But if she could not offer Archie the tenderness he craved, she gave him
at least all the other assistance in her power. Her executive ability
stood them both in good stead.
It was she who interviewed Mr. Moore, far more successfully than Judge
Carmichael had done, persuading him not only to hush the matter up but
to retain Archie in his employ. "If I can afford to take another chance
on him, surely you can?" she insisted; an argument which the dazzled old
gentleman found quite unanswerable.
Within a week she had procured an excellent tenant for the house,
furnished, with privilege of sale at a month's notice. She had disposed
of her little car at a good price, and placed Pegasus for the time being
in the Carmichael stable.
"I can't sell her, of course, nor give her away--it would be like
selling or giving away Ellen Neal! But if you'll just ride her, Emily,
and play with her sometimes? She's used to a good deal of attention."
"I'll probably spoil her to death," promised Emily, deeply touched by
this first sign of sentiment she had seen in her friend during that
tragic time.
Joan moved about her pretty house, cleaning, packing, getting things in
order for the tenant, as calmly as if she were not leaving it forever.
Even in the nursery she was perfectly composed, until she came upon the
toys Ellen had hidden there. Then she locked the door for awhile, and
neither Emily nor Ellen dared go to her.
"But what are we going to do ourselves?" moaned Ellen, rocking
helplessly to and fro in her kitchen. All her self-reliance had deserted
her. She was suddenly an old woman.
"I haven't decided yet, dear. One thing at a time," replied her
mistress, steadily....
But in the end it was Archie who decided.
He had acquiesced without comment in all Joan's arrangements. Only once
had he protested. It was when she telegraphed Stefan Nikolai for the
money.
"Not that, Joan--not that, _please_!" he said, with a quick flush. "I'd
rather go to the Pen than that--Really, the Pen will be quite a rest for
me," he added, piteously.
"Nonsense!" she replied; and he said no more.
But for all his acquiescence, he did not seem to be numbed by the thing,
as Joan was. Though she often heard him walking up and down his room at
night, and suffered for him, at times he appeared almost happy.
"I can't get over how _good_ people are!" he said once. "Think of Mr.
Moore being willing to take me back! Not as manager, of course--the boys
wouldn't be wanting to take orders from me yet awhile. Nor I couldn't
expect to handle money. But he sent for me, and said I was the best
salesman he'd ever had, and offered me the old job back on a commission
basis! Pretty nice, what?"
"Shall you take it?" she asked, curiously. She herself could not have
faced disgrace with any such meekness.
"Take it? Why, I jumped at the chance!"
Joan flushed.
"Archie," she said suddenly, "do you realize that there's a war going on
over there in Europe! Do you realize that there is need in France for
every able-bodied man that's got a life to spare?--Have you thought of
that?"
She was startled by the change in his face. The veins stood out on his
forehead, and his hands clenched. "Have I thought of it? God, girl, what
else do you suppose I've been thinking about the past year? I'd give the
soul out of my body to slip away from this--this grab-bag, and get into
a good clean fight--Those damned baby-killers! Gosh!--fight? Just give
me a chance at that dachshund of a Kaiser with my two bare hands!
But"--he made the little gesture that she realized was becoming
characteristic of him--a gesture of renunciation--"I've got to stay here
now. There isn't any money in soldiering."
Her flush deepened. "Money! I never want to hear the word again. Haven't
you had enough to do with just 'money,' Archie?"
"Not on your life," he said doggedly. "I've got to make a heap of it
before I'm through. Fifteen thousand dollars!--That reminds me," he went
on in another tone. "You say they need able-bodied men over there--don't
they need women, too? D'you suppose your friend Nikolai could find
something for you to do in that unit of his?"
He caught the sudden gleam in her eye.
"That would please you, wouldn't it?" he said quietly. "Of course it
would mean hard work, dangerous work, too, perhaps--but it's a great
chance for you, for anybody! To sort of help make history.... Mr.
Nikolai was talkin' to us once about those two kinds of happiness,
Huettengluck and Heldengluck--remember? Well, I don't believe you're the
sort to be satisfied with any Huettengluck--nor I wouldn't want you to
be. Take your chance, Joan--and don't lose it." His voice shook a
little. "I'd like mighty well to have somebody of my name mixed up in
this war somehow!"
She put her hand on his--almost her first demonstration of tenderness
since the shock came; but the gleam had already died out of her eyes.
"That's dear of you, Archie--fine and generous. But if your place is
here, mine is, too. I am not going to desert you. How can you think such
a thing? I mean to be a better wife to you than I have been. We've got
to start again, and start right. I want to help you...."
And then inexplicably, unbelievably, the worm turned. His nerves had
strained too far. He shook off her hand as if it burned him.
"Help!" he said roughly. "Help? A hell of a lot of help _you_ are! Going
around like a martyr, with a don't touch-me, how-dare-you look on your
face, as if I'd done the thing just to spite you! My God! A woman with
any guts to her--"
"_Archie!_"
"Oh, yes, that shocks you--such a fine lady as you are," He seemed to be
working himself up, like a woman in hysterics. "So grandly indifferent
to money, too!--just so's you've got enough of it. Who spent the money,
anyway?--tell me that! Was it me, who haven't bought myself so much as a
new pair of pants in three years?"
She stared at him, mutely. "_So this_," she thought, "_is the real
man!_" His ears, his great, coarse hands--they meant something after
all.
Her white look drove him into a further frenzy. "Oh, yes, glare at me,
if I'm good enough for you to glare at!--Let me tell you something--if
it's on my account you're staying, you needn't. That's all! It's a
_wife_ a man wants at a time like this, not any marble image, not any
tragedy-queen! Not any noble character that watches him out of the
corner of her eye, and if he's real good--pats him on the hand! I've had
enough of that!--Go on with your friend Nikolai," he cried violently.
"Try him out for six months or a year, and if he suits, and you don't
want to come back here--by God, you needn't!"
"Archie," she said, trembling in every limb, "I shall leave your house
to-morrow."
"Good!" he cried. "Good! And I'm going to beat you to it!"
He strode to the kitchen door and flung it wide. "Come here, Ellen Neal,
and bear witness that I'm leaving this house first."
The front door banged behind him....
The two women stared at each other.
"Was that--was that _Mr. Archie_?"
"Yes," said Joan, still trembling, "it was!--Come upstairs and help me
pack my trunk."