The man who advanced from the group which had just entered the
hotel, appeared to be about thirty years old; he was tall and
sparely built and stooped very slightly as though in youth he had
outgrown his strength and had never quite caught up. He had a
prominent nose and a chin which, at first glance, seemed forceful;
but that impression altered at once to a feeling that here was a man
of whom something might have been made but had not. He was not at
all dissolute or unpleasant looking; his mouth was sensitive, almost
shy, with only lines of amiability about it; his eyes, which looked
smaller than they really were because of the thick lenses of his
glasses, were gray and good natured and observant. His hair was
black and turning gray--prematurely beyond doubt. It was chiefly the
grayness of his hair, indeed, which made Ruth suppose him as old as
thirty. He wore a dark overcoat and gray suit--good clothes, so good
that one noticed them last--the kind of clothes which Sam Hilton
always thought he was buying and never procured. He pulled off a
heavy glove to offer a big, boyish hand.
“How do you do, Cy--Miss Gail?” he greeted her. He was quite sure of
her but doubtful as to use of her given name.
“Hubert Lennon!” Ruth exclaimed, giving her hand to his grasp--a
nice, pleased, and friendly grasp. She had ventured that, whoever he
was, he had known Cynthia Gail long ago but had not seen her
recently; not for several years, perhaps, when she was so young a
girl that everyone called her Cynthia. Her venture went well.
She was able to learn from him, without his suspecting that she had
not known, that she had an engagement with him for the afternoon;
they were to go somewhere--she could not well inquire where--for
some event of distinct importance for which she was supposed to be
“ready.”
“I’m not ready, I’m sorry to say,” Ruth seized swiftly the chance
for fleeing to refuge in “her” room. “I’ve just come in, you know.
But I’ll dress as quickly as I can.”
“I’ll be right here,” he agreed.
She stepped into a waiting elevator and drew back into the corner;
two men, who talked together, followed her in and the car started
upwards. If the Germans had sent someone to the hotel to observe her
when she appeared to take the place of Cynthia Gail, that person
pretty clearly was not Hubert Lennon, Ruth thought; but she could
not be sure of these two men. They were usual looking, middle-aged
men of the successful type who gazed at her more than casually;
neither of them called a floor until after Ruth asked for the third;
then the other said, “Fourth,” sharply while the man who remained
silent left the elevator after Ruth. She was conscious that he came
behind her while she followed the room numbers along the hallway
until she found the door of 347; he passed her while she was opening
it. She entered and, putting the key on the inside, she locked
herself in, pressing close to the panel to hear whether the man
returned. But she heard only a rapping at a door farther on; the
man’s voice saying, “I, Adele;” then a woman’s and a child’s voices.
“Nerves!” Ruth reproached herself. “You have to begin better than
this.”
She was in a large and well-furnished bedroom; the bed and bureau
and dressing table were set in a sort of alcove, half partitioned
off from the end of the room where was a lounge with a lamp and a
writing desk. These were hotel furniture, of course; the other
articles--the pretty, dainty toilet things upon the dressing table,
the dresses and the suit upon the hangers in the closet, the
nightdress and kimono upon the hooks, the boots on the rack, the
waists, stockings, undergarments, and all the other girl’s things
laid in the drawers--were now, of necessity, Ruth’s. There was a new
steamer trunk upon a low stand beyond the bed; the trunk had been
closed after being unpacked and the key had been left in it. A
small, brown traveling bag--also new--stood on the floor beside it.
Upon the table, beside a couple of books and magazines, was a pile
of department-store packages--evidently Cynthia Gail’s purchases
which she had listed in her letter to her mother. The articles,
having been bought on Saturday, had been delivered on Monday and
therefore had merely been placed in the room.
Ruth could give these no present concern; she could waste no time
upon examination of the clothes in the closet or in the drawers. She
bent at once before the mirror of the dressing table where Cynthia
Gail had stuck in two kodak pictures and two cards at the edge of
the glass. The pictures were both of the same young man--a tall,
straight, and strongly built boy in officer’s uniform; probably
Lieutenant Byrne, Ruth thought; at least he was not Hubert Lennon;
and the cards in the glass betrayed nothing about him, either; both,
plainly, were “reminder” cards, one having “Sunday, 4:30!” written
triumphantly across it, the other, “Mrs. Malcolm Corliss, Superior
9979.”
Ruth knew--who in Chicago did not know?--of Mrs. Malcolm Corliss,
particularly since America entered the war. Ruth knew that the
Superior number was a telephone probably in Mrs. Corliss’ big home
on the Lake Shore Drive. Ruth picked up the leather portfolio lying
upon the dressing table; opening it, she faced four portrait
photographs; an alert, able and kindly looking man of about fifty; a
woman a few years younger, not very unlike Ruth’s own mother and
with similarly sweet eyes and a similar abundance of beautiful hair.
These photographs had been but recently taken. The third was several
years old and was of a handsome, vigorous, defiant looking boy of
twenty-one or two; the fourth was of a cunning, bold little youth of
twelve in boy-scout uniform. Ruth had no doubt that these were
Cynthia Gail’s family; she was very glad to have that sight of them;
yet they told her nothing of use in the immediate emergency. Her
hand fell to the drawer of the dresser where, a moment ago, Ruth had
seen a pile of letters; she recognized that she must examine
everything; yet it was easier for her to open first the letters
which had never become quite Cynthia Gail’s--the three letters and
the dispatch which the clerk had given Ruth.
She opened the telegram first and found it was from her father. She
was thinking of herself, not as Ruth Alden, but as actually being
Cynthia Gail now. It was a great advantage to be able to fancy and
to dream; she _was_ Cynthia Gail; she _must_ be Cynthia henceforth
or she could not continue what she was doing even here alone by
herself; and surely she could not keep up before others unless, in
every relation, she thought of herself as that other girl.
Letter received; it’s like you, but by all means go ahead;
I’ll back you. Love.
Father.
That told nothing except that she had, in some recent letter,
suggested an evidently adventurous deviation from her first plan.
The first letter from Decatur which Cynthia Gail now opened was from
her mother--a sweet, concerned motherly letter of the sort which
that girl, who had been Ruth Alden, well knew and which made her cry
a little. It told absolutely nothing about anyone whom Cynthia might
meet in Chicago except the one line, “I’m very glad that Mrs.
Malcolm Corliss has telephoned to you.” The second letter from
Decatur, written a day earlier than the other, was from her father;
from this Cynthia gained chiefly the information--which the Germans
had not supplied her--that her father had accompanied her to
Chicago, established her at the hotel and then been called back home
by business. He had been “sorry to leave her alone” but of course
she was meeting small risks compared to those she was to run. The
letter from Rockford, which had arrived only that morning, was from
George--that meant George Byrne. She had been engaged to him, it
appeared; but they had quarreled on Sunday; he felt wholly to blame
for it now; he was very, very sorry; he loved her and could not give
her up. Would she not write him, please, as soon as she could bring
herself to?
The letter was all about themselves--just of her and of him. No one
else at all was mentioned. The letters in the drawer--eight in
number--were all from him; they mentioned, incidentally, many people
but all apparently of Decatur; there was no reference of any sort to
anyone named Hubert or Lennon.
She returned the letters to their place in the drawer and laid with
them those newly received. The mail, if it gave her small help, at
least had failed to present any immediately difficult problem of its
own. There was apparently no anxiety at home about her; she safely
could delay responding until later in the afternoon; but she could
not much longer delay rejoining Hubert Lennon or sending him some
excuse; and offering excuse, when knowing nothing about the
engagement to which she was committed, was perhaps more dangerous
than boldly appearing where she was expected. The Germans had told
her that they believed she had no close friends in Chicago; and, so
far as she had added to that original information, it seemed
confirmed.
The telephone bell rang and gave her a jump; it was not the
suddenness of the sound, but the sign that even there when she was
alone a call might make demand which she could not satisfy. She
calmed herself with an effort before lifting the receiver and
replying.
“Cynthia?” a woman’s voice asked.
“Yes,” she said.
“It’s a large afternoon affair, dear,” the voice said easily. “But
quite wartime. I’d wear the yellow dress.”
“Thank you, I will,” Cynthia said, and the woman hung up.
That shocked Cynthia back to Ruth again; she stood in the center of
the room, turning about slowly and with muscles pulling with queer,
jerky little tugs. The message had purported to be a friendly
telephone call from some woman who knew her intimately; but Ruth
quickly estimated that that was merely what the message was meant to
appear. For if the woman really were so intimate a friend of Cynthia
Gail, she would not have made so short and casual a conversation
with a girl whom she could not have seen or communicated with since
Sunday. No; it was plain that the Germans again were aiding her;
plain that they had learned--perhaps from Hubert Lennon waiting for
her in the hotel lobby--about her afternoon engagement; plain, too,
that they were ordering her to go.
A new and beautiful yellow dress, suitable for afternoon wear, was
among the garments in the closet; there was an underskirt and
stockings and everything else. Ruth was Cynthia again as she slipped
quickly out of her street dress, took off shoes and stockings and
redressed completely. She found a hat which evidently was to be worn
with the yellow dress. So completely was she Cynthia now, as she
bent for a final look in the glass, that she did not think that she
looked better than Ruth Alden ever had; she wondered, instead,
whether she looked as well as she should. She found no coat which
seemed distinctly for the afternoon; so she put on the coat which
she had bought. She carried her knitting bag with her as before--it
was quite an advantage to have a receptacle as capacious as a
knitting bag which she could keep with her no matter where she went.
Descending to the ground floor, she found about the same number and
about the same sort of people passing back and forth or lounging in
the lobby. Hubert Lennon was there and he placed himself beside her
as she surrendered her room key.
“You’re perfectly corking, Cynthia!” he admired her, evidently
having decided during his wait that he could say her name.
Color--the delicate rose blush in her clear skin which Sam Hilton so
greatly liked--deepened on her cheek.
“All ready now, Hubert,” she said; her use of his name greatly
pleased him and he grasped her arm, unnecessarily, to guide her out.
“Just a minute,” she hesitated as she approached the telegraph desk.
“I’ve a wire to send to father.”
The plan had popped out with the impulse which had formed it; she
had had no idea the moment before of telegraphing to Charles Gail.
But now the ecstasy of the daring game--the game beginning here in
small perils, perhaps, but also perhaps in great; the game which was
swiftly to lead, if she could make it lead, across the sea and
through France into Switzerland and then into the land of the enemy
upon the Rhine--had caught her; and she knew instinctively how to
reply to that as yet uncomprehended telegram from her father.
She reached for the dispatch blanks before she remembered that,
though her handwriting would not be delivered in Decatur, still here
she would be leaving a record in writing which was not like Cynthia
Gail’s. So she merely took up the pen in her gloved fingers and gave
it to Hubert Lennon who had not yet put his gloves on.
“You write for me, please,” she requested. “Mr. Charles F. Gail,”
she directed and gave the home street number in Decatur. “Thanks for
your wire telling me to go ahead. I knew you’d back me. Love. Thia.”
“What?” Lennon said at the last word.
“Just sign it ‘Thia.’”
He did so; she charged the dispatch to her room and they went out.
The color was still warm in her face. If one of the men in the lobby
was a German stationed to observe how she did and if he had seen her
start the mistake of writing the telegram, he had seen also an
instant recovery, she thought.
A large, luxurious limousine, driven by a chauffeur in private
livery, moved up as they came to the curb. When they settled side by
side on the soft cushions, the driver started away to the north
without requiring instructions.
“You were fifteen years old when I last had a ride with you,” Hubert
obligingly informed her.
That was nine years ago, in nineteen nine, Cynthia made the mental
note; she had become twenty-four years old instead of twenty-two,
since the morning.
“But I knew you right away,” he went on. “Aunt Emilie would have
come for you but you see when she telephoned and found you weren’t
in at half-past one, she knew she couldn’t call for you and get to
Mrs. Corliss’ on time. And she’s a stickler for being on time.”
So it was to Mrs. Corliss’ they were going--to her great home on the
drive. The car was keeping on northward along the snow-banked
boulevard with the white and arctic lake away to the right and, on
the left, the great grounds of Mrs. Potter Palmer’s home.
“She’d have sent a maid for you,” Hubert explained, “but I said it
was stupid silly to send a maid after a girl who’s going into the
war zone.”
“I’m glad you came instead for another ride with me,” Cynthia said.
He reddened with pleasure. In whatever circles he moved, it was
plain he received no great attention from girls.
“I tried to get into army and navy both, Cynthia,” he blurted,
apropos of nothing except that he seemed to feel that he owed
explanation to her as to why he was not in uniform. “But they turned
me down--eyes. Even the Canadians turned me down. But Aunt Emilie’s
giving an ambulance; and they’re going to let me drive it. They get
under fire sometimes, I hear. On the French front.”
“They’re often under fire,” Cynthia assured. “A lot of ambulance men
have been killed and wounded; so that’s no slacker service.”
“Not if you can’t get in anything better,” he said, “but mighty
little beside what Gerry Hull’s been doing.”
She startled a little. He had spoken Gerry Hull’s name with far less
familiarity than Sam Hilton had uttered it that morning; but Hubert
Lennon’s was with the familiarity of one who knows personally the
man mentioned.
“You’ve seen him since he’s back?” Cynthia asked. It came to her
suddenly that they--he and she--were going to meet Gerry Hull!
The car was slowing before the turn in the driveway for Mrs.
Corliss’ city home; a number of cars were ahead and others took line
behind for the _porte cochère_ where guests were entering the house.
“Yes; I know him pretty well,” Hubert said with a sort of pitiful
pride. He was sensitive to the fact that, when he had spoken of
Gerry Hull, her interest in him had so quickened; but he was quite
unresentful of it. “I’ll see that he knows you, Cynthia,” he
promised.
She sat quiet, trying to think what to say to Hubert Lennon after
this; but he did not want the talk brought back to himself. He spoke
only of his friend until the man opened the door of the car; the
house door was opened at the same moment; and Cynthia, gathering her
coat about her and clutching close to her knitting bag, stepped out
of the car and into the hall, warm and scented with hot-house
flowers, murmurous with the voices and movement of many people in
the big rooms beyond. A man servant directed her to a room where
maids were in attendance and where she laid off her coat. She had
never in her life been at any affair larger than a wedding or a
reception to a congressman at Onarga; so it was a good deal all at
once to find oneself a guest of Mrs. Corliss’, for it was plain that
this reception was by no means a public affair but that the guests
all had been carefully selected; it was more to be present carrying
a knitting bag (fortunately many others brought knitting bags) in
which were twenty-three hundred dollars and a passport to France;
and something more yet to meet Gerry Hull--or rather, have him meet
you. For when she came out to the hall again, Hubert was waiting for
her.
“I can’t find Aunt Emilie just now, Cynthia,” he said. “But I’ve
Gerry. There’s no sense in getting into that jam. We’ll go to the
conservatory; and Gerry’ll come there. This way, Cynthia. Quick!”