It was while Brewster was in the depths of despair that his financial affairs had a windfall. One of the banks in which his money was deposited failed and his balance of over $100,000 was wiped out. Mismanagement was the cause and the collapse came on Friday, the thirteenth day of the month. Needless to say, it destroyed every vestige of the superstition he may have had regarding Friday and the number thirteen.
Brewster had money deposited in five banks, a transaction inspired by the wild hope that one of them might some day suspend operations and thereby prove a legitimate benefit to him. There seemed no prospect that the bank could resume operations, and if the depositors in the end realized twenty cents on the dollar they would be fortunate. Notwithstanding the fact that everybody had considered the institution substantial there were not a few wiseacres who called Brewster a fool and were so unreasonable as to say that he did not know how to handle money. He heard that Miss Drew, in particular, was bitterly sarcastic in referring to his stupidity.
This failure caused a tremendous flurry in banking circles. It was but natural that questions concerning the stability of other banks should be asked, and it was not long before many wild, disquieting reports were afloat. Anxious depositors rushed into the big banking institutions and then rushed out again, partially assured that there was no danger. The newspapers sought to allay the fears of the people, but there were many to whom fear became panic. There were short, wild runs on some of the smaller banks, but all were in a fair way to restore confidence when out came the rumor that the Bank of Manhattan Island was in trouble. Colonel Prentiss Drew, railroad magnate, was the president of this bank.
When the bank opened for business on the Tuesday following the failure, there was a stampede of frightened depositors. Before eleven o'clock the run had assumed ugly proportions and no amount of argument could stay the onslaught. Colonel Drew and the directors, at first mildly distressed, and then seeing that the affair had become serious, grew more alarmed than they could afford to let the public see. The loans of all the banks were unusually large. Incipient runs on some had put all of them in an attitude of caution, and there was a natural reluctance to expose their own interests to jeopardy by coming to the relief of the Bank of Manhattan Island.
Monty Brewster had something like $200,000 in Colonel Drew's bank. He would not have regretted on his own account the collapse of this institution, but he realized what it meant to the hundreds of other depositors, and for the first time he appreciated what his money could accomplish. Thinking that his presence might give confidence to the other depositors and stop the run he went over to the bank with Harrison and Bragdon. The tellers were handing out thousands of dollars to the eager depositors. His friends advised him strongly to withdraw before it was too late, but Monty was obdurate. They set it down to his desire to help Barbara's father and admired his nerve.
"I understand, Monty," said Bragdon, and both he and Harrison went among the people carelessly asking one another if Brewster had come to withdraw his money. "No, he has over $200,000, and he's going to leave it," the other would say.
Each excited group was visited in turn by the two men, but their assurance seemed to accomplish but little. These men and women were there to save their fortunes; the situation was desperate.
Colonel Drew, outwardly calm and serene, but inwardly perturbed, finally saw Brewster and his companions. He sent a messenger over with the request that Monty come to the president's private office at once.
"He wants to help you to save your money," cried Bragdon in low tones. "That shows it's all up."
"Get out every dollar of it, Monty, and don't waste a minute. It's a smash as sure as fate," urged Harrison, a feverish expression in his eyes.
Brewster was admitted to the Colonel's private office. Drew was alone and was pacing the floor like a caged animal.
"Sit down, Brewster, and don't mind if I seem nervous. Of course we can hold out, but it is terrible—terrible. They think we are trying to rob them. They're mad—utterly mad."
"I never saw anything like it, Colonel. Are you sure you can meet all the demands?" asked Brewster, thoroughly excited. The Colonel's face was white and he chewed his cigar nervously.
"We can hold out unless some of our heaviest depositors get the fever and swoop down upon us. I appreciate your feelings in an affair of this kind, coming so swiftly upon the heels of the other, but I want to give you my personal assurance that the money you have here is safe. I called you in to impress you with the security of the bank. You ought to know the truth, however, and I will tell you in confidence that another check like Austin's, which we paid a few minutes ago, would cause us serious, though temporary, embarrassment."
"I came to assure you that I have not thought of withdrawing my deposits from this bank, Colonel. You need have no uneasiness—"
The door opened suddenly and one of the officials of the bank bolted inside, his face as white as death. He started to speak before he saw Brewster, and then closed his lips despairingly.
"What is it, Mr. Moore?" asked Drew, as calmly as possible. "Don't mind Mr. Brewster."
"Oglethorp wants to draw two hundred and fifty thousand dollars," said Moore in strained tones.
"Well, he can have it, can't he?" asked the Colonel quietly. Moore looked helplessly at the president of the bank, and his silence spoke more plainly than words.
"Brewster, it looks bad," said the Colonel, turning abruptly to the young man. "The other banks are afraid of a run and we can't count on much help from them. Some of them have helped us and others have refused. Now, I not only ask you to refrain from drawing out your deposit, but I want you to help us in this crucial moment." The Colonel looked twenty years older and his voice shook perceptibly. Brewster's pity went out to him in a flash.
"What can I do, Colonel Drew?" he cried. "I'll not take my money out, but I don't know how I can be of further assistance to you. Command me, sir."
"You can restore absolute confidence, Monty, my dear boy, by increasing your deposits in our bank," said the Colonel slowly, and as if dreading the fate of the suggestion.
"You mean, sir, that I can save the bank by drawing my money from other banks and putting it here?" asked Monty, slowly. He was thinking harder and faster than he had ever thought in his life. Could he afford to risk the loss of his entire fortune on the fate of this bank? What would Swearengen Jones say if he deliberately deposited a vast amount of money in a tottering institution like the Bank of Manhattan Island? It would be the maddest folly on his part if the bank went down. There could be no mitigating circumstances in the eyes of either Jones or the world, if he swamped all of his money in this crisis.
"I beg of you, Monty, help us." The Colonel's pride was gone. "It means disgrace if we close our doors even for an hour; it means a stain that only years can remove. You can restore confidence by a dozen strokes of your pen, and you can save us."
He was Barbara's father. The proud old man was before him as a suppliant, no longer the cold man of the world. Back to Brewster's mind came the thought of his quarrel with Barbara and of her heartlessness. A scratch of the pen, one way or the other, could change the life of Barbara Drew. The two bankers stood by scarcely breathing. From the outside came the shuffle of many feet and the muffled roll of voices. Again the door to the private office opened and a clerk excitedly motioned for Mr. Moore to hurry to the front of the bank. Moore paused irresolutely, his eyes on Brewster's face. The young man knew the time had come when he must help or deny them.
Like a flash the situation was made clear to him and his duty was plain. He remembered that the Bank of Manhattan Island held every dollar that Mrs. Gray and Peggy possessed; their meager fortune had been entrusted to the care of Prentiss Drew and his associates, and it was in danger.
"I will do all I can, Colonel," said Monty, "but upon one condition."
"That is?"
"Barbara must never know of this." The Colonel's gasp of astonishment was cut short as Monty continued. "Promise that she shall never know."
"I don't understand, but if it is your wish I promise."
Inside of half an hour's time several hundred thousand came to the relief of the struggling bank, and the man who had come to watch the run with curious eyes turned out to be its savior. His money won the day for the Bank of Manhattan Island. When the happy president and directors offered to pay him an astonishingly high rate of interest for the use of the money he proudly declined.
The next day Miss Drew issued invitations for a cotillon. Mr. Montgomery Brewster was not asked to attend.
Miss Drew's cotillon was not graced by the presence of Montgomery Brewster. It is true he received an eleventh-hour invitation and a very cold and difficult little note of apology, but he maintained heroically the air of disdain that had succeeded the first sharp pangs of disappointment. Colonel Drew, in whose good graces Monty had firmly established himself, was not quite guiltless of usurping the role of dictator in the effort to patch up a truce. A few nights before the cotillon, when Barbara told him that Herbert Ailing was to lead, he explosively expressed surprise. "Why not Monty Brewster, Babs?" he demanded.
"Mr. Brewster is not coming," she responded, calmly.
"Going to be out of town?"
"I'm sure I do not know," stiffly.
"What's this?"
"He has not been asked, father." Miss Drew was not in good humor.
"Not asked?" said the Colonel in amazement. "It's ridiculous, Babs, send him an invitation at once."
"This is my dance, father, and I don't want to ask Mr. Brewster."
The Colonel sank back in his chair and struggled to overcome his anger. He knew that Barbara had inherited his willfulness, and had long since discovered that it was best to treat her with tact.
"I thought you and he were—" but the Colonel's supply of tact was exhausted.
"We were"—in a moment of absent mindedness. "But it's all over," said Barbara.
"Why, child, there wouldn't have been a cotillon if it hadn't been for—" but the Colonel remembered his promise to Monty and checked himself just in time. "I—I mean there will not be any party, if Montgomery Brewster is not asked. That is all I care to say on the subject," and he stamped out of the room.
Barbara wept copiously after her father had gone, but she realized that his will was law and that Monty must be invited. "I will send an invitation," she said to herself, "but if Mr. Brewster comes after he has read it, I shall be surprised."
Montgomery, however, did not receive the note in the spirit in which it had been sent. He only saw in it a ray of hope that Barbara was relenting and was jubilant at the prospect of a reconciliation. The next Sunday he sought an interview with Miss Drew, but she received him with icy reserve. If he had thought to punish her by staying away, it was evident that she felt equally responsible for a great deal of misery on his part. Both had been more or less unhappy, and both were resentfully obstinate. Brewster felt hurt and insulted, while she felt that he had imposed upon her disgracefully. He was now ready to cry quits and it surprised him to find her obdurate. If he had expected to dictate the terms of peace he was woefully disappointed when she treated his advances with cool contempt.
"Barbara, you know I care very much for you," he was pleading, fairly on the road to submission. "I am sure you are not quite indifferent to me. This foolish misunderstanding must really be as disagreeable to you as it is to me."
"Indeed," she replied, lifting her brows disdainfully. "You are assuming a good deal, Mr. Brewster."
"I am merely recalling the fact that you once told me you cared. You would not promise anything, I know, but it meant much that you cared. A little difference could not have changed your feeling completely."
"When you are ready to treat me with respect I may listen to your petition," she said, rising haughtily.
"My petition?" He did not like the word and his tact quite deserted him. "It's as much yours as mine. Don't throw the burden of responsibility on me, Miss Drew."
"Have I suggested going back to the old relations? You will pardon me if I remind you of the fact that you came to-day on your own initiative and certainly without my solicitation."
"Now, look here, Barbara—" he began, dimly realizing that it was going to be hard, very hard, to reason.
"I am very sorry, Mr. Brewster, but you will have to excuse me. I am going out."
"I regret exceedingly that I should have disturbed you to-day, Miss Drew," he said, swallowing his pride. "Perhaps I may have the pleasure of seeing you again."
As he was leaving the house, deep anger in his soul, he encountered the Colonel. There was something about Monty's greeting, cordial as it was, that gave the older man a hint as to the situation.
"Won't you stop for dinner, Monty?" he asked, in the hope that his suspicion was groundless.
"Thank you, Colonel, not to-night," and he was off before the Colonel could hold him.
Barbara was tearfully angry when her father came into the room, but as he began to remonstrate with her the tears disappeared and left her at white heat.
"Frankly, father, you don't understand matters," she said with slow emphasis; "I wish you to know now that if Montgomery Brewster calls again, I shall not see him."
"If that is your point of view, Barbara, I wish you to know mine." The Colonel rose and stood over her, everything forgotten but the rage that went so deep that it left the surface calm. Throwing aside his promise to Brewster, he told Barbara with dramatic simplicity the story of the rescue of the bank. "You see," he added, "if it had not been for that open-hearted boy we would now be ruined. Instead of giving cotillons, you might be giving music lessons. Montgomery Brewster will always be welcome in this house and you will see that my wishes are respected. Do you understand?"
"Perfectly," Barbara answered in a still voice. "As your friend I shall try to be civil to him."
The Colonel was not satisfied with so cold-blooded an acquiescence, but he wisely retired from the field. He left the girl silent and crushed, but with a gleam in her eyes that was not altogether to be concealed. The story had touched her more deeply than she would willingly confess. It was something to know that Monty Brewster could do a thing like that, and would do it for her. The exultant smile which it brought to her lips could only be made to disappear by reminding herself sharply of his recent arrogance. Her anger, she found, was a plant which needed careful cultivation.
It was in a somewhat chastened mood that she started a few days later for a dinner at the DeMille's. As she entered in her sweeping golden gown the sight of Monty Brewster at the other end of the room gave her a flutter at the heart. But it was an agitation that was very carefully concealed. Brewster was certainly unconscious of it. To him the position of guest was like a disguise and he was pleased at the prospect of letting himself go under the mask without responsibility. But it took on a different color when the butler handed him a card which signified that he was to take Miss Drew in to dinner. Hastily seeking out the hostess he endeavored to convey to her the impossibility of the situation.
"I hope you won't misunderstand me," he said. "But is it too late to change my place at the table?"
"It isn't conventional, I know, Monty. Society's chief aim is to separate engaged couples at dinner," said Mrs. Dan with a laugh. "It would be positively compromising if a man and his wife sat together."
Dinner was announced before Monty could utter another word, and as she led him over to Barbara she said, "Behold a generous hostess who gives up the best man in the crowd so that he and some one else may have a happy time. I leave it to you, Barbara, if that isn't the test of friendship."
For a moment the two riveted their eyes on the floor. Then the humor of the situation came to Monty.
"I did not know that we were supposed to do Gibson tableaux to-night," he said drily as he proffered his arm.
"I don't understand," and Barbara's curiosity overcame her determination not to speak.
"Don't you remember the picture of the man who was called upon to take his late fiancée out to dinner?"
The awful silence with which this remark was received put an end to further efforts at humor.
The dinner was probably the most painful experience in their lives. Barbara had come to it softened and ready to meet him half way. The right kind of humility in Monty would have found her plastic. But she had very definite and rigid ideas of his duty in the premises. And Monty was too simple minded to seem to suffer, and much too flippant to understand. It was plain to each that the other did not expect to talk, but they both realized that they owed a duty to appearances and to their hostess. Through two courses, at least, there was dead silence between them. It seemed as though every eye in the room were on them and every mind were speculating. At last, in sheer desperation, Barbara turned to him with the first smile he had seen on her face in days. There was no smile in her eyes, however, and Monty understood.
"We might at least give out the impression that we are friends," she said quietly.
"More easily said than done," he responded gloomily.
"They are all looking at us and wondering."
"I don't blame them."
"We owe something to Mrs. Dan, I think."
"I know."
Barbara uttered some inanity whenever she caught any one looking in their direction, but Brewster seemed not to hear. At length he cut short some remark of hers about the weather.
"What nonsense this is, Barbara," he said. "With any one else I would chuck the whole game, but with you it is different. I don't know what I have done, but I am sorry. I hope you'll forgive me."
"Your assurance is amusing, to say the least."
"But I am sure. I know this quarrel is something we'll laugh over. You keep forgetting that we are going to be married some day."
A new light came into Barbara's eyes. "You forget that my consent may be necessary," she said.
"You will be perfectly willing when the time comes. I am still in the fight and eventually you will come to my way of thinking."
"Oh! I see it now," said Barbara, and her blood was up. "You mean to force me to it. What you did for father—"
Brewster glowered at her, thinking that he had misunderstood. "What do you mean?" he said.
"He has told me all about that wretched bank business. But poor father thought you quite disinterested. He did not see the little game behind your melodrama. He would have torn up your check on the instant if he had suspected you were trying to buy his daughter."
"Does your father believe that?" asked Brewster.
"No, but I see it all now. His persistence and yours—you were not slow to grasp the opportunity offered."
"Stop, Miss Drew," Monty commanded. His voice had changed and she had never before seen that look in his eyes. "You need have no fear that I will trouble you again."
A typographical error in one of the papers caused no end of amusement to every one except Monty and Miss Drew. The headlines had announced "Magnificent ball to be given Miss Drew by her Finance," and the "Little Sons of the Rich" wondered why Monty did not see the humor of it.
"He has too bad an attack to see anything but the lady," said Harrison one evening when the "Sons" were gathered for an old-time supper party.
"It's always the way," commented the philosophical Bragdon, "When you lose your heart your sense of humor goes too. Engaged couples couldn't do such ridiculous stunts if they had the least particle of it left."
"Well, if Monty Brewster is still in love with Miss Drew he takes a mighty poor way of showing it." "Subway" Smith's remark fell like a bombshell. The thought had come to every one, but no one had been given the courage to utter it. For them Brewster's silence on the subject since the DeMille dinner seemed to have something ominous behind it.
"It's probably only a lovers' quarrel," said Bragdon. But further comment was cut short by the entrance of Monty himself, and they took their places at the table.
Before the evening came to an end they were in possession of many astonishing details in connection with the coming ball. Monty did not say that it was to be given for Miss Drew and her name was conspicuously absent from his descriptions. As he unfolded his plans even the "Little Sons," who were imaginative by instinct and reckless on principle, could not be quite acquiescent.
"Nopper" Harrison solemnly expressed the opinion that the ball would cost Brewster at least $125,000. The "Little Sons" looked at one another in consternation, while Brewster's indifference expressed itself in an unflattering comment upon his friend's vulgarity. "Good Lord, Nopper," he added, "you would speculate about the price of gloves for your wedding."
Harrison resented the taunt. "It would be much less vulgar to do that, Monty, saving your presence, than to force your millions down every one's throat."
"Well, they swallow them, I've noticed," retorted Brewster, "as though they were chocolates."
Pettingill interrupted grandiloquently. "My friends and gentlemen!"
"Which is which?" asked Van Winkle, casually.
But the artist was in the saddle. "Permit me to present to you the boy Croesus—the only one extant. His marbles are plunks and his kites are made of fifty-dollar notes. He feeds upon coupons à la Newburgh, and his champagne is liquid golden eagles. Look at him, gentlemen, while you can, and watch him while he spends thirteen thousand dollars for flowers!"
"With a Viennese orchestra for twenty-nine thousand!" added Bragdon. "And yet they maintain that silence is golden."
"And three singers to divide twelve thousand among themselves! That's absolutely criminal," cried Van Winkle. "Over in Germany they'd sing a month for half that amount."
"Six hundred guests to feed—total cost of not less than forty thousand dollars," groaned "Nopper," dolefully.
"And there aren't six hundred in town," lamented "Subway" Smith. "All that glory wasted on two hundred rank outsiders."
"You men are borrowing a lot of trouble," yawned Brewster, with a gallant effort to seem bored. "All I ask of you is to come to the party and put up a good imitation of having the time of your life. Between you and me I'd rather be caught at Huyler's drinking ice cream soda than giving this thing. But—"
"That's what we want to know, but what?" and "Subway" leaned forward eagerly.
"But," continued Monty, "I'm in for it now, and it is going to be a ball that is a ball."
Nevertheless the optimistic Brewster could not find the courage to tell Peggy of these picturesque extravagances. To satisfy her curiosity he blandly informed her that he was getting off much more cheaply than he had expected. He laughingly denounced as untrue the stories that had come to her from outside sources. And before his convincing assertions that reports were ridiculously exaggerated, the troubled expression in the girl's eyes disappeared.
"I must seem a fool," groaned Monty, as he left the house after one of these explanatory trials, "but what will she think of me toward the end of the year when I am really in harness?" He found it hard to control the desire to be straight with Peggy and tell her the story of his mad race in pursuit of poverty.
Preparations for the ball went on steadily, and in a dull winter it had its color value for society. It was to be a Spanish costume-ball, and at many tea-tables the talk of it was a god-send. Sarcastic as it frequently was on the question of Monty's extravagance, there was a splendor about the Aladdin-like entertainment which had a charm. Beneath the outward disapproval there was a secret admiration of the superb nerve of the man. And there was little reluctance to help him in the wild career he had chosen. It was so easy to go with him to the edge of the precipice and let him take the plunge alone. Only the echo of the criticism reached Brewster, for he had silenced Harrison with work and Pettingill with opportunities. It troubled him little, as he was engaged in jotting down items that swelled the profit side of his ledger account enormously. The ball was bound to give him a good lead in the race once more, despite the heavy handicap the Stock Exchange had imposed. The "Little Sons" took off their coats and helped Pettingill in the work of preparation. He found them quite superfluous, for their ideas never agreed and each man had a way of preferring his own suggestion. To Brewster's chagrin they were united in the effort to curb his extravagance.
"He'll be giving automobiles and ropes of pearls for favors if we don't stop him," said "Subway" Smith, after Monty had ordered a vintage champagne to be served during the entire evening. "Give them two glasses first, if you like, and then they won't mind if they have cider the rest of the night."
"Monty is plain dotty," chimed Bragdon, "and the pace is beginning to tell on him."
As a matter of fact the pace was beginning to tell on Brewster. Work and worry were plainly having an effect on his health. His color was bad, his eyes were losing their lustre, and there was a listlessness in his actions that even determined effort could not conceal from his friends. Little fits of fever annoyed him occasionally and he admitted that he did not feel quite right.
"Something is wrong somewhere," he said, ruefully, "and my whole system seems ready to stop work through sympathy."
Suddenly there was a mighty check to the preparations. Two days before the date set for the ball everything came to a standstill and the managers sank back in perplexity and consternation. Monty Brewster was critically ill.
Appendicitis, the doctors called it, and an operation was imperative.
"Thank heaven it's fashionable," laughed Monty, who showed no fear of the prospect. "How ridiculous if it had been the mumps, or if the newspapers had said, 'On account of the whooping-cough, Mr. Brewster did not attend his ball.'"
"You don't mean to say—the ball is off, of course," and Harrison was really alarmed.
"Not a bit of it, Nopper," said Monty. "It's what I've been wanting all along. You chaps do the handshaking and I stay at home."
There was an immediate council of war when this piece of news was announced, and the "Little Sons" were unanimous in favor of recalling the invitations and declaring the party off. At first Monty was obdurate, but when some one suggested that he could give the ball later on, after he was well, he relented. The opportunity to double the cost by giving two parties was not to be ignored.
"Call it off, then, but say it is only postponed."
A great rushing to and fro resulted in the cancelling of contracts, the recalling of invitations, the settling of accounts, with the most loyal effort to save as much as possible from the wreckage. Harrison and his associates, almost frantic with fear for Brewster's life, managed to perform wonders in the few hours of grace. Gardner, with rare foresight, saw that the Viennese orchestra would prove a dead loss. He suggested the possibility of a concert tour through the country, covering several weeks, and Monty, too ill to care one way or the other, authorized him to carry out the plan if it seemed feasible.
To Monty, fearless and less disturbed than any other member of his circle, appendicitis seemed as inevitable as vaccination.
"The appendix is becoming an important feature in the Book of Life," he once told Peggy Gray.
He refused to go to a hospital, but pathetically begged to be taken to his old rooms at Mrs. Gray's.
With all the unhappy loneliness of a sick boy, he craved the care and companionship of those who seemed a part of his own. Dr. Lotless had them transform a small bedchamber into a model operating room and Monty took no small satisfaction in the thought that if he was to be denied the privilege of spending money for several weeks, he would at least make his illness as expensive as possible. A consultation of eminent surgeons was called, but true to his colors, Brewster installed Dr. Lotless, a "Little Son," as his house surgeon. Monty grimly bore the pain and suffering and submitted to the operation which alone could save his life. Then came the struggle, then the promise of victory and then the quiet days of convalescence. In the little room where he had dreamed his boyish dreams and suffered his boyish sorrows, he struggled against death and gradually emerged from the mists of lassitude. He found it harder than he had thought to come back to life. The burden of it all seemed heavy. The trained nurses found that some more powerful stimulant than the medicine was needed to awaken his ambition, and they discovered it at last in Peggy.
"Child," he said to her the first time she was permitted to see him, and his eyes had lights in them: "do you know, this isn't such a bad old world after all. Sometimes as I've lain here, it has looked twisted and queer. But there are things that straighten it out. To-day I feel as though I had a place in it—as though I could fight things and win out. What do you think, Peggy? Do you suppose there is something that I could do? You know what I mean—something that some one else would not do a thousand times better."
But Peggy, to whom this chastened mood in Monty was infinitely pathetic, would not let him talk. She soothed him and cheered him and touched his hair with her cool hands. And then she left him to think and brood and dream.
It was many days before his turbulent mind drifted to the subject of money, but suddenly he found himself hoping that the surgeons would be generous with their charges. He almost suffered a relapse when Lotless, visibly distressed, informed him that the total amount would reach three thousand dollars.
"And what is the additional charge for the operation?" asked Monty, unwilling to accept such unwarranted favors.
"It's included in the three thousand," said Lotless. "They knew you were my friend and it was professional etiquette to help keep down expenses."
For days Brewster remained at Mrs. Gray's, happy in its restfulness, serene under the charm of Peggy's presence, and satisfied to be hopelessly behind in his daily expense account. The interest shown by the inquiries at the house and the anxiety of his friends were soothing to the profligate. It gave him back a little of his lost self-respect. The doctors finally decided that he would best recuperate in Florida, and advised a month at least in the warmth. He leaped at the proposition, but took the law into his own hands by ordering General Manager Harrison to rent a place, and insisting that he needed the companionship of Peggy and Mrs. Gray.
"How soon can I get back to work, Doctor?" demanded Monty, the day before the special train was to carry him south. He was beginning to see the dark side of this enforced idleness. His blood again was tingling with the desire to be back in the harness of a spendthrift.
"To work?" laughed the physician. "And what is your occupation, pray?"
"Making other people rich," responded Brewster, soberly.
"Well, aren't you satisfied with what you have done for me? If you are as charitable as that you must be still pretty sick. Be careful, and you may be on your feet again in five or six weeks."
Harrison came in as Lotless left. Peggy smiled at him from the window. She had been reading aloud from a novel so garrulous that it fairly cried aloud for interruptions.
"Now, Nopper, what became of the ball I was going to give?" demanded Monty, a troubled look in his eyes.
"Why, we called it off," said "Nopper," in surprise.
"Don't you remember, Monty?" asked Peggy, looking up quickly, and wondering if his mind had gone trailing off.
"I know we didn't give it, of course; but what date did you hit upon?"
"We didn't postpone it at all," said "Nopper." "How could we? We didn't know whether—I mean it wouldn't have been quite right to do that sort of thing."
"I understand. Well, what has become of the orchestra, and the flowers, and all that?"
"The orchestra is gallivanting around the country, quarreling with itself and everybody else, and driving poor Gardner to the insane asylum. The flowers have lost their bloom long ago."
"Well, we'll get together, Nopper, and try to have the ball at mid-Lent. I think I'll be well by that time."
Peggy looked appealingly at Harrison for guidance, but to him silence seemed the better part of valor, and he went off wondering if the illness had completely carried away Monty's reason.
It was the cottage of a New York millionaire which had fallen to Brewster. The owner had, for the time, preferred Italy to St. Augustine, and left his estate, which was well located and lavishly equipped, in the hands of his friends. Brewster's lease covered three months, at a fabulous rate per month. With Joe Bragdon installed as manager-in-chief, his establishment was transferred bodily from New York, and the rooms were soon as comfortable as their grandeur would permit. Brewster was not allowed to take advantage of his horses and the new automobile which preceded him from New York, but to his guests they offered unlimited opportunities. "Nopper" Harrison had remained in the north to renew arrangements for the now hated ball and to look after the advance details of the yacht cruise. Dr. Lotless and his sister, with "Subway" Smith and the Grays, made up Brewster's party. Lotless dampened Monty's spirits by relentlessly putting him on rigid diet, with most discouraging restrictions upon his conduct. The period of convalescence was to be an exceedingly trying one for the invalid. At first he was kept in-doors, and the hours were whiled away by playing cards. But Monty considered "bridge" the "pons asinorum," and preferred to play piquet with Peggy. It was one of these games that the girl interrupted with a question that had troubled her for many days. "Monty," she said, and she found it much more difficult than when she had rehearsed the scene in the silence of her walks; "I've heard a rumor that Miss Drew and her mother have taken rooms at the hotel. Wouldn't it be pleasanter to have them here?"
A heavy gloom settled upon Brewster's face, and the girl's heart dropped like lead. She had puzzled over the estrangement, and wondered if by any effort of her own things could be set right. At times she had had flashing hopes that it did not mean as much to Monty as she had thought. But down underneath, the fear that he was unhappy seemed the only certain thing in life. She felt that she must make sure. And together with the very human desire to know the worst, was the puritanical impulse to bring it about.
"You forget that this is the last place they would care to invade." And in Brewster's face Peggy seemed to read that for her martyrdom was the only wear. Bravely she put it on.
"Monty, I forget nothing that I really know. But this is a case in which you are quite wrong. Where is your sporting blood? You have never fought a losing fight before, and you can't do it now. You have lost your nerve, Monty. Don't you see that this is the time for an aggressive campaign?" Somehow she was not saying things at all as she had planned to say them. And his gloom weighed heavily upon her. "You don't mind, do you, Monty," she added, more softly, "this sort of thing from me? I know I ought not to interfere, but I've known you so long. And I hate to see things twisted by a very little mistake."
But Monty did mind enormously. He had no desire to talk about the thing anyway, and Peggy's anxiety to marry him off seemed a bit unnecessary. Manifestly her own interest in him was of the coldest. From out of the gloom he looked at her somewhat sullenly. For the moment she was thinking only of his pain, and her face said nothing.
"Peggy," he exclaimed, finally, resenting the necessity of answering her, "you don't in the least know what you are talking about. It is not a fit of anger on Barbara Drew's part. It is a serious conviction."
"A conviction which can be changed," the girl broke in.
"Not at all." Brewster took it up. "She has no faith in me. She thinks I'm an ass."
"Perhaps she's right," she exclaimed, a little hot. "Perhaps you have never discovered that girls say many things to hide their emotions. Perhaps you don't realize what feverish, exclamatory, foolish things girls are. They don't know how to be honest with the men they love, and they wouldn't if they did. You are little short of an idiot, Monty Brewster, if you believed the things she said rather than the things she looked."
And Peggy, fiery and determined and defiantly unhappy, threw down her cards and escaped so that she might not prove herself tearfully feminine. She left Brewster still heavily enveloped in melancholy; but she left him puzzled. He began to wonder if Barbara Drew did have something in the back of her mind. Then he found his thoughts wandering off toward Peggy and her defiance. He had only twice before seen her in that mood, and he liked it. He remembered how she had lost her temper once when she was fifteen, and hated a girl he admired. Suddenly he laughed aloud at the thought of the fierce little picture she had made, and the gloom, which had been so sedulously cultivated, was dissipated in a moment. The laugh surprised the man who brought in some letters. One of them was from "Nopper" Harrison, and gave him all the private news. The ball was to be given at mid-Lent, which arrived toward the end of March, and negotiations were well under way for the chartering of the "Flitter," the steam-yacht belonging to Reginald Brown, late of Brown & Brown.
The letter made Brewster chafe under the bonds of inaction. His affairs were getting into a discouraging state. The illness was certain to entail a loss of more than $50,000 to his business. His only consolation came through Harrison's synopsis of the reports from Gardner, who was managing the brief American tour of the Viennese orchestra. Quarrels and dissensions were becoming every-day embarrassments, and the venture was an utter failure from a financial point of view. Broken contracts and lawsuits were turning the tour into one continuous round of losses, and poor Gardner was on the point of despair. From the beginning, apparently, the concerts had been marked for disaster. Public indifference had aroused the scorn of the irascible members of the orchestra, and there was imminent danger of a collapse in the organization. Gardner lived in constant fear that his troop of quarrelsome Hungarians would finish their tour suddenly in a pitched battle with daggers and steins. Brewster smiled at the thought of practical Gardner trying to smooth down the electric emotions of these musicians.
A few days later Mrs. Prentiss Drew and Miss Drew registered at the Ponce de Leon, and there was much speculation upon the chances for a reconciliation. Monty, however, maintained a strict silence on the subject, and refused to satisfy the curiosity of his friends. Mrs. Drew had brought down a small crowd, including two pretty Kentucky girls and a young Chicago millionaire. She lived well and sensibly, with none of the extravagance that characterized the cottage. Yet it was inevitable that Brewster's guests should see hers and join some of their riding parties. Monty pleaded that he was not well enough to be in these excursions, but neither he nor Barbara cared to over-emphasize their estrangement.
Peggy Gray was in despair over Monty's attitude. She had become convinced that behind his pride he was cherishing a secret longing for Barbara. Yet she could not see how the walls were to be broken down if he maintained this icy reserve. She was sure that the masterful tone was the one to win with a girl like that, but evidently Monty would not accept advice. That he was mistaken about Barbara's feeling she did not doubt for a moment, and she saw things going hopelessly wrong for want of a word. There were times when she let herself dream of possibilities, but they always ended by seeming too impossible. She cared too much to make the attainment of her vision seem simple. She cared too much to be sure of anything.
At moments she fancied that she might say a word to Miss Drew which would straighten things out. But there was something about her which held her off. Even now that they were thrown together more or less she could not get beyond a certain barrier. It was not until a sunny day when she had accepted Barbara's invitation to drive that things seemed to go more easily. For the first time she felt the charm of the girl, and for the first time Barbara seemed unreservedly friendly. It was a quiet drive they were taking through the woods and out along the beach, and somehow in the open air things simplified themselves. Finally, in the softness and the idle warmth, even an allusion to Monty, whose name usually meant an embarrassing change of subject, began to seem possible. It was inevitable that Peggy should bring it in; for with her a question of tact was never allowed to dominate when things of moment were at stake. She cowered before the plunge, but she took it unafraid.
"The doctor says Monty may go out driving to-morrow," she began. "Isn't that fine?"
Barbara's only response was to touch her pony a little too sharply with the whip. Peggy went on as if unconscious of the challenge.
"He has been bored to death, poor fellow, in the house all this time, and—"
"Miss Gray, please do not mention Mr. Brewster's name to me again," interrupted Barbara, with a contraction of the eyebrows. But Peggy was seized with a spirit of defiance and plunged recklessly on.
"What is the use, Miss Drew, of taking an attitude like that? I know the situation pretty well, and I can't believe that either Monty or you has lost in a week a feeling that was so deep-seated. I know Monty much too well to think that he would change so easily." Peggy still lived largely in her ideals. "And you are too fine a thing not to have suffered under this misunderstanding. It seems as if a very small word would set you both straight."
Barbara drew herself up and kept her eyes on the road which lay white and gleaming in the sun. "I have not the least desire to be set straight." And she was never more serious.
"But it was only a few weeks ago that you were engaged."
"I am sorry," answered Barbara, "that it should have been talked about so much. Mr. Brewster did ask me to marry him, but I never accepted. In fact, it was only his persistence that made me consider the matter at all. I did think about it. I confess that I rather liked him. But it was not long before I found him out."
"What do you mean?" And there was a flash in Peggy's eyes. "What has he done?"
"To my certain knowledge he has spent more than four hundred thousand dollars since last September. That is something, is it not?" Miss Drew said, in her slow, cool voice, and even Peggy's loyalty admitted some justification in the criticism.
"Generosity has ceased to be a virtue, then?" she asked coldly.
"Generosity!" exclaimed Barbara, sharply. "It's sheer idiocy. Haven't you heard the things people are saying? They are calling him a fool, and in the clubs they are betting that he will be a pauper within a year."
"Yet they charitably help him to spend his money. And I have noticed that even worldly mammas find him eligible." The comment was not without its caustic side.
"That was months ago, my dear," protested Barbara, calmly. "When he spoke to me—he told me it would be impossible for him to marry within a year. And don't you see that a year may make him an abject beggar?"
"Naturally anything is preferable to a beggar," came in Peggy's clear, soft voice.
Barbara hesitated only a moment.
"Well, you must admit, Miss Gray, that it shows a shameful lack of character. How could any girl be happy with a man like that? And, after all, one must look out for one's own fate."
"Undoubtedly," replied Peggy, but many thoughts were dashing through her brain.
"Shall we turn back to the cottage?" she said, after an awkward silence.
"You certainly don't approve of Mr. Brewster's conduct?" Barbara did not like to be placed in the wrong, and felt that she must endeavor to justify herself. "He is the most reckless of spend-thrifts, we know, and he probably indulges in even less respectable excitement."
Peggy was not tall, but she carried her head at this moment as though she were in the habit of looking down on the world.
"Aren't you going a little too far, Miss Drew?" she asked placidly.
"It is not only New York that laughs at his Quixotic transactions," Barbara persisted. "Mr. Hampton, our guest from Chicago, says the stories are worse out there than they are in the east."
"It is a pity that Monty's illness should have made him so weak," said Peggy quietly, as they turned in through the great iron gates, and Barbara was not slow to see the point.