IV
Many men, possibly a majority, have sufficient equipment for at least afair measure of success. Yet all but a few are downright failures,passing their lives in helpless dependence, glad to sell themselves fora small part of the value they create. For this there are two mainreasons. The first is, as Norman said, that only a few men have theself-restraint to resist the temptings of a small pleasure to-day inorder to gain a larger to-morrow or next day. The second is that few menpossess the power of continuous concentration. Most of us cannotconcentrate at all; any slight distraction suffices to disrupt anddestroy the whole train of thought. A good many can concentrate for afew hours, for a week or so, for two or three months. But there comes asmall achievement and it satisfies, or a small discouragement and itdisheartens. Only to the rare few is given the power to concentratesteadily, year in and year out, through good and evil event or report.
As Norman stepped into his auto to go to the office--he had ridden ahorse in the park before breakfast until its hide was streaked withlather--the instant he entered his auto, he discharged his mind ofeverything but the business before him down town--or, rather, businessfilled his mind so completely that everything else poured out and away.A really fine mind--a perfect or approximately perfect instrument to thepurposes of its possessor--is a marvelous spectacle of order. It is likea vast public library constantly used by large numbers. There arealcoves, rows on rows, shelves on shelves, with the exactest systemeverywhere prevailing, with the attendants moving about in list-bottomedshoes, fulfilling without the least hesitation or mistake the multitudeof directions from the central desk. It is like an admirably drilledarmy, where there is the nice balance of freedom and discipline thatgives mobility without confusion; the divisions, down to files and evenunits, can be disposed along the line of battle wherever needed, or canbe marshaled in reserve for use at the proper moment. Such a mind may beused for good purpose or bad--or for mixed purposes, after the usualfashion in human action. But whatever the service to which it is put, itacts with equal energy and precision. Character--that is a thing apart.The character determines the morality of action; but only the intellectdetermines the skill of action.
In the offices of that great law firm one of the keenest pleasures ofthe more intelligent of the staff was watching the workings of FrederickNorman's mind--its ease of movement, its quickness and accuracy, itsobedience to the code of mental habits he had fixed for himself. Inlarge part all this was born with the man; but it had been brought to astate of perfection by the most painful labor, by the severestdiscipline, by years of practice of the sacrifice of smalltemptations--temptations to waste time and strength on the littlepleasant things which result in such heavy bills--bills that bankrupt aman in middle life and send him in old age into the deserts of povertyand contempt.
Such an unique and trivial request as that of Josephine Burroughs beingwholly out of his mental habit for down town, he forgot it along witheverything else having to do with uptown only--along with Josephineherself, to tell a truth which may pique the woman reader and may bewholly misunderstood by the sentimentalists. By merest accident he wasreminded.
As the door of his private office opened to admit an important client hehappened to glance up. And between the edge of the door frame and hisclient's automobile-fattened and carefully dressed body, he caught aglimpse of the "poor little forlornness" who chanced to be crossing theouter office. A glint of sunlight on her hair changed it fromlifelessness to golden vital vividness; the same chance sunbeam touchedher pale skin with a soft yellow radiation--and her profile wasdelicately fine and regular. Thus Norman, who observed everything, sawa head of finely wrought gold--a startling cameo against the dead whiteof office wall. It was only with the second thought that he recognizedher. The episode of the night before came back and Josephine's penitentyet persistent note.
He glanced at the clock. Said the client in the amusing tone of one whowould like to take offense if he only dared, "I'll not detain you long,Mr. Norman. And really the matter is extremely important."
There are not many lawyers, even of the first rank, with whom their bigclients reverse the attitude of servant and master. Norman might wellhave been flattered. In that restrained tone from one used to servilityand fond of it and easily miffed by lack of it was the whole story ofNorman's long battle and splendid victory. But he was not in the mood tobe flattered; he was thinking of other things. And it presently annoyedhim that his usually docile mind refused to obey his will's order toconcentrate on the client and the business--said business being one ofthose huge schemes through which a big monster of a corporation isconstructed by lawyers out of materials supplied by great capitalistsand controllers of capital, is set to eating in enormous meals thesubstance of the people; at some obscure point in all the principalveins small but leechlike parasite corporations are attached,industriously to suck away the surplus blood so that the owners of thebeast may say, "It is eating almost nothing. See how lean it is, poorthing! Why, the bones fairly poke through its meager hide."
An interesting and highly complicated enterprise is such a construction.It was of the kind in which Norman's mind especially delighted; Herculesis himself only in presence of an herculean labor. But on that day hecould not concentrate, and because of a trifle! He felt like a giantdisabled by a grain of dust in the eye--yes, a mere grain of dust! "Imust love Josephine even more than I realize, to be fretted by such apaltry thing," thought he. And after patiently enduring the client forhalf an hour without being able to grasp the outlines of the project, herose abruptly and said: "I must get into my mind the points you've givenme before we can go further. So I'll not waste your time."
This sounded very like "Clear out--you've bored me to my limit ofendurance." But the motions of a mind such as he knew Norman had werebeyond and high above the client's mere cunning at dollar-trapping. Hefelt that it was the part of wisdom--also soothing to vanity--to assumethat Norman meant only what his words conveyed. When Norman was alone herang for an office boy and said:
"Please ask Miss Halliday to come here."
The boy hesitated. "Miss Hallowell?" he suggested.
"Hallowell--thanks--Hallowell," said Norman.
And it somehow pleased him that he had not remembered her name. Howsignificant it was of her insignificance that so accurate a memory ashis should make the slip. When she, impassive, colorless, nebulous,stood before him the feeling of pleasure was, queerly enough, mingledwith a sense of humiliation. What absurd vagaries his imagination hadindulged in! For it must have been sheer hallucination, his seeing thosewonders in her. How he would be laughed at if those pictures he had madeof her could be seen by any other eyes! "They must be right when theysay a man in love is touched in the head. Only, why the devil should Ihave happened to get these crazy notions about a person I've no interestin?" However, the main point--and most satisfactory--was that Josephinewould be at a glance convinced--convicted--made ashamed of her absurdattack. A mere grain of dust.
"Just a moment, please," he said to Miss Hallowell. "I want to give youa note of introduction."
He wrote the note to Josephine Burroughs: "Here she is. I've told heryou wish to talk with her about doing some work for you." When hefinished he looked up. She was standing at the window, gazing out uponthe tremendous panorama of skyscrapers that makes New York the mostastounding of the cities of men. He was about to speak. The words fellback unuttered. For once more the hallucination--or whatever itwas--laid hold of him. That figure by the window--that beautiful girl,with the great dreamy eyes and the soft and languorous nuances of goldenhaze over her hair, over the skin of perfectly rounded cheek andperfectly moulded chin curving with ideal grace into the whitest andfirmest of throats----
"Am I mad? or do I really see what I see?" he muttered.
He turned away to clear his eyes for a second view, for an attempt tosettle it whether he saw or imagined. When he looked again, she wasobserving him--and once more she was the obscure, the cipherlike MissHallowell, ten-dollar-a-week
typewriter and not worth it. Evidently shenoted his confusion and was vaguely alarmed by it. He recovered himselfas best he could and debated whether it was wise to send her toJosephine. Surely those transformations were not altogether his ownhallucinations; and Josephine might see, might humiliate him bysuspecting more strongly--... Ridiculous! He held out the letter.
"The lady to whom this is addressed wishes to see you. Will you gothere, right away, please? It may be that you'll get the chance to makesome extra money. You've no objection, I suppose?"
She took the letter hesitatingly.
"You will find her agreeable, I think," continued he. "At any rate, thetrip can do no harm."
She hesitated a moment longer, as if weighing what he had said. "No, itwill do no harm," she finally said. Then, with a delightful color and aquick transformation into a vision of young shyness, "Thank you, Mr.Norman. Thank you so much."
"Not at all--not in the least," he stammered, the impulse strong to takethe note back and ask her to return to her desk.
When the door closed behind her he rose and paced about the roomuneasily. He was filled with disquiet, with hazy apprehension. Hisnerves were unsteady, as if he were going through an exhausting strain.He sat and tried to force himself to work. Impossible. "What sort ofdamn fool attack is this?" he exclaimed, pacing about again. He searchedhis mind in vain for any cause adequate to explain his unprecedentedstate. "If I did not know that I was well--absolutely well--I'd think Iwas about to have an illness--something in the brain."
He appealed to that friend in any trying hour, his sense of humor. Helaughed at himself; but his nerves refused to return to the normal. Herushed from his private office on various pretexts, each time lingeredin the general room, talking aimlessly with Tetlow--and watching thedoor. When she at last appeared, he guiltily withdrew, feeling thateveryone was observing his perturbation and was wondering at it andjesting about it. "And what the devil am I excited about?" he demandedof himself. What indeed? He seated himself, rang the bell.
"If Miss Hallowell has got back," he said to the office boy, "please askher to come in."
"I think she's gone out to lunch," said the boy. "I know she came in awhile ago. She passed along as you was talking to Mr. Tetlow."
Norman felt himself flushing. "Any time will do," he said, bending overthe papers spread out before him--the papers in the case of the GeneralTraction Company resisting the payment of its taxes. A noisome odorseemed to be rising from the typewritten sheets. He made a wry face andflung the papers aside with a gesture of disgust. "They never doanything honest," he said to himself. "From the stock-jobbing ownersdown to the nickel-filching conductors they steal--steal--steal!" Andthen he wondered at, laughed at, his heat. What did it matter? An antpilfering from another ant and a sparrow stealing the crumb found byanother sparrow--a man robbing another man--all part of the universalscheme. Only a narrow-minded ignoramus would get himself wrought up overit; a philosopher would laugh--and take what he needed or happened tofancy.
The door opened. Miss Hallowell entered, a small and demure hat upon hermasses of thick fair hair arranged by anything but unskillful fingers."You wished to see me?" came in the quiet little voice, sweet and frankand shy.
He roused himself from pretended abstraction.
"Oh--it's you?" he said pleasantly. "They said you were out."
"I was going to lunch. But if you've anything for me to do, I'll be gladto stay."
"No--no. I simply wished to say that if Miss Burroughs wished to make anarrangement with you, we'd help you about carrying out your part of it."
She was pale--so pale that it brought out strongly the smooth dead-whitepurity of her skin. Her small features wore an expression of pride, ofhaughtiness even. And in the eyes that regarded him steadily there shonea cold light--the light of a proud and lonely soul that repels intrusioneven as the Polar fastnesses push back without effort assault upon theirsolitudes. "We made no arrangement," said she.
"You are not more than eighteen, are you?" inquired he abruptly.
The irrelevant question startled her. She looked as if she thought shehad not heard aright. "I am twenty," she said.
"You have a most--most unusual way of shifting to various ages andpersonalities," explained he, with some embarrassment.
She simply looked at him and waited.
His embarrassment increased. It was a novel sensation to him, thisfeeling ill at ease with a woman--he who was at ease with everyone andput others at their ease or not as he pleased. "I'm sorry you and MissBurroughs didn't arrange something. I suppose she found the hoursdifficult."
"She made me an offer," replied the girl. "I refused it."
"But, as I told you, we can let you off--anything within reason."
"Thank you, but I do not care to do that kind of work. No doubt any kindof work for wages classes one as a servant. But those people upthere--they make one _feel_ it--feel menial."
"Not Miss Burroughs, I assure you."
A satirical smile hovered round the girl's lips. Her face was altogetherlovely now, and no lily ever rose more gracefully from its stem than didher small head from her slender form. "She meant to be kind, but she wasinsulting. Those people up there don't understand. They're vain andnarrow. Oh, I don't blame them. Only, I don't care to be brought intocontact with them."
He looked at her in wonder. She talked of Josephine as if she wereJosephine's superior, and her expression and accent were such that theycontrived to convey an impression that she had the right to do it. Hegrew suddenly angry at her, at himself for listening to her. "I amsorry," he said stiffly, and took up a pen to indicate that he wishedher to go.
He rather expected that she would be alarmed. But if she was, she whollyconcealed it. She smiled slightly and moved toward the door. Lookingafter her, he relented. She seemed so young--was so young--and wasevidently poor. He said:
"It's all right to be proud, Miss Hallowell. But there is such a thingas supersensitiveness. You are earning your living. If you'll pardon mefor thrusting advice upon you, I think you've made a mistake. I'm sureMiss Burroughs meant well. If you had been less sensitive you'd soonhave realized it."
"She patronized me," replied the girl, not angrily, but with amusement."It was all I could do not to laugh in her face. The idea of a woman whoprobably couldn't make five dollars a week fancying she was the superiorof any girl who makes her own living, no matter how poor a living itis."
Norman laughed. It had often appealed to his own sense of humor, thedelusion that the tower one happened to be standing upon was part ofone's own stature. But he said: "You're a very foolish young person.You'll not get far in the world if you keep to that road. It windsthrough Poverty Swamps to the Poor House."
"Oh, no," replied she. "One can always die."
Again he laughed. "But why die? Why not be sensible and live?"
"I don't know," replied she. She was looking away dreamily, and her eyeswere wonderful to see. "There are many things I feel and do--and I don'tat all understand why. But--" An expression of startling resolutionflashed across her face. "But I do them, just the same."
A brief silence; then, as she again moved toward the door, he said, "Youhave been working for some time?"
"Four years."
"You support yourself?"
"I work to help out father's income. He makes almost enough, but notquite."
Almost enough! The phrase struck upon Norman's fancy as both amusing andsad. Almost enough for what? For keeping body and soul together; forkeeping body barely decently clad. Yet she was content. He said:
"You like to work?"
"Not yet. But I think I shall when I learn this business. One feelssecure when one has a trade."
"It doesn't impress me as an interesting life for a girl of your age,"he suggested.
"Oh, I'm not unhappy. And at home, of evenings and Sundays, I'm happy."
"Doing what?"
"Reading and talking with father and--doing the housework--and all therest of it."
&nbs
p; What a monotonous narrow little life! He wanted to pity her, but somehowhe could not. There was no suggestion in her manner that she was anobject of pity. "What did Miss Burroughs say to you--if I may ask?"
"Certainly. You sent me, and I'm much obliged to you. I realize it wasan opportunity--for another sort of girl. I half tried to accept becauseI knew refusing was only my--queerness." She smiled charmingly. "You arenot offended because I couldn't make myself take it?"
"Not in the least." And all at once he felt that it was true. This girlwould have been out of place in service. "What was the offer?"
Suddenly before him there appeared a clever, willful child, full of thechildish passion for imitation and mockery. And she proceeded to "takeoff" the grand Miss Burroughs--enough like Josephine to give the satirepoint and barb. He could see Josephine resolved to be affable and equal,to make this doubtless bedazzled stray from the "lower classes" feelcomfortable in those palatial surroundings. She imitated Josephine'swalk, her way of looking, her voice for the menials--gracious andcondescending. The exhibition was clever, free from malice, redolent ofhumor. Norman laughed until the tears rolled down his cheeks.
"You ought to go on the stage," said he. "How Josephine--Miss Burroughswould appreciate it! For she's got a keen sense of humor."
"Not for the real jokes--like herself," replied Miss Hallowell.
"You're prejudiced."
"No. I see her as she is. Probably everyone else--those around her--seeher money and her clothes and all that. But I saw--just her."
He nodded thoughtfully. Then he looked penetratingly at her. "How didyou happen to learn to do that?" he asked. "To see people as they are?"
"Father taught me." Her eyes lighted up, her whole expression changed.She became beautiful with the beauty of an intense and adoring love."Father is a wonderful man--one of the most wonderful that ever lived.He----"
There was a knock at the door. She startled, he looked confused. Bothawakened to a sense of their forgotten surroundings, of who and whatthey were. She went and Mr. Sanders entered. But even in his confusionNorman marveled at the vanishing of the fascinating personality who hadbeen captivating him into forgetting everything else, at thereappearance of the blank, the pale and insignificant personalityattached to a typewriting machine at ten dollars a week. No, notinsignificant, not blank--never again that, for him. He saw now the fullreality--and also why he, everyone, was so misled. She made him think ofthe surface of the sea when the sky is gray and the air calm. It liessmooth and flat and expressionless--inert, monotonous. But let sunbeamstrike or breeze ever so faint start up, and what a commotion ofunending variety! He could never look at her again without beingreminded of those infinite latent possibilities, without wondering whatnew and perhaps more charming, more surprising varieties of look andtone and manner could be evoked.
And while Sanders was talking--prosing on and on about things Normaneither already knew or did not wish to know--he was thinking of her. "Ifshe happens to meet a man with enough discernment to fall in love withher," he said to himself, "he certainly will never weary. What a pitythat such a girl shouldn't have had a chance, should be wasted on someunappreciative chucklehead of her class! What a pity she hasn'tambition--or the quality, whatever it is--that makes those who have itget on, whether they wish or no."
During the rest of the day he revolved from time to time indistinctideas of somehow giving this girl a chance. He wished Josephine wouldand could help, or perhaps his sister Ursula. It was not a matter thatcould be settled, or even taken up, in haste. No man of his mentalityand experience fails to learn how perilous it is in the least tointerfere in the destiny of anyone. And his notion involved not slightinterference with advice or suggestion or momentarily extended helpinghand, but radical change of the whole current of destiny. Also, heappreciated how difficult it is for a man to do anything for a youngwoman--anything that would not harm more than it would help. Only onething seemed clear to him--the "clever child" ought to have a chance.
He went to see Josephine after dinner that night His own house, whilerichly and showily furnished, as became his means and station,seemed--and indeed was--merely an example of simple, old-fashioned"solid comfort" in comparison with the Burroughs palace. He had neverliked, but, being a true New Yorker, had greatly admired the splendor ofthat palace, its costly art junk, its rotten old tapestries, itsunlovely genuine antiques, its room after room of tastelessmagnificence, suggesting a museum, or rather the combination home andsalesroom of an art dealer. This evening he found himself curious,critical, disposed to license a long-suppressed sense of humor. Whilehe was waiting for Josephine to come down to the small salon into whichhe had been shown, her older sister drifted in, on the way to a latedinner and ball. She eyed him admiringly from head to foot.
"You've _such_ an air, Fred," said she. "You should hear the butler on thesubject of you. He says that of all the men who come to the house youare most the man of the world. He says he could tell it by the way youwalk in and take off your hat and coat and throw them at him."
Norman laughed and said, "I didn't know. I must stop that."
"Don't!" cried Mrs. Bellowes. "You'll break his heart. He adores it. Youknow, servants dearly love to be treated as servants. Anyone who thinksthe world loves equality knows very little about human nature. Mostpeople love to look up, just as most women love to be ruled. No, youmust continue to be the master, the man of the world, Fred."
She was busy with her gorgeous and trailing wraps and with her cigaretteor she would have seen his confusion. He was recalling his scene withthe typewriter girl. Not much of the man of the world, then and there,certainly. What a grotesque performance for a man of his position, for aserious man of any kind! And how came he to permit such a person tomimic Josephine Burroughs, a lady, the woman to whom he was engaged? Inthese proud and pretentious surroundings he felt contemptiblyguilty--and dazed wonder at his own inexplicable folly and weakness.
Mrs. Bellowes departed before Josephine came down. So there was norelief for his embarrassment. He saw that she too felt constrained.Instead of meeting him half way in embrace and kiss, as she usually did,she threw him a kiss and pretended to be busy lighting a cigarette andarranging the shades of the table lamp. "Well, I saw your 'poor littlecreature,'" she began. She was splendidly direct in all her dealings,after the manner of people who have never had to make their own way--tocajole or conciliate or dread the consequences of frankness.
"I told you you'd not find her interesting."
"Oh, she was a nice little girl," replied Josephine with elaborategraciousness--and Norman, the "take off" fresh in his mind, was acutelycritical of her manner, of her mannerisms. "Of course," she went on,"one does not expect much of people of that class. But I thought herunusually well-mannered--and quite clean."
"Tetlow makes 'em clean up," said Norman, a gleam of sarcasm in hiscareless glance and tone. And into his nostrils stole an odor offreshness and health and youth, the pure, sweet odor that is the base ofall the natural perfumes. It startled him, his vivid memory of a featureof her which he had not been until now aware that he had ever noted.
"I offered her some work," continued Josephine, "but I guess you keepher too busy down there for her to do anything else."
"Probably," said Norman. "Why do you sit on the other side of the room?"
"Oh, I don't know," laughed Josephine. "I feel queer to-night. And itseems to me you're queer, too."
"I? Perhaps rather tired, dear--that's all."
"Did you and Miss Hallowell work hard to-day?"
"Oh, bother Miss Hallowell. Let's talk about ourselves." And he drew herto the sofa at one end of the big fireplace. "I wish we hadn't set thewedding so far off." And suddenly he found himself wondering whetherthat remark had been prompted by eagerness--a lover's eagerness--or byimpatience to have the business over and settled.
"You don't act a bit natural to-night, Fred. You touch me as if I were astranger."
"I like that!" mocked he. "A stranger hold your hand
likethis?--and--kiss you--like this?"
She drew away, suddenly laid her hands on his shoulders, kissed him uponthe lips passionately, then looked into his eyes. "_Do_ you love me,Fred?--_really_?"
"Why so earnest?"
"You've had a great deal of experience?"
"More or less."
"Have you ever loved any woman as you love me?"
"I've never loved any woman but you. I never before wanted to marry awoman."
"But you may be doing it because--well, you might be tired and want tosettle down."
"Do you believe that?"
"No, I don't. But I want to hear you say it isn't so."
"Well--it isn't so. Are you satisfied?"
"I'm frightfully jealous of you, Fred."
"What a waste of time!"
"I've got something to confess--something I'm ashamed of."
"Don't confess," cried he, laughing but showing that he meant it."Just--don't be wicked again That's much better than confession."
"But I must confess," insisted she. "I had evil thoughts evil suspicionsabout you. I've had them all day--until you came. As soon as I saw you Ifelt bowed into the dust. A man like you, doing anything so vulgar as Isuspected you of--oh, dearest, I'm _so_ ashamed!"
He put his arms round her and drew her to his shoulder. And the scene ofmimicry in his office flashed into his mind, and the blood burned in hischeeks. But he had no such access of insanity as to entertain the ideaof confession.
"It was that typewriter girl," continued Josephine. She drew away againand once more searched his face. "You told me she was homely."
"Not exactly that."
"Insignificant then."
"Isn't she?"
"Yes--in a way," said Josephine, the condescending note in her voiceagain--and in his mind Miss Hallowell's clever burlesque of that note."But, in another way--Men are different from women. Now I--a woman ofmy sort--couldn't stoop to a man of her class. But men seem not to feelthat way."
"No," said he, irritated. "They've the courage to take what they wantwherever they find it. A man will take gold out of the dirt, becausegold is always gold. But a woman waits until she can get it at afashionable jeweler's, and makes sure it's made up in a fashionable way.I don't like to hear _you_ say those things."
Her eyes flashed. "Then you _do_ like that Hallowell girl!" she cried--andnever before had her voice jarred upon him.
"That Hallowell girl has nothing to do with this," he rejoined. "I liketo feel that you really love me--that you'd have taken me wherever youhappened to find me--and that you'd stick to me no matter how far Imight drop."
"I would! I would!" she cried, tears in her eyes. "Oh, I didn't meanthat, Fred. You know I didn't--don't you?"
She tried to put her arms round his neck, but he took her hands and heldthem. "Would you like to think I was marrying you for what you have?--orfor any other reason whatever but for what you are?"
It being once more a question of her own sex, the obstinate lineappeared round her mouth. "But, Fred, I'd not be _me_, if I were--aworking girl," she replied.
"You might be something even better if you were," retorted he coldly."The only qualities I don't like about you are the surface qualitiesthat have been plated on in these surroundings. And if I thought it wasanything but just you that I was marrying, I'd lose no time aboutleaving you. I'd not let myself degrade myself."
"Fred--that tone--and don't--please don't look at me like that!" shebegged.
"'Would you like to think I was marrying you for what youhave?--or for any other reason whatever but for what you are?'"]
But his powerful glance searched on. He said, "Is it possible that youand I are deceiving ourselves--and that we'll marry and wake up--and bebored and dissatisfied--like so many of our friends?"
"No--no," she cried, wildly agitated. "Fred, dear we love each other.You know we do. I don't use words as well as you do--and my mind worksin a queer way--Perhaps I didn't mean what I said. No matter. If mylove were put to the test--Fred, I don't ask anything more than thatyour love for me would stand the tests my love for you would stand."
He caught her in his arms and kissed her with more passion than he hadever felt for her before. "I believe you, Jo," he said. "I believe you."
"I love you so--that I could be jealous even of her--of that little girlin your office. Fred, I didn't confess all the truth. It isn't true thatI thought her--a nobody. When she first came in here--it was in thisvery room--I thought she was as near nothing as any girl I'd ever seen.Then she began to change--as you said. And--oh, dearest, I can't helphating her! And when I tried to get her away from you, and she wouldn'tcome----"
"Away from me!" he cried, laughing.
"I felt as if it were like that," she pleaded. "And she wouldn'tcome--and treated me as if she were queen and I servant--only politely,I must say, for Heaven knows I don't want to injure her----"
"Shall I have her discharged?"
"Fred!" exclaimed she indignantly. "Do you think I could do such athing?"
"She'd easily get another job as good. Tetlow can find her one. Doesthat satisfy you?"
"No," she confessed. "It makes me feel meaner than ever."
"Now, Jo, let's drop this foolish seriousness about nothing at all.Let's drop it for good."
"Nothing at all--that's exactly it. I can't understand, Fred. What isthere about her that makes her haunt me? That makes me afraid she'llhaunt you?"
Norman felt a sudden thrill. He tightened his hold upon her handsbecause his impulse had been to release them. "How absurd!" he said,rather noisily.
"Isn't it, though?" echoed she. "Think of you and me almost quarrelingabout such a trivial person." Her laugh died away. She shivered, cried,"Fred, I'm superstitious about her. I'm--I'm--_afraid_!" And she flungherself wildly into his arms.
"She _is_ somewhat uncanny," said he, with a lightness he was far fromfeeling. "But, dear--it isn't complimentary to me, is it?"
"Forgive me, dearest--I don't mean that. I couldn't mean that. But--I_love_ you so. Ever since I began to love you I've been looking round forsomething to be afraid of. And this is the first chance you've givenme."
"_I've_ given you!" mocked he.
She laughed hysterically. "I mean the first chance I've had. And I'mdoing the best I can with it."
They were in good spirits now, and for the rest of the evening were asloverlike as always, the nearer together for the bit of rough sea theyhad weathered so nicely. Neither spoke of Miss Hallowell. Each hadprivately resolved never to speak of her to the other again. Josephinewas already regretting the frankness that had led her to expose a nottoo attractive part of herself--and to exaggerate in his eyes theimportance of a really insignificant chit of a typewriter. When he wentto bed that night he was resolved to have Tetlow find Miss Hallowell ajob in another office.
"She certainly _is_ uncanny," he said to himself. "I wonder why--I wonderwhat the secret of her is. She's the first woman I ever ran across whohad a real secret. _Is_ it real? I wonder."
The Grain of Dust: A Novel Page 4