Bonbright stopped in the library door, for he saw there not only his father, whom he had expected to see, but his mother also. He had not foreseen this. It made the thing harder to tell, for he realized in an instant how his mother would receive the news. He wished he had been less abrupt, but here he was and there could be no drawing back now. His mother was first to see him.
"Bonbright…" she said, rising.
He walked to her and kissed her, not speaking.
"Where have you been? Your father and I have been terribly worried. Why did you stay away like this, without giving us any word?"
"I'm sorry if I've worried you, mother," he said, but found himself dumb when he tried to offer an explanation of his absence.
"You have worried us," said his father, sharply. "You had no business to do such a thing. How were we to know something hadn't happened to you—with the strike going on?"
"It was very inconsiderate," said his mother.
There fell a silence awkward for Bonbright. His parents were expecting some explanation. He had come to give that explanation, but his mother's presence complicated the situation, made it more difficult. There had never been that close confidence between Mrs. Foote and Bonbright which should exist between mother and son. He had never before given much thought to his relations with her; had taken them as a matter of course. He had not given to her that love which he had seen manifested by other boys for their mothers, and which puzzled him. She had never seemed to expect it of him. He had been accustomed to treat her with grave respect and deference, for she was the sort of person who seems to require and to be able to exact deference. She was a very busy woman, busy with extra-family concerns. Servants had carried on the affairs of the household. Nurses, governesses, and such kittle-cattle had given to Bonbright their sort of substitute for mother care. Not that Mrs. Foote had neglected her son—as neglect is understood by many women of her class. She had seen to it rigidly that his nurses and tutors were efficient. She had seen to it that he was instructed as she desired, and his father desired, him to be instructed. She had not neglected him in a material sense, but on that highest and sweetest sense of pouring out her affection on him in childhood, of giving him her companionship, of making her love compel his love—there she had been neglectful…. But she was not a demonstrative woman. Even when he was a baby she could not cuddle him and wonder at him and regard him as the most wonderful thing in creation…. She had never held him to her breast as God and nature meant mothers to hold their babies. A mercenary breast had nourished him.
So he grew up to admire her, perhaps; surely to stand in some awe of her. She was his mother, and he felt vaguely that the relationship demanded some affection from him. He had fancied that he was giving her affection, but he was doing nothing of the sort…. His childish troubles had been confided to servants. His babyish woes had been comforted by servants. What genuine love he had been able to give had been given to servants. She had not been the companion of his babyhood as his father had failed to be the companion of his youth. … So far as the finer, the sweeter affairs of parenthood went, Bonbright had been, and was, an orphan….
"Have you nothing to say?" his father demanded, and, when Bonbright made no reply, continued: "Your mother and I have been unable to understand your conduct. Even in our alarm we have been discussing your action and your attitude. It is not one we expected from a son of ours…. You have not filled our hopes and expectations. I, especially, have been dissatisfied with you ever since you left college. You have not behaved like a Foote…. You have made more trouble for me in these few months than I made for my father in my life…. And yesterday—I would be justified in taking extreme measures with you. Such an outburst! You were disrespectful and impertinent. You were positively REBELLIOUS. If I had not more important things to consider than my own feelings you should have felt, more vigorously than you shall, my displeasure. You dared to speak to me yesterday in a manner that would warrant me in setting you wholly adrift until you came to your senses…. But I shall not do that. Family considerations demand your presence in our offices. You are to take my place and to carry on our line…. This hasn't seemed to impress you. You have been childishly selfish. You have thought only of yourself—of that thing you fancy is your individuality. Rubbish! You're a Foote—and a Foote owes a duty to himself and his family that should outweigh any personal desires…. I don't understand you, my son. What more can you want than you have and will have? Wealth, position, family? Yet for months you have been sullen and restless-and then openly rebellious…. And worse, you have been compromising yourself with a girl not of your class…."
"I could not believe my ears," said Mrs. Foote, coldly.
"However," said his father, "I shall overlook what has passed." Now came the sop he had planned to throw to Bonbright.
"You have been in the office long enough to learn something of the business, so I shall give you work of greater interest and responsibility…. You say, ridiculously enough, that you have been a rubber stamp. Common sense should have told you you were competent to carry no great responsibilities at first…. But you shall take over a part of my burden now…. However, one thing must come first. Before we go any farther, your mother and I must have your promise that you will discontinue whatever relations you have with this boarding-house keeper's daughter, this companion of anarchists and disturbers."
"I have insisted upon THAT," said Mrs. Foote. "I will not tolerate such an affair."
"There is no AFFAIR," said Bonbright, finding his voice. His young eyes began to glow angrily. "What right have you to suppose such a thing—just because Miss Frazer happens to be a stenographer and because her mother keeps a boarder! Father insulted her yesterday. That caused the trouble. I couldn't let it pass, even from him. I can't let it pass from you, mother."
"Oh, undoubtedly she's worthy enough," said Mr. Foote, who had exchanged a glance with his wife during Bonbright's outburst, as much as to say, "There is a serious danger here."
"Worthy enough!" said Bonbright, anger now burning with white heat.
"But," said his father, "worthy or not worthy, we cannot have our son's name linked in any way with a person of her class. It must stop, and stop at once."
"That you must understand distinctly," said Mrs. Foote.
"Stop!" said Bonbright, hoarsely. "It sha'n't stop, now or ever. That's what I came home to tell you…. I'm not a dumb beast, to be driven where you want to drive me. I'm a human being. I have a right to make my own friends and to live my own life…. I have a right to love where I want to—and to marry the girl I love…. You tried to pick out a wife for me…. Well, I've picked out my own. Whether you approve or not doesn't change it. Nobody, nothing can change it…. I love Ruth Frazer and I'm going to marry her. That's what I came home to tell you."
"What?" said his father, in a tone of one who listens to blasphemy.
Bonbright did not waver. He was strong enough now, strong in his anger and in his love. "I am going to marry Ruth Frazer," he repeated.
"Nonsense!" said his mother.
"It is not nonsense, mother. I am a man. I have found the girl I love and will always love. I intend to marry her. Where is there nonsense in that?"
"Do you fancy I shall permit such a thing? Do you imagine for an instant that I shall permit you to give me a daughter-in-law out of a cheap boarding house? Do you think I shall submit to an affront like that?… Why, I should be the laughingstock of the city."
"The city finds queer things to laugh at," said Bonbright.
"My son—" began Mr. Foote; but his wife silenced him. She had taken command of the family ship. From this moment in this matter Bonbright Foote VI did not figure. This was her affair. It touched her in a vital spot. It threatened her with ridicule; it threatened to affect that most precious of her possessions—the deference of the social world. She knew how to protect herself, and would attend to the matter without assistance.
"You will never see that girl again," she said, as though the saying of it concluded the episode.
Bonbright was silent.
"You will promise me NOW that this disgraceful business is ended.NOW…. I am waiting."
"Mother," said Bonbright, "you have no right to ask such a thing. Even if I didn't love Ruth, I have pledged my word to her…"
Mrs. Foote uttered an exclamation indicative of her disgust.
"Pledged your word!… You're a silly boy, and this girl has schemed to catch you and has caught you…. You don't flatter yourself that she cares for you beyond your money and your position…. Those are the things she had her eye on. Those are what she is trading herself for…. It's scandalous. What does your pledged word count for in a case like this?… Your pledged word to a scheming, plotting, mercenary little wretch!"
"Mother," said Bonbright, in a strained, tense voice, "I don't want to speak to you harshly. I don't want to say anything sharp or unkind to you—but you mustn't repeat that…. You mustn't speak like that about Ruth."
"I shall speak about her as I choose…"
"Georgia!…" said Mr. Foote, warningly.
"If you please, Bonbright." She put him back in his place. "Iwill settle this matter with our son—NOW."
"It is settled, mother," said Bonbright.
"Suppose you should be insane enough to marry her," said Mrs. Foote. "Do you suppose I should tolerate her? Do you suppose I should admit her to this house? Do you suppose your friends—people of your own class—would receive her—or you?"
"Do you mean, mother," said Bonbright, his voice curiously quiet and calm, "that you would not receive my wife here?"
"Exactly that. And I should make it my business to see that she was received nowhere else…. And what would become of you? Everyone would drop you. Your wife could never take your position, so you would have to descend to her level. Society would have none of you."
"I fancy," said Bonbright, "that we could face even that—and live."
"More than that. I know I am speaking for your father when I say it. If you persist in this we shall wash our hands of you utterly. You shall be as if you were dead…. Think a moment what that means. You will not have a penny. We shall not give you one penny. You have never worked. And you would find yourself out in the world with a wife to support and no means of supporting her. How long do you suppose she would stay with you?… The moment she found she couldn't get what she had schemed for, you would see the last of her…. Think of all that."
"I've thought of all that—except that Ruth would care for my money. … Yesterday I left the office determined never to go into it again. I made up my mind to look for a job—any job—that would give me a living—and freedom from what Bonbright Foote, Incorporated, means to me. I was ready to do that without Ruth…. But the family has some claims to me. I could see that. So I came back. I was going to tell father I would go ahead and do my best…. But not because I wanted to, nor because I was afraid."
"You see," his mother said, bitingly, "it lasted a whole day with you."
"Mother!"
Bonbright turned to his father. "I am going to marry Ruth. That cannot be changed. Nothing can alter it…. I am ready to come back to the office—and be Bonbright Foote VII… and you can't guess what that means. But I'll do it—because it seems to be the thing I ought to do…. I'll come back if—and only if—you and mother change your minds about Ruth…. She will be my wife as much as mother is your wife, and you must treat her so. She must have your respect. You must receive her as you would receive me… as you would have been glad to receive Hilda Lightener. If you refuse—I'm through with you. I mean it…. You have demanded a promise of me. Now you must give me your promise—to act to Ruth as you should act toward my wife…. Unless you do the office and the family have seen the last of me." He did not speak with heat or in excitement, but very gravely, very determinedly. His father saw the determination, and wavered.
"Georgia," he said, again.
"No," said Mrs. Foote.
"The Family—the business." said Mr. Foote, uncertainly.
"I'd see the business ended and the Family extinct before I would tolerate that girl…. If Bonbright marries her he does it knowing how I feel and how I shall act. She shall never step a foot in this house while I live—nor afterward, if I can prevent it. Nor shall Bonbright."
"Is that final, mother?… Are you sure it is your final decision?"
"Absolutely," she said, her voice cold as steel.
"Very well," said Bonbright, and, turning, he walked steadily toward the door.
"Where are you going?" his father said, taking an anxious step after his son.
"I don't know," said Bonbright. "But I'm not coming back."
He passed through the door and disappeared, but his mother did not call after him, did not relent and follow her only son to bring him back. Her face was set, her lips a thin, white line.
"Let him go," she said. "He'll come back when he's eaten enough husks."
"He's GOT to come back…. We've got to stop this marriage. He's our only son, Georgia—he's necessary to the Family. HIS son is necessary."
"And hers?" she asked, with bitter irony.
"Better hers than none," said Mr. Foote.
"You would give in…. Oh, I know you would. You haven't a thought outside of Family. I wasn't born in your family, remember. I married into it. I have my own rights in this matter, and, Family or no Family, Bonbright, that girl shall never be received where I am received…. NEVER."
Mr. Foote walked to the window and looked out. He saw his son's tall form pass down the walk and out into the street—going he did not know where; to return he did not know when. He felt an ache in his heart such as he had never felt before. He felt a yearning after his son such as he had never known. In that moment of loss he perceived that Bonbright was something more to him than Bonbright Foote VII—he was flesh of his flesh and blood of his blood. The stifled, cramped, almost eliminated human father that remained in him cried out after his son….
As Bonbright walked away from his father's house he came into possession for the first time of the word RESPONSIBILITY. It was defined for him as no dictionary could define it. Every young man meets a day when responsibility becomes to him something more than a combination of letters, and when it comes he can never be the same again. It marks definitely the arrival of manhood, the dropping behind of youth. He can never look upon life through the same eyes. Forever, now, he must peer round and beyond each pleasure to see what burden it entails and conceals. He must weigh each act with reference to the RESPONSIBILITY that rests upon him. Hitherto he had been swimming in life's pleasant, safe, shaded pools; now he finds himself struggling in the great river, tossed by currents, twirled by eddies, and with no bottom upon which to rest his feet. Forever now it will be swim—or sink….
To-morrow Bonbright was to undertake the responsibilities of family headship and provider; to-night he had sundered himself from his means of support. He was jobless. He belonged to the unemployed…. In the office he had heard without concern of this man or that man being discharged. Now he knew how those men felt and what they faced.
Realization of his condition threw him into panic. In his panic he allowed his feet to carry him to the man whose help had come readily and willingly in another moment of need—to Malcolm Lightener.
The hour was still early. Lights shone in the Lightener home and Bonbright approached the door. Mr. Lightener was in and would see him in the office. It was characteristic of Lightener that the room in the house which was peculiarly his own was called by him his office, not his den, not the library…. There were two interests in Lightener's life—his family and his business, and he stirred them together in a quaintly granite sort of way.
For the second time that evening Bonbright stood hesitating in a doorway.
"Well, young fellow?" said Lightener. Then seeing the boy's hesitation:"Come in. Come in. What's happened NOW?"
"Mr. Lightener," said Bonbright, "I want a job. I've got to have a job."
"Um!… Job! What's the matter with the job you've got?"
"I haven't any job…. I—I'm through with Bonbright Foote,Incorporated—forever."
"That's a darn long time. Sit down. Waiting for it to pass will be easier that way…. Now spit it out." He was studying the boy with his bright gray eyes, wondering if this was the row he had been expecting. He more than half hoped, as he would have expressed it, "that the kid had got his back up." Bonbright's face, his bearing, made Lightener believe his back WAS up.
"I've got to have a job—"
"You said that once. Why?"
"I'm going to be married to-morrow—"
"What?"
"I'm going to be married to-morrow—and I've got to support my wife—decently…"
"It's that little Frazer girl who was crying all over my office to-day," said Lightener, deducing the main fact with characteristic shrewdness. "And your father wouldn't have it—and threw you out…or did the thing that stands to him for throwing out?"
"I got out. I had gotten out before. Yesterday morning…. Somebody told him I'd been going to see Ruth—and he was nasty about it. Called it a liaison….I—I BURNED UP and left the office. I haven't been back."
"That accounts for his calling me up—looking for you. You had him worried."
"Then I got to thinking," said Bonbright, ignoring the interruption. "I was going back because it seemed as if I HAD to go back. You understand? As if there was something that compelled me to stick by the Family…."
"How long have you been going to marry this girl?"
"She said she would marry me to-night."
"Engaged to-night—and you're going to marry to-morrow?"
"Yes….And I went home to tell father. Mother was there—"
Lightener sucked in his breath. He could appreciate what Bonbright's mother's presence would contribute to the episode.
"—and she was worse than father. She—it was ROTTEN, Mr. Lightener—ROTTEN. She said she'd never receive Ruth as her daughter, and that she'd see she was never received by anybody else, and she—she FORCED father to back her up….There wasn't anything for me to do but get out….I didn't begin to wonder how I was going to support Ruth till it was all over with."
"That's the time folks generally begin to wonder."
"So I came right here—because you CAN give me a job if you will—and I've got to have one to-night. I've got to know to-night how I'm going to get food and a place to live for Ruth."
"Um!…We'll come to that." He got up and went to the door. From thence he shouted—the word is used advisedly—for his wife and daughter. "Mamma…. Hilda. Come here right off." He had decided that Bonbright's affairs stood in need of woman's counsel.
Mrs. Lightener appeared first. "Why, Bonbright!" she exclaimed.
"Where's Hilda?" asked Lightener. "Need her, too."
"She's coming, dear," said Mrs. Lightener.
There are people whose mere presence brings relief. Perhaps it is because their sympathy is sure; perhaps it is because their souls were given them, strong and simple, for other souls to lean upon. Mrs. Lightener was one of these. Before she knew why Bonbright was there, before she uttered a word, he felt a sense of deliverance. His necessities seemed less gnawing; there was a slackening of taut nerves….
Then Hilda appeared. "Evening, Bonbright," she said, and gave him her hand.
"Let's get down to business," Lightener said. "Tell 'em, Bonbright."
"I'm going to marry Ruth Frazer to-morrow noon," he said, boldly.
Mrs. Lightener was amazed, then disappointed, for she had come to hope strongly that she would have this boy for a son. She liked him, and trusted in his possibilities. She believed he would be a husband to whom she could give her daughter with an easy heart…. Hilda felt a momentary shock of surprise, but it passed quickly. Like her father, she was sudden to pounce upon the concealed meaning of patent facts—and she had spent the morning with Ruth. She was first to speak.
"So you've decided to throw me over," she said, with a smile…. "I don't blame you, Bonbright. She's a dear."
"But who is she?" asked Mrs. Lightener. "I seem to have heard the name, but I don't remember meeting her."
"She was my secretary," said Bonbright. "She's a stenographer in Mr.Lightener's office now."
"Oh," said Mrs. Lightener, and there was dubiety in her voice.
"Exactly," said Lightener.
"MOTHER!" exclaimed Hilda. "Weren't you a stenographer in the office where dad worked?"
"It isn't THAT," said Mrs. Lightener. "I wasn't thinking about the girl nor about Bonbright. I was thinking of his mother."
"That's why he's here," said Lightener. "The Family touched off a mess of fireworks. Mrs. Foote refuses to have anything to do with the girl if Bonbright marries her. Promised to see nobody else did, too. Isn't that it, Bonbright?"
"Yes."
"I don't like to mix in a family row…"
"You've GOT to, dad," said Hilda. "Of course Bonbright couldn't stand THAT." They understood her to mean by THAT the Foote family's position in the matter. "He couldn't stand it…. I expect you and mother are disappointed. You wanted me to marry Bonbright, myself…"
"HILDA!" Mrs. Lightener's voice was shocked.
"Oh, Bonbright and I talked it over the night we met. Don't be a bit alarmed. I'm not being especially forward…. We've got to do something. What does Bon want us to do?"
"He wants me to give him a job."
She turned to Bonbright. "They turned you out?"
"I turned myself out," he said.
She nodded understandingly. "You WOULD," she said, approvingly. "What kind of a job can you give him, dad?"
"H'm. THAT'S settled, is it? What do you think, mother?"
"Why, dear, he's got to support his wife," said Mrs. Lightener.
Malcolm Lightener permitted the granite of his face to relax in a rueful smile. "I called you folks in to get your advice—not to have you run the whole shebang."
"We're going to run it, dad….Don't you like Ruth Frazer?"
"I like her. She seems to be a nice, intelligent girl….Cries all over a man's office…."
"I like her, too, and so will mother when she meets Ruth. I like her a eap, Bon; she's a DEAR. Now that the job for you is settled—"
"Eh?" said Lightener.
Hilda smiled at him and amended herself. "Now that a very GOOD job for you is settled, I'll tell you what I'm going to do. First thing, I'm invited to the wedding, and so is mother, and so are some other folks. I'll see to that. It isn't going to be any justice-of-the-peace wedding, either. It's going to be in the church, and there'll be enough folks there to make it read right in the paper."
"I'm afraid Ruth wouldn't care for that," said Bonbright, dubiously. "I know she wouldn't."
"She's got to start off RIGHT as your wife, Bon. The start's everything. You want your friends to know her and receive her, don't you? Of course you do. I'll round up the folks and have them there. It will be sort of romantic and interesting, and a bully send off for Ruth if it's done right. It 'll make her quite the rage. You'll see. …That's what I'm going to do—in spite of your mother. Your wife will be received and invited every place thatIam….Maybe your mother can run the dowagers, but I'll bet a penny I can handle the young folks." In that moment she looked exceedingly like her father.
"HILDA!" her mother exclaimed again. "You must consider Mrs. Foote. We don't want to have any unpleasantness over this…."
"We've got it already," said Hilda, "and the only way is to—go the limit."
Lightener slammed the desk with his fist. "Right!" he said. "If we meddle at all we've got to go the whole distance. Either stay out altogether or go in over our heads…. But how about this girl, Hilda, does she belong?"
"She's decently educated. She has sweet manners. She's brighter than two-thirds of us. She'll fit in all right. Don't you worry about her."
"Young man," growled Lightener, "why couldn't you have fallen in love with my daughter and saved all this fracas?"
Bonbright was embarrassed, but Hilda came to his rescue. "Because I didn't want him to," she said. "You wouldn't have MADE me marry him, would you?"
"PROBABLY not," said her father, with a rueful grin.
"I'm going to take charge of her," said Hilda. "We'll show your mother,Bon."
"You're—mighty good," said Bonbright, chokingly.
"I'm going to see her the first thing in the morning. You see. I'll fix things with her. When I explain everything to her she'll do just as I want her to."
Mrs. Lightener was troubled; tears stood in her eyes. "I'm so sorry, Bonbright. I—I suppose a boy has the right to pick out his own wife, but it's too bad you couldn't have pleased your mother…. Her heart must ache to-night."
"I'm afraid," said Bonbright, slowly, "that it doesn't ache the way you mean, Mrs. Lightener."
"It's a hard place to put us. We're meddling. It doesn't seem the right thing to come between mother and son."
"You're not," said Hilda. "Mrs. Foote's snobbishness came between them."
"That's just what it is. Ruth is just as nice as she is or anybody else. She ought to be glad she's getting a daughter like Ruth. You'd be….And we can't sit by and see Bon and his wife STARVE, can we? We can't fold our hands and let Mrs. Foote make Ruth unhappy. It's cruel, that's what it is, and nothing else. When Ruth is Bon's wife she has the right to be treated as his wife should be. Mrs. Foote has no business trying to humiliate her and Bon—and she sha'n't."
"I suppose you're right, dear. I KNOW you're right…. But I'm thinking how I'd feel if it were YOU."
"You'd never feel like Mrs. Foote, mother. If I made up my mind to marry a man out of dad's office—no matter what his job was, if he was all right himself—you wouldn't throw me out of the house and set out to make him and me as unhappy as you could. You aren't a snob."
"No," said Mrs. Lightener, "I shouldn't."
Malcolm Lightener, interrupted. "Now you've both had your say," he said, "and you seem to have decided the thing between you. I felt kind of that way, myself, but I wanted to know about you folks. What you say GOES….Now clear out; I want to talk business to Bonbright."
Hilda gave Bonbright her hand again. "I'm glad," she said, simply. "I know you'll be very happy."
"And I'll do what I can, boy," said Mrs. Lightener
Bonbright was moved as he had never been moved before by kindliness and womanliness. "Thank you…. Thank you," he said, tremulously. "I—you don't know what this means to me. You've—you've put a new face on the whole future…."
"Clear out," said Malcolm Lightener.
Hilda made a little grimace at him in token that she flouted his authority, and she and her mother said good night and retired from the room.
"Now," said Malcolm Lightener.
Bonbright waited.
"I'm going to give you a job, but it won't be any private-office job. I don't know what you're good for. Probably not much. Don't get it into your head I'm handing a snap to you, because I'm not. If you're not worth what I pay you you'll get fired. Understand?"
"Yes, sir."
"If you stick you'll learn something. Not the kind of rubbish you've been sopping up in your own place. I run a business, not a museum of antiquity. You'll have to work. Think you can?"
"I've wanted to. They wouldn't let me."
"Um!…You'll get dirt on your hands….Most likely you'll be running Bonbright Foote, Incorporated, one of these days. This thing won't last. Your father'll have to come around….I only hope he lets you stay with me long enough to teach you some business sense and something about running a plant. I'll pay you enough to support you and this girl of yours—but you'll earn it. When you earn more you'll get it…Sounds reasonable."
"I—I can't thank you enough."
"Report for work day after to-morrow, then. You're a man out of a job. You can't afford honeymoons. I'll let you have the day off to-morrow, but next morning you be in my office when the whistle blows. I always am."
"Yes, sir."
"Where are you going to live? Got any money?"
"I don't know where we shall live. Maybe we'd better find a place to board for a while. I've got a hundred dollars or so."
"Board!…Huh! Nobody's got any business boarding when they're married. Wife has too much time on her hands. Nothing to do. Especially at the start of things your wife'll need to be busy. Keep her from getting notions….I'll bet the percentage of divorces among folks that board is double that it is among folks that keep house. Bound to be….You get you a decent flat and furnish it. Right off. After you get married you and your wife pick out the furniture. That's what I'm giving you the day off to-morrow for. You can furnish a little flat—the kind you can afford, for five hundred dollars…. You're not a millionaire now. You're a young fellow with a fair job and a moderate salary that you've got to live on. …Better let your wife handle it. She's used to it and you're not. She'll make one dollar go as far as you would make ten."
"Yes, sir."
Lightener moved awkwardly and showed signs of embarrassment. "And listen here," he said, gruffly, "a young girl's a pretty sweet and delicate piece of business. They're mighty easy to hurt, and the hurt lasts a long time….You want to be married a long time, I expect, and you want your wife to—er—love you right on along. Well, be darn careful, young fellow. Start the thing right. More marriages are smashed in the first few days than in the next twenty years….You be damn gentle and considerate of that little girl."
"I—I hope I shall, Mr. Lightener."
"You'd better be….Where you going to-night?"
"To the club. I have some things there. I've always kept enough clothes there to get along on."
"Your club days are over for some time. Married man has no business with a club till he's forty….Evenings, anyhow. Stay at home with your wife. How'd you like to have her running out to some darn thing three or four nights a week?…Go on, now. I'll tell Hilda where you are. Probably she'll want to call you up in the morning….Good night."
"Good night…and thank you."
"Huh!" said Malcolm Lightener, and without paying the slightest bit of attention to whether Bonbright stayed or went away, he took up the papers on his desk and lost himself in the figures that covered them. Bonbright went out quietly, thankfully, his heart glad with its own song….The future was settled; safe. He had nothing to fear. And to-morrow he was going to enter into a land of great happiness. He felt he was entering a land of fulfillment. That is the way with the very young. They enter upon marriage feeling it is a sort of haven of perpetual bliss, that it marks the end of unhappiness, of difficulties, of loneliness, of griefs…when, in reality, it is but the beginning of life with all the diverse elements of joy and grief and anxiety and comfort and peace and discord that life is capable of holding….
Hilda Lightener had found Ruth strangely quiet, with a manner which was not indifference to her imminent marriage, but which seemed more like numbness.
"You act as if you were going to be hanged instead of married," Hilda told her, and found no smile answering her own.
Ruth was docile. She offered no objection to any suggestion offered by Hilda, accepted every plan without demurring. Hilda could not understand her, and was troubled. Wholly lacking was the girlish excitement to be expected. "Whatever you want me to do I will do, only get it over with," seemed to be Ruth's attitude. She seemed to be holding herself in, communing with herself. A dozen times Hilda had to repeat a question or a statement which Ruth had not heard, though her eyes were on Hilda's and she seemed to be giving her attention.
She was saying to herself: "I must go through with it…. I can't draw back…. What I am doing is RIGHT—RIGHT."
She obeyed Hilda, not so much through pliancy as through listlessness, and presently Hilda was going ahead with matters and acting as a sort of specially appointed general manager of the marriage. She directed Ruth what to wear, saw it was put on, almost bundled Ruth and her mother into the carriage, and convoyed them to the church, where Bonbright awaited them. She could not prevent a feeling of exasperation, especially toward Mrs. Frazer, who had moved from chair to chair, uttering words of self-pity, and pronouncing a constant jeremiad…. Such preliminaries to a wedding she had never expected to witness, and she witnessed them with awakened foreboding.
A dozen or so young folks and Malcolm Lightener and his wife witnessed the brief ceremony. Until Ruth's appearance there had been the usual chattering and gayety, but even the giddiest of the youngsters was restrained and subdued by her white, tense face, and her big, unseeing eyes.
"I don't like it," Lightener whispered to his wife.
"Poor child!… Poor child!" she whispered back, not taking her eyes from Ruth's face.
After the rector pronounced the final words of the ceremony Ruth stood motionless. Then she turned slowly toward Bonbright, swaying a trifle as if her knees were threatening to fail her, and said in a half whisper, audible to those about: "It's over?… It's all over?"
"Yes, dear."
"It can't be undone," she said, not to her husband, but to herself. "We are—married."
Hilda, fearing some inauspicious act or word, bustled forward her bevy of young folks to offer their babel of congratulations. As she presented them one by one, Ruth mustered a wan smile, let them take her cold, limp hand. But her mind was not on them. All the while she was thinking: "This is my HUSBAND…. I belong to this man…. I am his WIFE." Once in a while she would glance at Bonbright; he seemed more a stranger to her than he had done the first time her eyes had ever rested on him—a stranger endowed with odious potentialities. …
Mrs. Lightener took Ruth into her arms and whispered, "He's a dear, good boy…." There was comfort in Mrs. Lightener's arms, but scant comfort in her words, yet they would remain with Ruth and she would find comfort in them later. Now she heard Malcolm Lightener speaking to her husband. "You be good to that little girl, young man," he said. "Be mighty patient and gentle with her." She waited for Bonbright's reply. "I love her," she heard Bonbright say in a low voice. It was a good answer, a reassuring answer, but it stabbed Ruth with a new pang, for she had traded on that love; she was a cheat. Bonbright was giving her his love in exchange for emptiness. Somehow she could not think of the Cause now, for this was too intimate, too individual, too personal….
Presently Bonbright and Ruth were being driven to their hotel. The thought of wedding breakfast or of festivities of any sort had been repugnant to Ruth, and Hilda had not insisted. They were alone. Ruth lay back against the soft upholstery of Malcolm Lightener's limousine, colorless, eyes closed. Bonbright watched her face hungrily, scrutinizing it for some sign of happiness, for some vestige of feeling that reciprocated his own. He saw nothing but pallor, weariness.
"Dear," he whispered, and touched her hand almost timorously. Her hand trembled to his touch, and involuntarily she drew away from him. Her eyes opened, and in them his own eager eyes read FEAR…. He was startled, hurt. Being only a boy, with a boy's understanding and a boy's pride, he was piqued, and himself drew back. This was not what he had expected, not what the romances he had read had led him to believe would take place. In stories the bride was timid, yet eager; loving, yielding, happy. She clung to her husband, her heart beating against his heart, whispering her adoration and demanding whispered adoration from him…. Here all of this was lacking, and something which crouched at the opposite pole of human emotion was present—FEAR.
"You must be patient and gentle with her," Malcolm Lightener had said with understanding, and Bonbright was wise enough to know that there spoke experience; probably there spoke truth, not romance, as it is set down on the printed page. Even if Ruth's attitude were unusual, so the circumstances were unusual. It was no ordinary marriage preceded by an ordinary, joyous courtship. In this moment Bonbright took thought, and it was given him to understand that now, as at no other moment in his life with Ruth, was the time to exercise patience and gentleness.
"Ruth," he said, taking her hand and holding it with both his own, "you mustn't be afraid of ME…. You are afraid. You're my wife," he said, boyishly. "It's my job to make you happy—the most important job I've got—and to look after you and to keep away from you everything that might—make you afraid." He lifted her fingers to his lips; they were cold. "I want to take you in my arms and hold you… but not until you want me to. I can wait…. I can do ANYTHING that you want me to do. Both of us have just gone through unpleasant things—and they've tired and worried you…. I wish I might comfort you, dear…." His voice was low and yearning.
She let her hand remain in his, and with eyes from which the terror was fading she looked into his eyes to find them clear, honest, filled with love and care for her. They were good eyes, such as any bride might rejoice to find looking upon her from her husband's face.
"You're—so good," she whispered. Then: "I'm tired, Bonbright, so tired—and—Oh, you don't understand, you CAN'T understand…. I'll be different presently—I know I shall. Don't be angry…"
"Angry!"
"I'll be a good wife to you, Bonbright," she said, tremulously, a bit wildly. "I—You sha'n't be disappointed in me…. I'll not cheat. … But wait—WAIT. Let me rest and think. It's all been so quick."
"You asked that," he said, hurt and puzzled.
"Yes…. It had to be—and now I'm your wife… and I feel as if I didn't know you—as if you were a stranger. Don't you understand?… It's because I'm so helpless now—just as if you owned me and could do what you wanted to with me… and it makes me afraid…."
"I—I don't understand very well," he said, slowly. "Maybe it's because I'm a man—but it doesn't seem as if it ought to be that way." He stopped and regarded her a moment, then he said, "Ruth, you've never told me you loved me."
She sensed the sudden fear in his voice and saw the question that had to be answered, but she could not answer it. To-day she could not bring herself to the lie—neither to the spoken lie nor the more difficult lying action. "Not now," she said, hysterically. "Not to-day…. Wait…. I've married you. I've given myself to you…. Isn't that enough for now?… Give me time."
It was not resentment he felt, not doubt of her. Her pitiful face, her cold little hands, the fear that lurked in her eyes, demanded his sympathy and forbearance, and, boy though he was, with all a boy's inexperience, he was man enough to give them, intuitive enough to understand something of the part he must play until she could adjust herself to her new condition.
He pressed her hand—and released it. "I sha'n't bother you," he said, "until you want me…. But it isn't because I don't want you—don't want to hold you—to LOVE you… and to have you love me…. It will be all right, dear. You needn't be afraid of me…."
The car was stopping before the hotel. Now the doorman opened the door and Bonbright helped his bride to alight. She tottered as her feet touched the sidewalk, and he took her arm to support her as he might have helped an invalid. The elevator carried them up to the floor on which were the rooms that had been prepared for them, and they stopped before the door while he inserted the key and turned the lock for their admission. On the threshold she halted, swept by a wave of terror, but, clenching her hands and pressing shut her eyes, she stepped within. The door closed behind them—closed out her girlhood, closed out her independence, shut away from her forever that ownership of herself which had been so precious, yet so unrecognized and unconsidered. It seemed to her that the closing of that door—even more than the ceremony of marriage—was symbolical of turning over to this young man the title deeds of her soul and body. …
Bonbright was helping her to rid herself of her wraps, leading her to a sofa.
"Lie down," he said, gently. "You're tired and bothered. Just lie down and rest."
"Are we going away?" she asked, presently. "Have I got to get ready?"
He had promised her they would go away—and had not seen her since that moment to tell her what had happened. Hilda would not let him go to her that morning, so she was in ignorance of the change in his condition, of his break with his family, and of the fact that he was nothing but a boy with a job, dependent upon his wages. Until this moment he had not thought how it might affect her; of her disappointment, of the fact that she might have expected and looked forward to the position he could give her as the wife of the heir apparent to the Foote dynasty…. It embarrassed him, shamed him as a boy might be shamed who was unable to buy for his girl a trinket she coveted at some country fair. Now she must be told, and she was in no condition to bear disappointments.
"I promised you we should go away," he said, haltingly, "but—but I can't manage it. Things have happened….I've got to be at work in the morning. Maybe I should have told you. Maybe I should have come last night after it happened—"
She opened her eyes, and at the expression of his face she sat up, alarmed. It told her that no ordinary, small, casual mishap had befallen, but something vital, something which might affect him—and her tremendously.
"What is it?" she asked. "What has happened?"
"I went home last night," he said, slowly. "After—you promised to marry me—I went home to tell father….Mother was there. There was a row—but mother was worse than father. She was—rather bad."
"Rather bad—how, Bonbright?"
"She—didn't like my marrying you. Of course we knew neither of them would like it, but I didn't think anything like this would happen. …You know father and I had a fuss the other day, and I left the office. I had thought things over, and was going back. It seemed as if I ought to go back—as if that was the thing to do…. Well, mother said things that made it impossible. I'm through with them for good. The Family and the Ancestors can go hang." His voice grew angry as recollection of that scene presented itself. "Mother said I shouldn't marry you…"
"You—you don't mean you're not going to—to have anything to do withBonbright Foote, Incorporated—and all those thousands of men?"
"That's it….I couldn't do anything else. I had to break with them. Father was bad, but it was mother….She said she would never receive you or recognize you as my wife—and that sort of thing—and I left. I'm never going back…. On your account I'm sorry. I can't give you so much, and I can't do the things for you that I could…. We'll be quite poor, but I've got a job. Mr. Lightener gave me a job, and I've got to go to work in the morning. That's why we can't go away…."
"You mean," she said, dully, trying to sense this calamity, "that you will never go back? Never own—that—business?"
"It was a choice of giving you up or that. Mother made that clear. If I married you I should never have anything from them…."
She did not see the happiness that might lie for her in the possession of a husband whose love was so great that he could give up the kingdoms of the earth for her. She could not see the strength of the boy, his loyalty, his honor. All she saw was the crushing of her plan before it began to germinate…. She had given herself for the Cause. She was here, this young man's wife, alone in these rooms with him, because she loved the Cause and had martyred herself for it…. Her influence was to ameliorate the conditions of thousands of the Bonbright Foote laborers; she was to usher in a new era for them—and for that she had offered herself up…. And now, having bound herself forever to this boy that she did not love—loving another man—the possibility of achievement was snatched from her and her immolation made futile. It was as if she plunged into a rapids, offering her life to save a child that struggled there, to find, when she reached the little body, and it was too late to save herself, that it was a wax figure from some shop window…. But her position was worse than that; what she faced was worse than swift, merciful death…. It was years of a life of horrid possibilities, tied to a man whose chattel she was. She stood up and clutched his arm.
"You're joking," she said, in a tense, metallic voice.
"I'm sorry, dear. It's very true."
"Oh!" Her voice was a wail. "It can't be—it can't be. I couldn't bear that—not THAT…."
Bonbright seized her by the arms and peered into her face. "Ruth," he said, "what do you mean? Was THAT why you married me? You're not like those women I've heard about who married—for MONEY."
"No….No…" she cried. "Not that—Oh, don't believe that."
She spoke the truth, and Bonbright could not doubt it. Truth was in her words, her tone, her face….It was a thing she was incapable of, and he knew it. She could not be mean, contemptible. He drew her to him and kissed her, and she did not resent it. A surge of happiness filled him….She had been dismayed because of him. There was no other interpretation of her words and actions. She was conscience stricken because she had brought misfortune upon him.
He laughed boyishly. "Don't worry about me. I don't care," he said, gayly, "so long as I have you. You're worth it a dozen times….I'm glad, Ruth—I'm glad I had to pay for you dearly. Somehow it makes me seem worthier—you understand what I mean…."
She understood—understood, too, the interpretation he had put on her words. It brought a flush to her white cheeks….She disengaged herself gently.
"If we're not going away," she said, "I can lie down—and rest."
"Of course."
"Alone? In the next room?"
He opened the door for her. "I'll be as quiet as a mouse," he said. "Have a good sleep. I'll sit here and read." She read in his eyes a plea for affection, for another kiss, as she left him, but she had not the strength to give it. She went into the adjoining room, and shut the door after her. Then she stood there silently regarding the door—regarding the KEY…. If she locked it she was safe from him. He could not come in…. She could lock him out.
Her hand went to the key, but came away without turning it. No…. She had no right. She had made her bargain and must abide by it. Bonbright was her husband and she was his wife, and as such she must not turn locks upon him…. Marriage gave him the right of free access.
Dressed as she was, in the suit that had been her wedding dress, she threw herself upon the bed and gave up her soul to torment. She had taken her all and paid it for a thing desirable in her eyes—and her all had bought her nothing. She had wrenched her love from the man to whom she had given it, and all her life must counterfeit love for a man whom she did not love—and in return she would receive—nothing. She had seen herself a Joan of Arc. That dream was blown away in a breath…. But the bargain was made. That she did not receive what she had thought to receive was no fault of Bonbright's—and she must endure what was to be endured. She must be honest with him—as honesty showed its face to her. To be honest with him meant to her to deceive him daily, hourly, to make her life a lie. He was cheated enough as matters stood—and he did not deserve to be cheated. He was good, gentle, a man. She appreciated him—but she did not love him. … And appreciating him, aware of his strength and his goodness to her, she could not keep her eyes off the door. She lay there eying it with ever increasing apprehension—yet she did not, would not, could not, rise to turn the key….
In every formation of a fresh family group there must be readjustments of habit and of thought. Two people who fancy they know each other intimately discover that they are in reality utter strangers. They start a new acquaintanceship at the moment of marriage, and the wonder of it is that so many millions of them manage the thing with success. It is true that a man and woman who join their hands and their fortunes because of a deep-seated, genuine, calm affection have a greater chance of lasting happiness than those who unite because of the spur of sudden, flaring passion. There are those who contend that friendship and mutual confidence are a firmer foundation for marriage than the emotion that we call love. Thousands of men and women have married because prudence told them a certain other individual would make a trustworthy, efficient, comfortable husband or wife, and as days and weeks and years passed this respect and trust and regard has blossomed into a beautifully permanent flower of love….Doubtless happiness has resulted from marriages which resulted from motives purely mercenary, for human beings are blessed by Heaven with a quality called adaptability. Of no marriage can one predict happiness surely. At the altar the best one can do is to hope for the best….But what can be said of a marriage brought about by the causes and motives that led Bonbright Foote to Ruth Frazer and Ruth Frazer to Bonbright Foote?
Of the two, Bonbright's reasons most nearly approached the normal, and therefore the safe; Ruth had been urged by a motive, lofty perhaps, visionary, but supremely abnormal. Therefore the adjustments to be made, the problems to be mastered, the difficulties in their road to a comfortable, reasonably happy future, were multiplied many times. Instead of being probable, the success of their little social entity became merely possible, doubtfully possible.
Ruth, being a woman, understood something of this. Bonbright, being a boy, and a singularly inexperienced boy, understood it not at all, and as he sat alone, a closed door between him and his wife, he wearied his brain upon the puzzle of it. He came to the conclusion that the present difficult situation was the natural thing. It was natural for the bride to be timid, frightened, reluctant, for she was entering a dark forest of strange, new experiences. He understood that his own case might be exaggerated because their marriage had been preceded by no ordinary courtship, with the opportunity which a courtship gives to begin the inevitable readjustments, and to become accustomed to intimacy of thought and act.
The ordinary man has little intuition, but a world of good intentions. Men blunder woefully in their relations with women, not because of innate boorishness in the sex, not because of willful brashness, but because of lack of understanding. They mean well, but their performance is deplorable…. In that moment Bonbright's most valuable possession was a certain intuition, a fineness, a decency, a reserve, a natural modesty. As he sat there alone he reached a conclusion which was, probably, the most profoundly wise conclusion he was to arrive at in his life. It came not so much from taking thought, as by blessed inspiration. This conclusion was that he must court Ruth Frazer as a sweetheart, not approach her as a husband….
It was a course that would require infinite patience, forbearance, fineness. In his love for Ruth he felt himself capable of it; felt that it would bring its reward.
So he sat and waited. He did not approach the door which she had watched with apprehensive eyes until weariness had closed them in sleep….
The luncheon hour had passed when he heard Ruth moving about within.
"Hungry?" he called to her, boyishly. His voice reassured her. It was comradely. There was nothing in it that menaced her security….The sleep and the rest had bettered her. She was less tense, more calmly resigned to events. She had marshaled her will; had set it to bear her up and to compel her to carry on bravely and without hysteria the part of a wife.
"I am hungry," she said, and presently she appeared in the door, stood there a moment, and then walked across the room to Bonbright. "Thank you," she said, simply, and he understood.
"You don't mind being poor for a while?" he asked.
"I've always been poor," she said, with something that approached her old smile.
"Because," he said, "we are poor. I am going to earn about thirty dollars a week. So, you see, we can't afford to live here. We've got to find a little house or flat…."
"Let's begin," she cried. It was not the delight of a woman at the thought of hunting for her first home, but the idea of having something to do, of escaping from these rooms. "Let's go right out to look."
"First," he said, with pretended severity, "we eat."
So they went down to the dining room, and after they had eaten they inaugurated their house hunting. Perhaps Providence intervened at this difficult moment to give them occupation. If so, Providence acted with amazing wisdom and kindness.
Ruth found an interest in the search. She forgot. Her mind was taken from morbid breedings as they climbed stairs and explored rooms and questioned agents. Bonbright was very happy—happier because he was openly and without shame adapting his circumstances to his purse…. They found a tiny flat, to be had for a fourth of their income. Ruth said that was the highest proportion of their earnings it was safe to pay for rent, and Bonbright marveled at her wisdom in such matters. …
Then there were the furnishings to select. Bonbright left the selection and the chaffering wholly to Ruth—and she enjoyed it. The business rested, refreshed, stimulated her. It pushed her fears into the dim background and brought again to the light of day her old self that Bonbright loved. More than once she turned the light of her famous grin upon him or upon some thrice lucky salesman.
But the end was reached at last; everything was done that could be done, and there was nothing to do but to return to the hotel. Ruth did her best to keep up her spirits, but by every block that they approached the hotel, by so much her lightness vanished, by so much her apprehension, her heartache, the black disappointment of the failure of her great plan, returned.
Bonbright saw the change and it grieved him—it strengthened the determination he had made. When they reached their rooms he drew her over to the sofa.
"Let's sit here together, dear," he said. "We haven't had a decent talk, and there are a heap of things to talk about, aren't there?"
She forced herself to sit down close to him, and waited icily, steeling herself to yield to his demonstrations of affection if he offered them, but he did not.
"I've an idea," he said. "I—I hope you'll like it. It'll be sort of—fun. Sort of a game, you know…. While I sat here this afternoon I was thinking about us—and—how I want to make you happy….We were married—suddenly. Most folks play along and get to know each other, and grow to love each other gradually, I guess….I didn't grow to love you gradually. I don't know how it was with you. But, anyhow, we missed our courtship. We started right in by being husband and wife. Of course I'm glad of that….Don't think I'm not. I wanted you—right away. But—but my idea was that maybe we could—have our courtship now—after we are married….Mayn't we?"
"What—what do you mean?" she asked, fearfully, hopefully.
"We'll pretend we aren't married at all," he said. "We'll make believe we're at a house party or something, and I just met you. I'm no end interested in you right off, of course. I haven't any idea how you feel about me….We'll start off as if we just met, and it's up to me to make you fall in love with me….I'll bring out the whole bag of tricks. Flowers and candy and such like, and walks and rides. I'll get right down and pursue you….After a while you'll—maybe—get so far as to call me by my first name." He laughed like a small boy. "And some day you'll let me hold your hand—pretending you don't know I'm holding it at all….And I'll be making love to you to—to beat the band. Regular crush I'll have on you….What do you think?"
"You mean REALLY?…You mean we'll LIVE like that? That we won't be married, but do like you said?" She was staring at him with big, unbelieving eyes.
"That's the idea exactly….We won't be married till I WIN you. That's the game….And I'll try hard—you haven't any notion how hard I'll try." There was something pleading, pathetic in his voice, that went to her heart.
"Oh," she said, breathlessly, "that's DEAR of you…. You're good—so GOOD…. I—I hate myself…. You'll do THAT?… I didn't—know anybody—could be—so—so good." She swayed, swayed toward him in a storm of tears, and he drew her face down on his shoulder while with awkward hand he patted her shoulder.
"There…. There…" he said, clumsily, happily. She did not draw away from him, but lay there wetting his coat with her tears, her heart swelling with thanks-giving; fear vanished, and something was born in her breast that would never die. The thing that was born was a perfect trust in this man she had married, and a perfect trust is one of the rarest and most wonderful things under the sun.
For so young a man, Bonbright felt singularly fatherly. He held his wife gently, silently, willing that she should cry, with a song in his heart because she nestled to him and wept on his shoulder. If he deluded himself that she clung to him because of other, sweeter emotion than grief, relief, it did not diminish his happiness. The moment was the best he had known for months, perhaps the best he had ever known.
Ruth sat up and wiped her eyes. He looked into them, saw them cleared now of dread, and it was a sufficient reward. For her part, in that instant, Ruth almost loved Bonbright, not as lovers love, but as one loves a benefactor, some one whose virtues have earned affection. But it was not that sort that Bonbright asked of her, she knew full well.
"Now—er—Miss Frazer," he said, briskly, "I don't want to appear forward for a new acquaintance, but if I suggested that there was a bully play in town—sort of tentatively, you know—what would happen to me?"
"Why, Mr. Foote," she replied, able to enter into the spirit of the pretense, "I think you'd find yourself in the awkward position of a young man compelled to buy two seats."
"No chaperons?"
"Where I come from," she said, "chaperons are not in style."
"And we'll go some place after the play….I want to make the most of my opportunity, because I've got to work all day to-morrow. It's a shame, too, because I have a feeling that I'd like to monopolize you."
"Aren't you going a bit fast for a comparative stranger?" she asked, merrily.
He pretended to look crestfallen. "You sha'n't have to put me in my place again," he promised; "but wait—wait till we've known each other a week!…Do you know, Miss Frazer, you have a mighty charming smile!"
"It has been remarked before," she said.
"We mustn't keep our hostess waiting. I'm afraid we'll be late for dinner, now." He chuckled at the idea.
"I never have eaten dinner with a man in evening dress," she said, with a touch of seriousness. "In the country I come from the men don't wear them." How true that was—in the country she came from, the country of widows who kept boarding houses, of laborers, of Dulac and their sort! She was in another land now, a land she had been educated to look upon with enmity; the land of the oppressor. Little revolutionist—she was to learn much of that country in the days to come and to know that in it bad men and good men, worthy women and trifling women, existed in about the same ratio as in her own familiar land….Bonbright insisted upon buying her violets—the first costly flowers she had ever worn. They occupied desirable seats—and the few plays Ruth had seen she had seen from gallery heights! Fortunately it was a bright play, brimming with laughter and gayety, presenting no squalid problems, holding up to the shrinking eyes of the audience no far-fetched, impossible tangles of sex. They enjoyed it. Ruth enjoyed it. That she could do so is wonderful, perhaps, but then, so many human capabilities are wonderful! Men about to be hanged eat a hearty meal with relish…. How much more might Ruth find pleasure since she had been granted a reprieve!
When the curtain descended they moved toward the exits, waiting for the crowd to clear the way. Bonbright's attention was all for Ruth, but her eyes glanced curiously about, observing the well-fed, well-kept, brilliantly dressed men and women—men and women of the world to which she belonged now. As one approached them and saw them, they were singularly human. Their faces were not different from faces she was accustomed to. Cleaner they were, perhaps, with something more of refinement. They were better dressed, but there she saw the same smiles, the same weariness, the same charm, the same faces that told their tales of hard work and weary bodies…. They were just human beings, all of them, HER sort and these….
Suddenly her fingers tightened on her husband's arm. He heard her draw a quick, startled little breath, and looked up to see his father and mother approaching them, from the opposite direction. Bonbright had not expected this. It was the last place in the world he had thought to encounter his parents—but there they were, not to be avoided. He stopped, stiffened. Ruth stole a glance at his face and saw it suddenly older, tenser.
Mr. and Mrs. Foote approached slowly. Ruth knew the moment Mrs. Foote saw her husband, for the stately woman bit her lip and spoke hurriedly to Bonbright's father, who glanced at Bonbright and then at her uncertainly. Ruth saw that Mrs. Foote held her husband's arm, did not allow him to turn aside, but led him straight toward them…. Bonbright stood stiff, expectant. On came his father and mother, with no quickening of pace. Bonbright's eyes moved from one face to the other as they approached. Now they were face to face. Mrs. Foote's eyes encountered Ruth's, moved away from the girl to her son, moved on—giving no sign of recognition. Mr. Foote looked stonily before him….And so they passed, refusing even a bow to their son, the only child that had been given them….That others had seen the episode Ruth knew, for she saw astonished glances, saw quick whisperings.
Then she looked up at her husband. He had not turned to look after his parents, but was staring before him, his face white, his eyes burning, little knots of muscle gathered at the points of his jaw. She pressed his arm gently and heard his quick intake of breath—so like a sob.
"Come," he said, harshly. "Come."
"It was cruel—heartless," she said, fiercely, quickly partisan, making his quarrel her own, with no thought that the slight had been for her as well as for him.
"Come," he repeated.
They went out into the street, Bonbright quivering with shame and anger, Ruth not daring to speak, so white, so hurt was his face, so fierce the smolder in his eyes.
"You see…" he said, presently. "You see…."
"I've cost you THAT," she said.
"That," he said, slowly, as if he could not believe his words, "that was my father and—my mother."
Ruth was frightened. Not until this moment did she realize what she had done; not until now did the teeth of remorse clench upon her. To marry her—because he loved her—this boy at her side must suffer THIS. It was her doing….She had cheated him into it. She had cost him this and was giving nothing to pay for it. He had foreseen it. Last night he had cut adrift from his parents because of her—willingly. She knew he would have made, would make, any sacrifice for her….And she had married him with no love in her heart, married him to use him for her own ends!
She dared not doubt that what she had done was right. She dared not question her act, nor that the end justified the means she had used. …But the end was not to be attained. By the act of marrying Bonbright she had made it impossible for herself to further the Cause….It was a vicious circle of events.
As she watched his face she became all woman; revolutionist and martyr disappeared. Her heart ached for him, her sympathy went out to him. "Poor boy!…" she said, and pressed his arm again.