Chapter VIII: Part 8

Becker voiced the thought that was uppermost in his mind: “My father and mother think I am as successful as any man need be. They do not comprehend that what I am doing now is drudgery, a present makeshift only—that my career is all before me. The only opportunity I have had, and I should scarcely call it that, was five years ago when I went to New York, thinking, for I knew no better, that I might accomplish something there. I tramped the streets for days in my effort to get a hearing. I offered my manuscripts to any one who would print them, as a gift. Bah! it was the same always—native work had no value. If I could only get to Europe—there they know what is music and what is rubbish. My father and mother do not wish to be unkind but they are not informed in these matters, and when I came back beaten and more humiliated than I can say, I saw they were glad of my failure. Their thought was that I should have been satisfied, and their one regret was for the money I had expended in so vain an undertaking.”

His strong face showed plainly the pain that was his—the hunger and the longing.

Philip thought of those innumerable younger brothers. It would be years before any of them could come to the front and ease the load that kept Franz's shoulder to the wheel; meanwhile he was chained to a spot that could only give him suffering. There was danger, too, in the waiting. He might lose the very power to utilize his liberty when it did come. Men sometimes survive their inspiration and their genius.

Becker threw himself back in his chair: “We spend years in toiling for a little money that we may purchase opportunity and then—then, we die. Bah! what a fool one is to hope when the chances are all against him.”

“Did you ever speculate on the final adjustment? God's apology to man?”

Franz shook his head: “What presumption, to suppose God keeps any record of us—such atoms as we are!”

“Not at all. My religion holds the splendid comfort of conceit and is based on the thought that man—and by man I mean primarily myself—is all, that my work, my good resolutions—which are a source of constant annoyance and distress to me—entitle me to certain favors in this world and the world to come. To be sure, opposition to the divine will is rather useless—at best we can but squirm like very small fish over a hot fire. Still, I shall make reparation for the absurdity of my beliefs by the dignity and persistency of my revolt, on much the same principle that prompts me to swear when I hurt myself by a foolish attempt to walk through an obstructed doorway in the dark, not that it does any good, but just to express my contempt for the inexorable.”

Franz smoked his pipe thoughtfully. Philip occasionally shocked even his liberal ideas of propriety. They sat looking at the hideous little stove for a space and neither spoke. At last Philip said:

“Why, I say, haven't you a sort of a half-uncle in the West who could help you if he would? Can't you bone him for a start?”

Franz's brow darkened instantly: “You mean my step-father's brother? Don't speak of him.”

“Oh, I beg your pardon,” Philip made haste to say. “The fact is, I can stand almost anything in the shape of misfortune myself, except my relatives, but I thought it might be different with you.”

“You do not comprehend. This person I loathe. It is nothing to him, of course. He is a rich man. I wonder what good money can do a brute like that?”

He looked out of the window, watching the dead leaves the wind was blowing into drifts against the fence in the yard below, and added almost sadly: “I think hate has been a more potent factor in my growth than love—at least it has stirred my heart the deepest.”

“So your uncle is out of the question even though he should be willing to aid you?”

Becker struck the ashes from his pipe, remarking as he did so: “What can I do that will give me the longed-for opportunity? You are usually prolific in good advice.”

“You might marry money.”

“Never!” Franz interposed quickly. His friend's love-affair met with his strongest disapproval.

Philip ignored the interruption: “Now there is Mrs. Monroe. I have young Perkins' word for it that she admires you immensely. I am creditably informed she enjoys a fair income and she is still handsome and shapely—thanks to God and her tailor! Even the tooth of time has been dulled on her hardy anatomy. Franz, there is your chance.”

“Don't be a fool! Do you think I——”

Franz was interrupted by the sound of an exceedingly pleasant voice that arose from the hall below. The voice was assuring some one that its owner was perfectly familiar with the way to Franz's room and was declining all proffers of assistance in finding it, with profuse thanks.

Becker and Philip had paused to listen, and now the latter said: “I rather fancy it's Perkins.” A moment after a gentle tap sounded on the door, accompanied by, “May I come in?”

In response to Becker's bidding the door opened and Perkins stood before them.

Now there are awful depths of oblivion that may be sounded in a small town, and not to know the Perkinses was one of these depths, for that was to argue yourself unknown. Yet, to his credit be it said that Perkins was a modest youth, despite his temptation to gloat in the fact that his family represented two generations of riches; which was by far the most splendid incident in their history.

Young Perkins was not adapted to gloating. He was a youth with a supersensitive conscience and sandy side-whiskers, which grew out stubbily from an equally sandy complexion, and he would be polite to everybody, which was a sheer weakness on his part and not to be excused on any plea whatever.

What Perkins did not do his mother in nowise remedied, for she quarreled with her kind on a footing of perfect equality charming to behold, setting herself up for no better than the rest.

Perkins stood before his friends, breathless from his run up the stairs, his whole appearance indicating unusual excitement. He dropped down into the chair Franz pushed toward him, saying:

“Wait a minute till I get my wind. I am quite floored because of several things that have taken place to-day.”

He wiped his florid face vigorously with his handkerchief.

“I—you see—that is, my mother received word yesterday from Madame Dennie, of Paris—Paris, France, you know—that she is in America. In New York, I think. Madame Dennie is the widow of Gabrielle Honore Dennie, who was a very distinguished man in France, prior to his death. I am sure I don't know what he did and my mother has never told me, but whatever it was I am certain he did it and it was uncommon. There was a stack of money in it. He was a banker, you know.”

“Look here, Perkins,” Philip remonstrated. “What is this all about?”

“But, you don't catch what I am driving at,” Perkins cried eagerly; “he married my mother's cousin.”

“Who did?” Philip asked.

“Monsieur Dennie.”

“Oh,—well, go ahead.”

“That's exactly what I am trying to do. He married Miss Ballard, my mother's cousin. That was before he died, of course. My mother was a Ballard and as you are both aware, that's my first name, and they were very celebrated people.”

Perkins was still polishing his freckled features till they fairly glistened. He finally tucked his handkerchief resolutely into his pocket and folded his hands.

“I must get this straight, I am quite excited. Permit me to get my breath.”

And he gazed benignantly at his friends from under his white lashes, a beaming smile playing over his countenance and dying away in the stubby growth of his side-whiskers.

“You fellows must have mercy upon me a moment longer. What I wish to tell you is this: On Saturday Madame Dennie is supposed to have left New York for this place. I assure you we were completely overwhelmed by the news, for while we—my mother that is—is her only living relative in America, the family connection has been allowed to languish. Heretofore my mother has made it a point to fight industriously with every Ballard with whom she came in contact. That's a distinctly Ballard trait, and in addition to the inherited and warlike instincts of her race, my mother's element is hot water. Very hot, you know, and I must admit it is seldom you find a person who spends less time out of her element than my mother. However, she has told me it will be the proudest moment of her life when Madame Dennie enters her house, so I am hopeful the hatchet will be buried blade down.” With a stifled gasp, Perkins came to a pause.

“See here, Perkins,” Philip said, “what is it you are trying to tell us? Come, don't keep it all to yourself. Let us into the secret. That's a good fellow.”

“My dear Philip, I pledge you my sacred word of honor my one wish is to enlighten you, but I appear little better than a candle whose light is placed under a bushel.” He looked pathetically from one to the other of his auditors. “Allow me to get started right. I trust I have made it clear to you that I have a cousin, Madame Dennie and she is a widow lady.”

“Widow alone is sufficient. It establishes her sex beyond dispute. Don't use the word lady when you can possibly avoid doing so. It's a hard worked word these days,” Philip advised.

“Oh, pardon me. Well, Madame Dennie, who is a widow, has announced her intention of coming to us and we are overwhelmed by the honor, for of course my cousin is a woman of the greatest elegance and culture. Must be, you know. But what”—and his voice rose in a quaver of nervous objection—“but what have we to offer her either in our mode of living or in a social way that will please her? It will all seem so stupid here after what she has been accustomed to.”

“Don't abuse the town,” Franz said. “It will be a liberal education to her.”

“Along a very illiberal line,” Philip added.

“Oh, hang the town! It's how we are going to entertain her that gets me.”

“You are a host in yourself, Perkins, and very funny,” Becker remarked laughingly.

“When is she coming?” Philip asked.

“Oh, yes, I didn't tell you that, did I?” Perkins shook off his dejection. “The letter was received yesterday. In it she simply said she would like to visit us if convenient and be our guest for a little while. We were to wire our answer and our answer was, 'Come.' What the dickens else could we have said even if we had wanted to? All this that I have told you took place yesterday and since then consternation has reigned supreme. My mother's hair has been done up in curl-papers for the last thirty-six hours, tight twisted, and has given her a raging headache. The house is no better than a howling wilderness. I pledge you my sacred word of honor that I ate my supper last night on the back-stairs off a sewing-board held in my lap and I was mighty thankful to get it then. This morning I went without breakfast. Dinner I ate from a shelf in the back pantry with a soup ladle and all because Madame Dennie is somewhere between here and New York contemplating a descent upon us. I have taken curlpapers out of the water pitcher, and as I hope for mercy hereafter there was one in the cold soup forming the bulk of my dinner to-day.”

Perkins became pensive for just the briefest space possible and a rather melancholy smile overspread his face.

“I say, did you fellows ever eat soup—cold soup—with curl-papers? Because if you never did—don't. It's about the most thoroughly revolutionary thing a man can do.”

“You haven't told us yet when she is coming,” Philip remarked. “When will it be, to-morrow?”

“That's what we are looking forward to.”

“How old is she, anyhow?” And Philip propounded one of the inquiries a young man is almost sure to make sooner or later concerning a woman.

“Oh, dear me, I can't tell. Forty or fifty though, I should say at a guess.”

Philip yawned. Madame's age made the whole affair seem very tame and unattractive to him. Perkins rambled on:

“That's the deuce of it. She will be old enough to take an interest in me. Women are forever taking an interest in me—a controlling interest you know—forever thinking I should be at work at something or other, just to keep me out of scrapes. And that's all bosh! I don't think there's any use for me to work, except perhaps to kill time, and I really couldn't do that, for in the end time will kill me and I shall be laid out stiff you know, quite dead, with tuberoses—”

“Limp you mean,” growled Franz correctively. “Where the devil did you ever get the notion that you could be stiff?”

“I hope I didn't seem vain when I said women were interested in me, you know I mean those who are old enough to know better,” Perkins ventured with much meekness, folding his hands over a stomach of which Philip was wont to remark, much to its owner's agony, that it was coming rapidly to the front.

“Of course you will invite us up to the house when your cousin comes,” the latter said. “Franz and I shall be immensely happy to call.”

Perkins brightened visibly. “I thought you rather slumped when I told you her age. To be sure you are to call. Did I ever speak of her brother to you—Geoffrey Ballard? I know a good deal more about him than I do about her. He has been in America frequently. In fact, as far as France goes, he is an exile: got into some difficulty and was forced to leave the country.”

This was said with studied carelessness; nevertheless it was plainly discernible that Perkins was accessible to the mild glow of pride which a perfectly respectable and well conducted youth usually feels in those of his family who have won their laurels in the shaded realms of the disreputable.

“I guess he is a very bad lot. Once my father chanced to meet him in New York. My father was fascinated by him and on the strength of the good impression he had made, Ballard borrowed several hundred dollars. He told a very plausible tale about a remittance from home that he was expecting. No sooner had he obtained an advance on what was coming than he got out of the way and it was the last father ever saw of him. He must have been very clever though, because you know my father was never a very great hand to lend money.”

His friends were too courteous to inform him of their perfect acquaintance with his father's posthumous reputation for close-fistedness, but Philip could not resist saying casually:

“I can readily believe that Ballard must be a very remarkable fellow.”

“Oh, no,” Perkins responded innocently, delighted that he was commanding Philip's attention; “we heard afterward he was a wild one—that he gambled and did all sorts of dishonorable things. Of course I wouldn't like to have either of you mention it, but once he pretty nearly killed a man in a duel. It was over a woman, you know.”

And he looked highly scandalized—proud and happy, too, for it's not every day one can tell of a cousin who fights duels.

It was getting dark; the afternoon was drawing to an end and while Perkins was still giving the details of which he was master, that related to Geoffrey Ballard's career, Philip had arisen from his chair.

“I shall say good night,” he remarked. “It is time I was on my way home.” IV

That afternoon while Perkins was busy discussing with his two friends the expected arrival of his mother's cousin, the Perkins' home, some six blocks distant, was the scene of violent Sabbath-breaking. It is but fair to state that the house-cleaning was done with a careful regard for the moral sentiment of the community, being of a secretive nature. In the house, in the midst of the disorder she had created, moved Mrs. Perkins, appareled in a gown decidedly the worse for wear and whose frayed train was momentarily collecting deposits of dust on its under edge.

Mrs. Perkins had been a beauty of the magnificent order. Perkins' sandy hair, complexion and freckles, were the gift of his father. The curlpapers to which her son had made honorable reference were conspicuous objects in her disordered costume, while her face was embellished with sundry dabs of dirt.

The Perkins' home was the finest in the town, but now it was in a state of wild confusion. The furnishings from the numerous rooms had been dragged into the halls where they accumulated in defiant heaps. Mrs. Perkins surveyed the ruin. “Where, where did it all come from?” she asked tragically.

At that moment had Mrs. Perkins lent a listening ear she might have heard, disturbing the Sunday quiet that filled the broad street outside with its peaceful repose, the distant rumble of wheels, foretelling the approach of some heavy vehicle.

“I think, Anna,” and she addressed herself to her principal assistant, “I think, Anna, this will be a lesson to me!—a lesson I shall not soon forget. What are you looking at?” For Anna was staring fixedly out of the window paying no heed to her mistress' remarks.

Even as she spoke Mrs. Perkins caught the sound of wheels as they rolled over the hard gravel of the carriageway below the window.

“I believe they have come,” Anna said, her nose against the glass. “I declare it looks like them. There are two of them and both are in black.”

At the news Mrs. Perkins sank down upon a chair completely overcome. “No, you can't mean it, Anna! For heaven's sake, look again!”

“There's two of them,” Anna answered triumphantly. “They're both getting out. It's them.”

Whereat Mrs. Perkins let fall two tears which plowed their way through the dust upon her cheek and fell with a muddy splash to the folded hands in her lap.

“That I should have lived to see this day!” she moaned.

“Shan't I go down and let them in?” asked Anna.

“No. I shall go myself.”

Mrs. Perkins arose, summoning up all the majesty of bearing at her command, and surveyed the faded silk wrapper that hung limply and dustily to her figure with profound disgust.

“I suppose I must—but, what an impression I shall give her. Run to her room and make sure all is right there. Thank heaven! I had the wisdom to see to that, and there is a quiet spot to which she can retire.”

So speaking Mrs. Perkins hurried down-stairs in response to the bell that was sounding for the second time. With a final desperate clutch at the curl-papers, a hasty adjusting of her skirts together with a last shake to free them from dust and lint, she opened the door. Mrs. Perkins afterward described her sensations as startling.

In common with her son she had anticipated welcoming a woman of mature years: instead she saw two women. Both were in black, but one wore the especial garments custom has made the sign of widowhood. The heavy veil was thrown back, revealing a face at once youthful and beautiful but of an extremely pallid coloring though it was touched with just the faintest glow, born perhaps of expectancy and excitement.

This was all Mrs. Perkins' bewildered faculties had time to grasp for the stranger said with a sweet little dignity that became her well, advancing a step as she did so: “I am Margaret Dennie.”

Her voice was beautifully soft, and in its enunciation suggestive of her foreign birth and education.

“I was expecting some one twice your age,” Mrs. Perkins said, laughing in sheer surprise. Her astonishment had so much the better of any reserve she had decided to show in the company of her distinguished kinswoman, that she simply used the words that came most readily to her tongue.

“Why, you are nothing but a child, a mere child, and you are Madame Dennie?” As she spoke she held out her hand. “But do come in; the man wants to get by with your baggage.” And she drew her into the hall, the maid following, leaving the steps to the driver and the trunks.

That evening was destined to remain forever more or less of a blank in Madame Dennie's memory. She was conscious only of the warmth of her welcome and an overpowering sense of fatigue.

Her real comprehension of events commenced on Monday morning when she was aroused from her sleep by the pelting of rain against the west windows of her room, accompanied by the steady and persistent drip, drip, of the water-spout's overflow beneath the eaves to the sodden ground below.

She had been in America ten days and in all that time had seen but one streak of murky sunshine stealing from behind the masses of vapor that drifted above the wet earth. Wind and rain had seemed to pursue her with absolute ill will as though the weather itself was determined to drive her out of the country and compel her to seek her usual winter's asylum in the south of France.

Raising her head from the pillows, she surveyed the room. A fire was burning brightly upon the hearth, the curtains at the windows were drawn, shutting out all evidences of the season's inclemency, save the steady and unceasing sound made by the storm.

Staying in bed offered superior advantages to getting up. With a sigh of contentment she nestled down drawing the covering about her, then closing her eyes and soothed by the contrast between the storm from without and the cheerful crackling of the fire upon the hearth, she gave herself up to thought.

The look upon the small face resting pallid and white against the whiteness of the pillows was far from happy, for madame dwelt much upon the unprofitableness of her past.

There were many reasons that might have induced the young girl to marry a man fifty years her senior—many reasons—and yet all of them were far removed from the realm of the affections. This Margaret Dennie knew well, and to her sorrow.

She would have liked to forget it all—indeed, the wish had extended over the last three years and resulted only in the positive knowledge that one can forget anything provided one wishes to remember it, or it is useful. Bitterness alone is defiant in the presence of forgetfulness.

She had at nineteen married Monsieur Dennie and had endured two years as his wife, then, mercifully for her, he had died.

A woman differently constituted would have thanked God for the release and set about enjoying herself, making merry with her late lord's wealth. In her case, however, three years had been spent in a vain effort to rid herself of some portion of the horror begotten in her soul by the sacrifice she had made. There had been but one governing motive in the ill-omened marriage—to get money for her brother.

Monsieur Dennie had promised to pay well for her charms and had kept his word with the result that Goeffrey Ballard had been freed from his pressing debts and given a new start and another chance to wreck himself—a chance of which he had availed himself most speedily, so that six months after the marriage no mortal could have said wherein lay the profits or where his condition was any better than before the crime had been consummated.

Margaret wondered often how she had survived those years of misery,—not that Monsieur Dennie was unkind; he had simply never succeeded in inspiring his young wife with one single spark of love. It had resolved itself from the first into dumb and uncomplaining sufferance on her part.

Nearness to him had caused her but one feeling—a dreadful repulsion—a horrible desire almost exceeding her control to cry out as if in pain, whenever he had touched her.

Under this strain she had lived for two long years, then came freedom; but the iron had entered her soul. Her whole nature was saddened and embittered beyond forgetfulness.

A morbid dread that she had confided to no one had taken possession of her; she was completely at the mercy of her own distressing fancies and had come to regard her marriage as a sin unpardonable, as something unforgivable in the eyes of God.

At best, marriage is an ordeal for any woman, and a loveless marriage is an abominable institution of torture. Not content with what could not be banished, try as she might to live away from it, she had some vague idea of a recompense to be made, an indefinite conception of earthly punishment which she was to inflict upon herself.

It was this conviction that prompted her to wear the deepest mourning as a matter of penance, for it reminded her of the awfulness of those years, accenting and keeping the recollection always before her as a sin she must not condone.

This was what drifted through her mind while she was in the drowsy state that is neither sleeping nor waking. With something like a sob she came to herself at last.

“Russell!” she called.

Her maid came from the adjoining apartment where for the last hour she had been busy unpacking trunks and arranging her mistress' wardrobe. She was a plain featured English woman who had served Margaret faithfully in the two capacities of nurse and maid.

“Will Madame dress?” she asked.

“Is it late?”

“The family has breakfasted.”

“I hope you told them I did not care for anything before luncheon?”

“Yes, Madame.”

“And it is raining again. It has done nothing but rain since we landed.”

While they were speaking Margaret had got into a long loose gown and moved to the fire, where Russell had already placed an easy chair for her. Wrapped in the voluminous folds of the garment she had donned she seemed quite small and very slight. Her face was wholly lacking in color except for a faint flush that at times burned on either cheek. Her hair, in two massive braids that fell below her waist, was a rich warm brown in the shadow, and golden where the light touched it. Her hands were small and beautifully shaped.

Most apparent was a fragile quality of face and form as if a breath might wither her.

Sitting in the great armchair and shrinking down toward the fire for warmth, shivering too, in unison with every gust of wind or rain that spent its force against the window, one could but marvel that she had known so much of life.

Russell brushed her hair gently, taking care the strain should not rest upon the dainty little head.

Margaret gazed thoughtfully into the fire. A certain sad aloofness was expressed in her manner as though all her sorrows had been borne without friend or confidante.

“I wonder if it's like this every day—without sunshine or clear skies,” she murmured.

Russell did not respond to the direct question, but finished dressing her hair and stepped to the door, saying:

“There is some one knocking. Perhaps ma-dame's cousin.”

As she spoke, she opened it and Mrs. Perkins asked from the threshold: “May I come in?”

For answer Margaret, turning in her chair, extended her hand, a smile upon her lips: “If you don't mind my dressing. I fear you will think me lazy. It must be late.”

Mrs. Perkins bustled to her side. A very becoming morning toilet contributed its due proportion to that lady's ease and comfort. “Really, my dear, I never felt so strongly drawn to any one as I am to you.” As she spoke she bent and kissed Margaret with great stateliness and ceremony. “You are not at all like the Ballards who were military people and much given to combativeness. Your poor dear mother and I used to hold most violent controversies. We had such a capacity for differences; it always came to the surface when we were thrown much together. But then it was a family trait and I suppose I should revere it accordingly. To be sure, your mother was a Ballard only by marriage, but she was an active partaker in the traditional characteristics. Dear! dear! how antagonistic we were, and yet, a real affection existed between us. Now, can't you tell me something about yourself?”

Mrs. Perkins drew up a chair and Margaret took one of her hands caressingly in her own: “But what shall I tell you?”

“About yourself, my dear. About yourself, by all means.”

“Ah!”—and she made a little depreciative gesture—“I am such an ordinary person. There is nothing more to tell.”

Mrs. Perkins shifted her position: “You can't fancy how amazed I was when I saw you. I had understood always that Monsieur Dennie, your late husband, was a man of very—what shall I say?”—she paused looking into Margaret's eyes, seeking earnestly for the right word, but the allusion to Monsieur Dennie did not stimulate any great burst of animation on the part of his widow, and she was forced to finish her incomplete sentence with, “a man of very advanced age.”

“He was seventy years old when we were married,” Margaret said quietly.

Mrs. Perkins elevated her eyebrows. “Why, you are young enough to be his granddaughter!”

“I was nineteen.” Her face had hardened perceptibly when Mrs. Perkins spoke her husband's name, and at the mention of her marriage this changed to a look of the keenest distress. Mrs. Perkins surmised that it had not been an occurrence of the utmost happiness to the girl-wife.

Intent upon getting away from what she conceived to be a disagreeable subject, though still with subdued inquisitiveness, she said:

“You have not been a widow then so very long?”

“Three years.” With unmistakable relief—“I have lived in the south of France during that time, but my home is in Paris. Since Monsieur Dennie's death I have not cared to return to it.” A pause followed.

Mrs. Perkins tapped the floor with her foot. She knew that any more questions would be in very bad form, as Margaret had shown that she was adverse to constituting herself the sole center of interest. Truth to tell, Mrs. Perkins was rather abashed. As a rule she had no compunctions when it came to catechising newcomers in the town as to their past and possible future. Her position, which was unassailable, made it quite safe to seek to put at rest all uncertainty under which she might be laboring. But Madame Dennie was distinctly of another world. Suddenly she bethought herself of her son. He was, as she knew, in the library engaged in stroking his immature side-whiskers and wondering if,—“she would like him, anyhow.”

Sunday evening had been spent in the society of his friend Becker and when he had presented himself at his own door shortly after ten, he found his mother waiting for him, with a glowing account of the splendor, beauty and culture of their young relative who had just withdrawn for the night.

“I think I have not told you of Ballard, my son, you know,” said Mrs. Perkins. “May I?”

Madame Dennie inclined her head by way of response, and Mrs. Perkins continued: “He is wild to meet you. For of course when he came in last evening, I had so much to tell him about you. He so regrets that he should have been absent. If we had only known when to look for you he would have been waiting for you at the train.” Margaret entreated her to make no excuses. The kindness she had met with all but overwhelmed her as it was, she said, but Mrs. Perkins was not to be turned aside now that she had got a fresh start with plain sailing ahead of her.

“My dear, he so regrets he did not know of your coming in season to meet you. Not to have done so seems to us so very inhospitable.”

Margaret pressed her hand gently. “You are most kind. I am sure I shall love you dearly and perhaps,” wistfully, “perhaps, you will grow to like me.”

“My dear, I do that already. I am drawn to you as I never was before to a—”

“A stranger you would say?”

“Yes, and no—for, after all, you are my cousin's child and that means much to me.”

Madame Dennie appeared a trifle helpless and as though she was incapable of meeting these advances. A repellent feeling—a wish to keep from close friendships had grown up in her heart—springing from the sure consciousness that she stood in need of sympathy and love and would be weakly dependent upon it once it was hers; but fearing always that she might tell those things her mind most fed upon, she shrank from intimacies.

Mrs. Perkins vacated her chair, and said with a trace of self-denial in her voice: “I shall let you dress now.”

With this she quitted the room and joined young Perkins in the library. She found him standing on a corner of the hearth-rug, lost in meditation.

“I hope she is all right, mother,” he said.

“Oh, yes—she will be down presently.”

“Is she much of a stunner by daylight?” he inquired.

“I wish you would be more select in your expressions, Ballard. She is a woman of the greatest elegance.”

“You like her, don't you, a lot?”

“I confess I do. There is something indescribably winning in her manner. I think her marriage was not at all a happy one.”

Perkins shook his head wisely: “He must have been too old for her, you know.”

“He was fifty years her senior, she has told me.”

Perkins was expressing his amazement at such a marriage, when the door opened and Margaret appeared on the scene. An embarrassed silence fell upon him at once. He barely managed to answer the greeting she gave him.

Long before that Monday was ended Ballard's interest in his cousin' had become tremendous. When night came he was her abject slave,—her worshipful admirer who demanded but one privilege, that he might still be allowed to worship—yet no one could have asked for less than she. She was almost timidly sensitive about being a care or burden to him or to his mother. Despite her habitual shrinking from nearer contact or sympathy, Perkins sat for the most of the day on a small corner of his chair, his knees tight together and his toes turned most resolutely in, like a plump little saffron-headed Trojan, heroically resolved on her amusement. The tension under which he put himself, was so stupendous that he absent-mindedly twisted every available button from his coat. He talked on innumerable topics: told her all about himself, “Not because I think myself at all unusual,” he had been careful to explain, “but because I am so perfectly acquainted with the subject.”

He racked his brain for fluent descriptions concerning his loftier emotions—told her his most cherished ambitions—“things I should never dream of telling any one else,” he said very truthfully. “But don't you know, I guess you call for the best that is in me.”

He launched forth in quest of miscellaneous data and was soon telling her of Franz Becker and Philip Southard. When he told her Becker was a musician and Margaret told him that music was the one thing she loved above all else, he felt as happy as though he had discovered a gold mine in the coal scuttle. So fascinated was he that during the ensuing half-hour he talked a good deal more music than he knew, and at last, in answer to a question she asked, he found himself manfully seeking to formulate a concise history of the United States.

In short, Perkins did much that day that a Solomon would have feared to undertake. Late in the afternoon the wind died down and the rain ceased. The clouds drifted from before the slowly sinking sun, and his crimson flames burned in the red west.

Together they went into the yard. It had become quite warm with the approach of the evening, but Margaret was folded in a great fur wrap. “I am always cold,” she had said.

For a time they had strolled about the grounds, which were very extensive, and Ballard had taken her into the conservatory where the gardener—who with the rest fell immediately under her gentle sway—picked for her a bunch of lilies-of-the-val-ley. Then they had gone into the house again where she shared her bouquet with Ballard—giving him a spray of white for his buttonhole. Much to his sorrow Perkins found it necessary to leave her and go down-town. With his departure Margaret was left quite to herself. The repairing of the preceding days' havoc demanding Mrs. Perkins' supervision, and tempted by the outer brightness, she summoned Russell and wandered into the grounds about the house and from the grounds into the street. Both found much to wonder at in the little western city. It was so different from anything they had either of them ever known. As they passed down the street they came to a church—the door stood open and there came from within a burst of melody. Perhaps some service was in progress. Margaret turned, and followed by Russell, entered the building. They found it empty save for one man who was just visible as he sat with bowed head before the organ, his hands upon the keys.

Madame Dennie was no mean judge of music. She had heard the greatest masters of the world and she knew that this player, whoever he might be, was not one of the least. He was improvising and from his own fancies drifted into Bach's first prelude. While his fingers were wandering through the opening bars, a sound stole out of the vacancy behind him.

The player turned and saw her standing in the aisle—the little gloved hands folded in unconscious devotion—the head thrown back with its delicate halo of golden hair, while through a stained glass window, high up beneath the arched roof, a single beam of light came to touch and transform the upturned face that stood forth boldly outlined against the surrounding shadows and the darkness that was gathering swiftly.

The final note was dying away, lingering out its sweetness lovingly upon the silence and the expression of rapt intenseness was fading from her face, when for the first time her eyes met his to be withdrawn instantly. A moment later and Margaret with her companion stole noiselessly from the church. Within the organ was sounding again, throbbing like a great heart that had awakened from its sleep to life and love. V

Madame Dennie had expressed the hope of avoiding all social obligations. And Perkins had barely ventured to ask her meekly if he might not invite his two most intimate friends to the house—he was “morally certain” she would like them immensely, they were such charming fellows. So in due season he had presented Franz and Philip, and to them Margaret was most gracious.

After their first meeting with Madame Dennie, the young men had walked home in a subdued frame of mind. They stopped at the Beckers' to smoke a farewell pipe and while under the stimulating influence of the weed Philip proceeded to analyze his emotions and indulge in critical comment.

“Didn't it strike you that Perkins was just a bit sappy to-night? How his tongue did rattle along and always about himself.” Philip meditated for a moment. “Perhaps I am uncharitable. I think my main grudge against him rests on this—I wanted to talk about myself.”

Franz was smoking his pipe. There was a faraway look in his eyes and he was paying little attention to what his companion said.

Philip continued: “How did you like Madame Dennie? She is very beautiful, don't you think? A woman of culture and great spirituality.” Franz was still silent. “There is something about her that impressed me as being touchingly sad and pathetic—I can't describe it, but it's there. I should say though she had an infinite capacity for happiness.”

Becker removed the pipe from his mouth. “I have seen her before,” he said simply.

“Oh!” Philip regarded him curiously.

“It was at church. In the evening while I was at my practise.” He paused abruptly.

“I am afraid Perkins is in a fair way to make a precious ass of himself,” Philip observed. “He is at the beginning of a bad business and ought to saw off. Perkins is all right, you know, but even his own mother would have to admit that he is freckled and fat. If he goes to falling in love with his cousin—”

By a sharp decisive blow Franz knocked the ashes from his pipe: “I shall have to say good night, Philip. I don't propose to send you home but—”

“Oh, that's all right. What's wrong? Have I said anything I shouldn't?”

“Shall I go down or will you be able to find your way out by yourself?” Franz asked.

He held open the door and Philip passed from the room. At the foot of the stairs he turned and called back his good night. Becker answered him cordially enough. When he found himself in the street Philip came to a stand.

“I declare he fairly put me out. As I live,” he finally cried, “as I live he is in love with her himself.”

During the succeeding weeks they both saw much of Madame Dennie.

Usually Philip prided himself on his ability to shock people, but with her he carefully eschewed all levity. Nothing could have induced him to advance the sacrilegious theories with which he delighted to offend. Such was his unblushing apostasy that Mrs. Perkins, who had long viewed him as one of the lost sheep, (chiefly by reason of the fact that for some years her son had at intervals favored her with scattered gems from his friend's remarks as well as with his scandalously unorthodox criticisms of vital questions) presented him with a volume of sermons.

Philip accepted this token of unexpectedly kindled solicitude with a stately gravity far surpassing the donor's, while Ballard went off into a series of convulsions that brought with them unworthy prominence and attendant disgrace. Furthermore, he was detected by his mother in the shameless act of winking at Becker.

Philip derived great good from those sermons. They gave him a convenient supply of paper for the lighting of fires in his room.

Those were delightful evenings they spent together when Philip would drop in on his way home from Barbara,—for the Perkinses were nothing if not fashionable and kept later hours than any other family in the town.

The young men would form a half-circle about Madame Dennie, where she nestled in an easy chair beside the fire for the warmth she loved and needed, and they would stand, looking down at the slight black-robed figure and sweet pure face, talking the while very boyishly of their hopes and their aims. Philip and Perkins especially had much to say of themselves. Indeed, there existed at first a very pronounced rivalry as to who should say the more.

They told her their desires, their ambitions—everything, and to their confessions she listened with a certain quaint little display of friendliness and affection that completely captivated them.

There was this peculiar feature noticeable in the devotion she inspired,—it was unselfish always for it was possible to love her in a manner that exacted nothing in return; possible to lay all at her feet, and ask but the joy of giving.

The fall and early winter were unusually inclement and a troublesome cough kept Margaret confined within doors. Perhaps resulting from this and the anxious care Russell took of her, they divined that she was not strong. It was solely by indirection they came to know that the frail little body had worn itself out to the verge of exhaustion. But the undisturbed quietness in which her days were spent pleased her fancy vastly better than any gaiety could have done. The latter she had known to the point of surfeiting while her husband lived and she recalled it as something to be avoided.

Thus it came that the weeks covering her stay in the small western city were the happiest she had ever known.

She enjoyed her companionship with Perkins and Philip,—she could like them unreservedly and in return be treated to a sincere admiration not without its gratification to the starved little heart.

She stood more in awe of Franz, and he kept his thoughts of her a secret. She could not guess that they lay too close against his very soul for utterance; but there was a remarkable gentleness in his bearing when in her presence—a reverent quality far removed from his customary brusk-ness.

Cling as she would to the past, Margaret was slowly growing away from it. She was almost happy. In course of time she might have been entirely so, but for the existence of her brother Geoff, who skulked on the outskirts of decency—and who only indicated that he thought of her when he showered her with begging letters.

In all the mad indulgence of his worthless career he had done no generous deed. He had burdened some one always, taking to himself the lion's share of the fruits and shirking all the toil.

It was to pay his debts, to give him a fresh start, that Margaret had been coerced by her mother into marrying Monsieur Dennie. That sin occurred at a day when Geoffrey had squandered the last of his patrimony and had embarrassed his mother's and sister's fortune besides.

Then it was that Margaret, but little more than a child, was taken from the school near Brussels and brought to Paris that Geoff might play her as his last card in the losing game of chance that was swallowing up their possessions.

He had cast about that he might effect a suitable alliance (to him a suitable alliance meant one that should not be scant of profit to himself) and had fastened upon Monsieur Dennie, who yielded up the price of purchase with the utmost readiness. More than this, while he lived, Geoff' was well provided for and if he had not been a chronic spendthrift could have thrived exceedingly. Unfortunately, he had no intention to be on easy terms with his good luck, but was forever making unreasonable demands upon his elderly brother-in-law for money, and for yet more money. The result was that when the old banker came to die he put his property in such shape that by no scheming could Geoff get his hands upon it.

Monsieur Dennie's methodical bestowing of his worldly belongings did not stop there. He arranged that an annuity should be paid Geoffrey and his mother. It was further stipulated that in the event of the latter's death Geoff should also have her portion.

Mrs. Ballard had not long survived her son-inlaw, and though Geoff had availed himself of the addition to his means her death gave him, the doubled amount was as insufficient as had been his previous lesser allowance.

After her husband's death Margaret was left to live her lonely life without interference from her brother. He went his course and she hers, though it was his habit to appear from time to time a seedy, shabby beggar and take from her every cent she could get together. Then he would vanish, no one knew where, until he again needed money. Nor was this all. He had married—much as he did everything else—to gratify some vacillating whim, and when the novelty of the relation wore off he had forsaken his family with never a regret, leaving the broken home for his sister to maintain.

For years Margaret had cared for his wife and children—“Kate and the three boys” were always in difficulties, more or less pressing, difficulties of the sort only money—blessed balm that it is—could alleviate. In short, there were more drains, more attacks made upon the wealth of Monsieur Dennie, deceased, than one could enumerate in a long talk. These just referred to were of the unceasing, never-ending variety, that came clamorously with each month, came again until they were satisfied.

But of all, Geoffrey Ballard was much the worst. He was seldom stationary or confined to any place by tie or occupation. He came and went at will; there was never any getting away from him.

Had it not been for Russell, Margaret would have been utterly defenseless, but the maid was a strong and reliable character, who strenuously resisted the wholesale absorption of her mistress' property. When madame's bankers remitted her income, Russell would take into her keeping the sum she deemed adequate for their proper support, and no one could take this from her.

With the bulk of what remained Geoff generally made off.

One evening while Margaret was alone in the library at early dusk, the room unlighted by other flame than the glowing of coals upon the hearth, there came a tapping at a long French window opening upon the porch. She looked up quickly, startled by the sound, and saw a man standing in the half shadow.

One glance sufficed,—it was Geoff.

Frightened and trembling, she arose and went to the window, pushing it aside that he might enter. Without a word, he stepped into the room.

“How damnably cold it is,” he grumbled. “Throw another lump of coal on the fire, will you? What a beastly climate—rough on a man who does not boast an overcoat. Thanks.” For Margaret mutely complied with his bidding.

The flames leaped up, disclosing a man of nearly forty, shabbily dressed in garments once of the greatest elegance, but which from hard usage were now nearly ragged.

He was of fine physique with a handsome countenance that, like his clothes, showed unmistakable symptoms of wear, for a record of the degrading course he had pursued so assiduously was stamped upon it.

He glanced around the room, taking in its appointments. They met with his approval, for he said:

“This is not at all bad. You do get your share of the good gifts of this world while I spend most of my time standing in the rain waiting to gather up the crumbs you scatter. Here I traveled from New Orleans to New York, thinking of course I should find you there. Imagine my predicament. All I had went to the pawn-shops, and I just managed to scrape through.”

This was said with an aggrieved air as though the fault was hers. “Now, what can you do for me?” he continued; “I want money. I think my dress bears out the statement—” And he took a disgusted survey of himself in a small mirror hanging above the chimneypiece.

On her deathbed, at the close of a very foolish life, Mrs. Ballard had wrung from her daughter the promise that she would never abandon her brother, and Margaret, who was the victim of sentimentality where her mother's last wish was concerned, had carried it out blindly without stopping to consider its injustice. The profligate brother now spread out his hands behind his back to catch the heat from the fire, and ensconced himself contentedly on the hearth-rug.

As his sister had vouchsafed him no response he returned to the charge. “I don't wish to force my needs upon you,” he said. “You must know it's hard for a man of my age to get down on his knees for the money to keep himself going.” Margaret raised her eyes to his, and stared at him, silent and miserable for a moment.

“Well?” Geoff asked impatiently, “what are you going to do for me—what may I count on?”

“When I saw you in New York, I told you distinctly what you were to expect, Geoff.”

Her tone while not unkind was positive. Gentle as she was and tender in all her dealings and judgments, a show of firmness had to be maintained in her relationship with this spendthrift, and too, she felt as bitter a sense of injury as her forgiving nature could harbor for the wreck he had made of her girlhood. She added almost hesitatingly:

“I—I am so sorry you have followed me here.” To him this seemed to denote such outrageous treachery that he was really hurt—and showed it. She went to his side, and placing an arm caressingly about his neck, said, “Forgive me, Geoff. I did not mean quite that, but I have been so happy here. If you could only be as I am then you would like it too, but you know you are so restless. That is what I meant.”

He shook off her arm rudely. “I understand, this sort of thing is useless—I'm not deceived.” She looked at him pityingly. How mistaken he was in every impulse and ideal.