THE WOMAN WHO WAS NOT MRS. GREGORY
Hardly had Abbott Ashton disappeared down the village vista of
moonlight and shadow-patches, before Fran's mood changed. Instead of
seeking to carry out her threat of bearding the lion in the den, she
sank down on the porch-steps, gathered her knees in her arms, and
stared straight before her.
She made a woebegone little figure with her dusty shoes, her black
stockings, her huddled body, while the big hat threw all into deepest
gloom. From hat to drawn-in feet, she was not unlike a narrow edge of
darkness splitting the moon-sheen, a somber shadow cast by goodness-
knows-what and threatening goodness-knows-whom.
Though of skilful resources, of impregnable resolution, Fran could be
despondent to the bluest degree; and though competent at the clash,
she often found herself purpling on the eve of the crisis. The moment
had come to test her fighting qualities, yet she drooped despondently.
Hamilton Gregory was coming through the gate. As he halted in
surprise, the black shadow rose slowly, wearily. He, little dreaming
that he was confronted by a shadow from the past, saw in her only the
girl who had been publicly expelled from the tent.
The choir-leader had expected his home-coming to be crowned by a
vision very different. He came up the walk slowly, not knowing what to
say. She waited, outwardly calm, inwardly gathering power. White-hot
action from Fran, when the iron was to be welded. Out of the deepening
shadows her will leaped keen as a blade.
She addressed him, "Good evening, Mr. Gregory."
He halted. When he spoke, his tone expressed not only a general
disapproval of all girls who wander away from their homes in the
night, but an especial repugnance to one who could laugh during
religious services. "Do you want to speak to me, child?"
"Yes." The word was almost a whisper. The sound of his voice had
weakened her.
"What do you want?" He stepped up on the porch. The moon had vanished
behind the rising masses of storm-clouds, not to appear again, but the
light through the glass door revealed his poetic features. Flashes of
lightning as yet faint but rapid in recurrence, showed his beauty as
that of a young man. Fran remained silent, moved more than she could
have thought possible. He stared intently, but under that preposterous
hat, she was practically invisible, save as a black shadow. He asked
again, with growing impatience, "What do you want?"
His unfriendliness gave her the spur she needed. "I want a home," she
said decidedly.
Hamilton Gregory was seriously disturbed. However evil-disposed, the
waif should not be left to wander aimlessly about the streets. Of the
three hotels in Littleburg, the cheapest was not overly particular. He
would take her there. "Do you mean to tell me," he temporized, "that
you are absolutely alone?"
Fran's tone was a little hard, not because she felt bitter, but lest
she betray too great feeling, "Absolutely alone in the world."
He was sorry for her; at the same time he was subject to the reaction
of his exhausting labors as song-leader. "Then," he said, with tired
resignation, "if you'll follow me, I'll take you where you can spend
the night, and to-morrow, I'll try to find you work."
"Work!" She laughed. "Oh, _thank_ you!" Her accent was that of
repudiation. Work, indeed!
He drew back in surprise and displeasure.
"You didn't understand me," she resumed. "What I want is a home. I
don't want to follow you anywhere. _This_ is where I want to stay."
"You can not stay here," he answered with a slight smile at the
presumptuous request, "but I'm willing to pay for a room at the
hotel--"
At this moment, the door was opened by the young woman who, some hours
earlier, had responded to Fran's knocking. Footsteps upon the porch
had told of Gregory's return.
The lady who was not Mrs. Gregory, was so pleased to see the gentleman
who was Mr. Gregory--they had not met since the evening meal--that, at
first, she was unaware of the black shadow; and Mr. Gregory, in spite
of his perplexity, forgot the shadow also, so cheered was he by the
glimpse of his secretary as she stood in the brightly lighted hall.
Such moments of delighted recognition are infinitesimal when a third
person, however shadowy, is present; yet had the world been there,
this exchange of glances must have taken place.
Fran did not understand--her very wisdom blinded her as with too great
light. She had seen so much of the world that, on finding a tree
bearing apples, she at once classified it as an apple tree. To
Gregory, Grace Noir was but a charming and conscientious sympathizer
in his life-work, the atmosphere in which he breathed freest. He had
not breathed freely for half a dozen hours--no wonder he was glad to
see her. To Grace Noir, Hamilton Gregory was but a benefactor to
mankind, a man of lofty ideals whom it was a privilege to aid, and
since she knew that her very eyes gave him strength, no wonder she was
glad to see him.
Could Fran have read their thoughts, she would not have found the
slightest consciousness of any shade of evil in their sympathetic
comradeship. As she could read only their faces, she disliked more
than ever the tall, young, and splendidly formed secretary.
"Oh!" said Grace with restraint, discovering Fran.
"Yes," Fran said with her elfish smile, "back again."
Just without the portal, Hamilton Gregory paused irresolutely. He did
not know what course to pursue, so he repeated vacantly, "I am willing
to pay--"
Fran interrupted flippantly: "I have all the money _I_ want." Then she
passed swiftly into the hall, rudely brushing past the secretary.
Gregory could only follow. He spoke to Grace in a low voice, telling
all he knew of the night wanderer. Her attitude called for
explanations, but he would have given them anyway, in that low
confidential murmur. He did not know why it was--or seek to know--
butwhenever he spoke to Grace, it was natural to use a low tone, as if
modulating his touch to sensitive strings--as if the harmony resulting
from the interplay of their souls called for the soft pedal.
"What is to be done?" Grace inquired. Her attitude of reserve toward
Gregory which Fran's presence had inspired, melted to potential
helpfulness; at the same time, her dislike for the girl solidified.
That Fran should have laughed aloud in the tent, removed her from the
secretary's understanding. But the worst indictment had been
pronounced against her by her own shameless tongue. That one so young,
without a home, without fear of the dark streets, should have all the
money she wants....
"What do you advise?" Gregory asked his secretary gently.
Grace cast a disdainful look at Fran. Then she turned to her employer
and her deliciously curved face changed most charmingly. "I think,"
she responded with a faint shake of rebuke for his leniency, "that you
should not need my advice in this matter." She had occasionally feared
that his irresolution at moments calling for important decisions
hinted at weakness. Why should he stand apparently helpless before
this small bundle of arrogant impudence?
Gregory turned upon Fran with affected harshness. "You must go." He
was annoyed that Grace should imagine him weak.
Fran's face hardened. It became an ax of stone, sharpened at each end,
with eyes, nose, and mouth in a narrow line of cold defiance. To
Grace, the acute wedge of white forehead, gleaming its way to the
roots of the black hair, and the sharp chin cutting its way down from
the tightly drawn mouth, spoke only of cunning. She regarded Fran as a
fox, brought to bay.
Fran spoke with calm deliberation: "I am not going away."
"I would advise you," said Grace, looking down at her from under
drooping lids, "to go at once, for a storm is rising. Do you want to
be caught in the rain?"
Fran looked up at Grace, undaunted. "I want to speak to Mr. Gregory.
If you are the manager of this house, he and I can go outdoors. I
don't mind getting wet. I've been in all kinds of weather."
Grace looked at Gregory, Her silences were effective weapons.
"I have no secrets from this lady," he said, looking into Grace's
eyes, answering her silence. "What do you want to say to me, child?"
Fran shrugged her shoulders, always looking at Grace, while neither of
the others looked at her. "Very well, then, of course it doesn't
matter to me, but I thought it might to Mr. Gregory. Since he hasn't
any secrets from you, of course he has told you that one of nearly
twenty years ago--"
It was not the rumble of distant thunder, but a strange exclamation
from the man that interrupted her; it was some such cry as human
creatures may have uttered before the crystallizing of recurring
experiences into the terms of speech.
Fran gave quick, relentless blows: "Of course he has told you all
about his Springfield life--"
"Silence!" shouted Gregory, quivering from head to foot. The word was
like an imprecation, and for a time it kept hissing between his locked
teeth.
"And of course," Fran continued, tilting up her chin as if to drive in
the words, "since you know all of his secrets--_all_ of them--you have
naturally been told the most important one. And so you know that when
he was boarding with his cousin in Springfield and attending the
college there, something like twenty years ago--"
"Leave us!" Gregory cried, waving a violent arm at his secretary, as
if to sweep her beyond the possibility of overhearing another word.
"Leave you--with _her_?" Grace stammered, too amazed by his attitude
to feel offended.
"Yes, yes, yes! Go at once!" He seemed the victim of some mysterious
terror.
Grace compressed her full lips till they were thinned to a white line.
"Do you mean for ever?"
"Oh, Grace--I beg your pardon--Miss Grace--I don't mean that, of
course. What could I do without you? Nothing, nothing, Grace--you are
the soul of my work. Don't look at me so cruelly."
"Then you just mean," Grace said steadily, "for me to go away for a
little while?"
"Only half an hour; that's all. Only half an hour, and then come back
to me, and I will explain."
"You needn't go at all, on my account," observed Fran, with a twist of
her mouth. "It's nothing to me whether you go or stay."
"She has learned a secret," Gregory stammered, "that vitally affects--
affects some people--some friends of mine. I must talk to her about--
about that secret, just for a little while. Half an hour, Miss Grace,
that is all. That is really all--then come back to me. You understand
that it's on account of the secret that I ask you to leave us. You
understand that I would never send you away from me if I had my way,
don't you, Grace?"
"I understand that you want me to go _now_," Grace Noir replied,
unresponsive. She ascended the stairway, at each step seeming to mount
that much the higher into an atmosphere of righteous remoteness.
No one who separated Gregory from his secretary could enjoy his
toleration, but Fran had struck far below the surface of likings and
dislikings. She had turned back the covering of conventionality to lay
bare the quivering heartstrings of life itself. There was no time to
hesitate. The stone ax which on other occasions might be a laughing
elfish face was now held ready for battle.
"Hadn't we better go in a room where we can talk privately?" Fran
asked. "I don't like this hall. That woman would just as soon listen
over the banisters as not. I've seen lots of people like her, and I
understand her kind."