Vanna drew a deep breath and tried to put down the awful feeling of indignation that seemed to be choking her, tried to summon a laugh.
“No,” she said, a little lilt coming in her voice in spite of herself, “he isn’t anybody’s farmhand. He’s a graduate of two colleges, and that’s his own land back there! He’s a gentleman!”
“Dressed like that?” asked Zane, lifting supercilious eyebrows. “In the words of the small street urchins, ‘Oh, yeah?’”
“One doesn’t do farmwork in a frock coat,” said Vanna sharply.
“Neither does a gentleman put on overalls,” said Zane contemptuously.
“Perhaps your definition of a gentleman and mine would differ,” said Vanna, now thoroughly angry. “Let’s change the subject. We haven’t but a short time to ride; let’s enjoy this lovely day and this lovely car.”
“I’m not so sure that we have but a short time to ride,” said the man with a sinister glitter in his dark eyes. “Has your desire to be back so soon anything to do with that country bumpkin back there? If it has, I certainly don’t intend to let him win out.”
“You are making me very angry!” said Vanna haughtily. “If you are going on to talk this way, I shall have to demand that you let me out and I’ll walk back.”
“And suppose I didn’t stop?” asked the smooth voice.
“Well, then I might have to jump out anyway!” said Vanna. “Only that would be rather messy for us both, wouldn’t it?” She was very angry now, but she did not want him to see it, and she was trying desperately to give an amusing turn to the conversation.
“Come,” she went on glancing at her wristwatch, “we’ve got an hour to ride, and then we must turn back. Two hours is positively all that I can spare you this afternoon. Please let’s make it as pleasant as possible.”
“Assuredly!” said the smooth voice, giving her another narrow, vexed glance. But immediately his manner changed and he began to talk pleasantly.
“See that wooded hillside over there? Those are pines. They are really lovely, aren’t they? But you should see the Black Forest as I have seen it,” and he was off into a reminiscence of some of his foreign adventures.
He could talk most fascinatingly when he chose. Just now he chose. It was his marvelous gift of conversation that had first interested Vanna in him. He knew how to describe an Italian sky or an adventure on a snow-clad mountain or a perilous voyage at sea or the depths of a treacherous jungle till one forgot all else in listening.
Vanna was charmed into forgetting her own present peculiar form of tortured uneasiness, and listening, she regained some degree of her first respect for the man and interest in his charm. There was a mysterious lure in his glance when he was like this, and Vanna felt more respect for her own first judgment of him, more of her initial confidence.
For an hour this went on, until he had her thoroughly in sympathy with his mood, until her eyes began to respond to his expression with a merry interest, and she was laughing and answering in a natural way.
Then suddenly, in just an hour, as if the alarm had been set in her mind and had gone off with a whirr, she roused to the fact that it was time to turn back.
“Well, this has been lovely,” she said heartily. “I’ve enjoyed your descriptions so much. It is wonderful to hear such experiences from one who has passed through them. But now, I’m sorry, the hour is up and I shall have to ask you to turn back.”
But the speed of the great car did not lessen one iota. In fact, it fairly seemed to take warning and leap forward to greater speed, and she felt the wind whipping her cheeks.
Her heart began to beat very fast now. She knew she was going to get angry again. She was not used to such high-handed ways. She cast a furtive glance at his profile and saw that it had hardened into cold stubbornness with that haughty sneer lying in wait about his lips like a wild, snarling animal waiting to leap upon one’s dearest wish.
“Please!” she said gently, looking at him with the calmness of a lady claiming his gallantry.
But the car went flying on.
At last he broke the silence. “You didn’t imagine that I really would bring you back in an hour, did you? You didn’t suppose I would take the trouble to come all this way up after you for a few minutes’ ride or a call, did you?”
“I’m sorry,” she said coldly. “You didn’t let me know you were coming or I would have forbidden you. I certainly did not expect you. I have made an engagement that I must in honor keep.”
“An engagement with a country lout!” sneered the man amusedly, and then it was as if the lion lying in wait about his lips sprang out and clawed at her heart.
The car leaped forward up steep inclines now, climbing a mountain with vast views in every direction, and the sun a great red ball of majesty sinking down the opal sky. Farther and farther from home now, and her watch fairly flying, the sun sinking lower and lower.
“I understood that you promised me you would get me back for my appointment at five o’clock.” She spoke through the breathless, rushing silence.
“No, I didn’t promise. Think back and see what I did say. I said have it your own way. But I knew when I got you into my car it would be my way, not yours!”
“Oh!” said Vanna in a very small voice and sat thinking that over for a time. She wondered. Was that the way he had treated his wives when they were once in his power? Well, here was one who would never again be in his power if she could help it. But could she? Was he somehow by this ride planning to get her in his power in such a way that she would have to yield to his wishes? She shuddered and sat trying to think what to do.
This was no time for mere anger. Anger would get her nowhere, she was sure. The furtive glances she cast his way told her that he was playing a favorite game now and that he would play his own part skillfully and firmly. She need not hope to win by using her usual weapons of arrogance and reserve. He had preempted those for himself.
“Just what do you expect to gain by acting this way?” she asked him at last, trying to make her tone quite calm and commonplace, although she had trouble keeping her voice steady.
“I expect to make you have a delightful evening when you come to yourself and give up your childishness.”
After considering this for several minutes, she asked, “And you don’t think that possibly you’ll end up by making me hate you?”
He laughed at that. “Hate is akin to love, you know. Many a woman has come to the greatest love of her life through hate.”
A great wave of helplessness came sickeningly over her at that, and she suddenly felt like putting her head down and weeping. Oh, if she had only listened to Gloria! And now she began to wonder why in the world she came with this man. Why did she not send him on his way at once, just as she would have done with anybody at home if she had another engagement? Why had she ever been such a fool as to think of him for a moment as a possible friend?
After a long time, she said through shut teeth that had suddenly taken to chattering as if she were cold, “Then I shall certainly endeavor not to hate you!”
He laughed again and looked at her. Was she coming around? “You are getting facetious!” he said. “I think you will soon be recovering. A woman likes to find her master.”
A still coldness settled down over Vanna’s heart, and something warned her that she must go very carefully. This was no ordinary man. This was a man of the world, experienced, sophisticated to the last degree! She could not hope to pit her feeble girl strength against his malignant will. She recalled certain things she had recently been hearing concerning Satan as the prince of the power of the air, and she shuddered again as she caught another glimpse of his handsome and now hateful face. Then she knew that she was frightened. Terribly frightened! And her first thought was of Robert Carroll. If she only had some kind of a broadcasting instrument whereby she could send him a message, an SOS. How quickly he would come for her! He would save her, she was sure.
But she had only her mind. Was it pos
sible for one mind to reach another across the space of miles? She had heard much talk of thought transference. Was it true? If calling for his help, could he hear? For several consecutive minutes she sat, her eyes cast down, trying to send her mind across the great spaces to where she had seen him last. Robert! Robert Carroll! Come and help me! Help! Help! Help!
But her overwrought mind kept jerking back to the present and thinking how impossible it was for Robert Carroll to hear! That might be all very well for a theory, but she knew too little about it to put it to any practical use now in her need.
But there was Robert Carroll’s God! He would call upon his God if he were in trouble. If she only had a right to call upon Robert Carroll’s God!
Oh, God! her heart cried, groping through the twilight pearliness, up through the pretty colored clouds overhead. Oh, God, find some way to help me for Robert Carroll’s sake, who loves You! Her heart kept saying it over and over.
The sun had gone down sharply and left the mountains in a dark, purply haze, laying their piney-plumed cheeks again the breast of the sky, and all the air was luminous with lovely light.
Down in the valleys off in the distance there were little nestling villages with dots of lighted windows beginning to show against the valley dusk, and the stern image by her side went driving madly on, never taking his eyes off the wheel, the miles leaping by with maddening haste. She looked at the speedometer and was alarmed at the pace they were making. She watched the road leap away and wished she dared jump out and dash back out of this man’s sight as the road was doing! At last she summoned voice again to speak and said, “Would you mind telling me your plans?”
Her voice was sweetly steady now as if she were entirely in accord with his purposes.
“Not at all,” he said briskly, quite ready to forgive her if she would be reasonable. “We are going to a place I’ve heard of where we can get a fine dinner and plenty to drink, and where they have a good orchestra and we can dance, and then we are going to sit down and have a talk in which we shall come to an understanding. After that we will make our plans.”
“Your plans, you mean?”
“Yes, if you want to put it that way.” He smiled that supercilious smile again. “But I’m expecting by that time that they will be your plans also. I’m not without some worldly experience you know.” The smile he gave her now made her desire never to see his hateful face again.
She struggled with her feelings. She did not easily yield to anyone who tried to coerce her. But she knew this man to be more than her match this time. He had her in his power. She must wait. She must think.
In silence the night settled down about them. She said nothing more, and he said nothing. The way ran through the darkness of deep forest land and then wound down, farther and farther, into pitch dark valleys and up again but still more and more down and less and less up. She wished she had noted the mileage when they started. How far were they from Afton?
Five o’clock had passed long since. Six o’clock and seven had come and gone. They would be on their way to meeting now, and what would they think of her? Oh, God, for Robert Carroll’s sake—
It was after eight o’clock, if she could judge by her weariness, when having skirted the edge of a fairly large town they drove up a hillside into a sharp turn among the trees and stopped before a heavily curtained, dimly lit house, where a number of cars were parked along the side of the drive. The place did not look attractive. It filled her with distrust. Would she find someone to help her in this place, or some way of escape?
It was too late now to get back for the meeting of course. That must be well under way, and what did they think of her, a deserter? But it was possibly not too late to get back before midnight. Or was it? She tried in her weary mind to calculate the hours they had been on the way in that fast flying car. But she must be on the alert and take any chance that offered.
“Come! This is the place!” said her escort, and there was actually pleasant anticipation in his voice.
She followed him silently, hating every step she took, wondering if perhaps this was the way God was taking to cure her of her insane interest in this terrible man. Wondering if it was her punishment for insisting on going to ride with him against Gloria’s earnest plea.
He seated her for a moment in a sort of reception room and went to speak to a waiter. Her glance went hurrying around the room for possible escape, but she dared not attempt it yet. If she tried to dart out the door with Zane standing over there in full sight of her, a word from him would have a dozen men at once after her. She had no hope of escape that way. She must bide her time.
He came back to her in a moment, and she forced a haughty little smile, a smile that seemed to say to him that she was here now, could not help herself, and she would make the best of it. Perhaps that was the way he read it, for he smiled down at her as if nothing had happened between them.
“Yes, this is the place,” he said, “I was sure I was on the right road. Now, dinner is ready at once. I’m going to look over the tables and see which is best. The dressing room is through that door and up some stairs to your right. Would you like to go and powder your nose before we eat?”
Silently acquiescing, she went toward the door to which he had pointed. It led to a short lighted stairway. She could hear voices up there. As she closed the door behind her, she felt a tiny draught of air blowing across her hot cheeks, and drawing a deep breath, she turned toward it and discovered a door, unlatched, that led outside. Someone had forgotten to fasten it. She pushed it softly and stepped through, out to a stone doorstep with lilac bushes sheltering it on either side in great thick clumps. Instinct led her to slip behind one of these, and there she stood with her heart beating wildly. What should she do now? She could not stay here. He would inevitably discover her, and that right quickly.
Should she dare to run out to the car and drive away in it? But she remembered seeing him lock the car and put the key in his pocket. Her heart sank. No hope of getting away that way. And even if she could, she would soon be caught. He would send out word to the police in every direction that she had stolen his car. She could not hope to get away with that.
But how should she get away? She could not walk all the distance to that village they had passed.
Then up the driveway, with two bright lights streaming ahead and noisy clatter, came a delivery truck, thrashing past her hiding place and coming to a halt near to the regions of the kitchen. Her resolve was taken at once.
She waited till the delivery boy swung down with his basket and went noisily to the kitchen. Then she flew like some shadowy bird of the night across the drive and put herself on the other side of his truck, standing in the shadow, waiting for his return, trying to remember how much money she had along with her. How thankful she was that her father had brought them up to carry money enough along for an emergency. It had been a habit with her always. But she couldn’t remember how much she had. There had been so little need for money in Afton.
But there was no time to calculate. The delivery boy was coming back with his empty basket and his hands full of cake that someone in the kitchen had given him. Now was her time.
“Could you take me back to the village with you?” she spoke out of the shadow. “I’ll give you five dollars if you will.”
The boy’s jaws paused in their chewing for a second as he surveyed her white face and delicate dress, and then he shifted his cake to his cheek and said jovially, “Five bucks? Sure, sister. Hop in!”
He reached down a sticky hand and pulled her up to the seat then whirled his truck noisily about as if it had been a toy and stepped on the gas.
Vanna shrank back into the shadow of the truck as they shot past the hooded windows and doors. It was all silent. No one was after her yet. Zane would not have discovered her absence so soon. He would wait perhaps a few minutes before making an alarm or sending some attendant up to the dressing room for her.
She sat breathless as they thundered down the road, almo
st laughing hysterically at the contrast between this and her ride up to this place.
She found herself clinging to the seat frantically, expecting momentarily to be thrown out as the truck bumped wildly down the dark hills and over the bumpy road that she had not noticed on her way up because of the resilient springs and soft upholstery. Here was a seamier side of life than even living on a farm and doing one’s own work. Or was this perhaps a part of farm life? Would one perhaps have to ride on trucks sometimes? Well, better far a truck and peace in the heart, than luxury, terror, anger, hate.
“What train you going ta take?” the truck driver asked when the last mouthful of cake had disappeared and he had wiped his mouth with the back of his hand, and his hand on the leg of his trousers, and turned to look her over.
“Why, I’m not sure just the exact time it goes,” said Vanna. “That’s why I am in such a hurry. I haven’t any timetable. You don’t happen to know about the trains, do you?”
“Well, there’s a train around nine thirty or ten goes through ta Portland, but it’s a way train, an’ powerful slow. I guess you could make that. It generally takes me ten or fifteen minutes ta make this run.”
He lit a cheap cigarette, took a puff or two, and leaning back gave her a friendly side glance. “You work up at that place?”
Vanna caught her breath and was about to make a haughty negative reply when she realized a vantage. “No,” she said with a slight drawl of indifference, “I didn’t like the looks of things.”
“Don’t blame ya!” said the lad approvingly. “It’s a tough joint. Wouldn’t want my sister ta stay in a dump like that, though times are hard an’ ya can’t be too choosy of course. Come far?”
“Well, not so far,” said Vanna. “It’s this side of Portland,” she added, “in the country. I can’t thank you enough for taking me to the train. I just couldn’t see staying there all night.”
“Don’t blame ya a bit. Well, I’m glad to help ya out.”
Beauty for Ashes Page 18
