She made no answer, and he repeated irritably: "Why don't you call her?
I want to speak to her."
Mrs. Fairford laid down her book and came to him.
"She's not here--just now."
He dealt with this also, laboriously. "You mean she's out--she's not in
the house?"
"I mean she hasn't come yet."
As she spoke Ralph felt a sudden strength and hardness in his brain and
body. Everything in him became as clear as noon.
"But it was before Miss Hicks left that you told me you'd sent for her,
and that she'd be here the following week. And you say Miss Hicks has
been gone three weeks."
This was what he had worked out in his head, and what he meant to say
to his sister; but something seemed to snap shut in his throat, and he
closed his eyes without speaking.
Even when Mr. Spragg came to see him he said nothing. They talked about
his illness, about the hot weather, about the rumours that Harmon B.
Driscoll was again threatened with indictment; and then Mr. Spragg
pulled himself out of his chair and said: "I presume you'll call round
at the office before you leave the city."
"Oh, yes: as soon as I'm up," Ralph answered. They understood each
other.
Clare had urged him to come down to Long Island and complete his
convalescence there, but he preferred to stay in Washington Square till
he should be strong enough for the journey to the Adirondacks, whither
Laura had already preceded him with Paul. He did not want to see any
one but his mother and grandfather till his legs could carry him to Mr.
Spragg's office. It was an oppressive day in mid-August, with a
yellow mist of heat in the sky, when at last he entered the big
office-building. Swirls of dust lay on the mosaic floor, and a stale
smell of decayed fruit and salt air and steaming asphalt filled the
place like a fog. As he shot up in the elevator some one slapped him
on the back, and turning he saw Elmer Moffatt at his side, smooth and
rubicund under a new straw hat.
Moffatt was loudly glad to see him. "I haven't laid eyes on you for
months. At the old stand still?"
"So am I," he added, as Ralph assented. "Hope to see you there again
some day. Don't forget it's MY turn this time: glad if I can be any use
to you. So long." Ralph's weak bones ached under his handshake.
"How's Mrs. Marvell?" he turned back from his landing to call out; and
Ralph answered: "Thanks; she's very well."
Mr. Spragg sat alone in his murky inner office, the fly-blown engraving
of Daniel Webster above his head and the congested scrap-basket beneath
his feet. He looked fagged and sallow, like the day.
Ralph sat down on the other side of the desk. For a moment his throat
contracted as it had when he had tried to question his sister; then he
asked: "Where's Undine?"
Mr. Spragg glanced at the calendar that hung from a hat-peg on the door.
Then he released the Masonic emblem from his grasp, drew out his watch
and consulted it critically.
"If the train's on time I presume she's somewhere between Chicago and
Omaha round about now."
Ralph stared at him, wondering if the heat had gone to his head. "I
don't understand."
"The Twentieth Century's generally considered the best route to Dakota,"
explained Mr. Spragg, who pronounced the word ROWT.
"Do you mean to say Undine's in the United States?"
Mr. Spragg's lower lip groped for the phantom tooth-pick. "Why, let me
see: hasn't Dakota been a state a year or two now?"
"Oh, God--" Ralph cried, pushing his chair back violently and striding
across the narrow room.
As he turned, Mr. Spragg stood up and advanced a few steps. He had given
up the quest for the tooth-pick, and his drawn-in lips were no more
than a narrow depression in his beard. He stood before Ralph, absently
shaking the loose change in his trouser-pockets.
Ralph felt the same hardness and lucidity that had come to him when he
had heard his sister's answer.
"She's gone, you mean? Left me? With another man?"
Mr. Spragg drew himself up with a kind of slouching majesty. "My
daughter is not that style. I understand Undine thinks there have been
mistakes on both sides. She considers the tie was formed too hastily. I
believe desertion is the usual plea in such cases."
Ralph stared about him, hardly listening. He did not resent his
father-in-law's tone. In a dim way he guessed that Mr. Spragg was
suffering hardly less than himself. But nothing was clear to him save
the monstrous fact suddenly upheaved in his path. His wife had left him,
and the plan for her evasion had been made and executed while he lay
helpless: she had seized the opportunity of his illness to keep him in
ignorance of her design. The humour of it suddenly struck him and he
laughed.
"Do you mean to tell me that Undine's divorcing ME?"
"I presume that's her plan," Mr. Spragg admitted.
"For desertion?" Ralph pursued, still laughing.
His father-in-law hesitated a moment; then he answered: "You've always
done all you could for my daughter. There wasn't any other plea she
could think of. She presumed this would be the most agreeable to your
family."
"It was good of her to think of that!"
Mr. Spragg's only comment was a sigh.
"Does she imagine I won't fight it?" Ralph broke out with sudden
passion.
His father-in-law looked at him thoughtfully. "I presume you realize it
ain't easy to change Undine, once she's set on a thing."
"Perhaps not. But if she really means to apply for a divorce I can make
it a little less easy for her to get."
"That's so," Mr. Spragg conceded. He turned back to his revolving chair,
and seating himself in it began to drum on the desk with cigar-stained
fingers.
"And by God, I will!" Ralph thundered. Anger was the only emotion in him
now. He had been fooled, cheated, made a mock of; but the score was not
settled yet. He turned back and stood before Mr. Spragg.
"I suppose she's gone with Van Degen?"
"My daughter's gone alone, sir. I saw her off at the station. I
understood she was to join a lady friend."
At every point Ralph felt his hold slip off the surface of his
father-in-law's impervious fatalism.
"Does she suppose Van Degen's going to marry her?"
"Undine didn't mention her future plans to me." After a moment Mr.
Spragg appended: "If she had, I should have declined to discuss them
with her." Ralph looked at him curiously, perceiving that he intended in
this negative way to imply his disapproval of his daughter's course.
"I shall fight it--I shall fight it!" the young man cried again. "You
may tell her I shall fight it to the end!"
Mr. Spragg pressed the nib of his pen against the dust-coated inkstand.
"I suppose you would have to engage a lawyer. She'll know it that way,"
he remarked.
"She'll know it--you may count on that!"
Ralph had begun to laugh again. Suddenly he heard his own laugh and it
pulled him up. What was he laughing about? What was he talking about?
The thing was to act--to hold his tongue and act. There was no use
uttering windy threats to this broken-spirited old man.
A fury of action burned in Ralph, pouring light into his mind and
strength into his muscles. He caught up his hat and turned to the door.
As he opened it Mr. Spragg rose again and came forward with his slow
shambling step. He laid his hand on Ralph's arm.
"I'd 'a' given anything--anything short of my girl herself--not to have
this happen to you, Ralph Marvell."
"Thank you, sir," said Ralph.
They looked at each other for a moment; then Mr. Spragg added: "But
it HAS happened, you know. Bear that in mind. Nothing you can do will
change it. Time and again, I've found that a good thing to remember."