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THE UNFORGIVING OFFENDER
* * * * * *
JOHN REED SCOTT'S
Previous Fiction Successes
The First Hurdle and Others
The Last Try
In Her Own Right
The Impostor
The Woman in Question
The Princess Dehra
Beatrix of Clare
The Colonel of the Red Huzzars
* * * * * *
[Illustration: PENDLETON PUT HIS ARM THROUGH HIS BRIDLE-REIN AND CAME
FORWARD _Page 105_]
THE UNFORGIVING OFFENDER
by
JOHN REED SCOTT
Author of "The Colonel of the Red Huzzars," "The Last Try,"
"The Woman in Question," "The First Hurdle," etc.
With Illustrations in Color by Clarence F. Underwood
[Illustration: Logo]
Philadelphia and London
J. B. Lippincott Company
1913
Copyright, 1913, by John Reed Scott
Published April, 1913
Printed by J. B. Lippincott Company
at the Washington Square Press
Philadelphia, U. S. A.
TO THE KNOCKERS WITH WHOM I USED TO LUNCH AT THE PITTSBURGH CLUB
THIS BOOK IS AFFECTIONATELY DEDICATED BY THE ONE WHO NEVER KNOCKED
CONTENTS
CHAPTER PAGE
I.--MONTAGUE PENDLETON AND SOME OTHERS 11
II.--THE RETURN OF THE OFFENDER 35
III.--THE VACILLATOR 50
IV.--A QUESTION OF FRIENDS 61
V.--THE CUT OF ONE'S CLOTHES 73
VI.--ON THE BRIDLE-PATH 92
VII.--AN OFFER AND AN ANSWER 112
VIII.--THE SUMMONS 124
IX.--HOPELESSNESS AND THREATS 142
X.--AT CRISS-CROSS 159
XI.--THE OVERTON MEADOW 173
XII.--A MATTER OF LIGHT 190
XIII.--THE UNPOPULAR GUEST 219
XIV.--NOBLESSE OBLIGE 250
XV.--IN THE CONSERVATORY 266
XVI.--THE UNANIMOUS OPINION 278
XVII.--DOLITTLE'S TALE 302
XVIII.--THE TRUTH BY PERSUASION 320
XIX.--THE ARREST 334
XX.--THE TURN OF THINGS 343
XXI.--OBSESSED 361
XXII.--THE SILVER CANDLESTICK 373
ILLUSTRATIONS
PAGE
PENDLETON PUT HIS ARM THROUGH HIS BRIDLE-REIN
AND CAME FORWARD _Frontispiece_
THE OFFENDER 62
THEY STOOD LEANING ON THE STONE BALUSTRADE 238
THE UNFORGIVING OFFENDER
I
MONTAGUE PENDLETON AND SOME OTHERS
The grill-room of the Otranto Country Club was filled with the usual
Saturday afternoon throng--the card players, the tennis players, the
golf players, and those who chose to do nothing.
Around a large circular table in the centre of the room were gathered
a crowd of the younger members, who had sufficient youth in them to
ignore rheumatism and neuralgia and the other penalties bred by damp
flannels and wet shoes. They had come in from court or course, and not
stopping for a bath and a rub and fresh garments had plunked themselves
down in vacant chairs, and joined in throwing once around for the
drinks. In an hour or so they would get the belated hot shower and the
change of clothes, and be none the worse for the delay. Happy youth!
A little way off, around another table similar in size, were those
who dressed first and drank afterward. They were not so noisy--their
spirits did not bubble forth. Other tables were scattered through the
room for such as wished a quiet chat with a friend or two--or a game of
cards; though there were not many who could play amid such confusion.
The ninth and eighteenth holes were directly in view from the south
windows and a foursome was on the former green. A caddy came scurrying
across toward the Club-house; a moment later one of the servants
hurried out with a pitcher of water. He poured four glasses and offered
them to the players. The last to be handed the tray was a tall, heavy,
elderly man with a jowly face and coarse features.
"If you've all got as much as you want," he said, "I'll take the rest,"
and ignoring the glass he grasped the pitcher, and burying his beefy
nose in its depth, drained it of the last drop.
"A-h!" he ended, wiping his expansive mouth with the back of his hand.
"I have never got over my boyhood liking to drink out of the pitcher.
It tastes different. Don't you think so?"
"Why not have a pitcher served at your table instead of a glass,
Emerson?" one of the players asked.
"I'd like to but mother won't let me!" Emerson laughed. "She says it's
not _au fait_, or _savoir faire_, or _on dit_, or something or other."
"It's not '_deshabille_,' you mean?" some one suggested.
"Damn if I know what it is, but you understand!" Emerson laughed again.
"My wife is a climber and she lugs me up with her, but I'm a powerful
drag at times, I fear--especially in manners. However, I tell her
that I put up the money and she and Marcia can supply the rest what's
necessary."
They went down to the locker rooms, nodding to three men in the
grill-room window as they passed.
"Poor old Emerson," said Pendleton, looking after them. "He is all
right at heart but such a blundering bounder. Among the men he can get
along, but the women are a bit trying to him, I fancy."
"The Emersons must have climbed over the bars while I was away--how did
they arrange it?" asked Sheldon Burgoyne, who had been abroad for the
last three years.
"Easy. They have a very good looking daughter who went to Dobbs
Ferry--she got to know the nice girls there and made good with them.
Her mother has the social bee and is a schemer. Emerson has the
requisite collateral and--attention to this part, please--he owned
a bit of ground which the Country Club simply had to have, and he
consented to sell it--if, and when, we would elect him to membership.
Naturally, we elected."
"I see," mused Burgoyne, watching his cigarette smoke float lazily out
the window.
"What do you see?" Devereux smiled.
"The usual thing. Father is impossible, but a good sort--mother is a
pusher and, I dare say, fat--yes?--and daughter is not only a beauty
but also something of a winner. Is she captured yet?"
"Not officially!" Pendleton answered; "but I understand that she is not
without suitors," with a bit of a smile.
"With papa having the stuff! I reckon not, Malvolio," returned
Burgoyne. "Give a woman money, and looks and some slight social
position, and you can trust her for the rest--even if the boys are
backward, which in this instance isn't likely."
"The Emersons are not the only 'new' ones the Club has admitted
recently," Pendleton remarked.
"Not by several dozen, my friend!" exclaimed Devereux. "In ten years
society will have passed from the control of those who are to those who
weren't."
"Progress!" said Burgoyne. "The march of improvement for the bettering
of the species. New blood--new blood!"
"Just so! Aristocracy of dollars is replacing aristocracy of
birth," Pendleton commented. "It's the way of the world, since time
began--money is the basis of our social structure, on it we stand,
without it we fall."
"Doesn't culture count at all?" Devereux asked.
"Culture isn't considered in the first instance," Pendleton replied.
"It's an asset but it isn't in the least essential. Riches with culture
are desirable, but riches alone are sufficient. Culture is decreasing
as riches increase."
"Just a trifle iconoclastic!" laughed Burgoyne. "You always were an
idol breaker, Pendleton."
"Is this proof of it?" Pendleton asked, indicating those in the
grill-room.
"Hum!--I reckon not," Burgoyne confessed, letting his eyes run over the
crowd.
"Here are sixty or seventy of our _best_ people, and how many belonged
two generations ago--or even one generation? You and Devereux and I,
and a half dozen others perhaps. The rest were nobodies. Yet to-day
they outnumber us ten to one.--They have bought their way into the old
clubs--their children have bought their way into the exclusive dancing
classes, their wives have bought their way through the fashionable
charities into the fashionable cotillons. Money--money--money!
Everything is money and money is everything. The golden key unlocks all
doors."
"The old order changeth, giving place"--began Burgoyne.
"Sentimentalize, that's right!" Pendleton exclaimed. "It's about all
that's left to us to do--except to go along with the bunch, and keep
our hands in our pockets to keep theirs out."
"Aren't the new ones even _honest_?" Burgoyne asked.
"They haven't shown it as yet."
"Do you think our ancestors were any different?"
"Possibly not--but they are dead and we are entirely respectable!"
smiled Pendleton. "Moreover it required a century for them to pry open
the doors--and culture was acquired while they were prying. Now--the
doors are jimmied open while you wait."
"I thought you said they opened them with a golden key," Burgoyne
remarked.
"They pry them open with the gold key, Sir Captious--is that plain to
you?"
"It's the survival of the fittest," suggested Devereux.
"On the basis of the dollar mark--yes."
"Which we have agreed is the universal basis now-a-days," said
Burgoyne. "Tell me, who is the young woman who has just driven up in
the cart?"
Pendleton glanced out in time to see a tall girl in a blue gown and a
picture hat toss the reins of the dancing bay to a groom and spring
lightly from her high perch.
"_That_ is Miss Emerson," he answered. "Does the world-wanderer approve
of her style?"
"Pretty fit!" was the reply. "Especially fit with such a father. Is it
the mother?"
"No--it's _not_ the mother," said Pendleton decidedly; "and we can't go
back any further. I'll present you if you wish."
"She _is very_ good looking," Burgoyne reflected.
"If you go upstairs you'll likely see plenty more with the same
opinion," Devereux remarked. "She is the most popular girl in the Club,
if attentions count and the number of the attentioners." He pushed back
his chair. "I think I'll go up myself--come along?"
"Not now, thank you," Burgoyne declined. "I shall sit here with
Pendleton and be put wise to the changes that have occurred in my
absence."
"You'll keep him busy--as changers we're in the chameleon class. So
long!" and with a nod he went upstairs.
"_He_ hasn't changed!" Burgoyne laughed.
"No--Dev is the same innocent fusser he always was--coming down every
year to the debutantes, as blithesome as a boy and as harmless. It's an
avocation with him--when business hours are over. And it's astonishing
how well he does both."
"Who is he fussing now--in particular?"
"Miss Emerson--he has been fussing her for two years--and she plays him
well."
"Seriously, you think?"
"No one takes Devereux's attentions seriously--not even himself."
"Two years is a long time with our friend. He used to last a year at
the most, then flit away to another bud. I didn't see her close but she
looks at least fifteen years younger than he."
"About that, I fancy," said Pendleton. "Moreover, one can never judge
what Devereux's actions mean--except that they don't mean what they
would naturally imply."
"Do you think he is actually interested in the Emerson girl?" Burgoyne
inquired.
"I don't know--I question if he himself knows--only it has been, for
him, most unusual and lasting."
"How's the girl?"
"You mean, what is her attitude toward Devereux?"
"No--how is she herself?"
"Pretty good sort," said Pendleton. "I don't know her well at all; I
see her at the dances--at dinner--at cards--across the tennis net--on
the golf course--the way one meets, you know--and she impresses me
always as distinctively likable. A square girl, I should call her."
"That is high praise from you, old man," Burgoyne remarked. "I
shouldn't want higher, if I were a woman."
"Oh, piffle!" Pendleton scoffed.
"It isn't piffle, nor nonsense, nor anything of the sort," returned
the other. "I knew the time when your _ipse dixit_ went far to make or
break a debutante."
"Forget it, Sheldon! Don't cast up my past sins--I'm trying to bury
them."
"Are you succeeding?"
"I hope so! At least I've deluded myself with the idea until some
reminding friend comes along and digs up a bunch of them and shakes the
bones." He touched a bell. "Take Mr. Burgoyne's order," he said to the
boy. "I'm going to drink a silver fizz--have one."
"Not on your life!" exclaimed Burgoyne. "I'm not fond of soap suds as a
beverage. I prefer them with my bath."
"Every one to his taste," said Pendleton. "There goes Miss Emerson
again, with Devereux _et al._ in tow," nodding toward the window.
"She looks like a thoroughbred," Burgoyne reflected, watching her swing
across the links to the tennis courts. "It's a pity she has such a
bounder for a father."
"The mother is worse; he is good natured and tries to be liked--she,
however, comes pretty near being impossible."
"But she is a schemer--a manager, you say?"
"And she has managed this campaign to perfection, I admit. She must
have lain awake nights for years scheming the moves. I saw it begin
ten years ago--when the Emersons first appeared at a quiet summer
hotel where some of our nice people went. She worked slowly, being
content to make progress by degrees--to pick up a nodding and speaking
acquaintance with the old families, and have her daughter get to know
their daughters. Children, you know, are neither discriminating nor
particular; if they like one, they don't ask for credentials. That is
how Marcia Emerson got to know those who later, when she went away to
school, became her friends. The campaign of _ma mère_ has never relaxed
in all those years--but it has taken many ramifications. The Club's
needing the piece of ground was a fortunate accident--of the dame's
foresight. She heard one day that we had bought here--the next day she
had put the idea into Emerson's head to buy also. She meant to get
in--and she got."
"One always admires a general!" commented Burgoyne. "At present I
suppose she is engaged in stalking a prospective son-in-law?"
"Precisely--and she has him stalked; but daughter may spoil her
plans--she has a mind of her own where she is intimately connected, I
fancy. She has not got that black hair and dark eyes for nothing."
"Hum!" said Burgoyne, watching her with an appraising glance. "She sure
is a looker--I don't blame the fellows for dancing attendance. If it
were a couple of hundred years earlier they would be rapiering one
another behind the coffee-house at sunrise.... Who is the man Madame
Emerson has selected for her daughter?"
"Our friend."
"Not Warwick Devereux?"
Pendleton smiled acquiescence.
"Good Lord! Does Devereux know it?"
"I fancy not!" Pendleton laughed--"but those who are looking on with a
knowing eye are wise to the mater's plan. Oh, she is a manager and a
schemer all right."
"Does _Miss Emerson_ know it?" Burgoyne asked.
"If she does she's not betraying it--though she can't be blind to
Devereux's dollars nor to his worth."
"Nor to his family," the other added.
Pendleton nodded. "It will be a great stroke for Mrs. Emerson if she
can marry her daughter into the Devereux-d'Este connection. Then she
can rest from her labors and her works will follow her. She will have
arrived."
"She is a trifle slow in coming into the dock, however," Burgoyne
observed.
"Give her time--she's headed straight--has been from the start--and she
has never missed a port yet. I've great faith in the old girl--she'll
land Dev for the daughter, I'll bet a fiver on it. He is too old to
stampede--she must drive him in slowly."
"You're mixing your metaphors!" Burgoyne laughed.
"Maybe I am--but she'll not get mixed in her purposes. Have another
drink?--No?--Then let us go up and sit on the piazza, and look at the
real thing--the butterflies whose frivolities and frivoling make a
country club endurable."
"Or unendurable!" his friend added.
"Depends on your point of view--and also your digestion. For my part,
my digestion being normal I enjoy watching them--their methods: their
little schemes, their jealousies, their punishments, their petty
deceptions and meannesses--all interest me in a casual way. I like to
sit back and study them--they amuse me."
"Is that all they do--amuse you?" Burgoyne asked. "Haven't they any
kindness or generosity or unselfishness?"
"Not much--certainly not here at the Club. Every woman's hand is
against every other woman, and she usually has a hat-pin concealed in
it--if that's possible. It's trite but true that a woman is a good
hater and a poor forgetter, and is utterly without conscience in
matters of friendship or of truth."
"Where did you acquire all your cynicism?" Burgoyne demanded.
"With my years--and on the piazza!"
"Well, you would better find an optimistic chair and a clearer vision.
You're flocking too much to yourself."
"Take the four yonder playing Auction," Pendleton continued, when they
had settled into a retired corner. "They are as lovely young matrons
as you will meet anywhere--far above the average indeed--and they are
inseparable; yet I myself have heard every one of them put the knife
into the other three, and then give it a twist besides."
"And from it you argue----"
"From it and innumerable other instances I argue that, as among
themselves, women have no conception of friendship--as men regard it.
Men are more charitable;--though it is the charity of indifference--and
it is without distinction as to sex. So long as he himself is not
affected he cares nothing--when he is affected the woman always
receives consideration."
"Exactly! the woman receives consideration from the man--and the man
receives consideration from the woman. The man is in advance of her
only in his indifference, and that is due mainly to temperament, and to
his preoccupation in other things--he hasn't the time. The woman _has_
the time."
"And if she hasn't time she finds it. I tell you a woman has neither
charity nor justice toward a woman," Pendleton reiterated.
"You are putting it too broadly," said Burgoyne.
"As a general proposition it can't be put too broadly."
"What were you doing with yourself while I was away?" Burgoyne demanded.
"Observing life around me!"
"Through blue glasses and with a misanthrope's eyes."
"I was not aware of it."
"Of course you were not! No one ever is---- It requires a friend to
make himself popular by telling you."
"What shall I tell _you_?" laughed Pendleton.
"Anything that's disagreeable--so long as it is the truth."
A rather large woman came down the piazza, nodding this way and that.
She was beautifully gowned, in the very best taste and in the style
that was calculated to soften her embonpoint into a gentle plumpness.
A flush that was charmingly natural glowed on cheek and lip, her eyes
were dark and delicately pencilled, her hands were bare of gloves and
sparkled with rings. As she passed the corner where Pendleton and
Burgoyne were sitting, she bowed effusively, and when they both arose
and returned it she suddenly veered across.
"I'm so glad to see you!" she radiated.
Pendleton presented his friend.
"Welcome home, Mr. Burgoyne, if I may," she greeted. "Mr. Pendleton,
won't you and Mr. Burgoyne dine with us here this evening?--just a
little informal party--with some Auction later?"
Pendleton's glance shot questioningly at Burgoyne and got an answer.
"Thank you very much, Mrs. Emerson," said he. "I shall be delighted."
"It will give me much pleasure, you are very kind," Burgoyne assured
her.
"Just as you are, no dressing you know--at seven-thirty on the piazza."
And with a smile and an intimate little nod she went on.
"Will you please tell me why you signalled me to accept?" Pendleton
inquired.
"Because I wanted you to accept."
"So I gathered--but why? why?"
"I want to see how the old dame does it--and whom she has."
"Couldn't you see quite as well without being in it?"
"Possibly--but I want to be in it.--Never refuse anything that promises
enjoyment if you can accept, is my policy. I'm beginning to follow the
line of least resistance--I've reached the age to justify it."
"Piffle!" said Pendleton--"you talk like a man of sixty."
"I'm thirty-four, which is quite old enough to warrant one in taking
things by the smooth handle."
"Even Mrs. Emerson?"
"Even Mrs. Emerson. Moreover, I want to observe the daughter--and the
table is an excellent place."
"You want to observe the daughter?" Pendleton inflected.
"Sure I do! Isn't there a campaign on to marry her to our old friend
Devereux? I want to look her over--and, as I said, I don't know a
better place than the table for the display of one's manners and
inherent breeding--or the lack of them."
"Don't you think that Devereux is competent to judge for himself?"
"No one is competent to judge where the heart is involved; but don't
think that I shall offer him advice--Lord, no! I only want to see for
my own satisfaction--and Miss Emerson is a strikingly handsome girl."
"The latter is nearer the truth, I reckon!" laughed Pendleton. "I
should think you would have had a surfeit of pretty girls in three
years' picking abroad."
"I never get surfeited with pretty girls. I'm like the chap in the
song--'Oh, you dear delightful women, why, I simply love you all.'
That's piffle, too, I suppose."
"Not at all," Pendleton observed. "I should call it a simple ebullition
of spirits--otherwise plain drunk."
"Who--I?"
"No--not you--the fellow in the song. There will be a bunch more here,
with similar delusions, about--eleven o'clock."
They smoked a while in silence, with a bow, now and then, to some one
that passed, or a word about some one that arrived or departed. The
piazza was filling up with the late comers, and with those from the
grill-room. The tables were being set for dinner--rubber-shod waiters
flitted about--the tinkle of glasses and the hiss of siphons punctuated
the chatter of the crowd.
"How many are actually enjoying themselves?" said Pendleton with a wave
of his hand to include every one on the piazza.
"Possibly half," Burgoyne answered--"the rest are bored to death."
"Half!" Pendleton laughed. "There isn't one in ten who wouldn't rather
be somewhere else at this moment."
"Then there are about a hundred and fifty people who are putting up an
amazingly good bluff."
"Bluff! What does that signify? Life is made up of bluff. We all are
bluffers--it's a game of bluffer and bluffee--with the devil getting
the one who is bluffed too often."
"You run to over-statements this afternoon!" Burgoyne remarked. "What
is the matter; been pinched in the stock market--has some girl given
you the mit--or are you letting some fool doctor tinker at you?"
"Which do you think it is?"
"It wouldn't be the first, and it couldn't be the second, so it must be
the third.--Don't do it, Pendleton! A doctor is the most awful habit a
well man can acquire--he never gets over it."
"Go to!" laughed Pendleton; "you're not in the fashion. It is the fad
now-a-days to be treated by a specialist."
"A woman's fad, not a man's," said Burgoyne. "It _isn't_ the
stock-market, is it?"
"I'm not on the wrong side, if that is what you mean."
"And it couldn't by any chance be a woman?"
"It could but it isn't.--I reckon I'm just naturally cynical."
"Get over it, Pendleton, get over it--it's an awful habit for yourself
and those around you! Be cheerful, old man, be cheerful. It's just as
easy and a whole heap more enjoyable. Look at me--why, I can----"
"Enjoy the prospect of dining with Mrs. Emerson! that is sufficient."
"Sufficient unto the mother is the daughter thereof. There are always
compensations, if we only let ourselves see them."
"What if the daughter isn't there?" Pendleton suggested.
"That would be a calamity," Burgoyne answered. "However, we'll hope for
the best."
"Are you thinking of entering the lists?"
"Go to, again! I said I'm interested for our friend!"
"How?"
"To see if Miss Emerson is worthy of the distinguished honor in store
for her."
"What earthly good will your 'seeing' do, if you don't tell Devereux
what you think?"
"None in the world, my friend!--It's pure----"
"Curiosity," Pendleton interjected. "I thought that you had overcome
your early affliction by travel."
"Which is worse--curiosity or a grouch?" laughed Burgoyne.
"Neither is worse--they both are reprehensible and to be avoided.
I'll make you a proposition--I'll get rid of my cynicism, pessimism
or grouch, if you will get rid of your curiosity, or interest in the
affairs of others, as you term it. Is it a bargain?"
"It is!--but we'll have to go to the Emerson dinner!" Burgoyne
stipulated.
Again silence. Presently Burgoyne spoke--a trifle low.
"I see Harry Lorraine is here--how does he take it?"
"You mean the loss of his wife? Like a ninny. He has backed and filled
until he has lost all sympathy. One day he thinks he will, the next day
he thinks he won't. Either he should have got a gun and chased Amherst
to the ends of the earth and shot the life out of him, or he should
instantly have filed his suit for divorce. To my mind, he has only one
course open now--to take her back and let by-gones be by-gones--if
_she_ will take him."
Burgoyne glanced at the other thoughtfully. Rumor had it that Pendleton
himself was very fond of Stephanie Mourraille before she married Harry
Lorraine; but rumor often lied, and he had not been here to verify
it himself. He knew that she was a handsome, dashing woman, somewhat
self-willed and given to having her own way, but amenable to influence
and altogether lovable. When he went away Lorraine was crazy about her
and the courtship was at its height. A little later, while he was in
Europe, he got cards to their marriage. Then suddenly, after a year
and a half, a friend's letter told him, _inter alia_, that Stephanie
Lorraine had run off with Garret Amherst--a man twice her age, and with
a wife and four children--and that they were supposed to have gone to
India. Four months ago he had encountered them in Paris--at the Café
Laurent in the Champs Elysées; but when he started over to speak to
them, they got up hurriedly and changed their table for one in a remote
corner, so he took the hint and did not recognize them.
"What in the devil possessed her?" he asked. "Amherst is not
particularly attractive."
"No--at least he is not attractive to the men--but they say he is the
devil among the women, in a quiet way. I reckon it was his reputation
that first caught Stephanie. After that he played her and--landed her.
I didn't think, however, he would completely lose his head and run away
with her."
"Amherst always struck me as exceedingly cool and calculating,"
Burgoyne observed.--"Still, one can never tell what love will do!"
"_Love!_" exclaimed Pendleton. "I wouldn't dignify it by any such name.
Call it what it was!"
"If you call it _that_ then why did they run away? They could have
gratified it quite as well had they remained within the bounds of the
conventional."
"It was the conventional which hampered:--they wanted to be
unrestrained in its enjoyment. When a man and a woman reach that state
they're little better than insane."
"I never took Stephanie to be one of that sort," Burgoyne reflected.
"She wasn't--until Amherst played his usual game--and got caught in
his own net. My idea of it is that she wouldn't yield until he proved
his devotion by taking her away, and finally she got him so crazy he
succumbed."
"I fancy that both of them have regretted it sadly enough long since."
"I'm sure of it. I understand that Amherst has made overtures to his
wife looking to a reconciliation; and as he converted almost all his
property before he left, she is considering whether a half loaf, with
financial ease and Amherst, isn't to be preferred to no loaf, no money,
and no Amherst. She's forty, you must remember, and not particularly
good looking at that. She's not likely to have another chance, if she
divorces him. So I'm betting she will permit him to return--_for the
children's sake_."
"And Stephanie?" asked Burgoyne. "There isn't any child there."
"I don't know!" said Pendleton slowly. "Normally she should be subdued
and retiring--keep out of the way for a year or two. But you never can
tell. Much depends on Lorraine's attitude.--If he were only half a man!
but he isn't--he's a damn nincompoop."
"How could Lorraine go gunning for Amherst when he didn't know where to
gun?" asked Burgoyne.
"He at least could have held his peace and shot Amherst on sight. But
he didn't even do that--he sniffled, and cried, and bemoaned, and
didn't know his own mind for an hour at a time. I've no patience with
him."
"It seems not!" agreed Burgoyne. "But you must remember Lorraine is
young, and that not every one is blessed with your calm determination
and decision. I rather think the majority of men would do as he has
done--temporize."
"Temporize! maybe--but he didn't even temporize; he shilly-shallied
like a weather cock."
"I see--you think that because Stephanie Lorraine had the courage to
run off, and may have courage to return, she thereby has proven that
she has nerve sufficient for both of them, so they would better hitch
up again and go on in double harness!" laughed Burgoyne.
"That may be the truth!" said Pendleton, "but all I said was that if
she will take him back he would better take her. They are about equally
culpable, so they can wipe off the slate and start afresh."
"Do you really think that is possible?" Burgoyne inquired.
"Certainly it's possible!"
"Here--in this town?"
"Why not?--it is their _own_ affair--no one has a scintilla of right to
question their decision. A husband may take his wife back, surely!"
"Granted, in the abstract--but what will be Society's judgment upon the
wife?"
"The men will forget it. The women will cease to remember--after a
time."
"After a generation or two!" Burgoyne remarked.
"It depends on the woman herself--on how she acts," said Pendleton.
"Somewhat--but it depends more on the women and how they feel. You
said, a moment ago, that women were poor forgetters. This is one of
the crimes they never forgive nor forget."
"Not exactly. They never forget the woman who has been unfortunate
_before_ marriage and has been found out. They have a slightly
different code for a married woman who has gone wrong and is
caught--and then rights herself. If she is prudent and has money,
caste, and friends, she'll pull herself through after a year or so."
"She will be more apt to pull through if her husband sticks to her,"
Burgoyne replied.
"I thought that was understood!" Pendleton responded.
"And if the husband--divorces her?"
Pendleton raised his hands.
"I don't know," he reflected. "Again, however, I think that it depends
on the woman and money and caste and friends. What would be impossible
for some is easily possible for others."
"How would it be with Stephanie Lorraine?" Burgoyne asked.
For a while Pendleton watched the smoke circle from his cigarette and
was silent. Then he dropped the cigarette into the ash tray, slowly
drew out another and lit it.
"She has money and caste--and she used to have plenty of friends,"
Burgoyne added.
"She hasn't as many friends as she once had," said Pendleton, slowly;
"though what she has are powerful. Lorraine's and Mrs. Amherst's
friends will be against her--and the fact that she ran away with
such a fellow as Amherst will be more against her than anything else.
If she had chosen a popular young chap, instead of a middle-aged
rouè-on-the-quiet, Society would be more ready with forgiveness."
Just then Devereux rounded the corner, with a paper in his hand, and
hurried over.
"Have you seen the _Evening Telegraph_?" he asked. "No?--Well, Amherst
has come back!"
"Back--to America?" asked Burgoyne.
"Back to _this town_--and gone again--with Mrs. Amherst and the
children--to Europe! What do you think of that?"
Burgoyne gave a soft whistle of astonishment. Pendleton shrugged his
shoulders a trifle and smiled grimly.
"You're not properly appreciative of news," declared Devereux. "Why
don't you say something?"
"You don't appreciate news yourself," Burgoyne answered. "We are simply
dumb with amazement."
"Is that the way it impresses you?" Devereux demanded, looking at
Pendleton.
"Not at all!" said Pendleton. "I'm not surprised. It is just what I
expected of Amherst."
"But Mrs. Amherst--to take him back!" Devereux exclaimed.
"It is the way of expediency under all the circumstances. She was wise."
"Well, I'd be damned if I would take him back!" Devereux declared.
"I don't fancy you would, Dev!" Pendleton smiled. "You're not a woman,
you know."
"Does the _Telegraph_ say anything as to Mrs. Lorraine's whereabouts?"
Burgoyne asked.
"They can't locate her but they think she is in New York," Devereux
answered--and went on with his news.
Pendleton, who was facing outward, suddenly leaned forward.
"The _Telegraph_ seems to have made a poor guess," said he. "Yonder is
Mrs. Lorraine now."
"Where?" Burgoyne cried, starting around.
"In the Victoria--coming up the drive."
"God!" Burgoyne exclaimed. "What a daring thing to do! And she is
alone, too."
Pendleton got up.
"I'm going to meet her--will you come along?" he asked.
"I will, indeed," said Burgoyne. "I like Stephanie--and I like her
nerve."
II
THE RETURN OF THE OFFENDER
Others than Pendleton had seen who was the occupant of the approaching
Victoria. And the news spread like the wind, with a bustle and a buzz
that swelled--grew louder and louder as the horses swung swiftly along
the front and drew up at the entrance--suddenly to be hushed to a
fearful calm as Montague Pendleton and Sheldon Burgoyne stepped out to
meet her.
She saw the two men, and sat leaning on her sunshade, a smile on her
lips, waiting--but without a glance toward the piazza and its expectant
crowd:--a slender woman, gowned in white, with a great black hat
topping auburn hair and shading a face that was almost flawless in its
proud, cold beauty.
"My dear Stephanie, I am _glad_ to see you!" said Pendleton.
"Do you mean it, Montague?" she asked, giving him her hand with a
dazzling smile that softened her whole countenance and made it very
tender.
"We do, indeed!" said Burgoyne, bowing over her other hand--while
Pendleton took her sunshade.
There was a momentary pause. She looked from one to the other a bit
questioningly--smiled again--and with a hand in each of theirs stepped
lightly from the carriage.
"We have a table just around the corner--shall we go to it?" Pendleton
suggested.
She shot him a glance from under her half-closed lids--a glance of
appreciation and gratitude.
"If you don't mind," she replied--"I'm a bit afraid of these people."
They went slowly down the piazza; and the crowd, which had been dumb
with amazement or curiosity or looking, suddenly began to talk like
mad, and to occupy themselves with the tea things or with one another.
Mrs. Lorraine saw--and with a haughtily amused smile, with never a
glance at any of them, with her head held high and her body turned a
trifle so as to converse with Pendleton, she threaded her way between
chairs and tables and people to the place reserved.
"Did you ever behold such brazenness!" exclaimed Mrs. Postlewaite when
Mrs. Lorraine had passed.
"The shameless woman!" Mrs. Pearce echoed.
"It is a disgrace to the Club!" pronounced Mrs. Busbee.
"It is a disgrace to society!" declared Mrs. Porterfield. "What shall
we do to manifest our disgust and disapproval?"
"Leave at once--it is positively contaminating to be near her," decided
Mrs. Postlewaite.
And they went straightway--summoning their cars with much to-do and
ostentatious show.
"Play! Play! be absorbed in the game--don't let on you've seen her!"
whispered young Mrs. Carstairs, as Mrs. Lorraine drew near....
"I didn't know what to do--I was facing her," said her partner, Mrs.
Chilten.
"It didn't matter greatly what you did," smiled Mrs. Burleston. "She
didn't look at any one--she ignored us all."
"She doesn't care a rap what we do--and she has proved it by coming
here," said Mrs. Westlake. "She has got pluck, all right."
"I should call it effrontery," said Mrs. Carstairs, "hardened
effrontery."
"I think she is to be pitied," Mrs. Westlake remarked.
"Are you prepared to pity her by offering friendship?" Mrs. Carstairs
asked.
"It doesn't look as if she were asking any one for either pity or
friendship," was the answer. "Moreover, I've known Stephanie Lorraine a
long time--and she isn't that sort."
"When a woman runs away from her husband with a man--and comes back,
she isn't any sort, in my opinion," Mrs. Carstairs sniffed.
"I hope, for the honor of our sex, that your opinion isn't ours as a
class," Mrs. Westlake smiled.
"On the basis of _honor_, Mrs. Lorraine could not be even considered,"
was the retort.
"I bid one on no trump--let us play cards and not fuss," interposed
Mrs. Chilten.
"And every one will do as she thinks best, anyway," said Mrs.
Burleston. "I bid two on hearts."
The men had been in a quandary.
Some timid ones had followed the women's lead and were looking
elsewhere as Mrs. Lorraine went by--others, bachelors mainly, would
have got up and bowed had she given them a glance, or even the
encouragement of not ignoring them.
"I didn't know whether she would care to speak to me," said Devonshire.
"Her attitude was not especially melting."
"The atmosphere on the piazza through the initial part of her progress
wasn't calculated to thaw," remarked Smithers. "I never saw so icy a
reception as the women gave her."
"They didn't have much on her," said Westlake. "She handed them as good
as they sent--and handed it first. _I'm_ for Mrs. Lorraine."
"So are all the men, I fancy--but we would better not let our wives
know it!" laughed Devonshire.
Smithers nodded. "They take her--conduct as a reflection on themselves."
"It is a queer trait in woman--a queer trait," reflected Westlake.
"Something is radically wrong with them, it seems to me, when they have
no pity for their kind. A man will condone the indiscretion, but a
woman never. Why is it?"
"And those who have themselves broken over and have not been found out,
are the most unforgiving," added Devonshire. "It's mighty queer!"
"It was a mighty kind thing for Pendleton and Burgoyne to do," said
Westlake. "I felt like applauding."
"So did I," echoed the others.
"And it doesn't detract a bit from the bravery, that Pendleton is said
at one time to have been in love with Stephanie Mourraille," remarked
Smithers.
"It rather increases it--and proves its truth," said Westlake. "As for
Burgoyne, he evidently is going to take her as he left her--cut out the
interim. However it is, it was a classy thing to do. I shall tell them
so."
"I wouldn't," Devonshire advised. "You might say it to Burgoyne but I
should be shy of saying it to Pendleton. It is not the sort of praise
that will appeal to him, I fancy--it is at the expense of the woman,
you know."
"H-u-m!" Westlake reflected. "I hadn't thought of that--but it's a
pretty fine spun reason."
"All the same, I wouldn't," was the reply.
Just then a servant delivered a message to Burgoyne and he arose and
went into the Club-house.
Mrs. Lorraine, Pendleton, and he had been keeping up a rapid fire of
small talk, without a reference to that which was uppermost in their
own and everyone's mind. It obtruded itself at every turn of the
conversation and everything that was said seemed in some way to hint
at it. It was a relief when Burgoyne left--it gave them time to catch
their breath, so to speak.
Pendleton drew out his case, selected a cigarette with great
deliberation, chose a match from the box on the table in front of him,
struck it, and very carefully made a light.
She sat back in her chair and closed her eyes, as one does who has
been subjecting them to strain and needs to rest them. Then the tension
of her nerves relaxed a trifle--she opened her eyes, to encounter
Pendleton's looking at her questioningly.
"Well?" she said, with her sweet smile. "What--is it?"
"What is what?" he answered.
"What is it that you want to know?" she asked.
"Nothing."
"What is it then I can tell you?"
"Whatever you wish to tell me."
"What would you soonest know? Ask--I am willing that you should. I
shall be glad to answer--you."
"I was wondering, Stephanie," he said, after a pause. "I was
wondering--why you did it?"
For a little time she did not reply.
"Why I--went off with Garret Amherst, you mean?" she said low.
"Good Lord, no!" he exclaimed. "That is your own affair. I meant why
you came to this place of all others in town, this afternoon."
"A fit of bravado," she answered. "I had already done so much that a
trifle more didn't matter. Moreover, I was curious to see what"--she
made a slight motion of her hand toward the crowd on the piazza--"they
would do. I saw!" she added with a bit of a laugh.
"Was it wise to try them all together?" he asked. "Wouldn't it have
been better to let them make up their minds gradually rather than to
force them to a decision in a moment?"
"Of course--I know it, but I've been so much a fool lately that I'm
reckless--I reckon it is in the blood. My father lost his life climbing
mountains, you know. Mine takes a different form, that's all--I run to
the unconventional. Run is a good word, isn't it?" she smiled.
"Yes--particularly the run _back_," said Pendleton.
"You think so?" she demanded.
"I'm sure of it, Stephanie--perfectly sure of it."
"What did I run back to?" she asked.
"Lorraine, if you want him!"
"I don't know that I want him," she shrugged--"and I don't think he'll
have me. Harry Lorraine is a weak, vacillating fool--that's why I
left him. If he had the strength of a man--just an ordinary man--he
could have saved me from Amherst. He would have taken me from him, at
any rate; he could have found us at any time. My mother knew where I
was--after the first two weeks."
"I thought as much," Pendleton commented.
"He wrote me three letters--at intervals. In the first, he was coming
over to kill Amherst on sight."
"He had the right idea."
"Yes--and I'd have blessed him if he had only done it!" she exclaimed.
"But instead he sent a second letter casting me off finally. And then
another--that whined and plead and threatened and sneered, and ended by
leaving me in doubt what he meant to do. I didn't care, of course, but
a woman likes to think of the man she married as strong enough to do
something in such a crisis. She wants to respect the man she has left,
so she can respect the other man more. And they both failed, Montague,
they both failed miserably. Lorraine as a husband was poor enough,
but Amherst was--beyond words. I came to despise him. You remember
one day at Granger's, when I came in with him; and later I asked you
how you liked him--you always spoke plainly to me, I think--and you
said, 'He is a mongrel--a vicious mongrel'; and I was indignant, and
left you abruptly--remember the episode? Well, _I've_ remembered it
many times--for he has shown it. He _is_ a mongrel--a vicious mongrel,
Montague. Had Harry Lorraine found us out then and even beaten him, I
would have thrown my arms around my husband's neck for very joy. But he
didn't. Instead of coming--he wrote!--_wrote_! Instead of descending as
an avengeful Jove he indited epistles! Can you imagine anything more
ridiculously absurd?"
"No," said Pendleton, "I can't even imagine it--but different men,
different minds, and different methods."
"And Amherst was worse," she went on. "I know that you think I ought to
have realized it before--I went off. I didn't--until it was too late.
He is too immaculate--too nice--too everything. Most men can wear their
clothes and be careful about their personal appearance without seeming
to be--without obtruding it on their wives or mistresses. Amherst, I
soon discovered, could not. That was the first thing to get on my
nerves. Then his--habits began to grow natural and--disgusting. He is
only veneered--and the veneer is very thin." She hesitated--flushed.
"And he was a--brute.--A miserable brute, Montague--and the break
came at last. We had quarrelled, and quarrelled, and quarrelled for
months--every time longer and bitterer than the others. That last night
it was dreadful, and I ran into another room and locked the door. I
would leave him in the morning, I decided. I was at breakfast when he
walked in and said:
"'I'm going back to Mrs. Amherst. I advise you to go back to Lorraine,
if he will take you. I sail from Cherbourg to-morrow. I have your
transportation, if you wish to accompany me to New York.'
"I positively laughed with joy. 'If Mrs. Amherst wants you she is
welcome to you, heaven knows!' I answered. 'I'm charmed to be rid of
you, nor will I trouble you for the transportation. I prefer henceforth
to pay my own way, thank you!'
"He wavered a moment--and hesitated. I ate my rolls and drank my
coffee. Then he held out his hand.
"'Good-bye!' he said.
"'Good-bye!' I answered, and nodded as indifferently as I would to a
chance acquaintance and just touched his fingers.
"He turned and went out. That is the last time I've seen him. I sailed
on the Celtic three days later, and came straight home--to my mother's
house, that is. I told her everything. I have told you, Montague; I
owed it to you because of old times, and because you have not forgotten
them. It was a brave thing you did, you and Burgoyne--though I fancy
that you led off and he only followed after. But to not another shall I
ever voluntarily open my lips on this matter."
"That is the wisest course, I think," he approved.
"There is no excuse for my conduct, according to the standards of
society," she admitted--"nor shall I attempt to excuse it. My defence
is worthless, as a defence. When I left with Amherst I was never
coming back. We were to be married as soon as we were free. We thought
both the others would divorce us at once. At least that was what _I_
thought--and what Amherst _said_. I realize now that it was only a
subterfuge with him; he wanted to get me off for a while and try me.
It's nice to think, isn't it? And when he had tried me for a few
months, he tired of me and tossed me aside like an old toy. I ought to
have known that I was simply a new plaything for him, and was to last
as long."
"You poor child!" said Pendleton. "Your mistake was in not appraising
Amherst at his proper value. He is pure cad; and you didn't know it
until--after."
She shook her head.
"He showed me only his nice side," she said. "I thought him the most
fascinating, the most gallant, the most dignifiedly handsome man that I
had ever met. Did the men know him for a cad?"
"Some of them did."
"Did you?"
He nodded.
"If you had only warned me!" she sighed.
"What good would it have done? You would have scorned advice--resented
it. Though I think I would have risked it had I the least notion of
whither you were tending."
"I wish you had risked it!" she exclaimed. "It might have made me
realize what I was doing. I had no one but Lorraine to depend on."
"You had yourself, Stephanie."
"Myself was the one thing I ought not have had," she replied. "Lorraine
should have taken me away--out of temptation. If need be he should
have knocked me down with a club like a cave man and dragged me out of
Amherst's clutches."
"Again what good would that have done? You would only have panted for
Amherst the more, and have gone to him at the first opportunity."
"It would have saved me--and I would have seen Amherst then for what he
is--a coward."
He shook his head.
"You think now that you would, but I doubt it," he replied. "No one
can say what would have happened, if what did happen hadn't happened.
Moreover, while as you know I have little enough respect for Lorraine,
yet hadn't he the right to suppose you would do the conventional thing
rather than the unconventional? Did he have any cause to suspect you
and Amherst?"
"I think not," she admitted--"more than that I was nice to Amherst;
and that, in public, he seemed to be fond of me in a well-bred way.
_You_ never would have suspected, Montague?" she asked.
"I never gave it a thought; because I considered you--not that sort.
The last one, indeed, who would be led into any such foolishness,
Stephanie."
"You thought me too calm and cold, doubtless?"
"Not exactly. I thought you too indifferent to men, and much too fond
of Society."
"And you didn't know how fascinating Garret Amherst could be--when he
wished."
"It's an accomplishment he doesn't waste on men," smiled Pendleton.
"I wonder if he has played his fascinating way with Mrs. Amherst?" she
reflected.
"This evening's _Telegraph_ says that they have gone to Europe
together."
She laughed lightly.