Mrs. Todd and her daughter, in driving away from the Haganés' official
home, had given the order, "Suruga Dai." To be truthful and more
accurate, this euphonious, topographical title, spoken in Japanese with
a delicious softening of continental "u's," and blurred Italian "g's,"
was, under Mrs. Todd's crisp American tongue, transformed to the alert
and inharmonious "Sew-roo-gar Da-eye." The driver, fortunately inured to
these attacks upon national enunciation, drove as straight to the
desired spot as if Yuki herself had named it.
Suruga Dai, so called because from its elevation can be seen the distant
plain of Suruga with its glittering single treasure, Fujiyama, is a
curious little welt of land, rising in a small loaf through the very
heart of modern Tokio. Official residences climb the slopes, foreign
homes perch at the top, Japanese villas and gardens crown it. A
fashionable hospital, endowed by the Empress, has risen there within a
decade; but, on Suruga Dai, the dominating presence is a huge Greek
Church, built and utilized for her own purposes, by Russia. From far
down the bay of Yedo, from car windows on the busy, curved track that
leads from Yokohama, this edifice stands as a sort of saturnine beacon.
Staring, treeless, defiant, with square white walls that hurt the eyes
with their blank brilliancy, and a squat blue-tiled roof fashioned to a
Byzantine dome, it rises above the verdure-hidden eaves of the Imperial
palace, checks the vista to many a narrow street, and hangs, a menace
and a humiliation, above the wide plain of alien interests. Boatmen on
the Sumida River, poling down rice, and wood, and charcoal from distant
villages, glance up toward it with a scowl and a prayer. If they were
Romanists they would cross themselves and ask protection of the Virgin.
Being heathen, they merely invoke the great living national spirit of
their race, bow reverent heads to the thought of their Emperor, and stop
at the next police-station to register their names as volunteers for the
army. Russia has claimed to believe that the commanding position of this
church is indicative of future rulership. They have boasted openly, in
the Far East, of this coming thraldom. What the Japanese will do with
the inimical temple and its priesthood in case of their ultimate victory
over Russia is an interesting problem. With their tolerance for all
religious belief, their innate delicacy and dignity, the foreigners who
best understand them would certainly predict an unchanged policy of
forbearance.
Mrs. Todd did not take a great deal of interest in Tokio street scenes.
Her mind generally streamed back like vapor to the exalted personage she
had recently left, or blew on before to an anticipated welcome. This was
the case to-day. Rudely torn from her Prince, she was thinking of the
little Countess K----, now in the Suruga Hospital after an attack of
appendicitis, to whom she had promised a visit. Count K----, one of the
rising statesmen of the country, was a particular friend of Dodge;
Minister Todd also believed great things of his future. Gwendolen,
beside her mother in the open carriage, answered intelligently, but with
obvious lack of interest, the commonplace remarks addressed to her. A
foretaste, a prescience of tragedy, lurked like a fog in the air.
Companioning Yuki's dilemma came her own,--recognized even in this
moment of irritation as incomparably less important, though still
maddening with the sting of nettles,--Dodge's foolish devotion to
Carmen, his continued coolness to herself. She was not old yet, or
experienced enough, to put herself in another's place. Dodge was trying
to hurt and humiliate her. Worse still, he was succeeding. She needed to
ponder no further. One does not write a geologic treatise on the pebble
in one's shoe. Dodge wished to injure her. It was cowardly, unmanly.
Dodge prided himself on his Southern blood. Gwendolen, with a sneer,
thought him--or tried to believe she thought him--a degenerate specimen
of chivalry. If at last he should attempt another overture to her
friendship, she would know well how to scorn him!
A great jerk of the wheels, and renewed vociferation from the coachman,
started the horses in a nervous scamper up the slope. Gwendolen's head
went back, the hatpins tugged at her yellow hair. She clutched at the
velvet brim of her hat, and at the same moment her lifted eyes fell on
the white walls and sagging dome of the Greek Church. The scowl she gave
it might have been borrowed from a rice-seller on his barge. "Detestable
barbarians!" she muttered. "If they ever _should_ dominate this land!"
"Gwendolen," said her mother, also jerked and unnerved by the speed,
"you are far too exaggerated in your expression of hatred to Russia.
Even Cy says so. You are going to get the Legation into trouble yet!"
Gwendolen threw herself back into a corner and sulked--if a thing the
color of light and flowers can be said to sulk. She went at least into
partial eclipse, and retained her penumbric mood to the hospital and
within it. The pleasure of receiving guests seemed, in the case of this
little invalid countess, to be entirely cancelled by her distress at
remaining rudely on her back, without a single bow. Mrs. Todd tried to
put her at her ease, speaking very loudly, as she often did in talking
to the Japanese, as if their ignorance of civilized languages lurked in
the ears as well as the tongue. Everything in the room was foreign,--the
white and brass bed, tables, chairs, spoons and medicine bottles, vases,
even the lithograph framed portraits of the Emperor and Empress hanging
on the opposite wall. The nurses wore gingham dresses, aprons, and white
caps. The cloven hoof showed literally (and with opprobrious connotation
deleted) in the thick-soled white, digitated socks on which they sped
with the lightness and swiftness of a breeze in a meadow. Relatives of
the countess came in presently, greeting and thanking the illustrious
visitors in her behalf. In spite of efforts to be at ease, the whole
visit crackled and creaked with starched formality. Gwendolen was glad
when her mother rose to go.
In the short drive home they passed directly by the gate of the French
Legation, and skirted the brick and plaster wall which hides a fair
garden. "It is a shame for a bachelor to keep this lovely place to
himself," observed Mrs. Todd, pensively.
"It would be a much worse shame for him to try to marry any decent
woman," said the girl, darkly.
"Gwendolen! Gwendolen! What on earth has come to you lately? You are not
like yourself, these days! You seem to hate the French as much as the
Russians. Neither nation is troubling you, just now, nor Yuki either!"
The parent put up her lorgnette to study her daughter's fair,
dissatisfied face.
Gwendolen went back to her corner and the sulks.
At the American Legation Mrs. Stunt awaited them. Mrs. Todd went with
more than usual willingness to her friend. Gwendolen had not been an
inspiring companion. The friendship between the two elder ladies,
threatened as we have seen by certain events at Yuki's first reception,
had received some skilful soldering, and, being new-painted by Mrs.
Stunt's voluminous explanations, had a fictitious lustre. Mrs. Todd was
neither far-seeing nor revengeful, yet, quite often now she passed a
thoughtful finger across the soldered spot.
Gwendolen went alone to a smaller reception-room. She wished to know
above all things whether her father was now with Prince Hagané. There
was but a single source of information,--Mr. Dodge. At first she thought
of going to him in person. What was that "snip," or his opinions,
compared with Yuki's danger? Her courage faltered, and she compromised
with it by a short note sent into the office by a servant.
"Mr. T. Caraway Dodge.
"MY DEAR MR. DODGE,--Kindly inform me whether my father, Mr.
Todd, is in the office. If not, where he has gone, and at what
hour he is expected back.
"Very truly,
"GWENDOLEN DE LANCY TODD."
In a very few moments she flushed, and bit her lip over the following
reply:
"Miss Gwendolen de Lancy Todd.
"MY DEAR MISS TODD,--Your father, Mr. Todd, is not in this
office. I am not at liberty to communicate the name of the place
to which he has gone. He expects to return about 2.30 P. M.
"Very truly,
"T. CARAWAY DODGE."
"Pshaw! I might have known it!" said Gwendolen, under her breath, as she
tore the note to small pieces. She looked at her watch. "Just one, and
he can't get here for an hour and a half. What shall I do until he
comes?" As if in answer, the luncheon-bell rang. She moved toward the
big dining-room, dreading to see Mrs. Stunt. Yes, she was there,
wriggling, smiling, opening her innocent blue eyes, as usual.
Gwendolen's greeting was civil, and no more. She sat through the meal in
silence, and ate practically nothing. Mrs. Stunt tried a few tactful
remarks about the girl's "being in love," as a reason for the lack of
appetite. After the unquiet meal, Gwendolen saw, with new dismay, that
the ladies were to take possession of the main drawing-room. This
deprived her of the solace of her piano. She wandered aimlessly about
the big rooms, starting a letter to an American friend, and desisting,
after the first page, pulling out bureau drawers, and forgetting why she
had opened them, doing, in fact, all those vague, self-irritating things
that indicate a perturbed and joyless mind.
She longed for intelligent human companionship,--for her father. When
dad should come, she told herself, she would lose this restless heart.
She longed for him and his counsel with a physical hunger. Her mind
veered again and again to Dodge, only to be whirled off fiercely. Mrs.
Todd as a confidante was impossible, even had the wily Stunt not claimed
her. Secure in the conviction of a commonplace mind, good Mrs. Todd
would have rushed at once to the Hagané residence, demanded instant
audience of Hagané, and failing in that have hastened to the Cha no yu
rooms to rescue her ailing protégé. No, Mrs. Todd, with all her kind
heart, could not be trusted!
The moments passed somehow. Gwendolen saw, through an upper window, her
father's approach. He came in a hired street kuruma. Even at this
distance she could see that the strain was gone from his face, if not
the excitement. He caught a glimpse of her, smiled, and waved to her.
Before the girl could reach him, he had entered the office and
confronted Dodge. Now she was brave. With dad to guard her, she could
brave a hundred such as Dodge. She burst in upon them, giving the
coolest of nods to the secretary, and pouring, without warning, a series
of petitions and exclamations upon her wondering father. At last he made
out that she wished to see him alone. Dodge had been quicker. Already
the inner door of the office closed behind him. Todd turned from the
blank panel to his daughter. The teasing twitch was on his thin lip, the
sparkle in his eye! "No, no, I can't stand it just now,--I'm worried,
oh, so horribly worried, and you must help me, dad, as you always do. Am
I not your only little girl?"
"You rascal," said Todd, seating himself, and drawing her down.
"Anything but a rascal to-day, dad. This trouble is real. Yuki may be in
danger,--I can't help her. I have thought and thought and thought, until
my brain goes round like flying ants in the sun. I can't help. I am an
impotent, miserable, feminine girl. What did you see at Yuki's house?"
"Why, I saw only what I went to see," answered her father. He gazed with
some concern on the chatterer, as if indeed she were light-headed.
"The meeting is over safely, then, and nothing happened?"
"The meeting is over! How did you know of it? The meeting is over and
everything happened. History may be changed because of it!"
"Then Pierre did not wake up? Don't think me crazy, dad! I can see that
you do. All that time, while you statesmen were closeted with Hagané,
Pierre Le Beau lay asleep a little way off, in the garden. Now perhaps
you will see what has worried me!" She gave a triumphant look.
"Good Lord!" said he. Then again, on a higher note, "Good _Lord_!" He
put her from him, rose, and began walking the narrow room. Gwendolen
nodded in satisfaction. At last he was stirred as deeply as she could
wish.
"Yuki isn't to blame. He wandered to that garden in delirium. He must
have gone there first thing, for she doesn't know how long he had been
in hiding. When she discovered him, the gates were already barred, and
Hagané had given her instructions. His fever was awful. She gave him
medicine for it, and then a heavy fever mixture, and put him to sleep in
the Cha no yu rooms!"
"Hagané being in ignorance?"
"Yes. She said she was going to try her best to tell him before the
meeting, though he had commanded her not to distract his thoughts. She
was going to try anyhow, but if she failed, there was nothing for it but
to trust the good Lord to keep him asleep until after the meeting, and
then to tell her husband immediately."
Todd gave a deep breath as of relief. He pushed the hair back from his
forehead. "God! It was a risk. She is too young to face such tragic
responsibilities! Poor child! poor child! But I guess it's all right
now!" Gwendolen heard him mutter.
She caught his arm. "You think she is safe? You left husband and wife
together?"
"Yes, and he looked at her as though she were an angel just come down. I
even dared to tease him a little. I told him he looked young and
handsome! The old War God almost blushed."
Suddenly the smile on his face turned gray. He stood perfectly still,
his long arms dangled. Life and youth ebbed from him.
"Father! Father!" cried the girl, in agony. "What is it? A terrible
thought has come to you! Don't hold it back. I must hear. I will go
mad!"
Todd seated himself, and touched his handkerchief to his lips. "I think
I had better not speak it, daughter."
"Tell me, _tell_ me!" said Gwendolen, fiercely. "Look at me,--look into
my eyes, father. I have your own strong spirit!"
"As I was coming home," began Mr. Todd, obediently, through whitening
lips, "I walked the first part of the way, you know, to cool my
excitement. The meeting had been terrific in importance,--terrific--" he
paused.
Gwendolen was now on her knees, reaping every look, every word, with her
bright eyes. "Yes, yes; Yuki may be in danger."
"A group of fellows were standing in front of the British
Legation,--Potter, Wyndham, and some others. They stopped me, and were
chaffing and joking as those English try to do, when a rickshaw with
three runners whizzed by like a Kentucky handicap, and there was Hagané
sitting bolt upright, with a face like an old N[=o] mask. 'That's deuced
odd,' says Wyndham; 'not ten minutes ago a yellow-headed foreigner
without a hat went by at the same pace. Looks as if Hagané were on the
scent.'"
"Oh, oh; did he say that the first was--Pierre?"
"No, he didn't say it; he didn't need to. They all looked it."
For one instant Gwendolen cowered against her father's knees. Then she
rose, straight, tall, self-possessed, and held a hand down to her
father. "Come, dad," she said, almost with a smile, "we have no time to
lose."
He sprang up, facing her. The faces glowed with the same purpose, a
white fire reflected from surfaces of ivory. Both pairs of eyes burned
to black jet. "Come, then," he said simply. He took his hat in passing.
She was bareheaded. A sealskin cap was lying on Dodge's desk. She caught
it up, as her father had done his hat. Hand in hand they hurried out,
Dodge, in wonder, watching them. They went down the Legation hill and
there summoned kuruma, with two runners apiece, promising a good reward
for haste. Only once the girl spoke. "Oh, dad, my heart weighs me to the
earth with its whispers."
At the Hagané home they were told that every one was out. Gwendolen's
quick eye saw that the servants were frightened, demoralized. She
insisted on having English speech with Tora. He came sulkily, and at
first refused to understand her words. This man's need for self-control
gave Gwendolen her most unbearable twinge of apprehension. "Tora!" she
cried aloud, "I love your mistress. I am good friend of Prince Hagané.
We wish to do only good things. Don't you understand? I love--good--we
will do _good_, not harm. Tell us where she went."
Tora studied the two faces intently. "Both Master and the Princess
Yuki-ko went ve'y quick, French Legation. Mooch troubles, I think." He
turned away, as if wishing to say no more.
The eyes of the two Americans met again. "That is a place where I cannot
take you, unannounced, my dear," said Mr. Todd.
"It is a place, too, where I think I could do little good. But she is
unharmed; that is certain. Ronsard cannot afford to have violence
there."
"Don't fancy things more terrible than they are," said Todd. "I myself
am full of hope. If I can get in at all, I can help explain. In the
meantime, be very cautious, and go home quietly."
"Yes, go home quietly to wait! Oh, I knew that was coming. To wait, to
be stretched out flat on the rack of hours, with every little red-hot
minute pinching me. But I will go. I trust you, dad, to do the best. I
will wait patiently, as meekly as Yuki herself could wait. That is all I
don't like about Yuki,--her meekness. Oh, my poor darling, what will
those vile men do to you?"
Again at the Legation gate she dismissed her two coolies, paying them an
incredible sum for immunity from bartering, and walked in, along the
gravelled driveway, on foot. Dodge, who had never left the neighborhood
of his office window, felt a renewed thrill of rapture at the sight of
his cap, set like a brown, inverted bird's-nest, on her bright curls. It
would be a different cap. No one should wear it after this consecration.
He watched the slight figure with yearning tenderness. Something in her
walk, a sort of suppressed excitement in her whole person, showed to
him. The unusual hung about her. Deliberately he came out from his den
to follow. She gave no backward glances.
Across the front of the Legation she hurried, taking a path that led
into the garden and wide lawn at the right. At its rim she poised,
uncertain; then, as if coming to a swift decision, took a diagonal
course across the turf. Exactly in the centre of the wide, green space
grew a clump of gigantic mushrooms with white tops and thick blue
bodies. As she neared them the mushrooms began to bob and nod in an
agitated fashion, while funny little hissing breaths came from the
midst. They were the professional lawn-weeders,--little old women with
round faces and high cheekbones, each armed with a pygmy sickle. They
worked in a tiny grazing squad, devouring, root and all, each intruding
tuft of clover, dandelion, pilewort, and even the spring messenger,
tsukushimbo, beloved of Japanese children.
"Kon-nichiwa," cried the girl, in her high, sweet voice.
"Kon-nichiwa (good day), o jo san," responded the little company,
rising, as corks on a single wave, and bobbing down again as one.
Gwendolen, interested in spite of her anxieties, stood still to watch
them. Dodge, unperceived, leaned against a kiri tree at the edge of the
lawn, with eyes only for her.
Their blue backs with a white ideograph bore the unanimity of a pack of
cards. "I feel just like Alice in Wonderland," thought the girl. "Oh, I
know I am Alice. They have been painting all the dandelions white. Was
this done by order of the duchess?" she asked aloud, and touched a snowy
flower with her foot.
The little dame nearest sent up a shy, sparkling glance, "Hek! hai!
Udzukushii tampopo gozaimasu!" (Ha, yes, unusually fine dandelion
honorably is!) She flushed crimson, and went feverishly to work again in
the shadow of the tall golden one.
Gwendolen watched them for a few moments longer. She seemed again to be
undecided, for she looked first toward the house, then outward, to the
far end of the garden, where a clump of young sugi trees made a
fragrant, shadowy retreat. "That awful Mrs. Stunt must be gone by this.
I believe I will go in and let Chopin make me more wretched still," she
was thinking. She looked more wistfully toward the far corner. "No, I'll
just go over there and have out one big, good cry, with no one to bother
me. If I cry in the house, mother will bring me aromatic spirits of
ammonia." Acting on the latter impulse, she started, running now toward
the trees.
"Arà! it runs well!" whispered one of the grass-cutters to a neighbor.
"These foreigners all have big, strong legs."
"I never can tell the foreign men from the foreign women," remarked
another.
"_D[=o]_-mo! you simpleton!" retorted the first. She was the one to whom
Gwendolen had spoken directly, and though covered with confusion at the
moment, now vaunted herself upon the incident, and prepared herself to
take precedence in all comments concerning the strange doings of
"I-i-jin." "_D[=o]_-mo! it is easy to observe. The men have upper bodies
square, like a box, and this box is tightly covered with woollen cloth.
From the lower corners of the square come two stiff legs, like posts.
Now the women show no legs at all, but the middle of the body is
shrunken very small, like a saké gourd about which a string has been
tied when it is green. Poor things, it must surely hurt them to be so
bound. It is a practice more strange than that of encasing feet, used by
Chinese women."
"They all look alike to me, I say," repeated the first, unimpressed by
this erudition. Perhaps the boastful breath of the speaker awoke a small
coal of obstinacy. "The children are small in size, so I know them to be
children; but all faces are alike, as the faces of cows, pigs, and
horses are alike, and all are hideous!"
"That one, now, was not so frightful of aspect," ventured a kindly
third, and pointed her sickle to the spot where Gwendolen, having
climbed a low hillock, just disappeared beyond.
"That one would have been almost good to look at, but for its nose!"
"The noses of all are like these sickles," said the dogmatic first.
"Buddha teaches us to be content with what cannot be changed. Perhaps to
the foreigners themselves the sharp noses are even beautiful!" said the
gentler critic.
A chorus of hisses and low laughs greeted this unheard-of generosity.
The little speaker flushed under the shower of raillery, but did not
abandon her humane position. Something in the American girl's face had
flashed excitement, a new interest, a feeling almost like recognition,
into her narrow vista. She hoped she would be called to work often in
this huge garden, where the bright-haired o jo san might wander.
Upon the hillock which rose in front of the little sugi grove, corners
of rough stone stuck out, and shrubs had been planted, chiefly of
azalea. Mingled with the many-colored blossoms, there curved long wands
of yama-buki, that most golden flower, the gorse of the Far East. For
once Gwendolen passed these waves of beauty by. Down there, over among
the tree-trunks where the ground was winter-strewn with fragrant brown
shreds of leaves, one could sit and cry to one's heart's content.
Deliberately she held back the fast-rising sobs until the haven was
gained, and then, hurling herself to earth, gave vent to her grief and
prophetic fears. "Oh, my poor little Yuki! What are those hard men
saying to you now? What will they do if they think you wrong? And I
can't help you! I can do nothing! Oh, I wish we hadn't come to this
place! Will any of us ever be happy again? I have my own grief, but I
hide it, ashamed, before your peril! Oh, my little sister, my only
little sister! If I could only catch you up like a drifting petal, and
hide you in my heart, and run away with you back to our other home, back
to schooldays, and happiness! But we'll never be young again, we'll
never be happy. Oh--oh--oh, my heart will break!"
The azaleas stared down in stately dignity; the yama-buki tossed
dissent. On a sugi limb quite near, a row of sparrows placed themselves,
slowly puffing out their feathers in unison, like so many buns in a warm
oven. They cocked their heads suspiciously toward the prostrate girl,
and gossiped about her, saying she had stolen her hair from the sun.
Dodge, half ashamed of himself, but led on by something stronger than
conventionality, passed the nodding group of weeders, answered their
salutation in an absent-minded fashion, and continued a slow but
unswerving route toward the sugi trees. At the hillock he paused. A
curious sound on the other side drew him upward. His brown head pushed a
way through the yama-buki limbs. Gwendolen was crying. He stared, not
half believing his senses. Gwendolen, the gay, insouciant, defiant,
enchanting Gwendolen, weep like this! Sooner should the stars send down
beams of soot!
A big something that partook of the physical nature of a hedgehog
burrowed upward in his throat. Something sweet and unaccustomed stung
his lids.
"Oh, my heart will break!" sobbed the girl once more. "There 's nobody
to help me! There's nobody to listen!"
With a single bound Dodge had cleared the hillock and was on his knees
beside her. A startled, upward look met him,--expectation, a wild joy,
new bitterness,--these flashed in turn across her expressive face. With
a wide movement of resistance, she turned away from him and buried her
tear-stained face upon her knees.
Dodge stood instantly. "Do you mean that I am to go?" he asked.
Sobs alone answered him. She could not drive him away. His presence, his
nearness, were appallingly sweet. Neither could she yield tamely where
she had promised herself a policy of condescension.
Despairing of further verbal instruction, and glad in his heart that the
repulse had not been more vehement, he walked off a few paces, and
seated himself against a tree. Gwendolen held her breath until he was
safely on the earth again. She could not have borne his instant
desertion. All he had to do now, Dodge was well aware, was simply to
wait, and be still. The one thing impossible to Gwendolen was indefinite
silence. Even before he began to expect them, the hysterical words came
fluttering, as on broken wings, to his ear. "I suppose you are
glo--glo--_glo_ating on this scene of my--agony! You li--li--like to see
me hideous, with red-rimmed eyes and a gar--gar--_gar_net nose!" Again
the head went down, and the tiny lace ball of a handkerchief came into
requisition.
"I can't see your eyes, Gwendolen, or your nose, either. I am not
looking for them. But if they were emerald green it wouldn't phase me.
You are in trouble. I didn't know you could cry like this. I wish I
could be of some aid, some little comfort to you."
Never before had he called her "Gwendolen" in this grave assured tone.
No mere love-sick boy could have done it. The voice was that of a man,
with a man's power and mastery and self-respect. The woman in her put up
a protecting hand, but the deeper nature responded with smiles. Reason,
instinct, affection; clamored, like insistent children, for the boon of
grace. Her heart leaned down to them. "Recognize him,--confide in
him,--win him now, forever," cried the voices. "Nothing can help you, in
a time like this, as his love might help. You need him, foolish
one,--why not admit it and have peace?" But Vanity and Pride put on
horrid masks, and frightened the petitioners. She kept her eyes hidden.
"Well, shall I go or stay?" asked Dodge, calmly. The young man listened
in admiring wonder at his own smooth tone. How could his thumping heart
and brain direct that tranquil flow?
"You are wel--wel--welcome to stay if you care to. I don't own the
grove," said the girl.
Dodge picked a bit of leaf from the earth and began to shred the frail,
brown lace. "I was awfully sorry, Miss Todd, not to be able to tell you
this morning where the Minister had gone. I am only a servant, you know,
and must obey orders."
"Oh, it's no matter," said Gwendolen, airily. She was elated to find her
spirits, her self-confidence, returning in a tide. "I know all about it
now,--a good deal more, I dare say, than you yourself."
"I know nothing, except the place where Mr. Todd was to go and the
purpose of the meeting. He was about to tell me the result of it, when
you came in and carried him off in triumph!"
"Not in triumph,--good heavens, not in triumph. This is the most awful
day of my life!" She lifted her head now, throwing it backward to the
slight wind, and drawing deep breaths. She expected him to urge her
confidence, to ask, at least, what trouble had come to her. Already
she had more than half decided to tell him all. He was a safe
confidant,--one of whom her father would approve,--and--she must admit
that, at times, he had clear judgment. He kept an irritating silence.
Gwendolen began to fidget.
"Well, don't you care whether I suffer or not? I thought you said you
wanted to help me!"
"I want it more than I want anything else in the world, except one
thing," said Dodge, and moved two trees nearer.
"Well, well," cried the other, nervously, "I shall tell you. I have been
simply dying to tell somebody. To bear a suspense like this all alone is
like keeping your fist in a water dyke,--or barring a door with your
arm, or some of those dreadful heroic things." Hampered at first by a
constantly recalled determination to maintain her dignity, she began the
exciting history of the day, starting from the moment when she heard of
Pierre's escape, and ending with the visit of her father and herself to
the deserted Hagané mansion.
Dodge listened to all with an interest that a barometer might feel. He
was silent, except for a very few terse, direct questions. Not an
exclamation escaped him, and not a point. As she neared the end,
Gwendolen's voice gave way, and the little handkerchief was raised.
Dodge moved a tree nearer.
"Now tell me what you think, tell me truly. I have buried my own
thoughts in the earth, and sit here on their grave."
"Let my thoughts go there with yours, dear," said her companion,
mournfully. "The affair is as bad as it could well be. Luck alone is
going to save your friend, and from what I have seen and known of Miss
Yuki, she doesn't seem marked out by good luck."
She did not resent his hopelessness. Apparently she had foreseen it. The
telling of her story had eased while it had wearied her. She gave a
long, sobbing sigh, like a child, and let her head droop.
Before she knew it Dodge's arm was around her. "I'd give my life to keep
this and all other sorrows from you, Gwendolen. But all I can offer now
is--myself. Come to me, darling, put your poor tired little head against
me, and let me try to comfort you."
The girl began to tremble piteously. In her nervous state, the brimming
tears soon overflowed. "No--no--" she whispered, trying to push him off.
"It is not me you love,--you are Car-car--_car_-men's! She said so. You
belong to Car-Carmen!"
"I belong to Carmen's cat!" cried Dodge. "What am I to Carmen or Carmen
to me?"
"Then you de--ceived her!"
"Pshaw! I'll make Carmen a sugar man in my image. She'll like that lots
better. I love only you--only you, you beautiful, golden, tormenting
angel of a girl! If you hadn't kept me on pins and needles, I wouldn't
say it! I love _you_, I say. How could any man in his senses ever love
any other woman after once seeing you?"
Gwendolen tried to be stern. "No," she said again, "you don't love, you
don't respect me. You were horrid that day! You defied me to my face.
You wouldn't apologize. Will you apologize now?"
"Indeed I won't," he cried with a ring of victory. "I'd be a mucker and
a sneak to do so, and you would never want to look at me again. Deny
it,--and deny that you love me,--oh, Gwendolen, Gwendolen!"
With a little sob, in which a golden feather had been caught, she leaned
to his arms.
He took up the little brown sealskin cap, flung it back to her head,
and, in his most boyish, impudent, and ecstatic tone, said in her ear,
"You know the penalty for wearing another fellow's hat?"