"You are absolutely mistaken——"
"No doubt, James. But whether I am or not makes absolutely no difference to me—or to Jacqueline Nevers——"
"What do you mean by that?"
"What I say, exactly. It will make no difference to Jacqueline, because you are going to keep your distance."
"Do you think so?"
"If you don't keep away from her I'll tell her a few things. Listen to me very carefully, James. You think I'm fond of you, don't you? Well, I am. But I've taken a fancy to Jacqueline Nevers that—well, if I were not childless I might feel it less deeply. I've put my arms around her once and for all. Now do you understand?"
"I tell you," he said steadily, "you are mistaken in believing——"
"Very well. Granted. What of it? One dirty little intrigue more or less doesn't alter what you are and have been. The plain point of the matter is this, James: you are not fit to aspire seriously to Jacqueline Nevers. Are you? I ask you, now, honestly; are you?"
"Does that concern you?"
She fairly snapped her teeth and her eyes sparkled:
"Yes; it concerns me! Keep away! I warn you—you and the rest of the Jacks and Reggies and similar assorted pups. Your hunting ground is elsewhere."
A sort of cold fury possessed him: "You had better not say anything to Miss Nevers about what you overheard in this room," he said in a colourless voice.
"I'll use my own judgment," she retorted tartly.
"Use mine. It is perhaps better. Don't interfere."
"Don't be a fool, James."
"Will you listen to me——"
"About Elena Clydesdale?" she asked maliciously.
"There is nothing to tell about her."
"Naturally. I never heard the Desboros were blackguards—only a trifle airy, James—a trifle gallant! Dear child, don't anger me. You know it wouldn't be well for you."
"I ask you merely to mind your business."
"That I shall do. My life's business is Jacqueline. You yourself made her so——" Malice indescribable snapped in her tiny black eyes, and she laughed harshly. "You made that motherless girl my business. Ask yourself if you've ever, inadvertently, done as decent a thing?"
"Do you understand that I wish to marry her?" he asked, white with passion.
"You!What do I care what your patronising intentions may be? And, James, if you drive me to it——" she fairly glared at him, "—I'll destroy even your acquaintanceship with her. And I possess the means to do it!"
"Try it!" he motioned with dry lips.
A moment later the animated chatter of young people filled the room, and among them sounded Jacqueline's voice.
"Oh!" she said, laughing, when she saw Mrs. Hammerton and Desboro coming from the embrasure of the window. "Have you been flirting again, Aunt Hannah!"
"Yes," said the old lady grimly, "and I think I've taken him into camp."
"Then it's my turn," said Jacqueline. "Come on, Mr. Desboro, you can't escape me. I'm going to beat you a game of rabbit!"
Everybody drifted into the billiard-room at their heels, and found them already at their stations on either side of the pool table, each one covering the side pocket with left hand spread wide. Jacqueline had the cue-ball; it lay on the cloth in front of her, and her slim right hand covered it.
"Ready?" she asked of Desboro.
"Ready," he said, watching her.
She made a feint; he sprang to the left; she shot the ball toward the right corner pocket, missed, carromed, and tried to recover it; but Desboro's arm shot out across the cloth and he seized it and shot it at her left corner pocket. It went in with a plunk!
"One for Jim!" said Reggie gravely, and, picking up a cue, scored with a button overhead.
"Plunk!" went the ball again into the same pocket; and Jacqueline gave a little cry of dismay as Desboro leaned far over the table, threatening, feinting, moving the ball so fast she could scarcely follow his hand. Then she thought she saw the crisis coming, sprang toward the left corner pocket, gave a cry of terror, and plunk! went the ball into her side pocket.
Flushed, golden hair in pretty disorder, she sprang back on guard again, and the onlookers watched the movement of her hands, fascinated by their grace and beauty as she defended her side of the table and, finally, snatched the ball from the very jaws of the right corner.
It was a breathless, exciting game, even for rabbit, and was foughtto a furious finish; but she went down to defeat, and Desboro came around the table to condole with her, and together they stepped aside to leave the arena free for Katharine Frere and Reggie.
"I'm so sorry, dear," he said under his breath.
"It's what I want, Jim. Never let me take the lead again—in anything."
His laugh was not genuine. He glanced across the room and saw Aunt Hannah pretending not to watch him. Near her stood Elena Clydesdale beside her husband, making no such pretence.
He said in a low voice: "Jacqueline, would you marry me as soon as I can get a license—if I asked you to do it?"
She blushed furiously; then walked over to the window and gazed out, dismayed and astounded. He followed.
"Will you, dear? I have the very best of reasons for asking you."
"Could you tell me the reasons, Jim?" she asked, still dazed.
"I had rather not—if you don't mind. Will you trust me when I say it is better for us to marry quietly and at once?"
She looked up at him dumbly, the scarlet slowly fading from brow and cheek.
"Do you trust me?" he repeated.
"Yes—I trust you."
"Will you marry me, then, as soon as I can arrange for it?"
She was silent.
"Will you?" he urged.
"Jim—darling—I wanted to be equipped—I wanted to have some pretty things, in order to—to be at my very best—for you. A girl is a bride only once in her life; a man remembers her as she came to him first."
"Dearest, as I saw you first, so I will always think of you."
"Oh, Jim! In that black gown and cuffs and collar!"
"You don't understand men, dear. No coronation robe ever could compete with that dress in my affections. You always are perfect; I never saw you when you weren't bewitching——"
"But, dear, there are other things——"
"We'll buy them together!"
"Jim,mustwe do it this way? I don't mean that I wished for any ostentation——"
"I did! I would have wished for a ceremony suited to your beauty and——"
"No, no! I didn't expect——"
"But I did—damn it!" he said between his teeth. "I wished it; I expected it. Don't you think I know what a girl ought to have? Indeed I do, Jacqueline. And in New York town another century will never see a bride to compare with you! But, my darling, I cannot risk it!"
"Risk it?"
"Don't ask me any more."
"No."
"And—will you do it—for my sake?"
"Yes."
There was a silence between them; he lighted a cigarette, turned coolly around, and glanced across the room. Elena instantly averted her gaze. Mrs. Hammerton sustained his pleasant inspection with an unchanging stare almost insolent.
After a moment he smiled at her. It was a mistake to do it.
After luncheon, Elena Clydesdale found an opportunity for a word with him.
"Will you remember that you have an engagement to-night?" she said in a guarded voice.
"I shall break it," he replied.
"What!"
"This is going to end here and now! Your business is with your husband. He's a decent fellow; he's devoted to you. I won't even discuss it with you. Break with him if you want to, but don't count on me!"
"I can't break with him unless I can count on you. Are you going to lie to me, Jim?"
"You can call it what you like. But if you break with him it will end our friendship."
"I tell you I'vegotto break with him. I've got to do it now—at once!"
"Why?"
"Because—because I've got to. I can't go on fencing with him."
"Oh!"
She crimsoned and set her little white teeth.
"I've got to leave him or be what—I won't be!"
"Then break with him," he said contemptuously, "and give a decent man another chance in life!"
"I can't—unless you——"
"Good God! I'd sooner cut my throat. My sympathy is for your husband. You're convicting yourself, I tell you! I've always had a dim idea that he was all right. Now I know it—and my obligations to you are ended."
"Then—you leave me—to him? Answer me, Jim. You refuse to stand between me and my—my degradation? Is that what you mean to do? Knowing I have no other means of escaping it except through you—except by defying the world with you!"
She broke off with a sob.
"Elena," he said, "your one salvation in this world is to have children! It will mean happiness and honour for you both—mutual respect, and, if not romantic love, at least a cordial understanding and mutual toleration. If you have such a chance, don't throw it away. Your husband is a slow, intelligent, kind, and patient man, who has borne much from you because he is honestly in love with you. Don't mistake his consideration for weakness, his patience for acquiescence. What kindness you have pretended to show him recently has given him courage. He is trying to make good because he believes that he can win you. This is clear reason; it is logic, Elena."
She turned on him in a flash of tears and exasperation.
"Logic! Do you think a woman wants that?" she stammered. "Do you think a woman arrives at any conclusion through the kind of reasoning that satisfies men? What difference does what you say make to me, when I hatehimand I loveyou? How does your logic help me to escape what is—is abhorrent to me! Do you suppose your reasoning makes it more endurable? Oh, Jim! For heaven's sake don't leave me to that—that man! Let me come here this evening after he has gone, and try to explain to you how I——"
"No."
"You won't!"
"No. I am going to town with Mrs. Hammerton and Miss Nevers on the evening train. And some day I am going to marry Miss Nevers."
During her week's absence from town Jacqueline's mail had accumulated; a number of business matters had come into the office, the disposal of which now awaited her decision—requests from wealthy connoisseurs for expert opinion, offers to dispose of collections entire or in part, invitations to dealers' secret conferences, urgent demands for appraisers, questions concerning origin or authenticity, commissions to buy, sell, advertise, or send searchers throughout the markets at home or abroad for anything from a tiny shrine of Limoges enamel to a complete suit of equestrian armour to fill a gap in a series belonging to some rich man's museum.
On the evening of her arrival at the office, she was beset by her clerks and salesmen, bringing to her hundreds of petty routine details requiring her personal examination. Also, it appeared that one of her clients had been outrageously swindled by a precious pair of fly-by-nights; and the matter required immediate investigation. So she was obliged to telephone to Mrs. Hammerton that she could not dine with her at the Ritz, and to Desboro that she could not see him for a day or two. In Desboro's case, a postscript added: "Except for a minute, dearest, whenever you come."
She did not even take the time to dine that evening, but settled down at her office desk as soon as the retail shop below was closed; and, with the tea urn and a rack of toast at her elbow, plunged straight into the delightfully interesting chaos confronting her.
As far as the shop was concerned, the New Year, as usual, had brought to that part of the business a lull in activity. It always happened so after New Years; and the stagnation steadily increased as spring approached, until by summer time the retail business was practically dead.
But a quiet market did not mean that there was nothing for her to do. Warehouse sales must be watched, auctions, public and private, in town and country, must be attended by one or more of her representatives; private clients inclined to sell always required tactful handling and careful consideration; her confidential agents must always be alert.
Also, always her people were continually searching for various objects ardently desired by all species of acquisitive clients; she must keep in constant touch with everything that was happening in her business abroad; she must keep abreast of her times at home, which required much cleverness, intuition, and current reading, and much study in the Museum and among private collections to which she had access. She was a very, very busy girl, almost too busy at moments to remember that she had fallen in love.
That night she worked alone in her office until long after midnight; and all the next day until noon she was busy listening to or instructing salesmen, clerks, dealers, experts, auctioneers, and clients. Also, the swindle and the swindlers were worrying her extremely.
Luncheon had been served on a tray beside her desk, and she was still absent-mindedly going over the carbon files of business letters, which she had dictated and dispatched that morning, when Desboro's card was brought to her. She sent word that she would receive him.
"Will you lunch withme, Jim?" she asked demurely, when he had appeared and shaken hands vigorously. "I've a fruit salad and some perfectly delicious sherbet! Please sit on the desk top and help me consume the banquet."
"Do you call that a banquet, darling?" he demanded. "Come out to the Ritz with me this instant——"
"Dearest! I can't! Oh, you don't know what an exciting and interesting mess my business affairs are in! A girl always has to pay for her pleasure. But in this case it's a pleasure to pay. Bring up that chair and share my luncheon like a good fellow, so we can chat together for a few minutes. It's all the time I can give you to-day, dearest."
He pulled up a chair and seated himself, experiencing somewhat mixed emotions in the presence of such bewildering business capability.
"You make me feel embarrassed and ashamed," he said. "Rotten loafer that I am! And you so energetic and industrious—you darling thing!"
"But, dear, your farmer can't plow frozen ground, you know; all your men can do just now is to mend fences and dump fertiliser and lime and gypsum over everything. And I believe they were doing that when I left."
"If," he said, "I were a real instead of a phony farmer, I'd read catalogues about wire fences; I'd find plenty to do if I were not a wretched sham. It's only, I hope, because you're in town that I can't drive myself back where I belong. I ought to be sitting in a wood-shed, in overalls, whittling sticks and yelling bucolic wisdom at Ezra Vail—— Oh, you needn't laugh, darling, but that's where I ought to be, and what I ought to be doing if I'm ever going to support awife!"
"Jim! You'renotgoing to support a wife! You absurd boy!"
"What!" he demanded, losing countenance.
"Did you think you were obliged to support me? How ridiculous! I'd be perfectly miserable——"
"Jacqueline! What on earth do you mean? We are going to live on my income."
"Indeed we are not! What use would I be to you if I brought you nothing except an idle, useless, lazy girl to support! It's unthinkable!"
"Do you expect toremainin business?" he asked, incredulously.
"Certainly I expect it!"
"But—darling——"
"Jim! Ilovemy business. It was father's business; it represents my childhood, my girlhood, my maturity. Every detail of it is inextricably linked with memories of him—the dearest memories, the tenderest associations of my life! Do you wish me to give them up?"
"How can you be my wife, Jacqueline, and still remain a business woman?"
"Dear, I am certainly going to marry you. Permit me to arrange the rest. It will not interfere with my being your devoted and happy wife. It wouldn't ever interfere with—with my being a—a perfectly good mother—if that's what you fear. If it did, do you suppose I'd hesitate to choose?"
"No," he said, adoring her.
"Indeed, I wouldn't! But remaining in business will give me what every girl should have as a right—an object in life apart from her love for her husband—and children—apart from her proper domestic duties. It is her right to engage in the business of life; it makes the contract between you and me fairer. I love you more than anything in the world, but I simply couldn't keep my self-respect and depend on you for everything I have."
"But, my darling, everything I have is already yours."
"Yes, I know. We can pretend it is. I know Icouldhave it—just as you could have this rather complicated business of mine—if you want it."
"Oh, Lord!" he exclaimed. "Imagine the fury of a connoisseur who engaged me to identify his priceless penates!"
He was laughing, too, now. They had finished their fruit salad and sherbet; she lighted a cigarette for him, taking a dainty puff and handing it to him with an adorable shudder.
"Idon'tlike it! I don't like any vices! How women can enjoy what men enjoy is a mystery to me. Smoke slowly, darling, because when that cigarette is finished you must make a very graceful bow and say good-bye to me until to-morrow."
"This is simply devilish, Jacqueline! I never see you any more."
"Nonsense! You have plenty to do to amuse you—haven't you, dear?"
But the things that once occupied his leisure so casually and so agreeably no longer attracted him.
"I don't want to read seed catalogues," he protested. "Couldn't I be of use to you, Jacqueline? I'll do anything you say—take off my coat and sweep out your office, or go behind the counter in the shop and sell gilded gods——"
"Imagine the elegant Mr. Desboro selling antiquities to the dangerous monomaniacs who haunt such shops as mine! Dear, they'd either drive you crazy or have you arrested for fraud inside of ten minutes. No; you will make a perfectly good husband, Jim, but you were never created to decorate an antique shop."
He tried to smile, but only flushed rather painfully. A sudden and wholly inexplicable sense of inferiority possessed him.
"You know," he said, "I'm not going to stand around idle while you run a prosperous business concern. And anyway, I can't see it, Jacqueline. You and I are going to have a lot of social obligations to——"
"We are likely to have all kinds of obligations," she interrupted serenely, "and our lives are certain to be very full, and you and I are going to be equal to every opportunity, every demand, every responsibility—and still have leisure to love each other, and to be to each other everything that either could desire."
"After all," he said, serious and unconvinced, "there are only twenty-four hours in a day for us to be together."
"Yes, darling, but there will be no wasted time in those twenty-four hours. That is where we save a sufficient number of minutes to attend to the business of life."
"Do you mean that you intend to come into this office every day?"
"For a while, yes. Less frequently when I have trained my people a little longer. What do you suppose my father was doing all his life? What do you suppose I have been doing these last three years? Why, Jim, except that hitherto I have loved to fuss overdetails, this office and this business could almost run itself for six months at a time. Some day, except for special clients here and there, Lionel Sissly will do what expert work I now am doing; and this desk will be his; and his present position will be filled by Mr. Mirk. That is how it is planned. And if you had given me two or three months, I might have been able to go on a bridal trip with you!"
"Wearegoing, aren't we?" he asked, appalled.
"If I've got to marry you offhand," she said seriously, "our wedding trip will have to wait. Don't you know, dear, that it always costs heavily to do anything in a hurry? At this time of year, and under the present conditions of business, and considering my contracts and obligations, it would be utterly impossible for me to go away again until summer."
He sprang up irritated, yet feeling utterly helpless under her friendly but level gaze. Already he began to realise the true significance of her position and his own in the world; how utterly at a moral disadvantage he stood before this young girl—moral, intellectual, spiritual—he was beginning to comprehend it all now.
A dull flush of anger made his face hot and altered his expression to sullenness. Where was all this leading them, anyway—this reversal of rôles, this self-dependent attitude of hers—this calm self-reliance—this freedom of decision?
Once he had supposed there was something in her to protect, to guide, advise, make allowance for—perhaps to persuade, possibly, even, to instruct. Such has been the immemorial attitude of man; it had been instinctively, and more or less unconsciously, his.
And now, in spite of her youth, her soft pliability, her almost childish grace and beauty, he was experiencing a half-dazed sensation as though, in full and confident career, he had come, slap! into collision with an occult barrier. And the impact was confusing him and even beginning to hurt him.
He looked around him uneasily. Everything in the office, somehow, seemed to be in subtle league with her to irritate him—her desk, her loaded letter-files, her stacks of ledgers—all these accused and offended him. But most of all his own helpless inferiority made him angry and ashamed—the inferiority of idleness confronted by industry; of aimlessness face to face with purpose; of irresolution and degeneracy scrutinised by fearlessness, confidence, and happy and innocent aspiration. And the combination silenced him.
And every mute second that he stood there, he felt as though something imperceptible, intangible, was slipping away from him—perhaps his man's immemorial right to lead, to decide, to direct the common destiny of this slim, sweet-lipped young girl and himself.
For it was she who was serenely deciding—who had already laid out the business of life for herself without hesitation, without resort to him, to his man's wisdom, experience, prejudices, wishes, desires. Moreover, she was leaving him absolutely free to decide his own business in life for himself; and that made her position unassailable. For if she had presumed to advise him, to suggest, even hint at anything interfering with his own personal liberty to decide for himself, he might have found some foothold, some niche, something to sustain him, to justify him, in assuming man's immemorial right to leadership.
"Dear," she said wistfully, "you look at me with such very troubled eyes. Is there anything I have said that you disapprove?"
"I had not expected you to remain in business," was all he found to say.
"If my remaining in business ever interferes with your happiness or with my duty to you, I will give it up. You know that, don't you?"
He reddened again.
"It looks queer," he muttered, "—your being in business and I—playing farmer—like one of those loafing husbands of celebrated actresses."
"Jim!" she exclaimed, scarlet to the ears. "What a horrid simile!"
"It's myself I'm cursing out," he said, almost angrily. "I can't cut such a figure. Don't you understand, Jacqueline? I haven't anything to occupy me! Do you expect me to hang around somewhere while you work? I tell you, I've got to find something to do as soon as we're married—or I couldn't look you in the face."
"That is for you to decide. Isn't it?" she asked sweetly.
"Yes, but on what am I to decide?"
"Whatever you decide, don't do it in a hurry, dear," she said, smiling.
The sullen sense of resentment returned, reddening his face again:
"I wouldn't have to hurry if you'd give up this business and live on our income and be free to travel and knock about with me——"
"Can't you understand that Iwillbe free to be with you—free in mind, in conscience, in body, to travel with you, be with you, be to you whatever you desire—but only if I keep my self-respect! And I can't keep that if I neglect the business of life, which, in my case, lies partly here in this office."
She rose and laid one slim, pretty hand on his shoulder. She rarely permitted herself to touch him voluntarily.
"Don't you wish me to be happy?" she asked gently.
"It's all I wish in the world, Jacqueline."
"But I couldn't be happy and remain idle; remain dependent on you for anything—except love. Life to the full—every moment filled—that is what living means to me. And only one single thing never can fill one's life—not intellectual research alone; not spiritual remoteness; nor yet the pursuit of pleasure; nor the swift and endless hunt for happiness; nor even love, dearest among men! Only the business of life can quite fill life to the brimming for me; and that business is made up of everything worthy—of the pleasures of effort, duty, aspiration, and noble repose, but never of the pleasures of idleness. Jim, have I bored you with a sermon? Forgive me; I am preaching only to instruct myself."
He took her hand from his shoulder and stood holding it and looking at her with a strange expression. So dazed, yet so terribly intent he seemed at moments that she laid her other hand over his, pressing it in smiling anxiety.
"What is it, dearest?" she murmured. "Don't you approve of me as much as you thought you did? Am I disappointing you already?"
"Good God!" he muttered to himself. "If there is a heaven, and your sort inhabit it, hell was reformed long ago."
"What are you muttering all to yourself, Jim?" she insisted. "What troubles you?"
"I'll tell you. You've picked the wrong man. I'm absolutely unfit for you. I know about all those decent things you believe in—all the things youare! But I don't know about them from personal experience; I never did anything decent because it was my duty to do it—except by accident. I never took a spiritual interest in anything or anybody, including myself! I never made a worthy effort; I never earned one second's worth of noble repose. And now—if there's anything in me to begin on—it's probably my duty to release you until I have made something of myself, before I come whining around asking you to marry a man not fit to marry——"
"My darling!" she protested, half laughing, half in tears, and closing his angry lips with both her hands. "I wantyou, not a saint or a holy man, or an archangel fresh from paradise! I want you as youare—as you have been—as you are going to be dear! Did any girl who ever lived find pleasure in perfection? Even in art it is undesirable. That's the beauty of aspiration; the pleasures of effort never pall. I don't know whether I'm laughing or crying, Jim! You look so solemn and miserable, and—and funny! But if you try to look dignified now, I'll certainly laugh! You dear, blessed, overgrown boy—just as bad as you possibly can be! Just as funny and unreasonable and perverse as are all boys! But Jacqueline loves you dearly—oh, dearly—and she trusts you with her heart and her happiness and with every beauty yet undreamed and unrevealed that a girl could learn to desire onearth! Are you contented? Oh, Jim! Jim! If you knew how I adore you! You must go, dear. It will mean a long night's work for me if you don't. But it's so hard to let you go—when I—love you so! When I love you so! Good-bye. Yes, to-morrow. Don't call at noon; Mrs. Hammerton is coming for a five-minute chat. And I do want you to myself for the few moments we may have together. Come about five and we can have tea here beside my desk."
He came next day at five. The day after that he arrived at the same hour, bringing with him her ring; and, as he slipped it over her finger, for the first time her self-control slipped, too, and she bent swiftly and kissed the jewel that he was holding.
Then, flushed and abashed, she shrank away, an exquisite picture of confusion, and stood turning and turning the ring around, her head obstinately lowered, absolutely unresponsive again to his arm around her and his cheek resting close against hers.
"What a beauty of a ring, Jim!" she managed to say at last. "No other engagement ring ever existed half as lovely and splendid as my betrothal ring. I am sorry for all the empresses and queens and princesses who can never hope to possess a ring to equal the ring of Jacqueline Nevers, dealer in antiquities."
"Nor can they hope to possess such a hand to adorn it," he said, "—the most beautiful, the purest, whitest, softest, most innocent hand in the world! The magic hand of Jacqueline!"
"Do you like it?" she asked, shyly conscious of its beauty.
"It is matchless, darling. Let empresses shriek with envy."
"I'm listening very intently, but I don't hear them. Jim. Also, I've seen a shop-girl with far lovelier hands. But please go on thinking so and hearing crowned heads shriek. I rather like your imagination."
He laughed from sheer happiness:
"I've got something to whisper to you. Shall I?"
"What?"
"Shall I whisper it?"
She inclined her small head daintily, then:
"Oh!" she exclaimed, startled and blushing to the tips of her ears.
"Will you be ready?"
"I—yes. Yes—I'll be ready——"
"Does it make you happy?"
"I can't realise—I didn't know it was to be so soon—so immediate——"
"We'll go to Silverwood. We can catch the evening express——"
"Dearest!"
"You can go away with me foroneweek, can't you?"
"I can't go now!" she faltered.
"For how long can you go, Jacqueline?"
"I—I've got to be back on Tuesday morning."
"Tuesday!"
"Isn't it dreadful, Jim. But I can't avoid it if we are to be married on Monday next. I must deal honourably by my clients who trust me. I warned you that our wedding trip would have to be postponed if you married me this way—didn't I, dear?"
"Yes."
She stood looking at him timidly, almost fearfully, as he took two or three quick, nervous steps across the floor, turned and came back to her.
"All right," he said. "Our wedding trip will have to wait, then; but our wedding won't. We'll be married Monday, go to Silverwood, and come back Tuesday—if it's a matter of honour. I never again mean to interfere with your life's business, Jacqueline. You know what is best; you are free and entitled to the right of decision."
"Yes. But because Imustdecide about things that concern myself alone, you don't think I adore you any the less, do you, Jim?"
"Nor do I love you the less, Jacqueline, because I can decide nothing for you, do nothing for you."
"Jim! Youcandecide everything for me—do everything! And youhavedone everything for me—by giving me my freedom to decide for myself!"
"Igave it to you, Jacqueline?"
"Did you think I would have taken it if you had refused it?"
"But you said your happiness depended on it."
"Which is why you gave it to me, isn't it?" she asked seriously.
He laughed. "You wonderful girl, to make me believe that any generosity of mine is responsible for your freedom!"
"But it is! Otherwise, I would have obeyed you and been disgraced in my own estimation."
"Do you mean that mine is to be the final decision always?"
"Why, of course, Jim."
He laughed again. "Empty authority, dear—a shadowy symbol of traditional but obsolete prerogative."
"You are wrong. Your decision is final. But—as I know it will always be for my happiness, I can always appeal from your prejudice to your intelligence," she added naïvely. And for a moment was surprised at his unrestrained laughter.
"What does it matter?" she admitted, laughing, too. "Between you and me the right thing always will be done sooner or later."
His laughter died out; he said soberly: "Always, God willing. It may be a little hard for me to learn—as it's hard, now, for example, to say good-bye."
"Jim!"
"You know I must, darling."
"But I don't mind sitting up a few minutes later to-night——"
"I know you don't. But here's where I exercise my harmlessly arbitrary authority for your happiness and for the sake of your good digestion."
"What a brute you are!"
"I know it. Back to your desk, darling! And go to bed early."
"I wanted you to stay——"
"Ha! So you begin to feel the tyranny of man! I'm going! I've got a job, too, if you want to know."
"What!"
"Certainly! How long did you suppose I could stand it to see you at that desk and then go and sit in a silly club?"
"What do you mean, darling?" she asked, radiant.
"I mean that Jack Cairns, who is a broker, has offered me a job at a small but perfectly proper salary, with the usual commission on all business I bring in to the office. And I've taken it!"
"But, dear——"
"Oh, Vail can run my farm without any advice from me. I'm going to give him more authority and hold him responsible. If the place can pay for itself and let us keep the armour and jades, that's all I ask of it. But I am asking more of myself—since I have begun to really know you. And I'm going to work for our bread and butter, and earn enough to support us both and lay something aside. You know we've got to think of that, because——" He looked very serious, hesitated, bent and whispered something that sent the bright colour flying in her cheeks; then he caught her hand and kissed the ring-finger.
"Good-bye," she murmured, clinging for an instant to his hand.
The next moment he was gone; and she stood alone for a while by her desk, his ring resting against her lips, her eyes closed.
Sunday she spent with him. They went together to St. John's Cathedral in the morning—the first time he had been inside a church in years. And he was in considerable awe of the place and of her until they finally emerged into the sunshine of Morningside Park.
Under a magnificent and cloudless sky, they walked together, silent or loquacious by turns, bold and shy, confident and timid. And she was a little surprised to find that, in the imminence of marriage, her trepidation was composure itself compared to the anxiety which seemed to assail him. All he had thought of was the license and the clergyman; and they had attended to those matters together. But she had wished him to have Jack Cairns present, and had told him that she desired to ask some friend of her girlhood to be her bridesmaid.
"Have you done so?" he inquired, as they descended the heights of Morningside, the beautiful weather tempting them to a long homeward stroll through Central Park.
"Yes, Jim, I must tell you about her. She, like myself, is not a girl that men of your sort might expect to meet——"
"The loss is ours, Jacqueline."
"That is very sweet of you. Only I had better tell you about Cynthia Lessler——"
"Who?" he asked, astonished.
"Cynthia Lessler, my girlhood friend."
"She is an actress, isn't she?"
"Yes. Her home life was very unhappy. But I think she has much talent, too."
"She has."
"I am glad you think so. Anyway, she is my oldest friend, and I have asked her to be my bridesmaid to-morrow."
He continued silent beside her so long that she said timidly:
"Do you mind, Jim?"
"I was only thinking—how it might look in the papers—and there are other girls you already know whose names would mean a lot——"
"Yes, I know. But I don't want to pretend to be what I amnot, even in the papers. I suppose I do need all the social corroboration I can have. I know what you mean, dear. But there were reasons. I thought it all over. Cynthia is an old friend, not very happy, not the fortunate and blessed girl that your love is making of me. But she is good and sweet and loyal to me, and I can't abandon old friends, especially one who is not very fortunate—and I—I thought perhaps it might help her a little—in various ways—to be my bridesmaid."
"That is like you," he said, reddening. "You never say or do anything but there lies in it some primary lesson in decency to me."
"You goose! Isn't it natural for a girl to wish for her oldest friend at such a time? That's really all there is to the matter. And I do hope you will like Cynthia."
He nodded, preoccupied. After a few moments he said:
"Did you know that Jack Cairns had met her?"
"Yes."
"Oh!" His troubled eyes sought hers, then shifted.
"That was another reason I wish to ask her," she said in a low voice.
"What reason?"
"Because Mr. Cairns knew her only as a very young, very lonely, very unhappy girl, inexperienced, friendless, poor, almost shelterless; and engaged in a profession upon which it is almost traditional for men to prey. And I wish him to know her again as a girl who is slowly advancing in an honest profession—as a modest, sweet, self-respecting woman—and as my friend."
"And mine," he said.
"You—darling!" she whispered.
They were married in the morning at St. George's in Stuyvesant Square.
Gay little flurries of snow, like wind-blown petals from an apple bough, were turning golden in the warm outbreak of brilliant sunshine; and there was blue sky overhead and shining wet pavements under foot as Jacqueline and Desboro came out of the shadows of the old-time church into the fresh splendour of the early morning.
The solemn beauty of the service still possessed and enthralled them. Except for a low word or two, they were inclined to silence.
But the mating sparrows were not; everywhere the little things, brown wings a-quiver, chattered and chirped in the throes of courtship; now and then, from some high façade rang out the clear, sweet whistle of a starling; and along the warm, wet streets ragged children were selling violets and narcissus, and yellow tulips tinted as delicately as the pale spring sunshine.
A ragged little girl came to stare at Jacqueline, the last unsold bunch of wilted violets lying on her tray; and Jacqueline laid the cluster over the prayer-book which she was carrying, while Desboro slipped a golden coin into the child's soiled hand.
Down the street his chauffeur was cranking the car; and while they waited for it to draw up along the curb, Jacqueline separated a few violets from the faintly fragrant cluster and placed them between the leaves of her prayer-book.
After a few moments he said, under his breath:
"Do you realise that we are married, Jacqueline?"
"No. Do you?"
"I'm trying to comprehend it, but I can't seem to. How soft the breeze blows! It is already spring in Stuyvesant Square."
"The Square is lovely! They will be setting out hyacinths soon, I think." She shivered. "It's strange," she said, "but I feel rather cold. Am I horridly pale, Jim?"
"You are a trifle colourless—but even prettier than I ever saw you," he whispered, turning up the collar of her fur coat around her throat. "You haven't taken cold, have you?"
"No; it is—natural—I suppose. Miracles frighten one at first."
Their eyes met; she tried to smile. After a moment he said nervously:
"I sent out the announcements. The evening papers will have them."
"I want to see them, Jim."
"You shall. I have ordered all this evening's and to-morrow morning's papers. They will be sent to Silverwood."
The car rolled up along the curb and stopped.
"Can't I take you to your office?" he whispered.
"No, dear."
She laid one slim hand on his arm and stood for a moment looking at him.
"How pale you are!" he said again, under his breath.
"Brides are apt to be. It's only a swift and confused dream to me yet—all that has happened to us to-day; and even this sunshine seems unreal—like the first day of spring in paradise!"
She bent her proud little head and stood in silence as though unseen hands still hovered above her, and unseen lips were still pronouncing her his wife. Then, lifting her eyes, winningly and divinely beautiful, she looked again on this man whom the world was to call her husband.
"Will you be ready at five?" he whispered.
"Yes."
They lingered a moment longer; he said:
"I don't know how I am going to endure life without you until five o'clock."
She said seriously: "I can't bear to leave you, Jim. But you know you have almost as many things to do as I have."
"As though a man could attend tothingson his wedding day!"
"This girlhasto. I don't know how I am ever going to go through the last odds and ends of business—but it's got to be managed somehow. Do you really think we had better go up to Silverwood in the car? Won't this snow make the roads bad? It may not have melted in the country."
"Oh, it's all right! And I'll have you to myself in the car——"
"Suppose we are ditched?" She shivered again, then forced a little laugh. "Do you know, it doesn't seem possible to me that I am going to be your wife to-morrow, too, and the next day, and the next, and always, year after year. Somehow, it seems as though our dream were already ending—that I shall not see you at five o'clock—that it is all unreal——"
The smile faded, and into her blue eyes came something resembling fear—gone instantly—but the hint of it had been there, whatever it was; and the ghost of it still lingered in her white, flower-like face.
She whispered, forcing the smile again: "Happiness sometimes frightens; and it is making me a little afraid, I think. Come for me at five, Jim, and try to make me comprehend that nothing in the world can ever harm us. Tell your man where to take me—but only to the corner of my street, please."
He opened the limousine door; she stepped in, and he wrapped the robe around her. A cloud over the sun had turned the world grey for a moment. Again she seemed to feel the sudden chill in the air, and tried to shake it off.
"Look at Mr. Cairns and Cynthia," she whispered, leaning forward from her seat and looking toward the church.
He turned. Cairns and Miss Lessler had emerged from the portico and were lingering there in earnest consultation, quite oblivious of them.
"Do you like her, Jim?" she asked.
He smiled.
"I didn't notice her very much—or Jack either. A man isn't likely to notice anybody at such a time—except the girl he is marrying——"
"Look at her now. Don't you think her expression is very sweet?"
"It's all right. Dear, do you suppose I can fix my attention on——"
"You absurd boy! Are you really as much in love with me as that? Please be nice to her. Would you mind going back and speaking to her when I drive away?"
"All right," he said.
Their glances lingered for a moment more; then he drew a quick, sharp breath, closed the limousine door, and spoke briefly to the chauffeur.
As long as the car remained in sight across the square, he watched it; then, when it had disappeared, he turned toward the church. But Cairns and Cynthia were already far down the street, walking side by side, very leisurely, apparently absorbed in conversation. They must have seen him. Perhaps they had something more interesting to say to each other than to him.
He followed them irresolutely for a few steps, then, as the idea persisted that they might not desire his company, he turned and started west across the sunny, wet pavement.
It was quite true that Cairns and Cynthia had seen him; also it was a fact that neither had particularly wanted him to join them at that exact moment.
Meeting at St. George's for the first time in two years, and although prepared for the encounter, these two, who had once known each other so well, experienced a slight shock when they met. The momentary contact of her outstretched hand and his hand left them both very silent; even the formal commonplaces had failed them after the first swift, curious glance had been exchanged.
Cairns noticed that she had grown taller and slenderer. And though there seemed to be no more of maturity to her than to the young girl he had once known, her poise and self-control were now in marked contrast to the impulsive and slightly nervous Cynthia he had found so amusing in callower days.
Once or twice during the ceremony he had ventured to glance sideways at her. In the golden half-light of the altar there seemed to be an unfamiliar dignity and sweetness about the girl that became her. And in the delicate oval of her face he thought he discerned those finer, nobler contours made by endurance, by self-denial, and by sorrow.
Later, when he saw her kiss Jacqueline, something in the sweet sincerity of the salute suddenly set a hidden chord vibrating within him; and, to his surprise, he found speech difficult for a moment, checked by emotions for which there seemed no reason.
And at last Jacqueline and Desboro went away, and Cynthia slowly turned to him, offering her hand in adieu.
"Mr. Cairns," she said quietly, "this is the last place on earth that you and I ever thought to meet. Perhaps it is to be our last meeting place. So—I will say good-bye——"
"May I not walk home with you? Or, if you prefer to drive, my car is here——" he began.
"Thank you; it's only to the theatre—if you care to walk with me——"
"Are you rehearsing?"
"There is a rehearsal called for eleven."
"Shall we drive or walk, Cynthia?"
"I prefer to walk. Please don't feel that you ought to go back with me."
He said, reddening: "I do not remember that my sense of duty toward you has ever been persistent enough to embarrass either of us."
"Of course not. Why should you ever have feltthat you owed any duty to me?"
"I did not say that I ever felt it."
"Of course not. You owed me none."
"That is a different matter. Obligations once sat very lightly on my shoulders."
"You owe me none," she repeated smilingly, as they emerged from the church into the warm March sunshine.
He was saying: "But isn't friendship an obligation, Cynthia?"
She laughed: "Friendship is merely an imaginary creation, and exists only until the imagination wearies. That is not original," she added. "It is in the new Barrie comedy we are rehearsing."
She turned her pretty head and glanced down the street where Jacqueline and Desboro still stood beside the car. Cairn's car was also waiting, and its owner made a signal to the chauffeur that he did not need him.
Looking at Jacqueline, Cynthia said:
"Long ago I knew that she was fitted for a marriage such as this—or a better one," she added in a lower voice.
"A better one?" he repeated, surprised.
"Yes," she nodded calmly. "Can you not imagine a more desirable marriage for a girl?"
"Don't youlikeDesboro?" he demanded.
"I like him—considering the fact that I scarcely know him. He has very handsome and very reckless eyes, but a good mouth. To look at him for the first time a woman would be inclined to like him—but he might hesitate to trust him. I had hoped Jacqueline might marry a professional man—considerably older than Mr. Desboro. That is all I meant."
He said, looking at her smilingly but curiously: "Have you any idea, Cynthia, how entirely you have changed in two years?"
She shook her head: "I haven't changed."
"Indeed you have——"
"Only superficially. What I was born I shall always be. Years teach endurance and self-control—if they teach anything. All one can learn is how to control and direct what one already is."
"The years have taught you a lot," he murmured, astonished.
"I have been to school to many masters, Mr. Cairns; I have studied under Sorrow; graduated under Poverty and Loneliness; and I am now taking a finishing course with Experience. Truly enough, I should have learnedsomething, as you say, by this time. Besides,you, also, once were kind enough to be interested in my education. Why should I not have learned something?"
He winced and bit his lip, watching Desboro and Jacqueline below. And, after a moment:
"Shall we walk?" she suggested, smilingly.
He fell into step beside her. Half way down the block she glanced back. Desboro was already crossing the square; the limousine had disappeared.
"I wonder sometimes," she remarked, "what has become of all those amusing people we once knew so well—Marianne Valdez, Jessie Dain, Reggie Ledyard, Van Alstyne. Do you ever see them any more?"
"Yes."
"And are they quite as gay and crazy as ever?"
"They're a bit wild—sometimes."
"Do they ever speak of me? I—wonder," she mused, aloud.
"Yes. They know, of course, what a clever girl you have turned into. It isn't usual, you know, to graduate from a girlie show into the legit. And I was talking to Schindler the other evening; and he had to admit that he had seen nothing extraordinary in you when you were with his noisy shows. It's funny, isn't it?"
"Slightly."
"Besides, you were such a wild little thing—don't you remember what crazy things we used to do, you and I——"
"Did I? Yes, I remember. In those days a good dinner acted on me like champagne. You see I was very often hungry, and when I wasn't starved it went to my head."
"You need not have wanted for anything!" he said sharply.
"Oh, no! But I preferred the pangs of hunger to the pangs of conscience," she retorted gaily.
"I didn't mean that. There was no string to what I offered you, and you know it! And you know it now!"
"Certainly I do," she said calmly. "You mean to be very kind, Jack."
"Then why the devil didn't——"
"Why didn't I accept food and warmth and raiment and lodging from a generous and harebrained young man? I'll tell you now, if you wish. It was because my conscience forbade me to accept all and offer nothing in return."
"Nonsense!I didn't ask——"
"I know you didn't. But I couldn't give, so I wouldn't take. Besides, we were together too much. I knew it. I think even you began to realise it, too. The situation was impossible. So I went on the road."
"You never answered any of those letters of mine."
"Mentally I answered every one."
"A lot of good that did me!"
"It did us both a lot of good. I meant to write to you some day—when my life had become busy enough to make it difficult for me to find time to write."
He looked up at her sharply, and she laughed and swung her muff.
"I suppose," he said, "now that the town talks about you a little, you will have no time to waste on mere Johnnies."
"Well, I don't know. When a mere Johnnie is also a Jack, it makes a difference—doesn't it? Do you think that you would care to see me again?"
"Of course I do."
"The tickets," she said demurely, "are three dollars—two weeks in advance——"
"I know that by experience."
"Oh! Then youhaveseen 'The Better Way'?"
"Certainly."
"Do you like—the show?"
"You are the best of it. Yes, I like it."
"It's my first chance. Did you know that? If poor little Graham hadn't been so ill, I'd never have had a look in. They wouldn't give me anything—except in a way I couldn't accept it. I tell you, Jack, I was desperate. There seemed to be absolutely no chance unless I—paid."
"Why didn't you write me and let me——"
"You know why."
"It would have been reward enough to see you make good—and put it all over that bald-headed, dog-faced——"
"My employer, please remember," she said, pretending to reprove him. "And, Jack, he's amusingly decent to me now. Men are really beginning to be kind. Walbaum's people have written to me, and O'Rourke sent for me, and I'm just beginning to make professional enemies, too, which is the surest sign that I'm almost out of the ranks. If I could only study! Now is the time! I know it; I feel it keenly—I realise how much I lack in education! You see I only went to high-school. It's a mercy that my English isn't hopeless——"
"It's good! It's better than I ever supposed it would be——"
"I know. I used to be careless. But what can you expect? After I left home you know the sort of girls I was thrown among. Fortunately, father was educated—if he was nothing else. My degeneracy wasn't permanent. Also, I had been thrown with Jacqueline, and with you——"
"Fine educational model I am!"
"And," she continued, not heeding him, "when I met you, and men like you, I was determined that whatever else happened to me my English should not degenerate. Jacqueline helped me so much. I tried to study, too, when I was not on the road with the show. But if only I could study now—study seriously for a year or two!"
"What do you wish to study, Cynthia?" he askedcarelessly.
"English! Also French and German and Italian. I would like to study what girls in college study. Then I'd like to learn stage dancing thoroughly. And, of course, I'm simply crazy to take a course in dramatic art——"
"But you already know a lot! Every paper spoke well of you——"
"Oh, Jack! Does that mean anything—when I know that I don't know anything!"
"Rot! Can you beat professional experience as an educator?"
"I'm not quite ready for it——"
"Very well. If you feel that way, will you be a good sort, Cynthia, and let me——"
"No!"
"I ask you merely to let me take a flyer!"
"No, Jack."
"Why can't I take a flyer? Why can't I have the pleasure of speculating on a perfectly sure thing? It's a million to nothing that you'll make good. For the love of Mike, Cynthia, borrow the needful and——"
"Fromyou?"
"Naturally."
"No, Jack!"
"Why not? Why cut off your nose to spite your face? What difference does it make where you get it as long as it's a decent deal? You can't afford to take two or three years off to complete your education——"
"Begin it, you mean."
"I mean finish it! You can't afford to; but if you'll borrow the money you'll make good in exactly one-tenth of the time you'd otherwise take to arrive——"
"Jack, I won't discuss it with you. I know you are generous and kind——"
"I'mnot! I'm anythingbut! For heaven's sake let a man indulge his vanity, Cynthia. Imagine my pride when you are famous! Picture my bursting vanity as I sit in front and tell everybody near me that the credit is all mine; that if it were not for me you would be nowhere!"
"It's so like you," she said sweetly. "You always were an inordinate boaster, so I am not going to encourage you."
"Can't you let me make you a business loan at exorbitant interest without expiring of mortification?"
They had reached the theatre; a few loafers sunning themselves by the stage entrance leered at them.
"Hush, Jack! I can't discuss it with you. But you know how grateful I am, don't you?"
"No, I don't——" he said sulkily.
"You are cross now, but you'll see it as I do half an hour hence."
"No, I won't!" he insisted.
She laughed: "Youhaven't changed, at all events, have you? It takes me back years to see that rather becoming scowl gather over the bridge of your ornamental nose. But it is very nice to know that you haven't entirely forgotten me; that we are still friends."
"Where are you living, Cynthia?"
She told him, adding: "Do you really mean to come?"
"Watch me!" he said, almost savagely, took off his hat, shook her hand until her fingers ached, and marched off still scowling.
The stage loafers shifted quids and looked after him with sneers.
"Trun out!" observed one.
"All off!" nodded another.
The third merely spat and slowly closed his disillusioned and leisure-weary eyes.
Cairns' energetic pace soon brought him to the Olympian Club, where he was accustomed to lunch, it being convenient to his office, which was on Forty-sixth Street.
Desboro, who, at Jacqueline's request, had gone back to business, appeared presently and joined Cairns at a small table.
"Anything doing at the office?" inquired the latter. "I suppose you were too nervous and upset to notice the market though."
"Well, ask yourself how muchyou'dfeel like business after marrying the most glorious and wonderful——"
"Ring off! I concede everything. It is going to make some splash in the papers. Yes? Lord! I wish you could have had a ripping big wedding though! Wouldn't she have looked the part? Oh, no!"
"It couldn't be helped," said Desboro in a low, chagrined voice. "I'd have given the head off my shoulders to have had the sort of a wedding to which she was entitled. But—I couldn't."
Cairns nodded, not, however, understanding; and as Desboro offered no explanation, he remained unenlightened.
"Rather odd," he remarked, "that she didn't wish to have Aunt Hannah with her at the fatal moment. They're such desperate chums these days."
"She did want her. I wouldn't have her."
"Is that so?"
"It is. I'll tell you why some day. In fact, I don't mind telling you now. Aunt Hannah has it in for me. She's a devil sometimes. You know it and I do. She has it in for me just now. She's wrong; she's made a mistake; but I couldn't tell her anything. You can't tell that sort of a woman anything, once she's made up her mind. And the fact is, Jack, she's already made up her mind that I was not to marry Jacqueline. And I was afraid of her. Andthat'swhy I married Jacqueline this way."
Cairns stared.
"So now," added Desboro, "you know how it happened."
"Quite so. Rotten of her, wasn't it?"
"She didn't mean it that way. She got a fool idea into her head, that's all. Only I was afraid she'd tell it to Jacqueline."
"I see."
"That's what scared me. I didn't know what she might tell Jacqueline. She threatened to tell her—things. And it would have involved a perfectly innocent woman and myself—put me in a corner where I couldn't decently explain the real facts to Jacqueline. Now, thank God, it's too late for Aunt Hannah to make mischief."