Deering, said that she had been reminded of Louis XVI leaving his family for the scaffold. But when I saw them five minutes later (you could still hear the far-off coughing of the northbound train) only Hurry looked grave, while Jock and his mother were ill.u.s.trating to perfection the old adage, "Out of sight out of mind."
They did not look like a mother and her children, but like a big sister with her very littlest brother and sister. Hurry, sitting in the middle, was being allowed to hold the reins and the whip. She was in her usual hurry, and you could see at a glance that over any actual use of the whip friction was constantly arising. Under the runabout could be seen the thin dangling legs of Cornelius Twombly. I waved and shouted. Mrs. Fulton and Jock waved and shouted back, and Hurry seized the opportunity to strike cunningly with the whip. The horse lurched sharply forward, the three handsome bare heads jerked sharply back, and upon two wheels, in dust and laughter, they rounded the nearest corner and vanished.
I was going nowhere in particular, and so I turned my pony and trotted after them. If they came to grief, I thought, I owed it to Fulton to be on hand to pick up the pieces. But I didn"t really expect to be useful. I caught them just as they pulled up in front of their house, and within a minute Hurry had commandeered me to ride her round the block, so I took her up in front, and we had a fine ride; then Jock, looking wistful, had to have his turn, and after that I was ordered to leave my pony and come see the new sand pile and the new puppy. Mrs.
Fulton had gone into the house and left me to my fate, so I gave a hand to Jock and a hand to Hurry, and they dragged me to their own particular playground, and made me build King Solomon"s palace in the "b.u.t.terfly that Stamped," and plant a whole palace garden with sprigs of box and Carolina cherry. And I built and planted with all my might, and it was a lot of fun, until suddenly Hurry crawled into my lap, and laid her head against me and went to sleep.
"You mustn"t mind her," said Jock, "she"s only a little baby."
I didn"t mind her a bit; but somehow she had taken all the fun out of me, and made me feel more serious and tender than I liked. I made her as comfortable as I could, and presently my own crossed legs began to go to sleep; the new puppy made a hunter-like dash into the nearest shrubbery, Jock caught up his bow and arrow and followed, the children"s nurse scuttled off toward the kitchen wing for a cup of tea, and I was generally abandoned to my fate.
Once or twice Hurry twitched sharply as all young animals do in sleep; and once she shook her head quite sharply as if a dream had required something of her and been denied. Then she turned her face upward so that it was in the full glare of the sun and because I had no hat I shielded it with my hand.
Then very quietly came Lucy Fulton and stood looking down at us, and I looked up at her, and in that exchange of glances was promoted from an acquaintance to an old and intimate friend of the family. Thereafter we did not have to make new beginnings of conversations, but could if we chose resume where we had left off.
Hurry waked as suddenly as she had gone to sleep, and Lucy made her thank me for taking such good care of her. But when it was time for me to get up out of the hot sand, I couldn"t at first because of the soundly sleeping legs, and when I managed it, it was for Hurry"s benefit, with a great, and I hope, humorous exaggeration of the pains and difficulties.
I don"t know why I drank so many c.o.c.ktails that night before dinner, nor so much champagne at dinner, nor so many whiskies afterward. I had neither made a heavy killing at the races, nor met with disaster. If the day differed from other days it was only in this, that I had received the confidence of a little child and her mother; that this confidence had touched my heart very nearly, and given me the wish to be of use to those two, and if necessary to sacrifice my selfish self for them. Feeling then that I was a better man than I had thought myself, elated with that thought, and almost upon the brink of good resolutions, I cut into a rubber of bridge, and began to drink c.o.c.ktails. Why, I shall never know. Let those who drink explain and understand, each to himself, and let those who don"t drink despise and condemn, publicly, as is usual with them.
VI
I was feeling very sentimental by the time I got to bed. I had had a long, and I suppose maudlin, talk with Harry Colemain on the beauties of matrimony. We had maintained the Fultons against all comers, as our ideal example of that inst.i.tution.
"Just think," I said, "this very night is the first one that John has been away from her since they were married. That"s going some. That"s some record. He boarded the train like a man mounting the scaffold to have his head chopped off."
I almost cried over the touching picture which I felt I had drawn.
"There aren"t many couples like them," Harry agreed wistfully. "But I bet even you and I had it in us to be decent and faithful if we"d ever struck the right girl. Those things are the purest luck, and we"ve been unlucky. But it makes me sick to be as old as we are, and no nearer _home_ than the day we left college."
"When that baby was asleep in my lap--did I tell you about that?"
"Twice," said Harry mournfully.
I didn"t believe him, and related the episode again. "It was wonderful," I said; "she was like a little stove with a fire in it.
She made me feel so trusted and tender that I could have put back my head and bawled like a wolf. Think of having babies like that for your very own, and a wife like Lucy Fulton thrown in."
"She could have married most anybody," said Harry, "but she took a poor man and a rank outsider because she--hic--loved him. That"s the kind of girl she is! Why n.o.body ever thought she"d settle to anybody. I bet she broke her word to half a dozen men, before she gave it to Fulton and kept it."
"I wouldn"t call him exactly an outsider," I said; "anyway she"s made an insider of him. Everybody likes him, and admires him. I never thought much of him at school, but I think he"s a peach now. And he understands everything you say to him."
"He understands a good deal more than we"ll ever be able to say to him.
_He"s_ got brains. Evelyn Gray is staying with them."
"I know she is. I dined there last night. She"s looking very pretty."
"She _is_ pretty," said Harry, "and she"s got pretty hands and feet; most pretty women haven"t. It"s usually the woman with a face that would stop a clock that has pretty feet."
"Like Mrs. Deering," I suggested.
"Exactly," he said. "But Deering is no fool."
"How do you mean he isn"t a fool?"
"Why," said Harry, "he makes her sleep with her feet on the pillow."
This struck me as very funny, and I laughed until I had forgotten what I was laughing at. Harry got laughing, too, after a while. He put his whole soul in it. Then we ordered two bottles of ale and had some fat wood put on the fire, and watched it roar and sputter with flame as only fat wood can. After much meditation and a swallow of the fresh-brought ale, my mind began to harp on Evelyn Gray, and to magnify her good looks and attractions. So I said:
"Harry, why don"t _you_ marry Evelyn?"
For a moment he scowled at the fire. Then he spoke in a bitter voice.
"Suppose _I_ wanted to, and _she_ wanted to," he said, "still we couldn"t."
"Why not?" I asked innocently, expecting, I think, that his phrase was some sort of a conundrum.
"Why, Archie, my boy," he said, and his scowl faded to a look of weariness and disgust, "it looks as if I might have to marry somebody else."
"Not----?"
He nodded. And presently he said, "It will be best for her--of course."
"But I haven"t heard even a rumor. Has he started anything?"
"No. He"s a decentish little chap. He"s trying to make up his mind whether to divorce her or be divorced himself. It hinges on the children. If he divorces her he"ll get them, and if he lets himself be divorced, she will."
"It"s big trouble, Harry!"
"Yes. For we are sick and tired of each other. I"d rather like to blow my head off."
"But if she divorces him, you needn"t marry her."
He rose slowly to his full height and held out his hand. "I"m going to turn in," he said. "Good night."
"Good night, Harry. I"m sorry for you, you know that."
"I only have my deserts," he said. "Sensible men, like you, steer clear of family complications."
When he had gone I had another bottle of ale in front of the fire, and from thinking of Harry, I got to thinking of how well ale seemed to go on top of whiskey, and to congratulating myself on my strong head and stomach. "n.o.body," I thought complacently, "would suspect that I had been drinking." Then I got to thinking once more about Evelyn Gray.
It was time I settled down, why not with Evelyn--if only to prove to her that the truths she had told me about myself weren"t true? I began to fancy that I had in me all the qualities that go to make the ideal husband, and that in Evelyn were to be found all the qualities which make the ideal wife. I could have wept to think what a good sportsman she was, and how Pilgrim-father honest.
On her writing-desk my mother has three little monkeys carved in ivory.
One has his hands clapped to his ears, one to his eyes, and the other to his mouth. Their names are "Hear no Evil," "See no Evil," and "Speak no Evil."
I have to pa.s.s her door to get to my room. But late at night that door is never left ajar. She is not the kind of mother who puts in a sudden (and wholly accidental!) appearance when her son is coming home a little the worse for wear. She has never seen me the worse for wear (and I"m not very often), and if she has her way (and I have mine) she never will.
"What in thunderation started _you_ last night?" said my father at breakfast.