ALIX THE THIRD
October came, with its red and golden trees, its brown pastures,
its crisp nights and its hazy, smoky days. Fires were kindled in
old-fashioned fireplaces; out in the farmyards busy housewives were
making soap and apple butter in great iron kettles suspended over
blazing logs; wagons laden with wheat and corn rumbled through
country roads and up to the Windom elevator; stores were thriving
under the spur of new-found money; the school was open, Main Street
childless for hours at a time,--and Courtney Thane was still in
Windomville.
He was a frequent, almost constant visitor at the red-brick house
on the knoll. The gossips were busy. Sage winks were exchanged when
Alix and he were seen together in her automobile; many a head was
lowered so that its owner might peer quizzically over the upper
rims of spectacles as they strolled past the postoffice and other
public porches; convicting feminine smiles pursued the young
man up the lane leading to Alix's home. There were some doubtful
head-shakings, but in the main Windomville was rather well pleased
with the prospect. Opinion, though divided, was almost unanimous:
few there were who held that "nothin' would come of it."
Charlie Webster was one of the latter. His early intimacy with the
ex-aviator had suffered a decided slump. His jovial attempts to
plague the young man about his intentions met with the frostiest
reception. Indeed, on one memorable occasion, the object of these
good-natured banterings turned upon him coldly and said:
"See here, Webster, you're getting to be considerable of a nuisance.
Cut it out, will you? You are not half as funny as you think you
are. I'm pretty well fed up with your freshness--understand?"
It was a slap in the face that Charlie DID understand, and one
he never forgot. As the rebuke was uttered on the porch of Dowd's
Tavern and in the presence of Flora Grady, Maude Baggs Pollock and
one or two others, the sting was likely to endure.
While Courtney's manner had undergone a decided change so far as
nearly all of his fellow-lodgers were concerned, he still maintained
a very friendly and courteous attitude toward the Dowd sisters and
Mr. and Mrs. Pollock. For some reason known only to himself,--(but
doubtless plain to the reader of this narrative),--he devoted most
of his attention to the editor and his wife and to the two spinsters
who were such close friends of the young lady of his dreams. As
for the others, he made no attempt to conceal his disdain.
It was not long before the Irish in Miss Flora Grady was aroused.
She announced to Miss Angie Miller that he was a "stuck up smart-Aleck,"
and sooner or later he'd get a piece of her mind that would "take
him down a couple of pegs." Miss Miller, while in complete accord
with Flora's views, was content to speak of him as "supercilious."
Charlie Webster grew more and more thoughtful under the weight of
indignity.
"I certainly missed my guess as to that feller," he remarked to
Doc Simpson and Hatch one day. "I had him sized up as a different
sort of feller altogether. Why, up to a couple of weeks ago, he
was as nice as pie to all of us,--'specially to me. He used to come
over to my office and sit around for hours, chatting and smoking
cigarettes and joshing like a good feller. But I've got it all
figgered out, boys. He was simply workin' me. He always led the
conversation round to Alix Crown, and then, like a dern' fool, I'd
let him pump me dry. Why, there's nothing he don't know about that
girl,--and all through me. Now he's got in with her,--just as he
wanted to all along,--and what does he do but tie a can to me and
give me a swift kick. And there's another thing I might as well
say to you fellers while I'm about it. I've been doing a lot of
thinking lately,--sort of putting things together in my mind,--and
it's my opinion that he is one of the blamedest liars I've ever
come across."
He paused to see the effect of this startling assertion. Hatch
removed the corn-cob pipe from between his lips and laconically
observed:
"Well, I know of one lie he's told."
"You do?"
"Remember him telling us at the supper table one night that a German
submarine fired three torpedoes at the steamer he was coming home
on with a lot of other sick and wounded? Well, a couple of nights
ago he forgot himself and made the statement that he was in a
hospital in England for nearly two months after the armistice was
signed."
"By gosh, that's right," cried Doc Simpson.
"And what's more," went on Hatch, "wasn't he serving in the British
Army? What I'd like to know is this: why would England be sending
her wounded soldiers over to America? You can bet your life England
wasn't doing anything like that."
"There's another thing that don't sound just right to me," said
Charlie, his brow furrowed. "He says one night he got lost driving
his ambulance and the first thing he knew he was away behind the
German lines. I may be wrong, but I've always thought both sides
had trenches. What puzzles me is how the dickens he managed to
drive that Ford of his over the German trenches without noticin'
'em,--and back again besides."
"Well," said Doc, desiring to be fair, "it seems to be the habit
of soldiers to lie a little. That's where we get the saying, 'he
lied like a trooper.' I know my Uncle George lied so much about what
he did in the Civil War that he ought to have had twenty pensions
instead of one. Still, there's a big change in Court, as you say,
Charlie. I wonder if Alix is really keen about him. He's up there
all the time, seems to me. Or is she just stringin' him?"
Charlie frowned darkly. "He's a slick one. I--I'd hate to see Alix
fall for him."
The sententious Mr. Hatch: "The smartest women in the world lose
their heads over a feller as soon as they find out he's in poor
health."
"He's in perfect health," exploded Charlie.
"I know,--but that don't prevent him from coughing and holding
his side and walking with a cane, does it? That's what gets 'em,
Charlie. The quickest way to get a girl interested is to let her
think you're in need of sympathy."
"It don't work when you're as fat as I am," said Charlie gloomily.
Conscious or unconscious of the varying opinions that were being
voiced behind his back, Courtney went confidently ahead with
his wooing. He congratulated himself that he was in Alix's good
graces. If at times she was perplexingly cool,--or "upstage," as
he called it,--he flattered himself that he knew women too well to
be discouraged by these purely feminine manifestations.
This was a game he knew how to play. The time was not yet ripe for
him to abandon his well-calculated air of indifference. That he was
desperately in love with her goes without saying. If at the outset
of his campaign he was inspired by the unworthy motive of greed,
he was now consumed by an entirely different desire,--the desire
to have her for his own, even though she were penniless.
Those whirlwind tactics that had swept many another girl off her
feet were not to be thought of here. Alix was different. She was
not an impressionable, hair-brained flapper, such as he had come in
contact with in past experiences. Despite her sprightly, thoroughly
up-to-the-moment ease of manner, and an air of complete sophistication,
she was singularly old-fashioned in a great many respects. While
she was bright, amusing, gay, there was back of it all a certain
reserve that forbade familiarity,--sufficient, indeed, to inspire
unexampled caution on his part. She invited friendship but not
familiarity; she demanded respect rather than admiration.
He was not slow in arriving at the conclusion that she knew men.
She knew how to fence with them. He was distinctly aware of this.
Other men, of course, had been in love with her; other men no doubt
had dashed their hopes upon the barrier in their haste to seize the
treasure. It was inconceivable that one so lovely, so desirable,
so utterly feminine should fail to inspire in all men that which
she inspired in him. The obvious, therefore, was gratifying. Granted
that she had had proposals, here was the proof that the poor fools
who laid their hearts at her feet had gone about it clumsily. Such
would not be the case with him. Oh no! He would bide his time, he
would watch for the first break in her enchanted armour,--and then
the conquest!
There were times, of course, when he came near to catastrophe,--times
when he was almost powerless to resist the passion that possessed
him. These were the times when he realized how easy it would have
been to join that sad company of fools in the path behind her.
He had no real misgivings. He felt confident of winning. True, her
moods puzzled him at times, but were they not, after all, omens of
good fortune? Were they not indications of the mysterious changes
that were taking place in her? And the way was clear. So far as he
knew, there was no other man. Her heart was free. What more could
he ask?
On her side, the situation was not so complex. He came from the
great outside world, he brought the outside world to the lonely
little village on the bank of the river. He was bright, amusing,
cultivated,--at least he represented cultivation as it exists in
open places and on the surface of a sea called civilization. He
possessed that ineffable quality known as "manner." The spice of the
Metropolis clung to him. He could talk of the things she loved,--not
as she loved the farm and village and the home of her fathers, but
of the things she loved because they stood for that which represented
the beautiful in intellect, in genius, in accomplishment. The breath
of far lands and wide seas came with him to the town of Windomville,
grateful and soothing, and yet laden with the tang of turmoil, the
spice of iniquity.
Alix was no Puritan. She had been out in the world, she had come
up against the elemental in life, she had learned that God in His
wisdom had peopled the earth with saints and sinners,--and she was
tolerant of both! In a word, she was broad-minded. She had been
an observer rather than a participant in the passing show. She had
absorbed knowledge rather than experience.
The conventions remained unshaken so far as she was personally
concerned. In others she excused much that she could not have
excused in herself,--for the heritage of righteousness had come
down to her through a long line of staunch upholders.
She loved life. She craved companionship. She could afford
to gratify her desires. Week-ends found two or more guests at her
home,--friends from the city up the river. Sometimes there were
visitors from Chicago, Indianapolis and other places,--girls she
had met at school, or in her travels, or in the canteen. Early in
the war her house was headquarters for the local Red Cross workers,
the knitters, the bandage rollers, and so on, but after the entry
of the United States into the conflict, most of her time was spent
away from Windomville in the more intense activities delegated to
women.
She attended the theatre when anything worth while came to the
city, frequently taking one or two of the village people with her.
Once, as she was leaving the theatre, she heard herself discussed
by persons in the aisle behind.
"That's Alix Crown. I'll tell you all about her when we get home.
Her father and mother were murdered years ago and buried in a well
or something. I wish she'd turn around so that you could get a good
look at her face. She's quite pretty and--"
And she had deliberately turned to face the speaker, who never
forgot the cold, unwavering stare that caused her to lower her own
eyes and her voice to trail off into a confused mumble.
Alix was a long time in recovering from the distress caused by the
incident. She avoided the city for weeks. It was her first intimation
that she was an object of unusual interest to people, that she was
the subject of whispered comment, that she was a "character" to be
pointed out to strangers. Even now, with the sting of injury and
injustice eased by time and her own good sense, there still remained
the disturbing consciousness that she was,--for want of a milder
term,--a "marked woman."
She was thoroughly acquainted with every detail connected with the
extensive farms and industries that had been handed down to her. A
great deal of her time was devoted to an intelligent and comprehensive
interest in the management of the farms. She was never out of
touch with conditions. Her tenants respected and admired her; her
foremen and superintendents consulted with her as they would not
have believed it possible to consult with a woman; her bankers
deferred to her.
She would have laughed at you if you had suggested to her that she
had more than a grain of business-sense, or ability, or capacity,
and yet she was singularly far-sighted and capable,--without being
in the least aware of it. Her pleasures were not allowed to interfere
with her obligations as a landlord, a citizen and a taxpayer.
A certain part of each day was set aside for the business of the
farms. She repaired bright and early to the little office at the
back of the house where her grandfather had worked before her,
and there she struggled over accounts, reports, claims,--and her
cheque-book. And like her grim, silent grandsire, she "rode" the
lanes that twined through field and timber,--only she rode gaily,
blithely, with sunshine in her heart. The darkness was always behind
her, never ahead.
Courtney undoubtedly had overcome the prejudice his visit to
Quill's Window had inspired in her. They never spoke of that first
encounter. It was as a closed book between them. He had forgotten
the incident. At any rate, he had put it out of his mind. He sometimes
wondered, however, if she would ever invite him to accompany her
to the top of that forbidden hill. In their rambles they had passed
the closed gate on more than one occasion. The words, "No Trespass,"
still met the eye. Some day he would suggest an adventure: the
descent to the cave in quest of treasure! The two of them! Rope
ladder and all! It would be great fun!
He was assiduous in his efforts to amuse her house guests. He laid
himself out to be entertaining. If he resented the presence of young
men from the city, he managed to conceal his feelings remarkably
well. On one point he was firm: he would not accompany her on any
of her trips to the city. Once she had invited him to motor in with
her to a tea, and another time she offered to drive him about the
city and out to the college on a sight-seeing tour. It was then
that he said he was determined to obey "doctor's orders." No city
streets for him! Even SHE couldn't entice him! He loved every inch
of this charming, restful spot,--every tree and every stone,--and
he would not leave it until the time came for him to go away forever.
He was very well satisfied with the fruits of this apparently
ungracious refusal. She went to the city less frequently than before,
and only when it was necessary. This, he decided, was significant.
It could have but one meaning.
Her dog, Sergeant, did not like him.