The crisis of surrender once passed Alexandra shed no more tears. Not
that she ceased to feel. Indeed, her sensibilities were all on edge and
remained so. But other feminine instincts soon asserted themselves.
One was the blessed refuge of clothes. Tragedy notwithstanding, she
must make herself presentable. She thought it would distract her. At
first it did because she had to scheme to make the most of her dwindling
store of wearing apparel. All that she was rich in were those outer
garments bequeathed to her by Mrs. Lambert. For hours she adapted this
and repaired that, improvising a pretense at a trousseau. That it was
only pretense burnt itself into her brain. Every ribbon she threaded
through slotted embroidery was not unlike a tug at her heart strings.
All her things had been marked with her name in full by the hands of the
loved mother who had put every stitch into them. Well, there would be
no change of name. She tried not to think what the dead mother, who had
treasured her and taught her to pray, would feel if she could know of
the step her only daughter was about to take. And though God now seemed
to have turned His face from her, or she hers from God, she thanked Him
for the dead's sake that avowal of it could not be made. Her mood was
one of thankfulness for small mercies. She no longer rebelled against
the laxity of stage morals. She was going to conform to them. The
stage had deadened her susceptibilities to right and wrong. She was of
it. She had elected to go the way it pointed. She had let down the
drawbridge of her maidenhood for the besieging host to walk over as an
invited guest.
In the midst of her needlework and her bitter thoughts there came the
sound of feet mounting the stairs. Mrs. Bell opened the door and
announced "The doctor to see you, Miss Hersey," in a tone that clearly
proclaimed that his visit provided her with a touch of the same kind of
excitement which she derived from a funeral. Alexandra was on her feet
by this time, painfully conscious of the litter of garments that lay
around her. Coloring, she gathered them all up in a heap, and turned to
face her lover. He stood still, impatiently waiting for Mrs. Bell to
depart, and only spoke when the sound of her descending footsteps had
died away. Then he took Alexandra in his arms and kissed her.
"I got your note a quarter of an hour ago," he said. "I couldn't wait.
I want to know about this wretched stage business. How soon can you get
out of it?"
The question took her aback. She could not understand why he should
wish her to leave the stage. She assumed that her connection with it
had been the spur to his desire of her.
"But--" she faltered, "do you want me to leave it?"
"Don't _you_ want to?"
"I--I don't think I ought to, now that I've made a start--"
"But, my dear child," he interrupted, "you won't want to work for your
living when you're my wife!"
She almost doubted the evidence of her ears.
"What did you say?" she managed to ask.
"I said: When you're my wife. What else could you be? You didn't
propose to be a sister to me, did you? I'm impatient, dear. In your
letter you wrote: 'Just when you wish.' Didn't you mean it?"
She hid her burning face on his shoulder as she thought of what she had
meant. And all the while his one idea had been marriage! His wife!
Wife! Surely no word ever spoken could be so full of hallowed
significance! ... What would he think of her if he knew what she had
really meant? Ought she to tell him? Maidenly modesty counseled
reserve, to take what the gods had given her. But would that be honest?
Maggy, in her position, would have blurted out the truth at once in her
downright way: "Married and respectable! Oh, my dear, I didn't think
you meant to include that in the program!" or some such easy phrase.
But she was not Maggy, and words would not come. She heard Meer asking
her how soon she could marry him; heard him outline a honeymoon in
places that would cure her cough. And all the while she could say
nothing. Meer, as happy as a schoolboy, was making an inspection of the
room. Love lent a glamour to its cramped proportions and mean
appurtenances. His eyes went to the small bed, resplendent now by reason
of Maggy's eiderdown; an exasperating little bed nevertheless because it
made nearly as many sleep-dispelling noises as the too obtrusive
cistern.
"And that's where you sleep!" he said softly. The lacy pillow-case with
her monogram on it, another of Maggy's gifts, lay uppermost. He bent
and kissed it, then laughed diffidently and moved toward her. She
shrank back a step, making a gesture with her hands that was almost
supplicatory.
"There's something I must say. I owe it to you," she said with quick
breaths. "You may not want to marry me when you know."
He saw that she was nerving herself to make some confession. Her
connection with the stage and his own intimate knowledge of it, gained
through professional attendance on many of its members, brought the
disquieting thought that it might have to do with that ethical laxity
that pervades its atmosphere. But none-the-less his arms went round
her.
"I know the stage is a dashed hard place for a girl," he said gruffly.
"So if it's anything that's finished and done with don't tell me."