Who Cares? A Story of Adolescence

by Cosmo Hamilton

  IV

  The crickets and the frogs vied with each other to fill the silencewith sound. The moon was up and had laid a silver carpet under thetrees. Fireflies flashed their little lights among the undergrowth likefairies signalling.

  Joan had sent her S. O. S. into the air and with supreme confidencethat it would reach Martin wherever he might be, left the window, wentto the pew in which Gilbert had arranged the cushions and sat down...Martin had grown tired of waiting for her. She had lost him. But twicebefore he had answered her call, and he would come. She knew it. Martinwas like that. He was reliable. And even if he held her in contemptnow, he had loved her once. Oh, what it must have cost him to leave herroom that night--it seemed so long ago--she had clung to being a kidand had conceived it to be her right to stay on the girlhood side ofthe bridge. To be able to live those days over again--how different shewould be.

  Without permitting Gilbert to guess what she was doing, she must humorhim and gain time. She gave thanks to God that he was in this gentle,exalted mood, and was treating her with a sort of reverence. Behind thedanger and the terror of it all she recognized the wonder of his love.

  "Gilbert," she said softly.

  "Well, my little spring girl?"

  "Come and sit here, where I can see you."

  "You have only to tell me what I'm to do," he said and obeyed at once.

  How different from the old affected Gilbert--this quiet man with theburning eyes who sat with his elbows on his knees and his back benttowards her and the light of one of the lanterns on his handsome face.She had played with a soul as well as with a heart, and also, itappeared, with a brain. How fatal had been her effect upon men--Martinout of armor and Gilbert on the wrong side of the thin dividing line.Men's love--it was too big and good a thing to have played with, if shehad only stopped to think, or some one had been wise and kind enough totell her. Who cares? These two men cared and so did she, bitterly,terribly, everlastingly.

  Would Martin hear--oh, would he hear? Martin, Martin!

  There was a long, strange silence.

  "Well, my little Joan?"

  "Well, Gilbert?"

  He picked up her hand and put his lips to it. "Still thinking?" heasked, with a curious catch in his voice.

  "Yes, Gilbert, give me time."

  He gave back her hand. "The night is ours," he said, but there was painin his eyes.

  And there they sat, these two, within an arm's reach, on the edge ofthe abyss. And for a little while there was silence--broken only by thecrickets and the frogs and the turning of many leaves by the puffs of asudden breeze.

  Was she never going to hear the breaking of twigs and the light treadoutside the window? Martin, Martin.

  And then Gilbert began to speak. "I can see a long way to-night, Joan,"he said, in a low voice. "I can see all the way back to the days when Iwas a small boy--years away. It's a long stretch."

  "Yes, Gilbert," said Joan. (Martin, Martin, did you hear?)

  "It's not good for a boy to have no father, my sweet. No discipline, nostrong hand, no man to imitate, no inspiration, no one to try and keepstep with. I see that now. I suffered from all that."

  "Did you, Gilbert?" Oh, when would the twigs break and the light stepcome? Martin, Martin.

  "A spoilt boy, a mother's darling, unthrashed, unled. What a cub atschool with too much money! What a conceited ass at college, buyingdeference and friends. I see myself with amazement taking to life withan air of having done it all, phrase-making and paying deference tonothing but my excellent profile. God, to have those years over again!We'd both do things differently given another chance, eh, Joan?"

  "Yes, Gilbert." He wasn't coming. He wasn't coming. Martin, Martin.

  She strained her ears to catch the sound of breaking twigs. Thecrickets and the frogs had the silence to themselves. She got up andwent to the window, with Gilbert at her elbow. She felt that he wasinstantly on his feet. Martin's face was not pressed against thescreen. He had heard. She knew that he had heard, because she wasalways able to make him hear. But he didn't care. When he had comebefore it was for nothing. She had lost him. She was un-Martined. Shewas utterly without help. She must give up. What was the good of makinga fight for it now that Martin cared so little as to turn a deaf ear toher call? He had even forgotten that he had loved her once. Death waswelcome then. Yes, welcome. But there was one way to make some sort ofretribution--just one. She would remain true to Martin.

  Gilbert touched her on the arm. "Come, Joan," he said. "The night'srunning away. Is it so hard to decide?"

  But against her will Nature, to whom life is so precious, put wordsinto her mouth. "I want you to try and understand something more aboutme," she said eagerly.

  "The time has gone for arguing," he replied, stiffening a little.

  "I'm not going to argue," she went on quickly, surprised at herself,deserted as she was. "I only want you to think a little more deeplyabout all this."

  He drew his hand across his forehead. "Think? I've thought until mybrain's hot, like an overheated engine."

  She leaned forward. Spring was fighting her battle. "I'm not worth alove like yours," she said. "I'm too young, too unserious. I'm not halfthe woman that Alice is."

  "You came to me in spirit that night in Paris. I placed yuu in myheart. I've waited all these years."

  "Yes, but there's Alice--no, don't turn away. Let me say what's in mymind. This is a matter of life or death, you said."

  He nodded. "Yes, life or death, together."

  "Alice doesn't disappoint," she went on, the words put upon her lips."I may, I shall. I already have, remember. This is your night, Gilbert,not mine, and whichever step we decide to take matters more to you thanto me. Let it be the right one. Let it be the best for you."

  But he made a wild sweeping gesture. His patience was running out."Nothing is best for me if you're not in it. I tell you you've got me,whatever you are. You have your choice. Make it, make it. The nightwon't last for ever."

  Once more she listened for the breaking twig and the light step. Therewas nothing but the sound of the crickets and the frogs. Martin hadforgotten. He had heard, she was sure of that, but he didn't care.Nature had its hand upon her arm, but she pushed it away. Her choicewas easy, because she wouldn't forget. She would be true to Martin.

  "I've made my choice," she said.

  "Joan, Joan--what is it?"

  "I don't love you."

  He went up to her, with his old note of supplication. "But I can teachyou, Joan, I can teach you, my dear."

  "No. Never. I love Martin. I always have and always shall."

  "Oh, my God," he said.

  "That's the truth.... Please be quick. I'm very tired!" She drewherself up like a young lily.

  For a moment he stood irresolute, swaying. Everything seemed to berunning past him. He was spinning like a top. He had hoped againsthope, during her silence and her argument. But now to be told not onlythat she would never love him but that she loved another man....

  He staggered across the room to the sideboard, opened the drawer, andthe thing glistened in his hand.

  Joan was as cold as ice. "I will be true," she whispered to herself. "Iwill be true. Martin, oh, Martin."

  With a superhuman effort Gilbert caught hold of himself. The cold thingin his hand helped him to this. His mouth became firm again and hisface gentle and tender. And he stood up with renewed dignity and theold strange look of exaltation. "I claim you then," he said. "I claimyou, Joan. Here, on this earth, we have both made mistakes. I withAlice. You with Martin Gray. In the next life, whatever it may be, wewill begin again together. I will teach you from the beginning. Deathand the Great Emotion. It will be very beautiful. Shut your eyes, mysweet, and we will take the little step together." The thing glistenedin his grasp.

  And Joan shut her eyes with her hands to her breast. "I love you,Martin," she whispered. "I love you. I will wait until you come."

  And Gilbert cried out, in a loud ringing voice, "Eternity, oh, God!"and
raised his hand.

  There was a crash, a ripping of window screen. Coatless, hatless, hisshirt gaping at the neck, his deep chest heaving, Martin swept into theroom like a storm, flung himself in front of Joan, staggered as thebullet hit him, cried out her name, crumpled into a heap at her feet.

  And an instant later lay beneath the sweet burden of the girl whosecall he had answered once again and to whom life broke like a glassball at the sight of him and let her through into space.

  V

  "You may go in," said the doctor.

  And Joan, whiter than a lily, rose from the corner in which she hadbeen crouching through all the hours of the night and went to thedoorway of the room to which Martin had been carried by the Nice Boyand Gilbert, the man who had been shocked back to sanity.

  On a narrow bed, near a window through which a flood of sunlightpoured, lay Martin from whom Death had turned away,--honest, normal,muscular, reliable Martin, the bullet no longer in his shoulder. Hiseyes, eager and wistful, lit up as he saw her standing there and thebrown hand that was outside the covers opened with a sort of quiver.

  With a rush Joan went forward, slipped down on her knees at the side ofthe bed, broke into a passion of weeping and pressed her lips to thatoutstretched hand.

  Making no bones about it, being very young and very badly hurt, Martincried too, and their tears washed the bridge away and the barriers andmisunderstandings and criss-crosses that had sprung up between themduring all those adolescent months.

  "Martin, Martin, it was all my fault."

  "No, it wasn't, Joany. It was mine. I wasn't merely your pal, ever. Iloved and adored you from the very second that I found you out on thehill. You thought it was a game, but it wasn't. It was the real thing,and I was afraid to say so."

  She crept a little nearer and put her head on his chest. "I was allwrong, Marty, from the start. I was a fool and a cheat, and you andGilbert and Alice have paid my bill. I've sent Gilbert back to Alice,and they'll forget, but it will take me all my life to earn my way backto you." She flung her arm across his body, and her tears fell on hisface.

  "Oh, God," he cried out, "don't you understand that I love you, Joany?Send all your bills to me. They're mine, because I'm yours, my baby,just all yours. You were so young and you had to work it off. I knewall that and waited. Didn't you know me well enough to be dead surethat I would wait?"

  The burden on her shoulders fell with a crash, and with a great cry ofpent-up gratitude and joy her lips went down to his lips.

  But the doctor was not so old that he had forgotten love and youth, andhe left those two young clinging things alone again and went back intothe sun.