Chapter III: Part 3

"I'll hush when I get good and ready." I longed to shake him, his tone and words were so much like those of a spoiled child. But he lowered his tone, nevertheless, and stood for a minute or two in sulky silence before the empty fireplace.

"Well! Come along," he said at last. "I'm sure there is no pleasure to me in looking over this place. I've seen it often enough when old Forsman had it filled with colonial junk, and served the best meals to be found on Long Island. It's like a coffin now to me. But I thought you might like to look it over, as you had never seen it. But for heaven's sake let us respect your scruples!"

I knew better than to make any answer. I wished above everything else to have this day end happily, this whole day to ourselves in the country, upon which I had counted so much. I feared Dicky would be angry enough to return to the city, as he had threatened to do when he found the inn closed. So it was with much relief that after we had gone back into the other room I heard him ask the caretaker if there were some place in the neighborhood where we could obtain a meal.

"Do you know where the Shakespeare House is?" she asked.

"Never heard of it," Dicky answered, "although I've been around here quite a bit, too."

"It's about six blocks further down toward the bay," she said, still in the same colorless tone she had used from the first. "It's on Shore Road. The Germans own it. Mr. Gorman, he's a builder, and he built an old house over into a copy of Shakespeare's house in England. Mrs. Gorman is English. She serves tea there on the porch in the summer, and I've heard she will serve a meal to anybody that happens along any time of the year, although she doesn't keep a regular restaurant. That's the only place I know of anywhere near. Of course, down on the bay there's the Marvin Harbor Hotel. You can get a pretty good meal there."

"Thank you very much," said Dicky, laying a dollar bill down on the table near us.

I had a sudden flash of understanding. Dicky meant all the time to recompense the woman in this way for allowing us to see the house. But the principle of the thing remained the same. Why could he not have told her frankly that he wished to look at the house and given her the dollar in the beginning?

I did not ask the question, however, even after we had left the old mansion and were walking down the road. I felt like adopting the old motto and leaving well enough alone.

I did not speak again until we had turned from the street down which we were walking into a winding thoroughfare labelled "Shore Road." Then a thought which had come to me during our walk demanded utterance.

"Dicky," I said quietly, "wasn't Gorman the name of the woman of whom the station master told you, and didn't she live on Shore Road?"

Dicky stopped short as if he had been struck.

"Of course it was," he almost shouted. "What a ninny I was not to remember it. She's the sister of that stunning girl we saw in the train. Isn't this luck? I may be able to get that girl to pose for me after all."

But I did not echo his sentiments. Secretly I hoped the girl would not be at her sister's home.

"This surely must be the place, Dicky," I said as we rounded a sudden turn on Shore Road and caught sight of a quaint structure that seemed to belong to the 16th century rather than the 20th.

Dicky whistled. "Well! What do you want to know about that?" he demanded of the horizon in general, for the little brown house with its balconies projecting from unexpected places and its lattice work cunningly outlined against its walls was well worth looking at. But our hunger soon drove us through the gate and up the steps.

A comely Englishwoman of about 40 years answered Dicky's sounding of the quaintly carved knocker. He lifted his hat with a curtly bow.

"We were told at Putnam Manor that we might be able to get dinner here," he began. "We came down from the city this morning expecting that the inn would be open. But we found it closed and we are very hungry. Would it be possible for you to accommodate us?"

"I think we shall be able to give you a fairly good dinner," she said with a simple directness that pleased me. "My husband went fishing yesterday and I have some very good pan fish and some oysters. If you are very hungry I can give you the oysters almost at once, and it will not take very long to broil the fish. Then, if you care for anything like that, we had an old-fashioned chicken pie for our own dinner. There is plenty of it still hot if you wish to try it."

"Madam," Dicky bowed again, "Chicken pie is our long suit, and we are also very fond of oysters and fish. Just bring us everything you happen to have in the house and I can assure you we will do full justice to it."

She smiled and went to the foot of the staircase, which had a mahogany stair rail carved exquisitely.

"Grace," she called melodiously. "There are two people here who will take dinner. Will you show them into my room, so they can lay aside their wraps?"

Without waiting for an answer, she motioned us to the staircase.

"My sister will take care of you," she said, and hurried out of another door, which we realized must lead to the kitchen.

Dicky and I looked at each other when she had left us.

"The beautiful unknown," Dicky said in a stage whisper. "Try to get on the good side of her, Madge. If I can get her to pose for that set of outdoor illustrations Fillmore wants, me fortune's made, and hers, too," he burlesqued.

I nudged him to stop talking. I have a very quick ear, and I had heard a light footstep in the hall above us. As we reached the top of the stairs the girl of whom we were talking met us.

I acknowledged unwillingly to myself that she was even more beautiful than she had appeared on the train. She was gowned in a white linen skirt and white "middy," with white tennis shoes and white stockings. Her dress was most unsuitable for the winter day, although the house was warm, but with another flash of remembrance of my own past privations, I realized the reason for her attire. This costume could be tubbed and ironed if it became soiled. It would stand a good deal of water. Her other clothing must be kept in good condition for the times when she must go outside of her home.

But if she had known of Dicky's mission and gowned herself accordingly she could not have succeeded better in satisfying his artistic eye. He stared at her open-mouthed as she spoke a conventional word of greeting and showed us into a bedroom hung with chintzes and bright with the winter sunshine.

She was as calm, as unconsciously regal, as she had been on the train. I knew, however, that she was not as indifferent to Dicky's open admiration as she appeared. The slightest heightening of the color in her cheek, a quickly-veiled flash of her eyes in his direction--these things I noticed in the short time she was in the room with us.

Was Dicky too absorbed in his plan or his drawings to see what I had seen? His words appeared to indicate that he was.

"Gee!" He drew a long breath as we heard Miss Draper--the name I had heard the 'bus driver give her--going down the stairs. "If I get a chance to talk to her today I'm going to make her promise to save that rig to pose in. She's the exact image of what I want. And graceful! 'Grace by name and grace by nature.' The old saw certainly holds good in her case."

I did not answer him. As I laid aside my furs and removed my hat and coat I felt a distinct sinking of the heart. I knew it was foolish, but the presence of this girl in whom Dicky displayed such interest took all the pleasure out of the day's outing.

"This is what I call eating," said Dicky as he helped himself to a second portion of the steaming chicken pie which Mrs. Gorman had placed before us. The oysters and the delicious broiled fish which had formed the first two courses of our dinner had been removed by her sister a few moments before.

Dicky had not been so absorbed in his meal, however, as to miss any graceful movement of Miss Draper's. The admiring glances which he gave her as she served us with quick, deft motions were not lost upon me. I knew that she was not oblivious of them either, although her manner was perfect in its calm, indifferent courtesy.

When it came time for dessert Mrs. Gorman bore the tray in on which it was served, a cherry roly-poly, covered with a steaming sauce.

"You're in luck," she said with a naive pride in her own culinary ability, as she served the pudding. "I don't often make this pudding, and my canned cherries from last summer are getting scarce. But my sister came home unexpectedly this morning, and this pudding is one of her favorites. So I made it for dinner. I thought perhaps it would cheer her up."

Miss Draper who entered at that moment with the coffee and a bit of English cheese that looked particularly appetizing, appeared distinctly annoyed at her sister's reference to her. Her cheeks flushed, and her eyes flashed a warning glance at Mrs. Gorman.

"I am sure this pudding would cheer anybody up," said Dicky genially, attacking his.

"It is delicious," I said, and, indeed, it was. "I have tasted nothing like this since I was a child in the country."

Mrs. Gorman beamed at the praise. She evidently was a hospitable soul.

"Would you like the recipe for it?" she asked.

"Indeed she would," Dicky struck in. "If you can teach Katie to make this," he turned to me, "I'll stand treat to anything you wish."

"What a rash promise," I smiled at Dicky, then turned to Mrs. Gorman. "I should be very glad to have the recipe," I said.

"Here," Dicky passed a pencil and the back of an envelope over the table.

So, while Mrs. Gorman dictated the recipe, I dutifully wrote it down.

"Thank you so much, Mrs. Gorman," I said as I finished writing.

"You are very welcome, I am sure," she said heartily. "You are strangers here, aren't you? I've never seen you around here before."

"This is my wife's first visit to this village," Dicky struck into the conversation. I realized that he welcomed this opportunity of beginning a conversation with Mrs. Gorman and her sister, so that he might lead up to his request for Miss Draper's services as a model.

"I have been in the village frequently," went on Dicky. "I used to sketch a good deal along the brook to the north of the village."

"Then you are an artist!" We heard Miss Draper's voice for the first time since she had shown us to the room above. Then her tones had been cool and indifferent. Now her exclamation was full of emotion of some sort.

"An artist!" echoed Mrs. Gorman, staring at Dicky as if he were the President.

There was a little strained silence, then Miss Draper picked up the serving tray and hurried into the kitchen. Mrs. Gorman wiped her eyes as she saw her sister's departure.

"You mustn't think we're queer," she said at length. "But I suppose your saying you are an artist brought all her trouble back to Grace, poor girl." Mrs. Gorman's eyes threatened to overflow again.

"If it wouldn't trouble you too much, tell us about it." Dicky's voice was gentle, inviting. "Perhaps we could help you."

"I don't think anybody can help." Mrs. Gorman shook her head sadly. "You see, ever since Grace was a baby, almost, she has wanted to draw things. I brought her up. I was the oldest and she the youngest of 12 children, and our mother died soon after she was born. I was married shortly afterward, and from the time she could hold a pencil in her hand she has drawn pictures on everything she could lay her hands on. In school she was always at the head of her class in drawing, but there was no money to give her any lessons, so she didn't get very far. Since she left school she has been planning every way to save money enough to go to an art school, but something always hinders."

Mrs. Gorman paused only to take breath. Having broken her reserve she seemed unable to stop talking.

"She went into a dressmaking shop as soon as she left school--I had taught her to sew beautifully--thinking she could earn money enough when she had learned her trade to have a term in an art school. But her health broke down at the sewing, and I had her home here a year."

I remembered the remarkable appearance of costly attire Miss Draper had achieved when we saw her in the station. This, then, was the solution. She had made them all herself.

"Then she got another position--"

Miss Draper came into the room in time to hear Mrs. Gorman's last words. She walked swiftly to her sister's side, her eyes blazing.

"Kate," she said, her voice low but tense with emotion. "Why are you troubling these strangers with my affairs?"

Before Mrs. Gorman could answer Dicky interposed.

"Just a minute, please," he said authoritatively. "As it happens, Miss Draper, I am in a position to make a proposition to you concerning employment which will provide you with a comfortable income, and at the same time enable you to pursue your studies."

Mrs. Gorman uttered an ejaculation of joy, but Miss Draper said nothing, only looked steadily at him. "This girl has had lessons in a hard school," I said to myself. "She has learned to distrust men and to doubt any proffered kindness."

"I have been commissioned to do a set of illustrations," Dicky went on, "in which the central figure is a young girl in the regulation summer costume, such as you have on. I have been unable to find a satisfactory model for the picture. If you will allow me to say so, you are just the type I wish for the drawings. If you will pose for them I will give you $50 and buy you a monthly commutation ticket from Marvin, so that you will have no expense coming or going. There are several artist friends of mine who have been looking for a model of your type. I think you could safely count upon an income of $40 or $50 a week after you get started. I know there are several other drawings I have in mind in which I could use you."

Mrs. Gorman had attempted to speak two or three times while Dicky was explaining his proposition, but Miss Draper had silenced her with a gesture. Now, however, she would not be denied. "A model!" she shrilled excitedly. "You're not insulting my sister by asking her to be a model, are you? Why, I'd rather see her dead than have her do anything so shameful--"

"Kate, keep quiet. You do not know what you are talking about." Miss Draper's voice was low and calm, but it quieted her older sister immediately.

"I take it you do not mean--figure posing." She hesitated before the word ever so slightly.

"Oh, no, nothing of the kind," I hastened to reassure her. "It's the ability to wear clothes well with a certain air, that he especially wants."

"And what do you mean by an opportunity to go on with my studies?"

The girl was really superb as she faced Dicky. With the prospect of more money than I knew she had ever had before, she yet could stand and bargain for the thing which to her was far more than money.

"Show me some of your drawings," Dicky spoke abruptly.

She went swiftly upstairs, returning in a moment with two large portfolios. These she spread out before Dicky on the table, and he examined the drawings very carefully.

I felt very much alone; out of it. For all Dicky noticed, I might not have been there.

"Not bad at all," was Dicky's verdict. "Indeed, some of them are distinctly good. Now I'll tell you what I will do," he said, turning to Miss Draper. "Until you find out what time you can give to an art school, I will give you what little help I can in your work. If you can be quiet, and I think you can, you may work in my studio at odd times, when you are not posing. What do you think of it?"

"Think of it?" Miss Draper drew a long breath. "I accept your offer gladly. When shall I begin?"

"I will drop you a postal, notifying you a day or two ahead of time," he returned.

We went out of the house and down the path to the gate before Dicky spoke.

"That was awfully decent of you, Madge, to square things with Mrs. Gorman like that. I appreciate it, I assure you."

"It was nothing," I said dispiritedly. I felt suddenly tired and old. "But I wish you would do something for me, Dicky."

"Name it, and it is yours," Dicky spoke grandiloquently.

"Take me home. We can see the harbor another time. I really feel too tired to do any more today."

Dicky opened his mouth, evidently to remind me that my fatigue was of sudden development, but closed it again, and turned in silence toward the railroad station.

We had a silent journey back. Neither Dicky nor I spoke, except to exchange the veriest commonplaces. We reached home about 5 o'clock to Katie's surprise.

"I'll hurry, get dinner," she said, evidently much flurried.

"We're not very hungry, Katie," I said. "Some cold meat and bread and butter, those little potato cakes you make so nicely, some sliced bananas for Mr. Graham and some coffee--that will be sufficient."

For my own part I felt that I never wished to see or hear of food again. The silent journey home, added to the events of the day, had brought on one of my ugly morbid moods.

XI

"I OWE YOU TOO MUCH"

"Bad news, Dicky?"

We were seated at the breakfast table, Dicky and I, the morning after our trip to Marvin, from which I had returned weary of body and sick of mind. Tacitly we had avoided all discussion of Grace Draper, the beautiful girl Dicky had discovered there and engaged as a model for his drawings, promising to help her with her art studies. But because of my feeling toward Dicky's plans breakfast had been a formal affair.

Then had come a special delivery letter for Dicky. He had read it twice, and was turning back for a third perusal when my query made him raise his eyes.

"In a way, yes," he said slowly. Then after a pause. "Read it." He held out the letter.

It was postmarked Detroit. The writing reminded me of my mother; it was the hand of a woman of the older generation.

I, too, read the letter twice before making any comment upon it. I wondered if Dicky's second reading had been for the same purpose as mine--to gain time to think.

I was stunned by the letter. I had never contemplated the possibility of Dicky's mother living with us, and here she was calmly inviting herself to make her home with us. For years she had made her home with her childless daughter and namesake, Harriet, whose husband was one of the most brilliant surgeons of the middle West.

I knew that Dicky's mother and sister had spoiled him terribly when they all had a home together before Dicky's father died. The first thought that came to me was that Dicky's whims alone were hard enough to humor, but when I had both him and his mother to consider our home life would hardly be worth the living.

I knew and resented also the fact that Dicky's mother and sisters disapproved of his marriage to me. In one of Dicky's careless confidences I had gleaned that his mother's choice for him had been made long ago, and that he had disappointed her by not marrying a friend of his sister.

I felt as if I were in a trap. To have to live and treat with daughterly deference a woman who I knew so disliked me that she refused to attend her son's wedding was unthinkable.

"Well!"

In Dicky's voice was a note of doubt as he held out his hand for his mother's letter. I knew that he was anxiously awaiting my decision as to the proposition it contained, and I hastened to reassure him.

"Of course there is but one thing to be done," I said, trying hard to make my tone cordial.

"And that is?" Dicky looked at me curiously. Was it possible that he did not understand my meaning?

"Why, you must wire her at once to come to us. Be sure you tell her that she will be most welcome."

I felt a trifle ashamed that the welcoming words were such a sham from my lips. Dicky's mother was distinctly not welcome as far as I was concerned. But my thoughts flew swiftly back to my own little mother, gone forever from me. Suppose she were the one who needed a home? How would I like to have Dicky's secret thoughts about her welcome the same as mine were now?

"That's awfully good of you, Madge." Dicky's voice brought me back from my reverie. "Of course I know you are not particularly keen about her coming. That wouldn't be natural, but it's bully of you to pretend just the same."

I opened my mouth to protest, and then thought better of it. There was no use trying to deceive Dicky. If he was satisfied with my attitude toward his mother, that was all that was necessary.

I poured myself another cup of coffee, when Dicky had gone to the studio, drank it mechanically, and touched the bell for Katie to clear away the breakfast things.

I did not try to disguise to myself the fact that I was extremely miserable. The day at Marvin, on which I had so counted, had been a disappointment to me on account of the attention Dicky had paid to Miss Draper. I reflected bitterly that I might just as well have spent the afternoon with Mrs. Smith of the Lotus Club, discussing the history course which she wished me to undertake for the club.

The thought of Mrs. Smith reminded me of the promise I had made her when leaving for Marvin that I would call her up on my return and tell her when I could meet her. I resolved to telephone her at once.

I felt a thrill of purely feminine triumph as I turned away from the telephone. I knew that Mrs. Smith would have declined to see me if she had consulted only her inclinations. That she still wished me to take up the leadership of the study course gratified me exceedingly, and made me thank my stars for the long years of study and teaching which had given me something of a reputation in the work which the Lotus Club wished me to undertake.

But when we met at a little luncheon room, Mrs. Smith and I managed to get through the preliminaries pleasantly.

"Now as to compensation," she said briskly. "I am authorized to offer you $20 per lecture. I know that it is not what you might get from an older or richer club, but it is all we can offer."

I was silent for a moment. I did not wish her to know how delighted I was with the amount of money offered.

"I think that will be satisfactory for this season, at least," I said at last.

"Very well, then. The first meeting, of course, will be merely an introduction and an outlining of your plan of study, so I will not need to trouble you again. If you will be at the clubrooms at half after one the first day, I will meet you, and see that you get started all right. Here comes our luncheon. Now I can eat in peace."

Her whole manner said: "Now I am through with you."

But I felt that I cared as little for her opinion of me as she evidently did of mine for her.

Twenty dollars a week was worth a little sacrifice.

Lillian Underwood's raucous voice came to my ears as I rang the bell of my little apartment. It stopped suddenly at the sound of the bell. Dicky opened the door and Mrs. Underwood greeted me boisterously.

"I came over to ask you to eat dinner with us Sunday," she said. "Then we'll think up something to do in the afternoon and evening. We always dine Sunday at 2 o'clock, a concession to that cook of mine. I'll never get another like her, and if she only knew it I would have Sunday dinner at 10 o'clock in the morning rather than lose her. I do hope you can come."

"There's nothing in the world to hinder as far as I know," said Dicky.

"I am so sorry," I turned to Lillian as I spoke. My dismay was genuine, for I knew how Dicky would view my answer. "But I could not possibly come on Sunday. I have a dinner engagement for that day which I cannot break."

"A dinner engagement!" Dicky ejaculated at last. "Why, Madge, you must be mistaken. We haven't any dinner engagement for that day."

"You haven't any," I tried to speak as calmly as I could. "There is no reason why you cannot accept Mrs. Underwood's invitation if you wish. But do you remember the letter I received a week ago saying an old friend of mine whom I had not seen for a year would reach the city next Sunday and wished an engagement for dinner? There is no way in which I can postpone or get out of the engagement, for there is no way I can reach my friend before Sunday."

I had purposely avoided using the words "he" or "him," hoping that Dicky would not say anything to betray the identity of the "friend" who was returning from the wilds. But I reckoned without Dicky. Either he was so angry that he recklessly disregarded Mrs. Underwood's presence or else his friendship with her was so close that it did not matter to him whether or not she knew of our differences.

"Oh, the gorilla with the mumps!" Dicky gave the short, scornful, little laugh which I had learned to dread as one of the preliminaries of a scene. "I had forgotten all about him. And so he really arrives on Sunday, and you expect to welcome him. How very touching!"

Dicky was fast working himself into a rage. Lillian Gale evidently knew the signs as well as I did, for she hurriedly began to fasten her cloak, which she had opened on account of the heat of the room.

"I really must be going," she murmured, starting for the door, but Dicky adroitly slipped between it and her.

"Talk about your romance, Lil," he sneered, "what do you think about this one for a best seller?"

"Oh, Dicky!" I gasped, my cheeks scarlet with humiliation at this scene before Mrs. Underwood, of all people. But Dicky paid no more attention to me than if I had been the chair in which I was sitting.

"Beautiful highbrow heroine," he went on, "has tearful parting with gallant hero more noted for his size than his beauty. He's gone a whole year. Heroine forgets him, marries another man. Now he comes back, heroine has to meet him and break the news that she is another's. Isn't it romantic?"

Lillian looked at him steadily for a moment, as if she were debating some course of action. Then she suddenly squared her shoulders, and, advancing toward him, took him by the shoulders and shook him slightly.

"Look here, my Dicky-bird," she said, and her tones were like icicles. "I didn't want to listen to this, and I beg your wife's pardon for being here, but now that you've compelled me to listen to you, you're going to hear me for a little while."

Dicky looked at her open-mouthed, exactly like a small boy being reproved by his mother.

"You're getting to be about the limit with this temper of yours," she began. "Of course I know you were as spoiled a lad as anybody could be, but that's no reason now that you are a man why you should kick up a rumpus any time something doesn't go just to suit your royal highness."

"See here, Lil!" Dicky began to speak wrathfully.

"Shut up till I'm through talking," she admonished him roughly.

If I had not been so angry and humiliated I could have laughed aloud at the promptness with which Dicky closed his mouth.

"You never gave me or the boys a taste of your rages simply because you knew we wouldn't stand for them. I'll wager you anything you like that Mrs. Graham never knew of your temper until after you had married her. But now that you're safely married you think you can say anything you like. Men are all like that."

She spoke wearily, contemptuously, as if a sudden disagreeable memory had come to her. She dropped her hands from his shoulders.

"Of course, I've no right to butt in like this," she said, as if recalled to herself. "I beg pardon of both of you. Good-by," and she dashed for the door.

But Dicky, with one of his quick changes from wrath to remorse, was before her.

"No you don't, my dear," he said, grasping her arm. "You know I couldn't get angry with you no matter what you said. I owe you too much. I know I have a beast of a temper, but you know, too, I'm over it just as quickly. Look here."

He flopped down on his knees in an exaggerated pose of humility, and put up his hands first to me and then to Lillian.

"See. I beg Madge's pardon. I beg Lillian's pardon, everybody's pardon. Please don't kick me when I'm down."

Lillian's face relaxed. She laughed indulgently.

"Oh, I'll forgive you, but I imagine it will take more than that to make your peace with your wife! It would if you were my husband. 'Phone me about Sunday. Perhaps Mrs. Graham can come over after dinner and meet you there. Good-by."

She hurried out to the door, this time without Dicky's stopping her. Dicky came toward me.

"If I say I am very, very sorry, Madge?" he said, smiling apologetically at me.

"Of course it's all right, Dicky," I forced myself to say.

Curiously enough, after all, my resentment was more against Lillian than against Dicky. Probably she meant well, but how dared she talk to my husband as if he were her personal property, and what was it he "owed her" that made him take such a raking over at her hands?

XII

LOST AND FOUND

"Margaret!"

"Jack!"

It was, after all, a simple thing, this meeting with my cousin-brother that I had so dreaded. Save for the fact that he took both my hands in his, any observer of our meeting would have thought that it was but a casual one, instead of being a reunion after a separation of a year.

But this meeting upset me strangely. I seemed to have stepped back years in my life. My marriage to Dicky, my life with him, my love for him, seemed in some curious way to belong to some other woman, even the permission to meet him in this way, which I had wrested from Dicky, seemed a need of another. I was again Margaret Spencer, going with my best friend to the restaurant where we had so often dined together.

And yet in some way I felt that things were not the same as they used to be. Jack was the same kindly brother I had always known, and yet there seemed in his manner a tinge of something different. I did not know what. I only knew that I felt very nervous and unstrung.

As I sank into the padded seat and began to remove my gloves I was confronted by a new problem.

My wedding ring, guarded by my engagement solitaire, was upon the third finger of my left hand. Jack would be sure to see them if I kept them on.

I told myself fiercely that I did not wish Jack to know I was married until after we had had this dinner together. With my experience of Dicky's jealousy I had not much hope that Jack and I would ever dine together in this fashion again.

On the other hand, I had a strong aversion to removing my wedding ring even for an hour or two. Besides being a silent falsehood, the act would seem almost an omen of evil. I am not generally superstitious, but something made me dread doing it.

However, I had to choose quickly. I must either take off the rings or tell Jack at once that I was married. I was not brave enough to do the latter.

Taking my silver mesh bag from my muff, I opened it under the table, and, quickly stripping off my gloves, removed my rings, tucked them into a corner of the bag and put gloves and bag back in my muff. Jack, man-like, had noticed nothing.

Now to keep the conversation in my own hands, so that Jack should suspect nothing until we had dined.

The waiter stood at attention with pencil pointed over his order card. Jack was studying the menu card, and I was studying Jack.

It was the first chance I had had to take a good look at this cousin-brother of mine after his year's absence. Every time I had attempted it I had met his eyes fixed upon me with an inscrutable look that puzzled and embarrassed me. Now, however, he was occupied with the menu card, and I stared openly at him.

He had changed very little, I told myself. Of course he was terribly browned by his year in the tropics, but otherwise he was the same handsome, well-set-up chap I remembered so well.

I knew Jack's favorite dish, fortunately. If he could sit down in front of just the right kind of steak, thick, juicy, broiled just right, he was happy.

"How about a steak?" I inquired demurely. "I haven't had a good one in ages."

"I'm sure you're saying that to please me," Jack protested, "but I haven't the heart to say so. You can imagine the food I've lived on in South America. But you must order the rest of the meal."

"Surely I will," I said, for I knew the things he liked. "Baked potatoes, new asparagus, buttered beets, romaine salad, and we'll talk about the dessert later."

The waiter bowed and hurried away. "You're either clairvoyant, Margaret or--"

"Perhaps I, too, have a memory," I returned gayly, and then regretted the speech as I saw the look that leaped into Jack's eyes.

"I wish I was sure," he began impetuously, then he checked himself. "I wonder whether we are too early for any music?" he finished lamely.

"I am afraid so," I said.

"It doesn't matter anyway. We want to talk, not to listen. I've got something to tell you, my dear, that I've been thinking about all this year I've been gone."

I did not realize the impulse that made me stretch out my hand, lay it upon his, and ask gently:

"Please, Jack, don't tell me anything important until after dinner. I feel rather upset anyway. Let's have one of our care-free dinners and when we've finished we can talk."

Jack gave me a long curious look under which I flushed hot. Then he said brusquely, "All right, the weather and the price of flour, those are good safe subjects, we'll stick to them."

The dinner was perfect in every detail. Jack ate heartily, and although I was too unstrung to eat much I managed to get enough down to deceive him into thinking I was enjoying the meal also.

The coffee and cheese dispatched, I leaned back and smiled at Jack. "Now light your cigar," I commanded.

"Not yet. We're going to talk a bit first, you and I."

I felt that same little absurd thrill of apprehension. Jack was changed in some way. I could not tell just now. He took my fingers in his big, strong hand.

"Look at me, Margaret."

Jack's voice was low and tense. It held a masterful note I had never heard. Without realizing that I did so, I obeyed him, and lifted my eyes to his.

What I read in them made me tremble. This was a new Jack facing me across the table. The cousin-brother, my best friend since my childhood, was gone.

I did not admit to myself why, but I wished, oh! so earnestly, that I had told Jack over the telephone of my marriage during his year's absence in the South American wilderness, where he could neither send nor receive letters.

I must not wait another minute, I told myself.

"Jack," I said brokenly, "there is something I want to tell you--I'm afraid you will be angry, but please don't be, big brother, will you?"

"There is something I'm going to tell you first," Jack smiled tenderly at me, "and that is that this big brother stuff is done for, as far as I'm concerned. In fact, I've been just faking the role for two or three years back, because I knew you didn't care the way I wanted you to. But this year out in the wilderness has made me realize just what life would be to me without you. I've been kicking myself all over South America that I didn't try to make you care. I've just about gone through Gehenna, too, thinking you might fall in love with somebody while I was gone. But I saw you didn't wear anybody's ring anyway, so I said to myself, 'I'm not going to wait another minute to tell her I love her, love her, love her.'"

Jack's voice, pitched to a low key anyway, so that no one should be able to hear what he was saying, sank almost to a whisper with the last words.

I sat stunned, helpless, grief-stricken.

To think that I should be the one to bring sorrow to Jack, the gentlest, kindest friend I had ever known!

"Oh, Jack, don't!" I moaned, and then, to my horror, I began to cry. I could not control my sobs, although I covered my face with my handkerchief.

"There, there, sweetheart, I'll have you out of this in a jiffy," Jack was at my side, helping me to rise, getting me into my coat, shielding me from the curious gaze of the other diners.

"Here!" He threw a bill toward the waiter. "Pay my bill out of that, get us a taxi quick, and keep the change. Hurry."

"Yes, sir--thank you, sir." The waiter dashed ahead of us. As we emerged from the door he was standing proudly by the open door of a taxi.

"Where to, sir?" The chauffeur touched his cap.

"Anywhere. Central Park." Jack helped me in, sat down beside me, the door slammed and the taxi rolled away.

The only other time in my life Jack had seen me cry was when my mother died. Then I had wept my grief out on his shoulder secure in the knowledge of his brotherly love. As the taxi started, he slipped his arm around me.

"Whatever it is, dear, cry it out in my arms," he whispered.

But at his touch I shuddered, and drew myself away. I was Dicky's wife. This situation was intolerable. I must end it at once. With a mighty effort, I controlled my sobs and, wiping my eyes, sat upright.

"Dear, dear boy," I said. "Please forgive me. I never thought of this or I would have told you over the telephone."

"Told me what?" Jack's voice was harsh and quick. His arm dropped from my wrist.

There was no use wasting words in the telling. I took courage in both hands.

"I am married, Jack," I said faintly. "I have been married over a month."

"God!" The expletive seemed forced from his lips. I heard the name uttered that way once before, when a man I knew had been told of his child's death in an automobile accident. It made me realize as nothing else could what Jack must be suffering.

But he gave no other sign of having heard my words, simply sat erect, with folded arms, gazing sternly into vacancy, while the taxi rolled up Fifth avenue.

Huddled miserably in my corner, I waited for him to speak. I had summoned courage to tell him the truth, but I could not have spoken to him again while his face held that frozen look. It frightened and fascinated me at the same time.

A queer little wonder crossed my mind. Suppose I had known of this a year ago. Would I have married Jack, and never known Dicky? Would I have been happier so?

Then there rushed over me the realization that nothing in the world mattered but Dicky. I wanted him, oh how I wanted him! Jack's suffering, everything else, were but shadows. My love for my husband, my need of him--these were the only real things.

I turned to Jack wildly.

"Oh, Jack, I must go home!"

"Margaret." Jack's voice was so different from his usual one that I started almost in fear.

"Yes, Jack."

"I don't want you to reproach yourself about this. I understand, dear. The right man came along, and of course you couldn't wait for me to come back to give my sanction."

"Oh! Jack! I ought to have waited: I know it. You have been so good to me"

"I've been good to myself, being with you," he returned tenderly. "But I almost wish you had told me over the telephone. You would never have known how I felt, and it would have been better all around"

He bent toward me, and crushed both my hands in his, looking into my face with a gaze that was in itself a caress.

"Now you must go home, little girl, back to--your--husband." The words came slowly.

"When shall I see you again, Jack?" I knew the answer even before it came.

"When you need me, dear girl, if you ever do," he replied. "I can't be near you without loving you and hating your husband, whoever he may be, and that is a dangerous state of affairs. But, wherever I am, a note or a wire to the Hotel Alfred will be forwarded to me, and, if the impossible should happen and your husband ever fail you, remember, Jack is waiting, ready to do anything for you."

My tears were falling fast now. Jack laid his hand upon my shoulder.

"Come, Margaret, you must control yourself," he said in his old brotherly voice. "I want you to tell me your new name and address. I'm never going to lose track of you, remember that. You won't see me, but your big brother will be on the job just the same."

I told him, and he wrote it carefully down in his note-book. Then he looked at me fixedly.

"You would better put your engagement and wedding rings back on," he said. "Of course I realize now that you must have taken them off when you removed your gloves in the restaurant, with the thought that you did not want to spoil my dinner by telling me of your marriage. But you must have them on when you meet your husband, you know."

How like Jack, putting aside his own suffering to be sure of my welfare. I put my hand in my muff, drew out my mesh bag and opened it.

"Jack!" I gasped, horror-stricken, "my rings are gone!"

"Impossible!" His face was white. He snatched my mesh bag from my grasp. "Where did you put them? In here?"

Jack turned the mesh bag inside out. A handkerchief, a small coin purse, two or three bills of small denominations, an envelope with a tiny powder puff--these were all.

"Are you sure you put them in here?"

"Yes." I could hardly articulate the word, I was so frightened.

"Have you opened your bag since?"

I thought a moment. Had I? Then a rush of remembrance came to me.

"I took out a handkerchief when I cried in the restaurant."

"You must have drawn them out then, and either dropped them there, or they may have been caught in the handkerchief and dropped in the taxi." We searched without success and Jack's face darkened as he ordered the chauffeur to speed back to Broquin's. "We must hurry, dear. This is awful. If you have lost those rings, your husband will have a right to be angry."

Neither of us spoke again until the taxi drew up in front of the restaurant. Then Jack said almost curtly:

"Wait here. I don't think it will be necessary for you to go inside, and it might be embarrassing for you."

He fairly ran up the steps and disappeared inside the door.

So anxious was I to know what would be the result of his inquiry that I leaned far forward in the machine, watching the door of Broquin's for Jack's return.

I did not realize my imprudence in doing this until I heard my name called jovially.

"Well! well, Mrs. Graham, I suppose you are on your way to our shack. Won't you give me the pleasure of riding with you?"

Hat in hand, black eyes dancing in malicious glee, I saw standing before me, Harry Underwood, of all people!

At that instant Jack came rushing out of the restaurant and up to the taxi.

"It's no use, Margaret. They can't find them anywhere."

"Jack, I want you to meet Mr. Underwood, a friend of my husband's," I said hastily, hoping to save the situation. "Mr. Underwood, my cousin, Mr. Bickett."

The two men shook hands perfunctorily.

"Glad to meet you, Mr. Bickett," Harry Underwood said, in his effusive manner. "Have you lost anything valuable? Can I help in any way?"

"Nothing of any consequence," I interrupted desperately.

"Oh, yes, I see, nothing of any consequence," he replied meaningly. His eyes were fixed upon my ungloved left hand, which showed only too plainly the absence of my rings.

"But don't worry," he continued. "Your Uncle Dudley is first cousin to an oyster. Wish you luck. So long," and lifting his hat he strolled on up the avenue.

Jack was consulting his note-book. I heard him give the address of my apartment to the driver. "Drive slowly," he added.

"Who was that man?" he demanded sternly. "He is no one you ought to know."

"I know, Jack," I said faintly. "I dislike him, I even dread him, but he and his wife are old friends of Dicky's and I cannot avoid meeting him."

"He will make trouble for you some day," Jack returned. "I don't like him, but there is nothing I can do to help you. I've messed things enough now."

"What shall I do, Jack?" I wailed. All my vaunted self-reliance was gone. I felt like the most helpless perfect clinging vine in the world.

"We're going straight to your home to see your husband," he said. "You will introduce me to him and then leave us. I shall explain everything to him."

"Oh, Jack," I said terrified, "he has such an uncertain temper, and, besides, he isn't at home. He was to take dinner at the Underwoods at 2 o'clock."

"Well, we must go there, then," returned Jack. "Put on your gloves, then the absence of the rings won't be noticed until I have a chance to explain about them."

I picked up the gloves and unfolded them. Something glittering rolled out of them and dropped into my lap.

"Oh, Jack, my rings!" I fairly shrieked. Then for the first time in my life I became hysterical, laughing and sobbing uncontrollably.

* * * * *

That night I told Dicky the whole story--not one word did I keep back from him--and when I came to the loss of my rings and the meeting with Harry Underwood, there developed a scene that I cannot even now bring myself to put down on paper. But at last Dicky managed to control himself enough to ask what I had told Harry Underwood.

"I told him that my rings had not been lost, that my gloves were too tight and that I had removed them to put on my gloves."

"Good!" Dicky's voice held a note of relenting. "That's one thing saved, any way. Wonder your conscience would let you tell that much of a lie."

His sneer aroused me. I had been speaking in a dreary monotone which typified my feeling. Now I faced him, indignant.

"See here, Dicky Graham, don't you imagine it would have been easier for me to lie about all this? I didn't need to tell you anything. Another thing I want you to understand plainly and that is my reason for not telling Jack at first that I was married.

"If I had had a real brother, you would have thought it perfectly natural for me to have waited for his return before I married. Now, no brother in the world could have been kinder to me than was Jack Bickett. We were indebted to him for a thousand kindnesses, for a lifetime of devotion. I never should have married without first telling him about it. Do you wonder that realizing this I delayed in every way the story of my marriage until I could find a suitable opportunity? I give you my word of honor that I did not dream he cared, and I expect you to believe me."

I walked steadily toward the door of my bedroom. I had not reached it, however, before Dicky clasped me in his arms, and I felt his hot kisses on my face.

"I'm seventeen kinds of a jealous brute, I know, sweetheart," he whispered, "but the thought of that other man, who seems to mean so much to you, drives me mad. I'm selfish, I know, but I'm mad about you."

I put my arms around his neck. "Don't you know, foolish Dicky," I murmured, "that there's nobody else in the world for me but just you, you, you?"

XIII

"IF YOU AREN'T CROSS AND DISPLEASED"

Today my mother-in-law!

That was my thought when I awoke on the morning of the day which was to bring Dicky's mother to live with us.

I am afraid if I set down my exact thoughts I should have to admit that I had a distinct feeling of rebellion against the expected visit of Dicky's mother.

If it were only a visit! There was just the trouble. Then I could have welcomed my mother-in-law, entertained her royally, kept at top pitch all the time she was with us, guarded every word and action, and kept from her knowledge the fact that Dicky and I often quarrelled.

But Dicky's mother, as far as I could see, was to be a member of our household for the rest of her life. She herself had arranged it in a letter, the calm phrases of which still irritated me, as I recalled them. She had taken me so absolutely for granted, as though my opinion amounted to nothing, and only her wishes and those of her son counted.

But suddenly my cheeks flamed with shame. After all, this woman who was coming was my husband's mother, an old woman, frail, almost an invalid. I made up my mind to put away from me all the disagreeable features of her advent into my home, and to busy myself with plans for her comfort and happiness.

I hurried through my breakfast, for I wanted plenty of time for the last preparations before Dicky's mother should arrive. Dicky had gone to his studio for a while and then would go over to the station in time to meet her train, which was due at 11:30.

As I started to my room I heard the peal of the doorbell.

"I will answer it, Katie," I called back, and went quickly to the entrance. A special delivery postman stood there holding out a letter to me. As I signed his slip, I saw that the handwriting upon the letter was Jack's.

What could have happened? I dreaded inexpressibly some calamity.