The girl's red lips curled disdainfully. "No, she was Spanish. Though she lived in Mexico, her family were Castilian and related to the royal Valois family of France. So you see how far back it goes. We have the journal of her husband. She married Dr. Robinson, who accompanied Lieutenant Pike on his famous expedition."
"Pike? Leftenant Pike?"
"No, he wasn't 'left.' He came back and became the General Pike who died at the moment of his glorious victory over the English, in the War of 1812."
"Ah, come to think—Pike of Pike's Peak. Never heard of the battle you mention; but as an explorer—So one of his companions married your ancestress?"
"Yes. He must have been another such man as Mr. Blake."
"The kind to risk stiletto thrusts for kisses?"
"Yes. I know I must be exactly like her—that haughty SenoritaAlisanda."
"Indeed, yes. I can almost see her dagger up your sleeve."
The girl's black eyes flashed fire. "If itwasthere, you'd get a good scratch!"
"Believe me," he apologized, "you quite failed to take me."
"It's no question of taking you. I prefer heroes."
"Can't say I blame you. You've all the fire and charm of a Spanish girl, and, permit me to add, the far greater charm of an American girl."
She looked to see if he was mocking her. Finding him unaffectedly sincere, she promptly melted into a most amiable and vivacious though unconventional debutante.
The constraint between Blake and Genevieve had rather increased than lessened when they left the others. Neither spoke until they had passed through the outer conservatory into the tropical heat of the palm room. But there the first whiff of the odor from the moist warm mould brought with it a flood of pungent memories.
"The river jungle," muttered Blake, sniffing. "Air was drier out under the cocoanut palms."
"That first night, in the tree!" murmured Genevieve. "How easily you hauled us up with the vine rope! Ah, then—and now!"
Blake drew away from her, his face darkening. "Hope you don't think I expected to see you here? If Jimmy knew, he didn't tell me."
"How could he know? Dolores did not phone to me until mid-afternoon. But even had you been told, I see no reason why you shouldn't have come."
"You don't?" he asked, his face brightening. "I was afraid you might think I was trying to dodge your conditions. Besides, I had promised myself not to call on you till I thought I saw a way to work out a big piece of engineering that I'm on."
"Then you have a good position? I'm so glad!"
"Not a regular position. But I've been given work and a chance at one of the biggest things in hydraulics—the Zariba Dam, out in Arizona."
"You're not going away?" Calmly as she tried to speak, she could not entirely repress an under-note of apprehension. Slight as was the betrayal of feeling, it enheartened him immensely. He beamed up at the palm crests that brushed the glazed dome.
"Looks like they're going to raise the roof, doesn't it?" he said. "Feel that way myself. Your father unloaded the Zariba project onto the Coville Construction Company, and they've offered a cool fifty thousand dollars to the man that figures out a feasible way to construct the dam. I spoke about it before, you may remember; but this bonus wasn't up then. If I put it through, I'll be recognized as a first-class engineer."
"You will succeed, of course," said Genevieve with perfect confidence in his ability to overcome such a relatively easy difficulty.
"Hope so," responded Blake. "I'm still tunnelling in the dark, though.Not a glimmer of a hole out."
"That is of small concern."
"Isn't it, though? I'm counting on that to boost me along on the other thing. Nothing like a little good luck to keep a fellow braced up."
"But I'm sure you have some Dutch blood,—and you know the Dutch never fight harder than when the odds are against them."
"Then it's too bad I'm not Hans Van Amsterdam. He'd have the scrap of his life."
"Do you mean that the odds are so greatly against you?" askedGenevieve, with sudden gravity.
"What's the use of talking about it?" said Blake, almost brusquely. "If I win, I win; and I'm supposed to believe that is all it means. If I lose, you're rid of me for good."
Genevieve bit her lip and turned her head to hide her starting tears.
"I did not think you would be so bitter over it!" she half sobbed.
"Can't you take a joke?" he demanded. "Great joke!—me thinking I've a ghost of a show of winning you! No; the laugh's on me, all right. Idea of me dreaming I can down that damnable thirst!"
"Tom, you'll not give up—you'll not!" she cried with a fierceness that shook him out of his bitter despondency.
"Give up?" he rejoined. "What d' you take me for? I'll fight—course I'll fight, till I'm down and out. People don't much believe in hell nowadays, Jenny. I do. I've been there. I'm bound to go there again, I don't know how soon. Don't think I'm begging for help or whining. Nobody goes to hell that hasn't got hell in him. He always gets just what's coming to him."
"No, no! It's not fair. I can't bear to hear you blame yourself. There's no justice in it. Both heredity and environment have been against you."
"Justice?" he repeated. He shook his head, with rather a grim smile. "Told you once I worked in a pottery. Supposing the clay of a piece wasn't mixed right, it wasn't the dish's fault if it cracked in the firing. Just the same, it got heaved on the scrap-heap."
Genevieve looked down at her clasped hands and whispered: "May not even a flawed piece prove so unique, so valuable in other respects, that it is cemented and kept?"
Blake laughed harshly. "Ever know a cracked dish to cement itself?"
"This is all wrong! The metaphor doesn't apply," protested the girl. "You're not a lifeless piece of clay; you're a man—you have a free, powerful will."
"That's the question. Have I? Has anybody? Some scientists argue that we're nothing but automatons—the creatures of heredity and environment."
"It's not true. We're morally responsible for all we do—that is, unless we're insane."
"And I'm only dippy, eh?" said Blake.
He moved ahead around the screening fronds of a young areca palm, and came to an abrupt halt, his eyes fixed on an object in the midst of the tropical undergrowth.
"Look here!" he called in a hushed tone.
Genevieve hesitated, and came to him with reluctant slowness. But when she reached his side and saw what it was he was looking at so intently, her cold face warmed with a tender glow, and, unable to restrain her emotion, she pressed her cheek against his arm. He quivered, yet made no attempt to take advantage of her weakness.
"Tom! oh, Tom!" she whispered. "It's exactly the color of the other one!"
"Wishthissnake was as easy to smash!" he muttered.
"It will be!" she reassured him. He made no response. After a short silence, she said, "In memory of that, Tom, I wish you would kiss me."
He bent over and touched his lips to her forehead with reverent tenderness. That was all.
When Mrs. Gantry came in on them, they were still standing side by side, but apart, contemplating the great crimson amaryllis blossom. Their attitude and their silence were, however, sufficient to quicken her apprehensions.
"My dear child," she reproached Genevieve, "you should know that this damp mouldy air is not wholesome for you."
"She's right, Miss Jenny," agreed Blake. "It's too much likeMozambique—gets your thoughts muddled. You've failed to do as you saidyou would. I ought to've gone sooner. Good-day, Mrs. Gantry. Good-day,Miss Jenny."
He turned away with decisive quickness.
"Must you go?" asked Genevieve, with a trace of entreaty that did not escape her aunt.
"Yes," said Blake.
"You'll come to see me soon!"
"Not till I see daylight ahead on the dam. Don't know when that will be. Best I can say is Adios!"
"I trust it will be soon."
"Same here," he responded, and he left the palm room with head down-bent, as if he were already pondering the problem, the solving of which was to free him from the self-imposed taboo of her house.
"My dear Genevieve!" Mrs. Gantry hastened to exclaim. "Why must you encourage the man?"
The girl pointed to the gorgeous blossom of the amaryllis. "That is one reason, Aunt Amice."
"That? What do you mean?"
"Your amaryllis—not the flower itself, but what it stands for to me."
"Still, I do not—"
"Not when you recall what I told you about that frightful puff adder—that I was stooping to pick an amaryllis when the hideous creature struck at me?"
"You mentioned something about a snake, but there was so much else—"
"Yes, it was only once of the many, many times when he proved himself a man. Though the adder only struck the fold of my skirt, I stood paralyzed with horror. Winthrope, as usual, was ineffectual. Tom came running with his club—and then—" The girl paused until the vivid blush that had leaped into her cheeks had ebbed away. "It was not alone his courage but his resourcefulness. Most men would have turned away from the writhing monster, full of loathing. He saw the opportunity to convert what had been a most deadly peril into a source of safety. He sent me away, and extracted the poison for his arrow tips."
"My dear child, I freely admit that he is an admirable savage," conceded Mrs. Gantry.
"Say rather that he was fit to survive in a savage environment. We shall now see him adapt himself to the other extreme."
"Young girls always tend to idealize those whom they chance to fancy." "Chance? Fancy? Dear Aunt Amice, you and papa do not, perhaps cannot, realize that for those many weeks I lived with storm and starvation, sun and fever, serpents and ferocious beasts all striving to destroy me. I saw the hard realities of life, and learned to think. Mentally I am no longer a young girl, but a woman, qualified to judge what her future should be."
The glowing face of her usually composed niece warned Mrs. Gantry to be discreet. She patted the coils of soft hair. "There, there, my dear. Pray do not misunderstand me. All I ask is that you make sure before you commit yourself,—a few months of delay, that you may compare him with the men of our own class."
Genevieve smiled. "I have gone quite beyond that already, Aunt Amice."
"Indeed?" murmured the elder woman. Too tactful to venture further, she placed a ring-crowded hand upon her ample bosom. "It is too close in here. I feel oppressed."
Genevieve readily accompanied her from the conservatory.
Blake had gone, alone, for they found Lord James in the midst of a lively tete-a-tete with Dolores.
At sight of the merry couple, Genevieve paused in the doorway to recall to her companion some previous conversation. "You see, Aunty. Confess now. They would make a perfect couple."
"Nonsense. He would never dream of such a thing, even were you out of his thoughts. What is more, though he seems to have caught her in one of her gay moods, I know that she simply abominates him. She told him as much, within a minute after you left us."
"I'm so sorry!" sighed Genevieve. "At least let us slip out without interrupting them. I must be going, anyway."
"My dear, I have you to consider before Dolores," replied Mrs. Gantry, and she advanced upon the unconscious couple. "Genevieve is going."
Lord James looked about, for the slightest fraction of a moment discomposed. Genevieve perceived the fleeting expression, and hastened to interpose. "Do not trouble. It is so short a distance."
But the Englishman was already bowing to Dolores. The girl turned her back upon him with deliberate rudeness.
"You see!" murmured Mrs. Gantry to Genevieve.
When Lord James and her niece had gone, the outraged dame wheeled upon her daughter. But at the first word, Dolores faced her with such an outblazing of rebellious anger that the mother thought best to defer her lecture.
On a frosty Sunday morning, some ten days later, Blake came swinging out Lake Shore Drive at a space-devouring stride that soon brought him to the Leslie mansion. He turned in, and the footman, who had received orders regarding him, promptly bowed him in.
After a moment's hesitancy, Blake handed over a calling card. All his previous cards had been printed, with a "C. E." after his name and nothing before it. These social insignia had been ordered for him by Lord James. Blake wondered how the innovation would impress Genevieve.
She presently came down to him, dressed for church but without her hat. He was quick to note the fact. "You're going out. Didn't mean to call at the wrong time."
"No," she replied. "I am going to church, but not until Aunt Amice and Dolores call by for us. That may not be for half an hour. I am very glad to see you. I remember what you said about your next call. This means, does it not, that you believe you can solve the problem of the Zariba Dam?"
"Yes. I sidetracked the proposition four days ago. Had all the facts and factors in my head, but couldn't seem to get anywhere. Well, I hadn't tried to think about the dam since then, but this morning, all of a sudden, the idea came to me."
"You had set your subconscious mind to working," remarked Genevieve. "The ideas of many of the great inventions and discoveries have come that way."
"Don't know about any subconscious mind," said Blake. "But that idea flashed into my head when I wasn't thinking of the dam at all—just like I'd dreamed it."
"You mean 'as if' you'd dreamed it, not 'like,'" said Genevieve, with a look of playful reproof.
"How's that?" he queried. "Never thought that was wrong. But I like your telling me. Is that right?"
"Quite,—grammatically as well as otherwise," she answered, smiling at his soberness. But her tone was as earnest as his. "The speech of a great engineer should be as correct as his figures."
"That's a go!" agreed Blake. "I'll hire a grammar expert just as soon as I work out this dam idea—um—you know what I mean—this idea about the dam. Don't know how long that will take. But I'm pretty sure I've got the thing cinched—else I wouldn't have had the nerve to come here this morning. You'll believe that, Jenny?"
"Of course. Yet there was no reason why you should have remained away even had you not succeeded. I did not mean you to—to take it that way, Tom."
"All right, then. I'll drop around often if it's not against rules."
"You'll come to church with me this morning?"
"Church!" echoed Blake, in mock-tragic fright. "Haven't been inside a church since I don't know when."
"All the more reason why you should go with us now," she argued.
"Us?"
"Aunt Amice always calls by for papa. He is one of the vestrymen of theCathedral, you know, but he'd never go if aunty did not come for him.We share the same pew. But it's a large one. There'll be room for you."
"Not in the same pew with your aunt and father," rejoined Blake. "It'd take a larger pew than was ever made, to hold them and me."
"Oh, but you must come, Tom. You'll enjoy the music. Here they are now."
"O-ho, Vievie, you in here?" called Dolores, and she darted in upon them. "Goodness! who's the man? Why, it's Mr. Blake. Hail to the hero!"
She pirouetted down to them and shook Blake's hand vigorously, chattering her fastest. "You can't imagine how glad I am to see you. I've had less than half of Jeems, with mamma butting in all the way over. Of course he'll sit between her and Vievie. If you'll come along as my own particular, I'll feed you on chocolates and keep you nudged during the sermon."
"Oh, but I say, Miss Gantry, those were to be my chocolates," protestedLord James from the doorway.
"Hello," said Blake. "So you're the man, are you? Better look out.First thing you know, you'll get roped."
"Roped? What's that?" demanded Dolores.
"Ask Jeems," laughed Blake.
"Er—seems to me I've heard the expression in relation to the term 'steer,'" observed Lord James.
"Oh, something to do with a ship," said the girl.
"Yes, with what the sailormen would call a trim craft. Eh, Jeems?" chuckled Blake.
"You're laughing at me!" accused the girl. "To make up for it, you'll have to come and hold my prayer-book for me. Just think!—a real hero to hold my prayer-book!"
"Excuseme!" objected Blake. "I don't know the places."
"Never mind. We can study the styles quite as well. Vievie, let's hurry on. Mamma has gone up to rout out Uncle Herbert. They'll be late—as usual."
"Well, then, I'll clear the track," said Blake. "Take good care ofJeems for me. Good-bye, Miss Jenny."
"Don't leave, Tom," replied Genevieve. "If you do not wish to go to theCathedral—"
"We'll all stay home," cut in Dolores.
"What's this about staying home?" came the voice of Mrs. Gantry from the hall.
"Quick, Mr. Blake!" exclaimed Dolores in a stage whisper. "Hide behind me. I'm taller than Vievie."
Her mother came in upon them in time to catch Blake's broadest grin."Stay at home, indeed! Such a delightful day as—Ah!"
"It is Mr. Blake, Aunt Amice," said Genevieve in a tone that compelled the stiffening matron to bow.
"Well, good-bye," repeated Blake.
"Please wait," said Genevieve. "If you do not wish to go to church, you must stay to—Here's papa."
"Not late this time, am I?" demanded Mr. Leslie, bustling into the room. "All ready, my dear? No, you've not got on your hat. Hello!" He stopped short, staring at Blake. "Didn't know you were to be with us."
"I'm not," said Blake.
"You're not? H'm,—why not? Not afraid of church, are you? Better join us."
Blake stared in open astonishment. "Thanks, I—Not this time, I guess," he replied.
Mr. Leslie seemed about to press the point, but paused and glanced at his watch.
"Please do not wait for me," said Genevieve. "I have decided not to go."
If Blake expected an outburst over this, he had another surprise in store for him. Mrs. Gantry turned away, tight-lipped and high of chin, either too full for utterance or else aware that it was an instant when silence was the better part of diplomacy.
Mr. Leslie followed her, after a half-irritable, half-cordial word toBlake. "Very well, very well. Some other time, then."
As Lord James took his leave of Genevieve with apparent nonchalance, Blake noted an exultant sparkle in the black eyes of Dolores. Yet the look was flatly contradicted by her words as she flounced about toward the door: "You needn't say good-bye, Mr. Scarbridge. You may as well stay right here, since she's not going."
"You see how she rags me," complained Lord James, hastening out after her.
Blake watched them go, his eyes keen with eager observation. He was still staring at the doorway when Genevieve offered banteringly, "A penny for your thoughts, Mr. Blake."
"You'll have to bid higher. Make it a coronet—I mean, half a crown."
"Only half a crown? Why not a crown—the oak crown of the conqueror? You know the Bible verse: 'He that overcometh himself is greater than he that taketh a city.'"
"Can't say as to that; but I've taken in the town, after having failed to overcome," said Blake with bitter humor.
"Tom! You must not speak of your defeats. They are past and of thePast. You must not even think of them. Have you ever been baptized?"
"Baptized? Let's see… Yes, I remember the question was brought up when I came back from my first hoboing and my sisters got me going to the Episcopal Mission. They even persuaded me to join what's called a confirmation class. That's when it had to be proved I'd been baptized."
"Oh, Tom! then you've been confirmed—you're an Episcopalian!"
"I was confirmed. That's not saying I'm an Episcopalian now."
"Have you joined another denomination?"
"No. It was just that my religious streak pinched out, and some years after that I read Darwin and Spencer and Haeckel."
"But that's no reason. If only you had read Drummond first, you'd have seen that true science and true religion are not opposed but are complementary to each other."
"Drummond?" queried Blake. "Never heard of him, that I remember. Anyway, I guess I'm not one of the religious kind. It was only to please my sisters I started in that time."
"But you'll go to church with me now, Tom?"
Blake hesitated. "Thought you told them you'd decided not to go?"
"Not to the Cathedral. There's the little chapel down the street, in which I was confirmed. It's nearer. We could walk. The bishop officiates at the communion this morning, but he is ill; so Mr. Vincent, the vicar, will preach. He's a young clergyman and is said to be as popular with the men of his congregation as with the women. His text to-day for morning service is—No, I'll not tell it to you, but I'm sure you'll find the sermon helpful."
"If you're so anxious to have me go, Jenny, I'll go. But it's to be with you, not because I'm interested in that kind of religion. I don't believe in going to a church every week and whining about being full of sin and iniquity and all that. The people that do it are either hypocrites and don't believe what they are saying, or else it's true, and they ought to go to jail."
Genevieve smiled regretfully. "You and I live in such different worlds.Will you not try to at least look into mine?"
"Well, I'll not sleep during the sermon," promised Blake.
She shook her head at his levity, and left him, to fetch her hat and furs.
When they went out, Blake had no need to stop in the hall. He had brought no overcoat. The first breath of the clear frosty air outside caused her to draw her furs about her graceful throat. She glanced at Blake, and asked with almost maternal concern. "Where's your topcoat? You'll take cold."
"What, a day like this?" he replied. "On a good hustling job I'd call this shirtsleeve weather."
"You're so hardy! That is part of your strength."
"Um-m," muttered Blake. "That cousin of yours is a hummer, isn't she?"
"If you but knew how she envies me my Crusoe adventures!"
"I'm not surprised to hear it. What gets me is seeing her go to the same church as her mother."
"She doesn't usually. But how could she miss such a chance to tease aunty and Lord James? She's a dear contrary girl."
"Then she's not an Episcopalian?"
"Oh, yes. Isn't it nice that we all are?"
"We all?" queried Blake.
"If you've been confirmed, you are, too. That's why I'm so glad you're coming with me. We'll take the communion together."
Blake's face darkened, and he replied hesitatingly: "Why, you see,Jenny, I—I don't think I want to."
"But, Tom, when it will please me so much!"
"You know I'd like to please you—only, you see, I'm not—I don't believe in it."
"Do you positively disbelieve in it?"
"Well, I can't say just that."
"Then I'm sure it will be all right. You'll not be irreverent, and maybe it will reawaken your own true spiritual self."
"Sorry," said Blake uneasily. "I'm afraid I can't do it, even to please you."
"But why not? Surely, Tom, you'll not allow your hard cold science to stand in the way of a sacrament!"
"I don't know whether it is a sacrament or isn't."
"Is that your reason for refusing what I so greatly desire?"
He looked away from her, and asked in a tone that was meant to be casual, "Do they use regular wine, or the unfermented kind?"
"So that's your reason!" she exclaimed. "I did not think you'd be afraid."
"Anything that has alcohol in it—" he sought to explain. "It's the very devil to rouse that craving! There have been times when I've taken a drink and fought it down—but not when—No, I can't risk it, Jenny."
"Not the communion wine? Surely no harm could come from that! You need take only the slightest sip."
"One taste might prove to be as bad as a glassful. You can't guess what it's like. I'm apt to go wild. Just the smell is bad enough."
"But it's thecommunion, Tom. You have been confirmed in the Church. You know what the consecrated bread and wine symbolize. You can recall to mind all the sacred associations."
"I'm mighty sorry," replied Blake. "If only that meant to me what it does to you, I might risk it. I'm no blatant atheist or anti-religionist. I'm simply agnostic; I don't believe. That's all. You have faith. I haven't. I didn't wish to get rid of my faith. It just went."
"It may come to you again, if you seek to partake of the spiritual communion," urged Genevieve.
"I'm willing enough to try that. But I'll not risk any wine."
"You'll not?" she cried. "Afraid to taste the consecrated wine? Then youareweak!—youarea coward! And I thought you strong, despite your own confession!"
The outburst of reproach forced Blake to flinch. He muttered in protest, "Good Lord, Jenny! you don't mean to say you make this a part of the test?"
"Does it mean nothing to you that I long to have you share the communion with me?" she rejoined. "What must I think of you if you dare not venture to partake of that holy symbol, in the communion of all that is highest within you with the Father?"
Blake quivered as though the frosty air had at last sent a chill through his powerful frame.
"You insist?" he asked huskily.
"You are strong. You will do it," she replied.
"You don't know what it means. But, since you insist—" he reluctantly acquiesced. He added almost inaudibly, "Up against it for sure! Still—there have been times—"
They reached the chapel and entered during the last verse of the Processional Hymn. As Genevieve was known to the usher in charge of the centre aisle, they were shown to a pew farther forward than Blake would have chosen.
Genevieve produced a dainty hymnal and prayer-book, and gave her companion the pleasurable employment of helping her hold first one and then the other, throughout the service. If his spirit was quickened by a re-hearing of the prayers in which he had once believed, he did not show it. But he seemed pleased at the fact that Genevieve was too intent upon worship to gaze around at the hats and dresses of the other ladies.
The chapel choir could not boast of any exceptional voices. It was, however, very well trained. Throughout the anthem Blake sat tense, almost quivering, so keen was his delight. At the close he sank back into the corner of the pew, his gaze shifting uneasily from the infirm and aged bishop in the episcopal chair to the thin, eager-faced young vicar who had hastened around to mount up into the pulpit.
With a quick movement, the vicar opened the thick Bible to his text, the announcement of which caused Blake to start and fix his attention upon him:
"'He that is slow to anger is better than the mighty, and he that ruleth his spirit than he that taketh a city.' Proverbs 16:32."
Genevieve glanced at Blake, who recalled how she had expressed her certainty that he would find the sermon helpful. The text was apt, to say the least. His hard-set face momentarily softened with a smile that caused her to settle back, in serene contentment. He assumed what Lord James would have termed his "poker face" and leaned up in the corner of the pew, to gaze at the preacher, as impassive as a wooden image.
The manner in which the Reverend Mr. Vincent elucidated his text soon won a stare of pleased surprise from Blake. He began by describing, no less vividly than briefly, the walled cities of the ancients and the enormous difficulty of capturing them, either by siege or assault. This was followed by a graphic summary of the life of Alexander the Great.
Blake listened with such intentness to this novel sermon that he did not perceive that Genevieve was no less intently studying him. It was evident he was deeply impressed by the obvious inference to be drawn from the life of the mighty young Macedonian,—the youth who conquered worlds, only to be himself conquered by his own vices.
But when, warming to his theme, the young vicar entered upon a eulogy of asceticism, Blake bent over and stared moodily at the printed "Suggestions to Worshippers" pasted on the back of the next pew. His big body, to all appearances, was absolutely still and rigid, but the fingers of his right hand moved about restlessly, tapping his knee or clenching upon the broad palm.
In the midst of Mr. Vincent's explanations of what he considered the fundamental differences between the self-torture of the Hindu yogis and the mortifications of spirit and body practised by the mediaeval monks, Blake shook his head in an uneasy, annoyed gesture. Yet if he meant this as an indication of dissent, he gave no other sign that he was following the thread of the sermon.
Even the close of the eloquent peroration, in which Mr. Vincent besought his hearers to prepare for the fasting and prayer of the Lenten season, failed to rouse Blake from his moody abstraction. But at the end of the regular service, when the white-gowned choir-boys flocked out and the majority of the congregation began to crowd into the aisles with decorous murmurings and the soft rustling of silken skirts, Blake raised his head and followed their departure with a shifting, disquieted gaze.
At last all others than those who had remained for the communion had passed out into the vestibule, and the closing of the doors muffled the loud clear voices of those on the outer steps. Genevieve touched Blake's arm. He started, and glanced up into the chancel. As he caught sight of the bishop and Mr. Vincent behind the rail, his uneasiness became so pronounced that Genevieve was alarmed.
"What is it? Are you ill?" she whispered.
"No," he replied. He thrust his shaking hands into his coat pockets, forced himself to take a deep breath, and added in a thick, half-inarticulate mutter, "no—won't give in—not a quitter."
She could not catch the words, but the resolute tone reassured her.
"It's the air in here. It's stifling. But we shall not be long now," she murmured, and she lapsed into devotional concentration.
Blake, however, followed the service with increasing restlessness. His fingers twitched within the sheltering pockets, and the lines of his face drew tense. He glanced about two or three times as though half inclined to bolt.
A little more, and he might have broken under the strain and run away. But then the communicants began to leave their pews and drift forward into the chancel. At the touch of Genevieve's hand upon his arm he started more sharply than before.
"Tom, you really are ill!" she insisted.
"No," he mumbled, "I guess I—Wait, though. I've forgotten. Does he mean we're supposed to take it as real flesh and blood?"
"Only the Romanists hold to that. We take it symbolically."
"Then why doesn't he say so?"
"He did. Besides, every one understands. You are coming?"
"Wine—alcohol—and she still insists!" he muttered in a thick, almost inarticulate voice.
Intent upon the sacrament, she failed to heed either his tone or the despair in his tense face.
"Come. We are the last," she urged. "We'll soon be out in the open air."
With a heaviness that she mistook for solemnity, he stepped out into the aisle for her to leave the pew, and walked beside her up into the chancel.
She knelt near the extreme end of the altar rail, and bent over with her face in the little hand that she had bared to receive the communion bread. For a moment Blake stood beside her, staring dubiously at the venerable figure of the bishop. Mr. Vincent passed between. Blake took a step to the left and knelt down beside Genevieve.
The only sounds in the chancel were the intoned murmurings of the bishop and Mr. Vincent and the labored breathing of an asthmatic woman next to Genevieve. The less indistinct of the murmuring voices drew near. Genevieve thrust out her palm a little way. Blake, without looking up, did the same.
Mr. Vincent reiterated his intoned statement above them, as though in invocation, and placed tiny squares of bread in their palms. They were the last in the line of kneeling communicants. Blake waited until Genevieve raised her hand to her mouth. Mechanically he followed her example. He swallowed the little morsel of bread with perceptible effort. Again he pressed his forehead down upon the hand that gripped the brass rail.
The bishop's voice now murmured near them, feeble and broken, yet very solemn: "'The Blood of our Lord Jesus Christ, which was shed for thee, preserve thy body and soul unto everlasting life. Drink this in remembrance that Christ's Blood was shed for thee, and be thankful.'"
Both of Blake's hands now clutched the rail in a grip that whitened the knuckles. Persons from the other end and the centre of the line were rising and softly retiring to their pews. The asthmatic woman gasped and fell silent as the bishop held the communion cup to her lips.
The bishop shuffled quietly along another step and stood bowed over the last two communicants. He was a very old man and he was ill. His voice sank to an inaudible murmur: "'The Blood … shed for thee, preserve … life. Drink this …"
Blake waited, tense and rigid, as one about to meet the shock of a deadly attack. The bishop drew the chalice back from Genevieve's lips in his trembling hands, and paused for Blake to reach out and take it.
Blake did not move. The bishop bent farther over. The fumes of the wine rose in the face of the kneeling man. He quivered and shrank back—then, almost violently, he flung up his head and caught the cup to his lips.
Genevieve was rising. Blake stood up abruptly and followed her down to their pew. She knelt at once; but he caught up his soft hat, and holding it before his face, bent down close to her ear. He spoke in a strained whisper: "Excuse me. I've got to go."
She half rose. "You're ill! I'll go with you and—"
"No. Sit still. I've a—a most important engagement with, a friend—Mr.Griffith. Got to hurry!"
"Not so loud!" she cautioned him. "If youmustgo, Tom!"
"Yes, must! Sorry, but—" His hand sought and closed upon hers in a sudden caressing clasp, and his voice became husky. "Good-bye, girlie! May not see you for a—for a time!"
"Why, are you going out of town?" she asked.
But he was already turning away. Without pausing to answer her question, he started rapidly down the aisle, his head and shoulders bent forward in a peculiar crouch. A slight frown of perplexity and displeasure marred the serenity of Genevieve's face. But the benign voice of the bishop immediately soothed her back into her beatific abstraction.
When the service was ended, she walked home in a most devotional frame of mind, and after luncheon, spent the afternoon searching out scriptural verses that she thought would aid in the spiritual re-awakening of Blake. Later in the afternoon she accompanied her father to the Gantrys', her face aglow with reverent joy. It was as if she felt that she had already guided Blake into the straight and narrow way that leads up out of the primitive.
They found Dolores industriously shocking her mother by a persistent heckling of Lord James, who was smiling at her quips and sallies and twirling his little blond mustache as if he enjoyed the raillery.
"Oh, here's Vievie, at last!" cried the girl. "Vievie darling, your eyes positively shine! Have you and the heroic Thomas been talking about the sharks and crocodiles of your late paradise? That was so cute of you, waiting this morning till we had gone, and then slipping off with him alone."
"We went to my little chapel. I knew the dear old bishop would be there. And the new vicar, Mr. Vincent, preached a splendid sermon."
"Which you talked about all the way home—I don't think," mockedDolores.
"No, you never think," agreed Mrs. Gantry.
"Mr. Blake had to hasten away, just before the close of the communion service," explained Genevieve. "He remembered an important engagement with Mr. Griffith."
"About the Zariba Dam?" queried her father with alert eagerness.
"He did not say. I am not altogether sure that he—"
"Pardon me," interrupted Lord James. "Do you really believe that, in the circumstances, he would leave you for a business appointment?"
"Why shouldn't he?" said Mr. Leslie. "If he solves the problem of that dam, his fortune is as good as made. He'll have big positions thrust upon him. Did he seem excited, my dear—abstracted?"
"Oh, do you think it was that?" replied Genevieve. "I feared he was ill. The ventilation of the chapel is so wretched. He did look odd; yet he would not admit that he felt ill. I was half doubtful whether it was right to insist that he stay to communion."
"Communion!" gasped Mrs. Gantry. "You don't mean to say, my dear, that you've made a convert of him? Impossible!"
"I'm afraid not," sighed Genevieve. "I believe he took the communion merely to oblige me."
"Took the communion?" echoed Lord James, no less astonished than Mrs.Gantry. "Surely you do not—er—It seems quite impossible, you know."
"Is it so very amazing, when I asked him—urged him?" said Genevieve, flushing ever so slightly under his incredulous look.
"My word!" he murmured. "Tom did that!"
"I regret that he was not in a condition to receive the utmost good from it. But he was either ill or else rendered uneasy over his business with Mr. Griffith," remarked Genevieve.
"Of course, of course!" assented Lord James, bending over to brush a speck from his knee. "Quite a pity, indeed!" He straightened and turned to Mrs. Gantry, with a forced smile. "Er—it's deuced stupid of me—agreeing to dine, y'know—deuced stupid. Must beg pardon for cutting it! I'd quite forgotten I was to meet Tom—er—and Griffith, at their offices. They may be waiting for me now."
"Why, of all things!" protested Dolores. "You don't mean to say you are going to run off, just when dinner is ready?"
"Lord Avondale has made his excuses," said her mother. "No doubt another time—"
"Very soon, I trust—very soon," assented Lord James, with a propitiatory glance at Dolores. "It's a keen disappointment, I assure you." He looked about at Genevieve. "If you ladies will be so kind—It's a most pressing matter. Er—Griffith is not in the best of health. He may have to take a trip to Florida."
"No, he won't," broke in Mr. Leslie. "Not unless he leaves some one to manage Lafayette Ashton. The young cub isn't fit to be left alone with that bridge. Isn't that what this appointment is about? Griffith may have it in mind to put Blake in charge of the bridge."
"Er—must say it wouldn't surprise me if he takes a run up there withGriffith," said Lord James. "May go along myself."
"But you'll be back for the ball!" exclaimed Dolores.
"Right-o! Count on me for the ball. That's a fortnight off. Ample time."
"Then I promise you two waltzes. Bring back Laffie with you. He dances divinely."
Lord James smiled in rather an absent manner, and turned to Genevieve. "You take me? I expect to be away with Tom for a few days. He will probably lack opportunity to call on you before he leaves town. You may have a message for me to take to him."
"Give him my best wishes for the success—of his work."
"That is all?"
For a few moments Genevieve stood hesitating, too intent upon her own thoughts to heed the covert stare of Dolores and the open scrutiny of her aunt and father. Lord James waited, with his averted gaze fixed upon the anxious face of Mrs. Gantry.
"That is all," quietly answered the girl, at last.
Mrs. Gantry sighed with relief, but Dolores frowned, and Mr. Leslie stared in irritable perplexity. Lord James bowed and hastened out before any of the others had observed his expression.
Griffith, C.E., sat in the inner room of the bare living apartments adjoining his office. His feet, clad in white socks and an ancient pair of carpet slippers, were perched upon the top of a clicking steam radiator. His lank body balanced itself perilously in a rickety cane-seated chair, which was tilted far back on the rear legs. His pipe, long since burnt out and cold, hung from his slack jaw, while his eyes, bright and excited, galloped through the last pages of a sensational society novel.
He reached the final climax of the series of climaxes, and sat for a moment tense; then, flirting the cheap thing into a corner, he drew down his feet and stood up, stretching and yawning. Having relieved his cramped muscles, he drew out a tobacco pouch. But while in the act of opening it, he glanced at the alarm-clock on the book-shelves, and ended by replacing the pouch, without loading his pipe.
"Nine," he croaked, and again he stretched and yawned.
A sharp knock sounded at the hall-door of the outer room. Before he could start in response, a second and far louder knock followed.
"H'm—must be a wire," he muttered, and he shuffled quickly over the faded carpet into the front room.
The door shook with a third knocking that sounded like fist blows. Griffith's eyes sharpened with the look of a man who has lived in rough places and scents danger. He turned the night-catch and stepped to one side as he flung the door open. Before him stood a tall young man in an English topcoat. The visitor's curly yellow hair was bare and his handsome face scarlet with embarrassment.
"I—er—I beg your pardon, Mr. Griffith. I—" he stammered.
A big hand swung up on his shoulder, and a deep voice, thick and jocular, cut short his apology. "Thash all ri', Cheems. Wash ri' in. Ish on'y ol' Grishsh. Wash ri' in, I shay."
Propelled by the hand on his shoulder, Lord James entered with a precipitancy that carried him half across the room. Blake followed with solemn deliberation, keeping a hand upon the door casing. Griffith stepped around and shut and bolted the door. Without a second glance at Blake, he shuffled close up to Lord James and demanded in a rasping, metallic voice, "What's the meaning of this, Mr. Scarbridge?"
"Thash all ri', Grish," interposed Blake, "thash all ri'. M'frenshChimmy Ear' Albondash. Hish fa'er's Dush Rubby—y' shee?"
Without raising his voice, Griffith gave utterance to a volley of blasphemous expletives that crackled on the air like an electric discharge.
"If you will kindly permit me, sir—"
"Hell!" cut in the engineer. "You call yourself his friend. Good friend you are, to let him touch a drop!"
"This is no time for misunderstandings between his friends, Mr. Griffith," said Lord James, with a quiet insistence that checked the other's anger. "He was hard at it when, I found him—had been for hours."
"Ri' she are, Chi-Chimmy boy! Ching o' it, Grishsh!—thish ish a relish—relishush lushingsh—church shaloo—loon."
Griffith went over to the swaying figure, and stared close into the pallid face and glittering, bloodshot eyes.
"You damned fool!" he jerked out.
"Whash—whash 'at? Whash you shay, Grishsh?"
"You damned idiot!"
"Thash all ri'. Goo' frensh, Grishsh, youm me. Lesh hash a dro-drop."
"Come on in," said the engineer. "I'll give you several drops." He shot a glance at the Englishman. "Lend a hand, will you?"
Lord James stepped quickly to the other side of Blake, who clasped each about the neck in a maudlin but vice-like embrace. As they moved toward the bedroom, Griffith exclaimed with strategic enthusiasm: "That's it, boys, come right on in. It's so confounded dusty here, let's have a bath."
"All ri', Grishsh, en'ching you shay. Bu' you wanna wash ou' y' don' gi' wa'er insish. Wa'er insish a man'sh wor' ching—"
"That's all right, old man," cut in Lord James, "I'll see to that.Leave it to me."
By this time they had come in beside Blake's own cot, which extended out of the corner of the room, at the foot of Griffith's equally simple bed. Griffith opened the door of a tiny bathroom and turned on the hot water in the tub. Lord James fell to stripping Blake, regardless of his protests that he could undress himself.
"Chuck it!" ordered his lordship, as Blake sought to interfere. "You don't want to keep us waiting our turn, do you?"
Blake launched upon an elaborate and envolved disclaimer that he had harbored the remotest idea of causing his friends the slightest trouble. In the midst Griffith came out of the bathroom. With his help, Blake was soon got ready, and the two led him in between them. In the corner of the bathroom was a small cabinet shower-bath with a wooden door. Blake turned toward it, but Griffith drew him about to the steaming tub.
"Hot room first, Tommy," he said. "Haven't forgotten how to take aTurkish, have you?"
Blake entered upon another profuse apology, meantime docily permitting the others to immerse him in the tub of hot water. Griffith promptly added still hotter water to the bath, while Lord James held the vapor curtains tight about the patient's neck. Before many minutes Blake began to grow restless, then to curse. But between them, Griffith and Lord James managed to keep him in the tub for more than a quarter of an hour.
"All right, Tommy. Now for the shower," said Griffith, at last.
Blake came out of the tub red and still wobbly. They rushed him over and shoved him into the cabinet. Lord James stepped clear, and Griffith slammed shut the door, latched it with an outside hook, and jerked open the lever of the shower-faucet, which was outside the cabinet.
"Oof!" grunted Blake, as the cold deluge poured down upon his bare head and body.
"Fine, hey?" called Griffith.
"Wow!Lemme ou'!Oo-ou!"
The cabinet shook with a bump that would have upset it had it not been screwed fast to the wall.
"Aw, now, don't do the baby-act, Tommy!" jeered Griffith. "Yowling like a bum, over a bath!"
"Be game, old man!" chimed in Lord James. "Take your medicine."
"Bu-but 'sh cole!W-whew!"
"Stay with it, old man—stay with it!" urged Lord James. "Don't lay down. Be a sport!"
"G-gosh! 'M free-freezin'! Lemme out!"
Griffith rubbed his hands together and cackled: "Stay with it, Tommy.It's doing the work. Stay with it."
"Damnation!" swore Blake. "O-open that door!"
"Time we were moving, Mr. Scarbridge," said Griffith.
He followed Lord James out of the bathroom, and closed the door. He led the way through into the front room, and closed that door. They stood waiting, silent and expectant.
The walls shook with a muffled crash.
"Repairs, five dollars," said Griffith. "Better stand farther over this way."
The bathroom door slammed open violently. The two men glanced into each other's eyes.
"You've played football?" croaked the engineer.
Lord James nodded.
"Tackle him low—fouler the better," advised Griffith.
There was a pause … One of the cots in the bedroom creaked complainingly.
"Huh," muttered Griffith. "Sulking, eh? Good thing for us." He gazed full into the Englishman's face, and offered his hand. "I hope you'll overlook what I said, Mr. Scarbridge—Lord Scarbridge. Under the circumstances—"
"Don't mention it, Mr. Griffith! It's—it's the most positive proof of your friendship for him—that you should have been so angered. Deuce take it, I'd give anything if this hadn't happened!"
"How did it happen?" asked Griffith. "Sit down—No; no chance of his coming out now."
Lord James slipped off his heavy topcoat, and seated himself, his dress clothes and immaculate linen offering an odd contrast to the shabby room. But the engineer looked only at the face of his visitor.
"It's a beastly shame—when he was holding his own so well!" exclaimed the Englishman.
"That's what gets me," said Griffith. "He seemed to have staved it off indefinitely. I didn't notice a single one of the usual signs. And he has let out that the dam was almost a certainty. If he had fizzled on it, I could understand how that and the way he's been grinding indoors night and day—"
"No; he's stood that better than I had feared. What a shame! what a beastly shame! When Miss Leslie learns—"
"Miss Leslie?" cut in Griffith. "If she shakes him for this, she's not much account—after all he did for her. If she's worth anything, now's the time for her to set to and help pull him up again. But you haven't said yet how it happened."
"That's the worst of it! To be sure, she was perfectly innocent. She must have thought it simply impossible that the communion wine—"
"Hey!—communion wine? That's what he meant by church saloons and religious lushing, then. She steered him up against that—knowing his one weakness?"
"My dear sir, how could she realize?"
"He told me she knew."
"But the communion wine!"
"Communion alcohol! Alcohol is alcohol, I don't care whether it's in a saloon or a church or pickling snakes in a museum. I tell you, Tommy's case has made a prohibition crank of me. Talk about it's being a man's lack of will and moral strength—bah!I never knew a man who had more will power than he, or who was more on the square. You know it."
"I—to be sure—except, you know, when he gives way to these attacks."
"Gives way!—and you've seen him fight! It's a disease, I tell you—a monomania like any other monomania. Why don't they say to a crazy man in his lucid intervals, 'Trouble with you is your lack of will power and moral strength. Brace up. Go to church'?"
"But you'd surely not say that Tom's insane? He himself lays it to his own weakness."
"What else is insanity but a kind of weakness—a broken cog in the machine which slips and throws everything out of gear, no matter how big the dynamo? I tell you, a dipsomaniac is no more to be blamed for lack of will power or moral strength than is a kleptomaniac, or than an epileptic is to be blamed for having fits. It's a disease. I'm giving it to you straight what the doctors say."
All the hopefulness went out of the Englishman's boyish face.
"Gad!" he murmured. "Gad! Then he can't overcome it."
"I don't know. The doctors don't seem to know. They say that a few seem to outgrow it—they don't know how, though. But all agree that the thing to do is to keep the patient braced—keep him boosted up."
"Count on me for that!" exclaimed Lord James.
"It's where this girl—Miss Leslie—ought to come in, if she's worth anything," thrust Griffith.
"But—but, my dear sir, you quite fail to understand. It will never do to so much as hint to her that he has failed."
"Failed!" retorted Griffith. "When she herself forced him to take the first drink—Don't cut in! If you know Tommy as well as you ought, you know he would never have taken that drink in the condition he was in—not a single drop of anything containing alcohol! No! the girl forced him—she must have. He's dead in love with her. He'd butt his head against a stone wall, if she told him to. Hell!—just when he had his chance at last!"
"His chance?"
"I've been figuring it as a chance. Supposing he had pulled off this big Zariba Dam, he'd have felt that he had made good. It might have brought around that change the doctors tell about. Don't you see? It might have fixed that broken cog—straightened him up somehow for good. But now—hell!"
Griffith bent over, with a groan.
"Gad!" murmured Lord James. After a long pause, he added slowly, "But, I assure you, regarding Miss Leslie, it will never do to tell her. If she hears of this, he will have no chance—none! That occurred to me immediately I inferred the deplorable truth. I told her we were thinking of going with you to the bridge—Michamac."
"You did? Say, I thought Britishers were slow, but you got your finger on the right button first shove. It's the very thing for him—change, open air, the bridge—Wait a minute, though! With the chances more than even that it's Tommy's own—Until he makes good on the dam, nobody would take his word against that lallapaloozer's."
"I—er—beg pardon. I fail to take you," said Lord James.
"Just the question of his finding out something that's apt to make him manhandle young Ashton."
"Ah—all the better, I say. Anything to divert his mind."
Griffith looked at the Englishman with an approving smile. "You sure are the goods, Mr. Scarbridge! It'll take two or three days for him to fight down the craving, even with all the help we can give him. Wait a minute till I phone to a drug-store."
He shuffled out through a side doorway that led into his private office. While he was telephoning, Lord James heard low moans from the bedroom. He clenched his hands, but he did not go in to his friend until Griffith returned and crossed to the inner door.
"Come in, Mr. Scarbridge," he said. "Next thing is to see if we can talk him into going to Michamac."