She surprised him by bursting into tears. "Oh, Claude, don"t be cross with me. Don"t say what you said the last time you were cross--that you"d go away and never come back again. If you did that I should die. I couldn"t live. I should kill myself."
There followed one of the scenes of soothing in which Claude was specially adept, and which he specially enjoyed. The pleasure was so exquisite that he prolonged it, so that by the time he emerged from the hothouse Jasper Fay was standing in the yard.
As the old man"s back was turned, Claude endeavored to slip by, un.o.bserved and silent. He succeeded in the silence, but not in being un.o.bserved. Glancing over his shoulder, he saw the dim figure d.o.g.g.i.ng him as it had dogged him on a former occasion, with the bizarre, sinister suggestion of a beast about to spring.
Claude could afford to smile at so absurd an idea in connection with poor old Fay, but his nerves were shaken by certain pa.s.sionate, desperate utterances he had just heard from Rosie. She was in general so prudent, so self-controlled, that he had hardly expected to see her give way either in weeping or in words. She had broken down in both respects, while his nature was so responsive that he felt as if he had broken down himself. In the way of emotions it had been delicious, wonderful. It was a revelation of the degree to which the little creature loved him. It was a sensation in itself to be loved like that. It struck him as a strange, new discovery that in such a love there was a value not to be reckoned by money or measured by social refinements. New, strange harmonies swept through the aeolian harp of his being--harmonies both tragic and exultant by which he felt himself subdued. It came to him conclusively that if in marrying Rosie there would be many things to forego, there would at least be compensation.
And yet he shivered at the stealthy creeping behind him of the shadowy old man, by whom he felt instinctively that he was hated.
CHAPTER XX
Claude found it a vivid and curious contrast to dine that evening with the Darlings and their sophisticated friends. The friends were even more sophisticated than Claude himself, since they had more money, had traveled more, and in general lived in a broader world. But Claude knew that it was in him to reach their standards and go beyond them. All he needed was the opportunity; and opportunity to a handsome young American of good antecedents like himself is rarely wanting. He never took in that fact so clearly as on this night.
He was glad that he had not been placed next to Elsie at table, for the reason that he felt some treachery to Rosie in his being there at all.
Conversely, in the light of Thor"s judgment, he felt some treachery to Elsie that he should come to her with Rosie"s kisses on his lips. Not that he owed her any explanations--from one point of view. Considering the broad lat.i.tude of approach and withdrawal allowed to American young people, and the possibility of playing fast and loose with some amount of mutual comprehension, he owed her no explanations whatever; but the fact remained that she was expressing a measure of willingness to be Juliet to his Romeo in braving the mute antagonism that existed between their respective families. As far as that went, he knew he was unwelcome to the Darlings; but he knew, too, that Elsie"s favor carried over her parents" heads the point of his coming and going. It was conceivable that she might carry over their heads a point more important still if he were to urge her.
To the Claude who was it seemed lamentable that he couldn"t urge her; but to the Claude who might be there were higher things than the gratification of fastidious social tastes, and for the moment that Claude had some hope of the ascendant. It was that Claude who spoke when, after dinner, the men had rejoined the ladies.
"Your mother doesn"t like my coming here."
Elsie threw him one of her frank, flying glances. "Well, she"s asked you, hasn"t she?"
He smiled. "She only asked me at the last minute. I can see some other fellow must have dropped out."
"You can see it because it"s a dinner-party of elderly people to which you naturally wouldn"t be invited unless there had been the place to fill. That constantly happens when people entertain as much as we do.
But it isn"t a slight to be asked to come to the rescue. It"s a compliment. You never ask people to do that unless you count them as real friends."
He insisted on his point. "I don"t suppose it was her idea."
"You mean it was mine; but even if it was, it comes to the same thing.
She asked you. She needn"t have done it."
He still insisted. "She did it, but she didn"t want to." He added, lowering his voice significantly, "And she was right."
He forced himself to return her gaze, which rested on him with unabashed inquiry. Everything about her was unabashed. She was free from the conventional manners of maidendom, not as one who has been emanc.i.p.ated from them, but as one who has never had them. She might have belonged to a generation that had outgrown the need for them, as perhaps she did.
Shyness, coyness, and emphasized reserve formed no part of her equipment; but, on the other hand, she was clear--clear with a kind of crystalline clearness, in eyes, in complexion, and in the staccato quality of her voice.
"She"s right--how?"
"Right--because I oughtn"t to come. I"m--I"m not free to come."
"Do you mean--?" She paused, not because she was embarra.s.sed, but only to find the right words. She kept her eyes on his with a candor he could do nothing but reciprocate. "Do you mean that you"re bound--elsewhere?"
He nodded. "That"s it."
"Oh!" She withdrew her eyes at last, letting her gaze wander vaguely over the music-room, about which the other guests were seated. They were lined on gilded settees against the white French-paneled walls, while a young man played Chopin"s Ballade in A flat on a grand piano in the far corner. Not being in the music-room itself, but in the large, square hall outside, the two young people could talk in low tones without disturbing the company. If she betrayed emotion it was only in the nervousness with which she tapped her closed fan against the palm of her left hand. Her eyes came back to his face. "I"m glad you"ve told me."
He took a virtuous tone. "I think those things ought to be--to be open and aboveboard."
"Oh, of course. The wonder is that I shouldn"t have heard it. One generally does."
"Oh, well, you wouldn"t in this case."
"Isn"t it anybody--about here?"
"It"s some one about here, but not any one you would have heard of. She lives in our village. She"s the daughter of a--well, of a market-gardener."
"How interesting! And you"re in love with her?" But because of what she saw in his face she went on quickly: "No; I won"t ask you that. Don"t answer. Of course you"re in love with her. _I_ think it"s splendid--a man with your"--chances was the word that suggested itself, but she made it future--"a man with your future to fall in love with a girl like that."
There was a bright glow in her face to which he tried to respond. He said that which, owing to its implications, he could not have said to any other girl in the world, but could say to her because of her twentieth-century freedom from the artificial. "Now you see why I shouldn"t come."
She gave a little a.s.senting nod. "Yes; perhaps you"d better not--for a while--not quite so often, at any rate. By and by, I dare say, we shall get everything on another--another basis--and then--"
She rose, so that he followed her example; but he shook his head. "No, we sha"n"t. There won"t be any other basis."
She took this with her usual sincerity. "Well, perhaps not. I don"t suppose we can really tell yet. We must just--see. When he stops," she added, with scarcely a change of tone, as she moved away from him, "do go over and talk to Mrs. Boyce. She likes attentions from young men."
What Claude chiefly retained of his brief conversation was the approval in the words, "_I_ think it"s splendid." He thought it splendid himself.
He felt positive now that if he had pressed his suit--if he had been free to press it--he might one day have been treading this polished floor not as guest, but as master. There were no difficulties in the way that couldn"t easily be overcome, if he and Elsie had been of a mind to do it--and she would have a good fifty thousand a year! Yes, it was splendid; there was no other word for it. He was giving up this brilliant future for the sake of little Rosie Fay--and counting the world well lost.
The sense of self-approval was so strong in him that as he traveled homeward he felt the great moment to have come. He must keep his word; he must be a gentleman. He was flattered by the glimpse he had got of Elsie Darling"s heart; and yet the fact that she might have come to love him acted on him as an incentive, rather than the contrary, to carrying out his plans. She would see him in a finer, n.o.bler light. As long as she lived, and even when she had married some one else, she would keep her dream of him as the magnificently romantic chap who could love a village maid and be true to her.
And he did love a village maid! He knew that now by certain infallible signs. He knew it by the very meagerness of his regret in giving up Elsie Darling and all that the winning of her would have implied. He knew it by the way he thrilled when he thought of Rosie"s body trembling against his, as it had trembled that afternoon. He knew it by the wild tingle of his nerves when she shuddered at the name of Thor. That is, he thought she had shuddered; but of course she hadn"t! What had she to shudder at? He was brought up against that question every time the unreasoning fear of Thor possessed him. He knew the fear to be unreasoning. However possible it might be to suspect Rosie--and a man was always ready to suspect the woman he loved!--to suspect Thor was absurd. If in the matter of Rosie"s dowry Thor was "acting queerly,"
there was an explanation of that queerness which would do him credit. Of that no one who knew Thor could have any question and at the same time keep his common sense. Claude couldn"t deny that he was jealous; but when he came to a.n.a.lyze his pa.s.sion in that respect he found it nothing but a dread lest his own supineness might allow Rosie to be s.n.a.t.c.hed away from him. He had been dilly-dallying over what he should have clinched. He had been afraid of the sacrifice he would be compelled to make, without realizing, as he realized to-night, that Rosie would be worth it. No later than to-morrow he would buy a license and a wedding-ring, and, if possible, marry her in the evening. Before the fact accomplished difficulties--and G.o.d knew there were a lot of them!--would smooth themselves away.
As he left the tram-car at the village terminus he was too excited to go home at once, so he pa.s.sed his own gate and went on toward Thor"s. It was not yet late. He could hear Thor"s voice reading aloud as the maid admitted him, and could follow the words while he took off his overcoat and silk hat and laid them carefully on one of the tapestried chairs. He still followed them as he straightened his cravat before the gla.s.s, pulled down his white waistcoat, and smoothed his hair.
""Christ"s mission, therefore,"" Thor read on, ""was not to relieve poverty, but to do away with it. It was to do away with it not by abolition, but by evolution. It is clear that to Christ poverty was not a disease, but a symptom--a symptom of a sick body politic. To suppress the symptom without undertaking the cure of the whole body would have been false to the thoroughness of His methods.""
Claude appeared on the threshold. Lois smiled. Thor looked up.
"h.e.l.lo, Claude! Come in. Just wait a minute. Reading Vibart"s _Christ and Poverty_. Only a few lines more to the end of the chapter. "To the teaching of Christ,"" Thor continued, ""belongs the discovery that the causes of poverty are economic only in the second place, and moral in the first. Economic conditions are shifting, changing vitally within the s.p.a.ce of a generation. Nothing is permanent but the moral, as nothing is effectual. Thou shalt love the Lord thy G.o.d with all thy heart and with all thy soul and with all thy mind, and thy neighbor as thyself; on these two commandments hang all the law and the prophets. On these two commandments hangs also the solution of the problems of poverty, seeing that a race that obeys them finds no such problems confronting it. In proportion to the spread of moral obedience these problems tend to disappear. They were never so near to disappearing as now, when the moral sense has become alive to them.""
Claude smoked a cigar while they sat and talked. It was talk in which he personally took little share, but from which he sought to learn whether or not Thor was satisfied with what he had done. If there was any _arriere pensee_, he thought he might detect it by looking on. It was a pleasant scene, Lois with her sewing, Thor with his book. The library had the characteristic of American libraries in general, of being the most cheerful room in the house.
"What I complain of in all this," Thor said, tossing the book on the table, "is the intermediary suffering. It does no good to the starving of to-day to know that in another thousand years men will have so grasped the principles of Christ that want will be abolished."
Lois smiled over her sewing. "You might as well say that it does no good to the people who have to walk to-day, or travel by trains and motors, to know that in a hundred years the common method of getting about will probably be by flying. This writer lays it down as a principle that there"s a rate for human progress, and that it"s no use expecting man to get on faster than he has the power to go."
"I don"t expect him to get on faster than he has the power to go. I only want him to go faster than he"s going."
"Haven"t you seen others, who wanted the same thing, dragging people off their feet, with the result that legs or necks were broken?"