CHAPTER XIIIWhich Is in Some Respects Unsatisfactory
Which Is in Some Respects Unsatisfactory
Jim Wayne had been going so frequently to Chebasset that people were beginning to talk of it. All foresaw the consummation of his courtship, and some gloomy shakes of the head were given to the subject.
Beth, the older people said, was just such another as Jim's mother: a soft woman, without the power either to restrain a man or to improve him. Such unhappiness as the widow Wayne's was, therefore, reserved to Beth—while Jim should be alive. As Jim was weaker in character than his father, and therefore less dissipated, he promised to live longer. Poor Beth!
Not for these reasons, however, was it that Colonel Blanchard took serious counsel concerning the possibility of interference. For when the inclination of the two young people was unmistakable Blanchard began to consider the side on which it affected him, regretting the hope which seemed about to vanish, that Beth should marry Pease. If only something might be done! The Colonel sought Judith as the person who alone could advise him, though until he opened the subject he had forgotten how seldom they agreed in their views. The Colonel was often conscious that his calibre was different from that of his daughter.
"Judith," he said, "you've been noticing what is going on between Beth and young Wayne? You think there's something in it?"
"If there isn't," she replied, "there will be very soon."
The Colonel took a few fretful paces up and down the room. Then he stopped before her. "What do you think of it?" he demanded.
For a moment Judith considered her answer; it is unpleasant to say things which may be remembered later when one has a brother-in-law. Nevertheless, as usual she spoke the truth. "I wish Beth wouldn't."
"When Pease is ready, too!" complained the Colonel. "Do you suppose he seems too old to her?"
"Beth likes older people," returned Judith. "And she'd be so safe with him."
"Yes," returned the Colonel, accepting all suggestions eagerly. "Yes, of course. Now, isn't there something we can do?"
"For instance?" challenged Judith; seeing that the Colonel had nothing to offer, she went on, "I never knew how to interfere in anything of that sort. Of course, you, as her father——"
"Do you think I could?" asked the Colonel hopefully.
"It's not often done," Judith replied.
The Colonel considered the possibility and shrank from it. Never had he denied anything either to himself or to his daughters; the most he had ever ventured toward his offspring was a petulant remonstrance. This tone, as he saw himself helpless, he took now toward Judith in default of Beth. "It seems hard," he complained. "I've brought her up—you don't know how much thought I've given you two girls. And now she turns back on me!"
"Why father," asked Judith in surprise, "how can it affect you so?"
The Colonel's thoughts rapidly skirted the pit which he had opened for himself. It is a long way from the hope of a rich son-in-law to the consideration of a daughter's happiness, but the Colonel presently coveredit. "Her comfort," he demanded. "Have I nothing at stake there?"
But this was obviously so artificial that he felt Judith could not fail to perceive it. She sat silent, and the Colonel, after changing the subject, presently got himself out of the house. Perhaps he was to be pitied, if to be good-natured, weak, indulgent, deserves a better reward than a vigorous daughter's too-keen comprehension. Besides, the gentle one was turning against him. He nursed his grievance against Beth for a while, then at last found comfort in Judith after all. She at any rate would marry money. If she would only be quick about it!
And the Colonel, free from observation, sat down in the shrubbery to study the newspaper which he had brought with him, in the hope of drawing from its columns of figures information which should tell him where to lay his bet. He was gambling from week to week, quite as if he were laying on the red or black, although the means of his ventures were Consolidated, and (following the hint Jim Wayne had given) Poulton Mining and Milling, besides (a little discovery he had made for himself) Tilly Valley Oil. They were all up a point or two, but the Colonel was not entirely relieved as he studied the figures, because more than a few points were needed in order to make up for the slump of last week.
A man puzzles long at these things, sometimes; the Colonel's time was on him now, making him very peevish. It was hard, hard indeed, that both the market and Beth should go against him.
As regards Beth, the signs of her feeling were unmistakable. The eye of blissful brooding which she now always showed, the loving consideration with which she fulfilled all duties, bespoke the thoughts whichmastered her. She and Jim had been drawing nearer through the weeks, a graded progress of lingering, slow-mounting ecstasy. And on one night, one starlight night, Beth and her lover came to a complete understanding.
Jim begged her to go with him to the beach. He was trembling a little himself, being genuinely inspired with a feeling above his own capacity to retain long; she felt the tremor in his voice as he asked the favour. "Let's get away from here," he said. "I want to speak with you."
So they went down to the beach, silent, so absorbed by what was coming that the touch of each other as they jostled in the darkness was enough to make them start. Jim had chosen where the proposal should be made, a nook beneath a bank where they had often sat by moonlight; but this was starlight, and no one was to see.
They sat beneath the bank; the dry sand made a soft seat, the breath of the salt-water quickened their spirits, the lapping of little waves spoke to them with a murmur of far away things. Their two hearts beat like four; Beth felt that she was breathless, Jim knew that he was wordless, and a long pause followed their arrival. At last Jim found that he could speak.
"How quiet it is!"
"And how lovely!"
He felt that this was mere temporising. "We've sat here a good many times," he began again. "Haven't we, Beth?"
"Yes," she murmured, feeling that it was coming.
"I—it's been great fun to see so much of you," he went on, "but it's got to come to an end before long."
"Really?" asked Beth weakly, all natural power of response completely lost.
"It's too much to stand, you know," asserted Jim. "I've—you've made me greedy, Beth. Either I want it all, or none at all."
She answered nothing, though he listened. Ah, it was a mistake to propose in the dark, for he lost the sight of her sweet face.
"Either to come, I mean," he went on again, "whenever I want, or never again, Beth."
"Jim!" she murmured.
"Shall I go away?" he asked. "Or shall we just go on meeting—every day—forever—till death do us part?" he concluded, satisfied that he had expressed the immutability of his sentiments. Getting no answer, he reached for Beth's hands in the darkness, and found the little fluttering things just coming toward him. Then he enfolded her and drew her to him, and what was said after that was too broken to be set down in type.
Thus was accomplished, and very creditably to Jim, the understanding which had been long in coming, and Beth whispered to him the wonderful words, "I love you!" Her little cup was more than full; her happiness overflowed her heart and found a somewhat larger receptacle waiting for it, namely her mind, in which it seemed somewhat thin. Even as she yielded herself to Wayne's embrace Beth's two natures declared themselves not in accord, now when the test was applied. Kisses were strangely fleshly things; Beth shrank beneath Jim's eagerness; poetry vanished before the fierceness of his embrace. This was not a communion of spirit with spirit; Jim did not speak with fervour of his relief from his trials and his fears. The tremolo of praise which her heart was prepared to utter found no response in his; the deeper thoughts were hers alone. She had thought admission to the treasures of Jim'smind would mean so much, and now his exultation oppressed her, while she winced beneath his physical delight.
Thus Beth, who had thought to sit hand in hand in deep communion, discovered that there was in Jim as man what was lacking in her as woman, and before long she led him home. Jim went with reluctance; it was too sweet to hold and kiss her; she was a morsel far finer than had yet come to him, and he failed to understand her purity, as the farmer's boy cannot comprehend the rebellion of a peach at being eaten.
Nor did Jim quite fall in with Beth's ideas, which she detailed to him as she neared the house. Tell her father and sister, of course, and after that, why not tell everybody else? Beth wished for a month or two of Jim to herself, and to rush into the world flaunting her happiness as if it were an achievement was not in her nature, so she begged of Jim this respite.
"It won't be news to any one by that time," he grumbled.
"But to oblige me, Jim? And really, never again can we have ourselves quite to ourselves." In their walk up the hill Beth had found time to tell herself that she was wrong to be so timid in Jim's embrace; that perhaps it was natural, but that every other girl felt so at first, and the feeling would pass. Thus she meant what she said about having him to herself; and Jim, turning and catching her, declared that there never was a sweeter little thing, that he must have a kiss, and that he would agree.
The Colonel and Judith had been sitting quite stolidly, back to back beside the lamp. But while the Colonel was oblivious to what was going on, Judith had been keenly alive to it. She had recognised the tremor in Jim's voice as he begged for the interview; how manysuch requests had been made of her! Yet having always gone to a proposal as a surgeon to an operation, to remove painfully yet kindly the cause of a disease, Judith knew how different her sensations had been from those of Beth, as she went, shrinking, to meet her happiness. During the half-hour that they were away, Judith imagined the bliss of those other two, and knew that however simple it was, it was enviable. Then when Beth returned, Judith started for very joy at the sight of her radiant face.
Very prettily Beth went and kissed her father, and stammered that there was something to tell him, for she and Jim now understood each other. It seemed to Beth natural that Judith should speak slowly, apparently choosing her words—but that the Colonel should wait until Judith had finished speaking, and then should burst out with more than Beth had expected him to say, as if to cover up less than she had expected him to feel, struck cold to Beth's warm little heart, and oppressed much of the remainder of the evening. She had scarcely recovered from it when train-time came, and with it Jim's good-by, almost violent—and the evening was over.
Poor little Beth, kneeling at your bedside, praying for one who, instead of hastening home to tell his mother, stays at the club till after midnight—poor little Beth, a white figure in the pale light of the late-rising moon, go to bed and dream the dreams of yesterday. It would be happier so.
But sleep avoided her. So many thoughts passed through her mind, of the reality which had come to her—a reality like others, hard in places—that Beth lay wakeful. She heard the clock strike eleven, heard her father and Judith come upstairs and say good-night, heard the two go to their rooms. They had said solittle to her, so little, and she was so lonesome! But in a few minutes a door opened, footsteps approached, and Judith stood by her sister's side. Beth stretched up her arms and drew her down.
"Talk to me," Judith murmured. "Tell me about it, about him."
Ah, this was sisterly and sweet! Beth had sometimes thought her sister cold; never would she do so again. She told her happy thoughts, not those vague suggestions of a difficult future or imperfect understanding. Her Jim was such a man! Her own words gave her confidence; clasped in Judith's arms, Beth poured out her hopes; more yet, she spoke of her fears in order to smile them away. She would face hardships, would bear what griefs the world might send, secure in her great love. And Judith, listening, murmured her agreement, her sympathy, her joy.
Then when Judith said good-night, she was held still closer for a moment. "I wish you the same good fortune, dear!" Beth kissed her, and released her.
Beth slept at last; it was Judith who was wakeful. The same good fortune?
Judith mused upon love. It was love which so blinded Beth's eyes and brought this ineffable happiness. Poor Beth! Yet Judith did not even smile with pity, for her nature told her that this love of Beth's, should it but last, would be more of a help, a guide and strength, than all of Judith's own knowledge. And repeating Beth's words, "the same good fortune," Judith wished for that happiness to come to her. To love a man, to believe in him, give herself to him: that would solve the problem of a future which often seemed too cold.
She recognised perfectly the drift of her feelings toward Ellis. Yet her enthusiasm for him was an impulse of the head rather than the heart; it was not apassion, but a state of mind. How much finer was Beth's perfect self-forgetfulness! And fearing that Ellis could never rouse her to a greater height than this intellectual approval, Judith's thoughts turned regretfully toward Mather. In all the years of their acquaintance, why had he nevermadeher love him? Well, that was past! But Judith, softened by this contact with Beth's happiness, and perceiving that the fascination of Ellis's personality was slowly growing on her, looked with regret upon the prospect of a merely rational union.
CHAPTER XIVMr. Pease Intrudes Upon a Secret
Mr. Pease Intrudes Upon a Secret
The summer passed; through October the city gathered its own to itself again. The stay-at-homes, such as Miss Cynthia and Mrs. Wayne, saw with relief shutters go down and blinds open, saw awnings spread over southern windows and children playing on lawns. Poor Mrs. Wayne, threatened with the loss of her treasure, could call less formally upon her daughter-in-law-to-be, yet could not quite reconcile herself with matters as they stood. But that is the way of mothers. Jim began to urge that the engagement be announced, but Beth put him off for another little while.
And now Pease found comfort in the thought of Beth's return, since it would give him his innocent pleasure without journeys or the neglect of business. His winter clothes were chosen with unusual care, nor did he this time repel the tailor's semi-annual attempt to give him a more youthful appearance. At his home Pease became a new man, and Miss Cynthia sneered as she fastened the charge upon him.
"More colour in your neckties!" she sniffed disdainfully.
He smiled, untroubled. "Yes; they tell me it's to be quite proper, this fall."
Astonishment prevented her from speaking; never before had he deserted the middle ground of fashion. Thus the lighter shade of his new overcoat was a sign, his wearing of tan shoes a portent. And his very carriagewas different, as of a man who has at last found the spring of youth and drinks of it daily. His mannerisms were softening, he took more interest in social news, and an undercurrent of thought always swayed his mind in the direction where knowledge or imagination placed Beth Blanchard.
There was stupidity in Pease, for he did not find the meaning of the existence of Jim Wayne. But very slowly he discovered the reason for his own sensations. He met Beth first in April; by the middle of the summer he knew that she attracted him extremely; a month later he acknowledged that he was going to Chebasset for the sake of seeing her; upon her return to Stirling he felt continual odd thoracic sensations which seemed to make him a living compass, pointing always to Beth. After a fortnight of this sort of thing he waked one day from a reverie of her, to realise that he loved her. The discovery affected him with vertigo; he had to seek the air and think the matter over. In about a week he became familiar with the situation and accepted it. He paused one evening before his motto from Goethe, and smiled to think that he had once considered the end of happiness to be mere culture.
Loving Beth, he did not at first include her in his hopes. There was such delight in contemplating a definite image in absence, such satisfaction in watching Beth herself when present, that for some time he went no further. He made it clear to Beth that he was always willing to attempt anything she desired, and then from time to time looked in on her and adored. Yet the humanising process eventually proceeded. Gazing at his idol until its every perfection was known to him, at last there came the question: Why not possess it? And this worked on him so that in the end he became extremely determined.
So gentle was the increase of his attentions that Beth did not at first take the alarm. At home, no abstraction betrayed him to Miss Cynthia, who thought that he had resigned himself. He was more lively, normal than ever before, and only Mather suspected in him the determination to do or die. The change of the scene of operations from Chebasset to the city, however, gave Mather no chance to keep abreast of the march of events, since the manager still spent most of his days and nights at the seaside. Thus no one enlightened Pease until it became Beth's task to do so herself.
He dressed himself with unusual care one afternoon; had it been the evening Miss Cynthia would never have suspected. But his newest suit, his freshest gloves, the box of violets in his hand, and (more than all) the single pink in his lapel—all these for a moment made her suspect the truth as she watched him leave the house. "Whatever is the man——?" But he was gone, and there was nothing to be done.
He found Beth at home, and gave her the box of violets. She thanked him with such prettiness as always charmed him, such warmth as always made him glow. The poor man tried now to say words of love, he who had never practised them even to himself. It was a long way round, through the weather, the news, the latest invitation, to the deepest emotion of the human heart. But he pointed straight to it at last, and Beth understood.
So she sprang to head him off in the kindest, surest way. "I——" she hesitated with heightened colour, "I have something to tell you, Mr. Pease. Almost nobody knows it [almost everybody was nearer the truth, as Jim weekly complained], but you have been such a good friend that I think I should like you to know."
"You are very kind," he answered, much pleased, and opening his bosom to the fatal dart. "I will tell no one without your permission."
"I should like you to tell your cousin," she said. "I—I——" Her face became scarlet. "Mr. Pease, I am engaged to marry Mr. Wayne."
Down fell his house of cards; it seemed as if the chambers of his brain resounded, and for a moment his head bowed low. Then he raised it again and looked at her, and for the merest instant she saw a face of misery.
"Oh, Mr. Pease," she cried, "I am so sorry!"
There was a moment of stupid silence. "I—I regret," he said at length, "to distress you, by letting you know."
"How can I help knowing?" she answered simply. He sat dumb while she, twisting her fingers in and out, sought for further words. "If I," she said at last with tears in her eyes, "if I have hurt you, I hope that you will blame me, and forget me."
"Blame?" he cried. "And forget? No, no!" She saw his face light nobly. "Miss Blanchard, you have given me new ideals—humanised me. Blame and forget? Why, my life was small and narrow; you have led me out of myself! Everything is better through knowing you. Therefore, I may say with a cheerful heart:
"Tis better to have loved and lostThan never to have loved at all!"
"Tis better to have loved and lostThan never to have loved at all!"
He sat upright and smiled, but tears stood in her eyes; she could make no response. After a moment he asked her: "You are to be married soon?"
"No," she answered, and gained command of herself. "We must wait a while—and you know it is very slow, rising in Mr. Wayne's business."
"Yes." Then he rose and held out his hand; she gave him hers at once. "I will go," he said. "Do not reproach yourself, and—God bless you always!" He bent and kissed her hand, smiled again, and then was gone.
She sat down, miserable. Not his brave cheerfulness, nor his almost comic quoting of the old-fashioned couplet, could drive from her the knowledge that his heart was bleeding. Slowly the tears welled out upon her cheeks.
Then Wayne entered joyously. "I passed old Pease on the steps, and he didn't see me. What's wrong with him?"
She ran to him. "Oh, Jim!" she cried, and clung to him, weeping.
"Oho! Indeed?" he exclaimed, and horrified her by loud laughter.
Pease had not noticed whom he passed upon the steps. For a moment after leaving the house he had stood in the vestibule, looking at the setting sun. One would have said that its splendour passed into his face and illumined it; indeed, a glory entered him at that moment, an ecstacy of self-forgetfulness. The sunset faded quickly, but the inner light still shone on his face as he went homeward.
Miss Cynthia saw it when he entered the parlour where she was sitting. Her cousin had never appeared so to her before, and for a moment she mistook. "Is it possible?" she asked herself.
"Cynthia," he said quietly, "Miss Beth Blanchard asked me to tell you that she is to marry Mr. Wayne."
"No!" she cried, angry at once, her love for her cousin blazing in her eyes. "She mustn't!" Then she was ashamed, for he answered gently:
"It seems to me a very happy fortune."
But he could say no more, for a single dry sob burst from her. Fearing to lose his own self-command, he went up to his room.
From that minute Miss Cynthia's admiration of her cousin, which for some time had been passive, recommenced to grow, expanding far beyond its former boundaries as she found what further depths there were in his character. Never, even in their early days of struggle, had he been so considerate, kind, and wise. Indeed, on the very day after his great disappointment he proved his manliness.
Pease travelled down to Chebasset and found Mather in the office as usual. The manager greeted him with an inward pity, for in the morning's mail he had received a letter from Beth, informing her dear George, whom she had always regarded as one of her best friends, that she and Mr. Wayne—etcetera, etcetera. With sorrow for Pease, therefore, Mather greeted him, to be surprised by the banker's smile. When his errand was announced Mather was surprised the more.
"You have been saying, haven't you," asked Pease, "that you must soon have an assistant here, to take charge of the mill while you are in the city."
"Yes," Mather answered. "We are running smoothly now, and my hands are more than full, taking care of both making and selling. I must be in the city all the time, so soon as I can find a capable man to take my place here."
"I have found him," announced Pease, beaming. "James Wayne!"
"I said acapableman, Mr. Pease," replied Mather. "The boy is green and flighty."
"Yes, I know," said Pease. "But isn't he worth the trial?"
Mather rose and began to pace the office. Did he daretrust anything in Jim's hands? "You promised me," he reminded, "that I should have full control over the business."
"So you shall, so you shall," soothed Pease. "But a trial? Come, now!"
Between respect for his employer, affection for Beth, and interest in Wayne himself, Mather saw that he was caught. "You're too good for words!" he said, and yielded.
So the position was offered to Jim, and gave Beth a happy opening to her engagement. Amid all the presents which, according to the custom that ignores the chance of a broken betrothal, came pouring in, nothing pleased Beth so much as the fact that now it was open to her Jim to make his way in the world.
CHAPTER XVWhich Develops the Colonel's Financial Strategy
Which Develops the Colonel's Financial Strategy
To Judith Blanchard the publication of her sister's engagement was an experience. Hourly Beth came to show a new letter or present, and with head at Judith's shoulder sighed because people were so kind. Whenever this happened, the image of Mather grew a little clearer in Judith's heart, and that of Ellis so much less distinct. At the same time there rose in Judith a dread of those vague misfortunes which Jim might bring on Beth, and when one evening Ellis came to call, he found Judith inspired with a desire to protect her sister against knowledge of the real hard-heartedness of the world.
"Your sister is very happy," he said after glancing at the table on which the presents were displayed. "May she always remain so!"
Judith turned on him with a curious energy. "You think she may not?"
"I hope she may," was all he would reply.
Judith studied him for a moment, then her eyes softened. "I am very fond of Beth," she said. "We all know Jim; among us we must teach him to be more of a man."
She spoke simply, but her words moved Ellis; her assumption that he was capable of human, domestic feeling almost roused it in him, and as at their first meeting he felt that she could make him better than himself. With the mist of sisterly affection shed upon her eyes, Judith was sweeter than he had ever knownher; yet at the same time a knowledge of her pricelessness came to him, and he feared this softer side of her as the one on which she would be strongest in defense: it was Mather's side. The sole feelings which Ellis knew himself capable of rousing in her were ambition and the admiration of great things; he felt that he must keep them constantly before her.
"I have some news for you," he said. And so he found himself safely in the back parlour just as the door-bell rang for another visitor.
It was Mather who came; Beth met him with thanks for the roses he had sent, perishable signs of good wishes. Jim had grumbled at the flowers: "Why doesn't he send something practical?" But Beth had been delighted, and now told Mather so, calling Wayne to her side to echo her words. Next she spoke with still deeper gratitude, alluding to the position which had been given Jim.
"And you are glad," Mather asked, "because after this you can't see so much of him?"
"Ah," Beth replied shyly, "we shall the sooner be able to see each other all the time."
"But don't thank me," Mather continued. "It was Pease's idea. Thank me if Jimkeepshis place." He nodded at the young man with a meaning which was not exactly jovial, and which Jim (being like others of his age, half-loutish and half-assertive) resented accordingly. So Jim got himself away, to talk aimless commonplaces with the next visitor, Pease, and to glare at Mather as he still spoke with Beth.
"He's prepared to be a father to me," Jim grumbled, for, in the business talk already held, Mather had laid down application and steadiness as requisites. Jim had taken the warning indifferently, whence the renewed hint, purposely given for Beth's benefit, as Jimappreciated. "Now," he thought, "she'll rub it into me."
Meanwhile Mather and Beth spoke of matrimony, and exchanged conventionalities while they struggled with deep thoughts. They felt that they understood each other; besides, each had at the same time a regret for the other's fate. Thus Beth, with her knowledge of Ellis in the back parlour, pitied Mather, who in his turn grieved that Jim's weaknesses were unknown to Beth. But being genuinely sympathetic, Mather and Beth felt the thrill of their friendship, and were more closely drawn together by this belief in each other's impending unhappiness. Therefore, though for a time they spoke in a lighter vein, at last their feeling came to the surface. Mather had described marriage and its inconveniences, as seen from the bachelor's standpoint. "I am not afraid!" declared Beth with a toss of the head. Then with an impulse he took her hands.
"We know that troubles may come, however lucky we may seem, don't we, Beth?" he said. "Look here, if ever you need any help, you'll remember me, won't you?"
And Beth, instead of retorting that she had her father and Jim to rely on, for the moment forgot those sturdy protectors, and promised that she would. Beth was at this time always on the edge of emotional gratitude, and there was a glimmer of tears in her affectionate eyes as she answered. Then the Colonel came wandering into the room, at the same time as the voices of Judith and Ellis were heard at the door of the back parlour, and Beth and Mather separated. Jim drew her aside at once.
"Why did you hold hands with him so?" he asked.
"He's one of the oldest friends I have," she replied in surprise. "And I'm so sorry for him, Jim!" Sheled him to the window recess, and tried to interest her lover in Mather's mournful fate, but Jim did not enter into her sorrow to the degree which she anticipated. Then that happened which Mather had desired and Jim dreaded, for Beth spoke of the position at the mill: he mustn't lose it. "You will work hard, won't you, Jim dear?"
"Do you suppose I shan't?" he demanded testily. Whereby he put Beth in the wrong, so that she repressed a sigh, and begged his pardon.
Now while Jim, after this triumph, assumed a sulky dignity which was quite appropriate, the Colonel was still wandering, mentally at least, if the quality of his words with Mather and Pease was a sign. "Woolgathering," decided Mather, and relapsed into silence while the Colonel explained to Pease that the peculiar actions of the autumn weather were—ha, peculiar, and how were matters with Mr. Pease? Then the Colonel did not listen, and started when the answer was innocently ended with a question. Vaguely, he said he didn't know.
"In my business," went on Pease, apparently satisfied, "the state of the stock market occasions considerable vigilance. One does not seem able even to guess what will happen."
"No," acquiesced the Colonel, this time with an attention which the fervour of his tone attested. "That is very true."
Unhappily true, he might have said without exaggeration. Indeed, were life an opera, and had each person hisleit-motif, the Colonel would have taken wherever he went an undertone of jarring excitement. The cymbals would best express the clashing of his hopes and fears; he rose in the night to figure on bits of paper, read the news feverishly each evening, and rousedJudith's criticism of his tendency to carry away the stock-market reports. Judith was watching those stocks in which Ellis was interested, but while her concern was merely in the theory of market manipulation, the Colonel's was sadly practical.
And it was on his mind this night that he was near an end; his life's opera was approaching that grand crash when the cymbals were to be drowned by the heavier brasses. In his pocket were barely two hundred dollars in cash, he had placed his last thousand at the broker's, and the broker had sent word that he must have another in the morning. The Colonel looked at his daughters, Beth sweet and Judith proud; he looked at Pease and Ellis, safe from calamity; he looked at Jim with his youth and Mather with his strength. None of them had troubles; he alone was miserable.
And the Colonel, when he could withdraw, went into a corner and brooded over his ill-luck, thus alone, of all the company, failing to remark the special brilliancy of Judith's beauty. Ellis saw it and was proud, for he had caused it; Mather noted it and groaned, for it was not for him; Beth admired; Jim came out of his sulk, swaggered, and made up to her; even Pease was roused to a mild admiration. And Judith herself felt as if she had moved the world a foot from its orbit.
Ellis's news had been important. "Do you remember the advice you gave me?" he had inquired when the two were alone in the little parlour.
"About the corporation lawyer?" she asked eagerly. "Of course! Tell me, have you done anything with him?"
"Anything? Everything!" he responded with enthusiasm. "That magazine told all about him, and I looked him up in New York. He came on here—I don't know how I should have put it through without him."
"Then you have managed it?" she asked.
Indeed he had, he assured her. A man gets—well, misjudged by others, sometimes; there had been a prejudice to overcome before he could affect this consolidation. The others had been unusually shy; the safeguards Ellis offered had not satisfied them. But the lawyer had straightened matters out so that all had gone smoothly, and he, Ellis, had saved money by his means.
"Good!" cried Judith.
"We paid him twenty-five," Ellis said.
"Twenty-five?"
"Thousand," he explained.
"So much?" cried Judith.
"Oh," answered Ellis, "it was no great affair for him. He often gets much more."
Judith was speechless.
"And," said Ellis, "there is some one else we ought to fee, if only it were possible. But I scarcely see how I could bring her name before the directors."
"A woman?" she asked, much excited.
"You," he replied briefly, and his mouth shut with its customary firmness. But his eyes noted her exhilaration.
"I?" she demanded. "I? Do you mean that what I said was of importance?"
"You have saved us time. You have put money directly in my pocket. Ten thousand is what I calculate I've saved in concessions, and in the time gained by shortening trouble I reckon I've made as much more." He laughed. "What percentage shall I give you?"
But she would not jest. "You're welcome, welcome!" she exclaimed. "I'm satisfied, just to feel that I havebeen a factor. Just to know that I—oh, Mr. Ellis, you can't know how I feel!"
And Judith was near the danger line at that moment, as she leaned toward him with sparkling eyes. He saw it, believed his chance had come, and sought to take advantage of it. "I shall consult you always after this," he said. "I will bring you all my difficulties. A partnership—what do you say to that?"
She laughed in deprecation, yet she was flattered, and the stimulus caused her to rear her head and expand her nostrils in the way she had. In his turn he was thrilled, and fire entered his veins.
"What do you say?" he repeated, leaning toward her. "Shall we be partners?"
"A silent partnership?" she asked. "Or will you put up the sign, Ellis and Blanchard?"
The answer sprang to his lips, but he checked it, wondering if he dared venture. A glance at her face decided him; she was looking, still with those triumphant eyes, away from him, as if she saw visions of success. He spoke hoarsely.
"Not Ellis and Blanchard, but—Ellis and Ellis!"
She looked at him. "What did you say?" she asked absently, as if her thoughts had been elsewhere. Then, looking where her glance had been, he saw Mather in the farther room. Mather—and she had not heard!
"I said nothing," he answered, almost choking.
Even his discomfiture escaped her, and presently she took him to the others. Her excitement was not gone, it made her wonderfully beautiful, but though he might triumph that he had caused it, he knew that she had slipped away from him. He tried in vain to master his exasperation.
Judith's thoughts were of Mather; she felt that if she could tell him what she had done, she would crush him.This was what she had hoped for: the time when she should prove that she could influence events. He had said the world would be too much for her! Perhaps now she could break that masterfulness against which she had always rebelled. And she smiled at the quiet assurance of his manner, for he had merely started a mill and built up a business, while she had all but created a Trust! It would humble him, if he but knew.
There is no need of describing the next half-hour's doings of that mixed company. Pride and sweetness, loutishness, strength, amiability, ambition, and a feeble man's weak despair, all were together in the Blanchard's parlour, and got on very badly. It is enough to say that Judith talked with Mather, looking at him from time to time with a gleam of unexpressed thought which he did not understand; that Ellis, trying to subdue a grin of fury into a suave smile, put his hands in his pockets and clenched them there; and that by this action he exposed, protruding from his vest pocket, the end of a narrow red book at which the Colonel was presently staring as if fascinated.
Now the Colonel had once been, as already stated, what the early Victorians were fond of calling a man of substance. Hence complacence to the exclusion of persistence, and a later life dominated by the achievements of youth. He ran away from college to go to the Civil War, and at the coming of peace retired on his laurels. Arduous service in the State militia brought him his title; he married, travelled, and frittered away the years until changes in the value of property brought him face to face with what might seem the unavoidable choice, either to accommodate himself to a more modest establishment, or to go to work to earn money.
Out of the seeming deadlock the Colonel's financial insight found a way. His capital, used as income, forsome years more maintained him in the necessary way of life. Meanwhile he promised himself to regain his money by the simple means of the stock market, but when he came to apply the remedy, some perverseness in its workings made it fail, and to his astonishment he found himself at the end of his resources. To none of his friends might he turn for relief, for your friend who lends also lectures, and the Colonel could never bear that. Our esteemed warrior was, however, still fertile in resource, and his genius discovered a possible base of supplies. Hence the fascination exerted by the check-book which Ellis always carried about with him.
Some moralists might dub the Colonel weak for dwelling on this contemplation. Yet consistency is regarded as a virtue, and the Colonel was usually consistent in trying to get what he wanted. With his military eye still fixed on the end of the narrow red book, he drew near to Ellis and began to speak with him. Naturally, that which was in the Colonel's mind came first to his lips.
"The stock market has been flighty lately," quoth he.
So were girls, thought Ellis. "Very flighty," he said. "But that scarcely concerns you, I hope."
"Oh, no, no!" the Colonel hastily assured him. "And yet—Mr. Ellis, may I have a word with you in my study?"
Accustomed though he was to every turn of fortune, Ellis's heart leaped. Was the fool coming into his hands at last? Then, as he looked once more at Judith, the unduly sensitive organ made the reverse movement, contracting with a spasm of real pain. She was not even noticing him now. He followed the worthy Colonel to what was called his study.
Blanchard had no moral struggle to make before hebroached his subject. His fibre had degenerated long ago; his sole feeling was regret that he must expose himself to one who was below his station. Taking care, therefore, not to lower himself in his own eyes by subservience in word or manner, the Colonel indicated his need of a few thousands, "just to tide him over." He wondered if Ellis were willing to advance the money.
Ellis took the request quietly, and sat as if thinking. His cold face concealed a disturbance within: elation struggling with an unforeseen doubt. This collapse on the Colonel's part Ellis had watched and hoped for, yet now that it had come a dormant instinct stirred, questioning whether to control Judith by such means were not unworthy of himself. A man was fair game, but a woman—Ellis roused himself impatiently. Entirely unaccustomed to making moral decisions, he could not see that he stood at the parting of ways, and that from the moment when he leagued himself with the Colonel, deceit entered into his relations with Judith. Intolerant of what seemed a weakness, he crushed down the doubt. What was he dreaming of? The chance was too good to be lost.
Need of appearing businesslike made him ask a few questions. "What security can you offer?"
"Nothing whatever," answered the Colonel, grandly simple.
"This house?" asked Ellis.
"Twice mortgaged, and," added the Colonel as if the joke were upon his mortgagees, "out of repair."
Ellis took note of the admission; if the mortgagees knew that the house were in poor condition, they might sell cheap. "The house at Chebasset?" he inquired.
"Merely rented."
"No stocks or bonds, no other property?" Ellis persisted.
"My furniture," was all the Colonel could suggest.
This time a real repugnance seized Ellis. "Nothing of that kind," he answered sharply, feeling that to have a lien on the very chair which Judith sat in was too much. Yet the thought of her, thus again brought in, grew in spite of this spasm of right feeling, and even while he despised the Colonel for his unmanliness, his own lower nature spoke. "There is one other thing, however."
The Colonel saw his meaning. "Mr. Ellis," he cried, with fine indignation, "I mean to repay you every cent!"
But the eye of the warrior fell before that of the parvenu. "Cur!" thought Ellis. "Damn your small spirit!" Nevertheless, he drew out his check-book. "You will give your note, of course?"
"Of course!" replied the Colonel with dignity. Two documents changed hands, one in fact, the other by courtesy representing the value of five thousand dollars. Then Ellis refused the Colonel's invitation to stay and smoke; the transaction tasted badly in his mouth.
"But at least you will come into the parlour again," said the Colonel, when they were once more in the front hall. Ellis stood without replying, and the Colonel waited while he looked in at the others.
Pease had gone, the other four remained, and Mather was the center of the group. Wayne was regarding him resentfully, Beth affectionately, Judith unfathomably. She still remembered the news which Ellis had brought.
"So you are glad to be a city man again?" asked Beth of Mather.
"Yes," he replied, "but poor Jim!"
"Poor Jim!" echoed Beth tenderly.
"He can stand it," testily rejoined the object of their sympathy.
"I don't know that I shall feel at home here, after being a countryman so long," said Mather. "Will you tell me all that has happened down-town in my absence. Judith?"
Without answering, she threw him a glance, meaning that she could—if she would! In the hall Ellis turned abruptly away, and gathered up his hat and coat.
"No, I won't come in," he said to the Colonel, and went away at once.
His hold on Blanchard, now that it was gained, seemed unaccountably small. It would grow, Ellis had no doubt of that, for the Colonel was on the road down hill; and yet the relationship promised less than it might. For though by this means Ellis might win possession of Judith, he wanted more than that; he must have her esteem. And Mather had taken her mind from him! Ellis grew hot and cold with that strange feeling whose name he could not discover, while yet its disturbances were stronger from day to day.
For the Colonel another act of his opera began with a pleasant jig; cheered, he retired to his study, and began to plan how to double Ellis's note. Jim took Beth away into the back parlour, where presently the light grew dim. As the two went, Judith saw Beth's upward glance into her lover's face, and her own thoughts changed and grew soft; she turned to watch Mather as he sat before what had been, earlier in the evening, a wood fire.
She noticed how natural it seemed for him to gather the embers together, put on wood from the basket, and start a little blaze. The action first carried her back to the period before he was her declared lover; next it drew her thoughts forward to a time when he might be—what Jim was to Beth. And Mather, unconsciouslyworking at the fire, started for Judith a train of musing.
Beth had taught her that to love was enviable, and that it might be a relief to have one's future fixed. Sitting thus with Mather, it seemed to Judith that just so must many a husband and wife be sitting, contented and at home. When compared with the restless dissatisfaction which so long had tormented her, the picture was alluring. Judith gave herself to the mood.
Mather toyed with the tongs for a minute longer, then gave the logs a final tap into place, and turned to her as if rousing from thought. "It's pleasant to be here," he said, "and it's fine to be in the city. I like to meet people on the street again. It's as if I had had years of exile."
She smiled without replying, and he went on. "I think it's done me good. Curious, isn't it, that to be knocked down and kicked out, and then to go away and look at people through a telescope, should be a real benefit? But I've gained a better perspective than before; I've had time to think of the theory as well as the practice of affairs. Yes, it's been healthful—but it's good to be back. You understand what I mean, don't you, Judith?"
"I do," she answered. Ellis was forgotten; here was George speaking as he had not spoken for a year, of his ideas and experiences. She was glad to have them brought to her, glad that he spoke freely and not bitterly, and again the remembrance of Beth's happiness brought a vision of closer relationship.
He noted the softness of her mood, and without effort let the time drift on, careful only not to disturb this harmony, until at last he felt that the talk should be stopped before it ended of itself, and so he took his leave.
She gave him one of her direct looks as she offered her hand. "You have been too busy, George," she said. "Come oftener." With the firm hand-clasp to express the undercurrent of their thoughts, they parted. Alone again by the fire, Judith indulged herself by looking forward. One could drift into marriage, easily and agreeably.
Then she heard Jim say good-night, and Beth came and leaned upon her chair. "I want to tell you what Mr. Fenno said to me this afternoon," said Beth. "About George and the new combination of the cotton millers."
"What had George to do with that?" asked Judith.
"The Wampum Mills held out a long while," answered Beth; "the whole thing depended upon them. Mr. Fenno is president; George is a director, but he sent in his resignation soon after he went to Chebasset, and didn't attend their meetings for weeks."
"Well?" asked Judith.
"Well, the directors couldn't make up their minds, and at last they refused to accept George's resignation, and sent for him. He looked into the matter, and then he——" Beth paused to laugh.
"Go on," begged Judith.
"He scolded them for not jumping at the chance. Mr. Fenno said he hadn't been so lectured since he was a boy; he was much pleased by it. So the Wampum Mills went into the combination three days ago, all of the little mills followed at once, and they expect to do almost double business now. Isn't it fine of George?"
"Fine!" agreed Judith, but her gentler mood was destroyed. Ellis also had had part in the combination, the greater part. If one were to compare the achievements and to choose between the men, if one were to do rather than to dream——! She threw off her thoughtsof Mather as one throws off a cloak and looks upon it lying shapeless. Life and action suddenly called her again; she, too, had influenced this matter. She remembered Ellis's acknowledgment of indebtedness, the suggestion of partnership, and the compliment pleased her. Mather passed completely from her mind, and Ellis dominated her as before.