IV

He took a cigar out of his pocket and began to smoke, and to think. His

impassive face showed no trace of emotion. He was simply waiting for a

train; but within he was in a panic, torn with rage, fear, and a frantic

desire for action.

Who the devil was Charley? After all, what did he know of Kathleen? What

did he know of women, anyway? He had left her alone for days and days,

while he looked after business matters in the city. He had left her

alone, partly because he wanted to go into the city, because he disliked

solitude and quiet. How did he know what she thought of when he was

gone? Charley!

He could scarcely endure it. His lean body trembled, like that of a

nervous horse held brutally in check. He wanted to bolt. Charley!

Unfortunately, Brecky did not find it difficult to believe evil. His

experience of life had been hard and definite. He had as high an opinion

of Kathleen as he had ever had of a human being, but he was not

trustful. He knew too much, and it was a one-sided knowledge.

It was possible that Kathleen was merely a fool, and didn’t realize what

she was doing; but this Charley wouldn’t be like that. If women were

more or less a mystery to Brecky, men were not. He had a sudden and very

clear picture of Kathleen, neat, rosy, pitifully self-assured, alighting

from the train, to be met by Charley.

All at once he knew who Charley was--that fat, owlish fellow who used to

sit so often at Kathleen’s table in the restaurant. Sands, his name was.

He had money of his own, and used to bother Brecky for tips on the

races. He used to sit for hours absorbed in the form sheets, trying to

figure things out for himself--with the usual results. And Kathleen had

turned from Brecky, the shrewd, the alert, the competent, to that

fellow!

“I’ve got nearly an hour to wait, haven’t I?” he asked.

Brecky’s voice rang out sharply in the quiet little room. The agent

opened his eyes, more startled than the words warranted. He fancied

there was something in the other man’s tone. He stared at him, instantly

wide awake.

“I guess I’ll have time to run home and get something,” Brecky went on.

“Don’t be late, though,” said the agent. “This’ll be the last train

to-night.”

Brecky vanished, slamming the door behind him. He retraced his steps

with dreamlike ease. He was not conscious of progressing until he found

himself once more at the hotel. He was filled with emotions so violent,

with such a confusion of hatred, jealousy, and pain, that he was truly

overwhelmed. His inarticulate soul could find no other words for his

anguish than--

“No one’s going to make a fool of _me_!”

He put his hand into his coat pocket for the key of the front door, but

it wasn’t there. He was obliged to go around to the back of the house

and enter through the cellar. He felt his way through the piercing cold

of that black underground cavern, and ascended the shaking wooden steps

to the kitchen.

The kitchen gave him a shock. It was exactly as he had left it, neat,

quiet, warm, with the clock ticking, the kettle gently steaming,

Kathleen’s apron across a chair. It was like the memory of a past

irretrievably gone. Brecky’s heart contracted with pain. He stopped for

a moment, to muster all the resolution he had.

He went upstairs into the bedroom, and from a drawer of the bureau he

took what he wanted. He caught a glimpse of himself in the mirror, saw

his face strained and hard beneath his inevitable cap, and he thought he

looked like a criminal in the movies. Well, why shouldn’t he?

He caught the train. He got in and settled himself comfortably in the

smoking car, deserted except for two men playing pinochle.

The train ran on smoothly, stronger than the wind. Brecky could see very

little from the window except the slanting rain and now and then a

blurred light. The turmoil in his brain never ceased. He looked

unpleasantly wide awake, staring, like a somnambulist. His gray eyes

never seemed to blink, or his face to move a muscle.

And for all his grief and fury he had no other words than that pitifully

inadequate refrain:

“No one’s going to make a fool of _me_!”

His cigar was out, but he did not notice it. He sat with a curiously

alert air, like a pointing dog, immobile, but terribly ready. He was

thinking.

He stopped the conductor as he passed through the car.

“Can you stop at New Chelsea?” he asked.

The conductor shook his head.

“It’s not an express stop,” he said. “You’ll have to go on to New York

and then take a train back. You’ll have to wait till to-morrow morning,

too. No more trains to-night!”

Brecky reflected. He took it for granted that if Kathleen had telephoned

to the fellow at New Chelsea, that was where he lived, and where he was

most likely to be found. He pulled at the conductor’s sleeve as the man

was moving away.

“Do you slow down anywhere near there?”

“Not enough for--”

“Just you tell me when you’re going to slow down a bit,” said Brecky.

“I’ve got to get there. You won’t be responsible.”

“I should be,” said the conductor sententiously. “Morally speaking, I

should be responsible.”

Brecky knew every inch of that line. As they approached the desired

destination, he got up and went out upon the platform. The pinochle

players saw him standing there, in the wind and the rain. Then,

suddenly, he vanished. He had climbed down the steps and jumped.

The fall stunned him, and he lay still for an instant. When he could

breathe freely again, he rose, and mechanically tried to brush himself

off. He was always a neat fellow.

The train had disappeared, and he was alone in the universe. He could

still hear the sea, dull and menacing, and the demoniac wind still blew.

He didn’t quite know where he was. His plan was to follow the tracks.

Wet to the skin, a sinister enough figure with his face nearly hidden by

pulled down cap and turned up collar, he went doggedly forward toward

the next station. He presented the appearance of a highwayman.

Before long he saw the feeble light of the New Chelsea station ahead of

him, blurred through the rain. With a sigh of relief he mounted the

wooden platform, where he was for the moment sheltered from the weather.

He tried to open the door, but it was locked. He looked in through the

window, and saw the dimly lit room, quite empty, and the stove, without

fire. Evidently the station master had gone for the night. This was a

blow to Brecky, for he had counted upon making inquiries here.

He prowled around the platform, scowling, trying to plan his course. To

his right he saw a few scattered lights, which must be, he thought, the

village of New Chelsea; and he went toward them, along a muddy road. In

due time he reached the main street. There was a drug store, closed and

locked, with a ghostly green light in the window. There was also a

protective light in the window of a well stocked grocery; but not a

human being to be seen, not a sound to be heard, except the yelping of a

dog somewhere in the hills that rose behind the town and partly

sheltered it from the wind. Only a sudden cruel gust, from time to time,

met him full in the face.

He turned a corner, and at the end of the street he saw a distant form,

walking with a slow and deliberate step very familiar to him. It was a

policeman, and Brecky hastened after him.

“I’ve lost my bearings,” he said. “Is Charley Sands’s place anywhere

near here?”

The policeman hesitated for a moment, with rural caution.

“What do you want to go there for?” he asked.

“Well,” said Brecky, laughing, “I suppose because I don’t want to walk

around New Chelsea all night in this weather. Three of us started here

in a motor, but we broke down a little way up the line, and we couldn’t

get our bearings. We each tried a different direction, and I guess I’m

the lucky one. Charley will have to turn out with a lantern to find the

other fellows.”

“Oh, they’ll be all right!” said the policeman, disarmed. “There’s

houses and little settlements all around this part of the country.”

He directed Brecky to the house of Charley Sands. A good walk, about

three miles, he should say--uphill, and mighty hard to find in the dark.

“Oh, I’ll find it all right!” said Brecky cheerfully.

V

He very nearly found something else that night. He lost his way

entirely. He went on, as in a dream, along muddy roads, up hills so

steep that he thought his weary heart would burst. He would not admit

his intolerable fatigue, and the frightful ravages made by passion and

bitterness. He wished to continue, inexorably, until he had accomplished

his object.

The country was unfamiliar and hostile to this denizen of cities. When

at last his strength was wholly gone, he did not know where to turn. He

dared not wake any of the people in the dark farmhouses he passed. He

crept up to a barn once, but a dog drove him away.

At last, at very last, he found an open shed behind a church, used as a

shelter for the buggies and the Fords of the worshipers; and he crouched

in there, relieved for a time from the unendurable confusion of the dark

and the wind. His cigars and matches were dry and safe in an inside

pocket, and he began to smoke. He hadn’t the slightest wish to sleep. He

didn’t even feel tired. He only wanted to stop for a moment, to secure a

pause in his superhuman exertions. He knew very well that if he hadn’t

found this refuge, he would have been defeated.

Wide-eyed and reflective, he sat in his corner until he observed that

the stormy dark was changing its aspect, that it was growing faintly and

drearily gray. It surprised him. He had forgotten that morning was ever

coming again. He got up and set out on his way once more.

An extraordinary thought occurred to him. It would have been better, he

said to himself, if he had died. He had lost Kathleen; why was he to

live? What had he left?

He had no longer any heart for revenge. He was sorry he had to see it

through; but, according to his queer code, it was absolutely necessary

to vindicate himself. Otherwise his self-respect would be gone, and he

could neither live nor die in peace.

It was nearly eight o’clock when he approached the house of Charley

Sands, which an early stirring laborer had pointed out to him. He had

planned that hour. He had also looked up the time of the train he meant

to take--when he had finished. It was due to his self-respect to make a

valiant effort to escape, although he didn’t really care.

It was a trim white house surrounded by placid lawns. He went up to it

with careless audacity, his hand grasping the revolver in his pocket.

What did he care? Let Sands see him, let him ask what he wanted; he

would soon find out!

Brecky had made himself neater, after his horrible night, than almost

any other man could have done; but at best he looked haggard and

menacing. He knew it, and was glad.

The weather had cleared, but he was still wet to the skin and cold,

although he was not aware of it. He walked along the gravel path, which

crunched under his firm tread. He was making no effort to conceal his

presence. He wished to be observed, to bring this thing to its climax,

to be done with it.

He ran up on the veranda, and, with one of those queer impulses of an

abstracted mind, instead of ringing the bell, he knocked sharply on the

door. He heard some one coming down the stairs, and he smiled. If it was

Charley--

But it was not. It was an entirely strange young woman, who looked at

him with distrust. He was so taken aback that he could not speak. He

stared and stared at her.

“Well?” she demanded impatiently.

“Sands here?” he managed to ask.

“What do you want with him?”

Brecky hesitated. His tired brain, flung loose from the pivot of his

fixed idea, spun round helplessly. He couldn’t really think at all.

Another woman here!

He was roused by the sight of her preparing to shut the door in his

face. He set his foot against it.

“I want to see him,” he said. “You call him!”

She was alarmed then, and began to call “Charley!” in a shrill voice.

Down the stairs came bounding the fat and owlish young man.

“Well!” he cried. “Brecky!”

The young woman frowned.

“He didn’t say who he was,” she said. “I didn’t know. Come in!”

Brecky entered, still dazed. They didn’t seem at all surprised to see

him, even at that hour of the morning, and in the lamentable state he

was in. He sat down uninvited, threw off his cap, and lighted a cigar.

“This is my wife, Brecky,” said Sands, in a tone of severe rebuke.

“Kathleen’s second cousin, you know.”

“All right!” said Brecky.

His manners, usually punctilious, had deserted him entirely. What he

wanted was for these people to clear out of their own room, and let him

think for a moment; but the young woman sat down opposite him. She was

rather nice-looking, in a shrewish way, but obviously hostile.

“She’s here,” she said.

Brecky sprang up.

“Let me see her!” he cried.

“I don’t think she wants to see you,” said the young woman. “I don’t

blame her. If she takes _my_ advice, she’ll never go back to you!”

Brecky looked at her steadily. He felt, however, that it was better not

to say what he thought just then.

“You’re just making a drudge out of her,” the other went on. “It’s a

shame--a pretty, lively young girl like Kathleen shut up in that awful

place! All you care about is getting your meals cooked. I wouldn’t do it

for any man. She’s sick and tired of it, I can tell you--being your

cook. If she takes my advice, she’ll go back to her old job, where

she’ll have a little money to spend and see a little life.”

“All right!” said Brecky again. “But maybe she doesn’t want to take your

advice. Anyway, I’d like to ask her.”

“Well, I hope she won’t see you. I know what you’ll do--make all sorts

of promises, till you get her back there again, and then she can go

right on cooking!”

“Do I see her, or don’t I?” asked Brecky, still quite calm.

“I’ll see,” said the peppery young woman, and went off and left him

alone.

He had a new idea to contend against, and one for which there was in his

experience no precedent. He could comprehend an elopement, but any

subtler reason for his wife’s leaving him was extremely hard for him to

grasp. It was his habit, though, to face facts, and he tried now.

He tried to imagine Kathleen as a human being, and not as his wife; but

he failed. What more could the girl want? He was filled with rage at her

ingratitude, and at the humiliating position she had got him into. He

was certainly being made a fool of, for the first time. He had done his

best, had worked for her, had been sober, kind, loyal. What more could

the girl want?

Whatever it was, she wouldn’t get it--that she wouldn’t! She had left

him, and she could come back, if she wished; but he wasn’t going to ask

her.

“That’s not my way!” he said to himself, with a grimace. “I won’t crawl

for any one. I haven’t done anything. It’s all her fault!”

He was half inclined to walk out of the house then and there, but if by

any chance Kathleen was going to be sorry, he didn’t want to miss it. He

discovered that he was extremely anxious for her to be sorry, and that

if she were, he might perhaps not be so very angry. She needn’t even say

it. One nice smile, and the thing would be over.

“I don’t know,” he thought. “Maybe it has been hard for her. She’s only

a kid. Of course, it doesn’t excuse her running away like that, and

making such a fool of me, but--well, I don’t know. Maybe, later on, I’ll

get a servant for her. I could afford it.”