On the last Saturday in April, the New York “Times” published an
account of the strike complications which were delaying Alexander’s New
Jersey bridge, and stated that the engineer himself was in town and at
his office on West Tenth Street.
On Sunday, the day after this notice appeared, Alexander worked all day
at his Tenth Street rooms. His business often called him to New York,
and he had kept an apartment there for years, subletting it when he
went abroad for any length of time. Besides his sleeping-room and bath,
there was a large room, formerly a painter’s studio, which he used as a
study and office. It was furnished with the cast-off possessions of his
bachelor days and with odd things which he sheltered for friends of his
who followed itinerant and more or less artistic callings. Over the
fireplace there was a large old-fashioned gilt mirror. Alexander’s big
work-table stood in front of one of the three windows, and above the
couch hung the one picture in the room, a big canvas of charming color
and spirit, a study of the Luxembourg Gardens in early spring, painted
in his youth by a man who had since become a portrait-painter of
international renown. He had done it for Alexander when they were
students together in Paris.
Sunday was a cold, raw day and a fine rain fell continuously. When
Alexander came back from dinner he put more wood on his fire, made
himself comfortable, and settled down at his desk, where he began
checking over estimate sheets. It was after nine o’clock and he was
lighting a second pipe, when he thought he heard a sound at his door.
He started and listened, holding the burning match in his hand; again
he heard the same sound, like a firm, light tap. He rose and crossed
the room quickly. When he threw open the door he recognized the figure
that shrank back into the bare, dimly lit hallway. He stood for a
moment in awkward constraint, his pipe in his hand.
“Come in,” he said to Hilda at last, and closed the door behind her. He
pointed to a chair by the fire and went back to his worktable. “Won’t
you sit down?”
He was standing behind the table, turning over a pile of blueprints
nervously. The yellow light from the student’s lamp fell on his hands
and the purple sleeves of his velvet smoking-jacket, but his flushed
face and big, hard head were in the shadow. There was something about
him that made Hilda wish herself at her hotel again, in the street
below, anywhere but where she was.
“Of course I know, Bartley,” she said at last, “that after this you
won’t owe me the least consideration. But we sail on Tuesday. I saw
that interview in the paper yesterday, telling where you were, and I
thought I had to see you. That’s all. Good-night; I’m going now.” She
turned and her hand closed on the door-knob.
Alexander hurried toward her and took her gently by the arm. “Sit down,
Hilda; you’re wet through. Let me take off your coat—and your boots;
they’re oozing water.” He knelt down and began to unlace her shoes,
while Hilda shrank into the chair. “Here, put your feet on this stool.
You don’t mean to say you walked down—and without overshoes!”
Hilda hid her face in her hands. “I was afraid to take a cab. Can’t you
see, Bartley, that I’m terribly frightened? I’ve been through this a
hundred times to-day. Don’t be any more angry than you can help. I was
all right until I knew you were in town. If you’d sent me a note, or
telephoned me, or anything! But you won’t let me write to you, and I
had to see you after that letter, that terrible letter you wrote me
when you got home.”
Alexander faced her, resting his arm on the mantel behind him, and
began to brush the sleeve of his jacket. “Is this the way you mean to
answer it, Hilda?” he asked unsteadily.
She was afraid to look up at him. “Didn’t—didn’t you mean even to say
goodby to me, Bartley? Did you mean just to—quit me?” she asked. “I
came to tell you that I’m willing to do as you asked me. But it’s no
use talking about that now. Give me my things, please.” She put her
hand out toward the fender.
Alexander sat down on the arm of her chair. “Did you think I had
forgotten you were in town, Hilda? Do you think I kept away by
accident? Did you suppose I didn’t know you were sailing on Tuesday?
There is a letter for you there, in my desk drawer. It was to have
reached you on the steamer. I was all the morning writing it. I told
myself that if I were really thinking of you, and not of myself, a
letter would be better than nothing. Marks on paper mean something to
you.” He paused. “They never did to me.”
Hilda smiled up at him beautifully and put her hand on his sleeve. “Oh,
Bartley! Did you write to me? Why didn’t you telephone me to let me
know that you had? Then I wouldn’t have come.”
Alexander slipped his arm about her. “I didn’t know it before, Hilda,
on my honor I didn’t, but I believe it was because, deep down in me
somewhere, I was hoping I might drive you to do just this. I’ve watched
that door all day. I’ve jumped up if the fire crackled. I think I have
felt that you were coming.” He bent his face over her hair.
“And I,” she whispered,—“I felt that you were feeling that. But when I
came, I thought I had been mistaken.”
Alexander started up and began to walk up and down the room.
“No, you weren’t mistaken. I’ve been up in Canada with my bridge, and I
arranged not to come to New York until after you had gone. Then, when
your manager added two more weeks, I was already committed.” He dropped
upon the stool in front of her and sat with his hands hanging between
his knees. “What am I to do, Hilda?”
“That’s what I wanted to see you about, Bartley. I’m going to do what
you asked me to do when you were in London. Only I’ll do it more
completely. I’m going to marry.”
“Who?”
“Oh, it doesn’t matter much! One of them. Only not Mac. I’m too fond of
him.”
Alexander moved restlessly. “Are you joking, Hilda?”
“Indeed I’m not.”
“Then you don’t know what you’re talking about.”
“Yes, I know very well. I’ve thought about it a great deal, and I’ve
quite decided. I never used to understand how women did things like
that, but I know now. It’s because they can’t be at the mercy of the
man they love any longer.”
Alexander flushed angrily. “So it’s better to be at the mercy of a man
you don’t love?”
“Under such circumstances, infinitely!”
There was a flash in her eyes that made Alexander’s fall. He got up and
went over to the window, threw it open, and leaned out. He heard Hilda
moving about behind him. When he looked over his shoulder she was
lacing her boots. He went back and stood over her.
“Hilda you’d better think a while longer before you do that. I don’t
know what I ought to say, but I don’t believe you’d be happy; truly I
don’t. Aren’t you trying to frighten me?”
She tied the knot of the last lacing and put her boot-heel down firmly.
“No; I’m telling you what I’ve made up my mind to do. I suppose I would
better do it without telling you. But afterward I shan’t have an
opportunity to explain, for I shan’t be seeing you again.”
Alexander started to speak, but caught himself. When Hilda rose he sat
down on the arm of her chair and drew her back into it.
“I wouldn’t be so much alarmed if I didn’t know how utterly reckless
you _can_ be. Don’t do anything like that rashly.” His face grew
troubled. “You wouldn’t be happy. You are not that kind of woman. I’d
never have another hour’s peace if I helped to make you do a thing like
that.” He took her face between his hands and looked down into it. “You
see, you are different, Hilda. Don’t you know you are?” His voice grew
softer, his touch more and more tender. “Some women can do that sort of
thing, but you—you can love as queens did, in the old time.”
Hilda had heard that soft, deep tone in his voice only once before. She
closed her eyes; her lips and eyelids trembled. “Only one, Bartley.
Only one. And he threw it back at me a second time.”
She felt the strength leap in the arms that held her so lightly.
“Try him again, Hilda. Try him once again.”
She looked up into his eyes, and hid her face in her hands.