Magsie had dropped into a chair with her back to him.
"I"ve made you cross," she said penitently, "and you"re punishing me! Was it my seeing Richie, Greg? You know I never cared---"
"Don"t take that tone," he said.
Her color flamed again, and she set her little teeth. He saw her breast rise and fall.
"Don"t think you can do this, Greg," she said with icy viciousness. "Don"t delude yourself! I can punish you, and I will.
Alice and George Valentine can fix it all up to suit themselves, but they don"t know me! You"ve said your say now, and I"ve listened. Very well!"
"Magsie," he said almost pleadingly, interrupting the hard little voice, "can"t you see what a mistake it"s all been?"
She looked at him with eyes suddenly flooded with tears.
"M-m-mistake to s-s-say we loved each other, Greg?"
The man did not answer. Presently Magsie began to speak in a sad, low tone.
"You can go now if you want to, Greg. I"m not going to try to hold you. But I know you"ll come back to me to-morrow, and tell me it was all just the trouble other people tried to make between us--it wasn"t really you, the man I love!"
"I"ll write you," he said after a silence. And from the doorway he added, "Good-bye." Magsie did not turn or speak; she could not believe her ears when she heard the door softly close.
Next day brought her only a letter from the steamer, a letter reiterating his good-byes, and asking her again to forgive him.
Magsie read it in stupefaction. He was gone, and she had lost him!
The first panic of surprise gave way to more reasonable thinking.
There were ways of bringing him back; there were arguments that might persuade Rachael to adhere to her original resolution. It could not be dropped so easily. Magsie began to wonder what a lawyer might advise. Billy came in upon her irresolute musing.
"h.e.l.lo, dearie! But I"m interrupting---" said Billy.
"Oh, h.e.l.lo, darling! No, indeed you"re not," Magsie said, tearing up an envelope lazily. "I was trying to write a letter, but I have to think it over before it goes."
"I should think you could write a letter to your beau with your eyes shut," Billy said. "You"ve had practice enough! I know you"re busy, but I won"t interrupt you long. Upon my word, I had a hard enough time getting to you. There was no boy at the lift, and only a dear old Irish girl mopping up the floors. We had a long heart- to-heart talk, and I gave her a dollar."
"A dollar! I"ll have to move-you"re raising the price of living!"
said Magsie. "She"s the janitor"s wife, and they"re rich already.
What possessed you?"
"Well, she unpinned her skirts and went after the boy," Billy said idly, "and it was the only thing I had." She was trying quietly to see the name on the envelope Magsie had destroyed, but being unsuccessful, she went on more briskly, "How is the beau, by the way?"
"I wish I had never seen the man!" Magsie said, glad to talk of him. "His wife is raising the roof now---"
"I thought she would!" Billy said wisely. "I didn"t see any woman, especially if she"s not young, giving all that up without a fight!
You know I said so."
"I know you did," said Magsie ruefully. "But I don"t see what she can do!"
"Well, she can refuse to give him his divorce, can"t she?" Billy said sensibly.
"But CAN she?" Magsie was obviously not sure.
"Of course she can!"
"But she doesn"t want him. I went to see her--"
"Went to see her? For heaven"s sake, what did you do that for?"
"Because I cared for him," Magsie said, coloring.
"For heaven"s sake! You had your nerve! And what sort of a person is she?"
"Oh, beautiful! I knew her before. And she said that she would not interfere. She was as willing as he was; then---"
"But now she"s changed her mind?"
"Apparently." Magsie scowled into s.p.a.ce.
"Well, what does HE say?" Billy asked after a pause.
"Why, he can"t--or he seems to think he can"t--force her."
"Well, I don"t know that he can--here. There are states--"
"Yes, I know, but we"re here in New York," Magsie said briefly. A second later she sat up, suddenly energetic and definite in voice and manner. "But there ARE ways of forcing her, as she will soon see," said Magsie in a venomous voice. "I have his letters. I could put the whole thing into a lawyer"s hands. There"s such a thing as-as a breach of promise suit--"
"Not with a married man," Billy interrupted. Magsie halted, a little dashed.
"How do you know?" she demanded.
"You"d have to show you had been injured--and you"ve known all along he was married," Billy said.
"Well"--Magsie was scarlet with anger--"I could make him sorry, don"t worry about that!" she said childishly.
"Of course, if his wife DID consent, and then changed her mind, and you sent his letters to her," Billy said after cogitation. "It might--he may have glossed it all over, to her, you know."
"Exactly!" Magsie said triumphantly. "I knew there was a way!
She"s a sensitive woman, too. You know you can"t go as far as you like with a girl, Billy," she went on argumentatively, "without paying for it somehow!"
"Make him pay!" said the practical Billy.
"I don"t want--just money," Magsie said discontentedly. "I want--I don"t want to be interfered with. I believe I shall do just that,"
she went on with a brightening eye. "I"ll write him---"
"Tell him. Ever so much more effective than writing!" Billy suggested.
"Tell him then," Magsie did not mean to betray his ident.i.ty if she could help it, "that I really will send these things on to his wife--that"s just what I"ll do!"
"Are there children?" asked Billy.