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@@ -0,0 +1,1314 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of The Yates Pride, by Mary E. Wilkins Freeman + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: The Yates Pride + +Author: Mary E. Wilkins Freeman + +Posting Date: August 10, 2008 [EBook #978] +Release Date: July, 1997 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE YATES PRIDE *** + + + + +Produced by Judith Boss + + + + + +THE YATES PRIDE + +A ROMANCE + +By Mary E. Wilkins Freeman + + + + +PART I + + +Opposite Miss Eudora Yates's old colonial mansion was the perky modern +Queen Anne residence of Mrs. Joseph Glynn. Mrs. Glynn had a daughter, +Ethel, and an unmarried sister, Miss Julia Esterbrook. All three were +fond of talking, and had many callers who liked to hear the feebly +effervescent news of Wellwood. This afternoon three ladies were there: +Miss Abby Simson, Mrs. John Bates, and Mrs. Edward Lee. They sat in the +Glynn sitting-room, which shrilled with treble voices as if a flock of +sparrows had settled therein. + +The Glynn sitting-room was charming, mainly because of the quantity +of flowering plants. Every window was filled with them, until the room +seemed like a conservatory. Ivy, too, climbed over the pictures, and the +mantel-shelf was a cascade of wandering Jew, growing in old china vases. + +"Your plants are really wonderful, Mrs. Glynn," said Mrs. Bates, "but I +don't see how you manage to get a glimpse of anything outside the house, +your windows are so full of them." + +"Maybe she can see and not be seen," said Abby Simson, who had a quick +wit and a ready tongue. + +Mrs. Joseph Glynn flushed a little. "I have not the slightest curiosity +about my neighbors," she said, "but it is impossible to live just across +the road from any house without knowing something of what is going on, +whether one looks or not," said she, with dignity. + +"Ma and I never look out of the windows from curiosity," said Ethel +Glynn, with spirit. Ethel Glynn had a great deal of spirit, which was +evinced in her personal appearance as well as her tongue. She had an +eye to the fashions; her sleeves were never out of date, nor was the +arrangement of her hair. + +"For instance," said Ethel, "we never look at the house opposite because +we are at all prying, but we do know that that old maid has been doing a +mighty queer thing lately." + +"First thing you know you will be an old maid yourself, and then your +stones will break your own glass house," said Abby Simson. + +"Oh, I don't care," retorted Ethel. "Nowadays an old maid isn't an old +maid except from choice, and everybody knows it. But it must have been +different in Miss Eudora's time. Why, she is older than you are, Miss +Abby." + +"Just five years," replied Abby, unruffled, "and she had chances, and I +know it." + +"Why didn't she take them, then?" + +"Maybe," said Abby, "girls had choice then as much as now, but I never +could make out why she didn't marry Harry Lawton." + +Ethel gave her head a toss. "Maybe," said she, "once in a while, even so +long ago, a girl wasn't so crazy to get married as folks thought. Maybe +she didn't want him." + +"She did want him," said Abby. "A girl doesn't get so pale and +peaked-looking for nothing as Eudora Yates did, after she had dismissed +Harry Lawton and he had gone away, nor haunt the post-office as she used +to, and, when she didn't get a letter, go away looking as if she would +die." + +"Maybe," said Ethel, "her folks were opposed." + +"Nobody ever opposed Eudora Yates except her own self," replied Abby. +"Her father was dead, and Eudora's ma thought the sun rose and set +in her. She would never have opposed her if she had wanted to marry a +foreign duke or the old Harry himself." + +"I remember it perfectly," said Mrs. Joseph Glynn. + +"So do I," said Julia Esterbrook. + +"Don't see why you shouldn't. You were plenty old enough to have your +memory in good working order if it was ever going to be," said Abby +Simson. + +"Well," said Ethel, "it is the funniest thing I ever heard of. If a girl +wanted a man enough to go all to pieces over him, and he wanted her, why +on earth didn't she take him?" + +"Maybe they quarreled," ventured Mrs. Edward Lee, who was a mild, +sickly-looking woman and seldom expressed an opinion. + +"Well, that might have been," agreed Abby, "although Eudora always had +the name of having a beautiful disposition." + +"I have always found," said Mrs. Joseph Glynn, with an air of wisdom, +"that it is the beautiful dispositions which are the most set the minute +they get a start the wrong way. It is the always-flying-out people who +are the easiest to get on with in the long run." + +"Well," said Abby, "maybe that is so, but folks might get worn all to a +frazzle by the flying-out ones before the long run. I'd rather take my +chances with a woman like Eudora. She always seems just so, just as calm +and sweet. When the Ames's barn, that was next to hers, burned down and +the wind was her way, she just walked in and out of her house, carrying +the things she valued most, and she looked like a picture--somehow she +had got all dressed fit to make calls--and there wasn't a muscle of her +face that seemed to move. Eudora Yates is to my mind the most beautiful +woman in this town, old or young, I don't care who she is." + +"I suppose," said Julia Esterbrook, "that she has a lot of money." + +"I wonder if she has," said Mrs. John Bates. + +The others stared at her. "What makes you think she hasn't?" Mrs. Glynn +inquired, sharply. + +"Nothing," said Mrs. Bates, and closed her thin lips. She would say no +more, but the others had suspicions, because her husband, John Bates, +was a wealthy business man. + +"I can't believe she has lost her money," said Mrs. Glynn. "She wouldn't +have been such a fool as to do what she has if she hadn't money." + +"What has she done?" asked Mrs. Bates, eagerly. + +"What has she done?" asked Abby, and Mrs. Lee looked up inquiringly. + +The faces of Mrs. Glynn, her daughter, and her sister became important, +full of sly and triumphant knowledge. + +"Haven't you heard?" asked Mrs. Glynn. + +"Yes, haven't you?" asked Ethel. + +"Haven't any of you heard?" asked Julia Esterbrook. + +"No," admitted Abby, rather feebly. "I don't know as I have." + +"Do you mean about Eudora's going so often to the Lancaster girls' to +tea?" asked Mrs. John Bates, with a slight bridle of possible knowledge. + +"I heard of that," said Mrs. Lee, not to be outdone. + +"Land, no," replied Mrs. Glynn. "Didn't she always go there? It isn't +that. It is the most unheard-of thing she had done; but no woman, unless +she had plenty of money to bring it up, would have done it." + +"To bring what up?" asked Abby, sharply. Her eyes looked as small and +bright as needles. + +Julia regarded her with intense satisfaction. "What do women generally +bring up?" said she. + +"I don't know of anything they bring up, whether they have it or not, +except a baby," retorted Abby, sharply. + +Julia wilted a little; but her sister, Mrs. Glynn, was not perturbed. +She launched her thunderbolt of news at once, aware that the critical +moment had come, when the quarry of suspicion had left the bushes. + +"She has adopted a baby," said she, and paused like a woman who had +fired a gun, half scared herself and shrinking from the report. + +Ethel seconded her mother. "Yes," said she, "Miss Eudora has adopted a +baby, and she has a baby-carriage, and she wheels it out any time she +takes a notion." Ethel's speech was of the nature of an after-climax. +The baby-carriage weakened the situation. + +The other women seized upon the idea of the carriage to cover their +surprise and prevent too much gloating on the part of Mrs. Glynn, Ethel, +and Julia. + +"Is it a new carriage?" inquired Mrs. Lee. + +"No, it looks like one that came over in the ark," retorted Mrs. Glynn. +Then she repeated: "She has adopted a baby," but this time there was no +effect of an explosion. However, the treble chorus rose high, "Where did +she get the baby? Was it a boy or a girl? Why did she adopt it? Did it +cry much?" and other queries, none of which Mrs. Glynn, Ethel, and Julia +could answer very decidedly except the last. They all announced that the +adopted baby was never heard to cry at all. + +"Must be a very good child," said Abby. + +"Must be a very healthy child," said Mrs. Lee, who had had experience +with crying babies. + +"Well, she has it, anyhow," said Mrs. Glynn. + +Right upon the announcement came proof. The beautiful door of the old +colonial mansion opposite was thrown open, and clumsy and cautious +motion was evident. Presently a tall, slender woman came down the path +between the box borders, pushing a baby-carriage. It was undoubtedly a +very old carriage. It must have dated back to the fifties, if not +the forties. It was made of wood, with a leather buggy-top, and was +evidently very heavy. + +Abby eyed it shrewdly. "If I am not mistaken," said she, "that is the +very carriage Eudora herself was wheeled around in when she was a baby. +I am almost sure I have seen that identical carriage before. When we +were girls I used to go to the Yates house sometimes. Of course, it was +always very formal, a little tea-party for Eudora, with her mother on +hand, but I feel sure that I saw that carriage there one of those times. + +"I suppose it cost a lot of money, in the time of it. The Yateses always +got the very best for Eudora," said Julia. "And maybe Eudora goes about +so little she doesn't realize how out of date the carriage is, but I +should think it would be very heavy to wheel, especially if the baby is +a good-sized one." + +"It looks like a very large baby," said Ethel. "Of course, it is so +rolled up we can't tell." + +"Haven't you gone out and asked to see the baby?" said Abby. + +"Would we dare unless Eudora Yates offered to show it?" said Julia, with +a surprised air; and the others nodded assent. Then they all crowded to +the front windows and watched from behind the screens of green flowering +things. It was very early in the spring. Fairly hot days alternated with +light frosts. The trees were touched with sprays of rose and gold and +gold-green, but the wind still blew cold from the northern snows, and +the occupant of Eudora's ancient carriage was presumably wrapped well +to shelter it from harm. There was, in fact, nothing to be seen in the +carriage, except a large roll of blue and white, as Eudora emerged from +the yard and closed the iron gate of the tall fence behind her. + +Through this fence pricked the evergreen box, and the deep yard was full +of soft pastel tints of reluctantly budding trees and bushes. There was +one deep splash of color from a yellow bush in full bloom. + +Eudora paced down the sidewalk with a magnificent, stately gait. There +was something rather magnificent in her whole appearance. Her skirts of +old, but rich, black fabric swept about her long, advancing limbs; +she held her black-bonneted head high, as if crowned. She pushed the +cumbersome baby-carriage with no apparent effort. An ancient India shawl +was draped about her sloping shoulders. + +Eudora, as she passed the Glynn house, turned her face slightly, so that +its pure oval was evident. She was now a beauty in late middle life. Her +hair, of an indeterminate shade, swept in soft shadows over her ears; +her features were regular; her expression was at once regal and gentle. +A charm which was neither of youth nor of age reigned in her face; +her grace had surmounted with triumphant ease the slope of every year. +Eudora passed out of sight with the baby-carriage, lifting her proud +lady-head under the soft droop of the spring boughs; and her inspectors, +whom she had not seen, moved back from the Glynn windows with +exclamations of astonishment. + +"I wonder," said Abby, "whether she will have that baby call her ma or +aunty." + +Meantime Eudora passed down the village street until she reached the +Lancaster house, about half a mile away on the same side. There dwelt +the Misses Amelia and Anna Lancaster, who were about Eudora's age, and +a widowed sister, Mrs. Sophia Willing, who was much older. The Lancaster +house was also a colonial mansion, much after the fashion of Eudora's, +but it showed signs of continued opulence. Eudora's, behind her trees +and leafing vines, was gray for lack of paint. Some of the colonial +ornamental details about porches and roof were sloughing off or had +already disappeared. The Lancaster house gleamed behind its grove of +evergreen trees as white and perfect as in its youth. The windows showed +rich slants of draperies behind their green glister of old glass. + +A gardener, with a boy assistant, was at work in the grounds when Eudora +entered. He touched his cap. He was an old man who had lived with the +Lancasters ever since Eudora could remember. He advanced toward her now. +"Sha'n't Tommy push--the baby-carriage up to the house for you, Miss +Eudora?" he said, in his cracked old voice. + +Eudora flushed slightly, and, as if in response, the old man flushed, +also. "No, I thank you, Wilson," she said, and moved on. + +The boy, who was raking dry leaves, stood gazing at them with a shrewd, +whimsical expression. He was the old man's grandson. + +"Is that a boy or a girl kid, grandpa?" he inquired, when the gardener +returned. + +"Hold your tongue!" replied the old man, irascibly. Suddenly he seized +the boy by his two thin little shoulders with knotted old hands. + +"Look at here, Tommy, whatever you know, you keep your mouth shet, and +whatever you don't know, you keep your mouth shet, if you know what's +good for you," he said, in a fierce whisper. + +The boy whistled and shrugged his shoulders loose. "You know I ain't +goin' to tell tales, grandpa," he said, in a curiously manly fashion. + +The old man nodded. "All right, Tommy. I don't believe you be, nuther, +but you may jest as well git it through your head what's goin' to happen +if you do." + +"Ain't goin' to," returned the boy. He whistled charmingly as he raked +the leaves. His whistle sounded like the carol of a bird. + +Eudora pushed the carriage around to the side door, and immediately +there was a fluttering rush of a slender woman clad in lavender down the +steps. This woman first kissed Eudora with gentle fervor, then, with a +sly look around and voice raised intentionally high, she lifted the +blue and white roll from the carriage with the tenderest care. "Did the +darling come to see his aunties?" she shrilled. + +The old man and the boy in the front yard heard her distinctly. The old +man's face was imperturbable. The boy grinned. + +Two other women, all clad in lavender, appeared in the doorway. They +also bent over the blue and white bundle. They also said something about +the darling coming to see his aunties. Then there ensued the softest +chorus of lady-laughter, as if at some hidden joke. + +"Come in, Eudora dear," said Amelia Lancaster. "Yes, come in, Eudora +dear," said Anna Lancaster. "Yes, come in, Eudora dear," said Sophia +Willing. + +Sophia looked much older than her sisters, but with that exception the +resemblance between all three was startling. They always dressed exactly +alike, too, in silken fabric of bluish lavender, like myrtle blossoms. +Some of the poetical souls in the village called the Lancaster sisters +"The ladies in lavender." + +There was an astonishing change in the treatment of the blue and white +bundle when the sisters and Eudora were in the stately old sitting-room, +with its heavy mahogany furniture and its white-wainscoted calls. Amelia +simply tossed the bundle into a corner of the sofa; then the sisters all +sat in a loving circle around Eudora. + +"Are you sure you are not utterly worn out, dear?" asked Amelia, +tenderly; and the others repeated the question in exactly the same tone. +The Lancaster sisters were not pretty, but all had charming expressions +of gentleness and a dignified good-will and loving kindness. Their blue +eyes beamed love at Eudora, and it was as if she sat encircled in a +soul-ring of affection. + +She responded, and her beautiful face glowed with tenderness and +pleasure, and something besides, which was as the light of victory. + +"I am not in the least tired, thank you, dears," she replied. "Why +should I be tired? I am very strong." + +Amelia murmured something about such hard work. + +"I never thought it would be hard work taking care of a baby," replied +Eudora, "and especially such a very light baby." + +Something whimsical crept into Eudora's voice; something whimsical crept +into the love-light of the other women's eyes. Again a soft ripple of +mirth swept over them. + +"Especially a baby who never cries," said Amelia. + +"No, he never does cry," said Eudora, demurely. + +They laughed again. Then Amelia rose and left the room to get the +tea-things. The old serving-woman who had lived with them for many years +was suffering from rheumatism, and was cared for by her daughter in the +little cottage across the road from the Lancaster house. Her husband and +grandson were the man and boy at work in the grounds. The three sisters +took care of themselves and their house with the elegant ease and lack +of fluster of gentlewomen born and bred. Miss Amelia, bringing in +the tea-tray, was an unclassed being, neither maid nor mistress, but +outranking either. She had tied on a white apron. She bore the +silver tray with an ease which bespoke either nerve or muscle in her +lace-draped arms. + +She poured the tea, holding the silver pot high and letting the amber +fluid trickle slowly, and the pearls and diamonds on her thin hands +shone dully. Sophia passed little china plates and fringed napkins, and +Anna a silver basket with golden squares of sponge-cake. + +The ladies ate and drank, and the blue and white bundle on the sofa +remained motionless. Eudora, after she had finished her tea, leaned +back gracefully in her chair, and her dark eyes gleamed with its mild +stimulus. She remained an hour or more. When she went out, Amelia +slipped an envelope into her hand and at the same time embraced and +kissed her. Sophia and Anna followed her example. Eudora opened her +mouth as if to speak, but smiled instead, a fond, proud smile. During +the last fifteen minutes of her stay Amelia had slipped out of the +room with the blue and white bundle. Now she brought it out and laid it +carefully in the carriage. + +"We are always so glad to see you, dearest Eudora," said she, "but you +understand--" + +"Yes," said Sophia, "you understand, Eudora dear, that there is not the +slightest haste." + +Eudora nodded, and her long neck seemed to grow longer. + +When she was stepping regally down the path, Amelia said in a hasty +whisper to Sophia: "Did you tell her?" + +Sophia shook her head. "No, sister." + +"I didn't know but you might have, while I was out of the room." + +"I did not," said Sophia. She looked doubtfully at Amelia, then at Anna, +and doubt flashed back and forth between the three pairs of blue eyes +for a second. Then Sophia spoke with authority, because she was the +only one of them all who had entered the estate of matrimony, and had +consequently obvious cognizance of such matters. + +"I think," said she, "that Eudora should be told that Harry Lawton has +come back and is boarding at the Wellwood Inn." + +"You think," faltered Amelia, "that it is possible she might meet him +unexpectedly?" + +"I certainly do think so. And she might show her feelings in a way which +she would ever afterward regret." + +"You think, then, that she--" + +Sophia gave her sister a look. Amelia fled after Eudora and the +baby-carriage. She overtook her at the gate. She laid her hand on +Eudora's arm, draped with India shawl. + +"Eudora!" she gasped. + +Eudora turned her serene face and regarded her questioningly. + +"Eudora," said Amelia, "have you heard of anybody's coming to stay at +the inn lately?" + +"No," replied Eudora, calmly. "Why, dear?" + +"Nothing, only, Eudora, a dear and old friend of yours, of ours, is +there, so I hear." + +Eudora did not inquire who the old friend might be. "Really?" she +remarked. Then she said, "Goodby, Amelia dear," and resumed her progress +with the baby-carriage. + + + + +PART II + +"She never even asked who it was," Amelia reported to her sisters, +when she had returned to the house. "Because she knew," replied Sophia, +sagely; "there has never been any old friend but that one old friend to +come back into Eudora Yates's life." + +"Has he come back into her life, I wonder?" said Amelia. + +"What did he return to Wellwood for if he didn't come for that? All +his relatives are gone. He never married. Yes, he has come back to see +Eudora and marry her, if she will have him. No man who ever loved Eudora +would ever get over loving her. And he will not be shocked when he sees +her. She is no more changed than a beautiful old statue." + +"HE is changed, though," said Amelia. "I saw him the other day. He +didn't see me, and I would hardly have known him. He has grown stout, +and his hair is gray." + +"Eudora's hair is gray," said Sophia. + +"Yes, but you can see the gold through Eudora's gray. It just looks as +if a shadow was thrown over it. It doesn't change her. Harry Lawton's +gray hair does change him." + +"If," said Anna, sentimentally, "Eudora thinks Harry's hair turned gray +for love of her, you can trust her or any woman to see the gold through +it." + +"Harry's hair was never gold--just an ordinary brown," said Amelia. +"Anyway, the Lawtons turned gray young." + +"She won't think of that at all," said Sophia. + +"I wonder why Eudora always avoided him so, years ago," said Amelia. + +"Why doesn't a girl in a field of daisies stop to pick one, which she +never forgets?" said Sophia. "Eudora had so many chances, and I don't +think her heart was fixed when she was very young; at least, I don't +think it was fixed so she knew it." + +"I wonder," said Amelia, "if he will go and call on her." + +Amelia privately wished that she lived near enough to know if Harry +Lawton did call. She, as well as Mrs. Joseph Glynn, would have enjoyed +watching out and knowing something of the village happenings, but the +Lancaster house was situated so far from the road, behind its grove of +trees, that nothing whatever could be seen. + +"I doubt if Eudora tells, if he does call--that is, not unless something +definite happens," said Anna. + +"No," remarked Amelia, sadly. "Eudora is a dear, but she is very silent +with regard to her own affairs." + +"She ought to be," said Sophia, with her married authority. She was, to +her sisters, as one who had passed within the shrine and was dignifiedly +silent with regard to its intimate mysteries. + +"I suppose so," assented Anna, with a soft sigh. Amelia sighed also. +Then she took the tea-tray out of the room. She had to make some +biscuits for supper. + +Meantime Eudora was pacing homeward with the baby-carriage. Her serene +face was a little perturbed. Her oval cheeks were flushed, and her mouth +now and then trembled. She had, if she followed her usual course, to +pass the Wellwood Inn, but she could diverge, and by taking a side +street and walking a half-mile farther reach home without coming in +sight of the inn. She did so to-day. + +When she reached the side street she turned rather swiftly and gave a +little sigh of relief. She was afraid that she might meet Harry Lawton. +It was a lonely way. There was a brook on one side, bordered thickly +with bushy willows which were turning gold-green. On the other side +were undulating pasture-lands on which grazed a few sheep. There were +no houses until she reached the turn which would lead back to the main +street, on which her home was located. + +Eudora was about midway of this street when she saw a man approaching. +He was a large man clad in gray, and he was swinging an umbrella. +Somehow the swing of that umbrella, even from a distance, gave an +impression of embarrassment and boyish hesitation. Eudora did not know +him at first. She had expected to see the same Harry Lawton who had gone +away. She did not expect to see a stout, middle-aged man, but a slim +youth. + +However, as they drew nearer each other, she knew; and curiously enough +it was that swing of the tightly furled umbrella which gave her the +clue. She knew Harry because of that. It was a little boyish trick which +had survived time. It was too late for her to draw back, for he had seen +her, and Eudora was keenly alive to the indignity of abruptly turning +and scuttling away with the tail of her black silk swishing, her India +shawl trailing, and the baby-carriage bumping over the furrows. She +continued, and Harry Lawton continued, and they met. + +Harry Lawton had known Eudora at once. She looked the same to him as +when she had been a girl, and he looked the same to her when he spoke. + +"Hullo, Eudora," said Harry Lawton, in a ludicrously boyish fashion. His +face flushed, too, like a boy. He extended his hand like a boy. The man, +seen near at hand, was a boy. In reality he himself had not changed. A +few layers of flesh and a change of color-cells do not make another man. +He had always been a simple, sincere, friendly soul, beloved of men and +women alike, and he was that now. Eudora held out her hand, and her eyes +fell before the eyes of the man, in an absurd fashion for such a stately +creature as she. But the man himself acted like a great happy overgrown +school-boy. + +"Hullo, Eudora," he said again. + +"Hullo," said she, falteringly. + +It was inconceivable that they should meet in such wise after the years +of separation and longing which they had both undergone; but each took +refuge, as it were, in a long-past youth, even childhood, from the +fierce tension of age. When they were both children they had been +accustomed to pass each other on the village street with exactly such +salutation, and now both reverted to it. The tall, regal woman in her +India shawl and the stout, middle-aged man had both stepped back to +their vantage-ground of springtime to meet. + +However, after a moment, Eudora reasserted herself. "I only heard a +short time ago that you were here," she said, in her usual even voice. +The fair oval of her face was as serene and proud toward the man as the +face of the moon. + +The man swung his umbrella, then began prodding the ground with it. +"Hullo, Eudora," he said again; then he added: "How are you, anyway? +Fine and well?" + +"I am very well, thank you," said Eudora. "So you have come home to +Wellwood after all this time?" + +The man made an effort and recovered himself, although his handsome face +was burning. + +"Yes," he remarked, with considerable ease and dignity, to which he +had a right, for Harry Lawton had not made a failure of his life, even +though it had not included Eudora and a fulfilled dream. + +"Yes," he continued, "I had some leisure; in fact, I have this spring +retired from business; and I thought I would have a look at the old +place. Very little changed I am happy to find it." + +"Yes, it is very little changed," assented Eudora; "at least, it seems +so to me, but it is not for a life-long dweller in any place to judge of +change. It is for the one who goes and returns after many years." + +There was a faint hint of proud sadness in Eudora's voice as she spoke +the last two words. + +"It has been many years," said Lawton, gravely, "and I wonder if it has +seemed so to you." + +Eudora held her head proudly. "Time passes swiftly," said she, tritely. + +"But sometimes it may seem long in the passing, however swift," said +Lawton, "though I suppose it has not to you. You look just the same," he +added, regarding her admiringly. + +Eudora flushed a little. "I must be changed," she murmured. + +"Not a bit. I would have known you anywhere. But I--" + +"I knew you the minute you spoke." + +"Did you?" he asked, eagerly. "I was afraid I had grown so stout you +would not remember me at all. Queer how a man will grow stout. I am not +such a big eater, either, and I have worked hard, and--well, I might +have been worse off, but I must say I have seen men who seemed to me +happier, though I have made the best of things. I always did despise a +flunk. But you! I heard you had adopted a baby," he said, with a sudden +glance at the blue and white bundle in the carriage, "and I thought +you were mighty sensible. When people grow old they want young people +growing around them, staffs for old age, you know, and all that sort of +thing. Don't know but I should have adopted a boy myself if it hadn't +been for--" + +The man stopped, and his face was pink. Eudora turned her face slightly +away. + +"By the way," said the man, in a suddenly hushed voice, "I suppose the +kid you've got there is asleep. Wouldn't do to wake him?" + +"I think I had better not," replied Eudora, in a hesitating voice. She +began to walk along, and Harry Lawton fell into step beside her. + +"I suppose it isn't best to wake up babies; makes them cross, and they +cry," he said. "Say, Eudora, is he much trouble?" + +"Very little," replied Eudora, still in that strange voice. + +"Doesn't keep you awake nights?" + +"Oh no." + +"Because if he does, I really think you should have a nurse. I don't +think you ought to lose sleep taking care of him." + +"I do not." + +"Well, I was mighty glad when I heard you had adopted him. I suppose +you made sure about his parentage, where he hailed from and what sort of +people?" + +"Oh yes." Eudora was very pale. + +"That's right. Maybe some time you will tell me all about it. I am +coming over Thursday to have a look at the youngster. I have to go to +the city on business to-morrow and can't get back until Thursday. I was +coming over to-night to call on you, but I have a man coming to the inn +this evening--he called me up on the telephone just now--one of the men +who have taken my place in the business; and as long as I have met you +I will just walk along with you, and come Thursday. I suppose the baby +won't be likely to wake up just yet, and when he does you'll have to get +his supper and put him to bed. Is that the way the rule goes?" + +Eudora nodded in a shamed, speechless sort of way. + +"All right. I'll come Thursday--but say, look here, Eudora. This is a +quiet road, not a soul in sight, just like an outdoor room to ourselves. +Why shouldn't I know now just as well as wait? Say, Eudora, you know how +I used to feel about you. Well, it has lasted all these years. There has +never been another woman I even cared to look at. You are alone, except +for that baby, and I am alone. Eudora--" + +The man hesitated. His flushed face had paled. Eudora paced silently and +waveringly at his side. + +"Eudora," the man went on, "you know you always used to run away from +me--never gave me a chance to really ask; and I thought you didn't care. +But somehow I have wondered--perhaps because you never got married--if +you didn't quite mean it, if you didn't quite know your own mind. You'll +think I'm a conceited ass, but I'm not a bad sort, Eudora. I would be +as good to you as I know how, and--we could bring him up together." He +pointed to the carriage. "I have plenty of money. We could do anything +we wanted to do for him, and we should not have to live alone. Say, +Eudora, you may not think it's the thing for a man to own up to, but, +hang it all! I'm alone, and I don't want to face the rest of my life +alone. Eudora, do you think you could make up your mind to marry me, +after all?" + +They had reached the turn in the road. Just beyond rose the stately pile +of the old Yates mansion. Eudora stood still and gave one desperate look +at her lover. "I will let you know Thursday," she gasped. Then she was +gone, trundling the baby-carriage with incredible speed. + +"But, Eudora--" + +"I must go," she called back, faintly. The man stood staring after the +hurrying figure with its swishing black skirts and its flying points of +rich India shawl, and he smiled happily and tenderly. That evening +at the inn his caller, a young fellow just married and beaming with +happiness, saw an answering beam in the older man's face. He broke off +in the midst of a sentence and stared at him. + +"Don't give me away until I tell you to, Ned," he said, "but I don't +know but I am going to follow your example." + +"My example?" + +"Yes, going to get married." + +The young man gasped. A look of surprise, of amusement, then of generous +sympathy came over his face. He grasped Lawton's hand. + +"Who is she?" + +"Oh, a woman I wanted more than anything in the world when I was about +your age." + +"Then she isn't young?" + +"She is better than young." + +"Well," agreed the young man, "being young and pretty is not +everything." + +"Pretty!" said Harry Lawton, scornfully, "pretty! She is a great +beauty." + +"And not young?" + +"She is a great beauty, and better than young, because time has not +touched her beauty, and you can see for yourself that it lasts." + +The young man laughed. "Oh, well," he said, with a tender inflection, "I +dare say that my Amy will look like that to me." + +"If she doesn't you don't love her," said Lawton. "But my Eudora IS +that." + +"That is a queer-sounding Greek name." + +"She is Greek, like her name. Such beauty never grows old. She stands on +her pedestal, and time only looks at her to love her." + +"I thought you were a business man as hard as nails," said the young +man, wonderingly. Lawton laughed. + +When Thursday came, Lawton, carefully dressed and carrying a long +tissue-paper package, evidently of roses, approached the Yates house. It +was late in the afternoon. There had been a warm day, and the trees were +clouds of green and more bushes had blossomed. Eudora had put on a +green silk dress of her youth. The revolving fashions had made it very +passable, and the fabric was as beautiful as ever. + +When Lawton presented her with the roses she pinned one in the yellowed +lace which draped her bodice and put the rest in a great china vase on +the table. The roses were very fragrant, and immediately the whole room +was possessed by them. + +A tiny, insistent cry came from a corner, and Lawton and Eudora turned +toward it. There stood the old wooden cradle in which Eudora had been +rocked to sleep, but over the clumsy hood Eudora had tacked a fall of +rich old lace and a great bow of soft pink satin. + +"He is waking up," said the man, in a hushed, almost reverent voice. + +Eudora nodded. She went toward the cradle, and the man followed. She +lifted the curtain of lace, and there became visible little feebly +waving pink arms and hands, like tentacles of love, and a little +puckered pink face which was at once ugly and divinely beautiful. + +"A fine boy," said the man. The baby made a grimace at him which was +hideous but lovely. + +"I do believe he thinks he knows you," said Eudora, foolishly. + +The baby made a little nestling motion, and its creasy eyelids dropped. + +"Looks to me as if he was going to sleep again," said Lawton, in a +whisper. Eudora jogged the cradle gently with her foot, and both were +still. Then Eudora dropped the lace veil over the cradle again and moved +softly away. + +Lawton followed her. "I haven't my answer yet, Eudora," he whispered, +leaning over her shoulder as she moved. + +"Come into the other room," she murmured, "or we shall wake the baby." +Her voice was softly excited. + +Eudora led the way into the parlor, upon whose walls hung some really +good portraits and whose furnishings still merited the adjective +magnificent. There had been opulence in the Yates family; and in this +room, which had been conserved, there was still undimmed and unfaded +evidence of it. Eudora drew aside a brocade curtain and sat down on an +embroidered satin sofa. Lawton sat beside her. + +"This room looks every whit as grand as it used to look to me when I was +a boy," he said. + +"It has hardly been opened, except to have it cleaned, since you went +away," replied Eudora, "and no wear has come upon it." + +"And everything was rather splendid to begin with, and has lasted. And +so were you, Eudora, and you have lasted. Well, what about my answer, +dear girl?" + +"You have to hear something first." + +Lawton laughed. "A confession?" + +Eudora held her head proudly. "No, not exactly," said she. "I am not +sure that I have ever had anything to confess." + +"You never were sure, you proud creature." + +"I am not now. I never intended to deceive you, but you were deceived. I +did intend to deceive others, others who had no right to know. I do not +feel that I owe them any explanation. I do owe you one, although I do +not feel that I have done anything wrong. Still, I cannot allow you to +remain deceived." + +"Well, what is it, dear?" + +Eudora looked at him. "You remember that afternoon when you met me with +the baby-carriage?" + +"Well, I should think so. My memory has not failed me in three days." + +"You thought I had a baby in that carriage." + +"Of course I did." + +"There wasn't a baby in the carriage." + +"Well, what on earth was it, then? A cat?" + +Eudora, if possible, looked prouder. "It was a package of soiled linen +from the Lancaster girls." + +"Oh, good heavens, Eudora!" + +"Yes," said Eudora, proudly. "I lost nearly everything when that +railroad failed. I had enough left to pay the taxes, and that was all. +After I had used a small sum in the savings-bank there was nothing. One +day I went over to the Lancasters', and I--well, I had not had much to +eat for several days. I was a little faint, and--" + +"Eudora, you poor, darling girl!" + +"And the Lancaster girls found out," continued Eudora, calmly. "They +gave me something to eat, and I suppose I ate as if I were famished. I +was." + +"Eudora!" + +"And they wanted to give me money, but I would not take it, and they +had been trying to find a laundress for their finer linen--their old +serving-woman was ill. They could find one for the heavier things, but +they are very particular, and I was sure I could manage, and so I begged +them to let me have the work, and they did, and overpaid me, I fear. And +I--I knew very well how many spying eyes were about, and I thought of +my proud father and my proud mother and grandmother, and perhaps I was +proud, too. You know they talk about the Yates pride. It was not so much +because I was ashamed of doing honest work as because I did resent those +prying eyes and tattling tongues, and so I said nothing, but I did go +back and forth in broad daylight with the linen wrapped up in the old +blue and white blanket, in my old carriage, and they thought what they +thought." + +Eudora laughed faintly. She had a gentle humor. "It was somewhat +laughable, too," she observed. "The Lancaster girls and I have had our +little jests over it, but I felt that I could not deceive you." + +Lawton looked bewildered. "But that is a real baby in there," he said, +jerking an elbow toward the other room. + +"Oh yes," replied Eudora. "I adopted him yesterday. I went to the +Children's Home in Elmfield. Amelia Lancaster went with me. Wilson +drove us over. I know a nurse there. She took care of mother in her last +illness. And I adopted this baby; at least, I am going to. He comes of +respectable people, and his parents are dead. His mother died when he +was born. He is healthy, and I thought him a beautiful baby." + +"Yes, he is," assented Lawton, but he still looked somewhat perplexed. +"But why did you hurry off so and get him, Eudora?" said he. + +"I thought from what you said that day that you would be disappointed +when you found out I had only the Lancaster linen and not a real baby," +said Eudora with her calm, grand air and with no trace of a smile. + +"Then that means that you say yes, Eudora?" + +For the first time Eudora gave a startled glance at him. "Didn't you +know?" she gasped. + +"How should I? You had not said yes really, dear." + +"Do you think," said Eudora Yates, "that I am not too proud to allow you +to ask me if my answer were not yes?" + +"So that is the reason you always ran away from me, years ago, so that I +never had a chance to ask you?" + +"Of course," said Eudora. "No woman of my family ever allows a +declaration which she does not intend to accept. I was always taught +that by my mother." + +Then a small but insistent cry rent the air. "The baby is awake!" cried +Eudora, and ran, or, rather, paced swiftly--Eudora had been taught never +to run--and Lawton followed. It was he who finally quieted the child, +holding the little thing in his arms. + +But the baby, before that, cried so long and lustily that all the women +in the Glynn house opposite were on the alert, and also some of the +friends who were calling there. Abby Simson was one. + +"Harry Lawton has been there over an hour now," said Abby, while the +wailing continued, "and I know as well as I want to that there will be a +wedding." + +"I wonder he doesn't object to that adopted baby," said Julia +Esterbrook. + +"I know one thing," said Abby Simson. "It must be a boy baby, it hollers +so." + + + + + +End of Project Gutenberg's The Yates Pride, by Mary E. 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