The d.u.c.h.ess now understood the unfatherly disregard Old Jimmie had shown for the ordinary welfare of Maggie. Not being her father, he had not cared. Superficially, at least, Jimmie Carlisle must have been a much more plausible individual twenty years earlier, to have won the implicit trust of Joe Ellison and to have become his foremost friend. She understood one reason why Old Jimmie had always boarded Maggie in the cheapest and lowest places; his hidden cupidity had thereby been pocketing about a thousand dollars a year of trust money for over sixteen years.
But there was one queer problem here to which the d.u.c.h.ess could not at this time see the answer. If Jimmie Carlisle had wished to gratify his cupidity and double-cross his friend, why had he not at the very start placed Maggie in an orphanage where she would have been neither charge nor cost to him, and thus have had the use of every penny of the trust fund? Why had he chosen to keep her by him, and train her carefully to be exactly what her father had most wished her not to be? There must have been some motive in the furtive, tortuous mind of Old Jimmie, that now would perhaps forever remain a mystery.
Of course she saw, or thought she saw, the reason for the report of Old Jimmie"s death to Joe Ellison. That report had been sent to escape an accounting.
As she sat through the night hours the d.u.c.h.ess for the first time felt warmth creep over her for Maggie. She saw Maggie in the light of a victim. If Maggie had been brought up as her father had planned, she might now be much the girl her father dreamed her. But Old Jimmie had entered the scheme of things. Yes, the audacious, willful, confident Maggie, bent on conquering the world in the way Old Jimmie and later Barney Palmer had taught her, was really just a poor misguided victim who should have had a far different fate.
And now the d.u.c.h.ess came to one of the greatest problems of her life.
What should she do? Considering the facts that Joe Ellison wished the life of a recluse and desired to avoid all talk of the old days, the chances were that he would never happen upon the real state of affairs.
Only she and Old Jimmie knew the essentials of the situation--and very likely Jimmie did not yet know that the friend who had once trusted him was now a free man. She felt as though she held in her hands the strings of destiny. Should she tell the truth?
She pondered long. All her considerations were given weight according to what she saw as their possible effect upon Larry; for Larry was the one person left whom she loved, and on him were fixed the aspirations of these her final years. Therefore her thoughts and arguments were myopic, almost necessarily specious. She wanted to see justice done, of course.
But most of all she wanted what was best for Larry. If she told the truth, it might result in some kind of temporary breakdown in Maggie"s att.i.tude which would bring her and Larry together. That would be disastrous. If not disastrous at once, certainly in the end. Maggie was a victim, and undoubtedly deserved sympathy. But others should not be sacrificed merely because Maggie had suffered an injury. She had been too long under the tutelage of Old Jimmie, and his teachings were now too thoroughly the fiber of her very being, for her to alter permanently. She might change temporarily under the urge of an emotional revelation; but she would surely revert to her present self. There was no doubt of that.
And the d.u.c.h.ess gave weight to other considerations--all human, yet all in some measure specious. Joe Ellison was happy in his dream, and would be happy in it all the rest of his life. Why tell the truth and destroy his precious illusion?--especially when there was no chance to change Maggie?
And further, she recalled the terrific temper that had lived within the composed demeanor of Joe Ellison. The fires of that temper could not yet be all burned out. If she told the truth, told that Jimmie Carlisle was still alive, that might be just touching the trigger of a devastating tragedy--might be disaster for all. What would be the use when no one would have been benefited?
And so, in the wisdom of her old head and the entanglements of her old heart, the d.u.c.h.ess decided she would never tell. And that loving, human decision she was to cling to through the stress of times to come.
But even while she was thus deciding upon a measure to checkmate them both, Larry was pacing his room at Cedar Crest, at last excitedly evolving the elusive plan which was to bring Maggie to her senses and also to him; and Maggie, all unconscious of this new element which had entered as a potential factor in her existence, all unconscious of how far she had been guided from the course which had been charted for her, was lying awake at the Grantham after a late party at which d.i.c.k Sherwood had been her escort, and was exulting pridefully over the seemingly near consummation of the plan that was to show Larry Brainard how wrong he was and that was to establish her as the cleverest woman in her line--better even than Barney or Old Jimmie believed her.
And thus separate wills each strove to direct their own lives and other lives according to their own separate plans; little thinking to what extent they were all entangled in a common destiny; and thinking not at all of the further seed that was being sown for the harvest-time of the whirlwind.
CHAPTER XXII
After Larry"s many days and nights of futile searching of his brain for a plan that would accord with his fundamental idea for awakening the unguessed other self of Maggie, the plan, which finally came to him complete in all its details in a single moment, was so simple and obvious that he marveled it could have been plainly before his eyes all this while without his ever seeing it. Of course the plan was dangerous and of doubtful issue. It had to be so, because it involved the reactions of strong-tempered persons as yet unacquainted who would have no foreknowledge of the design behind their new relationship; and because its success or failure, which might also mean his own complete failure, the complete loss of all he had thus far gained, depended largely upon the twist of events which he could not foresee and therefore could not guide.
Briefly, his plan was so to manage as to have Maggie received in the Sherwood household as a guest, to have her receive the frank, unquestioning hospitality (and perhaps friendship) of such a gracious, highly placed, unpretentious woman as Miss Sherwood, so distinctly a native of, and not an immigrant to, the great world. To be received as a friend by those against whom she plotted, to have the generous, unsuspecting friendship of Miss Sherwood--if anything just then had a chance to open the blinded Maggie"s eyes to the evil and error of what she was engaged upon, if anything had a chance to appeal to the finer things he believed to exist unrecognized or suppressed in Maggie, this was that thing.
And best part of this plan, its effect would be only within Maggie"s self. No one need know that anything had happened. There would be no exposure, no humiliation.
Of course there was the great question of how to get Miss Sherwood to invite Maggie; and whether indeed Miss Sherwood would invite her at all. And there was the further question, the invitation being sent, of whether Maggie would accept.
Larry decided to manipulate his design through d.i.c.k Sherwood. Late that afternoon, when d.i.c.k, just returned from the city, dropped into, as was his before-dinner custom, the office-study which had been set aside for Larry"s use, Larry, after an adroit approach to his subject, continued:
"And since I"ve been wished on you as a sort of step-uncle, there"s something I"d like to suggest--if I don"t seem to be fairly jimmying my way into your affairs."
"Door"s unlocked and wide open, Captain," said d.i.c.k. "Walk right in and take the best chair."
"Thanks. Remember telling me about a young woman you recently met? A Miss Maggie--Maggie--"
"Miss Cameron," d.i.c.k prompted. "Of course I remember."
"And remember your telling me that this time it"s the real thing?"
"And it IS the real thing!"
"You haven"t--excuse me--asked her to marry you yet?"
"No. I"ve been trying to get up my nerve."
"Here"s where you"ve got to excuse me once more, d.i.c.k--it"s not my business to tell you what should be your relations with your family--but have you told your sister?"
"No." d.i.c.k hesitated. "I suppose I should. But I hadn"t thought of it--yet. You see--" Again d.i.c.k hesitated.
"Yes?" prompted Larry.
"There are her relatives--that cousin and uncle. I guess it must have been my thinking of them that prevented my thinking of what you suggest."
"But you told me they hadn"t interfered much, and never would interfere." Larry gently pressed his point: "And look at it from Miss Cameron"s angle of view. If it"s the real thing, and you"re behaving that way toward her, hasn"t she good grounds for thinking it strange that you haven"t introduced her to your family?"
"By George, you"re right, Captain! I"ll see to that at once."
"Of course, d.i.c.k," Larry went on, carefully feeling his way, "you know much better than I the proper way to do such things--but don"t you think it would be rather nice, when you tell your sister, that you suggest to her that she invite Miss Cameron out here for a little visit? If they are to meet, I know Miss Cameron, or any girl, would take it as more of a tribute to be received in your own home than merely to meet in a big commonplace hotel."
"Right again, Captain! I"d tell Isabel to-night, and ask her to send the invitation--only I"m booked to scoot right back to the city for a little party as soon as I get some things together, and I"ll stay overnight in the apartment. But I"ll attend to the thing to-morrow night, sure."
"May I ask just one favor in the meantime?"
"One favor? A dozen, Captain!"
"I"ll take the other eleven later. Just now I only ask, since you haven"t proposed, that you won"t--er--commit yourself any further, in any way, with Miss Cameron until after you"ve told your sister and until after Miss Cameron has been out here."
"Oh, I say now!" protested d.i.c.k.
"I am merely suggesting that affairs remain in statu quo until after Miss Cameron"s visit with your sister. That"s not asking much of you, d.i.c.k--nor asking it for a very long time."
"Oh, of course I"ll do it, Captain," grumbled d.i.c.k affectionately.
"You"ve got me where I"ll do almost anything you want me to do."
But d.i.c.k did not speak to his sister the following evening. The next morning news came to Miss Sherwood of a friend"s illness, and she and her novel-reading aunt hurried off at once on what was to prove to be a week"s absence. But this delay in his plan did not worry Larry greatly as it otherwise would have done, for d.i.c.k repeated his promise to hold a stiff rein upon himself until after he should have spoken to his sister.
And Larry believed he could rely upon d.i.c.k"s pledged word.
During this week of waiting and necessary inactivity Larry concentrated upon another phase of his many-sided plan--to make of himself a business success. As has been said, he saw his chance of this in the handling of Miss Sherwood"s affairs; and saw it particularly in an idea that had begun to grow upon him since he became aware, through statements and letters from the agents turned over to him, of the extent of the Sherwood real-estate holdings and since he had got some glimmering of their condition. His previous venturings about the city had engendered in him a sense of moderate security; so he now began to make flying trips into New York in the smart roadster Miss Sherwood had placed at his disposal.
On each trip Larry made swift visits to several of the properties, until finally he had covered the entire list Miss Sherwood had furnished him through the agents. His survey corroborated his surmise. The property, mostly neglected apartment and tenement houses, was in an almost equally bad way whether one regarded it from the standpoint of sanitation, comfort, or cold financial returns. The fault for this was due to the fact that the Sherwoods had left the property entirely in the care of the agents, and the agents, being old, old-fashioned, and weary of business to the point of being almost ready to retire, had left the property to itself.
Prompted by these bad conditions, and to some degree by the then critical housing famine, with its records of some thousands of families having no place at all to go and some thousands of families being compelled for the sake of mere shelter to pay two and three times what they could afford for a few poor rooms, and with its records of profiteering landlords, Larry began to make notes for a plan which he intended later to elaborate--a plan which he tentatively ent.i.tled: "Suggestions for the Development of Sherwood Real-Estate Holdings."
Larry, knowing from the stubs of Miss Sherwood"s checkbook what would be likely to please her, gave as much consideration to Service as to Profit. The basis of his growing plan was good apartments at fair rentals. That he saw as the greatest of public services in the present crisis. But the return upon the investment had to be a reasonable one.
Larry did not believe in Charity, except for extreme cases. He believed, and his belief had grown out of a wide experience with many kinds of people, that Charity, of course to a smaller extent, was as definitely a source of social evil as the then much-talked-of Profiteering.
In the meantime he was seeing his old friend, Joe Ellison, every day; perhaps smoking with Ellison in his cottage after he had finished his day"s work among the roses, perhaps walking along the bluff which hung above the Sound, whose cool, clear waters splashed with vacation laziness upon the shingle. The two men rarely spoke, and never of the past. Larry was well acquainted with, and understood, the older man"s deep-rooted wish to avoid all talk bearing upon deeds and a.s.sociates of other days; that was a part of his life and a phase of existence that Joe Ellison was trying to forget, and Larry by his silence deferred to his friend"s desire.
On the day after Joe Ellison"s visit to the d.u.c.h.ess, Larry had received a note from his grandmother, addressed, of course, to "Mr. Brandon."