Once again Sally stopped crying. If only she could hold that smile before her, all might yet be well. Whenever she looked into his eyes and thought them tender, she must remember that smile. Whenever his voice tempted her against her reason, she must remember that--for to-night, anyhow; and to-morrow he must go back. Either that or she would leave. She could not endure this very long--certainly not for eleven days.
"Sally--where are you?"
It was Mrs. Halliday"s voice from downstairs.
"I"m coming," she answered.
The supper was more of an epicurean than a social success. Mrs.
Halliday had made hot biscuit, and opened a jar of strawberry preserves, and sliced a cold chicken which she had originally intended for to-morrow"s dinner; but, in spite of that, she was forced to sit by and watch her two guests do scarcely more than nibble.
"I declare, I don"t think young folks eat as much as they useter in my days," she commented.
Don tried to excuse himself by referring to a late dinner at Portland; but Sally, as usual, had no excuse whatever. She was forced to endure in silence the searching inquiry of Mrs. Halliday"s eyes as well as Don"s. For the half-hour they were at table she heartily wished she was back again in her own room in New York. There, at least, she would have been free to shut herself up, away from all eyes but her own.
Moreover, she had to look forward to what she should do at the end of the meal. For all she saw, she was going to be then in even a worse plight than she was now. For he would be able to talk, and she must needs answer and keep from crying. Above all things else, she must keep from crying. She did not wish him to think her a little fool as well as other things.
She was forced to confess that after the first five minutes Don did his best to relieve the tension. He talked to Mrs. Halliday about one thing and another, and kept on talking. And, though it was quite evident to her that he had no appet.i.te, he managed to consume three of the hot biscuit. After supper, when she rose to help her aunt in the kitchen, he wished also to help. But Mrs. Halliday would have neither of them. That made it bad for her again, for it left her with no alternative but to sit again upon the front porch with him. So there they were again, right back where they started.
"What did you run into the house for?" he demanded.
"Please let"s not talk any more, of that," she pleaded.
"But it"s the nub of the whole matter," he insisted.
"I went in because I did not want to talk any more."
"Very well. Then you needn"t talk. But you can listen, can"t you?"
"That"s the same thing."
"It"s exactly the opposite thing. You can listen, and just nod or shake your head. Then you won"t have to speak a word. Will you do that?"
It was an absurd proposition, but she was forced either to accept it or to run away again. Somehow, it did not appear especially dignified to keep on running away, when in the end she must needs come back again. So she nodded.
"Let"s go back to the beginning," he suggested. "That"s somewhere toward the middle of my senior year. I"d known Frances before that, but about that time she came on to Boston, and we went to a whole lot of dances and things together."
He paused a moment.
"I wish I"d brought a picture of her with me," he resumed thoughtfully, "because she"s really a peach."
Miss Winthrop looked up quickly. He was apparently serious.
"She"s tall and dark and slender," he went on, "and when she"s all togged up she certainly looks like a queen. She had a lot of friends in town, and we kept going about four nights a week. Then came the ball games, and then Cla.s.s Day. You ever been to Cla.s.s Day?"
Miss Winthrop shook her head with a quick little jerk.
"It"s all music and j.a.panese lanterns, and if you"re sure of your degree it"s a sort of fairyland where nothing is quite real. You just feel at the time that it"s always going to be like that. It was then I asked her to marry me."
Miss Winthrop was sitting with her chin in her hands, looking intently at the brick path leading to the house.
"You listening?"
She nodded jerkily.
"It seemed all right then. And it seemed all right after that.
Stuyvesant was agreeable enough, and so I came on to New York. Then followed Dad"s death. Dad was a queer sort, but he was square as a die. I"m sorry he went before he had a chance to meet you. I didn"t realize what good pals we were until afterward. But, anyway, he died, and he tied the property all up as I"ve told you. Maybe he thought if he didn"t I"d blow it in, because I see now I"d been getting rid of a good many dollars. I went to Frances and told her all about it, and offered to cancel the engagement. But she was a good sport and said she"d wait until I earned ten thousand a year. You listening?"
She nodded.
"Because it"s right here you come in. I was going to get it inside a year, and you know just about how much chance I stood. But it looked easy to her, because her father was pulling down about that much a month, and not killing himself either. I didn"t know any more about it than she did; but the difference between us was that as soon as I was on the inside I learned a lot she didn"t learn. I learned how hard it is to get ten thousand a year; more than that, I learned how unnecessary it is to get it. That"s what you taught me."
"I--I didn"t mean to," she interrupted.
"You"re talking," he reminded her.
She closed her lips firmly together.
"Whether you meant to or not isn"t the point. You did teach me that and a lot of other things. I didn"t know it at the time, and went plugging ahead, thinking everything was just the same when it wasn"t at all. Frances was headed one way and I was headed another. Then she went abroad, and after that I learned faster than ever. I learned what a home can be made to mean, and work can be made to mean, and life can be made to mean. All those things you were teaching me. I didn"t know it, and you didn"t know it, and Frances didn"t know it. That ten thousand grew less and less important to me, and all the while I thought it must be growing less and less important to her. I thought that way after the walks in the park and the walks in the country and that night at Coney."
She shuddered.
"I thought it even after she came back--even after my talk with Stuyvesant. He told me I was a fool and that Frances wouldn"t listen to me. I didn"t believe him and put it up to her. And then--for the first time--I saw that what I had been learning she had not been learning."
Don turned and looked at the girl by his side. It was growing dark now, so that he could not see her very well; but he saw that she was huddled up as he had found her that day in the little restaurant.
"Frances didn"t have the nerve to come with me," he said. "Her father stood in the way, and she couldn"t get by him. I want to be fair about this. At the beginning, if she"d come with me I"d have married her--though Lord knows how it would have worked out. But she didn"t dare--and she"s a pretty good sport, too. There"s a lot in her she doesn"t know anything about. It would do her good to know you."
Again he paused. It was as if he were trying hard to keep his balance.
"I want her to know you," he went on. "Because, after all, it was she who made me see you. There, in a second, in the park, she pointed you out to me, until you stood before me as clear as the star by the Big Dipper. She said, "It"s some other girl you"re seeing in me--a girl who would dare to go hungry with you." Then I knew. So I came right to you."
She was still huddled up.
"And here I am," he concluded.
There he was. He did not need to remind her of that. Even when she closed her eyes so that she might not see him, she was aware of it.
Even when he was through talking and she did not hear his voice, she was aware of it. And, though she was miserable about it, she would have been more miserable had he been anywhere else.
"I"m here, little girl," he said patiently.
"Even after I told you to go away," she choked.
"Even after you told me to go away."
"If you only hadn"t come at all!"
"What else was there for me to do?"
"You--you could have gone to that camp with her. She wanted you to go."