A MAN WITH MONEY
White and silver for Jean, the peacocky scarf making Emily shine with
the best of them, Dr. McKenzie called away at the last moment, and
promising to join them later; Derry catching his breath when he saw his
violets among Jean's laces; Drusilla wondering a little at this
transfigured Derry; Marion Gray settling down to the comfort of a chat
with Emily--what had these to do with a Tin Soldier on a shelf?
"How is your father, Derry?"
"Better, Drusilla. He has a fine nurse. Dr. McKenzie sent her."
"And I have Emily," Jean sang from the corner of the big car where
Derry had her penned in, with the fragrance of her violets sweeping
over him as he sat next to her. "I want Emily always, but Daddy has to
have a nurse in the office, and Emily won't give up her toys. And in
the meantime Hilda and I are ready to scratch each other's eyes out.
Please keep her as long as you can on your father's case, Mr. Drake."
"Say 'Derry,'" he commanded under cover of the light laughter of the
women.
"Not before---everybody--"
"Whisper it, then."
"Derry, Derry."
His pulses pounded. During the rest of the drive, he spoke to his
other guests and seemed to listen, but he heard nothing--nothing but
the whisper of that beloved voice.
As Derry had said, all the world of Washington was at the ball. The
President and his wife in a flag-draped box, she in black with a
turquoise fan, he towering a little above her, more than President in
these autocratic days of war. They looked down on men in the uniforms
of the battling world--Scot and Briton and Gaul--in plaid and khaki and
horizon blue--.
They looked down on women knitting.
Mrs. Witherspoon and a party of young people sat in a box adjoining
Derry's. Ralph was there and Alma Drew, and Alma was more than ever
lovely in gold-embroidered tulle.
Ralph knew what had happened when he saw Jean dancing with Derry.
There was no mistaking the soft raptures of the youthful pair. In the
days to come Ralph was to suffer wounds, but none to tear his heart
like this. And so when he danced with Jean a little later he did not
spare her.
"A man with money always gets what he wants."
"I don't know what you mean."
"I think you do. You are going to marry Derry Drake."
She shrank at this. She had in her meetings with Derry never looked
beyond the bliss of the moment. To have Ralph's rough fingers tearing
at the veil of her future was revolting.
She breathed quickly. "I shan't dance with you, if you speak of it
again."
"You shall dance with me," grimly, "this moment is my own--"
She was like wax in his strong arms. "Oh, how dare you." She was cold
with auger. "I want to stop."
"And I could dance forever. That's the irony of it--that I cannot make
you. But if I had Drake's money, I'd make you."
"Do you think it is his money?"
"Perhaps not. But the world will think it."
"If--if he wanted me, I'd marry him if he were a beggar in the streets."
"Has it gone as far as that? But you wouldn't marry a beggar. A
troubadour beneath your balcony, yes. But not a beggar. You'd want
him silken and blond and singing, and staying at home while other men
fought--"
She stopped at once. "If you knew what you were talking about; I'd
never speak to you again. But because I was fool enough once to
believe that Derry Drake was a coward, I am going to forgive you. But
I shall not dance with you again; ever--"
Making her way back alone to the box, she saw with a throb of relief
that her father had joined Emily and Marion Gray.
He uttered a quick exclamation as she came up. "What's the matter,
daughter?"
Her throat was dry. "I can't tell you now--there are too many people.
It was Ralph. I hate him, Daddy."
"My dear--"
"I do."
"But why?"
"Please, I don't want to talk about it--wait until we get home."
Looking out over the heads of the swaying crowd, she saw that Derry was
dancing with Alma Drew. And it was Alma who had said at the
Witherspoon dinner, "Everybody will forgive a man with money."
And that was what Ralph had thought of her, that she was like
Alma--that money could buy her--that she would sell the honor of her
country for gold--.
But worse than any hurt of her own was the hurt of the thing for Derry.
Ralph Witherspoon had dared to point a finger of scorn at him--other
people had dared--
She suffered intensely, not as a child, but as a woman.
Alma, out on the floor, was saying to Derry, "I saw you dancing with
Jean McKenzie. She's a quaint little duck."
"Not a duck, Alma," he was smiling, "a white dove--or a silver swan."
The look that he sent across the room to Jean was a revelation.
Like Ralph, she grew hateful. "So that's it? Well, a man with money
can get anything."
He had no anger for her. Jean might blaze in his defense, but his own
fires were not to be fanned by any words of Alma Drew. If he lost his
fortune, Jean would still care for him. It was fore-ordained, as fixed
as the stars.
So he went back to her, and when she saw him coming, the burden of her
distress fell from her. The world became once more hers and Derry's,
with everybody else shut out. When they had supper with the
Witherspoon party joining them, and Ralph palely repentant beside her,
she even, to the utter bewilderment of her father, smiled at him, and
talked as if their quarrel had never been.
Drusilla watched her with more than a tinge of envy. She was aware
that her own vivid charm was shadowed and eclipsed by the white flame
of Jean's youth and innocence. "And he loves her," she thought with a
tug of her heartstrings; "he loves her, and there'll never be anything
like it for him again."
She sat rather silently between Captain Hewes and Dr. McKenzie. Dr.
McKenzie had always admired Drusilla, but tonight his attention was
rather more than usual fixed upon her by a remark which Captain Hewes
had made when the two men had stood alone together watching the
dancers. "I have seen very little of American women--but to me
Drusilla Gray seems the supreme type."
"She is very attractive."
"She is more than that. She is inspiring, the embodiment of your best
ideals. When she sings one wonders that all men have not fought for
democracy."
That was something to say of a woman. Doctor McKenzie wondered if it
could be said of his own daughter. Set side by side with Drusilla,
Jean seemed a childish creature, unstable, swayed by the emotion of the
moment. Yet her fire matched Drusilla's, her dreams outran Drusilla's
dreams.
Two officers passed the table.
"How any man can keep out of it," Drusilla said. "Some day I shall put
on a uniform and pass for a boy--"
"Why not go over as you are?"
"They won't let me now. But some day they will. I can drive a
car--there ought to be a place for me."
"There is one for me," he said, "and my decision must be made tonight.
They are asking me to head a hospital staff in France. A letter came
this morning, and I've got to answer it."
Her eyes went to the flame-white maiden on the other side of the table.
"What does Jean say?"
"I haven't asked her. She wouldn't keep me back. But I am all she
has, and it would hurt."
"It would hurt. But you are not all that she has--you might as well
try to sweep back the sea as to stop what is going on over there. I
have been sitting here green with envy. Oh, if love might only come to
me like that."
"Like what?"
"Heaven-sent--never a doubt, never a speculation; just knowing and
believing--souls stripped bare of all pretence."
How splendid she was--how beautiful! He bent down to her. "Why
shouldn't it come to you?"
"Men don't love me that way. They admire and respect and then love.
But Jean? She's a moon maiden, luring them to--madness." She smiled
up at him.
"Captain Hewes says you are the supreme type--the perfect American."
"Yes, but he thinks of me as a type. Some day perhaps he will think of
me as a woman."
She brought the conversation back to Jean. "You need not let the
thought of her loneliness trouble you."
"You think then that I am going to lose her?"
"You have lost her already."
Sparks burned in the Doctor's eyes. "I don't believe it. She has
known him a few days--and I've given her my whole life."
"'Forsaking all others,'" murmured Drusilla.
"Yet she loves me."
"It isn't that she loves you less--she loves him more."
"Don't," he lifted his hand. "I am not sure that I can stand it."
"It makes your way clear. That's why I have said it. There will be
nothing now to keep you back from France."
Once upon a time she had said to Derry, "I can feel things, and I can
make others feel." She had, perhaps, tonight, been a little cruel, but
she had been cruel with a purpose.
All the way home Doctor McKenzie was very silent. When he kissed his
daughter before she went upstairs, he held her close and smoothed her
hair, but not a word did he say of the thing which had come to him.
He asked Emily, however, to wait a moment. "I have a letter to answer.
I should like your advice."
Wondering a little, she sat down by the fire. The peacocky scarf gave
out glittering lights of blue and green. She was tired and there were
shadows under her eyes.
He came at once to his proposition. "I am thinking of going to France,
Emily. If I do, can you stay with Jean?"
She turned her startled gaze upon him. "To France? Why?"
He told her. "They have been writing to me for weeks, and now the
moment for my decision has come. I haven't said anything to Jean. But
she won't keep me back. You know how she feels. But unless you can
come, I can't leave her."
"I should have to be all day in my shop."
"I know, but you could be here in the evening and at night, and she
could, of course, be with you in the shop, she likes that--and it would
keep her from brooding. Or, if you will give up the shop, I should
like to make it financially possible for you, Emily."
She shook her head. "No. You will be coming back, and then my
occupation would be gone." She hesitated. "But if I come--what of
Hilda?"
"She may decide to go over, too, as a nurse. We work well together."
She was silent, searching for the words which she felt that she ought
to say. So that was it? They would go together, and the tongues of
the world would wag. And Hilda would know that they were wagging, and
would not care. But he, with his mind on bigger things, would never
know, and would blunder unseeing into the net which was set for him.
She felt that she ought to warn him, that the good friendship which
existed between them demanded it. Yet it was a hard thing to say, and
she hated it. So the moment passed.
It was he who spoke first--of Jean and Derry. "What do you think of
it, Emily?"
"He is very much in love with her."
"And Jean?"
"Oh, I think you know. You saw her tonight."
He felt a sudden sense of age and loneliness. "She won't miss me,
then?"
"Do you think that anyone could make up to your little Jean for the
loss of her father?"
He covered his face with his hand. "You are feeling it like that?" she
asked, gently.
"Yes. She is all I have, Emily. And I am
jealous--desperately--desperately."
She searched for words to comfort him, and at last they came. "She
will be very proud of her Daddy in France."
"Do you think she will?"
"I know it."
"And yet--I am not really worthy of all that she gives--"
She leaned forward, her white hands in her lap. Jean's comment echoed
once more in his ears. "I like Emily's hands much better than
Hilda's." They seemed, indeed, to represent all that was lovely in
Emily, her refinement, her firmness, her gentle spirit.
"Bruce," she said--she rarely called him that--"your dear wife would
never have loved you if you hadn't been worthy of love."
"I need her--to hold me to my best."
"Hold yourself to it, Bruce--" She stood up. "I must go to bed, and
so must you. We have busy days before us."
He spoke impulsively. "You are a good woman, Emily--there's no one in
the world that I would trust to stay with Jean but you."
She smiled a little wistfully as she went upstairs. She had perhaps
comforted him, but she had left unsaid the words she should have
spoken. "You must not take Hilda with you. If you take her with you,
will your Jean be proud of her Daddy in France?"