THE TENSION SNAPS
Months back Fate had flung out a skein of broken threads to the wind of
Chance. In mid September she chose to bring the flying ends together.
It began when Hannah dropped a dipper. Hughie on his way to the
wood-box with an armful of kindlings jumped and dropped them with a
clatter. And he stepped on Toby's tail and swore. Hannah and Hughie
and Toby, startled, shared a sharp moment of resentment.
"Hughie," Hannah's impatience keyed her voice a trifle high, "'pon my
honor I don't know what gets into you. Ever since you took to diggin'
dots you've been as nervous as a cat. You're full of jumps. It's my
opinion if the doctor hadn't told you that Mr. O'Neill himself buried
the money in the fireplace, you'd be diggin' dots in a lunatic asylum!"
Hughie's horrified face of warning turned her cold with foreboding.
Hannah turned and gasped.
Joan stood behind her.
"Hannah," she asked, "what did you say?"
"I--I don't know," said Hannah, scarlet with confusion. "I'm all
unstrung and my head's queer--"
Hughie went out and slammed the door.
"You said that Mr. O'Neill--buried--the money--in Uncle's fireplace!"
repeated Joan distinctly. She caught Hannah's arm, her dark frightened
eyes imploring. "Hannah, did he?"
Shaking, Hannah put her apron to her eyes. "Hannah, you must tell me.
It is important that I know. No, don't cry. Did Mr. O'Neill bury the
money--in Uncle's fireplace?"
"Yes," choked Hannah in a low voice. "Oh, Hughie will never forgive
me!"
"How do you know?"
"The doctor. Hughie went on diggin', thinking there must be more,
until he was sick with nerves. The doctor had to tell him."
"And how did the doctor know?"
The girl's strained quiet helped Hannah to regain her self-control.
"Mr. O'Neill went to Rink's hotel to telephone," she faltered, wiping
her eyes, "and Sam Acker put his ear to the door. He--he telephoned
for a lot of ragged money--"
Joan caught her breath.
"And then a week later," gulped Hannah, "when the doctor came to tend
his wife, Sam told it, for Mr. O'Neill had said the doctor sent him
there to telephone. And the doctor never would have told but for
Hughie's nerves. He said so when he pledged us both to keep it secret.
He spoke wonderful about Mr. O'Neill. That I must say. And he called
him somebody Donkeyhote--"
"Where is Mr. O'Neill?"
"He drove down to the village with Mr. Rittenhouse for the mail."
Joan glided away like a shadow.
Don Quixote! And so he had done that strange, fantastic thing for
her--and she had given the money away to Don! Joan stopped at the foot
of the stairway, her face colorless and unbelieving, her mind casting
up a vivid picture of the night of search in the sitting room.
It--could--not--be!
Ah, but it could! For Kenny, reckless and on his mettle, was a
finished actor. And the morning at the telephone! His silence and
constraint had bothered her then not a little. Later, whirling through
the blizzard in a taxi, he had begged her not to do it. And he had
surrendered in the end with a sigh and smiled and kissed her. His
eyes, warmly blue, irresistibly Irish in their tenderness, seemed now
to stare at her with sad reproach. Ah, the kindness of him! Hot
stinging tears rolled slowly down the girl's white cheeks.
"Joan!" It was Brian's voice behind her.
Joan turned, trembling, blinked and smiled.
Something in her face drove his memory back to the moonlit wood. Niobe
on the verge of a passion of tears!
"You look like a sad little brown thrush," he said gently.
His voice, his eyes chilled her with foreboding. They stood in utter
silence.
Joan touched the throbbing veins in her throat and moistened her lips.
"You have heard from Mr. Whitaker--"
"Yes, Garry brought the letter up."
"When--"
"I'm sailing in a week. I go from here--to-morrow."
"Brian!"
The terror in her eyes startled him and the tension snapped. An
instant later she was crying wildly in his arms. Brian crushed his
lips against her cheek, conscious only of an agonizing stab of joy,
then Joan pulled away, her eyes dark with grief and shame.
"Oh, Brian, Brian," she whispered passionately, "I--want--to die."
"I've wanted to die for weeks," said Brian. "Almost I think I did."
Joan caught her breath with a shuddering gasp.
"Don't!" said Brian. "I--can't bear to hear you cry. I've always
known that I was a pretty poor sort but this--"
His honest eyes begged for understanding,
Joan's face, wet with tears, condoned.
"I--I am worse," she said unsteadily.
He caught her hands rebelliously.
"But you love me," he said wistfully. "That, at least--"
Joan slipped into his arms again with a sob.
"I love you better than my life," she said, "and I may--never--say it
again."
[Illustration: "I love you better than my life," Joan said, "and I
may--never--say it again."]
Brian pressed his cheek against her hair.
"No," he said. "No. I would not have you say it again, Joan, dear as
it is to hear it."
An eternity of minutes seemed to tick away in the silence.
"Brian, you must believe I meant to be true to Kenny--"
"Don't!" he choked, paling at the sound of Kenny's name. "Oh, Kenny,
Kenny!"
Joan buried her face in his arm. Both were thinking with hot
remorseful hearts of that stormy penitent with the laughing, tender
Irish eyes. Both loved him well. And both were pledging themselves to
keep his happiness intact.
Joan's tormented memory was busy with pictures: Kenny disastrously
sculling the punt to help her, Kenny in the death-chamber shuddering
and patient and passionately resolved to stay by her to the end, Kenny
with the lantern held high above her head, Kenny digging dots and
helping Don to study and Kenny tearing bricks from the ancient
fireplace.
She slipped out of his arms in a panic, her face, Brian thought, as
white as the old-fashioned lilies in the garden.
"Brian, go--" she choked.
With the truth of the ragged money burning itself into her mind--with
Brian so near and yet so far--the touch of his arms was torment.
Hungry for the peace of the pines and the lonely cabin, Joan fled
out-of-doors.