"Why not?" inquired Ruth, and I heard her dealing out more cards as she went on talking gaily. "I love a good argument. It wakes me up intellectually. Mymind's been so lazy. Itneedsto be waked up. It feels good, like the first spring plunge in a pond of cold water to a sleepy old bear who's been rolled up in a ball in some dark hole all winter. That's what it feels like. I never knew what fun it was to think and argue till I began taking the English course at Shirley. We argue by the hour there. It's great fun. But I suppose I'm terribly illogical and no fun to argue with. That's the way with most women. It isn't our fault.Men seem to want to make just nice soft pussy-cats out of us, with ribbons round our necks," she laughed, "and hear us purr. There! wait a minute. I'm going to get this. Come and see." Then abruptly, "Why, Bob, do the cards shockyou?"
"No, no—not a bit," he assured her.
"They do," she affirmed. "How funny. They do." There was a pause. "Well," she said at last (Will was still reading out loud and I could barely catch her answer). "Well, I suppose they're only pasteboard, just as the book was only paper and print. I can give them up."
"I don't want you to—not for me. No, don't. Go right ahead. Please," urged Bob. But it was too late.
"Of course not," replied Ruth, and I heard the cards going back into the box. "If I offend—and I see I do—of course not." And she rose and came over and sat on the sofa beside me.
From that time on I noticed a change in Robert and Ruth—nothing very perceptible. Robert cameas often, stayed as late—later. That was what disturbed me. Ruth rose in the morning, after some of those protracted sessions, suspiciously quiet and subdued. In place of the radiance that so lately had shone upon her face, often I perceived a puzzled and troubled expression. In place of her almost hilarious joy, a wistfulness stole into her bearing toward Bob.
"Of course," she said to me one day, "I have been living a sort of—well, broad life you might call it for a daughter of father's, I suppose. He was so straightlaced. But all the modes and codes I've been adopting for the last several years I adopted only to be polite, to do as other people did, simply not to offend—as Bob said the other day. I thought if I ever wanted to go back to the strict laws of my childhood again, I could easily enough. In fact I intended to, after I had had my little fling. But I've outgrown them. They don't seem reasonable to me now. I can't go back to them. Convictions stand in my way."
"Women ought not to have convictions," I said shortly.
"Don't you think so?" queried Ruth.
"Men," I replied, "have so much more knowledge and experience of the world. Convictions have foundations with men."
"How unfair somehow," said Ruth, looking away into space.
"Just you take my advice, Ruth," I went on, "and don't you let any convictions you may think you have get in the way of your happiness. Just you let themlie for a while. When you and Bob are hanging up curtains in your new apartment, and pictures and things, you won't care a straw about your convictions, then."
"I don't suppose so," replied Ruth, still meditative. "No, I suppose you're right. I'll let Bob have the convictions for both of us. I'm younger. I can re-adjust easier than he, I guess."
A few days later Ruth went to a suffrage meeting in town; not because she was especially interested, but because a friend she had made in a course she was taking at Shirley College invited her to go.
It was the winter that everybody was discussing suffrage at teas and dinner parties; fairs and balls and parades were being given in various cities in its interest; and anti-organizations being formed to fight it and lend it zest. It was the winter that the term Feminism first reached the United States, and books on the greater freedom of women and their liberalization burst into print and popularity.
On the suffrage question Ruth had always been prettily "on the fence," and "Oh, dear, do let's talk of something else," she would laugh, while her eyes invited. Her dinner partners were always willing.
"On the fence, Kidlet," Edith had once remonstrated to Ruth, "that's stupid!" Edith herself was strongly anti. "Of course I'm anti," she maintained proudly. "Anybody whoisanybody in Hilton is anti. The suffragists—dear me! Perfect freaks—most of them. People you never heard of! I peekedin at a suffrage tea the other day and mercy, such sights! I wouldn't be one of them for money. We're to give an anti-ball here in Hilton. I'm a patroness. Name to be printed alongside Mrs. ex-Governor Vaile's. How's that? 'On the fence,' Ruth! Why, good heavens, there's simply no two sides to the question. You come along to this anti-ball and you'll see, Kiddie!"
Well, as I said, Ruth went one day to a suffrage meeting in town. She had never heard the question discussed from a platform. When she came into the house about six o'clock, she was so full of enthusiasm that she didn't stop to go upstairs. She came right into the room where Will and I were reading by the cretonne-shaded lamp.
"I've just been to the most wonderful lecture!" she burst out, "on suffrage! I never cared a thing about the vote one way or the other, but I do now. I'mforit. Heart and soul, I'm for it! Oh, the most wonderful woman spoke. Every word she said applied straight to me. I didn't know I had such ideas until that woman got up and put them into words for me. They've been growing and ripening in me all these years, and I didn't know it—not until today. That woman said that sacrifices are made again and again to send boys to college and prepare them to earn a living, but that girls are brought up simply to be pretty and attractive, so as to capture a man who will provide them with food and clothes. Why, Lucy, don't you see that that's just what happened inourfamily? We slaved to send Oliver and Malcolm through college—but foryouand forme—what slaving was there done to prepare us to earn a living? Just think what I might be hadIbeen prepared for life like Malcolm or Oliver, instead of wasting all my years frivoling. Why, don't you see I could have convictions with a foundation then? I feel so helpless and ignorant with a really educated person now. Oh, dear, I wish this movement had been begun when I was a baby, so I could have profited by it! That woman said that when laws are equal for men and women,thenadvantages will be, and that every step we can make toward equalization is a step in the direction toward a fairer deal for women. Suffrage? Well, I should say I was for it! I think it's wonderful. I went straight up to that woman and said I wanted to join the League; and I did. It cost me a dollar."
"Good heavens, Ruth," exclaimed Will sleepily, from behind his paper. "Don't you go and get rabid on suffrage——Ease up, old girl. Steady."
"I don't see how any one can help but get rabid, Will, as you say, any more than a person could keep calm if he was a slave, when he first heard what Abraham Lincoln was trying to do."
"Steady there, old girl," jibed Will. "Is Bob such a terrific master as all that?"
"That's not the point, Will. Convention is the master—that's what the woman said. It isn't free of men we're trying to be."
"We! we! Come, Ruth. You aren't one of them in an hour, are you? Better wait and consult Bob first."
"Oh, Bob will agree with me. I know he will. It's such a progressive idea. And Iamone of them. I'm proud to be. I'm going to march in the parade next week."
I came to life at that. "Oh, Ruth, not really—not in Boston!"
"What? Up the center of Washington Street in French heels and a shadow veil?" scoffed Will.
"Up the center of Washington Street in something," announced Ruth, "if that's the line of march. Remember, Will, French heels and shadow veils have been my stock in trade, and not through any choice of mine, either. So don't throw them at me, please."
Will subsided. "Well, well, what next? A raring, tearing little suffragette, in one afternoon, too!"
Ruth went upstairs.
"Poor old Bob," remarked Will to me when we were alone.
IDIDN'T know whether it was more "poor old Bob" or "poor old Ruth." Ruth was so arduous at first, so in earnest—like a child with a new and engrossing plaything for a day or two, and then, I suppose, she showed her new toy to Bob, and he took it away from her. Anyway, she put it by. It seemed rather a shame to me. The new would have worn off after a while.
"And after all, Will," I maintained to my husband, "Robert Jennings is terribly old-school, sweet and chivalrous as can be toward women, but he can't treat Ruth in the way he does that helpless little miniature of a mother of his. He simply lives to protect her from anything practical or disagreeable. She adores it, but Ruth's a different proposition. The trouble with Robert is, he's about ten years behind the times."
"And Ruth," commented Will, "is about ten years ahead of the times."
"That is true of the different members of lots of households, in these times, but they don't need to come to blows because of it. Everybody ought to be patient and wait. Ruth has a pronounced individuality,for all you think she is nothing but a society butterfly. I can see it hurts to cram it into Robert Jennings' ideal of what a woman should be. It makes me feel badly to see Ruth so quiet and resigned, like a little beaten thing, so pitiably anxious to please. Self-confidence became her more. She hasn't mentioned suffrage since Robert called and stayed so late Wednesday, except to say briefly, 'I'm not going to march in the parade.' 'Why not?' I asked. 'Doesn't Bob want you to?' 'Oh, certainly. He leaves it to me,' she pretended proudly. 'But, you see, women in parades do offend some people. It isn't according to tradition, and I think it's only courteous to Bob, just before we are to be married, not to do anything offensive. After all, I must bear in mind,' she said, 'that this parade is only a matter of walking—putting one foot in front of the other. I'm bound to be happy, and I don't intend to allow suffrage to stand in my way either. Even convictions are only a certain condition of gray matter.' Oh, it was just pitiful to hear her trying to convince herself. I'm just afraid, Will, afraid for the future."
Not long after that outburst of mine to Will, my fears came true. One late afternoon, white-faced, wide-eyed, Ruth came in to me. She closed the door behind her. Her outside things were still on. I saw Robert Jennings out the window going slowly down the walk. Before Ruth spoke I knew exactly what she had to say.
"We aren't going to be married," she half whispered to me.
"Oh, Ruth——"
"No. Please. Don't, don't talk about it," she said. "And don't tell Will. Don't tell any one. Promise me. I've tried so hard—so hard. But my life has spoiled me for a man like Bob. Don't talk of it, please."
"I won't, Ruth," I assured her.
"I can do it. I thought I couldn't at first. But Ican!" she said fiercely, "Ican! I'll be misunderstood, I know. But I can't help that. We've decided it together. It isn't I alone. Bob has decided it, too. We both prefer to be unhappy alone, rather than unhappy together."
"In every marriage, readjustments are necessary," I commented.
"Don't argue," she burst out at me. "Don't! Don't you suppose Bob and I have thought of every argument that exists to save our happiness? For heaven's sake, Lucy, don't argue. I can't quite bear it." She turned away and went upstairs.
She didn't want any dinner. "I'm going to bed early," she told me an hour later when I knocked at her door. "No, not even toast and tea. Please don't urge me," she begged, and I left her. At ten when I went to bed her room was dark.
At half-past eleven I got up, stole across the hall, and stood listening outside her closed door. At long intervals I could hear her move. She was not sleeping. I waited an hour and stole across the hall again. She was still awake. Poor Ruth—sleepless, tearless (there was no sound of sobbing) hour after hour, there she was lying all night long, staring into the darkness, waiting for the dawn. At three I opened the door gently and went in, carrying something hot to drink on a tray.
"What is the matter?" she asked calmly.
"Nothing, Ruth. Only you must sleep, and here is some hot milk with just a little pinch of salt. It's so flat without. Nobody can sleep on an empty stomach."
"I guess that's the trouble," she said, and sat up and took the milk humbly, like a child. Her fingertips were like ice. I went into the bath-room, filled a hot-water bag, and got out an extra down-comforter. I was tucking it in when she asked, "What time is it?" And I told her. "Only three? Oh, dear—don't go—just yet." So I wrapped myself up in a warm flannel wrapper and sat down on the foot of her bed with my feet drawn up under me.
"I won't," I said, "I'll sit here."
"You're awfully good to me," Ruth remarked. "Iwascold and hungry, I guess. Oh, Lucy," she exclaimed, "I wish one person could understand, justone."
"I do, Ruth. I do understand," I said eagerly.
"It isn't suffrage. It isn't the parade. It isn't anyonething. It's justeverything, Lucy. I'm made up on a wrong pattern for Bob. I hurt him all the time.Isn't it awful—even though he cares for me, and I for him, we hurt each other?"
I kept quite still. I knew that Ruth wanted to talk to some one, and I sat there hugging my knees, thankful that I happened to be the one. Always I had longed for this mysterious sister's confidence, and always I had seemed to her too simple, too obvious, to share and understand.
"You know, Lucy," she went on wistfully, "I was awfully happy at first—so happy—you don't know. Why, I would do anything for Bob. I was glad to give up riches for him. My worldly ambitions shriveled into nothing. Comforts, luxuries—what were they as compared to Bob's love? But, oh, Lucy, it is giving up little things, little independencies of thought, little daily habits, which I can't do. I tried to give up these, too. You know I did. I said that the book was just paper and print and the cards just pasteboard. But all the time they were symbols. I could destroy the symbols easily enough, but I couldn't destroy what they stood for. You see, Bob and I have different ideals. That's at the bottom of all the trouble. We tried for weeks not to admit it, but it had to be faced finally."
"Your ideals aren't very different way down at their roots—both clean, true, sincere, and all that," I said, with a little yawn, so she might not guess how tremblingly concerned I really was.
"You don't know all the differences, Lucy," she said sadly. "There's something the trouble with me—something left out—something that I cannot blame Bob for feeling sorry about. I believe I'll tell you. You see, Bob met me under a misapprehension, and I've been trying to live up to his misapprehension ever since. The first time he ever saw me I was tucked away in a little room by myself looking at the picture of a sick child. I was crying a little. He thought that I was feeling badly out of sympathy for the mother of the child—the mother in me, you see, speaking to the mother in her. I wasn't really. I was crying because the house that the picture happened to hang in was so dull and grimy beside Grassmere. I was crying for the luxuries I had lost. I never told Bob the truth about that picture until last week, and all this time he's been looking upon me as an ideal woman—a kind of madonna, mother of little children, you understand, and all that—and I'm not. Something must be wrong with me. I don't even long to be—yet. Oh, you see how unfitted I am for a man to weave idealistic pictures about—like that. It seemed to hurt Bob when I told him the truth about myself, hurt him terribly, as if I'd tumbled over and broken his image of me—at the cradle, you know. Oh, Lucy, what an unnatural girl I am! I don't admire myself for it. I wish I could be what Bob thinks, but I can't. I can't."
"You aren't unnatural. You're just as human as you can be, Ruth. I felt just the way you do before I was married, and most every girl does as young as you, too. Bob ought to give you chance to grow up."
"Grow up! Oh, Lucy, I feel so old! I feel used up and put by already. I've lived my life and haven't I made a botch of it?" She laughed shortly. "And what shall I do with the botch now? I can't stay here. It would break my heart to stay here where I had hoped to be so happy—everything reminding me, you know. No, I can't stay here."
"Of course you can't, Ruth. We'll think of a way."
"And I simply can't go back to Edith," she went on, "after knowing Bob. I don't want to go out to Michigan with Tom and Elise. I hate Michigan. Dear me! I don't know what I shall do. I'm discouraged. Once I was eager and confident, filled with enthusiasm and self-pride. Like that old hymn, you know. How does it go? 'I loved to choose my path and see, but now lead Thou me on. I loved the garish day, and spite of fears, Pride ruled my will. Remember not past years.' That is what I repeat over and over to myself. 'Lead, kindly light, amidst th' encircling gloom.' The encircling gloom! Oh, dear!" She suddenly broke off, "I wish morning would come." It did finally, and with it, when the approaching sun began to pinken the eastern sky, sleep for my tormented sister.
WE all were seated about the table at one of Edith's sumptuous Sunday dinners at the Homestead when Ruth broke her news to the family. Tom had come East on a business trip, and was spending Sunday with Alec in Hilton; so Edith telephoned to all of us within motoring distance and invited us up for "Sunday dinner." This was two or three days after Ruth had told me that she and Bob were not to be married.
"Oh, yes, I'll go," she nodded, when I had clapped my hand over the receiver and turned to her questioningly, and afterward she said to me, "Concealing my feelings is one of the accomplishments my educationhasincluded. I'll go. I shan't tell them about Bob yet. I can't seem to just now."
I was therefore rather surprised when she suddenly abandoned her play-acting. She hadn't figured on the difficult requirements, I suppose, poor child. Bluff and genial Tom, grown rather gray and stout and bald now, had met her with a hearty, "Hello, bride-elect!" Oliver had shouted, "Greetings, Mrs. Prof!" And Madge, his wife, had tucked a tissue-paper-wrappedpackage under Ruth's arm: "My engagement present," she explained. "Just a half-a-dozen little guest-towels with your initials."
Later at the table Tom had cleared his throat and then remarked, "I like all I hear of this Robert Jennings. He's good stuff, Ruth. You've worried us a good deal, but you've landed on your feet squarely at last. He's a bully chap."
"And he's got a bully girl, too, now that she's got down to brass tacks," said Alec in big-brother style.
"Decided on the date?" cheerfully inquired Tom. "Elise said to be sure and find out. We're coming on in full force, you know."
"Yes, the date's decided," flashed Edith from the head of the table. "June 28th. It'll be hot as mustard, but Hilton will be lovely then, and all the summerites here. You must give me an hour on the lists after dinner, Kidlet. Bob's list, people, is three hundred, and Ruth's four, so I guess there'll be a few little remembrances. The envelopes are half directed already. I want you people to know this wedding is only seven weeks off, so hurry up and order your new gowns and morning coats. Simplicity isn't going to be the keynote of this affair."
"Hello!" exclaimed Tom abruptly, "I haven't inspected the ring yet. Let's see it. Pass it over, Toots."
Ruth glanced down at her hand. It was still there—Bob's unpretentious diamond set in platinum—shining wistfully on Ruth's third finger.
She started to take it off, then stopped and glanced over at me. "I think I'll tell them, Lucy," she said. "I've got something to tell you all," she announced. "I'm wearing the ring still, but—we've broken our engagement. I'm not going to marry Robert Jennings after all."
It sounded harsh, crude. Everybody stared; everybody stopped eating; I saw Tom lay down his fork with a juicy piece of duck on it. It had been within two inches of his mouth.
"Will you repeat that?" he said emphatically.
"Yes," complied Ruth, "I will. I know it seems sudden to you. I meant to write it, but after all I might as well tell you. My engagement to Robert Jennings is broken."
"Is this a joke?" ejaculated Edith.
"No," replied Ruth, still in that calm, composed way of hers. "No, Edith, it isn't a joke."
"Will you explain?" demanded Tom, shoving the piece of duck off his fork and abandoning it for good and all.
Ruth had become pale. "Why, there isn't much to explain, except I found out I wouldn't be happy with Bob. That's all."
"Oh," said Tom, "you found out you wouldn't be happy with Bob! Will you kindly tell us whom you mean to try your happiness on next?"
Ruth's gray eyes darkened. A little pink stole into her cheeks. "There's no good of your using that tone with me, Tom," she said.
"Did you know this?" asked Will of me from across the table.
I nodded.
"Do you mean to say it'strue?" demanded Edith.
I nodded again.
"You're crazy, Ruth," she burst out, "you're simply stark mad. It would be a public disgrace. You've got to marry him now. You've simply got to. It's worse than a divorce. Why—the invitations are all ordered, even the refreshments. The whole world knows about it. You'vegotto marry him."
"My own disgrace is my own affair, I guess," said Ruth, dangerously low.
"It'snotyour own affair. It's ours; it's the whole family's; it's mine. And I won't stand it—not a second time. Here I have toldeverybody, got my Boston list all made up, too, and all my plans made. Didn't I have new lights put into the ball-room especially, and a lot of repairs made on the house—a new bath-room, and everything? And all my house-party guests invited? Why—we'll be the laughing-stock of this entire town, if you play this game a second time. Good heavens, you'll be getting the habit. No, sir! Youcan'tgo back on your word in this fashion. You'vegotto marry Robert Jenningsnow."
"I wouldn't marry Breck Sewall to please you, Edith, and I won't marry Robert Jennings to please you either," said Ruth. "She wanted me to elope with Breck!" she announced calmly.
"That isn't true," replied Edith sharply.
"Why don't you call me a liar and have done with it?" demanded Ruth.
"I wanted to save you from disgrace, and you know it. I wanted——" A maid came in.
"Let us wait and continue this conversation later," remarked Tom.
"We don't wantyou," flared Edith at the maid. "I didn't ring. Go out till you're summoned. You're the most ungrateful girl I ever knew, Ruth. You're——"
"Come," interrupted Alec. "This isn't getting anywhere. Let us finish dinner first."
"I'm sure I don't want any more dinner," said Edith.
"Nor I," commented Ruth, with a shrug.
There were a salad fork and a dessert spoon still untouched beside our plates. It would have been thoughtful if Ruth had waited and lit her fuse when the finger-bowls came on. It seemed a shame to me to waste two perfectly good courses, and unnecessarily sensational to interrupt the ceremony of a Sunday dinner. But it was impossible to sit there through two protracted changes of plates.
"I guess we've all had enough," remarked Tom, disgustedly shoving away that innocent piece of duck. We rose stragglingly.
"I don't care to talk about this thing any more," said Ruth, as we passed through the hall. "You can thrash it out by yourselves. Lucy, you can represent me!" And she turned away to go upstairs.
Tom called back, "No, Ruth. This is an occasion that requires your presence, whether you like it ornot," he said. "Come back, please. There are a few questions that need to be settled."
Ruth acquiesced condescendingly. "Oh, very well," she replied, and strolled down the stairs and into the library. She walked over to the table and leaned, half sitting, against it, while the rest of us came in and sat down, and some one closed the doors.
"Fire away!" she said flippantly, turning to Tom. She picked up an ivory paper-cutter with a tassel on one end, twisted the cord tight, and then holding the cutter up by the tassel watched it whirl and untwist.
Pretty, graceful, nonchalant, armored in a half smile, Ruth stood before her inquisitors. Bob never would have recognized this composed and unmoved girl as the anxious Ruth who had tried so hard to please and satisfy.
"First," began Tom (he has always held the position of high judge in our family), "first, I should be interested to know if you have any plans for the future, and, if so, will you be kind enough to tell us what they may be."
"I have plans," said Ruth, and began twisting the cord of the paper-cutter again.
"Will you put that down, please," requested Tom.
"Certainly," Ruth smiled over-obligingly and laid the paper-cutter on the table. She folded her arms and began tapping the rug with her toe. She was almost insolent.
"Well, then—what are your plans?" fired Tom at her with an obvious effort to control himself.
"New York," she announced mysteriously.
"Oh, New York!" repeated Tom. It was a scornful voice. "New York! And what do you intend to do in New York?"
"Oh, I don't know. I haven't decided. Something," she said airily.
"Ruth," said Tom, "please listen to me carefully if you can for a minute. We've always given you a pretty loose rein. Haven't we?"
Ruth shrugged her shoulders.
"You've had every advantage; attended one of the most expensive schools in this country; had all the money you required, coming-out party and all that; pleasures, flattery, attention—everything to make a girl contented. You've visited any one you pleased from one end of the United States to the other; traveled in Europe, Florida—anywhere you wanted; come and gone at will. Nothing to handicap you. Nothing hard. Nothing difficult. You'll agree. And what have you done with your advantages?What—I want to know?"
Ruth shrugged her shoulders again.
"You can't blame any one but yourself. You haven't been interfered with. I believed in letting you run your own affairs. Thought you were made of the right stuff to do it creditably. I was mistaken. You've had a fair trial at your own management and you've failed to show satisfactory results. NowI'mgoing to step in.I'mgoing to see ifIcan save you from this drifting about and getting nowhere. I don'task you to go back and anchor with Robert Jennings again. I'm shocked to confess that I don't believe you're worthy of a man like Jennings. It is no small thing to be decided carelessly or frivolously—this matter of marriage. Engaged to two men inside of one year, and now both affairs broken off. It's disgraceful! You've got to learn somehow or other that although you are a woman, you're not especially privileged to go back on decisions."
"I don't want to be especially privileged," said Ruth, and then she added, "special privileges would not be expected by women, if they were given equal rights."
"Oh, Suffrage!!!" exclaimed Tom with three exclamation points. "So that's it! That's at the bottom of all this trouble."
"That's at the bottom of it," suddenly put in my husband, emphatically.
"Oh, I see. Well, first, Ruth, you're to drop all that nonsense. Suffrage indeed! What doyouknow about it? You ought to be married and taking care of your own babies, and you wouldn't be disturbed by all these crazy-headed fads, invented by dissatisfied and unoccupied females. Suffrage! And perhaps you think that this latest exhibition of your changeableness and vacillation is an argument in favor of it."
"You needn't throw women's vacillation in their faces, Tom," replied Ruth calmly. "Stable decisions are matters of training and education. Girls of my acquaintance lack the experience with the business world. They don't come in contact with big transactions. They're guarded from them. A lawyer does the thinking for a woman of property oftentimes, and so, of course, women do not learn the necessity of precise statements, accurate thought, and all that. From the time a girl is old enough to think she knows she is just a girl, who her family hope will grow up to be pretty and attractive and marry well. If her family believed she was to grow up into a responsible citizen who would later control by her vote all sorts of weighty questions that affect taxes and tariffs and things, they would have to devote more thought to making her intelligent, because it would have an effect upon their individual interests. I'm interested in suffrage, Tom, not for the good it is going to do politics, but for the good it's going to do women."
Tom made an exclamation of disgust. He was beside himself with scorn and disapproval.
"Nonsense! Utter rot! Women were made to marry and be mothers. Women were——"
"But we'd be better mothers," Ruth cut in. "Don't you see, if——"
"Oh, I don't want to discuss suffrage," interrupted Tom; "I want to discuss your life. Let's keep to the subject. I want to see you settled and happy some day, and as I'm so much older than you, you must put yourself into my hands, and cheerfully. First, drop suffrage. Drop it. Good Lord, Ruth, don't be a faddist. Then I want you to lay your decision about Jennings on the shelf. Let it rest for a while. Postpone the wedding if you wish——"
"But, Tom," tucked in Edith, "that's impossible. The invitations——"
"Never mind, never mind, Edith," interrupted Tom. Then to Ruth he went on. "Postpone the wedding—oh, say a month or two, and then see how you feel. That's all I ask. Reasonable, isn't it?" he appealed to us all. "I'll have a talk with Jennings in the meanwhile," he went on. "This suffrage tommy-rot is working all sorts of unnecessary havoc. I'm sick of it. I didn't suppose it had caught any one in our family though. You drop it, Ruth, for a while. You wait. I'm going back home next Wednesday. Now I want you to pack up your things and be ready to start with me Wednesday night from New York. We'll see what Elise and the youngsters will do for you."
"I'm sorry, Tom," replied Ruth pleasantly, "but my decision about Bob is final; and as for going out West with you and becoming a fifth wheel in your household—no, I've had enough of that. My mind is made up. I'm going to New York."
"But I shan't allow it," announced Tom.
"Then," replied Ruth, "I shall have to go without your allowing it."
"What do you mean?" demanded Tom.
"Why—just what I say. I'm of age. If I were a man, I wouldn't have to ask my older brother's permission."
"And how do you intend to live?"
"On my income," said Ruth. "I bless father now for that stock he left me. Eight hundred dollars ayear has been small for me so far. I have had to have help, I know, but it will support my new life. I never was really grateful to father for that money till now. It makes me independent of you, Tom."
Edith, glaring inimically from her corner, exclaimed, "Grateful to her father! That's good!"
"My dear girl," said Tom, "we've never told you before, because we hoped to spare your feelings, but the time has come now. That stock father left you hasn't paid a dividend for a dozen years. It isn't worth its weight in paper. I have paid four hundred dollars, and Edith has been kind and generous enough to contribute four hundred dollars more, to keep you in carfares, young lady. It isn't much in order to talk of your independence around here."
The color mounted to Ruth's cheeks. She straightened. "What do you mean?" she asked.
"Exactly what I say. You haven't a penny of income. Edith and I are responsible for your living, and I want you to understand clearly that I shall not support a line of conduct which does not meet with my approval. Nor Edith either, I rather imagine."
"No, indeed, I won't," snapped out Edith. "I shan't pay a cent more. It's only rank ingratitude I get for it anyhow."
"Do you mean to say," said Ruth in a low voice—there was no flippancy to her now—"I've been living on Edith's charity, and yours, all these years? That I haven't anything of my own—not even my clothes—not eventhis," she touched a blue enameled watch andchain about her neck, "which I saved and saved so for? Haven't I any income? Haven't I a cent that's mine, Tom?"
"Not a red cent, Ruth—just some papers that we might as well put into the fireplace and burn up."
"Oh," she burst forth, "how unfair—how cruel and unfair!"
"There's gratitude for you," threw in Edith.
"To bring me up," went on Ruth, "under a delusion. To let me go on, year after year, thinking I was provided for, and then suddenly, when it pleases you, to tell me that I'm an absolute dependent, a creature of charity. Oh, how cruel that is! You tell me I ought to be grateful. Well, I'm not—I'm not grateful. You've been false with me. You've brought me up useless and helpless. I'm too old now to develop whatever talent I may have had. I can only drudge now. What is there I can donow? Nothing—nothing—except scrub floors or something like that."
"Oh, yes, there is, too," said Edith. "You can marry Robert Jennings and be sensible."
"Marry a man for support, whether I want to or not? I'll die first. Youallwant me to marry him," she burst out at us fiercely, "but I shan't—I shan't. I'm strong and healthy, and I'm just beginning to discover that I've got some brains, too. There's something I can do, surely, some way I can earn money. I shan't go West with you, Tom. Understand that. I can't quite see myself growing old in all your various households—old and useless and dependent like lotsof unmarried women in large families. I can't see it without a fight anyhow. I don't care if I haven't any income. I can be a clerk in a store, I guess. Anyhow I shan't go West with you, Tom. I am of age. You can't make me. I know I'm just a woman, but I intend to live my own life just the same, and there's no one in this world who can bind and enslave me either!"
"You go upstairs, Ruth," ordered Tom. "I won't stand for such talk as that. You go upstairs and quiet down, and when you're reasonable, we'll talk again. We're not children."
"No, we're not," replied Ruth, "neither of us, and I shan't be sent upstairs as if I was a child either! You can pauperize me, and you can take away every rag I have on my back, too, if you want to, but I'll tell you one thing, you can't take away my independence. You think, Tom, you can frighten me, and conquer me, perhaps, by bullying. But you can't. Conditions are better for women than they used to be, anyhow, thank heaven, and for the courageous woman there's a chance to escape from just such masters of their fates asyou—Tom Vars, even though you are my brother. And I shall escape somehow,sometime. See if I don't. Oh, I know what you all think of me," she broke off. "You all think I'm hard and heartless. Well—perhaps you're right. I guess I am. Such an experience as this would just about kill any softhearted person, I should think. ButI'mnot killed. Remember that, Tom. You've got money, support, sentiment on your side. I've got nothing but my owndetermination. But I'm not afraid to fight. And I will, if you force me. You'd better be pretty careful how you handle such an utterly depraved person as you seem to think I am. Why, I didn't know you had such a poor opinion of me."
She gave a short little laugh which ended in a sort of sob. I was afraid she was going to cry before us. But the armor was at hand. She put it on quickly, the cynical smile, the nonchalant air.
"There is no good talking any more, as I see," she was able to go on, thus protected. "This is bordering on a scene, and scenes are such bad taste! I'm going into the living-room."
She crossed the room to the door. "You all can go on maligning me to your hearts' content. I've had about enough, thank you. Only remember supper is at seven, and Edith's maids want to get out early Sundays. Consider the maids at least," she finished, and left us, colors flying.
THE next morning when Will and I motored home we were alone. We approached the steeples of our town about noontime. I remember whistles were blowing and bells ringing as we passed through the Square. We saw Robert Jennings coming out of one of the University buildings on his way home from a late morning recitation. We slowed down beside him, and Will sang out to him to pile in behind; which he did, leaning forward and chatting volubly with Will and me for the next ten minutes about a new starter device for an automobile. When Will stopped in front of our walk, Robert hopped out of his back seat and opened the door for me.
It was when Will had motored out of hearing that Robert turned sharply to me and asked, "Did you leave her in Hilton?"
"No, Bob, Ruth isn't in Hilton. She's gone to New York," I told him gently.
"Whom is she staying with in New York? Your brother?" he asked.
"No, not Malcolm. No. But she's all right."
"What do you mean—'she's all right'?"
"Oh, I mean she has money enough—and all that."
"She isn'talonein New York!" he exclaimed. "You don't mean to say——"
"Now, Bob, don'tyougo and get excited about it. Ruth's all right. I'm just about worn out persuading my brother Tom that it is perfectly all right for Ruth to go to New York for a little while if she wants to. I can't begin arguing with you, the minute I get home. I'm all worn out on the subject."
"But what is she doing down there? Whom is she visiting? Who is looking out for her? Who went with her? Who met her?"
"Nobody, nobody. Nobody met her; nobody went with her; she isn't visiting anybody. Good heavens, Bob, you'd make a helpless, simpering little idiot out of Ruth if you had your way. She isn't a child. She isn't an inexperienced young girl. She's capable of keeping out of silly difficulties. She can be trusted. Let her use her judgment and good sense a little. It won't hurt her a bit. It will do her good. Don't you worry about Ruth. She's all right."
"But a girl—a pretty young girl like Ruth—you don't mean to say that Ruth—Ruth——"
"Yes, I do, too, Bob! And there are lots of girls just as pretty as Ruth in New York, and just as young, tapping away at typewriters, and balancing accounts in offices, and running shops of their own, too, in perfect safety. You're behind the times, Bob. I don't want to be horrid, but really I'm tired, and ifyou stay here and talk to me, I warn you I'm going to be cross."
We were in the house now. Bob had followed me in. I was taking off my things. He stared at me as I proceeded.
"I didn't see any sense at all in your breaking off your engagement," I went on. "You both cared for each other. I should have thought——"
"It was inevitable," cut in Bob gravely. "It was inevitable, Lucy."
"Well, then, if it was, Bob, all right. I won't say another word about it. But now that Ruth is nothing to you——"
"Nothing to me!" he exclaimed.
"Yes, that is what I said—nothing to you," I repeated mercilessly, "I beg of you don't come here and show approval or disapproval about what she's up to. Leave her to me now. I'm backing her. I tell you, just as I told Tom and the others, she's all right. Ruth'sall right."
But later in my room I wondered—I wondered if Ruth really was all right. Sitting in my little rocking-chair by the window, sheltered and protected by kind, familiar walls, I asked myself what Ruth was doing now. It was nearing the dinner hour. Where would Ruth be eating dinner? It was growing dark slowly. It would be growing dark in New York. Stars would be coming out up above the towering skyscrapers, as they were now above the apple trees in the garden. I thought of Ruth's empty bed across the hall. Wherewould she sleep tonight? Oh, Ruth—Ruth—poor, little sister Ruth!
I remember when you were a little baby wrapped up in soft, pink, knitted things. The nurse put you in my arms, and I walked very carefully into my mother's room with you and stood staring down at you asleep. I was only a little girl, I was afraid I would drop you, and I didn't realize as I stood there by our mother's bed that she was bidding her two little daughters good-by. She couldn't take one of my hands because they were both busy holding you; but she reached out and touched my shoulder; and she told me always to love you and take care of you and be generous and kind, because you were little and younger. And I said I would, and carried you out very proud and happy.
That was a long while ago. I have never told you about it—we haven't found it easy to talk seriously together—but I have always remembered. I used to love to dress you when you were a baby, and feed you, and take you out in the brown willow baby carriage like the real mothers. But, of course, you had to outgrow the carriage; you had to outgrow the ugly little dresses father and I used to select for you at the department stores in Hilton; you had to outgrow the two little braids I used to plait for you each morning when you were big enough to go to school; you had to outgrow me, too. I am so plain and commonplace.
Yesterday when you put your arms about me there in the smoky train-shed in Hilton, and cried a littleas I held you close, with the great noisy train that was to take you away snorting beside us, you became again to me the little helpless sister that mother told me to take care of. All the years between were blotted out. I remembered our mother's room, the black walnut furniture. I saw the white pillows and mother's long, dark braids lying over each of her shoulders. Again I heard her words; again I felt the pride that swelled in my heart as I bore you away.
"I hope you are safe tonight. You can always call on me. I will always come. Don't be afraid. And when you are unhappy, write to me. I shall understand. You are not hard, you are not heartless. You are tender and sensitive. Only your armor is made of flint. You are not changeable and vacillating. They didn't know. You are brave and conscientious." With some such words as these last did I write to Ruth before I slept that night. I believed in her as I never had before. I cherished her with my soul.
This is what had happened in Hilton. After Ruth had left the room the afternoon of her inquisition, the rest of us had sat closeted in serious consultation for two hours or more. It was after five when we emerged.
To Edith's inquiry as to Ruth's whereabouts, a maid explained that Miss Ruth had left word that she was going to walk out to the Country Club, and would return in time for supper at seven. I went upstairs to my room. A feeling of despair possessedme. I sat down and gazed out of the window. A maid knocked lightly as I sat staring and came in with a letter.
"Miss Ruth told me to wait until you were alone and then to give you this," she explained.
I thanked her and she departed. I locked the door, then tore open Ruth's note to me and read it.