CHAPTER III
IN DARKEST CHICAGO
The castaways from the wrecked taxicab hurried along the dolefulstreet. Both of them knew their Chicago, but this part of it was nottheir Chicago.
They hailed a pedestrian, to ask where the nearest street car linemight be, and whither it might run. He answered indistinctly from adiscreet distance, as he hastened away. Perhaps he thought theirquestion merely a footpad's introduction to a sandbagging episode. InChicago at night one never knows.
"As near as I can make out what he said, Marjorie," the lieutenantpondered aloud, "we walk straight ahead till we come to UmtyumpStreet, and there we find a Rarara car that will take us to BloptyblopAvenue. I never heard of any such streets, did you?"
"Never," she panted, as she jog-trotted alongside his military pace."Let's take the first car we meet, and perhaps the conductor can putus off at the street where the minister lives."
"Perhaps." There was not much confidence in that "perhaps."
When they reached the street-carred street, they found two tracks, butnothing occupying them, as far as they could peer either way. A smallshopkeeper in a tiny shop proved to be a delicatessen merchant sobusily selling foreign horrors to aliens, that they learned nothingfrom him.
At length, in the far-away, they made out a headlight, and heard thegrind and squeal of a car. Lieutenant Mallory waited for it, watch inhand. He boosted Marjorie's elbow aboard and bombarded the conductorwith questions. But the conductor had no more heard of their streetthan they had of his. Their agitation did not disturb his stoic calm,but he invited them to come along to the next crossing, where theycould find another car and more learned conductors; or, what promisedbetter, perhaps a cab.
He threw Marjorie into a panic by ordering her to jettison Snoozleums,but the lieutenant bought his soul for a small price, and overlookedthe fact that he did not ring up their fares.
The young couple squeezed into a seat and talked anxiously in sharpwhispers.
"Wouldn't it be terrible, Harry, if, just as we got to the minister's,we should find papa there ahead of us, waiting to forbid the bands, orwhatever it is? Wouldn't it be just terrible?"
"Yes, it would, honey, but it doesn't seem probable. There arethousands of ministers in Chicago. He could never find ours. Fact is.I doubt if we find him ourselves."
Her clutch tightened till he would have winced, if he had not been asoldier.
"What do you mean, Harry?"
"Well, in the first place, honey, look what time it is. Hardly morethan time enough to get the train, to say nothing of hunting for thatpreacher and standing up through a long rigmarole."
"Why, Harry Mallory, are you getting ready to jilt me?"
"Indeed I'm not--not for worlds, honey, but I've got to get thattrain, haven't I?"
"Couldn't you wait over one train--just one tiny little train?"
"My own, own honey love, you know it's impossible! You must rememberthat I've already waited over three trains while you tried to make upyour mind."
"And you must remember, darling, that it's no easy matter for a girlto decide to sneak away from home and be married secretly, and go allthe way out to that hideous Manila with no trousseau and no weddingpresents and no anything."
"I know it isn't, and I waited patiently while you got up the courage.But now there are no more trains. I shudder to think of this trainbeing late. We're not due in San Francisco till Thursday evening, andmy transport sails at sunrise Friday morning. Oh, Lord, what if Ishould miss that transport! What if I should!"
"What if we should miss the minister?"
"It begins to look a great deal like it."
"But, Harry, you wouldn't desert me now--abandon me to my fate?"
"Well, it isn't exactly like abandonment, seeing that you could gohome to your father and mother in a taxicab."
She stared at him in horror.
"So you don't want me for your wife! You've changed your mind! You'retired of me already! Only an hour together, and you're sick of yourbargain! You're anxious to get rid of me! You----"
"Oh, honey, I want you more than anything else on earth, but I'm asoldier, dearie, a mere lieutenant in the regular army, and I'm theslave of the Government. I've gone through West Point, and they won'tlet me resign respectably and if I did, we'd starve. They wouldn'taccept my resignation, but they'd be willing to courtmartial me anddismiss me the service in disgrace. Then you wouldn't want to marryme--and I shouldn't have any way of supporting you if you did. I onlyknow one trade, and that's soldiering."
"Don't call it a trade, beloved, it's the noblest profession in allthe world, and you're the noblest soldier that ever was, and in a yearor two you'll be the biggest general in the army."
He could not afford to shatter such a devout illusion or quench thelight of faith in those beloved and loving eyes. He tacitly admittedhis ability to be promoted commander-in-chief in a year or two. Heallowed that glittering possibility to remain, used it as a basis forargument.
"Then, dearest, you must help me to do my duty."
She clasped his upper arm as if it were an altar and she an Iphigeniaabout to be sacrificed to save the army. And she murmured with utterheroism:
"I will! Do what you like with me!"
He squeezed her hand between his biceps and his ribs and accepted theoffering in a look drenched with gratitude. Then he said,matter-of-factly:
"We'll see how much time we have when we get to--whatever the name ofthat street is."
The car jolted and wailed on its way like an old drifting rockingchair. The motorman was in no hurry. The passengers seemed to have nooccasion for haste. Somebody got on or got off at almost every corner,and paused for conversation while the car waited patiently. Buteventually the conductor put his head in and drawled:
"Hay! here's where you get off at."
They hastened to debark and found themselves in a narrow,gaudily-lighted region where they saw a lordly transfer-distributor, aprofound scholar in Chicago streets. He informed them that theminister's street lay far back along the path they had come; theyshould have taken a car in the opposite direction, transferred at someremote center, descended at some unheard-of street, walked threeblocks one way and four another, and there they would have been.
Mallory looked at his watch, and Marjorie's hopes dropped like awrecked aeroplane, for he grimly asked how long it would take them toreach the railroad station.
"Well, you'd ought to make it in forty minutes," the transfer agentsaid--and added, cynically, "if the car makes schedule."
"Good Lord, the train starts in twenty minutes!"
"Well, I tell you--take this here green car to Wexford Avenoo--there'susually a taxicab or two standin' there."
"Thank you. Hop on, Marjorie."
Marjorie hopped on, and they sat down, Mallory with eyes and thoughtson nothing but the watch he kept in his hand.
During this tense journey the girl perfected her soul for gracefulmartyrdom.
"I'll go to the train with you, Harry, and then you can send me homein a taxicab."
Her nether lip trembled and her eyes were filmed, but they were brave,and her voice was so tender that it wooed his mind from his watch. Hegazed at her, and found her so dear, so devoted and so pitifullyexquisite, that he was almost overcome by an impulse to gather herinto his arms there and then, indifferent to the immediate passengersor to his far-off military superiors. An hour ago they were younglovers in all the lilt and thrill of elopement. She had clung to himin the gloaming of their taxicab, as it sped like a genie at theirwhim to the place where the minister would unite their hands and raisehis own in blessing. Thence the new husband would have carried the newwife away, his very own, soul and body, duty and beauty. Then, ah,then in their minds the future was an unwaning honeymoon, the journeyacross the continent a stroll along a lover's lane, the Pacific oceana garden lake, and the Philippines a chain of Fortunate Isles decreedespecially for their Eden. And then the taxicab encountered alamppost. They thought they had merely w
recked a motor car--and lo,they had wrecked a Paradise.
The railroad ceased to be a lover's lane and became a lingeringtorment; the ocean was a weltering Sahara, and the Philippines a DryTortugas of exile.
Mallory realized for the first time what heavy burdens he had taken onwith his shoulder straps; what a dismal life of restrictions andhardships an officer's life is bound to be. It was hard to obey thesoulless machinery of discipline, to be a brass-buttoned slave. Hefelt all the hot, quick resentment that turns a faithful soldier intoa deserter. But it takes time to evolve a deserter, and Mallory hadonly twenty minutes. The handcuffs and leg-irons of discipline hobbledhim. He was only a little cog in a great clock, and the other wheelswere impinging on him and revolving in spite of himself.
In the close-packed seats where they were jostled and stared at, thesoldier could not even attempt to explain to his fascinated bride thewar of motives in his breast. He could not voice the passionaterebellion her beauty had whipped up in his soul. Perhaps if Romeo andJuliet had been forced to say farewell on a Chicago street car insteadof a Veronese balcony, their language would have lacked savor, too.
Perhaps young Mr. Montague and young Miss Capulet, instead of wailing,"No, that is not the lark whose notes do beat the vaulty heaven sohigh above our heads," would have done no better than Mr. Mallory andMiss Newton. In any case, the best these two could squeeze out was:
"It's just too bad, honey."
"But I guess it can't be helped, dear."
"It's a mean old world, isn't it?"
"Awful!"
And then they must pile out into the street again so lost in woe thatthey did not know how they were trampled or elbowed. Marjorie'sdespair was so complete that it paralyzed instinct. She forgotSnoozleums! A thoughtful passenger ran out and tossed the basket intoMallory's arms even as the car moved off.
Fortune relented a moment and they found a taxicab waiting where theyhad expected to find it. Once more they were cosy in the flyingtwilight, but their grief was their only baggage, and the clasp oftheir hands talked all the talk there was.
Anxiety within anxiety tormented them and they feared another wreck.But as they swooped down upon the station, a kind-faced tower clockbeamed the reassurance that they had three minutes to spare.
The taxicab drew up and halted, but they did not get out. They werekissing good-byes, fervidly and numerously, while a grinningstation-porter winked at the winking chauffeur.
Marjorie simply could not have done with farewells.
"I'll go to the gate with you," she said.
He told the chauffeur to wait and take the young lady home. Thelieutenant looked so honest and the girl so sad that the chauffeursimply touched his cap, though it was not his custom to allow strangefares to vanish into crowded stations, leaving behind nothing morenegotiable than instructions to wait.
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