It was only May, but the freshness of early summer already clothed
the great fields of the rancho. The old resemblance to a sea was still
there, more accented, perhaps, by the undulations of bluish-green
grain that rolled from the actual shore-line to the foothills. The farm
buildings were half submerged in this glowing tide of color and lost
their uncouth angularity with their hidden rude foundations. The same
sea-breeze blew chilly and steadily from the bay, yet softened and
subdued by the fresh odors of leaf and flower. The outlying fringe of
oaks were starred through their underbrush with anemones and dog-roses;
there were lupines growing rankly in the open spaces, and along the
gentle slopes of Oak Grove daisies were already scattered. And, as if it
were part of this vernal efflorescence, the eminence itself was crowned
with that latest flower of progress and improvement,--the new Oak Grove
Hotel!
Long, low, dazzling with white colonnades, verandas, and balconies which
retained, however, enough of the dampness of recent creation to make
them too cool for loungers, except at high noon, the hotel nevertheless
had the charms of freshness, youth, and cleanliness. Reddy's fastidious
neatness showed itself in all the appointments, from the mirrored and
marbled barroom, gilded parlors, and snowy dining-room, to the chintz
and maple furnishing of the bedrooms above. Reddy's taste, too, had
selected the pretty site; his good fortune had afterward discovered
in an adjoining thicket a spring of blandly therapeutic qualities. A
complaisant medical faculty of San Francisco attested to its merits;
a sympathetic press advertised the excellence of the hotel; a
novelty-seeking, fashionable circle--as yet without laws and blindly
imitative--found the new hotel an admirable variation to the vulgar
ordinary “across the bay” excursion, and an accepted excuse for a novel
social dissipation. A number of distinguished people had already visited
it; certain exclusive families had secured the best rooms; there were a
score of pretty women to be seen in its parlors; there had already been
a slight scandal. Nothing seemed wanting to insure its success.
Reddy was passing through the little wood where four months before he
had parted from Kelly Woodridge to learn his fate from her father. He
remembered that interview to which Nelly's wafted kiss had inspired
him. He recalled to-day, as he had many times before, the singular
complacency with which Mr. Woodridge had received his suit, as if it
were a slight and unimportant detail of the business in hand, and how he
had told him that Kelly and her mother were going to the “States” for a
three months' visit, but that after her return, if they were both “still
agreed,” he, Woodridge, would make no objection. He remembered the
slight shock which this announcement of Kelly's separation from him
during his probationary labors had given him, and his sudden suspicion
that he had been partly tricked of his preliminary intent to secure her
company to solace him. But he had later satisfied himself that she
knew nothing of her father's intentions at the time, and he was fain to
content himself with a walk through the fields at her side the day she
departed, and a single kiss--which left him cold. And now in a few days
she would return to witness the successful fufillment of his labors,
and--reward him!
It was certainly a complacent prospect. He could look forward to a
sensible, prosperous, respectable future. He had won back his good
name, his fortune, and position,--not perhaps exactly in the way he
had expected,--and he had stilled the wanton, foolish cravings of his
passionate nature in the calm, virginal love of an honest, handsome girl
who would make him a practical helpmeet, and a comfortable, trustworthy
wife. He ought to be very happy. He had never known such perfect health
before; he had lost his reckless habits; his handsome, nervous face had
grown more placid and contented; his long curls had been conventionally
clipped; he had gained flesh unmistakably, and the lower buttons of
the slim waistcoat he had worn to church that memorable Sunday were too
tight for comfort or looks. HE WAS happy; yet as he glanced over the
material spring landscape, full of practical health, blossom, and
promise of fruition, it struck him that the breeze that blew over it was
chilly, even if healthful; and he shivered slightly.
He reached the hotel, entered the office, glanced at the register, and
passed through into his private room. He had been away for two days,
and noticed with gratification that the influx of visitors was still
increasing. His clerk followed into the room.
“There's a lady in 56 who wanted to see you when you returned. She asked
particularly for the manager.”
“Who is she?”
“Don't know. It's a Mrs. Merrydew, from Sacramento. Expecting her
husband on the next steamer.”
“Humph! You'll have to be rather careful about these solitary married
women. We don't want another scandal, you know.”
“She asked for you by name, sir, and I thought you might know her,”
returned the clerk.
“Very well. I'll go up.”
He sent a waiter ahead to announce him, and leisurely mounted the
stairs. No. 56 was the sitting-room of a private suite on the first
floor. The waiter was holding the door open. As he approached it a
faint perfume from the interior made him turn pale. But he recovered his
presence of mind sufficiently to close the door sharply upon the waiter
behind him.
“Jim,” said a voice which thrilled him.
He looked up and beheld what any astute reader of romance will have
already suspected--the woman to whom he believed he owed his ruin in
San Francisco. She was as beautiful and alluring as ever, albeit she was
thinner and more spiritual than he had ever seen her. She was tastefully
dressed, as she had always been, a certain style of languorous silken
deshabille which she was wont to affect in better health now became her
paler cheek and feverishly brilliant eyes. There was the same opulence
of lace and ornament, and, whether by accident or design, clasped around
the slight wrist of her extended hand was a bracelet which he remembered
had swept away the last dregs of his fortune.
He took her hand mechanically, yet knowing whatever rage was in his
heart he had not the strength to refuse it.
“They told me it was Mrs. Merrydew,” he stammered.
“That was my mother's name,” she said, with a little laugh. “I thought
you knew it. But perhaps you didn't. When I got my divorce from
Dick--you didn't know that either, I suppose; it's three months ago,--I
didn't care to take my maiden name again; too many people remembered
it. So after the decree was made I called myself Mrs. Merrydew. You had
disappeared. They said you had gone East.”
“But the clerk says you are expecting your HUSBAND on the steamer. What
does this mean? Why did you tell him that?” He had so far collected
himself that there was a ring of inquisition in his voice.
“Oh, I had to give him some kind of reason for my being alone when I did
not find you as I expected,” she said half wearily. Then a change came
over her tired face; a smile of mingled audacity and tentative coquetry
lit up the small features. “Perhaps it is true; perhaps I may have a
husband coming on the steamer--that depends. Sit down, Jim.”
She let his hand drop, and pointed to an armchair from which she had
just risen, and sank down herself in a corner of the sofa, her thin
fingers playing with and drawing themselves through the tassels of the
cushion.
“You see, Jim, as soon as I was free, Louis Sylvester--you remember
Louis Sylvester?--wanted to marry me, and even thought that he was the
cause of Dick's divorcing me. He actually went East to settle up some
property he had left him there, and he's coming on the steamer.”
“Louis Sylvester!” repeated Reddy, staring at her. “Why, he was a bigger
fool than I was, and a worse man!” he added bitterly.
“I believe he was,” said the lady, smiling, “and I think he still
is. But,” she added, glancing at Reddy under her light fringed lids,
“you--you're regularly reformed, aren't you? You're stouter, too, and
altogether more solid and commercial looking. Yet who'd have thought of
your keeping a hotel or ever doing anything but speculate in wild-cat
or play at draw poker. How did you drift into it? Come, tell me! I'm not
Mrs. Sylvester just yet, and maybe I might like to go into the business
too. You don't want a partner, do you?”
Her manner was light and irresponsible, or rather it suggested a
childlike putting of all responsibility for her actions upon others,
which he remembered now too well. Perhaps it was this which kept him
from observing that the corners of her smiling lips, however, twitched
slightly, and that her fingers, twisting the threads of the tassel,
were occasionally stiffened nervously. For he burst out: Oh yes; he had
drifted into it when it was a toss up if it wasn't his body instead
that would be found drifting out to sea from the first wharf of San
Francisco. Yes, he had been a common laborer,--a farm hand, in those
fields she had passed,--a waiter in the farm kitchen, and but for luck
he might be taking her orders now in this very hotel. It was not her
fault if he was not in the gutter.
She raised her thin hand with a tired gesture as if to ward off the
onset of his words. “The same old Jim,” she repeated; “and yet I thought
you had forgotten all that now, and become calmer and more sensible
since you had taken flesh and grown so matter of fact. You ought to have
known then, as you know now, that I never could have been anything to
you as long as I was tied to Dick. And you know you forced your presents
on me, Jim. I took them from YOU because I would take nothing from Dick,
for I hated him. And I never knew positively that you were in straits
then; you know you always talked big, Jim, and were always going to make
your fortune with the next thing you had in hand!”
It was true, and he remembered it. He had not intended this kind of
recrimination, but he was exasperated with her wearied acceptance of his
reproaches and by a sudden conviction that his long-cherished grievance
against her now that he had voiced it was inadequate, mean, and
trifling. Yet he could not help saying:--
“Then you had presents from Sylvester, too. I presume you did not hate
him, either?”
“He would have married me the day after I got my divorce.”
“And so would I,” burst out Reddy.
She looked at him fixedly. “You would?” she said with a peculiar
emphasis. “And now”--
He colored. It had been part of his revengeful purpose on seeing her to
tell her of his engagement to Kelly. He now found himself tongue-tied,
irresolute, and ashamed. Yet he felt she was reading his innermost
thoughts.
She, however, only lowered her eyes, and with the same tired expression
said: “No matter now. Let us talk of something nearer. That was two
months ago. And so you have charge of this hotel! I like it so much. I
mean the place itself. I fancy I could live here forever. It is so far
away and restful. I am so sick of towns and cities, and people. And this
little grove is so secluded. If one had merely a little cottage here,
one might be so happy.”
What did she mean?--what did she expect?--what did she think of doing?
She must be got rid of before Kelly's arrival, and yet he found himself
wavering under her potent and yet scarcely exerted influence. The
desperation of weakness is apt to be more brutal than the determination
of strength. He remembered why he had come upstairs, and blurted out:
“But you can't stay here. The rules are very stringent in regard to--to
strangers like yourself. It will be known who you really are and what
people say of you. Even your divorce will tell against you. It's all
wrong, I know--but what can I do? I didn't make the rules. I am only a
servant of the landlord, and must carry them out.”
She leaned back against the sofa and laughed silently. But she presently
recovered herself, although with the same expression of fatigue. “Don't
be alarmed, my poor Jim! If you mean your friend, Mr. Woodridge, I
know him. It was he, himself, who suggested my coming here. And
don't misunderstand him--nor me either. He's only a good friend of
Sylvester's; they had some speculation together. He's coming here to see
me after Louis arrives. He's waiting in San Francisco for his wife and
daughter, who come on the same steamer. So you see you won't get into
trouble on my account. Don't look so scared, my dear boy.”
“Does he know that you knew me?” said Reddy, with a white face.
“Perhaps. But then that was three months ago,” returned the lady,
smiling, “and you know how you have reformed since, and grown ever so
much more steady and respectable.”
“Did he talk to you of me?” continued Reddy, still aghast.
“A little--complimentary of course. Don't look so frightened. I didn't
give you away.”
Her laugh suddenly ceased, and her face changed into a more nervous
activity as she rose and went toward the window. She had heard the sound
of wheels outside--the coach had just arrived.
“There's Mr. Woodridge now,” she said in a more animated voice. “The
steamer must be in. But I don't see Louis; do you?”
She turned to where Reddy was standing, but he was gone.
The momentary animation of her face changed. She lifted her shoulders
with a half gesture of scorn, but in the midst of it suddenly threw
herself on the sofa, and buried her face in her hands.
A few moments elapsed with the bustle of arrival in the hall and
passages. Then there was a hesitating step at her door. She quickly
passed her handkerchief over her wet eyes and resumed her former look
of weary acceptation. The door opened. But it was Mr. Woodridge who
entered. The rough shirt-sleeved ranchman had developed, during the last
four months, into an equally blunt but soberly dressed proprietor. His
keen energetic face, however, wore an expression of embarrassment and
anxiety, with an added suggestion of a half humorous appreciation of it.
“I wouldn't have disturbed you, Mrs. Merrydew,” he said, with a gentle
bluntness, “if I hadn't wanted to ask your advice before I saw Reddy.
I'm keeping out of his way until I could see you. I left Nelly and her
mother in 'Frisco. There's been some queer goings-on on the steamer
coming home; Kelly has sprang a new game on her mother, and--and suthin'
that looks as if there might be a new deal. However,” here a sense that
he was, perhaps, treating his statement too seriously, stopped him, and
he smiled reassuringly, “that is as may be.”
“I don't know,” he went on, “as I ever told you anything about my Kelly
and Reddy,--partik'lerly about Kelly. She's a good girl, a square girl,
but she's got some all-fired romantic ideas in her head. Mebbee it kem
from her reading, mebbee it kem from her not knowing other girls, or
seeing too much of a queer sort of men; but she got an interest in the
bad ones, and thought it was her mission to reform them,--reform them
by pure kindness, attentive little sisterly ways, and moral example. She
first tried her hand on Reddy. When he first kem to us he was--well, he
was a blazin' ruin! She took him in hand, yanked him outer himself, put
his foot on the bedrock, and made him what you see him now. Well--what
happened; why, he got reg'larly soft on her; wanted to MARRY HER, and
I agreed conditionally, of course, to keep him up to the mark. Did you
speak?”
“No,” said the lady, with her bright eyes fixed upon him.
“Well, that was all well and good, and I'd liked to have carried out my
part of the contract, and was willing, and am still. But you see, Kelly,
after she'd landed Reddy on firm ground, got a little tired, I reckon,
gal-like, of the thing she'd worked so easily, and when she went East
she looked around for some other wreck to try her hand on, and she found
it on the steamer coming back. And who do you think it was? Why, our
friend Louis Sylvester!”
Mrs. Merrydew smiled slightly, with her bright eyes still on the
speaker.
“Well, you know he IS fast at times--if he is a friend of mine--and she
reg'larly tackled him; and as my old woman says, it was a sight to see
her go for him. But then HE didn't tumble to it. No! Reformin' ain't in
HIS line I'm afeard. And what was the result? Why, Kelly only got all
the more keen when she found she couldn't manage him like Reddy,--and,
between you and me, she'd have liked Reddy more if he hadn't been so
easy,--and it's ended, I reckon, in her now falling dead in love with
Sylvester. She swears she won't marry any one else, and wants to devote
her whole life to him! Now, what's to be done! Reddy don't know it yet,
and I don't know how to tell him. Kelly says her mission was ended when
she made a new man of him, and he oughter be thankful for that. Couldn't
you kinder break the news to him and tell him there ain't any show for
him?”
“Does he love the girl so much, then?” said the lady gently.
“Yes; but I am afraid there is no hope for Reddy as long as she thinks
there's a chance of her capturing Sylvester.”
The lady rose and went to the writing-table. “Would it be any comfort
to you, Mr. Woodridge, if you were told that she had not the slightest
chance with Sylvester?”
“Yes.”
She wrote a few lines on a card, put it in an envelope, and handed it to
Woodridge. “Find out where Sylvester is in San Francisco, and give him
that card. I think it will satisfy you. And now as I have to catch the
return coach in ten minutes, I must ask you to excuse me while I put my
things together.”
“And you won't first break the news to Reddy for me?”
“No; and I advise you to keep the whole matter to yourself for the
present. Good-by!”
She smiled again, fascinatingly as usual, but, as it seemed to him, a
trifle wearily, and then passed into the inner room. Years after, in his
practical, matter of fact recollections of this strange woman, he always
remembered her by this smile.
But she had sufficiently impressed him by her parting adjuration to
cause him to answer Reddy's eager inquiries with the statement that
Kelly and her mother were greatly preoccupied with some friends in
San Francisco, and to speedily escape further questioning. Reddy's
disappointment was somewhat mitigated by the simultaneous announcement
of Mrs. Merrydew's departure. But he was still more relieved and
gratified to hear, a few days later, of the marriage of Mrs. Merrydew
with Louis Sylvester. If, to the general surprise and comment it
excited, he contributed only a smile of cynical toleration and superior
self-complacency, the reader will understand and not blame him. Nor did
the public, who knew the austere completeness of his reform. Nor did Mr.
Woodridge, who failed to understand the only actor in this little comedy
who might perhaps have differed from them all.
A month later James Reddy married Kelly Woodridge, in the chilly little
church at Oakdale. Perhaps by that time it might have occurred to him
that although the freshness and fruition of summer were everywhere, the
building seemed to be still unwarmed. And when he stepped forth with his
bride, and glanced across the prosperous landscape toward the distant
bay and headlands of San Francisco, he shivered slightly at the dryly
practical kiss of the keen northwestern Trades.
But he was prosperous and comfortable thereafter, as the respectable
owner of broad lands and paying shares. It was said that Mrs. Reddy
contributed much to the popularity of the hotel by her charming freedom
from prejudice and sympathy with mankind; but this was perhaps only due
to the contrast to her more serious and at times abstracted husband. At
least this was the charitable opinion of the proverbially tolerant and
kind-hearted Baroness Streichholzer (nee Merrydew, and relict of the
late lamented Louis Sylvester, Esq.), whom I recently had the pleasure
of meeting at Wiesbaden, where the waters and reposeful surroundings
strongly reminded her of Oakdale.
THE HEIR OF THE McHULISHES.