WITHIN an hour from the time Alfred had entered his office that morning he was leaving it, in a taxi, with his faithful secretary at his side, and his important papers in a bag at his feet. “Take me to the Sherwood,” he commanded the driver, “and be quick.”
As they neared Alfred's house, Johnson could feel waves of increasing anger circling around his perturbed young employer and later when they alighted from the taxi it was with the greatest difficulty that he could keep pace with him.
Unfortunately for Jimmy, the outer door of the Hardy apartment had been left ajar, and thus it was that he was suddenly startled from Zoie's unwelcome embraces by a sharp exclamation.
“So!” cried Alfred, and he brought his fist down with emphasis on the centre table at Jimmy's back.
Wheeling about, Jimmy beheld his friend face to face with him. Alfred's lips were pressed tightly together, his eyes flashing fire. It was apparent that he desired an immediate explanation. Jimmy turned to the place where Zoie had been, to ask for help; like the traitress that she was, he now saw her flying through her bedroom door. Again he glanced at Alfred, who was standing like a sentry, waiting for the pass-word that should restore his confidence in his friend.
“I'm afraid I've disturbed you,” sneered Alfred.
“Oh, no, not at all,” answered Jimmy, affecting a careless indifference that he did not feel and unconsciously shaking hands with the waiting secretary.
Reminded of the secretary's presence in such a distinctly family scene, Alfred turned to him with annoyance.
“Go into my study,” he said. “I'll be with you presently. Here's your list,” he added and he thrust a long memorandum into the secretary's hand. Johnson retired as unobtrusively as possible and the two old friends were left alone. There was another embarrassed silence which Jimmy, at least, seemed powerless to break.
“Well?” questioned Alfred in a threatening tone.
“Tolerably well,” answered Jimmy in his most pleasant but slightly nervous manner. Then followed another pause in which Alfred continued to eye his old friend with grave suspicion.
“The fact is,” stammered Jimmy, “I just came over to bring Aggie——” he corrected himself—“that is, to bring Zoie a little message from Aggie.”
“It seemed to be a SAD one,” answered Alfred, with a sarcastic smile, as he recalled the picture of Zoie weeping upon his friend's sleeve.
“Oh no—no!” answered Jimmy, with an elaborate attempt at carelessness.
“Do you generally play the messenger during business hours?” thundered Alfred, becoming more and more enraged at Jimmy's petty evasions.
“Just SOMETIMES,” answered Jimmy, persisting in his amiable manner.
“Jimmy,” said Alfred, and there was a solemn warning in his voice, “don't YOU lie to me!”
Jimmy started as though shot. The consciousness of his guilt was strong upon him. “I beg your pardon,” he gasped, for the want of anything more intelligent to say.
“You don't do it well,” continued Alfred, “and you and I are old friends.”
Jimmy's round eyes fixed themselves on the carpet.
“My wife has been telling you her troubles,” surmised Alfred.
Jimmy tried to protest, but the lie would not come.
“Very well,” continued Alfred, “I'll tell you something too. I've done with her.” He thrust his hands in his pockets and began to walk up and down.
“What a turbulent household,” thought Jimmy and then he set out in pursuit of his friend. “I'm sorry you've had a misunderstanding,” he began.
“Misunderstanding!” shouted Alfred, turning upon him so sharply that he nearly tripped him up, “we've never had anything else. There was never anything else for us TO have. She's lied up hill and down dale from the first time she clinched her baby fingers around my hand—” he imitated Zoie's dainty manner—“and said 'pleased to meet you!' But I've caught her with the goods this time,” he shouted, “and I've just about got HIM.”
“Him!” echoed Jimmy weakly.
“The wife-stealer,” exclaimed Alfred, and he clinched his fists in anticipation of the justice he would one day mete out to the despicable creature.
Now Jimmy had been called many things in his time, he realised that he would doubtless be called many more things in the future, but never by the wildest stretch of imagination, had he ever conceived of himself in the role of “wife-stealer.”
Mistaking Jimmy's look of amazement for one of incredulity, Alfred endeavoured to convince him.
“Oh, YOU'LL meet a wife-stealer sooner or later,” he assured him. “You needn't look so horrified.”
Jimmy only stared at him and he continued excitedly: “She's had the effrontery—the bad taste—the idiocy to lunch in a public restaurant with the blackguard.”
The mere sound of the word made Jimmy shudder, but engrossed in his own troubles Alfred continued without heeding him.
“Henri, the head-waiter, told me,” explained Alfred, and Jimmy remembered guiltily that he had been very bumptious with the fellow. “You know the place,” continued Alfred, “the LaSalle—a restaurant where I am known—where she is known—where my best friends dine—where Henri has looked after me for years. That shows how desperate she is. She must be mad about the fool. She's lost all sense of decency.” And again Alfred paced the floor.
“Oh, I wouldn't go as far as that,” stammered Jimmy.
“Oh, wouldn't you?” cried Alfred, again turning so abruptly that Jimmy caught his breath. Each word of Jimmy's was apparently goading him on to greater anger.
“Now don't get hasty,” Jimmy almost pleaded. “The whole thing is no doubt perfectly innocent. Talk to her gently. Win her confidence. Get her to tell you the truth.”
“The truth!” shouted Alfred in derision. “Zoie! The truth!”
Jimmy feared that his young friend might actually become violent. Alfred bore down upon him like a maniac.
“The truth!” he repeated wildly. “She wouldn't know the truth if she saw it under a microscope. She's the most unconscionable little liar that ever lured a man to the altar.”
Jimmy rolled his round eyes with feigned incredulity.
“I found it out before we'd been married a month,” continued Alfred. “She used to sit evenings facing the clock. I sat with my back to it. I used to ask her the time. Invariably she would lie half an hour, backward or forward, just for practice. THAT was the BEGINNING. Here, listen to some of these,” he added, as he drew half a dozen telegrams from his inner pocket, and motioned Jimmy to sit at the opposite side of the table.
Jimmy would have preferred to stand, but it was not a propitious time to consult his own preferences. He allowed himself to be bullied into the chair that Alfred suggested.
Throwing himself into the opposite chair, Alfred selected various exhibits from his collection of messages. “I just brought these up from the office,” he said. “These are some of the telegrams that she sent me each day last week while I was away. This is Monday's.” And he proceeded to read with a sneering imitation of Zoie's cloy sweetness.
“'Darling, so lonesome without you. Cried all day. When are you coming home to your wee sad wifie? Love and kisses. Zoie.'” Tearing the defenceless telegram into bits, Alfred threw it from him and waited for his friend's verdict.
“She sent that over the wire?” gasped Jimmy.
“Oh, that's nothing,” answered Alfred. “That's a mild one.” And he selected another from the same pocket. “Here, listen to this. This is what she REALLY did. This is from my secretary the same night.”
“You spied upon her!” asked Jimmy, feeling more and more convinced that his own deceptions would certainly be run to earth.
“I HAVE to spy upon her,” answered Alfred, “in self-defence. It's the only way I can keep her from making me utterly ridiculous.” And he proceeded to read from the secretary's telegram. “'Shopped all morning. Lunched at Martingale's with man and woman unknown to me—Martingale's,'” he repeated with a sneer—“'Motored through Park with Mrs. Wilmer until five.' Mrs. Wilmer,” he exclaimed, “there's a woman I've positively forbidden her to speak to.”
Jimmy only shook his head and Alfred continued to read.
“'Had tea with Mr. and Mrs. Thompson and young Ardesley at the Park View.' Ardesley is a young cub,” explained Alfred, “who spends his time running around with married women while their husbands are away trying to make a living for them.”
“Shocking!” was the extent of Jimmy's comment, and Alfred resumed reading.
“'Dinner and theatre same party. Supper at Wellingford. Home two A. M.'” He looked at Jimmy, expecting to hear Zoie bitterly condemned. Jimmy only stared at him blankly. “That's pretty good,” commented Alfred, “for the woman who 'CRIED' all day, isn't it?”
Still Jimmy made no answer, and Alfred brought his fist down upon the table impatiently. “Isn't it?” he repeated.
“She was a bit busy THAT day,” admitted Jimmy uneasily.
“The truth!” cried Alfred again, as he rose and paced about excitedly. “Getting the truth out of Zoie is like going to a fire in the night. You think it's near, but you never get there. And when she begins by saying that she's going to tell you the 'REAL truth'”—he threw up his hands in despair—“well, then it's time to leave home.”
There was another pause, then Alfred drew in his breath and bore down upon Jimmy with fresh vehemence. “The only time I get even a semblance of truth out of Zoie,” he cried, “is when I catch her red-handed.” Again he pounded the table and again Jimmy winced. “And even then,” he continued, “she colours it so with her affected innocence and her plea about just wishing to be a 'good fellow,' that she almost makes me doubt my own eyes. She is an artist,” he declared with a touch of enforced admiration. “There's no use talking; that woman is an artist.”
“What are you going to do?” asked Jimmy, for the want of anything better to say.
“I am going to leave her,” declared Alfred emphatically. “I am going away.”
A faint hope lit Jimmy's round childlike face. With Alfred away there would be no further investigation of the luncheon incident.
“That might be a good idea,” he said.
“It's THE idea,” said Alfred; “most of my business is in Detroit anyhow. I'm going to make that my headquarters and stay there.”
Jimmy was almost smiling.
“As for Zoie,” continued Alfred, “she can stay right here and go as far as she likes.”
“Not with me,” thought Jimmy.
“But,” shrieked Alfred, with renewed emphasis, “I'm going to find out who the FELLOW is. I'll have THAT satisfaction!”
Jimmy's spirits fell.
“Henri knows the head-waiter of every restaurant in this town,” said Alfred, “that is, every one where she'd be likely to go; and he says he'd recognise the man she lunched with if he saw him again.”
Jimmy's features became suddenly distorted.
“The minute she appears anywhere with anybody,” explained Alfred, “Henri will be notified by 'phone. He'll identify the man and then he'll wire me.”
“What good will that do?” asked Jimmy weakly.
“I'll take the first train home,” declared Alfred.
“For what?” questioned Jimmy.
“To shoot him!” exclaimed Alfred.
“What!” gasped Jimmy, almost losing his footing.
Alfred mistook Jimmy's concern for anxiety on his behalf.
“Oh, I'll be acquitted,” he declared. “Don't you worry. I'll get my tale of woe before the jury.”
“But I say,” protested Jimmy, too uneasy to longer conceal his real emotions, “why kill this one particular chap when there are so many others?”
“He's the only one she's ever lunched with, ALONE,” said Alfred. “She's been giddy, but at least she's always been chaperoned, except with him. He's the one all right; there's no doubt about it. He's the beginning of the end.”
“His own end, yes,” assented Jimmy half to himself. “Now, see here, old man,” he argued, “I'd give that poor devil a chance to explain.”
“Explain!” shouted Alfred so sharply that Jimmy quickly retreated. “I wouldn't believe him now if he were one of the Twelve Apostles.”
“That's tough,” murmured Jimmy as he saw the last avenue of honourable escape closed to him.
“Tough!” roared Alfred, thinking of himself. “Hah.”
“On the Apostles, I mean,” explained Jimmy nervously.
Again Alfred paced up and down the room, and again Jimmy tried to think of some way to escape from his present difficulty. It was quite apparent that his only hope lay not in his own candor, but in Alfred's absence. “How long do you expect to be away?” he asked.
“Only until I hear from Henri,” said Alfred.
“Henri?” repeated Jimmy and again a gleam of hope shone on his dull features. He had heard that waiters were often to be bribed. “Nice fellow, Henri,” he ventured cautiously. “Gets a large salary, no doubt?”
“Does he!” exclaimed Alfred, with a certain pride of proprietorship. “No tips could touch Henri, no indeed. He's not that sort of a person.”
Again the hope faded from Jimmy's round face.
“I look upon Henri as my friend,” continued Alfred enthusiastically. “He speaks every language known to man. He's been in every country in the world. HENRI UNDERSTANDS LIFE.”
“LOTS of people UNDERSTAND LIFE,” commented Jimmy dismally, “but SOME people don't APPRECIATE it. They value it too lightly, to MY way of thinking.”
“Ah, but you have something to live for,” argued Alfred.
“I have indeed; a great deal,” agreed Jimmy, more and more abused at the thought of what he was about to lose.
“Ah, that's different,” exclaimed Alfred. “But what haveI?”
Jimmy was in no frame of mind to consider his young friend's assets, he was thinking of his own difficulties.
“I'm a laughing stock,” shouted Alfred. “I know it. A 'good thing' who gives his wife everything she asks for, while she is running around with—with my best friend, for all I know.”
“Oh, no, no,” protested Jimmy nervously. “I wouldn't say that.”
“Even if she weren't running around,” continued Alfred excitedly, without heeding his friend's interruption, “what have we to look forward to? What have we to look backward to?”
Again Jimmy's face was a blank.
Alfred answered his own question by lifting his arms tragically toward Heaven. “One eternal round of wrangles and rows! A childless home! Do you think she wants babies?” he cried, wheeling about on Jimmy, and daring him to answer in the affirmative. “Oh, no!” he sneered. “All she wants is a good time.”
“Well,” mumbled Jimmy, “I can't see much in babies myself, fat, little, red worms.”
Alfred's breath went from him in astonishment
“Weren't YOU ever a fat, little, red worm?” he hissed. “Wasn'tIever a little, fat, red——” he paused in confusion, as his ear became puzzled by the proper sequence of his adjectives, “a fat, red, little worm,” he stammered; “and see what we are now!” He thrust out his chest and strutted about in great pride.
“Big red worms,” admitted Jimmy gloomily.
But Alfred did not hear him. “You and I ought to have SONS on the way to what we are,” he declared, “and better.”
“Oh yes, better,” agreed Jimmy, thinking of his present plight. “Much better.”
“But HAVE we?” demanded Alfred.
Jimmy glanced about the room, as though expecting an answering demonstration from the ceiling.
“Have YOU?” persisted Alfred.
Jimmy shook his head solemnly.
“HaveI?” asked the irate husband.
Out of sheer absent mindedness Jimmy shrugged his shoulders.
As usual Alfred answered his own question. “Oh, no!” he raged. “YOU have a wife who spends her time and money gadding about with——”
Jimmy's face showed a new alarm.
“—my wife,” concluded Alfred.
Jimmy breathed a sigh of relief.
“I have a wife,” said Alfred, “who spends her time and my money gadding around with God knows whom. But I'll catch him!” he cried with new fury. “Here,” he said, pulling a roll of bills from his pocket. “I'll bet you I'll catch him. How much do you want to bet?”
Undesirous of offering any added inducements toward his own capture, Jimmy backed away both literally and figuratively from Alfred's proposition.
“What's the use of getting so excited?” he asked.
Mistaking Jimmy's unwillingness to bet for a disinclination to take advantage of a friend's reckless mood, Alfred resented the implied insult to his astuteness.
“You think I can't catch him?” he exclaimed. “Let's see the colour of your money,” he demanded.
But before Jimmy could comply, an unexpected voice broke into the argument and brought them both round with a start.
“Good Heavens,” exclaimed Aggie, who had entered the room while Alfred was talking his loudest. “What a racket!”
Her eyes fell upon Jimmy who was teetering about uneasily just behind Alfred. She stared at him in amazement. Was it possible that Jimmy, the methodical, had left his office at this hour of the morning, and for what?
Avoiding the question in Aggie's eyes, Jimmy pretended to be searching for his pocket handkerchief—but always with the vision of Aggie in her new Fall gown and her large “picture” hat at his elbow. Never before had she appeared so beautiful to him, so desirable—suppose he should lose her? Life spread before him as a dreary waste. He tried to look up at her; he could not. He feared she would read his guilt in his eyes. “What guilt?” he asked himself. There was no longer any denying the fact—a secret had sprung up between them.
Annoyed at receiving no greeting, Aggie continued in a rather hurt voice:
“Aren't you two going to speak to me?”
Alfred swallowed hard in an effort to regain his composure.
“Good-morning,” he said curtly.
Fully convinced of a disagreement between the two old friends, Aggie addressed herself in a reproachful tone to Jimmy.
“My dear,” she said, “what are you doing here this time of day?”
Jimmy felt Alfred's steely eyes upon him. “Why!” he stammered. “Why, I just came over to—bring your message.”
“My message?” repeated Aggie in perplexity. “What message?”
Alfred's eyebrows drew themselves sharply together.
Jimmy had told so many lies this morning that another more or less could not matter; moreover, this was not a time to hesitate.
“Why, the message you sent to Zoie,” he answered boldly.
“But I sent no message to Zoie,” said Aggie.
“What!” thundered Alfred, so loud that Aggie's fingers involuntarily went to her ears. She was more and more puzzled by the odd behaviour of the two.
“I mean yesterday's message,” corrected Jimmy. And he assumed an aggrieved air toward Aggie.
“You villain,” exclaimed Aggie. “I told you to 'phone her yesterday morning from the office.”
“Yes, I know,” agreed Jimmy placidly, “but I forgot it and I just came over to explain.” Alfred's fixed stare was relaxing and at last Jimmy could breathe.
“Oh,” murmured Aggie, with a wise little elevation of her eye-brows, “then that's why Zoie didn't keep her luncheon appointment with me yesterday.”
Jimmy felt that if this were to go on much longer, he would utter one wild shriek and give himself up for lost; but at present he merely swallowed with an effort, and awaited developments.
It was now Alfred's turn to become excited.
“Oh, IS it!” he cried with hysterical laughter.
Aggie regarded him with astonishment. Was this her usually self-controlled friend?
“Oh, no!” sneered Alfred with unmistakable pity for her credulity. “That's not why my wife didn't eat luncheon with you. She may TELL you that's why. She undoubtedly will; but it's NOT why. Oh, no!” and running his hands through his hair, Alfred tore up and down the room.
“What do you mean by that?” Aggie asked in amazement.
“Your dear husband Jimmy will doubtless explain,” answered Alfred with a slur on the “dear.” Then he turned toward the door of his study. “Pray excuse me—I'M TOO BUSY,” and with that he strode out of the room and banged the study door behind him.
“Goodness gracious!” gasped Aggie. She looked after Alfred, then at Jimmy. She was the picture of consternation. “What's the matter with him?” she asked.
“Just another little family tiff,” answered Jimmy, trying to assume a nonchalant manner.
“Not about YOU!” gasped Aggie.
“Me!” cried Jimmy, his equilibrium again upset. “Certainly not!” he declared. “What an idea!”
“Yes, wasn't it?” answered Aggie. “That just shows how silly one can be. I almost thought Alfred was going to say that Zoie had lunched with you.”
“Me?” again echoed Jimmy, and he wondered if everybody in the world had conspired to make him the target of their attention. He caught Aggie's eye and tried to laugh carelessly. “That would have been funny, wouldn't it?” he said.
“Yes, wouldn't it,” repeated Aggie, and he thought he detected a slight uneasiness in her voice.
“Speaking of lunch,” added Jimmy quickly, “I think, dearie, that I'll come home for lunch in the future.”
“What?” exclaimed Aggie in great amazement.
“Those downtown places upset my digestion,” explained Jimmy quickly.
“Isn't this very SUDDEN,” she asked, and again Jimmy fancied that there was a shade of suspicion in her tone.
His face assumed a martyred expression. “Of course, dear,” he said, “if you insist upon my eating downtown, I'll do it; but I thought you'd be glad to have me at home.”
Aggie turned to him with real concern. “Why, Jimmy,” she said, “what's the matter with you?” She took a step toward him and anxiously studied his face. “I never heard you talk like that before. I don't think you're well.”
“That's just what I'm telling you,” insisted Jimmy vehemently, excited beyond all reason by receiving even this small bit of sympathy. “I'm ill,” he declared. No sooner had he made the declaration than he began to believe in it. His doleful countenance increased Aggie's alarm.
“My angel-face,” she purred, and she took his chubby cheeks in her hands and looked down at him fondly. “You know I ALWAYS want you to come home.” She stooped and kissed Jimmy's pouting lips. He held up his face for more. She smoothed the hair from his worried brow and endeavoured to cheer him. “I'll run right home now,” she said, “and tell cook to get something nice and tempting for you! I can see Zoie later.”
“It doesn't matter,” murmured Jimmy, as he followed her toward the door with a doleful shake of his head. “I don't suppose I shall ever enjoy my luncheon again—as long as I live.”
“Nonsense,” cried Aggie, “come along.”
WHEN Alfred returned to the living room he was followed by his secretary, who carried two well-filled satchels. His temper was not improved by the discovery that he had left certain important papers at his office. Dispatching his man to get them and to meet him at the station with them, he collected a few remaining letters from the drawer of the writing table, then uneasy at remaining longer under the same roof with Zoie, he picked up his hat, and started toward the hallway. For the first time his eye was attracted by a thick layer of dust and lint on his coat sleeve. Worse still, there was a smudge on his cuff. If there was one thing more than another that Alfred detested it was untidiness. Putting his hat down with a bang, he tried to flick the dust from his sleeve with his pocket handkerchief; finding this impossible, he removed his coat and began to shake it violently.
It was at this particular moment that Zoie's small face appeared cautiously from behind the frame of the bedroom door. She was quick to perceive Alfred's plight. Disappearing from view for an instant, she soon reappeared with Alfred's favourite clothes-brush. She tiptoed into the room.
Barely had Alfred drawn his coat on his shoulders, when he was startled by a quick little flutter of the brush on his sleeve. He turned in surprise and beheld Zoie, who looked up at him as penitent and irresistible as a newly-punished child.
“Oh,” snarled Alfred, and he glared at her as though he would enjoy strangling her on the spot.
“Alfred,” pouted Zoie, and he knew she was going to add her customary appeal of “Let's make up.” But Alfred was in no mood for nonsense. He thrust his hands in his pockets and made straight for the outer doorway.
Smiling to herself as she saw him leaving without his hat, Zoie slipped it quickly beneath a flounce of her skirt. No sooner had Alfred reached the sill of the door than his hand went involuntarily to his head; he turned to the table where he had left his hat. His face wore a puzzled look. He glanced beneath the table, in the chair, behind the table, across the piano, and then he began circling the room with pent up rage. He dashed into his study and out again, he threw the chairs about with increasing irritation, then giving up the search, he started hatless toward the hallway. It was then that a soft babyish voice reached his ear.
“Have you lost something, dear?” cooed Zoie.
Alfred hesitated. It was difficult to lower his dignity by answering her, but he needed his headgear. “I want my hat,” he admitted shortly.
“Your hat?” repeated Zoie innocently and she glanced around the room with mild interest. “Maybe Mary took it.”
“Mary!” cried Alfred, and thinking the mystery solved, he dashed toward the inner hallway.
“Let ME get it, dear,” pleaded Zoie, and she laid a small detaining hand upon his arm as he passed.
“Stop it!” commanded Alfred hotly, and he shook the small hand from his sleeve as though it had been something poisonous.
“But Allie,” protested Zoie, pretending to be shocked and grieved.
“Don't you 'but Allie' me,” cried Alfred, turning upon her sharply. “All I want is my hat,” and again he started in search of Mary.
“But—but—but Allie,” stammered Zoie, as she followed him.
“But—but—but,” repeated Alfred, turning on her in a fury. “You've butted me out of everything that I wanted all my life, but you're not going to do it again.”
“You see, you said it yourself,” laughed Zoie.
“Said WHAT,” roared Alfred.
“But,” tittered Zoie.
The remnants of Alfred's self-control were forsaking him. He clinched his fists hard in a final effort toward restraint. “You'd just as well stop all these baby tricks,” he threatened between his teeth, “they're not going to work. THIS time my mind is made up.”
“Then why are you afraid to talk to me?” asked Zoie sweetly.
“Who said I was afraid?” demanded Alfred hotly.
“You ACT like it,” declared Zoie, with some truth on her side. “You don't want——” she got no further.
“All I want,” interrupted Alfred, “is to get out of this house once and for all and to stay out of it.” And again he started in pursuit of his hat.
“Why, Allie,” she gazed at him with deep reproach. “You liked this place so much when we first came here.”
Again Alfred picked at the lint on his coat sleeve. Edging her way toward him cautiously she ventured to touch his sleeve with the brush.
“I'll attend to that myself,” he said curtly, and he sank into the nearest chair to tie a refractory shoe lace.
“Let me brush you, dear,” pleaded Zoie. “I don't wish you to start out in the world looking unbrushed,” she pouted. Then with a sly emphasis she added teasingly, “The OTHER women might not admire you that way.”
Alfred broke his shoe string then and there. While he stooped to tie a knot in it, Zoie managed to perch on the arm of his chair.
“You know, Allie,” she continued coaxingly, “no one could ever love you as I do.”
Again Alfred broke his shoe lace.
“Oh, Allie!” she exclaimed with a little ripple of childish laughter, “do you remember how absurdly poor we were when we were first married, and how you refused to take any help from your family? And do you remember that silly old pair of black trousers that used to get so thin on the knees and how I used to put shoe-blacking underneath so the white wouldn't show through?” By this time her arm managed to get around his neck.
“Stop it!” shrieked Alfred as though mortal man could endure no more. “You've used those trousers to settle every crisis in our lives.”
Zoie gazed at him without daring to breathe; even she was aghast at his fury, but only temporarily. She recovered herself and continued sweetly:
“If everything is SETTLED,” she argued, “where's the harm in talking?”
“We've DONE with talking,” declared Alfred. “From this on, I act.” And determined not to be cheated out of this final decision, he again started for the hall door.
“Oh, Allie!” cried Zoie in a tone of sharp alarm.
In spite of himself Alfred turned to learn the cause of her anxiety.
“You haven't got your overshoes on,” she said.
Speechless with rage, Alfred continued on his way, but Zoie moved before him swiftly. “I'll get them for you, dear,” she volunteered graciously.
“Stop!” thundered Alfred. They were now face to face.
“I wish you wouldn't roar like that,” pouted Zoie, and the pink tips of her fingers were thrust tight against her ears.
Alfred drew in his breath and endeavoured for the last time to repress his indignation. “Either you can't, or you won't understand that it is extremely unpleasant for me to even talk to you—much less to receive your attentions.”
“Very likely,” answered Zoie, unperturbed. “But so long as I am your lawful wedded wife——” she emphasised the “lawful”—“I shan't let any harm come to you, ifIcan help it.” She lifted her eyes to heaven bidding it to bear witness to her martyrdom and looking for all the world like a stained glass saint.
“Oh, no!” shouted Alfred, almost hysterical at his apparent failure to make himself understood. “You wouldn't let any harm come to me. Oh, no. You've only made me the greatest joke in Chicago,” he shouted. “You've only made me such a laughing stock that I have to leave it. That's all—that's all!”
“Leave Chicago!” exclaimed Zoie incredulously. Then regaining her self-composure, she edged her way close to him and looked up into his eyes in baby-like wonderment. “Why, Allie, where are we going?” Her small arm crept up toward his shoulder. Alfred pushed it from him rudely.
“WE are not going,” he asserted in a firm, measured voice. “Iam going. Where's my hat?” And again he started in search of his absent headgear.
“Oh, Allie!” she exclaimed, and this time there was genuine alarm in her voice, “you wouldn't leave me?”
“Wouldn't I, though?” sneered Alfred. Before he knew it, Zoie's arms were about him—she was pleading desperately.
“Now see here, Allie, you may call me all the names you like,” she cried with great self-abasement, “but you shan't—you SHAN'T go away from Chicago.”
“Oh, indeed?” answered Alfred as he shook himself free of her. “I suppose you'd like me to go on with this cat and dog existence. You'd like me to stay right here and pay the bills and take care of you, while you flirt with every Tom, Dick and Harry in town.”
“It's only your horrid disposition that makes you talk like that,” whimpered Zoie. “You know very well that I never cared for anybody but you.”
“Until you GOT me, yes,” assented Alfred, “and NOW you care for everybody BUT me.” She was about to object, but he continued quickly. “Where you MEET your gentlemen friends is beyond me.Idon't introduce them to you.”
“I should say not,” agreed Zoie, and there was a touch of vindictiveness in her voice. “The only male creature that you ever introduced to me was the family dog.”
“I introduce every man who's fit to meet you,” declared Alfred with an air of great pride.
“That doesn't speak very well for your acquaintances,” snipped Zoie. Even HER temper was beginning to assert itself.
“I won't bicker like this,” declared Alfred.
“That's what you always say, when you can't think of an answer,” retorted Zoie.
“You mean when I'm tired of answering your nonsense!” thundered Alfred.
Realising that she was rapidly losing ground by exercising her advantage over Alfred in the matter of quick retort, Zoie, with her customary cunning, veered round to a more conciliatory tone. “Well,” she cooed, “suppose I DID eat lunch with a man?”
“Ah!” shrieked Alfred, as though he had at last run his victim to earth.
She retreated with her fingers crossed. “I only said suppose,” she reminded him quickly. Then she continued in a tone meant to draw from him his heart's most secret confidence. “Didn't you ever eat lunch with any woman but me?”
“Never!” answered Alfred firmly.
There was an unmistakable expression of pleasure on Zoie's small face, but she forced back the smile that was trying to creep round her lips, and sidled toward Alfred, with eyes properly downcast. “Then I'm very sorry I did it,” she said solemnly, “and I'll never do it again.”
“So!” cried Alfred with renewed indignation. “You admit it?”
“Just to please you, dear,” explained Zoie sweetly, as though she were doing him the greatest possible favour.
“To please me?” gasped Alfred. “Do you suppose it pleases me to know that you are carrying on the moment my back is turned, making a fool of me to my friends?”
“Your friends?” cried Zoie with a sneer. This time it was her turn to be angry. “So! It's your FRIENDS that are worrying you!” In her excitement she tossed Alfred's now damaged hat into the chair just behind her. He was far too overwrought to see it. “Ihaven't done you any harm,” she continued wildly. “It's only what you think your friends think.”
“You haven't done me any harm?” repeated Alfred, in her same tragic key, “Oh no! Oh no! You've only cheated me out of everything I expected to get out of life! That's all!”
Zoie came to a full stop and waited for him to enumerate the various treasures that he had lost by marrying her. He did so.
“Before we were married,” he continued, “you pretended to adore children. You started your humbugging the first day I met you. I refer to little Willie Peck.”
A hysterical giggle very nearly betrayed her. Alfred continued:
“I was fool enough to let you know that I admire women who like children. From that day until the hour that I led you to the altar, you'd fondle the ugliest little brats that we met in the street, but the moment you GOT me——”
“Alfred!” gasped Zoie. This was really going too far.
“Yes, I repeat it!” shouted Alfred, pounding the table with his fist for emphasis. “The moment you GOT me, you declared that all children were horrid little insects, and that someone ought to sprinkle bug-powder on them.”
“Oh!” protested Zoie, shocked less by Alfred's interpretation of her sentiments, than by the vulgarity with which he expressed them.
“On another occasion,” declared Alfred, now carried away by the recital of his long pent up wrongs, “you told me that all babies should be put in cages, shipped West, and kept in pens until they got to be of an interesting age. 'Interesting age!'” he repeated with a sneer, “meaning old enough to take YOU out to luncheon, I suppose.”
“I never said any such thing,” objected Zoie.
“Well, that was the idea,” insisted Alfred. “I haven't your glib way of expressing myself.”
“You manage to express yourself very well,” retorted Zoie. “When you have anything DISAGREEABLE to say. As for babies,” she continued tentatively, “I think they are all very well in their PLACE, but they were NEVER meant for an APARTMENT.”
“I offered you a house in the country,” shouted Alfred.
“The country!” echoed Zoie. “How could I live in the country, with people being murdered in their beds every night? Read the papers.”
“Always an excuse,” sighed Alfred resignedly. “There always HAS been and there always would be if I'd stay to listen. Well, for once,” he declared, “I'm glad that we have no children. If we had, I might feel some obligation to keep up this farce of a marriage. As it is,” he continued, “YOU are free andIam free.” And with a courtly wave of his arm, he dismissed Zoie and the entire subject, and again he started in pursuit of Mary and his hat.
“If it's your freedom you wish,” pouted Zoie with an abused air, “you might have said so in the first place.”
Alfred stopped in sheer amazement at the cleverness with which the little minx turned his every statement against him.
“It's not very manly of you,” she continued, “to abuse me just because you've found someone whom you like better.”
“That's not true,” protested Alfred hotly, “and you know it's not true.” Little did he suspect the trap into which she was leading him.
“Then you DON'T love anybody more than you do me?” she cried eagerly, and she gazed up at him with adoring eyes.
“I didn't say any such thing,” hedged Alfred.
“Then you DO,” she accused him.
“I DON'T,” he declared in self defence.
With a cry of joy, she sprang into his arms, clasped her fingers tightly behind his neck, and rained impulsive kisses upon his unsuspecting face.
For an instant, Alfred looked down at Zoie, undecided whether to strangle her or to return her embraces. As usual, his self-respect won the day for him and, with a determined effort, he lifted her high in the air, so that she lost her tenacious hold of him, and sat her down with a thud in the very same chair in which she had lately dropped his hat. Having acted with this admirable resolution, he strode majestically toward the inner hall, but before he could reach it, Zoie was again on her feet, in a last vain effort to conciliate him. Turning, Alfred caught sight of his poor battered hat. This was the final spur to action. Snatching it up with one hand, and throwing his latchkey on the table with the other, he made determinedly for the outer door.
Screaming hysterically, Zoie caught him just as he reached the threshold and threw the whole weight of her body upon him.
“Alfred,” she pleaded, “if you REALLY love me, you CAN'T leave me like this!” Her emotion was now genuine. He looked down at her gravely—then into the future.
“There are other things more important than what YOU call 'love,'” he said, very solemnly.
“There is such a thing as a soul, if you only knew it. And you have hurt mine through and through.”
“But how, Alfred, how?” asked the small person, and there was a frown of genuine perplexity on her tiny puckered brow. “What have I REALLY DONE,” She stroked his hand fondly; her baby eyes searched his face.
“It isn't so much what people DO to us that counts,” answered Alfred in a proud hurt voice. “It's how much they DISAPPOINT us in what they do. I expected better of YOU,” he said sadly.
“I'll DO better,” coaxed Zoie, “if you'll only give me a chance.”
He was half inclined to believe her.
“Now, Allie,” she pleaded, perceiving that his resentment was dying and resolved to, at last, adopt a straight course, “if you'll only listen, I'll tell you the REAL TRUTH.”
Unprepared for the electrical effect of her remark, Zoie found herself staggering to keep her feet. She gazed at Alfred in amazement. His arms were lifted to Heaven, his breath was coming fast.
“'The REAL TRUTH!'” he gasped, then bringing his crushed hat down on his forehead with a resounding whack, he rushed from her sight.
The clang of the closing elevator door brought Zoie to a realisation of what had actually happened. Determined that Alfred should not escape her she rushed to the hall door and called to him wildly. There was no answer. Running back to the room, she threw open the window and threw herself half out of it. She was just in time to see Alfred climb into a passing taxi. “Alfred!” she cried. Then automatically she flew to the 'phone. “Give me 4302 Main,” she called and she tried to force back her tears. “Is this Hardy & Company?” she asked.
“Well, this is Mrs. Hardy,” she explained.
“I wish you'd ring me up the moment my husband comes in.” There was a slight pause, then she clutched the receiver harder. “Not COMING back?” she gasped. “Gone!—to Detroit?” A short moan escaped her lips. She let the receiver fall back on the hook and her head went forward on her outstretched arms.