Mrs. Jules Levice was slowly gaining the high-road to recovery, and many of the restrictions for her cure had been removed. As a consequence, and with an eye ever to Ruth’s social duties, she urged her to leave her more and more to herself.
As a matter of course, Ruth had laid the case of Bob and his neighborhood before her father’s consideration. A Jewish girl’s life is an open page to her family. Matters of small as well as of larger moment are freely discussed. The result is that while it robs her of much of her Christian sister’s spontaneity, which often is the latter’s greatest charm, it also, through the sagacity of more experienced heads, guards her against many indiscretions. This may be a relic of European training, but it enables parents to instil into the minds of their daughters principles which compare favorable with the American girl’s native self-reliance. It was as natural for Ruth to consult her father in this trivial matter, in view of Louis’s disapproval, as it would be for her friend, Dorothy Gwynne, to sally anywhere so long as she herself felt justified in so doing.
Ruth really wished to go; and as her father, after considering the matter, could find no objection, she went. After that it was enough to tell her mother that she was going to see Bob. Mrs. Levice had heard the doctor speak of him to Ruth; and any little charity that came in her way she was only too happy to forward.
Bob’s plain, ungarnished room soon began to show signs of beauty under Ruth’s deft fingers. A pot of mignonette in the window, a small painting of exquisite chrysanthemums on the wall, a daily bunch of fresh roses, were the food she brought for his poet soul. But there were other substantial things.
The day after she had replaced the coarse horse-blanket with a soft down quilt, the doctor made one of his bi-weekly visits to her mother.
As he stood taking leave of Ruth on the veranda, he turned, with his foot on the last step, and looked up at her as if arrested by a sudden thought.
“Miss Levice,” said he, “I should like to give you a friendly scolding. May I?”
“How can I prevent you?”
“Well, if I were you I should not indulge Bob’s love of luxury as you do. He positively refused to get up yesterday on account of the ‘soft feel,’ as he termed it, of that quilt. Now, you know, he must get up; he is able to, and in a week I wish to start him in to work again. Then he won’t be able to afford such ‘soft feels,’ and he will rebel. He has had enough coddling for his own good. I really think it is mistaken kindness on your part, Miss Levice.”
The girl was leaning lightly against one of the supporting columns. A playful smile parted her lips as she listened.
“Dr. Kemp,” she replied, “may I give you a little friendly scolding?”
“You have every right.” His tone was somewhat earnest, despite his smiling eyes. A man of thirty-five does not resent a friendly scolding from a winsome young girl.
“Well, don’t you think it is rather hard of you to deprive poor Bob of any pleasure to-day may bring, on the ground that to-morrow he may wish it too, and will not be able to have it?”
“As you put it, it does seem so; but I am pugnacious enough to wish you to see it as practically as I do. Put sentiment aside, and the only sensible thing to be done now is to prepare him for the hard, uncushioned facts of an active life.”
“But why must it be so hard for him?”
“Why? In the face of the inevitable, that is a time-wasting, useless question. Life is so; even if we find its underlying cause, the discovery will not alter the fact.”
“Yes, it will.”
“How?”
“By its enabling us to turn our backs on the hard way and seek a softer.”
“You forget that strait-jacket to all inclination,—circumstance.”
“And are you not forgetting that friendly hands may help to remove the strait-jacket?”
Her lovely face looked very winning, filled with its kindly meaning.
“Thank you,” said he, raising his hat and forgetting to replace it as he spoke; “that is a gentle truth; some day we shall discuss this further. For the present, use your power in getting Bob upon his feet.”
“Yes.” She gave a hurried glance at the door behind her, and ran quickly down to the lowest step. “Dr. Kemp,” said she, a little breathlessly, “I have wished for some time to ask you to let me know when you have any cases that require assistance outside of a physician’s,—such as my father or I might lend. You must have a broad field for such opportunities. Will you think of me then, please?”
“I will,” he replied, looking with amused pleasure at her flushed face. “Going in for philanthropy, Miss Levice?”
“No; going out for it, thank you;” and she put her hand into his outstretched one. She watched him step into his carriage; he turned and raised his hat again,—a trifling circumstance that Ruth dwelt upon with pleasure; a second glance always presupposes an interested first.
He did not fail to keep his promise; and once on the lookout for “cases” herself, Ruth soon found enough irons in the fire to occupy her spare moments.
Mrs. Levice, however, insisted upon her resuming her place in society.
“A young girl must not withdraw herself from her sphere, or people will either consider her eccentric or will forget her entirely. Don’t be unreasonable, Ruth; there is no reason why you should not enjoy every function in our circle, and Louis is always happy to take you. When he asked you if you would go with him to the Art Exhibition on Friday night, I heard you say you did not know. Now why?”
“Oh, that? I never gave it a second’s thought. I promised Father to go with him in the afternoon; I did not consider it worth an explanation.”
“But, you see, I did. It looks very queer for Louis to be travelling around by himself; couldn’t you go again in the evening with him?”
“Of course, you over-thoughtful aunt. If the pictures are good, a second visit will not be thrown away,—that is, if Louis is really anxious for my companionship. But, ‘I doubt it, I doubt it, I do.’”
“What nonsense!” returned her mother, somewhat testily. “Why shouldn’t he be? You are always amiable together, are you not?”
“Well,” she said, knitting her brows and pursing her lips drolly, “that, methinks, depends on the limits and requirements of amiability. If disputation showeth a friendly spirit, then is my lord overfriendly; for it oft hath seemed of late to pleasure his mood to wax disputations, though, in sooth, lady fair, I have always maintained a wary and decorous demeanor.”
“I can imagine,” laughed her mother, a little anxiously; “then you will go?”
“Why not?”
If Arnold really cared for the outcome of such manoeuvres, Mrs. Levice’s exertions bore some fruit.
There are few communities, comparatively speaking, with more enthusiastic theatre-lovers than are to be found in San Francisco. The play was one of the few worldly pleasures that Mr. Levice thoroughly enjoyed. When a great star was heralded, he was in a feverish delight until it had come and gone. When Bernhardt appeared, the quiet little man fully earned the often indiscriminately applied title of “crazy Frenchman.” A Frenchman is never so much one as when confronted in a foreign land with a great French creation; every fibre in his body answers each charm with an appreciation worked to fever-heat by patriotic love; at such times the play of his emotions precludes any idea of reason to an onlooker. Bernhardt was one of Levice’s passions. Booth was another, though he took him more composedly. The first time the latter appeared at the Baldwin (his opening play was “Hamlet”) the Levices—that is, Ruth and her father—went three times in succession to witness his matchless performance, and every succeeding characterization but strengthened their enthusiasm.
Booth was coming again. The announcement had been rapturously hailed by the Levices.
“It will be impossible for us to go together, Father,” Ruth remarked at the breakfast-table. “Louis will have to take me on alternate nights, while you stay at home with Mamma; did you hear, Louis?”
“You will hardly need to do that,” answered Arnold, lowering his cup; “if you and your father prefer going together, I shall enjoy staying with your mother on those nights.”
“Thanks for the offer—and your evident delight in my company,” laughed Ruth; “but there is one play at which you must submit to the infliction of my presence. Don’t you remember we always wished to see the ‘Merchant of Venice’ and judge for ourselves his interpretation of the character? Well, I am determined that we shall see it together.”
“When does he play it?”
“A week from Saturday night.”
“Sorry to disappoint you, but I shall be out of town at the end of next week.”
“Oh, dear? Honestly? Can’t you put it off? I want so much to go.”
“Impossible. Go with your father.”
“You know very well neither of us would go off and leave Mamma alone at night. It is horrid of you to go. I am sure you could manage differently if—”
“Why, my child!”
She was actually pouting; and her father’s quiet tone of surprised reprimand just headed off two great tears that threatened to fall.
“I know,” she said, trying to smile, and showing an April face instead; “but I had just set my heart on going, and with Louis too.”
“That comes of being a spoilt only child,” put in Arnold, suavely. “You ought to know by this time that of the many plans we make with ourselves, nine out of ten come to nought. Before you set your heart on a thing, be sure you will not have to give it up.”
Ruth, still sore with disappointment, acknowledged this philosophic remark with a curled lip.
“There, save your tears for something more worthy,” cut in Levice, briskly; “if you care so much about it, we or chance must arrange it as you wish.”
But chance in this instance was not propitious. Wednesday came, and Arnold saw no way of accommodating her. He left town after taking her to see the “Fool’s Revenge” as a sort of substitution.
“You seemed to be enjoying the poor Fool’s troubles last night,” observed Dr. Kemp, in the morning; they were still standing in Mrs. Levice’s room.
“I? Not enjoying his troubles; I enjoyed Booth, though,—if you can call it enjoyment when your heart is ready to break for him. Were you there? I did not see you.”
“No, I don’t suppose you did, or you would have been in the pitiable condition of the princess who had her head turned. I sat directly back of your box, in the dress-circle. Then you like Booth?”
“Take care! That is a dangerous subject with my family,” broke in Mrs. Levice. “Ruth has actually exhausted every adjective in her admiration vocabulary. The last extravaganza I heard from her on that theme was after she had seen him as Brutus; she wished herself Lucius, that in the tent scene she might kiss Booth’s hand.”
“It sounds gushing enough for a school-girl now,” laughed Ruth merrily, looking up at the doctor; “but at the time I meant it.”
“Have you seen him in all his impersonations?” he asked.
“In everything but ‘Shylock.’”
“You will have a chance for that on Saturday night. It will be a great farewell performance.”
“Undoubtedly, but I shall have to forego that last glimpse of him.”
“Now, Doctor,” cried Mrs. Levice, “will you please impress it on her that I am not a lunatic and can be left alone without fear? She wishes to go Saturday night, but refuses to go with her father on the ground that I shall be left alone, as Mr. Arnold is out of town. Is not that being unnecessarily solicitous?”
“Without doubt. But,” he added, turning deferentially to Ruth, “in lieu of a better escort, how would I do, Miss Levice?”
“I do not understand.”
“Will you come with me Saturday night to see ‘Shylock’?”
To be candid, Ruth was embarrassed. The doctor had said neither “will you honor me” nor “will you please me,” but he had both pleased and honored her. She turned a pair of radiant eyes to her mother. “Come now, Mrs. Levice,” laughed Kemp, noting the action, “will you allow your little girl to go with me? Do not detain me with a refusal; it will be impossible to accept one now, and I shall not be around till then, you know. Good-morning.”
Unwittingly, the doctor had caused an excitement in the hearts both of mother and daughter. The latter was naturally surprised at his unexpected invitation, but surprise was soon obliterated by another and quite different feeling, which she kept rigorously to herself. Mrs. Levice was in a dilemma about it, and consulted her husband in the evening.
“By all means, let her go,” replied he; “why should you have had any misgivings about it? I am sure I am glad she is going.”
“But, Jules, you forget that none of our Jewish friends allow their girls to go out with strangers.”
“Is that part of our religion?”
“No; but custom is in itself a religion. People do talk so at every little innovation against convention.”
“What will they say? Nothing detrimental either to Ruth or the doctor. Pshaw, Esther! You ought to feel proud that Dr. Kemp has asked the child. If she wishes to go, don’t set an impossible bogy in the way of her enjoyment. Besides, you do not care to appear so silly as you would if you said to the doctor, ‘I can’t let her go on account of people’s tongues,’ and that is the only honest excuse you can offer.” So in his manly, practical way he decided it.
On Saturday night Ruth stood in the drawing-room buttoning her pale suede glove. Kemp had not yet come in. She looked unusually well in her dull sage-green gown. A tiny toque of the same color rested on her soft dark hair. The creamy pallor of her face, the firm white throat revealed by the broad rolling collar, her grave lips and dreamy eyes, hardly told that she was feeling a little shy. Presently the bell rang, and Kemp came in, his open topcoat revealing his evening dress beneath. He came forward hastily.
“I am a little late,” he said, taking her hand, “but it was unavoidable. Ten minutes to eight,” looking at his watch; “the horses must make good time.”
“It is slightly chilly to-night, is it not?” asked Ruth, for want of something better to say as she turned for her wrap.
“I did not feel it,” he replied, intercepting her. “But this furry thing will keep the cold off, if there is any,” he continued, as he held it for her, and quite unprofessionally bent his head to hook it at her throat. A strange sensation shot through Ruth as his face approached so close her own.
“How are your mother and father?” He asked, holding the door open, while she turned for her fan, thus concealing a slight embarrassment.
“They are as usual,” she answered. “Father expects to see you after the play. You will come in for a little supper, will you not?”
“That sounds alluring,” he responded lightly, his quick eye remarking, as she came toward him, the dainty femininity of her loveliness, that seemed to have caught a grace beyond the reach of art.
It thus happened that they took their places just as the curtain rose.
Everybody remembers the sad old comedy, as differently interpreted in its graver sentiment as there are different interpreters. Ruth had seen one who made of Shylock merely a fawning, mercenary, loveless, blood-thirsty wretch. She had seen another who presented a man of quick wit, ready tongue, great dignity, greater vengeance, silent of love, wordy of hate. Booth, without throwing any romantic glamour on the Jew, showed him as God and man, but mostly man, had made him: an old Jew, grown bitter in the world’s disfavor through fault of race; grown old in strife for the only worldly power vouchsafed him,—gold; grown old with but one human love to lighten his hard existence; a man who, at length, shorn of his two loves through the same medium that robbed him of his manly birthright, now turned fiend, endeavors with tooth and nail to wreak the smouldering vengeance of a lifetime upon the chance representative of an inexorable persecution.
All through the performance Ruth sat a silent, attentive listener. Kemp, with his ready laugh at Gratiano’s sallies, would turn a quick look at her for sympathy; he was rather surprised at the grave, unsmiling face beside him. When, however, the old Jew staggered alone and almost blindly from the triumphantly smiling court-room, a little pinch on his arm decidedly startled him.
He lowered his glass and turned round on her so suddenly that Ruth started.
“Oh,” she faltered, “I—I beg your pardon; I had forgotten you were not Louis.”
“I do not mind in the least,” he assured her easily.
The last act passes merrily and quickly; only the severe, great things of life move slowly.
As the doctor and Ruth made their way through the crowded lobby, the latter thought she had never seen so many acquaintances, each of whom turned an interested look at her stalwart escort. Of this she was perfectly aware, but the same human interest with which Kemp’s acquaintances regarded her passed by her unnoticed.
A moment later they were in the fresh, open air.
“How beautiful it is!” said Ruth, looking up at the stars. “The wind has entirely died away.”
“‘On such a night,’” quoth Kemp, as they approached the curb, “a closed carriage seems out of season.”
“And reason,” supplemented Ruth, while the doctor opened the door rather slowly. She glanced at him hesitatingly.
“Would you—” she began.
“Right! I would!” The door was banged to.
“John,” he said, looking up at his man in the box, “take this trap round to the stable; I shall not need the horses again to-night.”
John touched his hat, and Kemp drew his companion’s little hand through his arm.
“Well,” he said, as they turned the corner, “Were you satisfied with the great man to-night?”
“Yes,” she replied meditatively, “fully; there was no exaggeration,—it was all quite natural.”
“Except Jessica in boy’s clothes.”
“Don’t mention her, please; I detest her.”
“And yet she spoke quite prettily on the night.”
“I did not hear her.”
“Why, where were you while all the world was making merry on the stage?”
“Not with them; I was with the weary, heart-broken old man who passed out when joy began.”
“Ah! I fancied you did not half appreciate Gratiano’s jesting. Miss Levice, I am afraid you allow the sorry things of life to take too strong a hold on you. It is not right. I assure you for every tear there is a laugh, and you must learn to forget the former in the latter.”
“I am sorry,” replied Ruth, quite sadly; “but I fear I cannot learn that,—tears are always stronger than laughter. How could I listen to the others’ nonsense when my heart was sobbing with that lonely old man? Forgive me, but I cannot forget him.”
They walked along silently for some time. Instinctively, each felt the perfect accord with which they kept step. Ruth’s little ear was just about on a level with the doctor’s chin. He hardly felt the soft touch of her hand upon his sleeve; but as he looked at the white profile of her cheek against the dark fur of her collar, the knowledge that she was there was a pleasing one.
“Did you consider the length of our walk when you fell in with my desire?” he asked presently.
“I like a long walk in pleasant weather; I never tire of walking.”
“You have found the essentials of a good pedestrian,—health and strength.”
“Yes; if everybody were like me, all your skill would be thrown away,—I am never ill.”
“Apparently there is no reason why you should be, with common-sense to back your blessings. If common-sense could be bought at the drug-store, I should be rid of a great many patients.”
“That reminds me of a snatch of conversation I once overheard between my mother and a doctor’s wife. I am reminded of it because the spirit of your meaning is diametrically opposed to her own. After some talk my mother asked, ‘And how is the doctor?’ ‘Oh,’ replied the visitor, with a long sigh, ‘he’s well enough in body, but he’s blue, terribly blue; everybody is so well, you know.’”
“Her sentiment was more human than humane,” laughed Kemp. He was glad to see that she had roused herself from her sad musings; but a certain set purpose he had formed robbed him now of his former lightness of manner.
He was about to broach a subject that required delicate handling; but an intuitive knowledge of the womanly character of the young girl aided him much. It was not so much what he had seen her do as what he knew she was, that led him to begin his recital.
“We have a good many blocks before us yet,” he said, “and I am going to tell you a little story. Why don’t you take the full benefit of my arm? There,” he proceeded, drawing her hand farther through his arm, “now you feel more like a big girl than like a bit of thistledown. If I get tiresome, just call ‘time,’ will you?”
“All right,” she laughed. She was beginning to meet halfway this matter-of-fact, unadorned, friendly manner of his; and when she did meet it, she felt a comfortable security in it. From the beginning to the end of his short narrative he looked straight ahead.
“How shall I begin? Do you like fairy tales? Well, this is the soul of one without the fictional wings. Once upon a time,—I think that is the very best introduction extant,—a woman was left a widow with one little girl. She lived in New Orleans, where the blow of her husband’s death and the loss of her good fortune came almost simultaneously. She must have had little moral courage, for as soon as she could, she left her home, not being able to bear the inevitable falling off of friends that follows loss of fortune. She wandered over the intermediate States between here and Louisiana, stopping nowhere long, but endeavoring to keep together the bodies and souls of herself and child by teaching. They kept this up for years until the mother succumbed. They were on the way from Nevada to Los Angeles when she died. The daughter, then not eighteen, went on to Los Angeles, where she buried her mother, and endeavored to continue teaching as she had been doing. She was young, unsophisticated, sad, and in want in a strange town. She applied for advice to a man highly honored and recommended by his fellow-citizens. The man played the brute. The girl fled—anywhere. Had she been less brave, she would have fled from herself. She came to San Francisco and took a position as nurse-girl; children, she thought, could not play her false, and she might outlive it. The hope was cruel. She was living near my home, had seen my sign probably, and in the extremity of her distress came to me. There is a good woman who keeps a lodging-house, and who delights in doing me favors. I left the poor child in her hands, and she is now fully recovered. As a physician I can do no more for her, and yet melancholy has almost made a wreck of her. Nothing I say has any effect; all she answers is, ‘It isn’t worth while.’ I understand her perfectly, but I wished to infuse into her some of her old spirit of independence. This morning I asked her if she intended to let herself drift on in this way. I may have spoken a little more harshly than necessary, for my words broke down completely the wall of dogged silence she had built around herself. ‘Oh, sir,’ she cried, weeping like the child she is, ‘what can I do? Can I dare to take little children by the hand, stained as I am? Can I go as an impostor where, if people knew, they would snatch their loved ones from me? Oh, it would be too wretched!’ I tried to remonstrate with her, told her that the lily in the dust is no less a lily than is her spotless sister held high above contamination. She looked at me miserably from her tear-stained face, and then said, ‘Men may think so, but women don’t; a stain with them is ignoble whether made by one’s self or another. No woman knowing my story would think me free from dishonor, and hold out her clean hands to me.’ ‘Plenty,’ I contradicted. ‘Maybe,’ she said humbly; ‘but what would it mean? The hand would be held out at arm’s length by women safe in their position, who would not fail to show me how debased they think me. I am young yet; can you show me a girl, like myself in years, but white as snow, kept safe from contamination, as you say, who, knowing my story, would hold out her hand to me and not feel herself besmirched by the contact? Do not say you can, for I know you cannot.’ She was crying so violently that she would not listen to me. When I left her, I myself could think of none of my young friends to whom I could propound the question. I know many sweet, kind girls, but I could count not one among them all who in such a case would be brave as she was womanly—until I thought of you.”
Complete silence followed his words. He did not turn his glance from the street ahead of him. He had made no appeal, would make none, in fact. He had told the story with scarcely a reflection on its impropriety, that would have arrested another man from introducing such an element into his gentle fellowship with a girl like Ruth. His lack of hesitancy was born of his manly view of the outcast’s blamelessness, of her dire necessity for help, and of a premonition that Ruth Levice would be as free from the artificiality of conventional surface modesty as was he, through the earnestness of the undertaking.
There is something very sweet to a woman in being singled out by a man for some ennobling virtue. Ruth felt this so strongly that she could almost hear her heart beat with the intoxicating knowledge. No question had been asked, but she felt an answer was expected. Yet had her life depended on it, the words could not have come at that moment. Was she indeed what he esteemed her? Unconsciously Dr. Kemp had, in thought, placed her on a pedestal. Did she deserve the high place he had given her, or would she?
With many women the question would have been, did she care for Dr. Kemp’s good opinion? Now, though Ruth was indeed put on her mettle, her quick sympathy had been instantly touched by the girl’s miserable story. Perhaps the doctor’s own feelings had influenced her, but had the girl stood before her at the moment, she would have seized her hand with all her own gentle nobility of soul.
As they turned the corner of the block where Ruth’s house stood, Kemp said deliberately,—
“Well?”
“I thank you. Where does she live?”
Her quiet, natural tone told nothing of the tumult of sweet thoughts within. They had reached the house, and the doctor opened the gate before he answered. When he did, after they had passed through, he took both her hands in his.
“I shall take you there,” he said, looking down at her with grave, smiling eyes; “I knew you would not fail me. When shall I call for you?”
“Do not call for me at all; I think—I know it will be better for me to walk in alone, as of my own accord.”
“Ah, yes!” he said, and told her the address. She ran lightly up the steps, and as he turned her key in the door for her, she raised a pair of starry eyes to his.
“Dr. Kemp,” she said, “I have had an exceptionally lovely evening. I shall not soon forget it.”
“Nor I,” he returned, raising his hat; holding it in his hand, he gently raised her gloved hand to his lips. Herbert Kemp was a gentleman of the old school in his manner of showing reverence to women.
“My brave young friend!” he said; and the next minute his firm footfall was crunching the gravel of the walk. Neither of them had remembered that he was to have come in with her. She waited till the gate clicked behind him, and then softly closed the heavy door.
“My brave young friend!” The words mounted like wine to her head. She forgot her surroundings and stood in a sweet dream in the hall, slowly unbuttoning her glove. She must have remained in this attitude for five minutes, when, raising her eyes, still shadowy with thought, she saw her cousin before her down the hall, his arm resting on the newel-post.
“Louis!” she cried in surprise; and without considering, she hurried to him, threw her arm around his neck, and kissed him on the cheek. Arnold, taken by storm, stepped slightly back.
“When did you get home?” she asked, the pale rose-flush that mantled her cheeks making her face exquisite.
“A half an hour ago.”
She looked at him quickly.
“Are you tired, Louis?” she inquired gently. “You are somewhat pale, and you speak in that way.”
“Did you enjoy the play?” he asked quietly, passing by her remarks.
“The play!” she echoed, and then a quick burning blush suffused her face. The epilogue had wholly obliterated the play from her recollection.
“Oh, of course,” she responded, turning from the rather sardonic smile of his lips and seating herself on the stairs; “do you want to hear about it now?”
“Why not?”
“Well,” she began, laying her gloves in her lap and snuggling her chin in the palms of her hands, “shall I tell you how I felt about it? In the first place, I was not ashamed of Shylock; if his vengeance was distorted, the cause distorted it. But, oh, Louis, the misery of that poor old man! After all, his punishment was as fiendish as his guilt. Booth was great. I wish you could have seen the play of his wonderful eyebrow and the eloquence of his fine hand. Poor old, lonely Shylock! With all his intellect, how could he regret that wretched little Jessica?”
“He was a Jewish father.”
“How singularly you say that! Of course he was a Jew; but Jewish hardly describes him,—at least, according to the modern idea. Are you coming up?”
“Yes. Go on; I will lower the gas.”
“Wouldn’t you like something to eat or drink? You look so worn out; let me get you something.”
“Thanks; I have dined. Good-night.” The girl passed on to her pretty white and gold room. Shylock had again fled from her memory, but there was singing in her heart a deep, grave voice saying,—
“My brave young friend!”
“A humble bard presents his respects to my Lady Marechal Niel, and begs her to step down to the gate for about two minutes.”
The note was handed to Ruth early the next morning as she stood in the kitchen beating up eggs for an omelette for her mother’s breakfast. A smile of mingled surprise and amusement overspread her face as she read; instinctively turning the card, she saw, “Herbert Kemp, M. D.,” in simple lithograph.
“Do I look all right, Mary?” she asked hurriedly, placing the bowl on the table and half turning to the cook as she walked to the door. Mary deliberately placed both hands on her hips and eyed her sharply.
“And striped flannel dresses and hairs in braids,” she began, as she always did, as if continuing a thought, “being nice, pretty flannel and nice, pretty braids, Miss Ruth do look sweet-like, which is nothing out of the common, for she always do!”
The last was almost shouted after Ruth, who had run from the cook’s prolixity.
As she hurried down the walk, she recognized the doctor’s carriage, containing the doctor himself with Bob in state beside him. Two hands went up to two respective hats as the gate swung behind her, and she advanced with hand extended to Bob.
“You are looking much better,” she exclaimed heartily, shaking the rather bashfully outstretched hand; “your first outing, is it not?”
“Yes, lady.” It had been impossible for her to make him call her by name.
“He elected to pay his first devoirs to the Queen of Roses, as he expressed it,” spoke up Kemp, with his disengaged hand on the boy’s shoulder, and looking with a puzzled expression at Ruth. Last night she had been a young woman; this morning she was a young girl; it was only after he had driven off that he discovered the cause lay in the arrangement of her hair.
“Thank you, Bob; presently I expect to have you paying me a visit on foot, when we can come to a clearer understanding about my flower-beds.”
“He says,” returned the boy, turning an almost humbly devoted look on Kemp, “that I must not think of gardening for some weeks. And so—and so—”
“Yes?”
“And so,” explained the doctor, briskly, “he is going to hold my reins on our rounds, and imbibe a world of sunshine to expend on some flowers—yours or mine, perhaps—by and by.”
Bob’s eyes were luminous with feeling as they rested on the dark, bearded face of his benefactor.
“Now say all you have to say, and we’ll be off,” said Kemp, tucking in the robe at Bob’s side.
“I didn’t have anything to say, sir; I came only to let her know.”
“And I am so glad, Bob,” said Ruth, smiling up into the boy’s shy, speaking eyes. People always will try to add to the comfort of a convalescent, and Ruth, in turn, drew down the robe over the lad’s hands. As she did so, her cousin, Jennie Lewis, passed hurriedly by. Her quick blue eyes took in to a detail the attitudes of the trio.
“Good-morning, Jennie,” said Ruth, turning; “are you coming in?”
“Not now,” bowing stiffly and hurrying on.
“Cabbage-rose.”
Bob delivered himself of this sentiment as gently as if he had let fall a pearl.
The doctor gave a quick look at Ruth, which she met, smiling.
“He cannot help his inspiration,” she remarked easily, and stepped back as the doctor pulled the reins.
“Come again, Bob,” she called, and with a smile to Kemp she ran in.
“And I was going to say,” continued Mary, as she re-entered the kitchen, “that a speck of aig splashed on your cheek, Miss Ruth.”
“Oh, Mary, where?”
“But not knowin’ that you would see anybody, I didn’t think to run after you; so it’s just this side your mouth, like if you hadn’t wiped it good after breakfast.”
Ruth rubbed it off, wondering with vexation if the doctor had noticed it. Truth to say, the doctor had noticed it, and naturally placed the same passing construction on it that Mary had suggested. Not that the little yellow splash occupied much of his attention. When he drove off, all he thought of Ruth’s appearance was that her braided hair hung gracefully and heavily down her back; that she looked young,—decidedly young and missish; and that he had probably spoken indiscreetly and impulsively to the wrong person on a wrong subject the night before.
Dress has a subtile influence upon our actions: one gown can make a romp, another a princess, another a boor, another a sparkling coquette, out of the same woman. The female mood is susceptibly sympathetic to the fitness or unfitness of dress. Now, Ruth was without doubt the same girl who had so earnestly and sympathetically heard the doctor’s unconventional story; but the fashion of her gown had changed the impression she had made a few hours back.
An hour later, and Dr. Kemp could not have failed to recognize Ruth, the woman of his confidence. Something, perhaps a dormant spirit of worldliness, kept her from disclosing to her mother the reason of her going out. She herself felt no shame or doubt as to the advisability of her action; but the certain knowledge of her mother’s disapproval of such a proceeding restrained the disclosure which, of a surety, would have cost her the non-fulfilment of a kindly act. A bit of subterfuge which hurts no one is often not only excusable, but commendable. Besides, it saved her mother an annoying controversy; and so, fully satisfied as to her part, Ruth took her way down the street. The question as to whether the doctor had gone beyond the bounds of their brief acquaintance had of course been presented to her mind; but if a slight flush came into her face when she remembered the nature of the narrative and the personality of the narrator, it was quickly banished by the sweet assurance that in this way he had honored her beyond the reach of current flattery.
A certain placid strength possessed her and showed in her grave brown eyes; with her whole heart and soul she wished to do this thing, and she longed to do it well. Her purpose robbed her of every trace of nervousness; and it was a sweet-faced young woman who gently knocked at room Number 10 on the second floor of a respectable lodging-house on Polk Street.
Receiving no answer to her knock, she repeated it somewhat more loudly. At this a tired voice called, “Come in.”
She turned the knob, which yielded to her touch, and found herself in a small, well-lighted, and neat room. Seated in an armchair near the window, but with her back toward it, was what on first view appeared to be a golden-haired child in black; one elbow rested on the arm of the chair, and a childish hand supported the flower-like head. As Ruth hesitated after closing the door behind her, she found a pair of listless violet eyes regarding her from a small white face.
“Well?” queried the girl, without changing her position except to allow her gaze to travel to the floor.
“You are Miss Rose Delano?” said Ruth, as she came a step nearer.
“What of that?” Asked the girl, lifelessly, her dull eyes wandering everywhere but to the face of her strange interlocutor.
“I am Ruth Levice, a friend of Dr. Kemp. Will that introduction be enough to make you shake hands with me?”
She advanced toward her, holding out her hand. A burning flame shot across Rose Delano’s face, and she shrank farther back among her pillows.
“No,” she said, putting up a repellent hand; “it is not enough. Do not touch me, or you will regret it. You must not, I say.” She arose quickly from her chair and stood at bay, regarding Ruth. The latter, taller than she by head and shoulders, looked down at her smiling.
“I know no reason why I must not,” she replied gently.
“You do not know me.”
“No; but I know of you.”
“Then why did you come; why don’t you go?” The blue eyes looked with passionate resentment at her.
“Because I have come to see you; because I wish to shake hands with you.”
“Why?”
“Why?”
“Why do you wish to do that?”
“Because I wish to be your friend. May we not be friends? I am not much older than you, I think.”
“You are centuries younger. Who sent you here? Dr. Kemp?”
“No one sent me; I came of my own free will.”
“Then go as you came.”
“No.”
She stood gracefully and quietly before her. Rose Delano moved farther from her, as if to escape her grave brown eyes.
“You do not know what you are doing,” cried the girl, excitedly; “have you no father or mother, no one to tell you what a girl should not do?”
“I have both; but I have also a friend,—Dr. Kemp.”
“He is my friend too,” affirmed Rose, tremulously.
“Then we have one good thing in common; and since he is my friend and yours, why should we not be friends?”
“Because he is a man, and you are a woman. He has then told you my story?”
“Yes.”
“And you feel yourself unharmed in coming here—to such a creature as I?”
“I feel nothing but pity for you; I do not blame you. But, oh, little one, I do so grieve for you because you won’t believe that the world is not all merciless. Come, give me your hand.”
“No,” she said, clasping her hands behind her and retreating as the other advanced; “go away, please. You are very good, but you are very foolish. Bad as I am, however, I shall not let you harm yourself more; leave my room, please.”
“Not till I have held your hands in mine.”
“Stop! I tell you I don’t want you to come here; I don’t want your friendship. Can’t you go now, or are you afraid that your sweetheart will upbraid you if you fail to carry out his will?”
“My sweetheart?” she asked in questioning wonder.
“Yes; only a lover could make a girl like you so forget herself. I speak of Dr. Kemp.”
“But he is not my lover,” she stated, still speaking gently, but with a pale face turned to her companion.
“I—I—beg your pardon,” faltered the girl, humbly drooping her head, shamed by the cold pride in her tormentor’s face; “but why, oh, why, then, won’t you go?” she continued, wildly sobbing. “I assure you it is best.”
“This is best,” said Ruth, deliberately; and before Rose knew it she had seized her two hands, and unclasping them from behind her, drew them to her own breast.
“Now,” she said, holding them tightly, “who is the stronger, you or I?” She looked pleasantly down at the tear-stained face so close to hers.
“O God!” breathed the girl, her storm-beaten eyes held by the power of her captor’s calmness.
“Now we are friends,” said Ruth, softly, “shall we sit down and talk?”
Still holding the slender hands, she drew up a chair, and seating the frail girl in the armchair, sat down beside her.
“Oh, wait!” whispered Rose; “let me tell you everything before you make me live again.”
“I know everything; and truly, Rose, nothing you can say could make me wish to befriend you less.”
“How nobly, how kindly he must have told you!”
“Hush! He told me nothing but the truth. To me you are a victim, not a culprit. And now, tell me, do you feel perfectly strong?”
“Oh, yes.” The little hand swept in agony over her sad, childish face.
“Then you ought to go out for a nice walk. You have no idea how pleasant it is this morning.”
“I can’t, indeed I can’t! and, oh, why should I?”
“You can and you must, because you must go to work soon.”
Two frightened eyes were raised to hers.
“Yes,” she added, patting the hand she held; “you are a teacher, are you not?”
“I was,” she replied, the catch in her voice still audible.
“What are you used to teaching?”
“Spanish, and English literature.”
“Spanish—with your blue eyes!” The sudden outburst of surprise sent a faint April-like beam into Rose’s face.
“Si, Senorita.”
“Then you must teach me. Let me see. Wednesdays,—Wednesday afternoon, yes?”
Again the frightened eyes appealed to her; but Ruth ignored them.
“And so many of my friends would like to speak Spanish. Will you teach them too?”
“Oh, Miss Levice, how can I go with such a past?”
“I tell you,” said Ruth, proudly rearing her head, “if I introduce you as my friend, you are, you must be, presentable.”
The pale lips strove to answer her.
“To-morrow I shall come with a number of names of girls who are ‘dying,’ as they say, to speak Spanish, and then you can go and make arrangements with them. Will you?”
Thus pushed to the wall, Rose’s tear-filled eyes were her only answer.
Ruth’s own filled in turn.
“Dear little Rose,” she said, her usual sweet voice coming back to her, “won’t it be lovely to do this? You will feel so much better when you once get out and are earning your independent, pleasant living again. And now will you forgive me for having been so harsh?”
“Forgive you!” A red spot glowed on each pallid cheek; she raised her eyes and said with simple fervor, “I would die for you.”
“No, but you may live for me,” laughed Ruth, rising; “will you promise me to go out this morning, just for a block or two?”
“I promise you.”
“Well, then, good-by.” She held out her hand meaningly; a little fluttering one was placed in hers, and Ruth bent and kissed the wistful mouth. That pure kiss would have wiped out every stain from Rose’s worshipping soul.
“I shall see you to-morrow surely,” she called back, turning a radiant face to the lonely little figure in the doorway. She felt deliriously happy as she ran down the stairs; her eyes shone like stars; a buoyant joyfulness spoke in her step.
“It is so easy to be happy when one has everything,” she mused. She forgot to add, “And gives much.” There is so much happiness derived from a kind action that were it not for the motive, charity might be called supreme selfishness.