"It isn't really a present at all, of course, for it was bought with your money, and perhaps you won't like it, for I've noticed you never wear any jewelry. But I couldn't bear to come home without a single thing for you—and this represents—what you've been to me."
As he spoke, he slipped into her hand a delicate chain of gold, on which hung a tiny star; she turned it over two or three times without speaking, and her eyes filled with tears again. Then she said:
"Itisa present, for this means you travelled third-class, and stayed at cheap hotels, and went without your lunches—or you couldn't have bought it. You had only enough money for the trip we originally planned, without those six weeks in Italy. I'll wearthispiece of jewelry—and it will represent whatyou'vebeen tome, in my mind. Will you put it on yourself?"
She held it towards him, bending forward, her head down. It seemed to Austin that her loveliness was like the fragrance of a flower. Involuntarily, the hands which clasped the little chain around her white throat, touching the warm, soft skin, fell to her shoulders, and drew her closer.
The swift and terrible change that went over Sylvia's face sent a thrust of horror through him. She shut her eyes, and shrank away, trembling all over, her face grown ashy white. Instantly he realized that the gesture must have replied to her some ghastly experience in the past; that perhaps she had more than once been tricked into an embrace by a gift; that a man's love had meant but one thing to her, and that she now thought herself face to face with that thing again, from one whom she had helped and trusted. For an instant the grief with which this realization filled him, the fresh compassion for all she had suffered, the renewed love for all her goodness, were too much for him. He tried to speak, to take away his hands, to leave her. He seemed to be powerless. Then, blessedly, the realization of what he should do came to him.
"Open your eyes, Sylvia," he commanded.
Too startled to disobey, she did so. He looked into them for a full minute, smiling, and shook his head.
"You did not understand, dear lady," he said. And dropping on his knees before her, he took her hands, laid them against his cheek for a minute, touched them with his lips, and left her.
Uncle Mat made a determined effort to persuade Sylvia to return to New York with him; and though he was not successful, he was not altogether discouraged by her reply.
"Ihavebeen thinking of it," she said, "but I promised Mrs. Gray I'd stay here through the winter, and she'd be hurt and disappointed now if I didn't; besides, I don't feel quite ready for New York myself yet. I realize that I've remained—nearly long enough—and as soon as the warm weather comes, I'm going to have my own little house remodelled and put in order, and move there for the summer. It'll be such fun—just like doll's housekeeping! Then in the fall—I wont promise—but perhaps if you still want me, I'll come to you, at least until I decide what to do next."
"Come now for a visit, if you won't for the rest of the winter."
"Not yet; by spring I'm afraid I'll have to have some new clothes—I've had nothing since I came here except a fur coat, which arrived by parcel post! Sally wants to go away in the Easter vacation, and if you can squeeze us both into your little guest-room, perhaps we'll come together then."
"You're determined to have some sort of a bodyguard in the shape of your new friends to protect you from your old ones?"
"Not quite that. I'll come alone if you prefer it," said Sylvia quickly.
"No, no, my dear; I should be glad to have Sally. How about Austin, too? He could sleep on the living-room sofa, you know, and that would make four of us to go about together, which is always a pleasant number. Thomas would be home at that time, and Austin could probably leave more easily than at any other."
"Ask him by all means. I think he would be glad to go."
Austin was accordingly invited, and accepted with enthusiasm. Uncle Mat found him in the barn, where he was separating cream with the new electric separator, but he nodded, with a smile which showed all his white teeth, as his voice could not be heard above the noise of the machine.
"Indeed, I will," he said heartily, when the current was switched off again. "How unfortunate that Easter comes so late this year—but that will give us all the longer to look forward to it in! I hate to have you go back, Mr. Stevens, but I suppose the inevitable call of the siren city is too much for your easily tempted nature!"
Mr. Stevens laughed, and assented. "How that boy has changed!" he said to himself as he walked back to the house. "He fairly radiates enthusiasm and wholesomeness. Well, I'm sorry for him. I wish Sylvia would leave now instead of in the spring, in spite of her promises and scruples and what-not. And I wish, darn it all, that she were as easy to read as he is."
Austin's existence, just at that time, seemed even more rose-colored than Uncle Mat could suspect. The day after Christmas he pondered for a long time on the events of the night before, and gave some very anxious thought to his future line of conduct. At first he decided that it would be best to avoid Sylvia altogether, and thus show her that she had nothing to dread from him, for her sudden fear had been very hard to bear; but before night another and wiser course presented itself to him—the idea of going on exactly as if nothing had happened that was in the least extraordinary, and prove to her that he was to be trusted. Accordingly, assuming a calmness which he was very far from feeling, he stopped at her door again before going upstairs, saying cheerfully:
"Tell me to go away if you want to; if not, I've come for my firstFrench lesson."
Sylvia looked up with a smile from the book she was reading. "Entrez, monsieur," she said gayly; "avez-vous apporté votre livre, votre cahier, et votre plume? Comment va l'oncle de votre ami? Le chat de votre mère, est-il noir?"
Austin burst out laughing at her mimicry of the typical conversation in a beginner's grammar, and she joined him. The critical moment had passed. He saw that he was welcome, that he had risen and not fallen in her regard, though he was far from guessing how much, and opening his book, drew another chair near the fire and sat down beside her.
"You must have some romances as well as this dry stuff," she said, when he had pegged away at Chardenal for over an hour. "We'll read Dumas together, beginning with the Valois romances, and going straight along in the proper order. You'll learn a lot of history, as well as considerable French. Some of it is rather indiscreet but—"
"Which of us do you think it is most likely to shock?" he asked, with such an expression of mock-alarm that they both burst out laughing again; and when they had sobered down, "Now may we have some Browning, please?"
So Sylvia reached for a volume from her shelf, and began to read aloud, while Austin smoked; she read extremely well, and she loved it. She went from "The Last Duchess" to "The Statue and the Bust," from "Fra Filippo Lippi" to "Andrea del Sarto." And Austin sat before the fire, smoking and listening, until the little clock again roused them to consciousness by striking twelve.
"This will never do!" he exclaimed, jumping up. "I must have regular hours, like any schoolboy. What do you say to Monday, Wednesday, and Friday evenings, from seven-thirty to ten? The other nights I'll bend my energies to preparing my lessons."
"A capital idea. Good-night, Austin."
"Good-night, Sylvia."
There were, however, no more French lessons that week. The next evening twenty young people went off together in sleighs, got their supper at White Water, danced there until midnight, and did not reach home until three in the morning. The following night there was a "show" in Wallacetown, and although they had all declared at their respective breakfast-tables—for breakfast is served anywhere from five-thirty to six-thirty in Hamstead, Vermont—that nothing would keep them out of bed after supperthatnight, off they all went again. A "ball" followed the "show," and the memory of the first sleigh-ride proved so agreeable that another was undertaken. And finally, on New Year's Eve the Grays themselves gave a party, opening wide the doors of the fine old house for the first time in many years. Sylvia played for the others to dance on this occasion, as she had done at Christmas, but in the rest of the merry-making she naturally could take no part. Austin, however, proved the most enthusiastic reveller of all, put through his work like chain lightning, and was out and off before the plodding Thomas had fairly begun. Manlike, it did not occur to him to give up any of these festivities because Sylvia could not join in them. For years he had hungered and thirsted, as most boys do, for "a good time"—and done so in vain. For years his work had seemed so endless and yet so futile—for what was it all leading to?—that it had been heartlessly and hopelessly done, and when it was finished, it had left him so weary that he had no spirit for anything else much of the time. Now the old order had, indeed, changed, yielding place to new. Good looks, good health, and a good mind he had always possessed, but they had availed him little, as they have many another person, until good courage and high ideals had been added to them. He scarcely saw Sylvia for several days, and did not even realize it, they seemed so full and so delightful; then coming out of the house early one afternoon intending to go to the barn to do some little odd jobs of cleaning up, he met her, coming towards him on snowshoes, her cheeks glowing, and her eyes sparkling. She waved her hand and hurried towards him.
"Oh,Austin! Are you awfully busy?"
"No, not at all. Why?"
"I've just been over to my house, for the first time—you know in the fall, I couldn't walk, and then I lost the key, and—well, one thing after another has kept me away—lately the deep snow. But these last few days I got to thinking about it—you've all been gone so much I've been alone, you see—so I decided to try getting there on snowshoes—just think of having a house that's so quiet that there isn't even aroadto it any more! It was quite a tramp, but I made it and went in, and, oh! it's sowonderful—so exactly like what I hoped it was going to be—that I hurried back to see if you wouldn't come and see it too, and let me tell you everything I'm planning to do to it?"
She stopped, entirely out of breath. In a flash, Austin realized, first, that she had been lonely and neglected in the midst of the good times that all the others had been having; realized, too, that he had never before seen her so full of vitality and enthusiasm; and then, that, without being even conscious of it, she had come instinctively to him to share her new-found joy, while he had almost forgotten her in his. He was not sufficiently versed in the study of human nature to know that it has always been thus with men and women, since Eve tried to share her apple with Adam and only got blamed for her pains. Austin blamed himself, bitterly and resentfully, and decided afresh that he was the most utterly ungrateful and unworthy of men. His reflections made him slow in answering.
"Don't youwantto come?"
"Of course I want to come! I was just thinking—wait a second, I'll get my snowshoes."
"I'm going to tear down a partition," she went on excitedly as they ploughed through the snow together, "and have one big living-room on the left of the front door; on the right of it a big bedroom—I've alwayspinedfor a downstairs bedroom—I don't know why, but I never had one till I came to your house—with a bathroom and dressing-room behind it; the dining-room and kitchen will be in the ell. I'm sure I can make that unfinished attic into three more bedrooms, and another bathroom, but I want to see what you think. I'm going to have a great deep piazza all around it, and a flower-garden—and—"
She could hardly wait to get there. Her enthusiasm was contagious. Austin soon found himself making suggestions, helping her in her plans. They went through every nook and corner of the tiny cottage; he had not dreamed that it possessed the possibilities that Sylvia immediately found in it. They stayed a long time, and walked home over fields of snow which the sinking sun was turning rosy in its glowing light. That evening Austin came for his lesson again.
By the second of January, the last of the visitors had gone, and the old Gray place was restored to the order and quiet which had reigned before the holidays began. Mrs. Gray was lonely, but her mind was at ease. She had been watching Austin closely, and it seemed quite clear to her that Uncle Mat was mistaken about him. The idea that her favorite son was going to be made unhappy was quickly dismissed; and in her rejoicing over the first payment on their debt at the bank, and in the new position of importance and consequence which her husband was beginning to occupy in the neighborhood, it was soon completely forgotten. The succeeding months seemed to prove her right; and the all-absorbing interest in the family was Mr. Gray's election to the Presidency of the Cooperative Creamery Association of Hamstead, and his probable chances of being nominated as First Selectman—in place of Silas Jones, recently deceased—at March Town Meeting.
Wallacetown, the railroad centre which lay five miles south of Hamstead across the Connecticut River, was generally regarded by the agricultural community in its vicinity as a den of iniquity. This opinion was not deserved. Wallacetown was progressive and prosperous; its high school ranked with the best in the State, its shops were excellent, its buildings, both public and private, neat and attractive. There were several reasons, however, for the "slams" which its neighbors gave it. Its population, instead of being composed largely of farmers, the sons, grandsons, and great-grandsons of the "old families" who had first settled the valley, was made up of railway employees and officials, and of merchants who had come there at a later date. Close team-work between them and the dwellers in Hamstead, White Water, and other villages near at hand, would have worked out for the advantage of both. But unfortunately they did not realize this. Wallacetown was also the only town in the vicinity where a man "could raise a thirst" as Austin put it, Vermont being "dry," and New Hampshire, at this time, "local option." Probably, from the earliest era, young men have been thirsty, and their parents have bemoaned the fact. It is not hard to imagine Eve wringing her hands over Cain and Abel when they first sampled generously the beverage they had made from the purple grapes which grew so plentifully near the Garden of Eden. Wallacetown also offered "balls," not occasionally, but two or three times a week. The Elks Hall, the Opera House, and even the Parish House were constantly being thrown open, and a local orchestra flourished. These "balls" were usually quite as innocent as those that took place in larger cities, under more elegant and exclusive surroundings; but the stricter Methodists and Congregationalists of the countryside did not believe in dancing at all, especially when there might be a "ginger-ale high-ball" or a glass of ale connected with it. Besides, there were two poolrooms and a wide street paved with asphalt, and brilliantly lighted down both sides. Trains ran—and stopped—by night as well as by day, and Sundays as well as week-days. In short, Wallacetown was up-to-date. That alone, in the eyes of Hamstead, was enough to condemn it. And when an enterprising citizen opened a Moving-Picture Palace, and promptly made an enormous success of it, Mrs. Elliott could no longer restrain herself.
"It's something scandalous," she declared, "to see the boys an' girls who would be goin' to Christian Endeavor or Epworth League if they'd ben brought up right, crowdin' 'round the entrance doors lookin' at the posters, an' payin' out good money that ought to go into the missionary boxes for the heathen in the Sandwich Islands, to go an' see filums of wimmen without half enough clothes on. We read in theWallacetown Buglethat there was goin' to be a picture called 'The Serpent of the Nile' an' Joe an' I thought we could risk that, it sounded kinder geographical an' instructive. Of course we went mostly to see the new buildin' an' who else would be there, anyway. But land! the serpent was a girl dressed in the main in beads an' a pleasant smile. She loafed around on hard-lookin' sofas that was set right out in the open air, an' seemed to have more beaux than wimmen-friends. I'm always suspicious of that kind of a woman. I wanted to leave right away, as soon as I see what it was goin' to be like, but Joe wouldn't. He wanted to set right there until it was over. He seemed to feel afraid some one might see us comin' out, an' that maybe we better stay until the very end, so's we wouldn't be noticed, slippin' out with the crowd.—Have you took cold, Sylvia? You seem to have a real bad cough."
Sylvia, who had been sewing peacefully beside the sunny kitchen window filled with geraniums, rose hastily, and left Mrs. Gray alone with her friend. Having gained the hall in safety, she sank down on the stairs, and laughed until the tears rolled down her cheeks. And here Austin, coming in a moment later, found her.
"What on earth—?" he began, and then, without even pursuing his question, sat down beside her and joined in her laugh. "What would you do?" he said at last, when some semblance of order had been restored, "without Mrs. Elliott? Considering the quiet life you lead, you must be simply pining for amusement."
"I am," said Sylvia. "Austin—let's go to the movies in Wallacetown to-morrow night."
Austin, suddenly grave, shook his head. "Shows" in Wallacetown were associated in his mind with a period in his life when he had very nearly broken his mother's heart, and which he had now put definitely behind him. The idea of connecting Sylvia, even in the most remote way, with that period, was abhorrent to him.
"Why not?" she asked defiantly.
"Well, for one thing, the roads are awful. This combination in March of melting snow and mud is worse than anything I know of—ruts and holes and slush. It would take us over an hour to get there."
"And three to get back, I suppose," said Sylvia pertly; "we could go in my motor."
"I haven't taken out the new license for this year yet. Besides, though I believe the movies are very good for a place the size of Wallacetown, of course, they can't be equal to what you'll be seeing in New York pretty soon. Wait and go there."
"I won't!" said Sylvia, springing up. "I'll get Thomas to take me. You always have some excuse when I want you to do anything. Why don't you say right out that you don't care to go?"
Sylvia expected denials and protestations. She was disappointed. Thomas had arrived home for his long spring vacation a few days before, and had promptly begun to follow Sylvia about like a shadow. Austin, who never sought her out except for his French lessons, had endeavored to remonstrate with his younger brother. The boy flared up, with such unusual and unreasonable anger, that Austin had decided it was wiser not to try to spare him any longer, but to let "him make a fool of himself and have it over with." When Sylvia made her tart speech, it suddenly flashed through his mind that a ten-mile ride, without possibility of interruption, was an excellent opportunity for this. He therefore grinned so cheerfully that Sylvia was more puzzled and piqued than ever.
"I'm sure Thomas would be tickled to death to take you," he said enthusiastically; "I'll get the car registered the first thing in the morning, and he can spend the afternoon washing and oiling it. It really needs a pretty thorough going-over. It'll do my heart good to see him in his old clothes for once. He seems to have entirely overlooked the fact that he was to spend this vacation being pretty useful on the farm, and not sighing at your heels dressed in the height of fashion as he understands it. He's wearing out the mat in front of the bureau, he stands there so much, and I've hardly had a chance for a shave or a tub since he got here. He locks himself in the bathroom and spends hours manicuring his nails and putting bay-rum on his hair. He—All right, I won't if you say so! But, Sylvia, you ought to make a real spree of this, and go in to the drug-store for an ice-cream soda after the show."
"Is that the usual thing?"
"It's the most usual thing that I should recommend to you. Of course, there are others—
"Austin, you are really getting to be the limit. Go tell Thomas I want him."
"With pleasure. I haven't," murmured Austin, "had a chance to tell him that so far. He's never been far enough off—except when he was getting ready to come. That's probably what he's doing now. I'll go upstairs and see."
Austin had guessed right. Thomas stood in front of the mirror, shining with cleanliness, knotting a red silk tie. He had reached that stage in a young man's life when clothes were temporarily of supreme importance. Gone was the shy and shabby ploughboy of a year before. This self-assertive young gentleman was clad in a checked suit in which green was a predominating color, a black-and-white striped shirt, and chocolate-colored shoes. His hair, still dripping with moisture, was brushed straight back from his forehead and the smell of perfumed soap hung heavy about him.
"Hullo," he said, eyeing his brother's intrusion with disfavor, "how dirty you are!"
Austin, whose khaki and corduroy garments made him look more than ever like a splendid bronze statue, nodded cheerfully.
"I know. But some one's got to work. We can't have two lilies of the field on the same farm.—Sylvia wants to speak to you."
"Do you know why?" asked Thomas, promptly displaying more dispatch.
"I think she intends to suggest that you should take her to the moving-pictures in Wallacetown to-morrow night. She doesn't get much amusement here, and now that she's feeling so much stronger again, I think she rather craves it."
"Of course she does," said Thomas, "and if you weren't the most selfish, pig-headed, blind bat that ever flew, you'd have seen that she got it, long before this. Where is she?"
It seemed to the impatient Thomas that the next evening would never arrive. All night, and all the next day, he planned for it exultantly. He was to have the chance which the ungrateful Austin had seen fit to cast away. He would show Sylvia how much he appreciated it. Through the long afternoon, suddenly grown unseasonably warm, he toiled on the motor until it was spick and span from top to bottom and from end to end. He was careful to start his labors early enough to allow a full hour to dress before supper, cautioned his mother a dozen times to be sure there was enough hot water left in the boiler for a deep bath, and laid out fresh and gorgeous garments on the bed before he began his ablutions. He was amazed to find, when he came downstairs, that Sylvia, who had tramped over to the brick cottage that afternoon, was still in the short muddy skirt and woolly sweater that she had worn then, poking around in the yard testing the earth for possibilities of early gardening.
"The frost has come out a good deal to-day," she said, wiping grimy little hands on an equally grimy handkerchief; "I expect the mud will be awful these next few weeks, but I can get in sweet peas and ever-bearing strawberries pretty soon now."
"We'll have to start right after supper," said Thomas, by way of a delicate hint. He did not feel that it was proper for him to suggest to Sylvia that her present costume was scarcely suitable to wear if she were to accompany him to a "show."
"Start?" Sylvia looked puzzled. Then she remembered that in a moment of pique with Austin she had arranged to go to Wallacetown with Thomas. As she thought it over, it appealed to her less and less. "You mean to Wallacetown? I'm afraid I'd forgotten all about it, I've been so busy to-day. I wonder if we'd better try it? The warmth to-day won't have improved the roads any, and they were pretty bad before."
Thomas felt as if he should choke. That she should treat so casually the evening towards which he had been counting the moments for twenty-four hours seemed almost unbearable. He strove, however, to maintain his dignified composure.
"Just as you say, of course," he replied with hurt coolness.
Sylvia glanced at him covertly, and the corners of her mouth twitched.
"I suppose we may as well try it," she said. "Do you suppose some of the others would like to come with us? There's plenty of room for everybody."
Again Thomas choked. This was the last thing that he desired. How was he to disclose to Sylvia the wonderful secret that he adored her with the whole family sitting on the back seat?
"I don't believe they could get ready now," he said; "they didn't know you expected them to go, you see, and there's really awfully little time." He took out his watch.
Sylvia fled. Twenty minutes later she appeared at the supper-table, clad in a soft black lace dress, slightly low in the neck, her arms only partially concealed by transparent, flowing sleeves, her waving hair coiled about her head like a crown. She had on no jewels—only the little star that Austin had given her—and the gown was the sort of demi-toilette which two years before she would have considered hardly elaborate enough for dinner alone in her own house. To the Grays, however, her costume represented the zenith of elegance, and Thomas began vaguely to feel that there was something the matter with his own appearance.
"Ought I to have put on my dress-suit?" he asked Austin in a stage-whisper, as Sylvia left the room to get her wraps.
The mere thought of a dress-suit at the Wallacetown "movies" was comic to the last degree, but the merciless Austin jumped at the suggestion.
"Why don't you? You won't be very late if you change quickly. You won't need to take another bath, will you? I'll bring round the car."
He showed himself, indeed, all that was helpful and amiable. He not only brought around the car, he went up and helped Thomas with stubborn studs and a refractory tie. He stood respectfully aside to let his brother wrap Sylvia's coat around her, and held open the door of the car.
"Have a good time!" he shouted after them, as they plunged out of sight, somewhat jerkily, for Thomas, who had not driven a great deal, was not a master of gear-shifting. His mother looked at him anxiously.
"I can't help feelin' you're up to some deviltry, Austin," she said uneasily, "though I don't know just what 'tis. I'm kinder nervous about this plan of them goin' off to Wallacetown."
"I'm not," said Austin with a wicked grin, and took out his French dictionary.
The first part of the evening, however, seemed to indicate that Mrs. Gray's fears were groundless. Sylvia and Thomas reached the Moving-Picture Palace without mishap, though they had left the Homestead so late owing to the latter's change of attire and the slow rate at which the mud and his lack of skill had obliged them to ride, that the audience was already assembled, and "The Terror of the Plains," a stirring tale of an imaginary West, was in full progress before they were seated. Thomas's dress-suit did not fail to attract immediate attention and equally immediate remarks, and Sylvia, who hated to be conspicuous, felt her cheeks beginning to burn. But—more sincerely than Mr. Elliott—she decided that it was better to wait until the entertainment was over than to attract further notice by going out at once. Thomas, less sensitive than she, enjoyed himself thoroughly.
"We have splendid pictures in Burlington," he announced, "but this is good for a place of this size, isn't it, Sylvia?"
"Yes. Don't talk so loudly."
"I can't talk any softer and have you hear unless I put my head up closer. Can I?"
"Of course, you may not. Don't be so silly."
"I didn't mean to be fresh. You're not cross, are you, Sylvia?"
It seemed to her as if the "show" would never end. Chagrin and resentment overcame her. What had possessed her to come to this hot, stuffy place with Thomas, instead of reading French in her peaceful, pleasant sitting-room with Austin? Why didn't Austin show more eagerness to be with her, anyway? She liked to be with him—ever and ever so much—didn't see half so much of him as she wanted to. There was no use beating about the bush. It was perfectly true. She was growing fonder of him, and more dependent on him, every day. And every other man she had ever known had been grateful for her least favor, while he—Her hurt pride seemed to stifle her. She was very close to tears. She was jerked back to composure by the happy voice of Thomas.
"My, but that was a thriller! Come on over to the drug-store, Sylvia, and have an ice-cream cone."
"I'm not hungry," said Sylvia, rising, "and it must be getting awfully late. I'd rather go straight home."
Thomas, though disappointed, saw no choice. But once off the brilliantly lighted "Main Street," and lumbering down the road towards Hamstead, he decided not to put off the great moment, for which he had been waiting, any longer. Wondering why his stomach seemed to be caving in so, he tactfully began.
"Did you know I was going to be twenty-one next month, Sylvia?" he asked.
"No," said Sylvia absently; "that is, I had forgotten. You seem more like eighteen to me."
This was a somewhat crushing beginning. But Thomas was not daunted.
"I suppose that is because I was older than most when I went to college," he said cheerfully, "but though you're a little bit older, I'm nearer your age than any of the others—much nearer than Austin. Had you ever thought of that?"
"No," said Sylvia again, still more absently. "Why should I? I feel about a thousand."
"Well, youlookabout sixteen! Honest, Sylvia, no one would guess you're a day over that, you're so pretty. Has any one ever told you how pretty you are?"
"Well, it has been mentioned," said Sylvia dryly, "but I have always thought that it was one of those things that was greatly overestimated."
"Why, it couldn't be! You're perfectly lovely! There isn't a girl in Burlington that can hold a candle to you. I've been going out, socially, a lot all winter, and I know. I've been to hops and whist-parties and church-suppers. The girls over there have made quite a little of me, Sylvia, but I've never—"
There was a deafening report. Thomas, cursing inwardly, interrupted himself.
"We must have had a blow-out," he said, bringing the car to a noisy stop."Wait a second, while I get out and see."
It was all too true. A large nail had passed straight through one of the front tires. He stripped off his ulster, and the coat of his dress-suit, and turned up his immaculate trousers.
"You'll have to get up for a minute, while I get the tools from under the seat, Sylvia. I'm awfully sorry.—It's pretty dark, isn't it?—I never changed a tire but once before. Austin's always done that."
"Austin's always done almost everything," snapped Sylvia. Then, peering around to the back of the car, "Why don'tyou dosomething? Whatisthe matter now?"
"The lock on the extra wheel's rusted—you see it hasn't been undone all winter. I can't get it off."
"Well,smashit, then! We can't stay here all night."
"I haven't got anything to smash itwith. I must have forgotten to put part of the tools back when I cleaned the car."
"Oh, Thomas, you are the mostinefficientboy about everything except farming that I ever saw! Let me see if I can't help."
She jumped out, her feet, clad in silk stockings and satin slippers, sinking into the mud as she did so. Together for fifteen minutes, rapidly growing hot and angry, they wrestled with the refractory lock. At the end of that time they were no nearer success than they had been in the beginning.
"We'll have to crawl home on a flat tire," she said at last disgustedly;"I hope we'll get there for breakfast."
Thomas had never seen her temper ruffled before. Her imperiousness was always sweet, and it was Heaven to be dictated to by her. The fact that he believed her to be comparing him in her mind to Austin did not help matters. Austin, as he knew very well, would have managed some way to get that tire changed. For some time they rode along in silence, the mud churning up on either side of the guards with every rod that they advanced. At last, realizing that his precious moments were slipping rapidly away, and that though, in Sylvia's present mood, it was hardly a favorable time to go on with his declaration, the morrow would be even less so, Thomas summoned up his courage once more.
"Is your back tired?" he asked. "It's awfully jolty, going over these ruts. I could steer all right with one hand, if you would let me put my other arm around you."
"You're not steering any too well as it is," remarked Sylvia tartly. "Thomas! What are you thinking of? Don't you touch me!—There, now you've done it!"
Thomas certainly had "done it." Sylvia, at his first movement, had slapped him in the face with no gentle tap. And Thomas, with only one hand on the wheel, and too amazed to keep his wits about him, had allowed the car to slide down the side of the road into the deep, muddy gutter, straight in front of the Elliotts' house.
Late as it was, a light was snapped on in the entrance without delay. Electricity had been installed here before any other place in the village had been blessed with it, for the owners never missed a chance of seeing anything, and Mrs. Elliott seemed to sleep with one eye and one ear open. She appeared now in the doorway, dressed in a long, gray flannel "wrapper," her hair securely fastened in metal clasps all about her head, against the "crimps" for the next day.
"Who is it?" she cried sharply—"and what do you want?"
Of all persons in the world, this was the last one whom either Sylvia or Thomas desired to see. Neither answered. Nothing dismayed, Mrs. Elliott advanced down the walk. Her carpet-slippers flapped as she came.
"Come on, Joe," she called over her shoulder to her less intrepid spouse. "Are you goin' to leave me alone to face these desperate drunkards, lurchin' around in the dead of night, an' makin' the road unsafe for doctors who might be out on some errand of mercy—they're the onlyrespectablepeople who wouldn't be abed at this hour of the night. You better get right to the telephone, an' notify Jack Weston. He ain't much of a police officer, to be sure, but I guess he can deal with bums like these—too stewed to answer me, even!" Then, as she drew nearer, she gave a shriek that might well have been heard almost as far off as Wallacetown, "Land of mercy! It's Sylvia an' Thomas!"
Thomas cowered. No other word could express it. But Sylvia got out, slamming the door behind her.
"We've been to Wallacetown to a moving-picture show," she said with a dignity which she was very far from feeling, "and we've been unfortunate in having tire-trouble on the way home. And now we seem to be stuck in the mud. I had no idea the roads were in such a condition, or of course I shouldn't have gone. We can't possibly pry the motor up in this darkness, so I think we may as well leave it where it is, first as last until morning, and walk the rest of the way home. Come on, Thomas."
"I wouldn't ha' b'lieved," said Mrs. Elliott severely, "that you would ha' done such a thing. Prayer-meetin' night, too! Well, it's fortunate no one seen you but me an' Joe. If I was gossipy, like some, it would be all over town in no time, but you know I never open my lips. But, land sakes! here comes ateam. Who can this be?"
Eagerly she peered out through the darkness. Then she turned again to the unfortunate pair.
"It's Austin in the carryall," she cried excitedly; "now, ain't that a piece of luck? You won't have to walk home, after all. Though whathe'sout for, either, at this hour—"
Austin reined in his horse. "Because I knew Sylvia and Thomas must have got into some difficulty," he said quietly. Considering the pitch at which it had been uttered, it had not been hard to overhear Mrs. Elliott's speech. "Pretty bad travelling, wasn't it? I'm sorry. Tires, too? Well, that was hard luck. But we'll be home in no time now, and of course the show was worth it. You didn't hurt your dress-suit any, did you, Thomas? I worried a little about that. You drive—I'll get in on the back seat with Sylvia, and make sure the robe's tucked around her all right. It seems to be coming off cold again, doesn't it? Good-night, Mrs. Elliott—thank you for your sympathy."
Conversation languished. Austin, unseen by the miserable Thomas on the front seat, and unreproved by the weary and chilly Sylvia, "tucked the robe around her" and then, apparently, forgot to take his arm away. Moreover, he searched in the darkness for her small, cold fingers, and gathered them into his free hand, which was warm and big and strong. As they neared the house, he spoke to her.
"The next time you want to go to 'a show' I guess I'd better take you myself, after all," he whispered. "You'll find a hot-water bag in your bed, and hot lemonade in the thermos bottle on the little table beside it. I put a small 'stick' in it—oh, just a twig! And I've kept the kitchen fire up. The water in the tank's almost boiling, if you happen to feel like a good tub—"
He helped her out, and held open the front door for her gravely. Then, closing it behind her, he turned to Thomas.
"You'd better run along, too," he said, with a slight drawl; "I'll put the horse up."
"Oh, go to hell!" sobbed Thomas.
"So you refused Weston's offer of three hundred dollars for Frieda?"
"Yes, father. Do you think I was wrong?"
"Well, I don't know. That's a good deal of money, Austin."
"I know, but think what she cost to import, and the record she's making! I told him he might have two of the brand-new bull calves at seventy-five apiece."
"What did he say?"
"Jumped at the chance. He's comingforthe calves, andwiththe cash early to-morrow morning. I said he might have a look at Dorothy, too. Peter thinks she isn't quite up to our standard, and I'm inclined to agree with him, though I imagine his opinion is based partly on the fact that she's a Jersey! If Weston will give three hundred forher, right on the spot, I think we'd better let her go."
"Did you do any other special business in Wallacetown?"
"I took ten dozen more eggs to Hassan's Grocery, and he paid me for the last two months. Thirty dollars. Pretty good, but we ought to do better yet, though, of course, we eat a great many ourselves. How's the tax assessing coming along? I suppose you've been out all day, too."
"Yes. I'm so green at it I find it rather hard work. It's hard luck that both of the listers should be sick just now, though in New Hampshire the selectmen always have to do the assessing. But I've had some funny experiences to-day. I found one woman terribly distressed because her husband wasn't at home. 'He waited 'round all yesterday afternoon for you, thinkin' you'd probably be here,' she said, 'but he's gone to White Water to-day.' 'Well,' I said, 'let's see if we can't get along just as well without him. Have you a horse?' 'Yes, but he's over age—he can't be taxed.' 'Any cows?' 'Just two heifers—they're too young.' 'Any money on deposit?' 'Lord, no!' 'Then there's only the poll-tax?' I suggested. 'Bless you, he's seventy-six years old—there ain't no poll-tax!' she rejoined. And the long and short of it was that they weren't taxable for a single thing!"
Austin laughed. "How much longer are you going to be at this, father?" he asked, as he turned to go away.
"All through April, I'm afraid. I'm sorry it makes things so much harder for you on the farm, Austin, but it means three dollars a day. I'm so glad Katherine and Edith could go on the high school trip to Washington—your mother had her first letter this noon. You'll want to read it—they're having a wonderful time. I'm trying to figure out whether we can possibly let Katherine go to Wellesley next year. She's got her heart just set on it, and Edith seems perfectly willing to stay at home, so we shan't be put to any extra expense for her."
"I guess when the time comes we can find a way to help Katherine if she helps herself as much as Thomas and Molly are doing. By the way, has it occurred to you that there may be some reason for Edith's sudden turn towards domesticity?"
"Why, no—what do you mean?"
"Peter."
"Peter!" echoed Mr. Gray, aghast; "why the child isn't seventeen yet, and he can't be more than a couple of years older!"
"I know. But such things do sometimes happen."
"You don't consider Peter a suitable match for one of your sisters?" went on the horrified father; "why, she's oceans above him."
"Any farther than Sylvia is above Thomas? You seem to be taking that rather hard."
For Thomas, in spite of Austin's warnings, and his chastening experience on the night of the expedition to the Moving-Picture Palace, had broken bounds again and openly declared himself. Sylvia, who already reproached herself for her ill-temper on that occasion, was very kind and very sweet, and had the tact and wisdom not to treat the matter as a joke; but she was as definite and firm in her "no" as she was considerate in the way she put it. Thomas was as usual quite unable to conceal his feelings, and his parents were grieving for him almost as much as he was for himself, although they had never expected any other outcome to his first love-affair, and were somewhat amazed at his presumption.
"You never thought of this yourself," went on the bewildered parent, ignoring Austin's last remark, feeling that his children were treating him most unfairly by indulging in so many affairs of the heart which could not possibly have a fortunate outcome. "Ihaven't noticed a thing, and I'm sure your mother hasn't, or she would have spoken about it to me. Why, Edith's hardly out of her cradle."
"It would take a pretty flexible cradle to hold Edith nowadays," returned Austin dryly; "she's running around all over the countryside, and she has more partners at a dance than all the other girls put together. She isn't as nice as Molly, or half so interesting as Katherine, but she has a little way with her that—well, I don't know justwhatit is, but I see the attraction myself. I thought I'd tell you so that if you didn't like it, we could try to scrimp a little harder, and send her off for a year or so, too—she never could get into college, but she might go to some school of Domestic Science. No—I didn't notice Peter's state of mind myself at first."
"Sylvia!" said his father sharply. "She didn't approve, of course."
"On the contrary, very highly. She says that the sooner a girl of Edith's type is married—to the right sort of a man, of course—the better, and I'm inclined to think that she's right. Then she pointed out that Peter had gone doggedly to school all winter, struggling with a foreign language, and enduring the gibes he gets from being in a class with boys much younger than himself, with very good grace. She mentioned how faithful and competent he was in his work, and how interested in it; asked if I had noticed the excellency of his handwriting, his accounts—and his manners! And finally she said that a boy who would promise his mother to go to church once a fortnight at least, and keep the promise, was doing pretty well."
"Speaking of church," said Mr. Gray uneasily, as if forced to agree with all Austin said, yet anxious to change the subject, "Mr. Jessup is calling. He comes pretty frequently."
"Yes—I had noticedthatfor myself! I don't think Sylvia particularly likes it."
"Then I imagine she can stop it without much outside help," said his father, somewhat ruefully. "Well, we must get to work, and not sit here talking all the rest of the afternoon—not that there's so very much afternoon left! What are you going to do next, Austin?"
"Change my clothes, and then start burning the rubbish-pile—there's a good moon, so I can finish it after the milking's done."
"That means you'll be up until midnight—and you were out in the barn at five!" exclaimed Mr. Gray. "I don't see where you get all your energy."
"From ambition!" laughed Austin, starting away. "This is going to be the finest farm in the county again, if I have anything to do about it." As he entered the house, and went through the hall, he could hear voices in Sylvia's parlor, and though the door was ajar, he went past it, contrary to his custom. His father was right. If she did not like the minister's visits, she was quite competent to stop them without outside help. Was it possible—couldit be?—that shedidlike them? He flung off his business clothes and got into his overalls with a sort of savage haste—after all, what difference ought it to make to him whether she liked them or not? She was going away almost immediately, would inevitably marry some one before very long, Mr. Jessup at least held a dignified position and possessed a good education, and if she married him, she would come back to Hamstead, they could see her once in a while—Having tried to comfort himself with these cheering reflections, he started down the stairs, inwardly cursing. Then he heard something which made him stop short.
"Please go away," Sylvia was saying, in the low, penetrating voice he knew so well, "and I think it would be better if you didn't come any more. How dare you speak to me like that! And how can a clergyman so lose his sense of dignity as to behave like any common fortune-hunter?"
Austin pushed open the door without stopping to knock, and walked in.
"Good-afternoon, Mr. Jessup," he said coolly, "my father told me we were having the pleasure of a call from you. I'm just going out to milk—won't you come with me, and see the cattle? They're really a fine sight, tied up ready for the night."
Mr. Jessup picked up his hat, and Austin held the door open for him to pass out, leaving Sylvia standing, an erect, scornful little black figure, with very red cheeks, her angry eyes growing rapidly soft as she looked straight past the minister at Austin.
The results of Mr. Jessup's visit were several. The most immediate one was that Austin's work was so delayed by the interruption it received that it was nearly nine o'clock before he was able to start his bonfire. Thomas joined him, but after an hour declared he was too sleepy to work another minute, and strolled off to bed. Austin's next visitor was his father, who merely came to see how things were getting along and to say good-night. And finally, when he had settled down to a period of laborious solitude, he was amazed to see Sylvia open and shut the front door very quietly, and come towards him in the moonlight, carrying a white bundle so large that she could hardly manage it.
"For Heaven's sake!" he exclaimed, hurrying to help her, "you ought to have been asleep hours ago! What have you got here?"
"Something to add to your bonfire," she said savagely, and as he took the great package from her, the white wrapping fell open, showing the contents to be inky black. "All the crepe I own! I won't wear it another day! I've been respectful to death—even if I couldn't be to the dead—and to convention long enough. I've swathed myself in that stuff for nearly fifteen months! I won't be such a hypocrite as to wear it another day! And if Thomas—and—and—Mr. Jessup and—and everybody—are going to pester the life out of me, I might just as well be in New York as here. I'm glad I'm going away."
"No one else is going to pester you," said Austin quietly, "and they won't any more. But you'll have a good time in New York—I think it's fine that you're going." He tossed the bundle into the very midst of the burning pile, and tried to speak lightly, pretending not to notice the excitement of her manner and the undried tears on her flushed cheeks. "I think you're just right about that stuff, too. Will this mean all sorts of fluffy pink and blue things, like what Flora Little wears? I should think you would look great in them!"
"No—but it means lots and lots of pure white dresses and plain black suits and hats, without any crepe. Then in the fall, lavender, and gray, and so on."
"I see—a gradual improvement. Won't you sit down a few minutes? It's a wonderful night."
"Thank you. Austin—you and Sally will have to help me shop when I get toNew York—Heaven knows what I can wear to travel down in."
Austin stopped raking, and flung himself down on the grass beside her."Sylvia," he said quickly, "I'm awfully sorry, but I can't go."
"Can't go! Why not?" she exclaimed, with so much disappointment in her voice that he was amazed.
"Father's a selectman now, you know, and away all day just at this time on town business. There's too much farmwork for Thomas and Peter to manage alone. I didn't foresee this, of course, when I accepted your uncle's invitation. I can't tell you how much it means to me to give it up, but you must see that I've got to."
"Yes, I see," she said gravely, and sat silently for some minutes, fingering the frill on her sleeve. Then she went on: "Uncle Mat wants me to stay a month or six weeks with him, and I think I ought to, after. deserting him for so long. When I come back, my own little house will be ready for me, and it will be warm enough for me to move in there, so I think these last few days will be 'good-bye.' Your family has let me stay a year—the happiest year of all my life—and I know your mother loves me—almost as much as I love her—and hates to have me go. But all families are better off by themselves, and in one way I think I've stayed too long already."
"You mean Thomas?"
She nodded, her eyes full of tears. "I ought to have gone before it happened," she said penitently; "any woman with a grain of sense can usually see that—that sort of thing coming, and ward it off beforehand. But I didn't think he was quite so serious, or expect it quite so soon."
"The young donkey! To annoy you so!"
"Annoyme! Surely you don't thinkThomaswas thinking of the money?"
"Good Lord, no, it never entered his head! Neither did it enter his head what an unpardonable piece of presumption it was on his part to ask you to marry him. A great, ignorant, overgrown, farmer boy!"
"You are mistaken," said Sylvia quietly; "I do not love Thomas, but if I did, the answer would have had to be 'no' just the same. The presumption would be all on my part, if I allowed any clean, wholesome, honest boy, in a moment of passion, to throw away his life on a woman like me. Thomas must marry a girl, as fresh as he is himself—not a woman with a past like mine behind her."
For nearly a year Austin had exercised a good deal of self-control for a man little trained in that valuable quality. At Sylvia's speech it gave way suddenly, and without warning. Entirely forgetting his resolution never to touch her, he leaned forward, seizing her arm, and speaking vehemently.
"I wish you would get rid of your false, gloomy thoughts about yourself as easily as you have got rid of your false, gloomy clothing," he said, passionately. "The mother and husband who made your life what it was are both where they can never hurt you again. Your character they never did touch, except in the most superficial way. When you told me your story, that night in the woods, you tried to make me think that you did voluntarily—what you did. You lied to me. I thought so then. I know it now. You were flattered and bullied, cajoled and coerced—a girl scarcely older than my sister Edith, whom we consider a child, whose father is distressed to even think of her as marriageable. It is time to stop feeling repentance for sins you never committed, and to look at yourself sanely and happily—if you must be introspective at all. No braver, lovelier, purer woman ever lived, or one more obviously intended to be a wife and mother. The sooner you become both, the better."
There was a moment of tense silence. Sylvia made no effort to draw away from him; at last she asked, in a voice which was almost pleading in its quality:
"Is that what you think of me?"
Austin dropped his hand. "Good God, Sylvia!" he said hoarsely; "don't you know by this time what I think of you?"
"Then you mean—that you want me to marry you?"
"No, no, no!" he cried. "Why are you so bound to misunderstand and misjudge me? I beg you not to ride by yourself, and you tell me I am 'dictating.' I go for months without hearing from you for fear of annoying you, and you accuse me of 'indifference.' I bring you a gift as a vassal might have done to his liege lady—and you shrink away from me in terror. I try to show you what manner of woman you really are, and you believe that I am displaying the same presumption which I have just condemned in my own brother. Are you so warped and embittered by one experience—a horrible one, but, thank Heaven, quickly and safely over with!—that you cannot believe me when I tell you that the best part of a decent man's love is not passion, but reverence? His greatest desire, not possession, but protection? His ultimate aim, not gratification, but sacrifice?"
He bent over her. She was sitting quite motionless, her head bowed, her face hidden in her hands; she was trembling from head to foot. He put his arm around her.
"Don't!" he said, his voice breaking; "don't, Sylvia. I've been rough and violent—lost my grip on myself—but it's all over now—I give you my word of honor that it is. Please lift your head up, and tell me that you forgive me!" He waited until it seemed as if his very reason would leave him if she did not answer him; then at last she dropped her hands, and raised her head. The moon shone full on her upturned face, and the look that Austin saw there was not one of forgiveness, but of something so much greater that he caught his breath before she moved or spoke to him.
"Are you blind?" she whispered. "Can't you see how I have felt—since Christmas night, even if you couldn't long before that? Don't you know why I just couldn't go away? But I thought you didn't care for me—that you couldn't possibly have kept away from me so long if you did—that you thought I wasn't good enough—Oh, my dear, my dear—" She laid both hands on his shoulders.
The next instant she was in his arms, his lips against hers, all the sorrow and bitterness of their lives lost forever in the glory of their first kiss.
When, two days later, Sylvia and Sally left for New York, none of the Grays had been told, much less had they suspected, what had happened. A certain new shyness, which Austin found very attractive, had come over Sylvia, and she seemed to wish to keep their engagement a secret for a time, and also to keep to her plan of going away, with the added reason that she now "wanted a chance to think things over."
"To think whether you really love me?" asked Austin gravely.
"Haven't I convinced you that I don't need to think that over any more?" she said, with a look and a blush that expressed so much that the conversation was near to being abruptly ended.
Austin controlled himself, however, and merely said:
"I'm going down to our little cemetery this afternoon to put it in good order for the spring; I know you've always said you didn't want to go there, but perhaps you'll feel differently now. All the Grays are buried there, and no one else, and in spite of all the other things we've neglected, we've kept that as it should be kept; and it's so peaceful and pretty—always shady in summer, when it's hot, and sheltered in winter, when it's cold! I thought you could take a blanket and a book, and sit and read while I worked. Afterwards we can walk over to your house if you like—you may want to give me some final directions about the work that's to be done there while you're gone."
"I'd love to go to the cemetery—or anywhere else, for that matter—with you," said Sylvia, "and afterwards—toourhouse. Perhaps you'll want to give some directions yourself!"
The tiny graveyard lay in the hollow of one of the wooded slopes which broke the great, undulating meadow which stretched from the Homestead to the river, a wall made of the stones picked up on the place around it, a plain granite shaft erected by the first Gray in the centre, and grouped about the shaft the quaint tablets of the century before, with old-fashioned names spelled in an old-fashioned manner, and with homely rhymes and trite sayings underneath; farther off, the newer gravestones, more ornate and less appealing. The elms were just beginning to bud, and the cold April wind whistled through them, but the pines were as green and sheltering as always, and Sylvia spread her blanket under one of them, and worked away at the sewing she had brought instead of a book, while Austin burned the grass and dug and pruned, whistling under his breath all the time. He stopped once to call her attention to a robin, the first they had seen that spring, and finally, when the sacred little place was in perfect order, came with a handful of trailing arbutus for her, and sat down beside her.
"I thought I remembered seeing some of this on the bank," he said; "it's always grown there—will you take it for your 'bouquet des fiançailles,' Sylvia? I remember how surprised we all were last year because you liked the little wild flowers best, and went around searching for them, when your rooms were full of carnations and hothouse roses. And because you used to go out to walk, just to see the sunsets. Do you still love sunsets, too?"
"Yes, more than ever. In the fall while you were gone, I used to go down to the river nearly every afternoon, and watch the color spread over the fields. There's something about a sunset in the late autumn that's unlike those at any other time of year—have you ever noticed? It's not rosy, but a deep, deep golden yellow—spreading over the dull, bare earth like the glory from the diadem of a saint—one of those gray Fathers of early Italy, for instance."
"I know what you mean—but they seem to me more like the glory that comes into any dull, bare life," said Austin,—"the kind of glory you've been to me. It worries me to hear you say you want to go away to 'think things over.' What is there to think over—if you're sure you care?"
"There are lots of details to a thing of this sort."
"A thing of what sort?"
"Oh, Austin, how stupid you are! A—a marriage, of course."
"I thought all that was necessary were two willing victims, a license, and a parson."
"Well, there's a good deal more to it than that. Besides, your family would surely guess if I stayed here. I want to keep it just to ourselves for a little while."
"I see. It's all right, dear. Take all the time you want."
"What would you tell them, anyway?" she went on lightly,—"that I proposed to you, and that you accepted me? Or, to be more exact, that you didn't accept me, but said, 'No, no, no!' most decidedly, and went on repeating it, with variations, until I threw myself into your arms? It was an awful blow to my pride—considering that heretofore I've certainly had my fair share of attention, and even a little more than that—to have to doallthe love-making, and I'm certainly not going to go brag about it—' This time the conversation really did get interrupted, for Austin would not for one instant submit to such a "garbling of statistics" and took the quickest means in his power to put an end to it."
He had the wisdom, however, greater, perhaps, than might have been expected, not to oppose any of her wishes just then, and it was Sylvia herself who at the last minute felt her heart beginning to fail her, and called him to the farther end of the station platform, on the pretext of consulting him about some baggage.
"I don't see how I can say good-bye—in just an ordinary way," she whispered, "and I'm beginning to miss you dreadfully already. If I can't stand it, away from you, you must arrange to come down for at least a day or two."
It was beginning to sprinkle, and, taking her umbrella, he opened it and handed it to her, leaning forward and kissing her as soon as she was hidden by it.
"I never meant to say good-bye 'in an ordinary way,'" he said cheerfully, "whatever your intentions were! And, of course, I'll manage to come to town for a day or two, if you find you really want me. Fred would be glad to help me out for that long, I'm sure. On the other hand, if it's a relief to be rid of me for a while, and New York looks pretty good to you, don't hurry back—you've been away for a whole year, remember. I'll understand."
In spite of his cheerful words and matter-of-course manner, Austin stood watching the train go out with a heavy heart. He was very sincere in feeling that his presumption had been great, and that he had taken advantage of feelings which mere youth and loneliness might have awakened in Sylvia, and from which she would recover as soon as she was with her own friends again. And yet he loved her so dearly that it was hard—even though he acknowledged that it was best—to let her go back to the world by whose standards he felt he fell short in every way.
"If I lose her," he said to himself, "I must remember that—of course I ought to. King Cophetua and the beggar maid makes a very pretty story—but it doesn't sound so well the other way around. And then she's given me such a tremendous amount already—if I never get any more, I must be thankful for that."
Sally spent a rapturous week in New York, and came home with her modest trousseau all bought and glowing accounts of the good times she had had.
"The very first thing Sylvia did, the morning after we got there," she said, "was to buy a new limousine and hire a man to run it. My, you ought to see it! It's lined with pearl gray, and Sylvia keeps a gold vase with orchids—fresh ones every day—in it! She helped me choose all my things, and I never could have got half so much for my money, or had half such pretty things if she hadn't; and she began right off to get the mostelegantclothes for herself, too! I knew Sylvia was pretty, but I never knewhowpretty until I saw her in a low-necked white dress! We went to the theatre almost every evening, and saw all the sights, besides—it didn't take long to get around in that automobile, I can tell you! Perfect rafts of people kept coming to see her all the time, telling her how glad they were to see her back, and teasing her to do things with them. I bet she'll get married again in no time—there weredozensof men, all awfully rich and attractive and apparently justcrazyabout her! We went out twice to lunch, and once to dinner, at the grandest houses I ever even imagined, and every one was lovely to me, too, but of course it was only Sylvia they really cared about. I was about wild, I got so excited, but it didn't make any more impression on Sylvia than water rolling off a duck's back—she didn't seem the least bit different from when she was here, helping mother wash the supper dishes, and teaching Austin French. She took it all as a matter of course. I guess we didn't any of us realize how important she was."
"I did," said Austin.
"You!" exclaimed his sister, with withering scorn. "You've never been even civil to her, much less respectful or attentive! If you could see the way other men treat her—"
"I don't want to," said Austin, with more truth than his sister guessed.
A young, lovely, and agreeable widow, with a great deal of money, and no "impediments" in the way of either parents or children, is apt to find life made extremely pleasant for her by her friends; and every one felt, moreover, that "Sylvia had behaved so very well." For two months after her husband's death, she had lived in the greatest seclusion, too ill, too disillusioned and horror-stricken, too shattered in body and soul—as they all knew only too well—to see even her dearest friends. Then she had gone to the country, remaining there quietly for a year, regaining her health and spirits, and had now returned to her uncle's home, lightening her mourning, going out a little, taking up her old interests again one by one—a fitting and dignified prelude for a new establishment of her own. She could not help being pleased and gratified at the warmth of her reception; and she found, as Austin had predicted, that "New York looked pretty good to her." It is doubtful whether the taste for luxury, once acquired, is ever wholly lost, even though it may be temporarily cast aside; and Sylvia was too young and too human, as well as too healthy and happy again, not to enjoy herself very much, indeed.
For nearly a month she found each day so full and so delightful as it came, that she had no time to be lonely, and no thought of going away; but gradually she came to a realization of the fact that the days weretoofull; that there were no opportunities for resting and reading and "thinking things over"; that the quiet little dinners and luncheons of four and six, given in her honor, were gradually but surely becoming larger, more formal and more elaborate; that her circle of callers was no longer confined to her most intimate friends; that her telephone rang in and out of season; that the city was growing hot and dusty and tawdry, and that she herself was getting tired and nervous again. And when she waked one morning at eleven o'clock, after being up most of the night before, her head aching, her whole being weary and confused, it needed neither the insistent and disagreeable memory of a little incident of the previous evening, nor the letter from Austin that her maid brought in on her breakfast-tray, to make her realize that the tinsel of her gayety was getting tarnished.
* * * * *
DEAREST (the letter ran):
It is midnight, and—as you know—I am always up at five, but I must send you just a few words before I go to bed, for these last two days have been so full that it has seemed to be impossible to find a moment in which to write you. "Business is rushing" at the Gray Homestead these days, and everything going finely. The chickens and ducklings are all coming along well—about four hundred of them—and we've had three beautiful new heifer calves this week. Peter is beside himself with joy, for they're all Holsteins. I went to Wallacetown yesterday afternoon, and made another $200 payment on our note at the bank—at this rate we'll have that halfway behind us soon.
To-day I've been over at your house every minute that I could spare and succeeded in getting the last workman out—for good—at eight o'clock this evening. (I bribed him to stay overtime. There are a few little odd jobs left, but I can work those in myself in odd moments.) There is no reason now why you shouldn't begin to send furniture any time you like. I never would have believed that it would be possible to get three such good bedrooms—not to mention a bathroom and closets—out of the attic, or that tearing out partitions and unblocking fireplaces would work such wonders downstairs. It's all just as you planned it that first day we tramped over in the snow to see it—do you remember?—and it's all lovely, especially your bedroom on the right of the front door, and the big living-room on the left. The papers you chose are exactly right for the walls, and the white paint looks so fresh and clean, and I'm sure the piazza is deep enough to suit even you. I've ploughed and planted your flower- and vegetable-gardens, as well as those at the Homestead, and this warm, early spring is helping along the vegetation finely, so I think things will soon be coming up. We've decided to try both wheat and alfalfa as experiments this year, and I can hardly wait to see whether they'll turn out all right.
Katherine graduates from high school the eighteenth of June, and as Sally's teaching ends the same day, and Fred's patience has finally given out with a bang, she has fixed the twenty-fifth for her wedding. Won't she be busy, with just one week to get ready to be a bride, after she stops being a schoolmarm? But, of course, we'll all turn to and help her, and Molly will be home from the Conservatory ten days before that—you know how efficient she is. By the way, has she written you the good news about her scholarship? We may have a famous musician in the family yet, if some mere man doesn't step in and intervene. Speaking of lovers, Peter is teaching Edith Dutch! And when mother remonstrated with her, she flared up and asked if it was any different from having you teach me French! (I sometimes believe "the baby" is "onto us," though all the others are still entirely unsuspicious, and keep right on telling me I never half appreciated you!) So they spend a good deal of time at the living-room table, with their heads rather close together, but I haven't yet heard Edith conversing fluently in that useful and musical foreign language which she is supposed to be acquiring.