The Best of Mary Roberts Rinehart

by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  On the day, then, that David first sat up in bed Clare went to the house and took her place in the waiting-room. She was dressed with extreme care, and she carried a parasol. With it, while she waited, she drilled small nervous indentations in the old office carpet, and formulated her line of action.

  Nevertheless she found it hard to begin.

  "I don't want to keep you, if you're busy," she said, avoiding his eyes. "If you are in a hurry--"

  "This is my business," he said patiently. And waited.

  "I wonder if you are going to understand me, when I do begin?"

  "You sound alarmingly ominous." He smiled at her, and she had a moment of panic. "You don't look like a young lady with anything eating at her damask cheek, or however it goes."

  "Doctor Livingstone," she said suddenly, "people are saying something about you that you ought to know."

  He stared at her, amazed and incredulous.

  "About me? What can they say? That's absurd."

  "I felt you ought to know. Of course I don't believe it. Not for a moment. But you know what this town is."

  "I know it's a very good town," he said steadily. "However, let's have it. I daresay it is not very serious."

  She was uneasy enough by that time, and rather frightened when she had finished. For he sat, quiet and rather pale, not looking at her at all, but gazing fixedly at an old daguerreotype of David that stood on his desk. One that Lucy had shown him one day and which he had preempted; David at the age of eight, in a small black velvet suit and with very thin legs.

  "I thought you ought to know," she justified herself, nervously.

  Dick got up.

  "Yes," he said. "I ought to know, of course. Thank you."

  When she had gone he went back and stood before the picture again. From Clare's first words he had had a stricken conviction that the thing was true; that, as Mrs. Cook Morgan's visitor from Wyoming had insisted, Henry Livingstone had never married, never had a son. He stood and gazed at the picture. His world had collapsed about him, but he was steady and very erect.

  "David, David!" he thought. "Why did you do it? And what am I? And who?"

  Characteristically his first thought after that was of David himself. Whatever David had done, his motive had been right. He would have to start with that. If David had built for him a false identity it was because there was a necessity for it. Something shameful, something he was to be taken away from. Wasn't it probable that David had heard the gossip, and had then collapsed? Wasn't the fear that he himself would hear it behind David's insistence that he go to Baltimore?

  His thoughts flew to Elizabeth. Everything was changed now, as to Elizabeth. He would have to be very certain of that past of his before he could tell her that he loved her, and he had a sense of immediate helplessness. He could not go to David, as things were. To Lucy?

  Probably he would have gone to Lucy at once, but the telephone rang. He answered it, got his hat and bag and went out to the car. Years with David had made automatic the subordination of self to the demands of the practice.

  At half past six Lucy heard him come in and go into his office. When he did not immediately reappear and take his flying run up the stairs to David's room, she stood outside the office door and listened. She had a premonition of something wrong, something of the truth, perhaps. Anyhow, she tapped at the door and opened it, to find him sitting very quietly at his desk with his head in his hands.

  "Dick!" she exclaimed. "Is anything wrong?"

  "I have a headache," he said. He looked at his watch and got up. "I'll take a look at David, and then we'll have dinner. I didn't know it was so late."

  But when she had gone out he did not immediately move. He had been going over again, painfully and carefully, the things that puzzled him, that he had accepted before without dispute. David and Lucy's reluctance to discuss his father; the long days in the cabin, with David helping him to reconstruct his past; the spring, and that slow progress which now he felt, somehow, had been an escape.

  He ate very little dinner, and Lucy's sense of dread increased. When, after the meal, she took refuge in her sitting-room on the lower floor and picked up her knitting, it was with a conviction that it was only a temporary reprieve. She did not know from what.

  She heard him, some time later, coming down from David's room. But he did not turn into his office. Instead, he came on to her door, stood for a moment like a man undecided, then came in. She did not look up, even when very gently he took her knitting from her and laid it on the table.

  "Aunt Lucy."

  "Yes, Dick."

  "Don't you think we'd better have a talk?"

  "What about?" she asked, with her heart hammering.

  "About me." He stood above her, and looked down, still with the tenderness with which he always regarded her, but with resolution in his very attitude. "First of all, I'll tell you something. Then I'll ask you to tell me all you can."

  She yearned over him as he told her, for all her terror. His voice, for all its steadiness, was strained.

  "I have felt for some time," he finished, "that you and David were keeping something from me. I think, now, that this is what it was. Of course, you realize that I shall have to know."

  "Dick! Dick!" was all she could say.

  "I was about," he went on, with his almost terrible steadiness, "to ask a girl to take my name. I want to know if I have a name to offer her. I have, you see, only two alternatives to believe about myself. Either I am Henry Livingstone's illegitimate son, and in that case I have no right to my name, or to offer it to any one, or I am--"

  He made a despairing gesture.

  "--or I am some one else, some one who was smuggled out of the mountains and given an identity that makes him a living lie."

  Always she had known that this might come some time, but always too she had seen David bearing the brunt of it. He should bear it. It was not of her doing or of her approving. For years the danger of discovery had hung over her like a cloud.

  "Do you know which?" he persisted.

  "Yes, Dick."

  "Would you have the unbelievable cruelty not to tell me?"

  She got up, a taut little figure with a dignity born of her fear and of her love for him.

  "I shall not betray David's confidence," she said. "Long ago I warned him that this time would come. I was never in favor of keeping you in ignorance. But it is David's problem, and I cannot take the responsibility of telling you."

  He knew her determination and her obstinate loyalty. But he was fairly desperate.

  "You know that if you don't tell me, I shall go to David?"

  "If you go now you will kill him."

  "It's as bad as that, is it?" he asked grimly. "Then there is something shameful behind it, is there?"

  "No, no, Dick. Not that. And I want you, always, to remember this. What David did was out of love for you. He has made many sacrifices for you. First he saved your life, and then he made you what you are. And he has had a great pride in it. Don't destroy his work of years."

  Her voice broke and she turned to go out, her chin quivering, but half way to the door he called to her.

  "Aunt Lucy--" he said gently.

  She heard him behind her, felt his strong arms as he turned her about. He drew her to him and stooping, kissed her cheek.

  "You're right," he said. "Always right. I'll not worry him with it. My word of honor. When the time comes he'll tell me, and until it comes, I'll wait. And I love you both. Don't ever forget that."

  He kissed her again and let her go.

  But long after David had put down his prayer-book that night, and after the nurse had rustled down the stairs to the night supper on the dining-room table, Lucy lay awake and listened to Dick's slow pacing of his bedroom floor.

  He was very gentle with David from that time on, and tried to return to his old light-hearted ways. On the day David was to have his first broiled sweetbread he caught the nurse outside, borrowed her cap and apron and carried in the t
ray himself.

  "I hope your food is to your taste, Doctor David," he said, in a high falsetto which set the nurse giggling in the hall. "I may not be much of a nurse, but I can cook."

  Even Lucy was deceived at times. He went his customary round, sent out the monthly bills, opened and answered David's mail, bore the double burden of David's work and his own ungrudgingly, but off guard he was grave and abstracted. He began to look very thin, too, and Lucy often heard him pacing the floor at night. She thought that he seldom or never went to the Wheelers'.

  And so passed the tenth day of David's illness, with the smile on Elizabeth's face growing a trifle fixed as three days went by without the shabby car rattling to the door; with "The Valley" playing its second and final week before going into New York; and with Leslie Ward unconsciously taking up the shuttle Clare had dropped, and carrying the pattern one degree further toward completion.

  XIV

  JUST how Leslie Ward had drifted into his innocuous affair with the star of "The Valley" he was not certain himself. Innocuous it certainly was. Afterwards, looking back, he was to wonder sometimes if it had not been precisely for the purpose it served. But that was long months after. Not until the pattern was completed and he was able to recognize his own work in it.

  The truth was that he was not too happy at home. Nina's smart little house on the Ridgely Road had at first kept her busy. She had spent unlimited time with decorators, had studied and rejected innumerable water-color sketches of interiors, had haunted auction rooms and bid recklessly on things she felt at the moment she could not do without, later on to have to wheedle Leslie into straightening her bank balance. Thought, too, and considerable energy had gone into training and outfitting her servants, and still more into inducing them to wear the expensive uniforms and livery she provided.

  But what she made, so successfully, was a house rather than a home. There were times, indeed, when Leslie began to feel that it was not even a house, but a small hotel. They almost never dined alone, and when they did Nina would explain that everybody was tied up. Then, after dinner, restlessness would seize her, and she would want to run in to the theater, or to make a call. If he refused, she nursed a grievance all evening.

  And he did not like her friends. Things came to a point where, when he knew one of the gay evenings was on, he would stay in town, playing billiards at his club, or occasionally wandering into a theater, where he stood or sat at the back of the house and watched the play with cynical, discontented eyes.

  The casual meeting with Gregory and the introduction to his sister brought a new interest. Perhaps the very novelty was what first attracted him, the oddity of feeling that he was on terms of friendship, for it amounted to that with surprising quickness, with a famous woman, whose face smiled out at him from his morning paper or, huge and shockingly colored, from the sheets on the bill boards.

  He formed the habit of calling on her in the afternoons at her hotel, and he saw that she liked it. It was often lonely, she explained. He sent her flowers and cigarettes, and he found her poised and restful, and sometimes, when she was off guard, with the lines of old suffering in her face.

  She sat still. She didn't fidget, as Nina did. She listened, too. She was not as beautiful as she appeared on the stage, but she was attractive, and he stilled his conscience with the knowledge that she placed no undue emphasis on his visits. In her world men came and went, brought or sent small tribute, and she was pleased and grateful. No more. The next week, or the week after, and other men in other places would be doing the same things.

  But he wondered about her, sometimes. Did she ever think of Judson Clark, and the wreck he had made of her life? What of resentment and sorrow lay behind her quiet face, or the voice with its careful intonations which was so unlike Nina's?

  Now and then he saw her brother. He neither liked nor disliked Gregory, but he suspected him of rather bullying Beverly. On the rare occasions when he saw them together there was a sort of nervous tension in the air, and although Leslie was not subtle he sensed some hidden difference between them. A small incident one day almost brought this concealed dissension to a head. He said to Gregory:

  "By the way, I saw you in Haverly yesterday afternoon."

  "Must have seen somebody else. Haverly? Where's Haverly?"

  Leslie Ward had been rather annoyed. There had been no mistake about the recognition. But he passed it off with that curious sense of sex loyalty that will actuate a man even toward his enemies.

  "Funny," he said. "Chap looked like you. Maybe a little heavier."

  Nevertheless he had a conviction that he had said something better left unsaid, and that Beverly Carlysle's glance at her brother was almost hostile. He had that instantaneous picture of the two of them, the man defiant and somehow frightened, and the woman's eyes anxious and yet slightly contemptuous. Then, in a flash, it was gone.

  He had meant to go home that evening, would have, probably, for he was not ignorant of where he was drifting. But when he went back to the office Nina was on the wire, with the news that they were to go with a party to a country inn.

  "For chicken and waffles, Les," she said. "It will be oceans of fun. And I've promised the cocktails."

  "I'm tired," he replied, sulkily. "And why don't you let some of the other fellows come over with the drinks? It seems to me I'm always the goat."

  "Oh, if that's the way you feel!" Nina said, and hung up the receiver.

  He did not go home. He went to the theater and stood at the back, with his sense of guilt deadened by the knowledge that Nina was having what she would call a heavenly time. After all, it would soon be over. He counted the days. "The Valley" had only four more before it moved on.

  He had already played his small part in the drama that involved Dick Livingstone, but he was unaware of it. He went home that night, to find Nina settled in bed and very sulky, and he retired himself in no pleasant frame of mind. But he took a firmer hold of himself that night before he slept. He didn't want a smash, and yet they might be headed that way. He wouldn't see Beverly Carlysle again.

  He lived up to his resolve the next day, bought his flowers as usual, but this time for Nina and took them with him. And went home with the orchids which were really an offering to his own conscience.

  But Nina was not at home. The butler reported that she was dining at the Wheelers', and he thought the man eyed him with restrained commiseration.

  "Did she say I am expected there?" he asked.

  "She ordered dinner for you here, sir."

  Even for Nina that sounded odd. He took his coat and went out again to the car; after a moment's hesitation he went back and got the orchids.

  Dick Livingstone's machine was at the curb before the Wheeler house, and in the living-room he found Walter Wheeler, pacing the floor. Mr. Wheeler glanced at him and looked away.

  "Anybody sick?" Leslie asked, his feeling of apprehension growing.

  "Nina is having hysterics upstairs," Mr. Wheeler said, and continued his pacing.

  "Nina! Hysterics?"

  "That's what I said," replied Mr. Wheeler, suddenly savage. "You've made a nice mess of things, haven't you?"

  Leslie placed the box of orchids on the table and drew off his gloves. His mind was running over many possibilities.

  "You'd better tell me about it, hadn't you?"

  "Oh, I will. Don't worry. I've seen this coming for months. I'm not taking her part. God knows I know her, and she has as much idea of making a home as--as"--he looked about--"as that poker has. But that's the worst you can say of her. As to you--"

  "Well?"

  Mr. Wheeler's anxiety was greater than his anger. He lowered his voice.

  "She got a bill to-day for two or three boxes of flowers, sent to some actress." And when Leslie said nothing, "I'm not condoning it, mind you. You'd no business to do it. But," he added fretfully, "why the devil, if you've got to act the fool, don't you have your bills sent to your office?"

  "I suppose I don't need to tell yo
u that's all there was to it? Flowers, I mean."

  "I'm taking that for granted. But she says she won't go back."

  Leslie was aghast and frightened. Not at the threat; she would go back, of course. But she would always hold it against him. She cherished small grudges faithfully. And he knew she would never understand, never see her own contribution to his mild defection, nor comprehend the actual innocence of those afternoons of tea and talk.

  There was no sound from upstairs. Mr. Wheeler got his hat and went out, calling to the dog. Jim came in whistling, looked in and said: "Hello, Les," and disappeared. He sat in the growing twilight and cursed himself for a fool. After all, where had he been heading? A man couldn't eat his cake and have it. But he was resentful, too; he stressed rather hard his own innocence, and chose to ignore the less innocent impulse that lay behind it.

  After a half hour or so he heard some one descending and Dick Livingstone appeared in the hall. He called to him, and Dick entered the room. Before he sat down he lighted a cigarette and in the flare of the match Leslie got an impression of fatigue and of something new, of trouble. But his own anxieties obsessed him.

  "She's told you about it, I suppose?"

  "I was a fool, of course. But it was only a matter of a few flowers and some afternoon calls. She's a fine woman, Livingstone, and she is lonely. The women have given her a pretty cold deal since the Clark story. They copy her clothes and her walk, but they don't ask her into their homes."

  "Isn't the trouble more fundamental than that, Ward? I was thinking about it upstairs. Nina was pretty frank. She says you've had your good time and want to settle down, and that she is young and now is her only chance. Later on there may be children, you know. She blames herself, too, but she has a fairly clear idea of how it happened."

  "Do you think she'll go back home?"

  "She promised she would."

  They sat smoking in silence. In the dining-room Annie was laying the table for dinner, and a most untragic odor of new garden peas began to steal along the hall. Dick suddenly stirred and threw away his cigarette.