Scorned
Anthony's brain, accustomed to the most precise and unexciting of
routines, was tired--not nearly so tired as it was destined to become,
yet too tired to grasp at once the significance of that flaming
countenance. He could no more than stand limply and look at Johnson
Boller, as that gentleman, ignoring Mary altogether, strode down upon
him with clenched fists.
"You did it, but you'll never get away with it!" he cried.
"Johnson----"
"Never in the world! I've got Wilkins as a witness and----"
"Witness for what?"
Johnson Boller, albeit he trembled with fury, controlled himself.
"Don't try that baby-stare stuff on me, Fry," he said. "I understand
now. Last night I thought you were off on one of your eccentric spells,
but you were crazy like a fox, you were! But don't think for one minute
that Beatrice is fool enough to drop into such a trap!"
Anthony himself did a little controlling.
"What are you talking about?" he cried.
"The thing you've tried to put over, to get me away from Beatrice!"
Johnson Boller thundered. "That's enough! Don't deny it! I know you
don't approve of matrimony; I know you never wanted me to get married; I
know that we haven't traveled around as much this last six months as we
did in the twenty years before it--and I suppose you've been lonely,
because nobody else in the world would stand for you. But by Heaven,
Anthony, I never thought you'd try to break up my family by----"
"Try to do what?"
Johnson Boller dashed the sweat of fury from his eyes.
"I come to stay with you, when Beatrice goes," he said tremblingly. "And
although there's no woman in this flat ordinarily, a woman's here last
night----"
"Stop there!" Anthony Fry cried savagely. "Do you mean that I brought
this woman here deliberately? Do you mean that I _knew_?"
"Knew!" Johnson Boller jeered.
"Then I tell you that you're an infernal ass, sir, and I decline to
defend myself!" Anthony snarled fiercely. "You! You lovesick fool and
your crazy imagination! You're too much in love to reason, but--what
about _me_?"
"Well, what about you?" Johnson Boller sneered.
"I," said Anthony, "have borne the reputation of a decent man! No women
have ever been in this apartment before, save one or two relatives! No
woman of any description has ever passed the night here before. And yet
now, when this infernal thing has happened, your poor addled wits--oh,
bah! Bah, sir!"
"Don't bah at me!" Mr. Boller said dangerously, although not quite so
dangerously, because Anthony's emotion had carried its own conviction.
Then, for a little, these two old friends stood and trembled and glared
at each other, Johnson Boller contemplating a swift and terrible
uppercut to Anthony's lean jaw, which should stretch him unconscious
perhaps for hours--Anthony meanwhile wondering superheatedly whether,
once his long fingers had wound about Johnson Boller's plump throat, he
could hold on until wretched life was extinct.
They were angry, terribly angry and almost for the first time in their
lives, and had they stood and glared for another fifteen seconds it is
possible that one or the other might have ended his days in Sing Sing's
electric chair--but as it happened Mary's voice came upon the vibrating,
pregnant air, clear and cool and full of warranted acerbity.
"While all this talk of reputations is going on," said Mary, "what about
mine?"
Anthony Fry's tension snapped. Johnson Boller, it seemed, was of no mind
to relinquish his rare fury so easily, for he stood with his fists
clenched and trembled a little even now and his color was no lighter
than scarlet; but Anthony turned and bowed almost humbly.
"I beg your pardon, Miss Mary," he said bitterly.
"Miss Mary!" echoed Boller. "You know her, hey?"
"She told me to call her Mary," Anthony said stiffly.
"When? When you hired her for this job?" Johnson Boller persisted,
although quite weakly.
"When I discovered--not half an hour back--that she was--er--what she
is," Anthony said coldly. "And let that be an end to your comments,
please. You saw me meet this young woman for the first time, as you will
know when you recover your senses. You know for what purpose and under
what misapprehension I brought her to this apartment. Don't make a bad
matter worse by injecting your personal brand of asininity."
He turned his back on Johnson Boller and walked away.
Johnson Boller, however, turned his whole attention to Mary, perched on
the arm of a chair, distressed enough but self-contained, pretty as a
picture. And slowly reason climbed upon her throne again in Johnson
Boller's brain, possessed though it was by Beatrice, loveliest of wives.
He smiled suddenly, because Beatrice in far-off Montreal would never
know; he even grinned after a few seconds; and then, the enormity of the
joke on Anthony Fry overcoming him suddenly, Johnson Boller opened his
mouth and laughed--not a mere, decent expression of mirth, but a roar
which suggested a wild bull in acute agony.
A Niagara of sound left Johnson Boller and ended in a deep, happy
wheeze--and the torrent broke loose again and he hugged his fat sides
and rocked and roared again, until Wilkins, genuinely startled, entered
the living-room, and stopped, more genuinely startled, and regarded the
altered David with mouth wide open.
"God bless my soul!" Wilkins said frankly. "What----"
"Wilkins!" Anthony snapped.
"I--I beg pardon, sir!" the faithful one choked. "The young lady----"
"The young lady," said his master, and his voice had the edge of a razor
blade, "is--here by accident, Wilkins. She came here last night, under a
misapprehension, while masquerading as a boy. You will forget
immediately that I have told you this."
"Very good, sir," Wilkins said; and being one of those rare, model
creatures we read about but rarely meet, he straightened up and forced
his tone back to the matter-of-fact mumble. "As to breakfast, sir?"
Anthony glanced at Mary.
"Yes, I'm quite human," she said crisply. "I eat breakfast."
"For three, Wilkins," said Anthony.
And now, with Wilkins moving incessantly in and out, a peculiar, almost
silent constraint came upon them. Anthony, at the window gazed at the
distant street and tried his best to think; there was just one awful
thought that obtruded itself upon his mind and, although he thrust it
away again and again, the thought came back and mocked at him. Mentally,
he lashed at it--yet ever and anon it returned and mocked a little more
and made impish faces at him.
Johnson Boller, recovering in a long, delighted series of wheezes,
merely ambled to a corner and gazed at Mary, who affected to read
unconcernedly. She was certainly pretty and watching a pretty girl had
never wearied Mr. Boller; but far beyond her prettiness was the terrific
joke on old Anthony.
This was Anthony who, year in and year out, avoided even social
gatherings where women predominated. This was Anthony, who abominated
the whole sex and could be goaded into actual rage by repeated
suggestions that one of his wealth and standing should marry! This was
Anthony, who had threatened to leave the Lasande that day, long ago,
when the pretty little woman canvasser had flitted past the office and
made her way to this very living-room.
Well, it was one on Anthony! Nay, it was a million on Anthony! From this
day forth, Johnson Boller reflected in the depths of his perverted,
amusement-loving mind, he had such a grip on Anthony Fry that, should he
order that distinguished citizen to walk down Fifth Avenue with a lump
of sugar on his nose, he would have no choice but obedience.
And how Anthony would writhe and how that austere countenance could be
colored with the blush of helpless anger! A quantity of the savage,
merciless little boy had survived in Johnson Boller and this wait for
breakfast was really one of the happiest periods of his life.
Wilkins, quite himself again, worked deftly. The service elevator from
the pantry, one of the Lasande's features, whined softly to the Fry
apartment and stopped, and presently, silently, Anthony motioned them to
the table.
Johnson Boller came shaking pleasantly, albeit with countenance grave
enough. Mary came daintily and thoughtfully. But Anthony Fry came as one
going to his doom--because the inescapable thought had fastened in his
brain and every new, terrible second held less hope than had the one
before.
Coffee was poured then and food served and Wilkins moved out.
"Is he gone now?" Mary asked quietly.
"Yes," sighed Anthony.
"Then, without wasting any more time, wouldn't it be as well to decide
just what we are going to do?"
Anthony sighed bitterly.
"Now that you have elected to change into a very charming young woman, I
have no idea of what we're going to do, if you mean by way of getting
you out unnoticed."
Mary's head went a little higher.
"That's exactly what I mean, of course," said she. "As for my getting
into my own clothes, what else was there to do? I couldn't wear those
ridiculous things you gave me; nothing in the world could have tempted
me to go on the street in them, even if I could have worn them. I
telephoned for Felice and had her bring my things because I--I wanted to
feel sane again, I think, and if she hadn't made such a wretched
disturbance, poor child, I'd have been into them and out of here long
ago."
"And I," escaped Anthony, "should have had to explain."
"You're very precious of that good name of yours, aren't you?" Mary
asked tartly.
"I have always been," said Anthony.
And then, all unaware that Mary's pretty lips had compressed and that
her eyes were flashing opinions which caused Johnson Boller fairly to
quake with glee, Anthony's head dropped lower and he stared at his
untouched plate. The thought was there still--the awful, menacing thing,
coming nearer each instant, growing stronger and stronger.
"It must be lovely to be such a thoroughly good and proper man," Mary
said sweetly. "Couldn't you possibly forget yourself for a moment and
tell me how you plan to get me out of here? Couldn't you spend just five
minutes trying to think just what I'm going to tell my people?"
"Eh?" gasped Anthony.
"Oh, yes, I have people--a mother and a father and then some more," Mary
informed him. "Nice people, almost as proper in their notions as you
are."
Anthony merely stared at her numbly. Unconsciously, perhaps, she had
driven the last, long nail into his coffin. Her people! Momentarily, he
had forgotten that she might have people and might have to explain to
them just where last night had been passed. But now that she mentioned a
father, it seemed to Anthony that he could see a mighty man, a man of
wrath and muscle and perhaps a man who could slay with one blow and--oh,
there was no other way!
All his life, Anthony had shied from woman. All these last twenty-five
years he had thanked his lucky stars that one of them had never snared
him! He had been alone, to live as he pleased and act as he pleased and
think as he pleased; married men do not do that, as witness Johnson
Boller, ensnared by Beatrice, a decent enough young woman but his ruler.
Yes, up to the age of forty-five he had been alone and contented, year
in and year out, indulging every little foible without a soul to
question, going as he liked and coming as he liked.
But that was over now! That was over and done with, forever! Anthony
Fry, with a tiny groan, looked up from his plate and faced Mary.
"Young woman," said he deeply, solemnly enough to cause Johnson Boller
to stop quaking and take to staring, "I have avoided women all my life."
"Yes?" Mary said.
"I have done so," Anthony went on steadily, marching to the gallows as a
brave man should, with never a falter once he was started, "because to
my--possibly eccentric--mind, matrimony has no attractions. The bachelor
state, I fondly imagined, was to be my chosen state until death."
Mary looked him over rather too critically, examining the wrinkles at
the corners of his eyes and considering the extreme width of his part.
"That was a good enough idea," she said heartily. "What has it to do
with getting me out of here?"
"It has a great deal to do with it, as you will see," Anthony said, with
a great, quivering sigh. "For the fact of your presence I alone will
take the blame."
"Thanks," said Mary.
"And since the blame is mine, I will make what amends I can," Anthony
Fry concluded, and nerved though he was, his voice broke. "I will
consent to marry you!"
"Huh?" cried John Boller.
Mary, for the moment, said nothing at all. The intake of her breath was
audible, though, and her color rose--not in embarrassment, plainly in
anger. Mary's eyes snapped, too, and she leaned a little toward him
questioningly, as if incredulous of her own hearing.
"You'll do _what_?" said Mary.
"I will consent to marry you!" Anthony repeated, and it seemed to him
that his voice was coming hollowly and from a great distance, presumably
from the caverns of a matrimony-infested Hades. "It will be
simple--painfully simple. The ceremony can be performed this morning and
in New Jersey. We will leave at once and without notifying either your
friends or mine, on an extended wedding tour--I should say of six
months' duration at the least," Anthony went on brokenly, while Johnson
Boller gazed at him in pure fascination. "In a week or so we can write
everywhere, giving the impression that it has been an elopement, the
ceremony having been performed yesterday. Then----"
"Stop!" Mary cried. "Stop that--that planning!"
"Eh?"
The girl was sitting bolt upright, eyes snapping, and Anthony regarded
her in astonishment. Also, she thumped the table with her small clenched
fist as she looked straight at him and gasped:
"Why, I--I wouldn't marry you if you were ten times the last man in the
world!"
"But----"
"No!" Mary said quite wildly.
"There is not another thing to do," Anthony informed her, with a
forlorn, heart-broken smile. "Your good name----"
"You'll find some other way of preserving my good name!" Mary said
warmly. "I'm engaged now to the very finest man in the whole world!"
"You're engaged!" Anthony cried intelligently.
"Yes, and he's a sane man, too, and he doesn't cry over the prospect of
marrying me!" the young woman hurtled on. "He's a _real_ man, and if he
ever finds out that you made me stay here all last night, he'll ignore
the circumstances and shoot you just as sure as you're sitting there!"
She stopped, breathing hard, and shook her head at Anthony Fry, so that
the red-gold curls tumbled about quite riotously. Anthony, blinking,
said nothing at all, but his friend Johnson Boller took to muttering,
rather like a perturbed hen.
As a matter of fact, Boller was downright fond of Anthony, and the
prospect of having him slain in cold blood was very distressing. Turning
helpful for the first time, Johnson Boller was on the point of trying to
think up ways and means of getting Mary out--but Mary herself was
speaking again.
"And don't think that that ridiculous proposal lifts any responsibility
from your shoulders, either!" she said, energetically. "It doesn't!"
"I had not meant to imply that it did," Anthony said dully.
"You got me here and you've kept me here," said Mary, and it was plain
that her even temper had not yet returned. "You'll have to devise the
way to get me out of here and what to say when I do get home."
"Yes," murmured Anthony.
"And if it will help any in rousing you out of that apathetic state,"
the girl concluded, "you may as well know that there isn't the slightest
doubt in the world that the police have a general alarm for me long
before this!"
"Wow!" said Johnson Boller.
"I am--trying to think!" Anthony said with difficulty.
So far as posture went, he looked it. His lean hands were gripping the
edges of the table nervously, and his head was bent again; he scowled
and then shook his head as if to dispel the scowl. He cleared his throat
repeatedly; he glanced at Johnson Boller, whose expression was divided
between irrepressible amusement and some concern--and he cleared his
throat once more and stared his fried egg fixedly in its lone eye.
Thus he was sitting after five silent minutes, which both Mary and
Boller had improved gastronomically, when Wilkins entered.
"Beg pardon, Mr. Fry," said he. "A gentleman to see you."
"I can't see him," Anthony said quickly.
Wilkins smiled.
"But this gentleman's on his way up now, sir," he said. "He's one of
your friends, and the office allowed him to come up and merely 'phoned
that he was coming. It is Mr. Robert Vining, sir!"
Anthony shook his head.
"Well, I cannot see even Mr. Vining this morning," he said. "Say, when
he comes to the door, that--good gracious!"
This last being quite justified, because Mary, with one small shriek,
had bounded from her chair like a frightened fawn! The chair, toppling
over, bumped about the floor for a bit until Wilkins caught it, and
Mary, both hands clutched upon her bosom, stood poised for a full
second, eyes round and horrified, lips parted.
Then, as the lightning flashes, Mary had turned, and it seemed that she
floated through the air to the corridor and into the corridor and down
the corridor. In rather less than another second the door of the recent
David's chamber closed with a slam.
At the door the buzzer was buzzing.
"Will you see him, sir?" asked Wilkins.
"What? Yes," said Anthony. "Take away that chair and that extra plate
before you open the door."
Johnson Boller stood with lips pursed gravely until Wilkins was gone.
"Are you going to let him--er--know?"
"Hardly," said Anthony. "Although--I don't know. Bob's level-headed and
resourceful and reliable. Do you suppose it would be possible to--ask
his aid?"
"Think of the girl!" said Johnson Boller. "Think what----"
He stopped, for Mr. Robert Vining was with them--a tall,
broad-shouldered, person of a year or so past thirty, bright and steady
of eye, and with the flush of health upon his carefully shaven cheek. He
entered like the muscular paragon he was, lithely and easily as a tiger;
and it seemed to Anthony that, if he did nothing else, fifteen minutes
of his conversation might serve to restore normal thought.
Robert Vining was all of the pleasant every day that had been before
their visit to the fight, and the very sight of him was stimulating.
So he clasped Vining's hand and said heartily:
"Good morning, Bob! You've breakfasted?"
"Long since," grinned young Mr. Vining. "I--who uses perfume around
here?"
"No one," Anthony said, paling slightly. "Possibly----"
Vining's eyes twinkled.
"Guess I imagined it," he said. "There's a reason! Well, it's early, but
I thought I'd drop in for a moment in passing and see what you thought
of the alleged battle last night. Hello, Johnson! Heard you were here.
Did you go, too?"
"Yep," said Johnson Boller, gazing at his old friend and wondering
whether Anthony thought he was looking and acting like himself.
"It was one grand lemon, Anthony, was it not?" asked Mr. Vining,
sprawling comfortably for a stay and pinching the end of his cigarette.
Anthony himself settled down in his pet chair for a normal quarter-hour.
"It was all of that," he agreed almost cheerfully. "I've seen the
so-called Kid in pretty bad form before; he was a howling outrage when
he fought Morr two years ago, but last night----"
His voiced trailed away oddly and for cause. Wilkins, coming from
nowhere in particular, was standing in the corridor. He looked straight
at his master and with great meaning, and having caught his attention he
rolled his eyes toward David's room and nodded slightly. Again he looked
at Anthony, again he nodded; and Anthony rose abruptly.
"You--excuse me for a moment, Bob?" he asked, in the same low, husky
voice that had afflicted him before this morning. "Wilkins--ah--Wilkins
wishes----"
He hurried across the room and followed Wilkins as he backed into the
shadows of the corridor.
"She wishes to see you, sir," the invaluable one whispered. "She rang
for me and she says it's urgent."
"But----"
"I'd go at once, sir!" Wilkins breathed fervently. "I really would, Mr.
Fry. She seems in a bit of a temper, if I may say so."
Anthony passed him without further comment or protest, and hastened to
David's door. Apprehension filled him suddenly, not so much because
there was any reason for apprehension as because he was nervous. Anger
went up, too, that the wretched girl should have upset the first calm
and peaceful moment of the morning, so that it is quite possible that
Anthony failed to smile as he entered the chamber.
For that matter, Mary was not smiling either. She stood at the foot of
the bed, clinging to it, and her bosom heaved and her eyes bored into
Anthony Fry.
"That--that man!" she whispered quite dramatically.
"He is merely an old friend of mine, Miss Mary," Anthony said
impatiently. "I have no idea of mentioning your existence, far less
of----"
"Did your man say _Robert_ Vining?"
"Of course."
"Is that the Robert Vining of Vining & Dale, lawyers, in Wall Street?"
Mary cried softly.
"Of course," said Anthony. "It isn't possible that you know him?"
"_Know_ him?" Mary echoed wildly. "That's the man I'm going to marry!"