He had been at home about two weeks, when her first letter came. So far the only sc.r.a.p of her handwriting that he possessed was the formal release that she had given him the afternoon they became engaged, and which, for safe keeping doubtless, he always carried in his pocketbook, and which he sometimes found himself reading over--not as a proof that he could get out of his engagement, but rather in an attempt to verify the fact that he had ever got into it.
However unfamiliar with her writing, he had not the least doubt about the letter from the first instant that he saw it. No one else could use such absurd faint blue and white paper and such large square envelopes. As he took it up, he said to himself that it had never occurred to him that she would write, and yet he saw without any sense of inconsistency that he had looked for this letter in every mail. And yet, so perverse is the nature of mankind, that he opened it, not with pleasure, but with a sudden return of all his old terror of being trapped.
"Dear Max," it said. "I have been pretending so often to write to you for the benefit of my inquiring friends, that I think I may as well do it as a tribute to truth.
"How foolish that was--the night you went away! One gets carried away sometimes by the drama of a situation, without any relation to the facts, and the idea of parting forever from one"s fiance is rather dramatic, isn"t it? I cried all night, and rather enjoyed it. Then in the morning when I woke up, everything seemed to have returned to the normal, and I could not understand what had made me so silly.
"Don"t suppose that because you have gone, I am therefore freed from the disagreeable criticism of which you made such a speciality. Ned comes in almost every day to tell me that he does not approve of my conduct. I am not behaving, it appears, as an affianced bride should. Don"t you like to think of Ned so loyally protecting your interests in your absence?
His criticisms are, I suppose, based on the attentions of a nice little boy just out of college, who calls me "Helen," and writes sonnets to me which are to appear in the most literary of weeklies. Look out for them.
They are good, and may raise your low estimate of my charms. The best one begins:
"When the blond wonder first on Paris dawned--
"Isn"t that pretty?
"Write to me. At least send me a blank envelope that I may leave ostentatiously on my desk.
"Yours at the moment,
"CHRISTINE."
Riatt"s first thought on laying down the letter was: "Hickson never in the world objected to any little poet just out of college, and she knows it very well. It"s Linburne he is worried about--Linburne, whose name she does not even mention." And how absurd to attempt to make him believe she had cried all night. That was simply an untruth. Yet oddly enough, it came before his eyes in a more vivid picture than many a scene he had actually witnessed.
A few minutes later he went to the club and looked up the literary weekly of which she had spoken. There was no sonnet in it, but the issue of the next week contained it. Riatt read it with an emotion he could not mistake. It brought Christine like a visible presence before him. Also it made him angry, to have to see her like this, through another man"s eyes.
"Little whelp," he said, "to detail a woman"s beauty in print like that!
What does he know about it anyhow? I don"t believe for one second she looked at him like that."
The sonnet ended:
She turned, a white embodiment of joy, And looking on him, sealed the doom of Troy.
He was roused by a friendly shout in his ear. "Ho, ho, Max, reading poetry, are you? What love does for the worst of us!" It was Welsley, who s.n.a.t.c.hed the paper out of his hand, running over the lines rapidly to himself: "Hem, hem, "carnation, alabaster, gold and fire." Some queen, that, eh? Have you had your dinner? Well, don"t be cross. There"s no reason why you shouldn"t read verse if you like. And this young man is the latest thing. My wife says they are going to import him here to speak to the Greek Study Club."
"I shall be curious to hear him, if the Greek Club will ask me," said Max.
"Oh, you"ll be in the East getting married," answered Welsley.
Strangely enough, it was with something like a pang that Max said to himself that he wouldn"t be.
"Carnation, alabaster, gold and fire."
It was not a bad line, he thought.
After dinner, he felt a little more amiable, and so he sat down and wrote his first real letter to his fiancee.
"If we were really engaged, my dear Christine," he wrote, "you would have had a night letter long before this, asking you to explain to me just how it was that you did look on that amorous young poet. His verse is pretty enough, though I can"t say I exactly enjoyed it. However, my native town thinks very highly of him, and intends to ask him to come and address one of our local organizations. If so, I shall have an opportunity of questioning him on the subject of the sources of his inspiration. "Is Helen a real person?" I shall ask. "Not so very," I can imagine his replying. Ah, what would we both give to know?
"My friends here, stimulated by Dorothy Lane"s ravishing description of you, have asked many times to see your picture. I am ashamed of my own carelessness in having gone away without obtaining one for exhibition purposes. Will you send me one at once? One not already in circulation among poets and painters. I will set it on my writing table, and allow my eyes to stray sentimentally toward it whenever I have people to dinner.
"By the way, the day I left New York I told a florist to send you flowers every day. We worked out quite an elaborate scheme for every day in the week. Did he ever do it?
"Yours, at least in the sight of this company,
"MAX RIATT."
In answer to this, he was surprised by a telegram:
"So sorry for absurd mistake. Entirely misunderstood source of the flowers. Enjoy them a great deal more now. Yes, they come regularly. A thousand thanks. Am sending photograph by mail."
Riatt did not need to ask himself from whom she had imagined they came.
Not the poet, unless magazine rates were rising unduly. Nor Hickson, who failed a little in such attentions. No, it was Linburne--and evidently Linburne"s attentions were taken so much as a matter of course, that she had not even thanked him, nor had he noticed her omission.
He did not answer the telegram, nor did he acknowledge the photograph but, true to his word, he established it at once on his desk in a frame which he spent a long time in selecting. The picture represented Christine at her most queenly and unapproachable. She wore the black and gold dress, and the huge feather fan was folded across her bare arms.
Every time he looked at it, he remembered how those same arms had been clasped round his own stiff and unbending neck. And sometimes he found the thought distracted his attention from important matters.
It was about the middle of February when he received one morning a letter from Nancy Almar. He knew _her_ handwriting. She was always sending him little notes of one kind or another. This one was very brief.
"Clever mouse! So it knew a way to get out all the time!"
All day he speculated on the meaning of this strange message. Had Nancy discovered some proof of the nature of his engagement? Had Christine been moved by pity to tell Hickson the truth? On the whole he inclined to think that this was the explanation.
The next day he knew he had been mistaken. He had a letter from Laura Ussher--not the first in the series--urging him to come back at once.
"Max," she wrote, with a haste that made her almost indecipherable, "you must come. What are you dreaming of--to leave a proud, beautiful, impressionable creature like Christine the prey to so finished a villain as Linburne? You are not so ignorant of the ways of the world as not to know his intentions. Most people are saying you deserve everything that is happening to you. I try to explain, but I know you saw enough while you were here to be put upon your guard. Why don"t you come? I must warn you that if you do not come at once you need not come at all."
Riatt had just come in; it was late in the afternoon. The letters were lying on his writing table; and as he finished this one, he raised his eyes and looked at Christine"s picture.
He did not believe Laura"s over-wrought picture. Christine was no fool, Linburne no villain. There was probably a little flirtation, and a good deal of gossip. But that would all be put a stop to by the announcement of Christine"s engagement to Hickson. He did not even feel annoyed at his cousin"s suggestion that he did not know his way about the world. He knew it rather better than she did, he fancied.
And having so disposed of his mail, he took up the evening paper which lay beneath it, and read the first headline:
Mrs. Lee Linburne to seek divorce: Wife of well-known multimillionaire now at Reno--
As he read this a blind rage swept over Riatt. He did not stop to inquire why if he were willing to give Christine up to Hickson he was infuriated at the idea of Linburne"s marrying her; nor why, as he had allowed himself to be made use of, he was angry to find that he had been far more useful than he had supposed. He only knew that he was angry, and with an anger that demanded instant action.
He looked at his watch. He had time to catch a train to Chicago. He went upstairs and packed. He knew that what he was doing was foolish, that he would poignantly regret it, but he never wavered an instant in his intention.
He reached New York early in the afternoon. He had notified no one of his departure, and he did not announce his arrival. He went straight to the Fenimers" house--not indeed expecting to find Christine at home at that hour, but resolved to await her return.
The young man at the door, who had known Riatt before, appeared confused, but was decided.
Miss Fenimer, he insisted, was out.
Glancing past him Riatt saw a hat and stick on the hall table. He had no doubt as to their owner.
"I"ll wait then," he said, coming in, and handing his own things to the footman, who seemed more embarra.s.sed still.
Taking pity on him, Riatt said: