liveliness was a little factitious. She wondered whether he had detected
it. She looked up at him, and found that he was gazing full at her. She
had never before recognized how clear his eyes were and how piercing.
"I haven't thanked you yet for those lovely violets," she began again,
hastily. "They are exquisite! But then you have always such good taste
in flowers. They have made the day less dreary for me--really they have.
They were company in my loneliness."
He looked at her in surprise. "You lonely?" he asked. "How can that be?"
"Why not?" she returned.
"You have made yourself a home here," he answered, looking about the
room. "You have hosts of friends in New York. Whenever I see you in
society you are surrounded by admirers. How can you be lonely?"
She was about to make an impetuous reply, but she checked herself.
"I am not really a New-Yorker, you know," she said at last. "I am a
stranger in a strange city. You don't know what that means."
"I think I do," he responded. "The city is even stranger to me than it
can be to you."
"I doubt it," she responded.
"I was once at sea alone in an open boat for three days," he went on,
"and--it must seem absurd to you, very absurd, I suppose--but I was not
as lonely as I am, now and then, in the midst of the millions of people
here in New York."
"So you have felt that way too, have you?" she asked. "You have been
overwhelmed by the immensity of the metropolis? You have known what it
is to sink into the multitude, knowing that nobody cares who you are, or
where you are going, or what you are doing, or what hopes and desires
and dreams fill your head? You have found out that it is only in a great
city that one can be really isolated--for in a village nobody is ever
allowed to be alone. But in a human whirlpool like this you can be
sucked down to death and nobody will answer your outcry."
He gave her another of his penetrating glances. "It surprises me that
you can have such feelings--or even that you can know what such feelings
are," he said, "you who lead so brilliant a life, with dinners every
day, and parties, and--"
"Yes," she interrupted, with a hard little laugh, "but I have been
lonely even at a dinner of twenty-four. I go to all these things, as you
say--I've had my share of gaiety this winter, I'll admit--and then I
come back here to this hideous hotel, where I don't know a single soul.
Why, I haven't a real friend--not what I call a _friend_--in all New
York."
She saw that he had listened to her as though somewhat surprised, not
only by what she was saying, but also by the tone in which she said it.
She observed that her last remark struck him as offering an opening for
the proposal which she felt certain he had come to make that afternoon.
"You must not say that, Mrs. Randolph," he began. "Surely you know that
I--"
Then he broke off suddenly as the door of the next room opened and
Jemima entered with a tray in her hands.
"You will let me give you a cup of tea, won't you?" the widow asked, as
Jemima poured out the steaming water.
"Thank you," the sailor answered. "Your tea is always delicious."
Jemima lighted the lamp under the silver kettle. Then she left the room,
silently, and Stone was about to take up the conversation where she had
interrupted it, when she came back with a plate of thin
bread-and-butter, and a little glass dish with slices of lemon.
He checked himself again, not wanting to talk before the servant. Jemima
stole a curious glance at him, as though wondering what manner of man he
was. Then she turned down the flame of the little lamp and left the
room.
Mrs. Randolph was glad that the conversation had been interrupted at
that point. She had made up her mind to accept Stone's offer when he
should ask her to marry him, but her immediate impulse was to
procrastinate. She did not doubt that he would propose before he left
her that afternoon, and yet she wanted to keep him at arm's-length as
long as she could. There were imperative reasons, she thought, why she
should marry him; but she knew she would bitterly regret having to give
up her liberty--having to surrender the control of herself.
"You don't take sugar, I remember," she said, as she poured out his cup
of tea. "And only one slice of lemon, isn't it?"
"Only one," he answered, as he took the cup. "Thank you."
There was a change of tone in his voice, and she knew that it was
hopeless for her to try to postpone what he had to say. But she could
not help making the effort.
"I'm so glad you like this tea," she said, hastily. "It is part of a
chest Miss Marlenspuyk had sent to her from Japan, and she let me have
two or three pounds. Wasn't it nice of her?"
But the attempt failed. The sailor had gulped his tea, and now he set
the cup down.
"Mrs. Randolph--" he began, with a break in his voice.
"Mr. Stone!" she answered, laughingly; "that's a solemn way of
addressing me, isn't it? At least it's serious, if it isn't solemn."
"Mrs. Randolph," he repeated, "what I have to say is serious--very
serious to me, at least."
Then she knew that it was idle to try to delay matters. She drew a long
breath and responded as lightly as she could:
"Yes?"
"I hope I am not going to take you by surprise, Mrs. Randolph," he went
on. "You are so bright and so quick that you must have seen that I
admired you."
He waited for her response, and she was forced to say something. Even
though the man was trying to marry her for the money he thought she had,
he was at least exhibiting a most becoming ardor.
"Well," she declared, "I didn't suppose you were very much bored in my
society."
"I have never before seen a woman in whose society I have taken so much
pleasure," he answered. "You cannot imagine how great a joy it has been
for me to know you, and how much I have enjoyed the privilege of coming
to see you here in your charming home."
She glanced at the commonplace parlor of the hotel she hated, but she
said nothing.
"You spoke just now of loneliness," he continued. "I hope you don't know
what that really is--at least that you don't know it as I know it. But
if you have felt it at all, I shall have the less hesitation in asking
if you--if you are willing to consider what it would mean to me if you
could put an end to my loneliness."
"Mr. Stone!" she said, as she dropped her eyes.
"It is not your beauty alone that has drawn me to you," he urged, "not
your charm, although I have felt that from the first day I met you. No;
it is more than that, I think--it is your goodness, your gentleness,
your kindness, your womanliness. I don't know how to find words for what
I want to say, but you must know what I mean. I mean that I love you,
and I beg you to be my wife."
"This is very sudden, Mr. Stone," she replied.
"Is it?" he asked, honestly. "I thought everybody must have seen how I
felt toward you."
"Oh, I supposed you liked me a little," she went on.
"I love you with all my heart," he said, and she wondered at the
sincerity with which he said it. She wished she had never heard that
little Mat Hitchcock talk against him.
"Of course, I can't expect that you should love me all at once," he
continued; "no; that's too much to hope. But if you only like me a
little now, and if you will only let me love you, I shall be satisfied."
And he leaned forward and took her hand.
"I do like you, Mr. Stone," she forced herself to answer. She thrilled a
little at his fervor, doubtful as she was as to the reason for his
wooing. And as his eyes were fixed on her she thought that she had never
before done justice to his looks. He was a strong figure of a man. His
mouth was masterful; but the woman who yielded herself to him was likely
to have a satisfactory defender.
"Well," he asked, when she said nothing, "is it to be yes or no?" And
his voice trembled.
"Will you be satisfied if I do not say 'no'--even if I do not say 'yes,'
all at once?" she returned.
"I shall have to be, I suppose," he answered, and there was a ring of
triumph in his voice. "But I shall never let go of you till I get you to
say 'yes.'" And he raised her hand to his lips and kissed it.
She made no resistance; she would have made none had he clasped her in
his arms; she was even a little surprised that he did not. She was
irritatingly conscious that his warmth was not displeasing to her--that
she seemed not to resent his making love to her although she suspected
him of a base motive.
For a moment or more nothing was said. He still held her hand firmly
clasped in his.
At last he spoke: "You have granted me so much that I have no right to
ask for more. But I have not a great deal of time now to persuade you to
marry me. Some day this summer I expect to be ordered to sea again--some
day in July or August; and I want to have you for my wife before I go."
"Oh, Mr. Stone," she cried, "that is very soon!"
"Can't you call me John?" he asked, following up his advantage. "Can't I
call you Evelyn?"
She smiled, and did not deny him, and he kissed her hand again. He kept
hold of it now as though he felt sure of it. She acknowledged to herself
that he was making progress.
They talked for a while about his term of sea service. He thought that
he might be assigned to the Mediterranean squadron, and, if he were, she
could come to Europe to him and spend the next winter at Villefranche.
Then they discussed travel in France and in Italy, and the places they
had visited.
With her delicate feminine perceptions she soon discovered that there
was something he wished to say but did not know how to lead up to.
Curious to learn what this might be, she let the conversation drop, so
that he could make a fresh start in his blunt fashion.
Finally he came to the point. "Evelyn," he began, abruptly, "do you know
the Pixleys in San Francisco--Tom Pixley, I mean?"
"I think I have met him," she answered, wondering what this might lead
to.
"He is an old friend of mine," Stone continued. "He was here a fortnight
ago, and I had a long talk with him. He knows all about those Grass
Valley mines."
She smiled a little bitterly and withdrew her hand. She thought that
perhaps the stock was worth more than she had supposed, and that Stone
had been told so by Pixley. All her contempt for a man who could marry a
woman for money rose hot within her.
"Does he?" she asked, carelessly, not trusting herself to say more.
"You have--it's not my business, I know," urged the sailor, "but I don't
mind, if I can spare you any worry in the future--you have a lot of
stock in the Belinda and Lone Star, haven't you?"
"Yes," she replied.
"It does not pay at all, does it?" he asked.
She looked at him coldly as she responded, "I have not received any
dividends this year."
"But you spoke to me once as if you counted on this stock," he
returned--"as if you thought that the dividends were only deferred."
"Did I?" she said, distantly, as though the matter interested her very
little.
"That was why I took the liberty of getting the facts out of Tom
Pixley," Stone continued. "It wasn't my business, I know, but, loving
you as I did, I was afraid you might be bitterly disappointed."
"No," she interrupted, "I am not likely to be bitterly disappointed."
"Then you were aware already that the Belinda and Lone Star is a
failure?" he asked. "I am very glad you were, for I was afraid I might
be the bearer of bad news."
She gazed at him in intense astonishment. "Do you mean to say that my
stock is worthless?" she inquired.
"I fear it is worth very little," he answered. "Tom Pixley told me he
believed that they were going to abandon the workings, and that the
interest on the mortgage had not been paid for two years."
"So you knew all along that I was poor?" she asked. "Then why did you
ask me to marry you?"
John Stone looked at her for a moment in amazement, while his cheeks
flamed. Then he rose to his feet and stood before her.
"Did you suppose that I wanted to marry you for your money?" he said,
making an obvious effort for self-control.
"Yes," she answered, lowering her eyes. "And that is why I was going to
accept you."
She felt that the man was still staring at her, wholly unable to
understand.
"I am poor, very poor," she went on, hurriedly. "I don't know how I am
going to live next month. I believed that you thought I was wealthy. It
seemed to me a mean thing for a man to do, to marry a woman for her
money, so I didn't mind deceiving you."
He stood silently gazing at her for a minute, and she could not but
think that a man was very slow to understand.
Then he sat down again, and took her hand once more, and petted it.
"You must have been sadly tried if you were willing to do a thing like
that," he said, with infinite pity in his voice. "You poor child!"
It was her turn then to be astonished, but she was swifter of
comprehension.
"Do you mean to say that you still want to marry me," she asked, looking
him full in the face, "even after I have insulted you?"
"Yes," he answered. "I want to marry you--and more than ever now, so
that you may never again be exposed to a temptation like this."
"But now I refuse to marry you," she returned, forcibly, as she withdrew
her hand. "I say 'no' now--without hesitation this time."
"Why?" he asked.
"Because it isn't fair now," she responded.
"Fair?" he repeated, puzzled.
"I couldn't do it now; it would be too mean for anything," she
explained. "As long as I supposed you thought I was rich and were going
to marry me for my money, I didn't mind cheating you. I could let you
marry me even if I didn't love you, and it would only be serving you
right. But now!--now I couldn't! It wouldn't be fair to you. I am pretty
mean, I confess, but I'm not mean enough for that, I hope."
Again he took a moment to think before he spoke.
"I don't know what to make of you," he began. "Am I to understand that
you were going to marry me, though you did not love me, so long as you
thought I did not love you, but that now, when you know that I really do
love you, for that very reason you refuse to marry me?"
"That's it," she cried. "You must see how I feel about it. It wouldn't
be fair to marry you now I know you are in earnest, would it?"
"But if I am willing," he urged; "if I want you as much as ever; if I
feel confident that I can get you to love me a little in time; if you
will only let me hope--"
"Oh, I couldn't," she answered. "I couldn't cheat you now I really know
you--now that I like you a great deal better than I did."
He was about to protest again, when she interrupted him.
"Don't let's talk about it any more," she said, impetuously; "it has
given me a headache already."
Forbidden to speak upon the one subject about which he had something to
say, the man said nothing, and for a minute or more there was silence.
They could hear the patter of the rain as it pelted against the window
near which they were sitting. Then there was a slight flash of
lightning, followed by a distant growl of thunder.
A shiver ran through Mrs. Randolph, and she gave a little nervous laugh.
"I hate lightning," she explained, "and I detest a storm--don't you? I
don't see how any one can ever choose to be a sailor."
He smiled grimly. "I am a sailor," he said.
"And are you going to sea again soon?" she returned. "I shall miss you
dreadfully. I'm glad I sha'n't be here in New York when you are gone.
Perhaps I shall leave first."
"Where are you going?" he asked, eagerly.
"I've got to go somewhere," she answered, "now that I've had to change
all my plans. I'm going to Milwaukee."
"To Milwaukee?" he repeated. "I did not know you had any friends there."
"I haven't," she answered, with a repetition of the hard little laugh.
"Not a friend in Milwaukee, and not a friend in New York."
"Then why are you going?"
"I must earn my living, somehow," she responded, "and I can't paint, and
I can't embroider, and I can't teach whist, and I'm not young enough to
go on the stage--so I'm to settle down as the matron of a girl's school
in Milwaukee. The place has been offered to me, and I intend to accept
it."
"When must you be there?" he inquired.
"Oh, I don't know," she answered. "Next week some time, or perhaps not
till next month. I'm not sure when."
John Stone rose to go. "Then I may come to see you again--Evelyn?" he
asked.
Her heart throbbed a little as she heard her name from his lips.
"Oh yes," she replied, cordially. "Come and see me as often as you can.
I hate to be as lonely as I was this afternoon."
And she held out her hand.
"Good-by, then," he responded, and he raised her hand again and kissed
it.
When he had gone she walked restlessly to and fro for several minutes.
At last she opened her desk and took out the unfinished letter and tore
it up impatiently. Then she went to the window and peered out.
Twilight was settling down over the city, but the sky was leaden, with
not a gleam of sunset along the horizon. Lights were already twinkling
here and there over the vast expanse of irregular roofs across which she
was looking. The rain was heavier than ever, and it fell in sheets, now,
as though it would never cease.
Yet the solitary woman looking out at the dreary prospect did not feel
so lonely as she had felt two hours earlier. She had meant to accept
John Stone, and she had rejected him. But it was a comfort to her to
know that somewhere in the immense city that spread out before her there
was a man who really loved her.
(1898)
[Illustration: An Idyl of Central Park]
It was nearly five o'clock on an afternoon early in May when Dr. Richard
Demarest bicycled up Fifth Avenue and into Central Park. He looked at
his watch to make sure of the hour, and then he dismounted on the
western side of the broad drive, whence he could see everybody who might
seek to enter the Park long before they were likely to discover him. He
had reason to believe that Miss Minnie Contoit, who had refused to marry
him only a fortnight before, and whom he had not seen since, was going
to take a little turn on her wheel in the Park that afternoon.
As it had happened, he had gone into the club to lunch that morning, and
he had met her only brother, with whom he had always carefully
maintained the most pleasant relations. By ingeniously pumping Ralph
Contoit he had ascertained that the girl he loved was going out at five
with her father and her grandfather. The brother had been even franker
than brothers usually are.
"I say," he had declared, "I don't know what has come over Minnie this
last ten days; she's been as cross as two sticks, and generally she's
pretty even-tempered for a girl, you know. But she's been so touchy
lately; she nearly took my head off this morning! I guess you had better
have Dr. Cheever come around and prescribe for her. Cocaine for a bad
temper is what she needs now, I can tell you!"
Although he was a rejected lover, he was not melancholy. In the
springtime youth feels the joy of living, and Richard Demarest took
delight in the beauty of the day. The foliage was everywhere fresh and
vigorous after the persistent rains of April, and a scent of young
blossoms came to him from a clump of bushes behind the path. A group of
half a dozen girls flashed past him on their wheels, laughing lightly as
they sped along home, each of them with a bunch of fragrant lilacs
lashed to her handle-bar.
He followed them with his eye till they turned out of the Park; and then
at the entrance he saw the girl he was waiting for riding her bicycle
carefully across the car-tracks in Fifty-ninth Street. Her father and
grandfather were with her, one on each side.
Dr. Demarest sprang on his wheel and sped on ahead. When he came to the
foot of the Mall he swerved to the westward. Then he turned and retraced
his path, reaching the branching of the ways just as General Contoit
with his son and granddaughter arrived there.
The General was nearly seventy, but he sat his wheel with a military
stiffness, holding himself far more carefully than his son, the
Professor. Between them came Miss Minnie Contoit, a slim slip of a girl,
in a light-brown cloth suit, with her pale, blond hair coiled tightly
under a brown alpine hat. They had just come up a hill, and the
General's face was ruddy, but the girl's was as colorless as ever.
Demarest had often wondered why it was that no exercise ever brought a
flush to her ivory cheeks.
He watched her now as her grandfather caught sight of him, and cried
out: "Hello, Doctor! Out for a spin?"
He saw her look up, and then she glanced away swiftly, as though to
choose her course of conduct before she acknowledged his greeting.
"Good afternoon, General; how well you are looking this spring!" said
Demarest. "Good afternoon, Professor. And you, too, Miss Contoit. Going
round the Park, are you? May I join you?" He looked at her as he asked
the question.
It was her grandfather who answered: "Come along, come along! We shall
be delighted to have you!"
She said nothing. They were all four going up on the east side of the
Mall, and they had already left behind them the bronze mass-meeting of
misshapen celebrities which disfigures that broad plateau. A Park
omnibus was loitering in front of them, and they could not pass it four
abreast.
"Come on, papa," cried the girl; "let's leave grandpa and Dr. Demarest
to take care of each other! We had better go ahead and show them the
way!"
It struck Dr. Demarest that she was glad to get away from him, as though
her sudden flight was an instinctive shrinking from his wooing. He
smiled and held this for a good sign. He was in no hurry to have his
talk out with her, and he did not mean to begin it until a proper
opportunity presented itself. He was glad to have her in front of him,
where he could follow her movements and get delight out of the play of
the sunshine through the branches as it fell molten on her fine, light
hair. It pleased him to watch her firm strokes as they came to a hill
and to see that she rode with no waste of energy.
The General had done his duty in the long years of the war, and he liked
to talk about what he had seen. Dr. Demarest was a good listener, and
perhaps this was one reason why the old soldier was always glad of his
company. The young doctor was considerate, also, and he never increased
his pace beyond the gait most comfortable for his elder companion; and
as they drew near to the Metropolitan Museum he guided the General away
to the Fifth Avenue entrance and thence back to the main road, by which
excursion they avoided the long and steep hill at the top of which
stands Cleopatra's Needle. And as they had ridden on the level rather
rapidly they almost caught up with the General's son and
granddaughter.
[Illustration: "I'M SURE HE'D RATHER TALK TO YOU, MY DEAR, SO YOU CAN
RUN ALONG TOGETHER"]
The two couples were close to each other as they went around the
reservoir, along the shaded road on the edge of the Park, with the
sidewalk of Fifth Avenue down below. Everywhere the grass was fresh and
fragrant; and everywhere the squirrels were frequent and impertinent,
cutting across the road almost under the wheels, or sitting up on the
narrow sward in impudent expectation of the nuts gently thrown to them
from the carriages.
When they came to McGowan's Pass he saw the Professor suddenly dismount,
and he thought that Minnie was going on alone and that her father had to
call her back.
"Shall we rest here for a while, father?" asked the Professor, as the
General and the Doctor dismounted.
"Just as you say," the old soldier answered; "just as you say. I'm not
at all fatigued, not at all. But don't let us old fogies keep you young
folks from your exercise. Minnie, you and the Doctor can ride on--"
"But, grandpa--" she began, in protest.
"I'll stay here a minute or two with your father," the General
continued. "The Doctor is very kind to let me talk to him, but I'm sure
he'd rather talk to you, my dear; so you two can run along together."
"I shall be delighted to accompany Miss Contoit if she cares to have a
little spin," said Dr. Demarest, turning to her.
"Oh, well," she answered, a little ungraciously; then she smiled
swiftly, and added: "I always do what grandpa wants. Don't you think I'm
a very good little girl?" And with that she started forward, springing
lightly to her seat after her bicycle was in motion.
Demarest was jumping on his wheel to follow, when her father called out,
"Don't let her ride up-hill too fast, Doctor!"
"Isn't papa absurd?" she asked, laughing; "and grandpa, too? They are
always wanting me to take care of myself, just as if I didn't!"