BERTHA'S YELLOW CART
Ben found his office a most cheerful and pleasant resort--just what he
needed. And each morning as soon as his breakfast was eaten, he went to
his desk to write, to read his morning paper, and to glance at the law
journals. He called this "studying." About eleven o'clock the Haneys
regularly drove down, and they went over some paper, or some proposal
for investment, or Williams came in with a report of the mines. This
filled in the time till lunch. Not infrequently he got into the
carriage, and they rode up to get Alice to fill out the table. In the
afternoon they sometimes went out to the mesas, and it was this almost
daily habit of driving and lunching with the Haneys which infuriated
Mrs. Crego (who really loved Alice) and troubled Lee Congdon (who was,
as she said, frankly in love with Ben). Gossips were already discussing
the outcome of it all.
"Just such a situation as that has produced a murderess," said Mrs.
Crego to the judge one night. But he only shook his paper and scowled
under its cover, refusing to say one word further concerning the Haneys.
Alice, studying Ben with those uncanny eyes of hers, saw him slowly
yielding to the charm of Bertha's personality, which was maturing
rapidly under the influence of her love. She was as silent as ever, but
her manner was less boyish. The swell of her bosom, the glow that came
into her face, had their counterparts in the unconsciously acquired
feminine grace of her bearing. She was giving up many of the phrases
which jarred on polite ears, and she did this, naturally, by reason of
her association with Alice. She saw and took on many of the little
niceties of the older woman's way of eating and drinking.
At Lee Congdon's suggestion, she abandoned the cross-saddle. It required
a great deal of character to give up the free and natural way of riding
(the way in which all women rode until these latter days), and to assume
the helpless, cramped, and twisted position the side-saddle demands; but
she did it in the feeling that Ben liked her better for the change. And
he did. She could see approval in his eyes when she rode out for the
first time in conventional riding-skirt, looking very slim and strong
and graceful. "I can't stand for the 'hard hat,'" she confessed. "I'll
wear a cap or a sombrero, but no skillet for me."
These were perfect days for the girl-wife. Under these genial suns, with
such companionship, such daily food, she rushed towards maturity like
some half-wild colt brought suddenly from the sere range into abundant
and peaceful pasture, the physical side of her being rounded out,
glowing with the fires of youth, at the same time that the poor old
Captain sank slowly but surely into inactivity and feebleness. She did
not perceive his decline, for he talked bravely of his future, and
called her attention to his increasing weight, which was indeed a sign
of his growing inertness.
And so the months passed with no one of the little group but Alice
suffering, for Mart had attained a kind of resignation to his condition.
He still talked of going up to the camp, but the doctor and Bertha
persuaded him to wait, and so he endured as patiently as he could, and
if he suffered, gave little direct sign of it.
Alice, fully alive now to the gossip of the town (thanks to Mrs. Crego),
found herself helpless in the matter. She believed the young people to
be--as they were--innocent of all disloyalty, and she could not assume
the rôle of the jealous woman. She was frightened at thought of the
suffering before them all, and it was in this fear that she said to Ben
one day: "Boy, you're giving up a deal of time to the Haneys."
He answered, promptly. "They pay me for it."
"I know they do. But, dearest, you ought to take more time to study--to
prepare yourself for other clients--when they come."
He laughed. "They're not likely to come right away, and, besides, I do
get in an hour or two every day."
"But you ought to study _six_ hours every day. Aren't the traditions of
Lincoln and Daniel Webster all to that effect: work all day with the ax,
and study in the light of pine knots all night?"
He took her words as lightly as they were spoken. "Something like that.
But I'm no Daniel Webster; I'm not sure I want to go in for criminal law
at all."
She spoke, sharply. "You mustn't think of getting your fees too easy,
Ben. I don't think any good lawyer wins without work. Do you?"
"I didn't mean that," he hastened to say. "You do me an injustice. I
really read more than you think, and my memory is tenacious, you know.
Besides, I can't refuse to give the Haneys the most of my time; for they
are my only clients, and the Captain is most generous."
"The mornings ought to be enough," she hazarded.
"I know what you mean. I do go out with them afternoons a good deal, but
I consider that a part of my duty. They are so helpless socially. You've
always felt that yourself."
"I feel it now, Bennie boy, but we mustn't neglect all friends for them.
Other people don't know that you do this as a matter of business, and of
course you can't tell any one; for if the Haneys heard of it they would
be cut to the heart. Do they put it on a business basis?"
"They never mention it. Bertha isn't given to talking subtleties, as you
know, and the Captain takes it all as it comes these days."
It hurt her to hear him speak of Mrs. Haney in that off-hand, habitual
way, and she foretold further misconception on the part of Mrs. Crego in
case he should forget--as he was likely to do--and allude to "Bertha" in
her presence. But how could she tell him not to do that? She merely
said: "I like Mrs. Haney, and I feel sorry for her--I mean I'm sorry she
can't have a place in the town to which she is really entitled. She is
improving very rapidly."
"Isn't she!" he cried out. "That little thing is reading right through
the town library--a book every other day, she tells me."
"Novels, I fear."
"No; that's the remarkable thing. She's reading history and biography.
Isn't it too bad she couldn't have had Bryn Mawr or Vassar? I've advised
her to have in some one of the university people to coach her. I've
suggested Miss Franklin. I wish you'd uphold me in it."
He had never told Alice of the talk in the garden that day, nor of the
look in Bertha's eyes which decided him to assume the position of mentor
as well as legal adviser, and he did not now intimate more than a casual
supervision of her reading. As a matter of fact, he was directing her
daily life as absolutely as a husband--more absolutely, in fact; for she
obeyed his slightest wish or most minute suggestion. He withheld these
facts from Alice, not from any perceived disloyalty to her, but from his
feeling that his advice to Bertha was paid for and professional, and
therefore not to be spread wide before any one. He did not conceal
anything; he merely outlined without filling in the bare suggestion.
He not merely gave his fair client lists of books, he talked with her
upon them, and so far as he was able spoke seriously and conscientiously
about them. She seized upon his suggestion, and got Miss Franklin, one
of the teachers of the schools, to come in now and again of an evening
to help her, and, being fond of music, she bought a piano and began to
take lessons. All of which (Lee Congdon would have said) threatened to
render her commonplace and uninteresting; but Alice Heath felt quite
differently about that.
"No; the more that girl gets, the more she'll have, Lee. As Ben says,
she's the kind that if she were a boy would turn out a big self-made
man. That's a little twisted as to grammar, but you see what I mean. Sex
is one of the ultimate mysteries, isn't it? Now, why didn't I inherit my
father's ability?"
"You did, only you never use it. But this girl hasn't your father to
draw from."
"No; but her father was an educated man--a civil engineer, she tells me,
who came out here for one of the big railroads. He was something of an
inventor, too. That's the reason he died poor--they nearly all do."
"But the mother?"
"Well, she's weak and tiresome now, but she's by no means common. She's
broken by hard work, but she's naturally refined. No, the girl isn't so
bad; it's the frightful girlhood she endured in that little hotel. I
think it's wonderful that she could associate with the people she
did--barbers and railway hands, and all that--and be what she is to-day.
If she had married a man like young Bennett, for example, she would have
gone far."
"She can't go far with Haney chained to her wrist," said the blunt Mrs.
Congdon.
"But think what will happen when she is his widow!"
"And his legatee!"
"Precisely."
"She'll cut a wide swath. She's going to be handsome."
They had reached a danger-point, for Lee was on the verge of saying
something about Ben's infatuation; but she didn't, and Alice knew why
she didn't, for she asked, rather abruptly: "Won't you come over
Thursday night? I'm going to take the Haneys to dinner at the hotel."
She flushed under Lee's gaze. "It's really Bennie's party, and I'm going
to make it as pretty as I can."
"Alice, I don't understand you. Why do you do this?"
"Because I must. She and the Captain are going East on a visit, and Ben
wants to give them a 'jolly send-off,' as he calls it. Besides, I like
the girl."
Lee mused in silence for a few moments. "I guess you're right. Of course
I'll come. Who else will?"
"Several of Ben's new friends and the Cregos--"
"Not the missus?"
"Yes; she comes because she's consumed with curiosity. Oh, it really
promises to be smart!"
Congdon came in just in time to hear these words, "Who promises to be
smart--Mrs. Haney?"
The women laughed. "Another person going about with a mind full of Mrs.
Haney."
"Well, why not? I just passed her on the street in her new dog-cart, and
she was ripping good to look at. Say, that girl is too swift for this
town. You people better keep close to her if you want to know what's
doing in gowns and cloaks. Did you ever see such development in your
life? Say, girls, I always believed in clothes. But, my eyes! I didn't
think cotton and wool and leather could make such a change. Who is
putting her on?"
"The cart is a new development," said Alice. "I hope it wasn't yellow?"
"Well, it was."
"The Captain was in it?"
"Not on your life. The Captain was at home in the easy-chair by the
fire."
The women looked at each other. Then Lee said: "The beginning of the
end. Poor old Captain."
Congdon was loyalty itself. "Now don't you jump at conclusions. Yes, she
pulled up, and I went out to see her. She gave me her hand in the old
way, and said; 'Isn't this a joke. The Captain ordered it from Chicago.
He saw a picture in one of my magazines of a girl driving one of these
things, and here I am. You don't think they'll charge me a special
license, do you?' Oh, she's all right. Don't you worry about her. Then
she said: 'What I don't like about it is the Captain can't ride in it.
I'm not going to keep it,' she said."
"That was for effect," remarked Lee.
"Don't be nasty, Mrs. Congdon. You can't look into her big serious eyes
and say such things."
Lee looked at Alice. "Oh, well, if it comes down to 'big serious eyes,'
then all criticism is valueless. Aren't men curious? Character is
nothing, intellect is nothing--it's all a question of whether we're
good-lookin' or not. Sometimes I'm discouraged. An artist husband is so
hard to please."
"I didn't use to be, dovey," he replied, with a mischievous gleam.
"He means when he took me. I'm used to his slurs. Just think, Alice, I
accepted this man fresh from Paris, with all his sins of omission and
commission upon him, and now he reviles me to my teeth." She patted the
hand he slipped round her neck. "Tell us more about Mrs. Haney. How was
she dressed?"
"In perfect good taste--almost too good. She looked like one of Joe
Meyer's early posters. Gee! but she was snappy in drawing. She carries
that sort of thing well--she's so clean and nifty in line. If she could
have a year in Paris--wow!--well, us to Fifth Avenue, sure thing!"
"All depends on what is at the bottom of that girl's soul," retorted
Lee, sententiously. "A light woman with money is a flighty combination.
I don't pretend to say what your little Mrs. Haney is at bottom. Thus
far I like her. I talk about her freely, but I defend her in public.
But, at the same time, fifty thousand dollars a year is a corrupting
power."
Congdon gravely assented to this. "You're perfectly right; that's the
reason I keep our income down to fifteen hundred. I'd hate to see you
look like a ready-made cloak advertisement."
Alice rose rather wearily. "Thursday night, you said?"
"Yes; and I guess, following the latest bulletin concerning Mr. Haney,
we better put on our swellest ginghams."
Alice, on her way home, continued to think of Mrs. Haney; indeed, she
was seldom out of her mind. And she had a feeling of having known her
for a long time--since girlhood; and yet less than a year had passed
since that dinner at Lee Congdon's. Spring was coming; the hint of it
was in the sweet air, and in the clear piping of a prairie lark in a
vacant lot. Spring! And how long it had been since Ben had referred to
their marriage! Perhaps he took it for granted. "Perhaps he sees in me
only failing health, and dares not speak."
She was not gaining; that she knew, and so did Lee. She had stayed too
long in the raw climate of her native city. "He must not marry me!" she
despairingly cried. "I must not let him ruin his life in that way!" And
she sank back in the corner of her carriage with wrinkled, pallid face,
and quivering lips; for Bertha was passing up the avenue, driving a
smart-stepping cob, in her cart, and in the seat beside her, as radiant
as herself, sat Ben Fordyce.