BUT WHY WAS SHE LONESOME?
Everybody was at the depot to meet Gail; just everybody in the world! It
was midnight when the train rolled in, and, as she came toward the gate,
the faces outside, with the high station lights beaming down upon their
eagerness, were like a flashing dream of all the faces she had ever
loved. Of course there was her mother, a little stiff, a little sedate,
a little reserved, but, under her calm exterior, fluttering with a flood
of pent-up emotion. There was her father, a particularly twinkling-eyed
gentleman, a somewhat thinner, somewhat older, somewhat neater edition
of Uncle Jim, and he had, of all things, her favourite collie, Taffy,
perched high on his shoulder! It was from her father that Gail had her
vivacity and from her mother her faculty of introspection. Dazed by the
unexpected delight, and the pain, too, of seeing all these dear old
faces, she was for picking them out in detail, when Taffy made a blur of
them. Taffy, suddenly recognising his playfellow in the throng, first
deafened Miles Sargent with a series of welcoming barks, and then began
climbing up his back. Sargent, always gifted with the capacity for
over-estimating his own powers, a quality which had permitted his
brother Jim to slightly outrun him in the game of life, had fondly hoped
that he could restrain Taffy by the firm hold of the forepaws over his
shoulder; but collies are endowed with a separate set of muscles for
wriggling purposes alone, and the first thing Miles Sargent knew, Taffy
had crawled right over him, and had kicked off from his cravat, and had
shot straight through the outcoming throng, a flash of yelping brown and
white, brushing over a woman with a basket, and landing against Gail
with the force of all his lively affection.
That was only the beginning of the impetuosity with which she was
received at home. She had never realised that she had quite so many
friends, and even the people in the street seemed familiar, as she was
bundled out to the car, with Arly smiling steadfastly in the background
and remembered only at intervals. They looked more substantial and
earnest and sincere and friendly, these people, than the ones with whom
she had been recently associated. They were more polished in New York,
more sure of themselves, more indifferent to the great mass of their
fellow humanity, but here one could be trustful. It was so good to be
home!
Of course Howard was there, just the same old Howard, and he bustled up
to her with the same old air of proprietorship, quite as if nothing had
ever happened to disturb their relations. It was he who took her by the
arm and engineered her out to her father’s car. At first she was puzzled
by his air of having a right to boss her around, and then the reason
flashed on her mind. Pride! Howard did not want their set to know that
he was no longer drum major in the Sargent procession.
“There’s a wad of roses at the house for you, Snapsy,” her father
informed her as the machine started, and his brown eyes twinkled until
they almost seemed to be surrounded by a halo. “They’re from number one,
I think.”
“Number one?” puzzled Gail, who had taken a folding seat so that she
might occasionally pat Taffy, who sat up sedately with the chauffeur.
“Miles,” protested Mrs. Sargent, trying to direct his glance toward
Arly.
“Edward E. Allison,” grinned Gail’s father. “He must be a very active
gentleman. Probably telephoned his own florist in New York to telegraph
Marty here to supply you. Nothing has arrived from the other eight.”
Gail had a mad impulse to search for her time table. She remembered
now—could she ever forget it—that her nine slaves had been numbered!
“Dad!” she wailed. “You couldn’t have seen that awful paper!”
“We receive the New York papers now at four P.M.,” he informed her, with
an assumption of local pride in the fact. “This morning’s _Planet_ had a
wonderful circulation here. I think everybody in town has seen it.”
Arly Fosland had the bad grace to giggle. Mrs. Sargent looked at her
dubiously. She had, of course, implicit confidence in Gail’s selection
of friends, but nevertheless she was not one to make up her own mind too
rapidly.
“Everybody’s proud of you, Snapsy!” went on Miles Sargent. “That’s a
wonderful collection of slaves to have made in so short a time.”
“Please don’t, Dad!” begged Gail.
“For myself, I favour number five,” continued her father, enjoying
himself very much, and Arly Fosland made up her mind that she was going
to feel very homelike in the Sargent house, at dinner times. “Number
five is—”
“Miles!” and Mrs. Sargent put her hand comfortingly on Gail’s knee,
while she turned reproachful eyes on her husband.
“Why, Judith,” protested Mrs. Sargent’s husband, in mock surprise;
“number five—”
“Dad, I’ll jump out of this car!”
“—is the Reverend Smith Boyd, of Market Square Church, the wealthiest
and most fashionable congregation in the world. Number six—Mrs. Fosland,
I couldn’t make out number six very well. I suppose you know him.”
Arly shrieked.
“I can tell you all about them,” she volunteered, judging that this was
perhaps the best way to relieve Gail’s embarrassment. “Number one, the
gentleman who sent the flowers, is a good-looking bachelor of
forty-five, whose specialty is in making big street car companies out of
little ones, and Gail hadn’t been in New York a week, when he took the
first vacation he’s had in ten years. He’ll probably go back to work
to-morrow morning. He was the hero of the wreck.”
“No doubt a good provider,” commented Mr. Sargent, gravely checking off
number one.
Even Mrs. Sargent was smiling now, but Gail was looking interestedly at
the old familiar street, and marvelling that it had changed so little.
It seemed impossible that she had only been gone a few weeks. She was
particularly not hearing the flippant conversation in the car.
“Number two is Dick Rodley,” enumerated Arly, remembering vividly the
grouping of the nine slaves. “He’s the handsomest man in the world!”
“Probably fickle.”
“Number three, Willis Cunningham. He wears a beard. I’d rather talk
about number four, Houston Van Ploon,” and she babbled on with her
descriptions of the nine slaves, until finally Gail laughed and helped
her out.
Somehow, the returned wanderer felt lonely, even with three cars of
friends following her home, as a guard of honour. That was a strange
sensation. Everything was the same, all her friends were steadfast in
their affection, and she was overjoyed to be back among them; yet she
was lonely. Who could explain it?
Here was Main Street. Dear old busy Main Street, with its shops and its
hotels and its brilliantly lighted drugstores, the latter only serving
to accentuate the deserted blackness. She was sorry that she had not
arrived at an earlier hour, when the windows would have been lighted and
the streets busier with people; though, of course, it was always dull on
Sunday night. Cricky! Sunday! She had an engagement with Houston Van
Ploon to attend a concert to-night, and she had forgotten to send him
word. He had been at Uncle Jim’s, stiff as a ramrod and punctual to the
second, of course.
Taffy, who had been whining his newly re-aroused distress over the
absence of Gail, now suddenly remembered that she was home again, and
turned around with a short, sharp bark. He stuck out his tongue and
rolled it at her, laughing, and his tail flopped. He quivered all over.
Now up the avenue, the dear old wide avenue, with its double rows of
trees and its smooth asphalt, glistening like sprinkling rain from the
quartz sand embedded in its surface, and with the prosperous looking
brown stone houses lining each side of the way, every house with its
lawn and its shrubbery and its glass-doored vestibule. They were nearly
all alike these houses, even to lawns and shrubbery, except that some of
them had no iron dogs in the grass, and others had no little white
cupids holding up either a goose spouting water out of its mouth or an
umbrella which furnished its own rain. They were dear houses, every one,
ever so much more personal than the heartless residences of New York;
and her friends lived in them. It was so good to be home!
She became more excited now. There was their own house just ahead,
occupying nearly half the block, and slightly larger than the others! It
was brilliantly lighted from the basement to the attic, and all the
servants were either on the front steps or peeping from around the
corner of the house, and old mammy Emma, who had cooked Gail’s own
little individual custard pies since she was a baby, had her apron to
her eyes. Gail’s heart was just plumb full! There was no place, oh, no
place in all the world like home!
Taffy jumped out of the machine as it turned in at the gate, and ran up
ahead to bark a proper welcome, and touched the top step with a circle
like a whip-snapper, and was back again, a long brown and white streak
bellying down to the grass, and prancing a circle around the machine,
and leaping in the air to bark, and back up to the steps and back to the
machine; then lay down in the grass and rolled over, and, jumping up,
chased a cat out of the next yard, in the mere exuberance of joy; but
was back again to crouch before Gail, and whine, as she stepped out of
the car.
Old Plympton was there, the hollow-stomached black butler, whose
long-tailed coat dropped straight from the middle of his back, and
flapped against the bend of his knees when he walked. His voice trembled
when he greeted Miss Gail, and old Auntie Clem, who had tended Miss Gail
when she was a little girl no bigger than that, and until the fancy
French maid came, just politely took her young missus upstairs to her
room, and took off those heavy shoes, and made her drink her thimble
glass of hot-spiced port wine. It was so good to be home!
Of course her friends had piled into the house after her, a whole
chattering mob of them, and, late as the hour was, Vivian Jennings
opened the piano and rattled into Auld Lang Syne, which the company sang
with a ringing zest! The tears filled Gail’s eyes as she listened. They
were such faithful, whole-hearted people back here! It was good to go
away, now and then, just for the joy of coming home again; but one
should not go too often. After all, this was a better life.
Auntie Clem triumphed. She had Miss Gail all fixed up before that fancy
French maid had on her trifling little cap and her hair primped. Arly,
choosing Auntie Clem instantly for her personal attendant on this brief
visit, naturally refused to intrude further on the home coming, and
expressed herself as frantically in love with her little blue bedroom
and boudoir.
When Gail went downstairs, in a comfortable little red house gown which
was tremendously artful in its simplicity, she found the whole jolly
company in the big dining room, where Miles Sargent had insisted on
opening something in honour of the happy event. She coloured as her
father turned his twinkling eyes on her, but he did not take occasion to
call her a slave driver or to tease her any further about the work of
art which had driven her home. She reproached herself crossly for having
suspected him of such a crudity. Of course he would not do that!
They had sandwiches, and olives, and cake, and cookies—trust Mammy Emma
for that—and nuts and fruit and bonbons, and coffee, and champagne.
Everybody was excited, walking around with a sandwich in one hand and an
olive in the other, joking with Gail, and complimenting her, and teasing
her, but in every word and look and action, showing that they loved her.
She had a new knowledge of them, an understanding of what it is like to
have a whole circle of friends who have grown up from childhood
together. They understood each other, and knew each other’s weaknesses
and faults, so that they were not shocked when they saw evidences of
them, and they knew each other’s virtues, so that they did not
overestimate anything and look for too much, and they were dependent
upon each other and knew it, and they were loyal; that was it! Loyal!
Loyal to the very core! It was good, so good to be home!
No one thought anything about it when Howard Clemmens stayed behind,
after all the rest had gone home. Howard had always done that. It was
his right.
Howard was distressed in his mind about several things, and, out of a
habitual acquiescence in his old assumption of leadership, and because
she was tired, and because she was tender of thought toward all her old
friends, she answered his very direct questions. Yes, she had finished
her visit. No, she was not engaged. That atrocious newspaper article had
only been a regular Sunday paper social sensation. They fastened that
sort of a story on some one at least once a year. These little matters
settled, Howard was himself again. He was very glad that Gail had
returned to her normal mode of existence, and now that all this
foolishness was over, he took the earliest opportunity to mention the
little matter between them. Would Gail reconsider her answer to the
question he had asked her in New York? He informed her fully as to the
state of his affections, which had not changed in the least, and he
rather expected that this magnanimous attitude on his part would meet
with melting appreciation. He was very much astonished that it did not,
and displeased when she refused him again. Confound it, he had not given
her time to settle down!
She was only slightly troubled when he bade her good-night. She was
sorry that she could not see the matter as he did, but there was no
trace of doubt in her mind. Somehow, Howard seemed rather colourless of
late. He was a dear, good boy; but she was not the kind of a girl he
needed.
With only as much trouble on her brow as could be smoothed away by her
fingertips, she went back into the dining room, where her father, who
liked to have a table near him, was enjoying an extra cup of coffee with
his cigar, and shedding the mild disapproval of Mrs. Sargent, who
foresaw a restless night for him. Gail, who had not spared time for
food, poured herself a glass of water, picked up one of the delicious
little chicken sandwiches, and sat down, within easy leaning distance of
her father, for one of the good, old-time, comfortable family chats.
Taffy curled around her feet, and the group was complete.
Somehow, that inexplicable feeling of loneliness returned to her, in the
midst of this most dear intimacy. What was it? No one can form far ties
without leaving behind some enduring thread of spiritual communication;
for better or for worse.