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@@ -0,0 +1,10651 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Alice Adams, by Booth Tarkington + +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: Alice Adams + +Author: Booth Tarkington + +Posting Date: July 21, 2008 [EBook #980] +Release Date: July, 1997 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALICE ADAMS *** + + + + +Produced by Charles Keller + + + + + +ALICE ADAMS + +By Booth Tarkington + + + +CHAPTER I + +The patient, an old-fashioned man, thought the nurse made a mistake in +keeping both of the windows open, and her sprightly disregard of his +protests added something to his hatred of her. Every evening he told her +that anybody with ordinary gumption ought to realize that night air was +bad for the human frame. "The human frame won't stand everything, +Miss Perry," he warned her, resentfully. "Even a child, if it had just +ordinary gumption, ought to know enough not to let the night air blow on +sick people yes, nor well people, either! 'Keep out of the night air, no +matter how well you feel.' That's what my mother used to tell me when I +was a boy. 'Keep out of the night air, Virgil,' she'd say. 'Keep out of +the night air.'" + +"I expect probably her mother told her the same thing," the nurse +suggested. + +"Of course she did. My grandmother----" + +"Oh, I guess your GRANDmother thought so, Mr. Adams! That was when all +this flat central country was swampish and hadn't been drained off yet. +I guess the truth must been the swamp mosquitoes bit people and gave 'em +malaria, especially before they began to put screens in their windows. +Well, we got screens in these windows, and no mosquitoes are goin' to +bite us; so just you be a good boy and rest your mind and go to sleep +like you need to." + +"Sleep?" he said. "Likely!" + +He thought the night air worst of all in April; he hadn't a doubt it +would kill him, he declared. "It's miraculous what the human frame WILL +survive," he admitted on the last evening of that month. "But you and +the doctor ought to both be taught it won't stand too dang much! You +poison a man and poison and poison him with this April night air----" + +"Can't poison you with much more of it," Miss Perry interrupted him, +indulgently. "To-morrow it'll be May night air, and I expect that'll be +a lot better for you, don't you? Now let's just sober down and be a good +boy and get some nice sound sleep." + +She gave him his medicine, and, having set the glass upon the center +table, returned to her cot, where, after a still interval, she snored +faintly. Upon this, his expression became that of a man goaded out of +overpowering weariness into irony. + +"Sleep? Oh, CERTAINLY, thank you!" + +However, he did sleep intermittently, drowsed between times, and even +dreamed; but, forgetting his dreams before he opened his eyes, and +having some part of him all the while aware of his discomfort, he +believed, as usual, that he lay awake the whole night long. He was +conscious of the city as of some single great creature resting fitfully +in the dark outside his windows. It lay all round about, in the damp +cover of its night cloud of smoke, and tried to keep quiet for a few +hours after midnight, but was too powerful a growing thing ever to +lie altogether still. Even while it strove to sleep it muttered with +digestions of the day before, and these already merged with rumblings +of the morrow. "Owl" cars, bringing in last passengers over distant +trolley-lines, now and then howled on a curve; faraway metallic +stirrings could be heard from factories in the sooty suburbs on the +plain outside the city; east, west, and south, switch-engines chugged +and snorted on sidings; and everywhere in the air there seemed to be +a faint, voluminous hum as of innumerable wires trembling overhead to +vibration of machinery underground. + +In his youth Adams might have been less resentful of sounds such as +these when they interfered with his night's sleep: even during +an illness he might have taken some pride in them as proof of his +citizenship in a "live town"; but at fifty-five he merely hated them +because they kept him awake. They "pressed on his nerves," as he put it; +and so did almost everything else, for that matter. + +He heard the milk-wagon drive into the cross-street beneath his windows +and stop at each house. The milkman carried his jars round to the "back +porch," while the horse moved slowly ahead to the gate of the next +customer and waited there. "He's gone into Pollocks'," Adams thought, +following this progress. "I hope it'll sour on 'em before breakfast. +Delivered the Andersons'. Now he's getting out ours. Listen to the darn +brute! What's HE care who wants to sleep!" His complaint was of the +horse, who casually shifted weight with a clink of steel shoes on the +worn brick pavement of the street, and then heartily shook himself in +his harness, perhaps to dislodge a fly far ahead of its season. Light +had just filmed the windows; and with that the first sparrow woke, +chirped instantly, and roused neighbours in the trees of the small yard, +including a loud-voiced robin. Vociferations began irregularly, but were +soon unanimous. + +"Sleep? Dang likely now, ain't it!" + +Night sounds were becoming day sounds; the far-away hooting of +freight-engines seemed brisker than an hour ago in the dark. A cheerful +whistler passed the house, even more careless of sleepers than the +milkman's horse had been; then a group of coloured workmen came by, and +although it was impossible to be sure whether they were homeward bound +from night-work or on their way to day-work, at least it was certain +that they were jocose. Loose, aboriginal laughter preceded them afar, +and beat on the air long after they had gone by. + +The sick-room night-light, shielded from his eyes by a newspaper propped +against a water-pitcher, still showed a thin glimmering that had grown +offensive to Adams. In his wandering and enfeebled thoughts, which +were much more often imaginings than reasonings, the attempt of the +night-light to resist the dawn reminded him of something unpleasant, +though he could not discover just what the unpleasant thing was. Here +was a puzzle that irritated him the more because he could not solve it, +yet always seemed just on the point of a solution. However, he may have +lost nothing cheerful by remaining in the dark upon the matter; for +if he had been a little sharper in this introspection he might have +concluded that the squalor of the night-light, in its seeming effort +to show against the forerunning of the sun itself, had stimulated some +half-buried perception within him to sketch the painful little synopsis +of an autobiography. + +In spite of noises without, he drowsed again, not knowing that he did; +and when he opened his eyes the nurse was just rising from her cot. He +took no pleasure in the sight, it may be said. She exhibited to him a +face mismodelled by sleep, and set like a clay face left on its cheek in +a hot and dry studio. She was still only in part awake, however, and by +the time she had extinguished the night-light and given her patient his +tonic, she had recovered enough plasticity. "Well, isn't that grand! +We've had another good night," she said as she departed to dress in the +bathroom. + +"Yes, you had another!" he retorted, though not until after she had +closed the door. + +Presently he heard his daughter moving about in her room across the +narrow hall, and so knew that she had risen. He hoped she would come +in to see him soon, for she was the one thing that didn't press on his +nerves, he felt; though the thought of her hurt him, as, indeed, every +thought hurt him. But it was his wife who came first. + +She wore a lank cotton wrapper, and a crescent of gray hair escaped to +one temple from beneath the handkerchief she had worn upon her head for +the night and still retained; but she did everything possible to make +her expression cheering. + +"Oh, you're better again! I can see that, as soon as I look at you," she +said. "Miss Perry tells me you've had another splendid night." + +He made a sound of irony, which seemed to dispose unfavourably of Miss +Perry, and then, in order to be more certainly intelligible, he added, +"She slept well, as usual!" + +But his wife's smile persisted. "It's a good sign to be cross; it means +you're practically convalescent right now." + +"Oh, I am, am I?" + +"No doubt in the world!" she exclaimed. "Why, you're practically a well +man, Virgil--all except getting your strength back, of course, and that +isn't going to take long. You'll be right on your feet in a couple of +weeks from now." + +"Oh, I will?" + +"Of course you will!" She laughed briskly, and, going to the table in +the center of the room, moved his glass of medicine an inch or two, +turned a book over so that it lay upon its other side, and for a few +moments occupied herself with similar futilities, having taken on the +air of a person who makes things neat, though she produced no such +actual effect upon them. "Of course you will," she repeated, absently. +"You'll be as strong as you ever were; maybe stronger." She paused for a +moment, not looking at him, then added, cheerfully, "So that you can fly +around and find something really good to get into." + +Something important between them came near the surface here, for though +she spoke with what seemed but a casual cheerfulness, there was a +little betraying break in her voice, a trembling just perceptible in the +utterance of the final word. And she still kept up the affectation of +being helpfully preoccupied with the table, and did not look at her +husband--perhaps because they had been married so many years that +without looking she knew just what his expression would be, and +preferred to avoid the actual sight of it as long as possible. +Meanwhile, he stared hard at her, his lips beginning to move with little +distortions not lacking in the pathos of a sick man's agitation. + +"So that's it," he said. "That's what you're hinting at." + +"'Hinting?'" Mrs. Adams looked surprised and indulgent. "Why, I'm not +doing any hinting, Virgil." + +"What did you say about my finding 'something good to get into?'" he +asked, sharply. "Don't you call that hinting?" + +Mrs. Adams turned toward him now; she came to the bedside and would have +taken his hand, but he quickly moved it away from her. + +"You mustn't let yourself get nervous," she said. "But of course when +you get well there's only one thing to do. You mustn't go back to that +old hole again." + +"'Old hole?' That's what you call it, is it?" In spite of his weakness, +anger made his voice strident, and upon this stimulation she spoke more +urgently. + +"You just mustn't go back to it, Virgil. It's not fair to any of us, and +you know it isn't." + +"Don't tell me what I know, please!" + +She clasped her hands, suddenly carrying her urgency to plaintive +entreaty. "Virgil, you WON'T go back to that hole?" + +"That's a nice word to use to me!" he said. "Call a man's business a +hole!" + +"Virgil, if you don't owe it to me to look for something different, +don't you owe it to your children? Don't tell me you won't do what we +all want you to, and what you know in your heart you ought to! And if +you HAVE got into one of your stubborn fits and are bound to go back +there for no other reason except to have your own way, don't tell me so, +for I can't bear it!" + +He looked up at her fiercely. "You've got a fine way to cure a sick +man!" he said; but she had concluded her appeal--for that time--and +instead of making any more words in the matter, let him see that there +were tears in her eyes, shook her head, and left the room. + +Alone, he lay breathing rapidly, his emaciated chest proving itself +equal to the demands his emotion put upon it. "Fine!" he repeated, with +husky indignation. "Fine way to cure a sick man! Fine!" Then, after a +silence, he gave forth whispering sounds as of laughter, his expression +the while remaining sore and far from humour. + +"And give us our daily bread!" he added, meaning that his wife's little +performance was no novelty. + + + +CHAPTER II + +In fact, the agitation of Mrs. Adams was genuine, but so well under her +control that its traces vanished during the three short steps she +took to cross the narrow hall between her husband's door and the one +opposite. Her expression was matter-of-course, rather than pathetic, as +she entered the pretty room where her daughter, half dressed, sat before +a dressing-table and played with the reflections of a three-leafed +mirror framed in blue enamel. That is, just before the moment of +her mother's entrance, Alice had been playing with the mirror's +reflections--posturing her arms and her expressions, clasping her hands +behind her neck, and tilting back her head to foreshorten the face in a +tableau conceived to represent sauciness, then one of smiling weariness, +then one of scornful toleration, and all very piquant; but as the door +opened she hurriedly resumed the practical, and occupied her hands in +the arrangement of her plentiful brownish hair. + +They were pretty hands, of a shapeliness delicate and fine. "The best +things she's got!" a cold-blooded girl friend said of them, and meant +to include Alice's mind and character in the implied list of possessions +surpassed by the notable hands. However that may have been, the rest +of her was well enough. She was often called "a right pretty +girl"--temperate praise meaning a girl rather pretty than otherwise, +and this she deserved, to say the least. Even in repose she deserved +it, though repose was anything but her habit, being seldom seen upon +her except at home. On exhibition she led a life of gestures, the unkind +said to make her lovely hands more memorable; but all of her usually +accompanied the gestures of the hands, the shoulders ever giving them +their impulses first, and even her feet being called upon, at the same +time, for eloquence. + +So much liveliness took proper place as only accessory to that of the +face, where her vivacity reached its climax; and it was unfortunate that +an ungifted young man, new in the town, should have attempted to define +the effect upon him of all this generosity of emphasis. He said that +"the way she used her cute hazel eyes and the wonderful glow of her +facial expression gave her a mighty spiritual quality." His actual +rendition of the word was "spirichul"; but it was not his pronunciation +that embalmed this outburst in the perennial laughter of Alice's girl +friends; they made the misfortune far less his than hers. + +Her mother comforted her too heartily, insisting that Alice had "plenty +enough spiritual qualities," certainly more than possessed by the other +girls who flung the phrase at her, wooden things, jealous of everything +they were incapable of themselves; and then Alice, getting more +championship than she sought, grew uneasy lest Mrs. Adams should repeat +such defenses "outside the family"; and Mrs. Adams ended by weeping +because the daughter so distrusted her intelligence. Alice frequently +thought it necessary to instruct her mother. + +Her morning greeting was an instruction to-day; or, rather, it was +an admonition in the style of an entreaty, the more petulant as Alice +thought that Mrs. Adams might have had a glimpse of the posturings to +the mirror. This was a needless worry; the mother had caught a thousand +such glimpses, with Alice unaware, and she thought nothing of the one +just flitted. + +"For heaven's sake, mama, come clear inside the room and shut the door! +PLEASE don't leave it open for everybody to look at me!" + +"There isn't anybody to see you," Mrs. Adams explained, obeying. "Miss +Perry's gone downstairs, and----" + +"Mama, I heard you in papa's room," Alice said, not dropping the note of +complaint. "I could hear both of you, and I don't think you ought to get +poor old papa so upset--not in his present condition, anyhow." + +Mrs. Adams seated herself on the edge of the bed. "He's better all the +time," she said, not disturbed. "He's almost well. The doctor says so +and Miss Perry says so; and if we don't get him into the right frame +of mind now we never will. The first day he's outdoors he'll go back to +that old hole--you'll see! And if he once does that, he'll settle down +there and it'll be too late and we'll never get him out." + +"Well, anyhow, I think you could use a little more tact with him." + +"I do try to," the mother sighed. "It never was much use with him. I +don't think you understand him as well as I do, Alice." + +"There's one thing I don't understand about either of you," Alice +returned, crisply. "Before people get married they can do anything they +want to with each other. Why can't they do the same thing after they're +married? When you and papa were young people and engaged, he'd have done +anything you wanted him to. That must have been because you knew how to +manage him then. Why can't you go at him the same way now?" + +Mrs. Adams sighed again, and laughed a little, making no other response; +but Alice persisted. "Well, WHY can't you? Why can't you ask him to do +things the way you used to ask him when you were just in love with each +other? Why don't you anyhow try it, mama, instead of ding-donging at +him?" + +"'Ding-donging at him,' Alice?" Mrs. Adams said, with a pathos somewhat +emphasized. "Is that how my trying to do what I can for you strikes +you?" + +"Never mind that; it's nothing to hurt your feelings." Alice disposed of +the pathos briskly. "Why don't you answer my question? What's the matter +with using a little more tact on papa? Why can't you treat him the way +you probably did when you were young people, before you were married? I +never have understood why people can't do that." + +"Perhaps you WILL understand some day," her mother said, gently. "Maybe +you will when you've been married twenty-five years." + +"You keep evading. Why don't you answer my question right straight out?" + +"There are questions you can't answer to young people, Alice." + +"You mean because we're too young to understand the answer? I don't see +that at all. At twenty-two a girl's supposed to have some intelligence, +isn't she? And intelligence is the ability to understand, isn't it? +Why do I have to wait till I've lived with a man twenty-five years to +understand why you can't be tactful with papa?" + +"You may understand some things before that," Mrs. Adams said, +tremulously. "You may understand how you hurt me sometimes. Youth +can't know everything by being intelligent, and by the time you could +understand the answer you're asking for you'd know it, and wouldn't need +to ask. You don't understand your father, Alice; you don't know what it +takes to change him when he's made up his mind to be stubborn." + +Alice rose and began to get herself into a skirt. "Well, I don't think +making scenes ever changes anybody," she grumbled. "I think a little +jolly persuasion goes twice as far, myself." + +"'A little jolly persuasion!'" Her mother turned the echo of this phrase +into an ironic lament. "Yes, there was a time when I thought that, too! +It didn't work; that's all." + +"Perhaps you left the 'jolly' part of it out, mama." + +For the second time that morning--it was now a little after seven +o'clock--tears seemed about to offer their solace to Mrs. Adams. "I +might have expected you to say that, Alice; you never do miss a chance," +she said, gently. "It seems queer you don't some time miss just ONE +chance!" + +But Alice, progressing with her toilet, appeared to be little concerned. +"Oh, well, I think there are better ways of managing a man than just +hammering at him." + +Mrs. Adams uttered a little cry of pain. "'Hammering,' Alice?" + +"If you'd left it entirely to me," her daughter went on, briskly, "I +believe papa'd already be willing to do anything we want him to." + +"That's it; tell me I spoil everything. Well, I won't interfere from now +on, you can be sure of it." + +"Please don't talk like that," Alice said, quickly. "I'm old enough to +realize that papa may need pressure of all sorts; I only think it makes +him more obstinate to get him cross. You probably do understand him +better, but that's one thing I've found out and you haven't. There!" +She gave her mother a friendly tap on the shoulder and went to the door. +"I'll hop in and say hello to him now." + +As she went, she continued the fastening of her blouse, and appeared in +her father's room with one hand still thus engaged, but she patted his +forehead with the other. + +"Poor old papa-daddy!" she said, gaily. "Every time he's better somebody +talks him into getting so mad he has a relapse. It's a shame!" + +Her father's eyes, beneath their melancholy brows, looked up at her +wistfully. "I suppose you heard your mother going for me," he said. + +"I heard you going for her, too!" Alice laughed. "What was it all +about?" + +"Oh, the same danged old story!" + +"You mean she wants you to try something new when you get well?" Alice +asked, with cheerful innocence. "So we could all have a lot more money?" + +At this his sorrowful forehead was more sorrowful than ever. The deep +horizontal lines moved upward to a pattern of suffering so familiar to +his daughter that it meant nothing to her; but he spoke quietly. "Yes; +so we wouldn't have any money at all, most likely." + +"Oh, no!" she laughed, and, finishing with her blouse, patted his cheeks +with both hands. "Just think how many grand openings there must be for +a man that knows as much as you do! I always did believe you could get +rich if you only cared to, papa." + +But upon his forehead the painful pattern still deepened. "Don't you +think we've always had enough, the way things are, Alice?" + +"Not the way things ARE!" She patted his cheeks again; laughed again. +"It used to be enough, maybe anyway we did skimp along on it--but the +way things are now I expect mama's really pretty practical in her ideas, +though, I think it's a shame for her to bother you about it while you're +so weak. Don't you worry about it, though; just think about other things +till you get strong." + +"You know," he said; "you know it isn't exactly the easiest thing in the +world for a man of my age to find these grand openings you speak of. And +when you've passed half-way from fifty to sixty you're apt to see some +risk in giving up what you know how to do and trying something new." + +"My, what a frown!" she cried, blithely. "Didn't I tell you to stop +thinking about it till you get ALL well?" She bent over him, giving +him a gay little kiss on the bridge of his nose. "There! I must run to +breakfast. Cheer up now! Au 'voir!" And with her pretty hand she waved +further encouragement from the closing door as she departed. + +Lightsomely descending the narrow stairway, she whistled as she went, +her fingers drumming time on the rail; and, still whistling, she came +into the dining-room, where her mother and her brother were already at +the table. The brother, a thin and sallow boy of twenty, greeted her +without much approval as she took her place. + +"Nothing seems to trouble you!" he said. + +"No; nothing much," she made airy response. "What's troubling yourself, +Walter?" + +"Don't let that worry you!" he returned, seeming to consider this to be +repartee of an effective sort; for he furnished a short laugh to go +with it, and turned to his coffee with the manner of one who has +satisfactorily closed an episode. + +"Walter always seems to have so many secrets!" Alice said, studying +him shrewdly, but with a friendly enough amusement in her scrutiny. +"Everything he does or says seems to be acted for the benefit of some +mysterious audience inside himself, and he always gets its applause. +Take what he said just now: he seems to think it means something, but +if it does, why, that's just another secret between him and the secret +audience inside of him! We don't really know anything about Walter at +all, do we, mama?" + +Walter laughed again, in a manner that sustained her theory well enough; +then after finishing his coffee, he took from his pocket a flattened +packet in glazed blue paper; extracted with stained fingers a bent and +wrinkled little cigarette, lighted it, hitched up his belted trousers +with the air of a person who turns from trifles to things better worth +his attention, and left the room. + +Alice laughed as the door closed. "He's ALL secrets," she said. "Don't +you think you really ought to know more about him, mama?" + +"I'm sure he's a good boy," Mrs. Adams returned, thoughtfully. "He's +been very brave about not being able to have the advantages that are +enjoyed by the boys he's grown up with. I've never heard a word of +complaint from him." + +"About his not being sent to college?" Alice cried. "I should think you +wouldn't! He didn't even have enough ambition to finish high school!" + +Mrs. Adams sighed. "It seemed to me Walter lost his ambition when nearly +all the boys he'd grown up with went to Eastern schools to prepare for +college, and we couldn't afford to send him. If only your father would +have listened----" + +Alice interrupted: "What nonsense! Walter hated books and studying, and +athletics, too, for that matter. He doesn't care for anything nice that +I ever heard of. What do you suppose he does like, mama? He must like +something or other somewhere, but what do you suppose it is? What does +he do with his time?" + +"Why, the poor boy's at Lamb and Company's all day. He doesn't get +through until five in the afternoon; he doesn't HAVE much time." + +"Well, we never have dinner until about seven, and he's always late for +dinner, and goes out, heaven knows where, right afterward!" Alice shook +her head. "He used to go with our friends' boys, but I don't think he +does now." + +"Why, how could he?" Mrs. Adams protested. "That isn't his fault, poor +child! The boys he knew when he was younger are nearly all away at +college." + +"Yes, but he doesn't see anything of 'em when they're here at +holiday-time or vacation. None of 'em come to the house any more." + +"I suppose he's made other friends. It's natural for him to want +companions, at his age." + +"Yes," Alice said, with disapproving emphasis. "But who are they? I've +got an idea he plays pool at some rough place down-town." + +"Oh, no; I'm sure he's a steady boy," Mrs. Adams protested, but her tone +was not that of thoroughgoing conviction, and she added, "Life might +be a very different thing for him if only your father can be brought to +see----" + +"Never mind, mama! It isn't me that has to be convinced, you know; and +we can do a lot more with papa if we just let him alone about it for a +day or two. Promise me you won't say any more to him until--well, until +he's able to come downstairs to table. Will you?" + +Mrs. Adams bit her lip, which had begun to tremble. "I think you can +trust me to know a FEW things, Alice," she said. "I'm a little older +than you, you know." + +"That's a good girl!" Alice jumped up, laughing. "Don't forget it's the +same as a promise, and do just cheer him up a little. I'll say good-bye +to him before I go out." + +"Where are you going?" + +"Oh, I've got lots to do. I thought I'd run out to Mildred's to see what +she's going to wear to-night, and then I want to go down and buy a +yard of chiffon and some narrow ribbon to make new bows for my +slippers--you'll have to give me some money----" + +"If he'll give it to me!" her mother lamented, as they went toward the +front stairs together; but an hour later she came into Alice's room with +a bill in her hand. + +"He has some money in his bureau drawer," she said. "He finally told me +where it was." + +There were traces of emotion in her voice, and Alice, looking shrewdly +at her, saw moisture in her eyes. + +"Mama!" she cried. "You didn't do what you promised me you wouldn't, did +you--NOT before Miss Perry!" + +"Miss Perry's getting him some broth," Mrs. Adams returned, calmly. +"Besides, you're mistaken in saying I promised you anything; I said I +thought you could trust me to know what is right." + +"So you did bring it up again!" And Alice swung away from her, strode +to her father's door, flung it open, went to him, and put a light hand +soothingly over his unrelaxed forehead. + +"Poor old papa!" she said. "It's a shame how everybody wants to trouble +him. He shan't be bothered any more at all! He doesn't need to have +everybody telling him how to get away from that old hole he's worked in +so long and begin to make us all nice and rich. HE knows how!" + +Thereupon she kissed him a consoling good-bye, and made another gay +departure, the charming hand again fluttering like a white butterfly in +the shadow of the closing door. + + + +CHAPTER III + +Mrs. Adams had remained in Alice's room, but her mood seemed to have +changed, during her daughter's little more than momentary absence. + +"What did he SAY?" she asked, quickly, and her tone was hopeful. + +"'Say?'" Alice repeated, impatiently. "Why, nothing. I didn't let him. +Really, mama, I think the best thing for you to do would be to just keep +out of his room, because I don't believe you can go in there and not +talk to him about it, and if you do talk we'll never get him to do the +right thing. Never!" + +The mother's response was a grieving silence; she turned from her +daughter and walked to the door. + +"Now, for goodness' sake!" Alice cried. "Don't go making tragedy out of +my offering you a little practical advice!" + +"I'm not," Mrs. Adams gulped, halting. "I'm just--just going to dust the +downstairs, Alice." And with her face still averted, she went out into +the little hallway, closing the door behind her. A moment later she +could be heard descending the stairs, the sound of her footsteps +carrying somehow an effect of resignation. + +Alice listened, sighed, and, breathing the words, "Oh, murder!" turned +to cheerier matters. She put on a little apple-green turban with a dim +gold band round it, and then, having shrouded the turban in a white +veil, which she kept pushed up above her forehead, she got herself into +a tan coat of soft cloth fashioned with rakish severity. After that, +having studied herself gravely in a long glass, she took from one of +the drawers of her dressing-table a black leather card-case cornered in +silver filigree, but found it empty. + +She opened another drawer wherein were two white pasteboard boxes of +cards, the one set showing simply "Miss Adams," the other engraved in +Gothic characters, "Miss Alys Tuttle Adams." The latter belonged to +Alice's "Alys" period--most girls go through it; and Alice must have +felt that she had graduated, for, after frowning thoughtfully at the +exhibit this morning, she took the box with its contents, and let the +white shower fall from her fingers into the waste-basket beside her +small desk. She replenished the card-case from the "Miss Adams" +box; then, having found a pair of fresh white gloves, she tucked an +ivory-topped Malacca walking-stick under her arm and set forth. + +She went down the stairs, buttoning her gloves and still wearing +the frown with which she had put "Alys" finally out of her life. She +descended slowly, and paused on the lowest step, looking about her with +an expression that needed but a slight deepening to betoken bitterness. +Its connection with her dropping "Alys" forever was slight, however. + +The small frame house, about fifteen years old, was already inclining +to become a new Colonial relic. The Adamses had built it, moving into it +from the "Queen Anne" house they had rented until they took this step in +fashion. But fifteen years is a long time to stand still in the midland +country, even for a house, and this one was lightly made, though the +Adamses had not realized how flimsily until they had lived in it for +some time. "Solid, compact, and convenient" were the instructions to the +architect, and he had made it compact successfully. Alice, pausing +at the foot of the stairway, was at the same time fairly in the +"living-room," for the only separation between the "living room" and the +hall was a demarcation suggested to willing imaginations by a pair of +wooden columns painted white. These columns, pine under the paint, +were bruised and chipped at the base; one of them showed a crack that +threatened to become a split; the "hard-wood" floor had become uneven; +and in a corner the walls apparently failed of solidity, where the +wall-paper had declined to accompany some staggerings of the plaster +beneath it. + +The furniture was in great part an accumulation begun with the wedding +gifts; though some of it was older, two large patent rocking-chairs and +a footstool having belonged to Mrs. Adams's mother in the days of hard +brown plush and veneer. For decoration there were pictures and vases. +Mrs. Adams had always been fond of vases, she said, and every year +her husband's Christmas present to her was a vase of one sort or +another--whatever the clerk showed him, marked at about twelve or +fourteen dollars. The pictures were some of them etchings framed in +gilt: Rheims, Canterbury, schooners grouped against a wharf; and Alice +could remember how, in her childhood, her father sometimes pointed out +the watery reflections in this last as very fine. But it was a long time +since he had shown interest in such things--"or in anything much," as +she thought. + +Other pictures were two water-colours in baroque frames; one being the +Amalfi monk on a pergola wall, while the second was a yard-wide display +of iris blossoms, painted by Alice herself at fourteen, as a birthday +gift to her mother. Alice's glance paused upon it now with no great +pride, but showed more approval of an enormous photograph of the +Colosseum. This she thought of as "the only good thing in the room"; +it possessed and bestowed distinction, she felt; and she did not regret +having won her struggle to get it hung in its conspicuous place of +honour over the mantelpiece. Formerly that place had been held for +years by a steel-engraving, an accurate representation of the Suspension +Bridge at Niagara Falls. It was almost as large as its successor, the +"Colosseum," and it had been presented to Mr. Adams by colleagues in +his department at Lamb and Company's. Adams had shown some feeling when +Alice began to urge its removal to obscurity in the "upstairs hall"; he +even resisted for several days after she had the "Colosseum" charged +to him, framed in oak, and sent to the house. She cheered him up, of +course, when he gave way; and her heart never misgave her that there +might be a doubt which of the two pictures was the more dismaying. + +Over the pictures, the vases, the old brown plush rocking-chairs and +the stool, over the three gilt chairs, over the new chintz-covered easy +chair and the gray velure sofa--over everything everywhere, was the +familiar coating of smoke grime. It had worked into every fibre of +the lace curtains, dingying them to an unpleasant gray; it lay on +the window-sills and it dimmed the glass panes; it covered the walls, +covered the ceiling, and was smeared darker and thicker in all corners. +Yet here was no fault of housewifery; the curse could not be lifted, as +the ingrained smudges permanent on the once white woodwork proved. The +grime was perpetually renewed; scrubbing only ground it in. + +This particular ugliness was small part of Alice's discontent, for +though the coating grew a little deeper each year she was used to it. +Moreover, she knew that she was not likely to find anything better in +a thousand miles, so long as she kept to cities, and that none of +her friends, however opulent, had any advantage of her here. Indeed, +throughout all the great soft-coal country, people who consider +themselves comparatively poor may find this consolation: cleanliness has +been added to the virtues and beatitudes that money can not buy. + +Alice brightened a little as she went forward to the front door, and +she brightened more when the spring breeze met her there. Then all +depression left her as she walked down the short brick path to the +sidewalk, looked up and down the street, and saw how bravely the maple +shade-trees, in spite of the black powder they breathed, were flinging +out their thousands of young green particles overhead. + +She turned north, treading the new little shadows on the pavement +briskly, and, having finished buttoning her gloves, swung down her +Malacca stick from under her arm to let it tap a more leisurely +accompaniment to her quick, short step. She had to step quickly if she +was to get anywhere; for the closeness of her skirt, in spite of its +little length, permitted no natural stride; but she was pleased to be +impeded, these brevities forming part of her show of fashion. + +Other pedestrians found them not without charm, though approval may have +been lacking here and there, and at the first crossing Alice suffered +what she might have accounted an actual injury, had she allowed herself +to be so sensitive. An elderly woman in fussy black silk stood there, +waiting for a streetcar; she was all of a globular modelling, with +a face patterned like a frost-bitten peach; and that the approaching +gracefulness was uncongenial she naively made too evident. Her round, +wan eyes seemed roused to bitter life as they rose from the curved high +heels of the buckled slippers to the tight little skirt, and thence with +startled ferocity to the Malacca cane, which plainly appeared to her as +a decoration not more astounding than it was insulting. + +Perceiving that the girl was bowing to her, the globular lady hurriedly +made shift to alter her injurious expression. "Good morning, Mrs. +Dowling," Alice said, gravely. Mrs. Dowling returned the salutation with +a smile as convincingly benevolent as the ghastly smile upon a Santa +Claus face; and then, while Alice passed on, exploded toward her a +single compacted breath through tightened lips. + +The sound was eloquently audible, though Mrs. Dowling remained unaware +that in this or any manner whatever she had shed a light upon her +thoughts; for it was her lifelong innocent conviction that other people +saw her only as she wished to be seen, and heard from her only what she +intended to be heard. At home it was always her husband who pulled down +the shades of their bedroom window. + +Alice looked serious for a few moments after the little encounter, then +found some consolation in the behaviour of a gentleman of forty or +so who was coming toward her. Like Mrs. Dowling, he had begun to show +consciousness of Alice's approach while she was yet afar off; but his +tokens were of a kind pleasanter to her. He was like Mrs. Dowling again, +however, in his conception that Alice would not realize the significance +of what he did. He passed his hand over his neck-scarf to see that it +lay neatly to his collar, smoothed a lapel of his coat, and adjusted +his hat, seeming to be preoccupied the while with problems that kept +his eyes to the pavement; then, as he came within a few feet of her, +he looked up, as in a surprised recognition almost dramatic, smiled +winningly, lifted his hat decisively, and carried it to the full arm's +length. + +Alice's response was all he could have asked. The cane in her right +hand stopped short in its swing, while her left hand moved in a pretty +gesture as if an impulse carried it toward the heart; and she smiled, +with her under lip caught suddenly between her teeth. Months ago she had +seen an actress use this smile in a play, and it came perfectly to Alice +now, without conscious direction, it had been so well acquired; but the +pretty hand's little impulse toward the heart was an original bit all +her own, on the spur of the moment. + +The gentleman went on, passing from her forward vision as he replaced +his hat. Of himself he was nothing to Alice, except for the gracious +circumstance that he had shown strong consciousness of a pretty girl. He +was middle-aged, substantial, a family man, securely married; and +Alice had with him one of those long acquaintances that never become +emphasized by so much as five minutes of talk; yet for this inconsequent +meeting she had enacted a little part like a fragment in a pantomime of +Spanish wooing. + +It was not for him--not even to impress him, except as a messenger. +Alice was herself almost unaware of her thought, which was one of the +running thousands of her thoughts that took no deliberate form in words. +Nevertheless, she had it, and it was the impulse of all her pretty +bits of pantomime when she met other acquaintances who made their +appreciation visible, as this substantial gentleman did. In Alice's +unworded thought, he was to be thus encouraged as in some measure a +champion to speak well of her to the world; but more than this: he was +to tell some magnificent unknown bachelor how wonderful, how mysterious, +she was. + +She hastened on gravely, a little stirred reciprocally with the +supposed stirrings in the breast of that shadowy ducal mate, who must be +somewhere "waiting," or perhaps already seeking her; for she more often +thought of herself as "waiting" while he sought her; and sometimes this +view of things became so definite that it shaped into a murmur on her +lips. "Waiting. Just waiting." And she might add, "For him!" Then, being +twenty-two, she was apt to conclude the mystic interview by laughing at +herself, though not without a continued wistfulness. + +She came to a group of small coloured children playing waywardly in a +puddle at the mouth of a muddy alley; and at sight of her they gave over +their pastime in order to stare. She smiled brilliantly upon them, but +they were too struck with wonder to comprehend that the manifestation +was friendly; and as Alice picked her way in a little detour to keep +from the mud, she heard one of them say, "Lady got cane! Jeez'!" + +She knew that many coloured children use impieties familiarly, and she +was not startled. She was disturbed, however, by an unfavourable hint in +the speaker's tone. He was six, probably, but the sting of a criticism +is not necessarily allayed by knowledge of its ignoble source, and +Alice had already begun to feel a slight uneasiness about her cane. Mrs. +Dowling's stare had been strikingly projected at it; other women more +than merely glanced, their brows and lips contracting impulsively; and +Alice was aware that one or two of them frankly halted as soon as she +had passed. + +She had seen in several magazines pictures of ladies with canes, and on +that account she had bought this one, never questioning that fashion is +recognized, even in the provinces, as soon as beheld. On the contrary, +these staring women obviously failed to realize that what they were +being shown was not an eccentric outburst, but the bright harbinger of +an illustrious mode. Alice had applied a bit of artificial pigment to +her lips and cheeks before she set forth this morning; she did not +need it, having a ready colour of her own, which now mounted high with +annoyance. + +Then a splendidly shining closed black automobile, with windows of +polished glass, came silently down the street toward her. Within it, as +in a luxurious little apartment, three comely ladies in mourning sat +and gossiped; but when they saw Alice they clutched one another. They +instantly recovered, bowing to her solemnly as they were borne by, yet +were not gone from her sight so swiftly but the edge of her side glance +caught a flash of teeth in mouths suddenly opened, and the dark glisten +of black gloves again clutching to share mirth. + +The colour that outdid the rouge on Alice's cheek extended its area and +grew warmer as she realized how all too cordial had been her nod and +smile to these humorous ladies. But in their identity lay a significance +causing her a sharper smart, for they were of the family of that Lamb, +chief of Lamb and Company, who had employed her father since before she +was born. + +"And know his salary! They'd be SURE to find out about that!" was her +thought, coupled with another bitter one to the effect that they had +probably made instantaneous financial estimates of what she wore though +certainly her walking-stick had most fed their hilarity. + +She tucked it under her arm, not swinging it again; and her breath +became quick and irregular as emotion beset her. She had been enjoying +her walk, but within the space of the few blocks she had gone since she +met the substantial gentleman, she found that more than the walk was +spoiled: suddenly her life seemed to be spoiled, too; though she did not +view the ruin with complaisance. These Lamb women thought her and her +cane ridiculous, did they? she said to herself. That was their parvenu +blood: to think because a girl's father worked for their grandfather +she had no right to be rather striking in style, especially when the +striking WAS her style. Probably all the other girls and women would +agree with them and would laugh at her when they got together, and, +what might be fatal, would try to make all the men think her a silly +pretender. Men were just like sheep, and nothing was easier than for +women to set up as shepherds and pen them in a fold. "To keep out +outsiders," Alice thought. "And make 'em believe I AM an outsider. +What's the use of living?" + +All seemed lost when a trim young man appeared, striding out of a +cross-street not far before her, and, turning at the corner, came +toward her. Visibly, he slackened his gait to lengthen the time of his +approach, and, as he was a stranger to her, no motive could be ascribed +to him other than a wish to have a longer time to look at her. + +She lifted a pretty hand to a pin at her throat, bit her lip--not with +the smile, but mysteriously--and at the last instant before her shadow +touched the stranger, let her eyes gravely meet his. A moment later, +having arrived before the house which was her destination, she halted +at the entrance to a driveway leading through fine lawns to the +intentionally important mansion. It was a pleasant and impressive +place to be seen entering, but Alice did not enter at once. She paused, +examining a tiny bit of mortar which the masons had forgotten to scrape +from a brick in one of the massive gate-posts. She frowned at this tiny +defacement, and with an air of annoyance scraped it away, using the +ferrule of her cane an act of fastidious proprietorship. If any one had +looked back over his shoulder he would not have doubted that she lived +there. + +Alice did not turn to see whether anything of the sort happened or not, +but she may have surmised that it did. At all events, it was with +an invigorated step that she left the gateway behind her and went +cheerfully up the drive to the house of her friend Mildred. + + + +CHAPTER IV + +Adams had a restless morning, and toward noon he asked Miss Perry to +call his daughter; he wished to say something to her. + +"I thought I heard her leaving the house a couple of hours ago--maybe +longer," the nurse told him. "I'll go see." And she returned from the +brief errand, her impression confirmed by information from Mrs. Adams. +"Yes. She went up to Miss Mildred Palmer's to see what she's going to +wear to-night." + +Adams looked at Miss Perry wearily, but remained passive, making no +inquiries; for he was long accustomed to what seemed to him a kind of +jargon among ladies, which became the more incomprehensible when they +tried to explain it. A man's best course, he had found, was just to let +it go as so much sound. His sorrowful eyes followed the nurse as she +went back to her rocking-chair by the window, and her placidity showed +him that there was no mystery for her in the fact that Alice walked +two miles to ask so simple a question when there was a telephone in +the house. Obviously Miss Perry also comprehended why Alice thought it +important to know what Mildred meant to wear. Adams understood why Alice +should be concerned with what she herself wore "to look neat and tidy +and at her best, why, of course she'd want to," he thought--but he +realized that it was forever beyond him to understand why the clothing +of other people had long since become an absorbing part of her life. + +Her excursion this morning was no novelty; she was continually going to +see what Mildred meant to wear, or what some other girl meant to wear; +and when Alice came home from wherever other girls or women had been +gathered, she always hurried to her mother with earnest descriptions of +the clothing she had seen. At such times, if Adams was present, he might +recognize "organdie," or "taffeta," or "chiffon," as words defining +certain textiles, but the rest was too technical for him, and he +was like a dismal boy at a sermon, just waiting for it to get itself +finished. Not the least of the mystery was his wife's interest: she was +almost indifferent about her own clothes, and when she consulted Alice +about them spoke hurriedly and with an air of apology; but when Alice +described other people's clothes, Mrs. Adams listened as eagerly as the +daughter talked. + +"There they go!" he muttered to-day, a moment after he heard the front +door closing, a sound recognizable throughout most of the thinly built +house. Alice had just returned, and Mrs. Adams called to her from the +upper hallway, not far from Adams's door. + +"What did she SAY?" + +"She was sort of snippy about it," Alice returned, ascending the stairs. +"She gets that way sometimes, and pretended she hadn't made up her mind, +but I'm pretty sure it'll be the maize Georgette with Malines flounces." + +"Didn't you say she wore that at the Pattersons'?" Mrs. Adams inquired, +as Alice arrived at the top of the stairs. "And didn't you tell me she +wore it again at the----" + +"Certainly not," Alice interrupted, rather petulantly. "She's never worn +it but once, and of course she wouldn't want to wear anything to-night +that people have seen her in a lot." + +Miss Perry opened the door of Adams's room and stepped out. "Your father +wants to know if you'll come and see him a minute, Miss Adams." + +"Poor old thing! Of course!" Alice exclaimed, and went quickly into the +room, Miss Perry remaining outside. "What's the matter, papa? Getting +awful sick of lying on his tired old back, I expect." + +"I've had kind of a poor morning," Adams said, as she patted his hand +comfortingly. "I been thinking----" + +"Didn't I tell you not to?" she cried, gaily. "Of course you'll have +poor times when you go and do just exactly what I say you mustn't. You +stop thinking this very minute!" + +He smiled ruefully, closing his eyes; was silent for a moment, then +asked her to sit beside the bed. "I been thinking of something I wanted +to say," he added. + +"What like, papa?" + +"Well, it's nothing--much," he said, with something deprecatory in his +tone, as if he felt vague impulses toward both humour and apology. "I +just thought maybe I ought to've said more to you some time or other +about--well, about the way things ARE, down at Lamb and Company's, for +instance." + +"Now, papa!" She leaned forward in the chair she had taken, and +pretended to slap his hand crossly. "Isn't that exactly what I said you +couldn't think one single think about till you get ALL well?" + +"Well----" he said, and went on slowly, not looking at her, but at the +ceiling. "I just thought maybe it wouldn't been any harm if some time or +other I told you something about the way they sort of depend on me down +there." + +"Why don't they show it, then?" she asked, quickly. "That's just what +mama and I have been feeling so much; they don't appreciate you." + +"Why, yes, they do," he said. "Yes, they do. They began h'isting my +salary the second year I went in there, and they've h'isted it a little +every two years all the time I've worked for 'em. I've been head of the +sundries department for seven years now, and I could hardly have more +authority in that department unless I was a member of the firm itself." + +"Well, why don't they make you a member of the firm? That's what they +ought to've done! Yes, and long ago!" + +Adams laughed, but sighed with more heartiness than he had laughed. +"They call me their 'oldest stand-by' down there." He laughed again, +apologetically, as if to excuse himself for taking a little pride in +this title. "Yes, sir; they say I'm their 'oldest stand-by'; and I guess +they know they can count on my department's turning in as good a report +as they look for, at the end of every month; but they don't have to take +a man into the firm to get him to do my work, dearie." + +"But you said they depended on you, papa." + +"So they do; but of course not so's they couldn't get along without me." +He paused, reflecting. "I don't just seem to know how to put it--I +mean how to put what I started out to say. I kind of wanted to tell +you--well, it seems funny to me, these last few years, the way your +mother's taken to feeling about it. I'd like to see a better +established wholesale drug business than Lamb and Company this side the +Alleghanies--I don't say bigger, I say better established--and it's kind +of funny for a man that's been with a business like that as long as +I have to hear it called a 'hole.' It's kind of funny when you think, +yourself, you've done pretty fairly well in a business like that, and +the men at the head of it seem to think so, too, and put your salary +just about as high as anybody could consider customary--well, what I +mean, Alice, it's kind of funny to have your mother think it's mostly +just--mostly just a failure, so to speak." + +His voice had become tremulous in spite of him; and this sign of +weakness and emotion had sufficient effect upon Alice. She bent over him +suddenly, with her arm about him and her cheek against his. "Poor papa!" +she murmured. "Poor papa!" + +"No, no," he said. "I didn't mean anything to trouble you. I just +thought----" He hesitated. "I just wondered--I thought maybe it wouldn't +be any harm if I said something about how things ARE down there. I +got to thinking maybe you didn't understand it's a pretty good place. +They're fine people to work for; and they've always seemed to think +something of me;--the way they took Walter on, for instance, soon as I +asked 'em, last year. Don't you think that looked a good deal as if they +thought something of me, Alice?" + +"Yes, papa," she said, not moving. + +"And the work's right pleasant," he went on. "Mighty nice boys in our +department, Alice. Well, they are in all the departments, for that +matter. We have a good deal of fun down there some days." + +She lifted her head. "More than you do at home 'some days,' I expect, +papa!" she said. + +He protested feebly. "Now, I didn't mean that--I didn't want to trouble +you----" + +She looked at him through winking eyelashes. "I'm sorry I called it a +'hole,' papa." + +"No, no," he protested, gently. "It was your mother said that." + +"No. I did, too." + +"Well, if you did, it was only because you'd heard her." + +She shook her head, then kissed him. "I'm going to talk to her," she +said, and rose decisively. + +But at this, her father's troubled voice became quickly louder: "You +better let her alone. I just wanted to have a little talk with you. I +didn't mean to start any--your mother won't----" + +"Now, papa!" Alice spoke cheerfully again, and smiled upon him. "I want +you to quit worrying! Everything's going to be all right and nobody's +going to bother you any more about anything. You'll see!" + +She carried her smile out into the hall, but after she had closed the +door her face was all pity; and her mother, waiting for her in the +opposite room, spoke sympathetically. + +"What's the matter, Alice? What did he say that's upset you?" + +"Wait a minute, mama." Alice found a handkerchief, used it for eyes and +suffused nose, gulped, then suddenly and desolately sat upon the bed. +"Poor, poor, POOR papa!" she whispered. + +"Why?" Mrs. Adams inquired, mildly. "What's the matter with him? +Sometimes you act as if he weren't getting well. What's he been talking +about?" + +"Mama--well, I think I'm pretty selfish. Oh, I do!" + +"Did he say you were?" + +"Papa? No, indeed! What I mean is, maybe we're both a little selfish to +try to make him go out and hunt around for something new." + +Mrs. Adams looked thoughtful. "Oh, that's what he was up to!" + +"Mama, I think we ought to give it up. I didn't dream it had really hurt +him." + +"Well, doesn't he hurt us?" + +"Never that I know of, mama." + +"I don't mean by SAYING things," Mrs. Adams explained, impatiently. +"There are more ways than that of hurting people. When a man sticks to a +salary that doesn't provide for his family, isn't that hurting them?" + +"Oh, it 'provides' for us well enough, mama. We have what we need--if I +weren't so extravagant. Oh, _I_ know I am!" + +But at this admission her mother cried out sharply. "'Extravagant!' +You haven't one tenth of what the other girls you go with have. And +you CAN'T have what you ought to as long as he doesn't get out of that +horrible place. It provides bare food and shelter for us, but what's +that?" + +"I don't think we ought to try any more to change him." + +"You don't?" Mrs. Adams came and stood before her. "Listen, Alice: your +father's asleep; that's his trouble, and he's got to be waked up. He +doesn't know that things have changed. When you and Walter were little +children we did have enough--at least it seemed to be about as much +as most of the people we knew. But the town isn't what it was in those +days, and times aren't what they were then, and these fearful PRICES +aren't the old prices. Everything else but your father has changed, and +all the time he's stood still. He doesn't know it; he thinks because +they've given him a hundred dollars more every two years he's quite a +prosperous man! And he thinks that because his children cost him more +than he and I cost our parents he gives them--enough!" + +"But Walter----" Alice faltered. "Walter doesn't cost him anything at +all any more." And she concluded, in a stricken voice, "It's all--me!" + +"Why shouldn't it be?" her mother cried. "You're young--you're just at +the time when your life should be fullest of good things and happiness. +Yet what do you get?" + +Alice's lip quivered; she was not unsusceptible to such an appeal, but +she contrived the semblance of a protest. "I don't have such a bad time +not a good DEAL of the time, anyhow. I've got a good MANY of the things +other girls have----" + +"You have?" Mrs. Adams was piteously satirical. "I suppose you've got +a limousine to go to that dance to-night? I suppose you've only got +to call a florist and tell him to send you some orchids? I suppose +you've----" + +But Alice interrupted this list. Apparently in a single instant all +emotion left her, and she became businesslike, as one in the midst of +trifles reminded of really serious matters. She got up from the bed +and went to the door of the closet where she kept her dresses. "Oh, see +here," she said, briskly. "I've decided to wear my white organdie if you +could put in a new lining for me. I'm afraid it'll take you nearly all +afternoon." + +She brought forth the dress, displayed it upon the bed, and Mrs. Adams +examined it attentively. + +"Do you think you could get it done, mama?" + +"I don't see why not," Mrs. Adams answered, passing a thoughtful hand +over the fabric. "It oughtn't to take more than four or five hours." + +"It's a shame to have you sit at the machine that long," Alice said, +absently, adding, "And I'm sure we ought to let papa alone. Let's just +give it up, mama." + +Mrs. Adams continued her thoughtful examination of the dress. "Did you +buy the chiffon and ribbon, Alice?" + +"Yes. I'm sure we oughtn't to talk to him about it any more, mama." + +"Well, we'll see." + +"Let's both agree that we'll NEVER say another single word to him about +it," said Alice. "It'll be a great deal better if we just let him make +up his mind for himself." + + + +CHAPTER V + +With this, having more immediately practical questions before them, they +dropped the subject, to bend their entire attention upon the dress; and +when the lunch-gong sounded downstairs Alice was still sketching repairs +and alterations. She continued to sketch them, not heeding the summons. + +"I suppose we'd better go down to lunch," Mrs. Adams said, absently. +"She's at the gong again." "In a minute, mama. Now about the +sleeves----" And she went on with her planning. Unfortunately the +gong was inexpressive of the mood of the person who beat upon it. It +consisted of three little metal bowls upon a string; they were unequal +in size, and, upon being tapped with a padded stick, gave forth +vibrations almost musically pleasant. It was Alice who had substituted +this contrivance for the brass "dinner-bell" in use throughout her +childhood; and neither she nor the others of her family realized that +the substitution of sweeter sounds had made the life of that household +more difficult. In spite of dismaying increases in wages, the Adamses +still strove to keep a cook; and, as they were unable to pay the higher +rates demanded by a good one, what they usually had was a whimsical +coloured woman of nomadic impulses. In the hands of such a person the +old-fashioned "dinner-bell" was satisfying; life could instantly be +made intolerable for any one dawdling on his way to a meal; the bell was +capable of every desirable profanity and left nothing bottled up in the +breast of the ringer. But the chamois-covered stick might whack upon +Alice's little Chinese bowls for a considerable length of time and +produce no great effect of urgency upon a hearer, nor any other effect, +except fury in the cook. The ironical impossibility of expressing +indignation otherwise than by sounds of gentle harmony proved +exasperating; the cook was apt to become surcharged, so that explosive +resignations, never rare, were somewhat more frequent after the +introduction of the gong. + +Mrs. Adams took this increased frequency to be only another +manifestation of the inexplicable new difficulties that beset all +housekeeping. You paid a cook double what you had paid one a few years +before; and the cook knew half as much of cookery, and had no gratitude. +The more you gave these people, it seemed, the worse they behaved--a +condition not to be remedied by simply giving them less, because you +couldn't even get the worst unless you paid her what she demanded. +Nevertheless, Mrs. Adams remained fitfully an optimist in the matter. +Brought up by her mother to speak of a female cook as "the girl," she +had been instructed by Alice to drop that definition in favour of one +not an improvement in accuracy: "the maid." Almost always, during +the first day or so after every cook came, Mrs. Adams would say, at +intervals, with an air of triumph: "I believe--of course it's a little +soon to be sure--but I do really believe this new maid is the treasure +we've been looking for so long!" Much in the same way that Alice dreamed +of a mysterious perfect mate for whom she "waited," her mother had +a fairy theory that hidden somewhere in the universe there was the +treasure, the perfect "maid," who would come and cook in the Adamses' +kitchen, not four days or four weeks, but forever. + +The present incumbent was not she. Alice, profoundly interested herself, +kept her mother likewise so preoccupied with the dress that they were +but vaguely conscious of the gong's soft warnings, though these were +repeated and protracted unusually. Finally the sound of a hearty voice, +independent and enraged, reached the pair. It came from the hall below. + +"I says goo'-BYE!" it called. "Da'ss all!" + +Then the front door slammed. + +"Why, what----" Mrs. Adams began. + +They went down hurriedly to find out. Miss Perry informed them. + +"I couldn't make her listen to reason," she said. "She rang the gong +four or five times and got to talking to herself; and then she went up +to her room and packed her bag. I told her she had no business to go out +the front door, anyhow." + +Mrs. Adams took the news philosophically. "I thought she had something +like that in her eye when I paid her this morning, and I'm not +surprised. Well, we won't let Mr. Adams know anything's the matter till +I get a new one." + +They lunched upon what the late incumbent had left chilling on the +table, and then Mrs. Adams prepared to wash the dishes; she would "have +them done in a jiffy," she said, cheerfully. But it was Alice who washed +the dishes. + +"I DON'T like to have you do that, Alice," her mother protested, +following her into the kitchen. "It roughens the hands, and when a girl +has hands like yours----" + +"I know, mama." Alice looked troubled, but shook her head. "It can't be +helped this time; you'll need every minute to get that dress done." + +Mrs. Adams went away lamenting, while Alice, no expert, began to splash +the plates and cups and saucers in the warm water. After a while, as +she worked, her eyes grew dreamy: she was making little gay-coloured +pictures of herself, unfounded prophecies of how she would look and what +would happen to her that evening. She saw herself, charming and demure, +wearing a fluffy idealization of the dress her mother now determinedly +struggled with upstairs; she saw herself framed in a garlanded archway, +the entrance to a ballroom, and saw the people on the shining floor +turning dramatically to look at her; then from all points a rush of +young men shouting for dances with her; and she constructed a superb +stranger, tall, dark, masterfully smiling, who swung her out of the +clamouring group as the music began. She saw herself dancing with him, +saw the half-troubled smile she would give him; and she accurately +smiled that smile as she rinsed the knives and forks. + +These hopeful fragments of drama were not to be realized, she knew; but +she played that they were true, and went on creating them. In all of +them she wore or carried flowers--her mother's sorrow for her in this +detail but made it the more important--and she saw herself glamorous +with orchids; discarded these for an armful of long-stemmed, heavy +roses; tossed them away for a great bouquet of white camellias; and +so wandered down a lengthening hothouse gallery of floral beauty, all +costly and beyond her reach except in such a wistful day-dream. And upon +her present whole horizon, though she searched it earnestly, she could +discover no figure of a sender of flowers. + +Out of her fancies the desire for flowers to wear that night emerged +definitely and became poignant; she began to feel that it might be +particularly important to have them. "This might be the night!" She was +still at the age to dream that the night of any dance may be the vital +point in destiny. No matter how commonplace or disappointing other +dance nights have been this one may bring the great meeting. The unknown +magnifico may be there. + +Alice was almost unaware of her own reveries in which this being +appeared--reveries often so transitory that they developed and passed in +a few seconds. And in some of them the being was not wholly a stranger; +there were moments when he seemed to be composed of recognizable +fragments of young men she knew--a smile she had liked, from one; the +figure of another, the hair of another--and sometimes she thought +he might be concealed, so to say, within the person of an actual +acquaintance, someone she had never suspected of being the right seeker +for her, someone who had never suspected that it was she who "waited" +for him. Anything might reveal them to each other: a look, a turn of the +head, a singular word--perhaps some flowers upon her breast or in her +hand. + +She wiped the dishes slowly, concluding the operation by dropping a +saucer upon the floor and dreamily sweeping the fragments under the +stove. She sighed and replaced the broom near a window, letting her +glance wander over the small yard outside. The grass, repulsively +besooted to the colour of coal-smoke all winter, had lately come to life +again and now sparkled with green, in the midst of which a tiny shot of +blue suddenly fixed her absent eyes. They remained upon it for several +moments, becoming less absent. + +It was a violet. + +Alice ran upstairs, put on her hat, went outdoors and began to search +out the violets. She found twenty-two, a bright omen--since the number +was that of her years--but not enough violets. There were no more; she +had ransacked every foot of the yard. + +She looked dubiously at the little bunch in her hand, glanced at +the lawn next door, which offered no favourable prospect; then went +thoughtfully into the house, left her twenty-two violets in a bowl +of water, and came quickly out again, her brow marked with a frown of +decision. She went to a trolley-line and took a car to the outskirts of +the city where a new park had been opened. + +Here she resumed her search, but it was not an easily rewarded one, +and for an hour after her arrival she found no violets. She walked +conscientiously over the whole stretch of meadow, her eyes roving +discontentedly; there was never a blue dot in the groomed expanse; but +at last, as she came near the borders of an old grove of trees, left +untouched by the municipal landscapers, the little flowers appeared, and +she began to gather them. She picked them carefully, loosening the earth +round each tiny plant, so as to bring the roots up with it, that it +might live the longer; and she had brought a napkin, which she +drenched at a hydrant, and kept loosely wrapped about the stems of her +collection. + +The turf was too damp for her to kneel; she worked patiently, stooping +from the waist; and when she got home in a drizzle of rain at five +o'clock her knees were tremulous with strain, her back ached, and she +was tired all over, but she had three hundred violets. Her mother moaned +when Alice showed them to her, fragrant in a basin of water. + +"Oh, you POOR child! To think of your having to work so hard to get +things that other girls only need lift their little fingers for!" + +"Never mind," said Alice, huskily. "I've got 'em and I AM going to have +a good time to-night!" + +"You've just got to!" Mrs. Adams agreed, intensely sympathetic. "The +Lord knows you deserve to, after picking all these violets, poor thing, +and He wouldn't be mean enough to keep you from it. I may have to get +dinner before I finish the dress, but I can get it done in a few minutes +afterward, and it's going to look right pretty. Don't you worry about +THAT! And with all these lovely violets----" + +"I wonder----" Alice began, paused, then went on, fragmentarily: "I +suppose--well, I wonder--do you suppose it would have been better policy +to have told Walter before----" + +"No," said her mother. "It would only have given him longer to grumble." + +"But he might----" + +"Don't worry," Mrs. Adams reassured her. "He'll be a little cross, but +he won't be stubborn; just let me talk to him and don't you say anything +at all, no matter what HE says." + +These references to Walter concerned some necessary manoeuvres which +took place at dinner, and were conducted by the mother, Alice having +accepted her advice to sit in silence. Mrs. Adams began by laughing +cheerfully. "I wonder how much longer it took me to cook this dinner +than it does Walter to eat it?" she said. "Don't gobble, child! There's +no hurry." + +In contact with his own family Walter was no squanderer of words. + +"Is for me," he said. "Got date." + +"I know you have, but there's plenty of time." + +He smiled in benevolent pity. "YOU know, do you? If you made any +coffee--don't bother if you didn't. Get some down-town." He seemed +about to rise and depart; whereupon Alice, biting her lip, sent a +panic-stricken glance at her mother. + +But Mrs. Adams seemed not at all disturbed; and laughed again. "Why, +what nonsense, Walter! I'll bring your coffee in a few minutes, but +we're going to have dessert first." + +"What sort?" + +"Some lovely peaches." + +"Doe' want 'ny canned peaches," said the frank Walter, moving back his +chair. "G'-night." + +"Walter! It doesn't begin till about nine o'clock at the earliest." + +He paused, mystified. "What doesn't?" + +"The dance." + +"What dance?" + +"Why, Mildred Palmer's dance, of course." + +Walter laughed briefly. "What's that to me?" + +"Why, you haven't forgotten it's TO-NIGHT, have you?" Mrs. Adams cried. +"What a boy!" + +"I told you a week ago I wasn't going to that ole dance," he returned, +frowning. "You heard me." + +"Walter!" she exclaimed. "Of COURSE you're going. I got your clothes all +out this afternoon, and brushed them for you. They'll look very nice, +and----" + +"They won't look nice on ME," he interrupted. "Got date down-town, I +tell you." + +"But of course you'll----" + +"See here!" Walter said, decisively. "Don't get any wrong ideas in your +head. I'm just as liable to go up to that ole dance at the Palmers' as I +am to eat a couple of barrels of broken glass." + +"But, Walter----" + +Walter was beginning to be seriously annoyed. "Don't 'Walter' me! I'm no +s'ciety snake. I wouldn't jazz with that Palmer crowd if they coaxed me +with diamonds." + +"Walter----" + +"Didn't I tell you it's no use to 'Walter' me?" he demanded. + +"My dear child----" + +"Oh, Glory!" + +At this Mrs. Adams abandoned her air of amusement, looked hurt, and +glanced at the demure Miss Perry across the table. "I'm afraid Miss +Perry won't think you have very good manners, Walter." + +"You're right she won't," he agreed, grimly. "Not if I haf to hear any +more about me goin' to----" + +But his mother interrupted him with some asperity: "It seems very +strange that you always object to going anywhere among OUR friends, +Walter." + +"YOUR friends!" he said, and, rising from his chair, gave utterance to +an ironical laugh strictly monosyllabic. "Your friends!" he repeated, +going to the door. "Oh, yes! Certainly! Good-NIGHT!" + +And looking back over his shoulder to offer a final brief view of his +derisive face, he took himself out of the room. + +Alice gasped: "Mama----" + +"I'll stop him!" her mother responded, sharply; and hurried after the +truant, catching him at the front door with his hat and raincoat on. + +"Walter----" + +"Told you had a date down-town," he said, gruffly, and would have opened +the door, but she caught his arm and detained him. + +"Walter, please come back and finish your dinner. When I take all the +trouble to cook it for you, I think you might at least----" + +"Now, now!" he said. "That isn't what you're up to. You don't want to +make me eat; you want to make me listen." + +"Well, you MUST listen!" She retained her grasp upon his arm, and +made it tighter. "Walter, please!" she entreated, her voice becoming +tremulous. "PLEASE don't make me so much trouble!" + +He drew back from her as far as her hold upon him permitted, and looked +at her sharply. "Look here!" he said. "I get you, all right! What's the +matter of Alice GOIN' to that party by herself?" + +"She just CAN'T!" + +"Why not?" + +"It makes things too MEAN for her, Walter. All the other girls have +somebody to depend on after they get there." + +"Well, why doesn't she have somebody?" he asked, testily. "Somebody +besides ME, I mean! Why hasn't somebody asked her to go? She ought to be +THAT popular, anyhow, I sh'd think--she TRIES enough!" + +"I don't understand how you can be so hard," his mother wailed, huskily. +"You know why they don't run after her the way they do the other girls +she goes with, Walter. It's because we're poor, and she hasn't got any +background. + +"'Background?'" Walter repeated. "'Background?' What kind of talk is +that?" + +"You WILL go with her to-night, Walter?" his mother pleaded, not +stopping to enlighten him. "You don't understand how hard things are for +her and how brave she is about them, or you COULDN'T be so selfish! It'd +be more than I can bear to see her disappointed to-night! She went clear +out to Belleview Park this afternoon, Walter, and spent hours and hours +picking violets to wear. You WILL----" + +Walter's heart was not iron, and the episode of the violets may have +reached it. "Oh, BLUB!" he said, and flung his soft hat violently at the +wall. + +His mother beamed with delight. "THAT'S a good boy, darling! You'll +never be sorry you----" + +"Cut it out," he requested. "If I take her, will you pay for a taxi?" + +"Oh, Walter!" And again Mrs. Adams showed distress. "Couldn't you?" + +"No, I couldn't; I'm not goin' to throw away my good money like that, +and you can't tell what time o' night it'll be before she's willin' to +come home. What's the matter you payin' for one?" + +"I haven't any money." + +"Well, father----" + +She shook her head dolefully. "I got some from him this morning, and +I can't bother him for any more; it upsets him. He's ALWAYS been so +terribly close with money----" + +"I guess he couldn't help that," Walter observed. "We're liable to go to +the poorhouse the way it is. Well, what's the matter our walkin' to this +rotten party?" + +"In the rain, Walter?" + +"Well, it's only a drizzle and we can take a streetcar to within a block +of the house." + +Again his mother shook her head. "It wouldn't do." + +"Well, darn the luck, all right!" he consented, explosively. "I'll get +her something to ride in. It means seventy-five cents." + +"Why, Walter!" Mrs. Adams cried, much pleased. "Do you know how to get a +cab for that little? How splendid!" + +"Tain't a cab," Walter informed her crossly. "It's a tin Lizzie, but you +don't haf' to tell her what it is till I get her into it, do you?" + +Mrs. Adams agreed that she didn't. + + + +CHAPTER VI + +Alice was busy with herself for two hours after dinner; but a little +before nine o'clock she stood in front of her long mirror, completed, +bright-eyed and solemn. Her hair, exquisitely arranged, gave all she +asked of it; what artificialities in colour she had used upon her face +were only bits of emphasis that made her prettiness the more distinct; +and the dress, not rumpled by her mother's careful hours of work, was a +white cloud of loveliness. Finally there were two triumphant bouquets +of violets, each with the stems wrapped in tin-foil shrouded by a bow of +purple chiffon; and one bouquet she wore at her waist and the other she +carried in her hand. + +Miss Perry, called in by a rapturous mother for the free treat of a look +at this radiance, insisted that Alice was a vision. "Purely and simply +a vision!" she said, meaning that no other definition whatever would +satisfy her. "I never saw anybody look a vision if she don't look one +to-night," the admiring nurse declared. "Her papa'll think the same I do +about it. You see if he doesn't say she's purely and simply a vision." + +Adams did not fulfil the prediction quite literally when Alice paid a +brief visit to his room to "show" him and bid him good-night; but he +chuckled feebly. "Well, well, well!" he said. + +"You look mighty fine--MIGHTY fine!" And he waggled a bony finger at her +two bouquets. "Why, Alice, who's your beau?" + +"Never you mind!" she laughed, archly brushing his nose with the violets +in her hand. "He treats me pretty well, doesn't he?" + +"Must like to throw his money around! These violets smell mighty sweet, +and they ought to, if they're going to a party with YOU. Have a good +time, dearie." + +"I mean to!" she cried; and she repeated this gaily, but with an +emphasis expressing sharp determination as she left him. "I MEAN to!" + +"What was he talking about?" her mother inquired, smoothing the rather +worn and old evening wrap she had placed on Alice's bed. "What were you +telling him you 'mean to?'" + +Alice went back to her triple mirror for the last time, then stood +before the long one. "That I mean to have a good time to-night," she +said; and as she turned from her reflection to the wrap Mrs. Adams held +up for her, "It looks as though I COULD, don't you think so?" + +"You'll just be a queen to-night," her mother whispered in fond emotion. +"You mustn't doubt yourself." + +"Well, there's one thing," said Alice. "I think I do look nice enough to +get along without having to dance with that Frank Dowling! All I ask is +for it to happen just once; and if he comes near me to-night I'm going +to treat him the way the other girls do. Do you suppose Walter's got the +taxi out in front?" + +"He--he's waiting down in the hall," Mrs. Adams answered, nervously; and +she held up another garment to go over the wrap. + +Alice frowned at it. "What's that, mama?" + +"It's--it's your father's raincoat. I thought you'd put it on over----" + +"But I won't need it in a taxicab." + +"You will to get in and out, and you needn't take it into the Palmers'. +You can leave it in the--in the--It's drizzling, and you'll need it." + +"Oh, well," Alice consented; and a few minutes later, as with Walter's +assistance she climbed into the vehicle he had provided, she better +understood her mother's solicitude. + +"What on earth IS this, Walter?" she asked. + +"Never mind; it'll keep you dry enough with the top up," he returned, +taking his seat beside her. Then for a time, as they went rather jerkily +up the street, she was silent; but finally she repeated her question: +"What IS it, Walter?" + +"What's what?" + +"This--this CAR?" + +"It's a ottomobile." + +"I mean--what kind is it?" + +"Haven't you got eyes?" + +"It's too dark." + +"It's a second-hand tin Lizzie," said Walter. "D'you know what that +means? It means a flivver." + +"Yes, Walter." + +"Got 'ny 'bjections?" + +"Why, no, dear," she said, placatively. "Is it yours, Walter? Have you +bought it?" + +"Me?" he laughed. "_I_ couldn't buy a used wheelbarrow. I rent this +sometimes when I'm goin' out among 'em. Costs me seventy-five cents and +the price o' the gas." + +"That seems very moderate." + +"I guess it is! The feller owes me some money, and this is the only way +I'd ever get it off him." + +"Is he a garage-keeper?" + +"Not exactly!" Walter uttered husky sounds of amusement. "You'll be just +as happy, I guess, if you don't know who he is," he said. + +His tone misgave her; and she said truthfully that she was content not +to know who owned the car. "I joke sometimes about how you keep things +to yourself," she added, "but I really never do pry in your affairs, +Walter." + +"Oh, no, you don't!" + +"Indeed, I don't." + +"Yes, you're mighty nice and cooing when you got me where you want me," +he jeered. "Well, _I_ just as soon tell you where I get this car." + +"I'd just as soon you wouldn't, Walter," she said, hurriedly. "Please +don't." + +But Walter meant to tell her. "Why, there's nothin' exactly CRIMINAL +about it," he said. "It belongs to old J. A. Lamb himself. He keeps it +for their coon chauffeur. I rent it from him." + +"From Mr. LAMB?" + +"No; from the coon chauffeur." + +"Walter!" she gasped. + +"Sure I do! I can get it any night when the coon isn't goin' to use it +himself. He's drivin' their limousine to-night--that little Henrietta +Lamb's goin' to the party, no matter if her father HAS only been dead +less'n a year!" He paused, then inquired: "Well, how d'you like it?" + +She did not speak, and he began to be remorseful for having imparted +so much information, though his way of expressing regret was his own. +"Well, you WILL make the folks make me take you to parties!" he said. "I +got to do it the best way I CAN, don't I?" + +Then as she made no response, "Oh, the car's CLEAN enough," he said. +"This coon, he's as particular as any white man; you needn't worry about +that." And as she still said nothing, he added gruffly, "I'd of had a +better car if I could afforded it. You needn't get so upset about it." + +"I don't understand--" she said in a low voice--"I don't understand how +you know such people." + +"Such people as who?" + +"As--coloured chauffeurs." + +"Oh, look here, now!" he protested, loudly. "Don't you know this is a +democratic country?" + +"Not quite that democratic, is it, Walter?" + +"The trouble with you," he retorted, "you don't know there's anybody in +town except just this silk-shirt crowd." He paused, seeming to await +a refutation; but as none came, he expressed himself definitely: "They +make me sick." + +They were coming near their destination, and the glow of the big, +brightly lighted house was seen before them in the wet night. Other +cars, not like theirs, were approaching this center of brilliance; long +triangles of light near the ground swept through the fine drizzle; small +red tail-lights gleamed again from the moist pavement of the street; +and, through the myriads of little glistening leaves along the curving +driveway, glimpses were caught of lively colours moving in a white glare +as the limousines released their occupants under the shelter of the +porte-cochere. + +Alice clutched Walter's arm in a panic; they were just at the driveway +entrance. "Walter, we mustn't go in there." + +"What's the matter?" + +"Leave this awful car outside." + +"Why, I----" + +"Stop!" she insisted, vehemently. "You've got to! Go back!" + +"Oh, Glory!" + +The little car was between the entrance posts; but Walter backed it out, +avoiding a collision with an impressive machine which swerved away +from them and passed on toward the porte-cochere, showing a man's face +grinning at the window as it went by. "Flivver runabout got the wrong +number!" he said. + +"Did he SEE us?" Alice cried. + +"Did who see us?" + +"Harvey Malone--in that foreign coupe." + +"No; he couldn't tell who we were under this top," Walter assured her as +he brought the little car to a standstill beside the curbstone, out in +the street. "What's it matter if he did, the big fish?" + +Alice responded with a loud sigh, and sat still. + +"Well, want to go on back?" Walter inquired. "You bet I'm willing!" + +"No." + +"Well, then, what's the matter our drivin' on up to the porte-cochere? +There's room for me to park just the other side of it." + +"No, NO!" + +"What you expect to do? Sit HERE all night?" + +"No, leave the car here." + +"_I_ don't care where we leave it," he said. "Sit still till I lock her, +so none o' these millionaires around here'll run off with her." He got +out with a padlock and chain; and, having put these in place, offered +Alice his hand. "Come on, if you're ready." + +"Wait," she said, and, divesting herself of the raincoat, handed it to +Walter. "Please leave this with your things in the men's dressing-room, +as if it were an extra one of your own, Walter." + +He nodded; she jumped out; and they scurried through the drizzle. + +As they reached the porte-cochere she began to laugh airily, and spoke +to the impassive man in livery who stood there. "Joke on us!" she +said, hurrying by him toward the door of the house. "Our car broke down +outside the gate." + +The man remained impassive, though he responded with a faint gleam +as Walter, looking back at him, produced for his benefit a cynical +distortion of countenance which offered little confirmation of Alice's +account of things. Then the door was swiftly opened to the brother and +sister; and they came into a marble-floored hall, where a dozen sleeked +young men lounged, smoked cigarettes and fastened their gloves, as they +waited for their ladies. Alice nodded to one or another of these, and +went quickly on, her face uplifted and smiling; but Walter detained her +at the door to which she hastened. + +"Listen here," he said. "I suppose you want me to dance the first dance +with you----" + +"If you please, Walter," she said, meekly. + +"How long you goin' to hang around fixin' up in that dressin'-room?" + +"I'll be out before you're ready yourself," she promised him; and kept +her word, she was so eager for her good time to begin. When he came +for her, they went down the hall to a corridor opening upon three great +rooms which had been thrown open together, with the furniture removed +and the broad floors waxed. At one end of the corridor musicians sat in +a green grove, and Walter, with some interest, turned toward these; but +his sister, pressing his arm, impelled him in the opposite direction. + +"What's the matter now?" he asked. "That's Jazz Louie and his half-breed +bunch--three white and four mulatto. Let's----?" + +"No, no," she whispered. "We must speak to Mildred and Mr. and Mrs. +Palmer." + +"'Speak' to 'em? I haven't got a thing to say to THOSE berries!" + +"Walter, won't you PLEASE behave?" + +He seemed to consent, for the moment, at least, and suffered her to take +him down the corridor toward a floral bower where the hostess stood with +her father and mother. Other couples and groups were moving in the +same direction, carrying with them a hubbub of laughter and fragmentary +chatterings; and Alice, smiling all the time, greeted people on +every side of her eagerly--a little more eagerly than most of them +responded--while Walter nodded in a noncommittal manner to one or two, +said nothing, and yawned audibly, the last resource of a person who +finds himself nervous in a false situation. He repeated his yawn and +was beginning another when a convulsive pressure upon his arm made him +understand that he must abandon this method of reassuring himself. They +were close upon the floral bower. + +Mildred was giving her hand to one and another of her guests as rapidly +as she could, passing them on to her father and mother, and at the +same time resisting the efforts of three or four detached bachelors who +besought her to give over her duty in favour of the dance-music just +beginning to blare. + +She was a large, fair girl, with a kindness of eye somewhat withheld by +an expression of fastidiousness; at first sight of her it was clear that +she would never in her life do anything "incorrect," or wear anything +"incorrect." But her correctness was of the finer sort, and had no air +of being studied or achieved; conduct would never offer her a problem to +be settled from a book of rules, for the rules were so deep within her +that she was unconscious of them. And behind this perfection there was +an even ampler perfection of what Mrs. Adams called "background." The +big, rich, simple house was part of it, and Mildred's father and mother +were part of it. They stood beside her, large, serene people, murmuring +graciously and gently inclining their handsome heads as they gave their +hands to the guests; and even the youngest and most ebullient of these +took on a hushed mannerliness with a closer approach to the bower. + +When the opportunity came for Alice and Walter to pass within this +precinct, Alice, going first, leaned forward and whispered in Mildred's +ear. "You DIDN'T wear the maize georgette! That's what I thought you +were going to. But you look simply DARLING! And those pearls----" + +Others were crowding decorously forward, anxious to be done with +ceremony and get to the dancing; and Mildred did not prolong the +intimacy of Alice's enthusiastic whispering. With a faint accession of +colour and a smile tending somewhat in the direction of rigidity, she +carried Alice's hand immediately onward to Mrs. Palmer's. Alice's own +colour showed a little heightening as she accepted the suggestion thus +implied; nor was that emotional tint in any wise decreased, a moment +later, by an impression that Walter, in concluding the brief exchange +of courtesies between himself and the stately Mr. Palmer, had again +reassured himself with a yawn. + +But she did not speak of it to Walter; she preferred not to confirm the +impression and to leave in her mind a possible doubt that he had done +it. He followed her out upon the waxed floor, said resignedly: "Well, +come on," put his arm about her, and they began to dance. + +Alice danced gracefully and well, but not so well as Walter. Of all the +steps and runs, of all the whimsical turns and twirlings, of all the +rhythmic swayings and dips commanded that season by such blarings as +were the barbaric product, loud and wild, of the Jazz Louies and their +half-breed bunches, the thin and sallow youth was a master. Upon his +face could be seen contempt of the easy marvels he performed as he +moved in swift precision from one smooth agility to another; and if some +too-dainty or jealous cavalier complained that to be so much a stylist +in dancing was "not quite like a gentleman," at least Walter's style was +what the music called for. No other dancer in the room could be thought +comparable to him. Alice told him so. + +"It's wonderful!" she said. "And the mystery is, where you ever learned +to DO it! You never went to dancing-school, but there isn't a man in the +room who can dance half so well. I don't see why, when you dance like +this, you always make such a fuss about coming to parties." + +He sounded his brief laugh, a jeering bark out of one side of the mouth, +and swung her miraculously through a closing space between two other +couples. "You know a lot about what goes on, don't you? You prob'ly +think there's no other place to dance in this town except these +frozen-face joints." + +"'Frozen face?'" she echoed, laughing. "Why, everybody's having a +splendid time. Look at them." + +"Oh, they holler loud enough," he said. "They do it to make each other +think they're havin' a good time. You don't call that Palmer family +frozen-face berries, I s'pose. No?" + +"Certainly not. They're just dignified and----" + +"Yeuh!" said Walter. "They're dignified, 'specially when you tried to +whisper to Mildred to show how IN with her you were, and she moved you +on that way. SHE'S a hot friend, isn't she!" + +"She didn't mean anything by it. She----" + +"Ole Palmer's a hearty, slap you-on-the-back ole berry," Walter +interrupted; adding in a casual tone, "All I'd like, I'd like to hit +him." + +"Walter! By the way, you mustn't forget to ask Mildred for a dance +before the evening is over." + +"Me?" He produced the lop-sided appearance of his laugh, but without +making it vocal. "You watch me do it!" + +"She probably won't have one left, but you must ask her, anyway." + +"Why must I?" + +"Because, in the first place, you're supposed to, and, in the second +place, she's my most intimate friend." + +"Yeuh? Is she? I've heard you pull that 'most-intimate-friend' stuff +often enough about her. What's SHE ever do to show she is?" + +"Never mind. You really must ask her, Walter. I want you to; and I want +you to ask several other girls afterwhile; I'll tell you who." + +"Keep on wanting; it'll do you good." + +"Oh, but you really----" + +"Listen!" he said. "I'm just as liable to dance with any of these +fairies as I am to buy a bucket o' rusty tacks and eat 'em. Forget it! +Soon as I get rid of you I'm goin' back to that room where I left my hat +and overcoat and smoke myself to death." + +"Well," she said, a little ruefully, as the frenzy of Jazz Louie and his +half-breeds was suddenly abated to silence, "you mustn't--you mustn't +get rid of me TOO soon, Walter." + +They stood near one of the wide doorways, remaining where they had +stopped. Other couples, everywhere, joined one another, forming +vivacious clusters, but none of these groups adopted the brother and +sister, nor did any one appear to be hurrying in Alice's direction to +ask her for the next dance. She looked about her, still maintaining that +jubilance of look and manner she felt so necessary--for it is to the +girls who are "having a good time" that partners are attracted--and, in +order to lend greater colour to her impersonation of a lively belle, +she began to chatter loudly, bringing into play an accompaniment of +frolicsome gesture. She brushed Walter's nose saucily with the bunch +of violets in her hand, tapped him on the shoulder, shook her pretty +forefinger in his face, flourished her arms, kept her shoulders moving, +and laughed continuously as she spoke. + +"You NAUGHTY old Walter!" she cried. "AREN'T you ashamed to be such a +wonderful dancer and then only dance with your own little sister! You +could dance on the stage if you wanted to. Why, you could made your +FORTUNE that way! Why don't you? Wouldn't it be just lovely to have all +the rows and rows of people clapping their hands and shouting, 'Hurrah! +Hurrah, for Walter Adams! Hurrah! Hurrah! Hurrah!" + +He stood looking at her in stolid pity. + +"Cut it out," he said. "You better be givin' some of these berries the +eye so they'll ask you to dance." + +She was not to be so easily checked, and laughed loudly, flourishing her +violets in his face again. "You WOULD like it; you know you would; you +needn't pretend! Just think! A whole big audience shouting, 'Hurrah! +HURRAH! HUR----'" + +"The place'll be pulled if you get any noisier," he interrupted, not +ungently. "Besides, I'm no muley cow." + +"A 'COW?'" she laughed. "What on earth----" + +"I can't eat dead violets," he explained. "So don't keep tryin' to make +me do it." + +This had the effect he desired, and subdued her; she abandoned her +unsisterly coquetries, and looked beamingly about her, but her smile was +more mechanical than it had been at first. + +At home she had seemed beautiful; but here, where the other girls +competed, things were not as they had been there, with only her mother +and Miss Perry to give contrast. These crowds of other girls had all +done their best, also, to look beautiful, though not one of them had +worked so hard for such a consummation as Alice had. They did not need +to; they did not need to get their mothers to make old dresses over; +they did not need to hunt violets in the rain. + +At home her dress had seemed beautiful; but that was different, +too, where there were dozens of brilliant fabrics, fashioned in new +ways--some of these new ways startling, which only made the wearers +centers of interest and shocked no one. And Alice remembered that she +had heard a girl say, not long before, "Oh, ORGANDIE! Nobody wears +organdie for evening gowns except in midsummer." Alice had thought +little of this; but as she looked about her and saw no organdie except +her own, she found greater difficulty in keeping her smile as arch and +spontaneous as she wished it. In fact, it was beginning to make her face +ache a little. + +Mildred came in from the corridor, heavily attended. She carried a great +bouquet of violets laced with lilies of-the-valley; and the violets were +lusty, big purple things, their stems wrapped in cloth of gold, with +silken cords dependent, ending in long tassels. She and her convoy +passed near the two young Adamses; and it appeared that one of the +convoy besought his hostess to permit "cutting in"; they were "doing it +other places" of late, he urged; but he was denied and told to console +himself by holding the bouquet, at intervals, until his third of the +sixteenth dance should come. Alice looked dubiously at her own bouquet. + +Suddenly she felt that the violets betrayed her; that any one who looked +at them could see how rustic, how innocent of any florist's craft they +were "I can't eat dead violets," Walter said. The little wild flowers, +dying indeed in the warm air, were drooping in a forlorn mass; and it +seemed to her that whoever noticed them would guess that she had picked +them herself. She decided to get rid of them. + +Walter was becoming restive. "Look here!" he said. "Can't you flag one +o' these long-tailed birds to take you on for the next dance? You came +to have a good time; why don't you get busy and have it? I want to get +out and smoke." + +"You MUSTN'T leave me, Walter," she whispered, hastily. "Somebody'll +come for me before long, but until they do----" + +"Well, couldn't you sit somewhere?" + +"No, no! There isn't any one I could sit with." + +"Well, why not? Look at those ole dames in the corners. What's the +matter your tyin' up with some o' them for a while?" + +"PLEASE, Walter; no!" + +In fact, that indomitable smile of hers was the more difficult to +maintain because of these very elders to whom Walter referred. They +were mothers of girls among the dancers, and they were there to fend and +contrive for their offspring; to keep them in countenance through any +trial; to lend them diplomacy in the carrying out of all enterprises; +to be "background" for them; and in these essentially biological +functionings to imitate their own matings and renew the excitement of +their nuptial periods. Older men, husbands of these ladies and fathers +of eligible girls, were also to be seen, most of them with Mr. Palmer +in a billiard-room across the corridor. Mr. and Mrs. Adams had not been +invited. "Of course papa and mama just barely know Mildred Palmer," +Alice thought, "and most of the other girls' fathers and mothers are old +friends of Mr. and Mrs. Palmer, but I do think she might have ASKED papa +and mama, anyway--she needn't have been afraid just to ask them; +she knew they couldn't come." And her smiling lip twitched a little +threateningly, as she concluded the silent monologue. "I suppose she +thinks I ought to be glad enough she asked Walter!" + +Walter was, in fact, rather noticeable. He was not Mildred's only guest +to wear a short coat and to appear without gloves; but he was singular +(at least in his present surroundings) on account of a kind of +coiffuring he favoured, his hair having been shaped after what seemed +a Mongol inspiration. Only upon the top of the head was actual hair +perceived, the rest appearing to be nudity. And even more than by any +difference in mode he was set apart by his look and manner, in which +there seemed to be a brooding, secretive and jeering superiority and +this was most vividly expressed when he felt called upon for his loud, +short, lop-sided laugh. Whenever he uttered it Alice laughed, too, as +loudly as she could, to cover it. + +"Well," he said. "How long we goin' to stand here? My feet are sproutin' +roots." + +Alice took his arm, and they began to walk aimlessly through the rooms, +though she tried to look as if they had a definite destination, keeping +her eyes eager and her lips parted;--people had called jovially to them +from the distance, she meant to imply, and they were going to join these +merry friends. She was still upon this ghostly errand when a furious +outbreak of drums and saxophones sounded a prelude for the second dance. + +Walter danced with her again, but he gave her a warning. "I don't want +to leave you high and dry," he told her, "but I can't stand it. I got to +get somewhere I don't haf' to hurt my eyes with these berries; I'll go +blind if I got to look at any more of 'em. I'm goin' out to smoke as +soon as the music begins the next time, and you better get fixed for +it." + +Alice tried to get fixed for it. As they danced she nodded sunnily to +every man whose eye she caught, smiled her smile with the under +lip caught between her teeth; but it was not until the end of the +intermission after the dance that she saw help coming. + +Across the room sat the globular lady she had encountered that morning, +and beside the globular lady sat a round-headed, round-bodied girl; +her daughter, at first glance. The family contour was also as evident +a characteristic of the short young man who stood in front of Mrs. +Dowling, engaged with her in a discussion which was not without +evidences of an earnestness almost impassioned. Like Walter, he was +declining to dance a third time with sister; he wished to go elsewhere. + +Alice from a sidelong eye watched the controversy: she saw the globular +young man glance toward her, over his shoulder; whereupon Mrs. Dowling, +following this glance, gave Alice a look of open fury, became much more +vehement in the argument, and even struck her knee with a round, fat +fist for emphasis. + +"I'm on my way," said Walter. "There's the music startin' up again, and +I told you----" + +She nodded gratefully. "It's all right--but come back before long, +Walter." + +The globular young man, red with annoyance, had torn himself from +his family and was hastening across the room to her. "C'n I have this +dance?" + +"Why, you nice Frank Dowling!" Alice cried. "How lovely!" + + + +CHAPTER VII + +They danced. Mr. Dowling should have found other forms of exercise and +pastime. + +Nature has not designed everyone for dancing, though sometimes those +she has denied are the last to discover her niggardliness. But the round +young man was at least vigorous enough--too much so, when his knees +collided with Alice's--and he was too sturdy to be thrown off his feet, +himself, or to allow his partner to fall when he tripped her. He held +her up valiantly, and continued to beat a path through the crowd of +other dancers by main force. + +He paid no attention to anything suggested by the efforts of the +musicians, and appeared to be unaware that there should have been some +connection between what they were doing and what he was doing; but he +may have listened to other music of his own, for his expression was of +high content; he seemed to feel no doubt whatever that he was dancing. +Alice kept as far away from him as under the circumstances she could; +and when they stopped she glanced down, and found the execution of +unseen manoeuvres, within the protection of her skirt, helpful to one of +her insteps and to the toes of both of her slippers. + +Her cheery partner was paddling his rosy brows with a fine handkerchief. +"That was great!" he said. "Let's go out and sit in the corridor; +they've got some comfortable chairs out there." + +"Well--let's not," she returned. "I believe I'd rather stay in here and +look at the crowd." + +"No; that isn't it," he said, chiding her with a waggish forefinger. +"You think if you go out there you'll miss a chance of someone else +asking you for the next dance, and so you'll have to give it to me." + +"How absurd!" Then, after a look about her that revealed nothing +encouraging, she added graciously, "You can have the next if you want +it." + +"Great!" he exclaimed, mechanically. "Now let's get out of here--out of +THIS room, anyhow." + +"Why? What's the matter with----" + +"My mother," Mr. Dowling explained. "But don't look at her. She keeps +motioning me to come and see after Ella, and I'm simply NOT going to do +it, you see!" + +Alice laughed. "I don't believe it's so much that," she said, and +consented to walk with him to a point in the next room from which Mrs. +Dowling's continuous signalling could not be seen. "Your mother hates +me." + +"Oh, no; I wouldn't say that. No, she don't," he protested, innocently. +"She don't know you more than just to speak to, you see. So how could +she?" + +"Well, she does. I can tell." + +A frown appeared upon his rounded brow. "No; I'll tell you the way she +feels. It's like this: Ella isn't TOO popular, you know--it's hard to +see why, because she's a right nice girl, in her way--and mother thinks +I ought to look after her, you see. She thinks I ought to dance a whole +lot with her myself, and stir up other fellows to dance with her--it's +simply impossible to make mother understand you CAN'T do that, you see. +And then about me, you see, if she had her way I wouldn't get to dance +with anybody at all except girls like Mildred Palmer and Henrietta Lamb. +Mother wants to run my whole programme for me, you understand, but the +trouble of it is--about girls like that, you see well, I couldn't do +what she wants, even if I wanted to myself, because you take those +girls, and by the time I get Ella off my hands for a minute, why, their +dances are always every last one taken, and where do I come in?" + +Alice nodded, her amiability undamaged. "I see. So that's why you dance +with me." + +"No, I like to," he protested. "I rather dance with you than I do with +those girls." And he added with a retrospective determination which +showed that he had been through quite an experience with Mrs. Dowling in +this matter. "I TOLD mother I would, too!" + +"Did it take all your courage, Frank?" + +He looked at her shrewdly. "Now you're trying to tease me," he said. "I +don't care; I WOULD rather dance with you! In the first place, you're +a perfectly beautiful dancer, you see, and in the second, a man feels a +lot more comfortable with you than he does with them. Of course I know +almost all the other fellows get along with those girls all right; but +I don't waste any time on 'em I don't have to. _I_ like people that are +always cordial to everybody, you see--the way you are." + +"Thank you," she said, thoughtfully. + +"Oh, I MEAN it," he insisted. "There goes the band again. Shall we?" + +"Suppose we sit it out?" she suggested. "I believe I'd like to go out in +the corridor, after all--it's pretty warm in here." + +Assenting cheerfully, Dowling conducted her to a pair of easy-chairs +within a secluding grove of box-trees, and when they came to this +retreat they found Mildred Palmer just departing, under escort of a +well-favoured gentleman about thirty. As these two walked slowly away, +in the direction of the dancing-floor, they left it not to be doubted +that they were on excellent terms with each other; Mildred was evidently +willing to make their progress even slower, for she halted momentarily, +once or twice; and her upward glances to her tall companion's face were +of a gentle, almost blushing deference. Never before had Alice seen +anything like this in her friend's manner. + +"How queer!" she murmured. + +"What's queer?" Dowling inquired as they sat down. + +"Who was that man?" + +"Haven't you met him?" + +"I never saw him before. Who is he?" + +"Why, it's this Arthur Russell." + +"What Arthur Russell? I never heard of him." Mr. Dowling was puzzled. +"Why, THAT'S funny! Only the last time I saw you, you were telling me +how awfully well you knew Mildred Palmer." + +"Why, certainly I do," Alice informed him. "She's my most intimate +friend." + +"That's what makes it seem so funny you haven't heard anything about +this Russell, because everybody says even if she isn't engaged to him +right now, she most likely will be before very long. I must say it looks +a good deal that way to me, myself." + +"What nonsense!" Alice exclaimed. "She's never even mentioned him to +me." + +The young man glanced at her dubiously and passed a finger over the tiny +prong that dashingly composed the whole substance of his moustache. + +"Well, you see, Mildred IS pretty reserved," he remarked. "This Russell +is some kind of cousin of the Palmer family, I understand." + +"He is?" + +"Yes--second or third or something, the girls say. You see, my sister +Ella hasn't got much to do at home, and don't read anything, or sew, or +play solitaire, you see; and she hears about pretty much everything that +goes on, you see. Well, Ella says a lot of the girls have been talking +about Mildred and this Arthur Russell for quite a while back, you see. +They were all wondering what he was going to look like, you see; because +he only got here yesterday; and that proves she must have been talking +to some of 'em, or else how----" + +Alice laughed airily, but the pretty sound ended abruptly with an +audible intake of breath. "Of course, while Mildred IS my most intimate +friend," she said, "I don't mean she tells me everything--and naturally +she has other friends besides. What else did your sister say she told +them about this Mr. Russell?" + +"Well, it seems he's VERY well off; at least Henrietta Lamb told Ella he +was. Ella says----" + +Alice interrupted again, with an increased irritability. "Oh, never +mind what Ella says! Let's find something better to talk about than Mr. +Russell!" + +"Well, I'M willing," Mr. Dowling assented, ruefully. "What you want to +talk about?" + +But this liberal offer found her unresponsive; she sat leaning back, +silent, her arms along the arms of her chair, and her eyes, moist and +bright, fixed upon a wide doorway where the dancers fluctuated. She was +disquieted by more than Mildred's reserve, though reserve so marked had +certainly the significance of a warning that Alice's definition, "my +most intimate friend," lacked sanction. Indirect notice to this effect +could not well have been more emphatic, but the sting of it was left +for a later moment. Something else preoccupied Alice: she had just +been surprised by an odd experience. At first sight of this Mr. Arthur +Russell, she had said to herself instantly, in words as definite as if +she spoke them aloud, though they seemed more like words spoken to her +by some unknown person within her: "There! That's exactly the kind of +looking man I'd like to marry!" + +In the eyes of the restless and the longing, Providence often appears to +be worse than inscrutable: an unreliable Omnipotence given to haphazard +whimsies in dealing with its own creatures, choosing at random some +among them to be rent with tragic deprivations and others to be petted +with blessing upon blessing. + +In Alice's eyes, Mildred had been blessed enough; something ought to +be left over, by this time, for another girl. The final touch to the +heaping perfection of Christmas-in-everything for Mildred was that this +Mr. Arthur Russell, good-looking, kind-looking, graceful, the perfect +fiance, should be also "VERY well off." Of course! These rich always +married one another. And while the Mildreds danced with their Arthur +Russells the best an outsider could do for herself was to sit with Frank +Dowling--the one last course left her that was better than dancing with +him. + +"Well, what DO you want to talk about?" he inquired. + +"Nothing," she said. "Suppose we just sit, Frank." But a moment later +she remembered something, and, with a sudden animation, began to +prattle. She pointed to the musicians down the corridor. "Oh, look at +them! Look at the leader! Aren't they FUNNY? Someone told me they're +called 'Jazz Louie and his half-breed bunch.' Isn't that just crazy? +Don't you love it? Do watch them, Frank." + +She continued to chatter, and, while thus keeping his glance away from +herself, she detached the forlorn bouquet of dead violets from her dress +and laid it gently beside the one she had carried. + +The latter already reposed in the obscurity selected for it at the base +of one of the box-trees. + +Then she was abruptly silent. + +"You certainly are a funny girl," Dowling remarked. "You say you don't +want to talk about anything at all, and all of a sudden you break +out and talk a blue streak; and just about the time I begin to get +interested in what you're saying you shut off! What's the matter with +girls, anyhow, when they do things like that?" + +"I don't know; we're just queer, I guess." + +"I say so! Well, what'll we do NOW? Talk, or just sit?" + +"Suppose we just sit some more." + +"Anything to oblige," he assented. "I'm willing to sit as long as you +like." + +But even as he made his amiability clear in this matter, the peace was +threatened--his mother came down the corridor like a rolling, ominous +cloud. She was looking about her on all sides, in a fidget of annoyance, +searching for him, and to his dismay she saw him. She immediately made a +horrible face at his companion, beckoned to him imperiously with a dumpy +arm, and shook her head reprovingly. The unfortunate young man tried to +repulse her with an icy stare, but this effort having obtained little to +encourage his feeble hope of driving her away, he shifted his chair +so that his back was toward her discomfiting pantomime. He should +have known better, the instant result was Mrs. Dowling in motion at an +impetuous waddle. + +She entered the box-tree seclusion with the lower rotundities of her +face hastily modelled into the resemblance of an over-benevolent smile +a contortion which neglected to spread its intended geniality upward to +the exasperated eyes and anxious forehead. + +"I think your mother wants to speak to you, Frank," Alice said, upon +this advent. + +Mrs. Dowling nodded to her. "Good evening, Miss Adams," she said. "I +just thought as you and Frank weren't dancing you wouldn't mind my +disturbing you----" + +"Not at all," Alice murmured. + +Mr. Dowling seemed of a different mind. "Well, what DO you want?" he +inquired, whereupon his mother struck him roguishly with her fan. + +"Bad fellow!" She turned to Alice. "I'm sure you won't mind excusing him +to let him do something for his old mother, Miss Adams." + +"What DO you want?" the son repeated. + +"Two very nice things," Mrs. Dowling informed him. "Everybody is so +anxious for Henrietta Lamb to have a pleasant evening, because it's the +very first time she's been anywhere since her father's death, and of +course her dear grandfather's an old friend of ours, and----" + +"Well, well!" her son interrupted. "Miss Adams isn't interested in all +this, mother." + +"But Henrietta came to speak to Ella and me, and I told her you were so +anxious to dance with her----" + +"Here!" he cried. "Look here! I'd rather do my own----" + +"Yes; that's just it," Mrs. Dowling explained. "I just thought it was +such a good opportunity; and Henrietta said she had most of her dances +taken, but she'd give you one if you asked her before they were all +gone. So I thought you'd better see her as soon as possible." + +Dowling's face had become rosy. "I refuse to do anything of the kind." + +"Bad fellow!" said his mother, gaily. "I thought this would be the best +time for you to see Henrietta, because it won't be long till all her +dances are gone, and you've promised on your WORD to dance the next with +Ella, and you mightn't have a chance to do it then. I'm sure Miss Adams +won't mind if you----" + +"Not at all," Alice said. + +"Well, _I_ mind!" he said. "I wish you COULD understand that when I +want to dance with any girl I don't need my mother to ask her for me. I +really AM more than six years old!" + +He spoke with too much vehemence, and Mrs. Dowling at once saw how +to have her way. As with husbands and wives, so with many fathers and +daughters, and so with some sons and mothers: the man will himself be +cross in public and think nothing of it, nor will he greatly mind a +little crossness on the part of the woman; but let her show agitation +before any spectator, he is instantly reduced to a coward's slavery. +Women understand that ancient weakness, of course; for it is one of +their most important means of defense, but can be used ignobly. + +Mrs. Dowling permitted a tremulousness to become audible in her voice. +"It isn't very--very pleasant--to be talked to like that by your own +son--before strangers!" + +"Oh, my! Look here!" the stricken Dowling protested. "_I_ didn't +say anything, mother. I was just joking about how you never get over +thinking I'm a little boy. I only----" + +Mrs. Dowling continued: "I just thought I was doing you a little favour. +I didn't think it would make you so angry." + +"Mother, for goodness' sake! Miss Adams'll think----" + +"I suppose," Mrs. Dowling interrupted, piteously, "I suppose it doesn't +matter what _I_ think!" + +"Oh, gracious!" + +Alice interfered; she perceived that the ruthless Mrs. Dowling meant to +have her way. "I think you'd better go, Frank. Really." + +"There!" his mother cried. "Miss Adams says so, herself! What more do +you want?" + +"Oh, gracious!" he lamented again, and, with a sick look over his +shoulder at Alice, permitted his mother to take his arm and propel him +away. Mrs. Dowling's spirits had strikingly recovered even before the +pair passed from the corridor: she moved almost bouncingly beside her +embittered son, and her eyes and all the convolutions of her abundant +face were blithe. + +Alice went in search of Walter, but without much hope of finding him. +What he did with himself at frozen-face dances was one of his most +successful mysteries, and her present excursion gave her no clue leading +to its solution. When the musicians again lowered their instruments +for an interval she had returned, alone, to her former seat within the +partial shelter of the box-trees. + +She had now to practice an art that affords but a limited variety of +methods, even to the expert: the art of seeming to have an escort or +partner when there is none. The practitioner must imply, merely by +expression and attitude, that the supposed companion has left her for +only a few moments, that she herself has sent him upon an errand; and, +if possible, the minds of observers must be directed toward a conclusion +that this errand of her devising is an amusing one; at all events, she +is alone temporarily and of choice, not deserted. She awaits a devoted +man who may return at any instant. + +Other people desired to sit in Alice's nook, but discovered her in +occupancy. She had moved the vacant chair closer to her own, and she +sat with her arm extended so that her hand, holding her lace kerchief, +rested upon the back of this second chair, claiming it. Such +a preemption, like that of a traveller's bag in the rack, was +unquestionable; and, for additional evidence, sitting with her knees +crossed, she kept one foot continuously moving a little, in cadence with +the other, which tapped the floor. Moreover, she added a fine detail: +her half-smile, with the under lip caught, seemed to struggle against +repression, as if she found the service engaging her absent companion +even more amusing than she would let him see when he returned: there was +jovial intrigue of some sort afoot, evidently. Her eyes, beaming with +secret fun, were averted from intruders, but sometimes, when couples +approached, seeking possession of the nook, her thoughts about the +absentee appeared to threaten her with outright laughter; and though +one or two girls looked at her skeptically, as they turned away, their +escorts felt no such doubts, and merely wondered what importantly funny +affair Alice Adams was engaged in. She had learned to do it perfectly. + +She had learned it during the last two years; she was twenty when for +the first time she had the shock of finding herself without an applicant +for one of her dances. When she was sixteen "all the nice boys in town," +as her mother said, crowded the Adamses' small veranda and steps, or sat +near by, cross-legged on the lawn, on summer evenings; and at eighteen +she had replaced the boys with "the older men." By this time most of +"the other girls," her contemporaries, were away at school or college, +and when they came home to stay, they "came out"--that feeble revival +of an ancient custom offering the maiden to the ceremonial inspection of +the tribe. Alice neither went away nor "came out," and, in contrast with +those who did, she may have seemed to lack freshness of lustre--jewels +are richest when revealed all new in a white velvet box. And Alice may +have been too eager to secure new retainers, too kind in her efforts to +keep the old ones. She had been a belle too soon. + + + +CHAPTER VIII + +The device of the absentee partner has the defect that it cannot be +employed for longer than ten or fifteen minutes at a time, and it may +not be repeated more than twice in one evening: a single repetition, +indeed, is weak, and may prove a betrayal. Alice knew that her present +performance could be effective during only this interval between +dances; and though her eyes were guarded, she anxiously counted over the +partnerless young men who lounged together in the doorways within her +view. Every one of them ought to have asked her for dances, she thought, +and although she might have been put to it to give a reason why any of +them "ought," her heart was hot with resentment against them. + +For a girl who has been a belle, it is harder to live through these bad +times than it is for one who has never known anything better. Like a +figure of painted and brightly varnished wood, Ella Dowling sat against +the wall through dance after dance with glassy imperturbability; it was +easier to be wooden, Alice thought, if you had your mother with you, as +Ella had. You were left with at least the shred of a pretense that you +came to sit with your mother as a spectator, and not to offer yourself +to be danced with by men who looked you over and rejected you--not for +the first time. "Not for the first time": there lay a sting! Why had you +thought this time might be different from the other times? Why had you +broken your back picking those hundreds of violets? + +Hating the fatuous young men in the doorways more bitterly for every +instant that she had to maintain her tableau, the smiling Alice knew +fierce impulses to spring to her feet and shout at them, "You IDIOTS!" +Hands in pockets, they lounged against the pilasters, or faced one +another, laughing vaguely, each one of them seeming to Alice no more +than so much mean beef in clothes. She wanted to tell them they were no +better than that; and it seemed a cruel thing of heaven to let them go +on believing themselves young lords. They were doing nothing, killing +time. Wasn't she at her lowest value at least a means of killing time? +Evidently the mean beeves thought not. And when one of them finally +lounged across the corridor and spoke to her, he was the very one to +whom she preferred her loneliness. + +"Waiting for somebody, Lady Alicia?" he asked, negligently; and his easy +burlesque of her name was like the familiarity of the rest of him. He +was one of those full-bodied, grossly handsome men who are powerful and +active, but never submit themselves to the rigour of becoming athletes, +though they shoot and fish from expensive camps. Gloss is the most +shining outward mark of the type. Nowadays these men no longer use +brilliantine on their moustaches, but they have gloss bought from +manicure-girls, from masseurs, and from automobile-makers; and their +eyes, usually large, are glossy. None of this is allowed to interfere +with business; these are "good business men," and often make large +fortunes. They are men of imagination about two things--women and money, +and, combining their imaginings about both, usually make a wise first +marriage. Later, however, they are apt to imagine too much about some +little woman without whom life seems duller than need be. They run away, +leaving the first wife well enough dowered. They are never intentionally +unkind to women, and in the end they usually make the mistake of +thinking they have had their money's worth of life. Here was Mr. Harvey +Malone, a young specimen in an earlier stage of development, trying to +marry Henrietta Lamb, and now sauntering over to speak to Alice, as a +time-killer before his next dance with Henrietta. + +Alice made no response to his question, and he dropped lazily into the +vacant chair, from which she sharply withdrew her hand. "I might as well +use his chair till he comes, don't you think? You don't MIND, do you, +old girl?" + +"Oh, no," Alice said. "It doesn't matter one way or the other. Please +don't call me that." + +"So that's how you feel?" Mr. Malone laughed indulgently, without much +interest. "I've been meaning to come to see you for a long time honestly +I have--because I wanted to have a good talk with you about old times. I +know you think it was funny, after the way I used to come to your house +two or three times a week, and sometimes oftener--well, I don't blame +you for being hurt, the way I stopped without explaining or anything. +The truth is there wasn't any reason: I just happened to have a lot of +important things to do and couldn't find the time. But I AM going to +call on you some evening--honestly I am. I don't wonder you think----" + +"You're mistaken," Alice said. "I've never thought anything about it at +all." + +"Well, well!" he said, and looked at her languidly. "What's the use of +being cross with this old man? He always means well." And, extending his +arm, he would have given her a friendly pat upon the shoulder but she +evaded it. "Well, well!" he said. "Seems to me you're getting awful +tetchy! Don't you like your old friends any more?" + +"Not all of them." + +"Who's the new one?" he asked, teasingly. "Come on and tell us, Alice. +Who is it you were holding this chair for?" + +"Never mind." + +"Well, all I've got to do is to sit here till he comes back; then I'll +see who it is." + +"He may not come back before you have to go." + +"Guess you got me THAT time," Malone admitted, laughing as he rose. +"They're tuning up, and I've got this dance. I AM coming around to +see you some evening." He moved away, calling back over his shoulder, +"Honestly, I am!" + +Alice did not look at him. + +She had held her tableau as long as she could; it was time for her to +abandon the box-trees; and she stepped forth frowning, as if a little +annoyed with the absentee for being such a time upon her errand; +whereupon the two chairs were instantly seized by a coquetting pair +who intended to "sit out" the dance. She walked quickly down the broad +corridor, turned into the broader hall, and hurriedly entered the +dressing-room where she had left her wraps. + +She stayed here as long as she could, pretending to arrange her hair +at a mirror, then fidgeting with one of her slipper-buckles; but the +intelligent elderly woman in charge of the room made an indefinite +sojourn impracticable. "Perhaps I could help you with that buckle, +Miss," she suggested, approaching. "Has it come loose?" Alice wrenched +desperately; then it was loose. The competent woman, producing needle +and thread, deftly made the buckle fast; and there was nothing for Alice +to do but to express her gratitude and go. + +She went to the door of the cloak-room opposite, where a coloured man +stood watchfully in the doorway. "I wonder if you know which of the +gentlemen is my brother, Mr. Walter Adams," she said. + +"Yes'm; I know him." + +"Could you tell me where he is?" + +"No'm; I couldn't say." + +"Well, if you see him, would you please tell him that his sister, Miss +Adams, is looking for him and very anxious to speak to him?" + +"Yes'm. Sho'ly, sho'ly!" + +As she went away he stared after her and seemed to swell with some +bursting emotion. In fact, it was too much for him, and he suddenly +retired within the room, releasing strangulated laughter. + +Walter remonstrated. Behind an excellent screen of coats and hats, in a +remote part of the room, he was kneeling on the floor, engaged in a game +of chance with a second coloured attendant; and the laughter became +so vehement that it not only interfered with the pastime in hand, but +threatened to attract frozen-face attention. + +"I cain' he'p it, man," the laughter explained. "I cain' he'p it! You +sut'n'y the beatin'es' white boy 'n 'is city!" + +The dancers were swinging into an "encore" as Alice halted for an +irresolute moment in a doorway. Across the room, a cluster of matrons +sat chatting absently, their eyes on their dancing daughters; and Alice, +finding a refugee's courage, dodged through the scurrying couples, +seated herself in a chair on the outskirts of this colony of elders, +and began to talk eagerly to the matron nearest her. The matron seemed +unaccustomed to so much vivacity, and responded but dryly, whereupon +Alice was more vivacious than ever; for she meant now to present the +picture of a jolly girl too much interested in these wise older women to +bother about every foolish young man who asked her for a dance. + +Her matron was constrained to go so far as to supply a tolerant nod, now +and then, in complement to the girl's animation, and Alice was grateful +for the nods. In this fashion she supplemented the exhausted resources +of the dressing-room and the box-tree nook; and lived through two more +dances, when again Mr. Frank Dowling presented himself as a partner. + +She needed no pretense to seek the dressing-room for repairs after that +number; this time they were necessary and genuine. Dowling waited for +her, and when she came out he explained for the fourth or fifth time how +the accident had happened. "It was entirely those other people's fault," +he said. "They got me in a kind of a corner, because neither of those +fellows knows the least thing about guiding; they just jam ahead and +expect everybody to get out of their way. It was Charlotte Thom's +diamond crescent pin that got caught on your dress in the back and made +such a----" + +"Never mind," Alice said in a tired voice. "The maid fixed it so that +she says it isn't very noticeable." + +"Well, it isn't," he returned. "You could hardly tell there'd been +anything the matter. Where do you want to go? Mother's been interfering +in my affairs some more and I've got the next taken." + +"I was sitting with Mrs. George Dresser. You might take me back there." + +He left her with the matron, and Alice returned to her picture-making, +so that once more, while two numbers passed, whoever cared to look was +offered the sketch of a jolly, clever girl preoccupied with her elders. +Then she found her friend Mildred standing before her, presenting Mr. +Arthur Russell, who asked her to dance with him. + +Alice looked uncertain, as though not sure what her engagements were; +but her perplexity cleared; she nodded, and swung rhythmically away with +the tall applicant. She was not grateful to her hostess for this alms. +What a young hostess does with a fiance, Alice thought, is to make him +dance with the unpopular girls. She supposed that Mr. Arthur Russell had +already danced with Ella Dowling. + +The loan of a lover, under these circumstances, may be painful to the +lessee, and Alice, smiling never more brightly, found nothing to say to +Mr. Russell, though she thought he might have found something to say to +her. "I wonder what Mildred told him," she thought. "Probably she said, +'Dearest, there's one more girl you've got to help me out with. You +wouldn't like her much, but she dances well enough and she's having a +rotten time. Nobody ever goes near her any more.'" + +When the music stopped, Russell added his applause to the hand-clapping +that encouraged the uproarious instruments to continue, and as they +renewed the tumult, he said heartily, "That's splendid!" + +Alice gave him a glance, necessarily at short range, and found his eyes +kindly and pleased. Here was a friendly soul, it appeared, who probably +"liked everybody." No doubt he had applauded for an "encore" when he +danced with Ella Dowling, gave Ella the same genial look, and said, +"That's splendid!" + +When the "encore" was over, Alice spoke to him for the first time. + +"Mildred will be looking for you," she said. "I think you'd better take +me back to where you found me." + +He looked surprised. "Oh, if you----" + +"I'm sure Mildred will be needing you," Alice said, and as she took his +arm and they walked toward Mrs. Dresser, she thought it might be just +possible to make a further use of the loan. "Oh, I wonder if you----" +she began. + +"Yes?" he said, quickly. + +"You don't know my brother, Walter Adams," she said. "But he's somewhere +I think possibly he's in a smoking-room or some place where girls aren't +expected, and if you wouldn't think it too much trouble to inquire----" + +"I'll find him," Russell said, promptly. "Thank you so much for that +dance. I'll bring your brother in a moment." + +It was to be a long moment, Alice decided, presently. Mrs. Dresser had +grown restive; and her nods and vague responses to her young dependent's +gaieties were as meager as they could well be. Evidently the matron had +no intention of appearing to her world in the light of a chaperone for +Alice Adams; and she finally made this clear. With a word or two of +excuse, breaking into something Alice was saying, she rose and went to +sit next to Mildred's mother, who had become the nucleus of the cluster. +So Alice was left very much against the wall, with short stretches +of vacant chairs on each side of her. She had come to the end of her +picture-making, and could only pretend that there was something amusing +the matter with the arm of her chair. + +She supposed that Mildred's Mr. Russell had forgotten Walter by this +time. "I'm not even an intimate enough friend of Mildred's for him to +have thought he ought to bother to tell me he couldn't find him," she +thought. And then she saw Russell coming across the room toward her, +with Walter beside him. She jumped up gaily. + +"Oh, thank you!" she cried. "I know this naughty boy must have been +terribly hard to find. Mildred'll NEVER forgive me! I've put you to so +much----" + +"Not at all," he said, amiably, and went away, leaving the brother and +sister together. + +"Walter, let's dance just once more," Alice said, touching his arm +placatively. "I thought--well, perhaps we might go home then." + +But Walter's expression was that of a person upon whom an outrage has +just been perpetrated. "No," he said. "We've stayed THIS long, I'm goin' +to wait and see what they got to eat. And you look here!" He turned upon +her angrily. "Don't you ever do that again!" + +"Do what?" + +"Send somebody after me that pokes his nose into every corner of the +house till he finds me! 'Are you Mr. Walter Adams?' he says. I guess he +must asked everybody in the place if they were Mr. Walter Adams! Well, +I'll bet a few iron men you wouldn't send anybody to hunt for me again +if you knew where he found me!" + +"Where was it?" + +Walter decided that her fit punishment was to know. "I was shootin' dice +with those coons in the cloak-room." + +"And he saw you?" + +"Unless he was blind!" said Walter. "Come on, I'll dance this one more +dance with you. Supper comes after that, and THEN we'll go home." + + +Mrs. Adams heard Alice's key turning in the front door and hurried down +the stairs to meet her. + +"Did you get wet coming in, darling?" she asked. "Did you have a good +time?" + +"Just lovely!" Alice said, cheerily, and after she had arranged the +latch for Walter, who had gone to return the little car, she followed +her mother upstairs and hummed a dance-tune on the way. + +"Oh, I'm so glad you had a nice time," Mrs. Adams said, as they reached +the door of her daughter's room together. "You DESERVED to, and it's +lovely to think----" + +But at this, without warning, Alice threw herself into her mother's +arms, sobbing so loudly that in his room, close by, her father, half +drowsing through the night, started to full wakefulness. + + + +CHAPTER IX + +On a morning, a week after this collapse of festal hopes, Mrs. Adams +and her daughter were concluding a three-days' disturbance, the "Spring +house-cleaning"--postponed until now by Adams's long illness--and Alice, +on her knees before a chest of drawers, in her mother's room, paused +thoughtfully after dusting a packet of letters wrapped in worn muslin. +She called to her mother, who was scrubbing the floor of the hallway +just beyond the open door, + +"These old letters you had in the bottom drawer, weren't they some papa +wrote you before you were married?" + +Mrs. Adams laughed and said, "Yes. Just put 'em back where they were--or +else up in the attic--anywhere you want to." + +"Do you mind if I read one, mama?" + +Mrs. Adams laughed again. "Oh, I guess you can if you want to. I expect +they're pretty funny!" + +Alice laughed in response, and chose the topmost letter of the packet. +"My dear, beautiful girl," it began; and she stared at these singular +words. They gave her a shock like that caused by overhearing some +bewildering impropriety; and, having read them over to herself several +times, she went on to experience other shocks. + + +MY DEAR, BEAUTIFUL GIRL: + + +This time yesterday I had a mighty bad case of blues because I had not +had a word from you in two whole long days and when I do not hear from +you every day things look mighty down in the mouth to me. Now it is all +so different because your letter has arrived and besides I have got a +piece of news I believe you will think as fine as I do. Darling, you +will be surprised, so get ready to hear about a big effect on our +future. It is this way. I had sort of a suspicion the head of the firm +kind of took a fancy to me from the first when I went in there, and +liked the way I attended to my work and so when he took me on this +business trip with him I felt pretty sure of it and now it turns out +I was about right. In return I guess I have got about the best boss in +this world and I believe you will think so too. Yes, sweetheart, after +the talk I have just had with him if J. A. Lamb asked me to cut my hand +off for him I guess I would come pretty near doing it because what he +says means the end of our waiting to be together. From New Years on he +is going to put me in entire charge of the sundries dept. and what do +you think is going to be my salary? Eleven hundred cool dollars a year +($1,100.00). That's all! Just only a cool eleven hundred per annum! +Well, I guess that will show your mother whether I can take care of you +or not. And oh how I would like to see your dear, beautiful, loving face +when you get this news. + +I would like to go out on the public streets and just dance and shout +and it is all I can do to help doing it, especially when I know we will +be talking it all over together this time next week, and oh my darling, +now that your folks have no excuse for putting it off any longer we +might be in our own little home before Xmas. + +Would you be glad? + +Well, darling, this settles everything and makes our future just about +as smooth for us as anybody could ask. I can hardly realize after all +this waiting life's troubles are over for you and me and we have nothing +to do but to enjoy the happiness granted us by this wonderful, beautiful +thing we call life. I know I am not any poet and the one I tried to +write about you the day of the picnic was fearful but the way I THINK +about you is a poem. + +Write me what you think of the news. I know but write me anyhow. + +I'll get it before we start home and I can be reading it over all the +time on the tram. + + +Your always loving + +VIRGIL. + + + +The sound of her mother's diligent scrubbing in the hall came back +slowly to Alice's hearing, as she restored the letter to the packet, +wrapped the packet in its muslin covering, and returned it to the +drawer. She had remained upon her knees while she read the letter; now +she sank backward, sitting upon the floor with her hands behind her, an +unconscious relaxing for better ease to think. Upon her face there had +fallen a look of wonder. + +For the first time she was vaguely perceiving that life is everlasting +movement. Youth really believes what is running water to be a permanent +crystallization and sees time fixed to a point: some people have dark +hair, some people have blond hair, some people have gray hair. Until +this moment, Alice had no conviction that there was a universe before +she came into it. She had always thought of it as the background of +herself: the moon was something to make her prettier on a summer night. + +But this old letter, through which she saw still flickering an ancient +starlight of young love, astounded her. Faintly before her it revealed +the whole lives of her father and mother, who had been young, after +all--they REALLY had--and their youth was now so utterly passed from +them that the picture of it, in the letter, was like a burlesque of +them. And so she, herself, must pass to such changes, too, and all that +now seemed vital to her would be nothing. + +When her work was finished, that afternoon, she went into her father's +room. His recovery had progressed well enough to permit the departure +of Miss Perry; and Adams, wearing one of Mrs. Adams's wrappers over his +night-gown, sat in a high-backed chair by a closed window. The weather +was warm, but the closed window and the flannel wrapper had not sufficed +him: round his shoulders he had an old crocheted scarf of Alice's; his +legs were wrapped in a heavy comfort; and, with these swathings about +him, and his eyes closed, his thin and grizzled head making but a slight +indentation in the pillow supporting it, he looked old and little and +queer. + +Alice would have gone out softly, but without opening his eyes, he spoke +to her: "Don't go, dearie. Come sit with the old man a little while." + +She brought a chair near his. "I thought you were napping." + +"No. I don't hardly ever do that. I just drift a little sometimes." + +"How do you mean you drift, papa?" + +He looked at her vaguely. "Oh, I don't know. Kind of pictures. They get +a little mixed up--old times with times still ahead, like planning what +to do, you know. That's as near a nap as I get--when the pictures mix up +some. I suppose it's sort of drowsing." + +She took one of his hands and stroked it. "What do you mean when you say +you have pictures like 'planning what to do'?" she asked. + +"I mean planning what to do when I get out and able to go to work +again." + +"But that doesn't need any planning," Alice said, quickly. "You're going +back to your old place at Lamb's, of course." + +Adams closed his eyes again, sighing heavily, but made no other +response. + +"Why, of COURSE you are!" she cried. "What are you talking about?" + +His head turned slowly toward her, revealing the eyes, open in a haggard +stare. "I heard you the other night when you came from the party," he +said. "I know what was the matter." + +"Indeed, you don't," she assured him. "You don't know anything about it, +because there wasn't anything the matter at all." + +"Don't you suppose I heard you crying? What'd you cry for if there +wasn't anything the matter?" + +"Just nerves, papa. It wasn't anything else in the world." + +"Never mind," he said. "Your mother told me." + +"She promised me not to!" + +At that Adams laughed mournfully. "It wouldn't be very likely I'd hear +you so upset and not ask about it, even if she didn't come and tell me +on her own hook. You needn't try to fool me; I tell you I know what was +the matter." + +"The only matter was I had a silly fit," Alice protested. "It did me +good, too." + +"How's that?" + +"Because I've decided to do something about it, papa." + +"That isn't the way your mother looks at it," Adams said, ruefully. "She +thinks it's our place to do something about it. Well, I don't know--I +don't know; everything seems so changed these days. You've always been +a good daughter, Alice, and you ought to have as much as any of these +girls you go with; she's convinced me she's right about THAT. The +trouble is----" He faltered, apologetically, then went on, "I mean the +question is--how to get it for you." + +"No!" she cried. "I had no business to make such a fuss just because a +lot of idiots didn't break their necks to get dances with me and because +I got mortified about Walter--Walter WAS pretty terrible----" + +"Oh, me, my!" Adams lamented. "I guess that's something we just have +to leave work out itself. What you going to do with a boy nineteen or +twenty years old that makes his own living? Can't whip him. Can't keep +him locked up in the house. Just got to hope he'll learn better, I +suppose." + +"Of course he didn't want to go to the Palmers'," Alice explained, +tolerantly--"and as mama and I made him take me, and he thought that was +pretty selfish in me, why, he felt he had a right to amuse himself any +way he could. Of course it was awful that this--that this Mr. Russell +should----" In spite of her, the recollection choked her. + +"Yes, it was awful," Adams agreed. "Just awful. Oh, me, my!" + +But Alice recovered herself at once, and showed him a cheerful face. +"Well, just a few years from now I probably won't even remember it! I +believe hardly anything amounts to as much as we think it does at the +time." + +"Well--sometimes it don't." + +"What I've been thinking, papa: it seems to me I ought to DO something." + +"What like?" + +She looked dreamy, but was obviously serious as she told him: "Well, +I mean I ought to be something besides just a kind of nobody. I ought +to----" She paused. + +"What, dearie?" + +"Well--there's one thing I'd like to do. I'm sure I COULD do it, too." + +"What?" + +"I want to go on the stage: I know I could act." At this, her father +abruptly gave utterance to a feeble cackling of laughter; and when +Alice, surprised and a little offended, pressed him for his reason, he +tried to evade, saying, "Nothing, dearie. I just thought of something." +But she persisted until he had to explain. + +"It made me think of your mother's sister, your Aunt Flora, that died +when you were little," he said. "She was always telling how she was +going on the stage, and talking about how she was certain she'd make a +great actress, and all so on; and one day your mother broke out and said +she ought 'a' gone on the stage, herself, because she always knew she +had the talent for it--and, well, they got into kind of a spat about +which one'd make the best actress. I had to go out in the hall to +laugh!" + +"Maybe you were wrong," Alice said, gravely. "If they both felt it, why +wouldn't that look as if there was talent in the family? I've ALWAYS +thought----" + +"No, dearie," he said, with a final chuckle. "Your mother and Flora +weren't different from a good many others. I expect ninety per cent. of +all the women I ever knew were just sure they'd be mighty fine actresses +if they ever got the chance. Well, I guess it's a good thing; they enjoy +thinking about it and it don't do anybody any harm." + +Alice was piqued. For several days she had thought almost continuously +of a career to be won by her own genius. Not that she planned details, +or concerned herself with first steps; her picturings overleaped all +that. Principally, she saw her name great on all the bill-boards of that +unkind city, and herself, unchanged in age but glamorous with fame and +Paris clothes, returning in a private car. No doubt the pleasantest +development of her vision was a dialogue with Mildred; and this became +so real that, as she projected it, Alice assumed the proper expressions +for both parties to it, formed words with her lips, and even spoke some +of them aloud. "No, I haven't forgotten you, Mrs. Russell. I remember +you quite pleasantly, in fact. You were a Miss Palmer, I recall, in +those funny old days. Very kind of you, I'm shaw. I appreciate your +eagerness to do something for me in your own little home. As you say, a +reception WOULD renew my acquaintanceship with many old friends--but I'm +shaw you won't mind my mentioning that I don't find much inspiration in +these provincials. I really must ask you not to press me. An artist's +time is not her own, though of course I could hardly expect you to +understand----" + +Thus Alice illuminated the dull time; but she retired from the interview +with her father still manfully displaying an outward cheerfulness, while +depression grew heavier within, as if she had eaten soggy cake. Her +father knew nothing whatever of the stage, and she was aware of his +ignorance, yet for some reason his innocently skeptical amusement +reduced her bright project almost to nothing. Something like this always +happened, it seemed; she was continually making these illuminations, all +gay with gildings and colourings; and then as soon as anybody else so +much as glanced at them--even her father, who loved her--the pretty +designs were stricken with a desolating pallor. "Is this LIFE?" Alice +wondered, not doubting that the question was original and all her own. +"Is it life to spend your time imagining things that aren't so, and +never will be? Beautiful things happen to other people; why should I be +the only one they never CAN happen to?" + +The mood lasted overnight; and was still upon her the next afternoon +when an errand for her father took her down-town. Adams had decided +to begin smoking again, and Alice felt rather degraded, as well as +embarrassed, when she went into the large shop her father had named, and +asked for the cheap tobacco he used in his pipe. She fell back upon an +air of amused indulgence, hoping thus to suggest that her purchase +was made for some faithful old retainer, now infirm; and although the +calmness of the clerk who served her called for no such elaboration of +her sketch, she ornamented it with a little laugh and with the remark, +as she dropped the package into her coat-pocket, "I'm sure it'll please +him; they tell me it's the kind he likes." + +Still playing Lady Bountiful, smiling to herself in anticipation of the +joy she was bringing to the simple old negro or Irish follower of the +family, she left the shop; but as she came out upon the crowded pavement +her smile vanished quickly. + +Next to the door of the tobacco-shop, there was the open entrance to a +stairway, and, above this rather bleak and dark aperture, a sign-board +displayed in begrimed gilt letters the information that Frincke's +Business College occupied the upper floors of the building. Furthermore, +Frincke here publicly offered "personal instruction and training in +practical mathematics, bookkeeping, and all branches of the business +life, including stenography, typewriting, etc." + +Alice halted for a moment, frowning at this signboard as though it were +something surprising and distasteful which she had never seen before. +Yet it was conspicuous in a busy quarter; she almost always passed it +when she came down-town, and never without noticing it. Nor was this the +first time she had paused to lift toward it that same glance of vague +misgiving. + +The building was not what the changeful city defined as a modern one, +and the dusty wooden stairway, as seen from the pavement, disappeared +upward into a smoky darkness. So would the footsteps of a girl ascending +there lead to a hideous obscurity, Alice thought; an obscurity as dreary +and as permanent as death. And like dry leaves falling about her she saw +her wintry imaginings in the May air: pretty girls turning into +withered creatures as they worked at typing-machines; old maids "taking +dictation" from men with double chins; Alice saw old maids of a dozen +different kinds "taking dictation." Her mind's eye was crowded with +them, as it always was when she passed that stairway entrance; and +though they were all different from one another, all of them looked a +little like herself. + +She hated the place, and yet she seldom hurried by it or averted +her eyes. It had an unpleasant fascination for her, and a mysterious +reproach, which she did not seek to fathom. She walked on thoughtfully +to-day; and when, at the next corner, she turned into the street that +led toward home, she was given a surprise. Arthur Russell came rapidly +from behind her, lifting his hat as she saw him. + +"Are you walking north, Miss Adams?" he asked. "Do you mind if I walk +with you?" + +She was not delighted, but seemed so. "How charming!" she cried, giving +him a little flourish of the shapely hands; and then, because she +wondered if he had seen her coming out of the tobacco-shop, she laughed +and added, "I've just been on the most ridiculous errand!" + +"What was that?" + +"To order some cigars for my father. He's been quite ill, poor man, and +he's so particular--but what in the world do _I_ know about cigars?" + +Russell laughed. "Well, what DO you know about 'em? Did you select by +the price?" + +"Mercy, no!" she exclaimed, and added, with an afterthought, "Of course +he wrote down the name of the kind he wanted and I gave it to the +shopman. I could never have pronounced it." + + + +CHAPTER X + +In her pocket as she spoke her hand rested upon the little sack of +tobacco, which responded accusingly to the touch of her restless +fingers; and she found time to wonder why she was building up this +fiction for Mr. Arthur Russell. His discovery of Walter's device for +whiling away the dull evening had shamed and distressed her; but she +would have suffered no less if almost any other had been the discoverer. +In this gentleman, after hearing that he was Mildred's Mr. Arthur +Russell, Alice felt not the slightest "personal interest"; and there was +yet to develop in her life such a thing as an interest not personal. At +twenty-two this state of affairs is not unique. + +So far as Alice was concerned Russell might have worn a placard, +"Engaged." She looked upon him as diners entering a restaurant look upon +tables marked "Reserved": the glance, slightly discontented, passes on +at once. Or so the eye of a prospector wanders querulously over staked +and established claims on the mountainside, and seeks the virgin land +beyond; unless, indeed, the prospector be dishonest. But Alice was no +claim-jumper--so long as the notice of ownership was plainly posted. + +Though she was indifferent now, habit ruled her: and, at the very time +she wondered why she created fictitious cigars for her father, she +was also regretting that she had not boldly carried her Malacca stick +down-town with her. Her vivacity increased automatically. + +"Perhaps the clerk thought you wanted the cigars for yourself," Russell +suggested. "He may have taken you for a Spanish countess." + +"I'm sure he did!" Alice agreed, gaily; and she hummed a bar or two of +"LaPaloma," snapping her fingers as castanets, and swaying her body a +little, to suggest the accepted stencil of a "Spanish Dancer." "Would +you have taken me for one, Mr. Russell?" she asked, as she concluded the +impersonation. + +"I? Why, yes," he said. "I'D take you for anything you wanted me to." + +"Why, what a speech!" she cried, and, laughing, gave him a quick glance +in which there glimmered some real surprise. He was looking at +her quizzically, but with the liveliest appreciation. Her surprise +increased; and she was glad that he had joined her. + +To be seen walking with such a companion added to her pleasure. She +would have described him as "altogether quite stunning-looking"; and she +liked his tall, dark thinness, his gray clothes, his soft hat, and his +clean brown shoes; she liked his easy swing of the stick he carried. + +"Shouldn't I have said it?" he asked. "Would you rather not be taken for +a Spanish countess?" + +"That isn't it," she explained. "You said----" + +"I said I'd take you for whatever you wanted me to. Isn't that all +right?" + +"It would all depend, wouldn't it?" + +"Of course it would depend on what you wanted." + +"Oh, no!" she laughed. "It might depend on a lot of things." + +"Such as?" + +"Well----" She hesitated, having the mischievous impulse to say, "Such +as Mildred!" But she decided to omit this reference, and became serious, +remembering Russell's service to her at Mildred's house. "Speaking of +what I want to be taken for," she said;--"I've been wondering ever since +the other night what you did take me for! You must have taken me for the +sister of a professional gambler, I'm afraid!" + +Russell's look of kindness was the truth about him, she was to discover; +and he reassured her now by the promptness of his friendly chuckle. +"Then your young brother told you where I found him, did he? I kept my +face straight at the time, but I laughed afterward--to myself. It +struck me as original, to say the least: his amusing himself with those +darkies." + +"Walter IS original," Alice said; and, having adopted this new view of +her brother's eccentricities, she impulsively went on to make it more +plausible. "He's a very odd boy, and I was afraid you'd misunderstand. +He tells wonderful 'darky stories,' and he'll do anything to draw +coloured people out and make them talk; and that's what he was doing at +Mildred's when you found him for me--he says he wins their confidence +by playing dice with them. In the family we think he'll probably write +about them some day. He's rather literary." + +"Are you?" Russell asked, smiling. + +"I? Oh----" She paused, lifting both hands in a charming gesture of +helplessness. "Oh, I'm just--me!" + +His glance followed the lightly waved hands with keen approval, then +rose to the lively and colourful face, with its hazel eyes, its small +and pretty nose, and the lip-caught smile which seemed the climax of +her decorative transition. Never had he seen a creature so plastic or so +wistful. + +Here was a contrast to his cousin Mildred, who was not wistful, and +controlled any impulses toward plasticity, if she had them. "By George!" +he said. "But you ARE different!" + +With that, there leaped in her such an impulse of roguish gallantry +as she could never resist. She turned her head, and, laughing and +bright-eyed, looked him full in the face. + +"From whom?" she cried. + +"From--everybody!" he said. "Are you a mind-reader?" + +"Why?" + +"How did you know I was thinking you were different from my cousin, +Mildred Palmer?" + +"What makes you think I DID know it?" + +"Nonsense!" he said. "You knew what I was thinking and I knew you knew." + +"Yes," she said with cool humour. "How intimate that seems to make us +all at once!" + +Russell left no doubt that he was delighted with these gaieties of hers. +"By George!" he exclaimed again. "I thought you were this sort of girl +the first moment I saw you!" + +"What sort of girl? Didn't Mildred tell you what sort of girl I am when +she asked you to dance with me?" + +"She didn't ask me to dance with you--I'd been looking at you. You were +talking to some old ladies, and I asked Mildred who you were." + +"Oh, so Mildred DIDN'T----" Alice checked herself. "Who did she tell you +I was?" + +"She just said you were a Miss Adams, so I----" + +"'A' Miss Adams?" Alice interrupted. + +"Yes. Then I said I'd like to meet you." + +"I see. You thought you'd save me from the old ladies." + +"No. I thought I'd save myself from some of the girls Mildred was +getting me to dance with. There was a Miss Dowling----" + +"Poor man!" Alice said, gently, and her impulsive thought was that +Mildred had taken few chances, and that as a matter of self-defense her +carefulness might have been well founded. This Mr. Arthur Russell was a +much more responsive person than one had supposed. + +"So, Mr. Russell, you don't know anything about me except what you +thought when you first saw me?" + +"Yes, I know I was right when I thought it." + +"You haven't told me what you thought." + +"I thought you were like what you ARE like." + +"Not very definite, is it? I'm afraid you shed more light a minute or +so ago, when you said how different from Mildred you thought I was. That +WAS definite, unfortunately!" + +"I didn't say it," Russell explained. "I thought it, and you read my +mind. That's the sort of girl I thought you were--one that could read a +man's mind. Why do you say 'unfortunately' you're not like Mildred?" + +Alice's smooth gesture seemed to sketch Mildred. "Because she's +perfect--why, she's PERFECTLY perfect! She never makes a mistake, and +everybody looks up to her--oh, yes, we all fairly adore her! She's like +some big, noble, cold statue--'way above the rest of us--and she hardly +ever does anything mean or treacherous. Of all the girls I know I +believe she's played the fewest really petty tricks. She's----" + +Russell interrupted; he looked perplexed. "You say she's perfectly +perfect, but that she does play SOME----" + +Alice laughed, as if at his sweet innocence. "Men are so funny!" she +informed him. "Of course girls ALL do mean things sometimes. My own +career's just one long brazen smirch of 'em! What I mean is, Mildred's +perfectly perfect compared to the rest of us." + +"I see," he said, and seemed to need a moment or two of thoughtfulness. +Then he inquired, "What sort of treacherous things do YOU do?" + +"I? Oh, the very worst kind! Most people bore me particularly the men in +this town--and I show it." + +"But I shouldn't call that treacherous, exactly." + +"Well, THEY do," Alice laughed. "It's made me a terribly unpopular +character! I do a lot of things they hate. For instance, at a dance I'd +a lot rather find some clever old woman and talk to her than dance with +nine-tenths of these nonentities. I usually do it, too." + +"But you danced as if you liked it. You danced better than any other +girl I----" + +"This flattery of yours doesn't quite turn my head, Mr. Russell," Alice +interrupted. "Particularly since Mildred only gave you Ella Dowling to +compare with me!" + +"Oh, no," he insisted. "There were others--and of course Mildred, +herself." + +"Oh, of course, yes. I forgot that. Well----" She paused, then added, "I +certainly OUGHT to dance well." + +"Why is it so much a duty?" + +"When I think of the dancing-teachers and the expense to papa! All sorts +of fancy instructors--I suppose that's what daughters have fathers for, +though, isn't it? To throw money away on them?" + +"You don't----" Russell began, and his look was one of alarm. "You +haven't taken up----" + +She understood his apprehension and responded merrily, "Oh, murder, no! +You mean you're afraid I break out sometimes in a piece of cheesecloth +and run around a fountain thirty times, and then, for an encore, show +how much like snakes I can make my arms look." + +"I SAID you were a mind-reader!" he exclaimed. "That's exactly what I +was pretending to be afraid you might do." + +"'Pretending?' That's nicer of you. No; it's not my mania." + +"What is?" + +"Oh, nothing in particular that I know of just now. Of course I've had +the usual one: the one that every girl goes through." + +"What's that?" + +"Good heavens, Mr. Russell, you can't expect me to believe you're really +a man of the world if you don't know that every girl has a time in her +life when she's positive she's divinely talented for the stage! It's the +only universal rule about women that hasn't got an exception. I don't +mean we all want to go on the stage, but we all think we'd be wonderful +if we did. Even Mildred. Oh, she wouldn't confess it to you: you'd have +to know her a great deal better than any man can ever know her to find +out." + +"I see," he said. "Girls are always telling us we can't know them. I +wonder if you----" + +She took up his thought before he expressed it, and again he was +fascinated by her quickness, which indeed seemed to him almost +telepathic. "Oh, but DON'T we know one another, though!" she cried. + +"Such things we have to keep secret--things that go on right before YOUR +eyes!" + +"Why don't some of you tell us?" he asked. + +"We can't tell you." + +"Too much honour?" + +"No. Not even too much honour among thieves, Mr. Russell. We don't tell +you about our tricks against one another because we know it wouldn't +make any impression on you. The tricks aren't played against you, and +you have a soft side for cats with lovely manners!" + +"What about your tricks against us?" + +"Oh, those!" Alice laughed. "We think they're rather cute!" + +"Bravo!" he cried, and hammered the ferrule of his stick upon the +pavement. + +"What's the applause for?" + +"For you. What you said was like running up the black flag to the +masthead." + +"Oh, no. It was just a modest little sign in a pretty flower-bed: +'Gentlemen, beware!'" + +"I see I must," he said, gallantly. + +"Thanks! But I mean, beware of the whole bloomin' garden!" Then, picking +up a thread that had almost disappeared: "You needn't think you'll ever +find out whether I'm right about Mildred's not being an exception by +asking her," she said. "She won't tell you: she's not the sort that ever +makes a confession." + +But Russell had not followed her shift to the former topic. "'Mildred's +not being an exception?'" he said, vaguely. "I don't----" + +"An exception about thinking she could be a wonderful thing on the stage +if she only cared to. If you asked her I'm pretty sure she'd say, 'What +nonsense!' Mildred's the dearest, finest thing anywhere, but you won't +find out many things about her by asking her." + +Russell's expression became more serious, as it did whenever his cousin +was made their topic. "You think not?" he said. "You think she's----" + +"No. But it's not because she isn't sincere exactly. It's only because +she has such a lot to live up to. She has to live up to being a girl +on the grand style to herself, I mean, of course." And without pausing +Alice rippled on, "You ought to have seen ME when I had the stage-fever! +I used to play 'Juliet' all alone in my room.' She lifted her arms in +graceful entreaty, pleading musically, + + "O, swear not by the moon, the inconstant moon, + That monthly changes in her circled orb, + Lest thy love prove----" + + +She broke off abruptly with a little flourish, snapping thumb and finger +of each outstretched hand, then laughed and said, "Papa used to make +such fun of me! Thank heaven, I was only fifteen; I was all over it by +the next year." + +"No wonder you had the fever," Russell observed. "You do it beautifully. +Why didn't you finish the line?" + +"Which one? 'Lest thy love prove likewise variable'? Juliet was saying +it to a MAN, you know. She seems to have been ready to worry about his +constancy pretty early in their affair!" + +Her companion was again thoughtful. "Yes," he said, seeming to be rather +irksomely impressed with Alice's suggestion. "Yes; it does appear so." + +Alice glanced at his serious face, and yielded to an audacious +temptation. "You mustn't take it so hard," she said, flippantly. + +"It isn't about you: it's only about Romeo and Juliet." + +"See here!" he exclaimed. "You aren't at your mind-reading again, are +you? There are times when it won't do, you know!" + +She leaned toward him a little, as if companionably: they were walking +slowly, and this geniality of hers brought her shoulder in light contact +with his for a moment. "Do you dislike my mind-reading?" she asked, and, +across their two just touching shoulders, gave him her sudden look of +smiling wistfulness. "Do you hate it?" + +He shook his head. "No, I don't," he said, gravely. "It's quite +pleasant. But I think it says, 'Gentlemen, beware!'" + +She instantly moved away from him, with the lawless and frank laugh of +one who is delighted to be caught in a piece of hypocrisy. "How lovely!" +she cried. Then she pointed ahead. "Our walk is nearly over. We're +coming to the foolish little house where I live. It's a queer little +place, but my father's so attached to it the family have about given up +hope of getting him to build a real house farther out. He doesn't mind +our being extravagant about anything else, but he won't let us alter one +single thing about his precious little old house. Well!" She halted, and +gave him her hand. "Adieu!" + +"I couldn't," he began; hesitated, then asked: "I couldn't come in with +you for a little while?" + +"Not now," she said, quickly. "You can come----" She paused. + +"When?" + +"Almost any time." She turned and walked slowly up the path, but he +waited. "You can come in the evening if you like," she called back to +him over her shoulder. + +"Soon?" + +"As soon as you like!" She waved her hand; then ran indoors and watched +him from a window as he went up the street. He walked rapidly, a fine, +easy figure, swinging his stick in a way that suggested exhilaration. +Alice, staring after him through the irregular apertures of a lace +curtain, showed no similar buoyancy. Upon the instant she closed +the door all sparkle left her: she had become at once the simple and +sometimes troubled girl her family knew. + +"What is going on out there?" her mother asked, approaching from the +dining-room. + +"Oh, nothing," Alice said, indifferently, as she turned away. "That Mr. +Russell met me downtown and walked up with me." + +"Mr. Russell? Oh, the one that's engaged to Mildred?" + +"Well--I don't know for certain. He didn't seem so much like an engaged +man to me." And she added, in the tone of thoughtful preoccupation: +"Anyhow--not so terribly!" + +Then she ran upstairs, gave her father his tobacco, filled his pipe for +him, and petted him as he lighted it. + + + +CHAPTER XI + +After that, she went to her room and sat down before her three-leaved +mirror. There was where she nearly always sat when she came into her +room, if she had nothing in mind to do. She went to that chair as +naturally as a dog goes to his corner. + +She leaned forward, observing her profile; gravity seemed to be her +mood. But after a long, almost motionless scrutiny, she began to produce +dramatic sketches upon that ever-ready stage, her countenance: she +showed gaiety, satire, doubt, gentleness, appreciation of a companion +and love-in-hiding--all studied in profile first, then repeated for a +"three-quarter view." Subsequently she ran through them, facing herself +in full. + +In this manner she outlined a playful scenario for her next interview +with Arthur Russell; but grew solemn again, thinking of the impression +she had already sought to give him. She had no twinges for any +underminings of her "most intimate friend"--in fact, she felt that her +work on a new portrait of Mildred for Mr. + +Russell had been honest and accurate. But why had it been her instinct +to show him an Alice Adams who didn't exist? + +Almost everything she had said to him was upon spontaneous impulse, +springing to her lips on the instant; yet it all seemed to have been +founded upon a careful design, as if some hidden self kept such designs +in stock and handed them up to her, ready-made, to be used for its own +purpose. What appeared to be the desired result was a false-coloured +image in Russell's mind; but if he liked that image he wouldn't be +liking Alice Adams; nor would anything he thought about the image be a +thought about her. + +Nevertheless, she knew she would go on with her false, fancy colourings +of this nothing as soon as she saw him again; she had just been +practicing them. "What's the idea?" she wondered. "What makes me tell +such lies? Why shouldn't I be just myself?" And then she thought, "But +which one is myself?" + +Her eyes dwelt on the solemn eyes in the mirror; and her lips, +disquieted by a deepening wonder, parted to whisper: + +"Who in the world are you?" + +The apparition before her had obeyed her like an alert slave, but now, +as she subsided to a complete stillness, that aspect changed to the +old mockery with which mirrors avenge their wrongs. The nucleus of some +queer thing seemed to gather and shape itself behind the nothingness of +the reflected eyes until it became almost an actual strange presence. +If it could be identified, perhaps the presence was that of the hidden +designer who handed up the false, ready-made pictures, and, for unknown +purposes, made Alice exhibit them; but whatever it was, she suddenly +found it monkey-like and terrifying. In a flutter she jumped up and went +to another part of the room. + +A moment or two later she was whistling softly as she hung her light +coat over a wooden triangle in her closet, and her musing now was +quainter than the experience that led to it; for what she thought was +this, "I certainly am a queer girl!" She took a little pride in so much +originality, believing herself probably the only person in the world to +have such thoughts as had been hers since she entered the room, and the +first to be disturbed by a strange presence in the mirror. In fact, the +effect of the tiny episode became apparent in that look of preoccupied +complacency to be seen for a time upon any girl who has found reason to +suspect that she is a being without counterpart. + +This slight glow, still faintly radiant, was observed across the +dinner-table by Walter, but he misinterpreted it. "What YOU lookin' so +self-satisfied about?" he inquired, and added in his knowing way, "I saw +you, all right, cutie!" + +"Where'd you see me?" + +"Down-town." + +"This afternoon, you mean, Walter?" + +"Yes, 'this afternoon, I mean, Walter,'" he returned, burlesquing +her voice at least happily enough to please himself; for he laughed +applausively. "Oh, you never saw me! I passed you close enough to pull +a tooth, but you were awful busy. I never did see anybody as busy as +you get, Alice, when you're towin' a barge. My, but you keep your hands +goin'! Looked like the air was full of 'em! That's why I'm onto why you +look so tickled this evening; I saw you with that big fish." + +Mrs. Adams laughed benevolently; she was not displeased with this +rallying. "Well, what of it, Walter?" she asked. "If you happen to see +your sister on the street when some nice young man is being attentive to +her----" + +Walter barked and then cackled. "Whoa, Sal!" he said. "You got the parts +mixed. It's little Alice that was 'being attentive.' I know the big fish +she was attentive to, all right, too." + +"Yes," his sister retorted, quietly. "I should think you might have +recognized him, Walter." + +Walter looked annoyed. "Still harpin' on THAT!" he complained. "The kind +of women I like, if they get sore they just hit you somewhere on the +face and then they're through. By the way, I heard this Russell was +supposed to be your dear, old, sweet friend Mildred's steady. What you +doin' walkin' as close to him as all that?" + +Mrs. Adams addressed her son in gentle reproof, "Why Walter!" + +"Oh, never mind, mama," Alice said. "To the horrid all things are +horrid." + +"Get out!" Walter protested, carelessly. "I heard all about this Russell +down at the shop. Young Joe Lamb's such a talker I wonder he don't ruin +his grandfather's business; he keeps all us cheap help standin' round +listening to him nine-tenths of our time. Well, Joe told me this +Russell's some kin or other to the Palmer family, and he's got some +little money of his own, and he's puttin' it into ole Palmer's trust +company and Palmer's goin' to make him a vice-president of the company. +Sort of a keep-the-money-in-the-family arrangement, Joe Lamb says." + +Mrs. Adams looked thoughtful. "I don't see----" she began. + +"Why, this Russell's supposed to be tied up to Mildred," her son +explained. "When ole Palmer dies this Russell will be his son-in-law, +and all he'll haf' to do'll be to barely lift his feet and step into +the ole man's shoes. It's certainly a mighty fat hand-me-out for this +Russell! You better lay off o' there, Alice. Pick somebody that's got +less to lose and you'll make better showing." + +Mrs. Adams's air of thoughtfulness had not departed. "But you say this +Mr. Russell is well off on his own account, Walter." + +"Oh, Joe Lamb says he's got some little of his own. Didn't know how +much." + +"Well, then----" + +Walter laughed his laugh. "Cut it out," he bade her. "Alice wouldn't run +in fourth place." + +Alice had been looking at him in a detached way, as though estimating +the value of a specimen in a collection not her own. "Yes," she said, +indifferently. "You REALLY are vulgar, Walter." + +He had finished his meal; and, rising, he came round the table to her +and patted her good-naturedly on the shoulder. "Good ole Allie!" he +said. "HONEST, you wouldn't run in fourth place. If I was you I'd never +even start in the class. That frozen-face gang will rule you off the +track soon as they see your colours." + +"Walter!" his mother said again. + +"Well, ain't I her brother?" he returned, seeming to be entirely serious +and direct, for the moment, at least. "_I_ like the ole girl all right. +Fact is, sometimes I'm kind of sorry for her." + +"But what's it all ABOUT?" Alice cried. "Simply because you met me +down-town with a man I never saw but once before and just barely know! +Why all this palaver?" + +"'Why?'" he repeated, grinning. "Well, I've seen you start before, you +know!" He went to the door, and paused. "I got no date to-night. Take +you to the movies, you care to go." + +She declined crisply. "No, thanks!" + +"Come on," he said, as pleasantly as he knew how. + +"Give me a chance to show you a better time than we had up at that +frozen-face joint. I'll get you some chop suey afterward." + +"No, thanks!" + +"All right," he responded and waved a flippant adieu. "As the barber +says, 'The better the advice, the worse it's wasted!' Good-night!" + +Alice shrugged her shoulders; but a moment or two later, as the jar of +the carelessly slammed front door went through the house, she shook her +head, reconsidering. "Perhaps I ought to have gone with him. It might +have kept him away from whatever dreadful people are his friends--at +least for one night." + +"Oh, I'm sure Walter's a GOOD boy," Mrs. Adams said, soothingly; and +this was what she almost always said when either her husband or Alice +expressed such misgivings. "He's odd, and he's picked up right queer +manners; but that's only because we haven't given him advantages like +the other young men. But I'm sure he's a GOOD boy." + +She reverted to the subject a little later, while she washed the dishes +and Alice wiped them. "Of course Walter could take his place with the +other nice boys of the town even yet," she said. "I mean, if we could +afford to help him financially. They all belong to the country clubs and +have cars and----" + +"Let's don't go into that any more, mama," the daughter begged her. +"What's the use?" + +"It COULD be of use," Mrs. Adams insisted. "It could if your father----" + +"But papa CAN'T." + +"Yes, he can." + +"But how can he? He told me a man of his age CAN'T give up a business +he's been in practically all his life, and just go groping about for +something that might never turn up at all. I think he's right about it, +too, of course!" + +Mrs. Adams splashed among the plates with a new vigour heightened by an +old bitterness. "Oh, yes," she said. "He talks that way; but he knows +better." + +"How could he 'know better,' mama?" + +"HE knows how!" + +"But what does he know?" + +Mrs. Adams tossed her head. "You don't suppose I'm such a fool I'd +be urging him to give up something for nothing, do you, Alice? Do you +suppose I'd want him to just go 'groping around' like he was telling +you? That would be crazy, of course. Little as his work at Lamb's brings +in, I wouldn't be so silly as to ask him to give it up just on a CHANCE +he could find something else. Good gracious, Alice, you must give me +credit for a little intelligence once in a while!" + +Alice was puzzled. "But what else could there be except a chance? I +don't see----" + +"Well, I do," her mother interrupted, decisively. "That man could make +us all well off right now if he wanted to. We could have been rich long +ago if he'd ever really felt as he ought to about his family." + +"What! Why, how could----" + +"You know how as well as I do," Mrs. Adams said, crossly. "I guess you +haven't forgotten how he treated me about it the Sunday before he got +sick." + +She went on with her work, putting into it a sudden violence inspired by +the recollection; but Alice, enlightened, gave utterance to a laugh +of lugubrious derision. "Oh, the GLUE factory again!" she cried. "How +silly!" And she renewed her laughter. + +So often do the great projects of parents appear ignominious to their +children. Mrs. Adams's conception of a glue factory as a fairy godmother +of this family was an absurd old story which Alice had never taken +seriously. She remembered that when she was about fifteen her mother +began now and then to say something to Adams about a "glue factory," +rather timidly, and as a vague suggestion, but never without irritating +him. Then, for years, the preposterous subject had not been mentioned; +possibly because of some explosion on the part of Adams, when his +daughter had not been present. But during the last year Mrs. Adams had +quietly gone back to these old hints, reviving them at intervals and +also reviving her husband's irritation. Alice's bored impression was +that her mother wanted him to found, or buy, or do something, or +other, about a glue factory; and that he considered the proposal so +impracticable as to be insulting. The parental conversations took place +when neither Alice nor Walter was at hand, but sometimes Alice had come +in upon the conclusion of one, to find her father in a shouting mood, +and shocking the air behind him with profane monosyllables as he +departed. Mrs. Adams would be left quiet and troubled; and when Alice, +sympathizing with the goaded man, inquired of her mother why these +tiresome bickerings had been renewed, she always got the brooding and +cryptic answer, "He COULD do it--if he wanted to." Alice failed to +comprehend the desirability of a glue factory--to her mind a father +engaged in a glue factory lacked impressiveness; had no advantage over +a father employed by Lamb and Company; and she supposed that Adams knew +better than her mother whether such an enterprise would be profitable +or not. Emphatically, he thought it would not, for she had heard him +shouting at the end of one of these painful interviews, "You can keep up +your dang talk till YOU die and _I_ die, but I'll never make one God's +cent that way!" + +There had been a culmination. Returning from church on the Sunday +preceding the collapse with which Adams's illness had begun, Alice +found her mother downstairs, weeping and intimidated, while her father's +stamping footsteps were loudly audible as he strode up and down his room +overhead. So were his endless repetitions of invective loudly audible: +"That woman! Oh, that woman; Oh, that danged woman!" + +Mrs. Adams admitted to her daughter that it was "the old glue factory" +and that her husband's wildness had frightened her into a "solemn +promise" never to mention the subject again so long as she had breath. +Alice laughed. The "glue factory" idea was not only a bore, but +ridiculous, and her mother's evident seriousness about it one of those +inexplicable vagaries we sometimes discover in the people we know best. +But this Sunday rampage appeared to be the end of it, and when Adams +came down to dinner, an hour later, he was unusually cheerful. Alice +was glad he had gone wild enough to settle the glue factory once and for +all; and she had ceased to think of the episode long before Friday of +that week, when Adams was brought home in the middle of the afternoon by +his old employer, the "great J. A. Lamb," in the latter's car. + +During the long illness the "glue factory" was completely forgotten, by +Alice at least; and her laugh was rueful as well as derisive now, in the +kitchen, when she realized that her mother's mind again dwelt upon this +abandoned nuisance. "I thought you'd got over all that nonsense, mama," +she said. + +Mrs. Adams smiled, pathetically. "Of course you think it's nonsense, +dearie. Young people think everything's nonsense that they don't know +anything about." + +"Good gracious!" Alice cried. "I should think I used to hear enough +about that horrible old glue factory to know something about it!" + +"No," her mother returned patiently. "You've never heard anything about +it at all." + +"I haven't?" + +"No. Your father and I didn't discuss it before you children. All you +ever heard was when he'd get in such a rage, after we'd been speaking of +it, that he couldn't control himself when you came in. Wasn't _I_ always +quiet? Did _I_ ever go on talking about it?" + +"No; perhaps not. But you're talking about it now, mama, after you +promised never to mention it again." + +"I promised not to mention it to your father," said Mrs. Adams, gently. +"I haven't mentioned it to him, have I?" + +"Ah, but if you mention it to me I'm afraid you WILL mention it to him. +You always do speak of things that you have on your mind, and you +might get papa all stirred up again about--" Alice paused, a light of +divination flickering in her eyes. "Oh!" she cried. "I SEE!" + +"What do you see?" + +"You HAVE been at him about it!" + +"Not one single word!" + +"No!" Alice cried. "Not a WORD, but that's what you've meant all along! +You haven't spoken the words to him, but all this urging him to change, +to 'find something better to go into'--it's all been about nothing on +earth but your foolish old glue factory that you know upsets him, and +you gave your solemn word never to speak to him about again! You didn't +say it, but you meant it--and he KNOWS that's what you meant! Oh, mama!" + +Mrs. Adams, with her hands still automatically at work in the flooded +dishpan, turned to face her daughter. "Alice," she said, tremulously, +"what do I ask for myself?" + +"What?" + +"I say, What do I ask for myself? Do you suppose _I_ want anything? +Don't you know I'd be perfectly content on your father's present income +if I were the only person to be considered? What do I care about any +pleasure for myself? I'd be willing never to have a maid again; _I_ +don't mind doing the work. If we didn't have any children I'd be glad to +do your father's cooking and the housework and the washing and ironing, +too, for the rest of my life. I wouldn't care. I'm a poor cook and a +poor housekeeper; I don't do anything well; but it would be good enough +for just him and me. I wouldn't ever utter one word of com----" + +"Oh, goodness!" Alice lamented. "What IS it all about?" + +"It's about this," said Mrs. Adams, swallowing. "You and Walter are a +new generation and you ought to have the same as the rest of the new +generation get. Poor Walter--asking you to go to the movies and a +Chinese restaurant: the best he had to offer! Don't you suppose _I_ see +how the poor boy is deteriorating? Don't you suppose I know what YOU +have to go through, Alice? And when I think of that man upstairs----" +The agitated voice grew louder. "When I think of him and know that +nothing in the world but his STUBBORNNESS keeps my children from having +all they want and what they OUGHT to have, do you suppose I'm going to +hold myself bound to keep to the absolute letter of a silly promise he +got from me by behaving like a crazy man? I can't! I can't do it! No +mother could sit by and see him lock up a horn of plenty like that in +his closet when the children were starving!" + +"Oh, goodness, goodness me!" Alice protested. "We aren't precisely +'starving,' are we?" + +Mrs. Adams began to weep. "It's just the same. Didn't I see how flushed +and pretty you looked, this afternoon, after you'd been walking with +this young man that's come here? Do you suppose he'd LOOK at a girl like +Mildred Palmer if you had what you ought to have? Do you suppose he'd be +going into business with her father if YOUR father----" + +"Good heavens, mama; you're worse than Walter: I just barely know the +man! DON'T be so absurd!" + +"Yes, I'm always 'absurd,'" Mrs. Adams moaned. "All I can do is cry, +while your father sits upstairs, and his horn of plenty----" + +But Alice interrupted with a peal of desperate laughter. "Oh, that +'horn of plenty!' Do come down to earth, mama. How can you call a GLUE +factory, that doesn't exist except in your mind, a 'horn of plenty'? Do +let's be a little rational!" + +"It COULD be a horn of plenty," the tearful Mrs. Adams insisted. "It +could! You don't understand a thing about it." + +"Well, I'm willing," Alice said, with tired skepticism. "Make me +understand, then. Where'd you ever get the idea?" + +Mrs. Adams withdrew her hands from the water, dried them on a towel, +and then wiped her eyes with a handkerchief. "Your father could make a +fortune if he wanted to," she said, quietly. "At least, I don't say a +fortune, but anyhow a great deal more than he does make." + +"Yes, I've heard that before, mama, and you think he could make it out +of a glue factory. What I'm asking is: How?" + +"How? Why, by making glue and selling it. Don't you know how bad most +glue is when you try to mend anything? A good glue is one of the rarest +things there is; and it would just sell itself, once it got started. +Well, your father knows how to make as good a glue as there is in the +world." + +Alice was not interested. "What of it? I suppose probably anybody could +make it if they wanted to." + +"I SAID you didn't know anything about it. Nobody else could make it. +Your father knows a formula for making it." + +"What of that?" + +"It's a secret formula. It isn't even down on paper. It's worth any +amount of money." + +"'Any amount?'" Alice said, remaining incredulous. "Why hasn't papa sold +it then?" + +"Just because he's too stubborn to do anything with it at all!" + +"How did papa get it?" + +"He got it before you were born, just after we were married. I didn't +think much about it then: it wasn't till you were growing up and I saw +how much we needed money that I----" + +"Yes, but how did papa get it?" Alice began to feel a little more +curious about this possible buried treasure. "Did he invent it?" + +"Partly," Mrs. Adams said, looking somewhat preoccupied. "He and another +man invented it." + +"Then maybe the other man----" + +"He's dead." + +"Then his family----" + +"I don't think he left any family," Mrs. Adams said. "Anyhow, it belongs +to your father. At least it belongs to him as much as it does to any one +else. He's got an absolutely perfect right to do anything he wants to +with it, and it would make us all comfortable if he'd do what I want him +to--and he KNOWS it would, too!" + +Alice shook her head pityingly. "Poor mama!" she said. "Of course he +knows it wouldn't do anything of the kind, or else he'd have done it +long ago." + +"He would, you say?" her mother cried. "That only shows how little you +know him!" + +"Poor mama!" Alice said again, soothingly. "If papa were like what you +say he is, he'd be--why, he'd be crazy!" + +Mrs. Adams agreed with a vehemence near passion. "You're right about him +for once: that's just what he is! He sits up there in his stubbornness +and lets us slave here in the kitchen when if he wanted to--if he'd so +much as lift his little finger----" + +"Oh, come, now!" Alice laughed. "You can't build even a glue factory +with just one little finger." + +Mrs. Adams seemed about to reply that finding fault with a figure +of speech was beside the point; but a ringing of the front door bell +forestalled the retort. "Now, who do you suppose that is?" she wondered +aloud, then her face brightened. "Ah--did Mr. Russell ask if he +could----" + +"No, he wouldn't be coming this evening," Alice said. "Probably it's the +great J. A. Lamb: he usually stops for a minute on Thursdays to ask how +papa's getting along. I'll go." + +She tossed her apron off, and as she went through the house her +expression was thoughtful. She was thinking vaguely about the glue +factory and wondering if there might be "something in it" after all. If +her mother was right about the rich possibilities of Adams's secret--but +that was as far as Alice's speculations upon the matter went at this +time: they were checked, partly by the thought that her father probably +hadn't enough money for such an enterprise, and partly by the fact that +she had arrived at the front door. + + + +CHAPTER XII + +The fine old gentleman revealed when she opened the door was probably +the last great merchant in America to wear the chin beard. White as +white frost, it was trimmed short with exquisite precision, while his +upper lip and the lower expanses of his cheeks were clean and rosy from +fresh shaving. With this trim white chin beard, the white waistcoat, +the white tie, the suit of fine gray cloth, the broad and brilliantly +polished black shoes, and the wide-brimmed gray felt hat, here was a +man who had found his style in the seventies of the last century, and +thenceforth kept it. Files of old magazines of that period might show +him, in woodcut, as, "Type of Boston Merchant"; Nast might have drawn +him as an honest statesman. He was eighty, hale and sturdy, not aged; +and his quick blue eyes, still unflecked, and as brisk as a boy's, saw +everything. + +"Well, well, well!" he said, heartily. "You haven't lost any of your +good looks since last week, I see, Miss Alice, so I guess I'm to take +it you haven't been worrying over your daddy. The young feller's getting +along all right, is he?" + +"He's much better; he's sitting up, Mr. Lamb. Won't you come in?" + +"Well, I don't know but I might." He turned to call toward twin disks of +light at the curb, "Be out in a minute, Billy"; and the silhouette of a +chauffeur standing beside a car could be seen to salute in response, as +the old gentleman stepped into the hall. "You don't suppose your daddy's +receiving callers yet, is he?" + +"He's a good deal stronger than he was when you were here last week, but +I'm afraid he's not very presentable, though." + +"'Presentable?'" The old man echoed her jovially. "Pshaw! I've seen lots +of sick folks. _I_ know what they look like and how they love to kind of +nest in among a pile of old blankets and wrappers. Don't you worry about +THAT, Miss Alice, if you think he'd like to see me." + +"Of course he would--if----" Alice hesitated; then said quickly, "Of +course he'd love to see you and he's quite able to, if you care to come +up." + +She ran up the stairs ahead of him, and had time to snatch the crocheted +wrap from her father's shoulders. Swathed as usual, he was sitting +beside a table, reading the evening paper; but when his employer +appeared in the doorway he half rose as if to come forward in greeting. + +"Sit still!" the old gentleman shouted. "What do you mean? Don't you +know you're weak as a cat? D'you think a man can be sick as long as you +have and NOT be weak as a cat? What you trying to do the polite with ME +for?" + +Adams gratefully protracted the handshake that accompanied these +inquiries. "This is certainly mighty fine of you, Mr. Lamb," he said. +"I guess Alice has told you how much our whole family appreciate your +coming here so regularly to see how this old bag o' bones was getting +along. Haven't you, Alice?" + +"Yes, papa," she said; and turned to go out, but Lamb checked her. + +"Stay right here, Miss Alice; I'm not even going to sit down. I know +how it upsets sick folks when people outside the family come in for the +first time." + +"You don't upset me," Adams said. "I'll feel a lot better for getting a +glimpse of you, Mr. Lamb." + +The visitor's laugh was husky, but hearty and re-assuring, like his +voice in speaking. "That's the way all my boys blarney me, Miss Alice," +he said. "They think I'll make the work lighter on 'em if they can +get me kind of flattered up. You just tell your daddy it's no use; he +doesn't get on MY soft side, pretending he likes to see me even when +he's sick." + +"Oh, I'm not so sick any more," Adams said. "I expect to be back in my +place ten days from now at the longest." + +"Well, now, don't hurry it, Virgil; don't hurry it. You take your time; +take your time." + +This brought to Adams's lips a feeble smile not lacking in a kind of +vanity, as feeble. "Why?" he asked. "I suppose you think my department +runs itself down there, do you?" + +His employer's response was another husky laugh. "Well, well, well!" he +cried, and patted Adams's shoulder with a strong pink hand. "Listen to +this young feller, Miss Alice, will you! He thinks we can't get along +without him a minute! Yes, sir, this daddy of yours believes the whole +works 'll just take and run down if he isn't there to keep 'em wound up. +I always suspected he thought a good deal of himself, and now I know he +does!" + +Adams looked troubled. "Well, I don't like to feel that my salary's +going on with me not earning it." + +"Listen to him, Miss Alice! Wouldn't you think, now, he'd let me be the +one to worry about that? Why, on my word, if your daddy had his way, _I_ +wouldn't be anywhere. He'd take all my worrying and everything else off +my shoulders and shove me right out of Lamb and Company! He would!" + +"It seems to me I've been soldiering on you a pretty long while, Mr. +Lamb," the convalescent said, querulously. "I don't feel right about it; +but I'll be back in ten days. You'll see." + +The old man took his hand in parting. "All right; we'll see, Virgil. Of +course we do need you, seriously speaking; but we don't need you so bad +we'll let you come down there before you're fully fit and able." He went +to the door. "You hear, Miss Alice? That's what I wanted to make the old +feller understand, and what I want you to kind of enforce on him. The +old place is there waiting for him, and it'd wait ten years if it took +him that long to get good and well. You see that he remembers it, Miss +Alice!" + +She went down the stairs with him, and he continued to impress this upon +her until he had gone out of the front door. And even after that, the +husky voice called back from the darkness, as he went to his car, "Don't +forget, Miss Alice; let him take his own time. We always want him, but +we want him to get good and well first. Good-night, good-night, young +lady!" + +When she closed the door her mother came from the farther end of the +"living-room," where there was no light; and Alice turned to her. + +"I can't help liking that old man, mama," she said. "He always sounds +so--well, so solid and honest and friendly! I do like him." + +But Mrs. Adams failed in sympathy upon this point. "He didn't say +anything about raising your father's salary, did he?" she asked, dryly. + +"No." + +"No. I thought not." + +She would have said more, but Alice, indisposed to listen, began to +whistle, ran up the stairs, and went to sit with her father. She found +him bright-eyed with the excitement a first caller brings into a slow +convalescence: his cheeks showed actual hints of colour; and he was +smiling tremulously as he filled and lit his pipe. She brought the +crocheted scarf and put it about his shoulders again, then took a chair +near him. + +"I believe seeing Mr. Lamb did do you good, papa," she said. "I sort of +thought it might, and that's why I let him come up. You really look a +little like your old self again." + +Adams exhaled a breathy "Ha!" with the smoke from his pipe as he waved +the match to extinguish it. "That's fine," he said. "The smoke I had +before dinner didn't taste the way it used to, and I kind of wondered if +I'd lost my liking for tobacco, but this one seems to be all right. You +bet it did me good to see J. A. Lamb! He's the biggest man that's ever +lived in this town or ever will live here; and you can take all the +Governors and Senators or anything they've raised here, and put 'em in +a pot with him, and they won't come out one-two-three alongside o' him! +And to think as big a man as that, with all his interests and everything +he's got on his mind--to think he'd never let anything prevent him from +coming here once every week to ask how I was getting along, and then +walk right upstairs and kind of CALL on me, as it were well, it makes +me sort of feel as if I wasn't so much of a nobody, so to speak, as your +mother seems to like to make out sometimes." + +"How foolish, papa! Of COURSE you're not 'a nobody.'" + +Adams chuckled faintly upon his pipe-stem, what vanity he had seeming to +be further stimulated by his daughter's applause. "I guess there aren't +a whole lot of people in this town that could claim J. A. showed that +much interest in 'em," he said. "Of course I don't set up to believe +it's all because of merit, or anything like that. He'd do the same for +anybody else that'd been with the company as long as I have, but still +it IS something to be with the company that long and have him show he +appreciates it." + +"Yes, indeed, it is, papa." + +"Yes, sir," Adams said, reflectively. "Yes, sir, I guess that's so. And +besides, it all goes to show the kind of a man he is. Simon pure, that's +what that man is, Alice. Simon pure! There's never been anybody work +for him that didn't respect him more than they did any other man in the +world, I guess. And when you work for him you know he respects you, +too. Right from the start you get the feeling that J. A. puts absolute +confidence in you; and that's mighty stimulating: it makes you want to +show him he hasn't misplaced it. There's great big moral values to the +way a man like him gets you to feeling about your relations with the +business: it ain't all just dollars and cents--not by any means!" + +He was silent for a time, then returned with increasing enthusiasm to +this theme, and Alice was glad to see so much renewal of life in him; he +had not spoken with a like cheerful vigour since before his illness. The +visit of his idolized great man had indeed been good for him, putting +new spirit into him; and liveliness of the body followed that of the +spirit. His improvement carried over the night: he slept well and +awoke late, declaring that he was "pretty near a well man and ready for +business right now." Moreover, having slept again in the afternoon, +he dressed and went down to dinner, leaning but lightly on Alice, who +conducted him. + +"My! but you and your mother have been at it with your scrubbing and +dusting!" he said, as they came through the "living-room." "I don't know +I ever did see the house so spick and span before!" His glance fell upon +a few carnations in a vase, and he chuckled admiringly. "Flowers, too! +So THAT'S what you coaxed that dollar and a half out o 'me for, this +morning!" + +Other embellishments brought forth his comment when he had taken his old +seat at the head of the small dinner-table. "Why, I declare, Alice!" he +exclaimed. "I been so busy looking at all the spick-and-spanishness +after the house-cleaning, and the flowers out in the parlour--'living +room' I suppose you want me to call it, if I just GOT to be +fashionable--I been so busy studying over all this so-and-so, I declare +I never noticed YOU till this minute! My, but you ARE all dressed up! +What's goin' on? What's it about: you so all dressed up, and flowers in +the parlour and everything?" + +"Don't you see, papa? It's in honour of your coming downstairs again, of +course." + +"Oh, so that's it," he said. "I never would 'a' thought of that, I +guess." + +But Walter looked sidelong at his father, and gave forth his sly and +knowing laugh. "Neither would I!" he said. + +Adams lifted his eyebrows jocosely. "You're jealous, are you, sonny? You +don't want the old man to think our young lady'd make so much fuss over +him, do you?" + +"Go on thinkin' it's over you," Walter retorted, amused. "Go on and +think it. It'll do you good." + +"Of course I'll think it," Adams said. "It isn't anybody's birthday. +Certainly the decorations are on account of me coming downstairs. Didn't +you hear Alice say so?" + +"Sure, I heard her say so." + +"Well, then----" + +Walter interrupted him with a little music. Looking shrewdly at Alice, +he sang: + + "I was walkin' out on Monday with my sweet thing. + She's my neat thing, + My sweet thing: + I'll go round on Tuesday night to see her. + Oh, how we'll spoon----" + + +"Walter!" his mother cried. "WHERE do you learn such vulgar songs?" +However, she seemed not greatly displeased with him, and laughed as she +spoke. + +"So that's it, Alice!" said Adams. "Playing the hypocrite with your old +man, are you? It's some new beau, is it?" + +"I only wish it were," she said, calmly. "No. It's just what I said: +it's all for you, dear." + +"Don't let her con you," Walter advised his father. "She's got +expectations. You hang around downstairs a while after dinner and you'll +see." + +But the prophecy failed, though Adams went to his own room without +waiting to test it. No one came. + +Alice stayed in the "living-room" until half-past nine, when she went +slowly upstairs. Her mother, almost tearful, met her at the top, and +whispered, "You mustn't mind, dearie." + +"Mustn't mind what?" Alice asked, and then, as she went on her way, +laughed scornfully. "What utter nonsense!" she said. + +Next day she cut the stems of the rather scant show of carnations and +refreshed them with new water. At dinner, her father, still in high +spirits, observed that she had again "dressed up" in honour of his +second descent of the stairs; and Walter repeated his fragment of +objectionable song; but these jocularities were rendered pointless by +the eventless evening that followed; and in the morning the carnations +began to appear tarnished and flaccid. + +Alice gave them a long look, then threw them away; and neither Walter +nor her father was inspired to any rallying by her plain costume for +that evening. Mrs. Adams was visibly depressed. + +When Alice finished helping her mother with the dishes, she went +outdoors and sat upon the steps of the little front veranda. The night, +gentle with warm air from the south, surrounded her pleasantly, and the +perpetual smoke was thinner. Now that the furnaces of dwelling-houses +were no longer fired, life in that city had begun to be less like life +in a railway tunnel; people were aware of summer in the air, and in +the thickened foliage of the shade-trees, and in the sky. Stars were +unveiled by the passing of the denser smoke fogs, and to-night they +could be seen clearly; they looked warm and near. Other girls sat upon +verandas and stoops in Alice's street, cheerful as young fishermen along +the banks of a stream. + +Alice could hear them from time to time; thin sopranos persistent in +laughter that fell dismally upon her ears. She had set no lines or nets +herself, and what she had of "expectations," as Walter called them, were +vanished. For Alice was experienced; and one of the conclusions she drew +from her experience was that when a man says, "I'd take you for anything +you wanted me to," he may mean it or, he may not; but, if he does, he +will not postpone the first opportunity to say something more. Little +affairs, once begun, must be warmed quickly; for if they cool they are +dead. + +But Alice was not thinking of Arthur Russell. When she tossed away the +carnations she likewise tossed away her thoughts of that young man. She +had been like a boy who sees upon the street, some distance before him, +a bit of something round and glittering, a possible dime. He hopes it is +a dime, and, until he comes near enough to make sure, he plays that it +is a dime. In his mind he has an adventure with it: he buys something +delightful. If he picks it up, discovering only some tin-foil which has +happened upon a round shape, he feels a sinking. A dulness falls upon +him. + +So Alice was dull with the loss of an adventure; and when the laughter +of other girls reached her, intermittently, she had not sprightliness +enough left in her to be envious of their gaiety. Besides, these +neighbours were ineligible even for her envy, being of another caste; +they could never know a dance at the Palmers', except remotely, through +a newspaper. Their laughter was for the encouragement of snappy young +men of the stores and offices down-town, clerks, bookkeepers, what +not--some of them probably graduates of Frincke's Business College. + +Then, as she recalled that dark portal, with its dusty stairway mounting +between close walls to disappear in the upper shadows, her mind drew +back as from a doorway to Purgatory. Nevertheless, it was a picture +often in her reverie; and sometimes it came suddenly, without sequence, +into the midst of her other thoughts, as if it leaped up among them from +a lower darkness; and when it arrived it wanted to stay. So a traveller, +still roaming the world afar, sometimes broods without apparent reason +upon his family burial lot: "I wonder if I shall end there." + +The foreboding passed abruptly, with a jerk of her breath, as the +street-lamp revealed a tall and easy figure approaching from the north, +swinging a stick in time to its stride. She had given Russell up--and he +came. + +"What luck for me!" he exclaimed. "To find you alone!" + +Alice gave him her hand for an instant, not otherwise moving. "I'm glad +it happened so," she said. "Let's stay out here, shall we? Do you think +it's too provincial to sit on a girl's front steps with her?" + +"'Provincial?' Why, it's the very best of our institutions," he +returned, taking his place beside her. "At least, I think so to-night." + +"Thanks! Is that practice for other nights somewhere else?" + +"No," he laughed. "The practicing all led up to this. Did I come too +soon?" + +"No," she replied, gravely. "Just in time!" + +"I'm glad to be so accurate; I've spent two evenings wanting to come, +Miss Adams, instead of doing what I was doing." + +"What was that?" + +"Dinners. Large and long dinners. Your fellow-citizens are immensely +hospitable to a newcomer." + +"Oh, no," Alice said. "We don't do it for everybody. Didn't you find +yourself charmed?" + +"One was a men's dinner," he explained. "Mr. Palmer seemed to think I +ought to be shown to the principal business men." + +"What was the other dinner?" + +"My cousin Mildred gave it." + +"Oh, DID she!" Alice said, sharply, but she recovered herself in the +same instant, and laughed. "She wanted to show you to the principal +business women, I suppose." + +"I don't know. At all events, I shouldn't give myself out to be so much +feted by your 'fellow-citizens,' after all, seeing these were both done +by my relatives, the Palmers. However, there are others to follow, I'm +afraid. I was wondering--I hoped maybe you'd be coming to some of them. +Aren't you?" + +"I rather doubt it," Alice said, slowly. "Mildred's dance was almost the +only evening I've gone out since my father's illness began. He seemed +better that day; so I went. He was better the other day when he wanted +those cigars. He's very much up and down." She paused. "I'd almost +forgotten that Mildred is your cousin." + +"Not a very near one," he explained. "Mr. Palmer's father was my +great-uncle." + +"Still, of course you are related." + +"Yes; that distantly." + +Alice said placidly, "It's quite an advantage." + +He agreed. "Yes. It is." + +"No," she said, in the same placid tone. "I mean for Mildred." + +"I don't see----" + +She laughed. "No. You wouldn't. I mean it's an advantage over the rest +of us who might like to compete for some of your time; and the worst of +it is we can't accuse her of being unfair about it. We can't prove she +showed any trickiness in having you for a cousin. Whatever else she +might plan to do with you, she didn't plan that. So the rest of us must +just bear it!" + +"The 'rest of you!'" he laughed. "It's going to mean a great deal of +suffering!" + +Alice resumed her placid tone. "You're staying at the Palmers', aren't +you?" + +"No, not now. I've taken an apartment. I'm going to live here; I'm +permanent. Didn't I tell you?" + +"I think I'd heard somewhere that you were," she said. "Do you think +you'll like living here?" + +"How can one tell?" + +"If I were in your place I think I should be able to tell, Mr. Russell." + +"How?" + +"Why, good gracious!" she cried. "Haven't you got the most perfect +creature in town for your--your cousin? SHE expects to make you like +living here, doesn't she? How could you keep from liking it, even if you +tried not to, under the circumstances?" + +"Well, you see, there's such a lot of circumstances," he explained; "I'm +not sure I'll like getting back into a business again. I suppose most +of the men of my age in the country have been going through the same +experience: the War left us with a considerable restlessness of spirit." + +"You were in the War?" she asked, quickly, and as quickly answered +herself, "Of course you were!" + +"I was a left-over; they only let me out about four months ago," he +said. "It's quite a shake-up trying to settle down again." + +"You were in France, then?" + +"Oh, yes; but I didn't get up to the front much--only two or three +times, and then just for a day or so. I was in the transportation +service." + +"You were an officer, of course." + +"Yes," he said. "They let me play I was a major." + +"I guessed a major," she said. "You'd always be pretty grand, of +course." + +Russell was amused. "Well, you see," he informed her, "as it happened, +we had at least several other majors in our army. Why would I always be +something 'pretty grand?'" + +"You're related to the Palmers. Don't you notice they always affect the +pretty grand?" + +"Then you think I'm only one of their affectations, I take it." + +"Yes, you seem to be the most successful one they've got!" Alice said, +lightly. "You certainly do belong to them." And she laughed as if at +something hidden from him. "Don't you?" + +"But you've just excused me for that," he protested. "You said nobody +could be blamed for my being their third cousin. What a contradictory +girl you are!" + +Alice shook her head. "Let's keep away from the kind of girl I am." + +"No," he said. "That's just what I came here to talk about." + +She shook her head again. "Let's keep first to the kind of man you are. +I'm glad you were in the War." + +"Why?" + +"Oh, I don't know." She was quiet a moment, for she was thinking that +here she spoke the truth: his service put about him a little glamour +that helped to please her with him. She had been pleased with him during +their walk; pleased with him on his own account; and now that pleasure +was growing keener. She looked at him, and though the light in which +she saw him was little more than starlight, she saw that he was looking +steadily at her with a kindly and smiling seriousness. All at once it +seemed to her that the night air was sweeter to breathe, as if a distant +fragrance of new blossoms had been blown to her. She smiled back to him, +and said, "Well, what kind of man are you?" + +"I don't know; I've often wondered," he replied. "What kind of girl are +you?" + +"Don't you remember? I told you the other day. I'm just me!" + +"But who is that?" + +"You forget everything;" said Alice. "You told me what kind of a girl +I am. You seemed to think you'd taken quite a fancy to me from the very +first." + +"So I did," he agreed, heartily. + +"But how quickly you forgot it!" + +"Oh, no. I only want YOU to say what kind of a girl you are." + +She mocked him. "'I don't know; I've often wondered!' What kind of a +girl does Mildred tell you I am? What has she said about me since she +told you I was 'a Miss Adams?'" + +"I don't know; I haven't asked her." + +"Then DON'T ask her," Alice said, quickly. + +"Why?" + +"Because she's such a perfect creature and I'm such an imperfect one. +Perfect creatures have the most perfect way of ruining the imperfect +ones." + +"But then they wouldn't be perfect. Not if they----" + +"Oh, yes, they remain perfectly perfect," she assured him. "That's +because they never go into details. They're not so vulgar as to come +right out and TELL that you've been in jail for stealing chickens. +They just look absent-minded and say in a low voice, 'Oh, very; but I +scarcely think you'd like her particularly'; and then begin to talk of +something else right away." + +His smile had disappeared. "Yes," he said, somewhat ruefully. "That +does sound like Mildred. You certainly do seem to know her! Do you know +everybody as well as that?" + +"Not myself," Alice said. "I don't know myself at all. I got to +wondering about that--about who I was--the other day after you walked +home with me." + +He uttered an exclamation, and added, explaining it, "You do give a man +a chance to be fatuous, though! As if it were walking home with me that +made you wonder about yourself!" + +"It was," Alice informed him, coolly. "I was wondering what I wanted to +make you think of me, in case I should ever happen to see you again." + +This audacity appeared to take his breath. "By George!" he cried. + +"You mustn't be astonished," she said. "What I decided then was that I +would probably never dare to be just myself with you--not if I cared +to have you want to see me again--and yet here I am, just being myself +after all!" + +"You ARE the cheeriest series of shocks," Russell exclaimed, whereupon +Alice added to the series. + +"Tell me: Is it a good policy for me to follow with you?" she asked, and +he found the mockery in her voice delightful. "Would you advise me to +offer you shocks as a sort of vacation from suavity?" + +"Suavity" was yet another sketch of Mildred; a recognizable one, or it +would not have been humorous. In Alice's hands, so dexterous in this +work, her statuesque friend was becoming as ridiculous as a fine figure +of wax left to the mercies of a satirist. + +But the lively young sculptress knew better than to overdo: what she did +must appear to spring all from mirth; so she laughed as if unwillingly, +and said, "I MUSTN'T laugh at Mildred! In the first place, she's +your--your cousin. And in the second place, she's not meant to be funny; +it isn't right to laugh at really splendid people who take themselves +seriously. In the third place, you won't come again if I do." + +"Don't be sure of that," Russell said, "whatever you do." + +"'Whatever I do?'" she echoed. "That sounds as if you thought I COULD be +terrific! Be careful; there's one thing I could do that would keep you +away." + +"What's that?" + +"I could tell you not to come," she said. "I wonder if I ought to." + +"Why do you wonder if you 'ought to?'" + +"Don't you guess?" + +"No." + +"Then let's both be mysteries to each other," she suggested. "I mystify +you because I wonder, and you mystify me because you don't guess why I +wonder. We'll let it go at that, shall we?" + +"Very well; so long as it's certain that you DON'T tell me not to come +again." + +"I'll not tell you that--yet," she said. "In fact----" She paused, +reflecting, with her head to one side. "In fact, I won't tell you not +to come, probably, until I see that's what you want me to tell you. +I'll let you out easily--and I'll be sure to see it. Even before you do, +perhaps." + +"That arrangement suits me," Russell returned, and his voice held no +trace of jocularity: he had become serious. "It suits me better if +you're enough in earnest to mean that I can come--oh, not whenever I +want to; I don't expect so much!--but if you mean that I can see you +pretty often." + +"Of course I'm in earnest," she said. "But before I say you can come +'pretty often,' I'd like to know how much of my time you'd need if you +did come 'whenever you want to'; and of course you wouldn't dare +make any answer to that question except one. Wouldn't you let me have +Thursdays out?" + +"No, no," he protested. "I want to know. Will you let me come pretty +often?" + +"Lean toward me a little," Alice said. "I want you to understand." And +as he obediently bent his head near hers, she inclined toward him as if +to whisper; then, in a half-shout, she cried, + +"YES!" + +He clapped his hands. "By George!" he said. "What a girl you are!" + +"Why?" + +"Well, for the first reason, because you have such gaieties as that one. +I should think your father would actually like being ill, just to be in +the house with you all the time." + +"You mean by that," Alice inquired, "I keep my family cheerful with my +amusing little ways?" + +"Yes. Don't you?" + +"There were only boys in your family, weren't there, Mr. Russell?" + +"I was an only child, unfortunately." + +"Yes," she said. "I see you hadn't any sisters." + +For a moment he puzzled over her meaning, then saw it, and was more +delighted with her than ever. "I can answer a question of yours, now, +that I couldn't a while ago." + +"Yes, I know," she returned, quietly. + +"But how could you know?" + +"It's the question I asked you about whether you were going to like +living here," she said. "You're about to tell me that now you know you +WILL like it." + +"More telepathy!" he exclaimed. "Yes, that was it, precisely. I suppose +the same thing's been said to you so many times that you----" + +"No, it hasn't," Alice said, a little confused for the moment. "Not at +all. I meant----" She paused, then asked in a gentle voice, "Would you +really like to know?" + +"Yes." + +"Well, then, I was only afraid you didn't mean it." + +"See here," he said. "I did mean it. I told you it was being pretty +difficult for me to settle down to things again. Well, it's more +difficult than you know, but I think I can pull through in fair spirits +if I can see a girl like you 'pretty often.'" + +"All right," she said, in a business-like tone. "I've told you that you +can if you want to." + +"I do want to," he assured her. "I do, indeed!" + +"How often is 'pretty often,' Mr. Russell?" + +"Would you walk with me sometimes? To-morrow?" + +"Sometimes. Not to-morrow. The day after." + +"That's splendid!" he said. "You'll walk with me day after to-morrow, +and the night after that I'll see you at Miss Lamb's dance, won't I?" + +But this fell rather chillingly upon Alice. "Miss Lamb's dance? Which +Miss Lamb?" she asked. + +"I don't know--it's the one that's just coming out of mourning." + +"Oh, Henrietta--yes. Is her dance so soon? I'd forgotten." + +"You'll be there, won't you?" he asked. "Please say you're going." + +Alice did not respond at once, and he urged her again: "Please do +promise you'll be there." + +"No, I can't promise anything," she said, slowly. "You see, for one +thing, papa might not be well enough." + +"But if he is?" said Russell. "If he is you'll surely come, won't you? +Or, perhaps----" He hesitated, then went on quickly, "I don't know the +rules in this place yet, and different places have different rules; but +do you have to have a chaperone, or don't girls just go to dances with +the men sometimes? If they do, would you--would you let me take you?" + +Alice was startled. "Good gracious!" + +"What's the matter?" + +"Don't you think your relatives----Aren't you expected to go with +Mildred--and Mrs. Palmer?" + +"Not necessarily. It doesn't matter what I might be expected to do," he +said. "Will you go with me?" + +"I----No; I couldn't." + +"Why not?" + +"I can't. I'm not going." + +"But why?" + +"Papa's not really any better," Alice said, huskily. "I'm too worried +about him to go to a dance." Her voice sounded emotional, genuinely +enough; there was something almost like a sob in it. "Let's talk of +other things, please." + +He acquiesced gently; but Mrs. Adams, who had been listening to the +conversation at the open window, just overhead, did not hear him. She +had correctly interpreted the sob in Alice's voice, and, trembling +with sudden anger, she rose from her knees, and went fiercely to her +husband's room. + + + +CHAPTER XIII + +He had not undressed, and he sat beside the table, smoking his pipe and +reading his newspaper. Upon his forehead the lines in that old pattern, +the historical map of his troubles, had grown a little vaguer lately; +relaxed by the complacency of a man who not only finds his health +restored, but sees the days before him promising once more a familiar +routine that he has always liked to follow. + +As his wife came in, closing the door behind her, he looked up +cheerfully, "Well, mother," he said, "what's the news downstairs?" + +"That's what I came to tell you," she informed him, grimly. + +Adams lowered his newspaper to his knee and peered over his spectacles +at her. She had remained by the door, standing, and the great greenish +shadow of the small lamp-shade upon his table revealed her but +dubiously. "Isn't everything all right?" he asked. "What's the matter?" + +"Don't worry: I'm going to tell you," she said, her grimness not +relaxed. "There's matter enough, Virgil Adams. Matter enough to make me +sick of being alive!" + +With that, the markings on his brows began to emerge again in all their +sharpness; the old pattern reappeared. "Oh, my, my!" he lamented. "I +thought maybe we were all going to settle down to a little peace for a +while. What's it about now?" + +"It's about Alice. Did you think it was about ME or anything for +MYSELF?" + +Like some ready old machine, always in order, his irritability responded +immediately and automatically to her emotion. "How in thunder could I +think what it's about, or who it's for? SAY it, and get it over!" + +"Oh, I'll 'say' it," she promised, ominously. "What I've come to ask you +is, How much longer do you expect me to put up with that old man and his +doings?" + +"Whose doings? What old man?" + +She came at him, fiercely accusing. "You know well enough what old man, +Virgil Adams! That old man who was here the other night." + +"Mr. Lamb?" + +"Yes; 'Mister Lamb!'" She mocked his voice. "What other old man would I +be likely to mean except J. A. Lamb?" + +"What's he been doing now?" her husband inquired, satirically. "Where'd +you get something new against him since the last time you----" + +"Just this!" she cried. "The other night when that man was here, if I'd +known how he was going to make my child suffer, I'd never have let him +set his foot in my house." + +Adams leaned back in his chair as though her absurdity had eased his +mind. "Oh, I see," he said. "You've just gone plain crazy. That's the +only explanation of such talk, and it suits the case." + +"Hasn't that man made us all suffer every day of our lives?" she +demanded. "I'd like to know why it is that my life and my children's +lives have to be sacrificed to him?" + +"How are they 'sacrificed' to him?" + +"Because you keep on working for him! Because you keep on letting him +hand out whatever miserable little pittance he chooses to give you; +that's why! It's as if he were some horrible old Juggernaut and I had to +see my children's own father throwing them under the wheels to keep him +satisfied." + +"I won't hear any more such stuff!" Lifting his paper, Adams affected to +read. + +"You'd better listen to me," she admonished him. "You might be sorry +you didn't, in case he ever tried to set foot in my house again! I might +tell him to his face what I think of him." + +At this, Adams slapped the newspaper down upon his knee. "Oh, the devil! +What's it matter what you think of him?" + +"It had better matter to you!" she cried. "Do you suppose I'm going +to submit forever to him and his family and what they're doing to my +child?" + +"What are he and his family doing to 'your child?'" + +Mrs. Adams came out with it. "That snippy little Henrietta Lamb has +always snubbed Alice every time she's ever had the chance. She's +followed the lead of the other girls; they've always all of 'em been +jealous of Alice because she dared to try and be happy, and because +she's showier and better-looking than they are, even though you do give +her only about thirty-five cents a year to do it on! They've all done +everything on earth they could to drive the young men away from her +and belittle her to 'em; and this mean little Henrietta Lamb's been the +worst of the whole crowd to Alice, every time she could see a chance." + +"What for?" Adams asked, incredulously. "Why should she or anybody else +pick on Alice?" + +"'Why?' 'What for?'" his wife repeated with a greater vehemence. "Do YOU +ask me such a thing as that? Do you really want to know?" + +"Yes; I'd want to know--I would if I believed it." + +"Then I'll tell you," she said in a cold fury. "It's on account of you, +Virgil, and nothing else in the world." + +He hooted at her. "Oh, yes! These girls don't like ME, so they pick on +Alice." + +"Quit your palavering and evading," she said. "A crowd of girls like +that, when they get a pretty girl like Alice among them, they act just +like wild beasts. They'll tear her to pieces, or else they'll chase +her and run her out, because they know if she had half a chance she'd +outshine 'em. They can't do that to a girl like Mildred Palmer because +she's got money and family to back her. Now you listen to me, Virgil +Adams: the way the world is now, money IS family. Alice would have just +as much 'family' as any of 'em every single bit--if you hadn't fallen +behind in the race." + +"How did I----" + +"Yes, you did!" she cried. "Twenty-five years ago when we were starting +and this town was smaller, you and I could have gone with any of 'em +if we'd tried hard enough. Look at the people we knew then that do hold +their heads up alongside of anybody in this town! WHY can they? Because +the men of those families made money and gave their children everything +that makes life worth living! Why can't we hold our heads up? Because +those men passed you in the race. They went up the ladder, and +you--you're still a clerk down at that old hole!" + +"You leave that out, please," he said. "I thought you were going to tell +me something Henrietta Lamb had done to our Alice." + +"You BET I'm going to tell you," she assured him, vehemently. "But first +I'm telling WHY she does it. It's because you've never given Alice any +backing nor any background, and they all know they can do anything they +like to her with perfect impunity. If she had the hundredth part of what +THEY have to fall back on she'd have made 'em sing a mighty different +song long ago!" + +"How would she?" + +"Oh, my heavens, but you're slow!" Mrs. Adams moaned. "Look here! You +remember how practically all the nicest boys in this town used to come +here a few years ago. Why, they were all crazy over her; and the girls +HAD to be nice to her then. Look at the difference now! There'll be a +whole month go by and not a young man come to call on her, let alone +send her candy or flowers, or ever think of TAKING her any place and +yet she's prettier and brighter than she was when they used to come. It +isn't the child's fault she couldn't hold 'em, is it? Poor thing, SHE +tried hard enough! I suppose you'd say it was her fault, though." + +"No; I wouldn't." + +"Then whose fault is it?" + +"Oh, mine, mine," he said, wearily. "I drove the young men away, of +course." + +"You might as well have driven 'em, Virgil. It amounts to just the same +thing." + +"How does it?" + +"Because as they got older a good many of 'em began to think more about +money; that's one thing. Money's at the bottom of it all, for that +matter. Look at these country clubs and all such things: the other +girls' families belong and we don't, and Alice don't; and she can't go +unless somebody takes her, and nobody does any more. Look at the other +girls' houses, and then look at our house, so shabby and old-fashioned +she'd be pretty near ashamed to ask anybody to come in and sit down +nowadays! Look at her clothes--oh, yes; you think you shelled out a lot +for that little coat of hers and the hat and skirt she got last March; +but it's nothing. Some of these girls nowadays spend more than your +whole salary on their clothes. And what jewellery has she got? A plated +watch and two or three little pins and rings of the kind people's maids +wouldn't wear now. Good Lord, Virgil Adams, wake up! Don't sit there and +tell me you don't know things like this mean SUFFERING for the child!" + +He had begun to rub his hands wretchedly back and forth over his bony +knees, as if in that way he somewhat alleviated the tedium caused by her +racking voice. "Oh, my, my!" he muttered. "OH, my, my!" + +"Yes, I should think you WOULD say 'Oh, my, my!'" she took him up, +loudly. "That doesn't help things much! If you ever wanted to DO +anything about it, the poor child might see some gleam of hope in her +life. You don't CARE for her, that's the trouble; you don't care a +single thing about her." + +"I don't?" + +"No; you don't. Why, even with your miserable little salary you could +have given her more than you have. You're the closest man I ever knew: +it's like pulling teeth to get a dollar out of you for her, now and +then, and yet you hide some away, every month or so, in some wretched +little investment or other. You----" + +"Look here, now," he interrupted, angrily. "You look here! If I didn't +put a little by whenever I could, in a bond or something, where would +you be if anything happened to me? The insurance doctors never passed +me; YOU know that. Haven't we got to have SOMETHING to fall back on?" + +"Yes, we have!" she cried. "We ought to have something to go on with +right now, too, when we need it. Do you suppose these snippets would +treat Alice the way they do if she could afford to ENTERTAIN? They leave +her out of their dinners and dances simply because they know she can't +give any dinners and dances to leave them out of! They know she can't +get EVEN, and that's the whole story! That's why Henrietta Lamb's done +this thing to her now." + +Adams had gone back to his rubbing of his knees. "Oh, my, my!" he said. +"WHAT thing?" + +She told him. "Your dear, grand, old Mister Lamb's Henrietta has sent +out invitations for a large party--a LARGE one. Everybody that is +anybody in this town is asked, you can be sure. There's a very fine +young man, a Mr. Russell, has just come to town, and he's interested +in Alice, and he's asked her to go to this dance with him. Well, Alice +can't accept. She can't go with him, though she'd give anything in +the world to do it. Do you understand? The reason she can't is because +Henrietta Lamb hasn't invited her. Do you want to know why Henrietta +hasn't invited her? It's because she knows Alice can't get even, and +because she thinks Alice ought to be snubbed like this on account of +only being the daughter of one of her grandfather's clerks. I HOPE you +understand!" + +"Oh, my, my!" he said. "OH, my, my!" + +"That's your sweet old employer," his wife cried, tauntingly. "That's +your dear, kind, grand old Mister Lamb! Alice has been left out of a +good many smaller things, like big dinners and little dances, but this +is just the same as serving her notice that she's out of everything! And +it's all done by your dear, grand old----" + +"Look here!" Adams exclaimed. "I don't want to hear any more of that! +You can't hold him responsible for everything his grandchildren do, I +guess! He probably doesn't know a thing about it. You don't suppose he's +troubling HIS head over----" + +But she burst out at him passionately. "Suppose you trouble YOUR head +about it! You'd better, Virgil Adams! You'd better, unless you want to +see your child just dry up into a miserable old maid! She's still young +and she has a chance for happiness, if she had a father that didn't +bring a millstone to hang around her neck, instead of what he ought to +give her! You just wait till you die and God asks you what you had in +your breast instead of a heart!" + +"Oh, my, my!" he groaned. "What's my heart got to do with it?" + +"Nothing! You haven't got one or you'd give her what she needed. Am I +asking anything you CAN'T do? You know better; you know I'm not!" + +At this he sat suddenly rigid, his troubled hands ceasing to rub his +knees; and he looked at her fixedly. "Now, tell me," he said, slowly. +"Just what ARE you asking?" + +"You know!" she sobbed. + +"You mean you've broken your word never to speak of THAT to me again?" + +"What do _I_ care for my word?" she cried, and, sinking to the floor at +his feet, rocked herself back and forth there. "Do you suppose I'll +let my 'word' keep me from struggling for a little happiness for my +children? It won't, I tell you; it won't! I'll struggle for that till I +die! I will, till I die till I die!" + +He rubbed his head now instead of his knees, and, shaking all over, he +got up and began with uncertain steps to pace the floor. + +"Hell, hell, hell!" he said. "I've got to go through THAT again!" + +"Yes, you have!" she sobbed. "Till I die." + +"Yes; that's what you been after all the time I was getting well." + +"Yes, I have, and I'll keep on till I die!" + +"A fine wife for a man," he said. "Beggin' a man to be a dirty dog!" + +"No! To be a MAN--and I'll keep on till I die!" + +Adams again fell back upon his last solace: he walked, half staggering, +up and down the room, swearing in a rhythmic repetition. + +His wife had repetitions of her own, and she kept at them in a voice +that rose to a higher and higher pitch, like the sound of an old +well-pump. "Till I die! Till I die! Till I DIE!" + +She ended in a scream; and Alice, coming up the stairs, thanked heaven +that Russell had gone. She ran to her father's door and went in. + +Adams looked at her, and gesticulated shakily at the convulsive figure +on the floor. "Can you get her out of here?" + +Alice helped Mrs. Adams to her feet; and the stricken woman threw her +arms passionately about her daughter. + +"Get her out!" Adams said, harshly; then cried, "Wait!" + +Alice, moving toward the door, halted, and looked at him blankly, over +her mother's shoulder. "What is it, papa?" + +He stretched out his arm and pointed at her. "She says--she says you +have a mean life, Alice." + +"No, papa." + +Mrs. Adams turned in her daughter's arms. "Do you hear her lie? Couldn't +you be as brave as she is, Virgil?" + +"Are you lying, Alice?" he asked. "Do you have a mean time?" + +"No, papa." + +He came toward her. "Look at me!" he said. "Things like this dance +now--is that so hard to bear?" + +Alice tried to say, "No, papa," again, but she couldn't. Suddenly and in +spite of herself she began to cry. + +"Do you hear her?" his wife sobbed. "Now do you----" + +He waved at them fiercely. "Get out of here!" he said. "Both of you! Get +out of here!" + +As they went, he dropped in his chair and bent far forward, so that his +haggard face was concealed from them. Then, as Alice closed the door, he +began to rub his knees again, muttering, "Oh, my, my! OH, my, my!" + + + +CHAPTER XIV + +There shone a jovial sun overhead on the appointed "day after +to-morrow"; a day not cool yet of a temperature friendly to walkers; and +the air, powdered with sunshine, had so much life in it that it seemed +to sparkle. To Arthur Russell this was a day like a gay companion who +pleased him well; but the gay companion at his side pleased him even +better. She looked her prettiest, chattered her wittiest, smiled her +wistfulest, and delighted him with all together. + +"You look so happy it's easy to see your father's taken a good turn," he +told her. + +"Yes; he has this afternoon, at least," she said. "I might have other +reasons for looking cheerful, though." + +"For instance?" + +"Exactly!" she said, giving him a sweet look just enough mocked by her +laughter. "For instance!" + +"Well, go on," he begged. + +"Isn't it expected?" she asked. + +"Of you, you mean?" + +"No," she returned. "For you, I mean!" + +In this style, which uses a word for any meaning that quick look and +colourful gesture care to endow it with, she was an expert; and she +carried it merrily on, leaving him at liberty (one of the great values +of the style) to choose as he would how much or how little she meant. He +was content to supply mere cues, for although he had little coquetry of +his own, he had lately begun to find that the only interesting moments +in his life were those during which Alice Adams coquetted with him. +Happily, these obliging moments extended themselves to cover all +the time he spent with her. However serious she might seem, whatever +appeared to be her topic, all was thou-and-I. + +He planned for more of it, seeing otherwise a dull evening ahead; and +reverted, afterwhile, to a forbidden subject. "About that dance at Miss +Lamb's--since your father's so much better----" + +She flushed a little. "Now, now!" she chided him. "We agreed not to say +any more about that." + +"Yes, but since he IS better----" + +Alice shook her head. "He won't be better to-morrow. He always has a bad +day after a good one especially after such a good one as this is." + +"But if this time it should be different," Russell persisted; "wouldn't +you be willing to come if he's better by to-morrow evening? Why not wait +and decide at the last minute?" + +She waved her hands airily. "What a pother!" she cried. "What does it +matter whether poor little Alice Adams goes to a dance or not?" + +"Well, I thought I'd made it clear that it looks fairly bleak to me if +you don't go." + +"Oh, yes!" she jeered. + +"It's the simple truth," he insisted. "I don't care a great deal about +dances these days; and if you aren't going to be there----" + +"You could stay away," she suggested. "You wouldn't!" + +"Unfortunately, I can't. I'm afraid I'm supposed to be the excuse. Miss +Lamb, in her capacity as a friend of my relatives----" + +"Oh, she's giving it for YOU! I see! On Mildred's account you mean?" + +At that his face showed an increase of colour. "I suppose just on +account of my being a cousin of Mildred's and of----" + +"Of course! You'll have a beautiful time, too. Henrietta'll see that you +have somebody to dance with besides Miss Dowling, poor man!" + +"But what I want somebody to see is that I dance with you! And perhaps +your father----" + +"Wait!" she said, frowning as if she debated whether or not to tell him +something of import; then, seeming to decide affirmatively, she asked: +"Would you really like to know the truth about it?" + +"If it isn't too unflattering." + +"It hasn't anything to do with you at all," she said. "Of course I'd +like to go with you and to dance with you--though you don't seem to +realize that you wouldn't be permitted much time with me." + +"Oh, yes, I----" + +"Never mind!" she laughed. "Of course you wouldn't. But even if papa +should be better to-morrow, I doubt if I'd go. In fact, I know I +wouldn't. There's another reason besides papa." + +"Is there?" + +"Yes. The truth is, I don't get on with Henrietta Lamb. As a matter of +fact, I dislike her, and of course that means she dislikes me. I should +never think of asking her to anything I gave, and I really wonder she +asks me to things SHE gives." This was a new inspiration; and Alice, +beginning to see her way out of a perplexity, wished that she had +thought of it earlier: she should have told him from the first that she +and Henrietta had a feud, and consequently exchanged no invitations. +Moreover, there was another thing to beset her with little anxieties: +she might better not have told him from the first, as she had indeed +told him by intimation, that she was the pampered daughter of an +indulgent father, presumably able to indulge her; for now she must +elaborately keep to the part. Veracity is usually simple; and its +opposite, to be successful, should be as simple; but practitioners of +the opposite are most often impulsive, like Alice; and, like her, they +become enmeshed in elaborations. + +"It wouldn't be very nice for me to go to her house," Alice went on, +"when I wouldn't want her in mine. I've never admired her. I've always +thought she was lacking in some things most people are supposed to be +equipped with--for instance, a certain feeling about the death of a +father who was always pretty decent to his daughter. Henrietta's father +died just, eleven months and twenty-seven days before your cousin's +dance, but she couldn't stick out those few last days and make it a +year; she was there." + +Alice stopped, then laughed ruefully, exclaiming, "But this is dreadful +of me!" + +"Is it?" + +"Blackguarding her to you when she's giving a big party for you! Just +the way Henrietta would blackguard me to you--heaven knows what she +WOULDN'T say if she talked about me to you! It would be fair, of course, +but--well, I'd rather she didn't!" And with that, Alice let her pretty +hand, in its white glove, rest upon his arm for a moment; and he looked +down at it, not unmoved to see it there. "I want to be unfair about +just this," she said, letting a troubled laughter tremble through +her appealing voice as she spoke. "I won't take advantage of her with +anybody, except just--you! I'd a little rather you didn't hear anybody +blackguard me, and, if you don't mind--could you promise not to give +Henrietta the chance?" + +It was charmingly done, with a humorous, faint pathos altogether +genuine; and Russell found himself suddenly wanting to shout at her, +"Oh, you DEAR!" Nothing else seemed adequate; but he controlled the +impulse in favour of something more conservative. + +"Imagine any one speaking unkindly of you--not praising you!" + +"Who HAS praised me to you?" she asked, quickly. + +"I haven't talked about you with any one; but if I did, I know +they'd----" + +"No, no!" she cried, and went on, again accompanying her words with +little tremulous runs of laughter. "You don't understand this town yet. +You'll be surprised when you do; we're different. We talk about one +another fearfully! Haven't I just proved it, the way I've been going for +Henrietta? Of course I didn't say anything really very terrible about +her, but that's only because I don't follow that practice the way most +of the others do. They don't stop with the worst of the truth they can +find: they make UP things--yes, they really do! And, oh, I'd RATHER they +didn't make up things about me--to you!" + +"What difference would it make if they did?" he inquired, cheerfully. +"I'd know they weren't true." + +"Even if you did know that, they'd make a difference," she said. "Oh, +yes, they would! It's too bad, but we don't like anything quite so well +that's had specks on it, even if we've wiped the specks off;--it's just +that much spoiled, and some things are all spoiled the instant they're +the least bit spoiled. What a man thinks about a girl, for instance. Do +you want to have what you think about me spoiled, Mr. Russell?" + +"Oh, but that's already far beyond reach," he said, lightly. + +"But it can't be!" she protested. + +"Why not?" + +"Because it never can be. Men don't change their minds about one another +often: they make it quite an event when they do, and talk about it as +if something important had happened. But a girl only has to go down-town +with a shoe-string unfastened, and every man who sees her will change +his mind about her. Don't you know that's true?" + +"Not of myself, I think." + +"There!" she cried. "That's precisely what every man in the world would +say!" + +"So you wouldn't trust me?" + +"Well--I'll be awfully worried if you give 'em a chance to tell you that +I'm too lazy to tie my shoe-strings!" + +He laughed delightedly. "Is that what they do say?" he asked. + +"Just about! Whatever they hope will get results." She shook her head +wisely. "Oh, yes; we do that here!" + +"But I don't mind loose shoe-strings," he said. "Not if they're yours." + +"They'll find out what you do mind." + +"But suppose," he said, looking at her whimsically; "suppose I wouldn't +mind anything--so long as it's yours?" + +She courtesied. "Oh, pretty enough! But a girl who's talked about has a +weakness that's often a fatal one." + +"What is it?" + +"It's this: when she's talked about she isn't THERE. That's how they +kill her." + +"I'm afraid I don't follow you." + +"Don't you see? If Henrietta--or Mildred--or any of 'em--or some of +their mothers--oh, we ALL do it! Well, if any of 'em told you I didn't +tie my shoe-strings, and if I were there, so that you could see me, +you'd know it wasn't true. Even if I were sitting so that you couldn't +see my feet, and couldn't tell whether the strings were tied or not just +then, still you could look at me, and see that I wasn't the sort of girl +to neglect my shoe-strings. But that isn't the way it happens: they'll +get at you when I'm nowhere around and can't remind you of the sort of +girl I really am." + +"But you don't do that," he complained. "You don't remind me you don't +even tell me--the sort of girl you really are! I'd like to know." + +"Let's be serious then," she said, and looked serious enough herself. +"Would you honestly like to know?" + +"Yes." + +"Well, then, you must be careful." + +"'Careful?'" The word amused him. + +"I mean careful not to get me mixed up," she said. "Careful not to mix +up the girl you might hear somebody talking about with the me I honestly +try to make you see. If you do get those two mixed up--well, the whole +show'll be spoiled!" + +"What makes you think so?" + +"Because it's----" She checked herself, having begun to speak too +impulsively; and she was disturbed, realizing in what tricky stuff she +dealt. What had been on her lips to say was, "Because it's +happened before!" She changed to, "Because it's so easy to spoil +anything--easiest of all to spoil anything that's pleasant." + +"That might depend." + +"No; it's so. And if you care at all about--about knowing a girl who'd +like someone to know her----" + +"Just 'someone?' That's disappointing." + +"Well--you," she said. + +"Tell me how 'careful' you want me to be, then!" + +"Well, don't you think it would be nice if you didn't give anybody the +chance to talk about me the way--the way I've just been talking about +Henrietta Lamb?" + +With that they laughed together, and he said, "You may be cutting me off +from a great deal of information, you know." + +"Yes," Alice admitted. "Somebody might begin to praise me to you, too; +so it's dangerous to ask you to change the subject if I ever happen to +be mentioned. But after all----" She paused. + +"'After all' isn't the end of a thought, is it?" + +"Sometimes it is of a girl's thought; I suppose men are neater about +their thoughts, and always finish 'em. It isn't the end of the thought I +had then, though." + +"What is the end of it?" + +She looked at him impulsively. "Oh, it's foolish," she said, and she +laughed as laughs one who proposes something probably impossible. "But, +WOULDN'T it be pleasant if two people could ever just keep themselves +TO themselves, so far as they two were concerned? I mean, if they could +just manage to be friends without people talking about it, or talking to +THEM about it?" + +"I suppose that might be rather difficult," he said, more amused than +impressed by her idea. + +"I don't know: it might be done," she returned, hopefully. "Especially +in a town of this size; it's grown so it's quite a huge place these +days. People can keep themselves to themselves in a big place better, +you know. For instance, nobody knows that you and I are taking a walk +together today." + +"How absurd, when here we are on exhibition!" + +"No; we aren't." + +"We aren't?" + +"Not a bit of it!" she laughed. "We were the other day, when you walked +home with me, but anybody could tell that had just happened by chance, +on account of your overtaking me; people can always see things like +that. But we're not on exhibition now. Look where I've led you!" + +Amused and a little bewildered, he looked up and down the street, +which was one of gaunt-faced apartment-houses, old, sooty, frame +boarding-houses, small groceries and drug-stores, laundries and one-room +plumbers' shops, with the sign of a clairvoyant here and there. + +"You see?" she said. "I've been leading you without your knowing it. Of +course that's because you're new to the town, and you give yourself up +to the guidance of an old citizen." + +"I'm not so sure, Miss Adams. It might mean that I don't care where I +follow so long as I follow you." + +"Very well," she said. "I'd like you to keep on following me at least +long enough for me to show you that there's something nicer ahead of us +than this dingy street." + +"Is that figurative?" he asked. + +"Might be!" she returned, gaily. "There's a pretty little park at the +end, but it's very proletarian, and nobody you and I know will be more +likely to see us there than on this street." + +"What an imagination you have!" he exclaimed. "You turn our proper +little walk into a Parisian adventure." + +She looked at him in what seemed to be a momentary grave puzzlement. +"Perhaps you feel that a Parisian adventure mightn't please your--your +relatives?" + +"Why, no," he returned. "You seem to think of them oftener than I do." + +This appeared to amuse Alice, or at least to please her, for she +laughed. "Then I can afford to quit thinking of them, I suppose. It's +only that I used to be quite a friend of Mildred's--but there! we +needn't to go into that. I've never been a friend of Henrietta Lamb's, +though, and I almost wish she weren't taking such pains to be a friend +of yours." + +"Oh, but she's not. It's all on account of----" + +"On Mildred's account," Alice finished this for him, coolly. "Yes, of +course." + +"It's on account of the two families," he was at pains to explain, a +little awkwardly. "It's because I'm a relative of the Palmers, and the +Palmers and the Lambs seem to be old family friends." + +"Something the Adamses certainly are not," Alice said. "Not with either +of 'em; particularly not with the Lambs!" And here, scarce aware of what +impelled her, she returned to her former elaborations and colourings. +"You see, the differences between Henrietta and me aren't entirely +personal: I couldn't go to her house even if I liked her. The Lambs and +Adamses don't get on with each other, and we've just about come to the +breaking-point as it happens." + +"I hope it's nothing to bother you." + +"Why? A lot of things bother me." + +"I'm sorry they do," he said, and seemed simply to mean it. + +She nodded gratefully. "That's nice of you, Mr. Russell. It helps. The +break between the Adamses and the Lambs is a pretty bothersome thing. +It's been coming on a long time." She sighed deeply, and the sigh +was half genuine; this half being for her father, but the other half +probably belonged to her instinctive rendering of Juliet Capulet, +daughter to a warring house. "I hate it all so!" she added. + +"Of course you must." + +"I suppose most quarrels between families are on account of business," +she said. "That's why they're so sordid. Certainly the Lambs seem a +sordid lot to me, though of course I'm biased." And with that she began +to sketch a history of the commercial antagonism that had risen between +the Adamses and the Lambs. + +The sketching was spontaneous and dramatic. Mathematics had no part in +it; nor was there accurate definition of Mr. Adams's relation to the +institution of Lamb and Company. The point was clouded, in fact; though +that might easily be set down to the general haziness of young ladies +confronted with the mysteries of trade or commerce. Mr. Adams either had +been a vague sort of junior member of the firm, it appeared, or else +he should have been made some such thing; at all events, he was an old +mainstay of the business; and he, as much as any Lamb, had helped to +build up the prosperity of the company. But at last, tired of providing +so much intelligence and energy for which other people took profit +greater than his own, he had decided to leave the company and found a +business entirely for himself. The Lambs were going to be enraged when +they learned what was afoot. + +Such was the impression, a little misted, wrought by Alice's quick +narrative. But there was dolorous fact behind it: Adams had succumbed. + +His wife, grave and nervous, rather than triumphant, in success, had +told their daughter that the great J. A. would be furious and possibly +vindictive. Adams was afraid of him, she said. + +"But what for, mama?" Alice asked, since this seemed a turn of affairs +out of reason. "What in the world has Mr. Lamb to do with papa's leaving +the company to set up for himself? What right has he to be angry about +it? If he's such a friend as he claims to be, I should think he'd be +glad--that is, if the glue factory turns out well. What will he be angry +for?" + +Mrs. Adams gave Alice an uneasy glance, hesitated, and then explained +that a resignation from Lamb's had always been looked upon, especially +by "that old man," as treachery. You were supposed to die in the +service, she said bitterly, and her daughter, a little mystified, +accepted this explanation. Adams had not spoken to her of his surrender; +he seemed not inclined to speak to her at all, or to any one. + +Alice was not serious too long, and she began to laugh as she came +to the end of her decorative sketch. "After all, the whole thing is +perfectly ridiculous," she said. "In fact, it's FUNNY! That's on account +of what papa's going to throw over the Lamb business FOR! To save your +life you couldn't imagine what he's going to do!" + +"I won't try, then," Russell assented. + +"It takes all the romance out of ME," she laughed. "You'll never go for +a Parisian walk with me again, after I tell you what I'll be heiress +to." They had come to the entrance of the little park; and, as Alice had +said, it was a pretty place, especially on a day so radiant. Trees of +the oldest forest stood there, hale and serene over the trim, bright +grass; and the proletarians had not come from their factories at this +hour; only a few mothers and their babies were to be seen, here and +there, in the shade. "I think I'll postpone telling you about it till we +get nearly home again," Alice said, as they began to saunter down one of +the gravelled paths. "There's a bench beside a spring farther on; we +can sit there and talk about a lot of things--things not so sticky as my +dowry's going to be." + +"'Sticky?'" he echoed. "What in the world----" She laughed despairingly. + +"A glue factory!" + +Then he laughed, too, as much from friendliness as from amusement; and +she remembered to tell him that the project of a glue factory was still +"an Adams secret." It would be known soon, however, she added; and the +whole Lamb connection would probably begin saying all sorts of things, +heaven knew what! + +Thus Alice built her walls of flimsy, working always gaily, or with at +least the air of gaiety; and even as she rattled on, there was somewhere +in her mind a constant little wonder. Everything she said seemed to be +necessary to support something else she had said. How had it happened? +She found herself telling him that since her father had decided on +making so great a change in his ways, she and her mother hoped at last +to persuade him to give up that "foolish little house" he had been so +obstinate about; and she checked herself abruptly on this declivity just +as she was about to slide into a remark concerning her own preference +for a "country place." Discretion caught her in time; and something +else, in company with discretion, caught her, for she stopped short in +her talk and blushed. + +They had taken possession of the bench beside the spring, by this time; +and Russell, his elbow on the back of the bench and his chin on his +hand, the better to look at her, had no guess at the cause of the blush, +but was content to find it lovely. At his first sight of Alice she had +seemed pretty in the particular way of being pretty that he happened +to like best; and, with every moment he spent with her, this prettiness +appeared to increase. He felt that he could not look at her enough: his +gaze followed the fluttering of the graceful hands in almost continual +gesture as she talked; then lifted happily to the vivacious face again. +She charmed him. + +After her abrupt pause, she sighed, then looked at him with her eyebrows +lifted in a comedy appeal. "You haven't said you wouldn't give Henrietta +the chance," she said, in the softest voice that can still have a little +laugh running in it. + +He was puzzled. "Give Henrietta the chance?" + +"YOU know! You'll let me keep on being unfair, won't you? Not give the +other girls a chance to get even?" + +He promised, heartily. + + + +CHAPTER XV + +Alice had said that no one who knew either Russell or herself would be +likely to see them in the park or upon the dingy street; but although +they returned by that same ungenteel thoroughfare they were seen by +a person who knew them both. Also, with some surprise on the part of +Russell, and something more poignant than surprise for Alice, they saw +this person. + +All of the dingy street was ugly, but the greater part of it appeared to +be honest. The two pedestrians came upon a block or two, however, where +it offered suggestions of a less upright character, like a steady enough +workingman with a naughty book sticking out of his pocket. Three or four +dim shops, a single story in height, exhibited foul signboards, yet fair +enough so far as the wording went; one proclaiming a tobacconist, one +a junk-dealer, one a dispenser of "soft drinks and cigars." The most +credulous would have doubted these signboards; for the craft of the +modern tradesman is exerted to lure indoors the passing glance, since if +the glance is pleased the feet may follow; but this alleged tobacconist +and his neighbours had long been fond of dust on their windows, +evidently, and shades were pulled far down on the glass of their doors. +Thus the public eye, small of pupil in the light of the open street, was +intentionally not invited to the dusky interiors. Something different +from mere lack of enterprise was apparent; and the signboards might have +been omitted; they were pains thrown away, since it was plain to the +world that the business parts of these shops were the brighter back +rooms implied by the dark front rooms; and that the commerce there was +in perilous new liquors and in dice and rough girls. + +Nothing could have been more innocent than the serenity with which these +wicked little places revealed themselves for what they were; and, bound +by this final tie of guilelessness, they stood together in a row which +ended with a companionable barbershop, much like them. Beyond was a +series of soot-harried frame two-story houses, once part of a cheerful +neighbourhood when the town was middle-aged and settled, and not old and +growing. These houses, all carrying the label. "Rooms," had the worried +look of vacancy that houses have when they are too full of everybody +without being anybody's home; and there was, too, a surreptitious +air about them, as if, like the false little shops, they advertised +something by concealing it. + +One of them--the one next to the barber-shop--had across its front an +ample, jig-sawed veranda, where aforetime, no doubt, the father of a +family had fanned himself with a palm-leaf fan on Sunday afternoons, +watching the surreys go by, and where his daughter listened to mandolins +and badinage on starlit evenings; but, although youth still held the +veranda, both the youth and the veranda were in decay. The four or five +young men who lounged there this afternoon were of a type known to shady +pool-parlours. Hats found no favour with them; all of them wore caps; +and their tight clothes, apparently from a common source, showed +a vivacious fancy for oblique pockets, false belts, and Easter-egg +colourings. Another thing common to the group was the expression of +eye and mouth; and Alice, in the midst of her other thoughts, had a +distasteful thought about this. + +The veranda was within a dozen feet of the sidewalk, and as she and her +escort came nearer, she took note of the young men, her face hardening +a little, even before she suspected there might be a resemblance between +them and any one she knew. Then she observed that each of these loungers +wore not for the occasion, but as of habit, a look of furtively +amused contempt; the mouth smiled to one side as if not to dislodge a +cigarette, while the eyes kept languidly superior. All at once Alice was +reminded of Walter; and the slight frown caused by this idea had just +begun to darken her forehead when Walter himself stepped out of the open +door of the house and appeared upon the veranda. Upon his head was a new +straw hat, and in his hand was a Malacca stick with an ivory top, for +Alice had finally decided against it for herself and had given it to +him. His mood was lively: he twirled the stick through his fingers like +a drum-major's baton, and whistled loudly. + +Moreover, he was indeed accompanied. With him was a thin girl who had +made a violent black-and-white poster of herself: black dress, black +flimsy boa, black stockings, white slippers, great black hat down upon +the black eyes; and beneath the hat a curve of cheek and chin made white +as whitewash, and in strong bilateral motion with gum. + +The loungers on the veranda were familiars of the pair; hailed them with +cacklings; and one began to sing, in a voice all tin: + + "Then my skirt, Sal, and me did go + Right straight to the moving-pitcher show. + OH, you bashful vamp!" + + +The girl laughed airily. "God, but you guys are wise!" she said. + +"Come on, Wallie." + +Walter stared at his sister; then grinned faintly, and nodded at Russell +as the latter lifted his hat in salutation. Alice uttered an incoherent +syllable of exclamation, and, as she began to walk faster, she bit her +lip hard, not in order to look wistful, this time, but to help her keep +tears of anger from her eyes. + +Russell laughed cheerfully. "Your brother certainly seems to have found +the place for 'colour' today," he said. "That girl's talk must be full +of it." + +But Alice had forgotten the colour she herself had used in accounting +for Walter's peculiarities, and she did not understand. "What?" she +said, huskily. + +"Don't you remember telling me about him? How he was going to write, +probably, and would go anywhere to pick up types and get them to talk?" + +She kept her eyes ahead, and said sharply, "I think his literary tastes +scarcely cover this case!" + +"Don't be too sure. He didn't look at all disconcerted. He didn't seem +to mind your seeing him." + +"That's all the worse, isn't it?" + +"Why, no," her friend said, genially. "It means he didn't consider +that he was engaged in anything out of the way. You can't expect to +understand everything boys do at his age; they do all sorts of queer +things, and outgrow them. Your brother evidently has a taste for queer +people, and very likely he's been at least half sincere when he's made +you believe he had a literary motive behind it. We all go through----" + +"Thanks, Mr. Russell," she interrupted. "Let's don't say any more." + +He looked at her flushed face and enlarged eyes; and he liked her all +the better for her indignation: this was how good sisters ought to feel, +he thought, failing to understand that most of what she felt was not +about Walter. He ventured only a word more. "Try not to mind it so much; +it really doesn't amount to anything." + +She shook her head, and they went on in silence; she did not look at him +again until they stopped before her own house. Then she gave him only +one glimpse of her eyes before she looked down. "It's spoiled, isn't +it?" she said, in a low voice. + +"What's 'spoiled?'" + +"Our walk--well, everything. Somehow it always--is." + +"'Always is' what?" he asked. + +"Spoiled," she said. + +He laughed at that; but without looking at him she suddenly offered him +her hand, and, as he took it, he felt a hurried, violent pressure upon +his fingers, as if she meant to thank him almost passionately for being +kind. She was gone before he could speak to her again. + + +In her room, with the door locked, she did not go to her mirror, but to +her bed, flinging herself face down, not caring how far the pillows +put her hat awry. Sheer grief had followed her anger; grief for +the calamitous end of her bright afternoon, grief for the "end of +everything," as she thought then. Nevertheless, she gradually grew more +composed, and, when her mother tapped on the door presently, let her in. +Mrs. Adams looked at her with quick apprehension. + +"Oh, poor child! Wasn't he----" + +Alice told her. "You see how it--how it made me look, mama," she +quavered, having concluded her narrative. "I'd tried to cover up +Walter's awfulness at the dance with that story about his being +'literary,' but no story was big enough to cover this up--and oh! it +must make him think I tell stories about other things!" + +"No, no, no!" Mrs. Adams protested. "Don't you see? At the worst, all HE +could think is that Walter told stories to you about why he likes to be +with such dreadful people, and you believed them. That's all HE'D think; +don't you see?" + +Alice's wet eyes began to show a little hopefulness. "You honestly think +it might be that way, mama?" + +"Why, from what you've told me he said, I KNOW it's that way. Didn't he +say he wanted to come again?" + +"N-no," Alice said, uncertainly. "But I think he will. At least I begin +to think so now. He----" She stopped. + +"From all you tell me, he seems to be a very desirable young man," Mrs. +Adams said, primly. + +Her daughter was silent for several moments; then new tears gathered +upon her downcast lashes. "He's just--dear!" she faltered. + +Mrs. Adams nodded. "He's told you he isn't engaged, hasn't he?" + +"No. But I know he isn't. Maybe when he first came here he was near it, +but I know he's not." + +"I guess Mildred Palmer would LIKE him to be, all right!" Mrs. Adams +was frank enough to say, rather triumphantly; and Alice, with a lowered +head, murmured: + +"Anybody--would." + +The words were all but inaudible. + +"Don't you worry," her mother said, and patted her on the shoulder. +"Everything will come out all right; don't you fear, Alice. Can't you +see that beside any other girl in town you're just a perfect QUEEN? Do +you think any young man that wasn't prejudiced, or something, would need +more than just one look to----" + +But Alice moved away from the caressing hand. "Never mind, mama. I +wonder he looks at me at all. And if he does again, after seeing my +brother with those horrible people----" + +"Now, now!" Mrs. Adams interrupted, expostulating mournfully. "I'm sure +Walter's a GOOD boy----" + +"You are?" Alice cried, with a sudden vigour. "You ARE?" + +"I'm sure he's GOOD, yes--and if he isn't, it's not his fault. It's +mine." + +"What nonsense!" + +"No, it's true," Mrs. Adams lamented. "I tried to bring him up to be +good, God knows; and when he was little he was the best boy I ever saw. +When he came from Sunday-school he'd always run to me and we'd go over +the lesson together; and he let me come in his room at night to hear his +prayers almost until he was sixteen. Most boys won't do that with +their mothers--not nearly that long. I tried so hard to bring him up +right--but if anything's gone wrong it's my fault." + +"How could it be? You've just said----" + +"It's because I didn't make your father this--this new step earlier. +Then Walter might have had all the advantages that other----" + +"Oh, mama, PLEASE!" Alice begged her. "Let's don't go over all that +again. Isn't it more important to think what's to be done about him? Is +he going to be allowed to go on disgracing us as he does?" + +Mrs. Adams sighed profoundly. "I don't know what to do," she confessed, +unhappily. "Your father's so upset about--about this new step he's +taking--I don't feel as if we ought to----" + +"No, no!" Alice cried. "Papa mustn't be distressed with this, on top of +everything else. But SOMETHING'S got to be done about Walter." + +"What can be?" her mother asked, helplessly. "What can be?" + +Alice admitted that she didn't know. + + +At dinner, an hour later, Walter's habitually veiled glance lifted, +now and then, to touch her furtively;--he was waiting, as he would have +said, for her to "spring it"; and he had prepared a brief and sincere +defense to the effect that he made his own living, and would like +to inquire whose business it was to offer intrusive comment upon his +private conduct. But she said nothing, while his father and mother were +as silent as she. Walter concluded that there was to be no attack, but +changed his mind when his father, who ate only a little, and broodingly +at that, rose to leave the table and spoke to him. + +"Walter," he said, "when you've finished I wish you'd come up to my +room. I got something I want to say to you." + +Walter shot a hard look at his apathetic sister, then turned to his +father. "Make it to-morrow," he said. "This is Satad'y night and I got a +date." + +"No," Adams said, frowning. "You come up before you go out. It's +important." + +"All right; I've had all I want to eat," Walter returned. "I got a few +minutes. Make it quick." + +He followed his father upstairs, and when they were in the room together +Adams shut the door, sat down, and began to rub his knees. + +"Rheumatism?" the boy inquired, slyly. "That what you want to talk to me +about?" + +"No." But Adams did not go on; he seemed to be in difficulties for +words, and Walter decided to help him. + +"Hop ahead and spring it," he said. "Get it off your mind: I'll tell the +world _I_ should worry! You aren't goin' to bother ME any, so why bother +yourself? Alice hopped home and told you she saw me playin' around with +some pretty gay-lookin' berries and you----" + +"Alice?" his father said, obviously surprised. "It's nothing about +Alice." + +"Didn't she tell you----" + +"I haven't talked with her all day." + +"Oh, I see," Walter said. "She told mother and mother told you." + +"No, neither of 'em have told me anything. What was there to tell?" + +Walter laughed. "Oh, it's nothin'," he said. "I was just startin' out +to buy a girl friend o' mine a rhinestone buckle I lost to her on a bet, +this afternoon, and Alice came along with that big Russell fish; and I +thought she looked sore. She expects me to like the kind she likes, and +I don't like 'em. I thought she'd prob'ly got you all stirred up about +it." + +"No, no," his father said, peevishly. "I don't know anything about it, +and I don't care to know anything about it. I want to talk to you about +something important." + +Then, as he was again silent, Walter said, "Well, TALK about it; I'm +listening." + +"It's this," Adams began, heavily. "It's about me going into this glue +business. Your mother's told you, hasn't she?" + +"She said you were goin' to leave the old place down-town and start a +glue factory. That's all I know about it; I got my own affairs to 'tend +to." + +"Well, this is your affair," his father said, frowning. "You can't stay +with Lamb and Company." + +Walter looked a little startled. "What you mean, I can't? Why not?" + +"You've got to help me," Adams explained slowly; and he frowned more +deeply, as if the interview were growing increasingly laborious for him. +"It's going to be a big pull to get this business on its feet." + +"Yes!" Walter exclaimed with a sharp skepticism. "I should say it was!" +He stared at his father incredulously. "Look here; aren't you just a +little bit sudden, the way you're goin' about things? You've let mother +shove you a little too fast, haven't you? Do you know anything about +what it means to set up a new business these days?" + +"Yes, I know all about it," Adams said. "About this business, I do." + +"How do you?" + +"Because I made a long study of it. I'm not afraid of going about it the +wrong way; but it's a hard job and you'll have to put in all whatever +sense and strength you've got." + +Walter began to breathe quickly, and his lips were agitated; then he set +them obstinately. "Oh; I will," he said. + +"Yes, you will," Adams returned, not noticing that his son's inflection +was satiric. "It's going to take every bit of energy in your body, and +all the energy I got left in mine, and every cent of the little I've +saved, besides something I'll have to raise on this house. I'm going +right at it, now I've got to; and you'll have to quit Lamb's by the end +of next week." + +"Oh, I will?" Walter's voice grew louder, and there was a shrillness +in it. "I got to quit Lamb's the end of next week, have I?" He stepped +forward, angrily. "Listen!" he said. "I'm not walkin' out o' Lamb's, +see? I'm not quittin' down there: I stay with 'em, see?" + +Adams looked up at him, astonished. "You'll leave there next Saturday," +he said. "I've got to have you." + +"You don't anything o' the kind," Walter told him, sharply. "Do you +expect to pay me anything?" + +"I'd pay you about what you been getting down there." + +"Then pay somebody else; _I_ don't know anything about glue. You get +somebody else." + +"No. You've got to---" + +Walter cut him off with the utmost vehemence. "Don't tell me what I got +to do! I know what I got to do better'n you, I guess! I stay at Lamb's, +see?" + +Adams rose angrily. "You'll do what I tell you. You can't stay down +there." + +"Why can't I?" + +"Because I won't let you." + +"Listen! Keep on not lettin' me: I'll be there just the same." + +At that his father broke into a sour laughter. "THEY won't let you, +Walter! They won't have you down there after they find out I'm going." + +"Why won't they? You don't think they're goin' to be all shot to pieces +over losin' YOU, do you?" + +"I tell you they won't let you stay," his father insisted, loudly. + +"Why, what do they care whether you go or not?" + +"They'll care enough to fire YOU, my boy!" + +"Look here, then; show me why." + +"They'll do it!" + +"Yes," Walter jeered; "you keep sayin' they will, but when I ask you to +show me why, you keep sayin' they will! That makes little headway with +ME, I can tell you!" + +Adams groaned, and, rubbing his head, began to pace the floor. Walter's +refusal was something he had not anticipated; and he felt the weakness +of his own attempt to meet it: he seemed powerless to do anything but +utter angry words, which, as Walter said, made little headway. "Oh, my, +my!" he muttered, "OH, my, my!" + +Walter, usually sallow, had grown pale: he watched his father narrowly, +and now took a sudden resolution. "Look here," he said. "When you say +Lamb's is likely to fire me because you're goin' to quit, you talk like +the people that have to be locked up. I don't know where you get such +things in your head; Lamb and Company won't know you're gone. Listen: I +can stay there long as I want to. But I'll tell you what I'll do: make +it worth my while and I'll hook up with your old glue factory, after +all." + +Adams stopped his pacing abruptly, and stared at him. "'Make it worth +your while?' What you mean?" + +"I got a good use for three hundred dollars right now," Walter said. +"Let me have it and I'll quit Lamb's to work for you. Don't let me have +it and I SWEAR I won't!" + +"Are you crazy?" + +"Is everybody crazy that needs three hundred dollars?" + +"Yes," Adams said. "They are if they ask ME for it, when I got to +stretch every cent I can lay my hands on to make it look like a dollar!" + +"You won't do it?" + +Adams burst out at him. "You little fool! If I had three hundred dollars +to throw away, besides the pay I expected to give you, haven't you got +sense enough to see I could hire a man worth three hundred dollars +more to me than you'd be? It's a FINE time to ask me for three hundred +dollars, isn't it! What FOR? Rhinestone buckles to throw around on your +'girl friends?' Shame on you! Ask me to BRIBE you to help yourself and +your own family!" + +"I'll give you a last chance," Walter said. "Either you do what I want, +or I won't do what you want. Don't ask me again after this, because----" + +Adams interrupted him fiercely. "'Ask you again!' Don't worry about +that, my boy! All I ask you is to get out o' my room." + +"Look here," Walter said, quietly; and his lopsided smile distorted his +livid cheek. "Look here: I expect YOU wouldn't give me three hundred +dollars to save my life, would you?" + +"You make me sick," Adams said, in his bitterness. "Get out of here." + +Walter went out, whistling; and Adams drooped into his old chair again +as the door closed. "OH, my, my!" he groaned. "Oh, Lordy, Lordy! The way +of the transgressor----" + + + +CHAPTER XVI + +He meant his own transgression and his own way; for Walter's stubborn +refusal appeared to Adams just then as one of the inexplicable but +righteous besettings he must encounter in following that way. "Oh, +Lordy, Lord!" he groaned, and then, as resentment moved him--"That dang +boy! Dang idiot!" Yet he knew himself for a greater idiot because he had +not been able to tell Walter the truth. He could not bring himself to do +it, nor even to state his case in its best terms; and that was because +he felt that even in its best terms the case was a bad one. + +Of all his regrets the greatest was that in a moment of vanity and +tenderness, twenty-five years ago, he had told his young wife a business +secret. He had wanted to show how important her husband was becoming, +and how much the head of the universe, J. A. Lamb, trusted to his +integrity and ability. The great man had an idea: he thought of +"branching out a little," he told Adams confidentially, and there were +possibilities of profit in glue. + +What he wanted was a liquid glue to be put into little bottles and sold +cheaply. "The kind of thing that sells itself," he said; "the kind of +thing that pays its own small way as it goes along, until it has profits +enough to begin advertising it right. Everybody has to use glue, and if +I make mine convenient and cheap, everybody'll buy mine. But it's got +to be glue that'll STICK; it's got to be the best; and if we find how +to make it we've got to keep it a big secret, of course, or anybody can +steal it from us. There was a man here last month; he knew a formula +he wanted to sell me, 'sight unseen'; but he was in such a hurry I got +suspicious, and I found he'd managed to steal it, working for the big +packers in their glue-works. We've got to find a better glue than that, +anyhow. I'm going to set you and Campbell at it. You're a practical, +wide-awake young feller, and Campbell's a mighty good chemist; I guess +you two boys ought to make something happen." + +His guess was shrewd enough. Working in a shed a little way outside the +town, where their cheery employer visited them sometimes to study their +malodorous stews, the two young men found what Lamb had set them to +find. But Campbell was thoughtful over the discovery. "Look here," he +said. "Why ain't this just about yours and mine? After all, it may be +Lamb's money that's paid for the stuff we've used, but it hasn't cost +much." + +"But he pays US," Adams remonstrated, horrified by his companion's idea. +"He paid us to do it. It belongs absolutely to him." + +"Oh, I know he THINKS it does," Campbell admitted, plaintively. "I +suppose we've got to let him take it. It's not patentable, and he'll +have to do pretty well by us when he starts his factory, because he's +got to depend on us to run the making of the stuff so that the workmen +can't get onto the process. You better ask him the same salary I do, and +mine's going to be high." + +But the high salary, thus pleasantly imagined, was never paid. Campbell +died of typhoid fever, that summer, leaving Adams and his employer the +only possessors of the formula, an unwritten one; and Adams, pleased to +think himself more important to the great man than ever, told his wife +that there could be little doubt of his being put in sole charge of +the prospective glue-works. Unfortunately, the enterprise remained +prospective. + +Its projector had already become "inveigled into another side-line," +as he told Adams. One of his sons had persuaded him to take up a +"cough-lozenge," to be called the "Jalamb Balm Trochee"; and the lozenge +did well enough to amuse Mr. Lamb and occupy his spare time, which was +really about all he had asked of the glue project. He had "all the MONEY +anybody ought to want," he said, when Adams urged him; and he could +"start up this little glue side-line" at any time; the formula was safe +in their two heads. + +At intervals Adams would seek opportunity to speak of "the little glue +side-line" to his patron, and to suggest that the years were passing; +but Lamb, petting other hobbies, had lost interest. "Oh, I'll start it +up some day, maybe. If I don't, I may turn it over to my heirs: it's +always an asset, worth something or other, of course. We'll probably +take it up some day, though, you and I." + +The sun persistently declined to rise on that day, and, as time went +on, Adams saw that his rather timid urgings bored his employer, and he +ceased to bring up the subject. Lamb apparently forgot all about glue, +but Adams discovered that unfortunately there was someone else who +remembered it. + +"It's really YOURS," she argued, that painful day when for the first +time she suggested his using his knowledge for the benefit of himself +and his family. "Mr. Campbell might have had a right to part of it, but +he died and didn't leave any kin, so it belongs to you." + +"Suppose J. A. Lamb hired me to saw some wood," Adams said. "Would the +sticks belong to me?" + +"He hasn't got any right to take your invention and bury it," she +protested. "What good is it doing him if he doesn't DO anything with it? +What good is it doing ANYBODY? None in the world! And what harm would +it do him if you went ahead and did this for yourself and for your +children? None in the world! And what could he do to you if he WAS old +pig enough to get angry with you for doing it? He couldn't do a single +thing, and you've admitted he couldn't, yourself. So what's your reason +for depriving your children and your wife of the benefits you know you +could give 'em?" + +"Nothing but decency," he answered; and she had her reply ready for +that. It seemed to him that, strive as he would, he could not reach her +mind with even the plainest language; while everything that she said to +him, with such vehemence, sounded like so much obstinate gibberish. +Over and over he pressed her with the same illustration, on the point of +ownership, though he thought he was varying it. + +"Suppose he hired me to build him a house: would that be MY house?" + +"He didn't hire you to build him a house. You and Campbell invented----" + +"Look here: suppose you give a cook a soup-bone and some vegetables, and +pay her to make you a soup: has she got a right to take and sell it? You +know better!" + +"I know ONE thing: if that old man tried to keep your own invention from +you he's no better than a robber!" + +They never found any point of contact in all their passionate +discussions of this ethical question; and the question was no more +settled between them, now that Adams had succumbed, than it had ever +been. But at least the wrangling about it was over: they were grave +together, almost silent, and an uneasiness prevailed with her as much as +with him. + +He had already been out of the house, to walk about the small green +yard; and on Monday afternoon he sent for a taxicab and went down-town, +but kept a long way from the "wholesale section," where stood the +formidable old oblong pile of Lamb and Company. He arranged for the +sale of the bonds he had laid away, and for placing a mortgage upon his +house; and on his way home, after five o'clock, he went to see an old +friend, a man whose term of service with Lamb and Company was even a +little longer than his own. + +This veteran, returned from the day's work, was sitting in front of the +apartment house where he lived, but when the cab stopped at the curb he +rose and came forward, offering a jocular greeting. "Well, well, Virgil +Adams! I always thought you had a sporty streak in you. Travel in +your own hired private automobile nowadays, do you? Pamperin' yourself +because you're still layin' off sick, I expect." + +"Oh, I'm well enough again, Charley Lohr," Adams said, as he got out and +shook hands. Then, telling the driver to wait, he took his friend's arm, +walked to the bench with him, and sat down. "I been practically well for +some time," he said. "I'm fixin' to get into harness again." + +"Bein' sick has certainly produced a change of heart in you," his +friend laughed. "You're the last man I ever expected to see blowin' +yourself--or anybody else to a taxicab! For that matter, I never heard +of you bein' in ANY kind of a cab, 'less'n it might be when you been +pall-bearer for somebody. What's come over you?" + +"Well, I got to turn over a new leaf, and that's a fact," Adams said. "I +got a lot to do, and the only way to accomplish it, it's got to be done +soon, or I won't have anything to live on while I'm doing it." + +"What you talkin' about? What you got to do except to get strong enough +to come back to the old place?" + +"Well----" Adams paused, then coughed, and said slowly, "Fact is, +Charley Lohr, I been thinking likely I wouldn't come back." + +"What! What you talkin' about?" + +"No," said Adams. "I been thinking I might likely kind of branch out on +my own account." + +"Well, I'll be doggoned!" Old Charley Lohr was amazed; he ruffled up +his gray moustache with thumb and forefinger, leaving his mouth open +beneath, like a dark cave under a tangled wintry thicket. "Why, that's +the doggonedest thing I ever heard!" he said. "I already am the oldest +inhabitant down there, but if you go, there won't be anybody else of the +old generation at all. What on earth you thinkin' of goin' into?" + +"Well," said Adams, "I rather you didn't mention it till I get started +of course anybody'll know what it is by then--but I HAVE been kind of +planning to put a liquid glue on the market." + +His friend, still ruffling the gray moustache upward, stared at him in +frowning perplexity. "Glue?" he said. "GLUE!" + +"Yes. I been sort of milling over the idea of taking up something like +that." + +"Handlin' it for some firm, you mean?" + +"No. Making it. Sort of a glue-works likely." + +Lohr continued to frown. "Let me think," he said. "Didn't the ole man +have some such idea once, himself?" + +Adams leaned forward, rubbing his knees; and he coughed again before he +spoke. "Well, yes. Fact is, he did. That is to say, a mighty long while +ago he did." + +"I remember," said Lohr. "He never said anything about it that I know +of; but seems to me I recollect we had sort of a rumour around the place +how you and that man--le's see, wasn't his name Campbell, that died of +typhoid fever? Yes, that was it, Campbell. Didn't the ole man have you +and Campbell workin' sort of private on some glue proposition or other?" + +"Yes, he did." Adams nodded. "I found out a good deal about glue then, +too." + +"Been workin' on it since, I suppose?" + +"Yes. Kept it in my mind and studied out new things about it." + +Lohr looked serious. "Well, but see here," he said. "I hope it ain't +anything the ole man'll think might infringe on whatever he had you +doin' for HIM. You know how he is: broad-minded, liberal, free-handed +man as walks this earth, and if he thought he owed you a cent he'd sell +his right hand for a pork-chop to pay it, if that was the only way; but +if he got the idea anybody was tryin' to get the better of him, he'd +sell BOTH his hands, if he had to, to keep 'em from doin' it. Yes, at +eighty, he would! Not that I mean I think you might be tryin' to get the +better of him, Virg. You're a mighty close ole codger, but such a thing +ain't in you. What I mean: I hope there ain't any chance for the ole man +to THINK you might be----" + +"Oh, no," Adams interrupted. "As a matter of fact, I don't believe he'll +ever think about it at all, and if he did he wouldn't have any real +right to feel offended at me: the process I'm going to use is one I +expect to change and improve a lot different from the one Campbell and I +worked on for him." + +"Well, that's good," said Lohr. "Of course you know what you're up to: +you're old enough, God knows!" He laughed ruefully. "My, but it will +seem funny to me--down there with you gone! I expect you and I both +been gettin' to be pretty much dead-wood in the place, the way the young +fellows look at it, and the only one that'd miss either of us would be +the other one! Have you told the ole man yet?" + +"Well----" Adams spoke laboriously. "No. No, I haven't. I thought--well, +that's what I wanted to see you about." + +"What can I do?" + +"I thought I'd write him a letter and get you to hand it to him for me." + +"My soul!" his friend exclaimed. "Why on earth don't you just go down +there and tell him?" + +Adams became pitiably embarrassed. He stammered, coughed, stammered +again, wrinkling his face so deeply he seemed about to weep; but finally +he contrived to utter an apologetic laugh. "I ought to do that, of +course; but in some way or other I just don't seem to be able to--to +manage it." + +"Why in the world not?" the mystified Lohr inquired. + +"I could hardly tell you--'less'n it is to say that when you been with +one boss all your life it's so--so kind of embarrassing--to quit him, I +just can't make up my mind to go and speak to him about it. No; I got it +in my head a letter's the only satisfactory way to do it, and I thought +I'd ask you to hand it to him." + +"Well, of course I don't mind doin' that for you," Lohr said, mildly. +"But why in the world don't you just mail it to him?" + +"Well, I'll tell you," Adams returned. "You know, like that, it'd have +to go through a clerk and that secretary of his, and I don't know who +all. There's a couple of kind of delicate points I want to put in it: +for instance, I want to explain to him how much improvement and so on +I'm going to introduce on the old process I helped to work out with +Campbell when we were working for him, so't he'll understand it's a +different article and no infringement at all. Then there's another +thing: you see all during while I was sick he had my salary paid to +me it amounts to considerable, I was on my back so long. Under the +circumstances, because I'm quitting, I don't feel as if I ought to +accept it, and so I'll have a check for him in the letter to cover it, +and I want to be sure he knows it, and gets it personally. If it had to +go through a lot of other people, the way it would if I put it in the +mail, why, you can't tell. So what I thought: if you'd hand it to him +for me, and maybe if he happened to read it right then, or anything, +it might be you'd notice whatever he'd happen to say about it--and you +could tell me afterward." + +"All right," Lohr said. "Certainly if you'd rather do it that way, I'll +hand it to him and tell you what he says; that is, if he says anything +and I hear him. Got it written?" + +"No; I'll send it around to you last of the week." Adams moved +toward his taxicab. "Don't say anything to anybody about it, Charley, +especially till after that." + +"All right." + +"And, Charley, I'll be mighty obliged to you," Adams said, and came back +to shake hands in farewell. "There's one thing more you might do--if +you'd ever happen to feel like it." He kept his eyes rather vaguely +fixed on a point above his friend's head as he spoke, and his voice was +not well controlled. "I been--I been down there a good many years and +I may not 'a' been so much use lately as I was at first, but I always +tried to do my best for the old firm. If anything turned out so's they +DID kind of take offense with me, down there, why, just say a good word +for me--if you'd happen to feel like it, maybe." + +Old Charley Lohr assured him that he would speak a good word if +opportunity became available; then, after the cab had driven away, +he went up to his small apartment on the third floor and muttered +ruminatively until his wife inquired what he was talking to himself +about. + +"Ole Virg Adams," he told her. "He's out again after his long spell of +sickness, and the way it looks to me he'd better stayed in bed." + +"You mean he still looks too bad to be out?" + +"Oh, I expect he's gettin' his HEALTH back," Lohr said, frowning. + +"Then what's the matter with him? You mean he's lost his mind?" + +"My goodness, but women do jump at conclusions!" he exclaimed. + +"Well," said Mrs. Lohr, "what other conclusion did you leave me to jump +at?" + +Her husband explained with a little heat: "People can have a sickness +that AFFECTS their mind, can't they? Their mind can get some affected +without bein' LOST, can't it?" + +"Then you mean the poor man's mind does seem affected?" + +"Why, no; I'd scarcely go as far as that," Lohr said, inconsistently, +and declined to be more definite. + + +Adams devoted the latter part of that evening to the composition of his +letter--a disquieting task not completed when, at eleven o'clock, he +heard his daughter coming up the stairs. She was singing to herself in a +low, sweet voice, and Adams paused to listen incredulously, with his +pen lifted and his mouth open, as if he heard the strangest sound in the +world. Then he set down the pen upon a blotter, went to his door, and +opened it, looking out at her as she came. + +"Well, dearie, you seem to be feeling pretty good," he said. "What you +been doing?" + +"Just sitting out on the front steps, papa." + +"All alone, I suppose." + +"No. Mr. Russell called." + +"Oh, he did?" Adams pretended to be surprised. "What all could you and +he find to talk about till this hour o' the night?" + +She laughed gaily. "You don't know me, papa!" + +"How's that?" + +"You've never found out that I always do all the talking." + +"Didn't you let him get a word in all evening?" + +"Oh, yes; every now and then." + +Adams took her hand and petted it. "Well, what did he say?" + +Alice gave him a radiant look and kissed him. "Not what you think!" she +laughed; then slapped his cheek with saucy affection, pirouetted across +the narrow hall and into her own room, and curtsied to him as she closed +her door. + +Adams went back to his writing with a lighter heart; for since Alice +was born she had been to him the apple of his eye, his own phrase in +thinking of her; and what he was doing now was for her. + +He smiled as he picked up his pen to begin a new draft of the painful +letter; but presently he looked puzzled. After all, she could be happy +just as things were, it seemed. Then why had he taken what his wife +called "this new step," which he had so long resisted? + +He could only sigh and wonder. "Life works out pretty peculiarly," he +thought; for he couldn't go back now, though the reason he couldn't was +not clearly apparent. He had to go ahead. + + + +CHAPTER XVII + +He was out in his taxicab again the next morning, and by noon he had +secured what he wanted. + +It was curiously significant that he worked so quickly. All the years +during which his wife had pressed him toward his present shift he had +sworn to himself, as well as to her, that he would never yield; and yet +when he did yield he had no plans to make, because he found them +already prepared and worked out in detail in his mind; as if he had long +contemplated the "step" he believed himself incapable of taking. + +Sometimes he had thought of improving his income by exchanging his +little collection of bonds for a "small rental property," if he could +find "a good buy"; and he had spent many of his spare hours rambling +over the enormously spreading city and its purlieus, looking for the +ideal "buy." It remained unattainable, so far as he was concerned; but +he found other things. + +Not twice a crow's mile from his own house there was a dismal and +slummish quarter, a decayed "industrial district" of earlier days. Most +of the industries were small; some of them died, perishing of bankruptcy +or fire; and a few had moved, leaving their shells. Of the relics, the +best was a brick building which had been the largest and most important +factory in the quarter: it had been injured by a long vacancy almost +as serious as a fire, in effect, and Adams had often guessed at the sum +needed to put it in repair. + +When he passed it, he would look at it with an interest which he +supposed detached and idly speculative. "That'd be just the thing," he +thought. "If a fellow had money enough, and took a notion to set up some +new business on a big scale, this would be a pretty good place--to make +glue, for instance, if that wasn't out of the question, of course. +It would take a lot of money, though; a great deal too much for me to +expect to handle--even if I'd ever dream of doing such a thing." + +Opposite the dismantled factory was a muddy, open lot of two acres +or so, and near the middle of the lot, a long brick shed stood in +a desolate abandonment, not happily decorated by old coatings of +theatrical and medicinal advertisements. But the brick shed had two +wooden ells, and, though both shed and ells were of a single story, here +was empty space enough for a modest enterprise--"space enough for almost +anything, to start with," Adams thought, as he walked through the low +buildings, one day, when he was prospecting in that section. "Yes, I +suppose I COULD swing this," he thought. "If the process belonged to +me, say, instead of being out of the question because it isn't my +property--or if I was the kind of man to do such a thing anyhow, here +would be something I could probably get hold of pretty cheap. They'd +want a lot of money for a lease on that big building over the way--but +this, why, I should think it'd be practically nothing at all." + +Then, by chance, meeting an agent he knew, he made inquiries--merely to +satisfy a casual curiosity, he thought--and he found matters much as he +had supposed, except that the owners of the big building did not wish +to let, but to sell it, and this at a price so exorbitant that Adams +laughed. But the long brick shed in the great muddy lot was for sale or +to let, or "pretty near to be given away," he learned, if anybody would +take it. + +Adams took it now, though without seeing that he had been destined +to take it, and that some dreary wizard in the back of his head had +foreseen all along that he would take it, and planned to be ready. He +drove in his taxicab to look the place over again, then down-town to +arrange for a lease; and came home to lunch with his wife and daughter. +Things were "moving," he told them. + +He boasted a little of having acted so decisively, and said that since +the dang thing had to be done, it was "going to be done RIGHT!" He was +almost cheerful, in a feverish way, and when the cab came for him again, +soon after lunch, he explained that he intended not only to get things +done right, but also to "get 'em done quick!" Alice, following him to +the front door, looked at him anxiously and asked if she couldn't help. +He laughed at her grimly. + +"Then let me go along with you in the cab," she begged. "You don't look +able to start in so hard, papa, just when you're barely beginning to get +your strength back. Do let me go with you and see if I can't help--or at +least take care of you if you should get to feeling badly." + +He declined, but upon pressure let her put a tiny bottle of spirits of +ammonia in his pocket, and promised to make use of it if he "felt faint +or anything." Then he was off again; and the next morning had men at +work in his sheds, though the wages he had to pay frightened him. + +He directed the workmen in every detail, hurrying them by example and +exhortations, and receiving, in consequence, several declarations of +independence, as well as one resignation, which took effect immediately. +"Yous capitalusts seem to think a man's got nothin' to do but break his +back p'doosin' wealth fer yous to squander," the resigning person loudly +complained. "You look out: the toiler's day is a-comin', and it ain't so +fur off, neither!" But the capitalist was already out of hearing, gone +to find a man to take this orator's place. + +By the end of the week, Adams felt that he had moved satisfactorily +forward in his preparations for the simple equipment he needed; but +he hated the pause of Sunday. He didn't WANT any rest, he told Alice +impatiently, when she suggested that the idle day might be good for him. + +Late that afternoon he walked over to the apartment house where old +Charley Lohr lived, and gave his friend the letter he wanted the head +of Lamb and Company to receive "personally." "I'll take it as a mighty +great favour in you to hand it to him personally, Charley," he said, in +parting. "And you won't forget, in case he says anything about it--and +remember if you ever do get a chance to put in a good word for me later, +you know----" + +Old Charley promised to remember, and, when Mrs. Lohr came out of the +"kitchenette," after the door closed, he said thoughtfully, "Just skin +and bones." + +"You mean Mr. Adams is?" Mrs. Lohr inquired. + +"Who'd you think I meant?" he returned. "One o' these partridges in the +wall-paper?" + +"Did he look so badly?" + +"Looked kind of distracted to me," her husband replied. "These little +thin fellers can stand a heap sometimes, though. He'll be over here +again Monday." + +"Did he say he would?" + +"No," said Lohr. "But he will. You'll see. He'll be over to find out +what the big boss says when I give him this letter. Expect I'd be kind +of anxious, myself, if I was him." + +"Why would you? What's Mr. Adams doing to be so anxious about?" + +Lohr's expression became one of reserve, the look of a man who has +found that when he speaks his inner thoughts his wife jumps too far to +conclusions. "Oh, nothing," he said. "Of course any man starting up a +new business is bound to be pretty nervous a while. He'll be over here +to-morrow evening, all right; you'll see." + +The prediction was fulfilled: Adams arrived just after Mrs. Lohr had +removed the dinner dishes to her "kitchenette"; but Lohr had little +information to give his caller. + +"He didn't say a word, Virgil; nary a word. I took it into his office +and handed it to him, and he just sat and read it; that's all. I kind of +stood around as long as I could, but he was sittin' at his desk with his +side to me, and he never turned around full toward me, as it were, so I +couldn't hardly even tell anything. All I know: he just read it." + +"Well, but see here," Adams began, nervously. "Well----" + +"Well what, Virg?" + +"Well, but what did he say when he DID speak?" + +"He didn't speak. Not so long I was in there, anyhow. He just sat there +and read it. Read kind of slow. Then, when he came to the end, he turned +back and started to read it all over again. By that time there was three +or four other men standin' around in the office waitin' to speak to him, +and I had to go." + +Adams sighed, and stared at the floor, irresolute. "Well, I'll be +getting along back home then, I guess, Charley. So you're sure you +couldn't tell anything what he might have thought about it, then?" + +"Not a thing in the world. I've told you all I know, Virg." + +"I guess so, I guess so," Adams said, mournfully. "I feel mighty +obliged to you, Charley Lohr; mighty obliged. Good-night to you." And he +departed, sighing in perplexity. + +On his way home, preoccupied with many thoughts, he walked so slowly +that once or twice he stopped and stood motionless for a few moments, +without being aware of it; and when he reached the juncture of the +sidewalk with the short brick path that led to his own front door, he +stopped again, and stood for more than a minute. "Ah, I wish I knew," he +whispered, plaintively. "I do wish I knew what he thought about it." + +He was roused by a laugh that came lightly from the little veranda near +by. "Papa!" Alice called gaily. "What are you standing there muttering +to yourself about?" + +"Oh, are you there, dearie?" he said, and came up the path. A tall +figure rose from a chair on the veranda. + +"Papa, this is Mr. Russell." + +The two men shook hands, Adams saying, "Pleased to make your +acquaintance," as they looked at each other in the faint light diffused +through the opaque glass in the upper part of the door. Adams's +impression was of a strong and tall young man, fashionable but gentle; +and Russell's was of a dried, little old business man with a grizzled +moustache, worried bright eyes, shapeless dark clothes, and a homely +manner. + +"Nice evening," Adams said further, as their hands parted. "Nice time o' +year it is, but we don't always have as good weather as this; that's +the trouble of it. Well----" He went to the door. "Well--I bid you good +evening," he said, and retired within the house. + +Alice laughed. "He's the old-fashionedest man in town, I suppose and +frightfully impressed with you, I could see!" + +"What nonsense!" said Russell. "How could anybody be impressed with me?" + +"Why not? Because you're quiet? Good gracious! Don't you know that +you're the most impressive sort? We chatterers spend all our time +playing to you quiet people." + +"Yes; we're only the audience." + +"'Only!'" she echoed. "Why, we live for you, and we can't live without +you." + +"I wish you couldn't," said Russell. "That would be a new experience for +both of us, wouldn't it?" + +"It might be a rather bleak one for me," she answered, lightly. "I'm +afraid I'll miss these summer evenings with you when they're over. I'll +miss them enough, thanks!" + +"Do they have to be over some time?" he asked. + +"Oh, everything's over some time, isn't it?" + +Russell laughed at her. "Don't let's look so far ahead as that," he +said. "We don't need to be already thinking of the cemetery, do we?" + +"I didn't," she said, shaking her head. "Our summer evenings will be +over before then, Mr. Russell." + +"Why?" he asked. + +"Good heavens!" she said. "THERE'S laconic eloquence: almost a proposal +in a single word! Never mind, I shan't hold you to it. But to answer +you: well, I'm always looking ahead, and somehow I usually see about how +things are coming out." + +"Yes," he said. "I suppose most of us do; at least it seems as if we +did, because we so seldom feel surprised by the way they do come out. +But maybe that's only because life isn't like a play in a theatre, and +most things come about so gradually we get used to them." + +"No, I'm sure I can see quite a long way ahead," she insisted, gravely. +"And it doesn't seem to me as if our summer evenings could last very +long. Something'll interfere--somebody will, I mean--they'll SAY +something----" + +"What if they do?" + +She moved her shoulders in a little apprehensive shiver. "It'll change +you," she said. "I'm just sure something spiteful's going to happen to +me. You'll feel differently about--things." + +"Now, isn't that an idea!" he exclaimed. + +"It will," she insisted. "I know something spiteful's going to happen!" + +"You seem possessed by a notion not a bit flattering to me," he +remarked. + +"Oh, but isn't it? That's just what it is! Why isn't it?" + +"Because it implies that I'm made of such soft material the slightest +breeze will mess me all up. I'm not so like that as I evidently appear; +and if it's true that we're afraid other people will do the things we'd +be most likely to do ourselves, it seems to me that I ought to be the +one to be afraid. I ought to be afraid that somebody may say something +about me to you that will make you believe I'm a professional forger." + +"No. We both know they won't," she said. "We both know you're the sort +of person everybody in the world says nice things about." She lifted +her hand to silence him as he laughed at this. "Oh, of course you are! I +think perhaps you're a little flirtatious--most quiet men have that one +sly way with 'em--oh, yes, they do! But you happen to be the kind of +man everybody loves to praise. And if you weren't, _I_ shouldn't hear +anything terrible about you. I told you I was unpopular: I don't see +anybody at all any more. The only man except you who's been to see me in +a month is that fearful little fat Frank Dowling, and I sent word to HIM +I wasn't home. Nobody'd tell me of your wickedness, you see." + +"Then let me break some news to you," Russell said. "Nobody would tell +me of yours, either. Nobody's even mentioned you to me." + +She burlesqued a cry of anguish. "That IS obscurity! I suppose I'm +too apt to forget that they say the population's about half a million +nowadays. There ARE other people to talk about, you feel, then?" + +"None that I want to," he said. "But I should think the size of the +place might relieve your mind of what seems to insist on burdening it. +Besides, I'd rather you thought me a better man than you do." + +"What kind of a man do I think you are?" + +"The kind affected by what's said about people instead of by what they +do themselves." + +"Aren't you?" + +"No, I'm not," he said. "If you want our summer evenings to be over +you'll have to drive me away yourself." + +"Nobody else could?" + +"No." + +She was silent, leaning forward, with her elbows on her knees and her +clasped hands against her lips. Then, not moving, she said softly: + +"Well--I won't!" + +She was silent again, and he said nothing, but looked at her, seeming +to be content with looking. Her attitude was one only a graceful person +should assume, but she was graceful; and, in the wan light, which made +a prettily shaped mist of her, she had beauty. Perhaps it was beauty of +the hour, and of the love scene almost made into form by what they had +both just said, but she had it; and though beauty of the hour passes, he +who sees it will long remember it and the hour when it came. + +"What are you thinking of?" he asked. + +She leaned back in her chair and did not answer at once. Then she said: + +"I don't know; I doubt if I was thinking of anything. It seems to me I +wasn't. I think I was just being sort of sadly happy just then." + +"Were you? Was it 'sadly,' too?" + +"Don't you know?" she said. "It seems to me that only little children +can be just happily happy. I think when we get older our happiest +moments are like the one I had just then: it's as if we heard strains of +minor music running through them--oh, so sweet, but oh, so sad!" + +"But what makes it sad for YOU?" + +"I don't know," she said, in a lighter tone. "Perhaps it's a kind of +useless foreboding I seem to have pretty often. It may be that--or it +may be poor papa." + +"You ARE a funny, delightful girl, though!" Russell laughed. "When your +father's so well again that he goes out walking in the evenings!" + +"He does too much walking," Alice said. "Too much altogether, over at +his new plant. But there isn't any stopping him." She laughed and shook +her head. "When a man gets an ambition to be a multi-millionaire his +family don't appear to have much weight with him. He'll walk all he +wants to, in spite of them." + +"I suppose so," Russell said, absently; then he leaned forward. "I wish +I could understand better why you were 'sadly' happy." + +Meanwhile, as Alice shed what further light she could on this point, the +man ambitious to be a "multi-millionaire" was indeed walking too much +for his own good. He had gone to bed, hoping to sleep well and rise +early for a long day's work, but he could not rest, and now, in his +nightgown and slippers, he was pacing the floor of his room. + +"I wish I DID know," he thought, over and over. "I DO wish I knew how he +feels about it." + + + +CHAPTER XVIII + +That was a thought almost continuously in his mind, even when he was +hardest at work; and, as the days went on and he could not free himself, +he became querulous about it. "I guess I'm the biggest dang fool alive," +he told his wife as they sat together one evening. "I got plenty else +to bother me, without worrying my head off about what HE thinks. I +can't help what he thinks; it's too late for that. So why should I keep +pestering myself about it?" + +"It'll wear off, Virgil," Mrs. Adams said, reassuringly. She was gentle +and sympathetic with him, and for the first time in many years he would +come to sit with her and talk, when he had finished his day's work. He +had told her, evading her eye, "Oh, I don't blame you. You didn't get +after me to do this on your own account; you couldn't help it." + +"Yes; but it don't wear off," he complained. "This afternoon I was +showing the men how I wanted my vats to go, and I caught my fool self +standing there saying to my fool self, 'It's funny I don't hear how he +feels about it from SOMEbody.' I was saying it aloud, almost--and it IS +funny I don't hear anything!" + +"Well, you see what it means, don't you, Virgil? It only means he hasn't +said anything to anybody about it. Don't you think you're getting kind +of morbid over it?" + +"Maybe, maybe," he muttered. + +"Why, yes," she said, briskly. "You don't realize what a little bit of +a thing all this is to him. It's been a long, long while since the +last time you even mentioned glue to him, and he's probably forgotten +everything about it." + +"You're off your base; it isn't like him to forget things," Adams +returned, peevishly. "He may seem to forget 'em, but he don't." + +"But he's not thinking about this, or you'd have heard from him before +now." + +Her husband shook his head. "Ah, that's just it!" he said. "Why HAVEN'T +I heard from him?" + +"It's all your morbidness, Virgil. Look at Walter: if Mr. Lamb held this +up against you, would he still let Walter stay there? Wouldn't he have +discharged Walter if he felt angry with you?" + +"That dang boy!" Adams said. "If he WANTED to come with me now, I +wouldn't hardly let him, What do you suppose makes him so bull-headed?" + +"But hasn't he a right to choose for himself?" she asked. "I suppose +he feels he ought to stick to what he thinks is sure pay. As soon as he +sees that you're going to succeed with the glue-works he'll want to be +with you quick enough." + +"Well, he better get a little sense in his head," Adams returned, +crossly. "He wanted me to pay him a three-hundred-dollar bonus in +advance, when anybody with a grain of common sense knows I need every +penny I can lay my hands on!" + +"Never mind," she said. "He'll come around later and be glad of the +chance." + +"He'll have to beg for it then! _I_ won't ask him again." + +"Oh, Walter will come out all right; you needn't worry. And don't you +see that Mr. Lamb's not discharging him means there's no hard feeling +against you, Virgil?" + +"I can't make it out at all," he said, frowning. "The only thing I can +THINK it means is that J. A. Lamb is so fair-minded--and of course he +IS one of the fair-mindedest men alive I suppose that's the reason he +hasn't fired Walter. He may know," Adams concluded, morosely--"he may +know that's just another thing to make me feel all the meaner: keeping +my boy there on a salary after I've done him an injury." + +"Now, now!" she said, trying to comfort him. "You couldn't do anybody an +injury to save your life, and everybody knows it." + +"Well, anybody ought to know I wouldn't WANT to do an injury, but +this world isn't built so't we can do just what we want." He paused, +reflecting. "Of course there may be one explanation of why Walter's +still there: J. A. maybe hasn't noticed that he IS there. There's so +many I expect he hardly knows him by sight." + +"Well, just do quit thinking about it," she urged him. "It only bothers +you without doing any good. Don't you know that?" + +"Don't I, though!" he laughed, feebly. "I know it better'n anybody! How +funny that is: when you know thinking about a thing only pesters you +without helping anything at all, and yet you keep right on pestering +yourself with it!" + +"But WHY?" she said. "What's the use when you know you haven't done +anything wrong, Virgil? You said yourself you were going to improve the +process so much it would be different from the old one, and you'd REALLY +have a right to it." + +Adams had persuaded himself of this when he yielded; he had found it +necessary to persuade himself of it--though there was a part of him, of +course, that remained unpersuaded; and this discomfiting part of him was +what made his present trouble. "Yes, I know," he said. "That's true, but +I can't quite seem to get away from the fact that the principle of the +process is a good deal the same--well, it's more'n that; it's just about +the same as the one he hired Campbell and me to work out for him. Truth +is, nobody could tell the difference, and I don't know as there IS +any difference except in these improvements I'm making. Of course, the +improvements do give me pretty near a perfect right to it, as a person +might say; and that's one of the things I thought of putting in my +letter to him; but I was afraid he'd just think I was trying to make up +excuses, so I left it out. I kind of worried all the time I was writing +that letter, because if he thought I WAS just making up excuses, why, it +might set him just so much more against me." + +Ever since Mrs. Adams had found that she was to have her way, the depths +of her eyes had been troubled by a continuous uneasiness; and, although +she knew it was there, and sometimes veiled it by keeping the revealing +eyes averted from her husband and children, she could not always cover +it under that assumption of absent-mindedness. The uneasy look became +vivid, and her voice was slightly tremulous now, as she said, "But +what if he SHOULD be against you--although I don't believe he is, of +course--you told me he couldn't DO anything to you, Virgil." + +"No," he said, slowly. "I can't see how he could do anything. It was +just a secret, not a patent; the thing ain't patentable. I've tried to +think what he could do--supposing he was to want to--but I can't figure +out anything at all that would be any harm to me. There isn't any way in +the world it could be made a question of law. Only thing he could do'd +be to TELL people his side of it, and set 'em against me. I been kind of +waiting for that to happen, all along." + +She looked somewhat relieved. "So did I expect it," she said. "I was +dreading it most on Alice's account: it might have--well, young men are +so easily influenced and all. But so far as the business is concerned, +what if Mr. Lamb did talk? That wouldn't amount to much. It wouldn't +affect the business; not to hurt. And, besides, he isn't even doing +that." + +"No; anyhow not yet, it seems." And Adams sighed again, wistfully. "But +I WOULD give a good deal to know what he thinks!" + +Before his surrender he had always supposed that if he did such an +unthinkable thing as to seize upon the glue process for himself, what he +would feel must be an overpowering shame. But shame is the rarest thing +in the world: what he felt was this unremittent curiosity about his old +employer's thoughts. It was an obsession, yet he did not want to hear +what Lamb "thought" from Lamb himself, for Adams had a second obsession, +and this was his dread of meeting the old man face to face. Such an +encounter could happen only by chance and unexpectedly; since Adams +would have avoided any deliberate meeting, so long as his legs had +strength to carry him, even if Lamb came to the house to see him. + +But people do meet unexpectedly; and when Adams had to be down-town he +kept away from the "wholesale district." One day he did see Lamb, as the +latter went by in his car, impassive, going home to lunch; and Adams, +in the crowd at a corner, knew that the old man had not seen him. +Nevertheless, in a street car, on the way back to his sheds, an hour +later, he was still subject to little shivering seizures of horror. + +He worked unceasingly, seeming to keep at it even in his sleep, for he +always woke in the midst of a planning and estimating that must have +been going on in his mind before consciousness of himself returned. +Moreover, the work, thus urged, went rapidly, in spite of the high wages +he had to pay his labourers for their short hours. "It eats money," he +complained, and, in fact, by the time his vats and boilers were in +place it had eaten almost all he could supply; but in addition to his +equipment he now owned a stock of "raw material," raw indeed; and when +operations should be a little further along he was confident his banker +would be willing to "carry" him. + +Six weeks from the day he had obtained his lease he began his +glue-making. The terrible smells came out of the sheds and went writhing +like snakes all through that quarter of the town. A smiling man, +strolling and breathing the air with satisfaction, would turn a corner +and smile no more, but hurry. However, coloured people had almost all +the dwellings of this old section to themselves; and although even they +were troubled, there was recompense for them. Being philosophic about +what appeared to them as in the order of nature, they sought neither +escape nor redress, and soon learned to bear what the wind brought them. +They even made use of it to enrich those figures of speech with which +the native impulses of coloured people decorate their communications: +they flavoured metaphor, simile, and invective with it; and thus may be +said to have enjoyed it. But the man who produced it took a hot bath +as soon as he reached his home the evening of that first day when his +manufacturing began. Then he put on fresh clothes; but after dinner he +seemed to be haunted, and asked his wife if she "noticed anything." + +She laughed and inquired what he meant. + +"Seems to me as if that glue-works smell hadn't quit hanging to me," he +explained. "Don't you notice it?" + +"No! What an idea!" + +He laughed, too, but uneasily; and told her he was sure "the dang glue +smell" was somehow sticking to him. Later, he went outdoors and walked +up and down the small yard in the dusk; but now and then he stood still, +with his head lifted, and sniffed the air suspiciously. "Can YOU smell +it?" he called to Alice, who sat upon the veranda, prettily dressed and +waiting in a reverie. + +"Smell what, papa?" + +"That dang glue-works." + +She did the same thing her mother had done: laughed, and said, "No! How +foolish! Why, papa, it's over two miles from here!" + +"You don't get it at all?" he insisted. + +"The idea! The air is lovely to-night, papa." + +The air did not seem lovely to him, for he was positive that he detected +the taint. He wondered how far it carried, and if J. A. Lamb would smell +it, too, out on his own lawn a mile to the north; and if he did, would +he guess what it was? Then Adams laughed at himself for such nonsense; +but could not rid his nostrils of their disgust. To him the whole town +seemed to smell of his glue-works. + +Nevertheless, the glue was making, and his sheds were busy. "Guess +we're stirrin' up this ole neighbourhood with more than the smell," his +foreman remarked one morning. + +"How's that?" Adams inquired. + +"That great big, enormous ole dead butterine factory across the street +from our lot," the man said. "Nothin' like settin' an example to bring +real estate to life. That place is full o' carpenters startin' in to +make a regular buildin' of it again. Guess you ought to have the +credit of it, because you was the first man in ten years to see any +possibilities in this neighbourhood." + +Adams was pleased, and, going out to see for himself, heard a great +hammering and sawing from within the building; while carpenters were +just emerging gingerly upon the dangerous roof. He walked out over the +dried mud of his deep lot, crossed the street, and spoke genially to +a workman who was removing the broken glass of a window on the ground +floor. + +"Here! What's all this howdy-do over here?" + +"Goin' to fix her all up, I guess," the workman said. "Big job it is, +too." + +"Sh' think it would be." + +"Yes, sir; a pretty big job--a pretty big job. Got men at it on all four +floors and on the roof. They're doin' it RIGHT." + +"Who's doing it?" + +"Lord! I d' know. Some o' these here big manufacturing corporations, I +guess." + +"What's it going to be?" + +"They tell ME," the workman answered--"they tell ME she's goin' to be a +butterine factory again. Anyways, I hope she won't be anything to smell +like that glue-works you got over there not while I'm workin' around +her, anyways!" + +"That smell's all right," Adams said. "You soon get used to it." + +"You do?" The man appeared incredulous. "Listen! I was over in France: +it's a good thing them Dutchmen never thought of it; we'd of had to +quit!" + +Adams laughed, and went back to his sheds. "I guess my foreman was +right," he told his wife, that evening, with a little satisfaction. +"As soon as one man shows enterprise enough to found an industry in a +broken-down neighbourhood, somebody else is sure to follow. I kind of +like the look of it: it'll help make our place seem sort of more busy +and prosperous when it comes to getting a loan from the bank--and I got +to get one mighty soon, too. I did think some that if things go as well +as there's every reason to think they OUGHT to, I might want to spread +out and maybe get hold of that old factory myself; but I hardly expected +to be able to handle a proposition of that size before two or three +years from now, and anyhow there's room enough on the lot I got, if we +need more buildings some day. Things are going about as fine as I could +ask: I hired some girls to-day to do the bottling--coloured girls along +about sixteen to twenty years old. Afterwhile, I expect to get a machine +to put the stuff in the little bottles, when we begin to get good +returns; but half a dozen of these coloured girls can do it all right +now, by hand. We're getting to have really quite a little plant over +there: yes, sir, quite a regular little plant!" + +He chuckled, and at this cheerful sound, of a kind his wife had almost +forgotten he was capable of producing, she ventured to put her hand upon +his arm. They had gone outdoors, after dinner, taking two chairs with +them, and were sitting through the late twilight together, keeping well +away from the "front porch," which was not yet occupied, however Alice +was in her room changing her dress. + +"Well, honey," Mrs. Adams said, taking confidence not only to put her +hand upon his arm, but to revive this disused endearment;--"it's grand +to have you so optimistic. Maybe some time you'll admit I was right, +after all. Everything's going so well, it seems a pity you didn't take +this--this step--long ago. Don't you think maybe so, Virgil?" + +"Well--if I was ever going to, I don't know but I might as well of. +I got to admit the proposition begins to look pretty good: I know the +stuff'll sell, and I can't see a thing in the world to stop it. It does +look good, and if--if----" He paused. + +"If what?" she said, suddenly anxious. + +He laughed plaintively, as if confessing a superstition. "It's +funny--well, it's mighty funny about that smell. I've got so used to it +at the plant I never seem to notice it at all over there. It's only when +I get away. Honestly, can't you notice----?" + +"Virgil!" She lifted her hand to strike his arm chidingly. "Do quit +harping on that nonsense!" + +"Oh, of course it don't amount to anything," he said. "A person can +stand a good deal of just smell. It don't WORRY me any." + +"I should think not especially as there isn't any." + +"Well," he said, "I feel pretty fair over the whole thing--a lot +better'n I ever expected to, anyhow. I don't know as there's any reason +I shouldn't tell you so." + +She was deeply pleased with this acknowledgment, and her voice had +tenderness in it as she responded: "There, honey! Didn't I always say +you'd be glad if you did it?" + +Embarrassed, he coughed loudly, then filled his pipe and lit it. "Well," +he said, slowly, "it's a puzzle. Yes, sir, it's a puzzle." + +"What is?" + +"Pretty much everything, I guess." + +As he spoke, a song came to them from a lighted window over their heads. +Then the window darkened abruptly, but the song continued as Alice went +down through the house to wait on the little veranda. "Mi chiamo Mimi," +she sang, and in her voice throbbed something almost startling in its +sweetness. Her father and mother listened, not speaking until the song +stopped with the click of the wire screen at the front door as Alice +came out. + +"My!" said her father. "How sweet she does sing! I don't know as I ever +heard her voice sound nicer than it did just then." + +"There's something that makes it sound that way," his wife told him. + +"I suppose so," he said, sighing. "I suppose so. You think----" + +"She's just terribly in love with him!" + +"I expect that's the way it ought to be," he said, then drew upon +his pipe for reflection, and became murmurous with the symptoms of +melancholy laughter. "It don't make things less of a puzzle, though, +does it?" + +"In what way, Virgil?" + +"Why, here," he said--"here we go through all this muck and moil to help +fix things nicer for her at home, and what's it all amount to? Seems +like she's just gone ahead the way she'd 'a' gone anyhow; and now, I +suppose, getting ready to up and leave us! Ain't that a puzzle to you? +It is to me." + +"Oh, but things haven't gone that far yet." + +"Why, you just said----" + +She gave a little cry of protest. "Oh, they aren't ENGAGED yet. Of +course they WILL be; he's just as much interested in her as she is in +him, but----" + +"Well, what's the trouble then?" + +"You ARE a simple old fellow!" his wife exclaimed, and then rose from +her chair. "That reminds me," she said. + +"What of?" he asked. "What's my being simple remind you of?" + +"Nothing!" she laughed. "It wasn't you that reminded me. It was just +something that's been on my mind. I don't believe he's actually ever +been inside our house!" + +"Hasn't he?" + +"I actually don't believe he ever has," she said. "Of course we +must----" She paused, debating. + +"We must what?" + +"I guess I better talk to Alice about it right now," she said. "He don't +usually come for about half an hour yet; I guess I've got time." And +with that she walked away, leaving him to his puzzles. + + + +CHAPTER XIX + +Alice was softly crooning to herself as her mother turned the corner of +the house and approached through the dusk. + +"Isn't it the most BEAUTIFUL evening!" the daughter said. "WHY can't +summer last all year? Did you ever know a lovelier twilight than this, +mama?" + +Mrs. Adams laughed, and answered, "Not since I was your age, I expect." + +Alice was wistful at once. "Don't they stay beautiful after my age?" + +"Well, it's not the same thing." + +"Isn't it? Not ever?" + +"You may have a different kind from mine," the mother said, a little +sadly. "I think you will, Alice. You deserve----" + +"No, I don't. I don't deserve anything, and I know it. But I'm getting +a great deal these days--more than I ever dreamed COULD come to me. +I'm--I'm pretty happy, mama!" + +"Dearie!" Her mother would have kissed her, but Alice drew away. + +"Oh, I don't mean----" She laughed nervously. "I wasn't meaning to +tell you I'm ENGAGED, mama. We're not. I mean--oh! things seem pretty +beautiful in spite of all I've done to spoil 'em." + +"You?" Mrs. Adams cried, incredulously. "What have you done to spoil +anything?" + +"Little things," Alice said. "A thousand little silly--oh, what's +the use? He's so honestly what he is--just simple and good and +intelligent--I feel a tricky mess beside him! I don't see why he likes +me; and sometimes I'm afraid he wouldn't if he knew me." + +"He'd just worship you," said the fond mother. "And the more he knew +you, the more he'd worship you." + +Alice shook her head. "He's not the worshiping kind. Not like that at +all. He's more----" + +But Mrs. Adams was not interested in this analysis, and she interrupted +briskly, "Of course it's time your father and I showed some interest in +him. I was just saying I actually don't believe he's ever been inside +the house." + +"No," Alice said, musingly; "that's true: I don't believe he has. Except +when we've walked in the evening we've always sat out here, even those +two times when it was drizzly. It's so much nicer." + +"We'll have to do SOMETHING or other, of course," her mother said. + +"What like?" + +"I was thinking----" Mrs. Adams paused. "Well, of course we could hardly +put off asking him to dinner, or something, much longer." + +Alice was not enthusiastic; so far from it, indeed, that there was a +melancholy alarm in her voice. "Oh, mama, must we? Do you think so?" + +"Yes, I do. I really do." + +"Couldn't we--well, couldn't we wait?" + +"It looks queer," Mrs. Adams said. "It isn't the thing at all for a +young man to come as much as he does, and never more than just barely +meet your father and mother. No. We ought to do something." + +"But a dinner!" Alice objected. "In the first place, there isn't anybody +I want to ask. There isn't anybody I WOULD ask." + +"I didn't mean trying to give a big dinner," her mother explained. "I +just mean having him to dinner. That mulatto woman, Malena Burns, goes +out by the day, and she could bring a waitress. We can get some flowers +for the table and some to put in the living-room. We might just as well +go ahead and do it to-morrow as any other time; because your father's in +a fine mood, and I saw Malena this afternoon and told her I might want +her soon. She said she didn't have any engagements this week, and I can +let her know to-night. Suppose when he comes you ask him for to-morrow, +Alice. Everything'll be very nice, I'm sure. Don't worry about it." + +"Well--but----" Alice was uncertain. + +"But don't you see, it looks so queer, not to do SOMETHING?" her mother +urged. "It looks so kind of poverty-stricken. We really oughtn't to wait +any longer." + +Alice assented, though not with a good heart. "Very well, I'll ask him, +if you think we've got to." + +"That matter's settled then," Mrs. Adams said. "I'll go telephone +Malena, and then I'll tell your father about it." + +But when she went back to her husband, she found him in an excited +state of mind, and Walter standing before him in the darkness. Adams was +almost shouting, so great was his vehemence. + +"Hush, hush!" his wife implored, as she came near them. "They'll hear +you out on the front porch!" + +"I don't care who hears me," Adams said, harshly, though he tempered his +loudness. "Do you want to know what this boy's asking me for? I thought +he'd maybe come to tell me he'd got a little sense in his head at last, +and a little decency about what's due his family! I thought he was +going to ask me to take him into my plant. No, ma'am; THAT'S not what he +wants!" + +"No, it isn't," Walter said. In the darkness his face could not be seen; +he stood motionless, in what seemed an apathetic attitude; and he spoke +quietly, "No," he repeated. "That isn't what I want." + +"You stay down at that place," Adams went on, hotly, "instead of trying +to be a little use to your family; and the only reason you're ALLOWED to +stay there is because Mr. Lamb's never happened to notice you ARE still +there! You just wait----" + +"You're off," Walter said, in the same quiet way. "He knows I'm there. +He spoke to me yesterday: he asked me how I was getting along with my +work." + +"He did?" Adams said, seeming not to believe him. + +"Yes. He did." + +"What else did he say, Walter?" Mrs. Adams asked quickly. + +"Nothin'. Just walked on." + +"I don't believe he knew who you were," Adams declared. + +"Think not? He called me 'Walter Adams.'" + +At this Adams was silent; and Walter, after waiting a moment, said: + +"Well, are you going to do anything about me? About what I told you I +got to have?" + +"What is it, Walter?" his mother asked, since Adams did not speak. + +Walter cleared his throat, and replied in a tone as quiet as that he +had used before, though with a slight huskiness, "I got to have three +hundred and fifty dollars. You better get him to give it to me if you +can." + +Adams found his voice. "Yes," he said, bitterly. "That's all he asks! +He won't do anything I ask HIM to, and in return he asks me for three +hundred and fifty dollars! That's all!" + +"What in the world!" Mrs. Adams exclaimed. "What FOR, Walter?" + +"I got to have it," Walter said. + +"But what FOR?" + +His quiet huskiness did not alter. "I got to have it." + +"But can't you tell us----" + +"I got to have it." + +"That's all you can get out of him," Adams said. "He seems to think +it'll bring him in three hundred and fifty dollars!" + +A faint tremulousness became evident in the husky voice. "Haven't you +got it?" + +"NO, I haven't got it!" his father answered. "And I've got to go to a +bank for more than my pay-roll next week. Do you think I'm a mint?" + +"I don't understand what you mean, Walter," Mrs. Adams interposed, +perplexed and distressed. "If your father had the money, of course +he'd need every cent of it, especially just now, and, anyhow, you could +scarcely expect him to give it to you, unless you told us what you want +with it. But he hasn't got it." + +"All right," Walter said; and after standing a moment more, in silence, +he added, impersonally, "I don't see as you ever did anything much for +me, anyhow either of you." + +Then, as if this were his valedictory, he turned his back upon them, +walked away quickly, and was at once lost to their sight in the +darkness. + +"There's a fine boy to've had the trouble of raising!" Adams grumbled. +"Just crazy, that's all." + +"What in the world do you suppose he wants all that money for?" his +wife said, wonderingly. "I can't imagine what he could DO with it. I +wonder----" She paused. "I wonder if he----" + +"If he what?" Adams prompted her irritably. + +"If he COULD have bad--associates." + +"God knows!" said Adams. "_I_ don't! It just looks to me like he had +something in him I don't understand. You can't keep your eye on a boy +all the time in a city this size, not a boy Walter's age. You got a girl +pretty much in the house, but a boy'll follow his nature. _I_ don't know +what to do with him!" + +Mrs. Adams brightened a little. "He'll come out all right," she said. +"I'm sure he will. I'm sure he'd never be anything really bad: and he'll +come around all right about the glue-works, too; you'll see. Of course +every young man wants money--it doesn't prove he's doing anything wrong +just because he asks you for it." + +"No. All it proves to me is that he hasn't got good sense asking me for +three hundred and fifty dollars, when he knows as well as you do the +position I'm in! If I wanted to, I couldn't hardly let him have three +hundred and fifty cents, let alone dollars!" + +"I'm afraid you'll have to let ME have that much--and maybe a little +more," she ventured, timidly; and she told him of her plans for the +morrow. He objected vehemently. + +"Oh, but Alice has probably asked him by this time," Mrs. Adams said. +"It really must be done, Virgil: you don't want him to think she's +ashamed of us, do you?" + +"Well, go ahead, but just let me stay away," he begged. "Of course I +expect to undergo a kind of talk with him, when he gets ready to say +something to us about Alice, but I do hate to have to sit through a +fashionable dinner." + +"Why, it isn't going to bother you," she said; "just one young man as a +guest." + +"Yes, I know; but you want to have all this fancy cookin'; and I see +well enough you're going to get that old dress suit out of the cedar +chest in the attic, and try to make me put it on me." + +"I do think you better, Virgil." + +"I hope the moths have got in it," he said. "Last time I wore it was to +the banquet, and it was pretty old then. Of course I didn't mind wearing +it to the banquet so much, because that was what you might call quite an +occasion." He spoke with some reminiscent complacency; "the banquet," +an affair now five years past, having provided the one time in his +life when he had been so distinguished among his fellow-citizens as to +receive an invitation to be present, with some seven hundred others, at +the annual eating and speech-making of the city's Chamber of Commerce. +"Anyhow, as you say, I think it would look foolish of me to wear a dress +suit for just one young man," he went on protesting, feebly. "What's the +use of all so much howdy-do, anyway? You don't expect him to believe we +put on all that style every night, do you? Is that what you're after?" + +"Well, we want him to think we live nicely," she admitted. + +"So that's it!" he said, querulously. "You want him to think that's our +regular gait, do you? Well, he'll know better about me, no matter how +you fix me up, because he saw me in my regular suit the evening she +introduced me to him, and he could tell anyway I'm not one of these +moving-picture sporting-men that's always got a dress suit on. Besides, +you and Alice certainly have some idea he'll come AGAIN, haven't you? +If they get things settled between 'em he'll be around the house and to +meals most any time, won't he? You don't hardly expect to put on style +all the time, I guess. Well, he'll see then that this kind of thing was +all show-off, and bluff, won't he? What about it?" + +"Oh, well, by THAT time----" She left the sentence unfinished, as if +absently. "You could let us have a little money for to-morrow, couldn't +you, honey?" + +"Oh, I reckon, I reckon," he mumbled. "A girl like Alice is some +comfort: she don't come around acting as if she'd commit suicide if she +didn't get three hundred and fifty dollars in the next five minutes. I +expect I can spare five or six dollars for your show-off if I got to." + +However, she finally obtained fifteen before his bedtime; and the next +morning "went to market" after breakfast, leaving Alice to make the +beds. Walter had not yet come downstairs. "You had better call him," +Mrs. Adams said, as she departed with a big basket on her arm. "I expect +he's pretty sleepy; he was out so late last night I didn't hear him come +in, though I kept awake till after midnight, listening for him. Tell him +he'll be late to work if he doesn't hurry; and see that he drinks his +coffee, even if he hasn't time for anything else. And when Malena comes, +get her started in the kitchen: show her where everything is." She +waved her hand, as she set out for a corner where the cars stopped. +"Everything'll be lovely. Don't forget about Walter." + +Nevertheless, Alice forgot about Walter for a few minutes. She closed +the door, went into the "living-room" absently, and stared vaguely at +one of the old brown-plush rocking-chairs there. Upon her forehead +were the little shadows of an apprehensive reverie, and her thoughts +overlapped one another in a fretful jumble. "What will he think? These +old chairs--they're hideous. I'll scrub those soot-streaks on +the columns: it won't do any good, though. That long crack in the +column--nothing can help it. What will he think of papa? I hope +mama won't talk too much. When he thinks of Mildred's house, or of +Henrietta's, or any of 'em, beside this--She said she'd buy plenty +of roses; that ought to help some. Nothing could be done about these +horrible chairs: can't take 'em up in the attic--a room's got to have +chairs! Might have rented some. No; if he ever comes again he'd see they +weren't here. 'If he ever comes again'--oh, it won't be THAT bad! But +it won't be what he expects. I'm responsible for what he expects: he +expects just what the airs I've put on have made him expect. What did I +want to pose so to him for--as if papa were a wealthy man and all that? +What WILL he think? The photograph of the Colosseum's a rather good +thing, though. It helps some--as if we'd bought it in Rome perhaps. I +hope he'll think so; he believes I've been abroad, of course. The +other night he said, 'You remember the feeling you get in the +Sainte-Chapelle'.--There's another lie of mine, not saying I didn't +remember because I'd never been there. What makes me do it? Papa MUST +wear his evening clothes. But Walter----" + +With that she recalled her mother's admonition, and went upstairs to +Walter's door. She tapped upon it with her fingers. + +"Time to get up, Walter. The rest of us had breakfast over half an hour +ago, and it's nearly eight o'clock. You'll be late. Hurry down and I'll +have some coffee and toast ready for you." There came no sound from +within the room, so she rapped louder. + +"Wake up, Walter!" + +She called and rapped again, without getting any response, and then, +finding that the door yielded to her, opened it and went in. Walter was +not there. + +He had been there, however; had slept upon the bed, though not inside +the covers; and Alice supposed he must have come home so late that he +had been too sleepy to take off his clothes. Near the foot of the bed +was a shallow closet where he kept his "other suit" and his evening +clothes; and the door stood open, showing a bare wall. Nothing whatever +was in the closet, and Alice was rather surprised at this for a moment. +"That's queer," she murmured; and then she decided that when he woke he +found the clothes he had slept in "so mussy" he had put on his "other +suit," and had gone out before breakfast with the mussed clothes to have +them pressed, taking his evening things with them. Satisfied with this +explanation, and failing to observe that it did not account for the +absence of shoes from the closet floor, she nodded absently, "Yes, that +must be it"; and, when her mother returned, told her that Walter had +probably breakfasted down-town. They did not delay over this; the +coloured woman had arrived, and the basket's disclosures were important. + +"I stopped at Worlig's on the way back," said Mrs. Adams, flushed with +hurry and excitement. "I bought a can of caviar there. I thought we'd +have little sandwiches brought into the 'living-room' before dinner, the +way you said they did when you went to that dinner at the----" + +"But I think that was to go with cocktails, mama, and of course we +haven't----" + +"No," Mrs. Adams said. "Still, I think it would be nice. We can make +them look very dainty, on a tray, and the waitress can bring them in. I +thought we'd have the soup already on the table; and we can walk right +out as soon as we have the sandwiches, so it won't get cold. Then, after +the soup, Malena says she can make sweetbread pates with mushrooms: and +for the meat course we'll have larded fillet. Malena's really a +fancy cook, you know, and she says she can do anything like that to +perfection. We'll have peas with the fillet, and potato balls and +Brussels sprouts. Brussels sprouts are fashionable now, they told me +at market. Then will come the chicken salad, and after that the +ice-cream--she's going to make an angel-food cake to go with it--and +then coffee and crackers and a new kind of cheese I got at Worlig's, he +says is very fine." + +Alice was alarmed. "Don't you think perhaps it's too much, mama?" + +"It's better to have too much than too little," her mother said, +cheerfully. "We don't want him to think we're the kind that skimp. Lord +knows we have to enough, though, most of the time! Get the flowers in +water, child. I bought 'em at market because they're so much cheaper +there, but they'll keep fresh and nice. You fix 'em any way you want. +Hurry! It's got to be a busy day." + +She had bought three dozen little roses. Alice took them and began to +arrange them in vases, keeping the stems separated as far as possible so +that the clumps would look larger. She put half a dozen in each of three +vases in the "living-room," placing one vase on the table in the center +of the room, and one at each end of the mantelpiece. Then she took the +rest of the roses to the dining-room; but she postponed the arrangement +of them until the table should be set, just before dinner. She was +thoughtful; planning to dry the stems and lay them on the tablecloth +like a vine of roses running in a delicate design, if she found that the +dozen and a half she had left were enough for that. If they weren't she +would arrange them in a vase. + +She looked a long time at the little roses in the basin of water, where +she had put them; then she sighed, and went away to heavier tasks, +while her mother worked in the kitchen with Malena. Alice dusted the +"living-room" and the dining-room vigorously, though all the time with a +look that grew more and more pensive; and having dusted everything, she +wiped the furniture; rubbed it hard. After that, she washed the floors +and the woodwork. + +Emerging from the kitchen at noon, Mrs. Adams found her daughter on +hands and knees, scrubbing the bases of the columns between the hall and +the "living-room." + +"Now, dearie," she said, "you mustn't tire yourself out, and you'd +better come and eat something. Your father said he'd get a bite +down-town to-day--he was going down to the bank--and Walter eats +down-town all the time lately, so I thought we wouldn't bother to set +the table for lunch. Come on and we'll have something in the kitchen." + +"No," Alice said, dully, as she went on with the work. "I don't want +anything." + +Her mother came closer to her. "Why, what's the matter?" she asked, +briskly. "You seem kind of pale, to me; and you don't look--you don't +look HAPPY." + +"Well----" Alice began, uncertainly, but said no more. + +"See here!" Mrs. Adams exclaimed. "This is all just for you! You ought +to be ENJOYING it. Why, it's the first time we've--we've entertained +in I don't know how long! I guess it's almost since we had that little +party when you were eighteen. What's the matter with you?" + +"Nothing. I don't know." + +"But, dearie, aren't you looking FORWARD to this evening?" + +The girl looked up, showing a pallid and solemn face. "Oh, yes, of +course," she said, and tried to smile. "Of course we had to do it--I do +think it'll be nice. Of course I'm looking forward to it." + + + +CHAPTER XX + +She was indeed "looking forward" to that evening, but in a cloud of +apprehension; and, although she could never have guessed it, this was +the simultaneous condition of another person--none other than the guest +for whose pleasure so much cooking and scrubbing seemed to be necessary. +Moreover, Mr. Arthur Russell's premonitions were no product of mere +coincidence; neither had any magical sympathy produced them. His state +of mind was rather the result of rougher undercurrents which had all the +time been running beneath the surface of a romantic friendship. + +Never shrewder than when she analyzed the gentlemen, Alice did not +libel him when she said he was one of those quiet men who are a bit +flirtatious, by which she meant that he was a bit "susceptible," the +same thing--and he had proved himself susceptible to Alice upon his +first sight of her. "There!" he said to himself. "Who's that?" And in +the crowd of girls at his cousin's dance, all strangers to him, she was +the one he wanted to know. + +Since then, his summer evenings with her had been as secluded as if, for +three hours after the falling of dusk, they two had drawn apart from +the world to some dear bower of their own. The little veranda was that +glamorous nook, with a faint golden light falling through the glass of +the closed door upon Alice, and darkness elsewhere, except for the one +round globe of the street lamp at the corner. The people who passed +along the sidewalk, now and then, were only shadows with voices, moving +vaguely under the maple trees that loomed in obscure contours against +the stars. So, as the two sat together, the back of the world was the +wall and closed door behind them; and Russell, when he was away from +Alice, always thought of her as sitting there before the closed door. A +glamour was about her thus, and a spell upon him; but he had a formless +anxiety never put into words: all the pictures of her in his mind +stopped at the closed door. + +He had another anxiety; and, for the greater part, this was of her own +creating. She had too often asked him (no matter how gaily) what he +heard about her, too often begged him not to hear anything. Then, hoping +to forestall whatever he might hear, she had been at too great pains to +account for it, to discredit and mock it; and, though he laughed at her +for this, telling her truthfully he did not even hear her mentioned, the +everlasting irony that deals with all such human forefendings prevailed. + +Lately, he had half confessed to her what a nervousness she had +produced. "You make me dread the day when I'll hear somebody speaking of +you. You're getting me so upset about it that if I ever hear anybody so +much as say the name 'Alice Adams,' I'll run!" The confession was but +half of one because he laughed; and she took it for an assurance of +loyalty in the form of burlesque. + +She misunderstood: he laughed, but his nervousness was genuine. + +After any stroke of events, whether a happy one or a catastrophe, we +see that the materials for it were a long time gathering, and the only +marvel is that the stroke was not prophesied. What bore the air of fatal +coincidence may remain fatal indeed, to this later view; but, with the +haphazard aspect dispelled, there is left for scrutiny the same ancient +hint from the Infinite to the effect that since events have never yet +failed to be law-abiding, perhaps it were well for us to deduce that +they will continue to be so until further notice. + +. . . On the day that was to open the closed door in the background of +his pictures of Alice, Russell lunched with his relatives. There were +but the four people, Russell and Mildred and her mother and father, in +the great, cool dining-room. Arched French windows, shaded by awnings, +admitted a mellow light and looked out upon a green lawn ending in a +long conservatory, which revealed through its glass panes a carnival of +plants in luxuriant blossom. From his seat at the table, Russell +glanced out at this pretty display, and informed his cousins that he +was surprised. "You have such a glorious spread of flowers all over the +house," he said, "I didn't suppose you'd have any left out yonder. In +fact, I didn't know there were so many splendid flowers in the world." + +Mrs. Palmer, large, calm, fair, like her daughter, responded with a mild +reproach: "That's because you haven't been cousinly enough to get used +to them, Arthur. You've almost taught us to forget what you look like." + +In defense Russell waved a hand toward her husband. "You see, he's begun +to keep me so hard at work----" + +But Mr. Palmer declined the responsibility. "Up to four or five in the +afternoon, perhaps," he said. "After that, the young gentleman is as +much a stranger to me as he is to my family. I've been wondering who she +could be." + +"When a man's preoccupied there must be a lady then?" Russell inquired. + +"That seems to be the view of your sex," Mrs. Palmer suggested. "It was +my husband who said it, not Mildred or I." + +Mildred smiled faintly. "Papa may be singular in his ideas; they may +come entirely from his own experience, and have nothing to do with +Arthur." + +"Thank you, Mildred," her cousin said, bowing to her gratefully. "You +seem to understand my character--and your father's quite as well!" + +However, Mildred remained grave in the face of this customary +pleasantry, not because the old jest, worn round, like what preceded it, +rolled in an old groove, but because of some preoccupation of her own. +Her faint smile had disappeared, and, as her cousin's glance met hers, +she looked down; yet not before he had seen in her eyes the flicker of +something like a question--a question both poignant and dismayed. He may +have understood it; for his own smile vanished at once in favour of a +reciprocal solemnity. + +"You see, Arthur," Mrs. Palmer said, "Mildred is always a good cousin. +She and I stand by you, even if you do stay away from us for weeks and +weeks." Then, observing that he appeared to be so occupied with a bunch +of iced grapes upon his plate that he had not heard her, she began to +talk to her husband, asking him what was "going on down-town." + +Arthur continued to eat his grapes, but he ventured to look again at +Mildred after a few moments. She, also, appeared to be occupied with +a bunch of grapes though she ate none, and only pulled them from their +stems. She sat straight, her features as composed and pure as those of +a new marble saint in a cathedral niche; yet her downcast eyes seemed to +conceal many thoughts; and her cousin, against his will, was more aware +of what these thoughts might be than of the leisurely conversation +between her father and mother. All at once, however, he heard something +that startled him, and he listened--and here was the effect of all +Alice's forefendings; he listened from the first with a sinking heart. + +Mr. Palmer, mildly amused by what he was telling his wife, had just +spoken the words, "this Virgil Adams." What he had said was, "this +Virgil Adams--that's the man's name. Queer case." + +"Who told you?" Mrs. Palmer inquired, not much interested. + +"Alfred Lamb," her husband answered. "He was laughing about his father, +at the club. You see the old gentleman takes a great pride in his +judgment of men, and always boasted to his sons that he'd never in his +life made a mistake in trusting the wrong man. Now Alfred and James +Albert, Junior, think they have a great joke on him; and they've twitted +him so much about it he'll scarcely speak to them. From the first, +Alfred says, the old chap's only repartee was, 'You wait and you'll +see!' And they've asked him so often to show them what they're going to +see that he won't say anything at all!" + +"He's a funny old fellow," Mrs. Palmer observed. "But he's so shrewd I +can't imagine his being deceived for such a long time. Twenty years, you +said?" + +"Yes, longer than that, I understand. It appears when this man--this +Adams--was a young clerk, the old gentleman trusted him with one of his +business secrets, a glue process that Mr. Lamb had spent some money to +get hold of. The old chap thought this Adams was going to have quite +a future with the Lamb concern, and of course never dreamed he was +dishonest. Alfred says this Adams hasn't been of any real use for years, +and they should have let him go as dead wood, but the old gentleman +wouldn't hear of it, and insisted on his being kept on the payroll; so +they just decided to look on it as a sort of pension. Well, one morning +last March the man had an attack of some sort down there, and Mr. Lamb +got his own car out and went home with him, himself, and worried about +him and went to see him no end, all the time he was ill." + +"He would," Mrs. Palmer said, approvingly. "He's a kind-hearted +creature, that old man." + +Her husband laughed. "Alfred says he thinks his kind-heartedness +is about cured! It seems that as soon as the man got well again he +deliberately walked off with the old gentleman's glue secret. Just +calmly stole it! Alfred says he believes that if he had a stroke in the +office now, himself, his father wouldn't lift a finger to help him!" + +Mrs. Palmer repeated the name to herself thoughtfully. "'Adams'--'Virgil +Adams.' You said his name was Virgil Adams?" + +"Yes." + +She looked at her daughter. "Why, you know who that is, Mildred," she +said, casually. "It's that Alice Adams's father, isn't it? Wasn't his +name Virgil Adams?" + +"I think it is," Mildred said. + +Mrs. Palmer turned toward her husband. "You've seen this Alice Adams +here. Mr. Lamb's pet swindler must be her father." + +Mr. Palmer passed a smooth hand over his neat gray hair, which was not +disturbed by this effort to stimulate recollection. "Oh, yes," he said. +"Of course--certainly. Quite a good-looking girl--one of Mildred's +friends. How queer!" + +Mildred looked up, as if in a little alarm, but did not speak. Her +mother set matters straight. "Fathers ARE amusing," she said smilingly +to Russell, who was looking at her, though how fixedly she did not +notice; for she turned from him at once to enlighten her husband. "Every +girl who meets Mildred, and tries to push the acquaintance by coming +here until the poor child has to hide, isn't a FRIEND of hers, my dear!" + +Mildred's eyes were downcast again, and a faint colour rose in her +cheeks. "Oh, I shouldn't put it quite that way about Alice Adams," she +said, in a low voice. "I saw something of her for a time. She's not +unattractive in a way." + +Mrs. Palmer settled the whole case of Alice carelessly. "A pushing sort +of girl," she said. "A very pushing little person." + +"I----" Mildred began; and, after hesitating, concluded, "I rather +dropped her." + +"Fortunate you've done so," her father remarked, cheerfully. "Especially +since various members of the Lamb connection are here frequently. They +mightn't think you'd show great tact in having her about the place." He +laughed, and turned to his cousin. "All this isn't very interesting to +poor Arthur. How terrible people are with a newcomer in a town; they +talk as if he knew all about everybody!" + +"But we don't know anything about these queer people, ourselves," said +Mrs. Palmer. "We know something about the girl, of course--she used to +be a bit too conspicuous, in fact! However, as you say, we might find a +subject more interesting for Arthur." + +She smiled whimsically upon the young man. "Tell the truth," she said. +"Don't you fairly detest going into business with that tyrant yonder?" + +"What? Yes--I beg your pardon!" he stammered. + +"You were right," Mrs. Palmer said to her husband. "You've bored him so, +talking about thievish clerks, he can't even answer an honest question." + +But Russell was beginning to recover his outward composure. "Try me +again," he said. "I'm afraid I was thinking of something else." + +This was the best he found to say. There was a part of him that wanted +to protest and deny, but he had not heat enough, in the chill that had +come upon him. Here was the first "mention" of Alice, and with it the +reason why it was the first: Mr. Palmer had difficulty in recalling her, +and she happened to be spoken of, only because her father's betrayal of +a benefactor's trust had been so peculiarly atrocious that, in the view +of the benefactor's family, it contained enough of the element of humour +to warrant a mild laugh at a club. There was the deadliness of the +story: its lack of malice, even of resentment. Deadlier still were +Mrs. Palmer's phrases: "a pushing sort of girl," "a very pushing little +person," and "used to be a bit TOO conspicuous, in fact." But she spoke +placidly and by chance; being as obviously without unkindly motive as +Mr. Palmer was when he related the cause of Alfred Lamb's amusement. +Her opinion of the obscure young lady momentarily her topic had been +expressed, moreover, to her husband, and at her own table. She sat +there, large, kind, serene--a protest might astonish but could +not change her; and Russell, crumpling in his strained fingers the +lace-edged little web of a napkin on his knee, found heart enough to +grow red, but not enough to challenge her. + +She noticed his colour, and attributed it to the embarrassment of a +scrupulously gallant gentleman caught in a lapse of attention to a lady. +"Don't be disturbed," she said, benevolently. "People aren't expected to +listen all the time to their relatives. A high colour's very becoming +to you, Arthur; but it really isn't necessary between cousins. You can +always be informal enough with us to listen only when you care to." + +His complexion continued to be ruddier than usual, however, throughout +the meal, and was still somewhat tinted when Mrs. Palmer rose. "The +man's bringing you cigarettes here," she said, nodding to the two +gentlemen. "We'll give you a chance to do the sordid kind of talking we +know you really like. Afterwhile, Mildred will show you what's in bloom +in the hothouse, if you wish, Arthur." + +Mildred followed her, and, when they were alone in another of the +spacious rooms, went to a window and looked out, while her mother seated +herself near the center of the room in a gilt armchair, mellowed with +old Aubusson tapestry. Mrs. Palmer looked thoughtfully at her daughter's +back, but did not speak to her until coffee had been brought for them. + +"Thanks," Mildred said, not turning, "I don't care for any coffee, I +believe." + +"No?" Mrs. Palmer said, gently. "I'm afraid our good-looking cousin +won't think you're very talkative, Mildred. You spoke only about twice +at lunch. I shouldn't care for him to get the idea you're piqued because +he's come here so little lately, should you?" + +"No, I shouldn't," Mildred answered in a low voice, and with that she +turned quickly, and came to sit near her mother. "But it's what I am +afraid of! Mama, did you notice how red he got?" + +"You mean when he was caught not listening to a question of mine? Yes; +it's very becoming to him." + +"Mama, I don't think that was the reason. I don't think it was because +he wasn't listening, I mean." + +"No?" + +"I think his colour and his not listening came from the same reason," +Mildred said, and although she had come to sit near her mother, she +did not look at her. "I think it happened because you and papa----" She +stopped. + +"Yes?" Mrs. Palmer said, good-naturedly, to prompt her. "Your father and +I did something embarrassing?" + +"Mama, it was because of those things that came out about Alice Adams." + +"How could that bother Arthur? Does he know her?" + +"Don't you remember?" the daughter asked. "The day after my dance I +mentioned how odd I thought it was in him--I was a little disappointed +in him. I'd been seeing that he met everybody, of course, but she was +the only girl HE asked to meet; and he did it as soon as he noticed her. +I hadn't meant to have him meet her--in fact, I was rather sorry I'd +felt I had to ask her, because she oh, well, she's the sort that 'tries +for the new man,' if she has half a chance; and sometimes they seem +quite fascinated--for a time, that is. I thought Arthur was above +all that; or at the very least I gave him credit for being too +sophisticated." + +"I see," Mrs. Palmer said, thoughtfully. "I remember now that you spoke +of it. You said it seemed a little peculiar, but of course it really +wasn't: a 'new man' has nothing to go by, except his own first +impressions. You can't blame poor Arthur--she's quite a piquant looking +little person. You think he's seen something of her since then?" + +Mildred nodded slowly. "I never dreamed such a thing till yesterday, +and even then I rather doubted it--till he got so red, just now! I was +surprised when he asked to meet her, but he just danced with her once +and didn't mention her afterward; I forgot all about it--in fact, I +virtually forgot all about HER. I'd seen quite a little of her----" + +"Yes," said Mrs. Palmer. "She did keep coming here!" + +"But I'd just about decided that it really wouldn't do," Mildred went +on. "She isn't--well, I didn't admire her." + +"No," her mother assented, and evidently followed a direct connection +of thought in a speech apparently irrelevant. "I understand the young +Malone wants to marry Henrietta. I hope she won't; he seems rather a +gross type of person." + +"Oh, he's just one," Mildred said. "I don't know that he and Alice Adams +were ever engaged--she never told me so. She may not have been engaged +to any of them; she was just enough among the other girls to get talked +about--and one of the reasons I felt a little inclined to be nice to +her was that they seemed to be rather edging her out of the circle. It +wasn't long before I saw they were right, though. I happened to mention +I was going to give a dance and she pretended to take it as a matter +of course that I meant to invite her brother--at least, I thought she +pretended; she may have really believed it. At any rate, I had to send +him a card; but I didn't intend to be let in for that sort of thing +again, of course. She's what you said, 'pushing'; though I'm awfully +sorry you said it." + +"Why shouldn't I have said it, my dear?" + +"Of course I didn't say 'shouldn't.'" Mildred explained, gravely. "I +meant only that I'm sorry it happened." + +"Yes; but why?" + +"Mama"--Mildred turned to her, leaning forward and speaking in a lowered +voice--"Mama, at first the change was so little it seemed as if Arthur +hardly knew it himself. He'd been lovely to me always, and he was still +lovely to me but--oh, well, you've understood--after my dance it was +more as if it was just his nature and his training to be lovely to me, +as he would be to everyone a kind of politeness. He'd never said he +CARED for me, but after that I could see he didn't. It was clear--after +that. I didn't know what had happened; I couldn't think of anything I'd +done. Mama--it was Alice Adams." + +Mrs. Palmer set her little coffee-cup upon the table beside her, calmly +following her own motion with her eyes, and not seeming to realize with +what serious entreaty her daughter's gaze was fixed upon her. Mildred +repeated the last sentence of her revelation, and introduced a stress of +insistence. + +"Mama, it WAS Alice Adams!" + +But Mrs. Palmer declined to be greatly impressed, so far as her +appearance went, at least; and to emphasize her refusal, she smiled +indulgently. "What makes you think so?" + +"Henrietta told me yesterday." + +At this Mrs. Palmer permitted herself to laugh softly aloud. "Good +heavens! Is Henrietta a soothsayer? Or is she Arthur's particular +confidante?" + +"No. Ella Dowling told her." + +Mrs. Palmer's laughter continued. "Now we have it!" she exclaimed. "It's +a game of gossip: Arthur tells Ella, Ella tells Henrietta, and Henrietta +tells----" + +"Don't laugh, please, mama," Mildred begged. "Of course Arthur didn't +tell anybody. It's roundabout enough, but it's true. I know it! I +hadn't quite believed it, but I knew it was true when he got so red. He +looked--oh, for a second or so he looked--stricken! He thought I didn't +notice it. Mama, he's been to see her almost every evening lately. They +take long walks together. That's why he hasn't been here." + +Of Mrs. Palmer's laughter there was left only her indulgent smile, which +she had not allowed to vanish. "Well, what of it?" she said. + +"Mama!" + +"Yes," said Mrs. Palmer. "What of it?" + +"But don't you see?" Mildred's well-tutored voice, though modulated and +repressed even in her present emotion, nevertheless had a tendency to +quaver. "It's true. Frank Dowling was going to see her one evening and +he saw Arthur sitting on the stoop with her, and didn't go in. And Ella +used to go to school with a girl who lives across the street from here. +She told Ella----" + +"Oh, I understand," Mrs. Palmer interrupted. "Suppose he does go there. +My dear, I said, 'What of it?'" + +"I don't see what you mean, mama. I'm so afraid he might think we knew +about it, and that you and papa said those things about her and her +father on that account--as if we abused them because he goes there +instead of coming here." + +"Nonsense!" Mrs. Palmer rose, went to a window, and, turning there, +stood with her back to it, facing her daughter and looking at her +cheerfully. "Nonsense, my dear! It was perfectly clear that she was +mentioned by accident, and so was her father. What an extraordinary man! +If Arthur makes friends with people like that, he certainly knows better +than to expect to hear favourable opinions of them. Besides, it's only a +little passing thing with him." + +"Mama! When he goes there almost every----" + +"Yes," Mrs. Palmer said, dryly. "It seems to me I've heard somewhere +that other young men have gone there 'almost every!' She doesn't +last, apparently. Arthur's gallant, and he's impressionable--but +he's fastidious, and fastidiousness is always the check on +impressionableness. A girl belongs to her family, too--and this one does +especially, it strikes me! Arthur's very sensible; he sees more than +you'd think." + +Mildred looked at her hopefully. "Then you don't believe he's likely to +imagine we said those things of her in any meaning way?" + +At this, Mrs. Palmer laughed again. "There's one thing you seem not to +have noticed, Mildred." + +"What's that?" + +"It seems to have escaped your attention that he never said a word." + +"Mightn't that mean----?" Mildred began, but she stopped. + +"No, it mightn't," her mother replied, comprehending easily. "On the +contrary, it might mean that instead of his feeling it too deeply to +speak, he was getting a little illumination." + +Mildred rose and came to her. "WHY do you suppose he never told us he +went there? Do you think he's--do you think he's pleased with her, and +yet ashamed of it? WHY do you suppose he's never spoken of it?" + +"Ah, that," Mrs. Palmer said,--"that might possibly be her own doing. +If it is, she's well paid by what your father and I said, because we +wouldn't have said it if we'd known that Arthur----" She checked herself +quickly. Looking over her daughter's shoulder, she saw the two gentlemen +coming from the corridor toward the wide doorway of the room; and she +greeted them cheerfully. "If you've finished with each other for a +while," she added, "Arthur may find it a relief to put his thoughts on +something prettier than a trust company--and more fragrant." + +Arthur came to Mildred. + +"Your mother said at lunch that perhaps you'd----" + +"I didn't say 'perhaps,' Arthur," Mrs. Palmer interrupted, to correct +him. "I said she would. If you care to see and smell those lovely things +out yonder, she'll show them to you. Run along, children!" + + +Half an hour later, glancing from a window, she saw them come from +the hothouses and slowly cross the lawn. Arthur had a fine rose in his +buttonhole and looked profoundly thoughtful. + + + +CHAPTER XXI + +That morning and noon had been warm, though the stirrings of a feeble +breeze made weather not flagrantly intemperate; but at about three +o'clock in the afternoon there came out of the southwest a heat like an +affliction sent upon an accursed people, and the air was soon dead of +it. Dripping negro ditch-diggers whooped with satires praising hell and +hot weather, as the tossing shovels flickered up to the street level, +where sluggish male pedestrians carried coats upon hot arms, and +fanned themselves with straw hats, or, remaining covered, wore soaked +handkerchiefs between scalp and straw. Clerks drooped in silent, big +department stores, stenographers in offices kept as close to electric +fans as the intervening bulk of their employers would let them; guests +in hotels left the lobbies and went to lie unclad upon their beds; while +in hospitals the patients murmured querulously against the heat, and +perhaps against some noisy motorist who strove to feel the air by +splitting it, not troubled by any foreboding that he, too, that hour +next week, might need quiet near a hospital. The "hot spell" was a +true spell, one upon men's spirits; for it was so hot that, in suburban +outskirts, golfers crept slowly back over the low undulations of their +club lands, abandoning their matches and returning to shelter. + +Even on such a day, sizzling work had to be done, as in winter. There +were glowing furnaces to be stoked, liquid metals to be poured; but such +tasks found seasoned men standing to them; and in all the city probably +no brave soul challenged the heat more gamely than Mrs. Adams did, when, +in a corner of her small and fiery kitchen, where all day long her +hired African immune cooked fiercely, she pressed her husband's evening +clothes with a hot iron. No doubt she risked her life, but she risked +it cheerfully in so good and necessary a service for him. She would have +given her life for him at any time, and both his and her own for her +children. + +Unconscious of her own heroism, she was surprised to find herself rather +faint when she finished her ironing. However, she took heart to believe +that the clothes looked better, in spite of one or two scorched places; +and she carried them upstairs to her husband's room before increasing +blindness forced her to grope for the nearest chair. Then, trying to +rise and walk, without having sufficiently recovered, she had to sit +down again; but after a little while she was able to get upon her feet; +and, keeping her hand against the wall, moved successfully to the door +of her own room. Here she wavered; might have gone down, had she not +been stimulated by the thought of how much depended upon her;--she made +a final great effort, and floundered across the room to her bureau, +where she kept some simple restoratives. They served her need, or her +faith in them did; and she returned to her work. + +She went down the stairs, keeping a still tremulous hand upon the rail; +but she smiled brightly when Alice looked up from below, where the +woodwork was again being tormented with superfluous attentions. + +"Alice, DON'T!" her mother said, commiseratingly. "You did all that this +morning and it looks lovely. What's the use of wearing yourself out on +it? You ought to be lying down, so's to look fresh for to-night." + +"Hadn't you better lie down yourself?" the daughter returned. "Are you +ill, mama?" + +"Certainly not. What in the world makes you think so?" + +"You look pretty pale," Alice said, and sighed heavily. "It makes me +ashamed, having you work so hard--for me." + +"How foolish! I think it's fun, getting ready to entertain a little +again, like this. I only wish it hadn't turned so hot: I'm afraid your +poor father'll suffer--his things are pretty heavy, I noticed. Well, +it'll do him good to bear something for style's sake this once, anyhow!" +She laughed, and coming to Alice, bent down and kissed her. "Dearie," +she said, tenderly, "wouldn't you please slip upstairs now and take just +a little teeny nap to please your mother?" + +But Alice responded only by moving her head slowly, in token of refusal. + +"Do!" Mrs. Adams urged. "You don't want to look worn out, do you?" + +"I'll LOOK all right," Alice said, huskily. "Do you like the way I've +arranged the furniture now? I've tried all the different ways it'll go." + +"It's lovely," her mother said, admiringly. "I thought the last way you +had it was pretty, too. But you know best; I never knew anybody with so +much taste. If you'd only just quit now, and take a little rest----" + +"There'd hardly be time, even if I wanted to; it's after five but I +couldn't; really, I couldn't. How do you think we can manage about +Walter--to see that he wears his evening things, I mean?" + +Mrs. Adams pondered. "I'm afraid he'll make a lot of objections, on +account of the weather and everything. I wish we'd had a chance to +tell him last night or this morning. I'd have telephoned to him this +afternoon except--well, I scarcely like to call him up at that place, +since your father----" + +"No, of course not, mama." + +"If Walter gets home late," Mrs. Adams went on, "I'll just slip out and +speak to him, in case Mr. Russell's here before he comes. I'll just tell +him he's got to hurry and get his things on." + +"Maybe he won't come home to dinner," Alice suggested, rather hopefully. +"Sometimes he doesn't." + +"No; I think he'll be here. When he doesn't come he usually telephones +by this time to say not to wait for him; he's very thoughtful about +that. Well, it really is getting late: I must go and tell her she ought +to be preparing her fillet. Dearie, DO rest a little." + +"You'd much better do that yourself," Alice called after her, but Mrs. +Adams shook her head cheerily, not pausing on her way to the fiery +kitchen. + +Alice continued her useless labours for a time; then carried her bucket +to the head of the cellar stairway, where she left it upon the top step; +and, closing the door, returned to the "living-room;" Again she changed +the positions of the old plush rocking-chairs, moving them into the +corners where she thought they might be least noticeable; and while +thus engaged she was startled by a loud ringing of the door-bell. For +a moment her face was panic-stricken, and she stood staring, then +she realized that Russell would not arrive for another hour, at the +earliest, and recovering her equipoise, went to the door. + +Waiting there, in a languid attitude, was a young coloured woman, with +a small bundle under her arm and something malleable in her mouth. +"Listen," she said. "You folks expectin' a coloured lady?" + +"No," said Alice. "Especially not at the front door." + +"Listen," the coloured woman said again. "Listen. Say, listen. Ain't +they another coloured lady awready here by the day? Listen. Ain't Miz +Malena Burns here by the day this evenin'? Say, listen. This the number +house she give ME." + +"Are you the waitress?" Alice asked, dismally. + +"Yes'm, if Malena here." + +"Malena is here," Alice said, and hesitated; but she decided not to +send the waitress to the back door; it might be a risk. She let her in. +"What's your name?" + +"Me? I'm name' Gertrude. Miss Gertrude Collamus." + +"Did you bring a cap and apron?" + +Gertrude took the little bundle from under her arm. "Yes'm. I'm all +fix'." + +"I've already set the table," Alice said. "I'll show you what we want +done." + +She led the way to the dining-room, and, after offering some instruction +there, received by Gertrude with languor and a slowly moving jaw, she +took her into the kitchen, where the cap and apron were put on. The +effect was not fortunate; Gertrude's eyes were noticeably bloodshot, +an affliction made more apparent by the white cap; and Alice drew her +mother apart, whispering anxiously, + +"Do you suppose it's too late to get someone else?" + +"I'm afraid it is," Mrs. Adams said. "Malena says it was hard enough to +get HER! You have to pay them so much that they only work when they feel +like it." + +"Mama, could you ask her to wear her cap straighter? Every time she +moves her head she gets it on one side, and her skirt's too long behind +and too short in front--and oh, I've NEVER seen such FEET!" Alice +laughed desolately. "And she MUST quit that terrible chewing!" + +"Never mind; I'll get to work with her. I'll straighten her out all I +can, dearie; don't worry." Mrs. Adams patted her daughter's shoulder +encouragingly. "Now YOU can't do another thing, and if you don't run and +begin dressing you won't be ready. It'll only take me a minute to dress, +myself, and I'll be down long before you will. Run, darling! I'll look +after everything." + +Alice nodded vaguely, went up to her room, and, after only a moment with +her mirror, brought from her closet the dress of white organdie she +had worn the night when she met Russell for the first time. She laid it +carefully upon her bed, and began to make ready to put it on. Her mother +came in, half an hour later, to "fasten" her. + +"I'M all dressed," Mrs. Adams said, briskly. "Of course it doesn't +matter. He won't know what the rest of us even look like: How could he? +I know I'm an old SIGHT, but all I want is to look respectable. Do I?" + +"You look like the best woman in the world; that's all!" Alice said, +with a little gulp. + +Her mother laughed and gave her a final scrutiny. "You might use just +a tiny bit more colour, dearie--I'm afraid the excitement's made you a +little pale. And you MUST brighten up! There's sort of a look in your +eyes as if you'd got in a trance and couldn't get out. You've had it all +day. I must run: your father wants me to help him with his studs. Walter +hasn't come yet, but I'll look after him; don't worry, And you better +HURRY, dearie, if you're going to take any time fixing the flowers on +the table." + +She departed, while Alice sat at the mirror again, to follow her advice +concerning a "tiny bit more colour." Before she had finished, her father +knocked at the door, and, when she responded, came in. He was dressed +in the clothes his wife had pressed; but he had lost substantially in +weight since they were made for him; no one would have thought that they +had been pressed. They hung from him voluminously, seeming to be the +clothes of a larger man. + +"Your mother's gone downstairs," he said, in a voice of distress. + +"One of the buttonholes in my shirt is too large and I can't keep the +dang thing fastened. _I_ don't know what to do about it! I only got one +other white shirt, and it's kind of ruined: I tried it before I did this +one. Do you s'pose you could do anything?" + +"I'll see," she said. + +"My collar's got a frayed edge," he complained, as she examined his +troublesome shirt. "It's a good deal like wearing a saw; but I expect +it'll wilt down flat pretty soon, and not bother me long. I'm liable to +wilt down flat, myself, I expect; I don't know as I remember any such +hot night in the last ten or twelve years." He lifted his head and +sniffed the flaccid air, which was laden with a heavy odour. "My, but +that smell is pretty strong!" he said. + +"Stand still, please, papa," Alice begged him. "I can't see what's the +matter if you move around. How absurd you are about your old glue smell, +papa! There isn't a vestige of it, of course." + +"I didn't mean glue," he informed her. "I mean cabbage. Is that +fashionable now, to have cabbage when there's company for dinner?" + +"That isn't cabbage, papa. It's Brussels sprouts." + +"Oh, is it? I don't mind it much, because it keeps that glue smell off +me, but it's fairly strong. I expect you don't notice it so much because +you been in the house with it all along, and got used to it while it was +growing." + +"It is pretty dreadful," Alice said. "Are all the windows open +downstairs?" + +"I'll go down and see, if you'll just fix that hole up for me." + +"I'm afraid I can't," she said. "Not unless you take your shirt off and +bring it to me. I'll have to sew the hole smaller." + +"Oh, well, I'll go ask your mother to----" + +"No," said Alice. "She's got everything on her hands. Run and take it +off. Hurry, papa; I've got to arrange the flowers on the table before he +comes." + +He went away, and came back presently, half undressed, bringing the +shirt. "There's ONE comfort," he remarked, pensively, as she worked. +"I've got that collar off--for a while, anyway. I wish I could go to +table like this; I could stand it a good deal better. Do you seem to be +making any headway with the dang thing?" + +"I think probably I can----" + +Downstairs the door-bell rang, and Alice's arms jerked with the shock. + +"Golly!" her father said. "Did you stick your finger with that fool +needle?" + +She gave him a blank stare. "He's come!" + +She was not mistaken, for, upon the little veranda, Russell stood facing +the closed door at last. However, it remained closed for a considerable +time after he rang. Inside the house the warning summons of the bell was +immediately followed by another sound, audible to Alice and her father +as a crash preceding a series of muffled falls. Then came a distant +voice, bitter in complaint. + +"Oh, Lord!" said Adams. "What's that?" + +Alice went to the top of the front stairs, and her mother appeared in +the hall below. + +"Mama!" + +Mrs. Adams looked up. "It's all right," she said, in a loud whisper. +"Gertrude fell down the cellar stairs. Somebody left a bucket there, +and----" She was interrupted by a gasp from Alice, and hastened to +reassure her. "Don't worry, dearie. She may limp a little, but----" + +Adams leaned over the banisters. "Did she break anything?" he asked. + +"Hush!" his wife whispered. "No. She seems upset and angry about it, +more than anything else; but she's rubbing herself, and she'll be all +right in time to bring in the little sandwiches. Alice! Those flowers!" + +"I know, mama. But----" + +"Hurry!" Mrs. Adams warned her. "Both of you hurry! I MUST let him in!" + +She turned to the door, smiling cordially, even before she opened it. +"Do come right in, Mr. Russell," she said, loudly, lifting her voice +for additional warning to those above. "I'm SO glad to receive you +informally, this way, in our own little home. There's a hat-rack here +under the stairway," she continued, as Russell, murmuring some response, +came into the hall. "I'm afraid you'll think it's almost TOO informal, +my coming to the door, but unfortunately our housemaid's just had a +little accident--oh, nothing to mention! I just thought we better +not keep you waiting any longer. Will you step into our living-room, +please?" + +She led the way between the two small columns, and seated herself in one +of the plush rocking-chairs, selecting it because Alice had once pointed +out that the chairs, themselves, were less noticeable when they had +people sitting in them. "Do sit down, Mr. Russell; it's so very warm +it's really quite a trial just to stand up!" + +"Thank you," he said, as he took a seat. "Yes. It is quite warm." And +this seemed to be the extent of his responsiveness for the moment. +He was grave, rather pale; and Mrs. Adams's impression of him, as +she formed it then, was of "a distinguished-looking young man, really +elegant in the best sense of the word, but timid and formal when he +first meets you." She beamed upon him, and used with everything she said +a continuous accompaniment of laughter, meaningless except that it was +meant to convey cordiality. "Of course we DO have a great deal of warm +weather," she informed him. "I'm glad it's so much cooler in the house +than it is outdoors." + +"Yes," he said. "It is pleasanter indoors." And, stopping with this +single untruth, he permitted himself the briefest glance about the room; +then his eyes returned to his smiling hostess. + +"Most people make a great fuss about hot weather," she said. "The only +person I know who doesn't mind the heat the way other people do is +Alice. She always seems as cool as if we had a breeze blowing, no matter +how hot it is. But then she's so amiable she never minds anything. It's +just her character. She's always been that way since she was a little +child; always the same to everybody, high and low. I think character's +the most important thing in the world, after all, don't you, Mr. +Russell?" + +"Yes," he said, solemnly; and touched his bedewed white forehead with a +handkerchief. + +"Indeed it is," she agreed with herself, never failing to continue her +murmur of laughter. "That's what I've always told Alice; but she never +sees anything good in herself, and she just laughs at me when I praise +her. She sees good in everybody ELSE in the world, no matter how +unworthy they are, or how they behave toward HER; but she always +underestimates herself. From the time she was a little child she was +always that way. When some other little girl would behave selfishly or +meanly toward her, do you think she'd come and tell me? Never a word +to anybody! The little thing was too proud! She was the same way about +school. The teachers had to tell me when she took a prize; she'd bring +it home and keep it in her room without a word about it to her father +and mother. Now, Walter was just the other way. Walter would----" But +here Mrs. Adams checked herself, though she increased the volume of +her laughter. "How silly of me!" she exclaimed. "I expect you know how +mothers ARE, though, Mr. Russell. Give us a chance and we'll talk about +our children forever! Alice would feel terribly if she knew how I've +been going on about her to you." + +In this Mrs. Adams was right, though she did not herself suspect it, +and upon an almost inaudible word or two from him she went on with her +topic. "Of course my excuse is that few mothers have a daughter like +Alice. I suppose we all think the same way about our children, but SOME +of us must be right when we feel we've got the best. Don't you think +so?" + +"Yes. Yes, indeed." + +"I'm sure _I_ am!" she laughed. "I'll let the others speak for +themselves." She paused reflectively. "No; I think a mother knows +when she's got a treasure in her family. If she HASN'T got one, she'll +pretend she has, maybe; but if she has, she knows it. I certainly +know _I_ have. She's always been what people call 'the joy of the +household'--always cheerful, no matter what went wrong, and always ready +to smooth things over with some bright, witty saying. You must be sure +not to TELL we've had this little chat about her--she'd just be furious +with me--but she IS such a dear child! You won't tell her, will you?" + +"No," he said, and again applied the handkerchief to his forehead for an +instant. "No, I'll----" He paused, and finished lamely: "I'll--not tell +her." + +Thus reassured, Mrs. Adams set before him some details of her daughter's +popularity at sixteen, dwelling upon Alice's impartiality among her +young suitors: "She never could BEAR to hurt their feelings, and always +treated all of them just alike. About half a dozen of them were just +BOUND to marry her! Naturally, her father and I considered any such idea +ridiculous; she was too young, of course." + +Thus the mother went on with her biographical sketches, while the pale +young man sat facing her under the hard overhead light of a white globe, +set to the ceiling; and listened without interrupting. She was glad to +have the chance to tell him a few things about Alice he might not +have guessed for himself, and, indeed, she had planned to find such an +opportunity, if she could; but this was getting to be altogether too +much of one, she felt. As time passed, she was like an actor who must +improvise to keep the audience from perceiving that his fellow-players +have missed their cues; but her anxiety was not betrayed to the still +listener; she had a valiant soul. + +Alice, meanwhile, had arranged her little roses on the table in as many +ways, probably, as there were blossoms; and she was still at it when +her father arrived in the dining-room by way of the back stairs and the +kitchen. + +"It's pulled out again," he said. "But I guess there's no help for it +now; it's too late, and anyway it lets some air into me when it bulges. +I can sit so's it won't be noticed much, I expect. Isn't it time you +quit bothering about the looks of the table? Your mother's been talking +to him about half an hour now, and I had the idea he came on your +account, not hers. Hadn't you better go and----" + +"Just a minute." Alice said, piteously. "Do YOU think it looks all +right?" + +"The flowers? Fine! Hadn't you better leave 'em the way they are, +though?" + +"Just a minute," she begged again. "Just ONE minute, papa!" And she +exchanged a rose in front of Russell's plate for one that seemed to her +a little larger. + +"You better come on," Adams said, moving to the door. + +"Just ONE more second, papa." She shook her head, lamenting. "Oh, I wish +we'd rented some silver!" + +"Why?" + +"Because so much of the plating has rubbed off a lot of it. JUST a +second, papa." And as she spoke she hastily went round the table, +gathering the knives and forks and spoons that she thought had their +plating best preserved, and exchanging them for more damaged pieces at +Russell's place. "There!" she sighed, finally. + +"Now I'll come." But at the door she paused to look back dubiously, over +her shoulder. + +"What's the matter now?" + +"The roses. I believe after all I shouldn't have tried that vine effect; +I ought to have kept them in water, in the vase. It's so hot, they +already begin to look a little wilted, out on the dry tablecloth like +that. I believe I'll----" + +"Why, look here, Alice!" he remonstrated, as she seemed disposed to turn +back. "Everything'll burn up on the stove if you keep on----" + +"Oh, well," she said, "the vase was terribly ugly; I can't do any +better. We'll go in." But with her hand on the door-knob she paused. +"No, papa. We mustn't go in by this door. It might look as if----" + +"As if what?" + +"Never mind," she said. "Let's go the other way." + +"I don't see what difference it makes," he grumbled, but nevertheless +followed her through the kitchen, and up the back stairs then through +the upper hallway. At the top of the front stairs she paused for a +moment, drawing a deep breath; and then, before her father's puzzled +eyes, a transformation came upon her. + +Her shoulders, like her eyelids, had been drooping, but now she threw +her head back: the shoulders straightened, and the lashes lifted over +sparkling eyes; vivacity came to her whole body in a flash; and she +tripped down the steps, with her pretty hands rising in time to the +lilting little tune she had begun to hum. + +At the foot of the stairs, one of those pretty hands extended itself at +full arm's length toward Russell, and continued to be extended until it +reached his own hand as he came to meet her. "How terrible of me!" she +exclaimed. "To be so late coming down! And papa, too--I think you know +each other." + +Her father was advancing toward the young man, expecting to shake hands +with him, but Alice stood between them, and Russell, a little flushed, +bowed to him gravely over her shoulder, without looking at him; +whereupon Adams, slightly disconcerted, put his hands in his pockets and +turned to his wife. + +"I guess dinner's more'n ready," he said. "We better go sit down." + +But she shook her head at him fiercely, "Wait!" she whispered. + +"What for? For Walter?" + +"No; he can't be coming," she returned, hurriedly, and again warned him +by a shake of her head. "Be quiet!" + +"Oh, well----" he muttered. + +"Sit down!" + +He was thoroughly mystified, but obeyed her gesture and went to the +rocking-chair in the opposite corner, where he sat down, and, with an +expression of meek inquiry, awaited events. + +Meanwhile, Alice prattled on: "It's really not a fault of mine, +being tardy. The shameful truth is I was trying to hurry papa. He's +incorrigible: he stays so late at his terrible old factory--terrible new +factory, I should say. I hope you don't HATE us for making you dine with +us in such fearful weather! I'm nearly dying of the heat, myself, so you +have a fellow-sufferer, if that pleases you. Why is it we always bear +things better if we think other people have to stand them, too?" And she +added, with an excited laugh: "SILLY of us, don't you think?" + +Gertrude had just made her entrance from the dining-room, bearing a +tray. She came slowly, with an air of resentment; and her skirt still +needed adjusting, while her lower jaw moved at intervals, though not +now upon any substance, but reminiscently, of habit. She halted before +Adams, facing him. + +He looked plaintive. "What you want o' me?" he asked. + +For response, she extended the tray toward him with a gesture of +indifference; but he still appeared to be puzzled. "What in the +world----?" he began, then caught his wife's eye, and had presence of +mind enough to take a damp and plastic sandwich from the tray. "Well, +I'll TRY one," he said, but a moment later, as he fulfilled this +promise, an expression of intense dislike came upon his features, and +he would have returned the sandwich to Gertrude. However, as she +had crossed the room to Mrs. Adams he checked the gesture, and sat +helplessly, with the sandwich in his hand. He made another effort to +get rid of it as the waitress passed him, on her way back to the +dining-room, but she appeared not to observe him, and he continued to be +troubled by it. + +Alice was a loyal daughter. "These are delicious, mama," she said; and +turning to Russell, "You missed it; you should have taken one. Too +bad we couldn't have offered you what ought to go with it, of course, +but----" + +She was interrupted by the second entrance of Gertrude, who announced, +"Dinner serve'," and retired from view. + +"Well, well!" Adams said, rising from his chair, with relief. "That's +good! Let's go see if we can eat it." And as the little group moved +toward the open door of the dining-room he disposed of his sandwich by +dropping it in the empty fireplace. + +Alice, glancing back over her shoulder, was the only one who saw him, +and she shuddered in spite of herself. Then, seeing that he looked at +her entreatingly, as if he wanted to explain that he was doing the best +he could, she smiled upon him sunnily, and began to chatter to Russell +again. + + + +CHAPTER XXII + +Alice kept her sprightly chatter going when they sat down, though the +temperature of the room and the sight of hot soup might have discouraged +a less determined gayety. Moreover, there were details as unpropitious +as the heat: the expiring roses expressed not beauty but pathos, and +what faint odour they exhaled was no rival to the lusty emanations of +the Brussels sprouts; at the head of the table, Adams, sitting low in +his chair, appeared to be unable to flatten the uprising wave of +his starched bosom; and Gertrude's manner and expression were of a +recognizable hostility during the long period of vain waiting for the +cups of soup to be emptied. Only Mrs. Adams made any progress in this +direction; the others merely feinting, now and then lifting their spoons +as if they intended to do something with them. + +Alice's talk was little more than cheerful sound, but, to fill a +desolate interval, served its purpose; and her mother supported her +with ever-faithful cooings of applausive laughter. "What a funny thing +weather is!" the girl ran on. "Yesterday it was cool--angels had charge +of it--and to-day they had an engagement somewhere else, so the devil +saw his chance and started to move the equator to the North Pole; but by +the time he got half-way, he thought of something else he wanted to do, +and went off; and left the equator here, right on top of US! I wish he'd +come back and get it!" + +"Why, Alice dear!" her mother cried, fondly. "What an imagination! Not +a very pious one, I'm afraid Mr. Russell might think, though!" Here she +gave Gertrude a hidden signal to remove the soup; but, as there was +no response, she had to make the signal more conspicuous. Gertrude was +leaning against the wall, her chin moving like a slow pendulum, her +streaked eyes fixed mutinously upon Russell. Mrs. Adams nodded several +times, increasing the emphasis of her gesture, while Alice talked +briskly; but the brooding waitress continued to brood. A faint snap of +the fingers failed to disturb her; nor was a covert hissing whisper of +avail, and Mrs. Adams was beginning to show signs of strain when her +daughter relieved her. + +"Imagine our trying to eat anything so hot as soup on a night like +this!" Alice laughed. "What COULD have been in the cook's mind not to +give us something iced and jellied instead? Of course it's because she's +equatorial, herself, originally, and only feels at home when Mr. Satan +moves it north." She looked round at Gertrude, who stood behind her. "Do +take this dreadful soup away!" + +Thus directly addressed, Gertrude yielded her attention, though +unwillingly, and as if she decided only by a hair's weight not to +revolt, instead. However, she finally set herself in slow motion; but +overlooked the supposed head of the table, seeming to be unaware of +the sweltering little man who sat there. As she disappeared toward +the kitchen with but three of the cups upon her tray he turned to look +plaintively after her, and ventured an attempt to recall her. + +"Here!" he said, in a low voice. "Here, you!" + +"What is it, Virgil?" his wife asked. + +"What's her name?" + +Mrs. Adams gave him a glance of sudden panic, and, seeing that the +guest of the evening was not looking at her, but down at the white cloth +before him, she frowned hard, and shook her head. + +Unfortunately Alice was not observing her mother, and asked, innocently: +"What's whose name, papa?" + +"Why, this young darky woman," he explained. "She left mine." + +"Never mind," Alice laughed. "There's hope for you, papa. She hasn't +gone forever!" + +"I don't know about that," he said, not content with this impulsive +assurance. "She LOOKED like she is." And his remark, considered as a +prediction, had begun to seem warranted before Gertrude's return with +china preliminary to the next stage of the banquet. + +Alice proved herself equal to the long gap, and rattled on through it +with a spirit richly justifying her mother's praise of her as "always +ready to smooth things over"; for here was more than long delay to be +smoothed over. She smoothed over her father and mother for Russell; and +she smoothed over him for them, though he did not know it, and remained +unaware of what he owed her. With all this, throughout her prattlings, +the girl's bright eyes kept seeking his with an eager gayety, which but +little veiled both interrogation and entreaty--as if she asked: "Is it +too much for you? Can't you bear it? Won't you PLEASE bear it? I would +for you. Won't you give me a sign that it's all right?" + +He looked at her but fleetingly, and seemed to suffer from the heat, in +spite of every manly effort not to wipe his brow too often. His colour, +after rising when he greeted Alice and her father, had departed, leaving +him again moistly pallid; a condition arising from discomfort, no doubt, +but, considered as a decoration, almost poetically becoming to him. +Not less becoming was the faint, kindly smile, which showed his wish to +express amusement and approval; and yet it was a smile rather strained +and plaintive, as if he, like Adams, could only do the best he could. + +He pleased Adams, who thought him a fine young man, and decidedly +the quietest that Alice had ever shown to her family. In her father's +opinion this was no small merit; and it was to Russell's credit, too, +that he showed embarrassment upon this first intimate presentation; here +was an applicant with both reserve and modesty. "So far, he seems to be +first rate a mighty fine young man," Adams thought; and, prompted by no +wish to part from Alice but by reminiscences of apparent candidates less +pleasing, he added, "At last!" + +Alice's liveliness never flagged. Her smoothing over of things was an +almost continuous performance, and had to be. Yet, while she chattered +through the hot and heavy courses, the questions she asked herself +were as continuous as the performance, and as poignant as what her eyes +seemed to be asking Russell. Why had she not prevailed over her mother's +fear of being "skimpy?" Had she been, indeed, as her mother said she +looked, "in a trance?" But above all: What was the matter with HIM? What +had happened? For she told herself with painful humour that something +even worse than this dinner must be "the matter with him." + +The small room, suffocated with the odour of boiled sprouts, grew hotter +and hotter as more and more food appeared, slowly borne in, between +deathly long waits, by the resentful, loud-breathing Gertrude. And while +Alice still sought Russell's glance, and read the look upon his face +a dozen different ways, fearing all of them; and while the straggling +little flowers died upon the stained cloth, she felt her heart grow as +heavy as the food, and wondered that it did not die like the roses. + +With the arrival of coffee, the host bestirred himself to make known a +hospitable regret, "By George!" he said. "I meant to buy some cigars." +He addressed himself apologetically to the guest. "I don't know what I +was thinking about, to forget to bring some home with me. I don't use +'em myself--unless somebody hands me one, you might say. I've always +been a pipe-smoker, pure and simple, but I ought to remembered for kind +of an occasion like this." + +"Not at all," Russell said. "I'm not smoking at all lately; but when I +do, I'm like you, and smoke a pipe." + +Alice started, remembering what she had told him when he overtook her on +her way from the tobacconist's; but, after a moment, looking at him, +she decided that he must have forgotten it. If he had remembered, she +thought, he could not have helped glancing at her. On the contrary, he +seemed more at ease, just then, than he had since they sat down, for he +was favouring her father with a thoughtful attention as Adams responded +to the introduction of a man's topic into the conversation at last. +"Well, Mr. Russell, I guess you're right, at that. I don't say but what +cigars may be all right for a man that can afford 'em, if he likes 'em +better than a pipe, but you take a good old pipe now----" + +He continued, and was getting well into the eulogium customarily +provoked by this theme, when there came an interruption: the door-bell +rang, and he paused inquiringly, rather surprised. + +Mrs. Adams spoke to Gertrude in an undertone: + +"Just say, 'Not at home.'" + +"What?" + +"If it's callers, just say we're not at home." + +Gertrude spoke out freely: "You mean you astin' me to 'tend you' front +do' fer you?" + +She seemed both incredulous and affronted, but Mrs. Adams persisted, +though somewhat apprehensively. "Yes. Hurry--uh--please. Just say we're +not at home if you please." + +Again Gertrude obviously hesitated between compliance and revolt, and +again the meeker course fortunately prevailed with her. She gave Mrs. +Adams a stare, grimly derisive, then departed. When she came back she +said: + +"He say he wait." + +"But I told you to tell anybody we were not at home," Mrs Adams +returned. "Who is it?" + +"Say he name Mr. Law." + +"We don't know any Mr. Law." + +"Yes'm; he know you. Say he anxious to speak Mr. Adams. Say he wait." + +"Tell him Mr. Adams is engaged." + +"Hold on a minute," Adams intervened. "Law? No. I don't know any Mr. +Law. You sure you got the name right?" + +"Say he name Law," Gertrude replied, looking at the ceiling to express +her fatigue. "Law. 'S all he tell me; 's all I know." + +Adams frowned. "Law," he said. "Wasn't it maybe 'Lohr?'" + +"Law," Gertrude repeated. "'S all he tell me; 's all I know." + +"What's he look like?" + +"He ain't much," she said. "'Bout you' age; got brustly white moustache, +nice eye-glasses." + +"It's Charley Lohr!" Adams exclaimed. "I'll go see what he wants." + +"But, Virgil," his wife remonstrated, "do finish your coffee; he might +stay all evening. Maybe he's come to call." + +Adams laughed. "He isn't much of a caller, I expect. Don't worry: I'll +take him up to my room." And turning toward Russell, "Ah--if you'll just +excuse me," he said; and went out to his visitor. + +When he had gone, Mrs. Adams finished her coffee, and, having glanced +intelligently from her guest to her daughter, she rose. "I think perhaps +I ought to go and shake hands with Mr. Lohr, myself," she said, adding +in explanation to Russell, as she reached the door, "He's an old friend +of my husband's and it's a very long time since he's been here." + +Alice nodded and smiled to her brightly, but upon the closing of the +door, the smile vanished; all her liveliness disappeared; and with this +change of expression her complexion itself appeared to change, so that +her rouge became obvious, for she was pale beneath it. However, Russell +did not see the alteration, for he did not look at her; and it was but +a momentary lapse the vacation of a tired girl, who for ten seconds lets +herself look as she feels. Then she shot her vivacity back into place as +by some powerful spring. + +"Penny for your thoughts!" she cried, and tossed one of the wilted +roses at him, across the table. "I'll bid more than a penny; I'll bid +tuppence--no, a poor little dead rose a rose for your thoughts, Mr. +Arthur Russell! What are they?" + +He shook his head. "I'm afraid I haven't any." + +"No, of course not," she said. "Who could have thoughts in weather like +this? Will you EVER forgive us?" + +"What for?" + +"Making you eat such a heavy dinner--I mean LOOK at such a heavy dinner, +because you certainly didn't do more than look at it--on such a night! +But the crime draws to a close, and you can begin to cheer up!" She +laughed gaily, and, rising, moved to the door. "Let's go in the other +room; your fearful duty is almost done, and you can run home as soon as +you want to. That's what you're dying to do." + +"Not at all," he said in a voice so feeble that she laughed aloud. + +"Good gracious!" she cried. "I hadn't realized it was THAT bad!" + +For this, though he contrived to laugh, he seemed to have no verbal +retort whatever; but followed her into the "living-room," where she +stopped and turned, facing him. + +"Has it really been so frightful?" she asked. + +"Why, of course not. Not at all." + +"Of course yes, though, you mean!" + +"Not at all. It's been most kind of your mother and father and you." + +"Do you know," she said, "you've never once looked at me for more than a +second at a time the whole evening? And it seemed to me I looked rather +nice to-night, too!" + +"You always do," he murmured. + +"I don't see how you know," she returned; and then stepping closer +to him, spoke with gentle solicitude: "Tell me: you're really feeling +wretchedly, aren't you? I know you've got a fearful headache, or +something. Tell me!" + +"Not at all." + +"You are ill--I'm sure of it." + +"Not at all." + +"On your word?" + +"I'm really quite all right." + +"But if you are----" she began; and then, looking at him with a +desperate sweetness, as if this were her last resource to rouse him, +"What's the matter, little boy?" she said with lisping tenderness. "Tell +auntie!" + +It was a mistake, for he seemed to flinch, and to lean backward, +however, slightly. She turned away instantly, with a flippant lift and +drop of both hands. "Oh, my dear!" she laughed. "I won't eat you!" + +And as the discomfited young man watched her, seeming able to lift +his eyes, now that her back was turned, she went to the front door and +pushed open the screen. "Let's go out on the porch," she said. "Where we +belong!" + +Then, when he had followed her out, and they were seated, "Isn't this +better?" she asked. "Don't you feel more like yourself out here?" + +He began a murmur: "Not at----" + +But she cut him off sharply: "Please don't say 'Not at all' again!" + +"I'm sorry." + +"You do seem sorry about something," she said. "What is it? Isn't it +time you were telling me what's the matter?" + +"Nothing. Indeed nothing's the matter. Of course one IS rather affected +by such weather as this. It may make one a little quieter than usual, of +course." + +She sighed, and let the tired muscles of her face rest. Under the hard +lights, indoors, they had served her until they ached, and it was a +luxury to feel that in the darkness no grimacings need call upon them. + +"Of course, if you won't tell me----" she said. + +"I can only assure you there's nothing to tell." + +"I know what an ugly little house it is," she said. "Maybe it was the +furniture--or mama's vases that upset you. Or was it mama herself--or +papa?" + +"Nothing 'upset' me." + +At that she uttered a monosyllable of doubting laughter. "I wonder why +you say that." + +"Because it's so." + +"No. It's because you're too kind, or too conscientious, or too +embarrassed--anyhow too something--to tell me." She leaned forward, +elbows on knees and chin in hands, in the reflective attitude she knew +how to make graceful. "I have a feeling that you're not going to tell +me," she said, slowly. "Yes--even that you're never going to tell me. I +wonder--I wonder----" + +"Yes? What do you wonder?" + +"I was just thinking--I wonder if they haven't done it, after all." + +"I don't understand." + +"I wonder," she went on, still slowly, and in a voice of reflection, "I +wonder who HAS been talking about me to you, after all? Isn't that it?" + +"Not at----" he began, but checked himself and substituted another form +of denial. "Nothing is 'it.'" + +"Are you sure?" + +"Why, yes." + +"How curious!" she said. + +"Why?" + +"Because all evening you've been so utterly different." + +"But in this weather----" + +"No. That wouldn't make you afraid to look at me all evening!" + +"But I did look at you. Often." + +"No. Not really a LOOK." + +"But I'm looking at you now." + +"Yes--in the dark!" she said. "No--the weather might make you even +quieter than usual, but it wouldn't strike you so nearly dumb. No--and +it wouldn't make you seem to be under such a strain--as if you thought +only of escape!" + +"But I haven't----" + +"You shouldn't," she interrupted, gently. "There's nothing you have to +escape from, you know. You aren't committed to--to this friendship." + +"I'm sorry you think----" he began, but did not complete the fragment. + +She took it up. "You're sorry I think you're so different, you mean to +say, don't you? Never mind: that's what you did mean to say, but you +couldn't finish it because you're not good at deceiving." + +"Oh, no," he protested, feebly. "I'm not deceiving. I'm----" + +"Never mind," she said again. "You're sorry I think you're so +different--and all in one day--since last night. Yes, your voice SOUNDS +sorry, too. It sounds sorrier than it would just because of my thinking +something you could change my mind about in a minute so it means you're +sorry you ARE different." + +"No--I----" + +But disregarding the faint denial, "Never mind," she said. "Do you +remember one night when you told me that nothing anybody else could do +would ever keep you from coming here? That if you--if you left me it +would be because I drove you away myself?" + +"Yes," he said, huskily. "It was true." + +"Are you sure?" + +"Indeed I am," he answered in a low voice, but with conviction. + +"Then----" She paused. "Well--but I haven't driven you away." + +"No." + +"And yet you've gone," she said, quietly. + +"Do I seem so stupid as all that?" + +"You know what I mean." She leaned back in her chair again, and her +hands, inactive for once, lay motionless in her lap. When she spoke it +was in a rueful whisper: + +"I wonder if I HAVE driven you away?" + +"You've done nothing--nothing at all," he said. + +"I wonder----" she said once more, but she stopped. In her mind she was +going back over their time together since the first meeting--fragments +of talk, moments of silence, little things of no importance, little +things that might be important; moonshine, sunshine, starlight; and her +thoughts zigzagged among the jumbling memories; but, as if she made for +herself a picture of all these fragments, throwing them upon the canvas +haphazard, she saw them all just touched with the one tainting quality +that gave them coherence, the faint, false haze she had put over this +friendship by her own pretendings. And, if this terrible dinner, or +anything, or everything, had shown that saffron tint in its true colour +to the man at her side, last night almost a lover, then she had indeed +of herself driven him away, and might well feel that she was lost. + +"Do you know?" she said, suddenly, in a clear, loud voice. "I have the +strangest feeling. I feel as if I were going to be with you only about +five minutes more in all the rest of my life!" + +"Why, no," he said. "Of course I'm coming to see you--often. I----" + +"No," she interrupted. "I've never had a feeling like this before. +It's--it's just SO; that's all! You're GOING--why, you're never coming +here again!" She stood up, abruptly, beginning to tremble all over. +"Why, it's FINISHED, isn't it?" she said, and her trembling was manifest +now in her voice. "Why, it's all OVER, isn't it? Why, yes!" + +He had risen as she did. "I'm afraid you're awfully tired and nervous," +he said. "I really ought to be going." + +"Yes, of COURSE you ought," she cried, despairingly. "There's nothing +else for you to do. When anything's spoiled, people CAN'T do anything +but run away from it. So good-bye!" + +"At least," he returned, huskily, "we'll only--only say good-night." + +Then, as moving to go, he stumbled upon the veranda steps, "Your HAT!" +she cried. "I'd like to keep it for a souvenir, but I'm afraid you need +it!" + +She ran into the hall and brought his straw hat from the chair where he +had left it. "You poor thing!" she said, with quavering laughter. "Don't +you know you can't go without your hat?" + +Then, as they faced each other for the short moment which both of them +knew would be the last of all their veranda moments, Alice's broken +laughter grew louder. "What a thing to say!" she cried. "What a romantic +parting--talking about HATS!" + +Her laughter continued as he turned away, but other sounds came from +within the house, clearly audible with the opening of a door upstairs--a +long and wailing cry of lamentation in the voice of Mrs. Adams. Russell +paused at the steps, uncertain, but Alice waved to him to go on. + +"Oh, don't bother," she said. "We have lots of that in this funny little +old house! Good-bye!" + +And as he went down the steps, she ran back into the house and closed +the door heavily behind her. + + + +CHAPTER XXIII + +Her mother's wailing could still be heard from overhead, though more +faintly; and old Charley Lohr was coming down the stairs alone. + +He looked at Alice compassionately. "I was just comin' to suggest maybe +you'd excuse yourself from your company," he said. "Your mother was +bound not to disturb you, and tried her best to keep you from hearin' +how she's takin' on, but I thought probably you better see to her." + +"Yes, I'll come. What's the matter?" + +"Well," he said, "_I_ only stepped over to offer my sympathy and +services, as it were. _I_ thought of course you folks knew all about it. +Fact is, it was in the evening paper--just a little bit of an item on +the back page, of course." + +"What is it?" + +He coughed. "Well, it ain't anything so terrible," he said. "Fact is, +your brother Walter's got in a little trouble--well, I suppose you might +call it quite a good deal of trouble. Fact is, he's quite considerable +short in his accounts down at Lamb and Company." + +Alice ran up the stairs and into her father's room, where Mrs. Adams +threw herself into her daughter's arms. "Is he gone?" she sobbed. "He +didn't hear me, did he? I tried so hard----" + +Alice patted the heaving shoulders her arms enclosed. "No, no," she +said. "He didn't hear you--it wouldn't have mattered--he doesn't matter +anyway." + +"Oh, POOR Walter!" The mother cried. "Oh, the POOR boy! Poor, poor +Walter! Poor, poor, poor, POOR----" + +"Hush, dear, hush!" Alice tried to soothe her, but the lament could +not be abated, and from the other side of the room a repetition in +a different spirit was as continuous. Adams paced furiously there, +pounding his fist into his left palm as he strode. "The dang boy!" he +said. "Dang little fool! Dang idiot! Dang fool! Whyn't he TELL me, the +dang little fool?" + +"He DID!" Mrs. Adams sobbed. "He DID tell you, and you wouldn't GIVE it +to him." + +"He DID, did he?" Adams shouted at her. "What he begged me for was money +to run away with! He never dreamed of putting back what he took. What +the dangnation you talking about--accusing me!" + +"He NEEDED it," she said. "He needed it to run away with! How could he +expect to LIVE, after he got away, if he didn't have a little money? Oh, +poor, poor, POOR Walter! Poor, poor, poor----" + +She went back to this repetition; and Adams went back to his own, then +paused, seeing his old friend standing in the hallway outside the open +door. + +"Ah--I'll just be goin', I guess, Virgil," Lohr said. "I don't see as +there's any use my tryin' to say any more. I'll do anything you want me +to, you understand." + +"Wait a minute," Adams said, and, groaning, came and went down the +stairs with him. "You say you didn't see the old man at all?" + +"No, I don't know a thing about what he's going to do," Lohr said, as +they reached the lower floor. "Not a thing. But look here, Virgil, +I don't see as this calls for you and your wife to take on so hard +about--anyhow not as hard as the way you've started." + +"No," Adams gulped. "It always seems that way to the other party that's +only looking on!" + +"Oh, well, I know that, of course," old Charley returned, soothingly. +"But look here, Virgil: they may not catch the boy; they didn't even +seem to be sure what train he made, and if they do get him, why, the ole +man might decide not to prosecute if----" + +"HIM?" Adams cried, interrupting. "Him not prosecute? Why, that's what +he's been waiting for, all along! He thinks my boy and me both cheated +him! Why, he was just letting Walter walk into a trap! Didn't you say +they'd been suspecting him for some time back? Didn't you say they'd +been watching him and were just about fixing to arrest him?" + +"Yes, I know," said Lohr; "but you can't tell, especially if you raise +the money and pay it back." + +"Every cent!" Adams vociferated. "Every last penny! I can raise it--I +GOT to raise it! I'm going to put a loan on my factory to-morrow. Oh, +I'll get it for him, you tell him! Every last penny!" + +"Well, ole feller, you just try and get quieted down some now." Charley +held out his hand in parting. "You and your wife just quiet down some. +You AIN'T the healthiest man in the world, you know, and you already +been under quite some strain before this happened. You want to take +care of yourself for the sake of your wife and that sweet little girl +upstairs, you know. Now, good-night," he finished, stepping out upon the +veranda. "You send for me if there's anything I can do." + +"Do?" Adams echoed. "There ain't anything ANYBODY can do!" And then, as +his old friend went down the path to the sidewalk, he called after him, +"You tell him I'll pay him every last cent! Every last, dang, dirty +PENNY!" + +He slammed the door and went rapidly up the stairs, talking loudly to +himself. "Every dang, last, dirty penny! Thinks EVERYBODY in this family +wants to steal from him, does he? Thinks we're ALL yellow, does he? +I'll show him!" And he came into his own room vociferating, "Every last, +dang, dirty penny!" + +Mrs. Adams had collapsed, and Alice had put her upon his bed, where she +lay tossing convulsively and sobbing, "Oh, POOR Walter!" over and +over, but after a time she varied the sorry tune. "Oh, poor Alice!" she +moaned, clinging to her daughter's hand. "Oh, poor, POOR Alice to have +THIS come on the night of your dinner--just when everything seemed to be +going so well--at last--oh, poor, poor, POOR----" + +"Hush!" Alice said, sharply. "Don't say 'poor Alice!' I'm all right." + +"You MUST be!" her mother cried, clutching her. "You've just GOT to be! +ONE of us has got to be all right--surely God wouldn't mind just ONE of +us being all right--that wouldn't hurt Him----" + +"Hush, hush, mother! Hush!" + +But Mrs. Adams only clutched her the more tightly. "He seemed SUCH a +nice young man, dearie! He may not see this in the paper--Mr. Lohr said +it was just a little bit of an item--he MAY not see it, dearie----" + +Then her anguish went back to Walter again; and to his needs as a +fugitive--she had meant to repair his underwear, but had postponed doing +so, and her neglect now appeared to be a detail as lamentable as the +calamity itself. She could neither be stilled upon it, nor herself +exhaust its urgings to self-reproach, though she finally took up another +theme temporarily. Upon an unusually violent outbreak of her husband's, +in denunciation of the runaway, she cried out faintly that he was cruel; +and further wearied her broken voice with details of Walter's beauty as +a baby, and of his bedtime pieties throughout his infancy. + +So the hot night wore on. Three had struck before Mrs. Adams was got to +bed; and Alice, returning to her own room, could hear her father's bare +feet thudding back and forth after that. "Poor papa!" she whispered in +helpless imitation of her mother. "Poor papa! Poor mama! Poor Walter! +Poor all of us!" + +She fell asleep, after a time, while from across the hall the bare +feet still thudded over their changeless route; and she woke at seven, +hearing Adams pass her door, shod. In her wrapper she ran out into the +hallway and found him descending the stairs. + +"Papa!" + +"Hush," he said, and looked up at her with reddened eyes. "Don't wake +your mother." + +"I won't," she whispered. "How about you? You haven't slept any at all!" + +"Yes, I did. I got some sleep. I'm going over to the works now. I got +to throw some figures together to show the bank. Don't worry: I'll get +things fixed up. You go back to bed. Good-bye." + +"Wait!" she bade him sharply. + +"What for?" + +"You've got to have some breakfast." + +"Don't want 'ny." + +"You wait!" she said, imperiously, and disappeared to return almost at +once. "I can cook in my bedroom slippers," she explained, "but I don't +believe I could in my bare feet!" + +Descending softly, she made him wait in the dining-room until she +brought him toast and eggs and coffee. "Eat!" she said. "And I'm going +to telephone for a taxicab to take you, if you think you've really got +to go." + +"No, I'm going to walk--I WANT to walk." + +She shook her head anxiously. "You don't look able. You've walked all +night." + +"No, I didn't," he returned. "I tell you I got some sleep. I got all I +wanted anyhow." + +"But, papa----" + +"Here!" he interrupted, looking up at her suddenly and setting down his +cup of coffee. "Look here! What about this Mr. Russell? I forgot all +about him. What about him?" + +Her lip trembled a little, but she controlled it before she spoke. +"Well, what about him, papa?" she asked, calmly enough. + +"Well, we could hardly----" Adams paused, frowning heavily. "We could +hardly expect he wouldn't hear something about all this." + +"Yes; of course he'll hear it, papa." + +"Well?" + +"Well, what?" she asked, gently. + +"You don't think he'd be the--the cheap kind it'd make a difference +with, of course." + +"Oh, no; he isn't cheap. It won't make any difference with him." + +Adams suffered a profound sigh to escape him. "Well--I'm glad of that, +anyway." + +"The difference," she explained--"the difference was made without his +hearing anything about Walter. He doesn't know about THAT yet." + +"Well, what does he know about?" + +"Only," she said, "about me." + +"What you mean by that, Alice?" he asked, helplessly. + +"Never mind," she said. "It's nothing beside the real trouble we're +in--I'll tell you some time. You eat your eggs and toast; you can't keep +going on just coffee." + +"I can't eat any eggs and toast," he objected, rising. "I can't." + +"Then wait till I can bring you something else." + +"No," he said, irritably. "I won't do it! I don't want any dang food! +And look here"--he spoke sharply to stop her, as she went toward the +telephone--"I don't want any dang taxi, either! You look after your +mother when she wakes up. I got to be at WORK!" + +And though she followed him to the front door, entreating, he could not +be stayed or hindered. He went through the quiet morning streets at +a rickety, rapid gait, swinging his old straw hat in his hands, and +whispering angrily to himself as he went. His grizzled hair, not trimmed +for a month, blew back from his damp forehead in the warm breeze; his +reddened eyes stared hard at nothing from under blinking lids; and one +side of his face twitched startlingly from time to time;--children might +have run from him, or mocked him. + +When he had come into that fallen quarter his industry had partly +revived and wholly made odorous, a negro woman, leaning upon her +whitewashed gate, gazed after him and chuckled for the benefit of a +gossiping friend in the next tiny yard. "Oh, good Satan! Wha'ssa matter +that ole glue man?" + +"Who? Him?" the neighbour inquired. "What he do now?" + +"Talkin' to his ole se'f!" the first explained, joyously. "Look like +gone distracted--ole glue man!" + +Adams's legs had grown more uncertain with his hard walk, and he +stumbled heavily as he crossed the baked mud of his broad lot, but cared +little for that, was almost unaware of it, in fact. Thus his eyes saw +as little as his body felt, and so he failed to observe something that +would have given him additional light upon an old phrase that already +meant quite enough for him. + +There are in the wide world people who have never learned its meaning; +but most are either young or beautifully unobservant who remain +wholly unaware of the inner poignancies the words convey: "a rain of +misfortunes." It is a boiling rain, seemingly whimsical in its choice of +spots whereon to fall; and, so far as mortal eye can tell, neither the +just nor the unjust may hope to avoid it, or need worry themselves by +expecting it. It had selected the Adams family for its scaldings; no +question. + +The glue-works foreman, standing in the doorway of the brick shed, +observed his employer's eccentric approach, and doubtfully stroked a +whiskered chin. + +"Well, they ain't no putticular use gettin' so upset over it," he said, +as Adams came up. "When a thing happens, why, it happens, and that's all +there is to it. When a thing's so, why, it's so. All you can do about it +is think if there's anything you CAN do; and that's what you better be +doin' with this case." + +Adams halted, and seemed to gape at him. "What--case?" he said, with +difficulty. "Was it in the morning papers, too?" + +"No, it ain't in no morning papers. My land! It don't need to be in no +papers; look at the SIZE of it!" + +"The size of what?" + +"Why, great God!" the foreman exclaimed. "He ain't even seen it. Look! +Look yonder!" + +Adams stared vaguely at the man's outstretched hand and pointing +forefinger, then turned and saw a great sign upon the facade of the big +factory building across the street. The letters were large enough to be +read two blocks away. + + "AFTER THE FIFTEENTH OF NEXT MONTH + THIS BUILDING WILL BE OCCUPIED BY + THE J. A. LAMB LIQUID GLUE CO. INC." + + +A gray touring-car had just come to rest before the principal entrance +of the building, and J. A. Lamb himself descended from it. He glanced +over toward the humble rival of his projected great industry, saw his +old clerk, and immediately walked across the street and the lot to speak +to him. + +"Well, Adams," he said, in his husky, cheerful voice, "how's your +glue-works?" + +Adams uttered an inarticulate sound, and lifted the hand that held his +hat as if to make a protective gesture, but failed to carry it out; and +his arm sank limp at his side. The foreman, however, seemed to feel that +something ought to be said. + +"Our glue-works, hell!" he remarked. "I guess we won't HAVE no +glue-works over here not very long, if we got to compete with the sized +thing you got over there!" + +Lamb chuckled. "I kind of had some such notion," he said. "You see, +Virgil, I couldn't exactly let you walk off with it like swallering a +pat o' butter, now, could I? It didn't look exactly reasonable to expect +me to let go like that, now, did it?" + +Adams found a half-choked voice somewhere in his throat. "Do you--would +you step into my office a minute, Mr. Lamb?" + +"Why, certainly I'm willing to have a little talk with you," the old +gentleman said, as he followed his former employee indoors, and he +added, "I feel a lot more like it than I did before I got THAT up, over +yonder, Virgil!" + +Adams threw open the door of the rough room he called his office, having +as justification for this title little more than the fact that he had a +telephone there and a deal table that served as a desk. "Just step into +the office, please," he said. + +Lamb glanced at the desk, at the kitchen chair before it, at the +telephone, and at the partition walls built of old boards, some covered +with ancient paint and some merely weatherbeaten, the salvage of a +house-wrecker; and he smiled broadly. "So these are your offices, are +they?" he asked. "You expect to do quite a business here, I guess, don't +you, Virgil?" + +Adams turned upon him a stricken and tortured face. "Have you seen +Charley Lohr since last night, Mr. Lamb?" + +"No; I haven't seen Charley." + +"Well, I told him to tell you," Adams began;--"I told him I'd pay +you----" + +"Pay me what you expect to make out o' glue, you mean, Virgil?" + +"No," Adams said, swallowing. "I mean what my boy owes you. That's what +I told Charley to tell you. I told him to tell you I'd pay you every +last----" + +"Well, well!" the old gentleman interrupted, testily. "I don't know +anything about that." + +"I'm expecting to pay you," Adams went on, swallowing again, painfully. +"I was expecting to do it out of a loan I thought I could get on my +glue-works." + +The old gentleman lifted his frosted eyebrows. "Oh, out o' the +GLUE-works? You expected to raise money on the glue-works, did you?" + +At that, Adams's agitation increased prodigiously. "How'd you THINK I +expected to pay you?" he said. "Did you think I expected to get money on +my own old bones?" He slapped himself harshly upon the chest and legs. +"Do you think a bank'll lend money on a man's ribs and his broken-down +old knee-bones? They won't do it! You got to have some BUSINESS +prospects to show 'em, if you haven't got any property nor securities; +and what business prospects have I got now, with that sign of yours up +over yonder? Why, you don't need to make an OUNCE o' glue; your sign's +fixed ME without your doing another lick! THAT'S all you had to do; just +put your sign up! You needn't to----" + +"Just let me tell you something, Virgil Adams," the old man interrupted, +harshly. "I got just one right important thing to tell you before we +talk any further business; and that's this: there's some few men in this +town made their money in off-colour ways, but there aren't many; and +those there are have had to be a darn sight slicker than you know how to +be, or ever WILL know how to be! Yes, sir, and they none of them had the +little gumption to try to make it out of a man that had the spirit not +to let 'em, and the STRENGTH not to let 'em! I know what you thought. +'Here,' you said to yourself, 'here's this ole fool J. A. Lamb; he's +kind of worn out and in his second childhood like; I can put it over on +him, without his ever----'" + +"I did not!" Adams shouted. "A great deal YOU know about my feelings +and all what I said to myself! There's one thing I want to tell YOU, +and that's what I'm saying to myself NOW, and what my feelings are this +MINUTE!" + +He struck the table a great blow with his thin fist, and shook the +damaged knuckles in the air. "I just want to tell you, whatever I did +feel, I don't feel MEAN any more; not to-day, I don't. There's a meaner +man in this world than _I_ am, Mr. Lamb!" + +"Oh, so you feel better about yourself to-day, do you, Virgil?" + +"You bet I do! You worked till you got me where you want me; and +I wouldn't do that to another man, no matter what he did to me! I +wouldn't----" + +"What you talkin' about! How've I 'got you where I want you?'" + +"Ain't it plain enough?" Adams cried. "You even got me where I can't +raise the money to pay back what my boy owes you! Do you suppose +anybody's fool enough to let me have a cent on this business after one +look at what you got over there across the road?" + +"No, I don't." + +"No, you don't," Adams echoed, hoarsely. "What's more, you knew my house +was mortgaged, and my----" + +"I did not," Lamb interrupted, angrily. "What do _I_ care about your +house?" + +"What's the use your talking like that?" Adams cried. "You got me where +I can't even raise the money to pay what my boy owes the company, so't +I can't show any reason to stop the prosecution and keep him out the +penitentiary. That's where you worked till you got ME!" + +"What!" Lamb shouted. "You accuse me of----" + +"'Accuse you?' What am I telling you? Do you think I got no EYES?" And +Adams hammered the table again. "Why, you knew the boy was weak----" + +"I did not!" + +"Listen: you kept him there after you got mad at my leaving the way +I did. You kept him there after you suspected him; and you had him +watched; you let him go on; just waited to catch him and ruin him!" + +"You're crazy!" the old man bellowed. "I didn't know there was anything +against the boy till last night. You're CRAZY, I say!" + +Adams looked it. With his hair disordered over his haggard forehead and +bloodshot eyes; with his bruised hands pounding the table and flying in +a hundred wild and absurd gestures, while his feet shuffled constantly +to preserve his balance upon staggering legs, he was the picture of a +man with a mind gone to rags. + +"Maybe I AM crazy!" he cried, his voice breaking and quavering. "Maybe +I am, but I wouldn't stand there and taunt a man with it if I'd done to +him what you've done to me! Just look at me: I worked all my life for +you, and what I did when I quit never harmed you--it didn't make two +cents' worth o' difference in your life and it looked like it'd mean all +the difference in the world to my family--and now look what you've DONE +to me for it! I tell you, Mr. Lamb, there never was a man looked up to +another man the way I looked up to you the whole o' my life, but I don't +look up to you any more! You think you got a fine day of it now, riding +up in your automobile to look at that sign--and then over here at my +poor little works that you've ruined. But listen to me just this +one last time!" The cracking voice broke into falsetto, and the +gesticulating hands fluttered uncontrollably. "Just you listen!" he +panted. "You think I did you a bad turn, and now you got me ruined for +it, and you got my works ruined, and my family ruined; and if anybody'd +'a' told me this time last year I'd ever say such a thing to you I'd +called him a dang liar, but I DO say it: I say you've acted toward me +like--like a--a doggone mean--man!" + +His voice, exhausted, like his body, was just able to do him this final +service; then he sank, crumpled, into the chair by the table, his chin +down hard upon his chest. + +"I tell you, you're crazy!" Lamb said again. "I never in the world----" +But he checked himself, staring in sudden perplexity at his accuser. +"Look here!" he said. "What's the matter of you? Have you got another of +those----?" He put his hand upon Adams's shoulder, which jerked feebly +under the touch. + +The old man went to the door and called to the foreman. + +"Here!" he said. "Run and tell my chauffeur to bring my car over here. +Tell him to drive right up over the sidewalk and across the lot. Tell +him to hurry!" + +So, it happened, the great J. A. Lamb a second time brought his former +clerk home, stricken and almost inanimate. + + + +CHAPTER XXIV + +About five o'clock that afternoon, the old gentleman came back to +Adams's house; and when Alice opened the door, he nodded, walked +into the "living-room" without speaking; then stood frowning as if he +hesitated to decide some perplexing question. + +"Well, how is he now?" he asked, finally. + +"The doctor was here again a little while ago; he thinks papa's coming +through it. He's pretty sure he will." + +"Something like the way it was last spring?" + +"Yes." + +"Not a bit of sense to it!" Lamb said, gruffly. "When he was getting +well the other time the doctor told me it wasn't a regular stroke, so to +speak--this 'cerebral effusion' thing. Said there wasn't any particular +reason for your father to expect he'd ever have another attack, if he'd +take a little care of himself. Said he could consider himself well as +anybody else long as he did that." + +"Yes. But he didn't do it!" + +Lamb nodded, sighed aloud, and crossed the room to a chair. "I +guess not," he said, as he sat down. "Bustin' his health up over his +glue-works, I expect." + +"Yes." + +"I guess so; I guess so." Then he looked up at her with a glimmer of +anxiety in his eyes. "Has he came to yet?" + +"Yes. He's talked a little. His mind's clear; he spoke to mama and me +and to Miss Perry." Alice laughed sadly. "We were lucky enough to get +her back, but papa didn't seem to think it was lucky. When he recognized +her he said, 'Oh, my goodness, 'tisn't YOU, is it!'" + +"Well, that's a good sign, if he's getting a little cross. Did he--did +he happen to say anything--for instance, about me?" + +This question, awkwardly delivered, had the effect of removing the +girl's pallor; rosy tints came quickly upon her cheeks. "He--yes, he +did," she said. "Naturally, he's troubled about--about----" She stopped. + +"About your brother, maybe?" + +"Yes, about making up the----" + +"Here, now," Lamb said, uncomfortably, as she stopped again. "Listen, +young lady; let's don't talk about that just yet. I want to ask you: you +understand all about this glue business, I expect, don't you?" + +"I'm not sure. I only know----" + +"Let me tell you," he interrupted, impatiently. "I'll tell you all about +it in two words. The process belonged to me, and your father up and +walked off with it; there's no getting around THAT much, anyhow." + +"Isn't there?" Alice stared at him. "I think you're mistaken, Mr. Lamb. +Didn't papa improve it so that it virtually belonged to him?" + +There was a spark in the old blue eyes at this. "What?" he cried. "Is +that the way he got around it? Why, in all my life I never heard of such +a----" But he left the sentence unfinished; the testiness went out of +his husky voice and the anger out of his eyes. "Well, I expect maybe +that was the way of it," he said. "Anyhow, it's right for you to stand +up for your father; and if you think he had a right to it----" + +"But he did!" she cried. + +"I expect so," the old man returned, pacifically. "I expect so, +probably. Anyhow, it's a question that's neither here nor there, right +now. What I was thinking of saying--well, did your father happen to let +out that he and I had words this morning?" + +"No." + +"Well, we did." He sighed and shook his head. "Your father--well, he +used some pretty hard expressions toward me, young lady. They weren't +SO, I'm glad to say, but he used 'em to me, and the worst of it was he +believed 'em. Well, I been thinking it over, and I thought I'd just have +a kind of little talk with you to set matters straight, so to speak." + +"Yes, Mr. Lamb." + +"For instance," he said, "it's like this. Now, I hope you won't think I +mean any indelicacy, but you take your brother's case, since we got to +mention it, why, your father had the whole thing worked out in his mind +about as wrong as anybody ever got anything. If I'd acted the way your +father thought I did about that, why, somebody just ought to take me out +and shoot me! Do YOU know what that man thought?" + +"I'm not sure." + +He frowned at her, and asked, "Well, what do you think about it?" + +"I don't know," she said. "I don't believe I think anything at all about +anything to-day." + +"Well, well," he returned; "I expect not; I expect not. You kind of look +to me as if you ought to be in bed yourself, young lady." + +"Oh, no." + +"I guess you mean 'Oh, yes'; and I won't keep you long, but there's +something we got to get fixed up, and I'd rather talk to you than I +would to your mother, because you're a smart girl and always friendly; +and I want to be sure I'm understood. Now, listen." + +"I will," Alice promised, smiling faintly. + +"I never even hardly noticed your brother was still working for me," he +explained, earnestly. "I never thought anything about it. My sons sort +of tried to tease me about the way your father--about his taking up this +glue business, so to speak--and one day Albert, Junior, asked me if I +felt all right about your brother's staying there after that, and I told +him--well, I just asked him to shut up. If the boy wanted to stay there, +I didn't consider it my business to send him away on account of +any feeling I had toward his father; not as long as he did his work +right--and the report showed he did. Well, as it happens, it looks now +as if he stayed because he HAD to; he couldn't quit because he'd 'a' +been found out if he did. Well, he'd been covering up his shortage for a +considerable time--and do you know what your father practically charged +me with about that?" + +"No, Mr. Lamb." + +In his resentment, the old gentleman's ruddy face became ruddier and his +husky voice huskier. "Thinks I kept the boy there because I suspected +him! Thinks I did it to get even with HIM! Do I look to YOU like a man +that'd do such a thing?" + +"No," she said, gently. "I don't think you would." + +"No!" he exclaimed. "Nor HE wouldn't think so if he was himself; he's +known me too long. But he must been sort of brooding over this whole +business--I mean before Walter's trouble he must been taking it to heart +pretty hard for some time back. He thought I didn't think much of +him any more--and I expect he maybe wondered some what I was going +to DO--and there's nothing worse'n that state of mind to make a man +suspicious of all kinds of meanness. Well, he practically stood up there +and accused me to my face of fixing things so't he couldn't ever raise +the money to settle for Walter and ask us not to prosecute. That's the +state of mind your father's brooding got him into, young lady--charging +me with a trick like that!" + +"I'm sorry," she said. "I know you'd never----" + +The old man slapped his sturdy knee, angrily. "Why, that dang fool of a +Virgil Adams!" he exclaimed. "He wouldn't even give me a chance to talk; +and he got me so mad I couldn't hardly talk, anyway! He might 'a' known +from the first I wasn't going to let him walk in and beat me out of my +own--that is, he might 'a' known I wouldn't let him get ahead of me in +a business matter--not with my boys twitting me about it every few +minutes! But to talk to me the way he did this morning--well, he was out +of his head; that's all! Now, wait just a minute," he interposed, as she +seemed about to speak. "In the first place, we aren't going to push this +case against your brother. I believe in the law, all right, and +business men got to protect themselves; but in a case like this, where +restitution's made by the family, why, I expect it's just as well +sometimes to use a little influence and let matters drop. Of course your +brother'll have to keep out o' this state; that's all." + +"But--you said----" she faltered. + +"Yes. What'd I say?" + +"You said, 'where restitution's made by the family.' That's what seemed +to trouble papa so terribly, because--because restitution couldn't----" + +"Why, yes, it could. That's what I'm here to talk to you about." + +"I don't see----" + +"I'm going to TELL you, ain't I?" he said, gruffly. "Just hold your +horses a minute, please." He coughed, rose from his chair, walked up and +down the room, then halted before her. "It's like this," he said. "After +I brought your father home, this morning, there was one of the things he +told me, when he was going for me, over yonder--it kind of stuck in +my craw. It was something about all this glue controversy not meaning +anything to me in particular, and meaning a whole heap to him and his +family. Well, he was wrong about that two ways. The first one was, +it did mean a good deal to me to have him go back on me after so many +years. I don't need to say any more about it, except just to tell you it +meant quite a little more to me than you'd think, maybe. The other way +he was wrong is, that how much a thing means to one man and how little +it means to another ain't the right way to look at a business matter." + +"I suppose it isn't, Mr. Lamb." + +"No," he said. "It isn't. It's not the right way to look at anything. +Yes, and your father knows it as well as I do, when he's in his right +mind; and I expect that's one of the reasons he got so mad at me--but +anyhow, I couldn't help thinking about how much all this thing HAD maybe +meant to him;--as I say, it kind of stuck in my craw. I want you to tell +him something from me, and I want you to go and tell him right off, if +he's able and willing to listen. You tell him I got kind of a notion +he was pushed into this thing by circumstances, and tell him I've lived +long enough to know that circumstances can beat the best of us--you tell +him I said 'the BEST of us.' Tell him I haven't got a bit of feeling +against him--not any more--and tell him I came here to ask him not to +have any against me." + +"Yes, Mr. Lamb." + +"Tell him I said----" The old man paused abruptly and Alice was +surprised, in a dull and tired way, when she saw that his lips had begun +to twitch and his eyelids to blink; but he recovered himself almost +at once, and continued: "I want him to remember, 'Forgive us our +transgressions, as we forgive those that transgress against us'; and if +he and I been transgressing against each other, why, tell him I think +it's time we QUIT such foolishness!" + +He coughed again, smiled heartily upon her, and walked toward the door; +then turned back to her with an exclamation: "Well, if I ain't an old +fool!" + +"What is it?" she asked. + +"Why, I forgot what we were just talking about! Your father wants to +settle for Walter's deficit. Tell him we'll be glad to accept it; but +of course we don't expect him to clean the matter up until he's able to +talk business again." + +Alice stared at him blankly enough for him to perceive that further +explanations were necessary. "It's like this," he said. "You see, if +your father decided to keep his works going over yonder, I don't say but +he might give us some little competition for a time, 'specially as he's +got the start on us and about ready for the market. Then I was figuring +we could use his plant--it's small, but it'd be to our benefit to have +the use of it--and he's got a lease on that big lot; it may come in +handy for us if we want to expand some. Well, I'd prefer to make a deal +with him as quietly as possible---no good in every Tom, Dick and Harry +hearing about things like this--but I figured he could sell out to me +for a little something more'n enough to cover the mortgage he put on +this house, and Walter's deficit, too--THAT don't amount to much +in dollars and cents. The way I figure it, I could offer him about +ninety-three hundred dollars as a total--or say ninety-three hundred and +fifty--and if he feels like accepting, why, I'll send a confidential man +up here with the papers soon's your father's able to look 'em over. You +tell him, will you, and ask him if he sees his way to accepting that +figure?" + +"Yes," Alice said; and now her own lips twitched, while her eyes filled +so that she saw but a blurred image of the old man, who held out his +hand in parting. "I'll tell him. Thank you." + +He shook her hand hastily. "Well, let's just keep it kind of quiet," +he said, at the door. "No good in every Tom, Dick and Harry knowing all +what goes on in town! You telephone me when your papa's ready to go over +the papers--and call me up at my house to-night, will you? Let me hear +how he's feeling?" + +"I will," she said, and through her grateful tears gave him a smile +almost radiant. "He'll be better, Mr. Lamb. We all will." + + + +CHAPTER XXV + +One morning, that autumn, Mrs. Adams came into Alice's room, and found +her completing a sober toilet for the street; moreover, the expression +revealed in her mirror was harmonious with the business-like severity +of her attire. "What makes you look so cross, dearie?" the mother asked. +"Couldn't you find anything nicer to wear than that plain old dark +dress?" + +"I don't believe I'm cross," the girl said, absently. "I believe I'm +just thinking. Isn't it about time?" + +"Time for what?" + +"Time for thinking--for me, I mean?" + +Disregarding this, Mrs. Adams looked her over thoughtfully. "I can't see +why you don't wear more colour," she said. "At your age it's becoming +and proper, too. Anyhow, when you're going on the street, I think you +ought to look just as gay and lively as you can manage. You want to show +'em you've got some spunk!" + +"How do you mean, mama?" + +"I mean about Walter's running away and the mess your father made of his +business. It would help to show 'em you're holding up your head just the +same." + +"Show whom!" + +"All these other girls that----" + +"Not I!" Alice laughed shortly, shaking her head. "I've quit dressing at +them, and if they saw me they wouldn't think what you want 'em to. It's +funny; but we don't often make people think what we want 'em to, mama. +You do thus and so; and you tell yourself, 'Now, seeing me do thus and +so, people will naturally think this and that'; but they don't. They +think something else--usually just what you DON'T want 'em to. I suppose +about the only good in pretending is the fun we get out of fooling +ourselves that we fool somebody." + +"Well, but it wouldn't be pretending. You ought to let people see you're +still holding your head up because you ARE. You wouldn't want that +Mildred Palmer to think you're cast down about--well, you know you +wouldn't want HER not to think you're holding your head up, would you?" + +"She wouldn't know whether I am or not, mama." Alice bit her lip, then +smiled faintly as she said: + +"Anyhow, I'm not thinking about my head in that way--not this morning, +I'm not." + +Mrs. Adams dropped the subject casually. "Are you going down-town?" she +inquired. + +"Yes." + +"What for?" + +"Just something I want to see about. I'll tell you when I come back. +Anything you want me to do?" + +"No; I guess not to-day. I thought you might look for a rug, but I'd +rather go with you to select it. We'll have to get a new rug for your +father's room, I expect." + +"I'm glad you think so, mama. I don't suppose he's ever even noticed it, +but that old rug of his--well, really!" + +"I didn't mean for him," her mother explained, thoughtfully. "No; he +don't mind it, and he'd likely make a fuss if we changed it on his +account. No; what I meant--we'll have to put your father in Walter's +room. He won't mind, I don't expect--not much." + +"No, I suppose not," Alice agreed, rather sadly. "I heard the bell +awhile ago. Was it somebody about that?" + +"Yes; just before I came upstairs. Mrs. Lohr gave him a note to me, and +he was really a very pleasant-looking young man. A VERY pleasant-looking +young man," Mrs. Adams repeated with increased animation and a +thoughtful glance at her daughter. "He's a Mr. Will Dickson; he has a +first-rate position with the gas works, Mrs. Lohr says, and he's fully +able to afford a nice room. So if you and I double up in here, then +with that young married couple in my room, and this Mr. Dickson in your +father's, we'll just about have things settled. I thought maybe I could +make one more place at table, too, so that with the other people from +outside we'd be serving eleven altogether. You see if I have to pay this +cook twelve dollars a week--it can't be helped, I guess--well, one more +would certainly help toward a profit. Of course it's a terribly worrying +thing to see how we WILL come out. Don't you suppose we could squeeze in +one more?" + +"I suppose it COULD be managed; yes." + +Mrs. Adams brightened. "I'm sure it'll be pleasant having that young +married couple in the house and especially this Mr. Will Dickson. He +seemed very much of a gentleman, and anxious to get settled in good +surroundings. I was very favourably impressed with him in every way; and +he explained to me about his name; it seems it isn't William, it's just +'Will'; his parents had him christened that way. It's curious." She +paused, and then, with an effort to seem casual, which veiled nothing +from her daughter: "It's QUITE curious," she said again. "But it's +rather attractive and different, don't you think?" + +"Poor mama!" Alice laughed compassionately. "Poor mama!" + +"He is, though," Mrs. Adams maintained. "He's very much of a gentleman, +unless I'm no judge of appearances; and it'll really be nice to have him +in the house." + +"No doubt," Alice said, as she opened her door to depart. "I don't +suppose we'll mind having any of 'em as much as we thought we would. +Good-bye." + +But her mother detained her, catching her by the arm. "Alice, you do +hate it, don't you!" + +"No," the girl said, quickly. "There wasn't anything else to do." + +Mrs. Adams became emotional at once: her face cried tragedy, and her +voice misfortune. "There MIGHT have been something else to do! Oh, +Alice, you gave your father bad advice when you upheld him in taking a +miserable little ninety-three hundred and fifty from that old wretch! If +your father'd just had the gumption to hold out, they'd have had to pay +him anything he asked. If he'd just had the gumption and a little manly +COURAGE----" + +"Hush!" Alice whispered, for her mother's voice grew louder. "Hush! +He'll hear you, mama." + +"Could he hear me too often?" the embittered lady asked. "If he'd +listened to me at the right time, would we have to be taking in boarders +and sinking DOWN in the scale at the end of our lives, instead of going +UP? You were both wrong; we didn't need to be so panicky--that was just +what that old man wanted: to scare us and buy us out for nothing! If +your father'd just listened to me then, or if for once in his life he'd +just been half a MAN----" + +Alice put her hand over her mother's mouth. "You mustn't! He WILL hear +you!" + +But from the other side of Adams's closed door his voice came +querulously. "Oh, I HEAR her, all right!" + +"You see, mama?" Alice said, and, as Mrs. Adams turned away, weeping, +the daughter sighed; then went in to speak to her father. + +He was in his old chair by the table, with a pillow behind his head, +but the crocheted scarf and Mrs. Adams's wrapper swathed him no more; +he wore a dressing-gown his wife had bought for him, and was smoking his +pipe. "The old story, is it?" he said, as Alice came in. "The same, same +old story! Well, well! Has she gone?" + +"Yes, papa." + +"Got your hat on," he said. "Where you going?" + +"I'm going down-town on an errand of my own. Is there anything you want, +papa?" + +"Yes, there is." He smiled at her. "I wish you'd sit down a while and +talk to me unless your errand----" + +"No," she said, taking a chair near him. "I was just going down to see +about some arrangements I was making for myself. There's no hurry." + +"What arrangements for yourself, dearie?" + +"I'll tell you afterwards--after I find out something about 'em myself." + +"All right," he said, indulgently. "Keep your secrets; keep your +secrets." He paused, drew musingly upon his pipe, and shook his head. +"Funny--the way your mother looks at things! For the matter o' that, +everything's pretty funny, I expect, if you stop to think about it. For +instance, let her say all she likes, but we were pushed right spang to +the wall, if J. A. Lamb hadn't taken it into his head to make that +offer for the works; and there's one of the things I been thinking about +lately, Alice: thinking about how funny they work out." + +"What did you think about it, papa!" + +"Well, I've seen it happen in other people's lives, time and time again; +and now it's happened in ours. You think you're going to be pushed right +up against the wall; you can't see any way out, or any hope at all; you +think you're GONE--and then something you never counted on turns up; +and, while maybe you never do get back to where you used to be, yet +somehow you kind of squirm out of being right SPANG against the wall. +You keep on going--maybe you can't go much, but you do go a little. See +what I mean?" + +"Yes. I understand, dear." + +"Yes, I'm afraid you do," he said. "Too bad! You oughtn't to understand +it at your age. It seems to me a good deal as if the Lord really meant +for the young people to have the good times, and for the old to have +the troubles; and when anybody as young as you has trouble there's a big +mistake somewhere." + +"Oh, no!" she protested. + +But he persisted whimsically in this view of divine error: "Yes, it +does look a good deal that way. But of course we can't tell; we're never +certain about anything--not about anything at all. Sometimes I look at +it another way, though. Sometimes it looks to me as if a body's troubles +came on him mainly because he hadn't had sense enough to know how not to +have any--as if his troubles were kind of like a boy's getting kept in +after school by the teacher, to give him discipline, or something or +other. But, my, my! We don't learn easy!" He chuckled mournfully. "Not +to learn how to live till we're about ready to die, it certainly seems +to me dang tough!" + +"Then I wouldn't brood on such a notion, papa," she said. + +"'Brood?' No!" he returned. "I just kind o' mull it over." He chuckled +again, sighed, and then, not looking at her, he said, "That Mr. +Russell--your mother tells me he hasn't been here again--not since----" + +"No," she said, quietly, as Adams paused. "He never came again." + +"Well, but maybe----" + +"No," she said. "There isn't any 'maybe.' I told him good-bye that +night, papa. It was before he knew about Walter--I told you." + +"Well, well," Adams said. "Young people are entitled to their own +privacy; I don't want to pry." He emptied his pipe into a chipped saucer +on the table beside him, laid the pipe aside, and reverted to a former +topic. "Speaking of dying----" + +"Well, but we weren't!" Alice protested. + +"Yes, about not knowing how to live till you're through living--and THEN +maybe not!" he said, chuckling at his own determined pessimism. "I see +I'm pretty old because I talk this way--I remember my grandmother saying +things a good deal like all what I'm saying now; I used to hear her +at it when I was a young fellow--she was a right gloomy old lady, I +remember. Well, anyhow, it reminds me: I want to get on my feet again as +soon as I can; I got to look around and find something to go into." + +Alice shook her head gently. "But, papa, he told you----" + +"Never mind throwing that dang doctor up at me!" Adams interrupted, +peevishly. "He said I'd be good for SOME kind of light job--if I could +find just the right thing. 'Where there wouldn't be either any physical +or mental strain,' he said. Well, I got to find something like that. +Anyway, I'll feel better if I can just get out LOOKING for it." + +"But, papa, I'm afraid you won't find it, and you'll be disappointed." + +"Well, I want to hunt around and SEE, anyhow." + +Alice patted his hand. "You must just be contented, papa. Everything's +going to be all right, and you mustn't get to worrying about doing +anything. We own this house; it's all clear--and you've taken care of +mama and me all our lives; now it's our turn." + +"No, sir!" he said, querulously. "I don't like the idea of being the +landlady's husband around a boarding-house; it goes against my gizzard. +_I_ know: makes out the bills for his wife Sunday mornings--works with +a screw-driver on somebody's bureau drawer sometimes--'tends the furnace +maybe--one the boarders gives him a cigar now and then. That's a FINE +life to look forward to! No, sir; I don't want to finish as a landlady's +husband!" + +Alice looked grave; for she knew the sketch was but too accurately +prophetic in every probability. "But, papa," she said, to console him, +"don't you think maybe there isn't such a thing as a 'finish,' after +all! You say perhaps we don't learn to live till we die but maybe that's +how it is AFTER we die, too--just learning some more, the way we do +here, and maybe through trouble again, even after that." + +"Oh, it might be," he sighed. "I expect so." + +"Well, then," she said, "what's the use of talking about a 'finish?' We +do keep looking ahead to things as if they'd finish something, but when +we get TO them, they don't finish anything. They're just part of going +on. I'll tell you--I looked ahead all summer to something I was afraid +of, and I said to myself, 'Well, if that happens, I'm finished!' But it +wasn't so, papa. It did happen, and nothing's finished; I'm going on, +just the same only----" She stopped and blushed. + +"Only what?" he asked. + +"Well----" She blushed more deeply, then jumped up, and, standing before +him, caught both his hands in hers. "Well, don't you think, since we do +have to go on, we ought at least to have learned some sense about how to +do it?" + +He looked up at her adoringly. + +"What _I_ think," he said, and his voice trembled;--"I think you're +the smartest girl in the world! I wouldn't trade you for the whole +kit-and-boodle of 'em!" + +But as this folly of his threatened to make her tearful, she kissed him +hastily, and went forth upon her errand. + +Since the night of the tragic-comic dinner she had not seen Russell, nor +caught even the remotest chance glimpse of him; and it was curious that +she should encounter him as she went upon such an errand as now engaged +her. At a corner, not far from that tobacconist's shop she had just left +when he overtook her and walked with her for the first time, she met him +to-day. He turned the corner, coming toward her, and they were face to +face; whereupon that engaging face of Russell's was instantly reddened, +but Alice's remained serene. + +She stopped short, though; and so did he; then she smiled brightly as +she put out her hand. + +"Why, Mr. Russell!" + +"I'm so--I'm so glad to have this--this chance," he stammered. "I've +wanted to tell you--it's just that going into a new undertaking--this +business life--one doesn't get to do a great many things he'd like to. I +hope you'll let me call again some time, if I can." + +"Yes, do!" she said, cordially, and then, with a quick nod, went briskly +on. + +She breathed more rapidly, but knew that he could not have detected it, +and she took some pride in herself for the way she had met this little +crisis. But to have met it with such easy courage meant to her something +more reassuring than a momentary pride in the serenity she had shown. +For she found that what she had resolved in her inmost heart was now +really true: she was "through with all that!" + +She walked on, but more slowly, for the tobacconist's shop was not far +from her now--and, beyond it, that portal of doom, Frincke's Business +College. Already Alice could read the begrimed gilt letters of the +sign; and although they had spelled destiny never with a more painful +imminence than just then, an old habit of dramatizing herself still +prevailed with her. + +There came into her mind a whimsical comparison of her fate with that +of the heroine in a French romance she had read long ago and remembered +well, for she had cried over it. The story ended with the heroine's +taking the veil after a death blow to love; and the final scene again +became vivid to Alice, for a moment. Again, as when she had read +and wept, she seemed herself to stand among the great shadows in the +cathedral nave; smelled the smoky incense on the enclosed air, and heard +the solemn pulses of the organ. She remembered how the novice's father +knelt, trembling, beside a pillar of gray stone; how the faithless lover +watched and shivered behind the statue of a saint; how stifled sobs and +outcries were heard when the novice came to the altar; and how a shaft +of light struck through the rose-window, enveloping her in an amber +glow. + +It was the vision of a moment only, and for no longer than a moment did +Alice tell herself that the romance provided a prettier way of taking +the veil than she had chosen, and that a faithless lover, shaking with +remorse behind a saint's statue, was a greater solace than one left on a +street corner protesting that he'd like to call some time--if he could! +Her pity for herself vanished more reluctantly; but she shook it off and +tried to smile at it, and at her romantic recollections--at all of them. +She had something important to think of. + +She passed the tobacconist's, and before her was that dark entrance to +the wooden stairway leading up to Frincke's Business College--the very +doorway she had always looked upon as the end of youth and the end of +hope. + +How often she had gone by here, hating the dreary obscurity of that +stairway; how often she had thought of this obscurity as something lying +in wait to obliterate the footsteps of any girl who should ascend into +the smoky darkness above! Never had she passed without those ominous +imaginings of hers: pretty girls turning into old maids "taking +dictation"--old maids of a dozen different types, yet all looking a +little like herself. + +Well, she was here at last! She looked up and down the street quickly, +and then, with a little heave of the shoulders, she went bravely in, +under the sign, and began to climb the wooden steps. Half-way up the +shadows were heaviest, but after that the place began to seem brighter. +There was an open window overhead somewhere, she found; and the steps at +the top were gay with sunshine. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Alice Adams, by Booth Tarkington + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK ALICE ADAMS *** + +***** This file should be named 980.txt or 980.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/9/8/980/ + +Produced by Charles Keller + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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