Chapter XI: Front Matter (11)

David was probably not at all braver than anybody else in the presence of the supernatural. But to him this apparition was not--never had been--supernatural. He knew very well that it was a phantom, and not composed of flesh and blood; but he was confident that it was the phantom of some real person. To his consciousness it was a shadowy disembodiment of a real woman, how explicable or inexplicable was of small consequence. Enough that it was some one who evidently appealed to him for a kindness. He knew that nobody except himself saw this person--knew it by their actions. He could not see her himself except when at a distance of at least several feet. Upon a near approach she took refuge in invisibility. But every day he could approach a little nearer before she vanished, as if she trusted him more and more. But she did not permit him to see her face until he bethought himself of pushing the wheel, so as to give her the motion for which she seemed to long.

Then, when he gave it a careful start and permitted it to run by itself, she turned her face over her shoulder, and smiled her pleased thanks back at him. At first the face was indistinct and evanescent. But it was growing more fixed, confident and clear. It was a handsome--a noble face. He should recognize it anywhere. Its first wistful, half-doubting expression of appeal was becoming reassured, serene, and confidently friendly.

Face and figure gradually took possession of his fancy. There was something about this shadow-woman that touched his enthusiasm of benevolence--a strong point in his character. He was sure that this was a woman in trouble, needing help, longing for sympathy, companionship and kindness--a woman isolated and weary of sorrow and struggle. He loved to help the helpless. From loving to help to loving the helped is an easy transition. The shadow-woman filled him, not with the desire of passion, but with the gentle affection which is the deepest root of the truest love, only the later flower of which is passion.

Thus far, beyond a natural curiosity, he had not cared to search for the living woman, whom he felt certain existed somewhere near him. Still her influence quite drove out of his mind every idea of being a lover of May Bentley, or aught toward her more than a pleasant acquaintance and friend. He now saw their relations in their true aspect. He should always admire and like May Bentley, but the shadow-woman was one whom it would be a perpetual delight to know, serve and protect.

On Saturday morning two gentlemen called at the store and inquired for David Dewness. Finding him, they inquired if he owned the southeast quarter of the northwest quarter of Section 21, town ---- north, of range ---- west. He stared. Then, remembering his forty acres, he begged them to wait a moment, while he got his deed.

Yes, he owned it.

“What do you hold it at?”

“I have not thought of selling.”

“Will you take twenty for it?”

Twenty dollars an acre, he thought. There must be some discovery on or near it. He reflected a moment. If it was worth that, there would certainly be other offers pretty soon. They wanted the refusal for twenty-four hours, inquired curiously about the title, and finally went away, first giving him one hundred dollars for the refusal for one day.

Three hours later another party called and wanted the land. Being told of the refusal given to the first comers, this party asked the price offered, and being told, exclaimed:

“Twenty thousand dollars! Why I’ll give you fifty, and one thousand for the refusal, if you will agree to sell to me for that price if they do not bid higher.”

David refused. Before night two other parties wanted it, and were deferred.

The next day they all called nearly together and began bidding for it. Meanwhile David had not only thought it all over, but had taken shrewd counsel. He positively refused to sell at any price. He would lease the forty acres for a term of years to the highest bidder. The result was that before night he had leased it to one of the parties, who agreed to pay a royalty of forty cents per ton for all ore mined and sold, with the further agreement that not less than twelve thousand five hundred tons per year should be mined and sold for a term of twenty years, and $5,000 bonus was to be paid in advance.

But this party insisted that there was a weakness, if not a defect, in the title that must be cured. The title ran through the firm of Dalrymple & Dalrymple, but the signature of Mrs. Dalrymple was lacking, and though her husband had never been sole owner, the title would be made perfectly secure by a quit claim from her, and any heir direct who might ever claim through her.

This put Dewness upon a search for Mrs. Dalrymple. While going about the city on this search he met, in crossing one of the parks, his quondam flame, May Bentley, riding with young Oriel Pilaster, Jr., upon Pilaster’s new tandem.

Oriel Pilaster, Jr., was the proudest young man in the city that day. He was proud of having been recently admitted to partnership with his father, the noted architect. He was proud of his fine new tandem. He was proudest of all of having, as he fondly believed, “cut out” David Dewness with the pretty and _piquante_ May Bentley, whom he had long admired at a distance. He was about to pass his supposed rival with a smile and nod of lofty triumph when, to his extreme consternation and chagrin, Miss May put on the brake hard and brought the machine to a standstill, at the same instant calling out:

“Mr. Dewness! David!”

David instantly went to her, hat in hand, and she smiled her very friendliest smile, and put out her hand, which David shook frankly.

“Excuse me a minute, Mr. Pilaster,” she said to that shocked youth, “I want to say a word to Mr. Dewness.”

So saying, she alighted nimbly, took David’s arm, and walked a few steps away, coolly leaving young Pilaster a statue of petrified chagrin seated on a tricycle, in full view of all the park loungers. That amazed young gallant was at first half inclined to ride off in a huff, but he wisely concluded that his best plan was to try and look just as happy as though this was exactly what he had all along been expecting, and wait until he knew the reason.

As soon as they were a little out of hearing, May volubly explained:

“I know who she is, David! It’s all right! The nicest girl! If you’d only said who it was I shouldn’t have cared. But, dear me! what a fool I was to quarrel with you, anyway! Because, you know, really and truly, you and I don’t care a button for each other except as friends, and it was nonsense to pretend anything else. Why, she’s just the girl that I should pick out for you! I half thought I knew her all the time, though she kept her face away from me. But the instant it flashed upon me--why I couldn’t mistake her for anybody else if I tried! Come, shake hands again over it!”

David shook hands again with a great pretense of enthusiasm. Then he calmly asked.

“Well, who do you think she is _now_?”

“Why, Miss Daphne Dalrymple, of course. Ah, you needn’t try to fool me any longer!”

David started in evident astonishment.

“Miss Daphne Dalrymple!”

“Yes; Miss Daphne Dalrymple, Dibble & Dribble’s typewriter. We used to be great friends; but, since the Dalrymples failed, she has dropped out of sight of her old friends, and is quite distant. But I love her dearly all the same, and I hope you will persuade her to come and see me. Now do. Good-bye! I expect Mr. Pilaster is angry clear through by this time.”

Mr. Dewness led her back, and thanked her earnestly, wished Mr. Pilaster a jolly time, and went off rapidly in the direction of Dibble & Dribble’s, while May proceeded to restore Mr. Pilaster’s spirits by explaining with a simulated sigh:

“Well, there! that is probably the last _I_ shall see of Mr. Dewness. He’s gone mad for a pretty girl, and I’ve been sending him straight to her. Mr. Pilaster, I’m too good. Here I go, like a fool, and send away a good friend, merely because he thinks he’ll be happier with another. But a girl is alway foolish to permit a man to be her friend; he is sure to desert a mere friend to run after the first pretty face that catches his fancy.”

Mr. Pilaster warmly defended his sex, and especially himself as one who would never prove a deserter, with such appearances of success as fully restored his pride, and filled his artful enchantress with almost irrepressible chuckles.

Dibble & Dribble received Mr. Dewness’s inquiries with cold civility. Miss Dalrymple was ill they believed, had been absent from her desk more than a fortnight. Perhaps the errand-boy could give him her street and number. The errand-boy, being called, did so with an evident interest in Miss Dalrymple. He said that Dr. Pulse’s office was right on the way, and perhaps Mr. Dewness had better see him before calling. Mr. Dewness did so, and the doctor accompanied him to the house.

Mrs. Dalrymple at the door reported her daughter better. She was sitting up in a rocking-chair with a shawl about her. The moment they entered the room her eyes were fixed upon Dewness, and her thin face lit up with a smile of pleased welcome. She paid no attention to the doctor, and did not wait for David to be presented, but offered her wasted hand eagerly to the young man, as to a well-known friend, and said, with a sick woman’s child-like trustfulness:

“You have come! I knew you would! Did you bring the wheel?”

David took her hand with a grasp of warm friendliness, and a look of gentle and kind sympathy, as he answered:

“Not now. If the doctor says you are well enough to go out a few minutes in the afternoon, I will bring it, and you shall have it every day.”

He, too, spoke as to a familiar friend, while he noted how wan and frail she appeared, and yet how beautiful and strong of body and soul she would be in health. Her mother interposed, saying:

“Why, Daphne, dear, I did not know you were acquainted.”

The girl colored faintly, but David answered, with one of his frank, straight looks in the eye:

“We are not old acquaintances, Mrs. Dalrymple, but, if you will allow me to say so, Miss Dalrymple has no truer friend than me.”

The sick girl’s eyes filled with tears, through which she smiled upon him.

“This is the gentleman who bought your tricycle, then, that you have spoken of so often this week. But, my dear, I thought you did not know his name.”

“I fear, madam,” said David, “that she didn’t quite catch my name when we were made acquainted,” and he turned such a droll look upon the girl that she laughed the first merry laugh heard in that room in a long time.

Then David turned the conversation by asking the doctor if he thought Miss Dalrymple was well enough to ride out once or twice a day, say, up and down the block, if he pushed the wheel, and saw that she did not exert herself. The doctor thought that five or ten minutes of very gentle exercise in the open air every day, morning and evening, after breakfast and after tea, would do her great good. But it must be only on clear, sunshiny days, and she must not be out after sundown nor before the air was dry and warm in the morning.

“Then,” said David, turning to the girl, “may I come this afternoon?”

“If you will. How good you are! And I do so long to go out, and to get well!”

The tears came into her eyes again, as she looked gratefully at David. But she was sick and weak, and intensely weary of being so, and also more or less _exaltée_ from the effects of medicine and illness. David smiled upon her with kind cordiality, as he said:

“Well, then, we’ll have you well and strong again in a little while. Trust the doctor and me.”

Then he turned to her mother and explained his errand about the land.

“I bought it at the Dalrymple sale for one hundred dollars. I wish to dispose of it now. You have no real claim, but you could annoy the owner by setting up one, and compelling him to perfect his title in court. In order to save any trouble I propose to buy it over again of you at the regular price for wild land--two dollars and a half an acre. That is, I will pay you one hundred dollars for your signature to this quit claim,” showing it, “and if you suppose you have any real rights, I will accompany you to any lawyer you may please to select, and pay for his opinion.”

Mrs. Dalrymple had some business knowledge, and remembered the land which her husband had taken for the firm on a bad debt, together with a horse which she used to drive. Her husband had often laughingly said that the horse was about as worthless as the land. She therefore cheerfully signed the deed, as also did Daphne; and Mr. Dewness insisted upon paying them the one hundred dollars, first going to fetch a notary to take the acknowledgment.

In their situation this money seemed almost a restoration of wealth, and Daphne once more said to Mr. Dewness, “How good you are!” with a fervor that was worth a great deal more than the money. He took his leave with a light heart, and he left light hearts behind him.

The money that he paid to the two desolate women did more than relieve their immediate needs--it lifted off their hearts the depressing influence of fear for the future. It restored their courage. If Daphne should lose her situation with Dibble & Dribble, this would last till she could get another. When Dewness had gone they kissed each other and wept softly together.

Then Dewness’s call had done the girl a world of mental and spiritual good. He had said very little, but his cheerful, sunshiny temper, his kindly interest, his quick sympathy and gentle courtesy were more blessed than the money. No doubt the pride that had caused her to retire from the society of her old friends upon her fall in fortune, and resolutely accept the position of a working-girl, was morbid in part, because she did not replace her former friends among the rich with new acquaintances among the lowly.

Youth cannot bear isolation. Solitude is for age, full stored with memory, knowledge and mental resources. Youth cannot bear it and preserve mental or spiritual health; youth must have companionship, sympathy and friendships.

Under incessant toil and loneliness the high courage of the girl broke down when illness fell upon her. She was, therefore, in the very best mood to accept this new friendship and society, as a prisoner accepts a release from prison.

For the first time since she had fallen ill, she lay down and slept the dreamless, wholesome, restoring sleep of returning health, ate with a slight but real relish, and when Mr. Dewness called, after supper, she looked marvelously brighter and better.

With what delight she greeted her lost wheel, when, carefully wrapped, they placed her upon its familiar saddle! How keenly she relished the balmy outdoor air of the quiet, maple-shaded street! With what sweet, womanly childishness she laughed at David’s gentle pleasantries! It was only a few minutes, for David was very careful to take her in before she was tired, and then he hastened away and presently returned with a boy bearing a tray on which were luscious ripe strawberries, a little pitcher of fresh cream, sugar, three or four big juicy oranges, a lemon and ice-cream. She was permitted by the doctor to eat just a taste of the berries and a teaspoonful of the cream, while David and Mrs. Dalrymple and the doctor ate to keep her company. And then David went away, and she slept like a tired child. Sometimes how very little makes a great happiness!

The ghost having become alive, the rest of the story almost tells itself. How they plighted their troth and named the day; and how the wedding was one of the happiest the club ever attended, and everybody said they were the most suitable and loving pair ever joined together--all these items the reader can imagine.

But the mystery remains to be cleared. One evening while the house was not yet complete, the two lovers sat together in the moonlight, talking over, for the twentieth time, their strange experience, when David said:

“After all, Daphne, there is one thing that puzzles me more than all the rest. I never could tell, when I saw your ghost, exactly what you wore.”

Daphne blushed celestial fire, and hid her face with her hands, peeping through her fingers shyly at David, and wondering to see him evidently seriously in earnest.

“You seemed to me,” continued David, not noticing her confusion, “at one moment to be in a gray riding-habit, but the next moment you wore your black or brown walking-dress, and when you faded out of sight, my last vision of you was in some sort of white robe. Now, how do you account for that?”

“Then I never appeared to you except in some dress? You could see me only in some dress, David?”

This timidly, and watching his face narrowly.

“Why, of course not,” said honest David, opening his eyes wide with surprise, “only I couldn’t ever quite make it out.”

She laughed softly and blushed vividly.

“Well, David--now you are in earnest?”

“Of course I am. Why, what’s the matter?”

“You know I was half delirious with the fever?”

“Yes.”

“And I longed to take a ride on my--your--wheel. How I did long to get out of that stuffy little room! It seemed to me that if I could find my wheel, and take a run in the pleasant outdoor air, it would do me so much good! Well, it seemed to me that I went out and wandered about the city till I found it. It was in front of Miss Bentley’s. And I saw you, and I knew by your face that you would be kind and lend it to me, because I was ill. Of course, when I found it, I bethought me that I should have a riding-suit, and I seemed to be clothed in the gray dress I used to wear. How funnily you acted! Do you remember stooping down, with your hands on your knees, to look at me?”

David grinned.

“That alarmed me a little, and when you came closer I walked away, and I remember changing my dress to a walking suit. And sometimes my mind changed from one to another, and I always seemed to myself to wear whatever I thought of. But, after you were so kind, and took so much trouble to push the tricycle about for me, and I saw you wanted to help me, out of pure sympathy, I ceased to be afraid of you, and got quite familiar, and--and--”

“Well. And what?”

“I was sick in bed, you know, when I had those strange dreams.”

“Yes, of course.”

“And, of course, I wasn’t wearing any dress in bed.”

“Of course not.”

“Well--now, don’t you laugh.”

“I won’t.”

“Some of the last times--after I wasn’t afraid of you any longer--I forgot.”

“You forgot what?”

“Why, I forgot to walk away in my street-dress and go home. I seemed to drop right out of the saddle and my riding-dress into my night-robe and my bed in the little room at home all at the same time, and without first going away from you.”

David laughed heartily in spite of his promise not do so. But it was such an honest laugh that it reassured her.

“And you were afraid that I saw the ghost longer than I ought?”--chuckling.

“Ye-es,” hiding her blushing face against his shoulder.

“Well, darling, I didn’t. You vanished, I thought, like an angel in a white cloud; but I never dreamed it was merely like a sick girl in her white robe.”

He laughed again until she slyly reached up and gave one of his ears a pinch that changed his laughter into a howl.

TO THE PACIFIC THROUGH CANADA.

BY ERNEST INGERSOLL.