forefinger, but she didn’t look up as she asked,
“Forgiven you for what, Daddy?”
“For coming between you and Phil Gallatin,” he said gently.
She started a trifle and then went on picking at the lace on her frock.
“Oh, that,” she said quietly. “You _had_ to do that. I’m glad you did.”
“No,” he interrupted. “You’re not glad, Jane. Neither am I. I did what
I thought was my duty, but it has made a difference with us both. I’m
sorry.”
“Sorry? Why?”
“Because it has made you unhappy--and resentful.”
“I’m not resentful.”
“Yes. I’ve felt it. Even if I’d been justified, you would still resent
it.”
“But you _were_ justified, Daddy, weren’t you?” she asked.
She turned her gaze full on his face and the pain in her eyes hurt him.
He got up and walked the length of the room before he replied.
“I did what I thought was right. I’d probably do the same thing again
under similar circumstances. I--I didn’t think Mr. Gallatin the kind of
man I wanted for you.”
She lay back in her chair and looked into the fire, but said nothing.
Loring came close to her and laid his hand on her shoulder.
“You loved him, Jane?”
She didn’t reply.
“You still love him, daughter?”
Her head moved slowly from side to side.
“No,” she muttered, stiflingly, “no, no.”
Loring smiled down at the top of her head.
“Why should you deny it, Jane? What would you say if I acknowledged
that I had made a mistake in judgment, that you were right after all,
that Phil Gallatin is not the man I thought him, that he’s worthy in
every way of your regard, that of all the young men I’ve met in New
York in business or out of it, he is the one man I would rather have
marry my daughter?”
She had risen and was leaning toward him, pale and trembling.
“What--do--you--mean?” she whispered fearfully.
He told her.
“That case you spoke of----?”
“He beat me--fairly--and he beat me badly, so badly that I can’t afford
to have him against me. I’ve taken him into the business. I can’t
afford to be without him.”
“Then--what you said about him----”
“I was fooled, child, completely fooled. We thought he was a joke. We
laughed at him and all the while he was out West working, quietly,
skillfully, diligently piling up his evidence. He’s made good, Jane,
and I’ve told him so. I’ve written him a note to-night, a note of
apology for my share in his unhappiness, telling him that I was sorry
for what had happened and telling him that he would be a welcome
visitor to my house----”
“Daddy!” Jane had straightened and now glanced fearfully toward the
door as though she expected to see Phil Gallatin at any moment coming
through the curtains. “You had no right to do that! I will not see him.
Whatever his business relations with you, you have no right to force
him on me. I have known for a long time that he was clever, that he
could make his way in the world if he wanted to, but your acceptance of
him changes nothing with me.”
“But you love him,” he persisted.
“No, no,” she protested. “I could never love a man who had once been
faithless--never forgive him--never even in death. That a man is
successful in the world is all you men care about. Oh, I know you.
Because he’s matched his brain against yours and beaten you, you think
he’s a demigod; but that doesn’t change the heart in him, the lips that
swear love eternal while they’re kissing another----”
“Lies!” broke in Loring with a wave of his hand. “I don’t believe that
story.”
Jane paused and examined him calmly, struggling for her control. When
she spoke her voice had sunk to a trembling note scarcely above a
whisper.
“Can you prove that story was a lie?”
“Prove it? No. But I believe it was.”
“You didn’t believe so once. Have you heard anything to make you change
your opinion?” she insisted.
He was tempted to lie but thought better of it, and his hesitation cost
him victory.
Jane turned toward the door. “I’m going away somewhere--abroad, if
you’ll let me, away from here. I will not see Mr. Gallatin--ever. I
despise him--utterly.”
She left her father standing in the middle of the room, his mouth
agape, and eyes staring at the door through which she had disappeared.
Keen as he was, there were still some things in the world, he
discovered, about which he needed information.
The next day Mr. Loring received a polite note from Mr. Gallatin
which still further mystified him. Mr. Gallatin thanked him for his
kind expressions of good will and expressed the intention of studying
further to deserve them; but hoped that Mr. Loring would comprehend
that reasons which it were better not to mention, would make it
impossible for him to take advantage of Mr. Loring’s personal kindness
in his cordial invitation.
Henry Loring was on the point of tearing up the note in disgust but
thought better of it. Instead, with a subtlety which showed that he had
not yet lost the knack of taking advantage of the lesser lessons of
life, he left it obtrusively upon the dressing table in Mrs. Loring’s
boudoir, where later, in her mother’s absence, Jane found it.
XXVIII
THE LODESTAR
April dissolved in mist and rain and the flowers of May were
blossoming. Nellie Pennington, who had not yet despaired, and Nina
Jaffray, who had, were driving in the Park in Mrs. Pennington’s
victoria. For two months Mrs. Pennington had been paying Nina more
than usual attention. To begin with she liked her immensely as she had
always done. Nina’s faults she believed to be the inevitable result of
her education and environment, for Nina was the daughter of a Trust,
and was its only indulgence. The habit of getting what she wanted
was in her blood and she simply couldn’t understand being balked in
anything. But Nina was beginning slowly and with some difficulty to
grasp the essentials of Philip Gallatin’s character and the permanence
of his reconstruction; and with the passage of time and event Nina had
a glimmering of the true caliber of his mind, all of which brought out
with unflattering definiteness her own frivolity and gave a touch of
farce-comedy, with which she had in her heart been far from investing
it, to her unconventional wooing.
Nellie Pennington understood her, and noted with no little satisfaction
the evidence of the chastening of her spirit. She knew now beyond all
doubt that had it not been for Nina, the reconciliation of Jane and
Phil Gallatin would have been effected.
She knew, too, that Nina had not played fair, and guessed by what
means Jane had been victimized. Indeed, Jane’s indifference to Nina
bore all tokens of intolerance, the intolerance of the pure for the
contaminated, the contemptuous pity of the innocent for the guilty.
But Mrs. Pennington had not lived in vain, and a talent for living her
own life according to an accepted code, had given her a kindly insight
into the lives of others. Whatever Nina’s faults, she had never merited
Jane’s pity or contempt. Jane was a fool, of course, but so was Nina,
each in her own way--a fool; but of the two it now seemed that Nina was
the lesser. Nellie Pennington had already noticed signs that Nina was
tired of the game and knew that if Larry Kane played his own trumps
with care, he might still win the odd trick, which was Nina. But as
far as Jane was concerned, Nellie also knew that Nina was ready to die
at her guns, for a dislike once born in Nina’s breast was not speedily
dispelled.
Mrs. Pennington looked up at the obelisk as though in the hope that
some of the wisdom of its centuries might suddenly be imparted to her.
Then she asked, “Nina, why don’t you marry Larry Kane?”
Nina Jaffray smiled.
“And confess defeat? Why?”
“Better confess it now than later.”
“Why confess it at all?”
“You’ll have to some day. You’re not going to marry Phil, you know.”
“No, I’m not going to marry Phil. I know that now. I haven’t proposed
to him for at least a month--and then he was quite impolite--rude, in
fact.” She sighed. “Oh, I don’t care, but I don’t want Jane Loring to
marry him.”
“She’s not likely to. She’s as hopelessly stubborn as you are.”
Nellie Pennington waited a moment, and then with a laugh, “Nina, you’ve
enjoyed yourself immensely, haven’t you? Jane is _such_ an innocent.
I’d give worlds to know what you said to her!”
Nina laughed. “Would you?”
“Yes, _do_ tell me.”
“I will. It’s very amusing. She expected me to lie, of course. So I
simply told her the truth.”
“And she believed----”
“The opposite.”
“Of course.”
Nellie Pennington laughed up at the passing tree tops.
“How clever of you, Nina! You’re wasting your time single. A girl of
your talents needs an atmosphere in which to display them.”
“And you suggest matrimony,” said Nina scornfully.
“There’s always your husband, you know.”
“But Larry isn’t an atmosphere. He’s too tangible.”
“All men are. It’s their chief charm.”
“H-m. I’ve never thought so. I shouldn’t have wanted to marry Phil if
he had been tangible.”
“Then suppose he had--er--accepted you?”
Nina shrugged and crossed her knees.
“I should probably have hated him cordially.”
The conversation changed, then lagged, and by the time Nina’s home was
reached both women were silent, Nina because she was bored, Nellie
because she was thinking.
“Good-by, dear,” laughed Nina, as she got down at her door. “Don’t be
surprised at anything you hear. I’m quite desperate, so desperate that
I may even take your advice. You’ll see me off at the pier, won’t you?”
Nellie Pennington nodded. She was quite sure that it was better for
everybody that Miss Jaffray should be upon the other side of the water.
The week following, quite by chance she met Henry K. Loring one
afternoon in the gallery at the Metropolitan where the ceramics were.
An emissary from the office was opening the cases for him and with
rare delight he was examining their contents with a pocket glass. She
watched him for a while and when the great man relinquished the last
piece of Lang-Yao _sang de bœuf_ and the case was closed and locked,
she intercepted him and led him off to a bench in a quiet corner where
she laid before him the result of a week of deliberation. He had begun
by being bored, for there was a case of the tea-dust glazes which he
had still planned to look over, but in a moment he had warmed to her
proposals and was discussing them with animation.
Yes, he had already planned to go to the Canadian woods again this
summer. Mrs. Loring wanted to go abroad this year. Mrs. Loring didn’t
like the woods unless he rented a permanent camp, the kind of place
that he and Jane despised. The plan had been discussed and Jane had
expressed a willingness to go. But at Mrs. Loring’s opposition the
matter had been dropped. But Loring had not given up the idea. It would
do Jane a lot of good, he admitted. Mrs. Pennington’s was a great plan,
a brave plan, a beautiful plan, one that did credit to her sympathies
and one that must in the end be successful. He would manage it. He
would take the matter up at once and arrange for the same guides and
outfit he had had last year. Would Mr. and Mrs. Pennington come as his
guests? Of course. Who else--Mr. Worthington and Colonel Broadhurst?
But could Mr. Kenyon be relied upon to do his share? Very well. He
would leave that to Mrs. Pennington.
The next afternoon, at Mrs. Pennington’s request, John Kenyon called at
her house in Stuyvesant Square, and his share in the arrangement was
explained to him. He was willing to do anything for Phil Gallatin’s
happiness that he could, of course, but it amused him to learn how
the agreeable lady had taken that willingness for granted, and how
she waved aside the difficulties which, as Kenyon suggested, might be
encountered. Phil might have other plans. He could be obstinate at
times. It might not be easy, either, to get Phil’s old guide for the
pilgrimage. He needed a rest himself, and would go with Phil himself,
if by doing so he could be of any assistance. It was now the first week
in May. He would see Phil and report in a few days.
It was the next morning at the office when Kenyon broached the matter
to his young partner. He was surprised that Phil fell in with the plan
at once.
“Funny,” said Phil. “I was thinking of that yesterday. I _am_ tired.
The woods will do me a lot of good, but do you think that Hood can get
along without us until August?”
“We’ll manage in some way. You deserve a rest, and I’m going to take
one whether I deserve it or not. Could you get that guide you had last
year, what’s his name--Joe----?”
“Keegón. I could try. We’d need two, but Joe can get another man. I
have the address. I’ll write to-day.”
Gallatin got up and walked across the room to the door, where he
stopped.
“I suppose I can fix matters with Mr. Loring----”
“Yes, I think so,” replied Kenyon guardedly. “But you’d better be sure
of it. He’s coming here to-morrow, isn’t he?”
Gallatin nodded gravely, and then thoughtfully went out.
That night John Kenyon dutifully reported in Stuyvesant Square. Mr.
Loring also dutifully reported there, and the three persons completed
the details of the conspiracy.
So it happened that toward the middle of June, Phil Gallatin and John
Kenyon reached the “jumping-off place” in the Canadian wilds. No two
“jumping-off places” are alike, but this one consisted of three or four
frame dwellings and a store, all squatted on the high bank of a small
river, which came crystal-clear from the mystery of the deep woods
above. John Kenyon got down from the stage that had driven them the ten
miles from the nearest railroad station and stood on the plank walk in
front of the store, a touch of color in his yellow cheeks, sniffing
eagerly at the smell of the pine balsam. Gallatin glanced around at
the familiar scene. Nothing was changed--the canoes drawn up along the
bank, the black setter dog, the Indian packers lounging in the shade,
the smell of their black tobacco, and the cool welcome of the trader
who came out of the store to greet them.
Joe Keegón and another Indian, whose name turned out to be Charlie
Knapp, got the valises out of the wagon. Gallatin offered Joe his
hand, and the Indian took it with the steady-eyed taciturnity of the
wilderness people. Joe was no waster of words or of emotion. He led
the way into the store of the trader, and they went over the outfit
together--blankets, ammunition, tea, pork, flour, tents, and all the
rest of it, while John Kenyon sat on a flour barrel, swinging his legs,
smoking a corncob pipe and listening.
That night, after Phil had turned in, he sent a letter and a telegram
to a Canadian address and gave them to the teamster with some money.
Then he, too, went to bed--dreaming of Arcadia.
* * * * *
They had been in the woods for three weeks now. They weren’t traveling
as light as Phil had done the year before and the outfit included two
canoes, well loaded. So they went slowly northward by easy stages,
fishing the small streams and camping early. Gallatin had at first
been in some doubt as to his partner’s physical fitness for severe
work, but he soon found that he need have given himself no concern,
for with every day a year seemed to be slipping away from John Kenyon,
who insisted on taking his share of the burdens with a will that
set Phil Gallatin’s mind at rest. And as they went farther into the
wilderness, they made almost camp for camp the ones that Phil had made
the year before. John Kenyon had hoped that Phil would take him into
the Kawagama country. He wanted very much to see that waterfall on the
south fork of the Birch River that Phil had spoken of. Kenyon had an
eye for the beautiful.
For some time he had been wondering what course of action he would
take if Phil refused to fall in with his plans, and had already begun
to think that it was time to take Joe into his confidence; but he soon
found that subterfuge was unnecessary, for Gallatin was directing their
course with an unerring definiteness to his own farthest camp among the
hills. John Kenyon guessed something of what was passing in the mind
of the younger man, and over the camp-fire watched him furtively. The
sun and wind had tanned him and the vigorous exercise had brought an
appetite that had filled the hollows of his cheeks; but in spite of
the glow of health and youth and the delight of their old friendship,
a shadow still hung in Phil Gallatin’s eyes, which even the joy of
the present could not dispel. Kenyon smoked quietly and asked subtle
questions about their further pilgrimage.
“To-morrow we’ll reach the permanent camp, eh, Joe?” said Gallatin.
Keegón nodded.
“We’ll stay there for a while--fish and explore.”
As the time approached for his dénouement, Kenyon had a guilty sense
of intrusion which tempered his delight in the possible success of the
venture. But he remembered that he had had little to do in shaping the
course of events or the direction of their voyage, except to modify the
speed of their journeys so that Phil might reach the spot intended at
the appointed time. Phil seemed drawn forward as though by a lodestar
to his destination, as though some force greater than his own will was
impelling him.
Kenyon had taken pains to keep a record by the calendar. It was the
twenty-eighth of June. The next day Kenyon changed places with Phil and
went in Joe’s canoe, when he took the old Indian into his confidence.
“We will camp to-night. To-morrow Phil will want to go fishing alone.
You must keep him in camp until the next day. Then you must go with him
in the morning, and lead him to the camp in the hills where the deer
was killed. _Comprenez?_”
Joe had learned to understand this grave, quiet man from the city, who
did his share of the work and who never complained, and he recognized,
by its contrast to this docility and willingness, the sudden voice of
authority. He nodded.
“A’right,” he said, with a nod. “I take heem.”
Joe’s loquacity was flattering. It was the first time on their
pilgrimage that Kenyon had heard Joe utter more than one word at a time.
The woods had seemed so vast, so interminable that Kenyon had often
wondered whether it would be possible to find a spot so lacking
in identity as the one they were seeking. But Joe’s nod and smile
completely reassured him. In his unfamiliarity with the wilderness he
had forgotten that here was Joe Keegón’s city, its trails, portages and
streams as clearly mapped in his mind as the streets of John Kenyon’s
New York. The Indian would find the place where the deer was killed.
Kenyon breathed a sigh of relief. The wheel of Destiny was spinning now
and Kenyon had nothing to do but sit and watch. He had done his share.
That night there was much to do, but Keegón seemed in no hurry. When
Gallatin, who seemed tireless was for making a permanent camp at once,
Joe shook his head and went on cleaning fish.
“To-morrow,” he said.
When the morrow came, Gallatin was off in the underbrush hunting
firewood before the others were awake. From his place by the fire Joe
watched him lazily.
“Aren’t you going to get to work, Joe?”
“Soon,” the Indian grunted, but made no movement to get up.
“I want to fish.”
“To-morrow.”
“Why not to-day?”
“Make camp.”
“It won’t take all day to make camp.”
“Rest,” said Joe. And that was all that Gallatin could get out of him,
so he said no more, for he knew by experience that when Joe’s mind had
decided a question of policy, mere words made no impression on him.
John Kenyon listened from the flap of the tent, with a sleepy eye on
the rising sun.
“Don’t try to combat the forces of nature, my son,” he laughed. “Joe’s
right! I for one am going to take things easy.” And he rolled himself
in his blanket, sank back on his balsam couch and closed his eyes
again.
There was nothing for Phil but to bow to the inevitable. That day he
worked harder even than the guides and it seemed to John Kenyon that
some inward force was driving him at the top of his bent. He spoke
little, laughed not at all and late in the afternoon went off upstream
alone with his rod and creel, returning later gloomy and morose.
“No fish,” said Joe, looking at the empty creel. “Fish to-morrow!”
Joe actually smiled and Gallatin laughed in spite of himself.
“Beeg fish--to-morrow,” repeated Joe. “I show--um.”
The next day Kenyon stayed in camp with Charlie Knapp, and watched
Phil’s departure upstream. Joe had full instructions and as he followed
Gallatin’s broad shoulders into the brush he turned toward the fire and
nodded to Kenyon. There was a pact between them and Kenyon understood.
The sun was high before Joe left the stream and cut into the
underbrush. His employer hadn’t even taken his rod from its case,
and his creel was empty. Early in the morning he had asked his guide
to take him to the little stream where the deer was killed, and he
followed the swift noiseless steps of the old Indian, his shoulders
bent, his eyes peering through the thicket in search of landmarks.
It was midday before the two men reached the familiar water and Phil
identified the two bowlders above his old camping-place. Here Keegón
halted, eying the pool below.
“Fish,” said he.
Gallatin fingered at the fastenings of his rod case, looking
downstream, while Joe sat on a rock and munched a biscuit.
“I’m going downstream, Joe. You follow.”
The Indian nodded and Gallatin moved down among the rocks in the bed
of the stream. Pools invited him, but he did not fish. He had not even
jointed his rod. He was moving rapidly now, like a man with a mission,
a mission with which fishing had nothing in common, splashing through
the shallow water, jumping from rock to rock, or where the going was
good along the shore, through the underbrush. There was a trail to
follow now, a faint trail scarcely defined, but in which he saw the
faint marks of last year’s footprints. His own they must be, heavy from
the weight of the deer he had carried through the mud and wet. They
were the symbols of his regeneration. Since then he had brought other
burdens to camp and had thrown them at her feet, for what?
Later on, in a moist spot, he stopped and peered at the ground
curiously. Other footprints had emerged from somewhere and joined his
own, fresh footprints, one made by the in-turned toe of an Indian, the
other smaller, the heel of which cut deep into the mud and moss. He
bent forward following them eagerly. What could a woman be doing here?
Suddenly Gallatin straightened and sniffed the air. The smoke of a camp
fire! The smell of cooking fish! Some one had preceded him. He moved
forward cautiously, his heart beating with suppressed excitement, his
mind for the first time aware that unusual impulses had dominated him
all the morning. He also knew that the smell of those cooking fish was
delicious.
In a moment he recognized the glade, the two beech trees and the rock,
saw the bulk of the shack that he had built, the glow of the fire and
a small figure sitting on a log before it, cooking fish on a spit.
He stopped and passed a hand before his eyes. Had a year passed? Or
was it--yesterday? Who was the girl that sat familiarly at his fire,
hatless, her brown hair tawny in the sunlight, her slender neck bent
forward?
He rubbed his eyes and peered again. There was no mistake. It was Jane.
XXIX
ARCADIA AGAIN
She did not move at his approach, although his footsteps among the
dried leaves must have been plainly audible, and he was within ten feet
of the fire before she turned.
“We had better be going soon, Challón,” she began and then stopped, as
she raised her head and looked at him. He wore his old fishing hat with
the holes in it, a faded blue flannel shirt, corduroys and laced boots;
and as her eye passed quickly over his figure to his face, she paled,
started backward and stared with a terror in her eyes of something
beyond comprehension. He saw her put her arm before her face to shut
out the sight of him and rise to one knee, stumbling blindly away, when
he caught her in his arms, whispering madly:
“Jane! Jane! Don’t turn away from me. It’s Phil, do you hear?
Myself--no other. You were waiting for me--and I came to you.”
She trembled violently and her hand clutched his arm as though to
assure herself of its reality.
“Jane, look up at me. Look in my eyes and you’ll see your vision
there--where it has always been, and always will be--unchangeable. Look
at me, Jane.”
Slowly she raised her head and saw that what he said was true, the
pallor of dismay retreating before the warm flush that suffused her
from neck to brow.
“It’s--_you_, Phil? I can’t understand----”
“Nor I. I don’t know or care--so long as you are here--close in my
arms. I’ll never let you go again. Kiss me, Jane.”