Jack"s heart gave a bound.
"But you were going if we went to Morfordsburg," he persisted. He was determined to get at the bottom of all his misgivings. Perhaps, after all, Peter was right.
Ruth caught her breath. The name of the town had reopened a vista which her anxiety over her father"s affairs had for the moment shut out.
"Well, but that is over now. I am going to stay here and help daddy."
Again the new fear tugged at her heart. "You are going to stay, too, aren"t you, Mr. Breen?" she added in quick alarm. "You won"t leave him, will you?--not if--" again the terrible money loss rose before her. What if there should not be money enough to pay Jack?
"Me! Why, Miss Ruth!"
"But suppose he was not able to--" she could not frame the rest of the sentence.
"You can"t suppose anything that would make me leave him, or the work."
This also came with an emphasis of positive certainty. "I have never been so happy as I have been here. I never knew what it was to be myself. I never knew," he added in softened tones, "what it was to really live until I joined your father. Only last night Uncle Peter and I were talking about it. "Stick to Mac," the dear old fellow said." It was to Ruth, but he dared not express himself, except in parables. "Then you HAD thought of going?" she asked quickly, a shadow falling across her face.
"No--" he hesitated--"I had only thought of STAYING. It was you who were going--I was all broken up about being left here alone, and Uncle Peter wanted to know why I did not beg you to stay, and I--"
Ruth turned her face toward him.
"Well, I am going to stay," she answered simply. She did not dare to trust herself further.
"Yes!--and now I don"t care what happens!" he exclaimed with a thrill in his voice. "If you will only trust me, Miss Ruth, and let me come in with you and your father. Let me help! Don"t let there be only two--let us be three! Don"t you see what a difference it would make? I will work and save every penny I can for him and take every bit of the care from his shoulders; but can"t you understand how much easier it would be if you would only let me help you too? I could hardly keep the tears back a moment ago when I saw you sink down here. I can"t see you unhappy like this and not try to comfort you."
"You do help me," she murmured softly. Her eyes had now dropped to the cushion at her side.
"Yes, but not--Oh, Ruth, don"t you see how I love you! What difference does this accident make--what difference does anything make if we have each other?" He had his hand on hers now, and was bending over, his eyes eager for some answer in her own. "I have suffered so," he went on, "and I am so tired and so lonely without you. When you wouldn"t understand me that time when I came to you after the tunnel blew up, I went about like one in a dream--and then I determined to forget it all, and you, and everything--but I couldn"t, and I can"t now. Maybe you won"t listen--but please--"
Ruth withdrew her hand quickly and straightened her shoulders. The mention of the tunnel and what followed had brought with it a rush of memories that had caused her the bitterest tears of her life. And then again what did he mean by "helping"?
"Jack," she said slowly, as if every word gave her pain, "listen to me. When you saved my father"s life and I wanted to tell you how much I thanked you for it, you would not let me tell you. Is not that true?"
"I did not want your grat.i.tude, Ruth," he pleaded in excuse, his lips quivering, "I wanted your love."
"And why, then, should I not say to you now that I do not want your pity? Is it because you are--" her voice sank to a whisper, every note told of her suffering--"you are--sorry for me, Jack, that you tell me you love me?"
Jack sprang to his feet and stood looking down upon her. The cruelty of her injustice smote his heart. Had a man"s glove been dashed in his face he could not have been more incensed. For a brief moment there surged through him all he had suffered for her sake; the sleepless nights, the days of doubts and misunderstandings! And it had come to this! Again he was treated with contempt--again his heart and all it held was trampled on. A wild protest rose in his throat and trembled on his lips.
At that instant she raised her eyes and looked into his. A look so pleading--so patient--so weary of the struggle--so ready to receive the blow--that the hot words recoiled in his throat. He bent his head to search her eyes the better. Down in their depths, as one sees the bottom of a clear pool he read the truth, and with it came a reaction that sent the hot blood rushing through his veins.
"Sorry for you, my darling!" he burst out joyously--"I who love you like my own soul! Oh, Ruth!--Ruth!--my beloved!"
He had her in his arms now, her cheek to his, her yielding body held close.
Then their lips met.
The Scribe lays down his pen. This be holy ground on which we tread. All she has she has given him: all the fantasies of her childhood, all the dreams of her girlhood, all her trust, her loyalty--her reverence--all to the very last pulsation of her being.
And this girl he holds in his arms! So pliant, so yielding, so pure and undefiled! And the silken sheen and intoxicating perfume of her hair, and the trembling lashes shading the eager, longing, soul-hungry eyes; and the way the little pink ears nestle; and the fair, white, dovelike throat, with its ripple of lace. And then the dear arms about his neck and the soft clinging fingers that are intertwined with his own! And more wonderful still, the perfect unison, the oneness, the sameness; no jar, no discordant note; mind, soul, desire--a harmony.
The wise men say there are no parallels in nature; that no one thing in the wide universe exactly mates and matches any other one thing; that each cloud has differed from every other cloud-form in every hour of the day and night, to-day, yesterday and so on back through the forgotten centuries; that no two leaves in form, color, or texture, lift the same faces to the sun on any of the million trees; that no wave on any beach curves and falls as any wave has curved and fallen before--not since the planet cooled. And so it is with the drift of wandering winds; with the whirl and crystals of driving snow, with the slant and splash of rain.
And so, too, with the flight of birds; the dash and tumble of restless brooks; the roar of lawless thunder and the songs of birds.
The one exception is when we hold in our arms the woman we love, and for the first time drink in her willing soul through her lips. Then, and only then, does the note of perfect harmony ring true through the spheres.
For a long time they sat perfectly still. Not many words had pa.s.sed, and these were only repet.i.tions of those they had used before. "Such dear hands," Jack would say, and kiss them both up and down the fingers, and then press the warm, pink sh.e.l.l palm to his lips and kiss it again, shutting his eyes, with the reverence of a devotee at the feet of the Madonna.
"And, Jack dear," Ruth would murmur, as if some new thought had welled up in her heart--and then nothing would follow, until Jack would loosen his clasp a little--just enough to free the dear cheek and say:
"Go on, my darling," and then would come--
"Oh, nothing, Jack--I--" and once more their lips would meet.
It was only when MacFarlane"s firm step was heard on the stairs outside that the two awoke to another world. Jack reached his feet first.
"Shall we tell him?" he asked, looking down into her face.
"Of course, tell him," braved out Ruth, uptilting her head with the movement of a fawn surprised in the forest.
"When?" asked Jack, his eager eyes on the opening door.
"Now, this very minute. I never keep anything from daddy."
MacFarlane came sauntering in, his strong, determined, finely cut features illumined by a cheery smile. He had squared things with himself while he had been dressing: "Hard lines, Henry, isn"t it?" he had asked of himself, a trick of his when he faced any disaster like the present.
"Better get Ruth off somewhere, Henry, don"t you think so? Yes, get her off to-morrow. The little girl can"t stand everything, plucky as she is." It was this last thought of his daughter that had sent the cheery smile careering around his firm lips. No glum face for Ruth!
They met him half-way down the room, the two standing together, Jack"s arm around her waist.
"Daddy!"
"Yes, dear." He had not yet noted the position of the two, although he had caught the joyous tones in her voice.
"Jack and I want to tell you something. You won"t be cross, will you?"
"Cross, Puss!" He stopped and looked at her wonderingly. Had Jack comforted her? Was she no longer worried over the disaster?
Jack released his arm and would have stepped forward, but she held him back.
"No, Jack,--let me tell him. You said a while ago, daddy, that there were only two of us--just you and I--and that it had always been so and--"
"Well, isn"t it true, little girl?" It"s extraordinary how blind and stupid a reasonably intelligent father can be on some occasions, and this one was as blind as a cave-locked fish.
"Yes, it WAS true, daddy, when you went upstairs, but--but--it isn"t true any more! There are three of us now!" She was trembling all over with uncontrollable joy, her voice quavering in her excitement.
Again Jack tried to speak, but she laid her hand on his lips with--
"No, please don"t, Jack--not yet--you will spoil everything."
MacFarlane still looked on in wonderment. She was much happier, he could see, and he was convinced that Jack was in some way responsible for the change, but it was all a mystery yet.