Seven Keys to Baldpate.
by Earl Derr Biggers.
CHAPTER I
"WEEP NO MORE, MY LADY"
A young woman was crying bitterly in the waiting-room of the railway station at Upper Asquewan Falls, New York.
A beautiful young woman? That is exactly what Billy Magee wanted to know as, closing the waiting-room door behind him, he stood staring just inside. Were the features against which that frail bit of cambric was agonizingly pressed of a pleasing contour? The girl"s neatly tailored corduroy suit and her flippant but charming millinery augured well.
Should he step gallantly forward and inquire in sympathetic tones as to the cause of her woe? Should he carry chivalry even to the lengths of Upper Asquewan Falls?
No, Mr. Magee decided he would not. The train that had just roared away into the dusk had not brought him from the region of skysc.r.a.pers and derby hats for deeds of knight errantry up state. Anyhow, the girl"s tears were none of his business. A railway station was a natural place for grief--a field of many partings, upon whose floor fell often in torrents the tears of those left behind. A friend, mayhap a lover, had been whisked off into the night by the relentless five thirty-four local. Why not a lover? Surely about such a dainty trim figure as this courtiers hovered as moths about a flame. Upon a tender intimate sorrow it was not the place of an unknown Magee to intrude. He put his hand gently upon the latch of the door.
And yet--dim and heartless and cold was the interior of that waiting-room. No place, surely, for a gentleman to leave a lady sorrowful, particularly when the lady was so alluring. Oh, beyond question, she was most alluring. Mr. Magee stepped softly to the ticket window and made low-voiced inquiry of the man inside.
"What"s she crying about?" he asked.
A thin sallow face, on the forehead of which a mop of ginger-colored hair lay listlessly, was pressed against the bars.
"Thanks," said the ticket agent. "I get asked the same old questions so often, one like yours sort of breaks the monotony. Sorry I can"t help you. She"s a woman, and the Lord only knows why women cry. And sometimes I reckon even He must be a little puzzled. Now, my wife--"
"I think I"ll ask her," confided Mr. Magee in a hoa.r.s.e whisper.
"Oh, I wouldn"t," advised the man behind the bars. "It"s best to let "em alone. They stop quicker if they ain"t noticed."
"But she"s in trouble," argued Billy Magee.
"And so"ll you be, most likely," responded the cynic, "if you interfere.
No, siree! Take my advice. Shoot old Asquewan"s rapids in a barrel if you want to, but keep away from crying women."
The heedless Billy Magee, however, was already moving across the unscrubbed floor with chivalrous intention.
The girl"s trim shoulders no longer heaved so unhappily. Mr. Magee, approaching, thought himself again in the college yard at dusk, with the great elms sighing overhead, and the fresh young voices of the glee club ringing out from the steps of a century-old building. What were the words they sang so many times?
"Weep no more, my lady, Oh! weep no more to-day."
He regretted that he could not make use of them. They had always seemed to him so sad and beautiful. But troubadours, he knew, went out of fashion long before railway stations came in. So his remark to the young woman was not at all melodious:
"Can I do anything?"
A portion of the handkerchief was removed, and an eye which, Mr. Magee noted, was of an admirable blue, peeped out at him. To the gaze of even a solitary eye, Mr. Magee"s aspect was decidedly pleasing. Young Williams, who posed at the club as a wit, had once said that Billy Magee came as near to being a magazine artist"s idea of the proper hero of a story as any man could, and at the same time retain the respect and affection of his fellows. Mr. Magee thought he read approval in the lone eye of blue. When the lady spoke, however, he hastily revised his opinion.
"Yes," she said, "you can do something. You can go away--far, far away."
Mr. Magee stiffened. Thus chivalry fared in Upper Asquewan Falls in the year 1911.
"I beg your pardon," he remarked. "You seemed to be in trouble, and I thought I might possibly be of some a.s.sistance."
The girl removed the entire handkerchief. The other eye proved to be the same admirable blue--a blue half-way between the shade of her corduroy suit and that of the jacky"s costume in the "See the World--Join the Navy" poster that served as background to her woe.
"I don"t mean to be rude," she explained more gently, "but--I"m crying, you see, and a girl simply can"t look attractive when she cries."
"If I had only been regularly introduced to you, and all that,"
responded Mr. Magee, "I could make a very flattering reply." And a true one, he added to himself. For even in the faint flickering light of the station he found ample reason for rejoicing that the bit of cambric was no longer agonizingly pressed. As yet he had scarcely looked away from her eyes, but he was dimly aware that up above wisps of golden hair peeped impudently from beneath a saucy black hat. He would look at those wisps shortly, he told himself. As soon as he could look away from the eyes--which was not just yet.
"My grief," said the girl, "is utterly silly and--womanish. I think it would be best to leave me alone with it. Thank you for your interest.
And--would you mind asking the gentleman who is pressing his face so feverishly against the bars to kindly close his window?"
"Certainly," replied Mr. Magee. He turned away. As he did so he collided with a rather excessive lady. She gave the impression of solidity and bulk; her mouth was hard and knowing. Mr. Magee felt that she wanted to vote, and that she would say as much from time to time. The lady had a glittering eye; she put it to its time-honored use and fixed Mr. Magee with it.
"I was crying, mamma," the girl explained, "and this gentleman inquired if he could be of any service."
Mamma! Mr. Magee wanted to add his tears to those of the girl. This frail and lovely damsel in distress owning as her maternal parent a heavy unnecessary--person! The older woman also had yellow hair, but it was the sort that suggests the white enamel pallor of a drug store, with the soda-fountain fizzing and the bottles of perfume ranged in an odorous row. Mamma! Thus rolled the world along.
"Well, they ain"t no use gettin" all worked up for nothing," advised the unpleasant parent. Mr. Magee was surprised that in her tone there was no hostility to him--thus belying her looks. "Mebbe the gentleman can direct us to a good hotel," she added, with a rather stagy smile.
"I"m a stranger here, too," Mr. Magee replied. "I"ll interview the man over there in the cage."
The gentleman referred to was not cheerful in his replies. There was, he said, Baldpate Inn.
"Oh, yes, Baldpate Inn," repeated Billy Magee with interest.
"Yes, that"s a pretty swell place," said the ticket agent. "But it ain"t open now. It"s a summer resort. There ain"t no place open now but the Commercial House. And I wouldn"t recommend no human being there--especially no lady who was sad before she ever saw it."
Mr. Magee explained to the incongruous family pair waiting on the bench.
"There"s only one hotel," he said, "and I"m told it"s not exactly the place for any one whose outlook on life is not rosy at the moment. I"m sorry."
"It will do very well," answered the girl, "whatever it is." She smiled at Billy Magee. "My outlook on life in Upper Asquewan Falls," she said, "grows rosier every minute. We must find a cab."
She began to gather up her traveling-bags, and Mr. Magee hastened to a.s.sist. The three went out on the station platform, upon which lay a thin carpet of snowflakes. There the older woman, in a harsh rasping voice, found fault with Upper Asquewan Falls,--its geography, its public spirit, its brand of weather. A dejected cab at the end of the platform stood mourning its lonely lot. In it Mr. Magee placed the large lady and the bags. Then, while the driver climbed to his seat, he spoke into the invisible ear of the girl.
"You haven"t told me why you cried," he reminded her.
She waved her hand toward the wayside village, the lamps of which shone sorrowfully through the snow.
"Upper Asquewan Falls," she said, "isn"t it reason enough?"
Billy Magee looked; saw a row of gloomy buildings that seemed to list as the wind blew, a blurred sign "Liquors and Cigars," a street that staggered away into the dark like a man who had lingered too long at the emporium back of the sign.
"Are you doomed to stay here long?" he asked.
"Come on, Mary," cried a deep voice from the cab. "Get in and shut the door. I"m freezing."
"It all depends," said the girl. "Thank you for being so kind and--good night."