FIGHTING FOR HER LIFE
The next day found Fran the bluest of the blue. No laughing now, as
she sat alone, half-way up the ladder leading to Gregory's barn-loft.
She meant to be just as miserable as she pleased, since there was no
observer to be deceived by sowing cheat-seed of merriment.
"The battle's on now, to a finish," muttered Fran despondently, "yet
here I sit, and here I scrooch." With her skirts gathered up in a
listless arm till they were unbecomingly abridged, with every muscle
and fiber seeming to sag like an ill-supported fence, Fran's thoughts
were at the abysmal stage of discouragement. For a time, there seemed
in her heart not the tiniest taper alight, and in this blackness, both
hope and failure were alike indistinguishable.
"But we'll see," she cried, at last coming down the ladder, "we'll
see!" and she clenched her fists, flung open the barn-door and marched
upon the house with battle in her eyes. Girding up her loins--that is,
smoothing her hair--and sharpening her weapons for instant use, she
opened the library door.
She knew Grace Noir had gone to the city with Robert Clinton, and yet
her feeling on seeing Hamilton Gregory alone, was akin to surprise.
How queerly lonesome he looked, without his secretary! There was
something ghostly about Grace Noir's typewriter--it seemed to have
fallen into Fran's power like an enemy's trophy too easily captured.
The pens and pencils were at her mercy, so readily surrendered that
they suggested treachery. Did an ambuscade await her? But impossible--
no train returned from the city until nine in the evening, and it was
now only three in the afternoon--six hours of clear field.
She found the philanthropist immersed in day-dreams. So deep was he
below the surface of every-day thoughts, that he might be likened to a
man walking on the floor of the sea. The thought of the good his money
and influence were accomplishing thrilled his soul, while through the
refined ether of this pious joy appeared the loveliness of Grace Noir,
lending something like spiritual sensuousness to his vision of duty.
He did not want the applause of the general public any more than he
wanted his past unearthed. It was enough if his philanthropy was known
to God and Grace Noir. She stood, to his mind, as a symbol of
religion--there can be no harm in reverencing symbols.
Fran's eyes drew him abruptly from the bottom of the sea. He emerged,
chilled and trembling. "Fran," he said, as if she had appeared in
answer to a summons, "I am unhappy about you. Your determination to
have nothing to do with the church not only distresses but embarrasses
me. You have insisted on coming into my life. Then why do you disgrace
it? You pretend that you want to be liked by us, yet you play cards
with strangers at night--it's outrageous. You even threw a card in my
yard where a card was never seen before."
"Do you think cards so very wicked?" asked Fran, looking at him
curiously.
"You know what I think. I look on gambling as immoral. But it ought to
be enough for me simply to forbid it. Cards, and dancing, and the
theater--these things are what destroy the influence of the church."
"And not going to the meeting-house," remarked Fran, with quiet
irony,--"that's perfectly dreadful."
She closed the door, and placed her back against it. A shake of her
head seemed to throw aside what they had been saying as of no more
importance than the waving tresses of black hair. She looked him in
the eyes, and said abruptly--
"I want to be your secretary."
Hamilton gripped his chair. He found the air hard to breathe after his
submarine inaction--doubtless he had stayed under too long. "I _have_
a secretary," he retorted, looking at her resentfully. He checked
words he would have liked to utter, on reflecting that his secret was
in Fran's keeping. She need but declare it, and his picture would
blossom forth in all the papers of the big cities. How Grace would
shrink from him, if she knew the truth--how that magnificent figure
would turn its back upon him--and those scornful, imperious, never-
faltering eyes...
Fran drew nearer. She seated herself upon the arm of a chair, one foot
on the floor, and spoke with restrained intensity: "I'm well enough
educated. I can take dictation and make good copy."
He allowed his tone to sound defiance--"I already have a secretary."
Fran continued with an effort, "Mother didn't like studying, very
well, but she was determined to get me out of the condition I was born
in; she taught me all she knew. When I caught up, she'd go digging
ahead on her own account to pull me a little higher. Wasn't she
splendid! So patient--" Fran paused, and stared straight before her,
straight into the memory of her mother's eyes.
Gregory reflected--"If this child had not come, had not intruded
herself upon my life! Haven't I suffered enough for my follies?"
"When mother died," Fran resumed, "she thought maybe Uncle Ephraim had
mellowed, so I went to him, because I thought I couldn't get along
without love." She shook her head, with a pathetic little smile. "But
I could! Uncle Ephraim didn't mellow, he dried up. He blamed me for
being born--I think, myself, it was a mistake. He turned me out, but I
was so tough I just couldn't be winter-killed. After that I went back
to the show and stocked up in experience. I mention it to point out
that a mild little job like being your private secretary wouldn't
strain a muscle. I expect I could even be a foreign secretary. It's as
easy to walk a rope that's rigged high, as one near the ground. All
the trouble is in the imagination."
Gregory's voice cut across hers, showing no comprehension of her last
words: "My secretary must be in sympathy with my work. To exercise
such talents as I have, is my religion, and I need a helper whose eyes
are fixed upon the higher life. This is final, and the subject must
never be reopened. I find it very painful."
Fran's discovery that he had not heard her plea, crimsoned her face.
She jumped from the armchair, breathing rapidly. "Then," she cried,
"if you won't have me, get another. The one you have must go."
"She shall do nothing of the sort," he coldly responded.
"Yes," Fran retorted violently, "I tell you she must go!" He struck
the table with his palm. "Never!"
"Shall I use my last resource?" Fran's eyes gleamed ominously.
The hand upon the table became a fist. That was his only reply.
"I would entreat you," said Fran, faltering, "and with tears--but what
good would it do? None. There's no use for one woman to weep if
another woman is smiling. Dismiss your secretary."
He leaned toward her from over the table, and spoke in a low level
tone: "I am going to appeal to your better nature. Think of the girls
of the street who need rescue, and the women of the cities who are
dying from neglect and vice. If you hinder my work, let the souls of
these outcasts be upon your soul! You can ruin me, but not without
ruining my good works. I don't ask you to keep silent on my account--
what am I but an instrument in the hands of Providence?--but for the
sake of the homeless thousands. I have atoned for my past, but the
world, always ready to crucify the divine, would rejoice to point the
finger of scorn at me, as if I were still the fool of twenty years
ago."
"But your secretary--"
"She is a vital factor in my work. Remove her, and the work ceases."
"How important!" cried Fran, throwing back her head. "What will God
dowhen she dies?"
"Perhaps I have gone too far. Still, it would be impossible to replace
her."
Fran made a step toward him--"My mother was replaced."
He started up. "You shall not speak of that. She lived her life, and I
demand the right to live mine. I tell you, the past is ended."
"But I am here," returned Fran. "I have not ended. Can't you look into
my face and see my mother living? She paid for her secret marriage,
wandering over the face of the earth with her baby, trying to find
you. I don't deny that you've paid for all--yes, even for your
desertion and your living a hidden life in this town. Maybe you've
suffered enough. But that isn't the question. Look at me. I am here. I
have come as truly out of your past as out of the past of my darling,
uncomplaining--what did you call her?--'_friend_'. And being here, I
ask, 'What will you do with me?' All I want is--just a little love."
The long loneliness of her life found expression in the eager voice,
in the yearning eyes. As he stared at her, half-stupefied, he imagined
she was holding out her arms to him in pleading. But it was not this
erect form, slight and tense, that reached forth as if to clasp him to
her heart; it was a memory of his youth, a memory that in some
oddmanner blurred his perception of the living presence. From the
fragile body of Fran, something leaped toward him, enveloping, overpowering.
It was partly Fran, and partly somebody else--how well he knew that
other somebody, that dead woman who had found reincarnation in the
soul of this wanderer.
She thought his covered face a token of weakening. "You must have
loved my mother once. Is it all so dead and forgotten that there is
none left for your child?"
But she was seeking to play upon strings that had long since ceased to
vibrate. He could not bring back, even in retrospect, the emotions
inspired by Josephine Derry. Those strings had been tuned to other
love-harmonies. To remember Fran's mother was to bring back not the
rapture of a first passion, but the garrish days of disillusionment.
He even felt something like resentment because she had remained
faithful--her search and unending love for him made so much more of
his desertion than ever he had made.
He could not tell Fran that he had never loved her mother. The dead
must not be reproached; the living could not be denied--so he was
silent.
His silence inspired Fran with hope. "I am so lonely, so lonely!" she
murmured plaintively, "so very lonely! There seems a reason for
everybody but me--I can't be explained. That's why I am disliked. If
there could be one heart for me to claim--whose heart should it be?
Does no sort of feeling tell you whose heart it should be?"
"Of course you are lonely, child, but that is your fault. You are in
this house on a footing of equality, and all seem to like you, except
Miss Grace--and I must say, her disapproval disturbs you very little.
But you won't adopt our ways. You get yourself virtually expelled from
school--do you blame me for that? You won't go to church--can you
expect church people to like you? You make everybody talk by your
indiscreet behavior--then wonder that the town shuns your society, and
complain because you feel lonesome!"
Fran's eyes filled with tears. "If you believe in me--if you try to
like me--that's all I ask. The whole town can talk, if I have you. I
don't care for the world and its street corners--there are no street
corners in my world."
"But, child--"
"You never call me Fran if you can help it," she interposed
passionately." Even the dogs have names. Call me by mine; it's Fran.
Say it, say it. Call me--oh, father, _father_. I want your love."
"Hush!" he gasped, ashen pale. "You will be overheard."
She extended her arms wildly: "What do you know about God, except that
He's _Father_. That's all--Father--and you worship Him as His son. Yet
you want me to care for your religion. Then why don't you show me the
way to God? Can you love Him and deny your own child? Am I to pray to
Him as my Father in Heaven, but not dare acknowledge my father on
earth? No! I don't know how others feel, but I'll have to reach
heavenly things through human things. And I tell you that you are
standing between me and God, just as the lives of so many Christians
hide God from the world."
"Hush, hush!" cried Gregory. "Child! this is sacrilege!"
"No, it is not. I tell you, I can't see God, because you're in the
way. You pray 'Our Father who art in Heaven...give us this day our
daily bread.' And I pray to you, and I say, My father here on earth,
give me--give me--your love. That's what I want--nothing else--I want
it so bad...I'm dying for it, father, can't you understand? Look--I'm
praying for it--" She threw herself wildly at his feet.
Deeply moved, he tried to lift her from the ground.
"No," cried Fran, scarcely knowing what she said, "I will not get up
till you grant my prayer. I'm not asking for the full rich love a
child has the right to expect--but give me a crust, to keep me alive--
father, give me my daily bread. You needn't think God is going to
answer your prayers, if you refuse mine."
Hamilton Gregory took her in his arms and held her to his breast.
"Fran," he said brokenly, "my unfortunate child...my daughter--oh,
why were you born?"
"Yes," sobbed Fran, resting her head upon his bosom, "yes, why was I
born?"
"You break my heart," he sobbed with her.
"Fran, say the word, and I will tell everything; I will acknowledge
you as my daughter, and if my wife--"
Fran shook her head. "You owe no more to my mother than to her," she
said, catching her breath. "No, the secret must be kept--always.
Nothing belongs to us but the future, since even the present belongs
to the past. Father--I must never call you that except when we are
alone--I must always whisper it, like a prayer--father, let me be your
secretary."
It was strange that this request should surround Fran with the chill
atmosphere of a tomb. His embrace relaxed insensibly. His moment of
self-abnegation had passed, and life appeared suddenly at the level.
He looked at his daughter in frightened bewilderment, as if afraid she
had drawn him too far from his security for further hiding. During the
silence, she awaited his decision.
It was because of her tumultuous emotions that she failed to hear
advancing footsteps.
"Some one is coming," he exclaimed, with ill-concealed relief. "We
mustn't be seen thus--we would be misunderstood." He strode to the
window, and pretended to look out. His face cleared momentarily.
The door opened, and Grace Noir started in, then paused significantly.
"Am I interrupting?" she asked, in quietest accent.
"Certainly not," Gregory breathed freedom. His surprise was so joyful
that he was carried beyond himself. "Grace! It's Grace! Then you
didn't go to the city with Bob. There wasn't any train--"
"I am here--" began Grace easily--
"Yes, of course, that's the main thing," his delight could not be held
in check. "You are here, indeed! And you are looking--I mean you look
well--I mean you are not ill--your return is so unexpected."
"I am here," she steadily persisted, "because I learned something that
affects my interests. I went part of the way with Mr. Clinton, but
after thinking over what had been told me, I decided to leave the
train at the next station. I have been driven back in a carriage. I
may as well tell you, Mr. Gregory, that I am urged to accept a
responsible position in Chicago."
He understood that she referred to marriage with Robert Clinton.
"But--" he began, very pale.
She repeated, "A responsible position in Chicago. And I was told, this
morning, that while I was away, Fran meant to apply for the
secretaryship, thus taking advantage of my absence."
Fran's face looked oddly white and old, in its oval of black hair.
"Who told you this truth?" she demanded, with a menacing gleam of
teeth.
"Who knew of your intentions?" the other gracefully said. "But that is
no matter. The point is that I have this Chicago opportunity. So if
Mr. Gregory wants to employ you, I must know it at once, to make my
arrangements accordingly."
"Can you imagine," Hamilton cried reproachfully, "that without any
warning, I would make a change? Certainly not. I have no intention of
employing Fran. The idea is impossible. More than that, it is--er--it
is absolutely preposterous. Would I calmly tear down what you and I
have been building up so carefully?"
"Then you had already refused Fran before I came?"
"I had--hadn't I, Fran?"
Fran gave her father a look such as had never before come into her
dark eyes--a look of reproach, a look that said, "I can not fight back
because of the agony in my heart." She went away silent and with
downcast head.