CHAPTER VII
Elinor Benton’s worldly intuition that a crisis was imminent in her home, an inevitable clash with her mother in which one or the other would have to admit herself vanquished was not without foundation. Neither the girl nor her father were able to comprehend the mother’s attitude nor why she should herself be, or wish them to be so different from all those with whom they were in these days thrown in contact. Sixteen years of suppressing her emotions, of unsatisfied longings had made her incapable of showing her inner feelings, the tenderness that so passionately wished only for the good of those dear to her. From some remote ancestor she must have inherited the coldness and intolerance she showed outwardly, and which was to her husband and children their only criterion. Cold and hard outwardly, intolerant to the extreme of anything that did not agree with her puritanical convictions which the years of self-communing had made all but fanatical, Marjorie Benton did not, could not open her heart and plead with those she loved to understand her, to meet her half-way in her efforts to make them see all she wished was to stand for what was good, pure and true. A faulty reasoning, aided by that inherited stubbornness, had persuaded her her best source was to assert indomitable authority as wife and mother—to force her own to bend to her will, with no idea of the give and take that makes worlds go around smoothly. She had forgot to reason, too, that her children were her own, and had without doubt inherited some of that very stubbornness which so momentarily threatened the Benton ship with going on the rocks.
Elinor had felt—seen—the clash coming. But she had not expected it quite so soon after her confidential chat with her father.
The lateness of the hour—(it was past seven) when she arrived home from her afternoon at the matinée was the signal—the beginning of it all. Her father and mother had finished their dinner and were in the library, the father absorbed in his evening paper, but the mother sat with her hands idly clasped in her lap, her eyes never wandering from the clock in the corner until her daughter rushed in apologetically.
“Sorry to be so late,” she deplored. “I hope you haven’t waited dinner for me.”
“Your father and I have had our dinner.” Her mother seemed not to notice the breathless apology. “I have ordered yours kept warm for you.”
“Thanks, mother, you are very kind, but I can’t eat a mouthful. We had a rather sumptuous luncheon, and it was 6:30 when we finished having tea at the Waldorf.”
Marjorie walked across the room and pressed the bell. When the butler entered she ordered him to inform the cook that “Miss Elinor had already dined.” Then she turned and faced her daughter.
“It strikes me, Elinor,” she said slowly, “that for a young girl so recently introduced into society, you are assuming unwarranted privileges.”
Though he at first attempted to assume a neutral attitude and kept his eyes on his paper, Hugh Benton stirred uneasily, his very attitude showing that the scene he felt sure would ensue was most distasteful to him. He set his jaws at a belligerent angle. Well, if it must come——
Elinor Benton flushed dully at her mother’s words. Her glance sought her father, and what she saw there apparently gave her courage. With a calmness and coldness matching Marjorie’s own, and with her dainty chin tipped at a dangerously belligerent angle that showed her as much like one parent as the other, she faced her mother, and, as though addressing an insolent stranger, her answer came icily.
“I fail to understand you, mother,” was what she said. “As usual you are speaking enigmatically.”
“In that case I shall lose no time in making myself clear,” the mother began, but her words were cut short.
“I say,” Hugh interrupted hurriedly as he dropped his paper, and glanced up with a smile as though some remarkable idea had come to him. “How about you two dressing as quickly as you can and driving into town with me. We can make one of the Roof shows! Eh, what?”
Elinor clapped her hands delightedly.
“Fine, Dad!” was her enthusiastic acceptance. “It won’t take me five minutes to dress. I’m dying to attend a Roof revue—I hope you can get tickets.”
“In case I can’t, we will go over to ‘The Palais Royal,’ ” Hugh answered, with a man’s natural eagerness to avert the inevitable argument between Marjorie and Elinor.
“One moment, please,” Marjorie cold, wide-eyed, forbidding, addressed her husband. “Your attempt to silence me, Hugh, is obvious. Besides, you know perfectly well I never attend a Roof show, and I surely will not permit my daughter to do so.”
With a pertness she had not before considered when addressing her mother, the daughter exclaimed with a toss of her head:
“Well I can’t see whyyoushould object if Dad proposes taking us!” Angry tears rushed to her eyes.
“I consider it unnecessary to state my reasons. It should be sufficient that I do object—most strenuously. There are a great many things that I wish to say to you, Elinor. This is probably an opportune time. Perhaps it would be better for you to come with me to my room.” Marjorie rose and started toward the door.
All signs of neutrality vanishing and with a sternness and a fire in his eyes his wife did not recognize, Hugh Benton threw down his paper and rose, too. He made his way to his daughter’s side.
“Elinor!” he said gently as he placed his arm about her. “Please go to your own room for awhile. I wish to speak with your mother, alone.”
“You just heard me request Elinor to come to my room?” Marjorie was astounded. “Surely you——”
“Elinor, do as I say,” Hugh repeated. His wife he ignored.
Marjorie’s glance at his white face and tightly compressed lips showed her a new Hugh. With an indifferent shrug of her shoulders she sat down to wait.
Frightened by what was occurring, Elinor’s arms went up to close about her father’s neck. Marjorie winced unconsciously as she saw the gesture. It proclaimed so plainly who her daughter believed to be her best friend—which one she loved.
“I’m sorry, Dad,” the girl stammered with a sob as she slowly left them.
Marjorie Benton’s eyebrows went up in disdain as the door closed behind Elinor and her husband came over to stand before her wordless, hands in pockets.
“I suppose,” she commented, bitterly, “you are greatly elated at having humiliated me before Elinor.”
“You know that is not true!” Hugh’s voice was tense as he gave his wife the lie for the first time in his life. He was thoroughly exasperated, out of patience with her and what he believed were her ideals. “I am only sure of one thing. You have got into the way of making a tragedy out of every little thing that does not suit you, and this is just another example. But if you are looking for tragedy, something real to dramatize over,” and his lips tightened into a grim line as he accentuated every word, “I just want to tell you that this time you may succeed beyond your wildest expectations!”
“Why, Hugh—what do you mean—I—” Marjorie’s voice was tremulous as she sought to understand what had brought this storm of her husband’s about her ears.
“I think this time you’ll have no cause to complain about not understanding what I mean. And for once, I expect you to listen to every word I say!”
There was no doubting the earnestness of Hugh Benton’s tone, or that he was wrought up to a pitch rarely known to his easy-going nature. For once, the cloak of her authority dropped from his wife’s shoulders and she shrank in her chair as her meek reply came.
“Very well—I’m listening. I suppose,” and there was a flicker of her sternness and sarcasm, “I may as well try to comprehend you and your very peculiar attitude——”
Hugh Benton flicked his cigarette into the wide fireplace, staring after it a moment before he turned to face his wife. With arms folded, he towered over her, his whole manner that of a stern, unyielding judge.
“Marjorie,” he began, “I realize that you are my wife, and as such, entitled to many privileges. But there is such a thing as carrying your prejudices too far. The way matters have been going on in this house for some time now simply cannot continue. Not only the children, but I, myself, have reached the limit of my endurance. We came to New York sixteen years ago at your suggestion, not mine. I always wish you to remember that. When I realized that your one ambition was for me to become a success in this great metropolis, I determined to use all my energies and capabilities to satisfy your desires. Financially and socially I believe I have reached your expectations. In everything else my life is a complete failure.”
“Failure?” Marjorie’s voice trembled as her face showed her genuine surprise.
Hugh nodded emphatically. “Yes, failure,” he emphasized. “My children love me, not for myself, but because I am able to gratify all of their whims and desires, and strange to say, I am perfectly willing to pay for their show of affection, because it is the only tie that binds me to my home.”
Tears of distress which in spite of her pride forced themselves to unwelcome eyes, trembled on Marjorie Benton’s eyelids and splashed down on the hands folded so quietly over her somber gray gown.
“Hugh!” she cried, distressed. “Surely you don’t know what you say! What about your wife?”
“You asked the same thing years ago, Marjorie,” Hugh answered bitterly, “when we discussed the advisability of coming to New York. You were all the world to me then, and——”
“AndnowI am nothing.” Marjorie’s quivering lips completed the sentence. “I—I understand, Hugh.”
“You are still the mother of my children, despite the fact that they are both disappointments to me.”
Hugh was calm in the face of his wife’s tragedy, but his very calmness gave back to his wife some of her fighting spirit.
“If they are disappointments to you, it is your own fault,” she flared. “You humor them beyond all reason. I try to enforce strict discipline, and you invariably interfere. This very evening when I attempted to reprimand Elinor, you resorted to almost childish subterfuge to prevent an argument.”
“I’ll tell you why I interfere.” Hugh was getting to the gist of his lecture. “It is for the simple reason that I consider you the real culprit. The children are not to blame because they are selfish, worldly, way beyond their age, and lacking in love and respect for their parents. You raised them both in schools and colleges where they were thrown in contact with the wrong companions. Had you kept your children with you and reared them in the environment of home and love, everything would have been different.”
“How like you to put the blame on me.” Marjorie’s lip curled in scorn, and her foot in its common sense high shoe tapped impatiently on the soft-toned rug. But Hugh Benton was in too deadly earnest to be switched from his main topic by a side remark. He went on, as though his wife had not spoken.
“And now, you expect a girl and boy, grown up, to obey you implicitly, and change in a few days the training they have received for years. I tell you, Marjorie, you are employing the wrong method. You must realize it is too late for you to command, and if you persist in continually arguing with Elinor, and criticising her every act, you will drive her to desperation, that’s all. She is a self-willed and headstrong girl, and it is necessary to handle her with caution and the utmost diplomacy.”
Marjorie could not forbear one bitter reminder. “As long as you find so much fault with your family, why don’t you devote less time to your club and try to remodel them?”
“If you were the kind of a wife I once believed you to be I shouldn’t have to find diversion at my club,” Hugh answered sadly. “But what do I ever find at home now, save criticism.”
“You really are a badly abused man, Hugh. First it is your children, and now your wife—I don’t see how you manage to bear up under your heavy burden.”
The tinge of sarcasm in Marjorie’s voice stung Hugh to the quick. His fist banged down on the table with rage.
“Whatisthe use?” he exclaimed violently. “I may as well try to reason with an infant. We have been drifting further and further apart until we haven’t a single idea in common. Our lives together under this roof is a mockery, but up to now I have always remembered that you are my wife and have never as much as permitted myself to indulge in the thought of another woman; but from this moment I amthroughwith conventionality. I am going to drift wherever the tide takes me. If you don’t care to be a wife to me, to interest yourself in at least some of my interests—I can’t find happiness in my own home, I shall seek it elsewhere!”
In his old manner of having said the last word on a subject, Hugh Benton jammed his hands in his pockets and stalked to the door. Marjorie heard him call out an order to have the limousine at the door in fifteen minutes. Then she looked up to see him standing with his hand on the door knob as he looked back into the room for one last word.
Elinor Benton realizes that Geraldine (Winifred Bryson) has stolen her father’s affection.(“The Valley of Content” screened as “Pleasure Mad.”)
Elinor Benton realizes that Geraldine (Winifred Bryson) has stolen her father’s affection.(“The Valley of Content” screened as “Pleasure Mad.”)
“And another thing!” He fairly bit off his words. “I understand you’ve decided to decline our invitation to the Thurston’s ball on the seventeenth through some foolish notion of not approving of some of their relations or guests. You are to accept at once—understand? I intend going and taking Elinor!”
Marjorie nodded dully—and with no other word he was gone.
For long minutes after the door had banged after her husband, Marjorie Benton sat quietly in her chair, almost too stunned to think. Surely she must have been dreaming. Hugh had never before displayed such a temper. The things he had said were positively indecent. She was aroused from her reverie by the slamming of the front door and the sound of the machine going down the driveway. She sighed as she got slowly to her feet. She remembered she must talk to Elinor. She must not let what Hugh had said interfere with her duty. At the locked door she rapped softly.
“Who is it?” called the girl.
“It’s mother, dear! I have come to have a talk with you.”
“Sorry, mother, but I have a dreadful headache,” was the languid response. “You will have to wait until another time.”
“I am not going to scold—I just want to have a heart-to-heart chat with you, dear.” Marjorie was surprised at her own pleading voice as a lump rose in her throat.
“I’d rather not talk to-night, mother—please excuse me.”
“Very well,” Marjorie faltered, but as she turned toward her own rooms, the hot tears rolled down her cheeks.
On Tuesday afternoon, at precisely two o’clock, Templeton Druid parked his classy little roadster near the 57th Street entrance of the park, and paced slowly up and down. He was waiting for Elinor Benton. Time after time he glanced impatiently at his watch. He had never before waited for anyone—this was a new experience.
It was twenty minutes past two when he saw her alight from a taxi in front of the Plaza. He hastened forward to meet her. All his anger at her tardiness melted away immediately at sight of the beautiful girl in her stunning sport suit and hat of Chinese blue.
“I’m so sorry to have kept you waiting,” was her breathless greeting. “I—I—was unavoidably detained.”
She felt she just could not confess to this man her difficulties in endeavoring to get away from her mother.
Marjorie always attended a settlement meeting on Tuesday, so usually Elinor was free to do as she pleased; but to-day, the president had been reported ill and the meeting was postponed.
So it had been only through soliciting the aid of Mrs. DeLacy over the telephone that Elinor finally managed to keep her appointment. Mrs. DeLacy called for her in the Thurston car, begging that she accompany her to the dentist. Before her mother had a chance to utter a protest, Elinor had consented, so there was nothing for Marjorie to do. As soon as they were a safe distance from home, Elinor summoned a taxi and hastened to her rendezvous. But had she been able to read her dear Geraldine’s thoughts as that fair chaperone lounged comfortably on her way to the shopping district, the Benton heiress might not have felt so grateful as she went light-hearted to meet her matinée idol. For Geraldine DeLacy, widow, social parasite, chaperone de luxe, was racking her clever brains for a plan whereby she might most advantageously use the confidence Elinor had been obliged to place in her.
“Nothing matters, now that you are here,” was Templeton’s gallant reply to the girl’s apology. “I was only beginning to fear you would not come—but now——”
Elinor’s eyes were on the actor’s car as he led her to it. She glowed.
“What a stunning little car!” she cried, in delight.
To praise any of Templeton Druid’s possessions was the next best thing to praising him. But it was with a blasé air that he consented to agree with his guest, as he turned the wheel to head toward Long Island.
“Yes, she is a good little car,” he admitted, a bit boredly, as though condescending to praise the machine. “When we get out on the road, I’ll let her out a bit and show you what she can do.”
Elinor’s eyes gained a new sparkle as the air colored her cheeks.
“It seems wonderful to be riding like this,” she enthused. “I’m so tired of always riding behind a chauffeur. Dad wanted to buy me a car of my own, but mother wouldn’t consider it. He is going to buy one for my brother when he graduates, and then I’ll coax Howard into teaching me how to run it.” And Elinor’s eyes brightened with anticipation.
“You don’t have to wait for that,” Templeton answered magnanimously. “I’m going to teach you how to run mine this very day. Just as soon as we strike a nice stretch of road, I’ll put you at the wheel.”
“How perfectly splendid! But I’m afraid you will find me an awkward pupil.”
“I promise not to become impatient,” Templeton laughed, “but I warn you I may exact a tiny payment.”
Elinor caught her breath a little as she recognized the eager boldness with which the actor looked into her eyes, as they paused at a crossing at the command of the uplifted white hand of a traffic officer. But already she had determined that her companion should not put her in the class of the unsophisticated. For this one day she would put behind her all thoughts of prudishness, all the reminders of her mother’s teachings she had come so to despise, but had not quite forgotten. So her blush was belied by the boldness of her words as she pertly retorted:
“I’ve never yet heard a complaint that I don’t pay my debts!”
Templeton Druid smiled complacently as he turned in at the ferry entrance. This was going to be easier than he thought. But—oh, well, wasn’t that always the way. There was certainly something in being Templeton Druid.
It was a glorious day. The sun shone radiantly, and the balmy breath of spring with bewildering fragrance flooded the atmosphere.
Gradually her companion persuaded Elinor Benton to talk of herself and family. Before long she was telling him her life’s history without once suspecting that he had purposely encouraged her to do so.
“By the way,” he suddenly seemed to remember. “I forgot to tell you something. Through Mrs. DeLacy’s kindness I have received an invitation to a dance at the Thurstons’ on the 17th.”
“Splendid!” Elinor exclaimed, her eyes dancing her pleasure. “Of course, you’ll accept?”
The man shook his head slowly. “I have thought of declining because I can’t get there until after the theater,” he demurred, “and that will be so late, but of course, if you wish me to come——”
“Why, of course, I do—ever so much!”
“You’ll promise to save a dance for me?”
“Two,” promised the girl, her mind busily engaged with the thought of a wonderful new frock for the occasion.
True to his word, he put her at the wheel, and she thoroughly enjoyed her first lesson in driving. The rose color flamed in her cheeks, and her eyes sparkled like twin stars. Templeton Druid, glancing at her from the corner of his eye, caught his breath in admiration. “She is only a slip of a girl,” he thought. “But what a magnificent woman she will be!”
As they stood up to leave the little inn where they had their sandwiches and tea, the actor, in his most courtly manner bent over, and reaching for her hand, pressed his lips gently to the tips of her fingers.
His was a vast experience with women. It had taught him much, enough to realize that, impetuous and pampered as this girl was, he must use the utmost discrimination in endeavoring to arouse her admiration.
Elinor’s heart pounded bewilderingly as she withdrew her hand and turned toward the car. It had not resumed its rhythmic beating even when they reached the Plaza where they were met by Mrs. DeLacy, who was true to her promise to see Elinor through her escapade. Templeton Druid found time for one confidential whisper.
“Now don’t forget your promise,” he reminded, his tone languishing as though nothing else in the world meant so much. “Be sure to ’phone me to-morrow morning and let me know when I can see you again.”
Elinor nodded but her eyes betrayed much to that wise little lady when she took her seat by Geraldine DeLacy’s side in the Thurston limousine.
CHAPTER VIII
Judged from a standpoint of society notables present, the Thurston dance was the success of the season. True, there was a notable lack of the old conservative element, the Knickerbocker strain, but no one noticed the absence of these kill-joys, as some of the younger set were wont to refer to them, and their absence was more than atoned for by the bevy of débutantes, second-season belles and attractive matrons whose doings filled so many columns in the society gossip. To say nothing of a scattering of celebrities. And to anyone who knew him, it was plain that Templeton Druid considered himself not the least of these.
The Broadway star made a late, a very late appearance—the affair had progressed to the stage where the younger set had long since abandoned their more proper dancing for the jazziest of modern Terpsichorean feats, utterly careless, in most cases, oblivious of the few frowns that met them from the few older matrons who had not accustomed themselves to seeing the sons and daughters of their own sort resort to the gyrations of public dance halls.
The Bentons, father and daughter, (it had been the greatest joy to Elinor when her mother had made a final declination of her own and her father’s invitation to accompany them) were among the earlier arrivals. Elinor Benton had not yet become so blasé that she was willing to forego any moment of triumph which was inevitably hers at such an affair. Her very happiness at the thought of meeting Templeton Druid again (though that one ride had only been the precursor of others which had followed and which had led in this short time to an intimacy she had never known with any of the men in her own set), of being held in his arms in the dance, and with the added zest of being from under her mother’s eyes, for she had dreaded the thought of introducing the matinée hero to her mother and being questioned as to her friendship, had further enhanced the beauty that made her the center of attraction wherever she went. Much thought had been spent on the gown she wore—a marvelous creation of georgette crêpe, itscouleur de roseshading from the deepest tint to a delicate shell pink. And strangely enough for her, it had not been the thought that it would bring the usual crowds of callow youth about her that had been responsible for the careful toilette. What Templeton Druid would think of her—could she further bring him to her feet—had been the all-absorbing hope as she had stood before her long mirror while her maid put the finishing touches to the dream she saw before her.
Elinor Benton had no worry about her father as far as her actor was concerned. She knew her father—knew his careless acceptance of anything she might tell him; knew, too, the only half hidden snobbery that would accept without question any guest of the Thurstons. Hugh Benton had reached the point where his society gods and goddesses could do no wrong.
A one-step was starting as the Bentons entered the big ball room. Hugh looked about him with as happy eyes as did his daughter. This was the kind of thing he loved; this what he had always been denied. His wife cared so little for the enjoyments of the society into which his hard work and diplomacy had landed them. But had he been a bit more observant, he would have seen that his little girl’s eyes were not as care-free as usual, that she was restless; there was still something that must occur to make her happiness complete. There was the thought that three hours must elapse before Templeton Druid should make his appearance. She saw several youths making their way in her direction. Of a sudden they seemed unspeakably inane. She did not want to dance with them. She placed her hand on her father’s arm.
“Come on, Dad, let’s dance,” she urged. “This is a one-step; I know you can dance that——”
Hugh Benton looked down and laughed as he placed his arm about his daughter.
“What’s in the baby that makes her want to dance with her old Dad, instead of these youngsters who are breaking their necks to reach her?” he asked humorously. But as they swung off, Elinor looked up at him, wrinkled her pretty nose and sniffed as she murmured: “MyoldDad! Hmmph! Handsomest, youngest man in the room, I’ll tell the world. The girls’ll all be dying with jealousy——”
A light-gloved hand brushed her bare arm. A warm perfume unlike any he had ever smelt made Hugh Benton glance up quickly. A soft musical voice drawled:
“Hello, child! Do I have to interrupt your dance to make you notice me—to say good-evening. I’ve been trying to catch your eye ever since you came in.”
Elinor Benton swung out of her father’s arms to face Geraldine DeLacy—a marvelous Geraldine in her soft clinging iridescent gown, her deep dark eyes sparkling with pleasurable enjoyment, as though seeing and speaking with Elinor Benton was the event of the evening most to be desired.
“Oh, Geraldine,” cried the girl. “Isn’t it fine to see you! And right now when I’m with Dad. Goodness knows,” and she flashed an impish smile at her parent, “when the other girls get a chance at him, I’m going to see precious little of him this evening—and I do so want you two to know each other. This is Mrs. DeLacy, Dad—you know, Geraldine, of whom I’ve told you so much.”
“She has indeed, Mrs. DeLacy,” Hugh Benton added cordially. “I feel almost as if we were old friends——”
The woman shot him an arch glance.
“Which we may be, I hope?” she queried, and there was something in that glance and appealing voice which sent a quiver through the financier’s nerve centers such as he had not known in many a day. “As I hope,” she added, playfully pinching Elinor’s cheek, “that it has been nice things this child has been saying about me.”
Elinor interrupted breathlessly.
“Why, Dad, I told you, didn’t I, that she was beautiful and fascinating and——”
“Quite the most wonderful creature alive—I admit it myself,” Geraldine’s laugh was whole-hearted, but the look she gave Hugh was one of mutual understanding. “It’s quite wonderful to be a chaperone to children who can find no fault in you because you love to see them enjoy themselves. And besides, a widow must have some admiration, and from what better source than the girls she loves?”
Hugh Benton had appreciated the glance of understanding, but now he could not restrain his gallant: “She wasn’t half eloquent enough, Mrs. DeLacy.”
Geraldine smiled and lowered her lashes over her wonderful dark eyes.
“It’s so fine to hear such things—even if one is not a débutante, and of course, has to take a back seat at such affairs as this.”
The music was beginning for a new dance. Elinor saw Frank Joyce, whose name was on her card, approaching.
“Oh, Dad,” she said, regretfully, “we’ve missed our dance, but we’ll have another later. Take good care of my family, Geraldine,” she called laughingly as she whirled away in young Joyce’s arms, her mind still on the slow moving time that separated her from Templeton Druid.
“Would you care to dance, Mrs. DeLacy, or would you prefer sitting it out?” asked Hugh.
“Oh, let’s talk,” Geraldine replied eagerly. “I canalwaysdance, but—” Her eyes were full of meaning. Hugh linked her arm within his and led her out to one of the verandahs.
“Will you have a wrap?” he inquired solicitously.
“Thank you, no,—the night is glorious.”
“This seems cozy,” Hugh said, as he drew up two wicker easy chairs beside a row of potted palms.
They were at the farthest end of the verandah. Music floated out from the ballroom, the soft rays of the moon slanted toward them, and the fragrance of the sweet peas and roses was wafted up from the sunken gardens.
Geraldine heaved a little sigh of contentment and settled back in her chair: “I’m sorry to have made you miss your dance with Elinor.”
“The pleasure of meeting you has entirely recompensed me,” Hugh replied gallantly.
“How lovely of you to say that.” Geraldine stared at Hugh so openly for a few moments, that he found himself blushing like a school-girl.
“I—I—beg your pardon,” she stammered. “I didn’t mean to stare so rudely, only I justcan’trealize it.”
“What is it that you can’t realize?”
“Why, that you are Elinor’s father—you are so—so young!”
“I’m forty-four years old,” Hugh answered smilingly.
“Really, Mr. Benton! Surely you have discovered an elixir of youth. I’ve met Mrs. Benton, and I can’t understand how you—oh please—forgive me—I have an abominable habit of thinking aloud.” Geraldine lowered her eyes while she waited anxiously to see what effect her thrust had taken.
“My wife is four years younger than I,” Hugh replied gravely. “You must remember that time deals more lightly with a man than it does with a woman.”
“You won’t think I’m presuming if I say that anyone would take Mrs. Benton to be many years your senior. Has she been ill?”
“No, Mrs. Benton has not been ill,” he sighed. “She is quite reserved, and a bit old-fashioned. Don’t you think it rather difficult to keep one’s youth without indulging in a few modern pleasures?”
“Indeed, I do,” Geraldine answered, and her sigh asked for understanding as she added, as though reluctantly, “and I can sympathize with you—my husband and I were—er——”
All the world—all his own world of finance and business, at least, gave Hugh Benton credit for being a clever man. It was a common expression among his club and business associates that anyone would have to get up early to put anything over on Hugh Benton. But there would have been smiles, contemptuous, tolerant, amused, could those men have seen Hugh Benton in the hands of a woman as clever as himself, cleverer by far, in her own sphere. For Hugh Benton had never lived by his wits. Geraldine DeLacy’s daily bread depended on hers. She molded him like wax. In her hands he was pliable as a child. It would have astonished even him could he have stood off in an astral body and heard himself discussing his most intimate domestic affairs with a total stranger. He did not know that Mrs. DeLacy was but satisfying her curiosity concerning the rumors she had heard of incompatibility in the Benton family, but Geraldine knew that it took her but one-half hour to discover all she wished to know.
But as he talked, becoming each minute more confidential, it seemed less and less that this beautiful woman was a stranger. It was so much to have her sitting next to him, looking at him tenderly, with eyes expressing sympathy and warmth. Her complete understanding of everything he said seemed so thorough. Her capability to grasp intuitively his innermost thoughts amazed him.
Geraldine adroitly turned the conversation to herself. She spoke of marriage to a man uncongenial to her every way—a marriage described as a sacrifice to save a home for her people—one of the old families of Virginia,—and then of her widowhood; how Mr. DeLacy had passed away six years ago, after losing his entire fortune, and leaving her a mere pittance of an income, barely enabling her to keep up a respectable appearance.
Hugh unconsciously cast a look of surprised inquiry at her magnificent gown.
Geraldine shrugged and laughed a little bitterly.
“You are looking at my gown,” she interposed quickly. “I’ll tell you a secret, one that I have never confided in another soul—I make all my own gowns. But what is one to do?” She spread her hands in a gesture of mute helplessness.
“Remarkable!” Hugh was genuinely admiring. “But it must keep you very busy.”
“It does—sometimes I sit up until four in the morning sewing—I can’t let it interfere with any of my social engagements, and still I must do it—it is the only way I can manage at all. Why the price of the gown your daughter is wearing this evening would provide six for me.”
“Wonderful little woman!” Hugh reached out daringly to pat her hand. “So few women would be content under such circumstances.”
“Oh, but I’m not always content. Sometimes I become very much discouraged, and heartsick—I’m so terribly alone in the world. The Thurstons are good, kind people, but somehow I just can’t unburden myself to them. We Lees, of Virginia, are so terribly proud, you know. If I only had someone to take a little interest in my affairs—the small amount of money that I have invested properly would mean so much to me.”
Had this bald bid come from any man he knew, Hugh Benton would have smiled his understanding smile and put it from his mind. But now so thoroughly had Geraldine DeLacy hypnotized the man who for years had been without sympathy or the flattery that is man’s meed that he did not even see that it was a blatant asking for aid. All he could see was that here was a beautiful, a sympathetic, an understanding woman in financial straits, that she, proud as she was, had confided in him, had given him confidence for confidence in the short time it had taken them to be such good friends, and that he knew he could aid her. Why, he could make it possible for her to be independent of any of these friends or relatives. It would not be necessary for her to sit up late at night, dimming her wonderful eyes, pricking those dainty fingers making gowns in which she looked so amazingly well dressed. He could imagine how hard it was for her to have to depend on even such relations as the Thurstons. Here was his opportunity to show himself a real friend—not the casual acquaintance of a few idle hours at a dance, talking while the music purred and the moon made it an hour for confidences.
“Why not let me help you?” he asked eagerly. “You know, investing money is my business, and when I hear of something good, let me double or triple that little sum for you?”
“Why, Mr. Benton!” Geraldine exclaimed, concealing her delight with well-feigned emotion. “You surely wouldn’t bother with me! I couldn’t let a busy man like you.”
“It would be the greatest pleasure, Mrs. DeLacy.”
“But it—it seems like such an imposition! Oh, it—it actually looks as though I—I was hinting—Oh, Mr. Benton, I wouldn’t have you think that for the world!”
“Nonsense! I don’t think anything of the kind. You happened to mention your affairs and I happened to be in a position to render you a little assistance—that’s all there is about it.”
“All?—Why—I—I—” Geraldine covered her eyes with her handkerchief and began to sob softly.
“Oh, please,” Hugh drew her hands from her eyes and patted her shoulder consolingly. “I can’t bear to see a woman cry.”
“You’re like all men in that respect,” Geraldine dried her eyes obediently and smiled up at him. “But in every other way you’re so different—I never met anyone like you—my friend. I won’t attempt to thank you now; I should only cry again. Hadn’t we better join the others?” Geraldine rose from her chair.
“Yes, I suppose we must.” Hugh reached for her hand and kissed the tips of her fingers. “But,” he added, meaningly, “remember this—you have called me your friend and—we shall meet again.” He finished abruptly as he led her toward the brightly-lighted windows, and there was determination in his tone.
Nell Thurston was just taking Templeton Druid, who had but made his belated pompous appearance, over to meet her father and mother when Mrs. DeLacy re-entered the ballroom on the arm of Hugh Benton. They made their way toward Elinor who stood alone for the moment, her eyes fastened with all the fascination of a bird on its natural enemy on the tall, lithe figure of the Thespian. So interested was she that she did not even see her father and friend, though she had taken occasion two or three times to wonder a little at their prolonged absence. “He’s here just to see me—me!” was her exultant thought. “Oh, what would they all think if they knew,” pridefully.
Like nearly everyone else the big room, so effectually had Templeton Druid learned to make his entrances, Hugh Benton saw the man, and his brows twisted in perplexity as he looked.
“Who is he?” he asked his companion. “It seems as if I know him, but I can’t quite place——”
“Templeton Druid,” informed Mrs. DeLacy.
Hugh’s “Oh,” was somewhat illuminative. “Oh,” he said, “Templeton Druid, the actor? Is he—is he a friend of the Thurstons?”
“He’s a friend of mine,” was Geraldine’s information, in a tone that removed from Hugh Benton’s mind any doubt of the matinée idol’s eligibility anywhere. “We went to the same school in Richmond. He’s from an excellent family.” They had reached Elinor’s side just in time for the girl to hear the last remark of Mrs. DeLacy, and it was a look of gratitude she shot at her friend and chaperone as she quickly took in of whom they were speaking. “Ah, Elinor,” purred Geraldine, as she placed her arm about the waist of the other, “I see a friend of ours. You know,” and she turned informatively to the father, “I introduced several girls to Mr. Druid at the Waldorf one afternoon while we were having tea. You were one of them, weren’t you, dear?” Elinor nodded, but Geraldine chattered on. “He’s really charming and cultured, but—ah, you shall judge for yourself, Mr. Benton.” Templeton Druid, his introductions to his hosts completed had straightened his tall figure in its immaculate evening garb and was looking about the room as though in search of someone. His glance caught Geraldine’s and she beckoned. He approached with an eagerness that brought a frown of something akin to jealousy to the financier’s face as he bent a keen look on his new-found friend. Geraldine held out her hand cordially.
“I’m so glad you could come,” she enthused. “You’ve met Miss Benton, haven’t you?” turning to Elinor, who felt as if the pounding of her heart must be heard above the buzz of conversation.
“I have had the pleasure,” Templeton replied, bending over Elinor’s hand.
“And this is Mr. Benton, Elinor’s father,” Geraldine continued.
“Glad to know you, Mr. Druid,” Hugh said as they shook hands. “I’ve always admired your work——”
Druid’s laugh was frank and hearty.
“And I yours, Mr. Benton,” he countered. “It’s a far more popular art.” Hugh Benton grinned understandingly.
“We artists,” he began, but the bang of jazz for the next dance drowned his unfinished epigram.
“Will you dance, Miss Benton?” Templeton turned to Elinor.
He held the girl closely to him as they circled about the room. “You’re ravishingly beautiful to-night,” he whispered, his voice vibrating with passionate tenderness. “Can’t we manage to slip away for a few moments so that I can have you to myself?”
“I don’t see how we can possibly get away,” she pouted prettily. “After this dance Nell will be waiting to introduce you to half a dozen girls, and they will monopolize you for the rest of the evening.”
“There isn’t a soul I want to meet—I only accepted this invitation in order to be near you,” he replied quickly. “Surely you can think of some way to rescue me from a lot of uninteresting girls. I can’t see anyone in this room but you—dear.”
Elinor thrilled delightedly at the “dear”—it was the first term of endearment he had used in addressing her.
“I’ll tell you what I will do,” she planned quickly. “After this dance, I’ll run upstairs for a wrap, while you manage to disappear through that French window at the end of the room—it leads into the garden and at the end of the path, you’ll find an adorable little summer-house. Wait there until I join you. But we can only remain away a few moments,” she continued as he started to voice his gratitude. “The lion of the hour will be missed, you know, and a search instituted for him.”
“Five minutes alone with the most bewitching girl in the world,” he assured her, “will compensate me for the balance of the evening.”
It was less hard than Elinor’s biased imagination had supposed for the man to slip away unobserved to the “adorable little summer-house” at the end of the path.
“My, but I’ve had a lot of dodging to do,” Elinor exclaimed breathlessly as she entered a few minutes later. “Whenever you’re anxious to avoid people, one seems to spring up like a jack-out-of-the-box at every turn!”
“Elinor,” Templeton murmured, reaching for her hand, and holding it close within his own. “Do you know why I begged you to grant me a few moments alone?”
“I can’t imagine,” she replied coyly, “unless it was for the purpose of admiring this wonderful moon.”
Elinor Benton’s eyes turned upward toward the silvery shining circle that beamed down upon them through the tangled vines of the summer house. She was tantalizingly close to the man who still held her warm little fingers. The perfume that clung about her soft young body stung all the man’s unbridled senses like a whiplash. His eyes and brain saw red as he threw out his arms and clasped her roughly to him, raining kisses on her upturned face.
“You tantalizing, wonderful little beauty!” he breathed. “Is there some vampire in you? You know very well that I’m mad about you! I adore you! The moon, stars and sun, all are eclipsed in your presence!”
Passively she remained in his arms while he kissed her again and again. He held her off at arms length and looked longingly at her.
“Do you care for me? A little?” he asked eagerly. “Tell me?”
Elinor’s head fell forward on his breast.
“I—Iloveyou,” she whispered, but there was a passion in the whispered words that even Templeton Druid, past master of heart affairs, had never before heard.
“My darling!”
His voice was softly caressing. But by the light of the moon the girl in his arms could not see the triumphant gleam in his eyes.
Content for the moment only to stand heart to heart with the man she loved, feeling his caressing touch, hearing his tender words of devotion, Elinor Benton let the world go by unheeded. Then came an unwelcome thought to obtrude. She drew back from him, and stared off into space.
“Oh, what will mother say?” she wailed dismally. “I’m not a bit worried about Dad—I can easily win him over—butmother?”
“Why?—Why?” he stammered confusedly. “Need we tell them anything about it?”
“You foolish boy! You’re so confused,” she laughed. “Isn’t it customary for a man to ask a girl’s parents for her hand in marriage?”
“Marriage!” he ejaculated. “Oh—to be sure—only we will have to keep all this secret for awhile—that is what I meant by suggesting our not mentioning anything to your parents—just yet. You see, dearest, I must play the rest of this season according to my contract, and one-half of my popularity is centered in my being anunmarriedmatinée hero. Besides, there is another matter, it will be necessary for me to adjust—one that I cannot explain at present.”
“I understand, dear. You are suggesting that we remain secretly engaged for the present?” she asked eagerly.
“Yes—that’s it exactly. Do you mind, sweetheart?”
“Oh, I think it will be wonderful; so delightfully romantic, and my meeting you clandestinely won’t seem at all wrong now that you are my affianced husband,” she replied with suppressed excitement.
“You’re a genuine little sport,” he exclaimed, generously helping himself to more of her kisses which she unhesitatingly returned.
“We will surely be missed,” Elinor struggled out of his embrace, and began to readjust her hair. “I’ll hurry back, and you come in a few minutes later.”
“Be sure to telephone to me to-morrow, dearest.”
“It is almost to-morrow now. I’ll ’phone you to-day—instead,” she answered laughingly as she hurried away.
Elinor snuggled in the car beside her father on their way home from the dance. She was supremely happy. Her heart sang in tune to the purring of the motor.
“He loves me! He loves me!”
Templeton Druid, the idol of all the young women in New York—lovedher!
It seemed almost too wonderful to be true. There was but one flaw. What would her mother say—when she finally told her? Her heart missed a beat in mere anticipation. “Dad will surely understand,” she told herself. She could always bring him about to her way of thinking.
She reached for his hand. “Are you tired, Daddy dear?”
“No, little one,” he replied. “I was just living over the evening—I don’t remember when I have so thoroughly enjoyed myself.”
“I’m so glad. I was afraid you might be dreadfully bored. How do you like Geraldine?”
“She is one of the most charming, interesting women I have ever met.” His answer came decisively, then there was a note of peevishness in his voice as he added: “Really, Elinor, I can’t see why your mother should object to her.”
The girl tossed her head.
“Oh, mother objects to anyone who is—well, the least bit—modern,” she replied impatiently. “Was she always so—so old-fashioned, Dad?”
Hugh closed his eyes. His thoughts traveled back over the years, until he found himself sitting on the steps of a humble four-room cottage, a beautiful girl beside him, his arm about her waist, and her head pillowed on his shoulder, their hearts aflame with love, pure, warm and, they believed, changeless.
“I don’t know,” he answered dreamily. “Your mother was very beautiful, my dear, and there was a time she meant the world to me. Perhaps—I can’t tell now—perhaps she was always—what you term—old-fashioned, but our ideas coincided perfectly in those days—now everything appears differently to me. I wonder sometimes, am I the one who is changed?”
Elinor Benton gave her father’s arm a little squeeze.
“Well, if you were ever like mother is to-day, all I can say is, thank heaven you have changed,” she said, with fervor. “But Daddy, dear, you never could have been like mother; you’re so wonderfully broad-minded about everything.”
“Am I, baby girl?” Hugh smiled. “Perhaps I appear that way to you, because as yet there has been nothing to warrant my acting otherwise.”
“That’s just it. The things that you consider perfectly all right, are the very ones that meet with mother’s disapproval. I wonder how she will act when the time arrives for me to choose a husband?” She seemed to ponder aloud, but in reality feeling her way cautiously.
“Why wonder about anything as distant as that?”
“Surely, you don’t wish me to be an old maid?” Elinor demanded indignantly.
“An old maid,” Hugh laughed heartily. “You are only a baby, and just beginning to see the world.”
“I’m past eighteen—please remember that, and——”
Her father turned her face upward to look at her quizzically.
“Who is the man, Elinor?” Hugh asked playfully.
“What—what do you mean, Daddy?” She could not quite hide a feeling of alarm, but her fears were calmed as her father queried: “Young Bronlee?”
“How ridiculous!” she exclaimed impatiently. “Does the fact of my having expressed an opinion, necessitate there being anyone in particular? And why should you immediately suggest Paul Bronlee? No,” and she shook her head sagely, “I’m sorry to disappoint you, Dad, but I shall never marry Paul Bronlee even if he is one of ‘the’ Bronlees and so desirable in your own and mother’s eyes. He bores me to death. In a year’s time, I should be obliged to divorce him. But why discuss anything so silly? Here we are home at last and I’m dead tired.”
Her father walked with her to the foot of the stairs and kissed her gently.
“Hurry up into slumber-land; I’m going to have another cigar. We can talk about your marriage another time. I don’t want to think of losing my girl yet, nor must she think of leaving. Good-night, dear.”
“Good-night, Dad,” she replied as she returned his caress perfunctorily, anxious to hurry away, to be alone.
Elinor Benton closed her door softly, though her impulse was to slam it. She flung her opera coat at a couch across the room and kicked a silver slipper into another. She stamped the still shod foot.
“Paul Bronlee, indeed!” she muttered.
She crossed over to her escritoire and from a locked drawer took out an autographed photograph of Templeton Druid. Her heart leapt as she gazed at it. Ah, there was a man! And he loved her! She held the pictured likeness to her lips, then held it at arm’s length as she half whispered:
“And they would talk to me about Paul Bronlee when I have you, dear heart! But never fear—I’ll show them I have a mind of my own. Looks as if I was going to have trouble with dad, too, but we’ll both show them. Marry first and tell them after—that’s the idea.”
Tenderly as though the pictured likeness were a living entity, she placed it back in its drawer which she carefully locked. Then she turned to ring for her maid. When Marie’s soft knock came on the door, Elinor Benton was lounging in a deep easy chair, her fair head nodding, but her thoughts wide awake, her mind filled with the image of one man.
In his favorite nook in the library, Hugh Benton was doing some thinking on his own account. What Elinor had said about an eventual marriage had disturbed him a little, but he passed it over hurriedly as a thing of the future. His great ambition was for his daughter to make a good marriage,—in which respect he was still like his wife, but to-night any future marriage of Elinor’s was of minor consideration. It was himself, what he was to do with his own life that had suddenly risen to stare him in the face. He felt that he was facing some sort of crisis, vague, it was true, but nevertheless imminent. He had paced the floor for a long time, till his subconscious mind had taken in every detail of the thick rug before he realized he was tired. He sank into his deep leather chair and sat facing the fire which, even in summer, was kept lighted here in the evenings. He must face squarely the thing that was worrying him—be honest with himself, at least. His lighted cigar fell into ash as he moodily stared before him, recalling the past, dreaming of what the future might be, if only——
He had been married to Marjorie for twenty-one years; now, the plain fact of the matter was he had fallen in love with another woman at first sight, precisely as a boy of twenty might have done. At first he severely criticised his own weakness, and then, suddenly and furiously, he blamed his wife for it all. She alone was responsible for the indifference existing between them. Their lives together under the same roof had been a mockery for the past few years. Had an atmosphere of congeniality and warmth prevailed in his home, he would not have been so susceptible to the charms of a beautiful and fascinating woman. Only a few weeks before he had threatened Marjorie that should the opportunity present itself, he would grasp elsewhere the happiness he could not obtain in his own home, little dreaming at that time how soon he would lose his head.
Dawn showed grayly through the half-drawn curtains. Completely worn out, he rose and went slowly up the stairs to his room, his perplexing problem still unsolved. It had left him utterly at sea. Well, matters would have to readjust themselves as best they could. He was in the hands of Fate, and would drift wherever the tide carried him. He realized, with just one slight pang of a resisting conscience that he did not feel the shame he should. The alluring prospects of an exciting adventure only caused him to experience a sensation of keen rebellion and joyous anticipation. So had actually changed the Hugh Benton of the Atwood days of sixteen years before.