When, after his interview with David, Robert Ferguson went into Mrs.
Maitland's office at the Works, he looked older by twenty years than
when he had left it the night before. Sarah Maitland, sitting at her
desk, heard his step, and wheeled round to greet him.
"Better shut that door," she said briefly; and he gave the door in the
glass partition a shove with his foot. Then they looked at each other.
"Well," she said; and stretched out her hand. "We're in the same box. I
guess we'd better shake hands." She grinned with pain, but she forced
her grunt of a laugh. "What's your story? Mine is only his explanation
to Nannie."
"Mine isn't even that. She merely wrote me she had married him; that
was all. Miss White told me what he wrote to Nannie. What do you know
about it?"
"That's all I know," she said, and gave him Blair's note.
He read it, and handed it back in silence.
"Well, what are you going to do?" she asked.
"Do? There's nothing to do. I'm done with her!"
"He's my son," Sarah Maitland said. "I have got to do something."
"But there's nothing to be done," he pointed out; it was not like this
ruthless woman to waste time crying over spilt milk. "They are both of
age, and they are married; that's all there is to it. I went into the
mayor's office and found the registry. The marriage is all right so far
as that goes. As for David--men don't go out with a gun or a horsewhip
in these fine times. He won't do anything. For that matter, he is well
rid of her. I told him so. I might have added that the best thing a
jilted man can do is to go down on his knees and thank God that he's
been jilted; I know what I'm talking about! As for your son--" he
stopped.
"Yes," she said, "_my son?_" And even in his fury, Robert Ferguson felt
a pang at the sight of her torn and ravaged face that quivered so that
he turned his eyes away out of sheer decency. "I must do something for
my son. And I think I know what it will be." She bit her forefinger,
frowning with thought. "I think I know ... I have not done right by
Blair."
"No, you haven't," he said dryly. "Have you just discovered that? But I
don't see what you or I or God Almighty can do _now_! They're married."
"Oh, I can't do anything about this marriage," she said, with a gesture
of indifference; "but that's not the important thing."
"Not important? What do you mean?"
"I mean that the important thing is to know what made Blair behave in
this way; and then cure him."
"Cure him! There's no cure for rottenness." He was so beside himself
with pain that he forgot that she was a woman, and Blair's mother.
"I blame myself for Blair's conduct," she said.
"Oh, Elizabeth is as bad as he is!" But he waited for her contradiction.
It did not come. "Probably worse." Involuntarily he raised a protesting
hand.
"But I mean to forgive her," said Sarah Maitland, with cold
determination.
"Forgive Elizabeth?" he said, angrily, and his anger was the very small
end of the wedge of his own forgiveness; "forgive _her_? It strikes me
the boot is on the other leg, Mrs. Maitland."
"Oh, well," she said, "what difference does it make? I guess it's a
case of the pot and the kettle. I'm not blaming your girl overmuch;
although a bad woman is always worse than a bad man. In this case,
Elizabeth acted from hate, and Blair from love; the result is the same,
of course, but one motive is worse than the other. But never mind
that--Blair has got her, and he will be faithful to her; for a while,
anyhow. And Elizabeth will get used to him--that's Nature, and Nature
is bigger than a girl's first fancy. So if David doesn't interfere--you
think he won't? you don't know human nature, Friend Ferguson! David
isn't a saint--at least I hope he isn't; I don't care much about
twenty-seven-year-old male saints. David may not be able to interfere,
but he'll try to, somehow. You wait! As for Blair, as I say, if David
doesn't put his finger in the pie, Blair isn't hopeless."
"I'm glad you think so."
"I _do_ think so. Blair is young yet; and if she costs him something,
he may value her--and I think I can manage to make her cost him
something! A man doesn't value what comes cheap; and all his life
everything has come cheap to Blair."
"I don't see what you're driving at."
"Just this," she explained; "Blair has had everything he wanted,--oh,
yes, yes; it's my fault!" she struck an impatient fist upon the arm of
her chair. "I told you it was my fault. Don't take precious time to
argue over that. It is _all_ my fault. There! will that satisfy you?
I've given him everything. So he thought he could have everything. He
doesn't know the meaning of 'no.' He has got to learn. I shall teach
him. I have thought it all out. I'm going to make a man of him."
"How?" said Robert Ferguson.
"I haven't got the details clear in my mind yet, but this is the gist
of it: _NO money but what he earns_."
"No money?"
"After this, it will be 'root, hog, or die.'"
"But Blair can't root," her superintendent said, fair in spite of
himself. And at that her face lighted with a sort of awful purpose.
"Then he must die! Ferguson, don't you see--_he has begun to die
already?_" Again her face quivered. "Look at this business of taking
David's wife--oh, I know, they weren't married yet, but the principle
is the same; what do you call that but dying? Look at his whole life:
what has he done? Received--received! Given nothing. Ferguson, you
can't fool God: you've got to give something! A privilege means an
obligation--the obligation of sweat! Sweat of your body or your brains.
Blair has never sweated. He's always had something for nothing. That is
the one immorality that damns. It has damned Blair. Of course, I ought
to have realized it before, but I--I suppose I was too busy. Yes; I
tell you, if Blair had had to work for what he's got, as you and I have
worked for what we've got, he wouldn't be where he is to-day. You know
that! He'd have had something else to think of than satisfying his
eyes, or his stomach, or his lust. He'd have been decent."
"He might have been," Robert Ferguson said drearily, "but I doubt it.
Anyway, you can't, by making him earn or go without, or anything else,
give David's girl back to him."
"No," she said heavily, and for a moment her passion of hope flagged;
"no, I can't do that. But I shall try to make it up to David in some
way, of course. Where is he?" she broke off.
He told her briefly of David's arrival and departure. "He's gone back
to his mother," he ended; "she'll comfort him." Then, with a bark of
anger, he added, "Mrs. Richie was always saying that Elizabeth would
turn out well. I wonder what she will say now? I knew better; her
mother, my brother Arthur's wife, was--no good. Yet I let Mrs. Richie
bamboozle me into building on her. I always said Life shouldn't play
the same trick on me twice--but it has done it! It has done it. My
heart was set on Elizabeth. Yes, Mrs. Maitland, I've been fooled
again--but so have you."
"Nothing of the kind! I never was fooled before," Sarah Maitland said;
"and I sha'n't be again. I am going to make a man of my son! As for
your girl, forgive her, Ferguson. Don't be a fool; you take it out of
yourself when you refuse forgiveness."
"I'll never forgive her," said Robert Ferguson; "she's hurt the woman
I--I have a regard for; she's made David's mother suffer. I'm done with
her!"