THE HAUNTED WHEEL.BY PRESIDENT BATES.TTHE great house of Dalrymple & Dalrymple went down and left no wreck behind—not even the heap of “dust” that so often remains concealed under the débris of a commercial crash. If a great brick block had suddenly collapsed with a roar and rumble, and, after the dust had blown away, there was not so much as a cellar to show where it had been, the ruin could not have been more strangely complete. It was as if the great business—capital, credit, stock, connections, goodwill, everything—had blown away like a fog and left no vestige. Even the great sign, whose gilded letters used to stretch clear across the tall front of the store in the middle of the block, was painted over in less than a month with the less fashionable, but perhaps as useful, legend, “Juggers & Wesch, Flour and Feed.” And the plate-glass windows, that for so many years displayed the most fashionable fineries, were now devoted to dusty bags of bran and barrels of cornmeal, beans and oats.It was not a great failure either—only $30,000. Nobody lost much. The Dalrymples sold everything, after the fashion of the honest merchants of the elder time, and nearly paid all their debts. They were only $30,000 to the bad—merely a descent from wealth and ease to poverty and $30,000 less than nothing. And it was not their fault. Their misfortunes began in the failures of others, and ended in their own. The Dalrymple brothers, everybody said, were left with their honor unimpaired. But everybody did not add the unhappy facts that they were left with honor alone past the age of active life, from long ease unfit to begin a new struggle for existence, bankrupt both physically and mentally as well as in fortune.The bachelor Dalrymple went away to California, where a relative offered him an asylum.James Dalrymple looked about for awhile vainly for something to do, and then died out of a world that had no use for him. His wife, aged fifty-five, and his daughter,aged eighteen, had a hard time of it—poor souls! Luckily the daughter was a business woman. She had often aided her father as his amanuensis. She knew how to use those modern instruments of commerce, the typewriter and short-hand. She could make out a bill, keep accounts, and write a terse, polite, clear business letter. She had been a society belle, but she had imbibed mental solids from natural taste. She was not too proud to walk with quiet strength on the bottom level, no matter how proudly she had walked at the top. So she sought and found employment, and kept her mother and herself in two or three rooms of a small cottage on an unfashionable street. With all the airs and graces and pretensions of wealth she put away also all the old loves and friendships. She thought they did not keep the true ring of heart soundness. She became simply Dibble & Dribble’s typewriter.A lady she was, every inch of her—accomplished, refined, gracious, charming, beautiful; not a fine lady; merely a poor young woman, without piano, wardrobe or “style.” She became only a straightforward, faithful, hard-working, modest business girl, known as Miss Dalrymple; for she was, after all, a little sensitive and proud, and permitted few except her mother to call her by her beautiful and stately old name of Daphne Dalrymple.By and by, in spite of her fine physique, she fell ill. Overwork in the hurry of the spring trade, unhealthful quarters, lack of generous food, damp, cold, miserable weather, worry of mind and exhaustion of body, all combined to bring her down with typho-malarial fever. Her employers, appreciating her value to them, permitted her salary to run on, and almost forgave her for being ill when she was most needed, on condition that she employed another girl, less efficient, but ambitious, to attempt to fill her place, and largely fall short of doing so.Typhoid fevers disorder the brain. The sick girl was seized with strange and vivid fancies. She longed for outdoor air and exercise. If she could only ride out again as she used when she was an heiress, upon her dainty tricycle, she knew she would soon be well and strong. But her wheel had disappeared with her piano and all the rest of the wreckage. So she lay fevered and in pain, and fancied herself following and hunting it down, she knew not where, and taking possession of it wherever found, and enjoying it. By some strange divination, she saw its owner—a young man—and grew familiar with his appearance in her sick fancy, even to the details of his dress. But, strangely, she could never hear the vision, though she knew by intuition and by his actions what he said sometimes. For more than a week these phantasms held her mind, to the alarm of the doctor, who pronounced her disease morbid and obstinate, and felt grave doubts of the result.Then a strange thing happened. An unknown young gentleman called at the cottage door and insisted upon being admitted to see her, and his claims were backed by the doctor.*****David Dewness was one of the most popular members of the bicycle club. When he first joined the club there was an amiable freshness about him that the club wits soon educated into an amiable ripeness. He was a fellow that would bear cultivation. He could take or give a joke with a pleasantness that disarmed everybody. But with his other qualities was a sweet obstinacy in certain directions. Nobody could ridicule him out of doing a kindness, however great the apparent folly. He would laugh as merrily as any of his critics over the foolishness of some of his good actions; but he would persist in doing them just the same.Moreover, David carried what the club men called a level business head. In the club business affairs his judgment commanded respect. He earned a fair salary in a commission house, and was much trusted by the firm.There was one of his investments, however, that the firm laughed at. Having saved a couple of hundred dollars about the time Dalrymple & Dalrymple failed, Dewness bought of that wreck forty acres of wild land, situated in the wilderness of mountain and swamp of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and nowhere near any of the then known mines. To be sure, the price he paid was only one hundred dollars; but his employers told him he might as wisely have thrown his hard-earned dollars into the river. David merely replied that he had always longed to be a landowner, and he had never had a cheaper chance to become one.The truth was that he had once visited that region, and there he had heard an iron-mining explorer, while intoxicated, declare that he positively knew that therewere rich beds of ore in the township where this forty acres lay. If iron should be discovered anywhere near his forty acres, he could sell at a large advance. Perhaps it might be found on his forty acres. In that case his fortune would be made. He knew the explorer to be one of the most expert and reliable of his strange class, and at the same time one of the most close-mouthed. Men of wealth believed the fellow to be full of valuable secrets; but he, like others, hoped that some day, in spite of his reckless gambling and drinking, he should possess means to use some of his secrets for himself, and not be forced to sell them for the advantage of others. David shrewdly thought he had surprised one of these secrets, and his hundred-dollar purchase was simply gambling on a frail chance. It was not much to lose; it might be very much to keep. So he kept it and his own counsel.David had one foible—a common one. Like many a young man, he believed himself in love with a pretty girl, when he was really only in love with the idea of being loved. May Bentley waspiquante, saucy, friendly, and heart-free. She liked David much, tyrannized over him more, was his good comrade always, and really loved him no more than he did her—that is, not at all. She simply loved having a lover—some one whom she could command and the other girls admire. Thus, there being no real and deep feeling between them, they got on admirably together, and were quoted by the aforesaid “other girls” as “just too happy for anything.” And yet the “other girls,” and likewise the club, very clearly knew that there wasn’t anything substantial in the supposed loves of Dewness and May Bentley. Though excellent friends, they would never be anything more, unless they should both make a dreadful mistake.Being an enthusiastic wheelman, David often wished that he possessed a tricycle, upon which May could ride. What a pretty picture she would be, and what a charming companion! he on his bicycle and she on a tricycle, at the club “ladies’ runs.”One day a dealer offered him a charming lady’s tricycle, nearly new and of an excellent style, for the low price of seventy-five dollars. Its owner must have money at once. Dewness looked it all over, and was satisfied that he could resell it for at least a hundred, and bought it. And presently he was enjoying the longed-for companionship of Miss May on his excursions, to the envy of various club men and ladies. Besides, he had bids for the tricycle of over a hundred dollars; but he held out for a higher price, at least for the time.One evening, just after sunset, David’s tricycle stood waiting for him in the street in front of the Bentley home. Miss May had been out with it, and Dewness, after riding his bicycle home and eating his supper, had returned, chatted and laughed awhile with May, and was then to ride home on the tricycle. As he walked down the path to the gate, still smiling at a joke that the vivacious girl had played on him, he suddenly saw a young woman sitting on his tricycle. Her face was partly turned from him, but the graceful pose of her figure, the proud carriage of her head, and a certain noble and womanly life that seemed to pervade and radiate from her presence, struck him as something rarely charming. She was the most vividly distinct of any object visible in the uncertain twilight. And yet there was that about her singularly indistinct.Mr. Dewness is one of those happily rare men who possess the feminine faculty of seeing what a lady wears. But, unaccountably, he could not tell whether this young woman, who had so coolly taken possession of his tricycle, was dressed in a gray wheeling costume or a dark walking dress. He had stopped suddenly on first seeing her, and now he put both hands on his knees and stooped to get a better view. No use. Her costume seemed to fluctuate, so to speak, alike in colors and style.But what business had she to be there at all? She certainly was not one of the club ladies, but a stranger. No one he knew possessed, or could possibly assume, that graceful air, or that noble womanliness.He walked a little nearer. As he did so the figure grew indistinct. Nearer yet. She seemed to fade like the delusion of a magic glass. He stooped down; he stretched himself up on tiptoe—the effect was the same. He passed through the gate, and stood within a dozen feet of the machine. There it stood, waiting for him, motionless and untenanted, just as a respectable Boston-bred tricycle, with ball-bearings and a front-steering handle-bar, ought!There wasn’t a woman anywhere in sight within a block!Mr. Dewness whistled the first two bars of “Sweet Little Buttercup” very softly, with his hands thrust into his pockets andhis feet planted apart. Then he stopped and reflected a full minute. Then he suddenly cocked his hat back so as to give it a bold, semi-piratical rake, walked up to the machine and put one hand upon the nearest handle, gave it a smart jerk, brushed the other hand across the saddle, as if feeling to see if there was any obstruction there, and began to whistle “I’m a Dutchman” with a fierce and ear-piercing emphasis. Nothing coming of this, he rather gingerly slid into the saddle and melted into the twilight of the distant street.Two days later, David called again at the Bentley’s to invite Miss May to take a spin with him. May and her mother were sitting upon the piazza. David approached and saluted the ladies, and asked the girl to go for a ride. She greeted him coldly, and declined, to his great surprise. Her manner made him ask for an explanation.“Who was the lady you took out yesterday?” she asked.“Nobody. I did not go out yesterday,” he answered, with evident perplexity.“Who was the girl I saw sitting on your tricycle in front of the store, waiting for you?”“You didn’t see any girl on my tricycle. When?”“Last evening, just after supper, I passed the store. The tricycle stood in front of it, and there was a young lady sitting on it, waiting for you to come out. I was going to stop for you, when I saw you had her company, and came home.”“Why, you are surely mistaken! There was nobody there!”“Didn’t you have the tricycle there?”“Yes. But there was no lady there.”“Perhaps you mean to say I can’t see, sir! Therewasa young lady sitting on it and waiting for you to come out.”David thought for a minute, with an air of embarrassment that confirmed her suspicions. Then he slowly and reluctantly, and yet with evident anxious interest, asked:“How did she look? Did you see her face?”“No: she kept her face turned away from me, as if she didn’t wish me to know her. She was a handsome girl, I should judge; but she acted as though she was ashamed of herself.”This with a cutting severity that, however, failed to wilt the offending David. On the contrary, it only seemed to increase his anxiety.“How was she dressed?” he demanded.“Dressed? As though that made any difference! Well”—seeing that David really expected an answer—“she wore a gray riding-suit.”“Gray?”“No; now I think, it wasn’t a riding-suit. It was a black walking-dress.”“Sure it was a black walking-dress?”“Pshaw! Who cares how she was dressed?”“I do. I want to find out who, if anybody, took the liberty to occupy my trike while I wasn’t present.”“It was strange; but, really, I don’t know how she was dressed. I thought at first that she wore a gray riding-suit. Then, when I looked again, I thought it was a black street-dress.”“What did she wear on her head?”“A gray riding-hat with a feather. No; it was a bonnet.”“A hat? A bonnet?”“Well, no. She was bare-headed, with thick brown hair.”“Bare-headed? in the street!” interrupted Mrs. Bentley. “Why, May!”“Well, mother, she had on a hat with a feather when I first saw her, half a block away. When I looked again, a little nearer, I thought it was a bonnet. But when I came quite near, she was bare-headed. She had large brown eyes, anyway.”“Brown eyes?”“Well, hazel.”“But you said she kept her face turned away from you, as if not wanting to be known.”“So she did. She didn’t look at me; still, I knew she had big brown—hazel—eyes.”Mrs. Bentley laughed.“Come, child! you are not very ingenious in making up a story to bother Mr. Dewness.”Mr. Dewness, however, did not laugh, or seem at all relieved.“Did you leave her sitting there?” he asked.“I leave her? No, sir; I went about my business, and she went into the store after you.”“Did you see her go into the store?”“No. But when I came quite near she was gone. Where else could she go?”“May,” said David, earnestly,“there was no person there! No young woman nor anybody else came into the store. I left the wheel standing not over ten minutes, and then came out and rode it home. Come, now, you are mistaken; let us go for a spin in the park.”“No, sir! You accuse me of telling a—a fib. I won’t have anything to do with a man who doesn’t believe my word! I know what I saw with my own eyes. While you have a girl come to visit you at the store, after business hours, you needn’t come to see me, Mr. Dewness!”“Come, come, May, you are too hasty,” interrupted Mrs. Bentley. “You haven’t heard what Mr. Dewness has to say,” looking at the young man inquiringly.“Mr. Dewness has nothing to say—just look at him, mother!”Poor David really had nothing to say. His face was enough to convict him. It wore an expression of bewilderment, very like that of a person who was wondering how it could have been found out, and not at all the injured surprise of an innocent party.“Well, sir; well,” said May.No reply.“Can’t you explain this” (hesitating for a mild word) “mistake?” asked Mrs. Bentley.David sighed hopelessly.“I can’t say any more than I have, Mrs. Bentley. There was no lady there! Miss May was mista—deluded in some strange way.”Mrs. Bentley rose in stately fashion.“I fear she was, Mr. Dewness! Good-evening, Mr. Dewness! Come, daughter!”The pair went into the house, leaving poor David staring after them, and twirling his cap in his hands. After they had quite disappeared, he remarked, softly and solemnly to himself:“The dickens!”He twiddled his cap some more, and let it fall. Then he picked it up and dusted it off, vacantly. Then he clapped it on the back of his head—“devilish” (as the Arkansans say)—and walked out of the gate whistling with a fiercer but melancholy emphasis his favorite air of “I’m a Dutchman,” mounted his wheel and rode away pensively, but with a “devilish” jauntiness.*****Two days later Mr. Dewness was found by several of the clubmen in one of the city parks about sunset, walking behind his empty tricycle and pushing it along the smooth paths. Occasionally he took a short run and sent it rolling a long way by a vigorous push. He had set up the screw of the steering head so that it would not turn easily, but would run straight. His actions were exactly as though there was some invisible person on the saddle whom he was pushing about out of pure kindness. The serious courtesy of his manner in this apparently ridiculous proceeding attracted attention, but nobody ventured to question him—a liberty his grave but somewhat menacing demeanor to those who approached distinctly repelled—until his club comrades appeared and fell to jeering him. To them he paid not the slightest attention for some minutes, but continued his strange occupation. But after a little, as if the imaginary occupant of the tricycle was gone, he stopped it, loosened the steering-head, mounted the saddle and rode about with the club as jolly as usual, but wholly impervious to their gibes and questioning.The truth was, he was becoming well acquainted with the ghost that haunted his tricycle. He had seen her presence several times every day. His fixed and curious attention had noticed that she seemed anxious to make the wheel move. She seemed to push vainly upon the treadles.David was probably not at all braver than anybody else in the presence of the supernatural. But to him this apparition was not—never had been—supernatural. He knew very well that it was a phantom, and not composed of flesh and blood; but he was confident that it was the phantom of some real person. To his consciousness it was a shadowy disembodiment of a real woman, how explicable or inexplicable was of small consequence. Enough that it was some one who evidently appealed to him for a kindness. He knew that nobody except himself saw this person—knew it by their actions. He could not see her himself except when at a distance of at least several feet. Upon a near approach she took refuge in invisibility. But every day he could approach a little nearer before she vanished, as if she trusted him more and more. But she did not permit him to see her face until he bethought himself of pushing the wheel, so as to give her the motion for which she seemed to long.Then, when he gave it a careful start and permitted it to run by itself, she turned her face over her shoulder, and smiled her pleased thanks back at him. At first the face was indistinct and evanescent. But it was growing more fixed, confident andclear. It was a handsome—a noble face. He should recognize it anywhere. Its first wistful, half-doubting expression of appeal was becoming reassured, serene, and confidently friendly.Face and figure gradually took possession of his fancy. There was something about this shadow-woman that touched his enthusiasm of benevolence—a strong point in his character. He was sure that this was a woman in trouble, needing help, longing for sympathy, companionship and kindness—a woman isolated and weary of sorrow and struggle. He loved to help the helpless. From loving to help to loving the helped is an easy transition. The shadow-woman filled him, not with the desire of passion, but with the gentle affection which is the deepest root of the truest love, only the later flower of which is passion.Thus far, beyond a natural curiosity, he had not cared to search for the living woman, whom he felt certain existed somewhere near him. Still her influence quite drove out of his mind every idea of being a lover of May Bentley, or aught toward her more than a pleasant acquaintance and friend. He now saw their relations in their true aspect. He should always admire and like May Bentley, but the shadow-woman was one whom it would be a perpetual delight to know, serve and protect.On Saturday morning two gentlemen called at the store and inquired for David Dewness. Finding him, they inquired if he owned the southeast quarter of the northwest quarter of Section 21, town —— north, of range —— west. He stared. Then, remembering his forty acres, he begged them to wait a moment, while he got his deed.Yes, he owned it.“What do you hold it at?”“I have not thought of selling.”“Will you take twenty for it?”Twenty dollars an acre, he thought. There must be some discovery on or near it. He reflected a moment. If it was worth that, there would certainly be other offers pretty soon. They wanted the refusal for twenty-four hours, inquired curiously about the title, and finally went away, first giving him one hundred dollars for the refusal for one day.Three hours later another party called and wanted the land. Being told of the refusal given to the first comers, this party asked the price offered, and being told, exclaimed:“Twenty thousand dollars! Why I’ll give you fifty, and one thousand for the refusal, if you will agree to sell to me for that price if they do not bid higher.”David refused. Before night two other parties wanted it, and were deferred.The next day they all called nearly together and began bidding for it. Meanwhile David had not only thought it all over, but had taken shrewd counsel. He positively refused to sell at any price. He would lease the forty acres for a term of years to the highest bidder. The result was that before night he had leased it to one of the parties, who agreed to pay a royalty of forty cents per ton for all ore mined and sold, with the further agreement that not less than twelve thousand five hundred tons per year should be mined and sold for a term of twenty years, and $5,000 bonus was to be paid in advance.But this party insisted that there was a weakness, if not a defect, in the title that must be cured. The title ran through the firm of Dalrymple & Dalrymple, but the signature of Mrs. Dalrymple was lacking, and though her husband had never been sole owner, the title would be made perfectly secure by a quit claim from her, and any heir direct who might ever claim through her.This put Dewness upon a search for Mrs. Dalrymple. While going about the city on this search he met, in crossing one of the parks, his quondam flame, May Bentley, riding with young Oriel Pilaster, Jr., upon Pilaster’s new tandem.Oriel Pilaster, Jr., was the proudest young man in the city that day. He was proud of having been recently admitted to partnership with his father, the noted architect. He was proud of his fine new tandem. He was proudest of all of having, as he fondly believed, “cut out” David Dewness with the pretty andpiquanteMay Bentley, whom he had long admired at a distance. He was about to pass his supposed rival with a smile and nod of lofty triumph when, to his extreme consternation and chagrin, Miss May put on the brake hard and brought the machine to a standstill, at the same instant calling out:“Mr. Dewness! David!”David instantly went to her, hat in hand, and she smiled her very friendliest smile, and put out her hand, which David shook frankly.“Excuse me a minute, Mr. Pilaster,” she said to that shocked youth,“I want to say a word to Mr. Dewness.”So saying, she alighted nimbly, took David’s arm, and walked a few steps away, coolly leaving young Pilaster a statue of petrified chagrin seated on a tricycle, in full view of all the park loungers. That amazed young gallant was at first half inclined to ride off in a huff, but he wisely concluded that his best plan was to try and look just as happy as though this was exactly what he had all along been expecting, and wait until he knew the reason.As soon as they were a little out of hearing, May volubly explained:“I know who she is, David! It’s all right! The nicest girl! If you’d only said who it was I shouldn’t have cared. But, dear me! what a fool I was to quarrel with you, anyway! Because, you know, really and truly, you and I don’t care a button for each other except as friends, and it was nonsense to pretend anything else. Why, she’s just the girl that I should pick out for you! I half thought I knew her all the time, though she kept her face away from me. But the instant it flashed upon me—why I couldn’t mistake her for anybody else if I tried! Come, shake hands again over it!”David shook hands again with a great pretense of enthusiasm. Then he calmly asked.“Well, who do you think she isnow?”“Why, Miss Daphne Dalrymple, of course. Ah, you needn’t try to fool me any longer!”David started in evident astonishment.“Miss Daphne Dalrymple!”“Yes; Miss Daphne Dalrymple, Dibble & Dribble’s typewriter. We used to be great friends; but, since the Dalrymples failed, she has dropped out of sight of her old friends, and is quite distant. But I love her dearly all the same, and I hope you will persuade her to come and see me. Now do. Good-bye! I expect Mr. Pilaster is angry clear through by this time.”Mr. Dewness led her back, and thanked her earnestly, wished Mr. Pilaster a jolly time, and went off rapidly in the direction of Dibble & Dribble’s, while May proceeded to restore Mr. Pilaster’s spirits by explaining with a simulated sigh:“Well, there! that is probably the lastIshall see of Mr. Dewness. He’s gone mad for a pretty girl, and I’ve been sending him straight to her. Mr. Pilaster, I’m too good. Here I go, like a fool, and send away a good friend, merely because he thinks he’ll be happier with another. But a girl is alway foolish to permit a man to be her friend; he is sure to desert a mere friend to run after the first pretty face that catches his fancy.”Mr. Pilaster warmly defended his sex, and especially himself as one who would never prove a deserter, with such appearances of success as fully restored his pride, and filled his artful enchantress with almost irrepressible chuckles.Dibble & Dribble received Mr. Dewness’s inquiries with cold civility. Miss Dalrymple was ill they believed, had been absent from her desk more than a fortnight. Perhaps the errand-boy could give him her street and number. The errand-boy, being called, did so with an evident interest in Miss Dalrymple. He said that Dr. Pulse’s office was right on the way, and perhaps Mr. Dewness had better see him before calling. Mr. Dewness did so, and the doctor accompanied him to the house.Mrs. Dalrymple at the door reported her daughter better. She was sitting up in a rocking-chair with a shawl about her. The moment they entered the room her eyes were fixed upon Dewness, and her thin face lit up with a smile of pleased welcome. She paid no attention to the doctor, and did not wait for David to be presented, but offered her wasted hand eagerly to the young man, as to a well-known friend, and said, with a sick woman’s child-like trustfulness:“You have come! I knew you would! Did you bring the wheel?”David took her hand with a grasp of warm friendliness, and a look of gentle and kind sympathy, as he answered:“Not now. If the doctor says you are well enough to go out a few minutes in the afternoon, I will bring it, and you shall have it every day.”He, too, spoke as to a familiar friend, while he noted how wan and frail she appeared, and yet how beautiful and strong of body and soul she would be in health. Her mother interposed, saying:“Why, Daphne, dear, I did not know you were acquainted.”The girl colored faintly, but David answered, with one of his frank, straight looks in the eye:“We are not old acquaintances, Mrs. Dalrymple, but, if you will allow me to say so, Miss Dalrymple has no truer friend than me.”The sick girl’s eyes filled with tears, through which she smiled upon him.“This is the gentleman who bought your tricycle, then, that you have spoken of so often this week. But, my dear, I thought you did not know his name.”“I fear, madam,” said David, “that she didn’t quite catch my name when we were made acquainted,” and he turned such a droll look upon the girl that she laughed the first merry laugh heard in that room in a long time.Then David turned the conversation by asking the doctor if he thought Miss Dalrymple was well enough to ride out once or twice a day, say, up and down the block, if he pushed the wheel, and saw that she did not exert herself. The doctor thought that five or ten minutes of very gentle exercise in the open air every day, morning and evening, after breakfast and after tea, would do her great good. But it must be only on clear, sunshiny days, and she must not be out after sundown nor before the air was dry and warm in the morning.“Then,” said David, turning to the girl, “may I come this afternoon?”“If you will. How good you are! And I do so long to go out, and to get well!”The tears came into her eyes again, as she looked gratefully at David. But she was sick and weak, and intensely weary of being so, and also more or lessexaltéefrom the effects of medicine and illness. David smiled upon her with kind cordiality, as he said:“Well, then, we’ll have you well and strong again in a little while. Trust the doctor and me.”Then he turned to her mother and explained his errand about the land.“I bought it at the Dalrymple sale for one hundred dollars. I wish to dispose of it now. You have no real claim, but you could annoy the owner by setting up one, and compelling him to perfect his title in court. In order to save any trouble I propose to buy it over again of you at the regular price for wild land—two dollars and a half an acre. That is, I will pay you one hundred dollars for your signature to this quit claim,” showing it, “and if you suppose you have any real rights, I will accompany you to any lawyer you may please to select, and pay for his opinion.”Mrs. Dalrymple had some business knowledge, and remembered the land which her husband had taken for the firm on a bad debt, together with a horse which she used to drive. Her husband had often laughingly said that the horse was about as worthless as the land. She therefore cheerfully signed the deed, as also did Daphne; and Mr. Dewness insisted upon paying them the one hundred dollars, first going to fetch a notary to take the acknowledgment.In their situation this money seemed almost a restoration of wealth, and Daphne once more said to Mr. Dewness, “How good you are!” with a fervor that was worth a great deal more than the money. He took his leave with a light heart, and he left light hearts behind him.The money that he paid to the two desolate women did more than relieve their immediate needs—it lifted off their hearts the depressing influence of fear for the future. It restored their courage. If Daphne should lose her situation with Dibble & Dribble, this would last till she could get another. When Dewness had gone they kissed each other and wept softly together.Then Dewness’s call had done the girl a world of mental and spiritual good. He had said very little, but his cheerful, sunshiny temper, his kindly interest, his quick sympathy and gentle courtesy were more blessed than the money. No doubt the pride that had caused her to retire from the society of her old friends upon her fall in fortune, and resolutely accept the position of a working-girl, was morbid in part, because she did not replace her former friends among the rich with new acquaintances among the lowly.Youth cannot bear isolation. Solitude is for age, full stored with memory, knowledge and mental resources. Youth cannot bear it and preserve mental or spiritual health; youth must have companionship, sympathy and friendships.Under incessant toil and loneliness the high courage of the girl broke down when illness fell upon her. She was, therefore, in the very best mood to accept this new friendship and society, as a prisoner accepts a release from prison.For the first time since she had fallen ill, she lay down and slept the dreamless, wholesome, restoring sleep of returning health, ate with a slight but real relish, and when Mr. Dewness called, after supper, she looked marvelously brighter and better.With what delight she greeted her lost wheel, when, carefully wrapped, they placed her upon its familiar saddle! How keenly she relished the balmy outdoor air of the quiet, maple-shaded street! With what sweet, womanly childishness she laughed at David’s gentle pleasantries! It was only a few minutes, for David was very carefulto take her in before she was tired, and then he hastened away and presently returned with a boy bearing a tray on which were luscious ripe strawberries, a little pitcher of fresh cream, sugar, three or four big juicy oranges, a lemon and ice-cream. She was permitted by the doctor to eat just a taste of the berries and a teaspoonful of the cream, while David and Mrs. Dalrymple and the doctor ate to keep her company. And then David went away, and she slept like a tired child. Sometimes how very little makes a great happiness!The ghost having become alive, the rest of the story almost tells itself. How they plighted their troth and named the day; and how the wedding was one of the happiest the club ever attended, and everybody said they were the most suitable and loving pair ever joined together—all these items the reader can imagine.But the mystery remains to be cleared. One evening while the house was not yet complete, the two lovers sat together in the moonlight, talking over, for the twentieth time, their strange experience, when David said:“After all, Daphne, there is one thing that puzzles me more than all the rest. I never could tell, when I saw your ghost, exactly what you wore.”Daphne blushed celestial fire, and hid her face with her hands, peeping through her fingers shyly at David, and wondering to see him evidently seriously in earnest.“You seemed to me,” continued David, not noticing her confusion, “at one moment to be in a gray riding-habit, but the next moment you wore your black or brown walking-dress, and when you faded out of sight, my last vision of you was in some sort of white robe. Now, how do you account for that?”“Then I never appeared to you except in some dress? You could see me only in some dress, David?”This timidly, and watching his face narrowly.“Why, of course not,” said honest David, opening his eyes wide with surprise, “only I couldn’t ever quite make it out.”She laughed softly and blushed vividly.“Well, David—now you are in earnest?”“Of course I am. Why, what’s the matter?”“You know I was half delirious with the fever?”“Yes.”“And I longed to take a ride on my—your—wheel. How I did long to get out of that stuffy little room! It seemed to me that if I could find my wheel, and take a run in the pleasant outdoor air, it would do me so much good! Well, it seemed to me that I went out and wandered about the city till I found it. It was in front of Miss Bentley’s. And I saw you, and I knew by your face that you would be kind and lend it to me, because I was ill. Of course, when I found it, I bethought me that I should have a riding-suit, and I seemed to be clothed in the gray dress I used to wear. How funnily you acted! Do you remember stooping down, with your hands on your knees, to look at me?”David grinned.“That alarmed me a little, and when you came closer I walked away, and I remember changing my dress to a walking suit. And sometimes my mind changed from one to another, and I always seemed to myself to wear whatever I thought of. But, after you were so kind, and took so much trouble to push the tricycle about for me, and I saw you wanted to help me, out of pure sympathy, I ceased to be afraid of you, and got quite familiar, and—and—”“Well. And what?”“I was sick in bed, you know, when I had those strange dreams.”“Yes, of course.”“And, of course, I wasn’t wearing any dress in bed.”“Of course not.”“Well—now, don’t you laugh.”“I won’t.”“Some of the last times—after I wasn’t afraid of you any longer—I forgot.”“You forgot what?”“Why, I forgot to walk away in my street-dress and go home. I seemed to drop right out of the saddle and my riding-dress into my night-robe and my bed in the little room at home all at the same time, and without first going away from you.”David laughed heartily in spite of his promise not do so. But it was such an honest laugh that it reassured her.“And you were afraid that I saw the ghost longer than I ought?”—chuckling.“Ye-es,” hiding her blushing face against his shoulder.“Well, darling, I didn’t. You vanished, I thought, like an angel in a white cloud; but I never dreamed it was merely like a sick girl in her white robe.”He laughed again until she slyly reached up and gave one of his ears a pinch that changed his laughter into a howl.
THE HAUNTED WHEEL.BY PRESIDENT BATES.
BY PRESIDENT BATES.
T
THE great house of Dalrymple & Dalrymple went down and left no wreck behind—not even the heap of “dust” that so often remains concealed under the débris of a commercial crash. If a great brick block had suddenly collapsed with a roar and rumble, and, after the dust had blown away, there was not so much as a cellar to show where it had been, the ruin could not have been more strangely complete. It was as if the great business—capital, credit, stock, connections, goodwill, everything—had blown away like a fog and left no vestige. Even the great sign, whose gilded letters used to stretch clear across the tall front of the store in the middle of the block, was painted over in less than a month with the less fashionable, but perhaps as useful, legend, “Juggers & Wesch, Flour and Feed.” And the plate-glass windows, that for so many years displayed the most fashionable fineries, were now devoted to dusty bags of bran and barrels of cornmeal, beans and oats.
It was not a great failure either—only $30,000. Nobody lost much. The Dalrymples sold everything, after the fashion of the honest merchants of the elder time, and nearly paid all their debts. They were only $30,000 to the bad—merely a descent from wealth and ease to poverty and $30,000 less than nothing. And it was not their fault. Their misfortunes began in the failures of others, and ended in their own. The Dalrymple brothers, everybody said, were left with their honor unimpaired. But everybody did not add the unhappy facts that they were left with honor alone past the age of active life, from long ease unfit to begin a new struggle for existence, bankrupt both physically and mentally as well as in fortune.
The bachelor Dalrymple went away to California, where a relative offered him an asylum.
James Dalrymple looked about for awhile vainly for something to do, and then died out of a world that had no use for him. His wife, aged fifty-five, and his daughter,aged eighteen, had a hard time of it—poor souls! Luckily the daughter was a business woman. She had often aided her father as his amanuensis. She knew how to use those modern instruments of commerce, the typewriter and short-hand. She could make out a bill, keep accounts, and write a terse, polite, clear business letter. She had been a society belle, but she had imbibed mental solids from natural taste. She was not too proud to walk with quiet strength on the bottom level, no matter how proudly she had walked at the top. So she sought and found employment, and kept her mother and herself in two or three rooms of a small cottage on an unfashionable street. With all the airs and graces and pretensions of wealth she put away also all the old loves and friendships. She thought they did not keep the true ring of heart soundness. She became simply Dibble & Dribble’s typewriter.
A lady she was, every inch of her—accomplished, refined, gracious, charming, beautiful; not a fine lady; merely a poor young woman, without piano, wardrobe or “style.” She became only a straightforward, faithful, hard-working, modest business girl, known as Miss Dalrymple; for she was, after all, a little sensitive and proud, and permitted few except her mother to call her by her beautiful and stately old name of Daphne Dalrymple.
By and by, in spite of her fine physique, she fell ill. Overwork in the hurry of the spring trade, unhealthful quarters, lack of generous food, damp, cold, miserable weather, worry of mind and exhaustion of body, all combined to bring her down with typho-malarial fever. Her employers, appreciating her value to them, permitted her salary to run on, and almost forgave her for being ill when she was most needed, on condition that she employed another girl, less efficient, but ambitious, to attempt to fill her place, and largely fall short of doing so.
Typhoid fevers disorder the brain. The sick girl was seized with strange and vivid fancies. She longed for outdoor air and exercise. If she could only ride out again as she used when she was an heiress, upon her dainty tricycle, she knew she would soon be well and strong. But her wheel had disappeared with her piano and all the rest of the wreckage. So she lay fevered and in pain, and fancied herself following and hunting it down, she knew not where, and taking possession of it wherever found, and enjoying it. By some strange divination, she saw its owner—a young man—and grew familiar with his appearance in her sick fancy, even to the details of his dress. But, strangely, she could never hear the vision, though she knew by intuition and by his actions what he said sometimes. For more than a week these phantasms held her mind, to the alarm of the doctor, who pronounced her disease morbid and obstinate, and felt grave doubts of the result.
Then a strange thing happened. An unknown young gentleman called at the cottage door and insisted upon being admitted to see her, and his claims were backed by the doctor.
*****
David Dewness was one of the most popular members of the bicycle club. When he first joined the club there was an amiable freshness about him that the club wits soon educated into an amiable ripeness. He was a fellow that would bear cultivation. He could take or give a joke with a pleasantness that disarmed everybody. But with his other qualities was a sweet obstinacy in certain directions. Nobody could ridicule him out of doing a kindness, however great the apparent folly. He would laugh as merrily as any of his critics over the foolishness of some of his good actions; but he would persist in doing them just the same.
Moreover, David carried what the club men called a level business head. In the club business affairs his judgment commanded respect. He earned a fair salary in a commission house, and was much trusted by the firm.
There was one of his investments, however, that the firm laughed at. Having saved a couple of hundred dollars about the time Dalrymple & Dalrymple failed, Dewness bought of that wreck forty acres of wild land, situated in the wilderness of mountain and swamp of the Upper Peninsula of Michigan, and nowhere near any of the then known mines. To be sure, the price he paid was only one hundred dollars; but his employers told him he might as wisely have thrown his hard-earned dollars into the river. David merely replied that he had always longed to be a landowner, and he had never had a cheaper chance to become one.
The truth was that he had once visited that region, and there he had heard an iron-mining explorer, while intoxicated, declare that he positively knew that therewere rich beds of ore in the township where this forty acres lay. If iron should be discovered anywhere near his forty acres, he could sell at a large advance. Perhaps it might be found on his forty acres. In that case his fortune would be made. He knew the explorer to be one of the most expert and reliable of his strange class, and at the same time one of the most close-mouthed. Men of wealth believed the fellow to be full of valuable secrets; but he, like others, hoped that some day, in spite of his reckless gambling and drinking, he should possess means to use some of his secrets for himself, and not be forced to sell them for the advantage of others. David shrewdly thought he had surprised one of these secrets, and his hundred-dollar purchase was simply gambling on a frail chance. It was not much to lose; it might be very much to keep. So he kept it and his own counsel.
David had one foible—a common one. Like many a young man, he believed himself in love with a pretty girl, when he was really only in love with the idea of being loved. May Bentley waspiquante, saucy, friendly, and heart-free. She liked David much, tyrannized over him more, was his good comrade always, and really loved him no more than he did her—that is, not at all. She simply loved having a lover—some one whom she could command and the other girls admire. Thus, there being no real and deep feeling between them, they got on admirably together, and were quoted by the aforesaid “other girls” as “just too happy for anything.” And yet the “other girls,” and likewise the club, very clearly knew that there wasn’t anything substantial in the supposed loves of Dewness and May Bentley. Though excellent friends, they would never be anything more, unless they should both make a dreadful mistake.
Being an enthusiastic wheelman, David often wished that he possessed a tricycle, upon which May could ride. What a pretty picture she would be, and what a charming companion! he on his bicycle and she on a tricycle, at the club “ladies’ runs.”
One day a dealer offered him a charming lady’s tricycle, nearly new and of an excellent style, for the low price of seventy-five dollars. Its owner must have money at once. Dewness looked it all over, and was satisfied that he could resell it for at least a hundred, and bought it. And presently he was enjoying the longed-for companionship of Miss May on his excursions, to the envy of various club men and ladies. Besides, he had bids for the tricycle of over a hundred dollars; but he held out for a higher price, at least for the time.
One evening, just after sunset, David’s tricycle stood waiting for him in the street in front of the Bentley home. Miss May had been out with it, and Dewness, after riding his bicycle home and eating his supper, had returned, chatted and laughed awhile with May, and was then to ride home on the tricycle. As he walked down the path to the gate, still smiling at a joke that the vivacious girl had played on him, he suddenly saw a young woman sitting on his tricycle. Her face was partly turned from him, but the graceful pose of her figure, the proud carriage of her head, and a certain noble and womanly life that seemed to pervade and radiate from her presence, struck him as something rarely charming. She was the most vividly distinct of any object visible in the uncertain twilight. And yet there was that about her singularly indistinct.
Mr. Dewness is one of those happily rare men who possess the feminine faculty of seeing what a lady wears. But, unaccountably, he could not tell whether this young woman, who had so coolly taken possession of his tricycle, was dressed in a gray wheeling costume or a dark walking dress. He had stopped suddenly on first seeing her, and now he put both hands on his knees and stooped to get a better view. No use. Her costume seemed to fluctuate, so to speak, alike in colors and style.
But what business had she to be there at all? She certainly was not one of the club ladies, but a stranger. No one he knew possessed, or could possibly assume, that graceful air, or that noble womanliness.
He walked a little nearer. As he did so the figure grew indistinct. Nearer yet. She seemed to fade like the delusion of a magic glass. He stooped down; he stretched himself up on tiptoe—the effect was the same. He passed through the gate, and stood within a dozen feet of the machine. There it stood, waiting for him, motionless and untenanted, just as a respectable Boston-bred tricycle, with ball-bearings and a front-steering handle-bar, ought!
There wasn’t a woman anywhere in sight within a block!
Mr. Dewness whistled the first two bars of “Sweet Little Buttercup” very softly, with his hands thrust into his pockets andhis feet planted apart. Then he stopped and reflected a full minute. Then he suddenly cocked his hat back so as to give it a bold, semi-piratical rake, walked up to the machine and put one hand upon the nearest handle, gave it a smart jerk, brushed the other hand across the saddle, as if feeling to see if there was any obstruction there, and began to whistle “I’m a Dutchman” with a fierce and ear-piercing emphasis. Nothing coming of this, he rather gingerly slid into the saddle and melted into the twilight of the distant street.
Two days later, David called again at the Bentley’s to invite Miss May to take a spin with him. May and her mother were sitting upon the piazza. David approached and saluted the ladies, and asked the girl to go for a ride. She greeted him coldly, and declined, to his great surprise. Her manner made him ask for an explanation.
“Who was the lady you took out yesterday?” she asked.
“Nobody. I did not go out yesterday,” he answered, with evident perplexity.
“Who was the girl I saw sitting on your tricycle in front of the store, waiting for you?”
“You didn’t see any girl on my tricycle. When?”
“Last evening, just after supper, I passed the store. The tricycle stood in front of it, and there was a young lady sitting on it, waiting for you to come out. I was going to stop for you, when I saw you had her company, and came home.”
“Why, you are surely mistaken! There was nobody there!”
“Didn’t you have the tricycle there?”
“Yes. But there was no lady there.”
“Perhaps you mean to say I can’t see, sir! Therewasa young lady sitting on it and waiting for you to come out.”
David thought for a minute, with an air of embarrassment that confirmed her suspicions. Then he slowly and reluctantly, and yet with evident anxious interest, asked:
“How did she look? Did you see her face?”
“No: she kept her face turned away from me, as if she didn’t wish me to know her. She was a handsome girl, I should judge; but she acted as though she was ashamed of herself.”
This with a cutting severity that, however, failed to wilt the offending David. On the contrary, it only seemed to increase his anxiety.
“How was she dressed?” he demanded.
“Dressed? As though that made any difference! Well”—seeing that David really expected an answer—“she wore a gray riding-suit.”
“Gray?”
“No; now I think, it wasn’t a riding-suit. It was a black walking-dress.”
“Sure it was a black walking-dress?”
“Pshaw! Who cares how she was dressed?”
“I do. I want to find out who, if anybody, took the liberty to occupy my trike while I wasn’t present.”
“It was strange; but, really, I don’t know how she was dressed. I thought at first that she wore a gray riding-suit. Then, when I looked again, I thought it was a black street-dress.”
“What did she wear on her head?”
“A gray riding-hat with a feather. No; it was a bonnet.”
“A hat? A bonnet?”
“Well, no. She was bare-headed, with thick brown hair.”
“Bare-headed? in the street!” interrupted Mrs. Bentley. “Why, May!”
“Well, mother, she had on a hat with a feather when I first saw her, half a block away. When I looked again, a little nearer, I thought it was a bonnet. But when I came quite near, she was bare-headed. She had large brown eyes, anyway.”
“Brown eyes?”
“Well, hazel.”
“But you said she kept her face turned away from you, as if not wanting to be known.”
“So she did. She didn’t look at me; still, I knew she had big brown—hazel—eyes.”
Mrs. Bentley laughed.
“Come, child! you are not very ingenious in making up a story to bother Mr. Dewness.”
Mr. Dewness, however, did not laugh, or seem at all relieved.
“Did you leave her sitting there?” he asked.
“I leave her? No, sir; I went about my business, and she went into the store after you.”
“Did you see her go into the store?”
“No. But when I came quite near she was gone. Where else could she go?”
“May,” said David, earnestly,“there was no person there! No young woman nor anybody else came into the store. I left the wheel standing not over ten minutes, and then came out and rode it home. Come, now, you are mistaken; let us go for a spin in the park.”
“No, sir! You accuse me of telling a—a fib. I won’t have anything to do with a man who doesn’t believe my word! I know what I saw with my own eyes. While you have a girl come to visit you at the store, after business hours, you needn’t come to see me, Mr. Dewness!”
“Come, come, May, you are too hasty,” interrupted Mrs. Bentley. “You haven’t heard what Mr. Dewness has to say,” looking at the young man inquiringly.
“Mr. Dewness has nothing to say—just look at him, mother!”
Poor David really had nothing to say. His face was enough to convict him. It wore an expression of bewilderment, very like that of a person who was wondering how it could have been found out, and not at all the injured surprise of an innocent party.
“Well, sir; well,” said May.
No reply.
“Can’t you explain this” (hesitating for a mild word) “mistake?” asked Mrs. Bentley.
David sighed hopelessly.
“I can’t say any more than I have, Mrs. Bentley. There was no lady there! Miss May was mista—deluded in some strange way.”
Mrs. Bentley rose in stately fashion.
“I fear she was, Mr. Dewness! Good-evening, Mr. Dewness! Come, daughter!”
The pair went into the house, leaving poor David staring after them, and twirling his cap in his hands. After they had quite disappeared, he remarked, softly and solemnly to himself:
“The dickens!”
He twiddled his cap some more, and let it fall. Then he picked it up and dusted it off, vacantly. Then he clapped it on the back of his head—“devilish” (as the Arkansans say)—and walked out of the gate whistling with a fiercer but melancholy emphasis his favorite air of “I’m a Dutchman,” mounted his wheel and rode away pensively, but with a “devilish” jauntiness.
*****
Two days later Mr. Dewness was found by several of the clubmen in one of the city parks about sunset, walking behind his empty tricycle and pushing it along the smooth paths. Occasionally he took a short run and sent it rolling a long way by a vigorous push. He had set up the screw of the steering head so that it would not turn easily, but would run straight. His actions were exactly as though there was some invisible person on the saddle whom he was pushing about out of pure kindness. The serious courtesy of his manner in this apparently ridiculous proceeding attracted attention, but nobody ventured to question him—a liberty his grave but somewhat menacing demeanor to those who approached distinctly repelled—until his club comrades appeared and fell to jeering him. To them he paid not the slightest attention for some minutes, but continued his strange occupation. But after a little, as if the imaginary occupant of the tricycle was gone, he stopped it, loosened the steering-head, mounted the saddle and rode about with the club as jolly as usual, but wholly impervious to their gibes and questioning.
The truth was, he was becoming well acquainted with the ghost that haunted his tricycle. He had seen her presence several times every day. His fixed and curious attention had noticed that she seemed anxious to make the wheel move. She seemed to push vainly upon the treadles.
David was probably not at all braver than anybody else in the presence of the supernatural. But to him this apparition was not—never had been—supernatural. He knew very well that it was a phantom, and not composed of flesh and blood; but he was confident that it was the phantom of some real person. To his consciousness it was a shadowy disembodiment of a real woman, how explicable or inexplicable was of small consequence. Enough that it was some one who evidently appealed to him for a kindness. He knew that nobody except himself saw this person—knew it by their actions. He could not see her himself except when at a distance of at least several feet. Upon a near approach she took refuge in invisibility. But every day he could approach a little nearer before she vanished, as if she trusted him more and more. But she did not permit him to see her face until he bethought himself of pushing the wheel, so as to give her the motion for which she seemed to long.
Then, when he gave it a careful start and permitted it to run by itself, she turned her face over her shoulder, and smiled her pleased thanks back at him. At first the face was indistinct and evanescent. But it was growing more fixed, confident andclear. It was a handsome—a noble face. He should recognize it anywhere. Its first wistful, half-doubting expression of appeal was becoming reassured, serene, and confidently friendly.
Face and figure gradually took possession of his fancy. There was something about this shadow-woman that touched his enthusiasm of benevolence—a strong point in his character. He was sure that this was a woman in trouble, needing help, longing for sympathy, companionship and kindness—a woman isolated and weary of sorrow and struggle. He loved to help the helpless. From loving to help to loving the helped is an easy transition. The shadow-woman filled him, not with the desire of passion, but with the gentle affection which is the deepest root of the truest love, only the later flower of which is passion.
Thus far, beyond a natural curiosity, he had not cared to search for the living woman, whom he felt certain existed somewhere near him. Still her influence quite drove out of his mind every idea of being a lover of May Bentley, or aught toward her more than a pleasant acquaintance and friend. He now saw their relations in their true aspect. He should always admire and like May Bentley, but the shadow-woman was one whom it would be a perpetual delight to know, serve and protect.
On Saturday morning two gentlemen called at the store and inquired for David Dewness. Finding him, they inquired if he owned the southeast quarter of the northwest quarter of Section 21, town —— north, of range —— west. He stared. Then, remembering his forty acres, he begged them to wait a moment, while he got his deed.
Yes, he owned it.
“What do you hold it at?”
“I have not thought of selling.”
“Will you take twenty for it?”
Twenty dollars an acre, he thought. There must be some discovery on or near it. He reflected a moment. If it was worth that, there would certainly be other offers pretty soon. They wanted the refusal for twenty-four hours, inquired curiously about the title, and finally went away, first giving him one hundred dollars for the refusal for one day.
Three hours later another party called and wanted the land. Being told of the refusal given to the first comers, this party asked the price offered, and being told, exclaimed:
“Twenty thousand dollars! Why I’ll give you fifty, and one thousand for the refusal, if you will agree to sell to me for that price if they do not bid higher.”
David refused. Before night two other parties wanted it, and were deferred.
The next day they all called nearly together and began bidding for it. Meanwhile David had not only thought it all over, but had taken shrewd counsel. He positively refused to sell at any price. He would lease the forty acres for a term of years to the highest bidder. The result was that before night he had leased it to one of the parties, who agreed to pay a royalty of forty cents per ton for all ore mined and sold, with the further agreement that not less than twelve thousand five hundred tons per year should be mined and sold for a term of twenty years, and $5,000 bonus was to be paid in advance.
But this party insisted that there was a weakness, if not a defect, in the title that must be cured. The title ran through the firm of Dalrymple & Dalrymple, but the signature of Mrs. Dalrymple was lacking, and though her husband had never been sole owner, the title would be made perfectly secure by a quit claim from her, and any heir direct who might ever claim through her.
This put Dewness upon a search for Mrs. Dalrymple. While going about the city on this search he met, in crossing one of the parks, his quondam flame, May Bentley, riding with young Oriel Pilaster, Jr., upon Pilaster’s new tandem.
Oriel Pilaster, Jr., was the proudest young man in the city that day. He was proud of having been recently admitted to partnership with his father, the noted architect. He was proud of his fine new tandem. He was proudest of all of having, as he fondly believed, “cut out” David Dewness with the pretty andpiquanteMay Bentley, whom he had long admired at a distance. He was about to pass his supposed rival with a smile and nod of lofty triumph when, to his extreme consternation and chagrin, Miss May put on the brake hard and brought the machine to a standstill, at the same instant calling out:
“Mr. Dewness! David!”
David instantly went to her, hat in hand, and she smiled her very friendliest smile, and put out her hand, which David shook frankly.
“Excuse me a minute, Mr. Pilaster,” she said to that shocked youth,“I want to say a word to Mr. Dewness.”
So saying, she alighted nimbly, took David’s arm, and walked a few steps away, coolly leaving young Pilaster a statue of petrified chagrin seated on a tricycle, in full view of all the park loungers. That amazed young gallant was at first half inclined to ride off in a huff, but he wisely concluded that his best plan was to try and look just as happy as though this was exactly what he had all along been expecting, and wait until he knew the reason.
As soon as they were a little out of hearing, May volubly explained:
“I know who she is, David! It’s all right! The nicest girl! If you’d only said who it was I shouldn’t have cared. But, dear me! what a fool I was to quarrel with you, anyway! Because, you know, really and truly, you and I don’t care a button for each other except as friends, and it was nonsense to pretend anything else. Why, she’s just the girl that I should pick out for you! I half thought I knew her all the time, though she kept her face away from me. But the instant it flashed upon me—why I couldn’t mistake her for anybody else if I tried! Come, shake hands again over it!”
David shook hands again with a great pretense of enthusiasm. Then he calmly asked.
“Well, who do you think she isnow?”
“Why, Miss Daphne Dalrymple, of course. Ah, you needn’t try to fool me any longer!”
David started in evident astonishment.
“Miss Daphne Dalrymple!”
“Yes; Miss Daphne Dalrymple, Dibble & Dribble’s typewriter. We used to be great friends; but, since the Dalrymples failed, she has dropped out of sight of her old friends, and is quite distant. But I love her dearly all the same, and I hope you will persuade her to come and see me. Now do. Good-bye! I expect Mr. Pilaster is angry clear through by this time.”
Mr. Dewness led her back, and thanked her earnestly, wished Mr. Pilaster a jolly time, and went off rapidly in the direction of Dibble & Dribble’s, while May proceeded to restore Mr. Pilaster’s spirits by explaining with a simulated sigh:
“Well, there! that is probably the lastIshall see of Mr. Dewness. He’s gone mad for a pretty girl, and I’ve been sending him straight to her. Mr. Pilaster, I’m too good. Here I go, like a fool, and send away a good friend, merely because he thinks he’ll be happier with another. But a girl is alway foolish to permit a man to be her friend; he is sure to desert a mere friend to run after the first pretty face that catches his fancy.”
Mr. Pilaster warmly defended his sex, and especially himself as one who would never prove a deserter, with such appearances of success as fully restored his pride, and filled his artful enchantress with almost irrepressible chuckles.
Dibble & Dribble received Mr. Dewness’s inquiries with cold civility. Miss Dalrymple was ill they believed, had been absent from her desk more than a fortnight. Perhaps the errand-boy could give him her street and number. The errand-boy, being called, did so with an evident interest in Miss Dalrymple. He said that Dr. Pulse’s office was right on the way, and perhaps Mr. Dewness had better see him before calling. Mr. Dewness did so, and the doctor accompanied him to the house.
Mrs. Dalrymple at the door reported her daughter better. She was sitting up in a rocking-chair with a shawl about her. The moment they entered the room her eyes were fixed upon Dewness, and her thin face lit up with a smile of pleased welcome. She paid no attention to the doctor, and did not wait for David to be presented, but offered her wasted hand eagerly to the young man, as to a well-known friend, and said, with a sick woman’s child-like trustfulness:
“You have come! I knew you would! Did you bring the wheel?”
David took her hand with a grasp of warm friendliness, and a look of gentle and kind sympathy, as he answered:
“Not now. If the doctor says you are well enough to go out a few minutes in the afternoon, I will bring it, and you shall have it every day.”
He, too, spoke as to a familiar friend, while he noted how wan and frail she appeared, and yet how beautiful and strong of body and soul she would be in health. Her mother interposed, saying:
“Why, Daphne, dear, I did not know you were acquainted.”
The girl colored faintly, but David answered, with one of his frank, straight looks in the eye:
“We are not old acquaintances, Mrs. Dalrymple, but, if you will allow me to say so, Miss Dalrymple has no truer friend than me.”
The sick girl’s eyes filled with tears, through which she smiled upon him.
“This is the gentleman who bought your tricycle, then, that you have spoken of so often this week. But, my dear, I thought you did not know his name.”
“I fear, madam,” said David, “that she didn’t quite catch my name when we were made acquainted,” and he turned such a droll look upon the girl that she laughed the first merry laugh heard in that room in a long time.
Then David turned the conversation by asking the doctor if he thought Miss Dalrymple was well enough to ride out once or twice a day, say, up and down the block, if he pushed the wheel, and saw that she did not exert herself. The doctor thought that five or ten minutes of very gentle exercise in the open air every day, morning and evening, after breakfast and after tea, would do her great good. But it must be only on clear, sunshiny days, and she must not be out after sundown nor before the air was dry and warm in the morning.
“Then,” said David, turning to the girl, “may I come this afternoon?”
“If you will. How good you are! And I do so long to go out, and to get well!”
The tears came into her eyes again, as she looked gratefully at David. But she was sick and weak, and intensely weary of being so, and also more or lessexaltéefrom the effects of medicine and illness. David smiled upon her with kind cordiality, as he said:
“Well, then, we’ll have you well and strong again in a little while. Trust the doctor and me.”
Then he turned to her mother and explained his errand about the land.
“I bought it at the Dalrymple sale for one hundred dollars. I wish to dispose of it now. You have no real claim, but you could annoy the owner by setting up one, and compelling him to perfect his title in court. In order to save any trouble I propose to buy it over again of you at the regular price for wild land—two dollars and a half an acre. That is, I will pay you one hundred dollars for your signature to this quit claim,” showing it, “and if you suppose you have any real rights, I will accompany you to any lawyer you may please to select, and pay for his opinion.”
Mrs. Dalrymple had some business knowledge, and remembered the land which her husband had taken for the firm on a bad debt, together with a horse which she used to drive. Her husband had often laughingly said that the horse was about as worthless as the land. She therefore cheerfully signed the deed, as also did Daphne; and Mr. Dewness insisted upon paying them the one hundred dollars, first going to fetch a notary to take the acknowledgment.
In their situation this money seemed almost a restoration of wealth, and Daphne once more said to Mr. Dewness, “How good you are!” with a fervor that was worth a great deal more than the money. He took his leave with a light heart, and he left light hearts behind him.
The money that he paid to the two desolate women did more than relieve their immediate needs—it lifted off their hearts the depressing influence of fear for the future. It restored their courage. If Daphne should lose her situation with Dibble & Dribble, this would last till she could get another. When Dewness had gone they kissed each other and wept softly together.
Then Dewness’s call had done the girl a world of mental and spiritual good. He had said very little, but his cheerful, sunshiny temper, his kindly interest, his quick sympathy and gentle courtesy were more blessed than the money. No doubt the pride that had caused her to retire from the society of her old friends upon her fall in fortune, and resolutely accept the position of a working-girl, was morbid in part, because she did not replace her former friends among the rich with new acquaintances among the lowly.
Youth cannot bear isolation. Solitude is for age, full stored with memory, knowledge and mental resources. Youth cannot bear it and preserve mental or spiritual health; youth must have companionship, sympathy and friendships.
Under incessant toil and loneliness the high courage of the girl broke down when illness fell upon her. She was, therefore, in the very best mood to accept this new friendship and society, as a prisoner accepts a release from prison.
For the first time since she had fallen ill, she lay down and slept the dreamless, wholesome, restoring sleep of returning health, ate with a slight but real relish, and when Mr. Dewness called, after supper, she looked marvelously brighter and better.
With what delight she greeted her lost wheel, when, carefully wrapped, they placed her upon its familiar saddle! How keenly she relished the balmy outdoor air of the quiet, maple-shaded street! With what sweet, womanly childishness she laughed at David’s gentle pleasantries! It was only a few minutes, for David was very carefulto take her in before she was tired, and then he hastened away and presently returned with a boy bearing a tray on which were luscious ripe strawberries, a little pitcher of fresh cream, sugar, three or four big juicy oranges, a lemon and ice-cream. She was permitted by the doctor to eat just a taste of the berries and a teaspoonful of the cream, while David and Mrs. Dalrymple and the doctor ate to keep her company. And then David went away, and she slept like a tired child. Sometimes how very little makes a great happiness!
The ghost having become alive, the rest of the story almost tells itself. How they plighted their troth and named the day; and how the wedding was one of the happiest the club ever attended, and everybody said they were the most suitable and loving pair ever joined together—all these items the reader can imagine.
But the mystery remains to be cleared. One evening while the house was not yet complete, the two lovers sat together in the moonlight, talking over, for the twentieth time, their strange experience, when David said:
“After all, Daphne, there is one thing that puzzles me more than all the rest. I never could tell, when I saw your ghost, exactly what you wore.”
Daphne blushed celestial fire, and hid her face with her hands, peeping through her fingers shyly at David, and wondering to see him evidently seriously in earnest.
“You seemed to me,” continued David, not noticing her confusion, “at one moment to be in a gray riding-habit, but the next moment you wore your black or brown walking-dress, and when you faded out of sight, my last vision of you was in some sort of white robe. Now, how do you account for that?”
“Then I never appeared to you except in some dress? You could see me only in some dress, David?”
This timidly, and watching his face narrowly.
“Why, of course not,” said honest David, opening his eyes wide with surprise, “only I couldn’t ever quite make it out.”
She laughed softly and blushed vividly.
“Well, David—now you are in earnest?”
“Of course I am. Why, what’s the matter?”
“You know I was half delirious with the fever?”
“Yes.”
“And I longed to take a ride on my—your—wheel. How I did long to get out of that stuffy little room! It seemed to me that if I could find my wheel, and take a run in the pleasant outdoor air, it would do me so much good! Well, it seemed to me that I went out and wandered about the city till I found it. It was in front of Miss Bentley’s. And I saw you, and I knew by your face that you would be kind and lend it to me, because I was ill. Of course, when I found it, I bethought me that I should have a riding-suit, and I seemed to be clothed in the gray dress I used to wear. How funnily you acted! Do you remember stooping down, with your hands on your knees, to look at me?”
David grinned.
“That alarmed me a little, and when you came closer I walked away, and I remember changing my dress to a walking suit. And sometimes my mind changed from one to another, and I always seemed to myself to wear whatever I thought of. But, after you were so kind, and took so much trouble to push the tricycle about for me, and I saw you wanted to help me, out of pure sympathy, I ceased to be afraid of you, and got quite familiar, and—and—”
“Well. And what?”
“I was sick in bed, you know, when I had those strange dreams.”
“Yes, of course.”
“And, of course, I wasn’t wearing any dress in bed.”
“Of course not.”
“Well—now, don’t you laugh.”
“I won’t.”
“Some of the last times—after I wasn’t afraid of you any longer—I forgot.”
“You forgot what?”
“Why, I forgot to walk away in my street-dress and go home. I seemed to drop right out of the saddle and my riding-dress into my night-robe and my bed in the little room at home all at the same time, and without first going away from you.”
David laughed heartily in spite of his promise not do so. But it was such an honest laugh that it reassured her.
“And you were afraid that I saw the ghost longer than I ought?”—chuckling.
“Ye-es,” hiding her blushing face against his shoulder.
“Well, darling, I didn’t. You vanished, I thought, like an angel in a white cloud; but I never dreamed it was merely like a sick girl in her white robe.”
He laughed again until she slyly reached up and gave one of his ears a pinch that changed his laughter into a howl.