Joe's daughter, staying on and on at Dawn Hill, was chief lieutenant, if
not principal, in my conspiracy to drift Anita day by day further and
further into the routine of the new life. Yet neither of us had shown by
word or look that a thorough understanding existed between us. My part was
to be unobtrusive, friendly, neither indifferent nor eager, and I held to
it by taking care never to be left alone with Anita; Alva's part was to
be herself--simple and natural and sensible, full of life and laughter,
mocking at those moods that betray us into the absurdity of taking
ourselves too seriously.
I was getting ready a new house in town as a surprise to Anita, and I took
Alva into my plot. “I wish Anita's part of the house to be exactly to her
liking,” said I. “Can't you set her to dreaming aloud what kind of place
she would like to live in, what she would like to open her eyes on in the
morning, what surroundings she'd like to dress in and read in, and all
that?”
Alva had no difficulty in carrying out the suggestions. And by harassing
Westlake incessantly, I succeeded in realizing her report of Anita's dream
to the exact shade of the draperies and the silk that covered the walls. By
pushing the work, I got the house done just as Alva was warning me that she
could not remain longer at Dawn Hill, but must go home and get ready for
her wedding. When I went down to arrange with her the last details of the
surprise, who should meet me at the station but Anita herself? I took one
glance at her serious face and, much disquieted, seated myself beside her
in the little trap. Instead of following the usual route to the house, she
turned her horse into the bay-shore road.
“Several days ago,” she began, as the bend hid the station, “I got a letter
from some lawyers, saying that an uncle of mine had given me a large sum
of money--a very large sum. I have been inquiring about it, and find it is
mine absolutely.”
I braced myself against the worst. “She is about to tell me that she is
leaving,” thought I. But I managed to say: “I'm glad to hear of your luck,”
though I fear my tone was not especially joyous.
“So,” she went on, “I am in a position to pay back to you, I think, what my
father and Sam took from you. It won't be enough, I'm afraid, to pay what
you lost indirectly. But I have told the lawyers to make it all over to
you.”
I could have laughed aloud. It was too ridiculous, this situation into
which I had got myself. I did not know what to say. I could hardly keep
out of my face how foolish this collapse of my crafty conspiracy made me
feel. And then the full meaning of what she was doing came over me--the
revelation of her character. I trusted myself to steal a glance at her; and
for the first time I didn't see the thrilling azure sheen over her smooth
white skin, though all her beauty was before me, as dazzling as when it
compelled me to resolve to win her. No; I saw her, herself--the woman
within. I had known from the outset that there was an altar of love within
my temple of passion. I think that was my first real visit to it.
“Anita!” I said unsteadily. “Anita!”
The color flamed in her cheeks; we were silent for a long time.
“You--your people owe me nothing” I at length found voice to say. “Even if
they did, I couldn't and wouldn't take _your_ money. But, believe me,
they owe me nothing.”
“You can not mislead me,” she answered. “When they asked me to become
engaged to you, they told me about it.”
I had forgotten. The whole repulsive, rotten business came back to me. And,
changed man that I had become in the last six months, I saw myself as I had
been. I felt that she was looking at me, was reading the degrading
confession in my telltale features.
“I will tell you the whole truth,” said I. “I did use your father's and
your brother's debts to me as a means of getting _to_ you. But, before
God, Anita, I swear I was honest with you when I said to you I never hoped
or wished to win you in that way!”
“I believe you,” she replied, and her tone and expression made my heart
leap with indescribable joy.
Love is sometimes most unwise in his use of the reins he puts on passion.
Instead of acting as impulse commanded, I said clumsily, “And I am very
different to-day from what I was last spring.” It never occurred to me how
she might interpret those words.
“I know,” she replied. She waited several seconds before adding: “I, too,
have changed. I see that I was far more guilty than you. There is no excuse
for me. I was badly brought up, as you used to say, but--”
“No--no,” I began to protest.
She cut me short with a sad: “You need not be polite and spare my feelings.
Let's not talk of it. Let us go back to the object I had in coming for you
to-day.”
“You owe me nothing,” I repeated. “Your brother and your father settled
long ago. I lost nothing through them. And I've learned that if I had never
known you, Roebuck and Langdon would still have attacked me.”
“What my uncle gave me has been transferred to you,” said she, woman
fashion, not hearing what she did not care to heed. “I can't make you
accept it; but there it is, and there it stays.”
“I can not take it,” said I. “If you insist on leaving it in my name, I
shall simply return it to your uncle.”
“I wrote him what I had done,” she rejoined. “His answer came yesterday. He
approves it.”
“Approves it!” I exclaimed.
“You do not know how eccentric he is,” she explained, naturally
misunderstanding my astonishment. She took a letter from her bosom and
handed it to me. I read:
“DEAR MADAM: It was yours to do with as you pleased. If you ever find
yourself in the mood to visit, Gull House is open to you, provided you
bring no maid. I will not have female servants about.
“Yours truly,
“HOWARD FORRESTER.”
“You will consent now, will you not?” she asked, as I lifted my eyes from
this characteristic note.