The time for the annual Firemen's Ball was now at hand. At this period the Firemen's Ball was an institution of the first social importance. As has been shown, the various organizations were voluntary associations, and in their ranks birds of a feather flocked together. On the common meeting ground of the big annual function all elements met, even—if they did not mingle as freely as they might.
In any case, the affair was very elaborate and very gorgeous. Preparations were in the hands of special committees months in advance. One company had charge of the refreshments, another of the music, a third of the floor arrangements, and so on. There was much jealous anxiety that each should do its part thoroughly and lavishly, for the honour of its organization. The members of each committee were distinguished by coloured ribbons, which they wore importantly everywhere. An air of preoccupied business was the proper thing for days before the event.
It was held this year in one of the armouries. The decoration committee had done its most desperate. Flags of all nations and strips of coloured bunting draped the rafters; greens from the Sausalito Hills framed the windows and doors; huge oiled Chinese lanterns swayed from the roofs. The floor shone like glass. At either end bowers of green half concealed the orchestras—two of them, that the music might never cease. The side rooms were set for refreshments. Many chairs lined the walls. Hundreds of lamps and reflectors had been nailed up in every conceivable place. It took a negro over an hour to light them all. Near the door stood a wide, flat table piled high with programs for the dancers. These were elaborate affairs, and had cost a mint of money—vellum folders, emblazoned in colour outside, with a sort of fireman heraldry and the motto: "We strive to save." Gilded pencils on short silken tasselled cords dangled from their corners.
At eight o'clock the lights were all blazing, the orchestras were tuning, and the floor fluttered with anxious labelled committeemen dashing to and fro. There was nothing for them to do, but they were nervous. By half-past eight the first arrivals could be seen hesitating at the outer door, as though reluctant to make a plunge; herded finally to the right and left of men's and women's dressing-rooms. After a long, chattering interval, encouraged by the slow accumulation of numbers, a little group debouched on the main, floor. Its members all talked and laughed feverishly, and tried with varying success to assume an accustomed ease they did not feel. Most of the women, somehow, seemed all white gloves and dancing slippers, and bore themselves rather like affable, slightly scared rabbits. The men suddenly became very facetious, swapping jokes in loud tones.
The orchestra at the far end immediately struck up, but nobody ventured on the huge and empty floor. Masters of ceremonies, much bebadged, rather conscious of white gloves, strove earnestly with hurried, ingratiating smiles to induce the younger members to break the ice. Ben Sansome, remarkable among them for his social ease and the unobtrusive correctness of his appointments, responsible head of the reception committee, masterfully seized a blushing, protesting damsel and whirled her away. This, however, was merely an informal sort of opening. The real bail could start only with the grand march; and the grand march was a pompous and intricate affair, possible only after the arrival of the city's elite. Partners for the grand march had been bespoken months before.
The Keiths arrived about half-past nine. Nan was looking particularly well in her girlish fashion. Her usual delicate colour was heightened by anticipation, for she intended ardently to "have a good time." For this occasion, too, she had put on the best of her new Eastern clothes, and was confident of the sensation they would create in the feminine breast. The gown was of silk the colour of pomegranate blossoms, light and filmy, with the wide skirts of the day, the short sleeves, the low neck. Over bodice and skirt had been gracefully trailed long sprays of blossoms. Similar flowers wreathed her head, on which the hair was done low and smooth, with a golden arrow securing it. A fine golden chain spanned her waist. From it dangled smaller chains at the ends of which depended little golden hands. These held up the front of the skirt artistically, at just the right height for dancing and to show flounces and ravishing petticoats beneath. It was an innovation of the sort the feminine heart delights in, a brand-new thing straight from Paris. Nan's gloves were of half length, the backs of the hands embroidered and displaying each several small sparkling jewels. The broad golden bracelets had been clasped outside the gloves. Around her little finger was a ring from which depended, on the end of a chain, a larger ring, and through this larger ring hung her dainty lace handkerchief. This was innovation number two. The men all stared at her proud, delicate, flowerlike effect of fresh beauty; but every woman present, and Nan knew it, noted first, the cut of her gown, second, the dangling little golden hands, and third, the handkerchief ring. She knew that not later than to-morrow at least a half-dozen urgent orders would be booked at Palmerston's; but she knew, also, that at least six months must elapse before those orders could be filled. As for the rest, her stockings were white, her slippers ribboned with cross-ties up the ankles, she carried a stiff and formal bouquet, as big around as a plate, composed of wired flowers ornamented with a "cape" of lace paper; but those things were common.
Altogether, Nan looked extraordinarily well, made a sensation. Keith was pleased and proud of her. He picked one of the blazoned vellum cards from the table and scrawled his initials opposite half a dozen dances.
"I'm going to hold you to those, you know," he said.
They proceeded, leisurely across the floor, and Keith established her in one of the chairs.
"I'll go get some of the men I want you to meet," said he. When he returned with Bernard Black he found Nan already surrounded, Ben Sansome was there, and Calhoun Bennett, and a half-dozen others, either acquaintances made on some of the Sundays, or young men brought up by Sansome in his capacity of Master of Ceremonies. She was having a good time laughing, her colour high, Keith looked about him with the intention of filling his own card.
Mrs. Morrell, surrounded by a hilarious group of the younger fry, was just entering the room. She was dressed in flame colour, and her gown was cut very low, plainly to reveal the swell of her ample bosom. Her evening gloves and slippers were golden, as was a broad metallic woven band around her waist. Altogether, striking, rather a conspicuous effort than an artistic success, any woman would have said; but there could be no doubt that she had provided a glittering bait for the attentions of the men.
Keith immediately made his way across to her.
"You are ravishing this evening," he said, reaching for her card. It was full. Keith was chopfallen.
"Take me to Mrs. Keith," asked Mrs. Morrell, taking the card again, "She looks charming to-night; that simple style just suits her wide-eyed innocence."
She placed her fingers lightly on Keith's arm and moved away, nodding over her shoulder at the rather nonplussed young men who had come in with her. Thus rid of them, she turned again to Keith.
"You didn't think I'd forget you!" she said, as though, reproachfully. "See, I kept you four dances. I put down those initials myself. Now don't you think I'm a pretty good sort?"
"Indeed I do! Which ones are they?" asked Keith, opening his own card.
"The third, seventh, ninth, and eleventh."
Keith hesitated for an appreciable instant. The seventh and eleventh he had put down for Nan. But somehow in the face of this smiling, cynical-looking, vivid creature, he rather shrank from saying that he had them with his wife. He swiftly reflected that, after all, he had four others with Nan, that she was so surrounded with admirers that she could not go partnerless, and that he would explain.
"Delightful!" he cried, pencilling his program.
Mrs. Morrell fluttered down alongside Mrs. Keith with much small talk. After a moment the music started for the grand march. Everybody took the floor.
"Where can Charley be!" cried Mrs. Morrell in apparent distress. "Don't wait here with me. I assure you I do not in the least mind sitting alone."
But she said it in a fashion that made it impossible, and in this manner Nan lost her first engagement with her husband. Not that it mattered particularly, she told herself, grand marches were rather silly things, and yet she could not avoid a feeling of thwarted pique at being so tied to the wall.
At the close of the march, and after the couples had pretty well resumed their seats, Mrs. Sherwood entered, unattended and very leisurely. She made, in her quieter manner, a greater sensation than had Mrs. Morrell. Quite self-possessed, carrying herself with her customary poise, dressed unobtrusively in black and gold, but with the distinction of an indubitable Parisian model, moving without self-consciousness in contrast to many of the other women, her small head high, her direct gaze a-smoulder with lazy amusement, she glided across the middle of the floor. The eyes of every woman in the ballroom were upon her. The "respectable" element stared shamelessly, making comments aside. Those a littledéclassé, on the fringe of society, or the "faster" women like Mrs. Morrell—who might in a way be considered her rivals—were apparently quite unaware of her. She made her unhasting way to a vacant chair, sat down, and looked calmly about her.
Immediately she was surrounded by a swarm of the unattached men. The attached men became very attentive to their partners.
"Hullo," remarked Keith cheerfully. "There's Mrs. Sherwood. I must go over and say good-evening to her."
On sudden impulse Nan rose with him. She instinctively disliked her present company and the situation; and a sudden pang of conscience had told her that not once since she had left the Bella Union had she laid eyes on the woman who had received her with so much kindness.
"Take me with you," she said to Keith.
"My dear!" cried Mrs. Morrell. "You wouldn't! Take my advice—you're young and innocent!"
She sought one of those exclusive, private-joke glances at Keith, but failed to catch his eye.
"She was very kind to me when I arrived," said Nan serenely. Keith, hesitated; then his impulsive, warm-hearted loyalty spoke.
"Good for you, Nan!" he cried.
They moved away, leaving Mrs. Morrell alone, biting her lip and planning revenges.
The group around Mrs. Sherwood fell away at their approach. Nan sat down next her, leaning forward with a pretty and girlish, impulsiveness.
"It's ages since I have seen you, and I have no excuse to offer," she said. "The days slip by."
"I know," said Mrs. Sherwood. "New house, new Chinaman, even new dog—enough to drive the most important thoughts out of one's head. But you've come out to-night like a flower, my dear. Your gown is charming, and it suits you so well!"
She chatted on, speaking of the floor, the music, the decorations, the crowd.
"I love this sort of thing," she remarked. "People in the mass amuse me. Jack couldn't get away until midnight, but I wouldn't wait for him. I told him it didn't worry me a bit to come without an escort," smoothing away what little embarrassment might linger. The music started up again. The Keiths arose and made their adieux. Mrs. Sherwood looked after them, her bright eyes tender. Mrs. Keith was the only woman who had yet spoken to her.
"Isn't she simply stunning?" cried Keith. "She has something about her that makes most of these others look cheap."
"She's really wonderfully attractive and distinguished looking," agreedNan.
"If she were only a little less practical—a little softer; more feminine—she'd be a sure-enough man killer. As it is, she needs a little more—you know what I mean—"
"More after Mrs. Morrell's fashion," suggested Nan a trifle wickedly. It popped out on the impulse, and the next instant Nan would have given anything if the words had not been said. Keith was arrested in mid-enthusiasm as though by cold water. He checked himself, looked at her sharply, then accepted the pseudo-challenge.
"Well, Mrs. Morrell, for all her little vulgarities, impresses you as being a very human sort of person."
He felt a sudden and unreasoning anger, possibly because the shot had hit a tender place.
"Shall we dance?" he suggested formally.
"I'm sorry," replied Nan, "I have this with Mr. Sansome; there he comes."
For the first time Keith felt a little irritated at the ubiquitous Sansome; but his sense of justice, while it could not smooth his ruffled feelings, nevertheless made itself heard.
"What I need is a drink," he told himself.
At the buffet he found a crowd of the non-dancing men, or those who had failed to get the early numbers. Here were many of his acquaintances; among them, to his surprise, he recognized the grim features of Malcolm Neil. All were drinking champagne. Keith joined them. They chaffed him unmercifully about his purchases of clouded titles in water lots, and he answered them in kind, aware of Neil's sardonically humorous eye fixed on him. But at the first bars of the next dance he bolted in search of Mrs. Morrell, with whom, he remembered, he had this number.
Mrs. Morrell danced smoothly and lightly for a woman of her size, but was inclined to snuggle up too close, to permit undistracted guidance to her partner. It was almost impossible to avoid collisions with other couples, unless one possessed a Spartan mind and an iron will. In spite of himself, Keith became increasingly aware of her breast pressing against his chest; her smooth arm against his shoulder; the occasional passing contact of her, scarcely veiled from the sense of touch by the thin flame-coloured silk; the perfume she affected; the faint odour of her bright blond hair. In an attempt to break the spell he made some banal remark, but she shook her head impatiently. She danced with her eyes half closed. When the music stopped she drew a deep sighing breath.
"You dance—oh, divinely!" she cried. "I might have known it."
She moved away, and Keith followed her, a trifle intoxicated.
"Let me see your card," she demanded abruptly. "Why, you haven't done your duty; this is hardly a third filled!"
"I hadn't started to fill it—and then you came in," breathed Keith.
They were opposite the door leading into one of the numerous small rooms off the main floor of the armoury.
"Let's sit here—and you can get me a punch," she suggested.
He brought the punch, and she drank it slowly, leaning back in an easy chair. The place was dimly lighted, and her blond, full beauty was more effective than in the more brilliantly lighted ballroom. Mrs. Morrell exerted all her fascination. The next dance was half over before either Keith or—apparently—Mrs. Morrell became aware of the fact.
"Oh, you must run!" she cried, apparently greatly exercised. "Don't mind me; go and find your partner."
Keith replied, that he had this dance free, a fact of which her inspection of his card had perfectly informed her. In answer to his return solicitation as to her own partner, she shrugged her shoulders.
"Oh, he'll find me," she said indifferently. "This is very cozy here."
They resumed what had become an ardent flirtation. Toward the end of the dance Mrs. Morrell's partner came in, looking very flurried. Before he could say a word, Mrs. Morrell began reproachfully to chide him with lack of diligence.
"I've been waiting justrootedto this spot!" she said truthfully.
"Shall we dance?" suggested the unfortunate young man.
"It's nearly over," replied Mrs. Morrell carelessly. "Do sit down with us. Get yourself something to drink.Don't go!" she commanded Keith fiercely under her breath.
At the beginning of the fourth dance, however, her next partner found her and led her away. She "made a face" over her shoulder at Keith.
When a woman makes up her mind to monopolize a man who has not acquired the fine arts of rudeness and escape she generally succeeds. Keith's cordial nature was incapable of rudeness. Besides, being a perfectly normal man, and Mrs. Morrell experienced and attractive, he liked being monopolized. It crossed his mind once or twice that he might be in for a scolding when he got home. Nan might be absurd. But he was so secure in his essential loyalty to Nan that his present conduct was more in the nature of a delightfully naughty escapade than anything else. He stole the apples now, and later would go dutifully for his licking. Men of Keith's nature are easily held and managed by a wise woman, but the woman must be very wise. Keith loved celebrations. On the wings of an occasion he rose joyfully and readily to incredible altitudes of high-spirited but harmless recklessness. Birthdays, anniversaries, New Years, Christmas, arrivals, departures, he seized upon with rapture. Each had its appropriate ceremonial, its traditional drink, the painstaking brewing of which was a sacred rite. On such occasions he tossed aside the cloak of the everyday. A "celebration" meant that you were different. Humdrum life and habits must be relegated to the background. It was permitted that, unabashed, you be as silly, as frivolous, as inconsequential, as boisterous, as lighthearted, as delightfully irresponsible as your ordinary concealed boyishness pleased. Customary repressions had nothing to do here. This was a celebration! And in the aforementioned our very wise woman would have seen—a safety valve.
Keith was off on a celebration to-night: an unpremeditated, freakish, impish, essentially harmless celebration, with a faint flavour of mischief in it because he had Nan in the back of his head all the time. He played up to Mrs. Morrell with exuberance, with honestly no thought except that he was having a whacking good time, and that old Nan was being teased. It was characteristic that for the time being he fell completely under Mrs. Morrell's fascination. They were together fully half the time, appearing on the floor only occasionally, then disappearing in one or the other of the many nooks. Mrs. Morrell "bolted" her dances shamelessly. Keith thought her awfully amusing and ingenious in the way she managed this. Sometimes they hid in out-of-the-way places. Sometimes she pretended to have mistaken the dance. "The sixth, are you verysure? I'm convinced it is only the fifth." Keith's conscience troubled him a little concerning the few names on his own card.
"I have this with Mrs. Wilkins," said he. "I really ought to go and look her up."
She took his card from him and deliberately tore it to small bits which she blew from the palm of her gloved hand. He protested in real dismay, but she looked him challengingly, recklessly, in the eye, until he laughed, too.
All this was, of course, well noticed. Keith, again characteristically, had not taken into consideration the great public. Nan might have remained comparatively indifferent to Keith's philandering about for an evening with the Morrell creature—she had by now a dim but growing understanding of "celebrations"—but that he should deliberately neglect and insult her in the face of all San Francisco was too much. Her high, young enjoyment of the evening fell to ashes. She was furiously angry, but she was a thoroughbred. Only a heightened colour and a sparkling eye might have betrayed her to an astute woman. Observing her, Ben Sansome took heart. It was evident to him that the Keiths had long since reached an absolute indifference in their relations, that they lived the conventional, tolerant, separate lives of the majority of married couples in Ben Sansome's smart acquaintance. He ventured to apply himself more assiduously, and was by no means badly received.
Keith remembered the next dance with his wife. He could not find her, although, a trifle conscience stricken, he searched everywhere. After the music had finished, she emerged from the dressing-room; the next time she could not be found at all. Evidently she was avoiding him with intention.
Mrs. Sherwood, after each dance, returned invariably to the same chair near the middle of one wall. There, owing to the fact that the "respectables" withdrew from the chairs on either side, withdrew gradually and without open rudeness, she held centre of a little court of her own. This made of it a sort of post of observation from which she could review all that was going on. She had no lack of partners, for she danced wonderfully, and in looks was quite the most distinguished woman there. Keith's dance with her came and went, but no Keith appeared to claim it. Mrs. Sherwood smiled a little grimly, and her glance strayed down the wall opposite until it rested on Nan. She examined the girl speculatively. Nan was apparently completely absorbed in Ben Sansome; but there was in her manner something feverish, hectic, a mere nothing, which did not escape Mrs. Sherwood's keen eye.
About midnight Sherwood appeared, and at once made his way to his wife's side. He was punctiliously dressed in the mode: a "swallowtail," bright, soft silk tie of ample proportions, frilled linen, and sparkling studs. He bent with an old-world formality over his wife's hand. She swept away her skirts from the chair at her side, her eyes sparkling softly with pleasure.
"You won't mind," she said carelessly to the young men surrounding her,"I want to talk to Jack for a minute."
They arose, laughing a little.
"That is your one fault, Mrs. Sherwood," said one, "you are altogether too fond of your husband."
"Well, how are things going?" asked Sherwood, as they moved away.
"I'm having a good time. But you're very late, Jack,"
"I know—I wanted to come earlier. Everything all right?"
At the question a little frown sketched itself on her clear brow.
"In general, yes," she said. "But they've got that Lewis boy out in the bar filling him up on champagne."
"That's a pity."
"It's a burning shame!" said she, "And I'd like to shake young Keith. He's dangled after the Morrell woman from start to finish in a manner scandalous to behold."
Sherwood laughed.
"The 'Morrell woman' will do his education good," he remarked.
"Well, she isn't doing that poor little Mrs. Keith's education any good," returned Mrs. Sherwood rather tartly.
Sherwood surveyed Nan and Ben Sansome leisurely.
"I must say she doesn't look crushed," he said, after a moment.
"Do you expect her to weep violently?" asked Mrs. Sherwood.
He accepted good naturedly the customary feminine scorn for the customary masculine obtuseness.
"Well, I don't know that we can help it," said he, philosophically.
Mrs. Sherwood appeared to come to a sudden resolution. She arose.
"You go get that Lewis boy away from the bar," she commanded.
Deliberately she shook and arranged her full skirts. The man with whom she had this dance, and who had been waiting dutifully for the conference to close, darted forward. She shook her head at him smilingly.
"I'm going to let you off," she told him. "You won't mind. I have something extra special to do."
She swept quite alone across the middle of the ballroom, serene, self-possessed; and walked directly toward Keith and Mrs.
Morrell, who were seated together at the other end. A perceptible pause seemed to descend. The music kept on playing, couples kept on dancing, but, nevertheless, suddenly the air was charged with attention. Sherwood looked after her with mingled astonishment and fond pride.
"A frontal attack, egad!" said he to himself.
Keith and Mrs. Morrell pretended, as long as they decently could, not to see her. She swam leisurely toward them. Finally Keith arose hastily; Mrs. Morrell stared straight ahead.
"Young man," accused Mrs. Sherwood, with a faint amusement in her rich, low voice, "do you know that this is our dance?"
Keith excused his apparent lapse volubly, telling several times over that his program had been destroyed, that he was abject when he thought of the light this put him in.
"It is only when angels like yourself condescend to reach me a helping hand that I have even a chance to right myself," he added. He thought this rather a good touch.
Mrs. Sherwood stood before him easily, in perfect repose of manner, the half smile still sketching her lips. She said just nothing at all in response to his glib excuses; but when he had quite finished she laid her hand in his arm. Mrs. Morrell, her colour high, continued to stare straight ahead, immobile except for the tapping of one foot. To Keith's request to be excused she vouchsafed a stiff half nod, partly in his direction.
They danced. Mrs. Sherwood, like most people who have command enough of their muscles to be able to keep them in graceful repose, danced marvellously well. When she stopped after a single turn of the room, Keith expostulated vigorously.
"You are a perfect partner," he told her.
"Take me in here and get me a sherbet," she commanded, without replying to his protests. "That's good," she said, when she had tasted it. "Now sit down and listen to me. You are making a perfect spectacle of yourself. Don't you know it?"
Keith stiffened to an extreme formality.
"I beg your pardon!" said he freezingly.
"That may be your personal individual right"—went on Mrs. Sherwood's low, rich voice evenly. She was not even looking at him, but rather idly toward the open door into the ballroom. Her fan swung from one finger; every line of her body was relaxed. She might have been tossing him ordinary commonplaces from the surface of a detached mind—"making a spectacle of yourself," she explained; "but you're making a perfect spectacle of your wife as well—and in public. That is not your right at all."
Keith sprang to his feet, furious.
"You are meddling with what is really my own business, madam," said he.
For the first time she looked up at him, dearly and steadily. In the eyes.
"Very well. That is true. Stop a moment and think. Are you attending to your business yourself, even decently? Yes, I understand; you are angry with me. If I were a man, you would challenge me to a duel and all that sort of thing." She smiled indifferently. "Let's take that for granted and get on. Sweep it aside. You are man enough to do it, or I mistake you greatly. Look down into yourself for even one second. Are you playing fair all around?Aren't you a little ashamed?"
She held him with, her clear, level gaze. His own did not fall before it, and his head went back, but slowly his face and neck turned red. Thus they stared at each other for a full half minute, she smiling slightly, perfectly cool; he seething with a suppressed emotion of some sort. Then she turned indolently away.
"You're too fine to do things like that," she said, with a new softness in her voice; "we all have too much faith in you. The common tricks would not appeal to you, except in idleness; is it not so?"
She smiled up at him, a little sidewise. Keith caught his breath. For a fleeting instant this extraordinary woman deigned to exert her feminine charms for the first time the coquette looked from her eyes; for the first time he saw mysteriously deep in her veiled nature a depth of possibility, of rich possibility—he could not grasp it—it was gone. But in spite of himself his pulses leaped like a flame. But now she was gazing again at the ballroom door, cool, indolent, aloof, unapproachable. Yet just at that instant, somehow, the other woman looked shallow, superficial, cold. His glance fell on Mrs. Morrell still sitting where he had left her. Something was wrong with her effect——
Analysis was submerged in a blaze of anger. This anger was not now against the woman before him; his instinct prevented that. Nor against Mrs. Morrell nor his wife; reluctant justice prevented that. Nor against himself—where it really belonged. Things were out of joint; he felt cross-grained and ugly. Mrs. Sherwood rose.
"You may take me back now," said she.
As they glided across the floor together, her small sleek head came just above his shoulder. No embarrassment disturbed her manner. Keith could not find in him a spark of resentment against her. She moved by his side with an air of poise and detachment as a woman whose mind had long since weighed and settled the affairs of her own cosmos so that trifles could not disturb her.
Leaving her in her accustomed chair, where Sherwood waited, Keith loyally returned to Mrs. Morrell, who still sat alone. Subconsciously he noticed something wrong with Mrs. Morrell. Her gowning was indeed rather a conspicuous effort than an artistic success. She had badly torn her dress—perhaps that was it.
Mrs. Morrell received him with every appearance of sympathy.
"You poor thing!" she cried. "What a fearful situation! Of course I know you couldn't help it."
But Keith was grumpy and monosyllabic. He refused to discuss the situation or Mrs. Sherwood, returning with an obvious effort to commonplaces. Mrs. Morrell exerted all her fascination to get him back to the former level. A little cold imp sat in the back of Keith's brain and criticised sardonically; Why will big women persist in being kittenish? Why doesn't she mend that awful rent, it's fairly sloppy! Suppose she thinks that kind of talk is funny! Idowish she wouldn't laugh in that shrill, cackling fashion! In short, the very tricks that an hour ago were jolly and amusing were now tiresome. Having been distrait, ungallant, masculinely put out for another fifteen minutes, he abruptly excused himself, sought out Nan, and went home.
From her point of observation, Mrs. Sherwood watched them go. Nan looked very tired, and every line of Keith's figure expressed a grumpy moroseness.
"Congratulations," said Sherwood.
"He certainly is a child of nature," returned his wife. "Look at him!He is cross, so helookscross. That this is a ballroom and that allSan Francisco is present is a mere detail."
"How did you break it up?" asked Sherwood curiously.
"Men are so utterly ridiculous! He had built up a lot of illusions for himself, but his instincts are true and good. It needed only a touch. It was absurdly simple."
"He'll go back to the Morrell to-morrow," asserted Sherwood confidently.
She shook her head.
"Not to her. Heseesher now. And not to-morrow. But eventually to somebody, perhaps. He has curly hair."
Sherwood laughed.
"Shear him, like Sampson," he suggested. "But it strikes me he has about the most attractive woman—bar one—in town right at home."
"She'd have no trouble in holding him if she were onlyawake. But she's only a dear little child—and about as helpless. She has very little subtlety. I'm afraid she'll follow the instincts of her training. She'll be too proud to do anything herself to attract her husband, once his attentions to her seem to drop off. She'll just become cold and proud—and perhaps eventually turn elsewhere."
"I don't believe she's a bit that kind," asserted Sherwood positively.
"Nor do I. But, Jack, a woman lonely enough has fancies, that in the long run may become convictions."
Mrs. Sherwood was completely right. Keith hadseenMrs. Morrell. The glamour had fallen from her at a touch. He did not in the least understand how this had happened, and considered that it was his own fault. Mrs. Morrell had not changed in the least, but he had, somehow. He looked upon himself as fickle, disloyal, altogether despicable. Yet for the life of him he could not get up the slightest spark of enthusiasm for musical evenings, Sunday night suppers, or week-end excursions into the country. They had fallen dead to his taste; and with the sudden revolt to which such temperaments as his are subject, he could not bear even the thought of them without a feeling of incipient boredom. The blow administered to his self-respect put him quite out of conceit with himself and the world in general. If he had followed his natural instinct, he would instanter have thrown, overboard all the Morrell episode, bag and baggage.
But that was, of course, impossible. Keith felt his obligations; he was a man of honour; he had respect for the feelings of others; he could not make friendly people the victims of his own outrageous freaks. That was out of the question!
Mrs. Morrell sent for him. She had been puzzled by the episode of the evening before. It would have been absolutely incredible to her that a hundred words from a woman who was not her rival could have destroyed her influence over this man. She had considerable knowledge of men, and she had played her cards carefully. But she realized that something was the matter; and she thought that the time had come to use the power she had gained. A note dispatched by the Chinaman would do.
Keith obeyed the summons. He knew himself well enough to realize that the intimacy, such as it was, must come to a pretty abrupt termination. Otherwise, he would shortly get very bored; and when he got very bored he became, in spite of himself, reserved and self-contained to the point of rudeness. For the exact reason that he saw thus clearly, his conscience was smiting him hard. Mrs. Morrell had done nothing to deserve this treatment. He was a dastard, a coward, ashamed of himself. If she wanted to see him, it was her due that he obey her summons promptly. He went with the vague idea of making amends by doing whatever she seemed to require—for this once.
She entered the dim sitting-room clad in a flowing silken negligée, which she excused on the ground of laziness.
"I'm still a little tired from last night," she said, with a laugh.
The soft material and informal cut clung to and defined the lines of her figure, showing to especial advantage the long sweep of her hips, the pliancy of her waist, the swell of her fine bust. A soft lilac colour set off the glint of her fair hair. She was, in fact, feeling a little languid from the reaction of the ball and in a sudden rush of emotion she admired Keith's crisp freshness. Her eyes swam a little and her breast heaved.
But the preliminary conversation went by jerks. Keith answered her advances with an effort toward ease and cordiality, but with a guarded, unnatural manner that sent a sudden premonitory chill to the woman's heart. Her instinct warned her. As the minutes passed, her uneasiness grew to the point of fear. Was she losing him? Why? This was no time for ordinary methods.
She arose and went to sit by his side.
"What's the matter, dear?" she asked.
"Nothing."
"Why are you acting in this manner? What have I done?"
"I'm not; you haven't done anything—of course."
She suddenly leaned forward, looking into his eyes, projecting all the force of her magnetism. She had before seen him respond, felt him quiver to her tentative, mischievous advances.
"Kiss me," she breathed.
Poor Keith was having a miserable enough time. He clung to his first thought—that this evening was her due, that he was in some way bound, in ending everything, to pay whatever coin he had left. He obeyed her, touching her lips lightly and coldly with his own. Never was chaster caress bestowed on melting mood!
She flung him violently aside, her face writhing and contorted with fury. She was enlightened, completely, as she could have been enlightened in no other manner.
"You can go!" she cried hoarsely. "Get out! Don't dare enter this house again!"
He made some sort of spiritless, feeble protest, trying his best to put some convincing quality into it. But she did not even listen. The ungoverned tiger-cat part of her nature was in the ascendant, the fierce pride of the woman living near the edge of the half-world. She would gladly have killed him. At length he went, very confused, bewildered, miserable—and relieved! He left behind him a bitter enemy.
In complete revulsion, Keith scuttled the frivolous world of women. As he expressed it, he was sick of women. They made him tired. Too much fuss trying to keep even with their vagaries. A man liked something he could bite on. He plunged with all the enthusiasm and energy of his vivid personality into his business deal of the water lots and into the fascinating downtown life of the pioneer city. The mere fact that he had ended that asinine Morrell affair somehow made him think he had made it all up to Nan, and he settled back tacitly and without further preliminaries into what his mood considered a most satisfactory domestic basis. That is, he took his home and his home life for granted. It was there when he needed it. He admired Nan greatly, and supplied her with plenty of money, and took her to places when he could get the time. Some day, when things were not quite so lively, they would go somewhere together. In the meantime he never failed to ask her every evening if she had enjoyed herself that day; and she never failed to reply that she had. Everything was most comfortable.
After the Firemen's Ball Nan, somehow relieved of any definite uneasiness, felt that she should be made much of, should be a little wooed, that Keith should make up a little for having been somewhat of a naughty boy. When, instead, she was left more alone than before, she was hurt and depressed. Of course, Milton did not realize—but what was there for her? Wing Sam ran the house; she worked a good deal in the garden, assisted by Gringo. Probably at no time in modern history have wives been left so much alone and so free as during this period. The man's world was so absorbing; the woman's so empty.
Ben Sansome dropped in quite often. He was always amusing, always agreeable, interested in all sorts of things, ready to give his undivided attention to any sort of a problem, no matter how trivial, to consider it attentively, and to find for it a fair and square deliberate solution. This is exceedingly comforting to the feminine mind. He taught Gringo not to "jump up"; he found out what was the matter with theGold of Ophircutting; he discovered and took her to see just the shade of hangings she had long sought for the blue room. Within a very short time he had established himself on the footing of the casual old-time caller, happening by, dropping in, commenting and advising detachedly, drifting on again before his little visit had assumed rememberable proportions. He had always the air of just leaning over the fence for a moment's chat; yet he contrived to spend the most of an afternoon. He spoke of Keith often, always in affectionate terms, as of a sort of pal, much as though he and Nanbothowned him, he, of course, in a lesser degree.
One afternoon, after he had actually been digging away at a bulb bed for half an hour, Nan suggested that he come in for refreshment. Gradually this became a habit. Sansome and Nan sat cozily either side the little Chinese tea table. He visibly luxuriated.
"You don't know what a privilege this is for me—for any lonesome bachelor in this crude city—to have a home like this to come to occasionally."
He hinted at his situation, but made of its details a dark mystery. The final impression was one of surface lightness and gayety, but of inner sadness.
"It is a terrible city for a man without an anchor!" he said. "Keith is a lucky fellow! If I only had some one, as he has, I might amount to something." A gesture implied what a discouraged butterfly sort of person he really was.
"You ought to marry," said Nan gently.
"Marry!" he cried. "Dear lady, whom? Where in this awful mixture they call society could one find a woman to marry?"
"There are plenty of nice women here," chided Nan.
"Yes—and all of them taken by luckier fellows! You wouldn't have me marry Sally Warner, would you—or any of the other half-dozen Sally Warners? I might as well marry a gas chandelier, a grand piano, and a code of immorals—but the standard of such women is so different from the standard of women like yourself."
Nan might pertinently have inquired what Ben Sansome did in this gallery, anyhow; but so cold-blooded and direct an attack would have required a cool detachment incompatible with his dark, good looks, his winning, appealing manners, his thoughtfulness in little things, his almost helpless reliance on her sympathy; in other words, it presupposed a rather cynical, elderly person. And Nan was young, romantic, easily stirred.
"All you need is to believe in yourself a little more," she said earnestly and prettily. "Why don't you undertake something instead of drifting? Some of the people you go with are not especially good for you—do you think so?"
"Good for me?" he laughed bitterly. "Who cares if I go to the dogs? They'd rather like me to; it would keep them company! And I don't know that I care much myself!" he muttered in a lower tone.
She leaned forward, distressed, her eyes shining with expostulation.
"You mustn't hold yourself so low," she told him vehemently. "You mustn't! There are a great many people who believe in you. For their sake you should try. If you would only be just a little bit serious—in regard to yourself, I mean. A gay life is all very well——"
"Gay?" he interrupted, then caught himself. "Yes, I suppose I do seem gay—God knows I try not to cry out—but, really, sometimes I'm near to ending it all——"
She was excited to a panic of negation.
"Oh, no! no!" she expostulated vehemently. ("Egad, she's stunning when she's aroused!" thought Sansome.) "You mustn't talk like that! It isn't fair to yourself; it isn't fair to your manhood! Oh, how you do need some one to pull you up! If I could only help!"
He raised his head and looked directly at her, his dark, melancholy eyes lighting slowly.
"You have helped; you are helping," he murmured. "I suppose I have been weak and a coward, I will try."
"That's right. I am so glad," she said, glowing with sweetness and a desire to aid. "Now you must turn over a new leaf," she hesitated. "Every way, I mean," she added with a little blush.
"I know I drink more than I ought," he supplied in accents of regret.
"Don't you suppose you could do without?" she begged very gently.
"Will you help me?" He turned on her quickly; then, his delicate instincts perceiving a faint, instinctive recoil at his advance, he added: "Just let me come here occasionally, into this quiet atmosphere, when it gets too hard and I can see no light; just to get your help, the strength I shall need to tide me over."
He looked very handsome and romantic and young. He was apparently very, deeply in earnest. Nan experienced a rash of pity, of protective maternal emotion.
"Yes, do come," she assented softly.
All this time Keith was busy every minute of the day. The water-lot matter was absorbing all his attention. Through skilful and secret agents Neil had acquired a great deal of scrip issued by the city for various public works and services which the holders had not yet exchanged for the new bonds. These he turned over to Keith. Very quietly, by prearrangement, the latter sued and obtained judgments. When all this had been fully accomplished—and not before then—the veil of secrecy was rent. Rowlee's paper advertised a forthcoming sale of water lots to satisfy the judgments.
Then followed, for Keith, an anxious period of three days. But at the end of that time the commissioners issued a signed warning that the titles conveyed by this sale would not be considered legal. On seeing this, Keith at once rushed around to Neil's office.
"Here it is," he announced jubilantly. "They held off so long that I began to be afraid they did not intend to play our game for us. But it's all right."
The matter was widely discussed; but next morning placards, bearing the text of the commissioners' warning, were posted on every blank wall in town and distributed as dodgers. These were attributed by the public to zeal on the part of those officials; but the commissioners knew nothing about it.
"Some anonymous friend of the city must have done it," Hooper told his friends, and added, "We are delighted!"
The unknown friend was Malcolm Neil himself.
This warning had its effect. As Keith had predicted, nobody cared to put good money into what was officially and authoritatively announced as a bad title. At the sheriff's sale there were no bona fide bidders except the secret agents of Malcolm Neil. The sheriff's titles—such as they were—went for a song. Immediately the ostensible purchasers were personally warned by the commission; but they seemed satisfied.
So matters rested until, a little later, the commissioners inserted in all the papers the customary legal advertisements setting forth a sale by them, under the State law, of these same water lots to satisfy the interest and fill the sinking fund for the bonds. The next morning appeared a statement signed by all the ostensible purchasers under the sheriff's sale. This stated dearly and succinctly the intention to contest any titles given by the commissioners, even to the highest courts. This was markedadvt, to indicate the newspaper's neutrality in the matter. Rowlee commented on the situation editorially, He took the righteous and indignant attitude, expressing extreme journalistic horror that such a hold-up should be possible in a modern, civilized community, hurling editorial contempt on the dastardly robbers who were thus intending to shake down the innocent purchasers, etc. In fact, he laid it on thick, But he managed to insinuate a doubt. Between the lines the least astute reader could read Rowlee's belief that perhaps these first purchasers might have a case, iniquitous but legal. He hammered away at this for a week. By the end of that time he had, by the most effective, indirect methods—purporting all the time to be attacking the signers of the warning—succeeded in instilling into the public mind a substantial distrust of the stability of the titles to be conveyed at the commissioners' sale. Malcolm Neil complimented him highly at their final and secret interview.
Again Keith's predictions were fulfilled to the letter. Nobody wanted to buy a lawsuit. There were a few bidders, it is true, but they were faint hearted. Another set of Malcolm's secret agents bid all the lots in at a nominal figure. That very afternoon they all met in Neil's stuffy little back office. Keith had the deeds prepared. All that was necessary was to affix the signatures. The purchasers under both sales conveyed their rights to Neil and Keith. The latter now possessed uncontested and incontestable title.
Having personally delivered the deeds to the recorder's office, Keith went home. In the relief from pressure, the triumph, and the exaltation, his instinct carried him to the actual background of his life—his genuine but preoccupied affection for Nan. The constraint, that had been so real to her, had never been anything but nebulous to him.
He burst into the house, capered around the room boyishly, seized her, and waltzed her gayly about. Quite taken by surprise, Nan's first thought was that he had been drinking too much; so naturally she failed to rise instantly to the occasion.
"Stop it, Milton!" she cried. "What has got into you! You're tearing me to ribbons!"
He laughed heartily.
"You must think I'm crazy," he acknowledged. "Sit down here, and learn what a great man your husband is." He poured out the story of the transaction, omitting no details of the clever schemes by which it had been worked. He was, above all, proud of his legal address and acumen—there was something in Eastern training, after all; this lay right under their noses, but none of them saw it until he came along and picked it up. "And there are some pretty smart men out here, too, let me tell you that," he added. "They're from all parts of the world, and they've had a hard practical education, their eye teeth are cut!" His egotism over being keener than the acknowledged big men was very fresh and charming. The money gained he mentioned as an afterthought, only when the other aspect of the situation had been exhausted. "The cold hard dollars are pretty welcome just now," he told her. "There's about a quarter million in those lots—and we can realize on all or part of them at any time. All came out of here!" He tapped his forehead, and paused in his rapid pacing to and fro to look down at her In the easy chair, "We are well off now. We needn't scrimp and save"—it did not for the moment occur to him that they had not been doing so—"I'm going to get you eight new gowns, and twelve new hats, and a bushel of diamonds——"
"I'm glad, very glad!" she cried, catching his enthusiasm, her mind for the first time occupying itself seriously with the mechanism of the deal. At first, when he had been explaining, she had not thrown off the impression that he had been drinking, and so had paid little attention to his explanations. "It sounds like magic. Tell me again—how you did it."
Nothing loath, he went over it again, making clear the double clouding of the titles.
But Nan, being much alone, had the habit, shared with few women of that time, of reading the newspapers. She had followed Rowlee's campaign, and she had taken seriously the editor's diatribes, Rowlee had been talking for effect. The ideals of ultimate civic honesty were yet fifty years in the future, but he had stumbled on their principle. Nan's mind, untrained in any business ethics, caught them; and her sure natural instincts had accepted their essential justice. In recognizing Milton's connection as promoter with just this deal, she was suddenly called upon to make adjustments for which there was no time. She knew Milton would do nothing wrong, and yet—he was waiting in triumph for her response.
"It was very clever. And yet, somehow, it doesn't sound right—" she puzzled, "Are you sure it's honest?"
"Honest?" he snorted, halted in mid-career, "Of course it's honest! Why isn't it honest?"
Confronted with the direct question, she really did not know. She groped, proffering tentatively some of the arguments half remembered from Rowlee's editorial columns. But she confronted now a lawyer, sure of himself. Keith explosively, and contemptuously demolished her contentions. Everything was absolutely legal, every step of it. If a man hadn't a right to buy in property at any sale and sell it again where he wanted, where in thunder was our boasted liberty? Just the kind of fool notion women get! Keith in his honest pride and triumph had come for sympathy and admiration. Turned back on himself, he became vaguely resentful, and shortly left the house.
Hardly had the front door closed after him when Nan burst into tears. She had not meant it to come out that way at all. Of course she had had no real thought that Milton would do anything dishonest; how absurd of him to take it that way! She had simply expressed a queer instinctive thought that had flashed across her mind; and now she could not for the life of her guess how she had come to do so. Miserably and passionately she realized that she had bungled it.
But if Keith missed the appreciation of his triumph at home, he received full meed of it downtown. In a corner of the Empire a dozen of the biggest men in town were gathered. They were Sam Brannan; Palmer, of Palmer, Cook & Co.; Colonel E. D. Baker, the original "silver-tongued orator"; Dick Blatchford, the contractor; Judge Terry, of the Supreme Court; oily, coarse Ned McGowan; Nugent and Rowlee, editors, and some others. They were doing an exceedingly important part of their daily business: sipping their late afternoon cocktails. Calhoun Bennett joined them.
"Little item of news to interest you-all," drawled the Southerner. "I've just come down from the recorder's office. The deeds for the water lots have just been recorded." He paused.
"Have a drink, Cal," urged Dick Blatchford, "and sit down. What of it?"
"They were recorded in the names of Malcolm Neil and young Keith. I'll have a cocktail."
"That so? Pretty shaky title. Which sale did they record under?"
"Both!" said Bennett.
He stood until he saw that the significance of this had soaked in; then he drew out a chair and sat down. Ned McGowan chuckled hoarsely.
"Pretty slick!" said he. "Wonder some of us didn't think of that! I suppose they went around and scared the purchasers until they got them, pretty cheap. Trust old Neil to drive a bargain!"
But Palmer, the banker, who had been thinking, here spoke up:
"The purchasers were undoubtedly their agents," he surmised quietly.
"By God, you're right!" cried Terry. "Old Malcolm is certainly the devil without a tail!"
"Speak of him and you get him," remarked Colonel Baker, pointing outNeil, who had just entered.
They raised a shout at him, until finally the old man, reluctantly and crabbedly, sidled over to join them.
"You're discovered, old fox!" cried Terry; "and the outraged dignity of the law demands a drink."
They plied him with half-facetious, half-envious congratulations. ButNeil would have none of them.
"Not my scheme," he growled. "Entirely Keith's. I'm a sleeping partner only. He engineered it all, thought of it all, dragged me in."
"You must have made a good thing out of it, Mr. Neil," suggested Palmer respectfully.
The formidable old man eyed the speaker grumpily for a moment.
"About a quarter million, cool, between us," he vouchsafed finally. He was, for some reason, willing to brag a bit.
This statement was received in admiring silence by all but Terry. Everybody but that devil-may-care and lawless pillar of the law was afraid of Neil. But Terry would joke with anybody.
"I hope you're going to let him have a little of it, Neil," he laughed.
The old man shifted his eyes from Palmer to Terry with much the air of restraining heavy guns. Terry met the impact untroubled.
"Judge," grunted the financier at last, "that young man will get his due share. He has tied me up in a contract that even your honoured court would find difficulty in breaking."
With this parting shot he arose and stumped out.
"If Malcolm Neil acknowledges he is tied up," observed Terry, who had not been in the slightest degree disturbed, "he is certainly tied up!"
"Consider the man who tied him," begged Colonel Baker. "He must, in the language of the poets, be a lallapaloozer."
"He's worth getting hold of," said Dick Blatchford.
Therefore, when, a little later, Keith appeared, he was hailed jovially, and invited to drink. Everybody was very cordial. Within five minutes he was hail fellow with them all, joking with the most august of them on terms of equality. Judge Terry, in whose court he had stood abashed, plied him with cocktails; Colonel Baker told several stories, one of which was new; Sam Brannan, with the mixture of coarseness, overbearing manners, and fascination that made him personally attractive to men and some women, called him "my boy"; and the rest of the party had whole-heartedly taken him in and were treating him as one of themselves. Keith had known all these men, of course, but they had been several cuts above him in importance, and his relations with most of them had been formal. His whole being glowed and expanded. After the first cocktail or two, and after a little of this grateful petting, he had some difficulty in keeping himself from getting too expansive, in holding himself down to becoming modesty, in not talking too much. He quite realized the meaning of this sudden cordiality; but he welcomed it as another endorsement, from the highest, most unimpeachable sources, of his cleverness and legal acumen.
They drank and talked until twilight. Then Keith began to make his excuses. They shouted him down.
"You're going to dinner with us, my son," stated Brannan. "They've opened an oyster palace down the street, and we're going to sample it."
"But my wife—" began Keith.
"Permit me," interrupted Terry, bending his tall form in courtesy. "I am about to dispatch a messenger to Mrs. Terry, and shall be pleased to instruct him to call at your mansion also."
It was so arranged. Immediately they adjourned to the new "Oyster Palace," a very gaudy white and gilt monstrosity with mirrors and negro minstrels. There were small private rooms, it seemed, and one of these was bespoken from the smiling manager, flattered at the patronage of these substantial men.
San Francisco lived high in those days. It could pay, and for pay the best will go anywhere. The dinner was quite perfect. There were more cocktails and champagne. Under the influence of good fellowship and drinks, Keith was finally prevailed upon to give the details of the whole transaction. Perhaps this was a little indiscreet, but he was carried away by the occasion. The noisy crowd suddenly became quiet, and listened with the deepest attention. When Keith had finished, there ensued a short silence. Then Judge Terry delivered his opinion.
"Sound as a dollar," he pronounced at last. "Not a hole in it. Is that your opinion, Colonel Baker?"
"Clever piece of work," nodded the orator gravely. After this interim of sobriety the dinner proceeded more and more noisily. The drink affected the different men in different ways. A flush appeared high on the cheek bones of Terry's lean face and an added dignity in his courtly manner. Brannan became louder and more positive. On Blatchford his potations had no appreciable effect except that his round face grew redder. Ned McGowan dropped even his veneer of good breeding, became foul mouthed and profane, full of unpublishable reminiscence to which nobody paid any particular attention. Calhoun Bennett's speech became softer, more deliberate, more consciously Southern. Keith, who was really most unaccustomed to the heavy drinking then in vogue, was filled with a warm and friendly feeling toward everybody. His thoughts were a bit vague, and he had difficulty in focussing his mind sharply. The lights were very bright, and the room warm.
Suddenly they were all in the open air under the stars. There seemed to have been an unexplained interim. Everybody was smoking cigars. Keith was tugging at his pocket and expostulating something about payment—something to do with the dinner. Evidently some part of him had gone on talking and thinking. The fresh air brought him back to the command. Various suggestions were being proffered. Blatchford was for hiring rigs and driving out to the Mission; Calhoun Bennett suggested the El Dorado; but Sam Brannan's bull voice decided them.
"I'm going to Belle's!" he roared, and at once started off up the street. The idea was received with acclamation. They straggled up the street toward the residential portion of town.
Keith followed. The delayed action of the drink had thrown him into a delicious whirling haze. He felt that he could be completely master of himself at any moment merely by making the effort; only it did not at present seem worth while. He knew where Belle's was: it was the ornate house diagonally across the street from his own, the one concerning which the clerk had been so evasive when they were house hunting.
Belle's was a three-story frame building, differing in no outward essential from the fashionable residences around it. On warm evenings there sometimes came through the opened windows the sound of a piano, the clink of glasses, loud laughter or singing. The chance bystander might have heard identically the same from any other house in the neighbourhood. Only Belle's occasionally—rarely occasionally—contributed a crash or an oath. Such things were, however, quickly hushed. Belle's was run on respectable lines. Men went in and out quite openly, with the tolerance of most, but to the scandal of a few. Those curious, consulting the yellowed files of the newspapers, can read little protests—signed withnom de plumes—from young women, complaining that young men of their acquaintance, after calling decorously on them, would cross quite openly to the house over the way. Yet they were powerless, for a year or so at least, to break up the custom.
For Belle's was a carry-over from the 49-51 days when of social life there was none at all. It differed from the merely disreputable house. Belle prided herself on quiet conduct and many friends. In person she was a middle-aged, still attractive Frenchwoman. She had furnished her parlours very elaborately, and she insisted that both her employees and clients should behave in the public rooms with the greatest circumspection.
Indeed, a casual visitor, unacquainted with the character of the place, might well have been deceived. The women sitting about were made up and very décolleté, to be sure, but their conduct, while not always of the highest tone, was nevertheless quite devoid of freedom. Belle permitted no overt word or action; nor was any visitor subjected to another expectation than the occasional opening of a bottle of wine "for the good of the house."
But outside of the one fundamental rule of decency, the caller could make himself comfortable in his own way. He could lounge, pound the piano, joke, play games, smoke where he pleased, and enjoy what was then a rarity—the company and conversation of nimble-witted, well-dressed, beautiful women whose ideas were not narrow. Ultimate possibilities were always kept very much in the background, but that there were possibilities made for present relaxation or freedom.
Twice a year Belle was in the habit of giving a grand party. The invitations were engraved. Entertainment was on a sumptuous scale. There were dancing, all sorts of card games, an elaborate supper, the best of music, often professional entertainers of great merit. Everything was free except wine. Nearly the whole masculine population turned out for Belle's big party—judges, legislators, bankers, merchants, as well as the professional politicians and the gamblers. The most prominent men of the city frequented Belle's at other times openly, without fear of public opinion—many of them merely for the sense of freedom and relaxation they there enjoyed. Everybody was welcome.
Keith, however, knowing the character of the place, had never been inside its doors. Now, enveloped in his rosy haze, exceedingly contented with his company, he followed where they led. At the door a neat coloured maid relieved him of his hat and coat, and smiled a welcome. His dazzled vision took in a long drawing-room, soft red carpets, red brocade curtains of heavy material, with edges of gold fringe and with gold cords, chandeliers of many dangling prisms, a white marble mantel, a grand piano, a few pictures of the nude, and many chairs. Ravishingly beautiful, wonderfully dressed women sat about in indolent attitudes.
The hilarious party at once scattered through the room, Calhoun Bennett went to the piano and began to play sentimental airs. Ned McGowan, his face very red, enthroned himself in an easy chair, clasping girls who perched on either arm. He talked to them in a low voice. They leaned over to hear, and every moment or so they burst into shrieks of laughter. Judge Terry was listening intently to some serious communication Belle herself was making to him. Sam Brannan was roaring for champagne. The others were circulating here and there, talking, playing practical jokes. Altogether, to Keith's rosy vision, a colourful and delightful scene. Nobody paid him the least attention.
How long he stood there he did not know. The groups before him shifted and changed confusedly. The lights seemed to blaze and to dim, and then to blaze again. After a long interval he became aware of a touch on his arm. He looked down. A piquant, dark-eyed, tilt-nosed girl was smiling up at him.
"Wat you do?" she was begging. "You come wiz me?"
He focussed his attention on the room. It was almost empty. He saw the back of Judge Terry disappearing into the street. He passed his hand across his eyes.
"Where are the others?" he asked confusedly.
She laughed with significance. He looked down at her again. Her complexion was a sort of dead white, her lips were red and glistening, her eyes were darkened. He turned suddenly and left the house. The coloured maid, disappointed in a tip, stood in the doorway, his hat and coat in her hands, staring after him. The cool air a little cleared his brain. He stopped short in the middle of the street, trying to collect himself.
"I'm drunk," he solved finally, and proceeded very carefully toward his own house. After each dozen steps he paused to collect his thoughts before proceeding. In one of these pauses he distinctly heard a window slam shut; there were plenty of louder things, he heard only the window. He hadn't the least idea of the time of night, except that it must be very late. As a matter of fact, it was not more than half-past ten. Near his own gate he nearly ran into a woman strolling. With some instinct of apology, he turned in her direction. As his bare head was revealed in the dim light, the woman uttered a low laugh.
"And was Belle as charming as ever?" demanded Mrs. Morrell sweetly but icily. "Go in carefully now, so dear little wifey won't know."
She laughed again and moved past him. He stared after her with a vague sense of injustice, somehow; then went on.