It meant a great deal to her, for she was sure that if Katharine could be removed from the household, peace must descend upon her own soul once more, and she longed for peace. Somehow, she felt that if she could only enjoy that supremacy of her wonderful beauty for one month more — for one last month, before she grew old — she could meet Katharine again, and forgive her all her youth and freshness, and forgive herself for having envied them. As her life was now, she could not, try how she would. The pain was upon her hourly, and she could not but resent it, and almost hate the cause of it.
Though she constantly looked at her miniature, and moved the brushes and little saucers on the table, her hearing was preternaturally sharpened, as it was in reality the barely audible sound of the distant front door which told her that Wingfield was gone. Instinctively she looked towards the door of her own room, hesitated, then rose suddenly, and went out with a quick, nervous step, and a determined look in her face. Without stopping to consider what she should say, she descended to the library.
Katharine looked up with an expression of annoyance as her mother entered.
“He’s gone, then?” said Mrs. Lauderdale, interrogatively.
“Yes. He’s just gone,” answered Katharine, in a voice that did not promise confidence.
“What did you tell him, dear?”
Mrs. Lauderdale sat down beside her daughter. The smile she put on was as unnatural as the endearing tone, and Katharine observed it. She suffered in the artificiality which had developed in her mother of late, so unlike the dignified personality which she had been used to love.
“Really, mother, I can’t repeat the conversation. I couldn’t if I wished to. What difference does it make what I said, since he’s gone? I told you what I should say. Well — I’ve said it.”
“You’ve sent him away for good — just like that?”
“I’ve told him the plain truth, and he’s gone. He won’t come back — unless he wants to see you,” she added, rather bitterly. “I don’t think he will, though. You’ve not exactly helped him to be happy.”
“Katharine!” There was an injured protest in the tone.
“I don’t see why you should be surprised,” answered the young girl. “Of course he might take it into his head to be angry with you for what you’ve done. It wasn’t very nice. I’m not sure that, in his place, I should ever wish to see you again.”
“My child, what an exaggeration! You talk as though I had deliberately sought him out and asked him to the house — almost asked him to marry you.”
“It comes to that,” observed Katharine, coldly.
“Really, Katharine, you’re — beyond words!” Mrs. Lauderdale drew back a little, in displeasure, and looked at her severely.
“I could forgive you,” continued the young girl, “if you hadn’t known that I love Jack and never shall marry any one else. You know it and you’ve always known it. That makes it much worse. You’ve made that poor man suffer without the slightest reason. You could just as well have told him that you knew I cared for some one else, and you could have been as nice to him as you pleased. You’ve hurt him, and you’ve driven me to hurt him, by no fault of mine, just to undo the mischief you’ve done. Of course, it’s papa who’s really done it all, but you needn’t have let him twist you round his little finger like a wisp of straw.”
“Oh, Katharine! Anything more unjust!”
“I’m not unjust, mother. But I’m too old to think everything you do is perfect, merely because it’s you. When I see a man like Archie Wingfield sitting there and straining his hands to keep himself quiet, and choking with the sound of his own words, I know he’s suffering — and when I know that he’s suffering uselessly, and that it’s all your fault and papa’s, I judge you — that’s all. I’m a grown woman. I have a right to judge.”
The door opened and Alexander Junior appeared upon the threshold, just returned from his office.
“I heard your voice, so I came in,” he said, with an electric smile which was meant to be conciliatory. “Oh!” he exclaimed, in altered tones, as he saw the faces of the two women, “has anything happened?”
For a moment there was silence. Mrs. Lauderdale looked at the empty fireplace, avoiding the eyes of both her husband and her daughter. But Katharine leaned back in her seat and faced her father. Her voice was almost as cold and steely as his could be when she answered him at last.
“Mr. Wingfield has just asked me to marry him,” she said. “And I have refused him — unconditionally.”
“You’ve done an exceedingly foolish thing, then,” answered Alexander Junior. “And you’ll be very sorry for it before long.”
He came nearer and stood by the fireplace, laying one authoritative hand upon the mantelpiece, and shaking the forefinger of the other in a warning manner.
“I’m the best judge of that,” answered Katharine, undaunted and unimpressed by his parental tone.
“You’re not,” answered Mr. Lauderdale. “You’ve acquired a habit of contradicting me lately. It seems to be a part of your plan for being as utterly undutiful and disobedient as you can. I warn you that I won’t submit to it any longer.”
“It’s of no use to threaten me, papa,” answered Katharine, controlling herself as well as she could. “And it doesn’t do any good to call me undutiful and disobedient so often. It doesn’t make it true.”
“Katharine!” cried her mother, in a tone of distress which was not artificial.
“I know what I’m saying, mother—”
“Then you should be sincerely ashamed of yourself, Katharine,” said Alexander Junior. “As sincerely as I’m ashamed that a daughter of mine should use such language.”
Katharine rose slowly from her chair and stood up before him, while her mother remained seated.
“Neither of you have any right to say that you’re ashamed of anything I’ve done,” she said. “As for my language, it’s mild enough — for what you’ve done. I’ve been ashamed of you both to-day — here, in this room, half an hour ago. You’ve told an honest man who’s foolishly in love with me that I cared for him, and would have him if he would ask me, when you know that I will never marry any one but Jack Ralston. It seems to me that I’ve had good reason to be ashamed of you. It was hard to look him in the face, and tell him that my father and mother had misled and deceived him — to make him own that he had it all from you, and that I’d not given him the shadow of a reason for thinking that I cared for him — that he had it all from you. Oh, it was so plain! Not that you can deny it — and you tell me that you’re ashamed of me! If I didn’t love Jack, do you know what I’d have done? I’d have married Archie Wingfield to save you your respect for yourself, and a little of his for you!”
“I refuse to listen any longer to such insane nonsense,” said Alexander Junior, whose slow wrath was rising by degrees.
“You shall listen to me,” answered Katharine. “I’m fighting with you for my life and happiness, and you’ve got to face me like an honest man — though you are my father!”
CHAPTER VIII.
“KATHARINE! THIS IS too much!” cried Alexander Junior, his anger rising in his eyes.
The man’s heavy hand fell emphatically upon the mantelpiece, making the old-fashioned gilt clock and the Chinese vases tremble and rattle. Mrs. Lauderdale was not a nervous woman, but she rose from her seat and stood beside her husband, not exactly as though she meant to take his side, and yet not exactly as a peace-maker. She felt herself accused as much as he did by the pale, strong girl who stood before them, one hand hanging by her side, the other pulling nervously at the little silver pin at her collar as though she felt that it was choking her. Of the three, at that moment, Mrs. Lauderdale was by far the most self-possessed.
“It’s true,” answered Katharine. “Every word of it’s true!”
As she spoke she caught her breath, and was obliged to stop, white with anger.
“Katharine — my child! Don’t!” cried Mrs. Lauderdale, fearing she was going to
faint.
“I think you’d better go, my dear,” said Alexander to his wife. “She’s beside herself. I’ll bring her to her senses.”
The passionate blood rose in the girl’s face and the words came again.
“No, mother — stay here!” she said. “You have no right to go away. Yes — I say that for months you’ve been doing your best, both of you, to destroy my happiness — and you’ll destroy my life with it, if I stay with you longer. You’ve tried to separate me from the man I love, and you’ve been trying every day and every hour to make me marry another man — pushing him on, encouraging him, telling him that I would accept him — for all I know, telling him that I loved him. I’ve not forgotten the things you’ve done — I’ve not forgotten the day when you, mother, you who had stood by us so long, suddenly turned without reason and told Jack to go away. Here, in this very room, last winter — and you, papa — I’ve only to make you remember how you took that letter when it was brought, and kept it all day, and repeated all the lies that people told about Jack — and mother read me the things in the papers — and you made me believe that he had written to me when he was drunk. It was all a lie, a miserable, infamous lie! And you liked it, and repeated it, and turned it over and embroidered it and beautified it — to make it hurt me more. It did hurt me — it almost killed me — but for Jack’s sake, I wish to God it had!”
“Katharine, this is blasphemy!” exclaimed her father, his cold eyes glittering with rage — but he was not fluent, he could find no words to dam the stream of hers.
“Blasphemy!” she cried, indignantly. “Is it blasphemy to pray — unless your God is my Devil?”
Beside himself with passion, her father made a step forward, and with a quick movement covered her mouth with one hand and grasped her arm with the other. But he miscalculated her quickness as against his strength. With a turn of the hand and wrist she was free and sprang backwards a step.
“It’s like you to lay your hands on a woman, after trying to sell her!” she cried, her lips turning a dull grey, her eyes colder and brighter than his own.
Being roused, they were terribly well matched. Mrs. Lauderdale threw herself between them. To do her justice, she faced her husband, with one hand stretched out to warn him back.
“No, no, mother! don’t come between us. I’m not afraid — I only got my mouth free to tell him that he’s a coward to lay his hands on me. But that was his only answer, because the things I say are true — every one of them, and more, too. That’s your one idea — both of you — to marry me off and get me out of the house, because you can’t look me in the face after the things you’ve done — after coming between me and Jack, as you’ve tried to do, and would have done, if we’d loved each other less — after trying to force me upon the first man who took a fancy to my face — after tormenting me to betray uncle Robert’s confidence — and it’s all been for money, and for nothing else. Money, money, money!”
“My child, you’re mad!” cried Mrs. Lauderdale. “What has money to do with it? What are you talking about? Do you know that you’re making the most insane accusations?”
“Let her talk,” said Alexander, in a low, sullen voice. “She doesn’t know what she’s saying.”
Ashamed of his outbreak, perhaps, or in sheer helplessness against Katharine’s desperate speech, he had fallen back again and stood leaning against the mantelpiece, his arms folded over his broad chest, his hands twitching at his sleeve, his pale mouth set like a steel trap, a dull, dangerous light in his eyes.
“You’re mistaken,” continued Katharine. “It’s all for money. Money’s at the root of every action of your life. You didn’t want me to marry Jack because he’s poor, and because uncle Robert might not leave him anything. Money! You thought at first you could make me take Hamilton Bright, because he’s cared for me so long — and because he’s beginning to be rich and is a partner in Bemans’ — money, again! Archie Wingfield — how many millions will he have? Money — of course. Uncle Robert’s will — what shall you get by it? Money — and you’d tear the figures out of my head with red hot pincers if you could — just to know how much you’ll have when the poor man’s dead. Ever since we were children, Charlotte and I, you’ve preached economy and saving and poverty — you’ve let my mother — your wife — and you’re the nephew of the great Robert Lauderdale — you’ve let her work her hands and her eyes till they ached to make a little money herself — not for herself only, but for us. No — don’t smile contemptuously like that. She’s done it all my life, and she’s doing it still. Your children could scarcely have been decently dressed, if she hadn’t earned a few hundred dollars for them. There’s hardly a thing I have on that she’s not paid for out of her earnings. We couldn’t have gone to our first ball, Charlotte or I, but for her. And still, day after day, you say you’re poor. Do you think I don’t see all the little meannesses? Do you think I can’t smell the vile cigars you make grandpapa smoke, to save those few cents? Is there a house among all our friends, poor as some of them are, where there isn’t a fire in the library, at least in the evening, even when there’s nobody asked to dinner? Economy, saving, meanness of all sorts — even the poor housemaid who broke her arm on the kitchen stairs! You sent to the hospital the day before she was to leave, half-cured and helpless, and made her sign the declaration that she made no further claim upon you. She came here when you were down town. Mother gave her five dollars — out of her earnings — but I heard her story. Oh, they’re endless, your ways of saving that filthy, miserable money of yours!”
“Are you really mad, Katharine?” asked her father, in a dull, monotonous voice.
“Child! You know we’re comparatively poor,” said Mrs. Lauderdale. “Come — dear child—”
She laid her hand on the girl’s arm as though she would lead her away and end the violent scene, but Katharine stood firm.
“Poor!” she cried, indignantly. “Comparatively poor! Yes — compared with uncle Robert or Mr. Beman, perhaps. But papa is not poor, though he has told you so for years, though he lets you work for money — you! Though he borrows five dollars of you — I’ve seen it again and again — and never returns it — borrows the poor little sums you earn by hard work! Oh, it’s not to be believed! Borrows without ever meaning to give it back — like an honest man — oh, he wouldn’t dare to do that with his dearest friend. But you! You can’t help yourself—”
“My dear, he keeps an account—”
“I know, I know! He pretends that he keeps the money for you and allows you interest! I’ve heard him say so. Interest on five dollars. And have you ever had it? Sordid — mean — there’s no word! And he keeps telling you that he’s poor, and that we must pinch and scrape or we shall go beyond our income — when he has over a million of dollars put away—”
“Be silent!” cried Alexander Junior, with sudden vehemence, his cheeks as grey as ashes.
“I won’t be silent! I’ll say every word I have to say. Look me in the face. Deny, if you dare, before God, that what I say is true — that you have that money put away somewhere. Is it true, or not, as you hope to be saved?”
Mrs. Lauderdale came between them again, laying her hands on Katharine’s arm and trying to make her leave the room.
“Take care, take care!” she cried, anxiously, and hardly knowing what she said. “Alexander — Katharine! Don’t — oh, please don’t quarrel like this — my child, my child! You’re beside yourself!”
“I’m not — it’s true as life and death!” answered the girl, resisting the pressure. “Ask him if it’s not! Make him swear that it’s not true — make him say, before heaven, that he has less than a million, while he’s selling his daughters and forcing his wife to work. Wait — don’t speak — listen to what he says! If he can’t say it, his whole life has been a lie, and he knows it — wait — hush!”
Katharine held her mother fast by the hands, and seemed to hold her own breath, her angry eyes fixed on her father’s face. Mrs. Lauderdale turned her
head instinctively, and looked at him. He met their glances for a few seconds, and his dry, pale lips parted as though he were about to speak, but no sound came. In the waning light his eyes had a glassy look. It only lasted a moment, and then his mouth was twisted with an expression meant for a smile.
“Take her away — she’s mad,” he said, and his voice seemed to be suddenly weak.
Katharine laughed aloud, bitterly and cruelly, in her triumph.
“If I were mad, as you say I am,” she said, a moment later, “that would not make it impossible for you to tell the truth. Yes, mother — I’m going now. I’ve said it all — and you know it’s true.”
Complete Works of F Marion Crawford Page 721
