. + +There was a chorus of protests. + +“Oh, come on, Pem!” Nickie entreated. “I don’t want to go alone with +three fellows, and I’m dying for a dance. Please, Pem, just for an +hour!” + +“No, thanks,” said Pem again. “I’m sorry, but I don’t feel up to it. I’m +tired.” + +And then, beside her, she heard a voice which, in spite of herself, she +could not hear unmoved. + +“I say, Miss Pembroke! Please!” + +She shook her head, but she smiled, for once more she caught a glimpse +of that curious likeness, and it made her gentle toward him. What was +it? What could she see in this flushed, unsteady boy to put her in mind +of that other, fine and stern, a young knight? + +“Look here!” said Caswell, bending lower, so that only she could hear. +“Please don’t--don’t judge me by this. I--I’m--I can’t tell you how +sorry I am for you to see me--like this. I--I don’t do it, you know, I +give you my word. You see, I’ve just come back from Melbourne, and this +was my first night on shore, and--if you’d just give me another chance!” + +“All right, I will,” said Pem suddenly. “I’ll see you again. I’ll be +glad to.” + +And she meant it. She no longer wanted to deny the unreasonable, half +scornful liking she felt for this man. She did like him, and that was +enough. + +“Oh, but, look here!” he cried. “We’re sailing to-morrow for Halifax. +I’ve only got this one night!” + +“But you’ll come back to New York, won’t you?” + +“Oh, some day!” he answered bitterly. “God knows when--_I_ don’t. We’re +running all over after cargoes. We may come back here from Halifax, and +we may go anywhere. It may be months before I see you again.” + +“Would that be so awful?” asked Pem, with a smile. + +But he didn’t smile. + +“Yes,” he said. “It would--for me!” + +Pem was annoyed at her own response to his emotion. She wanted to laugh +at him, and she could not. This was the worst sort of nonsense--the sort +of thing Nickie was always telling her about. Nickie would call this +“thrilling.” Well, Pem didn’t. + +“I’m sorry for you,” she said ironically; but, as if there were magic in +his eyes, the words turned to truth when she looked at him. “Please +don’t be silly!” she added, in a quite different voice--gentle, almost +appealing. + +“The only silly thing would be to pretend it wasn’t like this,” said he. +“I didn’t want it to be this way, but--it just happened. As soon as I +saw you--” + +Pem jumped up. + +“All right, Nickie!” she called out. “I’ll go with you!” + + +III + +Caswell got into the taxi after her and slammed the door. + +“Oh, Pem!” he said. “Pem, you wonderful girl!” + +“You know you really are silly!” she protested. + +“Then I hope to Heaven I’ll never be anything else! I’d give all the +common sense and prudence and so on in the world for one night like +this. Hang being sensible, anyhow! Let’s be silly, Pem!” + +“I am--I have been--sillier than I ever was before in my life. Don’t, +Arthur!” + +She felt obliged to object to his putting his arm about her shoulders +and kissing her--a very unconvincing little objection, however, to which +he paid no attention. + +“You do love me, don’t you, Pem?” he asked, and waited a long time. +“Pem! I say, Pem! You do love me, don’t you?” + +“Oh, I really don’t know!” she cried impatiently. + +Was it love, she thought? It was not in any way the love she had felt +before--not that strange and terrible thing, half pride, half humility, +half anguish and half ecstasy. + +“That couldn’t ever come again,” she thought. + +It had been her consolation for so long, that never again would that +intolerable emotion stir her heart. After she had lost that one man, +there wasn’t another walking the earth who could capture her +interest--until this evening. + +She couldn’t understand the glamour that enveloped young Caswell, the +inexplicable charm of him. He was neither very handsome nor very +clever--just an ordinary nice-looking boy; and yet, when he said that he +would give all the common sense and prudence and so on in the world for +one night like this, she agreed with him in her heart. + +They had gone to a restaurant and danced, they had taken a taxicab to +another restaurant and danced again, they had had supper--that was all +there was to it. It was simply one of those brainless “parties” so dear +to Nickie--with too much drinking on the part of the men, too much +smoking, the stupidest sort of talk and laughter. Then why had it been +so beautiful? Because of that boy’s glance which always followed her, +that look on his face, his fervent, halting love-making? + +Suddenly she stopped trying to reason about it. It _was_ beautiful. She +had been utterly happy again; she was happy now. + +“Pem!” he said. “Oh, Pem! Can’t you tell me? I’m going away, you know.” + +His voice broke, she felt the arm about her shoulders tremble a little, +and her eyes filled with tears. + +“I’m afraid I do love you,” she said. + +She gave him one kiss, and then, with a little laugh, pushed him away. + +“Don’t talk any more about it--not now,” she said. “Look! The sky’s +getting light. It’s morning.” + +“And I’m due on board at ten o’clock,” he said. “I’ll come back to you, +Pem. Pem, you won’t forget me? You won’t--you couldn’t, could you, +Pem?” + +“I don’t think so,” she answered. + +The taxi had stopped before the apartment house, where Nickie and the +two other boys, just arrived, were waiting for them in the street. A +pallid light was spreading in the sky, and a strange quiet lay over the +city. Trucks rumbled far away, but there wasn’t a voice or a footstep. +The street lamps still burned wanly. + +“It’s time for breakfast,” suggested one of the boys. “Let’s go to a +beanery and have something to eat.” + +“No!” said Pem sharply. “We’ve had enough. Good-by! Come on, Nickie!” + +For she had seen on Nickie’s face something that hurt her--something +that she had often seen in the mirror, reflected in her own eyes. + + +IV + +Nickie was lying on the bed, flat on her back, without a pillow, her +eyes resolutely closed, in a stern effort to rest. That morning, just as +she was saying good-by--very willingly--to the cantankerous old lady +with a broken arm whom she had been attending for three weeks, Dr. Lucas +had telephoned and told her that he wanted her for night duty on a +pneumonia case. It was a bad case, and she had a bad night ahead of her. +She must rest now; but she couldn’t. This wasn’t rest. + +She heard the key turned in the latch, and the front door opened +quietly. + +“Hello, Mac!” she called. + +But it was not Miss McCarty who answered. It was Pem. + +“You home, Nickie?” she said. “That’s nice.” + +She came into the bedroom. Nickie sat up and stared at her with wide +eyes. + +“For Pete’s sake!” she exclaimed. “What’s the meaning of all this, Pem?” + +“I don’t know,” replied Pem slowly. She had taken off her hat and coat, +and was looking at herself in the glass--at her carefully dressed hair, +the artful touch of color in her cheeks, the new frock of navy twill +with red leather buttons. “I look rather nice, don’t I, Nickie?” + +“Yes,” said Nickie, “stunning; but--well, I suppose I’m not used to it. +But what’s the reason, Pem?” + +Pem’s explanation did not satisfy her. Pem said that her patient was a +wealthy young woman suffering from a mild form of melancholia. She had +to be diverted, and-- + +“I had to look halfway decent, going about with her,” said Pem. “She +wanted me to.” + +“Finished now?” Nickie asked. + +“No--it may last for months; but I often get an afternoon off when her +sister comes to stay with her. She likes me to clear out sometimes, so +that she can tell her sister how awful I am.” + +“Doesn’t she like you, Pem?” + +“Oh, pretty well; but she doesn’t really like anybody but herself. +That’s what’s the matter with her. She’s got everything on earth--money, +and friends, and a wonderful husband. Lend me some of your powder, +Nickie?” + +“Powder? Going out again now, Pem?” + +Pem nodded. + +“Who with?” + +“With a man,” said Pem, laughing. “Don’t faint!” + +“Of course it’s not my business,” observed Nickie, “but it--it isn’t the +husband, is it?” + +She waited a long time for an answer. + +“I wish you’d tell me, Pem. I always tell you things.” + +Pem turned and looked at her steadily. + +“No, you don’t, Nickie,” she said; “not always.” + +Nickie looked back at her friend quite as steadily. + +“I do,” she said. “I tell you anything that really matters. You see, +Pem, the reason I am asking this is because I thought you were rather +gone on Arthur Caswell. You see, I’ve known him for a long while, so +I--” + +Pem turned to open the bureau drawer, and to take out a pair of white +gloves and a handkerchief. + +“I’ll tell you something, Nickie,” she said in a curt, cool voice. “He +would never have looked at me that night if I had been my real self. I +acted like a fool, and that’s what he liked. That’s what every one +likes. After he’d gone, everything seemed tame and flat, and I felt so +lonely that I couldn’t stand it. I’m going to keep on being a fool, +Nickie. I’m going to make people like me. I’m going to live, and enjoy +myself!” + +“All right,” said Nickie; “but what about Arthur Caswell?” + +“He’ll never come back.” + +“Yes, he will.” + +“If he does, then--but he won’t. I’m not going to waste my life--or +what’s left of it.” + +“If I was going to waste any lives,” said Nickie, “I’d rather waste my +own than any one else’s.” + +Pem was astounded. + +“What’s the matter with you?” she demanded. “Are you trying to preach to +me, Nickie? It was you who started the whole thing--always pestering me +to go to parties.” + +“I never went out with a married man in my life,” said Nickie; “and I +never would, either.” + +“That’s a little too much, after that last party!” returned Pem +scornfully. “You wouldn’t go out with a married man, but you don’t mind +three fellows who’ve been drinking!” + +“How do you know I didn’t mind?” cried Nickie, jumping up. “Just let me +tell you, Pem--I knew Arthur Caswell’s people in Halifax. His father’s a +strict Presbyterian. I know what he’d think about that, and I’d have +stopped Arthur, too, if--” + +Pem was about to make a sharp retort, but she changed her mind in time. +Going over to Nickie, she put her arms about her friend. + +“I’m sorry, little pal,” she said gently. “I didn’t mean to.” + +Nickie gave her a rough little hug. + +“All right, Pem,” she said. “I know! But, Pem, for my sake, please don’t +go out with this man. You’ll be sorry for it--awfully sorry. It’s not +like you. Don’t do it, Pem!” + +“You don’t understand, Nickie. He’s a wonderful man, so honorable--” + +“He’s not honorable if he goes out with you behind his wife’s back.” + +“How can he help it, when she’s turned her back on him for good? She’s +horrible to him. Nobody else would have put up with her as he has. He is +honorable, Nickie; he’s a gentleman through and through. He’s so +lonely--you don’t know what that is, but I do. He’s longing and longing +for women to be nice and friendly to him. If his wife was ever halfway +decent to him--” + +She stopped short, because the doorbell had rung. + +“There he is,” she said. “Nickie, it’s nothing to be ashamed of. I wish +you’d see him and talk to him. Then you’d understand. Open the door and +talk to him while I’m getting ready.” + +Nickie hesitated for a moment. + +“All right!” she said, then. “I’ll talk to him!” + +Without even troubling to smooth her unruly hair, off she went, down the +passage. In a moment she was back. + +“Pem,” she cried, “Arthur Caswell is here!” + +They stared at each other in a sort of dismay, both speechless for a +time. + +“I’ll take him out, quick,” said Pem. “When Mr. Blanchard comes, tell +him something--anything. I’ll see you later, Nickie. I’ll stop here +before I go back to Mr. Blanchard’s.” + +“All right,” Nickie said again. + +When Pem had gone, she closed the bedroom door after her; but she didn’t +even try to rest now. + + +V + +Pem went down the passage with a lagging step and a heart strangely +troubled and doubting. + +“No,” she said to herself. “Of course it can’t be like that. I just +imagined it. I’ve thought about it so much that--no, it couldn’t really +have been so wonderful. He couldn’t have been so dear. When I see him +again I shall get over being so silly.” + +But that silliness was the best thing in her life. For weeks the glamour +of that enchanted evening had colored all her days. The music they had +danced to still sounded in her ears, faint and stirring. When she closed +her eyes, she could see again the sparkle and glitter of that tinsel +fairyland of Broadway, made true and fine by the boy’s love. + +“I won’t be an idiot!” she told herself. “When I see him again, I’ll +find that he’s--not really like that!” + +So, with what fortitude she had, she entered the little sitting room. He +didn’t hear her. He was standing at the window, with his back toward the +room, his hands in his pockets--such a straight, stalwart figure! + +“Hello!” said Pem. “It’s a surprise to see you here again!” + +Then he turned, and it was true, all of it--that look she had +remembered, that glamour, that enchantment. + +“Oh, Pem!” he said. “Didn’t you know I’d come?” + +For a minute she was utterly content in his arms, as if her restless and +disconsolate spirit had at last found peace; but not for long. She moved +away, still holding his hand, and looking at him with a misty smile. + +“You’re so beautiful!” he said. “Sometimes I thought you couldn’t be as +lovely as I remembered, but you’re a hundred times--” + +The clock on the mantelpiece struck three. + +“Let’s go out!” she said hastily. + +He was a little taken aback. + +“Can’t we stay here, Pem? I want a chance to talk to you.” + +“Not here. We can talk somewhere else. I know a nice little tea room +where we can dance.” + +“I don’t want to dance,” said he; “and--look here, Pem! I’m a bit hard +up, this trip.” + +She couldn’t help kissing him for that. + +“As if I cared! We’ll take a bus ride, then.” + +“No, we won’t do that, either,” said he, half laughing. “We’ll stay +where we are. I want to talk to you. I--does this suit you, Pem?” + +From his pocket he pulled out a ring, carried loose in there, without a +box, without even a bit of paper, and laid it in her hand. There it was, +honest and unashamed, like himself--the tiniest little diamond. She +stared down at it through a veil of tears. + +“Best I could do,” he said a little forlornly. “You see, I never tried +to save my pay, and it’s darned small, Pem, old girl. I’m only third +mate. I dare say I don’t make as much as you do.” + +“Never mind! That doesn’t matter,” she answered, so low that he could +scarcely hear. + +It seemed to her the most touching and beautiful thing that had ever +happened, that he should come to her with his poor little ring, so +simply and loyally offering her all he had. + +“But we can manage,” he went on more cheerfully. “I’ve figured it out. +We can take a little flat, you know, and if we’re careful, we can get +on. You won’t mind a pretty quiet life, will you, Pem? Nickie told me +you weren’t keen on going out and all that. I’m not, either--at least, +not now. I was, you know, but not now. We’ll settle down--” + +He stopped short, looking at her with a faint frown, but she did not +meet his eyes. She was shocked, appalled, at her own traitorous +thoughts. She glanced again at the ring, and tried in vain to recapture +the tenderness and pity she had felt. + +To settle down and marry this boy--not to dance with him, not to listen +to his love-making to the accompaniment of music, in a bright dazzle of +light, but to marry him and settle down to a deadly quiet life--she knew +very well what that meant. She had often enough been in the sort of +little flat they would have to live in. She went into such places when +sickness was already there. She had seen all the makeshifts, all the +sordid and pitiful anxieties of such existences--people who hadn’t +enough towels and sheets, who couldn’t afford hot water bottles, who +couldn’t afford even the necessary sunlight. + +The quiet life! What had he to do with a quiet life? He had come +suddenly into her own chill, somber existence, startling her into youth +and gayety--that was why she loved him. A dear, honest, silly boy, to +dance with, to be happy with for an evening, but-- + +“Pem!” he said abruptly. “What’s the matter?” + +At his peremptory tone, she found it less difficult to speak. She put +her hand on his shoulder and spoke as kindly as she could. + +“I’m afraid you’re going ahead a little too fast,” she said. “After all, +we’ve only seen each other once before, you know. Doesn’t it seem--” + +“Do you mean that you don’t care for me?” he interrupted. + +His bluntness disconcerted her. + +“No,” she said, with a trace of impatience; “but we don’t really know +each other. I think we ought to wait--until we’re sure.” + +He was silent for a long time, searching her downcast face. + +“You’re sure now, aren’t you?” he asked at last. “All right, Pem! All my +fault! I might have known--” + +And in the face of his sincerity, his honest and unresentful pain, she +could give him no false hope, no false consolation, nothing but the +truth revealed to him by her silence. + +He took the ring from her hand and looked at it with a shadowy smile. +Then, before she knew what he was about, he threw it out of the open +window into the street. + +She came to the window and looked down, but she couldn’t see it in the +street far below. + +“Oh, why did you do that?” she cried. “Why, didn’t--” + +A sob rose in her throat. She turned away her head, so that he should +not see her tears. + +“Don’t cry!” he said. “It’s all my fault. I should have known better, of +course. I say, Pem! Please don’t cry! The whole thing isn’t worth it. +Just--let’s say good-by, Pem!” + +She held out both her hands. After a brief hesitation, he took them in +his. + +“I’ll never forgive myself!” she said unsteadily. “Never!” + +“Nothing to forgive,” he assured her, with a gallant attempt at a smile. +“I--anyhow, I’m glad I ever saw you. Good-by, Pem!” + +If it could only have ended then! If he could have gone then, with that +moment for them to remember! But it was their great misfortune that no +such memory should be left to them. + +The doorbell rang, and Nickie came out of her room. + +“Shall I go, Pem?” she asked. “Or--” + +Pem looked at her helplessly. As the flat was arranged, the front door +could not be opened without affording a plain view of the sitting room. + +“I’ll let it ring,” said Nickie, with a fine effect of carelessness. “No +one we want to see.” + +But that was not Pem’s way. She came of an austere and stiff-necked +family, living secluded on an exhausted little Vermont farm. They had +nothing much but pride to keep them warm in winter, to feed and clothe +them. Pride was the only heritage that came down to Pem, and pride would +not allow her to refuse admission to Mr. Blanchard, no matter what it +cost her. As for the possible cost to Arthur Caswell and to Nickie, that +didn’t occur to her just then. + +She opened the door herself. + +“I’m afraid I’m a little late,” said a courteous, apologetic voice. +“Please--” + +Then, as he followed Pem inside, he caught sight of the others, and made +a general bow. + +“This is Mr. Blanchard, Nickie,” said Pem. + +He looked altogether what Pem had called him--a gentleman through and +through. He was a rather slight man in the middle forties, with a +sensitive, harassed face, hair a little gray on the temples, and fine, +dark eyes. He hadn’t in the least a furtive or shamefaced air. Indeed, +there was a quiet sort of straightforwardness about him that favorably +impressed Nickie, in spite of her prejudice against the man. + +“I’ve heard a great deal about you from Miss Pembroke,” he said. + +Nickie liked his smile, his voice, his well bred ease. She liked all +this, and yet, when Pem presented Caswell to him, her liking was a pain. +Arthur seemed so young, so awkward, such an immature and unimpressive +creature, in contrast to his senior. She wanted to defend him against +comparison. She wanted to force Pem to see, and Mr. Blanchard to see, +the splendid qualities in the young sailor. + +But she had no chance. Before she could interfere, Blanchard had +mentioned that it was growing late. Pem had answered that she was ready, +and off they went. + + +VI + +“I would never have told you,” said Blanchard. “I would have gone on the +best way I could, without you; but now--” + +Pem looked at him across the table. By the light of the gold-shaded +electric candle his thin face was almost incredibly fine. He looked, she +thought, a little inhuman, with his delicate features, his dark, glowing +eyes, and the silvery gleam of white on his temples. His tremendous +consideration for her, his squeamishness, had made his story such a long +one! + +After all, she wasn’t a girl just out of school. + +“I’ve seen more of life than he has,” she reflected; “and yet it has +taken him two hours to tell me that his wife is going to divorce him. I +suppose it’ll take another hour before he can tell me that he hopes I +can marry him when he’s free. I suppose it ought to take me a week to +answer him!” + +She stifled a sigh. It was nonsense for him to try to shield his wife +from Pem, who had two months in which to observe her savage egotism. +Such a dilemma for his chivalrous soul--to make it clear to Pem that his +wife had no just cause for divorcing him, and yet to protect the woman +against the implication of cruel unreasonableness. All things +considered, he had done very well. + +“A--a mutual agreement,”, he had called it. “I think you’d better not go +back,” he went on gently. “She’s very much upset. Her sister and her +mother are with her.” + +Silence fell between them. The orchestra was playing in a gallery behind +them--a gay and delicate air. The rooms were filled with the sort of +people Pem liked about her, with light, laughing voices, faint perfumes, +and the smoke of cigarettes. + +One of Blanchard’s hands was extended on the table--a slender hand, +beautifully tended. He was so fastidious in everything, so kind, so +honorable, so appealing in his masculine assumption of her ignorance and +helplessness. He wanted to take care of her and shelter her. He would +have been horrified at the thought of her living in a little flat on a +third mate’s pay. He would have turned pale at the sight of that poor, +poor little ring. + +“You’re very quiet,” he said, a little anxiously. “I hope I haven’t--” + +Pem looked up with a smile. + +“No!” she thought, as if defying a voice that had not spoken. “It’s no +use! I’m not like that. I couldn’t stand it. I shall be happy with +Everett. It’s his kind of life that I want.” Aloud she said, in the +ladylike, noncommittal tone he expected of her: “I’d better be going +back to Nickie now.” + +Blanchard took her back in a taxi, and all the way he talked of +impersonal matters--not a word of love. She knew he wouldn’t mention +that until he was free to do so honorably. + +He left her at the door. She turned as she entered, and saw him standing +bareheaded in the street--a handsome and distinguished man, yet somehow +pitiful to her, with that touch of white at the temples. + +The flat was empty when she got in. Nickie, of course, had gone to her +case. Arthur Caswell--she couldn’t imagine his destination. + +On the kitchen table were the disorderly remains of a tea for two. The +sitting room, too, was very untidy, as Nickie always left it. Pem turned +on the electric light and began to set it in order. She emptied the ash +tray, full of the stubs of those horrible cheap cigarettes she had seen +Caswell smoking. She picked up the magazines that lay on the floor, and +straightened the chairs. + +The piano was open, with music on the rack. She went to close it. The +lid slipped from her hand, and, falling, jarred the strings with a +queer, trembling discord. She could have imagined it the faint, distant +echo of a voice--a young voice. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +APRIL, 1924 +Vol. LXXXI NUMBER 3 + + + + +His Remarkable Future + +THE STORY OF A RAPTUROUS BUT SOMEWHAT TUMULTUOUS ENGAGEMENT + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +“Haven’t you any umbrella?” asked Hardy, with a frown. + +“I have one,” answered Miss Patterson, “but not here.” + +She was dignified, he was somewhat severe. Both were important, +preoccupied, adult persons, full of business concerns; nevertheless, +they did not quite know how to proceed with the conversation. They stood +side by side in the lobby of the office building, looking not at all at +each other, but at the steady and violent rain. Miss Patterson was +reluctant to walk off in such a downpour, and Hardy was determined that +she should not. + +“Silly kid!” he thought. “In that flimsy suit and those fool shoes!” + +Any number of other girls ran past, some with newspapers over their +hats, some laughing, some gravely worried, but he was not perturbed by +them. They could stand it. No other living girl was so peculiarly +fragile as Miss Patterson, or beset with so many dangers. + +“I think it will stop,” said she. + +This annoyed him. She was trying to make light of a most serious +situation. + +“Why?” he demanded. + +“Because it always does stop,” she said. “At least, it always has, in +the past.” + +He turned his head to look at her, and he grew a little dizzy. In the +bleak light of that dismal day, Miss Patterson seemed to glow with a +strange radiance. Her light hair was like a nimbus under her hat, her +blue eyes were lambent, and she chose just that moment to make the color +deepen in her cheeks. It was not fair! + +“I’ll get a taxi,” he said. + +“Oh, no!” she protested. “Please don’t! I live miles and miles uptown.” + +“Doesn’t matter,” said Hardy, and off he darted. + +He stopped a cab with the air of a highwayman, and returned to Miss +Patterson. As he put her into the vehicle, a curious change came over +them. Hardy ceased to be masterful and severe, and Miss Patterson was no +longer dignified. They looked at each other steadily, with a strange +sort of despair. + +“Look here!” said Hardy, in an uncertain voice. “Can’t I come with you?” + +“Oh, no!” cried she. “Oh, no! Oh, you’d better not!” + +But they both knew that he was going with her, that he must, that the +inevitable moment had come, the moment foreseen by both of them all +through the winter. + +“What’s the address?” he asked. + +That was the last thing needed. Now he knew where the human, unofficial +Miss Patterson lived. She was disassociated from business now. She was +not a typist, but a girl. + +She seemed aware of all this, for, as he got into the cab beside her, +she looked at him in a new way--a look so bright, so clear, so gentle! + +“Look here!” he said. “I--I don’t want to be a nuisance. If you’d really +rather I didn’t come--” + +She only shook her head. If she had tried to speak, she would have ended +in tears. + +He didn’t know that he, too, had a new look--that his young face had +grown pale and strained, his eyes dark with his great fear and his great +hope. And this was the splendid, vainglorious Mr. Hardy from the import +department, the young man of whom great things were expected, who was to +be made assistant buyer when Mr. Hallock left at the end of the year. + +The other girls had talked about him a good deal, for he was a figure to +capture the imagination--a handsome boy, swaggering a little in the +honest pride of his young manhood: only twenty-three, and going to be +made assistant buyer! + +“You know,” he said. “I’ve often wanted to--to have a little talk with +you. I--I often noticed you.” + +“Did you?” said Miss Patterson, ready to laugh through her unshed tears, +for he needn’t have troubled to tell her that. + +“But you see,” he went on, “I didn’t know--I couldn’t tell whether +you--” + +She was very glad to hear that, because sometimes she had been afraid +that he could tell, could read in her face what was in her heart. + +“You know, you’re so different from any one else,” he said. “Every time +I saw you, I--whenever I saw you, it seemed--that is, I thought you were +so different from any one else.” + +He stopped, aware that he was doing very badly, and filled with horror +at his own idiotic words. She would think he was a fool. + +Yet how could he possibly convey to this ethereal, fragile, and +unworldly creature any idea of his own tempestuous love without alarming +and offending her? He had no business to love her. It was a gross +impertinence. She was an angel, and he was nothing but a clumsy-- + +The taxi turned a corner sharply, and he was flung sidewise, so that his +shoulder brushed hers. + +“I’m sorry!” he cried earnestly. “I couldn’t help it!” + +“But you’re soaking wet!” said Miss Patterson. + +Her gloved hand rested on his shoulder, and her voice--no, impossible! + +“You’re not--crying?” he asked incredulously. + +“Yes, I am,” said Miss Patterson. “I am. I can’t bear to--to think of +your getting so wet and catching a cold--just to get me a--a taxi!” + +“But I shan’t catch cold,” said Hardy. He was trying to bear in mind +that her words, her tears, were nothing but an expression of her +wonderful kindness and humanity. She would be sorry for any one who got +wet and caught a cold in her service. That was all that she +meant--absolutely all. “I shan’t catch cold,” he went on. “I never do: +but you--you see, you’re so delicate--” + +“I’m not!” said she. “Not a bit! But I remember perfectly well that last +February you had the most--oh, the most awful cold!” + +“Edith!” cried he, astounded, overwhelmed by this confession. “You +remember _that_?” + +Miss Patterson suddenly drew away, and ceased weeping. + +“Well, yes,” she admitted. “I--yes, I remember.” + +A silence. + +“Then you must--must feel a little interested in me,” said Hardy. + +Silence. + +“I hope you do,” added Hardy. + +The worst silence of all. + +“Why do you hope that?” she asked, in a blank, small voice. + +“Because I--ever since the first time I saw you, I thought perhaps you’d +noticed.” + +“Noticed what?” inquired Miss Patterson, and he fancied that there was a +shade of coldness in her voice. He was in despair. Of course she had no +idea what he was driving at, he was so appallingly clumsy and stupid +about it. He must do better than this! He drew a long breath. + +“My prospects are pretty good,” he remarked. “They’re going to make me +assistant buyer at the end of the year.” + +“So I’ve heard,” said she, and this time there was no mistaking the +coldness in her tone. + +“I didn’t say that to boast,” he assured her anxiously. “I only wanted +to tell you because--I wanted you to know that I--” + +“I shouldn’t blame you for boasting,” said Miss Patterson, in a polite, +formal way. “Every one says you have a remarkable future before you.” + +“Not without you!” he cried. “I don’t want any future without you! Oh, +Edith, I don’t know how to tell you--” + +The head of the auditing department, in which Miss Patterson worked, +often praised her for the quickness with which she grasped new ideas. +This praise seemed justified, for she understood Hardy without further +explanation. + +Nevertheless, they both had an enormous amount of explaining to do. All +the way uptown they were engaged in explaining to each other, with the +greatest earnestness, just how they felt, why they felt so, and when +they had begun to feel so. When they reached the depressing West Side +street where Edith lived, they hadn’t half finished. + +The taxi stopped, and the driver turned around, so that they couldn’t go +on explaining, or even say good-by; but Hardy went into the dingy little +vestibule with his Edith. + +“Darling girl!” he said. “Shan’t I come upstairs with you and see your +aunt?” + +She turned away. + +“I’d rather you didn’t, Joe,” she said. “Not just now, please!” + +He was willing to do anything in the world she wanted, except to leave +her; but that was almost impossible. She seemed to him so forlorn, so +little and so young. The brightness had left her face now. She was +downcast and pale. + +“Edith!” he said. “Aren’t you happy at home?” + +“No, Joe, I’m not,” she answered. “I’m wretched!” + +When she saw what that did to him, how much it hurt him, she was +overcome with remorse. + +“Oh, but it doesn’t matter--now!” she said. “Not now--when I have you. +Really and truly, Joe, I don’t care a bit!” + +Her anxiety to reassure him, to send him away happy, touched Hardy +almost beyond endurance. He had always been aware of something wistful, +something a little sorrowful about her, like a shadow over her clear +beauty. She had been the dearer to him for that. She was a thousand +times dearer to him now because she was sad, and must look to him for +her happiness. He meant to make her happy--at any cost! + + +II + +Those words, “at any cost,” did not come consciously into Hardy’s mind. +He didn’t really believe that happiness cost anything--or love, either. +You found them, suddenly, on your way through life, and of course you +had a right to keep what you found. + +He did see difficulties, though. His prospects were good, but in his +immediate present there were many things that troubled him. + +His chief trouble was one which young fellows of twenty-three who want +to get married have encountered before. It was money. His salary of +twenty-five hundred a year was more than he needed for his own wants, +and he had done a very sensible thing--he had begun buying stock in the +company that employed him, turning in ten dollars of his salary every +week for this purpose. He had four hundred dollars saved in that way, +but no one ever repented a folly more heartily than young Hardy now +regretted his prudence. + +He couldn’t touch that money. He knew very well that one of Mr. +Plummer’s strongest reasons for promoting him was that infernal stock he +was buying. If he were to sell it, or to stop his payments, Mr. Plummer +would want to know why, and Hardy’s prospects would be in jeopardy. He +couldn’t marry without those prospects, nor could he very well get +married without the money. + +Well, any wise and experienced person could solve that difficulty for +him. He must wait. Even Edith, who was neither wise nor experienced, +told him that. They were having lunch together a few days after their +great discovery of happiness, and Hardy had been explaining the +situation in detail. + +“We’ll have to wait,” said Edith. “Anyhow--” + +“No,” said he. “I can’t stand seeing you so miserable!” + +“But I’d be a hundred times more miserable if I thought I was doing you +any harm!” said Edith. + +As soon as the words were spoken, she realized that she had made a +serious mistake, and tried hastily to remedy it. + +“I’m really not miserable, Joe!” she cried. “Not a bit!” + +He knew better, though. Without even having seen her, he was becoming +acquainted with Edith’s aunt, and learning to appreciate her talent for +making people miserable. Edith never told him about it. It wasn’t her +habit to complain, but to any one who watched her as Hardy did, the +thing was obvious. + +One evening, when he was walking to the Subway with her, she had to stop +in the drug store to buy a bottle of “nerve tonic” at two dollars a +bottle. + +“You don’t take that stuff, do you, Edith?” he had asked anxiously. + +“Oh, no!” she replied. “It’s for Aunt Bessie. She’s in very poor health, +you know.” + +“What’s the matter with her?” Hardy bluntly inquired. + +He did not fail to notice Edith’s troubled, face and rising color; and +the answer that Aunt Bessie was “terribly nervous” seemed to him to +explain a good deal. + +Then he learned that Aunt Bessie was upset if Edith was a few minutes +late in getting home, and that she would be still more painfully upset +if Edith should even suggest going out in the evening. + +“She’s alone all day, you see,” the girl explained, “and it does seem +selfish to go out again.” + +“Oh, _very_ selfish!” Hardy interrupted. “And what about Saturday +afternoon and Sunday?” + +“Well, you see, Joe, she’s alone all week, and--and she hasn’t any one +but me. Anyhow, Joe, we see each other every day in the office, and we +can have lunch together, can’t we?” + +He said nothing more just then, for he could see that Edith was unhappy +and anxious. For those first few days even having lunch with her was +almost too good to be true; but the day when Edith said they must wait, +and Hardy said he wouldn’t, was Monday, after he had spent a horrible +Sunday without a glimpse of her. + +“No,” he said again. “We can’t go on like this. I can’t, anyhow.” + +Again she pointed out that they saw each other every day in the office, +and could have lunch together. She added that they had only been engaged +five days. + +“I know,” said he. “It would be all right if I could see you, but you +won’t let me come to your house, and you won’t go out with me.” + +“But we see each other--” + +“Yes, and we can have lunch together, for the next ten years, I +suppose!” Hardy interrupted. + +“It won’t be anything like ten years, you silly boy! At the end of the +year, when you--” + +“Yes, and do you know what’s going to happen then? They’re going to send +me to Europe, with Preble, for two months.” + +“Oh!” cried Edith. + +For a moment she was silent, overcome by this news. Then she made a +gallant attempt at a reasonable, calm, businesslike manner. + +“But, after all--two months!” she said. + +Her smile was a very poor one, and her voice betrayed her. Instead of +helping her, Hardy became unmanageable. + +“Look here!” he said. “September, October, November--that’s three months +that we can have lunch together. Then I’ll be away for December and +January: so perhaps after five months I may have a chance to--kiss you +once more, if your aunt doesn’t mind. Five whole months, and you won’t +let me see you alone for five minutes!” + +“Oh, Joe, darling! Do be reasonable!” + +“You’re a little too reasonable,” said he. “If you really cared for +me--” + +There is no better way to begin a quarrel than with those classic words. +Edith grew angry, but her anger was such a mild little thing compared to +Hardy’s that she took refuge in flight, and left him sitting alone in +the restaurant. All was over! + +That afternoon they had four hours to think over their words. When Edith +came downstairs, Hardy was waiting for her in the lobby. + +“Edith!” he said. “Edith! I don’t know how I could have been such a +brute! Edith, I can’t--” + +“Oh, Joe, you weren’t! I know it must seem heartless to you for me to +talk that way: but you don’t understand, Joe!” + +As they walked toward the Subway, she tried to tell him. It was the +hottest hour of that sultry September day, and she looked so jaded, so +pale, that he was frightened. He held her arm, his tall head bent, to +catch every word, his eyes fixed on her face. + +“You see,” she said, “I owe so much to Aunt Bessie. She took me when I +was a tiny girl, after mother died, and she gave up everything for +me--everything, Joe! She used the little bit of money she had to send me +to a good school, and when that was gone she went to work. That’s what +ruined her health--working in an office; and she did it for me, Joe. If +she’s a little--a little trying now, I--you do see, don’t you, Joe?” + +“Yes, my darling girl, I see,” he answered, more gently than she had +ever heard him speak before. “I think--see here, Edith! Could you spare +time for a soda?” + +She thought she could. They went into a shop near by, and sat down at a +little table in a dark corner. He stretched out his hand toward hers, +which lay on the table, but he drew it back again. He wasn’t going to do +anything that might bother her, never again. He would be patient, he +would do anything in the world she wanted. He was sick with remorse and +alarm at her pallor and fatigue. + +“I’ll do whatever you want, Edith,” he said. “Only--I love you so! If +you would just tell me more about yourself! It’s hard not to know.” + +It was her hand that grasped his. + +“As if I didn’t understand! Oh, Joe, I worried so awfully about you that +time you got wet! If you had been sick, I couldn’t have been with you. I +didn’t even know who there’d be to take care of you.” + +“Don’t!” he said suddenly. “Please don’t, little Edith! I don’t need +much taking care of. It’s you! Do you mind telling me what--how you--how +it is with you financially?” + +She did tell him, readily and frankly, and he was appalled. She was +supporting herself and her aunt on her meager salary. Two persons +entirely dependent on this slip of a girl! + +“Edith!” he said. “Won’t you marry me now? My salary’s enough for us to +scrape along on.” + +Both her hands clasped his now. + +“Joe, my own dearest, I can’t!” + +“We can take your aunt to live with us for a while, until I’ve got my +raise.” + +“Joe, we can’t!” + +“I don’t care how bad she is. If you can stand her, I can.” + +“You couldn’t! Don’t you see, Joe, that that would spoil everything? We +couldn’t start like that. But if you’d--” + +“If I’d what?” + +“Nothing!” she said hastily. “I’ll tell you another time.” + +But instead of telling him, she left a note on his desk the next +morning. + +DEAR JOE: + + I will marry you now, if you won’t ask me to give up my job. + +“I don’t wonder you wrote it,” said Hardy, when he met her for lunch. + +“Joe, it’s the only way!” + +“It’s not _my_ way,” said he. + +She reminded him that he had promised her to do whatever she wanted, and +he replied that he would do so--except in this instance. + +“Well, I won’t let you have the burden of taking care of Aunt Bessie,” +she told him. “It’s bad enough for you to think of getting married, +anyhow, when you’re so young, and just at the beginning of a wonderful +career--” + +“Young, am I? Then what about you?” he asked. “No! When you marry me, +you’ll be done with offices. That’s something I won’t argue about.” + +She pretended to be angry, but in her heart she adored him when he was +magnificent and arbitrary. + + +III + +“It isn’t really a lie,” said Edith. “I really do go to the French +class.” + +“It’s too near a lie to suit me,” said Hardy bluntly. “I’m sick of this +hole-and-corner business. It’s--can’t you see for yourself that it’s +degrading to both of us? Edith, can’t we be honest about this? Let me go +and see your aunt, and tell her the whole thing. If she makes a row, I +dare say I can live through it.” + +“I dare say _you_ could,” Edith answered briefly. + +They were coming near to one of the gates of Central Park. Their walk +together was almost at an end--a walk which only a few weeks ago would +have been a delight almost unsupportable, a thing to lie awake at night +remembering, to think of all through a busy day. Now that rapture, that +glamour, was gone. With all their love, their hope, their blind +tenderness for each other, they were bitter at heart. + +It was a wild, bright October evening. The moon seemed rocking in the +fitful clouds, the wind sprang like a kitten along the paths after the +dry leaves, the bare trees creaked stiff and resistant. All the world +was in motion, restless, hurried. All things were free--except +themselves. It was intolerable to Hardy, an affront to his fine young +pride in himself, his magnificent assurance. It was petty, base, +shameful! + +“Edith!” he said suddenly. “I won’t go on like this!” + +She stopped short in the middle of the path. + +“I’m tired of hearing that,” she replied, in a queer, unsteady voice. +“You’re always saying that--always blaming me; and you know we’ve got to +go on like this--or not go on at all!” + +“We haven’t. That’s what I’m always trying to tell you,” he said +stormily. “We don’t have to meet this way--in this beastly, lying +way--pretending to your aunt that your French lesson is for two hours +instead of one, so that we can have one hour a week alone together. Tell +her! Let her be upset! She’ll have to know some time. Then at least I +can come to see you in your own place, decently and honorably.” + +“I will not tell her now! You don’t realize what it’ll mean to Aunt +Bessie. You don’t care. She hasn’t any one but me. I _won’t_ tell her +now, and let her have all that long time to think about--losing me. +She’s going to be happy as long as possible.” + +Hardy took her arm. + +“Come on,” he said, “or you’ll be ten minutes late, and she’ll have a +nervous attack and keep you up all night, as usual!” + +But when he felt how she was shivering in her thin jacket, a terrible +compunction seized him. + +“Oh, Edith!” he cried. “Edith, never mind all that! Darling little +Edith, it’s only our affair, after all! Let’s get married now, before I +go!” + +“You know we can’t,” she said, with a sob. “Not when you’re so obstinate +and--and unkind. You know we couldn’t manage for ourselves and Aunt +Bessie, too, in any place where she’d be comfortable, just on your +salary; and you’re so unreasonable about my job!” + +“Look here, Edith--I’ll sell that blamed stock, and that’ll provide for +Aunt Bessie until I’ve got my raise.” + +“You won’t! You shan’t!” She pulled her arm away from him, and roughly +wiped away the tears running down her cheeks. “Don’t you dare to mention +such a thing! I’m not going to ruin your whole life just for--” + +“Well, you’ve ruined it!” said Hardy. “I can tell you that, if it’s any +satisfaction to you. I don’t care now what happens to me, or whether I +go on or not. You’ve shown me how little you care for me. +You’ve--Edith!” + +She had started running along the path, but he easily overtook her. All +at once their arms were about each other, Edith’s wet cheek against his, +and all their pain, their bitterness, lost in a passion of tenderness +and remorse. + + +IV + +Still Hardy went about the office, magnificent as ever, very well aware +of being a remarkable young fellow, who was to be made assistant buyer +at twenty-three, a man talked about, admired, and envied. He was still +proud of himself, still sure of himself, but some of the magic had gone +out of it, some of the zest. He couldn’t look forward to that trip to +Europe with unmixed joy now. + +Indeed, all the joys he had at this time were so mixed with anxiety and +impatience that he could scarcely recognize them. He dreaded leaving +Edith. He imagined all sorts of misfortunes that might befall her in his +absence. Sometimes he even resented his splendid future, because it so +burdened and harassed the present. He wanted to live _now_, not to wait. + +Worst of all was the humiliation he endured from their furtive and hasty +meetings. He had never before in his life been furtive, or even +cautious. He had lived boldly and rashly, in the light of day, and it +hurt and angered him to do otherwise. He wanted to love boldly and +rashly. He wanted to be proud of his love. + +Well, he wasn’t proud; he was ashamed. + +He couldn’t understand Edith’s viewpoint. Her life had been so +repressed, so weighted down by unjust and inordinate demands upon her, +that she was thankful for the briefest minutes of happiness. If she +could meet Hardy for ten minutes on a street corner, she was joyous for +those ten minutes--when he would let her be. He tried to let her. He +would watch her coming toward him--such a gallant little figure!--and he +would make up his mind to be tender and considerate; but when she was +with him, when he saw her ill dressed and ill nourished, and couldn’t +help her, when he saw her glance at her watch even when he was speaking, +his good resolutions only too often vanished, and he reproached her +bitterly. + +She didn’t endure his reproaches meekly. He wouldn’t have loved her, if +she had. On the contrary, she replied to him vigorously, and so many, +many times they had left each other in anger, to be paid for later by +hours of remorse. + +Neither of them was quarrelsome by nature, nor was there any lack of +real harmony between them. They were both generous, quick to forgive, +eager to understand, passionately loyal to each other. Every one of +their disagreements would have been quickly adjusted and forgotten, if +they had had time; but they never did have time, and neither did this +fellow of twenty-three and this girl of twenty have any greater amount +of patience and ripe wisdom than others of their age. + +Sometimes a sort of panic seized them, and they felt it necessary to +“explain.” They had fallen into the habit of taking a little more than +the allotted hour for lunch. Though Edith had been solemnly warned by +her superior, she found it impossible to leave Joe in the middle of a +speech. He was so unreasonable about her always being in a hurry. + +So there was lunch almost every day, and the walk to the Subway, and +that hour stolen from the French class once a week, all through October +and November, until the trip to Europe was only a few weeks ahead of +them. Mr. Plummer hadn’t actually told Hardy he was to go, but the thing +was understood. Mr. Loomis, the buyer, was taking pains to train him, +and had once or twice said such things as: + +“You’ll see how that is for yourself, Hardy, when you’re in France.” + +“It’ll probably be before Christmas,” said Hardy. “The idea is that I’m +not to be told until Hallock is gone, because I might slack up on my +present work. Silly, childish way to do--as if it was a treat for a good +boy!” + +“Well, it will be a treat, won’t it?” said Edith. “You’ve always--” + +He looked across the table at her. The cold air had brought no color +into her cheeks. She looked weary, downcast. He could see that her smile +was an effort, and in her eyes was the look that he couldn’t bear. + +“No!” he said. “I wish to Heaven I wasn’t going! I mean it! If I have to +leave you like this--” + +“Joe,” she began, and was silent for a minute. “I--I know it’s selfish +of me; but--oh, Joe, when I think of your going away--” + +Mr. Plummer, who was also taking lunch in that restaurant, saw his +promising young man lean across the table and lay his hand on that of +Miss Patterson from the auditing department. + +“Too bad!” thought Mr. Plummer. “A boy with a remarkable future before +him--and getting himself entangled before he’s begun! Too bad! Too bad!” + +Fortunately, however, he could not hear what monstrous folly the boy +spoke. + +“I won’t go, Edith! I’ll stay here with you. Nothing else counts with me +but you--only you. I’ll--” + +“I want you to go, Joe, darling,” said she, with quivering lips; “but I +thought--only I know you wouldn’t! I--if we could just get married +before you go, and not tell any one till you come back--just so that +we’d really belong to each other--then it wouldn’t be so hard!” + +And Hardy, the bold, the rash, the magnificent, who hated anything +secret and furtive, looked only once at her dear face, and agreed. + + +V + +“You’re late again, Miss Patterson,” said Mr. Dunne. + +“I’m awfully sorry,” said Edith. “I’ll really try not to again.” + +But she didn’t look sorry. She sat down at her desk, flushed and a +little out of breath, and, to Mr. Dunne’s great displeasure, there was a +smile hovering about her lips. + +“Miss Patterson,” said he, “I’m afraid this is once too often.” + +Edith looked up in alarm. + +“But, you see--” she began, and stopped. + +She couldn’t explain to Mr. Dunne that this was a most pardonable +lateness, and not at all likely to happen again. Going to the City Hall +for a marriage license wouldn’t occupy much of her time in the future. +Thinking of this, she smiled again--and lost her job. Mr. Dunne didn’t +like people who smiled when they were late. + +So it happened that just when she badly needed a smile she hadn’t one. +The wretched little imitation she gave to Hardy, an hour later, didn’t +deceive him for an instant. He stopped beside her desk--a thing he had +never done before. + +“What’s the matter?” he demanded, and would not be put off. + +No use to tell him that he shouldn’t stand there and talk to her! He +knew that very well, and he didn’t care. A mighty rage filled him. +Edith, his Edith, his own girl, to be discharged and humiliated like +this! + +“Get on your hat and jacket,” he commanded, “and come on!” + +“Joe! You mustn’t--” + +“Look here!” said he. “I won’t have you here like this. If Dunne told +you to go, then go now. Good Lord! Haven’t you any pride?” + +She was too wretched to be angry at him. She did get on her hat and +jacket, and, in full view of every one. Hardy walked out of the office +with her at three o’clock on a busy afternoon. + +“We’ll go to the flat,” he said, “and talk it over.” + +They had a flat of their own. Hardy had insisted upon this. + +“We’ll take it now,” he had said: “and whenever we see anything +especially good in the way of furniture, we’ll buy it. Then, when I come +back, we’ll have a place of our own all ready for us.” + +It wasn’t quite what they wanted, but Hardy had very little money just +then, and their only time for house hunting was what they had been able +to pilfer from their lunch hour; so they had taken the first one that +seemed at all suitable. It consisted of three tiny rooms in a remodeled +house west of Central Park. + +They had already become inordinately fond of this future home. To be +sure, there was nothing in it except a barrel containing a Limoges +dinner set, which Hardy had bought from a shipment received at the +office; but Edith had made a flying visit and measured the windows for +curtains, and after that she could look upon the place as her own. + +This afternoon, when Hardy opened the door with his latchkey, the place +was obviously a _future_ home. It was bare, bleak, and dusty, with +slanting sun rays falling across the ill laid board floor of what was +going to be the sitting room. + +The door closed behind them, and there they were, alone, with plenty of +time for talking now, and neither of them said one word. Hardy began +walking about. His footsteps made a loud and somehow a melancholy sound. +His voice in the empty little rooms was not at all his confident office +voice, but boyish, and, to Edith, terribly touching. + +She sat down on the barrel, struggling against her despair and misery, +while he moved about in the kitchen, mocked by a gas stove with no gas +in it, and water taps that gave forth no water. She knew how he felt; +she knew what he would say. + +“But I won’t!” she thought. “I’ll get another job. I won’t let him take +care of Aunt Bessie now. I won’t! I won’t! Not now, when he’s just +beginning.” + +If she were making resolves in the sitting room, so was Hardy in the +kitchen. He hadn’t been singled out by Mr. Plummer because of his +gentleness and consideration. He had a remarkable future because he was +remarkably persistent and clear-sighted about getting his own way, and +Edith was no match for him. + +“No!” said he. “No more jobs! We’ll tell your aunt _now_, and we’ll get +married to-morrow, as we planned, and we’ll move in here.” + +“We can’t, Joe. We haven’t any furniture, you know--” + +“Then we’ll get it.” + +“And Aunt Bessie--” + +“We’ll see Aunt Bessie now. Look here, little Edith! It’s got to be this +way. I couldn’t have my wife running about looking for a job. I couldn’t +go away and leave you working in a strange office. It was bad enough in +the old place. Look here, Edith, don’t you think you can be happy with +me? Don’t you love me enough?” + +“I love you too much, Joe! It’s not fair to you. You’ll--oh, Joe, you’ll +have to sell your stock, and Mr. Plummer--” + +“Edith,” he said, “I’ve been thinking lately--I don’t know how to put it +very well--but it seems to me that maybe it’s a mistake to live so much +in the future. Suppose there wasn’t any future--for us? Suppose +something happened to one of us? Edith, I can’t stand thinking of that! +Look here! Let’s just live now, and not be afraid of what’s going to +happen. Let’s start this thing”--he stopped for a moment--“with courage +and confidence,” he finished. + +She put her hand on his cheek and turned his head so that she could look +into his honest, steady eyes. + +“Let’s!” she said, with a very unsteady little smile. “I feel that way, +too, Joe. We’ll begin this minute, and unpack the china, just so that +we’ll--we’ll feel at home!” + + +VI + +Hardy turned his back upon Mr. Plummer, and looked out of the window. It +was a cold, rainy day. The people far below on the street were hurrying +by under umbrellas. + +“In that case, Hardy,” said Mr. Plummer, “I’m sorry, but--” + +“Yes, sir,” said Hardy. + +He couldn’t, at that moment, say anything more. Something had risen into +his throat and silenced him. He would have liked to speak, to tell the +man who had shown so kindly an interest in him that he regretted his +hasty and violent words. He hadn’t meant all that he said. He had come +to tell Mr. Plummer that he wanted to sell his stock. He had listened, +as patiently as he could, while his employer remonstrated with him. He +had endured a pretty stiff lecture upon his recent slackness and lack of +attention to work, because he knew he deserved it; but when Mr. Plummer +undertook to warn him about “entangling” himself with that “young woman +in the auditing department;” all his genuine respect for his chief had +vanished in an overwhelming anger. That “young woman” was his Edith! + +He didn’t like, now, to recall what he had said. + +“I’m sorry, Hardy,” said Mr. Plummer again. He was looking at the boy +with an odd expression on his lined face, a look half respectful, half +sorrowful. As a man, he liked Hardy the better for his outburst, but as +a business man he deplored it. + +“I wish you the best of luck, my boy,” he said. “Refer to me at any +time.” + +“Thank you, sir,” said Hardy. + +Off he went, with his words of apology unsaid, with five years of +friendly interest unrewarded, and with his own heart like lead. He +walked through the office for the last time, and into the corridor, +leaving so much behind him. + +Edith was waiting for him in the lobby. + +“Oh, Joe!” she cried. “I found a place uptown where they promised to +deliver the furniture this afternoon. Imagine! And I got the dearest +material for curtains! I brought a sample to show you.” + +She was opening her hand bag, but he stopped her. + +“No, don’t,” he said curtly. “Not just now.” + +Here she was, chattering about curtains, after all that had happened! He +remembered how he had left her the evening before, after a horrible +interview with her aunt. He remembered her pitiful attempts to soothe +and comfort that hysterical old demon, and her anguish when she failed +so utterly, and was told that if she married “that man” she would be +cast off--except for the trifling communications necessary to continuing +her support of the martyr. + +“And I couldn’t sleep for worrying about her!” he thought bitterly. “I +thought she’d be ill, and look at her now--perfectly happy, talking +about curtains!” + +“Come on!” he said aloud, and then stopped, with a frown. “Haven’t you +any umbrella?” he asked. + +“I have one,” she replied, “but not here. It wasn’t raining when I +started.” + +“Edith!” he said suddenly. “Don’t you remember?” + +How could he have imagined that she was happy, or that her mind was +filled with thoughts of curtains? That small, gallant, smiling thing, so +pale, so troubled, with the shadow of her suffering dark in her eyes! + +“It’s nearly twelve, Joe,” she said, looking at her watch. “We haven’t +much time.” + +“Oh, yes, we have!” he told her. “We have any amount of time, for I’m +never going back there.” + +“Joe!” she cried. “Oh, Joe! Oh, no, no! Don’t tell me you’ve--” + +He drew a long breath, and then looked down at her with a grin. + +“You’ve got a young man with a remarkably uncertain future,” he said. +“Never mind--we’ll start a new future. Anyhow, I shan’t have to go to +Europe now, and leave you.” + +“Oh, Joe! What have I done?” + +“I did it myself,” he said sturdily, “and I’m glad. Thank Heaven, we’ve +got time, now, for a nice, peaceful wedding!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JULY, 1924 +Vol. LXXXII NUMBER 2 + + + + +His Own People + +MRS. DENIS LANIER’S FIRST ENCOUNTER WITH HER HUSBAND’S FAMILY PROVES TO +BE A TRYING ORDEAL + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +After each stroke of the brush her bright hair flew out in glittering +threads, and in the strong light that centered upon the mirror her vivid +little face seemed framed in a sort of unearthly radiance. She looked at +the reflected image, at her great, solemn amber eyes, at her white +shoulders, at that sparkling flood of hair. + +A brief moment of joy that was, however, for almost at once came other +thoughts that put an end to it. She grew disconsolate and troubled. With +a sigh she threw down the hairbrush, and, going over to the table, +picked up her book. Being pretty wasn’t going to do her any good. On the +contrary, it might well be another charge against her, another offense +in a list already very long. + +“They’ll say he married me just because I’m pretty,” she reflected. + +And it was not so! Her incomparable Denis had seen and loved and praised +all those things in her heart of which she was honestly proud. He loved +her because she was valiant and loyal and tender. + +“Of course, he does like my looks,” she thought; “but even when I’m old +and ugly, he’ll still feel the same toward me. He said so--and I know +it!” + +But how was she to make these terrible people see all that? What she +needed for the ordeal before her was dignity, assurance, poise--that was +it. She had even gone so far as to buy a book on etiquette, to find the +secret. Useless! No situation like hers was mentioned in the portentous +volume. The bride received a visit from her husband’s family, or he +brought her to visit them, but there was no help offered to a bride who +was suddenly commanded to go all alone to meet her new people for the +first time. + +She looked through the pages again. “The Etiquette of Weddings”--there +had been precious little of that about _their_ wedding--just she and +Denis and a strange clergyman, with a deaconess and the sexton for +witnesses. “The Bride’s Family”--hers was hundreds of miles away, in +Maine. “The Groom’s Family”--she closed the book violently. + +“I ought to be ashamed of myself!” she cried. + +It seemed like treachery toward her own people, this fear of Denis’s +family. There was no reason on earth why she shouldn’t go to them with +her head high, no reason why she shouldn’t have poise. She must; she +would summon it up from the depth of her anxious heart, so that she +might do credit to her Denis. + +“And they may be very nice to me,” she said to herself, without for an +instant believing in the probability. + +She remembered the letters that Denis had received from his mother after +he had written to tell her of his engagement. He had never read a word +of them to Emily, but his face told her enough, and the black gloom that +settled over him. He admitted that his mother wanted him to wait--he +didn’t say how long, or for what, but Emily knew very well. His mother +was hoping that time would cure his deplorable and unaccountable folly +of wishing to marry an American stenographer. + +Well, it hadn’t. Their engagement had lasted five months--not a very +happy time for either of them, because of the depression that seized +Denis every time he had a letter from his people, or was in any way +reminded of them. Emily had endured this with admirable patience. She +knew that he loved her with all his honest heart, that he was proud of +her, and that he couldn’t help his queer, tribal notions about his +family. He was always saying that “a fellow owes it to his family” to do +this or that, and it was the strongest possible proof of his love for +Emily that he clung to her in spite of their opposition. + +Still, no matter how willing she was to understand Denis’s point of +view, Emily couldn’t be expected to share his reverence for his +relatives. On the contrary, she often found it very hard to hold her +tongue--as, for instance, on the day when he came to her with the air of +an absolutely desperate man, and told her that he was ordered off to New +Orleans on forty-eight hours’ notice, to survey a damaged hull, and that +they must be married before he left. + +When she objected, he threatened to throw up the whole business--that +flourishing business as a marine surveyor which was the very apple of +his eye--because he could not and would not leave Emily unless he left +her as his wife. She was secretly delighted by this impetuous and +domineering conduct, and sorry for him, too, because he was so obviously +upset; and yet she was exasperated. He couldn’t hide the fact that he +was making a tremendous sacrifice in affronting his sacrosanct people +for her sake. + +After the wedding he had sent a cable announcing it to his mother. Then +a reckless gayety had come over him, like that of a man who has nothing +more to lose. + +“I don’t care!” said Emily to herself, with tears in her eyes. “It’s all +part of his darlingness. He’s so terribly loyal!” + +Of course, he hadn’t imagined that his family would descend upon Emily +like this, when he was away. He had expected them to stay in England, +where they belonged. He would have been appalled at the thought of this +meeting. + +The latest development had come upon Emily like a thunderbolt. That +morning a letter had been brought up to her, and, without the faintest +suspicion, she had opened it to read: + +MY DEAR EMILY: + + I should be very pleased if you would dine with us this evening at + half past seven. + + Most sincerely yours, + MAUDE LANIER. + + +She had sent a messenger boy with her acceptance, because she knew that +that was what Denis would have wished; but she couldn’t make the best of +it, couldn’t recapture the smiling, careless bravery that Denis so loved +in her. She had had courage enough to leave her dear, shabby old home at +eighteen and go off to try her luck in the wide world. She had been able +to give Denis the most gallant, bright farewell. She had faced more than +one black moment in her twenty years, but she could not face Denis’s +family untroubled. + +She had given herself two hours to dress in, and she needed every second +of the time. Her prettiness seemed to ebb away with every breath she +drew. That radiant hair was an unruly tangle when she tried to put it +up. The brightness fled from her face, leaving it pale and strained. The +dark dress that Denis had admired so much was admirable no longer, but +austerely plain and grievously unbecoming. Emily could have wept at her +own image in the mirror. + +“I look so--so mean!” she cried, with a sob. “Such a meek, scared, silly +little object!” + +This wouldn’t do. The thing that the serious Denis had loved best of all +in her was her absurd, delightful gayety. She straightened her shoulders +and drew a long breath. + +“You know,” she said to her own reflection, “Denis picked _you_ out from +all the other girls in the world, and now you’ve simply got to show the +reason why. Even if you’re hideous, you needn’t be dismal. Here goes!” + +So she managed a smile, after all. + +She had been Mrs. Denis Lanier for only five weeks, had had a check book +and money to spend for the same short time, and it was still a little +intoxicating. She ordered a taxi from her room by telephone, and when it +was announced she went down into the lobby almost her own debonair self +again. Think of Mrs. Denis Lanier, in a fur coat and a pearl necklace, +getting into her taxi! + +Her father was a professor in a small New England college, and Emily had +been brought up with a full understanding of the woeful discrepancy +between the tastes and the incomes of professors and their families. She +had learned to be happy without any of the things for which her young +heart thirsted. It was the very essence of her nature to be happy; but +it cannot be denied that she was a hundred times more happy now that she +possessed some share of worldly goods. She wished and tried to be +high-minded, and still she couldn’t forget her pearl necklace. + + +II + +Mrs. Lanier was established in a hotel of the sort which Emily had never +yet entered. Directly she entered its august portals, she felt herself +dwindle again. What were her fur coat and her necklace here? Who was +Mrs. Denis Lanier? Nothing at all! + +She went up to the desk and told the haughty young man there that Mrs. +Denis Lanier wished to see Mrs. Cecil Lanier; and then she waited. + +It was the waiting that unnerved her. If some one had come at once, if +she had been taken upstairs without delay, her courage might have held +out; but to sit there, alone and unregarded, while fifteen endless +minutes went by, was too much for her. She began seriously to +contemplate running away. + +“She’s doing it on purpose--just to be rude and hateful!” she thought. +“I won’t stay! Denis wouldn’t want me to stay. It’s humiliating and--” + +She was aware then that some one had come up behind her and stopped at +her side, looking down at her. What is more, she felt certain that it +was a critical, hostile look. + +“Very well!” said she to herself. “Go ahead and stare! It doesn’t bother +me the least little bit in the world!” + +She sat quite still, trying valiantly not to care; but it was +unendurable. She felt her face flush. She stirred uneasily, and very +soon she turned, to glance up into a pair of glacial blue eyes. + +“Is this Emily?” asked the other. “I fancied so.” + +Remarkable, the implications that could be put into six short words! + +“Yes,” said Emily. “I’m--I am. And you’re--this is Denis’s mother?” + +For a moment they regarded each other in silence, and each with the same +thought, almost audible: + +“I _knew_ you’d be like this!” + +Of course Denis’s mother was like this--a handsome, gray-haired woman, +tall, rather angular, with a disdainful nose and a faint, chilly little +smile. In spite of her queer, stiff, high-waisted figure, her very +unbecoming coiffure, her positively ugly black satin dress, she produced +an effect of extraordinary magnificence. + +“It’s very odd of Denis to go off that way,” she said. + +“He couldn’t help it,” returned Emily hotly. “He had to go.” + +“Cecil, my younger son, called in at Denis’s office directly we landed, +and he was told that Denis had gone away,” Mrs. Lanier went on, without +noticing the interruption. “As soon as we had his cable, we arranged to +come. It seems to me very odd that he should run off like that! +However”--she paused for a moment, looking carefully at Emily--“perhaps +we’d better dine upstairs, alone,” she added, “instead of in the +restaurant. I know quite a number of people here.” + +With burning cheeks and eyes averted, Emily murmured: + +“That would be nicer.” + +As they walked together toward the lift, she tried to smile, to talk +brightly; but she was terribly hurt--even more hurt than angry. + +But this was Denis’s mother, a person of supreme importance in his +world. He couldn’t help but be influenced by her opinion; so her opinion +_must_ be favorable. + +“Is it--do you find it comfortable here?” Emily asked politely. + +Mrs. Lanier seemed surprised that any one should imagine her comfortable +here. She smiled wearily. + +“I’ve been in the States before,” she answered. “I dare say I shall do +very well for a time. I’m sorry, though, to hear that you and Denis are +going to live about in hotels.” + +“But we’re not! We’re going to start housekeeping just as soon as he--” + +“Denis is very domestic, like his father. I’m sorry to think of his +having to live about in hotels,” Mrs. Lanier went on. “However--” + +She preceded Emily down a corridor. At the end she opened a door, and +they entered a small sitting room. + +“We must have a little chat,” said Mrs. Lanier, “before Cecil comes in.” + +She took up a packet of letters from the console near her, and began +looking over them. + +“Let me see,” she said. “Ah, here it is! ‘She is only twenty, and very +young for her age,’ Denis tells me. Are you really? And then he +says--let me see--‘a remarkably sweet disposition.’ That’s very nice, +I’m sure. ‘Her people are thoroughly respectable, decent people, but +they’--well, no matter. ‘She is a very clever and amusing girl.’” + +This went on for an intolerable time. Extracts from poor Denis’s letters +were read aloud, as if for purposes of comparison with the real Emily, +and from time to time Mrs. Lanier asked very direct questions about her +parents, her education, her financial position. In the end, Emily had an +excellent picture of herself as she appeared to Denis’s mother--a silly, +awkward girl, without money or position, who had somehow cajoled a fine +young man to his destruction. + +She made no attempt to defend herself. She had no great talent for that. +She was a sensitive, impulsive creature, quite lacking in +self-satisfaction. Moreover, she was very young and inexperienced, and +perhaps a little too willing to learn. + +She began to think that she really was the contemptible creature that +Mrs. Lanier believed her to be. A sense of guilt oppressed her. She sat +before her imperturbable judge, pale and downcast, answering the older +woman’s questions in a low, unsteady voice. + +Presently Mrs. Lanier had an ally in her daughter Cynthia, a cool, +casual blond girl, who looked as if she could be beautiful if she liked, +but didn’t think it worth trying. Cynthia didn’t ask questions. That, +too, she seemed to think not worth trying. She simply began +conversations which died at once, because Emily could take no share in +them. + +There was really no malice in Cynthia--only a measureless indifference +to other people and their unimportant feelings. When she discovered that +Emily had never set foot in Paris, had never been to the opera or to a +race, and bought her clothes in department stores, she saw that poor +Denis’s wife was hopeless, and simply stopped talking. + +By this time Emily quite agreed with her. The window was open, and Mrs. +Lanier had asked her daughter to shut off “that horrible heat.” In a +temperature that caused Emily to shiver in misery, those two superior +creatures sat in calm comfort. + +Very well--if they could endure the cold, in their low-cut frocks, then +Emily, in a cloth dress, could also endure it, and would. She would +endure their little stinging, icy words, too--every one of them. + +In desperation she made an effort to imitate Cynthia’s cool and casual +air. A pitiable failure! There was precious little coolness in her +strained smile, her faltering words. The last trace of poise had slipped +from her. She no longer tried to hold her own, but simply to endure. + +“They’ll tell Denis,” she thought, over and over again. “Nothing could +really make him change toward me; but oh, this will hurt him so! If only +they had waited! Oh, if only they had waited until--until I was a little +older and--and had more poise!” + +A waiter came in to lay the table, and Mrs. Lanier ordered a dinner of +all the things that Emily most heartily disliked--such a cold, flat sort +of dinner! + +“Cecil should be here by now,” observed Mrs. Lanier, with a glance at +the clock. “He promised to make a particular effort to come, on Denis’s +account. Poor Cecil!” + +Emily wondered in what way she had injured Cecil, that he should be +sighed over in this fashion. + +It was now after eight o’clock, but Mrs. Lanier decided to wait for the +poor boy until half past eight; so there they sat, in the icy room, and +all of them silent now. Cynthia had given up, Mrs. Lanier had asked all +the questions in her mind, and certainly Emily was not inclined to +introduce any topic on her own account. She was stiff with cold, and she +fancied her miserable heart was numbed, too. She didn’t care very much +about anything. + + +III + +“Hello, people!” cried a jolly voice. + +There in the doorway stood a most engaging young fellow--a real human +being, thought Emily, a creature warm and happy, and able to smile. +Smile he did, and directly at Emily. + +“Cecil!” said Mrs. Lanier. “Denis’s wife, you know.” + +He went over to her gladly, and took her cold little hand in a cordial +grasp. + +“Clever of Denis!” he observed. “Very!” + +She looked up at him, half incredulous, but in his face there was no +mockery, no disdain--nothing but a very frank approbation. She _knew_ +that he thought her pretty. In the bright glow of his admiration her +prettiness seemed suddenly to come to life again, her frozen heart beat +faster, and color rose in her cheeks. A friend had come! + +What is more, Cecil was a powerful friend. He had a cheerful, +domineering sort of way with his mother and sister, and it was obvious +that they idolized him. He said that Emily was chilly, and that the +window was to be closed and the heat turned on. They suffered terribly, +but did not complain. He consulted Emily about the proposed menu. He +insisted upon knowing what she really liked, and saw that she got it. He +made her talk and made her laugh, because he was so persistently +cheerful and silly, and his mother and sister looked on with an air of +patient indulgence. + +Back came all her native gayety. She didn’t fear or dislike these frigid +women any more. She wasn’t a meek, scared, silly little object now; she +was the girl Denis loved, and they would have to love her, too. She felt +sure of herself, radiant, happy, no longer alien and oppressed; and +beyond all measure grateful to her new friend, her brother Cecil. + + +IV + +Nothing had been said by any of the Laniers about seeing her again, and +Emily had consulted her book on etiquette in vain for a hint. She was +the more disturbed by this because she had had a letter from Denis--a +solemn, miserable letter, filled with careful descriptions of the +scenery and the weather. Through it all, in every line, she could read +his longing for her and his great anxiety about her. Such a dear, +_stupid_ letter--honest and serious and manly, like Denis himself. He +knew well enough how to love, but nothing at all about making love. + +He hadn’t heard yet of his family’s arrival in New York, and, thought +Emily, he was not going to get the news from them first. Very likely his +mother would write to him by the same mail, but he would surely read +Emily’s letter first, and he should have her account of the meeting. + +Just what ought she to tell him? She would say, of course, that she had +dined with his people. + +“And then shall I say I’m going to call on them? Or should I invite them +here to dinner?” she thought. “Or ought I just to wait?” + +She was in her room, struggling with this problem, when Mr. Cecil Lanier +was announced. She hastened down into the lounge, very much pleased. +Here was something else to tell Denis. There was at least one member of +his family that she could praise with candor. + +She welcomed Cecil with frank pleasure, and he, on his part, seemed so +remarkably glad to see her again, so very friendly, that a new and +daring idea sprang up in her mind. It might be more diplomatic and more +polite to wait a little, however. In spite of his jolly, friendly +manner, there was something rather impressive about Cecil. He wasn’t to +be treated too casually. + +He was really younger than Denis, but he seemed older, not only because +his face was a little worn, and his smiling eyes a little tired, but +because of his affable worldliness. Denis, in his earnestness, his +straightforward simplicity, had sometimes seemed quite boyish to Emily, +but there was no trace of boyishness in Cecil. He was a charming fellow, +handsome, courteous, and amusing, and he knew it. Emily had mighty +little worldly wisdom, but she did not lack intuition, and she +thought--and rightly--that Cecil would be extraordinarily kind and +obliging to any one he liked, and by no means so to those he did not +like; so she decided to make him like her. + +It was not difficult. He had already been attracted to her the evening +before, and he was delighted with her this afternoon. The time fairly +flew. They had tea together at five o’clock; and after what seemed only +a few minutes, it was seven. + +“Let’s go out somewhere and have dinner,” said he. + +“Oh!” said Emily. “I’d like to, but--aren’t there other things you have +to do?” + +She was thinking of his mother. + +“I never have anything to do,” Cecil assured her cheerfully. “That’s the +great advantage of being hopelessly incompetent. I _can’t_ do anything, +you know.” + +“I don’t believe that. I’m sure you could do almost anything, if you +tried,” said Emily. + +She hadn’t meant to say it in quite that tone, or with quite that +admiring glance, and she grew a little red as he returned the glance +with interest. + +“I’m never going to try,” said he. “Once you start, people begin to +expect things of you.” He paused. “But if there’s anything _you’d_ like +done, Emily--” + +She had no more poise left then than you could put into a thimble. She +had a favor to ask of Cecil, and she felt sure he would grant it. She +was determined to ask it, too, and saw no reason why she should not, +and yet--and yet, in spite of his kindliness, Cecil made her uneasy and +confused. + +“I just thought,” she began, “that if you were going to write to +Denis--” + +“Never wrote to him in my life,” said Cecil; “but look here, Emily!” + +She did not look there, but down at her clasped hands. After a glance +around the empty tea room, Cecil bent forward and took one of these +hands. + +“Look here!” he said again. “Do you mean--you poor little kid!--do you +mean there’s something you don’t like to tell him yourself? Denis is +such a confoundedly high-minded--” + +“Oh, _no_!” cried Emily, shocked. “Mercy, no! I only thought--if you +were going to write--” Well, she had to finish it now. “I thought maybe +you’d tell him that you’d met me, and that you--you didn’t think I was +so horrible.” + +Cecil looked at her for a moment with a singular expression. + +“I see!” he said, with a faint smile. “I don’t think you’re exactly +horrible, Emily; but still, I don’t think I’d better write and tell old +Denis so.” + +“Why?” + +“Well, you see--” + +Emily, looking at him, did see, in a vague, uneasy fashion. She did not +care to ask Cecil for any explanation. Suddenly she didn’t want to talk +to him any more. She made all sorts of polite excuses, which he accepted +very good-humoredly, and they parted in the most friendly way; but in +her heart, Emily _never_ wanted to see him again. + +She cried herself to sleep that night, longing for her dear, honest, +comprehensible Denis, and wishing she need see nobody else but Denis all +the rest of her life. + + +V + +When Cecil came again the next afternoon, she could think of no good +reason for refusing to see him. After all, what had she against him? +Nothing at all--nothing real. He hadn’t said a word that she could +resent. It was only--well, she didn’t know what--something in his smile, +in his tired eyes. + +“It’s my own fault,” she decided. “I know he’d be all right, if I +weren’t so--silly. If I had more poise--” + +This afternoon she had an unusual amount of poise, for she had had a +letter from Denis that made her happy. She was Denis’s wife, and she +really didn’t care a snap of her fingers about any one else on earth. + +She found Cecil charming that day. + +“Let’s go out somewhere,” he suggested. “It would do me no end of +good--that is, if you’ll be jolly and a little bit kind to me. I’m not +happy to-day, Emily.” + +She believed that. She fancied that perhaps he was never very happy, and +she felt sorry for him. She was still more sorry when she saw how +quickly he responded to her own cheerful mood. + +It cannot be denied that this very superficiality of his made him a most +engaging companion. They took a taxi up to the Botanical Gardens, went +into the hemlock forest there, and wandered about for two hours, +breaking the enchanted stillness with their careless, happy talk, +without a moment’s constraint or weariness. Away from hotels and family +conventions, Cecil was a very different fellow. His polite +sophistication vanished, and with it his misleading pretense of being a +cheerful idiot. He wasn’t that. He was clever, adroit, and by no means +apathetic. + +As the sun was beginning to sink, they strolled out of the forest and +across the hilltop and the smooth meadows, past the greenhouses, to the +entrance. It was growing chilly, and they were tired and furiously +hungry. + +“We’ll have tea now,” said Cecil. “Please don’t always object, Emily!” + +So they took another taxi down town, to a sedate little tea room that +Emily suggested, and after tea he left her at her hotel. + +“Thank you, Emily,” he said simply. “I’ve never had a better day.” + +Emily, too, was happy. She wanted to rush upstairs and write all about +it to Denis. He was always pleased when she spent her time out of doors, +and he looked upon walking as a solemn duty. He said that she didn’t +walk nearly enough--that no American girls did. + +“Mrs. Lanier!” said the desk clerk, as she stopped for her key. + +With a cordial smile, he handed her a note. She recognized the +handwriting as her mother-in-law’s, and took the envelope with no great +pleasure. Nor was she in a hurry to open it. She took off her dusty +shoes and her street suit, put on slippers and a mandarin coat, let down +her glittering flood of hair, and only then, when she was lying in +comfort on the bed, did she open the thing. + +MY DEAR EMILY: + + I should be very pleased if you would dine with us this evening at + half past seven. + + Most sincerely yours, + MAUDE LANIER. + + +“But that’s the old note!” she cried. + +Jumping up, she looked in the desk to see if the other was missing. +There it was, and, taking it out, she compared the two. Except for the +date, they were exactly alike, word for word. That made her laugh, and +laughter gave her courage. + +“I shan’t go!” she thought. “I’m tired, and I don’t _want_ to go! I +don’t have to rush off every time I’m sent for!” + +She reached out for the telephone at the bedside and, with admirable +poise, asked for and obtained the hotel where the elder Mrs. Lanier was +living. It seemed somehow an audacious, almost an arrogant thing, to +telephone to that majestic creature while lying in bed with her hair +down. And to refuse her invitation! It was an adventure--it was +thrilling! + +But when Mrs. Lanier’s voice came to her over the wire, all Emily’s +exultation fled. + +“You can’t come?” said Denis’s mother. “That’s most unfortunate!” + +There was more than chilly indifference in her tone. There was actual +hostility, and something very like a threat. + +“You see,” Emily explained, “I’m awfully tired, and--” + +“If you will be at home, we shall call after dinner,” said Mrs. Lanier. +“Will you be alone?” + +“Yes, of course,” Emily answered, with as much cordiality as she could +manage. + +After she had hung up the receiver, the odd intonation of that word +“alone” still sounded in her ears. Wasn’t she always alone? Ever since +Denis had gone she had had no visitor, except one of the girls from the +office where she had formerly been employed. She had seen no one. + +Not that she cared for that. This new life, this new dignity, the +delights of buying new books to read and new clothes to wear, of eating +in the restaurant downstairs, of going to a matinée now and then, and, +above all, of writing immense letters to Denis every evening, had filled +her time in the most satisfactory fashion. + +“Who did she imagine would be here?” she thought, puzzled. “Some of my +awful friends that she couldn’t bear to see? I just wish Nina would drop +in again this evening!” + +That wasn’t likely, however. In all probability she would have to +entertain her difficult guests alone, and, as it couldn’t be avoided, +she resolved to make the best of it. Her sitting room was far inferior +to theirs, but it was bright with flowers, books and magazines lay about +on the table, and it was warm! + +“I’ll see if I can’t make them thaw out,” she decided. “Denis would be +so pleased!” + + +VI + +No, the warm, bright room couldn’t thaw them. On the contrary, Mrs. +Lanier seemed to bring in her own frigid atmosphere. She entered, +followed dutifully by her daughter and her son, and, without so much as +a smile, bade Emily good evening. + +“It’s so nice of you to come to see me!” said Emily. “Isn’t this a cozy +little room?” + +“It seems to me quite unbearably hot. However--” + +A chill silence fell. Cecil broke it by asking if he might smoke a +cigarette. Emily was about to say “Please do,” when Mrs. Lanier +interposed: + +“Pray don’t, Cecil--not in this close room!” + +With a trace of sulkiness, Emily got up and opened a window. A gust of +cold air blew into her face, stirring her bright hair. For an instant +she looked down into the street below--the hurrying taxicabs, the +hurrying people, all bent on their own concerns, all going somewhere. If +she were only out there with Denis! + +“I think,” said Mrs. Lanier, “that you had better come to live at my +hotel, Emily.” + +“Oh, thanks!” said Emily, alarmed. “But I’m very comfortable here. +Anyhow, I couldn’t afford it.” + +“I am willing to defray all your expenses myself.” + +“Thank you ever so much! But--” + +“I think it advisable,” said Mrs. Lanier. + +“Advisable?” Emily repeated, a little puzzled. “I don’t--” + +“You ought not to be here alone. You should be with your husband’s +family. I’m sure Denis would agree with me.” + +“He picked out this place himself. He said--” + +“In the circumstances, Denis would agree with me.” + +“In what circumstances?” Emily demanded, beginning to grow angry. + +“We called yesterday afternoon, and the clerk informed us that you had +gone out with a young man. I really don’t think Denis would--” + +That was too much! + +“Upon my word!” cried Emily. “Didn’t you know--” + +“I say!” interrupted Cecil, in haste. “Not our affair, is it? I +mean--hardly the thing, is it, to bother Emily like this? I mean to +say--” + +His pleasant, well bred voice trailed off into silence, and Emily, after +one amazed glance at his face, was silent too. + +So he hadn’t told them, and his eyes implored her not to tell! She sat +very still. All the heat of anger had died in her, leaving only +bitterness and scorn. She could not endure to look at any of them--not +at Cecil, with his contemptible faith in her good nature, not at the +hostile and suspicious Mrs. Lanier, not at the utterly indifferent +Cynthia. + +“I strongly advise you to come to us,” said Mrs. Lanier. + +“No,” replied Emily quietly. “I’m going to stay here.” + +Mrs. Lanier rose. + +“Then I shall feel it my duty to write to Denis,” she said, “and explain +this unfortunate situation to him. I wish him to know that I have done +my best.” + +“By all means write to him,” said Emily, as calmly as she could. + +“Come!” said Mrs. Lanier to her children, in a freezing tone. + +After ceremonious farewells they all left, Cecil last. He turned in the +doorway, but Emily was not looking at him. She was already absorbed in +the letter she was going to write to Denis. + +As soon as the door closed after them, she sat down at the desk, to put +down on paper all her burning indignation and resentment. She wrote +seven pages at lightning speed. Then she began to read over what she had +written, and suddenly she broke into tears. + +“No, I can’t!” she sobbed. “Poor Denis! They’re his own people. I can’t +say all that to him. Oh, poor Denis!” + +So in the end, after her fit of weeping had subsided, she wrote another +letter--a cheerful, airy little letter. Part of it was: + + Your mother seems to think I’m a flighty young thing. She wants me + to come and live in the hotel with her--so that she can keep an eye + on me, I suppose; but I’m going to stay here, in the place you and + I picked out together. I don’t imagine you’ll be _much_ worried by + any tales of my awfulness, will you, Denny? + +And then, moved by an honest and generous impulse to make her Denis +happy, she added: + + The trouble is that your mother doesn’t quite understand my + barbarous American ways yet. Perhaps I don’t understand her very + well, either; but we shall in time, I’m sure, Denny. Don’t worry + about it! + +She went to bed happier after that. As for her husband being in the +least troubled by any tales of her going out with young men, that was +simply absurd. He trusted her just as she trusted him. + + +VII + +Emily was not surprised at receiving a visit from Cecil the next day, +and not at all displeased. She wanted to see him--once more. + +He was waiting for her, and came toward her as she came out of the lift. +It was a relief that he did not smile. He was as grave as she was. + +“Emily!” he said. “I’m sorry!” + +“I am, too, Cecil.” + +“I can’t expect you to understand,” he went on. “I shouldn’t like you so +well if you could understand that sort of thing. No use trying to +explain; but I had to come and thank you for being so decent to me. +Besides, I wanted to tell you that I would set the thing right--tell +them I was the man, you know--before I go away.” + +“When are you going?” she asked coldly. + +“There’s a ship sailing on Saturday. I’ll try to get a passage on her. +Anyhow, I’ll go as soon as I can, Emily, so that I can clear up this +thing.” + +“You mean that you have to run away because you came to see me?” she +cried, with a sort of sorrowful scorn. + +“Yes,” he answered. “You see, Emily, I haven’t a penny of my +own--nothing but an allowance from mother. She’s a bit--difficult, at +times. If she hears that I’ve come to see you, she’ll call it disloyal, +d’you see? Fact! She’ll make it too hot for me, so I’d better run home +and--” + +“Oh, don’t go on!” said Emily. + +It was intolerable to hear him so frankly, almost carelessly, admitting +his shameful humiliation; and a little while ago she had thought him a +fine and gallant figure, so insouciant, so independent! + +“No!” she went on headlong. “Don’t tell your mother! I don’t care, no, +not one little bit, what any one thinks! Denis would--” + +She stopped, struggling with a sob that rose in her throat. + +“It simply doesn’t matter,” she added more calmly. “You needn’t tell any +one. You needn’t--run away; only please don’t talk about it any more.” + +He stood before her, not shamefaced, but simply unhappy. + +“I’m sorry, Emily!” he said again. + +And so was she--terribly sorry, remembering what an endearing companion +he had been, how considerate, how kindly. She was still grateful for +those poor little kindnesses. She saw much that was good in Cecil, no +malice, no harshness, only that pitiable lack of manly pride and honor, +that degradation of which he was not even aware. + +With a smile not very steady, she held out her hand. + +“Never mind, Cecil!” she said. “It’s all over now, and forgotten. Let’s +just say good-by and--” + +“Does it have to be good-by, Emily?” he asked wistfully. “Look here! +Suppose I tell mother, and simply face the row? Suppose I write and +explain to old Denis? Then why couldn’t you and I go on being friends?” + +She shook her head. + +“Nothing has to be explained to Denis,” she said. “I’ll just tell him, +if he asks me; and--I’m sorry, Cecil, but it does have to be good-by. I +wouldn’t make any trouble in the family for anything in the world!” + +He submitted to her decision, as he was inclined to submit to anything +definite, and off he went, with one last miserable look. Emily watched +him with misty eyes. + +“Poor Cecil!” she thought. “Poor fellow! But how terribly his mother +must hate me, if it’s disloyal for him even to come to see me!” + +Pain and dismay seized her at that thought. Ill will was a new thing in +her life, something which she had never felt in her own heart or in the +air about her. A most potent and subtle poison! + +She waited for a letter from Denis with a new feeling of resentment. He +ought to have written at once, to assure her that he only laughed at +other people’s tales--or, better still, that he was angry. Much better +if he would be angry. Emily found herself hoping for that with a bitter +delight that half frightened her. She wanted that! She wanted her +complete triumph, wanted to stand beside Denis while he humbled her +enemies. It was an ignoble hope, she knew, and yet it was beyond measure +precious to her. + +On the third day his letter came, and she tore it open eagerly. It was +unusually brief: + +MY DEAR EMILY: + + I think you had better go to mother’s hotel until I come back. It + seems advisable to me for several reasons. Only time for these few + lines, but I’ll write more fully later. Take care of yourself. + + Yours, + DENIS. + +That was how he vindicated her! So he believed what other people told +him! He wanted her to go where his mother could watch her! This was his +faith, his pride, his love! This was her triumph! + + +VIII + +“I’ll give him just one more day,” Emily declared in a tremulous voice. +“Then I’ll go home!” + +She knew, even while she spoke, the pitiable folly of her words. One +more day, when she had long ago given Denis all the days she ever could +live! And to talk of going home, when she had no home in all the wide +world! + +Her father’s house wasn’t her home now. If she went there, she would be +a visitor, welcomed and beloved, but always a visitor. She didn’t belong +there any more. The words of the old proverb came into her mind--“Home +is where the heart is.” Once upon a time she had thought that a fanciful +idea, but now she knew it to be true; and her heart, alas, was wandering +homeless. + +She had written Denis a very prompt reply to his letter. She had told +him that his people had treated her shamefully, that she was done with +them, and that he must take his choice. “Either them or me,” she had +said. “Please let me know when you have made up your mind.” + +She hadn’t thought that he would take so long about making up his mind, +or that her just anger would prove so feeble a flame. It was anger that +had warmed and strengthened her, anger that was her justification; and +it was flickering dimly now, leaving her defenseless against the cold +wind of doubt and bitter regret. + +If only she had had patience, if only she had waited until Denis came +back! They could have talked it over together; but instead of that, she +had forced upon him a decision that would inevitably cause him untold +pain. + +It was cruel! He _couldn’t_ choose between her and his venerated people; +and he couldn’t compromise--he was too downright for that. He would take +what she said seriously. Well, suppose he didn’t choose her? + +She thought that if Denis never came back to her, or if he came back +changed, she could not bear to live. + +It was half past five--time to put on her hat and go out to meet Nina at +the little _table d’hôte_ where they were to have dinner together. She +slipped her arms into her fur coat--the coat Denis had bought for +her--and pulled on a little hat without troubling to look in the mirror. +Who cared how she looked, anyhow? A whole week, and he hadn’t written. +Seven days, utterly shut off from him! + +“Perhaps there’ll be a letter for me downstairs,” she thought, knowing +very well that if there had been, it would have been sent up to her. + +There was no letter, but there was Denis himself. At first she couldn’t +possibly believe it. She saw some one come through the revolving +door--some one like Denis, only it couldn’t be he. He was in New +Orleans, and very busy there. The man she saw was very much like +Denis--the same sort of well knit, stalwart figure, the same sort of +dark, serious face. + +“It’s not you, is it?” she asked in a queer little voice. + +“Yes,” said he. + +His voice gave her no clew, nor did his keen, quiet face. She wasn’t +going to be silly. If he could be as cool as this, then so could she. + +“I was just going out to dinner with Nina Holley,” she told him. + +“I see!” said Denis. + +He stood aside for her to go out of the door. Then he followed her out, +and they walked down the street side by side, turned a corner, and went +down another street, without a single word. This was by no means what +Emily wanted. + +“Would you like to come with me?” she asked, with punctilious +politeness. + +“I _am_ coming with you,” replied Denis. + +Again they went on in silence, as long as Emily could endure it. + +“Haven’t you anything to say?” she cried at last. “Haven’t--” + +“I’ve a good deal to say,” he interrupted; “but not here.” + +That was too much for Emily. They were at a crisis in their lives. She +was waiting in desperate anxiety for what he would say, and he couldn’t +speak, because they were in the street, and some one might possibly +hear! He couldn’t for an instant forget his stiff Lanier propriety. + +“You’re angry,” she said. “I can see that. Well, it’s no use. I said +you’d have to choose, and I meant it. There’s not a bit of use in your +coming to quarrel with me. If you’re disgusted with me, go back to +your--” + +“Look here!” said Denis. “Are you trying to be funny?” + +Emily was very much taken aback at this question. + +“Funny?” she repeated. + +His hand closed suddenly on her arm. + +“Look here, old girl!” he said. “I’m--you’ll have to make allowances, +you know. It’s been a bit hard. I dare say it doesn’t seem much of a job +to you, but after all, you know, they’re my own people, and it’s been a +bit hard.” + +Emily stopped short in the street. + +“Denis!” she cried. “What do you mean?” + +“I went to see mother, but they were all out. I left a note. I think I +made it pretty clear.” + +“Oh, Denis! Denis! You mean you chose _me_?” + +“Don’t do that!” he said in alarm, pulling out a great handkerchief and +hastily dabbing at Emily’s eyes. “You _are_ a silly kid, and no mistake! +Of course it’s you, always. I thought you knew that well enough.” + +“I can’t possibly stop crying,” said Emily. “You’d better get a taxi.” + +He did so. Once they were in the cab, Denis Lanier took his wife in his +arms and kissed her in his own earnest and resolute fashion. + +“But how could you come, Denis?” + +“How could I not come? It seemed to me I was rather badly needed. Dont’t +cry, dear girl, please! I’m going back to-morrow, and I’ll take you with +me. I’ll not leave you again. But I say, Emily, exactly what was there +in my letter that upset you so? I couldn’t--” + +“You wanted me to go to your mother’s hotel!” + +“I know; but that wasn’t so bad, was it? She wanted you to come, and I +thought that if you did, you know--if she saw more of you, there’d +be--well, more harmony.” + +He was smiling down at her, as her head lay on his shoulder, but in his +eyes there was a pain that he could not hide or stifle. She sat up +suddenly. + +“There will be, Denis!” she said vehemently. “There will be harmony, my +dear, darling old Denis! I’ve been selfish and horrible!” He tried to +stop her, but she would go on. “I knew all the time that I was. Oh, +Denis, forgive me, and let me have another chance! Let’s go now to your +mother, and--” + +“Not much!” said Denis. “Not after the note I left!” + +“It’s early. Perhaps she hasn’t come home yet. Oh, do tell the man to +hurry! Denis, let me have my chance!” + + +IX + +There Denis sat, as much at home in that icy room as a frog in water. To +be sure, he had offered to close the window, but Emily had declined, +preferring to wear her fur coat. His very voice had changed. All the +warmth had gone out of it, and his face wore a look she had not seen +before--a bored and disdainful look. + +Yet she knew that he was really happy. All the talk about old friends +and old days, from which she was so entirely shut out, interested and +pleased him. She knew that he thought Cecil amusing and Cynthia a +beautiful and distinguished girl, and that he profoundly admired his +mother’s frosty calm. He was among his own people, and immeasurably glad +to be there. + +And Emily herself was quite happy, quite content to sit in silence. She +had two supreme consolations. One was the look in Denis’s eyes each time +he turned toward her, and that was often. He wasn’t good at expressing +himself in words, but his glance was eloquent enough, and it spoke only +to her. His own people were entirely shut out from their secret +happiness. They might ignore her if they liked; she didn’t care in the +least. They were the real outsiders. + +And the other compensation was a bit of paper tucked inside her +blouse--Denis’s note to his mother, which Mrs. Lanier was never to see. +Emily could well afford to be generous, for her triumph was complete and +magnificent. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +AUGUST, 1924 +Vol. LXXXII NUMBER 3 + + + + +Who Is This Impossible Person? + +THE STORY OF A VERY FORMIDABLE AUNT AND A VERY PERSISTENT YOUNG MAN + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +The up train stopped, a porter sprang down the steps with two heavy +bags, assisted a lady to descend, climbed on board again, and he and the +train went off, leaving the lady and the bags there. The platform was +deserted, shining like a treacherous sheet of water beneath the dim +lamps. The rain fell steadily. It was the blackest and most dismal night +that ever was. + +For some time the lady stood just where she had been left, with an +annoyed, affronted expression upon her face, as if she was waiting for +some one to come and remove this unpleasant weather. Nobody came, +nothing stirred, and she herself was strangely inactive. + +Did she look like a submissive or helpless creature? On the contrary, +she was a portly, white-haired lady, dressed in black of a somewhat +majestic style, and not only her face, but the set of her plump +shoulders and even the jet ornament on her toque, seemed to be alive +with energy and resolution. + +Yet she did not move. She turned her head to the north--rain and +darkness were there. She turned it to the south--the same thing. Behind +her she knew there was nothing but the railway track; so, with a sigh, +she picked up the bags and went on toward the waiting room. + +Then, had there been any one there to see, the secret of her reluctance +to move would have been revealed. This imposing and dignified lady, +whose very glance was a rebuke to frivolity, had nevertheless one +outrageous vanity--she _would_ wear shoes that were too small for her. + +Setting down the bags, she turned the handle of the door, and it was +locked. Through the glass she could see into the dimly lit room, where +there were plenty of benches upon which a sufferer might rest. +Exasperated, she rattled the knob and rapped upon the glass, but all in +vain. Picking up the bags again, she made her way painfully to the end +of the platform, to see what she could see. + +The town of Binnersville, however, was one of those illogical towns +which are almost invisible from their own proper railway stations. There +lay before her a forlorn and lifeless street lined with small shops, all +tight shut, and not a human being in sight. + +Her sharp eyes, however, caught sight of something very welcome. At the +end of the street, standing before a faintly illuminated drug store, +there was a real, civilized taxi. With all the speed possible to her she +went toward it, to seize it before it could vanish. + +The street was slippery, the bags were heavy, and the portly lady in her +little high-heeled shoes made a dangerous progress. Nevertheless, she +got there. Seeing no driver where a driver should have been, and being a +woman of enterprise and resource, she set down her bags, leaned across +the seat, and blew the horn three or four times--great, loud squawks +that resounded startlingly through the night. + +At once the door of the drug store opened, and a young man appeared on +the threshold. + +“Kindly take me to No. 93 Sloan Street,” said the portly, white-haired +lady. + +“But I’m not the driver,” said the young man. + +“Then kindly call the driver!” said she. + +Opening the door of the cab, she managed, with considerable effort, to +shove one of her bags inside. The young man was there to help her with +the other. + +“The driver’s in the shop,” he explained, “getting something taken out +of his eye; but--” + +“Be good enough to tell him I am waiting,” said she. + +“He’ll be along in a minute, and then he can take us both to--” + +“Pardon me!” said the portly lady, in a perfectly awful voice. + +The young man seemed a little taken aback. She was now settled inside +the cab, and he was standing outside in the rain. It was very dark, and +they could not see each other; but so expressive was her voice that he +fancied he knew how she looked. + +“I shall instruct the driver to return here for you, if you wish,” said +she. + +“But, you see,” said the young man, quite good-humoredly, “I had engaged +this cab. It’s late, and the weather’s bad, and I’m going in your +direction. We can--” + +“Pardon me! I cannot consent to that.” + +“What?” persisted the young man. “Why not?” + +“It is not my custom to encourage chance acquaintances,” replied she. +“If you insist upon getting in, I shall get out.” + +“But look here!” protested the young man. “I--” + +She was already struggling with the handle of the door. + +“Very well!” he said curtly. “I’ll go!” + +As he turned, he saw the driver coming out of the shop, holding a +handkerchief to his eye. + +“This lady wants to go to No. 93 Sloan Street,” said he. “Oh, never mind +me!” + +And he set off on foot up the hilly street, in the pelting rain. The +portly, white-haired lady watched him go. + +“I cannot,” she said, half aloud, “encourage chance +acquaintances--especially on Lynn’s account.” + + +II + +For years the house at 93 Sloan Street had displayed a sign announcing +that it was “to let or for sale,” and these words might as well have +been followed by “take it or leave it,” for that was the owner’s +attitude. + +It was a hopeless house, dark, damp, and badly arranged, standing in a +garden where enormous old trees cast so dense a shade over the front +lawn that not even grass would thrive. As for the back garden, only the +queerest, most obstinate, ancient shrubs were there, huddled against the +side fence, because anything less tenacious was inevitably carried away +by the river in its annual spring flood. + +Just now the river was low, dolloping along dejectedly between its brown +and uninteresting banks. Everything was brown--the water, the bare +trees, the fields, the road in front, and No. 93 itself. Altogether the +breath of life had gone out of Sloan Street, and to any one coming down +from the sunny, breezy hilltop it seemed a sorry spectacle. + +Some one had come down from the hilltop this morning--a brisk, neat +little red-haired lady. She came smartly along the road to No. 93, +pushed open the gate, and walked up the garden path. She saw the portly, +white-haired lady standing on the veranda, looking down the road. + +“Good morning!” said the visitor. “I’m your neighbor, Mrs. Aldrich.” + +She waited at the foot of the steps, because she thought she would not +go up on the veranda until she was invited. Well, she never was invited. + +“Is there anything I can do for you?” she asked, with honest and +neighborly good will. + +The portly lady looked down at her as if doubtful whether such a +creature could really exist. + +“Thank you, there is not,” she said. + +Mrs. Aldrich was greatly taken aback. + +“I thought perhaps--” she began, in a tone not quite so neighborly, but +the other interrupted. + +“Very good of you, I’m sure; but I shall do very well, thank you.” + +That last “thank you” seemed capable of lifting Mrs. Aldrich out of the +garden all by itself. + +“I wouldn’t set foot in that place again,” she declared, “if she begged +me on her knees!” + +This declaration was addressed to her nephew, Jerry Sargent. She had +made it before, to her husband and to a neighbor or so, but she found +special pleasure in telling things to Jerry, for the strange reason that +he never agreed with her. She was a shrewd, sensible, rather peppery +little woman. She had been his guardian when he was younger, and she +still interfered pretty considerably in his affairs--which he +good-humoredly permitted. + +“If you could have seen the way she looked at me!” she went on. “As if I +were a--a toad!” + +“I know,” replied Jerry. “I didn’t see her, but I heard her, and I know +the sort of look that would go with that tone. ‘Who is that impossible +person?’ She told me she didn’t encourage chance acquaintances, and it +looks as if she meant it!” + +“I should have made her get out of that taxi and walk--in the rain!” +cried Mrs. Aldrich, who had been informed of the episode of the previous +night. + +“Of course you would,” her nephew agreed, with a grin. “I know you! And +you’d have called her names out of the window as you passed her, +wouldn’t you? But I’m much milder. I was ashamed of being a chance +acquaintance, anyhow. It didn’t seem respectable.” + +“I wish you wouldn’t take everything so lightly!” complained Mrs. +Aldrich, but she didn’t mean it. The thing she loved best in her nephew +was his careless and generous good humor, his utter lack of malice or +resentment. “You ought to have more pride, Gerald, than to allow +yourself to be trampled on.” + +He rose to his feet, and stood looking down at her with an expression of +great severity; and though his aunt knew it to be assumed, she thought +it very becoming to his face. A big, handsome fellow he was, with the +gray eyes and black hair and all the wit and charm and grace of his +blessed mother, and all the energy and practical good sense of his +father. A good man of business he was, but into the dullest matter of +routine, into the most trifling details of everyday life, he brought his +own sort of laughing romance. + +“Very well, madam!” said he. “You’re disappointed in me because I’ve let +myself be trampled on. Now you’ll see what I can do when my pride is +roused!” + +“Jerry, you ridiculous boy! Where are you going?” + +“Down to No. 93,” said he. “The turning worm! Good-by!” + +And off he went, down the hill, whistling as he walked. + + +III + +Without the slightest hesitation Jerry opened the garden gate, went up +the path and up the steps, and rang the bell. At least, he imagined that +he rang the bell, but as a matter of fact he did nothing except turn a +handle which was connected with nothing. After two or three attempts he +began to suspect this, and knocked instead, which soon brought some one +running along the hall to open the door. + +He was astounded--not because it was a girl, and not because she was +pretty. He had seen pretty girls before, and knew that they were likely +to crop up anywhere; but this girl had exactly the sort of prettiness he +had been looking for and waiting for so long that he had almost given up +hope of finding it. + +She was tall, slender, dark-browed, so gracious and serene, with lovely, +fragile hands; and her eyes! They were black eyes, so clear, so quiet, +so luminous and untroubled! It didn’t make the least difference that she +was wearing a gingham apron and carried a rolling pin under her arm. She +was matchless, she was incomparable, in her was personified all the +romance left in the world. + +“Did you--” she began, and hesitated. “Are you--” + +“I thought--” he answered, still a little dazzled. “That is, I thought +maybe--” + +It was this tremendously important and significant conversation that the +portly, white-haired lady interrupted. She appeared suddenly in the +background, and regarded them with severe astonishment. + +“Are you the plumber?” she inquired of Jerry, raising her eyebrows. “Run +away, Lynn!” + +“I don’t think so,” he answered absently, because he was watching Lynn +“run away” as slowly as any healthy human being could well move. + +“Indeed!” said she. “The plumber should be here.” + +The inference evidently was that Jerry Sargent should have been the +plumber. + +“No,” he added, with a smothered sigh. “I just stopped in to see if +there was anything you wanted done.” + +“There are several things that I want done,” she replied; “but I trust I +shall be able to find the proper workmen to do them. I need a plumber +and a carpenter. Are you a carpenter?” + +Now Jerry knew very well that she knew he wasn’t a carpenter, and that +she simply wished to be obnoxious. On the spur of the moment, looking +steadily at her, he answered: + +“Yes, I am. Any little odd jobs you’d like done?” + +She returned his glance with one quite as steady. + +“There are,” she said. + +With that, he promptly took off his coat, and she, equally determined to +see the thing through, led him into the dismal front room. + +“I want shelves put up,” said she. “Three rows--on this wall. There are +boards in the cellar for that purpose.” + +Fortunately Jerry was by nature “handy,” and in his younger days had had +much experience in building chicken houses and rabbit hutches and such +things. With the calmest air in the world he set to work, wondering for +what possible reason she could want a triple row of enormous shelves. +For some time the portly lady watched him, but that didn’t worry him, +for he felt sure that she knew even less than he did about putting up +shelves; and at last she went away. + +When he was alone, he couldn’t help laughing. It might have ended that +way, with Jerry thinking the whole thing a rather idiotic joke, in which +he was getting somewhat the worst of it, if something had not happened +to change the aspect of the situation. + +He was hammering away at a bracket which would--he hoped--support one +end of one of those monster shelves, when he heard a light footstep +behind him. He turned and saw the incomparable girl. + +She smiled in her serious way, and Jerry tried to look equally serious, +but did not succeed very well. In the first place, it wasn’t natural to +him to be serious, and, in the second place, he was extraordinarily +pleased to see the incomparable girl again. He couldn’t help fancying +that she shared at least a little in his delight. + +Anyhow, she was very friendly toward this strange carpenter. She asked +him if he needed anything else for his work. He thanked her earnestly +and said that he did not. Then she advanced a little farther into the +room, and laid one of her slender little hands on the boards standing +against the wall. + +“Is the work very hard?” she asked. + +“No,” said Sargent. “I like it--very much!” + +There was a long silence. She was still standing beside the boards, +running her delicate fingers along the edges, with her eyes thoughtfully +downcast. The shifting sunshine, filtering through the leafy branches +outside, threw a wondrous light upon her gleaming dark hair and her +pale, clear features. Somehow it hurt Jerry to look at her. There was +something about her, some intangible shadow over her young face, which +made him feel sure that she had endured much, and had endured it with +fortitude and courage. + +“The poor little thing!” he thought. “Shut up here in this dismal hole, +with that dragon! Oh, the poor, poor little thing!” + +He suddenly realized that he was in his shirt sleeves. With a hasty +apology, he put on his coat. + +“You know,” he said, “I’m not really a carpenter.” + +“I knew you weren’t,” said she. “I knew you were--well, I mean, I knew +you weren’t.” + +Another silence. + +“Would you like a cup of tea?” she asked. “I’d be--oh!” + +“What’s the matter?” cried Jerry. + +“Nothing,” she answered, but he saw her pull a handkerchief out of her +pocket and wrap her hand in it. + +“Let me see!” he commanded. + +“Really it’s nothing,” she protested; “only a splinter from those +boards. I should have known better.” + +Well, splinters ought to be taken out, lest they fester; and it was the +most natural thing in the world for Jerry to insist upon performing the +operation. She fetched a needle, and he burned the point in the flame of +a match, and grasped her injured hand firmly. + +He hadn’t realized what it would mean. The splinter was long and deeply +embedded, and he could not help hurting her. She winced and bit her lip. +When at last the heartbreaking job was done, his face was quite pale. He +still held her hand, and was looking at her with the most miserable +contrition; but she smiled. + +“You mustn’t be so silly!” she said. “It’s really--” + +“Lynn!” said an awful voice. + +Lynn, suddenly growing very red, escaped at once, and Jerry saw her no +more that day. + +He would perfectly well endure being called a plumber, a carpenter, and +a chance acquaintance, but he could not endure this. He no longer wished +to laugh, he no longer saw this thing as a joke. On the contrary, he +was immeasurably offended by the suspicious and scornful glare he got +from the portly, white-haired lady. + + +IV + +Next morning the postman delivered a letter at No. 93, addressed to Mrs. +Nathaniel Journay, who was none other than the portly lady. + +DEAR MADAM: + + In order to avoid a misunderstanding which has often been a cause + for dissatisfaction in our tenants, we beg to call your attention + to that clause in your lease which restrains the tenant from + driving any nails into the walls, or in any way defacing or marring + the walls or woodwork of the premises. + + Trusting that you find the house entirely as represented, + + Very truly yours, + COOPER & COOPER, Agents. + + +“Humph!” said she, very much taken aback. + +Lynn looked up from her breakfast. + +“What is it, auntie?” she asked. + +“Nothing,” said the other calmly. “Simply one of the necessary +annoyances of a business career.” + +She was prepared to say a good deal more than that to a certain person. +She was by no means stupid. She put two and two together, and chalked up +a mighty black four against that fraudulent carpenter. He was the +talebearer. Very well--only wait until he presented himself again! + +In the meantime the indomitable woman finished the carpentering herself. +The noise of the hammering made her very nervous, but she made up her +mind to defy Cooper & Cooper if they should appear. She had to have +those shelves, and she would have them. + +That afternoon a man came by, asking for work. He said he was a +gardener; and after Mrs. Journay had cross-examined him until he was +reduced to an abject condition, and she felt sure he was no spy, she set +him to work. + +The next morning she had another letter from Cooper & Cooper, pointing +out to her that it was strictly prohibited to tenants to remove shrubs +in the garden, to lop off branches from trees, or in any way to mar or +deface the garden. + +This time she wrote a tart answer, remarking that the garden was in a +lamentable condition which no one could deface or mar, that the branches +lopped away had been those which shut off light from the house, and that +she would really be justified in sending the landlord a bill for this +work. Nevertheless, she did not employ the gardener again. + +For a few days she and her niece were invisibly busy within the house, +but at last, one bright morning, they came out with a ladder, which Mrs. +Journay held while Lynn climbed up it and hung out a glittering gilt +signboard, lettered in black: + + YE OLDE NEW ENGLAND BOX SHOPPE + +The sign shone in the sun like a warrior’s shield. The two women +regarded it with pride and pleasure. + +“I believe the customers will begin coming to-morrow,” said the elder. + +But the first thing to come the next day was a letter from Cooper & +Cooper. + +DEAR MADAM: + + It has no doubt escaped your notice that the premises at 93 Sloan + Street are upon highly restricted property, which restrictions + forbid the use of the house or grounds for any business purpose. + You will find this covered in the fifth section of your lease, any + violation of which, if willfully persisted in, renders the contract + null and void. + + Very truly yours, + COOPER & COOPER, Agents. + + +“Let ’em!” she cried aloud, dismayed, but valiant as ever. + +“What is it, auntie?” inquired Lynn. + +“Never mind, my dear!” said the other. “You go on painting your boxes, +and I’ll attend to the business arrangements.” + +Mrs. Journay spoke in her usual confident manner, but at heart she was +alarmed and not at all certain as to what she ought to do. She was +certain, however, that her niece must not be worried by these unexpected +developments. To protect Lynn was her chief duty on earth, and her chief +pleasure, too. Terrible as she might be to others, to Lynn she was never +anything but kind and generous and affectionate, in her august fashion. + +“I’d rather know, auntie,” insisted Lynn. “I think I really ought to +know. We’re partners, aren’t we?” + +“Yes,” said Mrs. Journay. “Yes, I know that, but--” + +“We can’t carry on our business,” Lynn continued, “unless we both know +everything about it--can we, darling?” + +She was now standing behind her aunt’s chair, resting her soft cheek +against that imposing coiffure. Mrs. Journay frowned. + +“It doesn’t seem necessary,” she said. + +She was already conquered, however. To tell the truth, her serious and +quiet niece had always been able to wind Mrs. Journay around her little +finger. + +“Let me see the letter, auntie dear!” said Lynn. + +She did see it, and the two former ones. + +“It’s that man!” declared Mrs. Journay. “There’s no possible doubt of +it. He came here to spy. Some one sent him. My theory is that some one +knew we were going to start this shop, and, fearing the competition, +determined to drive us out!” + +Lynn stood looking down at the letter with a curious expression. + +“I see!” she said. + +From her face one might imagine that whatever it was she saw gave her +very little pleasure. + +They were both silent for a time, with their meager little breakfast +forgotten between them. They had always been more or less poor, but +never in this way. Until recently they had lacked neither dignity nor +comfort. They had had their friends and their little diversions, and a +cozy sort of existence, until something happened. It doesn’t much matter +what the catastrophe was. The important fact is that their small income +vanished, and here they were, gallantly prepared to make a new one for +themselves. + +And was this enterprise, into which the very last of their savings had +gone, to be wrecked by Cooper & Cooper? Mrs. Journay would not permit +it. Often in the past, when she had coldly ignored people, such people +had disappeared from her sight--beneath the surface of the earth, for +all she knew; and she decided to try this on Cooper & Cooper. She would +scornfully ignore them. The shop should go on--it must! + +She was about to say this aloud, when Lynn began to speak. + +“Auntie dear,” she said, “let’s give it up!” + +“Lynn! I am surprised!” + +“Yes!” Lynn went on, with a sort of vehemence. “Let’s give this up and +go away from here.” + +“Lynn! Your boxes! The beautiful boxes you’ve painted!” + +“I’d like,” said Lynn, “to see them all sailing down the river! Oh, +auntie, do let’s go away! I hate this house and this place and--we’ll go +back to Philadelphia, and I’ll take a position in an office, and--” + +The girl stopped short at the sight of her aunt’s face. + +“Oh, my dear!” she cried. “I didn’t really mean that! No--we’ll stay +here, of course, and we’ll make a wonderful success of the shop.” + +She sat on the arm of her aunt’s chair, and they talked with enthusiasm +of their dazzling future; but they didn’t look at each other--not once. +They talked, they even laughed, and after breakfast they went about +busily preparing for customers; but all the time there lay over them the +black shadow of this persecution. Why should any one wish them ill? + +“I’d really be glad to go,” thought Mrs. Journay, “if it weren’t for +Lynn; but I can’t and won’t have Lynn working in an office. I’ll make +this--this disgusting shop a success!” + +Lynn went on painting boxes all the morning. + +“He was the only one who knew about the shelves,” she said to herself. +“Out of petty, despicable spite against poor auntie, he went off and +told the agents; and after he’d been so--not that I care, though. I knew +all the time that he was one of those men who always--who always pretend +to--to like people!” + +Still, in spite of not caring in the least, it seemed to her that this +incident was harder to bear than all her other misfortunes--harder to +bear than exile from her old home and her old friends, than her +desperate anxiety about money, or than the frightful tedium of painting +boxes. + +“Because it’s such a humiliation,” she explained to herself. + +The admiration of young men was certainly no new thing to Lynn, but that +a man should look at her like that, should speak as he had spoken, and +then so basely betray her aunt and herself-- + +Her cheeks burned with just anger, or perhaps with shame, that even for +a moment she should have thought so well of him. + + +V + +No one came to molest them that day, or the next, or all that week, or +that month, but this good fortune was counterbalanced by the fact that +no customers came, either. + +Mrs. Journay and her niece took turns in attending to the shop with the +regularity of deck officers standing watch; and, having once arranged a +schedule, they were afraid to depart from it, for fear of admitting in +any way that trade was not brisk. Lynn went on and on painting boxes, +because, in the first place, they had a large stock to be painted, and, +in the second place, she had nothing else to do; but the dismalness of +sitting in that big, dim room, to see the boxes piling up on the +shelves, and to make calculations which showed that the money decreased +even faster than the boxes increased, was not a life to give animation +to a girl, or comfort to an elderly lady. + +Indeed, the only thing that supported them was their splendid, +ridiculous Journay fortitude and obstinacy. They had gone into this +thing without help or advice. They wouldn’t ask help or advice now, and +they wouldn’t complain. + +It was Lynn’s turn in the shop that afternoon. She sat there behind a +long table on which were a tin cash box, wrapping paper, twine, and a +pile of pretty little blue cards on which was printed: + + YE OLDE NEW ENGLAND BOX SHOPPE--Hand-decorated gift boxes for all + purposes--Chests made to order. + +She was sewing, but when she heard a step on the veranda she hid the +sewing in a drawer and began to write busily on a pad. The front door +was open, and the customer entered the room. Lynn looked up with an +alert, businesslike expression--and it was that man! + +“I’ve been away,” he began eagerly. “Otherwise--” He stopped short, +looking at Lynn. “Is anything wrong?” he asked. + +“No,” she said evenly. + +For an instant her clear eyes rested on his face, and then they glanced +away, as if he wasn’t worth regarding. She was not rude, or scornful, or +awe-inspiring like her aunt, but her attitude was unmistakable. + +“I’ll have to ask you to excuse me,” she said politely. “I’m busy this +morning.” + +Rising, she moved toward the door. + +“No!” he cried. “Please wait! Please tell me what’s the matter! Every +minute I’ve been away, I’ve been thinking of getting back and seeing you +again. I--please don’t go! Just tell me!” + +“I have nothing to tell you,” said Lynn, with energy. “I have nothing to +say to you at all, except that I’d appreciate it if you wouldn’t come +again.” + +Then she vanished. Before Jerry had recovered himself, he was confronted +by his mortal enemy, Mrs. Journay. + +“Kindly send your bill for the carpenter work you did,” said she, “and +it will be attended to promptly.” + +He tried a smile. + +“That was just a little neighborly service--” he began. + +“I prefer not to accept it as such,” she interrupted. + +“Well, I prefer not to send bills,” said he, resolutely good-humored. +“If you’ll allow me, I’ll introduce myself--” + +“I do not allow you.” + +“I’m sorry,” he replied firmly, “but it’s time it was done. I’m Mr. +Sargent, your landlord.” + +This was a blow to stagger Mrs. Journay, but she rallied superbly. + +“Indeed!” said she. “Now I see it all! Very well, call your Cooper & +Cooper to put us out. Let them--” + +“But there’s no question of that!” he protested. “I’m only too glad--” +She really was magnificent! + +“I refuse to be under obligations to you,” she said. “Your agents may +forbid me to do such and such a thing, and I shall do it. I defy them. I +defy you. I intend to continue in this course until I am forcibly +ejected. Instruct your Cooper & Cooper to that effect. I do not +recognize you!” + + +VI + +This was ordinary rain. From a sullen sky it came driving down like a +sheet of fine wires, digging into the sodden ground, dashing on the +roof, beating down the tiny new leaves on the trees, riddling the muddy +water of the now hurrying river. This was the worst of three rainy days, +and the house on Sloan Street was in a sad state. There was water in the +cellar, there were spots of mold on the walls, and everywhere there was +a most miserable, dank, bleak chill, which even these two resolutely +cheerful women could not ignore. They did not appear to relish their +breakfast. + +“I--” began Mrs. Journay, and, for the first time since Lynn had known +her, she visibly hesitated. “If you can look after the shop alone,” she +said, “I’d like to--to--attend to some business.” + +Now, if she had not been so intent upon her own duplicity, Mrs. Journay +would have observed that Lynn’s conduct was unusual. The girl showed no +surprise at her aunt’s singular decision to go out in such weather. On +the contrary, she seemed relieved and pleased. + +“I don’t mind at all,” she replied. “Not a bit! I--not a bit!” + +So Mrs. Journay put on an old raincoat with capes, and a hat that was +good enough for the rain, and her overshoes, and set off. + +Lynn, watching that erect and imposing figure tramping through the mud +of Sloan Street, took out a handkerchief and cried into it for a good +ten minutes. She planned treachery that day. She had made a secret +appointment with a wholesaler who would, she hoped, buy all those boxes +for a lump sum, and thus put an end to some of their financial +difficulties--and also to the shop. + +Fortunate that she did not suspect her aunt’s errand! Even Mrs. Journay, +with her unconquerable spirit, was very, very unhappy that morning. + +“But,” she said to herself, “there wouldn’t have been enough to pay that +man his rent on the 1st of next month, and that I could _not_ bear!” + +She, too, had renounced the shop, and intended to tell Lynn so in the +evening. + +In the meantime, on she pressed. The mud was slippery, the rain +disconcerted her by beating in her face, and her shoes were even more +uncomfortable when worn with rubbers. What was worse, her way lay +uphill, and up a mighty steep hill at that, and she had a heavy heart to +carry with her. She turned her ankle rather painfully, the top button +burst off her raincoat--she breathed so hard--and the rain ran down her +neck. Still, as was her admirable way, she reached her goal. At last she +stood upon the summit of the hill, and though to be sure she did not cry +“Excelsior!” she felt a little like that. + +She turned for a last glance behind her. There lay Sloan Street far +below, and No. 93 was plainly visible in every detail. She sighed +sternly, faced her destiny again, and turned in at the gate of a fine +stone house before her. She rang the bell. + +“Mrs. Aldrich?” said she to the maid, and presented her card. + +She was asked to step into the music room, but would not. She was too +wet. She would stand in the hall; and there Mrs. Aldrich found her when +she descended. + +Now Mrs. Aldrich, when she saw that card, had meant to treat Mrs. +Journay as Mrs. Journay had treated her; but it was impossible. In the +first place, Mrs. Aldrich was not capable of a majestic manner. She was +peppery and sharp, sometimes, but never hoity-toity. In the second +place, the caller looked so forlorn and tired and wet that all her +rancor vanished. She held out her hand with a smile and a friendly +greeting. + +“Pardon me,” replied Mrs. Journay, in the most frigid tone she had ever +used. “I fear you mistake my purpose. I have come”--here she opened her +purse and took out a bit torn from a newspaper--“I have come to apply +for this position as cook.” + +“Oh!” cried Mrs. Aldrich. + +“If the position is not filled, I believe I have at least some of the +qualifications you desire. I understand cookery in all its branches. I +am honest, clean, and strictly sober.” + +This was awful! This was intolerable! + +“Oh, but, my dear Mrs. Journay!” cried Mrs. Aldrich, immeasurably +distressed. “I--don’t you see? I can’t! Let’s sit down and--” + +“Thank you,” interrupted the other. “Then I must apply to the next place +on my list.” + +“Oh, dear!” said Mrs. Aldrich, for she could not endure the thought of +Mrs. Journay going out into the rain again, and tramping about, looking +for a position as cook. She could not endure to see this magnificent +creature so humbled. “Can’t--something else be done?” she asked. + +“Thank you, it cannot.” + +“Then,” said Mrs. Aldrich, “if you really feel that you must, then +please stay here with me.” + +“Thank you. I shall ask you to allow me to use the telephone for the +purpose of sending a message to my niece. May I safely say that I shall +return to her at ten o’clock this evening?” + +“Oh, much earlier! Whenever you like!” + +“Pardon me,” said Mrs. Journay, “but I believe I understand the +requirements of such a position.” + + +VII + +“The dam has burst,” said old Mr. Cooper. + +He made this melodramatic announcement with great calm, because it was a +very unimportant dam, and not likely to evoke much excitement; but Jerry +Sargent, his employer, sprang to his feet. + +“What?” he cried. “Elliot’s dam? Then Sloan Street must be under water!” + +“I’m afraid so,” said Cooper, somewhat startled; “but No. 93 is the +only house there that’s tenanted, and I didn’t imagine you’d be much +upset about _them_.” + +He was still more startled by the expression he now saw upon Sargent’s +usually good-humored face. + +“What do you mean by supposing that?” thundered Jerry. “On the contrary, +they’re--they’re _special_ tenants. They--” + +“Well,” said Mr. Cooper, “you see, in view of the correspondence we had +with them--” + +“What correspondence?” + +“Why, those letters that Mrs. Aldrich directed us to send while you were +away. You distinctly said we were to take directions from her in your +absence.” + +“Let me see those letters!” + +Mr. Cooper produced them. Mr. Sargent read them. + +“It’s an outrage!” shouted Jerry. “It’s persecution! It’s--” + +He flung himself into his overcoat, jammed a felt hat well down on his +head, and started out, slamming the office door behind him. His roadster +stood at the curb. He got in, started off with a jerk, and went down the +street, around the corner, and out into the road that led to Sloan +Street from the town. It was a good road, and he took advantage of it. +He turned another corner, and Sloan Street lay before him at the foot of +the hill. + +Oh, Sloan Street was under water, sure enough! It was, in fact, a +shallow stream, moving sluggishly. It was certainly not more than six +inches deep, and there was no danger, visible or implied; yet to Sargent +it was horrible, that sullen, muddy stream, under the merciless downpour +of rain, with stanch old No. 93 standing there among the tossing, +dripping branches of the trees. + +He left his car, ran down the hill, and splashed into the water, ankle +deep. His feet sank into the mud, the rain beat in his face, but he bent +his head and floundered on, the slowness of his progress putting him +into a dogged fury. He wanted to get there at once, to explain. + +He stumbled over something, fell to his knees, and lost his hat while +regaining his feet. He wiped his rain-blurred eyes with a muddy sleeve, +and went on. + +“Mr. Sargent! Mr. Sa-argent!” + +He stopped, turned, and saw Lynn standing on the hill he had recently +left. + +“Oh, please come back!” she cried. “Please, Mr. Sargent!” + +He did come back, and stood before her. + +“I had to come,” he said, “to tell you that I didn’t know anything about +those letters from Cooper & Cooper. I never heard of them till to-day.” + +Never in his life had he imagined that a girl could look like this. Her +hair lay dank across her forehead, giving to her glowing face an +adorably childlike look. Her dark lashes were wet, and were like rays +about her clear eyes; and the kindness, the heavenly kindness of her +regard! The poor fellow had positively no idea that she was a forlorn, +bedraggled little object. There he stood, looking up at her, and she +looked at him, and tears came into her eyes. + +“Don’t!” he cried. + +“But you don’t know!” she said. + +She meant that he didn’t know how splendid and gallant and handsome he +appeared, bareheaded in the rain, with a great streak of mud across his +face, and how deeply touched she was by his coming through a flood to +explain about the letters; and of course she didn’t wish him to know. + +“I--my boxes!” she said, by way of explaining the tears. “I’ve been into +the city to see a wholesaler, and he’s bought them all. I had them all +on the dining room floor, ready to pack, and I’m afraid--” + +“I’ll see what I can do,” said Sargent. + +“No! No! Mr. Sargent, come out of that water!” said she sternly. “It +doesn’t matter!” + +“It does,” said he. “Wait here!” + +Off he splashed again. + +No. 93 was built on the side of a little slope. The front door was +reached by a flight of steps, but the back door was level with the +garden, and Jerry knew very well that the house must be filled with +water. He kicked open the gate, made his way along the path and up the +steps to the veranda, and put the pass key he carried with him into the +lock. + +The key turned readily, but the door would not open. He pushed his +hardest. At last he drew off a little and crashed against the door with +his shoulder. Then it opened, and a great flood of water, dammed up +inside, came rolling down the steps in a cascade. Suddenly something +heavy, borne on the swift-moving current, struck Jerry on the shins, +knocked him backward, and, sailing on, struck him violently on the head. +The chill, muddy water rolled over him, but he was as indifferent to it +as the fleet of hand-decorated boxes that went down the front steps with +him. + + +VIII + +Mrs. Aldrich and Mrs. Journay sat in the kitchen, side by side, on two +straight-backed chairs. They had just had a quarrel, due to Mrs. +Journay’s obstinately refusing to eat her lunch with Mrs. Aldrich and +insisting upon having it in the kitchen. In the course of this quarrel +Mrs. Aldrich had explosively confessed that it was she who had ordered +the Cooper & Cooper letters sent, and who had observed from her hilltop +all that went on below. + +“Because I didn’t like the way you treated my nephew,” she explained. +“Can you forgive me for that?” + +“I can,” said Mrs. Journay, calmly. “I should have felt the same, if it +had been my nephew.” + +“Then,” said Mrs. Aldrich triumphantly, “if you really do forgive me, +the least you can do is to come in and have lunch with me decently!” + +But Mrs. Journay would not, so Mrs. Aldrich had sent away the two +servants and eaten there in the kitchen with Mrs. Journay. In the +beginning both of them were very angry, but they became more and more +friendly every minute. They had a great deal to talk about--they had +Lynn and Jerry to talk about. + +“Jerry tells me that your niece is a charming girl,” said Mrs. Aldrich. +“He’s talked about her incessantly ever since he first saw her; and it +isn’t like Jerry to be so enthusiastic.” + +“She is a charming girl,” replied Mrs. Journay complacently; “and as for +your nephew--” + +The front doorbell rang, and Mrs. Aldrich went to open the door. Mrs. +Journay sat where she was. + +“Jerry!” she heard Mrs. Aldrich cry in a tone of fright. + +“Don’t worry!” answered a cheerful voice which Mrs. Journay recognized +without difficulty. “It’s only a scratch; but--this is Miss Journay. She +saved my life!” + +“Oh!” protested Lynn. “Really I didn’t!” + +Mrs. Journay then entirely forgot her position, and hurried into the +hall. There she saw that man, with a bandage around his head, and Lynn +standing beside him. + +“Auntie!” cried Lynn, amazed. “You here?” + +“Why not?” inquired Mrs. Journay. “I might ask why _you_ are here!” + +“Mr. Sargent got hurt trying to save my boxes,” Lynn explained +anxiously; “so you see, auntie--” + +“What am I expected to see?” asked Mrs. Journay, with lifted eyebrows. + +Mrs. Aldrich now intervened. + +“Jerry,” said she, “now that I’ve had an opportunity of knowing Mrs. +Journay better, I see that I was wrong--altogether wrong. I want her and +her niece to stay here with us until that horrible old barn is put in +order for them again--if it ever is; and I want you--” + +Jerry stepped forward and held out his hand, smiling. Lynn thought, with +a flash of hope, that even her aunt could not resist him; but Mrs. +Journay regarded him sternly. + +“Lynn,” said she, “introduce this young man to me. I do not know him.” + +“But, auntie!” protested Lynn. “You’ve seen him--” + +“Not properly,” said Mrs. Journay. + +“Mrs. Journay, this is my nephew, Gerald Sargent,” said Mrs. Aldrich. + +Then Mrs. Journay took his outstretched hand and smiled, the jolliest +sort of smile. + +“I always liked that boy!” she observed aside to Mrs. Aldrich. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +SEPTEMBER, 1924 +Vol. LXXXII NUMBER 4 + + + + +Mr. Martin Swallows the Anchor + +THE STRUGGLE BETWEEN OLIVE’S ARDENT ADMIRER AND HER FORMIDABLE AUNT + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Olive was weeping quietly, but Miss Torrance, sitting beside her in the +dark, was very calm, and even a little scornful. The unmerited +sufferings of the hero and heroine on the screen before them didn’t +trouble her. It was sure to come out all right in the end; and even if +it didn’t, who cared? + +Olive was a sentimental little thing, and yet the strong-minded, +prodigiously sensible Miss Torrance could understand, perhaps too well, +how she felt. It wasn’t the story that made Olive cry. It was the +spectacle of that swift, vivid, intense life that so disturbed her; and +it disturbed Miss Torrance, too. + +Yachts, tropical islands, coral reefs, dark figures in oilskins seen by +lightning flashes on storm-swept decks, clear lagoons, palm trees in the +moonlight--when you saw all that, and when you thought of getting up six +mornings a week at half past seven, and going down to the office, and +coming back to the boarding house at twenty minutes past five, and when +you were a stern, adventurous spirit, like Miss Torrance, or only +twenty-one, like Olive-- + +Miss Torrance and Olive often talked about traveling. They even got +booklets from the steamship companies, and planned routes and figured +expenses. Olive took it all very seriously, but Miss Torrance smiled +indulgently at such a childish pastime. + +Miss Torrance was not the sort of woman to cry for the moon. She often +said she wasn’t, and she never suspected that she was one of those still +more romantic creatures who try to build bridges to reach the moon. +Olive longed for impossible things, but Miss Torrance tried to get them. + +“Come, my dear!” said she, with just a trace of impatience. “This is +where we came in.” + +“All right!” answered Olive, with a resigned sigh. + +They squeezed past a row of people and went up the aisle and out into +the lobby. + +“Oh, mercy!” cried Olive. “Raining!” + +Miss Torrance said nothing, but her brows met in an anxious frown. + +The April rain was coming down in a steady torrent, drumming loud on the +roof, and spattering on the pavement. The streets shone like deep, black +water under the arc lights. Taxis spun by like incredibly swift motor +boats. It hadn’t at all the appearance of a shower. It was obstinately +and definitely a rainy night--chill, too, and windy, so that it was +almost impossible to believe that only six days ago, on Saturday, spring +had begun, and Miss Torrance and Olive had been irresistibly tempted to +buy spring hats. + +“We’ll take a taxi,” said Miss Torrance. “It’s cheaper than ruining our +new hats.” + +“All right!” said Olive. + +So Miss Torrance advanced to the very limit of the covered entrance, and +signaled to the taxis that went by, fleet and careless; but not one of +them stopped--no, not one. + +“Beasts!” said she. + +“Maybe they’re all taken,” suggested the gentle Olive, but Miss Torrance +would have none of that. + +She, too, still had in her mind the images of tropical islands and coral +reefs and high adventures, and somehow it hurt and angered her, and the +taxis that would not stop were like the stream of life itself that +hurried past and left her behind. + +“I’ll make one stop!” she declared grimly. “Here!” Taking off her brave +new hat, she thrust it into Olive’s hands. “I’ll stop one if I have to +stand in the middle of the street!” + +“Oh, don’t!” cried Olive. “Wait just a minute!” + +“Let me get you one,” said a cheerful voice. + +Turning, they both looked into the face of an unknown young man. It was +by no means a face to inspire alarm, nor was his manner at all sinister. +He was a sturdy, square-shouldered young chap, with a sunburned face, in +which his eyes looked amazingly blue. As he stood there, hat in hand, he +looked altogether so good-humored and friendly and honest that Miss +Torrance’s glare softened. + +“Well--” said she. + +He needed no more than that grudging consent. + +“Half a minute!” he cried, and off he darted into the rain. + +“Oh!” cried Olive. “Oh, Miss Torrance! Oh, we forgot! We can’t pay for +it! We have only fifteen cents!” + +“Oh!” said Miss Torrance, too. + +She certainly had forgotten, for the moment, that they had come out +simply for a walk, and hadn’t meant to go to the movies, or to buy the +cake of chocolate they had just eaten inside. To-morrow was pay day at +the office, and only that morning Miss Torrance had deposited the week’s +surplus in the savings bank, and Olive never had any surplus. + +“I’ll stop him!” she said hurriedly, and she, too, dashed off into the +rain. + +Just as she reached the curb, the young man arrived there on the running +board of a taxi. + +“Here you are!” said he, opening the door. + +“I meant--” said Miss Torrance. “Thank you just the same, but we have +changed our minds. We--we are going in the subway; but thank you.” + +The lights from the brilliant lobby shone across the street, making it +very bright where they were. The rain was pelting down on her sleek +blond head. The valiant little white ruffle at her neck was already +beaten flat, but she herself was indomitable--a little woman and a +good-looking one, although, by her severe expression and her curt +manner, you might fancy that she was trying to deny both the littleness +and the good looks, and to force you to remember only her thirty-five +years and her ability to earn her own living. + +“But--” protested the young man. + +“Thank you, just the same,” said Miss Torrance again, and, turning, +hastened back to Olive. + +The stranger was not a faint-hearted young man, however. He followed +her. + +“Look here!” he said earnestly. “You haven’t even an umbrella. You’ll +catch cold!” + +“Thank you, but it can’t be helped,” said Miss Torrance. + +She spoke sternly, but she didn’t really dislike this man. There was +something rather engaging about him, and she was very much pleased to +observe that not once did he even glance at Olive. Miss Torrance did not +wish strange young men to look at Olive. + +“I meant to take a taxi, anyhow,” said he. “Won’t you please let me drop +you?” + +He looked at Miss Torrance with a wistful, humble expression, which she +knew very well to be false. There was precious little humility in that +young man! Still, she didn’t dislike him on that account, either. +Indeed, she was almost ready to smile, when he added: + +“I’m going through West Twelfth Street. If you live anywhere near +there--” + +All thoughts of smiling abandoned her. + +“Thank you, _no_!” she replied frigidly. “Good evening! Come, Olive!” + +To her dismay, Olive did not come. + +“Let’s!” the girl whispered. “Why not? He seems--” + +Politely the young man stepped back a little. Miss Torrance gave Olive a +long and severe glance. + +“No!” said she. + +Olive was silent for a moment. Then she raised her eyes to her friend’s +face. + +“But I’d like to,” she said quietly. + +Then Miss Torrance had her turn at being silent. + +“Very well!” she said, at last. + +In those two words there was something not far from tragedy. Miss +Torrance was not stupid. She had seen in Olive’s face the dawn of a new +spirit of independence, and the shadow of the end of her own fiercely +benevolent despotism. And she loved Olive so! + +She put on her hat--such a smart little hat!--and, at that moment, she +hated it. It was absurd that any one who felt as she did just then +should wear a jaunty little hat like this! + +The young man was standing by the open door of the taxi. In they got, +she and Olive side by side, the stranger facing them. There was +something else in that cab which almost stifled Miss Torrance--something +which she insisted upon in stories, but found unbearable here--something +known professionally as “heart interest.” Olive did not speak one word, +and did not stir. The stranger’s conversation was quite impersonal, and +yet Miss Torrance knew. It seemed to her that she knew exactly what was +in the minds of her companions. + +The young fellow’s cheerful voice was speaking in the darkness. + +“Beastly weather, isn’t it?” he remarked, to fill a long, long pause. + +“Personally,” said Miss Torrance, “I don’t believe in thinking about the +weather. I agree with Dr. Johnson that it is contemptible for a being +endowed with reason to live in dependence upon the weather and the +wind.” + +“Well--” said the young man, who knew not Dr. Johnson, but was +respectful toward Miss Torrance. “You can’t help it very well at sea, +you know.” + +“Have you been at sea?” came Olive’s clear little voice. + +“Ever since I was seventeen. I’m chief officer now,” he answered, with +modest pride. “Passenger ship.” + +It seemed to Miss Torrance that even as he spoke she could smell a salty +vigor in the air. He came from the sea, did he--the sea of which she and +Olive talked so often? He was a sailor, was he? Miss Torrance’s heart +sank, remembering all that she and Olive had said about sailors. The +romance of the sea--what nonsense! + +They had reached the house. The young man sprang out and held open the +door of the cab; but he stood in the doorway, so that no one could get +out. + +“I _wish_ I could see you again!” he said earnestly. “We’re not sailing +until Monday--engine trouble. The cargo’s all in, and I know I could get +another afternoon or evening on shore.” + +He waited. + +“My name’s Martin--Sam Martin,” he went on anxiously. “I--I know a +fellow who lives in your house--Robertson. He could tell you--” + +“We don’t know any one in the boarding house,” said Miss Torrance +stiffly; “but thank you for bringing us home, Mr. Martin. Good evening!” + +The house door closed behind them, leaving them in the dark hall and Mr. +Martin out in the rain. Miss Torrance began to mount the stairs, and +Olive followed her, rather slowly. They entered the room which they +shared. + +“How,” inquired Miss Torrance, “did that young man know we lived on West +Twelfth Street?” + +“Well,” said Olive, who was taking off her shoes, so that her fair head +was bent and her face not to be seen, “I think perhaps he saw me coming +out of the house this morning.” + + +II + +Now Olive was not inclined to object to anything that Miss Torrance +might say or do. Her memory for office details was not remarkable, but +her memory of her friend’s thousand queer little kindnesses was +unalterable, ineffaceable. + +When she had been left an orphan by the death of her father, the very +first person to arrive at the house was Miss Torrance, her mother’s +cousin; and as soon as Miss Torrance entered the door, she had taken +charge of the bewildered and heartbroken girl. She had brought Olive +home with her, got her into bed, brought up dinner to her herself, and +looked after her in a brisk, matter-of-fact way for a long, weary +fortnight. + +There remained, for Olive to remember forever and ever, a Miss Torrance +who got up half a dozen times on bitter winter nights to mix medicines +and heat broth and milk, or even to talk pleasantly to an invalid who +sometimes wept for sorrow and weariness; a Miss Torrance who rose +earlier in the morning to attend to Olive’s breakfast, who rushed back +from the office at lunch time with little delicacies, who hurried home +at five o’clock as brisk, as competent, as unfailingly kind as ever. Her +salary was not a large one, yet she was ready, was glad and willing, to +feed, clothe, and shelter Olive for the rest of her days. She loved the +girl. From the very first moment that Olive had wept on her shoulder she +had loved her in a fierce, generous, tyrannical way of her own. + +She had never loved any one before, and sometimes she couldn’t quite +understand why she was so very, very fond of Olive; for the girl had +none of the qualities which Miss Torrance herself possessed, and which +she admired in others. Olive was a slender, quiet young girl, pretty +enough in her gentle way, but not of the type Miss Torrance was wont to +praise. Her brown eyes had a wistful sort of eagerness, and her mouth +was oversensitive. Altogether, there was something dreamy and +unpractical about her. + +At the end of the fortnight she had told Miss Torrance that she wanted +to set about earning her own living. The older woman was torn between +her wish to shelter and protect this gentle young creature and her +conviction that every human being should work. Conviction conquered, and +she found a place for Olive in the office of the _Far Afield_ magazine, +of which she was fiction editor. With a severe sort of patience, she +labored over Olive until she had made a pretty fair worker out of her, +but she had no illusions as to the girl’s lack of business ability. She +had begun now to train her for the career of a writer, and she saw more +hope in that. + +They were not friends in the office. Miss Torrance would not permit it. +Directly they entered the building, all intimacy was put aside until +five o’clock. They did not even lunch together, because Miss Torrance +considered it a bad precedent. Yet, the morning after the meeting with +that Mr. Martin, Miss Torrance, to save her life, could not help looking +very often through the half open door of her office toward the end of +the outer room where Olive sat. + +“Nonsense!” she said impatiently to herself. “She’ll forget him in a +week. She doesn’t know him--doesn’t know anything about him. He wasn’t +at all the type to suit her. A very ordinary, commonplace young man! I’m +glad I discouraged him. He was inclined to be troublesome.” + +Olive was quietly working away, as usual. + +“If she were--interested in him,” thought Miss Torrance uneasily, “she’d +look different.” + +The telephone on her desk rang. + +“Miss Torrance speaking!” she said briskly. + +“This is Sam Martin,” came the answer. “I wanted to ask you and--and--I +don’t know her last name, but I think I heard you call her Olive--I +wanted to ask you both to lunch.” + +A sort of panic seized Miss Torrance. Was she never to be rid of this +young man, never to have Olive all to herself again? + +“Olive cannot come,” she answered, in a voice that trembled with anger. + +“Then won’t you?” said he. “I’d like very much to talk to you.” She +consented to that, and at twelve o’clock she put on her jaunty little +hat and hurried out of the office, giving Olive a very strained smile as +she passed her. + +How much she regretted having consented to see Mr. Martin! She had meant +to crush him utterly, to point out to him how ungentlemanly, how +disgraceful, it was for him to persecute two defenseless women with his +unwelcome attentions; but instead of being offended or ashamed, all he +did was to entreat her for a chance. + +“Just give me a fair chance!” he begged. “If you find you don’t like me, +why, there’ll be no harm done. Let me come to see you, or write!” + +“No!” said Miss Torrance. “It’s ridiculous. It can’t possibly matter to +you.” + +“It does,” he declared. + +For a moment they were both silent, sitting at the table in the very +good restaurant, and not eating the very good lunch the young man had +ordered. + +“Look here, Miss Torrance!” he went on. “I’ve got to tell you. I’d been +in to stay overnight with Robertson, and in the morning I +saw--her--going out. The moment I saw her, I--look here, Miss Torrance, +you’ll have to believe me--the moment I saw her--she’s so--I--I can’t +tell you; but she’s so--sweet!” + +Miss Torrance could not endure this. She could not endure the sound of +his earnest, entreating voice, his pathetically inadequate words, or the +sight of his unhappy, honest young face. She did not know whether she +was contemptuous and angry, or even more unhappy than he was; but she +did know very positively that she wanted to get away, wanted to end +this. + +“You don’t know Olive,” she said coldly; “and I do. I tell you frankly, +Mr. Martin, that I shall do all I can to protect her from--” She +stopped. “She’s all I have in the world!” her heart cried. “I won’t let +her go. I won’t let her see you! Because, if she does see you--you +confident, good-looking, detestable creature!--how can she help loving +you and forgetting me, and how shall I live without her?” + +“But I’m--I give you my word I’m--respectable!” said he, in despair. +“I’ll tell you all about myself. I’ll get people to write you letters +about me. I--” + +“I don’t doubt you, Mr. Martin,” said Miss Torrance, with a chilly +smile; “but that’s not the point. You’ll pardon me, but I see no +advantage to Olive in making the acquaintance of a man whom she might +never see again. A sailor’s life--” + +“Oh, but look here! If she would marry me--” + +“Marry you?” cried Miss Torrance. “What preposterous nonsense is this, +when you haven’t spoken half a dozen words to each other?” + +“I can’t help it,” said he, terribly downcast, but resolute. “That’s the +way it is with me; and if she even seemed to--to be beginning to like +me, I’d give up the sea.” + +Miss Torrance smiled--not a trustful smile. + +“I mean it!” said he. “I have to make this trip, but when I come back, +I’ll stay. I promised, long ago, that if ever I met a girl I wanted to +marry, I’d swallow the anchor.” + +“Indeed!” said Miss Torrance. + +Like all innocent persons who wish to be convincing, Mr. Martin added +details. + +“The best friend I ever had made me promise that,” he went on. “He’d had +a hard lesson when he tried to mix the two--falling in love and going to +sea, I mean. He lost his ticket and his girl both.” + +“Indeed!” said Miss Torrance again. “Very interesting, I’m sure!” The +poor young man believed that she meant that. + +“Yes,” he said, “it is an interesting story. This chap--I’ll call him +Smith, if you don’t mind, because naturally he wouldn’t like to be +named. It happened some time ago--eighteen or twenty years ago, and this +chap was third officer on a cargo steamer running between London and +Antwerp. Well, one trip he met a girl in London, and he--well, you know, +he liked her, and she seemed to like him. He told her when he’d be +likely to dock again, and she said that that was her birthday, and that +she wanted him to come to a little dance she was having. Well, of +course, he got her a present. He pretty well broke himself to get her +something he thought she’d like, and I suppose he thought about her a +good deal. A fellow would, you know, at night, on watch, you know, and +so on. Well, they got in the morning of the very day he’d said--docked +at Tilbury--and then the old man told him he needn’t expect to get +ashore this trip. The first was married and lived in London, and the +second was signing off, so Smith would have to stay on board. Of course +he couldn’t say anything, but it hit him pretty hard. Look here, Miss +Torrance, does this bore you?” + +“No,” said Miss Torrance, who was interested in spite of herself. + +“Well, then, as soon as the others had cleared out, Smith stepped ashore +and telephoned to her. She began to tell him how glad she was, and how +she’d been hoping he’d be able to come to her dance, and he had to tell +her he couldn’t come. She asked him”--Martin grinned--“she asked him if +he couldn’t tell the captain it was her birthday, and then she asked him +if he couldn’t get some one to do his work for him. You know, girls +never understand responsibility; but they’re--there’s something sweet +about--” + +“Oh, nonsense!” said Miss Torrance sharply. + +“Anyhow, this girl didn’t--or wouldn’t--understand. She said if he +didn’t come that night, he needn’t ever come. She told him he was no +better than a slave--had no spirit, and so on. Well, there he was! It +was a rainy day, and--ever seen Tilbury Docks on a rainy day? I wish I +knew how to give you the--the effect. It’s the most dismal, desolate +place you’d ever want to see. The Alberta was coaling, too, and you know +what that means. + +“Except for a steward and some of the crew, there was no one on board +but Smith and the second engineer, and they didn’t hit it off very well. +The cargo was all out of her, and the new lot not coming in till the +next morning. The coaling was nearly done, and there was a train up to +London about four o’clock. Well, if you were making a story out of this, +you’d put in a lot here about a moral struggle. He must have had one, +you know--love and duty,” said Mr. Martin, obviously pleased with his +phrase. “That’s it--a struggle between love and duty, and love +conquered. He must have been very fond of that girl! He went to town on +the four o’clock train. He saw his girl, and she must have been a +remarkably pig-headed, unreasonable young person. She said she’d marry +him if he would give up the sea, but he would have to make up his mind +then and there, or she’d know he didn’t really care for her. So he said +he’d let her know before he sailed. + +“The dance broke up pretty late, so Smith went to spend the night with a +friend of his in London, and took the first train back to Tilbury in +the morning. Hadn’t been able to sleep all night, trying to make up his +mind whether he’d give up the sea or the girl. Well, he got back, and on +the dock he meets the marine superintendent of the line--a terrible old +fellow, Captain Leavitt. Poor Smith felt pretty sick when he saw the +captain. Anyhow, he says ‘Good morning, sir,’ and goes on to explain +that he’d just stepped ashore for a bit of breakfast at the hotel. + +“‘Ship’s breakfast not good enough for you, eh?’ says old Leavitt. + +“‘Oh, yes, sir,’ says Smith. ‘It wasn’t that--’ + +“‘If you’ve any complaints to make,’ says old Leavitt, with a queer sort +of grin, ‘now’s the time to make ’em, Mr. Smith!’ + +“Smith said he had none. + +“‘Satisfied with the Alberta, eh?’ asks old Leavitt. ‘Everything all +right on board when you stepped ashore for a little breakfast, Mr. +Smith?’ + +“By this time Smith felt pretty sure that Captain Leavitt knew how long +he’d been away, but he thought he’d better try to see it through. So he +says yes, everything was all right. + +“‘Humph!’ says old Leavitt, staring hard at him. ‘Well! So you’re quite +sure everything’s all right on board this morning, eh?’ + +“‘Oh, yes, sir!’ says Smith. + +At that Leavitt takes his arm, and, without another word, stumps along +beside him to the Alberta’s berth. The Alberta wasn’t there! + +“‘Sure everything’s all right on board, eh?’ says Captain Leavitt. ‘My +eyes aren’t as good as they were.’ + +“Poor Smith just stared and stared at the empty slip. He couldn’t say +one word. + +“‘She’s gone to the bottom!’ shouts Captain Leavitt. ‘And too bad you +didn’t go there with her, you young liar and blackguard!’” + +“Do you find that humorous?” demanded Miss Torrance, with a severe +glance at his laughing face. + +“Well, I can’t help it!” said Martin. “No one was hurt, you know. The +trimmers had loaded her down too much on one side, and she simply rolled +over and sank. And when you think of old Leavitt asking him if +everything was all right on board, when he knew all the time, I can’t +help thinking it’s funny!” + +Martin stopped, quite overcome with laughter. + +“This friend of yours--this Smith--did he consider it funny?” + +“Oh, Lord, no! But he’s a serious, high-minded sort of fellow. He +thought it was a disgrace, you know, and he went off and told the girl +that he was disgraced and ruined, and she threw him over. He never got +over it, and that’s why he got me to promise that if ever I--well, you +know, if I got seriously interested in a girl, I’d swallow the anchor. I +think he’s right. It’s not fair to a girl--” + +Miss Torrance rose. + +“I think, Mr. Martin,” said she, with a frigid little smile, “that if I +were you, I shouldn’t renounce my trade.” + +“Profession,” Mr. Martin suggested. + +“Occupation,” Miss Torrance compromised. “It is one thing for you to be +seriously interested in a girl, and quite another thing for her to be +seriously interested in you.” + +And with that she walked off, leaving her unfortunate young host +standing beside the table, on which remained the last course of that +excellent lunch. + + +III + +It was a lamentable day. There was a smoky fog outside, which was, for +some reason, twice as bad inside the house. When Miss Torrance let +herself in, the ill lit hall was thick with it, and the puny gas jet +spurted as if panting for breath. + +As usual, she stopped at the hall table to look at the letters there. +She picked one up hastily, and put it into her hand bag. Then, as she +was about to ascend the stairs, she caught sight of Mr. Robertson +standing in the doorway of the sitting room. + +“Good evening!” said he. + +Even in the dusk, she could see the gleam of his white teeth as he +smiled. She knew how he looked when he smiled, anyhow, for hadn’t she +been seeing him twice a day for at least six months? Olive had remarked +that he “looked like a darling.” Though Miss Torrance didn’t agree with +any such extravagant statement, she had secretly thought him a rather +distinguished man--until she had learned that he was a friend of Mr. +Martin’s. + +He was tall, very slender, very dark, with keen, thin features and an +odd smile that lifted his neat black mustache up to his narrow nostrils, +giving him an expression a little fierce, but altogether agreeable. Of +course, she didn’t know him, and wouldn’t know him. Let him smile! He +was a friend of that Mr. Martin’s, and he and Mr. Martin were both in a +conspiracy to rob her of Olive. + +Still, she couldn’t very well refuse to answer, and so she did, after a +fashion. Mr. Robertson did not seem to be discouraged. He made another +remark, which she also felt obliged to answer. Indeed, he began to talk, +and so artful was he that before she realized what she was doing, Miss +Torrance was engaged in conversation with him. + +She was thus engaged when Olive came, but that brought her to herself. +With the coldest little nod for Mr. Robertson, she went upstairs. + +“I see you were talking to Mr. Robertson,” Olive observed. + +“I couldn’t help it,” said Miss Torrance, with a frown. “He’s--well, I +don’t like the man.” + +Strange, then, that as she lay awake that night Miss Torrance should +constantly see before her the image of Mr. Robertson--a tall, dark form +in the dark hall, lounging against the hat stand in one of his +characteristically easy and nonchalant attitudes! Strange that she +should keep seeing his gleaming smile, and hearing in her ears his +quiet, courteous voice! + +All this caused her a curious uneasiness. For some reason it seemed to +her a great misfortune, almost a disaster, that he had spoken to her. A +very great misfortune! There he was, however, whether she liked him or +not. + +Being in all things so much quicker and brisker than Olive, she got +downstairs first in the morning. When she entered the dining room, +Robertson spoke again, and smiled. He pulled out her chair for her, and +paid her various polite little attentions not at all remarkable in +themselves, but new to Miss Torrance. She couldn’t actually be rude to +the man, for he hadn’t offended in any way, and he wasn’t really +obtrusive; but-- + +Morning and evening, for an endless week, she was obliged to see him, +and to make civil responses to his civil greetings. By the end of the +week she knew why she didn’t like Mr. Robertson. She didn’t like him +because she couldn’t manage him. She couldn’t overawe him. She couldn’t +impress him. When she was with him, she couldn’t really be Miss Torrance +at all. + +This, of course, she couldn’t endure. She wasn’t much used to talking to +men, and she had a pretty poor opinion of them in general. She thought +they ought to be ashamed of themselves, and Mr. Robertson evidently was +not at all ashamed of himself. He was a surveyor of hulls, and she +couldn’t help admitting that he had advanced further in business +knowledge than herself. He had lived in all sorts of outlandish +places--in Surabaya, in Hongkong, in Cape Town. He knew the world, and +seemed to take it for granted that she didn’t. Apparently he regarded +her as a dear, helpless little creature, and the incredible thing was +that, while with him, Miss Torrance couldn’t help feeling like that. + +One morning, when they were alone in the dining room, talking together +in what certainly looked like a friendly manner, she looked up at him +and asked him a question, with exactly the look and the voice of a dear, +helpless little creature. Mr. Robertson looked back at her. Their eyes +met. This made Miss Torrance very angry. + +“I’m down town almost every day,” said Mr. Robertson. “Can’t we arrange +to have lunch together some day?” + +“Thank you,” said Miss Torrance, “but I have no time.” + +She said it in a way that Mr. Robertson could not very well help +understanding. And the whole morning long she remembered +this--remembered how the smile had vanished from his face, how stiffly +he had bowed. + +“I hope I did discourage him!” she told herself vehemently. “He’s the +friend of that troublesome Mr. Martin, and he’s trying to scrape up an +acquaintance with me, so that he can give messages and so on to Olive. +Well, he shan’t!” + + +IV + +It was really spring now, a wild, gay April day, and Miss Torrance felt +unusually restless. She was wearing a new suit, dark blue, very plain, +very smart, and what with that and the spring in the air, she felt +inclined to festivity. She thought it would be nice if she was going to +meet somebody for lunch. Well, of course she wasn’t, but instead of +going to the tea room where she had been going for years, she went to a +near-by hotel. + +The first person she saw there was Olive, very cozily lunching with Mr. +Robertson. + +Miss Torrance got away without being seen, and went back to the office, +for she did not want any lunch now. She went home a little earlier than +usual, but she left nothing undone that should have been done. + +Olive noticed nothing amiss with her friend. When she left the office, +she didn’t hurry. She was glad to go slowly through the sweet afternoon. +The western sky was clear and clean, ready for the down going of the +sun, and the quiet and beautiful light of that most beautiful hour shone +full in her face. Seeing her at that moment, you could well understand +why poor Mr. Martin had been so suddenly overwhelmed. + +She gave a last glance at the sky before opening the front door. Then +she entered the house and went upstairs. The door was closed, so she +knocked. + +“Come in!” answered Miss Torrance. + +She was on her knees, packing her trunk. + +“What are you doing?” cried Olive. + +“I’m packing,” answered Miss Torrance. “I’m--going away.” + +“But why? Where?” + +“I saw you!” cried Miss Torrance. “I saw you--with that man!” + +Olive was silent, not by any means from guilt or confusion, but because +she was struggling against an unwonted anger. She thought of a good many +things to say in regard to this unwarrantable interference with her +affairs, but she did not say one of them. Instead, she looked down at +Miss Torrance, who was working away in hot haste, and every one of her +friend’s generosities and queer little kindnesses rose up before her. +She crossed the room and knelt by the other woman’s side, putting an arm +about her shoulders. + +“Oh, my dear!” she said gently. “If I’ve done anything to--to hurt you, +can’t you forgive me?” + +“It’s not that,” said Miss Torrance, in a hard, cold voice. “I’ve +nothing to forgive. It’s simply that I’ve--I’ve made a fool of myself.” +The tears were rolling down her cheeks, but she pretended not to know +it. “I’ve made the worst sort of fool of myself--and I will not face +that man again! I will not!” + +“But, darling,” said Olive gently, “if you feel like that, we’ll both +go.” + +“No!” cried Miss Torrance, with a loud sob. “I will not come between you +and your precious Mr. Martin!” + +“What do you mean?” said Olive. “I don’t--” She stopped. “That’s silly, +darling,” she went on, in an airy sort of way. “I’ve forgotten all about +Mr. Martin, and he’s gone off to sea and forgotten all about me, long +ago.” + +“He has not!” said Miss Torrance. “He wrote you two letters, and I tore +them up. Take your arm away, please, and let me get up!” + +Olive, too, had risen. + +“My letters!” she said faintly. “I didn’t think you would--” + +“Well, now you know,” said Miss Torrance. “Now you know what a--a beast +I am!” + +“Stop!” said Olive. + +“I won’t!” said Miss Torrance. “I pretended to myself that I wanted to +save you, but to-day, when I saw you with that man, I knew that I was +nothing but a jealous, meddlesome old--” + +Suddenly they were in each other’s arms, clinging to each other and +weeping. + +“Of course I’m going with you!” said Olive. “You might have known!” + + +V + +It was nothing--nothing at all--for Olive to give up the hope of seeing +Mr. Martin again. Twice only had her eyes rested upon his jolly, +sunburned face, and it ought to have been very easy to forget that. His +letters she had never seen, so they were surely nothing to think about. +Altogether, he and his letters were only the briefest sort of episode in +a life that might go on for thirty, forty, even fifty years longer. + +She had so much to be thankful for--a good position, a comfortable home, +and the immeasurable gratitude and devotion of her friend. Well, to be +sure, she was as quietly good-tempered as usual, and gave no sign that +she had not forgotten the whole thing; yet Miss Torrance knew that Olive +hadn’t forgotten. + +She could read it in the girl’s face, and she could read it in her own +heart. She could understand how Olive felt about her lost Mr. Martin. +She understood very well what it was to remember one face, one voice, so +constantly that all others were a weariness. + +“It really is like that!” she sometimes said to herself, with a sort of +awe. “I didn’t believe it, but it’s true!” + +She never spoke about this to Olive, nor did she think it necessary to +tell her that a week after they left the boarding house she had +returned there, to see Mr. Robertson, and to get from him the address of +the roving Mr. Martin. Mr. Robertson had gone away, the landlady didn’t +know where, so Miss Torrance was spared that humiliation, and had no +inclination to mention it. She had done away with the young man so +effectively that now, when she would have given her right hand to get +him back for Olive, she couldn’t find him. + +She tried her very best to atone. She no longer attempted to interfere +in Olive’s affairs, for she no longer felt herself supremely competent +to manage other people’s affairs. Indeed, the poor little woman was +sometimes so subdued, so crushed by remorse, that it was all Olive could +do to enliven her. + +There were times when Olive found it rather a strain to enliven any one, +when she would have welcomed any one who would perform that kind office +for her. To-day was one of those days. The work in the office had been +very heavy, and the weather was warm and sultry. She wanted to go home +and rest, and yet she was reluctant to enter the new boarding house, so +discouragingly like the old one. + +She closed the front door behind her, and sighed. The servant had +forgotten to light the gas, and the hall was inky black. There wasn’t a +sound in the house, and the only sign of life was a steamy smell of rice +and mutton ascending from the basement. + +Olive was about to go upstairs when the doorbell rang furiously, and she +thought she would wait and see what it meant. There might be a telegram +for herself. She knew of no living person to send her one, but still, +who knows what may happen? + +Anyhow, she lit the gas herself, and pretended to be looking at the +letters on the rack. She heard the maid coming up the basement stairs. +The bell rang again, louder and longer. + +“Mercy on us!” said the servant. “You’d think it was a fire!” She opened +the door, and in came a man, in great haste. + +“Miss Torrance!” he said. “I want to see Miss Torrance at once!” + +“She ain’t in,” said the maid, as if pleased. + +“Look here!” said the stranger. “I made them tell me at her office where +she lived, and this is the place, and I’m going to see her!” + +“She ain’t--” the servant began again, when Olive stepped forward. + +“Will I do?” she asked. + +“You!” he cried. + +Olive was not so much startled as he, because she had been looking at +Mr. Martin ever since he entered. Nor did she seem pleased. Mr. Martin +had apparently come here filled with rage against her Miss Torrance, and +that she would not tolerate. + +“What was it you wanted?” she inquired coldly. + +“I came,” said Mr. Martin firmly, “about this story--in this magazine. +It’s--it’s an outrage!” + +“Oh!” cried Olive. “Oh! The--the story?” + +He looked at her sternly, yet with a sort of compassion. + +“Do you mean that you know about it?” he asked. + +“Yes,” said Olive, in a faint little voice. “But--I didn’t think it was +so--so bad.” + +Mr. Martin looked at her with growing horror. + +“Look here!” he said. “You don’t mean--you can’t mean--it was signed +with a man’s name, but I felt sure Miss Torrance wrote it, because it’s +based on a story I told her myself, about Robertson. I called him +‘Smith,’ but I suppose she knew all the time--” + +“No!” Olive interposed. “No! Mr. Martin, I’m awfully sorry, but--I wrote +that story!” + +“What? You?” + +“I’m awfully sorry,” Olive said again, and she looked so. “You see, Mr. +Robertson told me the story himself, and he didn’t say that it wasn’t to +be used.” + +“Naturally he didn’t. It never entered his head that you would--” + +“But, you see, I didn’t mean--I didn’t think--I only thought it was +funny.” + +“Funny!” cried Mr. Martin, all his indignation returning. “You thought +it was funny to say--wait a minute!” He pulled a magazine out of his +pocket and turned the pages. “This!” he said in a terrible voice. “You +say, ‘The man went bowed under the weight of his infidelity. False to +his duty, false to his inmost self, he--’” + +“I didn’t!” + +“Here it is in black and white. ‘Raising his glass in his shaking hand, +he drank again, his bleared eyes peering--’” + +“I did not!” cried Olive. + +“You’ve made him out a drunken old beach comber--Robertson, the finest +fellow who ever lived! You’ve got all the facts there--any one could +recognize ’em. You say--” + +Olive could endure no more of this nightmare. She snatched the magazine +out of his hands. “Remorse,” the story was called, and the author’s name +was given as “John Hunt.” She suddenly collapsed upon the bottom step of +the stairs. + +For a moment the young man remained the just and stern judge. Then he +bent over her and said, in a voice of quite human solicitude: + +“I’m--perhaps you didn’t realize. Look here--I wish I hadn’t said all +that! I’m--please don’t cry!” + +“I’m not crying,” replied Olive, in a stifled voice. “Please forgive me! +It really isn’t funny, but--oh, oh, I just can’t help it!” + +He bent nearer. + +“Are you laughing?” he demanded incredulously. + +“Oh, please forgive me! It’s horrible, but--I’ll stop in a moment. You +see, that awful story is Miss Torrance’s, but I wrote a story, too--only +mine was better, I think, and funnier. You see, we both--” + +“You and Miss Torrance each wrote a story about Robertson?” + +“Yes, both of us, and neither of us knew. Oh, imagine the editors, and +Miss Torrance, and poor Mr. Robertson, and you, and me--” + +“Personally, I don’t see anything--” he began in a frigid tone, but it +was of no use. + +The dull, dingy old house rang with his great, hearty laugh. + + +VI + +They were all having dinner together in a restaurant. In the +circumstances, Miss Torrance could not well refuse, especially as it was +Mr. Martin’s one night on shore; but she was not happy. Every one else +was happy, but not she. + +As a rule, she strong-mindedly concealed her feelings, but to-night she +didn’t. She allowed Mr. Robertson to see just how miserable she was. +Olive and Mr. Martin might have seen this, too, if they had looked at +her. + +“It looks as if there was a new story beginning there,” observed Mr. +Robertson. “Might be called ‘Mr. Martin Swallows the Anchor.’” + +Miss Torrance refused to smile. + +“I shall miss Olive so,” she said, in a not very steady voice, “if +she--” + +“I’m sure you would,” agreed Mr. Robertson; “but she couldn’t find a +better fellow than young Martin. I’ve known him all his life, and--” + +“Yes, I know,” said Miss Torrance; “but I shall be lonely--oh, so +lonely!” + +It turned out, however, that she was not destined to be lonely. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JANUARY, 1925 +Vol. LXXXIII NUMBER 4 + + + + +Too French + +THE STORY OF A NERVOUS WRECK AND HER ATTRACTIVE YOUNG COMPANION + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Young Mandeville Ryder entered the employment bureau with extreme +reluctance. Indeed, when he opened the door and saw so many women in +there, and heard so many feminine voices, he would have backed out +again, only that he was too young to dare to run away. + +He was twenty-five--the age of pig-headed valor. He had undertaken to do +this thing, and he meant to do it. Instinct warned him to flee, but he +paid no heed. Hat in hand, he advanced to the desk and somewhat vaguely +made known his wants. + +It was a question of engaging a companion for his sister, who was a +nervous wreck. His brother-in-law had implored him to do this. + +“B-because,” Sheila’s husband said, “if I find any one--well, Mandy, you +know what she’ll probably say.” + +Mandeville did know. He had taken pity upon his luckless brother-in-law, +and had agreed to go and pick out a companion for Sheila; so here he +was. + +The young woman in charge of the bureau listened to him with courteous +inattention. She had long ago ceased to trouble with any one’s detailed +requirements. She knew that both employers and employees wanted and +demanded things that never existed in this world, and that in the end +they would take what they could get and be more or less satisfied. + +She was, however, rather favorably impressed by this client. Not only +was he more than six feet tall, extraordinarily good-looking, and +extremely well dressed, but he had an air about him--a superb sort of +nonchalance, which she saw through at once, and which she recognized as +merely a disguise for an honest, candid, and endearingly youthful +spirit; so she decided not to inflict Miss Mullins upon him. Miss +Mullins had been registered for six weeks, and, considering her +temperament and personal appearance, she needed every possible chance. + +“No!” thought the young woman in charge. “I’ll let him see Miss Twill.” + +Smiling pleasantly, she led Mandeville into a room where four women were +already established, talking, two in each corner, in low tones, and +eying each other with quick, terribly penetrating glances. A prominent +clubwoman was interviewing a poor little secretary, and a mild, +home-keeping lady was being interviewed by a stern and handsome English +governess. + +Young Mandeville had to sit either on a very low wicker rocking-chair, +or on a settee. He tried the rocking-chair first, but it brought his +knees up to his chin, so he had to take the settee, and this caused him +considerable anxiety; for suppose-- + +Well, it happened. Miss Twill, brought in and presented to him, did sit +down on the settee beside him. She was a cheery soul. All her +unimpeachable references mentioned her “cheerful disposition.” She +really had no perceptible faults at all, but she wouldn’t do. + +Young Mandeville was absolutely incapable of telling her this to her +cheerful face, and their conversation had trailed into an awful +succession of one “well” after another, when the intelligent manageress +of the bureau saved him. She sent him another prospective companion to +be interviewed, another and yet another, and none of them would do. + +Mandeville suffered exceedingly. He wished that he could give the +discouraged, pinched little old one a present--a dozen pairs of gloves, +for instance. He wished that he could invite the pert, pretty young one +out to lunch. He was sorry for all of them, and he felt like a brute; +but he knew what he wanted, and these would not do. There he sat, like a +caliph in his divan, pronouncing judgment upon these poor, anxious +creatures, and waiting, without much hope, for the right one. + +He had a clear idea of the right one. He had met her--in novels and in +the theater--a tall, grave, lovely young woman, exquisitely well bred, +dignified, and yet subtly pathetic; the sort of companion who can stand +about and converse with diplomats. Not that his sister ever entertained +diplomats, but that was the type. + +The manageress was becoming a little severe. It was dawning upon her +that this client was not so manageable as he looked. After he had seen +and--with great mental suffering--rejected six companions, she decided +to make an end of him. + +The room was temporarily empty of all but Mandeville when she returned +with the seventh applicant. + +“Miss La Chêne!” said she, and, saying, vanished. + +Miss La Chêne did not sit beside Mandeville on the settee--not she! She +took the low rocking-chair opposite him, crossed her feet modestly, +clasped her little white-gloved hands in her lap, and raised her eyes to +his face. Enormous, soft black eyes they were, set in a dark, lovely, +pointed face. She was dressed with an innocent sort of elegance, in a +dark suit and a small, close-fitting hat. She had about her such an air +of propriety, something so decorous and demure and delightful, that +Mandeville couldn’t repress a smile. She smiled, too, and dropped her +eyes. + +He didn’t know how to begin. This charming little thing was nothing but +a child, a kid. + +“Er--” he said, in his vague, grand manner. “Er--I don’t imagine you’ve +had much experience as a--er--a companion.” + +“None!” said she, almost with vehemence. “None at all; but I speak +French just as I do English, I can sew, I can read aloud, I can play the +piano. I have good personal references from people in Quebec, and I have +a diploma from the convent.” + +In hot haste she opened her hand bag, brought out some letters, and +handed them to the young man. Somehow he didn’t care to read them. +Somehow this interview lacked a businesslike tone. No--he couldn’t read +the poor little thing’s letters! + +She was watching him anxiously. + +“I’ll try very hard, if some one will only give me a chance!” said she. + +Poor little thing! Such a sweet, well bred little voice! + +“I know,” said Mandeville earnestly; “but--you see, my sister wants--” + +For instinct warned him that this delightful creature would not do. + +“You see--” he went on, but stopped short, because the poor little +thing’s black eyes filled with tears. + +“I’m only eighteen,” she said, “and all alone in the world.” + +This was more than he could endure. He was silent for a moment, trying +honestly to weigh the merits of the case. She was obviously well bred, +she spoke French, she could sew, she could read aloud, she could play +the piano; but all these qualifications became confused in his mind with +the quite irrelevant facts that she was only eighteen and all alone in +the world, and that she had those extraordinary, those marvelous eyes. + +“I’ll take you to see my sister,” he said, at last, for he thought that +his sister could not fail to be touched by so much youth, beauty, and +innocence. + + +II + +Sheila Robinson, the nervous wreck, lay on a couch in her boudoir, and +from time to time she wept. She was a handsome woman, a fine woman, +tall, regally formed, with long, languid blue eyes and a superb crown of +red hair. She was not unaware of her natural advantages, yet compliments +almost always made her weep. + +“If you could have seen me before I married Lucian Robinson!” was what +she usually said. + +She had just said this now, to Miss La Chêne, and Miss La Chêne had +answered instantly: + +“Oh, any one could _see_ how much you’ve suffered!” + +Considering the age and inexperience of the girl, this reply showed +talent; but what had the poor little thing, only eighteen and all alone +in the world, to depend upon except her own native wit? She had made a +determined effort to please Sheila Robinson, and she had succeeded at +the very first interview. Mrs. Robinson had been much gratified by her +wide-eyed interest and fervent sympathy. + +For a whole week Miss La Chêne had not failed once. She had been +earnestly attentive, obliging, polite, and amusing. She had been, +without complaint, a servant in the morning, a dear and intimate friend +in the afternoon, and completely forgotten in the evening. Everything +had gone very nicely indeed. + +But a week of calm was about as much as Mrs. Robinson’s nerves could +endure. Her husband was away on a business trip, and his daily letters +upset her horribly. She could, she assured Miss La Chêne, read between +the lines. She was wonderfully clever about this, though she modestly +said that it was all intuition. + +For instance, if a letter was dated the 12th, this remarkable woman knew +at once that it had really been written on the 5th, and given to some +complaisant friend to mail. If Lucian said that business was bad, it was +because he wished to lavish his money elsewhere. If he said that +business was good, it was because he was disgracefully happy. + +Altogether Mrs. Robinson was so barbarously ill-used and deceived by her +husband that she no longer cared what happened to her. The hotel suite +which she occupied became the scene of a lamentable martyrdom. She +trifled with her life. When she lay in bed, she observed to Miss La +Chêne that the doctor had positively ordered her to go out and divert +her mind. When she passed a hectic day away from home, she would +frequently remind Miss La Chêne, with a brave, scornful smile, that the +doctor had forbidden any excitement. Every meal, every cup of coffee, +every cigarette, was a reckless defiance of the doctor’s orders; but, as +she said, what did it all matter? Perhaps it would be better if she were +dead, and the heartless Lucian free to marry again. + +“If I should _not be here_ when he comes back,” she said to Miss La +Chêne, in a low, thrilling voice, “tell him that I forgive--everything!” + +Nevertheless, it seemed that she wished to know definitely what there +was to be forgiven, for on this particular morning she said she had a +“strange, psychic feeling that something was wrong,” and she desired to +verify the suspicion. She read her husband’s letter over and over. + +“My dear!” she said, with dangerous calmness. “He says he is at a hotel +in Washington, but I do not believe him! Something tells me he is not in +Washington at all!” + +Miss La Chêne looked appalled. + +“Please,” Mrs. Robinson went on, “get the hotel on the long distance for +me, my dear. I must know!” + +This the willing companion did. Mrs. Robinson took up the receiver and +requested to speak to Mr. Robinson. There was a pause. Then a pleasant +feminine voice answered her: + +“Mr. Robinson is out, but this is Mrs. Robinson speaking. May I--” + +It was terrible! In vain did Miss La Chêne point out that Robinson was +not a very unusual name, and that there might well be a Mrs. Robinson in +that hotel totally unknown to Mr. Lucian Robinson. + +“Don’t go on!” cried Mrs. Robinson. “I knew it--I knew it all the time! +My heart told me!” + +She began at once to prepare for her departure. In every crisis she was +wont to fly to some one who could “understand,” and it was now the turn +of her sister, Mrs. Milner, to perform this office for her. She was +going away. She cared not where she went, in her anguish, but she +thought that Miss La Chêne might as well buy her a ticket for Greenwich +and look up a train and order a taxi. + +“I must go at once,” she said, “while I have the strength. My dear, do I +look too terrible?” + +“Well,” replied Miss La Chêne, “of course, any one could see how much +you were suffering.” + +Mrs. Robinson cast a glance at the mirror. With her handsome face pale +with grief and Rachel powder, her eyes somber with pain and mascara, her +regal form dressed all in black, she did indeed look tragic. + +“What does it all matter?” she demanded. “You’ll stay here and look +after the packing, won’t you, my dear? And my jewels--” This was too +much for her. “My jewels!” she said wildly. “Almost all of them were +given to me by him, in those days when he still loved me. Take them +away! Never let me see them again--never! But be sure to get a receipt +from the safe-deposit, my dearest child, and remember that the bank +closes at three o’clock.” + +She gave the jewel case to Miss La Chêne and turned with a shudder, +covering her eyes with her hand. + +“Take the five o’clock train, my dear,” she said. “I’ll see that you’re +met at the station. Good-by! Good-by!” + +“_Au revoir!_” said Miss La Chêne, with fervor. + +Directly she was left alone, Miss La Chêne, with remarkable skill and +energy, set about the business of packing. She did the job well--as, +indeed, she did almost everything she undertook. + +In a way she enjoyed the task, but in another way it was unspeakably +painful. She adored handling these satin, silk, lace, chiffon, batiste, +and georgette garments of Mrs. Robinson’s, these perfumes, powders, +rouges, creams, and lotions, these hats, shoes, slippers, gloves, and +scarfs. She could thoroughly appreciate the somewhat flamboyant tastes +of the unhappy lady; but oh, how she coveted! Actually tears came into +her eyes--tears of fearful envy. + +She was an honest and sturdy little soul, however, and she tried to +console herself with the reflection that, if she continued to be honest, +industrious, and virtuous, she might some day have all that Mrs. +Robinson had, and more. Even in boarding school she had known that she +was going to marry a millionaire, and now she was so situated that she +might meet one at almost any minute. Who could tell what might not +happen at the house of this sister in Greenwich? + +So she did her work; and when it was done, and the trunks had gone off, +she sat down to rest for a little. It was at this minute, when her busy +little hands were idle, that temptation assailed her. She wondered what +Mrs. Robinson had in her jewel case. She discovered that the key was in +the lock. She did not see what harm it could possibly do just to look at +the jewels; and then she did not see what harm it could possibly do just +to try on a few of them. + +She tucked in her blouse, so as to leave her slender neck and shoulders +bare. She took the net off her smooth, neat coiffure, and produced a +fascinating effect of wildness by a few deft touches. Cosmetics she +needed not, for her eyes were starry, her cheeks flushed with delight. +She slipped two or three rings on her fingers and a broad gold bracelet +on one childish arm. She put on a long rope of pearls, and clasped about +her throat a short necklace of emeralds. + +Then she found a jeweled butterfly, the use of which she didn’t +comprehend, but she fastened it in her hair, just above her eyebrows; +and she stared and stared at her image in the mirror, enthralled by the +magical glimmer of the jewels. She was altogether the most amazingly +lovely little creature, and the man standing in the doorway behind her +was very properly overwhelmed. He never forgot that first glimpse of +Miss La Chêne. + +“I--I--I--” he stammered. + +She spun around, as white as a ghost. He was a slender, well dressed +man, with a thin, harassed face, pleasant brown eyes, and hair a little +gray. He was greatly embarrassed, and she was terrified; and that made +conversation difficult. + + +III + +Miss La Chêne was the first to recover. + +“Who are you?” she demanded in a small, defiant voice. + +“I?” said he, surprised. “B-but the thing is, who are _you_? I’m +Robinson.” + +Impossible! This mild and nervous gentleman the heartless brute who had +ruined Mrs. Robinson’s life, shattered her illusions, and made her the +nervous wreck she was? And yet, looking at him, Miss La Chêne could not +doubt him. He seemed authentic. + +“I’m Mrs. Robinson’s companion,” she said. “I--she--” + +Then, so abashed was she, so humiliated at being caught thus, bedecked +in Mrs. Robinson’s jewels, that she began to cry. She would not admit +that she was crying, however. With great tears rolling down her cheeks +and her lashes like wet rays, she explained, in a formal tone, that Mrs. +Robinson had left her behind to pack, and that she had just tried on +the--the jewels. + +“W-well, what of it?” he said cheerfully. “Th-there’s no harm done. See +here! Please don’t cry! Why shouldn’t you t-try on the things? Very +natural!” He paused. “And very becoming,” he added, with a singularly +nice sort of smile. + +She liked him. He was kind and courteous, and he evidently admired her. +When he asked where his wife had gone, Miss La Chêne found that she was +sorry for him. He was so innocent, so absolutely unaware of his latest +crime. He said that he had “popped in to surprise her.” + +For an instant the tactful and zealous companion was at a loss. She was +not very old and not very experienced, and this seemed to be rather a +delicate matter; but she was a warm-hearted little thing, and pretty +sharp-witted, and she was convinced now that Mr. Robinson was an old +darling, and badly misunderstood. So she told him the truth, in the +most tactful way she could. + +“B-but, good Lord!” cried the unfortunate man. “There might be t-ten +Robinsons in a b-big hotel!” + +“I know,” Miss La Chêne agreed. “I said that to Mrs. Robinson, but you +know how--sensitive and high-strung she is.” + +“Yes,” he said ruefully. “Yes, she is.” He sighed. “Well!” he said, and +sighed again. + +Miss La Chêne took advantage of his abstraction to retire to another +room, to take off her borrowed ornaments, and to restore her costume to +its usual demure neatness. When she came back with the jewels in her +hand, to restore them to the case, she found Mr. Robinson sitting in a +chair, staring before him, profoundly dejected. The only thought that +entered her kind little heart was a very admirable and very feminine +desire to cheer and comfort this unhappy man. + +“Wouldn’t you like a cup of tea, Mr. Robinson?” she asked. + +“Why, yes, I should,” he replied, very much pleased. + +So Miss La Chêne telephoned downstairs to the restaurant, and a tea was +sent up, but it did not suit the fastidious young woman. She did magical +things to it with various electric devices; and the tea itself was so +delectable, and the temporary hostess was so gay and amusing and +delightful and kind, that Robinson soon completely recovered his +spirits. He was a very good sort of fellow, too, when he had half a +chance, and altogether they were so cozy and jolly that they quite +forgot the time, until the clock struck. + +Then, startled as _Cinderella_ was by the same sound, Miss La Chêne +sprang up from the tea table. + +“_Mon Dieu!_” she cried. “_Quatre heures! Madame sera bien fâchée! Mais +que je suis bête! Mon Dieu!_” + +All this sounded very alarming to Robinson. He was relieved to hear that +the only trouble was that the bank had closed at three o’clock, and Miss +La Chêne could not deposit the jewels, as she had been directed to do. + +“Well, if that’s all,” said he, “I’ll take ’em myself to-morrow morning. +You run along and catch your train, and don’t worry.” + +Then he had to spoil all that cheerful, innocent little hour they had +had together. His face grew red, and he did not care to look at Miss La +Chêne. + +“Er,” he stammered, “I--I--I think it would be just as well not to +mention to Mrs. Robinson--” + +“Very well, Mr. Robinson,” said she. + + +IV + +Mandeville Ryder sat in a corner of the screened veranda, reading. It +was a good place for reading, cool and breezy; the electric lamp +afforded an excellent light, and his book was an interesting one. Twice +his young niece, Elaine Milner, had come out to entreat him to come in +and dance, but with a smile of lofty amusement he had refused. He said +he preferred reading. + +Yet, as a matter of fact, he hadn’t read one page. From where he sat he +could look through the window, through the long room where the dancing +was going on, into the smaller room beyond, where sat his two sisters, +Mrs. Robinson and Mrs. Milner, and with them Miss La Chêne. He could +look, and he did look. + +Elaine was a pretty girl, and she had collected two or three rather +pretty young things and a proper number of young fellows. All in all, +they were a cheerful, well dressed, well mannered lot of young people, +and the spectacle of their harmless merriment might well have brought a +smile to the lips of any observer; yet Mandeville did not smile. + +He was looking at Miss La Chêne, sitting there with the two ladies, +silent, decorous, and patient, in her plain little dark silk dress, the +very model of a companion. Only her enormous black eyes moved +restlessly, following the dancers with a look which Mandeville could +hardly endure. + +“Poor little thing!” he said to himself. “_Poor_ little thing! It’s a +confounded shame!” + +There wasn’t a girl there half so pretty as she, not a girl with +anything like her style, her charm, her grace. She was beyond measure +superior to all of them, yet there she had to sit, looking on. + +“And I let her in for this!” young Ryder thought. “She has no business +being a companion, anyhow. By George, if she had half a chance!” + +And, with a rather touching naïveté, he thought he could remedy all +this, could notably assist and hearten the poor little thing. He rose, +put down his book, entered the house, threaded his way among the +dancers, and presently stood beside Miss La Chêne’s chair. She raised +those big eyes to his face with a startled look. + +“We’ll try a dance, eh?” said the lordly, blond-crested youth. + +For a moment she hesitated. She knew she shouldn’t accept. Elaine +wouldn’t like it, Elaine’s mother wouldn’t like it, Mrs. Robinson +wouldn’t like it; but Miss La Chêne couldn’t resist. With another glance +at Mandeville she rose, he put his arm about her, and off they went. + +And, as he put it, they stopped the show. He was a wonderful dancer, and +she was incomparable. They danced with the curious gravity of +professionals. They did not smile, they did not speak, except when he +gave a low, brief order for a change of step. + +“Put on a tango!” said he, when the fox trot was ended. + +Somebody did this, and now they had the floor to themselves. They +stepped out with splendid arrogance, in absolute accord, lithe, utterly +easy, utterly and disdainfully sure of themselves. Mandeville looked +down at the dark, glowing little creature before him with a fine fire in +his blue eyes. + +“You’re the prettiest girl in the world!” he whispered. “And the +sweetest!” + +Well, this went to her head. When the tango was at an end, young Lyons, +who was Elaine’s latest interest in life, came entreating Miss La Chêne +for a dance. She forgot all worldly wisdom and discretion, she forgot +everything, except that she was young and pretty, and that the +handsomest and most distinguished young man in the room--or perhaps in +the universe--had singled her out for his attentions, and that all the +other men admired her. + +She _liked_ to be admired, and she _loved_ to dance. The music had got +into her blood. Her slender shoulders moved restlessly. She smiled, and +dimples showed in her olive cheeks. Her eyes were as bright as stars. + +“I just will!” she thought. “I’ll have one happy evening, anyhow!” + +She did. Penniless and obscure, in her plain, dark little dress, she had +come among these luxurious girls and eclipsed them all. Every one of the +young men was dazzled by her dainty coquetry, the faint foreign flavor +of her allurement. The girls were prodigiously civil. They jolly well +had to be, when this little intruder stood so high in favor with the +opposite sex. + +And all this was due to Mandeville Ryder. He had raised her up from her +sorrowful obscurity. She made no secret of her gratitude. Her eyes were +forever seeking his, and she generally found him looking at her. They +smiled at each other with a sort of friendly understanding. + +“He thinks he’s invented her,” said Elaine, to one of her friends. + +But there came, of course, that moment so dear to sour and middle-aged +moralists--the moment when the party breaks up, the music stops, and +fatigue comes across laughing faces. The guests went away, and there was +nobody left but the family and Miss La Chêne. She had danced, and now +she must pay the piper; and his bill was likely to be a large one. + +Elaine whispered something to her mother, Mrs. Milner whispered +something to Mrs. Robinson, and they all looked at Miss La Chêne in a +certain way. Mandeville had gone out on the veranda for a smoke, and she +had no friend here. + +“You needn’t wait,” said Mrs. Robinson, in a tone she had never used +before. + + +V + +There were two things the matter with Mandeville Ryder, and neither of +them was fatal. He was too young, and he was spoiled. He was a handsome +fellow, the only son of a well-to-do father; and he was so much run +after and so much flattered that he had acquired a manner and an outlook +lamentably toploftical. At heart, however, he was wholly honest, +generous, and chivalrous. + +On the morning after the dance, he went off to the city, resolved not to +come back to his sister’s house, and not to think any more of Miss La +Chêne; but even before lunch time he had resolved that he would go back. +He was a conceited ass, he told himself, and a girl like Miss La Chêne +was too good for any man. + +So back he went, arriving a little before the dinner hour. Perhaps he +was a little too consciously heroic in his determination to show the +greatest deference toward Miss La Chêne; but he soon got over that, for +he had no chance to display his heroism. + +All the sparkle and gayety had gone from the poor girl. When he began to +speak to her, she answered him with a hurried little nervous smile, and +flitted away. He couldn’t even catch her eye. She fairly clung to Mrs. +Robinson, hiding in the shadow of that regal lady. She was so pale, so +subdued, so startlingly changed from the charming little creature of the +evening before, that Mandeville was worried. + +It never occurred to him that he was responsible for this lamentable +change, and he went ahead, making a sufficiently unpleasant situation +worse and worse by his well meant efforts. At the dinner table he tried +to bring the pale and downcast Miss La Chêne into the conversation, and +wondered at her very brief answers and her flat, small voice. He knew +that she _could_ talk. + +“I’ll try a dance with you, Elaine,” he said to his niece, benevolently, +after dinner. + +“No, _thank_ you, Mandy,” said she, with a very peculiar smile. + +“Well, what about you, Miss La Chêne?” he asked, in all innocence. + +There was a terrific silence. + +“N-no, thank you, Mr. Ryder,” she finally managed. + +The wisdom of the past is very clearly demonstrated in the story of +_Cinderella_. You will remember that that long-suffering girl maintained +a canny silence regarding her _succès fou_ at the court balls until the +prince had made a frank declaration of his honorable intentions. +Otherwise her life between balls, with those stepsisters and that +stepmother, would have been unendurable--as Miss La Chêne’s life was +now. Naturally Mrs. Robinson and Mrs. Milner did not like to see their +adored and only brother making an idiot of himself about a girl who was +just a little nobody, and naturally they firmly believed it was all the +girl’s fault. They didn’t actually _say_ anything, but they managed +remarkably well with implications. + +Miss La Chêne could not defend herself. Never before in her brief life +had she shown herself deficient in spirit or in proper pride, but now a +terrible humility had come over her. She thought Mandeville Ryder was so +marvelous that he couldn’t possibly be interested in her. She thought he +hadn’t really meant it when he said she was the prettiest girl in the +world, and the sweetest. She thought he hadn’t really looked at her like +that. How was it possible, when the most beautiful and charming and +brilliant girls were all competing for his favor? No--he had only been +kind to her, because it was his dear, splendid way to be kind to every +one. + +And, after all, his kindness had brought her nothing but misery. It +seemed to her sometimes that she couldn’t bear the slights and the +innuendoes of Mrs. Milner and Mrs. Robinson another moment; and yet she +couldn’t quite make up her mind to go back to some cheap little boarding +house, to wait there until she could find another position, possibly +worse than this--and never, never to see Mandeville Ryder any more. She +generally cried after she got into bed at night. + +As for young Mandeville, he generally sat out on the veranda alone, +smoking, and meditating in a very miserable way. Miss La Chêne as a +dancing partner, gay and sparkling and lovely, had charmed him, but Miss +La Chêne subdued and obviously unhappy touched him to the heart. What +was the matter with her? + +A week went by, and then the household was thrown into turmoil by a +dramatic and tremendous reconciliation between Mrs. Robinson and her +husband. Mrs. Robinson enjoyed it very much, Mr. Robinson not quite so +much. Indeed, he had a pretty sheepish look when his wife sat beside him +on the sofa, weeping, with her head on his shoulder, and announced to +the assembled family: + +“Lucian and I are going to make a fresh start, and all the miserable, +miserable past is to be as if it had never been!” + +That evening Elaine sang Tosti’s “Good-by” for them: + + “Hark, a voice from the far-away! + ‘Listen and learn,’ it seems to say; + ‘All the to-morrows shall be as to-day, + All the to-morrows shall be as to-day!’” + +Her dancing eyes met Mandeville’s. He was obliged to get up and walk +over to the window, to hide a reluctant and irresistible grin; but Mrs. +Robinson noticed nothing. She had no sense of humor. She was too +intense. + +The next evening Robinson brought out his wife’s jewel case from the +city, and, knowing what was expected of him in any reconciliation, he +brought also a gift--a diamond pendant on a gold chain. It was +impossible for Mrs. Robinson not to show to the other members of the +household this proof of her husband’s penitent devotion. She took it +downstairs, and Mrs. Milner and Elaine hastened to her, and they all +three stood by the piano lamp, vehemently admiring the glittering thing. + +Robinson was rather pleased with himself; but then, unfortunately, he +caught sight of little Miss La Chêne standing outside the charmed +circle, pointedly disregarded by the others, and trying her valiant best +to look as if she didn’t care. Though he was years and years older than +Mandeville, and most bitterly experienced, the same dangerous notion +came into Mr. Robinson’s head--the wish to be kind to the luckless young +creature. He remembered how nice she had been to him, how kind and jolly +over that impromptu tea, how loyal and discreet in never mentioning it +to Mrs. Robinson. + +He crossed the room to her side, and stood there, talking to her. Miss +La Chêne, in the joy and comfort of being spoken to like a real, human +girl, came to life. Her face grew bright and piquant again, and she said +funny, amusing things that made Robinson laugh. They both forgot their +terribly precarious positions, and were happy and cheerful. + +Mrs. Robinson saw this; and that evening, when she went upstairs to her +room, she discovered that one of her bracelets was missing from the +jewel case. She had given the case to Miss La Chêne unlocked, and no one +else had touched it. + +“I c-can’t tell her!” thought the thrice-wretched Robinson. “Not now! If +I’d mentioned it in the beginning--but now, after all this t-time! If +she knew that we had t-tea together, and that I t-took the infernal +case! I can’t stand another of these rows--I simply c-can’t! I’ll make +it right, somehow.” + +So he persuaded his outraged wife not to summon policemen, or +detectives, or sheriffs that night, but to wait until the morning. Then +he pretended to go to sleep, but it was a long time before sleep really +came to him. He felt certain that Miss La Chêne would not betray him, +and he felt equally certain that to count upon her loyalty was about as +contemptible a thing as his sorry weakness had ever led him into doing. + + +VI + +Mandeville Ryder returned to his sister’s house the next evening at the +usual hour, and found Elaine sitting alone on the veranda. + +“Hello, Mandy!” she greeted him. + +“Afternoon, Elaine,” he vouchsafed. + +“Golly, such a row!” said she. + +“Who? Sheila and Lucian?” he asked, not much interested. + +“No--Aunt Sheila and mother and that poor little French girl--” + +“_What?_” + +“Yes!” said Elaine. “They’ve been looking for a chance to destroy her +ever since you danced with her. We’ve all been pretty beastly. _I’m_ +sorry. I don’t believe she ever stole--” + +“She--_stole_?” + +“That’s the tale--that she stole Aunt Sheila’s bracelet--the one you +gave her two years ago on her fifth anniversary.” + +“She?” cried Mandeville. His healthy face grew pale. His eyes narrowed. +“That’s a damned lie!” he said. + +Elaine was enchanted by this dramatic outburst. + +“You never heard such a row!” she continued, with unction. “You know +what mother and Aunt Sheila are when they get going. I feel sorry for +the poor girl.” + +“Where is she?” demanded Mandeville. + +“Oh, she’s gone!” said Elaine cheerfully. “But--oh, here’s Uncle Lucian! +Better and better! _Poor_ Uncle Lucian! He--” + +But Mandeville waited to hear no more. He ran up the stairs, to face his +sister, and to find out where Miss La Chêne had gone. + +At first he could find neither of his sisters, although he heard their +voices. He flung open door after door, and at last he discovered them in +the little room that had been Miss La Chêne’s. + +Sheila Robinson was very busy there. She was emptying out the bureau +drawers, ransacking the wardrobe, and unpacking a trunk. All over the +floor lay Miss La Chêne’s dainty belongings--filmy little garments, +shoes, bits of ribbon, a pathetic wreath of flowers from a hat. The +sight of these things--her things--trampled underfoot, was more than the +young man could endure. + +“What are you doing in here?” he shouted. + +“My bracelet is gone,” said his sister, “and I’m going to search that +girl’s room thoroughly.” + +“Clear out of here!” he ordered. “I won’t have it!” + +“_You_ won’t have it?” said she. “And pray--” + +“Look here!” said he. “Maybe you’ve forgotten the time you accused that +poor little chambermaid of stealing your ring, when it was in your purse +all the time; but I haven’t. I won’t have Miss La Chêne called--” + +“Lucian!” she cried, spying her husband in the doorway. “Don’t let +Mandeville insult me like this!” + +The unhappy Robinson essayed a smile. + +“I--I--I say, Mandy!” he stammered. “Sheila’s upset, you know, and--” + +“Get her out of here, Lucian!” cried Mandeville. + +“This is my house,” said Mrs. Milner, “and Sheila has a perfect right to +be here. That little French thing has robbed--” + +“Stop that!” shouted Mandeville. “Look here, Lucian, if you don’t get +them both out of here--” + +“Lucian, are you a man?” his wife demanded wildly. “Will you allow your +own wife to be insulted and ordered out--” + +Mandeville advanced toward his brother-in-law until he stood towering +above him. + +“If you don’t keep her quiet--” he said. + +“Lucian, protect me!” wailed Sheila. + +“I--I--I--” began Robinson. + +With one glance at him, Mandeville turned away. Only one glance--but it +might better have been a blow. + + +VII + +Elaine Milner was sitting on the veranda again, the next afternoon, all +ready with an astounding piece of news. A station taxi came up the +drive, and out stepped Mandeville Ryder. + +“Oh, Mandy!” she cried, when her attention was diverted by the arrival +of a second taxi, from which descended her Uncle Lucian. + +“For Heaven’s sake!” thought she. “Separate taxis--and they’re not even +speaking to each other!” + +Before she had recovered herself, both men had gone into the house. +Robinson went to his wife’s room, where she was not. Mandeville went to +Mrs. Milner’s boudoir, where she was. He knocked on the door. + +“Come in!” called his two sisters, and in he went. + +“Sheila!” he said. “Look here! I--I want you to send for Miss La Chêne +to come back--” + +“I dare say you do!” his sister interrupted. + +His face was flushed, and no man had ever a guiltier air. Young +Mandeville was not diplomatic, not adroit. So far in his life he had had +no occasion to be. He had existed in magnificent candor. + +“You made a big mistake,” he went on. “I knew it all the time. I knew +she--” + +“Perfectly obvious!” murmured Sheila. + +These words very greatly perturbed him. He didn’t know quite what his +sister meant, and he was alarmed; but he continued doggedly: + +“Because I found your confounded bracelet this morning--in your room at +the hotel, where you’d left it.” + +Mrs. Robinson and Mrs. Milner looked at each other. + +“Ah!” murmured Sheila. + +“And here it is,” said he. + +Mrs. Robinson took the velvet case that he held out to her, opened it, +and looked inside. + +“I see!” said she. “What a sweet, dear boy you are, Mandy! Isn’t he, +Nina?” + +“Perfectly pathetic!” said Mrs. Milner. + +“Well, why?” he demanded, horribly confused. + +No one answered him. + +“Well, look here!” he went on. “Now that you’ve got the thing, will you +send for her to come back? Or you can tell me where she lives, and I’ll +go and explain--” + +“Oh, I’m sure you would, Mandy!” said Sheila sweetly. + +“Well, what--” he began, growing angry now. + +There was another knock at the door, and in came Lucian Robinson. He +started at the sight of Mandeville. He wished never to see Mandeville +again. He couldn’t forget that look; and he couldn’t forget that if +Mandeville had known the truth, his contempt would have been beyond +measure greater. At the same time, he couldn’t help liking the +contemptuous young man, and admiring him, because he knew that nothing +in this world could ever induce Mandeville to do a base or cowardly +thing. + +“I--I--I--” he said, turning toward the door again. “L-later, my dear!” + +“Do come in, Lucian!” said his wife. “Mandeville was just speaking of +Miss La Chêne.” + +“Th-that’s queer!” cried Robinson, with very strained geniality. “Dashed +queer! Because I--” + +“Because you were just thinking about her?” his wife inquired +pleasantly. + +“N-no,” said he; “but--but--but--the thing is, I got thinking about that +b-bracelet, and--well!” From his pocket he pulled a velvet case. “H-here +it is!” he said. “I found it in your room at the--” + +He stopped, stricken with horror by the expression on his wife’s face. +She rose. She opened the door into Mrs. Milner’s bedroom. + +“Miss La Chêne!” she said. “Kindly come here! Perhaps _you_ can explain +this!” + +In came Miss La Chêne. Her face bore the marks of recent tears, but she +looked not at all abashed or humbled. On the contrary, she held her +little head mighty high. + +“You see,” Mrs. Robinson said to her, “both these gentlemen found my +bracelet in the room at the hotel. Doesn’t that seem rather strange?” +She turned toward her husband. “Because,” she went on, “I telephoned to +Miss La Chêne this morning, to tell her that I had found it myself, in +my bureau drawer.” + +Silence. + +“I wanted to apologize to Miss La Chêne,” Sheila continued. “I thought +she might be feeling badly about it. I didn’t know how _many_ people +there were to look after her and defend her. Mandeville and +Lucian--Mandeville I can understand, but why you should take it upon +yourself, Lucian, to shield this girl before you knew whether or not--” + +“Please!” Miss La Chêne interrupted anxiously. “It was a kind and +generous thing for Mr. Robinson to do for--” + +“You have the effrontery to take his part against me?” cried Mrs. +Robinson. “This--” + +“W-wait!” said Robinson. + +They all turned, startled by his tone. The harassed and wretched man had +spoken with a sternness no one had ever heard him employ before. The +spectacle of Miss La Chêne defending him was a little more than he could +bear. He had come to the end of his tether. Indeed, he had cut it, and +he stood free. His stammer had left him, and so had his nervous smile. + +“Be good enough to keep your disgusting suspicions to yourself,” he said +to his wife. “They only lower you in my eyes.” + +“You dare--” she began. + +“I’m sick and tired of being bullied and suspected and accused,” he went +on. “Of course I bought this bracelet. I did it partly to save a +defenseless girl, whom I knew to be innocent, from the outrageous +treatment I knew she’d get at your hands; but I did it chiefly because I +owed it to her. I was the last one to handle your accursed jewel case. I +took it from Miss La Chêne in the city. I met her there the day you +left. I had tea with her; and you can be proud or not of the fact that I +was afraid to tell you I had spoken to her.” + +The effect of this speech was tremendous. Every one in the room was +stricken into sinister silence. + +There stood Robinson, pale, but absolutely resolute, waiting for the +storm to break. It was going to be awful, but he didn’t care. He wasn’t +going to be badgered and bullied any more. Sheila was a fine woman. He +always had thought so, and he thought so now, but she-- + +“Lucian!” breathed Mrs. Milner, as if in awe. + +“Lucian!” cried Mrs. Robinson. + +And he saw that instead of being temporarily speechless with rage, she +was looking at him as she hadn’t looked for years and years--not since +that day, before they were married, when he had won the tennis singles, +and she had called him “my hero” in a very silly but somehow rather +touching way. + +“Oh, Lucian!” she cried again. + +His business training had taught him that nothing is more fatal than a +half triumph. He must go forward. + +“No!” said he. “Don’t talk to me. I won’t be talked to about this. Only +I want to offer my most sincere and humble apologies to Miss La Chêne--” + +“_Mon Dieu!_” cried Miss La Chêne, completely overcome. “_Ah, monsieur! +Que vous êtes gentil! Que vous êtes bon!_” + +“Please don’t cry!” said Robinson. + +“_Je n’y puis rien!_” sobbed she. + +He really couldn’t bear this, especially as, for all he knew, her words +might be an appeal to his better nature. He came nearer to her and +patted her shoulder. + +“There! There! There!” he said gently. + +And the poor little thing, worn out by the series of terrific scenes in +which she had been engaged, and by the misery and anxiety she had +endured, rested her head on Mr. Robinson’s shoulder and cried and cried. + +This was a sight which could not fail to impress Sheila Robinson deeply. + +“Lucian!” she said, beginning to cry herself, and speaking in an +imploring tone. “Please forgive me! Oh, please forgive me--and come over +here!” + +Robinson looked at his wife over Miss La Chêne’s shoulder. In his heart +he felt extremely sorry to see that regal creature brought low, but he +meant never to admit this. + +“The episode,” said he, “is ended. You have your bracelet--three of ’em +in fact; so we’ll say no more about it.” + +Then he looked at Mandeville. The young man was frowning heavily. He was +profoundly displeased, but he was no longer contemptuous. On the +contrary, he was envious. + +“Er--Miss La Chêne!” said he. + +She raised her head from Robinson’s shoulder, smiled uncertainly, and +walked off to a corner of the room, there to dry her eyes. Mandeville +followed her. + +“Look here!” said he to her, very low. “Robinson’s a fine fellow, and so +on, but he’s married!” + +“What of it?” said she coldly. “Do I do anything wrong?” + +“Oh, no!” Mandeville replied hastily. “Of course not. Only--look here! +Don’t--please don’t be--too French, you know!” + +They went out into the garden, and walked about there; and Mandeville +must have advanced some excellent arguments, because, before dinner was +announced, Miss La Chêne had promised not to be French at all any more, +but to become an American for the rest of her life. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +APRIL, 1925 +Vol. LXXXIV NUMBER 3 + + + + +The Good Little Pal + +HOW BARTY AND JACKO STARTED THEIR MARRIED LIFE UNDER ADVERSE +CIRCUMSTANCES + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +It was an afternoon very much like many other afternoons. Leadenhall +stood on the corner waiting for her. He was so weary, and still so much +absorbed in the work he had just left, he had waited for her so often, +and he was so sure of her coming, that he scarcely thought of her at +all. + +It was five o’clock of a fierce July day, and the sun still blazed +unabated in a cloudless sky. Before him, along Fifth Avenue, went an +unceasing stream of busses and motor cars. The noise, the heat, the +reek, the tireless movement, exasperated him. He wanted to go home for a +cold shower and a quiet smoke. He wanted to be let alone. + +Then he saw her, and there was nothing else in the world. She was coming +down a side street with that eager, beautiful gait of hers, so straight +and gallant, so self-possessed and debonair--and so touchingly slight +and young. He noticed for the first time, with an odd contraction of the +heart, how thin she had grown this summer. + +She had stopped at the corner. She smiled at him across the stream of +traffic, and a pang shot through him, because her dear face was so +tired. He raised his hat, but he could not smile in return. All the +other things--the minor things that had troubled him--were lost in his +great anxiety for Jacqueline. He dashed across the street, with the luck +of the foolhardy, and stood before her, looking at her in alarm. + +“Jacko!” he said. “Jacko! You’re tired!” + +“Well, I know it,” she answered, laughing. “So are you! Who isn’t, this +awful weather?” + +But she stopped laughing as their eyes met. They stood there, looking at +each other in silence for a long minute. Then the color rose in her +cheeks, and she turned her head aside. + +“Barty, don’t be silly,” she said. + +He did not answer. He took her arm to pilot her across the street again. +It seemed to him a terribly frail arm. He seized it tightly, in a sort +of panic. She meant to make a laughing protest against being hustled +along in this fashion, but somehow the light words would not come. A +glance at Barty’s face made her heart sink. + +“Oh, he is going to be silly!” she thought, in despair. “And I’m so +tired, and so hot, and so--unconvincing!” + +It had been decided between them that spring that they were to be simply +good pals--until a more propitious season. They were not even engaged. +No, they were both perfectly free. She had insisted that it should be +so, and so it was. She was free to worry about him and yearn over +him--even to cry over him night after night, if she liked. He was free, +too, to do as he chose; but when she looked at him now, at the close of +this weary day-- + +“You don’t take one bit of care of yourself!” she said suddenly, in an +angry, trembling voice. “I know perfectly well you’ve been smoking too +much, and I know you didn’t eat a proper lunch. Just look at you!” + +He was startled. + +“There’s nothing the matter with me, dear girl,” he said. “It’s only--” + +“I wish you could see yourself!” she cried. “You have a big black smudge +on your chin!” + +“Well, that’s not fatal,” he said, beginning to laugh; but then he saw +tears in her eyes. “Jacko! You’re nervous and upset. You’re overworked. +You’re tired. You’re--Jacko, you look like the devil!” + +“Thank you!” + +“I can’t stand it,” he went on doggedly, “and I won’t stand it! I want +to take care of you!” + +“You said you wouldn’t be silly, Barty!” + +“Silly!” said he. “I’ve been a fool! I won’t go on like this. If you +love me at all, if you care for me even a little, you won’t ask me to.” + +They had entered the park, and were walking down their usual path at +their usual brisk pace, only that to-day Barty held her by the arm, like +a captive, and their customary friendly conversation failed. The hour +she had dreaded had come. + +Barty was not easy to manage. Her ideal had been not to manage him, not +to use any feminine arts to beguile him, but to be frankly and +splendidly his comrade; but somehow that didn’t work. She could not +reason with Barty, she could not persuade him, she only could make him +do as she wished by the power she had over him. He loved her so much +that for love he would yield, and she did not want that. A true friend, +a good pal, would not stoop to managing. + +“Barty,” said she, “let’s sit down here and talk.” + +So he sat beside her on a bench and listened. All the time she spoke, +she saw--with dismay, and yet with a queer little thrill of +delight--that her words made absolutely no impression. Of course, she +spoke of Stafford, because Stafford was the dominant factor in their +problem. If Barty were to marry now, it would seriously offend Stafford, +and that would be the height of folly. + +A queer fellow, Stafford was--sensitive and touchy. He had done a great +deal for Barty, and he expected Barty to appreciate it. Certainly he +gave a great deal, but it had always seemed to Jacqueline that Stafford +got the best of the bargain. + +He was one of the foremost architects in the city. It was an honor for +the obscure young Barty to be singled out by such a man, to be taken +into his office, and, just recently, to be asked to share a studio +apartment with the great man; but in return he got all Barty’s honest +enthusiasm, his fidelity and gratitude. He had Barty’s companionship, +Barty’s sympathy for the many affronts this rough world offers to +sensitive men. + +Indeed, Jacqueline thought, he had a most unfair share of Barty’s life; +but Barty did not see that, and she was not going to mention it. Not for +any consideration on earth would she speak one word against Barty’s +hero. Not for any possible gain to herself would she tarnish his faith +in his friend, or injure his prospects for the future. She simply spoke +in a quiet, reasonable way of all that he owed Stafford. + +“And when it means so much,” she said, “to both of us--when it affects +your whole future--” + +“Well,” said Barty deliberately, “I dare say you’re right.” She glanced +up hopefully. “But I don’t care,” he went on. “I love you, and I won’t +go on like this any longer! I’ve tried, and I can’t--that’s all. I can’t +stand seeing you thin and miserable and shabby--” + +“I’m not shabby, Barty!” + +“You are--for _you_,” he said. “You ought to have everything in the +world! You’re so beautiful and wonderful! And you won’t let me do +anything for you. You won’t--” + +“I would let you,” she said hurriedly. “I’d let you--I’d love you to do +all sorts of things for me, Barty. I’d marry you to-morrow, if--” + +“If what?” he demanded. + +This idea had been so long in her mind, these words had been so often on +the tip of her tongue, that now she was going to speak them, whether he +liked it or not. + +“If you’d just get married--unostentatiously,” she said. + +“Unostentatiously?” he repeated. “I don’t know what you mean, Jacko.” + +“I mean, just go down to the City Hall and get married, and you go on +with your work, and I’ll go on with mine, and we won’t tell any one.” + +“Oh!” said he. “You mean secretly, do you?” + +He was looking at her with an expression she had never seen on his face +before. There was a hard, cold look in his gray eyes. + +“It’s no use talking about that,” he said curtly, “because I won’t do +it.” + +But he did. Later on, she remembered that hour with bitter regret and +remorse--the hour of her victory and his defeat. She had been unfair, +cruelly unfair. She had made use of those tears which he could not +endure. She had held out to him the prospect of gaining everything and +losing nothing, of having her and yet not alienating Stafford. + +He was ambitious, and she tempted him. She took advantage of his +hot-headed, unreasonable love for her, and she conquered him; and his +defeat was bad for her and worse for him. + +She meant only to do him good, to help him; but she was very young, and +she was a woman, and she had all a woman’s blind and beautiful and +absurd determination that her beloved should have his cake and eat it, +too. Barty needed her, and he should have her; and he needed Stafford, +and he should have Stafford too. Barty should have everything--except +his own way. + + +II + +Good pals don’t mind waiting. They understand how unimportant are tea +engagements compared with careers. They understand that often a man +simply can’t get away at a certain time. Even if he is too busy to +telephone, even if he forgets the engagement altogether, why, a good pal +accepts all that cheerfully. + +Still, Jacqueline did not think it necessary to be superfluously +cheerful. She was sitting at a table near the window of a down town tea +room, waiting for Barty to join her. + +The tea room closed at seven. It was now half past six, and she had been +sitting there since half past five. The brightness of the September day +had faded into twilight. The street outside, so crowded a little while +ago, was quiet now. One by one people were leaving the tea room, so that +she was surrounded by a widening area of empty tables. A group of +waitresses stood in a corner, talking together. There was a general air +of home-going; but she had no home. + +“It’s not Barty’s fault,” she said sturdily, to herself. “It was my own +idea.” + +She had made Barty do this. She had insisted upon this sort of marriage. +If it had turned out to be so much harder than she had foreseen, it was +her fault, not his. She was gallantly determined to carry on to the very +end, like a good pal. She did not want Barty to know how hard it was. +She was glad he did not know, and yet-- + +If he had not become resigned to the situation quite so readily! They +had been married seven weeks now, and his protests had ceased. He no +longer rebelled. All his thoughts were of the future. He was working +with a sort of dogged fury for that marvelous future, so that the +present seemed scarcely to exist for him. + +“It’s all for you, little pal,” he had often said to her. + +She knew he meant that, and she loved him for his ambition, his energy, +his determination. Presently he would come hurrying in, eager to tell +her exactly what he had been doing, absolutely confident that she would +understand, that she hadn’t minded waiting. He would talk about the fine +things that were going to happen--in five years’ time. He would talk +about large, impressive things. The little things--_her_ things--would +never be mentioned. + +For she could not hurt and trouble him by telling him how her back ached +and her head ached from typing all day, or how unreasonable, how +beastly, Miss Clarke had become, how lamentably the meals had +deteriorated in her little hotel under the new management, or how very +awkward it was to explain to sundry young men that she would never go +out with them, and wished to see them no more. + +“It would be like throwing rocks on a railway track,” she reflected, +smiling a little at the fancy. “It would derail poor Barty, just when +he’s flying along so splendidly, too!” + +A very nice young couple at the next table rose and went out, and +Jacqueline looked after them with a curious expression. She decided that +they were engaged, would soon be married, and would go to live in a new +little house somewhere, or even a flat--any place where lamps would be +lighted at this twilight hour. + +“Miss Miles!” exclaimed a delighted voice. Looking up, she saw Mr. +Terrill. “I just dropped in to buy some chocolates,” he explained, “and +I saw you!” + +He spoke as if it were the most amazing and delightful thing that could +have befallen him. Never before had Jacqueline seen Mr. Terrill except +in the presence of Miss Clarke, and she was surprised at the difference +in him. + +Miss Clarke, the authoress, somehow had a way of dwarfing all those +about her. She was so brilliant, so handsome, so humorous. Jacqueline +herself, secretary to this eminent woman, had always felt very young and +very uninteresting, and Mr. Terrill had seemed to her an agreeable but +rather insipid gentleman. + +He did not appear insipid now. He had, thought Jacqueline, a really +distinguished air. He was a tall, slight man of perhaps thirty-five, +with a sensitive, well bred face and a singularly pleasant voice. He was +looking down at her. + +“Miss Miles!” he said. “You look tired.” + +“I am tired,” replied Jacqueline. + +It was a relief to admit this, instead of pretending, like a good pal, +that she was not tired and never could be tired. + +“Can’t we have a cup of tea together?” he asked. + +“I’m waiting for some one,” she told him. + +“But can’t we have tea while you’re waiting?” said he. “The place will +close in fifteen minutes or so, you know.” + +A queer little anger arose in her. Barty would not like her to have tea +with Mr. Terrill. He was more than an hour late already, but he would +think nothing of that. He would explain casually that he had been too +busy to get away, and he would expect her to understand. Well, it was +her own fault--she had told him so many times that she did understand. + +“All right!” she said to herself. “There’s no reason why I shouldn’t +have tea with Mr. Terrill. It’ll do Barty good. Let him do a little of +the understanding, for a change!” + +But when the tea room had closed, and Barty had not come, she discovered +that it was Mr. Terrill, after all, who exasperated her, because he was +not Barty. It was her own Barty that she wanted, and no one else. The +idea of Mr. Terrill presuming, even unconsciously, to take Barty’s +place! + +She was humiliated, too, that Terrill should have seen her here, waiting +and waiting for some one who did not come. She was so tired, so +dispirited! + +Terrill was walking along the street beside her, in the direction of the +subway, and he was asking her to go down to Long Beach in his car on +Sunday. + +“Sorry,” said Jacqueline curtly, “but I can’t. I have an engagement.” + +“It would do you good,” said Terrill. “You look played out, Miss Miles. +A day at the seashore--” + +“I said I had an engagement,” Jacqueline interrupted pettishly. + +Terrill was neither discouraged nor offended, and his patience and +courtesy made her ashamed of herself; but, for some inexplicable reason, +being ashamed of herself caused her to behave still more outrageously +toward Terrill. She had never in her life been so disagreeable to any +one. + +The worst of it was that she found a wicked satisfaction in it, because +she saw that Terrill regarded her little outburst of pettishness as an +engaging feminine caprice. Apparently he did not care how trying she +was. He seemed to think she had a right to moods and humors. Evidently +he had no notion of her as a pal. + + +III + +As she ate her solitary dinner, Jacqueline reflected upon this episode. +Not a trace of wholesome contrition for her treatment of poor Mr. +Terrill remained. On the contrary, the whole thing filled her with +reprehensible contentment. Evidently Terrill admired her very much. She +felt that she ought to tell Barty about him. + +“And I’m afraid Barty won’t like it,” she thought. + +Rank hypocrisy! Afraid? She hoped with all her heart that he wouldn’t +like it. What if he should be really jealous and angry, and should +insist upon a public announcement of their marriage? What if she had to +give up her job and just be Barty’s wife? + +A sudden rush of tears filled her eyes. Not for anything on earth would +she hinder or worry Barty; but if he really insisted upon it-- + +He did not, however. Nothing, apparently, was farther from his thoughts. +Before she had finished her meal, a bell boy came in to tell her that +Mr. Leadenhall was waiting in the lounge, and she hurried in to him. She +had entirely forgiven him for breaking that tea engagement. In fact, she +was rather glad he had done so. + +There he stood, waiting for her, and the sight of him aroused in her a +tenderness that was half pain. Something she had once read in a book +came to her now. “A young falcon”--that was what Barty was like. He was +a strong, splendid, free creature whose heart would break if he were +fettered. + +“I’m not silly about him,” she thought. “I know he’s not so awfully +handsome.” + +But she thought there was something about Barty that marked him out +among all other men. His tie was crooked, his sandy hair was a little +ruffled, he might seem to others simply a passably good-looking young +fellow with a somewhat impatient and careless manner. His conversation +was practical enough for the most part. Indeed, his feet were solidly +planted on the earth; but Jacqueline had had a glimpse now and then of +his jealously guarded spirit, of his passion for beauty, of his love for +the mute harmonies of his great art. She loved all that was Barty--even +his faults; but his spirit she very nearly worshiped. + +When she had first met Barty, she herself had been ambitious. She had +wanted to write, to make a name for herself. She could laugh--or +weep--at that thought now. Ambition? She hadn’t known the meaning of the +word. For no imaginable reward could she have worked as Barty did. He +would work for days and days on a sketch or a plan, careless of rest or +food, in a fire of enthusiasm. Then, putting his enthusiasm aside, and +looking at it with his cool, impersonal brain, he would accept his work, +or he would reject and destroy it and begin all over again. + +Her own little ambition had flickered and died. It seemed to her a +sublime destiny to help Barty, to serve this rare talent which her +honest heart acknowledged as beyond measure superior to her own. + +Their hands met in a formal clasp, and they smiled at each other, with +their own secret smile of understanding. It was a wonderful thing to +meet thus in public, and to let nobody know that they belonged to each +other. + +“Old Jacko!” said he. + +“Old Barty!” said she. + +Looking into his steady gray eyes, all desire to tease him about Mr. +Terrill left her. All she wanted in the world was to help her man, at +any cost. + +“I’ve only got a few minutes,” he said. “I’ve got to go back and finish +that thing.” + +“The museum?” she asked, with a sinking heart, but with a bright +expression of interest. + +“No,” he answered, with a trace of impatience. “That can’t be hurried. +This is a bit of hack work--a plan for remodeling a house that ought to +be blotted out of existence.” + +“I hate you to do work like that, Barty!” + +“Oh, do you?” said he, smiling. “Well, I’ll tell you what it means, +Jacko. The fellow’s coming to look at the plans to-morrow, and if he +likes ’em--which he will--it means a week off for you and me.” + +“Oh, Barty! You don’t mean that we could go away together for a whole +week?” she cried. “Oh, Barty!” + +“Don’t, Jacko!” said he, turning away his head. “It--it makes me feel +like a brute. You know, I had meant you to have a honeymoon in Europe.” + +“As if I cared!” + +“Well, I care,” said he, with a sort of fierceness. “You deserve it. You +deserve--Jacko, you deserve more than I can ever give you in all my +life!” He met her eyes, which were bright with unshed tears. “No one +like you, Jacko!” he ended huskily. + + +IV + +She made up her mind not to count upon that week together. She felt sure +that something would happen to prevent it, that Miss Clarke wouldn’t let +her go, that Barty would be detained by some important work. + +Hers was the wildly unreasonable pessimism of a woman’s love. She +foresaw the direst misfortunes, and was almost resigned to them. She was +tired, too, after a long summer of hard work, and Miss Clarke was +increasingly disagreeable to her. She was worried about Barty, worried +about all sorts of absurd little things, so that she did not sleep well, +and could scarcely tolerate the meals in her hotel. A whole week away +somewhere with Barty? Impossible! + +But on Sunday morning he actually came. She went upstairs and got her +bag, which, with such wretched misgivings, she had packed the night +before. She got into the taxi with Barty. His bag was in there. They +really were going! + +“But where?” she asked, like a happy child. “Where are we going, Barty?” + +“Long Beach!” he said proudly. “You told me you liked it.” + +“I do!” she assured him earnestly. + +After all, what if they did happen to run across Mr. Terrill? + +“I’ve engaged a room,” he went on, “for Mr. and Mrs. Leadenhall. If we +see any one we know, all right. I’m pretty sick of this hole-and-corner +business, anyhow.” + +It was then that she noticed there was something wrong with +Barty--something very wrong. There was about him an air of grim +recklessness, almost of desperation. He was trying to be jolly, but he +achieved only a strained sort of hilarity utterly foreign to him, and +beyond measure distressing to Jacqueline. She watched him with growing +anxiety, pretending to believe in his pretense, but positively sick at +heart with apprehension. + +They went all the way down by taxi. + +“Hang the expense!” he said. “I’ve worked for it!” + +And she pretended to enjoy the trip. She was even jollier than Barty. +She spurred on her anxious heart to a hectic gayety. She talked and +laughed, always with her eyes on Barty’s face. + +He had engaged not a room, but a suite of parlor, bedroom, and bath. +Mentally she computed the cost of this, and was appalled; but even then +she said nothing. If this was what Barty wanted, very well, she was glad +he had it. If it gave him any joy to waste what he had worked so hard to +get, very well, she would not spoil his week by a single remonstrance. + +He was walking up and down the parlor, with his hands in his pockets, +and Jacqueline was in the bedroom, unpacking her bag. She had said all +the things she could think of in praise of the suite. While she tried to +think of some more praise, a blank little silence had fallen. + +“Jacko,” he said, “you--you really do like this, don’t you? You really +will be happy here, won’t you--for this week?” + +He spoke like a doomed man, as if this week was to be their last. He +didn’t even try to smile. Jacqueline could not bear it. + +“Barty,” she said, “aren’t you well?” + +“Well?” he repeated, in surprise. “Of course I’m well! I’m always well!” + +She hesitated for a moment. Then she got up and went into the parlor, +barring his path, so that he had to stop short in his pacing; and she +asked him the question that had been in the back of her mind all the +time. + +“Didn’t Mr. Stafford like your going away, Barty?” + +“Who cares?” said he. + +She hadn’t much doubt now. + +“I’d like to know, though, Barty,” she said quietly. “I’d rather know.” + +“I can’t see that it makes any difference what Stafford says or thinks. +After all--” + +“I want to know, Barty!” + +It seemed to her that this was the first time she had really felt like +Barty’s wife, with a wife’s dignity, a wife’s right to know what +concerned her husband. She saw that he felt this, too, for his +high-handed air was conspicuously absent. + +“Well,” he said, “if you must know, he made the devil of a row.” + +“Oh, Barty! But how unkind and unreasonable of him!” + +“Well, you see,” said Barty reluctantly, “he’s sick, and--” + +“Sick?” + +“Some trouble with his eyes. Can’t use them for a week or so. He wanted +me to put off going away.” + +“Oh, why didn’t you? Why didn’t you?” + +“Because I didn’t want to. I had told you we’d have this week together.” + +“I’d have understood, Barty!” + +“I know it; but, don’t you see, Jacko, you’re my wife, and you come +first.” + +She began to cry foolish tears of tenderness and pride. + +“That was very rash and imprudent,” she began. + +“I’m not prudent where you’re concerned,” said Barty, “and I’m sick of +trying to be. If it hadn’t been that I had promised you not to tell any +one, I’d have told Stafford then that I was going away with my wife.” + +“What did you tell him, Barty?” + +“Nothing.” + +“You must have said something!” + +“I told him I had made arrangements for a week’s holiday with a friend +of mine, and I couldn’t put it off.” + +Her moment of pride and delight was over now. She realized what had +happened. For her sake he had left the friend to whom he owed so much at +the time when that friend most needed him. It was the supreme proof of +his love for her, but it was a proof which she must not and could not +accept. + +She gently pushed Barty into a chair. Then she sat on the arm of it and +drew his head down against her heart; and with all the wisdom, all the +ingenuity, all the art born of her love, she talked to him, argued, +pleaded, warned, cajoled. There was dismay in her heart, but she was +unwaveringly resolute, and she vanquished him. + +Once more she took ruthless advantage of his masculine instinct to yield +to the beloved woman whatever she asked. For the second time she +safeguarded him to her own cost. Their love must be a help to him, not a +handicap. She was not a weak, silly creature to be indulged and +protected. She was his friend, his pal. She understood. + +“I’ll stay here by myself,” she said, “and it’ll be a splendid rest for +me. Of course, I’ll miss you, Barty, but we’ll write to each other +every day; and it won’t be very long before we shall be together all the +time.” + +She managed to say this without a tremor, and even with a smile; but +Barty could not respond. Almost unconsciously, she had used two terribly +potent arguments. She had evoked the sacred name of honor, telling him +that he was in honor bound not to desert Stafford; and she had warned +him that, in hazarding his future prospects, he was endangering her +happiness as well as his own. With these weapons she had defeated him. + +They went down into the dining room for lunch, and it was dust and ashes +to them. They sat facing each other across a small table. Their eyes +met, they tried to speak, but what was there to say? + +This was not an episode. It had the air of a final tragedy. Their week, +their one beautiful week, was lost! And they were so young, so honestly +and utterly in love! That day, neither of them believed that happiness +would ever come again. + +As they were leaving the dining room, a man rose from one of the tables +and bowed to Jacqueline. + +“Who’s that?” asked Barty. + +“Oh, I met him at Miss Clarke’s,” said Jacqueline. + +At that moment Mr. Terrill was not of sufficient importance to have a +name. He was less than nothing. + +They went up to their suite again, and Barty put into his bag the few +things he had unpacked so short a time before. Jacqueline helped him. +She brushed his hair with his military brushes, she straightened his +tie. She kissed him and sent him off with a smile. + +“Oh, Barty! Oh, Barty!” she cried, after he had gone. + + +V + +“Stopping here?” cried a delighted voice. + +Odd, how people keep on existing, completely unaware how superfluous +they are! Jacqueline turned from her contemplation of the moonlit sea to +the vastly inferior spectacle of Mr. Terrill, and answered him as +civilly as she could just then. + +“Yes,” she said, “for a rest.” + +“Not a very quiet place for a rest,” remarked Terrill. + +“I don’t like quiet places,” Jacqueline replied impatiently. + +He was charmed with this. The more unreasonable she was, the more he +liked her. + +“I enjoy a place like this,” he went on; “but not for a rest. What +appeals to me is the stimulation one finds in a motley crowd like this.” + +“Bah!” said Jacqueline, under her breath. + +If he would only go away and leave her alone! His voice and his presence +were an intolerable exasperation to her. She wanted Barty--and, failing +Barty, she wanted to think of him undisturbed; but Mr. Terrill continued +to exist, unabashed. + +“It’s a curious thing,” he continued, “the transformation that certain +qualities of light can effect. Of course, it’s been pretty thoroughly +studied in the theater; but to the average mortal--well, moonlight, for +instance. I’ve seen your face in lamplight and in the sunlight, but now, +in the light of the moon--” + +“It makes every one look ghastly, doesn’t it?” Jacqueline interrupted +hastily. “I hate it!” + +“Hate moonlight, Miss Miles?” said he, mildly reproachful. + +“Yes!” she answered stoutly. “I’m not one of those sentimental idiots!” + +He seemed to grasp her meaning, for he asked, in quite a different tone, +cheerful and matter-of-fact, if he might come down to visit her while +she was stopping here. + +“Oh, but--” said Jacqueline, dismayed. “You see, Mr. Terrill, I--” + +He waited patiently for the reason why he must not come to see Miss +Miles, and she tried hard to think of one. + +“Well,” she said lamely, “you probably wouldn’t find me at the hotel. +I--I take long walks, and I shouldn’t like you to come all that way from +the city, you know, and not find me.” + +“I’d take a longer trip than that, any day,” said Terrill, “just on the +chance of seeing you!” + +She had to let that pass. There was no way of explaining to him; but she +made up her mind that he should not find her in, whenever he might come. + +The next morning she had a letter from Barty. He wrote: + + You should have seen Stafford when I got back. There he was, + sitting in the dark. I told him I’d thought better of it--took all + the credit for your idea, little Jacko, but what else could I do? + + I see now that you were right. It was so hard to leave you that I + couldn’t see it then. All the way back on the train I was thinking + things about you that you wouldn’t have liked. I thought you were a + cold-blooded little beast to send me away like that; but after I’d + seen poor old Stafford, I saw how right you were. You know, Jacko, + I’d have given up Stafford, or anything else on earth, for that + week with you, but you wouldn’t let me make a fool of myself. I’ve + got it in me, you know, Jacko. I could make the most exalted, + glorious sort of fool of myself, and I’d enjoy it; but you’ll + always be my sensible little pal. + +Jacqueline put down the letter and sat for a time staring before her, +with a very odd expression on her face. Then she took it up and finished +it. + + Address letters in care of Jordan Galloway, Philipsville, Long + Island. That is the nearest village, and I’ll go there for the mail + whenever I get a chance; but don’t worry if you don’t hear from me + every day, dear girl, because sometimes I may not be able to get + into the village. + +And then many affectionate messages, and a check, “so that you can stay +where you are for another week.” + +This check was the first money Barty had ever given her. He had paid for +things--dinners, taxis, and so on--and he had bought her presents, but +this was different. If she was his friend, his pal, why should she let +him do this? + +He warned her in his letter not to swim out too far. They had often +bathed together. She was a good swimmer, strong and sound of wind, and +she knew Barty was proud of her; but she could not swim as well as he. +He could always have outdistanced her easily, if he had wished, but the +idea of competition had never occurred to them. They were pals, friends, +equals; but in almost everything he was stronger and more skillful. + +He earned four times as much as she, and he was going forward while she +stood still. When they went walking, she always tired first. Whatever +they undertook, he did better than she, and it seemed to them both so +much a matter of course that she had never thought of it before. + +She looked about her, at those rooms, so terribly empty without Barty. +She had made him go. She had sent away her man, telling him that she +could do without him; but could she? He would do very well with +Stafford. He would enjoy himself, no doubt, but how was it with her, +left alone here, and sick at heart, longing and longing for Barty? + +Suppose she had done wrong not to let him be a “glorious fool”? Suppose +it was all a mistake to try to be a pal? + + +VI + +Mr. Terrill did find her. He came across the beach to her, his thin, +sensitive face bright with pleasure, and stood before her, hat in hand, +looking down at her. + +She was not sorry to see him. She had had no letter from Barty for three +days. She had written to him every day--jolly, friendly little letters; +and not a word from him! Three days! + +“I went into the hotel and asked for you, Miss Miles,” said Terrill, +“but they would have it that there was no Miss Miles stopping there.” + +“How stupid!” murmured Jacqueline, with a smile; but at heart she was +ashamed and distressed. “He ought to know,” she thought. “It’s not +fair!” + +But if he knew, what would he think of Barty? + +“I came down in my car,” Terrill went on. “I thought perhaps you’d let +me take you for a ride.” + +“He’s got to know!” she thought. “Poor thing! At least I can give him +some sort of hint.” + +But he gave her no opportunity. He said nothing that could be seized +upon as an excuse for mentioning that there was a Barty in the offing. +It was his way of looking at her, the tone of his voice--intangible +things which, of course, he meant her to notice. He very well knew that +she did notice them, too. + +It was a distressing situation, yet not without zest; for she was young +and pretty, and when Mr. Terrill looked at her she felt ten times +younger and prettier than when she sat on the sands alone and lonely. +She tried not to like this, but she could not help it. + +“We could run along the Motor Parkway,” he was saying, “turn off at +Philipsville, and go--” + +“Philipsville?” + +“Yes. Do you know that route, Miss Miles?” + +“No, Mr. Terrill,” said she. + +He went on to describe the beauties of the trip he proposed. He need not +have troubled. Any road that passed through Philipsville was of peculiar +interest to Miss Miles. She accepted the invitation very graciously, and +off they went. + +It was a bright, cool morning, early in September, still summer, with +summer’s green beauty all about; yet in the air there was an indefinable +hint that the end was coming. There was an invitation to haste, even to +recklessness--to live in joy while the roads were still open, before the +iron frost came. + +Never had Mr. Terrill seen Miss Miles so charming. To be sure, she +responded with frank mockery to his sentimental glances, but he could +forgive that, because her mockery was so gay and so kindly. Indeed, he +liked everything she said and everything she did. She was willful, +lively, imperious, and he submitted gallantly to her least caprice. This +went to Jacqueline’s head a little; she found it only too agreeable to +be imperious. + +She made him stop the car while she gathered goldenrod and purple +asters. She made him halt at the top of a hill and sit there for a long +time in silence, while she admired the view. His patience and meekness +encouraged her to further boldness. She insisted upon getting out of the +car in Philipsville, pretending that she found that very dull and +commonplace little village “quaint.” + +With the obliging Mr. Terrill she strolled down the drowsy, tree-shaded +Main Street until she found what she was looking for--a sign reading +“Jordan Galloway, groceries and hardware.” Mr. Galloway’s store she also +acclaimed as “quaint.” She went in, and bought some wizened little +apples by way of excuse for lingering; and, behind the corner of a +calendar hanging on the wall, she saw a little sheaf of letters +addressed to Barty in her own handwriting. Then he hadn’t troubled to +come and get her letters! + +She was glad that the store was so dim and shadowy, for she could not +keep back the tears. Terrill was talking affably with the proprietor, +and nobody was looking at her just then. She could struggle valiantly +against her pain and bitterness, and could master them. + +She had turned toward Terrill, outwardly quite cool and self-possessed +again, and was about to suggest their going on, when a man came in--a +man so incongruous in Philipsville that she at once suspected his +identity. He was a tall, lean man, fastidiously dressed in a theatrical +sort of camper’s outfit--a gray flannel shirt, tweed knickerbockers, and +high boots, all fatally belied by his neat Vandyke beard, his delicate +hands, his toploftical air. What was more, he was smoking a cigarette in +a long ivory holder. It was scarcely necessary for Galloway to address +him as “Mr. Stafford.” She had felt sure enough of that already. + +“Er--we want potatoes, Galloway,” he said; “and--er--bread and bacon and +coffee, and so on.” + +He went over to the calendar, took down the letters, and put them into +his pocket. Then he saw Jacqueline. His hand went involuntarily to his +hat, but he was wearing none, so he bowed gravely instead. + +“Er--Galloway!” he said. “I’m in no hurry. Attend to the lady first.” + +“Thank you,” said Jacqueline, “but I’ve finished. I was only going to +ask if any one here would be kind enough to tell me where the old Veagh +house is. I wanted to see that doorway.” + +“No! Really?” cried Stafford. “Upon my word, that’s very interesting! +You’ll pardon me, but do you mind telling me where you heard of that +doorway?” + +“I read about it,” said Jacqueline simply, “in a book by Luther +Stafford, ‘Vistas of Enchantment.’” + +“No!” he cried, his dark face all alight. “Please allow me to introduce +myself--Luther Stafford, the writer of that little book.” + +So it came about that Mr. Terrill and Mr. Stafford were presented to +each other. When the enthusiastic Stafford suggested it, Terrill drove +them all in the car to see the doorway of the old Veagh house; but he +was singularly lukewarm about that architectural relic, and he did not +even pretend to share in Miss Miles’s hitherto unsuspected passion for +old doorways. + +No--he simply drove the car, and Miss Miles and Stafford sat on the back +seat. He heard them talking. Miss Miles was not imperious now. She was +so sweet, so gentle, so serious, so humbly anxious to be instructed. She +seemed to possess such a surprising acquaintance with architectural +terms! + +And all the time Jacqueline was praying in her heart: + +“Oh, let me make him like me! Oh, please, let me make him like me!” + +If she could only win Stafford’s unqualified approval, think what it +might mean to Barty and herself! She had never wanted anything so much +in her life before. + +Barty had often told her that Stafford was the most thoroughly likable +fellow he had ever met; but, hearing of the famous architect’s +high-strung nerves, his squeamishness, his minor affectations, she had +privately doubted the soundness of this estimate. Now she understood, +however. His fine enthusiasm for his art, his eagerness to share it, his +spontaneous courtesy, and, above all, something generous and frank and +indisputably great that was obvious in all that he said and did, won her +immediate respect and liking. And, oh, how she wanted him to like her! + +As they drove away from the abandoned farmhouse, it occurred to Stafford +that the sun was going down the sky. + +“By George!” he cried, alarmed. “I _am_ an idiot! It ’ll be dark now, +and I have all that stuff to carry back! The young chap who’s with me is +laid up--” + +“Laid up?” cried Jacqueline. + +“Yes, or he’d have come with me; but now--” + +“What’s the matter with him?” Jacqueline demanded fiercely. + +Her tone made Stafford turn toward her, and Terrill threw a startled +glance over his shoulder. + +“Why, it’s nothing much,” replied Stafford, puzzled. “He caught his foot +in an old trap that was buried under some leaves.” + +“Is it serious?” + +“No, it isn’t--not if it’s properly looked after.” + +“What are you doing for it?” + +He looked at her with a faint frown, and her eyes met his steadily. + +“I want to know,” she said bluntly, “because I’m Barty Leadenhall’s +wife.” + +There was a long silence. The sun had vanished now, and the dusty road +before them was somber under the deepening shadow of the trees. The sky +was pallid, the world was without light or color, and a terrible +oppression had suddenly descended upon Jacqueline. + +She no longer saw this episode as a gay little comedy. It was very close +to tragedy. Her high spirits of the afternoon seemed to her now only +heartless flippancy, tarnishing the dignity of her wifehood. + +“Then you’re the friend he went away with?” asked Stafford. + +“Yes,” she answered. + +“And--did you send him back to me?” + +Her face flushed. + +“He didn’t need sending,” she said. “He wanted to go. He--” + +“I see!” said Stafford, and again he was silent for a long time. “I +think you’d better come back with me,” he said at last. + +“But--you mean--now?” cried Jacqueline. “I don’t see how--” + +Terrill turned his head, only for an instant, just long enough for her +to see on his face a smile she never forgot. + +“I would if I were you, Mrs. Leadenhall,” he said. “Set your mind at +rest about--your husband.” + +There was nothing in his voice but honest, chivalrous kindness. He did +not resent her trickery, he did not despise her. He was only kind--so +kind that in the dusk she wept a little to herself. + + +VII + +They set off together across the fields. Stafford was burdened with a +tremendous sack, which he did not know how to carry properly. Jacqueline +could have given him good advice, for she had had five years’ experience +of girls’ camps; but she tactfully refrained. + +Whenever they came to an unusually rough bit of the trail, Stafford took +her arm, to render her assistance, which she did not in the least +require; but she accepted it with polite gratitude. There was absolutely +nothing of the pal in Stafford. He would only have thought the less of +her for knowing how to carry heavy sacks, and for being able to look out +for herself. + +A canoe was waiting for them at the head of a lake. As a matter of +course Jacqueline took up the second paddle, but Stafford earnestly +entreated her to put it down. He paddled in a very amateurish fashion, +and she could have done much better; but she held her tongue, and +listened to Stafford while he reassured her about Barty. + +Barty’s foot had not been badly injured in the first place, and it was +now almost healed. + +“He’s walking about,” said Stafford. “He could just as well have come +to-day, but I thought I’d like to try it alone.” + +The shores of the lake, where trees and bushes grew, were densely black, +but in the center of the lake there was a dim reflection of the +moonlight, though the moon itself was not yet visible. It was very +still. The woods were all alive with bird, beast, and insect, and the +water beneath the canoe was teeming with life, but no sound reached +their human ears but the dip of the paddle. Stafford’s voice broke the +stillness. + +“There used to be Indians here,” he said. + +A singularly inept remark for a man of his intelligence, yet in +Jacqueline’s mind it conjured up the most vivid images. She turned her +eyes toward the dark woods. + +The naked, copper-colored figures which had passed by there, silent as +the beasts themselves, the other canoes which had sped through these +waters; and after them their enemy, the paleface--an enemy inferior in +strength and endurance, ignorant of the forest ways, utterly alien here, +and yet, because of the invincible spirit in him, always conquering. +Indian and pioneer, warriors, hunters, killers--and behind them the +faithful, patient shadow of the burden bearer, the woman. Squaw woman +and white woman, carrying babies in their arms or on their backs, their +own God-given burdens; and always with other burdens, too--the homely +implements of daily life laid upon the shoulders of women, so that the +hands of the men might be free for their weapons. + +It had to be so. Only by the strong arm of her man could the woman and +her child live; but all that was over and done with. Where civilization +was established, woman was the friend and equal of man. + +Jacqueline moved a little, uneasy and resentful at the thoughts that +came to her. Those half legendary loves that were the glory of the +civilized world, those names which had, after hundreds of years, still +the power to stir the heart--_Romeo_ and _Juliet_, Hero and Leander, +_Paul_ and _Virginia_--magic names of imperishable glamour and beauty! +All good pals, weren’t they? All the women for whom men had ventured +sublime and terrible things, the women who had inspired the heroic +undertakings of history and romance, the women for whom men had gladly +died--all good pals, weren’t they? + +A pal? The nearest approach to a pal was the Indian squaw. She had +shared her man’s life, she had been his indispensable helper, and the +humble, unconsidered bearer of his burdens. The whole idea was a turning +back, a renunciation of something lofty and beautiful for something +commonplace and inferior. Barty had wanted to be a lover, and she made +him a comrade. He had asked for bread, and she had given him a stone. He +had longed for the high romance and glory of life, and she had said they +couldn’t afford it. She had tried to keep his money in his pockets for +him. She had kept his spirit pinned to the earth. + + +VIII + +The sack had bumped poor Stafford black and blue. With a weary sigh he +flung it across the other shoulder--and whack, those stony potatoes +caught him on the left leg. But he was nearly there now. That silly, +adorable girl must have had plenty of time to make her explanation to +Barty. Stafford had sent her on ahead from the landing stage with an +electric flash light. It was only a short half mile over a good trail, +and he was only a little way behind her, never out of hearing of a call. +He thought that she ought to see Barty alone. They must arrange their +own affairs in their own pathetic, blundering way. + +Whack! This time just behind the knee. Stafford flung the sack on the +ground and began to drag it after him. Let happen what might, he had the +tobacco safely in his pocket. If further meals depended upon carrying +that accursed sack any more, then he preferred never to eat again. + +Ah! He saw the flare of the camp fire now. + +“Hallo-o-o, Barty!” he shouted. + +“Halloo-o-o, Stafford!” Barty responded cheerfully. “What’s been keeping +you so late? I was beginning to get a bit uneasy.” + +Stafford made no answer, but came on at a very much quickened pace, +dragging the sack behind him over the rough ground. + +“Leadenhall!” he said. He stood still, looking anxiously about him. The +flickering light of the fire illumined a small cleared space in the dark +woodland, and there was no one there but Barty. “Didn’t some one else +come?” he demanded sharply. + +“Some one else?” said Barty, with a laugh. “Expecting callers?” + +Then Stafford told him. + +At first it seemed to Barty preposterous, and even a little annoying, +that the alert and self-reliant Jacko should have got herself lost in +this fashion. The trail up from the landing was perfectly clear and easy +to follow, and Stafford had given her his flash light. + +Barty went all the way down to the lake again, calling her name. Then, +as he stood on the shore of the black water, the note in his voice +changed. A fitful wind had sprung up, driving clouds across the face of +the moon. The trees stirred and sighed. No matter what feminine folly +had induced her to leave the trail, she _had_ left it. She was gone, +beyond reach of his voice. Which way? + +He remembered Stafford’s words--hard words for a young man of his temper +to swallow. + +“You accepted the responsibility for her life and her happiness,” +Stafford had said; “and you left her--a young, lovely thing like that. I +think you failed her pretty badly, Leadenhall!” + +It was Barty’s way to hold his tongue, and he had held his tongue then, +but he had thought. + +“I tried to please her and I tried to please you,” was what he thought; +“and I’m hanged if either of you know what you want. All right--_I_ do!” + +So he had set off in a grim and dogged humor. Of course, he was +glad--very glad--that Stafford had found Jacko so charming. Of course he +did not object to her going about with that fellow named +Terrill--certainly not! He trusted Jacko absolutely, and he was glad she +had been able to amuse herself a little; only it was a queer sort of +gladness. Of course, he wanted to be fair to his little pal. + +“Jacko!” he shouted. + +His lusty voice died away across the lake, and nothing answered. The +canoe was still there, so she couldn’t have gone back. She must have +turned off the trail into the woods. It was not a cold night; and there +was nothing there that could hurt her. Barty said that over and over +again to himself as he turned back--not along the trail, but through the +whispering wood. + +His flash light threw a valiant little pathway through the surrounding +darkness. He stopped every now and then to call her. He limped +painfully, and because of his injured foot he had on soft moccasins, not +good for going over stones and broken branches; but he could have gone +barefoot over red-hot plowshares then, and scarcely known it. + +What, nothing here to hurt her--little Jacko, alone in the black shadow +of the whispering trees--in the forest, where the old enemies, the +nameless and formless things, never wholly forgotten by the most +civilized heart, still lurked? He saw the wood not with his own eyes, +but with Jacko’s. Little Jacko, with her eager, beautiful gait, her +gallant little head held so high, and her pitiful youth and slightness! + +“Jacko!” he shouted in anguish. “Jacko!” + +He was in a panic now, trying to run, stumbling and falling, whirling +the flash light in a wide circle, shouting until his voice was hoarse +and strange. There was no fear, however baseless, that he did not feel +for her now, no disaster that he did not foresee. + +And at last he heard her. Her voice answered his. + +“Here, Barty!” she called faintly. + +He found her sunk on the ground in a heap, under a tree, white and limp. + +“I got lost, Barty,” she said, with a sob. “I’m--sorry!” + +He caught her up in his arms and held her strained against his heart. +The flash light had fallen to the ground, and he could not see her face. + +“Are you hurt?” he cried. “Jacko, are you hurt?” + +She flung her arms round his neck and drew down his head. He felt tears +on her cheeks. He was filled with a sublime and almost intolerable +tenderness for this beloved creature, clinging to him. He had no words. +He could only hold her close in his arms and kiss her cold face again +and again. + +“Barty!” she said. “Your foot! Let me down!” + +But he would not. He carried her back to the camp, and he did not +stumble or falter once. White and haggard with exhaustion, he came +staggering into the friendly firelight with Jacko in his arms, her face +hidden on his shoulder, her dark hair hanging loose over his arm. + +When he set her down, and she looked at him, she did not regret his +pain, his weariness, or the fear he had felt for her. On his face there +was a look that she would never forget--an exultation, a sort of +splendor that stirred her beyond all measure. This was his hour, the +hour that was due him, his hour of supreme effort and glorious victory. + +He could not quite suppress a groan as he turned aside, for his foot +throbbed horribly; but she knew that he was glad to endure it for her, +that it was his right and his pride so to endure for the woman he loved. +For the sake of his love she had done this for him. She had strayed away +so that he might find her anew, so that they might start all over again, +with the past effaced and the future all before them. + +Barty came limping toward her with a plate of unduly solid flapjacks +that he himself had cooked. He was followed by Stafford with a cup of +ferociously strong coffee. Both of them were so anxious, so concerned, +so busy doing clumsily what Jacqueline could have done so easily +herself. What she longed to do was to throw her arms about Barty’s neck, +to tell him that she did not want him to wait on her and serve her, but +to let her help him and share everything, good or bad, with him. + +But she stifled that longing. As he stood before her, she looked up into +his face with a smile--a strange and beautiful smile which he did not +quite understand. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +MAY, 1925 +Vol. LXXXIV NUMBER 4 + + + + +Flowers for Miss Riordan + +A CAVALIER’S FLORAL TRIBUTE WHICH HELPED ITS RECIPIENT TO ACHIEVE THE +FREEDOM OF HER SOUL + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +The gates were opened, and the crowd went shuffling and pushing out of +the dim ferry house. Fleet and glittering motor cars shot by, and after +them came thundering trucks, and great dray horses with earth-shaking +tramp--the whole world going by on parade, until it seemed that only an +enchanted ship could hold all of it. Then bells clanged and winches +rattled, the gates shut before Miss Riordan’s nose, and off went the +boat, with the world aboard, leaving in its wake a strip of foaming +water that after a while grew tranquil and a lucent green. + +Miss Riordan turned back and began to saunter up and down the ferry +house. She wore an annoyed expression. She was a cruel lady, frowning +upon the tardiness of her cavalier, who was doubtless rushing to her +from somewhere, breathless and humbly apologetic. + +“I am here,” she said in effect, “and I may as well wait, but it shall +never happen again--never!” + +Two boats gone! That meant forty minutes. + +“Well, of course, I came too early,” she reflected. “That makes it seem +longer; but I just won’t wait after the next one.” + +She knew she would, though. He knew it, too--knew he would find her +there. He would come when it suited him, and there she would be, waiting +for him. + +“He makes me sick!” she said to herself, with a sudden rush of tears. +“Who does he think he is, anyway? I bet, if everything was known--” + +But she hoped the time would never come when everything was known, even +if it should effect the well deserved humiliation of Mr. Louis Pirini. + +On the Day of Judgment there would be an angel with an immense book. He +would ask you questions, and write down your answers in letters of fire; +but he would know the right answers beforehand, or have them on file +somewhere, so you’d have to be careful what you said. It was a comfort +to think, though, that if that time came, you would be purely a soul, +without bodily contours, and certainly without age. Miss Riordan was not +very clear in mind about her sins, but she knew well enough which were +the things that filled her with the greatest shame and guilt--her age +and her physical luxuriance. + +“Well, anyhow, I don’t look it!” she said forlornly to herself. “He +don’t really know. He just tries to tease me--but I don’t care!” + +The energy she was obliged to expend in not caring for the humorous +remarks of Mr. Louis Pirini was, however, a considerable drain upon her +nervous system. Usually she was able to laugh when he did; but sometimes +he was too mean, and then she cried--a weakness she dreaded beyond +measure. Always, whether she laughed or cried, when he was with her and +when he was absent, she was filled with a passionate resentment against +him. + +Her grievances had grown monstrous; her heart was bursting with them. +Sometimes, when she lay awake at night, she thought that the only good +thing in the world would be to “get even” with him. + +But Mr. Pirini was safe as an immortal god from her vengeance. There was +no conceivable way in which she could hurt him. She couldn’t retaliate +by making unpleasant remarks about his personal appearance, because they +both knew that he was superb. She could not shame him by reminding him +of all she had done for him--she had tried that once. She couldn’t even +tell any one of her own generosity and his vile ingratitude. On the +contrary, she felt obliged to lie quite wildly. When she bought anything +new, she pretended that Louis had given it to her. When they went out +together, she pretended that it was his treat. + +“And he just stands there grinning!” she thought. “All I’ve done for +him, and look how he acts! Look at last Sunday, down to Coney, when we +met Sadie. She’s seen me and Louis going together nearly a year. It was +perfectly natural for her to say was him and me going to get married; +and what did he up and say, after all I’ve done for him? ‘Sure we are,’ +he says, ‘when hell freezes over!’ I’d just like to have told Sadie a +thing or two about him!” + +Unattainable consolation! She couldn’t ever tell any one, for nobody +would understand. She did not even care to bring the matter to the +attention of God prematurely, for she feared He would not consider all +the evidence, but would give a judgment based upon one or two salient +facts; and the facts were somehow so insignificant, compared with her +feelings. + +Twelve minutes, now, before the next boat. A sort of panic seized her. +He mustn’t come and discover her walking up and down like this, as if +she were impatient, as if she were eagerly waiting for him. No--she +would be found reading something with profound interest, unconscious of +the passing of time, of the waste of this Saturday afternoon, so +precious to her after a week’s work in the factory. + +She sauntered up to the news stand and fluttered over the pages of a +magazine. She thought it was “high-class,” and yet it was full of +pictures. She paid for it, and sat down on a bench. + +“Well, I read a lot of good things in school,” she reflected, always on +the defensive. “‘Hiawatha,’ and all that. I was real good in English.” + +She turned to an article on Turkey, a country which she thought immoral +and interesting, but it was difficult to divert her attention from her +feet. Funny, the way they hurt more when you were sitting down than when +you were walking! + +“Maybe I might have took a half a size longer,” she reflected. “Well, +anyways! This shiny paper kind of hurts my eyes. It’s an awful foolish +thing to wear glasses--makes you look so much older; only they do say it +gives you wrinkles to squint.” + +Wistfully she looked at the photograph of a group of Turkish beauties. +Certainly they were all stout, but somehow it was a different sort of +stoutness; and their eyes, their languorous, ardent eyes. + +“Yes, but I bet if everything was known--” thought Miss Riordan. + +Just then she became aware that some one was looking at her--some one +who had sat down beside her. She began to assume various expressions of +interest in her magazine. She frowned, as if absorbed. She raised her +eyebrows, amazed. She smiled and shook her head, incredulous. Then, as +she turned the page, she cast a furtive sidelong glance, to see who it +was. + +It was a little old man with a woeful face. His wrinkled brow, his +hanging jowls, and his sad, dim old eyes gave him rather the look of a +superannuated hound. Perhaps he was pathetic, but not to Miss Riordan. +She was very angry. She stared at him in haughty surprise, and turned +back to her magazine; but she could still feel his eyes fixed upon her. + +“The nerve of the man!” she thought indignantly. + +Presently he moved a little nearer and cleared his throat, as if about +to speak. This time she gave him a look calculated to destroy; but, just +the same, he did speak. + +“I see you are reading _Travel_,” he said. + +She glared at him. + +“I have had the honor of contributing one or two articles to that +publication,” he went on. “Little sketches of my various journeys; but +after all--” He smiled. “After all,” he said, “east or west, home is +best. I always return to Staten Island with renewed appreciation.” + +Miss Riordan was perturbed. She did not wholly understand this speech, +but she was impressed, and she was embarrassed. Clearly she had +misjudged this man. There was no occasion here for haughty glances. He +was venerable. + +“Yes,” he continued, “I find a rare combination of beauties in Staten +Island. The stirring panorama of the bay, with ships from the four +corners of the earth, the drowsy little hamlets, and the hills. The +words of our national anthem have always seemed to me peculiarly +applicable to the island--‘I love thy rocks and rills, thy woods and +templed hills.’ May I ask if you are a resident?” + +“You mean do I live there? Well, no,” said Miss Riordan. “I just go +there sometimes, with my friend.” + +“Ah!” said he. “There are so many delightful rambles--hilltop vistas +which linger long in the memory.” + +Miss Riordan and her friend were in the habit of taking the train at St. +George and going direct to South Beach. The vistas on that journey had +not appealed to her as memorable, nor had her rambles along the +boardwalk been especially delightful; but she did not care to say so. + +“I like the country,” she observed timidly, and was enchanted to see by +his face that this pleased him. + +He went on talking--which was what she desired. She would have sat there +for hours, listening to him. Never had she heard such words, never +imagined such refinement. She was filled with reverence that was almost +awe. And when he talked poetry! + +He quoted in his tremulous old voice: + + “To me the meanest flower that blows can give + Thoughts that do often lie too deep for tears.” + +It was too much! Miss Riordan’s own thoughts did not lie too deep. Her +tears welled up and brimmed over. She wiped her eyes with her perfumed +handkerchief, and mutely shook her head. + +Her companion had long since passed the age of such facile relief. He +peered at her in kindly distress, unable to find assuaging words for a +grief so inexplicable. + +“Please wait a moment!” he said, and with a little difficulty got upon +his feet. “Just wait a moment, please! I’ll be back directly.” + +She believed him, and while she waited, confident that he would return +to her, she thought about this thing in a misty fashion. + +Not yet in her life had Miss Riordan attempted to account for her +emotions. She felt, and that sufficed. She had no idea why the old +gentleman’s discourse upon the natural beauties of Staten Island should +have made her weep. She did not know why his talk had so charmed her. +She knew only, cared only, that a strange, tearful happiness had come +upon her. + +“I guess he liked to talk to me!” she thought, with satisfaction beyond +measure. + +Then she saw him coming toward her again, toddling along in his long +overcoat, with a little bouquet of roses in his gloved hand. + +“Oh, my goodness!” thought Miss Riordan, beginning to cry again. “Did +you ever?” + +He sat down beside her, a little out of breath. + +“If you’ll allow me,” he said, proffering the flowers. “From one lover +of Wordsworth to another. I saw that you were much moved by my little +allusion.” + +“You hadn’t ought to have done it!” said Miss Riordan, with a sob. “I +just don’t know what to say!” + +She held the flowers to her nose, and her tears rained upon them. This +was her first bouquet. Her next would very likely come when she was no +longer able to enjoy its fragrance or shed any more tears. + +“A feeling heart!” said the old gentleman. “There! Isn’t that the bell? +We’d better make our way on board, madam, or we shall be crowded out.” + +“I can’t! I got to wait!” she cried in despair; “but I’ll go with you as +far as the gates.” + +So she did. When they got there, he removed his hat and held out his +hand, standing before her bareheaded and in matchless dignity, in spite +of the jostling crowd. She took his hand and squeezed it hard. + +“Good-by!” she said. “Do take care of yourself!” + + +II + +She watched the old gentleman as he made his way toward the cabin. Each +time some one brushed against him, she cried under her breath: + +“Stop that pushing! Ain’t you ashamed of yourself?” + +“What you mutterin’ about?” asked a voice behind her. + +Turning, she confronted her Louis. + +“Well!” she exclaimed indignantly. “You’re a nice one, you are! But come +on! Hurry up! We can get this boat.” + +He caught her arm and held her back. + +“No!” he said. “Too late to go down to the island to-day.” + +“Too late!” said she. “And me waiting here all the afternoon! What do +you mean, too late?” + +“When I say too late, I mean too late,” replied Mr. Pirini, with his own +special insolence. + +“Well!” said Miss Riordan. “I don’t care!” + +This speech was surely a cue for exit, but she did not go. She said to +herself, as usual, that she just wanted to stay and tell that fellow +what she thought of him--which was manifestly impossible, as she had +never yet been able to discover what she really did think of him, except +that she hated him. + +There he stood, with his gray spats and his gray felt hat, worn +rakishly, and even new gray gloves. She knew that he had no job, nothing +at all to justify his swagger. Very likely he hadn’t enough in his +pocket to pay for his dinner. What cared he? He wouldn’t even thank her +if she paid for it. + +“Now you just look here, Louis!” she began in a trembling voice. + +“All right! I’m lookin’!” said he. + +His white teeth showed in a broad smile, and his eyes were fixed +steadily upon her. Though Miss Riordan, when she looked in the mirror, +may have seen an image which somewhat flattered the truth, she had no +illusions as to how she appeared in the eyes of Mr. Pirini. She tried to +roll the magazine so that her hands should be concealed. She changed the +position of her feet. + +“All right!” she said. “You can keep on looking!” + +“You bin cryin’,” observed her cavalier. + +That was too much! Those tears were not to be mentioned by him. + +“You mind your own business!” she retorted hotly. “I wasn’t crying over +you, anyways!” + +She saw that he didn’t believe that. + +“Have it your own way,” he said soothingly. “Whadder you say we go an’ +get some dinner?” + +“No!” replied Miss Riordan, and sat down upon the nearest seat. + +She always rejected his suggestions--at first; but, as always, she +regretted what she had done. Here was the very situation she had +dreaded--herself seated, flushed, struggling against her ever ready +tears, while he stood there smiling. + +“All right!” he said. “We’ll stay here, then.” + +This was another familiar move. How many victories had he won by his +patience, his smiling silence! He could wait, and he could hold his +tongue, and she could do neither. + +“And me waiting here all afternoon!” she burst out. “And then you come +and you say it’s too late to go down to the island. Well, what made you +come so late?” + +He did not answer. Another crowd had begun to move toward the gates, +like a herd seized with a migratory impulse. Perhaps something of that +ancient instinct stirred now in Miss Riordan. Certainly she had a +melancholy sensation of being left behind, abandoned, while her fellow +creatures moved on toward a better land--toward a Staten Island green +and fair, where in a glen a cataract came foaming down, and wild flowers +grew, very much like a landscape which hung up in her furnished room. +Well, didn’t she, too, wish to see that lovely spot? + +“I’m going to take the next boat!” she announced, rising. + +“All right!” said Louis. “I’m not. Good-by!” + +She wavered shamefully between the quite real Louis and the imaginary +Staten Island. + +“I’m going!” she answered in a loud, firm voice, but added: “Unless you +say you’re sorry you were so late.” + +“Sure! I’m sorry!” answered Louis readily. “Now let’s go an’ get some +dinner somewheres. All dressed up to kill, ain’t you? Bought yourself +some flowers an’ everything!” + +Miss Riordan had temporarily forgotten her bouquet. She glanced down at +the pallid blossoms, fainting in her hot hands, and a very curious +emotion came over her. + +“No, I did not buy them for myself!” she said vehemently. “They were +given to me.” + +“Sure!” said Louis. “Rudolph Valentino give ’em to you, didn’t he?” + +“Now you look here, Louis! A gentleman gave them to me--he _bought_ them +for me.” + +“Oh, Gawd!” said Louis. + +“He did! You stop your laughing!” + +But Mr. Pirini was so overwhelmed that he was obliged to drop into the +seat beside her, and there he sat, his handsome head thrown back, all +his strong white teeth showing in a prodigious and soundless laugh. Miss +Riordan turned upon him in a fury. + +“You stop that!” she commanded. “You just better believe me! It’s the +truth! A gentleman came and sat down beside me and began talking to me, +and by and by he got me them flowers.” + +“Sure I believe you!” said Louis. “Why wouldn’t I?” + +For a moment she could not speak. Her hate, and the insufferable +conviction of her impotence, made her heart beat fast and violently. She +felt stifled in a desperate struggle against complete submersion. Louis +would not believe her. She could not make him believe in her gentleman, +and to doubt his existence was to deny her a soul. That the old +gentleman had talked poetry to her and given her flowers was the sole +proof of her own immortal value. + +“I tell you it’s true!” she said in a choked voice. + +“Sure!” replied Louis, still grinning. + +His unfaith was destroying her. Under his arrogant, smiling glance she +was disintegrating. The woman whom the old gentleman had addressed, the +woman who longed for the mystic beauties of Staten Island as one longs +for Paradise, was being done to death, and there would remain only the +creatures she saw in her mirror--this ungainly body, this flushed and +troubled face. No! No! She had been worthy of the poetry and the +flowers. It was Louis who was too base to see her worth. + + +III + +Her hot anger began to cool, to harden into an emotion which she did not +comprehend. She stared back at Louis, at first with scorn, but after a +moment with puzzled curiosity. Had he always looked like this? Never any +different from this? + +“You look so kind of funny to-day!” she observed wonderingly. + +“Funny? What d’you mean, funny?” he demanded. + +“I don’t know,” she said, still staring at him. “Just--so kind +of--measly.” + +His swarthy face turned dark red, and in a low voice he made a forcible +retort; but Miss Riordan was past anger. She was looking at her bouquet, +lifting up the drooping heads with anxious care. + +“I’ll dry ’em in a nice little jar,” she thought. “I guess they’ll keep +forever that way.” + +Louis was still talking. + +“You’d better go away,” she said casually. “I’m going down to the +island.” + +He got up promptly. + +“I’ll go, all right!” said he. “An’ you can git down on your knees an’ +beg me, an’ I’ll never come back. Let me tell you--” + +“Oh, go on!” said Miss Riordan with mild impatience. + +He walked away, swaggering, his gray felt hat to one side, his toes +pointed out, his curly hair pushed up at the back of the neck by his +high collar. He passed through the turnstile and out of the ferry house, +and then, as far as she was concerned, he ceased to exist. Miss Riordan +got up and sauntered toward the gates. + +“He’s gone,” she thought. “He’d come back if I’d ask him, but I won’t!” + +This was true. Mr. Pirini’s charm had been completely dissolved in his +laughter. He had refused to believe in her gentleman. + +Thinking of that elderly cavalier, her heart swelled with enormous +aspirations. Here she was going to the country for a ramble, and +carrying a high-class magazine and that mystically precious bouquet. It +seemed to her that a monstrous burden had been lifted from her +shoulders. Shame, resentment, and miserable anxiety had departed with +Mr. Pirini. + +She raised the bouquet to her face and sniffed it vigorously. + +“I’m going to get a real _comfortable_ pair of shoes!” she said to +herself. “A size--_two_ sizes--bigger!” + +The freedom of Miss Riordan’s soul was achieved. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JUNE, 1925 +Vol. LXXXV NUMBER 1 + + + + +Sometimes Things Do Happen + +HOW THE LIVES OF FOUR YOUNG MARRIED PEOPLE WERE UTTERLY RUINED--FOR A +TIME, AT LEAST + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Mr. Samuel Pepys set down the happenings of his days with unique candor +and spirit, and, by so doing, became immortal. Edward Cane also kept a +diary. Like that of Mr. Pepys, it was written in cipher, and it had a +good deal about the author’s wife in it; but in other ways it was very +different. + +Edward was passionately concerned with the future. He made prophecies, +and it displeased him that these prophecies were not fulfilled. His was +a just and reasonable mind. He knew--none better--how things ought to +be, and he was displeased that they were not so. + +He had, indeed, given up looking through the earlier pages of his diary, +because it hurt too much; but he remembered some of the things. He +remembered, if not the actual words, at least the spirit in which he had +prophesied about this marriage of his. It was going to be different from +all other marriages. Why not, since he and his Mildred were different +from all other persons? It was going to be a splendid adventure. + +“We shall never become stodgy,” he had written. + +Well, as far as that went, they hadn’t. Quite the contrary! + +This evening he began his daily record: + + I have shut myself up in my-- + +“In my own room,” he was going to write, but that was not exact. It was +Mildred’s room, too. She could come in if she liked. He couldn’t really +shut himself up anywhere on earth. He crossed out the last two words, +and leaned his head on his hands, struggling valiantly to be just, fair, +and exact, and to crush down the extraordinary emotions that outrageous +woman aroused in him. + +Never, before his marriage, had he felt such fury, such unreasonable, +ungovernable exasperation. He had had a well deserved reputation for +being a strong, self-controlled, moderate young man. That was one reason +why he had risen high in the credit department of a mammoth +store--because he could handle angry, cajoling, or desperate customers +so firmly and calmly; and here in his own home he was utterly defeated. + +He raised his head and looked about him. He saw Mildred’s things +everywhere, crowding and jostling his things--even her silly white comb +standing up in one of his military brushes. + +“Well, what of it?” he asked himself. “I’m orderly and she’s not. I +always knew that.” + +No use--he could not be philosophic about it. He got up and removed the +comb with a jerk. As he did so, he caught sight of his own face in the +mirror. It startled him. It was a strained and haggard face. + +“I can’t stand this!” he said to himself. “This can’t go on!” + +And just at this moment the door burst open and she--the cause of all +his exasperation--appeared in the doorway. + +“Edward!” she said in a furious, trembling voice. “Will you get that +ladder, or won’t you?” + +“I will not,” he replied. + +His own voice was not altogether steady, but he was much calmer than +she. She had been crying--he could see that; and, as he faced her, she +began to cry again. + +“You beast!” she cried. “You selfish, heartless--” + +“Look here!” said Edward. “I can’t--I won’t stand any more of this! I’m +sick and tired--” + +“And what about me?” she retorted. “After your promising to make me +happy!” + +That was too much. Edward could have reminded her of things she had +promised, but he scorned to do so. Contempt overwhelmed him. She had no +scruples. The only thing on earth she cared about was to get her own +way; and she wasn’t going to get it--not this time! Her monstrous +unfairness, her ruthless egotism, appalled him. He felt anger mounting +to his brain, destroying his fine moderation. + +“Look here!” he began. + +“I won’t!” said she. “If I’d had any idea what you were really like, I’d +never have married you, Edward Cane!” + +“No doubt!” said Edward frigidly. “However, another woman--” + +All he had been going to say was that another woman--any other woman in +the world, indeed--would have considered him a fairly good husband; but +Mildred chose to take his words in a different spirit. + +“Another woman!” said she, and laughed. + +“If things happened as they should,” Edward went on, with heightened +color, “I’d go away--now. I’d go off--” + +“With another woman!” said she, and laughed again. + +He was glad to hear the doorbell ring. If he hadn’t gone out of the room +just then, he felt that he would certainly have put himself in the +wrong. His patience was exhausted. + +“Oh, are you leaving me now, Edward?” Mildred called after him +mockingly. “Hadn’t you better take a clean collar--or a toothbrush, at +least?” + +Evidently she hadn’t heard the bell, and he did not condescend to +enlighten her. He made up his mind not to speak to her again, no matter +what the provocation. He went on down the stairs to the front door, and +opened it. + +“Edward!” she cried. + +Ha! She was giving herself away now! She was worried! + +He opened the door wider, and, as he did so, he heard her start down the +stairs. It was only a bill, left lying on the veranda. He stepped out to +pick it up. + +“Edward!” he heard her call. “_Eddie!_” + +A sudden gust of wind blew the door to with a crash, and an equally +sudden impulse made him go hastily down the steps and along the path. + +The front door opened. + +“Eddie!” she called. “Come back this instant!” + +He strode up the road and turned the corner. + +“Do her good!” he said grimly to himself. “Now I’m out, I’ll just stay +out for a while. I’ll smoke, and take a stroll.” + +Unfortunately, however, he had changed into an old coat, and had nothing +to smoke with him, and no money to buy anything. Also, he was hatless. +He shrugged his shoulders with a fine gesture of indifference. He could +stroll, anyhow, and think--think this thing out to the bitter end. + +It was all bitter, beginning and middle as well as the end. Mildred +wished to make a slave of him, to break his spirit, to destroy his manly +pride. No--this should not be! + +It was a strange, uneasy sort of night--blowing up for rain, he thought. +Filmy black clouds went racing across a pallid sky, and the trees rocked +and tossed. It was cool, too, for May. He quickened his steps a little. + +“I’m upset,” he thought. “I’m more upset than I realized.” + +Somehow, the familiar suburban street had a new and almost sinister +aspect. The trim houses with their lighted windows looked like houses on +the stage--delusions, with no backs to them. Faint and eerie music was +coming through some one’s radio. A dog howled, far away. Everything was +different. + +“This is a fool trick,” he thought suddenly. “I can’t stay out here. +I’ll go back and--and simply not answer her.” + + +II + +A taxi came round the corner. The wheels, spinning over the road, +sounded like rain. He turned back. + +“Sir!” cried a voice. “Please!” + +The taxi had stopped, and a woman was leaning out of the window. Was she +calling him? It must be so, for there was no one else in sight. + +“Can you please tell me where Mrs. Rice lives?” said the woman. + +“Er--no,” said he. “I’m sorry, but I don’t know any one of that name +here.” + +He spoke a little stiffly, because he did not _like_ that voice. It was +musical enough, but lacking in calm. She was not discouraged, however. + +“If you’d just please look at this--card,” she said. “Perhaps I’ve read +the name wrong.” + +Now Edward was frankly suspicious. He did not want to approach that +taxi, but he had not the moral courage to refuse. He would have +preferred to be set upon by bandits, to be blackjacked and robbed, +rather than show his reluctance. He stepped off the curb and crossed the +road. He _knew_ that something was going to happen. + +The woman in the taxi handed him a card; and at the same moment she +clutched his collar, and, leaning forward, whispered in his ear: + +“Say that Mrs. Rice lives in that house! Pretend to read the card! +Quick!” + +What could he do? He didn’t want to say anything, but he did not know +how to refuse this agitated creature. He took the card, went around to +the front of the taxi, and pretended to read the card by the fierce +white glare of the headlights. + +“Oh!” he said. “Mrs. _Bice_! I see! _She_ lives there--in that house.” + +“Thank you!” said the woman in the taxi. + +The instinct of self-preservation warned him to be off then, but he had +also another instinct--that of helping other people who were in trouble. +Something was obviously wrong here, and, prudent or not, he could not +turn his back and walk off. The woman had got out, and stood beside him +in the road. + +“Please pay him and send him away!” she whispered. + +So that was the game! + +“I’m sorry,” said Edward blandly, “but I’ve come out without a penny in +my pockets.” + +“Here!” said she, and thrust a purse into his hand. “Only _please_ get +rid of him!” + +He saw he had been wrong. With a certain compunction, he approached the +driver. + +“Five dollars!” said the man. + +Edward leaned over and looked at the meter. + +“Two forty,” he said. + +“She made a special rate with me--” the driver began. + +“Two forty,” said Edward briefly. + +He opened the little purse, and found it crammed with bills--large +bills, some of them--an extraordinary amount of cash. He was searching +for change when the driver commenced. + +Now Edward, as assistant credit manager, was not unaccustomed to +remonstrances from persons who could not get what they wanted; nor was +his nature a submissive or timid one. He felt quite able to withstand +the driver’s attack; but women are not like that. Bluster impresses +them, and this woman was impressed. + +“Oh, please!” she cried. “Give him the five dollars! Give him anything! +Only do get rid of him!” + +After all, it was her money. Edward gave the driver a five-dollar bill, +with a low and forcible remark. The engine started up, and off went the +taxi. It seemed extraordinarily quiet after it had gone. + +“Drunk,” observed Edward. + +“I know!” said the woman. “He was perfectly awful!” + +She was going to cry, if she had not already begun; and he wanted no +more of _that_. + +“Now, then!” he said, in a loud, cheerful voice. “Shall I get you +another taxi?” + +“Please!” said she. + +She was crying now--no doubt about it. What was worse, she took his arm +and clung to it. + +“If you’ll wait here for a few minutes--” suggested Edward. + +“Oh, I can’t!” she cried. “Oh, please don’t go away and leave me all +alone!” + +He saw himself that it wouldn’t do to leave her standing here in the +street while he walked half a mile to the station for a taxi. + +“I’ll go into the Baxters’ and telephone for one,” he thought. + +But Mrs. Baxter was a particular friend of Mildred’s. She would bother +him. She would ask questions. She would want to know what he was doing, +wandering about at ten o’clock at night. She would suspect that there +had been a quarrel. + +The idea was intolerable. He would not go to the Baxters’; and, not +having been long in the neighborhood, he knew no one else. + +As he stood deliberating, the lights in the house behind them went out, +leaving the world very dark. For the moment, he felt a thousand miles +from home. He felt marooned, cut off. He couldn’t believe that just +around the corner was that six-room house of hollow tile, with all +improvements--that house which was mystically more than a house because +it was his home. He owned it. In his experience as assistant credit +manager he had seen what fatal accidents could happen to defer deferred +payments, and he would have none of them. His rule was to pay cash. +Mildred had more than once protested against this rule, but in vain. + +“You’re always looking ahead and imagining that all sorts of queer, +awful things are going to happen,” she had said, only the day before; +“but they never do!” + +They didn’t, didn’t they? A lot she knew! + +“Where _can_ I get a taxi?” asked the voice at his side, and he came out +of his reverie with a start. + +“I’m afraid you’ll have to walk to the station,” he said; “unless you +happen to pick one up on the way.” + +“Oh, dear!” said she. “Is it far? Half a mile? But if I’ve got to walk +that far--isn’t there some sort of hotel in the town?” + +“Yes--there’s the American House,” Edward told her. + +“Then I’ll go there,” said she. “If you’ll just please tell me the +way--” + +He knew that he must go with her--that she was one of those women who +can never go anywhere or do anything alone. Impossible to explain how he +knew this, or how, in the dark, and without having even once looked +squarely at her, he knew that she was young, pretty, and charmingly +dressed. Stifling a sigh, he set off at her side. It had to be. + +She thanked him very nicely. He assured her that it was no trouble at +all, and then they both fell silent. She sounded as if she were walking +quickly, her little high heels clacking smartly on the pavement; but as +a matter of fact their progress was slow--a snail’s pace, Edward +thought. At this rate, he wouldn’t get back to the house for an +hour--that is, if he ever did go back. He said to himself that he had +not made up his mind what he would do; but in his heart he knew that he +couldn’t help himself. He was a victim of destiny. + +“But it is awfully nice of you!” said the fair unknown. “Were you just +out taking a walk?” + +“I wasn’t going anywhere,” Edward replied gloomily. + +“That’s like me,” said she. “I’m not going anywhere. I don’t care where +I go, or what becomes of me!” + +This alarmed Edward. After having been married to Mildred for nearly six +months, he knew that such people were possible. They really didn’t care +where they went or what they did. They were incalculably dangerous and +reckless. + +“All women,” he thought somberly, “are alike--all of them!” + +Perhaps at this moment Mildred was not caring where she went or what +became of her. + +“I know you must wonder,” the fair unknown continued. “I don’t suppose +any one in the world could understand.” + +She paused, but Edward gave her no encouragement. + +“I really did know a Mrs. Rice who lived somewhere in this neighborhood +when I was a little girl,” she resumed. “Such a dear old lady. And +somehow, in my desperation, I thought of h-her.” She was wiping her eyes +with a small handkerchief. “You must think I’m so weak and s-silly!” + +“Oh, no!” said Edward politely. + +A fatalistic gloom enveloped him. He felt no curiosity at all. He knew +not where he was going, or why; and what chiefly occupied his mind was a +profound longing for a smoke and a hat. With a cigar, he felt, he could +have regained his philosophic outlook. With a hat, he could have faced +this situation more like a man of the world. He had neither, and he was +walking off into the night, away from home. + +The lights of the town made him anxious that the lady should dry her +tears. + +“I think it’s going to rain,” he observed in an easy, conversational +tone. “Country needs rain badly.” + +He might have known that it wouldn’t work. She paid no attention +whatever to this remark. + +“I only want to hide,” she said. “If I could have found dear old Mrs. +Rice! That driver--he was so awful! He was going to drive out into the +country and murder me. I saw it in his face. And then _you_ came!” + +“I happened to be there,” Edward corrected her. + +“Isn’t it strange, the way things happen?” she said in a low, intense +voice. “Doesn’t it seem like fate?” + +It did. Edward said nothing. He was trying to invent some excuse for +getting his arm away from her before they passed any shops where he was +known. He failed to do so, however. The lights in all the shops on the +main street shone upon him, hatless, with the desperate lady clinging to +him. + +The portico of the American House was in sight now. They drew nearer and +nearer. Ten steps more-- + +“Quick!” she whispered. She pulled violently at his arm, and in an +instant he found himself inside a jeweler’s shop. “He was there--outside +the hotel!” she whispered. “If he’d turned his head! He’d surely have +killed you! Isn’t that a _sweet_ bracelet?” + +This last remark was for the benefit of the young man who had come +behind the counter. He seemed pleased, and brought out the bracelet in a +velvet box. + +“Sweet, isn’t it?” she murmured. + +She nudged Edward hard. He glanced at her, and a thrill of terror ran +through him. She was smiling archly at him. Her tears had in no way +marred a most lovely and piquant face. She was a beautiful and elegant +woman, such as Edward had frequently seen in his office. He knew these +pampered beings, and their naïve and exorbitant demands. + +“Yes,” he replied faintly. + +“Get it for me, dear!” she said. + +He was stupefied. + +“I want it! Get it for me, dear!” she repeated, with the same arch +smile; but her elbow dug sharply into his ribs. + +“How much?” he asked in a hollow voice. + +“Only twenty-five dollars,” she said brightly. + +He turned aside, and from her well filled purse took out the requisite +amount. The young clerk wrapped up the bracelet and handed it to her. As +he did so, she leaned across the counter. + +“Is there a back way to get out?” she asked in a low and confidential +voice. “They’re out there, looking for us, and we want to give them the +slip.” + +“Certainly, madam,” said the clerk. “This way!” + +He opened a door at the rear of the shop. They followed him along a dark +passage, across a yard, through a gate in the fence, and out into +another street. + +“Er--good night!” said the clerk. + +“No!” returned Edward. “Look here!” + +But the fair unknown, still clinging to his arm, positively dragged him +on. + +“Stupid!” she hissed. “Hurry up! Do you want to be killed?” + +They turned the corner into a dark alley, and here Edward stopped. + +“Look here!” he said sternly. “This can’t go on! I--” + +“Don’t you see? He thought we were a bride and groom, trying to get +away.” + +Edward believed none of this. He did not believe that he was in any +danger of being killed by any person whatsoever, or that the clerk had +thought what the unknown imagined; but women, as he had noticed before, +always believed what they wished to believe. + +“I have to live in this town, you know,” he observed. + +Of course this observation did not move her. Women never considered the +future. They lived, reckless and heedless, in the present moment. + +“Where do you want to go now?” he pursued. “It’s getting late.” + +“Leave me!” said she. “It doesn’t matter. Thank you for all you’ve done. +Go away and leave me!” + +“I can’t leave you here--in an alley,” said Edward, repressing a violent +irritation. + +“What does it matter?” said she. “I don’t care what becomes of me!” + +“Well, I do!” said Edward. + +“Oh, how sweet of you!” she cried, and began to weep again. + +“I mean,” Edward explained hastily, “that I couldn’t leave _any_ woman +alone in a place like this.” + +“You’re so ch-chivalrous!” she sobbed. “I knew it the moment I heard +your voice!” + +“I am not chivalrous,” replied Edward firmly; “only--look here! I’ll get +a taxi and see you home.” + +“I have no home!” she wailed. + +“You must live somewhere.” + +“I don’t--not any more. Oh, leave me! Leave me! I don’t care!” She +clutched his arm again, in that frenzied manner which so startled and +annoyed him. “Oh, my hat!” she cried. “It’s raining!” + +She was right--the first heavy drops were beginning to fall. + +“Oh, my _pretty_ little hat!” she cried. + +Now, Edward’s was a just and logical mind, and yet even he had sometimes +been illogically moved by trifles. This infantile plaint about a pretty +little hat reminded him of certain things Mildred had said, and aroused +in him a pity which the stranger’s tragic and mysterious sorrows had +hitherto failed to inspire. + +“Come on!” he said. + + +III + +Edward was now the leader of the enterprise; he did not know where they +were going, but he led the way, down the alley and out into a street +which was new to him. It was one of those streets that may so often be +found lurking near neat little suburban railway stations--a mean street, +dark and deserted. A light burned dimly in a cutthroat barber’s, another +light in a shoemaker’s, revealing the shoemaker and his family of pale +infants. There was a--what was that? + +“The Palace Restaurant--never closed,” a sign said. + +They hurried into the Palace Restaurant just as the rain began in +earnest. + +“You can wait here till it’s over,” said Edward. + +He purposely refrained from saying “we,” but he knew that he could not +desert the silly, helpless creature. They sat down at a little table +near the window, and, when the proprietor came up to them, Edward +ordered ham and eggs and coffee. + +“I couldn’t eat anything in this horrible place!” whispered his +companion. + +At first Edward was inclined to agree with her. It was not an appetizing +place. The tablecloth was stained, and there was a stale and unpleasant +aroma in the air. A glass case displayed a lemon meringue pie and a +raisin cake which did not appeal to him. + +When the food came, however, he ate it--to his regret, for, after having +eaten, his desire for a smoke increased tenfold. He could think of +little else. Stern and silent, he sat there thinking of the cigars in +the pocket of his other coat, of the box of cigars in his office. He +knew this to be a weakness, and he was struggling against it; but the +struggle was difficult, and he was in no mood for his companion’s words. + +“You’re unhappy--like me,” she said softly. + +“No,” said Edward. “No--it’s entirely different.” + +“Oh, I understand!” she said. + +She went on, about life, and how hard it is when you really feel things, +and how alone you are, even in the midst of crowds. He tried not to +listen, but he had to hear some of it, and it infuriated him. + +“Very likely,” he said; “but I’d like to know your plans. What do you +want me to do? Get you a cab, or what?” + +She shrank back. + +“Oh!” she said. “I see! You mean--I understand! You want to go. Leave +me, then! Go! Why should you care what happens to me?” + +“It’s after eleven,” was all that Edward answered. + +There was a silence. + +“Very well!” she said coldly. “I shall take the next train into the +city.” + +There was another silence. The proprietor had retired, and they had the +Palace Restaurant entirely to themselves. The rain was dashing against +the windows. The street light outside showed only darkness. + +What, Edward wondered, was Mildred doing now? She was capable of +anything--of telephoning to the Baxters, to the police. Perhaps she had +gone away herself. Perhaps she was wandering about in this storm, +searching for her husband. It was a wild and fantastic notion, but that +was the sort of thing women did. Look at this one! He did look at her, +and she looked at him, with cold scorn. + +“Will you be kind enough--” she began. + +Just then the door opened and two men came in. They were the editor and +the subeditor of the local paper, both of whom Edward knew. + +“Hello, Cane!” said the editor. “Just put the paper to bed. What are you +doing here?” + +“Nothing much,” Edward replied as casually as possible. + +The editor turned to the fair unknown. + +“How do you like our little town, Mrs. Cane?” he asked. “Once you get to +know--” + +“I am not Mrs. Cane,” she interrupted frigidly. + +“Oh! I--er--yes,” said the editor. + +He waited a moment, but no one said anything. Then he and his colleague +sat down at a table as far away as they could get. + +“Why didn’t you keep still?” said Edward in a low, fierce voice. “He’s +editor of the newspaper here.” + +“Did you imagine I was that sort of woman?” she returned. “Did you think +I would pretend to be the wife of a perfect stranger?” + +“No,” said Edward; “but you didn’t need to say anything. He’ll talk--” + +“Do you imagine I care?” said she. + +Of course she didn’t. Women care only for themselves. Edward could not +trust himself to speak, but he thought. He thought. + +“I’ll find out who she is,” he said to himself, “so that I can send her +back for the money for her ham and eggs.” + +A dismal bellow pierced the night. + +“The eleven forty pulling out,” observed the editor to his companion. + +Edward heard this. + +“When’s the next train into the city?” he asked, across the room. + +“Five twenty to-morrow morning.” + +“Now you see what you’ve done!” said the fair unknown to Edward. + +“What I’ve done?” said he, amazed and indignant; but she was far more +indignant than he. + +“Now what am I going to do?” she demanded. “The last train’s gone. I +can’t go into the city, and there’s nowhere here for me to stay.” + +“Are you blaming me for--” + +“Yes,” said she. “You’re a man. You ought to have--” + +“Just what ought I have done?” Edward inquired with biting irony. + +“I don’t care!” said she. “Very well! I’m going to stay here all night.” + +“You can’t.” + +“I’m going to!” said she. + +“And I thought Mildred was unreasonable!” Edward reflected. + +The image of Mildred rose before him, remarkably vivid. With great +justice and moderation he compared her with this unknown individual. All +women were not alike. Mildred was different. There was something about +her--Sometimes, of course, she was simply outrageous, but, even at +that--That time when he had the flu--or when anything went wrong in the +office-- + +“And she’s very young,” thought the just man. “She’s nothing but a kid. +Perhaps I should have made allowances.” + +“Won’t you smoke?” said a voice. + +Glancing up, he saw the fair unknown proffering a silver cigarette case. +Edward did not smoke cigarettes, and he had pretty severe theories about +people who did so, but this time he was weak. He took one and lighted +it. It was a horrible perfumed thing, but it helped him. The fact that +he had broken one of his rules helped him, too. He felt more tolerant. + +“Don’t you--er--smoke?” he asked his companion. + +He thought she was just the sort of person who would; but she shook her +head. + +“Arthur doesn’t like me to,” she said. Her voice had changed, and her +face, too. She was downcast and pale. “I made him get me that case,” she +went on. “He hated to, but I made him.” + +Tears had come into her eyes again, but this time Edward felt rather +sorry for her. + +“Don’t cry!” he said kindly--the more so as the two editors had just +gone out, in discreet silence. + +“I can’t help it!” said she. “My whole life is ruined. You don’t +know--oh, you don’t know what a beast I’ve been! And now--now I’ve lost +Arthur!” + +“Who is Arthur?” Edward asked sympathetically. + +“My husband,” said she. The tears were raining down her cheeks. “My +dear, kind, wonderful, darling husband! I wanted to punish him, and +frighten him, and I ran away. We had a quarrel. My life is ruined, and +all because of a penny!” + +“A penny?” + +“Yes. Arthur said the two sides were called heads and tails, and I said +they were called odds and evens. I know he was wrong, but why didn’t I +give in? Oh, why didn’t I give in? Both our lives ruined! He’s +frightfully jealous. Hell never forgive this--and for a trifle like +that!” + +“I--” said Edward, and stopped. His face, too, had grown pale. “Ours was +about a cat--Mildred’s cat,” he went on. “It got up a tree, and she +wanted me to go next door and get a ladder and get it down. I told her +it could get down by itself when it was ready. She--” + +“How cruel of you!” interrupted his companion. + +“It was not cruel,” asserted Edward. + +“It was! If you loved Mildred, you’d get dozens of ladders for her.” + +“If she loved me, she wouldn’t ask me to make such a monkey of myself,” +retorted Edward. “I did it once, and the people next door laughed at me. +I heard them.” + +“You shouldn’t care,” said the fair unknown severely. “You were entirely +in the wrong.” + +“As a matter of fact,” said Edward, “you were entirely in the wrong +yourself, about that penny.” + +“What?” said she. + +She rose and faced him with flashing eyes. Edward rose, too. His eyes +did not flash, but they were steely. They regarded each other steadily, +with magnificent pride. + +Suddenly she began to laugh. + +“I am glad,” said Edward, “that you find this amusing.” + +“Oh, dear!” she said, sinking back into her chair. “Aren’t we +pig-headed, both of us?” + +“Kindly don’t--” Edward began, but she did not heed him. + +“Oh! A penny--and a cat!” + +“Well,” said Edward, “perhaps--” + +“Come on!” said she, rising again. “Let’s go back and start all over +again!” + +“I--” Edward began. + +“Oh, do come on!” she cried impatiently. “It was Arthur I saw outside +the American House--when I pulled you into the jeweler’s, you know. Oh, +do hurry! He’s traced me that far--perhaps we’ll find him still there!” + +“We?” + +“Of course!” she said. “You’ve got to explain everything to Arthur. Come +on!” + +“But your hat!” Edward reminded her, as a last desperate plea. + +“My hat!” she replied with supreme scorn. + +So they went out of the Palace Restaurant into the driving rain. + + +IV + +“Whew!” said Edward to himself, wiping his moist brow with a still +moister handkerchief. “Whew!” + +Arthur had been found in the American House, and he had been difficult +to handle. If Edward had not had such a thorough training in his +business, he could never have handled the situation in so masterly a +fashion. Arthur was a rich young man, and accustomed to being kotowed +to. Edward, however, was accustomed to rich people who were accustomed +to being kotowed to. Many times he had explained to wealthy and +indignant customers facts which they had not cared to consider--that, +for instance, the mere possession of enough money to pay one’s bills did +not suffice for a credit department; that there must be a certain +willingness to use the money for that purpose. + +Edward had not kotowed to Arthur. He had been mighty firm with him, +though kind, for he had felt sorry for the man. It had been a bad night +for Arthur. He had been desperately worried about his wife. Patiently, +inexorably, Edward had made him listen to reason, and in the end there +was a touching and beautiful reconciliation. Arthur’s wife, with truly +admirable unselfishness, had said that it did not matter who was right +about the penny. Both of them had declared that they owed everything to +Edward and would be his lifelong friends. + +He was now at liberty to attend to his own little affair. Having no +money to pay for a taxi, he set off on foot in the direction of his +home. It was still raining, and as black as the pit, yet he fancied he +could feel dawn in the air. Taking out his watch, he saw that it was +half past four. He had been away all night. He remembered his last words +to Mildred: + +“If things happened as they should--” + +She had said that they never did, but they had. He was strangely +justified, yet he felt no triumph. The rain fell cold upon his uncovered +head, and his spirit was cold within him. + +“She must have been worrying,” thought Edward. + +Indeed, that was an inadequate word for what he knew she must have felt. +He thought about Mildred, not in her outrageous moments, but as she was +at other times, when she was her unique and incomparable self. He +thought about marriage, in a large, general way. He also thought about +his own marriage, and what he had intended it to be. + +At last he thought about himself. Soaked through to the skin, cold and +weary, Edward groped after justice. It was a creditable performance--the +more so because he was unaware of it. He groped, and he found a new and +startling piece of wisdom. + +He quickened his pace. The wind had died down and the rain had stopped, +but he did not know that, for the drops still pattered thickly from the +trees. As he turned the corner of his own street, he saw in the sky the +first streak of dawn--a pale gray creeping up into the black. + +His reasonable mind told him that there was no cause here for wonder, +yet he did wonder. He stopped for a moment and watched the marvelous +dawn--watched it make a fresh and utterly new day and a new world. His +own house seemed to grow before his eyes, turning from a shadowy mass +into something familiar and yet strange. He had come home--after what +extraordinary wanderings! + +He advanced, walking on the sodden grass, so that his steps should be +noiseless. He entered his neighbor’s garden, thankful that they kept no +dog. He took a ladder from the unlocked tool shed, and, carrying it with +some difficulty, set it up against a certain tree on his own front lawn. + +Then, still noiselessly, he stole up on the veranda, and, stooping, +examined the doormat and the darkest corners. Unsatisfied, he went +around to the back of the house; and there, against the kitchen door, he +found that which he sought--a cat. He wished to tell Mildred that he had +brought her cat down from the tree, and he would not lie. It should be +true. + +The cat was mutinous. She struggled as he held her under his arm, and it +was difficult to ascend the ladder. However, he did so. He put the cat +on a branch, and let go of her for an instant, in order to get a better +hold on her for the descent. She began climbing higher up. He clutched +at her, but she eluded him. She was a heavy cat, but she went up a +slender branch, which bent perilously beneath her. + +“Kitty! Kitty!” whispered Edward. “Oh, you fool!” + +Her hind legs had slipped off, and for an instant they were kicking +desperately in the air, reminding him of a Zouave in white gaiters. + +“Come, kitty!” murmured Edward. “Come on, kitty!” + +The creature clawed and clutched desperately, swung under the bending +branch, came up on the other side, and began to come down, facing him +with wild yellow eyes. He caught her as she came within reach. He +thought the touch of a firm human hand would reassure the terrified +animal, but it was not so. She appeared to be suspicious and resentful. + +As the cat’s claws pierced his shoulder, Edward recoiled, and very +nearly fell from the ladder. Probably he uttered some sort of +exclamation, as almost anybody would. Anyhow, Mildred’s head appeared at +an upper window. + +“I’m getting your cat down,” Edward explained. + +By the time he had reached the foot of the ladder, with the cat, Mildred +had opened the front door. She was carrying something in her arms, which +she set down in the shadow of the veranda. She gave it a gentle push +with her foot, and it ran off, unseen by Edward. + +Edward set down his cat, and she also ran off. + +“There you are!” he said. + +Mildred came down the steps. + +“Oh, Eddie!” she cried. + +It was quite light now in the open. He could see her face, and it seemed +to him rather wonderful. + +“Eddie!” she said. “You’re soaking wet! Oh, Eddie, it was all my fault!” + +“I don’t know that it was,” replied Edward meditatively. “Some of it was +my fault, I think.” + +She came nearer to him. + +“Oh, Eddie!” she cried. “It really doesn’t matter one bit whose fault +things are, does it?” + +He was startled, for that was his own particular bit of wisdom, +painfully arrived at. Mildred _was_ a remarkable girl! + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JULY, 1925 +Vol. LXXXV NUMBER 2 + + + + +Miss What’s-Her-Name + +AN INEXPERIENCED TRAVELER’S EVENTFUL VOYAGE TO A SUMMER ISLE OF PALM +TREES AND SAPPHIRE WATERS + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Miss Smith was a governess. She was not one of those beautiful young +governesses so popular in romance, who live in the families of earls or +millionaires and suffer all sorts of persecutions. Though young, Miss +Smith was not exactly beautiful, and certainly she was not persecuted. +On the contrary, the Pattersons were kind to her and thought very highly +of her. + +She was a brisk, sensible little thing, neat as a new pin, with crisp, +curling black hair, clear blue eyes, and a lovely, healthy color. Her +dress, her manner, her smile, were brisk and neat and sensible. +Everything about her was pleasant--except for one great black shadow at +the back of her mind, which she bravely pretended to ignore. + +Sometimes, however, this lurking shadow refused to be ignored and crept +out, clouding her clear blue eyes, troubling her nice, sensible +thoughts, and making her, all in an instant, pale and downcast and +dismayed. The shadow was a fear--fear of poverty, fear of defeat and +failure, fear, above all, of romance. + +Miss Smith’s charming mother and father had been a romantic couple, and +she remembered what had happened to them. They had both been too poor +and too young and too charming. They had had no business to get married, +but they had got married, and their daughter remembered-- + +She remembered her mother putting a piece of cardboard inside her +slipper, because of a great hole in the sole, and her father going down +on one knee to kiss the slender little foot. It was very romantic, but +Miss Smith had seen tears in her father’s eyes and in her mother’s. + +She remembered a terrible quarrel over a boiled egg. There had been only +two eggs. She, a little girl, had got one of them for her breakfast, and +the other had been set before her father; but he wouldn’t have it. He +said that Nora positively needed it; and Nora--her mother--said that she +didn’t need it, didn’t want it, and wouldn’t have it. + +In the end Mr. Smith had thrown the egg out of the window, where it lay +in the mud, with the summer rain beating down on it. He had shouted +bitterly that he was no good, because he couldn’t make enough money to +buy enough eggs for his family; and the little girl had cried, and her +mother had cried, and their poor devoted little servant--their servants +were always devoted--had cried, too. It had ended with her father +sitting on the arm of her mother’s chair, tenderly stroking that +wonderful black hair, and herself sitting on her mother’s lap, while the +little servant stood in the doorway, drying her eyes on her apron. +Everybody begged everybody else’s pardon, and, after a while, they all +laughed; and that very morning a devoted neighbor--for their neighbors +were generally devoted, too--sent them a dozen new-laid eggs. + +That was the sort of thing which was always happening to them; but Miss +Smith remembered, not the gay ending, but the storm itself. Her mother +had said, often and often, that her life had been a beautiful one, that +she had been blessed above any woman she knew in the love and +comradeship of her husband; but Miss Smith remembered too many tears, +too many anxieties. She sometimes added, at the end of her prayers: + +“And please, dear Lord, don’t let me do anything like _that_!” + +She would not have made that particular prayer with such particular +earnestness if she had not known how easy it would be for her to do +something like that; but she did know. She knew that the germs of that +fatal disease called romance were in her blood, and she had to take +frequent doses of a bitter sort of moral quinine to keep them inactive. + +One of the best of these cures was in repeating to herself her full +name--her poor, pathetic, dreadful name, which she never let any one +know. Mr. and Mrs. Patterson were middle-aged and very serious, and +Gladys Patterson, though only ten in years, was quite a settled and +responsible character; and the life in that sedate West Side house was +so calm, so orderly, that there was much time for idle, foolish +thoughts. When any such came drifting through her mind, Miss Smith would +repeat her name to herself with a stern smile, and would be deeply +thankful for the “Smith” part of it, which was so thoroughly unromantic +and sensible. + +She tried to be thankful all the time. Before going to sleep she would +tell herself how thankful she was for this nice, dignified, safe +position, where she could probably remain five years longer, if she +continued to do her duty. The very thought of having to leave the +Pattersons and go out to look for a new position dismayed her; but she +comforted herself by the thought that in five years’ time she would be +twenty-nine--which is almost thirty--and that she would probably be much +more sensible then than she was now. + +In the meantime all she asked was that life should let her alone, and +she would let it alone. She couldn’t bear the idea of change. + +When Mr. Patterson first began talking about a trip to Bermuda, she was +so much delighted with the idea that she knew it must be wrong, and +became frightened, and hoped and hoped that that wonderful and dangerous +thing would never happen. When the trip was definitely settled upon, she +was increasingly miserable. Of course it wasn’t her business to give +advice to Mr. Patterson, and she never said a word, but she knew that it +was foolish. She knew how much better it would be to stay at home and be +safe. + +When Mr. Patterson talked about crystal caves and sapphire water and +angel fishes, when he spoke of blue skies and palm trees and roses in +December, she was ready to cry. She knew it was perfectly impossible for +such things to exist, and still more impossible that she could ever see +them. It was a dream, and dreams are terribly dangerous. She would not +buy any new clothes for the trip, and she would not believe in it. + +That is how matters stood on that dreadful Saturday morning when Miss +Smith cried: + +“Oh, I’ve forgotten my ticket!” + + +II + +Certain psychologists say that we forget only what we wish to forget, +but it would be a gross libel to say that poor Miss Smith had wanted to +forget her ticket. Quite the contrary! She was terribly ashamed of +herself, and terribly worried. + +“I’ll go back and get it,” she said. + +They were all on the pier then, and other passengers, who had not +forgotten their tickets, were showing them and going aboard. Trunks and +bags were being trundled past. Miss Smith caught a glimpse of the +gangplank, a curtain of fine, steady rain, and, behind that curtain, the +deck of the ship. There was magic about that ship, as there is about all +ships. There was the ship smell, as exciting as gunpowder. + +“I’ll _rush_ back and get it!” cried Miss Smith. + +That was really the beginning of the whole thing, and quite as strange +as any of the other things that happened. For Miss Smith to cry, in that +eager voice, that she would “rush,” for Miss Smith to be so flushed and +starry-eyed, for Miss Smith to be saying to herself, “Oh, I wouldn’t +miss going for _anything_!”--all this was nothing less than marvelous. + +“You’ve just about got time,” said Mr. Patterson severely. + +She rushed madly. A taxi had just drawn up outside, and a young man +dashed out of it in a frightful hurry. Miss Smith seemed vaguely to +remember his face, but it didn’t matter. She was in the taxi almost as +soon as his foot touched the ground. She was off. She was urging on the +taxi, in silence, with clenched hands. She would not miss that ship. She +wanted to go! She would go! + +Like a whirlwind she tore up the stairs of the sedate West Side house. +She pulled open her bureau drawer so violently that it came out +altogether and fell to the floor. There was the ticket. She thrust it +into her coat pocket, flew down the stairs, past the astonished +servants, hopped into the taxi again, and was off. How thankful she was +now that Mr. Patterson, in his characteristic fashion, had insisted upon +their going down to the ship in good time! + +The rain was coming down steadily. The taxi splashed through puddles, +and sometimes skidded a little, but what cared she? She felt triumphant +and happy. She felt sure she would not miss the ship; and she did not. +The crowd standing on the pier and the crowd standing on the deck, +separated by the curtain of rain, saw a flushed and breathless young +woman hurry up the gangplank at the very last moment. Up went the plank, +a minute later the whistle blew, and they were off. + +Still a little breathless, Miss Smith stood by the railing. In the +excitement of the moment she felt inclined to wave her hand, or her +handkerchief, as the people about her were doing; but that was absurd, +for she wasn’t saying good-by to any one, wasn’t leaving any one behind. +She turned, instead, to look for the Pattersons. + +They were not in sight, and Miss Smith, being a very inexperienced +traveler, did not quite know how to find them. As they were all on the +same ship, however, this did not worry her very much. She found a +steward to lead her to the stateroom that she was to share with Mrs. +Patterson and Gladys, and knocked on the door. No one answered. She +opened the door and went in. Not a trace of a Patterson there--no +baggage except her own suit case. She had had a steamer trunk, too, but +it was not there. + +Miss Smith sat down in a wicker armchair and waited. She meant to wait +patiently, but as a matter of fact she waited delightedly. The throb of +the engines set her blood dancing. Everything she saw was +fascinating--the three berths so neatly made up, the snugness, the +coziness of this little cabin, with the rain falling outside. She knew +that she had been very stupid and careless about the ticket, and that +Mr. and Mrs. Patterson were surprised and not very well pleased; but +even that couldn’t disturb her just now. She was on a ship, sailing the +sea! + +The sound of a bugle interrupted her reverie. Common sense, and another +and stronger inner voice, told her that this must mean lunch. There was +a little book hanging up on the wall. She looked in it, and learned that +lunch began at half past twelve. It was noon now. + +“Perhaps they’ll wait for me in the dining room--I mean, the dining +saloon,” thought Miss Smith. “I wonder if I ought to go down there or +wait here! I wonder what I ought to do!” + +She sat where she was for another very long half hour. Then she washed +her hands, straightened her hat, and set forth, rather timidly. She felt +that the Pattersons were keeping away from her in order to show their +disapproval, and she didn’t altogether blame them. + +That apologetic look, that little shadow of a doubtful smile, were +singularly becoming to her. What is more, the damp air had made her hair +curl quite riotously, and the glow of her recent excitement still +lingered on her face. Mr. Powers saw her standing there, looking +anxiously about the dining saloon, and he thought he had never seen such +a pretty little thing. + + +III + +The fog had closed round them. The engines stopped, and the ship +wallowed helplessly in a heavy sea. The great whistle blew warningly, +threateningly, but nothing answered. The engines started up again, and +the ship moved forward slowly. The captain was maneuvering very +cautiously against this worst of all sea enemies. + +The passengers, thought Mr. Powers, were as unconcerned as so many +babies in a huge perambulator. There they sat, wrapped up in their +steamer chairs, reading, or talking, or flirting, or disapproving of +flirting, trusting absolutely to that unseen captain. Mr. Powers had +traveled so much that he knew that things could happen. He was not +apprehensive or nervous, for that was not his nature; but he was alert +and interested. He lay back in his own deck chair, his soft hat pulled +well down, and under it his dark eyes stared thoughtfully before him at +the impenetrable fog. People tramped past him, but he took only a mild +interest in them until-- + +“Again!” he said to himself. “What on earth is that girl doing?” + +By “that girl” he meant Miss Smith, who had just hurried by like a leaf +in the wind, her face pale and anxious. It was the third time she had +hurried by like that, and he felt quite sure that she was not walking +for amusement or health. Evidently she was troubled--very much troubled; +and Mr. Powers, instead of telling himself that it was none of his +business, wanted to help her. + +That little figure hastening through the rainy dusk, so pale and +troubled, made a strong appeal to his imagination. He did not make light +of other people’s difficulties, and was not afraid to meddle in other +people’s affairs, either, if he thought he could be of any use. He was +not a very cautious or prudent young man, anyhow. He felt thoroughly at +home in this world, and on excellent terms with his fellow creatures, +and was not at all shy or awkward with them. He was waiting for a chance +to speak to this young woman, and it came. + +Miss Smith did not appear for some time. Before she passed Mr. Powers +again, she had climbed to the upper deck, and had got thoroughly wet and +chilled. She was thoroughly disheartened, too, so that there were tears +in her eyes, and she couldn’t see very well. In consequence, she +stumbled against an empty deck chair. + +“Oh! Excuse me!” she said, to nobody at all, and crossed hastily to the +rail, ostensibly to look out over it, but really to dry her eyes. + +Mr. Powers stood beside her. + +“You’re very wet,” he said. + +“Oh! No, thank you!” replied Miss Smith politely. + +“Don’t mention it,” said he, equally polite; “but you really are. If I +were you--” + +“But I--I can’t find the people I’m with!” cried Miss Smith, with +something like a sob. + +She was too miserable to realize that she was actually talking to a +strange man. She didn’t even glance at him. She didn’t care what he +looked like. He had an agreeable and steady sort of voice, however. +Anyhow, the moment had come when she had to tell some one. + +“I’ve looked and looked--and I can’t find them!” she went on. + +Now some people pretend, out of pompousness and self-importance, never +to be surprised by anything, and Mr. Patterson was one of these. If you +told him of anything amazing, he would say: + +“Ah! Is that so? Well, I’m not at all surprised.” + +Some people really are not surprised by anything, because they know what +an astounding world this is; and Mr. Powers was one of these. So he +said, in a quiet and friendly way: + +“Perhaps I can help you. I’ll try.” + +Poor little Miss Smith had no objection to his trying. She went below to +her cabin, changed into dry clothes from her suit case, and rested. She +did everything that Mr. Powers had suggested, and one thing that he had +not suggested--which was to shed a few tears, for it was a very +distressing situation. + +A little after four o’clock she descended to the dining saloon for a cup +of tea, and to see Mr. Powers, who was to meet her there and give her +his news of the lost Pattersons. She had felt sure that Mr. Powers would +be there waiting for her, and he was; yet Miss Smith gave a start at the +sight of him. + +This benevolent stranger who had so kindly offered to help her was not +the bespectacled, middle-aged stranger he ought to have been, but a +remarkably good-looking young man. Though he was neatly and quietly +dressed, and in no way conspicuous, either in appearance or manner, yet +there was something in the nonchalant grace of his tall body, in the +expression of his dark, keen face, that was unmistakably--romantic. She +felt it, she knew it. As she came toward him, her own expression +changed, and she became every inch a governess. + +It seemed to be part of Mr. Powers’s mental equipment, however, to judge +pretty shrewdly what other people were feeling. He spoke to Miss Smith +in quite an impersonal tone. + +“I’m afraid,” he said, “that the people you’re with aren’t with _you_. +It appears that neither they nor their luggage ever came aboard.” + +“Oh!” cried Miss Smith. “But they must have come! They had their +tickets, and I left them on the pier, with all their trunks and bags. +Oh, can I possibly have got on the wrong ship?” + +“No,” said he. “Your name’s on the passenger list, and so are their +names; but they’re not aboard.” + +“But where are they? They couldn’t have--have fallen overboard?” + +“Well,” said Mr. Powers thoughtfully, “three of them together would make +quite a splash. I imagine some one would have noticed it.” + +“I’ve read about people falling down into holds,” said Miss Smith. “Do +you think--” + +“I shouldn’t count on that,” said Mr. Powers. “No--it seems pretty clear +to me that they changed their minds at the last moment, for some reason, +and remained ashore.” + +Mr. Patterson change his mind at the last moment? That was the most +impossible solution of all. + +“It can’t be that,” said Miss Smith, shaking her head. “No! Something +has happened!” + +Mr. Powers looked down at her in silence for a moment. + +“Is it--serious?” he asked. “I mean, does it make very much difference +to you, your friends not being here?” + +“Difference!” cried Miss Smith. “Why, it--” She stopped short. “You +see,” she went on, in an altered tone, “I’m their governess.” + +She looked steadily at the stranger as she said this, because she knew +that to some persons a governess would be quite a different creature +from an independent traveler. If it made a difference to this young man, +she thought she would like to know it. As far as she could judge, it did +not. He returned her glance in the same friendly, quiet fashion. + +“I see!” he said. + +Miss Smith was quite sure, however, that he did not see, or even +imagine. If he had, he wouldn’t have suggested her sending a radio +message to the Pattersons’ house. + +“I--no, thanks,” said Miss Smith. “It really wouldn’t do any good. I’m +here, and I’ve got to go on. I’ll come back on the same ship.” + +For she had her return ticket and nothing else--absolutely nothing else +except two quarters, which she found in her coat pocket. When she made +her mad dash for the forgotten ticket, she had had a bill clutched in +her hand, and the two coins were the change that the driver had given +her. She knew that she had had her purse with her on the pier, just +before that, but what had become of it she could not tell. Had she +dropped it on the pier? Had she intrusted it to the Pattersons? Had she +left it in the taxi, or in the house? Anyhow, it was gone. The +Pattersons were gone. Her trunk was gone. Here she was, sailing over the +Atlantic, with two quarters and a suit case. + +She wasn’t going to allow this strange young man to pay for a radio +message for her. Besides, what could she say? “Where are you?” “What +shall I do?” Impossible! Something had happened--something mysterious, +inexplicable. All that she could do now was to go on to Bermuda, come +back as fast as possible, and present herself before the Pattersons. +Then she would be informed; and she felt pretty sure that she had lost +not only her purse but her nice, safe position as well. + +The Pattersons had been disgusted with her for forgetting her ticket, +and, in their anger, they had set her adrift. Perhaps she would never +find them again. She would never get another position, if she couldn’t +get a reference from the Pattersons. Her trunk was lost, with almost all +her clothes. Things were as bad as they could be. + +As she considered this appalling situation, a strange thing happened to +Miss Smith. Instead of feeling utterly crushed, a curious sort of +elation came over her. She suddenly felt very happy, very light, as if +her worldly possessions and prospects had been so many heavy burdens, +which had now fallen from her shoulders and left her free. + +“We might as well have our tea,” she remarked cheerfully. + +There were little fancy cakes on the table, and she liked little fancy +cakes. The tea was good, too. It was the most refreshing, invigorating +tea she had ever tasted. She had two cups of it. Then she went up on the +promenade deck with Mr. Powers, and they walked. It was dark now, and +chilly and windy, but she liked that strong, salt wind. + +“Where’s your deck chair?” asked Mr. Powers. + +“Oh, I don’t know!” said she. “I never asked.” + +“I’ll find it for you,” said he, and settled her comfortably in his, +with his rug wrapped about her, while he went off. + +She watched him going. Then she watched every one else who passed by; +and it could not be denied that of all the men whom Miss Smith saw not +one was so handsome, so distinguished, so interesting as Mr. Powers. + +She leaned back and closed her eyes. The wind had blown away the fog, +the ship was forging steadily ahead through the rainy night, and she was +on it! Penniless and alone, she was sailing the sea to a coral isle! +She, the brisk, sensible Miss Smith who, twenty-four hours ago, had been +a governess on the West Side of New York! + +“I don’t care!” she said to herself, with a sort of triumph. “I’m young +and healthy. I can--” + +She didn’t complete the thought, but at that moment she actually felt +that she could do pretty nearly anything, and could face the wide world +undaunted. It was a very nice sort of feeling. + + +IV + +The weather was rough, and many people who had appeared for lunch were +not to be seen at dinner; but Miss Smith came down, quite fresh and +rosy. Her suit case could provide nothing better than a blue linen +blouse, which she had intended for breakfasts, not dinners. As she +dressed, she thought, with a sigh, that she looked very sedate and +unattractive; but Mr. Powers did not seem to think so. At least, he +looked pleased to see her. + +“I hope you don’t mind,” he said, “but I’ve taken a place for you at +Herbert’s table. I’ve had Herbert for table steward before, and he’s +good.” + +Miss Smith did not mind, and she, too, found Herbert a good table +steward. + +“But I shan’t be able to give him any tip,” she thought. “And when I +come back, all alone--” + +Resolutely she banished that thought. She remembered how her father and +mother used to talk about the folly of “borrowing trouble.” She had +often thought that a shiftless sort of maxim, but now she found it wise. +Perhaps they themselves had been wiser than she realized, for they had +lived joyously in the day that was actually present, not troubling about +days that had gone, or about future days which no one can really +foresee. + +Perhaps, she thought, the people who so anxiously provide for the future +are the true romantics; for don’t they invent a future all full of +troubles, and then believe firmly in what they have invented? Perhaps +the so-called romantic people are the most practical, after all. + +It was a good thing that notions like this came into her head, for they +helped her to endure the disturbing events of that evening with more +calmness than she could have felt if she had been entirely the old Miss +Smith. Even as it was, she was not a little upset. She sat in the wicker +armchair in her brightly lighted little stateroom. The ship pitched up +and down. Her coat, hanging on a hook, flapped like a great bird, and +her patent leather suit case slid over to the wall and out again. The +thoughts in her mind were quite as uneasy. + +“Darcy!” she said to herself. “Darcy! Heavens!” + +For Mr. Powers had casually mentioned that his first name was Darcy. He +was an Irishman--a mining engineer--and he had lived in South America +for several years. + +“Oh, Heavens!” said poor Miss Smith again. + +For here were all the qualifications for a true hero of romance. And the +way he had told her all this! It was on the almost deserted promenade +deck, where the storm curtains filled and flapped in the wind, and the +rain beat against them, and the scuppers rippled and gurgled like little +brooks. Sensible people stayed within, but there these two had sat, side +by side. The electric lights overhead had shone fiercely upon Mr. +Powers’s dark, eager face, and upon his hair, black as a raven’s wing. +He had told her all these things because he wanted her to know about +him, because he hoped she would understand and like him. He had almost +said so in words, and he had certainly said so with that half smiling, +half anxious glance of his. + +“I don’t care!” said Miss Smith to herself, with a sob. + +She might be silly, but she wasn’t so silly as that. This thing might be +an adventure. Indeed, she was willing to admit that it was one, and to +see it through gallantly; but an adventure with a “heart interest” in it +she would _not_ have! + +In desperation she looked about for something to distract her mind. +There was nothing to read except the little booklet hanging on the wall +and an old copy of Lamb’s “Essays,” which she had brought along partly +because she loved it, and partly because it seemed a fitting book for a +governess. She took the booklet down. Once more she read the hours for +meals, and then: + + DECK CHAIRS AND RUGS--Deck chairs and rugs can be hired for the + voyage at fixed charges. Payment should be made to the deck + steward, who will issue a ticket. + +Then payment _had_ been made to the deck steward for her chair and rug, +and by Mr. Darcy Powers, and she could not reimburse him! + +“I’ll have to be civil to him, at least, after that!” thought Miss +Smith. + + +V + +Sunday was the fairest day that ever dawned. Mr. Powers was on deck +early. He saw the sun come up, and he was sorry Miss Smith was not there +to see it, too. He thought she would have enjoyed the spectacle, and he +himself would have enjoyed it more if she had been there. + +At half past eight he went down into the dining saloon and looked about. +Ten minutes later he descended again. Three times during the half hour +he went into the dining saloon and looked about; and at last, at nine +o’clock, he sat down and ordered his breakfast. + +“Perhaps she’s seasick,” he thought. + +Powers, as a rule, like all those who are never seasick, was +unsympathetic toward those who were. He was inclined to consider +seasickness a rather humorous thing; but in this case he did not think +so. He thought of Miss Smith with unreasonable compassion. Sitting there +over his very hearty breakfast, he began to worry about her. He thought +it was a monstrous thing, an outrage, that she should be seasick. He +began to grow angry with the Pattersons for getting themselves lost. +They had no right to be so careless about themselves, and to leave Miss +Smith all alone. + +“She shouldn’t have to be a governess, anyhow--a pretty little thing +like that,” he reflected. + +Why Miss Smith’s small size or personal appearance should have debarred +her from that useful employment he could not have explained, or why he +found her so very touching. He had no idea how truly terrible her +situation was. He had fancied, indeed, that it might be a good thing for +her to have a little holiday from her Pattersons; but he was sorry for +her, just the same. He remembered how her curly dark hair blew about her +face in the wind, how the ruffled collar of her blouse stood up, how +busy her small hands had been in quelling this enchanting disorder. + +Mr. Powers sent a steward to inquire after her, and ten minutes later +she appeared in person. + +“I overslept myself!” she explained cheerfully. + +He did not realize what that meant. For years and years Miss Smith had +got up at seven o’clock. She had needed no alarm clock, for her sense of +duty had never failed to arouse her; and now the sense of duty had +slumbered. She was a little shocked at herself, and just a little proud. +Coming down to breakfast at half past nine! + +“You’ve finished, haven’t you?” she said. + +But she knew very well that he would wait with her, and so he did. + +“I think you’ll like Bermuda,” he said. “It’s a pretty place. I have an +aunt living there, you know. I hope you’ll let me bring her to call on +you.” + +“Oh, I’m sorry, but, you see, I shan’t be there,” said Miss Smith. “I’m +going right back on this ship.” + +“But the ship doesn’t sail again till Saturday, you know.” + +“Saturday!” cried Miss Smith. “Doesn’t sail till Saturday!” + +“No. At this time of the year there’s only one sailing a week.” + +The breakfast had come. Herbert stood by, benevolently watching, but +Miss Smith could not eat. She swallowed a cup of coffee and rose. + +“I--I think I’ll go up on deck now,” she faltered. + +Mr. Powers naturally went with her. He settled her in her deck chair and +sat down beside her, and for a long time there was silence. + +“Look here!” he said at last. “I’m sorry to see you so upset, Miss +Smith; but these people--these Pattersons--_can’t_ be so unreasonable +as--” + +“Oh, it’s not that!” said she, in a sort of despair. “Only--” + +He waited, looking at her face, which had suddenly grown so pale. + +“I wish you’d tell me,” he said at length. “I know I’m a stranger to +you, but--” He paused. “My aunt’s down there, you know,” he went on. +“She might be able to--to advise you.” + +Advice! What good would that do? Miss Smith was obliged to live on a +strange island from Monday until Saturday on two quarters. She shook her +head mutely. She couldn’t talk. She wished Mr. Powers would go away and +leave her alone, to think. + +After a while, he did. He saw he wasn’t wanted, and he went; but then it +was worse than ever. + +At half past twelve he came back. + +“Won’t you come down to lunch?” he asked. + +“I--I don’t feel like eating,” said Miss Smith. + +Now, however, she was not so anxious for Mr. Powers to go away and let +her think, and he did not go. + +“Look here!” he said firmly. “Miss Smith, are you a good judge of +character?” + +“We-ell, yes,” replied Miss Smith. “Yes, I _think_ so.” + +There is no one in the world who does not think the same thing. Just ask +anybody! + +“Then please look at me,” said Mr. Powers. + +She raised her eyes to his face, only for an instant, and then glanced +away. + +“Do you think I have an honest face?” he asked. “Trustworthy?” + +“Ye-es,” said Miss Smith. + +“Then won’t you trust me? Tell me what’s wrong. I’m older than you, and +I’ve knocked about a lot. I’ve been up against all sorts of +difficulties, and I know pretty well how to get out of them. You’re +here, all alone. You’re very young and very--” Again he paused. “Very +much worried,” he continued; “and if you would tell me--” + +Miss Smith stole another glance at his face, and it seemed to her not +only trustworthy but intelligent and friendly; so she told him. The +sedate and sensible Miss Smith confessed to a strange man that she only +had two quarters. + +He was silent for a moment, staring before him. + +“If I’m any good at all,” he thought, “I’ll handle this thing properly, +so that she won’t be hurt or offended or troubled in any way.” + +So he said aloud, in just the right tone, calm and good humored: + +“I see! Of course you were worried; but it’s all right now. I’ll take +you to my aunt, Mrs. Mount. She’ll understand.” + +Fortunately Miss Smith was not a sufficiently good judge of character to +read Mr. Powers’s mind just then; for he was thinking: + +“You poor, sweet little thing! You poor little darling! I’d like to buy +the whole island and give it to you! You ought to have everything. You +deserve everything, you dear little thing!” + +Miss Smith didn’t believe that people ever really thought things like +that. + + +VI + +Nor was Darcy Powers so good a judge of character as he fondly imagined; +for his aunt did not accept the situation in the right spirit at all. +She pretended to do so, and he thought she did, but in her heart she was +bitterly angry and hurt. Her nephew was all she had in the world, and +she loved him. She had been looking forward to this vacation of his for +two years; and then he came driving up with this Miss Smith! + +She listened to his explanation with a pleasant smile. Still with a +pleasant smile, she conducted Miss Smith to the spare bedroom and was +very civil to her. Then her nephew had to go off to see certain old +ladies who had known him since childhood and wanted to see him +immediately, and Mrs. Mount ceased to smile. + +Miss Smith was not worrying any more. Indeed, she had almost stopped +thinking altogether. She had got off the boat that morning into a new +world. She had got into a carriage with Mr. Powers and driven along a +dream road. The colors. The white road, the white walls, the white +houses, glistening like sugar in the sun! The pure blue of the sky, the +glimpses of the sapphire sea, the glossy green of the palm leaves, the +dark green of the cedars, the pink roses, the purple bougainvillea, the +scarlet hibiscus! + +Mrs. Mount’s cottage was an enchanted cottage, like the one that +_Hänsel_ and _Gretel_ found in the wood, standing in a garden glorious +with flowers. And Mrs. Mount herself was so handsome and dignified and +polite, and this little bedroom was so bright, so sweet, so sunny! + +“I’m really here!” thought Miss Smith. “I did come! It’s true!” + +She had not even taken off her hat or opened her suit case. She just sat +there by the window, lost in an innocent and utterly happy dream. This +new world was so beautiful, and every one was so kind to her! + +“Darcy is a dear boy,” said a voice from the garden, which she +recognized as Mrs. Mount’s; “but this is _too_ much!” + +“I heard,” said another voice, unknown to Miss Smith, but belonging to +Mrs. Mount’s cousin, Miss Pineville, “that Darcy got off the boat this +morning with some stranger--” + +“And brought her here!” said Mrs. Mount. “She scraped up an acquaintance +with him on shipboard--you know how easy that is--and told him some +preposterous tale about being a governess, and having lost her purse and +the family she was with. Of course there’s not a word of truth in it. A +governess! An adventuress--that’s what she is!” + +“Does Darcy--” began the other. + +“Oh, Darcy!” interrupted Mrs. Mount impatiently. “He’s completely taken +in by her; but I’m going to talk to him later. For instance, there’s +her name. She distinctly told me her name was Nina Smith; but she left +the book she’d been reading on the sitting room table, and written in it +was ‘Little M., from father.’ Nina doesn’t begin with an ‘M,’ does it? +And Smith! That’s just the name any one would take as an alias, to avoid +suspicion. But you wait! I’ll find out the truth! I won’t have my nephew +imposed upon!” + +“I’d like to see her,” said the other eagerly. “Perhaps I--” + +“I’ll call her out for a cup of tea,” said Mrs. Mount. “But be polite to +her, Eliza, until I’ve found out.” + +So Mrs. Mount went in and knocked on Miss Smith’s door. There was no +answer. She knocked again, and then she opened the door. Miss Smith and +her suit case were gone. + +At first Mrs. Mount was glad. + +“She must have heard what I said to Eliza in the garden,” she told her +nephew. “She was frightened and ran away.” + +“Frightened?” said he. “Is that how you imagine a sensitive young girl +feels when she hears herself slandered and insulted? I brought her +here--to you--because I thought you’d understand, and you’ve driven her +away. An adventuress? Why, one look at her face might have told you--” + +He turned away abruptly, but one look at _his_ face had certainly told +Mrs. Mount something. She was no longer glad, but very sorry. She would +have told him so, but it was too late. He had gone out of the house, +slamming the door behind him. + + +VII + +Miss Smith had done the obvious thing. She could not set off with her +suit case and walk home, so she had taken the next best course. She had +gone quietly out of the back door, through the garden, and down the road +in the direction of the ship, which was, after all, a sort of bridge to +home. + +It was a long walk, and she had to ask her way, but in the course of +time she got there. A young officer was standing under the shed, +superintending the unloading of the cargo, and she went up to him. + +“You’re one of the officers, aren’t you?” she asked. + +He took off his cap and smiled at her. It was such a nice smile that she +was able to go on, in a brisk, sensible way: + +“I was one of the passengers, you know.” + +“Yes,” said he. “I saw you on board.” + +“And I want to go back,” said Miss Smith. “I want to go on the ship now, +and stay there until it sails.” + +He couldn’t help looking astonished. + +“But I’m afraid--” he began. + +“Well, I’ve got to!” cried Miss Smith, and he saw, with dismay, that +there were tears in her eyes. “I’ve g-got to! I have some money in the +savings bank in New York, and I can pay whatever it costs as soon as we +get back.” + +“Yes, I’m sure,” he said politely; “but I’m afraid--” + +He was silent for a moment, thinking of some tactful way of offering his +assistance to this young person with tears in her eyes. No one could +have felt more sympathetic than he; but Miss Smith, weary and sick at +heart, firmly believed that he, too, thought her an adventuress. + +“I’m a governess,” she said, in an unexpectedly loud and severe tone. +“The family I was coming with somehow missed the ship, and--” + +“What?” he cried. “A governess! But wait--look here!” + +“Yes, I am!” said she. “I am!” + +“Yes, but look here! I was at the gangway, you know, and just before we +sailed a young chap came dashing up and gave me a purse--a long brown +purse--” + +“My purse!” + +“‘It’s for Miss--can’t remember the name,’ he said. ‘It’s for Miss +What’s-Her-Name, the governess,’ and then he dashed off again.” + +“That’s me!” cried Miss Smith, pardonably ungrammatical in her emotion. + +“Look here! I’m most awfully sorry!” said the young officer earnestly. +“It’s all my fault. I turned it over to the purser and told him that +Miss What’s-Her-Name would probably come and ask for it. You see, I +never thought _you_ could be a governess, you know. I _am_ sorry!” + +“But is it there? Can I get it?” + +“Rather!” said he. “Purser’s on board now, getting ready to go ashore. +I’ll fetch him.” + +Off he went, and was back in no time with the purser and Miss Smith’s +pocketbook. There was a note inside it. + +MY DEAR MISS SMITH: + + At the moment of embarkation I have received a message that my + father in Chicago is dangerously ill, and wishes his family with + him. I find we have just time to catch the next train. As it is too + late to cancel our tickets, it seems advisable that you at least + should continue with the trip, so that the entire outlay will not + be wasted. You will, I am sure, have an instructive and + entertaining account of your experience for Gladys when you rejoin + us in New York. You will find your trunk and suit case in your + stateroom. + + As I do not know what money you may have in hand, I inclose an + express money order, to cover whatever expenses may arise. + + Wishing you a pleasant and profitable trip, I remain, + + Very truly yours, + HENRY PATTERSON. + + +“You see!” cried Miss Smith. “You see, I _am_--” + +But she could not go on. The purser and the second officer--the latter +had come up just then--decided that she ought to have a cup of tea, to +quiet her nerves, so they all went over to a little tea room in the +town. + +It was there that Powers found her sitting at the table with two young +men, all of them very jolly and cheerful. For a moment she was glad that +he should see her like that--no longer forlorn and dejected, but a real +human girl. Hat in hand, he stood beside her. He, too, tried to look +jolly and cheerful, but he failed; and, looking up at him, Miss Smith +felt a sudden sharp stab of regret. The adventure was over. + +She introduced him to the two young men, and explained to him about the +recovery of her purse. + +“Good!” said he. “Then everything’s all right now?” + +Of course everything was all right now, and yet--and yet somehow it +wasn’t. Something seemed to be wrong. The two young men from the ship +seemed to know this. They said they had better be getting along, and, +after cordial farewells, they did go along. + +Mr. Powers still stood where he was, still trying to look pleased, and +still failing to do so; and in a flash Miss Smith understood just how he +felt. He had wanted to be the one to make everything come out right, and +it was cruel that he had not been. It was their adventure--his and hers. +Nobody else had any business to get into it. It was coming out wrong! + +Now Miss Smith knew very well that heroines in adventures rarely take a +very active part, and that things just happen to them; but she was not +quite accustomed to adventures yet, and she was in the habit of doing +things for herself. Moreover, Darcy Powers was playing his part very +poorly, simply standing there and not suggesting their talking it over. + +“I’d like to go back and see Mrs. Mount,” she said firmly. + +His face brightened remarkably. + +“I didn’t think you’d ever--” he began. + +“I’d like to show her that letter and explain--” + +“See here!” he interrupted. “It’s not for _you_ to make explanations!” + +She liked the way he said that! + +“Still,” she said, “I’d rather.” + +So they got into a carriage and drove off along that same road; but it +was all very different now. The sun had gone down, leaving a soft, dark +violet sky. The bright colors were dimmed. It was, she thought, a +subdued and rather melancholy world. The adventure was over. + +Mr. Powers remarked again how glad he was that everything had come out +all right; but, as Miss Smith said nothing in response to this, he was +discouraged and fell silent for a time. + +“I never thought you’d come back there,” he said at last. “I +thought--perhaps you had overheard what my aunt said, and--” + +“Yes, I did overhear it,” said Miss Smith, in a calm and reasonable +tone; “but, after all, she knew nothing about me. Why should she?” + +“Anybody would know that you were--” he began, and stopped. + +Miss Smith waited in vain to hear what she was. Turning a corner, they +entered a road where the trees arched overhead and the low white walls +gleamed ghostlike. A faint breeze rustled the leaves, and the little +whistling frogs had set up their music. The lights of Mrs. Mount’s +cottage were visible at the end of the road. + +A strange pain seized Miss Smith. The lights of that little house, +shining out steadily into the tranquil dusk, put her in mind of another +cottage--her home, so long ago--and of the mother and father who had +lived in it. She thought of the careless laughter, the hope, the +courage, the great love, that had made their whole life a delightful +adventure. Foolish? Romantic? Unpractical? + +“They were the wisest, most wonderful people who ever lived,” she said +to herself, with a stifled sob; “and the bravest. They weren’t afraid of +life, like me!” + +“I wonder what happened to your trunk!” said Mr. Powers. + +So that was all he could think of to say! + +“I don’t know,” she answered; “and I don’t care, either. I suppose it +must have been taken away by mistake with the Pattersons’ luggage.” + +“I hope you’ll recover it,” said he. + +Another silence, very long. + +“I did tell Mrs. Mount one thing that wasn’t quite true,” said Miss +Smith. + +“What was that?” asked Darcy Powers, and she knew by his voice that he +thought whatever she had said was right. + +“I told her my first name was Nina--and it isn’t.” + +“What is it, then?” he asked. + +The carriage had stopped before the gate. He got out and helped her +down, and they both stood there until the sound of the horse’s hoofs had +died away. + +“What is your name?” he asked again. + +“It’s a very silly name,” she said. “I never tell it to any one.” + +Her hand was on the gate, to open it. His hand closed over hers. + +“Please!” he said. “I know you’re going away. I think you’ve begun to go +already. Can’t you just let me know that, so that I can think of you by +your own dear name?” + +“No!” said Miss Smith. + +She was really frightened. She knew that if she told him her name, here +in this enchanted garden, in the twilight, it would be fatal. The +adventure was becoming too much for her. Her own heart was getting too +much for her, filled with emotions she could not bear. She was Miss +Smith, the governess--the brisk, sensible, unromantic Miss Smith--she +tried valiantly to remember that. + +“No!” she said again, and pulled away her hand. + +Just then the door of the cottage opened, and Mrs. Mount appeared in the +lighted doorway. + +“Darcy!” she called. “And--oh, Miss Smith! Oh, come in, my dear!” + +Her voice had warmth in it, and kindliness. It reminded Miss Smith of +her mother, who used to stand in a lighted doorway like that, and call +her in from her play. She thought of herself going back to New York to +be a governess again. She thought of Mr. Powers--Darcy--left alone in +that garden, thinking of her. Was he, after all his kindness, to be left +thinking of her as “Miss Smith”? + +She turned toward him. + +“My name’s really Mavourneen,” she said. “You see, I was the only child, +and father and mother--” + +“Mavourneen!” said he, and somehow, as he said it, the name was not a +silly one at all. “That means--” + +“Yes, I know,” she interrupted hastily, and walked quickly up the path +toward Mrs. Mount. + +Somewhat to the young man’s surprise, Mrs. Mount held out her arms, and +Miss Smith went into them; and after all, it was not the end of the +adventure, but only the beginning. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +SEPTEMBER, 1925 +Vol. LXXXV NUMBER 4 + + + + +The Wonderful Little Woman + +MRS. FREMBY DEMONSTRATES HER ENERGY, COURAGE, AND EFFICIENCY, WITH +SOMEWHAT UNEXPECTED RESULTS + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +The clock struck midnight, but Mrs. Fremby did not even glance up from +her work. She had an old skirt, stretched over the transom, so that the +landlady could not see that the light was still on. The door was locked. +She was safe, and very snug. + +Outside, a preposterous storm raged. It was almost the beginning of +April, yet it snowed, and the wind howled. Let it! Mrs. Fremby had a +forbidden electric heater glowing richly before her. It could not warm +the vast and dingy front parlor that she inhabited, but it could and did +keep her feet warm. The flame of righteous indignation in her heart +helped, too, as she wrote: + + At last the American woman has definitely rebelled. She refuses any + longer to accept unquestioned the dictates of Paris as to what she + shall or shall not wear. This season it is plain to any impartial + observer that the influence of the French capital is distinctly on + the wane. + +Heavens, how she hated Paris! For years and years she had been fighting +its insidious influence upon American modes. Even when, in order to earn +her daily bread, she was obliged to describe what milady had worn at the +Longchamp races, she always managed to get in some clever bit of +propaganda--something like this, for instance: + + A certain American woman of unimpeachable social standing attracted + considerable attention by her costume of this and that, made in New + York, and showing in every line a skillful adaptation to the + American type. + +What if this independent American woman of unimpeachable standing was an +invention of Mrs. Fremby’s? Never having been within thousands of miles +of Longchamp, she was obliged to invent a little, and this mythical +creature was very real to her, and dear. She could absolutely see that +“American type,” tall, proud, and beautiful, completely dominating all +the _Parisiennes_. + +Mrs. Fremby herself was small. That was her misfortune; but she made the +most of herself. Even now, in an old and faded dressing gown, she was a +mighty smart, trim little woman, and, if she was not pretty, she had the +wit to know it, and to behave accordingly. Her good points were her +miniature figure, which was excellent, and her crown of glittering, wiry +red hair, which she arranged with much skill. The very foundation of +style, she often said, was individuality, and she had it. + +“The modes of this season will be marked by--” she was writing, when +there was a knock at the door. + +Mrs. Fremby got up. Swiftly and noiselessly she detached the heater and +thrust it, still red-hot, into a cupboard under the washstand. Then, +with a lofty expression of annoyance, she went to open the door; but it +was not the landlady--it was Judith Cane. + +“My dear!” cried Mrs. Fremby. “Come in!” + +Judith came in. Snowflakes were melting upon her furs, her eyelashes +were damp, and there was a fine color in her cheeks. She was indeed a +superb creature, tall, dark, and beautiful, the physical embodiment of +that “American type” who should have attracted considerable attention +at Longchamp. Unfortunately, however, she lacked a certain vital +quality--animation, Mrs. Fremby would have said, but in the office of +the _Daily Citizen_ they called it “bean.” They said in that office that +Judith was beautiful but dumb. + +Mrs. Fremby, however, was not one to pick flaws in her friends. She was +loyal, even to the point of prejudice. She was devoted to Judith, and +she acknowledged no faults in her. + +“Sit down, my dear child,” she said. + +As Judith did so, she locked the door again, and hastened about, making +hospitable preparations. She connected the heater again, and also a +small electric grill. The light grew perilously dim. + +“They ought to put in a larger meter,” observed Mrs. Fremby, with the +air of an electrical expert. “I can’t make coffee, my dear. It smells; +but we’ll have tea and rolls, and some perfectly delicious Bologna. +Isn’t it wretched weather?” + +“Yes,” said Judith. “And there I sat, rewriting and rewriting that +article about smoking accessories for Mr. Tolley, and in the end he +killed it!” + +“Beast!” said Mrs. Fremby. + +She remembered how Mr. Tolley had once described Judith. + +“She is,” he had said, “a space writer--which means that she fills blank +space in a blank manner.” + +“Never mind!” she went on. “I’ve got a thing here that ought to run to a +column, if you pad it a little. We’ll fix it up, and you can turn it in +to-morrow. Now, my dear, do tell me!” + +“I’ve lost,” said Judith. + +“I knew it!” cried Mrs. Fremby. “I felt it all along! What an outrage!” + +It was a question here of an orphan child. The child’s mother had been +Judith’s sister, and upon the sister’s decease Judith had put in a claim +for the custody of the infant. According to all the laws of justice and +humanity--as interpreted by Mrs. Fremby--Judith should have got the +infant, but another woman, a sister of the mere father, had likewise put +in a claim; and as this woman had a very wealthy husband, and a home, +and other things which surrogates deem advantageous for infants, and +Judith had none of these, the other claimant had triumphed. + +“It’s an outrage!” Mrs. Fremby repeated. “You’ll fight it, of course?” + +Judith shed a few melancholy tears. + +“I don’t know, Evelyn,” she said. + +“Don’t know! You must!” + +“It’s so expensive, Evelyn. Even if I got the poor little thing, I don’t +know what I could do with her. I only made twelve dollars last week.” + +Mrs. Fremby recognized in her friend a mood which exasperated her--a +large, vague despair and resignation. + +“You ought to know that I’ll always help you till you get on your feet,” +she said sternly. + +“I do know,” said Judith, shedding more tears; “but it seems to take me +so long to get on my feet! All I do is--to get on your feet.” + +“Nonsense!” said Mrs. Fremby. + +She had, in her heart, no very great illusions about Judith’s ability to +earn money, but what did that matter? Judith wanted her niece, and what +Judith wanted she ought to have. That was nothing more than justice. + +“Judith, I’m going to handle this,” she announced. + +“Don’t do anything--awful,” said Judith. “You know, Evelyn, you’re so--” + +Mrs. Fremby smiled as if she had received a compliment. + +“Leave it to me,” she said. “Just drink your tea, my dear child, and +don’t worry.” + +So Judith, with a sigh, let slip the burden from her magnificent +shoulders. + + +II + +It was a riotous sort of day. The wind went rampaging about Central +Park, and the sun laughed down upon the gay confusion of tossing +branches, just beginning to grow green. In sheltered spots traces of +snow still lingered, but it was melting very fast. The ground was soft, +the iron thrall of winter was loosed. + +It was not quite the sort of Sunday that Miss Mackellar could approve +of. The wind disarranged her hair, and the promise of spring troubled +her spirit. Her feet hurt, too. She sat down upon a bench and buttoned +her voluminous plaid coat tightly about her, and, as the young child +whose governess she was ran around and around the bench, she said “Woo!” +each time the child appeared before her. + +She did this with all the fervor she could command, for she was fond of +the little girl, and she was a conscientious woman; but she knew that +she failed. The child was generously giving her every chance to be +entertaining while sitting still, and she was not being entertaining. +Before long she would be obliged to rise and limp off in quest of ducks +and squirrels, who could do better. + +“Woo!” she said once more. + +“What is it ’at says ‘Woo’?” asked the child. “Bears?” + +“Yes, pet--bears. Big, brown, woolly bears.” + +“Do bears run after you?” + +“No, pet. They sit in their dark, dark caves and say ‘Woo.’” + +“I don’t like bears,” said the child flatly. + +Miss Mackellar could think of no other retort than a fresh “Woo,” but it +was not accepted. + +“I like tigers,” said the child; “tigers ’at pounce.” + +“Look out, then!” cried a gay voice. “I’m a tiger! And I pounce! +Gr-r-r!” + +It was a trim, brisk little red-haired woman who had just come around +the turn in the path. In fact, like a real tiger, she had been lurking +there in ambush for some time, watching and waiting unsuspected. + +“Gr-r-r!” she said again, moving forward with gleaming eyes and +outstretched claws. + +The little girl was delighted. With shrieks of joy she ran behind the +bench, pursued by this wholly satisfactory tiger. Around and around they +went, the brisk little woman as indefatigable as the child. + +But the dejected Miss Mackellar had a conscience which hurt her even +more than her shoes. She believed that life was very hard and painful, +and that if it wasn’t, then you were certainly doing wrong. She felt +that she had no right to sit there and be comfortable. + +“It’s very kind of you, I’m sure,” she said to Mrs. Fremby--for the +tiger was that lady; “but really I shouldn’t let you. I ought--” + +“It’s a pleasure,” Mrs. Fremby assured her. “I am very much in harmony +with children. Gr-r-r!” She disappeared around the bench again. “In +fact,” she continued, when she reappeared, “I wrote a series of articles +once upon ‘Scientific Play.’ Play is really work, you know.” + +“Indeed it is!” Miss Mackellar agreed, with a sigh. + +“I mean for the child. It is in play that a child develops those +qualities of--aha! Gr-r-r!” And again she was gone. “Now then!” she +said, addressing the child. “The tiger’s going to hide around the +corner, by those bushes, and you’d just better not look for it!” + +Miss Mackellar could not help feeling glad that the lively game was now +a little removed from her bench. She did not, however, believe in luck, +unless it was bad, and she wondered earnestly why this little interlude +of peace was granted to her. Perhaps it was to give her a chance to +think about serious things. She did so. + +But wasn’t it almost too quiet? Hunter and tiger had vanished around the +corner. That had happened half a dozen times before, but this time it +seemed so long-- + +Miss Mackellar rose to her feet with a worried frown. + +“I shouldn’t let that child out of my sight,” she thought. “I am failing +in my duty! They’ll have to come back and stay where I can see them, +or”--she sighed--“or I suppose I’ll have to follow where they go.” + +She walked around the turn of the path. No one in sight! + +She walked on a little. She stopped to listen. Not a sound! + +Then she went back to the bench and called: + +“Natalie! Natalie!” + +It is strange what a sinister effect may be caused by calling a person +who does not answer. As soon as she had called, Miss Mackellar grew +really frightened. She actually ran up the path, and, meeting a +nursemaid with a perambulator, she cried: + +“Oh, did you see a little girl with a tiger? No--I mean a little girl in +a pink hat and a red-haired woman?” + +“Er-huh,” said the nursemaid, staring hard at her. “Just a minute +ago--goin’ up that way, to the entrance, walking terrible fast.” + +“Oh, Heavens!” cried Miss Mackellar, ashen white. “Oh, stop them, +somebody! The child has been kidnaped!” + +The nursemaid also turned pale. + +“Oh, my!” she exclaimed. “I never! Then I’d better get _this_ baby home, +quick as ever I can!” + +And she set off with her perambulator at a dangerous rate of speed. + +The luckless Miss Mackellar stood in the middle of the path, clasping +her trembling hands, and trying in vain to make her panic-stricken brain +function lucidly. What she really wanted to do was to scream. + +“No, no!” she said to herself. “I must keep calm. Oh, there’s a +policeman! But I don’t know--perhaps that’s the wrong thing to do. It +might get into the newspapers, if I tell a policeman, and Mr. Donalds is +always so angry at newspapers. Oh! Oh! If they had only come to me and +told me they were going to steal the child, I’d have been glad to draw +all my money out of the savings bank and hide it under a tree for them! +That’s what they always seem to want some one to do. Of course I know I +wouldn’t have enough, but--oh, my precious Natalie! Oh, Mr. Donalds! Oh, +my poor darling Natalie!” + +She began to cry. + +“I’ll go to Mr. Donalds this instant,” she thought. “I don’t care what +happens to me. Let them put me in jail--that’s where I ought to be! It’s +all my fault!” + +Off she went, as fast as her shaking knees and her fluttering heart +permitted; and this is her last personal appearance in this story, for +any account of her interview with her employer would be too painful to +set before a humane reader. + +Only let it be said that she survived--that when Mr. Donalds rushed out +of his house on East Seventy-Fourth Street, Miss Mackellar was still +breathing. He had at first intended to take her with him, to identify +persons and places, but even he could see the uselessness of doing so. +She was in no condition to identify anything. She was beginning to rave +about the child’s having been carried off by a tiger; so he left her +behind. + +Like a stone from a catapult he shot out of his house and down the +street toward the park. He had no intention of allowing the police to +interfere with his private affairs. He believed he knew very well who +had stolen the child, and why. + +“Very well, madam!” he said to himself. “We shall see!” + + +III + +Mr. Donalds knew that the child would suffer no bodily harm, and he was +confident of his ability to snatch her away from contaminating moral +influences before serious injury to her character could result. Mr. +Donalds never failed. If he did not always accomplish exactly what he +set out to do, at least he did something else which seemed to him just +as good. + +He knew that in this case he would succeed, as usual, and therefore he +was able to devote his mind to being angry. His fury rose within him +like steam, actually seeming to inflate him, so that he bounced rather +than walked. A short, stoutish man he was, with a pale Napoleonic face +and a piercing glance--a man of tremendous energy and determination. + +Sometimes, however, he was a man of too little patience and +deliberation. This morning, for instance, although he had thought to +take his hat and his walking stick, he had forgotten to change his +slippers. He was wearing red morocco slippers that came up over the +ankle, and not only were they conspicuous, but they were too thin for +outdoor walking. + +However, it was not his way to turn back, and forward he went. He +entered the park and proceeded direct to the spot where Miss Mackellar +said she had last seen the child. He looked for clews. There were none. + +He followed the course which the nursemaid had pointed out to Miss +Mackellar, and in due time he arrived at another entrance. There was a +cab stand here, in which stood one taxi, with the chauffeur standing +beside it, leisurely surveying the world in which we live. Mr. Donalds +approached him. + +“See here!” he said. “Did you happen to see a red-haired woman and a +child in a pink hat come out of the park near here?” + +“Yep,” replied the man, without interest. + +Mr. Donalds had not lived some fifty years for nothing. He knew how to +inspire enthusiasm. He put his hand into his pocket. + +“Yes, sir!” answered the driver promptly, in a brisk and earnest tone. +“They came out here. I noticed ’em because she was in such a hurry. I +thought there was something queer about it. Anyways, she took Wickey’s +cab.” + +“Where did they go?” + +“Couldn’t tell you that, sir. They started up the avenoo; but they might +’a’ bin goin’ anywheres.” + +“Where can I find this Wickey?” inquired Mr. Donalds. + +“Well, I don’t know, sir. He’ll prob’ly come back here before long. Him +and me are buddies, an’ we gen’rally eat lunch together, if we can. O’ +course, lots o’ times we can’t. F’r instance, I might have to go out +any minute now.” + +“What’s the number of his cab?” + +“Don’t know, sir--didn’t notice. You see, we don’t always take out the +same one. Some days the one you’re used to is laid up.” + +Mr. Donalds reflected hastily. + +“I suppose I could find out by telephoning to the garage,” he suggested. + +“Yes, sir; but they wouldn’t know where he went. Wouldn’t do much good, +unless you want to set the cops after him.” + +“No,” said Mr. Donalds. “I’ll handle this myself. You’re fairly certain, +then, that this Wickey will return here before going to his garage?” + +“Expect to see him any minute now, sir.” + +“Very well, then--I’ll wait here. I’ll engage your cab. I’ll pay you for +your time until this Wickey comes,” said Mr. Donalds. + +He climbed into the cab, but he was very restless in there. + +“Be sure Wickey doesn’t pass by!” he called out of the window. + +“Oh, he’d gimme a hail,” the driver assured him. “Don’t you worry, sir.” + +But time was flying. At least, time was undoubtedly flying for the +nefarious red-haired woman, but for Mr. Donalds it passed with leaden +foot. The chauffeur was smoking what Mr. Donalds was wont to call a +“filthy cigarette,” and though he had often declared that such things +were not tobacco at all, still the aroma of this one put him painfully +in mind of cigars. He had none with him. He grew more and more restless. + +At last another cab came up, and its driver descended. + +“Is that Wickey?” cried Mr. Donalds. + +“No, sir,” answered his especial driver. “‘Nother fellow.” + +“Ask him to go somewhere and buy me half a dozen cigars,” said Mr. +Donalds. “Tell him to get Havana perfectos.” + +This was soon done, and as he began to smoke, Mr. Donalds felt calmer; +but a new and more serious craving now assailed him. He was in the habit +of lunching promptly at one o’clock, and it was now half past one. The +cab was hot with the sun blazing down upon it, and this, combined with +the bad effects of boiling rage, sizzling impatience, and fast growing +hunger, were impairing Mr. Donalds’s health. He felt positively ill. He +threw away his third cigar half finished. + +The driver approached the window. + +“I’m going to get a bite to eat, sir,” he said. “This here fellow knows +Wickey. He’ll stay till I get back.” + +“Just a minute!” said Mr. Donalds. “I--er--” + +This was intensely distasteful to him, but he knew that without food he +could not be at his best. + +“Bring me back something to eat,” he said; “something--er--small and not +conspicuous, if possible.” + +Thus it was that Mr. Donalds, eminent business man and mirror of +respectability, might have been seen eating a “hot dog” in a taxicab on +Fifth Avenue on a Sunday afternoon. He had pulled down the blinds, had +taken the first bite, and was discovering that he had never tasted +anything so exquisite, so zestful--when the door was opened and a +policeman looked in. + +“Now, what’s all this?” asked the policeman reproachfully. “This won’t +do, you know!” + +Mr. Donalds managed to convince the officer that his presence was +perfectly legitimate; but the incident disturbed him. He felt himself an +outcast from society. He no longer relished the “hot dog,” but he +finished it. + +Then he was assailed by a fearful thirst, and there is no knowing what +might have happened next, if the elusive Wickey had not appeared. + +“There he is!” cried Mr. Donalds’s driver. “Hey, Wickey! Come here!” + +Wickey approached. + +“Yes,” he said, in answer to Mr. Donalds’s questions. “I took ’em out to +a place on the Boston Post Road--long run. I jest got back--empty to +City Island; then I picked up a fare.” + +“Take me to the place where you left the woman,” said Mr. Donalds. + +“Sorry, sir,” said Wickey, “but I can’t afford to take the chance of +comin’ back empty.” + +“Oh, I’ll pay!” shouted Mr. Donalds. “Don’t waste any more time!” + + +IV + +In dust, in gasoline fumes, in an endless procession of cars, Mr. +Donalds proceeded on his way. They stopped for gasoline, they stopped +while Wickey investigated a knock in the engine, they stopped again and +again because the procession stopped. Signs told them to “go slow,” and +they went slow, until Mr. Donalds was on the verge of frenzy. + +He tried to be calm. He reminded himself that he was a relentless human +bloodhound, never to be eluded, and that no matter where the criminals +went, were it to the very ends of the earth, they could not escape him. +Even these thoughts could not appease him. He was hungry, he was +extremely thirsty, and he was displeased with his red morocco slippers. + +It is fortunate that he did not know how streaked with dust and +perspiration his face was, how rumpled his stubby hair. As it was, when +he caught any one staring at him, he believed it was because of the +ruthless determination of his expression. + +At last Wickey turned off the Post Road and stopped halfway down a lane, +before a little old-fashioned cottage which bore this sign: + + YE BETSY BARKER TEA HOUSE + +“Here’s where she went,” said Wickey. + +Mr. Donalds sprang out, and, bidding the man wait, opened the garden +gate and advanced up the path. The cottage door was unlatched, and he +entered, to find himself in a dim, cool little room, filled with small +tables and high-backed settees. + +There was no one else in the room. He had come in so quietly, in his +slippers, that no doubt he had not been heard. He waited a moment, and +then he rapped vigorously upon one of the tables. + +Almost immediately there entered a thin little white-haired woman +wearing a chintz apron. + +“Tea?” she asked in a little bleating voice. + +She was such a very respectable sort of little woman, and the atmosphere +of the place was so very tranquil, that Mr. Donalds felt somewhat +abashed. + +“No, thank you,” he said. “I’m looking for a woman with red hair and a +child in a pink hat.” + +Suddenly the whole thing seemed to him so fantastic that he was almost +apologetic--until he observed that the woman’s face grew very pale. + +“Ha!” he cried. “I see you know something of this! Then--” + +“I--I--I--” she faltered. “You must be mistaken. I--I never heard of +them. They’ve gone away.” + +“You contradict yourself, madam!” said Mr. Donalds sternly. “Come, tell +me what you know--at once!” + +“I--I--I--” said she, trembling with an alarm which he could not but +think guilty. “Oh! Please go away!” + +“Go away!” he repeated, affronted and amazed. “I have come here for the +purpose of--” + +She began to cry. Mr. Donalds had not been an employer of great numbers +of female stenographers for years and years without learning to +withstand tears. In fact, he had formed the notion that women generally +cried whenever they had made a mistake, and that it was a feminine way +of apologizing. + +“Come, come!” he said. “Tell me where the child is--immediately!” + +But all she did was to back into a corner and go on crying. Mr. Donalds +was not profoundly moved. On the contrary, he was irritated. + +“I shall search the premises,” he announced, and made for the door. + +The woman came after him, calling in a loud and terrified voice: + +“Evelyn! Evelyn! Evelyn! Quick!” + +This was undoubtedly a warning, and Mr. Donalds went forward very +rapidly. He reached the foot of a narrow, boxed-in stairway, and had his +foot on the bottom step, when, with a rustle of skirts and a click of +high heels, down rushed a little human whirlwind, with such impetuosity +that he had just time to spring aside. + +“What do you mean by this?” the whirlwind demanded. “What’s he been +doing, Betsy?” + +“He--he--he--” bleated the other. + +Mr. Donalds was silent, staring at this new one. She had red hair. She +had, moreover, the air of one who is capable of anything. He felt +absolutely certain that she was the kidnaper; and he decided that he +would confute, abash, and alarm her by a sudden onslaught. + +“Come!” he shouted. “Where is the child? Quick! No nonsense! Where is +the child?” + +“Do you imagine I’m going to tell you?” said she. + +He was very much taken aback and shocked by this unaccountable display +of effrontery. + +“Then you do not deny it?” + +“Certainly not!” she replied calmly. “I admit it.” + +“Then stand aside! I shall search the house!” + +“By all means,” said she. “The more time you waste over it, the better +for me.” + +Now, there might be some truth in this. He hesitated, scowling, staring +at the criminal, who returned his stare without flinching. He saw that +he had no ordinary person to deal with. This was a master mind. + +“I shall call the police,” he said, but he didn’t mean it. + +“Pray do!” said she. + +It was Mr. Donalds’s belief that those who could not be bullied must be +bribed; so he changed his tone. + +“Madam,” he said, “my sole object is the recovery of the child. To +accomplish this, I am willing--” + +“Come into the tea room, Mr. Henderson,” she interrupted, “and we’ll +discuss the matter. I can assure you that the child is quite safe and +happy, and that you will accomplish nothing by violence. No, Mr. +Henderson--the best thing you can do is to come to terms with me.” + +“My name is not Henderson,” he began, but she had gone past him into the +tea room, and he followed. + +“Tea, Betsy dear!” said she. “For two, please!” + +“No!” said Mr. Donalds. “I do not want tea!” + +“And sandwiches,” went on the red-haired woman, unperturbed. “And cake, +if you please, Betsy dear. Sit down, Mr. Henderson!” + +“I shall stand,” said he, and stand he did, with his arms folded. + +The woman sat down, and she said nothing. Mr. Donalds appreciated the +cleverness of this silence. By saying nothing at all she had him at a +disadvantage, for she did not mind waiting, and he did. He was obliged +to begin. + +“Well?” he demanded. + +“Well!” she returned briskly. + +There was another silence--quite a long one. + +“I suppose,” said Mr. Donalds, at last, “that you have some sort of +terms to suggest. Let me hear them!” + +“Certainly,” said she; “but here’s our tea. How nice! Thank you, Betsy +dear!” + +Mr. Donalds remained silent until the timid Betsy had set the tea out on +the table and once more retired. + +“Now!” he said grimly. “The terms, madam--the terms!” + +“Mr. Henderson,” she replied in a grave tone, “I wish you would sit down +and take a cup of tea--and a sandwich. They’re very nourishing +sandwiches. I made them myself; and you _need_ nourishment and +refreshment. You are tired, and in an extremely nervous condition.” + +This was almost more than Mr. Donalds could bear. He struggled with his +indignation for a moment, and then gave a short laugh. + +“No doubt my pitiful condition distresses you very greatly,” he +observed, with biting sarcasm. + +“It does,” said she. “I am a good judge of character, and, since I have +actually seen you, I am inclined to believe that you are not really a +bad or heartless man. I feel now that what you have done, you have done +more through lack of understanding than from deliberate cruelty.” + +“Upon my word!” said Mr. Donalds. + +He was dazed. He sank heavily into a chair opposite her, and stared at +her; and she actually smiled at him--smiled gravely but kindly. + +“Good!” said she. “Now we can talk like two reasonable human beings. +Milk _and_ sugar?” + +“It doesn’t matter,” said he, as if in a dream. “I don’t want it, +anyhow.” + +“I don’t care much for tea myself,” she told him; “but it is refreshing. +A sandwich? If you don’t like cheese, I’ll get you--” + +“I do like cheese,” he admitted. + +“Most men do,” said she. “My poor husband was so fond of it! He was a +newspaper man, and when he came home late I would make him a nice little +Welsh rarebit, and he’d have that and a glass of beer. That was years +ago, of course, when you could get beer.” + +She sighed, but Mr. Donalds understood that the sigh was only for her +late husband, not for any other vanished joys. + +“I do like to see a man comfortable!” she suddenly remarked. + +He believed her. Extraordinary and preposterous as it was, he believed +that she really wished _him_ to be comfortable. She had prepared a cup +of tea for him, and she watched him while he drank it and ate a +sandwich--yes, two or three sandwiches--with the air of a solicitous +hostess. + +“Another cup?” she asked. “And now won’t you smoke?” + +“Thank you,” said he. + +He lit a cigar and took a few puffs. He really felt very much better +now. The tea and the sandwiches had done him good, and the atmosphere of +the place was most restful. The sun was sinking. Already the corners of +the room were shadowy, and a shaft of mellow light from the window +illumined the woman’s glittering hair in a singular fashion. Seen thus, +and through a faint haze of tobacco smoke, she looked not exactly +pretty, but certainly attractive, so straight was she, so trim, so +smart, so self-possessed. + +Mr. Donalds came to his senses with a start. + +“The terms, madam!” he said--not savagely now, but firmly. + +“Mr. Henderson,” she replied, “I shouldn’t like you to misunderstand me. +Perhaps it is a weakness, but I shouldn’t like you to think that my +motives were unworthy.” + +“I--” he began, and stopped himself just in time. “I don’t think so,” he +had been about to say, but that would never do; so he said nothing. + +“I give you my word,” she continued, in a voice almost sorrowful, “that +I personally have nothing whatever to gain by this. My only object has +been to secure justice for others.” + +“Justice!” repeated Mr. Donalds. “You call it justice to--” + +“I do,” said she. “Now please listen. First”--she paused--“first, that +poor creature--that governess--” + +“Ha!” cried Mr. Donalds. “Miss Mackellar! So she is a party to this!” + +“No, she isn’t. She’s simply a victim, and I don’t wish her to suffer +for what isn’t her fault. _Any one_ could _see_ what she is,” the +red-haired woman went on with great earnestness. “She’s perfectly +helpless. She’s a victim of life--of man.” + +“I’m sure _I_--” he began indignantly. + +“I’m sure you’ve frightened her. I’m sure you’ve discharged her.” + +“Naturally!” + +“Well, then, the first article of our agreement must be this,” said she. +“Miss--Mackellar, you said? Miss Mackellar is to have an annuity of one +thousand dollars a year.” + +“No!” shouted Mr. Donalds. “No! I refuse!” + +“Then it’s a deadlock,” said she, and poured herself another cup of tea. + +A silence. + +“You assure me that the woman is absolutely innocent of any +participation in the kidnaping?” demanded Mr. Donalds. + +“Absolutely! Any one could see that. She’s only a poor, muddled, tired +little woman who does her best. She needs help, and you can very well +afford to do this for her.” + +“Very well!” said Mr. Donalds. “I agree to this--outrage!” + +To tell the truth, the red-haired woman’s description of Miss Mackellar +had rather touched him. + +“Will you write it down, please?” said she. “Just say that you will +provide an annuity of one thousand dollars a year for Miss Mackellar, as +from the 10th of April, 1925.” + +She spoke in an efficient, businesslike tone, which somehow gave an air +of plausibility to this incredible proposal, and he obeyed. He wrote on +a page of his notebook, signed it, and put it on the table before him. + +“And now,” she went on, “you will agree to settle upon Judith, for life, +an income of--” + +“Judith!” he cried. “This is too much!” + +“Write this,” she said calmly, “and I shall at once take you to the +child.” + +“This is blackmail!” he cried. “This is extortion!” + +“Mr. Henderson,” she replied sternly, “don’t you think, in your heart, +that you ought to do this for Judith? Think, Mr. Henderson! Think of all +that poor Judith--” + +“Who the devil is Judith?” he roared. “I never heard of her!” + +“Mr. Henderson!” + +“My name is not Henderson--I told you that before! My name is +Donalds--William Donalds, importer. Here! Here’s a card!” + +From his pocket he pulled not one card, but many, and they fell all over +the table. + +“Donalds!” he repeated. “Now you know with whom you have to deal. This +farce must end! This--” + +He stopped, because such an extraordinary change had come over the +woman. Her face had grown alarmingly white, and she was staring at him +with a sort of horror. + +“You--you _must_ be Mr. Henderson!” she said faintly. + +“I will not be!” he shouted. “I refuse! Nothing can induce me to assume +a false name! You have kidnaped my grandchild--” + +“Your niece, you mean.” + +“I don’t! I mean my grandchild. I have no niece. I--” + +“Wait a minute!” she interrupted. She rose to her feet and stood, +holding the back of the chair. “I’m afraid,” she said, “that there’s +been--some terrible mistake!” + +“You mean--the child? Quick! Something has happened to the child?” + +“No,” she said. “No--it’s just--me.” + +Criminal though she was, he could not help feeling sorry for her. + +“Madam, you are ill,” he said. “Sit down again!” + +She shook her head. + +“Mr. Donalds,” she said. “I--I must apologize. I’m afraid--it’s the +wrong child!” + +“The wrong--” + +“Yes. Please come!” + +She went out of the room, and he followed her up the stairs. She opened +the door of a room, and there, on a bed, he saw his grandchild, sleeping +peacefully. + +“No!” he whispered. “No--it’s the right child!” + +“It isn’t the one I meant,” said she. + +He looked at her. + +“Then you are not acting on behalf of my scoundrelly nephew, Masterton +Donalds?” he said. + +“I never heard of him.” + +“But I thought--he has made certain threats that he would attempt to +force me to make him an allowance. I thought--” + +“No,” said the red-haired woman in a very low voice. “Take her! I’m +sorry. It was all a mistake!” + + +V + +Judith was waiting in Mrs. Fremby’s room. She had been told to come +there at six o’clock, in order to hear some news. She had come, and had +found the room empty. Judith’s nature, however, was not an impatient +one. She waited, full of a calm confidence in her friend. She ate the +entire contents of a bag of chocolates that she found on the table, she +tried on Mrs. Fremby’s hats, and then she sat down to read Mrs. Fremby’s +latest article, which began thus: + + Paris no longer reigns undisputed over American modes. There is a + distinct tendency-- + +The door opened, and Mrs. Fremby entered. As was her habit, she locked +the door behind her. Then she smiled. It was a pretty sickly smile, but +Judith was not observant. + +“Hello, Judith!” she said. + +“Hello, Evelyn!” answered Judith. “What is the news you said you’d have +for me?” + +Mrs. Fremby took off her hat and coat, and sat down. + +“My dear,” she said, “I’m sorry, but I can’t tell you to-night. Later +on--” + +Judith’s beautiful eyes filled with tears of disappointment. + +“Oh, Evelyn!” she said. “I did hope there’d be something--something +about little Doris, or at least an order for an article. I only have two +dollars, Evelyn!” + +“I’ll lend you a little money,” said Mrs. Fremby. + +She spoke absent-mindedly, for she was calculating. The cost of +that taxi had been terrific--and all for nothing! She was tired +and downcast and miserable; but it was not her way to allow others +to know such things. She reflected that after Judith was gone she +could be as miserable as much and as long as she liked, but in the +meantime--courage! + +It was never a difficult matter to divert Judith’s mind, and within a +few minutes Mrs. Fremby had got her to talking about the spring costume +she wished she could buy. It was scarcely necessary to listen. Mrs. +Fremby was able to indulge in her own far from cheery thoughts. + +There was a knock at the door. Mrs. Fremby rose and opened it promptly. +It was the landlady. Let it be! There were no surreptitious cooking or +heating processes going forward just now. + +“There’s a gentleman wants to see you, Mrs. Fremby,” said the landlady, +with perfect affability. “He’s waiting down in the hall.” + +“I’ll see him,” said Mrs. Fremby. “Just a minute, Judith!” + +With a firm step she left the room. At heart, though, she was by no +means easy. She felt sure that this visitor was Mr. Donalds, and she was +not very anxious to see him again. + +It was Mr. Donalds. As she descended the stairs, she saw him standing, +hat in hand, in the dimly lit hall, and her heart sank still lower. He +was not a man to be trifled with. He was-- + +“Not a handsome man at all,” thought Mrs. Fremby; “but +distinguished-looking.” + +He came toward her. Their eyes met. They did not smile. + +“Madam,” said he, “I obtained your name and address from the--ah--person +in the tea room.” + +“She ought to have known better,” observed Mrs. Fremby. + +“I succeeded in convincing her that I intended no harm,” he went on; +“and I wish to assure you that I bear no ill will.” + +Mrs. Fremby softened. + +“I gave you a great deal of quite unnecessary trouble and anxiety,” she +said. “I regret it very much; but--perhaps I ought to explain. You see, +there is a friend of mine--Judith Cane--who has a little niece, her own +sister’s child; and the father’s people have taken the little girl away +from her. It’s shameful! Judith loves the child so much!” + +“But surely the law might be resorted to in such--” + +“The law!” said Mrs. Fremby scornfully. “They’ve got the _law_ on their +side; but what I wanted was justice--for Judith, I thought I’d steal the +child, and force them to do something for Judith.” + +“But the risk!” cried Mr. Donalds. “Did you realize the risk you--” + +“I don’t care about risks,” said Mrs. Fremby calmly. “Nobody would dare +to do anything to me!” + +Mr. Donalds knew well how absurd this statement was, yet he was +impressed. The dauntlessness of this little woman! + +“Judith knows nothing about it,” she continued; “and I don’t intend her +to know until the thing’s done.” + +“Madam! Mrs. Fremby! You don’t mean that you propose to do this again?” + +“Certainly I do.” + +“No!” he protested. “That must not be! You don’t realize--” + +“Yes, I do,” she interrupted. “It’s the only way; and this afternoon I +saw that you--even a man like you--you were willing to make all sorts of +concessions. Oh, I do wish!” she exclaimed. “I do wish you had been the +right one!” + +“Er--why?” asked Mr. Donalds, with a modest, downcast glance. + +“Because we got on so well. I could discuss things with you. You were so +reasonable--about that poor Miss Mackellar, for instance.” + +“Mrs. Fremby,” he said solemnly, “I consider that you were in the right +about Miss Mackellar. I mean to carry out your wishes in that matter.” + +“No!” she replied incredulously. “You can’t mean that, after I caused +you so much worry and--” + +“You did me good,” said he. “I don’t mind admitting it. The example of +your--your heroism--” + +“Oh, no!” + +“Your heroism,” he repeated doggedly, “and your unselfish devotion to +the interests of others--What is more, my grandchild is--is enthusiastic +in your praise. Mrs. Fremby, allow me to say that you are a wonderful +woman!” + +Mrs. Fremby was deeply touched. + +“Mr. Donalds,” she said, “for you to say that--after what has +happened--is magnanimous!” + +“I mean it,” said he; “but I most earnestly implore you not to do it +again. The risk is--appalling! It is possible--it is highly +probable--that I can be of some assistance to this friend of yours, +this--er--Miss Judith. Whatever I can do, Mrs. Fremby, I will--anything +authorized by law,” he added a trifle anxiously. + +“Mr. Donalds!” she cried. “Oh, Mr. Donalds! This is--oh, this is really +too much! I never--I never in my life--” + +He thought she was going to cry. She thought so too, for a moment, but +with a pretty severe effort she recovered herself. She smiled. That +smile completely finished Mr. Donalds. + +“Mrs. Fremby,” he said, “one thing more. I believe I told you that I was +an importer--” + +“I know. I’ve heard of your firm.” + +“Mrs. Fremby, I should be honored--it would be a favor to me--if you +would come to our showroom to-morrow morning and pick out for yourself +any one of the new model gowns from Paris--” + +“Paris!” cried Mrs. Fremby. “Never!” Mr. Donalds was startled by her +impassioned tone. “I wouldn’t wear a Paris gown--not for anything!” + +“Wouldn’t wear a Paris gown!” he repeated, overcome. “I never before +heard of a lady--” + +Mrs. Fremby held out her hand, and he took it. + +“You mustn’t think I don’t appreciate your generosity,” she said. “It’s +just a matter of principle.” + +Again their eyes met. + +“Wonderful little woman!” said he. + +It was amazing, the difference that one word of six letters made in that +phrase. Mrs. Fremby became quite confused. + +“What can I do,” continued Mr. Donalds, still holding her hand, “to mark +my profound appreciation?” + +Appreciation of what? Of Mrs. Fremby’s kidnaping his grandchild? Strange +that so practical a man as Mr. Donalds should become so curiously obtuse +about the clearest moral issues! Mrs. Fremby was undeniably a lawless, +reckless, dangerous sort of creature. + +“Mrs. Fremby,” said he, “will you do me the honor of dining with me +to-morrow evening?” + +“Thank you, Mr. Donalds, I will,” she replied, grave but very gracious. + +And you may believe it or not, but neither of them doubted for a moment +that it was an honor which she conferred upon him. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +OCTOBER, 1925 +Vol. LXXXVI NUMBER 1 + + + + +As Patrick Henry Said + +THE UNFORESEEN CIRCUMSTANCES THAT LED DR. JOE TO CHANGE SOME OF HIS +IDEAS ON THE SUBJECT OF PERSONAL LIBERTY + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +“Mean to tell me she won’t let you go?” demanded Dr. Joe, in his big +voice. + +“No,” said young Bennett stoutly, “I don’t mean to tell you anything of +the sort. Of course she’d let me go; only, if I did, there’d be no +one--well, no one to look after the furnace or--” + +“Merciful powers!” said Dr. Joe, staring at his friend in pity and +wonder. “So that’s what it’s done to you!” he thought. “Can’t take two +weeks off for a hunting trip with your old friend! Can’t call your soul +your own!” + +He was determined not to say a word of this, though. + +“If the man’s happy,” he thought, “the thing for me is to be tactful.” + +And no one could have convinced him that he was not tactful. He got up, +a formidable figure of a man, more than six feet in height and stalwart +in proportion. He was under thirty-five, yet no one ever spoke of him as +a young man, any more than people called him a handsome man, in spite of +the fine regularity of his massive features. He was simply Dr. Joe. +There was no one like him. + +“Well, my boy,” he said, in a soothing way, “I’ll be off now. Got half a +dozen calls to make before lunch. See you--” + +“Look here, Joe! I want you to come to dinner with us on Sunday.” + +“Can’t do it!” replied Dr. Joe, in alarm. + +“You’ve got to do it, Joe. She wants to meet you, and I want you to +see--what she’s done for me.” + +“Seen that already!” thought Dr. Joe, but, true to his policy of +tactfulness, he kept the thought to himself. “Some other time, old man,” +he said. + +“You know you can come on Sunday if you want to,” insisted Bennett. + +Dr. Joe did know that. What is more, he knew that Bennett knew it. + +“And I’ll have to go some time,” he thought ruefully, so he said: “All +right, old man--Sunday it is!” + +It was a genuine sacrifice. Although Sunday was six days off, the +thought of it recurred to him from time to time during the morning, and +bothered him. He hated to be pinned down to a definite engagement. His +day’s work was always heavy, and, when it was done, he liked to go home. +If no calls came for him in the evening, he was glad to drop in to see a +friend, for he was a sociable sort of fellow, but he very much disliked +feeling that he _had_ to go, that he was expected somewhere at a +definite time. He liked, in short, to feel free. + +“Breath of life to me,” he reflected. “As Patrick Henry said, give me +liberty or give me death. There’s Bennett--married--tied down like +that--dare say he’s happy, but it wouldn’t suit me. No, sir! I’ve got to +have my liberty. Come and go as I please--meals when it suits me--come +home tired--put on an old coat and light my pipe--that’s the life for +me!” + +Leaving the enslaved Bennett in his office, Dr. Joe drove off about his +business. He flew along the quiet country roads in his little car. He +would stop before a house and run up the steps. He never rang bells. If +a door was locked, he knocked vigorously upon it. If it was not locked, +he flung it open and walked in; and he had never yet failed to find a +welcome inside. His step was by no means light, yet no one, not even the +most querulous and nervous patient, had ever complained of that. He was +Dr. Joe. He expected every one to be glad to see him, and every one was. + +Things went well that morning. All the patients he visited were doing +nicely, and the weather was superb--a cool, bright October day. He drove +home for lunch in a very cheerful humor. He was contented and hungry. + +As he neared his own house, however, a faint cloud came over his +satisfaction. He hoped that Mrs. MacAdams, his housekeeper, would not +give him that stew again to-day. + +“Don’t like to say anything to her,” he thought; “but seems to me we’re +having that stew pretty often these days. It’s not--well, it’s all +right, of course, but--” + +He went up the steps of the veranda and burst open his own front door +with a magnificent crash. That was his signal to Mrs. MacAdams to put +his lunch on the table. + +He did not turn his head in the direction of the waiting room, though he +knew that people were in there. His office hours were from two to four, +and patients had no business to come at one o’clock. He often said, with +vehemence, that he would see no one--absolutely no one--before two +o’clock; but he did. He said he _would_ eat his lunch in peace; but he +didn’t. He always had to hurry. + +So he was going sternly toward the dining room, without even glancing in +at the waiting room, when an extraordinary sight arrested him. There was +some one sitting in the hall! + +This was altogether too much. Bad enough for patients to come long +before office hours, and haunt him while he ate his lunch, but to come +out into the hall to waylay him! + +He gave this person a severe glance. He got in return a glance which +somehow disconcerted him--a cool, amused, very steady glance. He stopped +short. The intruder was a woman. She was sitting in a high-backed chair, +her hands lying extended on the arms, and her feet planted solidly +before her, side by side. It was an Egyptian sort of attitude. + +There was nothing else about her, however, to suggest old Egypt. That +wrinkled, weather-beaten face with the long upper lip, half doleful, +half humorous, and those twinkling little gray eyes, were unmistakably +Irish; and Dr. Joe had rather a weakness for that race. Moreover, she +was shabbily dressed--a thing difficult for him to resist--and her hair +was gray. His just resentment vanished. + +“See here!” he said reproachfully. “You ought to be in the waiting room. +Patients aren’t allowed to sit out here.” + +She rose. + +“I am not one o’ thim,” she said. “It’s business I’ve come to see ye +about.” + +“Selling something?” asked Dr. Joe. + +If she was, he meant to buy it. + +“I am not,” she answered calmly. “I came to see ye about the bye.” + +“Buying what?” + +“I mean the young bye--the lad--” she began, when Mrs. MacAdams appeared +in the doorway of the dining room. + +“Your lunch is on the table, doctor,” she announced, in a faint, sad +voice. “I told that person--” + +“I’ll wait,” said the person. + +Dr. Joe waved his hand toward Mrs. MacAdams, and, as if he had been a +wizard, she vanished. It was never her policy to argue with her +employer. + +“I don’t understand you,” said Dr. Joe to the Irishwoman. “What is it +you want?” + +He spoke almost gently, for something in this shabby, gray-haired +stranger touched him. He didn’t care to eat his lunch and leave her +sitting in the hall. + +“Come here, Frankie!” said she. + +From a shadowy corner, where he had been standing unobserved, came a +small boy--a very small boy, thin and wiry, with red hair and a pale, +freckled face; a sulky-looking little boy, very neatly dressed in a +sailor suit and a cap which proclaimed him as belonging to the United +States Navy. + +“Take off yer cap, me lad,” said she, “and say good day to the doctor.” + +Frankie snatched off the cap, but speak he would not. + +“He’s a fantastical bye,” she explained. “Ye’d never believe the notions +he has. What’s in his mind now is he wants to be a doctor; and I’ve come +to see will ye make a doctor of him?” + +Dr. Joe began to laugh, but he stopped when he saw the woman’s face. + +“But you see--” he said. “A child of that age--how old is he?” + +“He is eight.” + +“He can’t know what he wants!” + +“He knows,” she asserted tranquilly. “It’s a doctor he wants to be. I’ve +been told yourself is the best doctor in it at all, and I’ve brought +the bye to ye to see will ye lave him study with ye.” + +The doctor struggled against another outburst of laughter. + +“I’m afraid--” he began. + +“His father’ll be paying whativer is right for the larnin’,” said the +woman. She paused a moment. “His father is a grand, rich man,” she went +on. “Him an’ his wife is travelin’ in foreign lands, and they’ve lift +the bye with me. It’s his nurse I am. Katie is me name.” + +“See here, Katie!” said Dr. Joe, very kindly. “The child’s far too +young. Later on, perhaps--” + +“Doctor dear!” she interrupted with intense earnestness. “Will ye not +lave him try? He’s to school in the mornin’s. Will ye not lave him be +with ye in the afternoons, to be watchin’ the way ye’ll be healin’ the +sick? Ye’d not know by lookin’ at him all that’s in his head. If ye’ll +talk to him, drawin’ it out of him, ye’ll see!” + +“I’m sorry, but it’s out of the question,” said Dr. Joe firmly. “When +the boy’s parents come back, I’ll talk to them, and--” + +“The one day!” said she. “Lave him stop here with ye the one day!” + +“I can’t do it. I’m sorry, but--” + +She came a step forward, with a look of piteous entreaty on her wrinkled +face. + +“The one day, doctor dear!” she cried. “Ye’ll do that for an ould woman! +He’s fed. He’ll need no more till I’ll come for him at six o’clock. All +o’ thim tellin’ me what a grand, kind man ye were, at all--and me ould +enough to be yer mother!” + +“I can’t!” said Dr. Joe, very much distressed. “It’s ridiculous!” + +“Sure, what trouble will it be for yer honor?” she pleaded. “An’ Frankie +only the small young child he is--just wantin’ to watch ye! Lave him +come with ye the one day, doctor dear! His father’ll--” + +“No!” shouted Dr. Joe. “Sorry! Can’t!” + +He made a rush for the dining room and closed the door behind him. + + +II + +This was the most absurd and unreasonable request that had ever been +made of him--which was saying a good deal, for his generosity was well +known, and full advantage was taken of it. And yet, somehow, the +incident touched and troubled him. He couldn’t forget the passionate +earnestness of the old Irishwoman. + +“Nonsense! Nonsense! Nonsense!” he said half aloud, and sat down at the +table. + +Before him stood a plate of that stew. He tasted it. + +“It’s--cold,” he observed, in an apologetic tone. + +In his heart he was afraid of Mrs. MacAdams. She was such a resigned, +subdued woman, and always so completely in the right, that he felt +vaguely guilty every time he saw her. + +“I thought you would be in a hurry, doctor,” she said faintly. “I had no +idea you would stay out in the hall so long, talking to that person.” + +“No, no, of course you didn’t,” Dr. Joe hastily assured her. “Quite all +right, Mrs. MacAdams. Many of ’em in the waiting room?” + +“I believe I opened the door six times,” she answered, with angelic +patience. + +He felt guiltier than ever. The feeling that he was a tyrant to Mrs. +MacAdams mingled with a wretched conviction that he had been unduly +abrupt with the poor old woman in the hall, until he saw himself as an +utterly heartless bully. He couldn’t bear it. + +“I just want to see,” he murmured, with an ingratiating smile, and, +getting up, opened the dining room door. + +Katie was gone. The high-backed chair was occupied by the little +red-haired boy, who sat there with his head thrown back and his eyes +fixed on the ceiling. + +“Now see here!” said Dr. Joe indignantly. “Did she--did your nurse go +off and leave you here?” + +“Yes, she did,” answered Frankie. + +“Well, you can’t stay here,” the doctor told him. + +Without a word Frankie rose, took up his cap, and walked off down the +passage. + +“Here, wait a minute!” called Dr. Joe. “You can’t go off like that!” + +Frankie stopped and turned. + +“You told me I couldn’t stay,” he said. + +The child’s manner was not in any way defiant or impertinent, but he +certainly was not abashed. He stood, cap in hand, looking straight into +the doctor’s face; and though he was by no means a handsome child, being +slight, pale, and undersized for his years, there was something in that +straightforward glance which Dr. Joe found very attractive. + +“See here, my boy!” he said. “What put the idea of being a doctor into +your head, anyhow?” + +“It just came,” said Frankie. “When I was in the hospital. When I had +pneumonia last winter. In New York. The internes used to talk to me. And +I liked it.” + +“Didn’t like the pneumonia, did you?” asked Dr. Joe. + +“I didn’t care,” said Frankie. “I liked to be there. I liked--” He +paused. “I liked the smell of the hospital,” he continued earnestly. + +“You’re a funny kid!” said Dr. Joe, laughing. + +Frankie did not seem to care for this. He turned away again and made for +the door, and this time Dr. Joe stopped him with a hand on his shoulder. + +“I don’t care!” said the boy. + +Now the words themselves had very little significance; it was the spirit +behind them that conquered Dr. Joe. The boy was obviously frightened by +that heavy hand on his shoulder. He was only eight, and he lived in a +child’s world. He had no understanding of these all-powerful grown +people, who laughed or flew into tempers for no reason at all. He +thought Dr. Joe was angry, and he was frightened--his eyes showed that; +but his mouth set in a firm, sulky line, and once more he declared that +he didn’t care. + +“By Jove!” cried Dr. Joe. “I will take you!” + + +III + +It was the first time Dr. Joe had ever been alone with a child. Of +course he had visited innumerable sick children, and had been very +popular with them, but he was ashamed now to remember the sort of things +he had said to other children of Frankie’s age. + +“Talked about bunnies and pussy cats!” he thought. “Must have made a +regular idiot of myself. This child’s exceptional, though.” + +That comforted him. He was convinced by this time that there was not and +never had been another child like Frankie. He couldn’t have explained +this, and he wouldn’t have tried. + +He firmly believed that he was a notable judge of human nature. He often +said that he could read a character at a glance; but, as a matter of +fact, what he really felt was usually a sudden and vehement prejudice, +and it was a prejudice he felt now, in favor of Frankie. He had talked +to him--“drawn him out,” as Katie had suggested, and he found the child +not only intelligent, but an independent, clear-sighted, honest, sturdy +little spirit. + +“We’ll go home now,” said Dr. Joe. “We’ll step on the gas, too. It’s +going to rain.” + +He looked up at the sky. The brightness of the autumn day had vanished +long ago, and the clouds were driving up fast before a steady, bleak +wind. He tucked the rug carefully about Frankie. A very little fellow he +was, after all, for all his cleverness--a queer little fellow. + +“Mustn’t let him get chilled,” he thought. + +With that in view, he drove at breakneck speed along the roads that lay +white before him in the stormy dusk, past houses where warm little +lights were beginning to gleam in the windows. It was the hour of +home-coming--and it suddenly occurred to Dr. Joe that he and Frankie +hadn’t much to go home to. Frankie had only a nurse waiting for him, and +the doctor had only Mrs. MacAdams. + +“Nonsense!” said Dr. Joe to himself. + +The storm couldn’t be dismissed as nonsense, however. Before they were +halfway home it came upon them, a fierce downpour, drumming on the +leather top of the car, dashing against the wind shield, crushing down +into the mud the last valiant green things by the wayside. The +headlights shone mistily into a world all darkness and confusion. + +It was no new thing to Dr. Joe. It was simply a storm, and he was +accustomed to being out in all weathers; but Frankie was of an age when +one is, unfortunately, only too carefully protected from the elements, +and he was thrilled. He wriggled joyously under the rug. + +“The grand time I’m havin’!” he said. + +Dr. Joe smiled to himself at the touch of brogue--picked up from the +boy’s nurse, no doubt; but he had to keep his mind on his driving. + +There were many turns in the road, and the mud was slippery. He was glad +when at last he turned into his own driveway. He hustled Frankie out of +the car and up the steps, burst open the front door, and entered his own +hall. + +And there was a girl. + +Now, if Dr. Joe had been the sort of man to be overcome by the sight of +a pretty face, he would never have been a bachelor at thirty-three; but +he wasn’t that sort of man, and it was not the prettiness of this girl +that made so great an impression upon him. It was the look on her face. + +He had never seen quite that look on a woman’s face before, that magical +and beautiful look of welcome. She came hurrying down the hall, and her +step was eager, her eyes were shining. She was smiling and holding out +her hands; and Dr. Joe felt that he had, for the first time since he +could remember, really come home. He didn’t know or care who she was, or +how she had got there, but only that she seemed somehow familiar and +dear, and he was happy because he found her here. + +He would have taken her outstretched hands--but the boy was ahead of +him. Frankie ran up to the girl. + +“Hello, Molly!” he said casually. + +Dr. Joe saw then that the smile and the welcome and all the magic had +been for Frankie, not for him. The girl turned to him, and she was a +different girl--a polite, composed young creature. + +“I’ve come to take Frankie home,” she said. “Thank you very much, +doctor.” + +For a moment he was too disappointed, too dejected, to answer. He was +only a doctor; people were glad to see him only because they thought he +could make them well. Nobody had ever looked at him as Molly looked at +Frankie, and nobody ever would. What was there waiting for _him_ when he +got home? A lot of patients who wouldn’t give him time to eat his meals, +and Mrs. MacAdams. His house was dark and dusty and cheerless, and the +aroma of that stew still lingered in the air. + +“Don’t mention it!” he said gloomily. + +She waited a moment, holding Frankie by the hand. If he had looked at +her, he would have recognized her expression, for it was the expression +worn by mothers, aunts, and all female relatives of young children, and +it meant that she was waiting to hear what a unique and wonderful child +Frankie was; but Dr. Joe was lost in his unusually dismal thoughts. He +was roused from them only by the sound of her voice. + +“Well, thank you again!” she said. “Come, Frankie! We’ll have to hurry.” + +Then he remembered what the weather was. + +“No!” he said. “You can’t go out in this storm. No--I’ll take you home +in my car.” + +Perhaps, on Frankie’s account, the girl would have accepted this offer, +but just at this moment the dining room door opened and Mrs. MacAdams +appeared. + +“Your dinner is on the table, doctor,” she said, in a severe and deeply +wounded tone. + +“In a minute,” said Dr. Joe. “I’m going out first.” + +“Oh, no!” cried the girl. “No, please! No, we really won’t let you! +We’ll sit here till the rain lets up. I have an umbrella. Please, +doctor, don’t keep your dinner waiting!” + +“I don’t care about my dinner,” said Dr. Joe. + +Mrs. MacAdams coughed. + +“Doctor,” said the girl, “if you let your dinner get cold, after you’ve +been so good to Frankie, I’ll never forgive myself!” + +He couldn’t help smiling at her tremendous earnestness, yet it pleased +him. He looked down at her and she looked up at him, and he was still +more pleased. Hers was the sort of prettiness that he liked best of +all--not the fragile, exquisite, rather alarming kind, but the simple, +honest, gentle sort--the home sort. + +She was little and slender, but she looked strong. She had blue eyes, +and they were beautifully kind; she had black hair that curled, and a +mouth that was generous and firm. What is more, Dr. Joe remembered the +look she had given Frankie when he came in. He knew what she was capable +of; he thought she was a wonderful girl. + +“See here!” he said. “Stay and have a bite with me--you and Frankie--and +I’ll take you home afterward.” + +Mrs. MacAdams coughed again. Goodness knows what meaning she intended to +convey, what warnings and reproaches, but certainly the effect was very +different from what she had wished. That cough awoke in Dr. Joe a firm +determination to ask whom he pleased, when he pleased, to his own board. +It also caused the girl to make a curious remark. + +“Dr. Joe,” she said, “Frankie’s nurse, that you saw this +afternoon--she’s my grandmother.” + +Now no one had ever heard Dr. Joe mention the word “democracy,” and he +never thought about it, either. If you had questioned him, he would have +told you, with considerable vigor, that he did not believe all men to be +equal. He saw human beings at all the crises of their lives, and he +knew that they weren’t equal. He saw people who were heroic in +suffering, and he admired them; he saw people who were not heroic, and +he pitied them, and that was about as far as he went in judging his +fellow creatures. As for dividing people according to their wealth, or +their social standing, or their education, that never entered his head; +so that he hadn’t the faintest notion that he was being tested, or that +the girl was being plucky. + +“I see!” he said cheerfully. “Now, then, Mrs. MacAdams! Can you scratch +up something for these two young people to eat?” + +Mrs. MacAdams did not like being asked to “scratch up” anything, and she +did not like these young people. + +“I shall do my best, doctor,” she promised in a rather chilly tone. + +It is regrettable to be obliged to say that she didn’t keep her promise. +Even Mrs. MacAdams could have done better, had she tried. + +Dr. Joe didn’t notice this, though. He was filled with delight at his +dinner party. He bustled about, pulling chairs up to the table, and +turning on more lights. His big, hearty voice was plainly audible to the +patients in the waiting room, and they wondered how he could be so +cheerful when they were not. + +“Now, then!” he said. + +He was sitting at the head of the table, and Miss Ryan--that was her +name--was at the foot, with Frankie between them, and the whole thing +seemed to him extraordiarily jolly. There was something on his plate, +and he was about to eat it, when he observed Miss Ryan lay her hand on +Frankie’s arm and whisper to him. + +“I don’t care!” said Frankie, aloud. “I’m hungry!” + +Miss Ryan’s face grew scarlet, and Dr. Joe frowned. + +“Come now, my boy!” he said. “This won’t do!” + +“I’m hungry!” said Frankie, with something like a sob. “Bread an’ butter +isn’t enough!” + +“But hasn’t he got--what _has_ he got, anyhow?” inquired Dr. Joe, +puzzled. + +“I don’t know,” said Miss Ryan; “but--I’d rather he didn’t eat it.” + +She was terribly distressed, but she was resolute. + +“It is cold sliced pot roast,” said Mrs. MacAdams, in an awful voice. + +A painful silence ensued. + +“I’m hungry, Molly!” cried Frankie at last, in a most mutinous voice. “I +don’t care what it is! I’m--” + +“Frankie!” said she. “You shan’t eat it, and that’s all there is to it.” +She took away the child’s plate. “I’m sorry,” she explained to Dr. Joe, +in an unsteady voice, “but we have to be very careful about what he +eats; and all that fat--” + +“See here, Mrs. MacAdams!” said Dr. Joe entreatingly. “Can’t you rake up +something for the child--milk--oatmeal--something of the sort?” + +“Doctor,” said Mrs. MacAdams, “I can neither rake up nor scratch up +anything else. This is the dinner I had prepared--for you. I was not +informed that there would be”--she paused--“a party of guests.” + +Then Dr. Joe had a bright idea--the sort of idea that would never have +occurred to any one else. + +“Tell you what!” he said. “Poor kid’s hungry. You know what suits him. +Perhaps you could find something if you looked around in the kitchen, +Miss Ryan, eh?” + +He didn’t realize what he had done, but Miss Ryan did. She looked at +Mrs. MacAdams with the nicest, most friendly sort of smile, but she got +from that lady a look that roused all her native spirit. + +“All right!” she said. “Thank you, Dr. Joe--I will!” + +And she rose and went into the kitchen. Mrs. MacAdams did not follow, +nor did she make an offer to help Miss Ryan. Perhaps she felt that this +girl was one who did not require much help; perhaps she had other +reasons. Anyhow, she stood there in the dining room, perfectly silent. +Frankie was silent, too, and very sulky. Dr. Joe was silent, and no +longer happy. His dinner party was not successful. + +He wondered. He wondered why he had so many dishes made from roasts, and +so seldom the roasts themselves. He wondered why the tablecloth was +neither dirtier nor cleaner. If it was never changed, it would certainly +have been worse than it was. It must, therefore, be clean sometimes; but +he couldn’t remember having ever seen it so. + + +IV + +It seemed a long time before Miss Ryan came back, but the delay was +justified. Upon a tray she bore three plates. What there was in two of +them Dr. Joe never knew, but what she set before him was a miracle. +Cheese and eggs and toast were part of it, but there must have been +other things. + +His spirits revived, and so did Frankie’s. He made jokes, and Frankie +laughed at them. So did Miss Ryan, but in a different way. Dr. Joe +suspected that something was amiss with her, and later, when he was +helping her on with her coat, he felt sure of it. The light in the hall +was dim, and he bent nearer. It was true--there were tears in her eyes. + +He said nothing at the moment. He waited until he had got them snugly +stowed into the car, Miss Ryan beside him, with Frankie on her lap. + +“What’s wrong, Miss Ryan?” he asked, in his blunt way. + +“Why, nothing!” she answered brightly. + +He knew there was, though. She wasn’t the sort of girl to have tears in +her eyes for nothing. He thought about it for awhile, and then he came +to a conclusion. + +“Miss Ryan,” he inquired, “what do you do?” + +In his wide experience of other people’s troubles, he had learned the +terrible and pitiful importance of jobs, or the lack of them. + +“Well, doctor,” she replied, “I play the piano in the music department +of the Novelty Bazaar.” + +“In the basement,” said Dr. Joe. “That’s not much of a job.” + +He was acquainted with the Novelty Bazaar and its system of ventilation. + +“Oh, it might be worse,” she returned cheerfully. + +“Not very much,” said Dr. Joe. + +Again he was silent, thinking of Miss Ryan at work in the basement of +the Novelty Bazaar. + +“I’m going to get you another job,” he announced abruptly. + +“I wish you’d get yourself another housekeeper!” she cried, with a +vehemence that startled him. “I never saw--anything so--awful. It’s a +sh-shame!” + +“See here!” said he, astounded. “You’re not crying about _that_?” + +“I’m not c-crying at all,” replied Miss Ryan, with dignity. “Only--when +I saw that kitchen--and that dinner--it’s cruel!” + +This made him laugh. + +“Cruel?” he said. “Mrs. MacAdams cruel? Poor old soul! She’s--” + +“It is cruel,” said Miss Ryan, “when you’re so busy and so--wonderfully +kind and good.” + +He had been called kind and good often enough before in his life, but it +had never sounded like this. He looked at Molly Ryan. The interior of +the little car was well lighted, so that he could see her clearly, +sitting there beside him, with Frankie in her strong young arms, and +those blue eyes of hers misty. Kind? He wasn’t the only one. + +“It’s down this street,” she told him. “There--that’s the house--with +the white fence.” + +He stopped the car before the house--such a poor, forlorn little house +it was--and Miss Ryan tried to set Frankie on his feet; but Frankie +would not stand. Limp and dazed with sleep, he sank down on the floor of +the car. + +“I’ll carry him,” said Dr. Joe. “Come on! We’ll make a dash for it.” + +So they did make a dash for it, through the pelting rain, to the veranda +of the poor little house, and Miss Ryan rang the bell. Nothing happened. +She waited a moment, rang again, and then opened the door with a +latchkey. + +Dr. Joe followed her inside, still carrying Frankie. She had lighted an +oil lamp on the table, and, as he came in out of the stormy darkness, +there was a picture he did not soon forget. It was a very little room, +and a very humble one; it was not tastefully furnished; indeed, regarded +in detail, it was quite the contrary; but it was a home. It was clean +and neat and blessedly tranquil in the lamplight. It was a house with a +heart--and Molly Ryan was in it. + +Frankie came to life now. + +“Where’s Katie?” he demanded. + +“She’s left a note,” said Molly. “I don’t understand. She’s never gone +out so late before; but perhaps some of the people she works for sent +for her.” + +The girl looked perplexed and troubled. Dr. Joe was perplexed, too. + +“People she works for?” he repeated. “Thought she was the boy’s nurse.” + +“She is,” answered Molly; “only while he’s at school she--she does other +things.” + +“What other things?” + +For a moment Molly looked dignified, and as if she would not answer, but +she thought better of it. She looked up at Dr. Joe with the +straightforward glance that he liked so well. + +“She does day’s work, Dr. Joe--scrubbing and cleaning.” + +“But see here--I don’t understand this! Do you mean to tell me that the +boy’s parents have gone off and left him with his nurse, and haven’t +given her any money to look after the child?” + +“She does look after him!” cried Miss Ryan hotly. “He goes to the +Lessell Academy. He’s getting the best education and the best care--” + +“I’m sure of that,” interrupted Dr. Joe. “What I don’t understand is why +his nurse has to go out scrubbing by the day. Why does the child live +here? Why don’t his parents--” + +“They can’t help it!” said Miss Ryan. Her cheeks were flaming, her blue +eyes alight. “They’ve done the best they can. They’re the--the finest, +most splendid people in the world. They--they just are!” + +Dr. Joe respected her loyal defense; but he didn’t agree with her. He +felt pretty sure now that Katie and this girl were burdened with the +entire support of the boy, that they went shabby while he was well +dressed, that they worked, scrubbing floors and playing the piano in the +Novelty Bazaar, while Frankie went to an expensive private school. To +his thinking, there was no possible excuse for parents who would do such +a thing. + +“See here!” he said. “I’ve got to go now--patients waiting for me. Send +Frankie to me again to-morrow. No trouble to me. Fact is, I rather like +to have him.” + +Miss Ryan held out her hand, and Dr. Joe took it. He didn’t know what to +say to her. He couldn’t very well ask her to come to see him, and he +didn’t quite know how to suggest coming to see her; so he only gripped +her little hand and said nothing, and it made him very unhappy. He +wanted to see her, not just some time in the indefinite future, but the +very next day and all other days. Going away from her was going away +from home. + + +V + +The next day was a dismal day by nature, and Mrs. MacAdams did nothing +to make it better. She gave Dr. Joe the worst breakfast he had yet had, +and she presented a curious and disturbing appearance. She had a bandage +around her throat and another around her left wrist, and a plug of +cotton wool in one ear. Time was when Dr. Joe would have made kindly +inquiries about these matters, but not now. He had learned that her +troubles were all due to opening the door for patients, to answering the +telephone, or to going up and down the stairs; and as he couldn’t remove +the cause, he was obliged to ignore the symptoms. + +Nevertheless it disturbed him and made him feel guilty, and he set off +to make his rounds in an unusually downcast mood. He did not forget that +he had promised Molly Ryan to find her another job. Indeed, he forgot +nothing at all about Molly--not even the way her dark hair curled above +her ears; but his morning was too busy and hurried, and he had no chance +to serve her. And this made him feel worse. + +When he came home at lunch time, he did not run up the steps. He walked, +and this gave him an opportunity to observe that the glass in the door +was grimy and the curtain covering it limp and spotted. He was about to +fling open the door when, to his surprise, it was opened for him. It was +opened by Miss Ryan, hatless, and wearing an apron. + +“Lots of people in the waiting room,” she whispered. “Your lunch is all +ready.” + +“See here!” he cried, astounded, but she had hurried off down the +passage. + +He followed her into the dining room. There was a clean cloth on the +table, and its radiance dazzled him. There was a wonderful aroma in the +air. + +“Sit down!” said she, and vanished into the kitchen. + +He did sit down, dazed and helpless. In a minute back she came, with a +broiled steak such as no man had ever eaten before, and fried potatoes, +and tomato salad, and other things. + +“Please eat it while it’s nice and hot,” she said. + +“See here!” cried Dr. Joe again. “What are you doing here?” + +“Begin to eat, then!” she insisted sternly. “Well, you see, you must +have dropped your notebook out of your pocket last night. I found it on +the veranda this morning, and I thought I’d better bring it to you. When +I came, that Mrs. MacAdams--well, she marched upstairs and got her hat +and coat, and she said--” + +Miss Ryan paused. + +“Well, what did she say?” the doctor asked. + +“All sorts of nasty, silly things,” answered Molly, growing very red. +“Anyhow, she went out of the house and said she was never coming back +if--” + +“If what?” + +“Oh, nothing!” said Miss Ryan hastily. “Only--she went. Some one had to +get your lunch, so I stayed.” + +“You--stayed!” Dr. Joe repeated, as if stunned. “You--stayed!” + +Miss Ryan grew redder than ever. + +“It wasn’t anything to do,” she said. “I couldn’t go to work, anyway, on +account of Frankie, because grandma hasn’t come back yet.” Her face +changed. “I can’t help thinking it’s queer,” she went on anxiously. “I +can’t help worrying. She never did such a thing before. She just left a +note.” + +The girl hesitated for a moment. Then from the pocket of her apron she +drew out a piece of wrapping paper and handed it to him. On it was +printed, in pencil: + + i have to go away a wile--gran. + +Miss Ryan watched Dr. Joe while he read it; then their eyes met. + +“She’s the finest woman God ever made,” said Molly quietly. “She’s done +everything in the world for me. She’s worked and slaved so that I could +have an education--and all the things she’s never been able to have.” + +Dr. Joe understood all that she meant him to understand, and he loved +her for it. Yes, he admitted that he loved her. He knew it wasn’t the +proper time to love her; he had only seen her twice. But he did, just +the same. + +“Molly Ryan!” he said. + +Even the tips of Miss Ryan’s ears grew red. + +“I--I can’t think about anything but grandma just now,” she said. +“I’m--I’m so worried about her!” + +“I’ll look after her,” said Dr. Joe. “I’ll see that she doesn’t go out +scrubbing any more. I’ll look after Frankie, too; and if you’ll only let +me--” + +“There’s the doorbell!” cried Molly. + +“I’ll go!” said Dr. Joe. + +“Oh, do please eat your nice hot lunch!” said she. + +“Won’t have you waiting on me!” he returned. + +They both reached the doorway at the same instant, and there was not +room there for the broad-shouldered doctor and any one else; so he +turned, and they faced each other. + +“Won’t you let me help you?” he said. “I don’t know how to explain--it +has come so suddenly. Of course, I know you don’t--of course, you +can’t--but--” + +“It’s the lunch,” said Miss Ryan. “You’re so glad to get a decent meal.” + +“It’s not!” he denied indignantly. “It’s--if you’d only just come here +twice a day, and stand in the hall and smile when I come in!” + +Then they both began to laugh. + +“It’s not a joke, though,” said Dr. Joe. + +“I know it,” said she. “I didn’t mean to be silly and horrid; only, +until grandma comes back--” + +The doorbell rang again. This time Molly got ahead of him, and ran down +the passage. + +“Grandma!” she cried, as she opened the door. + +Katie entered with a bland smile. + +“Good day to ye, doctor!” she said. + +Dr. Joe was remarkably glad to see her again. + +“Well!” he said, with a smile. “You’ve been causing a good deal of +anxiety--” + +“It’s sorry I am for that,” she broke in; “but it couldn’t be helped at +all.” + +“But where--” Molly began. + +“Whisht now!” said Katie. “It’s about Frankie I’ve come. Ye had the bye +with ye yesterday; and what did ye think of him, doctor dear?” + +“I was talking to Miss Ryan about that,” replied Dr. Joe seriously. “I’d +just told her that I’d be glad to look after the boy, and--” + +“D’ye mean it, doctor dear? D’ye mean ye’ll make a doctor out of him?” +she cried. + +“If that’s what he wants when--” + +Katie looked steadily at him for a minute, then she turned toward the +door. + +“My work’s done,” she said. “Ye’ve tould me ye’d make a doctor of him, +an’ ye’ll do it. Good day to ye, doctor dear!” + +“Here! Wait a minute!” he called. “I’d like to speak to you. Come in and +have lunch with me.” + +Katie stopped and faced him again, and he was aware of a fine dignity in +her. + +“Ye’d ask an ould woman like me to sit down at the table with ye?” she +inquired gravely. + +Dr. Joe flushed a little. + +“I have asked you,” he said. + +Her keen little eyes were still fixed on his face. + +“Then ye’re not one o’ thim that--then ye’d not think the worse of +Frankie if his parents wasn’t the grand, rich people they are?” + +“See here!” said Dr. Joe. “You have some mighty queer ideas!” + +“It is not myself has the queer ideas,” said she. “It’s others has thim. +I’m an ould woman, an’ I have seen a lot. If Frankie’s parents wasn’t +Mr. and Mrs. Mortimer Depew of New York, he’d niver have been took into +that academy; but they writ a latter, the two o’ thim, and he is there.” + +“Granny!” cried Molly. + +“Whisht now!” said the other. “I know well what I’m doin’. Didn’t I see +the way it wint with me own bye? If Frankie was to be the greatest +doctor that ever lived, he’d niver be the equal o’ that bye. He come +here from the ould country, and not a penny in his pockets. It was in +his head he’d be a doctor; so he worked in the days and studied in the +nights. Thim that had money had all their time for the studyin’, and +they wint ahead of him. Five years he took for that they’d do in two, +him workin’ in a garage in the days. Thin what does he do but get +married? A fine girl she was, too--a fine girl. ‘She’ll help me,’ says +he, ‘for she’s had a grand education.’ A school-teacher she was, a fine +girl. Thin Molly was born, and the two o’ thim schemin’ and plannin’ the +way she’d be a doctor’s daughter, and the grand time she’d have of it. +Thin the war came and he wint, like the rest o’ thim, and in the end of +it he was kilt; and it wasn’t so long before the poor girl died, too.” +Katie was silent for a moment. “But it’s different with Frankie,” she +said. “He’ll have a grand chance!” + +“He will,” said Dr. Joe. “He would, even if his parents weren’t Mr. and +Mrs. Mortimer Depew of New York.” + +She gave the doctor a startled, sidelong glance. + +“But they are!” she insisted. + +“Certainly, if you say so,” agreed Dr. Joe; “but I can’t help thinking +that it’s rather a pity. A father like that boy of yours, for instance, +would be some one he could be proud of.” + +“And an ould grandmother that scrubs floors?” + +“I couldn’t think of a much better one,” said Dr. Joe, pretending not to +notice that she was hastily wiping her eyes. + +“Whatever way it is,” she said, “I had me mind made up Frankie should +get his chance. And now ye’ve promised me, doctor dear, and I can go off +home to me brother in the ould country.” + +“Granny!” cried Molly. “But what about me? You can’t--” + +The old woman laid her hand on Molly’s shoulder. + +“Ye’ll get on, acushla,” she said gently. “I want to go back to the ould +country, and to what frinds is left me there. You’ll get on, you and +Frankie, the both o’ ye. Where is the bye?” + +“He’s in the kitchen, eating his lunch. But, granny--” + +“Lave him come here,” said she, “so I can have a word with him.” + +When Molly had gone, she turned again to the doctor. + +“Studyin’ music, she was, and goin’ to be one o’ thim--thim that gives +concerts an’ all,” she told him; “but I couldn’t go on with it. +Frankie’s a bye, and it’s a bye has to have the chance.” + +“You may be sure that if there’s anything I can do for her,” said Dr. +Joe, “I will.” + +“Well, there might be something,” said Katie judicially. Then Dr. Joe +was astounded to see a grin on the old woman’s face--not a smile, but a +broad grin. “Doctor dear,” she continued, “didn’t I pick ye out, the day +I saw ye in the clinic, an’ me there with Mrs. O’Day? Didn’t I know if +ye once set eyes on the two o’ thim--Frankie and Molly--ye’d be a frind +to thim? I’m an ould woman. I cannot do much more for thim. I wint off +to Mrs. O’Day’s last night, the way ye’d get better acquainted with +thim. Sure, ye’re not angry with me, doctor dear?” + +He was not. + + * * * * * + +On Sunday morning Mrs. Bennett telephoned to Dr. Joe, to remind him that +he had promised to come to dinner that night. She knew by his tone that +he had forgotten all about it. + +“But--yes, of course,” he said. “I--yes; but see here! I--I’m sorry, but +I’ll have to ask Molly.” + +“Molly, Dr. Joe?” + +“Yes,” he answered, with immense pride. “Girl I’m going to marry next +month. Can’t very well make any arrangements without consulting Molly, +you know!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +NOVEMBER, 1925 +Vol. LXXXVI NUMBER 2 + + + + +The Worst Joke in the World + +A STORY WHICH THROWS A NEW AND INTERESTING LIGHT UPON THE TIME-HONORED +PROBLEM OF THE MOTHER-IN-LAW + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Mrs. Champney was putting the very last things into her bag, and Mrs. +Maxwell and Mrs. Deane sat watching her. The room in which she had lived +for nearly four years was already strange and unfamiliar. The silver +toilet articles were gone from the bureau. The cupboard door stood open, +showing empty hooks and shelves. The little water colors of Italian +scenes had vanished from the walls, and the books from the table. All +those things were gone which had so charmed and interested Mrs. Maxwell +and Mrs. Deane. + +They were old ladies, and to them Jessica Champney at fifty was not old +at all. With her gayety, her lively interest in life, and her dainty +clothes, she seemed to them altogether young--girlish, even, in her +enthusiastic moments, and always interesting. They loved and admired +her, and were heavy-hearted at her going. + +“You’ve forgotten the pussy cat, Jessica,” Mrs. Maxwell gravely +remarked. + +“Oh, so I have!” said Mrs. Champney. + +Hanging beside the bureau was a black velvet kitten with a strip of +sandpaper fastened across its back, and underneath it the inscription: + + SCRATCH MY BACK + +It was intended, of course, for striking matches. As Mrs. Champney never +had occasion to strike a match, this little object was not remarkably +useful. Nor, being a woman of taste, would she have admitted that it was +in the least ornamental; but it was precious to her--so precious that a +sob rose in her throat as she took it down from the wall. + +She showed a bright enough face to the old ladies, however, as she +carried the kitten across the room and laid it in the bag. She had often +talked to these old friends about her past--about her two heavenly +winters in Italy, about her girlhood “down East,” about all sorts of +lively and amusing things that she had seen and done; but she had said +very, very little about the period to which the velvet kitten belonged. + +It had been given to her in the early days of her married life by a +grateful and adoring cook. It had hung on the wall of her bedroom in +that shabby, sunny old house in Connecticut where her three children had +been born. She could not think of that room unmoved, and she did not +care to talk of it to any one. + +Not that it was sad to remember those bygone days. There was no trace of +bitterness in the memory. It was all tender and beautiful, and sometimes +she recalled things that made her laugh through the tears; but even +those things she couldn’t talk about. + +There was, for instance, that ridiculous morning when grandpa had come +to see the baby, the unique and miraculous first baby. He had sat down +in a chair and very gingerly taken the small bundle in his arms, and the +chair had suddenly broken beneath his portly form. Down he crashed, his +blue eyes staring wildly, his great white mustache fairly bristling with +horror, the invaluable infant held aloft in both hands. If she had begun +to tell about that, in the very middle of it another memory might have +come--a recollection of the day when she had sat in that same room, the +door locked, her hands tightly clasped, her eyes staring ahead of her at +the years that must be lived without her husband, her friend and lover. + +She had thought she could not bear that, but she had borne it; and the +time had come when the memory of her husband was no longer an anguish +and a futile regret, but a benediction. She had lived a happy life with +her children. They were all married now, and in homes of their own, and +she was glad that it should be so. + +These four years alone had been happy, too. Her children wrote to her +and visited her, and their family affairs were a source of endless +interest. She had all sorts of other interests, too. She made friends +readily; she was an energetic parish worker; she loved to read; she +enjoyed a matinée now and then, or a concert, and the conversation of +Mrs. Maxwell and Mrs. Deane. + +With all her heart she had relished her freedom and her dignity. Her +children were always asking her to come and live with one or the other +of them, but she had always affectionately refused. She believed that it +wasn’t wise and wasn’t right. + +She had stayed on in this comfortable, old-fashioned boarding house in +Stamford, cheerful and busy. It had been a delight beyond measure to her +to send a little check now and then to one of her children, a present to +a grandchild, some pretty thing that she had embroidered or crocheted to +her daughters-in-law. Her elder son’s wife had written once that she was +a “real fairy godmother,” and Mrs. Champney never forgot that. It was +exactly what she wanted to be to them all--a gay, sympathetic, gracious +fairy godmother. + +But she wasn’t going to be one any longer. What her lawyer called a +“totally unforeseen contingency” had arisen, and all her life was +changed. He was a young man, that lawyer. His father had been Mrs. +Champney’s lawyer and friend in his day, and she had, almost as a matter +of course, given the son charge of her affairs when the elder man died. + +She had not wanted either of her sons to look after things for her. She +didn’t like even to mention financial matters to people she loved. +Indeed, she had been a little obstinate about this. And now this +“totally unforeseen contingency” had come, to sweep away almost all of +her income, and with it the independence, the dignity, that were to her +the very breath of life. + +If it had been possible, she would not have told her children. She had +said nothing when she had received that letter from the lawyer--such an +absurd and pitiful letter, full of a sort of angry resentment, as if she +had been unjustly reproaching him. She had gone to see him at once. She +had been very quiet, very patient with him, and had asked very few +questions about what had happened. She simply wanted to know exactly +what there was left for her, and she learned that she would have fifteen +dollars a month. + +So she had been obliged to write to her children, and they had all +wanted her immediately; but she chose her second son, because he lived +nearest, and she hadn’t enough money for a longer journey. Now she was +ready to go to his house. + +She locked the bag and gave one more glance around the empty room. + +“Well!” she said cheerfully. “That seems to be all!” + +Mrs. Maxwell rose heavily from her chair. + +“Jessica,” she said, not very steadily, “we’re going to miss you!” + +Mrs. Deane also rose. + +“Whoever else takes this room,” she added sternly, “it won’t be +_you_--and I don’t care what any one says, either!” + +Mrs. Champney put an arm about each of them and smiled at them +affectionately. She was, in their old eyes, quite a young woman, full of +energy and courage, trim and smart in her dark suit and her debonair +little hat; but she had never before felt so terribly old and +discouraged. + +She couldn’t even tell these dear old friends that she would see them +again soon, for in order to see them she would have either to get the +money for the railway ticket from her son, or else to invite them to her +daughter-in-law’s house. It hurt her to leave them like this--and it was +only the beginning. + +At this point the landlady came toiling up the stairs. + +“The taxi’s here, Mrs. Champney,” she said, with a sigh. “My, how empty +the room does look!” + +So Mrs. Champney kissed the old ladies and went downstairs. The two +servants were waiting in the hall to say good-by to her. She smiled at +them. Then the landlady opened the front door, and Mrs. Champney went +out of the house, still smiling, went down the steps, and got into the +taxi. + +She sat up very straight in the cab, a valiant little figure, dressed in +her best shoes, with spotless white gloves, and her precious sable +stole about her shoulders--and such pain and dread in her heart! There +was no one in the world who could quite understand what she felt in this +hour. To other people she was simply leaving a boarding house where she +had lived all by herself, and going to a good home where she was +heartily welcome, to a son whom she loved, a daughter-in-law of whom she +was very fond, and a grandchild who was almost the very best of all her +grandchildren; but to Mrs. Champney the journey was bitter almost beyond +endurance. + +She loved her children with all the strength of her soul, but she had +been wise in her love. She had tried always to be a little aloof from +them, never to be too familiar, never to be tiresome. She had given them +all she had, all her love and care and sympathy, and she had wanted +nothing in return. She wished them to think of her, not as weak and +helpless, but as strong and enduring, and always ready to give. And +now-- + +“Now I’m going to be a mother-in-law,” she said to herself. “Oh, please +God, help me! Help me not to be a burden to Molly and Robert! Help me to +stand aside and to hold my tongue! Oh, please God, help me _not_ to be a +mother-in-law!” + + +II + +Mrs. Champney had arranged matters so as to reach the house just at +dinner time. She even hoped that she might be a little late, so that +there wouldn’t be any time at all to sit down and talk. She had never +dreaded anything as she dreaded that first moment, the crossing of that +threshold. Her hands and feet were like ice, her thin cheeks were +flushed, anticipating it. She wanted to enter in an agreeable little +stir and bustle, to be cheerful, to be casual; but Robert and Molly were +too young for that. They would be too cordial. + +“I don’t expect them to want me,” said Mrs. Champney to herself. “They +can’t want me. If they’d only just not try--not pretend!” + +She did not know Molly very well. She had seen her a good many +times--Molly and the incomparable baby--but that had been in the days +when Mrs. Champney was a fairy godmother, with all sorts of delightful +gifts to bestow. Robert’s wife had been a little shy with her. A kind, +honest girl, Mrs. Champney had thought her, good to look at in her +splendid health and vitality, but not very interesting. And now she had +to come into poor Molly’s house! + +She was pleased to see that her train was late. She had not told them +what train she would take. Perhaps they wouldn’t keep dinner waiting. +When she got there, perhaps they would be sitting at the table. Then she +could hurry in, full of cheerful apologies, and sit down with them, and +there wouldn’t be that strained, terrible moment she so much dreaded. + +A vain hope! For, as she got out of the train, her heart sank to see +Robert there waiting for her--Robert with his glummest face, Robert at +his worst. + +There was no denying that Robert had a worst. He was never willful and +provoking, as his adorable sister could be upon occasion. He was never +stormy and unreasonable, like his elder brother; but he could be what +Mrs. Champney privately called “heavy,” and that was, for her, one of +the most dismaying things any one could be. She saw at the first glance +that he was going to be heavy now. + +“Mother!” he said, in a tone almost tragic. + +“But, my dear boy, how in the world did you know I’d get this train?” +she asked gayly. “I didn’t write--” + +“I’ve been waiting for an hour,” he answered. “You said ‘about dinner +time,’ and I certainly wasn’t going to let you come from the station +alone. This way--there’s a taxi waiting.” + +Mrs. Champney was ashamed of herself. Robert was the dearest boy, so +stalwart, so trustworthy, so handsome in his dark and somber fashion, +and so touchingly devoted to her! After all, wasn’t it far better to be +a little too heavy than too light and insubstantial? As he got into the +cab beside her, she slipped her arm through his and squeezed it. + +“You dear boy, to wait like that!” she said. + +“Mother!” he said again. “By Heaven, I could wring that fellow’s neck! +Speculating with your money--” + +“Don’t take it like that, Robert. It’s all over and done with now.” + +“No, it’s not!” said he. “It’s--the thing is, you’ve been used to all +sorts of little--little comforts and so on; and just at the present time +I’m not able to give you--” + +“Please don’t, Robert!” she cried. “It hurts me!” + +He put his arm about her shoulders. + +“You’re not going to be hurt,” he said grimly; “not by _any one_, +mother!” + +His tone and his words filled her with dismay. + +“Robert,” she said firmly, “I will not be made a martyr of!” + +“A victim, then,” Robert insisted doggedly. “You’ve been tricked and +swindled by that contemptible fellow; but Frank and I are going to see +that it’s made right!” + +“Oh, Robert! You’re not going to do anything to that poor, miserable, +distracted man?” + +“Nothing we can do. You gave the fellow a free hand, and he took +advantage of it. No, I mean that Frank and I are going to make it up to +you, mother.” + +He might as well have added “at any cost.” Mrs. Champney winced in +spirit, but at the same time she loved him for his blundering +tenderness, his uncomprehending loyalty. He meant only to reassure her, +but he made it all so hard, so terribly hard! She felt tears well up in +her eyes. How could she go through with this gallantly if he made it so +hard? + +Then, suddenly, there came to her mind the memory of a winter afternoon, +long, long ago, when Frank and Robert had been going out to skate. She +had heard alarming reports about the ice, and she had run after them, +bareheaded, into the garden. She could see that dear garden, bare and +brown in the wintry sunshine; she could see her two boys, stopping and +turning toward her as she called. + +Frank had laughingly assured her that there was no danger at all. That +was Frank’s way. She didn’t believe him, yet his sublime confidence in +himself and his inevitable good luck somehow comforted her; and then +Robert had said: + +“Well, look here, mother--we’ll promise not to go near the middle of the +pond at the same time. Then, whatever happens, you’ll have one of us +left anyhow--see?” + +And that was Robert’s way. The very thought of it stopped the dreaded +invasion of tears and made her smile to herself in the dark. Such a +splendidly honest way--and so devastating! + +The taxi had stopped now, and Robert helped her out in a manner that +made her feel very, very old and frail. + +“Wait till I pay the driver, mother,” he said. “Don’t try to go +alone--it’s too dark.” + +So Mrs. Champney waited in the dark road outside that strange little +house. Her son was paying for the cab; her son was going to assist her +up the path; she was old and helpless and dependent. + +Then the front door opened, and Molly stood there against the light. + +“Hello, mother dear!” she called, in that big, rich, beautiful voice of +hers. “Hurry in! It’s cold!” + +Mrs. Champney did hurry in, and Molly caught her in both arms and hugged +her tight. + +“Just don’t mind very much how things are, will you?” she whispered. “My +housekeeping’s pretty awful, you know!” + +Tears came to Mrs. Champney’s eyes again, because this was such a +blessed sort of welcome. + +“As if I’d care!” she said. + +“Let me show your room--and Bobbetty,” said Molly. + +She took the bag from Robert, who had just come in, and ran up the +stairs. Mrs. Champney followed her. All the little house seemed warm and +bright with Molly’s beautiful, careless spirit. It wasn’t strange or +awkward. It was like coming home; and the room that Molly had got ready +for her was so pretty! + +“Dinner’s all ready,” said Molly; “but--if you’ll just take one look at +Bobbetty. He’s--when he’s asleep, he’s--” + +Words failed her. + +Mrs. Champney got herself ready as quickly as she could, and followed +Molly down the hall to a closed door. Molly turned the handle softly, +and they stepped into a little room that was like another world, all +dark and still, with the wind blowing in at an open window. + +“Nothing wakes him up!” whispered Molly proudly, and turned on a +green-shaded electric lamp that stood on the bureau. + +Mrs. Champney went over to the crib and looked down at the child who lay +there--the child who was her child, flesh of her flesh, and was yet +another woman’s child. He was beautiful--more beautiful than any of her +children had been. He lay there like a little prince. His face, +olive-skinned and warmly flushed on the cheeks, wore a look of careless +arrogance, his dark brows were level and haughty, his mouth was richly +scornful; and yet, for all this pride of beauty, she could not help +seeing the baby softness and innocence and helplessness of him. + +He might lie there like a little prince, but he was caged in an iron +crib, he wore faded old flannel pyjamas, and beside him, where it had +slipped from the hand that still grasped it in dreams, lay such an +unprincely toy! Mrs. Champney, bending over to examine it, found it to +be a rubber ball squeezed into a white sock. + +It seemed to Mrs. Champney that she could never tire of looking at that +beautiful baby. She hadn’t half finished when Molly touched her arm and +whispered “Robert,” and, turning out the light, led her husband’s mother +across the dark, windy room out into the hall again. + +“I heard Robert getting restless downstairs,” she explained. + +Side by side they descended the stairs. Mrs. Champney was happy, with +that particular happiness which the companionship of babies brought to +her. She had friends who were made unhappy by the sight of babies. They +said that they couldn’t help looking ahead and imagining the sorrows in +store for the poor little things. But to Mrs. Champney this seemed +morbid and quite stupid, because, when the sorrows came, the babies +would no longer be babies, but grown people, and as well able as any one +else to deal with them. + +No--babies were not melancholy objects to Mrs. Champney. On the +contrary, they filled her with a strong and tender delight, because of +her knowledge that whatever troubles came to them, she could surely +help; because, for babies, a kiss is a cure for so much, and a song can +dry so many baby tears; because love, which must so often stand mute and +helpless before grown-up misery, can work such marvels for little +children. + +She was happy, then, until she reached the foot of the stairs--and not +again for a long time. + +Robert was waiting for them there. He came forward, with a faint frown, +and pushed into place two hairpins that were slipping out of Molly’s +hair. It was the most trifling action, yet it seemed to Mrs. Champney +very significant. He didn’t like to see those hairpins falling out, +didn’t like to see Molly’s lovely, shining hair in disorder. He noticed +things of that sort, and he cared. He cared too much. There had been a +look of annoyance and displeasure on his face that distressed Mrs. +Champney. + +Fussiness, she thought, was one of the most deplorable traits a man +could have. It was only another name for pettiness, and that was +something no member of her family had ever displayed. Could it be +possible that Robert, the most uncompromising and high-minded of all her +children, was developing in that way--and with such a wife as Molly? + +She watched her son with growing uneasiness during the course of the +dinner. It was a splendidly cooked dinner. The roast veal was browned +and seasoned to perfection, the mashed potatoes were smooth and light, +there were scalloped tomatoes and a salad of apples and celery, and a +truly admirable lemon meringue pie; but Robert frowned because the +potatoes were in an earthenware bowl, and the plates did not match. When +the splendid pie appeared, in the tin dish in which it had been baked, +he sprang up and carried it out into the kitchen, to return with it +damaged, but lying properly on a respectable dish. + +“Oh, I’m awfully sorry, Robert!” Molly said, each time that Robert found +something wrong; and there was such generous contrition in her honest +face that Mrs. Champney wanted to get up and shake her son. + +What did those silly little things matter? How could he even see them, +with Molly before his eyes? + +“She’s beautiful,” thought Mrs. Champney. “She wouldn’t be beautiful in +a photograph. I suppose she’d look quite plain; but when you’re with +her--when she smiles--it’s like a blessing!” + + +III + +It was not a comfortable meal for any of them, and Mrs. Champney was +glad when it was finished. She offered to help Molly with the dishes, +and she really wanted to do so; but when Molly refused, and she saw that +Robert didn’t like the idea, she did not persist. She went into the +little sitting room with Robert, and he settled her in an armchair, +putting behind her shoulders a plump cushion that made her neck ache. He +lit his pipe and began to move about restlessly. + +“You know,” he began abruptly, “Molly’s not really--slovenly.” + +“Robert!” cried Mrs. Champney. “What nonsense!” + +“Yes, I know,” he said doggedly; “but I don’t want you to think--” + +Mrs. Champney did not hear the rest of his speech. She was vaguely +aware that he was making excuses for Molly, but she did not stop him. He +had said enough. He had given her the key, and now she could understand. + +This was not pettiness, and Robert was not fussy. It was because he +loved Molly so much that he could not endure to have another person see +in her what might be construed as faults. If he had been alone with +Molly, he wouldn’t have cared, he wouldn’t even have noticed these +things. It was because his mother had come, and he was afraid. + +It is an old and a deep-rooted thing, the child’s faith in the mother’s +judgment. If the mother has been honest and wise, if the child has been +never deceived or disappointed by her, then, no matter how old he grows, +or how far he may go from her, that old and deep-rooted faith lives in +him. Robert, at twenty-six, was surer of himself than he was ever likely +to be again. He was certain that all his ideas were his own, and that no +living creature could influence him; yet he was terribly afraid of what +his mother might think of Molly. + +For, after all, his mother was the standard, and the home she had made +for him in his boyhood must forever be the standard of homes. She would +see that this home of Molly’s was not like that. She would think-- + +“You needn’t worry, my dear boy,” said Mrs. Champney gently. “I’m sure +I’ll understand Molly.” + +And no more than that. It wouldn’t do to tell him what she really +thought of Molly. It would sound exaggerated and insincere. It would +startle him, and it might conceivably make him contrary; so she held her +tongue. + +Presently Molly came in from the kitchen, flushed and smiling, and sank +into a chair. + +“Take off that apron, old girl,” said Robert. + +“Oh, I’m sorry!” said Molly. “I always forget!” + +Robert took it away into the kitchen. + +“Too tired for a song, Molly?” he asked when he returned. + +“Of course I’m not!” said she, getting up again. + +She was tired, though, and a little nervous, and Mrs. Champney felt +sorry for her; but Robert would have it so. His mother must see what +Molly could do. He lay back in his chair, smoking, with an air of regal +indifference, as if he were a young sultan who had commanded this +performance but was not much interested in it; but as a matter of fact +he was twice as nervous as Molly. + +He had spoken to his mother before about Molly’s singing, and Mrs. +Champney had thought of it as an agreeable accomplishment for a son’s +wife, but this performance amazed her. This was not a parlor +accomplishment, this big, glorious voice, true and clear, effortless +because so perfectly managed. This was an art, and Molly was an artist. + +“Molly!” she cried, when the song was done. “Molly, my dear! I don’t +know what to say!” + +Molly flushed with pleasure. + +“I do love music,” she said. “I often hope Bobbetty will care about it.” + +“That was a darned silly song, though,” observed Robert. + +Molly turned away hastily. + +“I know it was!” she said cheerfully. + +But Mrs. Champney had seen the tears come into her eyes. Molly was hurt. +She didn’t understand, and unfortunately Mrs. Champney did. She knew +that Robert had been trying to tell his mother that Molly could do even +better than this--that she could, if she chose, sing the most prodigious +songs. He was afraid that his mother would judge and condemn Molly for +that darned silly song about “the flowers all nodding on yonder hill.” + +“That’s what being a mother-in-law really means,” said Mrs. Champney to +herself. “It means being the third person, the one who stands outside +and sees everything--all the poor, pitiful little faults and weaknesses. +Love won’t help. The more I love them, the more I can’t help seeing, and +they’ll know--they’ll always know. When Robert is impatient, Molly will +know that I’ve noticed it, and she’ll think she has to notice it, too. +When Molly is careless, Robert will imagine that I’m blaming her, and +he’ll feel ashamed of her. That’s why mothers-in-law make trouble. It’s +not because they always interfere, or because they’re troublesome and +domineering. It’s because they _see_ all the little things that nobody +ought to see--the little things that would never grow important if a +third person wasn’t there. I used to feel so sorry for mothers-in-law. I +used to think it was a vulgar, heartless joke about their making +trouble. A joke? Oh, it’s the worst, most horrible joke in the +world--because it’s _true_!” + + +IV + +Mrs. Champney did not sleep well that night. When she first turned out +the light, a strange sort of panic seized her. She felt trapped, shut +in, here in this unfamiliar room, in this house where she had no +business to be, and yet could not leave. She got up and turned on the +light, and that was better, for she could think more clearly in the +light. She propped herself up on the pillows, pulled the blanket up to +her chin, and sat there, trying to find the way out. + +“There always is a way out,” she thought. “It’s never necessary to do a +thing that injures other people. I must not stay here, or with any of my +children. If I think quietly and sensibly, I can--” + +There was a knock at the door. + +“Are you all right, mother?” asked Robert’s voice. “I saw your light.” + +“Perfectly all right, dear boy!” she answered brightly. “I’m very +comfortable. Good night!” + +“Sure?” he asked. + +She wanted to jump up and go to him and kiss him--her dear, solemn, +anxious Robert; but that wouldn’t do. Never, never, while she had a +trace of dignity and honor, would she turn to her children for +reassurance. She was the mother. She could not always be strong, but she +could at least hide her weakness from her children. She could endure her +bad moments alone. + +“Quite sure!” she answered, and snapped out the light. “There! I’m going +to sleep! Good night, my own dear, dear boy!” + +“Good night, mother!” he answered. + +His voice touched her so! If only she could let go, and be frail and +helpless, and allow her children to take care of her! They would be so +glad to do it--they would be so dear and kind! + +“Shame on you, Jessica Champney!” she said to herself. “You weren’t an +old lady before you came here, and you’re not going to be one now. +You’re only fifty, and you’re well and strong. There must be any number +of things a healthy woman of fifty can do. Find them!” + +And then, as if by inspiration, she thought of Emily Lyons. + +The next morning, as soon as Robert had gone, she told Molly that she +wanted to “see about something”; and off she went, dressed in her best +again, and took the train to a near-by town. She was going to see Miss +Lyons. She had not met this old school friend for a good many years, but +she remembered her with affection and respect, and perhaps with a little +pity, because Emily had never married. She had devoted her life to +charitable work--an admirable existence, but, Mrs. Champney thought, +rather a forlorn one. + +Her pity fled in haste, however, when she saw Emily. + +A very earnest young secretary ushered the caller into a big, quiet, +sunny office, and there, behind a large desk, sat Miss Lyons. She rose +at once, and came forward with outstretched hands. Her blue eyes behind +the horn-rimmed spectacles were as friendly and kind as ever, and yet +Mrs. Champney’s heart sank. The Emily she wished to remember was a thin, +freckled girl with a long blond pigtail and a shy and hesitating +manner--an Emily who had very much looked up to the debonair and popular +Jessica. This was such a very different Emily--a person of importance, +of grave assurance, a person with a large, impressive office at her +command. To save her life Mrs. Champney couldn’t help being impressed by +offices and filing cabinets and typewriters. + +She sat down, and she tried to talk in her usual blithe and amusing way, +but she knew that she was not succeeding at all. In the presence of this +new Emily she felt shockingly frivolous. She was sorry that she had worn +her white gloves and her sable stole. She wished that the heels of her +new shoes were not so high. + +She told Emily that she wanted something to do. + +“Do you mean charitable work, Jessica?” asked Miss Lyons. + +“I’m afraid I’d have to be paid,” said Mrs. Champney, with a guilty +flush. “You see, Emily, I’ve had a--a financial disaster. Of course, my +children are only too willing, but--” + +“They’re all married, aren’t they?” asked Emily. + +Something in the grave, kindly tone of her question stung Mrs. Champney +into a sort of bitterness. + +“Yes,” she answered. “All of them are married. I’m a mother-in-law, +Emily.” + +Miss Lyons did not smile. She was silent for a time, looking down at +her polished desk as if she were consulting a crystal. Then she looked +up. + +“We happen to need somebody in the Needlecraft Shop,” she said. “I could +give you that, Jessica, at eighteen dollars a week; but--” + +“But what?” asked Mrs. Champney, after waiting a minute. + +“I’m afraid you haven’t had much experience,” said Miss Lyons. + +“I’ve done a good deal of parish work,” said Mrs. Champney anxiously. + +She had known love, and happiness with the man she loved. She had +endured the anguish of losing him. She had borne three children and +brought them up. She had traveled a little in the world. She had even +known a “financial disaster” at fifty; but in the presence of Emily +Lyons she was ready to admit that she had had no experience--that her +sole qualification for any useful occupation was the parish work she had +done. + +“If you’d like to try it, then,” said Emily gently. “I’ve found, though, +that women who have led a sheltered domestic life are inclined to be a +little oversensitive when it comes to business.” + +Mrs. Champney, into whose sheltered domestic life had come only such +incidents as birth and death and illness and accident and so on, said +that she hoped she wasn’t silly. + +“Of course you’re not, my dear!” said her old friend, taking her hand +across the desk. “You’re splendid! You always were!” + +And Mrs. Champney had to be satisfied with that. She was to begin at the +Needlecraft Shop the next morning. She was at last to enter the world; +but instead of being filled with ambitious hopes and resolves, she +actually could think of nothing but how she was to tell Robert about it. + +The only possible way was to take a mighty high hand with him from the +start, and the trouble was that she didn’t feel high-handed. She felt +depressed, and tired and--yes, crushed--that was the word for it. She +was not going to let Robert suspect that, however, or Molly, either. + +She decided to take her time about getting back. After leaving Emily, +she walked for a time through the streets of the brisk suburban town. +Then, seeing a clean little white-tiled restaurant, she went in there +and had her lunch. It was noon, and there were a good many other +business women there. Mrs. Champney tried to feel that she was one of +them now, but somehow she could not. Somehow the whole thing seemed +unreal, and even a little fantastic. + +She mustn’t think that it was unreal or fantastic, or how could she +convince Robert? She tried to make it real by doing all sorts of +calculations based upon eighteen dollars a week. With that amount, and +with what was left of her income, she could manage to live by herself, +somewhere near Robert and Molly, where she could see them and the baby +often, and yet be independent. Once more she could be a fairy +godmother--with sadly clipped wings, to be sure, but still able to +bestow a little gift now and then. + +She thought she would get something for Bobbetty now, and she bought one +of the nicest gray plush animals imaginable. The saleswoman said it was +a cat, but Mrs. Champney privately believed it to be a dog, because of +its drooping ears. Anyhow, it was a lovable animal, with a frank and +kindly expression and a most becoming leather collar. On the train, +going back, she regretfully took out its round yellow eyes, for they +were pins, and unless she forestalled him, Bobbetty would surely do +this. + +Even then it was a lovable animal, and Bobbetty received it with warm +affection. He was sitting in his high chair in the kitchen, while Molly +cooked the dinner. He was almost austerely neat and clean after his +bath, and he was eating a bowl of Graham crackers and milk, with a large +bib tied under his chin. A model child--yet, in the sidelong glance of +his black eyes in the direction of the new bowwow, who was not to be +touched until supper was finished, Mrs. Champney saw a thoughtful and +alarming gleam. Bobbetty was not quite sure whether he would continue +being good, or whether it would be nicer suddenly and violently to +demand the bowwow. + +Mrs. Champney helped him to choose the better course. She entertained +him while he ate, and then carried him off upstairs, with the bowwow, +and put him to bed. He became very garrulous then. He lay in his crib, +clasping the bow-wow, and he told Mrs. Champney all sorts of interesting +things in such a polite, conversational tone that she felt quite ashamed +of herself for interrupting him and telling him to go to sleep. + +He was nice about it, however. He paid no attention to this rudeness, +but pleasantly went on talking. Even when she went out of the room and +closed the door behind her, she heard his bland little voice continuing +the story of a wild horsy who stampled on _six_ policemens. Bobbetty was +not yet three, but he had personality. + +She was smiling as she went down the stairs--until she saw Robert. He +came to the foot of the stairs, watching her as she came toward him. She +had to meet his eyes, she had to smile again, but it was hard beyond all +measure. + +She had never seen that look on his face before. He had always been +utterly loyal to her, had always loved her, but it had been after the +fashion of a boy. The look she saw on his face now was not a boy’s; it +was the profound compassion and tenderness of a man. It came to her, +with a stab of pain, that she had cruelly underrated her son. She had +thought of him as a dear and rather clumsy boy, and he was so much more +than that--so much more! + +Her own affair seemed more fantastic than ever now. Here was Robert, +making his valiant battle in the world for the life and safety of his +wife and child. Here was Molly, busy with the vital needs of life, with +food and clothes, with the care of their child; and she herself was +going to work in the Needlecraft Shop. + +She had to tell them, of course. When they were all seated at the table, +she did so, in the most casual, matter-of-fact way. + +It was even worse than she had feared. Robert grew very white. + +“You mean--a job?” he asked. + +“It’s charitable work, really,” Mrs. Champney explained. “The +foreign-born women bring their needlework to the shop, and we sell it on +commission for them. The idea is to encourage their home industries, +and--” + +“But you’re going to get paid for it?” asked Robert. + +“Why, yes!” said Mrs. Champney brightly. “I’m sure I’ll enjoy the work, +too. I’ve always--” + +“You mean you’re going off to work every morning in this shop?” said +Robert. “Do you mind telling me why?” + +“Because I consider it very useful and interesting work, Robert,” +replied Mrs. Champney, with dignity. + +There was a long silence. + +“All right!” said Robert briefly. + +She knew how terribly she had hurt him. He had wanted to do so much for +her, to take her into his home and protect her and care for her, and she +would not let him. She had turned away with a smile from all that he had +to offer. She would take nothing. + +“I’ve always led--such an active life,” she said, in a very unsteady +voice. “I should think you could understand, Robert--” + +“I do!” he said grimly. + +“You don’t!” she cried. “You don’t! You--” + +She could not go on. She bent her head and pretended to be cutting up +something on her plate, but she could not see clearly. He never would +understand that she was doing this only for love of him, only so that +she might not be here in his home as the sinister third person who saw +everything and-- + +She started at the touch of Molly’s hand on her arm. + +“If that’s your way to be happy, darling,” said Robert’s wife, and Mrs. +Champney saw tears in her honest eyes. + + +V + +Mrs. Champney envisaged her life as divided into epochs, each one with +its own significance and its own memories. There was her childhood, +there was her girlhood. There were the early days of her married life, +when she and her husband had been alone. There were the crowded and +anxious and wonderful years when her children had been little. There was +the beginning of her widowhood, overshadowed with anguish and +loneliness, yet with a dark beauty of its own. There was her tranquil +middle age, and there was her business life. + +She had begun it on Tuesday, and this was Friday. It had lasted four +days, yet it seemed to her quite as long as all the years of her youth. +It seemed a lifetime in itself, in which she had acquired a new and +bitter wisdom. + +The train stopped at her station, and, with a crowd of other home-going +commuters, Mrs. Champney got out and hurried up the steps to the street, +to catch a trolley car; but she was not quick enough. By the time she +got there the car was full, and she drew back and let it go. She never +was quick enough any more. She seemed to have been transferred into a +world of terrific speed and vigor, where she was hopelessly +outdistanced, hopelessly old and weary and slow. + +She had thought, until this week, that she was a fairly intelligent and +energetic woman. She had even had her innocent little vanities; but now, +standing on the corner and looking after the car-- + +“I’m a silly, doddering old thing!” she said to herself, with a +trembling lip. + +She remembered all the dreadful defeats and humiliations of the week. +She remembered how slow she had been about wrapping up things and making +change--how curt she had been with some of the wealthiest and most +important customers--how stupid she had been about understanding the +Polish and Italian women who brought in their work. She remembered the +weary patience of Miss Elliott, who managed the shop. Miss Elliott was +not more than twenty-eight, but she had been to Mrs. Champney like a +discouraged but long-suffering teacher with a very trying child. + +“Doddering!” Mrs. Champney repeated. + +She was alone on the corner. In this new world nobody waited for +anything. Those who, like herself, had missed the car, had at once set +off on foot; and Mrs. Champney decided to do so herself. It was less +than a mile--a pleasant walk in the soft April dusk. + +This walk might have been specially designed by Miss Elliott to teach +Mrs. Champney another lesson; only it was a lesson that she had already +learned. She really needed no further demonstration of the fact that she +was fifty, and utterly tired and miserable. It was superfluous, it was +cruel, and it made her angry. When she reached the street where Robert’s +little house stood, her heart was hot and bitter with resentment. + +“If they’d only let me alone!” she thought. “I don’t want any one to +speak to me or look at me. I know I’m unreasonable. I want to be +unreasonable. I want to be let alone!” + +But of course she couldn’t be. Nobody can be let alone except those who +would give all the world for a little tiresome interference. Molly saw +at once how tired she was, and wanted her to lie down and have dinner +brought up to her. Robert, by saying nothing at all, was still more +difficult to endure. + +“I’m not particularly tired, Molly, thank you,” said Mrs. Champney, with +great politeness. + +What she wanted to do was to stamp her foot and cry: + +“Let me alone! Let me alone! To-morrow is Saturday, and the next day is +Sunday. You can talk to me on Sunday. Let me alone now!” + +She sternly repressed all this. She sat down at the table and tried to +eat her dinner. She forced herself to remain in the sitting room until +ten o’clock. + +“In a week or two I’ll go away and get a room for myself,” she thought, +“where I can be as tired as I like!” + +When the clock struck ten, she sat still and counted up to five hundred, +so that she wouldn’t seem like a tired person in a dreadful hurry to get +to bed. Then she rose, said good night to Robert and Molly, and went +upstairs. + +Even then she would not slight or omit any detail of her routine. She +washed, rubbed cold cream into her hands, braided her hair, folded her +clothes neatly, ready for the morning, and knelt down to say her +prayers. Then she turned out the light, opened the window, and got into +bed; and she was so glad to be there, so glad to lay her tired gray head +on the pillow, that she cried. + +She was ashamed of this weakness, and meant to struggle against it; but +sleep came before she had driven it away--a heavy and sorrowful sleep, +colored with the mist of tears. + +She slept. Then she sighed, and stirred in her sleep. Something was +coming through into the shadowy world of dreams--something imperious and +menacing. She didn’t want to wake up, but something was forcing her to +do so. She heard something calling. + +She sat up suddenly. It was a child’s voice calling “Mother!”--a sound +which would, she thought, have reached her even in heaven. + +“Mother! Mother! I _want_ you!” It was Bobbetty screaming that, and no +one answered him. “I want you, mother!” + +“What’s the matter with Molly?” thought Mrs. Champney in a blaze of +anger. + +She got out of bed and hurried barefooted across the room. That baby +voice was filling the whole house, the whole world, with its +heartbreaking cry: + +“Mother! Mother!” + +Mrs. Champney went out into the hall, and there she found Robert and +Molly standing in the dim light outside Bobbetty’s door--Molly with her +magnificent hair hanging loose about her shoulders, her face quite +desperate, tears rolling down her cheeks. + +“What’s the matter?” cried Mrs. Champney. + +“Hush!” whispered Robert. “Dr. Pinney said we weren’t to take him +up--said it was nothing but temper. I went in to see, and he’s perfectly +all right. He simply wants Molly to take him up.” + +“But he’s--so little!” sobbed Molly, in a smothered voice. + +“Mother! I want you, mother!” shrieked Bobbetty. + +Molly made a move forward, but Robert clutched her arm. He, too, was +pale and desperate. + +“No, Molly!” he said. “Dr. Pinney told us definitely--” + +“Bah!” cried Mrs. Champney, in a tone that amazed both of them. “Dr. +Pinney, indeed!” + +She opened the door of Bobbetty’s room, went in, snatched him out of his +crib, and carried him off, past his speechless parents, and into her own +room. + + +VI + +Bobbetty’s hand was flung out and fell, soft and limp, across Mrs. +Champney’s face. She opened her eyes. The dawn was stealing into the +room, coming like music. One drowsy little bird was awake in the world, +piping sweetly. The breeze came, fluttering the window curtain, and it +seemed to her that she could hear the footsteps of the glorious sun +coming up the sky. All creation waited for him--waited breathless, to +break into a great chorus of ecstasy when he appeared. + +Bobbetty was waking, too. His hard little head bumped against her +shoulder. His toes moved softly, he scowled, his great black eyes +opened, he looked sternly into her face, and then he smiled. + +“Gramma!” he said contentedly, and sat up. + +“We must be very quiet, not to wake mother,” said Mrs. Champney. + +“Why?” asked Bobbetty. + +In his superb arrogance he looked upon his mother somewhat as he looked +upon the sun. She existed solely for him. He adored her and he needed +her--that was why she existed. Mrs. Champney did not trouble to explain. +He would learn soon enough how very many other people there were in this +world, and that it was not his own world and his own sun at all. In the +meantime, let him make the most of it. She said that they would surprise +mother, and the idea appealed to Bobbetty. He said he would be as quiet +as a mouse, and so he was. + +Mrs. Champney got his ridiculous little garments and dressed him. She +knelt at his feet to put on his stubby sandals. She even kissed his +feet, and his hands, and his warm, olive-tinted cheeks, and the back of +his neck. He smiled upon her, condescendingly but kindly. + +Then she carried him down into the kitchen. He was a plump and sturdy +baby, but he was no burden to her arms. She wasn’t tired now. Indeed, +she thought she had never in her life felt so gay and light and happy. + +The sun had come, and the kitchen was filled with it. The aluminium +saucepans glittered like silver, and the water ran out of the tap in a +rainbow spray. She laid the table in the dining room, and Bobbetty +followed her back and forth, carrying the less dangerous things. + +There was a wonderful perfume in the air--the intangible sweetness of +spring--and with it, and no less wonderful, was the homely fragrance of +coffee and oatmeal and bacon. It was a divine hour, and Bobbetty knew +it. Bobbetty could share it with her--he and he alone. + +He dropped a loaf of bread that he was carrying, and, moved by impulse, +kicked it across the room. Mrs. Champney picked it up, without a word of +reproof. She knew how Bobbetty felt. + +Then she drew the chairs up to the table--and made her great discovery. + +“There are four chairs!” she cried aloud. “There are four of us! Why, +I’m not the third person at all!” + +She was so overcome by this that she sat down, and stared before her +with a dazed look. + +“There were three already--I’m the fourth, and four’s such a nice +number! I can’t go away and leave Robert and Molly alone together. +They’ll never be alone together any more--there’s Bobbetty. I can help +so much! They’re both so very, very young, and I could do so much! Molly +could have time for music. There are two buttons off Bobbetty’s +underwaist. Mother-in-law, indeed!” + +She heard the percolator boiling too hard, and she got up. In the +kitchen doorway she met Bobbetty with the bowwow. + +“Bobbetty!” she said. “Do you know something?” + +“Yes, I do!” shouted the child. + +But Mrs. Champney told him, anyhow. + +“Bobbetty,” she said, “there’s a Lucy Stone League for women who don’t +want to use their husbands’ names. I believe I’ll start a Jessica +Champney League for women who refuse to be called mothers-in-law. +There’s really no such thing as a mother-in-law, Bobbetty. It’s just a +joke, and a very nasty one. Really and truly, Bobbetty, there are +nothing but mothers-in-nature. I think I’ll invent some other word. Why +not ‘husbandsmother,’ or ‘wifesmother,’ or--” + +Molly appeared before her, evidently in great distress. + +“Oh, mother darling!” she cried. “You shouldn’t have done this! You +shouldn’t be up so early! You’ll be tired out before you start!” + +Mrs. Champney stirred the oatmeal, which was bubbling and spouting like +molten lava. + +“I don’t believe I will go,” she said. “It seems--such a waste of time. +I think I’ll stay home, and help you, and be a grandmother. I’ve tried +everything else, and I believe I’d do well at that.” + +Molly stared for a moment. Then she ran to the foot of the stairs. + +“Robert!” she called, in her ringing, joyous voice. “Robert! Mother’s +going to stay home!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +DECEMBER, 1925 +Vol. LXXXVI NUMBER 3 + + + + +As Is + +HOW MAUDE’S AUNT DEMONSTRATED THAT SHE WASN’T YOUNG, LIKE HER CHARMING +NIECE, AND DIDN’T CARE TO BE SILLY + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Miss Carter fished out the last doughnut from the kettle of bubbling +fat, laid it on a sheet of brown paper, and sprinkled it with powdered +sugar. + +“They’re extra good this time!” she said to herself. + +She stood looking down at them. There they lay in rows and rows, +feathery light, richly crisp and brown. + +“Oh, my!” she cried. “I do wish I could eat just one!” + +But even one doughnut would be treachery to Maude. + +“You’ll ruin your figure and your digestion by eating between meals, +Auntie Sue,” Maude had said. “Promise me you won’t!” + +Miss Carter had refused to promise, but she had said that she would try, +and she did try. She turned her back upon this temptation, with a faint +sigh, and gave a last glance round the kitchen. + +Nothing more for her to do here! It was as spotless as a chemist’s +laboratory. Indeed, that was what Maude wanted it to be like. She said +that a kitchen ought to be a home laboratory, and she wanted it all +white and bleak and stern. + +Even a high white stool had been provided for Miss Carter. She found it +very convenient for many purposes, but she _did_ like a rocking-chair, +and she had apologetically brought one down from the attic. To please +Maude she had painted it white, so that it also had a somewhat severe +look; but when there was nobody else in the house, Miss Carter always +got out that nice, downy old red silk cushion from the hall cupboard, +put it into the chair, and sat down and rocked comfortably while she +shelled peas or hulled berries, and so on. + +The cushion always disappeared before Maude got home, because it would +distress her. If she were to see it, she would surely go out the very +next day and buy a scientific, up-to-date one--perhaps one like those +hard, shiny things that dentists have in their chairs. + +Maude disapproved of old, soft, comfortable things, and called them +“slipshod.” She hated all that was not exact and efficient. It was +misery for her to hear Miss Carter talk about putting in “a pinch” of +cinnamon, instead of one-eighth of a teaspoonful, and the mention of “a +lump of butter the size of an egg” appalled her. + +She had bought Miss Carter glass measuring cups, quart measures, pint +measures, scales, and sets of spoons of all sizes; and yet, in the +making of these very doughnuts, Miss Carter had used that old blue +teacup for measuring, and she had put in many “pinches” of things. It +made her feel guilty to think of it, but she really couldn’t help it. At +forty-- + +Now there was another treacherous thought! Maude never allowed her to be +forty. + +“Never think of yourself as forty,” Maude often said, “and you won’t +feel forty.” + +But in her secret heart Miss Carter wished that she could just +comfortably be forty. It seemed to her a remarkably nice age to be. +Indeed, she felt proud of it. When she went to buy a hat, and the +saleswoman said something nice about her splendid head of hair, Miss +Carter liked to say: + +“It’s not bad for a woman of forty, if I do say it myself!” + +She didn’t say this any more, because it worried Maude, but there were +times when she defiantly thought it. It gave so much zest to life. For +instance, that evening when they came back from the picnic, and every +one else was so tired, and she wasn’t, one bit, even if she was for-- + +As she left the kitchen and the tantalizing aroma of the doughnuts, +another perfume came floating in at the open front door. It was the +scent of those dear little pinks and verbenas in the garden. + +“I guess I’ll go out and sit on the porch for half an hour,” thought +Miss Carter. + +So out she went, and the very sight of the garden on this summer day +made her so happy that tears came to her eyes. Maude had improved the +house a good deal, but she had been satisfied to leave the garden to her +aunt, and it was just as it had always been--a gay, careless sort of +garden, with a lawn shaded by fine old trees, and a rebellious crowd of +bright, old-fashioned flowers. The sweet alyssum was foaming over the +borders of the largest bed and marching down to the path, just as it had +done when she was a little girl. There were the rosebushes that her +mother had planted, and the privet hedge that had seemed so tall and +dark and impenetrable to a child’s vision. It was indeed a dear and +wonderful old garden! + +With a sigh of content, she sank into a chair--and almost at once jumped +up again. She mustn’t sit out here in her gingham house dress, wearing +these old shoes! Somebody might see her, and Maude would never get over +it if anybody should see her aunt looking really comfortable; so she +went back to the house, and up to her own room. + +This was, in Miss Carter’s eyes, the most charming room in all the +world. The things in it were old, and some of them were not very +beautiful, but she liked them--all of them, even the two old calendars +on the wall and the French clock that had not ticked for years and +years. The dark shades were pulled down against the afternoon sun, and a +limpid green light filled the room. The mahogany bureau shone like dark +water, and the big four-post bed, with its old-fashioned bolster and the +ruffled spread, looked exquisitely restful. + +“Upon my word,” said Miss Carter to herself, “I believe I could take +forty winks! Such a hot afternoon! And there’s nothing much I ought to +do for the next half hour.” + +Now the naps of housekeepers are different from the naps of other +people. There is always a faint feeling of guilt about them, no matter +how much work has been done, or how well earned the rest--always a +consciousness of all sorts of other things that ought to be done. Even +Miss Carter, whose house was a model of cleanliness and order, had this +feeling of guilt, and was quite human enough to enjoy her nap all the +more for it. + +She settled herself comfortably on the sofa, and closed her eyes. One of +the shades flapped softly in the breeze, and she thought that it was +like a sail, and that she was floating off somewhere--floating off-- + +The telephone bell rang. + +Miss Carter sat up, frowned a little, yawned, and went downstairs; and +over the wire came the voice that was dearer to her than any other voice +in the world. + +“Auntie Sue, darling, would it bother you if I were to bring some one +home for dinner?” + +“Bother me?” cried Miss Carter. “Why, of course not, child! You can +bring a dozen people, any time you’ve a mind to!” + +“I just thought I’d ask Mr. Rhodes,” said Maude. + +A very odd sort of feeling came over Miss Carter. She smiled graciously, +as people do who wish to hide their emotions from the watchful +telephone, and said: + +“I’ll be very glad to see him, child.” + +But this was not quite true. She had never heard of Mr. Rhodes before, +yet she had been expecting him for five years, ever since Maude was +eighteen. She had known that somebody was bound to come and take Maude +away, and this was the man--she was sure of it! The way Maude said she +would “ask Mr. Rhodes” was enough. + +“Well, why not?” Miss Carter demanded sternly of herself. “You couldn’t +expect a girl like Maude t-to s-stay--Pshaw, I’ve left my handkerchief +upstairs!” + +She went upstairs hastily, and lay down on the sofa again for a little +while, but she did not go to sleep. + +After awhile she got up and washed her face in cold water, and began to +get ready for Maude’s guest. Naturally Maude would expect her to wear +the _crêpe de Chine_ dress she had given her aunt as a birthday present, +so Miss Carter opened the cupboard door, and there it was--a dark and +elegant stranger, hanging there with a sort of disdainful air among the +sensible, sturdy linens and cottons. + +She brought it out, took off her loose, comfortable house dress, and +struggled into the _crêpe de Chine_. + +“A slip-on-dress,” Maude had called it. + +“A squirm-on dress, I should say!” thought Miss Carter. + +She did not like herself in that dress. She looked at her image in the +mirror, and she did not like it. A sturdy little woman she was, straight +as an arrow. Her face, with its small, clear, regular features and +healthy color, and those very blue eyes of hers, was quite as pretty as +it had been fifteen years ago--perhaps even more so, because of the +patience and the compassion she had learned; but she had long ago +forgotten to think about being pretty. She noted nothing except the +dress, which didn’t suit her. + +“Specially designed upon long, slender lines,” Maude had said. + +“And I’m not!” thought Miss Carter. “What’s the sense in a dress being +long and slender, if the person inside it is short and”--she +paused--“and roly-poly,” she added firmly. “That’s what I am!” + +She covered up all this magnificence with a big checked apron, and went +down into the kitchen again. The dinners that she prepared for Maude +every night were so good that it was scarcely possible to improve upon +them, but this evening she intended to try. She intended to outdo +herself for Maude’s Mr. Rhodes. + +From the garden she picked enough early June peas to make cream-of-pea +soup. The chicken, which she had intended to roast, was not, she +thought, quite large enough for three, so she made it into a fricassee, +with dumplings beyond description. Then she had a dish of wax beans, and +a dish of asparagus, cooked to perfection and seasoned only with plenty +of butter, and potatoes most marvelously fried, and she made fresh +strawberry ice cream. When you consider what it meant to crack ice and +turn the freezer, in that dress with long, tight sleeves and floating +things that hung from the shoulders-- + +She didn’t dare to take it off, though, for fear of their coming by an +early train, because she knew that even more than a superb dinner Maude +would want to see her aunt in all her glory. + +Then she laid the table with her finest tablecloth and her grandmother’s +china, and with every rose in the garden in a bowl in the center. She +really was pleased with the result. + + +II + +As it happened, they came by a late train, so that Miss Carter was +sitting on the veranda, looking very calm and leisurely, as they +approached. She did not feel so, however. When, around the corner of the +hedge, she saw Maude’s familiar gray hat, which came down almost to the +tip of her niece’s pretty little nose, and beside it a most unfamiliar +straw hat on a tall head that bent deferentially, she was anything but +calm--and, for a moment, anything but hospitable. How could she be glad +to see this man who might take Maude away from her? + +“He’d never appreciate her!” said Miss Carter. “Not in a month of +Sundays!” + +Perhaps this might seem a little unjust, when Miss Carter hadn’t even +seen the man yet; but what she meant was that neither this man nor any +one else in the world could know the Maude she knew. He had never seen +and never would see the remarkable infant Maude, the neatest baby that +ever was, who used to lie out in a basket under that elm tree, her long +white dress pulled down perfectly straight, her little dark head exactly +in the center of the tiny pillow, her clenched fists lying one on each +side of her round, serious face. + +How Maude’s mother used to laugh at that neat baby of hers! And how she +used to laugh at the slightly older Maude who went, every day for weeks, +in a pink sunbonnet and a pink dress, to try to open the garden gate, +and each time sat down unexpectedly upon the path! + +When there was no mother to laugh any more, Miss Carter had taken on the +job. At first she had thought that without her sister she never could +laugh again; but it proved easier than she had expected. She found that +when the person you love wants anything, you can do impossible things. +When figured out on paper, she had seen that it was impossible to send +Maude to college; but she had sent her. And now, when she realized how +impossible it would be to let Maude go, she knew in her heart that she +could and would do that gladly. + +“If he’s anything like good enough for her,” she stipulated. + +She felt pretty sure, though, that Maude would never look at a man who +was not admirable. She had seen that this Mr. Rhodes was tall, and she +expected him to be marvelously handsome, with knightly manners and a +commanding intellect. Maude was so very particular, and so intelligent +herself--a private secretary at the age of twenty-three! + +The garden gate opened, and there they were. Miss Carter rose with a +welcoming smile, but-- + +“Good gracious!” she cried to herself. “The man’s _old_!” + +He carried himself well, this tall man. His face, in its way, was a fine +one, kindly and strong and trustworthy; but Miss Carter saw the tiny +wrinkles at the corners of his eyes, and the touch of gray in his dark +hair, and she was cruelly disappointed. If she had seen him alone, she +wouldn’t have dreamed of calling him old, for he wasn’t more than +forty-five; but with Maude beside him he was a Methuselah. Maude was so +pathetically young! Her very earnestness was such a young sort of thing! +She hadn’t really learned to smile yet. + +“Auntie,” she said, “this is Mr. Rhodes.” + +Over the telephone her voice had sounded very happy, but now there was a +note of portentous solemnity in it. She spoke as if she were bidding her +aunt gaze upon one of the wonders of the world; and this did not please +Miss Carter. + +“I’m very glad to see you, Mr. Rhodes,” she said. + +She said it pleasantly enough, but in a tone that Maude had never heard +before. She looked different, too. No one would have dared to think of +her as roly-poly now. Her dignity was such that she actually looked +taller. + +“Dinner,” said she, “will be served in ten minutes.” + +From the way she spoke, there might have been a butler and two footmen +to serve dinner. It was hard to imagine that this Miss Carter knew what +a gingham apron was. Nevertheless, she put one on as soon as she entered +the kitchen. + +Almost at once Maude appeared in the doorway. + +“Auntie!” she said. “Auntie, do you like Mr. Rhodes?” + +“My dear, I don’t know him!” answered Miss Carter, as if surprised. + +But Maude, though young, was also a woman, and she knew what a deceitful +answer this was. + +“Yes, but--” she said, and paused. “You know, auntie, he’s a very +remarkable man,” she went on briskly. + +“Oh, indeed, is he?” replied Miss Carter pleasantly. + +Well, she didn’t think so. When called, Mr. Rhodes came in from the +veranda, took his place at the table, and ate his dinner. He said yes, +the weather was cool for this time of the year, and no, he hadn’t been +in this part of the State before, and yes, thanks, he would have a +little more of the fricassee, and the roses on the table were very fine, +and he liked roses. Remarkable, was he? + +“A wooden Indian!” said Miss Carter to herself. + +It hurt her to see Maude sitting there, with shining eyes and flushed +cheeks, fairly hanging on the man’s words, and to see that he never +looked at the girl in that way. When he did look at her--which was not +often--he wore a kind, grown-up sort of smile which Miss Carter thought +detestable. He did not appreciate Maude. Miss Carter was sorry she had +made ice cream, and she wouldn’t let him have a single doughnut. + +When dinner was over, they all went out on the veranda. Dusk had settled +over the garden, and the stars were out, faint in the violet sky. A +breeze stirred in the leaves of the old trees and swayed the gay little +flowers, which, scarlet or blue or orange, all looked white now. It was +a lovely night. Even the disapproving and indignant Miss Carter yielded +a little to its softening influence, and was silent, thinking of the +old, dear things that haunted her garden. + +“Do you mind if I smoke?” came Mr. Rhodes’s deep, quiet voice from the +dark corner where he sat. + +“Oh, no!” said Miss Carter, somewhat frigidly polite. + +Nobody had smoked a cigar on this veranda for a good many years. Miss +Carter’s father used to smoke. How the smell of the smoke drifting +through the dark brought back the memory of that big, jolly man, who +used suddenly to chuckle aloud when something amusing crossed his mind! +She smiled to herself, thinking of the days when the house had not been +the silent, orderly place it was now--the days when she and her brothers +had been young, and the house alive with voices, and laughter, and +youth. + +“And that’s what poor little Maude ought to have,” she thought. “Young +people--_silly_ young people--music and dancing. She shouldn’t be +sitting out here with me and this wooden Indian!” + +She made up her mind that at least the man should be made to talk, and +in a firm and resolute manner she set about the task of drawing him out. +Perhaps, in her heart, she hoped that he would reveal himself as dull +and pompous; but he did not. + +He was a shipbuilder, the descendant of a long line of Massachusetts +shipbuilders. To Miss Carter there was romance in that business, and Mr. +Rhodes evidently had the same feeling. He had a sort of reverence for +ships, and an inexhaustible fund of interesting tales about them. Not +that he was at all eloquent. He was rather a shy man, and halting in his +speech, and he needed a good deal of drawing out; but Miss Carter did +it. + +He talked, and Miss Carter, leaning back in her chair, enjoyed hearing +him. She liked the sound of his quiet, careful voice, and liked the +fragrant smoke of his cigar. She intended to go into the house +presently, to wash the dishes, leaving him and Maude by themselves for +awhile; but a dreadful thing happened. There was a pause in the +conversation, and suddenly the clock in the hall struck eleven. + +Mr. Rhodes got up hastily. He apologized for having stayed so long. He +seemed conscience-stricken, and wouldn’t even wait while they looked up +a train for him. He said good night and set off hurriedly. + +“You must come again,” Miss Carter told him. + +“Thank you,” he replied earnestly. + +“Soon!” cried Miss Carter, still more earnestly. + +“_Thank_ you!” answered his voice, from halfway down the path. + +“He never will,” thought Miss Carter, in despair. “Never! I’ve spoiled +everything! I never even gave him a chance to speak one single word to +Maude. Of course he’ll never come again!” + +And it did not add very greatly to her peace of mind to see that Maude +was unusually silent and pale. + +“You get right to bed, child,” she said. “I’ll do the dishes.” + +“No--I’ll help you, auntie darling.” + +“But you have to get up in the morning,” Miss Carter protested. + +“So do you,” returned Maude. + +“But you have to go to work.” + +“I don’t work as hard as you do,” said Maude. + +This startled Miss Carter, because somehow she never thought of her work +as work. It touched her, too, very much, and if she had not been a +Connecticut Carter she would probably have cried; but she was one, so +she couldn’t do that. She couldn’t even hint to Maude how sorry she was +for her wicked, selfish conduct. All she could do was to be very, very +brisk and cheerful, and to fly around the kitchen like a bee. + +And there was Maude, drying the dishes, her lovely young face so pale, +so grave! + +“A meddlesome old maid!” thought Miss Carter. “That’s what I am!” + +At last she had to say something. + +“I think Mr. Rhodes is--_very_ nice,” she observed, in an unexpectedly +loud voice. + +“Do you, auntie?” said Maude. “Well, I--I think so, too; but”--she +turned away, to put some glasses up on a shelf--“but I’m afraid that he +doesn’t consider me very interesting.” + +“Nonsense, child!” cried Miss Carter. + +“Well, I’m not,” said Maude. “I just don’t know anything!” + +Miss Carter was on the point of telling Maude that she was a college +graduate and a private secretary, and probably the most intelligent +young woman alive; but something stopped her. Instead, she said that she +must wind up the clock while she thought of it. In passing behind the +girl, she laid a hand on her shoulder. + +“My dear!” she said. “My dear!” + +Their eyes met--those two pairs of blue eyes that were so much alike. + +“Good night, auntie,” said Maude. + +“Good night, Maude,” said Miss Carter. + +And in those six words they said more than some people could have +expressed in an hour’s conversation. + + +III + +Miss Carter, lying awake in the dark, had before her eyes the image of +Maude, so pale and grave and so very young, standing there in that +dazzlingly white, highly efficient kitchen. The night wind blew in at +the open window, fluttering the curtains, and outside in the dark garden +a little owl gave its tremulous cry. A great loneliness came over her. +She thought of this old house, with all those rooms, so neat and +orderly--and empty, standing in the dark, quiet garden, and with herself +and poor lovely young Maude all alone in it. Two spinsters all alone! + +“No!” said Miss Carter, aloud. + +Miss Carter’s forefathers, three hundred years ago, had kept themselves +alive on the “stern and rock-bound coast” of New England because of +their grim determination; and though Miss Carter had inherited very +little of their grimness, she certainly was determined. Then and there +she made up her mind; and, what is more, she was positively artful about +it. + +“I was wondering,” she said to Maude, the next morning. “Didn’t Mr. +Rhodes say that his business was up in Massachusetts? How did you come +to meet him, child?” + +“Oh, he’s a great friend of Mr. Lawrence’s,” said Maude, very, very +casually. “Mr. Lawrence’s firm are shipowners, you know, and we write +all their insurance for them. Their office is on the same floor with us, +and I often--I often have to run in there. Whenever Mr. Rhodes comes to +New York, he always stops in there, and I’ve met him there several +times.” + +“I see!” said Miss Carter brightly. + +What she saw was the wave of color that rose in Maude’s cheeks. She also +saw how a letter could be addressed to Mr. Rhodes, in care of Mr. +Lawrence, in the same building where Maude worked. + +After Maude had gone, she wrote the letter. She told Mr. Rhodes that she +and her niece would be very pleased to see him next Sunday afternoon, +and she said that the “best” train was one that arrived at their station +about three o’clock. + +How could the truthful Miss Carter write such a letter? How could she +say that Maude would be glad to see Mr. Rhodes when she never told Maude +a word about his coming? How could she call a train a “best” train that +stopped at every tiniest station, and that arrived, moreover, at a time +when Maude would not be at home? But she did say all this, and was not +even ashamed of it. + +And then, right under Maude’s nose, she prepared a supper which utterly +surpassed the previous dinner; and when the poor, unsuspicious girl had +gone off to the Sunday school where she taught a class, Miss Carter flew +upstairs, put on the _crêpe de Chine_ dress, arranged her hair in a new +fashion, and just had time to get down to the veranda when Mr. Rhodes +appeared. + +She kept on in the same deplorably artful manner. Although she was still +a little out of breath from her struggle with the dress, she pretended +to be so deeply absorbed in the magazine she had just that moment +snatched up that she didn’t hear him coming up the path. There she sat, +looking calm, serene, almost queenly. + +As he mounted the steps, she glanced up with a mendacious air of +surprise, and rose, smiling, very polite, but still queenly. + +“Oh, Mr. Rhodes!” she said. “This is very nice! Sit down, won’t you?” + +He did so, and Miss Carter began her campaign. She said she was sorry +Maude wasn’t at home, but nothing could induce that girl to miss her +Sunday school class. + +“She’s so conscientious!” Miss Carter said, and told him several +anecdotes about Maude’s conscientiousness. + +Then she told him how devoted the children in the class were to Maude. +There was no pretense about Miss Carter now. She was speaking from her +heart, telling him what she knew to be the truth about her dear girl, +pleading Maude’s cause with dignity and sincerity. This man, this wooden +Indian, must be made to realize what Maude was! + +Miss Carter watched him pretty closely, but it did her no good, for it +was impossible to tell from his face what impression she was making. He +just listened. She waited for him to ask questions about Maude, but he +did not. After awhile she grew indignant, and spoke no more. He, too, +fell silent, and there they sat. + +He was one of those persons to whom the sunshine is becoming. In spite +of his age and his exasperating silence and his shocking lack of +curiosity, Miss Carter was obliged, in justice, to admit that she liked +his face. It was honest and keen and strong. She remembered, too, that +when he had talked about his ships he had been really interesting. Well, +he wasn’t going to talk about ships this time. He had been brought here +to be taught appreciation of Maude, and taught he should be. + +“Your garden--” he began. + +“Maude’s making a little rock garden,” Miss Carter said. “She had the +prettiest violets this spring!” + +“I like those bright-colored things that grow in the sun better,” said +he, with a gesture toward the glowing bed of pinks and phlox and +verbena. “My mother used to have those things in her garden.” + +Miss Carter didn’t say that she wasn’t interested in his mother’s +garden, but she looked it, and he seemed a little taken aback. He +glanced at her anxiously. He felt that somehow he had said the wrong +thing, and that he had better start another topic. + +“I’m going up home next week,” he observed. + +Miss Carter made no sort of reply to this. She could not. Going home, +was he? Going away? She thought of Maude’s pale, grave young face, of +the odd little note in her voice when she had said that she was afraid +Mr. Rhodes didn’t think she was very interesting. + +“He’s a--a selfish beast!” thought Miss Carter. + +This thought, too, was reflected in her honest face, and Mr. Rhodes saw +that once more he had said the wrong thing. + +“You see,” he explained, still more anxiously, “I’m obliged to go there. +My business--” + +Miss Carter raised her eyebrows with a toplofty expression never before +seen upon her face. + +“Indeed!” she said. + +The unhappy man could not imagine in what way he had offended her, but +he had no doubt that she was offended. He felt that he must go on +explaining. + +“You see,” he said, “it’s this.” + +From the pocket of his coat he brought out an advertisement. Miss Carter +glanced at it, and saw that on the 8th of July, at Rhodes’s dock, two +schooners were to be sold “as is where is.” + +“Indeed!” she said again. + +He gave up then, and relapsed into total silence. + +“Very well!” said Miss Carter, but not aloud. “Go home, then, and stay +there! I wish you’d never left your home! Maude was happy before you +came. Oh, you ought to be ashamed of yourself!” + +She looked at him, and to save her life she couldn’t help feeling just a +little sorry for him. He had such a bewildered and miserable air. + +“After all,” she thought, “he’s a guest.” + +So she went into the kitchen, took six doughnuts out of a stone crock, +put them on a plate, and brought them out to the veranda. + +“Maybe you’d like one,” she said. + +It was a mistake. While the man was eating a doughnut, he did not look +in the least old, or like a wooden Indian. Indeed, his enjoyment was +positively boyish, and Miss Carter could not help feeling a little +touched. She invited him to take another and another. + +“Did you make them?” he asked. + +“Yes, I did,” replied Miss Carter, with modest pride. + +“I never tasted anything like them--never!” he declared. + +“Well, I like to cook,” said Miss Carter. + +“You know,” he went on, “your niece told me a good deal about you, +and--” + +“Maude makes the most delicious soda biscuits!” cried Miss Carter, +suddenly recalled to her duty. + +“She told me all you’d done for her,” he continued. “I--I wanted to meet +you. I”--he paused--“I knew you’d be--like this!” + +It was Miss Carter’s intention to greet this statement with an amused, +indulgent smile; but she could not. There was something in the man’s +straightforward glance, in his quiet voice, that filled her with +confusion. She turned her head aside, feeling her cheeks grow hot. + +“You don’t know what I’m really like, Mr. Rhodes,” she said. + +“Yes, I do,” said he. “When I came this afternoon, you didn’t see me, at +first, but I--I saw you.” His face had grown red, but he went on +sturdily. “You--you don’t know how you looked, sitting there--in your +own home!” + +Miss Carter understood his speech only too well. She understood, by a +sort of instinct, that he was one of those men who see all the romance +and glamour of the world about the head of a woman in her own home. She +understood, too, that he was very lonely and very homesick; and she made +another mistake. + +“Tell me about your home,” she said. “Your mother’s garden--” + +He was silent for a moment. + +“Well, you see,” he said, “when my father died, my elder brother got the +old place; and he and his wife--well, they’ve made a good many changes.” + +Miss Carter felt a sudden and most unreasonable indignation against Mr. +Rhodes’s brother and sister-in-law. + +“I hate changes!” she said. Then, feeling that she had been too +vehement, she smiled. “That’s a sign of growing old,” she said. “I’m--” + +“Old!” he cried. “You!” + +Now this was the sort of thing almost any chivalrous man would have +said in the circumstances, but the way he said it--the way he looked at +her-- + +A most curious thing happened. Suddenly Miss Carter saw the Miss Carter +that _he_ saw--not the practical, brisk, busy woman who was simply +Maude’s aunt and a good housekeeper, but the woman who had bidden +farewell to romance fifteen years ago, when the man she was to have +married died. No--this Miss Carter was a charming and gracious woman, +and a pretty one. She positively felt the lovely color in her cheeks, +the soft tendrils of her brown hair about her temples, and even the +clear blueness of her eyes; and all her heart was filled with an +innocent and beautiful joy that it should be so. + +She sat very still, almost afraid to breathe, for fear of breaking the +enchantment. She was so happy! + +The garden gate clicked, and, looking up, she saw Maude. + + +IV + +Miss Carter was a wonderful hostess that evening. Maude was amazed. +Never in her life had she seen her aunt so lively and amusing, with such +a fine color on her cheeks and such a light in her eyes. She herself was +a serious and quiet young creature, as a rule, but this evening Miss +Carter made her talk and made her laugh--and Mr. Rhodes, too. + +There they sat at the table, a most cheerful little party, with a most +delectable tea set before them--a cold baked ham, a salad of tomatoes +stuffed with celery, corn muffins, little custards baked in brown cups, +strawberries and cream, and a superb three-layer chocolate cake; but +Miss Carter didn’t seem to be very hungry. It was all dust and ashes to +her. Every minute was a penance to her, and every smile she gave was a +little stab of pain. + +“Maude!” she cried, in her heart. “Oh, Maude, my dear, beautiful girl, +talk to him! Laugh, my darling! Talk to him, and make him see! I do +truly believe he is a good man--almost good enough for you! Oh, Maude, +my darling, laugh, and talk, and be young! Make him see your beautiful, +blessed youngness!” + +Poor serious Maude was always trying to turn the conversation toward +business, always bringing up charters, and marine insurance policies, +and so on; and Miss Carter was forever turning her skillfully aside from +these dangers, making her talk about dances and picnics and frivolous +and entertaining episodes from her college days. Miss Carter understood +the man, and Maude didn’t. Miss Carter knew only too well what things +pleased and touched him, and she was fiercely determined that he should +discover all those things in Maude. + +It was very hard, though. Every time she got a chance, Maude began again +about business. Her interest in shipping matters was prodigious. + +“Do you think those two schooners you’re going to sell will bring--” she +began, but again Miss Carter intervened. + +“I saw the advertisement,” she said. “For sale ‘as is where is’--that’s +a pretty high and mighty way to do business, I must say! Here they +are--take ’em or leave ’em!” + +“Well, you see--” Maude began again. + +Miss Carter felt sure that the girl wanted to explain to her aunt +exactly how schooners were sold. + +“Oh, can’t she see?” she thought, almost in despair. “He doesn’t want to +talk business! Oh, why can’t she just be young and--silly?” + +In the end, for all her gallant efforts, she was defeated. Maude got the +conversation where she wanted it, and she and Mr. Rhodes talked gravely +about charters. + +Miss Carter left them on the veranda, and went into the kitchen to wash +the dishes. She wished that there were twice as many. She wished that +there were enough dishes to keep her busy all night long, so that she +needn’t go to bed and lie there in the dark. + +She had failed--she knew it. Mr. Rhodes was very courteous and kindly to +Maude, but nothing more. All her youth and loveliness were wasted on +him. She was trying so desperately hard to please him, and she couldn’t! + +“Oh, it’s so cruel!” cried Miss Carter to herself, alone in the kitchen. +“Never mind, my dear little Maude! I’ll sell this house, dear, and we’ll +go and live somewhere else, where there are more young people--more life +for you. You mustn’t mind--you mustn’t care. Just forget all about him! +He’s going away, and we’ll never think about him again--never!” + +She heard Maude’s light footstep coming along the hall. + +“Auntie,” her niece told her, “Mr. Rhodes is going.” + +“Oh, is he?” said Miss Carter. + +She dried her hands, took off her apron, and came out to the front door. + +“Good night, Mr. Rhodes,” she said. + +“Good night,” he answered. + +She could not see him. It was dark out there. She hoped she would never +see him again, never remember his face, never think of the words that he +had not spoken. + +The front door closed, and he was gone. Miss Carter and Maude stood +alone in the dimly lit hall, and for a time neither of them spoke or +stirred. + +“Well!” said Miss Carter briskly. “Time we were in bed, child.” + +“Yes,” replied Maude, just as briskly. “It’s late.” + +Then they looked at each other and smiled. With their arms about each +other they went up the stairs and through the dark house, with all its +orderly, empty rooms; and at Maude’s door they said good night, both of +them still smiling. That was their way. + + +V + +It was the stillest afternoon. The sun blazed on high in a blue sky +without a single cloud, and all the growing things stood patient and +motionless in the fierce heat. Miss Carter was down on her knees, +weeding a flower bed. She wore an immense blue sunbonnet and a gay blue +and white calico dress. Grubbing down there among her beloved flowers, +she somehow had the air of belonging to them--a sort of flower nurse. + +“I don’t know,” she said to herself, “whoever decided which were flowers +and which were weeds. Why are the dear little dandelions weeds, when the +big, staring sunflowers aren’t? I guess it’s the same with a good many +other things. People look at children, and then set to work to weed +them--to uproot all sorts of brave little dandelion qualities in them, +and water and tend the big, showy sunflower traits.” + +Her reflections were interrupted by the sound of the telephone ringing +inside the house. She rose, clapped her hands vigorously together to get +rid of the clean, warm dirt, and went into the hall to answer the +summons. + +“Auntie!” said Maude’s voice. + +“Well, child?” asked Miss Carter. + +“Would it bother you if I brought Jack Rhodes home to dinner?” + +Miss Carter did not answer for a moment; but when she did speak, it was +with all her usual affectionate heartiness. + +“Of course it won’t bother me, my dear!” she said. “Any one you want, +any time!” + +But when she had hung up the receiver, she stood there in the hall with +a great weariness and dismay upon her face. All the peace of the hot, +still day was shattered--all the peace that she had won through the +long, long week. He was coming back! + +It seemed to her that she could not bear it. She could not watch Maude, +with her shining eyes and her flushed cheeks, looking at the man who +returned only a kindly, grown-up smile--the man who did not find Maude’s +sweet youth “interesting,” but turned to herself instead. She remembered +how he had looked at her, how his voice had sounded, speaking to her; +and that look and that tone should have been for Maude. + +“I won’t have it!” cried Miss Carter aloud, in an angry, trembling +voice. + +She felt a tear warm on her cheek, and she dashed it away, leaving a +smudge under her eye. + +“There I was,” she said, “all dressed up, sitting on the porch as +if--well, it won’t be like that this time! It was that dress--I always +hated that dress! Oh, Maude, my dear!” + +She felt other tears in her eyes, but she ignored them. + +“It won’t be like that this time!” she repeated with a grim smile. +“You’ll see!” + +She went out into the back entry and opened the ice box. + +“Plenty good enough!” she said. “It won’t take me half an hour to get it +ready. Now I’m going to finish that weeding!” + +Certainly Mr. Rhodes wouldn’t bother her. He could come if he liked. +There was plenty of good, wholesome food in the house for him to eat; +but not one extra touch would she give to the dinner, and not one extra +touch to her own appearance. She would have to wash her hands and face +and put on a clean dress, but not until after he arrived. First he +should see her just as she was. + +“As is where is!” said Miss Carter. + +So, when she thought it was about time for him to be coming, out she +went again, and down on her knees by the flower bed. The garden gate +clicked, but she did not raise her head until Maude spoke. Then she +rose, dusted off her hands, and turned. + +“Good after--” she began. + +But who was there? Who was that nice boy standing beside Maude, hat in +hand, with such an anxious, appealing smile on his young face? + +“This is Mr. Jack Rhodes, auntie,” Maude explained. + +“Oh!” said Miss Carter. + +Then, recovering her senses, she held out a somewhat grimy hand, and the +young man seized it in a hearty grasp. His face was scarlet, but his +eyes met hers very honestly. + +“I--I--it’s--” he said. “I--I hope--” + +Miss Carter beamed upon him, to reassure him, but he turned an imploring +glance toward Maude. No help did he get from her, however. Never had +Miss Carter seen that serious young woman so confused. She actually +frowned at the poor fellow. + +“I _told_ you auntie wouldn’t mind!” she said reproachfully. + +“Yes, I know you did,” said he; “but such short notice--” + +Miss Carter could scarcely believe her eyes; for Maude shrugged her +shoulders and turned her head away, and upon her face there was an +expression very like a pout. Now at last Maude was being young and +silly, and it was all most thoroughly appreciated. + +“There’s not much use my telling you anything!” she observed. + +“You know it isn’t that,” said Jack. + +They had both entirely forgotten Miss Carter. Maude looked coldly at the +young man. Then her eyes fell, and a faint smile appeared on her lips. + +“Yes, I do know,” she said. + +Again she looked at him and he looked at her, and it was the most +touching and absurd and beautiful look that Miss Carter had ever seen. + +“I’ll have to go in and look after the dinner,” she murmured; but they +didn’t even hear her. + +She was in too much of a hurry, just then, to trouble her head about the +mystery of this second Mr. Rhodes. It was enough for her to know that +for Maude he was the right and only Mr. Rhodes; and therefore he must +have a dinner such as had never been equaled. She flew about the kitchen +like a little whirlwind, and presently enchanting odors began to float +out from the oven and from the bubbling saucepans. She rushed down into +the cellar, and brought up her best preserves. She rushed out to the ice +box, and brought in a box of eggs, a crock of butter, a basket of +peaches, and a bottle of cream. As she hurried about, she was inventing +a dessert that should have freshly baked sponge cake and peaches and +strawberry preserves and cream in it. + +She had just begun to whip the cream when she was interrupted. + +“Isn’t it a pretty hot afternoon for you to be doing all this?” asked a +voice from the doorway. + +It was the first and original Mr. Rhodes. + +“Good gracious!” cried Miss Carter. “What ever are _you_ doing here?” + +Suddenly she was aware that she was very hot and tired and flustered, +that her hair was untidy, that she was wearing a rumpled and unbecoming +calico dress. She also remembered that she was sternly displeased with +Mr. Rhodes, and had intended him to see her like this; but she was still +more displeased with him because he did so see her. + +“If you’ll go out on the veranda,” she said, “I’ll have the dinner ready +in a--” + +“I want to help you,” he told her. + +“Certainly not!” replied Miss Carter. “Please go out on the veranda!” + +But he did not go. + +“They’re out there,” he said. “They don’t want me.” + +Miss Carter faced him squarely. + +“Who is that young man?” she demanded. “I can’t understand--” + +“He’s my nephew,” said Mr. Rhodes. “Perhaps I can explain. You see, he’s +in Lawrence’s office--doing very well, too; and your niece--well, the +first time I saw them together, I knew how the land lay.” + +“Nonsense!” said Miss Carter. + +“No,” he insisted. “It’s not. It’s the real thing.” + +They were both silent for a moment. + +“I’m fond of the boy,” he went on; “and--of course I saw what sort of +girl she was, but I wanted to see _you_.” He smiled. “It was a pretty +mean trick,” he said. “She telephoned to Lawrence’s office and asked for +Mr. Rhodes, and I happened to be there. I knew she meant Jack, but I +answered; and when she asked if Mr. Rhodes would like to come to dinner, +I said yes. We arranged to meet at the station, and”--he smiled +again--“there I was! Poor little thing, she made the best of it, but--” + +“I see!” said Miss Carter. + +She took up the egg beater and began to turn it vigorously, so that the +noise of it drowned whatever the man was saying. She didn’t want to +hear, anyhow. A strange and unreasonable alarm filled her. If this man +wasn’t Maude’s Mr. Rhodes--no, she wouldn’t think about that. She +wouldn’t think at all, but would simply turn that egg beater with a +prodigious clatter in the earthenware bowl. + +A large, strong hand was laid upon the handle of the thing, and the +noise ceased abruptly, leaving the kitchen amazingly quiet. + +“Miss Carter!” said Mr. Rhodes. + +“No!” said she, though she couldn’t have explained just what she meant. + +“You know you wrote and asked me to come last Sunday.” + +“That,” said Miss Carter, “was due to a misunderstanding.” + +“I know it was, but I thought--well, you see, I came again. I--I wanted +to see you.” + +Miss Carter left the egg beater and faced him squarely. She stood where +the golden light of the setting sun fell upon her soft, untidy hair. She +stood there, in her unbecoming dress, with her flushed, tired face, and +defied Mr. Rhodes. She thought that when he really looked at her, when +he realized what the true Miss Carter was like, a great change would +come over him. + +“I couldn’t go away until I’d seen you,” he said. “And now--” + +And now that he had seen her “as is,” of course he would never want to +see her again! + +“Now it’s harder than ever to go away,” he said. “Now I never want to go +away. You don’t know how you look--how--how lovely!” + +“Lovely?” she cried. + +“Yes!” said he. “You do! I mean it.” + +His steady eyes were fixed upon her face, but Miss Carter would not look +at him--not she! It was very well for Maude and that young man to stand +and stare at each other, but she wasn’t young, and she wasn’t going to +be silly. + +“If you really do want to help me--” she began briskly. + +“That’s what I want more than anything else in the world!” he told her. + +Then she did look at him, and she gave a smile which she believed to be +a very sensible, noncommittal, grown-up smile; but it didn’t seem like +that to him. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JANUARY, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVI NUMBER 4 + + + + +That’s Not Love + +SERENA PAGE’S COUNTRY PLACE WAS A HOUSE OF MIRTH, BUT MERRIMENT AND +TRAGEDY ARE OFTEN CLOSE TOGETHER + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +A gay world, that summer morning! The sprinkler on the lawn flung a +rainbow mist into the air, and left tiny diamonds shining on the grass +blades. Everything was astir--the leaves rustling on the trees, gay +flowers swaying on their stalks. Curtains fluttered at the open windows, +and through the cool, bright house voices came floating, light as +butterflies. Serena Page had arisen. + +To be sure, she had told her house guests the night before that just +because she had to get up was no reason why any one else should be +disturbed at the outrageous hour of half past eight; but somehow +everybody was disturbed. Somehow her getting up made confusion all +through the house; for that was Serena’s especial talent--to create an +exciting sort of bustle about her, without herself doing anything at +all. Serena! Never was a woman so misnamed! + +She came down the stairs, her filmy black negligee floating out behind +her, so that she seemed, as always, to be coming in a breeze--an +artificial breeze, though, perfumed and enervating, bringing no health +or color. She was without make-up at this early hour. Her handsome, +haggard face was pale, her eyes were heavy. + +She entered the breakfast room, and there was the Moriarty girl, +standing by the window. + +“Good morning, Mrs. Page,” she said, with that enigmatic smile of hers. + +Serena smiled, too, but faintly. Geraldine Moriarty was beginning to get +on her nerves very badly, and she was longing for an excuse to fly into +a rage with the girl. That was the only way Serena could get rid of +people. She could do nothing in cold blood. She had taken on Geraldine +in an outburst of generosity, and she would have to have an outburst of +anger before she could send her away. + +“Had breakfast?” she inquired. + +“No--I was waiting for you, Mrs. Page.” + +Serena took her place at the table, and the Japanese butler came forward +to serve her. She did not know his name. She was not even sure that she +had seen him before. She got her servants from an agency in the city, +which upon demand would send her out a “crew” commanded by a butler. +Sometimes things went wrong, and the whole lot left together; but +another crew always came promptly, and her household suffered very +little from the change. She had the art of making her home as impersonal +as a hotel; but she did notice this butler. She smiled upon him, because +his charmingly deferential air pleased her. He seemed to appreciate the +solemnity of the occasion. + +It was indeed an important occasion. It was the beginning of Serena’s +diet. Before this elegant and luxurious creature the butler set half of +a grapefruit, two slices of Graham bread toast without butter, and a cup +of black coffee. + +She shuddered a little, and closed her eyes. Every morning, henceforth, +she was to get up at half past eight, go through a set of exercises, +take a cold shower, and come downstairs--to this! Every one said she +wouldn’t be able to stand it. Those who pleased her best said she had +absolutely no need of a reducing diet, and would be made ill by it. + +Only the Moriarty girl showed no interest at all. Serena observed that +Geraldine had a slice of grilled Virginia ham on her plate. + +“How Connie could ever have called her a sweet child!” she thought. +“She’s as hard as nails!” + +Some six weeks ago Connie Blanchard had come to Serena with a most +piteous tale about Geraldine Moriarty. + +“Her mother and I went to the same school in Paris,” she had said; “and +now this sweet child’s all alone in the world. Something awful happened +to her father. He went bankrupt, or lost his mind, or something--I can’t +remember now--and Geraldine simply hasn’t a penny. Fine old Irish +family, you know, and she’s awfully well educated. I’d love to help her, +but you know how it is with me, my dear, living as I do in hotels--and +I’m not strong. Do please do something for the poor child, Serena!” + +Who could have done more? Serena had at once engaged Miss Moriarty as +secretary-companion, and here she was, getting a nice little salary, and +with practically no work to do. The secretarial duties were almost +nonexistent, for Serena very seldom wrote or even answered a letter. She +and her friends carried on their social activities by telephone, and +they liked to do their own talking. + +As for the companion part, that was absurd. Serena was always surrounded +by companions, and mighty obliging ones, too--penniless cousins, +ambitious and ambiguous ladies, all sorts of eager and pliant creatures, +who made up a little court where Serena ruled magnificently. No--all the +Moriarty girl had to do was to look on, and of course to admire; and it +was at this simple task that she so utterly failed. + +She didn’t seem to admire anything or anybody, not even herself. She was +ironically indifferent to her own dark beauty. She had no decent +clothes, and when Serena had offered her some very good things that she +was tired of, Geraldine had refused--politely, of course. She was always +polite, always careful not to give Serena any excuse for getting rid of +her. + +“But you’ll go, my dear!” thought Serena. “I’ve done quite enough for +you!” + +She glanced across the table at her silent companion. + +“Hopeless!” she reflected. “Simply hopeless! Of course she’s +good-looking, in a way--but she has absolutely _no_ charm, and _no_ +figure.” + +Miss Moriarty went on eating with an excellent appetite. She was never +talkative. She was quiet, but with a quiet which Serena did not find +restful or soothing. She was a tall girl, thin and supple, with a +careless grace in every movement. Her face had a gypsy darkness, with +high cheek bones, features delicate and yet bold, and black eyes with a +scornful light in them. She was dressed in a black skirt, a black +jersey, and a plain white blouse--a costume that made her look lanky, +thought the dieting Serena; and she had that air of not caring. + +“For Heaven’s sake, do talk, my dear!” cried Serena, overcome by +exasperation. “I’m all on edge this morning, and it makes me horribly +nervous to see you sitting there like a--like a graven image!” + +“I’ll try,” said Miss Moriarty obligingly. “Have you seen the +delphiniums?” + +“Never heard of the things,” said Serena. “Oh, do answer that for me, my +dear!” + +For the butler had come forward to say that a “generman” wanted to speak +to Mrs. Page on the telephone. + +There was, inevitably, a telephone in the breakfast room. There were +telephones everywhere in that house, so that, in order to speak to a +friend perhaps a hundred miles away, one need not have the fatigue of +walking more than twenty feet. Geraldine took up the receiver. + +“This is Mrs. Page’s secretary,” she said. “Will you give me the +message, please?” + +“Tell Mrs. Page it’s Sambo,” said a curt and very clear masculine voice. + +“It’s Sambo,” repeated Miss Moriarty, turning toward Serena. + +She was surprised by the change that came over that haggard, petulant +face. Forgotten were the nerves and the cruel diet. Serena sprang to her +feet and ran to the telephone, and even her voice was changed. + +“Sambo!” she cried. “What an hour! Yes, I know, but why didn’t you write +me, just once? I’m not reproaching you, silly boy! Only I did think +you’d have time just for a line. No, no! To-day, Sambo? But can’t you +give me some idea what time? Surely some time to-day? Oh, all right! +By-by, big boy!” + +She came back to the table and sank into her chair, laughing. + +“I’ll take a slice of that ham,” she said to the butler, “and cream for +my coffee. Quick! I’m starving!” Then she looked at Geraldine. “Sammy +Randall is coming,” she announced. + +“How nice,” said Geraldine. + +But Serena missed any irony there may have been in the words. Mrs. Anson +had appeared in the doorway, and she called to her: + +“Betty, Sambo’s coming out to-day!” + +“My dear, how simply marvelous!” cried Betty Anson, with fervor. + +Serena expected that fervor. She took it for granted that all her +friends would rejoice with her; and so they did. Serena, the queen, was +happy, and all her court was happy, too, reaping the benefits of her +good humor. + +“But that awful Moriarty!” she whispered to Betty Anson. “She’s worse +than usual this morning. I don’t know what’s the matter with her. She’s +so indifferent and ungrateful!” + +“Those people are always envious,” said Mrs. Anson. “Governesses and +companions--they’re not exactly servants, you know, and yet they’re +not--well, they’re simply out of everything.” + +“I wish she’d stay out altogether!” said Serena. + +Geraldine Moriarty wished the same thing. As she stepped out through the +long window of the breakfast room to the lawn, she wished that she need +never set foot in that house again. She hated it, she hated the life +there, and at times she came dangerously close to hating the people in +it. + +For, though Serena’s conclusion that the girl was “as hard as nails” was +an exaggeration, there was a grain of truth in it. She had, for her +nineteen years, a character remarkably definite and independent. She had +fortitude, courage, and the pride of Lucifer. She had come here, +penniless, solitary, and so young, direct from the almost cloistered +life she had led with her invalid mother, and not for one instant had +she been dazzled or swayed by the luxury and the feverish gayety about +her. She stayed because she knew no other way to earn her bread, but all +her salary she put into a savings bank, and would not touch a penny of +it. When there was enough, she meant to go away. She would learn typing +and shorthand, find work in an office, and be done with this existence +which she hated. + +She lived here in exile, utterly alien and lonely, among these people +whom she neither comprehended nor pitied. Her people had been +gentlefolk. She had been brought up in a tradition of dignity, honor, +and reserve, and she clung to that tradition with all the strength of +her loyal heart. What her people had been, she would be. Their ways were +the right ways. Their manners, their speech, their tastes, formed the +standards by which all others should be judged. And, so judged, Serena +and her friends were damned. Geraldine saw no good in them at all. They +were base, heartless, and vulgar. + +She walked across the lawn to the sea wall at the foot of the garden, +and jumped down to the beach, a few feet below. She wanted to be alone +for a little while in the fresh, sweet summer morning, in the sun and +the salt wind, and to forget the monstrous thing she had seen; but she +could not forget. In anger, in contempt, she was obliged to remember +Serena’s face at the mention of that man’s name. + +Evidently Serena “loved” this man with the mountebank name, and her +friends seemed to think it a charming idyl--the “love” of a woman of +forty, who had divorced one husband and was living in constant bickering +with a second. The fact of her being married was simply a side issue. +Faith and honor had no meaning at all for these people, and love--that +was what they called “love”! + + +II + +The summer day was drawing to a close. The shadows of the trees were +long upon the grass, the sun was sinking through a sky wistful and +delicate, faint rose and yellow. + +There was a blessed quiet all through the house. Serena and her friends +had certainly intended to be back for tea, but they had not come. They +never could do what they meant to do. Obstacles intervened, and they +were not well equipped for dealing with obstacles. It took so little to +stop them, to bar a road, to turn them off toward a new destination. +They had not come back, and Geraldine was having her tea alone in the +library, reading a book as she sipped it. + +That was how Sambo first saw her, sitting, very straight, in a +high-backed chair, with the last light of the sunset on her clear, pale +face. He said later that she had put him in mind of a Madonna, and there +were not many women he knew who could do that. He stood in the doorway, +staring at her, for quite a long time--so long that he never afterward +forgot how she looked then, so still, so lovely, so aloof. For a moment +he was almost afraid to disturb her. + +But the fear of disturbing other persons had not yet greatly influenced +young Samuel Randall. He was a conqueror, nonchalant and superb. He took +whatever things pleased him in this world. Slender, almost slight, with +his fine features, his mournful dark eyes, he had a poetic and touching +look about him; but it belied him. He was not poetic. He was greedy, and +willful, and reckless. + +He wanted to talk to this lovely image, so in he went. + +“This a gentle hint?” he asked. + +Geraldine put down her book and looked at him. + +“I said I was coming to-day,” he went on, “and they’re all out. That +mean I’m not wanted?” + +And he smiled his charming, arrogant smile, for he knew so well that he +was always wanted. + +“Mrs. Page meant to be home by five,” said Geraldine, with no smile at +all. “Something must have delayed her.” + +“Then you’ll give me a cup of tea, won’t you? I’m Randall, you know.” + +She said yes, none too cordially, and rang the bell for fresh tea. He +sat down opposite her, slouching in his chair, his handsome head thrown +back, his dark eyes watching her. + +“I’m Mrs. Page’s secretary,” she explained with cold formality. + +“Lucky, lucky Mrs. Page!” said he. + +A faint color rose in her cheeks. She resented his attitude, his easy +and careless manner, his appraising glance, and he read the resentment +in her face. + +“Prudish!” he thought. + +This did not annoy him. He liked this tall, dark, unsmiling girl just as +she was, a charming novelty; but he would have to change his tactics. + +“You were reading, weren’t you?” he said respectfully. “I hope I didn’t +interrupt you.” + +“No, Mr. Randall,” she answered. + +Then, suddenly, his undisciplined soul was filled with a sort of envy +for this untroubled and superior creature who read books. + +“I try to read,” he said. “I wish to Heaven I could; but it’s too late +now.” + +“I don’t see how it could ever be too late to read,” said Geraldine, +with a trace of scorn. + +He had straightened up in his chair. He was no longer staring at her, +but at the unlighted cigarette that he was rolling between his fingers. + +“The thing is,” he said, “I’ve been spoiled. People listen to me--any +damned nonsense I spout--and I’ve got out of the way of listening +myself. Now, you see, when I take up a book that’s worth reading, I feel +as if the writer fellow had got me into a corner, and was trying to lay +down the law; so I want to contradict him, and I chuck the blamed thing +across the room.” + +He spoke earnestly, and he was in earnest. It was his great charm that +he was always sincere. He was not inventing things to say to this girl. +He was simply selecting from his restless, curious mind those things +which he thought would interest her. He was succeeding, too--he saw +that. + +Geraldine did not speak, because to her reserved and proud spirit it was +impossible to speak easily to a stranger; but she thought over his words +with an odd sensation of distress. She felt sorry for the conquering +Sambo. + +He had picked up her book, and was turning the pages. It was a copy of +“The Hound of Heaven,” which her father had given her long ago. + +“Poetry!” he said. “Queer sort of stuff!” + +Then he read aloud: + + “I fled Him, down the nights and down the days; + I fled Him, down the arches of the years; + I fled Him, down the labyrinthine ways + Of my own mind--” + +He stopped, and for a moment he sat silent. The light was fading out of +the sky now, and in the dusk his face looked white and strained. The +echo of his strong young voice seemed still to drift through the shadowy +room. + +Looking at him, Geraldine had an extraordinary fancy, almost a vision, +of his terribly defiant soul fleeing, swift and laughing, to its own +destruction. She was filled with an austere compassion and wonder. It +was as if, in an instant, and without a word spoken, he had told her all +the long tale of his wasted years. + +“Sometimes,” he said, “the prey gets away from Him!” + +“No!” said Geraldine steadily. “No--never!” + +He struck a match, and by the flame that sprang out, vivid in the gray +dusk, she had a glimpse of his face, with eyes half closed, proud and +sorrowful; and he was changed in her sight forever. She saw him, not as +a puppet in a shameful drama, but as a fellow creature with a soul. + +“You know,” he said, “I’ve got lost!” + +The match went out, and the room seemed very dark now. Geraldine wanted +to speak, to tell him something, but she could not remember, afterward, +what incredible words had come to her mind. They were never to be +spoken, however, for just at that moment Serena came home. + + +III + +In her first generous enthusiasm Serena had declared that the “sweet +child” must dine with them, no matter who was there, and now neither she +nor Geraldine could find a plausible reason for altering the arrangement +which had grown so irksome. This evening, as usual, Geraldine went +upstairs to put on her one and only dinner dress. + +But she was not so reluctant as usual, nor so disdainful. She felt that +she was no longer utterly alone. This man who had come to the house was +different from the others. She remembered his face as she had seen it in +the flare of the match, and remembered the sound of his voice. If he was +lost, it was because he had been misguided. He was somehow a victim. + +Nobody noticed Miss Moriarty when she came to the table, for they were +all very well used to her and her one evening gown--that is, nobody but +Sambo; and to him she was new and lovely and profoundly interesting. He +thought that her slender hands were beautiful. So was the sweep of her +shining black hair away from her temples, and so was the proud arch of +her brows; and he thought that her poor little black dress, and her +youth and her disdainful air, were beyond measure touching. + +But he prudently kept his interest in Miss Moriarty to himself, and +behaved as he was expected to behave. The diet was postponed, and Serena +had asked the butler to see that there was “an awfully good dinner.” He +had justified her blind faith in him, for the dinner was an excellent +one. From the well stocked cellar he had selected the proper wines; but +nobody cared for these. They all preferred whisky. Throughout the meal +they drank whisky and smoked cigarettes, and their talk was in keeping +with this. + +“It’s not my business,” thought Geraldine. “I can’t change the world. +I’m just here to earn a living.” + +But the contempt and indifference which until now had been her armor +failed her to-night. She was troubled and very unhappy. None of these +people were mere puppets any longer. They had come alive, and they were +pitiful, and a little horrible. + +There was the girl they called Jinky--tall, gaunt, with a sort of wasted +beauty in her face. A year ago she had eloped with a very young +millionaire, and, as he was under age, his parents had had the marriage +annulled--annulled, wiped out, so that Jinky had come back from her +wedding trip discredited and shamed before all her world. She didn’t +seem to care. She seemed hilariously amused by the whispered +conversation of Levering, who sat next her; but to-night Geraldine felt +sure that Jinky did care--that the wound had left a cruel scar. + +There was Levering himself, with his supercilious, high-bred face. He +had married for money, and he hadn’t got the money. It was a notorious +joke in that circle that his middle-aged wife begrudged him every penny. +He suffered his ignoble humiliation, and his wife suffered, too, because +of her jealous and bitter infatuation for him. + +There was the _chic_ and lively little Mrs. Anson, with her eternal +scheming for invitations and other benefits. There was her husband, +gray-haired, distinguished in appearance, a slave to her ambition and +his own weakness. + +There was Serena, magnificent in her diamonds, talking only to Sambo, +looking only at Sambo. There was Sambo himself, the man who had said +that he was lost. He listened to Serena carelessly, and smiled, even +when her face was anxious and frowning. He smoked incessantly. The light +ashes from his cigarettes fell upon his plate, into his glass, and he +swallowed them, as if he neither knew nor cared what was barren ash and +what life-giving food. + +“Now what?” cried Serena, jumping up. “Bridge, or dancing, or what?” + +Geraldine had risen, too, and she fancied that she heard Mr. Anson, +standing beside her, mutter: + +“The deluge!” + +He was unsteady on his feet, and his weary face was a curious gray. +Geraldine had seen him like this before. He was trying to play, trying +to be one of them, to forget--and he never could. + +“Oh, dancing, of course!” said Jinky. + +They all went into the drawing-room, and one of the servants started the +phonograph playing. The music began, the thud of drums like bare feet +stamping, the sweet whine of Hawaiian guitars, like lazy laughter. +Geraldine had followed the others, meaning only to pass through on her +way to the garden, but halfway across the room Sambo stopped her. + +“Give me this dance!” he said softly. + +“No!” she answered with a quick frown, and moved away. + +But he came after her, and laid his hand on her shoulder. + +“Please!” he said. “Why won’t you?” + +The touch of his hand filled her with a great anger. She turned her head +and looked at him with scornful amazement--and found in his face only +laughter and cajolery. + +“Please!” he said again. “Just one dance!” + +“No!” she said. + +He could not very well misunderstand--or pretend to misunderstand--her +tone. He dropped his hand and stood back. + +“Sorry!” he said. + +She knew that he wasn’t sorry. She went past him, threading her way +among the dancing couples, and went upstairs to her own room. She locked +the door and stood leaning against it, in the dark, breathing a little +fast from her haste and anger. + +She hated him! Vivid before her was the image of his handsome face, +flushed with drinking, and of his conqueror’s smile. Intolerable was the +memory of his hand upon her shoulder. She hated him, and she could +almost hate herself because even for a minute she had thought he was +different. + + +IV + +The next morning, when Geraldine came downstairs, the house was like an +enchanted castle. The sun was streaming in, for it was full day, yet all +the rooms were silent and deserted. The little Japanese men had done +their work like brownies, and were now invisible, and all the people who +had danced the night before were lost in sleep. + +She went into the breakfast room and rang, and the butler came hurrying +in, smiling cheerfully. She told him what she wanted to eat, and crossed +to the window, for a breath of sweet air and a glimpse of the garden in +its morning beauty. + +The first thing she saw was Sam Randall, on the terrace, smoking a +cigarette. Her first impulse was to run away. He was down at the other +end, and he had not seen her yet; but she checked herself with a sort of +severity. Why should she run away from him? What had she to do with him, +or with any of the people in this house? She had judged and condemned +them long ago. It was only through a moment’s weakness that she had been +betrayed into taking an interest in this man. The weakness was mastered +now, and the interest had turned to scorn. He was just like the +others--perhaps a little worse! + +She heard his leisurely footsteps on the flags outside. She heard him +come in through the long window. She knew that he was standing beside +her, but she paid no heed until he spoke. + +“Good morning!” he said. + +Then she looked straight into his face. + +“Good morning,” she answered evenly. + +She was sorry, then, that she had looked at him, for there was no +laughter or arrogance about him now. He seemed subdued and anxious, +younger than she had remembered, and somehow appealing. + +“Look here!” he said. “I didn’t mean to offend you last night. I don’t +quite see why--but anyhow, I’m sorry!” + +Her breakfast was on the table, and she sat down before it. It occurred +to her that her silence was ungracious and unkind, but she knew no way +to break it. For all her self-reliance, she was very young and very +inexperienced. She could not mask her resentment; she could only hold +her tongue. + +Sambo sat down opposite her. She was determined not to raise her eyes, +but, without doing so, she could see his slender brown hands extended +across the table, and the cuffs of his soft blue shirt. She also saw +that he was holding a little field daisy. Surely there was nothing in +that to touch her heart, yet it did, and the pity that she felt for a +passing instant increased her anger. An obstinate and forbidding look +came over her face. + +“What’s the matter?” he asked. “Look here! Do you mind if I sit here +with you?” + +“It’s not for me to dictate to Mrs. Page’s guests.” + +“You can dictate to me all you want,” said he. “Nothing I’d like +better!” + +Again she was conscious that she was behaving ill, and again it +strengthened her obstinacy. + +“I’ll go away, if you like,” he went on; “but the way you talked to me +yesterday--I’ve been thinking so much about it! Please tell me what I’ve +done--what has made you change?” + +“I haven’t changed,” she answered coldly. + +He leaned nearer to her. + +“Look here!” he said entreatingly. “Don’t treat me like this! Don’t shut +me out! I came down early, just on the chance of seeing you. The others +will be down presently, so I only have this little minute. Let me talk +to you! You’re so wonderful--no one like you in the world--you and your +poetry and your lovely, quiet face! Don’t send me away, dear girl!” + +She sprang to her feet. + +“You have no right!” she cried. + +He, too, had risen. + +“I’m sorry,” he said. “You wouldn’t mind, if you knew how I felt about +you. I’m at your feet.” + +“You--” she began, but her voice was so uncertain that she could not go +on. + +“I’m at your feet,” he repeated quietly. “If you want to treat me like +this, I can’t help it. It won’t make any difference. I’ll always--” + +“Hush!” she said. “The servants will hear you!” + +“Let ’em!” said he. “I’ll bet they’ve heard worse than that!” + +Without another word he walked away, through the window, out to the +terrace again. + +Geraldine tried to go on with her breakfast, but a strange confusion and +pain filled her. She told herself that this was only an episode, of no +significance. Randall would go away soon, and she need never see him or +think of him again. What he had said to her he said, very likely, to +every woman he met. He had come here to see Serena. He belonged to +Serena. He was one of that circle, one of those people without heart, +without honor, without decency. + +“At her feet!” + +Geraldine remembered his hand on her shoulder, his laughter in the face +of her just anger. It was a lie! He had no more respect for her than he +had for these other women. He thought she was like them, and would be +flattered by a smile from him. She hated him! + +She had a fine opportunity to test his alleged humility that very day. +By noon, the rest of the household had come downstairs, languid and +heavy-eyed, and all in need of “bracers”; but not Sambo. He was not +jaded or depressed. He laughed at the others. It seemed to Geraldine +that wherever she went she could hear the sound of his debonair +laughter. He was easily the leader among them. No longer was Serena +their queen; it was Sambo who reigned supreme, not only because she had +exalted him, but because of his quick wit, his audacity, his graceless +and irresistible charm. + +They sat about half dead, until lunch time. After lunch they were +revivified enough to begin considering what to do with the afternoon. +Serena wanted to visit some friends, Mrs. Anson wanted to play bridge, +Levering wanted to go out on the yacht, but Sambo said they would go to +the Country Club, and he had his way. Every one went upstairs to dress, +except Geraldine. She wasn’t expected to come. Nobody thought about her +at all. + +Sambo had not spoken one word to her, had scarcely glanced at her. When +they were alone, he called her “wonderful”; but when the others were +there, he ignored her as they did. + + +V + +Geraldine was in her room, dressing for dinner, when they returned. The +house was suddenly in confusion. Electric bells rang, and she heard +their voices in an excited babel. They came in like a party of raiders +taking possession of an abandoned stronghold. + +“I can’t stand it much longer,” thought Geraldine. “I’m getting nervous +and irritable. I ought to go, only--” + +Only she had nowhere to go--nowhere in all the world. Strangers were +living in her old house. She wondered how it looked now. There used to +be an air of peace about it at this hour of a summer day, when the +tangled garden had grown dim, and the old house full of shadows. She and +her mother used to sit by the open window, in the dusk, not talking very +much, but so happy! Even old Norah in the kitchen was blessed by that +peace, and would croon contentedly as she moved about. All gone now! + +Geraldine had been a young girl then, like a child in the safe shelter +of her mother’s love--only a little while ago; but she would not think +of that. She would not shed a single tear. Her mother had been so brave, +even when her father was ruined and heartbroken by his failure in +business--for that was the “something dreadful” that had happened to +him. Even when he died, her mother had been so brave, and always so +quiet. That was the right way, and the way that Geraldine would follow. +If her forlorn young heart grew faint in her exile, she would look back, +just for a glance, would remember, just for an instant, and would be +comforted and strengthened. + +She put on her black dress, gave an indifferent glance in the mirror, +and opened the door; and there in the hall was Sambo, waiting for her. + +“Look here!” he said. “I want to know--I’ve simply got to know--what’s +the matter!” + +“Nothing,” she replied. + +She tried to pass, but he barred the way. + +“No!” he said. “I’m going away to-morrow morning, and I’ve got to know. +Have I offended you, or done anything you don’t like? The first time I +saw you, yesterday afternoon--what has made you change?” + +She did not answer, but her averted face was eloquent enough. + +“Look here!” he said. “If I thought it was simply that you disliked +me--” He paused for a moment. “But I don’t think that,” he went on. “You +did like me, at first. I’ve been thinking--Is it on account of Ser--of +Mrs. Page?” + +“What?” she cried, appalled. + +“Because, you know”--she noticed that he glanced up and down the softly +lit hall before he continued--“if it’s that, I give you my word there’s +nothing in it--absolutely nothing! I’ve never even pretended to her--” + +“Do you think I’m going to discuss _that_ with you?” she said, looking +at him with a sort of horror. + +“There’s nothing to discuss,” he answered. “I wanted you to know that; +but then--” + +“Please let me pass!” she said. “I don’t want to--talk to you!” + +He did not move. He stood squarely before her, with a queer, dogged, +miserable look on his face. + +“Not until you tell me why you--hate me,” he said. + +She was silent for a moment, her heart filled with almost intolerable +bitterness. Then suddenly she laughed. + +“Oh, but you’d really better go!” she said. “You wouldn’t like it if +some one should come and find you speaking to _me_!” + +She regretted the words as soon as they were spoken. A singular change +came over him. + +“You mean--” he began, and paused. “You think I’m ashamed to be seen +talking to you?” + +“Let me go!” she said vehemently. “I won’t listen!” + +But her defiance was little more than bravado. Her knees felt weak. She +was frightened by the inexplicable thing she had done. + +“That was a beastly, unjust thing to think,” he went on. “It was only on +your account. I thought you wouldn’t want any one to know--” + +“Know? Know what?” she interrupted, with an attempt at her former +scornfulness; but in her heart she was dismayed and terribly uneasy. + +“All right!” he said. “You think I’m ashamed. By Heaven, you’ll see! I’m +proud of it! It’s the finest thing I ever did in my life--to love you!” + +“Oh, stop!” she whispered. + +“No! I’d like every one in the world to know it. I’m proud of it! I told +you I was at your feet, and I meant it. I’ll--” + +“Oh, please!” she said. + +He stopped, looking at her as if stricken dumb by some unbearable +revelation. All that was hard and proud had vanished from her face, +leaving a tragic and exquisite loveliness. She stood there, in her +distress, like a lost princess, bewildered and solitary, but +unassailable in her mystic innocence. + +“Look here!” he said. “I--” His voice was so unsteady that he could not +go on for a moment. “I’m sorry,” he said. “I didn’t realize how--how +young you are. If you’ll forgive me--” + +She shook her head mutely. He waited in vain for a word, but none came. +Then he turned and walked away, and she went back into her own room and +locked the door. + +She, too, had not realized how young she was, how untried her strength. +This overwhelmed her; she was so miserable, so shaken, that now at last +the tears came in a wild storm. Her pride was mortally wounded. It was a +disgrace to her that Sam Randall should think of her like that. It was +cruel, horrible, unforgetable, that the first words of love she had ever +heard from a man should be his words. His talk of love was a mockery, an +insult. + +Yet the memory of his set face and his unsteady voice caused her a +strange pain that was not anger. + +“I can’t understand!” she cried to herself. “I can’t understand!” + +And it was the first time in her life that Geraldine, with her rigid +code, her intolerant and sharply defined opinions, had ever thought +that. + + +VI + +Jesse Page ordered the car stopped at the entrance to the driveway, and +went the rest of the way on foot. The stars were out in the bland summer +sky, and among the dark trees, stirred by no wind, the house with its +lighted windows had a gay and delicate beauty, an air of festival. Down +by the sea wall the little yacht was moored, swinging gently, throwing +into the black water two little quivering pools of red and green; but +there was not a sound from house or garden. + +“Not even a dog to bark when I come home!” he thought, with a faint, +bitter smile. + +Heaven knows he had made this solitude for himself! He was a man who had +found it easy to win affection--so easy that he distrusted what cost him +so little effort. He could believe in nothing and no one--himself least +of all. + +He walked on the grass, so that his footsteps made no sound. He was a +stalwart man, tall and of soldierly bearing, with a handsome, heavy face +and dark hair a little gray on the temples. He was a domineering, +headstrong, passionate man, and terribly unhappy. He wanted to be angry, +but it was unhappiness that filled him--a queer, pathetic sort of +bewilderment. + +“By God, it’s not fair! It’s not _fair_!” he said to himself over and +over again. + +That was the way he saw it--it was not fair that he should be hurt like +this. He never once looked for a cause, for any fault in himself, or for +any general rule to apply. It simply was not fair that this should +happen to him. + +He had been away, in Chicago, looking after some business affairs, +making more money--for her to spend, of course; and then this letter +came. What if it was anonymous, what if it was written in savage malice? +He had a pretty fair idea as to who had written it, and why. Serena had +enemies. He had listened to innuendo before; and now he was going to +know. + +The front of the house was deserted, and he went round to the side, +where the dining room was. Just as he turned the corner, he saw some one +come out through one of the French windows. He stopped, and drew back +into the shadow of the wall. It was a man, and he fancied he recognized +that slender and vigorous figure. He waited and watched. + +The other man stopped to light a cigarette, but his back was toward the +house. Then he strolled on leisurely toward the garage. Page followed +him a little way, but when the other entered the brightly lit building, +he was satisfied. It was young Randall. + +That was all he needed to know. He went back to the front of the house +and entered there. It was his own house, but the servants--a new +crew--did not know him. The butler tried to stop him, but he pushed the +anxious little man aside, and proceeded to the dining room. + +They were there, the whole crowd of them, sitting about the disordered +table, jaded and hot, and full of a restless languor. The air was thick +with cigarette smoke. A little blue-eyed man with a gray mustache was +performing an elaborate conjuring trick with match sticks and somebody’s +gold watch, and Serena lay back in her chair, looking at him with a +distant smile. Her haggard face was flushed, her eyes heavy. Jesse Page +thought he had never seen her more beautiful, or more hateful. + +“By God, it’s not fair!” he thought again. “I’ve given her everything, +I’ve put up with all her whims, and now I--I could kill her!” + +It was as if his thought had sped through the room like an arrow. Serena +straightened up in her chair, turned her head, and saw him standing in +the doorway. + +“Jesse!” she cried. + +He did not speak or move. He stood there, his straw hat pushed back, +staring at her with narrowed eyes. + +“Jesse!” she said again. + +She half rose from her chair, her own eyes dilated and fixed upon him. +Then some one near her stirred, and the sound recalled her to her +surroundings. Here was the stage upon which she was accustomed to play +a leading part, and every one was looking at her. + +She sank back into the chair again, with a laugh. + +“You beast!” she said. “You startled me so! Why didn’t you tell me you +were coming home, Jesse? Have you had your dinner?” + +He gave his hat to a servant, and sat down in the one chair that was +vacant. Now he had found out; now he knew. Startled her, had he? That +was guilty terror he had seen in her face! Let her sit there smiling, +radiant in her jewels, at the head of her own table! She was frightened, +she couldn’t take her eyes off her husband. + +“Hello, everybody!” he said genially. “Don’t let me spoil the party! +Come on, now! All have another drink, eh?” + +The response he got made him feel physically sick. + +“God, what people!” he thought. “They’re all afraid of me--afraid of a +row!” + +He looked around the table at the eagerly smiling faces, and he smiled +himself--a broad grin. + +“One missing, isn’t there?” he asked. “Who was sitting in this place?” + +There was a moment’s silence. + +“Oh, there?” said Serena. “Miss Moriarty. She’s gone upstairs with a bad +headache.” + +“I see!” said Page, still grinning. + +“I suppose I really ought to go up and see how the poor girl’s getting +on,” continued Serena. + +“Oh, no!” he said suavely. “Don’t go! Wait a bit, and perhaps she’ll +come back.” + +There was another silence. + +“We don’t want to sit here!” cried Betty Anson nervously, pushing back +her chair. “Let’s go!” + +“I like to sit here,” said Page. He poured himself another whisky, and +lit a cigarette. “I think I’ll have a _demi-tasse_ and a sandwich. You +people must keep me company. Don’t go, Betty!” + +She settled back again. She was sorry for Serena, but it would never do +to offend Jesse. + +“If there’s any serious trouble,” she thought, “poor Serena ’ll be done +for!” + +The ambitious Mrs. Anson couldn’t afford to take up the cause of people +who were done for. She glanced covertly across the table. Her husband +sat with his eyes fixed on the cloth, his distinguished gray head bent. +Levering was grave, but the shadow of a smile hovered about his lips. +Jinky, sitting next him--what was the matter with Jinky? + +“How queer she looks!” thought Mrs. Anson. + +She was really distressed by the look on Jinky’s wasted young face; for +of all the people there, Jinky could least afford any indiscreet pity. +Jesse Page was a distant cousin of hers; he had been generous to her, +and she needed it. No--she really shouldn’t look at Serena like that! + +Suddenly Jinky jumped up, and, without a word, walked across the room to +the window, and out on the terrace. + +“Jinky!” Page called sharply. “Where are you going?” + +She turned her head and glanced at him, but she did not answer. For a +moment she stood there in the bright light, a curiously dramatic figure +in her emerald green dress, with her gleaming black hair and her white, +thin face. Then she put her jade cigarette holder between her teeth, and +went off over the lawn. + +Page jumped up and followed her. + +“See here, Jinky!” he said furiously. “You’d better--” + +“See here, Jesse!” she interrupted. “You’re making a fool of yourself.” + +“All right! Perhaps I enjoy it.” + +“It’ll take,” said Jinky deliberately, “just about five minutes for you +to make such a mess of things that you’ll regret it all the rest of your +days, Jesse!” + +“Oh, no!” he said, with a grin. “It’ll take a good deal less than five +minutes--when I catch sight of that lad!” + +Jinky stopped. From where she stood she could look into the garage, and +she was satisfied. + +“Go ahead!” she said. “I’ll drop out.” + +As she turned back toward the house, he went with her. + +“Somehow,” he said, “I feel that where Jinky goes, there must I go, +too.” + +“Keep it up, Jesse!” said she. “You deserve what you’ll get!” + +They found the dining room deserted, with an air of haste and disorder +about it. A cigarette smoldered in a saucer, a cup of coffee had been +overturned, and a dark stain was still spreading slowly over the lace +cloth. Page went into the drawing-room, and Jinky followed. Serena was +not there. + +He went toward the door again, hesitated, and came back. Jinky had +vanished now, through the card room. + +“All right!” he said to himself. “Let them have a little more rope!” + + +VII + +Jinky met Serena coming down the stairs. There had been no love lost +between these two. They had never been friends, and Serena, with the +memory of more than one petty blow dealt to Jinky, expected no mercy +from her now. She was about to pass with a vague, strained smile, when +the girl stopped her. + +“You’ll have to try another line, Serena,” she said. “No use pretending +that Sambo wasn’t here.” + +“Oh, let me alone!” cried Serena desperately. “Don’t I know that?” + +“Well, look here,” said Jinky thoughtfully. “Where is he, anyhow?” + +“Down on the shore road, waiting for me. We were going to run over to +the Abercrombies’ in his car. If I don’t show up, he’ll come back here, +and they’ll telephone. Oh, Jinky, I’m--” + +“Hold up a minute! Let’s see! No use in _my_ going--Jesse would tag +along; but the Moriarty girl could go.” + +“Moriarty!” cried Serena. “You’re simply insane, Jinky! Why, she’s the +most--” + +“I think she’s a pretty decent sort of kid. Anyhow, I’ll try.” + +“But, Jinky, she’s ill--didn’t come down to dinner. She sent me word +that she had an awful headache. There’s no use wasting time over her.” + +“I’ll have a try at it,” persisted Jinky. + +“Jinky!” said Serena, with fervor. “You’re a simply wonderful pal to me! +I’ll never forget this--never!” + +“I hope you won’t,” replied Jinky. + +She went on up the stairs, and knocked on the Moriarty girl’s door. + +“Who is it?” asked a cold voice. + +“Let me in! I want to speak to you.” + +The door was opened. Jinky went in and closed the door after her. + +“Yes?” said Geraldine. + +But Jinky did not answer for a moment. She was looking at Geraldine, +studying her, with all her hard won wisdom. A child, she thought her--a +lovely child, with her heavy hair in a braid, and her outgrown bath +robe; but a child already half awakened to reality. + +“Look here!” she said briefly. “Do you want a chance to do a decent +thing?” + +“I--what is it?” + +“I’ll tell you,” said Jinky. “If you want to help, you can get dressed +and run down to the Shore Road and meet Sam Randall--” + +“No!” cried Geraldine. “I won’t! I won’t have anything to do with--with +that!” + +“You needn’t think it’s a grand operatic tragedy,” said Jinky. “Serena +and Sam aren’t exactly _Tristan_ and _Isolde_. There’s nothing very +wicked in their little flirtation; but Jesse Page just came home in a +pretty poisonous temper, and if Sambo comes back to the house now +there’ll be trouble.” + +“I don’t care!” + +“I suppose you don’t know what you’re talking about,” said Jinky. “I +hope you don’t. If you understood that you could stop a nasty scandal, +and perhaps something even worse, and you just wouldn’t do it, and +didn’t care--” She paused. “It’s serious,” she went on. “Jesse means +business. You can help these people if you want to. If you don’t want +to, all right! It’s up to you.” + +This was the first time Geraldine had had a problem presented to her in +such a way. There was no question of right or wrong. Evidently Jinky +thought it didn’t matter whether these people deserved to be helped or +not. She simply offered the other girl a chance to do a decent thing. + +Geraldine looked at Jinky, and found Jinky looking at her; and +Savonarola never preached a more eloquent sermon than Jinky did by her +silence. She stood there, smoking her cigarette, a haggard, reckless, +wasted young creature, just waiting to see if the other girl was willing +to help. It was up to Geraldine. + +“I’ll go,” she said. + +“Moriarty,” cried Jinky, “you’re a little gentleman! Hurry up now! I’ll +help you.” + +Geraldine needed assistance. Her hands were so unsteady that she was +glad to let Jinky pin up her hair and hook her belt. + +“Now, step!” said Jinky. “And see here, Moriarty--better let Sambo run +you down to the Abercrombies’ and tell them not to telephone here. See +Olive Abercrombie yourself; she’s got a down on Sambo. Tell her not to +say anything about anything. She’ll understand.” + +Geraldine put on her hat and took up a scarf--a funny, old-fashioned +knitted scarf that made Jinky smile. She could never afterward think of +that evening without remembering the old scarf. + + +VIII + +Sambo sat in his car, smoking, and contemplating the starry sky. He was +very unhappy, very much troubled, and so intent upon his own affairs +that Serena’s lateness had caused him no concern whatever. Indeed, when +he thought of her at all, it was to wish that she would never come. He +wished that he could start up his car and drive off somewhere--into +another world. + +Yet the world he was in was beautiful to-night. His car was drawn up +beside a coppice of pine trees--brave, tall trees standing black against +the sky, which was filled with the mild light of the stars. Behind him +lay the sea. He could hear it breaking quietly on the sand, and the salt +savor of it was in the air, with the aromatic fragrance of the pines. A +beautiful world, and he was young and vigorous, and his pockets were +well filled, and still he was saying to himself: + +“I’m so sick of the whole show--so blamed sick of the whole thing!” + +His quick ear caught the sound of footsteps hurrying along the road. He +sighed, sat up a little straighter, and waited, with a resigned and +somber expression upon his face. Now he realized that Serena was very +late, and he thought he would be justified in being rather disagreeable +about it. He didn’t want to see her, didn’t want to go to the +Abercrombies’. He was mortally weary of all this. + +The hurried steps drew nearer, and now he could dimly see an approaching +figure. Serena never walked like that--never came light and swift, tall +and free-moving as a young Diana! It looked like--but of course it +couldn’t be. It seemed so only because he had been thinking so much of +that other girl, and longing so much to see her. + +He turned up the headlights of his car, sending a clear river of light +along the road; and the hastening figure was plain to him now. It _was_ +Geraldine. + +He sprang out of the car and went to meet her, his dark face all alight. + +“Dear girl!” he cried. “Why, I couldn’t believe--” + +She drew back a little. + +“No!” she cried. “I--I only came--” + +“I don’t care why you came,” he began. “You’re here--that’s enough!” + +Then he noticed how anxious she was, how hurried, and how pale. The +light died out of his face. He became grave, as she was. + +“Anything wrong?” he asked. + +His voice was gentle, and he stood before her with a sort of humility. +He knew now that she had not come on his account, and he was terribly +disappointed. She saw that, yet she felt that, after all, it would not +be hard to explain to him, to ask anything of him. She felt sure that he +would understand, and would do whatever she wanted; and that knowledge +caused her an odd little thrill, half of pain, half of pride. + +“Mr. Randall,” she said, “Mr. Page has come home, and--” + +She stopped, and he saw a change come across her face--that cold and +scornful look again. When she had to put this thing into words, the +shamefulness and the ugliness of it were not to be disguised. + +“So they sent me,” she went on curtly, “to say that you had better not +come back now.” + +“I see!” said Randall. “I’m to run away, when Jesse comes? Well, I +won’t!” + +She had not expected this. + +“But don’t you see?” she said vehemently. “You’ll have to, on--on Mrs. +Page’s account.” + +“I won’t!” he declared again. + +They were both silent for a moment. + +“Look here!” he said abruptly. “How did you get mixed up in this? Why +did _you_ come?” + +“Because--I wanted--to help,” she answered, as if the words were hard to +speak. + +Again there was a silence. + +“All right!” he said, at last. “I’ll do whatever you say.” + +She looked away as she answered: + +“Miss--Jinky is the only name I know her by--she thought I’d better go +and speak to Mrs. Abercrombie.” + +“All right! Do you want me to run you down there now?” + +“Yes, please.” + +He opened the door of the car, but made no effort to help her in. Then, +when she was seated, he got in beside her. + +“Miss Moriarty!” he said. “Look here! Will you marry me?” + +She was too much astounded to utter a word. She sat staring at him. + +“You needn’t bother to answer,” he went on, without even turning his +head toward her. “I know you won’t. I just wanted you to know that that +was how I felt about you. Now you understand, anyhow!” + +He started the engine, and the little car shot off smoothly along the +road, under the shadow of trees, out into the open country, past wide +and quiet fields, past little lighted houses. They went at a terrific +speed. Geraldine closed her eyes, dazed by the rush of wind against her +face, the steady hum of the engine, and the dark landscape that seemed +to be streaming past her like a figured scarf. + +Randall did not speak again, yet she could almost believe that this wild +haste was the very voice of his reckless spirit. It was as if she were +listening to him all the time, as if he were telling her again that he +was lost--that he didn’t know where he was going, and didn’t care. + +And a very passion of regret and pity seized upon her. She did not judge +him now, or remember his misdeeds. She could not see him, but she knew +so well how he looked--so young, so gallant, so debonair, and so +pitiful. She was not frightened; she was sorrowfully resigned to go with +him, rushing through the dark, whatever their destination. + +Suddenly the car slowed down. Geraldine opened her eyes, faintly +surprised to find the world so quiet again. + +“Need gas,” he explained. + +He stopped before a little gasoline station, theatrically brilliant +against the dark trees. He jumped out, lifted the hood, looked in at the +engine, was satisfied; and, closing the hood, turned to speak to the man +who had come out of the station. + +The thing that followed was utterly unreal. Geraldine saw him standing +there, bareheaded, in his dinner jacket, in that brilliant light, like +an actor on a stage. He had just lit a cigarette, and was smiling at +something the garage man said, when another car came by and stopped with +grating brakes, a voice shouted something, and a shot rang out. Before +the girl could believe that it had happened, the other car had gone on, +and Randall and the garage man stood there, motionless, white, as if +listening intently to the shot that still echoed in the air. + +“Get his number!” the man bawled suddenly. + +She saw Randall put his hand into his pocket and bring out a roll of +bills. She could not hear what he said, but it was a short enough +speech. The man thrust the money into his own pocket, and ran to connect +the hose. Randall climbed back into the car. + +“That’s enough!” he said. + +In a minute they were off again. They went around the drive before the +station, turned homeward. + +“What happened?” she asked. + +“Nothing,” he said curtly. Then, in a moment: “I suppose you’ve got to +know. It was Page, trying a little melodrama. No harm done, but--but I +wish to God you hadn’t got mixed up in it! I’m going to get you home as +fast as I can. Just keep quiet about the whole thing, won’t you? +Don’t--” + +He stopped abruptly, and the car swerved to one side. He muttered +something under his breath, and went on steadily again; but suspicion +began to dawn upon her. + +“Mr. Randall!” she cried. “Are you hurt?” + +“No!” he replied, with a laugh--a strange laugh; “only--” + +“Mr. Randall,” she said, “I’m sure--oh, please stop the car! I _know_ +you’re hurt!” + +“Would you care, if I were?” + +“Yes!” she cried. “Yes, I would care! Oh, please don’t go on! Stop the +car, and let me see!” + +But he went on along the smooth, empty road, not driving fast now, but +very, very carefully. + +“It would be worth a bullet through the head,” he said, “to hear you +speak like that! But I’m _not_ hurt--I’m--not--” + +His labored voice almost broke her heart. + +“Sambo!” she cried. “Please, please let me see! Stop! Stop!” + +He did stop then. He put his arm about her, and drew her close to him. + +“My little darling!” he said. “My little blessed angel! For you to care +like this!” + +She let her head rest against his shoulder. She let him kiss her pale, +cold cheek. Then she began to sob. + +“Tell me!” she pleaded. + +“I’m not hurt,” he said gently. “Nothing for you to cry about, little +sweetheart; only, don’t you see, you’ve got to get home quick, before he +does? If you’ll go quietly to your room, and say nothing, there’ll be +no harm done. Come, now!” + +He took his arm from her shoulder, and started the engine. He went still +faster now. She spoke, but he did not answer. His eyes were intent upon +the road before him. He stopped at the foot of Serena’s garden. + +“Now stroll up to the house as if you’d been taking a walk,” he said. + +“No, I won’t! I can’t! I’m afraid you’re hurt!” + +“Look here!” he said. “There’s just one thing on earth you can do for +me, and that is to clear out. There’s nothing that could be so bad as +your getting mixed up in this. I mean it! Don’t--don’t make it hard. +Just go!” + +She could not withstand his broken and anxious voice. She obeyed as a +child obeys, leaden-hearted, in tears, only half comprehending, going +simply because he entreated her to go. She opened the door of the car +and got down into the road; but her scarf had caught in something. She +pulled at it, jerked it upward, and still it held fast. + +“Oh, go on!” he cried, as if in anger. + +“It’s my scarf!” she explained, with a sob. + +He turned to help her, tore the scarf loose, and then, with a strange +little whistling sigh, doubled over, with his head lying against the +side of the car. + +“Mr. Randall!” she cried. “Sambo! Oh, what’s the matter?” + +There was no answer from him. The engine was still running, the +headlights were shining out in the dark. The car was like a living +creature, trembling with impatience to be off, but the owner and master +of it lay still and silent. Geraldine reached out her hand, and her +fingers touched the soft, short hair on his temple. + +“What shall I do?” she said to herself. “Oh, what shall I do?” + +For a moment she was lost, panic-stricken, ready to sink down in the +dust beside the car and hide her eyes; but not for long. Little by +little her native courage flowed back. She grew strong again, and tried +to face this situation with her old austere and straightforward mind. + +“He’s fainted--that’s all,” she thought. “I must help him. I mustn’t +call any one else, because that’s just what he doesn’t want. It would be +unfair and cruel to call any one else, now that he’s--helpless!” + +Helpless, this man who, not an hour ago, had been so vividly alive, so +headstrong, so impetuous! Such pity seized her that she sobbed aloud. +Her hand still rested upon his bent head. She drew nearer, and kissed +his hair. + +“Oh, Sambo, dear!” she said. “I will help you!” + +Then she set off across the lawn that lay before her like a vast +wilderness. She dared not hurry, lest some one might see her and +question her. She had to go at a quiet and ordinary pace, had to +restrain her passionate impulse to run. + +“Brandy!” she thought. “That’s what they give people who faint. I’m sure +there’s some on the sideboard in the dining room. I mustn’t be silly. I +mustn’t let go of myself!” + +She had left him there alone, unconscious and helpless, but she must not +run. Nobody else must know. As she passed the front of the house, she +heard the sound of music and dancing feet from the drawing-room, and she +went by, carefully avoiding the bright rectangles of light from the +windows. On the buffet were three decanters. She was not quite sure +which was the brandy, but there was no time for hesitation. She poured +out a glassful from what she hoped was the right one, and turned toward +the window again. + +A voice spoke behind her. + +“Caught in the act!” It was Serena. She stood in the doorway, gay and +glittering, her face bright with a feverish excitement. “I’d never have +thought it of _you_!” she said, laughing. + +Geraldine stood like a statue, with the glass in her hand. It was +horrible to her to be caught like this, to be judged guilty as these +others were guilty; but it never occurred to her to invent a plausible +lie. Serena might think what she liked; there would be no explanation. +The girl turned to face her. + +“I needed it,” she said. + +“It’s a pretty stiff--” Serena began, and stopped short, staring at the +girl. “My God!” she cried. “What’s happened? Your scarf--” + +Geraldine looked down. One side of the scarf about her shoulders was +sodden and stained with blood. + +The glass dropped from her hand and crashed upon the floor, and a +sickening blackness swam before her eyes. She stretched out her hands, +and they touched nothing. Her knees gave way, and she staggered back. +Then, with a supreme effort, she recovered herself. She leaned against +the wall, sick and trembling, until the wild chaos in her brain passed +by. She heard Serena speaking. Presently she could see Serena’s +frightened face before her. + +“What is it? What’s the matter?” she was saying. + +“It’s Sambo,” said Geraldine, with an effort. “He’s hurt. Send some one +to bring him in!” + +“In here? Where is he?” + +“Down on the North Road, in his car. Send some one--” + +Serena came nearer. + +“See here, Geraldine!” she whispered. “I can’t! Wait! Let’s see--let’s +think how we can get him away!” + +“I tell you he’s hurt!” insisted Geraldine. “Send some one--” + +“Hush! Not so loud! I can’t have him here! You don’t understand. I’ve +had the most awful time with Jesse! I had to promise I’d never speak to +Sambo again. I simply can’t--” + +“I tell you he’s hurt!” reiterated Geraldine, with a sort of horror. “It +may be serious. He may be--” + +Serena began to cry. + +“I can’t help it! I’m awfully sorry, but I simply can’t have any more +trouble with Jesse. You ought to see that--” + +“Mrs. Page,” said Geraldine, “he may be dying. He’s got to be brought in +here at once!” + +“I can’t help it!” cried Serena petulantly. “Sam Randall is nothing to +me, and Jesse is simply everything. Jesse’s the only man I ever really +cared for, and I won’t--” + +“You beast!” said Geraldine. + +Serena stared at her in blank astonishment. It was incredible that the +cold and correct Miss Moriarty should have said that. + +“I’m surprised--” she began, but Geraldine would not listen. + +“A beast!” she said again. “You will have him in here, too!” + +“I won’t!” declared Serena. + +“Yes, you will!” said Geraldine. + +She stood holding the stained scarf against her heart, and it was as if +she held him, as if she were sheltering and defending the man who had +done so gallant a thing for her. Wounded and suffering, his one thought +had been for her--to protect her good name, to bring her safely home. He +was helpless now, and it was her turn. Nothing else mattered. All her +stern reserve, her stiff-necked dignity, her pride, were flung to the +winds. She was ready to fight for him, to defy all the world for his +sake. + +“Send some one out for him at once!” she said. “He’s been shot--and I +know who shot him. It was your--” + +“Hush! Not so loud, you horrible girl!” + +“I don’t care!” said Geraldine. “I don’t care who hears me! He’s been +shot. He’s going to be brought in here and taken care of, no matter what +it means to you or any one else. If you won’t do it, then I’m going +to--” + +“Wait!” whispered Serena. “Oh, what shall I do? Oh, can’t you see?” + +“No!” said Geraldine. “I don’t care about anything but Sambo!” + + +IX + +When young Randall opened his eyes again, he found himself back in his +room at the Pages’. He lay still for a moment, remembering. The window +was open, and the dark blue silk curtains fluttered, giving a glimpse of +darkness outside. The room was filled with a mild, quiet light, however, +and he felt sure that some one was there. He could not turn; his +shoulder was stiff and painful, and a mortal weariness weighed him down. +He tried to speak, and could not. All that he could manage was to draw +one hand across the cover a little way. + +But it was enough. Geraldine saw it. She came and stood beside him, +grave and lovely as ever, so untroubled, so quiet. + +“Everything’s all right,” she said gently. “The doctor’s seen you. +You’re very weak, but he says you’ll soon--” + +She stopped, because it was so hard to see him there, white and still, +with that mute appeal in his eyes. + +“You’re getting on nicely!” she said, with a sudden brisk cheerfulness. + +Then he managed to speak. + +“No!” he said, in that old defiant way of his. + +That was more than Geraldine could bear. She knelt down beside him and +laid her hand over his. She did not know how to say the words he wanted +to hear. She could only look and look at him, with tears in her eyes and +a little anxious, trembling smile on her lips. + +Again he tried to speak, but only one word came: + +“Love!” he said faintly. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +FEBRUARY, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVII NUMBER 1 + + + + +The Thing Beyond Reason + +A COMPLETE SHORT NOVEL--THE STORY OF THE STRANGE ADVENTURE THAT LED LEXY +MORAN TO A HOUSE OF TRAGEDY AND MYSTERY IN THE SUBURBS OF NEW YORK + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + +Author of “Angelica,” etc. + + +The house was very quiet to-night. There was nothing to disturb Miss +Alexandra Moran but the placid ticking of the clock and the faint stir +of the curtains at the open window. For that matter, a considerable +amount of noise would not have troubled her just then. As she sat at the +library table, the light of the shaded lamp shone upon her bright, +ruffled head bent over her work in fiercest concentration. She was +chewing the end of a badly damaged lead pencil, and she was scowling. + +“No!” she said, half aloud. “Won’t do! It can’t be ‘fix’; but, by +jiminy, I’ll get it if it takes all night!” + +She laid down the pencil and sat back in the chair, with her arms +folded. Though her present difficulty concerned nothing more serious +than a cross-word puzzle, an observer might have learned a good deal of +Miss Moran’s character from her manner of dealing with it. The puzzle +itself, with its neat, clear little letters printed in the squares, +would have been a revelation that whatever she undertook she did +carefully and intelligently--and obstinately. + +She was a young little thing, only twenty-three, and quite alone in the +world, but not at all dismayed by that. Her father had died some three +years ago, and, instead of leaving the snug little fortune she had been +taught to expect, he had left nothing at all; so that at twenty she had +had her first puzzle to solve--how to keep alive without eating the +bread of charity. + + _Copyright 1926, by Elisabeth Sanxay Holding_ + +It was no easy matter for a girl who was still in boarding school, but +she had done it. She had come to New York and had found a post as +nursery governess, and later as waitress in a tea room, and then in the +art department of an enormous store. She had gained no tangible profit +from these three years, she had no balance in the bank, but that did not +trouble her. She had learned that she could stand on her own feet, that +she could trust herself; and with this knowledge and the experience she +had had, and her quick wits and splendid health, she felt herself fully +armed against the world. Indeed, she had not a care on earth this +evening except the cross-word puzzle. + +“It must be ‘tocsin,’” she said to herself. “There’s something wrong +with the verticals. It can’t be ‘fix,’ and yet--” + +The telephone bell rang. Still pondering her problem, Lexy went across +the room. + +“Is Miss Enderby there?” asked a man’s voice. + +“She’s out,” answered Lexy cheerfully. + +“No!” said the man’s voice. “She can’t--I--for God’s sake, where’s Miss +Enderby?” + +“She’s out,” Lexy repeated, startled. “She went to the opera with her +mother and father.” + +“Who are you?” + +“I’m Mrs. Enderby’s secretary.” + +“Look here! Didn’t Miss Enderby say anything? Isn’t there any sort of +message for me?” + +“Nothing that I know of. The servants have gone to bed, but I’ll ask +them, if it’s anything important.” + +“No!” said the voice. “Don’t! No, never mind! Good-by!” + +“That’s queer!” said Lexy to herself, as she walked away from the +instrument, and then she dismissed the matter from her mind. “None of my +business!” she thought, and returned to her puzzle. + +Suddenly an inspiration came. + +“It _is_ ‘fix’!” she cried. “And it’s not ‘tocsin,’ but ‘toxins’! +Hurrah!” + +This practically completed the puzzle, and she began to fill in the +empty squares with the peculiar satisfaction of the cross-word +enthusiast. It was perfect, now, and she liked things to be perfect. + +As she leaned back, with a contented sigh, the clock struck twelve. + +“Golly! I didn’t realize it was so late!” she reflected. “Queer time for +any one to ring up!” + +She frowned again. Her special problem solved, she began to take more +interest in other affairs; and the more she thought of the telephone +incident, the more it amazed her. Caroline Enderby wasn’t like other +girls. The mere fact of a man’s telephoning to her at all was strange +and indeed unprecedented. + +“And he was badly upset, too,” thought Lexy. “He asked if she left a +message for him. Think of Caroline Enderby leaving a message for a man!” + +She began to feel impatient for Caroline’s return. + +“I’ll tell her when we’re alone,” she thought; “and she’ll have to +explain--a little, anyhow.” + +Lexy wanted an explanation very much, because she was fond of Caroline, +and very sorry for her. + +Mrs. Enderby was a Frenchwoman of the old-fashioned, conservative type, +with the most rigid ideas about the bringing up of a young girl, and her +husband--Lexy had often wondered what Mr. Enderby had been before his +marriage, for now he was nothing but a grave and dignified echo of his +wife. Between them, they had educated Caroline in a disastrous fashion. +She had never even been to school. She had had governesses at home, and +when a male teacher came in, for music or painting lessons, Mrs. Enderby +had always sat in the room with her child. Caroline never went out of +the house alone. She was utterly cut off from the normal life of other +girls. She was a gentle, lovely creature--a little unreal, Lexy had +thought her, at first; and she, at first, had been afraid of Lexy. + +Mrs. Enderby had advertised for a secretary, and Lexy had answered the +advertisement. Mrs. Enderby had wanted personal references, and Lexy had +supplied them, some five or six, of the highest quality. Mrs. Enderby +had investigated them with remarkable thoroughness, and had asked Lexy +many questions. Indeed, it had taken ten days to satisfy her that Miss +Moran was a fit person to come into her house, and Lexy had lived under +her roof and under her eagle eye for a month before she was allowed to +be alone with Caroline. After that first month, however, Mrs. Enderby +had made up her mind that Lexy was to be trusted, and the thin pretext +of “secretary” was dropped. + +Mrs. Enderby suffered from a not uncommon form of insomnia. She could +not sleep at convenient hours--at night, for instance--but could and did +sleep at very inconvenient hours during the day; and what she wanted was +not a secretary, but a companion for her daughter during these hours. + +She realized, too, that even the most strictly brought up _jeune fille_ +needed some sort of youthful society, and in Lexy she had found pretty +well what she wanted--a well mannered, well bred young woman of +unimpeachable honesty. So she had permitted Lexy and Caroline to go +shopping alone, and sometimes to a matinée or to a tea room. She asked +them shrewd questions when they came home, and their answers satisfied +her perfectly. They had never even spoken to a man! + +“And yet,” thought Miss Moran, “somehow Caroline has been carrying on +with some one, without even me finding out! I didn’t know she had it in +her!” + +Lexy yawned mightily. She was growing very sleepy, but not for worlds +would she go to bed until she had seen Caroline. She lay down on the +divan, her hands clasped under her head, and let all sorts of little +idle thoughts drift through her mind. Now and then a taxi went by, but +this street in the East Sixties was a very quiet one. The house was so +very still, and there was nothing in her own young heart to trouble her. +Her eyes closed. + +She was half asleep when the sound of Mrs. Enderby’s voice in the hall +brought her to her feet. It was a penetrating voice, with a trace of +foreign accent, and it was not a voice that Lexy loved. She went out of +the library into the hall. + +“Did you enjoy--” she began politely, and then stopped short. “But +where’s Caroline?” she cried. + +“Caroline? But at home, of course,” answered Mrs. Enderby. + +“At home? Here?” + +“But certainly! She had a headache. At the last moment she decided not +to go with us. You were not here when we left, Miss Moran.” + +“I know,” murmured Lexy. “I had just run out to the drug store; but--” + +“She went directly to bed,” Mrs. Enderby continued. “I thought, however, +that she would have sent for you during the course of the evening.” + +“Oh, I see!” said Lexy casually. + +At heart, however, she was curiously uneasy. Mr. Enderby stopped for a +moment, to give her some kindly information about the opera they had +heard. Then he and his wife ascended the stairs, followed by Lexy; and +with every step her uneasiness grew. She was sure that Caroline would +have sent for her if she had been in the house. + +Mrs. Enderby paused outside her child’s door. + +“The light is out,” she said. “She will be asleep. I shall not disturb +her. Good night, Miss Moran!” + +“Good night, Mrs. Enderby!” Lexy answered, and went into her own room. + +She gave Mrs. Enderby twenty minutes to get safely stowed away; then she +went out quietly into the hall, to Caroline’s room. She knocked softly; +there was no answer. She turned the handle and went in; the room was +dark and very still. She switched on the light. + +It was as she had expected--the room was empty. Caroline was not there. + + +II + +Lexy’s first impulse was to close the door of that empty room, and to +hold her tongue. It seemed to her that it would be treachery to Caroline +to tell Mrs. Enderby. She and Caroline were both young, both of the same +generation; they ought to stand loyally together against the tyrannical +older people. + +“Because, golly, what a row there’d be if Mrs. Enderby ever knew she’d +gone out!” Lexy thought. + +That was how she saw it, at first. Caroline had pretended to have a +headache so that she would be left behind, and would get a chance to +slip out alone. It was simply a lark. Lexy had known such things to +happen often before, at boarding school; and the unthinkable and +impossible thing was for one girl to tell on another. + +“She’ll be back soon,” thought Lexy, “and she’ll tell me all about it.” + +So she went into Caroline’s room, to wait. It was a charming room, pink +and white, like Caroline herself. Lexy turned on the switch, and two +rose-shaded lamps blossomed out like flowers. She sat down on a _chaise +longue_, and stretched herself out, yawning. On the desk before her was +Caroline’s writing apparatus, a quill pen of old rose, an ivory desk +set, everything so dainty and orderly; only poor Caroline had no +friends, and never had letters to write or to answer. + +“I wonder who on earth that was on the telephone,” Lexy reflected. “It +_was_ queer--just on the only night of her life when she’d ever gone out +on her own. And he sounded so terribly upset! It _was_ queer. Perhaps--” + +She was aware of a fast-growing oppression. The influence of Caroline’s +room was beginning to tell upon her. Caroline didn’t understand about +larks. She wasn’t that sort of girl. Quiet, shy, and patient, she had +never shown any trace of resentment against her restricted life, or any +desire for the good times that other girls of her age enjoyed. The more +Lexy thought about it, the more clearly she realized the strangeness of +all this, and the more uneasy she became. + +When the little Dresden clock on the mantelpiece struck one, it came as +a shock. Lexy sprang to her feet and looked about the room, filled with +unreasoning fear. One o’clock, and Caroline hadn’t come back! +Suppose--suppose she never came back? + +Lexy dismissed that idea with healthy scorn. Things like that didn’t +happen; and yet--what was it that gave to the pink and white lamplit +room such an air of being deserted? + +“Why, the photographs are gone!” she cried. + +She noticed now for the first time that the photographs of Mr. and Mrs. +Enderby in silver frames, which had always stood on the writing desk, +were not standing there now. + +She turned to the bureau. Caroline’s silver toilet set was not there. +She made a rapid survey of the room, and she made sure of her +suspicions. Caroline had gone deliberately, taking with her all the +things she would need on a short trip. + +“I’ve got to tell Mrs. Enderby now,” she thought. “It’s only fair.” + +She went out into the corridor, closing the door behind her, and turned +toward Mrs. Enderby’s room. She was very, very reluctant, for she +dreaded to break the peace of the quiet house by this dramatic +announcement. She hated anything in the nature of the sensational. +Level-headed, cool, practical, her instinct was to make light of all +this, to insist that nothing was really wrong. Caroline had gone, and +that was that. + +“There’s going to be such a fuss!” she thought. “If there’s anything I +loathe, it’s a fuss.” + +And all the time, under her cool and sensible exterior, she was +frightened. She felt that after all she was very young, and very +inexperienced, in a world where things--anything--things beyond her +knowledge--might happen. + +She knocked upon the door lightly--so lightly that no one heard her; and +she had to knock again. This time Mrs. Enderby opened the door. + +“Well?” she asked, not very amiably. + +“I thought I ought to tell you--” Lexy began; and still she hesitated, +moved by the unaccountable feeling that this might be treachery to +Caroline. + +“Tell me what?” asked Mrs. Enderby. “Come, if you please, Miss Moran! +Tell me at once!” + +“Caroline’s gone.” + +The words were spoken. Lexy waited in great alarm, wondering if Mrs. +Enderby would faint or scream. + +The lady did neither. She came out into the corridor, shutting the door +of her room behind her, and her first word and her only word was: + +“Hush!” + +Then she glanced about her at the closed doors, and, taking Lexy’s arm +in a firm grip, hurried her to Caroline’s room. Not until they were shut +in there did she speak again. + +“Now tell me!” she said. “Speak very low. You said--Caroline has gone?” + +“Yes,” said Lexy. “I came in here after you’d gone to bed, and--you can +see for yourself--the bed hasn’t been slept in. She’s taken her +things--her brush and comb and--” + +“And she told you--what?” + +“Me? Why, nothing!” answered Lexy, in surprise. “I didn’t see her. I +haven’t seen her since dinner.” + +“But you know,” said Mrs. Enderby. “You know where she has gone.” + +She spoke with cool certainty, and her black eyes were fixed upon Lexy +with a far from pleasant expression. + +Lexy looked back at her with equal steadiness. + +“Mrs. Enderby,” she said, “I _don’t_ know.” + +Mrs. Enderby shrugged her shoulders. + +“Very well!” she said. “You do not know exactly where she has gone. +_Bien, alors!_ You guess, eh?” + +“No,” answered Lexy, bewildered. “I don’t. I can’t.” + +“She has spoken to you of some--friend?” + +Seeing Lexy still frankly bewildered, Mrs. Enderby lost her patience. + +“The man!” she said. “Who is the man?” + +“I never heard Caroline speak of any man,” said Lexy. + +She spoke firmly enough, and she was telling the truth; but she +remembered that telephone call, and the memory brought a faint flush +into her cheeks. Mrs. Enderby did not fail to notice it. + +“Listen!” she said. “There is one thing you can do--only one thing. You +can hold your tongue. Tell no one. Let no one know that Caroline is not +here. You understand?” + +“But aren’t you going to--” + +“I am going to do nothing. You understand--nothing. There is to be no +scandal in my house.” + +“But, Mrs. Enderby!” + +“Hush! No one must know of this. To-morrow morning I shall have a letter +from Caroline.” + +“Oh!” said Lexy, with a sigh of genuine relief. “Oh, then you know where +she’s gone!” + +“I?” replied Mrs. Enderby. “I know nothing. This has come to me from a +clear sky. I have always tried to safeguard my child. I--” + +She paused for a moment, and for the first time Lexy pitied her. + +“It is the American blood in her,” Mrs. Enderby went on. “No French girl +would treat her parents so; but in this country--She has gone with some +fortune hunter. To-morrow I shall have a letter that she is married. +‘Please forgive me, _chère Maman_,’ she will say. ‘I am so happy. I, at +nineteen, and of an ignorance the most complete, have made my choice +without you.’ That is the American way, is it not? That is your +‘romance,’ eh? My one child--” + +Her voice broke. + +“No more!” she said. “It is finished. But--attend, Miss Moran! There +must be no scandal. No one is to know that she is not here.” + +She turned and walked out of the room. Lexy sank into a chair. + +“I don’t care!” she said to herself. “She’s wrong--I know it! It’s not +what she thinks. Caroline’s not like that. Something dreadful has +happened!” + + +III + +It seemed perfectly natural to be awakened in the morning by Mrs. +Enderby’s hand on her shoulder, and to look up into Mrs. Enderby’s +flashing black eyes. Lexy had gone to sleep dominated by the thought of +that masterful woman. She vaguely remembered having dreamed of her, and +when she opened her eyes--there she was. + +“Get up!” said Mrs. Enderby in a low voice. “Go into Caroline’s room. +When Annie comes with the breakfast tray, take it from her at the door. +I have told her that Caroline is ill with a headache. You understand?” + +“Yes, Mrs. Enderby,” answered Lexy. + +She sprang out of bed and began to dress, filled with an unreasoning +sense of haste. It wasn’t a dream, then--it was true. Caroline had gone, +and there was something Lexy must do for her. She could not have +explained what this something was, but it oppressed and worried her. She +could not rid herself of the feeling that she was not being loyal to +Caroline. + +“And yet,” she thought, “I had to tell Mrs. Enderby she wasn’t there. I +suppose I ought to have told her about that telephone call, too, but I +hate to do it! I know Caroline wouldn’t like me to; and what good can it +do, anyhow? Whoever it was, he didn’t know where she was. It was the +queerest thing--a man asking, ‘For God’s sake, where’s Miss Enderby?’ +when she wasn’t here! No, Mrs. Enderby is wrong. Caroline hasn’t just +gone away of her own accord. She’s not that sort of girl. Something has +happened!” + +Lexy finished dressing and went into Caroline’s room. In the gay April +sunshine, that dainty room seemed almost unbearably forlorn. + +She went over to the window and looked down into the street. People were +passing by, and taxis, and private cars--all the ordinary, casual, +cheerful daily life at which Caroline Enderby had so often looked out, +like a poor enchanted princess in a tower. A wave of pity and affection +rose in Lexy’s heart. + +“Oh, poor Caroline!” she said to herself. “Such a dull, miserable life! +I do wish--” + +There was a knock at the door, and she hurried across the room to open +it. The parlor maid stood there with a tray. Lexy took it from her with +a pleasant “good morning,” and closed the door again. Caroline’s +breakfast! There was something disturbing in the sight of that carefully +prepared tray, ready for the girl who was not there. + +The door opened--without a preliminary knock, this time--and Mrs. +Enderby came in. She turned the key behind her, and, without a word, +went over to the bed and pulled off the covers. Then she went into the +adjoining bathroom and started the water running in the tub. This done, +she sat down at the table and began to eat the breakfast on the tray. + +Lexy stood watching all this with indignation and a sort of horror. + +“All she cares about is keeping up appearances,” the girl thought. “The +only thing that worries her is that some one might find out. She doesn’t +know where poor Caroline is--and she can sit down and eat! I’m +comparatively a stranger, and even I--” + +Lexy was an honest soul, however. The fragrance of coffee and rolls +reached her, and she admitted in her heart that she, too, could eat, if +she had a chance. + +Mrs. Enderby was not going to give her a chance just yet. She finished +her meal and rose. + +“Now!” she said. “Just what is gone from here? We shall look.” + +So they looked, in the wardrobe, in the drawers, even in the orderly +desk. Very little was gone. + +“And now,” said Mrs. Enderby, “you lent her--how much money, Miss +Moran?” + +“I never lent her a penny in my life,” replied Lexy. + +Mrs. Enderby’s tone aroused a spirit of obstinate defiance in her. Those +flashing black eyes were fixed upon her with an expression which did not +please Lexy, and Lexy looked back with an expression which did not +please Mrs. Enderby. + +“So you will not tell me what you know!” said Mrs. Enderby, with a +chilly smile. + +It was on the tip of Lexy’s tongue to say, with considerable warmth, +that she _had_ told all she knew; but the memory of the telephone call +checked her. + +“If I tell her about that,” she thought, “she’ll just say, ‘Ah, I +thought so!’ And she’ll be surer than ever that Caroline has eloped with +a fortune hunter, and she won’t make any effort to find her. No--I’m not +going to tell her until she gets really frightened.” Aloud she said: +“I’ll do anything in the world that I can do, Mrs. Enderby, to help you +find Caroline.” + +“It is not necessary,” said Mrs. Enderby. “I shall have her letter.” + +There was another tap at the door. Mrs. Enderby closed the door leading +into the bathroom, and then called: + +“Come in!” + +The parlor maid entered. + +“You may take away the tray,” her mistress said graciously. “Miss +Enderby has finished.” + +Again a feeling that was almost horror came over Lexy. There was the bed +Caroline had slept in, there was the breakfast Caroline had eaten, there +was Caroline’s bath running--and Caroline wasn’t there! Lexy wanted to +get out of that room and away from Mrs. Enderby. + +“Do you mind if I go down and get my own breakfast now?” she asked, when +the parlor maid had gone out with the tray. + +“But certainly not!” Mrs. Enderby blandly consented. “We shall go down +together.” + +She turned off the water in the bath, and, following Lexy out of the +room, locked the door on the outside. The girl dropped behind her as +they descended the stairs, and studied the stout, dignified figure +before her with indignant interest. + +“A mother!” she thought. “A mother, behaving like this! How long is she +going to wait for her letter, I wonder? Well, if she won’t do anything, +then, by jiminy, I will!” + +A fresh example of Mrs. Enderby’s remarkable strength of mind awaited +them. Mr. Enderby was already seated at the table in the dining room. As +his wife entered, he rose, with his invariable politeness, and one +glance at his ruddy, cheerful face convinced Lexy that he knew nothing +of what had happened. + +“Caroline has a headache,” Mrs. Enderby explained. “It will be better +for her to rest for a little.” + +“Ah! Too bad!” said he. “Don’t think she gets out in the air enough. +Er--good morning, Miss Moran!” + +Lexy almost forgot to answer him, so intent was she upon watching Mrs. +Enderby open her letters. There must, she thought, be some change in +that calm, pale face when she didn’t find a letter from Caroline, there +must be something to break this inhuman tranquillity. + +But nothing broke it. Mr. Enderby ate his breakfast, and his wife +chatted affably with him while she glanced over her mail. The sunshine +poured into the room, gleaming on silver and linen, and on the cheerful +young parlor maid moving quietly about her duties. It was a morning just +like other mornings; and, in spite of herself, Lexy’s feeling of dread +and oppression began to lighten. Mr. Enderby was so thoroughly +unperturbed, Mrs. Enderby was so serene and majestic, the house was so +bright and pleasant in the spring morning, that it was hard to believe +that anything could be really amiss. + +“But I don’t care!” she thought sturdily. “_I_ know there is!” + +Mr. Enderby finished his breakfast and rose, and, as usual, his wife +accompanied him to the front door. Alone in the dining room, Lexy made +haste to finish her own meal. Just as she pushed back her chair, Mrs. +Enderby returned. + +“I shall ring, Annie,” she told the parlor maid, and the girl +disappeared. Then she turned to Lexy. “The letter has come,” she said. + +Lexy stared at her with such an expression of amazement and dismay that +Mrs. Enderby smiled. + +“You are very young,” she said. “You wish always for the dramatic. When +you have lived as long as I, you will see that such things do not +happen.” + +She spoke kindly, and Lexy saw in her dark eyes a look of weariness and +pain. + +“No, my child,” she went on. “In this life it is always the same things +that happen again and again. At twenty, one breaks the heart for a man; +at forty, one breaks the heart for one’s child. There is only that--and +money. Love and money--nothing else!” + +Lexy felt extraordinarily sorry for Mrs. Enderby; but even yet she +couldn’t quite believe that Caroline could have done such a thing. + +“But do you mean that she’s really--that she’s--” she began. + +“See, then!” said Mrs. Enderby. “Here is the letter!” + +Lexy took it from her, and read: + +CHERE MAMAN: + + I only beg you and papa to forgive me for what I have done; but I + knew that if I told you, you would not have let me go. When you get + this I shall be married. To-morrow I shall write again, to tell you + where I am, and to beg you to let me bring my husband to you. + + Oh, please, dear, dear mother and father, forgive me! + + Your loving, loving daughter, + CAROLINE. + + +“You see!” said Mrs. Enderby. “It is as I told you.” + +There were tears in Lexy’s eyes as she put the letter back into the +envelope. + +“It doesn’t seem a bit like Caroline, though,” she remarked. + +Mrs. Enderby smiled again, faintly, and held out her hand for the +letter. Lexy returned it to her, with an almost mechanical glance at the +postmark--“Wyngate, Connecticut.” + +All her defiance had vanished. She was obliged to admit now that Mrs. +Enderby was wise, and that she herself was-- + +“A little fool!” said Lexy candidly to herself. + + +IV + +“Do you mind if I go out for a walk?” asked the crestfallen Lexy; for +that was her instinct in any sort of trouble--to get out into the fresh +air and walk. + +“No,” answered Mrs. Enderby; “but I shall ask you to return in half an +hour. There is much to be done.” + +“Done!” cried Lexy. “But what can be done--now?” + +“That I shall tell you when you return,” said Mrs. Enderby. “In the +meantime, I trust you to say nothing of all this to any person whatever. +You understand, Miss Moran?” + +Miss Moran certainly did not understand, but she gave her promise to +keep silent, and, putting on her hat and coat, hurried out of the house. +Mighty glad she was to get out, too! + +“But why make a mystery of it like this?” she thought. “Every one has to +know, sooner or later, and it’s so--so ghastly, pretending that +Caroline’s there! Oh, it doesn’t seem possible, Caroline running off +like that, and I never even dreaming she was the least bit interested in +any man! I don’t see how she could have seen any one or written to any +one without my knowing it. It doesn’t seem possible!” + +She had reached the corner of Fifth Avenue, and was waiting for a halt +in the traffic, when she became aware of a young man who was standing +near her and staring at her. She glanced carelessly at him, and he took +off his hat, but he got no acknowledgment of his salute. He was a +stranger, and she meant him to remain a stranger. The bright-haired, +sturdy little Lexy was a very pretty girl, and she was not unaccustomed +to strange young men who stared. She knew how to handle them. + +As she crossed the avenue, he crossed, too. When she entered the park, +he followed. Now Lexy was never tolerant of this sort of thing, and +to-day, in her anxiety and distress, she was less so than ever. She +turned her head and looked the young man squarely in the face with a +scornful and frigid look; and he took off his hat again! + +“Just you say one word,” said she to herself, “and I’ll call a +policeman!” + +Yet, as she walked briskly on, something in the man’s expression haunted +her. He didn’t look like that sort of man. His sunburned face somehow +seemed to her a very honest one, and the expression on it was not at all +flirtatious, but terribly troubled and unhappy. + +“Perhaps he thinks he knows me,” she thought. “Well, he doesn’t, and +he’s not going to, either!” + +And she dismissed him from her mind. + +“When did Caroline go?” she pondered, continuing her own miserable train +of thought. “While I was doing cross words in the library? If she went +out by the front door, she must have gone right past the library. She +must have known I was there--and not even to say good-by!” + +It hurt. She had grown very fond of the shy, quiet Caroline, and she had +firmly believed that Caroline was fond of her. What is more, she had +thought Caroline trusted her. + +“She didn’t though. All the time, when we were so friendly together, she +must have been planning this and--_what?_” + +She stopped short, her dark brows meeting in a fierce frown, for the +unknown man had come up beside her and spoken to her. + +“Excuse me!” he said. + +Lexy only looked at him, but he did not wither and perish under her +scorn. + +“I’ve _got_ to speak to you,” he said. “It’s--look here! I’ve been +waiting outside the house all morning. Look here, please! You’re Lexy, +aren’t you?” + +This was a little too much! + +“If you don’t stop bothering me this instant--” she began hotly, but he +paid no heed. + +“_Where’s Miss Enderby?_” he cried. + +Lexy grew very pale. Those were the words she had heard over the +telephone last night, and this was the same voice. + +For a moment she was silent, staring at him, while he looked back at +her, his blue eyes searching her face with a look of desperate entreaty. +All her doubts vanished. She had not been wrong. She had been right--she +was sure of it. She knew that something had happened--something +inexplicable and dreadful. + +“Please tell me!” he said. “You don’t know--you can’t know--she told me +you were her friend.” + +“But who are you?” cried Lexy. + +His face flushed under the sunburn. + +“I--” he began, and stopped. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you,” he went on. +“I’d like to, but, you see, I can’t. If you’ll just tell me where +Car--Miss Enderby is! She’s safe at home, isn’t she? She--of course she +is! She _must_ be! She--she is, isn’t she?” + +“Well,” said Lexy slowly, “I don’t see how I can tell you anything at +all. I don’t know what right you have to ask any questions. I don’t know +who you are, or anything about you.” + +“No,” he replied, “I know that; but, after all, it’s not much of a +question, is it--just if Miss Enderby’s all right?” + +Lexy felt very sorry for him, in his obvious struggle to speak quietly +and reasonably. She wanted to answer him promptly and candidly, for his +sake and for her own, because she felt sure that he could tell her +something about Caroline; but she had promised Mrs. Enderby to say +nothing. + +“It’s so silly!” she thought, exasperated. “If I could tell him, I might +find out--” + +Find out what? Hadn’t Caroline written to say that she had gone away to +get married? In a day or two, probably to-morrow, they would learn all +the details from Caroline herself. This unhappy young man couldn’t know +anything. Indeed, he was asking for information. + +Who could he possibly be? A rival suitor? Lexy remembered Caroline’s +pitifully restricted life. _Two_ suitors of whom she had never heard? It +wasn’t possible! + +“No,” she thought. “There’s something queer--something wrong!” + +“Look here!” the young man said again. “Aren’t you going to answer me? +Just tell me she’s all right, and--” + +“What makes you think she isn’t?” asked Lexy cautiously. + +He looked straight into her face. + +“You’re playing with me,” he said. “You’re fencing with me, to make me +give myself away; and it’s a pretty rotten thing to do!” + +“Rotten?” Lexy repeated indignantly. “Rotten, not to answer questions +from a perfect stranger?” + +“Yes,” he said, “it is; because that’s a question you could answer for +any one. I’ve only asked you if Miss Enderby is--all right.” + +This high-handed tone didn’t suit Lexy at all. He was actually presuming +to be angry, and that made her angry. + +“I shan’t tell you anything at all,” she said, and began to walk on +again. + +He put on his hat and turned away, but in a moment he was back at her +side. + +“Look here!” he said. “Caroline told me you were her friend. She said +you could be trusted. All right--I am trusting you. I’ve felt, all +along, that there was--something wrong. I’ve got to know! If you’ll give +me your word that she’s safe at home, I’ll clear out, and apologize for +having made a first-class fool of myself; but if she’s not, I ought to +know!” + +Lexy stopped again. Their eyes met in a long, steady glance. + +“I can’t answer any questions this morning,” she told him. “I promised I +wouldn’t.” + +“Then there is something wrong!” the young man exclaimed. + +He was silent for a long time, staring at the ground, and Lexy waited, +with a fast beating heart, for some word that would enlighten her. At +last he looked up. + +“I’ve got to trust you,” he said simply. “Caroline meant to tell you, +anyhow. You see”--he paused--“I’m Charles Houseman, the man she’s going +to marry.” + +“Oh!” cried Lexy. + +“Now you’ll tell me, won’t you?” + +She stared and stared at him, filled with amazement and pity. Such a +nice-looking, straightforward, manly sort of fellow--and such a look of +pain and bewilderment in his blue eyes! + +“But--did she _say_ she would marry you?” + +“Of course she did! She--look here! You don’t know what I’ve been +through. It was I who telephoned last night. I--” + +“But why did you? Oh, please tell me! I am Caroline’s friend--truly her +friend. I want to understand!” + +“All right!” he said. “I telephoned because I was waiting for her, and +she didn’t come.” + +“Waiting for--Caroline?” + +“We had arranged to get married last night. She was to meet me, but she +didn’t come,” he said, a little unsteadily. “Perhaps she just changed +her mind. Perhaps she doesn’t want to see me any more. If that’s the +case, I’ll trust you not to mention anything about me--to any one. You +see now, don’t you, that I--I had to know?” + +Lexy’s eyes filled with tears. Moved by a generous impulse, she held out +her hand. + +“I’m so awfully sorry!” she cried. + +“Why? You mean--for God’s sake, tell me! You mean she has changed her +mind?” + +“I can’t tell you--not now.” + +“You can’t leave it at that,” said he. He had taken her outstretched +hand, and he held it tight. “I ought to know what has happened. I can’t +believe that Caroline would let me down like that. She--she’s not that +sort of girl. Something’s gone wrong. She wouldn’t leave me waiting and +waiting there for her at Wyngate.” + +“Wyngate!” cried Lexy. “But that was--” + +She stopped abruptly. Caroline’s letter had been postmarked “Wyngate.” +She had gone there to meet--some one. She had married--some one. + +“I can’t understand,” Lexy went on. “It’s terrible! I can’t tell you +now; but I’ll meet you here this afternoon, after lunch--about two +o’clock--and I’ll tell you then.” + +She turned away, then, in haste to get back to Mrs. Enderby, but he +stopped her. + +“Remember!” he said sternly. “I’ve trusted you. If Caroline hasn’t told +her people about me, you mustn’t mention my name. I gave her my word +that I would let her do the telling. I didn’t want it that way, but I +promised her, and you’ve got to do the same. If she hasn’t told about +me, you’re not to.” + +“Oh, Lord!” cried poor Lexy. “Well, all right, I won’t! Now, for +goodness’ sake, go away, and let me alone--to do the best I can!” + + +V + +Lexy was late. The half hour had been considerably exceeded when she ran +up the steps of the Enderbys house. She rang the bell, and the door was +opened promptly by Annie. + +“Mrs. Enderby would like to see you at once, miss,” the parlor maid said +primly. + +But Lexy stopped to look covertly at Annie. Did she know anything? It +was possible. Anything was possible now. Lexy was obliged to admit, +however, that Annie had no appearance of guilt or mystery. A brisk and +sober woman of middle age, who had been with the family for nearly ten +years, she looked nothing more or less than disapproving because this +young person had presumed to keep Mrs. Enderby waiting for several +minutes. + +“Anyhow, I can’t ask her,” thought Lexy. “That’s the worst part of all +this--I can’t ask anybody anything without breaking a promise to +somebody else; and yet everybody ought to know everything!” + +In miserable perplexity, she went upstairs to Mrs. Enderby’s sitting +room. Only one thing was clear in her mind, and that was that she must +be freed from her weak-minded promise not to mention Caroline’s absence. + +“And that’s not going to be easy,” she reflected, “when I can’t explain +to her. There’ll be a row. Well, I don’t care!” + +She did care, however. She respected Mrs. Enderby, and in her secret +heart she was a little afraid of her. She felt very young, very crude +and blundering, in the presence of that masterful woman; and she doubted +her own wisdom. + +“But what can I do?” she thought. “He said he trusted me. I _can’t_ tell +her! No, first I’ll get her to let me off that promise, and I’ll go and +tell that young man. Then I’ll make him let me off, and I’ll come and +tell her. Golly, how I hate all this fool mystery!” + +Mrs. Enderby was writing at her desk as Lexy entered the room. She +glanced up, unsmiling. + +“You are late,” she said. “I asked you to return in half an hour.” + +“I’m sorry,” Lexy replied meekly. + +“Very well! Now you will please to come with me.” + +She rose, and Lexy followed her down the hall to Caroline’s room. Mrs. +Enderby unlocked the door, and, when they had entered, locked the door +on the inside. + +“In fifteen minutes the car is coming,” she said. “I wish you to put on +Caroline’s hat and coat and a veil, and leave the house with me.” + +“You mean you want me to pretend I’m Caroline?” cried Lexy. + +“I wish it to be thought that you are Caroline,” Mrs. Enderby corrected +her. “Please waste no time. The car will be here--” + +“Mrs. Enderby, I--I can’t do it!” + +“You can, Miss Moran, and I think you will.” + +But Lexy was pretty close to desperation now. Her honest and vigorous +spirit was entangled in a network of promises and obligations and +deceptions, and she could not see how to free herself; but she would not +passively submit. + +“No,” she said, “I can’t. I’ve found out something--I can’t tell you +about it just now, but this afternoon I hope--” + +“This afternoon is another thing,” said Mrs. Enderby. “In the +meantime--” + +“But it’s important! It’s--” + +“You think I do not know? You think this letter sets my mind at rest?” +Mrs. Enderby demanded, with one of her sudden flashes of temper. “That +is imbecile! I know how serious it is that my child should leave me like +this; but I know what is my duty--first, to my husband. That first, I +tell you! It is for me to see that no disgrace comes upon his house, no +scandal--that first! Then, next, I must see to it that the way is left +open for Caroline to come back--if she wishes.” She came close to Lexy, +and fixed those black eyes of hers upon the girl’s face. “I tell you, +Miss Moran, there will be no scandal!” + +In spite of herself, Lexy was impressed. + +“But suppose--” she began. + +“No--we shall not suppose. I have told the servants that to-day Miss +Enderby goes into the country, to visit her old governess for a few +days. Very well--they shall see her go. If there is no other letter +to-morrow, I shall tell Mr. Enderby.” + +“Doesn’t he know?” + +“Please make haste, Miss Moran!” said Mrs. Enderby. + +As if hypnotized, Lexy began to dress herself in Caroline’s clothes; +but, as she glanced in the mirror to adjust the close-fitting little +hat, the monstrousness of the whole thing overwhelmed her. She had so +often seen Caroline in this hat and coat! + +“Oh, I can’t!” she cried. “I can’t! Suppose something terrible has +happened to her, and I’m--” + +“Keep quiet!” said Mrs. Enderby fiercely. “I tell you it shall be so! +Now, the veil. No, not like that--not as if you were disguising +yourself! So!” + +She unlocked the door, and, taking Lexy by the arm, went out into the +hall. Together they descended the stairs, Mrs. Enderby chatting volubly +in French, as she was wont to do with her daughter. None of the servants +would think of interrupting her, or of staring at her companion. It was +an ordinary, everyday scene. Annie was crossing the lower hall. + +“Miss Moran will be out all day,” said Mrs. Enderby. “There will be no +one at home for lunch.” + +“Yes, ma’am,” replied Annie. + +The maid would not notice when--or if--Miss Moran went out. There was +nothing to arouse suspicion in any one. + +They went out to the car. A small trunk was strapped on behind. +Everything had been prepared for Miss Enderby’s visit to the country. +The chauffeur opened the door and touched his cap respectfully, the two +women got in, and off they went. + +“Now you will please to dismiss this subject from your mind,” said Mrs. +Enderby. “I do not wish to talk of it.” She spoke kindly now. “You will +have a pleasant day in the country.” + +“Day!” said Lexy. “But what time will we get back?” + +“Before dinner.” + +“Oh, I’ve got to get back this afternoon! I’ve got to see some one! It’s +important--terribly important!” + +Mrs. Enderby smiled faintly. + +“The chauffeur must see you descend at Miss Craigie’s house,” she said. +“Once we are there, I have a hat and coat of your own in the trunk. I +shall explain what is necessary to Miss Craigie, who is very discreet, +very devoted. You can change then, but you must go home quietly by +train; and I think there are not many trains.” + +Lexy had a vision of the young man waiting and waiting for her in the +park that afternoon--the young man who had trusted her, who was waiting +in such miserable anxiety for some news of Caroline. + +“Mrs. Enderby,” she protested, “I can’t come with you. I’ve got to get +back this afternoon.” + +“No,” said Mrs. Enderby. + +Lexy made a creditable effort to master her anger and distress. + +“It’s important--to you,” she said. “I have to see some one about +Caroline--some one who can tell you something.” + +This time Mrs. Enderby made no answer at all. There she sat, stout, +majestic, absolutely impervious, looking out of the window as if Lexy +did not exist. What was to be done? She couldn’t communicate with the +chauffeur except by leaning across Mrs. Enderby, and a struggle with +that lady was out of the question. + +“But I’m not going on!” she thought. + +She waited until the car slowed down at a crossing. Then she made a +sudden dart for the door. With equal suddenness Mrs. Enderby seized her +arm. + +“Sit down!” she said, in a singularly unpleasant whisper. “There shall +be no scene. Sit down, I tell you!” + +“I won’t!” replied Lexy, but just then the car started forward, and she +fell back on the seat. + +“You will come with me,” said Mrs. Enderby. + +That overbearing tone, that grasp on her arm, were very nearly too much +for Lexy. She had always been quick-tempered. All the Morans were, and +were perversely proud of it, too; but Lexy had learned many lessons in a +hard school. She had learned to control her temper, and she did so now. +She was silent for a time. + +“All right!” she agreed, at last. “I’ll come. I don’t see what else I +can do--now; but after this I’ll have to use my own judgment, Mrs. +Enderby.” + +“You have none,” Mrs. Enderby told her calmly. + +Lexy clenched her hands, and again was silent for a moment. + +“I mean--” she began. + +“I know very well what you mean,” said Mrs. Enderby. “You mean that you +will keep faith with me no longer. I saw that. You wished to run off and +tell your story to some one this afternoon. I stopped that. After this, +I cannot stop you any longer. You will tell, but I think no one will +listen to you. I shall deny it, and no one will be likely to listen to +the word of a discharged employee.” + +Lexy had grown very pale. + +“I see!” she said slowly. “Then you’re going to--” + +“You are discharged,” interrupted Mrs. Enderby, “because I do not like +to have my daughter’s companion running into the park to meet a young +man.” + +“I see!” said Lexy again. + +And nothing more. All the warmth of her anger had gone, and in its place +had come an overwhelming depression. For all her sturdiness and +courage, she was young and generous and sensitive, and those words of +Mrs. Enderby’s hurt her cruelly. + +She sat very still, looking out of the window. They had left the city +now, and were on the Boston road. It was a sweet, fresh April day, and +under a bright and windy sky the countryside was showing the first soft +green of spring. + +Lexy remembered. She remembered the things she had so valiantly tried to +forget--the dear, happy days that were past, spring days like this, in +her own home, with her mother and father; early morning rides on her +little black mare, and coming home to the old house, to the people who +loved her; her father’s laugh, her mother’s wonderful smile, the +friendly faces of the servants. + +She was not old enough or wise enough as yet, for these memories to be a +solace to her. They were pain--nothing but pain. There was no one now to +love her, or even to be interested in her. She had cut herself off from +her old friends and gone out alone, like a poor, rash, gallant little +knight-errant, into the wide world to seek her fortune. Caroline had +disappeared, and Mrs. Enderby had dismissed her with savage contempt. +She would have to go out now and look for a new job. + +She straightened her shoulders. + +“This won’t do!” she said to herself. “It’s disgusting, mawkish +self-pity, and nothing else. I’m young and healthy, and I can always +find a job. What I want to think about now is Caroline, and what I ought +to do for her.” + +So she did begin to think about Caroline. The first thought that came +into her head was such an extraordinary one that it startled her. + +“Anyhow, she’s a pretty lucky girl!” + +Lucky? Caroline, who had lived like a prisoner, and who had now so +strangely disappeared, lucky--simply because a sunburned, blue-eyed +young man was so miserably anxious about her? + +“I suppose he’s thinking about her this minute,” Lexy reflected; “and +I’m sure nobody in the world is thinking about me. Well, I don’t care!” + + +VI + +The car took them to a drowsy little village, and stopped before a small +cottage on a side street. Mrs. Enderby got out, followed by Lexy, the +living ghost of Caroline. Side by side they went up the flagged path and +on to the porch. Mrs. Enderby rang the bell, and in a moment the door +was opened by a thin, sandy-haired woman in spectacles. + +“Mrs. Enderby!” she cried, her plain face lighting up in a delighted +smile. “And my dear little Caroline!” She held out her hand to Lexy, and +suddenly her face changed. “But--” she began. + +Mrs. Enderby pushed her gently inside and closed the door. + +“But it’s not Caroline!” cried Miss Craigie. + +“Hush!” said Mrs. Enderby. “I shall explain to you. Please allow the +chauffeur to carry upstairs a small trunk, and please have no air of +surprise.” + +Evidently Miss Craigie was in the habit of obeying Mrs. Enderby. She +opened the front door and called the chauffeur, who came in with the +trunk. + +“Turn your back!” whispered Mrs. Enderby to Lexy. “Go and look out of +the window!” + +Lexy heard the man go past the sitting room and up the stairs. Presently +he came running down, and the front door closed after him. + +“Now, Miss Craigie,” said Mrs. Enderby, “if you will permit Miss Moran +to go upstairs?” + +“Oh, certainly!” answered the bewildered Miss Craigie. “Whatever you +think best, Mrs. Enderby, I’m sure.” + +“Go!” said Mrs. Enderby. + +The lady’s tone aroused in Lexy a great desire not to go. Of course, now +that she had gone so far, it would be childish to refuse to continue; +but she meant to take her time. She stood there by the window, slowly +drawing off her gloves, her back turned to the room. Suddenly Mrs. +Enderby caught her by the shoulder and turned her around. + +“Go!” she said again. “Take off those things of my child’s. _Mon Dieu! +Mon Dieu!_ Have you no heart?” + +There was such a note of anguish in her voice that Lexy no longer +delayed. She followed Miss Craigie up the stairs to a neat, prim little +bedroom, where the trunk stood, already unlocked. + +“If you want anything--” suggested Miss Craigie, in her gentle and +apologetic way. + +“No, thank you,” replied Lexy. + +Miss Craigie went out, closing the door softly behind her. Lexy took +off Caroline’s hat and coat and laid them on the bed. + +“I wonder if I’ll ever see her wearing them again!” she thought. + +For a long time she stood motionless, looking down at the things that +Caroline had worn. Most pitifully eloquent, they seemed to her--the hat +that had covered Caroline’s fair hair, the coat that had fitted her +slender shoulders. Lexy looked and looked, grave and sorrowful--and in +that moment her resolution was made. + +“I’m going to find her!” she said, half aloud. “I don’t care what any +one else does or what any one else thinks. I _know_ she’s in trouble of +some sort, and I’m going to find her!” + +The last trace of what Lexy had called “mawkish self-pity” had vanished +now. She was no longer concerned with Mrs. Enderby’s attitude toward +herself. It didn’t matter. Finding another job didn’t matter, either. +She had a little money due her, and she meant to use it--every penny of +it--in finding Caroline. + +She washed her hands and face, brushed her hair, put on her own hat and +jacket, and went downstairs again. Mrs. Enderby was standing in the tiny +hall, and from the sitting room there came a sound of muffled sobbing. + +“She is an imbecile, that woman!” said Mrs. Enderby, with a sigh; “but +she will hold her tongue. And you?” + +“I’ve got to do as I think best,” answered Lexy. “I’ll say good-by now, +Mrs. Enderby.” + +“There is no train until three o’clock. It is now after one. We shall +have lunch directly.” + +“No, thank you,” said Lexy. “I’d rather go now. I dare say I can find +something to eat in the village.” + +She was not in the least angry now, or hurt; only she wanted to get +away, by herself, to think this out. + +“Good-by?” repeated Mrs. Enderby, with a smile. “You think, then, never +to see me again?” + +“No,” said Lexy. “I mean to see you again--when I have something to tell +you; but just now I want to go back and pack up my things.” + +“And leave my house?” + +“Yes.” + +They were both silent for a moment. Then, to Lexy’s amazement, Mrs. +Enderby laid a hand gently on the girl’s shoulder. + +“My child,” she said, “you think I am a very hard woman. Perhaps it is +so; but, like you, I do what seems to me the right. Certainly it is +better now that you should leave us; but not like this. You must have +your lunch here, then you must return to the house and sleep there, all +in the usual way. To-morrow you shall go.” She paused a moment. “You +shall go, if you are still determined that you will not keep faith with +me.” + +It was not a very difficult matter to touch Lexy’s heart. Whatever +resentment she may have felt against Mrs. Enderby vanished now, lost in +a sincere pity and respect; but she was firm in her purpose. + +“I’ve got to tell one person,” she said. “If I do, I shall be able to +tell you something you ought to know. I wish you could trust me! I wish +you could believe that all I’m thinking of is--Caroline!” + +“I do believe you,” said Mrs. Enderby. “You are very honest, and very, +very young. You wish to do good, but you do harm. Very well, my child--I +cannot stop you. Go your way, and I go mine; but”--she paused again, and +again smiled her faint, shadowy smile--“if I think it right that you +should be sacrificed, it shall be so. I am sorry. I have affection for +you. I shall be sorry if you stand in my way.” + +Lexy met her eyes steadily. + +“I’m sorry, too,” she said. + +And so she was. There was nothing in her heart now but sorrow for them +all--for Caroline, for Mrs. Enderby, for the luckless Mr. Houseman, even +for Miss Craigie; but most of all for Caroline. + +“I’ve got to find her,” she thought, over and over again; “and _he’ll_ +help me!” + +She had lunch in Miss Craigie’s cottage--a melancholy meal, with the +hostess red-eyed and dejected and Mrs. Enderby sternly silent. Then, +after lunch, poor Miss Craigie was sent out for a drive, in order to get +rid of the chauffeur while Lexy slipped out of the house and down to the +station. + +Everything went as Mrs. Enderby had willed it. Lexy caught the +designated train, and returned to the city. All the way in, her great +comfort was the thought of Mr. Houseman. He would help her. Now she +could tell him that Caroline had gone, and he would help her. + +“Of course, I’ve missed him to-day,” she thought; “but he’s sure to be +in the park again to-morrow. Perhaps he’ll telephone. He’s not the sort +to be easily discouraged, I’m sure.” + +It was dark when she reached the Grand Central, but, at the risk of +being late for dinner, Lexy chose to walk back to the house. She could +always think better when she was walking. + +“I want to get the thing in order in my own mind,” she reflected. “Mrs. +Enderby is so--confusing. Here’s the case--Mr. Houseman says Caroline +promised to meet him last night at a place called Wyngate, and they were +to be married. She left the house. This morning there was a letter from +her, postmarked Wyngate; but he says she didn’t go there. Well, then, +where did she go?” + +Impossible to answer that question with even the wildest surmise. + +“I’ll have to wait,” Lexy went on. “I’ll have to find out more from Mr. +Houseman. Perhaps they misunderstood each other. It’s no use trying to +guess. I’ll have to wait till I see him.” + +She recalled his honest, sunburned face with great good will. He was her +ally. He was young, like herself, not old and cautious and deliberate. +She liked him. She trusted him. In her loneliness and anxiety, he seemed +a friend. + +Annie opened the door with her customary air of disapproval. + +“Yes, miss,” she answered. “Mrs. Enderby came home in the car half an +hour ago. Dinner ’ll be served in ten minutes. Here’s a letter for you. +A young man left it about twenty minutes ago.” + +“If I’d taken a taxi from Grand Central, I’d have seen him!” was Lexy’s +first thought. + +Even a letter was something, however, and she ran upstairs with it, very +much pleased. Of course, it was from Mr. Houseman. She locked the door, +and, standing against it, looked at the envelope. It was addressed to +“Miss Lexy” in a good clear hand. That made her smile, remembering her +first indignation that morning. + +The letter ran thus: + +DEAR MISS LEXY: + + Please excuse me for addressing you like this, but I don’t know + your other name. I forgot to ask you. + + I waited in the park for you all afternoon. When it got dark, I + couldn’t stand it any longer, so I went to the house and asked for + Miss Enderby. The servant told me she had gone away to the country + with her mother this morning. + + Please tell Miss Enderby that I understand. I am sorry she didn’t + tell me before that she had changed her mind, instead of letting me + wait like that; but it’s finished now. Please tell her she can + count on me to hold my tongue, and never to bother her again in any + way. + + We are sailing to-night, or I should have tried to see you + to-morrow. In case you have any message for me, you can address me + at the company’s office, J. J. Eames & Son, 99 State Street. I + expect to be back in about six weeks. + + Very truly yours, + CHARLES HOUSEMAN. + + +“Sailing to-night!” cried Lexy. “Then he’s gone! He’s gone!” + + +VII + +“So you are still of the same mind?” inquired Mrs. Enderby. + +“More so, if anything,” Lexy answered seriously. + +It was after breakfast the next morning. Mr. Enderby had gone to his +office, and Mrs. Enderby and Lexy were alone in the dining room. There +was an odd sort of friendliness between them. Lexy felt no constraint in +asking questions. + +“There isn’t any letter this morning, is there, Mrs. Enderby?” + +“There is not.” + +“Then I suppose you’re going to tell Mr. Enderby?” + +“This evening.” + +“And then?” + +“Then I shall be guided by his advice,” Mrs. Enderby replied blandly. + +Lexy could have smiled at this. She knew how likely Mrs. Enderby was to +be guided by her husband; but she kept the smile and the thought to +herself. + +“I don’t want to interfere with your plans--” she began. + +“I have no plans.” + +“I mean, if you’re going to take steps to find her--” + +“My child,” said Mrs. Enderby, “it is clear that you wish to amuse +yourself with a grand mystery. I tell you there is no mystery, but you +do not believe me. I ask you to say nothing of this matter, but you +refuse. So I say to you now--go your own way, proceed with your mystery. +I do not think you can hurt me very much.” + +Lexy flushed. + +“I don’t want to hurt any one,” she declared stiffly. “I just want to +help your daughter.” + +“Proceed, then!” said Mrs. Enderby. + +Lexy rose. + +“Then I’ll say good-by, Mrs. Enderby,” she said. “My trunk’s packed. +I’ll send for it this afternoon.” + +“And where are you going in such a hurry?” + +“I’m going to Wyngate,” said Lexy. + +“Ah!” said Mrs. Enderby. “It is a pretty place, is it not?” + +“I don’t know. I’ve never seen it.” + +“Pardon me--you saw it yesterday. It is a small village through which we +passed on the way to Miss Craigie’s house.” + +“I didn’t know that.” + +“Now that you do know, perhaps you will spare yourself the trouble of +going there,” said Mrs. Enderby. “I assure you you will not find +Caroline there. I myself made certain inquiries. No such person has +arrived in Wyngate.” + +There was a moment’s silence. + +“But I observe by your face that you are not convinced,” Mrs. Enderby +went on. “‘This Mrs. Enderby, she is a stupid old creature,’ you think +to yourself. ‘I shall go there myself, and I shall discover that which +she could not.’” + +Lexy reddened again. + +“I don’t mean it that way,” she said. “It’s only that we look at this +from different points of view, and I feel--I feel that I’ve got to go.” + +“Very well!” said Mrs. Enderby, and she, too, rose. “You will please to +come to my room with me. There is part of your salary to be paid to +you.” + +Lexy followed her, still flushed, and very reluctant. She wished she +could afford to refuse that money. + +“But I’ve earned it,” she thought; “and goodness knows I’ll need it!” + +Mrs. Enderby sat down at her desk and took out her check book. While she +wrote, Lexy looked out of the window. + +“The amount due to you, including to-day, is thirty-two dollars,” said +Mrs. Enderby. “Here is a check for it.” + +“Thank you,” said Lexy. + +“One minute more! Here, my child, is another check.” + +Lexy stared at it, amazed. It was for one hundred dollars. + +“But, Mrs. Enderby, I can’t--” + +“You will please take it and say nothing more. I give you this because I +shall give you no reference. I shall answer no inquiries about you. You +understand?” + +“But I don’t want--” + +Mrs. Enderby pushed back her chair, and rose. She crossed the room to +Lexy, put both hands on the girl’s shoulders, and then did something far +more astonishing than the gift of the check. She kissed Lexy on the +forehead. + +“Good-by, and God bless you, little honest one!” she said, with a smile. +“I think we shall not see each other again, but I shall sometimes +remember you. Go, now, and bear in mind that you can always trust Miss +Craigie. She is an imbecile, but she can be trusted. _Adieu!_” + +Lexy’s eyes filled with tears. + +“_Au revoir!_” she said stoutly; and then, with one of her sudden +impulses, she put both arms around Mrs. Enderby’s neck and returned her +kiss vigorously. “I’m sorry!” she said. “I’m awfully sorry!” + +This was their parting. Lexy was thankful that it had been like this, +very glad that she could leave the house in good will and kindliness. It +strengthened her beyond measure. She wanted to help Caroline, and she +wanted to help Mrs. Enderby, too. + +“And I will!” she thought. “I know that I’m right and she’s wrong! She’s +rather terrible, too. Sometimes I think she’d almost rather not find out +the truth, if it was going to make what she calls a scandal. She will +have it that Caroline’s gone away of her own free will, to get married; +and if it’s anything else, she doesn’t want to know. She is hard, but +there’s something rather fine about her.” + +There was no one in the hall when Lexy left, and this was a relief, for +she supposed that Mrs. Enderby had told the servants, or would tell +them, that Miss Moran had been discharged. + +She went out and closed the door behind her. A fine, thin rain was +falling--nothing to daunt a healthy young creature like Lexy; yet she +wished that the sun had been shining. She wished that she hadn’t had to +leave the house in the rain, under a gray sky. Somehow it made her only +too well aware that she was homeless now, and alone. + +As was her habit when depressed, she set off to walk briskly; and by the +time she reached the Grand Central her cheeks were glowing and her heart +considerably less heavy. She learned that she had nearly three hours to +wait for the next train to Wyngate; so she bought her ticket, checked +her bag, and went out again. + +In a near-by department store she bought a little chamois pocket. Then +she went to the bank, cashed both her checks, and, putting the bills +into her pocket, hung it around her neck inside her blouse. It was very +comfortable to have so much money. + +Then, only as a forlorn hope, she rang up the offices of J. J. Eames & +Son, on State Street. + +“I don’t suppose they keep track of their passengers,” she thought; “but +it can’t do any harm.” + +So, when she got the connection, she asked politely: + +“Could you possibly tell me where Mr. Charles Houseman has gone?” + +“Certainly!” answered an equally polite voice at the other end of the +wire. “Just a moment, please! You mean Mr. Houseman, second officer on +the Mazell?” + +“I don’t know,” said Lexy, surprised. “Has he blue eyes?” + +There was an instant’s silence. Then the voice spoke again, a little +unsteadily. + +“I--I believe so.” + +“He’s laughing at me!” thought Lexy indignantly, and her voice became +severely dignified. + +“Can you tell me where the--the Mazell has gone?” + +“Lisbon and Gibraltar. We expect her back in about five weeks.” + +“Thank you!” said Lexy. “And that’s that!” she added, to herself. “So +he’s a sailor! I rather like sailors. Well, anyhow, he’s gone.” She +sighed. “Carry on!” she said. + +She went into a tea room on Forty-Second Street and ordered herself a +very good lunch. + +“Much better than I can afford,” she thought. “Goodness knows what’s +going to happen to me! Here I am, without visible means of support. I +suppose I’m an idiot. Lots of people would say so. They’d say I ought to +be looking for a new job this instant; but I don’t care! I’m not going +back on Caroline. Mrs. Enderby won’t do anything, and Mr. Houseman’s +gone away, and there’s nobody but me. Perhaps I can’t do very much, but, +by jiminy, I’m going to try!” + +There was still an hour to spare, and she passed it in a fashion she had +often scornfully denounced. She went shopping--without buying. She +wandered through a great department store, looking at all sorts of +things. Some of them she wanted, but she resolutely told herself that +she was better off without them. + +Then, at the proper time, she went back to the Grand Central, recovered +her bag, bought herself two or three magazines and a bar of chocolate, +and boarded the train. For all that she tried to be so cool and +sensible, she could not help feeling a queer little thrill of +excitement. Her quest had begun, and she could not in any way foresee +the end. + + +VIII + +Now it certainly was not Lexy’s way to take any great interest in +strange young men. There was not a trace of coquetry in her honest +heart, and she had always looked upon the little flirtations of her +friends with distaste and wonder. + +“_I’m_ not romantic!” she had said more than once. + +She believed that. She would have denied indignantly that her present +mission was romantic. She thought it a matter-of-course thing which she +was in honor bound to do for her friend Caroline Enderby. She felt that +she was very cool and practical about it, and a mighty sensible sort of +girl altogether. + +Certainly she saw the young man on the train, for her alert glance saw +pretty well everything. She saw him, and she thought she had never set +eyes on a handsomer man. + +He was very tall, and slenderly and strongly built. He was dressed with +fastidious perfection, and he had an air of marked distinction. In +short, he was a man whom any one would look at--and remember; but Lexy, +the unromantic girl, thought him inferior to the blue-eyed Mr. Houseman. +She preferred young Houseman’s blunt, sunburned face to the dark and +haughty one of this stranger. She simply was not interested in dark and +haughty strangers, however distinguished and handsome. She looked at +this one, and then returned to her magazines. + +She had a weakness for detective stories, and she was reading one +now--reading it in the proper spirit, uncritical and absorbed. Whenever +the train stopped at a station, she glanced up, and more than once, as +she turned her head, she caught the stranger’s eye. She wondered, later +on, why she hadn’t had some sort of premonition. People in stories +always did. They always recognized at once the other people who were +going to be in the story with them; but Lexy did not. Even toward the +end of the journey, when she and the stranger were the only ones left in +the car, she was not aware of any interest in him. + +Even when he, too, got out at Wyngate, Lexy was not specially +interested. It was only a little after five o’clock, but it was dark +already on that rainy afternoon, and the only thing that interested her +just then was the sight of a solitary taxi drawn up beside the platform. +Bag in hand, she hurried toward it, but the stranger got there before +her. When she arrived, he was speaking to the driver. + +There was no other taxi or vehicle of any sort in sight, no other lights +were visible except those of the station. It was a strange and unknown +world upon which she looked in the rainy dusk, and she felt a +justifiable annoyance with the ungallant stranger. He jumped into the +cab and slammed the door. + +“Driver!” cried Lexy. “Will you please come back for me?” + +But before the driver could answer, the door of the cab opened, and the +stranger sprang out. + +“I _beg_ your pardon!” he said, standing hat in hand before Lexy. “I’m +most awfully sorry! Give you my word I didn’t notice. I should have +noticed, of course. Absent-minded sort of beggar, you know! Please take +the cab, won’t you? I don’t in the least mind waiting. Please take it! +Allow me!” + +He tried to take her bag. His manner was not at all haughty. On the +contrary, it was a very agreeable manner, and the impulsive Lexy liked +him. + +“Why can’t we both go?” said she. + +“Oh, no!” he protested. “Please take the cab! Give you my word I don’t +mind waiting.” + +“It’s a dismal place to wait in,” said Lexy. “We can both go, just as +well as not.” + +The driver approved of Lexy’s idea. It saved him trouble. + +“Where do you want to go, miss?” he asked. + +“I don’t know,” said Lexy. “I suppose there’s a hotel, isn’t there?” + +“I say!” exclaimed the stranger. “Just what I’d been asking him, you +know! He says there’s no hotel, but a very decent boarding house.” + +“Mis’ Royce’s,” added the driver. “She takes boarders.” + +“All right!” said Lexy cheerfully. “Miss Royce’s it is!” + +The stranger took her bag, and put it into the taxi. He would have +assisted Lexy, but she was already inside; so he, too, got in. He closed +the door, and off they went. + +“I _am_ sorry, you know,” he said, “shoving ahead like that; but I +didn’t notice--” + +“Well, please stop being sorry now,” requested Lexy firmly. + +“Right-o!” said he. “You won’t mind my saying you’ve been wonderfully +nice about it?” + +“No, I don’t mind that a bit,” replied Lexy. “I like to be wonderfully +nice.” + +There was a moment’s silence. + +“Will you allow me to introduce myself?” said the stranger. “Grey, you +know--George Grey--Captain Grey, you know.” + +“Captain of a ship?” asked Lexy, with interest. She thought she would +like to talk about ships. + +“Oh, no!” said he, rather shocked. “Army--British army--stationed in +India.” + +“I knew you were an Englishman.” + +“Did you really?” said he, as if surprised. “People do seem to know. My +first visit to your country--six months’ leave--so I’ve come here to see +my sister--Mrs. Quelton. She’s married to an American doctor.” + +Lexy thought there was something almost pathetic in his chivalrous +anxiety to explain himself. + +“I’m Alexandra Moran,” she said. + +“Thank you!” said Captain Grey. “Thank you very much, Miss Moran!” + +There was no opportunity for further polite conversation, for the taxi +had stopped and the driver came around to the door. + +“Better make a run fer it!” he said. “I’ll take yer bags.” + +So Captain Grey took Lexy’s arm, and they did make a run for it, through +the fine, chilly rain, along a garden path and up on a veranda. The door +was opened at once. + +“Miss Royce?” asked Captain Grey. + +“Mrs. Royce,” said the other. “Come right in. My, how it does rain!” + +They followed her into a dimly lit hall. She opened a door on the right, +and lit the gas in what was obviously the “best parlor”--a dreadful +room, stiff and ugly, and smelling of camphor and dampness. Captain Grey +remained in the hall to settle with the driver, and Lexy decided to let +her share of the reckoning wait for a more auspicious occasion. She went +into the parlor with Mrs. Royce. + +“You and your husband just come from the city?” inquired the landlady. + +“He’s not my husband,” replied Lexy, with a laugh. “I never set eyes on +him before. There was only one taxi, and we were both looking for a +hotel. The driver said you took boarders, and that’s how we happened to +come together.” + +“I don’t take boarders much, ’cept in the summer time,” said Mrs. Royce. +She was a stout, comfortable sort of creature, gray-haired, and very +neat in her dark dress and clean white apron. She had a kindly, +good-humored face, too, but she had a landlady’s eye. “People don’t come +here much, this time of year,” she went on. “Nothing to bring ’em here.” + +These last words were a challenge to Lexy to explain her business, and +she was prepared. + +“I passed through here the other day in a motor,” she said, “on my way +to Adams Corners, and I thought it looked like such a nice, quiet place +for me to work in. I’m a writer, you know, and I thought Wyngate would +just suit me.” + +“I was born and raised out to Adams Corners,” said Mrs. Royce. “Guess +there’s no one living out there that I don’t know.” + +“Then perhaps you know Miss Craigie?” + +“Miss Margaret Craigie? I should say I did! If you’re a friend of +hers--” + +“Only an acquaintance,” said Lexy cautiously. + +“Set down!” suggested Mrs. Royce, very cordial now. “I’ll light a nice +wood fire. A writer, are you? Well, well! And the gentleman--I wonder, +now, what brings him here!” + +“He told me he’d come to see his sister,” said Lexy. “Mrs. Quelton, I +think he said.” + +“Quelton!” cried the landlady. “You didn’t say Quelton? Not the doctor’s +wife?” + +“Yes,” said the captain’s voice from the doorway. “Nothing happened to +her, has there? Nothing gone wrong?” + +Mrs. Royce stared at him with the most profound interest, and he stared +back at her, somewhat uneasily. + +“No,” said she, at last. “No--only--well, I’m sure!” + +There was a silence. + +“Could we possibly have a little supper?” asked Lexy politely. + +“Yes, indeed you can!” said Mrs. Royce. “Right away!” But still she +lingered. “Mrs. Quelton’s brother!” she said. “Well, I never!” + +Then she tore herself away, leaving Lexy and Captain Grey alone in the +parlor. + +“Seems to bother her,” he said. “I wonder why!” + +Lexy was also wondering, and longing to ask questions, but she felt that +it wouldn’t be good manners. + +“People in small places like this are always awfully curious,” she +observed. + +“Yes,” said he; “and Muriel may be a bit eccentric, you know. I rather +imagine she is, from her letters. I’ve never seen her.” + +“Never seen your own sister!” + +Lexy would certainly have asked questions now, manners or no manners, +only that Mrs. Royce entered the room again, to fulfill her promise to +make a “nice wood fire.” Amazing, the difference it made in the room! +The ugliness and stiffness vanished in the ruddy glow. It seemed a +delightful room, now, homely and welcoming and safe. + +“It’s real cozy here,” said Mrs. Royce, “on a night like this. I’m sorry +the dining room’s so kind of chilly.” + +“Oh, can’t we have supper here, by the fire?” cried Lexy. “Please! We’ll +promise not to get any crumbs on your nice carpet, Mrs. Royce!” + +“I guess you can,” replied the landlady benevolently. + +And so it happened that the ancient magic of fire was invoked in Lexy’s +behalf. Probably, if she and Captain Grey had had their supper in the +chilly dining room, they would have been a little chilly, too, and more +cautious. They might not have said all that they did say. + + +IX + +It was an excellent supper, and Captain Grey and Lexy thoroughly +appreciated it. They ate with healthy appetites, and they talked. Mrs. +Royce, from the kitchen, heard their cheerful, friendly voices, and +their laughter, and she didn’t for one moment believe that they had +never met before. Listening to them, she wore that benevolent smile once +more, and felt sure that she had encountered a very charming little +romance. + +It was all Lexy’s doing. It was Lexy’s beautiful talent, to be able to +create this atmosphere of honest and happy _camaraderie_. Before the +meal was finished, Captain Grey was talking to her as if they had known +each other since childhood, and he didn’t even wonder at it. It seemed +perfectly natural. + +Mrs. Royce came in to take away the dishes. + +“Going to set here a while?” she asked, looking at the two young people +with a smile of approval. “I’ll bring in some more wood.” She hesitated +a moment, and the landladyish glimmer again appeared in her eyes. “If it +was me,” she observed, in the most casual way, “the fire’d be enough +light. If it was me, now, I wouldn’t want that gas flaring and blaring +away--and burning up good money,” she added, to herself. + +“You’re right,” Lexy cheerfully agreed. “We’ll turn it down.” + +The rain was falling fast outside, driving against the windows when the +wind blew; and inside the young people sat by the fire, very content. + +“Queer thing!” said Captain Grey meditatively. “Never been in this place +before--never been in this country before--and yet it’s like coming +home!” + +“I know that feeling,” said Lexy. “I’ve had it before. I think only +people who haven’t any real homes of their own ever have it.” + +“But haven’t you any real home?” he asked, evidently distressed. + +“No,” she answered; “but please don’t think it’s tragic. It’s not.” + +“You haven’t impressed me as tragic,” he admitted. + +Lexy laughed. + +“Thank goodness!” she said. “I do want to keep on being--well, ordinary +and human, even when outside things seem a little tragic.” + +“Miss Moran!” he said, and stopped. + +It was some time before he spoke again. Lexy took advantage of his +abstraction to study his face by the firelight. When you come to +understand it a little, it wasn’t a haughty face at all, but a very +sensitive and fine one. + +“Miss Moran!” he said again. “About being ordinary and human--of course, +one wants to be that; but the thing is--I don’t know quite how to put +it, but if you have a feeling, you know--I mean a feeling that something +is wrong--” He paused again. “I mean,” he went on, “if you have a +feeling like that--a sort of--well, call it uneasiness--the question is +whether one ought to laugh at it, or take it as”--once more he +stopped--“as a warning,” he ended. + +A strange sensation came over Lexy. + +“I’ve been thinking a good deal about that very thing lately,” she +replied. “I believe feelings like that _are_ a warning. I’m sure it’s +wrong--foolish and wrong--to disregard them. Even if every one else, +even if your own mind tells you it’s all nonsense, you mustn’t care!” + +“I think you’re right,” he gravely agreed. “I’ve been trying to tell +myself that I’m an utter ass, but all the time I knew I wasn’t. I +knew--I know now--that there’s something--” + +An unreasoning dread possessed Lexy. She felt for a moment that she +didn’t want to hear any more. + +“I’d like to tell you about it, if you wouldn’t mind,” he said. “Somehow +I think you could help.” + +For an instant she hesitated. + +“Please do tell me,” she said at length. “I’d be glad to help, if I +can.” + +“It’s this,” he said. “Do you mind if I smoke? Thanks!” + +He took a cigarette case from his pocket. As he struck a match, she +could see his face very clearly in the sudden flame; and, for no reason +at all, she pitied him. + +“It’s this,” he said again. “It’s about my sister.” + +“The sister you’ve never seen?” + +The sensation of dread had gone, and she felt only the liveliest +interest. She wanted very much to hear about Captain Grey’s sister. + +“It wasn’t quite true to say I’d never seen her,” he explained, in his +painstaking way. “I have, you know; but not since I was six years old +and she was a baby. Our mother died when Muriel was born, out in India. +An aunt took the poor little kid to the States with her, and I stayed +out there with my father.” + +He drew on his cigarette for a minute. + +“She’s twenty-one now,” he said. “Last picture I had of her was when she +was fourteen or so. A pretty kid--a bit more than pretty--what you’d +call lovely.” + +He was silent for a little, staring into the fire. + +“When I was at school in England, it was arranged that she was to come +over; but she didn’t, and we’ve never met again. Twenty-one years--it’s +a long time.” + +“Yes, it is,” said Lexy gently, for something in his voice touched her. + +“We’ve written to each other, on and off. I’m not much good at that sort +of thing, but I thought her letters were--well, rather remarkable, you +know; but I dare say I’m prejudiced. She’s the only one of my own people +left.” + +“You poor, dear thing!” thought Lexy, with ready sympathy, but she did +not say anything. + +“Anyhow,” he presently continued, “I got an impression from her letters +that she was rather an extraordinary girl. She was studying music--said +she was going on the concert stage--awfully enthusiastic about it; and +then she married this doctor chap. She never said much about him, only +that she was very happy; but--well, I don’t believe that.” + +“Why?” + +“I don’t know. Anyhow, she was married about two years ago, and a few +months after her marriage she began writing oftener--almost every mail. +She was always wanting me to come over here and see her; and lately, in +her last letters, I--somehow I fancied she wanted me rather badly. +It--it worried me, so I arranged for leave. On the very day when I wrote +that I would be coming over this month, I had a letter from her, asking +me not to make any plans for coming this year. She said she’d taken up +her concert work again, and would be too busy to enjoy the visit, and so +on. I’d already made my plans, you see, so I went ahead. Then, about a +fortnight later, after she’d got my letter, I suppose, I had a cable. +‘Don’t come,’ it said. I cabled back, but she didn’t answer.” + +He looked anxiously at Lexy, but she said nothing. She sat very still, +curled up in a big chair, staring into the fire with an odd look of +uncertainty on her face. + +“You know,” he went on, “I’ve tried to think that she was simply too +busy, or something of that sort. But, Miss Moran, didn’t this woman’s +manner rather make you think there was something a bit--out of the way?” + +“Oh, I don’t know,” replied Lexy, in a casual tone which very much +disconcerted him. + +“I’ve been making a fool of myself!” he thought, flushing. “Why the +devil didn’t I keep my old-woman notions to myself? Now she’ll think--” + +But Lexy was not thinking that Captain Grey was a fool. She was only +very much afraid of being one herself, and was engaged in a severe +struggle against this danger. That dread, that vague and oppressive +dread, had come back, and she was fighting to throw it off. She wanted +to be, she _would_ be, her own normal, cheerful self again, living in a +normal, everyday world. + +“All this about his sister, and about Caroline!” she thought. “It’s +really nothing--nothing serious. Our both being here in Wyngate--that’s +nothing, either. It’s just a coincidence. If the gas wasn’t turned down, +I wouldn’t feel like this.” + +She would have risen and turned up the gas, only that she was ashamed to +do so. The fire was blazing merrily, shedding a ruddy light upon the +homely room, the most commonplace room in the world. There was Captain +Grey sitting there smoking--just an ordinary young man come to visit his +sister. There was herself--just Lexy Moran, well fed and warm and +comfortable, with more than a hundred dollars in a bag round her neck. +She could hear Mrs. Royce moving about in the kitchen, humming to +herself in a low drone. + +“I will _not_ be silly!” she told herself. + +And just then a train whistled--a long, melancholy shriek. Lexy had a +sudden vision of it, rushing through the dark and the rain. She had a +sudden realization of the outside world, vast, lonely, terrible, +stretching from pole to pole--forests, and plains, and oceans. The +monstrous folly of pretending that everything was snug and warm and +cozy! Things did happen--only cowards denied that. + +“Captain Grey!” she cried abruptly. “What you’ve told me--it is queer; +and it’s even queerer when I think what has brought me here to this +little place. Both of us here, in Wyngate! I think I’ll tell you.” + +And she did. + +He listened in absolute silence to the tale of Caroline Enderby’s +disappearance. Even after Lexy had finished, it was some time before he +spoke. + +“I’ll try to help you,” he said simply. + +“Oh, thank you!” cried Lexy, with a rush of gratitude. She wanted some +one to help her, and she could imagine no one better for the purpose +than this young man. He would help her--she was sure of it. Even the +fact of having told him most wonderfully lightened her burden. She gave +an irrepressible little giggle. + +“We have almost all the ingredients for a first-class mystery story,” +she said; “except the jewel--the famous ruby, or the great diamond.” + +“It’s an emerald, in this case,” said Captain Grey. + +Lexy straightened up in her chair, and stared at him. + +“You don’t really mean that?” she demanded. “There isn’t really an +emerald?” + +He smiled. + +“I’m afraid it hasn’t much to do with the case--with either of the +cases,” he said; “but there is an emerald--my sister’s.” + +“It didn’t come from India?” + +“It did, though!” + +“Don’t tell me it was stolen from a temple! That would be too good to be +true!” + +“I’m sorry,” he said; “but as far as I know, it’s never been stolen at +all, and its history for the last eighty years hasn’t been sinister. One +of the old rajahs gave it to my grandfather--a reward of merit, you +know. When my father married, it went to my mother. She never had any +trouble with it. She never wore it, because she didn’t like it.” + +“Why?” + +“Well, you see, it’s an ostentatious sort of thing, and she wasn’t +ostentatious.” He paused a moment. “My father told me, before he died, +that he wanted Muriel to have it when she was eighteen; and so, three +years ago, I sent it over to her.” + +“But how?” + +“You’re a good detective,” said he, smiling again. “You don’t miss any +of the points. It was a bit of a problem, how to send the thing; but I +had the luck to find some people I knew who were coming over here, and +they brought it. So that’s that!” + +“An emerald!” said Lexy. “This is almost too much! I think I’ll say good +night, Captain Grey. I need sleep.” + +As she followed Mrs. Royce up the stairs, she saw Captain Grey still +sitting before the fire, smoking; and it was a comforting sight. + + +X + +Lexy slept late the next morning. It was nearly nine o’clock when she +opened her eyes. She lay for a few minutes, looking about her. The gray +light of another rainy day filled the neat, unfamiliar little room, and +outside the window she could see the branches of a little pear tree +rocking in the wind. + +“I’m here in Wyngate,” she said to herself. “I was bent on coming here +to find Caroline; and now, here I am, and how am I going to begin?” + +She got up, and washed in cold water, in a queer, old-fashioned china +basin painted with flowers. She brushed her shining hair, and dressed, +feeling more hopeful every minute. + +“One step at a time!” she thought. “The first step was to come here; and +the next step--well, I’ll think of it after breakfast. Perhaps Captain +Grey will have thought of something.” + +But Captain Grey had gone out. + +“Jest a few minutes ago,” Mrs. Royce informed her. “He was down real +early--around seven, and he waited and waited for you. At half past +eight he et, and off he went.” + +“Did he say when he’d be back?” + +“No,” said Mrs. Royce. “He didn’t say much of anything. He’s a kind of +quiet young man, ain’t he? Well, he’d ought to get on with his sister, +then.” + +“Is she very quiet?” asked Lexy. + +“Quiet!” repeated Mrs. Royce. “Set down an’ begin to eat, Miss Moran. +I’ve fixed a real nice tasty breakfast for you, if I do say it as +shouldn’t. Corn gems, too. Mis’ Quelton quiet? I should say she was! +Quiet as”--she paused--“as the dead,” she went on, and the phrase made +an unpleasant impression upon Lexy. “An’ her husband, too. I never saw +the like of them. They never come into the village, an’ nobody ever goes +out there to the Tower. About twice a week the doctor drives into +Lymeswell--the town below here--and he buys a lot of food an’ all, an’ +he goes home. I can see him out of my front winder, an’ the sight of +him, driving along in that black buggy of his--it gives me the shivers!” + +“But if he’s a doctor--” + +“Don’t ask _me_ what kind of doctor he is, Miss Moran! He don’t go to +see the sick--that’s all I know.” + +“But his wife--what is she like?” + +“Miss Moran,” said the landlady, with profound impressiveness, “I guess +there ain’t three people in Wyngate that’s ever set eyes on her!” + +“But how awfully queer!” + +“You may well say ‘queer,’” said Mrs. Royce. “There she stays, out in +that lonely place--never seeing a soul from one month’s end to another. +She’s a young woman, too--young, an’ just as pretty as a picture.” + +“Then you are--” + +“I’m one of the few that has seen her,” said Mrs. Royce, with a sort of +grim satisfaction. “That’s why I take a kind of special interest in her. +I seen her the night the doctor brought her here to Wyngate a young +bride. That’ll be three years ago this winter, but I remember it as +plain as plain. There was a terrible snowstorm, and he couldn’t git out +to his place, so he had to bring her here, and she sat right in this +very room, just where you’re sitting.” + +Instinctively Lexy looked behind her. + +“I feel that same way myself--as if she was a ghost,” said Mrs. Royce +solemnly. “Near three years ago, and her living only three miles off, +an’ I’ve never set eyes on her again. I’ve never forgotten her, though, +the sweet pretty young creature!” + +“But why do you suppose she lives like that?” + +Mrs. Royce came nearer. + +“Miss Moran,” she said, “that doctor is crazy. I’m not the only one to +say it. He’s as crazy--hush, now! Here’s that poor young man!” + +The “poor young man” came into the room, with that very nice smile of +his. + +“Good morning!” he said. “I say, I’m sorry I didn’t wait for you a bit +longer, Miss Moran.” + +“I’m glad you didn’t,” said Lexy. “I’d have felt awfully guilty.” + +“I went out to telephone,” he explained. “Thought I’d tell Muriel I was +here, you know; but they have no telephone. Dashed odd, isn’t it, for a +doctor not to have a telephone in the house?” + +“I don’t think he’s a real doctor--a physician, I mean,” said Lexy. She +glanced around and saw that Mrs. Royce had gone. Springing up, she +crossed the room to Captain Grey. “Has Mrs. Royce--has any one said +anything to you?” she asked, almost in a whisper. + +“No!” answered the young man, startled. “Why? What’s up?” + +“Mrs. Royce says--I suppose I really ought to tell you.” + +“No doubt about it!” + +“Mrs. Royce says Dr. Quelton is crazy!” + +Captain Grey took the news very coolly. Lexy observed that he suppressed +a smile. + +“Oh, that!” he said. “But you know, Miss Moran, in these little villages +any one who’s at all out of the ordinary is called crazy. I’ve noticed +it before. I can soon find out for myself, though, can’t I? I thought, +if you didn’t want me this morning, I’d go over there--pay a call, you +know. I understand it’s three miles from here, so I shouldn’t be very +long. I’d come back here for lunch.” + +“But, Captain Grey, you mustn’t think I expect you to--” + +“It’s not that,” he said. “Only you said you’d let me help you in your +little job, and I want to!” He smiled down at her. “So,” he said, “I’ll +be back for lunch;” and off he went. + +Lexy went to the window and looked out. She saw Captain Grey striding +off up the muddy road, perfectly indifferent to the rain, and curiously +elegant, in spite of his wet weather clothes. She was thinking of him +with great friendliness and appreciation; but she was not thinking of +him in the least as Mrs. Royce imagined she was thinking. + +Mrs. Royce stood in the doorway, watching Lexy watch Captain Grey, +smiling and even beaming with benevolence; but she would have been +disappointed if she had suspected what was in Lexy’s head. + +“He’s awfully nice,” thought Lexy, “and awfully handsome, and I’m +certain that he’s absolutely trustworthy and honorable, but--” + +But somehow he wasn’t to be compared to Mr. Houseman. She knew +practically nothing about Mr. Houseman. She had talked with him for five +or ten minutes in the park, and his conversation had been entirely about +Caroline Enderby. He had shown himself to be quick-tempered and sadly +lacking in patience. He had written Lexy a stiff, offended, boyish +letter, and then he had disappeared. There was no sensible reason in the +world why she should think of him as she did, no reason why she should +hope so much to see him again; but she did. + +“Well, now!” said Mrs. Royce, at last. “You’ll be wanting a nice quiet +place for your writing.” + +“Writing!” said Lexy. “I never--” She stopped herself just in time, +remembering her shocking falsehood of the night before. “I never care +much where I write,” she ended. + +“Well, I’ve fixed up the sewing room for you,” said Mrs. Royce. “I’ve +put a nice strong table in there with drawers, where you can keep your +papers an’ all.” + +“You’re a dear!” said Lexy warmly. + +She said this because she thought it, and without the least calculation. +She liked Mrs. Royce, and when she liked people she told them so. That +was what made people love her. + +Mrs. Royce was completely won. + +“I’m real glad to do it for you,” she said. “I won’t bother you, +neither, while you’re working. I know how it is with writing. My cousin, +now--her husband was writing for the movies, an’ he was that upset if he +was disturbed!” + +Still conversing with great affability, Mrs. Royce led the reluctant +writer upstairs to the small room prepared for her, and shut her in. +Lexy sat down in a chair before the workmanlike table, and grinned +ruefully. She had said she was a writer, and now she had to be one. + +“Well,” she reflected, “here’s a chance to write to Mr. Houseman, +anyhow.” + +She never had the least difficulty in writing letters. For one reason, +she never bothered about them unless she had something to say, and then +she said it, briefly and lucidly, and was done. She told Mr. Houseman +all she knew about Caroline’s disappearance, and explained that she had +gone out to Wyngate in the hope of picking up some trace of her. + +“Of course,” she wrote, “I don’t know whether I’ll still be here when +you get back. If I’ve gone, I’ll leave my address with Mrs. Royce, in +case you should want to communicate with me.” + +This was admirable, so far; but, reading it over, Lexy was not +satisfied. She remembered the misery, the trouble and anxiety, in Mr. +Houseman’s blue eyes. She imagined him sailing the seas, bitterly hurt +because he thought Caroline had changed her mind. She thought of him +coming back and getting this letter, to revive all his alarm for +Caroline. This wasn’t, after all, a business letter. She took up her pen +again, and added: + + I think I can imagine how you feel about all this, and I am more + sorry than I can tell you. I hope we shall meet soon. + +This last phrase rather astonished her. She hadn’t meant to write just +that. She picked up the letter, intending to tear it up and write +another; but she thought better of it. + +“No!” she said to herself. “Let it stay. It’s true; why shouldn’t I hope +that we’ll meet again?” + +So she addressed the letter and sealed it, and then sat looking out of +the window at the rain. It was a hopeless sort of rain, faint and +fine--a hopeless, melancholy world, without color or promise. + +“I’d better take a walk!” thought Lexy, springing up. + +Before she reached the door there was a knock, and Mrs. Royce put her +head in. + +“He’s here!” she whispered. “He’s asking for you.” + +“Who?” cried Lexy. + +“Hush! The doctor!” answered Mrs. Royce. “You could ’a’ knocked me down +with a feather!” + + +XI + +Feathers would not have knocked down the sturdy Lexy, however. On the +contrary, she was pleased and interested by this utterly unexpected +visit. The sinister doctor here, in this house, and asking for her! She +started promptly toward the stairs. + +“Miss Moran!” cautioned the landlady, in a whisper. “Don’t tell him +nothing!” + +“Tell him!” said Lexy. “But I haven’t anything to tell!” + +“Well, you’d best be very careful!” said Mrs. Royce. + +With this solemn warning in her ears, Lexy descended the stairs. She saw +Dr. Quelton standing in the hall, hat in hand, waiting for her. The +doctor was rather a disappointment. He was not the dark, sinister figure +he should have been. He was a big man, powerfully built, with a clumsy +stoop to his tremendous shoulders. His heavy, clean-shaven face would +have been an agreeable one if it had not been for its expression, but +that expression was not at all an alarming or dangerous one. It was an +expression of the most utter and hopeless boredom. + +He came toward her. + +“Miss Moran?” he asked. + +Even his voice was listless, and his glance was without a spark of +interest. + +“Yes,” said she. + +“My brother-in-law, Captain Grey, told us you were here, and I did +myself the honor of calling,” he went on. + +“You certainly were quick about it!” thought Lexy. “Captain Grey +couldn’t have reached his sister’s house an hour ago, and it’s three +miles from here. Won’t you come into the sitting room?” she asked +aloud. + +“Thank you,” he replied, and followed Lexy into the decorous and dismal +room. + +He sat down opposite her in a small chair that cracked under his weight, +and he smiled a bored and extinguished smile. + +“A writer, I believe?” he said. + +“Well, yes, in a way,” answered Lexy, growing a little red. + +“My wife and I were very much interested,” he went on, with as little +interest as a human being may well display. “We don’t have many +newcomers here. It’s a very quiet place.” + +His apathetic manner exasperated Lexy. + +“But I don’t care how quiet it is,” she observed. + +“My wife and I like a quiet life,” he said. “My wife asked me to +explain, Miss Moran, that she is something of a recluse. Her health +prevents her from calling upon you; but she wished me to say that she +would be very happy to see you at the Tower, whenever it may be +convenient for you to call, any afternoon after four o’clock.” + +“Thank you,” replied Lexy. “Please thank Mrs. Quelton. I shall be very +pleased to come.” + +And now why didn’t he go away? This visit was apparently a painful duty +for him. He had delivered his message, and yet he lingered. + +“A very quiet place,” he repeated; “but perhaps you are not sociably +inclined?” + +“Oh, I’m sociable enough--at times,” said Lexy. + +“But at the present time you prefer solitude? For the purposes of your +work? As a change from the stimulating atmosphere of the city?” + +Any mention of her work made Lexy uncomfortable. + +“Well, yes,” she answered in a dubious tone. + +“I lived in New York myself for a number of years,” he went on. “I +wonder if you--may I ask what part of the city you lived in, Miss +Moran?” + +Lexy hesitated, and she meant him to see that she hesitated. After all, +however, it was not an unnatural or impertinent question, and she +couldn’t very well refuse to answer it. + +“In the East Sixties, near the park,” she said. “It wasn’t my own home, +though--I was a companion,” she added. + +She always liked people to know that. She was far from being cynical, +but she was aware that this information made a difference--to some +people. + +She was astonished to see the difference it made in Dr. Quelton. He +raised his black, weary eyes to her face and stared at her with +unmistakable insolence. + +“Ah!” he said. “I see! I thought so!” + +There was a moment’s silence. + +“And you’ve come to Wyngate to--er--to write?” he went on. “Very +interesting--very!” + +Lexy felt her cheeks grow hot. She wished with all her heart that she +had not involved herself in that stupid falsehood. It humiliated her so +much that she couldn’t answer Dr. Quelton with her usual spirit. He +noticed her confusion--no doubt about that. + +“Poetry, perhaps?” he suggested. + +“No!” said Lexy vehemently. “Not poetry!” + +He leaned forward a little, looking directly into her face. + +“Perhaps,” he said, “you write detective stories?” + +“Yes!” said Lexy. + +The doctor rose. + +“The solving of mysteries!” he said, with his unpleasant smile. “That +makes very interesting fiction!” + +Lexy rose, too. His tone, his manner, exasperated her almost beyond +endurance. She felt an ardent desire to contradict everything he said. +What is more, she was in no humor to hear mystery stories made light of. +She had had enough of that--first Mrs. Enderby pretending there was no +mystery, and then Mr. Houseman going off and pretending it was solved, +so that she was left alone to do the best she could. Wasn’t she in a +mystery story at this very minute, and without a single promising clew +to guide her? + +“There are plenty of mysteries that aren’t fiction,” she observed +curtly. + +“But they are never solved,” said Dr. Quelton. + +“Never solved?” said Lexy. “But lots of them are! You can read in the +newspapers all the time about crimes that--” + +“The mystery of a crime is never solved,” the doctor blandly proceeded. +“Never! Let us say, for example, that a murder is committed. The police +investigate, they arrest some one. There is a trial, the jury finds that +the suspect is guilty, the judge sentences him, and he is executed. +Public opinion is satisfied; but as a matter of fact, nothing whatever +has been solved. It is all guesswork. Not one living soul, not one +member of the jury, not the judge, not the executioner, really _knows_ +that the accused man was guilty. They think so--that is all. What you +call a ‘solution’ is merely a guess, based upon probabilities.” + +Lexy considered this with an earnest frown. + +“Well,” she said at last, “quite often criminals confess.” + +“In the days of witchcraft trials,” said he, “it was not uncommon for +women to come forward voluntarily and confess to being witches. In the +course of my own practice I have known people to confess things they +could not possibly have done. No!” He shook his head and smiled faintly. +“An acquaintance with the psychology of the diseased mind makes one very +skeptical about confessions, Miss Moran.” + +This idea, too, Lexy took into her mind and considered for a few +minutes. + +“Even an eyewitness,” Dr. Quelton went on, “is entirely unreliable. Any +lawyer can tell you how completely the senses deceive one. Three persons +can see the same occurrence, and each one of the three will swear to a +quite different impression. Each one may be entirely honest, entirely +convinced that he saw or heard what never took place.” + +“Do you mean that you think it’s never possible to find out who’s +guilty?” + +“Never,” he replied agreeably. “It can never be anything but a guess, as +I said, based upon probabilities. Human senses, human judgment, human +reason, are all pitifully liable to error.” + +Lexy was silent for a time, thinking over this. + +“Maybe you’re right,” she said slowly, “about the senses, and judgment, +and reason. Perhaps their evidence isn’t always to be trusted; but +there’s something else.” + +“Something else?” he repeated. “Something else? And what may that be?” + +Lexy looked up at him. There was a smile on his heavy, pallid face, +aloof and contemptuous; but she was chiefly concerned just then in +trying to put into words her own firm conviction, more for her own +benefit than for his. It was not reason that had brought her here to +look for Caroline, it was not reason that sustained her. + +“There’s something else,” she said again, with a frown. “There’s a way +of knowing things without reason. It’s--I don’t know just how to put it, +but it’s a thing beyond reason.” + +He laughed, and she thought she had never heard a more unpleasant laugh. + +“Certainly!” he said. “Beyond reason lies--unreason.” + +“I don’t mean that,” said Lexy. “I mean--” + +She stopped, because he had abruptly turned away and was walking toward +the door. She stood where she was, amazed by this unique rudeness; but +in the doorway he turned. + +“The thing beyond reason!” he said, almost in a whisper. Then, with a +sudden and complete change of manner, he went on: “It has been very +interesting to meet you, Miss Moran. My wife will enjoy a visit from +you. Any afternoon, after four o’clock!” He bowed politely. “After four +o’clock,” he repeated, and off he went. + +Lexy stood looking at the closed door. + +“Crazy?” she said to herself. “No--that’s not the word for him at all. +He’s--he’s just horrible!” + + +XII + +At half past twelve Captain Grey had not yet returned, and Mrs. Royce +declared that the ham omelet would be ruined if not eaten at once; so +Lexy went down to the dining room and ate her lunch alone. + +The rain was still falling steadily, and the little room was dim, +chilly, and, to Lexy, unbearably close. She wasn’t particularly hungry, +either, after such a hearty breakfast and no exercise. She felt restless +and uneasy. When Mrs. Royce went out into the kitchen to fetch the +dessert, she jumped up from the table, crossed the room, and opened the +window. + +The wild rain blew against her face, and it felt good to her. She drew +in a long breath of the fresh, damp air, and sighed with relief. + +“I’m going to go out this afternoon,” she said to herself, “if it rains +pitchforks! I can’t--” + +Just then she caught sight of Captain Grey coming down the road. Her +first impulse was to call out a cheerful salutation, but after a second +glance she felt no inclination for that. He was tramping along doggedly +through the rain, his hands in his pockets, his collar turned up. He was +as straight and soldierly as ever, but his face was pale, with such a +queer look on it! + +“Oh, dear!” thought Lexy. “Something’s gone wrong! Oh, the poor soul! +And he set off so happy this morning.” + +She went into the hall and opened the front door for him. Filled with a +motherly solicitude, she wanted to help him off with his overcoat, but +he abruptly declined that. + +“Am I late?” he asked. “I thought one o’clock, you know--I’m sorry.” + +“Mercy, that doesn’t matter!” said Lexy. “Aren’t you going to change +your shoes? You ought to. Well, then, you’d better come in and eat your +lunch this minute.” + +“You’re no end kind, to bother like that!” he said earnestly. “I do +appreciate it!” + +“Who wouldn’t be?” thought Lexy, glancing at him. “You poor soul, you +look as if you’d seen a ghost!” + +He took his place at the table, and Lexy sat down opposite him, her chin +in her hands, anxiously waiting for him to begin to tell her what had +happened. + +“Beastly day, isn’t it?” he said, with an obvious effort to speak +cheerfully. + +“Awful!” agreed Lexy. + +“And yet, you know,” he went on, “I rather like a walk on a day like +this. The country about here is pretty, don’t you think?” + +Lexy glanced around, to make sure that Mrs. Royce had closed the door +behind her. + +“Captain Grey!” she said, leaning across the table. “Tell me, did you +see her?” + +He did not meet Lexy’s eyes. He was looking down at his plate with that +curious dazed expression in his face. + +“Yes,” he said. “Yes, I saw her.” + +Lexy was hurt and disappointed by his manner. Evidently he didn’t want +to tell her anything, didn’t want to talk at all. Very well--the only +thing for her to do was to maintain a dignified silence. She did so for +almost ten minutes, but then nature got the upper hand. + +“Well?” she demanded. “Was everything all right?” + +“All right?” he repeated. “Oh, rather! Oh, yes, thanks--absolutely all +right.” + +This was too much for Lexy. + +“That’s good,” she said frigidly. “I’m going upstairs now, to write some +letters.” + +Her tone aroused him. He sprang to his feet, very contrite. + +“No! Look here!” he said. “Please don’t run away! I--I want to talk to +you, but it’s a bit hard. You can’t imagine what it’s like to see one of +your own people, you know--after such a long time.” + +Lexy sat down again. + +“Was she as you expected her to be?” she asked. + +“I don’t quite know what I expected,” he said. “Only--” + +He paused for a long time, and Lexy waited patiently, for she felt very +sorry for Captain Grey. At first sight she had imagined him to be +haughty, stiff, and aloof. She knew now that he was a very sensitive +man. He was terribly moved, and he wanted to tell her, but he couldn’t. + +She tried to help him. + +“Dr. Quelton came to see me this morning,” she observed. + +“Yes--he said he would. Very decent sort of chap, don’t you think?” + +“Do you mean you _liked_ him?” asked Lexy. + +Captain Grey was a little startled by this Yankee notion of liking a +person at first sight. + +“Well, you see,” he said, “I’ve only met him once; but he seems to me a +very decent sort of chap. He’s clever, you know, and--and so on, and my +sister seems very happy with him.” + +“Happy?” + +“Yes. I’ve been an ass, imagining all sorts of silly rot. She’s not very +strong, I’m afraid, but she’s happy, and--well, you know, their life out +there is lonely, of course, but there’s something about it, +rather--rather charming, you know. I’d like you to see it for yourself. +I was speaking about you to Muriel. She wants to know you, and I think +you’d like her. Would you come out there to tea with me this afternoon?” + +“Yes!” cried Lexy, with a vehemence that surprised him. + +There was nothing in the world she wanted more at that moment than to +see Captain Grey’s sister and to visit Dr. Quelton’s house. She didn’t +exactly know why, and she didn’t care, but she wanted to. + +Her trunk had not yet arrived. Indeed, she had only sent to Mrs. +Enderby’s for it that morning, but she was able to make herself +presentable with what she had in her bag, and excitement gave her an +added charm. She was in high spirits, gay and sparkling, so pretty and +so lively that Captain Grey was quite dazzled. + +He had engaged the one and only taxi. After they were settled in it, +and on their way along the muddy road, he said: + +“I say, Miss Moran, are there many American girls like you?” + +“No!” replied Lexy calmly. “I’m unique.” + +“I can believe that!” he said. “I’ve never seen any one like you. I was +telling Muriel how much I hope that you and she will hit it off. It +would be a wonderful thing for her to have a friend like you in this +place.” + +Something in his tone made Lexy turn serious. He was speaking as if she +was simply a nice girl he had happened to meet, as if she had nothing to +do but go out to tea and make agreeable friendships. + +“Yes,” she said, “but I don’t know how long I’ll be here. I certainly +haven’t accomplished much so far.” + +He was silent, and to Lexy his silence was very eloquent. + +“I came here for a definite purpose,” she told him. “I haven’t forgotten +that, and I’m not likely to forget it.” + +“I know,” said he, “but--” + +“But,” interrupted Lexy, “I know very well what you’re thinking--that +it’s a wild-goose chase, and that I’m a young idiot. Isn’t that it?” + +“I don’t mean that,” he protested; “only--don’t you see?” + +“I don’t!” Lexy grimly denied. “You’ve thought over the talk we had last +night, and you’ve decided that it was all nonsense.” + +“No, Miss Moran--not nonsense; but we were both a bit tired then, and +perhaps a bit overwrought.” + +“All right!” said Lexy. “Don’t go on! No--please drop it. I’ve talked +too much, anyhow. From now on I’m not going to talk to any one about my +little job. I’m going to go ahead in my own way, alone.” + +“You can’t,” said Captain Grey firmly. “I’m here, you know.” + +This did not appease Lexy, and she remained curt and silent all the rest +of the way. For a couple of miles the taxi went on along a broad, smooth +highway; then it turned off down a rough lane, bordered by dark +woodland, and entirely deserted. The rain drummed loud on the leather +top of the cab, the wind came sighing through the gaunt pines and the +slender, shivering birches; but when there was a lull, she heard another +sound, a sound familiar to her from childhood and yet always strange, +always heart-stirring--the dim, unceasing thunder of the sea. + +“Is the doctor’s house near the shore?” she inquired. + +“Yes--just on the beach.” + +“Oh, I’m so glad!” cried Lexy. “Our old house, where I was born, was on +the shore, and on days like this I used to love to go out and walk with +father. I love the sea so!” + +Captain Grey gave her an odd look, which she didn’t understand. Perhaps +that was just as well, for her words and her voice had troubled the +young man to an unreasonable degree. He wished he could say something to +comfort her. He wished he could offer her the sea as a gift, for +instance; and that would have been a mistake, because Lexy did not like +to be pathetic. + +Just at that moment, however, the taxi turned into a driveway, and there +was the house--the Tower. Lexy was disappointed. The name had called up +in her mind the picture of a gloomy edifice of gray stone, more or less +medieval, and altogether somber and forbidding; and this was nothing in +the world but a rather shabby old house, badly in need of paint, and +forlorn enough in the rain, but very ordinary and very ugly. Even the +tower, which had given the place its romantic name, was only a wooden +cupola with a lightning rod on top of it. + +“Can you get a good view of the sea from the windows?” Lexy demanded. + +“Well, not from the library, where I was,” he answered; “but perhaps--” + +“Captain Grey, I want to get out! I want to run down on the beach for +one instant!” + +“In this rain?” he protested. “You can’t!” + +“I’m not made of sugar,” said Lexy scornfully, “I’ve _got_ to run down +there just for an instant, before I go in.” + +“But, I say, your nice little hat, you know!” + +Lexy pulled off the nice little hat and laid it on his knee. Then she +rapped on the window, the driver stopped, and Lexy opened the door. + +“No! Look here! Please, Miss Moran!” cried Captain Grey. “Very well, +then, if you will go, I’ll go with you!” + +“I’d rather you didn’t,” said Lexy. “I feel as if I’d like to go alone +just for one look. You know how it is, sometimes. I haven’t had even a +smell of the sea for so long; and it reminds me--” + +She looked at him with a shadowy little smile, and he did understand. + +“All right!” he said. “Then slip on my coat.” + +She did so, to oblige him, and off she went, half running, down the +lane, in the direction of the sound of the surf. Captain Grey looked +after her--such an absurd little figure in that aquascutum of his that +almost touched the ground! He watched her till she was out of sight; +then he sat down in the cab and lit a cigarette. + +He thought about her, but Lexy had forgotten him. She found herself on a +desolate stretch of wet sand, with the gray sea tossing under a gray +sky. She smelled the hearty, salt smell, she remembered old things, sad +and sweet. Tears came into her eyes, and she felt them on her cheeks, +warm, salt as the sea. If only she could go running home, back to the +house where her mother used to wait for her! If only she could find her +father’s big, firm hand clasping her own! + +“I mustn’t be like this,” she said to herself. “Daddy would feel ashamed +of me.” + +In a cavernous pocket of the captain’s overcoat she found a +handkerchief. She dried her eyes with it, and turned back. The Tower +faced the lane, and the left side of it fronted the beach, rising stark +and high from the sands. She looked up at it. On the first floor a sun +parlor had been built out, and through the windows she could see a woman +sitting there in a deck chair. + +“I suppose that’s Muriel,” she thought, with a reawakening of her lively +interest. + +She came a little nearer. The woman was wearing a negligee and a +coquettish little silk cap. Her back was turned toward Lexy. She lay +there motionless, as if she were asleep. + +Lexy drew closer. The woman turned, straightened up in the chair, and +rose. A shiver ran along Lexy’s spine. She stopped and stared and +stared. + +The woman had raised her thin arms above her head, stretching. Then, for +a moment, she stood in an odd and lovely pose, with her hands clasped +behind her head. Oh, surely no one else ever stood like that! That +figure, that attitude--it couldn’t be any one else! + +“Caroline!” cried Lexy. “Caroline!” + +The woman did not hear. She was moving toward the long windows of the +room, and her every step, every line of her figure, was familiar and +unmistakable to Lexy. + +“Caroline!” she cried, running forward across the wet sand. “Wait! Wait +for me, Caroline!” + +A hand seized her arm. With a gasp, she looked into the pale, heavy face +of Dr. Quelton. He was smiling. + +“Miss Moran!” he said. “This is an unexpected pleasure--” + +Lexy jerked her arm away, and looked up at the windows of the sun +parlor. The woman had gone. + +“I saw Caroline!” she said. “In there!” + +“Caroline?” he repeated. “I’m afraid, I’m very much afraid, Miss Moran, +that you’ve made a mistake.” + +Their eyes met. In that instant, Lexy knew. He was still smiling with an +expression of bland amusement at this extraordinary little figure in the +huge coat; but he was her enemy, and she knew it. + +“Suppose we go on?” he suggested. “I believe it’s raining.” + +They turned and walked side by side around the house to the front door, +where Captain Grey stood waiting. + +“I say!” he exclaimed anxiously. “Your hair--your shoes--you’ll take a +chill, Miss Moran!” + +“I feel anxious about Miss Moran myself,” said Dr. Quelton. “I’m afraid +she’s a very imprudent young lady.” + +But Lexy said nothing. + + +XIII + +The doctor’s library had a charm of its own. It was a big room, +careless, a little shabby, but furnished in fastidious taste and with a +friendly sort of comfort. A great wood fire was blazing on the hearth, +and Dr. Quelton drew up an armchair before it for Lexy. + +“There!” he said. “Now you’ll soon be warm and dry. Anna!” + +“Yes, sir!” the parlor maid responded from the doorway. + +“Please tell Mrs. Quelton that Miss Moran is here.” + +“Yes, sir!” repeated the maid, and disappeared. + +Lexy sat down. Captain Grey stood, facing her, leaning one elbow on the +mantelpiece. Dr. Quelton paced up and down, his hands clasped behind +him. He looked like a dignified middle-aged gentleman in his own home. + +A door opened somewhere in the house, and for a moment Lexy heard the +homely and familiar sound of an egg-beater whirring and a cheerful Irish +voice inquiring about “them potaters.” It was surely a cheerful and +pleasant enough setting; but Lexy did not find it so. + +“I saw Caroline!” she insisted to herself. “I don’t care what any one +says. I saw Caroline!” + +A strange sensation of pain and dread oppressed her. What should she do? +Whom should she tell? + +“Captain Grey,” she thought; “but not now. It’s no use now. Dr. Quelton +would deny it. I’ll have to wait until we get out of here; and then, +perhaps, it ’ll be too late. He knows I saw her. Something--something +horrible--may happen!” + +A shiver ran through her. + +“Miss Moran is nervous,” said the doctor, with solicitude. + +“I’m not!” replied Lexy sharply. + +“I hope it’s not a chill,” said Captain Grey. + +“I should be inclined to think it nervousness,” said Dr. Quelton. “Our +landscape here is lonely and depressing, and Miss Moran has the artist’s +temperament, impressionable, high-strung.” + +“Not I!” declared Lexy, in a tone that startled Captain Grey. “Lonely +places don’t bother me. I don’t believe in ghosts.” + +“Oh!” said the doctor. “But here’s Mrs. Quelton. Muriel, this is Miss +Moran, the young writer of fiction.” + +Mrs. Quelton was coming down the long room, a beautiful woman, dark and +delicate, with a sort of plaintive languor in her manner. She held out +her hand to Lexy. + +“I’m so glad you’ve come!” she said. “George has told me so much about +you--the first American girl he’s known!” + +She glanced at her brother with a little smile. Lexy glanced at him, +too; and she was surprised and very much touched by the look on his +face. He couldn’t even smile. His face was grave, pale, almost solemn, +and he was regarding his sister with something like reverence. + +“Oh, poor fellow!” thought Lexy. “Poor lonely fellow! It’s such a +wonderful thing for him to find his sister--some one of his own. I only +hope she’s as nice as she looks.” + +This thought caused her to turn toward her hostess again. She _was_ +beautiful, and in a gentle and gracious fashion, and yet-- + +“I don’t know,” thought Lexy. “There’s something--she doesn’t look +ill--perhaps she’s just lackadaisical; but certainly she’s not simple +and easy to understand. She must know about Caroline Enderby. The thing +is, would she help me, or--” + +Or would Mrs. Quelton also be her enemy? Lost in her own thought, Lexy +sat silent. She had, indeed, certain grave faults in social deportment. +The head mistress of the finishing school she had attended had often +said to her: + +“Alexandra, it is absolutely inexcusable to give way to moods in the +company of other people!” + +In theory Lexy admitted that this was true, but it made no difference. +If she didn’t feel inclined to talk, she didn’t talk. It was so this +afternoon. She merely answered when she was spoken to--which was not +often, for Dr. Quelton was asking his brother-in-law questions about +India, and Mrs. Quelton seemed no more desirous to talk than Lexy was. +What is more, Lexy felt certain that the doctor’s wife was not listening +to the talk between the two men, but, like herself, was thinking her own +thoughts. + +The parlor maid wheeled the tea cart in, and Mrs. Quelton roused herself +to pour the tea and to make polite inquiries, in her plaintive tone, as +to what her guests wanted in the way of cream and sugar. The maid +vanished again, and Dr. Quelton passed about the cups and plates. + +“It’s China tea,” he observed. “I import it myself. It has quite a +distinctive flavor, I think.” + +Captain Grey praised it, and Lexy herself found it very agreeable. She +sipped it, staring into the fire, glad to be let alone. Behind her she +could hear Captain Grey talking about the Ceylon tea plantations. His +voice sounded so pathetic! + +“Another cup, Miss Moran?” asked Mrs. Quelton. + +“Yes, thank you,” answered Lexy, and the doctor brought it to her. + +Poor Captain Grey and his precious, new-found sister! The sound of his +voice brought tears to her eyes. + +“But this is idiotic!” she thought, annoyed and surprised. + +Still the tears welled up. She gulped down the rest of her tea hastily, +hoping that it would steady her, but it did not help at all. Sobs rose +in her throat, and an immense and formless sorrow came over her. + +“This has got to stop!” she thought, in alarm. “I can’t be such a +chump!” + +She turned to Mrs. Quelton. + +“Are you going to grow any--” she began, but her voice was so unsteady +that she had to stop for a moment. “Any flowers in--in your--g-garden?” + +The question ended in a loud and unmistakable sob. They all turned to +look at her, startled and anxious. + +She made a desperate effort to regain control of herself. + +“S-snapdragon,” she said. “So--so p-pretty!” + +Then, suddenly, all her defenses gave way. The teacup fell from her hand +and was shattered on the floor, and, burying her head in her arms, she +cried as she had never cried in her life. + +Mrs. Quelton stood beside her, one hand resting on Lexy’s shoulder. +Captain Grey was bending over her, profoundly disturbed. She tried to +speak, but she could not. + +“Miss Moran!” said Dr. Quelton solicitously. “Will you allow me to give +you a mild sedative?” + +“No!” she gasped. “No--I want to go home!” + +“I’ll telephone for the taxi,” suggested Captain Grey. “He wasn’t coming +back until half past five.” + +“Unfortunately we have no telephone,” said the doctor; “but I’ll drive +Miss Moran home.” + +“No! I want to walk.” + +“Not in this rain,” the doctor protested, “and in your overwrought +condition.” + +“I must!” She got up, the tears still streaming down her cheeks. “I +must!” she said wildly. “Let me go! Please let me go!” + +The doctor turned to Captain Grey. In the midst of her unutterable +misery and confusion, Lexy still heard and understood what he was +saying. + +“In a case of hysteria--better to humor her--the exercise and the fresh +air may help her.” + +The doctor’s wife helped Lexy with her hat and coat. She was very +gentle, very kind, and genuinely concerned for her unhappy little guest. +Lexy remembered afterward that Mrs. Quelton kissed her; but at the +moment nothing mattered except to get away, to get out of that house +into the fresh air. + +Without one backward glance she set off at a furious pace, splashing +through the puddles, almost running. Captain Grey kept easily by her +side with his long, lithe stride. Now and then he spoke to her, but she +could not trust herself to answer just yet. The storm within her was +subsiding. From time to time a sob broke from her, but the tears had +stopped. + +And now she was beginning to think. + +Twilight had come early on this rainy day, and it was almost dark before +they reached the end of the lane. Lexy slackened her pace. Then, as they +came to the corner of the highway, she stopped and laid her hand on her +companion’s sleeve. + +“Captain Grey!” she said. + +He looked down at her, but it was too dark to see what expression there +was on her pale face. He was vastly relieved, however, by the steadiness +of her voice. + +“Captain Grey!” she said again. “If I told you something--something very +important--would you believe me?” + +“Yes, yes, of course,” he answered hastily. “Of course, I would always +believe you; but I wish you wouldn’t try to talk about anything +important just now, you know. Let’s wait a bit, eh?” + +Lexy smiled to herself in the dark--a smile of extraordinary bitterness. +He wouldn’t believe her if she told him about Caroline. He would think +she was hysterical. She saw quite plainly that by this strange outburst +she had lost his confidence. + +She could in no way explain her sudden breaking down. Such a thing had +never happened to her before. She could not understand it, but she was +in no doubt about the unfortunate consequences of it. She was +discredited. + + +XIV + +Lexy sat on the edge of the bed, her hands clasped loosely before her, +her bright head bent, her eyes fixed somberly upon nothing; and she +could see nothing--not one step of the way that lay ahead of her. She +could not think what she ought to do next. For the first time in her +life, she had a feeling of utter confusion and dismay. + +“It’s because I’m so tired,” she said to herself. “I’ve never been +really tired out before.” + +But that in itself was a cause for alarm. Why should she feel like this, +so exhausted and depressed? Horrible thoughts came to her. Dr. Quelton +had called her nervous, high-strung, hysterical. Was that because he +had seen in her something which she herself had never suspected? Was she +hysterical? Mrs. Enderby had laughed at her. Mr. Houseman had gone away, +satisfied with his own solution. Captain Grey, chivalrous and kindly as +he was, had obviously lost interest in her affairs. Nobody believed in +her. Was it because every one could see-- + +She remembered the intolerable humiliation of the day before, her wild +outburst of tears in the Queltons’ house. Even in her childhood she had +never done such a thing before. + +“What does it mean?” she asked herself in terror. “What is the matter +with me? Is this whole thing just a delusion? I came here to find +Caroline, and I thought--I thought I did see her. Am I mad?” + +That was the awful thing that had lain in ambush in her mind ever since +yesterday, that had haunted her restless sleep all night. She had not +admitted it, but it had been there every minute. All her actions, all +her words, to-day, had the one object of showing Mrs. Royce and Captain +Grey how entirely normal and sensible she was. + +“That’s what they always do!” she whispered with dry lips. + +All day, hiding her terror and weakness, talking to Mrs. Royce, sitting +at the lunch table and talking and laughing with Captain Grey, trying to +make them believe her quite cheerful and untroubled--and all the time +perhaps they knew. Perhaps they were humoring her! + +She sprang up and went over to the window. The sun was beginning to sink +in a tranquil sky. It had been a beautiful day, but Lexy felt too weary +and listless to go out. She remembered now that both Captain Grey and +the landlady had urged her to do so, that they had both said it would do +her good. Then they must have noted that something was wrong with her. +What did they think it was? Did she look-- + +She crossed the room and stood before the mirror. The rays of the +setting sun fell upon her hair, turning it to copper and gold. It seemed +to her to shine with a strange light about her pallid little face. Her +eyes seemed enormous, somber, and terrible. + +She covered her face with her hands and flung herself on the bed, sick +and desperate. She could not see any one, could not speak to any one. +When a knock came at her door, she thrust her fingers into her ears and +lay there, with her eyes shut tight, trembling from head to foot; but +the knocking went on until she could endure it no longer. + +“Yes?” she said, sitting up. + +“Supper’s all on the table!” said Mrs. Royce’s cheerful voice. + +“I don’t want any supper to-night, thank you,” replied Lexy. + +Mrs. Royce expostulated and argued for a time, but she could not +persuade Lexy even to unlock the door; and at last, with a worried sigh, +she went downstairs again. + +The room was quite dark now, and the wind blowing in through the open +window felt chill; but Lexy was too tired to close the window or light +the gas. She was not drowsy. She lay stretched out, limp, overpowered +with fatigue, but wide awake, and with a curious certainty that she was +waiting for something. + +There was another knock at the door, and this time Captain Grey’s voice +spoke. + +“I say, Miss Moran!” he said anxiously. “You’re not ill, are you?” + +“No!” she answered, with a trace of irritability. “I’m just tired.” + +“But don’t you think you ought to eat something, you know? Or a cup of +tea?” + +“No!” she cried, still more impatiently. “I can’t. I want to rest.” + +“Can you open the door for half a moment?” he asked. “I’ve some roses +here that my sister sent to you. She wanted me to say--” + +The door opened with startling suddenness. Lexy appeared, and took the +roses out of his hand. + +“Thank you! Good night!” she said, and was gone again before he quite +realized what was happening. + +Then he heard the key turn in the lock, and, bewildered and very uneasy, +he went away. + +Lexy flung the roses down on the table, not even troubling to put them +into water. + +“Anything to get rid of him!” she said to herself. “I want to be let +alone!” + +She lay down on the bed again, pulling a blanket over herself. +Downstairs she could hear Mrs. Royce moving about in the kitchen, and +Captain Grey’s singularly agreeable voice talking to the landlady. It +seemed to her that they were in a different world, and that she was shut +outside, in a black and terrible solitude. + +“If I can only sleep!” she thought. “Perhaps, in the morning--” + +She was beginning to feel a little drowsy now. How heavenly it would be +to sleep, even for a little while! To sleep and to forget! + +The wind was blowing through the dark little room, bringing to her the +perfume of the roses--a wonderful fragrance. It was wonderful, but +almost too strong. It was too strong. It troubled her. + +“I’ll put them out on the window sill,” she murmured. “It’s such a queer +scent!” + +But she was too tired, too unspeakably tired. She didn’t seem able to +get up, or even to move. She sighed faintly, and closed her eyes. The +wind blew, strong and steady, heavy with that sweet and subtle odor. + + * * * * * + +“Look out!” cried Mr. Houseman. “She’s going about!” + +Lexy laughed, and ducked down into the cockpit while the boom swung +over. The little sailboat was flying over the sunny water like a bird. +There was not a cloud in the pure bright sky, not a shadow in her joyous +heart. + +“I am so glad you came!” she said. + +“Of course I came,” he answered. “I had to swim all the way from India.” + +“Mercy!” cried Lexy. “That must have been dreadful! But why?” + +Mr. Houseman leaned forward and whispered solemnly: + +“There was a tempest in a teapot.” + +This frightened her. + +“Do you think there’s going to be another one?” she whispered back. + +“Sure to be!” said he. “Don’t you see how dark it’s getting?” + +It was getting very dark. Lexy couldn’t see his face now. + +“Hold my hand!” he shouted, and she reached out for it; but she couldn’t +find him at all. + +“Mr. Houseman!” she cried. + +There was no answer. She stared about her, numb with terror. What was it +that rustled like that? What were these black, tall things that were +standing motionless about her on every side? + +“I’ve been dreaming,” she said to herself. “I’m in my own room, of +course. If I go just a few steps, I’ll touch the wall. I’m awake +now--only it’s so dark!” + +And what was it that rustled like that--like leaves in the wind? What +were these black, still forms about her? Trees? No--they couldn’t be +trees. + +In a wild panic she moved forward. Her outstretched hand touched +something, and she screamed. The scream seemed to run along through the +dark, leaping and rolling over the ground like a terrified animal. She +tried to run after it, stumbling and panting, until her shoulder struck +violently against something, and she stopped. + +And into her sick and shuddering mind her old sturdy courage began to +return. She tried to breathe quietly. She struggled desperately against +the awful weakness that urged her to sink down on the ground and cover +her eyes. + +“No!” she said aloud. “I won’t! I’m here! I’m alive! I will understand! +I will see!” + +She was able now to draw a deep breath, and the horrible fluttering of +her heart grew less. She stood motionless, waiting. It was coming back +to her, that immortal, unconquerable spirit of hers. The anguish and the +strange fear were passing. + +“I’m here,” she said. “I’m in a wood somewhere. These are trees. What I +hear are only the leaves in the wind. I don’t know where it is, or how I +got here; but I’m alive and well. I can walk. I can get out of it.” + +She moved forward again, quietly and deliberately. Her eyes were more +accustomed to the darkness now, and she made her way through the trees, +looking always ahead, never once behind her. + +“The wood must end somewhere,” she said. “The morning will have to come +some time. All I have to do is to go on.” + +Patter, patter, patter, like little feet running behind her. + +“Only the leaves on the trees,” said Lexy. “All I have to do is to go +on.” + +And she went on. Sometimes a wild desire to run swept over her, but she +would not hasten her steps, and she would not look behind. The primeval +terror of the forest pressed upon her, but she cast it away. Alone, +lost, in darkness and solitude, she kept her hold upon the one thing +that mattered--the honor and dignity of her own soul. + +“I’m not afraid,” she said. + +And then she saw a light. At first she thought it was the moon, but it +hung too low, and it was too brilliant. Even then she would not run. She +went on steadily toward it. In a few minutes she stepped out of the +woodland upon a road--a hard, asphalt road with lights along it. It was +quite empty, it was unfamiliar to her, but she would have gone down on +her knees and kissed the dust of it. It was a road, and all roads lead +home. + + +XV + +There were no stars and no moon, for the sky was filled with wild black +clouds flying before the wind. Lexy could not guess at the time. She had +no idea where she was, but it didn’t matter. The morning would come some +time, and the road would lead somewhere. + +“It’s better here,” she said to herself. “I’d far, far rather be here, +wherever it is, than shut up in that room with the thoughts I had!” + +Those thoughts, those fears, had utterly gone from her now, but the +memory of them was horrible. She shuddered at the memory of the hours +she had spent locked in her room, with that monstrous dread of madness +in her heart. Thank God, it had passed now! She walked along the +interminable empty road, her old self again, but graver and sterner than +she had ever been before in her life. + +“I’ve got to understand all this,” she said to herself. “I’ve got to +know what’s been the matter with me. That breakdown at the Queltons’, +that awful time yesterday afternoon, and this! I suppose I’ve been +walking in my sleep. I never did before. Something’s gone wrong with my +nerves, terribly wrong; and I’ve got to find out why.” + +She quickened her pace a little, because a trace of the old panic fear +had stirred in her. + +“It’s over!” she thought. “I’ll never imagine such a thing again; but I +wonder if I’ll ever feel quite sure of myself again!” + +For all her valiant efforts, tears came into her eyes. She had always +been so proudly and honestly sure of herself, she had always trusted +herself, and now--now she knew how weak, how untrustworthy she could be. +Now she would always have that knowledge, and would fear that the +weakness might come again. + +“I don’t know whether I really did see Caroline. I can’t feel certain of +anything. Perhaps I ought to give up all this and go away and rest; only +I’ve no place to go. There isn’t any one I can tell.” + +She straightened her shoulders and looked up at the vast, dark sky, +where black clouds ran before a wind that snapped at their heels like a +wolf; and the sight assuaged her. This world that lay under the open +sky--the woods, the hills, and above all, the sea--was her world. It +belonged to her equally with all God’s creatures. She had her part in it +and her place. There was no one to whom she could turn for comfort, her +faith in herself was cruelly shaken, and yet somehow she was not +forsaken and helpless. Some one was coming. It was dark, but the light +was coming! + +She went on, her brisk footsteps ringing out clearly in the silence. The +road was bordered on both sides by woods, where the leaves whispered, +and there was no sign anywhere of another human being; but the road must +lead somewhere. It began to go steeply uphill, and she became aware for +the first time that she was very tired and very hungry, and that one of +her shoes was worn through; but she had her precious money in the bag +around her neck, and, if she kept on going, she couldn’t help reaching +some place where she could get food and rest. + +“At the top of the hill I’ll be able to see better,” she thought. + +It was a long, long hill, and the stones began to hurt her foot in the +worn shoe; but she got to the top, and then below her she saw the lights +of a railway station. + +She went down the hill at a lively trot, and it was as if she had come +into a different world. Dogs barked somewhere not far off, and she +passed a barn standing black against the sky. It was a human world, +where people lived. + +When she reached the platform, the door of the waiting room was locked, +but inside she could see a light burning dimly in the ticket booth, and +a clock. Half past one! With a sigh of relief, she sat down on the edge +of the platform. She wouldn’t in the least mind sitting here until +morning, in a place where there were lights and a clock, and she could +hear a dog barking. She took off her shoe and rubbed her bruised foot, +and sighed again with great content. In four hours or so somebody would +come, and then she would find out where she was, and how to get back to +Mrs. Royce, and Mrs. Royce’s comfortable breakfast--coffee, ham and +eggs, and hot muffins. + +She started up, and hastily put on her shoe again, for in the distance +she heard the sound of a motor. She told herself that it would be the +height of folly to stop an unknown car in this solitary place, for there +were evil men abroad in the world; but there were a great many more +honest ones, and if she could only get back to Mrs. Royce’s now! + +She crossed the road and stood behind a big tree. The purr of the motor +was growing louder and louder, filling the whole earth. Her heart beat +fast, she kept her eyes upon the road, excited, but not sure what she +meant to do. + +It was a taxi. She sprang out into the road and waved her arms. + +“Taxi!” she shouted joyously. + +The car stopped with a jolt, and the driver jumped out. + +“Now, then! What’s up?” he demanded suspiciously. From a safe distance, +the light of an electric torch was flashed in her face. “Well, I’ll be +gosh-darned!” said he. “Ain’t you the boarder up to Mrs. Royce’s?” + +“Yes! I am! I am!” cried Lexy, overwhelmed with delight. “Can you take +me there?” + +“I can,” he replied; “but what on earth are you doing out here?” + +“I got lost,” said Lexy. “Where is this, anyhow?” + +“Wyngate station,” said he. “I’ll be gosh-darned! I never! Lost?” + +“Yes,” said Lexy. “Aren’t you the driver who took me up the day I came +here?” + +“That’s me--only taxi in Wyngate. Took you out to the Queltons’, too. +Hop in, miss!” + +His engine had stalled, and he set to work to crank it, while Lexy stood +beside him. + +“Drive awfully fast, will you?” she asked. + +He was too busy to answer for a moment. Then, when his engine was +running again, he straightened up and looked at her. + +“No, ma’am!” he said firmly. “No more of that for me! Not after what +happened a while ago. No, ma’am! I had my lesson!” + +“An accident?” inquired Lexy politely. + +“Well,” he said slowly, “I s’pose it was; but the more I think it over, +the more I dunno!” + +In the brightness cast by the headlights, Lexy could see his face very +well, and the look on it gave her a strange little thrill of fear. It +was not a handsome or intelligent face, but it was a very honest one, +and she saw, written plain upon it, a very honest doubt and dismay. Like +herself, he wasn’t sure. + +“It was this way,” he went on. “About three miles up Carterstown way +there’s a bad piece of road. There’s a steep hill, and a crossroad cuts +across the foot of it, and it’s too narrer for two cars to pass. It’s a +bad piece, and I always been keerful there. I was keerful that night. I +was coming along the crossroad, and I heard another car somewhere, and I +sounded the horn two or three times before I come to the foot of the +hill. Jest as I got there, and was turning up the hill, down comes +another car, full tilt. I couldn’t git out o’ the way. There’s stone +walls on both sides. I tried to back, but he crashed into me. I kind of +fainted, I guess. My cab was all smashed up, and I was cut pretty bad +with glass. They found me lying there about an hour after. The other +fellow--he was killed.” He stopped for a minute. “If it hadn’t been fer +his license number, nobody could ’a’ known who he was, he was so smashed +up. Seems he was from New York, driving a taxi belonging to one of them +big companies.” + +“Poor fellow!” said Lexy. + +“Yes,” said the other solemnly. “I kin say that, too, whatever he meant +to do.” + +“Meant to do?” + +The countryman came a step nearer. + +“I keep thinking about it,” he said in a half whisper. “This is the +queer thing about it, miss. That there car didn’t start till _I got to +the foot of the hill_! The engine was just racing, and the car wasn’t +moving along--I _know_ that. It was as if he’d been waiting up there for +me, and then down he came as if he meant”--the speaker paused again--“to +kill me,” he ended. + +“But--” Lexy began, and then stopped. + +She had a very odd feeling that this story was somehow of great +importance to her, but that she must put it away, that she must keep it +in her mind until later. This wasn’t the time to think about it. + +“Joe,” she said, “I want to hear more about this--all about it; but not +now. I’m too tired.” + +He gave himself a shake, like a dog. Then he turned to her with a slow, +good-natured smile. + +“I guess you are!” he said. “Lucky for you I just happened to be late +to-night, taking them Ainsly girls ’way out to their house after a +dance. Hop in, miss!” + +Lexy got in, and they set off. She leaned back and closed her eyes, but +they flew open again as if of their own accord. There was something she +wanted to see. Through the glass she could see Joe’s burly shoulders, a +little hunched--Joe, who, like herself, wasn’t sure. + +“Not now!” said something inside her. “Don’t think about that now. Try +not to think at all. Wait! Something is going to happen.” + +At the corner of the road leading to Mrs. Royce’s, she tapped on the +window. Joe stopped the cab with a jerk, sprang down from his seat, and +ran around to open the door. + +“What’s the matter, miss?” + +“Nothing,” said Lexy. “I’m sorry if I startled you, Joe. I thought I’d +get out here and slip into the house quietly, without disturbing any +one.” + +Joe grinned sheepishly. + +“I’ve got kind of jumpy since--that,” he said. “Howsomever, come on, +miss!” + +“Oh, I don’t mean to trouble you!” + +“I’m going to see you safe inside that there house!” Joe declared +firmly. + +Grateful for his genuine kindness, Lexy made no further protest. Side by +side they walked down the lane, their footsteps noiseless in the thick +dust, and Joe opened the garden gate without a sound. + +“I thought perhaps I could climb up that tree and get in at my window,” +Lexy whispered. + +“I’ll do it for you,” said Joe, “and come down and let you in by the +back door.” + +He was up the tree like a cat. He went cautiously along a branch, until +he could reach the roof of the shed with his toes. He dropped down on +the roof, and Lexy saw him disappear into her room. She went to the back +door. In a minute she heard the key turn inside, and the door opened. + +“Thank you ever so much, Joe!” she whispered. + +But he paid no attention to her. He stood still, drawing deep breaths of +the night air. + +“Them roses!” he said. “The smell of ’em made me kind of sick, like. +Throw ’em out, miss! Don’t go to sleep with them roses in the room!” + +Lexy did not answer for a time. + +“I’ll see you to-morrow, Joe,” she said. “I’ll pay you for the taxi, and +have a talk with you. And thank you, Joe, ever so much!” + +He touched his cap, murmured “Good night,” and off he went. + +Lexy went in, locked the kitchen door behind her, and stood there, +leaning against it, half dazed by the great light that was coming into +her mind. She was beginning to understand! The roses--the roses with +their strange and powerful fragrance! Her hysterical outburst after her +tea at Dr. Quelton’s house! She was beginning to understand, not the +details, but the one tremendous thing that mattered. + +“He did it,” she said to herself. “He made all this happen. I didn’t +just break down. I haven’t been weak and hysterical. He made it all +happen!” + +For a time her relief was an ecstasy. She could trust herself again. She +was so happy in that knowledge that she could have shouted aloud, to +waken Mrs. Royce and Captain Grey, and tell them. The monstrous burden +was lifted, she was free, she was her old sturdy, trustworthy self +again. + +She sank into a chair by the kitchen table, staring before her into the +dark, her lips parted in a smile of gratitude and delight; and then, +suddenly, the smile fled. She rose to her feet, her hands clenched, her +whole body rigid. + +“He did it!” she said again. “It’s the vilest and most horrible thing +any one can do. He tried to steal my soul. He turned me into that poor, +terrified, contemptible creature. I’ll never in all my life forgive him. +I’m going to find out--about that, and about Caroline. I’ll never give +up trying, and I’ll never forgive him!” + +She groped her way through the dark kitchen and into the hall. That was +where she had first seen Dr. Quelton. She stopped and turned, as if she +were looking into his face. + +“I’m stronger than you!” she whispered. + + +XVI + +Lexy came down to breakfast a little late the next morning, but in the +best of spirits, and with a ferocious appetite. She had no idea how or +when she had left the house the night before, but obviously neither Mrs. +Royce nor Captain Grey knew anything about it, and that sufficed. She +could go on eating, quite untroubled by their friendly anxiety. Let them +think what they chose--it no longer mattered to her. + +For, in spite of the warm liking she had for them both, she felt +entirely cut off from them now. If she told them the truth, they would +not believe her, they would not and could not help her. Nobody on earth +would help her. She faced that fact squarely. Whatever Dr. Quelton had +meant to accomplish, he had perfectly succeeded in doing one thing--he +had discredited her. Anything she said now would be regarded as the +irresponsible statement of a hysterical girl. + +Very well! She had done with talking. She meant to act now. + +“It was awfully nice of your sister to send me those roses,” she +observed. + +Captain Grey was standing by the window in the dining room, keeping her +company while she ate. He turned his head aside as she spoke, but not +before she had noticed on his sensitive face the odd and touching look +that always came over it at any mention of his sister. Evidently he +worshiped her, and yet Lexy was certain that he was somehow disappointed +in her. + +“She likes you very much,” he said. + +“I’m glad,” said Lexy; “but how did you manage to keep the roses so +wonderfully fresh, Captain Grey?” + +“The doctor wrapped them for me--some rather special way, you know--damp +paper, and then a cloth. He told me not to open them until I gave them +to you. Very clever chap, isn’t he?” + +“He is!” agreed Lexy, with a faint smile. + +“Mind if I smoke, Miss Moran?” asked the young man. “Thanks!” + +He lit a cigarette and sat down on the window sill. He was silent, and +so was Lexy, for she fancied that he had something he wished to say. + +“Miss Moran,” he said, at last, “you’ll go there again to see her, won’t +you?” + +Lexy considered for a moment. + +“Why?” she asked. “Why did you think I wouldn’t?” + +“I was afraid you might think--it’s the atmosphere of the place--I’m +sure of it--that made you nervous the other afternoon. It’s something +about the place, you know. I’ve felt it myself. I was afraid you +wouldn’t care to go again, and I don’t like to think of her +there--alone.” + +“She’s not alone,” observed Lexy blandly. “She has her clever husband.” + +“Yes, I know that, of course, but he’s--well, he’s not very cheery,” +said the young man earnestly. + +Lexy couldn’t help laughing. + +“No, he’s not very cheery,” she admitted. “Of course I’ll go again--this +afternoon, if you’d like.” + +“I say! You are good!” he cried. “I know jolly well that you don’t want +to go.” + +“I do, though,” declared Lexy. + +“Shall we walk over?” + +“If you don’t mind,” said Lexy, “I’ll go by myself. There’s something I +want to attend to first. I’ll meet you there at four o’clock.” + +“Right-o!” said he. “Then you won’t mind if I go there for lunch?” + +She assured him that she wouldn’t. + +“You poor dear thing!” she added, to herself. His solicitude touched +her. He seemed to feel himself responsible for her, as if she were a +very delicate and rather weak-minded child. “You’re not very cheery, +either!” she thought. And indeed he was not. His meeting with his sister +had upset him badly. Ever since he had first seen her, he had been +troubled and anxious and downcast. “And that’s because she’s not human,” +thought Lexy. “She’s beautiful, and gentle, and all that, but she’s like +a ghost. Of course it bothers him!” + +She did not give much more thought to Captain Grey, however. As soon as +he left the house, she went upstairs into the little sewing room, and +until lunch time she was busy writing the clearest and briefest account +she could of what had occurred. This she put into an envelope, which she +addressed to Mr. Charles Houseman and laid it on her bureau. + +“If anything happened, I suppose they’d give it to him,” she said to +herself. “I’d like him to know.” + +Somehow this gave her a good deal of comfort. Not that she expected +anything to happen, or was at all frightened, but she did not deny that +Dr. Quelton was a singularly unpleasant sort of enemy to have; and he +was her enemy--she was sure of it. + +Just because he had made such a point of her arriving after four +o’clock, she had made up her mind to reach the house well before that +hour--which would not please him. Directly after lunch she walked down +to the village. She found Joe taking a nap in his cab, outside the +station; and, regardless of the frightful curiosity of the villagers, +she stood there talking to him for a long time. He assured her, with +his sheepish grin, that he had told no one of his having met her the +night before, and he willingly promised never to mention it to any one +without her consent. + +“I ain’t so much of a talker,” he said. + +That was true, too. He was reluctant, to-day, to talk about his strange +adventure with the cab on the hill; but Lexy made him answer her +questions, and he wavered in no respect from his first version. + +“There was an inquest, an’ all,” he said. “I’m darned glad it’s all +over!” + +“It isn’t!” thought Lexy. “Somehow it belongs with other things. It’s a +piece of the puzzle. I can’t fit it in now, but I will some day!” + +So she thanked Joe, and paid him for last night’s trip, though he made +miserable and embarrassed efforts to stop her. Then she set off on her +way. + +It was four o’clock by her watch when she reached the garden gate. She +stopped for a moment with her hand on the latch, and, in spite of +herself, a little shiver ran through her. The battered old house in the +tangled garden looked more menacing to-day, in the tranquil spring +sunshine, than it had in the rain. It was utterly lonely and quiet. Lexy +could hear nothing but the distant sound of the surf, which was like the +beating of a tired heart. + +Against the advice of Mrs. Enderby, almost against her own reason, she +had come here to Wyngate, and to the house--and she had seen Caroline. +The thing which was beyond reason had been right--so right that it +frightened her; and now it bade her go on. It was like a voice telling +her that her feet were set in the right path. + +Lexy pushed open the gate and went in. The pleasant young parlor maid +opened the door. She looked alarmed. + +“I don’t know, miss,” she said. “Mrs. Quelton--I’ll go and ask the +doctor.” + +But from the hall Lexy had caught sight of Mrs. Quelton in the +drawing-room alone, and, with an affable smile for the anxious parlor +maid, she went in there. + +“I’m afraid I’m awfully early--” she began, and then stopped short in +amazement. + +Mrs. Quelton did not welcome the visitor, did not smile or speak. She +lay back in her chair and stared at Lexy with dilated eyes and parted +lips. Her face was as white as paper, and strangely drawn. + +“Are you ill?” cried Lexy, running toward her. + +Mrs. Quelton only stared at her with those brilliant, dilated eyes. Lexy +took the other woman’s hand, and it was as cold as ice, and utterly +lifeless. + +“Mrs. Quelton! Are you ill?” she asked again. + +Somehow it added to her horror to see, as she bent over her, that the +unfortunate woman’s face was ever so thickly covered with some curious +sort of paint or powder. It made her seem like a grotesque and horrible +marionette. + +“She’s old!” thought Lexy. “She’s terribly, terribly old!” + +She drew back her hand, for she could not touch that painted face. She +didn’t fail in generous pity, but she could not overcome an instinctive +repugnance. She turned around, intending to call the parlor maid, and +there was Dr. Quelton striding down the long room with a glass in his +hand. Without even glancing at Lexy, he stooped over his wife, raised +her limp head on one arm, and put the glass to her lips. She drank the +contents, and lay back again, with her eyes closed. Almost at once the +color began to return to her ashen cheeks. Her arms quivered, and then +she opened her eyes and looked up at him with a faint, dazed smile. + +“You’re better now,” he said. + +“Better!” she repeated. “But you were late! I needed it--I needed it!” + +“Come, now!” he said indulgently. “The faintness has passed. Now you +must go up to your room and rest a little before tea.” + +She rose, and to Lexy’s surprise her movements showed no trace of +weakness. Then, turning her head, she caught sight of the girl, and her +face lighted with pleasure. + +“Miss Moran!” she cried. “How very nice to--” + +“Miss Moran will wait, I’m sure,” the doctor interrupted. “You must rest +for half an hour, Muriel.” + +Taking her by the arm, he led her down the room. In the doorway she +looked back and smiled at her visitor; and if anything had been needed +to steel Lexy’s heart against the doctor, that smile on his wife’s face +would have done it--that poor, plaintive little smile. + +Standing there by Mrs. Quelton’s empty chair, she waited for him to +return, a cold and terrible anger rising in her. She heard his step in +the hall, heavy and deliberate, and presently he reëntered the room and +came toward her, his blank, dull eyes fixed upon nothing. She was quite +certain that he wanted to put her out of his way, and that he had no +scruple whatever as to methods; yet for all her youth and inexperience, +her utter loneliness, she felt that she was a match for him. + +“So you’ve come back to us, Miss Moran,” he said in his lifeless voice. +“I was afraid you might not.” + +“Oh, but why not?” Lexy inquired in a brisk and cheerful tone. “I like +to come here!” + +A curious thrill of exultation ran through her, for she saw on the +doctor’s face the faintest shadow of a frown. He was perplexed! She +baffled him, and he didn’t know whether she understood what had +happened. + +“It is a great pleasure to Mrs. Quelton and myself,” he said politely. +Then he raised his eyes and looked directly at her. “Perhaps,” he went +on, “you would be kind enough to spend a week here with us some time? +Although I’m afraid you might find it very dull.” + +“Oh, no!” Lexy assured him. “I’d love to come--whenever it’s convenient +for you.” + +They were still looking directly into each other’s eyes. + +“Suppose we say to-morrow?” suggested Dr. Quelton. + +“Thank you!” said Lexy. “I’ll come to-morrow!” + + +XVII + +Captain Grey was enchanted with the idea of Lexy’s spending a week with +his sister. He was going, too. Indeed, Lexy felt sure that Mrs. Quelton +had wanted him to go there some time ago, and that he had refused simply +on her own account. He didn’t like to leave her alone at Mrs. Royce’s, +and after her nervous breakdown that afternoon nothing could have +induced him to do so. He was anxious about her. He tried, with what he +believed was great tact, to find out her plans for the future. He was +genuinely troubled by the loneliness and uncertainty of her life. + +Lexy appreciated all this, and she liked the young man very +much--perhaps as much as he liked her; but the sympathetic understanding +which had promised to develop on the night when they talked together in +the firelight had never developed. Something had checked it. They were +the best of friends, but Captain Grey never again referred to what Lexy +had told him about Caroline Enderby, and about her reason for coming to +Wyngate; and Lexy said nothing, either. Evidently he thought that it had +been a far-fetched, romantic notion of hers, and hoped that she had +forgotten all about it. + +Lexy did not try to undeceive him. Her story would be too fantastic for +him to believe. Nobody would believe it, except a person with absolute +faith not only in her honesty but in her intelligence and +clear-sightedness; and there was no such person. She was not resentful +or grieved over this. She accepted it quietly, and prepared to go +forward alone. + +It had occurred to her lately that perhaps Mr. Houseman had been right, +and that Caroline had gone away of her own free will; but she meant to +_know_. She had seen the missing girl in Dr. Quelton’s house. Whatever +the doctor might say about the false evidence of the senses, Lexy’s +confidence in her own clear gray eyes was not in the least shaken. She +had seen Caroline once, and she was going to see her again. That was why +she was going to the Tower. + +“It’ll do Muriel no end of good,” said Captain Grey, when they were in +the taxi. “She’s--to tell you the truth, Miss Moran, I don’t feel +altogether easy about her.” + +“Why?” asked Lexy, very curious to know what he thought. + +“Well,” he said, “it’s hard to put it into words; but that’s not a +wholesome sort of life for a young woman, shut away like that. The +doctor says her health’s not good, but it’s my opinion that if she got +about more--saw more people, you know--” + +Lexy felt a great pity for him. Apparently he did not even suspect what +she was now sure of--that the unfortunate Muriel was hopelessly addicted +to some drug, which her husband himself gave to her. + +“And I hope he’ll go back to India before he does find out,” she +thought. “It’s too horrible--he worships her so!” + +“I’ve tried, you know,” he went on. “I wanted to take her into the city, +to a concert. Seems confoundedly queer, doesn’t it, the way she’s lost +interest in her music? She didn’t want to go. Then about the emerald--” + +“Oh!” said Lexy, who had forgotten about the emerald. + +“Chap I know designed a setting for it. It’s unset now, you know, and I +thought I’d like to do that for her while I was here; but she doesn’t +seem interested. I can’t even get her to let me see the thing. I’ve +asked her two or three times, but she always puts me off. Do you think +it bores her?” + +“Perhaps it does,” replied Lexy. + +“Well,” said the young man, “when a woman’s bored by a jewel like that, +she’s in a bad way. I wish you could see it!” + +“I wish I could,” said Lexy, and added to herself: “But I don’t think I +ever shall. Probably her husband’s got it.” + +They had now reached the Tower. The parlor maid opened the door for +them, and at once conducted Lexy upstairs to her room. + +It was a big room, with four windows, and very comfortably furnished; +but even a fire burning in the grate and two or three shaded electric +lamps could not give it a homelike air. There was a musty smell about +it, and there was an amazing amount of dust. It was neat, but it wasn’t +clean. Dust rose from the carpet when she walked, and from the chair +cushions when she sat down. She saw fluff under the bed and under the +bureau. + +“Not much of a housekeeper, poor soul!” thought Lexy. “It’s a pity. One +could do almost anything with a house like this, and all this beautiful +old furniture!” + +But this, after all, was a minor matter. She took off her hat, washed +her hands and face, brushed her hair, and left the room, closing the +door quietly behind her. + +“The house is strange to me,” she said to herself, with a grin. “I +shouldn’t wonder if I turned the wrong way, and got lost!” + +That was what she intended to do. She did not expect to make any +sensational discoveries, for Dr. Quelton did not seem to be the sort of +person who would leave clews lying about for her to pick up; but she did +hope that she might see or hear something--Heaven knows what--that might +bring her nearer to Caroline. + +So, instead of walking toward the stairs, she turned in the opposite +direction, along a hall lined with doors, all of them shut. At the end +there was a grimy window, through which the sun shone in upon the dusty +carpet and the faded wall paper. There was a forlorn and neglected air +about the place, a stillness which made it impossible for her to believe +that there was any living creature behind those closed doors. + +“I wish I had cheek enough to open some of them,” she thought; “but I’m +afraid I haven’t. I shouldn’t know what to say if there was some one in +the room. After all, I’m supposed to be a guest. I’ve got to be a little +discreet about my prying.” + +She went softly along the hall to the window, to see what was out there. +When she reached it, she was surprised to see that the last door was a +little ajar. She looked through the crack. It wasn’t a room in there, +but another hall, only a few feet long, ending at a narrow staircase. + +“That must be the way to the cupola,” she thought. “I suppose a guest +might go up there, to see the view.” + +So she pushed the door open and went on tiptoe to the stairs; and then +she heard a voice which she had no trouble in recognizing. It was Dr. +Quelton’s. + +“My dear young man,” he was saying. “I am not a psychologist. It has +always seemed to me the greatest folly to devote serious study to the +workings of so erratic and incalculable a machine as the human brain. It +is a study in which there are, practically speaking, no general rules, +no trustworthy data. It is, in my opinion, not a science at all, but a +philosophy; and philosophy makes no appeal to me. I frankly admit that I +am entirely materialistic. I care little for causes, but much for +effects. Consequently, I have devoted myself to medicine, in which I can +produce certain effects according to established rules.” + +“But I meant more particularly the effect of--of things on the mind--the +brain, you know,” said Captain Grey’s voice. + +Again Lexy felt a great pity for him. He sounded very, very young in +contrast to the doctor--so young and earnest, and so helpless! + +“Exactly!” said the doctor. “You were, I believe, trying to lead to a +suggestion that psychology might be of help to Muriel. Am I right?” + +There was a moment’s pause, during which Lexy very cautiously went +halfway up the stairs. + +“I did think of that,” said the young man valiantly. “It seems to me +she’s a bit--well, morbid, you know; and I’ve heard about those +chaps--those psychoanalysts, you know. Simply occurred to me that one of +them--merely a suggestion, you know. I’m not trying to be officious.” + +“A psychoanalyst,” said Dr. Quelton, “is a man who analyzes the psyche, +who solemnly and expensively analyzes something of whose existence he +has no proof whatever.” + +There was another silence. + +By this time Lexy had reached the head of the stairs. Beside her was an +open door, through which she could look, while she herself was hidden +from view. Beyond it was, as she had thought, the cupola--a small +octagonal room with windows on every side, through which the sun poured +in a dazzling flood. There was nothing in the room except a white enamel +table, a stool, a porcelain sink, and an open cabinet, upon the shelves +of which stood rows and rows of bottles, each one labeled. Facing this +cabinet, and with their backs toward the door, stood the two men--the +doctor with his shoulders hunched and his hands clasped behind him, and +Captain Grey, tall, slender, straight as a wand. + +“Materia medica--that is my art,” said the doctor. “I have devoted my +life to it, and I have learned--a little. I have made experiments. A +psychologist will offer to tell you why a man has murdered his +grandmother. I can’t pretend to do that, but I can give that man a +tablet which will make it practically certain that he _will_ kill his +grandmother if they are left alone together for ten minutes.” + +“But, I say!” protested Captain Grey. + +“I can assure you that I have never made the experiment,” said Dr. +Quelton, with a laugh; “but I could do it. I have learned that certain +states of mind can be produced by certain drugs.” + +Captain Grey turned his head, so that Lexy could see his handsome, +sensitive face in profile. + +“That seems to me a pretty risky thing to do,” he said, with a trace of +sternness. “I hope, sir, that you don’t--” + +“Don’t give Muriel drugs that make her disposed to murder her +grandmother?” interrupted the doctor, with another laugh; but he must +have noticed that his companion was unresponsive, for he at once changed +his tone. “No,” he said gravely. “I have made a particular study of +Muriel’s case. She seriously overtaxed herself in her musical studies. +Don’t be alarmed, my dear fellow--there is no permanent injury. It is +simply a profound mental and nervous lassitude--obviously a case where +artificial stimulation is required, until the tone of the lethargic +brain is restored. I am able to do for her what, I feel certain, no one +else now living could do. In this bottle”--he tapped one of them with +his forefinger--“I have a preparation which would make my fortune, if I +had the least ambition in that direction. Five drops of that, in a glass +of water, and her depression and apathy are immediately dispelled. There +is an instantaneous improvement in--” + +Lexy waited to hear no more. She slipped down the stairs as quietly as +she had come up, hurried along the hall, and went into her own room +again. Her knees gave way and she collapsed into a chair, staring ahead +of her with the most singular expression on her face. + +She was, in fact, looking at a new idea, and it was not a welcome one. + +“No!” she said to herself. “It’s out of the question. It’s too +dangerous. I can’t do it!” + +But the idea remained solidly before her; and the more she contemplated +it, the more was her honest heart obliged to admit the possibilities in +it. + +“It can’t do any real harm,” she said; “and it might do good--so much +good! All right, I’m going to do it!” + +Half an hour before dinner she went down into the library, a polite and +quiet young guest, even a little subdued. Dr. Quelton took Captain Grey +out for a stroll on the beach. He asked Lexy to go with them, but she +said she would prefer to stay with Mrs. Quelton. + +It was very peaceful and pleasant there in the library. The late +afternoon sun shone in through the long window, touching with a benign +light the shabby and graceful old furniture, picking out a glitter of +gold on the binding of a book, a dull gleam of silver or copper in a +corner. A mild breeze blew in, fluttering the curtains and bringing a +wholesome breath of the salt air. + +Mrs. Quelton was at her best. To be sure, she was not very interesting. +She talked about rather banal things--about the weather, about a kitten +that had run away, about the flowers in the conservatory; but Lexy, as +she watched her and listened to her, could understand better than ever +before what it was in Captain Grey’s sister that had so seized upon his +heart. Languid and aloof as she was, there was nevertheless an +undeniable charm about her, something sweet and kindly and lovable. She +said, more than once, how very glad she was to have Lexy with her, and +Lexy believed she meant it. + +The two men had strolled out of sight. + +“I must have left my handkerchief upstairs,” said Lexy. “Excuse me just +a minute, please!” + +But she was gone more than a minute, and when she returned her face was +curiously white. + + +XVIII + +The clock struck eleven. Lexy glanced up from her book, in the vain hope +that somebody would speak, would stir, would make some move to end this +intolerable evening; but nobody did. + +Dr. Quelton and Captain Grey were playing chess. They sat facing each +other at a small table, in a haze of tobacco smoke, silent and intent, +as if they had been gods deciding human destinies. Mrs. Quelton lay on +her _chaise longue_, doing nothing at all. If Lexy spoke to her, she +answered in a low tone, but cheerfully enough; but she so obviously +preferred not to talk that Lexy had taken up a book and vainly attempted +to read. + +It was the most wearisome and depressing evening she had ever spent. Her +lively and restless spirit had often enough found it dull at the +Enderbys’, and at other times and places; but this was different, and +infinitely worse. + +To begin with, a sense of guilt lay like lead upon her heart. She hoped +and believed that what she had done was right, but she was afraid, +terribly afraid, of what might result. She could not keep her eyes off +Mrs. Quelton’s face. She watched the doctor’s wife with a dread and +anxiety which she felt was ill concealed; and she had a chill suspicion +that the doctor was watching her, in turn. + +“Of course, he’s bound to find out some time,” she said to herself. “I +wasn’t such a fool as to expect more than a day or two, at the very +most; but I did hope there’d be time just to see--” + +Again she glanced at Mrs. Quelton. Was it imagination, or was there +already a faint and indefinable change? + +“No, that’s nonsense,” she thought. “There couldn’t be, so +soon--although I don’t know how often he gives her that priceless +tonic.” + +Suddenly she wanted to laugh. She had a very vivid memory of Dr. Quelton +tapping that bottle with his finger, and saying to Captain Grey that he +had a preparation in there which would make his fortune, if he chose. + +“It wouldn’t now,” she thought, struggling with suppressed laughter. + +There was nothing in that bottle now but water. Just before dinner she +had run up to the cupola, emptied its contents into the sink, and filled +it from the tap. + +The idea had come to her when she overheard the two men talking. It had +seemed to her then a plain and obvious duty to destroy the drug that so +horribly affected Mrs. Quelton. Fate had allowed her to see which bottle +it was. Fate gave her an undisturbed half hour when the doctor and +Captain Grey were out; and, to make her plan quite perfect, the liquid +in the bottle was colorless and almost without odor. + +She had thought it possible that the doctor would not notice the +substitution until his unhappy wife had had at least a chance to return +to a normal condition. Lexy had meant to wait and to watch, and, when +the moment came, to speak to Mrs. Quelton. She had thought that she +could warn the doctor’s wife, and implore her not to submit to that +hideous domination. + +She had scarcely thought of the risk to herself, and it had not occurred +to her that there might be serious risk to Mrs. Quelton. She knew almost +nothing about drugs and their effects. Her one idea had been to destroy +the thing that was destroying Mrs. Quelton. Only now, when it was done, +did she realize the mad audacity of her act. A man like Dr. Quelton +couldn’t be tricked by such a childish device. He would know what had +happened, and who had done it. Very likely he had plenty more of the +drug somewhere else. If he hadn’t-- + +“He’d feel like killing me,” thought Lexy. “I suppose he could, easily +enough. He must know all sorts of nice, quiet little ways for getting +rid of obnoxious people. Perhaps there was something in my dinner +to-night!” + +She dared not think of such a possibility. + +“No!” she said to herself. “He asked me here just to show me how little +I mattered. He knew I’d seen Caroline here, and he asked me to come, +because he was so sure I couldn’t do anything. I’m too insignificant for +him to bother with. He knows that nobody would believe what I said. He’d +only have to say that I was hysterical, and Captain Grey and Mrs. Royce +would be obliged to bear him out. He won’t trouble himself about me!” + +She stole a glance at him, and, to her profound uneasiness, she found +him staring intently at her. A shiver ran down her spine, and she turned +back to her book with a very pale face. If only it had been an +interesting book, so that she might have forgotten herself for a little +while! + +The clock struck half past eleven. + +“After all, I don’t see why I have to sit here,” she thought. “I +shouldn’t exactly break up the party if I went to bed.” + +And she was just about to close her book when Mrs. Quelton spoke. + +“I’m so tired!” she said in a high, wailing voice. “I’m so tired--so +tired--so tired!” + +Dr. Quelton hastily rose and came over to her chair. + +“Then you must go to bed,” he said. “Come!” + +He helped her to rise, and she stood, supported by his arm, her face +drawn and ghastly. + +“I’m so tired!” she moaned. + +Captain Grey came toward her, making a very poor attempt to smile. + +“Good night, Muriel!” he said, holding out his hand. + +She did not answer, or even look at him. Leaning on the doctor’s arm, +she went out of the room, into the hall, and up the stairs. Her wailing +voice floated back to them: + +“I’m so tired--so tired!” + +For a moment Captain Grey and Lexy were silent. Then-- + +“Good God!” he cried suddenly. “I can’t stand this! I--” + +Lexy came nearer to him. + +“Don’t stand it!” she whispered. “Take her away! Can’t you _see_? Take +her away!” + +“How can I? Her husband--she doesn’t want to go.” + +“Make her! Oh, can’t you see? He’s giving her some horrible drug!” + +“You mustn’t be alarmed,” said Dr. Quelton’s voice from the hall. They +both looked at him with a guilty start, but his blank eyes were staring +past them, at nothing. “It is unfortunate,” he said. “The little +excitement of this visit--” + +He walked past them into the room and over to the table, where his pipe +lay among the chessmen. He lit it deliberately and stood smoking it, +with one arm resting on the mantelpiece. + +“In her present highly nervous condition,” he went on, “the little +excitement of this visit has proved too much for her. I shall drive over +to the hospital and fetch a nurse--” + +“A nurse!” cried the young man. “Then she’s--” + +“There is absolutely no occasion for alarm, as I told you before. A few +days’ rest and quiet--” + +“Look here, sir!” said Captain Grey. “It seems to me--I’ve no wish to be +offensive, or anything of that sort, but it seems right to me”--he +paused for a moment--“to get a second opinion.” + +“I shouldn’t advise it,” replied the doctor blandly. + +“Possibly not, sir; but perhaps you would be willing to oblige me to +that extent. I don’t want to insist--” + +“I wouldn’t, if I were you.” + +There was a faint flush on the young man’s dark face. + +“Nevertheless--” he began, but again the doctor interrupted him. + +“My dear young man,” he said, “you oblige me to be frank. I should have +preferred a discreet silence; but as you are obviously determined to +make the matter as difficult as possible, you must hear the truth. For +some years your sister has been addicted to the use of certain drugs. +When I discovered this, I set about trying to cure the addiction. You +probably have no idea what that means. I venture to say that there is +nothing--absolutely nothing--more difficult in the entire field of +medicine. I have been working on the case for more than a year, and I +have made distinct progress; but it will be some time before the cure is +completed, and I can assure you that it never will be unless I am left +undisturbed. There is no other man now living who can do what I am +doing.” + +He spoke gravely and coldly, and his blank eyes were fixed upon Captain +Grey with a sort of sternness; but Lexy had a curious impression--more +than an impression, a certainty--that within himself Dr. Quelton was +laughing. + +“If you care to take another doctor into your confidence,” he went on, +“I can scarcely refuse permission; but you will regret it.” + +The young man said nothing. He turned away and stood by the open window, +looking out into the dark garden. Lexy waited for a moment. Then, with a +subdued “Good night,” she went out of the room, up the stairs, and into +her own room. + +“It’s a lie!” she said to herself. + + +XIX + +“Then you’re not going to do anything?” asked Lexy. + +“My dear Miss Moran, what in the world can I do?” returned Captain Grey, +with a sort of despair. + +They were sitting together on the veranda in the warm morning sunshine. +They had had breakfast in the dining room, with the doctor--an excellent +breakfast. The doctor had been at his best--courteous, affable, very +attentive to his guests. Everything in his manner tended to reassure the +young soldier. + +Everything in the world seemed to tend in that direction, Lexy thought. +A Sunday tranquillity lay over the country. Church bells were ringing +somewhere in the far distance. The windows of the library stood open, +and the parlor maid was visible in there, flitting about with broom and +duster. Everything was peaceful and ordinary, and Captain Grey had come +out on the veranda and attempted to begin a peaceful and ordinary +conversation. + +But Lexy had no intention of allowing him to enjoy such a thing. She +felt pretty sure that her time in this house would not be long. She had +caused Dr. Quelton an anxiety that he could not conceal. She had got in +his way. She could not tell whether he had discovered her trick yet, but +the effects were manifest; and if he didn’t know now, he would very +soon, and then-- + +Captain Grey must carry on when she was gone. + +“You’re properly satisfied--with everything?” she went on mercilessly. +“You’re not allowed even to see your sister. No one can see her. You’re +not allowed to call in another doctor.” + +“Even if I’m not properly satisfied,” he answered, “what can I do? In +her husband’s house, you know--I can’t make a row.” + +“Why can’t you?” + +He looked at her, startled and uneasy. Her question was ridiculous. Why +couldn’t he make a row? Simply because he couldn’t; because he wasn’t +that sort; because it wasn’t done; because almost anything was +preferable to making a row. + +“Of course, if you have a blind faith in Dr. Quelton--” she persisted. + +“Well, I haven’t,” he admitted; “but--” + +“Then let’s go upstairs and see her. The doctor has gone out.” + +“But the nurse--” + +“Put on your best commanding officer’s air,” said Lexy. “You can be +awfully impressive when you like. If I were you, there’s nothing I’d +stop at.” + +“Yes, but look here--what can I say to Quelton when he hears about it?” + +“Laugh it off,” said Lexy. + +The idea of Captain Grey trying to laugh off anything made her grin from +ear to ear. + +“Not much of a joke, though, is it?” he said rather stiffly. “Suppose he +hoofs us out of the house?” + +“Oh, dear!” cried Lexy. “You’re not a bit resourceful! Let’s try it, +anyhow. It’s horrible to think of her shut up like that. Perhaps she’s +longing to see you.” + +He rose. + +“Right-o!” he said. “Let’s try it!” + +Together they went up the stairs and down the hall of the other wing, +opposite that in which Lexy’s room was. Captain Grey knocked on a door, +and a quiet, middle-aged little nurse came out. + +“I’ll just pop in to see how my sister’s getting on,” said the young +man, and Lexy silently applauded his toploftical manner. + +“I’m sorry,” said the little nurse, “but Dr. Quelton has given strict +orders--” + +“Er--yes, quite so!” he interrupted suavely. “I shan’t stop a minute.” + +He came nearer, but the nurse drew back and stood with her back against +the door. + +“Dr. Quelton has given strict orders--” she repeated. + +“No more of that, please!” he said with a frown. “I’m going to see Mrs. +Quelton for a moment. Stand aside, please!” + +He did not raise his voice, but the quality of it was oddly changed. +Lexy felt a thrill of pleasure in its cool assurance and authority. +Perhaps he objected very much to “making a row,” but what a glorious row +he could make if he chose! If he would only once face Dr. Quelton like +this! + +“Stand aside, if you please!” he repeated, and the poor little nurse, +very much flustered, did so. + +“I’m afraid Dr. Quelton will be--” she began, but Captain Grey had +already entered the room. + +The nurse followed him, closing the door after her. Lexy opened it at +once and went in after them. She caught a glimpse of the young man and +the nurse vanishing through one of the long windows that led out to the +balcony. For a moment she hesitated, looking about her at the big, dim +room. The dark shades were pulled down, and not a trace of the spring’s +brightness entered here. + +Then she heard Captain Grey’s voice speaking. + +“My dear, my dear!” he said. “Can I do anything in the world for you? My +dear!” + +There was no answer. Lexy crossed the room to the window and looked out. +The balcony, too, was dim, with Venetian blinds drawn down on every +side, and on a narrow cot lay Muriel Quelton. There was a bandage over +her forehead and covering her hair, and under it her face had a mystic +and terrible beauty. She was as white as a ghost, with great dark +circles beneath her eyes; and she was so still--so utterly still--that +Lexy was stricken with terror. + +Captain Grey was sitting beside her in a low chair, holding one of her +lifeless hands, and Lexy saw on his face such anguish as she had never +looked upon before. + +“My dear!” he said again. + +Her weary eyes opened and looked up at him. Then the shadow of a smile +crossed her face. + +“Stay!” she whispered. + +Lexy drew nearer. Tears were running down her cheeks. She tried to read +the nurse’s face, but she could not. + +“How is--she--getting on?” she asked, speaking very low. + +“Lexy!” came a voice from the cot, almost inaudible. “Take it--the top +drawer--of the bureau--for you.” + +“But do you mean--I don’t understand!” cried Lexy. + +“Hush, please!” said the nurse severely. “Mrs. Quelton is not to be +excited.” + +Lexy was silent for a moment. Then, just as she was about to speak, her +quick ear caught a very unwelcome sound--the sound of a horse’s trot. +She turned away and went back through the window into the room. Dr. +Quelton was coming home. She couldn’t wait to find out what Muriel +Quelton had meant. Once more she was compelled to do the best she could +amid a fog of misunderstanding. + +“Lexy--take it--the top drawer--of the bureau--for you.” + +That was what she thought Mrs. Quelton had said, and she acted upon that +premise. She crossed the room to the bureau, and opened the top drawer. +In the dim light that filled the shuttered room she could not see very +clearly; but, as far as she could ascertain, there was nothing in the +drawer except some neatly folded silk stockings, a satin glove case, +some little odds and ends of ribbons, and a pile of handkerchiefs. She +looked into the glove case--nothing there but gloves. There was nothing +hidden away among the stockings, nothing among the ribbons. + +She heard the front door close and a step begin to mount the stairs, +deliberate and heavy, in the quiet house. In haste she went at the pile +of handkerchiefs. There were dozens of them, all of fine white linen, +all with a “2” embroidered in one corner--very uninteresting +handkerchiefs, Lexy thought; but halfway through the pile she came upon +one that she had seen before. + +It was so familiar to her that at first she was not startled or even +surprised. It was a handkerchief that she had embroidered for Caroline +Enderby. + +She took it up and looked at it with a frown. Then she heard Dr. +Quelton’s step in the hall outside. She tucked the handkerchief in her +belt, and tried to close the drawer, but it stuck. Her heart was beating +wildly, her knees felt weak. He would find her there, like a thief! + +But the footsteps went on past the door. She waited for a moment, and +then went noiselessly across to the door, opened it, looked up and down +the empty corridor, and ran, like a hare, back to her own room. + +Caroline’s handkerchief! Was that what Mrs. Quelton had meant her to +find? Or had she discovered it by accident? Did it mean that Mrs. +Quelton was at heart her ally? Or was this little square of linen all +that was left of Caroline? + +Lexy took it out of her belt and looked at it again, and her tears fell +on it. Whatever else it might imply, it told her clearly enough that her +friend _had been there_. Poor Caroline--the helpless little captive who +had left her prison to be lost in the strange world outside--had come +here, and she had brought with her the handkerchief that Lexy had +embroidered for her. It had come now into Lexy’s hand, a mute and +pitiful emissary, whose message she could not understand. + +“What shall I do?” she thought. “Oh, what must I do? Perhaps it’s time +for the police. Perhaps, if I show this to Captain Grey, he’ll believe +me. There must be some one, somewhere, who’ll believe me and help me!” + +There was a knock at the door. + +“Yes?” she said. + +“Open the door!” ordered Dr. Quelton’s voice. + +“No!” Lexy promptly replied. + +She put the handkerchief inside her blouse and stood facing the closed +door, with her hands clenched. Now he knew! + +She heard him laugh quietly. + +“Perhaps you’re right,” he said. “It is better, perhaps, for us not to +meet again. Even making every allowance for your hysterical, unbalanced +mind, I find it difficult to excuse this latest manifestation which I +have just this moment discovered. It was you, of course, who filled that +bottle with water?” + +She did not answer. + +“Why you did it, I don’t know,” he went on, “and probably you don’t know +yourself. It was the wanton mischief of an irresponsible child, but the +consequences in this instance are serious--very serious. Mrs. Quelton +will suffer for them. I doubt if she will recover. No, Miss Moran, you +are too troublesome a guest. You had better go--at once!” + +“All right!” said Lexy, in a defiant but trembling voice. + +“At once!” he repeated. “I shall send your bag this afternoon.” + + +XX + +“I don’t care!” said Lexy to herself, “I’ll come back!” + +She did not wish to have her bag sent after her. She packed it in great +haste, put on her hat and coat, and, opening the door of her room, +stepped out cautiously and looked up and down the corridor. There was no +one in sight, so she picked up her bag and set forth. + +She was running away--worse than that, she was being driven away; but +just at the moment she could see no other course open to her. She could +not appeal to Captain Grey while he was in such distracting anxiety +about his sister. It would be cruel, and it would be useless. What could +he do? If Dr. Quelton did not want her in his house, certainly his +brother-in-law could not insist upon her staying. + +“No!” she reflected. “He would only think it was his duty as a gentleman +to leave with me, and he would be miserable, not knowing what became of +his sister. I’ve got to go, that’s all; but, by jiminy, I’ll come back! +And then we’ll see how much more wanton mischief this irresponsible +child can manage!” + +There was in her heart a steady flame of anger. Hatred was not natural +to her, but her feeling for Dr. Quelton came dangerously near to it. For +Caroline’s disappearance, for Mrs. Quelton’s pitiful state, for her own +humiliation and suffering, she held him responsible; and she meant to +settle that score. + +She met no one on her way through the house. She went down the stairs, +opened the door, and stepped out into the dazzling sunshine. It was a +warm day, her bag was very heavy, and the three-mile walk to Mrs. +Royce’s was not inviting. It had to be done, however, and off she +started. + +The lane was thick with dust, and it was hard walking with that heavy +bag, but she went on at a smart pace as long as she thought any one +could possibly see her from the cupola. Then she set down the bag and +rested for a moment. + +“There’s a certain way to carry things without strain,” she thought. “I +read about it in a magazine. You use the muscles of your back, or your +shoulders, or something.” + +But she couldn’t remember how this was to be done; so, picking up the +bag in her usual way, went on again. Obviously her way was a very wrong +way, for by the time she had reached the end of the lane her fingers +were cramped and painful, and her arms ached; and there was the highway, +stretching endlessly before her under the hot noonday sun--two miles of +it or more. There was no reasonable chance of a taxi, and she knew no +one in the neighborhood who might come driving by. There was nothing in +sight but a man walking along the road toward her, and that didn’t +interest her. + +She went on as far as she could, and then stopped under a tree, to rub +her stiffening arms. + +“I wonder,” she thought, “if I could hide this darned old bag somewhere, +and send Joe for it later!” + +But her nicest clothes were in it, and the risk was too great. With a +resentful sigh she lifted it and stepped out again. The man coming along +the road was quite close to her now. She stopped short, and so did he. + +“Lexy!” he shouted, and came toward her on a run, with a wide grin on +his sunburned face. + +She dropped the bag with a thump, and stood waiting for him. He held out +both hands, and she took them. + +“Oh, golly!” she cried. “I’m so glad you’ve come, Mr. Houseman!” + +“So am I!” he said. “Ever since I got that last letter from you--” + +“Last! I only wrote one.” + +“Well, I got two,” he told her. “The second one came yesterday, about +this doctor, and the roses, you know.” + +“Mrs. Royce must have posted it!” said Lexy. “I wrote it, but I didn’t +mean it to be sent to you unless something happened to me.” + +“Enough has happened to you already!” + +“More things are going to happen,” said she. “Lots more!” + +It suddenly occurred to her that the proper moment had come for +withdrawing her hands from Mr. Houseman’s firm grasp. Indeed, she +thought the proper moment might already have passed, and a warm color +came into her cheeks. + +The young man flushed a little himself. + +“I didn’t mean to call you that,” he said; “but Caroline used to write a +lot about you, and she always called you ‘Lexy,’ so I got into the way +of thinking of you--like that.” + +“I don’t mind,” Lexy conceded. + +There was a moment’s silence. + +“Charles is my name,” he observed. + +Another silence. + +“Queer, isn’t it?” he said seriously. “Here we’ve only seen each other +once, and yet somehow it seems to me as if I’d known you for years!” + +“Well, the circumstances are rather unusual,” said Lexy. + +“You’re right! But look here--we’ve got to talk about all this. Where +were you going?” + +“Back to Mrs. Royce’s.” + +“Let’s go!” he said cheerfully, and picked up the bag as if it were +nothing at all. + +“But where were _you_ going?” asked Lexy. + +“To find you. You see, we ran into some awfully bad weather, and the +engines broke down, and we came back for repairs; so I got your letters. +I explained to the old man that I’d have to have leave, for some very +important business, and off I came to Wyngate. Your Mrs. Royce told me +you’d gone out to the Queltons’. I didn’t like that. Why did you go +there, after what had happened?” + +“I’ll tell you all about that later,” said Lexy; “but now you’ve got to +tell me things. How did you ever meet Caroline? How in the world did she +manage to write to you?” + +“Well, you see, I met her about a year ago, on board the Ormond. She and +her parents were coming back from France, and I was third officer, you +know. Her mother and father were seasick most of the time, so we had a +chance to--to talk to each other; and, you see--” + +“Yes, I see!” said Lexy gently. + +“One of the servants--a girl called Annie--used to post Caroline’s +letters for her, and I used to write to her in care of Annie’s mother. +We never had a chance to meet again, after that trip. I wanted to come +to the house and see her people, but she said it wasn’t any use; and +from what I saw of them on the Ormond I dare say she was right. I +wouldn’t have suited them. I haven’t any money, you know--nothing but my +pay; but it was enough for us to live on. Other fellows manage!” + +He was silent for a moment. + +“After all,” he said, “I’m not a beggar. I can hold my own pretty well +in the world, and I could look after a wife.” + +“I know it!” cried Lexy, with vehemence. She felt curiously touched by +his words, and quite indignant against the Enderbys and any one else who +did not appreciate him. + +“I asked Caroline to marry me,” he went on. “I told her I couldn’t give +her much, but we could have had a jolly sort of life. Look here! Are you +crying?” + +“A little bit,” Lexy admitted; “but don’t pay any attention to it. Go +on!” + +“That’s about all there is. She said she would meet me here in Wyngate, +because that’s the nearest station of the main line to some little place +where a nurse or a governess of hers lived.” + +“Miss Craigie!” + +“Never heard the name. Anyhow, she wanted to go there after we got +married, and--I wish you wouldn’t look like that!” + +“But I’m so _awfully_ sorry for you!” + +“It was pretty hard, at first,” he said; “but--well, you see, I’ve +thought a bit about it, and after all I’m glad we didn’t get married.” + +“Oh!” cried Lexy, profoundly shocked. “But that’s--” + +“Because I--you see, she didn’t--well, I don’t think she really liked me +very much.” + +Lexy was astounded. + +“Fact!” said he. “What she wanted was romance, and all that sort of +thing. She wanted to get away from home, and I was the only chance she +had; so there you are!” + +“That wasn’t very fair to you!” + +“I don’t blame her,” he said thoughtfully. “We were both--but what’s the +sense of talking about all that? The thing is to find her!” + +Lexy agreed to that promptly. + +“Now I’ll tell you everything that’s happened,” she said. + +He listened to her with alert attention. He interrupted her often to ask +questions, but they were always questions that she could answer. He +wanted all the facts, and what Lexy told him he unquestioningly accepted +as fact. When she said she had seen Caroline at the doctor’s house, he +believed her. He didn’t suggest that her eyes might have deceived her. +He trusted her--not only her good intentions, but her good sense. + +At last she came to the part of her story about which she was most +doubtful--the episode of the emptied bottle. She told it with +reluctance. + +“I don’t know now,” she said. “Perhaps I did wrong. Perhaps that really +was wanton mischief. I did so hate that horrible drug that changed her +so! When I did it, it seemed right; but now--” + +“It was right,” said he. “Any one’s better off dead than being drugged. +Everything you’ve done was right and splendid. You’re the pluckiest girl +I ever heard of--the best and most loyal little pal to poor Caroline! +There’s no one like you!” + +After Mrs. Enderby’s cold and skeptical smile, after Dr. Quelton’s +parting sneer, after Captain Grey’s doubts and uncertainties, this +speech rather went to Lexy’s head. The world seemed a different place. +She glanced at the young man, and he happened at that moment to be +looking at her. They both looked away hastily. + +“This fellow--this Captain Grey,” said Charles. “He seems to me to be +rather a chump!” + +“Oh, he’s not!” protested Lexy. “He’s as nice as can be!” + +Charles Houseman, who had believed everything that Lexy had said, did +not appear convinced of this; and for some inexplicable reason Lexy was +not greatly displeased by his lack of belief. + + +XXI + +Mrs. Royce was very much pleased to see her pet, Miss Moran, return. She +was well disposed toward Mr. Houseman, too, and willingly agreed to put +him up for a few days. She set to work at once to cook a good lunch for +them, but she did not hum under her breath, as was her usual habit. In +fact, she was greatly perplexed and worried. + +When her guests were seated at the table, she retired, leaving them +alone; but she did not go very far. She remained close to the door, so +that she could look through the crack. She observed that Miss Moran +seemed very lively and cheerful with this newcomer--though she had been +quite as lively and cheerful with Captain Grey. + +“Well, I don’t know, I’m sure!” said Mrs. Royce to herself, with a sigh. +“It beats _me_!” + +For the question which so troubled her was--which young man was _the_ +young man? + +“Both of ’em as nice, polite young fellers as you’d want to see,” she +repeated. “T’ other one’s handsomer, but he’s kind of foreignlike and +gloomy. This one’s got more gumption. The way he walked in here, smart +as a whip, and asked for Miss Moran, an’ when I says she’s gone to visit +the Queltons, why, off he went, after her! I like a man with gumption!” + +So did Miss Moran. Charles Houseman seemed to her the only living, +vigorous creature in a world of ghosts, the only one whom she could +really understand. There were no shadowy corners about him. He was +altogether honest, direct, and uncomplicated. He had no tact and no +caution. He had come now, in the midst of this wretched tangle, and she +completely believed that he would cut the Gordian knot. + +He had suggested that they should let the subject drop for a time. + +“I think I’ve got the facts straight,” he said; “and now I want to think +them over a bit. Let’s take a walk, and talk about something else.” + +Lexy agreed to the entire program. If she was tired, she either didn’t +know it, or she forgot it in the joy of this beautifully careless +companionship. She could say exactly what came into her head to Charles +Houseman. He understood her. He was interested in every word she spoke, +and, what is more, she was aware of the profound admiration that +underlay his interest. He thought she was wonderful, and that made her +strangely happy. + +“Do you know,” he said, “the first time I saw you, there in the park, +I--I liked the way you talked to me!” + +“How?” asked Lexy, with great interest. “I thought I must have seemed +awfully irritating and mysterious.” + +He grinned. + +“You were awfully mad when I spoke to you,” he said; “but I liked that. +I don’t know--somehow you made me think of Joan of Arc.” + +“Me?” cried Lexy. “With freckles, and such a temper? You couldn’t +imagine me listening to angels, could you?” + +“Yes,” he said, “I could.” + +She glanced at him to see if he was laughing, but he was not. His eyes +met hers with a quiet and steady look. + +“I didn’t need to imagine much,” he said. “You’ve told me what you’ve +been through, and I can see for myself what you are. I don’t think there +ever was another girl like you!” + +“Nonsense!” said Lexy, looking away. “I’m just pig-headed--that’s all.” + +They had wandered across the fields until they came to a little river, +running clear and swift under the elm trees. By tacit consent they sat +down on the bank. They didn’t talk much. Houseman skipped stones with +skill and earnest attention, and Lexy watched the minnows flitting past +through the limpid water. The sky was an unclouded blue. The sunlight +came through the branches, where the leaves were scarcely unfolded, and +made little golden sparkles on the hurrying current. It was all so +quiet--and yet it wasn’t peaceful. The world seemed too young, too +warmly and joyously alive, for peace. The spring was waiting in +eagerness for the summer. This still, fresh, sunlit day was only an +interlude. + +Casually, Houseman told her a good deal about himself. + +“From Baltimore,” he said. “My people wanted me to go into the navy. My +father and grandfather were both navy, but I couldn’t see it. Too cut +and dried! I’m on a cargo steamer now, and I like it.” + +And this information--with the additional facts that he was twenty-six, +that he had two brothers in the navy and three married sisters, and that +both of his parents were living--was all that he had to give about +himself. Lexy was satisfied. There he was, and any one with eyes to see +and ears to listen could understand him. Honest, blunt, and careless, +fearing nothing, shirking nothing, and facing life with cheerful +unconcern, he was, she thought, a comrade and an ally without an equal. + +The sun was setting when they turned homeward. The sky was swimming in +soft, pale colors, and a little breeze blew, stirring the new leaves. It +was a poetic and even a melancholy hour; but Houseman found nothing +better to say than that he was hungry. + +“So am I!” said Lexy. + +They looked at each other as if they had discovered still another bond +between them. They were happy--so happy! + +Mrs. Royce saw them from the kitchen window. They were strolling along +leisurely, side by side. They were quite composed and matter-of-fact, +and their desultory conversation was upon the subject of shellfish. The +young Baltimorean was an authority on oysters, but Lexy, as a New +Englander, had something to say on the subject of clam chowder. + +Mrs. Royce was suddenly enlightened. + +“_He’s_ the one!” she said to herself. “Well, I’m real glad, I’m sure!” + +So glad was she that she at once began to make a superb chocolate cake, +and she hummed a song about a young man on Springfield Mountain, who +killed a “pesky sarpent.” + +George Grey heard her. He was in the sitting room, smoking, and +apparently reading a book; but he never turned a page. He lit one +cigarette after another, and his hand was steady. He looked as he always +looked--fastidiously neat, self-possessed, and a little haughty; but in +spirit he was suffering horribly. + +Lexy knew that as soon as she saw him, because she knew him and liked +him so well. She held out her hand to him, not even pretending to smile, +but searching his face with an anxious and friendly glance. + +“Here’s Mr. Houseman, Caroline Enderby’s _fiancé_,” she said. “I’ve told +him the whole thing, so if there’s anything new--” + +Captain Grey stiffened perceptibly. He couldn’t see what possible +connection anybody’s _fiancé_ could have with his affairs. He shook +hands with Houseman, but not very nicely; and Houseman was not +excessively cordial. + +Lexy took no notice of this nonsense. Her mood of happy confidence had +passed now, and the dark and mysterious shadow had come back. There was +something of greater importance to think about than her personal +affairs. + +“Captain Grey,” she said, with a sort of directness, “I didn’t tell you +before, but I’m going to tell you now. I saw Caroline in that house, and +this morning I found--this.” + +He looked at the handkerchief, and then at Lexy. + +“But--” he began. + +“It means that she’s been there, or that she’s there now,” Lexy went on. +“It’s time we found out. Of course, I know how you feel about Dr. +Quelton. He’s your sister’s husband, and you didn’t want--” + +“It doesn’t make much difference now,” he said. “If you’ll wait a day or +so, she--” + +He turned away abruptly, and took out his cigarette case. + +“What do you mean?” cried Lexy. + +“It won’t be long,” he said quietly. “She--my sister--he says it won’t +be more than twenty-four hours, at the most.” + +“Oh, no! It can’t be! Captain Grey, don’t believe him!” + +“I tried not to,” he said. “I--well, we had a bit of a row, and I made +him let me bring in another doctor from the village here. He said the +same thing.” + +“What did the doctor say it was?” asked Houseman. + +“Pernicious anæmia. There’s nothing to be done.” + +Captain Grey seemed to find some difficulty in lighting his cigarette; +but when he had done so, and had drawn in a deep breath, he turned back +toward Lexy with a smile that startled her. She had never imagined he +could look like that. It was a wolfish kind of smile, lighting his dark +face with a sort of savage mirth. + +“When it’s over,” he said, “I’ll be very pleased to help you to hang +him, if you can; or I’ll wring his neck myself.” + +The other two stared at him in silence for a moment. + +“You think he’s--” Houseman began. + +“I don’t know whether he has actually murdered her or not,” said Captain +Grey; “but he has destroyed her--utterly wasted and ruined her life. He +taught her to take that damned drug; and when Miss Moran broke the +bottle--” + +“Oh! Did he tell you?” + +“He did. He says you’ve killed her. There was some rare drug in it that +he can’t get for a fortnight or so, and she can’t live without it.” + +“Captain Grey!” she cried, white to the lips. “I didn’t--” + +“I know,” he said gently. “You meant to help, and I’m glad you did it. +She’s better dead. This afternoon, for a little while, she was--herself. +She talked to me. She was very weak, but she was herself. She asked me +to help her not to take it again. She thought she was getting better. +Then that”--he paused--“that damned brute brought in a lawyer, so that +she could make her will. She couldn’t believe it. She looked up at me. +‘Oh, I’m not going to _die_, am I?’ she said. Before I could answer her, +he told her she must be prepared. Then I--” + +Again he turned away. + +“And you let him alone?” inquired Houseman. + +“It’s not time to settle with him--yet,” said the other. “That’s why I +came away, because I don’t want to kill him--yet. She’s unconscious now. +She will be, until it’s finished. I’m going back later, but I wanted to +come here--” He ceased speaking. “To you,” his eyes said to Lexy. + +She forgot everything else, then, except this tormented and suffering +human being who had turned to her for comfort. She pushed him gently +down into a chair, and seated herself on the arm of it. She took both +his hands and patted them, while she racked her brain for the right +thing to say. + +“We’ll do _something_!” she said. “There’s no reason to be in despair. +That young country doctor was probably entirely under the influence of +Dr. Quelton. We’ll get some one else. We’ll telephone to one of the big +hospitals in New York and find out who’s the very best man, and well get +him out here. Mr. Houseman will ring up--” + +But Mr. Houseman had disappeared. Worse still, Mrs. Royce’s telephone +was out of order. + +“Never mind!” said Lexy. “We’ll have a nice hot cup of tea, and then +well go to the grocery store. There’s a telephone there.” + +She made the captain drink his tea and eat a little. Then she ran +upstairs for her hat; and she was very angry at Charles Houseman for +running away. + + +XXII + +They set off together down the village street. There was no one about at +that hour. All Wyngate was partaking of its Sunday night supper within +doors, and one or two of the little wooden houses showed lights in the +front windows; but for the most part life was concentrated in the +kitchen. + +The drug store was locked, but a dim light was burning inside, and a +vigorous ringing of the night bell brought Mr. Binz, the owner, to open +the door. He was deeply interested in their errand. He suggested St. +Luke’s Hospital, for the reason that he had once been there himself, and +therefore held it almost sacred. + +“But,” he said, in his slow and impressive way, “if I was you, I’d ring +up Doc Quelton first, and find out how things are going up there; +because you may find out--” + +Lexy interrupted him hastily, for she didn’t want him to say what he +evidently wished to say. + +“There won’t be any change in Mrs. Quelton,” she said. “It would only be +a waste of time.” + +It was not so much for that poor woman, who she feared was beyond hope, +that she wanted the New York specialist, as for Captain Grey. It would +help him so much to feel that something was being done, that some one +was hurrying out here! + +“Might be more of a waste of time,” said Mr. Binz, “if some one was to +come all the way out here after she--” + +“Oh, all right!” cried Lexy impatiently. Then suddenly she remembered. +“They haven’t any telephone at the doctor’s house,” she said. + +“Suppose I go out there first, and see?” suggested Captain Grey. + +“No!” said Lexy. “Don’t!” + +But the idea impressed him as a good one, and go he would. + +“I’d rather see how she is, first,” he repeated. “If there’s no change, +I’ll come back.” + +Lexy looked at Mr. Binz with an angry and reproachful frown, which the +poor man did not understand. He had only wanted to give helpful advice. + +“Come on, then!” she said to Captain Grey. + +“I’ll leave you at Mrs. Royce’s,” he told her. + +“No, you won’t!” she contradicted with a trace of severity. “If you +_will_ go, I’m going with you!” + +He protested against this, but she would not listen, and so they went to +the garage for Joe’s taxi; but Joe and his taxi had gone out. An +interested bystander said that they could get a “rig” from the livery +stable with no trouble at all. They had only to find the proprietor, and +he, in turn, would find the driver, who would harness up the horse. + +“No, thanks,” said Captain Grey. He turned to Lexy. “I can’t wait,” he +told her. “I’m going to walk. Thank you for--” + +“I can walk, too,” said Lexy. “It’s only three miles.” + +“I don’t want you to, Miss Moran.” + +“I’m coming anyhow,” she replied. + +For that instinct in her, the thing which was beyond reason, drove her +forward. She could not let him go alone. She had walked that three miles +once before to-day, and she had walked farther than that with Houseman +in the afternoon. She was tired, terribly tired, and filled with a +queer, sick reluctance to approach that sinister house again; but she +had to go. She had said to herself that morning that she was coming +back, and now she was going to do so. + +They did not try to talk much on the way. What had they to say? They +were both filled with a dread foreboding. They hurried, yet they wished +never to come to the end of the journey. + +They turned down the lane, leaving the lights of the highway behind, and +went forward in thick darkness, under the shadow of the trees. The sound +of the sea came to them--the loneliest sound in all the world. + +“There’s a light in the house, anyhow!” said Lexy suddenly. + +Her own voice sounded so small, so pert, so futile, in the dark, that +she felt no surprise when Captain Grey showed a faint trace of +impatience in answering. + +“Naturally!” he said. + +Only, to her, it did not seem natural, that one little light shining out +through the glass of the front door. It would be more natural, she +thought, if there were only the darkness and the sound of the sea. + +They turned into the drive. Their footsteps sounded strangely and +terribly loud on the gravel, and became as sharp as pistol shots when +they mounted the veranda. The captain rang the bell, and the sound of it +ran through the house like a shudder; but no one came. He rang again and +again, but nothing stirred inside the house. He knocked on the glass, +and they waited, looking into the bright and empty hall; but no one +came. + +Captain Grey turned the knob, the door opened, and they went in. The +door of the library was open, showing only darkness. The stairs ran up +into darkness. Nothing moved, nothing stirred. Then, suddenly, a little +breeze rose, and the front door slammed with a crash behind them. Lexy +cried out, and caught the young man’s arm. + +“Don’t be afraid!” he said; but his face was ashen. For a moment they +stood where they were. “Miss Moran,” he went on, “would you rather wait +here while I go upstairs?” + +“No,” said Lexy. “I’ll come with you.” + +He started up the stairs, and she followed him closely. At almost every +step she looked behind her, and she did not know which was the more +horrible to her, the brightly lit hall or the darkness before them. +Suppose she saw some one in the hall behind them! + +Captain Grey did not once glance behind. He went on steadily. When he +reached the top of the flight, he took a box of matches from his pocket +and lit the gas. There was the long corridor, with the row of closed +doors. He turned down in the direction of Mrs. Quelton’s room, but Lexy +touched him on the shoulder. + +“I think you had better let me go first,” she suggested. “Perhaps she +won’t be ready to see you.” + +Their eyes met. + +“Thank you, Lexy!” he said simply, and went on again. + +He had never used her name before. He was trying to tell her that he +understood what she had wished to do for him. She had offered to go +first, alone, into the silent room, to see whatever might be there--to +spare him something, if she could. + +But he would not have it so. He stopped outside the door, and knocked +twice. Then he went in. + +It was dark and still in there, with the night wind blowing in through +the open windows. He struck a match and lit the gas. The room was empty. + +He went across to the long windows and out on the balcony. There was no +gas connection there. He struck one match after another, and went from +one end of the balcony to the other. There was nothing. + +“Not here!” he said, in a dazed, flat voice. + +Lexy could not speak at all. She had come out on the balcony, and stood +beside him. The sound of the sea was loud in her ears--or was it the +beating of her own heart? She held her breath and strained her eyes in +the darkness. + +“There’s--something--here!” she whispered tensely. + +“No!” he said aloud. “I looked. Come! We’ll go through the house.” + +She followed close at his heels. He went into every room, lit the gas, +looked about, and found nothing. Lexy grew confused with the opening and +closing of doors, the sudden flare of light in the darkness, the +succession of empty rooms. + +He went up into the cupola. Nothing there, nor in the servants’ rooms. +Then downstairs, through the long library, the dining room, the sitting +room, the kitchen, the pantry. He proceeded with a sort of merciless +deliberation, opened every door, looked into every cupboard. + +Finding a stable lantern in the kitchen, he lighted it and carried it +with him. The door to the cellar stood open. He went through it, down +the steep wooden stairs, and Lexy followed him. + +To her exhausted and frightened gaze the cellar seemed enormous--as vast +and august as some great ancient tomb. The lantern made a little pool of +light, and outside it the shadows closed in on them thickly. She came +near to him and caught him by the sleeve. + +“Oh, let’s go away!” she cried. “Let’s go away! We’ve looked--” + +“This is the last place,” he said gently. “After this, we’ll give it +up.” + +Fighting down the sick terror that had come over her, she walked beside +him in the little circle of light, and tried not to look at the shadows. + +“What’s that?” he exclaimed. + +“Oh, what?” she cried. + +He went back a few paces and set down the lantern. Then he advanced +again and bent over, staring at the floor. + +“Do you see?” he asked. + +She did see. A narrow strip of light lay along the floor. + +“It comes up from below,” he said. “There must be a subcellar. Let’s +see!” + +He brought back the lantern and examined the floor by its light, going +down on his hands and knees. + +“Stand back!” he said suddenly. “It’s a trapdoor. See--here’s a ring to +lift it.” + +Captain Grey pulled at the ring, but nothing happened. + +“I’m on the wrong side,” he said. + +Moving over, he pulled again, and a square of stone lifted. A clear +light came from below, showing a short ladder clamped to the floor. + +“Stay there, please,” he told Lexy. “You have the lantern. I shan’t be a +minute.” + +But as soon as he had reached the foot of the ladder, Lexy climbed down +after him; and just at the same moment, they saw-- + +They were standing in a tiny room with roughly mortared walls. A +powerful electric torch stood on end in one corner, and at their feet +lay the body of a man, face downward across a wooden chest. It was Dr. +Quelton. + +With a violent effort Captain Grey lifted the doctor’s heavy shoulder, +while Lexy covered her eyes. She knew that he was dead. No living thing +could lie so. + +Her head swam, her knees gave way, and she tottered back against the +wall, half fainting, when the captain’s voice rang out, with a note of +agony and despair that she never forgot. + +“My God! My God!” he wailed. “Oh, Muriel!” + +She opened her eyes. For a moment she was too giddy to see. Then, as her +vision cleared, she saw him on his knees beside the chest. + +Not a chest--it was a coffin; and on it was a strange little plate +glittering like gold, with an inscription: + + MURIEL QUELTON + + BELOVED WIFE OF PAUL QUELTON + + +XXIII + +When she looked back upon the experiences of that dreadful night, it +seemed to Lexy that both she and her companion displayed almost +incredible endurance. Since morning they had lived through a very +lifetime of emotion, to end now in this tragedy more horrible than +anything they could have feared. + +Yet, not five minutes after his cry of agony, Captain Grey had recovered +his self-control. He was able to speak quietly to Lexy, and she was able +to answer him no less quietly. + +“We’d better go,” he said. “We can do nothing here. It’s a case for the +police now.” + +“I’ve got to go back to the balcony,” Lexy told him. “There was +something there.” + +“Very well!” he agreed, and, without another word or a backward glance, +he went up the ladder. + +They returned through the house. He had left the lights burning and the +doors open, so that there was a monstrous air of festivity in the +emptiness. They went into Mrs. Quelton’s room again, and crossed through +it to the balcony. He carried the lantern with him, and by its steady +yellow flame they could see into every corner. There was the couch upon +which she had lain--disarranged, as if she had just risen from it. There +was a little table with medicine bottles on it. All the usual things +were in the usual places. + +“Nothing here,” said Captain Grey. + +Lexy was sure, however, that there was. She stepped to the balcony +railing, to look down into the garden below, and there, on the white +paint of the railing, she found something. + +“Look!” she said, in a matter-of-fact voice. “What’s this?” + +He came to her side. + +“It’s the print of a hand,” he said. “In blood, I should imagine.” + +For a moment they stared at the ghastly mark, a strange evidence of pain +and violence in this quiet place. + +“We’d better look in the garden,” he suggested. + +They went down. The grass beneath the balcony was beaten down in one +place, but there was nothing else. Some one had come and gone. They +could not even guess who it had been. They knew nothing. + +“Come, Lexy!” the captain said. + +They both turned for one last look at the accursed house, blazing with +spectral lights. Then they set off, away from it, over that weary road +again. + +“There’s no police station in the village, is there?” he asked. + +“I’ve never seen one, but I’ve heard Mrs. Royce talk about the +constable. Anyhow, she can tell us.” + +“Yes,” he said, and was silent for a moment. “Rather a pity, isn’t it,” +he went on, “that there has to be--all that? Because it doesn’t matter +now. It’s finished. Better if the house burned down to-night!” + +In her heart Lexy agreed with him. She had no curiosity left, and +scarcely any interest. As he had said, it was finished. She wanted to +rest, not to speak, not to think, not to remember; but it couldn’t be +so. They would both have to tell what they had seen, to answer +questions. It wasn’t enough that two people lay dead in that house of +horror. All the world, which knew and cared nothing about them, must +have a full explanation. + +“I suppose we couldn’t wait till morning?” she suggested. + +He took her hand and drew it through his arm. + +“You’re worn out,” he told her. “It’s altogether wrong. There’s no +reason why you should be troubled any more, Lexy. Slip into the house +quietly, and get to bed and to sleep. Nobody need know that you went +there.” + +“No!” she said. “We’ll see it through together.” + +The thought of Charles Houseman came to her, but she disowned it with a +listless sort of resentment. She felt, somehow, that he had failed her. +He had not been there when she needed him. He had not taken his part in +this ghastly and unforgetable sight. + +There was a light in Mrs. Royce’s front parlor. Perhaps he was in there, +waiting for her, cheerful and cool, a thousand miles away from the +nightmare world in which she had been moving. She did not want to see +him or speak to him just now. He hadn’t seen. He wouldn’t understand. + +Captain Grey opened the gate, and they went up the flagged walk. Before +they had mounted the veranda steps, the front door was flung wide, and +Mrs. Royce appeared. + +“Oh, my goodness!” she cried. “I thought you’d never come!” + +Her tone and her manner were so strange that they both stopped and +stared at her. + +“Oh, my goodness!” she cried again. “Oh, _do_ come in! I don’t know what +to do with her, I’m sure!” + +“Who?” asked Lexy. + +“Poor Mis’ Quelton. There she is, lyin’ upstairs--” + +“Mrs. _Quelton_?” + +“Joe, he brought her in his taxi, jest a little while after you’d gone.” + +“Brought Mrs. Quelton here?” + +“Brought her here and carried her up them very stairs,” declared Mrs. +Royce impressively; “right up into the east bedroom, and there she +lies!” + +She stood aside, and Lexy and Captain Grey entered the house. The young +man turned aside into the parlor, sank into a chair, and covered his +face with his hands. Lexy stood beside him, looking down at his bent +head, her face haggard and white. + +“Why did Joe do that?” she asked. + +“Don’t ask _me_, Miss Moran!” replied Mrs. Royce. “It beats me!” + +There was a silence. + +“But ain’t you going upstairs to see what she wants?” inquired Mrs. +Royce anxiously. + +Captain Grey sprang to his feet. + +“Good God!” he shouted. “What are you talking about?” + +Mrs. Royce backed into a corner, regarding him with alarm. + +“I jest thought you’d like to talk to her,” she faltered. + +“Do you mean she’s _not dead_?” + +“Dead? Oh, my goodness gracious me!” cried Mrs. Royce. “I never--” + +“Wait here,” Lexy told the captain. + +“No!” he replied. “I must--” + +But, disregarding him, Lexy turned to Mrs. Royce. + +“Let me see her,” she said. + +Mrs. Royce led the way upstairs. She went at an unusual rate of speed, +so that she was panting when she reached the top. + +“Kind of vi’lent!” she whispered, pointing downstairs, where Captain +Grey was. + +“This room?” asked Lexy. “Shall I go in?” + +“Well,” said Mrs. Royce, “seems to me I’d knock, if I was you.” + +Knock on the door of the room where Mrs. Quelton lay? Knock, and expect +an answer from that voice? It seemed to Lexy, for a moment, that she +could not raise her hand. + +But she did. She knocked, and she was answered. She turned the handle +and went in. An oil lamp stood on the bureau, and outside the circle of +its mellow light, in the shadow, Mrs. Quelton was sitting on the edge of +the bed; and it seemed to Lexy that she had never seen such a forlorn +and pitiful figure. + +“Oh, my dear!” she cried impulsively, and held out her arms. + +Mrs. Quelton rose. She came toward Lexy, her hands outstretched--when a +sudden cry from Mrs. Royce arrested her. + +“But that ain’t Mrs. Quelton!” cried the landlady. + + +XXIV + +If Lexy had not caught the unhappy woman, she would have fallen; but +those sturdy young arms held her, and, with Mrs. Royce’s help, they got +her on the bed. White as a ghost, incredibly frail in her black dress, +she lay there, scarcely seeming to breathe. + +“It _ain’t_ Mrs. Quelton!” repeated Mrs. Royce, in a whisper. + +“I know!” said Lexy softly. “Will you get me water and a towel, please?” + +Mrs. Royce went out of the room, and Lexy knelt down beside the bed. She +did know now--the woman whom they had all called Muriel Quelton was +really Caroline Enderby. + +Lexy did not blame herself for not having known before. Looking at that +face now, in its terrible stillness, she could trace the familiar +features easily enough, but how changed! How worn and lined, how _old_! +The brows, the lashes, the soft, disordered hair, were black now instead +of brown; but that merely physical alteration was of no significance, +compared with that other awful change. It was Caroline Enderby, the +gentle and pitifully inexperienced girl of nineteen, but it was Mrs. +Quelton, too, that tragic and somber figure. + +Mrs. Royce came back with a basin of water, clean towels, and a precious +bottle of eau de Cologne. + +“Poor lamb!” she whispered. “Ain’t she pretty?” + +Lexy wet a towel and passed it over that unconscious face again and +again. Mrs. Royce watched, spellbound; for the dark and haggard stranger +was passing away before her very eyes, and some one else was coming into +life--some one quite young and-- + +The closed lids fluttered, and then opened. + +“Lexy!” murmured the metamorphosed one. + +“I’m here, Caroline!” said Lexy, with a stifled sob. “Everything’s all +right, dear! Don’t worry--just rest!” + +“I can’t, Lexy! I can’t!” she answered, and from her eyes, now closed +again, tears came running slowly down her cheeks. + +“Yes, you can!” said Lexy. “We’ll--” + +“Supposing I get her some nice hot soup?” whispered Mrs. Royce, and, at +a nod from Lexy, she was off again. + +Caroline reached out and caught Lexy’s hand. + +“Oh, Lexy, Lexy!” she said. “Can you ever forgive me?” + +“No!” her friend replied cheerfully. “Never! But don’t bother now. You +can tell me later, when you feel better.” + +“I’ll never, never feel better till I’ve told you! Oh, Lexy, I knew +yesterday, and I didn’t tell you! Oh, Lexy, Lexy, I don’t understand! I +want to tell you! I want you to help me!” + +A flush had come into her cheeks. She was growing painfully excited. She +tried to sit up, but Lexy firmly prevented that. + +“Lie down, darling!” she said. “We’ll get a doctor.” + +“No! No! I’m not ill--not ill, Lexy, only tired. Oh, you don’t know! You +won’t let _him_ come here, Lexy?” + +“I promise you he’ll never trouble you again,” replied Lexy quietly. + +She saw Captain Grey standing in the doorway, behind the head of the +bed. She glanced at him, and then at Caroline again. Let him stay! +Whatever had happened, he ought to know. + +“I don’t understand,” said Caroline, clinging fast to Lexy’s hand. “I +want to tell you--all of it. You know, Lexy, I did a horrible, wretched +thing. I said I’d marry a man. I promised to meet him here in Wyngate, +because it was near to dear Miss Craigie’s. I didn’t tell you, but it +wasn’t because I didn’t trust you, Lexy--truly it wasn’t! It was only +because I knew mother would be so angry with you. I told him I’d take +the train that got here at eleven o’clock that night; but after I’d left +the house, I got frightened. I’d never gone out alone before. I couldn’t +bear it. If I hadn’t promised him, I’d have gone home again. I _wanted_ +to go home. I was sorry I’d promised.” + +“Don’t try to go on now, dear!” + +“I must! So I took a taxi. I thought I’d get here as soon as the train, +but when it was eleven o’clock we were still miles away. I thought +perhaps Charles wouldn’t wait, and there’d be nobody in Wyngate, and I +didn’t dare go home again; so I kept begging the driver to go faster. +Oh, Lexy, it was all my fault! He did go--terribly fast. It was +wonderful to be alone, and rushing along like that; and then I think he +ran into a telegraph pole, turning a corner. There was a crash, and I +didn’t know anything more for--I don’t know how long it’s been.” + +“Soup!” whispered Mrs. Royce, but Caroline was too intent upon her +confession to stop. + +Lexy took the broth and set it on the table. + +“I don’t know how long it was,” Caroline went on. “It must have been +days, or perhaps weeks. Sometimes I seemed to know, in a sort of dream. +Oh, it was horrible! Oh, Lexy, I can’t explain! I didn’t really know +anything, only that sometimes my mind seemed to be struggling--” + +“Take some of this soup,” said Lexy. “You’ve _got_ to, Caroline, or I +won’t listen.” + +Obediently Caroline allowed herself to be fed. She took fully half of +that excellent soup, and it did her good. + +“Yesterday,” she said, “I did know. I couldn’t sleep all night. I felt +so ill, I thought I was going to die; and all the time it was coming +back to me. I couldn’t think why I was there in that place. I was +frightened--worse than frightened. The nurse kept calling me ‘Mrs. +Quelton,’ and I told her I wasn’t Mrs. Quelton--I was Caroline Enderby. +She must have told him. He came, he kept looking at me, and saying, ‘You +are Muriel Quelton, I tell you!’ Then he sent the nurse away, and he +said: ‘If you insist that you are Caroline Enderby, you’re mad, and I’ll +send you to an asylum.’ I was--oh, Lexy, I’m not brave!--I was afraid of +him. When you came that morning, I didn’t dare to tell you. I hoped +you’d find the handkerchief, and know; and then--” + +Suddenly she turned and buried her face in the pillow. + +“Then I didn’t want you to know!” she sobbed. “Captain Grey--he sat +there with me. Lexy! Lexy! I didn’t know there was any one like him in +the world! I wanted to stay, then. I thought, if you found out, I’d have +to go away--to go home again, or to marry Charles. I’d promised to marry +him, Lexy, but I can’t! Not now!” + +“Hush, darling!” said Lexy hastily. + +This was something Captain Grey had no right to hear, but he did hear +it. He was still standing outside the door, motionless. + +“He was so kind!” Caroline went on. “And his face--” + +“Never mind that!” Lexy interrupted sternly. “Tell me how you got away.” + +“When _he_ came back, he found George there--I had to call him George.” + +“Yes, I see. Never mind!” + +“George went away, and then--he told me. He said his wife had died a few +months ago, and that in her will she’d left some jewel--a ruby--” + +“An emerald,” corrected Lexy. + +“Yes--it was an emerald. She’d left it to her brother, and he--Dr. +Quelton--had taken it long ago, and sold it, to get money for his +horrible drugs. She never knew that, and he didn’t tell her lawyer that +she’d died. I don’t know how he managed, or what he did, but nobody +knew. Then there came a letter from her brother, to say that he was +coming; and the doctor said--I’ll never forget it: + +“‘Consequently, Muriel Quelton had to be here, and she was; and she’ll +remain here until her purpose is served!’ + +“He told me what had happened. He said that as soon as he knew Captain +Grey was coming, he began to look for some one to take his poor wife’s +place. The captain hadn’t seen his sister since she was a baby, you +know, and all he knew was that she was tall and dark. Dr. Quelton said +he had arranged for some one to come from a hospital; and then he found +me. He drove by just a little while after the accident, and he found the +poor driver dead and me unconscious. He found a letter to mother in my +purse, and he mailed it afterward. Then he heard another car coming +along the road, and he started the engine and sent the taxi--with the +dead driver in his seat--crashing down the hill, to run into the other +car. He wanted the driver’s death to look like an accident. He didn’t +care if the other man were killed. He’s--he’s not human, Lexy! He told +me he had never in his life cared for any one except his wife. He told +me what a beautiful, wonderful woman she was--and yet he had stolen her +emerald when she was dying. Love! He couldn’t love any one!” + +But Lexy remembered her last glimpse of Dr. Quelton, lying dead across +the coffin of the woman he had robbed. Who would ever know, who was to +judge now, what might have been in his warped and utterly solitary +heart? + +“He told me,” Caroline went on, “that he had never felt any great +interest in me. A mediocre mind, he said I had. He told me he had never +so much as touched my finger tips. He sat there, talking so calmly! He +said he had kept me under the influence of some drug that made my mind +suggestible--I think that’s the word. He meant that whoever took that +drug would believe anything, accept anything. He had told me I was +Muriel Quelton, and I believed I was. Then he told me to dye my hair, +and to make up my face with things he gave me. He told me I was ill and +tired and growing old, and I felt so. Lexy, he said that even without +that, without making the least change in my appearance, no one would +have known me, because my _mind_ was changed. He said there was no +disguise in the world like that. Was it true, Lexy? Was I old, and--and +horrible to every one?” + +“No,” Lexy briefly replied. + +“Then he went on. He said he had no more of the drug left, and that he’d +have to dispose of me. ‘You know you’re very ill,’ he said. ‘The nurse +and that young fool of a doctor agree with me. I think you’re likely to +grow worse--very much worse--to-night. You’re very likely to die.’ Oh, +Lexy! What could I do but agree? I was shut up--so weak and ill--I knew +he could so easily give me something to kill me! He said that if I would +make a will and sign it as he told me, he would let me go and be--be +myself again. I couldn’t help it! And his wife was dead. It couldn’t do +her any harm if I signed her name. He wrote it, and I traced it on +another sheet of paper. I had to, Lexy! I knew it was wrong, but what +else could I possibly do?” + +“Never mind, Caroline!” said Lexy. “It didn’t do any harm, dear. And +then did he let you go?” + +An odd smile came over Caroline’s face. + +“Not exactly,” she said. “After I’d signed the will, leaving him the +emerald, he sent away the nurse. Then he came out on the balcony, sat +down, and began to talk to me. He was so pleasant and kindly! He made +plans for my getting away unnoticed, and brought me some sandwiches and +a cup of tea. He said I would have to eat a little, or I wouldn’t have +strength enough to go. It was getting dark then, and he couldn’t see my +face. I pretended to believe him, but I knew all the time. He kept +urging me to hurry up, and to eat the sandwiches and drink the tea. I +_knew_! I had made the will, and now, of course, I had to die. I tried +to think of a way out; and at last, when he saw that I didn’t eat or +drink, he spoke out plainly. He said that he had sent the servants away +for the afternoon, and that we were alone in the house. He got up; he +stood there and looked down at me. + +“‘That tea is an easy way out--quite painless and easy,’ he said; ‘but +if you won’t take it, there’s another way--not so easy!’ + +“He had some sort of hypodermic needle; but just then some one began +pounding on the door downstairs, and he had to go. He locked the door +after him, and he knew I was too weak to move. I tried. I got off the +couch, but I fell on the floor beside it; and then Charles came--” + +“_Charles?_” + +“He climbed up over the balcony. It was too dark to see him, but I heard +his voice, whispering, ‘Where are you?’ He found me, lifted me up, and +helped me over to the railing. Then we heard Dr. Quelton coming back. +There was another man, down in the garden, with a taxi. Charles called +out to him, and he stood below there. I heard Dr. Quelton unlock the +door, and I was so frightened that I felt strong enough to do anything +to get away. Charles helped me over, and the other man caught me. Then I +heard Charles shout, ‘Quick! Get her away!’ The other man pushed me into +the taxi and started off across the lawn. I fainted, and I didn’t know +anything more until I opened my eyes here.” + +“But where is he?” cried Lexy. “What happened to him?” + +“I don’t know.” + +“And you don’t seem to care, either!” said Lexy hotly. “He saved your +life, and now--” + +She thought of that bloody hand print, and the grass beaten down. The +young man who had no caution, no regard for the proprieties, had done +the direct and simple thing which appealed to his audacious mind. +Perhaps he had been killed in doing it. He would know how to face death +in the same straightforward way. + +Lexy would be as straightforward as he. She would find him, and she +wouldn’t try to think how much she cared about finding him. + +She rose. + +“I’ll get Mrs. Royce to stay with you, Caroline,” she said. + +“But where are you going, Lexy?” + +“I’m going to find Charles.” + +In the doorway she encountered Captain Grey. + +“Do you think she could stand seeing me?” he asked anxiously. “I mean do +you--” + +But Lexy didn’t even answer. + + +XXV + +After all, Lexy’s search for Charles Houseman was neither difficult nor +heroic, except in intention. She found him in the Lymewell Hospital. Joe +told her where he was, and Joe took her there. + +Houseman himself was rigidly determined not to be heroic. He had refused +to go to bed, and Lexy found him in a bare, whitewashed waiting room, +where he sat on a bench. + +“Just came in to get the hand dressed,” he said. “I’ll go back with you +now.” + +The doctor advised him not to, but Charles was not very susceptible to +advice. He wished to be entirely casual and matter-of-fact, and Lexy +tried to humor him. They stood together in the hall of the hospital +while a nurse went to get him a bottle of lotion from the dispensary, +and he talked in what he intended to be an offhand manner; but Lexy +could see that he was in pain, and almost exhausted, and his hair was +all on end. + +Somehow, that was the thing she couldn’t bear--that his hair should be +so ruffled. She could respect his determination to ignore the throbbing +anguish of his hand, she would, if he liked, pretend that there was +nothing at all tragic or unusual in the night’s adventure; but his +hair-- + +The nurse returned with the bottle, gave him directions for its use, and +told him sternly that he must come back the next morning for a dressing. + +“All right!” he said impatiently. “Come on, Lexy!” + +They got into Joe’s cab together, and off they went. + +“What happened to your hand?” inquired Lexy, as if it didn’t much +matter. + +“Knife through it,” he answered. “You see, I held the old fellow, to +give Mrs. Quelton a chance to get away. When I thought it was all right, +I gave him a shove backward, and started to climb over the balcony; and +he jabbed a knife through my hand. That’s what kept me so long--I +couldn’t get it out; and after I did, I--rested for a while. Then I +started for Wyngate, and I met Joe coming back to look for me. He said +he’d landed Mrs. Quelton all right. So that’s all!” + +Lexy was silent for a moment. + +“Of course you didn’t know it wasn’t Mrs. Quelton,” she said. “It was +Caroline all the time.” + +“Caroline?” he cried. “What do you mean? It couldn’t have been +Caroline!” + +Lexy gave him a very brief, very bare account of Caroline’s narrative. + +“Oh!” he said, when she had done; and again there was silence for a +time. “Does she still want to go on with the thing--marrying me, I +mean?” he asked finally, in a queer, flat tone. + +“No,” said Lexy pleasantly. “No--she does not.” + +“Oh!” he said again, with undisguised relief. “Well, then--it’s all +right, then!” + +“You don’t seem to be much surprised,” said Lexy. “Don’t you think it’s +the most extraordinary story you ever heard?” + +“Well, you see--I’m a bit tired,” he explained. “I haven’t grasped it +all yet; only, if she doesn’t want to marry me now, Lexy, dear, will +you?” + +At last Lexy could do what she had longed to do for the last half +hour--she could stroke down his ruffled hair. + +And this, as far as they were concerned, was the last act and the +fitting climax of the play. They were ready now for the curtain to rise +upon another play; but there were other people not so young, or not so +sturdy, for whom the first drama was not so readily dismissed. + +There was Captain Grey, who was never to see his sister now, never to +know if she had really wanted him and needed him. He did not soon forget +what had happened at the Tower. + +Mrs. Enderby was sent for, and arrived that morning before sunrise, with +her husband. She listened to Caroline’s strange story, and made what she +could of it. She had not one word of reproach for her daughter. + +“We shall not cry over the spilled milk,” she said. “Let us see what is +to be done, before the police come.” She had a thoroughly European point +of view about the police. “If we are fortunate enough to find an officer +with discretion,” she added, “even yet a scandal may be averted.” + +For that was still her passionate resolve--that there should be no +scandal. She thought and planned with desperate energy; she directed +every one as to the part he or she should play; and in the end she +succeeded. Nobody knew that Caroline had disappeared, and nobody ever +would know. Nobody knew that the so-called Mrs. Quelton was Caroline, +and that, too, would never be known. Only let Joe and Mrs. Royce be +persuaded to hold their tongues; as for Lexy, Captain Grey, and +Houseman, she could of course rely upon them. + +So the police were, as they say, baffled. Mr. Houseman told them a tale. +He had been alarmed about the lady whom he knew as Mrs. Quelton, and he +had climbed up on the balcony, hoping to see her alone; but he had met +Dr. Quelton instead, and had been hurt in trying to escape from him. + +Captain Grey also had a tale. He, too, had been alarmed about the lady +whom he believed to be his sister. He had gone with Miss Moran to call +upon her, and they had found the doctor dead, lying across the coffin. + +There was an inquest, and Mr. Houseman had a very unpleasant time of it, +being the last one who had seen the doctor alive; but there was no +really serious suspicion against him. The _post-mortem_ showed that the +doctor had died of some unknown poison, at least half an hour after the +young man had arrived at the hospital. The verdict was suicide, although +the coroner’s jury had its own opinion about the mysterious dark woman +who had posed as the doctor’s wife. An autopsy revealed that Mrs. +Quelton had died from a natural cause--phthisis of the lungs. In short, +as far as could be discovered, there was no murder at all. + +This was a disappointment to the public, but there was always the +mysterious dark woman. The police instituted a search for her, and there +was much about her in the newspapers, but she was never found. + +Miss Enderby returned to the city from her visit to Miss Craigie, and +friends of the family were interested to learn that while away she had +met such a nice young man--a Captain Grey, from India. He had to return +to his regiment, but, before he went, Caroline’s engagement to him was +announced. Later he was to retire from the army and come back to live in +New York. + +There was another item of news, of minor importance. That pretty little +secretary of Mrs. Enderby’s got married, and the Enderbys were +wonderfully kind about it--surprisingly so. It didn’t seem at all like +Mrs. Enderby to let the girl be married from her own house, and to give +her a smart little car for a wedding present. What is more, Mr. Enderby +found a very good position in his office for the young man. + +“My dear Sophie,” said one of Mrs. Enderby’s old friends, with the +peculiar candor of an old friend, “I’ve never known _you_ to do so much +for any one before!” + +Mrs. Enderby was standing on the top doorstep of her house, looking +after the car in which Lexy and her Charles had driven off for their +honeymoon, with Joe, of Wyngate, as their chauffeur. + +“So much for her?” she said. “It’s not enough--not half enough!” + +And there were actually tears in her eyes as she went back into the +house where Caroline was. + + +THE END + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +MARCH, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVII NUMBER 2 + + + + +Dogs Always Know + +INTO THIS DIGNIFIED LOVE STORY HUGE CAPTAIN MACGREGOR BARGES WITH A +GRAND CARGO OF HUMOR TO MATCH LITTLE LEROY’S DRAMATIC DOG + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +The lovely little Miss Selby came from Boston, and the large and not +unhandsome Mr. Anderson came from New York, and they did not like each +other. + +Indeed, Miss Selby was not very fond, just then, of any one who did not +come from Boston. Sometimes she even went so far as to declare to +herself that she did not like any one at all except the members of one +certain household in Boston. + +It was at night, after she had gone to bed, that she usually made this +somewhat narrow-minded declaration, because it was at that time, when +she was lying in the dark, that she would most vividly imagine that +especial household. Her mother, her grandmother, and her two aunts; they +were the kindest, wittiest, most delightful, lovable people who ever +breathed, and she compared all other persons with them. And, so +compared, Mr. Anderson came out very badly. + +As for Mr. Anderson, the reason he did not like Miss Selby was because +she obviously did not like him. He was a little sensitive about being +liked. + +He almost always had been, in the past, and when he saw Miss Selby’s +eyes resting on him, with that look which meant that she was mentally +comparing him with her mother, her grandmother, and her two aunts, he +felt chilled to the bone. Not that he looked chilled; on the contrary, +his face grew red, and he fancied that his neck, his ears, and his hands +did also. + +He justly resented this. It was not his fault that he was sitting at her +table. It wasn’t her table, anyhow; purely by luck had she sat alone at +it so long. It was the only place left in the dining room, and the +landlady told him to sit there. + +As he pulled out his chair he said, “Good evening,” with a friendly and +unsuspicious smile, and Miss Selby glanced up at him as if she were +surprised to hear a human voice issuing from this creature, and bent her +head in something probably intended to be a nod. + +Naturally, he did not speak again. But, as he sat facing her, and with +his back to the room, he could not help his eyes resting upon her from +time to time, and it was then that he had encountered that chilly look. + +It was very pitiful, he thought, to see one as young as she behaving in +such a way--really pitiful. Because she was not unattractive; even a +casual glance had informed him of that. + +Dark-browed, she was, and dark-eyed; but with hair that was bright and +soft and almost blond, and a lovely rose color in her cheeks; the sort +of girl a man would admire, if there had been the true womanly +gentleness in her aspect. But after that look, it was impossible to +admire; he could only pity. + +Strange as it may seem, Miss Selby pitied him, and for a somewhat +illogical reason. She saw pathos in the man because he was so large--so +much too large. His great shoulders towered above the table; knives and +forks looked like toys in his lean, brown hands, and his face was +invisible, unless she raised her eyes, which she did not intend to do +again. + +She had seen him, though, as he crossed the room, and she might have +thought him not bad looking, if he had not come to sit at her table. It +was an honest and alert young face, healthily tanned, with warm, gray +eyes, and a crest of wheat-colored hair above his forehead. But when he +did sit down at her table, she immediately began her usual comparisons. + +She imagined this young man in that sitting room in Boston, and she saw +clearly how much too large he was. It was a small room, and her mother +and her grandmother and her two aunts were all of a nice, neat, polite +size. + +“Like a bull in a china shop,” she thought, imagining him among them. + +This was unjust. It is never fair to judge bulls by their possible +behavior in china shops, anyhow; they seldom go into them, and when seen +in the fields, or in bullfights, and so on, they are really noble +animals. + +But that is what she did think, and as soon as she could finish her +dinner, she arose, with another of those almost imperceptible nods, and +went away. She went up to her own room, and began to study shorthand. + +She did this every evening, with great earnestness, for she was very +anxious to get a better position than the one she now had, and she was +so far advanced in her study that she could write absolutely anything in +shorthand--if you gave her time enough. She could often read what she +had written, too. + +As for Mr. Anderson, he also went up to his room, but not to study. He +had had all he wanted of that at college. Nor did he need to worry about +a better position. + +The one he had was good, and he was confident that he would have a +better one next year, and a still better one the year after that, and so +on and on, until he was one of the leading paper manufacturers in the +country--if not the leading one. He had just been made assistant +superintendent of a paper mill in this little town, and he had come out +in the most hopeful and cheerful humor. + +The hope and cheer had fled, now. He felt profoundly dejected. He had no +friends here, and if other people were like that girl, he never would +have any. For all he knew, there might be something repellent in his +manner, which his old friends had kindly overlooked. + +He began to think sorrowfully of those old friends, of the little flat +he had had in New York with two other fellows--such nice fellows--such a +nice flat. When you looked out of the window there you saw a façade of +other windows, with shaded lamps in them, and the shadows of people +passing back and forth, and down below in the street more people, and +taxis, and big, quiet, smooth-running private cars, and all the familiar +city sounds. And here, outside this window, there were trees--nothing +but trees. + +He had heard, often enough, about the loneliness of country dwellers +when in a great city, but he felt that it was not to be compared with +the loneliness of a city dweller among trees. He got up and went to the +window, and he couldn’t even see a human creature, only those sentinel +trees, moving a little against the pale and cloudy sky. + +It was a May night, and the air that blew on his face was May air, a +wonderful thing, filled with tender and exquisite perfumes, so cool and +sweet that he grew suddenly sick of his tobacco-scented room, and +decided to go out on the veranda. + +What happened was a coincidence, but it would surely have happened, +sooner or later. He met Miss Selby. As soon as he had stepped outside, +she opened the door and came out, too. + +There was an electric light in the ceiling of this veranda, which gave +it a singularly cheerless appearance, rather like the deck of a deserted +ship, with the chairs all drawn up along the wall. There was nobody else +there, and Mr. Anderson stood directly under the light, so that she +could see him very plainly. + +She said: “Oh!” and drew back hastily, putting her hand on the doorknob. + +This was a little too much! + +“Look here!” said Mr. Anderson crisply. “Don’t go in on _my_ account. +I’ll go, myself.” + +Now, Miss Selby was not really haughty or disagreeable. Simply, she had +been brought up on all sorts of Red Riding-hood tales, in which all the +trouble was caused by giving encouragement to strangers. + +She had been taught that it was a mad, reckless thing to acknowledge the +existence of persons whose grandparents had not been known, and +favorably known, to her grandparents. But certainly she had no desire to +offend any one, and this stranger did seem to be offended. So she said: + +“Oh, no! You mustn’t think of such a thing!” + +She meant it kindly, but unfortunately she was utterly unable to speak +in a natural way to a stranger. In reality she was a poor, homesick, +affectionate, kind-hearted young girl of twenty, who, not fifteen +minutes before, had been weeping from sheer loneliness. + +But she spoke in what seemed to him an obnoxiously condescending and +superior tone. He was a young man of many excellent qualities, but +meekness was not one of them, and he resented this tone. + +So he spoke with an air of amused indulgence, as if he thought her such +a funny little thing: + +“I don’t want to drive you away, you know.” + +She raised her eyebrows. + +“Why, of course not!” she said, just as much amused as he was, and sat +down in one of the chairs against the wall. + +She sat there, and he stood opposite her, leaning against the railing, +both of them silently not liking each other. Presently the silence +became unbearable. + +“The spring has come early this year,” observed Miss Selby. + +Mr. Anderson, the city dweller, knew precious little about what was +expected of spring, but he was determined to say something, anything. + +“Yes,” he agreed. “They were selling violets in the streets yesterday.” + +Miss Selby looked at him with a sort of horror. Was _that_ his idea of +spring--violets being sold on street corners? + +“But that doesn’t mean anything!” she cried. “They were probably +hothouse violets, anyway. You can’t possibly see the real spring unless +you go in the woods.” + +She needn’t think she owned the spring. Every year of his life he had +spent several weeks in the country at various hotels. He had seen any +number of woods, had walked in them, and admired them, too, with +moderation, however. + +“Yes, I know,” he admitted. “Last June I motored up through +Connecticut--” + +“Oh, but that’s different!” she explained. “Motoring--that’s not the +same thing at all! There’s a little wood near here--I go there almost +every Sunday--I wish you could see it!” + +“I’d like to,” he replied, without realizing the step implied. + +They were both dismayed by what had happened. Miss Selby arose hastily. + +“Well--good night!” she said, and fled upstairs to her room in a panic. + +“Heavens!” she thought. “Did he think I wanted him to come with me +to-morrow? Oh, dear! How--how awfully awkward! Oh, I do hope it will +rain!” + +Mr. Anderson, left by himself, lit his pipe. + +“After that,” he mused, “of course I’ll have to ask her to let me go +with her to-morrow. That’s only common courtesy.” + +Very well, he was willing to make the sacrifice. + + +II + +It did not rain the next day. On the contrary, it was as bright and +blithe a day as ever dawned. There was no plausible reason why a person +who went into the woods almost every Sunday should not go to-day. + +“It would be too rude, just to walk off, if he thinks I meant him to +come along,” thought Miss Selby. “But perhaps he won’t say anything more +about it.” + +He did not appear in the dining room while she ate her breakfast. + +“Probably he’s still asleep,” she thought, with that pardonable pride +every one feels at being up before some one else. + +He was not asleep. On the contrary, he was looking at her that very +moment, as she sat down at her precious table, eating the Sunday morning +coffee ring. He had breakfasted early on purpose, hoping that by so +doing he would avoid her, for the more he meditated upon her behavior, +the more sternly did he disapprove of it, and he had come downstairs +this morning resolved to be merely polite. + +He could not help sitting at her table; certainly he didn’t want to, and +she had no right to treat him as if he were an annoying intruder. But, +no matter what she did, he intended to be polite. + +And, as he sat on the veranda railing and observed her through the +window, he thought that perhaps it would not be so very difficult to be +polite to her. She looked rather nice this morning, in her neat, dark +dress, with the sun touching her brown hair to a warm brightness, and a +sort of Sunday tranquillity about her. He felt a chivalrous readiness to +take a walk in the woods with her; she might even point out all the +flowers and tell him facts about them, if she liked. + +She arose, and he turned his head and contemplated the landscape, so +that he would not be looking at her when she came out of the door. Only, +she didn’t come. Although he kept his head turned aside for a long time, +he heard no sound of a door opening or of footsteps, nothing but the +subdued voices of the four old ladies who sat on the veranda, enjoying +the sunshine. + +He glanced toward the dining room. She was not there. Very well; +probably she had changed her mind, and he would not be called upon to be +chivalrous, after all. He would have the whole day to himself, the whole +immensely long, blank, solitary day. + +Miss Selby, however, had simply gone upstairs to put on her hat. Or, +rather, she put on three hats, one after the other, two rather old ones, +and one quite new. She decided in favor of an old one, and felt somewhat +proud of herself for this, because didn’t it show how little she cared +about strangers? If it happened to be a singularly becoming hat, she +couldn’t help it. + +She went downstairs and out on the veranda, and there he was, even +bigger, she thought, than he had been last evening; a tremendous +creature, fairly towering above all the old ladies, and looking most +alarmingly masculine and strange. + +Something like panic seized her. He was so absolutely a stranger; she +knew nothing whatever about him; he might be the most undesirable +acquaintance that ever breathed. + +But when he said “Good morning,” she had to answer, and, in answering, +had to look at him, and was obliged to admit that his face was not +exactly sinister. + +“Off for a stroll?” he asked. + +“Yes,” she answered. “Yes, I am.” + +There was a silence, then chivalry required Mr. Anderson to speak. + +“Well--” he said. “If you don’t mind--I mean--I’d be very pleased--” + +“Oh! Certainly!” said Miss Selby. + +So off they went, together. They went across the lawn and down the road, +and after the first moment of awkwardness, they got on very well. + +Indeed, it was extraordinary to see upon how many topics they thought +alike. They both agreed that it was a beautiful morning; that the spring +was the best time of the year, that the smell of pine needles warm in +the sun was unique and delightful, and that Mrs. Brown’s coffee was +very, very bad. + +Then, according to Miss Selby’s directions, they turned off the highway +and entered the wood. It was not a thick and somber wood, but a lovely +little glade where slim silver birches grew, among bigger and more +stalwart trees, standing well spaced, so that the sun came through the +budding branches, making a delicate arabesque of light and shadow. + +And it was all so fresh, so verdant, so joyous, like one of those +half-enchanted forests through which knights used to ride, long ago, +when the world was younger. It was so serene, and yet so gay, that even +Mr. Anderson, the champion of cities, was captivated. + +He walked through that wood with Miss Selby, he saw how she looked when +she found violets growing, saw her, so to speak, in her natural habitat, +where she belonged, and that seemed to him something not easily to be +forgotten. There was Miss Selby, down on her knees, picking violets; +Miss Selby looking up at him, with that lovely color in her cheeks, and +her clear, candid eyes, asking him if they weren’t the “prettiest +things?” + +He answered: “No!” with considerable emphasis, but somehow she did not +trouble to ask him what he meant. + +She fancied that Mr. Anderson appeared to better advantage in the woods. +Seen among the trees he didn’t seem too large; indeed, with his blond +crest, his mighty shoulders, his long, easy stride, he was not in the +least like a bull in a china shop, but a notably fine-looking young +fellow. + +In short, when Miss Selby and Mr. Anderson returned to the boarding +house for the midday dinner, they no longer disliked each other. + + +III + +The old ladies had noticed this at once, and it pleased them. They saw +Miss Selby and Mr. Anderson talking cheerfully to each other at the +little table, and they said to one another: “Young people--young +people,” and they were old enough to understand what that meant. + +The “young people” themselves did not understand. They didn’t even know +that they were especially young, and certainly they saw nothing charming +or interesting in the fact that they were sitting at a small table and +talking to each other. + +They were, at heart, a little uneasy because they had stopped disliking +each other. Dislike was such a neat, definite, vigorous thing to feel, +and when it melted away, it left such a disturbing vagueness. Of course, +Miss Selby knew that she could not possibly like a stranger; the most +she would allow herself was--not to dislike him, and simply “not +disliking” a person is a very unsatisfactory state of mind. + +It couldn’t be helped, however. The dislike was gone. And there they +sat, not disliking each other, every single evening at that little +table. Naturally, they talked, and naturally, being at such close +quarters, they watched each other what time they talked, and when you do +that, it is extraordinary what a number of things you learn without +being told. + +The little shadow that flits across a face, the smile that is on the +lips and not in the eyes, the brave words and the anxious glance--these +things are eloquent. + +For instance, Miss Selby talked about that unique household in Boston. +She did not say much, that wasn’t her way; yet Mr. Anderson deduced that +the mother, the grandmother, and the two aunts were, so to speak, +besieged in their Bostonian home, that the wolf was at their door, and +that Miss Selby was engaged in keeping him at a safe distance. And that +she was probably the pluckiest, finest girl who had ever lived, +struggling on all by herself, homesick and lonely, and so young and +little. + +As for him, he talked chiefly about the manufacture of paper. Until now +this subject had not been a particular hobby of Miss Selby’s, but the +more she heard about it, the more she realized what an interesting and +fascinating topic it was. What is more, while Mr. Anderson talked about +paper, he told her, without knowing it, many other things. + +She learned that he was a very likable young fellow, with a great many +friends, and yet was sometimes a little lonely, because he had no one of +his own; that he was prodigiously ambitious, yet found his successful +progress in the paper business a little melancholy sometimes, because no +one else was very much affected by it. He said he had been brought up by +an aunt who had given him an expensive education and a great many +advantages; he spoke most dutifully of this aunt, and of all that he +owed to her, yet Miss Selby felt certain that this aunt was a very +disagreeable sort of person, who never let people forget what they owed +her. + +Very different from Miss Selby’s aunts! She had even begun to think that +perhaps her aunts, together with her mother and grandmother, might like +Mr. Anderson, in spite of his size. + +And then he spoiled everything. To be sure, he thought it was she who +spoiled everything, but she knew better. It was his lamentable, his +truly deplorable, masculine vanity. This man, who appeared so +independent, so intelligent-- + +This disillusioning incident took place on the second Sunday of their +acquaintance--the Sunday after that first walk. Almost as a matter of +course they set forth upon another walk, and as it was a bright, windy +day, rather too cool for sauntering in the woods, they went along the +highway at a brisk pace. + +The spring had capriciously withdrawn. The burgeoning branches were +flung about wildly against a sky blue, clear and cold; the ground +underfoot felt hard; everything gentle, promising and beguiling had gone +out of the world. And perhaps this affected Miss Selby; her cheeks were +very rosy, her eyes shining, and she was in high spirits, even to the +point of teasing Mr. Anderson a little. + +He found this singularly agreeable. For the most part, he could see +nothing but the top of her hat, coming along briskly beside him; but +every now and then she glanced up, and each time she did so he felt a +little dazzled, because of the radiance there was about her this day. He +thought--but how glad he was, later on, that he had kept his thoughts to +himself! + +There was a steep hill before them, and they went at it with that +feeling of pleasant excitement one has about new hills; they wanted to +get to the top and see what was on the other side. And very likely they +were a sort of allegory of youth, which always wants to get to the top +of hills and hopes to find something much better on the other side; but +this idea did not occur to them. And, alas, they never reached the top! + +Halfway up that hill there was a garden with a stone wall about it; a +wide lawn, ornamented with dwarf firs, a fine garden of the formal sort, +but not very interesting, and Miss Selby and Mr. Anderson were not +interested. They would have passed by with no more than a casual glance, +but as they drew near the gate a dog began to bark in a desperate and +violent fashion. And a sweet and plaintive voice said: + +“Oh, Sandy! Stop, you naughty boy!” + +Naturally they both turned their heads then, and they saw Mrs. Granger +standing behind the gate. At that time they did not know her name was +Mrs. Granger, or any other facts about her; but Miss Selby always +believed that, at that first glance, she learned more about Mrs. Granger +than--well, than certain other people ever learned, in weeks of +acquaintance. + +A charming little lady, Mrs. Granger was--dark and fragile, very +plaintive, very gentle, the sort of woman a really chivalrous man feels +sorry for. Especially at that moment when she was having such a very bad +time with that dog. + +It was a rough and unruly young dog--a collie, and a fine specimen, too, +but ill trained. She was holding him by the collar, and he was +struggling to get free, and barking furiously, his jaws snapping open +and shut as if jerked by a string, his whole body vibrating with his +unreasonable emotional outburst. + +“Keep quiet!” said she, with a pathetic attempt at severity, and when he +did not obey, she gave him a sort of dab on the top of the head. It was +more than his proud spirit would endure; he broke away from her, jumped +over the low gate, and flew at Mr. Anderson. + +But not in anger; on the contrary, he was wild with delight; he rushed +round and round the young man, lay down on his shoes, licked his hands. +And when Mr. Anderson patted him, he was fairly out of his mind, and +rolled in the dust. + +“Oh!” cried Mrs. Granger. “But--how wonderful!” She turned to Miss +Selby. “_Isn’t_ it wonderful?” + +“Isn’t what?” inquired Miss Selby. “I’m afraid I don’t--” + +“That strange instinct that animals have!” Mrs. Granger explained +solemnly. + +“What instinct?” asked Miss Selby, politely. “I thought he was just a +friendly little dog.” + +“Oh, but he’s not friendly with every one!” cried Mrs. Granger. “Not by +any means!” + +It was at this point that Miss Selby’s disillusionment began. She looked +at Mr. Anderson, expecting to find him looking amused, and instead of +that, he was pleased--a little embarrassed, but certainly pleased! + +Then the charming little lady spoke again, addressing Miss Selby: + +“What darling wild roses!” she exclaimed. “I do wish I could find some!” + +“They’re azaleas,” said Miss Selby. “And the woods at the foot of the +hill--next to your garden--are full of them.” + +Mr. Anderson was not looking at them just then, but only heard their +voices, and he was very much impressed by the contrast. One of them +sounded so gentle and sweet, and the other so chill, so curt. It was +deplorable that Miss Selby should be so ungracious; he was disappointed. + +So he thought that he, at least, would be decently civil to the poor +little woman, and he turned toward her with that intention, only he +could think of nothing to say. He smiled, though, and Mrs. Granger +smiled at him, and Miss Selby observed this. + +And Mrs. Granger knew that Miss Selby observed this, and she smiled at +Miss Selby. It was a smile that Mr. Anderson would never understand. + +“I wish you’d both come in and look at my garden!” said Mrs. Granger, +wistfully. + +“We--” began Mr. Anderson, cheerfully, but Miss Selby interrupted. + +“Thank you!” she said. “But I must go home now. Good morning.” + +And she actually set off, down the hill. Mr. Anderson, of course, was +obliged to follow, and the dog, Sandy, had the same idea. + +“Go home, old fellow!” the young man commanded. + +Sandy gave a yelp of joy at being addressed, and stood expectantly +beside him, grinning dog wise into his face. Mr. Anderson again ordered +him home, and Mrs. Granger called him, but he did not go. He had to be +dragged back by the collar and held, while Mrs. Granger fastened a leash +to his collar. + +“I never saw anything like it,” she declared. “He’s simply devoted to +you.” + +“Dogs generally take to me,” the young man admitted. + +Mrs. Granger raised her soft dark eyes to his face. + +“I think that’s a very wonderful thing!” said she, quietly. “Because I’m +sure they know. I’d trust Sandy’s judgment against any human being’s.” + +“Oh--well--” Mr. Anderson remarked, grown very red. + +“You must come and see Sandy again some day,” she suggested. “Poor +little doggie!” + +“I will!” said he. “Yes. Thanks, very much. I will!” + +All this had taken considerable time, and Miss Selby was nowhere to be +seen. He hurried after her and, turning the corner at the foot of the +hill, saw her marching briskly along ahead of him. She must have known +that he would follow, yet she did not look back once, and when he +reached her side she said nothing--neither did he. They went on. + +Presently Miss Selby began to talk, making a very obvious effort to be +polite. Mr. Anderson did not like this, but he, too, made an equally +obvious effort at politeness, and succeeded quite as well as she did, +and they continued in this formal, almost stately tone, for some time. + +When she looked back upon it, Miss Selby was always at a loss to +understand just how and when this correct tone had vanished from their +conversation, and the quarrel had begun. For it was a quarrel--a genuine +and a hearty one. And although Mrs. Granger was never once mentioned, +yet the quarrel was about her. + +Miss Selby declared flatly that dogs did not have any “wonderful +instinct” for judging people. Mr. Anderson said he _knew_ they did. + +“What?” she cried. “You don’t mean to say you think a dog knows by +instinct whether any one is--good or bad?” + +“That’s exactly what I do mean,” he declared. + +Then Miss Selby laughed. She regretted it afterward, but it was done. +She had laughed at Mr. Anderson, and he resented it, deeply. + +They walked side by side for half a mile, and never said one single +word, and by the time they reached the boarding house they had firmly +established that worst of all complications, an angry silence. It was +now impossible for either of them to speak. + + +IV + +It was impossible to break that silence without an intolerable sacrifice +of pride. Yet, so very, very small a thing would have sufficed; one +entreating glance from Mr. Anderson, and Miss Selby would have responded +willingly; just a shade of warmth in her smile, and the young man would +have made an impetuous apology. But he was not going to give entreating +glances to persons who laughed at him, and her smile showed no warmth at +all, but instead an extreme chilliness. + +They smiled when they met every evening in the dining room, simply to +keep up appearances--and it was a complete failure. The old ladies +noticed at once that something had gone wrong; they discussed it with +unflagging interest all week, wondering what had happened, and whose +fault it was. They all hoped that matters would be adjusted by Sunday. + +Sunday came, and it was a sweet, bright, warm day. The hour for taking +walks came, and Mr. Anderson went out--alone. The old ladies were truly +sorry to see this. Miss Selby also saw it. She came out on the veranda +just as he was going down the steps and, although she did not turn her +head, she had caught a glimpse of his tall, broad-shouldered figure +going off--alone. She had a book with her, and, siting down in a +sheltered corner, she began to read. + +It was impossible. On this gay spring morning nothing printed in books +could interest her. Not that she cared what Mr. Anderson did or where he +went. Only, she was homesick and so very lonely. There was nobody to +talk to, and it would be such a long, long time before she could afford +to take a vacation and go back to Boston to see her own people. + +“Er--good morning!” said Mr. Quincey, in his apologetic way. + +For two months Mr. Quincey had been apologetically making attempts to +talk to Miss Selby. He was a most inoffensive young man, a teller in the +local bank; he had virtually all the virtues there are: thrift, +industry, sobriety, honesty--and he knew people in Boston. Yet hitherto +Miss Selby had discouraged him, for no good reason at all, but simply +because she wished so to do. + +Imagine his surprise and delight when this morning she replied to him +with something like cordiality. The old ladies saw him sit down on the +railing near her chair, they saw his pleased smile, and they decided +that Miss Selby was a fickle and a heartless girl. + +Then presently they saw Miss Selby go out for a walk with Mr. Quincey. + +In the meantime, Mr. Anderson was striding along the quiet country roads +at a tremendous pace. No; he did not like the country. + +Except for his unique and wonderful paper mill, he could wish with all +his heart that he were back in the city, where there were numbers of +people he knew, friendly faces to see, jolly voices to hear. He could +think of no particular person he was especially anxious to see, yet it +seemed to him that he missed somebody, badly. + +So, he went up that hill again. Again Sandy was there, and Mrs. Granger; +again he was invited to look at the garden, and this time he accepted. + + +V + +Mrs. Granger was a widow, and she admitted herself that the loss of Mr. +Granger had made her very sympathetic. She told Mr. Anderson that she +“understood,” and he firmly believed this, without exactly knowing what +there was to be understood. + +Anyhow, her manner was wonderfully soothing to one who had recently been +laughed at, and the young man appreciated it. Twice they strolled round +the garden, followed by Sandy, and Mrs. Granger, in a charming and +playful way, made a chaperon of Sandy. + +“You know you’re Sandy’s friend,” she said. “He discovered you.” + +Mr. Anderson found this very touching. + +Then, when they had come round to the gate for the second time, she said +that she would be very pleased to see him if he would like to come in +for a cup of tea that afternoon. + +“Thank you!” he replied heartily. “That’s very kind of you.” + +And he really did think it was very kind of her, and that she was a +charming, gracious, kindly little lady, yet he had not said definitely +whether he would come to tea or not. + +For all the time, in the back of his mind, there was a queer, miserable +feeling he could not define, a sense of guilt, as if he had been very +careless about something very dear to him. He thought that he would not +make up his mind until--well, until he saw-- + +What he saw was Miss Selby coming home from a walk with Mr. Quincey. She +was carrying a small bouquet of violets, so he supposed that she had +been in the woods--in those same woods--and with Mr. Quincey. So Mr. +Anderson did go to tea with Mrs. Granger. + +Mrs. Granger said he might come on Wednesday evening, and he went. She +played on the piano and sang for him, and he praised her music so much +that she was charmingly confused. Never did she guess that it was not +admiration that moved him, but pity because she made so many mistakes in +technique. + +And he accounted all these mistakes to her credit; he thought, like many +another man, that the worse her performance in any art, the more +domestic and womanly she must be. He felt a fine, chivalrous regard for +the poor thing. + +But still he kept waiting for some sign of relenting on the part of Miss +Selby. Every evening, as he crossed the dining room to the little table +he thought that perhaps to-night it would be different; perhaps to-night +it would be as it had been during that time when they had talked to each +other. + +Of course, if she didn’t care, he wasn’t going to force his unwelcome +conversation upon her. She was a woman; it was her place to make the +first move. + +What had he done, anyhow? Maybe he had been a little hasty, but at least +he hadn’t laughed at her, or ever had the slightest desire to do such a +thing. And if, in her unreasonable feminine way, she wanted him to +apologize for things he hadn’t done, he was ready so to do--if she would +make the first move. + +“Very well!” thought Miss Selby every evening when she saw him. “If he’s +satisfied to--to let things go on like this, I’m sure I don’t care.” + +She was much better able to wear a calm expression of not caring than he +was. He looked dejected and sulky. But when out of the public eye, he +did better than she, for he merely walked up and down his room, or gazed +out gloomily upon those depressing trees, while she, locked in her own +room, often cried. + +The next Sunday it rained, but nevertheless he went out early in the +afternoon, and Miss Selby knew very well where he was going. + +“Let him!” she said to herself. “If he’s so easily taken in by +that--that designing woman and her dog, _I_ don’t care! She’s probably +trained the dog to behave like that.” + +This was unjust. Mrs. Granger had no need to train dogs to bring guests +into her house. Undoubtedly she liked Mr. Anderson, but if he had not +come there would still have been Captain MacGregor, whom she had been +liking for a good many years. Mr. Anderson was soon made aware of the +captain’s existence by Leroy. + +Now, there is no denying that Leroy himself was a shock to the young +man. To begin with, it seemed incredible that any one who looked as +young as Mrs. Granger should have a son eight years old, and in the +second place, if she did have a son, it should have been a different +kind of child. + +Leroy was a nice enough boy in his way, but completely lacking in the +plaintive and poetic charm of the mother. Indeed, he seemed more akin to +Sandy, a rough, cheerful, headstrong young thing. But he had none of +Sandy’s admirable instinct for judging human nature, and in the +beginning he did not like Mr. Anderson. + +He was frank about it. He said that Mr. Anderson’s watch was markedly +inferior to Captain MacGregor’s, and he expressed a belief that Captain +MacGregor could, if he wished, lick Mr. Anderson. He said a good many +things of this sort, so that the young man was badly prejudiced against +this unknown captain some time before he met him. + +And when he did meet him, on that rainy Sunday, nothing occurred to +soften the prejudice. He found MacGregor installed as an old friend. He +found also that the man had brought to Mrs. Granger, as a gift, six silk +umbrellas. + +Six! It was an overwhelming gift. Anderson himself had brought a box of +chocolates, but this was completely overshadowed by the umbrellas, just +as he himself was overshadowed by the impressive silence of the other +man. + +A big, weather-beaten fellow of forty-five or so was this MacGregor, +with the face and the manner of a gigantic Sphinx; he was neither +handsome nor entertaining, but it was impossible to ignore or despise +him. The solid worth of him, the honest self-respect, and the massive +obstinacy, were plainly apparent. + +He was not worried by the appearance of a strange young man; on the +contrary, he seemed mildly amused. He let Anderson do all the talking, +and just sat in a corner of the veranda, smoking his pipe. + +This aroused in Anderson an unworthy spirit of emulation. He did not +enjoy being so completely overshadowed by this man and his six +umbrellas, and he returned the very next evening with four superb +phonograph records. He found MacGregor there, just opening a paper +parcel containing fourteen pairs of white gloves. + +He waited until Wednesday, and then he arrived with a long box of the +most costly roses. The captain was not there, but Mrs. Granger showed +Anderson a little gift she had received from him the night before--five +mahogany clocks. + +The unhappy young man was almost ready to give up then, until Mrs. +Granger casually explained that Captain MacGregor was a marine insurance +adjuster and, in the course of his business, was often able to buy +articles which had been part of damaged cargoes and yet were themselves +in nowise damaged. + +“So that he sometimes brings me the most wonderful things,” she said. +“He _is_ so thoughtful and generous. Don’t you like him, Mr. Anderson?” + +“Well, you see, I don’t know him very well,” Anderson replied. + +He went home somewhat comforted. Not only had Mrs. Granger been +unusually sympathetic and charming, but her words had inspired him with +a new idea. + +On Friday evening he arrived with a very large package, which he left in +the hall. He then entered the sitting room, and found Mrs. Granger +sweetly admiring the captain’s latest gift--seven handsome black silk +blouses, all exactly alike. + +He let her go on admiring, and even generously said himself that they +were “very nice.” Then, after a decent interval--“By the way,” he +remarked, and went out into the hall and fetched in his package. + +It was pretty imposing. He had spoken to the foreman of the paper mill, +and the foreman had shown a friendly interest, so that he was now able +to present to Mrs. Granger: + +1 ream of the finest cream vellum writing paper, with envelopes. + +2 reams of gray note paper, with blue envelopes. + +1 ream of thin white writing paper, the envelopes lined with dark +purple. + +And a vast number of small memorandum pads; pink, blue, and yellow. + +“Those are for Leroy,” he said, with a modest air which failed to +conceal his triumph. This time he had won; there was no doubt about it. + + +VI + +On Saturday night Miss Selby did not appear at the little table. + +“Gone out to dinner,” he thought. + +Why shouldn’t she go out to dinner? He simply hoped that she was +enjoying herself. And, as he ate his solitary dinner, he thought about +this; he imagined Miss Selby enjoying herself somewhere, sitting at some +other table, and probably with some other young man sitting opposite +her. + +He knew how she would look if she were enjoying herself, with that +lovely color in her cheeks, and that wonderful smile of hers. Well, it +was none of his business--absolutely none of his business. + +And yet, after dinner, he found occasion to stop the landlady in the +hall, and to say, with an air of courteous indifference: + +“That young lady who sits at my table--didn’t see her to-night. Has she +gone away?” + +“No, Mr. Anderson!” answered Mrs. Brown, with stern solemnity. “She has +not. She’s lying upstairs, sick, at this very moment that I’m speaking +to you. And _I_ think it’s pneumonia, that’s what _I_ think.” + +“Pneumonia!” he cried. “But only last night--” + +“It takes you sudden,” Mrs. Brown asserted. “And Miss Selby--well, +people have often said to me how blooming she looked, but well I knew it +was nerve, and nerve alone, that kept her going. Nerve strength!” she +sighed. “It’s a treacherous thing, Mr. Anderson. You live on your +nerves, and then, all of a sudden, they snap--like that!” + +And her bony fingers snapped loudly, a startling sound in the dimly lit +hall. The young man was in no condition to judge of the value of Mrs. +Brown’s medical opinion; he was simply panic-stricken. + +He went out of the house in a sort of blind haste, and began to walk +along roads strange to him, under a cloudy and somber sky. He heard the +voice of the wind in the trees, and to his unaccustomed ears it held no +solace, but was a voice infinitely mournful. + +Pneumonia! That little, little pretty thing--so far from home--ill and +alone in a boarding house. Such a young, little thing. + +He remembered that morning in the woods--her face when she had looked up +at him from the violets she was picking--that radiant face, clear-eyed +as a child’s. + +“It’s my fault!” he cried aloud. “I ought to have known she couldn’t +take care of herself properly. It’s my fault! The poor little thing! +She’s done some fool trick--got her feet wet--probably makes her lunch +of an ice cream soda--perhaps she can’t afford any lunch. And +now--pneumonia! She had no _right_ to get pneumonia! It’s--” + +He stopped short, in a still, dark little lane, clenched his hands, +stood there shaken by pain, by anger, by all the unreason of grief and +anxiety. + +“She ought to have known better!” he shouted. + + +VII + +When he came downstairs the next morning, Mrs. Brown regarded his +strained and haggard face with profound interest, and she observed to +one of the old ladies that she believed Mr. Anderson was “coming down +with something.” + +He made inquiries about Miss Selby’s health, and obtained very vague and +confused replies, which he interpreted as people jaded and despondent +from a bad night are apt to interpret things. He went into the dining +room, but he could eat no breakfast. Who could, sitting alone at a +little table, opposite an empty chair? Then he went out again. + +It was a rainy day, but that was so fitting that he scarcely noticed it. +He remembered having seen a greenhouse not far away, and he went there. +It was not open on Sunday, but he made it be open. He banged so loud and +so long on the door that at last an old man came out of a near-by +cottage. + +“It’s a case of pneumonia!” said the young man, fiercely. “I’ve got to +have some flowers.” + +So he was admitted to the greenhouse, and he bought everything there +was, and then sat down at a little desk to write a card. He never forgot +the writing of that card, the rain drumming down on the glass roof, the +palms and rubber trees standing about him, and the hot, moist, steamy +smell like a jungle. He never forgot what he wrote, or how he felt while +he wrote it. + +But there would be no use in repeating what he wrote, for nobody ever +read that card. + +He put it with the flowers, and set off home. When he got there he gave +the bouquet, very sodden now, to Mrs. Brown’s servant, and said to her: + +“Please give this to Miss Selby. Give it to her yourself; don’t send +it.” + +Then he went up to his own room and locked the door. And the room was +all filled with the gray light of a rainy day. + +The clang of the dinner bell startled him; he jumped up, scowling, and +muttered: “Oh, shut up!” But, just the same, he had to obey it. He had +to go downstairs, and had to sit at the little table. + +Scarcely had he sat down when he saw Miss Selby enter the room--Miss +Selby in a new dark green linen dress, looking unusually pretty, and not +even pale. + +He arose; he was pale enough. He couldn’t speak. She must have received +that card; she must have read it. As she glanced at him, he saw the +color deepen in her cheeks, and her smile was uncertain. She was so +lovely. + +“I thought--” he began. + +She sat down, and he did, too. Again their eyes met. + +“It’s a miserable day,” she observed. + +He didn’t think so. He thought it was the most beautiful day that had +ever dawned; and he might have said something of the sort if he had not +just at that moment seen an awful thing. He stared, appalled, almost +unbelieving. + +The waitress was coming across the room, carrying his immense bouquet. + +“No!” he cried, half rising. + +But it was too late; she had come; she presented the bouquet to Miss +Selby with a pleased and kindly smile. + +“For you!” she announced. + +Every one in the room was watching with deep interest. + +“See here!” said the young man, in a low and unsteady voice. “I--I only +got them because I thought--they--she told me--you had pneumonia. I +thought--Give them back to her. Throw them away! I--I’m sorry--” + +“Sorry I haven’t got pneumonia?” asked Miss Selby. “It’s too bad, but +perhaps I can manage it some other time.” + +Her tone and her smile hurt him terribly. He wished that he could snatch +the flowers away from her. She was laughing at him again; every one in +the room was laughing at him. + +And it didn’t occur to him that Miss Selby couldn’t possibly know how he +felt, but was a very young and inexperienced creature who was also hurt +by his strange manner of giving bouquets. She thought he wanted her to +know that, unless she were very ill, he wouldn’t dream of giving her +flowers. She was even more hurt than he was. + +“Will you bring a vase, please, Kate?” she asked. + +Katie did bring a vase, and the hateful and offensive flowers were set +up between them, like a hedge. He leaned over, and with his penknife +deliberately cut off the card tied to the stems and put it into his +pocket. + +And not one more word did they speak all through that dreadful meal. + + +VIII + +In his pain and anger and humiliation he turned blindly to Mrs. Granger, +the charming little lady who never laughed at any one. He couldn’t get +to her fast enough; he strode on through the mud in the steady downpour +of rain, simply longing to see her, and to hear her soft, gracious +voice, and to be within the shelter of her friendly home. + +That card was still in his pocket; he took it out, and as he walked +along, tore it into bits and strewed them behind him. They fell into +puddles, where they would lie to be trampled on, those words he had +written--a suitable end for them. + +He pushed open the gate of Mrs. Granger’s garden, and was very much +comforted by Sandy’s ecstatic welcome. Dogs _did_ know. They appreciated +it when you meant well; they were not suspicious, not mocking. When you +gave them something they accepted it in good faith. + +He went on toward the house, walking rapidly, impatient to get in there +to the gentle serenity of Mrs. Granger’s presence. He rang the bell, and +directly the parlor-maid opened the door he knew he was not going to +have peace and solace. + +Something had gone wrong. He could hear Leroy’s voice raised in a loud, +forlorn bellow, and Mrs. Granger’s voice, tearful and trembling, and +Captain MacGregor’s voice, with a slightly exasperated note in it. He +entered the sitting room, and there was Mrs. Granger, weeping, and Leroy +sobbing. Sandy began to bark. + +“Oh, Mr. Anderson!” cried Mrs. Granger. “How can you let him do that? +Oh, please keep him quiet!” + +Anderson put the dog outside, and then returned. + +“But what’s the matter?” he asked. + +“Leroy’s been bitten by a m-mad d-dog!” cried Mrs. Granger. + +“Was _not_ a mad dog!” Leroy asserted. + +“See! Here on his leg!” she went on. “And he never told me! It happened +late yesterday!” + +“There’s no reason to assume that the dog was mad,” interrupted the +captain. + +“It was! Animals adore Leroy! Only a rabid dog would dream of biting +him!” + +“Was _not_ a rabid dog,” Leroy insisted sullenly. + +“Well, see here!” said Anderson. “If you think--if you’re worried--why +not have his leg cauterized?” + +“Oh, I can’t!” she cried. “My child burned with red-hot irons!” + +Leroy began to bellow at this inhuman suggestion, and Mrs. Granger +clasped him in her arms. + +“Don’t cry, darling!” she sobbed. “Mother won’t let them hurt you!” And +she looked at Captain MacGregor and Mr. Anderson with unutterable +reproach. + +They were silent for a time. + +“Well, see here!” Anderson suggested. “If you could find the dog, +and--keep it under observation for a few days--” + +This idea appealed to the child. + +“Sure!” he said. “I’ll find him, mom. You just let me alone, and I’ll +find him for you, all right!” + +“You said you couldn’t remember what the dog was like.” + +“Yes, I know. But I remember the street where it was, an’ I’ll go back +there to-morrow,” Leroy declared. “I could stay out o’ school jist in +the mornin’ and jist--ferret it out. I got lots of clews. An’ I bet +you--” + +“I’ll go with you now,” said Anderson. + +The agitated mother didn’t even thank him. + +“Perhaps that would be a good idea,” she admitted. “You might try it, +anyhow, and see.” + +So Leroy was fortified against the rain in oilskins and rubbers, and he +and Mr. Anderson set forth together in quest of the dog. The small boy +was highly pleased with the adventure; he did not often have an +opportunity to frolic in the rain, and he made the most of it, +caracoling before Anderson like a sportive colt. Sandy, too, would have +enjoyed it, but he was tied up. + +“One dog at a time,” said Anderson. “Now, young feller, let’s hear about +it.” + +“Aw, it was nothin’,” Leroy replied with admirable nonchalance. “Jist a +dog ran up an’ bit me. I mean, I was runnin’, an’ I guess I stepped on +his paw an’ he bit me.” + +“Did you tell your mother you stepped on the dog?” + +“I dunno what all I told her,” Leroy admitted. “Anyway, what’s it +matter? Had to do somethin’ to keep her quiet.” + +Anderson considered that it was not his place to rebuke this child, and +he let the disrespect pass. + +“Where did it happen?” + +“Long ways from here, all right!” said the boy, triumphantly. + +He spoke no more than the truth. It was a very long way. They went on +and on, down long, quiet suburban streets, lined with dripping trees and +houses with no signs of life. They went on and on. + +At first Leroy was talkative and cheerful, and found great satisfaction +in splashing in puddles, but as time went on he grew silent, and tramped +through the puddles more as a matter of principle than through +enjoyment. + +“What was the name of the street?” asked Anderson. + +“Well, I don’t know,” the boy answered, “but I guess I’d know it if I +saw it. Somewheres around here, it was. Might be around the next +corner.” + +They went round the corner, and there was a candy store. + +“That’s it!” Leroy announced. “It’s open, too.” + +Mr. Anderson said nothing, but walked steadily forward, and Leroy +trotted by his side. + +“They sure did have good lollypops in there,” observed Leroy. “Best I +ever tasted.” + +Still no response from the adult, possessor of all power and wealth. +Leroy sighed. And Anderson turned to look at him, and discovered a wet +and not very clean face upturned to his, with brown eyes very like +Sandy’s. Poor little kid, tramping along so bravely in his oilskins! He +looked tired, too. + +“All right!” said Anderson. “We’d better go back and get a few +lollypops.” + +After that Leroy went on, much encouraged in spirit. + +“Here’s the street!” he cried at last. “The lil dog ran out o’ one of +those houses--I don’t know which one.” + +Mr. Anderson rang the bell of the first house. The occupants owned no +dog, never had, and never intended so to do. In the second house he was +confronted by a very disagreeable old lady. She admitted that she had a +dog, and she said, with unction, that her dog could and would bite any +persons unlawfully trespassing on her property, as was any dog’s right. + +“I dare say Rover did bite the boy,” she suggested, “if he came in here +trampling and stampling all over my flower beds. And serve him right, I +say!” + +“I did not!” said Leroy, indignantly. “And that’s not the dog, Mr. +Anderson. I can see him out the window. He’s a police dog, and my dog +was a little one.” + +They proceeded to the next house. Nobody came to the door at all. There +was only one more house left on the street. + +“Well, I hope the right dog’s in there,” said Leroy, “but--” He paused, +then he laid his hand on Anderson’s sleeve. “Most any lil dog would +_do_,” he said, very low, “for _her_.” + +Mr. Anderson was about to protest sternly against such a dishonest and +immoral suggestion, but somehow he didn’t. The child’s hand looked so +very small, and his manner was so trusting. He said nothing at all, +simply walked up the path to this last house. + +He rang the bell, and the door was opened with startling suddenness by a +little man with spectacles and a neatly pointed white beard. He looked +like a professor, and he was a professor--of Romance Languages--and +because of his scholarly unworldliness, he had been cheated and swindled +so many times that he had become fiercely suspicious. He glared. + +“This boy has been bitten by a dog,” Mr. Anderson explained. “And we +want to find the dog, to see--” + +“Ha!” said the little man. “And what has this to do with me, pray?” + +“I thought perhaps you had a dog here--” + +The professor folded his arms. + +“Very well!” said he. “I have. And what of it?” + +“If you’ll let us see the dog--” + +“Aha!” said the professor. “I see! A blackmailing scheme! You wish to +see my dog. You will then cause this child to identify the dog as the +one which bit him, in order that you may collect damages. A ve-ry +pret-ty little scheme, I must admit!” + +Anderson had had a singularly trying day, and he was very weary of this +quest, anyhow. + +“Nothing of the sort!” he said curtly. “If you’ll be good enough to let +us see your dog--or if you’ll give me your assurance that the animal is +perfectly healthy--” + +“Don’t you give him a penny, Joseph!” cried a quavering female voice +from the dark depths of the hall. + +The professor laughed ironically. + +“Ve-ry pret-ty!” he repeated. “But you may as well understand, once and +for all, that I absolutely refuse to allow you to see my dog, or to give +you any assurance of any kind whatsoever.” + +And nothing could move him. Mr. Anderson argued with him with as much +tact and politeness as he could manage just at that time, but in vain. + +“See here!” he said at last. “Let me see the dog, and if it’s the right +one, I’ll _buy_ it. Now will you believe--” + +But the professor would not believe until Anderson had signed a document +which he drew up, solemnly promising that, if the dog were identified by +Leroy as the dog which had bitten him, he, Winchell Anderson, would +purchase the said dog for the sum of twenty-five dollars. + +Then, and then only, was the dog brought into the room. And Leroy +instantly, loudly and fervently asserted that it was _the_ dog. By this +time Mr. Anderson was perfectly willing to believe him. He paid the +money and stooped to pick up the dog, a small animal, of what might be +called the spaniel type. + +It snapped at him. He could not pick it up, because on the next attempt +his hand was bitten. At last, upon his paying in advance for the +telephone call, the professor summoned a taxi. Mr. Anderson could not +get the dog into the taxi, but Leroy had no trouble at all with it. It +seemed to like Leroy. + +They rode home in silence, because every time Anderson uttered a word +the animal growled and struggled in the boy’s arms. + +They reached Mrs. Granger’s house, and while Leroy ran ahead with the +dog in his arms, Anderson delayed a minute to pay the taxi with the last +bill remaining in his pockets. Then he followed. It had been a costly +and a wearisome quest, but Mrs. Granger’s relief and gratitude would be +sufficient reward. + +In the doorway of the sitting room he paused a moment, smiling to +himself at the scene before him. Leroy was down on his knees, playing +with this quite unexpected and delightful new dog, and Mrs. Granger +knelt beside him, one arm about her son’s neck. + +Captain MacGregor was there, but in a corner, so that one need not +consider him in the picture--the peaceful lamp-lit room, the gentle +mother and her child. + +“I’m very glad--” he began, when, at the sound of his voice, the dog +sprang up and rushed at him, and was caught by Leroy just in the nick of +time. He growled threateningly. + +“I guess I’d better tie him up,” said Leroy. “He doesn’t like Mr. +Anderson.” + +“Why, how very strange!” Mrs. Granger exclaimed. + +Leroy did tie him up to the leg of a table. + +“But why doesn’t the poor little doggie like Mr. Anderson?” pursued Mrs. +Granger, and there was something in her voice that dismayed the young +man. + +“I don’t know,” he replied, briefly. + +“It’s very strange,” she remarked. “Very! But sit down, Mr. Anderson. +Perhaps you were just a little bit rough in handling him--without +meaning to be.” + +“No, he wasn’t!” Leroy asserted, indignantly. “He--” + +At this point the dog broke loose, flew at Anderson, and would have +bitten him if Anderson had not prevented him--with his foot. + +“Oh!” cried Mrs. Granger. “Oh, Mr. Anderson, how could you! You kicked +the poor little doggie!” + +“I--I simply pushed him--with my foot,” said Anderson. “He’s a +bad-tempered little brute.” + +“Dogs are never bad-tempered unless they’re badly treated,” Mrs. Granger +declared, with severity. “They always know a friend from a foe.” + +“All right!” the young man agreed. “Then I’m afraid I’m a foe.” He +turned toward the door. “If you’ll excuse me,” he said, “I’ll be getting +along. I’m--I’m tired. Good evening!” + +“Good evening!” said Mrs. Granger and Captain MacGregor in unison. + +She let him go! He opened the front door and stepped out into the rain +again, and never in his life had he felt so bitter, so disappointed, so +cruelly, intolerably depressed. After all he had done, she let him go +like this! Not even a word of thanks. Poor little doggie, eh? + +Halfway down the path he heard a shout; it was Leroy, rushing after him +bareheaded through the rain. + +“Say!” he shouted. “You’re--” + +Words failed him, and he stretched out his hand, a rough, warm little +hand, wet from the rain, sticky from lollypops. Yet Anderson was very +glad to clasp it tight. + +“Good-by, old fellow!” he said. + +“Good-by, old fellow, yourself!” answered Leroy. + +And he sat on the gatepost, watching, and waving his hand as Anderson +went down the road in the rainy dusk. + + +IX + +Mr. Anderson had finished with women forever. And this resolve gave to +his face a new and not unbecoming sternness; the old ladies noticed it +directly he entered the dining room that evening. Miss Selby noticed it, +too, but pretended not to; she smiled that same chilly, polite smile, +and said never a word--neither did he. + +Supper was set before them, and they began to eat, still silent. And +then she spoke suddenly. + +“What’s the matter with your hand, Mr. Anderson?” she asked. + +“Oh, nothing; thanks!” he answered. + +Again a silence. But she could not keep her eyes off that clumsily-tied +bandage on his hand. + +“I wish you’d tell me!” she said. + +It was an entirely different tone, but he was no longer to be trifled +with like that. He smiled, coldly. + +“No doubt you’ll be very much amused,” he remarked, “to learn that I’ve +been bitten by a dog!” + +He waited. + +“Why don’t you laugh, Miss Selby?” he inquired. “It’s funny enough, +isn’t it? After I said that dogs always know. It’s what you might call +‘biting irony,’ isn’t it?” + +“I--don’t want to laugh,” said she. “I’m--just sorry.” + +He looked at her. + +“Miss Selby!” he cried. + +“I took your flowers upstairs,” she said. “I think--they’re the +prettiest--the prettiest flowers--I--ever saw.” + +“Miss Selby!” he exclaimed again. “See here! Please! When I thought you +were ill--” + +“I only had a little cold.” + +“I wrote a note,” he said. “I tore it up. I--I wish I hadn’t.” + +Miss Selby was looking down at her plate. + +“I wish you hadn’t, too,” she agreed. + +The old ladies had all finished their suppers, but not one of them left +the room. They were watching Miss Selby and Mr. Anderson. Surely not a +remarkable spectacle, simply a nice looking young man and a pretty +young girl, sitting, quite speechless, now, at a little table. + +Yet one old lady actually wiped tears from her eyes, and every one of +them felt an odd and tender little stir at the heart, as if the perfume +of very old memories had blown in at the opened window. + +“Let’s go out on the veranda,” said Mr. Anderson to Miss Selby, and they +did. + +The rain was coming down steadily, and the wind sighed in the pines. But +it was a June night, a summer night, a young night. + +Not an old lady set foot on the veranda that evening, not another human +being heard what Miss Selby from Boston, and Mr. Anderson from New York +had to say to each other. + +Only Mrs. Brown, opening the door for a breath of fresh air, did happen +to hear him saying something about the “best sort of paper for wedding +announcements.” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +APRIL, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVII NUMBER 3 + + TO OUR READERS--Since Mr. Munsey’s death we have received so many + inquiries for the books of which he was the author, all of which + have been out of print for many years, that in the present number + of the magazine we reprint, complete, this short novel, which was + written in the early part of 1892. We feel sure that our readers + will be greatly interested in the story, not only on account of its + authorship, but because it is a convincing picture of a phase of + American society thirty-five years ago. + + + + +Highfalutin’ + +THE BUNGALOW COLONY WAS A MAELSTROM OF MISUNDERSTANDING, BUT THE SHIP’S +OFFICER ASHORE NEVER LOST HIS BEARINGS + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +“We must simply look on it as a--a lark!” said Mrs. De Haaven, +resolutely. But her voice was not very steady, and her smile was +somewhat strained, for in her heart she saw this, not as a lark, but as +something very close to a tragedy. + +“It’s wonderfully light and airy,” her sister Rose began. + +This was true; a fresh sea breeze went blowing through the rooms, +fluttering the curtains and stirring the dark hair on Rose’s temples. +The tiny house was sweet with sun and salt wind. Both Mrs. De Haaven and +her sister could appreciate this, and they were sternly determined to +appreciate every possible good point about their new home. + +But--it was so tiny, so bare, so terribly strange; a sitting room, a +bedroom, and a kitchen, divided by partitions which did not reach to the +unstained rafters; painted floors, badly scuffed, the queerest +collection of scarred, weather-beaten furniture. + +“It will be like--camping out!” Mrs. De Haaven decided. + +The trouble was, that neither of them had had any sort of experience in +camping out, and, what is more, had never desired any such experience. +They had led the most casual, pleasant existence; when they had wanted +to be in the city, they had occupied Mrs. De Haaven’s charming little +flat; when it occurred to them that they would enjoy the country, they +had gone out to the old De Haaven farm on Long Island; if the impulse +seized them to travel, travel they did, in a comfortable and leisurely +fashion. + +Wherever they had been, in town or in the country, in Paris, in Cairo, +in Nice, there always had been plenty of people about to do all the +disagreeable and difficult things for them, and to do them willingly, +because not only had the two ladies paid well for all services rendered +them, but they were polite, kind and appreciative. + +And now, with a jolt and a jar, that smooth-moving existence had +stopped. Their lawyer, who had had complete charge of their nice little +fortune inherited from their father, had either done something terrible, +or something terrible had happened to him. They preferred, in charity, +to believe the latter, and anyhow, it did not matter. + +The money had dwindled down to almost nothing, the flat was sublet, the +farm rented, and the poor ladies had taken this beach bungalow on Staten +Island for the summer. They took it because it was cheap, and because it +was their tradition that one had to leave the city in the summer, and +because they hoped in this obscure little place to be let alone, to get +accustomed to their new life in peace. + +So here they were in their new home, all paid for, all furnished, all +ready for them to begin living in. It was certainly quiet enough, yet +somehow it did not impress Mrs. De Haaven as being peaceful; on the +contrary, there was something alarming, almost terrible, in the +quietness. + +Nobody was doing anything or preparing anything for them; nothing would +be done until she and Rose did it; the house simply stood there, waiting +for them to begin. How did one begin? + +She was a little shocked with Rose for turning her back on the house and +sitting down on the veranda railing. + +“Oh, Rose!” she said. “Shouldn’t we set to work--get things in order?” + +But Rose only reached out and caught her sister by the arm and pulled +her down beside her. + +“Look, darling!” she remarked. “That is _something_, isn’t it?” + +“That” was the sea before them--the North Atlantic, which rolled into +the bay and broke upon the sands. They had looked upon the Pacific, upon +the blue Mediterranean; they had seen many harbors, many beaches, beyond +comparison lovelier than this flat shore. + +But this, after all, was the great salt sea, the very source of life, +and the sun made it glitter, and the wind blew off it, fresh and +invigorating. It _was_ something. + +There they sat, with their arms about each other, such forlorn and +lovely creatures! Nina De Haaven, dark and delicate; Rose taller, +stronger, with a beautiful eagerness in her face, as if she waited in +trust and delight for whatever her destiny might bring. She was +twenty-four, and she had never really feared anything in her life. + +Rose was not afraid, now, of this new existence, only a little puzzled, +because she would have to be the one to start it. Nina was five years +older, but she was too gentle, too easily rebuffed; she had never quite +trusted life again after her beloved husband died. + +“There’s dinner,” thought Rose. “I’m sure they don’t supply food with +furnished bungalows. I’ll have to buy it and cook it. Mercy!” + +She had to do it, though, and she would. + +“Bread and butter,” she also thought, “and eggs and milk, and tea and +coffee, and sugar and spice. Everything goes in pairs! Coal and wood--” + +Nina, less abstracted, started up. + +“Somebody’s knocking somewhere!” she said. “I believe it’s our own back +door. I’ll go.” And she vanished into the house. Rose followed promptly, +and found her in the little kitchen, stooping over a basket on the +table. + +“It must be the dinner!” Nina declared, very much pleased. “There are +all sorts of things here.” + +“How can it be the dinner?” Rose asked. She, too, bent over the basket +and was enchanted by the varied assortment therein. + +“Perhaps the tradespeople do that when some one new moves in,” Mrs. De +Haaven suggested. “As a sort of sample. A boy just left it without a +word.” + +Rose shook her head. + +“I don’t think that’s likely,” she said. “I’m afraid it must be a +mistake. But--” She was busy cataloguing these household things in her +mind. Salt--she hadn’t thought of that; and a box of bacon, and matches. + +“I wish I’d kept house when Julian was alive,” said Mrs. De Haaven, “and +not lived in hotels. Then I shouldn’t be so--useless.” + +Rose gave her a little shake. + +“Encumberer of the earth!” she said, smilingly. “The thing is--whether I +dare to pretend to be as artless as you really are.” + +“What do you mean, Rose?” + +“I want to keep that basket!” + +“Oh, Rose! When you think it’s a mistake!” + +“Yes!” said Rose, firmly. “I’ll pay for it, of course, when I find out +who it belongs to. But it’s such a wonderful collection. I want it! +Here’s a package of pancake flour, and it tells you exactly how to make +them. And the tin of coffee has directions on it, too. We could get on +indefinitely, with pancakes and coffee.” + +“It would be terrible for our complexions,” Nina objected. + +“We can’t afford complexions, any more,” said Rose. And she began +unpacking the basket, setting the tins and packages in neat rows on the +dresser. The effect delighted them both; they were beginning to feel +really at home now. + + +II + +The sun was going down behind the house, and the sea before them +reflected in its darkening waters the faint purples and pinks streaking +the sky. Mrs. De Haaven and her sister were on the veranda, facing the +spectacle, but it aroused no enthusiasm in them; they were silent. They +were tired, dejected and--hungry. + +It was early in the season, and most of the bungalows were still +unoccupied; there was not a soul in sight, not a human sound to be +heard, nothing but the quiet breaking of the waves on the beach. A vast +and inhospitable world. + +“There comes some one!” said Mrs. De Haaven. + +Round the corner of the shore two figures came into sight, a girl and a +man. They came on very slowly, so close to each other that now and then +their shoulders touched. The strange sunset light touched their young +heads with a sort of glory. + +“We can ask her,” Mrs. De Haaven began doubtfully. + +“I suppose I’ll have to,” said Rose. “There’s no one else alive on the +surface of the earth. But--somehow I hate to bother them about oil +stoves at such a moment. Still, I can’t let her go!” + +She sighed, and got up, but just then the couple turned and began +walking up the sands directly toward them. They were so absorbed in each +other, not talking very much, but looking at each other from time to +time, long, long glances. + +The man was a passably good-looking young fellow of a somewhat scholarly +type, lean and tall, and wearing spectacles, but the girl was a marvel, +a miracle of soft, rich colors and vigorous health. Her eyes were blue, +her hair the shade of ripe wheat, her sunburned face beautifully +flushed. She was strong, lithe, straight-limbed, and such a joy to see +that Rose forgot all about oil stoves. + +“Well, good-by, Margie!” said the young man in spectacles, in the most +casual sort of tone. + +“Good-by, Paul!” the girl rejoined, equally casual. + +Their eyes met, and they both glanced hastily away. The girl essayed a +smile. + +“Well,” she said. “Good-by, Paul!” + +“Good-by, Margie!” he repeated. “I--” + +There was a long silence. + +“I’ll have to go in,” said she. “It’s late. Good-by, Paul!” + +She held out her hand, and he took it. They stood hand in hand, looking +at each other. Suddenly she snatched away her hand. + +“Good-by, Paul,” she cried, and ran off. + +“Good-by, Margie--dear!” he called after her. + +She had gone into the bungalow next to them, slamming the screen door +behind her. + +“How--sweet!” Mrs. De Haaven declared. “How dear and _young_, Rose!” + +“I’ll give her a chance to get settled first, before I go and ask her,” +said Rose. “It’s too sordid to ask her how to light a stove when she’s +just said good-by to Paul.” + +So they waited a little. Their neighbor was extraordinarily noisy in +there; doors banged, all sorts of things rattled and slammed, and while +they waited for this alarming racket to subside, a small open car came +down the road behind the houses, stopped, and presently the back door +slammed and a voice sounded in there--a man’s voice, and a young one, +too. + +“Look alive with that dinner, Margie! I’m in a hurry!” + +“The things haven’t come down from the store yet,” said Margie. “I +ordered them--” + +“Don’t make excuses,” the man interrupted. “I told you I’d be home at +six, and that I’d be in a hurry.” + +“Oh, I’m not making excuses!” answered Margie, scornfully. “I wouldn’t +bother to do that to you. I was just explaining. It’s not my fault if +the man doesn’t bring the things.” + +“We’ve got _their_ things!” Rose whispered to her sister. “I know it!” + +“If you’d stay at home and look after your job, instead of running about +with that measly little lawyer,” the man began. + +“Shut up!” cried Margie. + +And somehow that furious exclamation hurt both the listeners. For both +those quarreling voices, in spite of their bad temper and unrestraint, +were good voices, the voices of people who ought to know better. + +“All right!” said the man. “You wait till Bill comes home, young woman!” + +“I don’t give a darn about Bill!” she retorted. “If you’re in such a +hurry, take the car and go up to the store and get the stuff.” + +“Not much!” he said. “It’s your job to get the meals, and I won’t help +you. I’ve got enough work of my own to do.” + +“I’ll have to take them their things,” murmured Rose, and she and her +sister went into the kitchen and, by the feeble light of an ill-trimmed +lamp, began to repack the basket in haste. + +And while they were so engaged, there came the most tremendous slam of +all, next door, and a new voice sounded, another man’s voice, not loud +and angry, like the others, but cool, deliberate, and masterful. + +“What’s up?” he demanded. + +“No dinner ready,” the other man replied petulantly. + +“Because the things haven’t come from the store,” explained Margie, +sullenly. “I ordered them in plenty of time.” + +“Take your car and go and get ’em, Gilbert,” said the masterful voice. + +“But, look here, Bill! I’m in a hurry--” + +“Step!” said Bill. + +And Gilbert was “stepping” out of the back door just as Rose was coming +in with the basket. He backed into the kitchen again, and she followed +him. + +“I think these are yours,” she said. “They were left at our house--by +mistake, I’m sure.” + +Some one took the basket from her, and looking up, she had her first +sight of Bill. + +He was, she thought, the most impressive human being she had ever set +eyes on, and one of the handsomest. A tremendous fellow, blue-eyed and +fair-haired, like Margie, but without a trace of her sullenness; there +was a sort of grim good-humor in his face. + +He was not smiling, though; none of them were, and Rose was seized with +a sudden uneasiness in the presence of these three silent, blue-eyed +creatures. With a deprecating smile, she opened the back door, to +flee--when she remembered Nina. + +“I--I wish--” she said, addressing Margie. “After you’ve quite finished +here, of course. If you could just spare a moment to show me how to +light that oil stove.” + +“I’ll show you now,” said Bill. He followed her out the door, and his +fingers closed like steel on her arm as he helped her down the steps in +the dark and across the little strip of grass behind the houses. He did +not release her until she was safely in her own bare, dimly-lit kitchen. + +“Good evening!” he remarked to Nina, and swept off his white-covered +uniform cap with a magnificent gesture. Then, without words, he dropped +on one knee beside the stove, and he turned up the wick and struck a +match, just as Rose had done. + +“No oil in it,” he announced, rising. “I’ll get you some.” + +“Mercy!” said Nina, after he had gone. “What a-an overwhelming +creature!” + +“Isn’t he?” Rose agreed. “He made me forget that, even if the stove ever +does get lighted, there’s nothing to cook on it. I’ll have to ask him +where the store is.” + +“It’s dark now, Rose. You can’t go wandering about in this strange +place.” + +“There’s nothing I wouldn’t do now for the sake of food!” said Rose. + +There was a knock at the back door; they both called “Come in!” and Bill +reëntered, letting the screen door crash behind him. He was carrying a +tin of kerosene, and at once he set to work filling the stove. + +“I’m very sorry to put you to all this trouble!” Nina asserted, +earnestly. + +He didn’t answer at all; he lit all the burners, and then: + +“What next?” he asked. + +“If you’ll please tell me where the store is--the store that basket came +from--and how to get there--” + +“Now? It’s closed,” said he. His keen glance traveled round the bare +little kitchen. + +“I’ll see that you get your dinner,” he declared, and went off again, +before they could say a word. + +It was Gilbert who brought the dinner in on a tray, and no one could +have performed a neighborly service more ungraciously. He was a +remarkably good-looking boy of nineteen or so, but so surly, +ill-tempered-- + +“He’s a young beast!” said Rose, indignantly. + +Nina was silent a moment. + +“Isn’t it queer--” she remarked. “How contagious that is!” + +“Beastliness? _You’d_ never catch it!” Rose declared. + +“My dear, when he banged that tray down, and never even took off his +hat, I wanted to throw a plate at him,” said Nina, seriously. “I’d have +enjoyed it!” + +It was a good dinner, served on the coarsest of china, but well cooked. +And after they had eaten it and washed the dishes, they were ready to go +to bed and to sleep, not quite so forlorn in their new home. + + +III + +They were awakened the next morning by a persistent and none too gentle +knocking at the back door, and Nina, slipping on a dressing gown, +hurried to respond. She opened the door upon a riotous, glittering June +morning, and Margie, clear-eyed and glowing as the dawn--but far from +amiable. + +“Here’s your breakfast!” she said, thrusting a wooden box into Nina’s +hands. + +“Oh, but how awfully good and kind!” cried Nina. “I never--” + +“Bill said you didn’t have a thing in the house,” Margie remarked, +scornfully, “and couldn’t even light the stove. So he told me to bring +this.” + +Her brusque contempt was a little too much even for the gentle Nina. + +“It’s very kind of you,” she said, with a polite smile. “But we’d have +managed somehow--” + +Margie shrugged her shoulders. + +“Well, Bill told me to bring your breakfast,” she said. “And to ask what +you wanted from the store.” + +“Thank you, but I couldn’t think--” Nina began, but with another +disdainful shrug Margie had turned away. + +“We’ll have to swallow our pride,” Rose suggested from the doorway. +“Let’s be quick, too, before it gets cold.” + +“I’m going to dress first,” said Nina. “Because when that scornful +Margie goes out, I’m going to follow. I’ll follow her all day long till +she goes to the store.” + +And she meant that. She dressed herself with all her usual unobtrusive +art, and she kept an eye on the house next door. In the very act of +lifting her second cup of coffee to her lips, she heard the front door +slam. She sprang up, pulled on a delightful little hat, and ran out of +her own front door. + +Margie was walking quickly up the road, a strong, lithe young figure in +a jersey and a short skirt, bareheaded in the sun. And after her went +the slender and elegant Mrs. De Haaven, going to market for the first +time in her life. + +In a happy mood Rose set to work; she washed the dishes, made the bed, +set the little place in order, and then began unpacking the two big +trunks. Most of the clothes could stay in them, but there were all sorts +of other things--silver toilet articles, photographs, books, writing +materials, all the dear, friendly things that had often made even hotel +rooms look homelike. They worked wonders here. The only trouble was, +that there was no shelf for the books, and no flowers. + +“I’ll make a shelf!” Rose told herself. + +So she went out on the beach and found a suitable small board; then she +screwed two coat hooks into the wall beneath the sitting room window, +laid the board across them, and stood the favorite books on this in a +row. + +“Crude, but well-meaning!” she observed, surveying her first piece of +carpentering with a smile, and she went out to see if there were any +flowers about to delight Nina with when she came home. + +The first thing she saw was Bill coming down the road. Her impulse was +to step back into the house, but she was ashamed of such weakness; Bill +ought to be spoken to and thanked. So she sat down on the steps, and +Bill, catching sight of her, swung off his hat with that same fine +gesture. + +“_Comment ça va?_” he inquired, standing bareheaded before her. + +Certainly she had not expected French from Bill, but she politely +suppressed her surprise and answered cheerfully: + +“_Tres bien, merci, monsieur!_ I was just wondering if there were any +wild flowers growing about here?” + +She looked up at him, but hastily glanced aside, for Bill was looking +down at her with a smile which disconcerted her. + +“Flowers, eh?” he said. + +They were both silent for a time. Then Rose began, in a somewhat formal +tone: + +“My sister and I are both very grateful for--” + +A crash interrupted her. + +“What’s that?” asked Bill. + +“It sounds like my shelf,” she replied, ruefully. + +“Did _you_ try to put up a shelf?” Bill demanded. “Let’s have a look at +it.” + +Somehow she did not want Bill to come into their house. Not that she +distrusted or disliked him, but he made her uneasy. Still, she could not +very well refuse to let him come, so, with a good grace, she opened the +door and they entered. + +His blond head almost reached the ceiling; his great shoulders blocked +all the sunshine from the window; he seemed completely to fill the +little room. And she did not like him to be there. + +The pretty little things she had set out on the table seemed like a +child’s toys, the house was like a doll’s house, and she herself, with +her ineffectual shelf, felt altogether too diminished. He had been +staring at the fallen shelf and the coat hooks for some time with an odd +expression--as if he felt sorry for her. + +“Look here!” he said. “When you want anything of that sort done, tell +me.” + +“There’s no reason on earth why I should trouble you, Mr.--” + +“Morgan,” said he. “It wouldn’t be a trouble. There’s nothing I wouldn’t +do for you. Nothing!” + +The earnestness with which he spoke confused her. + +“Thank you, Mr. Morgan,” she began, hastily. “But--” + +“Look here!” he interrupted. “I’ve got to go away--and I don’t like to +leave you like this. You can’t look after yourself any better than a +baby.” + +Rose turned scarlet. + +“You’re mistaken, Mr. Morgan!” she declared, with a cold little smile. +“You’re very much mistaken!” + +“No,” he said. “No, I’m not. I knew, the first moment I saw you--” + +“We won’t discuss the matter, if you please.” + +“I’m not discussing anything,” said he, with a sort of gentleness. “I’m +only telling you that you’ve got me to count on whenever you need me.” + +Her hands clenched, but she answered quietly enough: + +“I can’t imagine any possibility of ‘needing’ you, Mr. Morgan.” + +He turned toward the door. + +“I don’t mean to make a nuisance of myself,” he declared, gravely. And +then he smiled. “I’m going away,” he added. “But I’m coming back!” + +The screen door banged after him, and Rose sat down on the couch and +began to cry. + +“Beast!” she cried. “I’d like to shake him!” + +But the idea of her shaking Mr. Morgan made her laugh. She dried her +tears, ashamed of her temper, and when Nina got back, she was her usual +good-natured, delightful self again. She did not mention the episode to +Nina; it would only distress her. + +“And I think I’m capable of managing Mr. Morgan!” she told herself, +grimly. + + +IV + +Nina was surprised by her sister’s censorious attitude. + +“But they do try to be neighborly!” she protested. + +“I don’t care!” said Rose, with unwonted heat. “I don’t like them, and I +don’t want anything to do with them. They’re a family of--savages!” + +“Oh, Rose! When that poor little Margie brings us flowers from her own +garden every day!” + +“Yes, because that Bill told her to!” thought Rose. But aloud she said: +“Brings them! She pretty nearly throws them at us.” + +“That’s just her way.” + +“Well, I don’t like her way, and I don’t want her flowers, and I don’t +like any of those Morgans, or anything they do. I never imagined such an +ill-tempered, quarrelsome family.” + +“I know,” said Nina, seriously. “And I think it’s pitiful.” + +“Pitiful! To snarl and snap at one another--” + +“Yes,” said Nina. “Because there’s something so splendid about them, in +spite of all that--something so honest and fine.” + +“Fine!” cried Rose, with a snort. + +“You must have noticed. They’re rough and unmannerly, but they’re never +vulgar. And they speak well. I think they’ve come down in the world, +Rose.” + +“They certainly have!” Rose agreed. “Down to the bottom. Nina, you’re +sentimental about your Morgans. You’ve seen how they live. A coarse, +ugly life, without one gracious touch. They eat in the kitchen, on a +table covered with oilcloth.” + +“Yes, and it’s a spotless kitchen, and everything about them is +wholesome.” + +“It’s no use,” Rose objected. “I don’t like them, and I won’t like them. +Now, you sit here on the veranda and read. I’m going to buy the Sunday +dinner.” + +“I’ll come with you,” said Nina, but she was glad Rose would not let +her. It was a long walk, and she felt tired, very tired and languid. She +did not want Rose to know how tired she was, or how worried. + +It seemed that their financial affairs were not definitely settled, as +they had believed. Mr. Doyle, the lawyer, kept writing to her letters +she could not quite understand, anxious, almost desperate letters, +accusing himself of “criminal folly”; begging her forgiveness, and +making all sorts of promises. He wrote always to her, never to Rose, and +she was glad of that, for she did not want Rose to know. + +But she was so tired. She tried valiantly to do her share, to be a good +comrade to her beloved sister; but she was not strong, either in body or +in spirit; she was a gentle soul; she could endure, but she could not +fight. She wanted only to live in peace and good will, harmless and +lovely as a flower. + +It was a Saturday afternoon; Gilbert had come home early in his little +car, and he and Margie had at once begun to quarrel fiercely. + +“Bill told you to take me to the village in the car, if I wanted!” she +declared. + +“Do you good to walk!” said her brother. + +“I won’t walk!” + +“All right! Then stay home!” + +Presently the back door slammed, in the Morgan fashion, and Nina hoped +he was going away. It hurt her to hear these two young creatures +quarrel so; she always wished that she had some magic word to stop them, +to bring quiet to their stormy spirits. She was waiting for the sound of +his engine starting up, when, to her surprise, she saw him standing on +the path before her. + +“Mrs. De Haaven,” he said, “can you spare me a few minutes?” + +“With pleasure!” she answered, as if this amazing request were quite a +matter of course. “Come up on the veranda, won’t you?” + +He did come up, and when she asked him, sat down opposite her. He was +silent for a few moments, and Nina studied him with frank and kindly +curiosity. For the first time she saw what a remarkably handsome boy he +was, a little haggard, a little too thin, perhaps, but tall and sinewy, +and notably distinguished. + +Yes, that was the word; he was distinguished looking, with his thin, +rather arrogant face, his slender, well-kept hands, his neat dark suit. +He was not surly to-day, and not shy or awkward; he looked at her +candidly as he spoke. + +“I hope you won’t mind,” he said. “But I knew _you_ could tell me. If +you’d give me your advice. I’ve got an invitation--but perhaps I’d +better show it to you.” + +He took a letter out of his pocket and handed it to her. It read: + +MY DEAR BOY: + + Why not run down for this week-end? Don’t bother to let me + know--just come if you can. I often think of you, and it seems to + me perfectly terrible that you should be living like that. And + quite unnecessary. I want you to meet some of your own sort. + + Yours--most sincerely, + LUCILLE WINTER. + + + +Lucille Winter! And writing in this vein to this boy! Nina held the +letter in her hand for a long time, unable to say anything to cloak her +thought. + +“You see,” said Gilbert, “I couldn’t go until to-day, on account of my +job. And I’d have to come back to-morrow night. D’you think that would +be all right?” + +“No!” thought Nina. “Nothing could be less right. It’s--a horrible +thing. You’re only a child. And Lucille--You don’t know Lucille, but I +do.” + +“You see,” he went on. “Mrs. Winter is my father’s cousin. You wouldn’t +suspect it, but my father’s family were--decent people.” + +“Oh!” Nina breathed. + +“I don’t mean that mother’s family wasn’t--all right,” he said. “My +mother--” He stopped. “My mother was a saint,” he announced. An odd +change came over his face; all the arrogance vanished, leaving it weary +and sorrowful. “And my father wasn’t,” he added. + +Another silence ensued. + +“So Bill’s got this idea of a simple life,” he said, with something like +a sneer. “He won’t let us see any of father’s people. Wouldn’t let me go +to college. He made me take this job--in the National Electric--when I +was only seventeen. In a year I’ll be twenty-one, and then Bill can go +to blazes. In the meantime--not much I can do. He controls the finances. +He’s away now, though. And I’m to Mrs. Winter’s.” + +“Oh, I don’t blame you!” thought Nina. “What a dreadful thing--to take a +boy like this and put him to work at seventeen, and make him live in +such a way! And if Lucille is his father’s cousin--She knows really good +people--It really would help him--” + +And because she was, in spite of her worldly experiences, so innocent +and good at heart, so ready to think well of every one, and so anxious +to help this unhappy boy, she did give him her advice. She told him what +clothes to take, what to tip the servants, and so on. + +“Please don’t tell Margie where I’ve gone,” he said. “I’ll be back +to-morrow night for dinner. And she’ll be all right--with you next +door.” He arose. “Thank you!” he said. “You’ve been--very kind to me.” + +She had meant to be. She hoped, she believed, that she had done well in +helping him to elude the tyrant Bill. + + +V + +Such a quiet afternoon. Rose turned off the highway, into the beach +road; the bright sea lay before her, roughened by a frolic wind, and on +its edge three or four little children played; their voices came to her +joyous and clear. Their end of the beach had been described by the real +estate agent as “the quiet end,” and so it was; their bungalow and the +Morgans’ were the only ones occupied as yet, and even these two showed +no signs of life to-day. + +Rose entered the house. It was certainly not a good house to hide in, +and she very soon discovered Nina in the bedroom with her hat on! + +“I had a telegram from Mr. Doyle,” she explained, hurriedly. “He wants +to see me about--something. So I thought to-day would be a good time to +run into town.” + +“That won’t do!” said Rose, severely. “You can’t treat me this way, Mrs. +De Haaven! I want to know all about it.” + +Nina turned and put both hands on her sister’s shoulders, looking +steadily into her face. + +“Rose!” she said. “Let me do this--my own way--alone. I’ve been such a +useless creature. No! Please, darling, let me finish! I have been +useless. I know you don’t mind, but--sometimes--Rose! I do so want to +manage this all by myself. And I know I can!” + +They were both silent for a moment. + +“All right! Go ahead, darling!” Rose agreed at last. “Only don’t come +back to-night. Stay in a hotel and come back to-morrow morning.” + +“And leave you all alone?” + +“The Morgans are here, and they’re enough. If you don’t promise not to +come back to-night, I’ll--I’ll go with you!” + +So Nina consented, although reluctantly, and a few minutes later they +set off together for the railway station. Rose stood on the platform, +looking after the train. + +“God bless you, darling!” she said, softly to herself. + +Poor valiant, gentle Nina, going off to attend to business affairs, to +“manage” the elusive and plausible Mr. Doyle. + +“But it would have hurt her if I’d said anything,” thought Rose. “And, +anyhow, things couldn’t be much worse, financially.” + +She walked back to the bungalow, a long walk; but she was in no hurry to +reënter the empty house. It was ridiculous to miss Nina so, just for one +night; it was weak and sentimental to feel so lonely. + +“I might learn a lesson from the Morgans,” she thought, as she went down +the beach road. “No one could accuse them of being too sentimental in +their family life!” + +And suddenly she felt sorry for the Morgans, with their quarrels and +their banging doors and their stormy, miserable existence. She thought +of them, and she thought of the love between Nina and herself which made +any place home, any trial endurable. And she pitied them with all her +heart. + +There was Margie on the veranda now, sewing--sewing in such a Morgan +way! She had a paper pattern spread out on the table, and the wind +fluttered it, and Margie pounced down upon it furiously, upsetting her +workbasket and getting herself tangled up in the yards and yards of +green charmeuse on her lap. Rose watched her for a minute; then she +said, moved by a friendly impulse: + +“Miss Morgan, won’t you let me help you?” + +Margie spun round, upsetting everything again. + +“No, thanks!” she replied, in her scornful way. But something in Rose’s +face made her flush and glance away. “Well,” she said, sullenly, “I _am_ +having a pretty bad time. There’s no reason why you should bother, +but--” + +Rose came up on the veranda beside her, and surveyed the woeful muddle. + +“What a pretty shade!” she remarked. “It ought to go well with your +hair.” + +“I know,” said Margie. “Paul--I mean--I’ve been told I ought to wear +green. And I’m going somewhere to-morrow afternoon.” + +“But you don’t expect to have this dress ready for to-morrow afternoon.” + +“I’ve got to.” + +Rose reflected for a moment. + +“I’ll tell you what!” she announced at last. “I have a green dress--a +really pretty georgette. I’ve only worn it once. With just a little bit +of altering, we could make it do beautifully for you to wear to-morrow. +It’s a good model. I got it in Paris last autumn. Won’t you come and +look at it?” + +“No!” cried Margie. “I don’t want any of your old clothes. I don’t +want--” Her voice broke. “I just hate you and your--highfalutin’ ways!” +she ended with a sob. + +“Upon my word!” Rose began, indignantly. “Is that--” But her resentment +could not endure against the sight of Margie weeping in that furious, +defiant way, the tears falling recklessly on the green charmeuse. + +“You don’t really hate me, Margie,” she said. “You couldn’t--when I like +you so much.” + +“Like me?” + +“I liked you the very first time I saw you,” Rose explained. “You were +saying good-by to Paul, on the beach.” + +“You saw Paul?” cried Margie. “I suppose you’ll tell Bill. Well, I don’t +care! If you don’t tell Bill, Gilbert will.” + +Rose found it surprisingly easy not to get angry with Margie. + +“But why should your brother object to Paul?” she inquired. + +“It’s not that,” said Margie. “Only what do you suppose Paul would think +of Bill--and this house--and the way we live? Oh, I’m so ashamed of us! +I’m so--so ashamed of us! If you knew--when mother was alive--three +years ago--we had our dear home, and everything so dainty and pretty in +it--and she kept us from fighting--just by being there. Oh, mother! +Mother darling! You don’t know--nobody knows--what it’s like--without +her.” + +Rose knelt down beside the girl, put an arm about her, and drew the +bright head down on her shoulder. + +“You poor little thing!” she crooned. “Poor little Margie!” + +“And now--I’m going to lose Paul,” Margie went on, in a choked voice. +“He’s always asking why he can’t come to see me in my own home. He’s +awfully particular and high minded. He hates to meet me on the sly that +way. And--” + +“I’d let him come, if I were you.” + +“I won’t! I’m too much ashamed of us.” + +“Couldn’t you make things a little better?” Rose suggested, very gently. + +“Bill won’t let me! Bill’s a beast! When mother died, he gave up our +dear old house--he’s packed up all her pretty things--they’re in the +woodshed, in barrels and boxes. He won’t let me touch them. He says +we’ve got to learn to work and to live simply. He just adored mother, +and he thought father didn’t make her happy enough, so he’s got this +idiotic idea about our not being like father’s people--not being +highfalutin’. ‘Plain living and high thinking,’ that’s what he’s always +saying. High thinking, when he hasn’t left one beautiful thing in our +lives! It’s all very well for him; he’s away at sea most of the time--” + +“At sea?” + +“Yes; he’s first mate on a cargo steamer,” said Margie, with a change in +her voice. “I know he’s a beast, and all that, but there is something +fine about Bill, after all. He’s a real man. And he’s been awfully good +to us--in his way. When Gilbert had bronchitis last winter, Bill +was--wonderful. And when mother died--I--I don’t know how I could have +lived without Bill.” + +She was silent for a moment. “Mother said she knew Bill would take care +of us--and he does--only it’s in a wrong way. Bill’s so--I don’t know +how to describe it--Bill’s so--big, he could live on a desert island and +not be discontented. He can live in this rough, common way and still +be--dignified. I don’t suppose you’ve ever noticed, but Bill has a way +of coming into a room sometimes and taking off his hat, that’s +like--like a king.” + +Rose felt her cheeks grow scarlet. + +“He _is_--impressive,” she agreed. + +“Bill’s big,” Margie went on, “and he only wants a few big things. But +Gilbert and I are little, and we want lots of little things. And--” She +sat up straight. + +“Paul wants to take me to see his sister to-morrow afternoon,” she said, +“and I’m going! There’ll be a row--because Gilbert said he’d have to +have his dinner at six, and he’s not going to get it. I’m not even going +to try to get home by six. He can tell Bill about Paul if he wants. I +don’t care. It’s got to happen some day.” + +“Margie, I’ll get Gilbert’s dinner for him to-morrow.” + +“You?” said Margie. + +“I’d like to. And you can enjoy your afternoon with an easy mind. I’ll +get Gilbert’s supper, and--Margie--bring Paul back with you, and I’ll +have something nice ready for you both.” + + +VI + +Rose had left a lamp burning in her own sitting room, as a beacon for +Nina, and all the time she was busy in the Morgan’s kitchen, she was +listening for that footstep. And for all her pleasure and excitement in +this surprise she had prepared for the Morgans, a vague anxiety lay in +the back of her mind, because Nina was so long in coming. She had +expected her for lunch, and the whole afternoon had gone by without her. + +She wished Nina could have seen Margie set out, in that Paris dress--the +loveliest, happiest creature! And she wished Nina were here now, to lend +her moral support in this wildly audacious plan, for, now that the thing +was done, she felt a little frightened. Margie and Gilbert were little +more than children; she could manage them; she could really help them. + +But it seemed to her that the shadow of Bill lay over the house; he +himself might be hundreds of miles away, but she couldn’t forget that +this was his house, and that she was defying him. The thought caused her +an odd sort of pain; you might dislike Bill, she thought, and vigorously +resent his domineering ways, but it was impossible not to respect him. + +It was even impossible not to like him just a little when you thought +how honestly he tried to take care of his unruly household, and when you +remembered all those little kindnesses. Well, the sensible thing was, +not to remember. + +She had a natural talent for cooking, and with the aid of a cookbook, +she had managed an excellent dinner. That part of the plan caused her no +worry. But the rest--She opened the oven door for one more look at the +pair of chickens sizzling richly in there, and then with a sigh, went +again to the dining room door. + +An amazing change was there! The round table was covered with a fine +damask cloth, and set out with gay, old-fashioned china, frail +glassware, sturdy old plate, all gleaming in the light of the shaded +lamp. On the walls hung two or three framed pictures, not masterpieces +by any means, but somehow lovable and friendly. + +“She’d like me to do this,” thought Rose. “For her children.” + +Because, as she had unpacked these things from the boxes and barrels, +such a strange feeling had come over her; she had felt that she +understood that mother. Standing here now, surrounded by the perishable +and infinitely touching belongings of that beloved woman, dead, but so +tenderly remembered by all her children, she thought she knew how she +had felt toward them all, how she had managed each one of them, wisely +and patiently; how she had loved them for the qualities which were so +splendid in them, and the faults that were only pitiful. And she wanted +them to remember their mother, not in bitterness and grief, but happily, +as if always conscious of her dear spirit. + +A sound startled her; a noise like little feet running over the tarred +paper on the roof. At first she thought, with no great comfort, that it +was rats, but then the pattering came upon the windowpanes, against the +door. It was rain. + +“Nina!” she thought. “What can be keeping her so late!” + +She went into the kitchen and opened the back door; the summer rain was +driving down with steady violence, drumming loud on the roof now, +spattering up from the path. Such a dark, strange world for Nina to be +out in alone! Moved by a sudden impulse, she ran out into the rain and +entered their own house; the lamp still burned clear and steady in the +neat little room. The clock struck six. + +“Oh, Nina!” she cried, aloud, in an unreasoning panic of fear. “Nina, +darling!” + +And then, above all the noise of the rain, she heard a familiar sound, +the slam of a door by which all the Morgans announced their home coming. +She hurried back there, her courage, her generous hopes, all gone now. + +“I’m an officious busybody!” she thought. “Why didn’t I stay at home and +mind my own affairs? Oh, I wish I’d let the Morgans alone! I wish--” + +She stopped short in the kitchen doorway, staring at Gilbert. He was +wearing a dinner jacket, and it was soaked through with rain; his collar +was wilted, his tie askew, his fair hair plastered across his forehead, +his blue eyes very brilliant. And his face, his clear-featured, handsome +young face, so white, so strained, so lamentably changed! The momentary +disgust she had felt turned to a painful compassion. + +“Gilbert!” she said, in a pleasant, matter-of-fact voice. “Get on dry +clothes. Your dinner’s ready for you.” + +She spoke to him as she thought his mother might have spoken; she +thought she felt a little as his mother might have felt to see the boy +like this. + +“No!” he said, in an unsteady voice. “Let me alone! What are you doing +here?” + +“I’m so glad I am here!” she thought. “So glad! Poor little Margie! If +she brings her Paul here now--” And aloud: “Gilbert!” she said, with +quiet authority. “Please do as I ask you--at once. Change your clothes.” + +“I won’t!” he said. “No, I won’t! You don’t know. You can’t understand. +Only Bill. Bill knew. Bill was right. I wish I was dead!” + +The same childish passion and unreason that Margie had shown. He sank +into a chair by the table and buried his face in his hands. + +“I wish I was dead!” he said again. + +And Rose, always listening for Nina’s step, had also to listen to this +boy’s sorry little tale. He had gone to visit his father’s cousin, +Lucille Winter. + +“Bill told me they were no good,” he said, “but I wouldn’t believe him. +And--you don’t know what it was like. I lost over a hundred dollars at +bridge. And I drank. I didn’t mean to, but every one else did, and I’ve +come home to my sister like this. If I’d had a penny left, I’d never +have come home again--never! It’s--you don’t know--it’s all so beastly, +and I thought I’d like that sort of life, but--I couldn’t get out fast +enough. I’ve found out now that old Bill was right--but it’s too late.” + +“It is not!” Rose declared, firmly. + +“I can’t pay that hundred,” he said. “And I’ve got to pay it to-morrow. +I--you can’t understand.” + +“And if you weren’t so honest and sound at heart you couldn’t feel so +sorry!” thought Rose. But she did not intend to give him too much +consolation; his shame and remorse were of inestimable value to him. “If +you’ll wash and change your wet clothes, and eat your nice hot dinner, +you’ll feel better,” she insisted. + +“I’ll--I’ll never feel better!” said he. + +“I’ll give you a cup of coffee now,” she began, when that sound, welcome +beyond all others, reached her ears--Nina’s step on the veranda. + +“Wait, Gilbert!” she cried, and ran back into her own house. Nina was +standing in the front room, drawing off her gloves. + +“Rose,” she said, in a strange, flat voice. “It’s all gone--every cent!” + +Rose helped her off with her wet jacket, took off her hat, pushed her +gently into a chair, and kneeling, began to unfasten her shoes, such +absurd little shoes, and soaked through. + +“Never mind, Nina!” she said. “We’re together, and that’s all that +matters.” + +Nina’s hands and feet were cold as ice, and her cheeks flushed. + +“Even the check we gave for this rent was no good,” she explained. “The +house belongs to Mr. Morgan, and I suppose he didn’t like to tell us. I +tried to borrow--just a little--this afternoon--from friends--I thought +they were friends--” + +“Hush, darling! Who cares? You’ll get straight into bed, with a +hot-water bottle at your poor cold feet, and I’ll make you a cup of +beautiful coffee.” + +She stopped short. + +Margie, bringing back Paul, to find Gilbert like that. And she had told +Margie to bring him. It was all her fault. + +She looked at the clock; half past six. Margie was to be expected any +minute now. Gilbert was sitting there in the kitchen in his wet clothes. +He didn’t look very strong. And Nina! Nina was telling her about Mr. +Doyle, and she pretended to pay attention, but she was listening for +Margie’s home-coming now with as much anxiety as she had listened for +Nina’s. This might spoil Margie’s poor little romance forever--and it +was _her_ fault. Gilbert would be ill. + +She had just got Nina into bed when the screen door slammed in the next +house. + +“One instant, Nina!” she cried, and rushed out, down the steps, through +the sodden little garden in the driving rain, and back into the Morgans’ +kitchen. Gilbert still sat just as she had left him, his head on his +arm. + +“I’ll--lock him in!” she thought, desperately. “But I’ll have to tell +Margie.” + +She went into the little passage, closing the kitchen door behind her, +and on into the sitting room. No one there. So she went toward the +dining room. The doorway was blocked by a tremendous figure, standing +there hat in hand, his back toward her. + +“Oh, _Bill_!” she cried, in her immeasurable relief. + +He turned; he saw her there, with her soft hair wet and disordered, her +face so white; he had seen his dining table set out with his mother’s +sacred possessions--and he showed no surprise. She thought that nothing +would surprise him, nothing would shock him, that he would meet anything +in his life coolly, honestly, and steadily--like a man. + +“Gilbert’s been to a week-end party at Lucille Winter’s,” she said. +“He’s--he’s in the kitchen. You’ve got to be very careful with him. He’s +only a child.” + +“All right!” Bill agreed, with the shadow of a smile. “I’ll take Gilbert +back into the fold. But this--” His smile vanished as he glanced toward +the dining room again. “This--” + +“I’m sorry,” said Rose. “But--poor little Margie’s bringing Paul--a +friend of hers, home to dinner to-night, and--” She paused a moment, +then she looked resolutely up at Bill. “I thought she would like it,” +she went on. “For her children--so that they’d remember--the things +they’ve forgotten. I’m sorry, but--” A sob choked her. + +“Please,” she begged, “be very kind to Margie--and Gilbert--and Paul. +I’ve got to go. I meant to stay, but--my Nina’s sick.” + +She turned to go, but tears blinded her; she stumbled against the +lintel. Bill’s hand touched her arm, the lightest touch, to guide her. + +“I promise you,” he said, “that everything shall be just as you want +it.” + +She brushed her hand across her eyes and looked at him. And she thought +she had never in her life seen anything like that look on his face. + +“I want to help you,” he announced. “That’s what I’ve always wanted, +since the first moment I saw you.” + +Neither of them had another word to say, to spoil that moment. She ran +back again to Nina, through the rain, and she thought she must sing, for +joy and relief. + +Everything was all right now, for Bill had come. She was so happy--so +happy--just because Bill had come. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +MAY, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVII NUMBER 4 + + + + +Bonnie Wee Thing + +MIMI DEXTER AND DESBOROUGH HUGHES WERE WORLDS APART IN THEIR APPRAISAL +OF LIFE--WITH THE ODDS AGAINST COMPROMISE + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Hughes did not desire or intend to fall in love, ever, with anybody. And +when he realized that he was doing so, and that the girl was Mimi, he +rebelled vigorously against this injustice on the part of fate. + +She was such an absolutely unsuitable person. She was so much too young, +and too pretty, and too lively. Even her name was almost an insult to +his intelligence. Mimi! That he should be devoted to a Mimi! He would +have struggled gallantly against this outrage, if he had had a chance. +But he did not see it coming. It fell upon him like a bolt from the +blue, like a sandbag upon the head in an apparently peaceful street. + +He met this Mimi on the ship coming over from England, where she had +been amusing herself, and he had been attending to some business for his +company. He never saw her dancing, or flirting, or promenading the deck, +as so many other girls did; on the contrary, he saw her always in a deck +chair at her mother’s side, reading books, or looking out over the sea, +with a grave and thoughtful expression. So he had thought that she was +different from other girls--and did not know that that thought is almost +always fatal to a young man’s peace of mind. + +Nor had he suspected that her grave and quiet air came, not from a +meditative spirit, but was due entirely to the malaise she always felt +on shipboard. And by the time she had overcome this, had her sea legs, +and was her true self again, it was too late. Five days only were needed +to deprive him of all freedom. That fifth evening the blow fell. + +There was no moonlight, no music, none of those things which might have +put him on his guard. It was four o’clock in the afternoon--one of the +most unromantic hours in the day--and he met her outside the purser’s +office--surely not a romantic spot. What is more, he had been changing +money and thinking about money. Then she came. She said she wanted to +send a wireless message to her Uncle Tommy in London. + +“I do love Uncle Tommy so!” she said. + +In justice, Hughes was obliged to admit that she did not realize what +she was doing. She was thinking solely of her Uncle Tommy at the moment; +that misty look in her eyes was all for him. But when he saw that look, +and when he heard her speak, Hughes was done for. He knew it. + +A strange sort of confusion came over him, so that he saw her in a haze, +her little, pointed face, her shining hair, her dark eyes, the striped +scarf about her shoulders, all swimming before him in a sort of rainbow. +He thought: “Good Lord! What a tender, sweet, lovely little thing! What +a darling little thing! I can’t help it! I love her!” + +It was a mercy that this confusion robbed him, temporarily, of all power +to speak, otherwise he would have said this aloud. But all he could do +was to stand there, staring at her; and her own preoccupation with Uncle +Tommy prevented her from noticing the look on his face. + +“You see,” she went on, “he said I’d probably never see him again. Of +course he always does say that. Every year mother says we’ll probably +never be able to go to England again, and every year they say good-by to +each other like that. ‘Good-by, Thomas, my dear brother!’ ‘Good-by, +Mary! It is not likely that we shall meet again in this world.’ I know +they enjoy it, but it does make me feel miserable for the first month. +And just suppose we couldn’t ever afford to go over again!” + +“‘Afford’?” thought Hughes. “Is she poor? Good Heaven! Is she +poor--worried--not able to get what she ought to have?” + +He studied both Mimi and her mother very critically after that. They +didn’t look poor; indeed, they seemed to him better dressed than any +other ladies in the world. But what did he know of such matters? All +those charming costumes might be pathetically cheap, for all he could +tell. Perhaps they made everything themselves. + +And, when you looked at them carefully, you saw that both mother and +child were very slender and little. They certainly were not the sort of +persons who could be poor with impunity. + +They asked him to call, and he did so without delay, the very day after +they landed. And his fears were confirmed. They were poor. They had a +flat over on the West Side, in the Chelsea district--the most pathetic +flat! + +In the sitting room there were two of the strangest bookcases, which +Mrs. Dexter said she had herself made, out of packing cases. Enameled +white, they were, with blue butterflies painted upon them by Mimi. And +there was a couch, covered in gay cretonne, which, directly he had sat +upon it, Hughes felt sure had also been made by Mrs. Dexter, perhaps out +of barrel staves. + +And everything was so dainty, and so neat, and so fragile. He could +scarcely open his mouth all the evening, for the distress and compassion +that filled him. + +Now, Hughes did not know it, but he was really a young man. He had lived +for twenty-six years, and he believed that those years had aged him and +completely disillusioned him. But Mrs. Dexter knew better. She knew how +young he was. She was sorry for him. She said so, to her daughter. She +said: + +“Poor Mr. Hughes! He’s such a nice boy!” + +She had seen other nice boys come into that pathetic flat, and she knew +what happened to them. She knew, better than any one else, what a +dangerous creature her child was. She expected Mimi to smile at her +words as if they were, somehow, a compliment, but, to her surprise, the +girl turned away, and pretended to look out of the window. + +“He--he is awfully nice, isn’t he?” Mimi remarked. + +Mrs. Dexter could scarcely believe her senses. She looked and looked at +her child, saw that dangerous head bent, heard that note of uncertainty +in her voice. Mrs. Dexter no longer felt sorry for Mr. Hughes; on the +contrary, she was suddenly inspired with an amazing insight into his +character. She saw grave faults in him. + +It might have been wiser if she had kept these revelations to herself, +but where her child was concerned she was perhaps a little prejudiced. +She had been a widow for many years, and had had nobody but this child +to think about; and although she had long ago made up her mind that she +must lose her some day, although she really wanted Mimi to marry some +day, she did wish to have a voice in electing the husband when the time +came. + +She wished to make no unreasonable demands; this husband need not be +extraordinarily handsome, or particularly famous; no, all she required +was a man of ancient lineage, considerable wealth, lofty character, +great intelligence, courtly manners, and a humble if not abject devotion +to Mimi. + +Mr. Hughes did not possess these qualifications. He was nothing more +than the branch office manager of a large typewriter company. His income +was pretty good, and the president of the company thought him a very +intelligent young man, but it was not the sort of intelligence Mrs. +Dexter valued. It was too businesslike. + +He did not scintillate. As for his character, that seemed to be good +enough, in a matter-of-fact way, and his manners were civil enough. But +it was in humility and abjectness that he was so deficient. She had +noticed that at once. + +“Of course, he’s a very _ordinary_ sort of young man,” she observed. + +“I don’t think so!” said Mimi. “I think--” + +She couldn’t explain exactly what it was she thought. Only that the very +first time she had set eyes on Mr. Hughes, she had realized that there +was something about him. Even before she had spoken a word to him, she +had watched him promenading the deck, had observed his long, vigorous +stride, his keen and somewhat severe profile, and she had _liked_ him. +Impossible to explain just why; perhaps it was that very lack of +abjectness that most entertained her. + +Other young men had been so terribly eager and anxious to please; and +Mr. Hughes was the only one who had ever sat beside her and not even +smiled when she smiled. Anyhow, whatever the cause, she _liked_ him, and +when Mrs. Dexter called him “ordinary,” it hurt her. + +Never before had Mrs. Dexter seen her daughter look hurt about any young +man, and it frightened her. When she was alone in her room that night, +she cried, and when that necessary prelude was done with, she began to +think, and presently she made up her mind. + +It was obvious to her that Mr. Hughes did not appreciate Mimi. Probably +he was not capable of so doing, but, in the circumstances, it was her +duty to do what she could. So she very cordially invited him to call on +a Saturday afternoon; and just before he was due to arrive, she told +Mimi that she had forgotten to buy tea, and sent her out to buy half a +pound of a sort which could only be bought at a shop some distance away. + +When Hughes arrived, he found Mrs. Dexter alone. He was not at all +alarmed by this, or by her extra-friendly manner; indeed, he was rather +touched by her welcome. They sat down, and she began to talk, and he was +not surprised that she should talk about Mimi. Such was his condition +that he couldn’t imagine how anybody could wish to talk of anything +else. + +She told him anecdotes of Mimi’s childhood and school days, all designed +to show him what a gifted, brilliant, remarkable child she had been. +Hughes listened with serious attention; he was impressed; he thought to +himself, what a wonderful girl Mimi was. What a wonderful girl! + +And then Mrs. Dexter ruined everything. If she had but stopped there, +content to demonstrate her child’s rare qualities by her own evidence, +all would have been well. But, instead, she tried to strengthen her case +by bringing in Professor MacAndrews as a witness. + +She began with a fervent eulogy of Professor MacAndrews, his vast +learning, his wonderful achievements, his noble character. And Hughes, +although still politely attentive, grew secretly restive, and wished to +hear no more of this paragon. Then she fetched a photograph of the +professor, and the young man was in no mood to admire. + +A small man, the professor had been, physically, that is; with a +pugnacious little white beard and fierce little eyes, and an upturned +nose. Hughes looked at the photograph with what might be called a +noncommittal expression, and said, “Yes, I see!” + +“A wonderful intellect!” Mrs. Dexter declared. “And you can’t imagine +how devoted he was to Mimi! He always predicted a remarkable future for +her. He said she was too young, then, for him to tell just how her +talents would develop, but he knew she would be _something_.” + +“I see!” said Hughes. + +His tone should have warned Mrs. Dexter, but it did not. She was too +intent upon making her point. + +“It really was beautiful,” she went on, “the devotion of that lonely old +scholar for little Mimi! Every one spoke of it. He used to come to the +house, you know, and as soon as he got inside the door, he’d say, ‘And +where’s the bonnie wee thing?’ That’s what he used to call her. From one +of Burns’s poems. See, it’s written here, in this book he gave her. + + “‘Bonnie wee thing, cannie wee thing, + Lovely wee thing, was thou mine + I wad wear thee in my bosom + Lest my jewel I should tine.’ + +“Of course it sounded quite different with his quaint Scotch accent.” + +“I see!” said Hughes. + +He hoped it had sounded different, because, as Mrs. Dexter read it, he +thought he had never heard anything so idiotic. The whole thing annoyed +him. He had no objection to Mrs. Dexter’s talking about Mimi; in fact, +he liked to hear her, and thought it natural and agreeable. But +otherwise, apart from Mrs. Dexter, who was Mimi’s mother, he had wished +to believe himself the sole true appreciator of Mimi. + +It was a pity that there was nobody at hand to tell Mrs. Dexter +anecdotes about Hughes’s childhood. If there had been any one--his +sister, for instance--she would have learned what a pig-headed fellow he +was; how, if you wanted to convince him, you must never, never argue +with him; how he simply could not be driven, but must be humored. Any +such person could have told her what a disastrous mistake she made in +thus bringing Professor MacAndrews into the situation. + +When Mimi came back with the tea, she saw at once that something had +gone amiss. At first she was worried, but presently the young man’s +silence and his very serious expression became annoying to her. It +seemed to her important to show him that she didn’t care in the least, +and in order so to do, she became more frivolous than he had ever before +seen her. For the first time she treated him as she had treated those +other nice boys; she laughed at him, and teased him, and dazzled him. + +Hughes was no more proof against this than any of the others had been, +but, unlike those others, he stubbornly resisted the enchantment. He was +ready to admit that she was dazzling, but the gayer she was, the more he +thought of Professor MacAndrews. He thought to himself that she must +know only too well how pretty she was, and how great was her power. + +“It’s a pity!” he thought, sternly. “It’s very bad for a girl to have a +silly old cuckoo like that making such a fuss over her. Calling her a +‘bonnie wee thing’! Of course I won’t deny that she is, but--” + +But no one should have told her so before Hughes had a chance. Certainly +he wasn’t going to tell her those things all over again, and he wasn’t +going to accept any bearded professor’s opinion of her, either. No; he +intended to study her gravely and dispassionately, and judge for +himself. + +Three times he came to the flat for that purpose, and each time that he +came, with his grave and dispassionate expression, the girl was more +frivolous than ever. And on the third evening she was outrageous. + +She said that evening that she would make him a Welsh rarebit. It +appeared to him no more than his duty as a guest, or a gentleman, or +something of the sort, to go into the kitchen with her, and there he +watched her make a most horrible concoction, the most leathery, +nightmare-provoking rarebit. And he saw that she knew nothing about +cooking, in its true and serious meaning, and she wore a silly little +apron, and she burned her silly little finger. + +As he walked home that evening, he told himself, almost violently, that +he had not kissed Mimi, and had not said a single word to her of any +significance. But that gave him precious little comfort. He had wanted +to, and he knew that she knew it. He remembered an unsteady little smile +of hers. + +“I won’t be a fool!” cried Hughes to himself. “I know she’s--well--a +very nice girl. I’ll admit that I--I like her. But she’s--well--she’s +not my sort. She’s--Look at the way they live! I couldn’t stand that. +All those little frilly curtains and covers and doodabs, and those +antique plates--with nothing real to eat on ’em. I know it’s all very +dainty and so on--but it’s--it’s too damn’ fancy!” + +He was honestly frightened, now. He didn’t see how he could ever escape +from that atmosphere of doodabs and fanciness. That moment in the +kitchen, that one glance they had exchanged, had shown him that being in +love was a malady which grew worse with time. + +He would inevitably ask Mimi to marry him, and if she refused him, life +would be intolerable; and if she accepted him, they would have to have a +home which would be filled with little lace doilies and antique plates, +and his existence would be made dainty--and fancy. + +Hughes had been brought up with Spartan simplicity by his very poor and +very proud family in New Hampshire, and their ways were the ways he +admired. He was not quite so fond of being poor, though, and had cured +himself of that, but he still lived in Spartan style. + +He had a furnished room, from which he had obliged the landlady to +remove all those things she most admired; he ate his meals in a shining +white restaurant where there were no tablecloths, and in his office he +would permit no trace of luxury. He wouldn’t even have a private office; +he sat out in plain view of his staff, upon a severely efficient chair, +before a desk which was a model of neatness and order. That was how he +liked things. And now, here he was, in love with Mimi! + +What to do? + +He thought of a plan. + + +II + +There was one woman in the world whom Hughes admired without +reservation, and that was his aunt, Kate Boles. He saw in her no flaw. +She was a childless widow, living alone in the loneliest little cottage +in the Berkshires; she had a hard life, and she gloried in it. + +Not only did Aunt Kate live upon an almost impossibly small income, but +she saved out of it, and when Hughes wanted to help her, she refused. +She said she had a roof over her head, and enough to eat, and clothing +to cover her decently, and that she wanted nothing more. He thought +this admirable. + +She admired him, too. It was a part of her philosophy of life to believe +that men could never be so noble as women, but, for a man, she thought +her nephew remarkably good. So, when he asked her, she came down from +her mountains, for the first time in many years. + +“Desborough Hughes!” she declared. “I shouldn’t do this for any one else +on earth.” + +“I appreciate it, Aunt Kate,” he agreed. + +But when he explained his intention, her face grew mighty grim. + +“Women!” she exclaimed. “You didn’t mention that in your letter, +Desborough!” + +“I know,” he said. “But--” + +“All you told me,” she went on, “was that you wanted to open that house +your Uncle Joseph left you out at Green Lake, and that you wanted me to +keep house for you and some friends of yours for awhile. Not a word did +you say about women.” + +“I didn’t think it would make any difference--” + +“Well, it does!” said she. “I don’t know that I’m inclined to keep house +for a parcel of idle women.” + +Hughes said that there were only two of them, a mother and a daughter. + +“And why can’t they keep house for themselves?” + +“They’re not accustomed to--to country life. They’re--” + +“I see!” said Mrs. Boles. “A couple of these highfalutin’ city people. I +may as well tell you, Desborough, that I don’t feel disposed to wait on +them hand and foot.” + +“I don’t want you to,” Hughes asserted. “It’s only--” He paused. He saw +that he would be obliged to give his aunt some inkling of his plan. +“It’s like this,” he said. “They’ve got used to that artificial, effete +sort of life, and I thought--a week or two of a different sort of +life--I thought it might--well--give them a--a new point of view.” + +“Desborough!” she exclaimed. “They want to marry you. I can see that.” + +“No, they don’t!” he pointed out. “I want to marry them. One of them, I +mean.” + +He had not wished to say that, but it couldn’t be helped. His serious +face grew scarlet, and he turned away, very greatly dreading the +questions and comments his aunt might utter. But, to his surprise, she +said nothing at all for a long time, and presently, to his still greater +surprise, she laid her bony hand on his shoulder. + +“Very well, my boy!” she said. + +He looked at her, but he could not read her face, and he was afraid to +ask her what her words and her tone signified. They made him uneasy, and +he wasn’t very happy, anyhow. + +He knew that he could count upon his aunt to set a superb example of +fine, old-fashioned simplicity and industry, but that, after all, was +not quite what he had intended. His idea had been simply to let Mimi and +her mother see what life was like--real life, without false and +unnecessary adornments. He hoped that this glimpse would impress them, +that was all, so that it would be easier for him to explain to Mimi +later on: + +“That’s what I call the right way to live. Plainly, simply--as you saw +it out at Green Lake.” + +And he did believe that when she actually saw this life in operation, +she would admire it. Only, it was important that his Aunt Kate should +not be too obviously an example. + +There was nothing he could do about it now, though. He had written to +his Aunt Kate, and she had come; he had arranged to open the house at +Green Lake, and to spend a three weeks’ vacation there, and the house +was open, and he was in it; he had invited Mrs. Dexter and Mimi for a +fortnight, and they were coming this afternoon. The experiment was about +to begin. He could only hope. + +But this afternoon he found it difficult to do any really effective +hoping. An unaccountable depression had come over him; he stood upon the +veranda of this house of his, smoking a pipe, and regarding the scene +before him with something very like dismay in his eyes. + +He had only seen the house once before, and it seemed to him that his +outlook must have been biased then by his pleasure in having inherited a +house. Certainly it had looked very different, that first time. It had +been midsummer, then, and he remembered standing in this same window and +looking out at the lake--a glimpse of glittering water seen through the +trees. + +It was late September, now, and the leaves were thinner, and he could +see the lake very well. Lake? It was a pond--a stagnant and sinister +little pond, covered with scum, the source and the refuge of all these +swarms and swarms of mosquitoes. And the house itself, which had seemed +so dim and cool and restful on that summer day, was strangely altered +now. + +His late uncle’s furniture was good, and quite plain enough to suit any +one, but it seemed to him that there wasn’t enough of it; the rooms had +so bare and desolate a look. And it was damp. He had been here now for a +week with his aunt, and she herself said that the dampness had “got into +her bones.” He thought that was a good way of putting it; the dampness +had got into his bones, too; he had never felt so cold in his life. He +was positively shivering with it. + +“That’s all nonsense!” he said to himself, angrily. “The mercury’s up to +fifty-eight. I can’t be cold!” + +He was, though--wretchedly, miserably cold. He sauntered down the hall +and stood in the doorway of the kitchen, pretending that he wished to +chat with his aunt, but really to be near the stove. It did him no good +at all; he felt as cold as ever, and the aroma of the plain dinner--a +lamb stew--which Mrs. Boles was cooking, filled him with unaccountable +distaste. Such was his mood that Mrs. Boles herself had a chilling +appearance; her gray hair seemed frosty; her white apron looked as if it +would be icy to touch. + +The cuckoo clock in the hall struck three. It was a cantankerous old +clock, and when it struck three, it meant a quarter to four; time for +him to be off. So off he went, out to the barn where he kept his car, in +he climbed, and set off for the railway station. + +And it was no use insisting that it was the jolting over bad roads which +made him shake so, because the shaking kept on after he had alighted and +was waiting on the platform. He was shivering violently; his teeth were +chattering; his head ached; he felt horribly ill. + +Still, when his guests descended from the train, he greeted them +cordially; he clenched his teeth to stop their chattering; he forced his +stiff lips into a smile; he talked. He drove them back to the house. And +that finished him. + +“Mr. Hughes! You have a chill!” cried Mrs. Dexter. + +“N-n-no!” he insisted. + +But nobody would pay any attention to what he said. He was driven +upstairs and ordered to lie down, and Mrs. Boles covered him up with +blankets and brought him hot lemonade to drink. He felt so exceedingly +miserable that he submitted to all this, but when she mentioned a +doctor, he rebelled. + +“L-look here!” he said. “I _won’t_ have a doctor! I mean that! I’ll be +all right in the morning. I’d be all right now if I had--” + +He told Mrs. Boles what he fancied he needed to make him all right, but +she sternly disagreed with him. She told him that this remedy he +mentioned was simply “poison,” and that hot lemonade was beyond measure +more beneficial. And, to be sure, the chill was already passing off, +only what took its place was even worse. He now became unbearably hot, +burning, and she wouldn’t let him take off a single one of that mound of +blankets. + +He remembered afterward that he had not been very amiable toward his +aunt. He was so humiliated by this weakness, so anxious about his +guests; he seemed to remember shouting at her to let him _alone_, and go +downstairs and look after those people. Anyhow, she went, and the +instant she was out of sight, he pushed the blankets off onto the floor, +and, with a throbbing head, lay back again and closed his eyes. + +He heard her come back into the room. She paused near him. + +“I tell you I’m all right!” he said, without opening his eyes. “For +Heaven’s sake, don’t leave those people alone! Go downstairs--” + +“It’s just me,” said the smallest voice. “I thought maybe you’d like a +cup of tea.” + +It was Mimi, standing there with a tray. He pulled the counterpane up to +his chin, and turned away his face; what he really wanted to do was to +cover up his head entirely, and not to answer, so that she could neither +see nor hear him. But if he did that, she wouldn’t go away, and he had +to make her go away immediately. It was unendurable that she should see +him like this. + +“Oh, thanks!” he said, in an odiously condescending voice. “But there’s +nothing much wrong with me. Half an hour’s nap, and I’ll be all right +again.” + +That put a quick stop to her dangerous sympathy. + +“Oh!” she observed. “I thought--I’m sorry I disturbed you, Mr. Hughes!” + +And out she went. She was offended; he knew that, but he had to make +her go, at any cost. He could endure almost anything with fortitude, but +not the thought of Mimi being sorry for him. He never allowed any one to +be sorry for him. + +As the door closed behind her, he turned his head. She had left the tray +on a chair beside him. On it were a cup and a saucer and a plate of his +uncle’s antique china which he had carefully put away. There was thin +bread with butter, cut star-shaped and placed just so. + +And there were two doilies. No, not doilies; those, at least, she could +not find in this house; they were two little lace handkerchiefs spread +out. + +And he was ill, helpless, unable to combat with any vigor this insidious +attack. In the gathering dusk he lay propped up on one elbow, looking at +those terrifying handkerchiefs. + + +III + +Hughes had said that he would be all right in the morning, but he was +surprised to find that he really was so. It seemed incredible that one +could feel as he had felt in the evening, and wake in the morning quite +well. More than ever was he ashamed of himself. He couldn’t have been +really ill at all. + +The great thing now was to efface the disastrous impression he must have +made by this weakness. He must make Mimi realize that he was not the +sort of person who was ever ill, or ever laid down, or desired cups of +tea. He came downstairs early, and after a few repentant words to Mrs. +Boles--who had got down still earlier--he decided to take a walk. + +Mimi and Mrs. Dexter would, of course, get up late, as was the habit of +city people, and when he met them, he would remark casually that he had +had a five-mile walk before breakfast. He went into the library, where +he had left his pipe, and he had just taken it in his hand when Mimi +appeared in the doorway. + +“Oh! I see you’re better this morning!” she remarked, polite and nothing +more. + +“Yes,” Hughes replied. “It was nothing. A cold--something of the sort. +But, Miss Dexter! Look here! I’m--I’m afraid I wasn’t--I didn’t--You may +have thought I didn’t appreciate your great kindness--” + +Miss Dexter appeared very much mollified by this tone. + +“Well, you weren’t yourself,” she said, softly. + +Hughes was silent for a moment. It was generous of her to think that, +but it wouldn’t do. + +“I’m afraid I was myself,” he admitted at last. “I mean--I am like that +sometimes. I don’t want you to think that I’m--” + +“I don’t,” she said softly. + +He was greatly disconcerted by this. He glanced at her; she was wearing +a rose-colored dress, and it made him a little dizzy. She was so +extraordinarily lovely. He did not think it wise to look at her any more +or to speak to her just then, so he began to fill his pipe instead. + +“Mr. Hughes,” she inquired, “have you had your breakfast?” + +“No,” he answered, “I was waiting for--” + +“Then you mustn’t smoke,” Mimi said firmly. “It’s the worst thing in the +world before breakfast. Please put that pipe down!” + +He was amazed, astounded, by this tone of authority, so much so that he +forgot himself and looked at her again. Ordering him about, tyrannizing +over him, this outrageous young thing! + +He was saved just in the nick of time by Mrs. Dexter’s entrance. But he +had had his warning. He knew that he would have put down that pipe. He +saw clearly that he would be absolutely under the girl’s thumb if he +didn’t look out. + +Anyhow, she was getting a salutary example of the plain and simple life. +Breakfast from thick, sensible china, set out on a red and white checked +cloth, wholesome food, but no trace of demoralizing daintiness. He +wondered anxiously what she thought of it; certainly she didn’t appear +at all disdainful, and certainly her appetite was not adversely +affected. And when the meal was ended, she offered, and even insisted, +in the most sincere and friendly manner, upon helping Mrs. Boles with +the dishes. He was proud of her. + +But he was very much disappointed in Mrs. Boles. She wouldn’t allow +this. She said: “No, child! Indeed you won’t!” as if she were defending +Mimi against persons who wished to treat her like a Cinderella in the +drudge phase. And when Mimi went out of the room to fetch something, +both Mrs. Boles and Mrs. Dexter looked after her with the same sort of +smile. + +“Well! We’re only young once!” Mrs. Boles said with a sigh. + +“Yes!” Mrs. Dexter agreed, also sighing. “Our troubles come soon +enough!” + +They meant him. He knew it. They meant that if Mimi should marry him, +she would at once cease to be young and happy. This exasperated him, yet +it worried him. Was it possible that these two matrons could discern in +him qualities fatal to a woman’s happiness? + +Did they think him capable of any harshness toward that small, gay +creature in a pink dress? Well, he wasn’t. He knew, and he alone, how he +felt about her. + +Still, he did not mention his plan of taking them for a fine, healthful +cross-country walk that afternoon, and instead he telephoned to the +village for a motor car. It came promptly at half past two, but it went +back again empty. Nobody cared to go out in it, because Mrs. Boles had a +chill. + + +IV + +It was nearly eight o’clock, and Hughes was suffering acutely from +hunger. He walked up and down, and up and down, the library, smoking his +pipe, and raging inwardly. + +“Please don’t bother!” he had urged Mrs. Dexter. + +And she had said: “Oh, but it’s no bother at all! Mimi and I really +enjoy getting up a dainty little dinner!” + +They were in the kitchen now. He could hear the egg-beater whirring, +and, at intervals, their light, agreeable voices, always so +good-tempered and affectionate toward each other. They had been at it +for hours; they must be exhausted. Every fifteen minutes or so he had +appeared in the kitchen doorway, to suggest, to plead, almost +desperately: + +“Look here! I _wish_ you wouldn’t! I wish you’d come out of there! +Anything will do, you know, any little simple thing--” + +But they would not come out. They only laughed at him. + +“I wish I could make her see how wasteful and foolish it is to give all +this time and effort to a meal!” he thought. “This idea that everything +must be so elaborate and ‘dainty.’ Why, good Lord! I’d rather have bread +and cheese--” + +Bread and cheese! He thought of a slice of homemade bread with a piece +of Swiss cheese lying upon it. He had had nothing to eat since twelve +o’clock. Bread and cheese! How he longed for that! And how he +appreciated the plain and simple life which provided meals of no matter +what sort at reasonable hours! + +It came into his mind that he would go upstairs and see his Aunt Kate +again. Just see her. He didn’t want to talk to her; simply, it was a +comfort to know that she was there, his ally. She felt as he did; their +ideals were the same. Plain, sensible people. + +He went out of the library and began to mount the stairs. A miserable +little jet of gas burned in the lower hall, and another one on the +landing, and they both sang a sad little piping tune. The house seemed +vast, this evening, a place of black shadows and chilly silence, and +many closed, menacing doors. + +He thought of Mrs. Dexter’s flat, with its homemade furniture and its +pathetic brightness. This was, of course, a fine, solid old house, and +the flat was a cheap and paltry thing. A girl would be glad, wouldn’t +she, to leave such a place, to leave the noise and dust of the city, and +come here? + +Of course there was this unaccountable malady which had attacked first +himself and now Mrs. Boles. But it had left him overnight, and she, too, +would no doubt be quite recovered in the morning. An odd sort of cold, +that was all it was. + +He knocked upon the door, and Mrs. Boles called “Come in!” and in he +went. The gas was turned low, and by the dim light the room looked +remarkably cheerless. Mrs. Boles lay flat on her back, her gray hair in +two braids, like an Indian, her gaunt, weather-beaten face immobile, her +eyes staring straight before her. + +“Desborough!” she said, without turning her head. + +He waited, thinking she was going to go on, but she said nothing +further. + +“How are you feeling now?” he asked. + +She didn’t trouble to answer that. + +“Desborough!” she exclaimed. “It’s malaria. I thought so yesterday, and +now I know it. You’ve got to get out of here. It’s a nasty, unwholesome +place.” + +“But perhaps--” said her nephew, terribly crestfallen. + +“There’s no ‘perhaps’ about it,” she declared sharply. “I know all about +malaria.” She was silent for a moment; then her brows drew together in a +severe frown. + +“That girl!” she remarked. “Just look at that!” + +He looked where she pointed, and there, on the chair, he saw a tray. The +antique china, the lace handkerchiefs--A great pain seized his heart. + +“Mi--Miss Dexter--” he began. + +“Yes,” said Mrs. Boles. “She brought me some tea. And just look how she +fixed up that tray!” + +Anger arose in him. He wouldn’t listen to a word against Mimi. + +“It seems to me Miss Dexter has--” he began again, but once more Mrs. +Boles interrupted him. + +“I never in my life had any one take so much trouble for me,” she +announced. “Bread--cut out star-shaped. Her own little handkerchiefs. +No, I never.” + +She paused, and across her grim face came a smile the like of which he +had not seen there before. + +“The bonnie wee thing!” she said. + +“What!” cried Hughes. “What! I mean--why did you say--that?” + +“It suits her,” said Mrs. Boles. “Her mother was talking to me to-day. +She told me that there was an old professor--a Mr. MacAllister--” + +“MacAndrews,” Hughes explained. + +“You’ve heard about him, then. Well, it seems to me--” Once more she +paused. “As soon as I told Mrs. Dexter that this was malaria, and we +ought to leave here, they both invited me to visit them. Both of +them--without an instant’s hesitation. She told me about their flat in +the city--and their life. They’re not at all well off, but they’re +happy. + +“They know how to live!” Mrs. Boles continued. “Kind, gracious people. +They know how to live. Any one could see that. They make every +detail--this tray, for instance. Desborough, it’s been a revelation to +me!” + +“Er--yes--” her nephew said absently. “Well, I’d better go downstairs, +now, and--and see if I can help them. What? What did you say?” + +“I said--you’d better get them to help you!” Mrs. Boles explained. + + +V + +He went out of the room, and closed the door behind him, but he did not +go downstairs; he stood there in the dim and drafty hall, thinking. He +had been going to show Mimi the right way to live, had he? He had +brought her here, to this house, to these malarial mosquitoes, to this +“nasty, unwholesome place.” He had made her eat her breakfast from a red +and white checked cloth; he had deprived her of doilies and frilled +curtains. + +He had been the most heartless, the most presumptuous, priggish, +despicable ass who had ever lived. Even his aunt had known better. His +“plan”! It had served one purpose, though; it had shown him to Mimi as +he really was, a blind, obstinate, humorless, cheerless-- + +She was coming up the stairs now; he knew her light, quick step. So he +pretended that he was coming down, and in the middle of the flight they +met. + +“I was looking for you!” she announced cheerfully. “Dinner’s ready!” + +He stood before her in silence for a few moments, his head bent; then +suddenly he said: + +“Mimi!” + +Such a miserable voice! + +“Oh, what’s the matter?” she cried, anxiously. + +“I haven’t appreciated you!” + +His tone was very contrite. + +“Heavens!” said Mimi. “I don’t care such an awful lot about being +appreciated, Mr. Hughes!” + +“But I do love you!” he declared. “I always have loved you. Only--I +didn’t appreciate you. I thought--if you came here--” + +“Well,” she said, “you were right! You knew perfectly well that if I +came here, and saw you in this awful house--and such an awful, dismal +life--You knew! It wasn’t fair!” + +“I never thought of such a thing!” he protested, indignantly. “My plan +was--” + +“Anyhow, it’s too late now,” she pointed out. “The harm’s done.” + +“What do you mean?” he asked, with a sinking heart. + +“I mean,” she replied sternly, “that you’ve simply got to have somebody +to take care of you!” + +He looked down at her. The size of her! The age of her! + +“But--do you mean--that _you_ are going to do that?” he demanded. + +“Yes!” she cried. “That’s _my_ plan!” + +He came down onto the step where she was standing. And she had really +very little trouble in convincing him of the merits of her plan. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JUNE, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVIII NUMBER 1 + + + + +Vanity + +MADELINE HOLLAND HAS A TRYING HOUR WHEN SHE SEES HER MIDDLE-AGED HUSBAND +ATTRACTED BY A YOUNGER AND PRETTIER RIVAL + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Mrs. Holland came out of her room, closing the door carefully behind +her. A shaft of sun came through the skylight, but beyond that bright +bar the hall was dim and very quiet, for her footsteps made no sound on +the thick carpet. She stood there for a moment, as if listening. A tall +woman she was, straight and slender, with a proudly carried head and a +proud and serene face. She did not look her fifty years, but she felt +them this morning. + +She listened, but she heard nothing, and presently she went on through +the warm patch of sunshine that for an instant brightened the smooth +blackness of her hair. At the head of the stairs she heard a sound of +life. Some one was coming up from the basement, breathing hard and +walking heavily, and accompanied by a pleasant little jingling of china +and silver. + +Mrs. Holland began to descend, and halfway down the flight she met +Hilda, carrying a tray. + +“I’ll take it to Miss Joyce, Hilda,” she said. + +“No, ma’am,” replied Hilda firmly. “Don’t you bother.” + +“I’d like to, Hilda,” returned Mrs. Holland with equal firmness. + +“It’s too heavy, ma’am.” + +“Nonsense!” said Mrs. Holland. + +Her hands, cool and slender, grasped the tray and came into contact with +Hilda’s roughened fingers; and Hilda, the vassal, was somehow shocked by +this. + +“All right, ma’am,” she agreed. + +Mrs. Holland took the tray and turned back. She heard a miserable little +sniffle from Hilda, but she dared not take notice of it. She was not +prepared to give consolation to other people this morning. + +She set the tray down on the floor, and opened one of those closed +doors. It was like another world in there, bright with sun, and a breeze +rioting through, setting in motion all the charming disorder +there--ribbons and silks and tissue paper in half open boxes, gay and +frivolous things hanging over the backs of chairs. It was a very untidy +room, but Mrs. Holland knew it would never be like this again. After +to-day it would be a neat, quiet, empty room. + +She closed the window, and then went over to the bedside. Joyce lay +there, with the sheet huddled about her so that only the top of her +rough, bright head was visible. Mrs. Holland touched her shoulder. + +“Wake up, child!” she said. + +She forced herself to stand there and to greet Joyce cheerfully on this +last morning. + +“Here’s your breakfast, you lazy little thing,” she added. + +Joyce sat up, dazed and heavy-eyed. Mrs. Holland held out a dressing +gown, and the girl slipped her arms into it with a childlike passivity. + +“It’s a beautiful day,” said Mrs. Holland. “You couldn’t have a better +day.” + +Suddenly Joyce awoke. Her dark eyes widened, and over her face stole a +shadow--a look so tender, so lovely, that Mrs. Holland was obliged to +turn away to bend over the tray. + +“Don’t let the toast get cold, child,” she said. + +Joyce did not speak, and when Mrs. Holland turned toward her again she +saw tears in her child’s steady, shining eyes. + +“Joyce,” she said, “my dear, my dear, let’s make this a very happy, a +very wonderful day!” + +They looked at each other, and Joyce’s lip quivered, but Mrs. Holland +still smiled. + +“I must bear this,” she told herself. “I must, and I can.” + +She pulled the table close to the bedside, poured out a cup of coffee, +and put cream and sugar into it, just as Joyce always liked it. Then she +lifted the silver cover from the toast. + +“Poor Hilda was so disappointed!” she said. “She wanted to bring the +tray herself. Come now, my pet! There, there!” + +Joyce’s eyes were still fixed upon her mother’s face. + +“This won’t do!” said Mrs. Holland, and then, with that gracious gayety +which so few were ever permitted to see in her, she tied a napkin about +the girl’s neck and began to feed her--a spoonful of coffee, a bit of +toast, a spoonful of coffee. + +“Spoiled little thing!” she scolded. “Naughty little thing, when there’s +so much to be done to-day!” + +“I know it!” cried Joyce, sitting up straight. “Mother, what shall we do +about old Mrs. Marriott’s candlesticks? When she comes and doesn’t see +them with the other presents, she’ll be so frightfully hurt!” + +“I found them last night in a hat box,” replied Mrs. Holland, laughing. + +“And, mother, suppose the jeweler hasn’t got that new clasp ready?” + +“Your father’s going there as soon as he has had breakfast. He told me +to tell you that if that clasp isn’t ready, he’ll buy you another +necklace.” + +“But I want the one that daddy picked out! I--oh, mother!” + +The girl stretched out her arms, with tears raining down her face; but +for an instant Mrs. Holland did not respond. She stood motionless, with +an odd, stony look, as if beyond measure affronted by those tears. + +“Oh, no, no!” she cried in her heart. “How can I stand this?” + +“Mother!” + +She sat down on the edge of the bed, took her child in her arms, and +stroked the ruffled head that lay against her breast. + +“Don’t, my darling,” she said gently. “It’s not right. It’s not kind to +Nick.” + +“I c-can’t help it,” Joyce answered in a stifled voice. “You and +daddy--my own darling people--” + +“You must help it, my sweetheart. You’ve eaten nothing at all. I’m going +to run your bath, now, and afterward Hilda will bring you some hot +coffee and toast.” + +She disengaged the clinging arms from about her neck, and took both the +girl’s hands in her own. She looked steadfastly into her child’s face, +and still smiled. + +“Don’t be so naughty!” she said. “There! Sit up and read your letters +until the bath’s run.” + +The tiled bathroom was dazzling in the sunlight. The nickel fittings +flashed like silver, and the water filling the tub was a wonderful +translucent green. + +“Mother!” Joyce called out. “Uncle Thomas has sent a check and an +awfully sweet letter!” + +Mrs. Holland pretended not to hear. She could not speak just then. She +sat on the edge of the tub, staring down into the shimmering, greenish +water, and even her child’s voice sounded very far away. The last moment +was almost here. In a few hours Joyce would be gone. + +“I must not spoil her day,” she thought. “I’ve got to be brave, just +until she goes; and then--then I don’t care.” + +The water had risen high enough. She turned off the tap and went back +into the bedroom. + +“All ready!” she said cheerfully. “Don’t dawdle, sweetheart.” + +“I won’t, mother,” Joyce promised. + +She had dried her tears, now. She was very grave, but quite composed. + +“That’s exactly how she looked when she went to apologize to grandma for +losing the family photographs,” thought Mrs. Holland. “She was a tiny +girl, then, and she was wearing that funny little plaid dress. She +doesn’t look any older now. She’s so young--so young!” + +She crossed the room briskly, opened the door, smiled back over her +shoulder, and stepped out into the dim, silent hall. It seemed to her +that the house had grown terribly old, a pompous, dull old house. She +went down the stairs slowly, for she was old, too. Her life was +finished. Joyce was going away. + + +II + +Hilda was serving breakfast in the basement dining room this morning, +leaving the upper floor to the caterer’s men. That basement room had not +been used since Joyce was a small girl and Mrs. Holland a young and very +anxious mother. She had had no one to help her then except Hilda, and +Hilda couldn’t be expected to go up and down stairs with the dishes. + +How different it had all been in those days--such a busy, eager sort of +life, with herself and Hilda always doing something for the baby! She +remembered other sunny mornings like this, and both of them in the +kitchen, Hilda ironing little white dresses, while she prepared barley +water for the precious bottles. Now there was a cook in the kitchen; a +competent woman, but a trifle forbidding--a stranger, not a friend like +Hilda. Everything was changed. + +Frank was sitting at the table, a newspaper propped up before him. + +“Oh, hello, Madeline!” he said with a vague sort of amiability. “How’s +everything going, eh?” + +“All right, thank you, Frank,” she replied, quietly. + +As she sat down, he put aside the newspaper; but, after all, he found +nothing to say. All he could think of this morning was Joyce, and he was +afraid to mention her. + +“Might upset Madeline,” he thought. + +To be sure, it was a good many years since he had seen his wife at all +upset. A quiet and dignified woman, she was, never at a loss; but this +morning there was something about her that disquieted him. + +“I remember how it used to be,” he thought, “when Joyce was a baby. That +time when there was a blizzard, and the milkman didn’t come--Lord, she +was almost wild! I had to go out in the storm to see what I could do. +Couldn’t get milk anywhere, and I didn’t dare to go home and tell her +so.” + +He smiled a little at the memory of that very good-natured young +husband, struggling through the blizzard in a vain search for milk. In +the end he had gone to their family doctor. The doctor had laughed at +him and told him to use condensed milk, and had written down directions +on a piece of paper. Then Frank had gone home to find them all +crying--Madeline and Hilda and the baby. + +Mrs. Holland saw her husband’s smile, and it did not please her. It was +so easy for Frank to smile, so easy for his nimble mind to turn away +from anything disagreeable and go off upon another tack! She knew very +well that his heart ached at the thought of losing Joyce. He had +suffered and would suffer from that; but he could forget for a time, and +she could not. + +He had always been like that. There was gray in his hair, and he had +grown much stouter--a big man, a handsome, jovial sort of _Porthos_, in +place of the slender and romantic young fellow he had been; but he was +changed in no other way. As he smiled, he had raised his hand to his +mustache in a gesture that was familiar to her. It meant that something +had amused him. He was not thinking about Joyce, because that would +disturb him, and he did not like to be disturbed. + +“Oh, life’s too short to worry!” he was fond of saying. + +Sometimes the anxious young mother had found consolation in that +debonair phrase, but to-day it seemed heartless and false. Life too +short? It was the monstrous length of life that appalled her now. Twenty +years more to her allotted span--twenty years, and they might be all +empty, all useless. + +Her divinely appointed work in the world had been to bear and to rear +her child, and now it was done. Joyce was going away to a new life of +her own in a distant city, and she no longer needed her mother. Nobody +needed Madeline Holland any more--certainly not Frank. He loved her, but +he was a remarkably independent creature, quite sufficient unto himself +in his own cheerful fashion. + +She looked across the table at him. He was a little downcast for the +moment, but as he caught her eye he smiled. He had finished his +breakfast. He rose, came round the table to her, and laid his hand on +her shoulder. + +“Well, old girl!” he said. “Here we are, eh? Day’s come at last! Thing +is, she’s got a good man--fine fellow. She’ll be happy, eh?” + +“Yes,” replied Mrs. Holland. + +But her own words and her husband’s words had no meaning at all this +morning. She had always hoped that Joyce would marry. Nick was a dear +boy, and Joyce would be happy with him. If Joyce were happy, she, too, +ought to be happy. + +“Only--oh, I’m a selfish woman!” she thought. “A selfish, selfish woman! +For I can’t be happy--not without my child, my baby, my one child. I +don’t want to live without my child!” + +Frank was speaking. She did not hear his words, for his voice sounded +faint and far off, but she was grateful to him for his kindliness, and +she looked up into his face with a smile. + +He patted her shoulder. + +“I know, old girl, I know,” he said. “I’m sorry! Well, I’ll be off, +now--some things to see about.” + +She heard him go out of the room, and heard his heavy tread on the +stairs. Halfway up the flight he stopped, and struck a match, and the +scent of tobacco smoke drifted down to her. He had “things to see +about”--he had his business, his many friends, his club. His life would +go on as usual, but hers was ended. Her work was done. + +She got up and crossed the room to the battered old high chair that had +been Joyce’s. For a moment she thought she would sink on her knees +before it, press her lips against the rung where scuffling little feet +had worn away the paint, close her eyes, and let the black and bitter +tide of pain close over her head; but the hour had not come yet. Joyce +still needed her for a few hours more. + + +III + +There was the strangeness of a dream about it. Madeline Holland stood +there and smiled and chatted with her guests, and nobody looked at her +curiously, nobody suspected her anguish. It was incredible, inhuman, +unreal. + +There was a slight confusion in the hall. Looking across the crowded +room, she saw the chauffeur and another young fellow bringing down +Joyce’s trunks to the car that waited outside. It was over. Joyce was +married--only it didn’t seem real yet. + +Even in the church it hadn’t seemed real. Madeline had been preoccupied, +distrait, her mind filled with the stupidest little thoughts. The +caterer’s men had been a little late. No one had remembered to thank old +Mrs. Marriott for her candlesticks, and she looked affronted. Would +Hilda be sure to stitch the collar and cuffs on that jersey dress before +she packed it? + +There was Frank standing before the altar; and he and Joyce and Nick all +looked so strange, so pale, so grave, so unfamiliar. Joyce’s veil was a +little too long. It was the veil that Madeline had worn at her own +wedding, but the fashion had changed so! + +No, the whole thing hadn’t been real. It was a dream, like all these +last days, when she had gone shopping with Joyce, when people had always +been coming and going in the house, and presents arriving, with such a +queer, excited sort of gayety in the air, and so much to be done. There +had been no time to think. + +She wasn’t really thinking now--only waiting, in a daze, for that last +moment which she knew she could not endure. The perfume of the roses +made her feel a little faint. There were roses everywhere, the breeze +from the open windows made a soft stir among them, and the petals +floated down silently upon the carpet. + +The big dining room had lost its look of solemn formality. It was +thronged with people, and filled with the sound of gay, light voices and +little muffled clinkings of silver on china. When a lull came in the +talk, Mrs. Holland could hear the familiar noises of the city streets, +of daily life going on out there in the heat and dust of the June day. +Unreal, all of it! + +She remembered a children’s party, here in this very room, years and +years ago, yet a hundred times more real than this. It was a dreadful +failure, for Joyce had been the worst of young hostesses--such an +absurd, impulsive little thing! She had devoted herself entirely to a +rather obnoxious little girl with blond pigtails and a smug face. She +had neglected all her other guests, even quarreling with them in defense +of this idolized creature; and afterward she had been so sorry. She had +knelt in her mother’s lap, with tears running down her flushed face into +Mrs. Holland’s neck, and their arms clasped tight about each other. + +“It’s so--so awful hard to be polite!” Joyce had sobbed. + +But really it wasn’t. Mrs. Holland found it easy enough to be polite, +even cheerful, with that last moment drawing nearer and nearer. Mrs. +Marriott was giving her an account of her grandson’s wedding in +California. + +“In a _bower_ of roses!” concluded the old lady, with a triumphant +glance at Mrs. Holland’s mere bowls and jars. + +“That must have been very pretty,” said Mrs. Holland. + +“It was beautiful!” the old lady corrected her, rather severely. + +She went on talking, but Mrs. Holland no longer heard her, for some one +had touched the piano in the drawing-room--a little chain of arpeggios +like a sweet and drawling voice. It hurt her to hear it, for she did not +want any one else to touch that piano. She remembered Joyce, so straight +and correct, her long braid hanging down her back, playing her new +pieces for her mother and father. Such funny, sprightly pieces they +were--“The Bullfrogs’ Carnival,” “The Elfin Schottische,” “Romping in +the Barn”; and so earnestly, so heavily, so determinedly were they +played by the blunt little fingers! + +No, that surely was not Joyce’s touch. Madeline wanted to know who it +could be, sitting there in Joyce’s place. + +Skillfully she maneuvered the talkative old lady to the center of the +room, where she could look through the open doorway into the +drawing-room, and there she saw her--a little blond creature with the +fragile figure of a child. She was a pretty girl, very young, and a +little pitiful in her flimsy silk dress, sleeveless and short-skirted; +but Mrs. Holland saw no pathos in her at that minute, for Frank Holland +was standing beside her, looking down at her with an air of bland +indulgence. + +The blond girl touched the keys again, and then she raised her eyes to +Frank’s face with a languishing smile. She spoke, and he raised his hand +to his mustache with that familiar gesture. + +“He’s flattered!” thought Mrs. Holland. + +She forgot all about Mrs. Marriott, and stood staring over the old +lady’s head at the pitiful scene--Frank so pleased and flattered by that +silly, vulgar little thing. + +“Madeline,” said old Mrs. Marriott, “who’s that young woman talking to +Frank? I never set eyes on her before.” + +“She’s poor Stella’s daughter,” replied Mrs. Holland. “I thought I ought +to ask them.” + +“Humph!” said the old lady thoughtfully. “Stella here?” + +“No--only the girl.” + +“Humph!” said the old lady again, and was silent. + +She remembered Stella very well--a cousin of Madeline’s, a pale, silent +girl, mulishly obstinate, who had taken a fancy to a man against whom +all her family and her friends had warned her. She had been bent upon +marrying him, had married him, and had vanished into a forlorn limbo. + +“And that’s her child,” observed old Mrs. Marriott. “A saucy chit, I +should call her!” + +“Mother!” said a voice beside Madeline, and she looked up to see Joyce’s +husband. + +It was the first time he had ever called her that, and in her heart she +winced at the word on his lips. It was hard for him to say it--she could +see that. His honest young face had flushed, and his voice was not very +steady. He was a little in awe of the grave and quiet Mrs. Holland, and +yet he was doggedly determined to say what he wanted to say. + +“I’ll--I’ll do my best,” he said. “She’s so fond of you, and she’s +always been so happy with you, but I--I’ll try to make her happy. +I’ll--” + +Mrs. Holland held out her hand, and he seized it in a nervous grasp. + +“There’s no reason in the world why you shouldn’t both be very happy, +dear boy,” she said earnestly. “You’re both--” + +She stopped, because Joyce had come. The last minute was here. She +looked at her daughter, but that beloved and wonderful face swam in a +haze before her. + +“Mother!” cried Joyce. “Oh, mother!” + +She threw her arms about her mother, and for a moment they clung to each +other, forgetting everything else in the world. Mrs. Holland felt her +child’s tears warm on her cheek, felt the poor, eager young heart beat +against her own. This was the last moment--and she could endure it. +Shaken by a tenderness that was anguish, she could think quite clearly, +could tell herself that her feeling was wrong, could detach herself from +those clinging arms. + +“This will never do!” she cried. “We mustn’t be so silly, must we?” + +Her steady, smiling eyes were fixed upon her child. There was not the +faintest shadow on her face, not the least tremor in her voice. There +was nothing in her heart but the one passionate wish that Joyce should +go away untroubled and happy, to begin her new life. + +For a moment Joyce wavered, ready to fly once more into those faithful +arms. Then, with a laugh that was half a sob, she gave her mother one +more kiss--and was gone. + +Mrs. Holland went out with the others and stood on the top step in a +cheerful, excited group. As Joyce leaned out of the car, her mother had +a last glimpse of her face, her eyes soft with tears, a trembling smile +on her lips. Then the car started. Everything was over. Joyce was gone. + + +IV + +The front door had closed after the last of the guests. Mrs. Holland +stood in the hall for a long moment, staring blankly at the closed door, +and turned toward the stairs. The caterer’s men were busy in the dining +room. She stopped to look at them, glad that they were here, glad of +any bustle or stir that postponed the hour when ordinary daily life +should begin. After all, Joyce’s going away was not the intolerable +moment. That would come when she would have to take up her life without +Joyce. + +At the foot of the stairs she met Hilda. + +“Go up in the sewing room, ma’am,” said Hilda in a stern, almost +threatening voice. “I’ll bring you up a nice hot cup of tea. You never +ate a mouthful of all that fancy stuff, and you need something.” + +“I really should like a cup of tea,” Mrs. Holland replied gratefully. + +She climbed the stairs slowly, not because she was weary, but because +there was so much time before her. The door of the sewing room was open, +and Hilda had drawn up a chair to the folding table. It looked +comfortable there in the ugly, familiar little room, with the sun +pouring in across the faded carpet. As she went in, she saw a pin on the +floor, glinting silvery bright in the sun’s path, and she stooped to +pick it up. + +“See a pin and pick it up, and all the day you’ll have good luck”--that +was what Miss Brown, the dressmaker, used to say to Joyce, and Joyce, as +a tiny girl, used to trot about the room, her head bent, her hair +falling over her eyes, earnestly looking for pins. + +Mrs. Holland smiled, remembering a shocking episode. She had promised +the child five cents a dozen for all the pins she picked up, and so +many, many dozens had been recovered from the floor that day--an +abnormal quantity. Before she went to sleep that night, Joyce had +confessed her crime. She had secretly emptied Miss Brown’s papers of +pins upon the floor. Poor, contrite little Joyce! + +Over in the corner stood a dress form--a pompous thing with a +marvelously rounded figure. “Aunt Sarah,” Joyce used to call it, very +disrespectfully. Only yesterday a skirt of Joyce’s had hung on it. No +Joyce now, no more of her laughter, no more of her dear voice! + +A heavy and deliberate tread was coming along the hall. It was Frank. +Madeline did not want to talk to him, or to any one, just then, but of +course he would come. Whenever he was at home in the daytime, away from +his beloved office, he was always a little forlorn, inclined to follow +her about from room to room. + +“Hello!” he said from the doorway. “So here you are, eh? Resting?” + +“Come in, Frank,” she invited. “Hilda’s going to bring up tea.” + +“Tea!” he repeated, with his big, hearty laugh. “Why, my dear girl, I’m +full of _pâté de foie gras_, and lobster salad, and _café parfait_, and +all the rest of it! Caterer did pretty well, don’t you think?” + +He came in and sat down in a queer, old-fashioned rocking-chair, with an +antimacassar tied to its back with faded ribbons. Such an incongruous +figure he was in a sewing room, this big, handsome man in his morning +coat, with spats, and a white gardenia in his buttonhole! He was smoking +a cigar, and was enjoying it. He crossed his legs and leaned back, and +Mrs. Holland smiled at the sight of the scarlet ribbons of the +antimacassar peeping coyly over his broad shoulder. + +He was glad to see her smile. + +“That’s the idea!” he said. “Thing is, not to mope. First day or +two--pretty hard, without the little girl. Thing is, to distract your +mind. It’s early. Plenty of time for a matinée. I’ll telephone for a +couple of seats at the Palace. You drink your tea and then get your hat +on. That’s right, Hilda! Tea--that’s what Mrs. Holland needs!” + +But Hilda was not responsive to his good humor just now. Her eyes and +nose were red, and her blunt face wore an expression of angry defiance. +She poured out a cup of tea and set it before Mrs. Holland in stony +silence. She was suffering, this faithful heart, and it was her own +grief that she defied. She had loved Joyce so, and she missed her so +greatly! + +Holland watched his wife in silence for a time. + +“By the way,” he said, “that Johnson girl, you know--” + +Mrs. Holland glanced up, in nowise deceived by his casual tone. + +“Who? Stella’s daughter?” + +“Yes. Er--pathetic case, don’t you think?” + +“I don’t know much about her,” replied Mrs. Holland dryly. + +“Well, it seems to me--I was talking to her--as far as I can see, a very +pathetic case.” + +He paused, and Mrs. Holland regarded him with a faint smile. His manner +was apologetic, but he was pleased with himself. His hand was raised to +his mustache, and he was looking down at the floor with a modest air. + +“Thing is,” he went on, “she wants to be a musician. She’s studied, +but--present circumstances--family had to sell their piano last month. +That’s pretty hard, isn’t it, my dear?” + +“Oh, very,” murmured Mrs. Holland. + +“She said that when she saw the piano here, she couldn’t keep her hands +off it. That’s hard luck, isn’t it?” + +“I suppose so.” + +Again he paused for some time. + +“I’m afraid,” he said, “that I--well, that perhaps you won’t approve--” + +“Why? What did you do?” + +“On the spur of the moment, my dear--” + +“What was it, Frank?” Madeline demanded, with a trace of impatience. + +“Well,” he said, “I told her--said she could come here and +practice--arrange with you--when it wouldn’t bother you.” + +“What?” she cried. “You--” + +Then she stopped short, because of the look she saw on his face--a +little guilty, but pleased. + +“I was afraid you wouldn’t like it,” he said. + +If she said she didn’t like it, he would be still more pleased. He would +think she was jealous. + +“I don’t mind at all, Frank,” she told him pleasantly. + +“Oh!” said he, somewhat taken aback. “Very good of you, my dear!” He +rose and went toward the door. “As long as we’re going out this +afternoon,” he added, “why not--well, why not let her begin to-day, eh?” + +Mrs. Holland had also risen. + +“I suppose you told her she could come this afternoon?” + +Frank was not very happy now. + +“Simply mentioned that we’d be out, and that--well, I didn’t think her +practicing would bother any one, you see.” + +“Yes--I see!” said Mrs. Holland. + +He lingered in the doorway, as if there were something else he wanted to +say; but whatever it may have been, he decided against voicing it. + +“Then you’ll get on your bonnet and shawl, eh?” he suggested. + +She smiled affably, and off he went. + +Mrs. Holland sat very still, listening to his footsteps going down the +hall. Her heart was filled with anger. + +“On his own daughter’s wedding day!” she thought. “A girl younger than +Joyce--a silly, artful little thing like that! Of course, she’s laughing +at him. Very well--let her! I shan’t try to stop him. He can make +himself just as ridiculous as he likes!” + +She poured herself another cup of tea, and ate the toast that Hilda had +brought with her. Anger had given her an appetite and a sort of energy. +Mope? Not she! + +As she went to dress, she passed the closed door of Joyce’s room, with +only a strange little qualm that was like the warning of a neuralgic +pain. Later would come the moment for the full realization of her loss. +Just now she had an important task to perform. She had to dress so that +she would look her best. She had to appear before Frank in the most +nonchalant and pleasant humor. She had to show him that she wasn’t at +all angry, and didn’t care in the least how absurd he was about poor +Stella’s daughter. + +She succeeded. That is, she was so very, very polite and casual that +Frank was somewhat dismayed. His intention had been to cheer her up, and +she gave him no chance for that. She never mentioned Joyce, she never +once looked downcast, but kept her eyes fixed upon the stage, showing a +lively interest even in the trained poodles. + +He was in nowise deluded by all this. He knew that she was angry, and +she could tell that he knew it by his anxious sidelong glances. + + +V + +“See here, old girl!” he said, as they drew near the house. “Suppose we +stay out for dinner? Eh?” + +“I’d rather go home, thank you, Frank.” + +He sighed. + +“Well,” he said, “we’ve got to go some time, of course; but +it’s--Madeline!” There was a note in his voice that she had never heard +before--an almost panic-stricken appeal. “Madeline!” he repeated. “I +hate the thought of going back. She--I can’t realize it. She seemed such +a child to me--such a--” He turned away his head. “Only hope the boy’ll +turn out well,” he added gruffly. + +They walked on in silence. When at last he spoke again, it was in his +usual vague, good-humored way. He had recovered himself; yet Mrs. +Holland was not glad. There was a strange little ache of regret in her +heart, as if she had missed some irrecoverable opportunity. She wanted +to speak, but the moment had passed. He did not need comfort from her +now, that was evident. + + * * * * * + +Hilda opened the door for them, and her face was not pleasant. + +“There’s a young lady here, ma’am,” she said, “playin’ the pianner.” + +That hardly needed saying, for all the house seemed filled with it--with +the austere beauty of a Bach fugue, played with a noble and honest +simplicity. It was music like a benediction upon a home. The hall was +dim, but through the window on the landing came the glow of sunset. A +pool of light lay upon the wine-red carpet; and that glow and color, and +the music, were strangely and gravely exalting. The old house had found +a voice for its loss--not sorrowful, not weary, but proclaiming a +strong, sure hope. + +Madeline Holland moved quietly to the doorway, and looked into the +drawing-room. No sunset light was there. The long room was shadowy and +without color, the roses set about were ghostly white, and their perfume +was like a haunting thing. The little figure at the piano was only a +shadow, too, with her head thrown back, her profile clear, pale, +expressionless. + +Mrs. Holland was strangely stirred. She turned toward her husband. The +light was too dim for her to see his face clearly, but in the merciful +dusk his features had their old romantic quality. He was staring +straight before him, motionless as a statue. She stretched out her hand +to touch his arm, to recall him from his distant world to herself, when +just at that moment he moved abruptly, pressed the switch, and filled +the room with light from the chandelier in the ceiling. + +The spell was broken. The girl spun around on the stool, sprang up, and +came toward Madeline. + +“Oh, Mrs. Hol-land!” she cried in her drawling little voice. “I’m afraid +I bothered you!” + +Yes, the spell was broken now. There was no music in the big, bright +room. The rapt young St. Cecilia was only Stella’s daughter, vain, +insincere, coquettish. + +“Not at all,” said Madeline. + +Her tone might have warned the most impervious, but Stella’s daughter +was not in the habit of noticing warnings. Instead, she looked at Frank, +smiling up into his face; and Mrs. Holland saw his hand go up to his +mustache. + +“Ask Miss Johnson to play something else for you, Frank,” she suggested. + +He did, and she consented archly. She went back to the piano, and he sat +down near her. + +“Fine technique!” he observed gravely. + +Frank talking about “technique!” Frank sitting there, quite unable to +conceal his satisfaction in this flattering attention! The girl glanced +at him sidelong, dropped her eyes, and bent her head. + +“What would you like, Mr. Hol-land?” she asked, timidly. + +“Oh--er--anything--anything,” he replied. “Er--what about something +operatic? Wagner, eh?” + +“Oh, how can he be so idiotic?” thought Madeline. “She’s laughing at +him!” + +As the girl began to play again, Mrs. Holland went out of the room. It +was Rubinstein’s “Melody in F,” but Frank wouldn’t know the difference. +He would recognize it as something familiar and “classical,” and would +be impressed; but the girl would know. She was laughing at Frank! + +For the first time in many years Mrs. Holland felt a desire to bang +doors. It would be a positive satisfaction to slam the drawing-room +door, and then to go upstairs and slam her own door and lock it. She had +done that once, long, long ago. Frank had come running up after her, and +had stood outside in the hall, angry himself, but very miserable, and +secretly frightened by her obstinate silence. They had “made it up” soon +enough in a silly, beautiful, generous young way, each of them insisting +on taking all the blame; but of course she wasn’t a foolish, headstrong +young thing like that any more. If Frank liked to make himself +ridiculous, he was quite at liberty to do so. + +At the foot of the stairs she paused, and decided that before going to +her room she would see the cook. For the last two mornings the oatmeal +had been much too thin, and a tactful remonstrance was needed. She +turned back. As she did so, the music stopped, and she could hear their +voices in the drawing-room. She could not help hearing. + +“Oh, Mr. Hol-land! You look so tired!” + +“Well--” + +“I’m so sorry for you! It must be awfully sad for you, your daughter +getting married, and all!” + +“Well--” said Frank again, in the same indulgent tone. + +Mrs. Holland went on down the stairs to the basement, so angry that her +knees trembled. Frank was delighted with that silly girl’s impertinent +pretense of sympathy, charmed by her sidelong glances and her +self-conscious smiles! + +“It’s his vanity,” she thought. “He’s always been like that. Any one +could flatter him.” + +There was no denying that Frank liked flattery. In his younger days he +used to come home and tell her, in the most artless way, of the various +compliments he had received. He didn’t do that now, for he was older and +wiser; but that didn’t mean that he got no more compliments, or that he +had ceased to relish them. He was a remarkably likable fellow. If this +girl so brazenly pursued him the first time she met him, there were +probably others-- + +This was so arresting a thought that Madeline stopped halfway down the +stairs. After all, how little she knew of Frank’s life outside his home! +They were old-fashioned people. He seldom mentioned business affairs to +his wife. That was his province, and the home was hers. There was a wall +between them--a high wall. + +It hadn’t been like that at first. She could remember very well the time +when Frank used to talk to her about his business, when she had known +the names of all his most important customers and had taken an anxious +interest in all his “big deals,” even reading the market reports. Of +course, when Joyce was born, everything had changed. She had been +absorbed in her baby. That was natural and right, wasn’t it? + +But perhaps Frank hadn’t changed when Madeline did. She began to +remember more and more of him in those early days. Here, up and down +these very stairs, he used to tramp, carrying the tiny Joyce on his +shoulders, both of them filling the house with their laughter. In that +basement dining room how many makeshift meals he had eaten, so +cheerfully, because she and Hilda were both busy with the baby! He had +always been so good-tempered about being put aside, so glad and willing +to help, so interested in every detail about the marvelous baby! + +She had depended upon Frank very much in those days. Then, as she grew +older and more competent, she had needed him less and less, and he had +been shut out of such domestic concerns. That was right, wasn’t it? A +man ought not to be bothered by household matters. He had his work, and +she had hers. + +“But Joyce belonged to both of us,” she thought. “He always loved her +so! He misses her, too.” + +A great fear seized her. Frank missed Joyce. He was lonely, and in the +moment of his loneliness this pretty young creature had appeared, to +flatter and interest him. He was middle-aged and lonely, and Stella’s +daughter was so pretty! Suppose this wasn’t a ridiculous and +exasperating episode, but a serious thing? Suppose she _lost_ Frank? + +“I won’t!” she cried. “I’ll send that girl away! I’ll never let her come +here again!” + +That was stupid. She couldn’t keep Frank in a glass case. Even if this +girl were gone, there were plenty of others in the world, pretty, +cajoling, flattering young creatures. + +“I’m not young any more,” she thought. “I’m old--old and selfish and +dull--a hundred years older in heart than Frank. He’s still a boy. He +always will be. If he likes to be flattered, it’s because he’s young +enough to believe in people.” + +Mechanically, moved by a blind impulse to hurry to Frank, she had +mounted the stairs again, and had come to the door of the drawing-room. + +“You’re so understanding!” Stella’s daughter was saying. + +Mrs. Holland stopped in the dimly lit hall and looked into the room. The +girl was sitting on the piano stool, her hands clasped in her lap, her +pretty head bent. Frank stood beside her. + +“Must be pretty hard for you,” he said gravely. + +The girl looked up at him, and her eyes were filled with tears. + +“You’re just the k-kindest man!” she murmured uncertainly. + +Flattery? Why need it be that? Wasn’t it possible that she really liked +Frank, and that he liked her? Oh, how young she was, and how pretty! + +All through this long, long day Mrs. Holland had borne herself +gallantly, with pride and with fortitude; but they both failed her now. +She leaned against the wall and covered her eyes with her hand, shaken +by a dreadful weakness and pain. + +“I’m old,” she thought. “I’m old and selfish. I’ve shut Frank out. I +haven’t appreciated him--and now I’ve lost him. It’s my own fault!” + +A door opened in the basement, and she heard Hilda’s tread on the +stairs. Hilda mustn’t see her like this! She was about to go upstairs to +her own room when it occurred to her that Hilda might think that was +“queer,” so she went into the drawing-room instead. + +Frank came a few steps toward her, with his vague smile, but the girl +did not rise. She looked at Mrs. Holland with a sort of defiance. + +“She’s old!” thought Stella’s child. “There’s gray in her hair, and +there are lines around her eyes. She never laughs; and he’s so +jolly--much too nice for her!” + +“She’s young,” thought Mrs. Holland. “So young, so pretty--and her music +is magic!” + +They looked and looked at each other, these two. + +“Well, old girl!” said Frank. + +Mrs. Holland turned, startled by his tone; and the sight of his face +filled her with an intolerable emotion. All the old tenderness there, +all the old kindliness and loyalty, not changed, not lost. + +“Frank!” she cried. + +“Tired, eh?” said he. “Well, sit down, my dear--sit down! Hard day, eh?” + +“No,” she said; “a beautiful, a very wonderful day!” + +“That’s the way to look at it,” he replied approvingly. “That’s the +spirit, eh?” + +Stella’s daughter had risen now, and was looking at Holland with angry +eyes and a trembling lip. He had forgotten all about _her_, just because +Mrs. Holland had come in! The way he looked at his wife, as if he didn’t +even know that there were lines around her eyes and gray in her hair! +The way she looked at him, as if she were so proudly and gratefully sure +of him and of herself! + +“I’m going home!” the girl announced vehemently. + +They both turned toward her, a little surprised, so that she felt like +an ill mannered child; and indeed she was a child, with only a child’s +crude weapons--a poor, ignorant, reckless child. + +“My dear,” said Madeline gently, “tell your mother I’ll come to see her +to-morrow, and we’ll talk things over--about your music, and so on.” + +The girl gave one last glance at Holland, but she knew it was useless. +When Mrs. Holland was there, she simply didn’t count with him. + +“Good night!” she said in a sulky, unsteady voice. + +“Good night!” their kind, grown-up voices answered in unison. + +The front door closed vigorously behind her. Madeline sat still, and +Frank stood beside her, his hand on her shoulder. The house was very +quiet, but it was not empty. Life was still going on in it. Life never +stopped, while the heart beat. + +“Frank,” she said, “I think we’d better go out to dinner, after all.” + +“If you feel up to it, my dear.” + +“We’ll have to go out more together, Frank. Now that Joyce has gone--” + +She stopped, and for a moment he was afraid that she would break down; +but when he bent and looked into her face, he saw that she was smiling a +very lovely smile. + +“Joyce has gone,” she said, “but you’re here, Frank!” + +He patted her shoulder, and, glancing up, she saw his hand raised to his +mustache. In all simplicity, he was pleased, because she had remembered +that. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JULY, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVIII NUMBER 2 + + + + +The Compromising Letter + +A ROMANTIC AFTERMATH OF THE RARE OLD DAYS WHEN CHARMING LADIES WIELDED A +FACILE QUILL + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Mr. Ronald Phillips was an authority upon Mme. Van Der Dokjen; indeed he +was the greatest living authority. + +He was also the sole authority. His fellow countrymen knew little about +Mme. Van Der Dokjen, and seemed to care less. He was not sorry for this. + +He had written a book called “Mme. Van Der Dokjen and Her Milieu,” in +which he gave as much information as he thought suitable for the public; +but he had a large collection of her letters and so on. He was thankful +that there were no other authorities to go snooping around and finding +out the things he did not choose to publish. + +Not that the lady had any guilty secrets in her life. She was +perfection. Only, there were little things, what you might call trifling +inconsistencies, things pardonable, even charming in themselves, but +foreign to her austere and energetic character. + +For instance, that letter written to her sister in 1777, in which she +described, with such unexpected enthusiasm, a certain young captain in +General Washington’s army. Mme. Van Der Dokjen was at that time +forty-three years of age. No doubt her interest in the young soldier was +pure patriotism. + +But Mr. Phillips preferred not to publish that letter; so squeamish was +he, that he did not even make use of the recipe it contained for quince +conserve, which illustrated her splendid housewifely talents. + +Indeed, he grew nervous about Mme. Van Der Dokjen. He lived in dread +lest some one should discover new documents concerning her. It was for +this reason that he went to live in the historic cottage on the banks of +the Hudson, in which she had ended her days. He thought that perhaps +there were documents hidden in it. + +It was as historic a cottage as one could wish to see. There were in it +a spinet, a frame for making candles, a spinning-wheel, and other +interesting objects. He set to work at once upon a new book to be called +“When Home Was Home,” which would depict Mme. Van Der Dokjen living in +this cottage, making conserves and candles, playing upon the spinet, and +entertaining the illustrious men of the age. + +Mr. Van Der Dokjen was there, too, but Phillips did not care much for +him. A dull dog, he must have been. + +In this book, Phillips was going to kill two birds with a pretty heavy +stone. He was going to give more highly valuable information about Mme. +Van Der Dokjen, and he was also going to show how lamentably had the +home declined since that day. Home life had degenerated, and home life +was the very foundation of morality. + +And the foundation of home life was--thrift. There was no virtue he +admired more. There was a great deal about thrift in his book. + +In the meantime, though, he had to eat to live. He could not himself +make conserves and candles; there must be a womanly spirit to look after +all this. So he invited his Cousin Winnie to become his housekeeper. + +She said that life could hold no greater joy, but that she could not +leave her only child. This was natural and admirable, and, as the child +was a daughter of twenty, who would not be likely to scratch the +furniture or steal the conserves, he said to bring her. + +In that branch of the family, Ronald Phillips was supreme. Not only was +he rich, but he was rich in the correct way--mysteriously. Everybody +knew exactly how much he had inherited from his father, but nobody knew +how much he had now, or how much he spent--or how he intended to leave +his fortune. Cousin Ronald’s money was one of the best and brightest +topics in the family. + +Also he was literary. He was rich, he was literary, and he had great +natural distinction. He disapproved of more things than any one else in +the family. He was tall, and handsome, in a distinguished way; he had +gray hair parted in the middle, a gray goatee, and a fine voice. Cousin +Winnie admired him profoundly. + +Her child, though, the young Lucy, belonged to a more critical +generation. She saw certain flaws. But she said nothing. She came with +her mother to the historic cottage, prepared to do her best. + +She had studied domestic science; she was energetic and healthy, and she +thought that she and her mother could make Cousin Ronald very +comfortable. She wished to do so; that was her nature. She was a kind +little thing. + +She was a pretty little thing, too. Cousin Ronald admitted it. Not in +the Mme. Van Der Dokjen style, but she was young yet. The years might +bring her more of the dignity, the calm of that matchless woman. + +And, as it was, she had her good points; she had clear, steady blue +eyes, and very satisfactory light hair, and she had a pleasing sort of +gayety about her. She sang while she was working. It was agreeable to +hear her. + +She had faults, undoubtedly, but they were, Cousin Ronald thought, more +the faults of her deplorable generation than anything inherent. He +thought they might be cured. He interpreted Mme. Van Der Dokjen to her, +also the significance of home life. + +“Yes,” she said. “Yes, Cousin Ronald, I know it’s lovely. But, you see, +I don’t have much time during the day, and in the evening I do like to +read or write letters.” + +“Mme. Van Der Dokjen wrote letters,” he pointed out. “An astounding +quantity of letters, when one considers her unflagging devotion to her +domestic duties, and her truly brilliant social life. There is no doubt +but that many of these letters--models of the epistolary art--were +written by the light of candles, Lucy.” + +“Yes, I know!” Lucy agreed. “But she was different.” + +“I concede the point,” said Cousin Ronald, with a trace of severity. +“Where, I ask, in the modern world, can one find a woman who is not +different--deplorably different? But I should like to point out to you, +Lucy, that this habit of continually saying--‘I know!’--gives a quite +false impression of your character. I do not believe you to be one of +these intolerable modern young women who fancy they ‘know’ everything.” + +“Yes, I know!” said Lucy. “I mean--I know that what you say is right, +Cousin Ronald. Only, I thought that just one oil lamp--” + +He told her that even one oil lamp would utterly destroy the +“atmosphere” of the historic cottage. + +“All right!” Lucy replied. + +He remembered how Mme. Van Der Dokjen was wont to reply to the requests +or commands of her elders. “You must be assured, Hon’d Sir, of my +pleasure in conforming to y’r lightest wish.” “All right!” That was the +modern way. He sighed. + +“And now your dinner’s ready,” Lucy announced. “Something awfully nice, +too.” + +He sighed no more. These meals which Cousin Winnie and her child +prepared for him were charming; he had never enjoyed anything more. They +had the real old-fashioned homeliness; plain food, but beautifully +cooked, and plenty of it. Cousin Ronald had spent his life in modest +hotels; and this was his first experience, since childhood, of home +life. + +“You have been here one month to-day, Cousin Winnie,” he remarked, as he +finished his fried chicken. “I must thank you. It has been--for me, that +is--a most delightful month.” + +“I’m sure, Cousin Ronald, it has been a pleasure,” said Cousin Winnie. +Tears came into her eyes. It was so touching to see Cousin Ronald +grateful. + +By common consent they omitted Lucy from the compliments. Like most +persons of middle-age, they knew that it is not wise to praise the +young; they remember what you say, and use it against you later on. +Cousin Ronald knew this by instinct, but Cousin Winnie knew from +experience. + +She was a thin, worn little lady, with a gentle and pretty face. It was +the general opinion in the family that she had been the helpless victim +of a cruel fate, and certainly she had had many undeserved misfortunes. +But she had survived them. She had kept upon the surface of the stormy +sea, like a cork. She could stand a good deal. + +This was a good thing, for fresh trials were approaching. + + +II + +It was a superb September morning, warm and still. The windows of the +dining room were open as they sat at breakfast, and Cousin Winnie saw +white butterflies out in the neat little garden. Most lovely perfumes +drifted in, fresh-cut grass and pine needles, and the very last roses; +and from the kitchen came another current, warmer, like a Gulf Stream, +and less romantic, but beautiful, made of the aromas of pancakes, maple +sirup, bacon, and coffee. + +The sun shone in; everything was good, and right, and Cousin Winnie was +happy. Her mail, too, was satisfactory. She had a letter from a jealous +and spiteful cousin in California, who insinuated that Cousin Ronald was +growing old, and falling prey to certain unscrupulous relatives. + +The injustice of this really flattered Cousin Winnie. Nobody could have +been less designing than she. The arrangement was entirely of Cousin +Ronald’s making; he had sought them out, in their cozy little flat in +New York, where they had managed well enough with the aid of Lucy’s +salary as an assistant librarian. + +They had been glad to come, but it was nothing like so dazzling a +situation as the spiteful cousin in California imagined. The financial +compensation was very modest. Very! Cousin Ronald was no spendthrift. + +And there was a great deal of work to be done in this cottage which was +so charmingly old fashioned. Still, Cousin Winnie was glad she had come, +because, for all Cousin Ronald’s distinction, his literary attainments, +she thought he was _pathetic_. She glanced up from the spiteful cousin’s +letter, to enjoy the heart-warming spectacle of the poor man eating +buckwheat cakes. + +But he was not eating at all. He was staring before him with unseeing +eyes. + +“Is anything the matter, Cousin Ronald?” she asked, anxiously. + +“Er--no, no,” he answered. “That is--nothing wrong with this most +excellent breakfast, my dear Winnie. But--er--but--er--” + +“Did you say ‘butter,’ Ronald?” + +“No, no, thank you. I have received a letter. I fear I must ask you to +excuse me, Winnie.” He arose. “I--I am perturbed!” he added. “I must be +alone for a time.” + +He gathered together his letters, most of which he had not yet opened, +and went out of the dining room, into his study. He locked the door, and +sat down before his desk. + +“Merciful Powers!” he murmured. + +The blow had fallen. Mme. Van Der Dokjen was most hideously threatened. + +Again he read the fatal letter. + +DEAR MR. PHILLIPS: + + Having heard of your interest in Colonial history, and particularly + in Mme. Van Der Dokjen, I feel sure you will be pleased to learn + that I have discovered a letter written by her to an ancestor of + mine--a certain Ephraim Ordway, captain in General Washington’s + army. + + Apparently Mme. V. took a pretty lively interest in Captain Ordway, + and the letter may provide an amusing sidelight upon the lady’s + history. + + If you would care to see it, I shall be glad to bring it to you + some day. + + Very truly yours, + STEPHEN ORDWAY. + + +“This,” said Cousin Ronald to himself, “is blackmail. ‘An amusing +sidelight--!’ Merciful Powers!” + +On a shelf before him stood a copy of “Mme. Van Der Dokjen and Her +Milieu,” chastely bound in gray and gold. As frontispiece there was a +portrait of her, smiling; but how dignified, how superb! “An amusing +sidelight!” + +“Of course I shall write to this fellow, and bid him bring his letter,” +thought Cousin Ronald. “But I’ll have to pay. Heaven knows what I shall +have to pay!” + +It was a truly horrible situation, for it combined the two greatest +fears of his soul; the fear of injury to Mme. Van Der Dokjen, and the +fear of spending much money. Because, as was mentioned before, Cousin +Ronald was no spendthrift. + +It was with the object of obtaining temporary relief from these painful +matters that he opened his other letters. But instead of relief, here +were more blows. It was the beginning of the month, and all the other +envelopes contained bills--for groceries, for meat, for vegetables, for +laundry. He added them together, and was appalled. He knew what it had +cost Mme. Van Der Dokjen to run this house; this was five times as much. + +For a moment, a sort of desperation seized upon him. He saw his hard +earned--by his father--money being squandered and dissipated upon all +sides. He saw himself paying these bills, and buying the compromising +letter, and being left a ruined man. + +“Merciful Powers!” he cried, with a groan. + +Then he arose, and went to Cousin Winnie, and told her that he was a +ruined man. + +In that chapter on Mme. Van Der Dokjen “During the War,” he had written +with a certain eloquence about her benevolence, and about womanly +sympathy in general; he had praised it, but not before had he +encountered it. And he found it even sweeter than he had believed. + +He and Cousin Winnie had a long talk. He assured her that he was +confiding in her. To tell the truth, he told her nothing, but he spoke +of his “troubles” in a large, vague fashion, he begged her to help him +to economize. And she pitied him. + +Lucy pitied him, too. But she was of a somewhat more practical nature. + +“If he’s ruined,” she said, “it seems to me that we’d better go back to +the city, and I’ll get another job. And at least we’ll have hot baths, +and electric lights, and enough to eat.” + +“I could not leave your Cousin Ronald now,” her mother declared, +solemnly. “He says that any day now he will know. And then we can +decide.” + +“Know what?” asked Lucy. + +“Know the worst,” her mother replied. + +“Nothing,” said Lucy, “could be worse than this.” + +Indeed, matters were bad, very bad. A black shadow lay over the +household. Every morning Cousin Ronald came to the breakfast table, with +a stern, set face, opened his letters, looked at Cousin Winnie, and said +“Nothing!” She knew not what fateful news he expected, but she dreaded +it, and yet wished it would come, that the blow would fall, the suspense +be ended. + +In the meantime, she did her utmost to aid the stricken man. Her +economies were heroic. No need to detail them here. She grew thinner and +paler, but she did not falter. Cousin Ronald told her frequently that he +did not know what he could do without her coöperation, and that was a +spur to the willing horse. + +She did not like her child to endure all this, though. Again and again +she urged Lucy to go back to the city, but Lucy refused. She would not +leave her mother, and she, too, was sorry for Cousin Ronald; quite as +sorry as her mother, though in a different way. In her eyes he was not +the distinguished and admirable figure Cousin Winnie thought him; he was +simply a “poor, funny old darling.” So, she remained, also waiting for +the blow. + +But no one suffered as did Cousin Ronald. He had written at once to this +Stephen Ordway, requesting him to bring the letter at his “earliest +convenience.” No answer came; days went by, and Cousin Ronald wrote +again. He waited and waited, in growing anguish. What, he asked himself, +could be the reason for this silence? Awful fancies came to him. + +His publishers wrote, asking if they might expect the manuscript of his +new book in time for their spring list. He knew not how to reply. He +dared not publish anything further about Mme. Van Der Dokjen while that +letter was at large. + +One night he had a dream. He dreamed that he went into Brentano’s, to +look at his book--“A Historic Cottage”--which had just been published, +in gray and gold, like the former volume. He was, in his dream, +examining this volume with justifiable pleasure, when his eye fell upon +another book beside it--a slim little book in a scarlet jacket--“The +Lady and the Soldier--An Amusing Sidelight Upon Mme. Van Der Dokjen.” + +It was a frightful dream, from which he awoke, cold and trembling. + +“Whatever he asks, I’ll pay it!” he thought. “But--Merciful Powers! It +may be a sum beyond the very bounds of reason.” + +Still, he would pay. He would not see this noble woman held up to the +world’s ridicule. Whatever the cost, he would pay. + +And, until he knew the cost, every cent must be saved. Very well; every +cent was saved. Cousin Winnie assisted him in this. He waited. They all +waited. + + +III + +The summer ran its course, and the great winds were beginning to blow. +The leaves were falling fast. And, in the city, janitors were informing +tenants that the furnace was being repaired; who so sorry as they for +any delay in getting up a fine sizzling head of steam in the boiler +these chilly mornings? + +In the historic cottage there was, of course, not even a hope of a +furnace. Cousin Winnie spent most of her time in the kitchen, where +there was a coal stove, and Cousin Ronald took long, healthful walks. +So did Lucy; often they went together, but not on this especial +afternoon. If they had, if Lucy had accompanied Cousin Ronald this +afternoon, all might have been different. + +Cousin Ronald, however, had remained in his study, communing, so to +speak, with Mme. Van Der Dokjen. It was growing late when from his +window he saw Lucy coming back from her walk. Her hair was blown about, +her cheeks were glowing, she looked the most alive, warm, radiant +creature imaginable. + +And he was chilly and dispirited, and, seeing her, he thought that +perhaps a walk might do all that for him. So he put on his hat and +overcoat and took up his stick, and set forth. Not ten yards from his +own gate he passed the man he so anxiously awaited, but he knew him not. +He went on, in one direction, and the man went on in the other. + +The man knocked at the door of the cottage, and Lucy opened it. She was +still flushed from her walk, and in that dim, low-ceilinged room she +seemed to him, with her fair hair that shone, her clear blue eyes, her +scarlet jersey, almost impossibly vivid. + +“I beg your pardon,” he said. “Does Mr. Phillips live here?” + +“Oh, yes!” Lucy answered. “But he’s just gone out. You might catch him +if--” + +“I’d be sure to miss him,” the stranger declared, firmly. “If it won’t +bother you, may I wait? I’ll just sit down out here.” And he indicated a +very historic settle which was built into the porch. All the winds that +blew, blew here; an eddy of leaves whirled about his feet, now, and Lucy +could scarcely hold the door open. + +“You’d better come in,” she suggested. + +“Well, thank you,” said he. + +Fresh from the stir and color of the windy day, the sitting room seemed +to him unpleasantly chill and dark as Lucy closed the door behind him. +The fire was out, for economy’s sake, and the tiny panes in the historic +window did not admit much light. + +“This is a pretty old house, isn’t it?” he observed. + +“Awfully!” said Lucy. “Sit down, won’t you? That chair’s a hundred and +fifty years old. And it’s one of the junior set, too!” + +“I’ve heard about this place. Belonged to Mme. Van Der Dokjen, didn’t +it?” + +“It still does!” said Lucy, grimly. + +The stranger glanced at her. + +“My name’s Ordway,” he explained. “I wrote to Mr. Phillips, and he asked +me to come. I’ve been away--on my vacation--or I’d have come before.” + +He wished that he had. He wished that he had come weeks ago. He felt +that he had lost priceless time. And he looked as if he thought that. + +Lucy had always liked red hair, and noses that turned up a little. This +young man had red hair and that sort of nose; he was big, too, and +broad-shouldered, and he looked cheerful. She asked him if he would care +to look over the historic cottage and its antiques. + +“Well--no, thanks,” he said. “Tell you the truth, I’ve had all I want of +historic things. My aunts, you know--they’ve got ancestors, and +documents. If you don’t mind, I’d rather just sit here and--” + +He said “wait,” but what he meant was “talk to you.” The girl knew this. +They did sit there, and they talked. The room grew dark; a very fine +sunset was going forward in its proper place; indeed, at that moment +Cousin Ronald was standing upon a hilltop, admiring it. But the laws of +nature kept it away from the sitting room. + +In the course of time Cousin Winnie was obliged to call for her +daughter’s aid. She came into the doorway; Mr. Ordway was presented to +her; she spoke to him graciously, and gave him a candle, then she took +away the radiant Lucy. + +Candle or no candle, the room seemed darker than ever to Ordway. He +began to walk about, but he knocked his shins against too many historic +objects, and at last he paused, in a spot where he could see into the +kitchen. He saw Cousin Winnie and Lucy preparing dinner by candlelight. + +And he did not find it picturesque. He saw Lucy vigorously plying the +pump beside the sink. He was not reminded of the old days, when home +life had been so much finer. He thought: + +“Good Lord! A pump! Candles! It’s a shame! It’s a darned shame! A girl +like that! It’s a darned shame!” + +He blamed Mr. Ronald Phillips for all this. + +When Cousin Ronald came home, he found a Stephen Ordway even more +sinister than he had feared; a stern and very reticent young man, a very +large one, too. By the light of the one candle in the sitting room, he +loomed, in the dictionary sense of the word--“loom: to appear larger +than the real size, and indefinitely.” His red hair had an infernal +gleam. + +“Mr.--er--Ordway?” said Cousin Ronald. “Yes--yes--I had--er--a +communication from you?” + +“You did, Mr. Phillips.” + +“Er--have you brought _it_ with you?” asked Cousin Ronald, very low. + +The young man said “Yes,” but made no move to produce any document. He +was thinking of something else. + +“This house is old,” he remarked; “but it seems pretty solid.” + +“Yes, indeed!” Cousin Ronald assented anxiously. “Yes, indeed!” He saw +that the young man was leading up to something. “Suppose we step into my +study?” + +The young man was looking about him, at the walls, up at the ceiling. + +“Yes,” he asserted. “The place could be wired.” + +“W-wired?” said Cousin Ronald. “I don’t--” + +“I’m an electrical engineer,” said Ordway. “I’ve been looking around +here. _Think_ what electricity could do for you here! Light--plenty of +light--electric water heater--pump--dish washer--vacuum +cleaner--percolator--stoves. You could have decent comfort!” + +Cousin Ronald could not fathom the motives of the stranger, but he felt +sure that they were profoundly subtle, and inimical to Cousin Ronald’s +welfare. Again he said: + +“Will you--er--step into my study, sir?” + +Ordway stepped, and when he got in there he loomed worse than ever. + +“See here!” he said. “Let me do this job for you--wiring the house.” + +Cousin Ronald felt a sort of illness, a sort of faintness. He believed +that he could comprehend the plot now. Instead of bluntly demanding a +certain sum for Mme. Van Der Dokjen’s letter, he was going to demand +this job--this impious, this vandal job, of “wiring” the cottage. And +the price--the price-- + +“I--er--fear it would be a somewhat costly undertaking,” said Cousin +Ronald. + +Ordway thought of the wonderful girl, groping about in this dismal +house, cold, forlorn, captive to an ogre relative. He was perhaps a +little obsessed by electricity--a good thing for one of his profession. +He thought it the great hope of the modern world. And he could not +endure the idea of a wonderful girl deprived of its benefits. He said: + +“The question is--if anything can be too ‘costly,’ when it’s a matter of +human dignity and welfare.” + +A shudder ran along Cousin Ronald’s spine. The moment had come. Very +well; he was ready. He admitted, in his own heart, that nothing could be +too costly where Mme. Van Der Dokjen’s dignity was concerned. He was +silent for a moment; then he raised his distinguished head. + +“Mr. Ordway,” he said, “name your price, sir!” + +Ordway stared at him with a faint frown. + +“I didn’t mean that,” he explained. What he had meant was that he would +be glad to do this job for nothing. But he feared to affront Mr. +Phillips. “It’s--I’d _enjoy_ doing it,” he said earnestly. + +Cousin Ronald could not endure the suspense any longer. + +“Mr. Ordway,” he said, “let us be direct, sir. That is ever my way. I +have long been prepared for this eventuality. I am ready, sir, to +consider the purchase of this letter. Be good enough to name your +price.” + + +IV + +Like many another man before him, Cousin Ronald was ill-served by his +own impatience. Ordway had come, intending to hand the letter over as a +gift of no importance, but being asked to name his price put ideas into +his head. He reflected. He reflected so long that Cousin Ronald grew +still more impatient. + +“I have been practicing the strictest economy,” he announced. “I may say +that I have endured something not short of actual discomfort, sir, in +order that I might be in a position to meet any--er--reasonable terms--” + +There was a knock at the door. It was Cousin Winnie. + +“Your _dinner_!” she whispered. “It’s _ready_!” + +Cousin Ronald did some quick reflecting himself. If the young man could +observe their strict economy for himself-- + +“Mr. Ordway, sir,” he said, “will you favor us with your company at a +very simple meal?” + +“Thank you!” Ordway replied. “I’d be pleased to.” + +This dinner had, in Cousin Ronald’s eyes, a sweet, old-fashioned charm. +A fire burned now upon the hearth; the board was set out with Wedgwood +and with Sheffield plate. And Cousin Ronald positively recreated Mme. +Van Der Dokjen, describing her just as she had been, here in this very +room. + +But Ordway was not moved. He did not give the Wedgwood or the plate +anything like the attention he gave to the economical dinner, and the +late Mme. Van Der Dokjen was, to him, of very inferior merit to the +living Lucy. All the time Cousin Ronald discoursed, Ordway was thinking +of Lucy, deprived of electricity and of all the other privileges she so +richly deserved. + +“It’s a darned shame!” he thought. “The old skinflint thinks more of +that letter than he does of his own family. A darned shame!” + +When the meal ended, Cousin Ronald suggested that Lucy sing, +accompanying herself upon the spinet--an art she had recently acquired. +He believed that this would soften the heart of the rapacious young man. + +It did. It did, indeed. To the sweetly jangling spinet she sang some +gentle old song. In firelight and candlelight-- + +The young man, watching her and hearing her, was quite as much moved as +Cousin Ronald could have desired--but in the wrong direction. + +Her song ended, Cousin Ronald and Ordway withdrew to the study, Cousin +Winnie and her child to the kitchen. Twenty minutes passed; then Ordway +reappeared. With a curtsy almost old-fashioned, Lucy went with him to +the door, even across the threshold. + +The wind slammed the door behind her, and for a few minutes she stood in +the porch, talking to the young man. Cousin Winnie, in the kitchen, +heard them; they were discussing a new play. Lucy said yes, she did like +the theater, but she didn’t go very often now. And she had heard “The +Maddened Brute” spoken of as a wonderful play--a really big thing. +Cousin Winnie missed a little here, owing to her duties; the next thing +she heard was Lucy saying good night to Mr. Ordway. + +It had been a very brief conversation, but Ordway, as he walked to the +station in the windy dark, imagined that she had said a great deal. He +thought, somehow, that she had told him what a miserable existence she +led in the historic cottage. What a _darned_ shame! + + +V + +Lucy was sitting at a small table by the dining room window. She had +bought a tube of cement, and with it she was mending a varied assortment +of antique china she had discovered in a cupboard. It was raining +outside, a chill, steady downpour. And the room was dim and cold, and it +was a dismal world. + +“I wish I was thirty!” she thought. Because at that advanced age she +believed that one could be content to live in a historic cottage, and +not mind dullness, or rain, or anything, very much. At thirty she would +be content to devote her life to the ruined Cousin Ronald and her heroic +mother. Yet, in a way, she disliked the thought of being thirty. She +disliked all her thoughts this afternoon. + +“As far as that goes,” she reflected, pursuing a certain familiar line, +“I don’t have to wait for anybody to invite me. I can take mother to see +‘The Maddened Brute’ this very Saturday, if I like. I’ve got enough +money for that. Only, mother wouldn’t like that sort of play. Anyhow, I +don’t care!” + +Carefully she cemented a handle on an ancient sugar basin; then, setting +it down to dry, she looked out of the window. The postman, in a rubber +coat, was coming along the muddy road. + +“I don’t care!” she said again. She was not the sort of girl who waited +with the slightest interest for letters that people had said they were +going to write a week ago. Let them write, or not write; what cared she? + +The postman came up on the porch and whistled, and the door opened--like +a sort of cuckoo clock--and Cousin Winnie took in the letters. But what +a long time she was in the hall! + +“I suppose she’s got another letter from a cousin,” thought Lucy. “If +there was anything for me--But I don’t care, anyhow.” + +At last Cousin Winnie came into the dining room. + +“A letter for you, Lucy,” she said, handed it to her child, and +vanished. With the utmost indifference Lucy opened her letter. It +contained two tickets for “The Maddened Brute” for Saturday afternoon, +an explanation of the difficulty of getting them, and a very civil +request that she and her mother meet Stephen Ordway for lunch at the +Ritz before the play. + +Not yet being thirty, the girl was pleased. + +“Mother!” she called. “Isn’t this nice? Listen--” + +No answer. She got up and went into the kitchen, and found her mother +standing by the window--just standing, doing nothing. This was alarming. + +“Mother!” she said. “What’s wrong?” + +“Lucy--” said her mother. “Oh, Lucy! Oh, think of it! You can travel! +You can have really nice clothes!” She was actually in tears. + +“What is the matter?” cried Lucy. And then: “_What’s this?_” + +It was a check for five thousand dollars which Cousin Winnie extended in +her trembling hand. + +“Your--your Cousin Peter--left it to you!” + +“Cousin Peter! Who’s he?” + +“You wouldn’t remember,” said Cousin Winnie. “A--a second cousin +of--your grandfather’s. Oh, Lucy! My dear, good child! Now you can go +away!” + +“But the check’s made out to you, and it’s signed L. B. Grey--” + +“A legal form,” Cousin Winnie explained. “I myself shall be well and +amply provided for. This check is entirely for you, Lucy.” + + +VI + +Somehow, “The Maddened Brute” was a disappointment. It was truly, as the +advertisements declared it, a tense and gripping drama of life in the +raw, but the characters were all so very violent that it was rather a +relief than a tragedy when any one of them was silenced by stabbing, +drowning, and so on. + +Mr. Ordway was a little tense himself. When Cousin Winnie had seen him +in the historic cottage, he had appeared such a cheerful young man, and +now he was so odd, so silent. He ordered a superb luncheon at the Ritz; +he provided them with an unparalleled box of chocolates; he was, in +material ways, a most satisfactory host. + +But spiritually he was depressing. In the theater he sat on the aisle, +next to Cousin Winnie, and whenever the curtain went down he kept asking +her about her plans, in a low and alarmingly serious voice. + +“You won’t stay in that house all winter, will you?” And he spoke of +pneumonia, of bronchitis, of rheumatism, with a horrid eloquence. He +said that candles often set houses on fire. He pictured such a disaster +on a bitter midwinter night. + +He spoke of thieves. He went on to escaped lunatics; and when the +curtain rose on the third act and showed the _Maddened Brute_ gibbering +in a cellar by the light of one candle, she gasped. + +“I must speak to Lucy!” she thought. “She’s got to go away!” It was her +policy not to interfere with her child, and she had waited very +patiently for some word as to what Lucy meant to do with the check. But +now she would wait no longer; she would speak to her about going away. + +She had no opportunity, though. The young man insisted on taking them +all the way back to the cottage. + +It did, indeed, look sinister that evening, so small, so lonely under a +stormy sky. Mad things could so easily be hiding behind those bushes. Of +course they weren’t, but they _could_. + +“You must come in, Mr. Ordway,” said Cousin Winnie. + +“Thanks,” he replied. “But--thanks, but I’ve got to go. Only, I wish +you’d tell me first that you’ve decided not to stay here this winter.” + +“Oh, dear!” said Cousin Winnie, mildly. “I’m sure I can’t.” + +“Why don’t you go to Bermuda?” continued the young man. “Or Florida? +You--both of you--look pale.” + +Although a little tiresome, Cousin Winnie thought the young man’s +solicitude rather touching. But Lucy answered him bluntly. + +“We can’t afford things like that. We’re going to stay here--” + +“But five thousand dollars ought--” he began, vehemently, and stopped +short. There was a blank silence. + +“Mother!” said Lucy, reproachfully. + +“My dear!” said Cousin Winnie. “_Naturally_, I never mentioned--” + +There was another silence. + +“Mr. Ordway,” Lucy began. “What made you say ‘five thousand dollars’?” + +“Oh! It--it just came into my head,” he replied. + +“It couldn’t,” said Lucy, coldly. “I’d like to know. Will you tell me, +please, why you thought I had five thousand dollars?” + +Another silence. + +“Because,” said Ordway, “I sent it.” + +“_Oh!_” cried mother and daughter. + +“But--listen, please!” said the young man, in great distress. “It’s--if +you’ll just listen. You see, I had a letter written by this Mme. Van Der +What’s Her Name--and Mr. Phillips wanted it--badly. And when I saw +how--what it was like in the cottage--and he seemed to have all he +wanted to spare for that darn fool letter. I made him pay five thousand +for it. Please! Just a minute! It really _belongs_ to you. You’re his +relatives.” + +“But--Cousin Peter!” cried Lucy. + +“I made him up,” said Cousin Winnie, faintly. “The letter said--from an +anonymous friend--and I thought--perhaps your Cousin Ronald himself--But +now, of course, Lucy will return it to you at once, Mr. Ordway.” + +“I can’t,” said Lucy, with a sob. “You told me this Cousin Peter +yarn--and you said you were amply provided for--and I’m young and +healthy--and the poor thing did look so wretched--” + +“Lucy! What ‘poor thing’? Oh, Lucy, what have you done?” + +“You told me he was ruined,” said Lucy. “And he did look so cold, and +wretched, and dismal--and I rather like him.” + +“Lucy! You didn’t--” + +“I did!” cried Lucy in despair. “I gave it to Cousin Ronald!” + +“He accepted it?” asked Ordway, in a terrible voice. + +“He had to,” Lucy replied. “I put it in an envelope and wrote--‘from an +admirer of Mme. Van Der Dokjen’!” + +No one spoke for a time. + +“I know it was foolish,” said Lucy, finally. “But the day I got it, I +felt so--I can’t describe it--so--well, so healthy, you know, and able +to do anything I wanted. And he was sitting in there, writing his poor +silly old book, with one candle. And his gray hair, and his funny little +beard--and the way he clears his throat--sort of baaing--like a lamb. +And I thought he was ruined.” + +“Foolish!” repeated Cousin Winnie, and with that she walked briskly up +the path. + +“I really am a little bit sorry,” Lucy remarked. + +“Sorry for what?” inquired Ordway. + +“Well,” said she. “For you, I guess. You must feel pretty flat, just +now.” + +“Thank you,” said he. “I do.” + +“It was a nasty, condescending thing.” + +“It wasn’t meant like that,” he declared. “What I--” + +The door of the cottage opened, and Cousin Winnie called: + +“Don’t stand there in the cold!” + +“Mother says--” Lucy began. + +“I heard her,” said Ordway. “Thing is--what do _you_ say?” + +“Well, I’d--I’d like you to come,” said Lucy. + + +VII + +Then they went in. They found Cousin Winnie standing by a console in the +hall, with a strange look on her face. + +“Really!” said she. “This is--Look at this!” + +And she held out to them a check for five thousand dollars, drawn by +Cousin Ronald to her order. + +“Listen!” she said, and began to read: + + “MY DEAR WINNIE: + + “An unexpected stroke of good fortune enables me to tender to you + this small token of my profound appreciation of your kindness + toward me in a dark hour. I beg that you will honor me by accepting + it. + + “Furthermore, it occurs to me that this cottage, hallowed as it is + to me by its associations, is scarcely suitable in its present + condition for a winter residence for ladies accustomed to modern + conveniences. I shall endeavor to arrange for the installation of + electricity, and I am this afternoon going into the city to consult + with an expert upon the advisability of a small furnace. + + “I shall be somewhat late in returning. Indeed, my dear Winnie, I + should prefer that you read this in my absence, and to consider--” + +“That’s all that matters,” said Cousin Winnie, hastily, folding up the +letter. + +“No! Read the rest!” her child firmly insisted. + +“No,” Cousin Winnie asserted. “I--I prefer not.” + +“But why?” Lucy began, and then stopped, staring at her mother. + +“Mother!” the girl exclaimed. + +“Don’t be silly!” said Cousin Winnie, severely. + +“Merciful Powers!” Lucy remarked, with a shocking mimicry of Cousin +Ronald’s manner. “I fear this is another compromising letter!” + +“It is not, at all!” Cousin Winnie declared indignantly. “Nothing could +be more honorable and--” + +Then suddenly they all began to laugh. Cousin Ronald, coming up the +path, heard them. He thought it was an agreeable thing to hear, +suggestive of that fine, old-fashioned home life. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +AUGUST, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVIII NUMBER 3 + + + + +Miss Cigale + +IT SHOULD BE QUITE NATURAL FOR A GRASSHOPPER TO KNOW MORE ABOUT PAWN +TICKETS THAN DOES AN ANT + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Mrs. Russell sat on the veranda, waiting for her son. A handsome and +dignified woman she was, and a very calm one, but her calmness did not +suggest patience. + +On the contrary, she looked like one of those persons who wait until +exactly the right moment, and then proceed to do whatever is exactly the +right thing to be done, leaving late or careless persons to their +well-deserved fate. Half past six was the dinner hour; at half past six +she would go into the dining room, and if her son were not home-- + +He always was home, though. For twenty-three years he had been trained +in punctuality, neatness, and economy, and his mother was satisfied with +the result. She turned her eyes toward the west, where the sun was +preparing to leave, gathering together his gorgeous, filmy raiment. + +She was not looking at, or thinking of, any sunset, however, but looked +in that direction because the railway station lay there, and she had +heard a train whistle. It was not Geordie’s regular train, but once in +awhile he came a little earlier; and, though Mrs. Russell was too +reasonable to expect such a thing, she hoped he was coming now. + +It was nice to have an extra half hour with her boy; nice to walk about +the lawn with him, to talk to him, to listen to him, even just to look +at him, as long as he didn’t catch her at it. + +No; he wasn’t coming early to-night. The long tree lined street was +empty, except for a woman who had just crossed the road. She was an odd +figure; even the judicial Mrs. Russell had to smile a little at her +frantic progress. A flower crowned hat had slipped far to the back of +her head, a gray dust coat, unbuttoned, flew out behind her. + +She walked bent by the weight of two heavy bags, pressing forward in +haste, as if struggling against a mighty wind. She came nearer, and +through the branches of a tree a shaft from the setting sun fell upon +her wild fair hair. + +“But--goodness gracious!” said Mrs. Russell, half aloud. “But--no! +Nonsense! It can’t be!” + +For there had been somebody else, with wild fair hair like that, shining +not gold, but silver when the sun lay on it; somebody else slight and +tall, and always in a desperate hurry. That was years and years ago. + +She got up and came to the edge of the veranda, a queer flutter in her +heart. Could there be any one else with quite that air--distinguished, +and yet a little ridiculous, and somehow so touching? + +“_Louie!_” she said, incredulously. + +Down went the bags on the pavement. The newcomer stood where she was for +an instant, then, headlong, rushed through the gate, up the steps, and +clasped Mrs. Russell in her arms so violently that the flower crowned +hat fell off and rolled down the steps. It lay on the gravel walk like a +poor dry little flowerpot. + +“Oh, Bella!” she cried. “Oh, Bella! Oh, Bella!” + +“There--” said Mrs. Russell. “Sit down, my dear! Try to control +yourself!” + +As a matter of fact, she was crying herself, in a quiet, dignified sort +of way. But, by the time she had gone down the steps and fetched her +sister’s lively hat, she had put an end to all such nonsense, and was +quite calm again. + +“I’m _very_ happy to see you, Louie--” she began, but the other +interrupted her. + +“After all these years!” she cried, with a sob. “It doesn’t seem +possible, does it, Bella? We were young then, Bella. Oh, think of that! +Young, Bella--” + +“I shan’t think of any such thing,” said Mrs. Russell, tartly. “Do stop +crying, Louie, please, and tell me something about yourself.” + +“It isn’t me yet, Bella; not the poor, silly forty-five-year-old me. +It’s the other Louie, with her hair down her back, sitting here with the +old Bella in that plaid dress. Do you remember that plaid gingham, +Bella, that mother made for you? With the bias--” + +“No!” Mrs. Russell replied. “I do not. I don’t want to, either. What I +want to hear is something about yourself, Louie--something sensible and +intelligible.” + +“I remember you, Bella, so well--sitting at the piano, with a great +black braid over your shoulder, playing that ‘Marche Aux Flambeaux,’ and +poor father keeping time with his pipe. And that duet, Bella! You and +I--the Grande Fantasia for Les Huguenots--” She giggled through her +tears, and that giggle was more than Mrs. Russell could bear. It made +the plaid dress and the duet and a hundred heartbreaking, dusty, +forgotten things rise up before her. + +“Louie!” she said. “I’m ashamed of you! When two sisters haven’t met +for--” + +“For two lifetimes!” said the incorrigible Louie. “I don’t care, Bella! +The old things are the best.” + +“What,” interrupted Mrs. Russell, sternly, “have you been doing all +these years, Louie? Why didn’t you ever write to me?” + +“I never had time, Bella. I’ve been too busy, failing. I’ve failed at +everything, Bella, everything! I gave my recital--and you must have read +how quickly and thoroughly I failed there. Then I tried giving music +lessons, but I was always late, or I forgot to come at all, or I’d feel +not in the mood for teaching. Then I studied filing and indexing, and +oh, Bella, you should have seen the awful things I did! You know I never +was exactly methodical! Then I learned typing. I was a little frightened +then, Bella. I really tried, at that. But, you see, I wasn’t young any +more then, and not good at the work. That failed, too. Then I tried to +peddle things--scented soap, from door to door.” + +“Louie! I--I’m very sorry, my dear!” + +“Well, you needn’t be!” said her sister, drying her eyes. “It’s been +very wonderful--sometimes, Bella. I’ve been happy most of the +time--because, you see, I never minded failing.” + +“Are you--” Mrs. Russell began, with no little embarrassment. “Are +you--in difficulties now, Louie?” + +“I haven’t a penny in the world, Bella. You remember that fable of La +Fontaine’s we used to recite in school? _‘La Cigale et La Fourmis’?_ +(The Grasshopper and the Ant.) I’m Miss Cigale, Bella, and you’re Mrs. +Fourmis. I’m the poor, silly grasshopper who danced the summer away--and +here I am, Bella. It’s winter--for me--and I want to rest, here with +you, until the summer comes back.” + +“Oh, don’t be so--‘highfalutin’’!” cried Mrs. Russell, stung by emotion +into using a long-forgotten word. “Try to talk sensibly, Louie.” + +This was all so typical of her sister; all her memories of Louisa were +made up of these queer little storms, these showers of tears, these +rainbow smiles. + +“Always so upsetting!” she thought, half angry. Yet there never had been +any one dear to her in the way Louisa was. + +“Come upstairs,” she said, firmly, “and get ready for dinner, and +then--Oh! There’s Geordie!” + +“Oh, Bella! Your son!” + +“Louie, listen to me! You must not be--silly about Geordie. He won’t +understand it, and he won’t like it. Do, for goodness’ sake, pull +yourself together!” + +But Louie couldn’t. She tried; she sat up very straight in her chair, +and smiled, but Mrs. Russell was not satisfied. She wished that she had +had time to put Louie in order before the boy saw her. He was so +fastidious; what would he think of this unexpected aunt, with her wild, +fair hair, her blue eyes swimming in tears, her trembling smile? + +“She looks worn,” thought Mrs. Russell, “but not--well, somehow, not +grown up!” + +Geordie had come up the steps now; a good-looking young fellow, and +somehow touching, with his sulky mouth and his sulky blue eyes. + +“Louisa!” said Mrs. Russell, in a threatening voice. “This is my son, +George. Geordie, your Aunt Louisa!” + +Poor Louisa said nothing at all, for fear of bursting into tears, but +Geordie could be trusted to behave with decorum. He said something about +this being an unexpected pleasure; said it punctiliously. But Mrs. +Russell knew at once, by the tone of his voice, that he didn’t like this +aunt. She saw him cast a quick glance at her lamentable untidiness. + +“Are those your bags, out in the street?” he inquired. “Shan’t I get +them?” + +“Oh, no!” cried Louie. “Please don’t bother! I’ll get them!” And she +made a sort of rush forward, which Mrs. Russell checked. + +“Louie!” she said, sternly, and after Geordie had gone down the steps: +“Louie! You must have more dignity!” + + +II + +There was no dinner at half past six that evening, or at seven, either. +When the clock struck the hour, there was Mrs. Russell sitting on the +veranda, while her son paced up and down, hands in his pockets, and his +face sulkier than ever. The sun was gone, now, and the clear sky was +fading from lemon-yellow into gray; the honeysuckle was coming to life +in the quiet dusk. + +“How long is she going to stay?” he demanded. + +Mrs. Russell didn’t like that tone. + +“Naturally I didn’t ask her,” she answered, stiffly. “She’s had a great +many--difficulties, and she’s come here, to me, for a rest.” + +“D’you mean she’s going to live here?” + +She was hurt and amazed at his manner, but it was not her way to show +it. + +“Your aunt hasn’t mentioned her plans for the future,” she replied. + +He walked up and down in silence for a time, and to his mother there was +something ominous in his steady footfall; it was, she thought, as if he +were going away from her, miles and miles away. Suddenly he spoke again, +from the other end of the veranda: + +“Isn’t it hard enough for us to get on as it is?” he asked. “Without an +extra--” + +“George!” she cried, too hurt to stifle the cry. “Your own aunt!” + +“Oh, let’s look at the thing from a practical point of view!” he +suggested, impatiently. “You know what my salary is, mother, and you +know how far it goes, or doesn’t go.” + +“Please!” said Mrs. Russell, curtly. “Surely we needn’t discuss this +now--before your aunt has been in the house an hour.” + +“Just as you please!” said he. “But--” Again he walked down to the other +end of the veranda. “All I mean is”--he went on, in a strained unsteady +voice--“that I can’t do any more. I’ve--I’ve done my best, and I can’t +do any more.” + +Mrs. Russell sat like a statue in the gathering darkness. She had come +face to face with sorrow and anxiety more than once in her life; she had +had her full share of all that; but never, never before had anything +wounded her like this. So she was a burden to her son. + +All the little money left her by her husband she had used for the boy’s +education and welfare, with all her love, her time, all her life thrown, +unconsidered, into the bargain. And now she was a burden to him. + +“I’ve lived too long,” she said as if to herself. + +Geordie had stopped in his restless pacing to and fro. + +“Mother!” he said. “You know I didn’t mean it. Mother! I’m sorry.” + +“Very well, my boy!” she answered, in her composed way. “We’ll say no +more about it.” + +He came a few steps nearer, but halted; he hadn’t been bred to the habit +of affection. A hundred thousand old impulses that had been stifled by +cool common sense made a great barrier now, just there, a few steps away +from his mother. He turned away again, and Mrs. Russell did not stir. + +It was over; that was their sensible way of dealing with all such +matters; not to take them out into the daylight and destroy them, but +to shut them up, to weigh down the heart for many and many a day. They +had ten minutes more alone there in the dusk together, ten long minutes, +and neither of them spoke. + +They were, of course, waiting for their luckless guest, and both +silently condemning her unpardonable delay. But, if they could have seen +her just then, down on the floor on her knees beside the neat little bed +in the neat, strange little room, not weeping, but very still, as if a +ruthless hand had struck into quietude all her flutterings. + +She had come downstairs, quite airy, quite gay, in a fresh blouse and a +not too dingy skirt, and, standing unnoticed in the doorway, she had +heard her nephew’s words. She had rushed up the stairs again, silent as +a moth, except for the tinkle of countless small hairpins dropping from +her riotous hair, and had sunk down on the floor like this, to taste +failure again. + +The clear chiming of the clock roused her. She got up, a little +bewildered for a moment. + +“I’ll go away!” she thought, at first. But, after all, her failure had +taught her something. She put more pins into her hair, a little more +powder on her nose; she tried a smile or two before the mirror, and down +the stairs she went, airy as before. + +“The only really terrible thing,” she said to herself, “is to fail +because you haven’t tried.” + +And so she did try. She sat at the table with her unsmiling and calm +sister, her unsmiling and sulky nephew, and she smiled for three; she +talked, and in the end she made them smile, not because she was +especially witty, but because her sweet, light spirit gave a glimmer to +all her words. She was ridiculous, but she was charming; she made of +that sober family dinner a high festival. And when they had finished: + +“Oh, let’s have coffee in the garden, Bella!” she said. + +“No!” said Mrs. Russell, startled. “We don’t have coffee, Louie. I think +it keeps one awake.” + +“But who doesn’t want to be awake on a night like this? Let’s be awake! +Let’s have a little table on the lawn, and candles--candlelight under +the trees is so wonderful, Bella!” + +“Mary won’t like it!” whispered Mrs. Russell. “It means extra work for +her.” + +“I’ll do it! All alone!” + +Mrs. Russell might have protested more, if she had not observed her son +pushing the books and papers off the top of a small table in the next +room. If he wanted it so, or if he were trying to atone, very well; she +would agree to this absurd proposal. + +So the table was placed in the back garden, and there Mrs. Russell and +her son sat, to wait for Louie and the coffee. They sat there under the +great dark beeches that rustled solemnly in the night wind and set the +candles to flickering. + +Candlelight wonderful under the trees? It was horrible; it was the most +sorrowful, gloomy, bitter thing. Was that the leaves stirring, or a sigh +from the boy? Mrs. Russell wanted to look at him, but dared not, for +fear that their eyes should meet, and with what lay between them, they +must not look into each other’s eyes. A burden to him--a burden too +heavy for his young shoulders-- + +Louie came across the grass with the tray, and this time Geordie’s sigh +was quite audible as he arose to take it from her. + +“There!” she cried. “Isn’t this nice?” + +Her gay voice sounded very pitiful in the dark. Mrs. Russell resolved to +make an effort to help the poor creature. + +“Yes,” she said. “It is--very nice.” But no other words came. + +There could be no silence where Louie was, though; even if no one spoke, +there was a swarm of dainty little sounds, the clink of a porcelain cup +on its saucer, the musical ring of a silver spoon on the brass tray; the +sugar tongs against the crystal bowl. + +“There!” Louie cried again. “Don’t you smoke, Geordie?” + +“Thanks!” said he, gloomily, and taking a cigarette from his case, he +leaned forward to light it at the candle. + +“Mercy!” exclaimed Mrs. Russell. The two others looked inquiringly at +her, but she said hastily that it was nothing. For she certainly did not +intend to explain what had startled her. + +It was the sight of Geordie’s face as he had leaned over the candle. His +blue eyes had seemed to dance and gleam, the flickering light had given +him a look as if smiling in impish glee--altogether, he had looked so +much, so very much, as Louie had looked years ago. + +He had drawn back into the shadows, tilting his chair against the trunk +of a tree, and, feeling herself deserted, Mrs. Russell tried to talk to +her sister. Useless! Geordie was there, and could hear if he wished. + +She understood what Louie was thinking about--what things she had in her +queer, pitiful life to think about, what compensations she had found for +missing wifehood and motherhood? + +“Because she’s not unhappy,” thought Mrs. Russell. “She hasn’t anything +at all, as far as I can see, and yet she’s not unhappy. Perhaps I’m as +much a failure as she is. I meant to help him--to make him happy. But +he’s miserable. I’ve done the best I can; I can’t do any more. It’s as +if his heart was breaking. Why? He has a good salary. I’ve only taken +just enough to keep his home as he likes it. He has plenty for his +clothes and whatever else he wants. I thought--I made him--happy.” + +Not one minute more could she endure this soft, dark silence; she wanted +to get into the house, in the lamplight, safely shut into her home, away +from the vast summer night. + +“What time is it, Geordie?” she asked, so suddenly that he started. + +“Nine,” he replied. + +“But what watch is that?” + +“A new one.” + +“Then where’s the one they gave you at the office, Geordie? Such a +handsome one, Louie! A present to him on his twenty-fourth birthday. +Engraved. Geordie, I hope you haven’t left it about, anywhere. It’s not +a thing to be careless with.” + +“No; it’s safe,” he said, briefly. + +“Where? In your room?” + +“It’s perfectly safe!” he answered, with such a note of exasperation in +his voice that Louie pitied him. + +“I’m sure--” she began happily, but her sister interrupted. + +“Well, I’m not. You don’t know what a boy that age is capable of. And +it’s a handsome watch. Geordie, I wish--There! Now you’ve broken this +new one! Oh, my dear--” + +For, as he arose, his foot had caught in the chair; he stumbled, and +dropped the watch with a thud. It was Louie who recovered it; Louie who +hastily gathered together the small oblong papers that fluttered out of +his breast pocket. One had fallen at Mrs. Russell’s feet; she stooped. + +“What--” she began; but Louie fairly snatched it out of her fingers. + +“Here, Geordie!” she said, gayly. + +Mrs. Russell did not know what these tickets were, but Louie did. Louie +knew well. + + +III + +Indeed, all the three inmates of the house were heavy at heart that +night, each with some especial knowledge not shared by the others. The +night grew sultry, too, and when the morning came, it was the first day +of real summer, hot and still. It was a day to make any one jaded who +had not slept well. + +Geordie was down first, and walking up and down the veranda; smoking, +too, his aunt noticed. + +“You shouldn’t, before breakfast!” she admonished him, cheerfully. “And +you can’t smell the flowers, either, if you do.” + +He smiled, a forced, strained sort of smile, but civil enough, +considering how unwelcome the sight of her was. He stopped walking up +and down, too, and, after a moment, said, in a perfunctory voice: + +“It’s going to be a hot day.” + +“Geordie!” said she. “Let me talk to you!” + +As much as his mother, did he hate and dread that note of fervor, of +intimacy. He moved his shoulders restlessly, and smiled again. + +“About time for breakfast,” he murmured evasively. + +“No, it’s not. Geordie, you won’t mind if I stay here with you and your +mother for a little while, will you?” + +He turned scarlet. + +“No. Of course not,” he replied. “Very glad.” + +“I want to stay--ever so much. But only if it can be my way. Because I’m +a frightfully obstinate creature, Geordie; absolutely unmanageable. And +I can’t bear not to be independent. I’m going to find myself a job--” + +“No!” he interrupted, with a frown. “Please don’t.” + +She seated herself on the rail of the veranda, a most undignified +attitude for one of her years, and yet, as always, there was a debonair +grace about her; something unconquerably girlish. + +“I will get a job, Geordie!” she announced. “That’s settled. No matter +where I live, I’ll do that. But I want so much to stay here, if you’ll +let me stay on my own terms. Let me pay my board and feel like a nice, +independent business woman!” + +“No!” he said, again. “I--it can’t be that way.” + +“But why, Geordie?” she asked, smiling a little. + +And he couldn’t endure her smile; he couldn’t endure her proposal; it +was the final straw for his already mutinous and unhappy spirit. If she +had any faint idea of what he already suffered from this talk about +being “an independent business woman”; if she had imagined what a sore +subject that was. + +“No!” he said. “If you want to stay here and make mother a visit, you’re +more than welcome. But--I don’t approve of women going out to work.” + +“What!” she cried. “Oh, but my dear boy!” + +There was something in her good-humored protest that made him hot with +resentment. She wasn’t laughing at him--and yet, she might as well have +been; she couldn’t have pointed out more plainly the absurdity of his +words and his attitude. Just by some little inflection of the voice, she +made him the youngest twenty-five that ever lived--a boy, a child, a +silly, pompous, impertinent young ass. + +“I won’t have it!” he said. + +She saw her mistake then--she was always quick to recognize her +failures--but it was too late to remedy it. + +“I’m sorry you feel like that, George,” she said, gravely. “Because, you +see, I couldn’t stay here unless it could be that way.” + +“Suit yourself!” he answered, briefly. + +But he regretted the words as soon as they were spoken. + +“I only meant--” he began, but when he turned he found her gone, +vanished in her own quick, quiet way. He hurried into the house to find +her, and looked for her everywhere, but in vain. + +And it seemed to him that he could not go off to the city with this new +burden upon his conscience. It was bad enough that he should have hurt +his mother the evening before; bad enough to endure the other +harassments that had tried him so sorely, for so long, without this new +misery. He thought of his aunt’s sprightliness; her gay and touching +friendliness toward him; he remembered how grave her face had become. + +“She might have known I didn’t mean that,” he thought, dismayed. “I +don’t like her, and she’ll be a bore and a nuisance; but I didn’t mean +to offend her.” + +And all the time he was perfectly aware that she wasn’t “offended,” any +more than a clover blossom is offended if you tread it underfoot. It was +he who had been offended at the idea of his mother’s sister going out to +work every day from under his roof--of any woman doing so, in whom he +was interested. Come to think of it, he was glad he had said he +“wouldn’t have it”; he meant that. He had told Nell also that he +wouldn’t have it. + +“Still,” he admitted, “I might have been a little more--well, more +cordial to her. Because I can see that she’s another one of those +people.” + +For lately the poor fellow had been learning something about that other +sort of people--people not sensible and restrained, but full of fancies +and notions and feelings; people who needed careful handling, unless you +were willing to see that look of pain and disappointment in their eyes. + +Mrs. Russell thought that her son looked pale and jaded that morning, +and noticed, with a heavy heart, how little he ate. + +“I suppose he’s working too hard,” she said to herself. “Wearing himself +out, and wasting all his youth--to take care of me. I suppose what he +wants is--” + +But she couldn’t quite imagine what he might want. + +“Perhaps he’d rather go off and live in the city with one of his +friends, like Dick Judson,” she thought. “I wonder if I couldn’t--” So +there she sat, calm and composed as ever, making the most absurd plans +for living on her own private income of thirty dollars a month. + +“Perhaps Louie and I together might manage something,” she thought. +“Louie knows more than I do about things of that sort. I’ll speak to +her.” + +Geordie went off, and still Mrs. Russell sat at the breakfast table, +waiting for her sister, and silently condemning this sloth that kept her +so late abed. + +As a matter of fact, Louie was half a mile away from the house, picking +daisies in a wide, sunny field. Seen from the road, you might have +thought that tall and slender creature with fair hair shining in the sun +was a care-free young girl; she moved so lightly, and now and then she +sang a snatch of song. + +But all this was mere bravado, her own especial method of preparing +herself for a painful ordeal. She had something to do that morning which +she dreaded, and instead of taking an extra cup of coffee, or anything +of that sort, the silly creature forgot all about breakfast and wandered +off into a daisy field. No wonder she was such a failure! + +She had peculiar compensations, though. The fierce hot sun, and the +rank, sweet smell of the humble little field flowers and weeds, even the +troublesome insects that crawled out from the daisies onto her hands, +and the little winged nuisances that flew in her face, amused and +solaced her, and did her, or so she fancied, more good than ten +breakfasts. + +And after a time she felt strong and tranquil enough to face her day. +From a pocket in her skirt she drew out a bit of paper--one of those +dropped by her nephew the evening before, and she looked at it +carefully. + +It was a pawn ticket, marked: + + Gold Watch. $50.00 + + +IV + +Now it happened that Miss Cigale, although she had said she hadn’t a +penny in the world, really did have sixty-five dollars. Considered as +the savings of a lifetime, it might pretty well be called nothing, and +in her careless way she had so thought of it; but now she saw it in a +quite different light. + +She had kept that ticket when she had picked up the others, for her idea +was to get back the watch for her nephew and make him happy. And to make +him, perhaps, a little fond of her. She had thought it possible last +night; had thought that if she brought him his watch, and told him that +she was going to take a position, he would see she wouldn’t be simply an +extra person to feed, but a friend and a helper; that he would like her, +and they would all three live together in that dear little house, in +that sweet, dear garden, in the jolliest way. She didn’t expect any of +that now, though. + +“No,” she said to herself. “I irritate and annoy him. I can see that. +I’m afraid he belongs to the ants, and he can’t endure grasshoppers. Oh, +I’m sorry! He’s such a dear boy!” + +She didn’t cry, for her tears were far more apt to be brought by joy +than by pain; but she was certainly unhappy, all by herself there in the +daisy field. To tell the truth, Miss Cigale was very tired, and had of +late been haunted by specters. Wan failure she knew and didn’t mind, but +when loneliness and uselessness came out hand in hand, she trembled. + +“I’ll get the watch,” she decided. “I’ll do that, anyhow. But I shan’t +come back. He doesn’t want me here, and--he’s a dear boy, but I don’t +think I want to come.” + +It was characteristic of her that she didn’t tell her sister she would +not return. If she had to do anything unpleasant, well, then, she did +it, as gallantly as she could; but if unpleasant things could be +avoided, right gladly would she sheer off. So she only said that she had +to “run into town,” and hugged and kissed her rather unresponsive +sister, and off she went, leaving behind her those heavy bags which +contained all the clothes and books and ridiculous, sentimental rubbish +she had in the world. + +“I can send for them,” she thought, “when I decide where I’m going.” And +she troubled her head no more about them. What did trouble her was a +memory. It was a memory of a girl--a tall, slender, fair-haired girl, a +music student in New York, living on an allowance from home. And living +all too carelessly on it, so that one day she found herself penniless, +and very hungry, and with four days to wait before the allowance could +arrive. And this girl--in the persistent memory--had taken a little gold +locket and a silver watch to the pawnbroker. She had thought it rather a +joke, until she had got there. + +“It’s silly to feel like that,” she said to herself this morning. “Very +silly. There’s nothing dishonorable or disgraceful in--in being +temporarily short of money. The most important business men have to get +loans. Heads of trusts and--every one. People go to their banks to get +loans, and they’re not ashamed of it. Well, this is exactly the same +thing. I simply walk in, repay the loan, take the watch, and go. Exactly +like paying a note at the bank.” + +Was it, though? Exactly like a bank--this queer, dark little shop, with +barred windows--and the man behind the counter was exactly like the +cashier her father used to bring home to dinner. She handed the ticket +across the counter, with the money; but the man pushed the money back to +her. + +“Wait a moment!” said he, with a curious glance at her. + +Then he disappeared, and Miss Cigale stood there, trying desperately +hard not to feel like a criminal, an outlaw, a highly suspicious +character. If she had been a man she would certainly have whistled; but, +as it was, she stared about her with the most casual, offhand air. + +Oh, but it was pitiful! To think that there were people so hard pressed +that they must bring here a cotton quilt, or a dingy umbrella, or, worst +of all, a child’s pair of rubber boots. Hanging on a line from the +ceiling were guitars and banjos and mandolins and ukeleles--music sold +into bondage. + +“Is this your own ticket, madam?” asked a voice, and, turning, she saw a +severe little elderly man looking at her through his spectacles. The +question dismayed her. He appeared so very much displeased; perhaps it +was a wrong sort of ticket, which Geordie shouldn’t have had. + +“Yes. Oh, yes!” she answered, with a very poor attempt at sprightliness. +“It’s mine.” + +“You didn’t buy it--or find it?” he asked. + +“Oh, no!” Miss Cigale replied, quite certain now that there was +something wrong. “It’s my own!” + +The elderly man looked at her steadily for a moment. + +“Wait a minute, please!” he said. “Be seated, madam!” + +So Miss Cigale sat down on a chair in a black corner, where a fur +neckpiece, smelling terribly of moth balls, brushed her shoulder, and +waited and waited. A little girl came in, gave up a ticket, and while +she, too, waited, stared at Miss Cigale, and diligently chewed gum. + +Such a queer little girl, with wispy hair, and a pale, drawn little +face, and so very nonchalant an air. At last she was given a small gas +stove, and went off with it. A young man came in with a traveling bag to +dispose of; a stout woman came and drove a hard bargain over a ring. +Nobody else had to wait, only Miss Cigale. + +“Something is wrong!” she thought. “Oh, what has the poor boy done?” + +Her hands and feet were very cold, her thin cheeks flushed and hot; she +wished now that she had taken a cup of coffee. For she was very far away +now from any such consolations as daisy fields. A burly man, with a +straw hat at the back of his head, entered the shop; he spied her, and, +to her horror, came directly over to her. + +“You, the one with this here ticket; what’s the number?” he asked. + +“I don’t remember the number,” said Miss Cigale faintly. He went over to +the counter and spoke to the elderly man in a voice too low for her to +hear. Then he sat down beside her, tipping his chair, and lit a cigar. +The smoke blew into her face, and his boot, crossed on his knee, brushed +her skirt. + +“I can’t stand this,” thought she. “I’ll take the ticket, and come back +later. I can’t bear this.” And she got up to go to the counter and ask +for the ticket. + +“Here!” said the man beside her. “Where you goin’?” + +Miss Cigale didn’t trouble to answer, but, to her amazement, he sprang +up and barred her way. + +“Go away!” she cried, in a trembling voice, but with a jerk of the thumb +he turned back his coat lapel and revealed a badge. + +Miss Cigale sank back into her chair again, in the dark corner. The man +was speaking to her, but she did not hear him. + +“What has he done?” she thought. “A detective! If I can only make them +think it was me. But, oh! How can I bear this?” + +Because, for all her failures, Miss Cigale had never before encountered +disgrace. She had suffered the crudest disappointments, she had been +hungry, cold, shabby, sleepless with anxiety, and all this she had +endured gallantly. But to be arrested by a detective in a pawnshop! + +Her idea of what was going to be done to her might have been laughable +if there could be found on earth any one able to laugh at the stricken, +heartsick creature. She thought that she would presently be taken before +a judge, and that, if she kept silent, as she intended to do, she would +be put into prison for whatever unimaginable offense the real owner of +the ticket had committed. + +“I can’t be brave about it!” she said to herself. “I can’t; I’m--I’m +frightened.” + +Why must she sit here so long? Why didn’t they take her away? It would +be almost better to be in prison than here, where the door opened and +closed, and people came in and out, and every one had a glance, casual +or curious, at her corner. The detective was writing in a notebook. +_What_ was he waiting for? + +“Handcuffs!” thought Miss Cigale. “Or--or a--warrant.” Imagination +carried her very far; she would not have been surprised by the entrance +of a file of soldiers, or white-coated doctors with a strait-jacket. The +most astounding images of things read or heard of filled her mind; she +lost track of time and space; what she suffered was a timeless, +universal thing, such as had been suffered these thousands of years by +how many dazed and trembling victims. The law--The Law! + +“Here she is!” said the detective to some one who had just entered. +“Claims it’s her own ticket.” + +“Oh--good--Lord!” cried a voice which reached Miss Cigale from very far +away. + +“Well, come along!” said the detective. “Come over to the station an’ +you can make your charge.” + +Miss Cigale did not understand; all she knew was that Geordie was here, +and in danger. + +“I--I don’t know that man,” she said, faintly. + +“Never mind!” the detective retorted, laughing. “You will, soon enough!” + +“No! Look here! It’s--it’s a mistake!” said Geordie. “It’s--I’ll drop +it.” + +Miss Cigale moved nearer to him. + +“Pretend you don’t know me!” she whispered. “I’ll--” + + +V + +That was the end of Miss Cigale’s struggle; at the critical moment she +failed again, most shamefully. She fainted. That is what comes of +preferring daisies to breakfast; of carrying romantic Victorian +sentiments over into modern life. She fainted. + +As long as she had failed, she thought she might as well do it +thoroughly. She could have come to before she did; she could have opened +her eyes before she did, only that there was nothing she cared to see. +She could hear, too. She heard her nephew calling “Aunt Louisa!” but his +low, furious tones did not make her in a hurry to answer. No; better to +lie here, like this, for as long a time as she could. + +“Aunt Louisa!” he said again, and this time his voice was quite +desperate. She opened her eyes. + +“If you’d only pretended,” she whispered chidingly. + +“Can you walk?” demanded the young man. “As far as a taxi?” + +“But--” she began, and, raising her head, looked about her. The man +behind the counter was writing in a book, the shop was empty. “The--the +detective?” she asked. + +He didn’t even answer; but, helping her to rise, and holding her very +firmly by the arm, led her out into the street. No one molested them. + +“But--Geordie!” she said. “Is it--postponed?” + +“I don’t know what you mean,” he replied, curtly. “I’ve arranged the +thing, anyhow, so that there’ll be no trouble for you. But if you wanted +that watch--why didn’t you _tell_ me? I’d have done anything, rather +than have this happen.” + +“George!” cried Miss Cigale. “Is it possible? No; it can’t be! You can’t +think that I--” She stopped short, looking into his stern face, and with +an expression on her own that somehow troubled him. + +Out here, in the bright sun, she seemed so different. It was hard to +think of her as a muddle-headed, desperate creature, trying, very +clumsily, to get possession of a watch that didn’t belong to her. No; +there was something about her that was--rather impressive. She didn’t +look ridiculous now, or pathetic. + +“I see!” she said. “You thought I wanted the thing for myself. Well, +that was quite a natural thing to think, George.” She spoke without the +slightest trace of rancor, simply admitting that it was natural--to some +human beings--to think as he did, and she could not blame him. + +“Well!” said he, surprised. “You see, when I couldn’t find the ticket, I +telephoned to the pawnbroker, and to the police. I thought it had been +stolen, and I said that if any one brought it in, to let me know.” + +“Yes,” said Miss Cigale. “It was a perfectly natural way for you to +think, my dear boy. And I was frightfully stupid to try to do it that +way. I meant to help you a little bit, but--” She smiled. “Anyhow, it’s +all over and done with now, and I hope we’ll part good friends.” + +“Part!” said he. “But aren’t you coming back?” + +“I’d rather not.” + +There they stood, on the street corner, all idea of a taxi forgotten. + +“But, look here!” said Geordie. “You did that for me--and I behaved--I +behaved--like a--” His voice broke. “I didn’t know,” he went on, +unsteadily. “Because, you see--I didn’t think any one could--any one in +the world.” + +“Oh, there are lots of people like me!” Miss Cigale assured him. “Lots +of grasshoppers. They dance the summer away, and then, when the winter +comes, they’re a horrible nuisance to the ants, but they’re inclined to +be pretty sympathetic toward any one else who has grasshopperish +troubles. Not that I think _you’re_ the least bit of a grasshopper, my +dear boy! I’m quite sure you’re far too intelligent and sensible for +that!” + +“No!” said Geordie, vehemently. “I am a grasshopper! Nobody knows what a +grasshopper--and a fool--I am!” + +“I’m sure it was just a temporary difficulty.” + +“I’ve been doing my best, for nearly a year, to make it permanent,” he +said, grimly. “You see, there’s a girl.” + +“I’m so glad!” cried Miss Cigale. + +“Glad? But I can’t afford to think about girls.” + +“I don’t care! As soon as I saw you, I hoped there was a girl,” Miss +Cigale went on. “Because you’re such a dear, obstinate, helpless, +splendid boy, and I hoped there was some one to see all that. She does, +doesn’t she?” + +Geordie had grown very red. + +“She sees the obstinacy, anyhow,” he answered. “You see, she’s a +secretary, and--” His jaw set doggedly. “She won’t give up her job!” he +said. “And I won’t get married unless she does.” + +“Too many won’ts!” said Miss Cigale. + +“Well, all of them together make a pretty big can’t,” said he. “We can’t +get married, that’s all. I’ve tried to make her see that we could +manage, but she says we can’t. Those--those tickets, you know. I bought +her a ring, and a--” He had to stop for a moment. “A little inlaid +writing desk for our home. Only--it’s nearly a year, and she won’t see +that we can manage without her salary, and I won’t--” + +“Oh, Geordie!” protested Miss Cigale. + +“I won’t!” said he. “I won’t!” And a more mulish expression was never +seen on a young man before. + +“Do get a taxi!” Miss Cigale suggested. + + +VI + +And not one of them realized the outrageous folly of that dinner! There +they sat, Miss Cigale, and Geordie, and Nell, who was the girl in the +case, in that expensive restaurant, eating all sorts of expensive +dishes, and all fancying themselves so businesslike! There was some +excuse for Miss Cigale, but Geordie, who was considered a practical and +level-headed young man by his business superiors, and Nell, whose +employer could not say enough in praise of her good sense and +ability--they should have known better. + +“He offered the position to me,” Miss Cigale was saying. “He almost +begged me to take it. To be his personal assistant in his booking agency +for musicians and concert singers, and so on. He said--” An odd change +came over her face; she looked for an instant remarkably handsome and +dignified. + +“He said,” she went on, calmly, “that no one else could handle his +clients as I could--no one else would have just the right manner, and +the sympathy and understanding of their problems. He always was very +flattering, years ago, when I gave my unlucky concert. It’s really a +very good position. But I wouldn’t take it then, because I was so sick +and tired of jobs that didn’t do the least bit of good to any one except +myself. I’m so tired of working just for myself. But now, if we arrange +this thing in a really businesslike way, you could take that sweet, tiny +house at the end of your mother’s street, Geordie. Nell could stay at +home, to look after things, and I’d contribute toward the expenses, of +course. It would be very much to my advantage--because then I’d have a +home, you see.” + +There was a silence. + +“Unless I’d be a nuisance?” Miss Cigale remarked. + +“You couldn’t be!” cried Nell. “There never was any one so kind and +dear!” + +“Unless Geordie objects?” said Miss Cigale. + +He glanced at her, and then stared. For there was a light of the most +charming malice in Miss Cigale’s eyes, and such a significant hint of a +smile on her lips. She was laughing at him! She was getting the better +of him! + +She was giving him a chance to get married in his own, obstinate way, +with Nell safely at home, and, in return, she demanded absolute +surrender from him. He could have his way--but only if Miss Cigale had +her way, and defiantly went out to work every day from under his roof. +Could he allow this? He looked at his Nell. + +This time Miss Cigale didn’t fail; she triumphed. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +SEPTEMBER, 1926 +Vol. LXXXVIII NUMBER 4 + + + + +Blotted Out + +IN THIS STORY A TIGRESS MASQUERADES AS A BEAUTIFUL WOMAN--IN OTHER +WORDS, AMY ROSS WAS PREDATORY AND CRUEL + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +James Ross was well content, that morning. He stood on the deck, one +elbow on the rail, enjoying the wind and the cold rain that blew in his +face, enjoying still more his feeling of complete isolation and freedom. + +None of the other passengers shared his liking for this bleak November +weather, and he had the windward side of the deck to himself. He was +alone there; he was alone in the world--and he meant to remain alone. + +Through the window of the saloon he could, if he liked, see the severe, +eagle-nosed profile of Mrs. Barron, who was sitting in there, more +majestic than ever in her shore-going outfit. She was a formidable lady, +stern, resolute, and experienced; she had marked him down as soon as he +had come on board at San Juan. + +Yet he had escaped from her; he had got the better of her, and so +skillfully that even to this moment she was not sure whether he had +deliberately avoided her, or whether it was chance. Yes, even now, if +the weather had permitted, she would have come out after him with her +card. + +But, if the weather had permitted that, Ross would not have been where +he was. The day before, she had captured him for an instant in the +dining saloon, and she had said that before they landed she would give +him her card. + +He had thanked her very civilly, but he had made up his mind that she +should do nothing of the sort. Because, if she did, she would expect a +card from him in return; she would want to know where he was going, and +he meant that she should never know, and never be able to find him. Even +she was not likely to go so far as to rush across the rain-swept deck +with that card of hers. + +He could also see, if he liked, the little blond head of Phyllis Barron, +who was sitting beside her mother, her hat in her lap. He knew very well +that Phyllis had taken no part at all in pursuing him, yet, in a way, +she was far more dangerous than Mrs. Barron. + +Before he had realized the danger, he had spent a good deal of time with +Phyllis--too much time. It was only a five days’ run up from Porto Rico; +he had never seen her before he came on board, and he intended never to +see her again; yet he felt that it might take him considerably more than +five days to forget her. + +This made him uncomfortable. Every glimpse of that quiet, thoughtful +little face, so very pretty, so touching in its brave young dignity and +candor, gave him a sort of qualm, as if she had spoken a friendly word +to him, and he had not answered. Indeed, so much did the sight of +Phyllis Barron disquiet him that he turned away altogether. + +And now, through the downpour, he saw the regal form of the Statue of +Liberty. It pleased him, and somehow consoled him for those qualms. It +was a symbol of what his life was going to be, a life of completest +liberty. He had left nobody behind him, there was nobody waiting for him +anywhere in the world; he cared for nobody--no, not he; and nobody cared +for him. That was just what he liked. + +He was young, he was in vigorous health, he had sufficient money, and no +one on earth had any sort of claim upon him. He could go where he +pleased, and do what he pleased. He was free. And here he was, coming +back to what was, after all, his native city, and not one soul there +knew his face. + +He smiled to himself at the thought, his dour, tight-lipped smile. +Coming home, eh? And nobody to greet him but the Statue of Liberty. He +was glad it was so. He didn’t want to be greeted; he wanted to be let +alone. And, in that case, he had better go now, before they came +alongside the pier, and Mrs. Barron appeared. + +He went below to his cabin, intending to stop there until all other +passengers had disembarked. The steward had taken up his bags, and the +little room had a forlorn and untidy look; not an agreeable place in +which to sit. But it was safe. + +Ross hung up his wet overcoat and cap, and sat down with a magazine, to +read. But he could not read a word. The engines had stopped; they had +arrived; he was in New York. In New York. Try as he would to stifle his +emotions, a great impatience and restlessness filled him. + +There were, in this city, thousands of men to whom Manila and Mayaguez +would seem names of almost incredible romance; men to whom New York +meant little but an apartment, the subway, the office, and the anxious +and monotonous routine of earning a living. But to Ross, New York had +all the allurement of the exotic, and those other ports had meant only +exile and discontent. He thought uncharitable thoughts about Mrs. +Barron, because she kept him imprisoned here when he so longed to set +foot on shore. + +There was a knock at the door. + +“Well?” Ross demanded. + +“Note for you, sir,” answered the steward. + +Ross grinned to himself at what he considered a new instance of Mrs. +Barron’s enterprise. For a moment he thought he would refuse to take the +note, so that he might truthfully say he had never got it; then he +reflected that Mrs. Barron was never going to have a chance to question +him about it, and he unlocked the door. + +“We’ve docked, sir,” the steward said. + +“I know it,” Ross agreed briefly. + +He took the note, tipped the steward, and locked the door after him. +Extraordinary, the way this lady had pursued him, all the way across! He +was not handsome, not entertaining, not even very amiable; she knew +nothing about him. + +Indeed, as far as her knowledge went, he might be any sort of dangerous +and undesirable character. Yet she had persistently--and obviously--done +her best to capture him for her daughter. + +He glanced at himself in the mirror. A lean and hardy young man, very +dark, with the features characteristic of his family, a thin, keen nose, +rather long upper lip, a saturnine and faintly mocking expression. They +were a disagreeable family, bitterly obstinate, ambitious, energetic, +and grimly unsociable. + +And he was like that, too; like his father and his grandfather and his +uncles. Without being in the least humble, he still could not understand +what Mrs. Barron had seen in him to make her consider him a suitable +son-in-law. + +With Phyllis Barron it was different. He had sometimes imagined that her +innocent and candid eyes had discerned in him qualities he had long ago +tried to destroy. It was possible that she had found him a little +likable. + +But _she_ wouldn’t pursue him. He was certain that she had not written +this note, or wanted her mother to write it. When he had realized his +danger, and had begun to spend his time talking to the doctor, instead +of sitting beside her on deck, she had never tried to recall him. +Whenever he did come, she always had that serious, friendly little smile +for him; but she had tried to make it very plain that, where she was +concerned, he was quite free to come or to go, to remember or to forget. + +Well, he meant to forget. His life was just beginning, and he did not +intend to entangle himself in any way. He sighed, not knowing that he +did so, and then, out of sheer idle curiosity, just to see how Mrs. +Barron worked, he opened the note. + +“Dear Cousin James--” it began. + +But, as far as he knew, he hadn’t a cousin in the world. With a puzzled +frown, he picked up the envelope; it was plainly addressed, in a clear, +small hand, to “Mr. James Ross. On board the S. S. Farragut.” + +“Must be a mistake, though,” he muttered. “I’ll just see.” And he went +on reading: + + You have never seen me, and I know you have heard all sorts of + cruel and false things about me. But I _beg_ you to forget all that + now. I am in such terrible trouble, and I don’t know where to turn. + I _beg_ you to come here as soon as you get this. Ask for Mrs. + Jones, the housekeeper. Say you have come from Cren’s Agency, about + the job as chauffeur. She will tell you everything. You _can’t_ + refuse just to come and let me tell you about this terrible thing. + + Your desperately unhappy cousin, + AMY ROSS SOLWAY. + + “Day’s End,” Wygatt Road, near Stamford. + +He sat, staring in amazement at this letter. + +“It’s a mistake!” he said, aloud. + +But, all the same, it filled him with a curious uneasiness. Of course, +it was meant for some one else--and he wanted that other fellow to get +it at once; he wanted to be rid of it in a hurry. + +He had nothing to do with any one’s Cousin Amy and her “terrible +trouble.” He rang the bell for the steward, waited, rang again, more +vigorously, again waited, but no one came. + +Then, putting the note back in its envelope, he flung open the door and +strode out into the passage, shouting “Steward!” in a pretty forcible +voice. No one answered him. He went down the corridor, turned a corner, +and almost ran into Mrs. Barron. + +“Mr. Ross!” said she, in a tone of stern triumph. “So here you are! +Phyllis, dear, give Mr. Ross one of our cards--with the address.” + +Then he caught sight of Phyllis, standing behind her mother. In her +little close fitting hat, her coat with a fur collar, she looked taller, +older, graver, quite different from that bright-haired, slender little +thing in a deck chair. And, somehow, she was so dear to him, so lovely, +so gentle, so utterly trustworthy. + +“I’ll never forget her!” he thought, in despair. + +Then she spoke, in a tone he had not heard before. + +“I’m sorry,” she said. “I haven’t any cards with me.” + +“Phyllis!” cried her mother. “I particularly asked you--” + +“I’m sorry,” Phyllis declared again. “We’ll really have to hurry, +mother. Good-by, Mr. Ross!” + +Her steady blue eyes met his for an instant, but, for all the regret and +pain he felt, his stubborn spirit refused to show one trace. Evidently +she knew he had tried to run away, and she didn’t want to see him again. +Very well! + +“Good-by, Miss Barron!” he said. + +She turned away, and he, too, would have walked off, but the dauntless +Mrs. Barron was not to be thwarted. + +“Then I’ll tell you the address!” said she. “Hotel Bernderly--West +Seventy-Seventh Street. Don’t forget!” + +“I shan’t,” Ross replied. “Thank you! Good-by!” + +He went back along the corridor, forgetting all about the note, even +forgetting where he was going, until the sight of a white jacket in the +distance recalled him. + +“Steward!” he shouted. + +The man came toward him, anxious and very hurried. + +“Look here!” said Ross. “This note--it’s not meant for me.” + +“Beg your pardon, sir, but a boy brought it aboard and told me to give +it to you.” + +“I tell you it’s not meant for me!” said Ross. “Take it back!” + +“But it’s addressed to you, sir. Mr. James Ross. There’s no other Mr. +Ross on board. The boy said it was urgent.” + +“Take it back!” Ross repeated. + +“I shouldn’t like to do that, sir,” said the steward, firmly. “I said +I’d deliver it to Mr. Ross. If you’re not--satisfied, sir, the purser +might--” + +“Oh, all right!” Ross interrupted, with a frown. “I haven’t time to +bother now. I’ll keep it. But it’s a mistake. And somebody is going to +regret it.” + + +II + +A casual acquaintance in San Juan had recommended the Hotel Miston to +Ross. “Nice, quiet little place,” he had said; “and you can get a really +good cup of coffee there.” + +So, when the United States customs officers had done with Ross, he +secured a taxi, and told the chauffeur to drive him to this Hotel +Miston. Not that he was in the least anxious for quiet, or had any +desire for a cup of coffee; simply, he was in a hurry to get somewhere, +anywhere, so that he could begin to live. + +In spite of the rain, he lowered the window of the cab, and sat looking +out at the astounding speed and vigor of the life about him. This was +what he had longed for, this was what he had wanted; for years and years +he had said to himself that when he was free, he would come here and +make a fortune. + +Well, he was free, and he was in New York, and he had already the +foundation of a nice little fortune. For eight years he had worked in +the office of a commission agent in Manila, and every day of those eight +years he had told himself that he wouldn’t stand it any longer. But he +had stood it. + +His grandfather had been a cynical old tyrant; he had thwarted the boy +in every ambition that he had. When James said he wanted to be a civil +engineer, as his father had been, old Ross told him he hadn’t brains +enough for that. James had not agreed with him, but as he had no money +to send himself home to college, he had been obliged to put up with what +old Ross called “a sound practical education.” + +At eighteen his education was declared finished, and he went to work. He +hated his work, he hated everything about his life, and from his meager +salary he had saved every cent he could, so that he would get away. + +Long ago he had saved enough to pay his passage to New York--but he had +not gone. His grandfather was old and ill, and, because of his bitter +tongue, quite without friends; he certainly gave no sign that he enjoyed +his grandson’s company, and James showed no affection for him; their +domestic life was anything but agreeable. + +Sick at heart, James saw his youth slipping by, wasted, his abilities +all unused; he told himself that he had done his duty, and more than his +duty to his grandfather. Yet he could not leave him. + +Then, six months ago, the old man had died, leaving everything he had to +“my grandson, James Ross, in appreciation of his loyalty,” the only sign +of appreciation he had ever made. It was a surprisingly large estate; +there was some property in Porto Rico, where James had spent his +childhood with his parents, but the greater part consisted of very sound +bonds and mortgages in the hands of a New York lawyer, Mr. Teagle. + +Mr. Teagle had written to James, and James had written to Mr. Teagle +several times in the last few months, but James had not told him when he +expected to arrive in New York. He had gone to Porto Rico in a little +cargo steamer, by the way of Panama; he had wound up his business there, +and now he wanted to walk in on Mr. Teagle in the most casual fashion. +He hated any sort of fuss; he didn’t want to be met at the steamer, he +didn’t want to be advised and assisted. He wanted to be let alone. + +The taxi stopped before the Hotel Miston, a dingy little place not far +from Washington Square. Ross got out, paid the driver, and followed the +porter into the lobby. He engaged a room and bath, and turned toward the +elevator. + +“Will you register, sir?” asked the clerk. + +Ross hesitated for a moment; then he wrote “J. Ross, New York.” After +all, this was his home; he had been born here, and he intended to live +here. + +He went upstairs to his room, and, locking the door, sat down near the +window. The floor still seemed to heave under his feet, like the deck of +a ship. He visualized the deck of the Farragut, and Phyllis in a deck +chair, looking at him with her dear, friendly little smile. + +He frowned at the unwelcome thought. That was finished; that belonged in +the past. There was a new life before him, and the sooner he began it, +the better. + +He reached in his pocket for Mr. Teagle’s last letter--and brought out +that note to “Cousin James.” At the sight of it, he frowned more +heavily; he tossed it across the room in the direction of the desk, but +it fluttered down to the floor. Let it lie there. He found Mr. Teagle’s +letter, and took up the telephone receiver. Presently: + +“Mr. Teagle’s office!” came a brisk feminine voice. + +“I’d like to see Mr. Teagle this morning, if possible.” + +“Sorry, but Mr. Teagle won’t be in to-day. Will you leave a message?” + +“No,” said Ross. “No, thanks.” And hung up the receiver. + +He sat for a time looking out of the window at the street, far below +him. The rain fell steadily; it was a dismal day. He could not begin his +new life to-day, after all. Very well; what should he do, then? Anything +he wanted, of course. Nobody could have been freer. + +He lit a cigarette, and leaned back in the chair. Freedom--that was what +he had wanted, and that was what he had got. And yet-- + +He turned his head, to look for an ash tray, and his glance fell upon +that confounded note on the floor. In the back of his mind he had known, +all the time, that he would have to do something about it. He disliked +it, and disapproved of it; a silly, hysterical sort of note, he thought, +but, nevertheless, it was an appeal for help, and it was from a woman. +Somebody ought to answer it. + +He began idly to speculate about the “terribly unhappy” Amy Ross Solway. +Perhaps she was young--not much more than a girl--like Phyllis. + +“Not much!” he said to himself. “_She_ wouldn’t write a note like that. +She’s not that sort. No matter what sort of trouble menaced--” + +It occurred to him that if Phyllis Barron were in any sort of trouble, +she would never turn to James Ross for help. He had shown her too +plainly that he was not disposed to trouble himself about other people +and their affairs. + +His family never did. They minded their own business, they let other +people alone, and other people soon learned to let them alone. Very +satisfactory! Lucky for this Amy Ross Solway that she didn’t know what +sort of fellow had got that note of hers. + +Still, something had to be done about it. At first he thought he would +mail it back to her, with a note of his own, explaining that he was not +her Cousin James, but another James Ross, who had got it by mistake. +But, no; that plan meant too much delay, when she was no doubt waiting +impatiently for a gallant cousin. + +Then he thought he would try to get her on the telephone, but that idea +did not suit him, either. It was always awkward, trying to explain +anything on the telephone--and, besides, she seemed anxious for secrecy. +He might explain to the wrong person, and do a great deal of harm. + +He began to think very seriously about that note now. And, for some +unaccountable reason, his thoughts of the unknown woman were confused +with thoughts of Phyllis Barron. It seemed to him that if Phyllis could +know how much attention he was giving to this problem which was not his +business, she would realize that he was not entirely callous. If she +thought he was, she misjudged him. + +Perhaps he was not what you might call impulsively sympathetic, but he +was not lacking in all decent feeling. He was not going to ignore this +appeal. + +“I’ll go out there!” he decided. “I’ll see this Amy Ross Solway, and +explain. And, if her trouble’s anything real, I’ll--” He hesitated. +“Well, I’ll give her the best advice I can,” he thought. + +No, James Ross was not what you might call impulsively sympathetic. But, +considering how vehemently he hated to be mixed up in other people’s +affairs, it was creditable of him even to think of giving advice, +creditable of him to go at all. + +He arose, put on his overcoat, caught up his hat, and went downstairs. +Nobody took any notice of him. He walked out of the Hotel Miston--and he +never came back. + + +III + +It did not please the young man to ask questions in this, his native +city. He had spent time enough in studying a map of New York, and he +knew his way about pretty well. But there were, naturally, things he did +not know; for instance, he went to the Pennsylvania Station, and learned +that his train for Stamford left from the Grand Central. + +It was after one o’clock, then, so he went into a restaurant and had +lunch before going farther--his first meal in the United States. He had +never enjoyed anything more. To walk through these streets, among the +hurrying and indifferent crowds, to be one of them, to feel himself at +home here, filled him with something like elation. It was _his_ city. + +A little after three, he boarded the train. And, in spite of his caution +and his native reticence, he would, at that moment, have relished a talk +with one of his fellow countrymen in the smoking car. He was not +disposed to start a conversation without encouragement, though, and +nobody took any notice of him; nobody had, since his landing. A clever +criminal, escaping from justice, could not have been much more +successful in leaving no traces. + +When he got out at Stamford, the rain had ceased, but the sky was +menacing and overcast. He stood for a moment on the platform, again +reluctant to ask questions, but there was no help for it this time. + +He stopped a grocer’s boy, and asked him where Wygatt Road was. The boy +told him. “But it’s a long way,” he added. + +Ross didn’t care how long it was. This was the first suburban town he +had seen, and it charmed him. Such a prosperous, orderly, lively town! +He thought that he might like to live here. + +Dusk was closing in early this dismal day; it was almost dark before he +reached the hill he had to climb. The street lights came on, and through +the windows of houses he could see shaded lamps and the shadows of +people, comfortable rooms, bright little glimpses of domestic life. Past +him, along the road, went an endless stream of motor cars, with a rush +and a glare of light; he scarcely realized that he was in the country +until he came to the top of the hill, and saw before him a signpost +marked “Wygatt Road.” + +He turned down here, and was at once in another world. It was dark, and +very, very quiet; no motors passed him, no lights shone out; he walked +on, quite alone, under tall old trees, to which clung a few leaves, +trembling in every gust of wind. Overhead, ragged black clouds flew +across the darkening sky; the night was coming fast. + +And now he began to think about his extraordinary errand, now he began +to think that he had been a fool to come. But it did not occur to him to +turn back. He never did that. He was sorry he had begun a foolish thing, +but, now that he had begun, he would carry on. If it took him all night, +if it took him a week, he would find “Day’s End,” and do what he had set +out to do. + +There was no one to ask questions of here; no human being, no house in +sight. On one side of him was a belt of woodland, on the other an iron +fence which appeared to run on interminably. Well, he also would go on +interminably, and if “Day’s End” was on Wygatt Road, he would certainly +come to it in the course of time. + +He did. There was a break in the fence at last, made by a gateway +between stone pillars, and here he saw, by the light of a match, “Day’s +End,” in gilt letters. He opened the gate and went in; a long driveway +stretched before him, tree lined; he went up it briskly. + +He saw nothing, and heard nothing, but he had a vague impression that +the grounds through which he passed were somber and forbidding, and he +expected to see a house in keeping with this notion, an old, sinister +house, suitable for people in “terrible trouble.” + +It was not like that, though. A turn in the driveway brought him in +sight of a long façade of lighted windows, and a large, substantial, +matter-of-fact house--which made him feel more of a fool than ever. Yet, +still he went on, mounted the steps of a brick terrace, and rang the +doorbell. + +The door was opened promptly by a pale and disagreeable young housemaid. + +“I want to see Mrs. Jones, the housekeeper,” said Ross. + +“You ought to go to the back door!” she remarked sharply. “You ought to +know that much!” + +Ross did not like this, but it was not his habit to let his temper +override discretion. + +“All right!” he said, and was turning away, ready to go to the back +door, ready to go anywhere, so that he accomplished his mission, when +the housemaid relented. + +“As long as you’re here, you can come in,” she said. “This way!” + +He followed her across a wide hall, with a polished floor and a fine old +stairway rising from it, to a door at the farther end. + +“It’s the room right in front of you when you get to the top,” she +explained. + +She opened the door; he went in, she closed the door behind him, and he +found himself in what seemed a pitch-black cupboard. But, as he moved +forward, his foot struck against a step, and he began cautiously to +mount a narrow, boxed-in staircase, until his outstretched hand touched +a door. + +He pushed it open, and found himself in a well lighted corridor, and, +facing him, a white painted door. And behind that door he heard some +one sobbing, in a low, wailing voice. + +He stopped, rather at a loss. Then, because he would not go back, he +went forward, and knocked. + +“Who is it?” cried a voice. + +“I came to see Mrs. Jones,” Ross replied casually. + +There was a moment’s silence; then the door was opened by the loveliest +creature he had ever seen in his life. He had only a glimpse of her, of +an exquisite face, very white, with dark and delicate brows and great +black eyes, a face childlike in its soft, pure contours, but terribly +unchildlike in its expression of terror and despair. + +“Wait!” she said. “Go in and wait!” + +She brushed past him, with a flutter of her filmy gray dress and a +breath of some faint fragrance, and vanished down the back stairs. + +Ross went in as he was instructed, and stood facing the door, waiting +with a certain uneasiness for some one to come. But nobody did come, and +at last he turned and looked about him. + +It was a cozy room, with a cheerful red carpet on the floor, and plenty +of solid, old-fashioned walnut furniture about; it was well warmed by a +steam radiator, and well lighted by an alabaster electrolier in the +ceiling; a clock ticked smartly on the mantelpiece, and on the sofa lay +a big yellow cat, pretending to be asleep, with one gleaming eye half +open. + +It was such a thoroughly commonplace and comfortable room that the young +man felt reassured. He decided to ignore the wailing voice he had heard, +and the pallid, lovely creature who had opened the door. For all he +knew, such things might be quite usual in this household, and, anyhow, +it was none of his business. He had come to see Mrs. Jones, and to +explain an error. + +He watched the smart little clock for five minutes, and then began to +grow restless. He had walked a good deal this day; he was tired; his +shoes were wet; he wanted to be done with this business and to get away. +Another five minutes-- + +It seemed to him that this was the quietest room he had ever known. Even +the tick of the clock was muffled, like a tiny pulse. It was altogether +too quiet. He didn’t like it at all. + +He frowned uneasily, and turned toward the only other living thing +there, the cat. He laid his hand on its head, and in a sort of drowsy +ecstasy the cat stretched out to a surprising length, opening and +curling up its paws. Its claws caught in the linen cover and pulled it +up a little, and Ross saw something under the sofa. + +He doubted the very evidence of his senses. He could not believe that he +saw a hand stretched out on the red carpet. He stared and stared at it, +incredulous. + +Then he stooped and lifted up the cover and looked under the sofa. There +lay a man, face downward. + +He was very still. It seemed to Ross that it was this man’s stillness +which he had felt in the room; it was the quiet of death. + + +IV + +Ross stood looking down at the very quiet figure in a sort of daze. He +did not find this horrible, or shocking; it was simply impossible. Here, +in this tranquil, cozy room--No, it was impossible! + +Going down on one knee, he reached out and touched the nape of the man’s +neck. But he did it mechanically; he had known, from the first glance, +that the man was dead. No living thing could lie so still. Quite cold-- + +The sound of a slow footstep in the corridor startled him. He sprang to +his feet, pulled down the linen cover, and was standing idly in the +center of the room when a woman entered, a stout, elderly woman with +calm brown eyes behind spectacles. + +“Well?” said she. + +“I came to see Mrs. Jones,” said Ross. “I had a note--” + +He spoke in a tone as matter-of-fact as her own, for to save his life he +could think of no rational manner in which to tell her what he had seen. +Such a preposterous thing to tell a sensible, elderly woman! The very +thought of it dismayed him. Of all things in the world, he hated the +theatrical. He could not be, and he would not be, dramatic. He wished to +be casual. + +But, in this case, it would not be easy. The thing he had found was, in +its very nature, dramatic, and was even now defying him to be casual and +sensible. He would have to tell her, point-blank, and she probably would +shriek or faint, or both. + +“Yes,” she said. “I’m Mrs. Jones. A note?” + +Her voice trailed away, and she stood regarding him in thoughtful +silence. Ross was quite willing to be silent a little longer, while he +tried to find a reassuring form for his statement; he looked back at +her, his lean face quite impassive, his mind working furiously. + +“Yes?” said Mrs. Jones. “Miss Solway did think, for a time, that she +might need some one to--advise her. But everything’s quite all right +now.” She paused a moment. “She’ll be sorry to hear you’ve made the +journey for nothing. She’ll appreciate your kindness, I’m sure. But +everything’s quite all right now.” + +“Oh, is it?” murmured Ross. + +He found difficulty in suppressing a grim smile. Everything was all +right now, was it, and he could run away home? He did not agree with +Mrs. Jones. + +“Yes,” she replied. “It was very kind of you to come, but--” + +“Wait!” cried Ross, for she had turned away toward the sofa. + +Without so much as turning her head, she went on a few steps, took the +knitted scarf from her shoulders, and threw it over the end of the sofa. +And he saw then that just the tip of the man’s fingers had been visible, +and that the trailing end of the scarf covered them now. She _knew_! + +“Well?” she asked, looking inquiringly at him through her spectacles. +No; it was impossible; the whole thing was utterly impossible! + +This sedate, respectable, gray-haired woman, this housekeeper who looked +as if she would not overlook the smallest trace of dust in a corner, +certainly, surely would not leave a dead man under her sofa. + +She was stroking the cat, and the animal had assumed an expression of +idiotic delight, pink tongue protruding a little, eyes half open. Would +even a cat be so monstrously indifferent if--if what he thought he had +seen under the sofa were really there? + +“Would you like me to telephone for a taxi to take you to the station?” +asked Mrs. Jones, very civilly. + +“Ha!” thought Ross. “You want to get rid of me, don’t you?” + +And that aroused all his stiff-necked obstinacy. He would _not_ go away +now, after all his trouble, without any sort of explanation of the +situation. + +“There’s a good train--” Mrs. Jones began, with calm persistence, but +Ross interrupted. + +“No, thanks,” he said. “I’d like to see Miss Solway first.” + +His own words surprised him a little. After all, why on earth should he +want to see this Miss Solway? A few hours ago he had been greatly +annoyed at the thought of having to do so; he would have been only too +glad never to see or to hear of her again. + +“It’s because I don’t like being made such a fool of,” he thought. + +For the first time since she had entered the room, Mrs. Jones’s calm was +disturbed. She came nearer to him, and looked into his face with obvious +anxiety, speaking very low, and far more respectfully. + +“It would be much better not to!” she said. “Much better, sir, if you’ll +just go away--” + +“I want to see Miss Solway,” Ross repeated. “There’s been a mistake, and +I want to explain.” + +“I know that, sir!” she whispered. “Of course, as soon as I saw you, I +knew you weren’t Mr. Ross. But--” + +“Look here!” said Ross, bluntly. “What’s it all about, anyhow?” + +“There was a little difficulty, sir,” said Mrs. Jones, still in a +whisper. “But it’s all over now.” + +All over now? A new thought came to Ross. Had the man under the sofa +been Miss Solway’s “terrible trouble,” and had Cousin James been sent +for to help--in doing what had already been done? + +He had, at this moment, a most clear and definite warning from his +brain. “_Clear out!_” it said. “_Get out of this, now. Don’t wait; don’t +ask questions; just go!_” All through his body this warning signal ran, +making his scalp prickle and his heart beat fast. “_It is bad for you +here. Go! Now!_” + +And his stubborn and indomitable spirit answered: “_I won’t!_” + +“I want to see Miss Solway,” he said, aloud. + +Mrs. Jones looked at him for a moment, and apparently the expression on +his face filled her with despair. + +“Oh, dear!” she said, with a tremulous sigh. “I knew; I told her it was +a mistake to send. Oh, dear!” + +Ross stood there and waited. + +“If you’ll go away,” she said, “Miss Solway will write to you.” + +Ross still stood there and waited. + +“Very well, sir!” she said, with another sigh. “If you must, you must. +This way, please!” + +He followed her out of the room, and he noticed that she did not even +glance back. She couldn’t know. It was impossible that any one who was +aware of what lay under the sofa could simply walk out of the room like +that, closing the door upon it. + +They went down the corridor, which was evidently a wing of the house, +and turned the corner into a wider hall. Mrs. Jones knocked upon a door. + +“Miss Amy, my pet!” she called, softly. + +The door opened a little. + +“The gentleman,” said Mrs. Jones. “He _will_ see you!” + +“All right!” answered a voice he recognized; the door opened wider, and +there was the girl he had seen before. Her body, in that soft gray +dress, seemed almost incredibly fragile; her face, colorless, framed in +misty black hair, with great, restless black eyes and delicate little +features, was strange and lovely as a dream. + +Too strange, thought Ross. For the first time he realized the +significance of her presence in the housekeeper’s room. He remembered +the wailing voice, her air of haste and terror as she had brushed past +him. She had been in there, alone. What did she know? What had she seen? + +“I had a note from you--” he began. + +“Hush!” said Mrs. Jones. “If you please, sir! It’s a mistake, Miss Amy, +my pet. This isn’t Mr. Ross. It’s quite a stranger.” + +Obviously she was warning her pet to be careful what she said, and Ross +decided that he, too, would be careful. He would have his own little +mystery. + +“Quite a stranger!” he repeated. + +“But--how did you get my note?” asked the girl. + +“It was given to me,” he answered. + +He saw Mrs. Jones and the girl exchange a glance. + +“If I hold my tongue and wait,” he thought, “they’ll surely have to tell +me something.” + +“But I don’t--” the girl began, when, to Ross’s amazement, Mrs. Jones +gave him a vigorous push forward. + +“You’re the new chauffeur!” she whispered, fiercely. + +Then he heard footsteps in the hall. He stood well inside the room, now; +a large room, furnished with quiet elegance. It was what people called a +boudoir, he thought, as his quick eye took in the details; a dressing +table with rose shaded electric lights and gleaming silver and glass; a +little desk with rose and ivory fittings; a silver vase of white +chrysanthemums on the table. + +“I’m afraid we can’t take you,” said Mrs. Jones, in an altogether new +sort of voice, brisk, and a little loud. “I’m sorry.” + +Ross was very well aware that some one else had come to the door and was +standing behind him. He was also aware of a sort of triumph in Mrs. +Jones’s manner. She thought she was going to get rid of him. But she +wasn’t. + +“If it’s a question of wages,” he said, “I’ll take a little less.” + +He saw how greatly this disconcerted her. + +“No,” she said. “No, I’m afraid not.” + +“What’s the matter? What’s the matter? What’s the matter?” demanded an +impatient voice behind him. He turned, and saw a stout, middle-aged man +of domineering aspect standing there and frowning heavily. + +“The young man’s come to apply for the chauffeur’s position, sir,” Mrs. +Jones explained. “But I’m afraid--” + +“Well, what’s the matter with him?” cried the domineering man. “Can he +drive a car? Has he got references, eh?” + +“Yes, sir,” Ross replied. + +“Let’s see your references!” + +“I left them at the agency,” said Ross, as if inspired. + +“Agency sent you, eh? Well, they know their business, don’t they? Can +you take a car to pieces and put it together again? Have you brains +enough to keep your gasoline tank filled, and to remember that when +you’re going round a corner some other fellow may be doing the same +thing?” + +“Yes, sir,” said Ross. + +The domineering man stared hard, and Ross met his regard steadily. + +“He’ll do,” said the man. “I like him. Looks you straight in the face. +Level headed. Well set up. Good nerves. Doesn’t drink. We’ll give him a +chance. Eddy!” + +He went out into the hall. + +“Eddy!” he shouted. “I want Eddy!” + +Mrs. Jones came close to Ross. + +“Go away!” she whispered. “You _must_ go away!” + +The domineering man had come back into the room. + +“Now, then, what’s your name?” he demanded brusquely. + +“Moss,” said Ross. + +“Moss, eh? Very well! Ah, here’s Eddy! Eddy, take this young man over to +the garage. See that he’s properly looked after. He’s our new +chauffeur.” + + +V + +The door closed behind them, and Ross round himself in the hall, alone +with this Eddy. They stared at each other for a moment; then, in spite +of himself, a grudging smile dawned upon Ross’s lean and dour face. Eddy +grinned from ear to ear. + +“Come on, shover!” he said. “I’ll show you your stall!” + +A sheik, Eddy was; very slender, with black hair well oiled and combed +back from his brow, and wearing clothes of the latest and jauntiest +mode. But he lacked the lilylike languor of the true sheik; his rather +handsome face was alert and cheerful; and although he moved with the +somewhat supercilious grace of one who had been frequently called a just +wonderful dancer, there was a certain wiry vigor about him. + +Ross followed him down the hall and around the corner, into the corridor +where Mrs. Jones’s room was. Ross saw that the door was a little ajar, +and he dropped behind, because he wanted to look into that room, but +Eddy, in passing, pulled it shut. + +Did he know, too? Certainly he did not look like the sort of youth who +went about closing doors unbidden, simply from a sense of order and +decorum. And that grin--did it signify a shrewd understanding of a +discreditable situation? + +It was at this instant that Ross began to realize what he had done. Only +dimly, though; for he thought that in a few moments he would be gone, +and the whole affair finished, as far as he was concerned. He felt only +a vague disquiet, and a great impatience to get away. He went after Eddy +down the back stairs and through a dark passage on the floor below, at +the end of which he saw a brightly lit kitchen where a stout cook bent +over the stove, and that same disagreeable housemaid was mixing +something in a bowl at the table. + +Then Eddy opened a door, and a wild gust of wind and rain sprang at +them. + +“Step right along, shover!” said Eddy. “Here! This way!” And he took +Ross by the arm. + +It was black as the pit out there; the wind came whistling through the +pines, driving before it great sheets of rain that was half sleet. It +was a world of black, bitter cold and confusion, and Ross thought of +nothing at all except getting under shelter again. + +It was only a few yards; then Eddy stopped, let go of Ross’s arm, and +slid back a door. This door opened upon blackness, too, but Ross was +glad enough to get inside. Eddy closed the door, turned on a switch, and +he saw that they were in a garage. + +It was a very ordinary garage, neat and bare, with a cement floor, and +two cars standing, side by side; yet, to Ross it had a sinister aspect. +He was very weary, wet and chilled to the bone, and this place looked to +him like a prison, a stone dungeon. Storm or no storm, he wanted to get +out, away from this place and these people. + +“Look here--” he began, but Eddy’s cheerful voice called out: “This +way!” and he saw him standing at the foot of a narrow staircase in one +corner. + +The one thing which made Ross go up those stairs was his violent +distaste for the dramatic. He felt that it would be absurd to dash out +into the rain. Instinct warned him, but once again he defied that +warning, and up he went. + +He was surprised and pleased by what he found up there: the jolliest, +coziest little room, green rug on the floor, big armchairs of imitation +red leather, reading lamp. It was not a room of much æsthetic charm, +perhaps, but comfortable, cheerful and homelike, and warm. + +The rain was drumming loud on the roof and dashing against the windows, +and Ross sighed as he looked at the big chairs. But he was beginning to +think now. + +“Take off your coat and make yourself at home,” said Eddy. + +“No,” Ross objected. “I can’t stay to-night. Didn’t bring my things +along.” + +“Oh, didn’t you?” said Eddy. “Why not?” + +“Because I didn’t come prepared to stay.” + +“What _did_ you come for?” asked Eddy. + +Now, this might be mere idle curiosity, and Ross decided to accept it as +that. + +“No,” he said, slowly. “I’ll go back to the city and get my things.” + +“It’s raining too hard,” Eddy declared. “It wouldn’t be healthy for you +to go out just now, shover.” + +This was a little too much for Ross to ignore. + +“Just the same,” he insisted, “I’m going now.” + +“Nope!” said Eddy. + +Ross moved forward, and Eddy moved, too, so that he blocked the doorway. +He was grinning, but there was an odd light in his eyes. + +“Now, lookit here!” he said. “You just make yourself comfortable for the +night, see?” + +Ross looked at him thoughtfully. He believed that it would not be +difficult to throw this slender youth down the stairs, and to walk out +of the garage, but he disliked the idea. + +“I don’t want to make any trouble, Eddy,” he explained, almost mildly. +“But I’m going.” + +“Nope!” said Eddy. + +Ross took a step forward. Eddy reached in his hip pocket and pulled out +a revolver. + +“Nope!” he said again. + +“What!” cried Ross, astounded. “Do you mean--” + +“Tell you what I mean,” said Eddy. “I mean to say that I know who you +are, and what you come for, and you’re going to sit pretty till +to-morrow morning. That’s what I mean.” + +He spoke quite without malice; indeed, his tone was good-humored. But he +was in earnest, he and his gun; there was no doubt about it. + +It was not Ross’s disposition to enter into futile arguments. He took +off his overcoat, sat down, calmly took out a cigarette and lit it. + +“I see!” he remarked. “But I’d like to know who I am, and what I came +for. I’d like to hear your point of view.” + +“Maybe you wouldn’t,” said Eddy. “Anyway, that can wait. Got to see +about feeding you now.” + +He locked the door behind him and dropped the key into his pocket. Then +he opened another door leading out of the sitting room, disclosing a +small kitchen. + +“Last shover we had, he was a married man,” he explained. “Him and his +wife fixed the place up like it is. I been living here myself, lately. +Let’s see--I got pork and beans, cawfee, cake--good cake--cook over at +the house made it. How does that strike you?” + +“Good enough!” answered Ross, a little absently. + +Eddy was moving about in the kitchen, whistling between his teeth; from +time to time he addressed a cheerful remark to his captive, but got no +answer. Presently he brought in a meal, of a sort, and set it out on a +table. + +“Here you are!” he announced. + +Ross drew up his chair, and fell to, with a pretty sharp appetite. + +“Look here!” he said, abruptly. “Who was that man--the one who--hired +me?” + +“Him? The Prince of Wales!” Eddy replied. “Thought you’d recognized +him.” + +This was Ross’s last attempt at questioning. Indeed, he was quite +willing to be silent now, for his deplorably postponed thinking was now +well under way. His brain was busy with the events of this day--this +immeasurably long day. Was it only this morning that he had got the +note? Only this morning that he had said good-by to Phyllis Barron? + +“She’d be a bit surprised if she knew where I’d gone!” he thought. + +And then, with a sort of shock, it occurred to him that +nobody--absolutely nobody on earth knew where he had gone, or cared. +These people here did not know even his name. He had come here, had +walked into this situation, and if he never came out again, who would be +troubled? + +Mr. Teagle had not expected him at any definite time, and would wait for +weeks and weeks before feeling the least anxiety about his unknown +client. The people at the Hotel Miston would scarcely notice for some +time the absence of Mr. Ross of New York, especially as his luggage +remained there to compensate them for any loss. Nobody would be injured, +or unhappy, or one jot the worse, if he never saw daylight again. + +This was one aspect of a completely free life which he had not +considered. He was of no interest or importance to any one. He began to +consider it now. + +Eddy had cleared away their meal, and had been turning over the pages of +a magazine. Now he began to yawn, and presently, getting up, opened +another door, to display a tidy little bedroom. + +“Whenever you’re ready to go by-by, shover,” he suggested. + +“Thanks, I’m all right where I am,” Ross asserted. + +“Suit yourself,” said Eddy. + +He set a chair against the locked door, pulled up another chair to put +his feet on, and made himself as comfortable as he could. But Ross made +no such effort. His family had never cared about being comfortable. No; +there he sat, too intent upon his thoughts to sleep. + +The realization of his own utter loneliness in this world had set him to +thinking about the man under the sofa. There might be some one waiting, +in tears, in terrible anxiety for that man. Probably there was. There +were very, very few human beings who had nobody to care. + +He had made up his mind to go to the police with his story the next +morning. And he saw very clearly the disagreeable position into which +his perverse obstinacy had brought him. He had discovered a man who was +certainly dead, and possibly murdered, and he had said not a word about +it to any one. + +He had refused to go away when he had a chance, and now, here he was, +held prisoner while, if there had been foul play, the persons +responsible would have ample time to make what arrangements they +pleased. He could very well imagine how his tale would sound to the +police. + +“Good Lord!” he said to himself. “What a fool I’ve been!” + + +VI + +It seemed to Ross that the great noise of the wind outside was mingled +now with the throb of engines and the rushing of water. He thought he +felt the lift and roll of the ship beneath him; he thought he was lying +in his berth again, on his way across the dark waste of waters, toward +New York. He wondered what New York would be like. + +Phyllis Barron was knocking at his door, telling him to hurry, hurry and +come on deck. This did not surprise him; he was only immensely relieved +and glad. + +“I knew you’d come!” he wanted to say, but he could not speak. He tried +to get up and dress and go out to her, but he could not move. He made a +desperate struggle to call to her. + +“Wait! Wait!” he tried to say. “I’m asleep. But I’ll wake in a minute. +Please don’t go away!” + +Then, with a supreme effort, he did wake. He opened his eyes. There was +Eddy, stretched out on his two chairs, sound asleep. And there was a +muffled knocking at the door, and a little wailing voice: + +“Eddy! Eddy! Oh, _can’t_ you hear me? Eddy!” + +For a moment Ross thought it was an echo from his dream, but, as the +drowsiness cleared from his head, he knew it was real. He got up and +touched the sleeping youth on the shoulder. + +“There’s some one calling you!” he said. + +Eddy opened his eyes with an alert expression and glared at Ross. + +“What?” he demanded, sternly. “No monkey tricks, now!” + +As a matter of fact, he was still more than half asleep, and Ross had to +repeat his statement twice before it was understood. Then he sprang up, +pushed aside the chairs, and unlocked the door. + +It was Miss Solway. She came in, like a wraith; she was wrapped in a fur +coat, but she looked cold, pale, affrighted; her black eyes wide, her +misty dark hair in disorder; a fit figure for a dream. + +“Eddy!” she said. “Go away!” + +“Lookit here, Miss Amy,” Eddy protested, anxiously. “Wait till morning.” + +“But it is morning!” she cried. “Go away, Eddy! Quick! I want to speak +to--Go away, do! I only have a minute to spare.” + +“Morning!” thought Ross. He looked at his watch, which showed a few +minutes past six; then at the window. It was as black as ever outside. + +“Lookit here, Miss Amy,” Eddy began again. “If I was you, I’d--” + +“Get out, fool!” she cried. “Idiot! This instant!” + +Her fierce and sudden anger astounded Ross. Her eyes had narrowed, her +nostrils dilated, her short upper lip was drawn up in a sort of snarl. +Yet this rage was in no way repellent; it was like the fury of some +beautiful little animal. He could perfectly understand Eddy’s answering +in a tone of resigned indulgence. + +“All right, Miss Amy. Have it your own way.” + +It seemed to Ross that that was the only possible way for any man to +regard this preposterous and lovely creature, not critically, but simply +with indulgence. + +Taking up his cap and overcoat, Eddy departed, whistling as he went down +the stairs. Miss Solway waited, scowling, until he had gone; then she +turned to Ross. + +“_Who are you?_” she demanded. + +He was greatly taken aback. He had not yet had time to collect his +thoughts; nothing much remained in his mind except the decision of the +night before that this morning he was going to the police with an +account of what he had seen. And, stronger and clearer than anything +else, was his desire and resolve to get away from here. + +“Oh, tell me!” she entreated. + +Ross reflected well before answering. Eddy suspected him of +something--Heaven knew what. Perhaps this girl did, too. He imagined +that they were both a little afraid of him. And, if he held his tongue, +and didn’t let them know how casual and unpremeditated all his actions +had been, he might keep them in wholesome doubt about him, and so get +away. + +“My name’s Moss,” he replied, as if surprised. “I came to get a job.” + +“No!” she said. “You got my note. But how could you? Who _can_ you be? +Nanna said--but I don’t believe it! I knew--as soon as I saw you--I felt +sure you’d come to help me. Oh, tell me! My cousin James sent you, +didn’t he?” + +“James Ross?” asked Ross, slowly. + +“Yes!” she answered, eagerly. “My cousin James. He did! I know it! +Mother always told me to go to him if I needed help. Of course, I know +he must be old now. I was afraid--so terribly afraid that he’d left the +ship, or that I’d forgotten the name of it. But I was right, after all. +I thought mother had said he was purser on the Farragut.” + +“What!” cried Ross. + +He began to understand now. Years and years ago--the dimmest memory--he +had had a cousin James who was purser on one of the Porto Rico boats. He +could vaguely remember his coming to their house in Mayaguez; a gloomy +man with a black beard; son of his father’s elder brother William. It +must have been on the old Farragut, scrapped nearly twenty years ago. + +And that cousin James had vanished, too, long ago. William Ross had had +three children, and outlived them all. Ross could remember his +grandfather telling him that. + +“All gone,” the old man had said; “both my sons and their sons. No doubt +the Almighty has some reason for sparing _you_; but it’s beyond me.” + +“_Your_ Cousin James?” said Ross, staring at her--because that had been +_his_ Cousin James. + +“Yes! Yes! Yes!” she answered, impatiently. “I told you. Now tell me +how--” + +But Ross wanted to understand. + +“What was your father’s name?” he demanded. + +“Luis Delmano,” she replied. “But what does that matter? I only have a +minute--” + +“Then why do you call yourself Solway if your name is--” + +“Oh!” she cried. “Now I see! You didn’t know the name of my mother’s +second husband! Nobody had told you that! Of course! I should have +thought of that. Mother told me how horrible her brothers were. When she +married daddy, they were so furious. They said they’d never see her or +speak to her or mention her name again--and I suppose they didn’t. +Nasty, heartless beasts! Their only sister!” + +Although Ross had never before heard of any sister of his father’s, the +story seemed to him probable. His grandfather, his father, and his uncle +were so exactly the sort of people to possess a sister whose name was +never mentioned; grim, savage, old-fashioned, excommunicating sort of +people. Yes; it was probable; but it was startling. Because, if this +girl’s mother had been his father’s sister, then he was her Cousin +James, after all. + +He did not want to be. His dark face grew a little pale, and he turned +away, looking down at the floor, considering this new and unwelcome +idea. + +“Now you understand!” she said. “And you did come to help me, didn’t +you?” + +This time his silence was deliberate, and not due to any confusion in +his thoughts. The blood in his veins spoke clearly to him. What those +other Rosses had condemned, he, too, condemned. He was like them. This +girl was altogether strange, exotic, and dangerous, and he wanted to get +away from her. + +It was his gift, however, to show no sign of whatever he might be +thinking; his face was expressionless, and she read what she chose +there. She came nearer to him, and laid her hand on his arm. + +“You will help me?” she said, softly. + +He looked down at her gravely. He knew that she was willfully attempting +to charm him--and how he did scorn anything of that sort! And yet--He +looked at her as some long forgotten Ross of Salem might have looked at +a bonny young witch. The creature was dangerous, and yet--Bonny she was, +and a young man is a young man. + +“I don’t see,” he began, doubtfully, when suddenly she cried: “Look!” +and pointed to the window. He turned, startled, but he saw nothing +there. + +“It’s getting light!” she cried. + +That was true enough. The sky was not black now, but all gray, pallid, +swept clean of clouds. The rain had ceased, but the mighty wind still +blew, and the tops of the trees bowed and bent before it, like inky +marionettes before a pale curtain. There was no sign yet of the sun, but +you could feel that the dawn was coming. + +“What of it?” asked Ross, briefly. + +“It’s the last day!” she answered. + +What a thing to say! The last day. It filled him with a vague sense of +dread, and it made him angry. + +“That’s not--” he began, but she did not heed him. + +“Listen!” she said. “You must help me! I don’t know what to do. I’m--I’m +desperate! I’ve--” She stopped, looking up into his wooden face; then, +seizing him by the shoulder, she tried to shake him. + +“Oh, for Heaven’s sake, look at me like a human being!” she cried. + +He stared at her, dumfounded. + +“Stop it!” she commanded. “You’ve got to listen to me!” + +He had never in his life been so amazed. She had flown at him, and +shaken him! It was unbelievable. It was pathetic. She was such a little +thing; so fierce, and so helpless. + +“All right!” he said, mildly. “I’m listening. What’s it all about?” + +His tone, his faint smile, did not please her. + +“Oh, you think it’s nothing!” she said. “You think I’m just a silly +girl, making an awful fuss about some childish trouble. _Don’t_ you? +Well, you’re wrong. Listen to me!” + +She stopped, and drew back a little, looking him straight in the face +with those strange black eyes of hers. + +“I’ve done a terrible thing,” she said, in a low, steady voice. “A +wicked, terrible thing. If I get what I deserve, I’m ruined and lost.” + +She turned away from him, and walked over to the window. Ross turned, +too, and followed her. She was gazing before her at the gray sky; the +curve of her cheek, her half parted lips, her wide brow, were altogether +innocent and lovely, but the look on her pale face was not so. It was +somber, bitter, and tragic. + +“The sun is coming up,” she said, almost inaudibly. “_Will_ you help +me?” + +“Yes,” Ross answered. + + +VII + +Ross stood by the window, watching the sun come up--the first sunrise he +had witnessed in his native land. From the east the light welled up and +spread, slow and inexorable, across the sky, like the Master’s glance +traveling over the chill world; and in his soul Ross dreaded that light. +It would mean discovery. That very quiet figure in the housekeeper’s +room would have his revenge. + +“I’m in it now,” Ross muttered. “Up to the neck.” + +And why? Was it pity for that girl? Was it a stirring of sentiment +because she was his kinswoman, his cousin? He did not think so. He might +have pitied her, and still gone away. He might have recognized their +kinship simply by keeping silent about what he had seen. No; it was +something more than that; something he could not quite understand. + +It was the claim of life upon a strong spirit. You are hardy and +valiant, life said; your shoulders are fitted to bear burdens, and bear +them you shall. Here before you is a cruel burden, and you cannot turn +aside. All the strong ones shall be chosen to suffer for the weak. You +are chosen, and you shall suffer. + +Well, he did. + +“I’ve done a wicked, terrible thing. If I get what I deserve, I’m ruined +and lost.” + +That was what she had said to him, and he interpreted it readily enough. +It was hideous to think of, but not difficult to believe. She was, he +thought, capable of any imaginable thing, good or evil. She would not +weigh, or calculate, or even understand; she would only _want_. She +would want to possess something, or she would want to destroy something +which irked her. + +“And after all,” he thought, “it’s not a hard thing to do. Even a +little, weak thing like her can--” + +His mind balked at the fatal word, but, with a frown, he deliberately +uttered it to himself. + +“Can kill,” he said. “I’ve got to face this squarely. Other women have +done things like that. A few drops of something in a glass, perhaps.” + +An uncontrollable shudder ran through him. + +“No!” he thought. “I needn’t think--that. I’ll wait till she’s told me. +The whole thing may be--some accident--something else.” + +But he remembered that she had been there alone in the housekeeper’s +room, and that he had heard her crying in there. He remembered her +words--“a wicked, terrible thing.” And he remembered, above everything +else, her face, with that look upon it. + +“Damn it!” he cried. “I won’t think at all--until I know something +definite. I’ll just carry on.” + +He could, and did, refuse to think of his immediate problem, but his +mind would not remain idle. It presented him with a very vivid picture +of Phyllis Barron. And now, for the first time, he welcomed that gentle +image. She was so immeasurably remote now, so far away, in an entirely +different world; a friendly, honest world, where she was living her +daily life, while he stood here, watching the sun rise upon a dreaded +and unpredictable day. + +“Well, shover!” said Eddy’s cheerful voice behind him. “The big boss ’ll +want the car for the eight forty.” + +“All right!” Ross agreed, promptly. “I want a bath and a shave first. +And maybe you’ll lend me a collar and a pair of socks.” + +“I’ll do that for you!” said Eddy. “And say! You could try Wheeler’s +uniform that he left behind. He was the shover before you. He left in a +hurry. Got kicked out. Most of our shovers do.” + +“Why?” + +“Well, I’ll tell you,” Eddy explained, sitting down on the edge of the +bed, and watching Ross shave with cold water, a very dull razor, and the +minute fragment of a shaving stick. “Most of our shovers get tempted and +fall--hard. Miss Amy ’ll ask ’em to take her some place where the boss +don’t want her to go, and not to mention it at home. And they do. And +then, the next time she gets mad at the boss, she tells him the whole +tale, just to worry him. And the shover goes. See?” + +“I see!” said Ross. + +“She was talking to me just now,” Eddy went on. “I guess I was mistaken +about you. She says you’re going to stay. Well!” He grinned. “I wish you +luck!” + +“Thanks!” said Ross. + +He understood that Eddy was warning him against the devices of Miss Amy, +but it was a little too late. + +He took a bath in water colder than any he had yet encountered; then he +tried on the uniform left behind by the unfortunate Wheeler. It was a +bit tight across the shoulders, and the style was by no means in +accordance with his austere taste, but he could wear it. + +“And I shan’t keep up this silly farce much longer,” he thought. + +“We might as well go over to the house for breakfast,” said Eddy. +“Ready?” + +Ross did not relish the glimpse he had of his reflection in the mirror. +That snug-fitting jacket with a belt in the back, those breeches, those +puttees--he did not like them. Worst of all, Eddy’s collar would not +meet round his neck, and he had fastened it with a safety pin. As he +took up the peaked cap and followed the cheerful youth, he felt, not +like an accomplice in a tragedy, but like a very complete fool--and that +did not please him. + +They crossed the lawn to the house, went in at the back door, and +entered the kitchen. There he sat down to breakfast with the cook, the +housemaid, the laundress, and Eddy. The kitchen was warm and clean, and +neat as a new pin; very agreeable in the morning sunshine. The breakfast +was good, and he was very hungry, and ate with a healthy appetite. But, +except for a civil good morning, he did not say one word. + +For he was listening. He was waiting, in an unpleasant state of tension, +for something which would shatter this comfortable serenity. It must +come. It was not possible that the figure under the sofa should remain +undiscovered, that life should progress as if nothing at all had +happened. Amy had said this was the “last day.” + +Nothing interrupted the breakfast, though; and, when he had finished, he +went back to the garage, to look over the sedan he was to drive. It was +a good car, and in perfect condition; nothing for him to do there. He +lit a cigarette, and stood talking to Eddy for a time. + +Eddy’s theme was Mr. Solway, Miss Amy’s long-suffering stepfather. + +“He’s the best man Gawd ever made,” said Eddy, seriously. “My father was +coachman to him for eighteen years, and when he passed out, Mr. Solway, +he kept me here. He seen that I got a good education and all. I wanted +this here shover’s job, but he said nothing doing. He said I’d ought to +get a job with a future. I’m down in the telephone comp’ny now--repair +man. He lets me live here for nothing--just for doing a few odd jobs. +He’s a prince!” He stamped out his cigarette with his heel. “And he has +a hell of a life!” he added. + +“How?” asked Ross, thirsting for any sort of information about this +household. + +“Her,” said Eddy. “Remember, I’m not saying nothing against Miss Amy. +I’ve known her all my life. But, I’ve done things for that girl I +wouldn’t have done for my own mother.” He paused. “I done things for her +I wish to Gawd I hadn’t done,” he said, and fell silent. + +Ross was silent, too. He remembered how Eddy had closed the door of the +housekeeper’s room. He remembered how very anxious Eddy had been to keep +him shut up in the garage all night. And he remembered that Eddy carried +a revolver. + +Why should he imagine that Amy Solway would do for herself any +unpleasing task, when apparently she found it so easy to make others do +things for her? This boy admitted he had done things for her which he +wished “to Gawd” he hadn’t. + +“You better start,” said Eddy, and Ross got into the sedan and drove up +to the house. He was undeniably nervous. He expected to see--he didn’t +know what; a pale face looking at him from one of the windows, a +handkerchief waved to him, a note slipped into his hand, some signal. +But there was nothing. + +Mr. Solway came bursting out of the front door, ran down the steps, said +“Good morning! Good morning!” to his new chauffeur, popped into the +sedan, and immediately began to read the newspaper. At the station he +bounced out, said “Four fifty,” and walked off. + +Ross stopped in the town and bought himself some collars. Even this +delay worried him; he might be badly needed at the house. But, in spite +of his haste to get back, he was mighty careful in his driving, because +he had no sort of license. He returned to the garage and put up the +car--and waited. + +Four hours did he wait. Eddy was nowhere about; no doubt he was +repairing telephones. Nobody came near the garage. Ross sketchily +overhauled both cars, swept out the place, and waited, not patiently, +either. + +He had agreed to help that girl, and he was prepared to do so, but he +was not going to be a chauffeur much longer. It was, he thought, a +singularly dull life. What is more, he had his own affairs to look +after; he wanted to get back to New York, and to see Mr. Teagle. + +At one o’clock the telephone in the garage rang, and the disagreeable +housemaid informed him that lunch was ready. Very well, he was ready for +lunch; he went over to the house and again sat down in the kitchen, and +ate again in silence. He had nothing to say, and the three women said +nothing to him. + +He was not a talkative young man; he and his grandfather had often +passed entire days with scarcely a word between them, and he took this +silence as a matter of course, quite innocent of the fact that it was +hostile. The new chauffeur was not liked in the kitchen. + +Then he went back to the garage, and waited, and waited, and waited, +with grim resentment. A little after four o’clock he was preparing to +take the sedan out again, when Amy appeared in the doorway, in her fur +coat and a little scarlet hat. + +“Oh, good!” she cried. “You’re all ready! I want you to take me--” + +“No!” said Ross. “Mr. Solway said four fifty, and I’m going to meet his +train.” + +“But he meant the four fifty from New York!” said she. “You’ll have +plenty of time.” She came nearer to him. “Please, please be quick!” she +said. “It’s my last chance!” + + +VIII + +“To the left, and straight ahead!” said Amy, as they drove out of the +gates. + +So, to the left he turned, and drove straight ahead. And he looked +straight ahead, too, although he knew very well that she was looking at +him. This girl took entirely too much for granted. It was one thing to +help her, but to obey her orders blindly was quite another, and it did +not suit him. Here he was, dressed up in a chauffeur’s uniform somewhat +too small for him, and behaving, no doubt, as those other chauffeurs had +behaved--like a fool. + +He heard her stir restlessly, with little flutterings and jinglings of +her silly feminine finery. She sighed deeply. + +“I don’t believe you’ve told me your right name,” she said, plaintively. + +“James Ross,” he announced. + +“James Ross!” she cried. “Oh, but you said--But he’s _old_!” + +“Another James Ross,” he remarked, coldly. But in his heart he was +rather pleased with the sensation his words caused. + +“Another one? Then--are you my cousin? Are you?” + +“I believe so,” Ross replied. + +She was silent for a moment; then she observed, thoughtfully: + +“I guess I’ll call you Jimmy.” + +“I’d rather you didn’t,” said Ross. “I don’t like it.” + +“I do!” said she. “I think Jimmy’s a darling name.” Suddenly she flung +one arm about his neck. “And I think _you’re_ a darling!” she added, +with a sob. + +“Look out!” Ross cried, sharply. “You mustn’t do that when I’m driving.” +He cast a glance along the straight, empty road, and then turned to her. +Her dark eyes were soft and shining with tears, but she was trying to +smile. + +“Oh, Jimmy!” she exclaimed. “I’m so glad you’ve come!” + +“All right!” said the Spartan young man. “Then suppose you tell me +what’s wrong?” + +“I can’t, Jimmy,” she answered. Her hand rested on his shoulder, but her +head was turned away. “I can’t--just now. Only, oh, Jimmy! Sometimes I +wish I were dead! Dead and buried with my darling mother--” + +He could think of nothing adequate to say to that, and, once more giving +a careful glance at the road, he patted her hand. + +“I’m sorry,” he declared gravely. + +“I know it’s not fair--not to tell you,” she said. “But--can’t you just +help me, Jimmy, and--and not care?” + +A curious emotion filled him; a great compassion and a great dread. + +“Why not?” he thought. “I don’t want to hear. I don’t want to know. +Better let well enough alone.” + +But he knew it was not better, and not possible. Not all the pity in the +world should make him a blind and ignorant tool. He was in honor bound +to ask his question. + +“Just this,” he said. “That man--in the housekeeper’s room?” + +“Why, what man?” she asked. “I don’t know what you mean.” + +His heart sank. Disappointment, and a sort of disgust for this childish +lie filled him; he did not want to look at her again. He drove on, down +a road which seemed to him endless, like a road in a dream. + +The sun was going down quietly, without pomp and glory, only slipping +out of sight and drawing with it all the light and color in the world. +They passed houses, they passed other cars, and it seemed to him that he +and this girl passed through the everyday life about them like ghosts, +set apart from their fellows, under a chill shadow. + +“Jimmy!” she said, abruptly. “How can you be so horrid! Why don’t you +_talk_? Why can’t you be like--like a real cousin?” + +“Perhaps I haven’t had enough practice,” Ross replied. + +She did not like this. + +“All right, then! _Don’t_ help me! Just go away and leave me to suffer +all alone!” she cried. “You’re a heartless--beast! Go away!” + +“Just as you please,” said Ross. “Can you drive the car?” + +She began to cry, but he paid no attention to this. + +“Jimmy,” she resumed, at last, “my Gayle’s coming to-night.” + +“Your Gayle?” he repeated. “What’s that?” + +“He’s the man I love,” she said, simply. + +And she was honest now, wholly in earnest; the childish artfulness had +gone, and she spoke quietly. + +“He’s coming to-night,” she went on. “And if anything--goes wrong, he’ll +go away, and never come back. And something’s very likely to go wrong, +Jimmy.” + +“You’ll have to remember that I don’t know what you’re talking about,” +said Ross. + +She did not resent his blunt manner now. + +“In the house where we’re going,” she explained, “there’s some one Gayle +must not see--no matter what happens. I’ll talk to--this person first; +I’ll try to persuade him. But if I can’t--That’s what I want you to do +for me. I want you to be sure to see that--this person doesn’t leave +that house to-night.” + +“And how am I to do that?” + +She was silent for a moment. + +“I don’t care,” she said then. “It doesn’t matter how it’s done.” + +“It does matter--to me.” + +“Listen to me!” she said, with a sort of sternness. “This man--in the +cottage--he’s blackmailing me. Because of something I did--something I’m +sorry for--terribly, terribly sorry--” + +“What will he take to keep quiet?” + +“Nothing. All he wants is to hurt and ruin me.” + +“That’s not blackmail,” said Ross. “If he can’t be bribed--” + +“Oh, what does it matter what you call it? He’s coming to-night, to +tell--this thing--and Gayle will go away!” + +“Look here!” said Ross. “Let him tell. If this Gayle of yours cares for +you, he’ll stand by you. If he doesn’t, you’re well rid of him. No; just +wait a minute! Don’t you see? You can’t lie to a man you’re--fond of. +You--” + +“I’m not going to lie. I’ll just say nothing. The thing is over, Jimmy; +over and done with. Mustn’t I even have a chance? Jimmy, I’m young! I’m +sorry--God knows I’m sorry for what I did--but it’s done. Nothing can +undo it. Won’t you--_won’t_ you let me have just a chance?” + +“But look here! Even if the man didn’t come to-night, he’d come some +other time. You don’t expect me to--” + +He stopped short, appalled by the words he had not spoken. He looked at +her, and in the gathering dusk he saw upon her white face that terrible, +still look again. + +“No!” he cried. + +“Jimmy!” she said. “Just keep him from coming to-night. Then to-morrow +I’ll tell you the whole thing. And perhaps you’ll think of something to +do. But--just to-night--keep him from coming!” + +Ross made no answer. + +“Down here, Jimmy--to the left,” she said, presently, and he turned the +car down a solitary lane, narrow, scored with ruts of half frozen mud. +It had grown so dark now that he turned on the headlights. + +“There!” she said. “That’s the house. Let me out!” + +He stopped the car. + +“Look here!” he began, but she had sprung out, and was hurrying across a +field of stubble. He could not let her go alone. He followed her, sick +at heart, filled again with that sense of utter solitude, of being cut +off from all his fellows, in a desolate and unreal world. His soul +revolted against this monstrous adventure, and yet he could not abandon +her. + +She went before him, light, surprisingly sure-footed upon those high +heels of hers. For some reason of her own, she had chosen to approach +the house from the side, instead of following the curve of the lane. She +came to a fence, and climbed it like a cat, and Ross climbed after her. + +They were in a forlorn garden, where the withered grass stood high, and +before them was the sorriest little cottage, battered and discolored by +wind and rain, all the shutters closed, not a light, not a curtain, not +a sign of life about it. + +“Look here!” Ross began again. “I’ve got to know--” + +She ran up the steps to the porch, where a broken rocking-chair began to +rock as she brushed it in passing. She opened the door and entered; it +was dark in there, but she ran up the stairs as if she knew them well; +before he was halfway up, he heard her hurrying footsteps on the floor +above, heard doors open and shut. + +Then a light sprang out in the upper hall, and she stood there, looking +down at him. By the unshaded gas jet he could see her face clearly, and +it shocked him; such anguish there, such terror. + +“Gone!” she gasped. “_Gone!_” + + +IX + +To Ross, with his rigid self-control, it seemed impossible that a human +creature could safely endure such violent emotion as hers. She was so +fragile; she looked ill, horribly ill, ghastly, he thought she would +faint, would fall senseless at his feet. He sprang up the stairs to be +with her. + +“Amy!” he cried. + +Her dark brows met in a somber frown; she shook her head, waving her +forefinger in front of her face; an odd, foreign little gesture. + +“No!” she said. “Keep quiet! Don’t speak to me. Let me think.” + +“Think!” said Ross to himself. “I don’t believe you’re capable of it, my +girl. But certainly you’re even less capable of listening to any one. +Very well; go ahead with your thinking, then; and I’ll wait for the next +development.” + +He lit a cigarette, and leaned against the wall, smoking, not sorry for +an interval of peace. + +“Look at the time!” Amy commanded sharply. “You’ll be late getting to +the station, unless you hurry. Why didn’t you remind me?” + +“Inexcusable of me,” said Ross. “I hope I shan’t lose my job.” + +She apparently did not choose to notice this flippancy. + +“Come!” she ordered, and went past him, down the stairs, and out of that +sorry little cottage. She ran all the way to the car, and two or three +times she said “Hurry!” to Ross, who kept easily at her side with his +usual stride. + +“Now!” she said. “Drive as fast as you possibly can!” + +“Sorry,” said Ross, “but my only license is one I had in Manila--and +even that’s expired. I can’t afford to take chances.” + +She shrugged her shoulders, with an unpleasant little laugh. She was in +a very evil temper; the light was on inside of the car, and now and then +he glanced at her, saw her sitting there, her black eyes staring +straight before her, her mouth set in a mutinous and scornful line. + +She was in torment; he felt sure of that, but he felt equally sure that +she would not hesitate to inflict torment upon others. She was cruel, +reckless, blind, and deaf in her folly. He wondered why it was that he +pitied her so. + +Then he, too, shrugged his shoulders; mentally, that is, for he was +incapable of so theatric a gesture in the flesh. He himself was in an +odd humor, a sort of resigned indifference. He had, for the moment, lost +interest in the whole affair. It was too fantastic, too confusing; he +didn’t care very much what happened, just now. + +“Let me out here!” she said. “There’s not time for you to take me up to +the house. I’ll walk. Now hurry!” + +He stopped the car at the corner of Wygatt Road; she got out, and he +went on, alone. And he was surprised by the difference which her going +made. It was as if a monstrous oppression were lifted from his spirit, +and he could once more draw a free breath, and once more see the open +sky. One clear star was out. No; it was not a mad world; there was awful +and majestic order in the universe, inexorable law. + +And she was truly pitiable, hurrying home beneath that one star; a poor, +helpless futile young thing, defying the whole world for her own desire. +She wanted him to help her! He would not help her in her desperate +folly, but he would not leave her now. Not now. + +These admirable ideas were entirely put out of his head by a new +dilemma. He arrived at the station; he heard the train coming in, and he +could find no advantageous place for his car. All the good places were +taken. He had to stop where he was certain Mr. Solway would never find +him, until, as the train came in, a taxi was seized by an alert woman, +and Ross got his car into that vacant place. + +Mr. Solway was not in the vanguard of the commuters; he came leisurely +and with dignity, talking with another man. Ross stood beside the open +door of the car; with a nod Mr. Solway got in, and the other man, too. +They paid no attention whatever to Ross; they settled themselves, and +went on talking, as if he were a ghost. + +“They closed at five and an eighth,” said the other man. “I can’t help +thinking that--” + +“Now, see here!” Mr. Solway interrupted. “You hold on to them, my boy. I +told you it was a good thing.” + +“It would be,” said the other. “A very good thing, sir, if I could +unload at five and an eighth--or even a bit less--when I bought at three +and three-fourths.” + +“Now, see here!” said Mr. Solway. “I’ll tell you something--which you +needn’t mention anywhere. I’m _buying_ at five and an eighth--up to six +and a half. Buying, mind you, my boy!” + +This was almost more than Ross could bear. This was just the sort of +talk he had thirsted for; this was what he had come to New York for; to +buy stocks at three and three-fourths and sell at six and one-half, or +more. There he sat, with his peaked cap pulled down over his lean, +impassive face, listening with a sort of rage. If he could only ask Mr. +Solway questions, only tell him that he had a few thousands of his own +all ready and waiting for a little venture like this. + +“And you’ll need all you can get, my boy,” Mr. Solway went on, “if +you’re going to marry Amy.” + +Then this was Gayle? Ross turned his head for one hasty glance--and +then, encountering the astonished frown of Mr. Solway, realized what an +improper thing he had done. Chauffeurs must not look. + +He had had this look, though, and had gained a pretty accurate +impression of the stranger. A tall young fellow, fair haired and gray +eyed; he was stalwart and broad shouldered, and altogether manly, but +there was in his face something singularly gentle and engaging. + +“And that’s the fellow!” thought Ross. “That’s the fellow who’s going to +be fooled and lied to.” + +He liked him. And he liked the vigorous and blustering Mr. Solway, and +he liked this rational, masculine conversation. It reassured him. He +reflected that, after all, he was not alone in this miserable affair, +not hopelessly cornered with the preposterous girl. No; Solway was her +stepfather, and the other man was her “Gayle.” They were in it, too. +They were his natural allies. + +“She’s got to tell them, that’s all,” he said to himself. “They’ll both +stand by her. I’ll make her tell them. I can’t handle this infernal +mystery alone. I’m too much in the dark.” + +He drove in at the gates, up the driveway, and stopped the car before +the house with a smartness that pleased him. Mr. Solway bounced out. + +“Here, now!” he said. “You--Moss--Moss, that’s it. Moss, just lend a +hand with this bag. That’s right; up the stairs--first door on the left. +That’s it! That’s it! There you are, Gayle, my boy!” + +He turned to Ross. + +“Moss,” he said. “Everything going along all right? That’s it! That’s +it! You let me know if there’s anything wrong.” + +Ross was hard put to it to suppress a smile. He imagined how it would be +if he should say: + +“Well, sir, there _was_ one little thing--a dead man under the +housekeeper’s sofa. But, perhaps I shouldn’t mention it.” + +He looked for a moment into the bluff, scowling, kindly face of the man +Eddy had called “a prince.” + +“Thank you, sir,” he said, and turned away, down the hall toward the +back stairs. And, as he came round the corner into the corridor, where +the housekeeper’s room was, his quick ear caught some words of such +remarkable personal interest to him that he stood still. + +“Another James Ross!” Mrs. Jones was saying. “That’s a likely story, I +must say! Amy, that man’s a fraud and a spy!” + +“No, Nanna darling, he’s not!” answered Amy, with sweet obstinacy. + +“I tell you he is, child. He’s got to go.” + +“No, dear,” said Amy. “He’s going to help me.” + +“Amy!” cried Mrs. Jones. “Can’t you trust me? I tell you it’s all right. +He won’t come to-night. I promise you he won’t!” + +“Oh, you mean well!” Amy remarked. “But you’ve made plenty of mistakes +before this.” + +“Amy, I promise you--” + +“No,” said Amy. “You told me before that I needn’t worry, that you’d +‘settled everything.’ And what happened? No; I’m afraid you’re getting +old, Nanna--old and stupid. I’m going to manage for myself now. And +Jimmy’s going to help me.” + +“Child!” Mrs. Jones protested. “That man will ferret out--” + +“I don’t care if he does,” said Amy. “He won’t tell, anyhow. Now don’t +bother me any more, Nanna. I’ve simply got to go.” + +Ross stepped quickly backward along the hall for a few yards; then he +went forward again, with a somewhat heavier tread. And just round the +corner of the corridor, he came face to face with Amy. + +Her beauty almost took his breath away. She wore a dress of white and +silver, and round her slender throat a short string of pearls. And +against all this gleaming white the pallor of her skin was rich and +warm, with a tint almost golden; and her misty hair was like a cloud +about her face, and her black eyes so soft, so limpid. + +“Jimmy!” she whispered. “Do I look nice?” + +“Er--yes; very nice,” Ross answered stiffly. + +She came close to him, put her hand on his shoulder. + +“Please, Jimmy!” she said, earnestly. “I do so awfully want to be +happy--just for a little while!” + +Ross had a moment of weakness. She was so young, so lovely; it seemed +important, even necessary, that she should be happy. But he valiantly +resisted the spell. + +“Who doesn’t?” he inquired. + +“Jimmy, dear!” she said. “I’m coming to the garage after dinner--to ask +you something--to beg you to do something. Will you do it, my _dear_ +little Jimmy?” + +“I’ll have to hear what it is first,” said Ross. + +But she seemed satisfied. + + +X + +Ross went up to the room over the garage, and sat down there. He was +hungry and tired, and in no pleasant humor. + +“It’s entirely too damned much!” he said to himself. “I’m--comparatively +speaking--a rich man. There’s money waiting for me. There’s a nice, +comfortable room in a hotel waiting for me; and decent clothes. I could +have gone to a play to-night. There was one I wanted to see. And here I +am--in a garage--dressed up like a monkey. No, it’s too much! I’m going +back to the city to-morrow. I’m going to see Teagle, and settle my +affairs. If Amy wants me to help her, I suppose I shall. But I won’t +stay here, and I won’t be a chauffeur.” + +The more he thought of all this, the more exasperated he became. And it +was nearly nine o’clock before he was summoned to dinner, which did not +tend to placate him. In spite of his hunger, he took his time in going +over to the house. He had no objection to being late, and he would have +no objection to hearing some one complain about it. Indeed, he wished +that some one would complain. Just one word. + +Looking for trouble, Ross was, when he entered the house. He pushed open +the swing door of the kitchen. + +What marvelous aromas were there! What a festive air! That grave woman, +the cook, was wreathed in smiles, for had she not this night +accomplished a dinner which even Mrs. Jones had praised? + +And the disagreeable housemaid was in softened mood, too, for she had +waited upon romance. She had already described, more than once, the +splendor of Miss Amy’s costume, and the way “him and her” had looked at +each other. + +The laundress was elated, because she was fond of romance, and still +more because she was a greedy young creature, and scented an especially +good dinner. And they all welcomed Ross with cordiality. + +“It’s too bad you had to be waiting the long time it was!” said the +cook. “You’ve a right to be famished entirely, Mr. Moss!” + +Much mollified, the young man admitted that he _was_ hungry. + +“You’d oughter of come over for a cuper tea this afternoon,” said the +housemaid. “And a piecer cake.” + +“You’d oughter of tole him, Gracie,” the laundress added. “Poor feller! +He don’t know the ways here, yet!” + +“Sit down, the lot of ye!” said the cook. + +They did, and that unparalleled dinner began. It must be borne in mind +that Ross was wholly unaccustomed to this sort of thing, to home cooking +at its best, to the maternal kindness of women toward a hungry man. He +liked it. + +He was in no hurry to go back to the solitude of the garage, and his own +thoughts. Being invited to smoke, he lit a cigarette and made himself +very comfortable, while the cook washed the dishes, and Gracie and the +laundress dried them. He was still taciturn, because he couldn’t be +anything else; but he answered questions. + +He admitted that he had traveled a bit, and when the laundress, who was +disposed to be arch, asked to be told about them queer places, he gave a +few facts about the exports and imports of Manila. Anyhow, they all +listened to him, and said, “Didjer ever!” and it was altogether the +pleasantest hour he had yet spent in his native land. + +And then--the swing door banged open, and there stood Amy, with a fur +coat over her shimmering dress, and an ominous look in her black eyes. + +“Moss!” she said. “What are you doing here? Get up and come with me at +once! I want to speak to you!” + +Without a word, he arose and followed her into the passage. + +“I told you I was coming to the garage!” she pointed out, in a low, +furious voice. “Why didn’t you wait there?” + +“Look here!” said Ross. “I don’t like this sort of thing.” + +Before his tone her wrath vanished at once. + +“I’m sorry, Jimmy!” she said. “I didn’t mean to be horrid. Only, it was +so hard for me to slip away--and I went all the way out to the garage in +the cold and the dark, and you weren’t there--and I’m so terribly +worried. Oh, you will hurry, won’t you?” + +“Hurry? Well, what do you want me to do?” + +“It may be too late, even now. Any instant he may come. He’ll ring the +bell, and Gracie will open the door. I _can’t_ tell her not to. He’ll +come in. Oh, Jimmy, you won’t let that happen, will you? Oh, do, do +please hurry!” + +“But just what--” + +“Go out and hide some place where you can watch the front door. And if +you see him coming--stop him! A thin, dark man, with a mustache. Oh, +hurry, Jimmy! All evening long I’ve been waiting and waiting--in +torment--for the sound of the bell. Go, Jimmy dear!” + +“How long do you expect me to wait for him?” + +“Oh, not so awfully long, dear. Just--” She paused. “Just till Eddy +comes home. I’m sure he won’t be late. Now hurry!” + +“I don’t want to do this,” said Ross. “I can’t stop--” + +“Oh, shut up!” she cried; and then tried to atone by patting his cheek. +“Jimmy, I’m desperate! Just help me this once! To-morrow I’ll explain it +all, and you’ll see. Only go now!” + +“I’ll have to get my overcoat from the garage,” he explained. + +“All right, dear!” she said, gently, and turned away. And as he went +toward the back door, he heard her sob. + +All the way to the garage that sob echoed in his ears. Her tears had not +affected him; they were too facile, too convenient. But that half +stifled sob in the dark--He went quickly, taking the key from his pocket +as he went; he, too, was in a hurry, now, to spare her this thing she +dreaded. + +He unlocked the door, turned on the switch, ran up the stairs, through +the sitting room, and into the bedroom, where his coat hung. + +He stopped short in the doorway. For, sitting on the bed was a tiny +girl, seriously engaged in tying a ribbon about the waist of a white +flannel rabbit. She looked up at the young man, but apparently was not +interested, and went on with her job. + +“Who are _you_?” demanded Ross. + +“Lil-lee,” said she. + +“Yes, but I mean--how did you get here?” + +“I comed in a balloon,” she assured him. + +Ross was completely ignorant about young children, but he realized that +they were not to be held strictly accountable for their statements. And +this child was such a very small one; such a funny little doll. She had +a great mane of fair hair hanging about her shoulders, and, on one +temple, a wilted bit of pink ribbon; she had serene blue eyes, a plump +and serious face, by no means clean. + +She wore a white dress, still less clean, a coral necklace, white--or +grayish white--socks all down about her ankles, and the most dreadful +little white shoes. He observed all this, because it was his way to +observe, and because he was so amazed that he could do nothing but stare +at her. + +“But who brought you?” he asked. + +“Minoo,” she replied. + +“Who’s Minoo?” + +The child held up the rabbit. + +“Oh, Lord!” cried Ross. “Won’t you please try to be--sensible? I don’t +know--Are you all alone here?” + +“I fink I are.” + +“The door was locked,” he said, aloud. “I can’t see--But what shall I do +with you?” + +“Gimme my dindin,” said she. + +Ross wished to treat so small and manifestly incompetent a creature with +all possible courtesy, but he was handicapped by his inexperience. + +“Look here, Lily!” he said, earnestly. “I’m in the deuce of a hurry just +now. If you’ll wait here, I’ll come back as soon as I can.” + +“I will be a good baby!” said she. “But I want my dindin!” + +He could have torn his hair. He could not fail Amy now. And he could not +leave a good baby alone and hungry, for he did not know how long. + +“Shall I take it to the house?” he thought. “The cook would feed it. +But--perhaps it’s another of these damned mysteries. I haven’t time to +think it out now. I’d better keep it here until I’ve thought a bit. See +here, Lily, what do you eat?” + +“Dindin,” Lily answered. + +“Yes, I know. But--I’ve got bread. Will that do?” + +“I _like_ bread and thugar!” she agreed. + +He hurried into the kitchen, cut four good, sturdy slices of bread, +covered them well with butter and sugar, and brought them back on a +plate. Then, with a vague memory of a puppy he had once had, he thought +of water, and brought a glassful. + +“Now I’ve got to go, Lily,” he explained. “But I’ll come back as soon as +I can. You just wait, see?” + +“I will!” she said, pleasantly, and held out her arms. + +He hesitated for a moment, half frightened; then he caught up the funny +little doll and kissed its cheek. + +It was not a doll. It was warm and alive, and solider than it looked. It +clung to him, and kissed him back again. + + +XI + +“You won’t feel the cold the first winter in the States.” + +That was what people in Manila and Porto Rico had told Ross. He thought +of those people now. You didn’t feel it, did you? Yes, you did! + +He had found “some place where he could hide and watch the front door”; +a plantation of firs halfway between the house and the gates. He had +been there more than an hour, prowling up and down behind the screen of +branches; he had at first tried to smoke, but darkness and cold +annihilated any sort of zest in the tobacco. He had attempted the army +setting-up exercises, considerably hampered by his overcoat; but nothing +produced in him either bodily warmth or a patient serenity of mind. + +He was worried about that child. Not once did he say to himself that it +was none of his business; he admitted willingly that a creature of that +size had a claim upon all full-grown persons; he admitted that, whoever +it was, and wherever it came from, it was entitled to his protection. + +“She’s too little to be left there alone,” he thought. “Much too little. +They always have nurses--or some one. She might fall down the stairs--or +turn on the gas stove. I’ve been gone more than an hour. Good Lord! This +is too much! What the devil’s the matter with that fellow, anyhow?” + +He was disgusted with this thin dark man with a mustache, who was so +outrageously late in coming. Very likely the funny little doll was +sitting up there, crying. The raw cold pierced to the marrow of his +bones. + +And this, he reflected, was his second night in his native land. The +first had been spent imprisoned in the garage, at the point of a +revolver, but it had been a thousand times better than this. He had been +warm and comfortable--and he had been innocent, a victim. Now he was +taking an active part in a thoroughly discreditable affair. + +He was committed to wait for a thin dark man with a mustache, and to +prevent his entering the house. And how was he to do this? Walk up to +him and begin to expostulate? Try to bribe him? + +The thought of bribery aroused in the young man an anger which almost +made him warm. No Ross would ever pay blackmail. Indeed, no Ross of his +branch was fond of parting with money for any purpose at all. They were +very prompt in paying their just bills and debts, but they took care +that these should be moderate. + +“No!” thought Ross. “If I was fool enough to give this fellow money, +he’d only come back for more, later on. I’m not going to start that. No! +But how am I going to stop him? Knock him out? That’s all very well, but +suppose he knocked me out? Or he may carry a gun. Of course, I suppose I +could come up behind him and crack him over the head with a rock. That’s +what my Cousin Amy would appreciate. But somehow it doesn’t appeal to +me. After all, what have I got against this fellow? What do I know about +him? Only what she’s told me. And she’s not what you’d call +overparticular with her words.” + +His thoughts were off, then, upon the track of that problem which +obsessed him. What had happened to the man under the sofa? He couldn’t +still be there. But who had taken him away, and where was he now? He +looked toward the house, so solid and dignified, with its façade of +lighted windows. He remembered his cozy dinner in the kitchen; he +thought of the orderly life going on there. + +It was impossible! Yet it was true. He had seen that dead man with his +own eyes. He had touched him. + +Who else knew? Surely Amy; but it was obvious that she had some one to +help her in all emergencies. Mrs. Jones? Ross believed that Mrs. Jones +had been well aware of the man’s presence in her room. Eddy? Eddy’s +behavior had been highly suspicious. + +He refused to go on with this profitless and exasperating train of +thought. He was sick of the whole thing. Amy had said that she would +“explain everything” to him the next day. Not for a moment did he +believe that she would do anything of the sort, but he did hope that at +least she would tell him a little. And, anyhow, whatever she told him, +whatever happened or did not happen, he was going away--back to normal, +honest, decent life. + +“I said I’d help her, and, by Heaven, I am!” he thought. “After to-night +we’re quits. I’ll hold my tongue about all this; but--I’m going!” + +He whacked his stiff arms across his chest. + +“Hotel Benderly, West Seventy-Seventh Street,” he said to himself. “I’m +going there to-morrow.” + +For he no longer saw Phyllis Barron as a danger. He was considerably +less infatuated with liberty after these two days. It occurred to him, +now, that to be entirely free meant to be entirely alone, and that to be +without a friend was not good. + +He wanted some one to trust, and he trusted Phyllis. No matter that he +had known her only five days; he had seen that she was honest; that she +was steadfast, and, loveliest virtue of all, she was self-controlled. He +knew that from her one need never dread tears, fury, despairs, +selfishness and cajoleries. + +Out there, in the cold and dark of his unhappy vigil, he thought of +Phyllis, and longed for her smile. + +“She’d never in her life get a fellow into a mess like this!” he +thought. “But Amy--” + +His distrust for his Cousin Amy was without limits. There was nothing, +he thought, that she might not do. She was perfectly capable of +forgetting all about him, and then, in the morning, if he were found +frozen to death at his post, she would pretend to wonder what on earth +the new chauffeur had been doing out there. + +“After eleven,” he thought. “And Eddy hasn’t come yet. Very likely she +knew he wouldn’t come. Perhaps he’s never coming back. All right! I’ll +wait till twelve, and then I’m going to take a look at that little kid. +I’ve got to. It’s too little.” + +So he walked up and down, up and down, over the rough, frozen patch of +ground behind the fir trees; his coat collar turned up, his soft hat +pulled low over his eyes, his face grim and dour; a sinister figure he +would have been to meet on a lonely road. + +Up and down--and then something happened. At first he could not grasp +what it was, only that in some way his world had changed. He stopped +short, every nerve alert. Then he realized that it was a sudden increase +in the darkness, and, turning toward the house, he saw the lights there +going out, one by one. + +“By George!” he thought. “They’re all going to bed! And I suppose I can +stay here all night, eh? While they’re warm and snug, the faithful +Cousin James will be on guard. All right! I said I’d do it. But I’m +going to get a glass of milk for that baby.” + +He set off as fast as his numb feet and stiff legs would carry him, +toward the back door. He would tell the cook that he was hungry, and she +would give him what he wanted. A kind, sensible woman, that cook. + +He pushed open the back door and went in; it was dark in the passage, +but warm, and the entrancing perfumes of the great dinner still lingered +there. He went on, toward the kitchen, but before he got there, the +swing door opened, and Mrs. Jones appeared. She stopped, and he thought +that she whispered: “It’s I!” + +He was a little disconcerted, because he knew that Mrs. Jones was not +fond of him, and he was extremely suspicious of her. But she looked so +sedate, almost venerable, standing there in the lighted doorway, in her +best black dress, with her gray hair, her spectacles. He took off his +hat, and spoke to her civilly. + +“I came to ask for a glass of milk,” he said. + +Then she repeated what she had said before, and it was not “It’s I,” but +the word “Spy!” uttered with a suppressed scorn that startled him. + +“Spy!” she said. “I know you!” + +He looked at her in stern amazement. + +“Leave this house!” she said. “You can deceive a poor innocent young +girl, but you can’t deceive me. You and your glass of milk! I know you! +And I tell you straight to your face that you’re not coming one step +farther. I’m going to stay here all night, and I’m going to see to it +that neither you nor anybody else comes to worry and torment that poor +girl. Go!” + +“All right!” said Ross, briefly, and, turning on his heel, went out of +the house. + +“If she’s going to take over the job of watchdog, she’s welcome to it,” +he thought. “I guess she’d be pretty good at that sort of thing. +But--spy!” + +His face grew hot. + +“I don’t feel inclined to swallow that,” he said to himself, +deliberately. “Some day we’ll have a reckoning, Mrs. Jones!” + + +XII + +The funny little doll lay asleep, very neat and straight, just in the +center of the bed, the covers drawn up like a shawl, one cheek pressed +against the pillow, its fair mane streaming out behind, as if it were +advancing doggedly against a high wind. There was no creature in the +world more helpless, yet it was not alert, not timid, as defenseless +little animals are; it slept in utter confidence and security. + +And that confidence seemed to Ross almost terrible. The tiny creature, +breathing so tranquilly, took for granted all possible kindness and +protection from him. It had asked him for food; it had offered a kiss. + +He stood looking down at it with considerable anxiety, yet with the hint +of a smile on his lips. + +“Made yourself at home, didn’t you?” he thought. + +As he looked, the child gave an impatient flounce, and threw one arm +over her head. Ross drew nearer, frowning a little; bent over to examine +that arm, that ruffled sleeve. + +“I don’t believe--” he muttered, and very carefully pulled out the +covers from the foot of the bed. His suspicions were confirmed; she was +fully dressed, even to her shoes. + +“Must be darned uncomfortable!” he thought. He hesitated a moment, half +afraid to touch her; but at last he cautiously unbuttoned one slipper. +She did not stir. He drew off the slipper, then the other one; then the +socks, and tucked in the covers again. + +“Poor little devil!” he said to himself. “Poor little devil! I wonder--” + +A great yawn interrupted him. + +“I’ll think about this in the morning,” he thought; “but I’m going to +get some sleep now--before anything else happens.” + +For, coming from the cold of his vigil into this warmth was making him +intolerably drowsy. He took off his collar and sat down to remove those +objectionable puttees. + +As this unprincipled intruder had so coolly taken possession of the bed, +he would have to sleep on the couch in the sitting room, but that didn’t +trouble him. He felt that he could sleep anywhere, and that +nothing--absolutely nothing--could keep him awake ten minutes longer. + +A sound from below startled him. Some one was unlocking the door. + +In his blind fatigue, he was ready to ignore even that. He didn’t _care_ +who came; he wanted to go to sleep. + +But he remembered the tiny creature in the bed, the creature who +expected his protection, and that roused him. Closing the bedroom door, +he went to the head of the stairs, and, in a voice husky with sleep, but +distinctly threatening, called out: + +“Who’s that?” + +“Me,” answered Eddy’s voice. + +Even before he saw the boy, Ross was aware that there was something +amiss with Eddy to-night. His voice was different; he climbed the stairs +so slowly. He came into the sitting room, and flung down the bag he was +carrying. + +“I’m all in!” he said. + +He looked it. His face was haggard and white; his glossy hair was no +longer combed back, but flopped untidily over his forehead. There was +nothing jaunty about Eddy now. He was weary, grimy, and dispirited. + +“Been doing overtime,” he explained. “Lot of wires down in that storm +last night.” + +“Look here!” said Ross. “There’s a child here--a baby. I don’t know +whose it is, or how it got here. But it’s asleep in there. Better not +disturb it.” + +“Wha-at!” cried Eddy. He looked amazed, he spoke in a tone of amazement, +but there was something-- + +“By Heaven!” thought Ross. “_You’ve_ got the other key to the garage, my +lad! And the child didn’t come through a locked door.” + +“A kid!” Eddy repeated. + +“Queer, isn’t it?” Ross inquired, sarcastically. “If not peculiar!” + +Eddy glanced at him, and then sat down and lit a cigarette. + +“I’ll say it’s queer!” he observed. + +“Especially as I’d left the door locked when I went out.” + +Again Eddy glanced at him. + +“Did you--what did they say--over at the house?” he asked. + +“Oh, nothing much!” + +He observed, with satisfaction, that this answer alarmed Eddy. + +“Well, lissen here,” he said. “Who did you tell? Old Jones?” + +“I don’t remember,” Ross declared. + +“But--” Eddy began, and stopped. + +“I’m going to turn in now,” said Ross. “Afraid you’ll have to put up +with the chair again to-night.” + +He crossed the room to the couch and lay down there. He was only partly +undressed, and he put his shoes beside him, and his overcoat across his +feet, because, in this nightmare existence, he had to be prepared for +every impossible emergency. + +“But I’ll get some sleep anyhow!” he thought, defiantly. + +He stretched out, with a sigh of relief, and closed his eyes, when an +almost inaudible sound, like the faintest echo of his own sigh, made him +glance up again. He saw that Eddy had buried his face in his hands, and +sat there, his slight shoulders hunched, his young head bent, in an +attitude of misery and dejection. + +And Ross was sorry for him. All through his confused and heavy dreams +that night ran a little thread of pity, of regret and pain, which he +could not understand. Only, he felt that in this adventure there was +more than the tragedy of death. + + * * * * * + +When he opened his eyes again, the room was filled with a strange, pale +light, unfamiliar to him. Dawn? It was more like twilight. He raised +himself on one elbow and looked out of the window, and, for the first +time in his life, he saw the snow. + +Thick and fast the flakes went spinning by, tapping lightly against the +glass, and, out beyond, he saw that all the world was white. White and +unimaginably still. He had seen plenty of pictures of snow-covered +landscapes, but he had never known the _feel_ of a snowstorm, the odd +tingle in the air, the sense of hushed expectancy. + +He was amazed and delighted with it. Old and forgotten fancies of his +childhood stirred in him now; queer little memories of glittering +Christmas cards, of fairy tales. He remembered a story his mother had +read to him, so very long ago, about a Snow Queen. + +And it was good for him to remember these things, after so many +ungracious years, just as it was good to see the snow, after so long a +time of tropic sun and rain. He knew that it was good, and for a little +time he was content, watching the snow fall. + +But his destiny was not inclined to allow him many peaceful moments just +then. Before he had even begun to think of his complicated anxieties, a +sound from the next room brought the whole burden upon him like an +avalanche. It was the child’s voice. + +He jumped up from the couch, and then he noticed that Eddy had gone. He +frowned, not knowing whether this was a disaster or a thing of no +importance, and, without stopping to put on his shoes, went across to +the bedroom door and turned the knob. He had come so quietly that no one +had heard him, and he was able to observe a curious scene. + +Eddy was on his knees, his head bowed before the little girl, who sat on +the bed, lifting strands of his glossy hair and pulling them out to +their fullest extent, with a grave and thoughtful air. + +“Lookit here!” whispered Eddy. “I wish you’d quit that, baby!” + +“You dot funny, flippety-floppety hair,” said she. + +“Well, anyway, hold your foot still won’t you?” he entreated. + +Ross saw, then, that Eddy was trying to put the child’s socks on, and +getting no intelligent coöperation from her. + +“What are you doing that for?” he asked. + +Eddy sprang to his feet like a cat. He looked at Ross, and Ross looked +at him, and the little girl lay back on the bed and began jouncing up +and down. + +“Well,” Eddy replied, slowly, “if you really want to know, it was me +brought her here, and now I’m goin’ to take her away again; that’s all.” + +Once more Ross was conscious of a disarming pity for the boy. He thought +he had never seen a human creature who looked so unhappy. + +“Look here, Eddy!” he remarked. “Who is she, anyhow?” + +“Her?” said Eddy. “Why what does it matter?” + +Ross was silent for a moment. + +“I--I’m interested in the little girl,” he said, half ashamed of this +weakness. “I’d like to know where she’s going.” + +“Gawd knows,” said Eddy, briefly. + +“What do you mean?” + +“She can’t stay here,” said Eddy. “That’s one sure thing.” + +Again he looked at Ross, with a strange intensity, as if he were trying +desperately to read that quite unreadable face. + +“If you’re really interested in the kid--” he began. + +“I am,” said Ross. + +Eddy sat down on the bed. + +“I don’t believe you told them, over at the house,” he continued. +“‘Cause, if they knew, they’d of--” + +“No, I didn’t,” said Ross. + +“Then nobody knows she’s here--but me and you?” + +“That’s all.” + +“Well,” said Eddy. + +Again Ross had a distinct warning of danger, and again he defied it, +standing there stubbornly resistant to all the ill winds that might +blow. + +“This kid,” Eddy pointed out--“she hasn’t got anybody in the world.” + +As if by common consent, they both turned to look at the child. She was +holding the rabbit aloft, and trying to touch it with one little bare +foot; she was quite happy; with superb unconcern she left her fate in +the hands of these two young men. + +“I’d explain it to you, if I could,” Eddy went on; “but I can’t, just +now. Later on, maybe. Only, she can’t stay here. I got to take her away +before anybody sees her.” He paused. “I know somewheres I could leave +her to-day, and bring her back here to-night, all right, only after +that--” + +A dim and monstrous suspicion stirred in Ross, but he would not examine +it. He did not want to understand. + +“After that,” he said, “I’ll look after her.” + + +XIII + +They had breakfast together, Ross and Eddy and the child. And the rabbit +was there, too, propped up against the coffeepot; he was fed with +spoonfuls of water, and he got pretty wet in the process. + +It was an amazing meal. It seemed to Ross sometimes that he was still +asleep, and this a dream--the little kitchen filled with that strange, +pale light, the snow falling steadily outside, and the child beside him. + +“Why did I say I’d look after her?” he thought, with a sort of wonder. +“What’s the matter with me, anyhow?” + +He didn’t know, and could not understand. He was hopelessly involved, +now, in this sorry muddle, and he saw, very clearly, that every step had +been taken deliberately, of his own free will. He could have got out, +long ago, but--here he was. And he was committed now to an undertaking +almost too fantastic, too preposterous to contemplate. + +Yet he did not regret it. Just as, in a shipwreck, he would have given +his life for a tiny creature like this, so was he obliged now to offer +it his protection. Eddy said she had nobody in the world. Very well, +then; he had to stop, to turn aside from his own affairs, and lend a +hand to this forlorn little fellow traveler. He had to do it. + +“More!” said the child, briskly. + +“More what?” asked Ross. + +“More--evvysing!” she cried, bouncing up and down perilously upon the +telephone directories he had piled on her chair. “More evvysing!” + +“Give her some cawfee,” suggested Eddy. + +“No,” said Ross. “Too young. They only have milk--things like that.” + +And, with these words, the fantasy became real. He had actually assumed +the responsibility, now. He was taking care of the child. He looked down +at her, frowning a little, and she looked up into his face with cheerful +expectancy. She knew very well! He was the one appointed to serve her, +and she knew it. He was to supply her with “more evvysing.” + +“Look here, Eddy!” he said. “There must be some one who’ll turn up later +to--to take care of the child. There’s bound to be _some one_.” + +Eddy glanced up as if he were about to speak, but his face grew scarlet, +and he turned away. + +“Well,” he said, after a time, “I dunno. It’s kind of hard to say. Only, +I thought you--I thought you’d be a good one to--take her.” + +Ross was surprised and curiously touched by this, and somewhat +embarrassed. A good one, was he, for this charge? He looked at the child +again. + +“Her face is dirty,” he observed, sternly. “She ought to be washed. Any +warm water in that kettle, Eddy?” + +“Yep. But I got to hurry, before the rest of ’em get up. Go on and eat, +kid!” He turned to Ross. “Tell you what I thought. I know a place where +I can take her and keep her till you come and get her after dark. It’s a +cottage where there’s nobody living just now. You go up the Post Road +about eight miles, till you come to a church that’s being built on the +left side of the road. Then you turn--” + +“Yes,” said Ross. “I--” He stopped, and Eddy sat staring blankly at him. + +“What?” he cried. “D’you know?” + +“Go on!” said Ross. “Go on! Tell me how to get there.” + +“What made you say ‘yes,’ like that?” + +“I meant I was listening to you. Go on, man!” And because of his +distaste for this lie, Ross spoke with a brusque impatience which +impressed Eddy. + +“All right!” he said. “But lissen here! I--well--you’re a funny sort of +guy. I never seen any one so close-mouthed in my life. I can’t make out +yet who you are, or what you come here for. But--” He sighed, and +stroked his glossy hair. “I got to trust you, that’s all. Last night I +thought I’d go crazy, trying to think what I could do about the kid. I +couldn’t--I’ll tell you where this place is, and I hope to Gawd you’ll +keep still about it. ’Cause, if we get any one else monkeying around +there--well--there’ll be trouble, that’s all. Big trouble.” + +“Go on!” said Ross. + +So Eddy did go on, giving him careful directions for reaching the +cottage Ross had visited the day before with Amy. + +“And for Pete’s sake, come as early as you can,” he ended. “Come before +it gets dark, will you? I--” He arose. “Come on, baby!” + +She jumped down from her chair, with a piece of bread and butter in one +hand, and the rabbit in the other; she was quite ready to go anywhere, +with any one. Ross washed her sticky hands and tried to wash her face, +but this annoyed her so much that he was not successful. Eddy brought +out her coat and bonnet from a cupboard; put on his own very modish +overcoat, and a cap, picked up the child, and off they went. + +From an upper window, Ross watched them go across the great white waste +that was so strange and yet somehow so familiar to him. Eddy stumbled +now and then, over some hidden unevenness in the ground, but the child +in his arms sat up straight and triumphant, her head, in the knitted +hood, turning briskly from side to side. Then they were lost to sight in +the falling snow and the gray morning light, and Ross turned back to the +empty rooms. + +It was only half past seven; he had nearly an hour before Mr. Solway +expected him, and he thought he would use that time for investigating +the engine of the limousine. Both cars were in deplorably good +condition; there was little he could justifiably do to them, and he was, +moreover, a mechanic of more enterprise than experience. But he was +devoted to engines, and pretty well up in the theory of the internal +combustion type. + +He put on a suit of overalls he found in the garage; he started the +engine and opened the hood; he was so pleased with that fine roar, that +powerful vibration which was like the beat of a great, faithful heart, +that he began to whistle. A superb motor; he would enjoy driving that +car. + +“She’s a beauty, all right!” said a voice, so very close to his ear that +he jumped. + +Standing at his elbow was a burly fellow of thirty-five or so, with a +bulldog jaw; his voice and his smile were friendly, but his blue eyes, +Ross thought, were not. + +“Yes, sir!” he went on. “You’ve got a mighty fine car there.” + +Ross said nothing. He did not care to continue his amateur explorations +under those cold blue eyes. He shut off the engine, closed the hood, and +turned toward the stranger with a challenging glance. + +But the stranger was not at all abashed. + +“Have a smoke,” he asked, proffering a packet of cigarettes. + +“No, thanks!” said Ross, and stood there, facing the other, and +obviously waiting for an explanation. + +“Dirty weather!” said the stranger. + +“All right!” said Ross sullenly. “What about it?” + +His tone was very nearly savage, for, to tell the truth, his position +was having a bad effect upon his temper. Having so much to conceal, so +many unwelcome secrets intrusted to him, he had begun to suspect every +one. He didn’t like this fellow. + +“Well, I’ll tell you,” said the stranger, in an easy and confidential +manner. “I came up this way, looking for a man. And I thought I’d drop +in here and see if you could give me any information.” He stopped to +light a cigarette, and his blue eyes were fixed upon Ross. “Fellow by +the name of Ives,” he said. “Ever hear of him, eh?” + +“No!” said Ross. + +“Ives,” said the other, slowly. “Martin Ives. Fellow about your age. +About your build. Dark complexioned--like you.” + +“D’you think I’m your Martin Ives?” demanded Ross, angrily. + +“I wish you were,” said the stranger, and his tone was so grave that +Ross had a sudden feeling of profound uneasiness. + +“Well, I’m not,” he said, “and I never heard of him. I’m new here--just +came two days ago.” + +“Two days, eh?” said the stranger. “That was Wednesday, eh?” + +“I shouldn’t have told him that,” thought Ross, dismayed. “But, good +Lord, I can’t remember to lie all the time! And, anyhow, what difference +can it make--when I came here?” + +But he could see, from the stranger’s face, that it had made a +difference. + +“You came here on Wednesday,” he continued. “I wonder, now, did you +happen to see any one--” + +“No!” shouted Ross. “I didn’t see any one. I didn’t see anything. I +never heard of your Ives. Go and ask some one else. I’m busy!” + +“I don’t want to bother you,” said the stranger, grown very mild. “I can +see you’re busy. But it’s a pretty serious thing. You see, Ives came to +Stamford on Tuesday. I’ve traced him that far. And after that--he’s +disappeared.” + +“Well, do you think I’ve got him hidden here?” + +“My name’s Donnelly,” the stranger went on. “And I’ve come out here to +find Ives.” + +“All right! I wish you luck!” + +“I don’t know,” said Donnelly, thoughtfully. “Maybe it won’t be so +lucky--for some people.” + +He was not looking at Ross now; his cold blue eyes were staring straight +before him. + +“But I think I’ll find him, all the same,” he declared, gently. + +“Ives was the man under the sofa,” thought Ross. + + +XIV + +Ross could not understand why that notion came as a shock to him. +Naturally, the man under the sofa had a name; every one had. Yet, +directly he thought of that figure as “Martin Ives,” instead of “the +man,” the whole affair grew ten times more tragic and horrible--and ten +times more dangerous. + +“A man” might disappear, but not Martin Ives. Martin Ives was real, he +had friends; he must have lived somewhere. He would be sought for--and +found. + +“This Donnelly--” thought Ross. “He’s got this far already. And he’ll +keep on.” + +In his mind he envisaged the inexorable progress of the search. Step by +step, hour by hour. If this man went away, another would come. The awful +march of retribution had begun. Nothing could stop it. + +“Murder will out.” + +His anger, his impatience, had quite vanished now. He could not resent +Donnelly’s presence, because he was inevitable. He seemed to Ross the +very personification of destiny, not to be eluded, not to be mollified. +He looked at him and, as he had expected, found the cold blue eyes +regarding him. + +“Do you think you can help me?” asked Donnelly. + +“I don’t see how,” said Ross. “I don’t know the fellow you’re looking +for. I’ll have to get along, now. Got to drive down to the station.” + +“Well,” said Donnelly, blandly, “I can wait.” + +“Not here!” said Ross, with energy. “They wouldn’t like--” + +“Oh, no, not here!” said the other. “See you later. So long!” And off he +went. + +Ross watched his burly figure tramping along the driveway until he was +out of sight; then he made haste to get himself ready, took out the car, +locked the garage, and drove up to the house. + +It was much too early. There he sat, shut up in the snug little sedan, +with the snow falling outside, as if he were some unfortunate victim of +an enchantment, shut up in a glass cage. And he began to think, now, of +what lay immediately before him. + +“I’ll have to make some sort of excuse to Mr. Solway for going away,” he +thought. “A lie, of course. I wish to Heaven I didn’t have to lie to +_him_. Then I’ll get the child, and clear out. I’ll find some sort of +home for her. Phyllis Barron will help me.” + +The idea dazzled him, the magnificent simplicity of it, the unspeakable +relief of just picking up the child and walking off. No explanations, no +more lies. He contemplated it in detail. How he would walk into the +Hotel Miston, into his comfortable room, and unpack his bags. How he +would take the child to Phyllis Barron, and tell her that here was a +poor little kid who had nobody in the world. She would know what to do; +she would help him; the nightmare would end. + +As for Amy-- + +“I’ll have it out with her to-day!” he thought. “I’m not called upon to +give up my entire life for that girl. I’ve done enough, and more than +enough.” + +The door opened, and out came Mr. Solway. Ross jumped out and opened the +door of the car. + +“Ha!” said Mr. Solway. “Very sensible--very sensible! You came early, so +that you’d have time to drive carefully. Very important--weather like +this. Very sensible! But wait a bit! Mr. Dexter’s coming along.” +Standing out in the snow, he shouted: “Gayle! Come, now! Come!” to the +unresponsive house; then he got into the car. + +“I’d like to speak to you for a minute, sir,” said Ross. + +Mr. Solway observed how white and strained the young man’s face was, and +he spoke to him very kindly. + +“Well?” he said. “What is it, Moss?” + +“I’m afraid I’ll have to leave to-morrow, sir.” + +“Leave, eh?” + +“Yes, sir. I--it’s--family troubles, sir.” + +“Married man?” asked Mr. Solway, in a low voice. + +“No, sir,” said Ross. The honest sympathy in the other man’s tone made +him sick with shame. “It’s a--a younger sister of mine.” + +“Well, my boy,” said Mr. Solway, “I’m sorry, very sorry. You’re the sort +of young fellow I like. Family troubles--Too bad! I’m sorry. Come back +here any time you like.” + +“Thank you, sir,” said Ross. + +“Nonsense! Nonsense! You’re the type of young--Ha, Gayle! Step in! Step +in. Start her up, Moss!” + +Ross did so. He had never been more unhappy in his life than he was now, +with his lie successfully accomplished. + +“This finishes it!” he thought, as he drove back from the station. “I’m +going to see Amy, and have it out with her. I’ll tell her about this +Donnelly. I’ll warn her--” + +And then go off and leave her to face the consequences alone? + +“But, hang it all, she’s not alone!” he cried to himself. “She’s got +Solway, and she’s got her Gayle. Why doesn’t she go to him? He’s the +natural one to share her troubles.” + +Unfortunately, however, he could not help understanding a little why Amy +did not want to tell Gayle. He had had another good look at Gayle when +he got out of the car at the station, and he was obliged to admit that +there was something very uncompromising in that handsome face. Nobody, +he thought, would want to tell Gayle Dexter a guilty secret. + +“I suppose she doesn’t particularly mind my knowing anything,” he +reflected, “because, as far as she’s concerned, I don’t count.” + +This idea pleased him as much as it would please any other young fellow +of twenty-six. And, combined with his many anxieties, and his hatred and +impatience toward his present position, it produced in him a very +unchivalrous mood. He brought the car into the garage, and sat down on +its step, with his watch in his hand. He gave Amy thirty minutes in +which to send him a message. + +Of course she didn’t send any. Then he went to the telephone which +connected with the house. Gracie’s voice answered him. + +“I want to speak to Miss Solway!” he said. + +“I’ll see,” said Gracie. + +He waited and waited, feeling pretty sure that Amy would not come; that +she would, indeed, never speak to him or think of him unless she wanted +him to do something for her. But presently, to his surprise, he heard +her voice, so very gentle and sweet that he could scarcely recognize it. + +“Moss?” she said, as if in wonder. + +“Yes,” he said. “Look here! I’d like to--” + +“I don’t think I’ll want the car all day,” said she. “Not in this +weather.” + +“Look here!” he began, again. “I want to speak to you. Now.” + +“I shan’t need you at all to-day, Moss,” said she, graciously, and he +heard the receiver go up on the hook. + +He stood for a moment, looking at the telephone. His dark face had grown +quite pale, and there was upon it a peculiar and unpleasant smile. + +But he was, in his way, a just man, and not disposed to let his temper +master him. He looked at the telephone, and he thought his thoughts for +a few moments; then he resolutely put this exasperation out of his mind, +and proceeded with his business. + +He decided to go and get the child without any further delay. There was +no reason for delay, and, to tell the truth, he was vaguely uneasy with +her away. He could easily keep her hidden in the garage until the +morning, and then get away early. And he wanted her here. + +He took off the hated uniform, dressed himself in his customary neat and +sober fashion, put his papers and what money he had into his pockets, +and set off toward the station, where he knew he could get a taxi. + +The beauty which had so enchanted him early in the morning was perishing +fast, now. The fields still showed an unbroken expanse of white, but the +trees were bare again. The flakes melted as they fell; the roads were a +morass of slush, and all the tingle had gone out of the air. It was a +desolate, depressing day, now, with a leaden sky. The slush came over +the tops of his shoes, his hat brim dripped, his spirits sank, in this +melancholy world. + +But at least he was alone, and able to go his own way, in his own good +time, and that was a relief. He stopped in the town, and bought himself +a pipe and a tin of tobacco. He stopped whenever he felt like it, to +look at things; and, passing a fruit stand, went in and bought two +apples for the little girl. + +“Good for children,” he thought, with curious satisfaction. + +He reached the station, and saw three or four vacant taxis standing +there; he selected one and went up to it, and was just about to give his +directions when a hand fell on his shoulder. + +“Well!” said a voice--the most unwelcome one he could have heard. + +It was Donnelly, grinning broadly. + +“Well!” said Ross, in a noncommittal tone. + +His brain was working fast. He couldn’t go to the cottage now. He must +somehow get rid of this fellow, and he must invent a plausible reason +for being here. + +“I walked down to get a few things,” he said, “but I guess I won’t try +walking back. The roads are too bad.” + +“You’re right!” said Donnelly, heartily. + +“Wygatt Road!” Ross told the taxi driver, and got into the cab. + +“Hold on a minute!” said Donnelly. “I’m going that way, too. I’ll share +the cab with you.” + +“Look here!” cried Ross. + +“Well?” said Donnelly. “I’m looking.” + +The unhappy young man did not know what to say. He felt that it would be +extremely imprudent to antagonize the man. + +“All right,” he said, at last, and Donnelly got in beside him. + +The cab set off, splashing through the melted snow--going back again to +that infernal garage. Suppose Donnelly hung about all day? + +“Where do you want to get out?” he demanded. + +“To tell you the truth,” said Donnelly, “I was waiting for you.” + +“Waiting! But--” + +“I sort of thought you might be coming to the station some time to-day,” +said the other, tranquilly, “and I waited. Wanted a little talk with +you.” + +“What about?” + +“Well, it’s this. I told you I was looking for a man called Ives.” + +“And I told you I didn’t--” + +“Now, hold on a minute! You told me you’d never heard of him. All right. +Now, I told you I knew Ives came out to Stamford on Tuesday. That was +about all I did know--this morning. But I’ve found out a little more +since then.” + +“What’s that got to do with me?” asked Ross, with a surly air and a +sinking heart. + +“That’s just what I don’t know. On Wednesday you came to Mr. Solway’s +house. You didn’t bring anything with you, and you haven’t sent for any +bag or trunk, or anything like that. Now, hold on! Just wait a minute! +You said you’d come from Cren’s Agency, I’m told. But Cren’s Agency told +me on the telephone that--Now, hold on! Don’t lose your temper! You can +clear this up easy enough. Just show me your license. Haven’t got it +with you, I suppose?” + +“No!” said Ross. + +“_All_ right. You’ve left it in the garage. Very well. That’s where +you’re going now, isn’t it? Unless--” He paused. “Unless you’d like to +come along with me.” + +“Come--where?” asked Ross. + +“Why, there’s a little cottage off the Post Road,” said Donnelly. “I’d +like to pay a little visit there this morning, and it came into my head +that maybe you’d like to come along with me, eh?” + + +XV + +Ross was, by nature, incapable of despair; but he felt something akin to +it now. He was so hopelessly in the dark; he did not know what to guard +against, what was most dangerous. He remembered Eddy’s warning, not to +let any one come “monkeying around” that cottage; but he did not know +the reason for that warning. Nor could he think of any way to prevent +Donnelly’s going there. + +Should he lock the fellow up in the garage until he had warned Eddy? No; +that was a plan lacking in subtlety. Certainly it would confirm whatever +suspicions Donnelly might have; it might do a great deal more harm than +good. + +Should he tell Amy, on the chance that she might suggest something? No. +The chance of her suggesting anything helpful was very small, and the +chance that she would do something reckless and disastrous very great. +Better keep Amy out of it. + +Then what could he do? The idea came into his head that he might keep +Donnelly quiet for a time by boldly asserting that he himself was Ives. +But perhaps Donnelly knew that he wasn’t. + +“By Heaven, why shouldn’t I tell him the truth?” he thought, in a sort +of rage. “Why not tell him I’m James Ross? There’s nothing against me. +I’ve done nothing criminal. I don’t even know what’s happened here. +I’ll just tell him.” + +And then Donnelly would ask him why he had come, and why he was here +masquerading as a chauffeur. How could he explain? For it never occurred +to him as a possibility that he could ignore Donnelly’s questions. + +There was an air of unmistakable authority about the man. Ross had not +asked him who he was, and he had no wish in the world to find out, +either; simply, he knew that Donnelly was justified in his very +inconvenient curiosity, that he had a right to know, and that he +probably would know, before long. + +“Perhaps I can manage to get away from him,” thought Ross. + +That was the thing! Somehow he must sidetrack Donnelly; get him off upon +a false scent, while he himself hastened to Eddy. Such a simple and easy +thing to do, wasn’t it? + +“Well!” said Donnelly. “Do we go back, and have a look at that license +of yours--or do we go and pay a little visit to that cottage, eh?” + +“I’m going back,” said Ross, curtly. + +“Of course,” Donnelly went on, in a mild and reasonable tone, “_I_ know, +and you know, that you’re not going to show me any license. What you +want is a little time to make up your mind. You’re saying to yourself: +‘I don’t know this fellow. I don’t know what he’s up to. I don’t see any +reason why I should trust him with any of my private affairs.’ You’re +right. Why should you? You’ve talked to certain other people, and you’ve +heard good reasons why you ought to keep quiet--about one or two little +things. That’s sensible enough. Why, naturally,” he went on, growing +almost indignant in defense of Ross, “naturally an intelligent young man +like you isn’t going to tell all he knows to a stranger. Why should +you?” + +Ross found it difficult to reply to this. + +“No,” said Donnelly. “Naturally not. What you say to me is: ‘Put your +cards on the table, Donnelly. Let’s hear who you are, and what you know, +and what you’re after. Then we can talk.’ That’s what you say. All +right. Now, I’ll tell you. I’ll be frank. I’ll admit that when I saw you +this morning, I thought you were Ives. You see, I’m frank--not +pretending to know it all. I made a mistake. You’re not Ives.” + +“Thanks!” said Ross. + +“When Ives came out here on Tuesday,” Donnelly proceeded, “he took a +taxi. I’ll tell you frankly that I just found that out this morning by a +lucky fluke. No credit to me. He went out to this cottage, and there he +met somebody.” + +“Oh, _that_ was me, I suppose,” said Ross. + +“No,” said Donnelly. “It was a woman.” + +“Oh, Lord!” thought Ross. “This is--I can’t stand much more of this.” + +“Now, I’m not going to pretend I know who that woman was,” Donnelly went +on. “I don’t. I haven’t found that out--yet. Not yet.” + +“But you will,” thought Ross. + +He felt sure of that. He believed that there was no hope now for the +guilty ones, and he felt that he was one of the guilty ones. He did not +know what had happened at “Day’s End,” but the burden of that guilt lay +upon his heart. This man was the agent of destiny, inexorable, in no way +to be eluded. He had come to find out, and find out he surely would. + +Ross was a young man of remarkable hardihood, though; no one had ever +yet been able to bully him, or to intimidate or fluster him. He had +precious little hope of success, but he meant to do what he could. If he +could only gain a little time, perhaps he might think of a plan, and, in +the meanwhile, he would say nothing and admit nothing. + +“Now, before we talk,” said Donnelly, “you want to know who I am, and +how I came to be mixed up in this business. As soon as you saw me, you +said to yourself: ‘Police!’” + +Ross winced at the word. + +“That was natural. But you made a mistake. I’ll tell you frankly that I +was a police detective once, but I’ve left the force. I’m a private +citizen, now, same as you are. Got a little business of my own--what you +might call a private investigator. Collecting information--jobs like +that. Nothing to do with criminal cases.” + +He was silent for a moment. + +“Nothing to do with criminal cases,” he repeated. “I don’t like ’em. +Now, this--” + +Again he fell silent. + +“We’ll hope this isn’t one,” he said. “I’ll tell you about it. My +sister, she’s a widow, and she keeps a rooming house, down on West +Twelfth Street. Well, yesterday she came to me with a story that sort +of interested me. She told me that about a month ago a young fellow took +a room in her house. Quiet young fellow, didn’t give any trouble, but +she’d taken a good deal of notice of him, in what you might call a sort +of motherly way.” + +“Yes, I know,” Ross nodded. + +“A good-looking young fellow, very polite and nice in his ways--and she +thought from the start that he was pretty badly worried about something. +She’d hear him walking up and down at night--and she said there was a +look on his face--You know how women are.” + +“Yes,” Ross agreed. + +“So, when he didn’t show up for a couple of nights, she came to me. I +told her to go to the police, but she had some sort of notion that he +wouldn’t like that--and I dare say she didn’t like it herself. Bad for +business--a thing like that in the newspapers, you know. So, just to +please her, I got his door unlocked, and had a look at his room.” + +“You found--” + +“Well, the first thing I saw there was a pile of money on the +table--about seventy-five dollars in bills, under a paper weight, and a +half finished letter. No name--just began right off--‘I won’t wait any +longer.’ But here’s the letter. You can see for yourself.” + +Unbuttoning his overcoat, he took a folded piece of paper from his +breast pocket and handed it to Ross. It read: + + I won’t wait any longer. I am coming out to Stamford to-morrow, and + if you refuse to see me this time, it will be the end. You’ve been + putting me off with one lie after the other for all this time, and + now it’s finished. I don’t know how you _can_ be so damned cruel. + Don’t you even want to see your own child? As for your husband--I + have no more illusions about that. You’re sick of me. All you want + is to get rid of me, and you don’t care how, either. Well, _I_ + don’t care. I’d be better off with a bullet through the head. It’s + only the baby-- + +Here there were several words scratched out, and it began again: + + Darling, my own girl, perhaps I’m wrong. I hope to God I am. + Perhaps you are really doing your best, and thinking of what’s best + for the child. Only, it’s been so long. I want you back so. I’ve + got a little money saved. I can keep you both. I can work. I can + make you happy, even if we are a bit poor. Darling, just let me see + you and-- + +That was the end. Ross touched his tongue to his dry lips, and folded up +the letter again. He dared not look at Donnelly, but he knew Donnelly +was looking at him. + +“Ives wrote that letter,” said Donnelly. “The way I figure it out is +this. He began to write, and then he decided that, instead of sending a +letter, he’d go. He must have been in a pretty bad state to leave all +that money behind. But, of course, he meant to come back. Well, he +didn’t. Aha! Here we are!” + +The taxi stopped before the gates of “Day’s End,” and Donnelly, getting +out, told the driver to wait for him. Then he set off with Ross, not +along the drive, but across the lawn, behind the fir trees. + +“I won’t bother you by telling you how I know he came to Stamford on +Tuesday,” he proceeded. “It’s my business to find out things like that. +He came, and he took a taxi out to this cottage I’ve mentioned, and a +woman met him there. He sent the taxi away--and that’s the last I’ve +heard of him.” + +The snow was wholly turned to rain, now; it blew against Ross’s face, +cold and bitter; the trees stood dripping and shivering under the gray +sky. He was wet, chilled to the bone, filled with a terrible foreboding. + +“That cottage belongs to an old lady in the neighborhood,” said +Donnelly. “But she doesn’t know anything about this. She said the place +had been vacant two years, and she didn’t expect to rent it till she’d +made some repairs. She said anybody could get into it easily enough if +they should want to. Well!” + +They stood before the garage, now, and Ross took the key from his +pocket. + +“So you see,” said Donnelly, “that’s how it is. I’ve traced him that +far. I know that there’s some woman in Stamford who has a good reason +for wanting to get rid of him. And now--” He looked steadily at Ross, +“And now I’ve about finished.” + +“Finished?” said Ross. “You--you mean--” + +But Donnelly did not answer. + + +XVI + +Ross went upstairs to the sitting room over the garage. It did not occur +to him to extend an invitation to his companion; he knew well enough +that he would hear those deliberate footsteps mounting after him; he +knew that Donnelly would follow. + +He took off his hat and overcoat and flung himself into a chair, and +Donnelly did the same, in a more leisurely fashion. Certainly he was not +a very troublesome shadow; he did not speak or disturb Ross in any way. +He just waited. + +And Ross sat there, his legs stretched out before him, hands in his +pockets, his head sunk, lost in a reverie of wonder, pity, and great +dread. + +“_Her_ child?” he thought. “Amy’s child? Ives was her husband, and that +baby is her child?” + +He recalled with singular vividness the phrases of that pitiful, +unreasonable letter. “Just let me see you.” “It’s been so long!” “You’re +sick of me. All you want is to get rid of me.” He could imagine Ives, +that fellow who was about his age, about his build--alone in his +furnished room, writing that letter. “How _can_ you be so damned cruel?” +And “darling.” + +“In a pretty bad state,” Donnelly had said. And he had come, with all +his hope and his fear and his pain, to “Day’s End,” and-- + +“But if--if that was Ives I saw in Mrs. Jones’s room,” thought Ross, +“then who was it Amy wanted me to watch for last night?” + +This idea gave him immeasurable relief. That man had not been Ives. Ives +hadn’t come yet. The whole tragedy was an invention of his own. + +“No reason to take it for granted that that letter was meant for Amy,” +he thought. “Plenty of other women in Stamford. No; I’ve simply been +making a fool of myself, imagining.” + +But there was one thing he had not imagined. There was, among all these +doubts and surmises, one immutable fact, the man under the sofa. He +could, if he pleased, explain away everything else, but not that. + +It seemed to him incredible that he had, in the beginning, accepted that +fact so coolly. He had thought it was “none of his business.” And now it +was the chief business of his life. It was as if that silent figure had +cried out to him for justice; as if he had come here only in order to +see that man, and to avenge him. + +“No!” he protested, in his soul. “I’ve got nothing to do with justice +and--vengeance. The thing’s done. It can never be undone. I don’t want +to see--any one punished for it. That’s not my business. I’m nobody’s +judge, thank God!” + +“Well?” said Donnelly, gently. + +Ross looked up, met his glance squarely. + +“I can’t help you,” he said. + +Donnelly arose. + +“I’m sorry for that,” he said. “Mighty sorry. I’ve been very frank with +you. Showed you the letter--laid my cards on the table. Because I had a +notion that you’d heard one side of the case, and that if you heard the +other you might change your mind. You might think that Ives hadn’t had a +fair deal.” + +“I can’t help that,” muttered Ross. + +“No,” said Donnelly, “of course you can’t. And I can’t help it now, +either.” He sighed. “Well,” he said, “I’ll be off now. Good-by!” + +“What are you going to do?” asked Ross, sitting up straight. + +“Why, I’m going to that cottage I mentioned,” said Donnelly. “And if I +don’t find Ives there, or something that’ll help me to find him--then +I’ll have to turn the case over to the police.” + +Ross got up and began to put on his damp overcoat. + +“I’ll go with you,” he said. + +Whether this was the best thing for him to do, he could not tell. But he +could see no way of preventing Donnelly from going, and he would not let +him go alone. He meant to be there, with Eddy and the little girl. + +Donnelly had already gone to the head of the stairs, and Ross followed +him, impatient to be gone. But the other’s burly form blocked the way. +He was listening. Some one was opening the door of the garage. + +Ross made an attempt to get by, but Donnelly laid a hand on his arm. + +“Wait!” he whispered. + +Light, quick footsteps sounded on the cement floor below, and then a +voice, so clear, so sweet: + +“Jim-my!” + +“Miss Solway!” he cried. “Jimmy’s not here. Only me--Moss--and a friend +of mine!” + +This was his warning to her, and he hoped with all his heart that she +would understand, and would go. Donnelly had begun to descend the +stairs. If she would only go, before that man saw her! + +But she had not gone. When he reached the foot of the stairs, and looked +over Donnelly’s shoulder, he saw her there. She was wearing her fur +coat, with the collar turned up, and a black velvet tam; the cold air +had brought a beautiful color into her cheeks; her hair was clinging in +little damp curls to her forehead; he had never seen her so lovely, so +radiant. And for all that he knew against her, and all that he +suspected, he saw in her now a pitiful and terrible innocence. + +“She doesn’t know!” he thought. “She doesn’t realize--she _can’t_ +realize--ever--what she’s done. She doesn’t even know when she hurts any +one.” + +And there was Donnelly, standing before her, hat in hand, his eyes +modestly downcast; a most inoffensive figure. She was not interested in +him; she thought he didn’t matter; she was looking past him at Ross, +with that cajoling, childish smile of hers. + +“Oh, Moss!” she said. “Will you bring the sedan round to the house? +Please? I want to go out.” + +“I’m sorry, Miss Solway,” he said, and it seemed to him that any one +could hear the significance in his voice. “Mr. Solway told me not to +take you out--in this weather.” + +“Oh!” she said, and sighed. “All right,” with gentle resignation; “I’ll +just have to wait, then.” + +“I’m sorry, Miss Solway,” said Ross again. + +Didn’t she see how that fellow was watching her? It was torment to Ross. +There was not a shadow on her bright face; she stood there, gay, +careless, perfectly indifferent to the silent Donnelly. + +“All right!” she said, and turned away, then, to open the door. But it +was heavy for her small fingers, and Donnelly hastened forward. + +“Excuse me, miss!” he said, and pushed back the door for her. + +“Oh, thanks!” she said, smiling into his face, and off she went, running +through the rain across the sodden lawn. Ross looked after her; so +little, so young. + +“And that’s Miss Solway!” said Donnelly, speculatively. + +Ross glanced at him, and his heart gave a great leap. For, on the +other’s face, was an unmistakable look of perplexity. + +“Yes,” he said, “that’s Miss Solway.” + +“She’s pretty young, isn’t she?” Donnelly pursued, still following with +his eyes the hurrying little figure. + +“I suppose so,” said Ross, casually. It was difficult for him to conceal +his delight. Donnelly was evidently at a loss; he couldn’t believe ill +of that girl with her careless smile. He thought she was too young, too +light-hearted. The very fact of her ignoring Ross’s warning had done +this for her. If she had understood, if across her smiling face had come +that look Ross had seen, that look of terror and dismay, Donnelly would +not have thought her too young. + +“He’s not sure now!” thought Ross. “He’s not sure. She has a chance now. +If I can only think of something.” + +He could not think of anything useful now, but he felt sure that he +would, later on. There was a chance now. Donnelly was only human; he, +like other men, could be deluded. + +They left the garage and walked back to the waiting taxi. + +“What about a little lunch first?” suggested Donnelly. + +“All right!” said Ross. + +So they stopped at a restaurant in the town, and sent away the cab. They +sat down facing each other across a small table. Ross was hungry, and +Donnelly, too, ate with hearty appetite, but he did not talk. He was +thoughtful, and, Ross believed, somewhat downcast. + +“Getting up a new theory,” said the young man to himself. “Perhaps I can +help him.” + +The vague outline of a plan was assembling in his mind, but he could not +quite discern it yet. It seemed to him plain that Donnelly had nothing +but suspicions; that he had no definite facts as to any connection +between Ives and Amy Solway. He had thought she was the woman to whom +that letter was addressed; but since he had seen her, he doubted. Very +well; he must be kept in doubt. + +When they had finished lunch, they went round the corner to a garage, +and took another taxi. Ross settled himself back comfortably, and filled +and lighted his new pipe; a good time to break it in, he thought. +Donnelly brought out a big cigar, which he kept in the corner of his +mouth while he talked a little upon the subject of tobacco. The cab grew +thick with smoke, and Ross opened the window beside him. The rain blew +in, but he did not mind that. + +They came to the cottage along the lane which took them directly to its +front gate. There it stood, forlorn and shabby, the shutters closed, the +neglected garden a dripping tangle. They went up the steps; Donnelly +knocked, but there was no answer. He pushed open the door, and they went +in. He called out: “Is there anybody here?” + +But Ross knew then that the house was empty. The very air proclaimed it. + +“My luck’s in!” he thought, elated. + + +XVII + +“Nice, cheerful little place!” observed Donnelly, looking about him. + +Ross said nothing. He had not even dared hope for such a stroke of luck +as that Eddy and the little girl should be gone, yet the silence in this +dim, damp, little house troubled him. Where and why had they gone? + +“We’ll just take a look around,” said Donnelly. + +He opened a door beside him, revealing a dark and empty room. He flashed +an electric torch across it; nothing there but the bare floor and the +four walls. He closed the door and went along the passage, and opened +the door of the next room. The shutter was broken here, and one of the +window panes, and the rain was blowing in, making a pool on the floor +that gleamed darkly when the flash light touched it. + +That door, too, he closed, with a sort of polite caution, as if he +didn’t want to disturb any one. Then he looked into the room at the end +of the passage. This was evidently the kitchen, for there was a sink +there, and a built-in dresser. He turned on the taps; no water. + +“Now we’ll just take a look upstairs,” he said, in a subdued tone. + +He mounted the stairs with remarkable lightness for so heavy a man; but +Ross took no such precaution. Indeed, he wanted to make a noise. He did +not like the silence in this house. + +Donnelly opened the door facing the stairs. One shutter had been thrown +back, and the room was filled with the gray light of the rainy +afternoon. And, lying on the floor, Ross saw a white flannel rabbit. + +It lay there, quite alone, its one pink glass eye staring up at the +ceiling, and round its middle was a bedraggled bit of blue ribbon which +Ross remembered very well. + +“Now, what’s this?” said Donnelly. + +He picked up the rabbit, frowning a little; he turned it this way and +that, he fingered its sash. And, to Ross, there was something grotesque +and almost horrible in the sight of the burly fellow with a cigar in one +corner of his mouth, and an intent frown on his red face, holding that +rabbit. + +“It’s a clew, isn’t it?” he inquired, with mock respect. + +Donnelly glanced at him quickly. Then he put the rabbit into the pocket +of his overcoat, from which its long ears protruded ludicrously. + +“Come on!” he said. + +The next door was locked, and here Donnelly displayed his professional +talents. Before Ross could quite see what he was at, he had taken +something from his pocket; he bent forward, and almost at once the lock +clicked, and he opened the door. + +It seemed to Ross that nothing could have been more eloquent of crime, +of shameful secrecy and misery, than that room. There was a wretched +little makeshift bed against one wall, made up of burlap bags and a +ragged portière; there was a box on which stood a lantern, an empty +corned beef tin, and a crushed and sodden packet of cigarettes. There +was nothing else. + +With a leaden heart, he looked at Donnelly, and saw him very grave. + +“Come on!” he said, again. + +And they went on, into every corner of that house that was so empty and +yet so filled with questions. They found nothing more. Some one had been +here, and some one had gone; that was all. + +Donnelly led the way back to the room where that some one had been. + +“Now we’ll see if we can find some more clews here,” he said. “Like the +fellows in the story books.” + +He took up the packet of cigarettes and went over to the window with it. +But, instead of examining the object in his hand, his glance was +arrested by something outside, and he stood staring straight before him +so long that Ross came up beside him, to see for himself. + +From this upper window there was an unexpectedly wide vista of empty +fields, still white with snow, and houses tiny in the distance, and a +belt of woodland, dark against the gray sky; all deserted and desolate +in the steady fall of sleet. What else? + +Directly before the house was the road, where the taxi waited, the +driver inside. Across the road the land ran downhill in a steep slope, +washed bare of any trace of snow, and at its foot was a pond, a somber +little sheet of water, shivering under the downpour. But there was +nobody in sight, nothing stirred. What else? What was Donnelly looking +at? + +“I think--” said Donnelly. “I guess I’ll just go out and mooch around a +little before it gets dark. Just to get the lay of the land. You don’t +want to come--in this weather. You just wait here. I won’t keep you +long.” + +Ross did want to go with him, everywhere, and to see everything that he +saw, but he judged it unwise to say so. He stood where he was, listening +to the other’s footsteps quietly descending; he heard the front door +close softly, and a moment later he saw Donnelly come out into the road +and cross it, with a wave of his hand toward the taxi driver, and begin +to descend the steep slope toward the pond. + +“What’s he going there for?” thought Ross. “What does he think--” + +Before he had finished the question, the answer sprang up in his mind. +Donnelly had not found Ives in the cottage, so he was going to look for +him down there. Suppose he found him? + +“No!” thought Ross. “It’s--impossible. I--I’m losing my nerve.” + +To tell the truth, he was badly shaken. He was ready to credit Donnelly +with superhuman powers, to believe that he could see things invisible to +other persons, that he could, simply by looking out of the window, trace +the whole course of a crime. + +“I’ve got to do something,” he thought. “Now is my chance. I can give +him the slip now.” + +But he was a good seven or eight miles from “Day’s End.” Well, why +couldn’t he hurry down, jump into the taxi, and order the driver to set +off at once? Long before Donnelly could find any way of escape from this +desolate region, he could get back to the house and warn Amy. And, in +doing so, he would certainly antagonize Donnelly, and confirm any +suspicions he might already have. + +“No,” he thought. “He’s not sure about Amy now. And I don’t believe he’s +got anything against me. I can’t afford to run away. He hasn’t found +anything yet that definitely connects Amy with the--the case.” + +But when he did? + +Donnelly had reached the bottom of the slope now, and was sauntering +along the edge of the pond, hands in his pockets. He had in nowise the +air of a sleuth hot upon a scent, but to Ross his leisurely progress +suggested an alarming confidence. He knew--what didn’t he know? And +Ross, the guilty one, knew nothing at all. In angry desperation, he +turned away from the window. + +“All right!” he said, aloud. “I’ll have a look for clews myself!” + +And, without the slightest difficulty, he found all the clews he wanted. + +The makeshift bed was the only place in the room where anything could be +hidden; he lifted up the portière that lay over the bags, and there he +found a shabby pocket-book in which were the papers of the missing +Martin Ives. + +Everything was there--everything one could want. There was a savings +bank book, there were two or three letters, and there was a little +snapshot of Amy, on the back of which was written: “To Marty--so that he +won’t forget.” + +Ross looked at that photograph for a long time. He was not expert enough +to recognize that the costume was somewhat outmoded, but he did know +that this picture had been taken some time ago, because Amy was so +different. It showed her standing on a beach, with the wind blowing her +hair and her skirts, her head a little thrown back, and on her face the +jolliest smile--a regular schoolgirl grin. + +It hurt him, the sight of that laughing, dimpled, little ghost from the +past. He remembered her as he had seen her to-day, still smiling, still +lovely, but so changed. She was reckless now, haunted now, even in her +most careless moments. + +He opened the top letter; it bore the date of last Monday, but no +address. It read: + +DEAR MR. IVES: + + Amy has asked me to reply to your letter of a month ago. I scarcely + need to tell you how greatly it distressed her. If you should come + to the house publicly now, everything she has tried to do would be + ruined. She had hoped that you would wait patiently, but as you + refuse to do so, she has consented to see you. + + She wants to see Lily as well, and, although there is a great deal + of risk in this, if you will follow my directions, I think we can + manage. Telephone to the nurse with whom the child is boarding to + bring her to the station at Greenwich by the train leaving New York + at 7.20 A.M. on Tuesday and Eddy will meet her there. You can take + an early afternoon train to Stamford. Take a taxi there and go up + the Post Road to Bonnifer Lane, a little past the Raven Inn. There + is a new church being built on the corner. Turn down here, and stop + at the first house, about half a mile from the main road. You will + find the little girl there, and I shall be there, waiting for you, + between three and five, and we can make arrangements for you to see + Amy. + + Remember, Mr. Ives, that Amy trusts you to do nothing until you + have seen her. + + Respectfully yours, + AMANDA JONES. + + +Ross folded up the letter. Yes; nobody could ask for a much better clew. +He took out another letter, but before opening it, he glanced out of the +window. And he saw Donnelly coming back. + +He put the wallet into his pocket, and went to the head of the stairs. A +great lassitude had come upon him; he felt physically exhausted. His +doubt--and his hope--were ended now. + +Donnelly came in quietly, and advanced to the foot of the stairs. It was +not possible to read his face by that dim light, but his voice was very +grave. + +“Come on!” he said. + +“Find anything?” asked Ross. + +Donnelly was silent for a moment. + +“I’ve finished,” he said, at last. + +“What--” began Ross. + +“I’ve finished,” Donnelly repeated, almost gently. “It’s up to the +police now. We’ll have that pond dragged.” + +Ross, too, was silent for a moment. + +“All right!” he said. “I’ll just get my hat.” + +He turned back into the room; Donnelly waited for him below. In a few +minutes Ross joined him, and they got into the cab. + + +XVIII + +M. Solway descended from the train and walked briskly toward his car. +The new chauffeur was standing there, stiff as a poker. + +“Well, Moss!” he said. “Everything all right, eh?” + +“Yes, thank you, sir,” said Ross. + +“That’s it!” said Mr. Solway, with his vague kindliness. He got into the +car, and Ross started off through the sleet and the dark. Mr. Solway +made two or three observations about the weather, but his chauffeur +answered “Yes, sir,” “That’s so, sir,” rather absent-mindedly. He was, +to tell the truth, very much preoccupied with his own thoughts. He was +wondering how a pond was dragged, and how long such a thing might take. + +He had seen no one, spoken to no one, since he had left Donnelly at the +police station and gone back to the garage alone. So he had had plenty +of time to think. + +He stopped the car before the house, Mr. Solway got out, and Ross drove +on to the garage. There would be a little more time for thinking before +he was summoned to dinner. He went upstairs and sat down, stretched out +in a chair, staring before him. He was still wearing the peaked cap +which had belonged to Wheeler; perhaps it was not a becoming cap, for +his face looked grim and harsh beneath it. + +He was not impatient, now, as that James Ross had been who had landed in +New York three days ago. Indeed, he seemed almost inhumanly patient, as +if he were willing to sit there forever. And that was how he felt. He +had done his utmost; now he could only wait. + +The sleet was rattling against the windows, and a great wind blew. It +must be a wild night, out in the fields, where a lonely little pond lay. +A bad night to be in that little cottage. A bad night, anywhere in the +world, for a child who had nobody. + +From his pocket he brought out a snapshot, and looked at it for a long +time; then he tore it into fragments and let them flutter to the floor. +He closed his eyes, then, but he was not asleep; the knuckles of his +hand grasping the arm of the chair were white. + +No; he wasn’t asleep. When the telephone rang in the garage, he got up +at once and went downstairs to answer it. + +“Dinner’s ready!” said Gracie’s voice. “Eddy come in yet?” + +“Not yet,” answered Ross. “But--wait a minute!” + +For he thought he heard some one at the door. He was standing with the +receiver in his hand when the door slid open and Eddy came in. + +“He’s just--” he began, turning back to the telephone, when Eddy sprang +forward and caught his arm, and whispered: “Shut up! Sh-h-h!” + +“Just about due,” said Ross to Gracie. Then he hung up the receiver and +faced Eddy. + +“Don’t tell ’em I’m here!” said Eddy. “I--I don’t want--I c-can’t stand +any--jabbering. I--Oh, Gawd!” + +At the end of his tether, Eddy was. His lips twitched, his face was +distorted with his valiant effort after self-control. And it occurred to +Ross that, for all his shrewdness and his worldly air, Eddy was not very +old or very wise. + +“What’s up, old man?” he asked. “Tell me. You’d better get your dinner +now.” + +“Nope!” said Eddy. “I--can’t eat. I--I don’t want to talk.” + +Ross waited for some time. + +“Lissen here,” said Eddy, at last. “You--you seemed to like--that kid. +You--you’ll look after her, won’t you?” + +“Yes,” Ross answered. + +He would have been surprised, and a little incredulous, if any one had +called him tactful, yet few people could have handled Eddy better. He +knew what the boy wanted; knew that he needed just this cool and steady +tone, this incurious patience. + +“Go and get her,” Eddy pleaded. “She’s down at the barber’s--near the +movie theayter. Go and get her.” + +“All right. I’ll have my dinner first, though. Want me to bring you +something?” + +“Nope!” said Eddy. “Lissen! I guess the cops are after me already.” + +“You mean they’ve--found him?” + +“Yep,” said Eddy. “They’ve found him. How did you know?” + +Ross did not answer the question. + +“Can’t you get away?” he asked. + +“Not going to try,” said Eddy. “I--I’m too d-darn tired. I--I _don’t +care_!” There was a hysterical rise in his voice, but he mastered it. +“Let ’em come!” + +“What have they got against you?” + +“They’ve found him--in the pond--where I put him.” + +“Who’s going to know that?” + +“Oh, they’ll know, all right!” said Eddy. “They got ways of finding out +things. They’ll know, and they’ll think it was me that--All right! Let +’em!” + +“Then you’re not going to tell?” + +Eddy looked at him. + +“D’you think it--wasn’t me?” + +“Yes,” Ross replied. “I think it wasn’t you, Eddy.” + +There was a long silence between them. + +“What d’you think I’d ought to do?” asked Eddy, almost in a whisper. + +“Suppose we talk it over,” said Ross. + +“Yes--but--_I_ dunno who you are.” + +“Well, let’s say I’m Ives.” + +Eddy sprang back as if he had been struck. + +“_Ives!_” + +“Look here!” said Ross. “I’m going to tell you what I did.” + +And, very bluntly, he told. Eddy listened to him in silence; it was a +strange enough thing, but he showed no surprise. + +“D’you think it’ll work?” he asked, when Ross had finished. + +“I hope so. Anyhow, there’s a chance. Now, you better tell me the whole +thing. There’s a lot that I don’t know--and I might make a bad mistake.” + +The telephone rang again. It was Gracie, annoyed by this delay. + +“I’ll come as soon as I can,” said Ross, severely. “But I’m working on +the car, and I can’t leave off for a few minutes.” + +He turned again to Eddy. + +“Go ahead!” he said. + +Eddy sat down on the step of the sedan, and Ross leaned back against the +wall, his arms folded, his saturnine face shadowed by the peaked cap. + +“Tuesday I went and got her--the kid, y’ know, and took her to the +cottage.” + +“Did you know about her before?” + +“Sure I did! I knew when they got married--her and Ives--four years ago. +She told me herself. You know the way she tells you things--crying an’ +all.” + +Ross did know. + +“Well, I used to see Ives hanging around. He was a nice feller--but he +didn’t have a cent. He was an actor. She was too young, +anyway--eighteen--same age as me. I told her I’d tell Mr. Solway, and +then she told me they’d got married. I felt pretty bad--on Mr. Solway’s +account. But she--well, you know how she acts. Her mother’d left her +some money she’s going to get when she’s twenty-five, if she don’t get +married without her stepfather’s consent. Mrs. Solway had the right +idea. She knew Amy, all right. Only, it didn’t work. Amy wanted to get +married and have the money, too. That’s how she is. So she told me she +was going to tell Mr. Solway when she was twenty-five. I know I’d ought +to have told him then, but--I didn’t.” + +Ross understood that. + +“Mr. Solway went over to Europe that summer, and she and Mrs. Jones went +somewheres out West, and Lily was born out there. And Ives, he took the +kid, and she came back here. She used to see Ives pretty often for +awhile--go into the city and meet him. Then she began talking about what +a risk it was. That was because she’d met this Gayle Dexter. That made +me sick! I said I’d tell Mr. Solway, but she said her and Ives was going +to get divorced, an’ nobody’d ever know, and that I’d ruin her life and +all. And I gave in--like a fool. Only, you see, I--I’ve known Amy all +my life.” + +“I see!” said Ross. + +“Well, it seems Ives was beginning to get suspicious, when she didn’t +see him no more. He kept writing; I used to get the letters for +her--general delivery--an’ she kept stalling--and at last he said he was +coming here to see her. Well, her and Mrs. Jones must have told him to +come along. And Tuesday I met the kid and took her to that cottage. My +idea, that was. I told Mrs. Jones about the place. I wish to Gawd I +hadn’t.” He was silent for a moment. “Only, I thought it might--I was +glad to do it, ’cause I thought maybe if Amy seen Ives and the kid, +she’d--kinder change her mind. He come that afternoon, and seen Mrs. +Jones. Well, I went there after work, and he told me Amy was coming to +see him next morning. He was real pleased. He was--he was a--nice +feller--” + +Eddy’s mouth twitched again. “I wish--I’d known. Anyway, she wouldn’t go +to see him. Jones tried to make her--said she’d got to have a talk with +him--but Amy, she took on something fierce. Said she’d never see him +again. Well, I guess he must of waited and waited, and in the afternoon +he come here to the garage. I tried to argue with him and all, but it +wouldn’t work. He started off for the house, and I telephoned over to +Jones. An’ he went--he went out of that door--” + +Eddy turned and stared at the door with an odd blank look. It was as if +he saw something--which was not there. + +“This very door,” he muttered. “My Gawd!” + +“Yes,” said Ross, quietly. “He went to the house. And then?” + +Eddy turned back with a shudder. + +“I didn’t never think,” he said. “Wheeler’d left, then, so I drove the +big car down to the station to meet Mr. Solway, and when I brung him +home, you was there. Old Lady Jones tried to tip me off. I saw her +trying to tell me something behind your back. I couldn’t make out what +it was, but I knew there was something queer. I thought you was a +detective Ives ’d sent to see what was going on, ’cause he’d been saying +he’d do that. I didn’t know, then--But next day Jones told me that--that +Ives had--died. Said he’d fell down dead from a heart attack. And she +said we’d got to get rid of him on the Q. T., for Amy’s sake. I--I +thought I couldn’t--but I did. Fella I know lent me his Ford. I said I +wanted to take a girl out. And, while you were out there on the lawn, +I--I got him--out of Jones’s room.” + +“Do you mean he’d been there all that time?” + +“I guess so. She told me she been sitting up all night, trying to--to +see if she could--do anything for him. But he--Anyway, Jones told me +what to do, and I did it. I--you don’t know what it was like--going all +that way--alone--with him. And I had to put stones in his pockets.” He +looked at Ross with a sort of wonder. + +“I can’t believe it now!” he cried. “It don’t seem true! I don’t know +_why_--only Jones told me that if I didn’t, there’d be a inquest an’ +all. And she said everyone’d think that Amy--It would all come out, she +said, and Amy and Mr. Solway’d be in the newspapers and all. And she +said he was dead, anyway. The pond couldn’t hurt _him_. I--” + +He came closer to Ross, and laid a hand on his sleeve. “Lissen here!” he +said. “D’you think that’s true--that he--just died?” + +“There’s no use thinking about that--now,” said Ross. + + +XIX + +Ross could feel sorry enough for Eddy, for his ghastly trip to the pond, +for all the dread and misery that lay upon his soul. He was sorry for +Ives, although his sufferings were at an end. He pitied Mr. Solway, in +his ignorance of all this. He was sorry, in his own way, for Amy. But, +above all creatures in this world, he pitied that little child. + +Eddy told him about her. When Ives had gone to “Day’s End,” he had left +the child with the obliging barber in town, and she had been there all +that night and the next day, until Mrs. Jones had sent Eddy after her. + +“She said it would start people talking, if the kid stayed there, and +she told me to take her back to the cottage and leave her till she made +some plans. But I couldn’t do that. The way I felt last night, I didn’t +care. I’d rather have seen the whole thing go to smash than leave the +kid alone there all night. That’s why I brung her here. And this +morning--I couldn’t stay there--in that house. It kind of gave me the +creeps. So I took her back to the barber’s.” He paused. + +“Jones don’t care about the kid,” he added. “She don’t care about +anything on earth but Amy. Lissen here! I know she’s old and all, but I +think--maybe she--I just wonder if the old girl had the nerve?” + +Ross had had that thought, too. But it seemed to him that, no matter who +had actually done this thing, even if it were an accident--which he did +not believe--the guilt still lay upon the woman who had betrayed and +abandoned the man and the child. Amy was guilty, and no one else. + +He straightened up, with a sigh. + +“Come along!” he said. “We’ll get our dinner. No! Don’t be a fool, my +lad. It’s what you need.” + +Eddy was considerably relieved by his confession. He went upstairs, +washed, changed his coat, and brushed his glossy hair, and when he set +off toward the house, there was a trace of his old swagger about him. +Only a trace, though, for he walked beneath a shadow. + +As for Ross, there was precious little change to be discerned in his +dour face and impassive bearing. And it was his very good fortune to be +so constituted that he did not show what he felt, for he was to receive +an unexpected shock. + +“Sit down!” said Gracie, sharply. “I put somethin’ aside for you. Now +hurry up! It puts me back with the dishes an’ all.” + +“An’ thim extry people,” said the cook, who was also a little out of +temper. “There’ll not be enough butter for breakfast, the way they did +be eatin’, an’ me without a word of warnin’ at all.” + +“It’s that Mr. Teagle,” said Gracie. “Them small men is always heavy +eaters.” + +“Teagle? Who’s he?” asked Eddy. + +“Haven’t you heard?” cried Gracie, almost unable to believe that she was +to have the bliss of imparting this amazing news. “Why, there was a body +found in a lake somewheres.” + +“Oh, I heard about that, down at the comp’ny!” said Eddy, scornfully. + +“But lissen, Eddy! It turns out it was a cousin o’ Miss Amy’s! It seems +they found some papers an’ letters an’ all near where they found him, +an’ he turns out to be her cousin! This Mr. Teagle, he’s a lawyer. They +sent for him, an’ he come out here to look at the poor feller, and then +he come to the house, ’cause Miss Amy’s goin’ to get all his money. She +took on somethin’ terrible! Mr. Solway, he telephoned to Mr. Dexter, and +he come out, too. I guess it was kinder to comfort her.” + +“What would she be needin’ all the comfortin’ for?” demanded the cook. +“She’d never set eyes on the cousin at all, and her to be gettin’ all +that money.” + +“She’s kinder sensitive,” said Gracie. + +“Sensitive, is it!” said the cook, with significance. + +Ross went on eating his dinner. He did not appear to be interested. When +he had finished, he bade them all a civil good night, and got up and +went out. + +“He’s a cold-blooded fish,” said Gracie. + +Yet, something seemed to keep him warm--something kept him steadfast and +untroubled as he walked, head down, against the storm of wind and sleet, +along the lonely roads to the town. He found the barber shop to which +Eddy had directed him, and when he entered, the lively little Italian +barber did not think his face forbidding. + +“I’ve come for the little girl,” said Ross. + +“Oh, she’s all right!” cried the barber. “She’s O. K. She eata soom nica +dinner--verrie O. K. She sooma kid.” + +He was a happy little man, pleased with his thriving business, with his +family, with his own easy fluency in the use of the American tongue. He +took Ross through the brilliantly lighted white tiled shop--a sanitary +barber, he was--into a back room, where were his wife and his own small +children. + +And among them was the little fair-haired Lily, content and quite at +home as she seemed always to be. You might have thought that she knew +she had nobody, and no place of her own in this world, and that she had +philosophically made up her mind to be happy wherever fate might place +her. + +She was sitting on the floor, much in the way of the barber’s wife, who +pursued her household duties among the four little children in the room +with the deft unconcern of a highly skilled dancer among eggshells. The +woman could speak no English, but she smiled at Ross with placid +amiability. She could not understand why three different men should have +brought this child here at different times; but, after all, she didn’t +particularly care. A passing incident, this was, in her busy life. + +As for the barber himself, he had his own ideas. He saw something +suspicious in the affair; a kidnaping, perhaps; but he preferred to know +nothing. It was his tradition to be wary of troubling the police. He +took the money Ross gave him, and he smiled. Nobody had told him +anything. He knew nothing. + +The barber’s wife got the little girl ready, and Ross picked her up in +his arms. She turned her head, to look back at the children, and her +little woolen cap brushed across his eyes; he had to stop in the doorway +of the shop, to shift her on to one arm, so that he could see. And then, +what he did see was Donnelly. + +“Well! Well!” said Donnelly, in a tone of hearty welcome. + +“Well!” said Ross. “I’m in a hurry to get back, now. To-morrow--” + +“Of course you are!” said Donnelly. “I’m not going to keep you a minute. +I’ve got something here I’d like the little girl to identify.” + +Ross’s arm tightened about the child. + +“No!” he protested. “No! She’s got nothing to do with--this.” + +“Pshaw!” said Donnelly, with a laugh. “It’s only this.” And from his +pocket he brought out the rabbit. + +“Oh, _my_ wabbit!” cried the little girl, with a sort of solemn ecstasy. + +“Hi! Taxi!” called Donnelly, suddenly, and a cab going by slowed down, +turned, skidding a little on the wet street, and drew up to the curb. +Without delay, Ross put the child inside, and got in after her, but +Donnelly remained standing on the curb, holding open the door. Light +streamed from the shop windows, but his back was turned toward it; his +face was in darkness; he stood like a statue in the downpour. + +“There’s some funny things about this case--” he observed. + +Ross said nothing. + +“Mighty funny!” Donnelly pursued. “And, by the way--” He leaned into the +cab. “I’ve seen a good deal of you to-day, but I don’t believe you’ve +told me your name.” + +It seemed to Ross for a moment that he could not speak. But, at last, +with a great effort, he said: + +“_Ives._” + +“Ah!” said Donnelly. + +Ross waited and waited. + +“If you’d like to see--my bank book and papers,” he finally suggested. + +“No,” said Donnelly, soothingly. “No, never mind. And this James Ross. +You never heard of him, I suppose?” + +“No.” + +“He landed in New York on Wednesday, went to a hotel in the city, left +his bags, and came right out to Stamford--and fell in a pond. Now, +that’s a queer stunt, isn’t it?” + +Ross put his arm round the child’s tiny shoulders and drew her close to +him. + +“Very!” he agreed. + +“I thought so myself. Queer! I found the man’s pocketbook in that +cottage--in that very room where you waited for me. What d’you think of +that? There was a letter from a lawyer in New York--name of Teagle. I +telephoned to him, and he came out. He could identify the man’s +handwriting and so on. But he’d never seen him. Said he didn’t think +there was any one in this country who had. He has a theory, though. Like +to hear it--or are you in a hurry?” + +“No! Go ahead!” + +“Well, Teagle’s theory is that this Mr. James Ross knew he had a cousin +out this way. Miss Solway, you know. It seems her mother made a match +the family didn’t approve of, and they dropped her, years ago. Now, +Teagle thinks this Mr. James Ross wanted to see for himself what this +cousin was like, and that he came out to that cottage to stay while he +sort of mooched around, getting information about her. Family feeling, +see? Only--he met with an accident.” + +“That sounds plausible,” said Ross. + +“You’re right! Now, of course, there’ll be a coroner’s inquest +to-morrow. But--” He paused. “I happened to be around when the doctor +made his examination. And he says--the man was dead before he fell in +the pond.” + +“Oh, God!” cried Ross, in his torment. “Don’t go on!” + +“Hold on a minute! Hold on! Of course that startles you, eh? You think +it’s a case of murder, eh? Well, I’ll tell you now that the verdict’ll +be--death from natural causes. No marks of violence. And Mr. James Ross +had a very bad heart. I dare say he didn’t know it. He died of heart +failure, and then he rolled down that slope. _I_ saw that for +myself--saw bushes broken, and so on, where something had rolled or been +dragged down there.” + +“Then?” + +“Then,” said Donnelly, “as far as I’m concerned, there’s no case. And +I’ll say good-by to you. Maybe you wouldn’t mind shaking hands, +Mr.--Ives?” + +Their hands met in a firm clasp. + +“On Miss Solway’s account,” said Donnelly, “I’m mighty glad you’re Mr. +Ives. _Good_-by!” + + +XX + +Ross was going away, at last. He was going as he had come, with no +luggage, with no ceremony. Only, he was going to take with him a small +child, and he left behind him his name, his money, and a good many +illusions--and a friend. Eddy was not likely to forget him. + +“You’re--you’re a white man!” he said, in a very unsteady voice. +“You’re--a prince.” + +“No,” Ross objected. “I’m a fool. The biggest damned fool that ever +lived.” + +“Have it your own way!” said Eddy. “I can think different if I like. +I--” He paused a moment. “It makes me sick, you goin’ away like this. +It--it--” + +Ross laid his hand on the boy’s shoulder. + +“Drop it!” he said. “Now, then! It’s about time for us to be off.” He +turned toward the bedroom. “I’ll wake her up, while you start the car. +I’ll take one of the blankets to wrap her in.” + +It was a little early for the train he wanted to catch, but he was in a +hurry to be gone. He might have known, though, that it was his fate +never to leave this place when or how he wished. + +He might have known that there was one inevitable thing still to be +faced. He heard the throb of the sturdy little engine downstairs; he +thought, he hoped, that the last moment had come, and, instead, he was +called upon to endure a moment almost beyond endurance. + +For Amy came. The sound of the engine prevented his hearing her +entrance; he had just gone into the bedroom when he heard her footsteps +on the stairs. In a wild storm of tears, desperate, white as a ghost, +she ran in to him. + +“Jimmy!” she gasped. “Oh, Jimmy! Jimmy!” + +He did not speak. What had he to say to her now? + +She was panting for breath, and her sobs were horrible, as if they +choked her. He wanted to close the bedroom door, but she had seized him +by the shoulder. + +“I didn’t know!” she cried. “Not--till to-night. Oh, Jimmy, I didn’t +know he was dead! He came to see me--and he died. Oh, Jimmy! Just when +Nanna told him--that I didn’t want to see him ever again. It killed him, +Jimmy. _I_ killed him!” + +“Oh, do keep quiet!” said Ross, in a sort of despair. + +“I can’t! I can’t! I can’t! If I’d only seen him--just once more! Nanna +begged me to--but I wouldn’t. And when Nanna told him, he--died! How can +I bear that? Oh, Jimmy! I didn’t think he’d care so much! Just as I care +for Gayle. Jimmy, listen to me! I’ll tell Gayle. I’ll go to him now. I +can’t let you do this for me, Jimmy!” + +For a moment his heart beat with a great hope. + +“Do you mean that?” he asked. + +“I never meant it to be like this. Never! Never! I thought Martin would +let me go--let me get a divorce. And if he hadn’t, I’d have given up +Gayle. I’ll give him up now, if you tell me to. Even if I die, too!” + +The hope was faint now. + +“You think he’d give you up, if he knew?” he asked. + +“Think? I know! He’d loathe me!” + +“And you’d be willing to marry him with--” + +“You don’t understand!” she interrupted, violently. “You never could. +You’re too good. And I’m not good--in your way. I was just a child when +I met Martin. I’m not a child now. Gayle’s my whole life to me. I love +him so that--” + +“For God’s sake, stop!” cried Ross. “It’s--infamous! Have you +_forgotten_?” + +All the light and passion fled from her face at his tone. She looked up +at him in terrified inquiry. Ross stood aside from the doorway, so that +she could see the child lying asleep on the bed. She went in very +softly, and stood looking down at the little creature. + +“You see,” she whispered, “I’ve given up--my soul--for Gayle.” + +He took her by the arm and led her out of the room, closing the door +behind them. + +“Very well!” he said. “On her account, it’s better like this. I’ll take +her. And you’ll have to forget her. Do you understand? There’s to be no +repentance, and so on. Make up your mind now.” + +“No,” she said, faintly. “I can’t. I won’t! I’ll just do what you tell +me. _You’ve_ got to decide.” + +“What!” he cried, appalled. “You’d try to make me?” + +The child gave a little chuckle in her sleep. He thought what the +child’s life would be, with Amy, if Amy were denied her Gayle. He +thought of Ives. He had taken Ives’s name, and with it the burden that +Ives could no longer carry. + +“All right!” he said. “It’s finished. I only hope to Heaven that Mr. +Solway can end his days without knowing. As for Dexter--he’ll have to +take his chance--like the rest of us. Good-by, Amy!” + +She caught one of his hands in both of hers, and pressed it against her +wet cheek. + +“Can you ever, ever forgive me, Jimmy?” she asked, with a sob. + +“I dare say!” said Ross, grimly. + + +XXI + +“Left hand, please!” + +Obediently, Mrs. Barron took her left hand out of the bowl of warm +water, and laid it on the towel, carefully, as if it might melt. And the +manicurist bent over it with her nice air of earnest attention. + +All this was agreeable to Mrs. Barron. She was rather proud of her +hands; she was altogether comfortable and tranquil; she had a pleasant, +restful day before her. + +In the afternoon she and her daughter were going to look at fur coats, +which was really better than the actual buying; and, in the evening, +they were all going to a play. The sun was shining, too, and the formal +sitting room of her hotel suite was cheerful and warm, and filled with +the perfume of the roses that stood all about. + +“It’s good to be home again,” she remarked. “At my time of life +traveling is not--” The telephone bell rang. “Answer that, my dear. It’s +dangerous to touch a telephone with damp hands--Oh! A gentleman to see +Miss Barron? What a strange time to call--ten o’clock in the morning! +Ask his name, my dear. He was on the Farragut with us? But how very +strange! Why doesn’t he give his name? But ask him to come up.” + +She dried her hands and arose, majestic even in her frivolous negligee. + +“Very strange!” she murmured. + +There was a knock at the door. + +“Come in!” she said. + +The door opened--and it was Mr. Ross! She took a step forward, with a +welcoming smile; then she stopped short. + +“Mr. Ross!” she cried. “But--Mr. Ross!” + +He did not fail to notice the change in her tone, the vanishing of her +smile. It did not surprise him. He stood in the doorway, hat in one +hand, the little girl clinging to the other, and he felt that, to her +piercing glance, he was a sorry enough figure. He felt shabby, as if he +had been long battered by wind and rain; he felt that somehow the +emptiness of his pockets was obvious to any one. + +“I’m sorry,” he said stiffly. “I’m afraid I’ve disturbed you. I thought +perhaps I could see Miss Barron, just for a moment.” + +“Come in!” said Mrs. Barron, and, turning to the manicurist, “Later, my +dear!” she said. + +Ross came in, and the manicurist, gathering her things together on her +tray, made haste to escape. She went out, closing the door behind her. + +“Mr. Ross!” said Mrs. Barron, in the same tone of stern wonder. + +“I’m sorry,” he said, again. “I’m afraid I’ve dis--” + +“But, my dear boy, what has happened?” she cried. + +He was absolutely astounded by her voice, by the kindly anxiety in her +face. + +“I just thought--” he began. + +“Sit down!” said she. “Here! On the sofa. You _do_ look so tired!” + +“I--I am,” he admitted. + +“And such a dear little girl!” said Mrs. Barron. “Such a dear little +mite.” + +She had sat down on the sofa beside the child, and was stroking her fair +mane, while her eyes were fixed upon Ross with genuine solicitude. She +looked so kind, so honest, so sensible--he marveled that he had ever +thought her formidable. + +“You wanted to see Phyllis?” she went on. “She’s out, just now; but you +must wait.” + +“By George!” cried Ross. + +For he had an inspiration. With all his stubborn soul he had been +dreading to meet Phyllis in his present condition. He was penniless, +and, what was worse, he could not rid himself of an unreasonable +conviction of guilt. And now that he found Mrs. Barron so kind-- + +“Mrs. Barron!” he said. “It’s really you I ought to speak to. It’s about +this child. She’s a--sort of cousin of mine, and she’s”--he paused a +moment--“alone.” + +Mrs. Barron was looking down at the child, very thoughtfully. + +“I don’t know any one in this country,” he went on, “so I thought if +you’d advise me. I want to find a home for her. A--a real home, you +know, with people who’ll--be fond of her. Just for a few months; later +on I’ll take her myself. But, just now--” His dark face flushed. + +“I’m a bit hard up just now,” he said; “but I’ll find a job right away, +and I’ll be able to pay for her board and so on.” + +Mrs. Barron continued to look thoughtful, and it occurred to him that +his request must seem odd to her--very odd. The flush on his face +deepened. + +“I’m sorry,” he said, coldly; “but there are a good many things I can’t +explain--” + +“Yes, you can!” Mrs. Barron declared, in her old manner. “And that’s +just what you’re going to do. As soon as I set eyes on you, on board +that ship, I knew what you were. And I am _never_ deceived about +character. Never, Mr. Ross! I knew at once that you were to be trusted. +I said to Phyllis: ‘That young man has force of character!’ I knew it. +Now you’ve gone and got yourself into trouble of some sort, and you’ve +come to me--very properly--and you’re going to tell me the whole thing.” + +“I can’t!” Ross protested. + +“Oh, yes, you can! Here you come and tell me you haven’t a penny, and +don’t know a soul in this country, and here’s this poor little child +who’s been foisted upon you--Don’t look surprised! I know it very well! +She’s been foisted upon you by selfish, heartless, unscrupulous people, +and you can’t deny it! Now, tell me what’s happened.” + +He did. And what is more, he was glad to tell her. + +There were a good many details that he left out, and he mentioned no +names at all, but the main facts of his amazing story he gave to her. +Especially was he emphatic in pointing out that he had now no name and +no money, and he thought that would be enough for her. + +But when he carefully pointed this out, she said: + +“Nonsense! You’ve got your own name, and you can go right on using it. +As for money, you’re never going to let that horrible, wicked woman rob +you like that--” + +“Look here, Mrs. Barron!” said Ross. “I am. I give you my word, I’ll +never reopen that case again. It’s finished. I’m going to make a fresh +start in the world and forget all about it.” + +“I shan’t argue with you now,” said Mrs. Barron, firmly. “You’re too +tired. And if you want a position--for awhile--Mr. Barron will find you +one. The little girl will stay here with us, of course. Now, take off +your coat and make yourself comfortable until lunch time.” + +“No!” said Ross. “No! I--don’t you see for yourself? I don’t want to +see--_anybody_.” + +“Mr. Ross!” said Mrs. Barron. “I’m not young any longer. I’ve lived a +good many years in the world, and I’ve learned a few things. And one of +them is--that character is the one thing that counts. Not money, Mr. +Ross; not intellect, or appearance, or manners; but character. What +you’ve done is very, very foolish, but--” She leaned across the child, +and laid her hand on his shoulder. “But it was very splendid, my dear +boy.” + +Ross grew redder than ever. + +“Just the same, I’d rather go,” he muttered, obstinately. + +“Here’s Phyllis now!” cried Mrs. Barron, in triumph. + +So he had to get up and face her--the girl he had run away from when he +had had so much to offer her. He had to face her, empty-handed, now; +heartsick and weary after his bitter adventure. + +And she seemed to him so wonderful, with that dear friendly smile. + +“Mr. Ross!” she said. + +She held out her hand, and he had to take it. He had to look at her--and +then he could not stop. They forgot, for a moment; they stood there, +hands clasped, looking at each other. + +“Didn’t I _know_ he’d come!” cried Mrs. Barron. + + +THE END + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +OCTOBER, 1926 +Vol. LXXXIX NUMBER 1 + + + + +Human Nature Unmasked + +A CYNIC SEES THE TRUE CHARACTERS OF HIS FRIENDS REVEALED BY A SEARCHING +TEST, THE LURE OF A MILLION DOLLARS + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Wilder sprang off the train, jostled his way through the crowd on the +platform, and dashed up the steps to the street, scowling with +impatience; and yet, when he got there, he stopped short. + +The trolley car that met the train was waiting in front of him, and +there was a rush of commuters toward it. He had meant to get on that +car, but he could not. He was too tired, too mortally sick and tired of +his fellow creatures. He could not and would not be crowded in there. He +wanted miles of uninhabited space about him. He felt that it was +impossible to endure the sight of a human face or the sound of a human +voice. + +Then, just behind him, some one called out cheerily: + +“Hello, Wilder!” + +He pretended not to hear, and set off down the street, with that +headlong gait of his. + +“Let me _alone_!” he said to himself. “Oh, Lord! I’m so tired!” + +All he asked was to be let alone, but he never was. At this moment +Marian was waiting for him. + +“Let her wait!” he thought. + +But, just the same, he hurried home to her. + +“I’m a slave!” he thought. “I’m a fool, an ass, an idiot, an imbecile!” + +These weaknesses were not obvious in Leonard Wilder’s appearance. A big +fellow, well set up, lean and vigorous, he looked like one abundantly +able to take care of himself. His face, with its big, bold nose, its +keen gray eyes, and that out-thrust underlip, looked like a clever face. +He was by no means handsome, but there was something about him that +pleased the eye. People were inclined to stare at him. People who knew +him detested and loved him at the same time. He was impossible to get on +with; yet, once you got used to him, it was hard to get on without him. + +He was an architect; but he said that if he could choose again, he would +be a house wrecker. There was, he said, no room on earth for an +architect until ninety-five per cent of all buildings now standing had +been razed to the ground. Feeling as he did, he nevertheless helped in +the erection of more monstrosities. The owners of a “development park” +employed him to design houses. + +“Regular little love nests!” said Connolly, the senior partner. + +“Why d’you call these things ‘nests’?” asked Wilder. “Haven’t you ever +_seen_ a nest? Don’t you realize the fundamental _decency_ of birds? +Why, man, birds _hide_ their nests! ‘Love nests,’ eh? Sheep pens, you +mean!” + +Connolly laughed; but he always arranged to keep his architect and his +clients as far apart as possible. When this could not be done, he took +care to explain in advance that Wilder was a genius. Connolly believed +this. He believed that only a genius could be so outrageous; that only a +genius would do such good work for so little money. He liked geniuses. + +Leonard’s own opinion of himself was less flattering. He called himself +a fool. For instance, here he was, hurrying home, when he so violently +did not want to go home, simply because it would upset Marian if he were +late. He always hurried home, and not out of good will. He felt no good +will toward anybody on earth. He was the complete cynic. He did not love +his fellow man. If he caught trains, it was only through a very +contemptible weakness. + +The sun had gone, but it was not yet dusk. As he reached his own corner, +the street lamps suddenly came alive, glowing with a faint, luminous +violet against the pallor of the sky. He was startled and enchanted by +the effect. He stopped, to stare up at them, to watch the delicate +changes in the sky. + +“Extraordinary thing!” he thought. “I spend my life looking for the +beautiful line--the clean, strong, inevitable line; and here is beauty +without line, almost without form or color--half tints, shadows--of +nothing. Why is this beautiful to me?” + +He wanted a formula, and could find none. He lit a cigarette, and leaned +back against the lamp-post, meditating. Marian saw this from the window. +She saw her brother-in-law standing on the street corner, smoking a +cigarette and staring at the sky, when he knew very well that dinner was +ready. Let him! She made up her mind that she would not say one word. +She put everything into the oven to keep hot, went out on the veranda, +and sat down there. + +When, at last, Wilder came down the street, and saw her, he knew by her +face that she was not saying a word. Instead of admiring this +forbearance, a fierce exasperation rose in him. He wanted her to say a +word, so that he could reply in other words. He desired a barrage of +peppery words. He had stopped, just to look at the sky--and she +begrudged him that! + +“Good evening, Leonard,” she said, quite politely. + +“Oh! Good evening!” said he, as if surprised. “You here?” + +Then he sat down on the top step and lit another cigarette. + +“And here I sit until you do say something!” he thought. + +“I will not be drawn into a dispute with Leonard,” thought Marian. “He’s +simply looking for a chance to be nasty; but I shan’t say a word.” + +From inside the house came a sound of hammering. It was Evan Wilder, +doing some little carpentering job; and this--this creditable and +helpful thing--filled Leonard with still greater exasperation. + +He was weary and hot. He wanted peace. He wanted a dim and lofty dining +room, a silent and highly competent manservant, and a rare sort of +dinner; and when he thought of what he was actually going to get-- + +He had meant not to speak, but that hammering was too much. + +“_Peter Pan_, the Boy Scout who never grew up,” he observed. “What good +turn is he doing now?” + +Marian still said nothing, but the effort she made to hold her tongue +vibrated through the air. + +“He is misguided,” Leonard went on. “If he were to follow our example, +Marian! Here we sit, developing serenity of soul in contemplation. I’m +happy to see you contemplative, Marian. Don’t you feel strengthened by +it?” + +“Leonard,” she replied, in a voice unsteady from many suppressed +emotions, “if, instead of sneering at Evan--” + +“Shan’t I put dinner on the table?” interrupted a voice. + +It was the voice of Marian’s young sister, Violet. Leonard rose. + +“Why didn’t you tell me she was here?” he asked sternly. + +“Why should I?” returned Marian. “I didn’t want to disturb you in your +soulful contemplations.” + +She, too, had risen. He admitted that she was a nice looking girl, but +it exasperated him to see that she was tired. It made him feel that +every one in the world was tired. He thought of Marian working all day +in this detestable little house. He thought of Evan sitting in his +office, waiting for the patients who did not come. Everything was awful! + +Violet disturbed him. He was sorry for her, just entering upon life in +all its awfulness; and she was so unsuspicious. She did not look either +tired or discouraged. She was a designer, working in a fashion studio, +and she did not seem to mind it. + +There she stood in the doorway. The light behind her shone on her bright +hair, making it glitter like gold wire. She had a nice color in her +cheeks, and across her nose was a band of freckles that seemed to Wilder +funny and very touching. She had serious blue eyes. She was a serious +girl altogether, but he always felt that the seriousness was not quite +honest. He strongly suspected that there were moments when she laughed. + +She glanced at Leonard as he came in, and smiled seriously. He would +have said that he was sorry he was late, only that Marian would have +heard, and it would have been mean to be sorry to Violet and not to +her. + +As he went upstairs to wash, he met his brother Evan coming down, with a +clean collar, and his dark hair still damp. He looked neat and subdued, +yet cheerful. Evan was always cheerful. His valiant smile did not soothe +the cynic, who came downstairs worse than ever. + +They all sat down at the table. + +“Ah! Tomato soup!” said Evan, bravely and brightly. + +“Tomatoes have gone up awfully,” observed Marian. + +“Listen!” said Violet. “That taxi--isn’t it stopping here?” + +“Good Lord!” cried Evan, springing up. “A patient!” + +“Probably an accident who can’t afford to pay,” said Marian. + +Evan retired, so that he might be mysteriously invisible to any patient, +and Marian went to open the door. + + +II + +From the dining room, Leonard and Violet could see who stood outside--a +large figure in a plumed hat and billowing cloak, like a cavalier. It +was no cavalier, however, but a lady. + +“Dr. Wilder’s house?” the stranger asked. + +“Yes,” said Marian. “If you’ll step into the waiting room, I’ll see if +the doctor’s disengaged.” + +“Deary,” said the visitor, “tell him it’s his Aunt Jean!” + +At this Evan stepped forward. + +“I am Dr. Wilder,” he announced sternly--sternly, because he had no Aunt +Jean. + +“No!” cried she. “You don’t say! You must be one of the boys; but it’s +old Dr. Wilder I’m looking for.” + +“He--” Evan began, and hesitated. “My father--” + +“No!” said she, all sympathy. “Gone? That’s just terrible! I looked in +the telephone book, and I saw ‘Dr. Wilder,’ and I came here. My! That’s +sad! And you’re a doctor, too? Deary, you’ve got a _grand_ presence!” + +Evan was considerably taken aback. + +“Deary,” said she, “I’ll explain--” + +Just then she caught sight of Leonard, who had come into the hall, urged +by sheer curiosity. He wished to hear the preposterous tale this woman +would surely tell. It was almost pathetic, to think of her coming before +him, the cynic, the merciless detector of human weakness, with her +ridiculous yarn. + +“You’re the one to remember!” she said. “Your eyes--so kind o’ piercing +looking, and all! You remember your Auntie Jean, I bet!” + +“No,” said Leonard, “I can’t say that I do.” + +Indeed, he felt that if he had ever set eyes on her before, he would +have remembered. She was not one easy to forget. Stout and tall, she +carried herself with majesty. In her face, powdered white as a clown’s, +her lips were a vivid scarlet. Sticky dark lashes surrounded her eyes, +and crowning all was a bushy halo of blond hair, dry and unreal as a +doll’s wig. No, Leonard did not remember her. + +Nevertheless, looking at her, a queer sympathy stirred in him. There was +something honest in her. Even the paint and powder and dyed hair were +honest. They showed no intention to deceive, but merely an artless +desire to make the best of what nature had provided. + +“Deary,” she said, “I’m your Uncle Lambert’s second.” + +There really had been an Uncle Lambert, a black sheep brother of their +father’s, and Leonard thought he could remember some talk about a +dreadful marriage. He was almost ready to believe that this lady might +be a relation--by marriage; but that did not exclude the possibility of +her being also a swindler. + +“I remember,” said she, “as plain as plain. Your mother was the only one +in the family that ever had a kind word for me--a sweet, lovely woman, +she was. Well do I remember her saying to me: ‘Jean,’ she said, and +those were her words--‘Jean,’ she said, ‘come and see the children.’ +Then she took me up through that rich, elegant house, and the taste +there was in those lace curtains I shall remember to my dying day, and +the carpet on the stairs as thick as fur, and there you were in the +nursery, the two of you, in little black velvet pants and white silk +shirts, as sweet and clean as two little lambs.” She sobbed. “Two little +lambs!” she insisted. “And Evan, he sat on my lap and played with my +locket, and well I remember he broke it off the chain and tried to +swallow it, and you stood in a corner, saying, ‘Go ‘way! Go ‘way!’ Two +l-little l-lambs!” + +Leonard believed her. He could not recollect the incident, but he +believed it had been as she said. + +“Sit down, Aunt Jean,” he said firmly. + +“Aunt!” said she. “Deary, I will _not_ forget this sweetness!” + +Still in tears, she sat down, and so did Leonard, but the others +remained standing. + +“Boys!” she said. “I’m all kind of fluttery.” She paused. “Boys!” she +said solemnly. “How are things with you?” + +“Bad,” replied Leonard, promptly. + +“Oh, no!” Evan chivalrously declared. “I’m married--” + +“A sweet, lovely woman!” said Aunt Jean, looking at Marian. “I can see +that; but--” She glanced about the neat, quiet little room. “Boys!” she +said. “I know!” + +There was something so portentous, so mysterious in her manner that Evan +glanced behind him, as if a specter had thrown a shadow. + +“This is not what you’ve been accustomed to,” she went on. “This is not +what you ought to have. No, sir! Servants to wait on you hand and foot, +and a fine house and all--that’s what you ought to have; and that’s what +you’re going to have! That’s just what I came for!” + +She was gratified to see that they were astonished. + +“Yes, sir!” she continued. “As soon as ever I heard the news, I came +right here. You’ve heard of Darcy Rose, of course?” + +To her surprise, they had not. + +“A grand man!” she said. “Him and I--he and me--were partners years ago. +A novelty act, it was--Rose and La Reine. He did mind reading and +mesmerizing, and I was Jean La Reine, the galvanic girl. I used to be +galvanized, you know, stiff as a board, lying in the air, all dressed in +white, and my hair down. It was a real pretty act, if I do say it +myself; but it kind of went out of style. Darcy, he went in for private +mind readings--séances and all, and he made a lot of money.” + +“Won’t you join us at dinner?” asked Evan, because he saw Marian looking +so patient. + +“Deary, I will!” said she. “And sweet it is of you to ask me!” + +She flung off the voluminous cape with a fine gesture, and stood before +them in a low-necked black satin dress, with a rope of pearls reaching +to what might be called her waist. Combined with the plumed hat and the +high-heeled velvet slippers, the effect was remarkable--especially if +one did not notice how worn and dusty the slippers were, how shabby the +dress, how bedraggled the feather. + +“Darcy Rose is doomed,” she said. “A grander spirit I never saw. One +week ago this very night he sent for me. ‘J.,’ he said, ‘I’m going,’ he +said.” She wiped her eyes. “‘And I’m ready,’ he said. ‘I haven’t one of +my own kin left,’ he said, ‘and me with a million dollars! J.,’ he said, +‘you and me were partners;’ and the way he talked about old times would +have wrenched tears out of a stone. He wanted to know what I was doing, +and I told him the solemn truth. ‘Darcy,’ I said, ‘I won’t tell you I’m +resting, for the truth is, I’ve given up the profession. I may look all +right to you,’ I said, ‘and there are many who admire a stately figger; +but it’s not the style just now, and on the stage I do not look so +young. I will not hide from you, Darcy, that I am demonstrating French +Cream Balm of Lettuce in the stores.’ Tears came into the man’s eyes.” +She turned to Marian. “He made a last will and testament,” she said, +“leaving all to me.” + +“I see!” said Marian. + +“And I wish to share it with the boys,” said Aunt Jean. “Darcy Rose +isn’t the only one can be grateful. Their mother was an angel to me, +when the rest of the family were--were _not_; and I’ve come to set +things right.” + +“That’s mighty kind of you,” said Evan. + +“Do have another slice of ham!” said Marian. + +“And wouldn’t you like a nice cup of tea?” asked Violet. + +Leonard said nothing. Although he had long ago lost all illusions about +human nature, he felt a queer sort of pain at seeing them all so very +kind and attentive--to a million dollars. It sickened him. He was not +going to join the crowd of flatterers. Let them truckle as they liked to +the poor old soul; he would be rudely honest. + +He was. + + +III + +It was an unseasonably hot June that year, and Wilder suffered from it. +He was tired to the bottom of his soul. A competition for a model house +was organized by a popular magazine, and he had been working in the +evenings on a set of plans, and had sent them in. + +He knew he would not win, for his house was much too good. Nobody would +appreciate that roof line, that staircase. He had done it to please +himself, as a relief from the love nests, and to divert his mind from +the sickening state of affairs at home, where Aunt Jean was now +installed in the house, an honored guest. + +The hot weather had brought on a boom in love nests. His firm advertised +that “every house will be built according to your ideas. The home we +build for you will be your Home o’ Dreams;” and clients came in with all +sorts of queer ideas. + +Basically, the love nests were strangely alike, but it was Wilder’s task +to give each one a mendacious air of individuality. + +“Seems to me that sort o’ cupola effect isn’t so artistic as the +others,” said Connolly, the senior partner. + +“Oh, yes, it is!” said Wilder. “More so, if possible. That cupola is the +most arty thing I’ve ever done. It makes the love nest a perfect little +hencoop.” + +Connolly glanced at his genius with a shade of anxiety. + +“Wilder,” he said, “you’re all wore out.” + +“No,” said Wilder, “I’m a man of iron.” He took off his eye shade and +got up. “And now,” he said, “peace and rest at length have come, all the +day’s long toil is past.” He stopped to light his pipe. “And now,” he +continued, “each heart is whispering ‘Home--home at last!’” + +“I’ll say you got the right idea,” said Connolly. + +“Just think of that to-night, as you’re going uptown in the subway,” +said Wilder. “Try to realize that all the hearts crammed in there with +you are whispering, ‘Home--home at last!’ Good night!” + +He took his hat and stepped out of the office; and there, in the arcade +of the big building, he saw Violet. She was looking at the window where +small models of the love nests were displayed. + +He had not seen Violet for some weeks, and it seemed to him that she had +improved during that time. He had seen her wearing the same hat and +dress before; but she had not looked like this in them. No--formerly she +had appeared serious and competent, and now she looked a gentle, an +appealing figure. You could imagine her waiting for a man, and glancing +up when he came, with a charming blush. + +“Hello, Violet!” he said. + +She glanced up, but she did not blush. On the contrary, the hot weather +had made her unusually pale. + +“Hello, Leonard!” she replied in her usual serious and friendly way. + +But he was not quite as usual. He could not help thinking that if she +had been waiting for him, it would be a curiously agreeable thing. + +“I haven’t seen you for a long time,” he said. + +“I’ve been to the house for dinner two or three times,” said Violet; +“but you weren’t home, and I can’t stay overnight any more, on account +of Aunt Jean having the spare room.” + +Violet lived in a furnished room on West Twelfth Street, and she had +been in the habit of spending the week-ends with her sister; but not any +more. She had been sacrificed. Compared with Aunt Jean’s million, all +Violet’s kindnesses, her loyal assistance in family crises, didn’t count +at all. She looked pale and jaded, and she had grown so extraordinarily +pretty in these last weeks! Leonard had been missing her--that was what +was the matter with him. + +Over her shoulder, he looked at the model love nests in the window. One +of them was lighted now; there were curtains in its tiny windows, +through which shone a mellow pink glow. Wilder knew that there was +nothing inside except an electric bulb with a crape paper shade, and +yet-- + +Somewhere there was a real house just like it, softly lighted in the +summer dusk, with flowers in a little garden. He could imagine that a +tired man, coming home to a house like that--to a smile, a kiss, to +quiet and tenderness--might find even one of Connolly’s love nests not +without beauty. + +“Vi!” he said. + +This time she did blush, and glanced away. + +“They _are_ sweet little houses!” she said defiantly. + +“Vi, let’s have dinner together! I’ll telephone to Marian.” + +“Well--” said Violet. “I should like it awfully. I get so lonely, +sometimes!” + +She had never talked like this before. She had never looked like this +before. + +“I’ll get a taxi,” said Leonard, “and we’ll go up to Claremont. I only +ask you not to come across with the usual family line about its being an +extravagance.” + +“I wasn’t going to,” said Violet. They had come out into the street +now, where a wan daylight lingered. “I’ve been thinking about that a +lot--about being extravagant. I’ve been--just afraid. I could do ever so +many things; but I’ve been afraid to get the thing I want to-day, +because then I might not be able to get something else to-morrow.” + +“That’s thrift, my dear girl--keeping your cake until you haven’t any +teeth to eat it with.” + +“Well, I--there’s a cab, Leonard.” + +He hailed it, and the driver slid up to the curb. Wilder opened the door +and took Violet’s arm, to help her in. Somehow it was such a young sort +of arm, firm and sturdy enough, but very slender--too slender. She +herself was altogether too slender and too young. It worried him. + +“I’m going to stop being afraid,” she said. “I’m going to trust life.” + +Wilder was silent. They were going up Broadway in an endless procession +of cabs and cars. Out of every building more and more people were +pouring, going home. Perhaps, for some of them, home was not a joke. + +Trust life? Just go ahead, and take the things that belong to youth? Not +to be so bitterly afraid of being disillusioned and disappointed, but to +trust life--and trust this girl? Didn’t he know by this time how +faithful, honest, and kind she was? + +“Could you rent one of those love nests?” she asked. + +His heart stood still for a moment. + +“I could buy one, on easy terms,” he said. + +“I mean could any one--could I rent one?” + +“You?” + +“Yes,” she said. “You see, Leonard, I’ve been thinking. I’d like a +little house.” + +He reached out for her hand, and took it, and she did not draw it away. + +“Vi!” he said. + +“I want to get a house for the summer, where I can take Aunt Jean,” she +said. “I think I can afford it. She’s nearly sixty, Leonard. Don’t you +think she’s--pathetic?” + +“Pathetic?” said Leonard. + +The most pathetic thing, he thought, was a man’s unconquerable longing +for the sort of girl who didn’t exist--a gentle young thing who waited +for him, who would be happy with him, in one of Connolly’s houses. + +Violet was a practical girl. She was perfectly willing to be sacrificed +for Aunt Jean’s million. She was sensible, and he was a fool. + +He could not very well push the girl’s hand away, but his clasp became +so limp that she withdrew it. She looked at him, but he did not look at +her. She tried to talk to him, but he answered with marked indifference. + +“If you can’t be a little more agreeable,” said Vi, a trifle unsteadily, +“I don’t see much use in our having dinner together.” + +“It wasn’t intended as a useful thing,” said Leonard. “Simply a +diversion.” + +“Well, I’m not diverted,” said Vi. “You’re being very--trying, Leonard!” + +“I’m sorry,” said he; “but I didn’t think you’d be able to stand me very +long.” + +“If you’d try--” + +“Didn’t you say I was trying?” + +“I think--” said Violet. “Please stop the cab! I’ll take a bus home.” + +Very well, he was not going to argue with her. He stopped the cab, and +they both got out. He put Violet on a bus, and then he walked uptown +along the Drive. There were lights in almost every window, now, and +across the river other lights shone out--from homes. + +“She was crying,” Leonard mused. + +Was he to be held responsible for that? Hardly. He had been on the point +of offering her all he had, but he had discovered in time that she was +after bigger game. Life in a love nest--with Aunt Jean and her million, +not with him! It was funny, in a way. + +And in another way it was not so very funny. He knew all about human +nature, but for a long time he had thought that Violet was different. +Well, she wasn’t. She had reproached him for being disagreeable. All +right! He reproached her, in his heart, for something a good deal worse +than that. + +It hurt--he would admit it. It hurt like the devil! + + +IV + +Leonard did not telephone home to Marian. After a solitary dinner in a +restaurant, he caught the nine o’clock train. He walked up from the +station at a leisurely pace. He was defying Marian. + +“Just let her start something!” he said to himself. + +The trouble was that she never did start anything. In her way, she was +a pretty decent sort of girl, and patient with Leonard. That winter, +when he had had the flu-- + +If she knew now how he felt! Of course he could not tell her, ever; but +if she did know! She would call him “poor boy,” and would not care how +late he was. + +He stopped in at the Greek confectioner’s and got a box of chocolates. +It would please the foolish woman, and he was rather fond of her. + +As he came down the street, he heard voices from the porch. He concealed +the chocolates in his newspaper. When he entered the house, Marian would +follow him, and then, if she happened to mention that he looked +miserable, he might admit he was, and let her call him “poor boy.” + +“And you’ll get a car,” he heard Aunt Jean say. + +“It certainly would help,” said Evan. + +“Deary, you’ve got to put up a good front. Just you get a bigger house, +and a car, and a maid in a cap and apron to open the door, and the +patients’ll come fast enough!” + +“You’re right!” agreed Evan, heartily. + +“And Marian ought to have a fur coat this winter. Deary, things like +that are an investment!” + +“I shouldn’t know myself in a fur coat,” said Marian, with an unnatural +little laugh. + +“And we’ll travel!” Aunt Jean went on, growing excited. “Go to +California, and all!” + +“Wonderful!” cried Marian. + +“And I’m going to get Leonard to build me a house,” said Aunt Jean. +“He’s a real genius.” + +“He is!” said Marian. + +“And Violet--” + +Leonard could endure no more. All of them eager to take anything they +could get from that poor old soul! Sitting there, discussing plans for +the spending of her money! Even Vi--Vi was going to rent a love nest for +Aunt Jean’s million. + +“Well, Leonard!” greeted Aunt Jean, as he came up the steps. “Sit down! +I bet you’re all tired out after this hot day.” + +“I am,” said Leonard. “I’m sick and tired.” + +“We were just talking about--” + +“I heard you,” Leonard interrupted; “but you can count me out, thanks. I +don’t need any assistance.” + +“But, deary!” + +“No!” said Leonard. “I’m grateful to you, but you’ll have plenty of +others to help you get rid of your money. I’m going--” He paused for a +moment. “I’m going away,” he went on. “I’m going out to California. +After you’ve finished helping everybody in sight, you can come out to +me, any time you like.” + +He went into the house, slamming the screen door behind him. He was sick +of it. He loathed human nature. Knaves and fools! Aunt Jean was one of +the fools, and he was another. + +There were some letters for him on the hall table. He took them into the +sitting room, and flung himself into a chair. He had never felt so tired +and so dispirited in his life. All of them, even Vi! + +He realized now that he had not been a really complete cynic. He had +thought that Evan was a darned fine fellow, making a gallant fight in +the world. He had thought Marian was a rather wonderful girl, loyal and +patient and strong. He had thought that Vi was the pluckiest, dearest +kid. He had had faith in these people. + +But no more! He was a cynic now, all right; and he really was going +away. He had not dreamed of such a thing until he said it, but he meant +it now. He would leave the rest of them to divide poor Aunt Jean’s +million, and, when she was cleaned out, he would look after her. + +He lit a cigarette and lay back in his chair. The room was tranquil and +pretty in the lamplight. The curtains fluttered in the night wind, and +he could smell the honeysuckle outside. This place had been a home for +him. He had believed that he hated it, but he hadn’t. He had loved +it--the neat, airy bedroom upstairs, the porch where the honeysuckle +climbed, the cheerful grin Evan had for him, Marian’s thousand +affectionate little services, and Vi coming and going. + +“They were all right,” he said to himself, forlornly, “until they +smelled money. Well, that’s human nature.” + +But he wanted to get away from human nature as fast as possible. There +would surely be work in California for an expert designer of love nests. +He knew nobody there; he would have no ties. + +Marian entered the room. + +“Excuse me, Leonard,” she said evenly, “but I’ll have to make up the +couch here for Vi. She’s coming out on the nine fifty.” + +“Don’t mind me,” said Leonard. + +Let her be offended! Plain speaking might have helped them; anyhow, they +knew now how he felt about things. He picked up his letters. The first +one was addressed to “Miss Jean La Reine.” He rose. + +“Letter for you, Aunt Jean!” he called. + +“Leonard!” said Marian, in a whisper. “Don’t!” + +He paid no heed. Holding the letter in his hand, he stood waiting until +Aunt Jean came in. + +“A letter?” said she. “My!” She looked at the envelope. “Boys!” she +cried. “It’s from the lawyer! I’m all fluttery!” + +Evan had come in with her, and, to Leonard’s furious disgust, he put his +arm about Aunt Jean. + +“Don’t be fluttery,” he said. “Take it easy! Sit down!” + +She shook her head, and the ready tears came into her eyes. + +“It’s the news,” she said. “Poor Darcy Rose! He was a grand friend to +me!” + +Leonard sat down again, and began to open his letters. He heard Aunt +Jean tear the envelope. + +“Oh, my God!” she cried. + +“Take it easy!” said Evan. “Never mind, Aunt Jean!” + +“Boys!” she cried. + +Her face had grown chalk white beneath the rouge. She looked her years +now. + +“Boys, he never left a cent--for any one.” + +“Never mind, dear!” said Marian. She was kneeling beside Aunt Jean, her +smooth cheek pressed against the raddled old one. + +“After I promised you--all I promised you--” + +“Aunt Jean, dear, we knew.” + +“Knew?” + +“We asked Vi to see the lawyer, weeks ago, because we were afraid, from +the very beginning, that--that you were going to be terribly +disappointed. Poor old Mr. Rose didn’t have anything to leave.” + +“And you let me stay, when you knew?” + +“We only wished you’d never find out, dear. We thought that if you got +used to us, you could be happy to keep on--” + +“A s-silly old woman without a c-cent!” she sobbed. “And all those +plans--that see-dan car for Evan, and the fur coat for you, and a little +holiday this summer! Oh, I wish I was dead!” + +Leonard had risen again. He saw that Evan and Marian were doing more for +the silly old woman without a cent than even a millionairess could have +expected. They had known all the time, all of them--Violet, too. Here +was human nature unmasked at last! + +Leonard had grown as pale as Aunt Jean. + +“Look here!” he said, with a frown. “Aunt Jean, your idea was--to share +with the family. Well, we can manage the car and the fur coat and the +little holiday, all right. I’ve won the competition.” + +“Leonard!” cried a voice from just beyond the doorway. + +He knew it was Violet, but he did not care to look at her just then. + +“Here’s a box of candy,” he said briefly, and turned toward the other +door. + +“Len, old man--” Evan began. + +“Leonard!” cried Marian. “Oh, you splendid boy!” + +“I knew he was a genius!” cried Aunt Jean. + +He could not speak just then. He went into the dining room to escape; +but Violet came after him. He turned and faced her. + +“Vi!” he said. “I’m--I’m sorry.” + +She held out her hand with a friendly smile, but somehow the +friendliness vanished. It turned into another sort of look, such as he +had never yet seen on any face. + +“Vi,” he said, “why didn’t you tell me about Aunt Jean?” + +“I hated to, Leonard. You--you do feel things so. You’d have been so +upset. You have said that life was unjust, and--you’re such an idealist, +Len!” + +“What?” said Leonard. “You think I’m like that?” + +“I--I know it!” replied Vi, with a break in her voice. “You can’t bear +it if everything isn’t perfect. You don’t understand human nature or--” + +“You mean you think I’m a fool,” said Leonard sternly. + +“I do not!” contradicted Vi. “I think--” She tried to get her hand away, +but it was impossible. “Imagine your wanting to give away your money the +moment you get it! I--I think--” + +Leonard was silent for a time, looking at her. + +“Violet,” he said, somberly, “I need some one to look after me.” + +“I’ve always known it!” agreed Violet. + + * * * * * + +“Don’t disturb ’em!” whispered Aunt Jean. “We’re young only once. That’s +just human nature. Deary, what could be sweeter?” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +DECEMBER, 1926 +Vol. LXXXIX NUMBER 3 + + + + +Home Fires + +TEMPERAMENTAL HOUSEKEEPING MAY HAVE ITS DISADVANTAGES, ESPECIALLY IN A +TWO-FAMILY HOUSE + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +It was a long way home, and a lonely way, along a road of frozen mud, +bordered by empty fields and trees stripped bare in the autumn winds. +The short November day was coming to a close, and the fields seemed vast +in the gathering dusk. Only at the top of the hill lingered a streak of +wild, unearthly yellow light, in a sky of flying clouds. + +Bess climbed the hill steadily, her eyes fixed upon that transient +glory; and she repeated to herself bits of poems she had learned in +school: + + “Count that day lost whose low descending sun + Views from thy hand no worthy action done.” + +A most characteristic sentiment! The frosty air had brought a fine color +into her cheeks, and her hair, in the sunset light, shone like copper +where the wind had blown it loose under her tam-o’-shanter. She was a +solitary little figure in a desolate world, but invincibly gallant and +earnest. + +At an early age she had become enamored of Longfellow’s “A Psalm of +Life,” and her diary was prefaced by the quotation: + + Life is real! Life is earnest! + +She had always felt like that. She had been left motherless when she was +a very tiny girl, and the chief influence of her childhood had been that +of her father, a man whom nobody could accuse of undue frivolity. He +believed that life was real, and earnest, and pretty awful--especially +now, when he was a ruined man. + +Bess, however, being only nineteen, could not see things quite as he +did. She was very grave about the situation, and desperately anxious to +help him. Just now she was on her way home from the village post office, +where she had mailed a letter to an old school friend, politely but +firmly refusing an invitation for a week-end. She realized that things +were very bad, but she could not help thinking that they might take a +better turn at any time. + +Her father thought this attitude half-hearted. He was a ruined man, and +he wished to do the thing thoroughly--wished to be completely and +properly a ruined man. He refused to cherish any illusions, any false +hopes. When ruin came, he had sold their old house in Connecticut, and +they had moved into the lower half of a two-family building in a New +Jersey suburb. Bess suffered quite as much as he did from this +uprooting, only she pretended to like it, so that he should not reproach +himself so bitterly. Whenever the least thing went wrong, he would say +in his most hopeless voice that all this was entirely his fault. + +As a matter of fact, it was. He was a professor who had written +philosophic essays, pointing out the pitiful follies of the human race, +and he should have known better than to trust persons who were +enthusiastic about oil wells. He did know better now, but it was too +late. + +Bess had almost reached the top of the hill now, and a ray of the sun, +shining upon a broken bottle, sidetracked her thoughts. It looked like a +piece of ice. + +“I bet there’s skating,” she thought. + +She thought of last winter--only last winter--and of all the girls +skating on the little lake in the school grounds. In her heart there +echoed the sound of their laughing voices, the strange, ringing hum of +skates on ice. She could feel again her own quiet content in the +companionship of her friends, the satisfaction of an orderly and +purposeful life. + +“But all that was just--a preparation,” she said to herself, valiantly. +“This is the real thing. I’m really useful now.” + +She repeated her very favorite verse: + + “Let us then be up and doing, + With a heart for any fate; + Still achieving, still pursuing, + Learn to labor and to wait.” + +That was what she intended to do, certainly. The pursuing and laboring +part was not so hard, but the waiting-- + + +II + +The sound of a car coming along the road made Bess draw to one side. +Very few cars came here, and she was a little curious about it. She +glanced up as it passed, and then stared after it, amazed. + +It was what looked like the wreck of a fine touring car, battered and +scarred, but with an engine that took the steep hill superbly. It was +piled high with household goods. A man was driving it, on the running +board crouched another man, and, perilously balanced upon a table wedged +into the tonneau, there sat a woman. She was laughing, and the +brightness of her face lingered in the girl’s mind. + +As they disappeared over the crest of the hill, a lamp shade fell out of +the car. Bess was hastening forward to retrieve it, but, before she got +there, one of the men appeared. He picked it up, and then something +arrested his attention. + +“Hi! Just come here!” he called, and the two others joined him. + +They all stood there, as if entranced with the view; and Bess, as she +passed them, heard the woman say something about “the austere charm of +all this.” She was somewhat surprised, and very much impressed, to learn +that any one could find charm of any sort in these barren fields, where +great billboards stood, declaring them to be highly desirable building +lots. She felt that she herself should have discovered this charm in the +six weeks she had been here. + +But now she observed something which the others had not seen. They had +their backs turned to the car, which stood halfway down the slope, and +they did not know that it had begun to slip. Bess called an anxious +warning, but they were talking, and did not hear; and the top-heavy car +was slowly gathering momentum. + +“Oh, do look out!” she cried. “It’s running away!” + +It was. Oblivious of brakes, it went careering down the hill, faster and +faster, bumping over the ruts, and flinging out all sorts of things as +it went. The others had heard her, now, and turned, and they all began +rushing after it. + +Too late! Going at great speed, the car smashed squarely into the stump +of a tree, stood up on its hind feet, and threw a great part of its load +over its head. Then it stood still and waited. + +Bess was the first to reach the scene of disaster, and she was dismayed. +There was a little red lacquer cabinet in splinters; there were books +with the pages fluttering away; a china clock was shattered to pieces; +the ground was strewn with wreckage. + +“Oh, what a pity!” she cried. “I’m so sorry! Such pretty things!” + +“Never mind!” said the woman, cheerfully. “Some of them were broken, +anyhow; and I don’t believe in caring too much about _things_, do you?” + +Struck by this philosophic point of view, Bess turned toward the +speaker, and found her still smiling. She was not a pretty woman. She +was small and pale and freckled, and her reddish hair was growing gray; +but that smile offers was a thing rarer than youth or beauty. + +“I _like_ her!” thought Bess. + +The two men had begun to stow the débris into the car in a way that +caused anguish to the girl’s orderly spirit. + +“Have you much farther to go?” she asked anxiously. “Because, if the +things are packed like that, I’m afraid they’ll fall out.” + +“My dear,” said the woman, “I don’t know how far it is. I took the +place, in blind faith, from an agent. It’s No. 9 Edgely Road.” + +“Oh, but that’s right there!” cried Bess, pointing. “That house, where I +live!” + +“A two-family house, isn’t it? Well, my dear, we’re the second family, +then!” said the woman, very much pleased, and she called out joyously: +“Tom Tench! Alan! I’ve found the place!” + +The two men approached. They also seemed surprised and pleased. + +“As if she’d done something very clever,” thought Bess. “Didn’t they +ever expect to find their house?” + +“My dear,” said the woman, “I’m Angelina Smith. This is my brother Alan, +and my cousin, Tom Tench. Boys, imagine! This is the young lady who +lives in the house!” + +Both the men took off their hats and smiled at her. + +“Shall we move the things in now?” asked the cousin, a somewhat portly +young man, in horn-rimmed spectacles. + +“Or will it bother you?” asked Miss Smith. + +Bess was disconcerted to see that they regarded her as a sort of +hostess. + +“Just as you like, of course,” she said. “I--can’t I help you?” + +“No!” replied the brother, promptly. “We can get along all right.” + +Bess glanced at him, but looked away again, hastily. There was something +in his steady, smiling gaze that confused her. He did not look much like +his sister. She was little, and he was tall. Her hair was reddish, and +his was black. He had the same wide, good-humored smile, but somehow it +was different. + +“It’s getting dark,” he said, “and it’s cold. You’d better run home.” + +Bess might have felt a little annoyed by his rather masterful manner, if +she had not noticed, as he moved to pick up a book, that he walked with +a limp; but that disarmed her. She liked him; she liked all of them; +there was something charming and a little pathetic about them. + +“Won’t you all come in and have a cup of tea with us first?” she asked, +strictly upon impulse. + +“My dear!” cried Miss Smith. “How kind of you! We will!” + +And they all followed her to the house, leaving the hapless car just +where it was. + +Bess knocked upon the door, to warn her father. He opened it with the +distressed air of a disturbed hermit. + +“Father,” said Bess, “these are our new neighbors. Miss Smith, my +father, Professor Gayle.” + +Miss Smith held out her hand, and the professor took it. She presented +her cousin and her brother, and they all shook hands gravely. + +“But how cozy!” she exclaimed, looking about her. + +“Ah! Yes! Yes! Yes!” said Professor Gayle. + +“Cozy” seemed a tactful word for that sitting room. When Bess and her +father left their old home, they had brought with them what they had +regarded, at the time, as just a few pieces of their old furniture; but +in this room the things had become too many and too large. + +Bess knew that the crowded room hurt her father not only æsthetically, +but physically. He was a big, gaunt man, very near-sighted, and almost +every time he moved his shins struck some sharp angle, or something +bumped him under the knees. When he made one of his fine, sweeping +gestures--sweeping, it truly was--it carried to the floor all sorts of +things from near-by tables. + +But Miss Smith was entranced. + +“Really a home!” said she. “You know, we all suddenly felt the need of a +home, ourselves, last week. It was at breakfast in the studio. Alan +said, ‘Christmas will soon be here.’ ‘What does Christmas mean to us, +who have no home?’ Tom Tench inquired. ‘Boys,’ I said, ‘you shall have a +home!’ So, you see!” + +“Ah, yes!” said the professor, vaguely. Bess had gone off to make tea, +and he was obliged to entertain the party alone. He scarcely felt equal +to it. “You said ‘studio’?” he continued. “Am I to understand that you +are--er--an artist, Miss Smith?” + +“All of us! I paint, and Tom Tench writes, and Alan designs. We’re very +quiet people,” she assured him. “We shan’t disturb you in the least.” + +“I’m sure,” said the professor, gallantly. + +And he really did feel that, if he must have neighbors, these were +remarkably unobjectionable ones--no children, no dogs, and he fancied +that they were not the sort to possess a loud speaker. + +He was still further encouraged when Tom Tench pulled a book from one of +the shelves, and gave a stern and loud opinion upon it. That was the +kind of thing the professor was accustomed to, and he immediately +pronounced a loud and scholarly contradiction. Then he and Miss Smith +and Tom Tench all began to talk about books. No one of them had any use +for the books praised by the others, but that made it all the more +interesting. + +They did not miss the brother. He had followed Bess into the kitchen, +and he said he wished to help her. She told him that there was really +nothing that he could do, but still he stayed there. He sat on the end +of the table, and talked to her. + +His conversation was not scholarly. He did not talk about books. He +talked about plays, and Bess had never seen anything except a few +Shakespearean dramas. He talked about dancing, and Bess had never +danced, except at school. Her particular friends had been very serious +girls, and her father was invariably serious; she was not accustomed to +frivolous conversation, and she could not answer Mr. Smith. After awhile +he gave up and fell silent. + +That night, after she had gone to bed, Bess lay awake for a time in the +dark. She endeavored to think of the future, and to decide whether she +could study shorthand by mail; but her thinking was unaccountably +disturbed by the memory of that young man, with his steady, smiling +glance and his very insignificant conversation. Somehow, it made her +unhappy. + + +III + +The new neighbors worked late into the night, with a great deal of +noise, and in the morning a van came with more furniture. Bess went +upstairs, to ask if she could help, but Miss Smith thanked her warmly, +said that moving meant nothing at all to her, and invited Bess and her +father to come up and dine with them that evening notwithstanding the +unplaced furniture. + +The professor, to his daughter’s surprise, seemed pleased by the +invitation. + +“It is something of an experience to meet genuine artists,” he said. “It +will do us good. Miss Smith is, I consider, a remarkable woman. I had a +talk with her yesterday, and the extent of her information is great.” + +“She forgot to tell me what time to come,” said Bess; “but if we go up +early--a little before six--perhaps I can help her.” + +When they went up, it might have been a little before six in the +morning, for any sign of dinner to be seen. Miss Smith, in a smock, was +busy drawing; Tom Tench was shut up in his room, writing, and all the +other rooms were in darkness. + +“You won’t mind waiting until I finish this?” she asked. “It’s a design +for a book jacket. It’s not at all what they ordered, and probably they +won’t take it; but it seems criminal to me to stifle a good idea. Tom +Tench won’t be long now. He makes a point of writing at least +twenty-five hundred words a day. He _will_ do that much, even if he’s +not in the mood, and has to tear it all up.” + +“I see!” said Bess, politely. “But, Miss Smith, you’re so busy--please +let me go into the kitchen and get things started for you. I’d really +love to.” + +“My dear, I don’t use the kitchen,” Miss Smith replied, calmly. + +“Don’t use the kitchen!” repeated the dinner guests in unison. + +“Never!” said she. “For busy people like ourselves, housekeeping has to +be reduced to the utmost simplicity. I’ve worked it all out. You’ll see! +The dinner will be prepared here, in this room, before your very eyes. +It won’t take me any time at all.” + +She continued to work, and to entertain them with pleasant conversation +until half past six. Then she rose, and, with a calm and efficient air, +went to a cupboard and brought out a number of electric +appliances--grill, percolator, toaster, and so on--which she placed upon +her cleared work table, and began to attach to the chandelier outlets. + +“Pray let me assist you,” said the professor, greatly distressed by what +he saw, for the plugs were screwed in askew, the cords wildly tangled, +and the chandelier rocking dangerously. + +She smilingly declined assistance, but when her back was turned, he did +what he could for the safety and welfare of the party. + +“But why,” he whispered to his daughter, “does she keep the window open? +It’s a cold night, and I find the draft is becoming most unpleasant.” + +Bess crossed the room to Miss Smith, who was leaning out of the open +window, and once more asked if she couldn’t help her. + +“It’s a l-little imp-provised ice box,” said the hostess, with +chattering teeth. “I nailed it up this morning.” + +To Bess it seemed extraordinary to improvise an ice box outside the +window when there was a genuine one in the kitchen; but she was +beginning to understand Miss Smith, and could not help admiring her +adventurous spirit, which wished to live like _Robinson Crusoe_, always +improvising, if not improving. + +“The meat!” whispered Miss Smith. “It’s frozen fast! I can’t get it off +the plate, or the plate off the shelf!” + +But, alas, she did get her ice box off the nails, and down it went into +the garden below. + +“Never mind, my dear!” she said. “Don’t say anything about it; I’m +always prepared for emergencies.” + +So she closed the window, retired into another room, and came back with +a number of tins. + +“Tom Tench!” she called. “Get ready! Dinner in ten minutes!” + +It was, however, nearly nine o’clock before they dined. Miss Smith had +trouble with her forest of electric cords, and never knew which things +were turned on and which off, so that the concoctions which she believed +to be cooling began to burn directly her back was turned, and the pots +which she was anxiously expecting to boil would be found, after a long +wait, to have been standing upon stoves absolutely cold. + +Young Smith was a model of cheerful patience. He came in cold and +hungry, and uncomplainingly remained cold and hungry for a long time. +The professor was courteously serene through everything, and Bess and +Angelina were unfailingly good-tempered; but Tom Tench was otherwise. He +was silent all through the meal; and, after it had been eaten, and the +ruins hidden behind a screen, he made himself felt. It was then that the +bitter Tench-Gayle feud began. + +“It’s darned cold!” he muttered, in a surly fashion. + +“Bitter weather,” the professor agreed. + +“I mean the _house_ is cold,” said Tench, with a frown. “There’s not +enough heat. The furnace needs looking after. Doesn’t somebody stoke it +up in the evening?” + +Now that furnace was the professor’s _bête noire_. He had not been able +to get a man to look after it, and he had said that he believed he could +do it himself. He was not so sure about it now, though, and this +humiliating knowledge, combined with just resentment at the other’s +tone, caused him to reply with considerable asperity: + +“It might be advisable to put on more coal. Perhaps we might so arrange +that I should attend to it in the morning, and you should see to it--” + +“I?” said Tom Tench. “Not much! I’m a writer. My business is to write, +and I have no time for anything else.” + +“Mr. Tench--” the professor began sternly, but young Smith rose. + +“I’ll have a go at it,” he said, cheerfully, and off he went. + +But it was too late. The harm was done; the feud had started. Tom Tench +strode off and shut himself into his own room, and Miss Smith interested +the professor in a discussion of Hindu myths. She was, Bess thought, the +kindest, the jolliest, the most utterly honest, and unaffected soul who +ever lived, but she could not dispel the sinister cloud that had come +over them. There was tension in the air. + +Mr. Smith did not come back. Bess watched the door and listened for a +footstep, but none came. At last she slipped out, without disturbing the +other two, and went downstairs--not exactly to look for Mr. Smith, of +course; but something might have happened to him. He might have fallen +down the cellar stairs, he might have been overcome by coal gas. + +The lower floor was very quiet. She listened, hesitated for a moment, +and then opened the cellar door. A light was burning down there, but +there was not a sound to be heard. Cautiously she began to descend the +steep stairs--and there she saw the young man, sitting on a box, smoking +a pipe, and reading a very frivolous comic magazine. + +“Oh!” said she. + +He sprang to his feet and came toward her, quickly enough, in spite of +his limp. + +“I’m waiting to see what will happen,” he explained. “I’ve done things +to that furnace!” + +He stood there, smiling up at her, and she felt obliged to smile back at +him, but it was not easy. + +“If he’d rather stay in the cellar,” she thought, “there’s no reason why +he shouldn’t--absolutely no reason. I’m sure--” + +“Look here!” said Mr. Smith, suddenly. “Couldn’t we go into the city to +dinner some evening?” + +A great indignation came over Bess, and a sort of alarm. Young Smith was +not smiling now; he seemed earnest enough--too earnest. Nobody had ever +looked at her like that before. He had preferred to hide in the cellar, +rather than talk to her upstairs; and now, when she had come, merely out +of humanity, to see if he were dead or alive, he misunderstood her. He +thought she was one of those girls who would jump at any invitation, +however casual. He thought she was running after him. + +“Thank you,” she said, frigidly; “but I don’t care for things like +that.” + +Then she turned and went up the stairs. She went into the kitchen and +made a cup of cocoa for her father to drink before he went to bed. + +“I hope I’ve made him see!” she thought. + +Suddenly she was overwhelmed by a recollection of Mr. Smith’s face, +after she had spoken. She remembered him standing there at the foot of +the cellar stairs, with a smudge on his cheek, and such a contrite, +miserable look in his blue eyes. + +“Oh!” she cried. “I’m nothing but a n-nasty little prig!” + + +IV + +The feud over the furnace developed with alarming rapidity. + +“In a house of this sort,” the professor observed severely to his child, +a week later, “which is not adapted to the complete independence of two +families, if the arrangement is to be tolerable, there must be a ready +and harmonious adjustment of the responsibilities. Now this Tench--the +other young man is away most of the time, and it is the natural, just, +and proper thing for this Tench to do his share in taking care of the +furnace.” + +But “this Tench” steadily refused to do anything but write. He never +went near the furnace. Miss Smith pluckily attempted to do his part. +Three or four times a day she descended into the cellar, crammed the +grate with coal, turned on or off whatever little turnable things she +saw, and opened and closed all the doors, with great good will. Not only +was this repugnant to Professor Gayle’s innate chivalry, but it was +dangerous, and he implored so earnestly that finally she desisted, and +the professor did it all. Alone he carried up the ashes, alone he +intrigued with coal dealers. + +When Miss Smith’s reckless management of her electric devices caused a +fuse to blow out--which happened often--Tench simply lighted a lamp. He +didn’t care. + +Then there was the daily battle about the mail. The postman left all +letters for the house with whatever person opened the door, and the +professor, being on the ground floor, was usually that person. Now Tom +Tench had all an author’s morbid attitude about mail. Whenever he +thought a letter should have come, and it had not, he made general +accusations of criminal carelessness. At last he took to walking out to +meet the postman, and then the professor accused him of willful delay in +the transmission of highly important documents. + +But it was in the matter of waste paper that Tom Tench was most +insufferable. He was always bringing down heaps of paper, and stuffing +it into the ash can. On windy days it blew out all over the garden; but +there was a still more serious aspect to this offense. + +“Mr. Tench, sir!” protested the professor. “As you have persistently +shirked your duty in helping me to carry up those ashes, you may not be +aware that sometimes they are hot, and liable to set fire to any +inflammable material placed upon them. Tie your--_rubbish_--into +bundles, if you please, ready for the collector.” + +“No time for that sort of nonsense,” said Tench, and kept on. + +No attempt was made to gloss over this hostility. The professor had not +had a quarrel for years, and it seemed to Bess that he actually enjoyed +this one. He would not make the least effort to avoid Tench. Almost +every evening he went upstairs for a chat with Miss Smith, and his +manner of ignoring Tench was not soothing. + +“Oh, Lord!” Tom Tench would rudely ejaculate. + +Then he would go into his room and bang the door; but he would not stay +there. He would come in and out of the sitting room, with an obnoxious +smile. + +If the two men enjoyed this, however, Bess and Angelina Smith did not. +They had grown very fond of each other, and they said that this +distressing situation did not and should not make the least difference +in their friendship. Angelina held that it was all the fault of her +temperamental cousin, Tom Tench, and that poor Professor Gayle was an +innocent victim: while Bess thought secretly that her father, being +older and wiser, should have avoided such an antagonism. + +“But it does seem a pity,” she said once, “that--your brother has to +suffer for it. He seems to work so hard, and he comes home late, and +half the time the house is freezing cold, or the lights are out, because +they’re squabbling about whose place it is to do things.” + +“Oh, Alan doesn’t mind,” Miss Smith assured her. “He’s the most +good-natured, darling creature! He doesn’t need to work so hard, either. +My dear, he stays late at his office simply because he doesn’t like to +come home. He told me so.” + +Bess decided then that it would be more sensible not to bother about +Mr. Smith, especially if he stayed late in his office simply because he +didn’t want to come home. That meant, of course, that there was no one +in the two-family house he wished to talk to, no one he cared to see. +She had scarcely exchanged a word with him since that brief conversation +on the cellar stairs. Sometimes she saw him from her window, going off +in that dreadful old car, early, before any one else was stirring +upstairs, probably without having had a proper breakfast. At night she +often heard him come in late, to be greeted brightly by his sister, who +never seemed to go to bed. + +To be sure, she had meant to discourage him, and apparently she had +succeeded. Very well--what of it? She had made up her mind to be a +little nicer the next time she talked to him, but evidently there wasn’t +going to be any next time. Again very well--what of it? + +He was Angelina’s brother, and a neighbor, and as such she was obliged, +was she not, to take a human interest in him? She learned that he was a +naval architect, and that he had hurt his foot by falling down a ship’s +hold during a visit of inspection. She also learned that he was the best +brother in the world. She was pleased to hear this, and pleased to think +that that pathetic limp would soon be gone, so that it would no longer +be necessary to feel sorry for him; but she was not going to bother +about him. + + +V + +The week before Christmas was one of terrific activity for Bess and +Angelina, and of unusually bitter hostility between Professor Gayle and +Tom Tench. They were shamefully immune from any sort of Christmas +spirit. + +Indeed, it seemed impossible to arrange any sort of neighborly +celebration. Bess had made mince pies and a plum pudding; Angelina had +painted place cards to be used on the dinner table. They had both +planned all sorts of jolly little Christmas presents, and a Christmas +tree; but where was the gathering to be? Tom Tench refused to set foot +in Professor Gayle’s domain; and though the professor could probably be +induced to go upstairs, who could foresee the consequences? + +Nevertheless, the two dauntless women refused to despair. + +“At the very last instant we’ll find some way to reconcile them,” said +Angelina. “We’ll have a wonderful Christmas--I know it! Let’s walk into +the village this afternoon, and get quantities of holly and mistletoe. +Why, my dear, it’s Christmas Eve! They can’t quarrel to-day. Nobody +could!” + +“They can, though,” said Bess, sadly. “I hear them now, out on the +stairs.” + +“It’s a shame!” said Angelina. “Of course, Tom Tench is _very_ +temperamental, but--my dear, I’m going to have one more talk with him +this evening. Alan talked to him, but he only made it worse.” + +“What did he say?” + +“He said, my dear, that any one who could be boorish and ill tempered +under the same roof as _you_ was a--well, all sorts of things.” + +“Oh! Did he?” said Bess, after a long silence. + +“And he wants us to move away,” Angelina continued. “He says he simply +can’t stand this.” + +“Oh!” said Bess again. + +Something in her voice touched the warm-hearted Angelina. She crossed +the room and put her arm about the younger girl. + +“My dear,” she said, “I’m not going to leave you. I’m much too fond of +you. And--if you don’t mind my saying so--I really do think you need +somebody cheerful here. Alan said it was absolutely my duty to teach you +to laugh. He thinks--” + +“It’s getting late, Angelina,” said Bess. “Let’s start!” + +It was getting late, because Angelina had been suddenly inspired to +finish a drawing after lunch, and it was after three before they set off +for the village. When they had bought all the holly they could carry, +and turned toward home, it was beginning to grow dark. + +It was a bleak and bitter day. The wind was against them now--a savage +wind that brought tears to their eyes. With their heads down against it, +they went along the desolate road, their numb hands clasping the prickly +holly, their numb feet suffering cruelly from the ruts frozen as hard as +iron. + +They came to the foot of the long hill--and how long it looked, that +treeless road, going steeply up to meet the wild, dark sky! + +“It’ll be--better--going down!” Bess shouted against the gale. + +“Much!” cried Angelina. “And--I _love_ Christmas!” + +Bess could have kissed her for those gallant words. The good will she +felt for her companion actually seemed to warm her, and she began the +ascent doggedly. Shoulder to shoulder, on they went, nearer and nearer +to home. They reached the top of the hill, where the wind was incredibly +fierce, and-- + +Angelina dropped her load of holly and seized Bess’s arm. + +“Look!” she cried. “Oh, look! Fire!” + +And there was the two-family house in a horrible, reddish glare! + +Of one accord they started running, battling against the wind. For a +time Bess clung to her armful of holly, because she so hated throwing +things away, but in the end it had to go. Their footsteps rang sharply +on the frozen road. They were breathless and panting, but the world +about them seemed strangely still--no shouts, no hurrying engines, no +audible excitement. The two-family house was burning in solitary and +awful splendor. + +Angelina stumbled to her knees at the foot of the hill, and Bess helped +her up. They heard the soft, rustling sound of flames, mounting +unhindered. + +“Where--is--everybody?” gasped Angelina. “Oh, Bess!” + +They struggled on, and turned in at the gate. The front of the building +was still untouched, and no one was there. They flew along the path to +the back of the house. Two figures were standing there, motionless, +sharply outlined against the red light--Professor Gayle and Tom Tench. + +“Father!” cried Bess, with all the breath she had left. “Can’t you do +_anything_?” + +He answered in a voice that was positively ferocious: + +“No! This is Mr. Tench’s fire. He is responsible, and he alone. His +papers thrown upon the hot ashes--” + +“Tom Tench!” cried Angelina, catching her cousin’s arm and shaking him. +“Do something! This instant!” + +“I won’t!” said he. “The fire started downstairs, on Gayle’s premises, +and it was his business to check it.” + +“It has spread to your premises. Put it out there, and--” + +“You’ll begin,” said Tom Tench. + +“I shall not!” said the professor. “I’ll be--I won’t!” + +And they kept on doing nothing, in spite of the desperate appeals and +entreaties, the wrath and despair, of Angelina and Bess. + +“Then we will!” cried Angelina. + +Followed by Bess, she ran around to the front of the house and up the +steps of the veranda. She was just opening the door when she was seized +by the arm and spun around. + +“I’m here,” said her brother. “Don’t worry!” + +To the surprise and indignation of Bess, the mere fact of her brother’s +being there seemed to reassure Angelina entirely. She sat down on the +rail of the veranda with a sigh of relief. + +“Alan’s very practical!” she observed, with satisfaction. + +But that did not suit Bess. She was not going to leave the fate of all +their household goods in the hands of Mr. Smith. She opened the door and +went in. + +“Come back!” shouted Alan, but she closed the door behind her. + +It was very much worse in there than she had expected. The hall was +thick with smoke that stifled and blinded her. She groped her way toward +the sitting room, with the desperate idea of saving at least an armful +of her father’s precious books; but a few steps were enough. There was +death for her there. Tears were streaming from her smarting eyes, and +every breath was a fiery torment. + +In a panic, she turned back. All she wanted now was to get out, to draw +one breath of cold, clear air; but the room was a trap, overcrowded as +it was with massive furniture. Stumbling and panic-stricken, she turned +this way and that. She could not find the door. She could not get out. +She tripped over something and fell. + +Alan Smith lifted her up. She clung to him in that dreadful, choking +darkness. She felt his strong arm about her, and heard his voice, +cheerful and steady. + +“All right! Don’t worry!” + +“Father’s books!” she whispered. + +And then the smoke came down and shut out all the world. + + +VI + +The village fire apparatus had done its best, and departed, and the +tenants of the two-family house were assembled in the Gayles’s sitting +room, dejected, weary, and silent. Bess lay on the sofa, still weak and +shaken. Angelina was looking over a mass of sodden papers which had once +been a portfolio of drawings, and the professor was helping her. Tom +Tench sat hunched in an armchair, staring gloomily before him. + +The curtains were scorched rags. Through a hole chopped in the ceiling +water was still dripping, and the room was devastated; but the worst +damage had occurred upstairs. The flames from Tom Tench’s papers heaped +upon the ash can had mounted upward, and had caught the curtains at a +window that happened to be open. It was bad enough down here, but +upstairs there was stark ruin. + +“I wonder where Alan is,” said Angelina. “He drove down to the +village--to buy something, I suppose; but it’s so late!” + +“As a matter of fact,” Tom Tench told her curtly, “he went to find a +doctor. He was hurt.” + +“Hurt!” cried Angelina and Bess together. “Hurt!” they repeated. + +“That’s what I said. He hurt himself. He came back in here--in this +jungle--this old curiosity shop--” + +“Mr. Tench!” said the professor. + +“Oh, it’s your room,” said Tench. “If you like it this way--but Alan +fell over one of these antique doodads and cut his head.” + +“Boys!” cried Miss Smith, greatly distressed. “Boys!” + +The professor glanced up. It was a long time since he had been +classified as a boy, and it was pleasing. + +“Miss Smith!” he said. + +Bess sat up straight. Was it possible? The way her father and Miss Smith +were looking at each other! + +“I didn’t mean--” Angelina began, somewhat confused, and then: “But it’s +true!” she said. “You really are--both of you--but there’s Alan!” + +The front door opened, and just at that moment there came from upstairs +the most pathetic, tired little voice. It was the cuckoo clock. + +“Midnight!” cried Alan. “Look here! Merry Christmas, you people!” + +The words might have been a charm, striking every one speechless. They +could only look at him, as he stood in the doorway, a bandage around his +head, his collar a wet and dirty rag, his face white with fatigue and +pain, and a wide grin on it. + +“Oh, Alan!” cried his sister. “My dear, dear boy! Your new set of +plans--for that yacht--they’re burned up!” + +It seemed to Bess that he winced a little, but it was almost +imperceptible. + +“Then we may starve yet,” he said; “but, anyhow, we’re all right for the +present. Look at this!” + +He held out a package that he was carrying. Bess took it from him, and +opened it gingerly. + +“But--” she said. + +“It’s the best sort of plum pudding there is,” he said. “I only wish I +could have got a bigger one. You’ll like it, all right!” + +She stood looking at the round tin in her hands. + +“But I’m afraid,” she said, “it--it must be a mistake. You see, it +says--” She looked up at him, and her eyes filled with tears. It was +_too_ pathetic! His head bandaged, his plans destroyed, his home in +ruins, and now this! “It says ‘corned beef’!” she faltered. + +Then she could bear no more. Taking the corned beef, she ran into the +kitchen, and began to cry there. + +Alan came after her. He put his arm about her shoulders, but, this being +the second time, she did not seem to notice it very much. + +“I am s-so s-sorry!” she wailed. + +“Please don’t be!” he entreated. “Two-family houses are a mistake, +anyhow. I’ve been staying late at the office, trying my hand at +designing a house, for a change. I wish you’d look at the plans!” + +“I think I’ll make some coffee,” said Bess, hastily, moving away. Then +her glance fell again upon the tin of corned beef. + +She looked at him, and their eyes met, and she began to laugh. + +“You little angel!” he cried. “I’ve never seen you do that before!” + +“I’ve just learned,” said Bess, still laughing. + +They had a good deal more to say. They took a very long time in getting +a very simple supper; but nobody tried to hurry them. Nobody seemed at +all impatient. Indeed, when Bess came in with a tray, they all smiled at +her in a new sort of way, as if they, too, had been somehow touched by +her gay young laughter. + +Nothing could have been more festive than that supper of coffee and +corned beef, eaten under a ceiling that still dripped, in a room with a +broken windowpane stuffed with rags, and heaps of charred débris from +upstairs piled in the corners. The wind howled outside, but nobody +cared. + +The professor rose to his feet. + +“This,” he said, “is Christmas Day; and in some respects I may say that +it is a--for me, personally--a merry one. I should like to take this +occasion to say--Mr. Tom Tench, sir, your cousin, Miss Smith, +has--er--shown me an example of--of--” He hesitated for a moment. “Mr. +Tench, sir!” he said. “Your hand!” + +Tom Tench sprang up and took the proffered hand in a vigorous clasp. + +“Gayle!” he said. “Gayle! I--I think I’ll run down and take a look at +that furnace!” + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +JULY, 1927 +Vol. XCI NUMBER 2 + + + + +The Old Ways + +THE STORY OF A YOUNG MAN WHO FELT QUITE SURE THAT HE WAS A CONQUEROR, +BUT WHO CAME TO HAVE SERIOUS DOUBTS ABOUT IT + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +It was bitter bread they had to eat, Mrs. Anders and her daughter. + +“You deaf, hey?” bellowed Oscar Anders. “Don’t you hear that bell, hey? +_No!_ Ingeborg, you stay where you are! Marie, you go!” + +The sight of them standing there, so downcast, filled him with anger. + +“You two dumb ones!” he shouted. “Marie, you go!” + +Mrs. Anders went. Ingeborg turned to the stove again, and lifted the lid +of a saucepan; but she could not see through her tears. From the hall +upstairs she could hear her mother’s voice, faltering out her broken +English; then the front door slammed. Some one else had gone away, +impatient and annoyed, unable to understand her. + +Outside the snow was falling--the first snow Ingeborg had seen. It was +not like the snow her mother had told her there was in Denmark. There +were no sleigh bells here, no dark fir trees to catch and hold a +glittering burden, no blazing fire within. This snow was sorrowful and +faint, vanishing as it touched the pavement, and through it monstrous +trucks thundered by, and people were passing, all hurried, all +strangers, never a familiar face. + +It was growing dark in the basement kitchen. The gas stove burned with a +clear blue flame in its shadowy corner. Mrs. Anders, coming into the +room, was almost invisible, but Oscar saw her. + +“Well?” he demanded. + +She answered him in Danish, and that made him so angry that he banged +down the legs of his tilted chair. + +“Speak American!” he shouted. + +“He don’t vant a r-room,” said Mrs. Anders. “He vent avay.” + +“Yes, and everybody’s going to ‘vent avay,’ if you don’t learn some +sense! I give you your food, and a nice room, and a pair of shoes last +week! A hat, even, for the girl! Everything you take, and bring nothing. +The two of you--_ach, Gott_, so dumb!” + +They said nothing, Mrs. Anders and her daughter. They had to endure +this, and they did endure it. + +“Oscar is a good man,” said Mrs. Anders to herself. “He gives us a +home--that I won’t forget. It is a home for me and Ingeborg.” + +Six months ago her husband had died. The poor man had been ill a long +time, and he left very little. A very bad time that had been, even +though the neighbors had been so kind. Then Oscar Anders, her husband’s +brother, had sent her the fare to New York, and had written that she and +Ingeborg could come to live with him, and maybe could help a little in +the rooming house he had just bought. + +“That was kind,” said Mrs. Anders to herself. “Oscar is a good man.” + +So they had left St. Croix, where Ingeborg had been born, and where Mrs. +Anders had lived for twenty years, and they had come to New York; and +Mrs. Anders had tried to repay Oscar’s kindness. From six in the morning +until perhaps nine at night she worked, keeping the big, old-fashioned +house clean and neat, and cooking meals for Oscar. It was hard work, but +she did not mind that. What she did mind was any contact with the alien +world outside. + +She had led a sheltered life in the West Indies, just with her husband +and his people. She had never troubled to learn English, and now nobody +understood her; and her timid air and poor clothes won very little +patience for her. She was sick with dread when she had to enter a new +shop to buy anything. She would return from one of these expeditions and +shut the door of Oscar’s house behind her with a long sigh of relief. + +Inside the house there were Oscar and the lodgers, all so cross! Well, +let them be; she knew she did not deserve it. She was a respectable +woman, and the mother of Ingeborg, and that was something to be proud +of. Such a neat little woman, too--small and spare, with a long nose and +a thin face with two spots of red on the high cheek bones; but only +Ingeborg looked at her kindly now. Her man was gone, and she had nobody +but Ingeborg, who was still a child to her mother. + +“Oh, thou dear little one!” thought Mrs. Anders, looking at her +daughter. “Thou little Ingeborg--so dear!” + +Ingeborg was making the coffee. Oscar was a good man, but he ought not +to call Ingeborg “dumb.” That was not right. Just think what the girl +could do in the house--so clever and quick at cooking, fine ironing, +sewing, anything you wanted done-- + +“The _bell_!” shouted Oscar. “_Ach, Gott_, she grows deaf now, the dumb +old woman!” + +“_Ach_, I don’t hear dot,” said Mrs. Anders hastily. “I go, Oscar!” + +She hurried up the stairs, whispering to herself the English words she +might need. She opened the front door, and there was another young man. +So many of them came! + +“Room?” he asked curtly. + +“Nice room,” said Mrs. Anders. “Top floor. Seven dollars. I show you.” + +“Seven?” said he. “Well, I’ll take a look.” + +Mrs. Anders had already begun to mount the stairs, and he followed her. +On the top floor she opened a door and showed him a bare little room, +very clean. + +“Seven dollars?” he repeated. + +Mrs. Anders was terribly anxious to let the room, because Oscar said it +was her fault that nobody had taken it yet. Perhaps seven dollars was +too much for it. She knew nothing about such matters; only she did so +want to let it. + +“Ver-ry goot room!” she said, and looked about for advantages to praise. +“Heatness!” she said, touching her worn shoe against the register, from +which came a tepid current of air. “Vater!” And she turned on the tap in +the wash basin. + +Still the young man did not seem impressed. + +“Well, see here,” he said. “What about--” + +The rest of his question Mrs. Anders could not understand. + +“Excoos?” she said, straining every nerve to catch his meaning. She saw +that he was growing impatient. A formidable young man he was, big and +blond, with eyes like blue ice, and a dogged jaw. + +“Vait, plis!” she cried. “Yoost a minoot!” + +“No!” he said, but Mrs. Anders was already hastening down the stairs. + +He called after her, but she paid no attention. Down the last dark +flight she stole, and looked into the kitchen, and behind Oscar’s back +made a signal to her daughter. Ingeborg came out into the passage. They +dared not even whisper, for fear of their tyrant; but Mrs. Anders +pointed up the stairs, and Ingeborg followed her like a shadow. + +The young man had not waited. He had come down into the hall, and was +about to let himself out of the front door, when Ingeborg spoke. + +“Is there something you want to ask about, please?” + +He turned and looked at her. The hall was dim, with only a single gas +jet high overhead, but he could see her well enough. She was small, and +looked very slight in her plain, dark dress. Her dark hair was wound in +braids about her head. Her face was pale and wide-browed, with clear, +dark eyes that looked back at him steadily. A colorless, quiet little +thing; what was there in _her_ to catch at his heart? + +“Yes,” he said curtly. “I wanted to know if I could get my breakfast +here, and what you’d charge.” + +Ingeborg explained the question to her mother in Danish, and then told +the young man: + +“I’ll find out, if you’ll please wait a moment.” + +His blue eyes followed her as she moved away. Then he turned his head +and looked out through the glass of the door. Mrs. Anders watched him, +terribly anxious. + +“Such a fine young man!” she thought. “So tall, and such a beautiful, +rich overcoat! I only hope he’ll take that room!” + +Now there came a great bellowing from downstairs. She could understand +those words. Oscar was angry, and shouting at little Ingeborg. + +“Excoos!” she cried. “Yoost a minoot!” + +“No!” he said with a frown. “Never mind, anyhow--I’ll take the room, +without breakfast. I’ll be back later.” + +He opened the door and let himself out. Mrs. Anders stood in the hall, +with tears in her eyes. She had not understood what he said. She thought +he had gone away, as so many others went away, angry because she was so +dumb. + +As a matter of fact, if the young man was angry with any one, it was +with himself, for his own folly. He ran down the steps and set off along +the street as if he were in a hurry to get away from that house. + +He had to wait at a crossing for the traffic to pass. On the opposite +corner he could see the snow swirling about the street lamp in a little +tumult; and it reminded him of something he had loved when he was a +child. His mother had had a glass ball with a paper landscape in it, and +when the ball was shaken a fierce snowstorm would fill the tiny world +inside it. He remembered it so well, and somehow the thought of it made +him recall other memories of his boyhood days, faint and sad and +beautiful--the jingle of sleigh bells, a glimpse of the lighted window +of a little house among the snow-covered hills, the long hoot of a train +speeding swiftly through the dark. + +He did not want to think of the past. He walked faster, but those +thoughts went along with him, and in them, all the time, was the face of +little Ingeborg. He had never seen her before, yet she seemed familiar +to him, like a figure from his own past, or from a dream. + +That pale face of hers, with its steadfast eyes--it was like a picture +in his old fairy tales of a snow queen, dressed in fur, driving off in a +sleigh shaped like a swan, and looking back sorrowfully over her +shoulder. It was like a face he had seen long, long ago, at some window. +It was the face of the beloved maiden who is always waiting, in every +tale, in every dream--waiting her deliverance. + +Not for him! He would not have it so. He had chosen another road, and +nothing should stop him. What did he care for that girl--a little, +shadowy, humble thing like that? + +He thought of Mabel, with her pearls about her throat, and her red lips, +and he laughed aloud. Who, seeing Mabel, would look again at that other? +Not he! + +He went back to his old room and packed his bag; then he walked over to +a little Italian restaurant for his dinner. He had _minestrone_ and +_ravioli_--queer food for that blond son of vikings; but he was used to +things like that. He had eaten stranger food in more unlikely places--in +Naples, in Calcutta, in Marseilles. He had seen the world--the beauty of +it and the worst of it. + +He took his time over his dinner, and it was nearly nine o’clock when he +ran up the steps of Oscar Anders’s house and rang the bell. Nobody came +to open the door. The young man set down his heavy bag, and frowned +impatiently. He was cold and wet, he was tired, and for some reason he +did not feel happy. He rang again. + +Then she came. She opened the door, and he entered and threw down his +bag. He did not want to look at her, but he could not help seeing her. +She was wearing a white blouse with a funny little plaid bow at the +collar, and a long, dark skirt. She was altogether foreign in those +clothes, with her dark braids about her head, and her subdued +air--foreign, and yet in some way familiar to him, and dear. + +“Well!” he said, with his masterful smile. “Here I am!” + +“Oh, I’m so sorry!” she replied. + +“What about?” + +“My mother didn’t understand you. She thought you weren’t coming back.” + +“I told her I was.” + +“But she doesn’t understand English very well. She thought--I’m so +sorry--but just a little while ago we let the room.” + +“What?” said he. He was angry now. “I should have paid, eh? Somebody +came along with money--” + +“No,” she said. “It was a mistake.” + +“Ingeborg!” shouted a great voice. + +The girl started a little, but she did not turn. + +“I’m very sorry,” she said. + +As she spoke, she looked straight at the young man, and she let him see +that she really was sorry--as if she were his friend, and really anxious +about him. Though she was so young and slight, there was a fine dignity +about her. + +“All right--I don’t care,” he said. “I can find another room.” + +“There’s a telephone here,” she suggested. “You could--” + +“No!” he interrupted roughly. + +“Ingeborg!” shouted the voice again. From the basement stairs there +appeared a great, fierce old head with grizzled brows and mustache. +“You!” cried Oscar. “What you doing here, hey? Who’s this?” + +“He came to see about a room,” said Ingeborg. + +“Well, we have no room for him.” + +“All right! Your daughter just told me--” + +“Daughter? She’s no daughter of mine. You, Ingeborg, get downstairs! +When there comes a man, you shall call your mother. You hear me? Get +downstairs!” + +The girl turned away, toward the stairs; and at sight of her mute +submission a great anger rose in the young man. Not even a glance over +her shoulder for him, not a smile at that old bully! She was just one of +those foreign girls, with no pride. + + +II + +He went out of the house, banging the door behind him. No pride--what +was a woman without pride? If she set no value on herself, how was a man +to hold her dear? + +He thought of Mabel, of all the American girls he had known. There was +not one among them who would have bent her head humbly to that old +fellow--not one; only this Ingeborg, this little alien with the dark +braids about her head. + +Halfway down the street he remembered his bag. He turned and strode +back, ran up the steps, and rang the bell violently. Perhaps she would +come again. What did he care? + +But it was Oscar who opened the door. + +“My bag!” said the young man. + +“Well, there it is,” said Oscar. “In this house we are not thieves.” + +The young man took up the bag, and for a moment the two of them looked +at each other. + +“So was I a fine fellow when I was young,” thought Oscar. Aloud he said, +with a sort of mildness: “Too bad that that dumb one didn’t keep you +your room! If you had come to _me_, it would have been different.” + +“A nice thing for me!” said the young man. “A night like this--and I +gave up my old room. A fellow I know told me to come here--name of +Nielsen.” + +“Nielsen?” repeated Oscar, staring thoughtfully at him. “Well, maybe I +find something. One room I have, but that’s not for a young fellow like +you--a fine room, with a piano in it. Maybe I let you have that room for +one night at the price of the other, because that dumb one--” + +“Oh, I’ll pay you for your fine room with a piano!” interrupted the +young man. “You can charge what you like--I don’t care!” + +Oscar Anders accepted the challenge. + +“Pay nothing at all--I don’t care!” he said. + +He threw open the door of the fine room, the front parlor, and lit the +gas. + +“Make yourself at home,” he said carelessly; for he would not let the +fellow see how much he thought of this parlor. + +The young man brought out a wallet, and again he and Oscar looked at +each other; and there was the same pride in both of them. + +“What’s your name, hey?” asked Oscar. + +“My name? Jespersen’s my name.” + +Oscar began to laugh. + +“Jespersen you call it?” he said. “Yespersen, I guess! That’s a name +from the old country.” + +“Well, I’m not from the old country. I was born here.” + +Oscar spoke to him in Danish. + +“Forget it!” said Jespersen curtly. + +“That’s right!” agreed Oscar. “I’m an American, too.” + +“Oh, you’re a squarehead!” said Jespersen. + +They both laughed at that. They sat down on two slender chairs covered +with faded tapestry, and began to smoke in the dim and chilly parlor. + +“Gunnar Jespersen--that’s my name,” said the young man. “My father was a +Dane and my mother was Swedish, but I was born here.” + +“Twenty-five years I am here,” said Oscar slowly. “It is a good country, +but some of the old ways are good, too.” He smoked for awhile in +silence. “You been a sailor,” he remarked, looking at the other’s hand, +with an anchor tattooed on its back. + +Gunnar did not answer that. + +“Better for me if I were a sailor now!” he thought. + +For there would come across him, without warning in these days, terrible +fits of bitterness and gloom. At the bottom of his soul there was a +stern austerity, born in him and bred in him. He could laugh as much as +he liked, he could swagger in his triumph, but in his soul he was sick +and ashamed. + +What was it that he had done? + +Six months ago he had been at Long Beach, strolling along the sands, in +his best shore clothes. He had been all alone, but he didn’t mind that. +There was plenty to look at. Now and then some girl would smile at him, +and he would smile back scornfully and go on his way. + +And then he had met Mabel. At first he could not believe that it was he +that she was looking at like that, out of the corners of her long black +eyes. Heaven knows Gunnar was proud enough, but he could hardly believe +that. The way she was dressed! The air she had! + +She was with another girl, and it was the other girl who had dropped her +purse almost at Gunnar’s feet. He had picked it up, and had spoken to +them arrogantly; but the more curt and scornful he was, the more did +Mabel smile on him, she with her pearls and her gloves and her drawling +voice. Ignoring her friend, she had walked close beside Gunnar. + +“It’s a shame,” she had said, “for you to be just a sailor!” + +That made him angry. He was studying navigation, he was going to take an +examination and get his mate’s ticket, and some day he would be master +of a ship. + +“My father’s the superintendent of a factory,” she said. “I know he’ll +give you a job.” + +“I don’t want any more jobs,” declared Gunnar. + +But, all the same, he went to her father the next day, and he did get a +job, and after two months he was made foreman. Now he had a little car +of his own, and two suits of clothes, and a fine watch. He was making +good money, and he wanted more. He had never thought much about money +until he met Mabel. + +Sometimes she came to the factory to drive her father home, and always +she stopped to talk to Gunnar. She didn’t care how much the men stared. + +“Gunnar,” she said one day, “I want you to come to the house to dinner.” + +“Not me!” said Gunnar. + +But he went, and he could not forget it. In the factory, grimy, in his +rough work clothes, he would remember how he had sat at table in their +fine house that night, with the girl opposite him, in a glittering +low-cut dress, and her mother and father making much of him. They wanted +him for their girl--he knew that. They would help him along in the +world, for her sake, and to his ruin--he knew that, too. + +For she waked everything that was worst in him. Sometimes in his heart +he called her a devil, yet he could not escape from her. Waking and +sleeping, his one dream was to conquer her, to make more money, to have +a house such as she lived in, to have a place in her world, and to be +his own master in it. + + +III + +“Well, Gunnar Jespersen,” said Oscar, getting up, “your breakfast you +can have downstairs at seven o’clock.” + +“Good night!” returned Gunnar briefly. + +But he did not have a good night in that fine room with a piano in it. + +He got up early the next morning--too early. With the shades pulled down +and the gas lighted, the parlor had a jaded look, as if it were tired +and sullen, like himself. He dressed and went out into the hall, and +downstairs to the basement. + +At the kitchen door he stopped and looked in, and there he saw Ingeborg +cooking the breakfast. She was as neat as a pin in her dark dress and +white apron, and with her smooth coronet of braids. She was pale, and +her eyes were red from weeping. A sad, quiet little thing she was, but +so dear to him, all in a moment! How good she was, he thought, like a +dear little angel! If only he could turn to her as his refuge! + +He saw everything so clearly now. Here was his good angel, to save his +soul from ruin. He had terrible need of her, of her goodness and +gentleness and patience. + +He went into the room. She turned at his footstep, and he came close to +her and stood before her, looking down into her face. Her eyes, shining +with clear truth, were lifted to his, but she did not smile. It was as +if she knew how desperate was his case. + +“Ingeborg!” he said, very low. “Dear little thing!” + +She turned away her head, and a faint color rose in her cheeks. + +“Such nice herrings for your breakfast!” she said. + +It was part of her blessedness that she could think of things like +that--safe and homely things. She was the innocent little handmaiden, +destined to make a home for his stormy spirit. He caught both her hands. + +“Look at me!” he commanded. + +But she shook her head, confused and smiling. + +“Ingeborg!” he began, but just then there came a stamping and a great +voice calling out: + +“Hey! You Ingeborg! I’m ready!” + +She ran to the stove and looked into the coffeepot. Then she began to +put the breakfast on the table, and Oscar and Gunnar sat down together. + +“I’ll keep the room,” said Gunnar. + +“That room’s for a married couple,” objected Oscar, “not for a young +fellow like you.” + +“I can pay for it,” said Gunnar. + +“I guess you want to play on that piano!” cried Oscar, with a shout of +laughter, and Gunnar laughed, too, because he was happy. + +The sun was up when he left for his work. It was a sharp March morning, +with a wind that blew the sky clear and clean. + +“The spring is coming,” thought Gunnar. “On Sunday, if it’s a nice day, +maybe I’ll get out my car and take Ingeborg for a ride.” + +He thought about that with a masterful joy. She was a little angel, but +she was human enough to falter beneath his bold gaze. He was a conqueror +again. + +It was late in the afternoon when Mabel came in. She came like a queen, +for wasn’t she the daughter of the superintendent? She beckoned to +Gunnar with her gloved hand, and he left his work and came to her; but +not like a subject to a queen. He stood before her with his blue shirt +open at the neck, his fair hair damp with sweat, his hands blackened, +but he was as cool and easy as she. + +They stood apart in the great room that trembled and throbbed with the +beat of machinery, and the men looked at them sidelong; but she was not +abashed. She could do as she pleased. + +“Gunnar,” she said, “I’ll wait for you by the bridge and drive you part +of the way home.” + +“You’ll have a nice long wait, then,” said Gunnar. “I won’t be finished +here for another hour.” + +“Perhaps they can manage to get on without you, if you leave a little +early,” she suggested with a slow smile. + +“Maybe they could,” said Gunnar; “but I’m not coming.” + +It was just this insolence that she liked in Gunnar. It was a challenge +to her. + +“I want to talk to you, Gunnar,” she told him. + +“There’s a rush order to get out,” replied Gunnar, “and I can’t leave +early.” + +At any cost she had to humble him--at any cost! + +“Gunnar,” she said, “after all, if it wasn’t for me--” + +“Some day I’ll pay you what I owe you,” he interrupted. + +They looked steadily at each other. + +“You’re a fool!” she said. “If it wasn’t for me, you wouldn’t be here at +all.” + +Gunnar laughed. + +“Do you think I’d starve if I wasn’t here?” he said. + +She wished it were like that. She wished she had the power of life and +death over him. She _would_ conquer him! + +She was silent for a moment, thinking how she could do it. He watched +her; and, for all his scorn, his heart beat fast at the sight of her +vivid beauty. She was a tall girl, thin, with a dark, narrow face, +rouged and powdered, her cruel mouth reddened. She was dressed in a fur +coat and high-heeled shoes, with her pearls about her neck. She was for +him the very symbol of the new world of money that he so fiercely +desired. + +“Gunnar!” she said. + +“Well?” returned Gunnar. + +She was not looking at him now. + +“Sunday evening I’m going to be all alone.” + +A sort of fear seized them both, for they saw a crisis coming near. +Either she must win or he must win. + +“What about it?” asked Gunnar. + +“You can telephone me on Sunday afternoon,” she said, “if you want to +come.” + +“Well, I don’t,” declared Gunnar. + +She smiled, but it was a queer smile, and she said nothing. Perhaps she +herself did not know what she meant. + +Gunnar spun around on his heel and went back to his work. + +“Let her wait!” he thought, and laughed aloud. “Here, you, Kelly! Get on +the job there!” + +He slept well that night, and the next morning, when he came down into +the kitchen, he was swaggering a little. Mrs. Anders was there, and he +had no chance to talk to Ingeborg; but he looked straight into the +girl’s face, and she smiled at him. + +“I’ll marry her!” he thought. “Yes, that’s what I’ll do!” + +“What you laughing about?” asked Mrs. Anders. + +“Oh, nothing!” said Gunnar. + +As a matter of fact, he was laughing at the idea of his getting married. +Gunnar Jespersen a married man! It was funny, but it made him very +happy. + +“Such a fine young man!” thought Mrs. Anders. “The best room in the +house he takes. He must be rich; and so handsome and strong, and his +people from the old country! If there should be a man like that for the +little Ingeborg--” + + +IV + +The next morning was Sunday. Gunnar took his bath, put on his Sunday +clothes, and came down into the kitchen, smiling with a secret +happiness. It was a mild, bright day; he was going to get his car and +take Ingeborg for a drive. + +All morning he was busy in the garage where his sedan had been stored +for the winter. Then he took off his overalls, scrubbed his hands, got +some lunch in a dairy, and drove to the house. He let himself in with +his latchkey, and went downstairs to the basement. In the kitchen Oscar +was sitting alone, reading the newspaper. Not caring to disturb him, +Gunnar went quietly away, looking for Ingeborg. He heard Mrs. Anders +down in the cellar, shaking up the furnace. + +Going upstairs again, in the front hall he stopped to listen, and he +heard quick little footsteps overhead. He ran up the stairs to the next +floor, and there he found Ingeborg, carrying a pile of clean towels. + +“I’ve brought my car,” he announced. “I’m going to take you out.” + +“Oh!” said Ingeborg. + +“Come on!” said Gunnar. “Get your hat and coat. There’s a heater in my +car.” + +“I’ve got to ask Uncle Oscar--” + +“No, you haven’t,” interrupted Gunnar. “None of his business! You’re +working all the time. You can go out on Sunday afternoon if you like.” + +“I can’t go without asking.” + +He was not angry now at her old-fashioned, foreign ways. Indeed, they +pleased him. + +“Well, I’ll ask your uncle,” he said. + +He went down into the basement, but before he got to the kitchen he +passed the open door of Ingeborg’s dark little room, and in there he saw +her hat and coat lying on the bed. + +“He might say no, that old squarehead,” thought Gunnar; so he took the +hat and coat, and ran upstairs again. “It’s all right,” he assured the +girl. + +If there was a row when they got home, he didn’t care. By that time he +would have told Ingeborg that they were going to be married, and Oscar +could say what he liked. + +Ingeborg did not doubt his assurance. She put on her hat and coat, there +in the hall. + +“I don’t look so very nice,” she said. + +“You’ll do,” replied Gunnar. + +He could have caught her in his arms that moment, she was so dear and so +funny in that hat and coat! + +“When we get married,” he thought, “I’ll buy new clothes for +her--stylish clothes. She’s pretty--prettier than any one else.” + +He was in a hurry to get her out of the house, before any one could stop +them. + +“Hurry up!” he said. + +She got into the car beside him, and they set off. + +“Oh, how fast you go!” she said. + +“Haven’t you ever been in a car before?” asked Gunnar. + +“Oh, yes--Uncle Oscar brought us from the ship in a taxicab.” + +“This is my own car,” said Gunnar. “In the summer I use it every day.” + +He knew where he wanted to go--out of the city, and across the bridge to +Long Island. It was not a pleasant neighborhood, but the rush of wind +against her face, and Gunnar beside her, made her heart sing. He turned +down a street gloomy and empty, lined with shuttered warehouses, and at +the end of it he stopped the car. + +“Here!” he said. “This is where I work.” + +“Oh, what a big place!” said Ingeborg. + +“I’m a foreman,” said Gunnar. + +Then, even as he spoke, he saw what was going to happen. If he married +Ingeborg, he wouldn’t be a foreman much longer. Mabel would see to that. +He would lose his job. He would have to give up his car, give up the +fine room, the good money. He could find another job in another factory, +but not as foreman. That wasn’t so easy. He would have to go to work +under another man. + +For a time he sat staring before him, his blue eyes grown hard. He had +not thought of this before. To give up so much, and of his own free +will! He was terribly downcast. + +Then Ingeborg stirred beside him, and he turned to her with a queer +look. His eyes were narrowed; he stared and stared at her. She glanced +at him, and then, with an uncertain little smile, bent her head. There +she sat, with her small hands folded--patient, a little confused; and +she was so dear to him--dearer than anything else in the world! He was +glad to give up all these things for her. He would give his life for +her, his beloved maiden, his little angel! + +He looked up and down the empty street. There was no one in sight. He +caught her in his arms, held her tight, and kissed her pale cheek. + +“Don’t!” she cried. + +He paid no attention to that. He laughed, because he was so proud and so +happy; and, putting his hand under her chin, he turned her head and +kissed her mouth. + +“You’re my girl!” he said. + +“Gunnar Jespersen!” she said. “How dare you treat me like this?” + +Her eyes were looking into his, and he was astounded by the stern anger +in them. She was not gentle now, not patient. Such a hot color there was +in her cheeks, such a light in her eyes! + +“Dare?” said Gunnar. “Do you think I’m afraid of you?” + +But he let her go; for he was afraid, and ashamed, and terribly hurt. + +“Gunnar Jespersen!” she said. “Take me home!” + +“You came out with me quick enough,” argued Gunnar. + +“Take me home!” repeated Ingeborg. + +“You can’t talk to me like that,” said Gunnar. “I’ll go when I’m ready.” + +But, just the same, he had to obey her. He turned the car and started +back. He was sick to the soul with shame and disappointment. He had +offered her everything, and she returned him only scorn and anger. Never +before in his life had any woman been able to hurt him so. Whether it +was anger or pure sorrow that he felt, he did not know; but it seemed to +him that he could not endure it. + +He wanted to say something that would hurt her; but when he looked at +her, he could not. She had grown pale again, and sat very straight, +looking before her, so stern and cold, and still dear to him. He could +not endure it. + +He stopped the car before a drug store. + +“Going to telephone,” he said. + +When he came out again, he felt that he had paid her back. + +“You’re not the only one. If you don’t want me, all right! There’s +somebody else that wants me--somebody who’s rich, with a fine house, and +pearls. What do I care for _you_?” + +In his heart he said this to Ingeborg, but not aloud. He dared not. For +all his great anger against her, there was something in her, some +strange dignity and power, that checked him. + +He took her to the corner of his street. + +“All right!” he said. “Now I’m going somewhere else.” + +He did not want to look at her again, but, as she walked off, he had to +look. There she went, so slender and little, so unattainable! + +“What have I done, anyhow?” he asked himself, with a sort of amazement. + +He did not know, and yet a terrible sense of guilt oppressed him; and +because he would not be humbled, not by any human creature, not by his +own soul, he would go to Mabel. He was reckless now. + +Unfortunately, Mabel would not be expecting him for several hours. He +drove about at random. At first he made up his mind that he would never +go back to the house where Ingeborg was. Never mind about the clothes he +had there! Let them go--what did he care? + +As the dusk came, and his bitterness still grew, he changed his mind and +turned back there. He was going to tell Ingeborg, going to tell all of +them. He wanted to do some reckless, arrogant thing, to show them what a +fellow he was. + +The most extraordinary ideas came into his head. He thought that perhaps +he would go down into the basement and tell Oscar that he wanted to buy +that piano. He must do something to show them, and something to give +rest to his inexplicable pain. + +He strode up the steps, unlocked the door, and opened it with a violence +that sent it crashing back against the wall. What did he care if he +broke it? He could pay for it. + +As he entered, a shadowy little form came up the stairs. + +“_Ach, Gott_, what have you done?” whispered Mrs. Anders. + +He closed the door and stood leaning against it. + +“What d’you mean?” he asked. + +She spoke to him rapidly in Danish, but he had long ago forgotten the +language of his fathers. + +“Speak English!” he said. “I don’t understand that stuff.” + +“_Ach_, what a spectacle!” said Mrs. Anders. “Her Uncle Oscar, he finds +she is vent out, and she will not say who vas it. _Ach_, so mad is he!” +She wiped her eyes on her apron. “It is a badness dat you do so, Gunnar +Jespersen!” + +He wanted to laugh, but he could not. Something of the same fear he had +felt for Ingeborg he felt now for Mrs. Anders--the mystic reverence for +a good woman that was in his soul. + +“Well, I’ll tell the old squarehead,” he said. “What’s the harm if she +does go out with a fellow?” + +“Hush!” said Mrs. Anders sternly. “It is a badness when you speak so of +the Uncle Oscar. He is a goot man. He gifs us a home.” + +Gunnar had to understand that, for in his own heart there was an echo of +that simple fidelity. Let him try to laugh if he would, the old +austerities were deathless in him. He stood before a good woman, and he +was abashed. + +He thought no more of going boastfully and arrogantly to Oscar Anders. +Anders was the master of this house, as Gunnar’s father had been master +of his. He was not to be affronted. + +“Where’s Ingeborg?” asked Gunnar, speaking very low. + +“You shall not tr-rouble my Ingeborg!” said Mrs. Anders. + +“I can speak to her, can’t I?” he inquired sullenly. + +Mrs. Anders looked at him in silence for a time. + +“She sits up on the stairs,” she said. “Her Uncle Oscar is too mad, so +he yells that she cannot come downstairs for it.” + +Gunnar set his foot on the lowest stair. He did not want to go to +Ingeborg. What had he to say to her? But he had to go. He went +unwillingly, slowly. + +“Well, what have I done, anyhow?” he asked himself. + + +V + +Up at the top of the house he found Ingeborg sitting on the stairs, in +the twilight. She was leaning her head against the wall, and her hands +were folded in her lap. He stood looking down at her for a long while, +but she paid no heed to him. + +“Well!” he said, with a rough affectation of carelessness. “What you +doing here?” + +“Nothing,” she answered coldly. + +Pain came over him like a wave, because of that coldness. + +“Ingeborg,” he said, “what makes you so mad at me?” + +“Go away, please! I don’t want to talk to you.” + +He could see her only dimly, and he dared not go a step nearer to her, +or even stretch out his hand. + +“Ingeborg,” he said, “if I told you I was sorry--” + +Such an effort it was to say that! + +“It wouldn’t make any difference,” said she. + +“What?” cried Gunnar. “If I’m sorry?” + +“No!” said Ingeborg. + +It was like a blow to him. He could not speak for a time. He had humbled +himself again, and still she was cold and stern--and still so dear to +him! + +“She’s right!” he cried, in his heart. “If she knew--” + +Suppose she did know? He was ready to believe that her clear and +innocent glance had a terrible penetration. He could not understand her. +Perhaps, in some way of her own, she did know all the wrong things he +had done. + +“Ingeborg!” he cried. “I--I’m sorry I did that! I--” + +Despair and pain choked him. In his blind need for her kindness, he came +close to her, sat down on the step below her, and buried his head in his +hands. + +“If you would marry me, Ingeborg,” he said, “then I’d be different!” + +“Marry you?” she said. “Do you think I am like that? Do you think I +would marry the first man who comes along? Why, I don’t even know you, +Gunnar Jespersen!” + +“Ingeborg!” he said. + +And that was all he could say. He could not tell her what he meant--that +for her sake he would give up all his pride, that for her sake he was +sick and ashamed. All he could do was to speak her name. + +She made no answer. He waited and waited for even one word, but in vain. + +“Are you--mad at me, Ingeborg?” he asked unsteadily. + +“No,” replied Ingeborg quietly. + +He sat up abruptly. + +“I think I’ll--lose my job,” he said. “Maybe I’ll have to go away.” He +thought that somehow she would understand all that he meant by that, all +that he renounced. “If I have to go away somewhere, to get a job,” he +went on, “promise not to marry some other fellow!” + +“I don’t want to marry any one, Gunnar Jespersen.” + +“Just promise to wait!” + +“No!” she said; but her voice was not cold now. + +“Ingeborg!” he cried. “Do you like me?” + +“I don’t know you, Gunnar Jespersen,” said Ingeborg with dignity. + +He rose, chilled and hopeless. + +“Well,” he said, “I’m going.” + +Her clear little voice came to him through the dark: + +“Maybe I will like you when I know you, Gunnar Jespersen!” + +He spun around. She had risen, and was standing close to him. He put out +his hand, but she drew back, and his arm fell to his side. He must not +touch her. He must wait. She had given him hope, and that was all. + +And it was enough. He had found at last the beloved maiden who must be +won. It would be hard, but it was good; it was what he wanted. It was a +challenge worthy of him. + +“All right!” he said. “You’ll see!” + +He ran down the stairs again, and his heart was light now. He was so +proud of the little Ingeborg who made him wait! + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +AUGUST, 1927 +Vol. XCI NUMBER 3 + + + + +By the Light of Day + +THE STORY OF A MAN WHO WANTED LIFE TO BRING HIM SOMETHING MUCH FINER AND +BETTER THAN THE COMMONPLACE THINGS IT BRINGS TO OTHER MEN + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +Kirby lay stretched out on the sand, watching the driftwood fire he had +built. The flame mounted steadily, this quiet night, sending out over +the dark water a trembling path of ruddy light. Now and then a little +rain of sparks fell, to die at once in the thick sand; and overhead a +young moon swam, clear silver, in a sky without clouds. + +He might have been alone on a desert island. Before him lay the calm +summer sea, and all about him stretched the flat and empty beach. He +liked this blank solitude--indeed, he needed it. + +The tiny thread of smoke from his cigarette rose beside the column of +smoke from the fire, like a sturdily independent spirit. His thoughts, +too, were aloof, detached from the insistent current of other people’s +thoughts. + +He had received a substantial rise in salary that morning. + +“Now you ought to think about getting married,” his sister had said, not +for the first time. + +He was thinking about it, but in a way that would have dismayed her. She +was always introducing him to “nice girls,” and growing a little annoyed +with him because of his indifference. + +“I don’t see what fault you can find with _her_!” she would say, as if +one of the “nice girls” was as good as another; and, in her heart, that +was what she did think. She wanted only to see Kirby married and in a +home of his own. + +He kept his own counsel, for it was no use trying to tell his sister. +Let her go on trying to snare him, to capture him, to bind him tight to +the life that he so utterly rejected! He had seen it happen to other +fellows he knew. He had watched them fall in love, get married, and set +up homes of their own, and had seen them grow harassed, preoccupied, +sometimes bitter. There was his brother-in-law, for instance, +complaining about the bills, talking of giving up his club, guilty and +apologetic if he came in late. It was supposed to be comic, all this +sort of thing, but Kirby did not see it so. + +“If there’s nothing better than that--” he thought. + +When he was younger he had been sure that there was something better. In +books, in operas, in plays, he had caught the echo of a sublime thing, +and he had believed that it was every man’s birthright--a love +passionate and honest and beyond measure generous. He had meant to wait +for it; but, as he grew older, his faith died. + +He did not see any such thing in actual life. He saw, instead, love that +began beautifully and honestly, but ended in a suburban home and a +thousand ignoble worries; and he would have none of that. If there was +nothing better, then he would do without. He was doing well in business, +and he would keep on doing better and better, and that would have to be +enough. + +He threw away his cigarette, clasped his hands under his head, and lay +looking at the stars. Here on this beach, as a boy, he had played +intensely serious games of Indians and pirates, always with a fire like +this. Even now he could recapture something of the old thrill of wonder +and expectancy, the feeling he had had that marvelous things were surely +going to happen. + +Well, they never had. Here he was, twenty-six, and assistant manager of +the accounting department of a machine belting company; a quiet, +competent young fellow with an air of businesslike reserve that +disguised the moods of his exacting and sensitive spirit. He went to the +office every day, he worked, he came home, he met those “nice girls.” He +talked to them and danced with them, and sometimes made love to them a +little, out of politeness; and that was all there was. + +And it wasn’t enough. Out here, in the summer night, his restlessness +grew intolerable. He wanted so much more--something stirring and lovely, +something that would give to his work and his life a fine significance. +So much more! + +“I’d better go back now,” he thought, and tried to pretend that this was +a concession to his sister. But it was not; it was because he had grown +too lonely. He got up, and was about to kick out the fire, to scatter it +and stamp it out, when, far down the beach, he saw a little white figure +coming toward him. + +He stood still, curiously intent. He had grown to think that this was +his own private territory, for hardly any one else came here, especially +after dark; yet here was this little thing coming on resolutely. + +It was a girl in a white dress--he could see that now. Her step made no +sound upon the sand. There was no breeze to flutter her skirts. She was +like a wraith, silent and dim. + +Then, to his surprise, she turned directly toward him. There was a rise +in the beach here, up from the edge of the sea, and she mounted it +briskly. + +“Excuse me,” she said, in a serious little voice. “I just wanted to see +the time.” + +Stretching out her arm toward the fire, she looked at her wrist watch. + +“You’ll have to come nearer,” Kirby told her. “I’m sorry, but mine’s +stopped.” + +But she stood where she was. + +“I saw your fire,” she said. “I’ve been watching it as I came along. I +do love fires on a beach!” + +“Yes?” returned Kirby vaguely. + +Her confident and friendly manner disconcerted him. He had never +encountered a girl like this. There was something unreal about her, +walking out of the dark, up to his fire, and beginning at once to talk +to him, as if she knew and trusted him. + +“Won’t you sit down for a little while?” he asked, a little doubtfully. + +“Thank you,” she answered promptly, and, coming nearer, sat down on the +sand, facing the sea. + +“She ought to know better,” thought Kirby. “She can’t know what sort of +fellow I might be.” + +He stood behind her, looking down at her. The firelight behind her threw +her slight figure, sitting with her hands clasped about her knees, into +sharp relief, but her face he could not see at all. + +“Do you know,” she said earnestly, “that pirates used to come here?” + +“Pirates?” he echoed. + +“Yes!” she said. “I read about it in a book from the library; and last +summer I _think_ I found a pirate’s earring. Auntie said it was a +curtain ring, but perhaps it wasn’t.” + +An odd thrill ran through Kirby. Pirates! Easy to imagine them, on just +such a night as this, landing in the cove below the rocks--swarthy, evil +men, creeping up inch by inch, with knives between their teeth. They +would leap upon him suddenly; there would be a desperate fight in the +glare of the fire. Then the pirate chief would carry away the girl, and +Kirby, the hero, would somehow escape from his bonds and swim after +them, and save her. + +She would know exactly how to behave in such circumstances, he felt +sure. He felt sure, too, that if he were to suggest that they should +“make believe” there were pirates here, she would immediately and +seriously agree. She was like a little girl, like some playmate from his +lost youth. In some queer way of her own she evoked for him the glamour +of childhood--she and her pirate’s earring! + +He sat down beside her, and they began to talk. It no longer seemed to +him a foolish and imprudent thing that she should have come to him like +this. She had the unthinking independence that children have. She would +go where she chose, and, if she was startled or distrustful, she would +run away. + +It made him happy that she should be here, this friendly little thing +with her pretty voice. + +“The fire’s getting low!” she cried. + +Springing up, she gathered an armful of wood to put on it. So did he, +and they stood side by side, throwing in the sticks with nice care. The +flames leaped up, and he saw her face--a small, pointed face framed in +dark hair, which floated in silky threads, and lit up by big, shining +dark eyes. It was like a face in a dream, so lovely that it almost took +his breath away. + +She sat down again, her head a little turned away from the blaze, and he +could no longer see her face; but he remembered it. It was there before +him in the dark, in all its vivid loveliness. He could not think of her +as a playmate now. The magic evocation of childhood was gone; he was a +man, and she was a young and beautiful woman. His content, his +happiness, had vanished. He was troubled, almost dismayed. + +“I’ve never seen any one like her!” he thought. “I didn’t know there +_was_ any one like her; and for her to come to me like this!” + +After all, wasn’t it what he had been waiting for, just this glimpse of +a lovely face, this clear and steady little voice in the dark, this +utterly unexpected encounter in the firelight on the lonely beach? + +She was still talking to him, with a sort of eagerness, but he scarcely +listened now. It seemed to him that her voice had changed. Indeed, he +could not hear or see her now. The fire was dying down, and she was no +more than a little silhouette against the starlit sky; but in her place +there was another--some one very beautiful and almost august, like the +young Diana come to earth. The innocence and candor of her were sublime; +she was fearless, of course, just as she was beautiful. + +Kirby did not realize how long he had been silent, when she stopped +speaking. Her voice still echoed in his ears, blended with the whisper +of the sea. He sat beside her, lost in a reverie. + +“This is how it ought to be,” he thought. “This is just right--to have +her come to me like this, and for her to _be_ like this!” + +He was roused by her getting up. + +“I’ll have to be going,” she said. + +“No!” said Kirby, rising, too. “Please don’t!” + +“But it’s late.” + +She turned toward him, and he had another glimpse of her face and her +shining, solemn dark eyes. + +“Please don’t!” he repeated. + +“But, you see, I’ve got to,” she explained. “I promised I’d be home by +nine o’clock.” + +“I’ll walk home with you.” + +“But--” she began. “I--I’d like you to, only--I think you’d better not, +please.” Then, as he was silent, she added, in distress: “I’m +sorry--really I am,” and held out her hand. + +He took it. He might have known, by the clasp of that warm and sturdy +little hand, that this was no goddess Diana whose feet were on the +hilltops; but he would not know it. His heart beat fast, and his fingers +tightened on hers. + +“You’ll let me see you again?” he said. + +“Oh, yes!” she replied. “Yes, of course! Some other evening--but I’ve +got to go now. Good night!” + +She tried to draw her hand away, but he held it fast. + +“Look here!” he said. “You can’t go like this! I don’t even know your +name.” + +“It’s Emmy--Emmy Richards,” she told him. + +“Mine’s Alan Kirby. You’ll let me come to see you?” + +“Well, you see,” she said, “I can’t very well. I’m just visiting here.” + +“Then meet me somewhere.” + +She stood before him with her head bent. The fire was almost out, and it +seemed to him that the world had grown dark and very still and a little +desolate. It was as if something had gone--some warm and living +presence. In his heart he was vaguely aware of what had happened. It was +the dear, jolly little playmate who had gone, taking with her the +innocent glamour of this hour, driven away by the note of ardor in his +voice. + +He was sorry and uneasy, but he would not stop. + +“Won’t you give me a chance?” he asked. “Let me see you again!” + +“I will,” she promised. “I’ll come here again--some other evening--like +this!” + +He understood very well what she meant. She wanted to recapture the +vanished charm, to come again in the same happy and careless way, to +talk by the fire again; but he would not have it so. + +“Look here!” he said. “Will you let me take you out to dinner +to-morrow?” + +She did not answer, but stood there with her head averted; and a fear +seized him that was like anger. + +“I don’t want to bother you,” he said curtly. “If you don’t want to see +me again--” + +“Well, I--I do!” she cried unsteadily. “Only--” + +He would go on. + +“Then come to dinner with me to-morrow!” + +“Oh, let’s not!” she cried. “I never go out to dinner--with people.” + +He smiled to himself at that, yet it hurt him. Poor little playmate, so +reluctant to leave her world of make-believe! + +“Just with me?” he urged, coming close to her. + +“Well, all right!” she said suddenly, with a sort of desperation. “All +right, then--I will!” + +“Where shall I meet you?” + +“I don’t know.” + +“The Pennsylvania Station--Long Island waiting room--at six?” + +She drew her hand away. + +“All right!” she said again. “Good night!” + +“Good night!” he answered. + + +II + +He stood beside what was left of his fire and watched her walking away, +a swift, light little figure against so vast a horizon; and he felt very +unhappy. + +“What’s the matter with me, anyhow?” he asked himself angrily. “It’s no +crime to ask a girl out to dinner, is it?” + +He stamped out the last sparks and set off for his sister’s house. He +was surprised, when he drew near, to hear the phonograph still playing. +It seemed to him that he had been gone so long, so far! + +He crossed the lawn, went up on the veranda, and looked in at the +window. They were still dancing in there. He saw that pretty little +blond girl in her short, sleeveless white satin frock. There came before +him the face of that other girl, seen only for a brief instant in the +firelight--that little dark face with shining eyes. + +“I love her!” he thought, with a sort of awe. “She’s the girl I’ve +always been waiting for. Emmy--little darling, wonderful Emmy--I love +her!” + +He could not endure to go in, to dance, to speak to any one else. He +stayed out there in the dark garden, walking up and down, smoking, +cherishing his dear vision. + +After awhile the two girls who had been dancing, and whom his sister had +invited specially on his account, came out, with two young fellows. +Kirby stepped back into the shadow of the trees and waited until they +had driven off, until he could no longer hear their gay voices. + +He compared these girls with Emmy. _She_ wore no paint or powder; he had +not seen her dancing in a hot and brilliant room. She belonged to +another world--a world of sea and open sky and firelight. She was a +creature with the free, fearless innocence of the Golden Age. + +“I love her so!” he thought. + +Nearly all of that long summer night he walked there in the garden, +profoundly stirred by the great thing that had overtaken him. Before him +was always the vision of her lovely face, filling his heart with +tenderness and a troubled delight. + +“I’m not good enough for her,” he thought. + +Without realizing it, he began to forget that he had smiled to himself +at the dear, funny things she had said, to forget what a little young +thing she was. What was in his mind now was a sort of goddess, +beautifully kind, but austere and aloof--a woman to be worshiped. His +humility was honest and fine and touching, but it was cruel, because +there was no goddess girl like that. There was only little Emmy +Richards, who was nineteen, and altogether human and liable to error. + +He let himself into the house quietly, so that no one heard him. He did +not want to talk to any one. + +When he came downstairs the next morning, he was still anxious for +silence, but his sister was not disposed to humor him. + +“Where did you go last night?” she demanded. + +How was he to answer that? He had gone into an enchanted world, and he +had found his beloved! + +“I took a walk along the beach,” he said, briefly. + +“A walk!” she cried. “You come here to visit me, and I ask people in to +meet you, and you go off, without a word, and take a walk! I never heard +of anything so selfish and hateful!” + +Her indignation took him by surprise. It seemed to him the most +preposterous thing that she should blame him for being with Emmy. + +“I’m sorry,” he said, though he really wasn’t, and his sister knew it; +but, looking at him, she saw that he was tired and troubled, and she +held her tongue. + + * * * * * + +Kirby’s work suffered that day because of his preoccupation with the +problem of the evening before him. He was determined to offer something +at least a little worthy of her. He had taken other girls out to dinner, +but this was beyond measure different. + +At last he thought of a restaurant he had seen advertised--a quiet, +dignified place; and he went there, engaged a table, and ordered a +wonderful little dinner. All the rest of the day he imagined how it was +going to be, he and Emmy sitting at that table, softly lit by candles. +He knew what he was going to say to her, and how she would look at him, +with her shining, solemn eyes. + +He came early to the waiting room and walked up and down, restless and +anxious. + +“She didn’t want to come,” he thought. “Perhaps she didn’t like me.” + +A pretty girl sitting on one of the benches smiled at him, but he looked +past her. Ten minutes late now! Of course, other girls were usually +late, but Emmy was different--utterly different. He remembered her now +with a sort of amazement--the innocent beauty of her face, the almost +incredible charm of her dear friendliness. + +“No one like her!” he thought. + +And that was true. There was not, and never could be, any girl like the +one that he, in his ardent, imperious young heart, had invented. + +Suppose she didn’t come at all? + +“I’ll find her!” he thought. “I know her name, and I’ll find her. I +won’t lose her!” + +He glanced around the waiting room again, and again he met the eyes of +the pretty girl who had smiled at him before. No denying that she was +pretty, but he was sternly uninterested. Let her smile! + +This time, though, she rose from her seat, and made a step in his +direction. + +“She’ll ask me some question about a train,” thought Kirby. + +He was a good-looking young fellow, and this sort of thing had happened +to him before. At another time he might perhaps have been a little less +severe. She was very pretty--a tall, slender girl in a very short frock, +with a red hat pulled down over one eye. Her piquant little face was +rouged and powdered. Kirby might have seen a sort of debonair charm +about her, if he had not had in his heart the image of another face, so +honest, so unspoiled, so very different! + +He walked the length of the room, and when he came back he passed quite +close to her. She smiled again--a tremulous, miserable, forlorn little +smile. He stopped and stared at her. + +“Look here!” he said. “_You’re_ not--are _you_--Miss Richards?” + +“Yes, I am,” she replied in a defiant and unsteady voice. + +He could not speak for a moment, so bitter was his disappointment. She +was not rare and wonderful; she was only a pretty, silly, painted little +thing, like thousands of others. + +“If only she hadn’t come!” he thought. “If only I’d never seen her +again! Then I could have gone on--” + +He realized, however, that he had invited her to meet him, and that in +common decency he must not let her see how he felt; so he smiled as +politely as he could. + +“Didn’t recognize you at first,” he said. “I’m sorry!” + +That was all he could manage for the moment. She, too, was silent, with +a set, strained smile on her lips. + +“We can’t stand here like this,” he thought. “I’ve asked her to dinner!” + +But he was not going to take this girl to the quiet little restaurant +with candles on the table. That had been for the other girl--the grave, +aloof, and beautiful one, who didn’t exist. + +“Come on!” he said briefly. “We’ll get a taxi.” + +She followed him without a word, and he helped her into a cab. + +“Where would you like to go?” he asked. + +“Oh, I don’t care,” she answered. + +Very well--if she didn’t care, neither would he. He gave the driver an +address and got in beside her. + +“Like to dance?” he asked. + +“I love it!” + +Then this would be merely an evening like other evenings. He would dance +with her, spend more money than he could afford, and then forget her. +She was not different, after all. There never had been any girl like the +one he had dreamed of, or invented, last night in the firelight. + +“What a fool I was!” he thought. + +He wanted to laugh at himself, and could not; it hurt too much. He so +badly needed the girl who did not exist--that honest, friendly, lovely +little thing with the innocent glamour of childhood still about her. He +glanced at the real one, sitting beside him. By the passing lights he +could see her face, which was turned toward the window. + +“She doesn’t know anything about me,” he thought. “She doesn’t care. +All she wants is a ‘good time’!” + +He took out his cigarette case and tendered it to her. + +“No, thank you,” she said. + +“I will, if you don’t mind,” said Kirby, and that was all he did say. + +He sat back in his corner, smoking, lost in his own thoughts. It was a +long drive, for he was taking her to a road house just outside the +city--a third-rate sort of place. + +“But she said she didn’t care,” he thought. + + +III + +They went on in a stream of other cars, like a flotilla of lighted +ships, in the mild summer night. He hated the whole thing--the dust, the +reek of gasoline, the tawdriness and staleness of the undertaking. He +had wanted something better. His ardent spirit had groped toward an +ideal, and, when he thought he had found it, it was only this! + +It was as if he had gone into a dim temple, ready to worship, and +suddenly a flood of garish light had come, and he saw that it was not a +temple at all, but a sorry palace of pleasure. He lit another cigarette +from the first one. + +“I’m--sorry I came!” said the girl beside him, in a shaky voice. + +He turned, but it was too dark to see her. + +“I beg your pardon?” he said, very much taken aback. + +“I didn’t want to come,” she went on. “I told you, but you _made_ me, +and now--and now--you see--” + +He quite realized that he had been behaving very ill, not even trying to +talk to her. After all, it wasn’t her fault. She couldn’t know what a +fool he had been. + +“I don’t see at all,” he said. “I--I’m very glad you’re here.” + +The feebleness of that made him ashamed, but he drew closer to her and +took her hand. She kept her head averted, but she made no objection. + +“That’s what she expects,” he thought bitterly. “She expects me to make +love to her. All right!” + +So he put his arm about her shoulders, and made up his mind to say to +her the things he had said to other girls; and because he was young, and +she was very pretty, some of his bitterness vanished. + +“You’re the sweetest little thing!” he said. “The moment I saw you--” + +She pulled away from him with a violence that astounded him. + +“Don’t talk to me like that!” she cried. “It’s--horrible!” + +“Sorry!” said Kirby stiffly, and withdrew to his corner; but the sound +of a sob made him bend toward her, filled with a reluctant contrition. +“Look here!” he continued. “I didn’t mean--” + +“I just--bumped my head,” she said. “That’s all; but I’d rather go home +now.” + +“But we’ve just got here,” objected Kirby. “Better have some dinner +first.” + +He got out of the cab and held out his hand to her, but she jumped out +unaided and walked to the foot of the steps. As he turned and saw her +standing where the lights of the portico shone full upon her, a queer, +reluctant tenderness swept over him. Her coat was a little too big for +her. Her red hat was pushed back, showing more of her candid brow, and +her dark hair was ruffled. She looked so weary and angry, and so young! +Even if she was not what he wanted her to be, she was somehow dear to +him. + +“Look here!” he said. “Look here! Let’s have a nice evening, anyhow!” + +She responded instantly to his tone. For the first time that night he +saw in her some likeness to the lost little playmate. + +“All right--let’s!” she cried. + +He led the way to the glass-inclosed veranda where small tables were set +out. The orchestra was playing, and through the long windows they could +see the ballroom where couples were dancing. + +“Isn’t it lovely?” she said. + +Kirby did not think so. He was regretting that he had brought her here. +They sat down at a table, and he took up the menu. + +“What do you like?” he asked. + +“Oh, anything!” said Emmy. + +She was looking about her with a sort of rapture. + +“Yes!” he thought. “This is the sort of thing she likes!” + +And again his disappointment came back, sharper than ever. He thought of +the dinner he had meant to have, by candlelight, in that quiet +restaurant, with the girl who didn’t exist. Was there never to be +anything like that for him, nothing fine and beautiful and stirring? + +“Well, I’m here, and I’ve got to make the best of it,” he thought. “What +will you have to drink?” he asked aloud. + +“To drink?” she repeated, looking at him anxiously. “Oh, let’s not!” + +Kirby ordered two cocktails. + +“You can’t come to a place like this and not order anything to drink,” +he explained when the waiter had gone. “Everybody does.” + +“Then I wish we hadn’t come here,” said she. + +The cocktails came, and he drank both of them. + +“Care to try a dance?” he asked. + +“No, thank you,” replied Emmy. + +She was looking about her with a different vision now. All the light was +gone from her face. Evidently she didn’t find the place lovely now. +Kirby himself became more conscious of the loud voices, the hysteric +laughter, the ugly disorder about him. He was sorry that he had brought +her here. He was ashamed of himself, and he did not like being ashamed +of himself. + +“You said you loved dancing,” he suggested. + +“Not now,” said Emmy. “It’s getting late. If you don’t mind, I’d like to +go home.” + +“Just as you please,” replied Kirby. + +They finished the dinner in silence. Kirby paid the preposterous bill, +and they went out to the taxi. + +“You needn’t bother to come with me,” said Emmy politely. + +“No bother at all,” returned Kirby, equally polite. “I’ll see you safely +to the station.” + +“I’m going to a friend’s house in the city.” + +He got in beside her. He sat as far from her as he could, and neither of +them spoke one word during all that long drive. In his heart he felt a +great remorse and regret, but he would not let her know that. + +But when the cab stopped at the address she had given him, and he helped +her out, he could no longer maintain that stubborn, miserable silence. + +“I’m sorry,” he told her. “I didn’t mean it to be like this.” + +“It doesn’t matter,” said Emmy. “Good night!” + + +IV + +Kirby stood where he was until she had gone up the steps and into the +house. Then he paid the cab and set off on foot for the Pennsylvania +Station. When he got there he found that there was an hour to wait for +the next train, and again he set off to walk about the streets, his +hands in his pockets, his pipe between his teeth. All the time her voice +echoed in his ears--her quiet little voice. + +“Good Lord!” he said to himself angrily. “It’s no tragedy! I asked the +girl out to dinner, I tried to give her a good time, and that’s all +there is to it.” + +But still her voice echoed in his heart, and still he felt that bitter +ache of regret. Let him walk as far as he would, he could not escape +from it. + +“She was unhappy,” he thought, and the thought pained him. He went on +walking, and when he got back to the station he found that he had missed +his train. It was the last for that day; the next one left at four +o’clock in the morning. + +He didn’t really care. He went to an all-night restaurant and had coffee +and bacon and eggs. Then he strolled back to the waiting room where he +had met her, and sat down there. He had the place to himself; there was +nothing to disturb his reflections. + +“The trouble was,” he said to himself, “that I was disappointed.” + +And, like an audible response, the words shaped themselves in his mind: + +“Well, what about her?” + +He had never been more unhappy in all his life. He dozed a little during +those long hours; but whether he slept or waked, he was conscious all +the time of that bitter ache of regret. + +There was an air of unreality about the early morning train. It was +almost empty, and such passengers as there were seemed to Kirby to be +very incongruous. For instance, where could that neat little gray-haired +woman be going at such an hour? Or that Italian with a fierce mustache, +who carried a square package wrapped in newspaper? + +The world outside, seen through the train window, had the same unreal +air. It was still dark, but this was not the serene darkness of night; +it was, he thought, more like the dim silence of an auditorium before +the curtain goes up. There was a feeling in the air that something +tremendous was about to happen, and that a myriad creatures waited. + +He felt the thrill of that expectancy himself. The window beside him was +open, and the wind blew in his face with a divine freshness. He could +see the trees and the sharp lines of roofs, as if they had stepped +forward out of the night’s obscurity. There came a drowsy chirping; the +curtain had begun to rise. + +Then all the birds began to wake, and the chorus swelled and swelled. +The insects were chirping, and he could hear the lusty crow of barnyard +cocks--such little creatures, raising so sublime and tremendous a +“Laudamus.” + +“The sun’s coming up,” said Kirby to himself. + +When he got out of the train the sky was gray, with only a thin veil +before the face of the coming wonder. There was a single taxi at the +station, and he hesitated, because two women had got out of the train +after him; but one of the women set off briskly along the village street +and the other one took the road, so he got into the cab. + +A moment later he had passed the woman on the road. There was light +enough to see her now. + +“Stop!” he cried, but the driver did not hear him. He banged on the +glass. “Stop! I want to get out!” + +Giving the man his last dollar bill, Kirby jumped out and turned back. + +She was coming toward him steadfastly, a straight and slender figure in +a dark dress and drooping black hat. He could see that the dress was +shabby, that her shoes were dusty and a little worn. Her face was pale, +and there was a smudge on her forehead. + +“Emmy!” he cried. + +She stopped short. A hot color rose in her cheeks, and ebbed away, +leaving her still paler. + +“Emmy!” he said uncertainly. “You look--you’ve changed!” + +“Well, no,” she answered, in that serious little voice. “You see, I’d +borrowed those clothes from a girl at the office. I stopped at her house +to leave them, and I missed the train.” She paused a moment. “I’m sorry +I ever wore them,” she said; “only she’s been so awfully dear and kind +to me, and she said she wanted to make me look nice.” + +“You did look nice!” said Kirby. + +He felt a sort of anguish at the sight of her. Why hadn’t he known, all +the time, that she was like this? She was innocent and honest and +lovely--and he had so grossly offended against her! He had taken her to +that third-rate place; he had been surly, obstinate, utterly blind; and, +worst of all, he had judged her so arrogantly! + +“I’m so sorry!” he said. “You don’t know--I didn’t mean--” + +“I’m sorry, too,” she said. “I never went out like that before, and I +wish I hadn’t done it.” + +They stood facing each other, standing in the middle of the empty road. +She was downcast, but he was looking at her with amazement. She was +_not_ that little flippant painted thing, like a thousand other girls! +How could he ever have thought so? Neither was she the wise, aloof young +goddess. She was just Emmy, rather shabby and very tired, with a smudge +on her forehead. + +“You don’t know,” he said, “how beautiful you are--in the daylight!” + +Again the color rose in her cheeks, and as swiftly receded. + +“I’ve got to hurry,” she exclaimed, with that earnest politeness of +hers. “You see, my little brother’s taking examinations to-day, and I +promised I’d make pancakes for his breakfast.” + +“Oh, Emmy!” he said, and began to laugh. + +She smiled herself, reluctantly. + +“Well, I did promise,” she declared. + +An immense happiness filled him. He knew now! He understood why those +other fellows wanted to get married and set up homes! Bills and worries +and even quarrels were not tragic, and not basely comic. They simply +didn’t matter. The one great thing was this infinite tenderness. He did +not want to worship a goddess any more; he wanted to take care of Emmy. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +NOVEMBER, 1927 +Vol. XCII NUMBER 2 + + + + +For Granted + +A COLORFUL STORY OF A PICTURESQUE ISLAND COLONY WELL KNOWN TO MANY +AMERICAN TRAVELERS + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +The streets of Port Linton were empty under the brazen glare of the sun, +so that Captain Vincey’s steps rang loud. They were unsteady, too. The +heat came up from the white coral road in tremulous waves, and worried +him. The blue sea and the blue sky, the white buildings and the white +roads, and the great, fierce, brassy sun all dazzled him. He dropped his +stick with a clatter, and from under the swing door of Willie’s Bar a +dog ran out, sniffed at the stick, and ran back again. + +“It’s the heat,” said Vincey to himself, as he straightened up. + +But in his heart he was a little frightened by the giddiness, the +surging in his head, and by the theatrically empty look of the world. He +could not quite remember what had brought him out at this hour, but his +footsteps were certainly directed toward the club. + +He decided not to go there, and went on down the hill--a big, swaggering +man, in a rumpled white linen suit and a green-lined helmet. + +“A t-touch of the sun,” he said to himself. + +He realized now that he could not very well go home alone, though he +wanted to go home. He had had no lunch. He had sat in his office, +looking over some papers, with a bottle of whisky on the desk. + +“Got to c-cut down on that,” he thought. “Plays the devil with a man’s +health!” + +Sometimes, in his blackest hours, he felt that perhaps it was not only +his health that had suffered. He would remember the James Vincey who had +come to Port Linton twenty years ago, and sometimes he even shed tears, +thinking of that promising young man and of what he had become. + +Turning the corner, he saw before him the cool, dim office of the Green +Arrow Navigation Company. He made for it with what haste he could. There +was his refuge. + +The doors stood open, and in he went. It was a dignified and handsome +office. Along one side was a mahogany counter, and facing it were groups +of wicker chairs and tables beneath palms in pots. At the end was a low +wooden railing with a gate, and behind this a girl sat at a typewriter. + +As he went toward her, she came hurrying out of the inclosure, shutting +the gate behind her. + +“Hello, Uncle James!” she said casually. + +“’Lo, Joey!” he answered. “T-touch--sun.” + +He sank heavily into one of the wicker chairs and took off his helmet. + +“Shall I get you a carriage?” she asked. + +“Might be ‘visable,” he said. + +She turned, went back through the barrier to a door at the rear, and +knocked. + +“Come in!” said a voice. + +She entered the private office, where a mild little gray-haired man sat +at a desk. + +“Uncle James isn’t feeling very well,” she said. There was no +embarrassment in her manner, nor in the gray-haired man’s. “I want to +get a carriage, and I left my purse at home,” she went on. “Can I get +ten shillings, Mr. Brown, please?” + +He pulled forward a little tin cash box, unlocked it, and took out a +ten-shilling note. The girl, bending over his desk, wrote on a slip of +paper: + + July 8--ten shillings--J. CRAIG. + +The transaction was a familiar one to both of them. + +She was a thin young creature with dark gray eyes and bobbed hair cut +square across her wide brow. She would have been pretty, with more +color and animation. She might even have been beautiful; but her face +was pale and impassive, and she had an air of quiet indifference, like +one accustomed to being taken for granted and thankful to have it so. + +“Why don’t you drive home with him, Joey?” + +“It’s only half past two, Mr. Brown.” + +“There’s nothing much to be done, Joey. Sprague will be back in a few +moments. You go along with the captain.” + +“But the last day, Mr. Brown!” + +“Pshaw!” said he. “Everything’s ready for the new man, Joey. +Everything’s in order.” + +“I’m going to miss you awfully, Mr. Brown!” + +There was a subdued sort of distress in her voice that touched him. He +patted her shoulder kindly. + +“I’ll be coming back to the island in six months, Joey, and then I’ll +look in now and then to see how things are getting along. This new +man--I don’t fancy he’ll make many changes. Things will go on in the +same old way. You go along home with the captain, Joey.” + +“I wish you a good trip, Mr. Brown. Good-by!” + +“Pshaw!” he said again. “_Au revoir_, we’ll say, Joey.” + +“_Au revoir_, Mr. Brown, and thank you.” + +They shook hands, smiling at each other. + +“I’ll just step out now and say good afternoon to your uncle,” said +Brown. + +Captain Vincey rose politely, dropping his helmet and stick. + +“Wish you--besht--short of trip,” he said. + +He was perfectly aware that he was swaying on his feet and speaking +indistinctly, and that his niece and Mr. Brown were both aware of it; +but none of them felt constrained or embarrassed. Captain Vincey’s +little weakness was simply to be taken for granted. + +The hack driver took it for granted. He helped the captain into the +carriage--carriages are the only vehicles in Port Linton--with a grave +and sympathetic air. Joey climbed in on the other side, and they set +off. Every one who saw them took it for granted. + +“There goes Vincey--tight again! Joey’s taking him home.” + +They drove through the little town and out into the country, along the +white road lined with oleanders, rose pink, creamy white, and scarlet, +under the blue, blue sky. When she had first come here, this loveliness +had stirred Joey to delight, but not any longer. She dare not be stirred +now. She saw before her a way interminably long and weary, and she went +forward in a sort of blindness, not stopping, not thinking, only +enduring. + +The carriage drew up before a little house standing on a hill, and the +driver got down to assist the captain. He had a great deal of trouble, +for Vincey was a big man and he a small one. + +Joey picked up the helmet and stick from the road, and followed them to +the house. Mrs. Vincey opened the door and received her son, and Joey +paid the driver. All taken for granted! + +“Your Uncle James says he doesn’t care for any tea. It’s this heat.” + +An unconquerable woman was Captain Vincey’s mother--slight and small, +straight as a dart, always neat and dignified and smiling. She was +nearly seventy, but she did not look it, so great was the spirit that +animated her fragile body. + +She had made a pot of tea, and she and her granddaughter drank it in the +kitchen. + +“Joey,” she said, “I’ll have to ask you to get me a little money +to-morrow.” + +“To-morrow? But the new man’s coming to-morrow, gran.” + +Both were silent for a time, looking out of the window, where below them +the blue Atlantic stretched, unendurably bright in the sun. Mrs. Vincey +was thinking of her old home in Kent, of green fields and dripping trees +under the soft blue of an April sky. It was strange that the days of her +girlhood seemed so close to her, so much more real than all the years of +wandering with her engineer husband in South America, in Canada, in New +York. That was all a little nebulous. What was vivid was the memory of +her Kentish fields. + +But to Joey the memory of her girlhood seemed so remote as to be +incredible. She was the only child of Mrs. Vincey’s daughter and her +American husband, left an orphan now, and penniless. She had come to +Port Linton from New York, three years ago, a jolly, lively schoolgirl +of seventeen, ready for adventure; and she had found--this. + +“I think you’d be happier if you found something to do, wouldn’t you, +Joey?” Mrs. Vincey had said. + +Joey had gone to see Mr. Brown--who was expecting her--and he had taken +her into his office. + +Mrs. Vincey stayed home and kept house. With smiling dignity she faced +tradesmen who explained why they could give her no more credit. Morning +after morning she telephoned her son’s business partner, to tell him +that “Captain Vincey was ill, and couldn’t come to the office.” She +cooked meals and served them decently, out of Heaven knows what pitiful +materials. She had kept the house neat, she had sat up at night, +patching and turning and mending clothes for them all. + +And she would not see, she dared not see, what was happening to +Joey--the jolly schoolgirl turning into this pale, still woman. She +would willingly have given her life for Joey, but she would not admit +her son’s shame. It _must_ be taken for granted! + +Better to look at the dazzling blue sea than at Joey’s pale face. + +“Another cup of tea, Joey?” + +“Yes, thank you, gran.” + +They did not mention the money again. Joey knew that her grandmother +would not have asked for it, if it had not been urgently needed; and +Mrs. Vincey knew that if it were in any way possible, Joey would get it +for her at any cost. + +The sun went down and a fresh breeze sprang up. The two women ate their +supper of bread and cheese and more tea, in the kitchen, while Captain +Vincey slept upstairs in his room. The moon came up and made a silver +path on the dark sea, for prisoners to look at, if they chose. + +“Good night, gran dear!” + +“Good night, Joey. You’re a good girl, Joey. Sleep well!” + +But Joey did not sleep very well. She sat up in bed, looking out at the +garden, where the moon was shining. A breeze blew in her face, fragrant +with jasmine. + +“If only the new manager will be nice!” she thought. “Oh, please let him +be nice!” + +The captain was much better in the morning. He bathed and shaved, put on +a clean white suit, and came down to breakfast in a witty and cheerful +humor. + +“Left my bicycle at the club,” he said. “You’d better telephone for a +carriage, Joey. The walk into town is a little too much for me--at my +age.” + +As Joey had had to leave her own bicycle at the office the day before, +in order to take him home, he asked her to drive in with him; but she +said she would enjoy the walk. + +Two miles of white coral road in the blazing sun, after an insufficient +breakfast! It was better, though, than sitting beside the captain, +driving in state past the shops where they owed money. + +She was a little late, and the boat had come in unusually early. She was +lying alongside the wharf, already unloading, and the door of the +private office was shut. + +“He’s come!” Sprague whispered to her. “He’s in there, talking to +McLean.” + +“What’s he like?” asked Joey. + +“Hard as nails!” said Sprague. + +She uncovered her typewriter and sat down before it, but she had no work +to do. She could only sit there, with her heart like lead. + +The door of the private office opened, and McLean came out. + +“Mr. Napier wants to see you,” he said briefly to Joey. As he moved +away, she heard him mutter: “New brooms sweep clean!” + +She got up and went into the private office, and there, at Mr. Brown’s +desk, sat the new man. It was a shock to find him so young. He looked +almost boyish. He was thin and dark, with a careless, preoccupied air. + +“Miss Craig?” he said. “Sit down! Take a letter, please. ‘Messrs. Pryden +& Fort, P-r-y--’” + +“I’m sorry, but I don’t take shorthand,” Joey interrupted in her quiet +way. + +He glanced up at her. + +“I thought--” he began, and stopped short as their eyes met. + + +II + +Mark Napier _was_ hard as nails, in a way. Lucky for him that he was! + +He had been a boy of eighteen, just out of school, and ready to enter +Oxford, when the war broke out. He had enlisted, and had been sent to +Flanders; had been wounded, patched up and sent back, and wounded twice +again. The third time the doctors told him that very likely he would +never walk again. + +For six months he had lain in the hospital, facing that possibility, +facing all the other new things he had learned. In the course of time +the doctors had reversed their decision, and he was discharged as +cured--a most interesting case. + +He went home--only he had no home to go to. The war had done for his +family. His mother had died, his brother had been killed, and so had +most of the friends he had cared for. There was no money--nothing at all +left for young Napier. + +He had got a post as clerk in the London office of the Green Arrow +Navigation Company. He had been only twenty-two then, and a queer +mixture of boyishness and maturity. He had had a lifetime of experience +of a sort; but of average, everyday life he knew next to nothing. He was +a shabby, silent boy, coolly and doggedly determined to get on in the +world. + +He had got on. Here he was, at twenty-nine, manager of the Port Linton +branch, going to master Port Linton and go on to something better. He +was still very young and intolerant in some ways, very mature in others. +He was very lonely, proud as Lucifer, and stubborn as a mule. + +The leisurely air of the office--his office--had annoyed him. He knew +how to handle men--he had learned that as a lieutenant at twenty-one. He +was just, and he was inflexible. He saw that things were lamentably +slack here, and he had wasted no time in telling Sprague and McLean that +a new era had begun. + +He had intended to let this girl know it, too--until he had glanced up +and their eyes met. + +Hard as nails was young Napier with Sprague, and McLean, and every one +else with whom he did business; but not with Joey. + +“Mr. Brown used to give me notes about the letters, and I answered them +myself,” she explained. + +Napier gave her his letters, and she answered them in the courteous and +stilted fashion that Mr. Brown had taught her. + +“I’m sorry,” said Napier, “but I’m afraid this won’t quite do. Sit down, +and I’ll give you some idea of what I want.” + +While he talked, he often glanced at her, and always he found her +steadfast gray eyes fixed upon his face. She took the letters away and +did them over again--his way this time. + +“She’s game,” he thought. “No whining--no excuses!” + +The others obeyed his orders because they had to; but Joey wanted to. +She was eager to help. She admired his way of doing things. She was his +friend. + +He had plenty of difficulties in this new job. Port Linton was a +conservative British colony, and some of the old clients resented young +Napier. McLean was dourly hostile; Sprague, under an obliging manner, +was impatient and scornful. Only Joey stood by him with absolute +loyalty. + +He would leave the door of his office open, so that he could see her at +her typewriter. Even after she had gone, as he sat later at his work, he +would look at the place where she had been and remember her wide-browed, +candid face, her dark hair, her gray eyes. For that slender, quiet girl +he felt a respect that was almost reverence, for she had the qualities +that he prized above all others--dignity, reserve, and loyalty. + +They had very little to say to each other during those first three days, +for they were very busy; but he was always aware of Joey, and in his +heart he always had confidence that she was his friend, his faithful +helper. + +“There’s no one like her,” he thought comfortably. + +He thought her beautiful, too. He thought that her rare, slow smile was +a wonderful thing, that her voice was the most solacing in all the +world, that her sunburned hands were lovelier than any he had ever seen. +His solitary and inflexible spirit turned toward her as its one refuge. + + * * * * * + +Late on Friday afternoon McLean brought him the books, which he wanted +to look over before paying the salaries on Saturday morning. Every one +else had gone home, and he and McLean sat alone in the private office, +which was filled with the light of the sunset. + +“Now!” thought McLean, watching. “Now you’ll have something to talk +about, my lad!” + +“What’s this?” said Napier, frowning. + +“What?” asked McLean, who knew very well. + +“Here’s fifteen pounds advanced to Sprague against his salary, before +Christmas. It seems that he began paying it off, ten shillings a week, +but here’s a month without paying anything; and here--why, he’s been +getting full pay for the past six weeks, and he still owes seven +pounds!” + +“His mother’s been ill,” said McLean. + +Napier said nothing. He didn’t need to speak--his look was enough. + +“You’ll also find,” volunteered McLean, “that on the first of the month +I had a week’s salary in advance.” + +“This won’t do!” said Napier briefly. + +McLean emptied Mr. Brawn’s little cash box on the desk. + +“What’s this?” said Napier, looking at the slips of paper. “‘July 5, +five shillings--J. Craig,’ ‘July 8, ten shillings--J. Craig’--so many of +them!” + +“It’s for cash advanced,” said McLean, looking at him. + +“I see!” said Napier. + +He stacked all the slips into a neat little pile and sat for a moment +staring at them. It was a disgraceful thing, to run an office like this. +It was not only slack, but very close to dishonesty. It was the firm’s +money these people were using. + +“Have a cigarette?” he said abruptly, holding out his case to McLean. + +“Thanks!” replied McLean, hiding a start of surprise. + +For a time they smoked in silence. + +“I can’t be hard on Sprague and McLean and not speak to her,” Napier was +thinking. “That would be too damned unjust. Her whole week’s salary has +been paid already, and she may need it badly. She may be in serious +trouble.” + +A great wave of tenderness swept over him as he thought of Joey. She was +so pale and slight, so young. + +“He’s almost human, after all!” McLean told himself, glancing at the new +manager. He waited for awhile. “Well?” he inquired at last. “What do you +want me to do about the pay envelopes, Mr. Napier?” + +“Deduct ten shillings from Sprague’s,” said Napier. “Deduct ten +shillings each week until his loan is repaid. It’s impossible to run an +office like this. Now, what about you? How do you want to manage your +advance? Ten--” + +“You can pay me nothing at all this week,” McLean replied curtly. + +There was another silence. + +“What about--Miss Craig?” asked Napier. “Is she--entirely dependent on +her salary?” + +“I can’t say.” + +“Does she--live alone?” + +“She does not. She lives with her uncle and her grandmother.” + +“Her uncle--what does he do?” + +“He’s in the commission business.” + +The sun was going down, and the light was draining fast out of the sky. +Napier’s face was in shadow. + +“McLean has a wife and child,” he thought, “and Sprague supports his +mother. She lives at home, with her people. I’ve got to be just!” + +“Well?” asked McLean. + +“Don’t make up an envelope for Miss Craig,” said Napier, rising. + +After a solitary dinner, he walked down to the water front, and smoked a +pipe, looking out over the little harbor. He was very unhappy over this +problem. + + +III + +“You see,” said Mark Napier, “I want to start with a clean slate, Miss +Craig. You will understand.” + +He was sitting on the edge of his desk, facing her, and she looked +steadily back at him. + +“Yes, I do see!” she said. + +And it was true. He wasn’t like Mr. Brown, mild and kind and easy-going. + +“I want to make a success of this thing,” he had told her before, and +she had responded whole-heartedly. + +He couldn’t understand her miserable anxieties, and she didn’t want him +to. She wanted to help him make a success. + +“But--er--if you would rather,” he said now, “we could deduct a little +every week.” + +His dark face had flushed, but he kept his eyes upon her with an anxious +intensity. If she wanted her money, she should have it. + +“Oh, no, thanks!” replied Joey politely. “It’s all right as it is, thank +you.” + +Her face grew scarlet. She dropped her eyes and turned away her head; +and, seeing her so, he knew that he loved her. + +“If there’s ever anything I can do--” he said unsteadily. + +She glanced at him, and again their eyes met. She had never seen a look +like that on any face. + +“Th-thank you, Mr. Napier,” she stammered, and went away in haste. + +She had no money for lunch, but she was not hungry. The hours went by +quickly; she worked well to-day, and her heart was singing. + +“See here, Miss Craig!” She looked up from her typewriter and saw Napier +standing beside her. “You haven’t been out to lunch--and it’s two +o’clock.” + +“I just wanted to finish this last letter,” said Joey. + +Again their eyes met, and he was dazzled by her loveliness. Her cheeks +were burning with heat and fatigue, and her eyes were brilliant. + +“Look here!” he said. “You’re tired. I want you to go home and rest.” + +“Oh, no, thanks!” + +“You do as I tell you!” ordered Napier. Fear made him brusque. He was +worried about Joey. “Come! Get your hat and go home!” he said. + +“But the letters--” + +“Never mind the letters,” he said. “Plenty of time on Monday morning. +Look here! You will rest, won’t you?” + +He was dismayed by the change that came over her. All the color suddenly +left her face, and she looked terribly white and strained. + +“I didn’t mean to be--abrupt,” he said hastily. “It’s only--” + +“I know!” said Joey, and smiled at him. + +It was a smile that he did not soon forget, steadfast and radiant. + +She had just remembered that she was going home empty-handed; and she +was conscious now of a sharp headache and a great weariness, as if these +things had also been waiting to be remembered. As she mounted her +bicycle, her knees felt weak. The sun beat down upon her, stinging her +shoulders beneath her thin blouse. Her eyes hurt from the glare of the +white road. Her heart ached, as well as her head. She was Captain +Vincey’s niece again, burdened by a hundred disgraceful anxieties. + +“He’ll find out,” she thought. “Some one will tell him about--Uncle +James.” + +She did not delude herself with the notion that it would make no +difference. Napier was not the sort to take Captain Vincey for granted. +He was not tolerant. He wanted everything just right. + +She found Mrs. Vincey sitting on the veranda, darning. + +“Joey! So early! What’s the matter, dear?” + +“I just felt--tired,” replied Joey; “but I’ll be all right after a nice +cup of tea, gran.” + +“We’ve run out of tea, Joey.” + +“Oh!” said Joey, and sat down on the steps. + +Mrs. Vincey stood behind her, turning and turning a sock in her thin +hands. + +“Unless you--brought home--anything,” she said. + +“There wasn’t anything coming to me this week,” said Joey. + +There was a moment’s silence. Mrs. Vincey stood looking down at that +little dark head. + +“Would you like a glass of lemonade, Joey?” she asked. + +Joey wanted nothing except to be let alone, but the anxiety in Mrs. +Vincey’s voice touched her beyond endurance. + +“That would be awfully nice!” she began brightly, and then suddenly +burst into tears. + +“Come upstairs and lie down, my deary!” + +Mrs. Vincey went up with her to the neat little room, dim and cool with +the blinds drawn down, fresh with the smell of the sea. + +“Lie down, deary! That’s it! I’ll unbutton your slippers. Never mind, +Joey, my deary--just take a little rest.” + +“I’m all right now, gran.” + +Better not to notice that Joey was still crying, with her head buried in +the pillow. Mrs. Vincey went out of the room, quietly closing the door +behind her, and stood outside in the hall, clasping her hands tight. + +“I haven’t anything to give her!” she thought. “Oh, it’s too much! She’s +so young!” + +She thought of one little thing she could do--a very little thing. She +put on her hat and went down the road a little way, to a small grocery +shop. + +“Good day, Mr. Spier!” + +“Good day, ma’am!” + +“I’d like two fresh eggs and a tin of milk and a quarter pound of Ceylon +tea and a quarter pound of butter, please, Mr. Spier.” + +“Yes, ma’am.” + +She stood there while Mr. Spier put the things into a bag. Then she had +to tell him that she would pay next Saturday, and to listen to Mr. Spier +saying that the bill was already so large, and had run on so long, and +times were so hard, that he didn’t see how he could--well, just this +once, then. + +A small package to carry, a small thing to do; yet Mrs. Vincey would +have preferred to shut herself into the house and die for lack of food, +rather than ask a favor from Mr. Spier. + +When she got home, she made a nice little omelet, a cup of tea, and two +slices of buttered toast, and brought them up to Joey; and Joey felt +better. + +Later in the afternoon a neighbor brought them a basket of tomatoes and +beans, and Mrs. Vincey and Joey sat out in the back garden under a cedar +tree, stringing the beans, and talking a little to each other--not +talking much because of the things they must not say. + +“James was quite himself this morning,” thought Mrs. Vincey. “If only +the--the heat doesn’t trouble him, and he can attend to business, things +ought to be better next week. Sunday dinner--who wants meat in this +weather? If only James can--can keep well!” + +For, with all her superb courage, there were things that Mrs. Vincey +would not face. + +“Aren’t the roses doing well?” said Joey. + +She was thinking that, after all, things _couldn’t_ be so bad. Something +would surely happen! + +A carriage was coming along the road. Mrs. Vincey glanced up. Joey sat +very still. Oh, no, it couldn’t be! Stopping here! + +They did not move, or speak, or look at each other. The carriage had +stopped. The garden gate creaked, and footsteps were coming along the +path at the front of the house--heavy and uncertain steps. They could +not see; they did not need to see. + +At the sound of the steps mounting to the veranda, Mrs. Vincey rose and +went around to the front of the house, neat, smiling, and dignified. +With a civil nod for the driver who had assisted him, she took her son’s +arm to lead him into the house; but he was in a bad mood. + +“The damned young jackanapes!” he shouted. “Sitting there--old Brown’s +place--damned young jackanapes--threw me out of office!” + +“Will you--settle with the driver, Joey?” asked Mrs. Vincey, very low. + +Joey did not answer. She was standing near the foot of the steps, with +such a look on her face! + +The driver saw that look, and walked back to his carriage. Mrs. Vincey +saw it, and her face grew rigid. Captain Vincey turned to see what she +was staring at, and he, too, saw it. It silenced him. + + +IV + +Mark Napier was sitting in the club that evening, reading the newspaper. +He had brought letters of introduction, and he knew a good many men +here--to nod to, at any rate; but conservative Port Linton was quite +willing to let him alone for awhile, and he preferred it so. He was not +genial, and had no talent for camaraderie. He was slow to give his +friendship, but, once given, it was worth keeping. + +The light of a shaded lamp fell on his dark face. + +“Pig-headed young jackanapes!” thought Captain Vincey. “But here +goes--on little Joey’s account!” + +Crossing the room, he flung himself into a chair beside Napier. + +“Well!” he said. + +Napier glanced quietly at him. + +“Thing is,” said the captain, “you didn’t know who I was, eh?” + +“Not then,” said Napier. + +He had been alone in his office that afternoon when this man had come +in--a big, swaggering man in a rumpled white suit, obviously half drunk. + +“You’re new manager?” he had begun. + +“I’m busy,” Napier had said. + +“I’m great friend old Brown’sh.” + +“I’m busy,” Napier had repeated. + +The visitor had sat down and begun to talk about Port Linton. + +“Jewel shet in shea--” + +Napier had pressed a button. + +“Show this gentleman out,” he had said, when Sprague appeared. + +The gentleman had protested vehemently, and had called Napier a “blasted +little whippersnapper” and other things; but Sprague had taken his arm +and got him out, murmuring soothing words in his ear. + +“That was Captain Vincey, sir,” he had said, when he returned. “He’s +Miss Craig’s uncle.” + +He had spoken with a sort of horror, and he was horrified; but the new +manager had only said: + +“Don’t let him come in here again.” + +Under Napier’s curt manner there had been a great dismay. This fellow +her uncle? Evidently he was in the habit of coming to the office. +Perhaps she would be hurt, or angry. Napier would do almost anything +rather than hurt or anger Joey--almost anything; but he would not +tolerate Captain Vincey. The firm had sent him out here to run this +office properly, and he was going to do it. He hoped Joey would +understand. + + * * * * * + +“Well, now you know!” said Vincey genially. + +Napier did not reply, and the captain began to grow angry; but he +remembered that look on Joey’s face. + +James Vincey had been a handsome man in his day, and even now, wreck as +he was, he had considerable personal charm. People liked him, and made +allowances for him. For Joey’s sake he would make this fellow like him. + +“Have a drink?” he said. + +“No, thanks,” said Napier. + +Unfortunately, it was a part of Vincey’s code to consider a refusal to +drink as an insult, and his face grew crimson. He was about to speak, +when again he remembered that look on Joey’s face, and again restrained +himself. + +“In climate like this--” he said. “You’re a newcomer. Wait till you’ve +been here a bit. You’ve never been out of England before, eh?” + +“I spent nearly four years--in Belgium and France,” said Napier, “and +the climate wasn’t very wholesome, where I was.” + +“Oh! The war, eh?” said Vincey. + +An unwelcome memory awakened in him. He remembered how, at the beginning +of the war, he had gone to enlist, and the doctor had rejected him--a +fine, big fellow in the forties, in the prime of life. Vincey had been +very indignant. + +The doctor had known him well, and had made allowances. + +“I’d advise you, Vincey,” he had said, “to cut down on--er--alcoholic +stimulants.” + +So Vincey had stayed behind in Port Linton, while his friends went +overseas. He had wangled some sort of military post for himself, and had +been made a captain; but a captain who sat at a desk was not what suited +him, and for some weeks he had let “alcoholic stimulants” alone. + +But he had gone back to them. “The strain of the war,” he said to +himself; and then, when it was over, there was the strain of his +uncomfortable financial position. + +He glanced uneasily at Napier. This young jackanapes had had four years +of it. Well, some fellows were like that--they could stand a strain. + +He beckoned to one of the colored boys and ordered a whisky and soda. + +“This climate--” he explained. + +Then, to his great indignation, the other man rose. + +“If there’s anything I can do for you, let me know,” said Napier, and +walked off. + +Vincey was purple with anger. He half rose, but the whisky had come, and +he sank back to drink it. His eyes glaringly followed Napier. + +“Damned young prig!” he said to himself. + +Slender and strong and straight was the young prig, with a fine pair of +shoulders and a well set head. A steady hand the young prig had, a +steady voice, a steady glance. Four years of it! + +“Another whisky!” called Captain Vincey. + +He gulped it down, waiting for the familiar feeling of partial oblivion; +but it did not come. Something within him was wide awake. + +“Joey!” he thought. + +His thoughts were not clear; they never were clear in these days. He +felt a confused sort of anguish, for he had fleeting glimpses of Joey’s +face, and it hurt him. He loved Joey, and had meant to do much for +her--his only sister’s child. He still would do something for +her--something, but what could he do? + +That fellow--taken a fancy to him, had she? Well, perhaps she’d get over +it, once she knew how he had treated her uncle. + +“Joey’s very fond of me,” he thought. + +Then he remembered the James Vincey he had been long ago--a promising +young fellow. A girl had been fond of him, but she had decided to wait +until he stopped drinking; and in the course of time he had forgotten +about her. + +“Don’t want--make trouble,” he thought. “If Joey likes the fellow--” + +A clear moment came to him. + +“You’ll never stop now!” he said to himself. “You’ll never do anything +for any one now! ’Nother whisky!” he cried aloud, with a sob. + +He saw James Vincey stumbling through the rest of his days, a cruel +burden to his mother, a disgrace to Joey--ruining Joey’s life before it +had well begun. He knew Joey. If it came to a choice between himself and +that young prig, Joey would stand by her uncle. + +And it had come to a choice. Joey would let Napier see what she thought +of his turning her uncle out of the office! + + * * * * * + +As he was going out, somebody called Napier into the billiard room and +held him in conversation for a few moments; and when at last he left the +club, he saw Captain Vincey going down the hill before him, reeling a +little. + +It was not pleasant for Napier to pass Miss Craig’s uncle, but he did +not slacken his pace. He was going to be here, on a small island, with +Captain Vincey, for a good long while. Inevitably he would have to meet +the man often. The same quality which had enabled Mark Napier to face +danger and death and agony, to make his way in the world quite alone, +made it impossible to shirk any unpleasantness. He went on down the hill +and passed Vincey with a curt good night. + +“A fine lad!” thought Vincey. “A fine, strong, clean lad!” + +For though Captain Vincey’s steps were so uncertain, his brain was very +clear now. + +Napier had turned the corner, and was walking rapidly along the street +that fronted the harbor, when he heard a splash. He stopped and turned +his head. The shops were all closed, and there was not a soul in sight. +There was not a sound--not a sound of those stumbling footsteps that had +been following his own. + +He ran back to the corner and crossed to the deserted wharf. Floating on +the dark water was a white helmet. + +He kicked off his shoes, threw off his coat, and jumped in over his +head. + + +V + +Caleb was half asleep on the seat of his carriage. He did not expect any +fares, but it was a fine night, and his wife was always disagreeable if +he came home too early. + +He heard footsteps, and opened his eyes. Two men were coming along the +street very slowly, arm in arm. That looked hopeful. He sat up. + +Then, as they passed under a street lamp, he sat bolt upright; for he +saw that they were both bareheaded and dripping wet, their linen suits +sodden. + +“Cap’n Vincey,” he said to himself, “and that new young fella!” He shook +with silent laughter. “Dey surely been havin’ a good time!” he thought. +“Been overboa’d!” + +They came on in silence until they reached Caleb’s carriage. The young +man hoisted Vincey in, and followed himself. + +“Drive to Captain Vincey’s house,” he said sharply. + +“Yes, sir!” replied the driver, still shaken with internal mirth. + +Off they went along the road, which gleamed softly white in the +starlight. A breeze blew in their faces, bearing the sweet and heavy +scent of night flowers. + +“Napier,” said James Vincey, “I’m much obliged to you. Missed my +footing. It might have ended badly for me. Very much obliged to you, my +boy!” + +“You didn’t miss your footing,” contradicted Napier in a very low voice. +“You--” + +“My boy,” interrupted Captain Vincey, equally low, “it’s necessary in +this life to take a good deal for granted. When you reach my age, you’ll +probably have learned”--he paused a moment--“probably have learned to +take it for granted that almost every man has a white streak in him. Now +we’ll say no more about it, if you please!” + +The horse’s hoofs rang loud and brisk in the quiet night. As they passed +the door of the club, two men were coming out. + +“Who’s that?” asked one of them. + +“By jove, it’s Vincey and that new chap--rolling home!” + +“Ha! I saw them having a few drinks in the club.” + +“Oh, well!” said the other indulgently. + +Napier and Vincey both heard the conversation. + +“You see!” said Vincey, and chuckled. “My intentions were good--meant to +make a neat exit.” + +“No need for you to do that, sir.” + +There was something in his tone which Captain Vincey had not heard for a +very long time. + +“My boy,” he said, “see here--I’m not asking for sympathy.” + +“Suppose we take that for granted, too, sir?” said Napier. + +He might have been a young officer speaking to his senior; or, thought +the older man, he might have been a son speaking to his father. Vincey +leaned back in his seat, closed his eyes, and set his teeth hard. + +“My boy!” he said. “My boy!” + +“Here we are, sir,” said Napier, as the carriage stopped. “Wait,” he +told the driver, and helped Vincey out. + +Mrs. Vincey was standing in the lighted doorway. + +“James!” she cried. “What has happened?” + +“Captain Vincey missed his footing,” Napier explained. + +“Come in!” said Mrs. Vincey, neat, smiling, and dignified again. + +So Napier crossed the threshold. + +“The kettle’s on,” said Mrs. Vincey. “Joey will make some nice hot tea, +to ward off a chill.” + +“Ha!” said Vincey. “Hot tea, eh?” He glanced at his companion, and then +for the first time he saw Napier smile. “My boy!” he said. + +Mrs. Vincey, watching them, felt as if an immense burden were lifted +from her weary shoulders. This stranger, in his youth and strength and +confidence, had come to her aid. + +“Won’t you sit down?” she asked anxiously. + +“Thank you,” said Napier, accepting the invitation. + +His dark hair was plastered against his forehead, and the water was +running off his jacket into pools on the floor; but he paid no attention +to that. The captain presented him, and he talked to Mrs. Vincey about +London. He was perfectly quiet and matter-of-fact. He was taking +everything for granted. + +Joey brought in the tea, and he rose; and Mrs. Vincey hurried out into +the kitchen, to cry, because of the look she had seen pass between them. +It was a look of faith and love--taken for granted. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +DECEMBER, 1927 +Vol. XCII NUMBER 3 + + + + +Incompatibility + +WHEN THERE IS NO COMPLETE SOLUTION OF A HUMAN PROBLEM, IT MAY BE THAT A +PARTIAL SOLUTION IS BETTER THAN NONE AT ALL + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +From the window of his office Blakie saw them coming, hand in hand, +looking very neat in their white dresses, shiny black pumps, and big +straw hats. They came quickly, eyes front, with a rigid, frightened air, +among the hurrying crowds of the down town street. + +“What’s she thinking of, to let them come alone?” he cried to himself. + +Snatching up his hat, he went out to meet them. A man jostled them, and +they stepped aside, directly in the path of another man in a hurry, who +ran into Irene and went on, frowning. Her hat fell off. She stooped to +pick it up, still holding fast to Martha’s hand. + +Blakie swung her up and kissed her hot, anxious little face. + +“Well, Renie!” he said. + +“Daddy!” she answered, with a sigh of relief. + +“And Marty!” + +“Oh, daddy _dear_!” + +Taking a hand of each, he turned back toward the office. No one would +jostle them now--not with his strength to protect them. Poor little +devils! + +There came back to him, in a rush, all the old savage exasperation he +thought he mastered. Just like Katherine, to send them alone! + +“Daddy, I’ve got a kitten!” said Martha. “It’s a gray, fluffy one!” + +But he was not listening. + +“You shouldn’t have come alone,” he said curtly. + +“Only just from the corner, daddy! Madge brought us to the corner, and +then she pointed where your office was, and there weren’t any streets to +cross or anything.” Something in Martha’s voice made him glance down at +her. He found her looking up at him with a queer, anxious little frown +knitting her brows. “She brought us right to the very corner, daddy!” + +“That’s all right, chick!” he said, squeezing her hand. “I mustn’t even +hint anything against--Katherine,” he thought. “Poor little kid--she’s +worried. This way!” he said aloud. “In here!” + +He opened the door of his new suite of offices. A fine suite it was, and +he was proud of it. + +“Rather different from the old place, eh?” he said. + +“Oh, yes!” said Martha. + +She had taken Renie’s hand again, and they stood stiff and straight, +terribly conscious of so many strange eyes regarding them. They were +beautiful children, dark as gypsies, with a lovely color in their +sunburned cheeks. Both of them were straight and sturdy, like himself. +They were unmistakably his children. + +“Dead image of you, Blakie!” said Crisson, his partner. “Fine kids! +Let’s see--how old are they?” + +“Martha’s ten and Irene is eight.” + +“Lord! How time flies!” said Crisson. + +The past six months had not flown for Blakie. + +Katherine was to have the children for six months of the year and he for +the other six months. + +“But you won’t really do that, Lew?” she had said. “You won’t take them +away from me?” + +Just like her, when she had tried to take them away from him! She had +come to his office--that was just like her, too; an outrageous thing to +do. They were divorced, by her wish. She had a generous allowance, and +he had agreed to everything she wanted, except to give up his children. + +“I won’t discuss it,” he had said to her. + +At first she had begged and pleaded, with tears streaming down her face. +When he remained unmoved, she had grown angry in her reckless, vehement +way. He was pretty sure that Crisson had heard her that day, and he +often wondered how much Miss Deering had heard. Certainly every one in +the outer office had seen her when she went out, with the marks of tears +on her face. + +He could never think of that day without growing hot with shame. For a +moment he even felt ashamed of the children, living reminders of his +disgrace. His wife had left him--every one knew that. + +“Miss Deering!” he said. + +He felt a little thrill of pleasure at the girl’s instant response. She +was always so eager, so willing. She answered his call with a smile on +her grave young face and a quick glance at him, as if she were trying to +read in his face what he wanted. + +“Do you think you could entertain these two young ladies for half an +hour?” he asked. + +“Oh, I think so!” she replied cheerfully. He saw the color rise in her +cheeks. She was proud to be chosen for this duty. + +She took the little girls by the hand and went off, and Blakie stood for +a moment, looking after them. Then he went into his private office and +shut the door. There was some work he wanted to do before lunch; but he +could not do it. The feel of those little hot hands had stirred him +intolerably. His children! He loved them so, he wanted them so! His +children! + +“I’ll never forgive her!” he cried in his heart. “It was a damnable +thing to do, to break up their home! They’re worried and puzzled. Poor +little kids!” + +His life with Katherine had been a misery to him, but he would have +endured it all his days rather than hurt his children. It was she who +had left her home. She had told him often enough that she “couldn’t +stand it,” but he had never expected that. + +“Heartless,” she had called him, and “a stiff, solemn prig.” That had +been her standard reproach for him--that he was a prig. When, coming +home late, he had found the children still up, romping with Katherine +and mad with excitement, and he had protested, she had called him a +prig. When he had asked her not to come down to breakfast in a dressing +gown, and when he had asked her to be more careful of her gossip before +the children, she had said the same thing. + +He had wanted to give them a normal, decent life, to assure them a good +start. + +“And, by Heaven, I will!” he thought. “I’ll have them, alone, for half +the year. I can give them some sort of idea!” + +Then, at the end of his six months, they would go back to Katherine and +her careless, rebellious life--breakfast in a dressing gown; old Madge +doing the work of the house just as it suited her; the telephone ringing +and people dropping in; Katherine, with her shining black hair in a +great, untidy knot, sitting at the piano, singing. + +He could never think of her singing without a twinge of pain, because of +what it had once meant to him--the big, glorious voice that came pouring +from her throat without effort; the feeling in it, the pity, the +tenderness. “Theatrical,” he had learned to call it, just as he had +learned to look upon her beauty with a fastidious detachment. Certainly +she was beautiful--a tall, full-bosomed, long-limbed creature, with a +lazy grace in every movement, and a face indestructibly lovely, with +dark gray eyes, clear, fine features, and a mouth too wide, too +generous, unforgetably sweet. + +It seemed to him that whatever Katherine took in her careless hands she +ruined. She wasted everything. She had had a magnificent career before +her, in light opera, and she had thrown it aside to marry him; and now +she had thrown him aside, hurt beyond healing. His love for her had been +a madness. He had been swept off his feet, infatuated, desperate; and +she had been so kind in the beginning--kinder than any other woman could +be. + +“Because she had her own way,” he thought. + +He had never criticized her then. He had not been doing so well in +business. They had lived in a tiny house in Brooklyn, with only old +Madge to help; and he had come home there at the end of the day like a +soul to Paradise. He remembered how he used to open the door with his +latchkey and go in; and no matter how quiet he was, she would always +hear him. + +“It’s himself!” she would call to Madge, with the trace of brogue that +never quite left her. “Put the dinner on the table, Madge darlin’!” + +Then she would come running to him, fling her arms around him, and draw +his head down on her breast. + +“You’re tired, my heart’s darlin’! There! Don’t you talk! Come in and +see what Madge and I have got for you!” + +“I’ve got to wash, Katherine.” + +“Wash in the kitchen, so you’ll not have to go upstairs, and you so +tired, my dearest!” + +But he never would wash in the kitchen. + +Then they would have dinner, old Madge joining in the conversation as +she waited on the table. Katherine had spoiled Madge from the start, +calling her “darling,” and sitting in the kitchen to talk with her; but +still, how Madge could cook! + +After dinner people would usually come in--friends of Katherine’s, whom +he did not much like, theatrical people, some of them charming, some of +them queer old friends whom she would not abandon. To show her husband +that he was supremely important, that he was not left out, she would sit +on the arm of his chair, with her hand on his shoulder, bending now and +then and kissing the top of his head. + +“Talk now, Lew darlin’!” she would say. “Listen now, will you, to what +Lew’s got to say!” + +But he had not liked such public demonstrations. + +“I loved her, though,” he thought. “I was happy.” + +He did not want to remember all that. It was intolerable to remember, in +his bitterness, those warm, glowing years of love and delight; and yet +it seemed to him that it would be wrong and cowardly to shirk the +memory, to shut his mind to any of the vivid little pictures that rose +before him. He closed his eyes, to see more clearly, and let the full +tide of the old pain rush over him. He was a man, and he could bear it. +He must bear it. + +Katherine had spoiled everything. As he got on in the world, he had had +to live differently, and she would not help him. Once he had asked +Crisson and his wife to dinner. He was not a partner then, and it was an +important occasion for him; but Katherine took it with her usual +careless good humor. When her guests arrived, she was not dressed. After +a very awkward wait of nearly half an hour, down she came, laughing and +lovely--and untidy. + +Blakie saw her through the Crisson’s eyes that night. He got a fresh +view of things to which he had grown almost accustomed--Madge’s casual +fashion of waiting, and the badly ironed napkins. + +After dinner she sat down at the piano and sang for them, and her coil +of shining hair came loose and slipped down. Mrs. Crisson, with a tight +smile, rose and put the pins in firmly, while Katherine went on singing. + +They had their first real quarrel that night. + +“Can’t you do your hair decently?” he said. “Mrs. Crisson--” + +“And her with a wisp of hair that looks like nothing at all!” Katherine +cried indignantly. + +“That’s not the point,” he told her, but she would not listen, and they +said cruel things to each other. + +In the morning she was her usual jolly self again, but it was harder for +him. + +That had been the beginning. Later there had been more and more +quarrels--when she had bought things they couldn’t afford, or, in one of +her fits of repentant economy, had insisted upon going shabby. + +“What do you care at all what people will be saying?” she would say, +when he protested. + +For she never cared. She came of a good family; her father had been +aid-de-camp to the governor of a British colony, but she had never +cared. + +“No!” she assured him, laughing. “Nobody else cared, either. They all +loved me. I could have gone to a ball in a flour sack, and nobody would +have cared!” + +“But, see here, for my sake, Katherine--” + +“I’ll try,” she said, and that same day she bought herself a huge +plum-colored velvet hat that appalled him. They had quarreled about +that, too. + +At first she had only laughed at his criticisms, but as time went on she +grew to resent them. In her girlhood, and during her brief time on the +stage, no one had criticized her. Every one had loved her. + +“And you!” she had cried once. “You’re the one ought to love me best of +all, and you do not, Lewis!” + +“What about your loving me a little? Won’t you just try?” + +There were years and years of that. Even after they had two servants, +the house was always a little untidy--not dirty, but with a +disorderliness that tormented him. The meals were often late, and she +herself was always late. Her friends were forever dropping in. They came +to her with all their troubles, and she would lend them money, or give +them warm-hearted, prejudiced advice, or just sit listening and crying +gallons of tears over some sad tale. Then she would want to tell her +husband all about it, and would grow angry at his lack of sympathy. + +All this went on until there was nothing left but bitterness between +them; and then she had gone away with the children and had written him a +letter to say that she was not coming back. + +He remembered that first night in the house. He had gone into her room, +all in disorder from her packing, and then into the empty nursery, where +Renie’s despised and ill-used rag doll sat in a broken rocking chair. If +he could have seen Katherine then he would have begged her to come back; +but when it came to writing a letter, that was a different matter. He +had his pride to consider. + +He had written briefly, asking her to come back for the sake of the +children, and he had had an answer from her lawyer. He had not been +sorry. Lonely as he was, there was an immense relief in that loneliness, +and there was a dignity which had long been lacking. It was as if he had +found his soul again. + +Finished now all their life together; but life itself was not finished. +Blakie was only forty-five, and there were years and years ahead of him. + +He thought of Frances Deering, with the curious uneasiness that the +thought of her always caused him. He couldn’t help knowing! She was very +grave, very businesslike in her manner, but he couldn’t help knowing! + +Sometimes, when he caught her looking at him, the honest, innocent +admiration in her eyes gave him a thrill of pride and pleasure. At other +times it troubled and irritated him. Twenty-two she was, not much more +than a kid--a good girl, and a pretty one, but he was not interested in +that sort of thing. He had loved Katherine with a love that would never +come again, and he wanted no more of that. + +Yet sometimes, in his hours of dejection and loneliness, he would think +of the solace of an honest, faithful affection, of what it would mean to +have some one waiting for him at home, some one to care if he were ill, +a companion for his older years. + +With an impatient frown he pushed away his papers and rose. He couldn’t +work now. + +As he went into the outer office he saw Frances sitting at her desk, +with the little girls beside her, all of them busy cutting out rabbits +from colored memorandum pads, and talking quietly together. Something in +the sight displeased him. The girl’s fair head, as it bent down toward +the children, had a meek look about it. Her quick and whole-hearted +acceptance of all Blakie’s orders made him feel like a sort of sultan, a +very lonely autocrat. He didn’t like that. + +“Thanks, very much, Miss Deering,” he said. “Now, kids!” + +Her eyes sought his face, as if to read there the meaning of his crisp, +impersonal tone. + +“What have I done that you don’t like?” her eyes asked. + +“You are not the one,” his heart answered. “You are good and pretty and +young, but you are not the one. What you want to see in my face no woman +will ever see again!” + + +II + +Blakie had made very careful plans. He had taken a flat near the park. +He had engaged a good cook, and a nursery governess who would come every +morning to take the children to the school on Riverside Drive where +Katherine had started them. It was not the school he would have chosen, +but they could not change every six months. + +He had consulted with his doctor about a proper diet for children of +their age. He had drawn up a schedule, not too rigid, for their baths, +meals, study, and exercise. He had bought roller skates for them to use +in the park; he had arranged riding lessons and dancing lessons for +them; he had bought them books and toys. + +He had furnished a room for each girl. Martha’s was pink--a pink rug, +rose-colored curtains, a little lamp with a rose-colored shade, wicker +chairs with cushions, a bookcase, a desk, and a rose-colored eider down +quilt on the foot of the little white bed. Next to Martha’s room was +Renie’s, decorated in blue. + +“How does that suit you?” he asked, opening the two doors. + +They stood one on each side of him, looking into those bright, cozy +little rooms with wide, solemn eyes. + +“They’re awfully sweet, daddy dear,” said Martha. + +“Awfully sweet,” Renie echoed, but he saw her restless dark eyes roving +about, looking for something. What could he have neglected or forgotten? + +“She feels strange here,” he thought. “It was bound to be like that at +first.” Aloud he said: “Dinner in ten minutes, chicks.” + +For it was his policy to give them no time to be homesick. + +All afternoon he had had them out at the Bronx zoo, and the cool April +air and the excitement had made them healthily tired. + +“Just time for a wash and brush,” he said. + +“I--can’t unbutton my shoes, daddy,” said Renie. + +“Never mind about your shoes,” he answered. + +“But mother said not to wear our best shoes in the house.” + +Just like Katherine, he thought! Dress up for a public appearance, and +never mind how you looked at home! + +“Never mind about your shoes,” he repeated a little impatiently. “Just +brush your hair.” + +“But mother told us--” said Renie, and he saw her lip tremble. + +“All right!” he said hastily. “Sit down!” + +He knelt down and unbuttoned the shiny pumps, while Martha, with a +brisk, competent air, opened their small suitcase and brought out two +pairs of cracked old pumps. + +They went off hand in hand to the bathroom, and came back damp and rosy. + +“Now!” he said, hoping that the sight of the dinner table would arouse +them to some expression of delight. + +It had seemed to him a matter of great importance that his daughters +should learn to like a well appointed table, to appreciate a charming +and orderly environment, and he had done his best here. A damask cloth +and gleaming silver, a centerpiece of roses, and before each child a +silver knife, fork, and spoon, monogrammed, and, to charm them, a little +china basket filled with pink and white sweets. + +“This is the way things ought to be,” he wanted to tell them. “This is +the way you ought to live. This is what I longed for, all through those +years of carelessness and disorder!” + +But he could not say that. He must not even hint at any disapproval of +their mother’s régime. That would be an inexcusable treachery. + +He felt certain that Katherine had never belittled him to them. He could +trust her for that. There was nothing petty about Katherine. + +“It’s awfully pretty, daddy!” said Martha. + +Renie echoed her sister’s approval; but they didn’t seem impressed. + +“They are strange here,” he thought. “After a few days it will be +different.” + +Their appetites were good, he noticed. Their mother had always looked +after their physical welfare most vigilantly. Their table manners were +good, too. Well, so were hers, when she bothered to think about such +things. + +“She’s taken good care of them,” thought Blakie. + +He had known that she would. Her love for her children was an +unfaltering, inexhaustible passion. She was often injudicious with them. +She spoiled them, of course, and sometimes she grew angry at them. Once +he had heard her call Martha a darned fool; but Martha had only laughed +at her, and then Katherine herself had laughed and hugged the child +tight. + +“Didn’t mean to be so cross, sweetheart baby!” + +“Oh, I know it, mother!” + +What sort of way was that to bring up children? + +“She’ll be missing them to-night,” he thought. + +It was hard to imagine Katherine without her children. She had always +been with them, and had taken them everywhere with her. Indeed, she had +been ridiculous about them, running to the school to say that she feared +Marty was tired, and calling in the doctor on any pretext. Yes, she +would be missing them to-night! + +“Good God, haven’t _I_ missed them for the last six months?” he thought. +“They are my children, too!” + +He glanced at their little dark heads bent over their plates, at their +blunt little fingers grasping the new knives and forks, and such a wave +of tenderness and pain swept over him that he could scarcely breathe. + +“I want to keep them!” he thought. “I want to give them the very best! +Poor little things!” + +After dinner he took them into the sitting room and read to them from +one of the new books. They were passionately interested. + +“Go on! Go on, daddy!” they cried, whenever he stopped to puff at his +cigar. + +At eight o’clock came the moment he dreaded. + +“They’ll miss their mother,” he thought. “It’ll be hard, this first +night.” + +“We’ll have a race with the undressing,” he said. “Call me when you are +ready--and the first one in bed gets a prize!” + +That worked very well. In an incredibly short space of time Marty +shouted: + +“Ready, daddy!” + +And her faithful little echo cried: + +“Ready, daddy!” + +They were both under the covers, grinning from ear to ear. Their clothes +were scattered all over the room, but he decided not to notice that +to-night. He even had an impulse to pretend to forget their prayers, for +fear of troubling them, but he resisted that. He didn’t insist upon any +great accuracy, however. + +“Now,” he said, “I’m going to be there in the sitting room. You can see +the light from your beds. If you want anything, call me.” + +Then he turned out their lamps, opened their windows, and kissed them in +a cheerful, casual way, fighting down his longing to catch them up, to +hold them fast, tight in his arms, after these six long months. + +“Night, daddy!” they called simultaneously. + +He sat down with a new book to read; but after all he could not read. +Here they were, safe in his care, surrounded with everything they ought +to have--except one thing. + +He smoked, staring at nothing. They were here with him, his children, +and yet there was a desolation in the place. He felt it, and he knew +they must feel it. + +He put down his cigar and went into Renie’s room. She was sound asleep. +He touched her head, found it damp with perspiration, and took off the +eider down quilt, which she had pulled up. + +Then he went into Martha’s room. She, too, was perfectly quiet, but her +head was covered up, and, as he tried quietly to draw down the quilt, +she clung to it. + +“Marty, dear! Are you awake?” he asked gently. + +“Yes, daddy,” replied a muffled voice. + +“Uncover your head, pet. It’s not good for you.” + +She obeyed him, but lay with her back turned to him. + +“Look here, Marty dear! Don’t cry!” He sat down beside her, and stroked +her hair. “Don’t cry, pet!” + +She was very quiet, but he felt her little shoulders shake. + +“Look here, Marty! I know how it is. You miss your mother.” + +“Oh, no!” she declared with a sob. + +“You needn’t mind telling me, Marty. It’s quite natural, dear.” + +“But it isn’t--polite,” she said, with another sob. + +“Yes, it is, Marty. I don’t mind.” + +“Don’t you really and truly mind, daddy?” she asked, turning to him. + +“Not a bit, Marty. It’s quite natural.” + +She sat up and flung her arms around his neck, burying her head on his +shoulder. She was drenched in tears. Even her little hands were damp. + +“Oh, I _do_ miss mother!” she whispered. “I _do_ miss her, daddy! I +don’t want to be unpolite, but I _do_ miss mother so!” + +He held her tight, in despair. + +“I know, Marty, I know; but you’ll be going back to her soon, dear.” + +“Then I’ll miss you,” she said. “All the t-time I’ll be going away and +m-missing you both!” + +He was frightened to feel her tremble so. He picked her up and carried +her into the bathroom. Her face was stained with tears, her eyes were +heavy, her body was shaken with sobs. + +He bathed her face with cold water, and gave her a drink. Then he +carried her into the sitting room. + +“Don’t cry so, Marty dear! Shall I read to you?” + +“I didn’t mean to be--so unpolite to you, daddy darling!” + +“Don’t say that, Marty!” he cried. “It’s--” + +Her wet cheek was pressed against his. + +“I missed you so, daddy,” she whispered, her voice hoarse from sobbing. + +She was growing quieter now, and he held her in his arms, feeling her +little heart beat against his. Then, suddenly, she burst out again +wildly: + +“Oh, daddy! Oh, daddy! I’ve got to be--always going away--and missing +you both! I can’t bear it, daddy! Oh, I miss mother so awfully, terribly +much! Oh, daddy, I want mother!” + +“Hush, Marty!” he said in anguish. “You’ll wake Renie, you know.” + +That calmed her at once. She sobbed a little longer, but her tears had +ceased. + +“It’s worse for Renie,” she said soberly. “She slept right in mother’s +room. I just had the door open between. I’d hate to have Renie wake up.” + +“So we’d better not talk, eh?” said Blakie. + +“I guess probably we hadn’t,” Martha agreed. + +She fell asleep there in his arms. Presently he carried her back to her +bed, and sat there beside her in the dark. + +Every six months a cruel parting, a difficult readjustment! It was bad +enough for a mature and armored spirit, but for children, two little +loving, bewildered children--what would it do to them? + +They were too young to be critical. They gave only love to both parents, +making no comparisons; but as they grew older it would not be so. +Suppose he succeeded in his attempt to make them appreciate a gracious, +well ordered life? Then, when they were with Katherine, they would +suffer--would suffer all the more because they loved her. Every six +months a cruel parting, a difficult readjustment! + +“It can’t be like this,” he said to himself. + +It was not for them to suffer, to make readjustments, to have their love +so tormented, their faithfulness so tried. No, let the guilty suffer, +not these innocent ones! + +He was guilty--he knew it; and Katherine was guilty. They had had a +beautiful and invaluable thing, and they had destroyed it by a thousand +almost imperceptible blows. It was gone now, and could never again be +restored; but it need not have perished. If he had been less critical, +if she had been less willful, if only there had been a little more +patience and generosity on either side, their love could have lived. + +Perhaps they were not well suited to each other. What did that matter? +He and his business partner were ill suited to each other, but it was +expedient for them to get on peacefully together, and they did. His +mother had been a very exasperating old lady, but he had considered it +his duty to get on with her, and he had done so. He had ardently +disliked the captain of his football eleven at college, but as a matter +of course he had mastered the dislike. He had learned to get on amicably +with all sorts of people; but this woman whom he had chosen-- + +Any two persons who were reasonably civilized and self-controlled could +get on together, if they tried. They might not be particularly happy in +doing so, but they could do it, if they tried. + +“We didn’t really try, either of us,” he thought. + +It was too late now to start again. There was too much to be forgiven +and forgotten; but these children should not suffer. + + +III + +The next day was Sunday, and Blakie had promised to take the two girls +into the country for a picnic; but at breakfast he suggested another +plan. + +“Suppose we go and see mother,” he said. + +Renie’s sensitive face grew scarlet, but Martha frowned a queer little +anxious frown. She couldn’t understand this. + +“We’ll go early,” he went on, “so that she won’t be out.” + +He sent them into the kitchen to talk to the cook, while he went into +Martha’s room to repack their bag. They would not come back to these gay +little pink and blue rooms! + +Then he took the bag downstairs, put it under the seat in the car, and +went up to fetch the children. He would not tell them they were not +coming back. If he could help it, there should not be another cruel +parting for them. + +He drove the car himself, leaving them together in the back seat; and +all the way he tried to find some consolation for his great bitterness. + +In all the world there was nothing but Frances Deering. + +“I’ll marry her,” he thought. “I’ll have a home of my own. She’s a dear +little kid!” + +He must have some one, and he saw clearly that he could build up a good +life with Frances. He was fond of her; perhaps he could love her, in a +way. He could have a good life, honorable and dignified and comfortable. + + * * * * * + +Katherine’s flat was in a very second-rate neighborhood. That was just +like her! + +“What do I care at all for the neighborhood,” he could imagine her +saying, “if it’s a nice flat with plenty of air and room?” + +He stopped the car before the door. + +“You wait here for awhile,” he told the children. + +Going into the ornate entrance hall, he asked the colored boy to +telephone upstairs to Mrs. Blakie that a gentleman had come to see her +on business. + +“You’re to go up,” said the boy. + +She opened the door for him herself. At the sight of him her face grew +white as death. + +“Oh, God!” she cried. “Something’s happened to them! Oh, God! I knew, if +I let them go--” + +“Don’t be silly!” he interrupted sharply. “They are both perfectly all +right. I simply want to speak to you for a moment, if--” + +He stopped short, shocked and dismayed that he had spoken in the old +tone of irritation. + +“Come in, Lew,” she said anxiously. + +He followed her into the sitting room. It was untidy, with music +scattered all about, and through the open doorway he could see the +breakfast dishes still on the table. + +“Madge has gone to mass,” she explained. + +There was a strange sort of humility about her that he had never seen +before. She was wearing a silk kimono, with her hair in a loose plait. +Her face was pale and jaded and stained with tears. + +“I’m sorry the place is so upset,” she said. + +He knew what made her so apologetic. He had the upper hand now--he had +her children. + +“Sit down, Katherine,” he said, stung to a great pity. “I shan’t waste +time beating about the bush. I’ve been thinking--most of the night.” + +“So have I,” she replied. “_All_ night!” + +“It’s not right, Katherine. It’s not fair to them.” + +“I know,” she said. + +He was silent for a moment, looking about him. It was easy to see why +her children loved her so, why she had so many friends. In all her +carelessness there was something lavish and generous. She was never +petty. She was like a child herself, reckless and impulsive--and lovely. +Hadn’t Blakie loved her himself, and known how beautifully kind she +could be? Never could his children suffer any great harm from her. + +“I’ve brought them back,” he said. + +“Lew!” + +“Yes,” he said. “It’s too damned hard on them--this way. I’ve brought +them back to you--to keep.” + +“Lew!” she cried. “Oh, my poor Lew!” + +Tears were running down her cheeks. He patted her shoulder. + +“Buck up!” he said. “You’ve got to think of something to tell them, so +that they won’t--be upset--about me.” + +He turned away, but she followed him. + +“Lew! They _will_ be upset! They’ve missed you. They need you.” + +He knew that. + +“All the night long I’ve been thinking,” she went on. “Can’t we start +again--for their sakes?” + +They faced each other now, and all that they had lost. If they were to +start again! There would be no gracious and dignified life for him, no +careless freedom for her. They would exasperate and hurt each other, +again and again. + +He walked over to the window and looked down to Renie and Martha, +sitting side by side in the car. + +“We can try,” he said. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +MARCH, 1928 +Vol. XCIII NUMBER 2 + + + + +Derelict + +TELLING WHAT CHARLES HACKETT DID WHEN HE HAD HIS CHOICE BETWEEN A LIFE +OF COMFORT AT HOME AND ONE OF ADVENTURE AND HARDSHIP IN THE TROPICS + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +The private office was dim in the gray light of a March dusk; through +the open window a chilly wind came blowing, with a fine drizzle of rain. +Wickham Hackett sat at his desk, in a circle of light from the shaded +lamp that illumined sharply his fine, haggard face, and made the graying +hair on his temples glisten like silver. He had the look of some worn +and ascetic recluse, sitting there in the chill and shadowy room. + +He was making notes for his address to the board of directors. He knew +very well that he could do this far better in the morning, that he was +too tired now for any efficient work; but he was too tired to think of +resting. The strain of his day had left him horribly tense, filled with +an almost unbearable sense of exasperation and urgency. + +His stenographer came to the open door. + +“Will you want me any longer, Mr. Hackett?” she asked. + +He was silent for a moment, struggling gallantly against his savage +mood. He wanted to shout at her, to swear at her, to tell her that it +was her business to stay as long as he did, and that she was a little +fool, with her high heels and her powdered nose; but he held his tongue, +turned away his head so that he need not see her, and answered mildly: + +“No. You can go, Miss Johnson.” + +After she had gone, he rose and went to the window. The pavement far +below was glistening, the lights were blurred. The rain blew in on him, +cold and fine. He liked the feel of it. He closed his eyes and drew a +deep breath. + +“By Heaven, I won’t quit!” he said to himself. “I won’t give in! I won’t +go home until I’ve got this thing straight in my mind, if I stay here +all night!” + +A great exultation seized him, a sense of power and energy. It was often +like this. He would reach what would seem to be the very limit of his +endurance, but if he held on, and would not rest, would not yield, this +curious new vigor would come to him, this feeling of triumph, as if he +had passed the boundary of normal endeavor and had become superhuman. He +would pay for this later, in a long night of sleeplessness, but it was +worth it. + +He saw before him now, with perfect clarity, just the words he would use +in his address. He drew back from the window, in a hurry to set them +down, and as he turned he saw a tall figure standing near his desk. The +shock made him dizzy for a moment. + +“_What_--” he began furiously, and stopped, staring. “Oh, it’s you, is +it, Charley?” he said. + +“It’s me,” replied the other cheerfully. “Knocked at the outer door and +nobody answered, so I walked in. Sorry I startled you.” + +“Nerves, I suppose,” murmured Wickham Hackett. “I’m very tired. Sit +down, man. I have something to tell you.” + +But the other remained standing. He was a tall man, lean and sunburned, +with a handsome, arrogant face and a swaggering air. He seemed like a +man from another age, who should have worn a sword at his side. An +adventurer, surely, but down on his luck now, with a frayed and +threadbare overcoat, a shabby hat, and deep lines about his gray eyes. + +“Sit down, man!” Wickham Hackett repeated impatiently. “Here, have a +smoke. I have some news for you, Charley.” + +“Can’t refuse!” said Charles Hackett, and he sat down, with one long leg +over the arm of the chair. “That’s good!” he added, at the first puff of +the cigar. + +Wickham Hackett looked down at the papers on his desk, because the sight +of this battered rover stirred him almost intolerably. He could remember +such a different Charles, years and years ago--such a careless, joyous, +and triumphant Charles; and to see him now, like this-- + +The returned wanderer had come into his brother’s office two weeks ago, +in his old casual way, as if the twelve years of his absence were +nothing at all. + +“Touch of fever,” he had said. “The doctors tell me I can’t live in a +tropical climate any more, so I’ve come home. Do you think you can find +me some sort of a job, Wick? There’s not a damned thing I can do that’s +any use; but you’re such a big fellow now, you might be able to find me +something, eh?” + +“I’ll find you a job,” Wickham Hackett had promised. + +Then Charley had begun asking about old friends. This one was dead, that +one gone away; all the inevitable vicissitudes of twelve years were +starkly revealed. It had been horrible, as if Charles were a ghost come +back to a world that had long forgotten him. + +“Well, yes, of course--it’s natural,” he had said. “The life there, in +the West Indies--quite different, you know. I like it.” + +“That’s hard luck, Charley,” Wickham Hackett had said. + +“No,” Charles had said. “No luck about it, Wick. I had it coming to me. +I’ve lived hard, and now I’ve got to pay. I’m forty, my health is +broken, and I haven’t a damned cent. That’s not bad luck, Wick--it’s bad +management;” and he had smiled, his teeth very white against his +sunburned face. + +That was the worst of it, to Wickham Hackett’s thinking--that incurable +carelessness and swagger of his brother’s. He was not sobered or +steadied by whatever misfortunes had befallen him. He still laughed, as +a man of another day might have laughed, with his back to the wall and +nothing left him but the sword in his hand. In a way, it was admirable, +but it was hard to witness that flashing smile, that debonair +manner--with the threadbare overcoat and the shabby hat! + +Wickham had taken his brother home with him. + +“But you’re married now,” Charles had protested. “Perhaps your wife--” + +“She’ll be glad to see you,” Wickham had answered. + +He had not felt at all sure of that, but one thing he did know--whether +Madeline was glad or sorry to see Charles, she would receive him kindly +and graciously. + +“I can always count on her,” Wickham had thought. + +That was the best thing in his life, the feeling he had about Madeline. +It was not the thing people usually speak of as “being in love.” In his +early youth he had known what that was. He had been in love, miserably, +bitterly, hotly in love, and he had come out of it, not unscarred; but +this, his feeling for Madeline, was different. This was a love of +dignity and utter trust. He honored her above all women on earth, and he +profoundly admired her reserved beauty. He gave her everything freely, +and put his very soul into her keeping. + +He never told her things like that. In the course of his first +disastrous love affair he had done plenty of talking, and he wished +never to use those words again. He had proved to Madeline, in their five +years of life together, what he thought of her, how he valued her, and +of course she would understand. + +She had been quite as kind and gracious to Charley as her husband had +expected. She had looked after the poor fellow’s comfort, had made him +feel at ease and happy. It had been good to see him so happy. + +“And now,” thought Wickham, “his troubles are pretty well over. He’ll be +all right.” Aloud he said: “Yes, I have news for you, Charley. I’ve--” + +“Hold on a minute!” said Charles Hackett. “I have some news myself, +Wick. Wait! Where is it? Here!” + +He drew an envelope from his breast pocket, took out the letter inside, +and spread it out on his knee. + +“From a fellow I knew down in Nicaragua,” he observed. “He’s got a deal +on there. Wants me to come in with him. Where is it? Here! ‘Your +experience will be better than capital,’ he says. ‘I’ll put up the money +and you’ll do the work.’ He says--” + +“What are you talking about?” Wickham interrupted impatiently. “You +can’t go down there. Now look here, Charley! I saw Carrick again to-day, +and he’s willing to take you in there. It’s a remarkable opportunity.” + +“Yes, but I--” + +“Don’t belittle yourself!” said Wickham. “You’ve got certain qualities +that ’ll be mighty useful to him. You’ve got brains, Charley--although +you don’t like to use ’em. I’ve been after Carrick for the last ten +days, and at last I’ve made him see the point. He wants to meet you +to-morrow, and then we’ll make a definite arrangement.” + +“Yes, but--” objected Charley. “I see; but--I think this Nicaragua job +would suit me better, Wick.” + +“Don’t be such a fool!” cried Wickham. “You know damned well that that +climate would kill you in a year; and here I’m offering you a chance any +other man would give his ears for!” + +“Yes, I know,” said Charles. “Very good of you, Wick. I appreciate it; +but--” + +Wickham sprang to his feet, shaken with a terrible anger. + +“You fool!” he shouted. “After I’ve--” He stopped suddenly, and stood +there visibly making a tremendous effort at self-control; and he won it. +“Sorry!” he said. “The truth is, I’m a bit tired. We won’t talk any more +about it now, eh? We’ll go along home, and after dinner--” + +“Yes,” said Charles; “but the thing is, Wick, I was thinking of having +dinner in town to-night. You see, there’s a boat to-morrow--” + +“No, you don’t!” said Wickham. “You’re not going to do any such foolish +and suicidal thing as that until we’ve had a talk.” + +“Yes, but--” + +“Charley,” said the other, “look here--I’m pretty tired. I can’t talk to +you properly now, and I want to. I’m not demonstrative, and never was. +Perhaps I haven’t let you see how much”--he paused, looking down at his +desk--“how much I have your welfare at heart,” he ended stiffly. + +“Wick, of course I’ve seen,” replied Charles, profoundly touched. “I’ve +appreciated everything; only you can’t make a silk purse out of a sow’s +ear. I’m a born tramp, Wick. I’d really _better_ go.” + +“For the Lord’s sake, shut up!” said Wickham, half laughing. “I can’t +talk to you until after dinner. Come along now and we’ll just make the +five forty.” + + +II + +It was Wickham’s habit to read a newspaper on the train going home, not +because his preoccupied mind felt any great interest in the outside +world, but because it was a protection. It kept people from talking to +him. + +This time, however, sitting beside Charles, he did not open his paper. +He showed his brother an almost exaggerated courtesy. For Charles’s sake +he made an effort he would have made for no one else. He tried to talk +about old friends and old days, turning his worn and sensitive face +toward the other with a look of fixed attention; but his mind wandered. +A thousand little anxieties and exasperations stirred him, and he grew +silent and distrait. + +Then his glance fell upon the sleeve of that threadbare overcoat, upon a +worn shoe carefully polished, and an almost unbearable compassion seized +him. Charley come home again, penniless and broken in health at forty! + +It was dark when they reached the suburban station, and the rain fell +steadily. They crossed the covered platform to Wickham’s car. The +chauffeur held the door open, they got in, and the car started. + +“I don’t know how it was,” said Charles, “but whenever I used to think +of home it was always like this--cold, rainy nights, and the little +houses lighted up. Sort of a charm about it, don’t you think?” + +There was some curious quality about Charles, something vivid in him, +which conjured up visions for the wanderer’s brother. He looked out of +the window, and it seemed to him that he could see as Charles saw--the +pleasant suburban street, lined with bare trees, and the comfortable +houses, lighted now, here a window with a red-shaded lamp, here a +bedroom light behind curtains, all of them so snug and safe from the +wind and the cold rain. Men were coming home and dinners were being +served, as men had been coming home to rest and eat since the dark +beginning of things. A bitter thing, to have no home, no welcome or +refuge! + +“Yes, I see,” said Wickham. + +At least Charles could share his home. + +“Unless he marries,” thought Wickham. “No reason why he shouldn’t do +well with Carrick--soon be in a position to marry and have a place of +his own. No reason at all!” + +A peculiar feeling of disquiet came over him, something shadowy and +elusive. He felt abashed, as if some one had rebuked him. Well, perhaps +it was a little hard to imagine Charles working in an office, making +money, catching the five forty to go home to some cozy little house of +his own; but it was not impossible. + +“He’s only forty,” thought Wickham, “and I have influence enough to help +him. No reason why it shouldn’t be like that!” + +He glanced uneasily at his brother. The car was lighted, and he could +see clearly that bold and arrogant profile. + +“No reason at all!” he told himself once more. + +But his disquiet persisted, like a warning of disaster. + +“He didn’t want to come back with me to-night. He wants to get away, to +go down there--to a climate that means the end of him. What’s the matter +with him? Is it pride? Doesn’t he want to accept favors from me?” + +Wickham knew it was not that, for Charles had asked him for a job. + +“And I’ve been careful,” he thought. “I haven’t said a word or done a +thing to hurt him.” + +He had never even mentioned the threadbare overcoat and the shabby hat, +or suggested a loan of money. He had noticed that Charles was always +supplied with tobacco, that he was able to pay car fares and buy +newspapers, and so on. He must have a little money left. + +“And he can start in next week with Carrick,” thought Wickham. “Then +he’ll be all right.” + +But why did he want to get away? + +“Restless,” his brother decided. “He’s lived in the tropics so long that +the idea of going to Nicaragua appealed to him, just for the moment.” + +The car turned in at the gates of Wickham’s place. He saw before him the +lights of his own home shining through the rain; and mechanically he +braced himself for an ordeal. + +It was his inflexible rule to enter his house with an amiable and +agreeable manner. When the parlor maid opened the door, he gave her +something as much like a smile as he could manage, bade her good +evening:, and entered the drawing-room. + +“Hello, Madeline!” he said. + +His wife came toward him. He put his hand on her shoulder and kissed her +cheek. + +“Nice and warm in here,” he observed. “I’ll go and have a wash and brush +up, and get ready for dinner.” + +It was hard for him to speak at all, fatigue so weighed upon him. He +went up the stairs, forcing himself to a brisk pace, entered his room, +and locked the door. Then suddenly he thought of things for his speech +to-morrow--just the things he had wanted. He pulled out his notebook and +fountain pen and began to make notes. + +“Mustn’t be late for dinner, though,” he thought. + +He took off his coat and went toward his bathroom. Then he thought of a +most effective sentence and hurried back to the table. + +“If I could have a quiet hour now!” he thought. “But that’s not fair to +Madeline.” + +He came down at the proper time, with more and more ideas for that +speech running through his mind, and entered the drawing-room again. +Madeline was sitting there, stretched out in a lounge chair, and Charles +stood beside her. They were laughing at something. + +Again that curious disquiet seized Wickham Hackett. He stood in the +doorway, looking at her, and it seemed to him that somehow she had +changed. + + * * * * * + +All through dinner Wickham’s eyes sought his wife’s face with covert +anxiety. She was as cool, as gay, as gracious as ever--a tall young +creature, exquisitely cared for, with shining dark hair and a delicate, +half disdainful face. He had never seen her ill-tempered or impatient, +had never known her to be anything but kind to him, and courteous and +lovely; and she was so to-night. He must have been dreaming to fancy +that there was a change, a shadow upon her unruffled beauty! + +Dinner finished, they went back into the drawing-room for coffee. + +“Wickie,” said Madeline, “you’ve been sleeping better lately, haven’t +you?” + +He had not, but because she looked anxious he said yes, he thought he +had. + +“Ah!” she cried triumphantly. “I knew it! Wickie, I’ve been deceiving +you. I’ve been giving you a new sort of coffee, with no caffeine in it!” + +“Shouldn’t have known it,” he said, smiling at her. + +She had risen, and was standing by the radio. She smiled back at him +over her shoulder and then began to turn the dial. + +“There!” she said. + +An orchestra was playing a waltz--a Spanish rhythm, with clicking +castanets. + +“Charles!” she said. + +But Charles Hackett did not answer. He sat smoking a cigarette, with his +coffee cup before him, and staring down at his worn and carefully +polished shoes. + +“_Charles!_” she cried, laughing. “You’re not very gallant this evening. +Do I have to ask you to dance?” + +“Well, not twice,” said Charles. + +He put down his cigarette, rose, crossed the room to her, and put his +arm about her, and they began to dance. + +What was the matter? Every evening since Charles had come he and +Madeline had had a dance or two after dinner. + +“Charles is the most wonderful dancer,” Madeline had said, and Wickham +had felt a little sorry for him, with only so futile an accomplishment +to his credit. + +If it made them happy, Madeline’s husband had been pleased; but he was +not pleased to-night. He was uneasy, the music worried him, and he moved +restlessly in his chair. + +“Perhaps it’s this new coffee,” he thought. “I need the stimulation of +the real thing. Poor girl!” + +“Wickie, I’ve been deceiving you!” The words came back to him with a +horrible shock. + +“Good God!” he cried to himself. “What’s the matter with me? This +is--shameful!” + +He closed his eyes for a moment, and tried not to hear the music. + +“I ought to take her out more,” he thought. “She’s so much younger than +I am. It’s dull for her here, but she’s never complained--never once. +The best wife a man ever had--the finest, straightest girl!” + +If she would come behind his chair now and lay her slender hand over his +closed eyes! Of course, she didn’t do things like that. There was +beneath her gayety a fastidious and almost austere reserve. That was +what he most respected in her. She was kind, always kind, but always +aloof. + +Well, he wanted it so. He would not have it otherwise; but if only just +this once he could feel her hand on his eyes, if she would stop and kiss +him! + +He opened his eyes, ashamed of his weakness; and he saw his brother’s +face. + + +III + +Madeline had gone upstairs, and the two men were alone together in the +library. Charles sat beside a lamp, with its light full upon him, but +Wickham had moved into a shadowy corner. + +Some neighbors had come in to play bridge, there had been more dancing +and a little supper; and through it all, all the time, Wickham had been +thinking of that look on his brother’s face--a look of terrible pain and +regret and tenderness. He was never going to forget it. + +“I can’t--just go on,” he thought. “It’s not possible. It’s--oh, God! +It’s my fault--I’ve thrown them together, and she’s so lovely and sweet +that I might have known. Oh, poor devil! That’s why he wants to go +away!” + +“Well, Wick,” said Charles, with a sigh. “Now for that talk, eh?” + +It was hard for Wickham Hackett to begin. + +“Charley,” he said, “I don’t want you to go.” + +“I know, Wick. You’ve been more than decent--about everything; but, to +tell you the truth, I have a hankering for the old life--see? I’m sorry +to let you down, when you’ve taken so much trouble to get me a job, but +I feel I’ve got to get South again, in the sun.” + +“Charley--” + +“The doctors don’t always know what they’re talking about, you know. +Personally I think it ’ll do me good to get down there in the sun.” + +“Charley,” said Wickham, with a monstrous effort, “I--I think you have +another reason.” + +“Eh?” said Charles, glancing up sharply. + +Their eyes met for an instant. + +“I wanted to tell you,” said Wickham, still with a painful effort, “that +it needn’t matter.” + +“But--it does,” murmured Charles. + +“I wanted to tell you that--I don’t blame you. You can’t help it. Who +could? I’m sure she doesn’t know. I was watching her this evening. I’m +sure she doesn’t suspect.” + +“No,” said Charles. “She doesn’t know.” + +“She needn’t ever. You can put up at a hotel, Charley, and just come +out for a visit now and then.” + +“No, old man,” said Charles quietly. “Wouldn’t do.” + +“Yes, it would. See here, Charley--that’s a remarkable opportunity with +Carrick. You’ll--” + +“I know,” said Charles; “but I think I’ll go down to Nicaragua, Wick.” + +“Charley, don’t do it! She doesn’t know; and as for me--I want you here. +It’s suicide to go down there. Stay here, Charley!” + +“Can’t, Wick,” said Charles. Then he glanced up, with his flashing +smile. “I’m off to-morrow, Wick. It’s the best thing. I’m going to make +my fortune down there--see?” + +“Charley, this is foolish melodrama stuff! You’re not a boy. It can’t be +as bad as that.” + +“It is, Wick--as bad as that.” + +Wickham was silent for a long time. + +“Charley--” he said, and held out his hand. + +“Wick, old man!” said Charles, taking it in his. + + +IV + +It was still raining the next morning, still blowing. Charles Hackett +had made his adieus, had been driven to the station in Wickham’s car, +caught an early train, and got into the city. He came out of the Grand +Central into the steady downpour, pulled the shabby hat down on his +forehead, turned up the collar of the threadbare overcoat, and set off +on foot. + +The wet and the mud soaked through his worn shoes, and the fine polish +was hopelessly lost. A very battered rover he looked; but the girl in +the florist’s shop thought him a splendid figure. + +“Charley!” she cried. + +There was no one else in the shop at this early hour, and he went with +her into the little back room, dim and chilly and bare, with a long +table, upon which the carnations she had been sorting lay scattered. + +“You’re so wet! Won’t you take off your coat, Charley?” + +“Can’t, Betty. I’m sailing at eleven, and there are things--” + +“Sailing, Charley? But--you’re not going away?” + +She stood before him, a slender, fair-haired girl in a green smock. He +had known her years ago in Havana, in the days of her father’s +prosperity; and he had found her again here, a lonely, plucky little +exile, earning her own bread. No one quite like her, he thought--no one +else with eyes so clear and candid, with so generous and sweet a smile; +but she was twenty-two and he was forty, and he hadn’t fifty dollars to +his name. + +“Yes, I’m going,” he said. “I don’t fit in here, you know, Betty.” + +“But--I thought you were going to get a job and stay here.” + +“Well,” Charles told her, “I’ve only had one job offered me, and it +doesn’t suit me; so I’m going down to Nicaragua.” + +“That’s quite a long way, isn’t it?” she said casually. + +“Yes, it is,” replied Charles. + +They were both silent for a time. The rain was rattling against the +window. The room was filled with the spicy fragrance of the carnations. + +“I--I thought you’d stay here,” the girl said. + +He knew well enough that she was crying, but he took care not to look at +her. + +“No,” he said gravely. “I don’t fit in here. I’m a derelict, and a +derelict can be a danger to navigation. I’ve known some pretty good +craft wrecked that way.” He was talking half to himself. When she looked +at him in troubled surprise, he smiled cheerfully. “So I’ve come to say +good-by, Betty,” he ended. + +“I’m sure I could help you to find something to do, Charley.” + +He shook his head, still smiling, his teeth white against his sunburned +face. She saw the fine lines about his eyes, his shabbiness, his +invincible gallantry. + +“Charley!” she cried, and threw her arms about his neck. “Oh, don’t, +_don’t_ go, Charley!” + +He held her tight, clasped to his wet coat, and with one hand stroked +her fair head lying on his shoulder. + +“Oh, don’t, don’t go away, Charley!” she sobbed. “I do--need you so!” + +He put his hand under her chin and lifted her face, streaming with +tears. He looked straight into her eyes, and smiled again. There was +something almost terrible in that smile, something inflexible, hard as +steel. + +“No, you don’t!” he said. “You’re a sentimental kid, that’s all. You’re +going to forget all about me, like a nice kid, and six months from now +you’re going to write me a letter and tell me about the wonderful boy +you’ve got.” + +She could smile, too, quite as steadily as he. + +“All right!” she said. “All right, if you want to pretend it’s that way; +but you know I won’t forget.” + +He did not smile any more. + +“Anyhow,” he said, “it’s good-by now.” + +She raised her head and kissed him. For a moment he crushed her against +him; then, with just the lightest kiss on her young head, he let her go, +took up his hat, and hurried off. He knew she had come to the door to +watch him go, but he did not look back. + + * * * * * + +All gray the harbor was that morning, and noisy with the hoarse din of +whistles and fog horns; but Charles Hackett stood on deck, in the rain, +to see the last of it. + +A lucky thing, he thought, that Wick hadn’t brought her down to see him +off! Lucky that last night Wick had looked at his face, not hers! It had +been so plain there to read--the doubt, the question, the fear, in the +eyes of Wickham’s wife. She didn’t know yet, but she was beginning to +know. + +“Why am I to have no life? Why am I to be shut out, denied everything +that is real?” + +She had turned with her unspoken question not to Wickham, but to his +brother. Charles had come to her, almost as if the sun of the tropics +had risen in the cool skies of her homeland. He had danced with her, +talked to her, with his vivid smile, his immeasurable careless vitality. +He had had for her not only his innate charm, but the charm of the +unknown. + +Even his very shabbiness had enchanted her, because it was a regal +thing. He, too, might have had his pockets well filled, but he had not +cared for money. He had thrown everything away, and had laughed a +careless laugh. + +Then he had seen what was coming. He had seen the doubt, the dismay, +which she herself did not understand. He had seen her turn to him, not +to her husband. + +Well, she wouldn’t turn to him any more, for he would not be there. +There would only be Wickham, chivalrous and quiet. She would forget the +doubt and the question that would never be asked and never be answered. +It was essential for Charles to go, never to be there again. + +The rain and the mist almost hid the shores from his sight now. He could +see only the tops of great buildings, like castles on a mountain top. +His girl was there, the girl who had clung to him so. + +He turned away from the rail, wet through. + +“Not for me!” he said to himself. + + + + +MUNSEY’S +MAGAZINE + +Vol. XCIV JUNE, 1928 NUMBER 1 + + + + + “I DO LOVE YOU, DOUGLAS!” + SHE WHISPERED + +[Illustration] + + + + +Inches and Ells + + A STORY WHICH EXPLAINS WHY MILDRED GRAHAM DECIDED, AS MANY OTHER + GIRLS HAVE DECIDED BEFORE HER, THAT MEN ARE QUEER + +By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding + + +She listened to his footsteps, going down and down the stone stairs, +until the echo died away; and still she stood as if she were listening, +one hand on the back of a chair, her lips parted, a faint frown on her +brow. + +But the silence settled about her, and even her own fast-beating heart +and quickened breathing grew quieter. + +“He’s gone,” she said aloud. + +Very well! She had told him to go, and she wanted him to go. She turned +away from the doorway and went toward her bedroom. + +“I never should have let him call here,” she thought. “He doesn’t +understand. He’s impossible. I knew it, too. I knew that if I gave him +an inch, he’d take ells and ells!” + +She was surprised and displeased to feel tears running down her cheeks. + +“How silly!” she said to herself. “I’ll see him again to-morrow; and if +he’s sorry--if he apologizes--” + +She clasped her hands tight, struggling against a sob. + +“I’ll go to bed and get a good night’s sleep,” she thought. “In the +morning--” + +But the tears would not stop. She saw her orderly little room in a mist. +The silver on the dressing table made a dazzling blur, and the edge of +the mirror was like a rainbow. + +“Silly!” she said to herself. + +There before her were the precious photographs of her father and her +mother, in a double frame. She picked them up and looked at them, +blinking away the tears until the beloved faces were clear to her. They +had trusted her to come to New York alone, to manage her own life with +dignity and discretion; they counted upon her not being silly. + +At this moment they would be sitting in the library at home, in the +serene quiet of their mutual affection and understanding. Perhaps her +father would be writing at his table, his gray head bent over some +scientific treatise, and her mother would be sewing or reading; but +whatever they were doing, their child would not be forgotten. The +thought of her would come to them at any moment. They must miss her, but +they were proud of her and sure of her. + +“I’ve got to make Douglas see,” she said to herself. “He’s got to show +decent respect for me. I know he’s fond of me, but--” + +The tears came again in a rush. + +“I know he’s fond of me,” she thought, and remembered the ring. + +Imagine his coming like that, with a ring to put on her finger, before +he had even asked her if she liked him! The very first time she had +asked him here, too! Catching her roughly in his arms and kissing her! + +He had shown no trace of delicacy or respect, no appreciation of the +honor done him in being asked here. He knew that she was quite alone, +and he had taken advantage of it. Kissing her like that, when she had +forbidden him! + +Well, she had made him realize her just resentment. She had sent him +away, him and his ring, not angrily, but quietly. + +“If he had even said he was sorry,” she thought. “Perhaps he will +to-morrow.” + +All the time she undressed, the tears were running down her face. + +“Because I’m so disappointed,” she told herself. “I didn’t think he’d be +like that.” + +She had seen him in the office every day for two months, and once she +had gone out to lunch with him, and once to dinner; and she had felt +that a very beautiful thing was beginning. She had seen in his gray eyes +a look that made her heart beat fast, had heard in his voice a queer, +grudging tenderness not to be forgotten. + +She had known, of course, that he was not quite the man she had dreamed +of, no knightly figure of romance. His manner was abrupt and +domineering. More than once she had seen him lose his temper with some +unlucky fellow worker, and speak in a grim white anger that distressed +her bitterly; but he was so honest and so uncompromising! She had +respected that, and had admired his tireless energy, his undoubted +cleverness. + +There were not many men of his age who had gone as far as he--head of a +department at twenty-four. Yes, she had been justified in liking him; +but there were those other things, those unreasonable things. When she +thought of him, it was not his business ability that she remembered, but +his quick smile, his steady glance, his way of scowling and running his +hand over the back of his head. + +“If he just says he’s sorry to-morrow,” she thought. “If he’ll just +realize that he was--horrible!” + +She fell asleep in a troubled and confused mood, and waked the next +morning with a heavy heart. + +“I won’t be weak and silly,” she thought. “If he’s not sorry--if he +can’t show the proper respect for me--then it’s finished!” + + +II + +She was sitting at her typewriter when he came into the office. She +heard his curt “good morning” to some one else, heard his footsteps +behind her. A wave of emotion rushed over her, so that for an instant +she could not breathe; but she sat very quiet, the slender, neat, +dark-haired Miss Graham that the office always beheld. + +Almost at once he sent for her. She rose, took her notebook and pencil, +and went into his private office. + +“Shut the door,” he said. + +The color rose in her cheeks, but she paid no heed to the command. He +rose and shut the door himself. + +“Look here!” he said. “I--I shouldn’t have made such a fool of myself, +only I thought you--liked me.” + +Her cheeks were flaming now. She looked straight into his face. + +“If that’s the way you look at it--” she said. + +“I came to you,” he said. “I offered you all I had, and you told me to +get out.” + +“Do you mean to say,” she cried, “that you don’t _see_ how outrageous +you were?” + +They stood facing each other, like enemies. + +“No,” he said, “I don’t see. I thought that if you asked me there, you +had been nice to me. I thought you liked me. Now that I see you don’t, +I’m sorry.” + +“You just call it making a fool of yourself, to be so arrogant and +disrespectful?” + +“I wasn’t arrogant!” he replied hotly. “Call it arrogance to come and +ask a girl to marry you--to offer her all you have?” + +“I suppose I should have felt honored,” she said, with a faint smile. + +His own face flushed. + +“Damned if I see what more you can expect!” + +“I expect respect from a man,” she told him. + +“Do you think I’d ask you to marry me if I didn’t respect you?” + +“The way you did it!” she cried. “It was--” + +“If you cared for me,” he said, “you wouldn’t have minded my--my kissing +you.” + +“Yes, I should!” + +Their eyes met. + +“Oh, Mildred!” he cried. “Do you mean you _do_ care?” + +A panic fear seized her. + +“I don’t!” she said. “No--I--it’s not fair to make me stand here and +listen to you!” + +He turned on his heel and walked over to the window. + +“All right,” he said unsteadily. “You needn’t stay.” + +She opened the door and went back into the outer office. She knew that +the other girls would notice her hot color, would see that she had no +dictation to transcribe, and would talk about it. She was humiliated, +and it was his fault. + +“I hate him!” she thought, and was shocked. + +It was wrong and horrible to hate. It was shameful to be so angry and +shaken. + +“He’s not worth bothering about,” she thought. “He _is_ arrogant. He’s +domineering and conceited. He calls it making a fool of himself to +insult and hurt me.” + +She did not see him again that morning. He used the dictaphone for his +letters, and presently she had them to type. It was strange to hear his +voice in her ears, his impatient young voice: + +“No, cross that out. No, begin it all over.” + +All that long day, and all the next day, went by without a word or +glance between them. The following morning was Saturday, a half holiday, +and Mildred was going, as usual, to spend the week-end at home. She came +to the office dressed for traveling, and bringing her bag with her. + +She went directly into Randall’s little office. + +“Mr. Randall,” she said, “I’m leaving to-day.” + +He looked up at her. + +“You’re supposed to give a week’s notice,” he said. + +“I’m sorry, but I’m not coming back.” + +“I haven’t--bothered you,” he said. + +After she had returned to her own desk, his voice echoed in her ears, +miserable, angry, and forlorn: + +“I haven’t bothered you.” + +“I can’t help it,” she thought. “I can’t stay here.” + +Promptly at twelve o’clock Randall left the office, without a word to +any one. The door closed behind him. + +“He’s gone,” she thought. “I won’t see him again!” + +And it seemed to her that his going left all the world empty and +desolate. + +“His lordship isn’t quite so gay this morning,” said the girl next to +her. “He got an awful calling down. Mr. Williams sent for him. I was in +Mr. Pratt’s office, and we both heard every word. I was tickled to +death! I can’t stand Randall.” + +“What was the matter?” asked Mildred, her eyes on her work. + +“Oh, it seems that Randall had been out with the boys last night, +playing poker and drinking, and Mr. Williams heard about it. When +Randall made a mistake in his work this morning, the old man jumped on +him--told him he wasn’t up to his work, and that if he kept on like that +he’d get the gate--told him he was expected to get here in the morning +fresh and fit. Oh, he just jumped on him! I was tickled to death, +Randall’s so high-hat.” + +“What did he say?” asked Mildred. + +“What could he say? ‘All right, sir. Yes, sir! No, sir!’ He had to come +down off his high horse _that_ time!” + +Mildred had a vision of young Randall, not domineering and energetic, +but standing downcast and unhappy before his chief. + +“I think it’s a shame!” she cried suddenly. “Mr. Williams might have +closed the door, anyhow, so that no one would hear!” + +“It’ll do Randall good,” said the other, with satisfaction. + +“No, it won’t!” Mildred retorted. + +She felt certain that humiliation would not do Randall good, but harm. A +great anger filled her, and a curious fear. + +“He can’t stand that,” she thought. “He won’t stand it. He’ll do +something silly. If Mr. Williams had just talked to him quietly and +nicely--if some one would--” + + +III + +She had lunch alone in a little tea room, and all the while she thought +of Randall, the arrogant, who had been humiliated and humbled. Playing +poker and drinking! They were things utterly outside her experience, and +the thought of them filled her with dismay and alarm. + +“He’s so reckless,” she thought. “He told me he was all alone in New +York. There’s no one to talk to him.” + +That public reprimand had come to him just after she had told him that +she was leaving. Perhaps that ring had been in his pocket at the +time--the ring that he must have bought with such a high heart. + +Through the tea room window she could look out on the crowded street. +That was the world out there--the world he lived in, hurried, careless, +and jostling; and he was pushing his way through it, hurried himself and +careless and solitary. + +“I can’t let him go like this, without a word,” she thought. “Perhaps if +I just spoke to him--nicely, it might help.” + +It was hard for her to do that, for it was he who should have come to +her, should have asked her not to go away, should have tried to set +himself right with her. + +“Now he’ll think I didn’t really mind his behaving that way,” she +thought. “He’ll be hard to manage, if I encourage him.” + +But she had to do it. Reluctantly, with a heavy heart, she telephoned to +the address he had given her. + +“Randall’s not in,” said a cheerful masculine voice. “I expect him any +minute. Can I take a message?” + +She hesitated. + +“Yes, please,” she said at last. “If you’ll tell him that Miss Graham is +leaving for Hartford on the five o’clock train, and that she’d like to +see him at the Grand Central for a moment before she goes.” + +“Miss Graham--leaving on the five o’clock train for Hartford--wants to +see him at the Grand Central. Right! I’ve got it all written down.” + +That was a later train than she had meant to take, and there was a long +time to be filled. She went into the book department of a big store and +picked out something to read--a serious book, the sort she had been +brought up to appreciate. Then she went to a tea room and had a plate of +ice cream. + +At half past four she reached the station, and stood near the gates of +the train, waiting--such a neat, composed, dignified young creature, +with her book under her arm. At heart she was nervous, but she meant to +try. She was going to speak to Randall gravely and earnestly. She would +not encourage him too much, but she would offer him her friendship, if +he would be worthy of it. It was a difficult thing for her to do, this +cherished only daughter, so sheltered, so gently bred, so quietly proud +in her own honorable and blameless life. She had taken a step down in +doing this. + +Her face was pale, but her eyes were steady and clear, searching the +crowd for him. It was right to try and help him. + +He was late in coming. Only fifteen minutes now--only ten minutes! + +On impulse she hurried to a telephone. + +“He hasn’t got the message,” she thought. “I’ll just say good-by. I’ll +tell him that perhaps I’ll see him again.” + +The same masculine voice answered. + +“I did give him the message,” it protested; “but you see, he’s got a +little party on here. He must have lost track of the time. I’ll call +him.” + +“No!” she cried. “Thank you. Good-by!” + +He had got her message and he had not troubled to come. She had to run +now to catch the train. He hadn’t come. He didn’t care. + +She stopped short as she reached the gates. + +“All abo-o-ard!” cried the conductor. + +But she did not go. She turned away from the train with a strange blank +look on her face. + +“I can’t!” she thought. “I love him. I can’t go like this!” + +She was surprised to find that it had grown dark when she reached the +street. A cold wind blew, and the myriad flashing lights of Forty-Second +Street, the noise, the crowds, confused her. Her composure and her +dignified self-reliance were gone; she felt desolate and abandoned. + +“What’s the matter with me?” she thought with a sob. “I ought to be +ashamed of myself. He got my message--and he didn’t come!” + +She tried to stop a taxi, but they all went past. + +“But he _wanted_ to come!” she cried in her heart. “I know he wanted to +come, only he’s too proud. I hurt him too much.” + +He would not come to her, so she was going to him. Was it possible? + +“I don’t care!” she said to herself. “I won’t go away like this!” + +At last she stopped a cab. + +“If he sees me--” she thought. + +For somehow she, who knew so little of love and life, knew that if he +saw her his stubborn pride would be melted. She must do it, at any cost +to her own pride. + +Terribly pale, she entered the hall of the apartment house where he +lived. The hall boy came forward. + +“Mr. Randall? I’ll telephone up.” + +“N-no, thank you,” she said. “I’ll just go up.” + +“It’s the rule--” the boy began; but after a glance at her pale, set +face he resigned himself with a sigh, and took her up in the elevator. + +He watched her going along the hall, so slender and straight, still with +the serious book under her arm. + +She rang the bell, and waited. She rang again, and the door was flung +open with a crash by a cheerful, fair-haired young fellow. + +“I want to see Mr. Randall,” she said. + +He stared at her for a moment. + +“Ran!” he called. “Come here! Some one to see you!” + + +IV + +From a room at the end of the hall young Randall appeared in his shirt +sleeves, with his dark hair ruffled and his face flushed. + +“Mildred!” he cried. + +The fair-haired fellow disappeared. + +“Mildred!” said Randall again. + +She tried to speak, but she could not. She stood there just outside the +door, with the book under her arm, only looking at him. + +He came down the hall to her. He, too, was silent. From the room at the +back she could hear laughter and the rattle of chips, and the air was +heavy with tobacco smoke. + +“Come in!” he said. + +She shook her head mutely, but he took her hand, drew her into the +little sitting room at the right, and closed the door after him. + +A terrible despair filled her. She had done this incredible thing, come +here after him, and now he would despise her! + +“Sit down!” he said. + +She was glad to do so, for her knees were trembling. + +“I couldn’t--” she said unsteadily. “I couldn’t go--I was afraid.” + +“Oh, _darling_!” he cried. He was on his knees beside her chair, with +his dark head bent on her arm. “Oh, my darling girl!” + +“Douglas!” she breathed, amazed, incredulous. + +“I’m so sorry!” he said in a muffled voice. “My darling girl! For you to +come here--you little angel! I’m so sorry!” + +“I just thought--” she faltered. + +“I’m so sorry!” he cried again. “I wish I could tell you! You’re such an +angel, and I’m not fit to speak to you!” + +She laid her hand on his head. He caught it in his own and raised it to +his lips in reverence. + +“Mildred,” he said, “you don’t know how I feel. I mean it when I say I’m +at your feet.” + +“But--” she began, and stopped, struggling with a new idea. “Is it like +this?” she thought. “If I’m just kind to him, and generous--” + +If she stooped in love and pity--if she came down from her +pedestal--would he worship her? She put her arm around his neck. + +“I do love you, Douglas!” she whispered. + +He rose to his feet. + +“Mildred,” he said, “you’ll see--I’ll do _anything_ for you! I’m not +half good enough, but, Mildred, I’ll try. I don’t care how long you want +me to wait. I’ll do anything you tell me!” + +When she had given him an inch, he had taken an ell; but when she was +reckless in her giving, he stood before her like this, utterly humble. + +“Just tell me what you want,” he said. + +She was silent for a moment. + +“I’d like you to come out to Hartford and see my father and mother,” she +said gravely. + +“All right!” he said. “I’ll get my hat and coat.” + +He left the door of the room open, and she could hear his curt voice in +the back room. + +“I’m going, boys.” + +“You can’t break up the party!” protested an indignant voice. + +“I’ve got to go,” he said. “My--the girl I’m engaged to--wants me to go +out to see her people.” + +“Henpecked already!” observed the same indignant voice. + +“Good-by!” said Randall. “You can take my chips, Fry. We’ll settle up +later.” + +When she had been dignified and reserved, he had been angry and +unmanageable. When she ran after him, at such a cost to her pride, she +became his sovereign lady, whose least word he obeyed. + +“Men are queer!” thought Mildred. + + + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 75147 *** |