The Breaking Point

by Mary Roberts Rinehart

  XLVII

  David was satisfied. The great love of his life had been given to Dick,and now Dick was his again. He grieved for Lucy, but he knew that theparting was not for long, and that from whatever high place she lookeddown she would know that. He was satisfied. He looked on his work andfound it good. There was no trace of weakness nor of vacillation in theman who sat across from him at the table, or slammed in and out of thehouse after his old fashion.

  But he was not content. At first it was enough to have Dick there, tostop in the doorway of his room and see him within, occupied with theprosaic business of getting into his clothes or out of them, nowand then to put a hand on his shoulder, to hear him fussing in thelaboratory again, and to be called to examine divers and sundry smearsto which Dick attached impressive importance and more impressive names.But behind Dick's surface cheerfulness he knew that he was eating hisheart out.

  And there was nothing to be done. Nothing. Secretly David watched thepapers for the announcement of Elizabeth's engagement, and each day drewa breath of relief when it did not come. And he had done another thingsecretly, too; he did not tell Dick when her ring came back. Annie hadbrought the box, without a letter, and the incredible cruelty of thething made David furious. He stamped into his office and locked it in adrawer, with the definite intention of saving Dick that one additionalpang at a time when he already had enough to hear.

  For things were going very badly. The fight was on.

  It was a battle without action. Each side was dug in and entrenched, andwaiting. It was an engagement where the principals met occasionally theneutral ground of the streets, bowed to each other and passed on.

  The town was sorry for David and still fond of him, but it resented hisstiff-necked attitude. It said, in effect, that when he ceased to makeDick's enemies his it was willing to be friends. But it said also, toeach other and behind its hands, that Dick's absence was discreditableor it would be explained, and that he had behaved abominably toElizabeth. It would be hanged if it would be friends with him.

  It looked away, but it watched. Dick knew that when he passed by on thestreets it peered at him from behind its curtains, and whispered behindhis back. Now and then he saw, on his evening walks, that line of carsdrawn up before houses he had known and frequented which indicated aparty, but he was never asked. He never told David.

  It was only when the taboo touched David that Dick was resentful, andthen he was inclined to question the wisdom of his return. It hurthim, for instance, to see David give up his church, and reading morningprayer alone at home on Sunday mornings, and to see his grim silencewhen some of his old friends were mentioned.

  Yet on the surface things were much as they had been. David rose early,and as he improved in health, read his morning paper in his officewhile he waited for breakfast. Doctor Reynolds had gone, and the desk inDick's office was back where it belonged. In the mornings Mike oiledthe car in the stable and washed it, his old pipe clutched in his teeth,while from the kitchen came the sounds of pans and dishes, and the odorof frying sausages. And Dick splashed in the shower, and shaved by themirror with the cracked glass in the bathroom. But he did not sing.

  The house was very quiet. Now and then the front door opened, and apatient came in, but there was no longer the crowded waiting-room,the incessant jangle of the telephone, the odor of pungent drugs andantiseptics.

  When, shortly before Christmas, Dick looked at the books containing thelast quarter's accounts, he began to wonder how long they could fighttheir losing battle. He did not mind for himself, but it was unthinkablethat David should do without, one by one, the small luxuries of his oldage, his cigars, his long and now errandless rambles behind Nettie.

  He began then to think of his property, his for the claiming, and toquestion whether he had not bought his peace at too great a cost toDavid. He knew by that time that it was not fear, but pride, which hadsent him back empty-handed, the pride of making his own way. And now andthen, too, he felt a perfectly human desire to let Bassett publish thestory as his vindication and then snatch David away from them all,to some luxurious haven where--that was the point at which he alwaysstopped--where David could pine away in homesickness for them!

  There was an irony in it that made him laugh hopelessly.

  He occupied himself then with ways and means, and sold the car.Reynolds, about to be married and busily furnishing a city office,bought it, had it repainted a bright blue, and signified to the world atlarge that he was at the Rossiter house every night by leaving it atthe curb. Sometimes, on long country tramps, Dick saw it outside afarmhouse, and knew that the boycott was not limited to the town.

  By Christmas, however, he realized that the question of meeting theirexpenses necessitated further economies, and reluctantly at last theydecided to let Mike go. Dick went out to the stable with a distinctsinking of the heart, while David sat in the house, unhappily waitingfor the thing to be done. But Mike refused to be discharged.

  "And is it discharging me you are?" he asked, putting down one ofDavid's boots in his angry astonishment. "Well, then, I'm telling youyou're not."

  "We can't pay you any longer, Mike. And now that the car's gone--"

  "I'm not thinking about pay. I'm not going, and that's flat. Who'd beafter doing his boots and all?"

  David called him in that night and dismissed him again, this time veryfirmly. Mike said nothing and went out, but the next morning he wasscrubbing the sidewalk as usual, and after that they gave it up.

  Now and then Dick and Elizabeth met on the street, and she bowed to himand went on. At those times it seemed incredible that once he had heldher in his arms, and that she had looked up at him with loving, faithfuleyes. He suffered so from those occasional meetings that he took towatching for her, so as to avoid her. Sometimes he wished she wouldmarry Wallace quickly, so he would be obliged to accept what now he knewhe had not accepted at all.

  He had occasional spells of violent anger at her, and of resentment, butthey died when he checked up, one after the other, the inevitable seriesof events that had led to the catastrophe. But it was all nonsenseto say that love never died. She had loved him, and there was neveranything so dead as that love of hers.

  He had been saved one thing, however; he had never seen her with WallieSayre. Then, one day in the country while he trudged afoot to make oneof his rare professional visits, they went past together in Wallie'sbright roadster. The sheer shock of it sent him against a fence, staringafter them with an anger that shook him.

  Late in November Elizabeth went away for a visit, and it gave hima breathing spell. But the strain was telling on him, and Bassett,stopping on his way to dinner at the Wheelers', told him so bluntly.

  "You look pretty rotten," he said. "It's no time to go to pieces now,when you've put up your fight and won it."

  "I'm all right. I haven't been sleeping. That's all."

  "How about the business? People coming to their senses?"

  "Not very fast," Dick admitted. "Of course it's a little soon."

  After dinner at the Wheelers', when Walter Wheeler had gone to a vestrymeeting, Bassett delivered himself to Margaret of a highly indignantharangue on the situation in general.

  "That's how I see it," he finished. "He's done a fine thing. A finerthing by a damned sight than I'd do, or any of this town. He's given upmoney enough to pay the national debt--or nearly. If he'd come backwith it, as Judson Clark, they wouldn't have cared a hang for the past.They'd have licked his boots. It makes me sick."

  He turned on her.

  "You too, I think, Mrs. Wheeler. I'm not attacking you on that score;it's human nature. But it's the truth."

  "Perhaps. I don't know."

  "They'll drive him to doing it yet. He came back to make a place forhimself again, like a man. Not what he had, but what he was. But they'lldrive him away, mark my words."

  Later on, but more gently, he introduced the subject of Elizabeth.

  "You can't get away from this, Mrs. Wheeler. So long as she stands of
f,and you behind her, the town is going to take her side. She doesn't knowit, but that's how it stands. It all hangs on her. If he wasn't the manhe is, I'd say his salvation hangs on her. I don't mean she ought totake him back; it's too late for that, if she's engaged. But a littlefriendliness and kindness wouldn't do any harm. You too. Do you everhave him here?"

  "How can I, as things are?"

  "Well, be friendly, anyhow," he argued. "That's not asking much. Isuppose he'd cut my throat if he knew, but I'm a straight-to-the-marksort of person, and I know this: what this house does the town will do."

  "I'll talk to Mr. Wheeler. I don't know. I'll say this, Mr. Bassett.I won't make her unhappy. She has borne a great deal, and sometimes Ithink her life is spoiled. She is very different."

  "If she is suffering, isn't it possible she cares for him?"

  But Margaret did not think so. She was so very calm. She was so calmthat sometimes it was alarming.

  "He gave her a ring, and the other day I found it, tossed into a drawerfull of odds and ends. I haven't seen it lately; she may have sent itback."

  Elizabeth came home shortly before Christmas, undeniably glad to be backand very gentle with them all. She set to work almost immediately on thegifts, wrapping them and tying them with methodical exactness, stickinga tiny sprig of holly through the ribbon bow, and writing cards withneatness and care. She hung up wreaths and decorated the house, andwhen she was through with her work she went to her room and sat with herhands folded, not thinking. She did not think any more.

  Wallie had sent her a flexible diamond bracelet as a Christmas gift andit lay on her table in its box. She was very grateful, but she had notput it on.

  On the morning before Christmas Nina came in, her arms full of packages,and her eyes shining and a little frightened. She had some news forthem. She hadn't been so keen about it, at first, but Leslie was like amadman. He was so pleased that he was ordering her that sable cape shehad wanted so. He was like a different man. And it would be July.

  Elizabeth kissed her. It seemed very unreal, like everything else. Shewondered why Leslie should be so excited, or her mother crying. Shewondered if there was something strange about her, that it should see sosmall and unimportant. But then, what was important? That one got upin the morning, and ate at intervals, and went to bed at night? Thatchildren came, and had to be fed and washed and tended, and cried agreat deal, and were sick now and then?

  She wished she could feel something, could think it vital whether Ninashould choose pink or blue for her layette, and how far she shouldwalk each day, and if the chauffeur drove the car carefully enough.She wished she cared whether it was going to rain to-morrow or not, orwhether some one was coming, or not coming. And she wished terribly thatshe could care for Wallie, or get over the feeling that she had savedher pride at a cost to him she would not contemplate.

  After a time she went upstairs and put on the bracelet. And late in theafternoon she went out and bought some wool, to make an afghan. It easedher conscience toward Nina. She commenced it that evening while shewaited for Wallie, and she wondered if some time she would be making anafghan for a coming child of her own. Hers and Wallace Sayre's.

  Suddenly she knew she would never marry him. She faced the future, withall that it implied, and she knew she could not do it. It was horriblethat she had even contemplated it. It would be terrible to tell Wallie,but not as terrible as the other thing. She saw herself then with thesame clearness with which she had judged Dick. She too, leaving herhavoc of wrecked lives behind her; she too going along her headstrongway, raising hopes not to be fulfilled, and passing on. She too.

  That evening, Christmas eve, she told Wallie she would not marry him.Told him very gently, and just after an attempt of his to embrace her.She would not let him do it.

  "I don't know what's come over you," he said morosely. "But I'll let youalone, if that's the way you feel."

  "I'm sorry, Wallie. It--it makes me shiver."

  In a way he was prepared for it but nevertheless he begged for time,for a less unequivocal rejection. But he found her, for the first time,impatient with his pleadings.

  "I don't want to go over and over it, Wallie. I'll take the blame. Ishould have done it long ago."

  She was gentle, almost tender with him, but when he said she had spoiledhis life for him she smiled faintly.

  "You think that now. And don't believe I'm not sorry. I am. I hate notplaying the game, as you say. But I don't think for a moment that you'llgo on caring when you know I don't. That doesn't happen. That's all."

  "Do you know what I think?" he burst out. "I think you're still madabout Livingstone. I think you are so mad about him that you don't knowit yourself."

  But she only smiled her cool smile and went on with her knitting. Afterthat he got himself in hand, and--perhaps he still had some hope. Itwas certain that she had not flinched at Dick's name--told her veryearnestly that he only wanted her happiness. He didn't want her unlessshe wanted him. He would always love her.

  "Not always," she said, with tragically cold certainty. "Men are notlike women; they forget."

  She wondered, after he had gone, what had made her say that.

  She did not tell the family that night. They were full of their ownconcerns, Nina's coming maternity, the wrapping of packages behindclosed doors, the final trimming of the tree in the library. Lesliehad started the phonograph, and it was playing "Stille Nacht, heiligeNacht."

  Still night, holy night, and only in her was there a stillness that wasnot holy.

  They hung up their stockings valiantly as usual, making a littleceremony of it, and being careful not to think about Jim's missing one.Indeed, they made rather a function of it, and Leslie demanded one ofNina's baby socks and pinned it up.

  "I'm starting a bank account for the little beggar," he said, anddropped a gold piece into the toe. "Next year, old girl."

  He put his arm around Nina. It seemed to him that life was doingconsiderably better than he deserved by him, and he felt very humble andcontrite. He felt in his pocket for the square jeweler's box that laythere.

  After that they left Walter Wheeler there, to play his usual part atsuch times, and went upstairs. He filled the stockings bravely, anorange in each toe, a box of candy, a toy for old time's sake, and thenthe little knickknacks he had been gathering for days and hiding inhis desk. After all, there were no fewer stockings this year than last.Instead of Jim's there was the tiny one for Nina's baby. That was theway things went. He took away, but also He gave.

  He sat back in his deep chair, and looked up at the stockings,ludicrously bulging. After all, if he believed that He gave and tookaway, then he must believe that Jim was where he had tried to think him,filling a joyous, active place in some boyish heaven.

  After a while he got up and went to his desk, and getting pen and paperwrote carefully.

  "Dearest: You will find this in your stocking in the morning, when youget up for the early service. And I want you to think over it in thechurch. It is filled with tenderness and with anxiety. Life is not sovery long, little daughter, and it has no time to waste in anger or inbitterness. A little work, a little sleep, a little love, and it is allover.

  "Will you think of this to-day?"

  He locked up the house, and went slowly up to bed. Elizabeth found theletter the next morning. She stood in the bleak room, with the ashes oflast night's fire still smoking, and the stockings overhead not festivein the gray light, but looking forlorn and abandoned. Suddenly her eyes,dry and fiercely burning for so long, were wet with tears. It was true.It was true. A little work, a little sleep, a little love. Not thegreat love, perhaps, not the only love of a man's life. Not the love ofyesterday, but of to-day and to-morrow.

  All the fierce repression of the last weeks was gone. She began tosuffer. She saw Dick coming home, perhaps high with hope that whatevershe knew she would understand and forgive. And she saw herself failinghim, cold and shut away, not big enough nor woman enough to meet himhalf way. She saw him fighting
his losing battle alone, protecting Davidbut never himself; carrying Lucy to her quiet grave; sitting alone inhis office, while the village walked by and stared at the windows; shesaw him, gaining harbor after storm, and finding no anchorage there.

  She turned and went, half blindly, into the empty street.

  She thought he was at the early service. She did not see him, but shehad once again the thing that had seemed lost forever, the warm sense ofhis thought of her.

  He was there, in the shadowy back pew, with the grill behind it throughwhich once insistent hands had reached to summon him. He was there, withLucy's prayer-book in his hand, and none of the peace of the day in hisheart. He knelt and rose with the others.

  "O God, who makest us glad with the yearly remembrance of the birth ofThy Son--"

  XLVIII

  David was beaten; most tragic defeat of all, beaten by those he hadloved and faithfully served.

  He did not rise on Christmas morning, and Dick, visiting him after analmost untasted breakfast, found him still in his bed and questioned himanxiously.

  "I'm all right," he asserted. "I'm tired, Dick, that's all. Tired offighting. You're young. You can carry it on, and win. But I'll never seeit. They're stronger than we are."

  Later he elaborated on that. He had kept the faith. He had run withcourage the race that was set before him. He had stayed up at night andfought for them. But he couldn't fight against them.

  Dick went downstairs again and shutting himself in his office fell topacing the floor. David was right, the thing was breaking him. Veryseriously now he contemplated abandoning the town, taking David withhim, and claiming his estate. They could travel then; he could getconsultants in Europe; there were baths there, and treatments--

  The doorbell rang. He heard Minnie's voice in the hail, not toofriendly, and her tap at the door.

  "Some one in the waiting-room," she called.

  When he opened the connecting door he found Elizabeth beyond it, apale and frightened Elizabeth, breathless and very still. It was aperceptible moment before he could control his voice to speak. Then:

  "I suppose you want to see David. I'm sorry, but he isn't well to-day.He is still in bed."

  "I didn't come to see David, Dick."

  "I cannot think you want to see me, Elizabeth."

  "I do, if you don't mind."

  He stood aside then and let her pass him into the rear office.

  But he was not fooled at all. Not he. He had been enough. He knewwhy she had come, in the kindness of heart. (She was so little. Goodheavens, a man could crush her to nothing!) She had come because she wassorry for him, and she had brought forgiveness. It was like her. It wasfine. It was damnable.

  His voice hardened, for fear it might be soft.

  "Is this a professional visit, or a Christmas call, Elizabeth? Orperhaps I shouldn't call you that."

  "A Christmas call?"

  "You know what I mean. The day of peace. The day--what do you think I'mmade of, Elizabeth? To have you here, gentle and good and kind--"

  He got up and stood over her, tall and almost threatening.

  "You've been to church, and you've been thinking things over, I know. Iwas there. I heard it all, peace on earth, goodwill to men. Bosh. Peace,when there is no peace. Good will! I don't want your peace and goodwill."

  She looked up at him timidly.

  "You don't want to be friends, then?"

  "No. A thousand times, no," he said violently. Then, more gently: "I'mmaking a fool of myself. I want your peace and good will, Elizabeth. Godknows I need them."

  "You frighten me, Dick," she said, slowly. "I didn't come to bringforgiveness, if that is what you mean. I came--"

  "Don't tell me you came to ask it. That would be more than I can bear."

  "Will you listen to me for a moment, Dick? I am not good at explainingthings, and I'm nervous. I suppose you can see that." She tried to smileat him. "A--a little work, a sleep, a little love, that's life, isn'tit?"

  He was watching her intently.

  "Work and trouble, and a long sleep at the end for which let us be dulythankful--that's life, too. Love? Not every one gets love."

  Hopelessness and despair overwhelmed her. He was making it hard for her.Impossible. She could not go on.

  "I did not come with peace," she said tremulously, "but if you don'twant it--" She rose. "I must say this, though, before I go. I blamemyself. I don't blame you. You are wrong if you think I came to forgiveyou."

  She was stumbling toward the door.

  "Elizabeth, what did bring you?"

  She turned to him, with her hand on the door knob. "I came because Iwanted to see you again."

  He strode after her and catching her by the arm, turned her until hefaced her.

  "And why did you want to see me again? You can't still care for me.You know the story. You know I was here and didn't see you. You've seenLeslie Ward. You know my past. What you don't know--"

  He looked down into her eyes. "A little work, a little sleep, a littlelove," he repeated. "What did you mean by that?"

  "Just that," she said simply. "Only not a little love, Dick. Maybe youdon't want me now. I don't know. I have suffered so much that I'm notsure of anything."

  "Want you!" he said. "More than anything on this earth."

  Bassett was at his desk in the office. It was late, and the nighteditor, seeing him reading the early edition, his feet on his desk,carried over his coffee and doughnuts and joined him.

  "Sometime," he said, "I'm going to get that Clark story out of you. Ifit wasn't you who turned up the confession, I'll eat it."

  Bassett yawned.

  "Have it your own way," he said indifferently. "You were shieldingsomebody, weren't you? No? What's the answer?"

  Bassett made no reply. He picked up the paper and pointed to an itemwith the end of his pencil.

  "Seen this?"

  The night editor read it with bewilderment. He glanced up.

  "What's that got to do with the Clark case?"

  "Nothing. Nice people, though. Know them both."

  When the night editor walked away, rather affronted, Bassett took up thepaper and reread the paragraph.

  "Mr. and Mrs. Walter Wheeler, of Haverly, announce the engagement oftheir daughter, Elizabeth, to Doctor Richard Livingstone."

  He sat for a long time staring at it.