"I will prove to you that you are sixteen," declared Von Gerhard, calmly.
We had come to a fork in the road. At the right the narrower road ran between two rows of great maples that made an arch of golden splendor.
The frost had kissed them into a gorgeous radiance.
"Sunshine Avenue," announced Von Gerhard. "It beckons us away from home, and supper and salad dressing and duty, but who knows what we shall find at the end of it!"
"Let"s explore," I suggested. "It is splendidly golden enough to be enchanted."
We entered the yellow canopied pathway.
"Let us pretend this is Germany, yes?" pleaded Von Gerhard. "This golden pathway will end in a neat little gla.s.s-roofed restaurant, with tables and chairs outside, and comfortable German papas and mammas and pig-tailed children sitting at the tables, drinking coffee or beer.
There will be stout waiters, and a red-faced host. And we will seat ourselves at one of the tables, and I will wave my hand, and one of the stout waiters will come flying. "Will you have coffee, _Fraulein_, or beer?" It sounds prosaic, but it is very, very good, as you will see.
Pathways in Germany always end in coffee and Kuchen and waiters in white ap.r.o.ns."
But, "Oh, no!" I exclaimed, for his mood was infectious. "This is France. Please! The golden pathway will end in a picturesque little French farm, with a dairy. And in the doorway of the farmhouse there will be a red-skirted peasant woman, with a white cap! and a baby on her arm! and sabots! Oh, surely she will wear sabots!"
"Most certainly she will wear sabots," Von Gerhard said, heatedly, "and blue knitted stockings. And the baby"s name is Mimi!"
We had taken hands and were skipping down the pathway now, like two excited children.
"Let"s run," I suggested. And run we did, like two mad creatures, until we rounded a gentle curve and brought up, panting, within a foot of a decrepit rail fence. The rail fence enclosed a stubbly, lumpy field. The field was inhabited by an inquiring cow. Von Gerhard and I stood quite still, hand in hand, gazing at the cow. Then we turned slowly and looked at each other.
"This pathway of glorified maples ends in a cow," I said, solemnly. At which we both shrieked with mirth, leaning on the decrepit fence and mopping our eyes with our handkerchiefs.
"Did I not say you were sixteen?" taunted Von Gerhard. We were getting surprisingly well acquainted.
"Such a scolding as we shall get! It will be quite dark before we are home. Norah will be tearing her hair."
It was a true prophecy. As we stampeded up the steps the door was flung open, disclosing a tragic figure.
"Such a steak!" wailed Norah, "and it has been done for hours and hours, and now it looks like a piece of fried ear. Where have you two driveling idiots been? And mushrooms too."
"She means that the ruined steak was further enhanced by mushrooms," I explained in response to Von Gerhard"s bewildered look. We marched into the house, trying not to appear like sneak thieves. Max, pipe in mouth, surveyed us blandly.
"Fine color you"ve got, Dawn," he remarked.
"There is such a thing as overdoing this health business," snapped Norah, with a great deal of acidity for her. "I didn"t tell you to make them purple, you know."
Max turned to Von Gerhard. "Now what does she mean by that do you suppose, eh Ernst?"
"Softly, brother, softly!" whispered Von Gerhard. "When women exchange remarks that apparently are simple, and yet that you, a man, cannot understand, then know there is a woman"s war going on, and step softly, and hold your peace. Aber ruhig!"
Calm was restored with the appearance of the steak, which was found to have survived the period of waiting, and to be incredibly juicy and tender. Presently we were all settled once more in the great beamed living room, Sis at the piano, the two men smoking their after-dinner cigars with that idiotic expression of contentment which always adorns the masculine face on such occasions.
I looked at them--at those three who had done so much for my happiness and well being, and something within me said: "Now! Speak now!" Norah was playing very softly, so that the Spalpeens upstairs might not be disturbed. I took a long breath and made the plunge.
"Norah, if you"ll continue the slow music, I"ll be much obliged. "The time has come, the Walrus said, to talk of many things.""
"Don"t be absurd," said Norah, over her shoulder, and went on playing.
"I never was more serious in my life, good folkses all. I"ve got to be.
This b.u.t.terfly existence has gone on long enough. Norah, and Max, and Mr. Doctor Man, I am going away."
Norah"s hands crashed down on the piano keys with a jangling discord.
She swung about to face me.
"Not New York again, Dawn! Not New York!"
"I am afraid so," I answered.
Max--bless his great, brotherly heart--rose and came over to me and put a hand on my shoulder.
"Don"t you like it here, girlie? Want to be hauled home on a shutter again, do you? You know that as long as we have a home, you have one. We need you here."
But I shook my head. From his chair at the other side of the room I could feel Von Gerhard"s gaze fixed upon us. He had said nothing.
"Need me! No one needs me. Don"t worry; I"m not going to become maudlin about it. But I don"t belong here, and you know, it. I have my work to do. Norah is the best sister that a woman ever had. And Max, you"re an angel brother-in-law. But how can I stay on here and keep my self-respect?" I took Max"s big hand in mine and gathered courage from it.
"But you have been working," wailed Norah, "every morning. And I thought the book was coming on beautifully. And I"m sure it will be a wonderful book, Dawn dear. You are so clever."
"Oh, the book--it is too uncertain. Perhaps it will go, but perhaps it won"t. And then--what? It will be months before the book is properly polished off. And then I may peddle it around for more months. No; I can"t afford to trifle with uncertainties. Every newspaper man or woman writes a book. It"s like having the measles. There is not a newspaper man living who does not believe, in his heart, that if he could only take a month or two away from the telegraph desk or the police run, he could write the book of the year, not to speak of the great American Play. Why, just look at me! I"ve only been writing seriously for a few weeks, and already the best magazines in the country are refusing my ma.n.u.scripts daily."
"Don"t joke," said Norah, coming over to me, "I can"t stand it."
"Why not? Much better than weeping, isn"t it? And anyway, I"m no subject for tears any more. Dr. von Gerhard will tell you how well and strong I am. Won"t you, Herr Doktor?"
"Well," said Von Gerhard, in his careful, deliberate English, "since you ask me, I should say that you might last about one year, in New York."
"There! What did I tell you!" cried Norah.
"What utter blither!" I scoffed, turning to glare at Von Gerhard.
"Gently," warned Max. "Such disrespect to the man who pulled you back from the edge of the yawning grave only six months ago!"
"Yawning fiddlesticks!" snapped I, elegantly. "There was nothing wrong with me except that I wanted to be fussed over. And I have been. And I"ve loved it. But it must stop now." I rose and walked over to the table and faced Von Gerhard, sitting there in the depths of a great chair. "You do not seem to realize that I am not free to come and go, and work and play, and laugh and live like other women. There is my living to make. And there is--Peter Orme. Do you think that I could stay on here like this? Oh, I know that Max is not a poor man. But he is not a rich man, either. And there are the children to be educated, and besides, Max married Norah O"Hara, not the whole O"Hara tribe. I want to go to work. I am not a free woman, but when I am working, I forget, and am almost, happy. I tell you I must be well again! I will be well! I am well!"
At the end of which dramatic period I spoiled the whole effect by bowing my head on the table and giving way to a fit of weeping such as I had not had since the days of my illness.
"Looks like it," said Max, at which I decided to laugh, and the situation was saved.
It was then that Von Gerhard proposed the thing that set us staring at him in amused wonder. He came over and stood looking down at us, his hands outspread upon the big library table, his body bent forward in an att.i.tude of eager intentness. I remember thinking what wonderful hands they were, true indexes of the man"s character; broad, white, surgeonly hands; the fingers almost square at the tips. They were hands as different from those slender, nervous, unsteady, womanly hands of Peter Orme as any hands could be, I thought. They were hands made for work that called for delicate strength, if such a paradox could be; hands to cling to; to gain courage from; hands that spelled power and reserve. I looked at them, fascinated, as I often had done before, and thought that I never had seen such SANE hands.
"You have done me the honor to include me in this little family conclave," began Ernst von Gerhard. "I am going to take advantage of your trust. I shall give you some advice--a thing I usually keep for unpleasant professional occasions. Do not go back to New York."
"But I know New York. And New York--the newspaper part of it--knows me.
Where else can I go?"
"You have your book to finish. You could never finish it there, is it not so?"