After Fred had gone out into the wilderness, and learned her lesson;
after that long day in the cottage, when her mind had emptied itself of
some of its own certainties, so that deep, primitive knowledges could
flow into it, she took up life again in her own way. She went to her
office, she exercised Zip, she accepted every invitation that came to
her; but she got thin. "Scrawny," her grandmother called it. Also, she
expended a good deal of money on a bridesmaid's dress--for something had
happened! Happened, curiously enough, on the very afternoon when she was
studying that hard page of Nature's book, all alone, in the empty
cottage by the lake....
The very next morning Laura had burst into 15 Payton Street. "Swear not
to tell," she said; and when Fred had sworn, the secret--glowing,
wonderful! was told in two words:
"_I'm_ engaged!"
Then came an ecstatic recital, ending with "I've decided on daffodil
yellow for your dresses. Rather far ahead--for it isn't to be until the
middle of December. But I think it's just as well to plan, don't you?"
"Of course it is," Fred agreed. ("_Oh, if I only hadn't asked him!_")
"Billy-boy will juggle out enough money for the finest satin going, for
his only daughter; but you girls can have perfectly sweet flowered
voile, over yellow charmeuse. I've a corking idea for your hats." Then
she looked at Fred closely. "You're not a bit surprised; I believe you
knew what was going to happen!"
Fred laughed non-committally. Laura herself had been so far from knowing
what was going to happen, that Howard Maitland had to fairly pound it
into her that he was in love with her! He had not meant to tell her so
soon. It wouldn't be decent, he thought, remembering that night in the
cottage. He hadn't meant to speak for at least a month. He was going to
mark time, and forget that there had ever been a minute when Fred Payton
had imagined she cared about him--"for, of course, that was all it
amounted to," he told himself; "imagination!" There was more modesty
than truth in his phrase, yet his conviction was sincere enough--"A girl
like Fred couldn't really care for _me_. I'm not up to her!"
It was characteristic of his simple soul, that he told Laura the same
thing, when he blundered into the proposal that he had meant to hold
back for a month. It was wrung from him by his despair at her
misunderstanding his feeling about Fred. He was in full swing of
haranguing her upon the wonderfulness of her cousin--"Of course; she's
perfectly stunning," Laura had interrupted; "I know she's simply great.
But why on earth you two don't announce your engagement I can't imagine!
You make me a little tired," she said, good-naturedly, but rather
obviously bored.
"Announce our _what_?"
"Engagement. Do you suppose we are all blind?"
Howard Maitland actually whitened a little under his Philippine tan.
"You are mistaken, Laura," he said, quietly. "If I have given you the
impression that Fred had the slightest feeling for me, I ought to be
kicked."
Laura turned an indignant face toward him: "Do you mean to tell me that
Fred has only been flirting with you? I don't believe it! She's not that
kind."
They were in the Childses' parlor in the yellow dusk of the autumn
afternoon. Laura had given her caller two cups of tea with four lumps of
sugar in each cup, and Howard, between innumerable little cakes, had
been telling her again of Frederica's behavior that terrible night at
the camp. It was at least the third time that she had heard the grim
details, and each time she had shivered and wished he would stop. To
silence him, she had charged upon him for not announcing his engagement;
it seemed flippant, but it would change the subject. His dismay made her
forget Flora, in real bewilderment. Not engaged to Fred! Had Fred played
with him?
"If Fred's been just flirting, she ought to be ashamed," Laura said,
hotly; "she knew you were perfectly gone on her."
"Laura, _you_ didn't suppose such a thing?"
"That you were gone on Fred? Of course I did! I knew you were crazy
about her, a year ago; and so did she. Howard, I'm awfully sorry."
"Sorry--for what?"
"For you."
Howard Maitland got on his feet, and walked the length of the room, and
back; he said something under his breath. Then he drew up a chair beside
her and took her hand.
"I never thought of such a thing."
"What!"
"You are the only girl I ever cared two cents for."
She put her hand against her young breast, in astounded question: "_I?_"
"I should think you'd have seen it. You, and--and everybody."
"But Howard, it can't be--_me_?" she protested, faintly.
"It's been you, always. When you accuse me of being in love with--with
anybody else, and say everybody thought so, you just bowl me over!" His
shocked astonishment left no doubt of his sincerity.
"But Freddy," Laura began--
He broke in sharply: "Fred knows how tremendously I admire her. I've
always said so, to you and to her, too. And I believe she likes me as
much as she likes any of us fellows--but of course I'm not up to her,
and she never flirted with me in her life! She's not the kind of girl
who wants to collect scalps," he said, almost with anger. "I never
thought of--caring for her. Why, I--I _couldn't_ care for Fred!"
"But you were always talking about her, and--"
"Of course I talked about her! Doesn't everybody talk about her? But as
for being in love with her--Laura, I tell you, you are the only girl in
existence, so far as I'm concerned. I suppose you don't care anything
about me."
Laura put her hands over her face, and laughed; then stretched them out
to him, and the tears brimmed over.... "Oh, Howard, you are such a
goose!"
There was a speechless moment; then he put his arms around her, kissed
the fluffy hair that brushed his lips, and said, "Oh, my little darling!
my little love...."
After that they had to talk it all over, and there were endless
explanations.
"You do believe I never thought of--anybody else?" he asked, again and
again. And she said yes, she believed it, but she didn't understand it.
"Why, I was so sure you were in love with her, I used to give you
chances to be together. Do you remember that afternoon you went to say
good-by to her, before you went to the Philippines? I stayed up-stairs
to give you a chance to ask her."
"_Laura!_"
"I did."
"How could you be so absurd?"
"Everybody thought so."
That silenced him. He was horribly ashamed. It was his fault, then, that
night in the cottage? "Everybody thought so." So, naturally, Fred
thought so--and she was the noblest and most generous woman in the
world! "It's my fault somehow, that she spoke," he told himself, in a
passion of humiliation.
That night he wrote to her. The engagement was not to "come out" for two
or three weeks;--"only the family must know," Laura said; but Howard had
protested: "Fred--let's tell Fred?"
"Well," Laura consented, reluctantly, "I'll go and see her to-morrow
morning and make her swear not to tell."
"She can keep a secret," he said. He did not add that Fred should learn
the secret before to-morrow morning. "I'm the one to break it to her,"
he thought. Then mentally kicked himself for saying "break it."
When he sat down at his desk that night to write to her, his face was
rigid at what was before him; it was nearly dawn before the task was
finished; letters--long letters, short letters, letters expressing his
admiration for her, letters ignoring it, letters about Laura, about the
Philippines, about Flora--were written out, torn up, flung into the
waste-basket. Then came the brief, blunt truth-telling: Laura had
accepted him, and he knew that she, his old pal, would wish them
happiness. Of course there was a postscript: she would be their very
best friend, because they both thought she was the finest woman they
knew.
When the letter was addressed and sealed, he went out into the
four-o'clock-in-the-morning stillness, and walked over to Payton Street
to slip it into the letter-box of the sleeping house. He would not trust
it to the mail; he would run no risk of Laura's arriving before the
first delivery. Fred mustn't be caught off guard! Then he walked
home--glanced at a little suspiciously by an officer on his somnolent
beat--about as uncomfortable a young man as ever realized his own
happiness in contrast to some one else's unhappiness--for, in spite of
his modest disclaimer, he knew that Fred was unhappy: "How would I feel
if Laura had refused me? And, of course, Fred is harder hit than a man
would be."
But, no matter how hard hit she was, thanks to that letter, the next
morning, when Laura swore her to secrecy, and said that the bridesmaids'
hats would be _dreams_! Fred's upper lip was smilingly stiff.
It was just after that that Mrs. Holmes began to say that her
granddaughter was "scrawny."