Chapter XXI: Enlightenment

Warren stamped the snow from his feet, shook himself like a wet dog, and entering the apartment hotel, passed at a step from the frigid zone to the tropics. At the desk he gave his name to a businesslike young woman who ascertained over the telephone that Mr. Forbes was in, and forthwith Warren was shot to the fifth floor. A smiling Japanese boy opened the door of Forbes' rooms, and Forbes himself came forward and gripped his friend's hand.

For a moment neither man found speech possible. "Congratulations, old fellow," Warren got out at last. "Best news I've heard for many a moon."

He gave his snowy coat to the waiting servant, seated himself and lighted a cigarette as a preliminary to conversation. "Well, how does it seem to have two eyes again? A bit intoxicating, I fancy. Rather like too much champagne."

"You know when a man has suffered enough, his idea of perfect happiness is to have the pain stop," Forbes answered. "I suppose the only way to size up a blessing at its real value is to have to do without it for a time." His words seemed to meet the requirements in the case, but Warren's quick ear detected in his voice a note of melancholy, and he thought he knew the explanation. Not being remarkable for tact, he promptly broached the delicate subject.

"Well, the fair Julia has done it. I got her cards week before last. Gosh, when you see the fellows the dear girls marry, it almost seems a compliment when they turn you down. You'd think it would take more than the Prendergast money and family connections and all that, to sugarcoat a pill like Murray."

"I wish her more happiness than she's likely to have, I'm afraid." Forbes spoke formally, his manner implying that it might be as well for Warren to change the subject, but his visitor took his time.

"Oh, well, Julia isn't capable of real unhappiness. She could be uncomfortable, or disappointed, or humiliated, or anything that doesn't go too deep, but unhappiness is beyond her. That other little girl now, she's different."

Forbes did not ask what girl was referred to. He kept his eyes on the floor.

"Julia looks as soft as a ripe plum," Warren continued. "Most of the dear creatures do, as if a rough word would crush them. But believe me, she's made of the same hard, calculating stuff as her old man. You never heard of old Studley's losing any sleep over the men he'd ruined on the street, did you? Julia won't have a wrinkle when she's sixty. If anybody is going to marry Murray Prendergast it ought to be that kind of woman."

If Forbes agreed with this frank expression of opinion, he gave no sign. He had the appearance of waiting patiently for the other to finish.

"Our little friend Hephzibah," continued Warren, "is the sort whose hair turns white in a single night, you know. Not that hers has--God forbid. You never saw that hair, my boy. You've got something to live for."

Forbes made a gesture of impatience. "Do you happen to know Miss Kent's address at the present time?"

"Do you happen to _want_ Miss Kent's address at the present time?" mocked Warren truculently.

Forbes hesitated. "Yes," he said with a seeming effort at frankness, "I do. Some of the things that were said, Warren, about her poverty, you remember, caused me considerable uneasiness. I felt that my leaving as I did when she had counted on having me until the cold weather, might have embarrassed her, and whatever ground I may have had for resentment, I had no wish to add to her financial worries. And so I sent her a check for the full amount I would have paid for board, up to the first of November."

Warren laughed sardonically. "Oh, you did, did you?"

"Yes, I did." Forbes' manner was a trifle aggrieved. "She returned it."

"Of course!"

"Perhaps you are in her confidence," Forbes said in a tone of annoyance.

"She never mentioned that particular matter to me. But I am glad to believe that she repays my friendship by a degree of trust."

Forbes waited a moment before continuing his explanation. "I did not write her again for some time. I was rather put out by the return of the check, foolishly, I suppose. But the last of November I sent her a rather long letter. You know, Ridgeley, when all is said and done, the girl saved my life."

"Well?"

"The letter came back to me from the Dead Letter Office. I thought it was a trick of some sort. It seemed incredible, you know, that when her family has been living at Oak Knoll for generations, she should drop out of sight and leave no more trace than an extinguished candle flame. I sent Evans down to look her up, and he reported that the three of them, Miss Kent, her foster brother, Howard, and Miss Finch, had all left town, and none of the old neighbors could give him any information as to their whereabouts. The old place has been sold to some one who is planning to build a summer hotel on the site."

Warren nodded. "I engineered that deal. It's a good location for such an enterprise. She sold for twelve thousand. I think I could have got her two or three thousand more, if she had been willing to wait, but she wasn't."

Forbes tried to appear relieved. "Twelve thousand! Well, I am glad to know she is not in immediate need. At the same time, Ridgeley, I should like her address."

Warren eyed him with malevolence. "It looks to me as if she wasn't particularly anxious for you to have it."

Forbes reddened. "Nonsense! Don't be an ass, Warren. It's quite important that I should have a talk with Miss Kent."

"I suppose you want to be sure that she's sufficiently penitent for the deception she practised on you."

"Really, my dear fellow, I can hardly see that it is any of your business what I have to say to her."

"Simply that I'm a friend of the lady's. And the only reason that I'm not her husband is that she's refused me, by letter and word of mouth, just eleven times by actual count. A singularly consistent character, our Hephzibah."

Forbes sat biting his lips. "I'm very sorry, Warren. I needn't say I had no idea--"

"Of course you had no idea. You took her devotion as a matter of course. You let your Julia insult her without speaking a word in her defense. And it never occurred to you that another man might think her unselfishness and her courage and her beauty and her wit made her a woman in a million."

"I must correct you on one point," Forbes said stiffly. "It is true the discovery that Miss Kent was not what I supposed her took me by surprise and I was both hurt and angry. But the engagement between Miss Studley and myself was broken finally and irrevocably because I defended--partly at least--the course Miss Kent had taken." He hesitated before adding, "If you really wish to marry her--"

"Oh, to hell with your '_ifs!_' I've been on my knees to her from the first minute I saw her. I'd marry her if she were Hephzibah Diggs."

"I was only going to say, Ridgeley, that if you are in earnest, you are pretty sure to win out. I can hardly imagine any woman's continuing to turn you down."

Warren did not appear touched by the obvious sincerity of this tribute. He glowered at the other man ill-naturedly.

"I dare say she would have married me but for one thing. I came on the scene too late."

"Too late?"

"Another man got ahead of me. She couldn't love me because she loved him."

"Do you mean that she's engaged?"

"Damn you!" Warren shouted furiously. "Don't put on those unconscious airs with me. You know well enough what man I mean, and you know whether you're engaged to her or not."

"You're out of your mind, Warren. You're talking like an insane man."

"Let it go at that, then. Call it that I'm crazy."

"If you will remember that I thought Miss Kent an elderly woman, you will realize that I--"

"Oh, your immaculate skirts are clean," exclaimed Warren, with preposterous bitterness. "You didn't make love to the nice old lady who was your father's boyhood flame. But you were so helpless and so darned pathetic and so dependent on her that you didn't have to. She's not like Julia, looking for an easy berth and a through ticket. Her idea of love is giving, giving without keeping count."

"You don't know what you're talking about," said Forbes, but with less conviction.

"Don't I, though! Do you remember the scheme we hatched to send Hephzibah to school?"

Forbes nodded.

"I came up and had a talk with her. Of course she was playing a part, but it wasn't all play-acting. She practically told me there was somebody she cared for. She--hang it all, Forbes, she's not always the audacious little devil who can palm herself off on an intelligent man as her own great-aunt, and never miss a cog. There was a look on her face when she spoke of that man--she was all angel, then."

"But what possible reason have you for thinking--why, you make me feel an ass for listening." Forbes' humility was so obvious as to be disarming.

"I know you're the man. She was always at me to have a talk with you and plead her cause, you know."

"But surely that wouldn't mean--"

"Yes, if you'd seen her eyes. You know how a dog looks when his master kicks him. Like that."

"Good God, Warren--"

"Oh, I don't suppose you like it," said Warren grimly. "But let me remind you that if it's unpleasant for you to listen, it's hell for me to tell you. I suppose you know what brought Julia to Oak Knoll to rescue you by force of arms."

"I believe Miss Kent wrote a letter."

"Yes, under pretense of congratulating Julia on her prospective engagement, she wrote her that you had been spending the most of your summer in the company of an attractive young girl. She'd sized up Julia's disposition pretty cleverly and she reckoned that if anything would hold her back, it would be a suspicion that there was a flaw in her title to your life-long devotion."

"But surely if she had felt as you imagine--"

"We're talking of Hephzibah, you know," growled Warren. "She was thinking of _your_ happiness, not of hers. Of course she knew she was taking a long shot. She was too smart to miss that little point. She risked exposure to give you what you wanted. That's the sort she is." He added gloomily, "I don't know why I'm such a fool as to tell you all this. I suppose it's because I know I haven't the ghost of a chance."

There was a long, depressing silence. "Well," said Forbes at length, his voice curiously shaken, "where shall I find her?"

"Good God, man, I don't know."

"You don't know?"

"The last word I had from her was a Christmas card and the blasted post-mark was so blurred that I couldn't make out where it was mailed. And in November I had this letter. You might as well read it, I suppose."

He took the worn missive from his pocket, handed it to Forbes, and began to smoke furiously. Forbes, his face very pale, read without comment.

"My Dear Mr. Warren:

"Well, the thing is accomplished. I am a capitalist, a woman of wealth, and also a wanderer on the face of the earth. But I'm not worrying about that side of it, it's so delicious to feel that all this money is mine and that I can have a trunk full of new clothes if I feel like it.

"Howard left for school yesterday. He will be a little behind his class, but the principal thinks he will have no difficulty in catching up if he is willing to work. Howard is so ambitious and eager that I know he is going to make me proud of him.

"You see I am sending you a check. It was awfully good of you to want to put this deal through because of your interest in me, but I can't help thinking it's better to be businesslike in business and friendly in friendship. So this check is for the celebrated lawyer, Mr. Warren, who has managed this affair so wonderfully, and my heart-felt gratitude is for my dear friend, Ridgeley Warren, whose kindness and generosity have been so much more than I deserved. I shall never forget it. When I am a wrinkled old woman, and can smile at some of the things that hurt now, it will warm my heart to remember your goodness.

"Dear Mr. Warren, I am not going to write you again at present. I have a feeling that if you keep on seeing me, you are more likely to keep on wishing for something it is better for you to forget. I am sure your generosity has more to do with your feeling than you have any idea of, and that when I am no longer at hand to make a continual appeal to your sympathy, you will soon be your usual self. I hope you will love the most beautiful and noblest girl in the world and marry her, and if you ever have reason to think that she doesn't appreciate the fact that she has drawn a prize, just send for me and I'll open her eyes.

"Words seem such inadequate things, don't they, when one's heart is full? I wish you could know all I mean when I say, Thank you.

"Gratefully yours,

"Agatha Kent.

"P.S. You will, I am sure, be seeing Mr. Forbes soon. The greatest favor you can do me is to make him understand how thoughtlessly I entered on the deception he so naturally resents. You see we were such good friends in a way--he really liked me and trusted me while he thought I was somebody else--it hurts to realize how completely I have forfeited his good opinion. You seem to understand so well that perhaps you may influence him to think of me a little more kindly."

Forbes folded the letter and gave it to its owner. "You deserve her if any man does, Ridgeley," he said with proper humility.

"I deserve her more than you do, if that's what you're trying to say," barked Warren. "And now you see what we're up against. Between us we've lost all trace of her."

"We must find her again," Forbes said firmly.

Warren's hostile gaze challenged him. "What for? Do you want to rub it in how she's outraged the sacred name of truth and all that rot?"

"No."

"Perhaps you're going to be magnanimous enough to forgive her?"

"Possibly," Forbes offered quietly, "I want to ask her to forgive me."

Warren's unhappy eyes met his full. "I suppose I'm in a rotten humor, old man. I do think you're a damned sight luckier than you deserve to be. But let it go. The question is, how are we to find her?"

As one result of the deliberations protracted over several hours, the following advertisement appeared in the leading newspapers of a dozen large cities:

"Information wanted. Any person acquainted with the present whereabouts of Hephzibah Diggs will confer a favor by communicating at once with the undersigned."

The anxious weeks went by. The two men consulted almost daily, with growing perplexity and diminishing hope. And Agatha made no sign.