TWO weeks in succession, after going to Derlingport, Lanny spent Sunday
in River-bank, and Alice enjoyed the visits immensely. Their brief
separation gave zest to the mere being together again. The third Sunday
Lanny did not come down, but wrote a long letter. The Derlingport nine
had jumped at the chance of securing him as a pitcher; they were to give
him ten dollars a game. He was mighty sorry, he wrote, that the nine's
schedule included Sunday games, but every ten dollars he could pick up
in that way made their wedding day come just so much nearer. He guessed,
he said, that it would be all right for him to play the Sunday games in
Derlingport, and in other towns than Riverbank; if Derlingport played
any Sunday games in Riverbank they could get another pitcher for the
games. He mentioned Roger; he had talked to the bosses of the nine, and
they were willing to find a job for Old Pop, and would do so if Roger
would sign up for the season, or what remained of it, but Lanny wrote
that he supposed the Sunday game business would shut Roger out of that.
Alice volunteered to let David and 'Thusia read the letter--it was the
first out-and-out love letter she had ever received--but they declined,
feeling that to do so would be to take an unfair advantage of
Alice's dutifulness, and she read them such portions as were not
pure love-making. The letter came Saturday. Alice was not greatly
disappointed that Lanny was not coming down, for he had suggested that
he might not come. She went to church Sunday morning, and Ben Derling
walked home with her. The Presbyterian Sabbath school was held in the
afternoon, and about the time Lanny was warming up for the first inning
of the Derlingport-Marburg ball game Alice was leading her class in
singing the closing song. Below the pulpit Lucille Hardcome beat time
with her jingling bracelets, and she smiled to see Ben Derling close
his hymn book, and edge past his class of boys with a glance in Alice's
direction. He hurried out as soon as the benediction was said, and
Lucille rightly guessed that he meant to wait for Alice in the lobby,
but Lucille captured Alice before she could escape.
“If you are not needed at home, Alice,” she said, “you must come with
me. I have the most interesting photographs! Dozens of them, pictures of
Europe. My carriage will be here directly.”
The photographs were not new. Lucille had made a flight through Europe
as soon as her husband was dead. It was her first use of the money she
inherited, and she had bought the photographs then--it was before the
days of picture postcards.
For six months after her return she had inflicted the photographs on
all her friends and acquaintances, and had then tired of them. They had
reposed peacefully in a box ever since, and might have remained there
forever, had she not invited Ben Derling to her house.
Lucille played a harp--a great gilded affair, and she asked Ben, who was
a fair violinist, to try a duet, suggesting that they might make part
of a program when she gave a concert for the church fund. Ben went
willingly enough, and played as well as he could, and enjoyed the
evening immensely. He found Lucille but an indifferent harpist, but
willing to let him make suggestions. She asked him what he thought of
a series of musical evenings, and he took to the idea enthusiastically.
This was Wednesday.
Lucille's real reason for asking Ben to her house had been to study him
a little more closely than she had had opportunity to do before. She
mentioned Alice, and Ben was enthusiastic enough to satisfy Lucille that
he liked Alice well. If Alice would be willing to try out a few things
with him, piano-violin duets, it would be a pleasing part of the musical
evenings, he said. Lucille thought so, too. They talked music; and
Lucille happened to mention that she had first heard the harp in Paris,
and Ben said he had not taken time to hear any music when he was in
Europe. It was the first Lucille had heard of Ben's European tour, and
she left him in her parlor while she hunted up the photographs.
She was not quite sure where they were. As she rummaged for them she
thought Ben over, and almost decided he would not do as a substitute for
Lanny Wesh. There was something gayly sparkling about Lanny, and Ben was
anything but gay or sparkling. He was short and chunky, serious-minded
and sedate. Some ancestor had given him a little greasy knob of a nose,
but this was his most unpleasant feature. It is easiest, perhaps, to
describe him as a thoroughly bathed young man, smelling of perfumed
soap, and with yellowish hair, ever smooth and glistening from recent
applications of a well-soaked hair-brush. He had no bad habits unless,
in one so young, incessant application to business is a bad habit. He
had taken his place in his grandfather's office the week the old man
died. Already, from bending over a desk, he was a little rounded in
the shoulders. His violin and his Sunday school class were his only
relaxations. He was a good boy, and a good son; but Lucille was afraid
he was not likely to appeal to the romantic taste of a girl like Alice.
When she discovered the photographs she was inclined to leave them where
they were, and tell Ben she could not find them, and let the musical
evenings be forgotten. The picture that happened to be on top was one
that pictured some city or cathedral of which Van Dusen had spoken when
last in her home, and more for Van Dusen than for Ben she gathered
the pictures in her arms, and carried them downstairs. Ben seized them
eagerly.
His trip abroad had been the one great upflaring of his life. He had
gone with a “party,” and had raced from place to place, but he had
a memory that was infallible. His eyes brightened as he saw the
photographs. He talked. He talked well. He made the pictures live.
He was in his element: he would have made an admirable stereopticon
lecturer had business not claimed him. He remembered dates, historical
associations, little incidents that had occurred and that had the
foreign tang. Before he had gone one quarter through the pile of
pictures, Lucille gathered them up.
“No more to-night!” she laughed. “We young folks must have our beauty
sleep,” and she sent him away. “He must show the pictures to Alice,” she
said to herself. “She will be made to visit Europe when she hears him
tell of it. He is quite another Ben.”
When, Sunday afternoon, Lucille found that Ben, as she had guessed, was
waiting in the lobby she hailed him at once, saying:
“How fortunate! I am taking Alice to look at my European pictures. You
'll come, won't you?” Ben was eager. There was room in the carriage for
him, crowding a little, which was not unpleasant when it was Alice who
was crowded against him. Lucille left them with the photographs while
she went to induce the maid to make a pitcher of lemonade. When she
returned Ben was talking. He and Alice were seated on a couch by the
window, and Alice was holding a photograph in her hands, studying it.
Ben sat turned toward her; he leaned to point out some feature of the
picture, and Alice asked a question. Lucille placed the pitcher of
lemonade on a stand, and went out; they were doing very well without
her. She felt she had made an excellent beginning; Lanny banished,
and Alice at least interested in what Ben was interested in. When she
interrupted them it was to suggest the musical evenings.
“It will be delightful!” Alice exclaimed. She had, for the moment, quite
forgotten Lanny. The moment had, in fact, stretched to something like
two hours. Ben walked home with her.