having a gorgeous time, and she carried Joy along with her till the
girl was choosing pink and white silks and satins, and patterns to
make them by, with as much enthusiasm as if no day of reckoning
loomed up, three and a half weeks away.
There was no way out. Of course, she would leave the things behind.
The thought gave her a pang already, for Joy had been dressed by her
grandfather's ideas only as far as frocks went. Her grandmother had
seen to everything else, and was devoted to a durable material known
as longcloth, which one buys by the bolt and uses forever.
But they sped merrily home, after a festive luncheon, with about
forty dollars' worth of silk and lace and ribbon aboard, not to
speak of patterns, and a blue muslin frock which was a bargain and
would just fit Joy, and which she had invested in herself.
_"Oh what a tangled web we weave
When first we practise to deceive!"_
Joy thought of that quotation so often now that she was beginning to
feel it was her favorite verse. But she touched the big parcel with
a small, appreciative foot, and remembered that the blue frock, at
least, would be saved out of the wreck, and that John liked blue.
Mrs. Hewitt showed her her bedroom when they got back, and left her
to take a nap. But she did not want to rest. She lay obediently
against the pillows and stared out the window at a great, vivid
maple tree, and felt very much like staying awake for the rest of
her natural life.
"How on earth was I to know that mothers-in-law were like this?" she
demanded of herself indignantly. "All the ones I ever heard about
made your life a misery."
It is rather calming to remember that you really couldn't have
foreseen what is happening to you. So Joy presently rose happily,
smoothed her hair and tidied herself generally, and came sedately
down the stairs, prepared to go on playing her part. Only it was
getting to feel more like a reality than a pretense. The other life,
the one she would go back to, seemed the dream now.
"John will be here soon," Mrs. Hewitt greeted her. "It will be a
surprise to him: you know, he hasn't an idea you are here. I wouldn't
tell him what Phyllis said."
Joy dimpled.
"Do you suppose he'll mind?" she ventured.
"Oh, I think he'll bear up," said Mrs. Hewitt amiably. "Come here,
Joy; I've cut out a half-dozen of the silk ones already. Do you know
how to do them? They're just a straight piece--see----"
Joy knelt down by her, absorbed in the pretty thing and in seeing
how to make it. The day was chillier than any had yet been, and a
fire had been built in the deep fireplace of the living-room. Mrs.
Hewitt was sitting near it, with the pretty scraps of silk and lace
all over her lap, and an ever-widening circle of cut-out garments
around her.
"We can do the most of these by hand," she mused. "Indeed, we
shouldn't do them any other way."
Joy rooted sewing things out of a basket near by and sat down just
where she was, between Mrs. Hewitt and the large, fatherly Maltese
cat who occupied a wonted cushion on the other side of the
fireplace. And so John found her when he came in. The lamp had just
been lighted, and its soft rays shone on Joy's bronze head and
down-bent, intent little face. She had on a little white apron that
Mrs. Hewitt had fastened around her waist, and she was sewing hard.
Before Joy heard John come in she felt him. No matter how tired he
was, there was always about John an atmosphere of well-being and
sunniness, of "all's right with the world," that made faces turn to
him instinctively when he stood in a doorway. But Joy did not raise
her eyes to look at him, nor did she move.
His mother rose and came over to greet him. Joy did not hear her
whisper: "The child feels a little shy. She'll be more at ease now
you've come."
John came swiftly over to where she sat on the floor, very still,
with her hands flying, and her eyes on her work.
"Why, Joy dear, this is a lovely thing that I didn't expect," he
said gently. "Welcome--home!"
He smiled down at her and held out his hands to help her up. Quite
unsuspectingly, she pushed her work into the pocket along the hem of
her sewing-apron and laid her hands in his, and he drew her easily
to her feet. But, instead of releasing her then, he drew her
closer--and kissed her, quite as calmly as he had his mother a
moment before.... No, not quite as calmly. Joy felt his arms close
around her, as if he was glad to have her in his hold.
"Let me go," she said in too low a voice for Mrs. Hewitt to hear.
"Who has drawn the wine must drink it," he told her in the same low
voice. He went on, still softly, but more seriously, "My child, this
sort of thing is necessary, if you want Mother to be satisfied while
you are here. It's--a courtesy to your hostess. I promise to do no
more of it than is necessary, as it seems to trouble you so.
But--don't you see?"
He released her, and she stepped away.
"I--see," she answered him a little uncertainly. "Th--thank you....
I--I couldn't help coming, John."
Then she fled upstairs to dress for dinner.
She puzzled all the time she was dressing. There was no use
talking--his mother _needn't_ be amused by such things. She
would get on perfectly well without seeing them. John might think he
was doing it as a sacred duty--in spite of her adoration of him it
did not impress Joy that way.... There were men who kissed you just
because you were a girl, if you let them; Clarence was that kind,
according to all accounts. But--John! He was the best, kindest,
noblest man she had ever known. Every one seemed to have the same
feelings about him that she had. Even when Clarence had sneered at
him he had only been able to call him a "reliable citizen."... And
yet--he seemed to want to kiss her! He liked it.
"Of course," said Joy to herself, with a beating heart beneath the
wisdom of Aunt Lucilla, "the answer is that he probably doesn't know
it. Men don't ever seem to know things about themselves. But I must
remember that it's no sign he likes _me._"
But it was quite true that it was going to have to continue. It had
dawned on Joy that her will was no match for that of the Hewitt
family. But it was a very kindly will. She smiled a little,
irrepressibly, as she clasped her girdle--she was wearing one of the
old picture dresses--and went downstairs. For even if you are a
little impostor who has captured a five-weeks' lover by means of a
wishing ring, unlimited things to wear are nice, and having the man
you are in love with want to pet you is nice, too!
At the top of the stairs a thought struck her. Joy's thoughts had a
way of arriving suddenly. She had set out to be happy. Very well!
"I don't see why I shouldn't be engaged to the limit!" she thought
daringly. "I--don't--see--why I shouldn't! ... for just this little
while--just this one little while out of my life before I go back to
the shadows! ... I don't care if I am bad! I don't care if I am
unmaidenly! I'll be as happy as ever I can. They'll think I'm very
dreadful, anyway, all of them, when they know all about me!"
She swept on down the stairs, head up, cheeks flaming.
And so, when she came upon John, waiting her courteously at the
stair-foot, she did just exactly what in her heart she desired to
do. She stood on the step above him and deliberately laid both
little white hands on his shoulders and smiled into his eyes.
"I am so glad I'm here with you," she said, looking at him with no
attempt to hide the love she felt for him. "Are you glad to have
your sweetheart in the house--for a little while? Say so--please,
dear!"
He laughed light-heartedly, and his eyes shone.
"A little while?" he answered gaily. "I can stand a lot more of you
than that, kiddie.... Come, now, Mother's waiting. Or shall I lift
you down from the step? ... I always seem to want to lift you about,
somehow, you're so little and light--such a little princess:"
He set his hands about her waist, but she slipped from him, laughing
excitedly.
"I believe you think I'm just a doll somebody gave you to play
with!" she told him with a certain sweet mockery that was hers
sometimes.... "Come, now, Mother's waiting!"
She ran down the hall, evading his grasp, and laughing back at him
over her shoulder, to Mrs. Hewitt and safety.
"Come, children, dinner will be cold," said Mrs. Hewitt obliviously.
"Coming, Mother dear!" answered Joy.
CHAPTER TEN
CLARENCE SWOOPS DOWN
It was quite as pleasant to breakfast with John as it had been to
dine with him, which had been something Joy had secretly wondered
about. When breakfast was over, he told her matter-of-coursely that
he was going to take her with him on his morning rounds.
"You'd better take a book," he advised her practically. "If you
don't, you'll be bored, because I'll be leaving you outside a good
deal while I'm inside seeing patients."
"I'll take my sewing," she told him, trying to be as matter-of-fact
as he was. "That is, if you don't mind."
She was smiling as happily as a child over being allowed to go, and
he smiled down at her, pleased, too.
"Not unless it's too big," he told her with an attempt at firmness
which failed utterly.
She went off, singing under her breath, as usual, to get a very
small sewing-bag, with a little piece of to-be-hemstitched pink silk
in it, and John looked over at his mother.
"She certainly has the prettiest ways!" he said involuntarily.
"You're a good lover, Johnny," his mother rejoined appreciatively.
"Nonsense!" said John before he thought, and then pulled himself up.
"That is--I don't think a man would have to be in love with her to see
that," he ended lamely. "I thought they were attractive before I----"
"Exactly," retorted his mother with distinct skepticism. "That's why
you--" She paused in mimicry of his breaking off, and, then, as Joy
came back, gave him an affectionate little push toward the door.
She followed them out to the gate and leaned over it, watching them.
"Good-by, children!" she called after them. "Don't be late for luncheon!"
"Don't stand out there in the wind with no wraps, Mother," advised John.
"Nonsense!" she replied with spirit. "You have Isabel De Guenther's
rheumatism on your mind, that's what's the matter with you. The idea
of a woman of her intelligence giving up to inflammatory rheumatism
is simply ridiculous. You don't get things unless you give up to them."
It was a beautiful doctrine, and doubtless had much to do with
making Mrs. Hewitt the healthy and dauntless person she was, but it
had its limitations, and John reminded her of them inexorably.
"You have neuritis when you catch cold in the wind, and you know
it," he told her. "Do go in, Mother, to please me."
"You know I'll be back again as soon as you're out of sight," she
observed. But she did go in.
Alas for the power of elderly ladies to keep off neuritis by
defiance! When they came back at twelve-thirty Mrs. Hewitt was
nowhere to be seen.
"Mrs. Hewitt says she has a slight headache, and will you please not
wait luncheon for her: she's having it upstairs," was the message
they received.
"Very well," said John gravely, and he and Joy proceeded to have
luncheon alone together.
He glanced smilingly across the table at Joy as she poured his tea
with steady little hands.
"It looks very much as if you were going to have to take charge,
more or less," he said. "That's our friend the neuritis. Mother
never admits it's anything but a headache the first day. Do you
think you can look after things?"
"Why not, if she wants me to?" asked Joy.
"Well, I can imagine you standing on a drawbridge or a portcullis,
or whatever it was they trimmed medieval castles with, and waving
your hands to the knights going by," began John teasingly; "but it's
a stretch of imagination to fancy a medieval princess pouring my tea
and seeing that my papers are in order ..."
"You _know_ I can't help having red hair," protested Joy,
coming straight to the point. "And if your grandfather had always
dressed you in costumes, you couldn't get to be modern all at once,
either. I think I'm doing very well."
John threw back his fair head and laughed.
The idea of his grandfather, who had been a wholesale hardware
merchant, with a New England temperament to match, "dressing him in
costumes," was an amusing one, and he said as much.
Joy laughed, too.
"Well, there, you see!" she said triumphantly. "There's a great deal
in not having handicaps. Why, there was a poet used to write things
as if he were me, all about that, and I couldn't stop him. One began:
_'I was a princess in an ivory tower:
Why did you sit below and sing to me?'"_
"Well," said John, as she paused indignantly, "I'll be the goat. Why
_did_ he sit below and sing to you?"
"Because he wanted the pull Grandfather could give him, as far as I
could make out," replied Joy with vigor. "And I don't call it a bit
nice way to act!"
She did not quite know why John laughed this time. But she was very
glad that he was not bored at being with her.
"Oh, Joy, Joy!" he said. "I take it back. You are not
medieval--entirely. Or, if you are, princesses in ivory towers are
more delightful figures than I've always thought them."
"We aim to please," said Joy demurely. "But I have to explain that a
lot, it seems to me. I had it out with Clarence Rutherford only a
day or so ago."
"Oh, you did?" considered John. "Well--don't try to please too hard.
Remember that you are supposed to please me; but you don't have to
extend your efforts beyond my family circle."
He was only half in earnest, but he was in earnest at least half.
She wondered just what he meant for a moment, then it occurred to
her that he meant Clarence, no less. She was on the verge of saying
comfortingly:
"Clarence is just trying to make me fall in love with him. He
doesn't count a bit."
But she stopped herself, remembering that Aunt Lucilla would never
have said such an unwise thing, let alone Gail.
"I must go now and see how your mother is, as soon as we are
through," she told him instead.
She found Mrs. Hewitt surrounded by more hot-water bottles than she
had ever thought existed, and reduced to the point where she was
nearly willing to confess to neuritis.
"I have pains all over me, child," she announced, "and as long as
you are here I shall continue to describe them, so you'd better run.
And if you tell John it's neuritis I shall probably take you over to
Phyllis' fountain and drown you the first day I'm up. It will be an
annoyingly chilly death if the weather keeps on as it is now----"
She stopped in order to give a little wriggle and a little moan, and
saw John standing in the doorway.
"How's the neuritis, Mother?" he inquired sympathetically.
"You know perfectly well," said his mother without surprise, "that I
can't spare one of these hot-water bottles to throw at you, John,
and I think you're taking a despicable advantage."
"I'll get you some more hot water," said he placidly, collecting two
red bags and a gray one, and crossing to her stationary washstand.
"There's a lower stratum you might get, Joy," suggested Mrs. Hewitt,
and Joy reached down at the hint and secured the two remaining
bottles, which she filled when John was through.
"That's _much_ better," Mrs. Hewitt thanked them, with what was
very like a purr.
"Incidentally," said John with concern in his voice, "it's about all
anybody can do for you till the weather changes; that and being
careful of your diet."
"Yes, and I got it this morning standing out in the damp and chill,
watching you out of sight. Watching people out of sight is unlucky,
anyway," said his mother. "I might as well say it, if you won't. And
I don't expect to be able to get up tomorrow, which is Thursday."
"Thursday?" asked John, sitting down on the couch at the foot of the
bed. "Is Thursday some special feast?"
"Thursday's the cook's day out, usually," explained Joy practically.
"But she doesn't need to worry. Dear, if you'll tell me what to do----"
"Usually Nora attends to things that day," explained Mrs. Hewitt
sadly, but with a trace of hope in her voice, "but tomorrow she has
a funeral she must attend. Quite a close funeral, she explained to
me; the remains was a dear friend!"
Joy smiled down on Mrs. Hewitt like a Rossetti angel.
"You don't need to worry a bit," she consoled. "How many meals will
she be gone?"
"Only one," Mrs. Hewitt told her, with what was obviously a
lightened heart. "Dinner."
"Just dinner for us three? Why, I can manage that easily," said Joy
confidently. "At least--I hope I'll suit. I really can cook."
"You blessed angel! Of course you'll suit!" said Mrs. Hewitt. "I'm
so glad. John _does_ like good meals."
She moaned a little, rather as if it was a luxury, and turned
cautiously over.
"You don't have to stay with me any longer, children," she said.
"The last responsibility is off my conscience. And I may state, in
passing, John, that I never imagined you had sense enough to pick
out anybody as satisfactory as Joy."
They both laughed a little, and then John said, abruptly, that he
had to go soon, and swept Joy off with him. Outside the door he
stopped short.
"See here, Joy, you mustn't do things like that," he said abruptly.
"You're a guest, not a maid."
She set her back against the closed door they had just emerged from
and looked up at him.
"Please let me go on playing," she begged him with a little break in
her voice. "You know I never had any mother to speak of, any more
than she had any daughter, and--and--please!"
He put his hand under her chin and lifted her face to look at it keenly.
"Do you really like her so, child?" he said.
Joy hoped he would not feel her cheek burn under his touch.
"Yes," she answered simply. "And--and now I must go and plan a
dazzling menu, please, and look in the icebox without hurting the
cook's feelings. It's a case of, 'Look down into the icebox,
Melisande!' as Clarence Rutherford would put it."
But she did not say the last sentence aloud. She only laughed as the
phrase presented itself to her.
"Now, what are you laughing at?" demanded John.
"If I told you," said Joy like an impertinent child, "you'd know.
And now, dear sir, you have to go out on your rounds. Be sure to be
back in time for dinner--my dinner. I'm going to plan it tonight,
even if I don't cook it."
He didn't seem angry at her--only amused.
"You plan a dinner--fairy princess!" he teased her, looking down at her
picturesque little figure from his capable, broad-shouldered height.
"See if I can't!" said Joy defiantly.
And he saw.
When he got back that evening, cold and tired and a little unhappy
over a child in his care who did not seem to be gaining, Joy met him
at the door, drawing him into the warmth and light with two little
warm hands. She had dressed herself in the little blue muslin frock
she had bought herself the morning before. It had a white fichu
crossing and tying behind, which gave her the look, somehow, of
belonging in the house. Her hair was parted demurely and pinned into
a great coil at the back of her head, held by a comb that he
recognized as his mother's. What he did not recognize or remember
was that he had told her once that his dream-girl "had her hair
parted--and wore blue--and was connected somehow with an open fire."
But he knew that she looked very sweet and lovely and very much as
if she belonged where she was.
"Oh, come in, dear!" she cried. "You're tired. Come to the fire a
minute before you go upstairs."
She spoke almost as if she were his wife, and he looked less tired
as he came to her.
"I like being welcomed home this way," he told her, putting his arm
around her, instead of releasing her, and going with her into the
living-room. "Why, Joy, I take it all back about your not being able
to keep house. One look at you would make anybody sure of it.... Are
you doing it all for Mother, dear?" he broke off unexpectedly to ask
her. "Aren't you doing it a little bit for me?"
She looked up at him, flushing.
"Yes--a little bit--" she said breathlessly. Then she made herself
speak more lightly. "I did make the dressing and the pudding sauce
myself," she admitted as gaily as she could for a fast-beating
heart. "But I hoped there weren't traces. Is there flour on my
face?"
She smiled flashingly at him and tipped her face up provokingly,
slipping from his hold where they stood by the fire together. He
made one step close to her again.
"You know perfectly well what to expect for a question like that,"
he said with an unaccustomed excitement in his voice, and kissed her.
Usually when he did that Joy made some struggle to escape. But
tonight, in the firelight, a little tired and very glad to see him,
she kissed him back, as if she were veritably his.
He dropped on one knee beside the blaze, drawing her down on the
hearth-rug by him.
"I feel like the man in the fairy-stories," he said in a voice Joy
did not quite know, "who catches an elf-girl in some unfair way, and
finds her turn to a dear human woman in his house. Joy ... will she
stay human?"
Joy's heart beat furiously as she knelt there, held close to his
side. The little head with its great coil of glittering hair drooped.
"She--she always was human," she half whispered, her throat
tightening with excitement. She could feel the blood stealing up
over her face.
"That is no answer, Joy, my dear," he said softly.
But it was at this moment that a voice behind the curtains said,
"Dinner is served."
Joy sprang up, but John stayed where he was, his broad shoulders and
fair head bent a little forward as he looked into the blaze.
She touched his arm timidly.
"John--please--you must go up and see your mother before dinner."
He roused himself from whatever he had been thinking of and turned
to her.
"I must, certainly," he replied, springing up. "I think I am
answered.... Am I not, dear?"
"Why, yes," said Joy with a little surprise, but as gently and
confidently as ever. "I answered you. I always do what you tell me,
don't I?"
He touched her hair lightly and smiled for an answer as he passed
her on his way up. She heard him whistling light-heartedly above, as
she, too, stood staring into the fire.
She hadn't thought that any one could be so very kind and lovely as
John was being to her tonight. She could feel yet the pressure of
his arm as he held her beside him. And it was going to last a great
deal longer--weeks longer! She could be as happy and as much with
him and as much to him as she wanted to. There would be Clarence's
mocking love-making, too, for flattery and amusement. And when she
had to go back home, at last, she would have so much happiness, so
much good times, so much love to remember, that it would keep her
warm and happy for years and years!
When John returned, his hair damp and nearly straight with brushing,
and his eyes still bright with laughter, she was sitting at the head
of the table, waiting for him happily.
"It's a nice world, isn't it?" she suggested like a child. "And do
you like whipped cream in your tomato bisque?"
"It is, and I do, very much. Am I to have it?"
Joy nodded proudly, her eyes shining.
"I don't know about the world, but you are going to have the whipped
cream," she said, as she felt for the electric push-button in the
floor with one small, circling foot.
"I might as well tell you now," said John gaily, "that the bell you
are trying to step on is disconnected. Mother unhooked it eight
months ago, because when she was excited she always forgot and
stamped on it. I think we use a glass and a knife."
"Oh!" said Joy. "Well, I haven't the technique--would you?"
But Nora came in with the soup just then without having been rung
for, having evidently been hovering sympathetically near.
"Pardon me, Doctor, but the bell is connected up," she breathed. "I
hooked it up myself as soon as Mrs. Hewitt gave Miss Havenith the
housekeeping."
It had evidently been a sore point with Nora--and, if the truth were
told, with John, who had an orderly mind. Although he adored his
flyaway, irresponsible mother, it was in spite of her ways and not
because of them.
"Do you think you are apt to get excited and step on the bell?" he
asked Joy.
She shook her head.
"I like things the way they're planned," she confessed. "They go
along more easily."
"I suppose," he meditated aloud, "you might even put a man's collars
in the same place twice running."
"Where else?" demanded Joy, who was so thoughtful of such things
that she was even intrusted with certain duties of the sort for
Grandfather.
"Well, Mother hasn't repeated herself for twenty-eight years," said
John a little wistfully. "She says she doesn't intend to get in a
rut, nor let me."
Joy laughed aloud.