Chapter III: Part 3

"Webb's one of the best men I know. He deserves to win whatever he wants. Do you like a hard pillow or a soft, Doctor?"

XII

BROWN'S OLD WORLD

On a certain morning in February, Mrs. Hugh Breckenridge alighted in haste from her limousine in front of a stately apartment house in the best quarter of a great city. She hurried through the entrance hall to the lift and was taken up with smooth speed to the seventh story. In a minute more she was eagerly pressing the button at the door of a familiar suite of rooms into which she had not had occasion to enter for more than a year, for the very good reason that they had been closed and unoccupied in the absence of their tenant.

The returned tenant himself opened the door to her, a tall figure looming in the dusk of an unlighted corridor--a tall figure infinitely dear to Sue Breckenridge.

"O Don!" cried the visitor in an accusing tone. "How could you come back without letting us know?"

"I've been back only an hour," explained Donald Brown, submitting to and warmly returning his sister's embrace. "How in the world did you hear of it so soon? Did Brainard--"

She nodded. "Mrs. Brainard called me up at once, of course. She knew you couldn't be serious in trying to keep people from knowing you were here, least of all your sister!"

"I was intending to come to you before luncheon; I only meant to surprise you. As for the rest--I should be glad if they needn't know; at least until I'm ready to leave."

"To leave! Don! You're not going to persist in going back! It can't be true! You won't give up this apartment--tell me you won't!"

His sister's tone was anguished. Before he answered Brown led her into the library of the suite, the room in which he had been occupied when her ring came, and put her into a big arm-chair, taking from her her wrap and furs. Then he sat down upon the edge of a massive mahogany writing-table near by, crossing his long legs and folding his arms, while she mutely waited for him to speak.

"Sue," he said--and his face had in it a sort of reflection of the pain in hers--"you may be sure I haven't come to this decision without a deal of thought. But I've made it, and I'm going to stick to it because I believe it's the thing for me to do. I assure you that since I came into these rooms they have been beseeching me, as loudly as inanimate things can not to desert them. I'm going to find it the hardest task of my life to take leave of them."

"Don't take leave of them! Lock them up for another year, if you must persist in your experiment, but don't, _don't_ burn your bridges behind you! Oh, how can you think of leaving your splendid church and going off to consign yourself to oblivion, living with poor people the rest of your days? You--_you_--Don!--I can't believe it of you!"

His face, in his effort at repression, grew stern. His folded arms became tense in the muscles.

"Don't make it harder for me than it is. I can't discuss it with you, because though I argued till I was dumb I could never make you see what I see. Accept my decision, Sue dear, and don't try my soul by pleading with me.... I have a lot to do. I should like your help. See here, would you care to have any of my things? Look about you. This is rather a good rug under your feet. Will you have it--and any others you fancy?"

She looked down at the heavy Eastern rug, exquisite in its softness and richness of colouring.

It was one of which, knowing its value, she had long envied her brother the possession. She put up her hand and brushed away the mist from her eyes.

"Aren't you going to take _any_ comfortable things with you? Are you going to go on living on pine chairs and rag carpets--you, who were brought up on rugs like this?"

He nodded. "For the most part. I've been wondering if I might indulge myself in one big easy chair, just for old times. But I'm afraid it won't do."

"Oh, mercy, Don! Why _not_?"

"How should I explain its presence, opposite my red-cushioned rocker? Give it a good look, Sue, that chair, and tell me honestly if I can afford to introduce such an incongruous note into my plain bachelor house up there."

She surveyed the chair in question, a luxurious and costly type standing for the last word in masculine comfort and taste. It was one which had been given to Brown by Webb Atchison, and had long been a favourite.

"Oh, I don't know," she said hopelessly, shaking her head. "I can't decide for any monk what he shall take into his cell."

Brown flushed, a peculiar dull red creeping up under his dark skin. He smothered the retort on his lips, however, and when he did speak it was with entire control, though there was, nevertheless, an uncompromising quality in his inflection which for the moment silenced his sister as if he had laid his hand upon her mouth.

"Understand me, once for all, Sue--if you can. I am going into no monastery. To such a man as I naturally am, I am going out of what has been a sheltered life into one in the open. You think of me as retiring from the world. Instead of that, I am just getting into the fight. And to fight well--I must go stripped."

She shook her head again and walked over to the window, struggling with very real emotion. At once he was beside her, and his arm was about her shoulders. He spoke very gently now.

"Don't take it so hard, dear girl. I'm not going to be so far away that I can never come back. You will see me from time to time. I couldn't get on without my one sister--with father and mother gone, and the brothers at the other side of the world. Come, cheer up, and help me decide what disposal to make of my stuff. Will you take the most of it?"

She turned about, presently, dried her eyes determinedly, and surveyed the room. It was a beautiful room, the sombre hues of its book-lined walls relieved by the rich and mellow tones of its rugs and draperies, the distinguished furnishings of the writing-table, and the subdued gleam of a wonderful reading-lamp of wrought copper which had been given to Brown by Sue herself.

"If you will let me," she said, "I'll give up one room to your things and put all these into it. Aren't you even going to take your books?"

"I must--a couple of hundred, at least. I can't give up such old friends as these."

"A couple of hundred--out of a couple of thousand!"

"There are five thousand in this room," said Brown cheerfully. "But two hundred will give me a very good selection of favourites, and I can change them from time to time. I have sixty or seventy already with me.... Hello! Who can that be? Has Brainard been giving me away right and left?"

He answered the ring, and admitted Webb Atchison, rosy of cheek and rather lordly of appearance, as always. The bachelor came in, frowning even as he smiled, and bringing to Donald Brown a vivid suggestion of old days.

"Caught!" he cried, shaking hands. "Thought you could sneak in and out of town like a thief in the night, did you? It can't be done, old man."

He was in a hurry and could stay but ten minutes. Five of those he devoted to telling Brown what he thought of the news he had heard, by which he understood that St. Timothy's was to lose permanently the man whom it had expected soon to have back. Brown listened with head a little down-bent, arms folded again, lips set in lines of determination. He had been fully prepared for the onslaughts of his friends, but that fact hardly seemed to make it easier to meet them. When Atchison had delivered himself uninterrupted, Brown lifted his head with a smile.

"Through, Webb?" he asked.

"No, I'm not through, by a long shot, but it's all I have time for now, for I came on a different matter. Since I heard you were here I've been telephoning around, and I've got together a little dinner-party for to-night that you won't evade if you have a particle of real affection for me. I'm not going to be cheated out of it. It'll be a hastily arranged affair, but there may be something decent to eat and drink. Brainard tells me you're not going to linger in town an hour after your business is done, so I thought best to lose no time. You'll come, of course? The way you're looking just now I don't know but you're equal to refusing me even such a small favour as this one!"

Brown crossed the room, to lay his hands on Atchison's shoulders. His eyes were dark with suppressed feeling.

"My dear old friend," said he affectionately, "I wish you wouldn't take the thing this way. I'm not dealing blows at those I love; if I'm dealing them at anybody it's at myself. I can't possibly tell you what it means to me--this crisis. I can only ask you not to think hardly of me. As for the dinner, if it will please you to have me agree to it I will, only--I should a little rather have you stand me up against a wall and take a shot at me!"

"For a deserter?"

Atchison spoke out of his grief and anger, not from belief in the motive he imputed. When he saw Donald Brown turn white and clench the hands he dropped from his friend's shoulders, Atchison realized what he had done. He winced under the sting of the quick and imperious command which answered him:

"Take that back, Webb!"

"I do--and apologize," said the other man instantly, and tears smarted under his eyelids. "You know I didn't mean it, Don. But--hang it all!--I'm bitterly disappointed and I can't help showing it."

"Disappointed in me--or in my act?" Brown was still stern.

"In your act, of course. I'm bound to acknowledge that it must take a brave man to cut cables the way you're doing--a mighty brave man."

"I don't care about being considered brave, but I won't be called a coward."

"I thought," said Atchison, trying to smile, "there was something in your Bible about turning the other cheek."

"There is," said Brown steadily. "And I do it when I come to your dinner. But between now and then I'll knock you down if you insult the course I've laid out for myself."

The two men gazed at each other, the one the thorough man of the world with every sign of its prospering touch upon him, the other looking somehow more like a lean and hardened young soldier of the army than a student of theology. Both pairs of eyes softened. But it was Atchison's which gave way first.

"Confound you, Don--it's because of that splendidly human streak in you that we love you here. You've always seemed to have enough personal acquaintance with the Devil and his works to make you understand the rest of us, and refrain from being too hard on us."

At which Sue Breckenridge--who had been listening with tense-strung nerves to the interview taking place in her presence--laughed, with an hysterical little sob shaking her. Both men looked at her.

"Poor Sue," said Brown. "She doesn't like to have you quarrel with me, yet it's all she can do to keep from quarrelling with me herself! Between you, if you don't undermine my purpose, it will be only because I've been preparing my defenses for a good while and have strong patrols out at the weak points."

"I give you fair warning, I'll undermine it yet if I can," and Atchison gripped Brown's hand with fervor before he went away, charging Sue Breckenridge with the responsibility of bringing her brother to the dinner to be given that evening.

"Now, what"--said Brown, turning to his writing-table when Atchison had gone, and absently picking up a bronze paper-weight which lay there--"put it into his head to fire a dinner at me the moment he knew I was here?"

"We all have a suspicion," said Sue, watching him as she spoke, "that he and Helena are ready to announce their engagement. It may have popped into his head that with you here it was just the time to do it. Of course," she went on hurriedly, in answer to something she thought she saw leap into her brother's face, "we don't absolutely know that they're engaged. He's been devoted for a good while, and since he's never been much that sort with women it looks as if it meant something."

"It looks it on his part," said Brown, opening a drawer in the table and appearing to search therein. "Does it look it on hers?"

"Not markedly so. But Helena's getting on--she must be twenty-six or seven--and she always seems happy with him. Of course that's no evidence, for she has such a charmingly clever way with men you never can tell when she's bored--and certainly they can't. It's just that it seems such a splendidly fitting match we're confident there's ground for our expectations."

"I see. Altogether, that dinner promises well for sensations--of one sort or another. Meanwhile, shall we pitch into business?"

Together they went through Brown's apartment, which was a large one, and comprised everything which he had once considered necessary to the comfort of a bachelor establishment. As he looked over that portion of the place pertaining to the cooking and serving of food he smiled rather grimly at the contrast it inevitably brought to his mind. Standing before the well-filled shelves in the butler's pantry he eyed a certain cherished set of Sèvres china, thinking of the cheap blue-and-white ware which now filled all his needs, and recalling with a sense of amusement the days, not so long past, when he would have considered himself ill served had his breakfast appeared in such dishes.

"It's all in the way you look at it, Sue," he exclaimed, opening the doors of leaded glass and taking down a particularly choice example of the ceramic art in the shape of a large Satsuma plate. "Look at that, now! Why should a chop taste any better off that plate than off the one I ate from this morning at daybreak? It tastes no better--I vow it doesn't taste as good. I've a keener appetite now than last year, when Sing Lee, my Chinese cook, was cudgelling his Asiatic brains to tempt me."

"That's not the way I look at it," Sue answered mournfully. "To me it makes all the difference in the world how food is served, not to mention how it is cooked. Do you ever have anything but bacon and eggs at that dreadful place of yours?"

"Bless your heart, yes! I don't deny myself good food, child--get that out of your mind. Why, just night before last Jennings and I had an oyster roast, on the half-shell, over the coals in my fireplace. My word, but they were good! If Webb can give us anything better than that to-night he'll surprise me."

"Who is Jennings? A laundryman or a policeman?"

"Neither. Jennings is a clerk in the office of a great wholesale hardware house. He was down on his luck, a while back, but he's pulled out of his trouble. When his wife's called out of town, as she often is by the old people back home, he keeps me company. He's particularly fond of roasted oysters, is Jennings, since a certain night when I introduced them to his unaccustomed palate. It's great fun to see him devour them."

Sue shook her head again. She could seem to do little else these days, being in a perpetual state of wonder and regret over that which she could not understand--quite as her brother had said. He sent her away an hour before luncheon time, telling her that he would follow when he had attended to certain matters in which she could not help. Having put her into her car, he waved a cheery hand at her as she drove away, and returned to his apartment. He lingered a little at the lift to ask after the welfare of the young man who operated it, whom he had known in past days; but presently he was in his library again with the door locked behind him. And here for a brief space business was suspended.

Before the big leather chair he fell upon his knees, burying his head in his arms.

"_Oh, good Father_,'" said Brown, just above his breath, "_only Thou canst help me through this thing. It's even harder than I thought it would be. I want the old life, I want the old love--my heart is weak within me at the thought of giving them up.... I know the temptation comes not from without but from within. It's my own weak self that is my enemy, not the lure of the life I'm giving up.... Give me strength--fighting strength.... Help me--'not to give in while I can stand and see_.'"

Presently he rose to his feet. He was pale, but in his face showed the renewed strength of purpose he had asked for. He set about the task of packing the few things he meant to take with him, working with a certain unhurried efficiency which accomplished no small amount in that hour before luncheon. Then he descended to find his sister's car waiting for him, and was whirled away.

XIII

BROWN'S TRIAL BY FLOOD

At nine o'clock that night, feeling a little as if he were in some sort of familiar dream, Brown, wearing evening dress for the first time in more than a year, sat looking about him. He was at Mrs. Brainard's right hand, in the post of the guest of honour, for Mrs. Brainard was playing hostess for her bachelor friend, Webb Atchison, in the apartment of the princely up-town hotel which was his more or less permanent home.

About the great round table were gathered a goodly company--the company of Brown's old friends among the rich and eminent of the city. Not only men of great wealth, but men distinguished in their professions, noted for their achievements, and honoured for their public services, were among those hurriedly asked to do this man honour. They had all been more or less constant members of his congregation during the years when he was making a name as the most forceful and fearless young preacher who ever ventured to tell the people of aristocratic St. Timothy's what he thought of them.

And they were gathered to-night to tell him what they thought of him. They were sparing no pains to do so. More than once, while he parried their attacks upon his resolution to leave them permanently, parried them with a smiling face, with a resolute quiet voice, with the quickness of return thrust for which he was famous in debate, he was inwardly sending up one oft-repeated, pregnant petition: "_Lord, help me through this--for Thy sake_!"

They were not men alone who combined against him with every pressure of argument; there were women present who used upon him every art of persuasion. Not that of speech alone, but that subtler witchery of look and smile with which such women well know how to make their soft blows tell more surely than harder ones from other hands. Among these, all of whom were women of charm and distinction after one fashion or another, was one who alone, though she seemed to be making no direct attack, was waging the heaviest war of all against Donald Brown's determination.

Atchison, in arranging the places of his guests, had put Helena Forrest at Brown's right, at the sacrifice of his own pleasure, for by this concession she was farthest from himself. Whether or not he understood how peculiarly deadly was the weapon he thus used against his friend, he knew that Helena was capable of exerting a powerful influence upon any man--how should he himself not know it, who was at her feet? He had no compunction in bringing that influence to bear upon Brown at this moment, when the actual word of withdrawal had not yet been spoken.

Yet as from time to time Atchison looked toward these two of his guests he wondered if Helena were doing all she could in the cause in which he had enlisted her. She was saying little to Brown, he could see that; and Brown was saying even less to her. Each seemed more occupied with the neighbour upon the farther side than with the other. Just what this meant Atchison could not be sure.

The dinner, an affair of surprising magnificence considering the brief hours of its preparation, drew at length to its close. It seemed to Brown that he had been sitting at that table, in the midst of the old environment in which he had once been carelessly happy and assured, for hours upon end, before the signal came at last for the departure of the women. And even then he knew that after they had gone the worst was probably to come. It came. Left alone with him, the men of the party redoubled their attacks. With every argument, renewed and recast, they assaulted him. He withstood them, refusing at the last to argue, merely lifting his head with a characteristic gesture of determination, smiling wearily, and saying with unshaken purpose: "It's no use, gentlemen. I've made up my mind. I'm sorry you think I'm wrong, but I can't help that, since I believe I'm right."

They could not credit their own failure, these men of power, so accustomed to having things go their way that they were unable to understand even the possibility of being defeated. And they were being defeated by a man whom they had never admired more--and they had made him, as Sue Breckenridge had said, the idol of the great church--than now when he refused them. But they, quite naturally, did not show him that. They showed him disappointment, chagrin, cynicism, disbelief in his judgment, everything that could make his heart beat hard and painfully with the weight of their displeasure.

Suddenly he rose to his feet. A hush fell, for they thought he was going to speak to them. He was silent for a minute, looking down at these old friends who were so fond of him; then he opened his mouth. But not to speak--to sing.

It was a powerful asset of Donald Brown's, and it had never been more powerful than now, this voice which had been given him of heaven. They had often heard him before but now, under these strange circumstances, they listened with fresh amazement to the beauty of his tones. Every word fell clean-cut upon their ears, every note was rich with feeling, as Brown in this strange fashion made his plea, took his stand with George Matheson's deathless words of passionate loyalty:

"Make me a captive, Lord,
And then I shall be free;
Force me to render up my sword,
And I shall conqueror be.
I sink in life's alarms
When by myself I stand;
Imprison me within Thy arms,
And strong shall be my hand."

When they looked up, these men, they saw that the women of the party had come back to the doors, drawn by an irresistible force.

In a strange silence, broken only by low-spoken words, the whole company returned to the living-rooms of the apartment. Here Brown himself broke the spell he had laid upon them.

Speaking in the ringing voice they knew of old, and with a gesture of both arms outflung as if he threw himself upon their friendship, he cried blithely:

"Ah, give me a good time now, dear people! Let me play I'm yours and you are mine again--just for to-night."

That settled it. Webb Atchison brought his hand down upon his victim's shoulder with a resounding friendly blow, calling:

"He's right. We've given him a bad two hours of it. Let's make it up to him, and let him have the right sort of send-off--since he will go. He will--there's no possible question of that. So let's part friends."

"I don't know," said Brown, smiling in the midst of the faces which now gave him back his smile, "but that if you are kind to me you'll test my endurance still more heavily. But--we'll risk it."

The scene now became a gay one--gay, at least, upon the surface. Brown was his old self again, the one they had known, and he was the centre of the good-fellowship which now reigned. So, for a time. Then came the supreme test of his life--as unexpectedly as such tests come, when a man thinks he has won through to the thin edge of the struggle.

XIV

BROWN'S TRIAL BY FIRE

He had gone alone into a den of Atchison's, where was kept a medley of books and pipes and weapons, a bachelor collection of trophies of all sorts. He was in search of a certain loving-cup which had been mentioned and asked for, and Atchison himself had for the moment left the apartment to see an insistent caller below. The den was at some distance from the place where the company was assembled, and Brown could hear their voices only in the remote distance as he searched. Suddenly a light sound as of the movement of silken draperies fell upon his ear, and at the same instant a low voice spoke. He swung about, to see a figure before him at sight of which, alone as he had been with it for months, he felt his unsubdued heart leap in his breast. By her face he knew she had followed him for a purpose. He let her speak.

"Donald Brown," she said--and she spoke fast and breathlessly, as if she feared, as he did, instant interruption and this were her only chance--"what you have said to-night makes me forget everything but what I want you to know."

Quite evidently her heart was beating synchronously with his, for he could see how it shook her. He stared at her, at the lovely line and colour of cheek and chin, at the wonderful shadowed eyes, at the soft darkness of her heavy hair. She was wearing misty white to-night, with one great red rose upon her breast; she was such a sight as might well blind a man, even if he were not already blind with love of her. The fragrance of the rose was in his nostrils--it assailed his senses as if it were a part of her, its fragrance hers. But he did not speak.

"You asked me something once," she went on, with an evident effort. "Would you mind telling me if--if--"

But he would not help her. He could not believe he understood what she meant to say.

"You make it very hard for me," she murmured. "Yet I believe I understand why, if this thing is ever said at all, I must be the one to say it. Do you--Donald--do you--still--care?"

"_O God_!" he cried in his heart. "_O God! Couldn't You have spared me this_?"

But aloud, after an instant, he said, a little thickly, "I think you know without asking. I shall never stop caring."

She lifted her eyes. "Then--" and she waited.

He must speak. She had done her part. His head swam with the sudden astounding revelation that she was his for the taking, if--Ah, but the _if_! He knew too well what that must mean.

"Are you tempting me, too?" he asked, with sudden fierceness. "Do you mean--like all the rest--I may have you if--I give up my purpose and stay here?"

Mutely her eyes searched his. Dumb with the agony of it his searched hers in return. He turned away.

"Don!" Her voice was all low music. The words vibrated appealingly; she had seen what it meant to him. She put out one hand as if to touch him--and drew it back. "Listen to me, please. I know--I know--what a wonderful sacrifice you are making. I admire and honour you for it--I do. But--think once more. This great parish--surely there is work for you here, wonderful work. Won't you do it--_with me_?"

He looked at her with sudden decision on his course.

"You left that photograph?" He spoke huskily.

She nodded.

"You left it there, in my poor house. I've cherished it there. It hasn't suffered. You wouldn't suffer. Will you live--and work--with me--_there_?"

"Oh!" She drew back. "How can you--Do you realize what you ask?"

"I don't ask it expecting to receive it. I know it's impossible--from your viewpoint. But--it's--all I have to ask--"

He broke off, fighting savagely with the desire to seize her in his arms that was all but overmastering him.

She moved away a step in her turn, standing, with down-bent head, the partial line of her profile, the curve of her neck and beautiful shoulder, presenting an even greater appeal to the devouring flame of his longing than her eyes had done. It seemed to him that he would give the heart out of his body even to press his lips upon that fair flesh just below the low-drooping masses of her hair, flesh exquisite as a child's in contrast with the dark locks above it. All the long months of his exile pressed upon him with mighty force to urge him to assuage his loneliness with this divine balm.

Suddenly she spoke, just above a whisper. "I wonder," she said, "if any woman ever humiliated herself--like this--to be so refused."

He answered that with swift, eager words: "It is the most womanly, the most wonderful thing, any woman could do for a man. I shall never forget it, or cease to honour you for it. I love you--_love you_--for it--ten thousand times more than I loved you before, if that can be. I _must_ say it. I must put it into words that you and I can both remember, or I think my heart will burst. But--Helena--I have vowed this vow to my God. I have put my hand to this plow. I can't turn back--not even for you. No man, having done that, '_and looking back, is fit for the kingdom of God_.' He isn't fit for the kingdoms of earth, either. He isn't fit for--hell!"

Very slowly she moved away from him, her head still drooping. At the door she did not pause and look back, actress-like, to try him with one more look. She went like a wounded thing. And at the sight, the wild impulse to rush after her and cry to her that nothing in the wide universe mattered, so that she should lift that head and lay it on his breast, gripped him and wrung him, till drops of moisture started out upon his forehead, and he turned sick. Then she was out of sight, and he stood grasping the back of a chair, fighting for control. This was a dinner-party--a dinner-party! Kind God in heaven! And he and she must go back to those other people and smile and talk, must somehow cover it all up. How was it conceivably to be done?

She could do it, perhaps. After all, it could not be the soul-stirring thing to her that it was to him. She loved him enough to be his wife--under the old conditions. She did not love him enough to go with him as his wife into the new conditions. Then she could not be suffering as he was suffering. Wounded pride--she was feeling that, no doubt of it--wounded pride is not a pleasant thing to feel. She loved him somewhat, loved him enough to take the initiative in this scene to-night. But real love--she could not know what that was, or she would follow him to the ends of the earth. It was the woman's part to follow, not the man's. Hers to give up her preference for his duty. Since she could not do this, she did not really love him. This was the bitterest drop in the whole bitter cup!

Footsteps came rapidly along the corridor, Webb Atchison appeared in the doorway. At the first sound of his return Brown had wheeled and was found standing before a cabinet, in which behind glass doors was kept a choice collection of curios from all parts of the world. He was trying to summon words to explain that he was looking for a certain loving-cup--_a loving-cup_--when one had just been presented, full to overflowing, to his thirsty lips, and he had refused to drink!

But Atchison was full of his message.

"Don, I've done my best to put the fellow off, but he will see you. Hang it!--to-night of all nights! I don't know why that following of yours should pursue you to this place. I suspect it will be considerable of a jolt to that chap to see you in an expanse of white shirt-front. But it seems somebody has been taken worse since you left, and insists on seeing you. Why in thunder did you leave an address for them to find you at?"

By the time Atchison had delivered himself of all this Brown had hold of himself, could turn and speak naturally. The news had been like a dash of cold water in the face of a fainting man.

"Who is worse--Mr. Benson?"

"Think that was the name--an old man. The messenger's waiting, though I told him you certainly couldn't go back to-night."

"I certainly shall go back to-night. Where is he?"

Expostulating uselessly, Atchison led the way. Brown found Andrew Murdison standing with a look of dogged determination on his face, which changed to one of relief when he saw Brown. Old Benson, the watchmaker, who had been convalescing from illness when Brown came away, had suffered a relapse and had probably but few hours to live.

With a brief leave-taking, in the course of which Brown held for an instant the hand of Helena Forrest and found it cold as ice in his grasp, he went away. As the train bore him swiftly back to the place he had left so recently, certain words came to him and stayed by him, fitting themselves curiously to the rhythmic roar of the train:

"_God is faithful, who will not suffer you to be tempted above that ye are able; but will with the temptation also make a way to escape, that ye may be able to bear it_."

And the car wheels, as they turned, seemed to be saying, mile after mile: "_A way to escape--a way to escape--a way to escape_!"

XV

BROWN'S BROWN STUDY

Standing in his kitchen doorway, Brown looked out into his back yard.

It was, in one way, an unusual back yard for that quarter of the city, and in that one way it differed from the back yards of his neighbours. While theirs were bounded on all sides by high and ugly board fences, his was encompassed by a stone wall standing even higher, and enclosing the small area of possibly forty feet by thirty in a privacy quite unknown elsewhere in the district. This stone wall had been laid by the Englishman who had built the house, his idea of having things to himself being the product of his early life in a country where not only is every man's house his castle, but the surrounding ground thereof, as well, his domain, from which he would keep out every curious eye.

It was an evening in mid-April. Brown had opened the big oak door to let the late western light of the spring day flood his kitchen, while he washed and put away the dishes lately used for his supper--and for that of a forlorn and ill-used specimen of tramp humanity who had arrived as he was sitting down.

He was presently to address a gathering of factory girls in a near-by schoolhouse; and he was trying, as he stood in the door, with the soft spring air touching gratefully his face, to gather his thoughts together for the coming talk. But he was weary with a long day's labours, and somehow his eyes could summon no vision of the faces he was to see. Instead--

"There ought to be a garden back here," he said to himself. "If I'm to stay here for the coming year--as it looks as if I must--I should cultivate this little patch and make it smile a bit. As it is, it's doing no good to anybody, not even Bim. He's pretty careless about his bones out here, and leaves them around instead of burying 'em decently. I must teach him better. This would be a good place to bring the children into, if it had some flowers in it."

The notion cheered him a little, as the thought of flowers in the spring has a way of doing. He made a rough plan of the garden, in his mind, laying out beds of sturdy bloom, training vines to cover the bleak expanse of stone, even planting a small tree or two of rapid growth--for the benefit of whomever should follow him as a tenant of the old house. Presently he closed the door with some sense of refreshment, mental and physical, and forced his thoughts into the channel it was now imperative they should occupy.

He took his way to the meeting in the schoolhouse, however, with a step less rapid than was usually his. It might have been the enervating influence of the mild spring air; it might have been the pressure of certain recollections which he had not yet succeeded, in the two months which had passed since the farewell dinner at Webb Atchison's, in so putting aside that they should not often depress and at times even dominate his spirit. Though he had left the old life completely behind him, and had settled into the new with all the conviction and purpose he could summon, he was subject, especially when physically weary, as to-night, to a heaviness of heart which would not be mastered.

"But I must--_I must_--stiffen my back," he said sternly to himself, as he neared the dingy schoolhouse toward which, from all directions, he could see his audience making its way. It was not the first time he had addressed these girls and women, in so informal and unostentatious a manner that no one of his hearers had so much as suspected his profession, but had taken him for one of their own class. "He's got a way with him," they put it, "that makes you feel like you could listen to him all night." The sight of them now provided the stimulus he needed, and as he smiled and nodded at two or three whom he had personally met he felt the old interest in his task coming to his aid.

And in a brief space he was standing before them telling them the things he had come to tell. It was not his message he had lacked--that had been made ready long before the hour--it was only the peculiar power and magnetism of speech and manner which had been the treasure of St. Timothy's, that he had felt himself unable to summon as he came to this humble audience. But now, as almost always, he was able to use every art at his command to capture their attention, to hold it, to carry it from point to point, and finally to drive his message home with appealing force. And this message was, as always, the simple message of belief in the things which make for righteousness.

Not all his auditors could arrive on time; they were obliged to come when they could. Brown's talks had to be subject to constant though painstakingly muffled interruptions, as one after another stole into the room. His attraction for his hearers, however, once he was fairly launched, was so great that there were few wandering eyes or minds. Therefore, to-night, when he had been speaking for a quarter of an hour, the quiet entrance of two figures which found places near the door at the back of the room disturbed nobody, and caused only a few heads to turn in their direction.

Those who did note the arrivals saw that they were strangers to the assembly. They saw something else, also, though they could not have told what it was. The two women, one young, one of middle age, were plainly dressed in cheap suits of dark serge, such as many of the working-women were wearing. Their hats were of the simplest and most inexpensive design, though lacking any of the commonplace finery to be seen everywhere throughout the room. But there was about the pair an undeniable since unconcealable air of difference, of refinement if it were only in the manner in which they slipped into their seats and fixed their eyes upon the speaker, with no glances to right or left. The eyes which noted them noted also that both were possessed of faces such as need no accessories of environment to make them hold the gaze of all about them.

"Settlement folks," guessed one girl to another, with a slight curl of the lip.

"_Sh-h--_! Who cares what they are when _he's_ talkin'?" gave back the other--and settled again to listening.

Brown had seen the newcomers, but they were far back in the room, which was by no means brilliantly lighted, and beneath the shadows of their hats there was for him no hint of acquaintance. He therefore proceeded, untrammelled by a knowledge which would surely have been his undoing had he possessed it at that stage of the evening. He went on interesting, touching, appealing to his listeners, waging war upon their hearts with all the skill known to the valiant, forceful speaker. Yet such was his apparent simplicity of method that he seemed to all but two of those who heard him to be merely talking with them about the things which concerned them.

His was not the ordinary effort of the amateur social worker--such though he felt himself to be. He had not a word to say to his hearers about "conditions"; he gave them no impression of having studied them and their environment till he knew more about it all than they did--or thought he did. He brought to them only what they felt, consciously or unconsciously, to be an intimate understanding of the human heart, whether it were found beating under the coarse garments of the factory hand or the silken ones of the "swells up-town." Gently but searchingly he showed them their own hearts, showed them the ugly things, the strange things, the wonderful things, of their own hearts--and then, when he had those hearts beating heavily and painfully before him, applied the healing balm of his message. Hard eyes grew soft, weary faces brightened, despairing mouths set with new resolve, and when the hour ended there seemed a clearer atmosphere, a different spirit, in the crowded room, than that which earlier had pervaded it.

"Say, ain't he what I told you?" One girl, passing near the two strangers as the company dispersed, inquired of another. "Don't it seem like he knows what you don't know yourself about how you're feelin'?"

"You can't be so down in the mouth when you're listenin' to him," was another comment which reached ears strained to attention. "You feel like there was some good livin', after all. Did Liz come, d'ye know? She needs somethin' to make her buck up. If she'd jest hear him--"

Brown remained in the room till almost the last were gone. The two strangers waited at the door, their backs turned to the room, as if in conference. Several women stayed to speak with the man who had talked to them, and the waiting ones could hear his low tones, the same friendly, comprehending, interested tones to which St. Timothy's had grown so happily accustomed. At length the last lingerer passed the two by the door, and Brown, approaching, spoke to them.

"Did you want to see me? Is there anything I can do?" he began--and the two strangers turned.

His astonished gaze fell first upon Mrs. Brainard, her fine and glowing eyes fixed upon him with both mirth and tenderness in their look. She had been deeply touched by the sights and sounds of the hour just passed, yet the surprise she had in store for her friend, Donald Brown, was moving her also, and her smile at him from under the plain little hat she wore was a brilliant one. But he stared at her for a full ten seconds before he could believe the testimony of his eyes. Was this--could this possibly be--the lady of the distinguished dress and bearing, who stood before him in her cheap suit of serge, with a little gray cotton glove upon the hand she held out to him?

He seized the hand and wrung it, as if the very contact was much to him. His face broke into a smile of joy as he said fervently, "I don't know how this happens, but it's enough for me that it does."

"I'm not the only one present, Don," said the lady, laughing, and turned to her companion.

If he had given the second figure a thought as he recognized his old friend, it was to suppose her some working-girl who had conducted the stranger to the place. But now he looked, and saw Helena Forrest.

"_You_!" he breathed, and stood transfixed.

Miss Forrest had always been, though never conspicuously dressed, such a figure of quiet elegance that one who knew her could almost recognize her with her face quite out of sight. Now, without a single accessory of the sort which stands for high-bred fashion, her beauty flashed at Brown like that of one bright star in a sky of midnight gloom. She was not smiling, she was looking straight at him with her wonderful eyes, and in them was a strange and bewildering appeal.

For a moment he could not speak--he, who had been so eloquent within her hearing for the hour past. He looked at her, and looked again at Mrs. Brainard, and back at Helena again, and then he stammered, "I can't--quite--believe it is you--either of you!" and laughed at his own confusion, his face flushing darkly under the skin, clear to the roots of the heavy locks on his forehead.

"But you see it is," said Helena's low voice. "We are confident of that ourselves, for the journey has seemed a long one, under two smothering veils. And we hadn't the easiest time finding you."

Brown recovered himself. "You didn't motor over this time, then?"

"The last time we were here," Mrs. Brainard reminded him, "you told us quite frankly that you didn't care to have your friends arrive in limousines, or in velvet and sables. So--we have left both behind."

"I see you have. It was wonderfully kind of you, though the disguise is by no means a perfect one. I wonder if you can possibly think, either of you, that you looked like the rest of my audience!"

"Did you know us when we came in?" questioned Mrs. Brainard, with a merry glance. "I think you did not, Mr. Donald Brown!"

"How long have you been here?"

"We must have come in near the beginning of your talk. You didn't even see us then, did you?"

"I saw two figures which looked strange to me--but--the lights--"

"Oh, yes," agreed the lady, gayly, "the lights were poor. And you saw two working-women who were merely strangers to you, so you didn't look again."

"I'm glad I didn't recognize you."

"Why? We rather hoped you would--didn't we, dear?"

She looked at her companion, who nodded, smiling.

"We both hoped and feared, I think," Helena said.

"I couldn't have gone stumbling on," Brown explained. "I should have had to dismiss the meeting, telling them I had a rush of blood to the head--or to the heart!"

At this moment he was helped out by the abrupt opening of the door beside him. A grimy-faced janitor looked in, wearing an expression of surly dissatisfaction. When he saw Brown the expression softened slightly, as if he knew a friend when he beheld him, but he did not withdraw. Brown rallied his absorbed faculties to appreciate what late hours meant to that busy janitor.

"Just leaving, Mr. Simpson," he said cheerfully, and led his visitors out into the school's anteroom.

"Are you at a hotel?" he asked, with eagerness, of Mrs. Brainard. "How can I--where can I--"

"We ran away," explained that lady promptly. "Not a soul knows where we are. We did not register at a hotel, for this is a secret expedition. We take the eleven-fifteen train back. Meanwhile, Don, am I not an acceptable chaperon? And won't my presence make it entirely proper for us to break a bit of bread with you in your bachelor home? We had only afternoon tea before we left. We are very hungry--or I am!"

"Oh, if you will only do that!" he said with an inflection of great pleasure. "I shall be so tremendously honoured I shall hardly know how to express it. I hope I have something for you fit to eat. If I haven't--"

"Bacon and eggs," said Mrs. Brainard, with twinkling eyes, "are what your sister Sue insists you live on. Never in my life did I have such a longing for bacon and eggs!"

"Then you shall have them--or an omelet garnished with bacon. And the corner grocery has some lettuce and radishes. I believe I can even achieve a salad."

Brown led the way through the ill-lighted streets, not talking as he might have done in another quarter of the city, but hurrying them past places he could not bear to have them see, and making one detour to avoid taking them through the poorest part of the neighbourhood. It was by no means a dangerous neighbourhood, but somehow he felt with these two rare women on his hands, as if he must guard them even from the ordinary sights to be had in the districts of the working class. And as he walked by their side it came upon him, as it had never done with such force before, that he could never seriously ask any woman from his own world to come and face such a life as the one he had chosen for the active years of his own.

Yet--he had also a curious feeling that he must not let that thought spoil for him the wonder of this visit. The hour was his, let him make the most of it. He had not so many happy hours that he could afford to lose one because it could be only one. He would not lose it.

XVI

BROWN'S NEW WORLD

So the house was reached--it was a dark and stern-looking little abode at this hour, with its windows unlighted, though usually the cheeriest on the square. Brown threw open the door and Bim sprang to meet him--turning aside, however, at sight of the strangers. Only a few embers glowed on the hearth, and the room was in darkness.

Brown closed the door behind them all. "Stand still, please," he said, "while I light up."

He threw some kindlings from a basket upon the fire, and they leaped into flame before he could light the lamp on his table. The room became a pleasant place at once, as any room must in fire- and lamp-light, so that it contain such few essentials of living as did Brown's--the red-cushioned chair by the hearth, the books and magazines upon the table, the two fine portraits on the wall.

"Now, please make yourselves comfortable," Brown urged, indicating the austere little bedroom his friends remembered. "And if you'll do that I'll go at the joyous task of getting you some supper."

"You must let us help you," Mrs. Brainard offered.

"Never! What could you do, either of you, in a bachelor's kitchen?"

"But we want to see the bachelor at work there."

"Your presence might upset me," he called back, laughing, as he hurried away.

Two minutes later, after an inspection of his larder, he was rushing up the street to the corner grocery, having escaped by way of the back door. If any of his friends of this quarter had happened to meet him under one of the scanty street lamps, they might have noted that the dark face, in these days usually so sober, to-night was alight with eagerness. Donald Brown's eyes were glowing, there was a touch of clear, excited colour on his cheek. His lips were all but smiling as he strode along. One hand was already in his pocket, feeling critically of the probable contents of the purse he longed to empty, to make a little feast for his so-welcome guests.