spoil for him the wonder of this visit. The hour was his, let him make
the most of it. He had not so many happy hours that he could afford to
lose one because it could be only one. He would not lose it.
XVI
BROWN'S NEW WORLD
So the house was reached--it was a dark and stern-looking little abode
at this hour, with its windows unlighted, though usually the cheeriest on
the square. Brown threw open the door and Bim sprang to meet him--turning
aside, however, at sight of the strangers. Only a few embers glowed on
the hearth, and the room was in darkness.
Brown closed the door behind them all. "Stand still, please," he said,
"while I light up."
He threw some kindlings from a basket upon the fire, and they leaped into
flame before he could light the lamp on his table. The room became a
pleasant place at once, as any room must in fire- and lamp-light, so that
it contain such few essentials of living as did Brown's--the
red-cushioned chair by the hearth, the books and magazines upon the
table, the two fine portraits on the wall.
"Now, please make yourselves comfortable," Brown urged, indicating the
austere little bedroom his friends remembered. "And if you'll do that
I'll go at the joyous task of getting you some supper."
"You must let us help you," Mrs. Brainard offered.
"Never! What could you do, either of you, in a bachelor's kitchen?"
"But we want to see the bachelor at work there."
"Your presence might upset me," he called back, laughing, as he
hurried away.
Two minutes later, after an inspection of his larder, he was rushing up
the street to the corner grocery, having escaped by way of the back
door. If any of his friends of this quarter had happened to meet him
under one of the scanty street lamps, they might have noted that the
dark face, in these days usually so sober, to-night was alight with
eagerness. Donald Brown's eyes were glowing, there was a touch of clear,
excited colour on his cheek. His lips were all but smiling as he strode
along. One hand was already in his pocket, feeling critically of the
probable contents of the purse he longed to empty, to make a little
feast for his so-welcome guests.
Arrived at Jim Burke's small store, the customer scanned the place
anxiously, and it seemed to him that its supplies had never been so
meagre. He succeeded in buying his lettuce, however, and a bottle of
salad oil, and, remembering a can of asparagus tips on his own shelves,
congratulated himself upon the attainment of his salad. Some eggs which
the grocer swore were above reproach, and some small bakery cakes,
completed the possibilities of the place for quick consumption. Brown ran
back to the house again, his arms full of parcels, his mind struggling
with the incredible fact that under his roof was housed, if only for an
hour or two, the one being whom he would give all but his soul to keep.
Entering his kitchen by its outer door he stopped short upon the
threshold. A figure in a white blouse, blue serge skirt, and little
white, beruffled apron, was arranging his table. The table had been
drawn into the middle of the room, his simple supplies of linen and
silver had been discovered, and the preparations were nearly complete.
In the middle of the table in a glass bowl was a huge bunch of violets,
come from he could not have guessed where, even if he had given any
thought to the attempt.
But he gave no thought to anything but the figure before him. If Helena
Forrest, in the silks and laces of her usual evening attire, had been
always one of extraordinary charm, in her present dress and setting she
was infinitely more enchanting to the man who stood regarding her with
his heart leaping into his throat. The whole picture she presented was
one of such engaging domesticity that no bachelor who had suffered the
loneliness this one had known so many months could fail to appreciate
it. He dropped his parcels and came forward. Mrs. Brainard was not
in the room, and the door was closed between the kitchen and the
living-room--by accident, or intention? The pulses in his temples were
suddenly beating hard.
Helena did not turn. She stood by the table, trifling with some little
detail of spoon or napkin, and her down-bent profile was presented to
Brown's gaze. As he stared at it a sudden vivid wave of colour swept over
her cheek, such an evidence of inner feeling as he had seldom observed in
her before, who usually had herself so well in hand.
He came close and stood looking down at that rich-hued cheek, the soft
waves of her dusky hair drooping toward it.
"What does this mean?" he said, unsteadily and very low. "This can't be
just to make me go mad with longing. For that's what I shall do if I
look long at you like this, here in my home--_you_ looking as if--as
if--you belonged here!"
He saw her hand tremble as it touched the violets in the bowl, arranging
them. It was a very beautiful hand, as he well knew, and he saw with
fresh wonder that there were no rings upon it, where rare and costly ones
were wont to be.
There was silence for an instant before her reply. Then she turned and
looked up, full into his face.
"May I belong here?" she said, very gently.
"Do you want to?"
"Yes."
"You are willing to leave it all--for me?"
"Yes."
"Ought I to let you?" His questions had been rapid, breathless, his
eyes were searching hers deeply. He was very near, but he had not put out
a hand to touch her. Yet no woman, seeing him as he stood there, could
feel herself the one who wooed, even though she led him on.
She looked away for an instant, while her lips broke into a little
smile of wonder at his control of himself. No need to tell her how she
drew him--she knew it with every fibre of her. Then she let him have
her eyes again.
"Do you think you can help letting me?" she said, and lifted her face
with that adorable, irresistible movement which tells its own story of
its own desire.
"No!" His voice shook. "Thank God, I don't have to try any longer."
It was no passive creature he took then into his eager arms, it was one
who raised her own with the rush of self-abandonment which made his joy
complete. Long as he had loved her he had not dreamed of her as ever
giving herself to any lover so splendidly. If he had dreamed--he realized
with a strange feeling at the heart--he could never have withstood....
It was to be hoped that Mrs. Brainard, in the other room, had found a
book upon the table which interested her or, hungry for food as she had
professed herself to be, she must inevitably have found the time pass
slowly before she was summoned to her promised supper.
Out in the old, dark, oak-walled kitchen, Brown was still putting
questions. He had placed his lady in a chair, and he sat on a little
old-fashioned "cricket" before her, one that he had found in the house
when he came and had carefully preserved for its oddity. It brought him
just where he could look up into her eyes. One of her hands was in both
his; he lifted it now and then to his lips as he talked. The packages of
eggs and lettuce and bakery cakes stood untouched and forgotten on the
table. If Helena remembered to be hungry, it was not worth the spoiling
of this hour to demand to be fed.
"Can I possibly make you comfortable here?" was one of his questions.
"Don't you think I look as if I might help you make us both
comfortable?" was her answer.
Brown looked at the plain little white blouse, at the simple blue serge
skirt, then on down to the foot which showed below the hem of the skirt.
"Is this the sort of shoe that working-women wear?" he inquired
skeptically.
Helena laughed. "Neither Mrs. Brainard nor I could bring ourselves to
that," she owned. "And since you and I are only to play at being poor--"
"We can afford to keep you in fine shoe feather? Yes, I think we can. But
you are going to miss a world of things you are used to, my queen--and
not only a world of things--the world itself."
"I know. But--I tried living in my world without you--and I failed."
He made an inarticulate exclamation, expressive of great joy, and
followed it with the age-old demand: "Tell me when you became willing to
come to mine."
"The night you were in town."
"What? Not at Atchison's dinner?"
"Yes. I would have come with you then. I would have come with you from
the singing of that song."
"But you--you let me think you wanted me to come back!"
"I am only human. I wanted you to come back. But--I wanted you to refuse
to come! If you hadn't refused--"
"Yes--"
"You wouldn't have towered as high for me as you do now. I might have
loved you, but--perhaps--I shouldn't have--adored you!"
The last words came in a whisper, and again the wonderful colour poured
itself over her face. Brown, at the sight, bent his head upon her hand,
and she put her other hand upon his heavy hair and gently caressed it.
When he lifted his head his eyes were wet.
"Oh, but I don't deserve that," he murmured brokenly, and put up his arms
and drew her down to him. Soon he spoke with solemnity.
"Darling, you are not making this great sacrifice wholly for me?
You love--the One I try to serve? You will be glad to serve Him,
too, with me?"
"Yes, Donald. But I love Him, I think, through you. I hope to reach your
heights some day, but you will have to lead me there."
They remembered Mrs. Brainard at last, and they remembered that Helena,
also, had had nothing at all to eat since the hour for afternoon tea.
Brown flung open the door into his living-room, his face aglow, and stood
laughing at the sight of Mrs. Brainard's posture in his red
rocking-chair. As if exhausted by the tortures of fatigue and starvation
she lay back in an attitude of utter abandonment to her fate, and only
the gleam of her eyes and the smile on her lips belied the dejection of
her pose. "It's a shame!" he cried, coming to her side. "Or would be
if--you hadn't aided and abetted it all."
"Are you happy, Donald dear?" asked the lady, sitting up and reaching up
both hands to him. "Ah, yes; I only need to look at you!"
"So happy I don't know what I'm doing, you kind, wise friend."
"Wise? I wonder if I am. What will they all say to me, I wonder, when
they know the part I've played? Never mind! Is Helena happy, too? I hope
so, for the poor girl has been through the depths, bless her!"
"Come and see!" And with his arm about her, Donald led her out into
the kitchen.
Helena came forward. "Dearest lady, will you stay and have supper with
us?" said she with quite the air of the proud young housewife, and Brown
laughed in his delight.
"Had I better stay?" inquired Mrs. Brainard, laughing with the man at her
side, while both regarded the figure before them with eyes which missed
no note in the appeal of her presence in that place.
"Oh, yes, indeed. We've plenty and to spare. Donald paid a visit to the
corner grocery not long ago, and we've new-laid eggs, and radishes and
all. Do stay!"
"I think I will." And Mrs. Brainard took the radiant face between her
soft, white, ringless hands and kissed it as a mother might.
In no time at all the hour had come for the visitors to go to their
train. In spite of their protests Brown would have a cab come for them,
though it took him some minutes to get one in a quarter of the city where
such luxury was rare.
"Time enough for self-denial," said he as he took his place facing them.
"Let me play I'm a man of affluence again--just for to-night."
"I'm afraid, Don, you'll always be tempted to call cabs for your wife,"
Mrs. Brainard said, and suppressed a bit of a sigh; for, after all, she
knew what the future must cost them both, and she herself would miss them
sadly from her world.
But it was Helena who silenced her. "When he walks, I'll walk," said she.
"Haven't I been in training for a year--even though I didn't know why I
was training?"
"I think we've both been in training for the year," said Brown.
"Even though we didn't know--God knew--and when He trains--then the
end is sure!"
When he had put them in their car, and had taken leave of them with a
look which he found it hard to tear away, plain and unpretentious
travellers though they were that night, he went striding back through
the April midnight to the little old house the Englishman had built
so long ago.
As he let himself in, Bim came tearing to meet him. The firelight was
still bright upon the hearth, and Brown sat down before it, leaning
forward to look into the glowing coals with eyes which saw there splendid
things. The dog came close and laid his head on Brown's knee and received
the absent-minded but friendly caress he longed for. Also, with the need
for speech, Bim's master told him something of what he was thinking.
"The look of her, Bim, boy, in those simple clothes--why, she was never
half so beautiful in the most costly things she ever wore. And she's
mine--mine! She's coming here--next month, Bim, to be my wife! Can you
believe it? I can't--not more than half. And yet, when I
remember--remember--
"And it seemed hard to me, Bim--all this year--my life here. I thought I
was an exile--I, with this coming to me! _O God--but You are good to
me--good_! How I will work--how we will work--_we_--"
He got up, presently, and as he stood on the hearth-rug, about to leave
it for his bed, a whimsical, wonderful thought struck him.
"I'll never have to borrow little Norah Kelcey any more, for the want of
something to get my arms about. Instead--some day--perhaps--_O God, but
You are good_!"
* * * * *
THE TIME OF HIS LIFE
"Dot, do you remember Kirke Waldron?"
Dorothy Broughton, daintily manipulating her breakfast grapefruit, her
shapely young arm showing interesting curves through the muslin and lace
of her morning gown--made by her own clever fingers--looked up at her
brother Julius. He was keeping her company at her late and solitary
breakfast, sitting casually on the arm of his brother-in-law's empty
chair, his long legs crossed, his arms folded upon his chest. His bright
eyes surveyed his sister as he spoke, from the crown of her carefully
ordered hair to the tips of her white shoes--he could see them from his
position at one side, and he observed that they were as white and as
fresh as her gown. That was one of the things Julius heartily approved of
in his pretty sister--her fastidiousness in such matters. He was
fastidious himself to a degree; nothing more correct in its way than his
own morning attire could have been imagined.
"Waldron?" Dorothy repeated. "That tall, solemn boy who used to stumble
over himself on his way to the blackboard?"
"And then had the rest of the class looking like a set of dough-heads
while he covered the blackboard with neat little figures that always
came out right; a perfect shark at 'math.' Yes, he's the one. Five
classes ahead of us then--fifteen now. We aren't in it, any of us, with
Kirkie Waldron these days."
"I've never heard nor thought of him since then," averred his sister. "Do
you mean he's made something of himself? I should never have thought it."
"No, you'd never have thought it, because he stumbled over his own feet
when he was a kid. Well, let me tell you it's the only thing he's ever
stumbled over. He's just been taken into the office of Haynes and
Ardmore, consulting mining engineers, and everybody says that'll mean a
partnership some day. And that brings me to my point. He hasn't taken a
day's vacation for two years. Day after to-morrow he sails for South
America to stay six months, looking after the development of a new mine
down there in Colombia. He can take to-morrow for a holiday, and I've
asked him out--with Bud's permission. And I want you to help me give him
the time of his life."
"Me?" Dorothy opened her brown eyes. "Oh, but I can't give you to-morrow!
The bridal party's going on an all-day motor trip."
Julius ran his hand through the crisp, half-curly locks of his black
hair. "Cut it out. You don't need to be on every last one of their
junketings. Get 'em to let you off for to-morrow."
"I can't possibly. I'm to be maid of honour, you know. Irene would never
forgive me, nor--some of the others."
Julius frowned. "See here, you're not letting Ridge Jordan get any
headway with you, are you? If you are you'd certainly better make him
take a day off while you see what a real man is like. After you've had a
good look at Kirke Waldron you'll be ready to let Tom Wendell and Ridge
Jordan and the rest of those bridal party men go to thunder. I don't
suppose Waldron was ever an usher or best man at a wedding in his life,
but I tell you he'll make every one of those little society men look like
copper cents, just the same."
Dorothy rose from her chair. Her brown eyes surveyed her brother from
between heavy chestnut lashes, and just now they were very haughty eyes.
Her curving, crimson lips were scornful. "I find it difficult to
believe," she observed, "that a boy whom I particularly detested, one of
the most awkward, solemn-faced, uninteresting boys I ever saw in my life,
can have blossomed into such a wonder. As for Ridgeway Jordan, I like him
very much. He may be a society man--which is no crime, I believe--but he
is also making quite as good, in his way, as your friend, Mr. Waldron.
And I certainly am not going to throw over an engagement as binding as
this one to give anybody 'the time of his life.'"
She walked out of the room, cancelling the effect of her haughtiness by
turning to throw back a smile at her brother, as ravishing a smile as if
he were no brother at all.
Her sister, Mrs. Jack Elliot, entering in time to glance curiously
from Dorothy's smile to Julius's scowl, inquired of Julius what might
be the matter.
He shook his head. "I don't like the symptoms. She takes it more and more
seriously when I hit Ridge Jordan in any way. I like Ridge myself, but I
wouldn't see Dot marry him for a good deal."
"I don't believe there is the least danger," his elder sister replied.
She looked a mere girl herself. She was immolating herself just now, as
was everybody else in the suburban town, on the altar of the
Clifford-Jordan bridal party. That the dinners and dances, drives and
luncheons might proceed without hindrance many family schedules were
being upset. Mrs. Jack's one anxiety at present was to have her charming
sister's bloom remain unworn by fatigue. Thus far Dorothy was holding
out better than any of the other bridesmaids. "Her colour was just as
good as ever, wasn't it?" Mrs. Jack murmured absently, preparing to
remove Dorothy's fruit plate. "I don't believe she ate a thing but
fruit," she murmured.
"Best thing she could do. After the stuff she undoubtedly got away with
at midnight her only salvation's a light breakfast. As to her colour, I
enriched it," he explained grimly, "by mentioning my feeling about Ridge.
If I thought, after all the attentions that girl has had, that she'd take
Ridge Jordan--with all his money! Dot's no girl to care such a lot about
money. It's this crazy bridal-party business that's upset her, I'll go
you! The thing's contagious. Lord Harry! I don't know that I could look
long at Irene and Harold myself without getting a touch of it."
"A touch! You and Sally?" Mrs. Jack smiled.
"Oh, well; that's different." Her brother thrust his hands into his
pockets and walked over to the window. "Entirely different. Sally and I
were intended for each other from the beginning; everybody knows that.
But now--what in thunder am I going to do with Waldron? Tell me that.
I've got him to come down here expressly to meet Dot. Of course I didn't
tell him so; he's not that sort. And now she's off for all to-morrow with
that confounded bridal party."
"Can't he come some other time?"
"I should say not; certainly not for months. He's off to South America
for a long stay--has this one day to himself. You see it wasn't till I
met him yesterday that I realized what the fellow had become; and then it
came over me all at once what it might mean to have him meet Dot just
now. I'm no matchmaker--"
"I should say that is just what you are!"
"No; but--'There is a tide,' you know. And Dot certainly has me worried
to death over Ridge Jordan."
"But, Julius"--Mrs. Jack's voice took on a tinge of anxiety--"we've
always thought well of Ridge. I don't just see--"
"I know you don't. He's not the man for Dot. I want a real man for her.
I've got him. Wait till you see Kirke!"
"You seem to think it's very simple--"
"By George, I think it is! I know how he felt about her when she was a
youngster: adored the ground she walked on. She never looked at him. I
tell you she'll look at him now; he's worth looking at."
"If he's so fine looking he may be engaged to some other girl."
"He's not. I made sure of that," declared Julius, audacity gleaming in
his eyes as usual. "Besides, I tell you, he's not that sort. He's no
matinee idol for looks; maybe you wouldn't even call him good looking.
I do; he's got the goods in his face, handsome or not. I tell you he's
a real man. Dot hasn't seen one yet. I'll make her see Kirke--somehow.
You wait."
He marched away, head up, eyes thoughtful, lips pursed in a whistle.
Next morning, when three luxurious motor cars stopped at Mrs. Jack's
door, Julius was lounging on the porch. It was his Senior vacation; he
could be forgiven for lounging. In his flannels, hands in pockets, he
strolled down the steps with his sister to see her off, though Ridgeway
Jordan was escorting her devotedly. He surveyed her, as he followed her,
with brotherly pride.
"That sister of mine has all the rest of them beaten at the
quarter-mile," was his inward reflection. "Not much money to do it on,
but she certainly knows how to get herself up to look as if she'd just
walked out of a tailor's box and a milliner's bandbox. Made that stunner
of a hat herself, I'll wager. Fresh as a peach, her face, too. The others
look a bit jaded."
Along with these inner comments he was keeping up a running fire of
talk with two of the bridesmaids, whom he knew well. His bright black
eyes, however, noted that Dorothy's place in the first car was next
that of Ridgeway Jordan, and that the face of that young man was
soberer than usual.
"Bad sign," he reflected as he turned away, after a hot-and-heavy
exchange of banter with certain of the men as the car prepared to start.
"When a chap begins to look solemn, sitting beside a girl you know he's
in love with, you can be sure he has it on his mind to have it out with
her before the day is over. If I could have just got Kirke to her
yesterday! Ridge may do it any time now; I can see it in his eye--and she
may take him. I don't know what's got into Dot. A month ago she'd have
laughed at the idea of marrying him; but now I can't be sure of her.
It's this idiotic bridal hysteria that's got her in its grip. By George,
she _shan't_ take him!"
An hour later, in his brother-in-law's trap, Julius drove to the station
to meet his guest. Kirke Waldron, descending from the train, found his
old schoolmate, younger than himself, but well remembered as the imp of
the High School, waiting for him on the station platform.
"Mighty glad to be sure of you," Julius declared, shaking hands. "Until I
actually caught sight of you I was still expecting a wire saying you
couldn't afford even the one day."
"The coast is clear," Waldron answered, returning the grip with equal
vigor. "I closed every account at midnight and have my one day as
free as air."
"The question is," Julius lost no time in beginning, as the two walked
along the trim, flower-bordered suburban platform toward the waiting
trap, "what sort of a day do you want? Outdoors, of course; no question
of that in hot weather. But--with people or away from them? I can take
you to my sister's for luncheon; to tell the truth, she's counting on
that. But afterward I have a little plan to carry you up into the
mountains to a place I know for an all-afternoon tramp and a dinner at
the best little inn in the country. Back in the late evening, a dash down
to our river and a swim by moonlight. How does that programme suit you?"
"It's great," agreed Kirke Waldron decidedly. "Nothing could suit me
better. Vacation, to me, means outdoors always. And it's a long time
since I've done any tramping in the home State."
"I knew you weren't one of the hammock-and-novel vacation sort," Julius
said as he put his new-old friend into the trap. "I'm not myself.
Though"--he confessed with honesty--"I have been known to sit with my
heels in the air for a longer consecutive period than you've ever done if
all your sittings were lumped together."
"What do you know as to where I've kept my heels?"