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THE WORKS OF KATHLEEN NORRIS

HARRIET AND THE PIPER

VOLUME XI



TO

DANIEL WEBB NYE

DEAR MAKER OF BOOKS AND FRIENDS




HARRIET AND THE PIPER




CHAPTER I


Richard Carter had called the place "Crownlands," not to please
himself, or even his wife. But it was to his mother's newly born family
pride that the idea of being the Carters of Crownlands made its appeal.
The estate, when he bought it, had belonged to a Carter, and the
tradition was that two hundred years before it had been a grant of the
first George to the first of the name in America. Madame Carter, as the
old lady liked to be called, immediately adopted the unknown owner into
a vague cousinship, spoke of him as "a kinsman of ours," and proceeded
to tell old friends that Crownlands had always been "in the family."

It was a home hardly deserving of the pretentious name, although it was
beautiful enough, and spacious enough, for notice, even among the
magnificent neighbours that surrounded it. It was of creamy brick,
colonial in design, and set in splendid lawns and great trees on the
bank of the blue Hudson. White driveways circled it, great stables and
garages across a curve of green meadows had their own invisible domain,
and on the shining highway there was a full mile of high brick fence, a
marching line of great maples and sycamores, and a demure lodge beside
the mighty iron gates.

Much of this was as Richard Carter had found it five years ago, but
about the house, inside and out, his wife had made changes, had lent
the place something of her own individuality and charm. It was Isabelle
Carter who had visualized the window-boxes and the awnings, the walks
where emerald grass spouted between the bricks, the terrace with its
fat balustrade and shallow marble steps descending to the river. Great
stone jars, spilling the brilliant scarlet of geraniums, flanked the
steps, and the shadows of the mighty trees fell clear and sharp across
the marble. And on a soft June afternoon, sitting in the silence and
the fragrance with boats plying up and down the river, and birds
twittering and flashing at the brim of the fountain, one might have
dreamed one's self in some forgotten Italian garden rather than a short
two hours' trip away from the busiest and most congested city of the
world.

On one of the wide benches that were placed here and there on the
descending terraces, in the late hours of an exquisite summer
afternoon, a man and a woman were sitting. They had strolled slowly
from the tennis court, where half-a-dozen young persons were violently
exercising themselves in the sunshine, with the vague intention of
reaching the tea table, on the upper level. But here, in the clear
shade, Isabelle Carter had suddenly seated herself, and Anthony Pope,
her cavalier, had thrown himself on the steps at her feet.

She was a woman worthy of the exquisite setting, and in her richly
coloured gown, against the clear cream of the marble, the new green of
the trees and lawns, and the brilliant hues of the flowers, she might
well have turned an older head than that of the boy beside her.
Brunette, with smooth cheeks deeply touched with rose, black eyes, and
a warmly crimson mouth that could be at once provocative and
relentless, she glowed like a flower herself in the sweet and
enervating heat of the summer's first warm day. She wore a filmy gown
of a dull cream colour, with daring great poppies in pink and black and
gold embroidered over it; her lacy black hat, shadowing her clear
forehead and smoke-black hair, was covered with the soft pink flowers.
She was the tiniest of women, and the little foot, that, in its
transparent silk stocking and buckled slipper, was close to Anthony's
hand, was like a child's.

The man was twice her size, and as dark as she, earnest, eager, and
to-day with a troubled expression clouding his face. It was to banish
that look, if she might, that Isabelle had deliberately stopped him
here.

She had been behaving badly toward him, and in her rather irresponsible
and shallow way she was sorry for it. Isabelle was a famous flirt, her
husband knew it, everyone knew it. There was always some man paying
desperate court to her, and always half-a-dozen other men who were
eager to be in his place. Now it was a painter, now a singer, now one
of the men of her husband's business world. They sent her orchids and
sweets, and odd bits of jewellery, and curious fans and laces, and
pictures and brasses, and quaint pieces of china. They sent her
tremendously significant letters, just the eloquent word or two, the
little oddity of date or signature or paper that was to impress her
with an individuality, or with the depth of a passion. Isabelle lived
for this, went from one adventure to another with the naive confidence
of a woman whose husband smiles upon her playing, and whose position is
impregnable.

But this boy, this Anthony, was different. In the first place he was
young, he was but twenty-six. In the second place he was, or had been,
her own son's closest friend. Ward Carter was twenty-two, and his
mother nineteen years older.

Yes, she was forty-one, although neither she nor her mirror admitted it
readily. Anthony, she thought, must realize it. He must realize that
his feeling for her was unthinkable, not to say absurd. It had taken
her by surprise, this last conquest. She had known the boy only a few
weeks. Ward had brought him home for a visit, at Easter, but Isabelle,
besides admiring his unusual beauty and identifying him with the Pope
fortune, had paid him small attention. She had been absorbed then in
the wretched conclusion of the Foster affair. Derrick Foster had been
distressing and annoying her unmercifully. After the warm and
delightful friendship of several months, after luncheons and teas,
opera and concerts in the greatest harmony, Derrick Foster had had the
daring, the impudence, to imply--to insinuate--

Well, Isabelle had gotten rid of him, although she could not yet think
of him without scarlet colour in her cheeks. And it had been on a
particularly trying afternoon, when the unshed tears of anger and hurt
pride had been making her fine eyes heavier and more mysterious than
usual, that this nice boy, this handsome friend of Ward, had gone
riding with her, and had shown such charming sympathy for her dark
mood. They had had tea at the Country Club, and Tony, as she had begun
at once to call him, had been wonderfully amusing and soothing.
Isabelle, when they came back to the house, had turned impulsively in
the hall, had laid her small hand, in its dashing gauntlet, upon his
big shoulder.

"You've carried me over an ugly bog, Little Boy!" she had said. "I like
you--such a lot!"

That was six weeks ago, but in those short six weeks the little boy
that she had patronized had entirely upset her preconceived ideas of
him. He was young, and he was absurd, but he did not know it, and
Isabelle began to feel the difficulty of keeping the whole world from
discovering it before he did. He made no secret of his passion. He came
straight to her in any company; he never looked at anybody else. The
young girls to whom she introduced him bored him, he was rude to them.
To her own daughter Nina, seventeen years old, his attitude was almost
paternal; he ignored Ward as if their friendship had never been. Toward
Richard Carter, who was pleasantly hospitable toward the lad, he showed
an icy and trembling politeness.

Isabelle saw now that she had made a mistake. She should have killed
this affair at the very beginning. Tony was not like the older men,
willing to play the game with just a little scorching of fingers.
Appearances meant nothing to Tony, and she had let the play go too far
now to convince him that she did not return something of his feeling.

Indeed, to her own amazement, his fire kindled fire in return. When he
was not at Crownlands she could laugh at him, even though her thoughts
were full of him. But when he was there, life to her was more radiant,
more full, more glowing with colour and fragrance. The books he
touched, the chair he had at breakfast, his young, lithe body in its
golfing knickerbockers, or his sleek black head above the dull black of
evening wear, haunted her oddly. He troubled her, but she had neither
quite the power nor quite the desire to banish him.

She looked down at him now, content to be alone with her and at her
feet, and a hundred mixed emotions stirred her. His feeling for her was
not only pitiable and absurd in him, but it was rapidly reaching the
point when it would make her absurd and pitiable, too. Nina,
instinctively scenting the affair, had already expressed herself as
"hating that idiot"; Ward had scowled, of late, at the mere mention of
Tony's name. Even her husband, the patient Richard, seeing the youth
ensconce himself firmly beside her in the limousine, had had aside his
mild comment: "Is this young man a fixture in our family, dear?"

"You should be playing tennis, Tony," said Isabelle.

"Tennis!" He laughed; there was a slight movement of his broad
shoulders.

"I think Miss Betty Allen was a little disappointed," the woman
pursued. A look of distaste crossed Anthony's face.

"Please--CHERIE!" he begged.

There was a silence brimming with sweetness and colour. Tony laid his
hand against her knee, groped until her own warm, smooth fingers were
in his own.

"Does Mr. Carter play golf to-morrow?" he asked, presently.

"I suppose so!"

"And you--what do you do?"

"Oh, I have a full day! People to lunch, friends of Madame Carter-"

The boy laughed triumphantly.

"I knew you'd say that!" he said. "Now, I'll tell YOU about to-morrow.
You and I are going to slip away, at about one o'clock, and go off in
the gray car. We'll go up to--well, somewhere, and we'll have our lunch
under the trees. I'll have Hansen pack us something at the club. We'll
be back at about four, for the tea callers, and they may have you until
I come back for dinner. After dinner we'll walk on the terrace--as we
did two wonderful, wonderful nights ago, and perhaps--" His voice had
fallen to a rich and tender note, his eyes were rapt. "Perhaps," he
said, "just before we go in, at the end of the terrace, you'll look up
at the stars again--"

"Tony!" Isabelle interrupted, her face brilliant with colour. "My dear
boy--my dear boy, listen to me--"

"Well?" he asked, looking up, as she paused.

"My dear," she said, with difficulty, "think where this is going to
end."

He jerked his head impatiently.

"Oh, if you are going to begin THAT again!"

"My dear, I have to begin that again! In all reason--in all REASON----"

"Isabelle, what in God's name has reason to do with it!" He knelt
before her, and caught her hands, and Isabelle had a terrified fear
that Ward, or Nina, or any one else, might start up or down the terrace
steps and see him. "The instant you realize what you and I are to each
other, my darling," he said, "you begin to talk of reason. Love isn't
reason, Cherie. It's the divinest unreason in the world! Cherie,
there's never been another woman for me; there never will be! It's
nothing to me that there are obstacles--I love them--I glory in them! I
can't live without you; I don't want to! You're frightened now, you
don't know how we can manage it. But I'll find the way. The only thing
that matters is that you must belong to me--you SHALL belong to me--as
I to you in every fibre of my being--"

"Tony--for Heaven's sake--!" Isabelle was in an agony. Somebody was
approaching. He had gotten to his feet, and was gloomily staring at the
river, when Nina Carter, followed by a great white Russian hound, came
flying down the steps.

"Mother--" Nina, a tall, overgrown girl, with spectacles on her
straight nose, and straight, light-brown hair in thick braids, stopped
short and gave her mother's companion a look of withering distaste.
"Mother," she began again, "aren't you coming up for tea? Granny's
there, and the others, from tennis, and Mrs. Bellamy telephoned that
she's bringing some people over, and there's nobody there but Granny
and me!"

Nina was like her New England father, conscientious, serious, gravely
condemnatory of the lax and the unconventional.

"Ask Betty Allen to pour," said Mrs. Carter, regaining her composure
rapidly, and assuming the air of hostess at once.

"Betty went home for a tub," Nina explained. "She's coming back. But,
Mother," she added, with a faintly reproachful and whining intonation,
"really, you ought to be there--"

Mrs. Carter knew this as well as Nina. But she found the child
extremely trying in this puritanical mood. Granting that this affair
with Tony did her, Isabelle, small credit, at least it was not for Nina
to sit in judgment. Rebellious, Isabelle fondled the loving nose of the
hound with a small, brown, jewelled hand, and glanced dubiously at
Tony's uncompromising back.

"Trot back, Nina love," said she to her daughter, cheerfully, "and ask
Miss Harriet to come out and pour. I'll be there directly. We'll come
right up. Run along!"

To Nina, in this ignominious dismissal, there was sweet. She adored
"Miss Harriet," the Miss Field who had been her governess and her
mother's secretary for the three happiest years of Nina's somewhat
sealed young life. It would be "fun" to have Miss Field pour. Nina
leaped obediently up the steps, with a flopping of thick braids and the
scrape of sturdy shoes, and the sweet summer world was in silence again.

Isabelle sat on, stroking the hound, her soul filled with perplexity.
The shadows were lengthening, the shafts of sunlight more bold and
clear. The hound, surprised at the silence, whined faintly.

"I wish it might have been Nina!" Isabelle said. Anthony's eloquent
back gave her sudden understanding of his fury. She got up, and went
noiselessly toward him, and she felt a shudder shake him as she slipped
her hand into his arm. "Ah, please, Tony," she pleaded, "what can I do?"

"Nothing!" he answered, suddenly pliant. "Nothing, of course." And he
turned to her a boyish face stern with pain. "Of course you can do
nothing, Cherie. I'm not such a--such a FOOL--" his voice broke
angrily--"that I can't see that! Come on, we'll go up and have
tea--with the Bellamys. And I--I'll be going to-night. I'll say
good-bye to you now--and perhaps you'll be good enough to make my
good-byes to the others--"

The youthfulness of it did not rob it of real dignity. Isabelle,
wretchedly mounting the steps beside him, felt her heart contract with
real pain. He would go away--it would all be over and forgotten in a
few weeks--and yet, how she longed to comfort him, to make him happy
again!

She looked obliquely at his set face, and what she saw there made her
feel ashamed.

 On the bright level of the upper terrace tea was merrily in
progress. In the streaming afternoon light the scene was strikingly
cheerful and pretty: the wide wicker chairs with their gay cretonne
cushions, the over-shadowing green trees in heavy leaf, the women's
many-coloured gowns and the men's cool whites and grays. On the broad
white balustrade Isabelle's great peacock was standing, with his tail
fanned to its amazing breadth; two maids, in their crisp black and
white, were coming and going with silver and china on their trays.

Miss Field had duly come down to preside, and all was well. Isabelle,
as she dropped into a chair, gave a sigh of relief; everyone was amused
and absorbed and happy. Everyone, that is, except the magnificent and
sharp-eyed old lady who sat, regally throned, near her, and favoured
her immediately with a dissatisfied look. Old Madame Carter had her own
good reasons for being angry, and she never spared any one available
from a participation in her mood.

She was remarkably handsome, even at seventy-five; with a crown of
puffed white hair, gold-rimmed eyeglasses, and an erect and finely
preserved figure. Her silk gown flowed over her knees, and formed a
rich fold about her shining slippers; a wide lace scarf was about her
shoulders, and she wore an old-fashioned watchchain of heavy braided
gold, and a great many handsome pins and rings. Her voice was
theatrically deep and clear, and her manner vigorous and impressive.

"Well, my dear, your friends were naturally wondering what important
matter kept their hostess away from her guests," she began. Isabelle
had not been her daughter-in-law for more than twenty years for
nothing. She shrugged and smiled carelessly, with an indifferent glance
at the group. Ward's friends, the tennis-players, and old Doctor and
Mrs. Potter and their niece, from next door. Nobody here of any
especial importance!

"Harriet is managing very nicely," Isabelle said, contentedly, as Tony,
with a sombre face and averted eyes, brought her her tea.

"So Ward seems to think," observed Ward's grandmother with acidity.
Isabelle laughed indifferently. Her son, slender and tall, and with
something of her own eagerness and fire in his sunburned young face,
was beside Miss Field, who talked to him in a quiet aside while she
busied herself with cups and spoons.

"Perfectly safe there!" Isabelle said.

"I should hope so!" old Madame Carter remarked, pointedly. "At least if
there's any of OUR blood in his veins--but of course he's all Slocum.
They used to say of my Aunt Georgina that she never married because the
only man she ever loved was beneath her socially--"

Isabelle knew all about Aunt Georgina, and she looked wearily away.
Tony, sighing elaborately, drew upon himself the old lady's fire.

"Why don't you go over and join the young people, Mr. Pope?" she asked,
pleasantly. "Isabelle and I can manage very well without a cavalier.
You're tired, Isabelle--I can always tell it. Be glad that you're too
young to know what that means, Mr. Pope. Go over there--there's a chair
next to Nina. What shall we suspect him of, Isabelle--a quarrel with
pretty Miss Allen?--if he avoids the young people, and looks like such
a thunder-cloud."

Isabelle sighed patiently.

"The Bellamys are coming in for awhile," she observed, with deliberate
irrelevance, "and I hope they'll bring their Swami--or whatever he is,
with them. He must be a queer creature."

"He's not a Swami, he's an artist," Tony said, drawn into a casual
conversation much against his will. "Blondin--I've met him. He has a
studio up on Fifty-ninth Street--goes in for poetry and musical
interpretations and I don't know what else. Now I believe it's Indian
philosophies--I can't bear him, he makes me sick!"

He relapsed into gloomy silence, and Isabelle put into her laugh
something affectionate and soothing.

"He evidently lives by his wits," she suggested, "which is something
you have never had to do!"

Tony scowled again. It was part of his charm for her that he was the
spoiled darling of fortune. Handsome and young, and with no family ties
to restrain him, he had recently come into his own enormous fortune.
Isabelle knew that his New York apartment was fit for a prince, that
his man servant was perfection, that he had his own pet affectations in
the matter of monogrammed linen, Italian stationery, and specially
designed speed cars. His manner with servants, his ready check book,
his easy French, and his unruffled self-confidence in any imaginable
contingency, coupled with his youth, had strong attraction for a woman
conscious of the financial restrictions of her own early years and the
limitations of her public school education.

"Why don't you go to the club and dress now, and come back and dine
with us?" she said, in an undertone.

"Do you want me?" he asked, sulkily.

"I'm ASKING you!"

For answer he stood up, and smiled wistfully down upon her, with a
hesitancy she knew well how to interpret in his eyes. She should not
have asked him to dinner; he should not accept her invitation. Yet he
had been longing so thirstily for just that permission, and she had
been yearning so to give it! Happiness came back into both their hearts
as he turned to go, and she gave him just a quick touch of a warm
little hand in farewell. At such a moment, when her mood of heroism
gave way to melting, Isabelle had a desperate sort of hope that one
more concession would not alter the inevitable parting, whenever it
came. This time--and this time--and this time--must positively be the
last.

Other guests had come in, and Miss Field was extremely busy, and Ward,
helping her officially, was busy, too. She had indeed offered her place
to Isabelle, but Isabelle, spurred by her mother-in-law's criticism,
would not have disturbed her secretary for any consideration now.

"No, no--stay where you are, my dear!" she had said. And Miss Field
remained.

"Fun to have you down here!" said Ward, in her ear.

Harriet Field had an aside with a maid regarding hot water. Then she
gave Ward an indulgent, an older-sisterly glance. He was in years
almost twenty-two, but at twenty-seven the young woman felt him ages
her junior. Ward was broad and fair, his light brown hair was somewhat
tumbled about from the tennis; his fine, strong young throat showed
brown where the loose collar turned back. Even in his flat tennis shoes
he stood a clear two inches above Miss Field, although she was not a
small woman by any means. He was a joyous, irresponsible boy, and he
and his mother's secretary had always been good friends since the day,
four years ago now, when the silent, somewhat grave Harriet Field had
first made her appearance in the family. Ward was so much a child in
those days that Harriet used to go with him to pick out suits and
shirts, and to buy matinee seats for him and his school friends, and
they laughed now to remember his favourite and invariable luncheon
order of potato salad and French pastries. Nina had had a nurse then,
and Harriet practised French with both the boy and girl, but now the
nurse was gone, and Ward could buy his own clothes, and Nina went to a
finishing school. So Miss Field had made herself useful in new ways;
she was quite indispensable now. The young people loved her; Richard
Carter occasionally said to his wife, "Very clever--very pretty girl!"
which was perhaps as close as he ever got to any domestic matter, and
Isabelle confided to her almost all her duties and cares. She
patronized Harriet prettily, and told her that she was too pretty to be
getting up to the thirties without a fiance, but Harriet only smiled
her inscrutable smile, and made no confidences on the subject of
admirers. Nina, insatiably curious, had gathered no more than that Miss
Harriet's father had been a college professor of languages, and that
her only relative was a married sister, much older, who had four
children, and lived in New Jersey.

She was a master of the art of keeping silent, this young woman, and
but for her beauty she might have been as inconspicuous as she
sincerely tried to be. But her simple gowns and her plainly massed hair
only served to emphasize the extraordinary distinction of her
appearance, and her utmost effort to obliterate herself could not quite
keep her from notice. Men raised their eyebrows, with a significant
puckering of the lips, when she slipped quietly through the halls; and
women narrowed their eyes, and looked questioningly at one another.
Isabelle, who was far too securely throned to be jealous of any one,
sometimes told her that she would make a fortune on the stage, but old
Mrs. Carter, who for reasons perfectly comprehensible in an old lady
who had once been handsome herself, detested Harriet, and said to her
daughter-in-law that in her opinion there was something queer about the
girl.

There was nothing queer in her aspect to-day, at all events, as she
demurely performed her duties at the tea table. To the occasional
pleasant and surprised "Hello, Miss Field!" she returned a composed and
unsmiling nod of greeting; for the rest, she poured and sweetened, and
conferred with the maids, in a manner entirely businesslike.

She was of that always-arresting type that combines a warm dusky skin
with blue eyes and fair hair. The eyes, in her case, were a soft smoky
blue, set in thick and inky black lashes, and the hair was brassy gold,
banded carelessly but trimly about her rather broad forehead. Her mouth
was wide, deep crimson, thin-lipped; it had humorous possibilities all
its own, and Nina and Ward thought her never so fascinating as when she
developed them; it was a mouth of secrets and of mystery, of character,
a mouth that had known the trembling of pain and grief, perhaps, but a
firm mouth now, and a beautiful one.

And in the broad forehead and the cheek-bones, just a shade high, and
the clearly pencilled brows and the clean modelling of the straight
young chin, there was a certain openness and firmness, a fortuitous
blending of form and proportion that would have made the head a perfect
model for a coin, a wonderful study in pastels. Looking at her, an
artist would have fancied her a bold and charming and boyish-looking
little girl, fifteen years ago, with that Greek chin and that tawny
mane; would have seen her sexless and splendid in her early teens, with
a flat breast and an untamed eye. And a romancer might have wondered
what paths had led her, in the superb realization of her beautiful
womanhood, at twenty-seven, to this subordinate position in the home of
a self-made rich man, and this conventional tea table on a terrace over
the Hudson. The smoky blue eyes to-day were full of an idle content;
the rounded breast rose and fell quietly under the plain checked gown
with its transparent frills at wrists and throat. Harriet may have had
her moments of rebellion, but this was not one of them. She had been
here for four years; she had held more difficult and less well-paid
positions for the four years before that; she had known fatigue and
ingratitude, and snubs and injustices, as every business woman,
especially in secretarial work, must know them, and she had no quarrel
with this particular occasion. Indeed, Nina's open adoration, Ward's
pointed attentions, and Isabelle's graciousness were making her feel
particularly cheerful, and more than offset the old lady's disapproval,
which was always more stimulating than otherwise to Harriet.

"Nearly half-past five, Nina," she said, presently. "Go and change and
brush, that's a darling! You look rather tumbled."

Nina, reaching for a marron, obediently wandered away, and immediately
the empty chair beside Harriet was taken by a newcomer, Richard Carter
himself, the owner of all this smiling estate, who had come up from the
little launch at the landing, had changed hastily into white flannels,
Harriet saw at a glance, and had unexpectedly joined them for tea. His
usual programme was to go off immediately for golf, and to make his
first appearance in the family at dinner-time, but perhaps it had been
unusually tiring in the city to-day--he looked pale and tired, and as
if some of the grime of the sun-baked streets clung about him still.

"Tea, Mr. Carter?" Harriet ventured.

He was watching his wife with a sort of idle interest. She had to
repeat her invitation.

"If you please, Miss Field! Tea sounded right, somehow, to me to-day.
It's been a terrible day!"

"I can imagine it!" Harriet's voice was pleasantly commonplace. But the
moment had its thrill for her. This lean, tall, tired man, with his
abstract manner, his perfunctory courtesies, his nervous, clever hands,
loomed in oddly heroic proportions in Harriet's life. His face was keen
and somewhat lined under a smooth crest of slightly graying hair; he
smiled very rarely, but there was a certain kindliness in his gray
eyes, when Nina or Ward or his wife turned to him, that Harriet liked.
He came and went quietly, absorbed in his business, getting in and out
of his cars with a murmur to his chauffeur, disappearing with his golf
sticks, presiding almost silently over his own animated dinner table.
He was always well groomed, well dressed without being in the least
conspicuous; always more or less tired when she saw him. In the
evenings he smoked, listened to music, went early to bed. But he never
failed to visit his mother, or pay her some little definite attention
when she was with them; and when Madame Carter was in her New York
apartment he called on her nearly every day.

For Harriet he had hardly a dozen words a year. He merely smiled kindly
when she thanked him for the Christmas gift that bore his untouched
card; if she went to her sister for a day or two, he gave her only a
nod of greeting when she came back. Sometimes he thanked her for a
small favour, briefly and indifferently; now and then asked with sharp
interest about Nina's teeth or his mother's headache.

But Harriet had known other types of men, and for his very silences,
for his indifference, for his loyalty to his own women, she had begun
to admire him long ago. She had not been born in this atmosphere of
pleasure and ease and riches; she was not entirely unfitted to judge a
man. There was not much to awaken respect in the men she met at
Crownlands, still less in the women. She liked Ward for his artless
boyishness; forgave Anthony Pope much because he was straight and clean
and self-respecting; but there were plenty of other men, spoiled and
selfish, weak and stupid; men who amused and flattered Isabelle Carter
perhaps, but among whom her husband loomed a very giant. Harriet had
watched Richard Carter with a keenness of which she was hardly
conscious herself, ready to detect the flaw, the weakness in his
character, but she never found it, and after awhile she became his
silent champion, his secret ally in all domestic matters, quick to see
that his mail and his telephone messages were sacred, that his meals
never were late, and that any small request, such as the use of the
study for some unexpected conference, or the speedy sending of a
telegram, was promptly granted.

Isabelle was always breezily civil to her husband; he had long ago
vanished as completely from among the vital elements of her life as if
he were dead, perhaps more than if he were dead. She thought--if she
thought about him at all--that he never saw her little affairs; she
supposed him perfectly satisfied with his home and children and club
and business, and incidentally with his beautiful figurehead of a wife.
They had quarrelled distressingly, several years ago, when he had bored
her with references to her "duty," and her influence over Nina, and her
obligations to her true self. But that had all stopped long since, and
now Isabelle was free to sleep late, to dress at leisure, to make what
engagements she pleased, to see the persons who interested her. Richard
never interfered; never was there a more perfectly discreet and
generous husband. Half the women Isabelle knew were attempting to live
exactly as she did, to cultivate "suitors," and drift about in an
atmosphere of new gowns and adulation and orchids and softly lighted
drawing rooms, and incessant playing with fire; it was the accepted
thing, in Isabelle's circle, and that she was more successful in it
than other women was not at all to her discredit.

Even Harriet, who was in her secrets, who saw maid and masseuse and
hair-dresser in desperate defence of Isabelle's beauty every morning,
who knew just what scenes there were over gowns and cosmetics, and the
tilt of hats--even Harriet admired her.

"Why not?" said Harriet sometimes to her sister, when she went to visit
Linda, and the subject of the beautiful Mrs. Carter was under
discussion. "She has a boy and a girl, her house runs perfectly, her
husband adores her--"

"Oh, he CAN'T adore her, Harriet!" Linda would protest. "No man could
adore that sort of--of shallowness, and selfishness, and vanity--"

"Well, I assure you he does! I think that sort of thing keeps a man
admiring a woman," the younger sister would maintain, airily. "He sees
her looking like a picture all the time, he sees other men crazy about
her--"

"Too much money!" Linda usually summarized, disapprovingly. But this
was always fuel to Harriet's flame.

"Too much money? You CAN'T have too much money! I've seen both
sides-don't ever say that to me! There's nothing in this WORLD but
money, right down at the bottom. If you haven't any, you can't live,
and the more you have the more decently and prettily--yes, and
generously, too--you can live! Look at Madame Carter, she was doing her
own work when she was my age--not that she ever mentions that, now! Can
you tell me that she isn't a thousand times happier now, with her maids
and her car and her dresses? And money did it--and if you and Fred had
two thousand, or twenty thousand, a month, instead of two hundred, do
you mean to tell me your lives wouldn't be fuller, and richer, and
happier? You shake your head, Linda, but that's just to make me
furious, for you know it's true! I admire Mrs. Carter, and I assure you
that if ever I do marry--which as you know I won't--you may be very
sure that money is the first thing I shall think about!"

It was their only ground for real dissension. Harriet usually was ready
to laugh and forget it almost instantly; but Linda, who was deeply
spiritual, never ceased to pray that all the dangers of life at
Crownlands would pass safely over the little sister's beloved head, and
that some real man, "like Fred," would win Harriet's turbulent and
restless heart, after all.




CHAPTER II


Madame Carter, gathering her draperies about her, was one of the first
to leave the terrace. Dressing for dinner was a slow and serious
business for her. She gave Harriet a cold, appraising glance as she
passed her; Richard Carter had risen to escort his mother, but she
delayed him for a moment.

"Miss Nina gone in, Miss Field?"

Harriet, whose manner with all old persons was the essence of
scrupulous formality, rose at once to her feet.

"Nina has gone to change her dress, Madame Carter."

"She took it upon herself to ask you to help us out this afternoon?"
the old lady added, with the sort of gracious cruelty of which she was
mistress. Richard Carter gave his daughter's companion a look that
asked indulgence. Harriet coloured brightly, fixing her eyes upon his
mother.

"Nina brought me a message from her mother, Madame Carter."

"Miss Nina did?" Madame Carter amended the title as if absently. "Mrs.
Carter," she added, with a glance toward the near-by group in whose
centre they could see the cream-coloured gown with its pink poppies,
"told me that she was surprised to see that you had--had stepped into
the breach so nicely--" Her son's reproachful glance had the effect of
interrupting her, and she turned to him. "Well, I am saying that it was
very nice of Miss Field, Richard," she protested. "I am sure there is
no harm in my saying that, my dear!"

Harriet said nothing, and resumed her seat as the old lady rustled
slowly away. Her heart was hot with fury, and she was only partly
soothed by hearing Richard Carter's murmur of reproach: "How can you be
so perverse, Mother--"

"Of all the detestable, horrible, maddening--" Harriet thought,
splashing hot water and clattering tea-cups. "Who's coming?" she added
aloud in an undertone to Ward, as one more motor swept about the
carriage drive.

"What is it, Beautiful?" Ward laughed. Harriet's glorious eyes widened
into smiling warning. His open and boyish admiration was a sort of joke
between them. Yet in this second, as he craned his neck to get a
glimpse of the approaching guests, a sudden thought was born in her.
Honour had compelled her to a generous policy with Ward. She had held
his admiration firmly in check, she had maintained a big-sister
attitude that was as wholesome for herself as for him.

But here, she thought with sudden satisfaction, might be her answer to
his grandmother's snubs, might be the realization of her own ambition,
after all. Ward was but four years her junior, and Ward would be
Richard Carter's heir.

No, that was nonsense, of course. And yet she played with the thought
amusedly, enjoying the vision of the old lady's anger and confusion,
and of the world's amazement at the masterly move of the quiet
secretary. Richard would be generous, thought Harriet idly, Isabelle
philosophical and indifferent, but how old Madame Carter would writhe!

"It's the Bellamys and their crowd," said Ward, watching the approach
of newcomers. "Look at that man with them, that fellow with the
hair--that's Blondin! That's the man I was telling you about the other
night, the man whose name I couldn't remember!"

"WHO?"

Harriet did not know whether she said it or screamed it. She lost all
consciousness of her surroundings and her neighbours for a few terrible
seconds; her mouth was dry, her throat constricted, and a hideous
weakness ran like nausea through her entire body. The brilliant terrace
swam in a mass of mingled colours before her eyes; the casual, happy
chatter about her was brassy and unintelligible. The hand with which
she touched the sugar tongs was icy cold, a pain split her forehead,
and she felt suddenly tired and broken. She sat perfectly still, like a
trembling little mouse in a trap, the colour drained from her face, her
breast rising and falling as if she had been running.

Ward had gone across to greet the Bellamys; Harriet fixed her eyes with
a sort of fascination upon the man to whom she presently saw him
talking. Almost everyone else in the group was looking at him, too;
Royal Blondin was used to it; one of his favourite affectations was an
apparent unconsciousness of being observed.

He talked to everyone, to children, to great persons and small, with
the same air of intense concentration with which he was now honouring
Ward. Well over six feet in height, he had dropped his leonine head,
with its thick locks of dark hair, a little on one side; his mobile,
thin lips were set, and his piercing eyes searched the boy's face with
a sort of passionate attention.

His figure was one to challenge attention anywhere. He wore a loosely
cut suit of pongee silk, the collar of the shirt flowing open, and a
blue scarf knotted at the throat. On one of his long dark hands there
was a blazing sapphire ring, and about his wide-brimmed Panama hat the
folded silk was of the same colour. Harriet could catch the intonations
of his voice, a deep and musical voice, which turned the trifles they
were discussing into matters of sudden import and beauty.

Introductions were in order, everyone wanted to meet the Bellamys'
friend, and Harriet saw that it pleased him, for some inscrutable
reason, to continue his ridiculous conversation with the flattered
Ward, and to accept names and greetings absently, in an aside, as it
were, smiling perfunctorily and briefly at the eager girls and women,
and returning immediately to his concerned and passionate undertones
with the boy.

Isabelle fluttered forward, to fare a little more fortunately. Ward
dropped into the background now, and his beautiful little mother stood
in a full sunset flood of light, with her small hand in that of the
lion, and the cream and black hat, with its pink roses, close to the
drooping, reverential head.

It was Isabelle who brought him to the tea table. Harriet had felt,
with a sure premonition of disaster, that it must be. She might not
escape, there was nothing for it but courage, now. Her breath was
behaving badly, and the muscles contracted in her throat, but she
managed a smile.

"And this is Miss Field, Mr. Blondin," said Isabella. "She will give
you some tea!"

"Miss Field," said Royal Blondin, and his dark hand came across the
tea-cups. Harriet, as his thin mouth twitched with just the hint of a
smile, looked straight into his eyes, and she knew he was as frightened
as she. But from neither was there a visible sign of consternation. "No
tea," the man said, making of the decision a splendid and significant
renunciation. "Nothing--nothing!"

"He only eats about once a month, and then it's dates and hay and
camel's milk and carrots!" Ward was beginning. Royal Blondin gave him a
look, deeply amused and affectionate.

"Not quite so bad, Laddie!" he protested, mildly.

"We might manage the dates," Isabelle smiled. Harriet had not spoken
because she was quite unable to command her voice. But she gained it
now to say in an undertone:

"I think I shall have to go in, Mrs. Carter. I promised Nina some help
with her Spanish. I wonder--"

"You speak Spanish, Miss Field?" said Royal Blondin, in Spanish.

This was an invitation to Ward to burst into involved sentences in the
tongue; Royal Blondin turned to him seriously. The rest of the company
might be bored or not, as they pleased, but he was only interested in
testing the boy's accent and vocabulary. As a matter of fact, everyone
laughed and listened, perfectly appreciating Ward's mad ventures and
the other man's liquid and easy assistance. A few seconds later Harriet
Field slipped from her place, crossed the terrace with her heart
beating sick and fast with fright, and made her escape.

She ran up the awninged steps that led to the square great hall, and
ascertained with relief that it was empty. On all sides wide doorways
gave her perspectives: the drawing rooms, in their brilliant summer
covers; the porches, with wicker tables and chairs; the music room; the
breakfast room all cheerful green and white; the library, in cool north
shadow; and the dining room, long and dark and dignified, where maids
were already moving noiselessly about the business of dinner. Here in
the hall was the pleasant shade and coolness, the subtle drifting scent
of early summer flowers, space, and the simplicity of dark polished
floors and sombre rugs. The whole house seemed empty, lovely, silent,
after the confusion of the terrace and the heat of the summer day.

Harriet mounted the stairs, threaded the familiar, pleasant hallways
above. She and Nina had a luxurious suite on the second floor, shut off
from the rest of the house by a single door, and rather remotely placed
in a wing that commanded a superb view of the river. There were guest
rooms on this floor, Richard Carter's room and his wife's beautiful
rooms, and there was an upstairs sitting room. But Madame Carter and
her grandson and his friends had their rooms on the third floor, the
old lady demanding a quiet and isolation that her daughter-in-law's
proximity did not favour.

Nina, half-dressed, was sprawling luxuriously on her bed when Harriet
came in. The three rooms of their suite were joined by doors almost
always open; they were small rooms, but to both the young women they
had always seemed entirely satisfactory. Just now they were in shade,
but outside the windows the blue river glittered, and the fresh, heavy
foliage of the trees moved softly, and inside was every charm of
furnishing, of brilliant flowered draperies, and of exquisite order.
There was a business-like heap of mail on Harriet's big desk; there
were flowers everywhere; fan-tailed Japanese gold fish moved languidly
about in a tall bowl of clear glass, and Nina's emerald-green parrot
walked upon his gaily painted perch, and muttered in a significant and
chuckling undertone. Glass doors were open upon a square porch, and the
sweet afternoon air stirred the crisp, transparent curtains.

Harriet shut the door, and leaned against it, and the world spun about
her. What now? What now? What now? hammered her heart. Nina tossed
aside her magazine, and regarded her with affectionate reproach.

"You ran upstairs!" she said. "I'm lying on your bed because Maude had
the laundry all over mine. Are you going to lie down?"

"No, my dear!" said Harriet, in an odd, breathy whisper.

"You DID run upstairs!" murmured Nina. She sat up, and put her bare
feet on the floor, groping for slippers, and yawned, with a red face.
"What time is it?"

"It's--" Harriet shook back the ruffle at her wrist, twisted her arm
slightly, and looked blindly down.

"Well?" said Nina, when she dropped her hand. But Harriet, smiling at
her blankly, had to look again.

"Six, dear--almost. Brush your hair, and get into something, and we'll
have half an hour before dinner comes up. I must be downstairs for
awhile to-night, I want to see just how the new cook sends dinner in
Your mother wasn't at all satisfied with luncheon yesterday. I don't
know why this comes to me," she added, busy with her mail in the little
sitting room. "Something your father ordered through the club. I'll
send that to Mr. Fox. Here's the bill for your two hats--Miss Nina
Carter, by Miss Field."

"What was the blue one?" asked Nina in the doorway, from a cloud of
hair.

"The-blue-one," Harriet said, absently, "was forty-five dollars. Not
bad for a smart little English hat with a little curled cock feather on
it, was it? It's quite the nicest you've ever had, I think." What
now?--What now? hammered her heart.

"Granny paid three times that for that brown hat last winter," observed
Nina.

"I know she did, and it was absolutely an unsuitable hat, and your
mother wouldn't let you wear it," Harriet said, mildly. "You are a
type, my dear. You must dress for that type."

Nina looked pleased. She was at an age when all girls are vain. Few
people noticed the appearance of the young heiress of Richard Carter,
except perhaps with kindly pity, but it was part of Miss Field's duty
to make the best of it, and Nina was grateful.

"I'll wear it to Francesca's tea!" she said, of the blue hat. The
social bow of a young neighbour, a little older than Nina, was to be
made in a few days' time, at a garden party, and Nina was absorbed in
the exciting prospect of assisting formally.

"No, it's not full dress," Harriet told her. "You'll have to wear the
white mull, and the white hat, and look very girly-girly."

"My eye-glasses make me look like a school-teacher playing baby," Nina
said, gloomily. Harriet laughed, dazed, but not ungrateful to find that
she could laugh and speak at all.

"He's come back!" she said in her heart. "My darling child, you aren't
going to wear your glasses!" she assured Nina, aloud. "Not if you have
to have a dog and a cane! Not if you fall into the fountain!"

"I shall be scared stiff!" Nina grumbled, coming out with her Spanish
books. Harriet, distracted for a moment, came to lean over her
shoulder, and the terror of half an hour ago began to flood her soul
and mind again. She went out to the porch, and looked down into the
clear shade of the early twilight, under the trees. The terrace was
deserted; every sign of the tea-party had vanished, not a crumb marred
the order of the grass-grown bricks. The chairs held formal attitudes,
the table was empty. All the motor-cars were gone from the drive. She
turned back into the room, breathing more easily.

At half-past seven she came up from a little diplomatic adjusting in
the service end of the house, to peep at Nina, who was reading in bed,
and to go on to Isabelle's room. If Mrs. Carter was alone, she liked to
see Harriet then, to be sure of any last message, or to discuss any
domestic plan.

Harriet found her, exquisite in twinkling black spangles, before her
mirror. Isabelle's hair was dressed in dark and shining waves and
scallops, netted invisibly, set with brilliant pins. There was not an
inch of her whole beautiful little person that would not have survived
a critical inspection. Her skin, her white throat, her arms and hands
and fingernails, her waist and ankles and her pretty feet, were all
absolute perfection. The illusion that veiled her slender arms stood at
crisp angles; the silk stockings showed a warm skin tint through their
thinness; her lower eyelids had been skillfully darkened, her cheeks
delicately rouged, and her lips touched with carmine; her brows had
been clipped and trained and pencilled, her lashes brushed with liquid
dye, and what fragrant powders and perfumes could add, had been added
in generous measure. She wore diamonds on her fingers, in her ears, and
about her throat, and her gown was held at her full smooth breast by a
platinum bar that bore a double line of magnificent stones. Harriet
always thought her handsome; to-night she had to admit that her
employer was truly beautiful.

Mrs. Carter was in a pleasant mood; she had a good disposition, and
there was nothing in her life now to ruffle it. She liked her bright,
luxurious dressing room, and the progress of her toilette was soothing
and restful. Her maid had been busy with her for nearly two hours. The
air was warm and fragrant, the prospect of dinner, with its eagerly
attendant Tony, rather stirred her, and the mirror had everything
delightful to say. Like all women of forty, Isabelle liked the night,
tempered lights and becoming settings, and the dignity of formal
entertaining. Last but not least, she had a new toy to-night, a great
black fan of uncurled wild ostrich plumes whose tumbled beauty she
waved about her slowly as Harriet came in, watching the effect in the
mirror with intense satisfaction.

"Oh, pretty--pretty!" Harriet said, seeing it.

"Isn't it ducky? Anthony Pope just sent it to me--the dear boy. I don't
know where he picks things up, or how he knows what's right." Mrs.
Carter half-closed the fan, and laid it against her bare shoulder, and
looked at it with tipped head and half-closed eyes.

"Did you see What's-His-Name?" she asked.

Harriet understood the allusion to the new chef.

"I've just been down there," she said. "Everything seems to be all
right, and looks delicious!"

"That's nice of you, Harriet," Isabelle said. The kitchen was not
strictly Harriet's responsibility, but Mrs. Carter had been making
changes there of late, and the girl's interest and interference were
invaluable. She laid down the fan, and pushed a silver case toward her
secretary, at the same time helping herself to a cigarette. But Harriet
shook her head.

"You're very clever, you know," Isabelle smiled, through a cloud of
pale smoke. "You're always in character, Harriet!"

Harriet smiled her inscrutable smile; there was just the suggestion of
a shrug. She had her own cigarette-case, and not infrequently used it
in Isabelle's presence. But at this hour, when Richard or Ward or Nina,
or even Madame Carter, might come in, she felt any familiarity
unsuitable. Isabelle, the least affected of women, for all her spoiling
and vanity, perfectly appreciated this, and liked Harriet for it.

"You amuse me," said Isabelle, making a long arm to brush away the ash
from her cigarette, "playing your part so discreetly. Your neat little
old-maidy silks--"

"Is it old-maidy?" Harriet asked, mildly, glancing down at the severe
blue cross-barred gown she wore, and straightening a transparent cuff.

"Not on you!" Isabella assured her. But her thoughts never left herself
long, and presently she discontentedly introduced her favourite topic:
"I could have been a business woman," she announced, thoughtfully, "my
father wouldn't hear of it, of course. We had no money!"

"We had no money, and no father," Harriet observed. "So I had no
choice. At eighteen I had to make my own way."

"At eighteen I jumped into marriage," the older woman said, still with
a reminiscent resentment in her tone. "Mr. Carter had his mother to
support, of course. We thought we were pretty reckless to pay sixty
dollars rent. He was only twenty, he was getting what was supposed to
be an enormous salary then. Heavens--it seems thousands of years ago!"

Harriet, who had imagination, could see it. The little brilliant wife,
insisting upon the fashionable apartment, worrying over the
extravagances of the one maid. The man eager only to push on, to more
money, more responsibility, wider fields, to make to-day's extravagance
to-morrow's reasonable expenditure.

Isabelle picked up the fan again, and gave her brilliant presentment in
the mirror a complacent glance.

"Is Mr. Pope's apartment attractive?" Harriet, who knew where her
thoughts were, asked idly. The older woman heard her perfectly, but she
affected indifference.

"Is--I didn't hear you. Oh--Mr. Pope's apartment. My dear, it is
perfection--absolutely. I have never seen anything so beautiful, and so
beautifully managed. And all by that boy. He has two coloured women and
the man--just a perfect menage. And they adore him. Absolutely!" She
mused happily, her lips twitching with some amusing memory. Then she
became businesslike. "Harriet, do you go to the city this week?"

"Nina and the girls are to see Ruth St. Denis on Friday," Harriet said.
"I thought Madame Carter would take them, but now she says no. But if
Nina stays with her grandmother overnight, I thought I would like to
see my sister; she hasn't been very well. That can wait, of course.
Miss Jay's tea-party is to-morrow; that's Thursday--"

"And that reminds me that Louise Jay telephoned to-day, and asked me if
you would take charge of the tea table," Isabelle said, with a shrewd
glance.

"At Mrs. Jay's house?" Harriet asked, after a second.

"Yes, at Francesca's tea-party!"

Harriet hesitated, and the colour crept into her smooth cheeks.

"I wonder why she asked that?"

"Because, in the first place, no one will drink tea," Isabelle who was
watching her intently said promptly. "In the second, Morgan won't be
there, because she says it's a kiddies' tea. I can't be there, and
presumably Mrs. Jay wants to depend on someone."

"One wonders," mused Harriet, in a most unpromising tone, "whether one
is asked as a maid, or a guest?"

"In this case, as a mother," Isabelle was inspired to answer.
"Personally, I should very much like it for Nina's sake. But you suit
yourself!"

The tone denied the words; Harriet knew what she was expected to do.
She knew that Isabelle would tell Mrs. Jay, in a day or two, that she
had simply mentioned it to Miss Field, and Miss Field had been free to
act exactly as she pleased. She knew that faintly annoyed expression on
Isabelle's face.

"I'll be delighted to help!" she said, lifelessly. "A lot of women and
children," she reflected, "and nobody drinking tea anyway, this
weather!"

"I say, Mater," Ward said from the doorway, with what he fondly
believed to be an English accent, "I'm no end peckish, what what? Say,
Mother," he added, becoming suddenly serious, "what do you think of
Blondin? Isn't he a corker? Say, listen, are you going to ask him to
dinner? Do we have to have the whole Bellamy tribe if we ask him, Miss
Harriet?"

"DON'T spill things and fuss with things, Ward," his mother protested
plaintively, protecting her bottles and jars from his big hands as he
sat down. "Yes, dear, we'll have him. I like him because he was so
enthusiastic about you. He's really quite a person."

"Person--you bet he is!" Ward said. "Gosh, he knows everything. You
ought to get him started about--oh, I don't know, philosophy, and the
way we all are forever getting things we don't want, and music--he can
beat the box, believe me! He gave talks at the Pomeroys' last year--"

Nina, trailing in in a blue wrapper, sat herself upon a chair, wrapped
her garments about her, and entered interestedly into the conversation.

"'The Ethics of the Everyday'," she contributed. "I remember it because
Adelaide Pomeroy and I used to be in the pantry, eating the tea things.
And he talked at our school about Tagore."

"I remember those talks at Lizzie Pomeroy's," Isabelle said,
thoughtfully. "I wish I had gone! I suppose he's got a book out. Will
you see if you can get me anything he's written when you're in town,
Harriet? If we're going to have him here--"

She glanced at herself in the glass, where a more primitive woman, in a
jungle, would have commenced a slow, solitary dance and song. If the
hint of a scornful smile touched the secretary's beautiful mouth, she
suppressed it. She had a little notebook in her pocket, and in it she
duly entered the name of Royal Blondin.

"Too much rouge on this side, Mother," said Ward. Mrs. Carter picked up
a hand-mirror, and studied herself carefully. When she had powdered and
rubbed one cheek, she thoughtfully rouged her lips again, pouting them
artfully, while Harriet and the children chattered. Nina was full of
excited anticipation. Francesca's tea to-morrow, and the box-party on
Friday, and a new gown for each-Nina fancied herself already a popular
and lovely debutante. Harriet imagined that she saw something of a
brother's pity in Ward's eyes as he watched her. Ward himself looked
his best in his evening black, and several years older than he really
was.

"We're a handsome couple, Miss Harriet," said Ward, with a glance
toward the door of solid mirror that chanced to reflect them both.
"Aren't we, Mother?"

"You're an idiot!" said Nina, scornfully. Harriet laughed maternally,
but in spite of herself her idle dream of the afternoon returned for a
second, and she wondered just how that faintly supercilious smile of
Isabelle's would be affected if she had her own right, here in this
family group, a Carter of the Carters, daughter of the house. And
thinking this, her smoky blue eyes met Ward's, and perhaps there was
something in them that he had not seen there before. At all events, she
was ashamed to see him colour suddenly, and become a little incoherent,
and to have him turn to her his full attention, with a sort of boyish
clumsiness that was touching in its way. Imaginary or not, the trifling
episode troubled her, and as Madame Carter came majestically in and the
little clock on the dresser pointed to the hour, she said her
good-nights, and carried Nina off again.

Richard Carter's wife and mother differed in no particular more
strikingly than in their attitude toward the toilet artifices they both
employed so lavishly. The old lady's beauty was even more than
Isabelle's assisted by art, for her snowy-white hair was a wig, her
teeth not her own, and her eyebrows quite openly manufactured without
one single natural hair to build upon. But it pleased her generation to
regard these facts as sacred, and to assume that the secrets of the
boudoir were unsuspected. Even Nina never saw so much as a powder puff
in her grandmother's dressing room, and any compliment upon her hair or
complexion Madame Carter received with gracious dignity.

She looked at Ward's departing back, now, and remarked with pointed
reproof:

"My son has never seen his mother even in the act of brushing her hair!
There are reserves--there are niceties--"

"Where did you have it brushed--down at the shop?" Isabelle asked,
laughing. Madame Carter never failed to be staggered by her
daughter-in-law's irreverence, yet she never could quite resist the
criticisms that courted it.

"For the last few years, I admit," she conceded with a somewhat shaken
dignity, "I admit that I have had recourse to what they call
'puffs'--you know what I mean? Made of my own hair, of course--"

"Made of your own imagination!" Isabelle amended, in her own heart. But
she only gave the old lady a somewhat disquieting smile as she picked
up the tumbled black fan and led the way down to dinner.




CHAPTER III


Nina was duly dressed for the tea-party the next day, and went to show
herself to her mother while Harriet dressed. The young girl really did
look her best in the filmy white with its severely plain ruffles, and
with a wide white hat on her thick, smoothly dressed hair. Miss Field,
too, although she was very pale to-day, looked "simply gorgeous," as
Isabelle expressed it, when she saw them off in the car, although
Harriet's gown was not new, and the little flowered hat she had crushed
down upon her splendid hair had been Isabelle's own a season ago.
Harriet was in no holiday mood; she felt herself in a false position;
this was to be one of the times when she paid high for all the beauty
and luxury of her life.

"... so then when she came to me," Nina was recounting the reception of
some celebrity at school, "of course I was awfully shy; you know me!"
She was suddenly diverted. "But I'm not as shy as I used to be, am I,
Miss Harriet?" she asked, confidingly.

"Not nearly!" Harriet made herself say, encouragingly.

"Well, then," Nina resumed, "when she came to me I don't know what I
said--I just said something or other--I can't for the life of me
remember what it was! Probably I just said that I had seen her in her
last three plays or something like that, anyway--anyway, she said to
Miss King that she had noticed me, and she said, 'It's an aristocratic
face!' Amy Hawkes told me, for a trade last. The girls were wild--they
were all so crazy to have her notice them, you know, and I thought--I
thought of course she'd speak of Lucia or Ethel Benedict or one of
those prettier girls; although," said Nina, with her little air of
conscientiousness, "Ethel didn't look a bit pretty that day. Sometimes
she does; sometimes she looks perfectly lovely! But that day she looked
sort of colourless. 'Aristocratic'!" Nina laughed softly. "Well, I'd
rather look aristocratic than be the prettiest girl in the world,
wouldn't you?"

Harriet glanced at her with something like pity. This was Nina in her
before-the-party mood. Her confidence and complacency would all begin
to ooze away from her, presently, and the words that came so readily to
Harriet would refuse to flow at all to any one else. She would come
home saying that she hated parties because people were all so shallow
and uninteresting, and that she couldn't help what her friends said of
her, she just wouldn't descend to that sort of nonsense.

"Here we are!" Harriet rather drily interrupted the flood. Nina gave a
startled glance at the lawns and gardens of the Jay mansion already
dotted with awnings and chairs, and sprinkled with the bright gowns of
the first arrivals. They were early, and their hostess, a handsome,
heavily built woman with corsets like armourplate under her exquisite
gown, and a blonde bang covering her forehead, came forward with her
daughter to meet them. Francesca was as slight as a willow, with a
demurely drooped little head and a honeyed little self-possessed manner.

"Very decent of you, Miss Field!" breathed Mrs. Jay, in a voice like
that of a horn. "You girls run along now--people will be comin' at any
minute. I'm going to take Miss Field to the table. Three hundred people
comin'," she confided as Harriet followed her across the lawn, and to
the rather quiet corner of the awninged porch where the tea table
stood, "and Mist' Jay just sent me a message that he won't be here
until six. My older daughter, Morgan, is stayin' with the Tom
Underbills--you know their place--lovely people--Well, now, I'll leave
you here, and you just ask for anything you need--"

The matron melted away; Harriet looked after her broad, retreating back
indifferently. Everyone knew Mrs. Jay, a harmless, generous,
good-natured and hospitable target for much secret criticism and
laughter. The odd thing was, old Mrs. Carter had sometimes pointed out
to the dutifully listening Harriet, that the woman really came of an
excellent family, so that her little affectations, her fondness for the
phrases "my older daughter, Morgan," and "lovely people, loads of
money, you know them?" were honest enough, in their way. She would have
loaned Harriet any amount of money, the girl reflected, smouldering,
she would have shown her genuine friendship and generosity in a crisis.
But she would not introduce people to Harriet this afternoon, and in a
day or two she would send Harriet a bit of lace, or a dainty waist, as
a delicate reminder that the courtesy had been a business one, after
all.

The afternoon was the perfection of summer beauty, and after a few
moments' solitude Harriet began to feel its spell. She put her cups and
spoons in order, and chatted with a hovering maid. Some elderly persons
came out and sat near, and were grateful for the quiet and the tea.
From the reception line, on the lawn, came such a brainless confusion
of jabbering and chattering as might well appall the old and nervous.

And presently the sun came out for Harriet in the arrival of a tall,
swiftly moving, dark-eyed woman some ten years older than she was
herself: Mary Putnam, one of the real friends the girl had gained in
the last four years. Young Mrs. Putnam, Harriet used to think, with a
little natural jealousy under her admiration, had everything. She was
not pretty, but hers was a distinguished appearance and a lovely face;
she had the self-possessed manner of a woman whose whole life has been
given to the social arts; she had a clever, kindly, silent husband who
adored her; her home, her garden, her clubs and her charities, and
finally she had her nursery, where Billy and Betty were rioting through
an ideal childhood.

"Harriet--you dear child!" said the rich and pleased voice, as Mary's
fine hand crossed the tea table for a welcoming touch. "But how nice to
find you here! I'm trying to get some tea for Mr. Putnam's aunt and
mother, but, my dear--it's getting very thick out there!"

"I can imagine it!" Harriet glanced toward the lawn.

"I've been wanting to see you," Mrs. Putnam said in an undertone. "But
suppose I carry them a tray first? Harriet, you are prettier than ever.
I love the green stripes! I've just been trying to think how long it is
since I've seen you."

"Not since the day you lunched with Mrs. Carter, and that was almost
two weeks ago!" Harriet's hands were busy with cups and plates; now she
nodded to a maid. "Mayn't Inga carry this to your mother, Mrs. Putnam?"
she asked. "And couldn't you stay here and have some tea yourself?"

Mrs. Putnam immediately settled herself in the neighbouring chair.

"I'm chaperoning little Lettice Graham for a week," she began, in the
delightful voice upon which Harriet had modelled her own. "But Lettice
is trying her little arts upon Ward Carter. Dear boy, that!"

"Ward? He IS a dear!" Harriet said, innocently.

"No blushing?" Mary Putnam asked, with a smiling look. The colour came
into Harriet's lovely face, and the smoky blue eyes widened innocently.

"Blushing--for WARD?" she asked.

Mrs. Putnam stirred her tea thoughtfully.

"I didn't know," she said. "You're young, and you know him well, and
you're--well, you have appearance, as it were!"

Harriet laughed.

"Ward is twenty-two," she observed.

"And you're--?"

"I shall be twenty-seven in August."

"Well, that's not serious," the older woman decided, mildly. "The point
is, he's a man. Ward has fine stuff in him," she added, "and also, I
think, he is beginning to care. It would be an engagement that would
please the Carters, I imagine."

The word engagement brought a filmy vision before Harriet's eyes, born
of the fragrance and sunshine of the summer. She saw a ring, laughter
and congratulations, dinner parties and receptions, shopping in
glittering Fifth Avenue.

"Perhaps it would," she said, with a hint of surprise in her tone.
"They are really very simple, and always good to me! But old Madame
Carter," she laughed, "would go out of her mind!"

"A boy in Ward's position may do much worse than marry a lovely and
sensible woman," Mrs. Putnam said. "Well, it just occurred to me. It is
your affair, of course. But looking back one sees how much just
the--well, the lack of a tiny push has meant in one's life!"

"And this is the push?" Harriet said, her heart full of the confusion
and happiness that this unusual mood of confidence and affection on
Mary Putnam's part had brought her.

"Perhaps!" The smooth, cool hand touched hers for a second before Mrs.
Putnam went upon her gracious way. Harriet hardly heard the bustle and
confusion about her for a few minutes. She sat musing, with her
splendid eyes fixed upon some point invisible to the joyous group about
her.

To Nina, meanwhile, had come the most extraordinary hour of her life.
It had begun with the familiar and puzzling humiliations, but where it
was to end the fluttered heart of the seventeen-year-old hardly dared
to think.

She had sauntered to a green bench, under great maples, with Lettice
Graham and Harry Troutt and Anna Poett. And Joshua Brevoort had come
for Anna, and they had sauntered away, with that mysterious ease with
which other girls seemed to manage young men. And then Harry and
Lettice had in some manner communicated with each other, for Lettice
had jumped up suddenly, saying, "Nina, will you excuse us? We'll be
back directly," and they had wandered off in the direction of the
river, giggling as they went. Nina had smiled gallantly in farewell,
but her feelings were deeply hurt. She hated to sit on here, visibly
alone, and yet there was small object in going back to the absorbed
groups nearer the house.

Then came the miracle. For as she uncomfortably waited, Ward's friend,
the queer man with the black eyes and thick hair, suddenly took the
seat beside her. Nina's heart gave a plunge, for if she was ill at ease
with "kids" like Harry and Joshua, how much less could she manage a
conversation with the lion of the hour! But Royal Blondin needed no
help from Nina.

"You're little Miss Carter, aren't you?" he said. "We were introduced,
back there, but there were too many young men around you then for me to
get a word in! However, I was watching you--I wonder if you know why
I've been watching you all afternoon?"

Nina cleared her throat, and gave one fleeting upward glance at the
dark and earnest eyes.

"I'm sure I don't know why any one should watch me!" she tried to say.
But everything after the first three words was lost in the ruffles of
the white gown.

"I'll tell you why. I watched you because, from the moment I saw you, I
said to myself, 'if that little girl isn't utterly wretched and out of
her element, among all these shallow chatterers and gigglers, I'm
mistaken!' I saw the lads gather about you, and I had my little
laugh--you must forgive me!--at the quiet little way you evaded them
all. Nice boys, all of them! But not worth YOUR while!"

Nina murmured a confidence.

"What did you say?" Blondin said. "But come," he added, frankly,
"you're not afraid of me, are you? My dear little girl, I'm old enough
to be your father! Look up--I want to see those eyes. That's better.
Now, that's more friendly. Tell me what you said?"

"I said--that Mother expected me to--to like them."

"To--? Oh, to like the boys. Mother expects it? Of course she does! And
some day she'll expect to dress you in white, and bid us all to come
and dance at the wedding! But in the meantime, Mother mustn't blame
someone who has just a LITTLE more discernment than--well, young
Brevoort, for example, for seeing that her tame dove is really a wild
little sea-gull starving for the sea. Now, look here, Miss Nina, you
hate all this society nonsense, don't you?"

"Loathe it!" Nina stammered, with a little excited laugh.

"Loathe it? Of course you do! Of course you do! And you don't want to
fall in love with one of these lads for a year or two, anyway?"

"Oh, my, no!" Nina felt the expression inadequate, but her breath had
been taken away. The man had turned about a little, his eyes were all
for her, and his arm, laid carelessly along the back of the green
bench, almost touched the white ruffles. They were in full sight of the
house, too, and if Lettice or Anna came back, they would see Nina in
deep and lasting conversation with the man that all the older women
were so mad about--

"You don't. But--what?" He bent his dark head.

"I said, 'But I don't know how you knew it'!" Nina repeated, looking
down in her overwhelming self-consciousness, but with a smile of utter
happiness and excitement.

A second later she looked up in some alarm. He was silent--she had
somehow said the awkward thing again I Nina's heart fluttered nervously.

But what she saw reassured her. Royal Blondin had squared himself
about, and had folded his arms, and was staring darkly into space.

"How I knew it!" he said in a half-whisper, as if to himself, after a
full half-minute of silence that thrilled Nina to the soul. "Child, I
don't know! Some day you and I will read books together--wonderful
books! And then perhaps we will begin to understand the cosmic
secret--why your soul reaches out to mine--why I not only want to know
you better, but why it is my solemn obligation to take the exquisite
thing your coming into my life may mean to us both! You're only a
child," he went on, in a lighter tone, "and I can read those big eyes
of yours, and can see that I'm frightening you! Well, this much
remains. You and I have somehow found each other in all this wilderness
of lies and affectations, and we're going to be friends, aren't we?"

"I--hope we are!" Nina said, clearing her throat, with a bashful laugh.

"You know we are!" Royal Blondin amended. And in a musing tone he
added: "I'm afraid I was a little bitter a few hours ago. And then I
saw you, just an honest, brave, bewildered little girl, wondering why
the deuce they all make such a fuss about nothing--clothes and bridge
parties and dinners--"

"They never SAY anything worth while!" Nina said, with daring. There
was exquisite homage in the dropped, listening head, the eyes that
smiled so close to her own. "But if I tell Mother that, she thinks I'm
crazy!" she added, lapsing into the school vernacular against a
desperate effort to sustain the conversation at his level.

"Because you're a little natural rebel," interpreted the man,
smilingly. "And that's the price we pay for it!"

"I'm afraid I've always been a rebel, then!" confessed Nina.

"Yes, those eyes of yours say that," Blondin conceded, sadly. "And it
doesn't make for happiness, Little Girl!" he warned her.

Nina narrowed her eyes, and stared into the green garden. She was not
wearing her glasses to-day, and hers were fine eyes, albeit a trifle
prominent, and with a somewhat strained expression.

"Oh, I know that!" she said. "Mother and Father," she confided, with
the merciless calm of seventeen, "they'd like me to be exactly like all
the other girls, flirting and dressing, and rushing about all day and
all night! But oh--how I hate it! Oh, I like the girls and boys--truly
I do, and I am popular with them all, I know that! But 'CASES'!" said
Nina with scorn.

"Dear Heaven!" Royal said, under his breath. "No--no--no--that's not
for you!" he murmured. "And yet--" and he turned upon her a look that
Nina was to remember with a thrill in the waking hours of the summer
night--"and yet, is it kindness to wake you up, child?" he mused. "Is
it right to show you the full beauty of that questing soul of yours?"

It was said as if to himself, as if he thought aloud. But Nina answered
it.

"I often think," she said, mirthfully, "that if people knew what I was
thinking, they'd go crazy! 'Oh, isn't the floor lovely--isn't the music
divine! Are you going to the club to-morrow? What are you going to
wear?'"

It was not a very brilliant imitation of a society girl's tone and
manner, but Royal Blondin seemed deeply impressed by it.

"Look here!" he said. "You're a little actress!"

"No. I'm not!" Nina laughed. "But I can always imitate anything or
anybody," she admitted. "It makes the girls perfectly wild sometimes!
But Ward's different," she resumed, going back to the more serious
topic. "I envy Ward! He is just as different from me as black and
white. Now Ward likes everyone--and everyone likes him. He just drifts
along, perfectly content to be popular, and to have a good time, and to
do the regular thing, and of course he knows NOTHING of moods--!"

"Bless the lad!" Blondin said, paternally.

"Oh, I manage to keep the appearance of doing exactly what the others
do," Nina hastened to say, "and I laugh and flirt just as if that was
the only thing in life! If people want to think I am a butterfly, why,
let them think so! My friend Miss Hawkes says that I have two
natures--but I don't know about that!"

She looked up at him to find his eyes fixed steadily upon her, and
flushed happily, with a fast-beating heart.

"With one of those natures I have nothing to do," Royal said. "But the
other I claim as my friend. Come, how about it? Are we going to be
friends? I am old enough to be your father, you know; you may tell
Mother that it is perfectly safe. When the right young man comes to
claim you, why, I'll resign my little friend with all the good will in
the world. But meanwhile, am I going to pick you out some books, am I
going to have some talks as wonderful as this one now and then? No--not
as wonderful, for of course this sort of thing doesn't come twice in a
lifetime! Will you give me your hand on it--and your eyes? Good girl!
And now I'll take you back to be scolded for running away from your own
friends for so long. I'm dining with Mother to-morrow. Shall I see you?"

"Oh, yes--if Mother lets me come down!" fluttered Nina. "But, no--we're
to be at Granny's!" she remembered.

"Soon, then!" He left her in the circling group, but all the world saw
him kiss her hand. Nina wandered about in a daze of pleasure and
satisfaction for another half-hour, paying attentions to Mother's poky
friends with a sparkle and charm that amazed them. Presently Ward and
the demure Amy Hawkes found her; the car was waiting. Miss Field, Ward
said, was no longer at the tea table; she had left a message to the
effect that she was walking home and would be there as soon as they
were.

He asked Amy and Nina, whose irrepressible gossip and giggling met with
only silence and scowls from his superior altitude, if they knew why
Miss Harriet had decided to walk. They stared at each other innocently,
on the brink of fresh laughter. No; they hadn't the least idea.




CHAPTER IV


Royal Blondin went straight from Nina to the tea table, which was
almost deserted now. Harriet saw him coming, and she knew what hour had
come. She stood up as he reached her, and they measured each other
narrowly, with unsmiling eyes.

There was reason for her paleness to-day, and for the faint violet
shadows about her beautiful eyes. Harriet had lain awake deep into the
night, tossing and feverish. She had gotten up more than once, for a
drink of water, for a look from her balcony at the solemn summer stars.
And among all the troubled images and memories that had trooped and
circled in sick confusion through her brain, the figure of this
smiling, handsome man had predominated.

She had always thought that he must come back; for years the fear had
haunted her at every street crossing, at every ring of Linda's
doorbell. At first it had been but a shivering apprehension of his
claims, an anticipation of what he might expect or want from her. Then
came a saner time, when she told herself that she was an independent
human being as well as he, that she might meet his argument with
argument, and his threat with threat.

But for the past year or two her lessening thoughts of him had taken
new form. Harriet had hoped that when they met again she might be in a
position to punish Royal Blondin, to look down at him from heights that
even his audacity might not scale.

That time, she told herself in the fever of the night, had not yet
come. Her pitiful achievements, her beauty, her French and Spanish, her
sober book reading, and her little affectations of fine linen and
careful speech, all seemed to crumple to nothing. She seemed again to
be the furious, helpless, seventeen-year-old Harriet of the Watertown
days, her armour ineffectual against that suave and self-confident
presence.

"Oh, how I hate him!" whispered the dry lips in the silence of the
night. And looking up at the wheeling grave procession of powdery
jewels against the velvet of the sky, Harriet had mused on escape, on a
disappearance as complete as her flight years ago had proved to be.

She had forced herself to unbind the wrappings, to look at the old
wound. She had gone in spirit to that old, shabby parlour to which
Linda and Fred had carried Josephine's crib late every night, and where
sheet music had cascaded from the upright piano. She saw, with the
young husband and wife, a fiery, tumblehead girl of fifteen or sixteen,
who helped with her sister's cooking and housework, who adored the
baby, who planned a future on the stage, or as a great painter, or as a
great writer--the means mattered not so that the end was fame and
wealth and happiness for Harriet.

Fred had brought Royal Blondin in to supper one night, and Royal had
laughed with the others at the spirited little waitress who delivered
herself of tremendous decisions while she came and went with plates,
and forgot to take off her checked blue apron when she finally slipped
into her place.

The man had been a derelict then, as now. But he was nine years older
than Harriet Field. He had had the same delightful voice, the same
penetrating eyes. He had brought poetry, music, art, into the sordid
little parlour of the Watertown apartment; he had helped Harriet to
tame and house those soaring ambitions. Seated on Linda's stiff little
fringed sofa, they had drunk deep of Keats and Shelley and Browning,
and Harriet's eyes had widened at what Royal called "world ethics." To
live--that was the gift of the gods! Not to be afraid--not to be bound!

Reaching this point in her recollections, the girl recalled herself
with a start. She was safe in luxurious Crownlands, it had all been
years ago. But again the abyss seemed to yawn at her feet. She felt
again those kisses that had waked the little-girl heart into passionate
womanhood; she shut her eyes and pressed her hand tight against them.
So young--so happy--so confident!--plunging headlong into that searing
blackness.

And now Royal Blondin was back again, and she was not ready for him.
She could not score now. But he could hurt her irreparably if he would.
Isabelle was an indifferent mother, and an incorrigible flirt, but at
the first word, at the first hint--ah, there would be no arguing, no
weighing of the old blame and responsibility! If there was the faintest
cloud of doubt, that would be enough! Better the driest and fussiest
old Frenchwoman for Nina, the dullest and least responsive of
Englishwomen. But by all means settle accounts at once with Miss Field,
and pay her railway fare, and wish her well.

Harriet had shaken back her mane of hair, had hammered furious fists
together up on the dark balcony. It wasn't fair--it wasn't fair--just
now, when she was so secure and happy! She had flung her arms across
the railing, and buried her hot face on them, and had wept desperate
and angry tears into the silken and golden tangle that shone dully in
the starlight.

The stars were paling, and the garden stirred with the first languid
breath of the hot day to come, when she suddenly rose and bound up the
loosened hair, and went in. Harriet was not yet twenty-seven, and every
fibre of her being cried out for sleep. Cold water on the tear-stained
face, and the childish prayer she never forgot, and she had crept
gratefully into the soft covers, and had had perhaps four hours of such
rest as only comes to youth.

So that the morning brought courage. Her heart was heavy and fearful,
but she knew that Royal would seek her, and she hoped much for the talk
that they were to have now. She did not refuse him her hand when he
came to the tea table, or her eyes, and there was friendliness, or the
semblance of it, in the voice with which she said his name. That he was
waiting, perhaps as fearfully as she, for his cue, was evidenced by the
quick relief with which he echoed the old familiarity.

"Harriet! I find you again. I've been waiting all this time to find
you! I'd heard Ward speak of 'Miss Field', of course! But it never
meant you, to me. I've been thinking of you all night."

"I've been thinking, too," she said, simply.

"It's after six," Blondin said with a glance about. "We can't talk
here. Can you get away? Can we go somewhere?"

Without another word she deserted her seat, pinned on her hat, and
picked up her gloves.

"There's a very quiet back road straight to Crownlands," she said,
considering. "We might walk."

"Anything!" he assented, briefly.

Guided by Harriet, who was familiar with the place, they slipped
through the hallway, and out a side door, crossing the lane that led
down to the garage, and striking into a splendid old quiet roadway
barred now by the shadows of elms and sycamores and maples, and filled
with soft green lights from the thick arch of new leaves. They had no
sooner gained the silence and solitude it afforded them than the man
began deliberately:

"Harriet, I've not thought of anything else since I came upon you
yesterday, after all these years. I want you to tell me that you--you
aren't angry with me."

There was a moment of silence. Then the girl said, quietly:

"No. I'm not angry, Roy."

"You knew--you knew how desperately I tried to find you, Harriet? What
a hell I went through?"

If she had steeled herself against the possibility of his shaking her,
she failed herself now. It was with an involuntary and bitter little
laugh that she said:

"You had no monopoly of that, Roy."

"But you ran away from me!" he accused her. "When I went to find you,
they told me the Davenports had moved away. Won't you believe that I
felt TERRIBLY--that I walked the streets, Harriet,
praying--PRAYING!--that I might catch a glimpse of you. It was the
uppermost thought for years--how many years? Seven?"

"More than eight," she corrected, in a somewhat lifeless voice. "I was
eighteen. My one thought, my one hope, when I last saw you, in Linda's
house," she went on, with sudden passion, "was that I would never see
you again! But I'm glad to hear you say this, Roy," she added, in a
gentler tone. "I'm glad you--felt sorry. Our going away was a mere
chance. Fred Davenport was offered a position on a Brooklyn paper, and
we all moved from Watertown to Brooklyn. I was grateful for it; I only
wanted to disappear! Linda stood by me, her children saved my life. I
was a nursery-maid for a year or two--I never saw anybody, or went
anywhere! I think Linda's friends thought her sister was queer,
melancholy, or weakminded--God knows I was, too! I look back," Harriet
said, talking more to herself than to him, and walking swiftly along in
the golden sunset light that streamed across the old back road, "and I
wonder I didn't go stark, staring mad! Strange streets, strange houses,
and myself wheeling Pip Davenport about the curbs and past the little
shops!"

"Don't think about it," he urged, with concern.

"No; I'll not think about it. Royal, don't think that all my feeling
was for myself. I thought of you, too. I missed you. Truly, I missed
what you had given my life!"

A dark flush came to the man's face, and when he spoke it was with an
honest shame and gratitude in his voice that would have surprised the
women who had only known him in his later years.

"You are generous, Harriet," he said. "You were always the most
generous girl in the world!"

More stirred than she wished to show herself, Harriet walked on, and
there was a silence.

"I hunted for you," Royal said presently. "For months it seemed to me
that we must meet, that we must talk! I came back from Canada in
August, I went to the house; it was taken by strangers. I went to
Fred's paper; he had been gone for months!"

"I know!" Harriet nodded. The wonderful smoky blue eyes met his for a
second, and there was something of sympathy now in their look. "I know,
Roy! It was," she shuddered, "it was a wretched business, all round!"

"Linda and Fred made it hard for you?" he asked.

"Oh, no! They were angels. But of course in their eyes, and mine,
too--I was marked."

Silence. Royal Blondin gave her a glance full of distress and
compunction. But he did not speak, and it was Harriet who ended the
pause.

"Well, that's what a little girl of eighteen may do with her life!" she
said. "I have been a fool--I have made a wreck of mine! Ambition and
youth went out of me then. It wasn't anything actual, Roy. But I have
known a hundred times why when I should have courage I had nothing but
fear, when I should have self-confidence I failed myself. Something in
my soul got broken!"

"You are the most beautiful woman in the world," Royal Blondin said,
steadily, "you are established here, they all adore you! Why do you say
that your life is a wreck?"

"I am the daughter of Professor Field," said Harriet, "and at
twenty-seven I am the paid companion of Mrs. Richard Carter's daughter!
Oh, well--I was happy enough to have the opportunity. I had studied
French, you know; and Mrs. Rogers took me abroad with her. She was an
outrageous old lady, but not curious! No reasonable woman could live
with her--I made myself endure it. Then I went to her daughter, Mrs.
Igleheart, the famous suffragette, for two years. And the Carters took
me from her." She shrugged indifferently. "What of yourself? Where have
you been?"

But he was not quite ready to drop the personal note.

"Harriet, now that we have met, we'll be friends? My life now is among
these people; you'll not be sorry if we occasionally meet?"

"In this casual way--no, we can stand that!" she agreed. The fears of
the night rose like mist, melted away. It was bad enough, but it was
not what her inflamed and fantastic apprehension had made it. He was no
revengeful villain, after all. He did not mean to harm her.

"I've been everywhere," he said, answering her question. "I made two
trips to China from San Francisco. I was interested in Chinese
antiques. Then I went into a Persian rug thing, with a dealer. We
handled rugs; I went all over the Union. After that, four years ago, I
went to Persia and into India, and met some English people, and went
with them to London. Then I came back here, as a sort of press agent to
a Swami who wanted to be introduced in America, and after he left I
rather took up his work, Yogi and interpretive reading, 'Chitra' and
'Shojo'--you don't know them?"

She shook her head, sufficiently at ease now even to smile in faint
derision.

"They eat it up, I assure you!" Royal Blondin said, in self-defence.

"Oh, I know they do!" Harriet agreed. "I've been hearing a great deal
about you lately! You have a studio?"

"I have--really!--the prettiest studio in New York. I rented my London
rooms, with my furniture in them, and I have a little apartment in
Paris, too, that I rent."

"And what's the future in it, Roy?" Now that the black dread was laid,
she could almost like him.

"The present is extremely profitable," he said, drily, "and I suppose
there might be--well, say a marriage in it, some day--"

"A rich widow?" Harriet suggested, simply.

"Or a little girl with a fortune, like this little Carter girl," he
added, lightly.

Harriet gave him a swift look.

"Don't talk nonsense! Nina's only a child!"

"She's almost eighteen, isn't she?"

The girl walked swiftly on for a full minute.

"How do you happen to know that?"

"Is it a secret?"

The possibility he hinted, however remote, was enough to stop her
short, actually and mentally. Considering, she stood still, with a face
of distaste. The hush before sunset flooded the quiet road. A bird
called plaintively from some low bush, was still, and called again.
From the river came the muffled, mellow note of a boat horn. Two ponies
looked over the brick wall, shook their tawny heads, and galloped to
the field with a joyous affectation of terror. Nina! By what fantastic
turn of the cards was Royal Blondin to be connected in her thoughts,
after all these years, with Nina?

She looked at Blondin, who was watching her with a half-sulky,
half-ingratiating air.

"My dear girl, that was merely an idle remark!" he said.

"Well, I hope so," Harriet said, going on, "anyway, she's a child!"

"You weren't--quite--a child, at eighteen," he reminded her.

The colour flooded her transparent dusky skin.

"That's--exactly--what I was!" she said, drily. "But talk to Nina, if
you don't believe me! Everything that is school-girly and romantic and
undeveloped, is Nina. If you held her coat for her, she would embroider
the circumstance into something significant and flattering! She is
absolutely inexperienced; she's what I called her, a child!"

"I've been talking to her," Blondin said. His companion looked at him
sharply, and after a second he laughed. "There is just one chance in
the world that I might make that little girl extremely happy!" he said.

"Don't talk nonsense!" Harriet said again, impatiently.

"Is it nonsense?" he asked, smiling.

"It's--preposterous!"

"I suppose," the man drawled, "that that is a question for the young
lady, and her parents, and myself, to decide."

"You suppose nothing of the sort!" Harriet said, sensibly, without
wasting a glance upon him. And she added in scorn, "I doubt very much
if it's possible!"

"Very probably it isn't," he conceded, amiably. "I seem middle-aged to
her. I--"

"You ARE thirty-eight," Harriet said.

"Exactly! But--don't forget!--I shall have the field to myself. The
mother won't interfere. Of the grandmother I have my doubts, but if the
father is like the usual American male parent, he will give the girl
her head!"

Harriet bit her lip. This was utterly unexpected. Into her
calculations, up to this point, she had taken only Royal Blondin and
herself. If this casual hint covered any truth, then the matter did not
stop there. Nina was involved, and with Nina, Ward and Nina's father
and Isabelle--

The complications were endless; her heart sickened before them. For she
read Nina's susceptible vanity as truly as he, and she knew besides,
what he did not know, that the formidable-appearing grandmother was
secretly a little piqued at Nina's lack of masculine attention, and
would probably further any romantic absurdity on the girl's part with
all her determined old soul. Nina adored at eighteen by the
much-talked-of poet; Nina, young and gauche perhaps, but married, and
entertaining guests in her husband's studio, would be a Nina far more
satisfying to her grandmother than the bread-and-butter Nina of to-day.

And yet, the conviction that Royal dared not betray her had been
flooding Harriet's heart with exquisite reassurance during this past
half hour. She was safe; her life at Crownlands took on a new and
wonderful beauty with that knowledge. And if she was fit to continue
there, Nina's companion, Isabelle's confidante, guide and judge for the
whole household, could she with any logic warn them against this man?

He had her trapped, and she saw it. If she was to have her safety, as
all this talk implied, then she must give him the same tacit assurance.
To threaten his standing was to wreck her own.

"Don't make a tragedy of it," Royal, watching her narrowly, interrupted
her thoughts to say lightly. "The girl will marry where she pleases.
She makes her own choice. If I can make the right impression on her and
convince her father and mother that I am fit for her, why, it isn't
your affair!"

"Isn't it?" Harriet whispered the question, as if to herself. Her eyes
looked beyond him darkly; the girl was young and innocent, greedy for
flattery, eager to live. What chance had little Nina Carter against
charm like his--experience like his? Harriet wondered if she could look
dispassionately on while Nina dimpled and flushed over her love affair,
while gowns were made and presents unpacked. Could she help to pin a
veil over that stupid little head; could she wave good-bye to Royal
Blondin and his girl wife; could she picture the room where Nina's
ignorance that night must face his sophistication, his passion, his
coarseness?

They had come to the particular lane that led to Crownlands now, and
she stood still by the ivy-covered brick wall, her face dark and sober
with thought in the soft, clear twilight.

"There won't be any kidnapping or chloroform about it!" Royal reminded
her.

"No--I know!" she answered, with a swift glance of pain. "But--"

But what? The alternative was Linda's house, at twenty-seven instead of
seventeen, and with the vague cloud over her even more definite than
before. Harriet winced. Nina, whispered her mind, was far less ignorant
than Harriet had been at her age.

"Life--the truths of life," Royal said, as if he read her thought, "may
not be to everyone what they--might be--might have been--to you!" The
colour rushed to her face.

"PLEASE, Roy--!" she said, suffocated.

"I may never be asked to the house after to-morrow night," said
Blondin, after a pause, realizing that he was gaining ground. "She
won't be here to-morrow night. This may be the beginning and end of it.
All I ask is that if I am made welcome here, on my own merits, you
won't interfere! The mere fact that you're living here doesn't mean
that you have the moral responsibility of the family on your shoulders,
does it? Does it?"

"No-o," Harriet admitted, in a troubled tone.

"Of course not! You live your life, and I mine. Is there anything wrong
about that?"

He looked down with quiet triumph at the exquisite face, never more
beautiful than in this soft light, against the setting of maples and
brick wall.

"You know you would never look at that girl except for her money, Roy!"
she burst out.

"Nor would any one else!" he amended, suavely.

Harriet gave a distressed laugh.

"Come! You and I never saw each other until this week," Blondin urged.
"That's the whole story."

Before she answered, the girl looked beyond him at the splendid stables
and lawns of Crownlands. One of the great cars was in the garage
doorway, its lamps winking like eyes in the dusk. An old gardener was
utilizing the last of the daylight, his back bent over a green box
border. Beyond, lights showed in the side windows of the great house.
Harriet could see pinkish colour up at her own porch; Nina was at home,
or Rosa was turning down the beds and making everything orderly for the
night. She had a swift vision of the great hallways, the flowers, the
silent, unobtrusive service; of Ward and his friends racketing
upstairs; the old lady majestically descending; of Isabelle at her
mirror. Richard Carter would come quietly down, groomed and keen-eyed;
he would glance at his mail, perhaps saunter out to the wide porch for
a chat with his mother before dinner was announced.

It had never lost its charm for her, her castle of dreams; she had
longed to be part of just such a household all her life! Now she
actually was part of it, and--if what Mary Putnam had hinted was true,
if her own fleeting suspicion only a few evenings ago was true; then
she might some day really belong to Crownlands, in good earnest!

After all, Nina was bound for some sort of indiscretion; nobody could
save her that! Even if there was any probability that Royal could carry
out his plan.

Harriet made her choice.

"Very well," she said, briefly. "I understand you. I turn in here.
Good-night!"

"Just a second!" he said, detaining her. "You won't hurt me with any of
them, Ward or the girl, or the father?"

The girl's lips curled with distaste.

"No," she said, tonelessly.

"The look implies that you despise me!" Royal said, smiling.

"Oh, not YOU!" she said, in a tone of self-contempt. And in another
second she was gone. He saw the slender figure, in its green gown,
disappear at a turning of the ivied wall. She paused for no backward
glance of farewell. But Royal Blondin was satisfied.




CHAPTER V


Again Harriet fled through the quiet house as if pursued by furies, and
again reached her room with white cheeks and a fast-beating heart. Nina
was not there. She crossed to the window, and stood there with her
hands clasped on her chest, and her breath coming and going stormily.

"Oh, he's clever!" she whispered, half aloud. "He's clever! He never
made a threat. He never made a threat of any kind! He knew that he had
me--he knew that he had me just where he wanted me!" And looking down
toward the lane, invisible now behind the trees and stables, in the
gathering dusk, she added scornfully, "You're clever, Roy. I wonder if
there's anything you wouldn't do, if it made for your own comfort or
brought you in money!

"But, at all events," summarized Harriet, quieting a little under the
soothing influence of solitude and safety, "I'm out of it! He won't
touch ME. And what he does here, in making his way with this family,
doesn't concern me! Nina is old enough to decide for herself--I had my
own living to make at her age, and no father to write me checks for my
birthdays, and no Uncle Edward to die and leave me a hundred and fifty
thousand dollars!"

She mused about the little fortune, left most unexpectedly five years
before to Nina and Ward by an uncle of their mother. Edward Potter had
been a bachelor, had been young when an accident flung him out of life,
and made his niece's children, the twelve-year-old Nina, and Ward at
sixteen, his heirs. The expectation had been that he would marry, that
sons and daughters of his own would disinherit the young Carters. But
his affianced wife had married someone else, after awhile, and the
fortune had gone on accumulating for Ward and for the girl whose
eighteenth birthday was only a few months off now. Harriet wondered if
Royal Blondin knew about it. Of course he knew about it! Harriet had
seen a check for one million dollars exhibited, under glass, among the
wedding gifts of one twenty-year-old girl a few months ago. She did not
suppose that Richard Carter would do that for his daughter, even if he
could. But he would probably double Uncle Edward's legacy, and the
bride would begin her new life with a fortune that was no contemptible
fraction of a million.

"And I am worrying about my responsibility to poor, dear little Nina!"
the girl said to herself, with a rather mirthless laugh, as Nina
herself came into the room.

Nina had been experiencing what were among the pleasantest hours of her
life. A school friend, Amy Hawkes, had come back with her from
Francesca Jay's tea, and the two had been prettily invited by Isabelle
to join the family downstairs at dinner. Coming at this particular
moment, it had seemed to Nina that she was emerging from the chrysalis
indeed.

But more than that. Amy, who was romance personified, under a plain and
demure exterior, had observed Nina's long conversation with Royal
Blondin, and had found an arch allusion to it so well received by Nina
that she had followed up that line of conversation, almost without
variation, ever since. By this time the girls had confided to each
other, over a box of chocolates in the deep chairs of the morning room,
everything of a sentimental nature that had ever happened to them in
their lives, and much that had not. Amy was convinced that Mr. Blondin
was just desperately in earnest, and that, for the sake of other
aspirants, Nina ought not to trifle with him, and Nina, with blazing
cheeks and tumbled hair, was assuming rapidly the airs of a sad
coquette.

Amy was to sleep with Nina, and Harriet realized, as she superintended
their fluttered dressing, that she, Harriet, would be obliged to go to
their door five times, between eleven and one o'clock that night, and
tell them that they must stop talking. With the grave manner that
always impressed young girls, and with a somewhat serious face, she was
busying herself with their frills and ribbons, when from the bathroom,
where Amy was drawing on silk stockings, and Nina had her toothbrush in
her mouth, she was electrified by a chance scrap of their conversation.

"If I do mention it to Mother," said Nina, rather thickly, "she will
only scold me! A man of his age--she'd be furious!"

"And don't you think you deserve to be scolded?" said Amy, in a
delightfully rebuking undertone. "My dear--he must be in the thirties!"

"No, I don't, Amy!" Nina protested, in a tone of great honesty and
innocence. "I can't help being like that. If I don't like a man, why, I
have nothing to say to him! If I do, why--his age--NOTHING--matters!"

She hesitated, and laughed a little laugh of pure pleasure.

"You flirt!" Amy said.

"Truly, honestly--" Nina was beginning, when both girls were smitten
into panicky silence by the sound of the slipper Harriet deliberately
dropped on the floor. Nina noiselessly bent her stocky young body far
forward, to look through the crack of the bathroom door. Harriet went
on quietly spreading the youthful dinner dresses on Nina's bed, snapped
up a dressing-table light, went on into her own room. But she had been
taken far more by surprise herself, if they had only known it, than had
Amy and Nina. Could Royal possibly have been the subject of their
confidences? Could he have made such progress in a single afternoon?
Knowing Royal, and knowing Nina, she was obliged to confess it possible.

While she stood pondering, in her own beautiful room, there was a
modest knock at the door, and Rosa came in with a box. She smiled, and
put it on Harriet's desk.

"For me?" the girl said, smiling in answer, and with some surprise.
Rosa nodded, and went her way, and Harriet went to the box. It was not
large, a florist's box of dark green cardboard; Harriet untied the
raffia string, and investigated the mass of silky tissue paper. Inside
was an orchid.

She took it out, a delicate cluster of flaky blossoms, poised
carelessly, like little white hearts, on the limp stem. She opened the
accompanying envelope, and found Ward's card. On the back he had
written,

"Just a little worried because he's afraid you're cross at him!"

Harriet stood perfectly still, the orchid in one hand, the card crushed
in the other. Ward Carter had sent orchids, no doubt, to other girls.
But Harriet Field had never had an orchid before from a man.

She put the card into her little desk, and the orchid into a slender
crystal vase. Then she went back to advise Amy and Nina as to gold
beads and the arrangement of hair. But a little later, when she was in
the big housekeeper's pantry, where several maids were busy with
last-minute manipulations of olives and ice and grapefruit, Ward came
out and found her, soberly busy in her old checked silk.

"Why didn't you wear it?"

"Wear it--you bad, extravagant child! I'll wear it to town to-morrow."

"No; but--" he sank his tone to one of enjoyable confidences--"but WERE
you mad at me?"

"Mad at you? But why should I have been?" Harriet demanded.

"Oh, I don't know! You looked so glum at breakfast."

"Well, you had nothing to do with it!" she assured him, in her
big-sisterly voice. "And it was the first orchid I ever had, and I
loved you for it!"

It was said in just the comradely, half-amused voice with which she had
addressed Ward a hundred times in the past year, but perhaps the boy
had changed. At all events, it was with something like pain and
impatience in his tone that he said gruffly:

"Yes, you do! You like me about as much as you like Nina, or Granny!"

"I like you--sh! just a LITTLE better than I do Granny!" Harriet
confided. "Don't spoil your dinner with olives, Ward! Don't muss
that--there's a dear! Dinner's announced, by the way. It's quarter past
eight."

"I'm going!" he grumbled, discontentedly.

"At any rate, I LOVE the orchid!" Harriet said, soothingly. He was
laughing too, as he disappeared, but something in his face was vaguely
troubling to her none-the-less, and she remembered it now and then with
a little compunction during her quiet evening of reading. She was tired
to-night, excited from the talk with Blondin that afternoon, and by the
general confusion and noise of the household. Ward--Nina--Royal--their
names flitted through her thoughts even when she tried to read; at such
a time as this she felt as if the life at Crownlands was like the
current of a river that moved too swiftly, or more appropriately
perhaps, like some powerful motor-car whose smooth, swift passage gave
its occupants small chance to investigate the country through which
they fled. Well, she would see Linda on Saturday, and have Sunday with
her and the children, and that meant always a complete change and a
shifted viewpoint, even when, as frequently happened, Linda took the
older-sisterly privilege of scolding.




CHAPTER VI


Linda, who had been Mrs. Frederick Davenport for some seventeen years,
had lived for the last ten in a quiet New Jersey village. The house for
which she and her husband paid the staggering rent of forty dollars a
month had proved to be in a region toward which the expected tide of
fashion did not turn, but it remained a quiet and eminently respectable
neighbourhood, remained almost unchanged, in fact, and Linda was
satisfied.

When Harriet had chaperoned Nina and Amy to the Friday afternoon
matinee, and had duly deposited Amy afterward in the Hawkes mansion,
and had escorted Nina to her grandmother's apartment, she was free to
direct Hansen to drive her to the Jersey tube, and to spend a hot,
uncomfortable hour in a stream of homegoing commuters, on the way to
Linda's house. She was unexpected, but that made no difference; the
Davenports had little company, and they were always ready to welcome
the beloved sister and aunt.

Linda's home was a shingled brown eight-room house, built in the first
years of the century, and consequently showing the simplicity and
spaciousness that were unknown in the architecture of the eighties. It
was exactly like a thousand other houses here in the Oranges, and like
a million in the Union. There was a porch, with a half-glass door
covered by a wire netting door, and a rusty mail box; there was a
square entrance hall with a side window and an angled stairway; there
was a kitchen back of the hall, and a square parlour with a green-tiled
mantel to the left; a square dining room back of the parlour, with a
window at the back and another at the side. The side window gave upon
the neighbouring house, a duplicate of this house, forty feet away, and
the back window commanded an oblong backyard in which clotheslines and
bean poles and a dog house, and a small vegetable garden protected by
collapsing chicken wire, and various pails and buckets appertaining to
the kitchen, all had place.

But up the slope of meadow beyond this yard were the woods, and the
Davenport children had always considered these woods as a part of their
legitimate domain, combining thus, as their mother said, "the
advantages of the country with all the conveniences of the city." What
the conveniences of the city were Harriet was unable to decide, but to
Linda's practical mind electric light, adequate plumbing, and a gas
stove were all extremely important.

A chipped cement path led to Linda's steps; there was no front fence.
It was considered vaguely elegant, in the neighbourhood, to let the
fifty-foot plots run together, as boundless estates might unite. So
that the old prim charm of pickets and protected gardens, and protected
babies playing in them, had long ago vanished from country homes, and
although the lawns here were all well tended, there was a certain
bareness and indefiniteness about the aspect that partly accounted for
the little curl of distaste that touched Harriet's mouth when she
thought of Linda's home.

She mounted the three cement steps from the sidewalk level, and the
four shabby and peeling wooden ones that rose to the porch. On this hot
summer afternoon the front door was open, and Harriet stepped into the
odorous gloom of the hall, and let the screen door bang lightly behind
her. There was a confused murmur of voices and the clinking of plates
in the dining room, but these ceased instantly, and a hush ensued.

Immediately, in the open archway into the parlour, a girl of fifteen
appeared, a pretty girl with blue eyes and brown hair, a shabby but
fresh little shirtwaist belted by a shabby but clean white skirt, and a
napkin dangling from her hand.

She made a round O of her mouth, and then gave a shout of pleasure.

"Oh, Mother--it's Aunt Harriet! Oh, you darling--!"

Harriet, laughing as she put down her bag and divested herself of her
hat and wraps, went from the child's wild embrace into the arms of
Linda herself, a tall, broadly built, pleasant-faced woman with none of
Harriet's own unusual beauty, but with a family resemblance to her
younger sister nevertheless.

"Well, you sweet good child!" she said, warmly. "Fred--here's Harriet!
Well, my dear, isn't it fortunate that we were late! We'd hardly
commenced!"

The remaining members of the family now streamed forth: Fred Davenport,
a thin, rather gray man of fifty, with an intelligent face, a worried
forehead, and kindly eyes; Julia, a blonde beauty of twelve; Nammy, a
fat, sweet boy of five, with a bib on; and Pip, a serious ten-year-old,
with black hair and faded blue overalls, and strong little brown hands
scrupulously scrubbed to the wrist-bones, where dirt and grime
commenced again unabated. Josephine, the oldest child, continued to
dance about the visitor delightedly, but the little thoughtful Julia
disappeared, and when presently they all went out to resume the
interrupted meal, a place had been set freshly for Harriet, and a clean
plate was waiting for her.

"Now, I don't know whether to take this out and heat it up for you, or
whether it's still hot," said Linda, beaming from her place at the head
of the table.

"I'll do it!" said Julia, half launched from her chair.

"Oh, Mother, it's plenty hot enough!" Josephine contended, good
naturedly. Harriet protested against the reheating plan. It seemed to
her the middle of the afternoon, with the blazing, merciless sunlight
streaming across the backyards. She had forgotten that Linda had dinner
at half-past six.

"Iced tea! Oh, don't you love it? I could die drinking it!" Julia said,
drawing the beverage from off the ice in her glass with Epicurean
delight.

"You very probably will!" her father said. The children laughed
hilariously. Linda put Harriet's plate before her, and Harriet attacked
codfish cakes and boiled potatoes and stewed tomatoes with pieces of
pulpy bread in them, with what appetite she could command. The stewed
blueberries that followed were ice-cold, and she enjoyed them as much
as the others did.

The talk ranged wholesomely from family to national affairs. Fred was a
newspaper man, one of the submerged many, underpaid, overworked,
unheard, yet vaguely gratified through all the long years by the
feeling that his groove was not quite the groove of the office, the
teller's desk, or the travelling salesman's "beat." Here in the little
suburban town his opinion gained some little weight from the fact that
he had been ten years with a New York evening paper. Fred held vaguely
with labour parties, with socialists and single-taxers; his
sister-in-law had a somewhat caustic feeling that if Fred had ever
given Linda a really capable maid, his opinions might have been more
endurable, to her, Harriet, at least. Linda had had maids, Polack and
Swedish girls, and Irish country girls hardly intelligible in speech.
But now she had no maid, she preferred the economy and independence of
doing her own housework.

They sat on into absolute darkness, finishing the last teaspoonful of
blueberry preserve, and the last crumby cooky. Mrs. Davenport was
interested in everything her sister had to say; knew the Carters, and
even some of their closest friends, by name, and asked all sorts of
questions about them. Josephine, after a half-hearted offer to help
with the dishes, departed for a rehearsal of "Robin Hood," which was to
be given by the women of the church as their annual entertainment.
While she was upstairs, little Nammy was sent up to bed, but when it
was absolutely necessary to have lights, and the group at the table
naturally adjourned, little Julia and Pip gallantly did their share of
the work.

Harriet knew that work by heart; no amount of absence could ever make
her unfamiliar with any detail of it. The clearing of the table, the
shaking of the crumpled tablecloth, the setting of the breakfast table,
the hot glare of electric light in the cluttered and odorous kitchen,
the scraping of congealed plates, the spreading of her damp tea towel
on the rack by the sink, the selection of a dry towel.

Linda, she reflected, had had seventeen years--had had something nearer
twenty-five years of it. For Linda had been only Josephine's age when
their mother died, and Professor Field's daughters had assumed the
management of his little home. Linda might have been anything, thought
her sister, as the older woman rinsed and soaped cheerfully, in the
insufferable heat of the kitchen, but she had always had cooking and
dishes to do. She said that she liked them.

Julia was Harriet's favourite among the children. Pip had been a baby,
entirely absorbing his mother, in those terrible days nine years ago,
but Julia had been a delicious, confidential two-year-old, with a warm
soft hand, and a flushed little friendly face under tumbling curls.
Harriet had bathed her, dressed her, fed her, and taken her for silent
walks. And on many a moonlit night the unconscious little body had been
held tight in Harriet's arms, and the unconscious little face wet with
passionate tears.

Julia had never known this, but Harriet never forgot it, and she looked
at Julia lovingly, as the small, sturdy girl in her shabby little
school-frock went to and fro busily.

"And now we can talk!" Linda said at last, when the kitchen was dark
and hot and orderly, and the children gone upstairs to bed in hot
darkness, and she and Harriet had taken the seats on the small, hot
porch. "This is a terrible night--nine o'clock--and they are hardly
settled off yet!"

Nine o'clock. They would still be at dinner at Crownlands, and the
river breeze would be blowing the thin curtains of Harriet's French
windows straight into the cool, fresh room. She would be out on the
porch, now, looking at the river lights, her book forgotten in her lap.
At the head of the table Richard Carter would be sitting, in his cool
and immaculate white, and at the foot, sparkling and beautiful, with
her fresh bare arms and her firm bare shoulders, her exquisitely
modelled hair and her bright eyes, Isabelle. And beside her, to-night,
Royal Blondin, musical, poetical, playing the game with all his
consummate art, scoring with every glance and word--

Fred was at the piano. It was a poor piano, and he was a poor player
who smoked his old pipe while he painstakingly fingered Mendelssohn's
"Songs Without Words" or the score of "The Geisha." But Linda loved him.

"He will putter away there, perfectly content, for an hour," she told
Harriet. "And at ten you'll see him starting to get Josephine. They're
great chums--she thinks there's no one in the world like Daddy!"

"How are things at the office?" Harriet asked.

"Oh, just about the same! Old Frank Judson died, you know, and of
course Fred expected the A. P. desk. But Allen had a nephew, just out
of Yale, it seems, and you can imagine how poor old Fred felt when they
put him in. However, I said he wouldn't last, and he didn't last! So
Fred has that desk now, and of course he is tremendously pleased."

"More money in it?" Harriet asked, practically.

"Well, there will be. Allen hasn't said anything about it, but Fred is
sure he will. But since Fred's mother died, we've felt very much
easier. It was an expense, and it was a responsibility, too," said
Linda, with her plain, fine, unselfish face only vaguely visible to
Harriet in the starlight. "And we were about six months clearing up the
final expenses. But now, with only ourselves and the children, it makes
me feel positively selfish! I did tell Mrs. Underhill that I would try
to sew regularly for the Belgians, and there's the Red Cross, I always
manage that. But--I know you'll be as glad as I am, Harriet, we are
really saving, at last."

"Well, you told me so last Christmas," Harriet said, sympathetically,
"when you and Fred took the Liberty Bonds--"

"Yes, that. But I mean really, for our home, now. And--but don't
mention this, Harriet, for we are in perfect DREAD that someone else
will have the same idea--you know that old place we've been watching
for years? Well, Mr. Adams told David Davenport that he believed that
it could be had for seven or eight thousand dollars, and perhaps only
one thousand or fifteen hundred paid down."

Harriet remembered the place perfectly, a shabby, fine old house on a
corner, with trees and an old stable, a plot perhaps one hundred feet
wide, a street flanked by new wooden houses and young trees. Linda and
Fred had wanted this house since the Sunday walk, wheeling Pip in the
perambulator, when they had first seen it.

"We could do wonders with that house!" said Linda, enthusiastically.
"Not all at once. But it has electric light in, that we know, and one
bath--"

Harriet's thoughts had wandered.

"How's David?"

"Lovely. He always comes to us for Sunday dinner," Linda said. "And he
always asks for you!" she added, with some significance. David
Davenport, Fred's somewhat heavy and plodding brother, a successful
Brooklyn dentist, had never made any secret of his feeling for the
beautiful Harriet. "David is a dear," his sister-in-law said, "the most
comfortable person to have about! And he is doing remarkably well. He
is going to make some woman very happy, Harriet. He and Fred both have
that--well, that domestic quality that wears pretty well! We've
promised to give the children a picnic on the ocean a week from Sunday,
and you'd be perfectly touched to see how David is planning for it.
We're to spend Saturday night with him--"

"I like David!" Harriet said, in answer to some faint indication of
reproach in her sister's tone. But immediately afterward she added, in
a lower voice: "Ward Carter has had Royal Blondin at the house this
week!"

Linda's rocker stopped as if by shock. There was an electric silence.
When she spoke again it was with awe and incredulity and something like
terror in her tone.

"Royal Blondin! He's in England!"

"He was," Harriet said, drily. "He's been in New York for two years
now."

"Harriet! Why didn't you tell me?"

"I didn't know, Sis. He came to tea last week--stepped up and held out
his hand--I hadn't even seen him since that night in your Watertown
house--"

Linda shuddered.

"I know--I remember!" she said in a whisper. And she added fervently,
"I hoped he was dead!"

"So did I!" Harriet said, simply.

There was another moment of silence. Then Linda said:

"Well, what about it? What did he say--what did you say?"

"Nothing very significant; what was there to say?" Harriet answered.
"Our meeting was entirely accidental. He had no idea of finding me; was
as surprised as I was." She stopped abruptly, musing on some
unpalatable thought. "You wouldn't know him, Linda. He is a perfect
freak," she said, presently, "talks about Karma and Nirvana and I don't
know what all! Whether he's a Theosophist or a Brahmin I don't know--"

"For Heaven's sake!" Mrs. Davenport commented, in healthy surprise and
contempt.

"New thought, and poetry, and the occult, and Tagore and the Russian
novelists, and the Russian music," Harriet said, "he lectures about
them and he has been extremely successful! He wears pongee coats and
red ties, and has his hair long, and--well, you never saw women act so
about anything or anybody!"

"Royal Blondin!" Linda exclaimed, aghast. "Perhaps their making fools
of themselves will make it not worth his while to bother you," she
speculated, hopefully.

"He's having dinner with the Carters to-night," Harriet said. To this
Linda could only ejaculate again an amazed:

"Royal Blondin!" And as Harriet merely nodded, in the gloom, she added,
vigorously, "Why, he hadn't a PENNY! He was always an idiot--he didn't
have enough to EAT ten years ago!"

"Well, he has enough to eat now! Ward told me that he gets three
hundred dollars for his drawing-room talks--his 'interpretive musings',
he called them. And he has a book of poetry out, and he reviews poetry
for some magazine--"

"Well, THAT--" Mrs. Davenport was still dazed with astonishment and
indignation. "That REALLY--" she began, and stopped, shaking her head.
"Tell me EVERYTHING you said!" she commanded.

"I will!" Harriet's voice fell flatly. "I came home to talk it over
with you." But it was fully five minutes later that she began the
inevitable confidences. "We talked--Roy and I--" she said, briefly. "He
doesn't belong in my life, now, any more than I do in his! We simply
agreed to a sort of mutual minding of our own business--"

"Thank God!" Mrs. Davenport said, fervently. "He--he doesn't want
to--he doesn't still feel--he won't worry you, then?" she asked
somewhat diffidently. Harriet's laugh had an unpleasant edge.

"He is after bigger game than I am, now!" she said.

"The brute!" her sister commented in a whisper. "It--it is all right,
then?" she asked, a little timidly.

"All right!" Harriet echoed, bitterly. "I haven't drawn a happy breath
since I saw him! All that time came up again, as fresh as if it were
yesterday--except that I HAVE climbed a little way, Linda; I was
happy--I was busy and useful--and I had--I had my self-respect!"

And suddenly the bright head was in Linda's lap, and she was sobbing
bitterly. Linda, with a great ache in her heart, circled her arms,
mother-fashion, as she had circled them a hundred times, about her
little sister.




CHAPTER VII


Harriet slept in the room with Julia and Josephine that night, or
rather tossed and lay wakeful there. The light of a street lamp came
squarely in on the white ceiling, and although the hall door was open,
there was no breath of air moving anywhere. The children slept in
attitudes of youthful abandonment; Harriet heard Fred and Linda
murmuring steadily, and could imagine of what they spoke; little Nammy
awakened, and there was an interval of maternal comforting, and then
silence.

At about two o'clock the wind streamed mercifully in, hot and thick,
but prophetic of rain, and Harriet, wandering about to make windows
fast, encountered Linda, on the same errand. When the worst of the
crackling and flashing was over, the girl glanced at her watch again.
Three o'clock, but she could sleep now. She sank deeply into dreams,
not to stir until Linda's alarm clock, hastily smothered, thrilled at
seven, and the small girls rose with cheerful noise, to let streams of
hot sunshine upon her face.

Her head ached; she brushed Julia's hair as a sort of bribe for turning
the small girl out of the bathroom, and was in the tub when Pip
hammered on the door for his turn. Linda was in a whirl of blue smoke
in the kitchen; Fred shouted a request for a little more hot water;
Josephine set the table with languid grace, entertaining her aunt with
a description of "Robin Hood."

Her face beaming with satisfaction, Linda assembled her brood. There
were cocoa and coffee and muffins and omelette and Fred's little bottle
of cream, and his paper, and there was, as always, Linda's spontaneous
grace before meat: "I wonder if we're thankful enough, when we think of
those poor people in Poland and Belgium!"

Immediately after breakfast the two small girls attacked their Saturday
morning's work with a philosophic vigour that rather touched their
aunt. This morning Linda would leave the whole lower floor to their
ministrations while she thoroughly cleaned the floor above. Josephine
must bake cake or cookies, all the dishwashing and dusting and sweeping
must be done before Mother came down at twelve to put finishing touches
on the lunch. Fred had hurried away after his hasty meal; the boys were
turned out into the backyard, which Pip was expected to rake while he
watched his small brother.

Harriet's heart ached deeply for them all as she watched the Jersey
marshes from the car window a few hours later. The poor little pretty
girls, gallantly soaking their small hands in dishwater and lye, eager
over the church production of "Robin Hood" and a picnic with Uncle
David at Asbury! Josephine was to be a stenographer when she finished
High School, and little Julia had expressed an angelic ambition to
teach a kindergarten class some day. Nina, at their ages, had had her
pony, her finishing school, her little silk stockings, and her
monogrammed ivory toilet set, her trip to England and France and Italy
with her mother and brother and grandmother.

Suppose that she, Harriet, was right in suspecting that Ward's feeling
was more than the passing gallantry of a light-hearted boy? She bit her
lip, narrowed her idle gaze on the meadows that flew by the car window.
It would be a nine-days' wonder, his marriage at twenty-two with his
mother's secretary, more than four years his senior. But after that?
After that there would be nothing to say or do. Young Mr. and Mrs. Ward
Carter would establish themselves comfortably, and the elder Carters
would visit them; Isabelle absorbed as usual in her own mysterious
thoughts, and Richard Carter--

Harriet's thoughts, none too comfortable up to this point, stopped
here, and she flushed. It was impossible to see Richard Carter, as she
saw him every day, in the role of husband, father, son, and employer,
without holding him in hearty respect. She liked him thoroughly; she
knew him to be the simplest, the most genuine and honest, of them all.
He had none of his wife's airy selfishness, none of his mother's cold
pride. Nina was far more of a snob than her father, and Ward--well,
Ward was only a sweet, spoiled, generous boy, at twenty-two. But
Harriet always saw behind Richard Carter, the years that had made him,
the patient, straightforward, hard-working clerk who had been sober,
and true, and intelligent enough to lift himself out of the common rut
long before the golden secret that lay at the heart of the Carter
Asbestos Company had flashed upon him. Money had not spoiled Richard;
he still held wealth in respect, while Ward ordered his racing car, and
Nina yawned over twelve-dollar school shoes.

No; she would not enjoy telling Richard that she was to marry his son.
Those keen eyes would read her through and through, and while her
father-in-law might love her, and see her beauty and charm with all the
rest of the world, Harriet knew that she must begin an actual campaign
for his esteem on her wedding day. The prospect had an unexpected
piquancy. She had little fear of its outcome. She would make Ward
Carter a wife for whom his father must come to feel genuine gratitude
and devotion. Every fibre of her being would be strained to make the
Carter marriage a success. She knew what persons to cultivate, and what
elements to weed out of their lives. There would be children, there
would be hospitality and music and a garden. And Ward should seriously
settle down to his business, whatever it might be, and show himself a
worthy son of his clever father.

Isabelle, simply because of her supreme indifference to whatever did
not affect her own personal affairs, would be easy to handle. Her son's
marriage might pique her, momentarily, but less, on the whole, than the
discovery that she had gained eight pounds, or that new wrinkles had
appeared about her eyes. She would very probably choose the position of
championing Harriet, if only to infuriate the old lady. Madame Carter
would of course be frantic, but Ward's wife need have no fear of her.
And Nina--

"I would very soon put a stop to that Blondin affair!" thought Harriet
at this point. But a sharp little wedge of fear entered her heart at
the same second. It would not do to anger Royal, that end of the tangle
must be handled very carefully. Whatever influence she might have with
Nina must be used with discretion.

"After all, Nina must live her own life, as I have to live mine!" she
thought. And her mind drifted to the happier thought of what a
brilliant marriage on her part would mean to the little girls who were
so busily cleaning an eight-room house in a little Jersey suburb.
Josephine and Julia should come to visit her, they should have little
frocks that would befit the pretty nieces of Mrs. Ward Carter; they
should have a taste of polo games and country clubs, and in a winter or
two Josephine's first formal dance should be given in Aunt Harriet's
house.

"Why not--why not?" Harriet asked herself, as she reached Madame
Carter's pretentious apartment house, and was whisked upstairs. She was
to meet Nina here, and she glanced about for the big limousine at the
curb, as an indication that the old lady might be ready to accompany
them back to Crownlands. But there was no car in sight. The maid's
first statement was that Miss Carter had gone home with her brother,
and when Madame Carter came magnificently into the room, Harriet could
see from the nature of her head-dress that she did not intend to assume
a hat for some hours. When Mrs. Carter meant to go out, her maid pinned
and pressed and veiled her hat immovably, while dressing her, as a
fixture, with the puffs and braids and curls of white hair.

"Well, our bird has flown!" said the old lady. Harriet could see that
she was pleased about something.

"Gone home with Ward?" Harriet asked. Madame Carter never shook hands
with her; there was conscious superiority in the little omission. She
sank into a chair, and Harriet sat down.

"Ward and his friend, this Mr. Blondin," Madame Carter said. "A very
interesting--a most unusual man. A very good family, too--excellent old
family. Yes. Nina assured us that she had to wait and go home with her
Daddy, but that--" Madame Carter gave Harriet a deeply significant
smile--"but that didn't seem to please Somebody very much!" she added.
"So I told Nina I thought Granny would be able to make it all right
with Daddy, and off the young people went."

She rocked, with a benignly triumphant expression, and a complacent
rustle of silken skirts. Harriet, beneath an automatic smile, hid a
troubled heart. Royal was losing no time, Ward his innocent instrument,
and this fatuous old lady of course playing his game for him! Madame
Carter had always spoiled Nina in something a trifle more defined and
malicious than the usual grandmotherly fashion. She had indulged the
child in chocolates when the doctor's prohibition of sweets was being
scrupulously enforced by Isabelle and Harriet; she had permitted late
hours and unsuitable plays when Nina visited her; she had encouraged
her granddaughter in a thousand little snobberies and affectations. And
she had taken a mischievous pleasure in thwarting Harriet whenever
possible, emphasizing the difference in her position and Nina's,
humiliating the companion whenever it was possible, in ways that were
far less subtle than Madame Carter imagined them to be.

Harriet saw now that she was pleased and flattered by an older man's
apparent admiration of Nina; and that she would further the girl's
first definite affair in every way that lay in her power. It was
maddening; it was exasperating beyond words. An honest warning would
have merely flattered her with its implication of her importance; ah,
no, Isabelle and Harriet might try to hold the child back--but Granny
knew girl nature better than either of them!

"Well, then, I must follow them home," Harriet said, pleasantly. "You
don't come back to-night?"

To this Madame Carter very pointedly made no answer; her plans were not
Miss Field's business. She rocked on placidly, in her ornate, pleasant
room, at whose curtained and undercurtained and overdraped windows the
summer sunshine was battling to enter. It was a large room, but seemed
small because the rugs were two and three deep on the floor, and there
was so much rich, dark furniture, so many lamps and jars and pictures
and boxes and frames, handsome but heterogeneous treasures that must
always remain in exactly the same positions. The several tables were
angled carefully, their draperies lay precisely placed, year after
year; Harriet knew that all the ten rooms were just the same, and that
the old lady liked to walk slowly through them, and note the lace over
satin, the glint of ranked wineglasses, the gleam of polished silver,
the clocks and candlesticks. There were certain ornate ashtrays for
Richard and Ward, there was a magnificent piano player, for which his
grandmother bought the boy a dozen rolls a month, selecting them with
splendid indifference on one of her regal expeditions downtown, and
there was a massive Victrola, which had once delighted Nina for hours
at a time.

"The child is growing up!" the old lady said, smiling at some thought.
"Well, we must look for love affairs now!"

Harriet felt that there was small profit in following this line of
conversation. She glanced at her twisted wrist.

"I think I will make that two o'clock train, Madame Carter, unless
there is some errand I might do for you?" she said respectfully.

This courtesy, from a beautiful young woman to an old one, always
antagonized Madame Carter. Harriet knew that she was casting about for
some honeyed and venomous farewell, when the muffled thrill of the bell
came to them, and the footsteps of Ella were heard. Immediately
afterward Richard Carter came quickly in.

He met Harriet at the door.

"How are you, Miss Field? Tell Nina to hurry; I've got about five
minutes!" he said, pleasantly.

"Don't keep Miss Field; she is making her train!" said his mother,
coming forward under full sail, and laying both hands about his. "I'll
explain about Nina. Come here--you have time to sit down with your
mother, I hope!"

Richard Carter gave his mother the peculiarly warm smile that was
especially her own.

"Went on with Ward, eh?" he said, in his hearty voice. "That's all
right, then. Oh, Miss Field!" he called, after Harriet's discreetly
retreating back, "the car's downstairs. Wait for me there; I'll run you
home in half the time the train takes. I'm playing in the tennis
finals, Mother--"

Harriet, turning for just a nod and smile, heard no more. His voice
dropped to a filial undertone, and he sank into a low chair, with his
hands still clasping the old lady's hand. But as she entered the lift,
the girl said to herself, with a passionate sort of gratitude: "Oh, I
like you! You're the only genuine and unselfish and kind-hearted one in
the whole crowd!"

She went down to the street, and saw the small car waiting. He was
driving himself to-day. With a great sense of comfort and relaxation
Harriet got into it, and was comfortably established, and tucked in
snugly, when Richard came down. He smiled at seeing her, got into his
own seat; the machine slipped smoothly into motion, the hot and sordid
streets began to glide by.

"Ever think how illuminating it would be, Miss Field, if we kept a list
of the things that are worrying us sick, and read 'em over a few weeks
later?"

"I suppose so!" the girl said, a little surprised, and yet with
fervour. "We'd have a fresh bunch then, and be worrying away just as
hard!"

The spontaneous response in her tone made Richard Carter laugh.

"I've had something on my mind for two months," he said, "to-day I ran
into the fellow I thought was going to make the trouble--we had lunch
together, and everything was settled up as calm as a June day! I feel
ten years younger than I did at this time yesterday! What made me think
of it was that I had it on my mind that you and Nina and the bags would
be a crowd in this car when I came out to my mother's a few minutes
ago. I was figuring on sending the bags on to-morrow, and so on and so
on--"

"It's often that way," Harriet smiled. "Only money trouble really seems
to have a solid, tangible form," she added, thoughtfully.

"Combined with some other," he surprised her by answering quickly, as
if he were quite at home with his subject. "If there isn't sickness--or
drink--"

"Oh, you can't say that, Mr. Carter!" Harriet was at home here, too.
"Everybody who is respectable and hard working and sober doesn't get
rich---"

"No, not rich!" He was really interested. "But our contention isn't
that riches are the only happiness, is it?" he countered.

"No, but I say that money trouble is a very real thing," she answered,
quickly.

"There is a golden mean, Miss Field, between being rich and being
poor!" he reminded her.

"I suppose I am rather bitter," Harriet said, enjoying this confidence
more than she could stop to realize, "because I have just been to see
my sister in New Jersey. She has four children, pretty well grown now,
and her husband is really a good man, and a steady man, too--he is a
sort of Jack-of-all-trades on a Brooklyn newspaper. I suppose Fred is
paid sixty dollars a week, and they save on that! But--"

"She's unhappy, eh?" asked the man, with a sidewise glance.

"Linda?" Harriet laughed ruefully. "No, she's not! She's too happy,"
she said, with a little laugh that apologized for the sentiment. "She
washes and cooks and plans all day and all night! I'm the one who
worries. It makes me sad to have her work so hard for so little--"

She sensed his lack of sympathy, and stopped short, in a little vague
surprise. There was a brief silence while he took the car skillfully
through a somewhat congested side street, then they were leaving the
hot city behind, and the fresh breath of the river was in their faces.
Harriet, in self-defence, sketched the Davenport home for him in a
dozen sentences.

"You might tell your brother-in-law, from me," Richard Carter said,
presently, "that there isn't much that money will buy HIM!"

Harriet flushed. She had had perhaps a dozen brief conversations with
Richard Carter before to-day, but they had never touched so personal a
note before.

"I sounded mercenary!" she said, a little uncomfortably. "But I didn't
mean to be. I suppose it is because I see so many things that money
would do for my sister; I'd love so to have the children beautifully
dressed and well educated. Little Pip, raking the yard to-day!--when he
ought to be in some wonderful Montessori school!"

"Oh, nonsense!" the man said, heartily. "Lord--Lord, I remember
Saturday morning, in a little Ohio town, and raking up the leaves, too!
That won't hurt them. I wish--I've often wished, that Nina's life ran a
little more in that direction," said her father, frankly. "It's hard
not to spoil 'em when you have the chance! Girls--well, perhaps it
isn't so bad for girls. But I look at Ward, now, and I wonder what on
earth is going to keep that boy straight. This Tony Pope, for
instance--it's too much, you know! They don't know the value of money,
and they don't know the value of life!"

"Ward is too sweet to be spoiled," Harriet ventured, somewhat timidly.

"You like the boy?" his father asked.

"I? Ward?" She was taken unawares, and flushed brightly. "Indeed I do!"

"I'm glad you do," Richard Carter said, in quiet satisfaction. "I've
imagined sometimes that you have a good influence on him--he's
impressionable." He fell into silence, and for some time there was no
further speech between them. Harriet was content to enjoy this restful
interval between the hurry and crowding of Linda's house and the
currents and cross-currents that she must encounter at Crownlands. She
watched the green country go by, the trees silent and heavy with their
rich foliage, the villages blazing with the last June roses. It was
oppressively hot, yesterday's storm had not much relieved the air, but
Harriet was conscious of a lazy feeling that it did not so much matter
now, the weather was no longer of importance. A mere accident had made
it natural for Richard Carter to drive her home, and yet she was
pleasantly thrilled by the circumstance.

They flew by the great gates of the country club, and turned in past
Crownlands lodge, and Harriet got out, at the steps, and turned her
happy, flushed face toward the man to thank him. A little spraying film
of golden hair had loosened under her hat; her cheeks had a summer burn
over their warm olive; her eyes shone very blue. Whatever she saw in
his face as he smiled and nodded at her pleased her, for she went
upstairs saying again to herself, "Oh, you're real----you're honest--I
LIKE you!"

It was delightful to get back into the familiar atmosphere, to catch
the fragrance of flowers in the orderly gloom downstairs, to take off
her hat and her hot, dusty clothing, and have a leisurely hot bath; to
put on fresh and fragrant summer wear, and to go down-stairs presently,
rejoicing in being young and comfortable, and tremendously interested
in life. A maid stopped to question her; there were letters to open;
she felt herself instantly a part of the establishment again, and at
home here. The significance of Richard Carter's parting look, its
honest admiration and friendliness, augmented by her own glance at a
chance mirror on her way upstairs, stayed with her pleasantly.

At one end of the terrace there was an awning whose shade fell upon the
brick flooring and the jars of bloom; and this afternoon it also shaded
Isabelle, in a basket chair, and the big hound, and Tony Pope. Harriet
cast them a passing glance, and wondered a little in her heart. The boy
was handsome, and fascinating, and rich, but it was just a little
unusual to have Isabelle so openly interested in any one. There were no
other callers this afternoon; Nina had driven to the golf club with her
father, and might be expected to remain there for tea, if any
entertainment offered, or to return home when Hansen brought the car
back.

The thought of Nina brought Royal Blondin again to Harriet's mind, and
she was conscious of a little internal wincing. But that risk must be
faced simply, as one of the unpalatable possibilities of life. That
Royal would take some step against which she must, in honour bound,
protest; that Nina should engage herself to him, and Nina's parents
consent; that no fortuitous circumstance should play into Harriet's
hands, and that she should be obliged to antagonize him openly was
unthinkable on this peaceful, golden afternoon. The canvas was too big,
the cast of characters too large, there must be some shifting of scene,
some change in plot, before anything so momentous occurred.

Yet the danger, faint though it might be, was already influencing her.
She was committed to a certain amount of diplomatic silence now; her
position here had subtly changed since the hour that brought Royal
Blondin back into her life a few days ago. Linda's concern, and her own
agony of apprehension when she first saw him, had shown her just how
frail was her hold upon this pleasant and smooth existence, and in
self-defence she had begun for the first time to think of making it
more definite. If she was to have all the terrors of maintaining a
dangerous position, at least she might be sure of its sweets.

Undefined and vague, all this was still somewhere in the background of
her thoughts as she returned to Crownlands, and when she met Ward
Carter, wrestling with the engine of his own rather disreputable racing
car, out in one of the clean, gravelled spaces near the garage. His
coat was off, his fresh, pleasant face streaked with oil and earth, his
sleeves rolled up to the elbow.

Harriet, who had wandered out idly, felt a little quickening of her
pulses as she saw him. There was no mistaking the pleasure in his eyes
as she came close.

"Spark plugs?" she asked, with the sympathy of one to whom the
peculiarities of the car were familiar.

"She's fixed now; I've just cleaned 'em," Ward announced, flinging away
his cigarette, and straightening his back. "She'll go like a bird, now.
When did you get back?"

"Your father drove me home, like the angel he is. You came with Nina?"

"Nina and Blondin. Then I drove him on to the Evans's. But she began to
act queer on the way home," said Ward, fondly, of the car. "Say--get in
and try her, will you?" he asked, eagerly.

"If you could wipe your face---" Harriet murmured, offering a
handkerchief. He declined it, but snatched out his own, and distributed
the dirt on his face somewhat more evenly. "Come on--come on, be a
sport!" he said. But perhaps he was as much surprised as delighted when
she very simply stepped into the low front seat. There was a friendly
nearness of her fresh white ruffles, and a thrilling fragrance and
sweetness and youngness about her this afternoon that was new. Miss
Field always, in Ward's simple vocabulary, had been a "corker." But now
he gave her more than one sidewise glance as they went dipping smoothly
up and down through the green lanes, and said to himself, "Gosh--when
she crinkles those blue eyes of hers, and her mouth sort of twitches as
if she wanted to laugh, she is a beauty--that's what SHE is!"

And dressing for dinner, some time later, he found himself stopping
short, once or twice, with his tie dangling in his hand, or his brushes
aimlessly suspended, while he calculated the chances of encountering
her again--in the pantry, in one of the hallways, in the side garden,
where she often went, at about twilight, with a book.

About a week later they met for a few moments in this very side garden.
It was early evening, and twilight and moonlight were mingled over the
silent roses, and the trimmed turf, and the low brick walls. The birds
had long gone to bed, and the first dews were bringing out a thousand
delicious odours of summer-time. Harriet's white gown and white shoes
made her a soft glimmering in the tender darkness; Ward was in informal
dinner clothes, with the shine of dampness still on his sleek hair, and
the pleasant freshness of his scarcely finished toilet still about him.

They came straight toward each other, and stood very close together,
and he took both of Harriet's hands.

"Now, what is it--what is it?" the man said, quickly. "I've been
waiting long enough. I can't stand it any longer! I can't go away
to-morrow, perhaps for two weeks, and not know!" "Ward," the girl
faltered, lifting an exquisite face that wore, even in the faint
moonshine, a troubled and intense expression, "can't we let it all wait
until you get back?"

"I'll keep my mouth shut, nobody suspects us, if that's what you mean!"
he answered, impatiently. "But--why, Harriet," and his arm went about
her shoulders, and he bent his face over hers, "Harriet, why not let me
go happy?" he pleaded.

"You'll see a dozen younger girls at the Bellamys' camp," Harriet
reasoned, "girls with whom it would be infinitely more suitable--"

"PLEASE!" he interrupted, patiently. And almost touching her warm,
smooth cheek with his own, and coming so close that to raise her
beautiful eyes was to find his only a few inches away, he added,
fervently, "You love me and I love you--isn't that all that matters?"

Did she love him? Harriet hoped, when she reviewed it all in the
restless, tossing hours of the night, that she had thought, in that
moment, that she did. It was wonderful to feel that strong eager arm
about her, there was a sweet and heady intoxication in his passion,
even if it did not awaken an answering passion in return. Under all her
reasoning and counter-reasoning in the night there crept the knowledge
that she had known that this was coming, had known that only a few days
of encouraging friendliness, only a few appealing glances from uplifted
blue eyes, and a few casual touches of a smooth brown hand must bring
this hour upon her. And back of this hour, and of a man's joy in
winning the woman he loved, she had seen the hazy future of prosperity
and beauty and ease, the gowns and cars and homes, the position of
young Mrs. Ward Carter.

But she told herself that all that was forgotten in that magic five
minutes of moonlight and fragrance and beauty in the rose garden; she
told herself that she really did love him--who could help loving
Ward?--and that she would save him far better than he could save
himself, from everything that was not loving and helpful and good, in
the years to come.

She had let him turn her face up, in the strengthening moonlight, and
kiss her hungrily upon the lips, and she had sent him in to his dinner
half-wild with the joy of knowing himself beloved. Harriet had gone in,
too, shaken and half-frightened, and with his last whispered prophecy
ringing in her ears:

"Wait a year--rot! I'll go to the Bellamys', because I promised to, but
the day I come back, and that's two weeks from to-day, we'll tell
everyone, and this time next year you will have been my wife for six
months!"




CHAPTER VIII


A most opportune lull followed, when Harriet Field had time to collect
her thoughts, and get a true perspective upon the events of the past
week. On the morning after Ward's departure for the Bellamys' camp she
had come downstairs feeling that guilt was written in her face, and
that the whole household must suspect her engagement to the son and
heir.

But on the contrary, nobody had time to pay her the least attention.
Nina was leaving for a visit to Amy Hawkes, at the extremely dull and
entirely safe Hawkes mansion, where four unmarried daughters
constituted a chaperonage beyond all criticism. Isabelle Carter was
giving and attending the usual luncheons and dinners, her husband
absorbed in an especially important business deal that kept him
alternate nights in the city. The house was quiet, the domestic
machinery running smoothly, the weather hot, sulphurous, and enervating.

A letter from Ward brought Harriet's colour suddenly to her cheeks, on
the third morning, but there was no one but Rosa to notice her
confusion. Ward wrote with characteristic boyishness. They were having
a corking time, there was nobody there as sweet as his girl was, and he
hoped that she missed him a little bit. He was thinking about her every
minute, and how beautiful she was that last night on the terrace, and
he couldn't believe his luck, or understand what she saw in him.

There were seven sheets to the letter; each one heavily engraved with
the name of the camp, "Sans Souci," and the telephone, post-office,
telegraph, and rail directions charmingly represented by tiny emblems
at the top of the letter-head. Harriet smiled over the dashing
sentences; it was an honest letter. She felt a thrill of genuine
affection for the writer; he would never grow up to her, but she would
make him an ideal wife none-the-less. She went about his father's home,
in these days, with a secret happiness swelling in her heart. It would
not be long now before the secretary and companion must take a changed
position here. It was not the least of her satisfactions that Ward
wrote her that Royal was at the camp, planning a trip to the Orient.
But before he went he talked of giving a studio tea for Nina. "I think
he is slightly mashed on the kid," wrote Ward, simply.

With Royal in China, Nina safely recovering from her June fever, and
Harriet affianced to Ward, the summer promised serenely enough. Harriet
answered the letter in her happiest vein. Her reply was but two
conservative pages; but she said more in the double sheet of fine
English handwriting than Ward had said in three times as much space. A
charming letter is one of the fruits of loneliness and reading; Harriet
was sure of her touch. His father, his mother, and Nina each had an
epigrammatic line or two, and for his grandmother Harriet dared a
little wit, and smiled to imagine his shout of appreciative laughter.

She dined as usual alone, that evening, and was surprised, at about
eight o'clock, to receive the demure notification from Rosa that Mrs.
Carter would like to see her. Harriet glanced at a mirror; her brassy
hair was as smoothly moulded as its tendency to curve and ring ever
permitted, and she wore a thin old transparent white gown that looked
at least comparatively cool on this insufferably hot evening. With
hardly an instant's delay she went downstairs.

On the terrace outside the drawing-room windows they were at a card
table: Richard, looking tired and hot in rumpled white, Isabelle
exquisite in silver lace, and young Anthony Pope. Near by, Madame
Carter majestically fingered some illustrated magazines.

It appeared that they wanted bridge; it was too hot to eat, too hot to
dance at the club, too hot--said Isabelle pathetically--to live!
Harriet had supposed her dining alone with her infatuated admirer, but
it appeared that Richard had driven his mother out from the city in
time to join them for salad and coffee, and that this angle of the
terrace, where the river breeze occasionally stirred, was the only spot
in the world that was approximately comfortable.

Obligingly, Harriet took her place, cut for the deal. But her eyes had
not fallen upon the group before she sensed that something was wrong,
and she had a moment's flutter of the heart for fear that someone
suspected her, that she was under surveillance. Had Royal--had Ward--

She turned a card, took the deal, found Anthony Pope her partner, and
entered into the game with spirit. Richard's first words to her were
reassuring; if there was constraint here, she was not involved in it.

"No trump--says little Miss Field. Well, that doesn't seem to frighten
me. Two spades."

"I think we might try three diamonds, Miss Field," Anthony said,
gravely and pleasantly, and Harriet felt herself acquitted of any
apprehension in that direction as well. It only remained for Isabelle
to show friendliness.

"Du hast diamonten and perlen, you two. I can see that! You're down,
Harriet!" Mrs. Carter said, thoughtfully. Harriet began thoroughly to
enjoy herself! If they were all furious, at least it was not with her.
She speculated, as she gathered in her tricks. Was it conceivable that
Richard did not enjoy the discovery of the tete-a-tete dinner? But
Isabelle had often been equally indiscreet, and he had never seemed to
resent it before. Harriet knew that Isabelle was ill at ease; she
suspected that Tony was furious. The old lady was obviously quivering
with baffled interest and curiosity.

In the little pool of light over the card table the air seemed to grow
hotter and hotter; there was suffocation in the velvet darkness. A
distant rumble of thunder broke heavily on the silence, the sky
glimmered with shaking light, and the great leaves of the sycamores
turned languidly in a hot breeze. Harriet, the only interested player,
was unfortunate with Tony, unfortunate with Isabelle. After three
rubbers the game ended suddenly; Richard said he had some letters to
write, and was keeping Fox waiting in the library; Anthony scribbled a
check, said brief and unfriendly good-nights; Isabelle merely raised
passionate dark eyes to his. She was languidly gathering in her spoils
when the lights of his car flashed yellow on the drive and he was gone.
Harriet, who had lost more than twenty dollars, gave a rueful laugh.
The old lady watched everyone in expectant silence.

But when Richard spoke it was only to Harriet, and then in an undertone
almost fatherly:

"You lose no money when we ask you to oblige us by playing, my dear. I
won't permit that! Twenty dollars and forty cents, was it? Consider it
paid."

"Oh, but truly--" she was beginning to protest. The grave look in his
eyes, the authoritative nod, interrupted her, and with a pleasant
little sensation of protection and of friendliness she had to concede
the point. Immediately afterward he said good-night to his mother and
wife, and went in to his study. Madame Carter followed him in, and went
upstairs, but Isabelle sat on moodily shuffling and reshuffling the
cards, in the bright soft light of the terrace lamps.

"Wait a minute, Harriet," she said, briefly, and Harriet obediently
loitered. But Isabelle seemed to have nothing to say. Her eyes were on
the cards, her beautiful breast, exposed in the low-cut silver gown,
rose and fell stormily, and Harriet saw that she was biting her full
under lip, as if anger seethed strong within her. In the gleam of the
lamps her dark hair took the shine of lacquer; there were jewelled
combs in it to-night, and the jewels winked lazily.

Bottomley, the butler, came out, and began discreetly to adjust chairs
and to supervise the carrying away of ashtrays and coffee-cups.

"Come upstairs to my room; I want to speak to you!" Isabelle said,
suddenly. Harriet followed her upstairs, and they entered the beautiful
boudoir together. Here Isabelle dropped into a chair, sitting sidewise,
with one bare arm locked across its rococo back, and stared dully ahead
of her, a queen of tragedy. Her silver scarf fluttered free, and the
toe of a spangled slipper beat with an angry, steady throb on the floor.

Germaine came forward, evidently more accustomed to this mood than
Harriet was. Like a flash the high-heeled shoes, the silver gown, and
the brocaded stays were whisked away, and a cool, loose silk robe
enveloped Isabelle, and she took a deep, cretonned chair by the window.
The lights were lowered, Isabelle nodded Harriet to the opposite chair.
Then at last she spoke.

"Can that creature hear?"

Harriet, thrilled, glanced toward the dressing room, and shook her head.

"I ask you," said Isabelle, with a great breath of anger restrained, "I
ask you if any woman in the world could stand it!"

"I knew something was wrong," Harriet murmured, as the other made a
dramatic pause.

"Wrong!" Isabelle echoed, scornfully. "You saw the way Mr. Carter
acted. You saw him make me ridiculous--make a fool of me! The boy will
never come to the house again."

"Oh, I don't think that!" Harriet said, in honesty.

"Mr. Carter stalked in upon us, at dinner--" his wife said, broodingly.
She fell into thought, and suddenly burst out, "Harriet, my heart aches
for that boy! My God--my God--what have I done to him!"

She rested her white full arms on the dressing table, and covered her
face with her hands. Harriet saw the frail silk of the dressing gown
stir with her sudden dry sobbing.

"My God--if I could cry!" Isabelle said, turning. And Harriet realized,
with a shock, that she was not acting. "Mr. Carter only sees what I
see," she added, "that it must stop. But I am afraid it will kill him.
He isn't like other men. He--" She opened a drawer, fumbled therein.
"Read that!" she said.

Harriet took the sheet of paper, pressed it open.

"'My heart,'" she read, in Tony Pope's handwriting. "'I will go away
from you if I must. But it will be further than India, Isabelle,
further than Rio or Alaska. While we two live, I must see you
sometimes. Perhaps outside the world there is a place big enough for me
to forget you!'"

"Now--!" said Isabelle, rising and beginning restlessly to walk the
floor. "Now, what shall I do? Send him away to his death, or risk Mr.
Carter's insulting him again, as he did to-night! Anthony Pope means
it, Harriet--I know him well enough for that. His whole life is one
thought of me. The flowers, the books, the notes--he only wakes in the
morning to hope for, to plan, a meeting, and the days when we don't
meet are lost days. You don't know how I've been worrying about it,"
said Isabelle, passionately, "I'm sick with worry!"

She fell silent. Germaine appeared with a tray, and began to loosen and
brush the dark hair, and Isabelle went automatically to the business of
creaming and rubbing, still shaken, but every minute more mistress of
herself. With the thick, dark switch gone, Harriet was almost shocked
by the change in the severely exposed forehead and face. Isabelle
looked fully her age now, more than her age. But the younger woman knew
that however honest her desire to disenchant her young lover, no woman
ever risks his seeing her thus. Isabelle might weep, and pray, and
suggest supreme sacrifice, but it would be the corseted and perfumed
and beautiful Isabelle from whom Tony parted, whom Tony must renounce.

"Well!" said the mistress, sombre-eyed still, and with a still heaving
breast. "There was something else, Harriet--Gently, please, Germaine,
my head aches frightfully. Oh, Harriet, will you see what this Blondin
man wants with Nina? She tells me he suggested some sort of summer
party in his roof garden; I don't know quite what it is. But her heart
is set on it. They seem to understand each other--I always felt that
when Nina's affairs did begin, she would pick out freaks like this!
But," Nina's mother sighed, resignedly, "that's all right. He's
interesting, and everyone's after him, and if it pleases her--! And
will you go to the Hawkes' for her in the morning? Hansen is going
at--I don't know what time, in the big car. Don't--" Germaine had gone
to the bathroom for a hot towel, and Isabelle dropped her voice, almost
affectionately--"don't worry about this little scene, Harriet. It will
be quite all right!"

"Oh, surely!" The companion's voice was light and cheerful; she went
upstairs only pleasantly excited and thrilled. And at the breakfast
table next morning Harriet could show the head of the house the same
bright assurance. She was young. Life was like a fascinating play.
Richard had come downstairs early, and they had their coffee alone.

"Nina?" asked her father.

"She comes back to-day," Harriet said. "Mrs. Carter is going to have
her masseuse, so she won't be down. She asked you to remember that you
are dining at the Jays' to-morrow. There's to be tennis at about four."

"Finals," he said, nodding. "Jim Kelsoe and one of the Irvins--"

"Judson Irwin," the girl supplied.

"Was it?" Richard Carter went out to his car apparently well pleased
with himself and his life. Harriet started for the Hawkes' with a
philosophic reflection or two as to the ephemeral quality of married
quarrels.

She brought Nina back at noon, a garrulous and complacent Nina, who
could pity the elder Hawkes as girls who "never had admirers." When
they reached the driveway of Crownlands, Harriet recognized the car
that was already there, and said to herself that Anthony Pope would
join them for luncheon. But just as she and Nina were about to enter
the cool, wide, dark doorway, Anthony himself passed them. He was
almost running, and apparently did not see them. He ran down the
shallow steps and sprang into his car, which scattered a spray of
gravel as he jerked it madly about, and was gone before she and Nina
had ended their look of surprise. Harriet detected a magnificent
astonishment in Bottomley's mild elderly glance as well; she went
slowly upstairs, with a dim foreboding far back in her heart.

In Nina's room were three flowers from Royal Blondin. Nina said
hastily, and in rapture: "Water lilies!" but a ten-year-old memory told
Harriet that they were lotus blooms. Another girl had had lotus blooms
years ago; Harriet wondered if Royal always sent them to the women he
admired, or rather, to the one whose favour was, for the moment, to his
advantage.

Nina had no such thoughts. Radiantly and amazedly she turned to Harriet.

"Oh, Miss Harriet, look! They're from Mr. Blondin! Oh, I do think that
is terribly nice of him. The idea! The IDEA! We were speaking of a poem
called 'The Lotus Flower'. Did you ever? I think that is terribly
decent of him, don't you? Shan't I write him? Would you? Hadn't I
better write him right now? Will you help me? I do think that is
terribly decent of him, don't you?"

And so on indefinitely. Harriet felt rather sorry for the gauche little
creature who flung aside her hat and wrap, and sat biting her gold
pen-handle, and spoiling sheet after sheet of paper. But there was
protection in Nina's absorption, too; she was far too happy to know or
care that Harriet felt somewhat worried, or to make any comment when
they went down to lunch to find that Isabelle begged to be excused.
They lunched alone with the old lady.

At about three, when the important note was written, and Harriet and
Nina were idling on the shady terrace, with the hound, the new
magazines, and their books, Hansen brought one of the small closed cars
to the side door. Five minutes later Isabelle, in a thin white coat, a
veiled white hat, and with a gorgeous white-furred wrap over her arm,
came out. Germaine was with her, carrying two shiny black suitcases.
Isabelle, Harriet thought, looked superbly handsome, but Germaine had
evidently been scolded, and had red eyes.

Isabelle came over to give her daughter a farewell kiss.

"Mrs. Webb has telephoned for me, ducky. Your father isn't coming home
to-night, but have a happy time with Miss Harriet, and I'll be back in
a day or two."

"I thought that you were dining to-morrow at the Jays'!" Harriet said.
That she had not been mistaken did not occur to her until she saw the
colour flood Isabelle's face.

"I forgot it. But I wonder if you will be sweet enough to telephone
to-morrow morning, and say that I am obliging an old friend?" Isabelle
said, smoothly. "I shall be with Mrs. Webb in Great Barrington,
Harriet. She made it a personal favour, and I couldn't refuse!
Good-bye, both of you. All right, Hansen!"

They swept away, leaving Harriet with a strange sense of nervousness
and suspense. The summer air seemed charged with menace, and the
silence that followed the noise of the car oddly ominous. She looked
about nervously; Nina was drifting through Vanity Fair, the sun was
warm, and the air sweet and still. But still her heart was beating
madly, and she felt frightened and ill at ease.

Madame Carter was on the terrace when they came back at five from an
idle trip to the club, reporting that her son had just returned
unexpectedly from the city, and had gone in to change for golf.

Nothing alarming here, yet Harriet experienced a sick thrill of
apprehension. Something abnormal seemed to be the matter with them all
this afternoon!

"Did you call me, Mr. Carter?" She hardly knew her own voice, as he
came down the three broad steps from the house. Her hands felt cold,
and she was trembling.

"Do you happen to know where Hansen is, Miss Field?"

"Driving Mrs. Carter to the Webbs' at Great Barrington," the girl
answered, readily. "Will young Burke do? Mrs. Webb telephoned, and Mrs.
Carter left in a hurry. She did not expect you to-night. Hansen ought
to be back at about seven, I should think--"

He was not listening to her; abruptly left her. When Harriet went into
the house she saw nothing of him. But she knew he had not gone away for
the usual golf, and was conscious still of that odd fluttering of mind
and soul, that presage of ill. She made her usual little round, spoke
briefly to a maid about some fallen daisy petals, consulted with the
housekeeper as to the new cretonne covers. A man was to come and
measure those covers this very afternoon--perhaps this was he, modestly
waiting at the side door.

But no, this man briefly and simply asked to be shown to Mr. Carter,
remarking that he was expected. He disappeared into the library;
Harriet saw no more of him for an hour, when he silently appeared
beside her, and asked to see the chauffeur Hansen as soon as he came.

Richard brought the strange man to the dinner table; but there was
nothing in that to make the dinner so unnatural. To be sure Richard ate
little, and spoke hardly at all; but this Mr. Williams was quite
entertaining, and the old lady in good spirits. Nina, pleased at being
downstairs, as she and Harriet usually were when her father and mother
were not at home, or when there was no company, also contributed some
shy remarks. But Harriet was beset with sudden fits of nervousness, and
oppressed by a heavy sense of impending disaster. She said to herself
that she wished heartily the weather would break and clear, she felt
like "a witch."

At eight Hansen was back, presenting himself in his dusty road-coat;
Mr. Carter immediately drew him with Williams into the library. Nina
loitered up to bed, but the old lady and Harriet remained downstairs.
They did not like, but they sometimes amused, each other. Suddenly came
the summons: would Miss Field please step into the library?

Hansen was going out as she came in; Richard was at the big flat-topped
desk, the man Williams standing somewhat in shadow. Harriet's heart
leaped; they were going to ask her about Royal.

"Just a moment, Miss Field," Richard said. "Will you sit down?" And as
Harriet, looking at him in frightened curiosity, did so, he began
quietly: "We are in some trouble here, Miss Field. I hardly know how to
tell you what we fear. Did you notice anything strange about--Mrs.
Carter's--manner to-day?"

"I thought I did," Harriet admitted.

"Did you think of any reason for it?"

Harriet gave the stranger a glance that made him an eavesdropper.

"I fancied that it was connected with--with what distressed her last
night, Mr. Carter."

"You may speak before Mr. Williams," Richard said. He looked down; was
silent. "I asked him to help me," he added, slowly. "Was young Mr. Pope
here to-day?"

"This morning, I don't know how long," Harriet said, with a great
light, or darkness, breaking in upon her mind, "he was leaving when
Nina and I came home."

Richard gravely considered this, and nodded his head.

"And immediately afterward Mrs. Carter went away?"

"Not immediately. Not until three."

"Do you know who took the telephone call from Mrs. Webb?" Richard said.

"No, because nobody did. No person named Webb called from Great
Barrington, or anywhere else, to-day," said Williams, breaking in
decidedly, his voice a contrast to Richard's hesitating tones. "As a
matter of fact, Hansen didn't drive to Great Barrington. Two miles from
your gate here, Mrs. Carter gave him other directions."

"What directions?" Harriet asked, antagonized by his manner, and
feeling her cheeks get red. The man evidently had small respect for
womanhood.

"He drove to New London," Richard supplied. "Pope's yacht is there."

His manner was very quiet, he spoke almost wearily, but Harriet felt as
if a cannon had exploded in the study. She turned white, looked toward
Williams, whose mouth was pursed in a silent whistle, looked back at
Richard, who was making idle pencil marks on a tablet of paper.

"I've had New London on the wire," said Mr. Williams. "Mr. Pope had
been getting ready for a cruise. The chances are that they have already
weighed anchor."

"On the other hand," Richard said, glancing at his watch, "we have an
excellent prospect of finding them there. I was not supposed to come
home until to-morrow night. I found Mrs. Carter's message at five,
twenty-four hours earlier than she expected me to. Williams may be
mistaken, of course," he finished, with a glance at the detective.

"Not likely!" said Williams, with a modest shrug.

"However, even if he is right," Richard resumed, "the chances are that
they are still there, and if they are, I will bring--my wife back with
me to-night. Meanwhile, I leave the house in your care, Miss Field. I
needn't tell you that my mother and Nina must be kept absolutely
ignorant of what we suspect. You'll know what to tell them, in case I
should be longer away. If our calculations are wrong, there's no
telling where I may follow Mrs. Carter. I leave this end of things to
you!"

The trust he placed in her, and something tired and patient in his
tone, brought the tears to Harriet's eyes.

"I'm sorrier than I can say," she said, huskily.

"I know you are! It's--" Richard passed his hand over his
forehead--"it's utter madness, of course. But, please God, we can keep
it all hushed up. She has Germaine with her; Hansen I can trust. We're
off now, Miss Field. I'll keep you informed if I can."

Harriet went back to the drawing room with her heart big with pride. He
had mentioned Hansen and Germaine, but he KNEW that he could trust her!
The event was sensational enough, was horrifying enough. But back of
the excitement lay the joy of being needed and being trusted.

"Mr. Carter going away again?" said Madame Carter.

"Mr. Williams came up from the city to consult him about something,"
Harriet explained, smoothly. "They may have to go back."

"To-night!" ejaculated the old lady. And immediately she added,
suspiciously, "What'd he want Hansen for?"

"Doctor and Mrs. Houghton," Bottomley announced, in his soothing
undertone. Harriet could have embraced the uninteresting elderly couple
who entered smilingly. They beamed that it was so hot--they were going
up to the club; couldn't the Carters join them?

"Mrs. Carter went to visit a friend in Great Barrington," Madame Carter
explained, "and my son has one of his clerks here, and may have to
return to the office to-night. Too bad!"

"But how about another lesson in bridge, Doctor Houghton?" Harriet
ventured. The old wife was instantly enthusiastic.

"Yes, now, Doctor! This is a splendid chance, for I know Madame Carter
isn't too good a player to be patient."

"I don't want to bore this pretty girl to death!" protested the old
man, gallantly. But Harriet had already signalled the attentive
Bottomley, and when Richard Carter came to say good-night a few minutes
later they were on the terrace, and hilarious over the beginner's
mistakes. Even Madame Carter enjoyed this; she was a poor player, but
she shone beside the Houghtons, and Harriet took care to consult her
respectfully, and agree seriously as to bids and leads.

"Good-night, Mother!" said Richard, touching with his lips the cool old
forehead, next to the white hair. "Wish I could play with you fellers
and girls!"

"You!" said old Mrs. Houghton, archly. "You'd scare us to death!"

Richard went smiling to the car, hearing Harriet murmur as he went: "I
think he has a two heart bid, don't you Madame Carter? You bid two
hearts, Doctor ..."




CHAPTER IX


That Isabelle's madness would run its full gamut did not occur to
Harriet until the next day. Then, as the serene hours moved by, and
there was no word and no sign from Richard, the possibilities began to
suggest themselves. It seemed to her incredible that any woman would
risk all that Isabelle had, for the sake of a fiery boy's first love,
and yet, on the other hand, there was the memory of Isabelle's
suffering two nights ago, and here were the amazing facts to prove it.

The girl went about in a dream, sometimes imagining the meeting of
husband and wife, sometimes trying to fancy Isabelle with her lover. As
was inevitable, the older woman seemed to lose something charming and
intangible in this confession of definite weakness. To be adored by any
man merely adds to her glory, but the instant she concedes him an inch,
the Beauty throws down her halo, the whole affair becomes mundane and
vulnerable. Harriet might have envied Isabelle once, now she saw her
frail, forty, her woman's pride weakened by admitted passion, and was
sorry for her. She had had all men at her feet, now she must feel
herself fortunate if she could hold one.

And with Isabelle's shame came a wholesome sting of shame to Isabelle's
companion. Harriet had seen nothing harmful in this affair a few days
ago; it was the way of this world of theirs. But she felt within her
now the awakening of something clean and stern; she found in her mind
odd phrases and terms--"a married woman's duty," "her sense of honour,"
"owing it to her husband and children."

It was for few women to enjoy the popularity that Isabelle had known.
But any woman might run away with a rich admirer. Harriet's admiration
for the cleverness with which Isabelle conducted this pretty playing
with fire disappeared, and in its place came the sharp conviction that
old-fashioned women like Linda had some justification, after all; it
was "dangerous," it did "lead to sin," it could indeed "happen once too
often."

Harriet felt her own lapsing morality regaining its standard. Just now,
when Nina most needed her mother, when Richard was struggling with
difficult business conditions, when Ward was engaged--

She interrupted her thoughts here, and tried to make herself feel like
a woman engaged to be married. Somehow the fact persisted in baffling
her. There was an unreality about it that prevented her from tasting
the full sweet. Engaged--to a rich man, and a rich man's son. Well,
perhaps when Ward came back, it would seem more believable.

But Ward might come back to a changed home. Harriet fancied a quiet
wedding, herself afterward as the true head of the disorganized family.
She would be Nina's natural chaperon, then, her father-in-law's--for
Richard would be that!--natural confidante. The prospect, and every
hour of this warm and silent day seemed to make it more definite,
brought the wild-rose colour to her face, and made her heart beat
faster. It was certainly a life full and gratifying beyond her
dreaming, and it was almost settled now! If Ward did not figure very
prominently in this bright dream, she told herself that Ward should
have no cause for grievance. He should always be first in everything;
but if his wife enjoyed her position, her connections, her place in the
family, surely there was no harm in that! There was but one stumbling
block: Royal Blondin. Her heart stopped at him.

She had been standing at one of the hall windows, a window deep set in
the brick wall, and commanding through elms and beeches the path to the
tennis court. Down this path Nina and Francesca Jay had recently
disappeared, with their rackets, for some practice. The sun was high,
and the sky cloudless; under the trees there was a softly mottled
pattern of light and shade. Outside the window the hound was lying, his
nose on his paws, his eyes shut. Harriet remembered walking in such a
summer wood, years and years ago, a little girl with yellow braids,
holding tight to her mother's hand. They had sat down on the ground,
and her mother and father had talked, and the little girl had lain on
her back for what seemed hours, looking at the sky.

There seemed to be no time for idle walks and dreaming in the woods
nowadays. Harriet had been four years at Crownlands, and had looked out
at this wood a thousand times, but she had never lost herself in it, or
lain staring up through branches there. She was always too busy: the
business of eating, and of amusing the others, and of keeping the
machinery moving, had always absorbed her. Personalities, microscopic
buzzing of midges, had blotted out the beautiful arches and aisles; and
if ever Harriet walked through the wood now, she was with chattering
women; she was wondering if this one, or that one, or the other one,
was hurt, or neglected, or piqued, was paired with the wrong person, or
had really intended the meaning that might be read into a look or tone.

--Hands pressed her eyes tight, and she came back to the present moment
with a start. Ward Carter was behind her. He laughed at her confusion,
and they sat down on the window seat together. Yes, he was going back
to the Bellamys', and so was Blondin, but they had both come in just
for lunch and the drive. They had driven a hundred and twenty miles
that morning, what? And they were going to drive back that afternoon,
what-what? And how about eats, old dear?

Instantly he brought reassurance to her. Ward was such a dear! Of
course she loved him.

"But you weren't a very good boy last night!" she said. Their hands
were locked; but she had shaken a negative when he would have kissed
her. Bottomley was everywhere at once.

"Rotten!" he confessed, easily. "I played poker, too. No man ought to
do that when he's edged. Sorry--sorry--sorry. Bad, bad, bad little
Edward! I lost two hundred to Bates, a curse upon him. But that was
nothing; once, there, I was over twelve hundred in. Listen. When we're
married it's all off. No smoking, drinking, gambling, wine, women, or
song, what?"

"You may not know it, but you never spoke a truer word!" the girl said.
His shout of laughter was pleasant to hear.

"Listen. Does the Mater know it? About us, I mean?"

"Oh, Ward--nobody knows it! Hush!" His mention of his mother brought
back realization with a rush, and she added uncomfortably, "She's at
Great Barrington."

"Oh, darn! I wanted to see her! She wrote me, and told me she loved me,
and that she didn't think she had been a very good mother to me!" He
laughed, youthfully, with a bewildered widening of his eyes. "I thought
she was sick. Well, maybe we can stop there going back."

"Where did you leave Mr. Blondin?"

"He beat it down to the tennis court. Say, listen, is there a chance
that he's stuck on Nina? It looks to me like what the watch comes in!"

Harriet glanced at her wrist before she answered him. Her heart was
sick within her. Close upon her radiant dream had come this shadow, far
more a shadow now, when her responsibility had infinitely increased,
and when she had had proof of the love and respect in which they held
her here.

"I don't think so!" she said, briefly. "I'll find Bottomley, and have
lunch put ahead."

"You don't like him!" Ward said, watching her closely.

"I don't like him for Nina!" she amended.

The boy followed her while she gave her order. Then they went out into
the blazing day together.

"Nina isn't going to have more than a scalp a day," said her brother,
fraternally.

"Nina has a fortune!" the girl remarked, drily, opening her wide white
parasol.

But Ward was rapidly squandering an equal amount, and it was not
impressive to him.

"Lord, he could marry a girl with ten times that! Look here, you don't
think a man like Blondin would consider that!" he protested.

"I would rather see Nina dead and buried!" The words burst from Harriet
against her will, against her promise to Royal. There was no help for
it, her essential honesty would have its way. "I make a splendid
conspirator!" she said to herself, in grim self-contempt.

"Talk to him!" Ward, fortunately, was not inclined to take her too
seriously. "You'll like him! Gosh, he certainly has a good effect on
me," added the youth, modestly. "He doesn't drink, and he talks to
me--you ought to hear him!--about character being fate, and all that!
Say, listen, before we get out of the woods--?"

His sudden sense of her nearness and beauty belied the careless words.
Harriet found his arms tight about her, her face tipped up to the
young, handsome face that was stirred now with trembling excitement.
The quick movement of his breast she could feel against her own, and
the passion of his kisses almost frightened her; she was held, bound,
half-lifted off her feet.

"Ward!" she gasped, freed at last, and with one hand to her disordered
hair, while the other held him at arm's-length. "Dear! PLEASE!"

It was no use. Soul and senses were enveloped again, and close to her
ear she heard his whisper: "I'm mad about you! Do you know that! I'm
mad about you!"

"I think you are!" she stammered, breathless and laughing. "You mustn't
do that! You mustn't do that! Why, we might be seen!"

Breathless, too, he flung back his hair, and stooped to pick up her
parasol.

"Do you think I care!" he panted, indifferently. "I wouldn't care if
the whole world saw!"

"Sh--sh!" By the magic only known to youth and womanhood Harriet had
gathered herself into trimness and calm again. She took her parasol
composedly. Her eyes told him the whole story. Nina and Royal Blondin
were two hundred feet away, coming up from the tennis court.

The four met cheerfully; apparently all at ease. Nina was stammering
and blushing a trifle more than usual, but Royal's presence would
account for that. Ward burst into a stream of idiotic conversation;
Harriet found herself sauntering ahead of the young Carters, discussing
Sheringham fans with the dilletant.

"You fool--fool--fool!" she said to herself. What had they seen? What
new twist to the situation would Nina's suspicions afford? Richard
Carter trusted her; this was no time to tell him that she loved his
son. Did she love Ward?--or with his keen and kindly eyes would Ward's
father see exactly what she saw in the marriage? Caught kissing in the
woods--like Rosa or Germaine; it was unthinkable! She, with her
hard-won prestige of dignity and reserve, exposed to Nina's laughing
insinuations, or, worse, Nina's prim disapproval. How she had weakened
her position here! How she had risked--her heart contracted with
pain--severing of her association with Crownlands.

Luncheon, under its veneer of gaiety and foolishness, offered fresh
terrors. For old Madame Carter had come down, and it occurred to
Harriet that if Nina had seen anything in the wood, she might naturally
interest her grandmother with an account of it. Nina rarely had so
interesting a topic of conversation. The old lady would go instantly to
her son. And Richard--Harriet could imagine him, tired, harassed,
heartsick over the recent inexplicable weakness of his wife, having to
face another woman's treachery, having to listen to the demure
announcement of the little secretary's engagement to his son.

Perhaps not treachery, exactly, thought Harriet, as the birds, and the
asparagus, and the crisp little rolls went the rounds. She ate, hardly
knowing what she tasted, and spoke with only a partial consciousness of
what she said. No, not treachery exactly, especially if she went to
Richard first with the news.

But break in upon his painful speculations with the blithe
announcement? What must he think of such utter lack of consideration?
He was experiencing the most overwhelming shock of all his life now; he
must shortly be exposed to all the whirl of scandal: the silenced
gossip, the averted eyes of his world, the weeklies with their muddy
insinuations, the staring fact headlined above his breakfast bacon.
This was her time to efface herself and the household, to help him to
lift the load.

"I'm afraid I wasn't listening, Mr. Blondin?"

"Miss Nina and I want to know what day we may have our party?" Royal
repeated.

"The studio party?"

"The roof-garden party. We're going to have it from half-past six to
half-past seven only, because then it won't be too hot. We shall only
ask the people we like! Gira Diable will come and dance for us, and
Tilly will read something--"

"That's Unger Tillotson, the actor!" Nina interpolated, ecstatically.

"We're not sure that we'll let Francesca and Amy come," Blondin
pursued. "Maybe we won't let them know anything about it! And everybody
has to wear costumes, so that the picture won't be spoiled."

"He doesn't like Amy and Francesca," Nina confessed, with a guilty
little laugh.

"Not at all. I like them very much." Blondin's languid, rich voice
corrected her. Nina shrank sensitively. "I think they're very charming
little schoolgirls. But I don't want them for my friends!"

At this Nina blossomed like the rose. Emotion choked her, and she
looked down at her plate with a fluttering laugh. This was irrefutable;
before Miss Harriet and Ward and Granny, too.

"That's what I meant!" she murmured, thickly.

"Why not have it at night, with lanterns?" Harriet said, quite
involuntarily. And again a pang of self-contempt swept over her. It was
hateful, it was incredible, but she was playing his game as calmly as
if doubts and reluctance had never entered her heart.

"People won't go to the city, summer evenings," Royal explained, "but a
great number are there in the afternoons. And then twilight, over the
city, and the bridges lighting up--I assure you it's like fairyland!"

"I wonder if I am to be invited to this party?" said Madame Carter,
royally. She had been watching this exchange of pleasantries with
approval.

"You? You're the queen of the whole affair!" Royal assured her. "You
don't have to costume unless you feel like it."

"Oh, Granny'll have the nicest there!" Nina predicted, gaily. Her
grandmother bridled complacently, although shaking a magnificent head.
Harriet knew that she would spend as much time upon her dress as the
youngest and most beautiful woman who attended.

"Come," said Madame Carter, brightly, "you didn't think I was going to
let you carry out this little plan without a chaperon!"

If there was a self-conscious second after this remark it was no more
than a second. Harriet's quick colour rose, but before Nina's nervous
little laugh had died away Blondin said easily:

"Ah, we'll surround the Little Duchess with chaperons; I'm not going to
be a party to her losing her heart anywhere around MY diggings!"

"From what I said at luncheon, I hope you didn't imagine that I thought
there was anything--well, in questionable taste, in your coming to
Nina's party!" said Madame Carter to Harriet an hour later, when the
men had started on their long run back to camp, and she was about to go
upstairs for her daily siesta.

"Not at all; I understood perfectly!" Harriet assumed an air of
abstraction, of pleasant unconcern. Her red lips were firm, and closed
firmly after the brief answer. The smoky blue eyes regarded Madame
Carter with innocent expectancy. The girl was amazingly handsome,
thought the old lady reluctantly.

"Of course, if Mrs. Carter can spare you, and considers it suitable,
you will be there!" said Madame Carter, amiably, mounting the first
stair.

"Surely!" Harriet said, with a murderous impulse. She watched the
erect, splendid old figure ascending. What was there about this old
lady that could put her, and indeed almost any one else who chanced to
be marked by her dislike, into a helpless fury of anger? "If I were
once safely married to Ward," the girl said to herself, "if--"

It was a tremendous "if," of course. There were a great many things now
that might turn the scales one way or another. Richard's attitude was
supremely important. He might feel that his son was taking a wise, a
desirable step. He might feel that to have the boy settled was to lift
just one care from the many that burdened his shoulders. On the other
hand, was it more probable that this untimely announcement, with its
accompanying merry-making and rejoicing, would utterly exasperate and
antagonize him? Harriet fancied him asking, with weary politeness, just
what their plans were? Did Ward propose to finish college? Had he
formed any idea of the means by which he should earn his living? He had
his uncle's legacy, of course, the larger part of it. Did the young
people propose to begin with that?

Harriet perfectly understood Richard's attitude to the average son of
the average wealthy family. She had heard his caustic comments upon
them often enough. He had earned his own education; he showed for
Isabelle's spoiling of her son the patience of helplessness. To make a
man of Ward, in his father's estimation, would have meant a
readjustment of their entire scheme of living and thinking. It was
simpler, pleasanter, to sacrifice Ward to the general comfort,
especially as he, Richard, was very busy, and as there was always a
possibility that the women were right, and would make a man of him
anyway. Harriet's keen eyes saw, if Isabelle's did not, that Ward had
been steadily gaining in his father's good graces for the last year or
two. His cheerful, casual manner masked no weakness, every muscle in
the young, big body was hard from tennis and baseball. If there were
sins of self-indulgence, natural to youth and money and charm, Ward
never brought them home with him. Lately he had begun to talk of
getting out of college at Christmas time, and "getting started." His
father watched him, Harriet saw, almost wistfully. Was the lad really
becoming a man, in a world of men?

"The probability is that he will favour our engagement," Harriet
reflected. But this was no time to risk the chance of crossing him. She
must wait. She must choose the lesser risk of Nina making mischief with
old Madame Carter; the contingency was there, but it was a remote
contingency.




CHAPTER X


At four o'clock Richard came home, and the instant Harriet saw his face
she realized, with a shock even sharper than the original moment of
incredulity, that he had had no success in his search. He was alone.

She was standing in one of the doorways of the lower hall when he
crossed it, but he did not see her. His face was drawn and gray, he
looked hot and rumpled and utterly weary; more, he who had always been
the pink of well-groomed perfection looked old. He asked Bottomley
briefly if Madame Carter was in her room, and, being informed that she
was, went hastily upstairs.

Harriet could only imagine, later, that he had gone in to see his
mother before brushing and changing, or perhaps to avoid Nina, who with
Amy catapulted down the stairway a few seconds after he went up. At all
events, it was to the old lady's beautiful sitting room that Harriet
was summoned a few minutes later. She knew at once that he had told his
mother all he knew and feared.

Madame Carter was shockingly agitated. She had a deep sense of the
dramatic, but she was not entirely acting now. Her face was pale under
its rouge, and the painful tears of age stood in her eyes. She was
sitting erect in a chair beside the divan where Richard sat; he did not
look up as Harriet came in, but continued to stroke his mother's hand.

"Miss Field!" said Madame Carter, "we have just had a most terrible--a
most unexpected--blow!"

Harriet simulated expectancy.

"There is every reason to believe," pursued Madame Carter,
majestically, "that my unfortunate daughter-in-law, Mr. Carter's wife,
Isabelle, has yielded to the passion of her lover! No, let me talk,
Richard," she interrupted herself, as the man raised haggard eyes to
watch her impersonally, "far better to face the facts, my dear! My son
tells me, Miss Field the--the well-nigh incredible statement
that--forgetting the honour of womanhood, and the tender claims of
maternity--"

"Miss Field," Richard did not have the manner of interruption, but his
quiet voice dominated the other voice none-the-less. Madame Carter fell
silent, and watched him with mournful pride. "Miss Field," he said, "we
want your help. The facts are these: Williams had all the roads
watched; they did not go by motor. Mrs. Carter reached New London at
five o'clock yesterday; Pope's boat, the Geisha, pulled out at
half-past six. From what Williams' men picked up, at the dock, Pope did
not expect her, was to have sailed this morning. She arrived, and
evidently he thought it wise to hurry their start. The pier had a dozen
boxes for the Geisha on it, groceries and what not, that they left
behind! They will probably skirt the coast for a few days, and put in
somewhere for supplies. But that"--he passed his hand wearily across
his forehead--"that doesn't concern us now. We got there at ten last
night--hours too late, of course." His voice fell, he mused, with a
knitted brow. "Well!" he said, suddenly recalling himself. "Now, Miss
Field, I want you to get hold of Ward. I want the boy home at once! He
must know. But there is of course a chance that Mrs. Carter is--is
planning to return. There may be a woman friend with her--it's not
probable, but it's possible. I don't want any one in the house, or out
of it, to suspect, and if you think it is possible, I should like Nina
protected!"

"I understand," Harriet said, quietly, in the silence.

"You will remember, Richard," Madame Carter said, in the accents of
Lady Macbeth, "that this is exactly what I always expected! I told you
so, twenty years ago. You brought it on yourself, my dear. A
Morrison--who ever heard of the Morrisons?--their mother--Mrs. Banks
tells me--was a school teacher! I have always felt--!"

Harriet heard the man's patient murmur as she slipped away. She crossed
the hall, and for the first time in four years entered Isabelle's suite
unannounced. It was in exquisite order; streams of late afternoon light
were falling on the gay walls and the bright chintzes. The novels
Isabelle had been skimming, the gold service of her dressing table, the
great four-poster with its deeps of transparent white embroideries over
white, all spoke of the beautiful woman who had spent so many hours
here. On the dressing table, with its splendid length doubled in the
mirror, was the great fan that her hand had idly wielded, only a few
days ago, in an hour of domestic felicity and happiness. And the
inanimate plumes, that Harriet picked up and idly unfurled, had played
their little part in the drama that had ended that bright scene once
and for all.

What to tell Nina?--Harriet wondered, going downstairs. But Nina proved
pleasantly indifferent to the maternal absence when she and Amy came up
from the tennis court for tea. To the guest or two who came calling
Harriet, installed quite naturally now behind the cups and saucers,
explained that Mrs. Carter was visiting with friends--having a
beautiful time, too, apparently. To an accidentally direct remark from
Amy she answered that she believed they were taking a motor trip just
at the moment, but she would forward a note, if Amy liked. Madame
Carter did not come out for tea; they were very quiet on the terrace.
But Richard was there, and Amy and Nina were developing their youthful
conversational arts upon him, when a maid came to stand respectfully
beside Harriet. "If you please, Miss Field, Mr. Bottomley would like to
know if you are to have your dinner downstairs to-night, please," said
Pauline, incidentally feeling as if she was in a dream of bliss. Her
last position had been in a well-to-do stationer's family in Newark,
and consesequently she might have entered into the feelings of Miss
Field far more intelligently than either imagined.

Harriet hesitated, glanced at Richard, wondering if he had heard. More
rested on this decision than there was any estimating. She dared not
decide.

"Miss Field will dine downstairs," Richard said, without glancing in
their direction. And when the maid had gone he said with pleasant
authority, "I wish you and Nina would do that regularly, Miss Field,
when you have no other plan."

"Thank you," Harriet said, with her heart singing.

Perhaps Nina suspected that something about his high-handed domestic
readjusting was unusual. She looked from her father to Harriet, and
after a moment's silence asked abruptly:

"When is Mother coming back?"

"I don't know!" her father answered, quickly.

"Say, listen, are we going to dress?" asked Amy. Nina, instantly
diverted, suggested that they go in. Nina's awkward bigness and Amy's
mousy neutral tones were as well displayed in one garment as another,
but both girls debated over pinks and blues, crepes and mulls, every
evening, as if the world was watching them alone. Harriet lingered for
only a word.

"Mr. Carter, it occurred to me that old Mrs. Singleton is going to
California, in her own car, to-morrow. Would it be possible to let Nina
and Amy and the household generally think--"

"Yes?" he encouraged her as she paused dubiously. He had risen to his
feet, and fixed his tired eyes on her face.

"I was wondering if we might confide in Mrs. Singleton--she was always
very fond of Mrs. Carter--and give out the impression that Mrs. Carter
had suddenly decided to make the trip with her."

"That's an idea," Richard said, thoughtfully. "I could see Mrs.
Singleton to-night--and--and talk it over."

"It might serve for only a few days," Harriet submitted.

"Yes, I see," he agreed, slowly.

"Well, I can give Nina a hint now!" Harriet said, going. The late
golden sunshine struck her bright hair to an aureole, as she went up
the brick steps and disappeared.

But it was too late for any soothing deception of Nina. A scene was in
full progress in Nina's bedroom, and Harriet's eye had only to go from
the prone form on the bed to the crushed newspaper that had drifted to
the floor, to know that the secret was out. Isabelle's face, radiant
and happy, looked out from the page. It was flanked by two smaller
pictures, Richard's and Anthony Pope's. Harriet could see the big
letters: "Young Millionaire--Wife of Richard Carter." The deluge was
upon them.

"Oh--it's a lie--it's a lie! My beautiful little mother!" Nina was
sobbing. "Oh, no, it's not true! It's a lie! Oh, how shall I ever hold
up my head again--to be disgraced--now just when I'm so young--and
ha-h-happy!"

"Nina, my child, control yourself!" Harriet, ignoring the staring and
pale-faced Amy, sat down on the edge of the bed, and shook the girl
slightly. "You mustn't give way! Come now, my dear, you must face this
like a woman. Think how your father and Ward will look to you--"

Acting, all of it, said Harriet in her soul. But despite the youthful
appetite for heroics, there were real tears in Nina's eyes, as there
had been in her grandmother's a few hours ago.

"Yes, that's true!" she said, wiping a swollen face on the handkerchief
Harriet supplied. "But oh--I don't believe it, and my father will sue
them for libel, you see if he doesn't! My mother's the purest and
sweetest and best woman ALIVE--and I'll KILL any one who says any
different!"

"Oo--oo, to see it in the paper there, right on the bed," said Amy, in
her reedy, colourless little voice, as Nina stopped suddenly. "Oo--oo,
I thought Nina would die!" Nina began to cry again, but more quietly.
"I guess I had better go--" Amy finished, plaintively.

"Oh, no!" said Nina in a choked voice, as she clung to her friend. "No,
darling! you stay with me. Oh, I must go see my father, and my poor,
poor grandmother! Oh, Amy, perhaps you HAD better go, for my family
will need me to-night. My mother--!" said Nina, crying again.

She and Amy parted solemnly, with many kisses.

"It's a thing that might happen to me, or to any girl," said Amy,
gravely. Harriet had an upsetting vision of stout, high-busted Mrs.
Hawkes, panting as she discussed the details of the Red Cross drive,
but she was very sympathetic with the young girls, and even agreed with
Nina, when Amy was gone, that it would be much more sensible to take
her bath, and put on her white organdie, and then go find her father.

They dined almost silently, and were about to disperse quietly for the
night, after an hour of half-hearted conversation in the drawing room,
obviously endured by Richard simply for his mother's sake, when Ward
burst in. He had travelled almost four hundred miles by motor that day,
his face was streaked with dirt and oil, and ghastly with fatigue. He
went straight to his father.

"Say, what's all this!" he said, in a voice hardly recognizable.
Harriet saw that he had been drinking. "I got your wire, and we
started. I thought the Mater was sick, perhaps. My God--THAT worried
me!" he broke off bitterly. "Blondin came with me; we stopped on the
road for dinner, and the man had a paper there. Is that what you wanted
me for--I don't believe it! It's a dirty lie, and the bounder that put
that in the paper--"

"I'm glad you came home, my boy," Richard said. "I've been waiting for
you--"

Harriet heard no more; she slipped from the room. There were genuine
tears in her own eyes now; for the boy had flung himself face downward
against a great chair, and was crying. All the household knew it;
Harriet could read it in Bottomley's carefully usual manner and quiet
speech. In the little music room across the hall Royal Blondin was
waiting.

"This is a terrible thing!" he said, seriously.

"Oh, frightful!" Harriet agreed. A rather flat silence ensued. She
seemed to have nothing to say to Royal now.

But she was not surprised when a moment later Nina came softly in, the
picture of girlish distress, with her wet eyes and fresh white gown.

"I thought it best to leave Ward with Granny and Father," Nina said, in
vague explanation, going straight to Blondin, who rose, dusty and
weary, but with a solicitous manner that was infinitely soothing.

"I hoped you wouldn't mind just seeing me," he said in a low tone. "I'm
not quite family, and yet I felt myself nearer than all the neighbours
and friends, eh?"

"I shan't see any one for ages," Nina murmured, plaintively, "but
you--you're different."

"And shall we talk about her sometimes?" Royal pursued, still close to
her, and holding both her hands. "As she was, beautiful and sweet and
good. For who are you and I, Little Girl, to judge what passion--what
love will do with human hearts?"

"Yes, I know!" Nina, who never could keep pace with him, said
mournfully.

Harriet could hear the undertones, and imagine what they said. She felt
extremely uneasy. If this unforeseen calamity had lifted her suddenly
in the family estimation, it would appear to be drawing Royal Blondin
closer as well.

His manner, she had grudgingly to admit, was perfection. When Richard
and Ward joined them a few moments later, he expressed himself with
manly brevity to the older man. He realized, said Blondin simply, that
he was absolutely de trop; he had merely imagined, as "the lad" had
imagined, that the sudden summons from camp meant illness or ordinary
emergency, or he would not have intruded at this time. He would not
express a sympathy that must sound extremely airy to the stricken
family. And now, if they would lend him Hansen, he would go over to the
club----

"Nonsense!" Ward said. "You're all dirty and tired and hungry, and so
am I. We'll clean up, and then we'll have something to eat first! Miss
Harriet'll look out for us."

"And I'd like to see you for a moment in the library, Miss Field,"
Richard said, rather wearily. He had been obviously displeased at
seeing the stranger, but Blondin's manner would have won a harder heart
than his. "I want something sent to the papers," Richard explained, in
an undertone.

Ah--they all wanted her, and needed her! How quick, and how efficient,
and how self-effacing Harriet was, as she went about the business of
making them all comfortable! She and Nina talked with the young men
while they demolished the cold roast and drank cup after cup of coffee.
Then Blondin selected several books, and went upstairs, and Harriet and
Nina disappeared in their own rooms; but Ward came downstairs again,
and he and his father settled in the library for a talk.

They talked deep into the night, Harriet knew, for she herself was
sleepless, and she could see from the upper balcony that a stream of
golden light was pouring across the brilliant flowers beneath the
library windows.

She had wrapped herself in a warm robe, over her thin nightgown, and
thrust her feet into fur-lined slippers, and after Nina was fathoms
deep in youthful slumber Harriet crept out to the balcony, and sat
thinking, thinking, thinking. She reviewed the incredible events of the
past few days, and the actors drifted before her vision fitfully:
Isabelle, white-bosomed and beautiful, in her prime; Tony Pope,
passionate and wretched; Royal, low-voiced, dreamy, poetic, with his
eloquent black eyes; Nina, newly awakened; Ward, weak, boyish, ardent;
Madame Carter full of theatrical dignity and well-rounded phrases, and
lastly--simple, strong, anxious to protect them all, even from their
own follies--Richard.

"Not one word of blame, not one ugly insinuation," she mused, "yet she
has shamed him, and he is so honourable; and she has made him
conspicuous, when he is so modest!"

She thought of Isabelle, fresh from Germaine's careful hands, lying in
her exquisite white against the cushions of a deck chair, smiling, in
the rosy flattering light under the green awning, at the infatuated man
beside her. Isabelle was a splendid sailor, and loved the sea. They
would land at some dreamlike Italian city, rising in tiers of pink and
cream and blue beside the sapphire Mediterranean, and Isabelle would
unfurl her white parasol, and walk beside him through the warmth and
beauty--

"Ugh!" said Harriet, with a healthy uprush of utter disgust. These few
months would not be cloudless for Isabelle, by any means. And after
them, what? Was it conceivable that those fatal sixteen years would
fail to identify Tony and Isabelle wherever they went, even if the
press was not eagerly assisting them? Supposing that Isabelle never
thought of Crownlands, of her handsome son and her young daughter, of
the man whose patience and cleverness had lifted her to all this luxury
from an apartment in a small town, would no memory of the place she had
held, and the friendships she had commanded, haunt her? Truly there was
always society for the Isabelles, but to Harriet's clean sense it
seemed but the society of a jail.

"I wouldn't change places with her!" Harriet decided, in the soft
silence and darkness of the summer night.

From Isabelle's problem her thoughts went to her own, to Royal Blondin.
She was wakeful and restless to-night simply because she could not
decide just how much she need fear him. Firstly, was there any reason
for antagonizing him, and secondly, would he hurt her if she did? For
Royal could not punish her without punishing himself, and could not
banish her from Crownlands if he ever hoped to show his own face there
again.

Nina, reaching her room that night, had flung her arms about Harriet's
neck.

"Oh, I'm so happy! Oh, Miss Harriet, were you ever in love?" she had
demanded, with a girl's wild, exultant laugh.

This was moving very fast indeed. Harriet had managed a sympathetic yet
warning smile.

"I think I have been. But, my dearest girl, you'll be in and out a
dozen times before the real thing comes along!"

Nina had smiled inscrutably at this, and slightly diverted the
conversation.

"Don't you think it was awfully decent of Mr. Blondin to want to go off
to the club to-night? Oh, I thought he looked perfectly stunning when
he looked at Father that way! He told me to telephone the club
to-morrow if I felt like just a quiet walk. Of course I shan't see any
one for weeks, after this. But he said some day when I'm in town with
Granny he didn't see why we couldn't go over and have a cup of tea with
him, even if we postponed the regular tea. Do you? He's different from
any one I ever knew. He says I am different from any girl he ever knew.
Do you think I am? I said I thought I was just like the others, except
that I like to read poetry and have my own ideas about things, and that
I couldn't flirt, or wouldn't if I could, and that the average boy just
bored me. I said that those things were sacred to me--"

Sacred to her! Long after the chattering voice was still, Harriet, out
on the balcony, remembered the phrase and winced. There would be small
sacredness in the hour that gave Nina to Royal Blondin. And yet, if in
his cleverness he won her first tenacious affection, it would be a
difficult thing to prevent. Isabella, her natural protector, was gone;
Richard saw nothing; the old lady was on the lovers' side, and Ward
also had been captivated by Blondin. It was only Harriet, only Harriet,
who saw and who understood.

Was he so bad? She tried to ask herself the question honestly, and an
honest shudder answered it before it was fairly framed. Nearly twenty
years Nina's senior, with an interest that could not, he confessed,
have existed except for the girl's fortune, that was arraignment
enough. But there was more. Harriet knew the smooth coldness, the
contemptuous superiority that within a year or two would blast the
youth and self-confidence of a dozen Ninas; she knew what his moral
code was, a code that made desire and opportunity the only law, and
that honoured passion as the crowning emotion of life. She tried to
picture Nina's marriage, their early days together, the breakfast
table, where the crude little girl blundered and floundered in
conversation, her helpless devotion, that would annoy and exasperate
him. She saw Nina's near-sighted eyes welling with hurt tears; Nina's
check book eagerly surrendered to win from her lord a few delicious
hours of the old flattery, the old attention. Harriet fancied Nina,
poor, plain, obtuse little Nina, home again: "But you don't know how
hard it is, Father. He is never there any more--he hardly ever speaks
to me!"

"It would take a clever woman to hold him," Harriet thought, "and it
wouldn't be worth a clever woman's while."

Nina-Ward-Royal-Richard. The wearying procession began again. Royal
might treat her with honesty and honour. He was not small in
everything, and she had never done him harm. But--there might come the
terrible moment when she had to face Richard with the confession. Yes,
she had known him before. Yes, they had entered into a tacit compact.
Yes, she had kept from Nina's father a secret that, while it might be
unimportant, certainly should have been told him.

Impossible to think the thing to any conclusion! Too many possibilities
might alter the entire situation. If she were married safely to Ward,
for example--? But then she dared not marry Ward until Royal's attitude
was finally defined. For if her position were dangerous now, what would
it be if she had committed herself irrevocably to deception by
marriage? Ward's young, crude intolerance sitting in judgment upon his
wife!--Harriet shivered.

Suddenly she fell upon her knees, and dropped her bright head against
the wide balustrade. She wanted to be a dignified, honourable, helpful
woman; not selfish, like Nina; not an intriguer, like Isabelle; not
proud, like Madame Carter. Something was changing in her heart and
soul; she did not feel angry and bitter any more. With Royal's
reappearance had come the realization that the old, sad time was no
longer a living wound in her life, it was merely a memory, young, and
mistaken, and to be forgotten. For years she had felt that it had
maimed her; now it seemed only infinitely pitiable. She could go on, to
honour and happiness, despite it. And how she longed to go on, with no
further handicap! If he would go away again, and leave her mistress of
the field. She only wanted her chance. She wanted to win her way, here
in this fascinating world; she wanted to be beloved and successful;
above all she wanted to be GOOD!

For a long time Harriet had not prayed. But now, in a few words, and
quite without premeditation, there burst from her the most sincere
prayer of her life. She looked up at the stars.

"God!" she said, softly, aloud, "help me! Make me do what is right,
however hard it is. Father, don't let me make another mistake!"




CHAPTER XI


Sudden peace and confidence flooded her spirit. She sat on, dreaming
and planning, but with no more mental distress. With the prayer she had
gained, in some subtle fashion, a new self-respect. She would not let
him frighten her again; after all, while she commanded her own soul,
Royal Blondin could not hurt her.

"And he shall not marry Nina, either!" Harriet decided, going in, stiff
and cold, but full of resolution. She looked at a clock, it was almost
four. Three hours' sleep was not to be despised, but Harriet was in no
mood for it. Instead she took a bath, and just as the dawn was
beginning to flood the world with mysterious half-lights and long wet
shadows, she crept out into the dew-drenched garden, and with a
triumphant sense of being alone, went into the wood. Early walks were
one of her delights. She was rarely alone otherwise; her position
afforded her almost every other luxury, but not often this one. Nina's
plans were usually cut to fit Harriet's; even the shortest errand, or
least interesting trip into town was pleasanter to Nina than her own
society.

It was exquisite in the wood. The light flashed on wet leaves, the
birds were awaking. A little steamer went up the satiny, dreaming
surface of the river, and when Harriet walked through the village,
heartening whiffs of boiling coffee and wood smoke came from the
labourers' cottages. She was young; she could have danced with
exultation in the hour and mood. It was almost seven o'clock when she
came back, glowing, beginning to feel warm and headachy, beginning to
realize that the July day would be hot, beginning to be conscious of
the eight-mile tramp. In the garden at Crownlands she met Royal,
leaving the house.

He studied her approvingly.

"Harriet, do you know you are extraordinarily easy to look upon? What
gets you up so early?"

"I've been walking," she said, briefly and unresponsively. His social
pleasantries instantly antagonized her, and he saw it.

"Well, I thought perhaps I had better get out. I'm at the club for a
day or two. I believe Miss Hawkes, Rosa, the eldest sister, wants me to
get up a reading, the great Indian Epic Poems, something along that
line. It's for the Red Cross, of course." He yawned, and smiled at the
early summer sky. "Ward tells me," he added, giving the girl a sharp
glance, "that you and he--eh?"

Harriet flushed.

"I'm sorry he told you!"

"Oh, my dear child!" Blondin made a deprecatory motion of his hands.
"Of course, I think you're very wise," he added.

This smote upon her new-born self-respect, and all the glory departed
from the day. She had taken off her loose white coat, and pushed back
the hat that pressed upon her thick, shining hair. It clung in damp
ringlets to the soft duskiness of forehead and temples, her cheeks
glowed rosily under their warm olive, and her clouded smoke-blue eyes
were averted; he could see only the thick, upcurling black lashes that
fringed them so darkly. The man saw her breast rise and fall with some
quick emotion as he half-smilingly watched her.

"The lad gets a beautiful and wise and very discreet wife," he was
beginning, but Harriet silenced him angrily.

"We need not indulge in compliments, Roy! If I marry Ward--"

"If--? I supposed it definite!"

"Well, when I marry him, then, it will be because I truly---" She
paused, halted at the great word. "Because I truly do admire and care
for him," she substituted, somewhat lamely.

"It isn't quite a pillar of smoke by day, and of fire by night?" he
suggested, quietly. Harriet saw the words written, in the handwriting
of a girl of seventeen, and had a moment of vertigo. She attempted no
answer. "In other words, you would hardly consider him if he had his
own way to make, if he had a salary of two hundred a month, like Fred
Davenport!" Royal added. "There's a certain magic about a background of
motorcars and Sherry's, and the opera Monday nights, and the bank
account, isn't there?"

Silence. But it was only for a moment. Then Harriet raised her eyes.

"He loves me," she reminded the man, quietly. "I don't know what a
boy's love is worth; he's only twenty-two, after all. But he does love
me! But believe me, Royal, you couldn't hurt me--as you ARE hurting
me!-if there was no truth in what you say. Ward has had three years at
college--I've not been a member of the family all that time without
knowing that he is not a saint! He has lived as other men do--as women
permit decent men to live, I suppose. Nina's different. She's younger.
She has never had an affair---"

"We were not discussing Nina!"

"No, I know it. But you reminded me that what I object to in you, with
her, I myself am doing with him--or something very like it! Except
that--" Harriet floundered a little, but regained her thread--"except
that he does care for me," she repeated; "he loves beauty--I can say
that to you without your misunderstanding!--and then, he knows me, we
have been intimate for years, we are congenial!"

"He knows everything about you," Royal repeated, innocently, as if the
defence she made were perfectly acceptable. But again she was stung to
silence.

"I am going to tell him frankly, exactly what you have said to me,"
Harriet said, presently, with decision and relief in her voice. "I
shall remind him that I have always been poor, and that it is utterly
impossible for me to separate the thought of him from the thought of
what my life as his wife would gain."

"Be careful how you play your hand alone!" the man said. "Half
confidence isn't much more than none at all!"

A moment later they parted: the woman entering the house for a cup of
coffee, and some conference with butler and housekeeper, and the man
starting off briskly for his early walk. But Blondin was smiling, as he
went upon his way, and Harriet was white with anger and impotence.

"I'll put everything else I have in this world in the balance, Roy!"
she said to herself, in the sunshiny silence of the breakfast room.
"But I'll hold no more stolen conversations with you! I'll break my
engagement with Ward, I'll go to Richard Carter and humiliate myself,
I'll go back to Linda's house without a penny in the world--but I'll be
done with you! Thank God, however the story may sound, especially with
your interpretations on it, you haven't my honour in your keeping,
though you may seem to have!"

The house was absolutely quiet; the clock on the stairs struck a
silvery seven. Harriet went noiselessly to her own room; Nina was
sleeping heavily. She flung off her clothes, sank into bed. And now at
last sleep came, deep, delicious, satisfying. Nina awoke, had her
breakfast in bed, tubbed and dressed, and still Harriet slept on.

"Miss Harriet, it's nearly noon!" The monitory voice penetrated at
last; Harriet awoke, smiling. "Father's gone to the city, and Ward with
him," Nina said, "and I telephoned the club and asked Mr. Blondin to
lunch--Granny said I might. And the papers--you ought to see them!
Father said to Bottomley that he was to say that the family was not
answering the telephone. Granny was darling to me this morning. She
thinks I could keep house for Father. I said no, thank you, not while
Miss Harriet was here. She said, Oh, no, she didn't mean immediately,
but if you married, or something. But of course I may move into
Mother's room, after awhile, although--isn't it funny?-I keep thinking
that she may come back. And Father said I was not to leave the place
to-day. I had nine letters; Amy said that she had cried all night, and
Mrs. Jay wrote Father, and oh--Father had a letter from Mother written
just before the boat went; he didn't show it to any one. And she said
they were going to Italy, and maybe Spain, he told Granny. Isn't it
TERRIBLE?"

Thus Nina, excited and pleased by the importance of being so close to
the calamity.

"I'll be dressed directly," Harriet said, in a matter-of-fact voice.
"Get at your Spanish, Nina, and I'll be with you in a few minutes!"

A day or two later there was a family conference in the library, and
Harriet realized more clearly than ever that it was impossible to
forecast the march of events. Richard announced that after
consideration he had decided that it would be wiser for the family to
weather the storm of talk that would follow Isabelle's disappearance,
in some neighbourhood less connected with her. He had therefore leased
an establishment on Long Island, where the children could have their
swimming and tennis, and his mother her usual nearness to town, but
where they would be comparatively inaccessible to a curious press and
public, and might disappear for a grateful interval. The life at
Huntington would be less formal than at Crownlands, but the house he
had taken was comfortable and roomy; there would be plenty of room for
Nina's girl friends and Ward's guests. Miss Field, Bottomley, and
Hansen would please see to it that the move was made with all possible
expedition. He would join the family there every week-end, possibly now
and then during the week, and he hoped the change would do them all
good, and bridge the difficult first months of--their misfortune. "I
have explained to my mother and the children," he said, quietly, to
Harriet, "that Mrs. Carter has asked for a divorce, which will, of
course, be immediately arranged.

"The trip," he ended, turning to his mother, "is only about the
distance this is, in the car. I've not seen the place, but I'm
confident that you'll like it."

"I shall of course remain there steadily, Richard," said the old lady,
with graciousness. "The length of the trip makes no difference. You
naturally have not had time to consider--how should you--that there is
a change in your circumstances, my son. The presence of an older woman
in your house is imperative."

He smiled at her patiently, and Ward laughed outright.

"You mean on Miss Field's account, Mother?"

Madame Carter was outraged at this outspokenness; she had supposed
herself somewhat obscure.

"If I do, my dear, it is a feeling that any WOMAN would share with me,
although possibly men--as the less delicate--"

"Oh, shucks, Granny!" Ward said, affectionately. "Where did you ever
get that line of dope?"

"Never mind, Ward," his father interrupted in turn. "We needn't discuss
that now. We'll be delighted for every hour you can spend with us,
Mother, whether it's for Miss Field's sake or ours. She'll take care of
us all, and herself into the bargain, I'm sure of that. Now, Miss
Field, about your check book; I've arranged---"

"The world, my dear, is less blind than you imagine!" his mother
reminded him pleasantly, gathering her draperies for departure.

"Well, about your checks," Richard said, with his indulgent smile, when
she was gone. "Where were we?"

"I have never respected and admired and been so grateful to any human
being as I am to you," thought Harriet. "I think you are the finest and
the strongest man I ever saw in my life!" Aloud she said, "I can send
Bottomley and his wife, and one or two of the girls down to-day, if you
think best. Then he can telephone me how things go."

Nina interposed an objection on the score of the tennis tournament at
the club, was overruled, and departed in her turn to discover, as
Harriet tactfully suggested, the condition of her bathing suit. Ward
had already gone to do some necessary telephoning, so that Harriet and
her employer were alone.

"Now, Miss Field," Richard said, when various details of management
were delegated, "you understand that you are in charge from now on. My
mother will--well, you know how to handle her! She is old--enjoys her
little bit of mischief sometimes! Anything unusual you can refer to me;
I shall be there every week, anyway."

He paused, and ruffled the scattered papers that were on the
flat-topped desk before him. Harriet watched him anxiously. She thought
he looked tired and old, and her heart ached at the troubled attempt he
was making to simplify the tragedy for them all. He was not handsome,
she reflected, but surely there had never been keener or pleasanter
gray eyes, and a mouth so strong when it was in repose, so honest when
it smiled. Not like Ward's ready and incessant laughter, not like Royal
Blondin's carefully calculated amusement.

Reaching this point in her thought, facing him with her whole beautiful
face alive with emotion and interest, Harriet smiled herself,
involuntarily and faintly. It was a smile of almost daughterly sympathy
and comradeship, friendly and innocent, and wholly irresistible. As
usual, her masses of hair were trimly pinned and braided, but stray
little golden feathers had loosened about the soft olive forehead, and
the neck of her thin white blouse was open, showing the straight column
of her young throat; the effect was unstudied and youthful, almost
childishly engaging and fresh.

Richard, catching the look, was perhaps unconsciously cheered by it.
Even at forty-four, and under his present difficulties and harassments,
he must have been dead not to be refreshed by the vision of earnest
youth and beauty that was so near him in the tempered summer light of
the great library.

"Thank you!" he said, as if she had spoken. "There is one more thing,
Miss Field," he added, idly rumpling his papers again, and then moving
his fine hand to his thick brown hair, whose shining order he rumpled,
too. "About this man Blondin. Do you know anything about him?"

A more direct shot at her innermost fastnesses could hardly have been
made. Robbed of breath and senses by the suddenness of it, and with dry
lips, Harriet could only falter a repetition:

"Know anything about him?"

"I don't know much, and what I do know I don't like," Richard
continued, noticing nothing amiss in her manner, perhaps because he was
so deeply absorbed in what he was saying. "He's a handsome fellow; he
knows his subject, I guess. He's the modern substitute for the
mediaeval minnesinger," he added, "a sort of father confessor--and the
women like to talk to him! But I don't like him. Now, I don't know how
he feels to Nina, or she to him, but as you know, she will come into
her uncle's fortune in a few months, unless the trustee, who is myself,
decides to defer payment for another three years. I merely want to say
that it might be as well to intimate to this young fellow that there
are conditions under which I would see fit to defer it, and anything
that brought him into that connection would--well, would constitute
one!"

"I didn't know of that!" Harriet exclaimed, in such obvious relief that
the man smiled involuntarily.

"Then you agree with me?" he asked, eagerly.

Here in the sombre sweetness of the library, with the man she admired
and respected above all others looking to her for confidence and
counsel, what could she say? Even had Royal Blondin been present,
Harriet might have cast every secondary consideration to the winds as
readily. As it was, she could only tell him the truth.

"Oh, yes--yes! I told Ward that I would rather see Nina dead!"

"Why do you say so?" Richard asked. "Now, I'll tell you why I do," he
added, as Harriet was, not unnaturally, groping for definite phrases,
"I've been watching this man. I had his record looked into. There's
nothing extremely bad in it--he seems to be a gentleman adventurer. But
there was an affair several years ago, his name mixed into some
divorce, and it developed then that he holds rather peculiar ideas
about free love, natural relationships--I needn't go into that. I don't
want him mixed up with my family. I'm going to speak to Ward about it,
warn him that his sister's happiness mustn't be risked by having the
fellow about at all. Meanwhile, you can take it up with Nina. Just let
her see that she isn't the only girl who has ever listened to him
reading 'In a Gondola.' You might hint that there was a good deal of
talk about him five or six years ago; there was a Swedish woman--I
didn't get the details!--but I imagine trial marriage comes pretty
close to it. You're tired," said Richard, abruptly.

"Indeed I'm not!" the girl protested, with white lips.

"You don't imagine the man is serious?" Richard asked, alarmed by her
manner.

"I don't know!" Harriet answered at random. "They've--they've hardly
known each other three weeks!"

"Ah, well! And she's only seventeen," her father said. "Distract her,
amuse her--if she's inclined to mope a bit. Get riding horses!"

No time to think--no time to trim her course. Harriet must plunge
blindly ahead now.

"Mr. Carter, would you--if you think wise--give your mother a hint of
this? Madame Carter is romantic, you know--"

"Oh, certainly! Certainly!" he said, approvingly. "I'll speak to her.
We must keep Nina a little girl this summer. And, Miss Field--"

It was said with only a slight change in the pleasant voice. But it
brought a sudden change in their relationship, a tightening of the
bonds that were all Harriet's world now.

"--Miss Field, I may say here and now that it is an unmixed privilege,
in my estimation," Richard Carter said, simply, "that my daughter, and
my son, too, for the matter of that, should have the advantage of your
influence, and your example, at this time. Of course it infinitely
simplifies my own problem. But I don't mean only that. I mean that with
your knowledge of the world, of work and poverty--I know them, too, I
know their value--you are infinitely qualified to balance their whole
social vision just now. I have never been unappreciative of the value
of a simple, good, unspoiled woman in my household. I have seen the
effect in a thousand ways. But at the present moment, I hardly know
where I could turn without you. I can only hope that in some way the
Carters may be able to repay you!"

The secretary's shining head dropped, and she rested her elbow on the
table, and pressed a white hand tight across her eyes for a moment of
silence. When she faced him again her face was a little pale, and her
magnificent eyes heavy with tears.

"I love all the Carters," she said, simply. "I only wish I were--half
what you say!"

And without another word she stood up, folded into a tiny oblong the
paper upon which she had been making a few notes, and went slowly to
the library door. More deeply stirred than she had been since the days
of her passionate girlhood, she turned on the threshold for a look of
farewell. But Richard Carter had left the desk, and was kneeling on one
knee before his safe; he had forgotten her. Harriet went across the
hall, mounted the stairs, and found her own room. She was hardly
conscious of what she was doing or thinking.

"Oh, what shall I do?" she whispered. "He trusts me to protect her! Oh,
why didn't I--the moment I knew that Royal was thinking of her--why
didn't I go to him then, and make a clean breast of it all! Now--now
I've promised! And they trust me and love me--and what shall I do! Oh,
God," whispered Harriet, sinking on her knees beside the bed, "You know
that I am good--You know that I can really help them all--can really
protect the girl! You know how I have chosen what was fine and good,
all these years, how I have longed for an opportunity to be useful and
happy! Don't let him come into my life again, and spoil it again. Don't
let Richard Carter lose faith in me, and despise me! I don't know
what's the matter with me," sobbed Harriet, burying her brimming eyes
in the pillows; "I never cry, I haven't cried like this for years and
years! I think I'm losing my mind!"




CHAPTER XII


The move to Huntington was made quickly and quietly, and lazy weeks
followed, to Harriet weeks of almost cloudless content. She and Nina
walked and rode, swam and practised their tennis stroke, paddled about
in a canoe, motored over miles of exquisite country. Madame Carter was
often with them, suggesting, disapproving, meddling, awaiting her
chance to score. Ward, early in August, after a serious talk with
Harriet, joined some friends for a motor run of three thousand miles,
and presently was sending them post cards from Monterey and Tahoe.
There was naturally no entertaining or formal social life for the
family this summer, but Richard almost always brought men down for
golf, over the week-ends, and seemed, if quiet and reserved, to be well
content.

They had been in the new home only a few days when Harriet had reason
to stop short in a busy morning of unpacking with one hand upon her
heart, and a great satisfaction in her eyes. Nina, reading from a note
from Royal Blondin, announced the sensational news that he had broken
his ankle. He was with friends at Newport, and must remain there now
for weeks, perhaps a month. Nina was please to write him, and to give
his regard to Miss Field, and ask her not to forget him.

Harriet was quite willing to overlook the delicate menace of the
message for the sake of the other news. For several weeks they were
safe. Nina did not know the family Royal had been visiting, there was a
long interval before she could possibly see him again. He would write
to the girl, of course, and Harriet knew with what absorbing emotion
she would look for his letters. But Nina was young and Nina wrote
wretchedly, and anything might happen, thought Harriet, consoling
herself with a vague argument that was in itself youthful, too.

Old Madame Carter was the only stumbling block now; there was no
question of her definite hostility. It was partly the jealousy of age
for youth, of departed beauty for beauty in its prime, but it was
mainly actuated by the old lady's sense of pride, her firm belief that
there was some mysterious merit of birth in the Carter blood, and that
to friendship with the Carters a mere upstart, a secretary, a
working-woman, could not with any justice aspire. In a thousand ways,
many of them approaching actual mendacity, she undermined Harriet's
usefulness, and annoyed and distracted the domestic force. If Harriet
decided that the weather was too warm for an out-of-door luncheon,
Madame Carter pleasantly overruled her, and there was much running to
and fro for the change. Messages undelivered by the old lady were
attributed to the secretary's carelessness, and there was more than one
occasion when Harriet had no choice between silence toward Madame
Carter or the flat accusation of untruthfulness.

Every hour under his roof, however, helped to convince her that Richard
Carter was unaware of very little that transpired there. His reading of
Nina's young secret had proved that; Harriet never remembered his ready
allusion to "In a Gondola" without surprise. How he had managed to
obtain that particular detail she could not imagine. But she hoped that
he read the relationship between her and his mother as truly, and that
time would reconcile the old lady to her presence in the house.

With September came changes. Blondin wrote that he was limping about
with a stick, and wanted to limp down to them as soon as they would ask
him. Ward was home again, as always irresponsible, a little older and
in some vague way a little coarser, Harriet thought, but still a most
enlivening element in the quiet household. Madame Carter had brought
with her, for several weeks' stay, a friend of Isabelle's, a pretty,
dashing little grass widow, Mrs. Tabor. The resolute brightness and
sweetness with which Ida Tabor attempted to amuse Richard gave Harriet
some hint of the plan which was taking shape in the back of his
mother's head. But she could only make Mrs. Tabor comfortable, and fit
her somehow into the youthful plans of the household.

"Miss Harriet," Nina said, without preamble, lying flat on the gently
rocking float, and catching little handfuls of water as she spoke,
"what'll I wear to-morrow?"

Harriet had already settled this question several times, but she was
always patient with Nina.

"White is prettiest," she said; "didn't we decide for the organdie?"

"The white with the rolled hem," Nina said with unction, "and pale pink
stockings, and white shoes."

"That will do nicely!" Harriet, always happiest in the water, was
sitting on the edge of the float, with her feet idly splashing. A
glorious September sun blazed down upon the water, there was absolute
silence up and down the curving shore. Above the plumy tops of the
trees, rising abruptly from the beach with its weather-burned bath
houses, the gables and porches of the new home showed here and there.
There were other country mansions scattered up and down beside the blue
waters of the Sound, but the Carters had no sense of having neighbours.

Nina, Ward, and Harriet fairly lived in the water, and Ward had
unconsciously served his father's cause by bringing home with him a
tongue-tied pleasant youth named Saunders Archer, whose presence in the
house had helped to keep Nina pleased and amused. She had already
imparted to Harriet the valuable information that Saunders had never
known his mother, and had never had a sister, "and of course I have
always been such an oddity in the family," said Nina, "that I got right
at his confidence in that dreadful way of mine! He said he didn't know
why he talked to me so frankly."

Harriet had seen to it that a variety of delightful plans awaited the
young people at every turn. The retirement natural after the recent
domestic catastrophe was too dangerous to risk now. They drove to
Piping Rock, to Easthampton; they yachted and swam; and the evenings
were filled with riotous entertainments of their own devising, and once
or twice with country club dances ten or twenty miles away. And Harriet
hoped, hoped, hoped, feverishly, incessantly, wearyingly, that the
danger was past.

But Amy came down, mild and colourless as ever, yet still more poised,
more socially adept than Nina, and with Amy innocently diverting
Saunders's bashful attentions, Nina returned to thoughts of Royal. The
"to-morrow" for which the white organdie had been selected was to bring
Royal for his first visit to Huntington. He was coming down with Madame
Carter and Mrs. Tabor in her car. The man, the old lady had protested
indignantly, had already been asked to visit them, and it was
preposterous, just because Richard fancied every man who looked at Nina
was in love with her, that he should be insulted! No matter, Richard
said, in an aside to Harriet, accepting the situation philosophically,
there was no need for suddenness. Harriet tried to be philosophical,
too. Richard was bringing two men down for golf this week-end, and with
Saunders and Amy, Royal and Madame Carter and Mrs. Tabor, the house
would be filled. She had plenty to do with the managing, the endless
details that were brought her mercilessly, hour after hour, by maids
and housekeeper. And yet under her quiet busyness and her happy hours
with the young people there lurked incessantly a fretted sense of
danger approaching.

Something of this was in her mind as she and Nina basked on the gently
heaving float, in the sunshine. Amy, with no particular desire to hide
the fact that she was a better swimmer than Nina, had essayed a swim to
the buoy, a hundred yards out in the channel. Nina, therefore, was
naturally turned to thoughts of a male who quite frankly did not admire
Amy; and she talked incessantly of Blondin. Harriet, the best swimmer
among them, remained with Nina, and now fancied she saw an opening for
a little talk she felt extremely timely.

"Mr. Blondin likes you, Nina, just because you aren't flirtatious and
silly, like the other girls. But he isn't the sort of man to get very
deeply interested in any woman, dear."

"No, I know he's not!" Nina said, quickly, turning suddenly red, and
looking attentively at the print of her wet hand on the dry, hot boards.

"And I would be sorry if he were," Harriet pursued, not too seriously,
"for I want you to marry a man of your own age, when you do marry, and
not a man who has had--well, other affairs, who has that confidential,
flattering manner with all women!"

"If you think I don't realize perfectly that you don't like Royal
Blondin, you are mistaken!" Nina said, airily, even with a yawn. "I am
perfectly able to manage my own affairs in THAT direction!"

"Yes, I know, dear. But we want you--" Harriet was beginning
pacifically. But Nina angrily interrupted:

"Oh, I know you and Father talk about me, if THAT'S what you mean!"

"No, dear, listen. We want you to see other types of men, to see all
kinds. You will be rich, Nina--"

"Why don't you say that Royal is after my money!" Nina burst out, with
symptoms of tears. The ready name frightened Harriet afresh; she knew
that they corresponded, that grass was not growing under Royal's feet.
She and Nina were sitting close together now, their drying hair tossed
backward, their faces flushed. "The first man I ever really liked,"
Nina said, with a heaving breast, "the first man who ever understood
me--!"

"Nina," Harriet said, "you don't want to have to write your husband a
check on your honeymoon?"

She felt it a cruel cut; but seventeen years of flattery and smoothness
had armed Nina in impregnable complacence. She gave a sneering laugh
that trembled on the brink of tears, and tried to control a mouth that
was shaking with anger. One look of utter scorn she did manage, then
she shrugged not so much her shoulders as her whole body, and flung
herself furiously into the water. Harriet called "Nina!" first
impatiently, and then coaxingly. But the younger girl swam steadily to
the shore, and Harriet saw her a minute later, shaking herself outside
the shower, before she disappeared into the big bath house. With a
grave face, as she absentmindedly tossed and spread the glorious mass
of her glittering hair, Harriet sat on, pondering. They had reached a
crisis; Nina, between delicious confidences to Amy and aggrieved appeal
to Royal, would commit herself now. There was no help for it; she,
Harriet, must act.

Amy and Saunders swam by her, breathless and screaming as they made for
shore, and fought and shrieked under the shower. Then they, too,
entered the dressing rooms, and there was absolute silence in the
world. Harriet had entirely forgotten Ward, until he swam under the
float, and with a characteristic yell, rose streaming like a seal under
her very feet.

Genuinely startled, she gratified him with a scream, and they both
laughed like children as he flung himself dripping on the hot boards,
and proceeded to bake luxuriously in the sun.

"It's the most gorgeous thing I ever saw, do you know that?" he asked,
with one hand touching the river of sparkling gold that blazed and
tumbled on her shoulders. "Listen, Harriet, do you remember the little
talk we had some weeks ago?"

"Perfectly," she said, a little unwillingly.

"Before I went to California, I mean," he further elucidated.

"Yes, I know what you mean, Ward!"

"Well, how about it?" the boy said, after a pause. Harriet, her
beautiful flushed face framed in curtains of shining hair, was
regarding him steadily, and almost sorrowfully.

"Do you mean to ask if I have changed?"

"Well--" he looked up. "I thought you might! They do--the ladies!"

"It wouldn't be fair to you. Ward," the girl said, slowly, after a
pause. "I love you, but I don't love you the way your wife will!"

"Why do you talk like that--it's all bunk!" he said, impatiently. "If
you try it and don't like it, why, you can get out, can't you?"

"Ward, don't say those things!" the girl said, distressedly.

"I want you!" he said, sullenly. "I'm crazy about you! My God--"

"Ward, please don't touch me!" she said, sharply, getting to her feet
with a spring, as he put his arm about her. "Don't--! I shall tell your
father if you do!"

"You didn't talk that way at Crownlands last June," the man said,
sulkily. "I don't see what has made such a difference now!"

"I think perhaps I'm different, Ward. The summer--" Harriet's voice
died into silence. Her eyes were fixed upon the figure of a man who
came down the little pier, and dove into the shining water. Two minutes
later, with a great gasp of satisfaction, Richard Carter drew himself
up beside them.

"Ha! That is something like! My Lord, the water is beautiful to-day!
How about the buoy? Who swims with me to the buoy?"

"Come on, Harriet!" Ward said, poising.

The girl hesitated, glanced toward the shore. Saunders, with a
white-clad girl on each side of him, was walking up to the house.

"Did your friends come down with you, Mr. Carter?" she asked, before
quite abandoning all responsibilities.

"Briggs and Gardiner--yes. They're getting into golf clothes. We're
going to play nine holes anyway, at the club. What time is dinner?"

"Eight o'clock. Unless you prefer--"

"No, no! Eight is fine. We'll be back at seven. My mother and Mrs.
Tabor and Blondin will be down from town at about six."

Harriet rose, too, and bundled the glory of her hair into a blue rubber
cap that made her look like a beautiful rosy French peasant. With no
further speech she made a splendid dive, and the men followed her.

It was one of life's beautiful hours, she thought, as in a great splash
of salt water she reached the buoy, and hung laughing and panting to
its restless bulk. Ward had preceded her by a full minute, Richard was
half a minute behind her. With much vainglorious boasting from the men,
they all rested there before the homeward swim. Harriet hardly spoke,
her cup was full to the brim with a mysterious felicity born of the
summer hour, the heaving waters, and the joyous mood of father and son.
When Richard praised her swimming she flushed in the severe blue cap,
and the blue eyes met his with the shy pleasure of a child. It was
while she was hastily dressing, in the hot bath house a little later,
that a sudden thought came to her, and flushed the lovely face again,
and brought her to a sudden pause.

A tremendous thought, that made her breast rise suddenly, and her eyes
fix themselves vaguely on space for a long, long minute. Her palms were
damp, and she put them over her hot cheeks. But that--she whispered in
the deeps of her soul, that was nonsense!

When Blondin arrived she did not see him, for Mrs. Tabor and Madame
Carter, elaborately entering at five, reported him "perfectly
wonderful" on the trip down, and that he had shown such transports at
the sight of the woods and the water that they had put him down perhaps
a mile away, to walk alone for the rest of the way, and commune with
his own exquisite soul. The expectantly waiting Nina, at this, followed
Amy upstairs in the direction of the white organdie, and Harriet felt a
little premonitory chill.

"Oh, Miss Field!" said Madame Carter's voice, an hour later, as Harriet
passed her door. The old lady had been talking with her grandson, while
she was resting, magnificent in a pale blue negligee, but her maid was
now extremely busy at the toilet table, and an elaborate dinner costume
was laid out upon the bed. Harriet entered.

"Well, how has the little household been running?" asked Madame Carter,
who had been away for almost a week. "Miss Nina looks sweet." And
without waiting for a reply, which indeed would have been of no
interest to her, she added, blandly, "Ward tells me that you are a
beautiful swimmer!"

"Ward did not find that out to-day," Harriet said, mildly, thus
informed that her radiant hour with both the Carters was known to the
mother and grandmother.

"My son is a brilliant man," said Madame Carter, with apparent
irrelevance, "but the most brilliant men in the world are the stupidest
in domestic life, isn't that so?"

Harriet, ready for the knife, said pleasantly that perhaps it was
sometimes so.

"Now my son," Madame Carter said, confidentially, "is a man of
scrupulous honour. But he is capable of placing a young woman,
and"--she bowed graciously--"a beautiful young woman, in a very false
position! I confess that if I were in that young woman's place, I
should resent it. I should feel--"

"If you mean me," Harriet said, interrupting the smooth, innocent old
voice, "I assure you that I do not feel my position here at all
false--" ["She always gets me wild, and gets me talking," Harriet added
to herself, with anger at her own weakness, "but I can't help it!"] And
aloud she finished, "I am Nina's companion, and in a sense,
housekeeper--"

"Pilgrim is housekeeper," Mrs. Carter corrected, Miss Pilgrim, a
one-time maid, was really Mrs. Bottomley, and had been manager below
stairs for a long time.

"There are things Pilgrim cannot do," Harriet suggested.

"I feel myself the difficulty of explaining your position here!" said
the old lady, raising both hands and arms in an elaborate gesture of
deprecation, and smiling kindly. "You put me in a false position, too!"

But Harriet had now reached the point she always did reach, sooner or
later, in these talks with Madame Carter, the point of mentally pitying
the old lady, and recollection that after all her mischievous tongue
could do no real harm.

"You will have to discuss that with Mr. Carter, of course!" It was
always ace of trumps, and Harriet only blamed herself for ever
beginning a conversation with anything else. Now she retired from the
field with all honours, forcing herself to dismiss the unpleasant
memory the instant she was out of reach of Madame Carter's voice. But
the old lady fumed for an hour, and took up the subject with her son
when he came dutifully in to take her down to dinner.

"Ida feels as I do," she said, when Mrs. Tabor, charming in blue,
joined them on the way downstairs. Richard felt a sensation of anger.
It was poor taste to involve a casual stranger like Ida Tabor in this
rather delicate family discussion. But he thought that the little widow
showed excellent sense in her rather slangy fashion.

"Well, of course, she's filled the bill this summer, Dick,
ab-so-loo-tely! But, let me tell you, that Nina of yours is beginning
to take notice, and she won't need a governess forever! With you to
keep an eye on things generally, Nina will soon be able to manage Dad's
affairs. I know just how you feel--never'll forget how utterly blank I
felt when Jack Tabor just quietly packed his trunks and walked out!
Why, I couldn't get hold of myself for months!"

"Where is Miss Field?" Richard was looking for the demure blue gown and
the bright head as they joined the young group downstairs.

"She is not coming down, Richard," his mother explained.

"Why not?" he asked, abruptly. His mother gave him a magnificent look,
warning, silencing, appealing.

"I'll explain it to you later, dear!" she said, half-annoyed and
half-pleading. "You may announce dinner, Bottomley!"

Bottomley duly announced dinner. But he might have added something to
the conversation, had he been permitted. He had had some simple and
direct conversation with Madame Carter, not an hour before, and had in
consequence sent up a dinner tray to Miss Field. Rosa, taking the tray,
had been instructed to say simply that Madame Carter had told Mr.
Bottomley that Miss Field wished her dinner upstairs. But Rosa was
perfectly in touch with the situation, too, and carried the news below
stairs that Miss Field had got as red as fire, and had stood looking
from Rosa to the tray, and from the tray to Rosa, for--well, full five
minutes, before she had said, "Thank you, Rosa, you may put it there on
the table!"

Madame Carter sparkled her best that evening. Mrs. Tabor, too, carried
along the conversation noisily if not brilliantly, until the young
people got well under way. Richard was rather silent, but then he was
always silent. And after awhile the rich, significant tones of Royal
Blondin were heard. It was well after nine when they all drifted out
into the cool dimness of the porch for coffee; Ward started music,
Saunders and Amy danced. The men attempted a little pool, but were too
weary, and by half-past ten Mrs. Tabor had tripped upstairs after the
young girls, with a buoyant good-night for her host, and the old lady,
lingering for a minute, had a chance to explain.

"About Miss Field, dear. I gave her just a kindly hint as to the
propriety of her being ALWAYS present at dinner, and she was sensible
enough to take it! Now and then, of COURSE--"

He jerked impatiently.

"I wish you would be a trifle more careful with your kindly hints,
Mother! Miss Field is a most exceptional girl--"

"My DEAR boy," said the old lady, fanning rapidly, "I could get you a
dozen women infinitely more capable--"

"--and I don't want her feelings hurt!" Richard finished, with a return
to his usual gentleness.

"You won't hurt her feelings!" his mother predicted, roundly. "Not
while the entire household is taking her orders, and the bank honouring
her checks--oh, no, my dear! don't worry about that!"

"To-morrow night," Richard said, half to himself, "I shall make it a
point to ask her to come down to dinner. If she prefers her room--"

"Richard," his mother said, in a low, furious tone, "if you do that,
you may be kind enough to excuse me! While poor Isabelle was here,
while Nina was a child, it was all well enough! But nothing could be
more unfortunate for your daughter, for your young son, than to have
any fresh gossip--the sort of thing people are only too ready to say,
and are beginning to say now!"

"Why, how you do cook up things from whole cloth, Mother!" the man said
with his indulgent smile. "You see the thing too closely, you are right
in the middle of it!"

"I see that Harriet Field is an extremely pretty woman," his mother
said, hotly.

Richard looked from the tip of his unlighted cigar into his mother's
eyes, looked back again.

"Why, yes, I suppose she is!" he said, thoughtfully. "Gardiner said
something about it just now. Said she'd make her fortune in the movies."

"I don't know about that," Madame Carter said, indifferently.

"Why can't you consider that we are fortunate to have her, Mother?"

"Because I don't want to see you in a false position before the world,
my son. You must consider---"

The man kissed her hand lightly, with a laugh that closed the
conversation.

"Consider nothing! It's all nonsense!" he said, and as she began her
leisurely and dignified ascent he turned toward the porch and the
solace of his cigar. While he and the other men smoked and mused, he
decided to see Harriet and have a long talk with her the next day, to
tell her that no matter what his mother said or did her word in the
house was law, to assure her that in his eyes at least her position was
secure beyond any question. Even with the varied group at the table
to-night, he had missed her; there was an influence even in her
silences, and a certain power in her very glances.

"Why the boy isn't heels over head in love with her I don't know!" he
thought of Ward. And when Gardiner, who had had merely a chance
encounter with her in the hall spoke again of the gold hair and dark
blue eyes, Richard fell into a benevolent dream of the little secretary
married to Gardiner, who was rich and a bachelor, and a very decent
fellow, too. He fancied young Mrs. Gardiner coming to visit the
Carters, and himself toasting her at a formal dinner, and wondered if
he had ever seen Harriet in evening dress. He would tell her to-morrow
that she must get an evening gown. Richard, always the man of business,
selected the hour on Sunday that would be most suitable for his talk
with her. He and the other men would get up at seven, and go to the
country club, where they would manage eighteen holes before breakfast
was served on the club porch, the famous chicken Maryland and waffles
of which the golfers dreamed for six days. After that they might get
into a game of bridge, pleasantly tired, well fed; there were less
agreeable things to do than sit on the shady club porch, ordering mild
drinks, and quarrelling over two or three hard-fought rubbers. Nina and
her crowd were to lunch at the club; last Sunday Harriet Field had come
out with Nina and looked on for a hand or two, other people were
drifting about, and it was extremely social and agreeable.

But he would be home to dress for dinner, at six, and then he would get
hold of Miss Field, and somewhat clear up the situation. Richard slept
upon the resolution, and arose in the sweet summer morning to a
satisfied recollection of it. He looked from his window into the green,
warm garden, and saw Miss Field herself emerging from the wood, and
Nina's friend, Blondin, beside her. Harriet had evidently been to
church; she carried a prayer-book; a broad-brimmed hat made the slender
figure, from this distance anyway, extremely picturesque. The man and
she were in earnest conversation.

"Now THAT" thought Richard, still paternally busy with matrimonial
plans for her, "that wouldn't do at all. I hope she isn't wasting any
time on that fellow. He's clever, he has a good manner, but by George,
that girl could marry any man, and make him a magnificent wife, too! I
rather thought we'd disposed of this Blondin, anyway! But they seem
friendly enough--"

For they had parted with a nod unmistakably familiar.




CHAPTER XIII


Blondin had been waiting for her at the church door. Harriet, coming
out, had indicated without a word that he might walk beside her. The
service had been ill-attended, and the few women who drifted away from
it did not walk in their direction, so they found themselves alone.
Harriet had been realizing ever since his arrival that Blondin had lost
none of his unique and baffling charm. His handsome person, his unusual
voice, his fashion of dreamily contributing to the conversation some
viewpoint entirely unexpected and fresh, his utter indifference to
general opinion--these made him a distinct entity in any group, and
would account for Nina's immediately renewed alliance, and for the
general disposition on the part of the household to accept him on his
own terms.

Harriet opened the conversation this morning with a frank yet reluctant
confession.

"I'm so sorry, Roy! But it is only fair to you to say that I've
changed. You will have to do what you think fit about it, of course.
But I can't pretend that I'm--I'm playing your game any longer."

"What game?" Blondin, falling into graceful step beside her, asked
pleasantly.

"I mean any possible--idea you might have of Nina!" Harriet said,
bravely.

"Oh, Nina!" he shrugged his shoulders lightly. "Don't take me too
seriously, my dear Harriet," he said. "Why, whenever we are alone
together, should you promptly begin to cross-question me about that
little person? Look about you--isn't this a divine morning? I always
rather fancy September, somehow. It's dry, panting, finished--and yet
there's something about the mornings and the evenings--"

Harriet made a faint, impatient ejaculation.

"Well, anyway, you know where I stand!" she said.

"And you know where I do," he answered, after a pause. "I can see
Carter has no particular enthusiasm for me--I suppose that's your work."

"I've said nothing definite," she answered, in a troubled voice.

"Then I shall!" Royal said, with sudden feeling. "I'm sick of this
shilly-shallying, and weighing words! If he will accept me as I am,
well and good--if not, I'm done! But he has a high opinion of you,
Harriet; what you say really counts!"

"You know where I stand," she could only repeat. They had reached the
garden now, and were at the foot of the steps.

"I don't quite see how you can take that tone," Blondin hinted. "Do you
expect to marry the boy?"

Harriet did not answer, except by a faint shrug. Her heart was sick
with fright, but there was no reason why he should be informed that she
had definitely broken with Ward. But he had never come so near a threat
before.

"Of course I am entirely at your mercy," she said, simply. Blondin
watched her for a full moment of silence before he said suddenly:

"All I ask you to do is assume, for the time being, that you and I met
as strangers a few weeks ago!"

"Oh, Roy," the girl exclaimed, "as if I were likely to do anything
else!"

She despised herself for the sense of relief that flooded her heart.

"Look here then," he said, after a moment of thought. "I'll make a
bargain with you. If you will consent not to make any allusion
to--well, to ten years ago, I'll do the same. I'll give you my solemn
promise on it. Say what you please about me now. You're under no bond
to protect me. I can hold my own. But the past is dead. Neither you nor
I will speak of it without agreeing to do so. How about it?"

She hesitated, the black lashes dropped, her restless hands twisting
and torturing her handkerchief. It protected her, she thought, while
leaving her free to oppose him.

"I'll agree," she said, finally.

"Promise?"

"Oh, I promise!" She bit her lip, and frowned, as if she would add
something more. But no words came, only her troubled eyes met his fully
and splendidly for a second.

Then with the brief, familiar nod which Richard Carter saw from his
upstairs window, she turned, and without another word went into the
house.

 The morning dragged. It was dry and hot, with promise of a storm
later. The men piled into the car, and went off for their golf. It was
ten o'clock before Nina and Amy came chattering downstairs; Royal was
in the music room then, evoking a tangle of dim chords from the piano,
smoking endless cigarettes. Presently Ward and his friend thundered
down to join the girls at breakfast; a maid circled the table with
toast and covered dishes.

Madame Carter's breakfast had been sent upstairs, and Mrs. Tabor had
joined her, for when the old lady sent a message to Harriet, the two
women were together, in elaborate negligee, and a litter of Sunday
papers was scattered about the beautiful bedroom. Upon Harriet's
entrance Mrs. Tabor gracefully rose to go, but she paused for a
pleasant good-morning.

Alone with her determined old enemy, Harriet assumed her usual air of
respectful readiness. Madame Carter had sent for her?

"Yes," said the old lady, looking aimlessly about her before gathering
her garments together, and sinking into a chair. "I wanted you to know
that the young people propose to drive to Easthampton, at about two
o'clock--my granddaughter has been here, teasing Granny for the plan,
and I have consented. They will dine there and be back at about--well,
after dinner."

"But won't that tire you?" Harriet asked.

"I? Oh, I shall not go. Ward will chaperon his sister, and Nina, Amy.
Mr. Blondin will see that they get home in time. It's quite all right,
Miss Field; I am entirely satisfied. They--"

"But, Madame Carter!" Harriet interrupted her as she had expected to be
interrupted. "Surely it would be better--"

"We won't discuss it, please, Miss Field!"

Harriet's cheeks reddened; she was silent.

"Your devotion to my son and his family is extremely praiseworthy,"
said Madame Carter, coldly. "But, as Mrs. Tabor, who is of course a
woman of the world, and comes of a very fine family--she was a Kingdon,
the Charleston family--as Mrs. Tabor was saying, Richard is just the
sort of chivalrous, splendid man who is perfectly helpless in his own
house!"

Harriet smiled, with a touch of scorn.

"When Mr. Carter is dissatisfied with me, Madame Carter, I shall of
course consider myself--dismissed. But until that time I am very glad
to make his own house comfortable for him."

The hard, angry colour of old age had been rising in Madame Carter's
face during this speech, and now she was quite obviously enraged.

"You are hardly in a position to dictate to me in this matter!" she
said, shaking. Harriet watched her gravely as she rose from her chair,
made a few restless turns about the room, opened and shut bureau
drawers, dropped and plucked up handkerchiefs and newspapers. In a dead
silence the girl asked:

"Was that all?"

A sort of sniff was the answer, and, leaving the room, Harriet saw the
door of Mrs. Tabor's room, adjoining, open cautiously. The ally was
creeping back for news of the fray, thought the girl, with a little
grin at the thought of the two women's discomfiture. But she sighed
again as she entered her own suite to find Nina and Amy complacently
dressing themselves for the afternoon's run.

"We're going to Easthampton, Miss Harriet; Granny said it was all
right," Nina said, in great spirits. "I know you won't feel hurt,
because the car simply won't accommodate more than five, and it's too
long a run to sit on laps--"

"But, dearie child," Harriet said, in her friendliest manner, "I don't
believe you had better do that! You're all pretty young, in case
anything occurred--"

A mutinous line marked Nina's babyish mouth. She would not yield to any
nursery control before Amy!

"Granny said it was all right, Miss Harriet, so just don't bother your
head about us!" she said, airily.

"Yes, I know, dear. But Granny's ideas are old-fashioned--"

"Old-fashioned people are apt to be even more rigid than we are, aren't
they?" Amy submitted lightly and sweetly.

Harriet, a trifle nonplussed by this determined resistance, stood
looking from one to the other, pondering.

"Anyway, I'm going!" Nina muttered, lacing high white buckskin shoes,
with some shortening of breath. "Granny says a girl's brother--"

Harriet paid no further attention to them, and the two developed a
splendid case for themselves. But she went down to find Ward, and took
him partially into her confidence. Would he please be a darling, and
see that there was no nonsense? She could not well cross his
grandmother and Nina without his father to back her. She disliked to
call his father at the club and make too much of the whole thing. Would
he promise her that they would be home by ten o'clock, at latest?

Somewhat comforted by Ward's affectionate loyalty, Harriet went up to
dress for the one o'clock luncheon, and while she was dressing a new
idea came to her. For a few minutes she shook her head, stood thinking,
with a face of distaste.

"I COULD do that!" she said, aloud. And she picked up the gingham dress
that she had laid on the bed.

But there was a prettier dress in Harriet's wardrobe, a gift from
Isabelle, that she had never worn. It was a flowered silk mull, of a
soft deep blue that was exactly the colour of Harriet's eyes, and at
the throat and wrists it had frills of transparent lace. The soft
ruffles that made the skirt were cunningly edged with black, and there
was a great open pink rose at the belt.

Harriet put on this enchanting garment, and as she did so she felt some
half-forgotten power rise strong within her. There was one trump in her
hand that she had never thought to play in a game with Nina Carter, but
she was glad to find it now.

She went downstairs, and found Royal Blondin lounging in the billiard
room, and idly knocking balls about. The second thing he said to her
was of the gown, the third of her eyes. Harriet stood beside him,
raising the eyes in question, and smiling. When she turned and went
slowly away, Blondin went after her.

At half-past two o'clock the car was at the side door, and Nina and Amy
came downstairs with their wraps, and Saunders and Ward ran about
laughing and confusing things. Blondin watched the performance lazily
from a basket chair on the porch, but when Nina called him a
half-laughing, half-daring, "We're ready, Mr. Blondin!" he sauntered
down to the car with his pleasantest expression, but with the regretful
statement that he was not going: a vicious headache had developed since
luncheon.

Whatever the effect on Amy and the young men, to Nina this was a
staggering blow. Harriet felt sorry for her as she saw the girl try to
meet it gallantly; she knew that the heart died from Nina's day there
and then. Nina had triumphed all through luncheon, had laughed and
chattered, had made Ward telephone a dinner reservation for five, and
had assumed a hundred coquettish airs. Now all this crumpled, faded
away, and Harriet knew, as she stood beside the car looking down at the
folded light rug on her arm, that she was ready to cry.

"No, you'll have a far nicer time without me," said Royal, throwing
away his cigarette, and resting one arm on the car. "I wouldn't
interfere, because I knew you'd all give it up! You just all have a
perfectly wonderful time, and I'll be down next week-end and hear about
it!"

Nina stood irresolute; too choked with sudden disappointment to risk
her voice. It was all hateful, maddening, horrible! Those two boys and
Amy--ah, there would be no "fun" now! She loathed Amy, getting in so
briskly, and saying, "Come on, Nina!" She hated Ward, she wished that
they were all dead, and herself, too. It was impossible that she should
be carried farther and farther away from him--after last night and
to-day!

The storm came at Good Ground, and they all had to scramble with
curtains, "smelly" curtains, Nina called them. And the dinner was eaten
in warm, sticky half-darkness on a hotel porch, with horrible music
making a horrible racket, according to the same authority. Saunders and
Amy held hands all the way home, too, and Nina thought it was
disgusting; everyone was too tired to talk, they bounced along silently
and crossly.

And upon getting home, Miss Harriet came out of the shadows on the
porch, looking perfectly exquisite in her new gown, sweetly interested
and cheerful. She said that she was so sorry the dinner was poor, they
had had such a nice dinner at home, and that she had had a talk with
their father, and they were to go back to Crownlands next week. Nina
did not see Blondin; she heard his voice from the smoking room, but her
arrival caused no cessation of the men's laughter and voices in there,
and the only news she had from him that night was from her grandmother,
who was in a bad temper, and reported that he and Miss Field had been
walking half the afternoon. Nina, for the first time in her life, cried
herself to sleep.

"Never mind, my dear," said the old lady with terrible insight, "if I
ask my son to choose between me and any other woman, I have no doubt of
the outcome!"

Harriet had assuredly triumphed, but it was on terms that for more than
one reason did not entirely please her. To affect a confidential
intimacy with Royal Blondin was utterly distasteful, and to have poor
little Nina sulky and silent far from pleasant. But most disquieting of
all was the immediate result of old Madame Carter's meddling.

For Richard, finding the pretty secretary prettier than ever in her
blue gown, and warmed by a relaxed day at the club and a mood of
friendliness, had specifically instructed her that she was to dine with
the family on all occasions, and to dress as the others did, and to
regard herself as "a member of the family." And this, Harriet was quick
to realize, really did place her in a peculiar position, made difficult
by Richard's kindly championing no less than his mother's hostility, by
the adoring sympathy of the servants, and the affectionate
familiarities of the Carter children. Richard's friends took their cue
from him, as was natural, and in the first early winter dinner parties
at Crownlands Harriet could not but sparkle and lead; she had reached
her own level at last.

Perhaps the master of the house but dimly saw the truth of this, but he
did see a most charming and pretty woman at the head of his
establishment, his daughter and son protected, his affairs capably
managed, and such hospitality and entertainment as he felt suitable
well handled. She and Nina shared Isabelle's old rooms, and Harriet
balanced Nina's first evening gowns with discreet but dignified black.

A sense of well-being and happiness began to envelop Richard Carter for
the first time in many years. He was conscious of a desire to express
his appreciation to Miss Field. It was natural that this should take
the form of money; a little present, in the form of a check. She had a
sister who was not rich; she would like to go home with laden hands.
But the question was, how much?

He was musing over this very point and other matters of deeper moment
one morning when Harriet herself came in. She returned his smile with
her usual bright nod, but he thought she looked pale and troubled.

"Mr. Carter," she said, bravely going to the point, "do you think Nina
is able, with your mother's help, to manage your house?"

Richard looked at her silently for perhaps two minutes. Then he said,
quietly:

"Mr. Blondin, eh?"

The girl looked bewildered.

"My mother has given me a hint, indeed I've seen, that he would want to
take you away from us!" Richard said.

Harriet, without any show of emotion, looked down, and was silent in
her turn. But it was not, he saw with surprise, the silence of
confusion. On the contrary, she seemed simply a little thoughtful and
puzzled.

"Mr. Carter," she said, presently, "I have reason to believe that Mr.
Blondin would be a very bad husband for Nina. I had no scruple in--in
diverting his thoughts. But if he was the only man in the world"--and
to his surprise, she slowly got to her feet, and spoke as if to
herself, her eyes fixed far away--"I would sooner kill him than marry
him!" she said.

Richard sat genuinely dumfounded. Her beauty, her assurance, and the
cleverness with which she had managed that Blondin's allegiance should
be temporarily shifted from his own daughter, held him mute. It was
with the charm of watching perfect acting that he followed this
extremely amusing and unexpected woman.

"I confess that I am glad to hear it!" he said, drily.

"Nina is very angry at me," Harriet said. "Well, I have to stand that!"

And she gave Nina's father a whimsical and friendly look.

"But what then?" Richard asked. Harriet immediately became serious
again.

"But this," she said, "you know your mother is right. You're all too
kind to me; I am really a member of the family. I love it. I love to
dress for dinner, and order the car, and charge things to your
accounts! But--it's not possible. You see that?"

Richard was quietly looking down. Now he made several parallel lines
with a pencil before he looked up.

"No. I don't see that!"

"Mary--Mrs. Putnam, for instance, who is very fond of me, and Mrs. Jay.
They want to ask me to dinner--to Christmas parties--and they're not
quite comfortable about it. I am not a member of your family even
though you are kind enough to treat me as one. I am a paid employee,
and Madame Carter naturally resents their treating me as anything else.
But most of all," said Harriet, seeing that she was not making headway,
"it's myself. Nina, and your mother, and Mrs. Tabor--it's just a hint
here and there--nothing at all! But it undermines my position--even
with Bottomley. I dress, I entertain your friends, I join you in town;
it makes talk. And I can't--I can't--"

She stood up, and turned her back on him proudly, and he knew that she
was crying.

"Just a minute," Richard said, finding himself more shaken than he
would have believed. "It is--you're sure it isn't Blondin?"

"Royal Blondin!" There was in her tone a pleasant, childish scorn and
indignation that again he thought amusing. She sat down facing him
again, and quite openly dried her eyes, and smiled. "No, it's more
serious," Harriet said. "It means constant irritation for your mother.
It means that she is always in a state of exasperation. I think--I
don't know, but I have reason to think--that she made it a choice, for
Mary Putnam, between us!"

"She has no right to do that," said Richard, soberly.

"I'm not--you know that!--criticizing," Harriet said. The man sighed,
and tossed a few papers on his desk.

"Sometimes I have hoped," he began, on a fresh tack, "that you and the
boy might fancy each other. I'm not satisfied with Ward. He needs an
anchor. That would be a solution for us all!" It was a random shot, but
to his surprise she flushed brightly.

"Ward knows that there is no chance of that," she said, quickly,
"dearly as I love him!"

Richard's eyes widened with whimsical amusement again.

"So you've refused Ward, have you?"

"Long ago," she answered, simply. The man laughed; but a moment later
his face grew dark and troubled again as he said:

"I hardly know what to do! The girl is the first consideration, of
course, and she needs you. I feel that she is not only safe, but happy,
when you are here. My mother needs you, too; she would pay, like the
rest of us, for worrying you out of the house. She couldn't manage
it--bringing Nina into town, ordering her clothes, entertaining the
boy's friends, answering letters--I know what it is! I've unfortunately
reached a place where I've got to feel free. You've heard us all talk
of this new asbestos merger--my dear girl, that will keep me going like
a slave for months, perhaps years! I won't know when I am to be home,
or what I shall have to cancel. I wish I could convince you that a
woman of seventy-five and a girl of seventeen are not exactly a jury--"

"This is the jury!" Harriet said, touching her own breast lightly. He
looked at her sombrely.

"I suppose so! I suppose I can't convince you how badly we need you. My
mother--well, she has always taken life that way; she can't change now.
I shall have Ida Tabor as a fixture here, I suppose, Nina running wild,
Ward never home! You--you give me exactly what I want here! Good
dinners, fires, hospitality, a good report from Nina and Ward; I can
bring men home, I can--" He mused, with a smile touching his fine,
tired face. "In short, I wish there was some fortunate young man
somewhere to make you Mrs. Smith or Jones, Miss Field, and let you come
back to the Carters immediately again!"

Harriet laughed, sighed sharply immediately upon the laugh.

"Unfortunately, there isn't such a man," she said. And she added, "Even
a widow, sometimes, is vulnerable!"

Richard smiled, but some sudden thought made the smile but an absent
one, and he sat quite obviously plunged in meditation for a long
minute. The clock and the fire ticked sleepily, and outside the high
windows the first tentative flutter of snow was melting on bare boughs
and brick walls.

"Here's another suggestion, Miss Field," he said, suddenly, looking up,
"I don't know how this will strike you; it has occurred to me before.
Gardiner hinted it--or I thought he did, and the more I think of it,
the more possible it seems. You are a business woman, and I am a
business man. You know exactly what I am, exactly what occurred in my
married life, after twenty-two years. That--that sort of thing is over,
of course. But there is that way of settling it, if you care to
consider it--"

He paused, with a questioning look of encouragement, embarrassment, and
affectionate interest. Harriet had grown pale, and had fixed her eyes
upon his as if under a spell.

"You mean--" Her voice failed her.

"I mean marriage. I mean that you and I shall quietly get married in a
few weeks, when I am free," he answered. "I have just indicated to you
what it would mean to me. I hope," he added, watching her closely, as
she sat stunned and silent, "I hope that it would also have its
advantages to you. Your position then would be unquestionable, my
mother--Nina--the world, would have nothing to say. I think you know
how thoroughly we all like you, and that my share of our--our business
partnership would be to make you as happy as was in my power. Your
influence on Ward is the one thing that may save the boy. Of Nina we've
already spoken. My mother--I know her!--would immediately become the
champion of her son's wife. There would be a three days' buzzing--that
would end it!"

The swift uprushing of joy in Harriet's heart was accompanied with the
first agonies of renunciation, was perhaps all the more poignantly
sweet because of them. She had not come to this hour without knowing
what he meant to her, this quiet man with the splendid mouth and the
keen gray eyes, and she trembled now with an exquisite emotion that
seemed to drown out all the past and all the future--everything except
that she loved him, and he needed her! But when she spoke it was as
coolly as he:

"Mr. Carter--what of your wife?"

His eyes met hers wearily.

"Divorce proceedings were instituted immediately it was definitely
established she had gone with young Pope. The decree will be absolute."

"But that will not--cannot alter the situation--" Harriet faltered.

"You mean--" the man hesitated "--you mean you--that you regard me as
married still?"

Harriet, mute with emotions absolutely overpowering, nodded without
speaking.

"Will you--will you let me think about it?" she faltered. A sudden
brightness came into his face. "You know how I was brought up to think
of divorce," she went on, pleadingly. "I've made plenty of mistakes in
my life, but I've never deliberately done what I felt was wrong."

"And this would be?" Richard asked, slowly.

"Well--I haven't thought about it!" she answered, slowly. "My
people--my sister and her husband--would say so! I--I would have said
so of some other woman!"

"This would not be an ordinary marriage; you would be entirely your own
mistress," Richard said, with quiet significance. "It would be a
marriage only in the eyes of the world. You--have a higher tribunal!"

"My own, you mean?" she asked, thoughtfully.

"Your own. You would know exactly why this marriage was not in
violation of any code of yours! The world might not acquit you, but you
would know in your own heart."

"I see," she said. "I--I must have time to think about it!"

"As long as you like!" She had risen, and now he rose, too, and went
with her to the library door, and opened it for her. "When you decide,
come and tell me," he said, bowing.

She turned to give him a parting smile, with a desperate wish to tell
him half the honour and joy she would feel in taking his name, in
sharing his responsibilities, but the pleasantly impersonal nod he gave
her chilled the words unspoken. Harriet fled to her room, and to the
porch beyond it, and flinging herself into a basket chair, covered her
face with her two hands, and for half an hour rocked to and fro audibly
gasping, half-laughing, half-crying, almost beside herself with
amazement and excitement.

To be Mrs. Richard Carter--to be Mrs. Richard Carter--to be mistress of
Crownlands, to command the cars and the maids, to enter the opera box
and the big shops--recognized, envied, triumphant--ah, it was a
prospect brilliant enough to dazzle a far more fortunate woman than
Harriet Field! To sign "Harriet Carter," to enter his office with
assurance, to say at the telephone, "Mrs. Carter, if you please--!"

"My chance," whispered Harriet, pressing her cold finger tips to her
hot cheeks again, "my chance at last--and I can't take it! No, I can't
take it--I don't care what his world does or thinks--my world doesn't
permit it! My father would never have spoken to me again--Linda
wouldn't! No--I can't. Not a divorced man, not a man with a living
wife! I've been a fool--I've been wrong, plenty of times, but I've
never committed myself to folly and wrong!"

She stared blindly ahead of her. After awhile she spoke again,
half-aloud:

"Oh, but why does it have to be this way! If I could go to him, tell
him what he means to me, if we were poor--if we could take a little
place next to Linda--never see Nina or his mother or Ward or Roy
again--Oh, what Heaven! How I should love it, planning for things
together, as Linda and Fred did, having him come home to me every night!

"But it isn't that way," Harriet suddenly recalled herself sensibly,
"and it is folly even to think about it! He is a rich man, and a
married man, and that ends it. That ends it."

A great desolation swept her spirit. She fell from bitter musing to
weakening. The law permitted it, after all. Plenty of good women had
shown her the way. The family needed her; she might do good here. And
above all, she loved him. Again the dream triumphed, and she was Mrs.
Carter, young, beautiful, and radiant, taking her place beside him. How
she would watch him, how she would guard him, what a life she would
build for him!

"But no, I mustn't think of that," Harriet said, sternly. "It would be
even different if he loved me. But he made that very clear! He made
that extremely clear! And the fact is this: that I marry a divorced man
the week he is free, a man who does not love me, but who can give me an
establishment! No--no--no--everything I've tried for all my life counts
for very little if I can do that!"

She heard a stirring in the bedroom.

"What time is it, Rosa?" she called, suddenly aware of weakness and
fatigue.

"My goodness, how you frightened me, Miss Field! It's just noon."

"Do you happen to know if Mr. Carter is still downstairs?"

"Yes'm, he is; he's expecting Mr. Fox to come!"

Harriet smoothed her tumbled hair, and went slowly downstairs.

"But I love him!" she said, suddenly standing still on the landing, to
look out at the softly falling snow with brimming eyes. "I love him
with all my soul!"

A moment later she knocked at the library door, opened it in answer to
his call, and went in, closing it behind her.




CHAPTER XIV


There was trouble at Linda's house; trouble so terrible that Harriet's
unexpected arrival caused no comment, caused no more than a weary
flicker of Linda's heavy eyes. Pip, the adored first-born son, lay
dangerously ill, and the whole household moved on tiptoe, heartsick
with dread. Fred, a white and unshaven Fred, was home in the cold gray
midday; the telephone was muted, the hall door stood ajar, the maid was
red-eyed. Harriet, entering with a cheerful call hushed suddenly on her
lips, kissed her brother-in-law while her eyes anxiously questioned
him, and put a heartening arm about Josephine, who came out in a
kitchen apron, and wept pitifully on her aunt's shoulder.

It was diphtheria, very bad, Fred stated lifelessly. Linda hardly left
the room; they were afraid for her, too, "if anything happened." "If
anything happened!" Harriet thought she had heard the phrase a hundred
times before the dreadful night came. The sympathetic neighbours
whispered it, the doctor said it gravely, the nurse muttered it in the
kitchen, and the little sisters, clinging together, faltered it with
trembling lips. The invalid was isolated on the upper floor; Harriet
only waited to get into a thin gown before noiselessly mounting to the
sick room. Linda, sitting beside the haggard little feverish boy,
looked at her sister apathetically, the nurse was glad to whisper
directions and slip away.

A bitter winter afternoon was waning, but the air in Pip's room was
warm, and there was the order and silence of recognized crisis. The
swollen little mouth moved, the heavy eyes; Linda bent above the child.

"What is it, my darling? Mother is right here--"

There was a new note in the passionate, tender voice. Linda was all
alive for the few seconds he needed her, then she sank into her
voiceless apathy again, and the short winter afternoon wore away, and
there was no change. The doctor came, the nurse returned, Fred appeared
at the door. After awhile it was dark, and a shaded lamp was lighted,
and Harriet went downstairs, to the world of subdued voices, and
smothered sobs, and fearful glances. And always horror brooded over the
little house, and over the simple, normal family living that had been
so taken for granted a few days before.

Harriet talked to the little girls, and while they were going to bed
amused Nammy, whose lighter attack of the disease, a week ago, had
begun the siege. Fred, tenderly attempting to reassure his daughters,
buttoned his small son into woollen sleeping-wear, brought the
inevitable drink, heard the garbled prayers, glancing now and then
toward the door, as if fearing a summons, and looking, Harriet thought,
stooped and gray and suddenly old.

She took Linda's place for an hour, but before it was up the mother
came back, and they kept their vigil together. Fred answered the
strange, untimely ringing of the door-bell, brought in packages,
conferred in the halls with the doctors. Midnight came, two o'clock,
four o'clock.

Suddenly there was panic. Harriet, by chance in the hall, saw Linda and
Fred and the doctors together, heard Linda's quick, anguished "Yes!"
and Fred's hoarse "Anything!" Her heart pounded; the nurse ran
upstairs. Harriet fell upon her knees with a sobbing whisper,
"No--no--no!" and Linda clung to her husband with a cry torn, from the
deeps of her heart, "Oh, Pip--my own boy!"

They were all needed; they were back in the sick room, there was hurry,
quick whispers, breathless replies. No time to think now, though
Harriet cast more than one agonized glance at Linda's drawn face, and
nodded more than once to Fred that she should not be here. The child
protested with a choked cry; and Linda's voice, that new, deep,
terrible voice, answered him, "Never mind, my dearest--just a minute,
that's all! Mother is taking care of you!" And Harriet heard her sister
say, in a breath almost inaudible: "Thy will be done--Thy will be done!"

 Dawn came slowly and reluctantly at seven; the village lay bleak
and closed under a sky of unbroken gray. Here and there smoke streamed
upward from a chimney, or a window-pane showed an oblong of pale light.
The dirty snow, frozen in thick lumps about the yard, was trodden by a
furtive black cat, that mounted a fence and meowed desolately.

Harriet saw this from Linda's kitchen, when she put out the light that
was becoming unnecessary. But her heart was singing for joy, and the
house was brimful of an inner light and cheer that no winter bleakness
could touch. The girl had been crying until she was almost blind, but
it was a crying mixed with laughter and prayers of utter thankfulness.
She and Fred had built up a roaring fire, had given the nurse a royal
breakfast, had had their own coffee, and now Harriet was waiting for
Linda, in that mood when the commonplaces of life take on an exquisite
flavour, and just to be free to eat and sleep and live is luxury.

She met Linda at the door, a weary Linda, ghastly as to face, grayer as
to straggling hair, but with such radiance in her eyes that Harriet,
clasped in her arms, began to cry again.

"What YOU need is coffee!" she faltered, trying to laugh, as Linda sat
down and rested her head in her hands.

"Oh, Harriet--if I can ever thank God enough!" Pip's mother said,
beginning on her breakfast with one long sigh. "Oh, my dear--! He's
sleeping like a baby, God bless him, and dear old Fred is sleeping,
too. Oh, Harriet, to go about the house, as I just have, covering Nammy
and the girls, and feeling that we're all going to be together again,
in a few days--my dear, I don't know what I've done to be so blessed!
My boy, who has never given any one one moment's care or trouble since
he was born--my darling, who looked up at me yesterday with his
beautiful eyes--"

The floodgates were loosed, and Linda laughed and cried, while she
enjoyed her breakfast with the appetite of a normal woman released from
cruel strain, whose whole brood lies safely sleeping under her roof.
Nammy's light illness, Pip's wet feet, Linda's unwillingness to believe
that it was anything but a cold, every hour of the four awful days of
danger, she reviewed them all. And oh, the goodness of people, the
solicitude of nurse and doctor, the generosity of God!

"Fred has been a miracle," said Linda, with her third cup of coffee,
"this will cost him five hundred dollars, but Harriet, I'll never
forget the way his voice rang out yesterday, 'I don't want you to think
of anything but giving me back my boy!' And Harriet, only ten days
ago--it seems ten years--I felt so terribly, I ACTED so terribly, about
that old house that I've been wanting so long! They sold it at auction,
and the Paysons got it for forty-three hundred, and I was perfectly
sick that Fred wouldn't bid! But now," said Linda, reverently, putting
her arm about Josephine, who came yawning into the kitchen, in her blue
wrapper, "now, if the Father spares me my girls and boys, and their
daddy, I shall never ask anything happier than this! Pip's better, Jo,"
she said to the child, who was kissing her dreamily, over and over,
"they put a tube in his throat last night, and saved him for us! And
now Mother must get a bath, and change, and perhaps some sleep, and
then go back and stay with him when he wakes up!" It was the afternoon
of the next day when Harriet could first speak of her own affairs. Pip,
recuperating with the amazing speed of childhood, was asleep, the other
children walking, the nurse gone. She could lay the whole matter before
Linda, who listened, over her mending, nodded, pursed her lips, or
raised her eyebrows.

If Linda might ever have been worldly minded, she had had her lesson
now, and the viewpoint she gave Harriet was the lofty one of a woman
who has faced a supreme sacrifice without shrinking and with unwavering
faith.

"You did right, dear," she assured her sister. "You could not stay
there, under the circumstances. Whatever their code is, yours is
different, yours has not been vitiated by luxury and idleness. As for
Mr. Carter's talk of marriage, that, of course, is simply an insult!"

"No, I don't think it was that," Harriet said, feeling herself revolt
inwardly at this plain speaking. She listened to Linda; she knew Linda
was right, but she fought an almost overwhelming impulse to say rudely,
"Oh, shut up, you don't know what you're talking about."

"I don't see what else it could be," Linda pursued, serenely. "A
married man--you would be no better than his--well, it's not a nice
word--but his mistress!"

"Not at all," Harriet said, trying hard to hide the irritation that
rose rebellious within her, "he is legally free, or will be soon, and
so am I!"

"I am speaking of God's law, not man's," Linda said, gently but
awfully, and Harriet was silent. "Fred says that such men regard these
matters far too lightly," Linda finished. Fred's name, thus introduced,
always had the effect of angering Harriet. She was suffering cruelly,
in these days, and moral reflections held small consolation for her.
She was homesick with an aching, gnawing homesickness that arose with
her in the morning, and went to bed with her at night; under everything
she said and did was the longing for Crownlands, for just one more word
or look from Richard Carter.

She had shared the family exaltation over Pip's recovery, and had
thought more than once in that fearful night of his illness that even
poverty, gray hairs, and the agony of parenthood, shared with the man
she loved, would have been ecstasy to her. But in the slow days and
weeks that followed, her spirit became exhausted with the struggle that
never ended within her. Her bridges were burned behind her; it was all
over. Whatever her emotions had been in leaving Crownlands, the
Carters' feelings had been quite obvious and simple. Old Madame Carter
had wished her well; Ward had written from college that he thought it
was "rotten," and that she had been a corker to get Dad to raise his
allowance for him; Nina had felt her own wings the stronger for the
change; and Richard had interrupted his little speech of regret twice
to answer the telephone, and had given her a check that placed, it
seemed to Harriet, the obligation permanently with her. The utter
desolation of spirit with which she had left them was evidently
unshared; the only word she had had from that old life had been from
Mary Putnam, and even this cordial note jarred Harriet with its frank
revelation of the change in her position. Mary wrote:

I telephoned Mr. Carter for your address, and he reports them all well.
I wanted to tell you that I am giving you a tremendous reputation with
Kane Bassett, who wants someone to be with his little girls. You know
their mother died, and the grandmother lives in England. It would be a
beautiful thing for you if I could manage it. The Putnams are all full
of happy plans for a month at Nassau, as usual running away from
January in New York.

Harriet looked at the two words that stood for Richard Carter, and her
heart beat thickly.

"I can't keep this up!" she told herself, playing games with little
convalescent Pip, walking over frozen roads with the girls, reading
under the evening lamp. "I can't keep this up! Twenty-seven, and a
governess, and in love with a married man who does not know I am
alive!" summarized Harriet, bitterly. "I will simply have to forget it,
and begin again, that's all."

And she meditated upon David, the excellent, steady, devoted David, who
was Fred's brother and a dentist in Brooklyn, and who gave the children
wonderful holidays at Asbury Park. It would make Linda and Fred very
happy to have her change toward him: they were a little hurt and silent
about David. He always went with them to the crowded beach where they
spent July and August, had had a car this year, Linda told her sister,
and had been "so popular."

Harriet would look off from her book; David's nearness did not hold the
thrill, the shaking, the happy suffusion of colour that the most casual
remembered glance of Richard Carter still possessed. No, she was richer
in her memory of Richard--

"I think you're a wonder! Don't you think Fred is a wonder!" Linda
would say. Fred's precious bank-account had been almost wiped out now;
he made evening calculations with a sharp pencil. But what was a
bank-account to a Pip coming downstairs on Christmas Day, shaky but
gay, in his wrapper, and glad to be with the family again?

David was there, Christmas Day, and there was a fire and a tree, happy
children everywhere, rosy little neighbours coming in to see the toys,
snowy wet garments spread on the porch after church. David took Harriet
walking in the fresh cold air, a Harriet so beautiful in her furry hat
and long coat, with her brilliant cheeks and her blue eyes shining
under a blown film of golden hair, that Linda, as she basted the turkey
in the hot kitchen, couldn't help a little prayer that that would all
come out "right."

"But, Davy dear!" Harriet and David had stopped short in the exquisite,
silent woods. "There is a feeling--a something that makes marriage
RIGHT! And I haven't it, that's all!"

"How do you know you haven't?" he said, smiling.

"Well---" She looked up bravely; David knew her whole story. "I've had
it!"

"You don't mean that old feeling ten years ago? My dear girl, that
wasn't love! That was just a little girl's first feeling. But look at
Fred and Linda after seventeen years. Why, it's sacred--it's holy.
Harriet, if once you said you would, it would COME. Why, that's the
very proof that you're as fine--as sensitive as you are--that you don't
feel it now. But, Harriet," his arm was about her now, his voice close
to her ear "don't let those years with rich people spoil you for the
real thing, dear! Think of our hunting for an apartment--Fred and I
haven't Mother to care for now; I've some of her good old mahogany, we
could pick out cretonnes and things--think of next summer, all
together, down at the beach! Linda's children---"

She looked up at him, with something wistful in her blue eyes.

"Sounds nice, Davy!" she said, childishly. Instantly she saw leap to
his face the look he had hidden so many years; she heard a new ring in
his voice.

"Ah--you darling! You will? You'll let me tell them---?"

"No, no, no!" Half-angry, half-sorry, she put away his embrace.
"I'll--Davy, I hate to spoil your Christmas Day--I don't know what to
say! I'll think about it!"

"And tell me--it's noon now---" He took out his watch.

"Oh, David, you make me feel as if I were catching a train!"

"And so you are, the Matrimonial Limited!" He would have his kiss, but
only caught it where the bright hair mingled with the dark fur of her
cap. Then she turned to go home, forbidding the topic imperatively,
meeting every buoyant hint with a suddenly serious warning. Her heart
was lead within her.

"I suppose there's no help for it," she thought, in a panic. "Linda'll
see--it'll all be out in five seconds!"

But Linda met them at the door, full of an announcement.

"Harriet, Mr. Carter is here!"

"Mr.--WHO?"

Back came the tide with a great rush, nothing else mattered. For a
moment Harriet was turned to stone. Then in a dream of radiance and
delight she went into the little parlour, and Richard Carter stood up
to greet her, and there was nobody else in the world. Linda had
introduced herself; David was introduced. Harriet glanced about
helplessly; he had not come here to say "Merry Christmas," surely.

"I suggested that Hansen take the little people for a five-minutes'
drive," he explained, "and then I shall have to hurry back. I wanted to
speak to you on a matter of business, Miss Field. I wonder--since
you're well wrapped--if we might walk to the corner and meet them; I'll
only steal you from your family for five minutes."

"Certainly!" Harriet's heart was singing. The voice, the pleasantly
certain manner, the firm, kind mouth--she drank in a fresh impression
as if she had been starving! She was hardly conscious of what he said;
it was enough that he had sought her out, that she was to have one more
word with him.

"I came here to discuss my own plans, Miss Field," he said at the gate,
"but a hint from your sister has made me fear that perhaps I am too
late. She tells me that you may be making plans of your own."

"David?" Harriet said, resentfully. "I have no plans with David!" she
said, simply.

"I didn't know," Richard answered. "I came to ask you to come back.
Things are in an absolute mess with us. We have not had a serene moment
since you left us--three weeks ago."

To go back--back to Crownlands! Harriet's spirit soared. She had been
strong enough to leave, to leave Nina's young impertinence, and Madame
Carter's coldness, but she knew she must go back! She had only
despaired of their ever needing her again. Every fibre of her being
strained toward the old life.

"Linda, my sister, thinks it would be unwise," she began. The man
interrupted her.

"There has been a new turn of events, Miss Field. I had some
information last night which may make a difference," he said, gravely.
"I received a wire from Pope, in France. My wife--Isabelle--died on an
operating table yesterday afternoon, in Paris."

Harriet, stupefied, could only look at him fixedly for a long minute.
Her lips parted, but she did not speak.

"DIED?" she whispered, sharply. The man nodded without speaking.
"But--but what was it?" Harriet said.

For answer he gave her the crumpled cable, with the bare statement of
fact. She read it dazedly, looked at his sombre face, and read it again.

"I need not tell you that it is a shock," Richard said, looking off
toward the bare village in its mantle of trampled snow. "It--it is--a
shock." And he folded the cable and returned it to his pocket. "We were
married twenty-three years," he said, simply. "She was an extremely
pretty girl, vivacious and happy--I imagine hers was a happy life!"

"I can't believe it!" Harriet said.

"Well, now," Richard began presently in a different tone, "we are, as I
said, Miss Field, in a mess. I haven't told the children this; they
have a lot of young people there over Christmas. Bottomley tells me
that he is leaving on the first. My mother and Nina are planning some
entertainment for New Year's night, and I suppose this will end all
that; I should suppose that Nina and her brother must have a period of
mourning. I am deeply involved in a big project in Brazil, committee
meetings all through January--I can't swing it, that's all.

"Now, when we last talked of the subject together," Richard pursued in
a businesslike way, "you objected to the suggestion of a marriage,
because my wife was then still alive. Am I correct?"

"Yes, that's correct!" Harriet said, voicelessly. She felt herself
beginning to tremble.

"My purpose in coming to-day was to suggest that, if that was your sole
objection," the man continued, painstakingly, "you might feel the
situation changed now. I need you. We all do. If it is my mother who
makes it impossible, or some other thing that I cannot change--why, I
must get along as best I can. But my proposition is that you and I are
quietly married to-morrow; you come back to-morrow night, and announce
it whenever you see fit. Of course, it might be wiser not to have the
two announcements come together; there will be the usual talk; Nina and
my mother prostrated; and so on, and perhaps--but you must use your own
judgment there. I may seem a little matter-of-fact about this, Miss
Field, but I am hoping you understand. You have impressed me as a woman
of unusual intelligence and sagacity; I am making you an unsentimental
business offer. I need you in my life and I offer you certain
advantages which it would be silly and school-boyish for me to deny I
possess. I have a certain standing in the community which even Mrs.
Carter's madness has not seemed to impair seriously. The boy and the
girl both love you, and you have my warmest friendship. As for the
financial end there will be the usual provision made for you in case of
my death and I will make the same monthly arrangement with you that I
had with Isabelle. I mention these matters so that you may understand
that your position in my household will be as free and independent as
was Isabella's. I do not know whether you will consider this a fair
return for what I ask, for after all you are giving your services for
life to the Carter household--

"Now, this is of course entirely subject to what pleases you in the
matter," he broke off to say emphatically. "I merely throw it out as a
suggestion. It would please me very much. I would draw a long breath of
relief to have it settled. Mrs. Tabor is there--stays there; takes the
head of my table. I spent last night at the club; I had cabled
Pope--and expected an answer, but my mother telephoned me at three
o'clock this morning to say that Ward and some of his friends had gone
out ice-skating. Ward's been dropped from his university. I can't have
that sort of thing, you know!"

"When--did you want me?" Harriet brought her beautiful eyes back from
some far vista.

"To-morrow?" he said, with sudden hope in his voice.

"To-morrow!" the girl echoed, in a dream.

"I thought that if you could meet me at my office to-morrow, I would
have all the arrangements made. Nina is to be at the Hawkes'; I send
the car for her at three. I thought that you and she could go home
together to Crownlands. I'll have to be in town that night."

"Home--to Crownlands!" Suddenly Harriet's lip quivered, and her eyes
brimmed with tears. "I'll be very glad to go back," she said, in a low
voice.

"Good!" he said. "I needn't tell you how I feel about it, it helps me
out tremendously. Now, about to-morrow, how would you like that to be?"

"Well," she laughed desperately through her tears. "We're Church of
England!" She laughed again when he took out his notebook and wrote the
words down.

"Once it's done," he said, reassuringly, "you'll see my mother and all
the rest of them come into line! It puts you in a definite position,
and although I may seem to be rushing and confusing you now, there is a
more peaceful time to come--we'll HOPE!" he added, grimly. "Here's
Hansen now. Lovely children," he added, of the young Davenports and
some intimates who were tumbling out of the car, "lovely mother."

"You'll not speak of this yet?" Harriet said, suddenly thinking of
David and Linda. "My sister might think it lacked deliberation--so
close upon Mrs. Carter's death. I'd rather have a little time, get
things straightened out---"

"Oh, certainly--certainly!" She could see he was relieved, was indeed
in cheerful spirits, as he gave his furred hand to the children's
mittened ones. They thanked him shrilly and Hansen smiled warmly upon
Harriet as he touched his cap. Then they were gone. Linda, watching
from the window, thought that the chauffeur's obvious respect for
Harriet was rather impressive. She came to the porch, and Richard waved
his farewell to them en masse.

"He's very nice," said Linda. "Poor fellow, he probably would have had
an entirely different moral code, if his life had been different!"
Harriet inwardly writhed, but she did not stir in the sisterly embrace
of Linda's arm. "Now if he would marry this Mrs. Tabor, whoever she
is," Linda resumed, comfortably, "that would be quite suitable! Then
you could go back with perfect propriety--"

"Oh, HUSH, for Heaven's sake!" Harriet said, in the deeps of her being.
But she said nothing aloud as they turned back into the warm house.

Fred's face was radiant; for no apparent purpose he caught his
sister-in-law in his arms as she passed him, and kissed the top of her
hair.

"Here--here--here--what's all this!" Linda laughed.

"Nothing at all!" Fred said, evidently in boisterous spirits. Harriet
looked sharply at David, but he was innocently laying train tracks for
little Nammy. But she suspected at once that the elder brother had had
a hint that matters were at least under consideration, and the rather
aimless laugh with which Linda presently embraced her, and the air of
suppressed excitement that marked the Christmas dinner, all confirmed
the suspicion. She felt a prickling sensation of the skin; a flush of
helpless annoyance.




CHAPTER XV


At three o'clock the next afternoon, Nina Carter, leaving the Hawkes'
mansion in New York City, with a great many laughing farewells,
descended to her father's waiting car, and discovered, sitting therein,
an extremely handsome young woman, furred and trimly veiled, and deep
in pleasant conversation with Hansen.

"Miss Harriet!" Nina ejaculated, in a tone that betrayed a vague
resentment as well as a definite surprise.

"Nina, dear!" Harriet accepted Nina's kiss warmly. "Are you glad to see
me?" And as Nina stumbled in, and established herself, Harriet
continued easily, "Your father and I had a talk, my dear, and he
suggested that I come back for awhile. So Hansen picked me up at the
office, and here I am! He tried to telephone you, I know, but you were
out. And now," said Harriet, glancing at her wrist watch, "I think we
will go right home, please, Hansen!"

Nina had been her own mistress for several delicious weeks, and to have
any sort of restriction again was very unpalatable to her. Harriet
could almost have laughed at her discomfiture, although she was sorry
for her, too. Nina smiled and listened with notable effort; Harriet
knew she was chagrined.

She sulked all the way home, and Madame Carter, meeting them at
Crownlands, gazed rather stonily at the newcomer, granting her only the
briefest greeting. But oh, how homelike and welcoming the beautiful
place, mantled in snow, looked to Harriet's eyes. The snapping fires,
the warmth and fragrance of the big rooms, and the very obvious welcome
of the maids, all were enchanting to her. Her first duty was to make a
brief tour below stairs, after which she went up to her own room.

When they returned from Huntington in the fall, she and Nina at
Richard's suggestion had taken Isabelle's handsome rooms, turning both
into bedrooms, and sharing the dressing rooms and bath that joined
them. It was here that Harriet found Nina awaiting her, still with her
hat on, and loitering with obvious discomfiture. There had been no
actual changes in her room except that the personal touch was gone.
Bottomley had put her bags here, and Nina spoke first of them.

"You've got a new suitcase?"

"Yes, I got that this morning; isn't it stunning?" Harriet eyed its
shiny blackness with satisfaction. "I had to get a gown or two," she
added, "and some little things! We've been so quiet at Mrs. Davenport's
that I hadn't any new clothes. Pip was ill, you know."

"Miss Harriet!" Nina said with a rush. "You're so sweet about things
like this, I wonder if you will mind taking the yellow guest room--it's
really much larger--and leaving this room? You see when I have
friends--"

Harriet, at the dressing table, had raised her hands to remove her hat.
Like any general, she realized the crisis of the apparently unimportant
moment, and met it by instinct.

"But you have an extra bed, besides the couch, in your room, Nina!"

Nina cleared her throat, threw back her head, regarded Harriet between
half-closed eyelids in a manner Harriet realized was new, and drawled:

"I know. But if you would be so very kind---?"

"Do you know, I'm afraid I shan't be so very kind!" Harriet said,
briskly. "You're one of my duties here, you know, little girl, and I
think Daddy would prefer to have me near you! Now, if you like to ask
him, perhaps he'll not agree with me; in which case I shall move
immediately! But meanwhile--" She picked up a thick book from the
table, read the title idly: "'Secret Memoirs of the Favourites of the
French Courts!' Where on earth did you get this?" she asked, surprised.
'"Five Dollars Net,'" she mused, glancing through it. "How well I know
this sort of rubbish! There are thousands of them on the market,
exquisitely printed, beautifully bound, and just so much--rot! Secret
memoirs of the favourites of the French Courts indeed! Most of them
hadn't the brains to write a decent note!" scoffed Harriet, cheerfully.

Nina's face was scarlet; she left the room abruptly. A moment or two
later Harriet sauntered into the adjoining room, and found her again.
The younger girl was assuming a ruffled and beribboned negligee, and
tossing her wraps and street dress about carelessly. Harriet noted this
with disapproving eyes, but said nothing. There was an immense picture
of Mrs. Tabor on the dressing table, and she found in that a sudden
solution of the strange change in Nina.

"'With Ladybird's unending devotion, to Ninette,'" read Harriet, from
the inky scrawl across the picture. "Do you call her Ladybird, Nina?
You and she have formed a pretty strong friendship, haven't you?"

"Oh, something more than that!" Nina drawled in her new manner. But,
being Nina, she could not resist the desire to display the new
possession. She jerked open a desk drawer, and Harriet saw thick
letters, still in their envelopes, and tied in bundles. "We write each
other almost every day!" said Nina, yawning, as she flung herself down
upon a couch, and reached for a book.

"I should fancy she would make a loyal friend," Harriet observed,
generously. Nina softened a little, although her voice was still
carefully bored and arrogant when she spoke:

"Oh, she's the best sort!"

It was one of Mrs. Tabor's phrases, Harriet recognized. She moved
easily about the room, picking up other handsome, superbly illustrated
volumes: "An American Woman in the Sultan's Harem," "A Favourite of
Kings."

"Does she have my room when she is here?" Harriet presently suggested,
sympathetically. "Now, my dear," she added, as Nina's quick
self-conscious and hostile look gave consent, "Mrs. Tabor is too
thoroughly acquainted with convention to blame you if your father keeps
you under a governess's eye for a little while longer. You're the most
precious thing your father has, Nina, and as I used to remind you years
ago, you don't begin to have the restrictions that the European
princesses have to bear!"

This view of the case was always pleasing to Nina's vanity; she was
quite clever enough to see that a friend protected and confined,
watched and valued, would lose no prestige with the charming
"Ladybird." She pouted; and Harriet saw that for the moment the battle
was hers.

"Darling gown!" said Harriet of the picture.

"Oh, she has the most wonderful clothes!" It was the old Nina's voice.
"She doesn't spend much, but she goes to the BEST places, and they know
her there, and the women at Hatson's will say, 'I've got a gown for
you, Mrs. Tabor!' She picked out this negligee, and she picked out
another gown for me that you haven't seen. That was one thing that made
trouble between her and her husband," Nina said, eagerly. "She can't
help looking smart, and he used to get so jealous, and she told me that
she told the judge exactly what she spent for clothes the last year,
and he said that that was less than his wife spent, mind you, and he
said he didn't know how she did it! And that was the judge, that had
never laid eyes on her before! She used to cry and cry, after she got
her divorce, because she said that she thought there was a sort of
disgrace about it. But this judge in Nevada said that a man like Jack
Tabor ought to be horsewhipped!"

"Has she--been here very much?" Harriet said, after a moment.

"Oh, lots! She loves to be here, and I can't think why," Nina said,
"because people are all crazy to get her, and she could go to the most
wonderful dinners and things. But she really is just like a girl,
herself; sometimes we burst right out laughing, because we think
exactly the same about things! And she just loves picnics, and to let
her hair down--and she's so funny! You'll just love her when you know
her--"

Nina, Harriet reflected, had had a thorough dose of poison. It would
take, like many diseases, more poison to cure her, a counter dose.
Going to her room to change to one of the new gowns, Harriet had a
moment of contempt for the new-found intimate, who could so
unscrupulously play upon the girl's hungry soul. But with this
situation it was possible to cope; there was definite comfort in the
fact that Nina had not mentioned Royal Blondin.

Brave in the new gown, whose lustreless black velvet made even more
brilliant her matchless skin, Harriet went to find Ward. She met
instead one of his house-guests, Corey Eaton, a man some years older
than Ward, a big, rawboned, unscrupulous youth, with a wild and
indiscriminate laugh. Mr. Eaton, greeting her enthusiastically,
admitted frankly that he was just up from bed, and that he had been
"lit up like a battleship" last night, and that he still felt the
effects of it.

"Mr. Eaton," Harriet said, in an undertone, making another strategic
decision, "come in here to the library, will you? I want to speak to
you."

"When you speak to me thus," said Corey Eaton, passionately, "I can
refuse you naught!"

But he sobered instantly into tremendous gravity at Harriet's first
confidence. She told him simply of Isabelle's death.

"Well, that surely is rotten--the poor old boy!" said Corey,
affectionately. "Ward's mad about his mother, too! Well, say, what do
you know about that? We'll beat it, Miss Field, Nixon and I. We came in
my car and we'll go to the Jays' for dinner. Say, that is tough,
though, isn't it?"

It was not eloquent, but it was sincere, and Harriet made her thanks so
personal and so flattering that the young man could only fervently push
his plans for departure, swearing secrecy, and evidently touched by
being taken into her confidence. The fastnesses were yielding one after
another; Harriet could have laughed as she left him at the foot of the
stairs. Bottomley respectfully addressed her as she turned back into
the hall:

"Miss Field, I wonder if you'd be so good--?"

She nodded, and accompanied him instantly into the pantry where they
could be alone.

"It's Madame," said Bottomley, bitterly, "she's just 'ad me up there
agine, it's really tryin'--that's what it is. It's tryin'! Now she'ad
to'ave her say about you bein' at table, Miss Field. I says that you
'ad stipulited that you WAS to be there. Now, I says, and I says it
arbitrarily like, and yet I says it respectful, too---"

"Now, just wait one moment, Bottomley," Harriet said, soothingly. "I
want to talk to you and Pilgrim. Is she in her room? Suppose we go
there?"

Pleased with the consideration in her manner, the outraged Bottomley
led the way. Mrs. Bottomley was enjoying a solitary cup of tea; she
bustled hospitably for more cups.

"I want to tell you that your comin' has taken a load off my soul,"
said Pilgrim, a gray, round-visaged woman who had a sentimental heart,
"and so I said to Mr. Carter not three days since! I know that
Bottomley," said Pilgrim with an Englishwoman's admiring look for her
lord, "would never have spoke so harsh if he had but known you might
come back. It's been very bad, indeed, Miss, since you went, as we was
tellin' you a bit back. Impudence, orders this way and that, confusion
and what not, and Mr. Ward very wild, really very wild, and so at last
Bottomley said he couldn't stand it."

"I'm hoping he will reconsider that," Harriet said, pleasantly, with a
glance at the face Bottomley tried to make inflexible. "For I'm going
to tell you two old friends some news. We have always been friends,
haven't we?" said Harriet.

"It would be 'ard to be anything else, and I've said it before this!
It's a different 'ouse with you in it!" Bottomley said. Pilgrim,
rocking to and fro, clasped Harriet's hand to her breast, and beamed.
With no further preamble Harriet announced Isabelle's death.

The servants were naturally shocked. There were a few moments of
ejaculatory and sorrowful surprise. Her that was so young and so
'andsome, and went off so bold and high! It didn't seem possible, so
far away from 'ome and all.

When this had died away, Harriet had more news.

"I'm going to tell you two something," she began. "You are the very
first to know, and I know you'll be glad. Before I left the house last
October, Mr. Carter did me the--the great honour to ask me to--to marry
him."

It gave her inward delight even to voice it; it made the miracle seem
more real. Bottomley and Pilgrim exchanged stupefied glances in a dead
silence.

"I met him at eleven o'clock to-day," Harriet finished, simply, "and we
drove to Greenwich in Connecticut, and we were married at one o'clock."

Bottomley and Pilgrim glanced again at each other, glanced at Harriet,
opened their mouths slowly.

Then Pilgrim dropped the hand she was familiarly caressing, and
Bottomley rose slowly to his feet.

"Oh, no!" Harriet said, flushing in utter confusion and with a nervous
laugh. "Oh, please! Please sit down, Bottomley, and please don't either
of you think that it has made any difference. Although I am Mrs. Carter
now, I'm still Miss Nina's companion!"

"To think of you bein' Mrs. Carter!" Pilgrim marvelled in a whisper.

"Oh, sh--sh--sh! You mustn't say it even!" Harriet caught both their
hands. "No one must know. I only told you so that you would help me, so
that you would understand! There will be no change, anywhere--"

Bottomley shook a dazed head; but Pilgrim looked at the other woman
with kindly eyes, and presently said:

"Well, now, it's hard on you, so young and pretty and all, and goin'
right on as if you wasn't married a bit!"

Harriet only smiled, but she blinked black lashes that the little touch
of sympathy had suddenly made wet. And presently when Bottomley was
gone, and she about to follow him, she laid one hand on Pilgrim's broad
black alpaca shoulder, and said:

"I had my own reasons, Pilgrim, you know. Reasons that make it all
seem--right, to me!"

"Well, why wouldn't you?" Pilgrim said, approvingly. "You'd have been a
very silly girl not to take him, and--as I always tell the
girls--love'll come fast enough afterwards!"

The words came back to Harriet, hours later, when the house was quiet,
and when, comfortably wrapped in a loose silk robe, she was musing
beside her fire. Nina was asleep; to Ward, who was headachy and
feverish, she had paid a late visit. He had been sick enough, after the
revel of Christmas Eve, to summon a doctor to-day; and was dozing
restlessly now, under the effect of a sedative. Madame Carter had not
come down to dinner, and when Harriet had sent in a message, had asked
to be excused from any calls, even from Nina and Miss Field, this
evening.

Nina had chattered constantly during the meal. Granny had had a
terrible time with them all. And Ward and Nina and "Royal"--the name
suddenly leaped between them again--had been arrested for speeding. And
Daddy had threatened Nina with a boarding-school, and Granny had cried.

"Where is Mr. Blondin now, Nina?" Harriet had asked.

"Oh, he's round!" Nina had said, airily. "I suppose you put Daddy up to
saying that I wasn't to see so much of him!" she had added, with her
worldly wise drawl.

"Not at all," Harriet had said.

"Ladybird and I are planning a trip," Nina had further confided. "I
shall be eighteen in February, you know, and we want to go round the
world. Would'nt it be wonderful to go with her, for she's been about
fifty times!"

"Wonderful!" Harriet had been obliged to concede.

"You know"-and Nina, in good spirits, had put her arm about Harriet as
they left the table--"you know, some day I'd love to do it with you!"
she had said, soothingly. "And some day we will, for I mean to travel a
great deal. But just now--she spoke of it, you know. And it would be
such an unusual opportunity. We're going to Algiers--and Athens--Mr.
Blondin is making out the list for us, and wouldn't it be fun if he
could go, too? He's afraid he can't, but if he could--!"

"But, dearest child, what does your father think?"

"Father--" Nina had shrugged regretfully. "But I shall be of age!" she
had reminded her companion.

"Yes, I know, dear, but Father's ward for another three years, you
know!"

"Why, Ladybird says"--the girl had been ready, and had spoken with
flushed cheeks--"Ladybird says that in that case we'll go anyway, and
she'll pay all expenses! That's the kind of friend SHE is!"

And Nina had flounced to a telephone, and had telephoned her friend in
New York, laughing, coquetting, and murmuring for a blissful half hour.

"Love'll come fast enough afterward!" Pilgrim had said, and Harriet
thought Pilgrim was rather a wise woman, in her homely way. The girl
stirred the fire and settled herself to watch it again.

After what? Well, certainly not after anything so short, simple, and
unconvincing as that three minutes with the clergyman to-day. The utter
unreality of that had seemed to blend with the silent, snowy day, and
with the dulled and dreamy condition of her own brain. Snow was falling
softly when she had met Richard Carter at the office, at half-past ten,
and snow lisped against the windows of the limousine as they two, with
Irving Fox, Richard's kindly, middle-aged, confidential clerk, were
whirled out of the city, and on and on through the bare little wintry
towns. They had all talked together, sometimes of herself and her
sister, sometimes of Nina and Ward, of Fox's amazing grandchildren, and
of business. Fox had had some papers to which they occasionally
referred; the old clerk was the only person to congratulate Harriet
warmly when the brief and bewildering business was over and she had her
wedding ring. It was alone with Fox that she made the return trip.
Richard came back by train, saving an hour, and was at the office when
they got there. Harriet did not see him again; he was in conference;
and presently she quietly got back into the motor-car, and on her way
to meet Nina she slipped the plain circle of gold into her hand bag.

She had it out to-night, and put it on her bare, pretty hand, and held
it to the fire, and slowly the events of the bewildering and tiring day
wheeled before her, and only the reality of the ring assured her that
it was not all a confused dream. Married! And all alone before the
glowing coals, weary from hostile encounters, on her marriage night!
Ward, to be sure, was always her champion, but Ward was drinking
heavily just now, and her influence was none the stronger because he
admired her while she held him at arm's-length. Nina was all ready to
flame into defiance, and the old lady's message had not been reassuring.

"But Bottomley and Pilgrim will stand by me!" Harriet said, with a
shaky laugh. She looked about the beautiful familiar room, the room
that had been Isabelle's for so many years, and wondered to think of
Isabelle, lying dead so far away, and a usurper already holding her
name and place.

She had intended to write to Linda to-night; Linda was vexed with her,
and small wonder! For Harriet had left the little New Jersey house
almost without farewells, had come down to an earlier breakfast even
than Fred's, and had said briefly that she was returning to the
Carters, and would see them all soon.

Why hadn't she told Linda? Well, for one reason, she had hardly
believed her own memory of the talk on Christmas Day with Richard. Then
she had feared opposition, feared Linda's shocked references to decent
intervals of mourning; Linda's frank unbelief that there was no strong
personal feeling involved on Richard's part; Linda's advice to a bride.

Harriet's face burned at the mere thought of it. No, she couldn't tell
Linda yet; she was too tired to write to-night, anyway. Linda and Fred
had not been at all approving, Christmas night. David had reproached
her, had disappeared earlier than was expected or necessary; they had
not failed of their suspicions.

"Well! I must go to bed," she said aloud, suddenly. She stood, one
elbow on the mantel, her beautiful eyes fixed on the dying fire. It was
midnight, the room and the house very still. Outside the snow was still
falling--falling. Her loose gown slipped back from the round young arm,
fell in folds about the slender figure; her rich hair was braided, and
hung in a rope of gold over one shoulder. Her smoke-blue eyes,
heavy-lidded in a rather white face, met their own gaze in the mirror.
"It isn't exactly what I expected marriage to be," mused Harriet,
smiling at the exquisite vision upon which no other eyes would fall.
"But after all," she said to herself, beginning to move about with last
preparations for bed, "I'm married to the man I love--nothing can
change that. And if he doesn't love me, he likes me. I've done nothing
wrong, and if my life is just a little different from most women's,
why, I shall have to make the best of it! And I did tell him--I did
tell him--"

And her thoughts went back to the first few minutes she had spent in
Richard's office that day. They had been alone, discussing the last
details of their astonishing plan, when she had suddenly taken the
plunge.

"Mr. Carter, there is just one thing! Of course," Harriet's cheeks had
flamed, "of course, this marriage of ours is not the usual marriage,
and yet, there is just one thing of which I would like to speak to you
before we--we go up to Greenwich." And finding his gray eyes pleasantly
fixed upon her she had gone on, confused but determined: "I'm
twenty-seven now-and perhaps I might have married some other man before
this--except that-when I was seventeen-I did fall in love with a man!
And we were to be married--!" She had stopped short; it was incredibly
hard. "He had--or I thought he had, brought something tremendously big
and wonderful into my life," Harriet had continued, "and I was a stupid
little girl, just taking care of my sister's babies and reading my
father's books--"

"You are under no obligation to tell me anything of this," Richard had
said, kindly, far more concerned for her distress than interested in
what she was saying. "I must have known that there were admirers! I
assure you that--"

"No, but just a moment!" Harriet had interrupted him. "I was
infatuated--I knew that at once, God knows I've known it ever since! I
went away with him, little fool that I was!"

A gleam of genuine surprise had come into Richard Carter's eyes, and he
looked at her without speaking.

"I was taken ill the day I left with him. While I was getting well I
had time to think it over. I knew then I was too young and too ignorant
to be any man's wife. I was frightened and I--well, I ran away; I went
back to my sister. Both she and her husband regarded me after that as
in some way marked, unprincipled, unworthy--"

"Poor child!" Richard had said. "They naturally would. You were no more
than Nina's age!"

"So that's my history," Harriet had finished, simply. "I thought I had
done with men. And there have been men, men like Ward, for instance, to
whom I could have been married without feeling that I need make any
mention of that old time. But I wanted to tell you."

"Thank you very much," Richard had said, gravely. "If the protection of
my name and my house seems welcome to you, after some battling with the
world, it will be an additional satisfaction to me."

And then before another word was spoken Fox had come in, announcing the
car, and they had begun the long, strange drive. And now, deep in the
quiet winter night, she was back at Crownlands, alone beside her fire,
able at last to rest, and to remember. It seemed to her that ever since
Richard's call on Linda's Christmas household yesterday she had walked
strangely detached and isolated, with odd booming noises in her ears,
and a panicky thumping at her heart. Now she felt suddenly safe and
secure again; none of the oppositions she had vaguely feared, from
David, from Linda, from the family at Crownlands, had interrupted the
mad plan; she was in a stronger position now than ever, and if the path
before her was dangerous and difficult, she was not too weary to-night
to feel confident of following it to the end.

She got into the luxurious bed, put out the bedside light, and lay with
her hands clasped behind her head, thinking. The clock struck one; snow
was still falling steadily outside, but in here the last pink glow of
firelight flickered and sank--flickered and sank lazily. It touched the
flowered basket chairs, the roses that filled a bowl on the bookshelf,
the table with its shaded lamp and its magazines.

Some sudden thought made Harriet smile ruefully. She indicated that it
was unwelcome by turning over to bury her bright head in the pillow,
and resolutely composing herself for sleep.




CHAPTER XVI


Morning found them half-buried in a bright dazzle of snow, the
midwinter miracle that sets the most jaded heart singing and the
weariest blood to moving more quickly. The bare trees glittered in a
glassy casing, and every twig carried its burden of soft fur.
Half-a-dozen shovels were scraping and clinking about Crownlands when
Nina and Harriet came downstairs, and Harriet saw the men laughing and
talking as they worked. The telephone announced Francesca Jay, with an
eager luncheon invitation for Nina and Ward; they were bob-sledding,
and it was perfectly glorious!

"I wish I liked people as much as they like me," Nina remarked over her
breakfast. "Now I like the Jays--but this being invited everywhere--all
the time!" Harriet, who suspected that Miss Jay's hospitality was
really directed at the engaging Ward, good-naturedly persuaded him to
go with his sister, thus assuring a real welcome from Francesca. He
looked pale, complained of a headache, and breakfasted on black coffee,
but agreed with her that fresh air and exercise would be the one sure
cure for him, and tramped off beside Nina at eleven o'clock willingly
enough.

Harriet was through with her housekeeping and her luncheon, and
meditating a letter to Linda, when Ida Tabor fluttered in. Harriet
heard the gay voice at the foot of the stairs: "Oh, sweetheart! Where's
my little girl?"

Mrs. Tabor looked a trifle dashed when only Harriet responded, although
she immediately assured Miss Field cordially with bright insincerity
that she had known of her return, and was "so glad!"

"I've been a sort of big sister here," she said, laughingly, "and, my
Lord, these kids have managed things wonderfully! But I suppose sooner
or later the machinery would have stalled without your fine Italian
hand!"

"Mr. Carter asked me to come back," Harriet stated, simply. She thought
the truth her best weapon, but Mrs. Tabor was ready for her.

"Mary Putnam told us that you were just resting and looking about," she
said, innocently, "and Dick--generous that he is!--couldn't feel
comfortably about it, I suppose! Well, I wanted to see Nina--?"

Harriet explained Nina's absence, and Mrs. Tabor pouted.

"I'd have stopped there," she said. "I'm on my way to the Fordyces';
they have a regular New Year's party, you know--"

This was deliberate, Harriet knew. Ida Tabor had not always been
admitted to the Fordyces' sacred portals.

"Blondin and I are getting it up," she further elucidated, "I want Nina
in it, and Ward, too. Blondin is lending us the most gorgeous
tapestries and things you ever saw!"

Harriet was not concerned for Nina's plans after today; for Richard had
telephoned her at three o'clock that the morning papers would have "the
news," and that he was coming home to tell his children of their
mother's death, to-night. But she must get rid of this woman now,
somehow. It would be fatal to have Ida Tabor here when Richard Carter
returned. Her time was short, Harriet thought anxiously, for at any
minute now the young people might stream back for tea.

"I might run up now and see the old lady!" said Mrs. Tabor who had
flung off her furs, and beautified herself at her hand-bag mirror. "I
don't really have to get to the Fordyces' until just before
dinner--really not then, if Nina wanted me!" She pressed her lips
together for the red colouring. "Mr. Carter be here to-night?" she
asked, casually.

Bottomley caused an interruption. Harriet turned to him with relief.
But unfortunately he answered the very question she was trying to evade.

"Mr. Carter had just telephoned, 'm, and says that he'll be 'ere at
about six, 'm!"

"Oh, thank you, Bottomley!" Harriet turned back to Ida, to see her
complacently loosening outer wraps.

"I came in the Warrens' car," said she, "they were to run over and say
Merry Christmas to the Bellamys, and then pick me up. But--if I won't
be in the way!--perhaps I might stay and see Nina; we've become great
chums. I suppose I'd better go to the room I always have? Then I'll run
up and get the latest news of the Battle of Shiloh from Madame Carter!"

It was now or never; Harriet's heart began to beat.

"Madame Carter has gone driving," she said. "She may be in at any
moment, but before she comes, I want to speak to you. We've had
terrible news here, Mrs. Tabor. Mr. Carter is coming home to tell the
children and his mother to-night. Mr. Pope cabled from Paris on
Christmas Eve that Mrs. Carter suddenly died that day!"

Ida Tabor never felt anything very deeply, but her emotions were
accessible enough, and violent while they lasted. She grew white,
gasped, somehow reached a chair, and burst into honest tears.
Isabelle--! Why, they had been friends for years! Why, she had been so
wonderfully well and strong!

"My God, isn't that the limit!" said Mrs. Tabor, drying her eyes. "I
don't know why I'm such a fool," she added, with perhaps a faint
resentment of Harriet's calm, "but I declare it's just about taken my
breath away! And they don't know it! Isn't that simply terrible!"

"Nobody knows it," Harriet said. And not quite innocently she added:
"The Fordyces, the Bellamys--everyone who knew her--are in total
ignorance of it! If you do tell them, Mrs. Tabor--and there is no
reason why you shouldn't--"

"Oh, I shall stay here with Nina to-night, anyway!" the visitor said,
decidedly. "She'll need me, of course! Poor little thing!"

"It seems too bad to spoil your New Year's plans," Harriet said,
smiling, "but you know Nina! She will put those long arms of hers about
you--and she won't hear of your leaving her for days! With Nina,"
Harriet pursued, thoughtfully, "it isn't so much that one can't find a
good excuse, as that she won't hear of excuses at all! I remember when
Mrs. Carter first went away, there were days of it--weeks of it!--just
talk, tears, tears, and talk--my arm used to ache from the weight of
Nina's arm! Mr. Carter intends to leave for Chicago to-morrow, Ward
will probably go up to the Eatons'---" Harriet rambled on, not
unconscious that she was making an impression. "Anyway," she finished,
"we shall be fearfully quiet and alone here, and your being here would
simply save the day for Nina!"

"Oh, I really couldn't stay over New Year's," Mrs. Tabor, looking
slightly discomfited, said slowly. "You see, the Fordyces--"

"Nina may keep you," Harriet said, lightly. Perhaps the other woman had
a sudden vision of the overwhelming Nina, a Nina so convinced of her
friend's real desire to stay that with a certain sportive heaviness she
would do the necessary telephoning and explaining herself, to keep her.
Perhaps she saw the alternate vision of herself at the Fordyces'
inaccessible, and it must be confessed dull, dinner table, electrifying
them all with the news of Isabelle Carter, coming as one admitted to
the family confidence and councils. She looked undecided, and bit her
under-lip.

"One wonders--?" she said, musingly. "Of course, I shouldn't want to
intrude to-night--it would be merely to have them feel that I was
HERE--"

"Mr. Carter has asked me to see that the family is alone to-night,"
Harriet said, courageously, "but of course he may feel that you are an
exception," she added, with the impersonal air of a mere employee. "I
only want to be able to tell him that I repeated his request, and told
you the reason for it. That's"--and she smiled pleasantly--"that is as
far as my authority goes, of course. I shall say simply that you know
of his wishes, and if you remain, I know I can say that it was to
please Nina!"

And now the two women exchanged an open glance that needed no pretence
and no concealment, and it was a glance of enmity.

"When I visit this house it is not at your invitation, Miss Field!"
said Mrs. Tabor, frankly. "I am aware of that," Harriet said, simply.

"Will you be so kind as to tell Nina and Madame Carter," the visitor
was resuming her wraps, and arranging her handsome hat and veil, "that
I will be here to-morrow, and that anything I can do I will be so glad
to do!--Is that Mrs. Warren's car, Bottomley? Thank you. Good
afternoon, Miss Field!"

"Good afternoon, Mrs. Tabor!" Harriet followed her to the hall door,
and heard a Parthian shot, ad-dressed in a cheerfully high voice to
kindly old Mrs. Warren, Mrs. Fordyce's mother, who was in the limousine.

"Nobody home! All my trouble for nothing!"

Old Mrs. Warren leaned against the frosted glass; waved from the
holly-dressed interior at Harriet, and the girl saw her lips frame
"Merry Christmas!" The door slammed; Bottomley came with stately
footsteps up to the hall again. Harriet gave a little laugh of triumph.
Now the coast was clear!

Thus it was that Richard Carter found only his mother and his children
at the dinner table that night, and no guests under his roof. Miss
Field, to be sure, was at the head of the table, but then Miss Field
was a member of the family. He interrogated her briefly as they went in.

"Ward's gang? That Eaton ass?"

"Oh, they went yesterday!"

"Speak to Bottomley?"

"Yes. He and Pilgrim are quite reconciled to remaining." Harriet
buttoned a cuff, to hide a dimple that would come to the corner of her
mouth. "And Mrs. Tabor came, and would have stayed," she could not
resist the temptation to add, "but I persuaded her that some other time
would be better!"

"Scene with Nina about it?" Richard had asked, curiously.

"Nina was not here," Harriet answered. And there was a faint smile in
the deep blue eyes that she raised suddenly to his.

"Ah, well, I knew of course that you would manage it!" he said,
contentedly. "It seems black art to me. I had enough of it!"

She smiled again, and went quietly to her place. But when he summoned
Ward and Nina to his mother's room, after dinner, she had disappeared,
and the family was quite alone when he broke the news to them.

Harriet, presently needed again, was astonished at the emotion of the
old lady, who had been genuinely fond of her daughter-in-law, and had
always been loyal to Isabelle, as one of the Carters. Madame Carter was
greatly shaken, Nina hysterical, Ward aggrieved, irritated at his own
feeling. He had not seen his mother for seven months, she had brought
nothing but a certain unpleasant notoriety to her children, yet her
death struck both the young creatures forcibly, and they felt shocked
and shaken.

"We can't be in the Fordyce tableaux," said Nina in an interval between
floods of sobs. "Not that I would want to, now! But I don't know; it
seems to me that I am the most unfortunate girl in the world!"

"I think both you and Ward should wear black for a certain period,"
Richard said to her. He had been walking the floor nervously, stopping
now and then beside the great chair where his mother sat silent and
stricken, to put his arm about her shoulders, and murmur to her
consolingly.

"When my mother died," Madame Carter quavered, with her handkerchief
pressed to the tip of her nose, "my sisters and I wore black, and
refused all social engagements for one year. We then, I remember
distinctly, began to wear white and lavender--"

Harriet smiled inwardly at the picture of Victorian mourning and
compared it to the mourning of to-day, as different indeed as was the
conception of motherhood to-day.

"I remember that a cousin of my mother, Cousin Mallie we used to call
her, got in a sewing woman, and all our black things were made right
there in the house--" the old lady was pursuing, mournfully, when Nina
broke in pettishly:

"I don't see why I have to wear black!"

"Why should you?" Ward said with bitter scorn. "It's only your mother!"
Nina began to cry.

"You and I will go down to Landmann's early to-morrow, Nina," Harriet
suggested, "and we'll have someone show us what is simple and nice--not
crape, you know," Harriet said with a glance at Richard Carter, "but
black, for a few months anyway."

"I think that would be the least, Richard," his mother approved. "I
believe I will go with you," she condescended to Harriet, "after all,
Isabelle was my daughter-in-law, and the mother of my grandchildren!"

"And I won't go to California or Bermuda or any-where else unless
Ladybird comes!" Nina burst out, with a broken sob.

"Nonsense!" her father began harshly. Harriet said:

"Bermuda? Is there a plan for Bermuda?"

"I suggested it for a few weeks," Richard said, frowning, "but I don't
propose to have Nina invite a group of friends. That isn't exactly the
idea."

"We could ask Mrs. Tabor," Harriet said, soothingly; "it is right in
the middle of the season, and perhaps she will feel she can hardly
spare the time. But I'm sure that if she can--"

"If I ask her, she'll go," Nina said, in a sulky, confident undertone.

Harriet had her doubts, but she did not express them. A month at
Nassau, in the undiluted company of Nina and her grandmother, was
enough to appall even Harriet's stout heart.

The event proved her right, for while Ida Tabor flew at once to her
disconsolate little friend, and assured Richard with tears in her eyes
that she would do anything in the world to help him, she weakened when
the actual test arrived.

"If just you and I and your dear grandmother were going, dearest girl,"
she said to Nina, "then it would be perfect. But as long as Miss Field,
who is perfectly charming and conscientious and all that, feels that
she must accompany us, why--you and I would never be a moment alone,
sweetheart, you know that! I DON'T like to think that it's jealousy--"

"Of course it's jealousy," Nina was pleased to decide, gloomily.
"Granny says that we don't need her, but Father just sticks to it that
she must manage everything!"

"I am going to run in every few days and amuse your father, and get the
news of you," said Ida Tabor. "You don't think that your father perhaps
trusts Miss Field too far, do you?" she added, carelessly. She was
standing behind Nina at the dressing table, experimenting with the
girl's thick, straight hair. "You look like one of the little Russian
princesses with it that way!" said she.

Nina was instantly diverted.

"I had to laugh at Christine yesterday," she said. "She said, 'Oh,
Ma'm'selle, you've got enough for two people here!' 'Oh,' I said, 'then
I ought to pay you double'!" Nina laughed. "And I did, too!" she
finished. For Nina, without ever being unselfish, was often extremely
generous. Ida Tabor smiled automatically.

"I don't suppose your father sees anything in Miss Field," she
submitted again, lightly.

"Oh, Heavens, no!" Nina said, studying herself in a handglass.
"Christine says that I ought to have my eyebrows pulled," she added,
thoughtfully. There was a rather steely look in the eyes of her friend
Ladybird, but she did not see it. Her smile of pleasure gradually gave
place to a pout. "I'm going to ask Father if we need Miss Harriet!" she
said.

And that evening she did indeed attack Richard on the subject, although
not as decidedly as she had planned. He listened to her interestedly
enough, with his evening paper held ready for his next glance.

"Let you roam about the country with Mrs. Tabor," he said, as the
girl's faltering accents stopped. "No, my dear, it's out of the
question! In the first place, she is not the sort of companion I would
choose for any girl, and in the second place I would never know where
you and your grandmother were, or what was happening to you! While Miss
Field is in charge I shall feel entirely safe. Of course, if Mrs. Tabor
chooses to invite herself, that's her affair!"

"Then I don't want to go!" Nina stormed. But in the end she did go. The
alternative of moping about Crownlands, and seeing her idol only at
intervals, was not alluring, and Mrs. Tabor herself urged her to go.
Madame Carter, Nina, and Harriet duly sailed, in the second week of
January, and Ward joined them almost a month later, in Nassau. And here
Harriet had the brother and sister at their best, free to show the
genuine childishness that was in them, to swim and picnic and tramp,
and here she indulged Nina in long talks, and encouraged her to
associate with the young people she met. Madame Carter found the island
air a help to her rheumatic knee, and consequently made no protest
against a lengthened stay. She slept, ate, and felt better than in the
cold northern winter, and at seventy-five these considerations were
important.

Harriet wrote once a week to Richard, making a general report, and
enclosing receipted hotel and miscellaneous bills. His communications
usually took the form of cables, although once or twice she received
typewritten letters.

In mid-April they all came home again, and Crownlands, in the year's
first shy filming of green, looked wonderful to Harriet's homesick
eyes. With joyous noises and confusion Ward and Nina scattered their
possessions about, and the old lady bustled, chattered, and commented.
Bottomley and Pilgrim were apparently enchanted to welcome home their
one-time tormentors, and in the fresh, orderly rooms, and the scent of
early flowers, and the burgeoning winds that shook the blossoms, there
was a wholesome order and familiarity delicious to the wanderers.

Richard was to join them at dinner; it had been impossible for him to
meet them when the boat arrived, but Fox had been there and attended to
the formalities. It had pleased them all to make the occasion formal
and to dress accordingly. Nina looked her prettiest in a white silk,
and the old lady was magnificent in diamonds and brocade. Harriet
deliberately selected her handsomest gown, a severe black satin that
wrapped her slender body with one superb and shining sweep, and left
her white arms and firm, flawless shoulders bare. The weeks of sunshine
and fresh air had been good for her, as for the others, and when she
was dressed, and stood in the full blaze of the lights, looking at
herself, she would not have been human not to be pleased. Her bright
hair was dressed high, and shone in rich waves and curves against the
soft, dusky forehead, and above the black-fringed, smoke-blue eyes. The
firm young lines of chin and throat, the swelling white breast that met
the encasing satin, the slippers with their twinkling buckles--she
could not but find every detail pleasing, and her scarlet mouth, firmly
shut, was twitched by a sudden dimple.

She glanced at the clock, went slowly to the door, and slowly down the
big square stairway. Richard and his children were in the lower hall,
and they all glanced up.

Down in the soft glow of light came Harriet, smiling as she slipped her
left arm about Nina, and gave the free hand to Nina's father. She was
apparently cool and unself-conscious; inwardly she felt feverish,
frightened and excited and happy, all at once. Richard was in evening
dress, too; he looked his best; his dark hair brushed to a shining
crest, and his gray eyes full of pleasure.

"Well, Miss Field--!" he said, a little breathlessly. "Well! Your
vacation hasn't done you any harm!"

"We had to make an occasion of our coming home!" Harriet said, with a
nervous laugh, trying not to see the admiration in his eyes.

"I must say I like the gown," Richard said, simply. It was impossible
not to speak of it, and of her; they were all staring at her.

"You look wonderful!" Nina said.

"Why, you saw this gown at Nassau," Harriet protested.

"Louise--or whoever she was of Prussia, or whatever you call it, turned
in the family vault when you walked down those stairs!" Ward said.
"Oo-oo--caught you under the mistletoe--oo-oo, you would!" he added,
with an effort to envelop her in his embrace.

"Ward, behave yourself!" Harriet said, evading him, and walking toward
the dining room with his grandmother, who came downstairs in her turn,
and joined them. "No pain in the knee?" Richard heard her say,
solicitously.

"Not a bit!" the old lady said, eagerly. "Why, my dear," she added,
grandly, "there's no rheumatism in our family! Not a bit! It was just
that fall I had, ten years ago, that settled there, that was all!
Immediately after that fall---"

Harriet had heard of the fall before. She had heard of it one hundred
times. But she listened attentively. She had an aside for Bottomley,
she drew Nina into the conversation, she was most at ease with Ward,
teasing him, drawing him out.

Richard Carter watched her, the incarnation of young and beautiful
womanhood. Clever he knew her to be, capable and conscientious, but
to-night she was in a new role. He liked to see her there at the other
end of the table; he realized that she was the centre of things, here
in his house, and that he had missed her.

After dinner it chanced that Bottomley called her to the telephone, and
that a moment later she passed the call on to Richard.

"It's Mr. Gardiner, Mr. Carter. He didn't know that you were here, but
he would rather speak to you," Harriet said. Richard went to the
telephone, and as she moved to make room for him, and gave him the
receiver, he had a sudden breath of the sweetness and freshness of her,
of hair and young firm skin, of the rustling satin gown, and the little
handkerchief that she dropped, and that he picked up for her. He smiled
as he gave it, and flushed inexplicably, and his first few words to the
bewildered Gardiner were a little shaken and breathless. But Richard
was quite himself again an hour or two later, when he sent for Miss
Field, and she came into the library.

"I needn't say that I'm entirely pleased with the way matters have
gone, Harriet," said Richard, when she had seated herself on the
opposite side of his big, flat desk, and locking her white hands on the
shining surface, had fixed her magnificent eyes on him. "Nina seems in
fine shape, and I have never seen my mother better. You seem to have a
genius for managing the Carters. Ward, of course, is the real problem
now--I wish the boy might have made his degree; but it wasn't to be
expected perhaps. He's clever, but his heart wasn't in it; he never
made the slightest effort to get through. I'm seriously considering
this offer from Gardiner; he's got to take his boy out to Nevada for
his health. Ward wants to go, and would very probably like it when he
got there. Gardiner's brother is a magnificent fellow, 'P. J.,' they
call him; he and his cattle are known all over that part of the
country. He's got two or three pretty girls--I hope Ward will try it,
anyhow! So that leaves Nina, who is safe enough with you, and my
mother, who seems perfectly well and happy. Meanwhile, while you've
been gone, we've gotten the Brazilian company well started, so that I
shall have a little more freedom than I've had for years."

"You look as if you needed it," Harriet observed.

"YOU look wonderful," Richard returned, simply. "Wonderful! Is that a
new gown?"

"Well, I had it made last November just before I went away. Mrs. Carter
gave me the material a year ago." Harriet glanced down at herself and
smiled.

"You might wear pearls--or something--with it," Richard said. "Do you
like pearls?"

It was astonishing to see the colour come up in her dusky skin; her
eyes met his almost pleadingly.

"Why--I never thought!" she said, in some confusion.

"I suppose a man may ask his wife if she likes pearls?" Richard said,
impelled by some feeling he did not define. He had leaned back in his
chair, and half-closed his eyes, as he studied her.

"Oh--please!" Harriet said in an agony. She gave a horrified glance
about, but the library was closed and silent. "Someone might hear you!"
she whispered. And a moment later she rose to her feet, and eyed him
quietly. "Was that all, Mr. Carter?" she asked. It was Richard's turn
to look a trifle confused.

"That's all--my dear!" he said, obediently. The term made her flush
again. He was still smiling when she closed the door.




CHAPTER XVII


It was the gayest spring that Harriet had ever known at Crownlands, for
even at her best, Isabelle had been socially an individualist, devoting
herself to one man at a time, and to nobody else, and the whole family
had necessarily accepted Isabelle's attitude. Richard had been too busy
to notice or protest, the old lady helpless, and Nina a child.

But now there was a beautiful and gracious woman in Isabelle's place,
and long before the world knew that Harriet Field was really Harriet
Carter, there was a very decided change in the social atmosphere. Nina
would be eighteen in June, and affairs for Nina and her friends began
to assume a more formal air. Ward, who seemed anxious to placate his
father, and convince him of his genuine reform, was almost always at
home, and Madame Carter was willing to accept the comfort and amusement
that Harriet's return brought to the house, and rarely raised an issue
with the triumphant secretary. And, more strange than all, Richard
began to bring his friends to the house; he was proud of his smoothly
running establishment, and proud of the charming woman who neither
flirted with nor ignored the men he brought home. They were plain men
sometimes, business associates who might have been ill at ease at
Crownlands, and voiceless at the dinner table. But Harriet drew them
out, and seemed to have some conversational divining rod by which she
touched with unfailing instinct upon the topic of each in turn.

Always beautiful and always busy, constantly in demand on all sides,
she went about his house like a smiling worker of miracles, and Richard
watched her. When she went home to her sister for a day or two he
missed her strangely, and wandered about the empty rooms with a
desolate sense of loss.

She was presently back, and amused the young people at the dinner table
with a spirited account of her sister's move into a new house--"really
an old house," that she and her family had been watching for years. It
had been auctioned, forfeited by the purchaser, it had figured in a
lawsuit, and now at last it was in the possession of the delighted
Davenports. And the move--with the baby carrying his puppy, and Pip the
goldfish, and the girls wheeling the old baby-carriage full of their
treasures, and Linda whitening her hands with a cut lemon, as she
walked the seven short blocks--! Harriet made them see it all, and
Richard laughed with the children. His mother, always reminiscent,
recalled a move in his own third year, when he had tasted furniture
polish, and made himself ill.

Nina and Amy and Ward had rushed from the dinner table to an early
dance at the club, and Richard, after a talk with his mother on the
terrace, had wandered about with a vague hope of finding Harriet
somewhere with her book. But she was not downstairs.

He went back, and presently accompanied his mother to her door. The old
lady stopped outside of Nina's open door, from which a subdued light
streamed.

"Oh, Miss Field--" said Madame Carter.

"Yes, Madame Carter!" The rich, ready voice responded instantly.
Richard hoped she would come to the door, but his mother's message was
delivered too quickly to make it necessary.

"You're waiting up for Nina?"

"Oh, yes, Madame Carter!" Harriet answered. The two exchanged
good-nights; Richard loitered into his mother's room, left her in her
maid's hands, and went back into the dimly lighted, spacious upper
hall. He felt oddly stirred; there were letters downstairs, his usual
books and amusements, but he felt curiously impelled to try for one
more word with Miss Field.

He opened the door of Nina's room, and went in, and knocked on the
half-open door within that connected it with Harriet's room.

"Come in. Is it you, Pilgrim?" the pleasant, quiet voice said. Richard
stepped to the doorway.

Harriet, seated in a square basket chair, under the soft flood of light
from a basket-shaded lamp, rose precipitately, and stood looking at him
with widened eyes and parted lips, without speaking. She was plainly
frightened, though she made herself smile. She wore a scant,
long-sleeved garment of a deep, oriental blue, that covered her from
her white throat to her feet, and yet that was obviously only for
bedroom wear, and to which she gave a quick, apologetic glance, as the
man came in. He noticed that in this mellow light her blue eyes seemed
to communicate a blue shadow to their neighbourhood, brows and lids,
and the clean arch in which they were set, all wore the same shadowy
blueness. The beautiful room was full of shadows; at the wide-open
windows thin curtains stirred in the cool night air.

"Frighten you?" Richard said.

"Is there something--?" Her eyes were those of a deer that is afraid to
turn.

"Why, I wanted to suggest that we tell our little piece of news to the
family," Richard suggested, after a momentary search for a suitable
subject. "I came very close to telling my mother, just now. Is there
any good reason for further delay?"

"Why, no, I don't--I don't suppose there is!" Harriet stammered.

"You see, my mother had left me in no doubt of her intentions with Mrs.
Tabor," Richard said, smiling. "I'll give Mrs. Tabor credit for being
as innocent as I am in the matter," he added, simply. "But there's a
plan for a Montreal trip--I believe Ida arrives for a week to-morrow,
and so on. I should be very glad to let the world know that--my
arrangements--in the line, are already made. It will be fairer to you,
too, I think. Gardiner asked me last night if the coast was clear--Ward
asked me if I thought there was any use in his trying again--"

"There will be talk," said Harriet with distaste, as he paused.

"I suppose so," he answered, simply. "But what we do is our own affair,
after all. I shall explain to my mother that for us both it seemed a
practical and a--well, not unpleasant solution. There need be no change
here, but you will simply have a more assured position--"

She had been watching him, with all June in her face. But as he went on
the colour slowly drained away, and about her beautiful eyes a look of
strain and even of something like shame gradually deepened. When she
spoke, it was as if the muscles of her throat were constricted.

"Yes, I see. Certainly, I see. We will have to let them talk. This
is--simply the best arrangement possible under the circumstances!"

"It is an arrangement that a man perhaps has no right to ask of a
woman," Richard said. "Love means a great deal in a girl's life, and I
suppose there is nothing else that makes up for the lack of it. But you
are not an ordinary woman, and I assure you that in every way that I
can I mean to prove to you how deeply I appreciate what you are doing
for us all."

"Thank you!" Harriet said, almost inaudibly.

"Simply change your name on your checks," Richard said, thoughtfully.
"I shall have Fox step into the bank with the authenticated signature.
And if there is anything else, use your own judgment. Perhaps, if I
tell my mother, you would like to write to certain friends--? You can
continue to draw on the Corn Exchange, that's simplest, and I hope
you'll remember that you have a large personal credit there," he added,
with a smile. "It occurred to me to-night that you--you mustn't let
your sister worry about that new house. If you want your own car--"

"Oh, good heavens, Mr. Carter!" Harriet said, suffocating.

"Ask me anything that puzzles you," the man said. And with a brief
good-night he was gone. Harriet, who had dropped back into her chair,
sat absolutely motionless for a long, long time. Her eyes were fixed on
space; she hardly breathed; it almost seemed as if her heart was
stopped.

Richard went downstairs, surprised to feel still vaguely unsatisfied.
He had had his word with Harriet, had said indeed much that he had not
expected to say. However, it was much better to let the world know
their relationship; he was perfectly satisfied to have it so. But
still, as he settled himself to an hour's reading, the plaguing little
impulse persisted. He would like to go upstairs again; he missed her
companionship.

There was something very appealing about this woman, thought Richard,
suddenly closing his book. Her beauty, her silences, her complete
subjugation of her own interests to his, he found strangely
fascinating. She had looked extremely beautiful in that long, dark blue
bedroom gown, reading Shakespeare. He wondered why she read Shakespeare.

"By George, she has made a most interesting woman of herself!" Richard
decided, opening his book again. "She ought to be right in the middle
of things, that girl!"

He was still reading when Nina and Amy came in, and yawned him
good-nights from the library doorway. He heard them go upstairs, heard
a burst of laughter and nonsense, and then Harriet's rich voice, and
then the closing door. Then there was silence. Richard discovered that
he was sleepy, and went upstairs, too.

A day or two later Madame Carter came out to the terrace at eleven
o'clock, beautifully groomed and gowned, and with an imperative hand
arrested Harriet, who was tumbled and sunburned from the tennis court
and was going toward the house.

"Just a moment, Miss Field," said she, magnificently. Harriet
obediently stood still, and watched Madame Carter's magnificence settle
itself slowly in a basket chair. The old lady freed an eyeglass ribbon
deliberately, straightened a ruffle, laid her magazine beside her on a
table. "There was a little matter of which I wished to speak to you,"
she said, suavely, bringing her distant glance to rest dispassionately
for a moment upon Harriet's face.

Harriet waited, amused, annoyed, impatient.

"I understand," Madame Carter said, "that you and my son--for some
reason best known to yourselves--have entered into a secret marriage?"

"Your first object, my dear, is not to antagonize his mother!" Harriet
reminded herself. Aloud she said mildly: "You have no reason to
disbelieve it, have you?"

"No reason to disbelieve my son!" his mother echoed, scandalized. "Why
should I have! Mr. Carter is the soul of honour--absolutely the soul.
Upon my word, I don't understand you!"

"I said you have no reason to disbelieve him," Harriet repeated. "You
said that you UNDERSTOOD that we had been married. It is true!"

And she looked off toward the river with an expression as composed as
that of Madame Carter herself.

"I suppose you know that old saying: 'A secret bride has a secret to
hide!'" the older woman pursued, pleasantly.

"I never heard it. I did not play much with the children of the
neighbourhood when I was a child," Harriet answered. "My father was
very anxious to protect us from picking up expressions of that sort!"

There was a silence. Harriet, beginning to be ashamed of herself, did
not look at her companion.

"A girl of your age has a great deal of confidence when she marries
into a family like mine," the old lady said, presently, in a tone that
trembled a little. "My son is a rich man--he is a prominent man. He has
used his own judgment, of course. But I confess that in your place I
should not carry myself with quite so much an air of--triumph! It seems
to me--"

Harriet had had time to reflect that such an opening would certainly
lead to tears and hysteria now, and might easily begin an estrangement
that would sadden and disappoint Richard. A few more such exchanges,
and his mother would retire worsted to her room, might possibly leave
his house, and punish Harriet cruelly through him. She determinedly
regained her calm, and taking the chair next to the enraged old lady,
quietly interrupted the flow of her angry words.

"I hope I have shown no air of triumph, Madame Carter," Harriet said.
"You yourself--and most wisely!--pointed out to us a few months ago
that the arrangement here was unconventional--"

"Everyone was talking, if you mind that!" the old lady snapped. But she
was slightly mollified, none-the-less. "But upon my word, you'd think
marrying into the family was something to be done every day--!" she was
beginning again, when Harriet interrupted again.

"No--no," she said, soothingly, conceding the last words an amused
smile that itself rather helped to placate her companion. "It is, of
course, the most serious step of my life! But the secrecy--as of course
you will appreciate--was because there has been so much terrible
notoriety this year! Why, Mr. Carter tells me that never in the history
of all the Carters--"

This fortunate lead was enough. Madame Carter launched forth superbly
upon a description of the usual Carter weddings, the ceremony, the
state. In perhaps twenty minutes she was blandly patronizing Harriet,
giving her encouraging little taps with her eyeglasses, warning her of
mistakes that Isabelle had made with Richard. Harriet knew that before
three days were over her terrible mother-in-law would be telling the
world just how wise, under the trying circumstances, the whole thing
was, and just how clearly she had foreseen it. She was still listening
respectfully, if a trifle confusedly, when Ward bounded from the house,
and gave her an effusive embrace.

"Hello, Mamma!" Ward said. Harriet laughed, as she pushed away the
filial arm. Hardly knowing what she said or did she made her way to the
house, and up to her own room.

But here, in Nina's room, were Nina and Mrs. Tabor, and from their
eyes, as she came in, she knew that they knew. Nina got up, and came
forward with a sort of sulky graciousness.

"I hope you'll be very happy, Miss Harriet--I suppose I oughtn't to
call you Miss Harriet any more," Nina said, with an effort to smile
that Harriet thought quite ghastly. She gave Harriet one of her big
hands, and hesitated over a kiss. But they did not kiss each other. Ida
Tabor watched them with the half-closed eyes of a cat.

"Confess you took my breath away," she said, frankly, "because it
doesn't seem the sort of thing that Dick Carter does! Always knew he
idolized Isabelle, poor girl, and never dreamed he'd put any one in her
place! Of course, Dick's a rich man, and he's the dearest fellow in the
world, at that, but knowing, as I do know--for I've known him since we
were kiddies--exactly what a firebrand Dick always has been-mad as a
hatter when he was in love, and consequently this talk of a sensible
arrangement--"

She had a quick, vivacious way of speaking, this pretty little angry
and disappointed woman, that often carried an offensive very
successfully. As she spoke, in an innocent voice, she glanced in and
out of the magazine she had caught up, and was apparently unconscious
of Harriet's blazing cheeks and darkening eyes. But now Harriet
interrupted her.

"I don't quite see the point, Mrs. Tabor," Harriet said, bravely and
deliberately, "you speak of Mr. Carter's being a rich man, and of his
love for his wife, and his having been a fiery young man. What has that
to do with me? I was here in his house as his daughter's companion--

"As far as being a companion to ME was concerned," Nina interpolated,
rapidly, in an airy undertone, and with a toss of her head. But Harriet
suppressed her with a glance.

"--that position I could not keep," she pursued, "but for Ward's sake
and Nina's there had to be some social life. My birth," said Harriet,
steadily, "is quite the equal of theirs; I was well able to fill that
place. Mr. Carter took the step that made it possible. That's all!"

There was a silence when she finished speaking. Ida Tabor was outfaced,
and she knew it. Her cheeks burned scarlet, and she was able to gasp
only the feeblest response.

"Thank you for your kind explanation!" she said, somewhat breathless,
and with a bow. Nina, giving Harriet a resentful glance, went over to
put her arm about her friend, who had risen, and was facing Harriet.

"It need make no difference with us, Ladybird!" Nina said in passionate
loyalty.

"Why, of course not," Harriet hastened to assure them. "Why should it?
It has been just as true since December, only you didn't know it!"

"THANK you!" Mrs. Tabor said again, with another twitch of countenance
intended for a smile.

"Will you want both these rooms now?" Nina said, insolently. "I don't
want to be in your way!"

"Be careful, Nina!" Harriet said with ominous calmness. And going into
her own room she added, in her usual quiet manner, "There will be no
changes, dear!" She realized that her heart was beating fast with
anger, but it died down rapidly, and she consoled herself with some
prophecies that the next few days were to justify to the fullest
extent. Nina's inseparable Ladybird would find little to interest her
in Crownlands now, Harriet suspected, and they would not long be
troubled by her company. She smiled as she heard Nina and Ida in the
next room.

"Put on your yellow gown, sweetheart," Ida said. "We're going to the
Bellamys' after lunch."

"Oh, I don't feel like going anywhere!" Nina said, pathetically. "Would
you just as soon stay here--and just read and talk, and fool around as
we did yester-day?"

"Just as soon do anything!" But there was a tiny edge to Ladybird's
tone that had not been there yesterday. "Only, dearest girl," she
added, lightly, "we're expected!"

For answer Nina only gave her rich, mischievous laugh, and Harriet knew
that she was embracing her friend.

"But a lot you and I care for that, don't we? We'll get into wrappers
and be comfortable. I'll have Bottomley simply telephone after lunch,
and say that we are unexpectedly detained. I can't get over it," Nina
said, luxuriating in surprise. Her voice sank to speculation, and the
two murmured awhile. Then Harriet heard Ida return the attack. "But
about the Bellamys, dear," and smiled a little sadly, to think of the
swiftness with which, to calculating Mrs. Tabor, the Carter stock was
declining, and the Bellamy market looking up.

"That crazy man who--you said--admired me last night," Nina was
presently saying, "tell me again what he said. I don't see how he could
have said I was picturesque, for there's nothing picturesque about that
old blue rag. I don't know, though, it's always been awfully smart. But
I'll tell you honestly, Ladybird, I'd rather be picturesque than almost
anything else."

"You're certainly that!" said Ida's bored voice.

"Well, if you say so, I'll believe you!" Nina said. Harriet knew that
they had been aware of her nearness, but now she very deliberately
closed the door.

At luncheon everything was exactly as usual; Richard had gone to the
city, not to return for a night or two, and several social engagements
distracted the young people from the contemplation of their father's
affairs.

Harriet had not dared to hope that they would accept the situation so
quietly, or that the world would. There were callers on the terrace
every afternoon, there were pleasant congratulations and good wishes,
there were a few paragraphs in the social weeklies. Richard had for
years been too busy for mere entertaining, and the dinner parties and
luncheons to the new Mrs. Carter, it was generally felt, must wait
until next season.

Meanwhile, the speculating world saw her going quietly about the house,
advising Nina, conferring with the domestic staff, laughing with Ward.
She immediately formed a habit of going into the old lady's room every
morning: Madame Carter had quite accepted her as a member of the great
house of Carter now, and came to depend upon the half-hour of morning
gossip. The world saw her in a box at the theatre, with the young
Carters, saw that Richard presently joined them, and laughed, in the
shadowy back of the box, at something his beautiful new wife said to
him over her shoulder. The world was obliged to decide that the little
secretary took her promotion very coolly, that there was something
queer about it.

But inwardly the little secretary was thrilled to her heart's core.
Even to glance at the gold ring on her finger made Harriet feel as if a
happiness almost shameful was bared to view. Her new position, modestly
as she filled it, was yet a high position. She saw Richard's growing
affection and trust, if he did not. She could afford to wait.

She visited Linda, almost afraid to show new gowns and new generosity,
almost afraid of the constant "Mrs. Carter."

"They'll be ruined!" Linda laughed, of the children's summer gowns and
the camera and wrist watch that transported Julia and Josephine to
Paradise. This rustling and perfumed Harriet, with the flowered little
French hat, and the filmy little odd gowns, was almost bewildering.

Decorously having tea on the terrace in the June afternoons, knowing
herself the centre of interest, Harriet's heart sang with a wild inward
delight. She smiled; she could afford the friendliest interest for
everyone's affairs. When her own were touched, there was a youthful
flushing, a deprecatory smile. But she took no one into her confidence.

"But when are you and Dick Carter going to dine with us?" Mary Putnam
said, one afternoon, at tea. Madame Carter, whose Victorian ideal of
romance was not at all dissatisfied with the idea of the employer
marrying his daughter's beautiful governess, smiled significantly.

"They're very odd lovers, my dear," she said to Mary with an eloquent
glance. Mary laughed, and looked at Harriet, whose face was suddenly
crimson, though she tried to laugh, too. The visitor, with instant
kindness, covered the little break.

"Whenever they're ready, they're going to dine with me!" she said,
patting Harriet's hand with real affection and understanding. The
arrival of a group from the tennis court, Nina, Ida, Ward, Francesca
Jay, and their friends, changed the subject immediately, the old lady
was distracted, and Harriet busy. But Mary was free to reflect. She had
the eyes of a contented woman, freed from her own problem for those of
others. "And Harriet is certainly mad about Richard," Mary mused.

But with the rest of the world she had to decide that there was
something in the affair that she did not understand.

When everyone else had gone from the terrace, and the late afternoon
light was throwing clear shadows across the warm red bricks, Nina and
Ida Tabor remained, talking. Nina had seated herself on the arm of her
friend's chair, and was chattering away in happy ignorance of the fact
that the older woman was seething within. Nina saw no reason for
jealousy because Harriet had just had an hour's petting from everyone,
had dominated the scene in her striped blue muslin, had finally
sauntered to the house between no more important persons than Granny
and Ward.

But to Ida it was insufferable, and she could only revenge herself upon
her innocent admirer.

"And now we positively must go in, Nina!" she said. "We've wasted this
whole afternoon!" And she added, of the embracing arm: "Don't! It's too
hot."

"Is playing tennis and talking with me WASTING an afternoon, Ladybird?"
Nina asked, archly.

"You know I don't mean that!" Mrs. Tabor said, impatiently, if fondly,
freeing herself. "But I have to get packed if I'm going to the Jays'!"

"But you're not going to the Jays'!" Nina said in soft, sweet,
confident reminder.

"But I must, darling!"

"Not if I ask you not to!" Nina persisted.

"Truly I must," Mrs. Tabor said, wearily.

"No, you mustn't!"

"But, dearest, I truly have to---"

"But, Ladybird," Nina laughed, happily, "I sent them a message this
afternoon that you were staying with me! So now," she finished,
triumphantly, "that's settled! And we'll go to bed early, with books,
and talk, and maybe creep down for something to eat about eleven, as we
did that other night--"

"Nina," Mrs. Tabor said, in a new voice, interrupting her, "you didn't
telephone Mrs. Jay, did you?"

"Indeed I did!" Nina was still smiling over the thought of her midnight
raid on the pantry with a flattering and laughing and girlish Ladybird,
a Ladybird who had simply "never gotten over" that chance encounter
with Father in the upper hall, and who had talked of it, and of their
slippered feet and kimonos, through hours of delicious giggling and
embarrassment.

"Well, then, you were extremely impertinent and officious," said a new
voice, that Nina hardly recognized.

Poor Nina! Harriet found her sobbing on her bed, half an hour later,
and took it for a sign that the wound would cure, that Nina did not
resent her sympathy and comfort. Nina was still heaving with deep sobs,
albeit taking steps toward a hot bath and a becoming gown, when Ida
went away. Her farewells were made only to the composed interloper, who
went with her pleasantly to the hall door, and turned back with some
remark for Bottomley that was in the perfect tone of the mistress.
Ida's heart was hot within her as she looked her last at Crownlands, in
the mellow light of the summer twilight.




CHAPTER XVIII


Royal Blondin presently came to pay his respects to Harriet in her
changed position. Nina had told her that he had been forbidden the
house, in December; they had seen him only two or three times since
their return from Bermuda, and then accidentally. Harriet was thankful
to believe the affair between him and Nina well over. The girl was
growing up now, there were other men in her world, and for the list for
her eighteenth birthday party she had merely mentioned his name among
others.

"You'll see that Royal gets a card, Harriet?" she had said.

"Well--yes, if you want him, but somehow one doesn't see the mysterious
and artistic Royal in so juvenile a party," Harriet had answered. Nina
might have disquieted her with her serene: "Oh, he'll come!" But
Harriet knew Nina was often over-sure of her own powers.

Three days before the garden party that was to mark the girl's
anniversary Royal drifted in with the assurance that was quite
characteristic of him. He rarely accepted an invitation, or waited for
one. Perhaps he was clever enough to know that half his acquaintances
detested him theoretically, but were glad to have him about. Nina and
Harriet came in from an afternoon at the club to find him playing with
languid hands at the piano, and he lazily rose to greet them. While
Nina was there, his attitude toward both was pleasantly impersonal, but
his suggestion, which was more like a command, that she run upstairs
and dress early, so that they might have a talk before dinner, sent the
girl flying, and he and Harriet could speak more freely.

"Well, Harriet, I congratulate you! How does it feel to be a married
woman? I was with Lenox, in his camp--we went up there to look it
over," Royal went on, in his musical voice. "It's a beautiful place, in
the Adirondacks. I saw your name in an evening paper; of course I was
delighted for you."

"Money and position don't really mean much to me," Harriet said,
unencouragingly.

"They don't?" he asked, with an upward glance.

"Not lately. Not as much as they always seemed to!" the girl added,
uncertainly.

"Perhaps because your dream is captured," Blondin suggested. "It's no
longer a myth! I wonder if it isn't always so?"

"I remember his taking that dreamy, silly tone years ago," Harriet
thought.

"My first sensation," Blondin said, "was one of satisfaction. I thought
to myself that my own cause, with Nina, was safe now. That you trusted
me, and I had every reason to trust you."

Harriet looked away for a brief silence, brought her eyes to his face.
She felt suddenly sick.

"Roy, you're not still serious about Nina?"

"I have never been anything else," he said, delicately.

"But--but why?" Harriet asked.

"I like the girl," he reminded her pleasantly. "I hope she is not
entirely indifferent to me--"

"Indifferent! She's at the age that marries anybody!" Harriet said,
indignantly.

"You give me hope," Royal said with a bow.

"Her father very violently opposes it," Harriet said, after a troubled
silence.

"I am well aware of that, my dear. Her father forbade me the house last
December. I submitted; the girl submitted. But we made our plans. I
fancy we will not have any difficulty now."

"You mean that you are engaged?"

"An understanding. We have corresponded, seen each other now and then
through Ida Tabor. It's," he smiled, dreamily, "extremely romantic, of
course," he said.

Harriet felt that she could have killed him.

"You understand that she won't have one penny, Roy. I know her father.
He won't yield. He'll forbid it; he'll not hesitate. If she does it
against his will, she will have to wait three years for her money.
Three years--! Roy, she wouldn't be happy three weeks! Mr. Carter spoke
to me about it the only time we've spoken of you. He said that he was
glad the affair had ended naturally; that you were not the man to make
Nina happy, and that he would rather have her suffer anything, and find
out her mistake at once, than have her heart broken, and her money
wasted, through several wretched years!"

Blondin had listened to this quietly, his eyes moving from her lips to
her own earnest eyes, and wandering over her animated face.

"I count on you to be my advocate, my dear Harriet," he said, after a
moment's silence. "Richard Carter believes in you; he has great faith
in your judgment. If you represent to him that you believe this to be a
wise step all round, we shall have no further trouble--'

"I can't honestly tell him so, Roy!" the girl interrupted.

"Can't you?" Blondin said. He looked across the open hallway to Nina,
descending in fresh ruffles and ribbons, and raised his voice. "Here
she is--looking like the very rose of girls! Come on now, Nina, you
aren't going to belong to anybody else but me for a while!" he said.
But as he turned to leave Harriet, he added again: "Can't you? Think it
over."

The girl thought it over with a maddening and feverish persistence that
presently caused her a sensation of actual sickness. How serious her
countenancing of Nina's love-affair might prove to be--how unimportant
it might prove to be--what Nina might do or might not do, these vague
speculations churned and seethed in the weary brain that could find no
beginning and no end to them. To have made a clean breast of the whole
matter months ago would have meant a delicious sense of freedom from
responsibility now, but then under those circumstances would she,
Harriet, have been here now? Certainly, even in the present purely
technical sense, she would not have been the second Mrs. Richard
Carter, nor would she have held her present position of trust and
responsibility.

While Nina and her lover murmured on the terrace Harriet brooded on
these things, and after dinner that evening she gave Richard so sharp a
warning that he sent at once for Nina, and with a clouded brow and
angry eyes briefly requested Harriet to be present while he spoke to
her.

Nina came at once, with an innocent expression on her rather heavy
young face. She seated herself near Harriet, and her father went to the
point at once.

"Nina," he said, seriously, "you saw Royal Blondin this afternoon,
didn't you?" And as Nina answered only with an ugly glance at Harriet,
the betrayer, he added, "Didn't I ask you not to see him any more,
several months ago?"

"Yes, you did," Nina said, in a low tone, and with a heaving breast.
She was sure of herself, but she felt a little frightened.

"I hope, and we all hope, that you will marry some day," Richard said.
"But you are too young now to make a wise choice. And until you are a
little older, you will have to take my word for it that such an affair
would only lead you to misery and regret."

Nina mumbled something bravely.

"I didn't hear you," her father said.

"I said, I didn't see what you could do about it!" the girl repeated,
desperately.

For a few moments of silence Richard merely looked gravely at his
daughter. Then he clasped his fine hands on the desk before him, and
cleared his throat.

"I cannot do as much as I should like, Nina," he conceded, "but I shall
do what I can. But first let me ask you: have you promised to marry Mr.
Blondin?"

Silence. Nina looked at the floor. Richard repeated his question.

"Yes, I have-and you can't kill me for it!" Nina said, and burst into
tears.

"Well," the father resumed, when Harriet had supplied a consolatory
murmur and a handkerchief, "I'm sorry, of course. Mrs. Tabor carried
letters between you, did she? You met him occasionally?"

"Two or three times," Nina said, sniffing and drying her eyes busily.

"You know my reasons for disliking him, Nina," her father said. "He is
a man more than twice your age; he has a certain sort of unsavory
reputation in his affairs with women. He has no income, no profession,
no home; all those things tell against him. But the most serious of
all, to me, is his mental attitude. The man has no wholesome, decent
code. He dabbles in the occult, in Oriental morality--or immorality.
With an older woman, that mightn't matter. She could guide him, perhaps
influence him. But you're only a child--"

"I shall be of age Tuesday!" Nina burst forth, resentfully.

"You will be of age Tuesday. True. But you will be my ward, as far as
your Uncle Edward's legacy is concerned, for another three years. Now,
Nina, if you persist in this folly, against my most earnest advice, I
can only forbid the man the house, and lock you in your room in the
good old-fashioned way. That I shall do. I shall then give out to the
world--that has already had a rare treat at the expense of the Carter
family!--the news of my utter disapproval of the match. If you manage
the marriage in spite of me, I shall forbid you and Blondin my house,
and as a matter of course use my right to withhold the payment of your
legacy for three years, and stop your present allowance, and your
credit with the shops. That's all I can do! And I do it, Nina," said
Richard in a softer tone, "I do it to hasten the inevitable, my dear! I
do it to bring you back to your father sooner instead of later; to give
you only one year of disillusionment and suffering, instead of seven or
eight!"

It must be a brave girl, thought Harriet, who could persist in any
course, after that. But Nina had the impregnable armour of ignorance
and pride, and she only sniffed pathetically again, and shrugged her
shoulders.

"You do everything in the world to MAKE my marriage a failure!" she
said with the irrepressible tears. "And I suppose you'll be delighted
if it is! Uncle Edward's money belongs to me; Ward has got his; and I
don't see why you just want to shame me before the world for your own
satisfaction! Royal is a perfect child about money; he says that I will
have to manage our business affairs, anyway. And I don't see--if a
woman can marry a rich man, why a man shouldn't sometimes be glad if a
girl has money! I'm PROUD to help him out, if he'll let me. He says he
won't--why, we had planned going--well, just everywhere, Honolulu and
southern California and just everywhere, only now he won't go! He says
he is going to stay right here, and take a position with an art
magazine that he just hates, and work it all off--before we go, if it
takes years--"

"Work what all off?" Harriet asked, simply and quietly.

"This money that a friend of his really lost, but he has taken it upon
himself," Nina answered, a little mollified. "It was eleven thousand
dollars, and he has PAID OFF about four, and anyway, I hate so much
talk about money!" she finished, angrily.

"My dear," Harriet said, as Richard, with a troubled face, remained
silent. "It isn't the money that we are worrying about. Why, ask your
father, Nina! Ask him if he wouldn't write Royal Blondin a check for
any sum to-day, ANY sum, if you and he would promise solemnly to wait
three years more. You will only be twenty-one then, Nina, still such a
child!"

Harriet paused, glancing at Richard for encouragement; he nodded
eagerly, and she went on:

"Marriage is a tremendous thing, Nina, and the only thing that makes it
right---"

"If you're going to say love," Nina broke in, scornfully, "you didn't
marry Father for love!"

"I was going to say mutual understanding and respect," Harriet said,
quietly, but the splendid colour flooded her face as she spoke, "and
you do not understand life, Nina, or men, or marriage. Royal Blondin is
a charming man, and a gifted man, but he is an adventurer, dear; he is
a man who has lived in all sorts of places, known all sorts of persons,
accepted all sorts of queer codes. There are coarse elements in him,
Nina, things that would utterly sicken and frighten you! Your father is
right; you would be back with us in a few months or years, perhaps with
a child, perhaps shattered in body as well as soul--not free to take up
your life again with Ward and Amy, but scarred and embittered and
changed--!"

"My God, how that woman loves the child!" Richard said to himself,
watching her. To him she seemed inspired. Her eyes were blurred with
tears, her voice shaking, and she had leaned over to clasp Nina's
hands, and so hold the girl's unwilling attention.

"Nina, can't you trust your father that far?" Harriet finished. "Can't
you realize that a man like Royal, embarrassed for money--no matter if
he truly admires you, and truly means to make you happy--can't think of
you without thinking also of what your generous checks are going to
mean to him? Write him a check for eleven thousand, Nina, as a
consolation for delaying the marriage a year. Try it!"

Nina rose to her feet. Her trembling mouth was desperately scornful,
and her eyes brimming, although she fought tears.

"I don't know why my own family is the first to think that nobody could
possibly love me for myself!" she said, in a breaking voice. "First
Harriet ruins my friendship with Ladybird--and then--then--!"

"Listen, Nina," her father said. He and Harriet had come around to
stand beside her, and he had encircled the shaking and protesting
shoulders with his arm. "I have just telephoned Fox to make
reservations for me on the next Brazilian steamer. I shall have to be a
month or six weeks in Rio de Janeiro every year now. Now I've just been
wondering why you and Harriet don't come with me this first trip? We
stop at the Barbadoes and Bahia; it's a magnificent steamer--swimming
tanks and gymnasium; you'll love it, and you'll love a touch of the
South American countries, too, a chance to try your Spanish. Why not
put off this marriage idea for a year, come along with me, you'll make
steamer acquaintances, you'll broaden out a little bit--"

"I won't go anywhere!" sobbed Nina, wildly, turning for flight,
"because I'm going to kill myself!"

Harriet only waited long enough after her dramatic exit to give Richard
a reassuring nod. Then she hurried after Nina.

The girl was sobbing on her bed, and for awhile she answered Harriet's
soothing touch of voice and hand only with angry jerks. Then they fell
to talking, and Nina confided for the first time fully in the older
woman. Royal's letters, his exquisite cards, sent with flowers, the
poems he had written her; here they all were. Harriet sympathized,
sighed, and consoled her affectionately. Presently she was able to
suggest a new thought to Nina, one that could not but be palatable to
the girl's hurt spirit.

"You see, you're only seventeen, Nina," Harriet said. "The age when
most girls are still in the schoolroom, long before they have affairs!
Well, you're not interested in college, so that ought to give you three
or four clear years of girlhood. You're bound to have other affairs,
you've proved that! You go to South America--perhaps there is some
interesting man on the steamer; you go to Canada--to California, the
world is yours. Now, Royal is different. He is an experienced man of
affairs; he will always have an attraction for women, and they for him.
You aren't his match, now, Nina. In a few years you may be--"

"I'm not jealous!" Nina said, proudly. But Harriet smiled.

"Yes, you are jealous. You wouldn't be a real true woman if you
weren't!" she accused. A reluctant dimple tugged at Nina's pouting
mouth. She did not dislike the idea of potential despotism, of the
travelled, experienced woman of the world, confident of her charm.

"If I offered a check to Royal, do you suppose he'd accept it!" she
remarked, after dark musing. She was sitting on the edge of her bed
now, and Harriet was brushing her hair.

"If you really are worried about his business affairs, Nina, why not
try it?" Harriet suggested, sensibly. To this Nina returned a pouting:

"I'm perfectly willing to try it!" And as a great concession she added
with a sigh, "And I'll tell him what Father thinks!"

"Now you're talking like a woman who has herself well in hand!" Harriet
said, approvingly. "When are you to see him?"

"He's coming over especially to see Father to-morrow," Nina said. "I
suppose I might as well go down," she added, eyeing herself gloomily in
her mirror, "for Ward and that boy seem absolutely at a loss for
amusement!"

"And I'll be down presently," Harriet said. But when Nina was gone she
walked slowly to her own dressing table, and sat down, and regarded
herself steadily, and with heavy eyes. Unexpectedly, here between the
family dinner and the early going to bed, on a June evening, a crisis
in her life was confronting her, and she knew that she must meet it.

Ward's guest was only the young Saunders boy, who had been with them
constantly last summer, and who was of absolutely no significance in
their lives. And yet Harriet had been introduced to him all over again
as "Mrs. Carter"--there was no halfway, in the eyes of the world at
least, in this relationship of hers with Richard, and she must begin to
take her place in the family.

"Mrs. Carter!" Bottomley and Pilgrim were beginning to call her so; she
must sign checks as "Harriet Carter" now, she must say "by Mrs. Carter"
in the shops, in a thousand little ways she must claim the dignity of
being his wife.

And Harriet loved that distinction as if the title, the signature, and
the dignity had never been vouchsafed to womankind before. She had
marvelled at her old self, that had taken "Miss" and "Mrs." with
cheerful indifference--why, there was a worldwide chasm between the
two! Just to have this silly Saunders boy call her Mrs. Carter, as a
matter of course, was to receive the accolade that gave her all her
longed-for dreams in one. It was the name of the man she loved, and,
even though in a shadowy and unloved way, she liked the title that made
her his.

But this dignity had its sting, too, and its responsibility. Harriet's
soul had been growing during this past year. She had thrown off the old
shell of bitterness and discouragement, she had become ambitious again,
even if only in the shallow, mercenary way that the life about her
encouraged. And then that had changed, too, and it had seemed to
Harriet only good to serve and to be busy, to work out the difficult
problem that was presented her with all the accumulated years of study
and dreams, philosophy and courage, to help her. Then love had come,
sweeping all her old life away before it--the flotsam and jetsam of
discouraged years; what was ignoble and sordid and outgrown had still
lined the river banks, it was true, but that was carried away now, the
man she loved needed her, and by some instinct deeper than any dull
male reasoning of his, had drawn her to him.

And now she owed him the truth, the whole, painful, humiliating story.
If she had told him months ago, so much the better and braver woman
she! She had not done so; she had been fighting Nina and his mother
then; she had been afraid. But she was not afraid now; he could forgive
that long-ago girl of seventeen because her advocate was the woman of
twenty-eight, the finished, cultivated, capable woman who had served
him and his house, who must win his respect back because she loved him
with every fibre of her being.

The words in which she would tell him came to her in a rush. Why--it
was nothing! It was less than nothing. In half an hour she would be
back here in her room again, with all the past clean and straight at
last, with the cloud gone, and with her whole soul singing with hope of
the glorious future. For a moment she knelt by her bed, her face in her
hands.

She rose to her feet. There was a tap at the door.

It was Bottomley. "If you please, 'm--Mr. Carter would be so much
obliged if she would step down to the library, 'm." Harriet gave
herself a parting glance, and followed the man downstairs.

"Courage!" she said to herself, with her hand on the library door.
"I've exaggerated and enlarged upon this thing too long! I've imagined
it into an importance that it really hasn't at all!"

Richard was back at his desk; he smiled and rose as she came in. There
was another man in the library, who rose and faced her, too.

And when Harriet saw him she knew that she was too late. It was Royal
Blondin.

A dizziness and sickness came over her as she went slowly to the chair
opposite Richard. She touched the desk for support as she sat down, and
felt that her fingers were cold and wet.

"Mr. Blondin has come to talk to me about Nina," Richard said. Harriet
somehow moved her dizzy eyes toward Blondin, and she smiled
mechanically. But she had to moisten her lips before she could speak.

"I see!" Her voice sounded horribly choked to her; she could find
nothing to add to the meaningless words.

"Mr. Blondin asks my consent to an immediate marriage," Richard said.
"You know my objections to that, Harriet, of course! We have just been
discussing them, as I explained to him. This is a painful matter to me,
and I regret it. But Mr. Blondin has given me no choice but to tell him
frankly why I think him an unsuitable husband for my daughter. I have
told him exactly what my procedure will be in such a case, and I think
we understand each other!"

Royal was smiling the serene, dreamy smile that was characteristic of
him.

"Nina," he said, tenderly, "is warm hearted. And a chance allusion to
my financial position, which I thought I owed her, has distressed her
unnecessarily. It will, truly, be out of the question for me to travel,
as we had planned. The unfortunate speculations of my friend--"

"Whose name you withhold," Richard interrupted the musical voice to
say, drily.

"Because of a promise!" Royal flashed promptly. "But," he resumed,
turning to Harriet, "I shall be able to negotiate this business, as I
assure Mr. Carter, without any assistance from him or his daughter,"
his lip curled scornfully, "and I do not propose to give her up for any
three years--or three weeks!"

Harriet could only look at him fixedly, with an ashen face.

"God help me," she breathed in her soul. "God help me!"

"Well," said Richard, with weary impatience, "we did not call you down
to bore you with this! I asked to see you, Harriet, because Mr. Blondin
has made the statement to me, just now, that you were heartily in
accord with his plans for Nina, and that you approved of the affair!"

The prayer in Harriet's heart did not stop as she moved her wretched
eyes to Blondin.

"I believed that you and she had not seen each other since December,"
she reminded him. "I lost no chance to advise her against the
engagement! I thought it was all over!"

"Well!" Richard said, with a breath of relief. He had been watching her
closely, now he settled back in his chair, and moved his contemptuous
scrutiny to Blondin.

"One moment!" Royal Blondin said, gently. But he was also pale. "You
believe that I would make Nina a good husband, don't you?" he asked
Harriet directly and quietly.

She was not looking at him. Her eyes were on Richard Carter.

"I believe you would ruin her life!" she said, deliberately.

"Thank you," Richard said. "I think that is all, Mr. Blondin. I was
aware that you had--misunderstood Mrs. Carter when you made that
statement!"

"Not quite all," Blondin persisted. "You believe that Nina would be
wiser not to marry me?" he asked Harriet.

"You--" She cleared her throat. "You know that I think so!" she said.

Blondin laughed.

"And now, Mr. Blondin, you will kindly leave my house!" said Richard.

The other man was watching Harriet, with a menace in his narrowed eyes.
White lines had drawn themselves about his tightly closed lips, yet he
was smiling. He had lost the game, truly, but she knew he would play
his last card, just the same. The suavity, the calm of years fell from
him, and his voice deepened into a sort of cold and quiet fury as he
said:

"One moment, Mr. Carter. Why don't you ask your wife what makes her
think I won't make Nina a good husband? Why don't you ask her if she
has been hiding something from you all this time? Why don't you ask her
if she herself wasn't madly in love--and with me!--when she was Nina's
age, and whether she was married in my studio, to me, ten years ago--!"

He had shot the phrases at her with a distinctness almost violent. Now
his dry voice stopped, but his swift, venomous look went from the
silent man at the desk to the silent woman who stood before him. Before
either moved or spoke he spoke again.

"Ask her--she'll tell you! Ask her!'

"Be quiet!" Richard said. "I don't believe one word of it!" And then as
the girl neither raised her eyes nor attempted to speak, he asked her,
encouragingly and quickly: "Harriet, will you tell him that not one
word of that is true?"

Harriet had risen, and was standing at the back of the carved black
chair with both her hands resting upon it. She had looked quietly at
Blondin, when he began to speak, and the beautiful white breast that
her black evening gown left bare had risen once or twice on a swift
impulse to interrupt him. But now she was looking down at her laced
fingers, with something despairing and helpless in the droop of her
bright head and lowered lashes.

It had had its times of seeming frightful to her, this secret, in the
troubled musings of the past year. But it had never loomed so horrible
and so momentous as now, in the silent library, with the eyes of the
man she loved fixed anxiously upon her. He had trusted, he was
beginning to admire her, and like his wife and his daughter and his
mother, she had failed him.

"Harriet?" he said in quick uneasiness. She raised her head now, and
looked at him with weary eyes devoid of any expression except
bewilderment and pain.

"Yes," she said, simply. "That is all--quite true. It sounds--" she
hesitated, and groped for words--"it sounds--as if--" she began, and
stopped again. "But it is all quite true!" she finished, in the
troubled tone of a child who is misunderstood.

Then for a long time there was silence in the library.




CHAPTER XIX


The curtains at the French windows in the library at Crownlands stirred
in the breeze of the warm summer night, the pendulum of the big clock
behind Richard Carter moved to and fro, but for a long time there was
no other sound in the library. Richard had dropped his eyes, was idly
staring at the blank sheet of paper before him. Royal Blondin, who had
folded his arms, for a moment studied Harriet between half-closed lids,
but presently his eyes fell, too, and with a rather troubled expression
he studied the pattern of the great Oriental rug.

Harriet stood motionless, turned to stone. If there was anything to be
said in her behalf, she could not say it now. For the first time the
full measure of her responsibility and the full measure of her deceit
smote her, and in utter sickness of spirit she could advance no excuse.
It was not that she had failed Blondin, or that she had failed Richard,
but the extent of her failure toward herself appalled her. She was not
the good, brave, cultivated woman she had liked to think herself; she
was one more egotist, with Nina, and Isabelle, and Ida, unscrupulously
playing her own game for her own ends.

"I'm extremely sorry," Richard said, presently, in a somewhat lifeless
tone. "I imagine that if my daughter had known this, she might have
been spared some suffering and some humiliation. But we needn't
consider that now." He was silent, frowning faintly. He put up a fine
hand and adjusted his eyeglasses with a little impatient muscular
twitching of his whole face that Harriet knew to be characteristic of
his worried moods. "Mr. Blondin," he said, wearily and politely, "I
have had a great deal on my mind, lately, and have perhaps been hasty
in my condemnation of you. However, this does not particularly help
your cause with my daughter. There are a great many aspects to the
matter, and I--I must take time to consider them. Nina must be my first
consideration, poor child! Her mother failed her--we have all failed
her! She has a right to know of this conversation--"

Harriet stirred, and his eyes moved to her. Without a word, and with a
stricken look in her beautiful, ashen face, she turned, and went slowly
toward the door. When she reached it, she steadied herself a second by
pressing one fine hand against the dark wood, then she opened it and
was gone.

"I'm very sorry--" Blondin said, hesitatingly, when the men were alone.

"Mrs. Carter," Richard said, getting to his feet, and very definitely
indicating an end to the conversation, "before she consented to
the--arrangement into which we entered, of course took me into her
confidence in this matter!"

"She--she did?" Royal stammered.

"Certainly she did," Richard said, harshly. And looking at him the
other man saw that his face looked haggard and colourless. "She did not
mention your name, I presume out of a sense of generosity to you. I
could have wished," he added, "that you had been similarly generous,
and had seen fit to leave her, and leave my daughter alone. I think I
must ask you to excuse me," said Richard at the door. His tone was one
of absolute suffocation. "I can see no object in your frankness
to-night, unless to distress and humiliate Mrs. Carter. My daughter,
and not myself, is the one entitled to your confidence, and you are
well aware of my feeling where she is concerned! I would to God," said
Richard, with bitterness, "that I had never seen your face! Mrs. Carter
has been a useful--and indispensable!--member of this family for many
years; if there was in her past some unpleasant and painful event, that
is her own affair--!"

"Not when she marries a man who is unaware of it," Blondin suggested,
in his pleasant, soft tones.

"That is mine!" Richard said, sternly. And he opened the library door.
"Good evening!" he said.

"Good evening!" Blondin, with his light, loitering step, crossed the
threshold, and Richard closed the door. He took his chair again, and
reached toward the bell that would have brought Bottomley to summon
Nina in turn. But halfway to the bell his resolution wavered,
disappeared. Instead, he rested his elbows on the table, and his head
in his hands, and there sounded from his chest a great sigh that was
almost a groan.

Oh, he was tired--he was tired--he was tired! It was all a mess--the
boy, the girl, their mother, his own arrangements for their protection
and safety. All a mess.

She had been beautiful, that girl, with her golden hair in the
lamplight, and her white arms a little raised to rest her locked hands
on the chair. Like some superb actress of tragedy, some splendid and
sullen prisoner at the bar. The slender figure in the dull wrapping of
satin, and the white bosom, had looked so young, so virginal, the blue
eyes were so honestly frightened and ashamed. And she had been that
bounder's wife--in his arms! Divorced! Harriet Field? Poor girl,
cornered by this unscrupulous scoundrel, this bully, with all the ugly
past dragged up like the muddy bottom of a river, staining and clouding
the clear waters. And what a look she had given him, there under the
lamp!

"It's a funny code," he mused. "Barbarians, that's what we are, when it
comes to women. Nina, Ida, Isabelle, Harriet--all of them pay for the
man-made rule! I shouldn't have forced her hand in this business
marriage; it was taking an advantage of her. No woman wants to marry
for anything but love, and if she had married for love, she would have
made a clean breast of this old affair, of course. I didn't exact that.
We've made a nice mess of it, all around!

"I mustn't let her work herself into a fever over all this!" he found
himself thinking.

But Nina must be the first consideration. He must plan for Nina. He
brought his thoughts back resolutely--his daughter must break her
engagement now, there was that much gained. And for the journey to Rio--

"But why didn't she tell me!" he interrupted himself, suddenly. The
reference was not to Nina. Again he saw the superb white shoulders in
the soft flood of lamp-light, and the flash of the blue eyes that
turned toward Blondin.

"She could have killed him!" Richard said. "My God! how she will love
when she does love!"

 Meanwhile, to Harriet had come the bitterest hour of her life.
She had reached a crossroads, and with steady fingers and an anguished
heart she prepared for the only step that to her whirling brain and
shamed soul seemed possible. She must disappear. There was no
alternative.

She had harmed them all, they could only think of her now as an
unscrupulous and mischievous woman who had by chance entered their
lives when they were all in desperate need of wisdom and guidance, who
had played her own contemptible game, and added one more hurt to the
hurt reputation of the house of Carter.

Harriet got out of her evening gown and into a loose wrapper. She went
about somewhat aimlessly, yet the suitcases, spread open on the bed,
were gradually filled, and her personal possessions gradually
disappeared from tables and walls. Now and then she stopped short,
heartsick and trembling; once her lips quivered and her eyes filled,
but for the most part she did not pause.

Nina, at about eleven, had come to the door between their rooms, and
opened it. The girl was undressed, and for a few moments she watched
Harriet scowlingly, with narrowed eyes.

"Are you going away?" she said, presently. Harriet brought heavy eyes
to meet hers, and stood considering a minute, as if bringing her
thoughts back a long distance.

"I--going away? Yes," she said, slowly. "Yes, I may."

Nina still stood watching, which seemed vaguely to trouble Harriet, who
gave her a restless glance now and then as she went to and fro.
Presently she spoke to Nina again.

"Good-night, Nina!"

"Good-night!" snapped Nina, and the door slammed.

Harriet continued to move about for perhaps half an hour before Nina's
odd manner recurred to her, on a wave of memory, and she seemed to hear
again Nina's ungracious tone.

"He told her!" she said, suddenly. "She saw Royal, and he told her!
Poor child--"

And she went to Nina's room, with a vague idea that she would sit
beside the weeping girl for awhile, one heavy heart close to the other,
even if no words could pass between them.

But Nina lay sleeping peacefully, and Harriet, after watching her for a
few minutes, went back to her own room. She went to the open window,
and stood staring absently out at the dark summer night, the great
branches of the trees moving in the restless wind, and the oblong of
dull light that still fell from the library window.

She could not see the horror as Richard saw it: she could not see
herself as only a mistaken woman, a woman with youth, beauty, and
intelligence pleading for her, one problem more in his life it is true,
but only one among many, and not the greatest. She did not see him as
he saw himself, his family as the somewhat troublesome, and yet quite
understandable, group of selfish human beings in whose perplexities he
had always played the part of arbiter.

To Harriet the thing loomed momentous, unforgivable, incalculable. It
assumed to her the proportions of a murder. Bigamy, perjury,
deceit--what hadn't she done! Richard, in her estimation, was not what
he thought himself, a somewhat ordinary man in the forties whose life
had already held poverty and disillusionment and wholesome
disappointment, whose nature had been tempered to humour and generosity
and philosophy; to Harriet, he was the richest, the finest, the most
deserving of men, and she the adventuress who had brought his name down
to shame and dishonour.

Until two o'clock she was wretchedly busy in soul and body. When the
last of her personal possessions was packed, and when she was aching
from head to foot, she took a hot bath, and crept into bed.

But not to sleep. The feverish agonies of shame and reproach held her.
She was pleading with Richard, she was talking to Nina--she was making
little of it--making much of it--she was saying a reluctant
"yes--yes--yes!" to their questioning.

At four o'clock she dressed herself again, half-mad with headache and
fatigue, and went out into a world that was just beginning to brighten
into faint shapes and colours. The fresh cold air of morning struck her
jaded senses with a delicious chill; she went noiselessly across the
terrace and down toward the water, her big soft coat brushing
spider-webs from the dim rosebushes as she went. The world lay silent,
fragrant, saturated with dew. Yet under its chill Harriet felt the
pervading warmth of the day that had gone, and the day that was to come.

She drew in great breaths of it; it was her world for another three
hours. Then men would begin to stir themselves, down at the river
docks, and at the stables and garages, and smoke would go up from the
chimneys of Crownlands, and rakes clink on the gravel walks. She went
down to the little pier, and sat on a weather-worn bench, and watched
the day breaking softly over the river.

Little wrinkles crossed the satiny surface of the Hudson, which looked
dark and metallic in the twilight. But presently there was a general
glimmering and widening, and across the river trees and houses were
touched with light, and window-panes flashed. Harriet, huddled into her
coat, did not stir; she might have been, for an hour, a part of the
motionless scene.

A steamer moved majestically up the river, the smoothly widening wake
spread from shore to shore; pink light showed at one cabin window; and
into Harriet's sombre thoughts came unbidden the picture of a yawning
cook, stumbling about amid his soot-blackened pots and pans.

With the morning, the peace of a conquered spirit fell upon her. She
had thought it all to an ending at last. It seemed to Harriet that
never in her life had she thought so clearly, so truly, so bravely. Her
duty to Richard, to his children, to Linda; she had faced them without
fear and without deception, tasting the humiliating truth to its bitter
dregs, planning the few short interviews that must precede her leaving
them all forever.

For Harriet emerged from the furnace the mistress of her own soul. She
had been wrong; she had been weak; she had been contemptible; but not
so wrong or weak or contemptible as they would think her. She would go
on her way now, the braver for the lesson and the shame. And what they
thought of her must never shake again her own knowledge of her own
innocence.

Go on her way to what? She did not know. But she neither feared what
the future might hold nor doubted, it. She could make her own way from
a new beginning.

"But before I go," said Harriet, resolutely, "I must tell him that I'm
sorry. And I must ask Nina to forgive me."

She turned, and buried her face in the thick, soft sleeve of her coat.
But she did not cry long, and when Jensen, the boatman, came out on the
dock at seven, the lady he knew to be his new mistress was sitting
composedly enough on her bench, studying the now glittering and
sparkling river with quiet eyes.

Harriet nodded to him, and rose somewhat stiffly, to go up to the
house. She mounted the brick steps with a thoughtfully dropped
head--the straight shafts of the sunlight were making it impossible to
face the house, in any case--and so was within three feet of Richard
Carter before she saw him.

He looked fresh, hard, even young, in his white flannels. They stood
looking at each other for a moment without speaking.

"Where have you been?" said Richard, sharply, then. "You look ill!"

Tears, despite her desperate resolution, suddenly stung Harriet's eyes.
And yet her heart leaped with hope.

"I wanted to see you, Mr. Carter," she faltered. "I couldn't sleep very
well. I've been down at the shore. But later--any time will do!"

"You couldn't sleep!" he exclaimed with quick sympathy. He looked from
her about him, as if for a shelter for her emotion. "Here," he said,
"come down the steps a bit. I was just going down to the court for a
little tennis; Ward may follow me, but he won't be dressed for half an
hour yet. Sit down here; we can talk."

They had come to the marble bench on the terrace, where Isabelle and
Anthony Pope, sheltered by these same towering trees and low brick
walls, had had their talk a year ago. Harriet, to her own
consternation, felt that she was in danger of tears.

"I--I hardly know how to say it," she began. "But--but you know how
ashamed I am!"

"I know--I know how you feel!" Richard said with a sort of brief
sympathy. "I'm sorry! But you know you mustn't take this all too hard.
I didn't--I was thinking of this last night; I didn't ask you
for--well, any more than you gave me, in this marriage of ours. Your
divorce was your own affair--"

The girl's tired eyes flashed.

"There was no divorce!" she said, quickly.

"No divorce?" he echoed with a puzzled frown.

"I want to tell you about it!" she said. But the tears would come
again. "I'm tired!" Harriet said, childishly, trying to smile. "I've
been up--walking. I couldn't sleep!"

The consciousness that he had been able to forget the whole tangle, and
sleep soundly, gave Richard's voice a little compunction as he said:

"You don't have to tell me now. We'll find a way out of it that is easy
for everyone--"

"No, but let me talk!" Harriet, in her eagerness, laid her fingers on
his wrist, and he was shocked to feel that they were icy cold. "I want
to tell you the whole thing--I want you to understand!" she said,
eagerly. Richard looked at her in some anxiety; there was no acting
here. The rich hair was pushed carelessly from the troubled forehead.
She was huddled in the enveloping coat, a different figure indeed from
his memory of the superb and angry girl of last night in the library
lamplight.

"Mr. Carter, I never knew my mother--" she began. But he interrupted
her.

"My dear," he said, in a tone he might have used to Nina. He laid his
warm, fine hand on hers, and patted it soothingly. "My dear girl, if
you feel that you would like to go to that motherly sister of yours--if
you feel that it would be wiser--"

"Oh, I am going to Linda at once!" Harriet said, feverishly, hurt to
the soul. "I had planned that! But--but won't you let me tell you?" she
pleaded. She had framed the sentences a hundred times in the long
night; they failed her utterly now, and she groped for words. "I was
only three years old when my mother died," she said. "Of course I don't
remember her--I only remember Linda. I was shy, my father was a
professor, we were too poor to have very much social life. I lived in
books, lived in my father's shabby little study really; I never had an
intimate girl friend! Linda was always good--angelically good--talking
of the Armenian sufferers, and of the outrages in the Congo, and of the
poor in New York's lower east side--she never cared that we were poor,
and that we hadn't clothes!"

"I know--I know!" Richard's eyes were smiling, as if he knew the
picture, and liked it.

"Well, Linda married when I was ten, and Josephine came, and then Julia
came. I still lived for books and babies. But, unlike Linda, I cared."
Harriet's whole face glowed; she looked off into space, and her voice
had a longing note. "I cared for clothes and good times!" she said. "I
adored the children, but I dreamed of
carriages--maids--glory--achievements! I knew that other women did it--"

"I remember feeling that way!" Richard commented, mildly, as she paused.

"Well," Harriet said, "I met Royal Blondin one night. He lived in our
town--Watertown. He had a dreadful, artificial sort of mother. My
sister didn't approve of her at all. A friend of his named Street was
an artist, and he had a nice little wife, and a baby, and they lived in
a big, barnlike sort of studio. It seemed wonderful to me. They loved
each other, and their baby, but they were so free! They would have the
whole crowd to dinner, twenty of us, bread and red wine and macaroni
and music and talk, it was wonderful--or I thought so! It was so
different from Linda's ideas, of frosted layer-cake, and chopped nuts,
and Five Hundred. I loved the studio, and they--they all loved me, and
he--Royal--loved me especially. He used to talk about Yogi philosophy
and Oriental religions and poetry, and after awhile it was understood
among them all that he loved me, and I him. And we were engaged. Of
course Linda suspected, and there was opposition at home, but in the
studio, helping the Streets get their suppers, it seemed so right--so
simple! Royal said he did not believe in the orthodox ceremony of
marriage. He argued that no one could live up to its promises, and I
believed him. Miriam Street, the artist's wife, was a poet, and she
wrote the ceremony by which we were married. We had a big supper, and
they were all there, and this poem--this marriage poem--was beautiful.
It was published in a magazine, afterward, and called 'A Marriage for
True Lovers'. It had a part for the woman to say, and a part for the
man, and Royal and I said those, and then it had a part for the woman's
friend, and the man's friend, and for all their friends. And then there
was a promise that when love failed on either side, the two were free,
to keep the memory of the perfect love unstained by the ugly years."

She paused; Richard did not speak. She had told him this much in a
simple, childish voice, a voice that was an echo of that old time, he
knew. Presently she went on:

"There was music, and then they all kissed me, and we had supper, and
they drank our health. I went back that night to my sister's; Royal
stayed with his mother. We planned to go away on our honeymoon the next
day. I did not tell Linda and Fred that I considered myself married. I
knew they would not understand and would try to interfere.

"The next morning I slipped away from the house, with my suitcase, and
I met Royal Blondin downtown. We motored to Syracuse, and took a train
there for New York. I had felt sick when I awakened--it was partly
excitement, and partly the supper the night before, when we had all
eaten and drunk too much. But I was very sick in the train, I thought I
was going to die. Royal persuaded me to eat my lunch in the dining car,
and that only made me worse. There was a nice woman in the train, with
two little girls, and she took care of me. And when she got to New
York--I had told her that I was on my wedding journey, and perhaps that
made her kind--she took us to her boarding-house, in West Forty-sixth
Street. The landlady was a dear, good woman, a Mrs. Harrington, and--I
was very sick by this time!--she put me into her own room, because the
house was full, and sent for her own doctor.

"It was a time of horror," Harriet said, smiling a little, after a
moment of thought. "The strange women and the strange room, and Royal
coming in with flowers, and sitting beside me. The doctor said it was a
touch of poisoning, and I was ill only a few days. But the
home-sickness, and the strangeness! Somehow, I didn't feel married, I
felt like a lost little girl. I wanted to be back in Linda's kitchen
again, safe, and scolding because nothing interesting ever happened.

"Well, I was sick for three or four days. It was the fourth day when I
was well enough to go out. Royal thanked them, and paid Mrs. Harrington
and the doctor and we went to lunch downtown--it was at Martin's, I
remember, and Royal was so excited and interested in everything. But I
still felt limp and dull. We shopped and went about seeing things after
lunch, and then we went to the hotel where he was staying. We were
registered there as Mr. and Mrs. Blondin; it was all quite taken for
granted."

Harriet stopped; her face was drawn and white, her words coming with
difficulty, the phrases brief and dry. Richard was paying her absolute
attention, his eyes fixed upon her face.

"We had dinner upstairs," she said. She paused, her lips tight pressed.

"I can't tell you," she began again, suddenly, "I can't tell you how it
was that I came suddenly to know that I was too young for marriage! In
Miriam Street's little studio, where they were laughing about the baby
and the supper, it had seemed different. But here, in a hotel, I
suddenly wanted my sister, I wanted to be home again.

"We were talking and planning naturally enough. Royal was coming and
going in the two rooms; I had plenty of chance to--to escape. Every
time I let one go by my heart beat harder."

He could tell from her voice that her heart was beating hard now with
the memory of that old time.

"If I had let them all go by," she recommenced, "my life would have
been different. In a few weeks we would have come back to Watertown, as
man and wife, and perhaps had a studio near the Streets', and perhaps
found a solution. But I couldn't!

"I caught up my coat; left my hat and bag. I went down the stairs, not
daring to wait for the elevator. And I went to Mrs. Harrington's. She
was very kind and took me in; she said that perhaps it would be better
to wait--until I was older. I cried all night, and the next day Mrs.
Harrington lent me the money and I went back to Linda.

"Of course, it was terrible, at first. But they were kind to me, in
their way. And I was--cured. I went into hysterics at the first mention
of the whole hideous thing. They saw Roy, and they told me that I need
never see him again. The papers--for it got to the papers!--said that a
divorce had been arranged, but there was no need for a divorce. It was
all hushed up--Linda and Fred never spoke of it. I--ah, well, I
couldn't!

"But when Fred's brother, David, who was in dental college then, began
to like me, then they began to make light of it," Harriet remembered.
"There had been no marriage, of course, either in law or in fact. They
all knew that. And I suppose if I had married David it might have been
happier for me. But as it was, I angered them. I didn't want to marry
David. And so it was what folly girls got themselves into--what the
world thought of a girl who had been 'talked about'--what the least
breath of scandal meant!"

"And you went back to Blondin?" Richard suggested.

"I? No, I never saw him again until a year ago in this garden!" Harriet
said.

"You never saw him again!" the man ejaculated.

"Not for nine years!"

"But--my God, my dear girl, he spoke of you as his wife!" Richard said.

"He said I had been. Not that I was now!"

The man looked at her, looked away at the river, and shrugged his
shoulders as if he were mystified by the ways of women.

"But--you were never his wife?" he said, flatly.

"Oh, no! You didn't think," Harriet said, hurt, "that I would have
married you, or any one else, if I had been!"

"You let him blackmail you for that," Richard further marvelled.

"I knew--in my own mind, of course, that I was not to blame," the girl
said, anxiously. "But it sounded--horrible."

Richard bit his lower lip, looked critically at his racket, slowly
shook his head.

"I didn't mind what any one thought," Harriet said, reading his
thought. "But they did!"

"They?" Richard repeated, patiently.

"Everyone," she supplied, promptly. "Your wife, your mother, Mary
Putnam! Even Mrs. Tabor."

"I suppose so!" he conceded, after a pause. And beneath his breath he
added, "Isabelle--Ida Tabor!"

His tone was all she asked of exquisite reassurance.

"I hoped you wouldn't!" she said, standing up with clasped hands and a
sudden brightening of her tired and colourless face. "That's what I
tried to make myself believe you would feel! I wanted so to leave it
all behind. I thought he had gone, that it was all over, that what it
was mattered more than what it sounded like! I thought I could save
Nina better, with what I knew, than any one else! But last night,"
Harriet added, "proved to me that I had been all wrong. I've been so
worried," she added, with utter faith in his decision. "I don't know
what you think we had better do."

For a full minute Richard watched her in silence. Then he said, mildly:

"About Nina, you mean?"

"About everything!" Harriet suddenly laughed gaily, like a child. Life
seemed once more straight and pleasant in this exquisite June morning;
she felt puzzled, but somehow no longer afraid. The menacing horrors of
all the years, the vague uneasiness that she had never quite dared to
face, were fluttering about her awakening spirit like Alice's pack of
cards.

"Nina will come into line," her father said, thoughtfully, "she doesn't
know what she wants. I wish--I wish he loved her!" he added, with a
faint frown. "I'll see him about it again. We'll take her to Rio.
She'll get over it."

"And--" Harriet stopped, and began again: "And do you want things to go
on just as they are?" she asked.

For answer Richard smiled at her in silence.

"No," he said, finally. "I can't say that I do. I want you to worry
less, and to buy yourself some new gowns, and to begin to enjoy life!
Shakespeare had you down fine when he talked about conscience making
cowards of us all. What did you do it for? A young, capable,
good-looking girl scared by a lot of old women! Now, we'll take up this
Nina question, later on. You'd better go up and get yourself some
coffee, and go to bed for awhile. Better plan to be in town for a day
or two, for you'll both need clothes for the steamer--"

"You're very kind," the girl said, eyes averted, voice almost
inaudible. They were both standing now, Harriet's head turned aside, so
that he could not see her face, but her soft fingers resting in his.

"I'm not kind at all!" Richard said, with a rather confused laugh. He
patted her hand encouragingly. "The sea trip will shake both you and
Nina up, and do you a world of good!" he said.

"You think--" Harriet raised the soft, dark lashes, and her splendid,
weary eyes met his, "You really aren't worried about Nina?"

And she tried by a very faint stirring of her fingers to free them, and
finding them held, dropped her eyes again.

"I think I have Blondin's number," Richard said, with more force than
eloquence. Then with a little laugh that was partly amused and partly
embarrassed, he let her go.

He watched the young, slender figure and the shining, bare head until
they disappeared among the great trees about the house.




CHAPTER XX


The summer Sunday ran its usual course. Ward and his sister went to
luncheon at the club; Madame Carter drove majestically to a late
service in the pretty, vine-covered village church. Harriet, at last
able to relax in soul and body, slept hour after glorious hour.
Richard, returning from golf for a late luncheon, asked for her. Mrs.
Carter was still asleep, Bottomley assured him, and received orders not
to disturb her. But when Mr. Blondin called, Richard told the butler he
was to be shown to the terrace at once.

At three o'clock, therefore, Royal Blondin followed his guide out to
the basket chairs that were set under the trees, and here he found
Richard, comfortably smoking, and alone. The host rose to greet him,
but they did not shake hands, and measured each other like wrestlers as
they sat down.

"I had your message," Royal said, as an opening.

"You've not seen Nina to-day?" Nina's father asked.

"I broke an engagement with her at the club," the other man assured
him. "We will probably meet at the Bellamys', at dinner this evening."

"Ah, it was about that I wished to speak." Richard paused, and Blondin
watched him with polite interest. "You have held your knowledge of Mrs.
Carter as a sort of weapon for some months," Richard said, presently,
"to use it when you saw fit. I have always been in my wife's
confidence--"

He paused, but for no reason that Blondin could divine. As a matter of
fact, it gave Richard a sudden and unexpected pleasure to speak of her
so, to realize that he really might give the most wonderful title in
the world to this beautiful and spirited woman.

"And I have also talked with Nina this morning," he went on. "I regret
to say that her intentions have not altered."

"A loyal little heart!" Blondin said, gravely and contentedly. "I knew
I could depend upon her!"

Richard looked at him steadily for a moment, and felt carefully for his
next words.

"You know how I feel about her marrying you--" he began.

Royal nodded, regretfully, broke the ash from his cigarette with a
delicately poised little finger, and regarded Richard questioningly.
"That is my misfortune," he said, resignedly; pleasantly aware that
Nina's father would never be his match in phrases and self-control.

"I needn't go over all that," Richard said. "I love my daughter; I
believe she will make a fine woman. But she isn't anything but a child
now!"

"Perhaps you fail to do her justice in that respect," Royal Blondin
said. Richard flushed with anger, but felt helpless under the other
man's quiet insolence.

"I said I wanted to see you on business, Mr. Blondin," Richard
continued, trying to keep impatience and contempt out of his voice,
"and we'll keep to business. I don't know what your circumstances are,
of course--"

He hesitated, and Blondin looked at him with a faint interest.

"I live simply," he said. "Nina's money will be all her own."

"Nina will have no money, not one five-cent piece, for exactly three
years!" Richard said.

Blondin shrugged.

"She is quite willing to try it!" he reminded her father.

"I know she is! But how about you?" Richard asked. "You are not a boy,
you have some idea of what marriage means. For three years you must
take care of her, dress her, amuse her, satisfy her that she has not
made a mistake. Then she does come into her money--yes. But three years
is a long time in which to keep her certain that the wisest thing she
can do is turn it over to you."

He paused; Blondin smoked imperturbably.

"The marriage must be a notorious one, in any case," Richard pursued.
"For I intend to make my stand too clear ever to permit of a
retraction. I shall forbid it--let the world know that I forbid it. I
shall forbid my daughter the house, and her wedding gift will be simply
the clothes she happens to have. From Tuesday--her eighteenth
birthday--she will turn to you for her actual pocket money, for her
theatre tickets and cab fares."

"I understand that perfectly!" Royal said, serenely. But underneath,
while not moved from his intention, he felt his customary assurance
shaken.

"She is extravagant, naturally," her father said. "She will want new
gowns, want to display her new importance a little. Those bills will
come to you, Mr. Blondin. All the world will know as well as you do
that I have washed my hands of the whole affair."

Royal nodded again. He began to be conscious of a growing disquietude.
He had naturally given much thought to this exact question during the
past few weeks, and had solved it only by dismissing it. He had assured
himself that with his only daughter no man as generous as Carter could
be really harsh, and had always held his knowledge of Harriet
comfortably in the back of his mind, as an irresistible lever. Now both
these considerations were losing their force, and the empty
satisfaction of defying Richard seemed to be losing its flavour, too.

Blondin had no money, and lived with an extravagance that kept him
perpetually worried for money. The rent of his studio had been raised;
he was conscious of the necessity of returning hospitalities, of buying
clothes. His credit would receive an immediate assistance from a
marriage with Richard Carter's daughter, to be sure, but to sustain a
credit for three years upon that shadowy footing would be extremely
trying.

He liked Nina; despite his contempt for the girl, there was a certain
pitying affection for her stubborn loyalty and simplicity. But he knew
exactly what hideous scenes must follow upon his marriage with her.
What could he do with her, even suppose him to have borrowed money
enough to make their honeymoon a success? He imagined her dawdling
about his studio, imagined his social standing as necessarily affected,
imagined Mr. and Mrs. Royal Blondin attempting to reach an agreement as
to which invitations would be accepted and which rejected. Railway
fares, luncheons downtown, all these cost money--lots of money. Nina
would want to entertain "the girls." And Royal had at present several
serious debts. He had lost money on three morning lectures, delightful
lectures and well-attended, but still a financial loss. He had been
foolish enough to lose money at bridge, at the Bellamys' a week ago,
and young Bellamy was carrying his check for three hundred and twelve
dollars, drawn upon a bank where Royal was already overdrawn. Then
there was an unpleasantness about three rugs, rugs he had taken four
years ago, in a moment of unbelievable prosperity, but for which seven
hundred and twenty dollars had been promised, and never paid. Royal had
indeed offered Hagopian the rugs and a bonus, back again; he was sick
of the studio, and the endless reminders from his landlord's agent that
the monthly one hundred and seventy-five dollars was overdue; he was
sick of the whole business.

But Hagopian had refused to take back the rugs, and the rent had
reached the four-figure mark, and until he had settled for the last
lectures, he did not feel encouraged to begin more.

This was not a cheerful outlook with which to begin three years of
penniless matrimony. Royal, suavely smiling, and smoking on the
terrace, wondered suddenly if old Madame Carter, who had always been
his champion, would help out.

But Richard seemed to read his thought.

"Nina has appealed to her grandmother," he said, "and I know my mother
sympathizes, and would be glad to help you. But her affairs are in my
hands. She preferred it so, when I offered her some securities years
ago, and it has always been so. Her bank account receives a monthly
check; she sends all her household bills to my secretary, Fox. He O.
K's and pays them. Consequently, she is not able to act in this matter,
and I think she is glad of it! I believe she would regret the--the
inevitable estrangement as much as I."

Blondin elevated his eyebrows politely, as one interested but not
concerned. But he knew, with a sort of rage, that he was beaten. His
only recourse now would be to plead to Nina an all-important wire from
the Pacific coast, a dying friend, a temporary absence. He could
sub-let his studio for twice the rent, and live on the margin until
kindly Fate, as always, turned up a new card. Nina would protest, would
weep that her beloved studio, where her first exciting housekeeping was
to begin, was occupied by strangers, but that was unavoidable. However,
he would annoy this gray-eyed, firm-lipped business man first.

But Richard had taken a small slip of tan paper from his pocket, and
was studying it thoughtfully. Royal saw it, and his eyes narrowed.

"Now, Mr. Blondin," Nina's father said, simply, "I'm a business man. I
can't beat about the bush, and call things by pretty names. I want a
favour of you, and I'm willing to pay for it. I telephoned you this
morning that I wanted to see you on a matter of business. This is my
proposition."

He leaned forward, and Royal saw the paper. He boasted to women of his
indifference to money, it was true, but as with all adventurers, it
held first place in his thoughts. No man who was in debt could look
upon that check unmoved. Royal might win at cards to-night, to be sure;
Carter might weaken to-morrow, it was true. But this check bore his
name, and it was sure.

To enter the bank, with Richard Carter's check for so substantial an
amount, to deposit it, exchange a careless word with the cashier, to
write his check for the overdue rent, with a casual apology; to play
bridge again, this evening, with young Bellamy, and this time win back
that accursed check of his own, as he knew he would win it. ...

It all fluttered before his eyes, despite his attempt to look
indifferent. It weighed down the little tarnished thing he called his
pride, already half-forfeited in this group. His last attempt at
bravado was obviously that, and he knew it.

"Just one moment, Mr. Carter. You say that you and I know what marriage
is. How do you reconcile it with your knowledge of Nina, your knowledge
of her upbringing, to plan deliberately what would make our
marriage--or any marriage--foredoomed to failure from the start? I
didn't spoil Nina, I didn't form her tastes. She has thought of herself
as an heiress, she has spent money, lived luxuriously. I only ask a
fair chance. Make it an allowance, if you like. Keep the matter in the
family; don't blaze to the world that you disapprove! Many a
less-promising marriage has turned out a brilliant success. She loves
me. I--I am devoted to her. I see tremendous possibilities in her!"

"She loves you as a child does, and because she doesn't know you,"
Richard said, inflexibly. "But you haven't heard what I propose,
Blondin. Hear me out. I give you this now, to-day, on condition that
before to-night you talk to Nina. Represent anything you wish to her.
Tell her what you please. But convince her that she must wait for two
years--with no letters, no meetings, no engagement--that's all.

"On my part, I promise that nobody in the world, not Mrs. Carter, not
anybody, will hear of this for two years from to-day, at least.
Meanwhile, we'll amuse Nina. Her grandmother wants to take her to Santa
Barbara next fall--Gardiner wants both the youngsters on his ranch this
summer, or she may go with me to Brazil. She'll have enough to think
about. We'll not hurt you with her, you may take my word for it. And I
tell you frankly that I shall be deeply grateful. I'm not paying you
for giving her up. I'm paying you for two years' delay. Young Hopper
will be at the Gardiners' this summer--she likes him, and he likes her!
Well, that's speculation." Richard dismissed it with a movement of his
fine hands. "But we'll distract her!" he promised. "Hopper may buy a
ranch out there--that sort of thing might suit Nina down to the ground!"

"Buy it with Nina's money," Royal could not help sneering.

Richard eyed him in surprise.

"When Joe Hopper died he left that boy's mother something in the
millions," he said. "There's an immense estate." And then, with a
reversion to business: "Come, now, Mr. Blondin. We understand each
other. Nina's dining at the Bellamys' to-night; you're staying there.
Will you see her?"

The check fluttered to the table between them. There was a long
silence. Then Blondin ground out his cigarette in a stone saucer, rose,
in all the easy beauty of his white summer clothes, his flowing scarf,
his dark, romantic locks. He lifted his straw hat, put it on, picked up
his stick, and laid it on the table. Then he took the check and read it
thoughtfully.

"Thank you!" he said. Yet the shameful thing struck him, an adept now
in evading and lying, as surprisingly easy, and as he sauntered away in
the June warmth and silence, it was not of Nina, or her father, or even
of himself that he was thinking.

He had met the widow of Joe Hopper a few nights ago: a faded little
pleasant woman of fifty, pathetically grateful for his casual
politeness in her strangeness and shyness. He had chanced, quite idly
and accidentally, to make an impression on her. She had promised to
come to the studio and look at his rugs.

Royal wondered why she dressed so badly; she needed simple materials
and flowing lines. He heard himself telling her so.

Richard sat on, on the terrace, thinking, and presently his mother came
out and joined him. Wasn't he, the old lady asked elaborately, going to
the club? It was almost five o'clock, her son reminded her. Two or
three of his business associates were coming to dinner; Hansen was to
drive them all into the city later. Now, he just felt lazy.

"No tea to-day?" he asked, presently. People usually went to the club
on Sunday, said his mother. She added, irrelevantly, that Harriet was
asleep. Richard said that she had looked tired this morning; sleep was
the best thing for her.

But suddenly life became significant and thrilling again; he heard her
voice, her laugh. She came swiftly and quietly out to them, smiling at
him, settling herself in the chair beside his mother. She wore white,
transparent, simple; there were coral beads about her firm young
throat. The dew of her deep sleep made her blue eyes wonderful; her
cheeks were as pink as a baby's.

"Aren't the June days delicious?" she said. Richard studied her,
smilingly, without answering. What would she say next, where would she
move her eyes, or lay her white hand, he wondered. When she murmured to
his mother in an undertone, he tried to catch the words.

"We're to have tea," Harriet announced. When it came, she poured it;
for awhile the three were alone. Richard found himself talking to make
her talk, but she was apparently interested only to draw out his mother
and himself. "I'm starving," she presently said, apologetically, "this
is luncheon and breakfast, too, for me!"

"Did you have a good sleep?" Richard asked. She flashed him an eloquent
look.

"Oh--the most delightful of my whole life! Eight hours without
stirring!"

The Hoyts arrived: a handsome mother and two equally handsome
daughters. Harriet went to them gracefully; Richard saw that she was
accepting good wishes. She took the callers to his mother, and filled
their cups herself.

"She certainly is wonderful!" Richard said. He perfectly realized his
own suddenly deepening feeling for her, but he dared not analyze it
yet. When Mrs. Hoyt hinted at a dinner, he took part in the
conversation. "Thursday? Why not, Harriet? We have no engagement for
Thursday?"

She flushed brightly, signalling to him that she had already indicated
an excuse. They had never dined together away from home. He need not
think, said Harriet's anxious manner, that he need carry the appearance
of marriage so far.

"But--but aren't Nina and I to be in town Thursday?" she ventured,

"Shopping. You can make that next week!" Richard said. He loved her
confusion.

"Then we surely will! Thank you," she said to Mrs. Hoyt.

"Thursday, then, at eight!" the caller said, departing. Richard
sauntered with them to their car, and returned to find Harriet
half-scandalized, half-laughing.

"But do you want to dine with them?" she asked.

"Why not?" His smile challenged her, and she laughed hardily.

"I suppose there is no reason why not, Mr. Carter!"

"You can wear"--he gestured--"the black and goldy thing. They'll all be
watching you!"

"Oh," she said, considering earnestly, "I have a much handsomer one
than that. Blue and silver. You've not seen it."

"Blue and silver, then." Richard felt a distinct regret when the men he
expected appeared. There was but one figure of any interest to him on
the shady, flower-scented terrace, and that was a woman's figure in a
white gown.

For two or three days he was conscious of a constant interest in her
appearances and disappearances, a constant desire to please her. He
found himself liking a certain young man, in his city club, for no
other reason than that he had asked admiringly for Mrs. Carter. He
found Harriet deeply interested in a book, and took the time to go into
a bookstore and ask the clerk for something "on the same line as the
Poulteney Letters." In Nina's old Kodak album, idly opened, he was
suddenly held by pictures of Nina's governess, beautiful even in a
bathing-suit, with dripping hair; lovely in the gipsy hats and short
skirts of camp life.

Richard Carter was conscious of one mastering curiosity: he wanted to
know just how Harriet regarded him. It seemed suddenly of supreme
importance. He thought of it in his office, and smiled to himself
during important business conferences, wondering about it. It seemed
incredible to him, now, that his experiences of the past year had been
so largely concerned with Harriet. His wife's companion, his daughter's
governess, his own capable and dignified housekeeper, the woman he had
so hastily married, all seemed a different person, a quite visionary
person, with whom just such businesslike arrangements had been possible.

But Harriet was beginning to seem to him a stranger who possessed at
once the most mysterious and childlike, the most beautiful and the most
baffling personality that he had ever known. He made excuses to go home
early, just to catch glimpses of this wife who was not his wife. That
he had ever taken a fatherly, advisory tone with this woman was
unbelievable; her mere approach made him catch his breath and lose his
coherency. He had walked into her room--he had patronized her--he had
asked her as casually to marry him as if she had been fifty, and as
plain as she was lovely!

Richard shuddered as he thought of it. He made constant efforts to
engage her in personalities, but she evaded him. There was a real
thrill for him in the quiet dinner at the Hoyts'. Mrs. Carter, said
slow old bewhiskered John Hoyt, was an extremely pretty woman. My
wife--Richard in answering called her that--looks particularly well in
an evening gown. Indeed she looked exquisite in the blue and silver
dress, laughing--still with that adorable mist of strangeness and
shyness about her--with her neighbours at the table, and afterward in
the drawing room, waving her silver fan slowly while Freda Hoyt, who
quite obviously adored her, whispered her long confidences.

Coming home in the limousine they had neighbours with them, old Doctor
and Mrs. Carmichael, so he might not have the word alone with her for
which he had been longing all evening. But he stopped her in the wide,
dim hallway when they reached Crownlands.

"Tired?" he said, at the foot of the stairs.

"Not a bit!" There was an enchanting vitality about her. She had
slipped the thin wrap from her shoulders, and she turned to him her
lovely, happy face. "Did you want me?"

"I wanted to say something to you," Richard said, feeling awkward as a
boy.

"In there?" She nodded, suddenly alert, toward the library.

"Why in there?" he asked, with a little husky laugh. His one impulse
was to put his arms about her.

"I thought--bills, perhaps?" Harriet said, innocently. It was the third
day of the month; he had often consulted her as to expenses before this.

"No," Richard said, with another unsteady little laugh. "It wasn't
bills. I was just wondering--if I had been very stupid," he said,
taking one of her hands, and looking up from the fingers that lay in
his to the face that now wore an expression a little frightened despite
the smile.

"Never with me!" Harriet said, in a low tone.

"Never so blind," Richard said, "never so matter-of-fact that I hurt
your feelings? Nothing of--that sort?"

"Always the kindest friend I ever had!" the girl answered, unsteadily,
and with suddenly wet eyes. "The--the most generous!"

He looked at her hand again, looked up at her as if he would speak. But
instead she felt her fingers pressed, and felt her heart thump with a
delicious terror.

"Do--do you like the blue and silver dress?" she asked with an excited
laugh.

"I like it better than any dress I have ever seen!" Richard answered,
seriously. Her hand free now, Harriet, standing on the lowest step,
made him a little bow that displayed the frail silver fan, the silver
slippers, the stockings with their silver lace.

"And wait until you see our frocks for the boat!" she warned him. "Nina
has a yellow coat--and I have a black lace and a white embroidery!
Really--REALLY I have never seen anything like the white one. SHEER,
you know--"

Bottomley came noiselessly, discreetly, across the hall. Instantly the
woman in blue and silver was all the mistress.

"Is Mr. Ward in, Bottomley?"

"He dined at 'ome, Mrs. Carter."

"Oh, thank you! You may lock up, then. Good-night, Mr. Carter!
Good-night, Bottomley!"

She was gone. The blue and silver gown and the bunched folds of the
furred coat vanished on the stairway landing. The tall clock that she
passed struck eleven. And Richard, going into his library, realized
that he was deeply and passionately in love. He could think of nothing
else--he did not wish to think of anything else. Her face came between
him and his book, her voice loitered in his ears, her precise, pretty
phrasing, the laughter that sometimes lurked beneath her tones.

He went upstairs, and to his own suite. There was a door between his
own sitting room and the room that had been Isabelle's. From the other
side of his door, to-night, came the murmur of voices: Harriet and Nina
were talking. Their conversation seemed full of fascination to Richard,
although he could not hear a word, and would not have made an effort to
do so. But he liked the thought of this lovely woman near his little
girl, of their conferences and confidences.

 Next day Harriet told him that Nina had been talking of young
Hopper.

"It seems that this awkward, tongue-tied youth is desperately enamoured
of Rosa Artures, of the Metropolitan Opera Company," Harriet said in
rich amusement. "Of course the Artures is forty-five, and has a
domestic life that is the delight of the women's magazines. But poor
little Hopper haunts her performances, and sends her orchids, just the
same. He had never met her until a week or two ago, then some friends
had her and her husband on their yacht, and he was there. And she ate,
it seems, and laughed, and even drank a little too much--he's entirely
disillusioned! Isn't it too bad? And somebody told me about it, so I
encouraged Nina to get him to talk last night. They talked only too
well! They exchanged tragedies."

"Well, that won't hurt her!" Richard said, thoughtfully.

"Hurt her!" Harriet answered, eagerly. "It will be the best thing in
the world for her!"

They were at the country club; Harriet chaperoning Nina, who was down
at the tennis court with a group of young persons; Richard breathless
and happy from a hard game of eighteen holes. He had encountered her on
the porch, on his way to the showers, experiencing, as he did so, the
thrill that belongs only to the unexpected encounter. Now they loitered
at the railing, in the shade of the green awnings, as entirely
oblivious of watching eyes as if the clubhouse were the library at home.

"Nina is charming as a confidante," Harriet said, "and she would make a
boy of that type a delightful wife. She is the sort that marries early,
or not at all, and I'm going deliberately to encourage this affair in a
quiet way. He's a dear fellow, domestic and shy; they'd love their home
and their children and Nina would develop into the ideal wife and
mother. She's discriminating, she makes nice friends, she has splendid
French and Spanish. She looks lovely to-day; I persuaded her to leave
her glasses at home, even if she did miss them a little, and she has on
one of the gowns we bought for the Brazilian trip."

"I made the reservations to-day. We sail the third of August," Richard
said. "We've got to have your pictures taken for the passports."

"South America!" Harriet gave a great sigh of joy. "You don't know how
excited I am!" she said. "Three weeks on a big liner--and we have to
have bathing-suits, somebody said for the canvas tank, and they have
all sorts of things on board. I've always wanted to go to Rio!"

"There are eight big staterooms with baths on this liner," Richard
said. "I've taken two adjoining ones, so we ought to be very
comfortable. Yes," he conceded, enjoying her enthusiasm, "it ought to
be a great trip! Will you and Nina want a maid?"

"A maid?" She widened her blue eyes. "Oh, no! Why should we?"

Richard laughed at her surprise.

"You might take Pilgrim," he suggested. And with an amused glance he
added: "You forget that you are a rich man's wife."

"Indeed I don't!" Harriet said, quickly. "I spend simply scandalous
sums! When I saw my sister last week," she confided, gaily, "she
explained that the payment on the new house would prevent the usual six
weeks at the beach this year, and I simply made them go! I paid the
rent on their cottage and bought the tickets, and--oh, all sorts of
things, little dresses and sandals and shade hats, and off they went!
You never saw such joy!"

Richard blinked his eyes, and managed a smile.

"What did you pay it out of?" he wondered,

"My bank account! Linda and I shopped a whole morning, and had lunch
downtown--it was more fun!" Harriet said, youthfully. "The rent," she
explained, "was eighty dollars--"

"What? For six weeks!" Richard interrupted.

"Do you think that's a lot?" she asked, anxiously.

"Go on!" he said. "They all went off, did they? Eighty dollars gives
them a cottage until the middle of August, does it?"

"Until school opens," she nodded. "All the other things--well, it came
to about two hundred."

"That's happiness, isn't it?" Richard said. "A cottage on a swarming
beach. Sons and daughters in bathing-suits, no real housekeeping for
the mother, nothing but sleep and swimming and plain meals!"

"They love it!" But Harriet's eyes drank in the awninged shade of the
country club porches, the flowered cretonne on the wicker chairs, the
women in their exquisite gowns, the smooth curves of the green links,
where brightly clad figures went to and fro. Riders were disappearing
into the green shade of the bridle paths; girls in white, demanding
tea, came up the shallow steps. A group of four women, at a card table,
broke up with laughter. "Yes, it's honester than this," she said,
bringing her eyes back to his. "I'll have Linda and the girls here some
day," she added, "and they'll think it is wonderful. But after all,
they get more taste out of life!"

"You know they do!" Richard said.

"Mrs. Carter," said a woman in bright yellow, coming up to them
suddenly, "will you be a darling and come and talk to my French
officer? The girls have all been practising their Berlitz on him, and
he's almost losing his mind! Dick," added this matron, who had linked
her arm about Harriet's waist, "for heaven's sake go clean up! Can't
you find time to talk to your wife at home? I've been watching you for
five minutes, getting my arms burned simply black--will you come, Mrs.
Carter? That's the poor soul, over there with Sarah. I don't know why
I've had a French governess for that girl for seven years!"

"To save the life of a fellow creature--" Harriet said in her liquid
French. She went off, laughingly, in the other woman's custody; Richard
looked after them a moment.

He saw them join the group of smiling girls and the harassed Frenchman;
saw the alien's face brighten as Harriet was introduced. A moment later
a boy with a tennis racket dashed up to them, and there was a
scattering in the direction of the courts. The girls surrounded the
boy, and streamed away chattering. The matron in yellow came back to
her card table. And Harriet, unfurling her parasol, deep in
conversation with the captured soldier, sauntered slowly after the
tennis players. The afternoon sunshine sent clean shadows across the
clipped grass; the stretched blue silk of Harriet's parasol threw a
mellow orange light upon her tawny hair and saffron-coloured gown.

Richard had a child's desperate wish that he was dressed, and might run
after them.

"They are playing the semi-finals," he said to himself, hurrying
through his change of garments. "I wish to the Lord I had gotten
through in time to get down there!"

 But it was not at the tennis that he looked, twenty minutes
later, when he reached the courts; although a brilliant play was being
made, and there was a spattering of applause. His eyes instantly found
Harriet's figure; she was still talking to the Frenchman, whose olive
face was glowing with interest and admiration, and not more than eight
inches, Richard thought, from her own. Harriet's own face wore the
shadow of a smile, her lashes were dropped, and she was gently pushing
the point of her closed parasol into the green turf. The chairs in
which they sat had been slightly turned from the court.

Richard engaged himself in conversation with two or three men and women
who were watching the youngsters' game, and presently found himself
applauding his son for a brilliant ace. But after perhaps five minutes
he walked quite without volition, straight to Harriet's neighbourhood,
and she rose at once, introduced her new friend, and with a glance at
her wrist, announced that she must go.

"Ward said he would drive me home the instant it was over," said
Harriet, clapping heartily for the triumphant finish of the set.

"I'll drive you home!" Richard said, instantly. "I've the small car."

"Friday night!" Harriet smiled. For Friday night was the night for a
men's dinner and poker game at the country club, and Richard usually
liked to be there.

"I can come back!" he persisted, suddenly caring more for this
concession than anything else in the world. Without another word she
agreed, bade her Frenchman what seemed to Richard a voluble good-bye,
and when the bowing officer disappeared turned with a reminiscent smile.

"And now what?"

"Where did you learn to chatter French that way?" Richard said, leading
the way to the line of parked motors.

"Oh, we lived in Paris--old Mrs. Rogers and I," Harriet reminded him
carelessly. And reaching the little rise of ground that lay between the
clubhouse and the parking field, she stood still, looking off across
the exquisite spread of fields and valleys, banded by great strips of
woods, and flooded now by the streaming shadows and golden lights of
the late afternoon. "What a day!" she said, filling her lungs with
great breaths of the sweet air. "What an hour!"

"What I meant to say to you up there on the porch," Richard said, "when
that--that woman interrupted--"

Harriet herself interrupted with a laugh.

"You say 'that woman' as if it was a bitter, deadly curse!" she said.

"Well--" They had reached the car now, and Richard was investigating
the oil gauge and spark plugs under the hood. "Well, a woman like that
breaks in--nothing to her!" he said with scorn, straightening up.

"Yes, but at a country club?" Harriet offered, placatingly, as she got
into the front seat, and tucked the pongee robe snugly about the
saffron-coloured gown.

"I suppose so!" He got in beside her; there was a moment of backing and
wrenching before they glided out smoothly on the white driveway. "What
I meant to say was this," he added, suddenly, with a sidewise glance
from his wheel. "I--I want you to realize that I appreciate the
injustice--the crudeness of my rushing to you in New Jersey that
Christmas Day. I realize that we all have imposed on you--we've taken
you too much for granted! I was in trouble, and I couldn't think of any
other way out of it. But for any man to put a proposition like that to
any woman--"

They were driving very slowly. He looked at her again, and met a
wondering look in her beautiful eyes that still further confused him.
He had been uncomfortably conscious of an odd confusion in touching
upon this subject at all. Yet his mind had been full of it all day.

"I never felt it so, I assure you!" Harriet said with her lucid,
friendly look. Richard felt that there was more to say, but realized
that he had selected an unfortunate time for these confidences.

"I'm afraid I've been extremely stupid in the matter," he said, feeling
for his words. "I've gone about it clumsily. To tell you the
truth--What does that boy want?"

It was Ward who was coming toward them across the green, with great
springs and leaps, like some mountain animal.

"Give us a lift!" shrieked Ward, flinging himself upon the car as its
speed decreased. "Something is the matter with my engine--engina
pectoris is what I call it! Father, Mr. Tom Grant expects you to dine
at his table to-night, he said to remind you. And, Harriet, angel of
angels, we will be about six or seven about the groaning board; is that
all right?"

"I told Bottomley six or seven," Harriet said, serenely. "Ward, get in
or get out," she added, maternally, "don't hang over the door in that
blood-curdling way!"

She had put her arm about the boy to steady him; they began to discuss
tennis scores with enthusiasm. Richard drove the rest of the way home
almost without speaking.

He planned to see Harriet again that evening, and left the club at
eleven o'clock, after an incredibly dull game, with the definite hope
that the youngsters would dance, or in some other way prolong the
summer evening at least until midnight. His heart sank when he reached
Crownlands; the lower floor showed only the tempered lights that burned
until the latest member of the family came in, and Bottomley reported
that the young persons had gone upstairs at about half-past ten, sir.
It was now half-past eleven.

Richard debated sending Harriet a message to the effect that he would
like to see her for a moment. The flaw in this plan was that he could
think of nothing about which there was the slightest necessity of
seeing her. He felt restless and anything but sleepy, and glanced
irresolutely at the library door, and at the stairway.

Suddenly uproar broke out upstairs: there were thumping feet, shrieks,
wild laughter, and slamming doors. With a suddenly lightened heart
Richard ran up the wide, square flight to the landing. His son, in
pajamas that were more or less visible beneath his streaming robe of
Oriental silk, was pirouetting about the upper hall with a siphon of
soda water. Subdued giggles and smothered gasps indicated that the
young ladies were somewhere near, in hiding. Young Hopper, under Ward's
direction, was investigating doors and alcoves.

"Amy Hawkes--Amy Hawkes--Amy Hawkes--come into court!" Ward intoned.
"Drunk and disorderly!"

"Here, here, here!" Richard said. "What's all this?" Amy and Nina, with
hysteric shrieks, immediately forsook cover, and dashed down to him,
clinging to him wildly.

"Oh, Father! Make them stop! Oh, Mr. Carter, save us!" screamed the
girls in delicious terror. "Oh, they got poor Francesca--she's locked
up in your room! They climbed up our porch, after they swore to Harriet
that they wouldn't make another SOUND--"

Harriet now appeared in the hallway, her hair falling in a braid over
her shoulder, and the long lines of the black robe she wore giving her
figure an unusual effect of height. She did not see Richard
immediately, for she had eyes only for Ward, as she caught his
shoulder, and took away the siphon.

"Now, Ward--look here," she said, sternly. "What sort of honour do you
call this! Half an hour ago I thought all this nonsense was STOPPED.
Shame on you! Those girls promised me--"

She saw Richard, and laughed, the colour flooding her face.

"Aren't they simply shameless!" she said. "I had them all settled down,
once! Nina, where's Francesca? You see," Harriet said, in rapid
explanation to Richard, "I gave the girls my room to-night, so that
they could all be together, and this is my reward!"

The girls, entirely unalarmed by her severity, had deserted Richard
now, and were clinging to her with weak laughter and feeble
explanations.

"Francesca unlocked that door, and rushed into Mr. Carter's room!" Amy
explained, wiping her eyes. "And then the boys locked her in there!"

The composed reappearance of Francesca at this point, however, added to
the general hilarity.

"You DID NOT lock me in, Smarties!" Francesca drawled, childishly.
"They climbed to the balcony, and we were--well, we were undressing,"
she said to Richard, "and here they were hammering and yelling
like--like Siwashes! We grabbed our wrappers, we wanted to---"

"We wanted to lock them out there!" Amy explained, laughing
uncontrollably. "But--"

"And I snapped off the light--" Nina interposed, with deep satisfaction.

"And, mind you--"

"And, Father--"

"And the wonder was that we didn't die of fright--"

"Now, look here," Harriet said, in the babel, "I'll give you all
exactly two minutes to QUIET DOWN. Never in the course of my life--"

Richard thought her maternal indulgence delightful; he thought the
young people who clung about her charming in their apologetic and
laughing promises. Ward and Bruce Hopper mounted to their own region;
Richard went with the girls and Harriet to the rooms that had been
attacked. Pilgrim, the tireless, was already there, replacing pillows,
straightening beds, untwisting curtains. The girls, with reminiscent
bubbles of laughter, began to help her.

After the last good-nights, Richard and Harriet had no choice but to
cross the hall again, and they stood there for a moment, laughing at
the recent excitement.

"After twelve," Harriet said, with a smiling shake of her head. "Aren't
they young demons! However," she added in an undertone, "it's the best
thing in the world for Nina! This sort of nonsense will blow cobwebs
away!"

Richard was only conscious of a desire to prolong this intimate little
moment of parental consultation.

"She doesn't speak of Blondin?" he asked.

"Not at all. The birthday came and went placidly enough," Harriet
answered, suddenly intent after her laughing. And as he did not speak
for a second, she looked up at him, innocently. "You don't think she's
hiding anything?" she asked, anxiously.

"I--no, I hardly think so," Richard answered, confusedly. Their eyes
met, and he smiled vaguely. Then Harriet slowly crossed the hall to the
door of the guest room where she was spending the night, and gave him
an only half-audible good-night. Richard stood watching the door for a
moment or two after it had closed upon the slender, dimly seen figure.
Then he went to his own rooms, and began briskly enough to move about
between the mirrors and dressing room, windows and bed. But two or
three times he stopped short, and found himself staring vacantly into
space, all movement arrested, even thought arrested for whole long
minutes at a time.

Harriet, entering her room, closed the door noiselessly, and remained
for a long time standing with her hands resting against it behind her,
her eyes alert, her breath coming as if she had been running. There was
only a night light in the bedroom; the covers were still tumbled back
from her sudden flight toward the rioting youngsters in the hall. She
got back into her bed, and opened her book. But for a long time she
neither slept nor read; her eyes widened at the faintest sound of the
summer night; her heart thumped madly when the curtains whispered at
the window, or the wicker chairs gave the faintest creak. It had not
been only for Richard that the midnight hour of responsibility and
informality shared had had its thrill.

One o'clock. Harriet closed her book and snapped off her light. But
first she went to the window, and leaned out into the sweet darkness.
There was shadow unbroken everywhere; no light in all the big house was
burning as late as her own.




CHAPTER XXI


After that life took on a mysterious fragrance and beauty that made
every hour of it an intoxication to the master and mistress of
Crownlands. The fact that their secret was all their own was all the
more enchanting. To the domestic staff, to the children, to the outside
world, life went upon its usual smooth way. Mr. Carter would be in town
to-night, Mr. Carter was detained at the office, Mrs. Carter was
chaperoning the young people, there were flowers for Mrs. Carter. That
was all Bottomley and Pilgrim and Ward and Nina saw.

But to Harriet and Richard the delicious, secret game of
hide-and-go-seek made everything else in the world insignificant.
Harriet opened the boxes of flowers he sent her with a heart
suffocating with joy. Richard consented to be absent from the dinner
table over which she presided with an agony of renunciation that almost
made him feel ill. When he chanced one day to meet her with Nina, in a
breezy, awninged summer restaurant, the sight of the slender figure
thrilled him as he had never been thrilled by any woman he had ever
known. He was to speak to her, to hear her voice! One day he bought her
shoes; in the shop she looked at him for approval. He thought the
shoes, low shoes with buckles, that showed the silk-clad ankle, very
suitable and pretty. He was thrown into sudden confusion when the shoe
clerk turned to him with a murmured mention of the price.

Ten dollars? Richard fumbled for his purse. He had met her walking
alone in the Avenue; she had said that she must get shoes. Hundreds of
other men were presumably buying their wives shoes, up and down the
brilliant street. But Richard found the adventure shaking to the soul.

"They're lovely shoes," Harriet said, as they walked out into the
sunshine. She told him that she was to meet Nina at his mother's at
five. Richard, with sudden eagerness, wondered if she would spend the
interval in having tea somewhere, but instead they went into a
bookshop, and she carried a new book triumphantly away. "It's a
frightful day in town," Harriet said, "and if we're a little early we
may all get away to the country that much sooner!"

She established herself contentedly beside him when they did finally
start for Crownlands. Ward, beside Hansen, did most of the talking;
Nina was silent, and Harriet noticed that she was very pale. Richard
was repeating to himself one phrase all the way; a phrase that he found
so thrilling and absorbing that it was enough to keep him from speaking
aloud, or listening to what the others said.

"I love her--I love her--I love her!" thought Richard. And sometimes he
glanced sidewise at her, her beautiful hair rippling in thick waves
under the thin veil, her face a little pale from the heat of the day,
her glorious eyes faintly shadowed. When the swift movement of the car
brought her shoulder against his, their eyes met for a smiling second,
and it seemed to Richard that his heart brimmed with the most delicious
emotion that he had ever known.

Nina complained of a headache when they reached home, and went early to
bed. Harriet, when she had tubbed and changed to an evening gown,
glanced in at Nina, and thought the girl asleep. There were men guests
for dinner, and afterward there was bridge. Harriet sat with Madame
Carter for awhile, for the old lady had also dined upstairs, went about
the house upon her usual errands, and, going to her own room, found
Nina reading, at about ten o'clock. Nina did not look up or speak as
Harriet came in.

The door that led to Richard's room was not only unlocked, but actually
ajar. Harriet gave it a surprised glance, and spoke to Nina, in the
next room.

"Nina, did you unlock this door?"

"What door?" Nina called. "Oh, yes!" she added. "I did."

"Oh," Harriet murmured. And she stepped to the door, and looked into
Richard's room.

It was a sort of upstairs sitting room, furnished simply, in man
fashion, with deep leather chairs on each side of the fireplace, broad
tables carrying only the essential lamps and ashtrays, a shabby desk
where Richard kept personal papers, and bookshelves crammed with
novels. Harriet, making a timid round, saw Balzac and Dickens, Dumas
and Fielding, several Shakespeares and a complete Meredith, jostling
elbows with modern novels in bright jackets, and yellow French romances
losing their paper covers.

With a great sense of adventure she looked down from the unfamiliar
windows at a new perspective of driveway and garden, peeped into the
big square bedroom beyond. Two large photographs of Nina and Ward and
an oil painting of his mother were here; there had been several
pictures of Isabelle once, Harriet knew, but these had long ago
disappeared.

Suddenly her heart turned to water; some tiny sound in the silence
warning her that someone had entered. She turned, discovered here in
the very centre of his own private apartment. He was standing not three
feet away from her. For a second they stared at each other with a sort
of mutual trepidation.

"Hello!" he said; then matter-of-factly, "I brought home a paper
to-night; I wanted Unger to see it! I left it in the suit I wore."

He stepped to the dressing room, and groped in a pocket, without moving
his pleasant look from her.

"Giving my room the once over?" he said.

"Nina left the door open. I've never been in here before," Harriet
said, trying to make her voice as natural as his own. Confused and
ashamed, she was hardly conscious of what she said.

"Here we are!" Richard glanced at the paper he had found. "See here,"
he said, presently, going to a window, "come here a minute, I want to
show you this! You see," they were both looking out into the moonlight
now, "you see, this is where I propose to build on that big room
downstairs, throw the library into the blue room, and have a big
sleeping porch upstairs here," he explained. "Perfectly feasible, and
yet it will make a different house of it!"

Harriet commented interestedly enough. But she heard his voice rather
than his words, and saw only the well-groomed, black-clad figure, the
shining patent-leather shoes, the fine hand that indicated the changes.

Perhaps he was conscious of confusion, too, for his words stopped, and
presently they were looking at each other in a strange silence, Richard
still smiling, Harriet wide eyed.

Then suddenly his strong arms held her close, and her blue, frightened
eyes were close to his, and she felt everything else in the world slip
away from her except the exquisite knowledge that she loved this man
with all her heart and soul.

"I want to tell you something," Richard said, quickly and incoherently.
"I want you to know that I love you--I think I've always loved you!
This wasn't in our bond, I know, but I think I couldn't have wanted you
so without loving you! If--if the time comes, Harriet, when you can
care for me, you'll tell me, won't you? That's all I want, just to know
that you will tell me. You're going to tell me, yourself! I'm going to
make you love me! I'll be patient--I'll not hurry you--but some day
you'll have to tell me that I've--I've won you!"

He had spoken swiftly, almost sternly, with a sort of desperate
determination. Now he freed her arms as suddenly as he had grasped
them, and added, in a lower tone:

"Until that time I'll not--not even--kiss the top of your hair,
Harriet," he said.

In the mad rushing of her senses she could not find the right word, but
she detained him with an entreating hand. Her eyes, shining with a look
that he had never seen there before, were fixed on his. But Richard did
not look at her eyes, he looked down at the hand she had laid on his
own.

"I don't think," Harriet said, breathlessly, "that I can ever like you
any more than I do!"

She had meant it for surrender; her heart was beating wildly with the
glorious shame of a proud woman who gives herself. But Richard was not
looking at the betraying eyes. In the great new love that had swept him
from all his old moorings there was a deep humility. He only heard her
say that she could never learn to love him. He bent his head over her
finger tips, and kissed them, as he said quietly:

"But I'm going to try to make you, just the same!"

Then he was gone, and Harriet was standing alone in the softly lighted
room. For a few moments she remained perfectly still, with her white
hands pressed to her burning cheeks. Then, shaken with joy and
surprise, with a delicious terror and something of a child's innocent
chagrin, she went noiselessly back to her own room, closed the
communicating door, and undressed with pauses for the dreams that would
come creeping over body and soul, and hold her in their exquisite
stillness for long minutes together.

She was brushing her hair when Nina suddenly appeared, and came
lifelessly in to sit on the edge of Harriet's bed. "I want to ask you
something!" Nina said, in an odd voice. "And, Harriet, I want you to
tell me the truth!"

Harriet, turning, faced her between two curtains of rippling gold. She
saw a new Nina, a subdued, thoughtful, serious woman in the old
confident Nina's place.

"But first I ought to tell you that I wasn't with Amy to-day!" Nina
said.

"Oh, Nina! Must we begin that sort of thing?" Harriet reproached her.
But she was puzzled by Nina's manner. "Back to school-girl tricks!" she
said.

"Never back to a school-girl," Nina said, with trembling lips. "No,"
she added, passionately, "I'll never be that again. Harriet," she went
on, "I've written Royal three times, since my birthday, and I've seen
him twice."

"You saw him to-day?" Harriet ventured.

"I went there this afternoon," Nina admitted, heavily. Then suddenly,
"Harriet, did my father pay him--did he take money--to break our
engagement?"

"Nina, what a horrible thought! Of course not!" Harriet could
fortunately answer in perfect honesty.

"Oh, Harriet," the girl caught her hands, turning sick and imploring
eyes toward her, "are you sure?"

"Nina, dear, your father would have told me!"

"He might not--he might not!" Nina said, feverishly. "But if he
did----!" she whispered, half to herself. "That's Pilgrim, I rang for
her," she said, of a knock on her own door. "Ask my father to come up,
will you?" she said to the maid, when Pilgrim appeared. "We'll settle
it now!"

"Mr. Carter is just coming up," Pilgrim said. And a moment later
Richard, with an interested face, came through Nina's room, and joined
them. Harriet had had time only to knot her hair back carelessly, and
slip into the most formal of her big Chinese coats.

"Father," Nina said, when they three were alone together, "did Royal
Blondin take a check from you ten days ago?"

Richard, taken unaware, glanced sharply at Harriet, who shook her head,
with an anxious look. He sat down beside Nina on the bed, and put a
fatherly arm about her.

"Ah, Father, DON'T put me off!" the girl begged. "I wrote him, after my
birthday," she said, "and told him that money made no difference to me.
He didn't answer. Then I got Bruce Hopper to ask his mother to have
Blondin meet her at the club for tea, and I saw him then. Bruce," Nina
cast in, still in the new, self-contained tone, "has been wonderful
about it! I know he only seems a silent sort of boy, but I'll never
forget what he's done for me! Royal," she resumed, "didn't want to see
me, and said he had promised Father that it was OVER. He--but I needn't
tell you all he said. It sounded----" Nina clung to her father's hands,
and shut her eyes. "It sounded so--so false!" she whispered, bitterly.
"So I went to his studio to-day!" she presently continued. "And--there
were two or three women there, but it wasn't that. They were--well,
perhaps they were just having fun. But----" And Nina looked pitifully
from Harriet's sympathetic face to her father's troubled eyes. "But
I've not been having much fun!" she faltered, with a suddenly trembling
mouth. "I've been planning--PRAYING!--that somehow it would come out
right. He told me to-day that he had promised not to see or speak to me
for two years," she said, slowly. "I--Father, I KNEW that he had a
reason! He was changed. I never saw him so! And two hours ago," she
pointed to the door that led into her father's room, "two hours ago I
went in there," she said, "and I looked over your own check book.
Father, did you write him a check? Was that the stub that had 'R.B.' on
it?"

Richard looked at her sorrowfully.

"I'm sorry, Nina," he said, simply. "I told him you should not know,
from me! I would have spared you that."

For a few minutes there was silence in the room. Then Nina said
bravely, through tears:

"I don't know why you should be sorry for what will save me months of
slow worry, all at one blow! You and Harriet needn't worry any more.
I'm cured. I've been a fool, I let him flatter me and lie to me," said
this new Nina, with bitter courage, "but I'm over it now. I'm sorry I
gave you so much trouble, Father----"

"My darling girl," her father said, tenderly. "I only wish I could
spare you all this!"

"Better now than two or three years after we were married," Nina said.
"Plenty of girls find it out then! Father, I want you to get that
check, through the clearing-house, for me," she said, heroically, "and
I want to keep it. If ever I'm a fool about a man again, I'll take it
out and look at it!"

"I have it, I told Fox to get it to-day," Richard said. "You shall have
it!"

Nina had turned suddenly white; it was as if a last little hope had
been killed.

"You have it!" she whispered. "He cashed it, then!"

"He cashed it the next morning," Richard said. Nina was silent for a
moment.

"How you must laugh at me, Harriet!" she said then.

"I? Laugh at you!" Harriet said, stricken. "My darling girl, I am the
last woman in the world who could do that! I was only your age, Nina,
when I met him--you know that story. Why, Nina, you're but eighteen,
after all, you'll have many and many an affair before the right man
comes along," Harriet said. "You'll look back on this some day, and
say, 'It was an experience, and I learned from it! It is only going to
make me happier and more sure when the man whom I really love comes to
me!' Aren't you much richer now, in actual knowledge of men, than Amy
and Francesca, who haven't had anything but school flirtations?"

Nina, sitting between Richard and Harriet on the bed, looked wistfully
from one face to another.

"I'll try to make it so, Harriet!" she said. And somewhat timidly she
added, "Father--and Harriet--shall you feel dreadfully if I say that I
don't want to go to Brazil? I'll tell you why. Ward is going out to the
Gardiner ranch, and Bruce is going, too, and it seems to me that riding
and camping and living in the open air will be--well, will seem better
to me than just being on the steamer! I dread seeing strange places and
meeting people," said Nina. "The Gardiner girls were simply darling to
me the term they were in school, and--don't you remember, Harriet?--we
were the only people who took them out for Christmas and Easter
holidays, and they like me! And--if you wouldn't be too disappointed,
Harriet, I believe I would like it better!"

"My darling girl," Harriet said, warmly, "you must do what seems right
to you. But you won't need me?" she added, tactfully.

"Well, you see Mrs. Gardiner and Mrs. Hopper are sisters," Nina
explained, readily, "and they'll be with us. But if you'd LIKE to
come--we are going camping in the most glorious canon that you ever
saw!" Nina interrupted herself with sudden enthusiasm. "And I am so
glad I really can ride! I'd feel so horribly if I couldn't!"

"I think you'll have a wonderful two months of it," Harriet said, "and
then Granny'll be coming West, to spend the winter in Santa Barbara,
and that will be delightful, too! And now, Nina love, it's after eleven
o'clock," she ended with a change of tone, "and you have had a terrible
day! We will have to do some more shopping to-morrow afternoon, and try
on the riding habits, and do a thousand things. And, Nina," Richard
heard her add tenderly, when his daughter had given him a rather sober
good-night kiss at the door of her room, "whenever you feel sad and
depressed about it, just remember to say to yourself, 'This won't last!
In a few months the sting will all be gone!'"

"Nina is in safe hands!" Richard said to himself, thankfully, as he
closed the door. He carried a memory of Harriet's earnest eyes, her
low, eager voice, her encouraging arm about Nina's shoulders.

 They were all at breakfast when he came down the next morning.
His mother, in one of the lacy, flowing robes she always wore before
noon, laid down a letter half-read, to smile at him. Ward, his dark
head very sleek above his informal summer costume, was deep in talk
with Bruce Hopper, who had evidently ridden over from the country club,
and was in a well-fitting, shabby jersey that became his somewhat lanky
frame. Nina, somewhat silent, but interested in everything, wore an
expression of quiet self-possession that her father found touching.
Nina was growing up, he thought.

Completing the group, and officiating at the foot of the table, was the
radiant Harriet. She looked as fresh as one of the creamy rosebuds that
were massed in the dull blue bowl before her, her shining hair framing
the dusky forehead like dull gold wings, the frail sleeves of her blue
gown falling back from her rounded arm.

"You're late, my son," said Madame Carter, as he kissed her temple.

"Never mind," Harriet said, serenely, "I've just this instant come, and
he saves my face! Do turn that toast, Ward!" she added. And to the
maid, "Mr. Carter's fruit, Mollie, please."

Breakfast was the least formal of all the informal meals at Crownlands.
Bottomley was never in evidence until the late luncheon; mail and
newspapers, and the morning gaiety of the young people all made for
cheerful disorder.

"If you're going into town at ten, Father, we'll go, too," Nina
suggested. "But I can't," she was heard to murmur in an undertone to
the disappointed Bruce. "I have to get CLOTHES, don't I?"

"Oh, Brazil--Brazil--Brazil!" the youth said, disgustedly. "I hate the
sound of it!"

"THESE clothes are for the ranch," Nina said, smiling. Both her father
and Harriet augured well from the youth's instantly transformed face.

"Say--honestly?" he asked, ineloquently, with an irrepressible grin.

"I think so," Nina murmured. The rest of their conversation was
inaudible; they presently wandered forth to finish it on the tennis
court. Ward followed his grandmother upstairs, and Harriet and Richard
were left to finish their breakfast alone.

"You look tired," Harriet said, rising, when his omelette came in, and
pausing beside the head of the table for an instant on her way to the
pantry.

"I had a bad night," Richard admitted. "But that's not all you're going
to have for breakfast?" he protested.

"I never have more!" Harriet smiled. "I'm sorry about the bad night,"
said she.

"I couldn't help thinking----" Richard began.

"What is it, Mollie?" he added, harshly, to the hovering maid.

"Nothing--no matter--sir," Mollie stammered, retreating. "It was just
that the man about the sheep came, sir----" she faltered.

"The sheep!" Richard echoed, frowning. Harriet laughed gaily.

"Oh, yes!" she said. "I told you I had ordered two or three young
sheep," she explained, "to keep our lawns cropped. They look so
adorable, and they do it so nicely! Has he got them, Mollie?" she
added, eagerly. "Oh, I must see them! I'll be back in exactly five
minutes, Mr. Carter," she said.

"What are we supposed to do with them in winter?" Richard asked,
smiling.

"Oh, they will have a little--a little byre!" she answered, readily.
"You'll--you'll like them!" And he heard her joyous voice following
Mollie away.

Richard pushed back his plate, and looked irresolutely after her. Then
suddenly he rose, and walked through the pantry, asking two startled
maids for Mrs. Carter. Etelka had been several years in the house
without ever seeing "him" in this neighbourhood before.

Richard crossed a sunshiny brick-walled yard, where linen was drying,
and went through a brick gateway that gave on a neglected little lane.
The lane had once been the driveway for a carriage and a prancing pair,
but there were only riding horses at Crownlands now, and three of these
were looking over the wall at the grass-grown road. And Richard found
Harriet here.

She was on her knees, in the pleasant green shadow of the old sycamores
and maples, her back was toward him, she was looking up into the face
of the old stableman, Trotter, who stood before her, his crooked,
dwarfed old figure still further bent, as he held two strong young ewes
by their thick, woolly shoulders.

As Trotter gave him a respectful good morning, Harriet sprang to her
feet, and whirled about, and Richard saw the woodeny stiff legs of a
very young lamb dangling from her arms, and the lamb's meek little
black-rubber face close to the beautiful face he loved.

"Oh, Richard!" she said, carried away by her own delight. "Look at it!
Isn't it the sweetest darling baby that ever was! Oh, you sweet!" she
said, putting her lips to the little woolly head.

"You are!" Richard said quite without premeditation.

Harriet laughed, surrendered the little lamb to Trotter, and followed
the old man's departure to the stables with an anxious warning.

"They're to have this little enclosure all to themselves," she
explained to Richard, when they were alone. "He's going to build them a
little shed." And as Richard, his back leaning against the low brick
wall, made no immediate attempt to move, she looked at him expectantly.
"Shall we go back?" she suggested.

"That sounded very pleasant to me," Richard said, with deliberate
irrelevance.

Harriet looked at him in puzzled silence.

"I mean your calling me Richard," he said.

She flushed brightly, and laughed.

"Did I? I always think of you as Richard!" she explained.

"So you abandon me on the Brazil trip?" he asked, watching her
seriously.

"Well----?" Harriet shrugged. "I thought you had to go," she added.
"I'm--I'll confess I'm disappointed. But to have Nina want to do
anything is such a relief to me that I'm only going to think of that!"

"Yes, I have to go," Richard said, slowly. "I must be there for a month
at least. But I'm disappointed, too. I got thinking of it, in the
night--I couldn't sleep! I'm disappointed, too." He fell silent. "I
wish," he said, hesitatingly, "that you had not told me that you--you
don't feel that you--are going to love me!" he said. "I love you with
all my heart and soul. It--well, it's all I think of, now. I want----"
He turned, and picking an ivy leaf from the wall, looked at it intently
for a moment, and tore it apart before he let it fall. "However," he
said, philosophically, smiling at her, "we'll let that wait!"

Harriet, close to him, laid one hand upon his shoulder.

"You misunderstood me," she said, steadily. "What I said was that I
could not love you more than I do! Aren't you--ever--going to
understand?"

For a long minute they looked straight into each other's eyes.

"Harriet, do you mean it?" Richard said then, simply.

"Yes," she answered, "I mean it! I've always meant it. I've always
loved you, I think. No man could want any woman to love him more!"

The blue eyes so near his own were misty with sudden tears. In the
deserted little lane, in the blue summer morning and the green shade of
the sycamores, they were alone. Richard put his arms about her.

And for a moment he held all the beauty and fragrance and laughter and
tears that was Harriet close to his heart; the soft hair tumbled, the
brown, firm young hand resting on his shoulder, the warm cheek against
his own.

A breeze rustled through the branches high above them; the blue river,
beyond the brick wall, flowed on in an even sheet of satin; two birds
looped the enclosure in a sudden twittering flight; and from the stable
region came the plaintive bleating of a mother sheep. But to Harriet
and Richard the world was all their own.

"My wife!" said Richard Carter.


THE END










End of Project Gutenberg's Harriet and the Piper, by Kathleen Norris