"Bernal"s heart is right, even if his theology doesn"t always please me," said his brother graciously, examining some cards that lay on the table. "I see Mrs. Wyeth has called," he continued to Nancy, looking up from these.
"Yes. She wanted me to see her sister, poor Mrs. Eversley, who is ill at her house. I promised to look in to-morrow."
"I"ve just been telling Nance how beautiful I think Mrs. Wyeth is," said Bernal. "She"s rare, with that face of the low-browed Greek. It"s one of the memories I shall take back to my Eve-less Eden."
"She _is_ beautiful," said Nancy. "Of course her nose is the least bit thin and long, but it rather adds zest to her face. Now I must dress for dinner."
When Nancy had gone, Bernal, who had been speaking with a marked lightness of tone, turned to Allan with an equally marked seriousness.
"Old chap, you know about that money of mine--of Grandfather"s?"
Allan instantly became attentive.
"Of course, there"s no hurry about that--you must take time to think it over," he answered.
"But there _is_ hurry! I shouldn"t have waited so long to make up my mind.
"Then you _have_ made up your mind?" questioned his brother, with guarded eagerness.
"Definitely. It"s all yours, Allan. It will help you in what you want to do. And not having it will help me to do what I want to do--make it simpler, easier. Take it--and for G.o.d"s sake be good to Nancy."
"I can"t tell you how you please me, Bernal. Not that I"m avid for money, but it truly seems more in accord with what must have been grandfather"s real wish. And Nancy--of course I shall be good to her--though at times she seems unable to please me."
There was a sanctified displeasure in his tone, as he spoke of Nancy. It caused Bernal to turn upon him a keen, speculative eye, but only for a moment. And his next words had to do with matters tangible. "To-morrow I"ll do some of the business that can be done here. Then I"ll go up to Edom and finish the transfers that have to be made there." After a brief hesitation, he added: "Try to please _her_ a bit, Allan. That"s all."
CHAPTER XVI
IN WHICH THE MIRROR IS HELD UP TO HUMAN NATURE
When, the next day, Nancy went to pay her promised visit to Mrs.
Eversley, the rectory was steeped in the deep household peace of mid-afternoon. Both Allan and Bernal had gone out soon after luncheon, while Aunt Bell had withdrawn into the silence, there to meditate the first letters of the alphabet of the inexpressible, to hover about the pleasant line that divides the normal from the subliminal.
Though bruised and torn, Nancy was still grimly upright in the eye of duty, still a worthy follower of orthodox ways. Buried in her own eventful thoughts in that mind-world where love is born and dies, where beliefs rise and perish but no sound ever disturbs the stillness, she made her way along the shaded side of the street toward the Wyeth residence. Not until she had pa.s.sed several doors beyond the house did she recall her errand, remember that her walk led to a goal, that she herself had matters in hand other than thinking, thinking, thinking.
Retracing her steps, she rang the bell and asked for Mrs. Eversley.
Before the servant could reply, Mrs. Wyeth rustled prettily down the hall from the library at the back. She wore a gown of primrose yellow.
An unwonted animation lighted the cold perfection of her face, like fire seen through ice.
"_So_ glad to see you!" she said with graceful effusion--"And the Doctor? And that queer, fascinating, puzzling brother of yours, how are they? So glad! Yes, poor sister keeps to her room and you really mustn"t linger with me an instant. I"m not even going to ask you to sit down. Go right up. Her door"s at the end of the hall, you know. You"ll comfort the poor thing beautifully, you dear!"
She paused for breath, a vivid smile taking the place of words. Mrs.
Linford, rendered oddly, almost obstinately reserved by this excessive cordiality, was conscious of something unnatural in that smile--a too great intensity, like the greenness of artificial palms.
"Thank you so much for coming, you angel," she went on playfully, "for doubtless I shall not be visible when you go. You see Donald"s off in the back of the house re-arranging whole shelves of wretched, dusty books and he fancies that he must have my suggestions."
"The door at the end of the hall!" she trilled in sweet but unmistakable dismissal, one arm pointing gracefully aloft from its enveloping foam of draperies, that same too-intense smile upon the Greek face that even Nancy, in moments of humane expansion, had admitted to be all but faultless. And the latter, wondering not a little at the stiff disposition to have her quickly away, which she had somehow divined through all the gushing cordiality of Mrs. Wyeth"s manner, went on upstairs. As she rapped at Mrs. Eversley"s door, the bell of the street door sounded in her ears.
Somewhat less than an hour after, she came softly out again, opening and closing the door noiselessly. So effectually had she soothed the invalid, that the latter had fallen into a much-needed sleep, and Nancy, eager to escape to that mind-world where the happenings are so momentous and the silence is so tense, had crept like a mouse from the room.
At the top of the stairs she paused to gather up her skirts. Then her ears seemed to catch the sound of voices on the floor below and she remained motionless for a second, listening. She had no desire to encounter for the second time the torrent of Mrs. Wyeth"s manner, no wish to meet unnecessarily one so disagreeably gifted in the art of arousing in her an aversion of which she was half ashamed.
No further sound greeted her straining ears, and, deciding that the way was clear, she descended the thickly carpeted stairs. Near the bottom, opposite the open doors of the front drawing-room, she paused to look into the big mirror on the opposite wall. As she turned her head for a final touch to the back of her veil, her eyes became alive to something in that corner of the room now revealed to her by the mirror--something that held her frozen with embarra.s.sment.
Though the room lay in the dusk of drawn curtains, the gown of Mrs.
Wyeth showed unmistakably--Mrs. Wyeth abandoned to the close, still embrace of an unrecognized man.
Distressed at the awkwardness of her position, Nancy hesitated, not knowing whether to retreat or go forward. She had decided to go on, observing nothing--and of course she _had_ observed nothing save an agreeable incident in the oft impugned domesticity of Mr. and Mrs.
Wyeth--when a further revelation arrested her.
Even as she put her foot to the next step, the face of Mrs. Wyeth was lifted and Mrs. Wyeth"s big eyes fastened upon hers through the impartial mirror. But their expression was not that of the placid matron observed in a pa.s.sage of conjugal tenderness. Rather, it was one of acute dismay--almost fear. Poor Mrs. Weyth, who had just said, "Doubtless I shall not be visible when you go!"
Even as she caught this look, Nancy started down the remaining steps, her cheeks hot from her own wretched awkwardness. She wanted to hurry--to run; she might still escape without having reason to suspect that the obscured person was other than he should be in the opinion of an exacting world. Then, as her hand was at the door, while the silken rustling of that hurried disentanglement was in her ears, the voice of Wyeth sounded remotely from the rear of the house. It seemed to come from far back in the library, removed from them by the length of the double drawing-rooms--a comfortable, smooth, high-pitched voice--lazy, drawling--
"Oh, _Linford!_"
_Linford!_ The name seemed to sink into the stillness of the great house, leaving no ripple behind. Before an answer to the call could come, she had opened the great door and pulled it sharply to behind her.
Outside, she lingered a moment as if in serenely absent contemplation of the street, with the air of one who sought to recall her next engagement. Then, gathering up her skirts, she went leisurely down the steps and pa.s.sed unhurriedly from the view of those dismayed eyes that she felt upon her from the Wyeth window.
On the avenue she turned north and was presently alone in a shaded aisle of the park--that park whose very trees and shrubs seem to have taken on a hard, knowing look from having been so long made the recipients of cynical confidences. They seemed to understand perfectly what had happened, to echo Wyeth"s high-pitched, friendly drawl, with an added touch of mockery that was all their own--"Oh--Linford!"
CHAPTER XVII
FOR THE SAKE OF NANCY
It was toward six o"clock when she ascended the steps of the rectory.
Bernal, coming from the opposite direction, met her at the door. Back of his glance, as they came together, was an intimation of hidden things, and at sight of him she was smitten by an electric flash of wonder. The voice of Wyeth, that friendly, untroubled voice, she now remembered had called to no specific Linford. In the paralysis of embarra.s.sment that had seized her in that darkened hallway, she had failed to recall that there were at least two Linfords in existence. In an instant her inner world, wrought into something like order in the past two hours, was again chaos.
"Why, Nance--you look like night, when there are no stars--what is it?"
He scanned her with an a.s.sumption of jesting earnestness, palpably meant to conceal some deeper emotion. She put a detaining hand on his arm as he was about to turn the key in the lock.
"Bernal, I haven"t time to be indirect, or beat about, or anything--so forgive the abruptness--were you at Mrs. Wyeth"s this afternoon?"
His ear caught the unusual note in her voice, and he was at once concerned with this rather than with her question.
"Why, what is it, Nance--what if I was? Are you seeing another Gratcher?"
"Bernal, quick, now--please! Don"t worry me needlessly! Were you at Mrs.
Wyeth"s to-day?"
Her eyes searched his face. She saw that he was still either puzzled or confused, but this time he answered plainly,