A fortnight passed. Preparations for the wedding went on in the Tresslyn
home with little or no slackening of the tension that had settled upon the
inmates with the advent of the disturber. Anne was now sullenly determined
that nothing should intervene to prevent the marriage, unless an unkind
Providence ordered the death of Templeton Thorpe. She was bitter toward
Braden. Down in her soul, she knew that he was justified in the stand he
had taken, and in that knowledge lay the secret of her revolt against one
of the commands of Nature. He had treated her with the scorn that she knew
she deserved; he had pronounced judgment upon her, and she confessed to
herself that she was guilty as charged. That was the worst of it; she
could pronounce herself guilty, and yet resent the justice of her own
decision.
In her desperation, she tried to hold old Mr. Thorpe responsible for the
fresh canker that gnawed at her soul. But for that encounter in his
library, she might have proceeded with confidence instead of the
uneasiness that now attended her every step. She could not free herself of
the fear that Braden might after all succeed in his efforts to persuade
the old man to change his mind. True, the contract was signed, but
contracts are not always sacred. They are made to be broken. Moreover, by
no stretch of the imagination could this contract be looked upon as sacred
and it certainly would not look pretty if exposed to a court of law. Her
sole thought now was to have it all safely over with. Then perhaps she
could smile once more.
In the home of the bridegroom, preparations for the event were scant and
of a perfunctory nature. Mr. Templeton Thorpe ordered a new suit of
clothes for himself—or, to be quite precise, he instructed Wade to order
it. He was in need of a new suit anyway, he said, and he had put off
ordering it for a long, long time, not because he was parsimonious but
because he did not like going up town for the "try-on." He also had a new
silk hat made from his special block, and he would doubtless be compelled
to have his hair trimmed up a bit about the nineteenth or twentieth, if
the weather turned a trifle warmer. Of course, there would be the trip to
City Hall with Anne, for the licence. He would have to attend to that in
person. That was one thing that Wade couldn't do for him. Wade bought the
wedding-ring and saw to the engraving; he attended to the buying of a gift
for the best man,—who under one of the phases of an all-enveloping irony
was to be George Dexter Tresslyn!—and in the same expedition to the
jewellers' purchased for himself a watch-fob as a self-selected gift from
a master who had never given him anything in all his years of service
except his monthly wage and a daily malediction.
Braden Thorpe made the supreme effort to save his grandfather. Believing
himself to be completely cured of his desire for Anne, he took the stand
that there was no longer a necessity for the old gentleman to sacrifice
himself to the greed of the Tresslyns. But Mr. Thorpe refused to listen to
this new and apparently unprejudiced argument. He was firm in his
determination to clip Anne's claws; he would take no chances with youth,
ultimate propinquity, and the wiles of a repentant sinner.
"You can guard against anything," said he in his wisdom, "except the
beautiful woman who repents. You never can tell what she'll do to make her
repentance satisfactory to everybody concerned. So we'll take no chances
with Anne. We'll put her in irons, my boy, so to speak."
And so it was that Braden, worn and disspirited, gave up in despair and
prepared for his return to London. He went before an examining board in
New York first and obtained his licence to become a practising physician
and surgeon, and, with a set expression in his disillusioned eyes, peered
out into the future in quest of the fame that was to take the place of a
young girl's love.
He met his first patient in the Knickerbocker Café. Lunching alone there
one day, a week before the date selected for sailing, he was accosted by
an extremely gay and pretty young woman who came over from a table of four
in a distant corner of the room.
"Is this Dr. Braden Thorpe?" she inquired, placing her hands on the back
of the chair opposite and leaning forward with a most agreeable, even
inviting smile.
Her face was familiar. "Since day before yesterday," he replied, rising
with a self-conscious flush.
"May I sit down? I want to talk to you about myself." She sat down in the
chair that an alert waiter pulled out for her.
"I am afraid you are labouring under a misapprehension," he said. "I—I am
not what you would call a practising physician as yet."
"Aren't you looking for patients?" she inquired. "Sit down, please."
"I haven't even an office, so why should I feel that I am entitled to a
patient?" he said. "You see, I've just got my licence to practice. As
things go, I shouldn't have a client for at least two years. Are you
looking for a doctor?"
"I saw by the papers this morning that the grandson of Mr. Templeton
Thorpe was a regular doctor. One of my friends over there pointed you out
to me. What is your fee for an appendicitis operation, Dr. Thorpe?"
"Good—ahem! I beg your pardon. You really startled me. I—"
"Oh, that's all right. I quite understand. Hard to grasp at first, isn't
it? Well, I've got to have my appendix out sooner or later. It's been
bothering me for a year, off and on. Everybody tells me I ought to have it
out sometime when it isn't bothering me and—"
"But, my dear young lady, I'm not the man you want. You ought to go to
some—"
"You'll do just as well as any one, I'm sure. It's no trick to take out an
appendix in these days. The fewer a doctor has snipped off, the less he
charges, don't you know. So why shouldn't I, being quite poor, take
advantage of your ignorance? The most intelligent surgeon in New York
couldn't do any more than to snip it off, now could he? And he wouldn't be
one-tenth as ignorant as you are about prices."
She was so gay and naïve about it that he curbed his amazement, and, to
some extent, his embarrassment.
"I suppose that it is also ignorance on my part that supplies me with
office hours in a public restaurant from one to three o'clock," he said,
with a very unprofessional grin.
"What hospital do you work in?" she demanded, in a business-like tone.
Humouring her, he mentioned one of the big hospitals in which he had
served as an interne.
"That suits me," she said. "Can you do it to-morrow?"
"For heaven's sake, madam, I—are you in earnest?"
"Absolutely. I want to have it done right away. You see, I do a good deal
of dancing, and—now, listen!" She leaned farther across the table, a
serious little line appearing between her brows. "I want you to do it
because I've always heard that you are one of the most earnest, capable
and ambitious young men in the business. I'd sooner trust you than any one
else, Dr. Thorpe. It has to be done by some one, so if I'm willing to take
a chance with you, why shouldn't you take one with me?"
"I have been in Europe for nearly three years. How could you possibly have
heard all this about me?"
"See that fellow over there facing us? The funny little chap with the baby
moustache? He—"
"Why, it's Simmy Dodge," cried Braden. "Are—are you—"
"Just a friend, that's all. He's one of the finest chaps in New York. He's
a gentleman. That's Mr. and Mrs. Rumsey Fenn,—the other two, I mean. You
can't see them for the florist shop in between. They know you too, so—"
"May I inquire why one of my friends did not bring you over and introduce
me to you, Miss—er—"
"Miss, in a sort of way, Doctor, but still a Missus," she said amiably.
"Well, I told them that I knew you quite well and I wouldn't let them come
over. It's all right, though. We'll be partially related to each other by
marriage before long, I understand; so it's all right. You see, I am Mrs.
George Dexter Tresslyn."
"You—you are?" he gasped. "By Jove, I thought that your face was familiar.
I—"
"One of the best advertised faces in New York about two years ago," she
said, and he detected a plaintive note in the flippant remark. "Not so
well-known nowadays, thank God. See here, Dr. Thorpe, I hope you won't
think it out of place for me _to_ congratulate you."
"Congratulate me? My dear Mrs. Tresslyn, it is not I who am to be married.
You confuse me with—"
"I'm congratulating you because you're not the one," said she, her eyes
narrowing. "Bless your soul, I know what I'm talking about. But say no
more. Let's get back to the appendix. Will you do the job for me?"
"Now that we are acquainted with each other," he said, suppressing a
natural excitement, "may we not go over and join Simmy and the Fenns?
Don't you think you'd better consult with them before irrevocably
committing yourself to me?"
"Fine! We'll talk it over together, the whole lot of us. But, I say, don't
forget that I've known you for years—through the family, of course. I want
to thank you first for one thing, Dr. Thorpe. George used to tell me how
you took my part in the—the smash-up. He said you wrote to him from Europe
to be a man and stand by me in spite of everything. That's really what
I've been wanting to say to you, more than the other. Still, I've got to
have it out, so come on. Let's set a day. Mrs. Fenn will go up to the
hospital with me. She's used to hospitals. Says she loves them. She's
trying her best to have Mr. Fenn go in next week to have his out. She's
had five operations and a baby. I'm awfully glad to know you, Dr. Thorpe.
I've always wanted to. I'd like better than anything I know of to be your
first regular patient. It will always be something to boast about in years
to come. It will be splendid to say to people, 'Oh, yes, I am the first
person that ever had her appendix removed by the celebrated Dr. Thorpe.'
It will—"
"But I have removed a great many," he said, carried away by her sprightly
good humour. "In my training days, so to speak."
"Oh, I'm sorry to hear that," she cried, disappointed. Then her face
brightened: "Still, I suppose you had to learn just where the thing is. It
wouldn't do to go about stabbing people in the wrong place, just as if the
appendix might be any little old where, would it?"
"I should say not," said he, arising and bowing very profoundly. Then he
followed close behind her trim, smart figure as they threaded their way
among the tables.
So this was the "pretty little mustard girl" that all fashionable New York
had talked about in the past and was dancing with in the present. This was
the girl who refused to go to the dogs at the earnest behest of the
redoubtable Mrs. Tresslyn. Somehow he felt that Fate had provided him with
an unexpected pal!
And, to his utter astonishment, he was prevailed upon to perform the
operation! The Fenns and Simeon Dodge decided the matter for him.
"I shall have to give up sailing next week," he said, as pleased as Punch
but contriving to project a wry face. "I can't go away and leave my first
bona-fide patient until she is entirely out of the woods."
"I have engagements for to-morrow and Wednesday," said Mrs. Rumsey Fenn,
after reflection. She was a rather pallid woman of thirty-five who might
have been accused of being bored with life if she had not made so many
successful efforts to prolong it.
"It doesn't happen to be your appendix, my dear," said her husband.
"Goodness, I wish it were," said she, regretfully. "What I mean is that I
can't go to the hospital with Lutie before,—let me see,—before Thursday.
Can you wait that long, dear?"
"Ask Dr. Thorpe," said young Mrs. Tresslyn. "He is my doctor, you know."
"Of course, you all understand that I cannot go ahead and perform an
operation without first determining—"
"Don't you worry," said the patient. "My physician has been after me for a
year to have it out. He'll back me up. I'll telephone him as soon as I get
back home, and I'll have him call you up, Dr. Thorpe. Thanks ever so much.
And, before I forget it, what is the fee to be? You see, I pay my own
bills, so I've got to know the—the worst."
"My fee will be even more reasonable than you hope, Mrs. Tresslyn," said
Braden, smiling. "Just guess at the amount you'd feel able to pay and then
divide it by two, and you'll have it."
"Dear me," cried Mrs. Fenn, "how perfectly satisfactory! Rumsey, you
_must_ have yours out this week. You're always talking about not being
able to afford things, and here's a chance to save money in a way you
never would have suspected."
"Good Lord, Madge," exclaimed her husband, "I've never had a pain in my
life. I wish you wouldn't keep nagging at me all the time to have an
operation performed, whether I need it or not. Let my appendix alone. It's
always treated me with extreme loyalty and respect, so why the deuce
should I turn upon the poor thing and assassinate it?"
"See here, Rumsey," said Simmy Dodge sagely, "if I were in your place I'd
have a perfectly sound tooth pulled some time, just to keep it from aching
when you're an old man. Or you might have your left leg amputated so that
it couldn't be crushed in a railroad accident. You ought to do something
to please Madge, old chap. She's been a thoughtful, devoted wife to you
for twelve or thirteen years, and what have you ever done to please her?
Nothing! You've never so much as had a crick in your neck or a pain that
you couldn't account for, so do be generous, Rumsey. Besides, maybe you
haven't got an appendix at all. Just think how you could crow over her if
they couldn't find one, even after the most careful and relentless search
over your entire system."
"She's always wanting me to die or something like that," growled Fenn;
"but when I talked of going to the Spanish War she went into hysterics."
"We'd only been married a month, Rumsey," said his wife reproachfully.
"But how could I have known that war was to be declared so soon?" he
demanded.
Braden and Simeon Dodge left the restaurant together. They were old
friends, college-mates, and of the same age. Dodge had gone into the law-
school after his academic course, and Thorpe into the medical college.
Their ways did not part, however. Both were looked upon as heirs to huge
fortunes, and to both was offered the rather doubtful popularity that
usually is granted to affluence. Thorpe accepted his share with the
caution of the wise man, while Dodge, not a whit less capable, took his as
a philanderer. He now had an office in a big down-town building, but he
never went near it except when his partner took it into his head to go
away for a month's vacation at the slack season of the year. At such
periods Mr. Dodge, being ages younger than the junior member of the firm,
made it his practice to go down to the office and attend to the business
with an earnestness that surprised every one. He gave over frolicking and
stuck resolutely to the "knitting" that Johnson had left behind. Possessed
of a natural though thrifty intelligence,—one that wasted little in
public,—and a latent energy that could lift him occasionally above a
perfectly normal laziness, he made as much of his opportunities as one
could expect of a young man who has two hundred thousand a year and an
amiable disposition.
No one in the city was more popular than Simmy Dodge, and no one more
deservedly so, for his bad qualities were never so bad that one need
hesitate about calling him a good fellow. His habits were easy but
genteel. When intoxicated he never smashed things, and when sober,—which
was his common condition,—he took extremely good care of other people's
reputations. Women liked him, which should not be surprising; and men
liked him because he was not to be spoiled by the women who liked him,
which is saying a great deal for an indolent young man with money. He had
a smile that always appeared at its best in the morning, and survived the
day with amazing endurance. And that also is saying a great deal for a
young man who is favoured by both sexes and a _supposedly_ neutral Dame
Fortune at the same time. He had broken many of the laws of man and some
of those imposed by God, but he always paid without apology. He was
inevitably pardoned by man and paroled by his Maker,—which is as much as
to say that he led a pretty decent sort of existence and enjoyed
exceedingly good health.
He really wasn't much to look at. Being a trifle under medium height,
weighing less than one hundred and twenty pounds stripped, as wiry as a
cat and as indefatigable as a Scotch terrier, and with an abnormally large
pair of ears that stood out like oyster shells from the sides of a round,
sleek head, he made no pretentions to physical splendour,—unless, by
chance, you would call the perky little straw-coloured moustache that
adorned his long upper lip a tribute to vanity. His eyes were blue and
merry and set wide apart under a bulging, intellectual looking forehead,
and his teeth were large and as white as snow. When he laughed the world
laughed with him, and when he tried to appear downcast the laughter went
on just the same, for then he was more amusing than ever.
"I didn't know you were a friend of hers," said he as they stood in front
of the hotel waiting for the taxi that was to take Thorpe to a hospital.
Thorpe remembered the admonition. "I tried to put a little back-bone into
George Tresslyn at the time of the rumpus, if that's what you'd call being
a friend to her," he said evasively.
"She's a nice little girl," said Simmy, "and she's been darned badly
treated. Mrs. Tresslyn has never gotten over the fact that Lutie made her
pay handsomely to get the noble Georgie back into the smart set. Plucky
little beggar, too. Lot of people like the Fenns and the Roush girls have
taken her up, primarily, I suppose, because the Tresslyns threw her down.
She's making good with them, too, after a fashion all her own. Must be
something fine in a girl like that, Brady,—I mean something worth while.
Straight as a string, and a long way from being a disgrace to the name of
Tresslyn. Quaint, isn't she?"
"Amazingly so. I think George would marry her all over again if she'd have
him, mother or no mother."
"Well, she's quaint in another respect," said Dodge. "She still considers
herself to be George Tresslyn's wife."
"Religion?"
"Not a bit of it. She just says she is, that's all, and what God joined
together no woman can put asunder. She means Mrs. Tresslyn, of course. By
the way, Brady, I wonder if I'm still enough of a pal to be allowed to say
something to you." The blue eyes were serious and there was a sort of
caressing note in his voice.
"We've always been pals, Simmy."
"Well, it's just this: I'm darned sorry things have turned out as they
have for you. It's a rotten shame. Why don't you choke that old
grandparent of yours? Put him out of his misery. Anne has told me of your
diabolical designs upon the hopelessly afflicted. She used to talk about
it for hours while you were in London,—and I had to listen with shivers
running up and down my back all the time. Nobody on earth could blame you
for putting the quietus on old Templeton Thorpe. He is about as hopelessly
afflicted as any one I know,—begging your pardon for treading on the
family toes."
"He's quite sane, Simmy," said Braden, with a smile that was meant to be
pleasant but fell short of the mark.
"He's an infernal old traitor, then," said Simmy hotly. "I wouldn't treat
a dog as he has treated you,—no kind of a dog, mind you. Not even a
Pekinese, and I hate 'em worse than snakes. What the devil does Anne mean?
Lordy, Lordy, man, she's always been in love with you. She—but, forgive
me, old chap, I oughtn't to run on like this. I didn't mean to open a
sore—"
"It's all right, Simmy. I understand. Thanks, old boy. It was a pretty
stiff blow, but—well, I'm still on my pins, as you see."
Dodge was hanging onto the door of the taxi, impeding his friend's
departure. "She's too fine a girl to be doing a rotten thing like this. I
don't mind telling you I've always been in—er—that is, I've always had a
tender spot for Anne. I suppose you know that?"
"I know that, Simmy."
"Hang it all, I never dreamed that she'd look at any one else but you, so
I never even peeped a word to her about my own feelings. And here she
goes, throwing you over like a shot, and spilling everything. Confound it,
man, if I'd thought she could possibly want to marry anybody else but you,
I'd have had my try. The good Lord knows I'm not much, but by thunder, I'm
not decrepit. I—I suppose it was the money, eh?"
"That's for you to say, Simmy; certainly not for me."
"If it's money she's after and not an Adonis, I don't see why the deuce
she didn't advertise. I would have answered in a minute. I can't help
saying it, old man, but I feel sorry for Anne, 'pon my soul, I do. I don't
think she's doing this of her own free will. See what her mother did to
George and that little girl in there? I tell you there's something nasty
and—"
"I may as well tell you that Anne _is_ doing this thing of her own free
will," said Braden gravely.
"I don't believe it," said Dodge.
"At any rate, Simmy, I'm grateful to you for standing clear while there
was still a chance for me. So long! I must be getting up to the hospital,
and then around to see her doctor."
"So long, Brady. See you on Thursday." He meant, good soul, that he would
be at the hospital on that day.