[Illustration: "You must steal in and not wake anybody"]

The Butterfly House

By

Mary E. Wilkins Freeman

 Author of "A Humble Romance, " "A New England Nun, " "The Winning Lady, " etc. 

 With illustrations by Paul Julien Meylan

New YorkDodd, Mead and Company1912

Chapter I

Fairbridge, the little New Jersey village, or rather city (for it hadwon municipal government some years before, in spite of the protestof far-seeing citizens who descried in the distance bonded debts outof proportion to the tiny shoulders of the place), was a misnomer. Often a person, being in Fairbridge for the first time, and beingdriven by way of entertainment about the rural streets, wouldinquire, "Why Fairbridge?"

Bridges there were none, except those over which the trains thunderedto and from New York, and the adjective, except to old inhabitantswho had a curious fierce loyalty for the place, did not seeminglyapply. Fairbridge could hardly, by an unbiassed person who did notdwell in the little village and view its features through the rosyglamour of home life, be called "fair. " There were a few prettystreets, with well-kept sidewalks, and ambitious, although smallhouses, and there were many lovely bits of views to be obtained, especially in the green flush of spring, and the red glow of autumnover the softly swelling New Jersey landscape with its warm red soilto the distant rise of low blue hills; but it was not fair enough ina general way to justify its name. Yet Fairbridge it was, withoutbridge, or natural beauty, and no mortal knew why. The origin of thename was lost in the petty mist of a petty past. 

Fairbridge was tragically petty, inasmuch as it saw itself great. InFairbridge narrowness reigned, nay, tyrannised, and was notrecognised as such. There was something fairly uncanny aboutFairbridge's influence upon people after they had lived there even afew years. The influence held good, too, in the cases of men whodaily went to business or professions in New York. Even Wall Streetwas no sinecure. Back they would come at night, and the terrible, narrow maelstrom of pettiness sucked them in. All outside interestwas as naught. International affairs seemed insignificant when onceone was really in Fairbridge. 

Fairbridge, although rampant when local politics were concerned, hadno regard whatever for those of the nation at large, except as theyinvolved Fairbridge. Fairbridge, to its own understanding, was anucleus, an ultimatum. It was an example of the triumph of theinfinitesimal. It saw itself through a microscope and loomed upgigantic. Fairbridge was like an insect, born with the convictionthat it was an elephant. There was at once something ludicrous, andmagnificent, and terrible about it. It had the impressiveness of theabnormal and prehistoric. In one sense, it _was_ prehistoric. It wasas a giant survivor of a degenerate species. 

Withal, it was puzzling. People if pinned down could not say why, inFairbridge, the little was so monstrous, whether it depended uponlocal conditions, upon the general population, or upon a few who hadan undue estimation of themselves and all connected with them. WasFairbridge great because of its inhabitants, or were the inhabitantsgreat because of Fairbridge? Who could say? And why was Fairbridge soimportant that its very smallness overwhelmed that which, by thenature of things, seemed overwhelming? Nobody knew, or rather, sotremendous was the power of the small in the village, that nobodyinquired. 

It is entirely possible that had there been any delicate gauge ofmentality, the actual swelling of the individual in his ownestimation as he neared Fairbridge after a few hours' absence, mighthave been apparent. Take a broker on Wall Street, for instance, or alawyer who had threaded his painful way to the dim light ofunderstanding through the intricate mazes of the law all day, as histrain neared his loved village. From an atom that went to make up themotive power of a great metropolis, he himself became an entirety. Hewas It with a capital letter. No wonder that under the circumstancesFairbridge had charms that allured, that people chose it for suburbanresidences, that the small, ornate, new houses with their perkylittle towers and æsthetic diamond-paned windows, multiplied. 

Fairbridge was in reality very artistically planned as to the sitesof its houses. Instead of the regulation Main Street of the countryvillage, with its centre given up to shops and post-office, sidestreets wound here and there, and houses were placed with a view toeffect. 

The Main Street of Fairbridge was as naught from a social point ofview. Nobody of any social importance lived there. Even thephysicians had their residences and offices in a more aristocraticlocality. Upon the Main Street proper, that which formed the centreof the village, there were only shops and a schoolhouse and one ortwo mean public buildings. For a village of the self-importance ofFairbridge, the public buildings were very few and very mean. Therewas no city hall worthy of the name of this little city which heldits head so high. The City Hall, so designated by ornate gilt lettersupon the glass panel of a very small door, occupied part of thebuilding in which was the post-office. It was a tiny building, twostories high. On the second floor was the millinery shop of Mrs. Creevy, and behind it the two rooms in which she kept house with herdaughter Jessy. 

On the lower floor was the post-office on the right, filthy with thefoot tracks of the Fairbridge children who crowded it in a noisyrabble twice a day, and perpetually red-stained with the shale of NewJersey, brought in upon the boots of New Jersey farmers, who alwaysbore about with them a goodly portion of their native soil. On theleft, was the City Hall. This was vacant except upon the first Mondayof every month, when the janitor of the Dutch Reformed Church, whoeked out a scanty salary with divers other tasks, got himself towork, and slopped pails of water over the floor, then swept, andbuilt a fire, if in winter. 

Upon the evenings of these first Mondays the Mayor and city officialsmet and made great talk over small matters, and with the labouring ofa mountain, brought forth mice. The City Hall was closed upon otheroccasions, unless the village talent gave a play for some localbenefit. Fairbridge was intensely dramatic, and it was popularlyconsidered that great, natural, histrionic gifts were squandered uponthe Fairbridge audiences, appreciative though they were. Outsidetalent was never in evidence in Fairbridge. No theatrical company hadever essayed to rent that City Hall. People in Fairbridge put thatsomewhat humiliating fact from their minds. Nothing would haveinduced a loyal citizen to admit that Fairbridge was too small gamefor such purposes. There was a tiny theatre in the neighbouring cityof Axminister, which had really some claims to being called a city, from tradition and usage, aside from size. Axminister was an ancientDutch city, horribly uncomfortable, but exceedingly picturesque. Fairbridge looked down upon it, and seldom patronised the shows (theynever said "plays") staged in its miniature theatre. When they didnot resort to their own City Hall for entertainment by local talent, they arrayed themselves in their best and patronised New York itself. 

New York did not know that it was patronised, but Fairbridge knew. When Mr. And Mrs. George B. Slade boarded the seven o'clock train, Mrs. Slade, tall, and majestically handsome, arrayed most elegantly, and crowned with a white hat (Mrs. Slade always affected white hatswith long drooping plumes upon such occasions), and George B. , nattyin his light top coat, standing well back upon the heels of his shinyshoes, with the air of the wealthy and well-assured, holding a beltedcigar in the tips of his grey-gloved fingers, New York was mostdistinctly patronised, although without knowing it. 

It was also patronised, and to a greater extent, by little Mrs. Wilbur Edes, very little indeed, so little as to be almost symbolicof Fairbridge itself, but elegant in every detail, so elegant as toarrest the eye of everybody as she entered the train, holding up thetail of her black lace gown. Mrs. Edes doted on black lace. Hersmall, fair face peered with a curious calm alertness from under theblack plumes of her great picture hat, perched sidewise upon acarefully waved pale gold pompadour, which was perfection and wouldhave done credit to the best hairdresser or the best French maid inNew York, but which was achieved solely by Mrs. Wilbur Edes' ownnative wit and skilful fingers. 

Mrs. Wilbur Edes, although small, was masterly in everything, fromwaving a pompadour to conducting theatricals. She herself was thestar dramatic performer of Fairbridge. There was a strong feeling inFairbridge that in reality she might, if she chose, rival Bernhardt. Mrs. Emerston Strong, who had been abroad and had seen Bernhardt onher native soil, had often said that Mrs. Edes reminded her of thegreat French actress, although she was much handsomer, and so moral!Mrs. Wilbur Edes was masterly in morals, as in everything else. Shewas much admired by the opposite sex, but she was a model wife andmother. 

Mr. Wilbur Edes was an admired accessory of his wife. He was so verytall and slender as to suggest forcible elongation. He carried hishead with a deprecatory, sidewise air as if in accordance with hiswife's picture hat, and yet Mr. Wilbur Edes, out of Fairbridge and inhis law office on Broadway, was a man among men. He was an exceptionto the personal esteem which usually expanded a male citizen ofFairbridge, but he was the one and only husband of Mrs. Wilbur Edes, and there was not room at such an apex as she occupied for more thanone. Tall as Wilbur Edes was, he was overshadowed by that immaculateblond pompadour and that plumed picture hat. He was a prime favouritein Fairbridge society; he was liked and admired, but his radiance wasreflected, and he was satisfied that it should be so. He adored hiswife. The shadow of her black picture hat was his place of perfectcontent. He watched the admiring glances of other men at hiswonderful possession with a triumph and pride which made him reallyrather a noble sort. He was also so fond and proud of his little twindaughters, Maida and Adelaide, that the fondness and pride fairlyilluminated his inner self. Wilbur Edes was a clever lawyer, but lovemade him something bigger. It caused him to immolate self, which isspiritually enlarging self. 

In one respect Wilbur Edes was the biggest man in Fairbridge; inanother, Doctor Sturtevant was. Doctor Sturtevant depended upon noother person for his glory. He shone as a fixed star, with his ownlustre. He was esteemed a very great physician indeed, and it wasconsidered that Mrs. Sturtevant, who was good, and honest, and portlywith a tight, middle-aged portliness, hardly lived up to her husband. It was admitted that she tried, poor soul, but her limitations wereheld to be impossible, even by her faithful straining following oflove. 

When the splendid, florid Doctor, with his majestically curvingexpanse of waistcoat and his inscrutable face, whirred through thestreets of Fairbridge in his motor car, with that meek bulk ofwomanhood beside him, many said quite openly how unfortunate it wasthat Doctor Sturtevant had married, when so young, a woman somanifestly his inferior. They never failed to confer that faintpraise, which is worse than none at all, upon the poor soul. 

"She is a good woman, " they said. "She means well, and she is a goodhousekeeper, but she is no companion for a man like that. "

Poor Mrs. Sturtevant was aware of her status in Fairbridge, and shewas not without a steady, plodding ambition of her own. That utterlycommonplace, middle-aged face had some lines of strength. Mrs. Sturtevant was a member of the women's club of Fairbridge, which waspoetically and cleverly called the Zenith Club. 

She wrote, whenever it was her turn to do so, papers upon everyimaginable subject. She balked at nothing whatever. She ranged fromhousehold discussions to the Orient. Then she stood up in the midstof the women, sunk her double chin in her lace collar, and read herpaper in a voice like the whisper of a blade of grass. DoctorSturtevant had a very low voice. His wife had naturally a stridentone, but she essayed to follow him in the matter of voice, as in allother things. The poor hen bird tried to voice her thoughts like hermate, and the result was a strange and weird note. However, Mrs. Sturtevant herself was not aware of the result. When she sat downafter finishing her papers her face was always becomingly flushedwith pleasure. 

Nothing, not even pleasure, was becoming to Mrs. Sturtevant. Lifeitself was unbecoming to her, and the worst of it was nobody knew it, and everybody said it was due to Mrs. Sturtevant's lack of taste, andthen they pitied the great doctor anew. It was very fortunate that itnever occurred to Mrs. Sturtevant to pity the doctor on her account, for she was so fond of him, poor soul, that it might have led to atragedy. 

The Zenith Club of Fairbridge always met on Friday afternoons. It wasa cherished aim of the Club to uproot foolish superstitions, henceFriday. It did not seem in the least risky to the ordinary person fora woman to attend a meeting of the Zenith Club on a Friday, inpreference to any other day in the week; but many a member had acovert feeling that she was somewhat heroic, especially if themeeting was held at the home of some distant member on an icy day inwinter, and she was obliged to make use of a livery carriage. 

There were in Fairbridge three keepers of livery stables, andcuriously enough, no rivalry between them. All three were natives ofthe soil, and somewhat sluggish in nature, like its sticky red shale. They did not move with much enthusiasm, neither were they to beeasily removed. When the New York trains came in, they, with theirequally indifferent drivers, sat comfortably ensconced in theircarriages, and never waylaid the possible passengers alighting fromthe train. Sometimes they did not even open the carriage doors, butthey, however, saw to it that they were closed when once thepassenger was within, and that was something. All three droveindifferent horses, somewhat uncertain as to footing. When a womansat behind these weak-kneed, badly shod steeds and realised thatStumps, or Fitzgerald, or Witless was driving with an utterindifference to the tightening of lines at dangerous places, and alsorealised that it was Friday, some strength of character was doubtlessrequired. 

One Friday in January, two young women, one married, one single, onevery pretty, and both well-dressed (most of the women who belonged tothe Fairbridge social set dressed well) were being driven by JimFitzgerald a distance of a mile or more, up a long hill. The slopewas gentle and languid, like nearly every slope in that part of thestate, but that day it was menacing with ice. It was one smooth glazeover the macadam. Jim Fitzgerald, a descendant of a fine old familywhose type had degenerated, sat hunched upon the driver's seat, hisloose jaw hanging, his eyes absent, his mouth open, chewing with slowenjoyment his beloved quid, while the reins lay slackly on the rustyblack robe tucked over his knees. Even a corner of that draggeddangerously near the right wheels of the coupé. Jim had notsufficient energy to tuck it in firmly, although the wind was sharpfrom the northwest. 

Alice Mendon paid no attention to it, but her companion, Daisy Shaw, otherwise Mrs. Sumner Shaw, who was of the tense, nervous type, hadremarked it uneasily when they first started. She had rappedvigorously upon the front window, and a misty, rather beautiful blueeye had rolled interrogatively over Jim's shoulder. 

"Your robe is dragging, " shrieked in shrill staccato Daisy Shaw; andthere had been a dull nod of the head, a feeble pull at the draggingrobe, then it had dragged again. 

"Oh, don't mind, dear, " said Alice Mendon. "It is his own lookout ifhe loses the robe. "

"It isn't that, " responded Daisy querulously. "It isn't that. I don'tcare, since he is so careless, if he does lose it, but I must saythat I don't think it is safe. Suppose it got caught in the wheel, and I know this horse stumbles. "

"Don't worry, dear, " said Alice Mendon. "Fitzgerald's robe alwaysdrags, and nothing ever happens. "

Alice Mendon was a young woman, not a young girl (she had left younggirlhood behind several years since) and she was distinctly beautifulafter a fashion that is not easily affected by the passing years. Shehad had rather an eventful life, but not an event, pleasant orotherwise, had left its mark upon the smooth oval of her face. Therewas not a side nor retrospective glance to disturb the serenity ofher large blue eyes. Although her eyes were blue, her hair was almostchestnut black, except in certain lights, when it gave out gleams asof dark gold. Her features were full, her figure large, but not toolarge. She wore a dark red tailored gown; and sumptuous sable fursshaded with dusky softness and shot, in the sun, with prismaticgleams, set off her handsome, not exactly smiling, but serenelybeaming face. Two great black ostrich plumes and one red one curleddown toward the soft spikes of the fur. Between, the two great blueeyes, the soft oval of the cheeks, and the pleasant red fullness ofthe lips appeared. 

Poor Daisy Shaw, who was poor in two senses, strength of nerve andmoney, looked blue and cold in her little black suit, and her paleblue liberty scarf was horribly inadequate and unbecoming. Daisy wasreally painful to see as she gazed out apprehensively at the draggingrobe, and the glistening slant over which they were moving. Aliceregarded her not so much with pity as with a calm, sheltering senseof superiority and strength. She pulled the inner robe of the coupéup and tucked it firmly around Daisy's thin knees. 

"You look half frozen, " said Alice. 

"I don't mind being frozen, but I do mind being scared, " repliedDaisy sharply. She removed the robe with a twitch. 

"If that old horse stumbles and goes down and kicks, I want to beable to get out without being all tangled up in a robe and dragged, "said she. 

"While the horse is kicking and down I don't see how he can drag youvery far, " said Alice with a slight laugh. Then the horse stumbled. Daisy Shaw knocked quickly on the front window with her little, nervous hand in its tight, white kid glove. 

"Do please hold your reins tighter, " she called. Again the misty blueeyes rolled about, the head nodded, the rotary jaws were seen, therobe dragged, the reins lay loosely. 

"That wasn't a stumble worth mentioning, " said Alice Mendon. 

"I wish he would stop chewing and drive, " said poor Daisy Shawvehemently. "I wish we had a liveryman as good as that Dougherty inAxminister. I was making calls there the other day, and it was asslippery as it is now, and he held the reins up tight every minute. Ifelt safe with him. "

"I don't think anything will happen. "

"It does seem to me if he doesn't stop chewing, and drive, I shallfly!" said Daisy. 

Alice regarded her with a little wonder. Such anxiety concerningpersonal safety rather puzzled her. "My horses ran away the otherday, and Dick went down flat and barked his knees; that's why I haveFitzgerald to-day, " said she. "I was not hurt. Nobody was hurt exceptthe horse. I was very sorry about the horse. "

"I wish I had an automobile, " said Daisy. "You never know what ahorse will do next. "

Alice laughed again slightly. "There is a little doubt sometimes asto what an automobile will do next, " she remarked. 

"Well, it is your own brain that controls it, if you can run ityourself, as you do. "

"I am not so sure. Sometimes I wonder if the automobile hasn't anuncanny sort of brain itself. Sometimes I wonder how far men can gowith the invention of machinery without putting more of themselvesinto it than they bargain for, " said Alice. Her smooth face did notcontract in the least, but was brooding with speculation and thought. 

Then the horse stumbled again, and Daisy screamed, and again tappedthe window. 

"He won't go way down, " said Alice. "I think he is too stiff. Don'tworry. "

"There is no stumbling to worry about with an automobile, " saidDaisy. 

"You couldn't use one on this hill without more risk than you takewith a stumbling horse, " replied Alice. Just then a carriage drawn bytwo fine bays passed them, and there was an interchange of nods. 

"There is Mrs. Sturtevant, " said Alice. "She isn't using theautomobile to-day. "

"Doctor Sturtevant has had that coachman thirty years, and he doesn'tchew, he drives, " said Daisy. 

Then they drew up before the house which was their destination, Mrs. George B. Slade's. The house was very small, but perkily pretentious, and they drove under the porte-cochère to alight. 

"I heard Mr. Slade had been making a great deal of money in cottonlately, " Daisy whispered, as the carriage stopped behind Mrs. Sturtevant's. "Mr. And Mrs. Slade went to the opera last week. Iheard they had taken a box for the season, and Mrs. Slade had a newblack velvet gown and a pearl necklace. I think she is almost too oldto wear low neck. "

"She is not so very old, " replied Alice. "It is only her white hairthat makes her seem so. " Then she extended a rather large but wellgloved hand and opened the coupé door, while Jim Fitzgerald sat andchewed and waited, and the two young women got out. Daisy had sometrouble in holding up her long skirts. She tugged at them withnervous energy, and told Alice of the twenty-five cents whichFitzgerald would ask for the return trip. She had wished to arrive atthe club in fine feather, but had counted on walking home in thedusk, with her best skirts high-kilted, and saving an honest penny. 

"Nonsense; of course you will go with me, " said Alice in the calmlyimperious way she had, and the two mounted the steps. They hadscarcely reached the door before Mrs. Slade's maid, Lottie, appearedin her immaculate width of apron, with carefully-pulled-out bows andlittle white lace top-knot. "Upstairs, front room, " she murmured, andthe two went up the polished stairs. There was a landing halfway, with a diamond paned window and one rubber plant and two palms, allvery glossy, and all three in nice green jardinières which exactlymatched the paper on the walls of the hall. Mrs. George B. Slade hada mania for exactly matching things. Some of her friends said amongthemselves that she carried it almost too far. 

The front room, the guest room, into which Alice Mendon and DaisyShaw passed, was done in yellow and white, and one felt almost sinfulin disturbing the harmony by any other tint. The walls were yellow, with a frieze of garlands of yellow roses; the ceiling was tintedyellow, the tiles on the shining little hearth were yellow, everyornament upon the mantel-shelf was yellow, down to a chinashepherdess who wore a yellow china gown and carried a basket filledwith yellow flowers, and bore a yellow crook. The bedstead was brass, and there was a counterpane of white lace over yellow, the muslincurtains were tied back with great bows of yellow ribbon. Even thepictures represented yellow flowers or maidens dressed in yellow. Therugs were yellow, the furniture upholstered in yellow, and all ofexactly the same shade. 

There were a number of ladies in this yellow room, prinkingthemselves before going downstairs. They all lived in Fairbridge;they all knew each other; but they greeted one another with the mostelegant formality. Alice assisted Daisy Shaw to remove her coat andliberty scarf, then she shook herself free of her own wraps, ratherthan removed them. She did not even glance at herself in the glass. Her reason for so doing was partly confidence in her own appearance, partly distrust of the glass. She had viewed herself carefully in herown looking-glass before she left home. She believed in what she hadseen there, but she did not care to disturb that belief, and she sawthat Mrs. Slade's mirror over her white and yellow draped dressingtable stood in a cross-light. While all admitted Alice Mendon'sbeauty, nobody had ever suspected her of vanity; yet vanity she had, in a degree. 

The other women in the room looked at her. It was always a matter ofinterest of Fairbridge what she would wear, and this was rathercurious, as, after all, she had not many gowns. There was a certainimpressiveness about her mode of wearing the same gown which seemedto create an illusion. To-day in her dark red gown embroidered withpoppies of still another shade, she created a distinctly newimpression, although she had worn the same costume often before atthe club meetings. She went downstairs in advance of the other womenwho had arrived before, and were yet anxiously peering at themselvesin the cross-lighted mirror, and being adjusted as to refractoryneckwear by one another. 

When Alice entered Mrs. Slade's elegant little reception-room, whichwas done in a dull rose colour, its accessories very exactlymatching, even to Mrs. Slade's own costume, which was rose silk underblack lace, she was led at once to a lady richly attired in black, with gleams of jet, who was seated in a large chair in the place ofhonour, not quite in the bay window but exactly in the centre of theopening. The lady quite filled the chair. She was very stout. Herface, under an ornate black hat, was like a great rose full ofoverlapping curves of florid flesh. The wide mouth was perpetuallycurved into a bow of mirth, the small black eyes twinkled. She wasMrs. Sarah Joy Snyder, who had come from New York to deliver herfamous lecture upon the subject: "Where does a woman shine with morelustre, at home or abroad?"

The programme was to be varied, as usual upon such occasions, bylocal talent. Leila MacDonald, who sang contralto in the churchchoir, and Mrs. Arthur Wells, who sang soprano, and Mrs. Jack Evarts, who played the piano very well, and Miss Sally Anderson, who hadtaken lessons in elocution, all had their parts, besides thepresident of the club, Mrs. Wilbur Edes, who had a brief address inreadiness, and the secretary, who had to give the club report for theyear. Mrs. Snyder was to give her lecture as a grand climax, thenthere were to be light refreshments and a reception following theusual custom of the club. 

Alice bowed before Mrs. Snyder and retreated to a window at the otherside of the room. She sat beside the window and looked out. Just thenone of the other liverymen drove up with a carriage full of ladies, and they emerged in a flutter of veils and silk skirts. Mrs. Slade, who was really superb in her rose silk and black lace, with an artfulfrill of white lace at her throat to match her great puff of whitehair, remained beside Mrs. Snyder, whose bow of mirth widened. 

"Who is that magnificent creature?" whispered Mrs. Snyder with a gushof enthusiasm, indicating Alice beside the window. 

"She lives here, " replied Mrs. Slade rather stupidly. She did notquite know how to define Alice. 

"Lives here in this little place? Not all the year?" rejoined Mrs. Snyder. 

"Fairbridge is a very good place to live in all the year, " repliedMrs. Slade rather stiffly. "It is near New York. We have all theadvantages of a great metropolis without the drawbacks. Fairbridge isa most charming city, and very progressive, yes, very progressive. "

Mrs. Slade took it rather hardly that Mrs. Snyder should intimateanything prejudicial to Fairbridge and especially that it was notgood enough for Alice Mendon, who had been born there, and livedthere all her life except the year she had been in college. Ifanything, she, Mrs. Slade, wondered if Alice Mendon were good enoughfor Fairbridge. What had she ever done, except to wear handsomecostumes and look handsome and self-possessed? Although she belongedto the Zenith Club, no power on earth could induce her to dischargethe duties connected herewith, except to pay her part of theexpenses, and open her house for a meeting. She simply would notwrite a paper upon any interesting and instructive topic and read itbefore the club, and she was not considered gifted. She could notsing like Leila MacDonald and Mrs. Arthur Wells. She could not playlike Mrs. Jack Evarts. She could not recite like Sally Anderson. 

Mrs. Snyder glanced across at Alice, who looked very graceful andhandsome, although also, to a discerning eye, a little sulky, andbored with a curious, abstracted boredom. 

"She is superb, " whispered Mrs. Snyder, "yes, simply superb. Why doesshe live here, pray?"

"Why, she was born here, " replied Mrs. Slade, again stupidly. It wasas if Alice had no more motive power than a flowering bush. 

Mrs. Snyder's bow of mirth widened into a laugh. "Well, can't she getaway, even if she was born here?" said she. 

However, Mrs. George B. Slade's mind travelled in such a circle thatshe was difficult to corner. "Why should she want to move?" said she. 

Mrs. Snyder laughed again. "But, granting she should want to move, isthere anything to hinder?" she asked. She wasn't a very clever woman, and was deciding privately to mimic Mrs. George B. Slade at somefuture occasion, and so eke out her scanty remuneration. She did notthink ten dollars and expenses quite enough for such a lecture ashers. 

Mrs. Slade looked at her perplexedly. "Why, yes, she could Isuppose, " said she, "but why?"

"What has hindered her before now?"

"Oh, her mother was a helpless invalid, and Alice was the only child, and she had been in college just a year when her father died, thenshe came home and lived with her mother, but her mother has been deadtwo years now, and Alice has plenty of money. Her father left a gooddeal, and her cousin and aunt live with her. Oh, yes, she could, butwhy should she want to leave Fairbridge, and--"

Then some new arrivals approached, and the discussion concerningAlice Mendon ceased. The ladies came rapidly now. Soon Mrs. Slade'shall, reception-room, and dining-room, in which a gaily-decked tablewas set, were thronged with women whose very skirts seemed full ofimportant anticipatory stirs and rustles. Mrs. Snyder's curved smilebecame set, her eyes absent. She was revolving her lecture in hermind, making sure that she could repeat it without the assistance ofthe notes in her petticoat pocket. 

Then a woman rang a little silver bell, and a woman who sat short butrose to unexpected heights stood up. The phenomenon was amazing, butall the Fairbridge ladies had seen Miss Bessy Dicky, the secretary ofthe Zenith Club, rise before, and no one observed anything remarkableabout it. Only Mrs. Snyder's mouth twitched a little, but sheinstantly recovered herself and fixed her absent eyes upon Miss BessyDicky's long, pale face as she began to read the report of the clubfor the past year. 

She had been reading several minutes, her glasses fixed firmly (oneof her eyes had a cast) and her lean, veinous hands trembling withexcitement, when the door bell rang with a sharp peremptory peal. There was a little flutter among the ladies. Such a thing had neverhappened before. Fairbridge ladies were renowned for punctuality, especially at a meeting like this, and in any case, had one beenlate, she would never have rung the bell. She would have tappedgently on the door, the white-capped maid would have admitted her, and she, knowing she was late and hearing the hollow recitative ofMiss Bessy Dicky's voice, would have tiptoed upstairs, then slippeddelicately down again and into a place near the door. 

But now it was different. Lottie opened the door, and a masculinevoice was heard. Mrs. Slade had a storm-porch, so no one could lookdirectly into the hall. 

"Is Mrs. Slade at home?" inquired the voice distinctly. The ladieslooked at one another, and Miss Bessy Dicky's reading was unheard. They all knew who spoke. Lottie appeared with a crimson face, bearinga little ostentatious silver plate with a card. Mrs. Slade adjustedher lorgnette, looked at the card, and appeared to hesitate for asecond. Then a look of calm determination overspread her face. Shewhispered to Lottie, and presently appeared a young man in clericalcostume, moving between the seated groups of ladies with an air notso much of embarrassment as of weary patience, as if he had expectedsomething like this to happen, and it had happened. 

Mrs. Slade motioned to a chair near her, which Lottie had placed, andthe young man sat down. 

Chapter II

Many things were puzzling in Fairbridge, that is, puzzling to aperson with a logical turn of mind. For instance, nobody could saythat Fairbridge people were not religious. It was a church goingcommunity, and five denominations were represented in it;nevertheless, the professional expounders of its doctrines were heldin a sort of gentle derision, that is, unless the expounder happenedto be young and eligible from a matrimonial point of view, when hegained a certain fleeting distinction. Otherwise the clergy wereregarded (in very much the same light as if employed by a railroad)as the conductors of a spiritual train of cars bound for the PromisedLand. They were admittedly engaged in a cause worthy of the highestrespect and veneration. The Cause commanded it, not they. They hadalways lacked social prestige in Fairbridge, except, as beforestated, in the cases of the matrimonially eligible. 

Dominie von Rosen came under that head. Consequently he was for themoment, fleeting as everybody considered it, in request. But he didnot respond readily to the social patronage of Fairbridge. He was, seemingly, quite oblivious to its importance. Karl von Rosen wasbored to the verge of physical illness by Fairbridge functions. Evena church affair found him wearily to the front. Therefore hispresence at the Zenith Club was unprecedented and confounding. He hadoften been asked to attend its special meetings but had neveraccepted. Now, however, here he was, caught neatly in the trap of hisown carelessness. Karl von Rosen should have reflected that theZenith Club was one of the institutions of Fairbridge, and met upon aFriday, and that Mrs. George B. Slade's house was an exceedinglylikely rendezvous, but he was singularly absent-minded as to what wasnear, and very present minded as to what was afar. That which shouldhave been near was generally far to his mind, which was perpetuallygathering the wool of rainbow sheep in distant pastures. 

If there was anything in which Karl von Rosen did not take theslightest interest, it was women's clubs in general and the ZenithClub in particular; and here he was, doomed by his own lack ofthought to sit through an especially long session. He had gone outfor a walk. To his mind it was a fine winter's day. The long, glittering lights of ice pleased him and whenever he was sure that hewas unobserved he took a boyish run and long slide. During his walkhe had reached Mrs. Slade's house, and since he worked in hispastoral calls whenever he could, by applying a sharp spur to hisdisinclination, it had occurred to him that he might make one, andreturn to his study in a virtuous frame of mind over a slight andunimportant, but bothersome duty performed. If he had had his witsabout him he might have seen the feminine heads at the windows, hemight have heard the quaver of Miss Bessy Dicky's voice over the clubreport; but he saw and heard nothing, and now he was seated in themidst of the feminine throng, and Miss Bessy Dicky's voice quaveredmore, and she assumed a slightly mincing attitude. Her thin handstrembled more, the hot, red spots on her thin cheeks deepened. Reading the club reports before the minister was an epoch in anepochless life, but Karl von Rosen was oblivious of her except as adisturbing element rather more insistent than the others in which hewas submerged. 

[Illustration: He was doomed by his own lack of thought to sitthrough an especially long session]

He sat straight and grave, his eyes retrospective. He was constantlygetting into awkward situations, and acquitting himself in them withmarvellous dignity and grace. Even Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder, astute asshe was, regarded him keenly, and could not for the life of her tellwhether he had come premeditatedly or not. She only discovered onething, that poor Miss Bessy Dicky was reading at him and posing athim and trembling her hands at him, and that she was throwing it allaway, for Von Rosen heard no more of her report than if he had beenin China when she was reading it. Mrs. Snyder realised that hardlyanything in nature could be so totally uninteresting to the young manas the report of a woman's club. Inasmuch as she herself was devotedto such things, she regarded him with disapproval, although with acertain admiration. Karl von Rosen always commanded admiration, although often of a grudging character, from women. His utterindifference to them as women was the prime factor in this; next tothat his really attractive, even distinguished, personality. He washandsome after the fashion which usually accompanies devotion towomen. He was slight, but sinewy, with a gentle, poetical face andgreat black eyes, into which women were apt to project tendernessmerely from their own fancy. It seemed ridiculous and anomalous thata man of Von Rosen's type should not be a lover of ladies, and thefact that he was most certainly not was both fascinating andexasperating. 

Now Mrs. George B. Slade, magnificent matron, as she was, moreoverone who had inhaled the perfume of adulation from her youth up, felta calm malice. She knew that he had entered her parlour after themanner of the spider and fly rhyme of her childhood; she knew thatthe other ladies would infer that he had come upon her invitation, and her soul was filled with one of the petty triumphs of pettyFairbridge. 

She, however, did not dream of the actual misery which filled theheart of the graceful, dignified young man by her side. Sheconsidered herself in the position of a mother, who forces anundesired, but nevertheless, delectable sweet upon a child, who gazesat her with adoration when the savour has reached his palate. She didnot expect Von Rosen to be much edified by Miss Bessy Dicky's report. She had her own opinion of Miss Bessy Dicky, of her sleeves, of hergown, and her report, but she had faith in the truly decorativefeatures of the occasion when they should be underway, and she hadimmense faith in Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder. She was relieved when MissBessy Dicky sat down, and endeavoured to compose her knees, which bythis time were trembling like her hands, and also to assume anexpression as if she had done nothing at all, and nobody was lookingat her. That last because of the fact that she had done so little, and nobody was looking at her rendered her rather pathetic. 

Miss Bessy Dicky did not glance at the minister, but she, nevertheless, saw him. She had never had a lover, and here was thehero of her dreams. He would never know it and nobody else would everknow it, and no harm would be done except very possibly, by and by, alaceration of the emotions of an elderly maiden, and afterwards alife-long scar. But who goes through life without emotional scars?

After Miss Bessy Dicky sat down, Mrs. Wilbur Edes, the lady of thesilver bell, rose. She lifted high her delicate chin, her perfectblond pompadour caught the light, her black lace robe swept round herin rich darkness, with occasional revelations of flower and leaf, thefairly poetical pattern of real lace. As she rose, she diffusedaround her a perfume as if rose-leaves were stirred up. She held adainty handkerchief, edged with real lace, in her little left hand, which glittered with rings. In her right, was a spangled fan like ablack butterfly. Mrs. Edes was past her first youth, but she wasundeniably charming. She was like a little, perfect, ivory toy, whichtime has played with but has not injured. Mrs. Slade looked at her, then at Karl von Rosen. He looked at Mrs. Wilbur Edes, then lookedaway. She was most graceful, but most positively uninteresting. However, Mrs. Slade was rather pleased at that. She and Mrs. Edeswere rival stars. Von Rosen had never looked long at her, and itseemed right he should not look long at the other woman. 

Mrs. Slade surveyed Mrs. Edes as she announced the next number on theprogramme, and told herself that Mrs. Edes' gown might be real laceand everything about her very real, and nice, and elegant, but shewas certainly a little fussy for so small a woman. Mrs. Sladeconsidered that she herself could have carried off that elegance in amuch more queenly manner. There was one feature of Mrs. Edes' costumewhich Mrs. Slade resented. She considered that it should be worn by awoman of her own size and impressiveness. That was a little wrap ofermine. Now ermine, as everybody knew, should only be worn by largeand queenly women. Mrs. Slade resolved that she herself would have anermine wrap which should completely outshine Mrs. Edes' littleaffair, all swinging with tails and radiant with tiny, bright-eyedheads. 

Mrs. Edes announced a duet by Miss MacDonald and Mrs. Wells, and satdown, and again the perfume of rose leaves was perceptible. Karl vonRosen glanced at the next performers, Miss MacDonald, who was verypretty and well-dressed in white embroidered cloth, and Mrs. Wells, who was not pretty, but was considered very striking, who trailedafter her in green folds edged with fur, and bore a roll of music. She seated herself at the piano with a graceful sweep of her greendraperies, which defined her small hips, and struck the keys withslender fingers quite destitute of rings, always lifting them highwith a palpable affectation not exactly doubtful--that was saying toomuch--but she was considered to reach limits of propriety with hersinuous motions, the touch of her sensitive fingers upon piano keys, and the quick flash of her dark eyes in her really plain face. Therewas, for the women in Fairbridge, a certain mischievous fascinationabout Mrs. Wells. Moreover, they had in her their one object ofcovert gossip, their one stimulus to unlawful imagination. 

There was a young man who played the violin. His name was HenryWheaton, and he was said to be a frequent caller at Mrs. Wells', andshe played his accompaniments, and Mr. Wells was often detained inNew York until the late train. Then there was another young man whoplayed the 'cello, and he called often. And there was EllisBainbridge, who had a fine tenor voice, and he called. It wasdelightful to have a woman of that sort, of whom nothing distinctlyculpable could be affirmed, against whom no good reason could bebrought for excluding her from the Zenith Club and the social set. Intheir midst, Mrs. Wells furnished the condiments, the spice, andpepper, and mustard for many functions. She relieved to a greatextent the monotony of unquestioned propriety. It would have beenhorribly dull if there had been no woman in the Zenith Club whofurnished an excuse for the other members' gossip. 

Leila MacDonald, so carefully dressed and brushed and washed, and sofree from defects that she was rather irritating, began to sing, thenpeople listened. Karl von Rosen listened. She really had a voicewhich always surprised and charmed with the first notes, then ceasedto charm. Leila MacDonald was as a good canary bird, born to sing, and dutifully singing, but without the slightest comprehension of hersong. It was odd too that she sang with plenty of expression, but herown lack of realisation seemed to dull it for her listeners. Karl vonRosen listened, then his large eyes again turned introspective. 

Mrs. Edes again arose, after the singing and playing ladies hadfinished their performance and returned to their seats, and announceda recitation by Miss Sally Anderson. Miss Anderson wore a lightsummer gown, and swept to the front, and bent low to her audience, then at once began her recitation with a loud crash of emotion. Shepostured, she gesticulated. She lowered her voice to inaudibility, she raised it to shrieks and wails. She did everything which she hadbeen taught, and she had been taught a great deal. Mrs. Sarah JoySnyder listened and got data for future lectures, with her mirthfulmouth sternly set. 

After Sally Anderson, Mrs. Jack Evarts played a glittering thingcalled "Waves of the Sea. " Then Sally Anderson recited again, thenMrs. Wilbur Edes spoke at length, and with an air which commandedattention, and Von Rosen suffered agonies. He laughed with sicklyspurts at Mrs. Snyder's confidential sallies, when she had at lasther chance to deliver herself of her ten dollar speech, but the worstordeal was to follow. Von Rosen was fluttered about by women bearingcups of tea, of frothy chocolate, plates of cake, dishes of bonbons, and saucers of ice-cream. He loathed sweets and was forced intoaccepting a plate. He stood in the midst of the feminine throng, thesolitary male figure looking at his cup of chocolate, and a slice ofsticky cake, and at an ice representing a chocolate lily, whichsomebody had placed for special delectation upon a little table athis right. Then Alice Mendon came to his rescue. 

She deftly took the plate with the sticky cake, and the cup of hotchocolate, and substituted a plate with a chicken mayonnaisesandwich, smiling pleasantly as she did so. 

"Here, " she whispered. "Why do you make a martyr of yourself for sucha petty cause? Do it for the faith if you want to, but not for thickchocolate and angel cake. "

She swept away the chocolate lily also. Von Rosen looked at hergratefully. "Thank you, " he murmured. 

She laughed. "Oh, you need not thank me, " she said. "I have a naturalinstinct to rescue men from sweets. " She laughed again maliciously. "I am sure you have enjoyed the club very much, " she said. 

Von Rosen coloured before her sarcastic, kindly eyes. He began tospeak, but she interrupted him. "You have heard that silence isgolden, " said she. "It is always golden when speech would be a lie. "

Then she turned away and seized upon the chocolate lily and pressedit upon Mrs. Joy Snyder, who was enjoying adulation and good things. 

"Do please have this lovely lily, Mrs. Snyder, " she said. "It is thevery prettiest ice of the lot, and meant especially for you. I amsure you will enjoy it. "

And Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder, whose sense of humour deserted her whenshe was being praised and fed, and who had already eaten bonbonsinnumerable, and three ices with accompanying cake, took thechocolate lily gratefully. Von Rosen ate his chicken sandwich andmarvelled at the ways of women. 

After Von Rosen had finished his sandwiches and tea, he made his wayto Mrs. Snyder, and complimented her upon her lecture. He had aconstitutional dislike for falsehoods, which was perhaps not so mucha virtue as an idiosyncrasy. Now he told Mrs. Snyder that he hadnever heard a lecture which seemed to amuse an audience more thanhers had done, and that he quite envied her because of her power ofholding attention. Mrs. Snyder, with the last petal of her chocolatelily sweet upon her tongue, listened with such a naïveté ofacquiescence that she was really charming, and Von Rosen had spokenthe truth. He had wondered, when he saw the eagerly tilted faces ofthe women, and heard their bursts of shrill laughter and clapping ofhands, why he could not hold them with his sermons which, he mightassume without vanity, contained considerable subject for thought, asthis woman, with her face like a mask of mirth, held them with hercompilation of platitudes. 

He thought that he had never seen so many women listen with suchintensity, and lack of self-consciousness. He had seen only two pattheir hair, only one glance at her glittering rings, only threearrange the skirts of their gowns while the lecture was in progress. Sometimes during his sermons, he felt as if he were holding forth toa bewildering sea of motion with steadily recurrent waves, whichfascinated him, of feathers, and flowers, swinging fur tails, andkid-gloved hands, fluttering ribbons, and folds of drapery. Karl vonRosen would not have acknowledged himself as a woman-hater, thatsavoured too much of absurd male egotism, but he had an underconviction that women were, on the whole, admitting of courseexceptions, self-centered in the pursuit of petty ends to the extentof absolute viciousness. He disliked women, although he had neverowned it to himself. 

In spite of his dislike of women, Von Rosen had a house-keeper. Hehad made an ineffectual trial of an ex-hotel chef, but had finallybeen obliged to resort to Mrs. Jane Riggs. She was tall and strong, wider-shouldered than hipped. She went about her work with longstrides. She never fussed. She never asked questions. In fact, sheseldom spoke. 

When Von Rosen entered his house that night, after the club meeting, he had a comfortable sense of returning to an embodied silence. Thecoal fire in his study grate was red and clear. Everything was inorder without misplacement. That was one of Jane Riggs' chieftalents. She could tidy things without misplacing them. Von Rosenloved order, and was absolutely incapable of keeping it. ThereforeJane Riggs' orderliness was as balm. He sat down in his Morris chairbefore his fire, stretched out his legs to the warmth, which wasgrateful after the icy outdoor air, rested his eyes upon a plastercast over the chimney place, which had been tinted a beautiful hue byhis own pipe, and sighed with content. His own handsome face was rosywith the reflection of the fire, his soul rose-coloured with completesatisfaction. He was so glad to be quit of that crowded assemblage ofeager femininity, so glad that it was almost worth while to haveencountered it just for that sense of blessed relief. 

Mrs. Edes had offered to take him home in her carriage, and he haddeclined almost brusquely. To have exchanged that homeward walk overthe glistening earth, and under the clear rose and violet lights ofthe winter sunset, with that sudden rapturous discovery of theslender crescent of the new moon, for a ride with Mrs. Edes in herclosed carriage with her silvery voice in his ear instead of the keensilence of the winter air, would have been torture. Von Rosenwondered at himself for disliking Mrs. Edes in particular, whereas hedisliked most women in general. There was something about her felinemotions instinct with swiftness, and concealed claws, and the halfkeen, half sleepy glances of her green-blue eyes, which irritated himbeyond measure, and he was ashamed of being irritated. It implied apower over him, and yet it was certainly not a physical power. It wassubtle and pertained to spirit. He realised, as did many inFairbridge, a strange influence, defying reason and will, which thissmall woman with her hidden swiftness had over nearly everybody withwhom she came in contact. It had nothing whatever to do with sex. Shewould have produced it in the same degree, had she not been in theleast attractive. It was compelling, and at the same time irritating. 

Von Rosen in his Morris chair after the tea welcomed the intrusion ofJane Riggs, which dispelled his thought of Mrs. Wilbur Edes. Janestood beside the chair, a rigid straight length of woman with a whiteapron starched like a board, covering two thirds of her, and waitedfor interrogation. 

"What is it, Jane?" asked Von Rosen. 

Jane Riggs replied briefly. "Outlandish young woman out in thekitchen, " she said with distinct disapproval, yet with evidenthelplessness before the situation. 

Von Rosen started. "Where is the dog?"

"Licking her hands. Every time I told her to go, Jack growled. Mebbeyou had better come out yourself, Mr. Von Rosen. "

When Von Rosen entered the kitchen, he saw a little figure on thefloor in a limp heap, with the dog frantically licking its hands, which were very small and brown and piteously outspread, as if insupplication. 

"Mebbe you had better call up the doctor on the telephone; she seemsto have swooned away, " said Jane Riggs. At the same time she made onelong stride to the kitchen sink, and water. Von Rosen looked aghastat the stricken figure, which was wrapped in a queer medley ofgarments. He also saw on the floor near by a bulging suitcase. 

"She is one of them pedlars, " said Jane Riggs, dashing water upon thedumb little face. "I rather guess you had better call up the doctoron the telephone. She don't seem to be coming to easy and she mayhave passed away. "

Von Rosen gasped, then he looked pitifully at the poor little figure, and ran back to his study to the telephone. To his great relief as hepassed the window, he glanced out, and saw Doctor Sturtevant'sautomobile making its way cautiously over the icy street. Then forthe first time he remembered that he had been due at that time abouta matter of a sick parishioner. He opened the front door hurriedly, and stated the case, and the two men carried the little unconsciouscreature upstairs. Then Von Rosen came down, leaving the doctor andMartha with her. He waited in the study, listening to the soundsoverhead, waiting impatiently for the doctor's return, which was notfor half an hour or more. In the meantime Martha came downstairs onsome errand to the kitchen. Von Rosen intercepted her. "What doesDoctor Sturtevant think?" he asked. 

"Dunno, what he thinks, " replied Martha brusquely, pushing past him. 

"Is she conscious yet?"

"Dunno, I ain't got any time to talk, " said Martha, casting a flaminglook at him over her shoulder as she entered the kitchen. 

Von Rosen retreated to the study, where he was presently joined bythe doctor. "What is it?" asked Von Rosen with an emphasis, whichrendered it so suspicious that he might have added: "what the devilis it?" had it not been for his profession. 

Sturtevant answered noiselessly, the motion of his lips conveying hismeaning. Then he said, shrugging himself into his fur coat, as hespoke, "I have to rush my motor to see a patient, whom I dare notleave another moment, then I will be back. "

Von Rosen's great Persian cat had curled himself on the doctor's furcoat, and now shaken off, sat with a languid dignity, his greatyellow plume of a tail waving, and his eyes like topazes fixedintently upon Sturtevant. At that moment a little cry was heard fromthe guest room, a cry between a moan and a scream, but unmistakably anote of suffering. Sturtevant jammed his fur cap upon his head andpulled on his gloves. 

"Don't go, " pleaded Von Rosen in a sudden terror of helplessness. 

"I must, but I'll break the speed laws and be back before you knowit. That housekeeper of yours is as good as any trained nurse, andbetter. She is as hard as nails, but she does her duty like amachine, and she has brains. I will be back in a few minutes. "

Then Sturtevant was gone, and Von Rosen sat again before his studyfire. There was another little note of suffering from above. VonRosen shuddered, rose, and closed his door. The Persian cat came andsat in front of him, and gazed at him with jewel-like eyes. There wasan expression of almost human anxiety and curiosity upon the animal'sface. He came from a highly developed race; he and his forbears hadalways been with humans. At times it seemed to Von Rosen as if thecat had a dumb knowledge of the most that he himself knew. He reacheddown and patted the shapely golden head, but the cat withdrew, curledhimself into a coil of perfect luxuriousness, with the firelightcasting a warm, rosy glow upon his golden beauty, purred a littlewhile, then sank into the mystery of animal sleep. 

Von Rosen sat listening. He told himself that Sturtevant should beback within half an hour. When only ten minutes had passed he tookout his watch and was dismayed to find how short a time had elapsed. He replaced his watch and leaned back. He was always listeninguneasily. He had encountered illness and death and distress, butnever anything quite like this. He had always been able to givepersonal aid. Now he felt barred out, and fiercely helpless. 

He sat ten minutes longer. Then he arose. He could reach the kitchenby another way which did not lead past the stairs. He went out there, treading on tiptoe. The cat had looked up, stretched, and lazilygotten upon his feet and followed him, tail waving like a pennant. Hebrushed around Von Rosen out in the kitchen, and mewed a little, delicate, highbred mew. The dog came leaping up the basement stairs, sat up and begged. Von Rosen opened the ice box and found thereinsome steak. He cut off large pieces and fed the cat and dog. He alsofound milk and filled a saucer. 

He stole back to the study. He thought he had closed all the doors, but presently the cat entered, then sat down and began to lickhimself with his little red rough tongue. Von Rosen looked at hiswatch again. The house shook a little, and he knew that the shakingwas caused by Jane Riggs, walking upstairs. He longed to go upstairsbut knew that he could not, and again that rage of helplessness cameover him. He reflected upon human life, the agony of its beginning;the agony, in spite of bravery, in spite of denial of agony, theagony under the brightest of suns, of its endurance; the agony of itsend; and his reflections were almost blasphemous. His religion seemedto crumble beneath the standing-place of his soul. A torture ofdoubt, a certainty of ignorance, in spite of the utmost efforts offaith, came over him. The cat coiled himself again and sank intosleep. Von Rosen gazed at him. What if the accepted order of thingswere reversed, after all? What if that beautiful little animal wereon a higher plane than he? Certainly the cat did not suffer, andcertainly suffering and doubt degraded even the greatest. 

He looked at his watch and saw that Sturtevant had been gone fiveminutes over the half hour. He switched off the electric light, andstood in his window, which faced the street down which the doctor inhis car must come. He realised at once that this was more endurable. He was doing what a woman would have done long before. He wasmasculine, and had not the quick instinct to stand by the window andwatch out, to ease impatience. The road was like a broad silver bandunder the moon. The lights in house windows gleamed through drawnshades, except in one house, where he could see quite distinctly awoman seated beside a lamp with a green shade, sewing, with regularmotions of a red, silk-clad arm. Von Rosen strained his eyes, andsaw, as he thought, a dark bulk advancing far down the street. Hewatched and watched, then noted that the dark bulk had not moved. Hewondered if the motor had broken down. He thought of running out tosee, and made a motion to go, then he saw swiftly-moving lights passthe dark bulk. He thought they were the lights of the motor, but asthey passed he saw it was a cab taking someone to the railroadstation. He knew then that the dark bulk was a clump of trees. 

Then, before he could fairly sense it, the doctor's motor camehurtling down the street, its search-lights glaring, swinging fromside to side. The machine stopped, and Von Rosen ran to the door. 

"Here I am, " said Sturtevant in a hushed voice. There was a soundfrom the room above, and the doctor, Von Rosen and nurse looked ateach other. Then Von Rosen sat again alone in his study, and now, inspite of the closed door, he heard noises above stairs. Solitude wasbecoming frightful to him. He felt all at once strangely young, likea child, and a pitiful sense of injury was over him, but the sense ofinjury was not for himself alone, but for all mankind. He realisedthat all mankind was enormously pitiful and injured, by the mere factof their obligatory existence. And he wished more than anything inthe world for some understanding soul with whom to share his sense ofthe universal grievance. 

But he continued to sit alone, and the cat slept in his golden coilof peace. Then suddenly the cat sat up, and his jewel eyes glowed. Helooked fixedly at a point in the room. Von Rosen looked in the samedirection but saw nothing except his familiar wall. Then he heardsteps on the stairs, and the door opened, and Jane Riggs entered. Shewas white and stern. She was tragic. Her lean fingers were clutchingat the air. Von Rosen stared at her. She sat down and swept hercrackling white apron over her head. 

Chapter III

When Margaret Edes had returned home after the Zenith Club, shedevoted an hour to rest. She had ample time for that before dressingfor a dinner which she and her husband were to give in New York thatevening. The dinner was set for rather a late hour in order to enableMargaret to secure this rest before the train-time. She lay on acouch before the fire, in her room which was done in white and gold. Her hair was perfectly arranged, for she had scarcely moved her headduring the club meeting, and had adjusted and removed her hat withthe utmost caution. Now she kept her shining head perfectly stillupon a rather hard pillow. She did not relax her head, but she didrelax her body, and the result, as she was aware, would bebeautifying. 

Still as her head remained, she allowed no lines of disturbance toappear upon her face, and for that matter, no lines of joy. Secretlyshe did not approve of smiles, more than she approved of tears. Bothof them, she knew, tended to leave traces, and other people, especially other women, did not discriminate between the traces oftears and smiles. Therefore, lying with her slim graceful bodystretched out at full length upon her couch, Margaret Edes' face wasas absolutely devoid of expression as a human face could well be, andthis although she was thinking rather strenuously. She had not beenpleased with the impression which Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder had made uponthe Zenith Club, because Mrs. Slade, and not she, had beeninstrumental in securing her valuable services. Mrs. Edes had aNapoleonic ambition which was tragic and pathetic, because it couldcommand only a narrow scope for its really unusual force. If Mrs. Edes had only been possessed of the opportunity to subjugate Europe, nothing except another Waterloo could have stopped her onward march. But she had absolutely nothing to subjugate except poor littleFairbridge. She was a woman of power which was wasted. She wasabsurdly tragic, but none the less tragic. Power spent upon pettyends is one of the greatest disasters of the world. It wrecks notonly the spender, but its object. Mrs. Edes was horribly andunworthily unhappy, reflecting upon Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder and Mrs. Slade. She cared very much because Mrs. Slade and not she had broughtabout this success of the Zenith Club, with Mrs. Snyder ashigh-light. It was a shame to her, but she could not help it, becauseone living within narrow horizons must have limited aims. 

If only her husband had enough money to enable her to live in NewYork after the manner which would have suited her, she felt capableof being a leading power in that great and dreadful city. Probablyshe was right. The woman was in reality possessed of abnormal nerveforce. Had Wilbur Edes owned millions, and she been armed with thepower which they can convey, she might have worked miracles in hersubtle feminine fashion. She would always have worked subtly, andnever believed her feminine self. She understood its worth too well. She would have conquered like a cat, because she understood herweapons, her velvet charm, her purr, and her claws. She would nothave attempted a growling and bulky leap into success. She would haveslid and insinuated and made her gliding progress almostimperceptible, but none the less remorseless. 

But she was fated to live in Fairbridge. What else could she do?Wilbur Edes was successful in his profession, but he was not anaccumulator, and neither was she. His income was large during someyears, but it was spent during those years for things which seemedabsolutely indispensable to both husband and wife. For instance, to-night Wilbur would spend an extravagant sum upon this dinner, which he was to give at an extravagant hotel to some people whom Mrs. Edes had met last summer, and who, if not actually in the great swim, were in the outer froth of it, and she had vague imaginings of futuregain through them. Wilbur had carried his dress suit in that morning. He was to take a room in the hotel and change, and meet her at theNew York side of the ferry. As she thought of the ferry it was allMrs. Edes could do to keep her smooth brow from a frown. Somehow theferry always humiliated her; the necessity of going up or down thatcommon, democratic gang plank, clinging to the tail of her fine gown, and seating herself in a row with people who glanced askance at herevening wrap and her general magnificence. 

Poor Mrs. Edes was so small and slight that holding up magnificenceand treading the deck with her high-heeled shoes was physicallyfatiguing. Had she been of a large, powerful physique, had her bodymatched her mind, she might not have felt a sense of angryhumiliation. As it was, she realised that for her, _her_, to beobliged to cross the ferry was an insult at the hands of Providence. But the tunnel was no better, perhaps worse, --that plunged intodepths below the waters, like one in a public bath. Anything soexquisite, so dainty, so subtly fine and powerful as herself, shouldnot have been condemned to this. She should have been able to giveher dinners in her own magnificent New York mansion. As it was, therewas nothing for her except to dress and accept the inevitable. 

It was as bad as if Napoleon the Great had been forced to ride tobattle on a trolley car, instead of being booted and spurred andastride a charger, which lifted one fore-leg in a fling of scorn. Ofcourse Wilbur would meet her, and they would take a taxicab, but evena taxicab seemed rather humiliating to her. It should have been herown private motor car. And she would be obliged to descend the stairsat the station ungracefully, one hand clutching nervously at the tailof her gorgeous gown, the other at her evening cloak. It wasabsolutely impossible for so slight a woman to descend stairs withdignity and grace, holding up an evening cloak and a long gown. 

However, there would be compensations later. She thought, withdecided pleasure, of the private dining-room, and the carefullyplanned and horribly expensive decorations, which would be eminentlycalculated to form a suitable background for herself. The flowers andcandle-shades were to be yellow, and she was to wear her yellowchiffon gown, with touches of gold embroidery, a gold comb set withtopazes in her yellow hair, and on her breast a large, gleaming stonewhich was a yellow diamond of very considerable value. Wilbur hadcarried in his suit case her yellow satin slippers, her gold-beadedfan, and the queer little wrap of leopard skin which she herself hadfashioned from a rug which her husband had given her. She had muchskill in fashioning articles for her own adornment as a cat has inburnishing his fur, and would at any time have sacrificed thecurtains or furniture covers, had they met her needs. 

She would not be obliged--crowning disgrace--to carry a bag. All shewould need would be her little case for tickets, and her changepurse, and her evening cloak had pockets. The evening cloak laybeside the yellow chiffon gown, carefully disposed on the bed, whichhad a lace counterpane over yellow satin. The cloak was of a creamycloth lined with mink, a sumptuous affair, and she had a tiny minktoque with one yellow rose as head covering. 

She glanced approvingly at the rich attire spread upon the bed, andthen thought again of the dreadful ferry, and her undignified hopacross the dirty station to the boat. She longed for the days ofsedan chairs, for anything rather than this. She was an exquisitelady caught in the toils of modern cheap progress toward all herpleasures and profits. She did not belong in a democratic country atall unless she had millions. She was out of place, as much out ofplace as a splendid Angora in an alley. Fairbridge to her instinctswas as an alley; yet since it was her alley, she had to make the bestof it. Had she not made the best of it, exalted it, magnified it, shewould have gone mad. Wherefore the triumph of Mrs. Slade inpresenting Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder seemed to her like an affair ofmoment. For lack of something greater to hate and rival, she hatedand rivalled Mrs. Slade. For lack of something big over which toreign, she wished to reign over Fairbridge and the Zenith Club. Mrs. Slade's perfectly-matched drawing-room took on the semblance of athrone-room, in which she had seen herself usurped. 

Then she thought of the young clergyman, even as he was thinking ofher. She knew perfectly well how he had been trapped, but she failedto see the slightest humour in it. She had no sense of humour. Shesaw only the additional triumph of Mrs. Slade in securing this ratherremarkable man at the Zenith Club, something which she herself hadnever been able to do. Von Rosen's face came before her. Sheconsidered it a handsome face, but no man's face could disturb her. She held her virtue with as nervous a clutch as she held up her finegown. To soil either would be injudicious, impolitic, and she neverdesired the injudicious and impolitic. 

"He is a handsome man, " she said to herself, "an aristocratic-lookingman. " Then the telephone bell close beside her divan rang, and shetook up the receiver carefully, not moving her head, sat up, and puther delicate lips to the speaking tube. 

"Hello, " said a voice, and she recognised it as Von Rosen's althoughit had an agitated, nervous ring which was foreign to it. 

"What is it?" she said in reply, and the voice responded withvolubility, "A girl, a young Syrian girl, is at my home. She is in aswoon or something. We cannot revive her. Is the doctor at home? Tellhim to hurry over, please. I am Mr. Von Rosen. Tell him to hurry. Shemay be dead. "

"You have made a mistake, Mr. Von Rosen, " said Mrs. Edes' thin voice, as thin and silvery as a reed. "You are speaking to Mrs. Wilbur Edes. My telephone number is 5R. You doubtless want Doctor Sturtevant. Hisnumber is 51M. "

"Oh, pardon, " cried the voice over the telephone. "Sorry to havedisturbed you, Mrs. Edes, I mistook--"

The voice trailed into nothingness. There was a sharp ring. Mrs. Edeshung up her receiver. She thought slowly that it was a strangecircumstance that Mr. Von Rosen should have a fainting or dead youngSyrian girl in his house. Then she rose from the divan, holding herhead very stiffly, and began to dress. She had just enough time todress leisurely and catch the train. She called on one of the twomaids to assist her and was quite equipped, even to the little minktoque, fastened very carefully on her shining head, when there was asoft push at the door, and her twin daughters, Maida and Adelaide, entered. They were eight years old, but looked younger. They werealmost exactly alike as to small, pretty features and pale blondcolouring. Maida scowled a little, and Adelaide did not, and peopledistinguished them by that when in doubt. 

They stood and stared at their mother with a curious expression ontheir sharp, delicate little faces. It was not exactly admiration, itwas not wonder, nor envy, nor affection, yet tinctured by all. 

Mrs. Edes looked at them. "Maida, " said she, "do not wear that bluehair-ribbon again. It is soiled. Have you had your dinners?"

"Yes, mamma, " responded first one, then the other, Maida with thefrown being slightly in the lead. 

"Then you had better go to bed, " said Mrs. Edes, and the two littlegirls stood carefully aside to allow her to pass. 

"Good night, children, " said Mrs. Edes without turning hermink-crowned head. The little girls watched the last yellow swirl oftheir mother's skirts, disappearing around the stair-landing, thenAdelaide spoke. 

"I mean to wear red, myself, when I'm grown up, " said she. 

"Ho, just because Jim Carr likes red, " retorted Maida. "As for me, Imean to have a gown just like hers, only a little deeper shade ofyellow. "

Adelaide laughed, an unpleasantly snarling little laugh. "Ho, " saidshe, "just because Val Thomas likes yellow. "

Then the coloured maid, Emma, who was cross because Mrs. Edes'evening out had deprived her of her own, and had been ruthlesslyhanging her mistress's gown which she had worn to the club in a wadon a closet hook, disregarding its perfumed hanger, turned upon them. 

"Heah, ye chillun, " said she, "your ma sid for you to go to baid. "

Each little girl had her white bed with a canopy of pink silk in acharming room. There were garlands of rosebuds on the wallpaper andthe furniture was covered with rosebud chintz. 

While their mother was indignantly sailing across the North River, her daughters lay awake, building air-castles about themselves andtheir boy-lovers, which fevered their imaginations, and aged themhorribly in a spiritual sense. 

"Amy White's mother plays dominoes with her every evening, " Maidaremarked. Her voice sounded incredibly old, full of faintderisiveness and satire, but absolutely non-complaining. 

"Amy White's mother would look awfully funny in a gown like Mamma's, "said Adelaide. 

"I suppose that is why she plays dominoes with Amy, " said Maida inher old voice. 

"Oh, don't talk any more, Maida, I want to go to sleep, " saidAdelaide pettishly, but she was not in the least sleepy. She wishedto return to the air-castle in which she had been having sweetconverse with Jim Carr. This air-castle was the abode of innocence, but it was not yet time for its building at all. It was such a littlechildish creature who lay curled up under the coverlid strewn withrosebuds that the gates of any air-castle of life and love, andknowledge, however innocent and ignorant, should have been barredagainst her, perhaps with dominoes. 

However, she entered in, her soft cheeks burning, and her pulsetingling, and saw the strange light through its fairy windows, andher sister also entered her air-castle, and all the time their motherwas sailing across the North River toward the pier where her husbandwaited. She kept one gloved hand upon the fold of her gown, ready toclutch it effectually clear of the dirty deck when the pier wasreached. When she was in the taxicab with Wilbur, she thought againof Von Rosen. "Dominie von Rosen made a mistake, " said she, "andcalled up the wrong number. He wanted Doctor Sturtevant, and he gotme. " Then she repeated the message. "What do you suppose he wasdoing with a fainting Syrian girl in his house?" she ended. 

A chuckle shook the dark bulk in its fur lined coat at her side. "Thequestion is why the Syrian girl chose Von Rosen's house to faint in, "said he lightly. 

"Oh, don't be funny, Wilbur, " said Margaret. "Have you seen thedining-room? How does it look?"

"I thought it beautiful, and I am sure you will like it, " said WilburEdes in the chastened tone which he commonly used toward his wife. Hehad learned long ago that facetiousness displeased her, and he livedonly to please her, aside from his interest in his profession. PoorWilbur Edes thought his wife very wonderful, and watched with delightthe hats doffed when she entered the hotel lift like a littleberuffled yellow canary. He wished those men could see her later, when the canary resemblance had altogether ceased, when she wouldlook tall and slender and lithe in her clinging yellow gown with thegreat yellow stone gleaming in her corsage. 

For some reason Margaret Edes held her husband's admiration with amore certain tenure because she could not be graceful when weigheddown with finery. The charm of her return to grace was a never-endingsurprise. Wilbur Edes loved his wife more comfortably than he lovedhis children. He loved them a little uneasily. They were unknownelements to him, and he sometimes wished that he had more time athome, to get them firmly fixed in his comprehension. Without theslightest condemnation of his wife, he had never regarded her as awoman in whom the maternal was a distinguishing feature. He saw withapprobation the charming externals with which she surrounded theiroffspring. It was a gratification to him to be quite sure thatMaida's hair ribbon would always be fresh and tied perkily, and thatAdelaide would be full of dainty little gestures copied from hermother, but he had some doubts as to whether his wonderful Margaretmight not be too perfect in herself, and too engrossed with theduties pertaining to perfection to be quite the proper manager ofimperfection and immaturity represented by childhood. 

"How did you leave the children!" he inquired when they were in theirbedroom at the hotel, and he was fitting the yellow satin slippers tohis wife's slender silk shod feet. 

"The children were as well as usual. I told Emma to put them to bed. Do you think the orchids in the dining-room are the right shade, Wilbur?"

"I am quite sure. I am glad that you told Emma to put them to bed. "

"I always do. Mrs. George B. Slade is most unpleasantly puffed up. "

"Why?"

"Oh, because she got Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder to speak to the club. "

"Did she do her stunt well?"

"Well enough. Mrs. Slade was so pleased, it was really offensive. "

Wilbur Edes had an inspiration. "The Fay-Wymans, " said he (theFay-Wymans were the principal guests of their dinner party), "know alot of theatrical people. I will see if I can't get them to inducesomebody, say Lydia Greenway, to run out some day; I suppose it wouldhave to be later on, just after the season, and do a stunt at theclub. "

"Oh, that would be simply charming, " cried Margaret, "and I wouldrather have it in the spring, because everything looks so muchprettier. But don't you think it will be impossible, Wilbur?"

"Not with money as an inducement. " Wilbur had the pleasantconsciousness of an unusually large fee which was sure to be his ownbefore that future club meeting, and he could see no betteremployment for it than to enable his adored wife to outshine Mrs. George B. Slade. When in New York engaged in his profession, WilburEdes was entirely free from the vortex of Fairbridge, but his wife, with its terrible eddies still agitating her garments, could suck himtherein, even in the great city. He was very susceptible to herinfluence. 

Margaret Edes beamed at her husband as he rose. "That will makeMarion Slade furious, " she said. She extended her feet. "Prettyslippers, aren't they, Wilbur?"

"Charming, my dear. "

Margaret was so pleased that she tried to do something very amiable. 

"That was funny, I mean what you said about the Syrian girl at theDominie's, " she volunteered, and laughed, without making a crease inher fair little face. She was really adorable, far more than pretty, leaning back with one slender, yellow-draped leg crossed over theother, revealing the glittering slippers and one silken ankle. 

"It does sound somewhat queer, a Syrian girl fainting in theDominie's house, " said Wilbur. "She could not have found a housewhere her sex, of any nationality, are in less repute. "

"Then you don't think that Alice Mendon--?" There was a faint noteof jealousy in Margaret's voice, although she herself had not theslightest interest in Dominie von Rosen or any man, except herhusband; and in him only because he was her husband. As the husbandof her wonderful self, he acquired a certain claim to respect, evenaffection, such as she had to bestow. 

"I don't think Alice Mendon would take up with the Dominie, if hewould with her, " responded Wilbur Edes hastily. Margaret did notunderstand his way of speaking, but just then she looked at herselfin an opposite mirror, and pulled down one side of her blondpompadour a bit, which softened her face, and added to itsallurement. The truth was Wilbur Edes, before he met Margaret, hadproposed to Alice Mendon. Alice had never told, and he had not, consequently Margaret did not know. Had she known it would have madeno difference, since she could not imagine any man preferring Aliceto herself. All her jealousy was based upon the facts of her superiorheight, and ability to carry herself well, where she knew herselfunder many circumstances about as graceful as an Angora cat walkingupon her hind legs. She was absolutely sure of her husband. Theepisode with Alice had occurred before he had ever even seen Herself. She smiled radiantly upon him as she arose. She was conscious of noaffection for her husband, but she was conscious of a desire to showappreciation, and to display radiance for his delectation. 

"It is charming of you to think of getting Lydia Greenway to read, you dear old man, " said she. Wilbur beamed. 

"Well, of course, I can not be sure, that is not absolutely sure, butif it is to be done, I will manage it, " said he. 

It was at this very time, for radically different notes sound at thesame time in the harmony or discord of life, that Von Rosen'shousekeeper, Jane Riggs, stood before him with that crackling whiteapron swept over her face. 

"What is it?" asked Von Rosen, and he realised that his lips werestiff, and his voice sounded strange. 

A strange harsh sob came from behind the apron. "She was all bent toone side with that heavy suit case, as heavy as lead, for I heftedit, " said Jane Riggs, "and she couldn't have been more than fifteen. Them outlandish girls get married awful young. "

"What is it?"

"And there was poor Jack lickin' her hands, and him a dog everybodyis so scared of, and she a sinkin' down in a heap on my kitchenfloor. "

"What is it?"

"She has passed away, " answered Jane Riggs, "and--the baby is a boy, and no bigger than the cat, not near as big as the cat when I come tolook at him, and I put some of my old flannels and my shimmy on him, and Doctor Sturtevant has got him in my darning basket, all linedwith newspapers, the New York _Sun_, and the _Times_ and hot waterbottles, and it's all happened in the best chamber, and I call itpretty goings on. "

Jane Riggs gave vent to discordant sobs. Her apron crackled. VonRosen took hold of her shoulders. "Go straight back up there, " heordered. 

"Why couldn't she have gone in and fainted away somewhere where therewas more women than one, " said Jane Riggs. "Doctor Sturtevant, hesent me down for more newspapers. "

"Take these, and go back at once, " said Von Rosen, and he gathered upthe night papers in a crumpled heap and thrust them upon the woman. 

"He said you had better telephone for Mrs. Bestwick, " said Jane. Mrs. Bestwick was the resident nurse of Fairbridge. Von Rosen sprang tothe telephone, but he could get no response whatever from the Centraloffice, probably on account of the ice-coated wires. 

He sat down disconsolately, and the cat leapt upon his knees, but hepushed him away impatiently, to be surveyed in consequence by thosetopaz eyes with a regal effect of injury, and astonishment. Von Rosenlistened. He wondered if he heard, or imagined that he heard, aplaintive little wail. The dog snuggled close to him, and he felt awarm tongue lap. Von Rosen patted the dog's head. Here was sympathy. The cat's leap into his lap had been purely selfish. Von Rosenlistened. He got up, and tried to telephone again, but got noresponse from Central. He hung up the receiver emphatically and satdown again. The dog again came close, and he patted the humble lovinghead. Von Rosen listened again, and again could not be sure whetherhe actually heard or imagined that he heard, the feeblest, mosthelpless cry ever lifted up from this earth, that of a miserable newborn baby with its uncertain future reaching before it and all thesins of its ancestors upon its devoted head. 

When at last the door opened and Doctor Sturtevant entered, he wascertain. That poor little atom of humanity upstairs was lifting upits voice of feeble rage and woe because of its entrance intoexistence. Sturtevant had an oddly apologetic look. "I assure you Iam sorry, my dear fellow--" he began. 

"Is the poor little beggar going to live?" asked Von Rosen. 

"Well, yes, I think so, judging from the present outlook, " repliedthe doctor still apologetically. 

"I could not get Mrs. Bestwick, " said Von Rosen anxiously. "I thinkthe telephone is out of commission, on account of the ice. "

"Never mind that. Your housekeeper is a jewel, and I will get Mrs. Bestwick on my way home. I say, Von Rosen--"

Von Rosen looked at him inquiringly. 

"Oh, well, never mind; I really must be off now, " said the doctorhurriedly. "I will get Mrs. Bestwick here as soon as possible. Ithink--the child will have to be kept here for a short time anyway, considering the weather, and everything. "

"Why, of course, " said Von Rosen. 

After the doctor had gone, he went out in the kitchen. He had had nodinner. Jane Riggs, who had very acute hearing, came to the head ofthe stairs, and spoke in a muffled tone, muffled as Von Rosen knewbecause of the presence of death and life in the house. "The roast isin the oven, Mr. Von Rosen, " said she, "I certainly hope it isn't toodry, and the soup is in the kettle, and the vegetables are all readyto dish up. Everything is ready except the coffee. "

"You know I can make that, " called Von Rosen in alarm. "Don't thinkof coming down. "

Von Rosen could make very good coffee. It was an accomplishment ofhis college days. He made some now. He felt the need of it. Then hehandily served the very excellent dinner, and sat down at hissolitary dining table. As he ate his soup, he glanced across thetable, and a blush like that of a girl overspread his dark face. Hehad a vision of a high chair, and a child installed therein with thecustomary bib and spoon. It was a singular circumstance, buteverything in life moves in sequences, and that poor Syrian childupstairs, in her dire extremity, was furnishing a sequence in theyoung man's life, before she went out of it. Her stimulation of hissympathy and imagination was to change the whole course of hisexistence. 

Meanwhile, Doctor Sturtevant was having a rather strenuous argumentwith his wife, who for once stood against him. She had hernot-to-be-silenced personal note. She had a horror of the alien andunusual. All her life she had walked her chalk-line, and anythingoutside savoured of the mysterious, and terrible. She wasAnglo-Saxon. She was what her ancestresses had been for generations. The strain was unchanged, and had become so tense and narrow that itwas almost fathomless. Mrs. Sturtevant, good and benevolent on herchalk-line, was involuntarily a bigot. She looked at Chinese laundrymen, poor little yellow figures, shuffling about with bags of soiledlinen, with thrills of recoil. She would not have acknowledged it toherself, for she came of a race which favoured abolition, but nothingcould have induced her to have a coloured girl in her kitchen. Herimaginations and prejudices were stained as white as her skin. Therewas a lone man living on the outskirts of Fairbridge, in a littleshack built by himself in the woods, who was said to have Indianblood in his veins, and Mrs. Sturtevant never saw him without thatawful thrill of recoil. When the little Orientals, men or women, swayed sidewise and bent with their cheap suitcases filled withEastern handiwork, came to the door, she did not draw a long breathuntil she had watched them out of sight down the street. It made nodifference to her that they might be Christians, that they might havesuffered persecution in their own land and sought our doorlessentrances of hospitality; she still realised her own aloofness fromthem, or rather theirs from her. They had entered existence entirelyoutside her chalk-line. She and they walked on parallels which to alleternity could never meet. 

It therefore came to pass that, although she had in the secret depthsof her being bemoaned her childlessness, and had been conscious ofyearnings and longings which were agonies, when Doctor Sturtevant, after the poor young unknown mother had been laid away in theFairbridge cemetery, proposed that they should adopt the bereftlittle one, she rebelled. 

"If he were a white baby, I wouldn't object that I know of, " saidshe, "but I can't have this kind. I can't make up my mind to it, Edward. "

"But, Maria, the child is white. He may not be European, but he iswhite. That is, while of course he has a dark complexion and darkeyes and hair, he is as white, in a way, as any child in Fairbridge, and he will be a beautiful boy. Moreover, we have every reason tobelieve that he was born in wedlock. There was a ring on a poorstring of a ribbon on the mother's neck, and there was a fragment ofa letter which Von Rosen managed to make out. He thinks that the poorchild was married to another child of her own race. The boy is allright and he will be a fine little fellow. "

"It is of no use, " said Maria Sturtevant. "I can't make up my mind toadopt a baby, that belonged to that kind of people. I simply can not, Edward. "

Sturtevant gave up the matter for the time being. The baby remainedat Von Rosen's under the care of Mrs. Bestwick, and Jane Riggs, butwhen it was a month old, the doctor persuaded his wife to go over andsee it. Maria Sturtevant gazed at the tiny scrap of humanity curledup in Jane Riggs' darning basket, the old-young face creased assoftly as a rosebud, with none of its beauty, but with a compellingcharm. She watched the weak motion of the infinitesimal legs and armsbeneath the soft smother of wrappings, and her heart pained her withlonging, but she remained firm. 

"It is no use, Edward, " she said, when they had returned to VonRosen's study. "I can't make up my mind to adopt a baby coming fromsuch queer people. " Then she was confronted by a stare of blankastonishment from Von Rosen, and also from Jane Riggs. 

Jane Riggs spoke with open hostility. "I don't know that anybody hasasked anybody to adopt our baby, " said she. 

Von Rosen laughed, but he also blushed. He spoke rather stammeringly. "Well, Sturtevant, " said he, "the fact is, Jane and I have talked itover, and she thinks she can manage, and he seems a bright littlechap, and--I have about made up my mind to keep him myself. "

"He is going to be baptised as soon as he is big enough to be takenout of my darning basket, " said Jane Riggs with defiance, but Mrs. Sturtevant regarded her with relief. 

"I dare say he will be a real comfort to you, " she said, "even if hedoes come from such queer stock. " Her husband looked at Von Rosenand whistled under his breath. 

"People will talk, " he said aside. 

"Let them, " returned Von Rosen. He was experiencing a strange new joyof possession, which no possibility of ridicule could daunt. However, his joy was of short duration. The baby was a little over threemonths old, and had been promoted to a crib, and a perambulator, hadbeen the unconscious recipient of many gifts from the women of VonRosen's parish, and of many calls from admiring little girls. Janehad scented the danger. She came home from marketing one morning, quite pale, and could hardly speak when she entered Von Rosen'sstudy. 

"There's an outlandish young man around here, " said she, "and you hadbetter keep that baby close. "

Von Rosen laughed. "Those people are always about, " he said. "Youhave no reason to be nervous, Jane. There is hardly a chance he hasanything to do with the baby, and in any case, he would not be likelyto burden himself with the care of it. "

"Don't you be too sure, " said Jane stoutly, "a baby like that!"

Jane, much against her wishes, was obliged to go out that afternoon, and Von Rosen was left alone with the baby with the exception of alittle nurse girl who had taken the place of Mrs. Bestwick. Then itwas that the Syrian man, he was no more than a boy, came. Von Rosendid not at first suspect. The Syrian spoke very good English, and hewas a Christian. So he told Von Rosen. Then he also told him that thedead girl had been his wife, and produced letters signed with thename which those in her possession had borne. Von Rosen wasconvinced. There was something about the boy with his haughty, almostsullen, oriental manner which bore the stamp of truth. However, whenhe demanded only the suit-case which his dead wife had brought whenshe came to the house, Von Rosen was relieved. He produced it atonce, and his wonder and disgust mounted to fever heat, when thatEastern boy proceeded to take out carefully the gauds of femininehandiwork which it contained, and press them upon Von Rosen atexorbitant prices. Von Rosen was more incensed than he oftenpermitted himself to be. He ordered the boy from the house, and hedeparted with strong oaths, and veiled and intricate threats afterthe manner of his subtle race, and when Jane Riggs came home, VonRosen told her. 

"I firmly believe the young rascal was that poor girl's husband, andthe boy's father, " he said. 

"Didn't he ask to have the baby?"

"Never mentioned such a thing. All he wanted was the article of valuewhich the poor girl left here. "

Jane Riggs also looked relieved. "Outlandish people are queer, " shesaid. 

But the next morning she rushed into Von Rosen's room when he hadbarely finished dressing, sobbing aloud like a child, her facerigidly convulsed with grief, and her hands waving frantically withno effort to conceal it. 

Chapter IV

The little Syrian baby had disappeared. Nobody had reckoned with thesoft guile of a race as supple and silent as to their real intentionsas cats. There was a verandah column wound with a massive wistariavine near the window of the baby's room. The little nurse girl wenthome every night, and Jane Riggs was a heavy sleeper. When she hadawakened, her first glance had been into the baby's crib. Then shesprang, and searched with hungry hands. The little softly indentednest was not warm, the child had been gone for some hours, probablyhad been taken during the first and soundest sleep of the household. Jane's purse, and her gold breast pin, had incidentally been takenalso. When she gave the alarm to Von Rosen, a sullen, handsome Syrianboy was trudging upon an unfrequented road, which led circuitously tothe City, and he carried a suit-case, but it was held apart, by someof the Eastern embroideries used as wedges, before strapping, andfrom that came the querulous wail of a baby squirming uncomfortablyupon drawn work centre pieces, and crepe kimonas. Now and then theboy stopped and spoke to the baby in a lovely gentle voice. Hepromised it food, and shelter soon in his own soft tongue. He wascarrying it to his wife's mother, and sullen as he looked and was, and thief as he was, love for his own swayed him, and made himdetermined to hold it fast. Von Rosen made all possible inquiries. Heemployed detectives but he never obtained the least clue to thewhereabouts of the little child. He, however, although he grievedabsurdly, almost as absurdly as Jane, had a curious sense of joy overthe whole. Life in Fairbridge had, before birth and death entered hishome, been so monotonous, that he was almost stupefied. Here was athread of vital gold and flame, although it had brought pain with it. When Doctor Sturtevant condoled with him, he met with an unexpectedresponse. "I feel for you, old man. It was a mighty unfortunate thingthat it happened in your house, now that this has come of it, " hesaid. 

"I am very glad it happened, whatever came of it, " said Von Rosen. "It is something to have had in my life. I wouldn't have missed it. "

Fairbridge people, who were on the whole a good-natured set, werevery sympathetic, especially the women. Bessy Dicky shed tears whentalking to Mrs. Sturtevant about the disappearance of the baby. Mrs. Sturtevant was not very responsive. 

"It may be all for the best, " she said. "Nobody can tell how thatchild would have turned out. He might have ended by killing Mr. VonRosen. " Then she added with a sigh that she hoped his poor motherhad been married. 

"Why, of course she was since there was a baby, " said Bessy Dicky. Then she rose hastily with a blush because Doctor Sturtevant's motorcould be heard, and took her leave. 

Doctor Sturtevant had just returned from a call upon Margaret Edes, who had experienced a very severe disappointment, coming as it didafter another very successful meeting of the Zenith Club at DaisyShaw's, who had most unexpectedly provided a second cousin whorecited monologues wonderfully. Wilbur had failed in his attempt tosecure Lydia Greenway for Margaret's star-feature. The actress hadpromised, but had been suddenly attacked with a very severe coldwhich had obliged her to sail for Europe a week earlier than she hadplanned. Margaret had been quite ill, but Doctor Sturtevant gave herpain pellets with the result that late in the afternoon she sat onher verandah in a fluffy white tea gown, and then it was that littleAnnie Eustace came across the street, and sat with her. Annie was notlittle. Although slender, she was, in fact, quite tall and wideshouldered and there was something about her which seemed to justifythe use of the diminutive adjective. Possibly it was her face, whichwas really small and very pretty, with perfect cameo-like featuresand an odd, deprecating, almost painfully humble expression. It wasthe face of a creature entirely capable of asking an enemy's pardonfor an injury inflicted upon herself. In reality, Annie Eustace hadvery much that attitude of soul. She always considered the wrong asher natural place, and, in fact, would not have been comfortableelsewhere, although she suffered there. And yet, little Annie Eustacewas a gifted creature. There was probably not a person in Fairbridgewho had been so well endowed by nature, but her environment andup-bringing had been unfortunate. If Annie's mother had lived, thedaughter might have had more spirit, but she had died when Annie wasa baby, and the child had been given over to the tyranny of twoaunts, and a grandmother. As for her father, he had never marriedagain, but he had never paid much attention to her. He had been areserved, silent man, himself under the sway of his mother andsisters. Charles Eustace had had an obsession to the effect that theskies of his own individual sphere would fall to his and his child'sdestruction, if his female relatives deserted him, and that they hadthreatened to do, upon the slightest sign of revolt. SometimesAnnie's father had regarded her wistfully and wondered within himselfif it were quite right for a child to be so entirely governed, buthis own spirit of yielding made it impossible for him to realise thesituation. Obedience had been little Annie Eustace's first lessontaught by the trio, who to her represented all government, in herindividual case. 

Annie Eustace obeyed her aunts, and grandmother (her father had beendead for several years), but she loved only three, --two were women, Margaret Edes and Alice Mendon; the other was a man, and the love wasnot confessed to her own heart. 

This afternoon Annie wore an ugly green gown, which was, moreover, badly cut. The sleeves were too long below the elbow, and too shortabove, and every time she moved an arm they hitched uncomfortably. The neck arrangement was exceedingly unbecoming, and the skirt notwell hung. The green was of the particular shade which made her lookyellow. As she sat beside Margaret and embroidered assiduously, andvery unskilfully, some daisies on a linen centre-piece, the otherwoman eyed her critically. 

"You should not wear that shade of green, if you will excuse mysaying so, dear, " she remarked presently. 

Annie regarded her with a charming, loving smile. She would haveexcused her idol for saying anything. "I know it is not verybecoming, " she agreed sweetly. 

"Becoming, " said Margaret a trifle viciously. She was so out of sortsabout her failure to secure Lydia Greenway that she felt a greatrelief in attacking little Annie Eustace. 

"Becoming, " said she. "It actually makes you hideous. That shade isimpossible for you and why, --I trust you will not be offended, youknow it is for your own good, dear, --why do you wear your hair inthat fashion?"

"I am afraid it is not very becoming, " said Annie with the meeknessof those who inherit the earth. She did not state that her auntHarriet had insisted that she dress her hair in that fashion. Anniewas intensely loyal. 

"Nobody, " said Margaret, "unless she were as beautiful as Helen ofTroy, should wear her hair that way, and not look a fright. "

Annie Eustace blushed, but it was not a distressed blush. When onehas been downtrodden one's whole life, one becomes accustomed to it, and besides she loved the down-treader. 

"Yes, " said she. "I looked at myself in my glass just before I cameand I thought I did not look well. "

"Hideous, " said Margaret. 

Annie smiled agreement and looked pretty, despite the fact that herhair was strained tightly back, showing too much of her intellectualforehead, and the colour of her gown killed all the pink bloom lightsin her face. Annie Eustace had a beautiful soul and it showed forthtriumphant over all bodily accessories, in her smile. 

"You are not doing that embroidery at all well, " said Margaret. 

Annie laughed. "I know it, " she said with a sort of meek amusement. "I don't think I ever can master long and short stitch. "

"Why on earth do you attempt it then?"

"Everybody embroiders, " replied Annie. She did not state that hergrandmother had made taking the embroidery a condition of her callupon her friend. 

Margaret continued to regard her. She was finding a species of salvefor her own disappointment in this irritant applied to another. "Whatdoes make you wear that hair ring?" said she. 

"It was a present, " replied Annie humbly, but she for the first timelooked a little disturbed. That mourning emblem with her father's andmother's, and a departed sister's hair in a neat little twist under asmall crystal, grated upon her incessantly. It struck her as aspecies of ghastly sentiment, which at once distressed, and impelledher to hysterical mirth. 

"A present, " repeated Margaret. "If anybody gave me such a present asthat, I would never wear it. It is simply in shocking bad taste. "

"I sometimes fear so, " said Annie. She did not state that her AuntJane never allowed her to be seen in public without that dismaladornment. 

"You are a queer girl, " said Margaret, and she summed up all her moodof petty cruelty and vicarious revenge in that one word "queer. "

However, little Annie Eustace only smiled as if she had been given apeculiarly acceptable present. She was so used to being underrated, that she had become in a measure immune to criticism, and besidescriticism from her adored Mrs. Edes was even a favour. She tookanother bungling stitch in the petal of a white floss daisy. 

Margaret felt suddenly irritated. All this was too much like rainingfierce blows upon a down pillow. 

"Do, for goodness sake, Annie Eustace, stop doing that awfulembroidery if you don't want to drive me crazy, " said she. 

Then Annie looked at Margaret, and she was obviously distressed andpuzzled. Her grandmother had enjoined it upon her to finish just somany of these trying daisies before her return and yet, on the otherhand, here was Margaret, her adorable Margaret, forbidding her towork, and, moreover, Margaret in such an irritable mood, with thatsmooth brow of hers frowning, and that sweet voice, which usually hada lazy trickle like honey, fairly rasping, was as awe-inspiring asher grandmother. Annie Eustace hesitated for a second. Hergrandmother had commanded. Margaret Edes had commanded. The strongestimpulse of her whole being was obedience, but she loved Margaret, andshe did not love her grandmother. She had never confessed such ahorror to herself, but one does not love another human being whosemain aim toward one is to compress, to stiffen, to make move in astep with itself. Annie folded up the untidy embroidery. As she didso, she dropped her needle and also her thimble. The needle layglittering beside her chair, the thimble rolled noiselessly over thetrailing fold of her muslin gown into the folds of Margaret's whitesilk. Margaret felt an odd delight in that. Annie was careless, andshe was dainty, and she was conscious of a little pleasurablepreening of her own soul-plumage. 

Margaret said nothing about the thimble and needle. Annie satregarding her with a sort of expectation, and the somewhat mussylittle parcel of linen lay in her lap. Annie folded over it her veryslender hands, and the horrible hair ring was in full evidence. 

Margaret fixed her eyes upon it. Annie quickly placed the hand whichwore it under the other. Then she spoke, since Margaret did not, andshe said exactly the wrong thing. The being forced continually intothe wrong, often has the effect of making one quite innocently takethe first step in that direction even if no force be used. 

"I hear that the last meeting of the Zenith Club was unusuallyinteresting, " said little Annie Eustace, and she could have saidnothing more hapless to Margaret Edes in her present mood. Quiteinadvertently, she herself became the irritant party. Margaretactually flushed. "I failed to see anything interesting whateverabout it, myself, " said she tartly. 

Annie offended again. "I heard that Mrs. Sarah Joy Snyder's addresswas really very remarkable, " said she. 

"It was simply a very stupid effort to be funny, " returned Margaret. "Sometimes women will laugh because they are expected to, and theydid that afternoon. Everything was simply cut and dried. It always isat Mrs. George B. Slade's. I never knew a woman so absolutelydestitute of originality. "

Annie looked helplessly at Margaret. She could say no more unless shecontradicted. Margaret continued. She felt that she could no longerconceal her own annoyance, and she was glad of this adoring audienceof one. 

"I had planned something myself for the next meeting, something whichhas never been done, " said she, "something new, and stimulating. "

"Oh, how lovely!" cried Annie. 

"But of course, like all really clever plans for the real good andprogress of a club like ours, something has to come up to prevent, "said Margaret. 

"Oh, what?"

"Well, I had planned to have Lydia Greenway, you know she is really agreat artist, come to the next meeting and give dramaticrecitations. "

"Oh, would she?" gasped Annie Eustace. 

"Of course, it would have meant a large pecuniary outlay, " saidMargaret, "but I was prepared, quite prepared, to make somesacrifices for the good of the club, but, why, you must have read itin the papers, Annie. "

Annie looked guiltily ignorant. 

"I really do not see how you contrive to exist without keeping morein touch with the current events, " said Margaret. 

Annie looked meekly culpable, although she was not. Her aunts did notapprove of newspapers, as containing so much information, so muchcheap information concerning the evil in the world, especially for ayoung person like Annie, and she was not allowed to read them, although she sometimes did so surreptitiously. 

"It was in all the papers, " continued Margaret, with her censoriousair. "Lydia Greenway was obliged to leave unexpectedly and go to theRiveria. They fear tuberculosis. She sailed last Saturday. "

"I am so sorry, " said Annie. Then she proceeded to elaborate herstatement in exactly the wrong way. She said how very dreadful itwould be if such a talented young actress should fall a victim ofsuch a terrible disease, and what a loss she would be to the public, whereas all that Margaret Edes thought should be at all considered byany true friend of her own was her own particular loss. 

"For once the Zenith Club would have had a meeting calculated to takeFairbridge women out of their rut in which people like Mrs. Slade andMrs. Sturtevant seem determined to keep them, " returned Margarettestily. Annie stared at her. Margaret often said that it was thefirst rule of her life never to speak ill of any one, and she keptthe letter of it as a rule. 

"I am so sorry, " said Annie. Then she added with more tact. "It wouldhave been such a wonderful thing for us all to have had LydiaGreenway give dramatic recitals to us. Oh, Margaret, I can understandhow much it would have meant. "

"It would have meant progress, " said Margaret. She looked imperiouslylovely, as she sat there all frilled about with white lace and silkwith the leaf-shadows playing over the slender whiteness. She liftedone little hand tragically. "Progress, " she repeated. "Progressbeyond Mrs. George B. Slade's and Mrs. Sturtevant's and Miss BessyDicky's, and that is precisely what we need. "

Annie Eustace gazed wistfully upon her friend. "Yes, " she agreed, "you are quite right, Margaret. Mrs. Slade and Mrs. Sturtevant andpoor Bessy Dicky and all the other members are very good, and wethink highly of them, but I too feel that we all travel in a rutsometimes. Perhaps we all walk too much the same way. " Then suddenlyAnnie burst into a peal of laughter. She had a sense of humour whichwas startling. It was the one thing which environment had not beenable to subdue, or even produce the effect of submission. AnnieEustace was easily amused. She had a scent for the humorous like ahound's for game, and her laugh was irrepressible. 

"What on earth are you laughing at now?" inquired Margaret Edesirritably. 

"I was thinking, " Annie replied chokingly, "of some queer long-leggedbirds I saw once in a cage in a park. I really don't know whetherthey were ibises or cranes, or survivals of species, but anyway, thelittle long-legged ones all walked just the same way in a file behinda tall long-legged one, who walked precisely in the same way, and allof a sudden, I seemed to see us all like that. Only you are not inthe least like that tall, long-legged bird, Margaret, and you are thepresident of the Zenith Club. "

Margaret surveyed Annie with cool displeasure. "I, " said she, "seenothing whatever to laugh at in the Zenith Club, if you do. "

"Oh, Margaret, I don't!" cried Annie. 

"To my mind, the Zenith Club is the one institution in this littleplace which tends to advancement and mental improvement. "

"Oh, Margaret, I think so too, you know I do, " said Annie in ashocked voice. "And my heart was almost broken because I had to missthat last meeting on account of grandmother's having such a severecold. "

"The last meeting was not very much to miss, " said Margaret, forAnnie had again said the wrong thing. 

Annie, however, went on eagerly and unconsciously. She was only awarethat she was being accused of disloyalty, or worse, of actuallypoking fun, when something toward which she felt the utmost respectand love and admiration was concerned. 

"Margaret, you know, " she cried, "you know how I feel toward theZenith Club. You must know what it means to me. It really does takeme out of my little narrow place in life as nothing else does. Icannot tell you what an inspiration it really is to me. Oh, Margaret, you know!"

Margaret nodded in stiff assent. As a matter of fact, she _did_ know. The Zenith Club of Fairbridge did mean very much, very much indeed, to little Annie Eustace. Nowhere else did she meet _en masse_ othersof her kind. She did not even go to church for the reason that hergrandmother did not believe in church going at all and wished her toremain with her. One aunt was Dutch Reformed and the other Baptist;and neither ever missed a service. Annie remained at home Sundays, and read aloud to her grandmother, and when both aunts were in themidst of their respective services, and the cook, who was intenselyreligious, engaged in preparing dinner, she and her old grandmotherplayed pinocle. However, although Annie played cards very well, itwas only with her relatives. She had never been allowed to join theFairbridge Card Club. She never attended a play in the city, becauseAunt Jane considered plays wicked. It was in reality doubtful if shewould have been permitted to listen to Lydia Greenway, had thatperson been available. Annie's sole large recreation was the ZenithClub, and it meant, as she had said, much to her. It was to thestifled young heart as a great wind of stimulus which was for thestrengthening of her soul. Whatever the Zenith Club of Fairbridge wasto others, it was very much worth while for little Annie Eustace. Shewrote papers for it, which were astonishing, although her hearersdimly appreciated the fact, not because of dulness, but becauselittle Annie had written them, and it seemed incredible to Fairbridgewomen that little Annie Eustace whom they had always known, and whosegrandmother and aunts they knew, could possibly write anythingremarkable. It was only Alice Mendon who listened with a frown ofwonder, and intent eyes upon the reader. When she came home upon oneoccasion, she remarked to her aunt, Eliza Mendon, and her cousin, Lucy Mendon, that she had been impressed by Annie Eustace's paper, but both women only stared and murmured assent. The cousin was verymuch older than Alice, and both she and her mother were of a placid, reflective type. They got on very well with Alice, but sometimes shehad a queer weariness from always seeing herself and her own ideas inthem instead of their own. And she was not in the least dictatorial. She would have preferred open, antagonistic originality, but she gota surfeit of clear, mirror-like peace. 

She was quite sure that they would quote her opinion of AnnieEustace's paper, but that did not please her. Later on she spoke toAnnie herself about it. "Haven't you something else written that youcan show me?" She had even suggested the possibility, thedesirability, of Annie's taking up a literary career, but she hadfound the girl very evasive, even secretive, and had never broachedthe subject again. 

As for Margaret Edes, she had never fairly listened to anything whichanybody except herself had written, unless it had afforded matter fordiscussion, and the display of her own brilliancy. Annie'sproductions were so modestly conclusive as to apparently afford nostanding ground for argument. In her heart, Margaret regarded them asshe regarded Annie's personality, with a contempt so indifferent thatit was hardly contempt. 

She proceeded exactly as if Annie had not made such a ferventdisclaimer. "The Zenith Club is the one and only thing which liftsFairbridge, and the women of Fairbridge, above the common herd, " saidshe majestically. 

"Don't I know it? Oh, Margaret, don't I know it, " cried the otherwith such feverish energy that Margaret regarded her wonderingly. Forall her exploiting of the Zenith Club of Fairbridge, she herself, unless she were the main figure at the helm, could realise nothing init so exceedingly inspiring, but it was otherwise with Annie. It wasquite conceivable that had it not been for the Zenith Club, she neverwould have grown to her full mental height. Annie Eustace had a mindof the sequential order. By subtle processes, unanalysable even byherself, even the record of Miss Bessy Dicky started this mind uponmomentous trains of thought. Unquestionably the Zenith Club acted asa fulminate for little Annie Eustace. To others it might seem, duringsome of the sessions, as a pathetic attempt of village women to raisethemselves upon tiptoes enough to peer over their centuries of weedyfeminine growth; an attempt which was as futile, and even ridiculous, as an attempt of a cow to fly. But the Zenith Club justified itsexistence nobly in the result of little Annie Eustace, if in noother, and it, no doubt, justified itself in others. Who can say whatthat weekly gathering meant to women who otherwise would not moveoutside their little treadmill of household labour, what uplifting, if seemingly futile grasps at the great outside of life? Let no oneunderrate the Women's Club until the years have proven itsuselessness. 

"I am so sorry about Lydia Greenway, " said Annie, and this time shedid not irritate Margaret. 

"It does seem as if one were simply doomed to failure every time onereally made an effort to raise standards, " said Margaret. 

Then it was that Annie all unconsciously sowed a seed which led tostrange, and rather terrifying results. "It would be nice, " saidlittle Annie, "if we could get Miss Martha Wallingford to read aselection from _Hearts Astray_ at a meeting of the club. I read a fewnights ago, in a paper I happened to pick up at Alice's, that she wasstaying in New York at the Hollingsgate. Her publishers were to giveher a dinner last night, I believe. "

Margaret Edes started. "I had not seen that, " she said. Then sheadded in a queer brooding fashion, "That book of hers had an enormoussale. I suppose her publishers feel that they owe it to her to giveher a good time in New York. Then, too, it will advertise _HeartsAstray_. "

"Did you like the book?" asked Annie rather irrelevantly. Margaretdid not reply. She was thinking intently. "It would be a greatfeature for the club if we could induce her to give a reading, " shesaid at length. 

"I don't suppose it would be possible, " replied Annie. "You know theysay she never does such things, and is very retiring. I read in thepapers that she was, and that she refused even to speak a few wordsat the dinner given in her honour. "

"We might ask her, " said Margaret. 

"I am sure that she would not come. The paper stated that she had hadmany invitations to Women's Clubs and had refused. I don't think sheought because she might be such a help to other women. "

Margaret said nothing. She leaned back, and, for once, her face wasactually contracted with thought to the possible detriment of itssmooth beauty. 

A clock in the house struck, and at the same time Maida and Adelaideraced up the steps, followed by gleeful calls from two little boys onthe sidewalk. 

"Where have you been?" asked Margaret. Then she said without waitingfor a reply, "If Martha Wallingford would come, I should prefer thatto Lydia Greenway. "

Maida and Adelaide, flushed and panting, and both with mouths full ofcandy, glanced at their mother, then Maida chased Adelaide into thehouse, their blue skirts flitting out of sight like blue butterflywings. 

Annie Eustace rose. She had noticed that neither Maida nor Adelaidehad greeted her, and thought them rude. She herself had been mostcarefully trained concerning manners of incoming and outgoing. She, however, did not care. She had no especial love for children unlessthey were small and appealing because of helplessness. 

"I must go, " she said. "It is six o'clock, supper will be ready. "She glanced rather apprehensively as she spoke at the large whitehouse, not two minutes' walk distant across the street. 

"How very delightful it is to be as punctual as your people are, "said Margaret. "Good-bye, Annie. " She spoke abstractedly, and Anniefelt a little hurt. She loved Margaret, and she missed her fullattention when she left her. She passed down the walk betweenMargaret's beautifully kept Japanese trees, and gained the sidewalk. Then a sudden recollection filled her with dismay. She had promisedher grandmother to go to the post-office before returning. Animportant business letter was expected. Annie swept the soft tail ofher muslin into a little crushed ball, and ran, her slender legsshowing like those of a young bird beneath its fluff of plumage. Sherealized the necessity of speed, of great speed, for the post-officewas a quarter of a mile away, and the Eustace family supped at fiveminutes past six, with terrible and relentless regularity. Why itshould have been five minutes past instead of upon the stroke of thehour, Annie had never known, but so it was. It was as great anoffence to be a minute too early as a minute too late at the Eustacehouse, and many a maid had been discharged for that offence, her pleathat the omelet was cooked and would fall if the meal be delayed, being disregarded. Poor Annie felt that she must hasten. She couldnot be dismissed like the maid, but something equally to be dreadedwould happen, were she to present herself half a minute behind timein the dining-room. There they would be seated, her grandmother, her Aunt Harriet, and her Aunt Jane. Aunt Harriet behind the silvertea service; Aunt Jane behind the cut glass bowl of preserves; hergrandmother behind the silver butter dish, and on the table would bethe hot biscuits cooling, the omelet falling, the tea drawing toolong and all because of her. There was tremendous etiquette in theEustace family. Not a cup of tea would Aunt Harriet pour, not a spoonwould Aunt Jane dip into the preserves, not a butter ball would hergrandmother impale upon the little silver fork. And poor Hannah, themaid, white aproned and capped, would stand behind Aunt Harriet likea miserable conscious graven image. Therefore Annie ran, and ran, andit happened that she ran rather heedlessly and blindly and droppedher mussy little package of fancy work, and Karl von Rosen, comingout of the parsonage, saw it fall and picked it up rather gingerly, and called as loudly as was decorous after the flying figure, butAnnie did not hear and Von Rosen did not want to shout, neither didhe want, or rather think it advisable, to run, therefore he followedholding the linen package well away from him, as if it were adisagreeable insect. He had never seen much of Annie Eustace. Nowand then he called upon one of her aunts, who avowed her preferencefor his religious denomination, but if he saw Annie at all, shewas seated engaged upon some such doubtfully ornamental or usefultask, as the specimen which he now carried. Truth to say, hehad scarcely noticed Annie Eustace at all. She had produced theeffect of shrinking from observation under some subtle shadow ofself-effacement. She was in reality a very rose of a girl, loving andsweet, and withal wonderfully endowed; but this human rose, dweltalways for Karl von Rosen, in the densest of bowers through which herbeauty and fragrance of character could not penetrate his senses. Undoubtedly also, although his masculine intelligence would havescouted the possibility of such a thing, Annie's dull, ill-made garbserved to isolate her. She also never came to church. That perfectlittle face with its expression of strange insight, must have arousedhis attention among his audience. But there was only the Aunt HarrietEustace, an exceedingly thin lady, present and always attired in richblacks. Karl von Rosen to-day walking as rapidly as became hisdignity, in pursuit of the young woman, was aware that he hardly feltat liberty to accost her with anything more than the greeting of theday. He eyed disapprovingly the parcel which he carried. It was avery dingy white, and greyish threads dangled from it. Von Rosenthought it a most unpleasant thing, and reflected with mild scorn andbewilderment concerning the manner of mind which could find amusementover such employment, for he divined that it was a specimen offeminine skill, called fancy work. 

Annie Eustace ran so swiftly with those long agile legs of hers thathe soon perceived that interception upon her return, and notovertaking, must ensue. He did not gain upon her at all, and he beganto understand that he was making himself ridiculous to possibleobservers in windows. He therefore slackened his pace, and met Annieupon her return. She had a letter in her hand and was advancing witha headlong rush, and suddenly she attracted him. He surrendered theparcel. "Thank you very much, " said Annie, "but I almost wish you hadnot found it. "

[Illustration: "I almost wish you had not found it"]

Von Rosen stared at her. Was she rude after all, this very prettygirl, who was capable of laughter. "You would not blame me if you hadto embroider daisies on that dreadful piece of linen, " said Anniewith a rueful glance at the dingy package. 

Von Rosen smiled kindly at her. "I don't blame you at all, " hereplied. "I can understand it must be a dismal task to embroiderdaisies. "

"It is, Mr. Von Rosen--" Annie hesitated. 

"Yes, " said Von Rosen encouragingly. 

"You know I never go to church. "

"Yes, " said Von Rosen mendaciously. He really did not know. In futurehe, however, would. 

"Well, I don't go because--" again Annie hesitated, while the youngman waited interrogatively. 

Then Annie spoke with force. "I would really like to gooccasionally, " she said, "I doubt if I would always care to. "

"No, I don't think you would, " assented Von Rosen with a queerdelight. 

"But I never can because--Grandmother is old and she has not muchleft in life, you know. "

"Of course. "

"It is all very well for people to talk about firesides, and knittingwork, and peaceful eyes of age fixed upon Heavenly homes, " saidAnnie, "but all old people are not like that. Grandma hates to knitalthough she does think I should embroider daisies, and she does liketo have me play pinocle with her Sunday mornings, when Aunt Harrietand Aunt Jane are out of the way. It is the only chance she hasduring the whole week you know because neither Aunt Harriet nor AuntJane approves of cards, and poor Grandma is so fond of them, it seemscruel not to play with her the one chance she has. "

"I think you are entirely right, " said Von Rosen with graveconviction and he was charmed that the girl regarded him as if he hadsaid nothing whatever unusual. 

"I have always been sure that it was right, " said Annie Eustace, "butI would like sometimes to go to church. "

"I really wish you could, " said Von Rosen, "and I would make anespecial effort to write a good sermon. "

"Oh, " said Annie, "Aunt Harriet often hears you preach one which shethinks very good. "

Von Rosen bowed. Suddenly Annie's shyness, reserve, whatever it was, seemed to overcloud her. The lovely red faded from her cheeks, thelight from her eyes. She lost her beauty in a great measure. Shebowed stiffly, saying: "I thank you very much, good evening, " andpassed on, leaving the young man rather dazed, pleased and yetdistinctly annoyed, and annoyed in some inscrutable fashion athimself. 

Then he heard shouts of childish laughter, and a scamper of childishfeet, and Maida and Adelaide Edes rushed past, almost jostling himfrom the sidewalk. Maida carried a letter, which her mother hadwritten, and dispatched to the last mail. And that letter wasdestined to be of more importance to Von Rosen than he knew. 

As for Annie Eustace, whose meeting with Von Rosen had, after herfirst lapse into the unconsciousness of mirth, disturbed her, as themeeting of the hero of a dream always disturbs a true maiden who hasnot lost through many such meetings the thrill of them, she hurriedhome trembling, and found everything just exactly as she knew itwould be. 

There sat Aunt Harriet perfectly motionless behind the silver teaservice, and although the cosy was drawn over the teapot, the teaseemed to be reproachfully drawing to that extent that Annie couldhear it. There sat Aunt Jane behind the cut glass bowl of preservedfruit, with the untouched silver spoon at hand. There sat hergrandmother behind the butter plate. There stood Hannah, white cappedand white aproned, holding the silver serving tray like a petrifiedstatue of severity, and not one of them spoke, but their silence, their dignified, reproachful silence was infinitely worse than atorrent of invective. How Annie wished they would speak. How shewished that she could speak herself, but she knew better than to evenoffer an excuse for her tardiness. Well she knew that the stonysilence which would meet that would be worse, much worse than this. So she slid into her place opposite her Aunt Jane, and began her owntask of dividing into sections the omelet which was quite flatbecause she was late, and seemed to reproach her in a miserable, low-down sort of fashion. 

However, there was in the girl's heart a little glint of youthfuljoy, which was unusual. She had met Mr. Von Rosen and had forgottenherself, that is at first, and he had looked kindly at her. There wasno foolish hope in little Annie Eustace's heart; there would be nospire of aspiration added to her dreams because of the meeting, butshe tasted the sweet of approbation, and it was a tonic which shesorely needed, and which inspired her to self-assertion in achildishly naughty and mischievous way. It was after supper thatevening, that Annie strolled a little way down the street, takingadvantage of Miss Bessy Dicky's dropping in for a call, to slinkunobserved out of her shadowy corner, for the Eustaces were fond ofsitting in the twilight. The wind had come up, the violent strongwind which comes out of the south, and Annie walked very near thebarberry hedge which surrounded Doctor Sturtevant's grounds, and thegreen muslin lashed against it to its undoing. When Annie returned, the skirt was devastated and Aunt Harriet decreed that it could notbe mended and must be given to the poor Joy children. There were manyof those children of a degenerate race, living on the outskirts ofFairbridge, and Annie had come to regard them as living effigies ofherself, since everything which she had outgrown or injured pastrepair, fell to them. "There will be enough to make two nice dressesfor Charlotte and Minnie Joy, " said Aunt Harriet, "and it will not bewasted, even if you have been so careless, Annie. "

Annie could see a vision of those two little Joy girls getting aboutin the remnants of her ghastly muslin, and she shuddered, althoughwith relief. 

"You had better wear your cross barred white muslin afternoons now, "said Aunt Harriet, and Annie smiled for that was a pretty dress. Shesmiled still more when Aunt Jane said that now as the cross-barredwhite was to be worn every day, another dress must be bought, and shementioned China silk--something which Annie had always longed toown--and blue, dull blue, --a colour which she loved. 

Just before she went to bed, Annie stood in the front doorway lookingout at the lovely moonlight and the wonderful shadows whichtransformed the village street, like the wings of angels, and sheheard voices and laughter from the Edes' house opposite. ThenMargaret began singing in her shrill piercing voice from which shehad hoped much, but which had failed to please, even at the ZenithClub. 

Annie adored Margaret, but she shrank before her singing voice. Ifshe had only known what was passing through the mind of the singerafter she went to bed that night, she would have shuddered more, forMargaret Edes was planning a possible _coup_ before which Annie, inspite of a little latent daring of her own, would have been aghast. 

Chapter V

The next morning Margaret announced herself as feeling so much betterthat she thought she would go to New York. She had several errands, she said, and the day was beautiful and the little change would doher good. She would take the train with her husband, but a differentferry, as she wished to go up town. Wilbur acquiesced readily. "It isa mighty fine morning, and you need to get out, " he said. Poor Wilburat this time felt guiltily culpable that he did not own a motor carin which his Margaret might take the air. He had tried to see his wayclear toward buying one, but in spite of a certain improvidence, thewhole nature of the man was intrinsically honest. He always ended hisconference with himself concerning the motor by saying that he couldnot possibly keep it running, even if he were to manage the firstcost, and pay regularly his other bills. He, however, felt it to be ashame to himself that it was so, and experienced a thrill of positivepain of covetousness, not for himself, but for his Margaret, when oneof the luxurious things whirled past him in Fairbridge. He, it wastrue, kept a very smart little carriage and horse, but that was notas much as Margaret should have. Every time Margaret seemed a littledull, or complained of headache, as she had done lately, he thoughtmiserably of that motor car, which was her right. Therefore when sheplanned any little trip like that of to-day, he was immeasurablypleased. At the same time he regarded her with a slightly bewilderedexpression, for in some subtle fashion, her face as she propoundedthe trifling plan, looked odd to him, and her voice also did notsound quite natural. However, he dismissed the idea at once as merefancy, and watched proudly the admiring glances bestowed upon her inthe Fairbridge station, while they were waiting for the train. Margaret had a peculiar knack in designing costumes which were atonce plain and striking. This morning she wore a black China silk, through the thin bodice of which was visible an under silk strewnwith gold disks. Her girdle was clasped with a gold buckle, and whenshe moved there were slight glimpses of a yellow silk petticoat. Herhat was black, but under the brim was tucked a yellow rose againsther yellow hair. Then to finish all, Margaret wore in the lace at herthroat, a great brooch of turquoise matrix, which matched her eyes. Her husband realised her as perfectly attired, although he did not inthe least understand why. He knew that his Margaret looked a woman ofanother race from the others in the station, in their tailoredskirts, and shirtwaists, with their coats over arm, and theirshopping bags firmly clutched. It was a warm morning, and feminineFairbridge's idea of a suitable costume for a New York shopping tripwas a tailored suit, and a shirtwaist, and as a rule, the shirtwaistdid not fit. Margaret never wore shirtwaists, --she understood thatshe was too short unless she combined a white skirt with a waist. Margaret would have broken a commandment with less hesitation thanshe would have broken the line of her graceful little figure with twoviolently contrasting colours. Mrs. Sturtevant in a grey skirt and anelaborate white waist, which emphasised her large bust, lookedridiculous beside this fair, elegant little Margaret, although herclothes had in reality cost more. Wilbur watched his wife as shetalked sweetly with the other woman, and his heart swelled with thepride of possession. When they were on the train and he sat byhimself in the smoker, having left Margaret with Mrs. Sturtevant, hisheart continued to feel warm with elation. He waited to assist hiswife off the train at Jersey City and realised it a trial that hecould not cross the river on the same ferry. Margaret despised thetube and he wished for the short breath of sea air which he would geton the Courtland ferry. He glanced after her retreating black skirtswith the glimpses of yellow, regretfully, before he turned his backand turned toward his own slip. And he glanced the more regretfullybecause this morning, with all his admiration of his wife, he had adim sense of something puzzling which arose like a cloud of mysterybetween them. 

Wilbur Edes sailing across the river had, however, no conception ofthe change which had begun in his little world. It was only a shakeof the kaleidoscope of an unimportant life, resulting in a differentcombination of atoms, but to each individual it would be a tremendousevent partaking of the nature of a cataclysm. That morning he hadseen upon Margaret's charming face an expression which made it seemas the face of a stranger. He tried to dismiss the matter from hismind. He told himself that it must have been the effect of the lightor that she had pinned on her hat at a different angle. Women are soperplexing, and their attire alters them so strangely. But WilburEdes had reason to be puzzled. Margaret had looked and really wasdifferent. In a little while she had become practically a differentwoman. Of course, she had only developed possibilities which hadalways been dormant within her, but they had been so dormant, thatthey had not been to any mortal perception endowed with life. Hitherto Margaret had walked along the straight and narrow way, sometimes, it is true, jostling circumstances and sometimes beingjostled by them, yet keeping to the path. Now she had turned her feetinto that broad way wherein there is room for the utmost self whichis in us all. Henceforth husband and wife would walk apart in aspiritual sense, unless there should come a revolution in thecharacter of the wife, who was the stepper aside. 

Margaret seated comfortably on the ferry boat, her little feetcrossed so discreetly that only a glimpse of the yellow fluff beneathwas visible, was conscious of a not unpleasurable exhilaration. Shemight and she might not be about to do something which would placeher distinctly outside the pale which had henceforth enclosed herlittle pleasance of life. Were she to cross that pale, she felt thatit might be distinctly amusing. Margaret was not a wicked woman, butvirtue, not virtue in the ordinary sense of the word, but straightwalking ahead according to the ideas of Fairbridge, had come to driveher at times to the verge of madness. Then, too, there was alwaysthat secret terrible self-love and ambition of hers, never satisfied, always defeated by petty weapons. Margaret, sitting as gracefully asa beautiful cat, on the ferry boat that morning realised thevindictive working of her claws, and her impulse to strike at herodds of life, and she derived therefrom an unholy exhilaration. 

She got her taxicab on the other side and leaned back, catchingfrequent glances of admiration, and rode pleasurably to the regalup-town hotel which was the home of Miss Martha Wallingford, while inthe city. She, upon her arrival, entered the hotel with an air whichcaused a stir among bell boys. Then she entered a reception room andsat down, disposing herself with slow grace. Margaret gazed about herand waited. There were only three people in the room, one man and twoladies, one quite young--a mere girl--the other from the resemblanceand superior age, evidently her mother. The man was young and almostvulgarly well-groomed. He had given a glance at Margaret as sheentered, a glance of admiration tempered with the consideration thatin spite of her grace and beauty, she was probably older thanhimself. Then he continued to gaze furtively at the young girl whosat demurely, with eyes downcast beneath a soft, wild tangle of darkhair, against which some pink roses and a blue feather on her hatshowed fetchingly. She was very well dressed, evidently awell-guarded young thing from one of the summer colonies. The mother, high corseted, and elegant in dark blue lines, which made only agraceful concession to age, without fairly admitting it, neverallowed one glance of the young man's to escape her. She also saw herslender young daughter with every sense in her body and mind. 

Margaret looked away from them. The elder woman had given her costumean appreciative, and herself a supercilious glance, which had beenmet with one which did not seem to recognise her visibility. Margaretwas not easily put down by another woman. She stared absently at theornate and weary decorations of the room. It was handsome, buttiresome, as everybody who entered realised, and as, no doubt, thedecorator had found out. It was a ready-made species of room, with noheart in it, in spite of the harmonious colour scheme and reallyartistic detail. 

Presently the boy with the silver tray entered and approachedMargaret. The young man stared openly at her. He began to wonder ifshe were not younger than he had thought. The girl never raised herdowncast eyes; the older woman cast one swift sharp glance at her. The boy murmured so inaudibly that Margaret barely heard, and sherose and followed him as he led the way to the elevator. MissWallingford, who was a young Western woman and a rising, if notalready arisen literary star, had signified her willingness toreceive Mrs. Wilbur Edes in her own private sitting-room. Margaretwas successful so far. She had pencilled on her card, "Can you see meon a matter of importance? I am not connected with the Press, " andthe young woman who esteemed nearly everything of importance, and wasafraid of the Press, had agreed at once to see her. Miss MarthaWallingford was staying in the hotel with an elderly aunt, againstwhose rule she rebelled in spite of her youth and shyness, whichapparently made it impossible for her to rebel against anybody, andthe aunt had retired stiffly to her bedroom when her niece saidpositively that she would see her caller. 

"You don't know who she is and I promised your Pa when we startedthat I wouldn't let you get acquainted with folks unless I knew allabout them, " the aunt had said and the niece, the risen star, had sether mouth hard. "We haven't seen a soul except those newspaper men, and I know everyone of them is married, and those two newspaper womenwho told about my sleeves being out of date, " said MarthaWallingford, "and this Mrs. Edes may be real nice. I'm going to seeher anyhow. We came so late in the season that I believe everybody inNew York worth seeing has gone away and this lady has come in fromthe country and it may lead to my having a good time after all. Ihaven't had much of a time so far, and you know it, Aunt Susan. "

"How you talk, Martha Wallingford! Haven't you been to the theatreevery night and Coney Island, and the Metropolitan and--everythingthere is to see?"

"There isn't much to see in New York anyway except the people, "returned the niece. "People are all I care for anyway, and I don'tcall the people I have seen worth counting. They only came to make alittle money out of me and my sleeves. I am glad I got this dress atMcCreery's. These sleeves are all right. If this Mrs. Edes should bea newspaper woman, she can't make fun of these sleeves anyway. "

"You paid an awful price for that dress, " said her aunt. 

"I don't care. I got such a lot for my book that I might as well havea little out of it, and you know as well as I do, Aunt Susan, thatSouth Mordan, Illinois, may be a very nice place, but it does notkeep up with New York fashions. I really did not have a decent thingto wear when I started. Miss Slocumb did as well as she knew how, buther ideas are about three years behind New York. I didn't knowmyself, how should I? And you didn't, and as for Pa, he would thinkeverything I had on was stylish if it dated back to the ark. Youought to have bought that mauve silk for yourself. You have moneyenough; you know you have, Aunt Susan. "

"I have money enough, thanks to my dear husband's saving all hislife, but it is not going to be squandered on dress by me, now he isdead and gone. "

"I would have bought the dress for you myself, then, " said the niece. 

"No, thank you, " returned the aunt with asperity. "I have never beenin the habit of being beholden to you for my clothes and I am notgoing to begin now. I didn't want that dress anyway. I always hatedpurple. "

"It wasn't purple, it was mauve. "

"I call purple, purple, I don't call it anything else!" Then theaunt retreated precipitately before the sound of the opening door andentrenched herself in her bedroom, where she stood listening. 

Margaret Edes treated the young author with the respect which shereally deserved, for talent she possessed in such a marked degree asto make her phenomenal, and the phenomenal is always entitled toconsideration of some sort. 

"Miss Wallingford?" murmured Margaret, and she gave an impression ofobeisance; this charming elegantly attired lady before the Westerngirl. Martha Wallingford coloured high with delight and admiration. 

"Yes, I am Miss Wallingford, " she replied and asked her caller to beseated. Margaret sat down facing her. The young author shuffled inher chair like a school girl. She was an odd combination of enormousegotism and the most painful shyness. She realised at a glance thatshe herself was provincial and pitifully at a disadvantage personallybefore this elegant vision, and her personality was in reality moreprecious to her than her talent. 

"I can not tell you what a great pleasure and privilege this is forme, " said Margaret, and her blue eyes had an expression of admiringrapture. The girl upon whom the eyes were fixed, blushed and giggledand tossed her head with a sudden show of pride. She quite agreedthat it was a pleasure and privilege for Margaret to see her, theauthor of _Hearts Astray_, even if Margaret was herself so charmingand so provokingly well dressed. Miss Martha Wallingford did not hideher light of talent under a bushel with all her shyness, which wasnot really shyness at all but a species of rather sullen pride andresentment because she was so well aware that she could not do wellthe things which were asked of her and had not mastered the art ofdress and self poise. 

Therefore, Martha, with the delight of her own achievements full uponher face, which was pretty, although untutored, regarded her visitorwith an expression which almost made Margaret falter. It was probablythe absurd dressing of the girl's hair which restored Margaret'sconfidence in her scheme. Martha Wallingford actually wore a frizzledbang, very finely frizzled too, and her hair was strained from thenape of her neck, and it seemed impossible that a young woman whoknew no better than to arrange her hair in such fashion, should notbe amenable to Margaret's plan. The plan, moreover, sounded verysimple, except for the little complications which might easily arise. Margaret smiled into the pretty face under the fuzz of short hair. 

"My dear Miss Wallingford, " said she, "I have come this morning tobeg a favour. I hope you will not refuse me, although I am such anentire stranger. If, unfortunately, my intimate friend, Mrs. Fay-Wyman, of whom I assume that you of course know, even if you havenot met her, as you may easily have done, or her daughter, Miss EdithFay-Wyman, had not left town last week for their country house, Rose-In-Flower, at Hyphen-by-the-Sea, a most delightful spot. Mr. Edes and I have spent several week ends there. I am prevented fromspending longer than week ends because I am kept at home by my twodarling twin daughters. Mrs. Fay-Wyman is a sweet woman and I do sowish I could have brought her here to-day. I am sure you would atonce fall madly in love with her and also with her daughter, MissEdith Fay-Wyman, such a sweet girl, and--" But here Margaret wasunexpectedly, even rudely interrupted by Miss Wallingford, who lookedat her indignantly. 

"I never fall in love with women, " stated that newly risen literarystar abruptly, "why should I? What does it amount to?"

"Oh, my dear, " cried Margaret, "when you are a little older you willfind that it amounts to very much. There is a soul sympathy, and--"

"I don't think that I care much about soul sympathy, " stated MissWallingford, who was beginning to be angrily bewildered by herguest's long sentences, which so far seemed to have no point as faras she herself was concerned. 

Margaret started a little. Again the doubt seized her if she were notmaking a mistake, undertaking more than she could well carry through, for this shy authoress was fast developing unexpected traits. However, Margaret, once she had started, was not easily turned back. She was as persistently clinging as a sweet briar. 

"Oh, my dear, " she said, and her voice was like trickling honey, "only wait until you are a little older and you will find that you docare, care very, very much. The understanding and sympathy of otherwomen will become very sweet to you. It is so pure and ennobling, sofree from all material taint. "

"I have seen a great many women who were perfect cats, " stated MissMartha Wallingford. 

"Wait until you are older, " said Margaret again and her voice seemedfairly dissolving into some spiritual liquid of divine sweetness. "Wait until you are older, my dear. You are very young, so young tohave accomplished a wonderful work which will live. "

"Oh, well, " said Martha Wallingford, and as she spoke she fixedpitiless shrewd young eyes upon the face of the other woman, whichdid not show at its best, in spite of veil and the velvety darknessof hat-shadow. This hotel sitting-room was full of garish crosslights. "Oh, well, " said Martha Wallingford, "of course, I don't knowwhat may happen if I live to be old, as old as you. "

Margaret Edes felt like a photograph proof before the slightestattempt at finish had been made. Those keen young eyes conveyed theimpression of convex mirrors. She restrained an instinctive impulseto put a hand before her face, she had an odd helpless sensationbefore the almost brutal, clear-visioned young thing. Again sheshrank a little from her task, again her spirit reasserted itself. She moved and brought her face somewhat more into the shadow. Thenshe spoke again. She wisely dropped the subject of feminineaffinities. She plunged at once into the object of her visit, whichdirectly concerned Miss Martha Wallingford, and Margaret, who was asastute in her way as the girl, knew that she was entirely right inassuming that Martha Wallingford was more interested in herself thananything else in the world. 

"My dear, " she said, "I may as well tell you at once why I intrudedupon you this morning. "

"Please do, " said Martha Wallingford. 

"As I said before, I deeply regret that I was unable to bring somewell-known person, Mrs. Fay-Wyman, for instance, to make usacquainted in due form, but--"

"Oh, I don't care a bit about that, " said Martha. "What is it?"

Margaret again started a little. She had not expected anything likethis. The mental picture which she had formed of Martha Wallingford, the young literary star, seemed to undergo a transformation akin toan explosion, out of which only one feature remained intact--thebook, "_Hearts Astray_. " If Miss Wallingford had not possessed afirm foundation in that volume, it is entirely possible that Margaretmight have abandoned her enterprise. As it was, after a little gaspshe went on. 

"I did so wish to assure you in person of my great admiration foryour wonderful book, " said she. Martha Wallingford made no reply. Shehad an expression of utter acquiescence in the admiration, also ofhaving heard that same thing so many times, that she was somewhatbored by it. She waited with questioning eyes upon Margaret's face. 

"And I wondered, " said Margaret, "if you would consider it tooinformal, if I ventured to beg you to be my guest at my home inFairbridge next Thursday and remain the weekend, over Sunday. Itwould give me so much pleasure, and Fairbridge is a charming littlevillage and there are really many interesting people there whom Ithink you would enjoy, and as for them--!" Margaret gave a slightroll to her eyes--"they would be simply overwhelmed. "

"I should like to come very much, thank you, " said MarthaWallingford. 

Margaret beamed. "Oh, my dear, " she cried, "I can not tell you howmuch joy your prompt and warm response gives me. And--" Margaretlooked about her rather vaguely, "you are not alone here, of course. You have a maid, or perhaps, your mother--"

"My Aunt Susan is with me, " said Miss Wallingford, "but there is nouse inviting her. She hates going away for a few days. She says it isjust as much trouble packing as it would be to go for a month. Thereis no use even thinking of her, but I shall be delighted to come. "

Margaret hesitated. "May I not have the pleasure of being presentedto your aunt?" she inquired. 

"Aunt Susan is out shopping, " lied Miss Martha Wallingford. AuntSusan was clad in a cotton crepe wrapper, and Martha knew that shewould think it quite good enough for her to receive anybody in, andthat she could not convince her to the contrary. It was only recentlythat Martha herself had become converted from morning wrappers, andthe reaction was violent. "The idea of a woman like this Mrs. Edesseeing Aunt Susan in that awful pink crepe wrapper!" she said toherself. She hoped Aunt Susan was not listening, and would not make aforcible entry into the room. Aunt Susan in moments of impulse wasquite capable of such coups. Martha glanced rather apprehensivelytoward the door leading into the bedroom but it did not open. AuntSusan was indeed listening and she was rigid with indignation, but intruth, she did not want to accompany her niece upon this projectedvisit, and she was afraid of being drawn into such a step should shepresent herself. Aunt Susan did dislike making the effort of a visitfor a few days only. Martha had told the truth. It was very hot, andthe elder woman was not very strong. Moreover, she perceived thatMartha did not want her and there would be the complication ofkicking against the pricks of a very determined character, which hadgrown more determined since her literary success. In fact, Aunt Susanstood in a slight awe of her niece since that success, for all herrevolts which were superficial. Therefore, she remained upon her sideof the door which she did not open until the visitor had departedafter making definite arrangements concerning trains and meetings. Then Aunt Susan entered the room with a cloud of pink crepe in herwake. 

"Who was that?" she demanded of Martha. 

"Mrs. Wilbur Edes, " replied her niece, and she aped Margaret toperfection as she added, "and a most charming woman, most charming. "

"What did she want you to do?" inquired the aunt. 

"Now, Aunt Susan, " replied the niece, "what is the use of going overit all? You heard every single thing she said. "

"I did hear her ask after me, " said the aunt unabashed, "and I heardyou tell a lie about it. You told her I had gone out shopping and youknew I was right in the next room. "

"I didn't mean to have you come in and see a woman dressed like thatone, in your wrapper. "

"What is the matter with my wrapper?"

Martha said nothing. 

"Are you going?" asked her aunt. 

"You know that too. "

"I don't know what your Pa would say, " remarked Aunt Susan, butrather feebly, for she had a vague idea that it was her duty toaccompany her niece and she was determined to shirk it. 

"I don't see how Pa can say much of anything since he is in SouthMordan, Illinois, and won't know about it, unless you telegraph, until next week, " said Martha calmly. "Now, come along, Aunt Susan, and get dressed. I have made up my mind to get that beautiful whitesilk dress we looked at yesterday. It did not need any alteration andI think I shall buy that pearl and amethyst necklace at Tiffany's. Iknow Mrs. Edes will have an evening party and there will begentlemen, and what is the use of my making so much money out of_Hearts Astray_ if I don't have a few things I want? Hurry and getdressed. "

"I don't see why this wrapper isn't plenty good enough for a fewerrands at two or three stores, " said the aunt sulkily, but sheyielded to Martha's imperative demand that she change her wrapper forher black satin immediately. 

Meantime Margaret on her way down town to the ferry was conscious ofa slight consternation at what she had done. She understood that inthis young woman was a feminine element which radically differed fromany which had come within her ken. She, however, was determined to goon. The next day invitations were issued to the Zenith Club for thefollowing Friday, from four to six, and also one to dinner thatevening to four men and five women. She planned for Sunday anautomobile ride; she was to hire the car from the Axminister garage, and a high tea afterward. Poor Margaret did all in her power to makeher scheme a success, but always she had that chilling doubt of herpower. Miss Martha Wallingford had impressed her as being a youngwoman capable of swift and unexpected movements. She was ratherafraid of her but she did not confess her fear to Wilbur. When heinquired genially what kind of a girl the authoress was, she replied:"Oh, charming, of course, but the poor child does not know how to doup her hair. " However, when Martha arrived Thursday afternoon andMargaret met her at the station, she, at a glance, discovered thatthe poor child had discovered how to do up her hair. Some persons'brains work in a great many directions and Martha Wallingford's wasone of them. Somehow or other, she had contrived to dispose of hertightly frizzed fringe, and her very pretty hair swept upward from aforehead which was both intellectual and beautiful. She was welldressed too. She had drawn heavily upon her royalty revenue. She hadworked hard and spent a good deal during the short time sinceMargaret's call, and her brain had served her body well. She steppedacross the station platform with an air. She carried no provincialbag--merely a dainty little affair mounted in gold which matched hergown--and she had brought a small steamer trunk. 

Margaret's heart sank more and more, but she conducted her visitor toher little carriage and ordered the man to drive home, and whenarrived there, showed Martha her room. She had a faint hope that theroom might intimidate this Western girl, but instead of intimidationthere was exultation. She looked about her very coolly, butafterward, upon her return to East Mordan, Illinois, she bragged agood deal about it. The room was really very charming and rathercostly. The furniture was genuine First Empire; the walls, which werehung with paper covered with garlands of roses, were decorated withold engravings; there was a quantity of Dresden ware and there was alittle tiled bathroom. Over a couch in the bedroom lay a kimona ofwhite silk embroidered with pink roses. Afterward Martha made cruelfun of her Aunt's pink crepe and made her buy a kimona. 

"Shall I send up my maid to assist you in unpacking, MissWallingford?" inquired Margaret, inwardly wondering how the dinnerwould be managed if the offer were accepted. To her relief, Marthagave her an offended stare. "No, thank you, Mrs. Edes, " said she, "Inever like servants, especially other peoples', mussing up mythings. "

When Margaret had gone, Martha looked about her, and her mouth wasfrankly wide open. She had never seen such exquisite daintiness andit daunted her, although she would have died rather than admit it. She thought of her own bedroom at home in East Mordan, Illinois, withits old black walnut chamber set and framed photographs and chromos, but she maintained a sort of defiant pride in it even to herself. InMartha Wallingford's character there was an element partaking of thenature of whalebone, yielding, but practically unbreakable, andsometimes wholly unyielding. Martha proceeded to array herself fordinner. She had not a doubt that it would be a grand affair. Shetherefore did not hesitate about the white silk, which was a robe ofsuch splendour that it might not have disgraced a court. It showed agreat deal of her thin, yet pretty girlish neck, and it had a verylong train. She had a gold fillet studded with diamonds for herhair--that hair which was now dressed according to the very latestmode--a mode which was startling, yet becoming, and she claspedaround her throat the Tiffany necklace, and as a crowning touch, puton long white gloves. When she appeared upon the verandah whereMargaret sat dressed in a pretty lingerie gown with Wilbur in a lightgrey business suit, the silence could be heard. Then there was onedouble gasp of admiration from Maida and Adelaide in their whitefrocks and blue ribbons. They looked at the visitor with positiveadoration, but she flushed hotly. She was a very quick-witted girl. Margaret recovered herself, presented Wilbur, and shortly, they wentin to dinner, but it was a ghastly meal. Martha Wallingford in herunsuitable splendour was frankly, as she put it afterward, "hoppingmad, " and Wilbur was unhappy and Margaret aghast, although apparentlyquite cool. There was not a guest besides Martha. The dinner wassimple. Afterward it seemed too farcical to ask a guest attired likea young princess to go out on the verandah and lounge in a wickerchair, while Wilbur smoked. Then Annie Eustace appeared and Margaretwas grateful. "Dear Annie, " she said, after she had introduced thetwo girls, "I am so glad you came over. Come in. "

"It is pleasanter on the verandah, isn't it?" began Annie, then shecaught Margaret's expressive glance at the magnificent white silk. They all sat stiffly in Margaret's pretty drawing-room. Martha saidshe didn't play bridge and upon Annie's timid suggestion of pinocle, said she had never heard of it. Wilbur dared not smoke. All thatwretched evening they sat there. The situation was too much forMargaret, that past mistress of situations, and her husband wasconscious of a sensation approaching terror and also wrath wheneverhe glanced at the figure in sumptuous white, the figure expressingsulkiness in every feature and motion. Margaret was unmistakablysulky as the evening wore on and nobody came except this other girlof whom she took no notice at all. She saw that she was pretty, herhair badly arranged and she was ill-dressed, and that was enough forher. She felt it to be an insult that these people had invited herand asked nobody to meet her, Martha Wallingford, whose name was inall the papers, attired in this wonderful white gown. When AnnieEustace arose to go, she arose too with a peremptory motion. 

"I rather guess I will go to bed, " said Martha Wallingford. 

"You must be weary, " said Margaret. 

"I am not tired, " said Martha Wallingford, "but it seems to me asdull here as in South Mordan, Illinois. I might as well go to bed andto sleep as sit here any longer. "

When Margaret had returned from the guest room, her husband looked ather almost in a bewildered fashion. Margaret sank wearily into achair. "Isn't she impossible?" she whispered. 

"Did she think there was a dinner party?" Wilbur inquiredperplexedly. 

"I don't know. It was ghastly. I did not for a moment suppose shewould dress for a party, unless I told her, and it is Emma's nightoff and I could not ask people with only Clara to cook and wait. "

Wilbur patted his wife's shoulder comfortingly. "Never mind, dear, "he said, "when she gets her chance to do her to-morrow's stunt atyour club, she will be all right. "

Margaret shivered a little. She had dared say nothing to Martha aboutthat "stunt. " Was it possible that she was making a horriblemistake?

The next day, Martha was still sulky but she did not, as Margaretfeared, announce her intention of returning at once to New York. Margaret said quite casually that she had invited a few of thebrightest and most interesting people in Fairbridge to meet her thatafternoon and Martha became curious, although still resentful, andmade no motion to leave. She, however, resolved to make no furthermistakes as to costume, and just as the first tide of the Zenith Clubbroke over Margaret's threshold, she appeared clad in one of herSouth Mordan, Illinois, gowns. It was one which she had tucked intoher trunk in view of foul weather. It was a hideous thing made fromtwo old gowns. It had a garish blue tunic reaching well below thehips and a black skirt bordered with blue. Martha had had it madeherself from a pattern after long study of the fashion plates in aSunday newspaper and the result, although startling, still halfconvinced her. It was only after she had seen all the members of theZenith Club seated and had gazed at their costumes, that she realisedthat she had made a worse mistake than that of the night before. Tobegin with, the day was very warm and her gown heavy and clumsy. Theother ladies were arrayed in lovely lingeries or light silks andlaces. The Zenith Club was exceedingly well dressed on that day. Martha sat in her place beside her hostess and her face looked like asulky child's. Her eye-lids were swollen, her pouting lips dropped atthe corners. She stiffened her chin until it became double. Margaretwas inwardly perturbed but she concealed it. The programme went onwith the inevitable singing by Miss MacDonald and Mrs. Wells, theplaying by Mrs. Jack Evarts, the recitation by Sally Anderson. Margaret had not ventured to omit those features. Then, Mrs. Sturtevant read in a trembling voice a paper on Emerson. ThenMargaret sprang her mines. She rose and surveyed her audience withsmiling impressiveness. "Ladies, " she said, and there was animmediate hush, "Ladies, I have the pleasure, the exceeding pleasureof presenting you to my guest, Miss Martha Wallingford, the author of_Hearts Astray_. She will now speak briefly to you upon her motive inwriting and her method of work. " There was a soft clapping of hands. Margaret sat down. She was quite pale. Annie Eustace regarded herwonderingly. What had happened to her dear Margaret?

The people waited. Everybody stared at Miss Martha Wallingford whohad written that great seller, _Hearts Astray_. Martha Wallingfordsat perfectly still. Her eyes were so downcast that they gave theappearance of being closed. Her pretty face looked red and swollen. Everybody waited. She sat absolutely still and made no sign exceptthat of her obstinate face of negation. Margaret bent over her andwhispered. Martha did not even do her the grace of a shake of thehead. 

Everybody waited again. Martha Wallingford sat so still that she gavethe impression of a doll made without speaking apparatus. It did notseem as if she could even wink. Then Alice Mendon, who dislikedMargaret Edes and had a shrewd conjecture as to the state of affairs, but who was broad in her views, pitied Margaret. She arose withconsiderable motion and spoke to Daisy Shaw at her right, and brokethe ghastly silence, and immediately everything was in motion andrefreshments were being passed, but Martha Wallingford, who hadwritten _Hearts Astray_, was not there to partake of them. She was inher room, huddled in a chair upholstered with cream silk strewn withroses; and she was in one of the paroxysms of silent rage whichbelonged to her really strong, although undisciplined nature, andwhich was certainly in this case justified to some degree. 

"It was an outrage, " she said to herself. She saw through it all now. She had refused to speak or to read before all those women's clubsand now this woman had trapped her, that was the word for it, trappedher. 

As she sat there, her sullenly staring angry eyes saw in largeletters at the head of a column in a morning paper on the tablebeside her, "'_The Poor Lady_, ' the greatest anonymous novel of theyear. "

Then she fell again to thinking of her wrongs and planning how sheshould wreak vengeance upon Margaret Edes. 

Chapter VI

Martha Wallingford was a young person of direct methods. She scornedsubterfuges. Another of her age and sex might have gone to bed with aheadache, not she. She sat absolutely still beside her window, quitein full view of the departing members of the Zenith Club, had theytaken the trouble to glance in that direction, and some undoubtedlydid, and she remained there; presently she heard her hostess's tinyrap on the door. Martha did not answer, but after a repeated rap andwait, Margaret chose to assume that she did, and entered. Margaretknelt in a soft flop of scented lingerie beside the indignant youngthing. She explained, she apologised, she begged, she implored Marthato put on that simply ravishing gown which she had worn the eveningbefore; she expatiated at length upon the charms of the people whomshe had invited to dinner, but Martha spoke not at all until she wasquite ready. Then she said explosively, "I won't. "

She was silent after that. Margaret recognised the futility offurther entreaties. She went down stairs and confided in Wilbur. "Inever saw such an utterly impossible girl, " she said; "there she sitsand won't get dressed and come down to dinner. "

"She is a freak, must be, most of these writer people are freaks, "said Wilbur sympathetically. "Poor old girl, and I suppose you havegot up a nice dinner too. "

"A perfectly charming dinner and invited people to meet her. "

"How did she do her stunt this afternoon?"

Margaret flushed. "None too well, " she replied. 

"Oh, well, dear, I don't see how you are to blame. "

"I can say that Miss Wallingford is not well, I suppose, " saidMargaret, and that was what she did say, but with disastrous results. 

Margaret, ravishing in white lace, sprinkled with little goldbutterflies, had taken her place at the head of her table. Emma wasserving the first course and she was making her little speechconcerning the unfortunate indisposition of her guest of honour whenshe was suddenly interrupted by that guest herself, an image of sulkywrath, clad in the blue and black costume pertaining to South Mordan, Illinois. 

"I am perfectly well. She is telling an awful whopper, " proclaimedthis amazing girl. "I won't dress up and come to dinner because Iwon't. She trapped me into a woman's club this afternoon and tried toget me to make a speech without even telling me what she meant to doand now I won't do anything. "

With that Miss Wallingford disappeared and unmistakable stamps wereheard upon the stairs. One woman giggled convulsively; another took aglass of water and choked. A man laughed honestly. Wilbur was quitepale. Margaret was imperturbable. Karl von Rosen, who was one of theguests and who sat behind Annie Eustace, looked at Margaret withwonder. "Was this the way of women?" he thought. He did not doubt forone minute that the Western girl had spoken the truth. It had beenbrutal and homely, but it had been the truth. Little Annie Eustace, who had been allowed to come to a dinner party for the first time inher life and who looked quite charming in an old, much mended, butvery fine India muslin and her grandmother's corals, did not, on thecontrary, believe one word of Miss Wallingford's. 

Her sympathy was all with her Margaret. It was a horrible situationand her dear Margaret was the victim of her own hospitality. Shelooked across the table at Alice Mendon for another sympathiser, butAlice was talking busily to the man at her right about a new book. She had apparently not paid much attention. Annie wondered how itcould have escaped her. That horrid girl had spoken so loudly. Shelooked up at Von Rosen. "I am so sorry for poor Margaret, " shewhispered. Von Rosen looked down at her very gently. This littlegirl's belief in her friend was like a sacred lily, not to be touchedor soiled. 

"Yes, " he said and Annie smiled up at him comfortably. Von Rosen wasglad she sat beside him. He thought her very lovely, and there was asubtle suggestion of something besides loveliness. He thought thatdaintily mended India muslin exquisite, and also the carvedcorals, --bracelets on the slender wrists, a necklace--resting like aspray of flowers on the girlish neck, a comb in the soft hair whichAnnie had arranged becomingly and covered from her aunt's sight witha lace scarf. She felt deceitful about her hair, but how could shehelp it?

The dinner was less ghastly than could have been expected after therevelation of the guest of honour and the blank consternation of thehost, who made no attempt to conceal his state of mind. Poor Wilburhad no society tricks. Alice Mendon, who was quite cognizant of thewhole matter, but was broad enough to leap to the aid of anotherwoman, did much. She had quite a talent for witty stories and agoodly fund of them. The dinner went off very well, while MarthaWallingford ate hers from a dinner tray in her room and felt thatevery morsel was sweetened with righteous revenge. 

The next morning she left for New York and Margaret did not attemptto detain her although she had a lunch party planned besides theSunday festivities. Margaret had had a scene with Wilbur after thedeparture of the guests the previous evening. For the first time inher experience, the devoted husband had turned upon his goddess. Hehad asked, "Was it true, what that girl said?" and Margaret hadlaughed up at him bewitchingly to no effect. Wilbur's face was verystern. 

"My dear, " said Margaret, "I knew perfectly well that if I actuallyasked her to speak or read, she would have refused. "

"You have done an unpardonable thing, " said the man. "You havebetrayed your own sense of honour, your hospitality toward the guestunder your roof. "

Margaret laughed as she took an ornament from her yellow head but thelaugh was defiant and forced. In her heart she bitterly resented herhusband's attitude and more bitterly resented the attitude of respectinto which it forced her. "It is the very last time I ask a Westernauthoress to accept my hospitality, " said she. 

"I hope so, " said Wilbur gravely. 

That night Karl von Rosen walked home with Annie Eustace. She hadcome quite unattended, as was the wont of Fairbridge ladies. Thatlong peaceful Main Street lined with the homes of good people alwaysseemed a safe thoroughfare. Annie was even a little surprised whenVon Rosen presented himself and said, "I will walk home with you, Miss Eustace, with your permission. "

"But I live a quarter of a mile past your house, " said Annie. 

Von Rosen laughed. "A quarter of a mile will not injure me, " he said. 

"It will really be a half mile, " said Annie. She wanted very muchthat the young man should walk home with her, but she was very muchafraid of making trouble. She was relieved when he only laughed againand said something about the beauty of the night. It was really awonderful night and even the eyes of youth, inhabiting it with fairydreams, were not essential to perceive it. 

"What flower scent is that?" asked Von Rosen. 

"I think, " replied Annie, "that it is wild honeysuckle, " and hervoice trembled slightly. The perfumed night and the strange presencebeside her went to the child's head a bit. The two walked along underthe trees, which cast etching-like shadows in the broad moonlight, and neither talked much. There was scarcely a lighted window in anyof the houses and they had a delicious sense of isolation, --the girland the man awake in a sleeping world. Annie made no further allusionto Miss Wallingford. She had for almost the first time in her life alittle selfish feeling that she did not wish to jar a perfect momenteven with the contemplation of a friend's troubles. She was veryhappy walking beside Von Rosen, holding up her flimsy embroideredskirts carefully lest they come in contact with dewy grass. She hadbeen admonished by her grandmother and her aunts so to do andreminded that the frail fabric would not endure much washing howeverskilful. Between the shadows, her lovely face showed like a whiteflower as Von Rosen looked down upon it. He wondered more and morethat he had never noticed this exquisite young creature before. Hedid not yet dream of love in connection with her, but he wasconscious of a passion of surprised admiration and protectiveness. 

"How is it that I have never seen you when I call on your AuntHarriet?" he asked when he parted with her at her own gate, a statelywrought iron affair in a tall hedge of close trimmed lilac. 

"I am generally there, I think, " replied Annie, but she was alsoconscious of a little surprise that she had not paid more attentionwhen this young man, who looked at her so kindly, called. Then cameone of her sudden laughs. 

"What is it?" asked Von Rosen. 

"Oh, nothing, except that the cat is usually there too, " repliedAnnie. Von Rosen looked back boyishly. 

"Be sure I shall see you next time and hang the cat, " he said. 

When Annie was in her room unclasping her corals, she considered howvery much mortified and troubled her friend, Margaret Edes, mustfeel. She recalled how hideous it had all been--that appearance ofthe Western girl in the dining-room door-way, her rude ways, herflushed angry face. Annie did not dream of blaming Margaret. She wasalmost a fanatic as far as loyalty to her friends was concerned. Sheloved Margaret and she had only a feeling of cold dislike anddisapprobation toward Miss Wallingford who had hurt Margaret. As forthat charge of "trapping, " she paid no heed to it whatever. She madeup her mind to go and see Margaret the very next day and tell her asecret, a very great secret, which she was sure would comfort her andmake ample amends to her for all her distress of the night before. Little Annie Eustace was so very innocent and ignorant of the ways ofthe world that had her nearest and dearest been able to look into herheart of hearts, they might have been appalled, incredulous andreverent, according to their natures. For instance, this very good, simple young girl who had been born with the light of genius alwaysassumed that her friends would be as delighted at any good fortune ofhers as at their own. She fairly fed upon her admiration of AliceMendon that evening when she had stepped so nobly and tactfully intothe rather frightful social breach and saved, if not wholly, thesituation. 

"Alice was such a dear, " she thought, and the thought made her facefairly angelic. Then she recalled how lovely Alice had looked, andher own mobile face took on unconsciously Alice's expression. Standing before her looking-glass brushing out her hair, she sawreflected, not her own beautiful face between the lustrous folds, butAlice's. Then she recalled with pride Margaret's imperturbabilityunder such a trial. "Nobody but Margaret could have carried off suchan insult under her own roof too, " she thought. 

After she was in bed and her lamp blown out and the white moon-beamswere entering her open windows like angels, she, after saying herprayers, thought of the three, Margaret, Alice, and Karl von Rosen. Then suddenly a warm thrill passed over her long slender body but itseemed to have its starting point in her soul. She saw verydistinctly the young man's dark handsome face, but she thought, "Howabsurd of me, to see him so distinctly, as distinctly as I seeMargaret and Alice, when I love them so much, and I scarcely know Mr. Von Rosen. " Being brought up by one's imperious grandmother and twoimperious aunts and being oneself naturally of an obedientdisposition and of a slowly maturing temperament, tends to lengthenthe long childhood of a girl. Annie was almost inconceivably a child, much more of a child than Maida or Adelaide Edes. They had beenallowed to grow like weeds as far as their imagination was concerned, and she had been religiously pruned. 

The next afternoon she put on her white barred muslin and obtainedher Aunt Harriet's permission to spend an hour or two with Margaretif she would work assiduously on her daisy centre piece, and steppedlike a white dove across the shady village street. Annie, unless sheremembered to do otherwise, was prone to toe in slightly with herslender feet. She was also prone to allow the tail of her white gownto trail. She gathered it up only when her Aunt called after her. Shefound Margaret lying indolently in the hammock which was strungacross the wide shaded verandah. She was quite alone. Annie had seenwith relief Miss Martha Wallingford being driven to the station thatmorning and the express following with her little trunk. Margaretgreeted Annie a bit stiffly but the girl did not notice it. She wasso full of her ignorant little plan to solace her friend with her ownjoy. Poor Annie did not understand that it requires a nature seldommet upon this earth, to be solaced, under disappointment and failure, by another's joy. Annie had made up her mind to say very little toMargaret about what had happened the evening before. Only at first, she remarked upon the beauty of the dinner, then she said quitecasually, "Dear Margaret, we were all so sorry for poor MissWallingford's strange conduct. "

"It really did not matter in the least, " replied Margaret coldly. "Ishall never invite her again. "

"I am sure nobody can blame you, " said Annie warmly. "I don't want tosay harsh things, you know that, Margaret, but that poor girl, inspite of her great talent, cannot have had the advantage of goodhome-training. "

"Oh, she is Western, " said Margaret. "How very warm it is to-day. "

"Very, but there is quite a breeze here. "

"A hot breeze, " said Margaret wearily. "How I wish we could afford ahouse at the seashore or the mountains. The hot weather does get onmy nerves. "

A great light of joy came into Annie's eyes. "Oh, Margaret dear, " shesaid, "I can't do it yet but it does look as if some time before longperhaps, I may be able myself to have a house at the seashore. Ithink Sudbury beach would be lovely. It is always cool there, andthen you can come and stay with me whenever you like during the hotweather. I will have a room fitted up for you in your favourite whiteand gold and it shall be called Margaret's room and you can alwayscome, when you wish. "

Margaret looked at the other girl with a slow surprise. "I do notunderstand, " said she. 

"Of course, you don't. You know we have only had enough to live hereas we have done, " said Annie with really childish glee, "but oh, Margaret, you will be so glad. I have not told you before but now Imust for I know it will make you so happy, and I know I can trust younever to betray me, for it is a great secret, a very great secret, and it must not be known by other people at present. I don't knowjust when it can be known, perhaps never, certainly not now. "

Margaret looked at her with indifferent interrogation. Annie did notrealise how indifferent. A flood-tide of kindly joyful emotion doesnot pay much attention to its banks. Annie continued. She lookedsweetly excited; her voice rose high above its usual pitch. "Youunderstand, Margaret dear, how it is, " she said. "You see I am quiteunknown, that is, my name is quite unknown, and it would reallyhinder the success of a book. "

Margaret surveyed her with awakening interest. "A book?" said she. 

"Yes, a book! Oh, Margaret, I know it will be hard for you tobelieve, but you know I am very truthful. I--I wrote the book theyare talking about so much now. You know what I mean?"

"Not the--?"

"Yes, _The Poor Lady_, --the anonymous novel which people are talkingso much about and which sold better than any other book last week. Iwrote it. I really did, Margaret. "

"You wrote it!"

Annie continued almost wildly. "Yes, I did, I did!" she cried, "andyou are the only soul that knows except the publishers. They saidthey were much struck with the book but advised anonymouspublication, my name was so utterly unknown. "

"You wrote _The Poor Lady_?" said Margaret. Her eyes glittered, andher lips tightened. Envy possessed her, but Annie Eustace did notrecognise envy when she saw it. 

Annie went on in her sweet ringing voice, almost producing the effectof a song. She was so happy, and so pleased to think that she wasmaking her friend happy. 

"Yes, " she said, "I wrote it. I wrote _The Poor Lady_. "

"If, " said Margaret, "you speak quite so loud, you will be heard byothers. "

Annie lowered her voice immediately with a startled look. "Oh, " shewhispered. "I would not have anybody hear me for anything. "

"How did you manage?" asked Margaret. 

Annie laughed happily. "I fear I have been a little deceitful, " shesaid, "but I am sure they will forgive me when they know. I keep ajournal; I have always kept one since I was a child. Aunt Harrietwished me to do so. And the journal was very stupid. So littleunusual happens here in Fairbridge, and I have always been ratherloath to write very much about my innermost feelings or very muchabout my friends in my journal because of course one can never tellwhat will happen. It has never seemed to me quite delicate--to keep avery full journal, and so there was in reality very little to write. "Annie burst into a peal of laughter. "It just goes this way, thejournal, " she said. "To-day is pleasant and warm. This morning Ihelped Hannah preserve cherries. In the afternoon I went over toMargaret's and sat with her on the verandah, embroidered two daisiesand three leaves with stems on my centre piece, came home, hadsupper, sat in the twilight with Grandmother, Aunt Harriet and AuntSusan. Went upstairs, put on my wrapper and read until it was time togo to bed. Went to bed. Now that took very little time and was notinteresting and so, after I went upstairs, I wrote my entry in thejournal in about five minutes and then I wrote _The Poor Lady_. Ofcourse, when I began it, I was not at all sure that it would amountto anything. I was not sure that any publisher would look at it. Sometimes I felt as if I were doing a very foolish thing: spendingtime and perhaps deceiving Grandmother and my aunts very wickedly, though I was quite certain that if the book should by any chancesucceed, they would not think it wrong. 

"Grandmother is very fond of books and so is Aunt Harriet, and I haveoften heard them say they wished I had been a boy in order that Imight do something for the Eustace name. You know there have been somany distinguished professional men in the Eustace family and they ofcourse did not for one minute think a girl like me could do anythingand I did not really think so myself. Sometimes I wonder how I hadthe courage to keep on writing when I was so uncertain but it wasexactly as if somebody were driving me. When I had the book finished, I was so afraid it ought to be typewritten, but I could not managethat. At least I thought I could not, but after awhile I did, and ina way that nobody suspected, Aunt Harriet sent me to New York. Youknow I am not often allowed to go alone but it was when Grandmotherhad the grippe and Aunt Susan the rheumatism and Aunt Harriet had anumber of errands and so I went on the Twenty-third Street ferry, anddid not go far from Twenty-third Street and I took my book in myhandbag and carried it into Larkins and White's and I saw Mr. Larkinsin his office and he was very kind and polite, although I think nowhe was laughing a little to himself at the idea of my writing a book, but he said to leave the MSS. And he would let me hear. And I left itand, oh, Margaret, I heard within a week, and he said such lovelythings about it. You know I always go to the post-office, so therewas no chance of anybody's finding it out that way. And then theproof began to come and I was at my wits' end to conceal that, but Idid. And then the book was published, and, Margaret, you know therest. Nobody dreams who wrote it, and I have had a statement and oh, my dear, next November I am to have a check. " (Annie leaned over andwhispered in Margaret's ear. ) "Only think, " she said with a burst ofrapture. 

Margaret was quite pale. She sat looking straight before her with astrange expression. She was tasting in the very depths of her soul abitterness which was more biting than any bitter herb which ever grewon earth. It was a bitterness, which, thank God, is unknown to many;the bitterness of the envy of an incapable, but self-seeking nature, of one with the burning ambition of genius but destitute of thedivine fire. To such come unholy torture, which is unspeakable at theknowledge of another's success. Margaret Edes was inwardly writhing. To think that Annie Eustace, little Annie Eustace, who had worshippedat her own shrine, whom she had regarded with a lazy, scarcelyconcealed contempt, for her incredible lack of wordly knowledge, herprovincialism, her ill-fitting attire, should have achieved a triumphwhich she herself could never achieve. A cold hatred of the girlswept over the woman. She forced her lips into a smile, but her eyeswere cruel. 

"How very interesting, my dear, " she said. 

Poor Annie started. She was acute, for all her innocent trust inanother's goodness, and the tone of her friend's voice, the look inher eyes chilled her. And yet she did not know what they signified. She went on begging for sympathy and rejoicing with her joy as achild might beg for a sweet. "Isn't it perfectly lovely, Margaretdear?" she said. 

"It is most interesting, my dear child, " replied Margaret. 

Annie went on eagerly with the details of her triumph, the book saleswhich increased every week, the revises, the letters from herpublishers, and Margaret listened smiling in spite of her torture, but she never said more than "How interesting. "

At last Annie went home and could not help feeling disappointed, although she could not fathom the significance of Margaret'sreception of her astonishing news. Annie only worried because shefeared lest her happiness had not cheered her friend as much as shehad anticipated. 

"Poor Margaret, she must feel so very bad that nothing can reconcileher to such a betrayal of her hospitality, " she reflected as sheflitted across the street. There was nobody in evidence at her houseat window or on the wide verandah. Annie looked at her watch tuckedin her girdle, hung around her neck by a thin gold chain which hadbelonged to her mother. It yet wanted a full hour of supper time. Shehad time to call on Alice Mendon and go to the post-office. Alicelived on the way to the post-office, in a beautiful old colonialhouse. Annie ran along the shady sidewalk and soon had a glimpse ofAlice's pink draperies on her great front porch. Annie ran down thedeep front yard between the tall box bushes, beyond which bloomed ina riot of colour and perfume roses and lilies and spraying heliotropeand pinks and the rest of their floral tribe all returned to theirdance of summer. Alice's imposing colonial porch was guarded oneither side of the superb circling steps by a stone lion from overseas. On the porch was a little table and several chairs. Alice satin one reading. She was radiant in her pink muslin. Alice seldom worewhite. She was quite sensible as to the best combinations of herselfwith colours although she had, properly speaking, no vanity. Shearranged herself to the best advantage as she arranged a flower in avase. On the heavily carved mahogany table beside her was a blue andwhite India bowl filled with white roses and heliotrope and lemonverbena. Annie inhaled the bouquet of perfume happily as she came upthe steps with Alice smiling a welcome at her. Annie had worshippedmore fervently at Margaret Edes' shrine than at Alice's and yet shehad a feeling of fuller confidence in Alice. She was about to tellAlice about her book, not because Alice needed the comfort of her joybut because she herself, although unknowingly, needed Alice's readysympathy of which she had no doubt. Her interview with Margaret hadleft the child hurt and bewildered and now she came to Alice. Alicedid not rise and kiss her. Alice seldom kissed anybody but sheradiated kindly welcome. 

"Sit down, little Annie, " she said, "I am glad you have come. My auntand cousin have gone to New York and I have been alone all day. Wewould have tea and cake but _I_ know the hour of your Medes andPersians' supper approaches instead of my later dinner. "

"Yes, " said Annie, sitting down, "and if I were to take tea and cakenow, Alice, I could eat nothing and grandmother and my aunts are veryparticular about my clearing my plate. "

Alice laughed, but she looked rather solicitously at the girl. "Iknow, " she said, then she hesitated. She pitied little Annie Eustaceand considered her rather a victim of loving but mistaken tyranny. "Iwish, " she said, "that you would stay and dine with me to-night. "

Annie fairly gasped. "They expect me at home, " she replied. 

"I know, and I suppose if I were to send over and tell them you woulddine with me, it would not answer. "

Annie looked frightened. "I fear not, Alice. You see they would havehad no time to think it over and decide. "

"Yes, I suppose so. "

"I have time to make you a little call and stop at the post-officefor the last mail and get home just in time for supper. "

"Oh, well, you must come and dine with me a week from to-day, and Iwill have a little dinner-party, " said Alice. "I will invite somenice people. We will have Mr. Von Rosen for one. "

Annie suddenly flushed crimson. It occurred to her that Mr. Von Rosenmight walk home with her as he had done from Margaret's, and alonging and terror at once possessed her. 

Alice wondered at the blush. 

"I was so sorry for poor Margaret last night, " Annie said with anabrupt change of subject. 

"Yes, " said Alice. 

"That poor Western girl, talented as she is, must have been oddlybrought up to be so very rude to her hostess, " said Annie. 

"I dare say Western girls are brought up differently, " said Alice. 

Annie was so intent with what she had to tell Alice that she did notrealise the extreme evasiveness of the other's manner. 

"Alice, " she said. 

"Well, little Annie Eustace?"

Annie began, blushed, then hesitated. 

"I am going to tell you something. I have told Margaret. I have justtold her this afternoon. I thought it might please her and comforther after that terrible scene at her dinner last night, but nobodyelse knows except the publishers. "

"What is it?" asked Alice, regarding Annie with a little smile. 

"Nothing, only I wrote _The Poor Lady_, " said Annie. 

"My dear Annie, I knew it all the time, " said Alice. 

Annie stared at her. "How?"

"Well, you did not know it, but you did repeat in that book verbatim, ad literatim, a sentence, a very striking one, which occurred in oneof your papers which you wrote for the Zenith Club. I noticed thatsentence at the time. It was this: 'A rose has enough beauty andfragrance to enable it to give very freely and yet itself remain arose. It is the case with many endowed natures but that is a factwhich is not always understood. ' My dear Annie, I knew that youwrote the book, for that identical sentence occurs in _The Poor Lady_on page one hundred forty-two. You see I have fully considered thematter to remember the exact page. I knew the minute I read thatsentence that my little Annie Eustace had written that successfulanonymous book, and I was the more certain because I had always hadmy own opinion as to little Annie's literary ability based upon thosesame Zenith Club papers. You will remember that I have often told youthat you should not waste your time writing club papers when youcould do work like that. "

Annie looked alarmed. "Oh, Alice, " she said, "do you think anybodyelse has remembered that sentence?"

"My dear child, I am quite sure that not a blessed woman in that clubhas remembered that sentence, " said Alice. 

"I had entirely forgotten. "

"Of course, you had. "

"It would be very unfortunate if it were remembered, because thepublishers are so anxious that my name should not be known. You see, nobody ever heard of me and my name would hurt the sales and the poorpublishers have worked so hard over the advertising, it would bedreadful to have the sales fall off. You really don't think anybodydoes remember?"

"My dear, " said Alice with her entirely good-natured, even amused andtolerant air of cynicism, "the women of the Zenith Club remembertheir own papers. You need not have the slightest fear. But Annie, you wonderful little girl, I am so glad you have come to me withthis. I have been waiting for you to tell me, for I was impatient totell you how delighted I am. You blessed child, I never was more gladat anything in my whole life. I am as proud as proud can be. I feelas if I had written that book myself, and better than written itmyself. I have had none of the bother of the work and my friend hadit and my friend has the fame and the glory and she goes around amongus with her little halo hidden out of sight of everybody, exceptmyself. "

"Margaret knows. "

Alice stiffened a little. "That is recent, " she said, "and I haveknown all the time. "

"Margaret could not have remembered that sentence, I am sure, " Anniesaid thoughtfully. "Poor Margaret, she was so upset by what happenedlast night that I am afraid the news did not cheer her up as much asI thought it would. "

"Well, you dear little soul, " said Alice, "I am simply revelling inhappiness and pride because of it, you may be sure of that. "

"But you have not had such an awful blow as poor Margaret had, " saidAnnie. Then she brightened. "Oh Alice, " she cried, "I wanted somebodywho loved me to be glad. "

"You have not told your grandmother and aunts yet?"

"I have not dared, " replied Annie in a shamed fashion. "I know Ideceived them and I think perhaps grandmother might find it hard notto tell. She is so old you know, and she does tell a great dealwithout meaning and Aunt Susan likes to tell news. I have not dared, Alice. The publishers have been so very insistent that nobody shouldknow, but I had to tell you and Margaret. "

"It made no difference anyway about me, " said Alice, "since I alreadyknew. "

"Margaret can be trusted too, I am sure, " Annie said quickly. 

"Of course. "

Annie looked at her watch. "I must go, " she said, "or I shall belate. Isn't it really wonderful that I should write a successfulbook, Alice?"

"You are rather wonderful, my dear, " said Alice. Then she rose andput her arms around the slender white-clad figure and held her close, and gave her one of her infrequent kisses. "You precious littlething, " she said, "the book is wonderful, but my Annie is morewonderful because she can be told so and never get the fact into herhead. Here is your work, dear. "

An expression of dismay came over Annie's face. "Oh, dear, " she said, "I have only embroidered half a daisy and what will Aunt Harrietsay?"

"You have embroidered a whole garden as nobody else can, if peopleonly knew it, " said Alice. 

"But Alice, " said Annie ruefully, "my embroidery is really awful andI don't like to do it and the linen is so grimy that I am ashamed. Oh, dear, I shall have to face Aunt Harriet with that half daisy!"

Alice laughed. "She can't kill you. "

"No, but I don't like to have her so disappointed. "

Alice kissed Annie again before she went, and watched the slightfigure flitting down between the box-rows, with a little frown ofperplexity. She wished that Annie had not told Margaret Edes aboutthe book and yet she did not know why she wished so. She was very farfrom expecting the results. Alice was too noble herself to entertainsuspicions of the ignobility of others. Certainty she was obliged toconfront, as she had confronted the affair of the night before. Itwas, of course, the certainty that Margaret had been guilty of adisgraceful and treacherous deed which made her uneasy in a vaguefashion now and yet she did not for one second dream of what was tooccur at the next meeting of the Zenith Club. 

That was at Mrs. Sturtevant's and was the great affair of the year. It was called, to distinguish it from the others, "The AnnualMeeting, " and upon that occasion the husbands and men friends of themembers were invited and the function was in the evening. Margarethad wished to have the club at her own house, before the affair ofMartha Wallingford, but the annual occasions were regulated by theletters of the alphabet and it was incontrovertibly the turn of theletter S and Mrs. Sturtevant's right could not be questioned. Duringthe time which elapsed before this meeting, Margaret Edes was moreactively unhappy than she had ever been in her life and all herstrong will could not keep the traces of that unhappiness from herface. Lines appeared. Her eyes looked large in dark hollows. Wilburgrew anxious about her. 

"You must go somewhere for a change, " he said, "and I will get mycousin Marion to come here and keep house and look out for thechildren. You must not be bothered even with them. You need acomplete rest and change. "

But Margaret met his anxiety with irritation. She felt as if somefatal fascination confined her in Fairbridge and especially did shefeel that she must be present at the annual meeting. Margaret neverfor one minute formulated to herself why she had this fierce desire. She knew in a horrible way at the back of her brain, but she kept theknowledge covered as with a veil even from herself. 

She had a beautiful new gown made for the occasion. Since she hadlost so much colour, she was doubtful of the wisdom of wearing herfavourite white and gold, or black. She had a crepe of a peculiarshade of blue which suited her and she herself worked assiduouslyembroidering it in a darker shade which brought out the colour of hereyes. She looked quite herself when the evening came and Wilbur'sface brightened as he looked at her in her trailing blue with alittle diamond crescent fastening a tiny blue feather in her goldenfluff of hair. 

"You certainly do look better, " he said happily. 

"I am well, you old goose, " said Margaret, fastening her long bluegloves. "You have simply been fussing over nothing as I told you. "

"Well, I hope I have. You do look stunning to-night, " said Wilbur, gazing at her with a pride so intense that it was almost piteous inits self-abnegation. 

"Is that your stunt there on the table?" he inquired, pointing to along envelope. 

Margaret laughed carefully, dimpling her cheeks. "Yes, " she said, andWilbur took the envelope and put it into his pocket. "I will carry itfor you, " he said. "By the way, what is your stunt, honey? Did youwrite something?"

"Wait, until you hear, " replied Margaret, and she laughed carefullyagain. She gathered up the train of her blue gown and turned uponhim, her blue eyes glowing with a strange fire, feverish roses on hercheeks. "You are not to be surprised at anything to-night, " she saidand laughed again. 

She still had a laughing expression when they were seated in Mrs. Sturtevant's flower-scented drawing-room, a handsome room, thanks tothe decorator, who was young and enthusiastic. Margaret had dulyconsidered the colour scheme in her choice of a gown. The furniturewas upholstered with a wisteria pattern, except a few chairs whichwere cane-seated, with silvered wood. Margaret had gone directly toone of these chairs. She was not sure of her gown being exactly theright shade of blue to harmonise with the wisteria at close quarters. The chair was tall and slender. Margaret's feet did not touch thefloor, but the long blue trail of her gown concealed that, and shecontrived to sit as if they did. She gave the impression of a tallcreature of extreme grace as she sat propping her back against hersilvered chair. Wilbur gazed at her with adoration. He had almostforgotten the affair of Martha Wallingford. He had excused hisMargaret because she was a woman and he was profoundly ignorant ofwomen's strange ambitions. Now, he regarded her with unqualifiedadmiration. He looked from her to the other women and back again andwas entirely convinced that she outshone them all as a sun a star. Helooked at the envelope in her blue lap and was sure that she hadwritten something which was infinitely superior to the work of anyother woman there. Down in the depths of his masculine soul, WilburEdes had a sense of amused toleration when women's clubs wereconcerned, but he always took his Margaret seriously, and the ZenithClub on that account was that night an important and graveorganisation. He wished very much to smoke and he was wedged into anuncomfortable corner with a young girl who insisted upon talking tohim and was all the time nervously rearranging her hair, but he had agood view of his Margaret in her wonderful blue gown, in her silverchair, and he was consoled. 

"Have you read _The Poor Lady_?" asked spasmodically the girl, anddrove in a slipping hair-pin at the same time. 

"I never read novels, " replied Wilbur absently, "haven't much timeyou know. "

"Oh, I suppose not, but that is such a wonderful book and only think, nobody has the least idea who wrote it, and it does make it sointeresting. I thought myself it was written by Wilbur Jack until Icame to a sentence which I could quite understand and that put himout of the question. Of course, Wilbur Jack is such a great geniusthat no young girl like myself pretends to understand him, but thatis why I worship him. I tell Mamma I think he is the ideal writer foryoung girls, so elevating. And then I thought _The Poor Lady_ mighthave been written by Mrs. Eudora Peasely because she is always solucid and I came to a sentence which I could not understand at all. Oh, dear, I have thought of all the living writers as writing thatbook and have had to give it up, and of course the dead ones are outof the question. "

"Of course, " said Wilbur gravely, and then his Margaret stood up andtook some printed matter from an envelope and instantly the situationbecame strangely tense. Men and women turned eager faces; they couldnot have told why eager, but they were all conscious of somethingunusual in the atmosphere and every expression upon those expectantfaces suddenly changed into one which made them as a listening unit. Then Margaret began. 

Chapter VII

Wilbur Edes thought he had never seen his wife look as beautiful asshe did standing there before them all with those fluttering leavesof paper in her hand. A breeze came in at an opposite window andMargaret's blue feather tossed in it; her yellow hair crisped andfluffed and the paper fluttered. Margaret stood for an appreciablesecond surveying them all with a most singular expression. It wascompounded of honeyed sweetness, of triumph, and something else moresubtle, the expression of a warrior entering battle and ready fordeath, yet terrible with defiance and the purpose of victory, anddeath for his foe. 

Then Margaret spoke and her thin silvery voice penetrated to everyear in the room. 

"Members of the Zenith Club and friends, " said Margaret, "I take theopportunity offered me to-night to disclose a secret which is asource of much joy to myself, and which I am sure will be a source ofjoy to you also. I trust that since you are my friends and neighboursand associates in club work, you will acquit me of the charge ofegotism and credit me with my whole motive, which is, I think, not anunworthy one coming to you in joy, as I would come in sorrow for yoursympathy and understanding. I am about to read an extract from a bookwhose success has given me the most unqualified surprise and delight, knowing as I do that a reading by an author from her own work alwaysincreases the interest even though she may not be an able expositorby word of mouth of what she has written. "

Then Margaret read. She had chosen a short chapter which was initself almost a complete little story. She read exceedingly well andwithout faltering. People listened with ever-growing amazement. ThenMrs. Jack Evarts whispered so audibly to a man at her side that shebroke in upon Margaret's clear recitative. "Goodness, she's readingfrom that book that is selling so, --_The Poor Lady_--I remember everyword of that chapter. "

Then while Margaret continued her reading imperturbably, the chorusof whispers increased. "That is from _The Poor Lady_, yes, it is. Didshe write it? Why, of course, she did. She just said so. Isn't itwonderful that she has done such a thing?"

Wilbur Edes sat with his eyes riveted upon his wife's face, his owngone quite pale, but upon it an expression of surprise and joy sointense that he looked almost foolish from such a revelation of hisinner self. 

The young girl beside him drove hair pins frantically into her hair. She twisted up a lock which had strayed and fastened it. She lookedalternately at Wilbur and Margaret. 

"Goodness gracious, " said she, and did not trouble to whisper. "Thatis the next to the last chapter of _The Poor Lady_. And to think thatyour wife wrote it! Goodness gracious, and here she has been livingright here in Fairbridge all the time and folks have been seeing herand talking to her and never knew! Did you know, Mr. Edes?"

The young girl fixed her sharp pretty eyes upon Wilbur. "Neverdreamed of it, " he blurted out, "just as much surprised as any ofyou. "

"I don't believe I could have kept such a wonderful thing as thatfrom my own husband, " said the girl, who was unmarried, and had nolover. But Wilbur did not hear. All he heard was his belovedMargaret, who had secretly achieved fame for herself, reading on andon. He had not the slightest idea what she was reading. He had nointerest whatever in that. All he cared for was the amazing fact thathis wife, his wonderful, beautiful Margaret, had so covered herselfwith glory and honour. He had a slightly hurt feeling because she hadnot told him until this public revelation. He felt that his ownprivate joy and pride as her husband should have been perhaps sacredand respected by her and yet possibly she was right. This publicglory might have seemed to her the one which would the most appeal tohim. 

He had, as he had said, not read the book, but he recalled with asort of rapturous tenderness for Margaret how he had seen the postersall along the railroad as he commuted to the city, and along theelevated road. His face gazing at Margaret was as beautiful in itsperfectly unselfish pride and affection, as a mother's. To think thathis darling had done such a thing! He longed to be at home alone withher and say to her what he could not say before all these people. Hethought of a very good reason why she had chosen this occasion toproclaim her authorship of the famous anonymous novel. She had beenso humiliated, poor child, by the insufferable rudeness of thatWestern girl that she naturally wished to make good. And how modestand unselfish she had been to make the attempt to exalt anotherauthor when she herself was so much greater. Wilbur fully exoneratedMargaret for what she did in the case of Martha Wallingford in thelight of this revelation. His modest, generous, noble wife hadhonestly endeavoured to do the girl a favour, to assist her in spiteof herself and she had received nothing save rudeness, ingratitude, and humiliation in return. Now, she was asserting herself. She wasshowing all Fairbridge that she was the one upon whom honour shouldbe showered. She was showing him and rightfully. He remembered withcompunction his severity toward her on account of the MarthaWallingford affair, his beautiful, gifted Margaret! Why, even thenshe might have electrified that woman's club by making the revelationwhich she had won to-night and reading this same selection from herown book. He had not read Martha Wallingford's _Hearts Astray_. Hethought that the title was enough for him. He knew that it must beone of the womanish, hysterical, sentimental type of things which hedespised. But Margaret had been so modest that she had held back fromthe turning on the search-light of her own greater glory. She hadmade the effort which had resulted so disastrously to obtain a lesserone, and he had condemned her. He knew that women always usedcircuitous ways toward their results, just as men used sledge-hammerones. Why should a man criticise a woman's method any more than awoman criticise a man's? Wilbur, blushing like a girl with pride anddelight, listened to his wife and fairly lashed himself. He waswholly unworthy of such a woman, he knew. 

When the reading was over and people crowded around Margaret andcongratulated her, he stood aloof. He felt that he could not speak ofthis stupendous thing with her until they were alone. Then DoctorSturtevant's great bulk pressed against him and his sonorous voicesaid in his ear, "By Jove, old man, your wife has drawn a luckynumber. Congratulations. " Wilbur gulped as he thanked him. ThenSturtevant went on talking about a matter which was rather dear toWilbur's own ambition and which he knew had been tentativelydiscussed: the advisability of his running for State Senator in theautumn. Wilbur knew it would be a good thing for him professionally, and at the bottom of his heart he knew that his wife's success hadbeen the last push toward his own. Other men came in and begantalking, leading from his wife's success toward his own, until Wilburrealised himself as dazzled. 

He did not notice what Von Rosen noticed, because he had kept hisattention upon the girl, that Annie Eustace had turned deadly palewhen Margaret had begun her reading and that Alice Mendon who wasseated beside her had slipped an arm around her and quietly andunobtrusively led her out of the room. Von Rosen thought that MissEustace must have turned faint because of the heat, and was consciousof a distinct anxiety and disappointment. He had, without directlyacknowledging it to himself, counted upon walking home with AnnieEustace, but yet he hoped that she might return, that she had notleft the home. When the refreshments were served, he looked for her, but Annie was long since at Alice Mendon's house in her room. Alicehad hurried her there in her carriage. 

"Come home with me, dear, " she had whispered, "and we can have a talktogether. Your people won't expect you yet. "

Therefore, while Karl von Rosen, who had gone to this annual meetingof the Zenith Club for the sole purpose of walking home with Annie, waited, the girl sat in a sort of dumb and speechless state in AliceMendon's room. It seemed to her like a bad dream. Alice herselfstormed. She had a high temper, but seldom gave way to it. Now shedid. There was something about this which roused her utmost powers ofindignation. 

"It is simply an outrage, " declared Alice, marching up and down thelarge room, her rich white gown trailing behind her, her chin high. "I did not think her capable of it. It is the worst form of thieveryin the world, stealing the work of another's brain. It isinconceivable that Margaret Edes could have done such a preposterousthing. I never liked her. I don't care if I do admit it, but I neverthought she was capable of such an utterly ignoble deed. It was allthat I could do to master myself, not to stand up before them all anddenounce her. Well, her time will come. "

"Alice, " said a ghastly little voice from the stricken figure on thecouch, "are you sure? Am I sure? Was that from my book?"

"Of course it was from your book. Why, you know it was from yourbook, Annie Eustace, " cried Alice and her voice sounded high withanger toward poor Annie herself. 

"I hoped that we might be mistaken after all, " said the voice, whichhad a bewildered quality. Annie Eustace had a nature which could notreadily grasp some of the evil of humanity. She was in reality dazedbefore this. She was ready to believe an untruth rather than theincredible truth. But Alice Mendon was merciless. She resolved thatAnnie should know once for all. 

"We are neither of us mistaken, " she said. "Margaret Edes read achapter from your book, _The Poor Lady_, and without stating in somany words that she was the author, she did what was worse. She madeeverybody think so. Annie, she is bad, bad, bad. Call the spade aspade and face it. See how black it is. Margaret Edes has stolen fromyou your best treasure. "

"I don't care for that so much, " said Annie Eustace, "but--I lovedher, Alice. "

"Then, " said Alice, "she has stolen more than your book. She hasstolen the light by which you wrote it. It is something hideous, hideous. "

Annie gave a queer little dry sob. "Margaret could not have done it, "she moaned. 

Alice crossed swiftly to her and knelt beside her. "Darling, " shesaid, "you must face it. It is better. I do not say so because I donot personally like Margaret Edes, but you must have courage and faceit. "

"I have not courage enough, " said Annie and she felt that she hadnot, for it was one of the awful tasks of the world which was beforeher: The viewing the mutilated face of love itself. 

"You must, " said Alice. She put an arm around the slight figure anddrew the fair head to her broad bosom, her maternal bosom, whichserved her friends in good stead, since it did not pillow the headsof children. Friends in distress are as children to the women of hertype. 

"Darling, " she said in her stately voice from which the anger hadquite gone. "Darling, you must face it. Margaret did read thatchapter from your book and she told, or as good as told everybodythat she had written it. "

Then Annie sobbed outright and the tears came. 

"Oh, " she cried, "Oh, Alice, how she must want success to do anythinglike that, poor, poor Margaret! Oh, Alice!"

"How she must love herself, " said Alice firmly. "Annie, you must faceit. Margaret is a self-lover; her whole heart turns in love towardher own self, instead of toward those whom she should love and wholove her. Annie, Margaret is bad, bad, with a strange degeneratebadness. She dates back to the sins of the First Garden. You mustturn your back upon her. You must not love her any more. "

"No, I must not love her any more, " agreed Annie, "and that is thepity of it. I must not love her, Alice, but I must pity her until Idie. Poor Margaret!"

"Poor Annie, " said Alice. "You worked so hard over that book, dear, and you were so pleased. Annie, what shall you do about it?"

Annie raised her head from Alice's bosom and sat up straight, with alook of terror. 

"Alice, " she cried, "I must go to-morrow and see my publishers. Imust go down on my knees to them if necessary. "

"Do you mean, " asked Alice slowly, "never to tell?"

"Oh, never, never, never!" cried Annie. 

"I doubt, " said Alice, "if you can keep such a matter secret. I doubtif your publishers will consent. "

"They must. I will never have it known! Poor Margaret!"

"I don't pity her at all, " said Alice. "I do pity her husband whoworships her, and there is talk of his running for State Senator andthis would ruin him. And I am sorry for the children. "

"Nobody shall ever know, " said Annie. 

"But how can you manage with the publishers?"

"I don't know. I will. "

"And you will have written that really wonderful book and never havethe credit for it. You will live here and see Margaret Edes praisedfor what you have done. "

"Poor Margaret, " said Annie. "I must go now. I know I can trust younever to speak. "

"Of course, but I do not think it right. "

"I don't care whether it is right or not, " said Annie. "It must neverbe known. "

"You are better than I am, " said Alice as she rang the bell, whichwas presently answered. "Peter has gone home for the night, Mariesaid, " Alice told Annie, "but Marie and I will walk home with you. "

"Alice, it is only a step. "

"I know, but it is late. "

"It is not much after ten, and--I would rather go alone, if you don'tmind, Alice. I want to get settled a little before Aunt Harriet seesme. I can do it better alone. "

Alice laughed. "Well, " she said, "Marie and I will stand on the frontporch until you are out of sight from there and then we will go tothe front gate. We can see nearly to your house and we can hear ifyou call. "

It was a beautiful night. The moon was high in a sky which wasperceptibly blue. In the west was still a faint glow, which was likea memory of a cowslip sunset. The street and the white house-frontwere plumy with soft tree shadows wavering in a gentle wind. Anniewas glad when she was alone in the night. She needed a moment forsolitariness and readjustment since one of the strongestreadjustments on earth faced her--the realisation that what she hadloved was not. She did not walk rapidly but lingered along the road. She was thankful that neither of her aunts had been to the annualmeeting. She would not need to account for her time so closely. Suddenly she heard a voice, quite a loud voice, a man's, with a musicof gladness in it. Annie knew instinctively whose it was, and shestepped quickly upon a lawn and stood behind a clump of trees. A manand woman passed her--Margaret Edes and her husband--and Wilbur wassaying in his glad, loving voice, "To think you should have done sucha thing, Margaret, my dear, you will never know how proud I am ofyou. "

Annie heard Margaret's voice in a whisper hushing Wilbur. "You speakso loud, dear, " said Margaret, "everybody will hear you. "

"I don't care if they do, " said Wilbur. "I should like to proclaim itfrom the housetops. " Then they passed and the rose scent ofMargaret's garments was in Annie's face. She was glad that Margarethad hushed her husband. She argued that it proved some little senseof shame, but oh, when all alone with her own husband, she had madeno disclaimer. Annie came out from her hiding and went on. The Edesahead of her melted into the shadows but she could still hearWilbur's glad voice. The gladness in it made her pity Margaret more. She thought how horrible it must be to deceive love like that, tohear that joyful tone, and know it all undeserved. Then suddenly sheheard footsteps behind and walked to one side to allow whoever it wasto pass, but a man's voice said: "Good evening, Miss Eustace, " andVon Rosen had joined her. He had in truth been waiting like anyvillage beau near Alice Mendon's house for the chance of her emergingalone. 

Annie felt annoyed, and yet her heart beat strangely. 

"Good evening, Mr. Von Rosen, " she said and still lingered as if toallow him to pass, but he slowed his own pace and sauntered by herside. 

"A fine evening, " he remarked tritely. 

"Very, " agreed Annie. 

"I saw you at the evening club, " said Von Rosen presently. 

"Yes, " said Annie, "I was there. "

"You left early. "

"Yes, I left quite early with Alice. I have been with her since. "

Annie wondered if Mr. Von Rosen suspected anything but his next wordsconvinced her that he did not. 

"I suppose that you were as much surprised as the rest of us, although you are her intimate friend, at Mrs. Edes' announcementconcerning the authorship of that successful novel, " said he. 

"Yes, " said Annie faintly. 

"Of course you had no idea that she had written it?"

"No. "

"Have you read it?"

"Yes. "

"What do you think of it? I almost never read novels but I suppose Imust tackle that one. Did you like it?"

"Quite well, " said Annie. 

"Tell me what is it all about?"

Annie could endure no more. "It will spoil the book for you if I tellyou, Mr. Von Rosen, " said she, and her voice was at once firm andpiteous. She could not tell the story of her own book to him. Shewould be as deceitful as poor Margaret, for all the time he wouldthink she was talking of Margaret's work and not of her own. 

Von Rosen laughed. After all he cared very little indeed about thebook. He had what he cared for: a walk home with this very sweet andvery natural girl, who did not seem to care whether he walked homewith her or not. 

"I dare say you are right, " he said, "but I doubt if your telling meabout it would spoil the book for me, because it is more thanprobable that I shall never read it after all. I may if it comes inmy way because I was somewhat surprised. I had never thought of Mrs. Edes as that sort of person. However, so many novels are writtennowadays, and some mighty queer ones are successful that I presume Ishould not be surprised. Anybody in Fairbridge might be the author ofa successful novel. You might, Miss Eustace, for all I know. "

Annie said nothing. 

"Perhaps you are, " said Von Rosen. He had not the least idea of thethinness of the ice. Annie trembled. Her truthfulness was as herlife. She hated even evasions. Luckily Von Rosen was so far fromsuspicion that he did not wait for an answer. 

"Mrs. Edes reads well, " he said. 

"Very well indeed, " returned Annie eagerly. 

"I suppose an author can read more understandingly from her ownwork, " said Von Rosen. "Don't you think so, Miss Eustace?"

"I think she might, " said Annie. 

"I don't know but I shall read that book after all, " said Von Rosen. "I rather liked that extract she gave us. It struck me as out of thecommon run of women's books. I beg your pardon, Miss Eustace. If youwere a writer yourself I could not speak so, but you are not, and youmust know as well as I do, that many of the books written by womenare simply sloughs of oversweetened sentiment, and of entirelyinnocent immorality. But that chapter did not sound as if it couldbelong to such a book. It sounded altogether too logical for theaverage woman writer. I think I will read it. Then after I have readit, you will not refuse to discuss it with me, will you?"

"I do not think so, " replied Annie tremulously. Would he never talkof anything except that book? To her relief he did, to her relief andscarcely acknowledged delight. 

"Are you interested in curios, things from Egyptian tombs, forinstance?" he inquired with brutal masculine disregard of sequence. 

Annie was bewildered, but she managed to reply that she thought shemight be. She had heard of Von Rosen's very interesting collection. 

"I happened to meet your aunt, Miss Harriet, this afternoon, " saidVon Rosen, "and I inquired if she were by any chance interested andshe said she was. "

"Yes, " said Annie. She had never before dreamed that her Aunt Harrietwas in the least interested in Egyptian tombs. 

"I ventured to ask if she and her sister, Miss Susan, and you also, if you cared to see it, would come some afternoon and look at mycollection, " said Von Rosen. 

Nobody could have dreamed from his casual tone how carefully he hadplanned it all out: the visit of Annie and her aunts, the delicatelittle tea served in the study, the possible little stroll with Anniein his garden. Von Rosen knew that one of the aunts, Miss Harriet, was afflicted with rose cold, and therefore, would probably notaccept his invitation to view his rose-garden, and he also knew thatit was improbable that both sisters would leave their aged mother. Itwas, of course, a toss-up as to whether Miss Harriet or Miss Susanwould come. It was also a toss-up as to whether or not they mightboth come, and leave little Annie as companion for the old lady. Infact, he had to admit to himself that the latter contingency was themore probable. He was well accustomed to being appropriated by elderladies, with the evident understanding that he preferred them. Hewould simply have to make the best of it and show his collection asgracefully as possible and leave out the rose-garden and thedelicious little tête-à-tête with this young rose of a girl and thinkof something else. For Karl von Rosen in these days was accustominghimself to a strange visage in his own mental looking-glass. He hadnot altered his attitude toward women but toward one woman, and thatone was now sauntering beside him in the summer moonlight, her fluffywhite garments now and then blowing across his sober garb. He wasconscious of holding himself in a very tight rein. He wondered howlong men were usually about their love-making. He wished to make lovethat very instant, but he feared lest the girl might be lost by suchimpetuosity. In all likelihood, the thought of love in connectionwith himself had never entered her mind. Why should it? Karl in lovewas very modest and saw himself as a very insignificant figure. Probably this flower-like young creature had never thought of love atall. She had lived her sweet simple village life. She had obeyed hergrandmother and her aunts, done her household tasks and embroidered. He remembered the grimy bit of linen which he had picked up and hecould not see the very slightest connection between that sort ofthing and love and romance. Of course, she had read a few lovestories and the reasoning by analogy develops in all minds. She mighthave built a few timid air castles for herself upon the foundationsof the love stories in fiction, and this brought him around to thefatal subject again almost inevitably. 

"Do you know, Miss Eustace, " he said, "that I am wishing a very queerthing about you?"

"What, Mr. Von Rosen?"

"I am wishing, you know that I would not esteem you more highly, itis not that, but I am wishing that you also had written a book, areally good sort of love story, novel, you know. "

Annie gasped. 

"I don't mean because Mrs. Edes wrote _The Poor Lady_. It is notthat. I am quite sure that you could have written a book every whitas good as hers but what I do mean is--I feel that a woman writer ifshe writes the best sort of book must obtain a certain insightconcerning human nature which requires a long time for most women. "Von Rosen was rather mixed, but Annie did not grasp it. She was veryglad that they were nearing her own home. She could not endure muchmore. 

"Is _The Poor Lady_ a love story?" inquired Von Rosen. 

"There is a little love in it, " replied Annie faintly. 

"I shall certainly read it, " said Von Rosen. He shook hands withAnnie at her gate and wanted to kiss her. She looked up in his facelike an adorably timid, trustful little child and it seemed almosthis duty to kiss her, but he did not. He said good-night and againmentioned his collection of curios. 

"I hope you will feel inclined to come and see them, " he said, "with--your aunts. "

"Thank you, " replied Annie, "I shall be very glad to come, if bothAunt Harriet and Aunt Susan do not. That would of course oblige me tostay with grandmother. "

"Of course, " assented Von Rosen, but he said inwardly, "HangGrandmother. "

In his inmost self, Von Rosen was not a model clergyman. He, however, had no reason whatever to hang grandmother, but quite the reverse, although he did not so conclude, as he considered the matter on hisway home. It seemed to him that this darling of a girl was fairlyhedged in by a barbed wire fence of feminine relatives. 

He passed the Edes' house on his way and saw that a number of theupper windows were still lighted. He even heard a masculine voicepitched on a high cadence of joy and triumph. He smiled a littlescornfully. "He thinks his wife is the most wonderful woman in theworld, " he told himself, "and I dare say that a novel is simply likean over-sweetened ice-cream, with an after taste of pepper, out ofsheer deviltry. " Had he known it, Margaret Edes herself was tastingpepper, mustard and all the fierce condiments known, in her verysoul. It was a singular thing that Margaret had been obliged tocommit an ignoble deed in order to render her soul capable of tastingto the full, but she had been so constituted. As Karl von Rosenpassed that night, she was sitting in her room, clad in her whitesilk negligee and looking adorable, and her husband was fairly on hisknees before her, worshipping her, and she was suffering after afashion hitherto wholly uncomprehended by her. Margaret had neverknown that she could possibly be to blame for anything, that shecould sit in judgment upon herself. Now she knew it and the knowledgebrought a torture which had been unimaginable by her. She strove notto make her shrinking from her husband and his exultation--herterrified shrinking--evident. 

"Oh, Margaret, you are simply wonderful beyond words, " said Wilbur, gazing up into her face. "I always knew you were wonderful, ofcourse, darling, but this! Why, Margaret, you have gained aninternational reputation from that one book! And the reviews havebeen unanimous, almost unanimous in their praise. I have not read it, dear. I am so ashamed of myself, but you know I never read novels, but I am going to read my Margaret's novel. Oh, my dear, mywonderful, wonderful dear!" Wilbur almost sobbed. "Do you know whatit may do for me, too?" he said. "Do you know, Margaret, it may meanmy election as Senator. One can never tell what may sway popularopinion. Once, if anybody had told me that I might be elected tooffice and my election might possibly be due to the fact that my wifehad distinguished myself, I should have been humbled to the dust. ButI cannot be humbled by any success which may result from yoursuccess. I did not know my wonderful Margaret then. " Wilbur kissedhis wife's hands. He was almost ridiculous, but it was horriblytragic for Margaret. 

She longed as she had never longed for anything in her life, for thepower to scream, to shout in his ears the truth, but she could not. She was bound hard and fast in the bands of her own falsehood. Shecould not so disgrace her husband, her children. Why had she notthought of them before? She had thought only of herself and her ownglory, and that glory had turned to stinging bitterness upon hersoul. She was tasting the bitterest medicine which life and the wholeworld contains. And at the same time, it was not remorse that shefelt. That would have been easier. What she endured wasself-knowledge. The reflection of one's own character under unbiasedcross-lights is a hideous thing for a self-lover. She was thinking, while she listened to Wilbur's rhapsodies. Finally she scarcely heardhim. Then her attention was suddenly keenly fixed. There werehorrible complications about this which she had not considered. Margaret's mind had no business turn. She had not for a momentthought of the financial aspect of the whole. Wilbur was different. What he was now saying was very noble, but very disconcerting. "Ofcourse, I know, darling, that all this means a pile of money, but onething you must remember: it is for yourself alone. Not one penny ofit will I ever touch and more than that it is not to interfere in theleast with my expenditures for you, my wife, and the children. Everything of that sort goes on as before. You have the sameallowance for yourself and the children as before. Whatever comesfrom your book is your own to do with as you choose. I do not evenwish you to ask my advice about the disposal of it. "

Margaret was quite pale as she looked at him. She remembered now thesum which Annie had told her she was to receive. She made nodisclaimer. Her lips felt stiff. While Wilbur wished for nodisclaimer, she could yet see that he was a little surprised atreceiving none, but she could not speak. She merely gazed at him in ahelpless sort of fashion. The grapes which hung over her friend'sgarden wall were not very simple. They were much beside grapes. Wilbur returned her look pityingly. 

"Poor girl, " he said, kissing her hands again; "she is all tired outand I must let her go to bed. Standing on a pedestal is rathertiresome, if it is gratifying, isn't it, sweetheart?"

"Yes, " said Margaret, with a weary sigh from her heart. How littlethe poor man knew of the awful torture of standing upon the pedestalof another, and at the same time holding before one's eyes thatlooking-glass with all the cross-lights of existence full upon it!

Margaret went to bed, but she could not sleep. All night long sherevolved the problem of how she should settle the matter with AnnieEustace. She did not for a second fear Annie's betrayal, but therewas that matter of the publishers. Would they be content to allowmatters to rest?

The next morning Margaret endeavoured to get Annie on the telephonebut found that she had gone to New York. Annie's Aunt Harrietreplied. She herself had sent the girl on several errands. 

Margaret could only wait. She feared lest Annie might not returnbefore Wilbur and in such a case she could not discuss matters withher before the next day. Margaret had a horrible time during the nextsix hours. The mail was full of letters of congratulation. A localreporter called to interview her. She sent word that she was out, buthe was certain that he had seen her. The children heard the news andpestered her with inquiries about her book and wondering looks ather. Callers came in the afternoon and it was all about her book. Nobody could know how relieved she was after hearing the four-thirtytrain, to see little Annie Eustace coming through her gate. Anniestood before her stiffly. The day was very warm and the girl lookedtired and heated. 

"No, thank you, " she said, "I can not sit down. I only stopped totell you that I have arranged with the publishers. They will keep thesecret. I shall have rather a hard task arranging about the checks, because I fear it will involve a little deceit and I do not likedeceit. "

Annie, as she spoke, looked straight at Margaret and there wassomething terrible in that clear look of unsoiled truth. Margaret putout a detaining hand. 

"Sit down for a minute, please, " she said cringingly. "I want toexplain?"

"There is nothing whatever to explain, " replied Annie. "I heard. "

"Can you ever forgive me?"

"I do not think, " said Annie, "that this is an ordinary offence aboutwhich to talk of forgiveness. I do pity you, Margaret, for I realisehow dreadfully you must have wanted what did not belong to you. "

Margaret winced. "Well, if it is any satisfaction to you, I amrealising nothing but misery from it, " she said in a low voice. 

"I don't see how you can help that, " replied Annie simply. Then shewent away. 

It proved Margaret's unflinching trust in the girl and Annie'srecognition of no possibility except that trust, that no request norpromise as to secrecy had been made. Annie, after she got home, almost forgot the whole for a time, since her Aunt Harriet, and AuntHarriet was the sister who was subject to rose-colds, announced herdetermination to call at Mr. Von Rosen's the next afternoon withAnnie and see his famous collection. 

"Of course, " said she, "the invitation was meant particularly for me, since I am one of his parishioners, and I think it will be improvingto you, Annie, to view antiquities. "

"Yes, Aunt Harriet, " said Annie. She was wondering if she would beallowed to wear her pale blue muslin and the turquoise necklace whichwas a relic of her grandmother's girlhood. Aunt Susan sniffeddelicately. 

"I will stay with Mother, " she said with a virtuous air. 

The old lady, stately in her black satin, with white diamondsgleaming on her veinous hands, glanced acutely at them. The next day, when her daughter Harriet insisted that the cross barred muslin wasnot too spoiled to wear to the inspection of curios, she declaredthat it was simply filthy, and that Annie must wear her blue, andthat the little string of turquoise beads was not in the least toodressy for the occasion. 

It therefore happened that Annie and her Aunt Harriet set forth atthree o'clock in the afternoon, Annie in blue, and her aunt in thinblack grenadine with a glitter of jet and a little black bonnet witha straight tuft of green rising from a little wobble of jet, and ablack-fringed parasol tilted well over her eyes. Annie's charminglittle face was framed in a background of white parasol. Margaret sawthem pass as she sat on her verandah. She had received morecongratulatory letters that day, and the thief envied the one fromwhom she had taken. Annie bowed to Margaret, and her Aunt Harrietsaid something about the heat, in a high shrill voice. 

"She is a wonderful woman, to have written that successful novel, "said Aunt Harriet, "and I am going to write her a congratulatorynote, now you have bought that stationery at Tiffany's. I feel thatsuch a subject demands special paper. She is a wonderful woman andher family have every reason to be proud of her. "

"Yes, " said Annie. 

"It is rather odd, and I have often thought so, " said Aunt Harriet, moving alongside with stately sweeps of black skirts, "that you haveshown absolutely no literary taste. As you know, I have often writtenpoetry, of course not for publication, and my friends have been sogood as to admire it. "

"Yes, Aunt Harriet, " said Annie. 

"I realise that you have never appreciated my poems, " said AuntHarriet tartly. 

"I don't think I understand poetry very well, " little Annie said withmeekness. 

"It does require a peculiar order of mind, and you have never seemedto me in the least poetical or imaginative, " said her aunt in anappeased voice. "For instance, I could not imagine your writing abook like Mrs. Edes, and _The Poor Lady_ was anonymous, and anybodymight have written it as far as one knew. But I should never haveimagined her for a moment as capable of doing it. "

"No, " said Annie. 

Then they had come to the parsonage and Jane Riggs, as rigid asstarched linen could make a human being, admitted them, and presentlyafter a little desultory conversation, the collection, which wasreally a carefully made one, and exceedingly good and interesting, was being displayed. Then came the charming little tea which VonRosen had planned; then the suggestion with regard to the rose-gardenand Aunt Harriet's terrified refusal, knowing as she knew the agonyof sneezes and sniffs sure to follow its acceptance; and then Annie, a vision in blue, was walking among the roses with Von Rosen and bothwere saying things which they never could remember afterward--aboutthings in which neither had the very slightest interest. It was onlywhen they had reached the end of the pergola, trained over withclimbers, and the two were seated on a rustic bench therein, that theconversation to be remembered began. 

Chapter VIII

The conversation began, paradoxically, with a silence. Otherwise, itwould have begun with platitudes. Since neither Von Rosen nor AnnieEustace were given usually to platitudes, the silence wasunavoidable. Both instinctively dreaded with a pleasurable dread theshock of speech. In a way this was the first time the two had beenalone with any chance of a seclusion protracted beyond a very fewminutes. In the house was Aunt Harriet Eustace, who feared a rose, asshe might have feared the plague, and, moreover, as Annie comfortablyknew, had imparted the knowledge to Von Rosen as they had walked downthe pergola, that she would immediately fall asleep. 

"Aunt Harriet always goes to sleep in her chair after a cup of tea, "Annie had said and had then blushed redly. 

"Does she?" asked Von Rosen with apparent absent-mindedness but inreality, keenly. He excused himself for a moment, left Annie standingin the pergola and hurried back to the house, where he interviewedJane Riggs, and told her not to make any noise, as Miss Eustace inthe library would probably fall asleep, as was her wont after a cupof tea. Jane Riggs assented, but she looked after him with a long, slow look. Then she nodded her head stiffly and went on washing cupsand saucers quietly. She spoke only one short sentence to herself. "He's a man and it's got to be somebody. Better be her than anybodyelse. "

When the two at the end of the pergola began talking, it wasstrangely enough about the affair of the Syrian girl. 

"I suppose, have always supposed, that the poor young thing's husbandcame and stole his little son, " said Von Rosen. 

"You would have adopted him?" asked Annie in a shy voice. 

"I think I would not have known any other course to take, " repliedVon Rosen. 

"It was very good of you, " Annie said. She cast a little glance ofadmiration at him. 

Von Rosen laughed. "It is not goodness which counts to one's creditwhen one is simply chucked into it by Providence, " he returned. 

Annie laughed. "To think of your speaking of Providence as'chucking. '"

"It is rather awful, " admitted Von Rosen, "but somehow I never dofeel as if I need be quite as straight-laced with you. "

"Mr. Von Rosen, you have talked with me exactly twice, and I am at aloss as to whether I should consider that remark of yours as acompliment or not. "

"I meant it for one, " said Von Rosen earnestly. "I should not haveused that expression. What I meant was I felt that I could be myselfwith you, and not weigh words or split hairs. A clergyman has to do alot of that, you know, Miss Eustace, and sometimes (perhaps all thetime) he hates it; it makes him feel like a hypocrite. "

"Then it is all right, " said Annie rather vaguely. She gazed up atthe weave of leaves and blossoms, then down at the wavering carpet oftheir shadows. 

"It is lovely here, " she said. 

The young man looked at the slender young creature in the blue gownand smiled with utter content. 

"It is very odd, " he said, "but nothing except blue and thatparticular shade of blue would have harmonised. "

"I should have said green or pink. "

"They would surely have clashed. If you can't melt into nature, it ismuch safer to try for a discord. You are much surer to chord. Thatblue does chord, and I doubt if a green would not have been a sort ofswear word in colour here. "

"I am glad you like it, " said Annie like a school girl. She felt verymuch like one. 

"I like you, " Von Rosen said abruptly. 

Annie said nothing. She sat very still. 

"No, I don't like you. I love you, " said Von Rosen. 

"How can you? You have talked with me only twice. "

"That makes no difference with me. Does it with you?"

"No, " said Annie, "but I am not at all sure about--"

"About what, dear?"

"About what my aunts and grandmother will say. "

"Do you think they will object to me?"

"No-o. "

"What is it makes you doubtful? I have a little fortune of my own. Ihave an income besides my salary. I can take care of you. They cantrust you to me. "

Annie looked at him with a quick flush of resentment. "As if I wouldeven think of such a thing as that!"

"What then?"

"You will laugh, but grandmother is very old, although she sits up sostraight, and she depends on me, and--"

"And what?"

"If I married you, I could not, of course, play pinocle withgrandmother on Sunday. "

"Oh, yes, you could. I most certainly should not object. "

"Then that makes it hopeless. "

Von Rosen looked at her in perplexity. "I am afraid I don'tunderstand you, dear little soul. "

"No, you do not. You see, grandmother is in reality very good, almosttoo good to live, and thinking she is being a little wicked playingpinocle on Sunday when Aunt Harriet and Aunt Susan don't know it, sort of keeps her going. I don't just know why myself, but I am sureof it. Now the minute she was sure that you, who are the minister, did not object, she would not care a bit about pinocle and it wouldhurt her. "

Annie looked inconceivably young. She knitted her candid brows andstared at him with round eyes of perplexity. Karl von Rosen shoutedwith laughter. 

"Oh, well, if that is all, " he said, "I object strenuously to yourplaying pinocle with your grandmother on Sunday. The only way you canmanage will be to play hookey from church. "

"I need not do that always, " said Annie. "My aunts take naps Sundayafternoons, but I am sure grandmother could keep awake if she thoughtshe could be wicked. "

"Well, you can either play hookey from church, or run away Sundayafternoons, or if you prefer and she is able, I will drive yourgrandmother over here and you can play pinocle in my study. "

"Then I do think she will live to be a hundred, " said Annie with apeal of laughter. 

"Stop laughing and kiss me, " said Von Rosen. 

"I seldom kiss anybody. "

"That is the reason. "

When Annie looked up from her lover's shoulder, a pair of topaz eyeswere mysteriously regarding her. 

"The cat never saw me kiss anybody, " said Von Rosen. 

"Do you think the cat knows?" asked Annie, blushing and moving away alittle. 

"Who knows what any animal knows or does not know?" replied VonRosen. "When we discover that mystery, we may have found the key toexistence. "

Then the cat sprang into Annie's blue lap and she stroked his yellowback and looked at Von Rosen with eyes suddenly reflective, rathercoolly. 

"After all, I, nor nobody else, ever heard of such a thing as this, "said she. "Do you mean that you consider this an engagement?" sheasked in astonishment. 

"I most certainly do. "

"After we have only really seen and talked to each other twice!"

"It has been all our lives and we have just found it out, " said VonRosen. "Of course, it is unusual, but who cares? Do you?"

"No, I don't, " said Annie. They leaned together over the yellow catand kissed each other. 

[Illustration: They leaned together over the yellow cat and kissedeach other]

"But what an absurd minister's wife I shall be, " said Annie. "Tothink of your marrying a girl who has staid at home from church andplayed cards with her grandmother!"

"I am not at all sure, " said Von Rosen, "that you do not get morebenefit, more spiritual benefit, than you would have done from mysermons. "

"I think, " said Annie, "that you are just about as funny a ministeras I shall be a minister's wife. "

"I never thought I should be married at all. "

"Why not?"

"I did not care for women. "

"Then why do you now?"

"Because you are a woman. "

Then there was a sudden movement in front of them. The leaf-shadowsflickered; the cat jumped down from Annie's lap and ran away, hisgreat yellow plume of tail waving angrily, and Margaret Edes stoodbefore them. She was faultlessly dressed as usual. A woman of hertype cannot be changed utterly by force of circumstances in a shorttime. Her hat was loaded with wisteria. She wore a wisteria gown ofsoft wool. She held up her skirts daintily. A great amethyst gleamedat her throat, but her face, wearing a smile like a painted one, wasdreadful. It was inconceivable, but Margaret Edes had actually inview the banality of confessing her sin to her minister. Of course, Annie was the one who divined her purpose. Von Rosen was simplybewildered. He rose, and stood with an air of polite attention. 

"Margaret, " cried Annie, "Margaret!"

The man thought that his sweetheart was simply embarrassed, becauseof discovery. He did not understand why she bade him peremptorily toplease go in the house and see if Aunt Harriet were awake, that shewished to speak to Mrs. Edes. He, however, went as bidden, alreadydiscovering that man is as a child to a woman when she is really inearnest. 

When he was quite out of hearing, Annie turned upon her friend. "Margaret, " she said, "Margaret, you must not. "

Margaret turned her desperate eyes upon Annie. "I did not know itwould be like this, " she said. 

"You must not tell him. "

"I must. "

"You must not, and all the more now. "

"Why, now?"

"I am going to marry him. "

"Then he ought to know. "

"Then he ought not to know, for you have drawn me into your web ofdeceit also. He has talked to me about you and the book. I have notbetrayed you. You cannot betray me. "

"It will kill me. I did not know it would be like this. I neverblamed myself for anything before. "

"It will not kill you, and if it does, you must bear it. You must notdo your husband and children such an awful harm. "

"Wilbur is nominated for Senator. He would have to give it up. Hewould go away from Fairbridge. He is very proud, " said Margaret in abreathless voice, "but I must tell. "

"You cannot tell. "

"The children talk of it all the time. They look at me so. Theywonder because they think I have written that book. They tell all theother children. Annie, I must confess to somebody. I did not know itwould be like this. "

"You cannot confess to anybody except God, " said Annie. 

"I cannot tell my husband. I cannot tell poor Wilbur, but I thoughtMr. Von Rosen would tell him. "

"You can not tell Mr. Von Rosen. You have done an awful wrong, andnow you can not escape the fact that you have done it. You cannot getaway from it. "

"You are so hard. "

"No, I am not hard, " said Annie. "I did not betray you there beforethem all, and neither did Alice. "

"Did Alice Mendon know?" asked Margaret in an awful voice. 

"Yes, I had told Alice. She was so hurt for me that I think she mighthave told. "

"Then she may tell now. I will go to her. "

"She will not tell now. And I am not hard. It is you who are hardupon yourself and that nobody, least of all I, can help. You willhave to know this dreadful thing of yourself all your life and youcan never stop blaming yourself. There is no way out of it. You cannot ruin your husband. You can not ruin your children's future andyou cannot, after the wrong you have done me, put me in the wrong, asyou would do if you told. By telling the truth, you would put me tothe lie, when I kept silence for your sake and the sakes of yourhusband and children. "

"I did not know it would be like this, " said Margaret in herdesperate voice. "I had done nothing worth doing all my life and thehunger to do something had tormented me. It seemed easy, I did notknow how I could blame myself. I have always thought so well ofmyself; I did not know. Annie, for God's sake, let me tell. You can'tknow how keenly I suffer, Annie. Let me tell Mr. Von Rosen. Peoplealways tell ministers. Even if he does not tell Wilbur, but perhapshe can tell him and soften it, it would be a relief. People alwaystell ministers, Annie. "

It seemed improbable that Margaret Edes in her wisteria costume couldbe speaking. Annie regarded her with almost horror. She pitied her, yet she could not understand. Margaret had done something of whichshe herself was absolutely incapable. She had the right to throw thestone. She looked at a sinner whose sin was beyond her comprehension. She pitied the evident signs of distress, but her pity, althoughdevoid of anger, was, in spite of herself, coldly wondering. Moreover, Margaret had been guilty in the eyes of the girl of a muchworse sin than the mere thievery of her book; she had murdered love. Annie had loved Margaret greatly. No, she loved her no longer, sincethe older woman had actually blasphemed against the goddess whom thegirl had shrined. Had Margaret stolen from another, it would havemade no difference. The mere act had destroyed herself as an image oflove. Annie, especially now that she was so happy, cared nothing forthe glory of which she had been deprived. She had, in truth, neverhad much hunger for fame, especially for herself. She did not carewhen she thought how pleased her lover would have been and herrelatives, but already the plan for another book was in her brain, for the child was a creator, and no blow like this had any lastingpower over her work. What she considered was Margaret's revelation ofherself as something else than Margaret, and what she did resentbitterly was being forced into deception in order to shield her. Shewas in fact hard, although she did not know it. Her usually gentlenature had become like adamant before this. She felt unlike herselfas she said bitterly:

"People do not always tell ministers, and you cannot tell Mr. VonRosen, Margaret. I forbid it. Go home and keep still. "

"I cannot bear it. "

"You must bear it. "

"They are going to give me a dinner, the Zenith Club, " said Margaret. 

"You will have to accept it. "

"I cannot, Annie Eustace, of what do you think me capable? I am notas bad as you think. I cannot and will not accept that dinner andmake the speech which they will expect and hear all thecongratulations which they will offer. I cannot. "

"You must accept the dinner, but I don't see that you need make thespeech, " said Annie, who was herself aghast over such extremity oftorture. 

"I will not, " said Margaret. She was very pale and her lips were atight line. Her eyes were opaque and lustreless. She was in realitysuffering what a less egotistical nature could not even imagine. Allher life had Margaret Edes worshipped and loved Margaret Edes. Nowshe had done an awful thing. The falling from the pedestal of afriend is nothing to hurling oneself from one's height of self-esteemand that she had done. She stood, as it were, over the horrible bodyof her once beautiful and adored self. She was not actuallyremorseful and that made it all the worse. She simply could not evadethe dreadful glare of light upon her own imperfections; she who hadalways thought of herself as perfect, but the glare of knowledge camemostly from her appreciation of the attitude of her friends andlovers toward what she had done. Suppose she went home and toldWilbur. Suppose she said, "I did not write that book. My friend, Annie Eustace, wrote it. I am a thief, and worse than a thief. " Sheknew just how he would look at her, his wife, his Margaret, who hadnever done wrong in his eyes. For the first time in her life she wasafraid, and yet how could she live and bear such torture and notconfess? Confession would be like a person ill unto death, giving up, and seeking the peace of a sick chamber and the rest of bed and thecare of a physician. She had come to feel like that and yet, confession would be like a fiery torture. Margaret had in some almostinsane fashion come to feel that she might confess to a minister, aman of God, and ease her soul, without more. And she had never beenreligious, and would have formerly smiled in serene scorn at her ownstate of mind. And here was the other woman whom she had wronged, forbidding her this one little possibility of comfort. 

She said again humbly, "Let me tell him, Annie. He will only thinkthe more of you because you shielded me. "

But Annie was full of scorn which Margaret could not understand sinceher nature was not so fine. "Do you think I wish him to?" she said, but in a whisper because she heard voices and footsteps. "You cannottell him, Margaret. "

Then Von Rosen and Aunt Harriet, whose eyes were dim with recentsleep, came in sight, and Harriet Eustace, who had not seen Margaretsince the club meeting, immediately seized upon her two hands andkissed her and congratulated her. 

"You dear, wonderful creature, " she said, "we are all so proud ofyou. Fairbridge is so proud of you and as for us, we can only feelhonoured that our little Annie has such a friend. We trust that shewill profit by your friendship and we realise that it is such aprivilege for her. "

"Thank you, " said Margaret. She turned her head aside. It was ratherdreadful, and Annie realised it. 

Von Rosen stood by smiling. "I am glad to join in thecongratulations, " he said. "In these days of many books, it is agreat achievement to have one singled out for special notice. I havenot yet had the pleasure of reading the book, but shall certainlyhave it soon. "

"Thank you, " said Margaret again. 

"She should give you an autograph copy, " said Harriet Eustace. 

"Yes, " said Margaret. She drew aside Annie and whispered, "I shalltell my husband then. I shall. "

Then she bade them good afternoon in her usually graceful way;murmured something about a little business which she had with Annieand flitted down the pergola in a cloud of wisteria. 

"It does seem wonderful, " said Harriet Eustace, "that she should havewritten that book. "

Von Rosen glanced at Annie with an inquiring expression. He wonderedwhether she wished him to announce their engagement to her aunt. Theamazing suddenness of it all had begun to daunt him. He was inconsiderable doubt as to what Miss Harriet Eustace, who was a mostconservative lady, who had always done exactly the things which alady under similar circumstances might be expected to do, who alwayssaid the things to be expected, would say to this, which must, ofcourse, savour very much of the unexpected. Von Rosen was entirelysure that Miss Harriet Eustace would be scarcely able to conceive ofa marriage engagement of her niece especially with a clergymanwithout all the formal preliminaries of courtship, and he knew wellthat preliminaries had hardly existed, in the usual sense of theterm. He felt absurdly shy, and he was very much relieved whenfinally Miss Harriet and Annie took their leave and he had saidnothing about the engagement. Miss Harriet said a great deal abouthis most interesting and improving collection. She was a woman of apatronising turn of mind and she made Von Rosen feel like a littleboy. 

"I especially appreciate the favour for the sake of my niece, " shesaid. "It is so desirable for the minds of the young to be improved. "Von Rosen murmured a polite acquiescence. She had spoken of histall, lovely girl as if she were in short skirts. Miss Harrietcontinued:

"When I consider what Mrs. Edes has done, " she said, --"written a bookwhich has made her famous, I realise how exceedingly important it isfor the minds of the young to be improved. It is good for Annie toknow Mrs. Edes so intimately, I think. "

For the first time poor Annie was conscious of a distinct sense ofwrath. Here she herself had written that book and her mind, in orderto have written it, must be every whit as improved as Margaret Edes'and her Aunt Harriet was belittling her before her lover. It was astruggle to maintain silence, especially as her aunt went on talkingin a still more exasperating manner. 

"I always considered Mrs. Wilbur Edes as a very unusual woman, " saidshe, "but of course, this was unexpected. I am so thankful that Anniehas the great honour of her friendship. Of course, Annie can never dowhat Mrs. Edes has done. She herself knows that she lacks talent andalso concentration. Annie, you know you have never finished thatdaisy centre piece which you begun surely six months ago. I am quitesure that Mrs. Edes would have finished it in a week. "

Annie did lose patience at that. "Margaret just loathes fancy work, Aunt Harriet, " said she. "She would never even have begun that centrepiece. "

"It is much better never to begin a piece of work than never tofinish it, " replied Aunt Harriet, "and Mrs. Edes, my dear, has beenengaged in much more important work. If you had written a book whichhad made you famous, no one could venture to complain of your lack ofindustry with regard to the daisy centre piece. But I am sure thatMrs. Edes, in order to have written that book of which everybody istalking, must have displayed much industry and concentration in allthe minor matters of life. I think you must be mistaken, my dear. Iam quite sure that Mrs. Edes has not neglected work. "

Annie made no rejoinder, but her aunt did not seem to notice it. 

"I am so thankful, Mr. Von Rosen, " said she, "that my niece has thehonour of being counted among the friends of such a remarkable woman. May I inquire if Mrs. Edes has ever seen your really extraordinarycollection, Mr. Von Rosen. "

"No, she has not seen it, " replied Von Rosen, and he looked annoyed. Without in the least understanding the real trend of the matter, hedid not like to hear his sweetheart addressed after such a fashion, even though he had no inkling of the real state of affairs. To hismind, this exquisite little Annie, grimy daisy centre piece and all, had accomplished much more in simply being herself, than had MargaretEdes with her much blazoned book. 

"I trust that she will yet see it, " said Miss Harriet Eustace. Harriet Eustace was tall, dull skinned and wide mouthed, and she hada fashion, because she had been told from childhood that her mouthwas wide, of constantly puckering it as if she were eating alum. 

"I shall be of course pleased to show Mrs. Edes my collection at anytime, " said Von Rosen politely. 

"I hope she will see it, " said Harriet, puckering, "it is soimproving, and if anything is improving to the ordinary mind, whatmust it be to the mind of genius?"

The two took leave then, Annie walking behind her aunt. The sidewalkwhich was encroached upon by grass was very narrow. Annie did notspeak at all. She heard her aunt talking incessantly withoutrealising the substance of what she said. Her own brain wasoverwhelmed with bewilderment and happiness. Here was she, AnnieEustace, engaged to be married and to the right man. The combinationwas astounding. Annie had been conscious ever since she had firstseen him, that Karl von Rosen dwelt at the back of her thoughts, butshe was rather a well disciplined girl. She had not allowed herselfthe luxury of any dreams concerning him and herself. She had notconsidered the possibility of his caring for her, not because sheunderestimated herself, but because she overestimated him. Now, sheknew he cared, he cared, and he wanted to marry her, to make her hiswife. After she had reached home, when they were seated at the teatable, she did not think of telling anybody. She ate and felt as ifshe were in a blissful crystal sphere of isolation. It did not occurto her to reveal her secret until she went into her grandmother'sroom rather late to bid her good night. Annie had been sitting byherself on the front piazza and allowing herself a perfect feast infuture air-castles. She could see from where she sat, the lights fromthe windows of the Edes' house, and she heard Wilbur's voice, and nowand then his laugh. Margaret's voice, she never heard at all. Anniewent into the chamber, the best in the house, and there lay hergrandmother, old Ann Maria Eustace, propped up in bed, reading anovel which was not allowed in the Fairbridge library. She had biddenAnnie buy it for her, when she last went to New York. 

"I wouldn't ask a girl to buy such a book, " the old lady had said, "but nobody will know you and I have read so many notices about itswickedness, I want to see it for myself. "

Now she looked up when Annie entered. "It is not wicked at all, " shesaid in rather a disappointed tone. "It is much too dull. In order tomake a book wicked, it must be, at least, somewhat entertaining. Thewriter speaks of wicked things, but in such a very moral fashion thatit is all like a sermon. I don't like the book at all. At the sametime a girl like you had better not read it and you had better seethat Harriet and Susan don't get a glimpse of it. They would be setinto fits. It is a strange thing that both my daughters should besuch old maids to the bone and marrow. You can read it though if youwish, Annie. I doubt if you understand the wickedness anyway, and Idon't want you to grow up straight-laced like Harriet and Susan. Itis really a misfortune. They lose a lot. "

Then Annie spoke. "I shall not be an old maid, I think, " said she. "Iam going to be married. "

"Married! Who is going to marry you? I haven't seen a man in thishouse except the doctor and the minister for the last twenty years. "

"I am going to marry the minister, Mr. Von Rosen. "

"Lord, " said Annie's grandmother, and stared at her. She was a queerlooking old lady propped up on a flat pillow with her wicked book. She had removed the front-piece which she wore by day and her faceshowed large and rosy between the frills of her night cap. Her chinablue eyes were exceedingly keen and bright. Her mouth as large as herdaughter Harriet's, not puckered at all, but frankly open in analarming slit, in her amazement. 

"When for goodness sake has the man courted you?" she burst forth atlast. 

"I don't know. "

"Well, I don't know, if you don't. You haven't been meeting himoutside the house. No, you have not. You are a lady, if you have beenbrought up by old maids, who tell lies about spades. "

"I did not know until this afternoon, " said Annie. "Mr. Von Rosen andI went out to see his rose-garden, while Aunt Harriet--"

Then the old lady shook the bed with mirth. 

"I see, " said she. "Harriet is scared to death of roses and she wentto sleep in the house and you got your chance. Good for you. I amthankful the Eustace family won't quite sputter out in old maids. "The old lady continued to chuckle. Annie feared lest her aunts mighthear. Beside the bed stood a table with the collection of thingswhich was Ann Maria Eustace's nightly requirement. There were a goodmany things. First was a shaded reading lamp, then a candle and amatchbox; there was a plate of thin bread and butter carefully foldedin a napkin. A glass of milk, covered with a glass dish; two bottlesof medicine; two spoons; a saucer of sugared raspberries; exactly onesquare inch of American cheese on a tiny plate; a pitcher of water, carefully covered; a tumbler; a glass of port wine and a bottle ofcamphor. Old Ann Maria Eustace took most of her sustenance at night. Night was really her happy time. When that worn, soft old bulk ofhers was ensconsed among her soft pillows and feather bed and she hadher eatables and drinkables and literature at hand, she was in herhappiest mood and she was none the less happy from the knowledge thather daughters considered that any well conducted old woman shouldhave beside her bed, merely a stand with a fair linen cloth, a glassof water, a candle and the Good Book, and that if she could not goimmediately to sleep, she should lie quietly and say over texts andhymns to herself. All Ann Maria's spice of life was got from a hiddenantagonism to her daughters and quietly flying in the face of theirprejudices, and she was the sort of old lady who could hardly havelived at all without spice. 

"Your Aunt Harriet will be hopping, " said the perverse old lady withanother chuckle. 

"Why, grandmother?"

"Harriet has had an eye on him herself. "

Annie gasped. "Aunt Harriet must be at least twenty-five yearsolder, " said she. 

"Hm, " said the old lady, "that doesn't amount to anything. Harrietdidn't put on her pearl breast-pin and crimp her hair unless she hadsomething in her mind. Susan has given up, but Harriet hasn't givenup. "

Annie still looked aghast. 

"When are you going to get married?" asked the old lady. 

"I don't know. "

"Haven't settled that yet? Well, when you do, there's the white satinembroidered with white roses that I was married in and my old laceveil. I think he's a nice young man. All I have against him is hiscalling. You will have to go to meeting whether you want to or notand listen to the same man's sermons. But he is good looking and theysay he has money, and anyway, the Eustaces won't peter out in oldmaids. There's one thing I am sorry about. Sunday is going to be apretty long day for me, after you are married, and I suppose before. If you are going to marry that man, I suppose you will have to begingoing to meeting at once. "

Then Annie spoke decidedly. "I am always going to play pinocle withyou Sunday forenoons as long as you live, grandmother, " said she. 

"After you are married?"

"Yes, I am. "

"After you are married to a minister?"

"Yes, grandmother. "

The old lady sat up straight and eyed Annie with her delighted chinablue gaze. 

"Mr. Von Rosen is a lucky man, " said she. "Enough sight luckier thanhe knows. You are just like me, Annie Eustace, and your grandfatherset his eyes by me as long as he lived. A good woman who has senseenough not to follow all the rules and precepts and keep good, isn'tfound every day, and she can hold a man and holding a man is about astough a job as the Almighty ever set a woman. I've got a pearlnecklace and a ring in the bank. Harriet has always wanted them butwhat is the use of a born old maid decking herself out? I always knewHarriet and Susan would be old maids. Why, they would never let theirdoll-babies be seen without all their clothes on, seemed to thinkthere was something indecent about cotton cloth legs stuffed withsawdust. When you see a little girl as silly as that you can alwaysbe sure she is cut out for an old maid. I don't care when you getmarried--just as soon as you want to--and you shall have a prettywedding and you shall have your wedding cake made after my oldrecipe. You are a good girl, Annie. You look like me. You are enoughsight better than you would be if you were better, and you can makewhat you can out of that. Now, you must go to bed. You haven't toldHarriet and Susan yet, have you?"

"No, grandmother. "

"I'll tell them myself in the morning, " said the old lady with achuckle which made her ancient face a mask of mirth and mischief. "Now, you run along and go to bed. This book is dull, but I want tosee how wicked the writer tried to make it and the heroine is justmaking an awful effort to run away with a married man. She won'tsucceed, but I want to see how near she gets to it. Good-night, Annie. You can have the book to-morrow. "

Annie went to her own room but she made no preparation for bed. Shehad planned to work as she had worked lately until nearly morning. She was hurrying to complete another book which she had begun beforeMargaret Edes' announcement that she had written _The Poor Lady_. Thespeedy completion of this book had been the condition of secrecy withher publishers. However, Annie, before she lit the lamp on her tablecould not resist the desire to sit for a minute beside her window andgaze out upon the lovely night and revel in her wonderful happiness. The night was lovely enough for anyone, and for a girl in the raptureof her first love, it was as beautiful as heaven. The broad villagegleaming like silver in the moonlight satisfied her as well as astreet of gold and the tree shadows waved softly over everything likewings of benediction. Sweet odours came in her face. She could seethe soft pallor of a clump of lilies in the front yard. The shrillingof the night insects seemed like the calls of prophets of happiness. The lights had gone out of the windows of the Edes' house, butsuddenly she heard a faint, very faint, but very terrible cry and awhite figure rushed out of the Edes' gate. Annie did not wait asecond. She was up, out of her room, sliding down the stair banistersafter the habit of her childhood and after it. 

Chapter IX

Margaret Edes, light and slender and supple as she was, and moreoverrendered swift with the terrible spur of hysteria, was no match forAnnie Eustace who had the build of a racing human, being long-windedand limber. Annie caught up with her, just before they reached AliceMendon's house, and had her held by one arm. Margaret gave a stifledshriek. Even in hysteria, she did not quite lose her head. She hadunusual self-control. 

"Let me go, " she gasped. Annie saw that Margaret carried a suit-case, which had probably somewhat hindered her movements. "Let me go, Ishall miss the ten-thirty train, " Margaret said in her breathlessvoice. 

"Where are you going?"

"I am going. "

"Where?"

"Anywhere, --away from it all. "

The two struggled together as far as Alice's gate, and to Annie'sgreat relief, a tall figure appeared, Alice herself. She opened thegate and came on Margaret's other side. 

"What is the matter?" she asked. 

"I am going to take the ten-thirty train, " said Margaret. 

"Where are you going?"

"To New York. "

"Where in New York?"

"I am going. "

"You are not going, " said Alice Mendon; "you will return quietly toyour own home like a sensible woman. You are running away, and youknow it. "

"Yes, I am, " said Margaret in her desperate voice. "You would runaway if you were in my place, Alice Mendon. "

"I could never be in your place, " said Alice, "but if I were, Ishould stay and face the situation. " She spoke with quiteundisguised scorn and yet with pity. 

"You must think of your husband and children and not entirely ofyourself, " she added. 

"If, " said Margaret, stammering as she spoke, "I tell Wilbur, I thinkit will kill him. If I tell the children, they will never really havea mother again. They will never forget. But if I do not tell, I shallnot have myself. It is a horrible thing not to have yourself, AliceMendon. "

"It is the only way. "

"It is easy for you to talk, Alice Mendon. You have never beentempted. "

"No, " replied Alice, "that is quite true. I have never been temptedbecause--I cannot be tempted. "

"It is no credit to you. You were made so. "

"Yes, that is true also. I was made so. It is no credit to me. "

Margaret tried to wrench her arm free from Annie's grasp. 

"Let me go, Annie Eustace, " she said. "I hate you. "

"I don't care if you do, " replied Annie. "I don't love you any moremyself. I don't hate you, but I certainly don't love you. "

"I stole your laurels, " said Margaret, and she seemed to snap out thewords. 

"You could have had the laurels, " said Annie, "without stealing, if Icould have given them to you. It is not the laurels that matter. Itis you. "

"I will kill myself if it ever is known, " said Margaret in a lowhorrified whisper. She cowered. 

"It will never be known unless you yourself tell it, " said Annie. 

"I cannot tell, " said Margaret. "I have thought it all over. I cannottell and yet, how can I live and not tell?"

"I suppose, " said Alice Mendon, "that always when people do wrong, they have to endure punishment. I suppose that is your punishment, Margaret. You have always loved yourself and now you will have todespise yourself. I don't see any way out of it. "

"I am not the only woman who does such things, " said Margaret, andthere was defiance in her tone. 

"No doubt, you have company, " said Alice. "That does not make iteasier for you. " Alice, large and fair in her white draperies, towered over Margaret Edes like an embodied conscience. She wasalmost unendurable, like the ideal of which the other woman hadfallen short. Her mere presence was maddening. Margaret actuallygrimaced at her. 

"It is easy for you to preach, " said she, "very easy, Alice Mendon. You have not a nerve in your whole body. You have not an ungratifiedambition. You neither love nor hate yourself, or other people. Youwant nothing on earth enough to make the lack of it disturb you. "

"How well you read me, " said Alice and she smiled a large calm smileas a statue might smile, could she relax her beautiful marble mouth. 

"And as for Annie Eustace, " said Margaret, "she has what I stole, andshe knows it, and that is enough for her. Oh, both of you look downupon me and I know it. "

"I look down upon you no more than I have always done, " said Alice;but Annie was silent because she could not say that truly. 

"Yes, I know you have always looked down upon me, Alice Mendon, " saidMargaret, "and you never had reason. "

"I had the reason, " said Alice, "that your own deeds have provedtrue. "

"You could not know that I would do such a thing. I did not know itmyself. Why, I never knew that Annie Eustace could write a book. "

"I knew that a self-lover could do anything and everything to furtherher own ends, " said Alice in her inexorable voice, which yetcontained an undertone of pity. 

She pitied Margaret far more than Annie could pity her for she hadnot loved her so much. She felt the little arm tremble in her claspand her hand tightened upon it as a mother's might have done. 

"Now, we have had enough of this, " said she, "quite enough. Margaret, you must positively go home at once. I will take your suit-case, andreturn it to you to-morrow. I shall be out driving. You can get inwithout being seen, can't you?"

"I tell you both, I am going, " said Margaret; "I cannot face what isbefore me. "

"All creation has to face what is before. Running makes nodifference, " said Alice. "You will meet it at the end of every mile. Margaret Edes, go home. Take care of your husband, and your childrenand keep your secret and let it tear you for your own good. "

"They are to nominate Wilbur for Senator, " said Margaret. "If theyknew, if he knew, Wilbur would not run. He has always had ambition. Ishould kill it. "

"You will not kill it, " said Alice. "Here, give me that suit-case, Iwill set it inside the gate here. Now Annie and I will walk with youand you must steal in and not wake anybody and go to bed and tosleep. "

"To sleep, " repeated Margaret bitterly. 

"Then not to sleep, but you must go. "

The three passed down the moon-silvered road. When they had reachedMargaret's door, Alice suddenly put an arm around her and kissed her. 

"Go in as softly as you can, and to bed, " she whispered. 

"What made you do that, Alice?" asked Annie in a small voice when thedoor had closed behind Margaret. 

"I think I am beginning to love her, " whispered Alice. "Now you knowwhat we must do, Annie?"

"What?"

"We must both watch until dawn, until after that train to New Yorkwhich stops here at three-thirty. You must stand here and I will goto the other door. Thank God, there are only two doors, and I don'tthink she will try the windows because she won't suspect our beinghere. But I don't trust her, poor thing. She is desperate. You stayhere, Annie. Sit down close to the door and--you won't be afraid?"

"Oh, no!"

"Of course, there is nothing to be afraid of, " said Alice. "Now Iwill go to the other door. "

Annie sat there until the moon sank. She did not feel in the leastsleepy. She sat there and counted up her joys of life and almostforgot poor Margaret who had trampled hers in the dust raised by herown feet of self-seeking. Then came the whistle and roar of a trainand Alice stole around the house. 

"It is safe enough for us to go now, " said she. "That was the lasttrain. Do you think you can get in your house without wakinganybody?"

"There is no danger unless I wake grandmother. She wakes very earlyof herself and she may not be asleep and her hearing is very quick. "

"What will she say?"

"I think I can manage her. "

"Well, we must hurry. It is lucky that my room is away from theothers or I should not be sure of getting there unsuspected. Hurry, Annie. "

The two sped swiftly and noiselessly down the street, which was nowvery dark. The village houses seemed rather awful with their darkwindows like sightless eyes. When they reached Annie's house Alicegave her a swift kiss. "Good-night, " she whispered. 

"Alice. "

"Well, little Annie?"

"I am going to be married, to Mr. Von Rosen. "

Alice started ever so slightly. "You are a lucky girl, " shewhispered, "and he is a lucky man. "

Alice flickered out of sight down the street like a white moonbeamand Annie stole into the house. She dared not lock the door behindher lest she arouse somebody. She tip-toed upstairs, but as she waspassing her grandmother's door, it was opened, and the old womanstood there, her face lit by her flaring candle. 

"You just march right in here, " said she so loud that Annie shudderedfor fear she would arouse the whole house. She followed hergrandmother into her room and the old woman turned and looked at her, and her face was white. 

"Where have you been, Miss?" said she. "It is after three o'clock inthe morning. "

"I had to go, grandmother, and there was no harm, but I can't tellyou. Indeed, I can't, " replied Annie, trembling. 

"Why can't you? I'd like to know. "

"I can't, indeed, I can't, grandmother. "

"Why not, I'd like to know. Pretty doings, I call it. "

"I can't tell you why not, grandmother. "

The old woman eyed the girl. "Out with a man--I don't care if you areengaged to him--till this time!" said she. 

Annie started and crimsoned. "Oh, grandmother!" she cried. 

"I don't care if he is a minister. I am going to see him to-morrow, no, to-day, right after breakfast and give him a piece of my mind. Idon't care what he thinks of me. "

"Grandmother, there wasn't any man. "

"Are you telling me the truth?"

"I always tell the truth. "

"Yes, I think you always have since that time when you were a littlegirl and I spanked you for lying, " said the old woman. "I ratherthink you do tell the truth, but sometimes when a girl gets a maninto her head, she goes round like a top. You haven't been alone, youneedn't tell me that. "

"No, I haven't been alone. "

"But, he wasn't with you? There wasn't any man?"

"No, there was not any man, grandmother. "

"Then you had better get into your own room as fast as you can andmove still or you will wake up Harriet and Susan. "

Annie went. 

"I am thankful I am not curious, " said the old woman clambering backinto bed. She lit her lamp and took up her novel again. 

The next morning old Ann Maria Eustace announced her granddaughter'sengagement at the breakfast table. She waited until the meal was infull swing, then she raised her voice. 

"Well, girls, " she said, looking first at Harriet, then at Susan, "Ihave some good news for you. Our little Annie here is too modest, soI have to tell you for her. "

Harriet Eustace laughed unsuspiciously. "Don't tell us that Annie hasbeen writing a great anonymous novel like Margaret Edes, " she said, and Susan laughed also. "Whatever news it may be, it is not that, "she said. "Nobody could suspect Annie of writing a book. I myself wasnot so much surprised at Margaret Edes. "

To Annie's consternation, her grandmother turned upon her a long, slow, reading look. She flushed under it and swallowed a spoonful ofcereal hastily. Then her grandmother chuckled under her breath andher china blue eyes twinkled. 

"Annie has done something a deal better than to write a book, " saidshe, looking away from the girl, and fixing unsparing eyes upon herdaughters. "She has found a nice man to marry her. "

Harriet and Susan dropped their spoons and stared at their mother. 

"Mother, what are you talking about?" said Harriet sharply. "She hashad no attention. "

"Sometimes, " drawled the old lady in a way she affected when shewished to be exasperating, "sometimes, a little attention is sostrong that it counts and sometimes attention is attention whennobody thinks it is. "

"Who is it?" asked Harriet in rather a hard voice. Susan regardedAnnie with a bewildered, yet kindly smile. Poor Susan had neverregarded the honey pots of life as intended for herself, and thuscould feel a kindly interest in their acquisition by others. 

"My granddaughter is engaged to be married to Mr. Von Rosen, " saidthe old lady. Then she stirred her coffee assiduously. 

Susan rose and kissed Annie. "I hope you will be happy, very happy, "she said in an awed voice. Harriet rose, to follow her sister'sexample but she looked viciously at her mother. 

"He is a good ten years older than Annie, " she said. 

"And a good twenty-five younger than you, " said the old lady, andsipped her coffee delicately. "He is just the right age for Annie. "

Harriet kissed Annie, but her lips were cold and Annie wondered. Itnever occurred to her then, nor later, to imagine that her AuntHarriet might have had her own dreams which had never entirely endedin rainbow mists. She did not know how hardly dreams die. They aresometimes not entirely stamped out during a long lifetime. 

That evening Von Rosen came to call on Annie and she received himalone in the best parlour. She felt embarrassed and shy, but veryhappy. Her lover brought her an engagement ring, a great pearl, whichhad been his mother's and put it on her finger, and Annie eyed herfinger with a big round gaze like a bird's. Von Rosen laughed at thegirl holding up her hand and staring at the beringed finger. 

"Don't you like it, dear?" he said. 

"It is the most beautiful ring I ever saw, " said Annie, "but I keepthinking it may not be true. "

"The truest things in the world are the things which do not seem so, "he said, and caught up the slender hand and kissed the ring and thefinger. 

Margaret on the verandah had seen Von Rosen enter the Eustace houseand had guessed dully at the reason. She had always thought that VonRosen would eventually marry Alice Mendon and she wondered a little, but not much. Her own affairs were entirely sufficient to occupy hermind. Her position had become more impossible to alter and moreghastly. That night Wilbur had brought home a present to celebrateher success. It was something which she had long wanted and which sheknew he could ill afford:--a circlet of topazes for her hair. Shekissed him and put it on to please him, but it was to her as if shewere crowned because of her infamy and she longed to snatch the thingoff and trample it. And yet always she was well aware that it was notremorse which she felt, but a miserable humiliation that she, Margaret Edes, should have cause for remorse. The whole day had beenhideous. The letters and calls of congratulation had been incessant. There were brief notices in a few papers which had been marked andsent to her and Wilbur had brought them home also. Her post-officebox had been crammed. There were requests for her autograph. Therewere requests for aid from charitable institutions. There wererequests for advice and assistance from young authors. She had twopackages of manuscripts sent her for inspection concerning theirmerits. One was a short story, and came through the mail; one was abook and came by express. She had requests for work from editors andpublishers. Wilbur had brought a letter of congratulation from hispartner. It was absolutely impossible for her to draw back except forthat ignoble reason: the reinstatement of herself in her own esteem. She could not possibly receive all this undeserved adulation andretain her self esteem. It was all more than she had counted upon. She had opened Pandora's box with a vengeance and the stinging thingsswarmed over her. Wilbur sat on the verandah with her and scarcelytook his eyes of adoring wonder from her face. She had sent thelittle girls to bed early. They had told all their playmates andtalked incessantly with childish bragging. They seemed to mock her aswith peacock eyes, symbolic of her own vanity. 

"You sent the poor little things to bed very early, " Wilbur said. "They did so enjoy talking over their mother's triumph. It is thegreatest day of their lives, you know, Margaret. "

"I am tired of it, " Margaret said sharply, but Wilbur's look ofworship deepened. 

"You are so modest, sweetheart, " he said and Margaret writhed. PoorWilbur had been reading _The Poor Lady_ instead of his belovednewspapers and now and then he quoted a passage which he remembered, with astonishing accuracy. 

"Say, darling, you are a marvel, " he would remark after everyquotation. "Now, how in the world did you ever manage to think thatup? I suppose just this minute, as you sit there looking so sweet inyour white dress, just such things are floating through your brain, eh?"

"No, they are not, " replied Margaret. Oh, if she had only understoodthe horrible depth of a lie!

"Suppose Von Rosen is making up to little Annie?" said Wilburpresently. 

"I don't know. "

"Well, she is a nice little thing, sweet tempered, and pretty, although of course her mental calibre is limited. She may make a goodwife, though. A man doesn't expect his wife always to set the riveron fire as you have done, sweetheart. "

Then Wilbur fished from his pockets a lot of samples. "Thought I mustorder a new suit, to live up to my wife, " he said. "See which youprefer, Margaret. "

"I should think your own political outlook would make the new suitnecessary, " said Margaret tartly. 

"Not a bit of it. Get more votes if you look a bit shabby from thesort who I expect may get me the office, " laughed Wilbur. "This newsuit is simply to enable me to look worthy, as far as my clothes areconcerned, of my famous wife. "

"I think you have already clothes enough, " said Margaret coldly. 

Wilbur looked hurt. "Doesn't make much difference how the old manlooks, does it, dear?" said he. 

"Let me see the samples, " Margaret returned with an effort. Therewere depths beyond depths; there were bottomless quicksands in a lie. How could she have known?

That night Wilbur looked into his wife's bedroom at midnight. "Awake?" he asked in his monosyllabic fashion. 

"Yes. "

"Say, old girl, Von Rosen has just this minute gone. Guess it's amatch fast enough. "

"I always thought it would be Alice, " returned Margaret wearily. Loveaffairs did seem so trivial to her at this juncture. 

"Alice Mendon has never cared a snap about getting married any way, "returned Wilbur. "Some women are built that way. She is. "

Margaret did not inquire how he knew. If Wilbur had told her that hehad himself asked Alice in marriage, it would have been as if she hadnot heard. All such things seemed very unimportant to her in theawful depths of her lie. She said good-night in answer to Wilbur'sand again fell to thinking. There was no way out, absolutely no way. She must live and die with this secret self-knowledge which abasedher, gnawing at the heart. Wilbur had told her that he believed thather authorship of _The Poor Lady_ might be the turning point of hiselection. She was tongue-tied in a horrible spiritual sense. She wasdisfigured for the rest of her life and she could never once turnaway her eyes from her disfigurement. 

The light from Annie Eustace's window shone in her room for two hoursafter that. She wondered what she was doing and guessed Annie waswriting a new novel to take the place of the one of which she hadrobbed her. An acute desire which was like a pain to be herself theinjured instead of the injurer possessed her. Oh, what would it meanto be Annie sitting there, without leisure to brood over her newhappiness, working, working, into the morning hours and have nothingto look upon except moral and physical beauty in her mentallooking-glass. She envied the poor girl, who was really workingbeyond her strength, as she had never envied any human being. Theenvy stung her, and she could not sleep. The next morning she lookedill and then she had to endure Wilbur's solicitude. 

"Poor girl, you overworked writing your splendid book, " he said. Thenhe suggested that she spend a month at an expensive seashore resortand another horror was upon Margaret. Wilbur, she well knew, couldnot afford to send her to such a place, but was innocently, albeitrather shamefacedly, assuming that she could defray her own expensesfrom the revenue of her book. He would never call her to account asto what she had done with the wealth which he supposed her to bereaping. She was well aware of that, but he would naturally wonderwithin himself. Any man would. She said that she was quite well, thatshe hated a big hotel, and much preferred home during the hot season, but she heard the roar of these new breakers. How could she havedreamed of the lifelong disturbance which a lie could cause?

Night after night she saw the light in Annie's windows and she knewwhat she was doing. She knew why she was not to be married until nextwinter. That book had to be written first. Poor Annie could not enjoyher romance to the full because of over-work. The girl lost flesh andMargaret knew why. Preparing one's trousseau, living in a loveaffair, and writing a book, are rather strenuous, when undertaken atthe same time. 

It was February when Annie and Von Rosen were married and the weddingwas very quiet. Annie had over-worked, but her book was published, and was out-selling _The Poor Lady_. It also was publishedanonymously, but Margaret knew, she knew even from the reviews. Thenshe bought the book and read it and was convinced. The book wasreally an important work. The writer had gone far beyond her firstflight, but there was something unmistakable about the style to sucha jealous reader as Margaret. Annie had her success after all. Shewore her laurels, although unseen of men, with her orange blossoms. Margaret saw in every paper, in great headlines, the notice of thegreat seller. The best novel for a twelve-month--_The Firm Hand_. Wilbur talked much about it. He had his election. He was a Senator, and was quietly proud of it, but nothing mattered to him as much asMargaret's book. That meant more than his own success. 

"I have read that novel they are talking so much about and it cannotcompare with yours, " he told her. "The publishers ought to push yoursa little more. Do you think I ought to look in on them and have alittle heart-to-heart talk?"

Margaret's face was ghastly. "Don't do anything of the sort, " shesaid. 

"Well, I won't if you don't want me to, but--"

"I most certainly don't want you to. " Then Margaret never had a dayof peace. She feared lest Wilbur, who seemed nightly more incensed atthe flaming notices of _The Firm Hand_ might, in spite of herremonstrances, go to see the publishers, and would they keep thesecret if he did?

Margaret continued to live as she had done before. That was part ofthe horror. She dared not resign from the Zenith Club. However, shecame in time to get a sort of comfort from it. Meeting all thosemembers, presiding over the meetings, became a sort of secretflagellation, which served as a counter irritation, for her tormentedsoul. All those women thought well of her. They admired her. Theacute torture which she derived from her knowledge of herself, ascompared with their opinion of her, seemed at times to go a littleway toward squaring her account with her better self. And the clubalso seemed to rouse within her a keener vitality of her better self. Especially when the New Year came and Mrs. Slade was electedpresident in her stead. Once, Margaret would have been incapable ofaccepting that situation so gracefully. She gave a reception to Mrs. Slade in honour of her election, and that night had a little returnof her lost peace. Then during one of the meetings, a really goodpaper was read, which set her thinking. That evening she playeddominoes with Maida and Adelaide, and always after that a gamefollowed dinner. The mother became intimate with her children. Shereally loved them because of her loss of love for herself, andbecause the heart must hold love. She loved her husband too, but herealised no difference because he had loved her. That coldness hadhad no headway against such doting worship. But the childrenrealised. 

"Mamma is so much better since she wrote that book that I shall beglad when you are old enough to write a book too, " Adelaide said onceto Maida. 

But always Margaret suffered horribly, although she gave no sign. Shetook care of her beauty. She was more particular than ever about herdress. She entertained, she accepted every invitation, and theymultiplied since Wilbur's flight in politics and her own reputedauthorship. She was Spartan in her courage, but she suffered, becauseshe saw herself as she was and she had so loved herself. It was notuntil Annie Eustace was married that she obtained the slightestrelief. Then she ascertained that the friend whom she had robbed ofher laurels had obtained a newer and greener crown of them. She wentto the wedding and saw on a table, Annie's new book. She glanced atit and she knew and she wondered if Von Rosen knew. He did not. 

Annie waited until after their return from their short weddingjourney when they were settled in their home. Then one evening, seated with her husband before the fire in the study, with the yellowcat in her lap, and the bull terrier on the rug, his white skin rosyin the firelight, she said:

"Karl, I have something to tell you. "

Von Rosen looked lovingly at her. "Well, dear?"

"It is nothing, only you must not tell, for the publishers insistupon its being anonymous, I--wrote _The Firm Hand_. "

Von Rosen made a startled exclamation and looked at Annie and shecould not understand the look. 

"Are you displeased?" she faltered. "Don't you like me to write? Iwill never neglect you or our home because of it. Indeed I will not. "

"Displeased, " said Von Rosen. He got up and deliberately knelt beforeher. "I am proud that you are my wife, " he said, "prouder than I amof anything else in the world. "

"Please get up, dear, " said Annie, "but I am so glad, although it isreally I who am proud, because I have you for my husband. I feel allcovered over with peacock's eyes. "

"I cannot imagine a human soul less like a peacock, " said Von Rosen. He put his arms around her as he knelt, and kissed her, and theyellow cat gave an indignant little snarl and jumped down. He wasjealous. 

"Sit down, " said Annie, laughing. "I thought the time had come totell you and I hoped you would be pleased. It is lovely, isn't it?You know it is selling wonderfully. "

"It is lovely, " said Von Rosen. "It would have been lovely anyway, but your success is a mighty sweet morsel for me. "

"You had better go back to your chair and smoke and I will read toyou, " said Annie. 

"Just as if you had not written a successful novel, " said Von Rosen. But he obeyed, the more readily because he knew, and pride andreverence for his wife fairly dazed him. Von Rosen had been moreacute than the critics and Annie had written at high pressure, andone can go over a book a thousand times and be blind to things whichshould be seen. She had repeated one little sentence which she hadwritten in _The Poor Lady_. Von Rosen knew, but he never told herthat he knew. He bowed before her great, generous silence as he wouldhave bowed before a shrine, but he knew that she had written _ThePoor Lady_, and had allowed Margaret Edes to claim unquestioned thehonour of her work. 

As they sat there, Annie's Aunt Susan came in and sat with them. Shetalked a good deal about the wedding presents. Wedding presents werevery wonderful to her. They were still spread out, most of them ontables in the parlour because all Fairbridge was interested inviewing them. After a while Susan went into the parlour and gloatedover the presents. When she came back, she wore a slightly disgustedexpression. 

"You have beautiful presents, " said she, "but I have been looking allaround and the presents are not all on those tables, are they?"

"No, " said Annie. 

Von Rosen laughed. He knew what was coming, or thought that he did. 

"I see, " said Aunt Susan, "that you have forty-two copies of MargaretEdes' book, _The Poor Lady_, and I have always thought it was a verysilly book, and you can't exchange them for every single one isautographed. "

It was quite true. Poor Margaret Edes had autographed the forty-two. She had not even dreamed of the incalculable depths of a lie. 

THE END

[Transcriber's note:

The following spelling inconsistencies were present in the originaland were not corrected in this etext:

wordlyensconsed/ensconced]