THE ROAD TO UNDERSTANDING
It was on a gray morning early in February that Betty found her employer
pacing the library from end to end like the proverbial caged lion. When
he turned and spoke, she was startled at the look on his face--a worn,
haggard look that told of sleeplessness--and of something else that she
could not name.
He ignored her conventional morning greeting.
"Miss Darling, I want to speak to you."
"Yes, Mr. Denby."
"Will you come here to live--as my daughter?"
"Will I--what?" The amazement in Betty's face was obviously genuine.
"You are surprised, of course; and no wonder. I didn't exactly what you
call 'break it gently,' did I? And I forgot that you haven't been
thinking of this thing every minute for the last--er--month, as I have.
Won't you sit down, please." With an abrupt gesture he motioned her to a
chair, and dropped into one himself. "I can't, of course, beat about the
bush now. I want you to come here to this house and be a daughter to me.
Will you?"
"But, _Mr. Denby_!"
"'This is so sudden!' Yes, I know," smiled the man grimly. "That's what
your face says, and no wonder. It may seem sudden to you--but it is not
at all so to me. Believe me, I have given it a great deal of thought. I
have debated it--longer than you can guess. And let me tell you at once
that of course I want your mother to come, too. That will set your mind
at rest on that point."
"But I--I don't think yet that I--I quite understand," faltered the
girl.
"In what way?"
"I can't understand yet why--why you want me. You see, I--I have thought
lately that--that you positively disliked me, Mr. Denby." Her chin came
up with the little determined lift so like her mother.
With a jerk Burke Denby got to his feet and resumed his nervous stride
up and down the room.
"My child,"--he turned squarely about and faced her,--"I want you. I
need you. This house has become nothing but a dreary old pile of horror
to me. You, by some sweet necromancy of your own, have contrived to make
the sun shine into its windows. It's the first time for years that there
has been any sun--for me. But when you go, the sun goes. That's why I
want you here all the time. Will you come? Of course, you understand I
mean adoption--legally. But I don't want to dwell on that part. I want
you to _want_ to come. I want you to be happy here. Won't you come?"
Betty drew in her breath tremulously. For a long minute her gaze
searched the man's face.
"Well, Miss Betty?" There was a confident smile in his eyes. He had the
air of a man who has made a certain somewhat dreaded move, but who has
no doubt as to the outcome.
"I'm afraid I--can't, Mr. Denby."
"You--_can't_!"
Betty, in spite of her very real and serious concern and anxiety, almost
laughed at the absolute amazement on the man's face.
"No, Mr. Denby."
"May I ask why?" There was the chill of ice in his voice.
Again Betty felt the almost hysterical desire to laugh. Still her face
was very grave.
"You-- I-- In the end you would not want me, Mr. Denby," she faltered,
"because I--I should not be--happy here."
"May I ask why--_that_?"
There was no answer.
"Miss Darling, why wouldn't you be happy here?"
Genuine distress came into Betty's face.
"I would rather not say, Mr. Denby."
"But I prefer that you should."
"I can't. You would think me--impertinent."
"Not if I tell you to say it, Miss Betty. Why can't you be happy here?
You know very well that you would have everything that money could buy."
"But what I want is something--money can't buy."
"What do you mean?"
No reply.
"Miss Darling, what do you mean?"
With a sudden fierce recklessness the girl turned and faced him.
"I mean _that_--just that--what you did now, and a minute ago. The way
you have of--of expecting everybody and everything to bend to your will
and wishes. Oh, I know, it's silly and horrible and everything for me to
say this. But you _made_ me do it. I told you it was impertinent! Don't
you see? I'd have to have love and laughter and sympathy and interest
and--and all that around me. I _couldn't_ be happy here. This house is
like a tomb, and you--sometimes you are jolly and kind and--and _fine_.
But I never know _how_ you're going to be. And I'd die if I had to worry
and fret and fear all the time how you _were_ going to be! Mr. Denby,
I--I couldn't live in such a place, and mother couldn't either. And I--
Oh, what have I said? But you made me do it, you made me do it!"
For one long minute there was utter silence in the room. Burke Denby, at
the library table, sat motionless, his hand shading his eyes. Betty, in
her chair, wet her lips and swallowed convulsively. Her eyes were
frightened--but her chin was high.
Suddenly he stirred. His hand no longer shaded his face. Betty, to her
amazement, saw that his lips were smiling, though his eyes, she knew,
were moist.
"Betty, my dear child, I thought before that I wanted you. I know now
I've _got_ to have you."
Betty, as if the smile were contagious, found her own lips twitching.
"What--do you mean?"
"I mean that your fearless little tirade was just what I needed, my
dear. I _have_ expected everything and everybody to bend to my will and
wishes. I suspect that's what's been the matter, too, all the way up. I
thought once, long ago, I'd learned my lesson. But it seems I haven't.
Here I am up to the same old tricks again. Will you come and--er--train
me, Betty? I will promise to be very docile."
Betty did laugh this time--and the tension snapped. "Train"--the very
word with which she had shocked her mother weeks before!
"Seriously, my dear,"--the man's face was very grave now,--"I want you
to talk this thing over with your mother. I am a lonely old man--yes,
old, in spite of the fact that I'm barely forty--I feel sixty! I want
you, and I need you, and--notwithstanding your unflattering opinion of
me, just expressed--I believe I can make you happy, and your mother,
too. She shall have every comfort, and you shall have love and laughter
and sympathy and interest, I promise you. Now, isn't your heart
softening just a wee bit? _Won't_ you come?"
"Why, of course, I--appreciate your kindness, Mr. Denby, and"--Betty
drew a tremulous breath and looked wistfully into the man's pleading
eyes--"it would be lovely for--mother, wouldn't it? She wouldn't have to
worry any more, or--or--"
Burke Denby lifted an imperative hand. His face lighted. He sprang to
his feet and spoke with boyish enthusiasm.
"The very thing! Miss Darling, I want you to go home and bring your
mother back to luncheon with you. Never mind the work," he went on, as
he saw her quick glance toward his desk. "I don't want to work. I
couldn't--this morning. And I don't want you to. I want to see your
mother. I want to tell her--many things--of myself. I want her to see
me, and see if she thinks she could give you to me as a daughter, and
yet not lose you herself, but come here with you to live."
"But I--I could tell her this to-night," stammered Betty, knowing still
that, in spite of herself, she was being swept quite off her feet by the
extraordinary enthusiasm of the eager man before her.
"I don't want to wait till to-night. I want to see her now.
Besides,"--he cocked his head whimsically with the confident air of one
who knows his point is gained,--"I want a magazine, and I forgot to ask
you to get it for me last night. I want the February 'Research.' So
we'll just let it go that I'm sending you to the station newsstand for
that. Incidentally, you may come back around by your mother's place and
bring her with you. There, now surely you won't object to--to running an
errand for me!" he finished triumphantly.
"No, I surely can't object to--to running an errand for you," laughed
Betty, as she rose to her feet, a pretty color in her face. "And
I--I'll try to bring mother."
It was in a tumult of excitement and indecision that Betty hurried down
the long Denby walk that February morning. What would her mother say?
How would she take it? Would she consent? Would she consent even to go
to luncheon--she who so seldom went anywhere? It was a wonderful
thing--this proposal of Mr. Denby's. It meant, of course,--everything,
if they accepted it, a complete metamorphosis of their whole lives and
future. It could not help meaning that. But would they be happy there?
Could they be happy with a man like Mr. Denby? To be sure, he said he
would be willing to be--trained. (Betty's face dimpled into a broad
smile somewhat to the mystification of the man she chanced to be meeting
at the moment.) But would he be really kind and lovable like this all
the time? He had been delightful once before--for a few days. What
guaranty had they that he would not again, at the first provocation,
fall back into his old glum unbearableness?
But what would her mother say? Well, she would soon know. She would get
the magazine, then hurry home--and find out.
It was between trains at the station, and the waiting-room was deserted.
Betty hurriedly told the newsstand woman what she wanted, and tried to
assume a forbidding aspect that would discourage questions. But the
woman made no move to get the magazine. She did not seem even to have
heard the request. Instead she leaned over the counter and caught
Betty's arm in a vise-like grip. Her face was alight with joyous
excitement.
"Well, I am glad to see you! I've been watchin' ev'ry day fur you. What
did I tell ye? _Now_ I guess you'll say I know when I've seen a face
before! _Now_ I know who you are. I see you with your mother at Martin's
grocery last Sat'day night, and I tried ter get to ye, but I lost ye in
the crowd. I see _you_ first, then I see her, and I knew then in a
minute who you was, and why I'd thought I'd seen ye somewheres. I
hadn't--not since you was a kid, though; but I knew yer mother, an'
you've got her eyes. You're Helen Denby's daughter. My, but I'm glad ter
see ye!"
Betty, plainly distressed, had been attempting to pull her arm away from
the woman's grasp; but at the name a look of relief crossed her face.
"You are quite mistaken, madam," she said coldly. "My mother's name is
not Helen Denby."
"But I see her myself with my own eyes, child! Of course she's older
lookin', but I'd swear on my dyin' bed 'twas her. Ain't you Dorothy
Elizabeth?"
Betty's eyes flew wide open.
"You--know--my--_name_?"
"There! I knew 'twas," triumphed the woman. "An' ter think of you comin'
back an' workin' fur yer father like this, an'--"
"My--_what_?"
It was the woman's turn to open wide eyes of amazement.
"Do you mean to say you don't know Burke Denby is your father?"
"But he isn't my father! My father is dead!"
"Who said so?"
"Why, mother--that is--I mean--she never said-- What do you mean? He
can't be my father. My mother's name is Helen Darling!" Betty was making
no effort to get away now. She was, indeed, clutching the woman's arm
with her free hand.
The woman scowled and stared. Suddenly her face cleared.
"My Jiminy! so that's her game! She's keepin' it from ye, I bet ye," she
cried excitedly.
"Keeping it from me! Keeping what from me? What are you talking about?"
Betty's face had paled. The vague questions and half-formed fears
regarding her mother's actions for the past few months seemed suddenly
to be taking horrible shape and definiteness.
"Sakes alive! Do you mean ter say that you don't know that Burke Denby
is your father, an' that he give your mother the go-by when you was a
kid, an' she lit out with you an' hain't been heard of since?"
"No, no, it can't be--it can't be! My father was good and fine, and--"
"Rats! Did she stuff ye ter that, too? I tell ye _'tis_ so. Say, look
a-here! Wa'n't you down ter Martin's grocery last Sat'day night at nine
o'clock?"
"Y-yes."
"Well, wa'n't you there with yer mother?"
"Y-yes." A power entirely outside of herself seemed to force the answers
from Betty's lips.
"Well, I see ye. You was tergether, talkin' to the big fat man with the
red nose. I started towards ye, but I lost ye in the crowd."
Betty's face had grown gray-white. She remembered now. That was the
night her mother had run away from--something.
"But I knew her," nodded the woman. "I knew she was Helen Denby."
"But maybe you were--mistaken."
"Mistaken? Me? Not much! I don't furgit faces. You ask yer mother if she
don't remember Mis' Cobb. Didn't I live right on the same floor with her
fur months? Hain't yer mother ever told ye she lived here long ago?"
Betty nodded dumbly, miserably.
"Well, I lived next to her, and I knew the whole thing--how she got the
letter tellin' her ter go, an' the money Burke Denby sent her--"
"Letter! Money! You mean he wrote her to--go--away? He _paid_ her?" The
girl had become suddenly galvanized into blazing anger.
"Sure! That's what I'm tellin' ye. An' yer mother went. I tried ter stop
her. I told her ter go straight up ter them Denbys an' demand her
rights--an' _your_ rights. But she wouldn't. She hadn't a mite o' spunk.
Just because he was ashamed of her she--"
"Ashamed of her! _Ashamed_ of my mother!"--if but Helen Denby could have
seen the flash in Betty's eyes!
"Sure! She wa'n't so tony, an' her folks wa'n't grand like his, ye know.
That's why old Denby objected ter the marriage in the first place. But,
say, didn't you know any of this I'm tellin' ye? Jiminy! but it does
seem queer ter be tellin' ye yer own family secrets like this--an' you
here workin' in his very home, an' not knowin' it, too. If that ain't
the limit--like a regular story-book! Now, I ain't never one ter butt in
where 'tain't none of my affairs, but I've got ter say this. You're a
Denby, an' ought ter have some spunk; an' if I was you I'd brace right
up an'-- Here, don't ye want yer magazine? What are ye goin' ter do?"
But the girl was already halfway across the waiting-room.
If Betty's thoughts and emotions had been in a tumult on the way to the
station, they were in a veritable chaos on the return trip. She did not
go home. She turned her steps toward the Denby Mansion; and because she
knew she could not possibly sit still, she walked all the way.
So this was the meaning of it--the black veil daytimes, the walks only
at night, the nervous restlessness, the unhappiness. Her mother _had_
had something to conceal, something to fear. Poor mother--dear
mother--how she must have suffered!
But why, _why_ had she come back here and put her into that man's home?
And why had she told her always how fine and noble and splendid her
father was. Fine! Noble! Splendid, indeed! Still, it was like
mother,--dear mother,--always so sweet and gentle, always seeing the
good in everything and everybody! But why had she put her there--in that
man's house? How could she have done it?
And Burke Denby himself--did he know? Did he suspect that she was his
daughter? Adopt her, indeed! Was _that_ the way he thought he could pay
her mother back for all those years? And the grief and the hurt and the
mortification--where did they come in? Ashamed of her! _Ashamed of her,
indeed!_ Why, her little finger was as much finer and nobler and-- But
just wait till she saw him, that was all!
Like the overwrought, half-beside-herself young hurricane of
wrathfulness that she was, Betty burst into the library at Denby House a
few minutes later.
The very sight of her face brought the man to his feet.
"Why, Betty, what's the matter? Where's your mother? Couldn't she come?
What is the matter?"
"Come? No, she didn't come. She'll never come--never!"
Before the blazing wrath in the young eyes the man fell back limply.
"Why, Betty, didn't you tell her--"
"I've told her nothing. I haven't seen her," cut in the girl crisply.
"But I've seen somebody else. I know now--everything!"
From sheer stupefaction the man laughed.
"Aren't we getting a little--theatrical, my child?" he murmured mildly.
"You needn't call me that. I refuse to recognize the relationship," she
flamed. "Perhaps we are getting theatrical--that woman said it was like
a story-book. And perhaps you thought you could wipe it all out by
adopting me. Adopting me, indeed! As if I'd let you! I can tell you it
isn't going to _end_ like a story-book, with father and mother and
daughter--'and they all lived happily ever after'--because I won't let
it!"
"What do you mean by that?" The man's face had grown suddenly very
white.
Betty fixed searching, accusing eyes on his countenance.
"Are you trying to make me think you don't know I'm your daughter;
that--"
"Betty! Are you really, really--my little Betty?"
At the joyous cry and the eagerly outstretched arms Betty shrank back.
"Then you _didn't_ know--that?"
"No, no! Oh, Betty, Betty, is it true? Then it'll all be right now. Oh,
Betty, I'm so glad," he choked. "My little girl! Won't you--come to me?"
She shook her head and retreated still farther out of his reach. Her
eyes still blazed angrily.
"Betty, dear, hear me! I don't know-- I don't understand. It's all too
wonderful--to have it come--_now_. Once, for a little minute, the wild
thought came to me that you might be. But, Betty, you yourself told me
your father was--dead!"
"And so he is--to me," sobbed Betty. "You aren't my father. My father
was good and true and noble and--you--"
"And your mother _told_ you that?" breathed the man, brokenly. "Betty,
I--I-- Where is she? Is she there--at home--now? I want to--see her!"
"I shan't let you see her." Betty had blazed again into unreasoning
wrath. "You don't deserve it. You told her you were ashamed of her.
_Ashamed of her!_ And she's the best and the loveliest and dearest
mother in the world! She's as much above and beyond anything you--you--
_Why_ she let me come to you I don't know. I can't think why she did it.
But now I--I--"
"Betty, if you'll only let me explain--"
But the great hall door had banged shut. Betty had gone.
Betty took a car to her own home. She was too weak and spent to walk.
It was a very white, shaken Betty that climbed the stairs to the little
apartment a short time later.
"Why, Betty, darling!" exclaimed her mother, hurrying forward. "You are
ill! Are you ill?"
With utter weariness Betty dropped into a chair.
"Mother, why didn't you tell me?" she asked dully, heartbrokenly. "Why
did you let me come here and go to that house day after day and not
know--anything?"
"Why, what--what do you mean?" All the color had drained from Helen
Denby's face.
"Did you ever know a Mrs. Cobb?"
"That woman! Betty, she hasn't--has she been--talking--to you?"
Betty nodded wearily.
"Yes, she's been talking to me, and-- Oh, mother, mother, _why_ did you
come here--_now_?" cried Betty, springing to her feet in sudden frenzy
again. "How could you let me go there? And only to-day--this morning, he
told me he wanted to adopt me! And you--he was going to have us both
there--to live. He said he was so lonely, and that I--I made the sun
shine for the first time for years. And afterwards, when I found out
_who_ he was, I thought he meant it as a salve to heal all the
unhappiness he'd caused you. I thought he was trying to _pay_; and I
told him--"
"You _told_ him! You mean you've seen him since--Mrs. Cobb?"
"Yes. I went back. I told him--"
"Oh, Betty, Betty, what are you saying?" moaned her mother. "What have
you done? You didn't tell him _that_ way!"
"Indeed I did! I told him I knew--everything now; and that he needn't
think he could wipe it out. And he wanted to see you, and I said he
couldn't. I--"
An electric bell pealed sharply through the tiny apartment.
"Mother, that's he! I know it's he! Mother, don't let him in," implored
Betty. But her mother already was in the hall.
Betty, frightened, despairing, and angry, turned her back and walked to
the window. She heard the man's quick cry and the woman's sobbing
answer. She heard the broken, incoherent sentences with which the man
and the woman attempted to crowd into one brief delirious minute all the
long years of heartache and absence. She heard the pleading, the
heart-hunger, the final rapturous bliss that vibrated through every tone
and word. But she did not turn. She did not turn even when some minutes
later her father's voice, low, unsteady, but infinitely tender, reached
her ears.
"Betty, your mother has forgiven me. Can't--you?"
There was no answer.
"Betty, dear, he means--we've forgiven each other, and--if _I_ am happy,
can't you be?" begged Betty's mother, tremulously.
Still no answer.
"Betty," began the woman again pleadingly.
But the man interposed, a little sadly:--
"Don't urge her, Helen. After all, I deserve everything she can say, or
do."
"But she doesn't understand," faltered Helen.
The man shook his head. A wistful smile was on his lips.
"No, she doesn't--understand," he said. "It's a long road
to--understanding, dear. You and I have found it so."
"Yes, I know." Helen's voice was very low.
"And there are sticks and stones and numberless twigs to trip one's
feet," went on the man softly. "And there are valleys of despair and
mountains of doubt to be encountered--and Betty has come only a little
bit of the way. Betty is young."
"But"--it was Helen's tremulous voice--"it's on the mountain-tops
that--that we ought to be able to see the end of the journey, you know."
"Yes; but there are all those guideboards, remember," said the man, "and
Betty hasn't come to the guideboards yet--regret--remorse--forgiveness--
patience, and--atonement."
There was a sudden movement at the window. Then Betty, misty-eyed, stood
before them.
"I know I am--on the mountain of doubt now, but"--she paused, her gaze
going from one to the other of the wondrously glorified faces before
her--"I'll try so hard to see--the end of the journey," she faltered.
"Betty!" sobbed two adoring voices, as loving arms enfolded her.