TO-MORROW
Jane Cable, upon entering the cab, offered no resistance when
Graydon drew her head over against his shoulder. His strong right
hand clasped her listless fingers and the warmth of his heart came
bounding into her veins as if by magic. He did not speak to her, but
she knew that he was claiming her then for all time; she knew that
nothing could stand in the way of his purpose. The sobs grew less
despairing, her understanding of things less vague and uncertain.
A few moments before she had felt that she was no kin to the world;
now there was a new appreciation of love and its greatness in her
soul.
This man had loved her, and he would take her up and shield her
against the hate of the world. There had not been a moment when her
own love for him wavered; she worshipped him now as she had in the
beginning. The revelation of Droom, the theatric scenes in the cafe,
the crushing of the small hope she had cherished, all conspired
in this secure moment to waken her into a realisation of what an
overbalancing power love is.
Unconsciously her fingers tightened upon his and her body drew
closer; she was arraying herself against the fear that she might
lose this haven of rest and joy, after all--the haven she had been
willing to scourge and destroy in the bitterness of her heart. A
great wave of pity for herself came sweeping over her. It grew out
of the dread that he might, after all, deny her the place that no
one else in the world could give.
Graydon's cold face was suddenly illumined; the incomprehensible
sweetness of pain rushed through his blood. He had given up his hope
as blighted after the harsh hour with Droom; he could not believe
his newfound success. Doubt, unbelief, enveloped him as he raised
her head, a kiss crying for its kind. His arm crept behind her
shoulders. She did not offer a repulse; her wet cheek touched his
in submission. It was the first time his hungry arms had held her
in centuries it seemed to him--and to her; it was the first time
their lips had met--except in dreams--since that horrid night so
long ago.
"Jane, Jane!" he was whispering in her ear; her plans, her purposes,
her sacrifices, were running away from her in riotous disorder.
She could not hold them in check; they fled like weaklings before
the older and stronger hopes and desires.
They did not know of the blockade of cabs at the corner of Forty-second
Street, nor how long they stood there. Shouting cabmen and police
officers tried to rival the white blizzard in profuseness, but they
did not hear them.
"Oh, Graydon, I cannot, I must not," she was crying, holding his
hand with almost frenzied disdain for the words so plaintively
loyal. "It is out of the question, dearest. You know it is. I love
you, oh, how I love you. But I--I must not be your wife. I--I--"
"I've had enough of this, Jane," he said so firmly that she stiffened
perceptibly in his arms. "It's all confounded rot. Excuse me, but
it is. I know you think you're right, but you're not. Old Elias
gave the best advice in the world. You know what it was. We've just
got to make our own happiness. Nobody else will do it for us, and
it's just as easy to be happy as it is to be the other way. I'm
tired of pleading. I've waited as long as I intend to. We're going
to be married to-morrow."
"Graydon!"
"Don't refuse! It's no use, dearest. We've lost a year or two. I
don't intend to lose another day. What do I care about your father
and mother? What did they care about you? You owe all the rest of
your life to yourself and to me. Come! will you consent willingly
or--" He paused. She was very still in his arms for a long time.
"I do so want to be happy," she said at last, reflectively. "No,
no! don't say anything yet. I am only wondering how it will be
after we've been married for a few years. When I'm growing old and
plain, and you begin to tire of me as most men grow weary of their
wives--what then? Ah, Graydon, I--I have thought about all that,
too. You'll never reproach me openly--you couldn't do that, I know.
But you may secretly nourish the scorn which--"
"Jane," he said, dropping the tone of confident authority and
speaking very tenderly, "you forget that my father is a convict.
You forget that he has done things which will forever keep me a
beggar at your feet. I am asking YOU to forget and overlook much
more than you could ever ask of me. Old Elias, wretch that he is,
has pointed out our ways for us; they run together in spite of what
may conspire to divide them. Jane, I love my soul, but I love you
ten thousand times better than my soul."
"I did not believe I could ever be so happy again," she murmured,
putting her hands to his face.
"To-morrow, dear?"
"Yes."
Graydon, rejoicing in his final victory, hurried to his rooms later
in the evening. As he was about to enter the elevator he noticed a
grey-suited boy in brass buttons, who stood near by, an inquiring
look in his face.
"This is Mr. Bansemer," observed the laconic youth who ran the
single elevator in the apartment building.
"Something for me?" demanded Graydon, turning to the boy in grey.
"Special delivery letter, sir. Sign here."
Graydon took the thick envelope from the boy's hand. With a start,
he recognised his father's handwriting. Curiously he turned the
letter over in his fingers as he ascended in the car, wonder growing
in his brain. He did not wait to remove his overcoat on entering his
rooms, but strode to the light and nervously tore open the envelope.
Dread, hope, anxiety, conspired tu make his fingers tremble. There
were many closely written pages. How well he remembered his father's
writing!
As he read, his eyes grew wide with wonder and unbelief. They raced
through the pages, wonder giving way to joy and exultation as he
neared the end of the astounding message from the far-away prisoner.
A shout forged to his lips; he hugged the letter to his heart;
tears came into his eyes, a sob broke in, his throat.
"Thank God!" he cried, throwing himself into a chair to eagerly
read and reread the contents of the letter. Suddenly he sprang to
his feet and dashed across the room to the telephone.
"She will die of joy!" he half sobbed, in the transports of
exhilaration. Five minutes later he was on his way to her hotel,
clutching the priceless letter in his bare fingers, deep down in
his overcoat pocket. He had shouted over the 'phone that the good
news would not keep till morning, and she was waiting up for him
with Mr. and Mrs. Cable, consumed by curiosity.
"This letter"--he gasped, as he entered the room--"from father.
He's written, Jane--everything. I knew he would. Elias didn't know
it all. He knew half of the truth, that's all. Good Lord, I--I
can't read it, Mr. Cable. You--please."
David Cable, white-faced and trembling, read aloud the letter from
James Bansemer. It was to "My beloved son." The first appealing
sentences were given to explanation and apology for the determined
silence he had maintained for so many months. He spoke casually of
his utter indifference to the success of certain friends who were
working for his pardon. "If they secure my release," he wrote, "I
shall find happiness if you clasp my hand but once before I leave
America forever." Farther on he said: "I will not accept parole.
It is a poor premium on virtue, and, as you know, my stock of that
commodity has been miserably low."
"I may be required to serve my full term," read David Cable. "In
that case, we should not see one another for years, my son. You
have much to forgive and I have much more to forget. We can best
see our ways to the end if we seek them apart. The dark places won't
seem so black.... My sole purpose in writing this letter to you,
my son, is to give back to you as much happiness as I can possibly
extract from this pile of misery. I am not pleading for anything;
I am simply surrendering to the good impulses that are once more
coming into their own, after all these years of subjection....
I am not apologising to the Cables. I am doing this for your sake
and for the girl who has wronged no one and to whom I have acted
with a baseness which amazes me as I reflect upon it inside these
narrow walls.
"You will recall that I would have permitted you to marry her--I
mean, in the beginning. Perhaps it was spite which interposed later
on. At least, be charitable enough to call it that. Clegg has been
here to see me. He says you are bound to make Jane Cable your wife.
I knew you would. For a long time I have held out, unreasonably, I
admit, against having her as my daughter. I could not endure the
thought of giving you up altogether. Don't you comprehend my thought?
I cannot bring myself to look again into her eyes after what she
saw in this accursed prison.... She was born in wedlock.... The
story is not a long one. Elias Droom knows the names of her father
and mother, but I am confident that he does not know all of the
circumstances. For once, I was too shrewd for him. The story of
my dealings in connection with Jane Cable is a shameful one, and
I cannot hope for pardon, either from you or from her."
Here he related, as concisely as possible, the incidents attending
Mrs. Cable's first visit to his office and the subsequent adoption
of the babe.
"I knew that there was wealth and power behind the mystery. There
was a profitable scandal in the background. Unknown to Mrs. Cable,
I began investigations of my own. She had made little or no effort
to discover the parents of the child. She could have had no purpose
in doing so, I'll admit.... [Here he gave in detail the progress of
his investigations at the Foundlings' Home, at the health office,
at certain unsavory hospitals and in other channels of possibility.]
...At last, I found the doctor, and then the nurse. After that, it
was easy to unearth the records of a child's birth and of a mother's
death--all in New York City.... Droom can tell you the names of
Jane's parents, substantiating the names I have just given to you.
He did not know that they had been married nearly two years prior
to the birth of the child. It was a clandestine marriage.... I went
straight to the father of the foundling. He was then but little
more than twenty-one years of age--a wild, ruthless, overbearing,
heartless scoundrel, who had more money but a much smaller conscience
than I.... To-day he is a great and, I believe, respected gentleman,
for he comes of good stock.... I had him trembling on his knees
before me. He told me the truth. Egad, my son, I am rather proud
of that hour with him.
"It seems that this young scion of a wealthy house had lost his
insecure heart to the daughter of a real aristocrat. I say real,
because her father was a pure Knickerbocker of the old school.
He was, naturally, as poor as poverty itself. With his beautiful
daughter he was living in lower New York--barely subsisting,
I may say, on the meagre income that found its way to him through
the upstairs lodgers in the old home. Here lived Jane's mother,
cherishing the traditions of her blood, while her father, sick and
feeble, brooded over the days when he was a king in Babylon. The
handsome, wayward lover came into her life when she was nineteen.
They were married secretly in the city of Boston.
"The young husband imposed silence until after he had attained his
majority. There was a vast fortune at stake. In plain words, his
father had forbidden the marriage. He had selected another one to
be the wife of his son.... Jane was born in the second year of their
wedded life. It was, of course, important that the fact should be
kept secret. I am inclosing a slip of paper containing the names
of the minister, the doctor and the nurse who afterwards attended
her, together with the record of death. It is more convenient to
handle than this bulky letter--which I trust you will destroy. You
will also find the name of the hospital in which Jane was born and
where her mother died, ten days later. I may say, in this connection,
that not one of the persons mentioned knew the true name of the
young mother, nor were they sure of the fact that she was a wife.
Her gravestone in the old cemetery bears the name of the maiden,
not the wife. Her father never knew the truth....
"What I did in the premises need not be told. That is a part of
my past. I learned how the cowardly young father, glad to be out
of the affair so easily, hired the nurse to leave the baby on the
doorstep. Then I went to the banker whose son he was. I had absolute
proof of the marriage. He paid me well to keep the true story from
reaching the public. The son was whisked abroad and he afterwards
married the girl of his father's choice. I do not believe that he
has ever given a thought to the whereabouts or welfare of his child.
It was her heritage of caste!
"If Jane cares to claim her rights as this man's lawful daughter,
proof is ample and undeniable. I fancy, however, she will find
greater joy as the daughter of David Cable. Her own father has less
of a heart than yours, for, after all, my son, I love you because
you are mine. Love me, if you can; I have nothing else left that
I care for. Remember that I am always
Your loving father,
JAMES BANSEMER."
THE END