Ruggles turned red. I know he writes to Em White in vacations.
“I’ll do my best,” he said, quite meekly. “That is, I’ll compose it. But you’ll have to copy it. You can imitate the Old Fellow’s handwriting so well.”
“But look here,” I said, an uncomfortable idea striking me, “what about Sylvia? Won’t she feel kind of flattish when she finds out he didn’t write it? For of course he’ll tell her. We haven’t anything against her, you know.”
“Oh, Sylvia won’t care,” said Ruggles serenely. “She’s the sort of girl who can take a joke. I’ve seen her eyes shine over tricks we’ve played on the professors before now. She’ll just laugh. Besides, she doesn’t like the Old Fellow a bit. I know from the way she acts with him. She’s always so cool and stiff when he’s about, not a bit like she is with the other professors.”
Well, Ruggles wrote the letter. At first he tried to pass it off on me as his own composition. But I know a few little things, and one of them is that Ruggles couldn’t have made up that letter any more than he could have written a sonnet. I told him so, and made him own up. He had a copy of an old letter that had been written to his sister by her young man. I suppose Ruggles had stolen it, but there is no use inquiring too closely into these things. Anyhow, that letter just filled the bill. It was beautifully expressed. Ruggles’s sister’s young man must have possessed lots of ability. He was an English professor, something like Micky, so I suppose he was extra good at it. He started in by telling her how much he loved her, and what an angel of beauty and goodness he had always thought her; how unworthy he felt himself of her and how little hope he had that she could ever care for him; and he wound up by imploring her to tell him if she could possibly love him a little bit and all that sort of thing.
I copied the letter out on heliotrope paper in my best imitation of the Old Fellow’s handwriting and signed it, “Yours devotedly and imploringly, George Osborne.” Then we mailed it that very evening.
The next evening the Cad girls gave a big reception in the Assembly Hall to an Academy alumna who was visiting the Greek professor’s wife. It was the smartest event of the term and everybody was there — students and faculty and, of course, Sylvia Grant. Sylvia looked stunning. She was all in white, with a string of pearls about her pretty round throat and a couple of little pink roses in her black hair. I never saw her so smiling and bright; but she seemed quieter than usual, and avoided poor Micky so skilfully that it was really a pleasure to watch her. The Old Fellow came in late, with his tie all crooked, as it always was; I saw Sylvia blush and nudged Ruggles to look.
“She’s thinking of the letter,” he said.
Ruggles and I never meant to listen, upon my word we didn’t. It was pure accident. We were in behind the flags and palms in the Modern Languages Room, fixing up a plan how to get Em and Jennie off for a moonlit stroll in the grounds — these things require diplomacy I can tell you, for there are always so many other fellows hanging about — when in came Sylvia Grant and the Old Fellow arm in arm. The room was quite empty, or they thought it was, and they sat down just on the other side of the flags. They couldn’t see us, but we could see them quite plainly. Sylvia still looked smiling and happy, not a bit mad as we had expected, but just kind of shy and radiant. As for the Old Fellow, he looked, as Em White would say, as Sphinx-like as ever. I’d defy any man alive to tell from the Old Fellow’s expression what he was thinking about or what he felt like at any time.
Then all at once Sylvia said softly, with her eyes cast down, “I received your letter, Mr. Osborne.”
Any other man in the world would have jumped, or said, “My letter!!!” or shown surprise in some way. But the Old Fellow has a nerve. He looked sideways at Sylvia for a moment and then he said kind of drily, “Ah, did you?”
“Yes,” said Sylvia, not much above a whisper. “It — it surprised me very much. I never supposed that you — you cared for me in that way.”
“Can you tell me how I could help caring?” said the Old Fellow in the strangest way. His voice actually trembled.
“I — I don’t think I would tell you if I knew,” said Sylvia, turning her head away. “You see — I don’t want you to help caring.”
“Sylvia!”
You never saw such a transformation as came over the Old Fellow. His eyes just blazed, but his face went white. He bent forward and took her hand.
“Sylvia, do you mean that you — you actually care a little for me, dearest? Oh, Sylvia, do you mean that?”
“Of course I do,” said Sylvia right out. “I’ve always cared — ever since I was a little girl coming here to school and breaking my heart over mathematics, although I hated them, just to be in your class. Why — why — I’ve treasured up old geometry exercises you wrote out for me just because you wrote them. But I thought I could never make you care for me. I was the happiest girl in the world when your letter came today.”
“Sylvia,” said the Old Fellow, “I’ve loved you for years. But I never dreamed that you could care for me. I thought it quite useless to tell you of my love — before. Will you — can you be my wife, darling?”
At this point Ruggles and I differ as to what came next. He asserts that Sylvia turned square around and kissed the Old Fellow. But I’m sure she just turned her face and gave him a look and then he kissed her.
Anyhow, there they both were, going on at the silliest rate about how much they loved each other and how the Old Fellow thought she loved Micky and all that sort of thing. It was awful. I never thought the Old Fellow or Sylvia either could be so spooney. Ruggles and I would have given anything on earth to be out of that. We knew we’d no business to be there and we felt as foolish as flatfish. It was a tremendous relief when the Old Fellow and Sylvia got up at last and trailed away, both of them looking idiotically happy.
“Well, did you ever?” said Ruggles.
It was a girl’s exclamation, but nothing else would have expressed his feelings.
“No, I never,” I said. “To think that Sylvia Grant should be sweet on the Old Fellow when she could have Micky! It passes comprehension. Did she — did she really promise to marry him, Ruggles?”
“She did,” said Ruggles gloomily. “But, I say, isn’t that Old Fellow game? Tumbled to the trick in a jiff; never let on but what he wrote the letter, never will let on, I bet. Where does the joke come in, Polly, my boy?”
“It’s on us,” I said, “but nobody will know of it if we hold our tongues. We’ll have to hold them anyhow, for Sylvia’s sake, since she’s been goose enough to go and fall in love with the Old Fellow. She’d go wild if she ever found out the letter was a hoax. We have made that match, Ruggles. He’d never have got up enough spunk to tell her he wanted her, and she’d probably have married Micky out of spite.”
“Well, you know the Old Fellow isn’t a bad sort after all,” said Ruggles, “and he’s really awfully gone on her. So it’s all right. Let’s go and find the girls.”
The Parting of The Ways
Mrs. Longworth crossed the hotel piazza, descended the steps, and walked out of sight down the shore road with all the grace of motion that lent distinction to her slightest movement. Her eyes were very bright, and an unusual flush stained the pallor of her cheek. Two men who were lounging in one corner of the hotel piazza looked admiringly after her.
“She is a beautiful woman,” said one.
“Wasn’t there some talk about Mrs. Longworth and Cunningham last winter?” asked the other.
“Yes. They were much together. Still, there may have been nothing wrong. She was old Judge Carmody’s daughter, you know. Longworth got Carmody under his thumb in money matters and put the screws on. They say he made Carmody’s daughter the price of the old man’s redemption. The girl herself was a mere child, I shall never forget her face on her wedding day. But she’s been plucky since then, I must say. If she has suffered, she hasn’t shown it. I don’t suppose Longworth ever ill-treats her. He isn’t that sort. He’s simply a grovelling cad —
that’s all. Nobody would sympathise much with the poor devil if his wife did run off with Cunningham.”
Meanwhile, Beatrice Longworth walked quickly down the shore road, her white skirt brushing over the crisp golden grasses by the way. In a sunny hollow among the sandhills she came upon Stephen Gordon, sprawled out luxuriously in the warm, sea-smelling grasses. The youth sprang to his feet at sight of her, and his big brown eyes kindled to a glow.
Mrs. Longworth smiled to him. They had been great friends all summer. He was a lanky, overgrown lad of fifteen or sixteen, odd and shy and dreamy, scarcely possessing a speaking acquaintance with others at the hotel. But he and Mrs. Longworth had been congenial from their first meeting. In many ways, he was far older than his years, but there was a certain inerradicable boyishness about him to which her heart warmed.
“You are the very person I was just going in search of. I’ve news to tell. Sit down.”
He spoke eagerly, patting the big gray boulder beside him with his slim, brown hand. For a moment Beatrice hesitated. She wanted to be alone just then. But his clever, homely face was so appealing that she yielded and sat down.
Stephen flung himself down again contentedly in the grasses at her feet, pillowing his chin in his palms and looking up at her, adoringly.
“You are so beautiful, dear lady. I love to look at you. Will you tilt that hat a little more over the left eye-brow? Yes — so — some day I shall paint you.”
His tone and manner were all simplicity.
“When you are a great artist,” said Beatrice, indulgently.
He nodded.
“Yes, I mean to be that. I’ve told you all my dreams, you know. Now for my news. I’m going away to-morrow. I had a telegram from father to-day.”
He drew the message from his pocket and flourished it up at her.
“I’m to join him in Europe at once. He is in Rome. Think of it — in Rome! I’m to go on with my art studies there. And I leave to-morrow.”
“I’m glad — and I’m sorry — and you know which is which,” said Beatrice, patting the shaggy brown head. “I shall miss you dreadfully, Stephen.”
“We have been splendid chums, haven’t we?” he said, eagerly.
Suddenly his face changed. He crept nearer to her, and bowed his head until his lips almost touched the hem of her dress.
“I’m glad you came down to-day,” he went on in a low, diffident voice. “I want to tell you something, and I can tell it better here. I couldn’t go away without thanking you. I’ll make a mess of it — I can never explain things. But you’ve been so much to me — you mean so much to me. You’ve made me believe in things I never believed in before. You — you — I know now that there is such a thing as a good woman, a woman who could make a man better, just because he breathed the same air with her.”
He paused for a moment; then went on in a still lower tone:
“It’s hard when a fellow can’t speak of his mother because he can’t say anything good of her, isn’t it? My mother wasn’t a good woman. When I was eight years old she went away with a scoundrel. It broke father’s heart. Nobody thought I understood, I was such a little fellow. But I did. I heard them talking. I knew she had brought shame and disgrace on herself and us. And I had loved her so! Then, somehow, as I grew up, it was my misfortune that all the women I had to do with were mean and base. They were hirelings, and I hated and feared them. There was an aunt of mine — she tried to be good to me in her way. But she told me a lie, and I never cared for her after I found it out. And then, father — we loved each other and were good chums. But he didn’t believe in much either. He was bitter, you know. He said all women were alike. I grew up with that notion. I didn’t care much for anything — nothing seemed worth while. Then I came here and met you.”
He paused again. Beatrice had listened with a gray look on her face. It would have startled him had he glanced up, but he did not, and after a moment’s silence the halting boyish voice went on:
“You have changed everything for me. I was nothing but a clod before. You are not the mother of my body, but you are of my soul. It was born of you. I shall always love and reverence you for it. You will always be my ideal. If I ever do anything worth while it will be because of you. In everything I shall ever attempt I shall try to do it as if you were to pass judgment upon it. You will be a lifelong inspiration to me. Oh, I am bungling this! I can’t tell you what I feel — you are so pure, so good, so noble! I shall reverence all women for your sake henceforth.”
“And if,” said Beatrice, in a very low voice, “if I were false to your ideal of me — if I were to do anything that would destroy your faith in me — something weak or wicked—”
“But you couldn’t,” he interrupted, flinging up his head and looking at her with his great dog-like eyes, “you couldn’t!”
“But if I could?” she persisted, gently, “and if I did — what then?”
“I should hate you,” he said, passionately. “You would be worse than a murderess. You would kill every good impulse and belief in me. I would never trust anything or anybody again — but there,” he added, his voice once more growing tender, “you will never fail me, I feel sure of that.”
“Thank you,” said Beatrice, almost in a whisper. “Thank you,” she repeated, after a moment. She stood up and held out her hand. “I think I must go now. Good-bye, dear laddie. Write to me from Rome. I shall always be glad to hear from you wherever you are. And — and — I shall always try to live up to your ideal of me, Stephen.”
He sprang to his feet and took her hand, lifting it to his lips with boyish reverence. “I know that,” he said, slowly. “Good-bye, my sweet lady.”
When Mrs. Longworth found herself in her room again, she unlocked her desk and took out a letter. It was addressed to Mr. Maurice Cunningham. She slowly tore it twice across, laid the fragments on a tray, and touched them with a lighted match. As they blazed up one line came out in writhing redness across the page: “I will go away with you as you ask.” Then it crumbled into gray ashes.
She drew a long breath and hid her face in her hands.
The Promissory Note
Ernest Duncan swung himself off the platform of David White’s store and walked whistling up the street. Life seemed good to Ernest just then. Mr. White had given him a rise in salary that day, and had told him that he was satisfied with him. Mr. White was not easy to please in the matter of clerks, and it had been with fear and trembling that Ernest had gone into his store six months before. He had thought himself fortunate to secure such a chance. His father had died the preceding year, leaving nothing in the way of worldly goods except the house he had lived in. For several years before his death he had been unable to do much work, and the finances of the little family had dwindled steadily. After his father’s death Ernest, who had been going to school and expecting to go to college, found that he must go to work at once instead to support himself and his mother.
If George Duncan had not left much of worldly wealth behind him, he at least bequeathed to his son the interest of a fine, upright character and a reputation for honesty and integrity. None knew this better than David White, and it was on this account that he took Ernest as his clerk, over the heads of several other applicants who seemed to have a stronger “pull.”
“I don’t know anything about you, Ernest,” he said bluntly. “You’re only sixteen, and you may not have an ounce of real grit or worth in you. But it will be a queer thing if your father’s son hasn’t. I knew him all his life. A better man never lived nor, before his accident, a smarter one. I’ll give his son a chance, anyhow. If you take after your dad you’ll get on all right.”
Ernest had not been in the store very long before Mr. White concluded, with a gratified chuckle, that he did take after his father. He was hard-working, conscientious, and obliging. Customers of all sorts, from the rough fishermen who came up from the harbour to the old Irishwomen from the back country roads, liked him. Mr. White was satisfied. He was beginning to grow o
ld. This lad had the makings of a good partner in him by and by. No hurry; he must serves long apprenticeship first and prove his mettle; no use spoiling him by hinting at future partnerships before need was. That would all come in due time. David White was a shrewd man.
Ernest was unconscious of his employer’s plans regarding him; but he knew that he stood well with him and, much to his surprise, he found that he liked the work, and was beginning to take a personal interest and pleasure in the store. Hence, he went home to tea on this particular afternoon with buoyant step and smiling eyes. It was a good world, and he was glad to be alive in it, glad to have work to do and a dear little mother to work for. Most of the folks who met him smiled in friendly fashion at the bright-eyed, frank-faced lad. Only old Jacob Patterson scowled grimly as he passed him, emitting merely a surly grunt in response to Ernest’s greeting. But then, old Jacob Patterson was noted as much for his surliness as for his miserliness. Nobody had ever heard him speak pleasantly to anyone; therefore his unfriendliness did not at all dash Ernest’s high spirits.
“I’m sorry for him,” the lad thought. “He has no interest in life save accumulating money. He has no other pleasure or affection or ambition. When he dies I don’t suppose a single regret will follow him. Father died a poor man, but what love and respect went with him to his grave — aye, and beyond it. Jacob Patterson, I’m sorry for you. You have chosen the poorer part, and you are a poor man in spite of your thousands.”
Ernest and his mother lived up on the hill, at the end of the straggling village street. The house was a small, old-fashioned one, painted white, set in the middle of a small but beautiful lawn. George Duncan, during the last rather helpless years of his life, had devoted himself to the cultivation of flowers, shrubs, and trees and, as a result, his lawn was the prettiest in Conway. Ernest worked hard in his spare moments to keep it looking as well as in his father’s lifetime, for he loved his little home dearly, and was proud of its beauty.
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