Dolores never sent her address to Rufus Holt’s secretary, although
she came in course of time to need the remittances which were to be
forwarded through him. She hated Holt and loved John too much for that.
Should that whisper in the night be heard by the world, the fight of
the strong would indeed be lost to the weak. There was no choice. She
must hide herself that “little while,” guilty though she might appear.
She lived in various places. She found various employment.
There was the naturalized tailor who rented the basement of the
house where she had found a room and who seemed to assume from “Mrs.
Trevor’s” face that she could baste “straight.” But she did not
“naturalize,” either to the shop or his idea of her, and he took
to complaining of her work. His subtlety was inadequate to cover
his relief when she transferred to a restaurant, one of the sort to
which ladies were “cordially” invited. But there came a day when this
proprietor, as well, begrudged the price of his mistake.
Even time and time’s tutelage did not take the strangeness from the
fact that no one wanted her about any more.
Weeks and months passed--Spring and Summer and another Fall-time. She
was forced to look at her funds, also at the necessity to make them do.
That grew to be her chief concern--to make them do.
Moving her bags was expensive and thinning an Airedale to the finest
“point” of safety entailed anxiety. His canine protests against the
experiment were what first lifted her eyes to a sign beside the door
of a substantial house. A savoury odor of beef stew wafted from the
downstairs windows and attracted the young dog so powerfully that,
with ears laid back and muscles straining against his leash, he pulled
her up the first two steps. What attracted the girl was the invitation
of brass letters laid upon an ebony board:
RETREAT FOR WAYWARD GIRLS
For more than two hours they had been walking slowly. Each day now they
walked more slowly. And the slower they walked, the more urgent had
grown their present landlady’s “want” of their room. The window signs
were scarce in this cheap section of the city, said to be congested
beyond all record. And such “To Lets” as they had found were said at
the doors, after momentary inspection, to be already “taken.”
So now, weariness and the odor of stew on the crisp autumn air decided
the dog. The cold sunlight falling upon the topmost, polished word of
the sign--RETREAT--decided the girl.
The matron proved to be a quite good imitation of a mother. The girls
under her charge were mostly repentant--some she had graduated into
good cheer. “Waywardness” was an infliction to be frankly discussed; to
be vied over, sighed and cried over with consoling _camaraderie_. Even
the dog was pitied. Indeed, his demands for ready relief were met far
too generously for his gastronomic good.
Although the “new girl” did not explain about herself--there was no
need of that--she relaxed within the warming atmosphere of the retreat
and tried hard to please. Interestedly she listened to tales of the
benevolent gentleman who directed the philanthropy. With so many
examples of waywardness about her, she came to take a less strained
view of her plight.
But the night and day stories poured into her ears--stories of the
undying devotion of the varied “friends” in the varied inmates’ cases
who, through varied circumstances, had been separated from their
hearts’ desires by cruel Fate--filled her with a longing for John Cabot
that increased with the approach of her ordeal. Despite her unselfish
resolves, she wanted him to know. He must have been hurt if he knew of
her seeming desertion. Her past fear of the “risks,” as italicized by
Rufus Holt, was wiped off the slate of her mind. The risk of death,
which involved the greater risk of loss of love, was writ instead--to
stay.
She decided to disregard the lawyer’s caution to the extent of a
telephone call to John’s office. But he was not in and she dared not
leave name or number. To put anything in writing was dangerous. Holt
had warned her, yet a note was the only recourse left--one brief,
careful note. Stationery and a pen she secured from the matron; forced
herself to write briefly and constrainedly; addressed it to Mr. Cabot’s
banking-house. Lest she permit apprehension to change her mind, she
placed her finished missive at once on the table in the hall, where it
would be given to the postman on his next round.
She was returning to her room--very slowly now--when the ensuing
dialogue, first in a woman’s voice, then in a man’s, came to her ears
from behind a door marked “PRIVATE” that gave into the hall.
“With a sham like you, there’s nothing to life. Why didn’t I see in
time that my husband was the one who should have lived--you the one to
die?”
“How like a woman, to shift the blame! Wasn’t the whole scheme your
own--the cat-boat, the surprise attack, that weird knowledge of----”
“Hush, for Heaven’s sake!”
“See, you’re the guilty one. You tremble at the truth. I never had
heard of a death-spot in the human ear. I couldn’t have struck true.
And I couldn’t have play-acted your grief over the accident. Certainly
you ought to grant, Mary, that I was all right then. Expected we’d be
married like other folks, once we’d got the business well started on
the capital from his life insurance. You say you have no respect for
me. Well, there’s more than one cause for a loss of respect. What about
mine for you? How can I know when some new lover will tempt you to
drive a nail through the lobe of _my_ ear--to throw _me_ into a tide
rip? It isn’t a man’s nature, I tell you----”
“Don’t call yourself a man. You have cheated me unforgivably. And
yet----”
“‘And yet.’ Thank God we’ve reached argument’s end for to-day! We both
know what we know and that I can prove it. More than you hate me you
fear me. Come, we might as well be friends.”
“_Friends?_ Remember that I can prove it, too, on you.”
“But you won’t, dear heart. Aren’t you tired yet of threatening me?
Eventually you’ll settle to living it out peaceably on my terms. Why
not now? Come. Be a sensible soul and agree----”
One of the voices alone might have puzzled Dolores, but together she
had recognized both. They had struck her like a blow. As if physically
stunned, she had clung to the balustrade for aid in undertaking the
first few steps of the stairway. By now, more strength came to her.
Quietly and rapidly as she could, she toiled beyond ear-shot up the
flight.
Out of breath she collapsed on her narrow iron bed; lay realizing, not
only the significance to herself of what she had overheard, but its
meaning to the two principals as well.
So that was the hideous bond that tied them. That was why each
pretended an affection for, considered and, if need be, defended the
other. They had paid a human life for love and found that crime brought
only mutual contempt.
Through the realization of what enforced their hostile, yet voluntary
companionship came personal anxiety. Her letter--what if he should
notice and examine it? Why hadn’t she taken it out and posted it
herself?
But there was no time to be wasted over futile afterthoughts. She could
not chance his reading so much as the address. She must recover her
letter.
From the head of the stairs she could not see whether or not it still
lay on the table, which stood in the hall near the street entrance.
She could see, however, that the door marked “PRIVATE” was ajar. As
no sound of voices came to her, she concluded that the two in the
hateful lockstep must have gone. She counted possible costs, then again
descended the stairs.
They stood beside the table. Not until she saw their faces would she
believe the worst. Not only had he noticed the address of the letter,
but had opened and was reading it.
A smile was on his face--the æsthetic, pale-eyed, appealing face of
Vincent Seff. His agreeable laugh sounded as he turned to Mrs. Hutton.
“Of all the chickens to come home to roost in the coop of little Vin!
You remember that pugilistic Puritan, John Cabot? As addressed to him,
Mary, what can these hieroglyphics mean? Listen:
“‘Soon a rosebud will open its petals to the world. I may not stay to
care for it. I depend on you.’”
Impulse ruled Dolores. She crossed the hall; stretched out her hand for
the letter; faced them.
“It is mine. You have no right to read it.”
For a long moment Seff simply looked at her. Then he took the
lavender-bordered ’kerchief from his sleeve and with it wiped his lips.
“Well met,” said he at last, “_Miss Nectarine_.”
“You have no right to open a sealed and stamped letter intended for
the mails,” Dolores insisted. “Will you give it back to me or shall I
appeal to the head of this institution?”
“Appeal. I am the head of the institution. I have a right to do
whatsoever I see fit within its hallowed walls.” The satisfaction of
his smile increased.
Mrs. Hutton, a shade grayer, calmer and handsomer, at first had looked
chiefly astonished. Now she intervened.
“Best give it back, Vin. Being what you are--or rather, what you
aren’t--you can have no interest in the affairs of this girl, unless
that----”
“Unless that I do feel so obligated by my debts and her I owe so much.
But take your delicate little effusion. I couldn’t possibly forget a
word of it.”
Her letter in hand, Dolores turned and was about to undertake the
stairs again, when he stopped her.
“Just a moment, Miss Trent. How long will it take you to retreat
yourself out of here?”
“To retreat?” she asked. “But I thought the object of this house----”
“Allow me to explain. The purpose of the institution is to help girls
who repent of their waywardness, not to encourage hardened sinners. I
have followed your career in the newspapers. I consider it a privilege
to have read your latest attempt at extortion. Naturally I assume that,
once your present handicap is overcome, you’ll go on, like a brook,
purling round the hearts of men--on and on and on. There are public
reformatories for persons of your sort. To realize our ideals, we must
be somewhat particular here.”
Mrs. Hutton, as well as the girl, looked at him. Drawn to the full of
his dapper height, his face lit by artistic appreciation of his own
pose, his gesture delicately drawn, he might have impressed a stranger
as the benevolent of the inmates’ praise.
But Mary Hutton was not a stranger. That equivocally proud yet
contemptuous smile was on her lips as she turned to Dolores.
“You at least will have a child. I have nothing--nothing,” she
remarked. “Don’t be annoyed by a little thing like Vincent Seff turned
to philanthropy and good works.”
* * * * *
The ultimatum of the head of the Retreat increased the urgency of
Dolores’ letter. She posted it herself before setting out to find a
new place. She was fortunate, however. Before night she had located a
rooming-house “lady” sufficiently in need, sufficiently pessimistic,
sufficiently old and shiftless and poor-spirited to waive references
and accept two weeks’ rental in advance. Here she laid in what she
still could pay for toward her needs; here lived along and waited with
hard-dying hope.
Since she had found the place so soon, she regretted the hasty posting
of her note. Rather than chance another of those risks to John, of
which the deposed shop-keeper’s suggestions had increased her fear, she
had given her new address to that quite good imitation of a mother, the
matron of the Retreat, for the forwarding of mail or the convenience of
any friends who might telephone about her or call to see her.
The incidents of her days became the variation from morning confidence
to evening despondency; of her nights, the discarding, under crush of
the blackness, of one after another of her schemes for a second and
more direct message. And, whether in the daytime or at night, a bark
of the dog at an unaccustomed sound would rouse her to radiance--to
heart-hammering joy; or his growling return to the tedium of his life
would bring her back to heart-stilling disappointment. Either John had
made no response to her appeal or the matron had failed to supply the
address.
Heavier upon her pressed thoughts of the power of her enemies. Where
would her note lead Catherine Cabot if it chanced into the hands of her
hirelings? What might not Seff reveal? How much might those omniscient
detectives learn from their watch of John?
So far Fate had conspired against her with a nice regard for every
detail. She became possessed by the pertinent query: Why should _she_
expect the mind of Fate to change?
Any question over the advisability of telephoning Rufus Holt was
answered by her inability to go out in search of a booth. Just
before one fevered dawn the idea of advertisement came and crowded
out the sickening controversy over whether John or the matron was
to blame. Why hadn’t that occurred to her before? In a return of
expectation, she composed a “personal” that seemed to her adequately
“covered”--recognizable only to him addressed. There was piquancy in
the thought that the Press which had been her enemy should now serve
her as a friend. Fortunate that she knew which of the morning papers he
was accustomed to read with care--doubly fortunate that there still was
enough left of her hoard to pay for a single notice.
The poor-spirited landlady looked especially pessimistic over the
errand on which she was asked to go, any chance of a reward depending
upon its success. Her new tenant was likely to be a great deal of
trouble, she anticipated aloud, and she never before had been reduced
to taking dogs. Had not the room been so long vacant, she would not
have considered the pair of them. She suspected, moreover, from the
things they were doing without, that they had about reached the limit
of their wherewithal. However, none could say but what she always
looked on the bright side of things and she’d do her best about getting
all the display the money would buy for the personal.
Dolores’ confidence increased after the old woman had gone. Such doubts
as crowded in, she exorcised with the reminder that her advertisement
would have succeeded or failed in one day’s time. Often in the past she
had deplored the fact that the marvelous output of the press should die
in a day; now she rejoiced in the fact. By to-morrow he would have come
or--But she would not--dared not face the alternative.
That night her baby was born.
The old woman did what she had time for and the charity doctor
stayed a while. Afterward, Dolores must have sunk into a state of
semi-consciousness--must have slept or dozed away the time, for she
roused to incredulity on being told that it was noon of the next day.
Two other facts penetrated her listlessness. The life of that day’s
_Times_ must soon be spent and her child was a girl.
Suppose he did not come. That meant that another girl-child was
fatherless. Already, in the world’s opinion, she would be accounted
worse than motherless.
As before, time became merely a variation of hope and despondency....
What was that? Surely, an Airedale bred to watchfulness would not grow
so excited had he not recognized a step or voice!... But no, he was
a silly dog, silly and extremely bored. He and she, too, must have
imagined the step and the voice.
A girl, their babe--a hapless, little human, who was not to inherit
even such paternal affection and care as could be spared from poppy
paste. Another girl she had brought into a world which had no justice
for unprotected girls.... Perhaps, if he did not come, it would be
best that their baby be spared the learning of life--the humiliations,
the disillusionments, the death-stab of love that lied.... Since he
had not come, love _must_ have lied. Both her messages would not have
gone astray. There was significance in this second failure. Too late
to protect her from his weakness had come his strength. If he did not,
_would_ not come----
She must be very ill; must have dozed off a while--that is, if the old
woman told the truth about night having come again.... Likely she _had_
told the truth, for the room was quite dark, except for the one dim
gas-jet lit in the old-fashioned chandelier.
The landlady had come in to say that she wanted the room as soon as
Dolores was able to get about. A refined adult--a single gentleman--had
enquired about it that day. Mrs. Trevor should remember her saying from
the first that she never took in dogs or babies. She knew what babies
were--just one sick spell after another. And she had no space in the
back-yard for regular laundry. She was a kind-hearted woman and honest
about her bargains, the Lord knew. But she had herself to think of and
the other folks in the house. She wasn’t one to worry a fellow woman
sick-a-bed, but the gent had said he would stop in the morning for
his answer. Naturally, she would need to name the exact day he could
come. Her soft heart always had been her worst enemy, but business was
business.
After the old woman had dismalled herself out, Dolores’ gaze again
strayed to the gas-jet. The turned-down flame fascinated her and
seemed to make a light in her mind. It flickered an answer to the
embarrassing question of when she could give over the room.... What
time was it now?... Nine o’clock.... The day that was the life of a
news sheet was long since done....
There were three jets to the chandelier. It wasn’t going to take
long. Already she was affected by the fumes. The dog was sniffing
suspiciously, whining protest....
“A life for a life,” she told him unfeelingly, thinking of Jack,
the only one who ever had loved without harming her. But then--the
Airedale, after all, had not asked Jack’s life any more than she had
asked her mother’s.... She arose, tottered to the door, took him by the
nape of the neck and thrust him into the pure air of the hall.
Fortunately the babe was too young to realize or complain; would never
know about life--never know. Dolores held the small form to her heart
and shuddered anew over what life might have meted out to so tiny and
helpless a creature.
“There is the mark of the seal they call the signet of Solomon,” she
mumbled through the dark to the chandelier. “There are to will and
to have your will. There are your social ideas, your excesses, your
pleasures that end in death----”
Who was it had reminded her of Maupassant not so very long ago?
Oh, yes.... That night.... What, indeed, was folly but “a riotous
expenditure of will”?... He had not seemed a man to shirk the
obligations of his folly--John Cabot--that night. Yet he had not
come.... So tender he had seemed in his madness for her; so willing to
deny himself; so determined to consider her. He had made her realize
the happiness which she and Jack had tried to learn from a bird....
Still, where now--happiness?... And God--where was God?
Who was bending over her?... Amor--could that be the gallant love-lad,
so broken and so gaunt? Had he come to mock her?... And was it
Innocentia clinging, peaked and weeping, to his hand?
Sorry comforters, the two. Their visit distressed her more than the
nauseous fumes from the jets.
There were Vincent Seff and Mary Hutton, now. Why were they still
together?... Strange that whichever died first, the other would be
there, attentive to the end lest the fear of God overcome the fear of
man in a death-bed repentance.... They could be sure of each other’s
company to the end.... Hate, then, bound people closer than love....
Love? How lonely was love!
“I never--knew God, but I knew--you. Why--_why_ hast
thou--forsaken--me?”
The gasp was wrung from her stress of body and soul. In the darkness
and the aloneness it quavered heartbrokenly upward with her thought of
John Cabot.
Then she remembered the lady she had admired in the railway station,
long, long ago--the lady who had sneezed. She hadn’t made the
usual fuss about it; had just leaned out and done it, neatly and
composedly.... What was human life but a sneeze? Birth was the warning;
youth the preparation; life the sniffing and death the wiping of eyes.
After death perhaps one settled back into composure.... The lady had
proved a good example in so many crises of her life. It was well to
have remembered her in death.... She must make no fuss; must do it
neatly and composedly.
She threw back her head; set her lips hard; breathed deep and long ...
deep and long ... deep and long....