Pledged to the Dead.
by Seabury Quinn.
_A tale of a lover who was pledged to a sweetheart who had been in her grave for more than a century, and of the striking death that menaced him--a story of Jules de Grandin_
The autumn dusk had stained the sky with shadows and orange oblongs traced the windows in my neighbors" homes as Jules de Grandin and I sat sipping kaiserschmarrn and coffee in the study after dinner. "_Mon Dieu_," the little Frenchman sighed, "I have the _mal du pays_, my friend. The little children run and play along the roadways at Saint Cloud, and on the Ile de France the pastry cooks set up their booths.
_Corbleu_, it takes the strength of character not to stop and buy those cakes of so much taste and fancy! The Napoleons, they are crisp and fragile as a coquette"s promise, the eclairs filled with cool, sweet cream, the cream-puffs all aglow with cherries. Just to see them is to love life better. They----"
The shrilling of the door-bell startled me. The pressure on the b.u.t.ton must have been that of one who leant against it. "Doctor Trowbridge; I must see him right away!" a woman"s voice demanded as Nora McGinnis, my household factotum, grudgingly responded to the hail.
"Th" docthor"s offiss hours is over, ma"am," Nora answered frigidly.
"Ha"f past nine ter eleven in th" marnin", an" two ter four in th"
afthernoon is when he sees his patients. If it"s an urgent case ye have there"s lots o" good young docthors in th" neighborhood, but Docthor Trowbridge----"
"Is he here?" the visitor demanded sharply.
"He is, an" he"s afther digestin" his dinner--an" an illigant dinner it wuz, though I do say so as shouldn"t--an" he can"t be disturbed----"
"He"ll see me, all right. Tell him it"s Nella Bentley, and I"ve _got_ to talk to him!"
De Grandin raised an eyebrow eloquently. "The fish at the aquarium have greater privacy than we, my friend," he murmured, but broke off as the visitor came clacking down the hall on high French heels and rushed into the study half a dozen paces in advance of my thoroughly disapproving and more than semi-scandalized Nora.
"Doctor Trowbridge, won"t you help me?" cried the girl as she fairly leaped across the study and flung her arms about my shoulders. "I can"t tell Dad or Mother, they wouldn"t understand; so you"re the only one--oh, excuse me, I thought you were alone!" Her face went crimson as she saw de Grandin standing by the fire.
"It"s quite all right, my dear," I soothed, freeing myself from her almost hysterical clutch. "This is Doctor de Grandin, with whom I"ve been a.s.sociated many times; I"d be glad to have the benefit of his advice, if you don"t mind."
She gave him her hand and a wan smile as I performed the introduction, but her eyes warmed quickly as he raised her fingers to his lips with a soft "_Enchante, Mademoiselle_." Women, animals and children took instinctively to Jules de Grandin.
Nella dropped her coat of silky shaven lamb and sank down on the study couch, her slim young figure molded in her knitted dress of coral rayon as revealingly as though she had been cased in plastic cellulose. She has long, violet eyes and a long mouth; smooth, dark hair parted in the middle; a small straight nose, and a small pointed chin. Every line of her is long, but definitely feminine; b.r.e.a.s.t.s and hips and throat and legs all delicately curved, without a hint of angularity.
"I"ve come to see you about Ned," she volunteered as de Grandin lit her cigarette and she sent a nervous smoke-stream gushing from between red, trembling lips. "He--he"s trying to run out on me!"
"You mean Ned Minton?" I asked, wondering what a middle-aged physician could prescribe for wandering Romeos.
"I certainly do mean Ned Minton," she replied, "and I mean business, too. The darn, romantic fool!"
De Grandin"s slender brows arched upward till they nearly met the beige-blond hair that slanted sleekly backward from his forehead.
"_Pardonnez-moi_," he murmured. "Did I understand correctly, _Mademoiselle_? Your _amoureux_--how do you say him?--sweetheart?--has shown a disposition toward unfaithfulness, yet you accuse him of romanticism?"
"He"s not unfaithful, that"s the worst of it. He"s faithful as Tristan and the chevalier Bayard lumped together, _sans peur et sans reproche_, you know. Says we can"t get married, "cause----"
"Just a moment, dear," I interrupted as I felt my indignation mounting. "D"ye mean the miserable young puppy cheated, and now wants to welch----"
Her blue eyes widened, then the little laughter-wrinkles formed around them. "You dear old mid-Victorian!" she broke in. "No, he ain"t done wrong by our Nell, and I"m not asking you to take your shotgun down and force him to make me an honest woman. Suppose we start at the beginning: then we"ll get things straight.
"You a.s.sisted at both our debuts, I"ve been told; you"ve known Ned and me since we were a second old apiece, haven"t you?"
I nodded.
"Know we"ve always been crazy about each other, too; in grammar school, high school and college, don"t you?"
"Yes," I agreed.
"All right. We"ve been engaged ever since our freshman year at Beaver.
Ned just had his frat pin long enough to pin it on my shoulder-strap at the first freshman dance. Everything was set for us to stand up in the chancel and say "I do" this June; then Ned"s company sent him to New Orleans last December." She paused, drew deeply at her cigarette, crushed its fire out in an ash-tray, and set a fresh one glowing.
"That started it. While he was down there it seemed that he got playful. Mixed up with some glamorous Creole gal." Once more she lapsed into silence and I could see the heartbreak showing through the armor of her flippant manner.
"You mean he fell in love----"
"I certainly do _not_! If he had, I"d have handed back his ring and said "Bless you, me children", even if I had to bite my heart in two to do it; but this is no case of a new love crowding out the old. Ned still loves me; never stopped loving me. That"s what makes it all seem crazy as a hashish-eater"s dream. He was on the loose in New Orleans, doing the town with a crowd of local boys, and prob"bly had too many Ramos fizzes. Then he barged into this Creole dame"s place, and----"
she broke off with a gallant effort at a smile. "I guess young fellows aren"t so different nowadays than they were when you were growing up, sir. Only today we don"t believe in sprinkling perfume in the family cesspool. Ned cheated, that"s the bald truth of it; he didn"t stop loving me, and he hasn"t stopped now, but I wasn"t there and that other girl was, and there were no conventions to be recognized. Now he"s fairly melting with remorse, says he"s not worthy of me--wants to break off our engagement, while he spends a lifetime doing penance for a moment"s folly."
"But good heavens," I expostulated, "if you"re willing to forgive----"
"You"re telling me!" she answered bitterly. "We"ve been over it a hundred times. This isn"t 1892; even nice girls know the facts of life today, and while I"m no more anxious than the next one to put through a deal in shopworn goods, I still love Ned, and I don"t intend to let a single indiscretion rob us of our happiness. I----" the hard exterior veneer of modernism melted from her like an autumn ice-glaze melting in the warm October sun, and the tears coursed down her cheeks, cutting little valleys in her carefully-applied make-up. "He"s my man, Doctor," she sobbed bitterly. "I"ve loved him since we made mud-pies together; I"m hungry, thirsty for him. He"s everything to me, and if he follows out this fool renunciation he seems set on, it"ll kill me!"
De Grandin tweaked a waxed mustache-end thoughtfully. "You exemplify the practicality of woman, _Mademoiselle_; I applaud your sound, hard common sense," he told her. "Bring this silly young romantic foolish one to me. I will tell him----"
"But he won"t come," I interrupted. "I know these hard-minded young a.s.ses. When a lad is set on being stubborn----"
"Will you go to work on him if I can get him here?" interjected Nella.
"Of a cert.i.tude, _Mademoiselle_."
"You won"t think me forward or unmaidenly?"
"This is a medical consultation, _Mademoiselle_."
"All right; be in the office this time tomorrow night. I"ll have my wandering boy friend here if I have to bring him in an ambulance."
Her performance matched her promise almost too closely for our comfort. We had just finished dinner next night when the frenzied shriek of tortured brakes, followed by a crash and the tinkling spatter of smashed gla.s.s, sounded in the street before the house, and in a moment feet dragged heavily across the porch. We were at the door before the bell could buzz, and in the disk of brightness sent down by the porch light saw Nella bent half double, stumbling forward with a man"s arm draped across her shoulders. His feet scuffed blindly on the boards, as though they had forgot the trick of walking, or as if all strength had left his knees. His head hung forward, lolling drunkenly; a spate of blood ran down his face and smeared his collar.
"Good Lord!" I gasped. "What----"
"Get him in the surgery--quick!" the girl commanded in a whisper. "I"m afraid I rather overdid it."
Examination showed the cut across Ned"s forehead was more b.l.o.o.d.y than extensive, while the scalp-wound which plowed backward from his hairline needed but a few quick st.i.tches.