“Good heaven,” he muttered, “where am I? Is it a barricade?”
His heart stood still for a second. Distinctly he heard the soft, suppressed cry of a woman—and then the unmistakable sound of scurrying fabrics. The sounds came from some remote corner of the room—or possibly from a room hard by—and were indicative of great alarm on the part of an unseen person.
Bosworth was not a slow thinker. He took the safest way. Without hesitation he called out: “It’s all right! I am Bosworth Van Pycke!”
There was dead silence for the next sixty seconds. The French clock ticked them off. He involuntarily counted twenty-five or thirty before a small, hushed voice responded,—from the library, he was sure,—the voice of a woman.
“What did you say?”
“I am Mr. Van Pycke. Don’t be alarmed. It’s—it’s all a mistake. I—”
“Mr. Van Pycke? Why—why—”
He recognized the voice.
“Is that you, Miss Downing?”
“Are you—are you sure that you are Mr. Van Pycke? I have my finger on the call button. Wha—what are you doing here?”
“I am trying to get out,” he said, lowering his voice. “Don’t you recognize my voice?”
“Ye—yes, I think I do.”
“Where are you?”
“Why didn’t you go out before?” asked the voice, a bit querulously he thought.
“I am not a sleep walker,” he said. Realizing that it was a poor time to jest, he hastily supplemented: “I went to sleep—waiting. Where are you? What time is it? Is every one in bed?”
The curtains at the opposite end of the room parted very slowly. First, a strong, red glow appeared beyond, mellow and somewhat fitful; then the shadowy figure of the girl was silhouetted against the red, framed on either side by shivering drapery.
She was still wearing the white satin evening gown. He took hope.
“It isn’t so late, after all,” he cried, starting toward her.
“I hope you will go away at once, Mr. Van Pycke,” she said quickly. “It is half-past one—and every one is in bed. I don’t understand why you are still here.”
“I’ll tell you all about it,” he said, not very confidently. “Don’t turn me out until I’ve got warm, please. I give you my word, I’m paralyzed with the cold.”
“Really, Mr. Van Pycke, I—I can’t have you here—I mean, it is so terribly late. I—I—”
“Were you horribly frightened?” he asked, somewhat irrelevantly. He had come up to her by this time, and, peering beyond, saw a splendid fire in the library grate. There were no lights in the room. A big chair stood before the fender, invitingly.
His teeth were chattering.
“I was almost petrified,” she said rather breathlessly. “If you had not called out, I—I think my heart would have refused to beat again. Oh, I am so glad it is you and not a burglar!”
“May I come in and get warm?” he pleaded. She saw that he was shivering. With a quick glance over her shoulder she stood aside and allowed him to pass.
“You are cold,” she said. “Sit down by the fire. I’ll poke it up a bit. Just for a few minutes, and then you must go. I wonder if the racket alarmed the servants. You see, I am the only person in this part of the house, Mr. Van Pycke.”
He looked up from the grate, over which he was holding his hands. “By the way, why are you not in bed? I distinctly remember you said good night—and started.”
She hesitated. “I wasn’t sleepy,” she said.
“On the other hand, I slept very soundly,” he said. “Have you been down here all this time?”
“Since twelve o’clock. I love a grate fire.”
“Won’t you sit down? Do.”
“No, thank you. I’ll wait till you have gone. If I sit down now, you’ll stay, I’m afraid.”
He moved the big chair and drew up another for himself beside it. She watched the proceedings without approval or resentment. When the two chairs stood side by side before the fender, he motioned for her to sit down. She was now gazing at him fixedly, a somewhat detached smile on her lips. After a moment she shrugged her shoulders and sat down. He promptly dropped into the other chair and stretched out his feet to the fire.
“You said something that surprised me, just as you left me—two hours ago,” he remarked, after a long silence. “A year’s vacation on full pay,” he repeated.
“I am Mrs. De Foe’s secretary,” she said quietly. He turned to look at her.
“Secretary? I didn’t dream of that, Miss Downing.”
“Have I fallen in your estimation?” she asked, meeting his gaze steadily.
“I think you’ve risen,” he said slowly.
“You may not remember me, but I crossed on the steamer with you from Liverpool when I was eight years old. You were eleven, I think you said. I was a very pretty little girl. You said that, too. Do you remember?”
He was cudgeling his brain. “I can’t say that I do, to be perfectly candid. Still, I’ve been wondering where I’ve seen you. I recall the voyage, but as for little girls, I remember but one. Ah, she was a little beauty. I was so desperately in love with her that I dare say I had thoughts or eyes for no one else. I’m sorry.”
“Do you remember her name?”
“Perfectly. It wasn’t so long ago, you know. I’m twenty-five. She had a perfectly ungovernable nurse. I was obliged to do my worshiping from a distance. By Jove, that reminds me, her father was put down and out a few years ago in Wall Street. I think he had a stroke of paralysis, or something, poor devil, afterwards. Lost everything. I wonder what has become of her. I never saw her after we landed in New York.”
“Was her name Pembroke?”
He started. “Yes,—Mary Pembroke! You knew her? Why, I believe—” He stared hard.
“I am Mary Pembroke,” said she, leaning back and smiling. His astonishment was unqualified.
“You? Yes! I can see it now. All evening there has been some vague thing about you that has puzzled me. Why, it is wonderful—positively wonderful. I—” He stopped suddenly, a look of concern in his eyes. “I hope I didn’t say anything just now to hurt you,—I mean, about your father.”
“You spoke of him as the world speaks, Mr. Van Pycke. And you did say ‘poor devil.’ That was something. He is—still a helpless invalid. Perhaps you did not know that.”
“I’m sorry—very sorry.” He hesitated for a moment. “Is that why you are Mrs. De Foe’s secretary?”
“We are quite poor, Mr. Van Pycke. So poor that I am unwilling to take from the slender annuity that keeps us together—my father, my two little sisters and me. There is enough for him to live on to the end of his poor, desolated life. I am strong, and I love him too well to take from that little store. Mine hasn’t been such a trying position, after all. Mrs. Scoville is an old friend. I’ve known her since I was a little girl. She’s been very kind and very generous. I don’t mind the work. It’s much better than marrying some one for his money, I’m sure. Have you ever read of Lily Bart? She had a very much harder time than I, poor thing, in her house of mirth. She did not deserve it, but she served as a warning to me.”
“I dare say you remember that I told Mrs. Scoville I had come up here tonight to propose to her,” he said ruefully. She nodded, and her eyes narrowed.
“You are not so brave as I am, Mr. Van Pycke,” she said. “I thought you were very brave and very manly as a little boy.”
“Well, I didn’t ask her, after all,” he said, resenting her tone. “I don’t believe I could have done it, if it had actually come to the test. I couldn’t do it now to save my very soul. I’m going to marry for love or not at all. Money be hanged.”
“Oh, don’t say that!” she cried. “You forget how rich you are!”
“Rich! I’m a pauper.”
“On twelve thousand a year? I consider myself quite well off on the fifteen hundred Mrs. Scoville pays me. You are fabulously rich.”
“You are laughing at me,” he exclaimed
, shamed.
“Who am I to laugh at the wonderful Buzzy Van Pycke, prince of the dandies in—”
“Please don’t.” He clenched his hands and set his jaw, leaning forward to gaze into the bed of coals. She studied his averted face.
“You have a strong face,” she said at last, voicing her thoughts.
“Thanks,” he muttered.
“You don’t know how to work. Is that it, Mr. Van Pycke?” she asked.
“Oh, I fancy I could earn a living,” he said, without looking up.
“And then you could save the twelve thousand intact,” she observed. He looked up curiously. “In ten years you would have at least one hundred and twenty-five thousand. You could buy a yacht with that much money. Just think what fun it would be to spend it all in an hour.”
“It may interest you to know that I am going to work,” he said, conscious of a burning sensation in his face.
“Are you in earnest?”
“Certainly. I’m tired of this sort of thing.”
“Splendid! And what are you going to do? Something gentlemanly, I hope, such as selling bonds on commission. Gentlemen who go to work always do that, don’t they, whether they’re qualified or not?”
“You’re a bit sarcastic, aren’t you? I was going to sell bonds, having been solicited to do so, but I’ve changed my mind. I’m going to get a job with an undertaker.”
They laughed, at first rather half heartedly, then merrily. For ten minutes they talked of the past, the present, and the future. He gathered that she had assumed the name of Downing for secretarial purposes only; that she kept herself very much in the background in Mrs. Scoville’s establishment; that she had watched his social career with unflagging interest; that she was returning to her own home on the following day, with a check for fifteen hundred in her possession; that she expected to marry if the right man came along; that Mrs. Scoville had made her a present of the gown—and so on and so forth. They discussed the wedding and the hullabaloo it was to create. They united in deprecating the impulse which robbed the marriage of its natural sanctity, but they agreed that she was a lovely bride.
“And now you must go home,” she said at last. The clock chimed a quarter after two.
“That reminds me,” he said. “You said you were going to your own home in the morning, early enough to avoid the reporters, who are to be managed by Stokes. May I inquire where your own home is, Miss Pembroke?”
“We live in Princeton, Mr. Van Pycke.”
“Princeton? Why, I was there four years, you know. Strange I never saw you.”
“You forget we were living in Fifth Avenue or Mayfair until two years ago. The house in Princeton is all that is left of the Pembroke millions. It was my mother’s.”
“By Jove, I remember you came out three years ago. I—I was asked, wasn’t I?”
“You were. And you didn’t come.”
“I’d like to come to Princeton, if it isn’t too late.”
“If it doesn’t interfere with your work, you mean.”
“Oh, come now!” he protested.
“We have to consider everything,” she said.
“I’ll try to get a job in the faculty. I remember distinctly that I knew more than any man in the faculty at one time. That would simplify matters, wouldn’t it?”
“Do you really feel the need of that eyeglass, Mr. Van Pycke?” she asked, again veering off, much to his annoyance.
“Not at all.” He calmly tossed the monocle upon the coals. She cried out.
“Oh, I didn’t mean you to do that. I love monocles!”
“The deuce! Why didn’t you say so?” he lamented.
“It’s too bad,” she sighed. “You would have needed it so much, too, looking for work.”
“By Jove, I like you!” he cried. “You’re a plucky girl and a philosopher. You do something toward the support of a whole family, while I—well, look at me! What good have I done? I have not earned ten dollars in my whole life by honest toil. I’m ashamed. I am—”
“Please, please,” she interposed despairingly. “Don’t go into that again. It’s too late. I am really very sleepy now. I hate to turn you out in the storm, but you must go. If the servants should—heavens, please go!”
“You’re right! I’m off. I’ll be as quiet as a mouse, so don’t worry. This has been the most gallant night of my life. I’ll live it over a hundred times in my dreams. By the way, what train do you take in the morning?” He was shaking hands with her, standing beside her chair. There was a new light in his eyes.
“The ten-fifteen, if it isn’t snowbound. Why?”
“Never mind. I just asked,” he said. He was thinking of violets and a trip to the ferry.
“Don’t do anything so absurd, Mr. Van Pycke,” she said severely, trying to read his thoughts. He laughed blithely, full of certain early morning enterprise. “Good-bye. Oh, just listen to the wind!”
She shuddered.
“Don’t leave the fire,” he said. “And do go to bed! Remember, you are to catch the ten-fifteen.”
He tiptoed into the hall. There was not a sound in the house. A minute later the outer doors closed behind him, gently. He was out in the cold, bitter night, plowing his way through snowdrifts three and four feet deep, bound for the hotel next door, the nearest place of refuge.
In the office he left a call for seven o’clock. Not in ten years had he done anything so amazing.
“She helps to support a family—a helpless father and two small sisters,” he said to himself as he crept into bed. “But, it wouldn’t be the same thing supporting my governor. I should say not!” Later on, very drowsily: “I was sure I had seen her before. Little Mary Pembroke! How I adored her! But it seems to me her hair was yellow then. It’s black now. Still, I dare say that’s better than if it had been black then and yellow now. Seven o’clock! What an ungodly hour to get up. But I’ll have to get used to it.”
Miss Pembroke resisted the desire to look after him from the front window. She couldn’t bear the thought of scraping the frost from the window pane with her fingernails, for one thing; for another, he might take it into his head to look back.
So she went to bed, thinking of him—as she had been doing for an hour or more before his amazing second appearance.
“He was such a shy boy,” she reflected. “But he was the best looking thing. Dear me, how long ago it seems! And those silly love letters I wrote to him and never mailed. What funny things children are!”
At nine o’clock the next morning she was called to the telephone. She was at breakfast, and her bag was ready for the train. An early glance from the window had filled her with misgivings. The street was absolutely impassable, it seemed to her.
“I won’t talk to the reporters,” she said to Stokes.
“It isn’t a reporter, Miss. It’s a gentleman.”
“Don’t be a snob, Stokes. Who is it?”
“It’s Mr. Van Pycke, Miss.”
She started. Then she flushed warmly.
“Say to him, Stokes, that I have gone,” she said, after a moment.
“Very good, Miss. Anything else?”
She pondered. “Yes, Stokes. Ask him to hold the wire.”
“Hold the wire, Miss?”
“Yes, while you run to the door to call me back.”
A moment later she was in the telephone room, quite out of breath.
“Who is it?” she called. She compelled him to repeat the name four times. Eventually he got her serious attention.
“No trains until this afternoon?” she cried despairingly. “Why, the children will be at the station to meet me.”
“Trains all snowbound,” he announced quite cheerfully. “I’ve been telephoning.”
“It’s awfully good of you. I’ll call up the Pennsylvania—”
“Don’t bother,” he called. “I’ve seen to all that. There’s only one thing to do. Go to the ferry at one o’clock and wait. They’ll get a train out as soon as possible. I’m glad it’s
to be no earlier than one. This is my busy day, you see.”
“What has that to do with it?”
“I think I can be at liberty at one o’clock, that’s all. I’m at my rooms now, writing letters of resignation to eleven clubs and declining invitations to four Christmas house parties on Long Island. I’m going down to see Thrush and Wrenn, the publishers, at eleven.”
“Indeed?”
“Yes. I’m thinking of writing a book exposing New York society. They’re all the rage now. This will be the literary remains of a fizzle.”
“Are you jesting?”
“It depends,” he said. “At ten I am to see George P. Krosson, the capital king. You see I have been telephoning. I got him out of bed at seven-thirty. He says he didn’t know I had it in me to be so energetic. He’s an old friend, however, so it’s all right. He—”
“Please tell me what it’s all about. I know who he is, so don’t enlighten me. He once was an old friend of ours.”
“Well, he’s always said he’d take me as a secretary, if I’d agree to buckle down to it. I’m going to try it on.”
“You—to be a secretary?”
“Don’t be so surprised, please! It’s only a starter, you know. His last secretary owns a bank now, and the present one is going to Congress. But I’ll tell you about it—at the ferry.”
She tried not to appear to be looking for him when her fretting taxicab finally struggled up to the ferry building at Twenty-third Street, just before one o’clock. Nearly an hour had been spent in the trip from the Scoville home to the ferry. There were times when she thought the effort would have to be abandoned.
He was there. In fact he opened the door and assisted her to alight from the vehicle. There was a brief discussion with the driver over the register’s showing. Then they hurried into the ferry building, pursued by three bags and a “Much obliged, Miss,” from the surprised chauffeur.
“You were very reckless, giving him a dollar,” he criticised severely, but not forgetting that he had given five the night before. He had been wondering all the morning if she had noticed the cocktails.
“It is so good of you to come down,” she said, a color in her cheeks that was not from the cold. He was marveling. Never, in all his life, had he seen any one so pretty as this trim, proud young person in the Persian lamb coat and ermine stole and muff. She gauged his thoughts. “Presents from Mrs. Scoville—in advance of Christmas,” she said dryly. He was properly embarrassed. “Now, I must ask about the trains.”
The George Barr McCutcheon Megapack: 25 Classic Novels and Stories Page 213