The Best of Gene Stratton-Porter

by Gene Stratton-Porter

  The eyes of the father were very bright.

  “The friend for whom you wanted the moth is a girl?” he asked indifferently, as he ran the book leaves through his fingers.

  “The girl of whom I wrote you last summer, and told you about in the fall. I helped her all the time I was away.”

  “Did Edith know of her?”

  “I tried many times to tell her, to interest her, but she was so indifferent that it was insulting. She would not hear me.”

  “We are neither one in any condition to sleep. Why don’t you begin at the first and tell me about this girl? To think of other matters for a time may clear our vision for a sane solution of this. Who is she, just what is she doing, and what is she like? You know I was reared among those Limberlost people, I can understand readily. What is her name and where does she live?”

  Philip gave a man’s version of the previous summer, while his father played with the book industriously.

  “You are very sure as to her refinement and education?”

  “In almost two months’ daily association, could a man be mistaken? She can far and away surpass Polly, Edith, or any girl of our set on any common, high school, or supplementary branch, and you know high schools have French, German, and physics now. Besides, she is a graduate of two other institutions. All her life she has been in the school of Hard Knocks. She has the biggest, tenderest, most human heart I ever knew in a girl. She has known life in its most cruel phases, and instead of hardening her, it has set her trying to save other people suffering. Then this nature position of which I told you; she graduated in the School of the Woods, before she secured that. The Bird Woman, whose work you know, helped her there. Elnora knows more interesting things in a minute than any other girl I ever met knew in an hour, provided you are a person who cares to understand plant and animal life.”

  The book leaves slid rapidly through his fingers as the father drawled: “What sort of looking girl is she?”

  “Tall as Edith, a little heavier, pink, even complexion, wide open blue-gray eyes with heavy black brows, and lashes so long they touch her cheeks. She has a rope of waving, shining hair that makes a real crown on her head, and it appears almost red in the light. She is as handsome as any fair woman I ever saw, but she doesn’t know it. Every time any one pays her a compliment, her mother, who is a caution, discovers that, for some reason, the girl is a fright, so she has no appreciation of her looks.”

  “And you were in daily association two months with a girl like that! How about it, Phil?”

  “If you mean, did I trifle with her, no!” cried Philip hotly. “I told her the second time I met her all about Edith. Almost every day I wrote to Edith in her presence. Elnora gathered violets and made a fancy basket to put them in for Edith’s birthday. I started to err in too open admiration for Elnora, but her mother brought me up with a whirl I never forgot. Fifty times a day in the swamps and forests Elnora made a perfect picture, but I neither looked nor said anything. I never met any girl so downright noble in bearing and actions. I never hated anything as I hated leaving her, for we were dear friends, like two wholly congenial men. Her mother was almost always with us. She knew how much I admired Elnora, but so long as I concealed it from the girl, the mother did not care.”

  “Yet you left such a girl and came back whole-hearted to Edith Carr!”

  “Surely! You know how it has been with me about Edith all my life.”

  “Yet the girl you picture is far her superior to an unprejudiced person, when thinking what a man would require in a wife to be happy.”

  “I never have thought what I would ‘require’ to be happy! I only thought whether I could make Edith happy. I have been an idiot! What I’ve borne you’ll never know! To-night is only one of many outbursts like that, in varying and lesser degrees.”

  “Phil, I love you, when you say you have thought only of Edith! I happen to know that it is true. You are my only son, and I have had a right to watch you closely. I believe you utterly. Any one who cares for you as I do, and has had my years of experience in this world over yours, knows that in some ways, to-night would be a blessed release, if you could take it; but you cannot! Go to bed now, and rest. To-morrow, go back to her and fix it up.”

  “You heard what I said when I left her! I said it because something in my heart died a minute before that, and I realized that it was my love for Edith Carr. Never again will I voluntarily face such a scene. If she can act like that at a ball, before hundreds, over a thing of which I thought nothing at all, she would go into actual physical fits and spasms, over some of the household crises I’ve seen the mater meet with a smile. Sir, it is truth that I have thought only of her up to the present. Now, I will admit I am thinking about myself. Father, did you see her? Life is too short, and it can be too sweet, to throw it away in a battle with an unrestrained woman. I am no fighter—where a girl is concerned, anyway. I respect and love her or I do nothing. Never again is either respect or love possible between me and Edith Carr. Whenever I think of her in the future, I will see her as she was to-night. But I can’t face the crowd just yet. Could you spare me a few days?”

  “It is only ten days until you were to go north for the summer, go now.”

  “I don’t want to go north. I don’t want to meet people I know. There, the story would precede me. I do not need pitying glances or rough condolences. I wonder if I could not hide at Uncle Ed’s in Wisconsin for awhile?”

  The book closed suddenly. The father leaned across the table and looked into the son’s eyes.

  “Phil, are you sure of what you just have said?”

  “Perfectly sure!”

  “Do you think you are in any condition to decide to-night?”

  “Death cannot return to life, father. My love for Edith Carr is dead. I hope never to see her again.”

  “If I thought you could be certain so soon! But, come to think of it, you are very like me in many ways. I am with you in this. Public scenes and disgraces I would not endure. It would be over with me, were I in your position, that I know.”

  “It is done for all time,” said Philip Ammon. “Let us not speak of it further.”

  “Then, Phil,” the father leaned closer and looked at the son tenderly, “Phil, why don’t you go to the Limberlost?”

  “Father!”

  “Why not? No one can comfort a hurt heart like a tender woman; and, Phil, have you ever stopped to think that you may have a duty in the Limberlost, if you are free? I don’t know! I only suggest it. But, for a country schoolgirl, unaccustomed to men, two months with a man like you might well awaken feelings of which you do not think. Because you were safe-guarded is no sign the girl was. She might care to see you. You can soon tell. With you, she comes next to Edith, and you have made it clear to me that you appreciate her in many ways above. So I repeat it, why not go to the Limberlost?”

  A long time Philip Ammon sat in deep thought. At last he raised his head.

  “Well, why not!” he said. “Years could make me no surer than I am now, and life is short. Please ask Banks to get me some coffee and toast, and I will bathe and dress so I can take the early train.”

  “Go to your bath. I will attend to your packing and everything. And Phil, if I were you, I would leave no addresses.”

  “Not an address!” said Philip. “Not even Polly.”

  When the train pulled out, the elder Ammon went home to find Hart Henderson waiting.

  “Where is Phil?” he demanded.

  “He did not feel like facing his friends at present, and I am just back from driving him to the station. He said he might go to Siam, or Patagonia. He would leave no address.”

  Henderson almost staggered. “He’s not gone? And left no address? You don’t mean it! He’ll never forgive her!”

  “Never is a long time, Hart,” said Mr. Ammon. “And it seems even longer to those of us who are well acquainted with Phil. Last night was not the last straw. It was the whole straw-stack. It crushed Phil so far as she is conc
erned. He will not see her again voluntarily, and he will not forget if he does. You can take it from him, and from me, we have accepted the lady’s decision. Will you have a cup of coffee?”

  Twice Henderson opened his lips to speak of Edith Carr’s despair. Twice he looked into the stern, inflexible face of Mr. Ammon and could not betray her. He held out the ring.

  “I have no instructions as to that,” said the elder Ammon, drawing back. “Possibly Miss Carr would have it as a keepsake.”

  “I am sure not,” said Henderson curtly.

  “Then suppose you return it to Peacock. I will phone him. He will give you the price of it, and you might add it to the children’s Fresh Air Fund. We would be obliged if you would do that. No one here cares to handle the object.”

  “As you choose,” said Henderson. “Good morning!”

  Then he went to his home, but he could not think of sleep. He ordered breakfast, but he could not eat. He paced the library for a time, but it was too small. Going on the streets he walked until exhausted, then he called a hansom and was driven to his club. He had thought himself familiar with every depth of suffering; that night had taught him that what he felt for himself was not to be compared with the anguish which wrung his heart over the agony of Edith Carr. He tried to blame Philip Ammon, but being an honest man, Henderson knew that was unjust. The fault lay wholly with her, but that only made it harder for him, as he realized it would in time for her.

  As he sauntered into the room an attendant hurried to him.

  “You are wanted most urgently at the ’phone, Mr. Henderson,” he said. “You have had three calls from Main 5770.”

  Henderson shivered as he picked down the receiver and gave the call.

  “Is that you, Hart?” came Edith’s voice.

  “Yes.”

  “Did you find Phil?”

  “No.”

  “Did you try?”

  “Yes. As soon as I left you I went straight there.”

  “Wasn’t he home yet?”

  “He has been home and gone again.”

  “Gone!”

  The cry tore Henderson’s heart.

  “Shall I come and tell you, Edith?”

  “No! Tell me now.”

  “When I reached the house Banks said Mr. Ammon and Phil were out in the motor, so I waited. Mr. Ammon came back soon. Edith, are you alone?”

  “Yes. Go on!”

  “Call your maid. I can’t tell you until some one is with you.”

  “Tell me instantly!”

  “Edith, he said he had been to the station. He said Phil had started to Siam or Patagonia, he didn’t know which, and left no address. He said—”

  Distinctly Henderson heard her fall. He set the buzzer ringing, and in a few seconds heard voices, so he knew she had been found. Then he crept into a private den and shook with a hard, nervous chill.

  The next day Edith Carr started on her trip to Europe. Henderson felt certain she hoped to meet Philip there. He was sure she would be disappointed, though he had no idea where Ammon could have gone. But after much thought he decided he would see Edith soonest by remaining at home, so he spent the summer in Chicago.

  Chapter 21

  Wherein Philip Ammon Returns to the Limberlost, and Elnora Studies the Situation

  “We must be thinking about supper, mother,” said Elnora, while she set the wings of a Cecropia with much care. “It seems as if I can’t get enough to eat, or enough of being at home. I enjoyed that city house. I don’t believe I could have done my work if I had been compelled to walk back and forth. I thought at first I never wanted to come here again. Now, I feel as if I could not live anywhere else.”

  “Elnora,” said Mrs. Comstock, “there’s some one coming down the road.”

  “Coming here, do you think?”

  “Yes, coming here, I suspect.”

  Elnora glanced quickly at her mother and then turned to the road as Philip Ammon reached the gate.

  “Careful, mother!” the girl instantly warned. “If you change your treatment of him a hair’s breadth, he will suspect. Come with me to meet him.”

  She dropped her work and sprang up.

  “Well, of all the delightful surprises!” she cried.

  She was a trifle thinner than during the previous summer. On her face there was a more mature, patient look, but the sun struck her bare head with the same ray of red gold. She wore one of the old blue gingham dresses, open at the throat and rolled to the elbows. Mrs. Comstock did not appear at all the same woman, but Philip saw only Elnora; heard only her greeting. He caught both hands where she offered but one.

  “Elnora,” he cried, “if you were engaged to me, and we were at a ball, among hundreds, where I offended you very much, and didn’t even know I had done anything, and if I asked you before all of them to allow me to explain, to forgive me, to wait, would your face grow distorted and unfamiliar with anger? Would you drop my ring on the floor and insult me repeatedly? Oh Elnora, would you?”

  Elnora’s big eyes seemed to leap, while her face grew very white. She drew away her hands.

  “Hush, Phil! Hush!” she protested. “That fever has you again! You are dreadfully ill. You don’t know what you are saying.”

  “I am sleepless and exhausted; I’m heartsick; but I am well as I ever was. Answer me, Elnora, would you?”

  “Answer nothing!” cried Mrs. Comstock. “Answer nothing! Hang your coat there on your nail, Phil, and come split some kindling. Elnora, clean away that stuff, and set the table. Can’t you see the boy is starved and tired? He’s come home to rest and eat a decent meal. Come on, Phil!”

  Mrs. Comstock marched away, and Philip hung his coat in its old place and followed. Out of sight and hearing she turned on him.

  “Do you call yourself a man or a hound?” she flared.

  “I beg your pardon—” stammered Philip Ammon.

  “I should think you would!” she ejaculated. “I’ll admit you did the square thing and was a man last summer, though I’d liked it better if you’d faced up and told me you were promised; but to come back here babying, and take hold of Elnora like that, and talk that way because you have had a fuss with your girl, I don’t tolerate. Split that kindling and I’ll get your supper, and then you better go. I won’t have you working on Elnora’s big heart, because you have quarrelled with some one else. You’ll have it patched up in a week and be gone again, so you can go right away.”

  “Mrs. Comstock, I came to ask Elnora to marry me.”

  “The more fool you, then!” cried Mrs. Comstock. “This time yesterday you were engaged to another woman, no doubt. Now, for some little flare-up you come racing here to use Elnora as a tool to spite the other girl. A week of sane living, and you will be sorry and ready to go back to Chicago, or, if you really are man enough to be sure of yourself, she will come to claim you. She has her rights. An engagement of years is a serious matter, and not broken for a whim. If you don’t go, she’ll come. Then, when you patch up your affairs and go sailing away together, where does my girl come in?”

  “I am a lawyer, Mrs. Comstock,” said Philip. “It appeals to me as beneath your ordinary sense of justice to decide a case without hearing the evidence. It is due me that you hear me first.”

  “Hear your side!” flashed Mrs. Comstock. “I’d a heap sight rather hear the girl!”

  “I wish to my soul that you had heard and seen her last night, Mrs. Comstock,” said Ammon. “Then, my way would be clear. I never even thought of coming here to-day. I’ll admit I would have come in time, but not for many months. My father sent me.”

  “Your father sent you! Why?”

  “Father, mother, and Polly were present last night. They, and all my friends, saw me insulted and disgraced in the worst exhibition of uncontrolled temper any of us ever witnessed. All of them knew it was the end. Father liked what I had told him of Elnora, and he advised me to come here, so I came. If she does not want me, I can leave instantly, but, oh I hoped she would understand!”<
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  “You people are not splitting wood,” called Elnora.

  “Oh yes we are!” answered Mrs. Comstock. “You set out the things for biscuit, and lay the table.” She turned again to Philip. “I know considerable about your father,” she said. “I have met your Uncle’s family frequently this winter. I’ve heard your Aunt Anna say that she didn’t at all like Miss Carr, and that she and all your family secretly hoped that something would happen to prevent your marrying her. That chimes right in with your saying that your father sent you here. I guess you better speak your piece.”

  Philip gave his version of the previous night.

  “Do you believe me?” he finished.

  “Yes,” said Mrs. Comstock.

  “May I stay?”

  “Oh, it looks all right for you, but what about her?”

  “Nothing, so far as I am concerned. Her plans were all made to start to Europe to-day. I suspect she is on the way by this time. Elnora is very sensible, Mrs. Comstock. Hadn’t you better let her decide this?”

  “The final decision rests with her, of course,” admitted Mrs. Comstock. “But look you one thing! She’s all I have. As Solomon says, ‘she is the one child, the only child of her mother.’ I’ve suffered enough in this world that I fight against any suffering which threatens her. So far as I know you’ve always been a man, and you may stay. But if you bring tears and heartache to her, don’t have the assurance to think I’ll bear it tamely. I’ll get right up and fight like a catamount, if things go wrong for Elnora!”