THE DAY OF THE BEAST

BY

ZANE GREY

AUTHOR OF

TO THE LAST MAN,

THE HERITAGE OF THE DESERT,

THE MYSTERIOUS RIDER, ETC.

NEW YORK

GROSSET & DUNLAP

PUBLISHERS

Made in the United States of America

Contents

THE
DAY OF THE BEAST

CHAPTER I

His native land! Home!

The ship glided slowly up the Narrows; and from its deck Daren
Lane saw the noble black outline of the Statue of Liberty limned
against the clear gold of sunset. A familiar old pang in his
breast—longing and homesickness and agony, together with
the physical burn of gassed lungs—seemed to swell into a
profound overwhelming emotion.

“My own—my native land!” he whispered, striving to wipe the
dimness from his eyes. Was it only two years or twenty since he
had left his country to go to war? A sense of strangeness dawned
upon him. His home-coming, so ceaselessly dreamed of by night and
longed for by day, was not going to be what his hopes had
created. But at that moment his joy was too great to harbor
strange misgivings. How impossible for any one to understand his
feelings then, except perhaps the comrades who had survived the
same ordeal!

The vessel glided on. A fresh cool spring breeze with a scent of
land fanned Lane’s hot brow. It bore tidings from home. Almost he
thought he smelled the blossoms in the orchard, and the damp
newly plowed earth, and the smoke from the wood fire his mother
used to bake over. A hundred clamoring thoughts strove for
dominance over his mind—to enter and flash by and fade. His
sight, however, except for the blur that returned again and
again, held fast to the entrancing and thrilling scene—the
broad glimmering sun-track of gold in the rippling channel,
leading his eye to the grand bulk of America’s symbol of freedom,
and to the stately expanse of the Hudson River, dotted by moving
ferry-boats and tugs, and to the magnificent broken sky-line of
New York City, with its huge dark structures looming and its
thousands of windows reflecting the fire of the sun.

It was indeed a profound and stirring moment for Daren Lane, but
not quite full, not all-satisfying. The great city seemed to
frown. The low line of hills in the west shone dull gray and
cold. Where were the screaming siren whistles, the gay streaming
flags, the boats crowded with waving people, that should have
welcomed disabled soldiers who had fought for their country? Lane
hoped he had long passed by bitterness, but yet something rankled
in the unhealed wound of his heart.

Some one put a hand in close clasp upon his arm. Then Lane heard
the scrape of a crutch on the deck, and knew who stood beside
him.

“Well, Dare, old boy, does it look good to you?” asked a husky
voice.

“Yes, Blair, but somehow not just what I expected,” replied Lane,
turning to his comrade.

“Uhuh, I get you.”

Blair Maynard stood erect with the aid of a crutch. There was
even a hint of pride in the poise of his uncovered head. And for
once Lane saw the thin white face softening and glowing.
Maynard’s big brown eyes were full of tears.

“Guess I left my nerve as well as my leg over there,” he said.

“Blair, it’s so good to get back that we’re off color,” returned
Lane. “On the level, I could scream like a madman.”

“I’d like to weep,” replied the other, with a half laugh.

“Where’s Red? He oughtn’t miss this.”

“Poor devil! He sneaked off from me somewhere,” rejoined Maynard.
“Red’s in pretty bad shape again. The voyage has been hard on
him. I hope he’ll be well enough to get his discharge when we
land. I’ll take him home to Middleville.”

“Middleville!” echoed Lane, musingly. “Home!… Blair, does it
hit you—kind of queer? Do you long, yet dread to get home?”

Maynard had no reply for that query, but his look was expressive.

“I’ve not heard from Helen for over a year,” went on Lane, more
as if speaking to himself.

“My God, Dare!” exclaimed his companion, with sudden fire. “Are
you still thinking of her?”

“We—we are engaged,” returned Lane, slowly. “At least we
were. But I’ve had no word that she——”

“Dare, your childlike faith is due for a jar,” interrupted his
comrade, with bitter scorn. “Come down to earth. You’re a
crippled soldier—coming home—and damn lucky at that.”

“Blair, what do you know—that I do not know? For long I’ve
suspected you’re wise to—to things at home. You know I
haven’t heard much in all these long months. My mother wrote but
seldom. Lorna, my kid sister, forgot me, I guess…. Helen always
was a poor correspondent. Dal answered my letters, but she never
told me anything about home. When we first got to France I
heard often from Margie Henderson and Mel Iden—crazy kind
of letters—love-sick over soldiers…. But nothing for a
long time now.”

“At first they wrote! Ha! Ha!” burst out Maynard. “Sure, they
wrote love-sick letters. They sent socks and cigarettes and candy
and books. And they all wanted us to hurry back to marry them….
Then—when the months had gone by and the novelty had worn
off—when we went against the hell of real war—sick or
worn out, sleepless and miserable, crippled or half demented with
terror and dread and longing for home—then, by God, they
quit!”

“Oh, no, Blair—not all of them,” remonstrated Lane,
unsteadily.

“Well, old man, I’m sore, and you’re about the only guy I can let
out on,” explained Maynard, heavily. “One thing I’m glad
of—we’ll face it together. Daren, we were kids
together—do you remember?—playing on the
commons—straddling the old water-gates over the
brooks—stealing cider from the country
presses—barefoot boys going to school together. We played
Post-Office with the girls and Indians with the boys. We made
puppy love to Dal and Mel and Helen and Margie—all of
them…. Then, somehow the happy thoughtless years of youth
passed…. It seems strange and sudden now—but the war
came. We enlisted. We had the same ideal—you and
I.—We went to France—and you know what we did there
together…. Now we’re on this ship—getting into port of
the good old U.S.—good as bad as she is!—going home
together. Thank God for that. I want to be buried in Woodlawn….
Home! Home?… We feel its meaning. But, Dare, we’ll have no
home—no place…. We are old—we are through—we
have served—we are done…. What we dreamed of as glory
will be cold ashes to our lips, bitter as gall…. You always
were a dreamer, an idealist, a believer in God, truth, hope and
womanhood. In spite of the war these somehow survive in you….
But Dare, old friend, steel yourself now against disappointment
and disillusion.”

Used as Lane was to his comrade’s outbursts, this one struck
singularly home to Lane’s heart and made him mute. The chill of
his earlier misgiving returned, augmented by a strange
uneasiness, a premonition of the unknown and dreadful future. But
he threw it off. Faith would not die in Lane. It could not die
utterly because of what he felt in himself. Yet—what was in
store for him? Why was his hope so unquenchable? There could be
no resurgam for Daren Lane. Resignation should have
brought him peace—peace—when every nerve in his
shell-shocked body racked him—when he could not subdue a
mounting hope that all would be well at home—when he
quivered at thought of mother, sister, sweetheart!

The ship glided on under the shadow of America’s emblem—a
bronze woman of noble proportions, holding out a light to ships
that came in the night—a welcome to all the world. Daren
Lane held to his maimed comrade while they stood bare-headed and
erect for that moment when the ship passed the statue. Lane knew
what Blair felt. But nothing of what that feeling was could ever
be spoken. The deck of the ship was now crowded with passengers,
yet they were seemingly dead to anything more than a safe arrival
at their destination. They were not crippled American soldiers.
Except these two there were none in service uniforms. There
across the windy space of water loomed the many-eyed buildings,
suggestive of the great city. A low roar of traffic came on the
breeze. Passengers and crew of the liner were glad to dock before
dark. They took no notice of the rigid, erect soldiers. Lane, arm
in arm with Blair, face to the front, stood absorbed in his sense
of a nameless sublimity for them while passing the Statue of
Liberty. The spirit of the first man who ever breathed of freedom
for the human race burned as a white flame in the heart of Lane
and his comrade. But it was not so much that spirit which held
them erect, aloof, proud. It was a supreme consciousness of
immeasurable sacrifice for an ideal that existed only in the
breasts of men and women kindred to them—an unutterable and
never-to-be-spoken glory of the duty done for others, but that
they owed themselves. They had sustained immense loss of health
and happiness; the future seemed like the gray, cold, gloomy
expanse of the river; and there could never be any reward except
this white fire of their souls. Nameless! But it was the
increasing purpose that ran through the ages.

The ship docked at dark. Lane left Blair at the rail, gloomily
gazing down at the confusion and bustle on the wharf, and went
below to search for their comrade, Red Payson. He found him in
his stateroom, half crouched on the berth, apparently oblivious
to the important moment. It required a little effort to rouse
Payson. He was a slight boy, not over twenty-two, sallow-faced
and freckled, with hair that gave him the only name his comrades
knew him by. Lane packed the boy’s few possessions and talked
vehemently all the time. Red braced up, ready to go, but he had
little to say and that with the weary nonchalance habitual with
him. Lane helped him up on deck, and the exertion, slight as it
was, brought home to Lane that he needed help himself. They found
Maynard waiting.

“Well, here we are—the Three Musketeers,” said Lane, in a
voice he tried to make cheerful.

“Where’s the band?” inquired Maynard, sardonically.

“Gay old New York—and me broke!” exclaimed Red Payson, as
if to himself.

Then the three stood by the rail, at the gangplank, waiting for
the hurried stream of passengers to disembark. Down on the wharf
under the glaring white lights, swarmed a crowd from which rose a
babel of voices. A whistle blew sharply at intervals. The whirr
and honk of taxicabs, and the jangle of trolley cars, sounded
beyond the wide dark portal of the dock-house. The murky water
below splashed between ship and pier. Deep voices rang out, and
merry laughs, and shrill glad cries of welcome. The bright light
shone down upon a motley, dark-garbed mass, moving slowly. The
spirit of the occasion was manifest.

When the three disabled soldiers, the last passengers to
disembark, slowly and laboriously descended to the wharf, no one
offered to help them, no one waited with a smile and hand-clasp
of welcome. No one saw them, except a burly policeman, who
evidently had charge of the traffic at the door. He poked his
club into the ribs of the one-legged, slowly shuffling Maynard
and said with cheerful gruffness: “Step lively, Buddy, step
lively!”

Lane, with his two comrades, spent three days at a
barracks-hospital for soldiers in Bedford Park. It was a long
flimsy structure, bare except for rows of cots along each wall,
and stoves at middle, and each end. The place was overcrowded
with disabled service men, all worse off than Lane and his
comrades. Lane felt that he really was keeping a sicker man than
himself from what attention the hospital afforded. So he was
glad, at the end of the third day, to find they could be
discharged from the army.

This enforced stay, when he knew he was on his way home, had
seemed almost unbearable to Lane. He felt that he had the
strength to get home, and that was about all. He began to
expectorate blood—no unusual thing for him—but this
time to such extent that he feared the return of hemorrhage. The
nights seemed sleepless, burning, black voids; and the days were
hideous with noise and distraction. He wanted to think about the
fact that he was home—an astounding and unbelievable thing.
Once he went down to the city and walked on Broadway and Fifth
Avenue, taxing his endurance to the limit. But he had become used
to pain and exhaustion. So long as he could keep up he did not
mind.

That day three powerful impressions were forced upon Lane, never
to be effaced. First he found that the change in him was vast and
incalculable and vague. He could divine but not understand.
Secondly, the men of the service, disabled or not, were old
stories to New Yorkers. Lane saw soldiers begging from
pedestrians. He muttered to himself: “By God, I’ll starve to
death before I ever do that!” He could not detect any aloofness
on the part of passers-by. They were just inattentive. Lane
remembered with sudden shock how differently soldiers had been
regarded two or three years ago. He had read lengthy newspaper
accounts of the wild and magnificent welcome accorded to the
first soldiers to return to New York. How strange the contrast!
But that was long ago—past history—buried under the
immense and hurried and inscrutable changes of a nation. Lane
divined that, as he felt the mighty resistless throb of the great
city. His third and strongest impression concerned the women he
met and passed on the streets. Their lips and cheeks were rouged.
Their dresses were cut too low at the neck. But even this fashion
was not nearly so striking as the short skirts, cut off at the
knees, and in many cases above. At first this roused a strange
amaze in Lane. “What’s the idea, I wonder?” he mused. But in the
end it disgusted him. He reflected that for two swift years he
had been out of the track of events, away from centers of
population. Paris itself had held no attraction for him. Dreamer
and brooder, he had failed to see the material things. But this
third impression troubled him more than the other two and stirred
thoughts he tried to dispel. Returning to the barracks he learned
that he and his friends would be free on the morrow; and long
into the night he rejoiced in the knowledge. Free! The grinding,
incomprehensible Juggernaut and himself were at the parting of
the ways. Before he went to sleep he remembered a forgotten
prayer his mother had taught him. His ordeal was over. What had
happened did not matter. The Hell was past and he must bury
memory. Whether or not he had a month or a year to live it must
be lived without memories of his ordeal.

Next day, at the railroad station, even at the moment of
departure, Lane and Blair Maynard had their problem with Red
Payson. He did not want to go to Blair’s home.

“But hell, Red, you haven’t any home—any place to go,”
blurted out Maynard.

So they argued with him, and implored him, and reasoned with him.
Since his discharge from the hospital in France Payson had always
been cool, weary, abstracted, difficult to reach. And here at the
last he grew strangely aloof and stubborn. Every word that bore
relation to his own welfare seemed only to alienate him the more.
Lane sensed this.

“See here, Red,” he said, “hasn’t it occurred to you that Blair
and I need you?”

“Need me? What!” he exclaimed, with perceptible change of tone,
though it was incredulous.

“Sure,” interposed Blair.

“Red—listen,” continued Lane, speaking low and with
difficulty. “Blair and I have been through the—the whole
show together…. And we’ve been in the hospitals with you for
months…. We’ve all got—sort of to rely on each other….
Let’s stick it out to the end. I guess—you know—we
may not have a long time….”

Lane’s voice trailed off. Then the stony face of the listener
changed for a fleeting second.

“Boys, I’ll go over with you,” he said.

And then the maimed Blair, awkward with his crutch and bag,
insisted on helping Lane get Red aboard the train. Red could just
about walk. Sombrely they clambered up the steps into the
Pullman.

Middleville was a prosperous and thriving inland town of twenty
thousand inhabitants, identical with many towns of about the same
size in the middle and eastern United States.

Lane had been born there and had lived there all his life, seldom
having been away up to the advent of the war. So that the
memories of home and town and place, which he carried away from
America with him, had never had any chance, up to the time of his
departure, to change from the vivid, exaggerated image of
boyhood. Since he had left Middleville he had seen great cities,
palaces, castles, edifices, he had crossed great rivers, he had
traveled thousands of miles, he had looked down some of the
famous thoroughfares of the world.

Was this then the reason that Middleville, upon his arrival,
seemed so strange, sordid, shrunken, so vastly changed? He
stared, even while he helped Payson off the train—stared at
the little brick station at once so familiar and yet so strange,
that had held a place of dignity in the picture of his memory.
The moment was one of shock.

Then he was distracted from his pondering by tearful and joyful
cries, and deeper voices of men. He looked up to recognize
Blair’s mother, father, sister; and men and women whose faces
appeared familiar, but whose names he could not recall. His acute
faculty of perception took quick note of a change in Blair’s
mother. Lane turned his gaze away. The agony of joy and
sorrow—the light of her face—was more than Lane could
stand. He looked at the sister Margaret—a tall, fair girl.
She had paint on her cheeks. She did not see Lane. Her strained
gaze held a beautiful and piercing intentness. Then her eyes
opened wide, her hand went to cover her mouth, and she cried out:
“Oh Blair!—poor boy! Brother!”

Only Lane heard her. The others were crying out themselves as
Blair’s gray-haired mother received him into her arms. She seemed
a proud woman, broken and unsteady. Red Payson’s grip on Lane’s
arm told what that scene meant to him. How pitiful the vain
effort of Blair’s people to hide their horror! Presently mother
and sister and women relatives fell aside to let the soldier boy
meet his father. This was something that rang the bells in Lane’s
heart. Men were different, and Blair faced his father
differently. The wild boy had come home—the scapegoat of
many Middleville escapades had returned—the ne’er-do-well
sought his father’s house. He had come home to die. It was there
in Blair’s white face—the dreadful truth. He wore a ribbon
on his breast and he leaned on a crutch. For the instant, as
father and son faced each other, there was something in Blair’s
poise, his look of an eagle, that carried home a poignant sense
of his greatness. Lane thrilled with it and a lump constricted
his throat. Then with Blair’s ringing “Dad!” and the father’s
deep and broken: “My son! My son!” the two embraced.

In a stifling moment more it seemed, attention turned on Red
Payson, who stood nearest. Blair’s folk were eager, kind,
soft-spoken and warm in their welcome.

Then it came Lane’s turn, and what they said or did he scarcely
knew, until Margaret kissed him. “Oh, Dare! I’m so glad to
see you home.” Tears were standing in her clear blue eyes.
“You’re changed, but—not—not so much as Blair.”

Lane responded as best he could, and presently he found himself
standing at the curb, watching the car move away.

“Come out to-morrow,” called back Blair.

The Maynard’s car was carrying his comrades away. His first
feeling was one of gladness—the next of relief. He could be
alone now—alone to find out what had happened to him, and
to this strange Middleville. An old negro wearing a blue uniform
accosted Lane, shook hands with him, asked him if he had any
baggage. “Yas sir, I sho knowed you, Mistah Dare Lane. But you
looks powerful bad.”

Lane crossed the station platform, and the railroad yard and
tracks, to make a short cut in the direction of his home. He
shrank from meeting any one. He had not sent word just when he
would arrive, though he had written his mother from New York that
it would be soon, He was glad that no one belonging to him had
been at the station. He wanted to see his mother in his home.
Walking fast exhausted him, and he had to rest. How dead his legs
felt! In fact he felt queer all over. The old burn and gnaw in
his breast had expanded to a heavy, full, suffocating sensation.
Yet his blood seemed to race. Suddenly an overwhelming emotion of
rapture flooded over him. Home at last! He did not think of any
one. He was walking across the railroad yards where as a boy he
had been wont to steal rides on freight trains. Soon he reached
the bridge. In the gathering twilight he halted to clutch at the
railing and look out across where the waters met—where
Sycamore Creek flowed into Middleville River. The roar of water
falling over the dam came melodiously and stirringly to his ears.
And as he looked again he was assailed by that strange sense of
littleness, of shrunkenness, which had struck him so forcibly at
the station. He listened to the murmur of running water. Then,
while the sweetness of joy pervaded him, there seemed to rise
from below or across the river or from somewhere the same strange
misgiving, a keener dread, a chill that was not in the air, a
fatal portent of the future. Why should this come to mock him at
such a sacred and beautiful moment?

Passers-by stared at Lane, and some of them whispered, and one
hesitated, as if impelled to speak. Wheeling away Lane crossed
the bridge, turned up River Street, soon turned off again into a
darker street, and reaching High School Park he sat down to rest
again. He was almost spent. The park was quiet and lonely. The
bare trees showed their skeleton outlines against the cold sky.
It was March and the air was raw and chilly. This park that had
once been a wonderful place now appeared so small. Everything he
saw was familiar yet grotesque in the way it had become dwarfed.
Across the street from where he sat lights shone in the windows
of a house. He knew the place. Who lived there? One of the
girls—he had forgotten which. From somewhere the
discordance of a Victrola jarred on Lane’s sensitive ears.

Lifting his bag he proceeded on his way, halting every little
while to catch his breath. When he turned a corner into a side
street, recognizing every tree and gate and house, there came a
gathering and swelling of his emotions and he began to weaken and
shake. He was afraid he could not make it half way up the street.
But he kept on. The torture now was more a mingled rapture and
grief than the physical protest of his racked body. At last he
saw the modest little house—and then he stood at the gate,
quivering. Home! A light in the window of his old room! A
terrible and tremendous storm of feeling forced him to lean on
the gate. How many endless hours had the pictured memory of that
house haunted him? There was the beloved room where he had lived
and slept and read, and cherished over his books and over his
compositions a secret hope and ambition to make of himself an
author. How strange to remember that! But it was true. His day
labor at Manton’s office, for all the years since he had
graduated from High School, had been only a means to an end. No
one had dreamed of his dream. Then the war had come and now his
hope, if not his faith, was dead. Never before had the
realization been so galling, so bitter. Endlessly and eternally
he must be concerned with himself. He had driven that habit of
thought away a million times, but it would return. All he had
prayed for was to get home—only to reach home
alive—to see his mother, and his sister Lorna—and
Helen—and then…. But he was here now and all that prayer
was falsehood. Just to get home was not enough.. He had been
cheated of career, love, happiness.

It required extreme effort to cross the little yard, to mount the
porch. In a moment more he would see his mother. He heard her
within, somewhere at the back of the house. Wherefore he tip-toed
round to the kitchen door. Here he paused, quaking. A cold sweat
broke out all over him. Why was this return so dreadful? He
pressed a shaking hand over his heart. How surely he knew he
could not deceive his mother! The moment she saw him, after the
first flash of joy, she would see the wreck of the boy she had
let go to war. Lane choked over his emotion, but he could not
spare her. Opening the door he entered.

There she stood at the stove and she looked up at the sound he
made. Yes! but stranger than all other changes was the change in
her. She was not the mother of his boyhood. Nor was the change
alone age or grief or wasted cheek. The moment tore cruelly at
Lane’s heart. She did not recognize him swiftly. But when she
did….

“Oh God!… Daren! My boy!” she whispered.

“Mother!”

CHAPTER II

His mother divined what he knew. And her embrace was so close,
almost fierce in its tenderness, her voice so broken, that Lane
could only hide his face over her, and shut his eyes, and shudder
in an ecstasy. God alone had omniscience to tell what his soul
needed, but something of it was embodied in home and mother.

That first acute moment past, he released her, and she clung to
his hands, her face upturned, her eyes full of pain and joy, and
woman’s searching power, while she broke into almost incoherent
speech; and he responded in feeling, though he caught little of
the content of her words, and scarcely knew what he was saying.

Then he reeled a little and the kitchen dimmed in his sight.
Sinking into a chair and leaning on the table he fought his
weakness. He came close to fainting. But he held on to his sense,
aware of his mother fluttering over him. Gradually the spell
passed.

“Mother—maybe I’m starved,” he said, smiling at her.

That practical speech released the strain and inspired his mother
to action. She began to bustle round the kitchen, talking all the
while. Lane watched her and listened, and spoke occasionally.
Once he asked about his sister Lorna, but his mother either did
not hear or chose not to reply. All she said was music to his
ears, yet not quite what his heart longed for. He began to
distrust this strange longing. There was something wrong with his
mind. His faculties seemed too sensitive. Every word his mother
uttered was news, surprising, unusual, as if it emanated from a
home-world that had changed. And presently she dropped into
complaint at the hard times and the cost of everything.

“Mother,” he interrupted, “I didn’t blow my money. I’ve saved
nearly a year’s pay. It’s yours.”

“But, Daren, you’ll need money,” she protested.

“Not much. And maybe—I’ll be strong enough to go to
work—presently,” he said, hopefully. “Do you think Manton
will take me back—half days at first?”

“I have my doubts, Daren,” she replied, soberly. “Hattie Wilson
has your old job. And I hear they’re pleased with her. Few of the
boys got their places back.”

“Hattie Wilson!” exclaimed Lane. “Why, she was a kid in the
eighth grade when I left home.”

“Yes, my son. But that was nearly three years ago. And the
children have sprung up like weeds. Wild weeds!”

“Well! That tousle-headed Wilson kid!” mused Lane. An uneasy
conviction of having been forgotten dawned upon Lane. He
remembered Blair Maynard’s bitter prophecy, which he had been
unable to accept.

“Anyway, Daren, are you able to work?” asked his mother.

“Sure,” he replied, lying cheerfully, with a smile on his face.
“Not hard work, just yet, but I can do something.”

His mother did not share his enthusiasm. She went on preparing
the supper.

“How do you manage to get along?” inquired Lane.

“Lord only knows,” she replied, sombrely. “It has been very hard.
When you left home I had only the interest on your father’s life
insurance. I sold the farm—”

“Oh, no!” exclaimed Lane, with a rush of boyhood memories.

“I had to,” she went on. “I made that money help out for a long
time. Then I—I mortgaged this place…. Things cost so
terribly. And Lorna had to have so much more…. But she’s just
left school and gone to work. That helps.”

“Lorna left school!” ejaculated Lane, incredulously. “Why,
mother, she was only a child. Thirteen years old when I left!
She’ll miss her education. I’ll send her back.”

“Well, son, I doubt if you can make Lorna do anything she doesn’t
want to do,” returned his mother. “She wanted to quit
school—to earn money. Whatever she was when you left home
she’s grown up now. You’ll not know her.”

“Know Lorna! Why, mother dear, I carried Lorna’s picture all
through the war.”

“You won’t know her,” returned Mrs. Lane, positively. “My boy,
these years so short to you have been ages here at home. You will
find your sister—different from the little girl you left.
You’ll find all the girls you knew changed—changed. I have
given up trying to understand what’s come over the world.”

“How—about Helen?” inquired Lane, with strange reluctance
and shyness.

“Helen who?” asked his mother.

“Helen Wrapp, of course,” replied Lane, quickly in his surprise.
“The girl I was engaged to when I left.”

“Oh!—I had forgotten,” she sighed.

“Hasn’t Helen been here to see you?”

“Let me see—well, now you tax me—I think she did come
once—right after you left.”

“Do you—ever see her?” he asked, with slow heave of breast.

“Yes, now and then, as she rides by in an automobile. But she
never sees me…. Daren, I don’t know what
your—your—that engagement means to you, but I must
tell you—Helen Wrapp doesn’t conduct herself as if she were
engaged. Still, I don’t know what’s in the heads of girls to-day.
I can only compare the present with the past.”

Lane did not inquire further and his mother did not offer more
comment. At the moment he heard a motor car out in front of the
house, a girl’s shrill voice in laughter, the slamming of a
car-door—then light, quick footsteps on the porch. Lane
could look from where he sat to the front door—only a few
yards down the short hall. The door opened. A girl entered.

“That’s Lorna,” said Lane’s mother. He grew aware that she bent a
curious gaze upon his face.

Lane rose to his feet with his heart pounding, and a strange
sense of expectancy. His little sister! Never during the endless
months of drudgery, strife and conflict, and agony, had he
forgotten Lorna. Not duty, nor patriotism, had forced him to
enlist in the army before the draft. It had been an ideal which
he imagined he shared with the millions of American boys who
entered the service. Too deep ever to be spoken of! The barbarous
and simian Hun, with his black record against Belgian, and French
women, should never set foot on American soil.

In the lamplight Lane saw this sister throw coat and hat on the
banister, come down the hall and enter the kitchen. She seemed
tall, but her short skirt counteracted that effect. Her bobbed
hair, curly and rebellious, of a rich brown-red color, framed a
pretty face Lane surely remembered. But yet not the same! He had
carried away memory of a child’s face and this was a woman’s. It
was bright, piquant, with darkly glancing eyes, and vivid cheeks,
and carmine lips.

“Oh, hot dog! if it isn’t Dare!” she squealed, and with
radiant look she ran into his arms.

The moment, or moments, of that meeting between brother and
sister passed, leaving Lane conscious of hearty welcome and a
sense of unreality. He could not at once adjust his mental
faculties to an incomprehensible difference affecting everything.

They sat down to supper, and Lane, sick, dazed, weak, found
eating his first meal at home as different as everything else
from what he had expected. There had been no lack of warmth or
love in Lorna’s welcome, but he suffered disappointment. Again
for the hundredth time he put it aside and blamed his morbid
condition. Nothing must inhibit his gladness.

Lorna gave Lane no chance to question her. She was eager,
voluble, curious, and most disconcertingly oblivious of a
possible sensitiveness in Lane.

“Dare, you look like a dead one,” she said. “Did you get shot,
bayoneted, gassed, shell-shocked and all the rest? Did you go
over the top? Did you kill any Germans? Gee! did you get to ride
in a war-plane? Come across, now, and tell me.”

“I guess about—everything happened to me—except going
west,” returned Lane. “But I don’t want to talk about that. I’m
too glad to be home.”

“What’s that on your breast?” she queried, suddenly, pointing at
the Croix de Guerre he wore.

“That? Lorna, that’s my medal.”

“Gee! Let me see.” She got up and came round to peer down
closely, to finger the decoration. “French! I never saw one
before…. Daren, haven’t you an American medal too?”

“No.”

“Why not?”

“My dear sister, that’s hard to say. Because I didn’t deserve it,
most likely.”

She leaned back to gaze more thoughtfully at him.

“What did you get this for?”

“It’s a long story. Some day I’ll tell you.”

“Are you proud of it?”

For answer he only smiled at her.

“It’s so long since the war I’ve forgotten so many things,” she
said, wonderingly. Then she smiled sweetly. “Dare, I’m proud of
you.”

That was a moment in which his former emotion seemed to stir for
her. Evidently she had lost track of something once memorable.
She was groping back for childish impressions. It was the only
indication of softness he had felt in her. How impossible to
believe Lorna was only fifteen! He could form no permanent
conception of her. But in that moment he sensed something akin to
a sister’s sympathy, some vague and indefinable thought in her,
too big for her to grasp. He never felt it again. The serious
sweet mood vanished.

“Hot dog! I’ve a brother with the Croix de Guerre. I’ll
swell up over that. I’ll crow over some of these Janes.”

Thus she talked on while eating her supper. And Lane tried to eat
while he watched her. Presently he moved his chair near to the
stove. Lorna did not wait upon her mother. It was the mother who
did the waiting, as silently she moved from table to stove.

Lorna’s waist was cut so low that it showed the swell of her
breast. The red color of her cheeks, high up near her temples,
was not altogether the rosy line of health and youth. Her
eyebrows were only faint, thin, curved lines, oriental in effect.
She appeared to be unusually well-developed in body for so young
a girl. And the air of sophistication, of experience that seemed
a part of her manner completely mystified Lane. If it had not
been for the slangy speech, and the false color in her face, he
would have been amused at what he might have termed his little
sister’s posing as a woman of the world. But in the light of
these he grew doubtful of his impression. Lastly, he saw that she
wore her stockings rolled below her knees and that the edge of
her short skirt permitted several inches of her bare legs to be
seen. And at that he did not know what to think. He was stunned.

“Daren, you served a while under Captain Thesel in the war,” she
said.

“Yes, I guess I did,” replied Lane, with sombre memory resurging.

“Do you know he lives here?”

“I knew him here in Middleville several years before the war.”

“He’s danced with me at the Armory. Some swell dancer! He and
Dick Swann and Hardy MacLean sometimes drop in at the Armory on
Saturday nights. Captain Thesel is chasing Mrs. Clemhorn now.
They’re always together…. Daren, did he ever have it in for
you?”

“He never liked me. We never got along here in Middleville. And
naturally in the service when he was a captain and I only a
private—we didn’t get along any better.”

“Well, I’ve heard Captain Thesel was to blame for—for what
was said about you last summer when he came home.”

“And what was that, Lorna?” queried Lane, curiously puzzled at
her, and darkly conscious of the ill omen that had preceded him
home.

“You’ll not hear it from me,” declared Lorna, spiritedly. “But
that Croix de Guerre doesn’t agree with it, I’ll tell the
world.”

A little frown puckered her smooth brow and there was a gleam in
her eye.

“Seems to me I heard some of the kids talking last summer,” she
mused, ponderingly. “Vane Thesel was stuck on Mel Iden and Dot
Dalrymple both before the war. Dot handed him a lemon. He’s still
trying to rush Dot, and the gossip is he’d go after Mel even now
on the sly, if she’d stand for it.”

“Why on the sly?” inquired Lane. “Before I left home Mel Iden was
about the prettiest and most popular girl in Middleville. Her
people were poor, and ordinary, perhaps, but she was the equal of
any one.”

“Thesel couldn’t rush Mel now and get away with it, unless on the
q-t,” replied Lorna. “Haven’t you heard about Mel?”

“No, you see the fact is, my few correspondents rather neglected
to send me news,” said Lane.

The significance of this was lost upon his sister. She giggled.
“Hot dog! You’ve got some kicks coming, I’ll say!”

“Is that so,” returned Lane, with irritation. “A few more or less
won’t matter…. Lorna, do you know Helen Wrapp?”

“That red-headed dame!” burst out Lorna, with heat. “I should
smile I do. She’s one who doesn’t shake a shimmy on tea, believe
me.”

Lane was somewhat at a loss to understand his sister’s
intimation, but as it was vulgarly inimical, and seemed to hold
some subtle personal scorn or jealousy, he shrank from
questioning her. This talk with his sister was the most unreal
happening he had ever experienced. He could not adjust himself to
its verity.

“Helen Wrapp is nutty about Dick Swann,” went on Lorna. “She
drives down to the office after——”

“Lorna, do you know Helen and I are engaged?” interrupted Lane.

“Hot dog!” was that young lady’s exposition of utter amaze. She
stared at her brother.

“We were engaged,” continued Lane. “She wore my ring. When I
enlisted she wanted me to marry her before I left. But I wouldn’t
do that.”

Lorna promptly recovered from her amaze. “Well, it’s a damn lucky
thing you didn’t take her up on that marriage stuff.”

There was a glint of dark youthful passion in Lorna’s face. Lane
felt rise in him a desire to bid her sharply to omit slang and
profanity from the conversation. But the desire faded before his
bewilderment. All had suffered change. What had he come home to?
There was no clear answer. But whatever it was, he felt it to be
enormous and staggering. And he meant to find out. Weary as was
his mind, it grasped peculiar significances and deep portents.

“Lorna, where do you work?” he began, shifting his interest.

“At Swann’s,” she replied.

“In the office—at the foundry?” he asked.

“No. Mr. Swann’s at the head of the leather works.”

“What do you do?”

“I type letters,” she answered, and rose to make him a little bow
that held the movement and the suggestion of a dancer.

“You’ve learned stenography?” he asked, in surprise.

“I’m learning shorthand,” replied Lorna. “You see I had only a
few weeks in business school before Dick got me the job.”

“Dick Swann? Do you work for him?”

“No. For the superintendent, Mr. Fryer. But I go to Dick’s office
to do letters for him some of the time.”

She appeared frank and nonchalant, evidently a little proud of
her important position. She posed before Lane and pirouetted with
fancy little steps.

“Say, Dare, won’t you teach me a new dance—right from
Paris?” she interposed. “Something that will put the shimmy and
toddle out of biz?”

“Lorna, I don’t know what the shimmy and toddle are. I’ve only
heard of them.”

“Buried alive, I’ll say,” she retorted.

Lane bit his tongue to keep back a hot reprimand. He looked at
his mother, who was clearing off the supper table. She looked
sad. The light had left her worn face. Lane did not feel sure of
his ground here. So he controlled his feelings and directed his
interest toward more news.

“Of course Dick Swann was in the service?” he asked.

“No. He didn’t go,” replied Lorna.

The information struck Lane singularly. Dick Swann had always
been a prominent figure in the Middleville battery, in those
seemingly long past years since before the war.

“Why didn’t Dick go into the service? Why didn’t the draft get
him?”

“He had poor eyesight, and his father needed him at the iron
works.”

“Poor eyesight!” ejaculated Lane. “He was the best shot in the
battery—the best hunter among the boys. Well, that’s
funny.”

“Daren, there are people who called Dick Swann a slacker,”
returned Lorna, as if forced to give this information. “But I
never saw that it hurt him. He’s rich now. His uncle left him a
million, and his father will leave him another. And I’ll say it’s
the money people want these days.”

The materialism so pregnant in Lorna’s half bitter reply checked
Lane’s further questioning. He edged closer to the stove, feeling
a little cold. A shadow drifted across the warmth and glow of his
mind. At home now he was to be confronted with a monstrous and
insupportable truth—the craven cowardice of the man who had
been eligible to service in army or navy, and who had evaded it.
In camp and trench and dug-out he had heard of the army of
slackers. And of all the vile and stark profanity which the war
gave birth to on the lips of miserable and maimed soldiers, that
flung on the slackers was the worst.

“I’ve got a date to go to the movies,” said Lorna, and she
bounced out of the kitchen into the hall singing:

She went upstairs, while Lane sat there trying to adapt himself
to a new and unintelligible environment. His mother began washing
the dishes. Lane felt her gaze upon his face, and he struggled
against all the weaknesses that beset him.

“Mother, doesn’t Lorna help you with the house work?” he asked.

“She used to. But not any more.”

“Do you let her go out at night to the movies—dances, and
all that?”

Mrs. Lane made a gesture of helplessness. “Lorna goes out all the
time. She’s never here. She stays out until midnight—one
o’clock—later. She’s popular with the boys. I couldn’t stop
her even if I wanted to. Girls can’t be stopped these days. I do
all I can for her—make her dresses—slave for
her—hoping she’ll find a good husband. But the young men
are not marrying.”

“Good Heavens, are you already looking for a husband for Lorna?”
broke out Lane.

“You don’t understand, Dare. You’ve been away so long. Wait till
you’ve seen what girls—are nowadays. Then you’ll not wonder
that I’d like to see Lorna settled.”

“Mother, you’re right,” he said, gravely. “I’ve been away
so—long. But I’m back home now. I’ll soon get on to things.
And I’ll help you. I’ll take Lorna in hand. I’ll relieve you of a
whole lot.”

“You were always a good boy, Daren, to me and Lorna,” murmured
Mrs. Lane, almost in tears. “It’s cheered me to get you home,
yet…. Oh, if you were well and strong!”

“Never mind, mother. I’ll get better,” he replied, rising to take
up his bag. “I guess now I’d better go to bed. I’m just about all
in…. Wonder how Blair and Red are.”

His mother followed him up the narrow stairway, talking, trying
to pretend she did not see his dragging steps, his clutch on the
banisters.

“Your room’s just as you left it,” she said, opening the door.
Then on the threshold she kissed him. “My son, I thank God you
have come home alive. You give me hope in—in spite of
all…. If you need me, call. Good night.”

Lane was alone in the little room that had lived in waking and
dreaming thought. Except to appear strangely smaller, it had not
changed. His bed and desk—the old bureau—the few
pictures—the bookcase he had built himself—these were
identical with images in his memory.

A sweet and wonderful emotion of peace pervaded his
soul—fulfilment at last of the soldier’s endless longing
for home, bed, quiet, rest.

“If I have to die—I can do it now without hate of
all around me,” he whispered, in the passion of his spirit.

But as he sat upon his bed, trying with shaking and clumsy hands
to undress himself, that exalted mood flashed by. Some of the
dearest memories of his life were associated with this little
room. Here he had dreamed; here he had read and studied; here he
had fought out some of the poignant battles of youth. So much of
life seemed behind him. At last he got undressed, and
extinguishing the light, he crawled into bed.

The darkness was welcome, and the quiet was exquisitely soothing.
He lay there, staring into the blackness, feeling his body sink
slowly as if weighted. How cool and soft the touch of sheets!
Then, the river of throbbing fire that was his blood, seemed to
move again. And the dull ache, deep in the bones, possessed his
nerves. In his breast there began a vibrating, as if thousands of
tiny bubbles were being pricked to bursting in his lungs. And the
itch to cough came back to his throat. And all his flesh seemed
in contention with a slowly ebbing force. Sleep might come
perhaps after pain had lulled. His heart beat unsteadily and
weakly, sometimes with a strange little flutter. How many weary
interminable hours had he endured! But to-night he was too far
spent, too far gone for long wakefulness. He drifted away and
sank as if into black oblivion where there sounded the dreadful
roll of drums, and images moved under gray clouds, and men were
running like phantoms. He awoke from nightmares, wet with cold
sweat, and lay staring again at the blackness, once more alive to
recurrent pain. Pain that was an old, old story, yet ever acute
and insistent and merciless.

The night wore on, hour by hour. The courthouse clock rang out
one single deep mellow clang. One o’clock! Lane thrilled to the
sound. It brought back the school days, the vacation days, the
Indian summer days when the hills were golden and the purple haze
hung over the land—the days that were to be no more for
Daren Lane.

In the distance somewhere a motor-car hummed, and came closer,
louder down the street, to slow its sound with sliding creak and
jar outside in front of the house. Lane heard laughter and voices
of a party of young people. Footsteps, heavy and light, came up
the walk, and on to the porch. Lorna was returning rather late
from the motion-picture, thought Lane, and he raised his head
from the pillow, to lean toward the open window, listening.

“Come across, kiddo,” said a boy’s voice, husky and low.

Lane heard a kiss—then another.

“Cheese it, you boob!”

“Gee, your gettin’ snippy. Say, will you ride out to Flesher’s
to-morrow night?”

“Nothing doing, I’ve got a date. Good night.”

The hall door below opened and shut. Footsteps thumped off the
porch and out to the street. Lane heard the giggle of girls, the
snap of a car-door, the creaking of wheels, and then a low hum,
dying away.

Lorna came slowly up stairs to enter her room, moving quietly.
And Lane lay on his bed, wide-eyed, staring into the blackness.
“My little sister,” he whispered to himself. And the words that
had meant so much seemed a mockery.

CHAPTER III

Lane saw the casement of his window grow gray with the glimmering
light of dawn. After that he slept several hours. When he awoke
it was nine o’clock. The long night with its morbid dreams and
thoughts had passed, and in the sunshine of day he saw things
differently.

To move, to get up was not an easy task. It took stern will, and
all the strength of muscle he had left, and when he finally
achieved it there was a clammy dew of pain upon his face. With
slow guarded movements he began to dress himself. Any sudden or
violent action might burst the delicate gassed spots in his lungs
or throw out of place one of the lower vertebrae of his spine.
The former meant death, and the latter bent his body like a
letter S and caused such excruciating agony that it was worse
than death. These were his two ever-present perils. The other
aches and pains he could endure.

He shaved and put on clean things, and his best coat, and
surveyed himself in the little mirror. He saw a thin face, white
as marble, but he was not ashamed of it. His story was there to
read, if any one had kind enough eyes to see. What would Helen
think of him—and Margaret Maynard—and Dal—and
Mel Iden? Bitter curiosity seemed his strongest feeling
concerning his fiancee. He would hold her as engaged to him until
she informed him she was not. As for the others, thought of them
quickened his interest, especially in Mel. What had happened to
her.

It was going to be wonderful to meet them—and to meet
everybody he had once known. Wonderful because he would see what
the war had done to them and they would see what it had done to
him. A peculiar significance lay between his sister and
Helen—all these girls, and the fact of his having gone to
war.

“They may not think of it, but I know,” he muttered to
himself. And he sat down upon his bed to plan how best to meet
them, and others. He did not know what he was going to encounter,
but he fortified himself against calamity. Strange portent of
this had crossed the sea to haunt him. As soon as he was sure of
what had happened in Middleville, of the attitude people would
have toward a crippled soldier, and of what he could do with the
month or year that might be left him to live, then he would know
his own mind. All he sensed now was that there had been some
monstrous inexplicable alteration in hope, love, life. His ordeal
of physical strife, loneliness, longing was now over, for he was
back home. But he divined that his greater ordeal lay before him,
here in this little house, and out there in Middleville. All the
subtlety, intelligence, and bitter vision developed by the war
sharpened here to confront him with terrible possibilities. Had
his countrymen, his people, his friends, his sweetheart, all
failed him? Was there justice in Blair Maynard’s scorn? Lane’s
faith cried out in revolt. He augmented all possible catastrophe,
and then could not believe that he had sacrificed himself in
vain. He knew himself. In him was embodied all the potentiality
for hope of the future. And it was with the front and stride of a
soldier, facing the mystery, the ingratitude, the ignorance and
hell of war, that he left his room and went down stairs to meet
the evils in store.

His mother was not in the kitchen. The door stood open. He heard
her outside talking to a neighbor woman, over the fence.

“—Daren looks dreadful,” his mother was saying in low
voice. “He could hardly walk… It breaks my heart. I’m glad to
have him along—but to see him waste away, day by day, like
Mary Dean’s boy—” she broke off.

“Too bad! It’s a pity,” replied the neighbor. “Sad—now it
comes home to us. My son Ted came in last night and said he’d
talked with a boy who’d seen young Maynard and the strange
soldier who was with him. They must be worse off than
Daren—Blair Maynard with only one leg and—”

“Mother, where are you? I’m hungry,” called Lane, interrupting
that conversation.

She came hurriedly in, at once fearful he might have heard, and
solicitous for his welfare.

“Daren, you look better in daylight—not so white,” she
said. “You sit down now, and let me get your breakfast.”

Lane managed to eat a little this morning, which fact delighted
his mother.

“I’m going to see Dr. Bronson,” said Lane, presently. “Then I’ll
go to Manton’s, and round town a little. And if I don’t tire out
I’ll call on Helen. Of course Lorna has gone to work?”

“Oh yes, she leaves at half after eight.”

“Mother, I was awake last night when she got home,” went on Lane,
seriously. “It was one o’clock. She came in a car. I heard girls
tittering. And some boy came up on the porch with Lorna and
kissed her. Well, that might not mean much—but something
about their talk, the way it was done—makes me pretty sick.
Did you know this sort of thing was going on?”

“Yes. And I’ve talked with mothers who have girls Lorna’s age.
They’ve all run wild the last year or so. Dances and rides! Last
summer I was worried half to death. But we mothers don’t think
the girls are really bad. They’re just crazy for fun,
excitement, boys. Times and pleasures have changed. The girls say
the mothers don’t understand. Maybe we don’t. I try to be
patient. I trust Lorna. I can’t see through it all.”

“Don’t worry, mother,” said Lane, patting her hand. “I’ll see
through it for you. And if Lorna is—well, running too
much—wild as you said—I’ll stop her.”

His mother shook her head.

“One thing we mothers all agree on. These girls, of this
generation, say fourteen to sixteen, can’t be stopped.”

“Then that is a serious matter. It must be a peculiarity of the
day. Maybe the war left this condition.”

“The war changed all things, my son,” replied his mother, sadly.

Lane walked thoughtfully down the street toward Doctor Bronson’s
office. As long as he walked slowly he managed not to give any
hint of his weakness. The sun was shining with steely brightness
and the March wind was living up to its fame. He longed for
summer and hot days in quiet woods or fields where daisies
bloomed. Would he live to see the Indian summer days, the smoky
haze, the purple asters?

Lane was admitted at once into the office of Doctor Bronson, a
little, gray, slight man with shrewd, kind eyes and a thoughtful
brow. For years he had been a friend as well as physician to the
Lanes, and he had always liked Daren. His surprise was great and
his welcome warm. But a moment later he gazed at Lane with
piercing eyes.

“Look here, boy, did you go to the bad over there?” he demanded.

“How do you mean, Doctor?”

“Did you let down—debase yourself morally?”

“No. But I went to the bad physically and spiritually.”

“I see that. I don’t like the color of your face…. Well, well,
Daren. It was hell, wasn’t it? Did you kill a couple of Huns for
me?”

Questions like this latter one always alienated Lane in some
unaccountable way. It must have been revealed in his face.

“Never mind, Daren. I see that you did…. I’m glad you’re
back alive. Now what can I do for you?”

“I’ve been discharged from three hospitals in the last two
months—not because I was well, but because I was in better
shape than some other poor devil. Those doctors in the service
grew hard—they had to be hard—but they saw the worst,
the agony of the war. I always felt sorry for them. They never
seemed to eat or sleep or rest. They had no time to save a man.
It was cut him up or tie him up—then on to the next….
Now, Doc, I want you to look me over and—well—tell me
what to expect.”

“All right,” replied Doctor Bronson, gruffly.

“And I want you to promise not to tell mother or any one. Will
you?”

“Yes, I promise. Now come in here and get off some of your
clothes.”

“Doctor, it’s pretty tough on me to get in and out of my
clothes.”

“I’ll help you. Now tell me what the Germans did to you.”

Lane laughed grimly. “Doctor, do you remember I was in your
Sunday School class?”

“Yes, I remember that. What’s it got to do with Germans?”

“Nothing. It struck me funny, that’s all…. Well, to get it
over. I was injured several times at the training camp.”

“Anything serious?”

“No, I guess not. Anyway I forgot about them. Doctor, I
was shot four times, once clear through. I’ll show you. Got a bad
bayonet jab that doesn’t seem to heal well. Then I had a dose of
both gases—chlorine and mustard—and both all but
killed me. Last I’ve a weak place in my spine. There’s a vertebra
that slips out of place occasionally. The least movement may do
it. I can’t guard against it. The last time it slipped out
I was washing my teeth. I’m in mortal dread of this. For it
twists me out of shape and hurts horribly. I’m afraid it’ll give
me paralysis.”

“Humph! It would. But it can be fixed…. So that’s all they did
to you?”

Underneath the dry humor of the little doctor, Lane thought he
detected something akin to anger.

“Yes, that’s all they did to my body,” replied Lane.

Doctor Bronson, during a careful and thorough examination of
Lane’s heart, lungs, blood pressure, and abdominal region, did
not speak once. But when he turned him over, to see and feel the
hole in Lane’s back, he exclaimed: “My God, boy, what made
this—a shell? I can put my fist in it.”

“That’s the bayonet jab.”

Doctor Bronson cursed in a most undignified and unprofessional
manner. Then without further comment he went on and completed the
examination.

“That’ll do,” he said, and lent a hand while Lane put on his
clothes. It was then he noticed Lane’s medal.

“Ha! The Croix de Guerre!… Daren, I was a friend of your
father’s. I know how that medal would have made him feel.
Tell me what you did to get it?”

“Nothing much,” replied Lane, stirred. “It was in the Argonne,
when we took to open fighting. In fact I got most of my hurts
there…. I carried a badly wounded French officer back off the
field. He was a heavy man. That’s where I injured my spine. I had
to run with him. And worse luck, he was dead when I got him back.
But I didn’t know that.”

“So the French decorated you, hey?” asked the doctor, leaning
back with hands on hips, and keenly eyeing Lane.

“Yes.”

“Why did not the American Army give you equal honor?”

“Well, for one thing it was never reported. And besides, it
wasn’t anything any other fellow wouldn’t do.”

Doctor Bronson dropped his head and paced to and fro. Then the
door-bell rang in the reception room.

“Daren Lane,” began the doctor, suddenly stopping before Lane,
“I’d hesitate to ask most men if they wanted the truth. To many
men I’d lie. But I know a few words from me can’t faze you.”

“No, Doctor, one way or another it is all the same to me.”

“Well, boy, I can fix up that vertebra so it won’t slip out
again…. But, if there’s anything in the world to save your
life, I don’t know what it is.”

“Thank you, Doctor. It’s—something to know—what to
expect,” returned Lane, with a smile.

“You might live a year—and you might not…. You might
improve. God only knows. Miracles do happen. Anyway, come
back to see me.”

Lane shook hands with him and went out, passing another patient
in the reception room. Then as Lane opened the door and stepped
out upon the porch he almost collided with a girl who evidently
had been about to come in.

“I beg your——” he began, and stopped. He knew this
girl, but the strained tragic shadow of her eyes was strikingly
unfamiliar. The transparent white skin let the blue tracery of
veins show. On the instant her lips trembled and parted.

“Oh, Daren—don’t you know me?” she asked.

“Mel Iden!” he burst out. “Know you? I should smile I do. But
it—it was so sudden. And you’re older—different
somehow. Mel, you’re sweeter—why you’re beautiful.”

He clasped her hands and held on to them, until he felt her
rather nervously trying to withdraw them.

“Oh, Daren, I’m glad to see you home—alive—whole,”
she said, almost in a whisper. “Are you—well?”

“No, Mel. I’m in pretty bad shape,” he replied. “Lucky to get
home alive—to see you all.”

“I’m sorry. You’re so white. You’re wonderfully changed, Daren.”

“So are you. But I’ll say I’m happy it’s not painted face and
plucked eyebrows…. Mel, what’s happened to you?”

She suddenly espied the decoration on his coat. The blood rose
and stained her clear cheek. With a gesture of exquisite grace
and sensibility that thrilled Lane she touched the medal. “Oh!
The Croix de Guerre…. Daren, you were a hero.”

“No, Mel, just a soldier.”

She looked up into his face with eyes that fascinated Lane, so
beautiful were they—the blue of corn-flowers—and
lighted then with strange rapt glow.

“Just a soldier!” she murmured. But Lane heard in that all the
sweetness and understanding possible for any woman’s heart. She
amazed him—held him spellbound. Here was the
sympathy—and something else—a nameless need—for
which he yearned. The moment was fraught with incomprehensible
forces. Lane’s sore heart responded to her rapt look, to the
sudden strange passion of her pale face. Swiftly he divined that
Mel Iden gloried in the presence of a maimed and proven soldier.

“Mel, I’ll come to see you,” he said, breaking the spell. “Do you
still live out on the Hill road? I remember the four big white
oaks.”

“No, Daren, I’ve left home,” she said, with slow change, as if
his words recalled something she had forgotten. All the radiance
vanished, leaving her singularly white.

“Left home! What for?” he asked, bluntly.

“Father turned me out,” she replied, with face averted. The soft
roundness of her throat swelled. Lane saw her full breast heave
under her coat.

“What’re you saying, Mel Iden?” he demanded, as quickly as he
could find his voice.

Then she turned bravely to meet his gaze, and Lane had never seen
as sad eyes as looked into his.

“Daren, haven’t you heard—about me?” she asked, with
tremulous lips.

“No. What’s wrong?”

“I—I can’t let you call on me.”

“Why not? Are you married—jealous husband?”

“No, I’m not married—but I—I have a baby,” she
whispered.

“Mel!” gasped Lane. “A war baby?”

“Yes.”

Lane was so shocked he could not collect his scattered wits, let
alone think of the right thing to say, if there were any right
thing. “Mel, this is a—a terrible surprise. Oh, I’m
sorry…. How the war played hell with all of us! But for
you—Mel Iden—I can’t believe it.”

“Daren, so terribly true,” she said. “Don’t I look it?”

“Mel, you look—oh—heartbroken.”

“Yes, I am broken-hearted,” she replied, and drooped her head.

“Forgive me, Mel. I hardly know what I’m saying…. But
listen—I’m coming to see you.”

“No,” she said.

That trenchant word was thought-provoking. A glimmer of
understanding began to dawn in Lane. Already an immense pity had
flooded his soul, and a profound sense of the mystery and tragedy
of Mel Iden. She had always been unusual, aloof, proud,
unattainable, a girl with a heart of golden fire. And now she had
a nameless child and was an outcast from her father’s house. The
fact, the fatality of it, stunned Lane.

“Daren, I must go in to see Dr. Bronson,” she said. “I’m glad
you’re home. I’m proud of you. I’m happy for your mother and
Lorna. You must watch Lorna—try to restrain her. She’s
going wrong. All the young girls are going wrong. Oh, it’s a more
dreadful time now than before or during the war. The
let-down has been terrible…. Good-bye, Daren.”

In other days Manton’s building on Main Street had appeared a
pretentious one to Lane’s untraveled eyes. It was an old
three-story red-brick-front edifice, squatted between higher and
more modern structures. When he climbed the dirty dark stairway
up to the second floor a throng of memories returned with the
sensations of creaky steps, musty smell, and dim light. When he
pushed open a door on which MANTON & CO. showed in black
letters he caught his breath. Long—long past! Was it
possible that he had been penned up for three years in this
stifling place?

Manton carried on various lines of business, and for Middleville,
he was held to be something of a merchant and broker. Lane was
wholly familiar with the halls, the several lettered doors, the
large unpartitioned office at the back of the building. Here his
slow progress was intercepted by a slip of a girl who asked him
what he wanted. Before answering, Lane took stock of the girl.
She might have been all of fifteen—no older. She had curly
bobbed hair, and a face that would have been comely but for the
powder and rouge. She was chewing gum, and she ogled Lane.

“I want to see Mr. Manton,” Lane said.

“What name, please.”

“Daren Lane.”

She tripped off toward the door leading to Manton’s private
offices, and Lane’s gaze, curiously following her, found her
costume to be startling even to his expectant eyes. Then she
disappeared. Lane’s gaze sought the corner and desk that once
upon a time had been his. A blond young lady, also with bobbed
hair, was operating a typewriter at his desk. She glanced up, and
espying Lane, she suddenly stopped her work. She recognized him.
But, if she were Hattie Wilson, it was certain that Lane did not
recognize her. Then the office girl returned.

“Step this way, please. Mr. Smith will see you.”

How singularly it struck Lane that not once in three years had he
thought of Smith. But when he saw him, the intervening months
were as nothing. Lean, spare, pallid, with baggy eyes, and the
nose of a drinker, Smith had not changed.

“How do, Lane. So you’re back? Welcome to our city,” he said,
extending a nerveless hand that felt to Lane like a dead fish.

“Hello, Mr. Smith. Yes, I’m back,” returned Lane, taking the
chair Smith indicated. And then he met the inevitable questions
as best he could in order not to appear curt or uncivil.

“I’d like to see Mr. Manton to ask for my old job,” interposed
Lane, presently.

“He’s busy now, Lane, but maybe he’ll see you. I’ll find out.”

Smith got up and went out. Lane sat there with a vague sense of
absurdity in the situation. The click of a typewriter sounded
from behind him. He wanted to hurry out. He wanted to think of
other things, and twice he drove away memory of the girl he had
just left at Doctor Bronson’s office. Presently Smith returned,
slipping along in his shiny black suit, flat-footed and slightly
bowed, with his set dull expression.

“Lane, Mr. Manton asks you to please excuse him. He’s extremely
busy,” said Smith. “I told him that you wanted your old job back.
And he instructed me to tell you he had been put to the trouble
of breaking in a girl to take your place. She now does the work
you used to have—very satisfactorily, Mr. Manton thinks,
and at less pay. So, of course, a change is impossible.”

“I see,” returned Lane, slowly, as he rose to go. “I had an idea
that might be the case. I’m finding things—a little
different.”

“No doubt, Lane. You fellows who went away left us to make the
best of it.”

“Yes, Smith, we fellows ‘went away,'” replied Lane, with satire,
“and I’m finding out the fact wasn’t greatly appreciated. Good
day.”

On the way out the little office girl opened the door for him and
ogled him again, and stood a moment on the threshold.
Ponderingly, Lane made his way down to the street. A rush of cool
spring air seemed to refresh him, and with it came a realization
that he never would have been able to stay cooped up in Manton’s
place. Even if his services had been greatly desired he could not
have given them for long. He could not have stood that place.
This was a new phase of his mental condition. Work almost
anywhere in Middleville would be like that in Manton’s. Could he
stand work at all, not only in a physical sense, but in
application of mind? He began to worry about that.

Some one hailed Lane, and he turned to recognize an old
acquaintance—Matt Jones. They walked along the street
together, meeting other men who knew Lane, some of whom greeted
him heartily. Then, during an ensuing hour, he went into familiar
stores and the post-office, the hotel and finally the Bradford
Inn, meeting many people whom he had known well. The sum of all
their greetings left him in cold amaze. At length Lane grasped
the subtle import—that people were tired of any one or
anything which reminded them of the war. He tried to drive that
thought from lodgment in his mind. But it stuck. And slowly he
gathered the forces of his spirit to make good the resolve with
which he had faced this day—to withstand an appalling
truth.

At the inn he sat before an open fire and pondered between brief
conversations of men who accosted him. On the one hand it was
extremely trying, and on the other a fascinating and grim
study—to meet people, and find that he could read their
minds. Had the war given him some magic sixth sense, some
clairvoyant power, some gift of vision? He could not tell yet
what had come to him, but there was something.

Business men, halting to chat with Lane a few moments, helped
along his readjustment to the truth of the strange present.
Almost all kinds of business were booming. Most people had money
to spend. And there was a multitude, made rich by the war, who
were throwing money to the four winds. Prices of every commodity
were at their highest peak, and supply could not equal demand. An
orgy of spending was in full swing, and all men in business,
especially the profiteers, were making the most of the
unprecedented opportunity.

After he had rested, Lane boarded a street car and rode out to
the suburbs of Middleville where the Maynards lived. Although
they had lost their money they still lived in the substantial
mansion that was all which was left them of prosperous days.
House and grounds now appeared sadly run down.

A maid answered Lane’s ring, and let him in. Lane found himself
rather nervously expecting to see Mrs. Maynard. The old house
brought back to him the fact that he had never liked her. But he
wanted to see Margaret. It turned out, however, that mother and
daughter were out.

“Come up, old top,” called Blair’s voice from the hall above.

So Lane went up to Blair’s room, which he remembered almost as
well as his own, though now it was in disorder. Blair was in his
shirt sleeves. He looked both gay and spent. Red Payson was in
bed, and his face bore the hectic flush of fever.

“Aw, he’s only had too much to eat,” declared Blair, in answer to
Lane’s solicitation.

“How’s that, Red?” asked Lane, sitting down on the bed beside
Payson.

“It’s nothing, Dare…. I’m just all in,” replied Red, with a
weary smile.

“I telephoned Doc Bronson to come out,” said Blair, “and look us
over. That made Red as sore as a pup. Isn’t he the limit? By
thunder, you can’t do anything for some people.”

Blair’s tone and words of apparent vexation were at variance with
the kindness of his eyes as they rested upon his sick comrade.

“I just came from Bronson’s,” observed Lane. “He’s been our
doctor for as long as I can remember.”

Both Lane’s comrades searched his face with questioning eyes, and
while Lane returned that gaze there was a little constrained
silence.

“Bronson examined me—and said I’d live to be eighty,” added
Lane, with dry humor.

“You’re a liar!” burst out Blair.

On Red Payson’s worn face a faint smile appeared. “Carry on,
Dare.”

Then Blair fell to questioning Lane as to all the news he had
heard, and people he had met.

“So Manton turned you down cold,” said Blair, ponderingly.

“I didn’t get to see him,” replied Lane. “He sent out word that
my old job was held by a girl who did my work better and at less
pay.”

The blood leaped to Blair’s white cheek.

“What’d you say?” he queried.

“Nothing much. I just trailed out…. But the truth is,
Blair—I couldn’t have stood that place—not for a
day.”

“I get you,” rejoined Blair. “That isn’t the point, though. I
always wondered if we’d find our old jobs open to us. Of course,
I couldn’t fill mine now. It was an outside job—lots of
walking.”

So the conversation see-sawed back and forth, with Red Payson
listening in languid interest.

“Have you seen any of the girls?” asked Blair.

“I met Mel Iden,” replied Lane.

“You did? What did she—”

“Mel told me what explained some of your hints.”

“Ahuh! Poor Mel! How’d she look?”

“Greatly changed,” replied Lane, thoughtfully. “How do you
remember Mel?”

“Well, she was pretty—soulful face—wonderful
smile—that sort of thing.”

“She’s beautiful now, and sad.”

“I shouldn’t wonder. And she told you right out about the baby?”

“No. That came out when she said I couldn’t call on her, and I
wanted to know why.”

“But you’ll go anyhow?”

“Yes.”

“So will I,” returned Blair, with spirit. “Dare, I’ve known for
over a year about Mel’s disgrace. You used to like her, and I
hated to tell you. If it had been Helen I’d have told you in a
minute. But Mel … Well, I suppose we must expect queer things.
I got a jolt this morning. I was pumping my sister Margie about
everybody, and, of course, Mel’s name came up. You remember
Margie and Mel were as thick as two peas in a pod. Looks like
Mel’s fall has hurt Margie. But I don’t just get Margie
yet. She might be another fellow’s sister—for all the
strangeness of her.”

“I hardly knew my kid sister,” responded Lane.

“Ahuh! The plot thickens…. Well, I couldn’t get much out of
Marg. She used to babble everything. But what little she told me
made up in—in shock for what it lacked in volume.”

“Tell me,” said Lane, as his friend paused.

“Nothing doing.” … And turning to the sick boy on the bed, he
remarked, “Red, you needn’t let this—this gab of ours
bother you. This is home talk between a couple of boobs who’re
burying their illusions in the grave. You didn’t leave a sister
or a lot of old schoolgirl sweethearts behind to——”

“What the hell do you know about whom I left behind?” retorted
Red, with a swift blaze of strange passion.

“Oh, say, Red—I—I beg your pardon, I was only
kidding,” responded Blair, in surprise and contrition. “You never
told me a word about yourself.”

For answer Red Payson rolled over wearily and turned his back.

“Blair, I’ll beat it, and let Red go to sleep,” said Lane, taking
up his hat. “Red, good-bye this time. I hope you’ll be better
soon.”

“I’m—sorry, Lane,” came in muffled tones from Payson.

“Cut that out, boy. You’ve nothing to be sorry for. Forget it and
cheer up.”

Blair hobbled downstairs after Lane. “Don’t go just yet, Dare.”

They found seats in the parlor that appeared to be the same
shabby genteel place where Lane had used to call upon Blair’s
sister.

“What ails Red?” queried Lane, bluntly.

“Lord only knows. He’s a queer duck. Once in a while he lets out
a crack like that. There’s a lot to Red.”

“Blair, his heart is broken,” said Lane, tragically.

“Well!” exclaimed Blair, with quick almost haughty uplift of
head. He seemed to resent Lane’s surprise and intimation. It was
a rebuke that made Lane shrink.

“I never thought of Red’s being hurt—you know—or as
having lost…. Oh, he just seemed like so many other boys ruined
in health. I——”

“All right. Cut the sentiment,” interrupted Blair. “The fact is
Red is more of a problem than we had any idea he’d be…. And
Dare, listen to this—I’m ashamed to have to tell you.
Mother raised old Harry with me this morning for fetching Red
home. She couldn’t see it my way. She said there were hospitals
for sick soldiers who hadn’t homes. I lost my temper and I said:
‘The hell of it, mother, is that there’s nothing of the kind.’
… She said we couldn’t keep him here. I tried to coax her….
Margie helped, but nothing doing.”

Blair had spoken hurriedly with again a stain of red in his white
cheek, and a break in his voice.

“That’s—tough,” replied Lane, haltingly. He could choke
back speech, but not the something in his voice he would rather
not have heard. “I’ll tell you what. As soon as Red is well
enough we’ll move him over to my house. I’m sure mother will let
him share my room. There’s only Lorna—and I’ll pay Red’s
board…. You have quite a family—”

“Hell, Dare—don’t apologize to me for my mother,” burst out
Blair, bitterly.

“Blair, I believe you realize what we are up against—and I
don’t,” rejoined Lane, with level gaze upon his friend.

“Dare, can’t you see we’re up against worse than the
Argonne?—worse, because back here at home—that
beautiful, glorious thought—idea—spirit we had is
gone. Dead!”

“No, I can’t see,” returned Lane, stubbornly.

“Well, I guess that’s one reason we all loved you, Dare—you
couldn’t see…. But I’ll bet you my crutch Helen makes you see.
Her father made a pile out of the war. She’s a war-rich snob now.
And going the pace!”

“Blair, she may make me see her faithlessness—and perhaps
some strange unrest—some change that’s seemed to come over
everything. But she can’t prove to me the death of anything
outside of herself. She can’t prove that any more than Mel Iden’s
confession proved her a wanton. It didn’t. Not to me. Why, when
Mel put her hand on my breast—on this medal—and
looked at me—I had such a thrill as I never had before in
all my life. Never!… Blair, it’s not dead. That
beautiful thing you mentioned—that spirit—that fire
which burned so gloriously—it is not dead.”

“Not in you—old pard,” replied Blair, unsteadily. “I’m
always ashamed before your faith. And, by God, I’ll say you’re my
only anchor.”

“Blair, let’s play the game out to the end,” said Lane.

“I get you, Dare…. For Margie, for Lorna, for Mel—even if
they have—”

“Yes,” answered Lane, as Blair faltered.

CHAPTER IV

As Lane sped out Elm Street in a taxicab he remembered that his
last ride in such a conveyance had been with Helen when he took
her home from a party. She was then about seventeen years old.
And that night she had coaxed him to marry her before he left to
go to war. Had her feminine instinct been infallibly right? Would
marrying her have saved her from what Blair had so forcibly
suggested?

Elm Street was a newly developed part of Middleville, high on one
of its hills, and manifestly a restricted section. Lane had found
the number of Helen’s home in the telephone book. When the
chauffeur stopped before a new and imposing pile of red brick,
Lane understood an acquaintance’s reference to the war rich. It
was a mansion, but somehow not a home. It flaunted something
indefinable.

Lane instructed the driver to wait a few moments, and, if he did
not come out, to go back to town and return in about an hour. The
house stood rather far from the street, and as Lane mounted the
terrace he observed four motor cars parked in the driveway. Also
his sensitive ears caught the sound of a phonograph.

A maid answered his ring. Lane asked for both Mrs. Wrapp and
Helen. They were at home, the maid informed him, and ushered Lane
into a gray and silver reception room. Lane had no card, but gave
his name. As he gazed around the room he tried to fit the
delicate decorative scheme to Mrs. Wrapp. He smiled at the idea.
But he remembered that she had always liked him in spite of the
fact that she did not favor his attention to Helen. Like many
mothers of girls, she wanted a rich marriage for her daughter.
Manifestly now she had money. But had happiness come with
prosperity?

Then Mrs. Wrapp came down. Rising, he turned to see a large
woman, elaborately gowned. She had a heavy, rather good-natured
face on which was a smile of greeting.

“Daren Lane!” she exclaimed, with fervor, and to his surprise,
she kissed him. There was no doubt of her pleasure. Lane’s thin
armor melted. He had not anticipated such welcome. “Oh, I’m glad
to see you, soldier boy. But you’re a man now. Daren, you’re
white and thin. Handsomer, though!… Sit down and talk to me a
little.”

Her kindness made his task easy.

“I’ve called to pay my respects to you—and to see Helen,”
he said.

“Of course. But talk to me first,” she returned, with a smile.
“You’ll find me better company than that crowd upstairs. Tell me
about yourself…. Oh, I know soldiers hate to talk about
themselves and the war. Never mind the war. Are you well? Did you
get hurt? You look so—so frail, Daren.”

There was something simple and motherly about her, that became
her, and warmed Lane’s cold heart. He remembered that she had
always preferred boys to girls, and regretted she had not been
the mother of boys. So Lane talked to her, glad to find that the
most ordinary news of the service and his comrades interested her
very much. The instant she espied his Croix de Guerre he
seemed lifted higher in her estimation. Yet she had the delicacy
not to question him about that. In fact, after ten minutes with
her, Lane had to reproach himself for the hostility with which he
had come. At length she rose with evident reluctance.

“You want to see Helen. Shall I send her down here or will you go
up to her studio?”

“I think I’d like to go up,” replied Lane.

“If I were you, I would,” advised Mrs. Wrapp. “I’d like your
opinion—of, well, what you’ll see. Since you left home,
Daren, we’ve been turned topsy-turvy. I’m old-fashioned. I can’t
get used to these goings-on. These young people ‘get my goat,’ as
Helen expresses it.”

“I’m hopelessly behind the times, I’ve seen that already,”
rejoined Lane.

“Daren, I respect you for it. There was a time when I objected to
your courting Helen. But I couldn’t see into the future. I’m
sorry now she broke her engagement to you.”

“I—thank you, Mrs. Wrapp,” said Lane, with agitation. “But
of course Helen was right. She was too young…. And even if she
had been—been true to me—I would have freed her upon
my return.”

“Indeed. And why, Daren?”

“Because I’ll never be well again,” he replied sadly.

“Boy, don’t say that!” she appealed, with a hand going to his
shoulder.

In the poignancy of the moment Lane lost his reserve and told her
the truth of his condition, even going so far as to place her
hand so she felt the great bayonet hole in his back. Her silence
then was more expressive than any speech. She had the look of a
woman in whom conscience was a reality. And Lane divined that she
felt she and her daughter, and all other women of this distraught
land, owed him and his comrades a debt which could never be paid.
For once she expressed dignity and sweetness and genuine sorrow.

“You shock me, Daren. But words are useless. I hope and pray
you’re wrong. But right or wrong—you’re a real
American—like our splendid forefathers. Thank God
that spirit still survives. It is our only hope.”

Lane crossed to the window and looked out, slowly conscious of
resurging self-control. It was well that he had met Mrs. Wrapp
first, for she gave him what he needed. His bleeding vanity, his
pride trampled in the dirt, his betrayed faith, his unquenchable
spirit of hope for some far-future good—these were not
secrets he could hide from every one.

“Daren,” said Mrs. Wrapp, as he again turned to her, “if I were
in my daughter’s place I’d beg you to take me back. And if you
would, I’d never leave your side for an hour until you were well
or—or gone. … But girls now are possessed of some
infernal frenzy…. God only knows how far they go, but
I’m one mother who is no fool. I see little sign of real love in
Helen or any of her friends…. And the men who lounge around
after her! Walk upstairs—back to the end of the long
hall—open the door and go in. You’ll find Helen and some of
her associates. You’ll find the men, young, sleek, soft,
well-fed—without any of the scars or ravages of war. They
didn’t go to war!… They live for their bodies. And I
hate these slackers. So does Helen’s father. And for three years
our house has been a rendezvous for them. We’ve prospered, but
that has been bitter fruit.”

Strong elemental passions Lane had seen and felt in people during
the short twenty-four hours since his return home. All of them
had stung and astounded him, flung into his face the hard brutal
facts of the materialism of the present. Surely it was an
abnormal condition. And yet from the last quarter where he might
have expected to find uplift, and the crystallizing of his
attitude toward the world, and the sharpening of his
intelligence—from the hard, grim mother of the girl who had
jilted him, these had come. It was in keeping with all the other
mystery.

“On second thought, I’ll go up with you,” continued Mrs. Wrapp,
as he moved in the direction she had indicated. “Come.”

The wide hall, the winding stairway with its soft carpet, the
narrower hallway above—these made a long journey for Lane.
But at the end, when Mrs. Wrapp stopped with hand on the farthest
door, Lane felt knit like cold steel.

The discordant music and the soft shuffling of feet ceased.
Laughter and murmur of voices began.

“Come, Daren,” whispered Mrs. Wrapp, as if thrilled. Certainly
her eyes gleamed. Then quickly she threw the door open wide and
called out:

“Helen, here’s Daren Lane home from the war, wearing the Croix
de Guerre.”

Mrs. Wrapp pushed Lane forward, and stood there a moment in the
sudden silence, then stepping back, she went out and closed the
door.

Lane saw a large well-lighted room, with colorful bizarre
decorations and a bare shiny floor. The first person his glance
encountered was a young girl, strikingly beautiful, facing him
with red lips parted. She had violet eyes that seemed to have a
startled expression as they met Lane’s. Next Lane saw a slim
young man standing close to this girl, in the act of withdrawing
his arm from around her waist. Apparently with his free hand he
had either been lowering a smoking cigarette from her lips or had
been raising it there. This hand, too, dropped down. Lane did not
recognize the fellow’s smooth, smug face, with its tiny curled
mustache and its heated swollen lines.

“Look who’s here,” shouted a gay, vibrant voice. “If it isn’t old
Dare Lane!”

That voice drew Lane’s fixed gaze, and he saw a group in the far
corner of the room. One man was standing, another was sitting
beside a lounge, upon which lay a young woman amid a pile of
pillows. She rose lazily, and as she slid off the lounge Lane saw
her skirt come down and cover her bare knees. Her red hair,
bobbed and curly, marked her for recognition. It was Helen. But
Lane doubted if he would have at once recognized any other
feature. The handsome insolence of her face was belied by a
singularly eager and curious expression. Her eyes, almost green
in line, swept Lane up and down, and came back to his face, while
she extended her hands in greeting.

“Helen, how are you?” said Lane, with a cool intent mastery of
himself, bowing over her hands. “Surprised to see me?”

“Well, I’ll say so! Daren, you’ve changed,” she replied, and the
latter part of her speech flashed swiftly.

“Rather,” he said, laconically. “What would you expect? So have
you changed.”

There came a moment’s pause. Helen was not embarrassed or
agitated, but something about Lane or the situation apparently
made her slow or stiff.

“Daren, you—of course you remember Hardy Mackay and Dick
Swann,” she said.

Lane turned to greet one-time schoolmates and rivals of his.
Mackay was tall, homely, with a face that lacked force, light
blue eyes and thick sandy hair, brushed high. Swann was slight,
elegant, faultlessly groomed and he had a dark, sallow face,
heavy lips, heavy eyelids, eyes rather prominent and of a
wine-dark hue. To Lane he did not have a clean, virile look.

In their greetings Lane sensed some indefinable quality of
surprise or suspense. Swann rather awkwardly put out his hand,
but Lane ignored it. The blood stained Swann’s sallow face and he
drew himself up.

“And Daren, here are other friends of mine,” said Helen, and she
turned him round. “Bessy, this is Daren Lane…. Miss Bessy
Bell.” As Lane acknowledged the introduction he felt that he was
looking at the prettiest girl he had ever seen—the girl
whose violet eyes had met his when he entered the room.

“Mr. Daren Lane, I’m very happy to meet some one from ‘over
there,'” she said, with the ease and self-possession of a woman
of the world. But when she smiled a beautiful, wonderful light
seemed to shine from eyes and face and lips—a smile of
youth.

Helen introduced her companion as Roy Vancey. Then she led Lane
to the far corner, to another couple, manifestly disturbed from
their rather close and familiar position in a window seat. These
also were strangers to Lane. They did not get up, and they were
not interested. In fact, Lane was quick to catch an impression
from all, possibly excepting Miss Bell, that the courtesy of
drawing rooms, such as he had been familiar with as a young man,
was wanting in this atmosphere. Lane wondered if it was
antagonism toward him. Helen drew Lane back toward her other
friends, to the lounge where she seated herself. If the situation
had disturbed her equilibrium in the least, the moment had
passed. She did not care what Lane thought of her guests or what
they thought of him. But she seemed curious about him. Bessy Bell
came and sat beside her, watching Lane.

“Daren, do you dance?” queried Helen. “You used to be good. But
dancing is not the same. It’s all fox-trot, toddle, shimmy
nowadays.”

“I’m afraid my dancing days are over,” replied Lane.

“How so? I see you came back with two legs and arms.”

“Yes. But I was shot twice through one leg—it’s about all I
can do to walk now.”

Following his easy laugh, a little silence ensued. Helen’s green
eyes seemed to narrow and concentrate on Lane. Dick Swann inhaled
a deep draught of his cigarette, then let the smoke curl up from
his lips to enter his nostrils. Mackay rather uneasily shifted
his feet. And Bessy Bell gazed with wonderful violet eyes at
Lane.

“Oh! You were shot!” she whispered.

“Yes,” replied Lane, and looked directly at her, prompted by her
singular tone. A glance was enough to show Lane that this very
young girl was an entirely new type to him. She seemed to vibrate
with intensity. All the graceful lines of her body seemed
strangely instinct with pulsing life. She was bottled lightning.
In a flash Lane sensed what made her different from the
fifteen-year-olds he remembered before the war. It was what made
his sister Lorna different. He felt it in Helen’s scrutiny of
him, in the speculation of her eyes. Then Bessy Bell leaned
toward Lane, and softly, reverently touched the medal upon his
breast.

“The Croix de Guerre,” she said, in awe. “That’s the
French badge of honor…. It means you must have done something
great…. You must have—killed Germans!”

Bessy sank back upon the lounge, clasping her hands, and her eyes
appeared to darken, to turn purple with quickening thought and
emotion. Her exclamation brought the third girl of the party over
to the lounge. She was all eyes. Her apathy had vanished. She did
not see the sulky young fellow who had followed her.

Lane could have laughed aloud. He read the shallow souls of these
older girls. They could not help their instincts and he had
learned that it was instinctive with women to become emotional
over soldiers. Bessy Bell was a child. Hero-worship shone from
her speaking eyes. Whatever other young men might be to her, no
one of them could compare with a soldier.

The situation had its pathos, its tragedy, and its gratification
for Lane. He saw clearly, and felt with the acuteness of a woman.
Helen had jilted him for such young men as these. So in the
feeling of the moment it cost him nothing to thrill and fascinate
these girls with the story of how he had been shot through the
leg. It pleased him to see Helen’s green eyes dilate, to see
Bessy Bell shudder. Presently Lane turned to speak to the
supercilious Swann.

“I didn’t have the luck to run across you in France!” he queried.

“No. I didn’t go,” replied Swann.

“How was that? Didn’t the draft get you?”

“Yes. But my eyes were bad. And my father needed me at the works.
We had a big army contract in steel.”

“Oh, I see,” returned Lane, with a subtle alteration of manner he
could not, did not want to control. But it was unmistakable in
its detachment. Next his gaze on Mackay did not require the
accompaniment of a query.

“I was under weight. They wouldn’t accept me,” he explained.

Bessy Bell looked at Mackay disdainfully. “Why didn’t you drink a
bucketful of water—same as Billy Means did? He got in.”

Helen laughed gayly. “What! Mac drink water? He’d be ill….
Come, let’s dance. Dick put on that new one. Daren, you can watch
us dance.”

Swann did as he was bidden, and as a loud, violent discordance
blared out of the machine he threw away his cigarette, and turned
to Helen. She seemed to leap at him. She had a pantherish grace.
Swann drew her closely to him, with his arm all the way round
her, while her arm encircled his neck. They began a fast swaying
walk, in which Swann appeared to be forcing the girl over
backwards. They swayed, and turned, and glided; they made strange
abrupt movements in accordance with the jerky tune; they halted
at the end of a walk to make little steps forward and back; then
they began to bounce and sway together in a motion that Lane
instantly recognized as a toddle. Lane remembered the one-step,
the fox-trot and other new dances of an earlier day, when the
craze for new dancing had become general, but this sort of
gyration was vastly something else. It disgusted Lane. He felt
the blood surge to his face. He watched Helen Wrapp in the arms
of Swann, and he realized, whatever had been the state of his
heart on his return home, he did not love her now. Even if the
war had not disrupted his mind in an unaccountable way, even if
he had loved Helen Wrapp right up to that moment, such singular
abandonment to a distorted strange music, to the close and
unmistakably sensual embrace of a man—that spectacle would
have killed his love.

Lane turned his gaze away. The young fellow Vancey was pulling at
Bessy Bell, and she shook his hand off. “No, Roy, I don’t want to
dance.” Lane heard above the jarring, stringing notes. Mackay was
smoking, and looked on as if bored. In a moment more the Victrola
rasped out its last note.

Helen’s face was flushed and moist. Her bosom heaved. Her gown
hung closely to her lissom and rather full form. A singular
expression of excitement, of titillation, almost wild, a softer
expression almost dreamy, died out of her face. Lane saw Swann
lead Helen up to a small table beside the Victrola. Here stood a
large pitcher of lemonade, and a number of glasses. Swann filled
a glass half full, from the pitcher, and then, deliberately
pulling a silver flask from his hip pocket he poured some of its
dark red contents into the glass. Helen took it from him, and
turned to Lane with a half-mocking glance.

“Daren, I remember you never drank,” she said. “Maybe the war
made a man of you!… Will you have a sip of lemonade with a shot
in it?”

“No, thank you,” replied Lane.

“Didn’t you drink over there?” she queried.

“Only when I had to,” he rejoined, shortly.

All of the four dancers partook of a drink of lemonade,
strengthened by something from Swann’s flask. Lane was quick to
observe that when it was pressed upon Bessy Bell she refused to
take it: “I hate booze,” she said, with a grimace. His further
impression of Bessy Bell, then, was that she had just fallen in
with this older crowd, and sophisticated though she was, had not
yet been corrupted. The divination of this heightened his
interest.

“Well, Daren, you old prune, what’d you think of the toddle?”
asked Helen, as she took a cigarette offered by Swann and tipped
it between her red lips.

“Is that what you danced?”

“I’ll say so. And Dick and I are considered pretty spiffy.”

“I don’t think much of it, Helen,” replied Lane, deliberately.
“If you care to—to do that sort of thing I’d imagine you’d
rather do it alone.”

“Oh Lord, you talk like mother,” she exclaimed.

“Lane, you’re out of date,” said Swann, with a little sneer.

Lane took a long, steady glance at Swann, but did not reply.

“Daren, everybody has been dancing jazz. It’s the rage. The old
dances were slow. The new ones have pep and snap.”

“So I see. They have more than that,” returned Lane. “But pray,
never mind me. I’m out of date. Go ahead and dance…. If you’d
rather, I’ll leave and call on you some other time.”

“No, you stay,” she replied. “I’ll chase this bunch pretty soon.”

“Well, you won’t chase me. I’ll go,” spoke up Swann, sullenly,
with a fling of his cigarette.

“You needn’t hurt yourself,” returned Helen, sarcastically.

“So long, people,” said Swann to the others. But it was perfectly
obvious that he did not include Lane. It was also obvious, at
least to Lane, that Swann showed something of intolerance and
mastery in the dark, sullen glance he bestowed upon Helen. She
followed him across the room and out into the hall, from whence
her guarded voice sounded unintelligibly. But Lane’s keen ear,
despite the starting of the Victrola, caught Swann’s equally low,
yet clearer reply. “You can’t kid me. I’m on. You’ll vamp Lane if
he lets you. Go to it!”

As Helen came back into the room Mackay ran for her, and locking
her in the same embrace—even a tighter one than
Swann’s—he fell into the strange steps that had so shocked
Lane. Moreover, he was manifestly a skilful dancer, and showed
the thin, lithe, supple body of one trained down by this or some
other violent exercise.

Lane did not watch the dancers this time. Again Bessy Bell
refused to get up from the lounge. The youth was insistent. He
pawed at her. And manifestly she did not like that, for her face
flamed, and she snapped: “Stop it—you bonehead! Can’t you
see I want to sit here by Mr. Lane?”

The youth slouched away fuming to himself.

Whereupon Lane got up, and seated himself beside Bessy so that he
need not shout to be heard.

“That was nice of you, Miss Bell—but rather hard on the
youngster,” said Lane.

“He makes me sick. All he wants to do is lolly-gag…. Besides,
after what you said to Helen about the jazz I wouldn’t dance in
front of you on a bet.”

She was forceful, frank, naive. She was impressed by his
nearness; but Lane saw that it was the fact of his being a
soldier with a record, not his mere physical propinquity that
affected her. She seemed both bold and shy. But she did not show
any modesty. Her short skirt came above her bare knees, and she
did not try to hide them from Lane’s sight. At fifteen, like his
sister Lorna, this girl had the development of a young woman. She
breathed health, and something elusive that Lane could not catch.
If it had not been for her apparent lack of shame, and her rouged
lips and cheeks, and her plucked eyebrows, she would have been
exceedingly alluring. But no beauty, however striking, could
under these circumstances, stir Lane’s heart. He was fascinated,
puzzled, intensely curious.

“Why wouldn’t you dance jazz in front of me?” he inquired, with a
smile.

“Well, for one thing I’m not stuck on it, and for another I’ll
say you said a mouthful.”

“Is that all?” he asked, as if disappointed.

“No. I’d respect what you said—because of where you’ve been
and what you’ve done.”

It was a reply that surprised Lane.

“I’m out of date, you know.”

She put a finger on the medal on his breast and said: “You could
never be out of date.”

The music and the sliding shuffle ceased.

“Now beat it,” said Helen. “I want to talk to Daren.” She gayly
shoved the young people ahead of her in a mass, and called to
Bessy: “Here, you kid vamp, lay off Daren.”

Bessy leaned to whisper in his ear: “Make a date with me, quick!”

“Surely, I’ll hunt you up. Good-bye.”

She was the only one who made any pretension of saying good-bye
to Lane. They all crowded out before Helen, with Mackay in the
rear. From the hall Lane heard him say to Helen: “Dick’ll sure go
to the mat with you for this.”

Presently Helen returned to shut the door behind her; and her
walk toward Lane had a suggestion of the oriental dancer. For
Lane her face was a study. This seemed a woman beyond his
comprehension. She was the Helen Wrapp he had known and loved,
plus an age of change, a measureless experience. With that
swaying, sinuous, pantherish grace, with her green eyes narrowed
and gleaming, half mocking, half serious, she glided up to him,
close, closer until she pressed against him, and her face was
uplifted under his. Then she waited with her eyes gazing into
his. Slumberous green depths, slowly lighting, they seemed to
Lane. Her presence thus, her brazen challenge, affected him
powerfully, but he had no thrill.

“Aren’t you going to kiss me?” she asked.

“Helen, why didn’t you write me you had broken our engagement?”
he counter-queried.

The question disconcerted her somewhat. Drawing back from close
contact with him she took hold of his sleeves, and assumed a
naive air of groping in memory. She used her eyes in a way that
Lane could not associate with the past he knew. She was a
flirt—not above trying her arts on the man she had jilted.

“Why, didn’t I write you? Of course I did.”

“Well, if you did I never got the letter. And if you were on the
level you’d admit you never wrote.”

“How’d you find out then?” she inquired curiously.

“I never knew for sure until your mother verified it.”

“Are you curious to know why I did break it off?”

“Not in the least.”

This reply shot the fire into her face, yet she still persisted
in the expression of her sentimental motive. She began to finger
the medal on his breast.

“So, Mr. Soldier Hero, you didn’t care?”

“No—not after I had been here ten minutes,” he replied,
bluntly.

She whirled from him, swiftly, her body instinct with passion,
her expression one of surprise and fury.

“What do you mean by that?”

“Nothing I care to explain, except I discovered my love for you
was dead—perhaps had been dead for a long time.”

“But you never discovered it until you saw
me—here—with Swann—dancing, drinking, smoking?”

“No. To be honest, the shock of that enlightened me.”

“Daren Lane, I’m just what you men have made me,” she
burst out, passionately.

“You are mistaken. I beg to be excluded from any complicity in
the—in whatever you’ve been made,” he said, bitterly. “I
have been true to you in deed and in thought all this time.”

“You must be a queer soldier!” she exclaimed, incredulously.

“I figure there were a couple of million soldiers like me, queer
or not,” he retorted.

She gazed at him with something akin to hate in her eyes. Then
putting her hands to her full hips she began that swaying,
dancing walk to and fro before the window. She was deeply hurt.
Lane had meant to get under her skin with a few just words of
scorn, and he had imagined his insinuation as to the change in
her had hurt her feelings. Suddenly he divined it was not that at
all—he had only wounded her vanity.

“Helen, let’s not talk of the past,” he said. “It’s over. Even if
you had been true to me, and I loved you still—I would have
been compelled to break our engagement.”

“You would! And why?”

“I am a physical wreck—and a mental one, too, I fear….
Helen, I’ve come home to die.”

“Daren!” she cried, poignantly.

Then he told her in brief, brutal words of the wounds and ravages
war had dealt him, and what Doctor Bronson’s verdict had been.
Lane felt shame in being so little as to want to shock and hurt
her, if that were possible.

“Oh, I’m sorry,” she burst out. “Your mother—your
sister…. Oh, that damned horrible war! What has it not
done to us?… Daren, you looked white and weak, but I never
thought you were—going to die…. How dreadful!”

Something of her girlishness returned to her in this moment of
sincerity. The past was not wholly dead. Memories lingered. She
looked at Lane, wide-eyed, in distress, caught between strange
long-forgotten emotions.

“Helen, it’s not dreadful to have to die,” replied Lane.
“That is not the dreadful part in coming home.”

“What is dreadful, then?” she asked, very low.

Lane felt a great heave of his breast—the irrepressible
reaction of a profound and terrible emotion, always held in
abeyance until now. And a fierce pang, that was physical as well
as emotional, tore through him. His throat constricted and ached
to a familiar sensation—the welling up of blood from his
lungs. The handkerchief he put to his lips came away stained red.
Helen saw it, and with dilated eyes, moved instinctively as if to
touch him, hold him in her pity.

“Never mind, Helen,” he said, huskily. “That’s nothing…. Well,
I was about to tell you what is so dreadful—for me…. It’s
to reach home grateful to God I was spared to get
home—resigned to the ruin of my life—content to die
for whom I fought—my mother, my sister, you, and all
our women (for I fought for nothing else)—and find my
mother aged and bewildered and sad, my sister a painted little
hussy—and you—a strange creature I despise….
And all, everybody, everything changed—changed in some
horrible way which proves my sacrifice in vain…. It is not
death that is dreadful, but the uselessness, the hopelessness of
the ideal I cherished.”

Helen fell on the couch, and burying her face in the pillows she
began to sob. Lane looked down at her, at her glistening auburn
hair, and slender, white, ringed hand clutching the cushions, at
her lissom shaking form, at the shapely legs in the rolled-down
silk stockings—and he felt a melancholy happiness in the
proof that he had reached her shallow heart, and in the fact that
this was the moment of loss.

“Good-bye—Helen,” he said.

“Daren—don’t—go,” she begged.

But he had to go, for other reasons beside the one that this was
the end of all intimate relation between him and Helen. He had
overtaxed his strength, and the burning pang in his breast was
one he must heed. On the hall stairway a dizzy spell came over
him. He held on to the banister until the weakness passed.
Fortunately there was no one to observe him. Somehow the
sumptuous spacious hall seemed drearily empty. Was this a home
for that twenty-year-old girl upstairs? Lane opened the door and
went out. He was relieved to find the taxi waiting. To the driver
he gave the address of his home and said: “Go slow and don’t give
me a jar!”

But Lane reached home, and got into the house, where he sat at
the table with his mother and Lorna, making a pretense of eating,
and went upstairs and into his bed without any recurrence of the
symptoms that had alarmed him. In the darkness of his room he
gradually relaxed to rest. And rest was the only medicine for
him. It had put off hour by hour and day by day the inevitable.

“If it comes—all right—I’m ready,” he whispered to
himself. “But in spite of all I’ve been through—and have
come home to—I don’t want to die.”

There was no use in trying to sleep. But in this hour he did not
want oblivion. He wanted endless time to think. And slowly, with
infinite care and infallible memory, he went over every detail of
what he had seen and heard since his arrival home. In the
headlong stream of consciousness of the past hours he met with
circumstances that he lingered over, and tried to understand, to
no avail. Yet when all lay clearly before his mental gaze he felt
a sad and tremendous fascination in the spectacle.

For many weeks he had lived on the fancy of getting home, of
being honored and loved, of being given some little meed of
praise and gratitude in the short while he had to live. Alas!
this fancy had been a dream of his egotism. His old world was
gone. There was nothing left. The day of the soldier had
passed—until some future need of him stirred the emotions
of a selfish people. This new world moved on unmindful, through
its travail and incalculable change, to unknown ends. He, Daren
Lane, had been left alone on the vast and naked shores of Lethe.

Lane made not one passionate protest at the injustice of his
fate. Labor, agony, war had taught him wisdom and vision. He
began to realize that no greater change could there be than this
of his mind, his soul. But in the darkness there an irresistible
grief assailed him. He wept as never before in all his life. And
he tasted the bitter salt of his own tears. He wept for his
mother, aged and bowed by trouble, bewildered, ready to give up
the struggle—his little sister now forced into erotic
girlhood, blind, wilful, bold, on the wrong path, doomed beyond
his power or any earthly power—the men he had met, warped
by the war, materialistic, lost in the maze of self-preservation
and self-aggrandizement, dead to chivalry and the honor of
women—Mel Iden, strangest and saddest of mysteries—a
girl who had been noble, aloof, proud, with a heart of golden
fire, now disgraced, ruined, the mother of a war-baby, and yet,
strangest of all, not vile, not bad, not lost, but groping like
he was down those vast and naked shores of life. He wept for the
hard-faced Mrs. Wrapp, whose ideal had been wealth and who had
found prosperity bitter ashes at her lips, yet who preserved in
this modern maelstrom some sense of its falseness, its baseness.
He wept for Helen, playmate of the years never to return,
sweetheart of his youth, betrayer of his manhood, the young woman
of the present, blase, unsexed, seeking, provocative, all
perhaps, as she had said, that men had made her—a travesty
on splendid girlhood. He wept for her friends, embodying in them
all of their class—for little Bessy Bell, with her
exquisite golden beauty, her wonderful smile that was a light of
joy—a child of fifteen with character and mind, not yet
sullied, not yet wholly victim to the unstable spirit of the day.

And traveling in this army that seemed to march before Lane’s
eyes were the slackers, like Mackay and Swann, representative of
that horde of cowards who in one way or another had avoided the
service—the young men who put comfort, ease, safety,
pleasure before all else—who had no ideal of
womanhood—who could not have protected women—who
would not fight to save women from the apish Huns—who
remained behind to fall in the wreck of the war’s degeneration,
and to dance, to drink, to smoke, to ride the women to their
debasement.

And for the first and the last time Lane wept for himself,
pitifully as a child lost and helpless, as a strong man facing
irreparable loss, as a boy who had dreamed beautiful dreams, who
had loved and given and trusted, who had suffered insupportable
agonies of body and soul, who had fought like a lion for what he
represented to himself, who had killed and killed—and whose
reward was change, indifference, betrayal and death.

That dark hour passed. Lane lay spent in the blackness of his
room. His heart had broken. But his spirit was as unquenchable as
the fire of the sun. If he had a year, a month, a week, a day
longer to live he could never live it untrue to himself. Life had
marked him to be a sufferer, a victim. But nothing could kill his
soul. And his soul was his faith—something he understood as
faith in God or nature or life—in the reason for his
being—in his vision of the future.

How then to spend this last remnant of his life! No one would
guess what passed through his lonely soul. No one would care. But
out of the suffering that now seemed to give him spirit and
wisdom and charity there dawned a longing to help, to save. He
would return good for evil. All had failed him, but he would fail
no one.

Then he had a strange intense desire to understand the present.
Only a day home—and what colossal enigma! The war had been
chaos. Was this its aftermath? Had people been rocked on their
foundations? What were they doing—how living—how
changing? He would see, and be grateful for a little time to
prove his faith. He knew he would find the same thing in others
that existed in himself.

He would help his mother, and cheer her, and try to revive
something of hope in her. He would bend a keen and patient eye
upon Lorna, and take the place of her father, and be kind,
loving, yet blunt to her, and show her the inevitable end of this
dancing, dallying road. Perhaps he could influence Helen. He
would see the little soldier-worshipping Bessy Bell, and if by
talking hours and hours, by telling the whole of his awful
experience of war, he could take up some of the time so fraught
with peril for her, he would welcome the ordeal of memory. And
Mel Iden—how thought of her seemed tinged with strange
regret! Once she and he had been dear friends, and because of a
falsehood told by Helen that friendship had not been what it
might have been. Suppose Mel, instead of Helen, had loved him and
been engaged to him! Would he have been jilted and would Mel have
been lost? No! It was a subtle thing—that answer of his
spirit. It did not agree with Mel Iden’s frank confession.

It might be difficult, he reflected, to approach Mel. But he
would find a way. He would rest a few days—then find where
she lived and go to see her. Could he help her? And he had an
infinite exaltation in his power to help any one who had
suffered. Lane recalled Mel’s pale sweet face, the shadowed eyes,
the sad tremulous lips. And this image of her seemed the most
lasting of the impressions of the day.

CHAPTER V

The arbiters of social fate in Middleville assembled at Mrs.
Maynard’s on a Monday afternoon, presumably to partake of tea.
Seldom, however, did they meet without adding zest to the
occasion by a pricking down of names.

Mrs. Wrapp was the leading spirit of this self-appointed
tribunal—a circumstance of expanding, resentment to Mrs.
Maynard, who had once held the reins with aristocratic hands.
Mrs. Kingsley, the third member of the great triangle, claimed an
ancestor on the Mayflower, which was in her estimation a guerdon
of blue blood. Her elaborate and exclusive entertainments could
never be rivalled by those of Mrs. Wrapp. She was a widow with
one child, the daughter Elinor, a girl of nineteen.

Mrs. Maynard was tall, pale, and worldly. Traces of lost beauty
flashed in her rare smiles. When Frank Maynard had failed in
business she had shrouded her soul in bitterness; and she saw the
slow cruel years whiten his head and bend his shoulders with the
cold eye of a woman who had no forgiveness for failure. After Mr.
Maynard’s reverse, all that kept the pair together were the son
Blair, and the sweet, fair-haired, delicate Margaret, a girl of
eighteen, whom the father loved, and for whom the mother had
large ambitions. They still managed, in ways mysterious to the
curious, to keep their fine residence in the River Park suburb of
Middleville.

On this April afternoon the tea was neglected in the cups, and
there was nothing of the usual mild gossip. The discussion
involved Daren Lane, and when two of those social arbiters
settled back in their chairs the open sesame of Middleville’s
select affairs had been denied to him.

“Why did he do it?” asked Mrs. Kingsley.

“He must have been under the influence of liquor,” replied Mrs.
Maynard, who had her own reasons for being relieved at the
disgrace of Daren Lane.

“No, Jane, you’re wrong,” spoke up Mrs. Wrapp, who, whatever else
she might be, was blunt and fair-minded. “Lane wasn’t drunk. He
never drank before the war. I knew him well. He and Helen had a
puppy-love affair—they were engaged before Lane went to
war. Well, the day after his return he called on us. And if I
never liked him before I liked him then. He’s come back to die!
He was ill for two weeks—and then he crawled out of bed
again. I met him down town one day. He really looked better, and
told me with a sad smile that he had ‘his ups and downs’…. No,
Lane wasn’t drunk at Fanchon Smith’s dance the other night. I was
there, and I was with Mrs. Smith when Lane came up to us. If ever
I saw a cool, smooth, handsome devil it was Lane…. Well, he
said what he said. I thought Mrs. Smith would faint. It is my
idea Lane had a deep motive back of his remark about Fanchon’s
dress and her dancing. The fact is Lane was sick at what
he saw—sick and angry. And he wanted Fanchon’s mother and
me to know what he thought.”

“It was an insult,” declared Mrs. Maynard, vehemently.

“It made Mrs. Smith ill,” added Mrs. Kingsley. “She told me
Fanchon tormented the life out of her, trying to learn what Lane
said. Mrs. Smith would not tell. But Fanchon came to me and
I told her. Such a perfectly furious girl! She’ll not wear
that dress or dance that dance very soon again. The
story is all over town.”

“Friends, there are two sides to every question,” interposed the
forceful Mrs. Wrapp. “If Lane cared to be popular he would have
used more tact. But I don’t think his remark was an insult. It
was pretty raw, I admit. But the dress was indecent and the dance
was rotten. Helen told me Fanchon was half shot. So how could she
be insulted?”

Mrs. Maynard and Mrs. Kingsley, as usual, received Mrs. Wrapp’s
caustic and rather crude opinions with as good grace as they
could muster. Plain it was that they felt themselves a shade
removed from this younger and newer member of society. But they
could not show direct antagonism to her influence any more than
they could understand the common sense and justice of her
arguments.

“No one will ever invite him again,” declared Mrs. Maynard.

“He’s done in Middleville,” echoed Mrs. Kingsley. And that
perhaps was a gauntlet thrown.

“Rot!” exclaimed Mrs. Wrapp, with more force than elegance. “I’ll
invite Daren Lane to my house…. You women don’t get the point.
Daren Lane is a soldier come home to die. He gave himself. And he
returns to find all—all this sickening—oh, what shall
I call it? What does he care whether or not we invite him? Can’t
you see that?”

“There’s a good deal in what you say,” returned Mrs. Kingsley,
influenced by the stronger spirit. “Maybe Lane hated the new
styles. I don’t blame him much. There’s something wrong with our
young people. The girls are crazy. The boys are wild. Few of them
are marrying—or even getting engaged. They’ll do
anything. The times are different. And we mothers don’t
know our daughters.”

“Well, I know mine” returned Mrs. Maynard, loftily. “What
you say may be true generally, but there are exceptions. My
daughter has been too well brought up.”

“Yes, Margie is well-bred,” retorted Mrs. Wrapp. “We’ll admit she
hasn’t gone to extremes, as most of our girls have. But I want to
observe to you that she has been a wall-flower for a year.”

“It certainly is a problem,” sighed Mrs. Kingsley. “I feel
helpless—out of it. Elinor does precisely what she wants to
do. She wears outlandish clothes. She smokes and—I’m afraid
drinks. And dances—dreadfully. Just like the other
girls—no better, no worse. But with all that I think she’s
good. I feel the same as Jane feels about that. In spite of
this—this modern stuff I believe all the girls are
fundamentally the same as ten years ago.”

“Well, that’s where you mothers get in wrong,” declared Mrs.
Wrapp with her vigorous bluntness. “It’s your pride. Just because
they’re your daughters they are above reproach…. What
have you to say about the war babies in town? Did you ever hear
of that ten years ago? You bet you didn’t. These girls are
a speedy set. Some of them are just wild for the sake of
wildness. Most of them have to stand for things, or be
left out altogether.”

“What in the world can we do?” queried Mrs. Maynard, divided
between distress and chagrin.

“The good Lord only knows,” responded Mrs. Wrapp, herein losing
her assurance. “Marriage would save most of them. But Helen
doesn’t want to marry. She wants to paint pictures and be free.”

“Perhaps marriage is a solution,” rejoined Mrs. Maynard
thoughtfully.

“Whom on earth can we marry them to?” asked Mrs. Kingsley. “Most
of the older men, the bachelors who’re eligible haven’t any use
for these girls except to play with them. True, these
young boys only think of little but dances, car-rides, and
sneaking off alone to spoon—they get engaged to this girl
and that one. But nothing comes of it.”

“You’re wrong. Never in my time have I seen girls find lovers and
husbands as easily as now,” declared Mrs. Wrapp. “Nor get rid of
them so quickly…. Jane, you can marry Margaret. She’s pretty
and sweet even if you have spoiled her. The years are slipping
by. Margaret ought to marry. She’s not strong enough to work.
Marriage for her would make things so much easier for you.”

With that parting dig Mrs. Wrapp rose to go. Whereupon she and
Mrs. Kingsley, with gracious words of invitation and farewell,
took themselves off leaving Mrs. Maynard contending with an
outraged spirit. Certain terse remarks of the crude and practical
Mrs. Wrapp had forced to her mind a question that of late had
assumed cardinal importance, and now had been brought to an issue
by a proposal for Margaret’s hand. Her daughter was a great
expense, really more than could longer be borne in these times of
enormous prices and shrunken income. A husband had been found for
Margaret, and the matter could be adjusted easily enough, if the
girl did not meet it with the incomprehensible obstinacy peculiar
to her of late.

Mrs. Maynard found the fair object of her hopes seated in the
middle of her room with the bright contents of numerous boxes and
drawers strewn in glittering heaps around her.

“Margaret, what on earth are you doing there?” she demanded.

“I’m looking for a little picture Holt Dalrymple gave me when we
went to school together,” responded Margaret.

“Aren’t you ever going to grow up? You’ll be hunting for your
dolls next.”

“I will if I like,” said the daughter, in a tone that did not
manifest a seraphic mood.

“Don’t you feel well?” inquired the mother, solicitously.
Margaret was frail and subject to headaches that made her
violent.

“Oh, I’m well enough.”

“My dear,” rejoined Mrs. Maynard, changing the topic. “I’m sorry
to tell you Daren Lane has lost his standing in Middleville.”

The hum and the honk of a motor-car sounded in the street.

“Poor Daren! What’s he done?… Any old day he’ll care!”

Mrs. Maynard was looking out of the window. “Here comes a crowd
of girls…. Helen Wrapp has a new suit. Well, I’ll go down. And
after they leave I want a serious talk with you.”

“Not if I see you first!” muttered Margaret, under her breath, as
her mother walked out.

Presently, following gay talk and laughter down stairs, a bevy of
Margaret’s friends entered her boudoir.

“Hello, old socks!” was Helen’s greeting. “You look punk.”

“Marg, where’s the doll? Your mother tipped us off,” was Elinor’s
greeting.

“Where’s the eats?” was Flossie Dickerson’s greeting. She was a
bright-eyed girl, with freckles on her smiling face, and the
expression of a daring, vivacious and happy spirit—and
acknowledged to be the best dancer and most popular girl in
Middleville. Her dress, while not to be compared with her
friends’ costumes in costliness, yet was extreme in the
prevailing style.

“Glad to see you, old dear,” was dark-eyed, dark-haired Dorothy
Dalrymple’s greeting. Her rich color bore no hint of the
artificial. She sank down on her knees beside Margaret.

The other girls draped themselves comfortably round the room; and
Flossie with a ‘Yum Yum’ began to dig into a box of candy on
Margaret’s couch. They all talked at once. “Hear the latest,
Marg?”

“Look at Helen’s spiffy suit!”

“Oh, money, money, what it will buy!”

“Money’ll never buy me, I’ll say.”

“Marg, who’s been fermentin’ round lately? Girls, get wise to the
flowers.”

“Hot dog! See Marg blush! That comes from being so pale. What are
rouge and lip-stick and powder for but to hide truth from our
masculine pursuers?”

“Floss, you haven’t blushed for a million years.”

It was Dorothy Dalrymple who silenced the idle badinage.

“Marg, you rummaging in the past?” she cried.

“Yes, and I love it,” replied Margaret. “I haven’t looked over
this stuff for years. Just to remember the things I did!… Here,
Dal, is a picture you once drew of our old teacher, Miss Hill.”

Dorothy, whom the girls nicknamed “Dal,” gazed at the drawing
with amaze and regret.

“She was a terror,” continued Margaret. “But Dal, you never had
any reason to draw such a horrible picture of her. You were her
pet.”

“I wasn’t,” declared Dorothy.

“Maybe you never knew Miss Hill adored you, Dal,” interposed
Elinor. “She was always holding you up as a paragon. Not in your
lessons—for you were a bonehead—but for deportment
you were the class!”

“Dal, you were too good for this earth then, let alone
these days,” said Margaret.

“Miss Hill,” mused Elinor, gazing at the caricature. “That’s not
a bad drawing. I remember Miss Hill never had any use for me.
Small wonder. She was an honest-to-God teacher. I think she
wanted us to be good…. Wonder how she got along with the kids
that came after us.”

“I saw Amanda Hill the other day,” spoke up Flossie. “She looked
worn out. She was nice to me. I’ll bet my shirt she’d like to
have us back, bad as we were…. These kids of to-day! My Gawd!
they’re the limit. They paralyze me. I thought I was
pretty fast. But compared to these youngsters I’m tied to a post.
My kid sister Joyce—Rose Clymer—Bessy Bell!… Some
kids, believe me. And take it from me, girls, these dimple-kneed
chickens are vamping the older boys.”

“They’re all stuck on Bessy,” said Helen.

Margaret squealed in delight. “Girls, look here. Valentines! Did
you ever?… Look at them…. And what’s this?… ‘Wonders of
Nature—composition by Margaret Maynard.’ Heavens! Did I
write that? And what’s this sear and yellow document?”

A slivery peal of laughter burst from Margaret.

“Dal, here’s one of your masterpieces, composed when you were
thirteen, and mooney over Daren Lane.”

“I? Never! I didn’t write it,” denied Dorothy, with color in her
dark cheeks.

“Yes you did. It’s signed—’Yours forever Dot Dalrymple.’
… Besides I remember now Daren gave it to me. Said he wanted to
prove he could have other girls if he couldn’t have me.”

“How chivalrous!” exclaimed Dorothy, joining in the laugh.

“Ah! here’s what I’ve been hunting,” declared Margaret, waving
aloft a small picture. “It’s a photograph of Holt, taken five
years ago. Only the other evening he swore I hadn’t kept
it—dared me to produce it. He’ll want it now—for some
other girl. But nix, it’s mine…. Dal, isn’t he a handsome boy
here?”

With sisterly impartiality Dorothy declared she could not in the
wildest flight of her imagination see her brother as handsome.

“Holt used to be good-looking,” said she. “But he outgrew it.
That South Carolina training camp and the flu changed his looks
as well as his disposition.”

“Holt is changed,” mused Margaret, gazing down at the
picture, and the glow faded from her face.

“Dare Lane is handsome, even if he is a wreck,” said Elinor, with
sudden enthusiasm. “Friday night when he beat it from Fanchon’s
party he sure looked splendid.”

Elinor was a staunch admirer of Lane’s and she was the inveterate
torment of her girl friends. She gave Helen a sly glance. Helen’s
green eyes narrowed and gleamed.

“Yes, Dare’s handsomer than ever,” she said. “And to give the
devil his due he’s finer than ever. Too damn fine for this
crowd!… But what’s the use—” she broke off.

“Yes, poor Dare Lane!” sighed Elinor. “Dare deserves much from
all of us, not to mention you. He has made me think. Thank
Heaven, I found I hadn’t forgotten how.”

“El, no one would notice it,” returned Helen, sarcastically.

“It’s easy to see where you get off,” retorted Elinor.

Then a silence ensued, strange in view of the late banter and
quick sallies; a silence breathing of restraint. The color died
wholly from Margaret’s face, and a subtle, indefinable, almost
imperceptible change came over Dorothy.

“You bet Dare is handsome,” spoke up Flossie, as if to break the
embarrassment. “He’s so white since he came home. His eyes
are so dark and flashing. Then the way he holds his
head—the look of him…. No wonder these damned slackers
seem cheap compared to him…. I’d fall for Dare Lane in a
minute, even if he is half dead.”

The restraint passed, and when Floss Dickerson came out with
eulogy for any man his status was settled for good and all.
Margaret plunged once more into her treasures of early
schooldays. Floss and Elinor made merry over some verses Margaret
had handed up with a blush. Helen apparently lapsed into a
brooding abstraction. And presently Dorothy excused herself, and
kissing Margaret good-bye, left for home.

The instant she had gone Margaret’s gay and reminiscent mood
underwent a change.

“Girls, I want to know what Daren Lane did or said on Friday
night at Fanchon’s,” spoke up Margaret. “You know mother dragged
me home. Said I was tired. But I wasn’t. It was only because I’m
a wall-flower…. So I missed what happened. But I’ve heard talk
enough to make me crazy to know about this scandal. Kit Benson
was here and she hinted things. I met Bessy Bell. She asked me if
I knew. She’s wild about Daren. That yellow-legged broiler! He
doesn’t even know her…. My brother Blair would not tell me
anything. He’s strong for Daren. But mother told me Daren had
lost his standing in Middleville. She always hated Daren. Afraid
I’d fall in love with him. The idea! I liked him, and I like him
better now—poor fellow!… And last, when El mentioned
Daren, did you see Dal’s face? I never saw Dal look like that.”

“Neither did I,” replied Elinor.

“Well, I have,” spoke up Helen, with all of her mother’s
bluntness. “Dal always was love-sick over Daren, when she was a
mere kid. She never got over it and never will.”

“Still water runs deep,” sapiently remarked Elinor. “There’s a
good deal in Dal. She’s fine as silk. Of course we all remember
how jealous she was of other girls when Daren went with her. But
I think now it’s because she’s sorry for Daren. So am I. He was
such a fool. Fanchon swears no nice girl in Middleville will ever
dance that new camel-walk dance in public again.”

“What did Daren say?” demanded Margaret, with eyes lighting.

“I was standing with Helen, and Fanchon when Daren came up. He
looked—I don’t know how—just wonderful. We all knew
something was doing. Daren bowed to Fanchon and said to her in a
perfectly clear voice that everybody heard: ‘I’d like to try your
camel-walk. I’m out of practice and not strong, but I can go once
around, I’m sure. Will you?'”

“You’re on, Dare,” replied Fanchon.

“Then he asked. ‘Do you like it?'”

“‘I’ll say so, Dare—crazy about it.'”

“Of course you know why it’s danced—and how it’s
interpreted by men,” said Daren.

“What do you mean?” asked Fanchon, growing red and flustered.

“Then Daren said: ‘I’ll tell your mother. If she lets you dance
with that understanding—all right.’ He bent over Mrs. Smith
and said something. Mrs. Wrapp heard it. And so did Mrs. Mackay,
who looked pretty sick. Mrs. Smith nearly fainted!… but
she recovered enough to order Daren to leave.”

“Do you know what Daren said?” demanded Margaret, in a frenzy of
excitement.

“No. None of the girls know. We can only imagine. That makes it
worse. If Fanchon knows she won’t tell. But it is gossip all over
town. We’ll hear it soon. All the girls in town are imagining.
It’s spread like wildfire. And what do you think, Margie?
In church—on Sunday—Doctor Wallace spoke of it. He
mentioned no names. But he said that as the indecent dress and
obscene dance of the young women could no longer be influenced by
the home or the church it was well that one young man had the
daring to fling the truth into the faces of their mothers.”

“Oh, it was rotten of Daren,” replied Margaret, with tears in her
eyes. She was ashamed, indignant, incredulous. “For him to do a
thing like that! He’s always been the very prince of gentlemen.
What on earth possessed him? Heaven knows the dances are vile,
but that doesn’t excuse Daren Lane. What do I care what Doctor
Wallace said? Never in a thousand years will Mrs. Smith or mother
or any one forgive him. Fanchon Smith is a little snob. I always
hated her. She’s spiteful and catty. She’s a flirt all the way.
She would dance any old thing. But that’s not the point. Daren’s
disgraced himself. It was rotten—of him. And—I’ll
never—forgive—him, either.”

“Don’t cry, Margie,” said Elinor. “It always makes your eyes red
and gives you a headache. Poor Daren made a blunder. But some of
us will stick to him. Don’t take it so badly.”

“Margie, it was rotten of Daren, one way you look at it—our
way,” added Flossie. “But you have to hand it to him for that
stunt.”

Helen Wrapp preserved her sombre mood, silent and brooding.

“Margie,” went on Elinor, “there’s a lot back of this. If Dare
Lane could do that there must be some reason for it. Maybe we all
needed a jolt. Well, we’ve got it. Let’s stand by Daren. I will.
Helen will. Floss will. You will. And surely Dal will.”

“If you ask me I’ll say Dare Lane ought to hand something
to the men!” burst out Floss Dickerson, with fire in her eyes.

“You said a mouthful, kiddo,” responded Helen, with her narrow
contracted gaze upon Margaret. “Daren gave me the once
over—and then the icepick!”

“Wonder what he gave poor Mel—when he heard about her,”
murmured Elinor, thoughtfully.

“Mel Iden ought to be roasted,” retorted Helen. “She was always
so darned superior. And all the time …”

“Helen, don’t you say a word against Mel Iden,” burst out
Margaret, hotly. “She was my dearest friend. She was lovely. Her
ruin was a horrible shock. But it wasn’t because she was bad….
Mel had some fanatical notion about soldiers giving
all—going away to be slaughtered. She said to me, ‘A
woman’s body is so little to give,'”

“Yes, I know Mel was cracked,” replied Helen. “But she needn’t
have been a damn fool. She didn’t need to have had that baby!”

“Helen, your idea of sin is to be found out,” said Elinor, with
satire.

Again Floss Dickerson dropped her trenchant personality into the
breach.

“Aw, come off!” she ejaculated. “Let somebody roast the men once,
will you? I’m the little Jane that knows, believe me. All
this talk about the girls going to hell makes me sick. We may be
going—and going in limousines—but it’s the men who’re
stepping on the gas.”

“Floss, I love to hear you elocute,” drawled Helen. “Go to it!
For God’s sake, roast the men.”

“You always have to horn in,” retorted Floss. “Let me get this
off my chest, will you?… We girls are getting talked about.
There’s no use denying it. Any but a blind girl could see it. And
it’s because we do what the men want. Every girl wants to go
out—to be attractive—to have fellows. But the price
is getting high. They say in Middleville that I’m rushed more
than any other girl. Well, if I am I know what it costs…. If I
didn’t ‘pet’—if I didn’t mush, if I didn’t park my corsets
at dances—if I didn’t drink and smoke, and wiggle like a
jelly-fish, I’d be a dead one—an egg, and don’t you
overlook that. If any one says I want to do these things
he’s a fool. But I do love to have good times, and little by
little I’ve been drawn on and on…. I’ve had my troubles staving
off these fellows. Most of them get half drunk. Some of the girls
do, too. I never went that far. I always kept my head. I never
went the limit. But you can bet your sweet life it wasn’t their
fault I didn’t fall for them…. I’ll say I’ve had to walk home
from more than one auto ride. There’s something in the gag, ‘I
know she’s a good girl because I met her walking home from an
auto ride.’ That’s one thing I intend to cut out this
summer—the auto rides. Nothing doing for little Flossie!”

“Oh, can’t we talk of something else!” complained Margaret,
wearily, with her hands pressing against her temples.

CHAPTER VI

Mrs. Maynard slowly went upstairs and along the hall to her
daughter’s room. Margaret sat listlessly by a window. The girls
had gone.

“You were going for a long walk,” said Mrs. Maynard.

“I’m tired,” replied Margaret. There was a shadow in her eyes.

The mother had never understood her daughter. And of late a
subtle change in Margaret had made her more of a puzzle.

“Margaret, I want to talk seriously with you,” she began.

“Well?”

“Didn’t I tell you I wanted you to break off your—your
friendship with Holt Dalrymple?”

“Yes,” replied Margaret, with a flush. “I did not—want to.”

“Well, the thing which concerns you now is—he can’t be
regarded as a possibility for you.”

“Possibility?” echoed Margaret.

“Just that, exactly. I’m not sure of your thoughts on the matter,
but it’s time I knew them. Holt is a ne’er-do-well. He’s gone to
the bad, like so many of these army boys. No nice girl will ever
associate with him again.”

“Then I’m not nice, for I will,” declared Margaret, spiritedly.

“You will persist in your friendship for him in the face of my
objection?”

“Certainly I will if I have any say about it. But I know Holt.
I—I guess he has taken to drink—and carrying on. So
you needn’t worry much about our friendship.”

Mrs. Maynard hesitated. She had become accustomed to Margaret’s
little bursts of fury and she expected one here. But none came;
Margaret appeared unnaturally calm; she sat still with her face
turned to the window. Mrs. Maynard was a little afraid of this
cold, quiet girl.

“Margaret, you can’t help seeing now that your mother’s judgment
was right. Holt Dalrymple once may have been very interesting and
attractive for a friend, but as a prospective husband he was
impossible. The worst I hear of him is that he drinks and
gambles. I know you liked him and I don’t want to be unjust. But
he has kept other and better young men away from you.”

Margaret’s hand clenched and her face sank against the
window-pane.

“We need say no more about him,” went on Mrs. Maynard. “Margaret,
you’ve been brought up in luxury. If your father happened to die
now—he’s far from well—we’d be left penniless. We’ve
lived up every dollar…. We have our poor crippled Blair to care
for. You know you must marry well. I’ve brought you up with that
end in view. And it’s imperative you marry soon.”

“Why must a girl marry?” murmured Margaret, wistfulness in her
voice. “I’d rather go to work.” “Margaret, you are a Maynard,”
replied her mother, haughtily. “Pray spare me any of this new
woman talk about liberty—equal rights—careers and all
that. Life hasn’t changed for the conservative families of
blood…. Try to understand, Margaret, that you must marry and
marry well. You’re nobody without money. In society there are
hundreds of girls like you, though few so attractive. That’s all
the more reason you should take the best chance you have, before
it’s lost. If you don’t marry people will say you can’t. They’ll
say you’re fading, growing old, even if you grow prettier every
day of your life, and in the end they’ll make you a miserable old
maid. Then you’ll be glad to marry anybody. If you marry now you
can help your father, who needs help badly enough. You can help
poor Blair…. You can be a leader in society; you can have a
house here, a cottage at the seashore and one in the mountains;
everything a girl’s heart yearns for—servants, horses,
autos, gowns, diamonds——”

“Everything except love,” interrupted Margaret, bitterly.

Mrs. Maynard actually flushed, but she kept her temper.

“It’s desirable that you love your husband. Any sensible woman
can learn to care for a man. Love, as you dream about it is
merely a—a dream. If women waited for that they would never
get married.”

“Which would be preferable to living without love.”

“But Margaret, what would become of the world? If there were
fewer marriages—Heaven knows they’re few enough
nowadays—there would be fewer families—and in the end
fewer children—less and less——”

“They’d be better children,” said Margaret, calmly.

“Eventually the race would die out.”

“And that’d be a good thing—if the people can’t love each
other.”

“How silly—exasperating!” ejaculated Mrs. Maynard. “You
don’t mean such nonsense. What any girl wants is a home of her
own, a man to fuss over. I didn’t marry for love, as you dream
it. My husband attended to his business and I’ve looked after his
household. You’ve had every advantage. I flatter myself our
marriage has been a success.”

Margaret’s eyes gleamed like pointed flames.

“I differ with you. Your married life hasn’t been successful any
more than it’s been happy. You never cared for father. You
haven’t been kind to him since his failure.”

Mrs. Maynard waved her hand imperiously in angry amaze.

“I won’t stop. I’m not a baby or a doll,” went on Margaret,
passionately. “If I’m old enough to marry I’m old enough to talk.
I can think, can’t I? You never told me anything, but I could
see. Ever since I can remember you and father have had one
continual wrangle about money—bills—expenses. Perhaps
I’d have been better off without all the advantages and luxury.
It’s because of these things you want to throw me at some man.
I’d far rather go to work the same as Blaid did, instead of
college.”

“Whatever on earth has come over you?” gasped Mrs. Maynard,
bewildered by the revolt of this once meek daughter.

“Maybe I’m learning a little sense. Maybe I got some of it from
Daren Lane,” flashed back Margaret.

“Mother, whatever I’ve learned lately has been learned away from
home. You’ve no more idea what’s going on in the world to-day
than if you were actually dead. I never was bright like Mel Iden,
but I’m no fool. I see and hear and I read. Girls aren’t pieces
of furniture to be handed out to some rich men. Girls are waking
up. They can do things. They can be independent. And being
independent doesn’t mean a girl’s not going to marry. For she can
wait—wait for the right man—for love…. You say I
dream. Well, why didn’t you wake me up long ago—with the
truth? I had my dreams about love and marriage. And I’ve learned
that love and marriage are vastly different from what most
mothers make them out to be, or let a girl think.”

“Margaret, I’ll not have you talk in this strange way. You owe me
respect if not obedience,” said Mrs. Maynard, her voice
trembling.

“Oh, well, I won’t say any more,” replied Margaret, “But can’t
you spare me? Couldn’t we live within our means?”

“After all these years—to skimp along! I couldn’t endure
it.”

“Whom have you in mind for me to—to marry?” asked the girl,
coldly curious.

“Mr. Swann has asked your hand in marriage for his son Richard.
He wants Richard to settle down. Richard is wild, like all these
young men. And I have—well, I encouraged the plan.”

“Mother!” cried Margaret, springing up.

“Margaret, you will see”

“I despise Dick Swann.”

“Why?” asked her mother.

“I just do. I never liked him in school. He used to do such mean
things. He’s selfish. He let Holt and Daren suffer for his
tricks.”

“Margaret, you talk like a child.”

“Listen, mother.” She threw her arms round Mrs. Maynard and
kissed her and spoke pleadingly. “Oh, don’t make me hate myself.
It seems I’ve grown so much older in the last year or
so—and lately since this marriage talk came up. I’ve
thought of things as never before because I’ve—I’ve learned
about them. I see so differently. I can’t—can’t love Dick
Swann. I can’t bear to have him touch me. He’s rude. He takes
liberties…. He’s too free with his hands! Why, it’d be wrong to
marry him. What difference can a marriage service make in a
girl’s feelings…. Mother, let me say no.”

“Lord spare me from bringing up another girl!” exclaimed Mrs.
Maynard. “Margaret, I can’t make you marry Richard Swann. I’m
simply trying to tell you what any sensible girl would see she
had to do. You think it over—both sides of the
question—before you absolutely decide.”

Mrs. Maynard was glad to end the discussion and to get away. In
Margaret’s appeal she heard a yielding, a final obedience to her
wish. And she thought she had better let well enough alone. The
look in Margaret’s clear blue eyes made her shrink; it would
haunt her. But she felt no remorse. Any mother would have done
the same. There was always the danger of that old love affair;
there was new danger in these strange wild fancies of modern
girls; there was never any telling what Margaret might do. But
once married she would be safe and her position assured.

CHAPTER VII

Daren Lane left Riverside Park, and walked in the meadows until
he came to a boulder under a huge chestnut tree. Here he sat
down. He could not walk far these days. Many a time in the Indian
summers long past he had gathered chestnuts there with Dal, with
Mel Iden, with Helen. He would never do it again.

The April day had been warm and fresh with the opening of a late
spring. The sun was now gold—rimming the low hills in the
west; the sky was pale blue; the spring flowers whitened the
meadow. Twilight began to deepen; the evening star twinkled out
of the sky; the hush of the gloaming hour stole over the land.

“Four weeks home—and nothing done. So little time left!” he
muttered.

Two weeks of that period he had been unable to leave his bed. The
rest of the time he had dragged himself around, trying to live up
to his resolve, to get at the meaning of the present, to turn his
sister Lorna from the path of dalliance. And he had failed in
all.

His sister presented the problem that most distressed Lane. She
had her good qualities, and through them could be reached. But
she was thoughtless, vacillating, and wilful. She had made him
promises only to break them. Lane had caught her in falsehoods.
And upon being called to account she had told him that if he
didn’t like it he could “lump” it. Of late she had grown away
from what affection she had shown at first. She could not bear
interference with her pleasures, and seemed uncontrollable. Lane
felt baffled. This thing was a Juggernaut impossible to stop.

Lane had scraped acquaintance with Harry Hale, one of Lorna’s
admirers, a boy of eighteen, who lived with his widowed mother on
the edge of the town. He appeared to be an industrious,
intelligent, quiet fellow, not much given to the prevailing
habits of the young people. In his humble worship of Lorna he was
like a dog. Lorna went to the motion pictures with him
occasionally, when she had no other opportunity for excitement.
Lane gathered that Lorna really liked this boy, and when with him
seemed more natural, more what a fifteen-year-old girl used to
be. And somehow it was upon this boy that Lane placed a forlorn
hope.

No more automobiles honked in front of the home to call Lorna
out. She met her friends away from the house, and returning at
night she walked the last few blocks. It was this fact that awoke
Lane’s serious suspicions.

Another problem lay upon Lane’s heart; if not so distressing as
Lorna’s, still one that added to his sorrow and his perplexity.
He had gone once to call on Mel Iden. Mel Iden was all soul.
Whatever had been the facts of her downfall—and reflection
on that hurt Lane so strangely he could not bear it—it had
not been on her part a matter of sex. She was far above
wantonness.

Through long hours in the dark of night, when Lane’s pain kept
him sleepless, he had pondered over the mystery of Mel Iden until
it cleared. She typified the mother of the race. In all periods
of the progress of the race, war had brought out this instinct in
women—to give themselves for the future. It was a provision
of nature, inscrutable and terrible. How immeasurable the
distance between Mel Iden and those women who practised birth
control! As the war had brought out hideous greed and baseness,
so had it propelled forward and upward the noblest attributes of
life. Mel Iden was a builder, not a destroyer. She had been
sexless and selfless. Unconsciously during the fever and emotion
of the training of American men for service abroad, and the
poignancy of their departure, to fight, and perhaps never return,
Mel Iden had answered to this mysterious instinct of nature.
Then, with the emotion past, and face to face with staggering
consequences, she had reacted to conscious instincts. She had
proved the purity of her surrender. She was all mother. And Lane
began to see her moving in a crystal, beautiful light.

For what seemed a long time Lane remained motionless there in the
silence of the meadow. Then at length he arose and retraced his
slow steps back to town. Darkness overtook him on the bridge that
spanned Middleville River. He leaned over the railing and peered
down into the shadows. A soft murmur of rushing water came up.
How like strange distant voices calling him to go back or go on,
or warning him, or giving mystic portent of something that would
happen to him there! A cold chill crept over him and he seemed
enveloped in a sombre menace of the future. But he shook it off.
He had many battles to fight, not the least of which was with
morbid imagination.

When he reached the center of town he entered the lobby of the
Bradford Inn. He hoped to meet Blair Maynard there. A company of
well-dressed youths and men filled the place, most of whom
appeared to be making a merry uproar.

Lane observed two men who evidently were the focus of attention.
One was a stranger, very likely a traveling man, and at the
moment he presented a picture of mingled consternation and anger.
He was brushing off his clothes while glaring at a little, stout,
red-faced man who appeared about to be stricken by apoplexy. This
latter was a Colonel Pepper, whose acquaintance Lane had recently
made. He was fond of cards and sport, and appeared to be a
favorite with the young men about town. Moreover he had made
himself particularly agreeable to Lane, in fact to the extent of
Lane’s embarrassment. At this moment the stranger lost his
consternation wholly in wrath, and made a threatening movement
toward Pepper. Lane stepped between them just in time to save
Pepper a blow.

“I know what he’s done. I apologize for him,” said Lane, to the
stranger. “He’s made a good many people victims of the same
indignity. It’s a weakness—a disease. He can’t help
himself. Pray overlook it.”

The stranger appeared impressed with Lane’s presence, probably
with his uniform, and slowly shook himself and fell back, to
glower at Pepper, and curse under his breath, still uncertain of
himself.

Lane grasped Colonel Pepper and led him out of the lobby.

“Pepper, you’re going to get in an awful mess with that stunt of
yours,” he declared, severely. “If you can’t help it you ought at
least pick on your friends, or the town people—not
strangers.”

“Have—a—drink,” sputtered Pepper, with his hand at
his hip.

“No, thanks.”

“Have—a—cigar.”

Lane laughed. He had been informed that Colonel Pepper’s failing
always took this form of remorse, and certainly he would have
tried it upon his latest victim had not Lane interfered.

“Colonel, you’re hopeless,” said Lane, as they walked out. “I
hope somebody will always be around to protect you. I’d carry a
body guard…. Say, have you seen Blair Maynard or Holt Dalrymple
to-night?”

“Not Blair, but Holt was here early with the boys,” replied
Pepper. “They’ve gone to the club rooms to have a little game.
I’m going to sit in. Lately I had to put up a holler. If the boys
quit cards how’m I to make a living?”

“Had Holt been drinking?”

“Not to-night. But he’s been hitting the bottle pretty hard of
late.”

Suddenly Lane buttonholed the little man and peered down
earnestly at him. “Pepper, I’ve been trying to straighten Holt
up. He’s going to the bad. But he’s a good kid. It’s only the
company…. The fact is—this’s strictly confidential, mind
you—Holt’s sister begged me to try to stop his drinking and
gambling. I think I can do it, too, with a little help. Now,
Pepper, I’m asking you to help me.”

“Ahuh! Well, let’s go in the writing room, where we can talk,”
said the other, and he took hold of Lane’s arm. When they were
seated in a secluded corner he lighted a cigar, and faced Lane
with shrewd, kindly eyes. “Son, I like you and Blair as well as I
hate these slackers Swann and Mackay, and their crowd. I could
tell you a heap, and maybe help you, though I think young Holt is
not a bad egg…. Is his sister the dark one who steps so
straight and holds herself so well?”

“Yes, that sounds like Dorothy,” replied Lane.

“She’s about the only one I know who doesn’t paint her face and I
never saw her at—well, never mind where. But the fact I
mean makes her stand out in this Middleville crowd like a light
in the dark…. Lane, have you got on yet to the speed of the
young people of this old burg?”

“I’m getting on, to my sorrow,” said Lane.

“Ahuh! You mean you’re getting wise to your kid sister?”

“Yes, I’m sorry to say. What do you know, Pepper?”

“Now, son, wait. I’m coming to that, maybe. But I want to know
some things first. Is it true—what I hear about your
health, bad shape, you know—all cut up in the war? Worse
than young Maynard?”

Pepper’s hand was close on Lane’s. He had forgotten his cigar.
His eyes were earnest.

“True?” laughed Lane, grimly. “Yes, it’s true…. I won’t last
long, Pepper, according to Doctor Bronson. That’s why I want to
make hay while the sun shines.”

“Ahuh!” Pepper cleared his throat. “Forgive this, boy…. Is it
also true you were engaged to marry that Helen Wrapp—and
she threw you down, while you were over there?”

“Yes, that’s perfectly true,” replied Lane, soberly.

“God, I guess maybe the soldier wasn’t up against it!” ejaculated
Pepper, with a gesture of mingled awe and wonder and scorn.

“What was the soldier up against, Pepper?” queried Lane.
“Frankly, I don’t know.”

“Lane, the government jollied and forced the boys into the army,”
replied Pepper. “The country went wild with patriotism. The
soldiers were heroes. The women threw themselves away on anything
inside a uniform. Make the world safe for democracy—down
the Hun—save France and England—ideals, freedom,
God’s country, and all that! Well, the first few soldiers to
return from France got a grand reception, were made heroes of.
They were lucky to get back while the sentiment was hot. But that
didn’t last…. Now, a year and more after the war, where does
the soldier get off? Lane, there’re over six hundred thousand of
you disabled veterans, and for all I can read and find out the
government has done next to nothing. New York is full of begging
soldiers—on the streets. Think of it! And the poor devils
are dying everywhere. My God! think of what’s in the mind of one
crippled soldier, let alone over half a million. I just have a
dim idea of what I’d felt. You must know, or you will know, Lane,
for you seem a thoughtful, lofty sort of chap. Just the kind to
make a good soldier, because you had ideals and nerve!… Well, a
selfish and weak administration could hardly be expected to keep
extravagant promises to patriots. But that the American public,
as a body, should now be sick of the sight of a crippled
soldier—and that his sweetheart should turn him
down!—this is the hideous blot, the ineradicable shame, the
stinking truth, the damned mystery!”

When Pepper ended his speech, which grew more vehement toward the
close, Lane could only stare at him in amaze.

“See here, Lane,” added the other hastily, “pardon me for blowing
up. I just couldn’t help it. I took a shine to you—and to
see you like this—brings back the resentment I’ve had all
along. I’m blunt, but it’s just as well for you to be put wise
quick. You’ll find friends, like me, who will stand by you, if
you let them. But you’ll also find that most of this rotten world
has gone back on you….”

Then Pepper made a sharp, passionate gesture that broke his cigar
against the arm of his chair, and he cursed low and deep.
Presently he addressed Lane again. “Whatever comes of any
disclosures I make—whatever you do—you’ll not
give me away?”

“Certainly not. You can trust me, Pepper,” returned Lane.

“Son, I’m a wise old guy. There’s not much that goes on in
Middleville I don’t get on to. And I’ll make your hair curl. But
I’ll confine myself to what comes closest home to you. I
get you, Lane. You’re game. You’re through. You have come
back from war to find a hell of a mess. Your own
sister—your sweetheart—your friend’s brother and your
soldier pard’s sister—on the primrose path! And you with
your last breath trying to turn them back! I’ll say it’s a damn
fine stunt. I’m an old gambler, Lane. I’ve lived in many towns
and mixed in tough crowds of crooked men and rotten women. But
I’m here to confess that this after-the-war stuff of
Middleville’s better class has knocked out about all the faith I
had left in human nature…. Then you came along to teach me a
lesson.”

“Well, Pepper, that’s strong talk,” returned Lane. “But cut it,
and hurry to—to what comes home to me. What’s the matter
with these Middleville girls?”

“Lane, any intelligent man, who knows things, and who can
think for himself, will tell you this—that to judge from
the dress, dance, talk, conduct of these young girls—most
of them have apparently gone wrong.”

“You include our nice girls—from what we used to call
Middleville’s best families?”

“I don’t only include them. I throw the emphasis on them. The
girls you know best.”

Lane straightened up, to look at his companion. Pepper certainly
was not drunk.

“Do you know—anything about Lorna?”

“Nothing specifically to prove anything. She’s in the thick of
this thing in Middleville. Only a few nights ago I saw her at a
roadhouse, out on the State Road, with a crowd of youngsters.
They were having a high old time, I’ll say. They danced jazz, and
I saw Lorna drink lemonade into which liquor had been poured from
a hip-pocket flask.”

Lane put his head on his hands, as if to rest it, or still the
throbbing there.

“Who took Lorna to this place?” he asked, presently, breathing
heavily.

“I don’t know. But it was Dick Swann who poured the drink out of
the flask. Between you and me, Lane, that young millionaire is
going a pace hereabouts. Listen,” he went on, lowering his voice,
and glancing round to see there was no one to overhear him,
“there’s a gambling club in Middleville. I go there. My rooms are
in the same building. I’ve made a peep-hole through the attic
floor next to my room. Do I see more things than cards and
bottles? Do I! If the fathers of Middleville could see what I’ve
seen they’d go out to the asylum…. I’m not supposed to know
it’s more than a place to gamble. And nobody knows I know. Dick
Swann and Hardy Mackay are at the head of this club. Swann is the
genius and the support of it. He’s rich, and a high roller if I
ever saw one…. Among themselves these young gentlemen call it
the Strong Arm Club. Study over that, Lane. Do you get it?
I know you do, and that saves me talking until I see red.”

“Pepper, have you seen my sister—there?” queried Lane,
tensely.

“Yes.”

“With whom?”

“I’ll not say, Lane. There’s no need for that. I’ll give you a
key to my rooms, and you can go there—in the
afternoons—and paste yourself to my peep-hole, and
watch…. Honest to God, I believe it means bloodshed. But I
can’t help that. Something must be done. I’m not much good, but I
can see that.”

Colonel Pepper wiped his moist face. He was now quite pale and
his hands shook.

“I never had a wife, or a sweetheart,” he went on. “But once I
had a little sister. Thank Heaven she didn’t live her girlhood in
times like these.”

Lane again bowed his head on his hands, and wrestled with the
might of reality.

“I’m going to take you to these club-rooms to-night,” went on
Pepper. “It’ll cause a hell of a row. But once you get in,
there’ll be no help for them. Swann and his chums will have to
stand for it.”

“Did you ever take an outsider in?” asked Lane.

“Several times. Traveling men I met here. Good fellows that liked
a game of cards. Swann made no kick at that. He’s keen to gamble.
And when he’s drinking the sky’s the limit.”

“Wouldn’t it be wiser just to show me these rooms, and let me
watch from your place—until I find my sister there?”
queried Lane.

“I don’t know,” replied Pepper, thoughtfully. “I think if I were
you I’d butt in to-night with me. You can drag young Dalrymple
home before he gets drunk”.

“Pepper, I’ll break up this—this club,” declared Lane.

“I’ll say you will. And I’m for you strong. If it was only the
booze and cards I’d not have squealed. That’s my living. But by
God, I can’t stand for the—the other stuff any longer!…
Come on now. And I’ll put you on to a slick stunt that’ll take
your breath away.”

He led the way out of the hotel, in his excitement walking rather
fast.

“Go slow, Pepper,” said Lane. “We’re not going over the top.”

Pepper gave him a quick, comprehending look.

“Good Lord, Lane, you’re not as—as bad as all that!”

Lane nodded. Then at slower pace they went out and down the
bright Main Street for two blocks, and then to the right on West
Street, which was quite comparable to the other thoroughfare as a
business district. At the end of the street the buildings were
the oldest in Middleville, and entirely familiar to Lane.

“Give White’s the once over,” said Pepper, indicating a brightly
lighted store across the street. “That place is new to you, isn’t
it?”

“Yes, I don’t remember White, or that there was a confectionery
den along here.”

“Den is right. It’s some den, believe me…. White’s a
newcomer—a young sport, thick with Swann. For all I know
Swann is backing him. Anyway he has a swell joint and a good
trade. People kick about his high prices. Ice cream, candy, soda,
soft drinks, and all that rot. But if he knows who you are you
can get a shot. It’ll strike you funny later to see he waits on
the customers himself. But when you get wise it’ll not be so
funny. He’s got a tea parlor upstairs—and they say it’s
some swell place, with a rest room or ladies’ dressing room back.
Now from this back room the girls can get into the club-rooms of
the boys, and go out on the other side of the block. In one way
and out the other—at night. Not necessary in the
afternoon…. Come on now, well go round the block.”

A short walk round the block brought them into a shaded, wide
street with one of Middleville’s parks on the left. A row of
luxuriant elm trees helped the effect of gloom. The nearest
electric light was across on the far corner, with trees obscuring
it to some extent. At the corner where Pepper halted there was an
outside stairway running up the old-fashioned building. The
ground floor shops bore the signs of a florist and a milliner;
above was a photograph gallery; and the two upper stories were
apparently unoccupied. To the left of the two stores another
stairway led up into the center of the building. Pepper led Lane
up this stairway, a long, dark climb of three stories that taxed
Lane’s endurance.

“Sure is a junk heap, this old block,” observed Pepper, as he
fumbled in the dim light with his keys. At length he opened a
door, turned on a light and led Lane into his apartment. “I have
three rooms here, and the back one opens into a kind of areaway
from which I get into an abandoned storeroom, or I guess it’s an
attic. To-morrow afternoon about three you meet me here and I’ll
take you in there and let you have a look through the peep-hole I
made. It’s no use to-night, because there’ll be only boys at the
club, and I’m going to take you right in.”

He switched off the light, drew Lane out and locked the door.
“I’m the only person who lives on this floor. There’re three
holes to this burrow and one of them is at the end of this hall.
The exit where the girls slip out is on the floor below, through
a hallway to that outside stairs. Oh, I’ll say it’s a Coney
Island maze, this building! But just what these young rakes
want…. Come on, and be careful. It’ll be dark and the stairs
are steep.”

At the end of the short hall Pepper opened a door, and led Lane
down steep steps in thick darkness, to another hall, dimly
lighted by a window opening upon the street.

“You’ll have to make a bluff at playing poker, unless my butting
in with you causes a row,” said Pepper, as he walked along.
Presently he came to a door upon which he knocked several times.
But before it was opened footsteps and voices sounded down the
hall in the opposite direction from which Pepper had escorted
Lane.

“Guess they’re just coming. Hard luck,” said Pepper. “‘Fraid
you’ll not get in now.”

Lane counted five dark forms against the background of dim light.
He saw the red glow of a cigarette. Then the door upon which
Pepper had knocked opened to let out a flare. Pepper gave Lane a
shove across the threshold and followed him. Lane did not
recognize the young man who had opened the door. The room was
large, with old walls and high ceiling, a round table with chairs
and a sideboard. It had no windows. The door on the other side
was closed.

“Pepper, who’s this you’re ringin’ in on me?” demanded the young
fellow.

“A pard of mine. Now don’t be peeved, Sammy,” replied Pepper. “If
there’s any kick I’ll take the blame.”

Then the five young men glided swiftly into the room. The last one was
Dick Swann. In the act of closing the door behind him, he saw Lane, and
started violently back. His face turned white. His action, his look
silenced the talk.

“Lane! What do you want?” he jerked out.

Lane eyed him without replying. He thought he read more in Swann’s face
and voice than any of the amazed onlookers.

“Dick, I fetched Lane up for a little game,” put in Pepper, with
composure.

Swann jerked as violently out of his stiffened posture as he had frozen
into it. His face changed–showed comprehension–relief–then flamed
with anger.

“Pepper, it’s a damn high-handed imposition for you to bring strangers
here,” he burst out.

“Well, I’m sorry you take it that way,” replied Pepper, with deprecatory
spreading of his hands. He was quite cool and his little eyes held a
singular gleam. “You never kicked before when I brought a stranger.”

Swann fiercely threw down his cigarette.

“Hell! I told you never to bring any Middleville man in here.”

“Ahuh! I forgot. You’ll have to excuse me,” returned Pepper, not with
any particular regret.

“What’s the matter with my money?” queried Lane, ironically, at last
removing his steady gaze from Swann to the others. Mackay was there, and
Holt Dalrymple, the boy in whom Lane had lately interested himself. Holt
resembled his sister in his dark rich coloring, but his face wore a
shade of sullen depression. The other two young men Lane had seen in
Middleville, but they were unknown to him.

“Pepper, you beat it with your new pard,” snarled Swarm. “And you’ll not
get in here again, take that from me.”

The mandate nettled Pepper, who evidently felt more deeply over this
situation than had appeared on the surface.

“Sure, I’ll beat it,” returned he, resentfully. “But see here, Swann. Be
careful how you shoot off your dirty mouth. It’s not beyond me to hand a
little tip to my friend Chief of Police Bell.”

“You damned squealer!” shouted Swann. “Go ahead–do your worst. You’ll
find I pull a stroke…. Now get out of here.”

With a violent action he shoved the little man out into the hall. Then
turning to Lane he pointed with shaking hand to the door.

“Lane, you couldn’t be a guest of mine.”

“Swann, I certainly wouldn’t be,” retorted Lane, in tones that rang.
“Pepper didn’t tell me you were the proprietor of this–this joint.”

“Get out of here or I’ll throw you out!” yelled Swann, now beside
himself with rage. And he made a threatening move toward Lane.

“Don’t lay a hand on me,” replied Lane. “I don’t want my uniform
soiled.”

With that Lane turned to Dalrymple, and said quietly: “Holt, I came here
to find you, not to play cards. That was a stall. Come away with me. You
were not cut out for a card sharp or a booze fighter.
What’s got into you that
you can gamble and drink with slackers?”

Dalrymple jammed his hat on and stepped toward the door. “Dare,
you said a lot. I’ll beat it with you—and I’ll never come
back.”

“You bet your sweet life you won’t,” shouted Swann.

“Hold on there, Dalrymple,” interposed Mackay, stepping out.
“Come across with that eighty-six bucks you owe me.”

“I—I haven’t got it, Mackay,” rejoined the boy, flushing
deeply.

Lane ripped open his coat and jerked out his pocket-book and tore
bills out of it. “There, Hardy Mackay,” he said, with deliberate
scorn, throwing the money on the table. “There are your
eighty-six dollars—earned in France…. I should
think it’d burn your fingers.”

He drew Holt out into the hall, where Pepper waited. Some one
slammed the door and began to curse.

“That ends that,” said Colonel Pepper, as the three moved down
the dim hall.

“It ends us, Pepper, but you couldn’t stop those guys with a
crowbar,” retorted Dalrymple.

Lane linked arms with the boy and changed the conversation while
they walked back to the inn. Here Colonel Pepper left them, and
Lane talked to Holt for an hour. The more he questioned Holt the
better he liked him, and yet the more surprised was he at the
sordid fact of the boy’s inclination toward loose living. There
was something perhaps that Holt would not confess. His health had
been impaired in the service, but not seriously. He was getting
stronger all the time. His old job was waiting for him. His
mother and sister had enough to live on, but if he had been
working he could have helped them in a way to afford him great
satisfaction.

“Holt, listen,” finally said Lane, with more earnestness. “We’re
friends—all boys of the service are friends. We might even
become great pards, if we had time.”

“What’s time got to do with it?” queried the younger man. “I’m
sure I’d like it—and know it’d help me.”

“I’m shot to pieces, Holt…. I won’t last long….”

“Aw, Lane, don’t say that!”

“It’s true. And if I’m to help you at all it must be now…. You
haven’t told me everything, boy—now have you?”

Holt dropped his head.

“I’ll say—I haven’t,” he replied, haltingly.
“Lane—the trouble is—I’m clean gone on Margie
Maynard. But her mother hates the sight of me. She won’t stand
for me.”

“Oho! So that’s it?” ejaculated Lane, a light breaking in upon
him. “Well, I’ll be darned. It is serious, Holt…. Does
Margie love you?”

“Sure she does. We’ve always cared. Don’t you remember how Margie
and I and Dal and you used to go to school together? And come
home together? And play on Saturdays?… Ever since then!… But
lately Margie and I are—we got—pretty badly mixed
up.”

“Yes, I remember those days,” replied Lane, dreamily, and
suddenly he recalled Dal’s dark eyes, somehow haunting. He had to
make an effort to get back to the issue at hand.

“If Margie loves you—why it’s all right. Go back to work
and marry her.”

“Lane, it can’t be all right. Mrs. Maynard has handed me the
mitt,” replied Holt, bitterly. “And Margie hasn’t the courage to
run off with me…. Her mother is throwing Margie at
Swann—because he’s rich.”

“Oh Lord, no—Holt—you can’t mean it!”
exclaimed Lane, aghast.

“I’ll say I do mean it. I know it,” returned Holt,
moodily. “So I let go—fell into the dumps—didn’t care
a d—— what became of me.”

Lane was genuinely shocked. What a tangle he had fallen upon!
Once again there seemed to confront him a colossal Juggernaut, a
moving, crushing, intangible thing, beyond his power to cope
with.

“Now, what can I do?” queried Holt, in sudden hope his friend
might see a way out.

Despairingly, Lane racked his brain for some word of advice or
assurance, if not of solution. But he found none. Then his spirit
mounted, and with it passion.

“Holt, don’t be a miserable coward,” he began, in fierce scorn.
“You’re a soldier, man, and you’ve got your life to
live!… The sun will rise—the days will be long and
pleasant—you can work—do something. You can
fish the streams in summer and climb the hills in autumn. You can
enjoy. Bah! don’t tell me one shallow girl means the world. If
Margie hasn’t courage enough to run off and marry
you—let her go! But you can never tell. Maybe Margie
will stick to you. I’ll help you. Margie and I have always been
friends and I’ll try to influence her. Then think of your mother
and sister. Work for them. Forget yourself—your
little, miserable, selfish desires…. My God, boy, but it’s a
strange life the war’s left us to face. I hate it. So do
you hate it. Swann and Mackay giving nothing and getting all! …
So it looks…. But it’s false—false. God did not intend
men to live solely for their bodies. A balance must be
struck. They have got to pay. Their time will come…. As
for you, the harder this job is the fiercer you should be. I’ve
got to die, Holt. But if I could live I’d show these slackers,
these fickle wild girls, what they’re doing…. You can do it,
Holt. It’s the greatest part any man could be called upon to
play. It will prove the difference between you and them….”

Holt Dalrymple crushed Lane’s hand in both his own. On his face
was a glow—his dark eyes flashed: “Lane—that’ll be
about all,” he burst out with a kind of breathlessness. Then his
head high, he stalked out.

The next day was bad. Lane suffered from both over-exertion and
intensity of emotion. He remained at home all day, in bed most of
the time. At supper time he went downstairs to find Lorna
pirouetting in a new dress, more abbreviated at top and bottom
than any costume he had seen her wear. The effect struck him at
an inopportune time. He told her flatly that she looked like a
French grisette of the music halls, and ought to be ashamed to be
seen in such attire.

“Daren, I don’t think you’re a good judge of clothes these days,”
she observed, complacently. “The boys will say I look spiffy in
this.”

So many times Lorna’s trenchant remarks silenced Lane. She hit
the nail on the head. Practical, logical, inevitable were some of
her speeches. She knew what men wanted. That was the pith of her
meaning. What else mattered?

“But Lorna, suppose you don’t look nice?” he questioned.

“I do look nice,” she retorted.

“You don’t look anything of the kind.”

“What’s nice? It’s only a word. It doesn’t mean much in my young
life.”

“Where are you going to-night?” he asked, sitting down to the
table.

“To the armory—basketball game—and dance afterward.”

“With whom?”

“With Harry. I suppose that pleases you, big brother?”

“Yes, it does. I like him. I wish he’d take you out oftener.”

“Take me! Hot dog! He’d kill himself to take me all the
time. But Harry’s slow. He bores me. Then he hasn’t got a car.”

“Lorna, you may as well know now that I’m going to stop your car
rides,” said Lane, losing his patience.

“You are not,” she retorted, and in the glint of the eyes
meeting his, Lane saw his defeat. His patience was exhausted, his
fear almost verified. He did not mince words. With his mother
standing open-mouthed and shocked, Lane gave his sister to
understand what he thought of automobile rides, and that as far
as she was concerned they had to be stopped. If she would not
stop them out of respect to her mother and to him, then he would
resort to other measures. Lorna bounced up in a fury, and in the
sharp quarrel that followed, Lane realized he was dealing with
flint full of fire. Lorna left without finishing her supper.

“Daren, that’s not the way,” said his mother, shaking her head.

“What is the way, mother?” he asked, throwing up his hands.

“I don’t know, unless it’s to see her way,” responded the mother.
“Sometimes I feel so—so old-fashioned and ignorant before
Lorna. Maybe she is right. How can we tell? What makes all the
young girls like that?”

What indeed, wondered Lane! The question had been hammering at
his mind for over a month. He went back to bed, weary and
dejected, suffering spasms of pain, like blades, through his
lungs, and grateful for the darkness. Almost he wished it was all
over—this ordeal. How puny his efforts! Relentlessly life
marched on. At midnight he was still fighting his pangs, still
unconquered. In the night his dark room was not empty. There were
faces, shadows, moving images and pictures, scenes of the war
limned against the blackness. At last he rested, grew as free
from pain as he ever grew, and slept. In the morning it was
another day, and the past was as if it were not.

May the first dawned ideally springlike, warm, fresh, fragrant,
with birds singing, sky a clear blue, and trees budding green and
white.

Lane yielded to an impulse that had grown stronger of late. His
steps drew him to the little drab house where Mel Iden lived with
her aunt. On the way, which led past a hedge, Lane gathered a
bunch of violets.

“‘In the spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of
love,'” he mused. “It’s good, even for me, to be alive
this morning…. These violets, the birds, the fresh smells, the
bursting green! Oh, well, regrets are idle. But just to
think—I had to go through all I’ve known—right down
to this moment—to realize how stingingly sweet life is….”

Mel answered his knock, and sight of her face seemed to lift his
heart with an unwonted throb. Had he unconsciously needed that?
The thought made his greeting, and the tender of the violets,
awkward for him.

“Violets! Oh, and spring! Daren, it was good of you to gather
them for me. I remember…. But I told you not to come again.”

“Yes, I know you did,” he replied. “But I’ve disobeyed you. I
wanted to see you, Mel…. I didn’t know how badly until I got
here.”

“You should not want to see me at all. People will talk.”

“So you care what people say of you?” he questioned, feigning
surprise.

“Of me? No. I was thinking of you.”

“You fear the poison tongues for me? Well, they cannot harm me.
I’m beyond tongues or minds like those.”

She regarded him earnestly, with serious gravity and slowly
dawning apprehension; then, turning to arrange the violets in a
tiny vase, she shook her head.

“Daren, you’re beyond me, too. I feel a—a change in you.
Have you had another sick spell?”

“Only for a day off and on. I’m really pretty well to-day. But I
have changed. I feel that, yet I don’t know how.”

Lane could talk to her. She stirred him, drew him out of himself.
He felt a strange desire for her sympathy, and a keen curiosity
concerning her opinions.

“I thought maybe you’d been ill again or perhaps upset by the
consequences of your—your action at Fanchon Smith’s party.”

“Who told you of that?” he asked in surprise.

“Dal. She was here yesterday. She will come in spite of me.”

“So will I,” interposed Lane.

She shook her head. “No, it’s different for a man…. I’ve missed
the girls. No one but Dal ever comes. I thought Margie would be
true to me—no matter what had befallen…. Dal comes, and
oh, Daren, she is good. She helps me so…. She told me what you
did at Fanchon’s party.”

“She did! Well, what’s your verdict?” he queried, grimly. “That
break queered me in Middleville.”

“I agree with what Doctor Wallace said to his congregation,”
returned Mel.

As Lane met the blue fire of her eyes he experienced another
singularly deep and profound thrill, as if the very depths of him
had been stirred. He seemed to have suddenly discovered Mel Iden.

“Doctor Wallace did back me up,” said Lane, with a smile. “But no
one else did.”

“Don’t be so sure of that. Harsh conditions require harsh
measures. Dal said you killed the camel-walk dance in
Middleville.”

“It surely was a disgusting sight,” returned Lane, with a
grimace. “Mel, I just saw red that night.”

“Daren,” she asked wistfully, following her own train of thought,
“do you know that most of the girls consider me an outcast?
Fanchon rides past me with her head up in the air. Helen Wrapp
cuts me. Margie looks to see if her mother is watching when she
bows to me. Isn’t it strange, Daren, how things turn out? Maybe
my old friends are right. But I don’t feel that I am what
they think I am…. I would do what I did—over and over.”

Her eyes darkened under his gaze, and a slow crimson tide stained
her white face.

“I understand you, Mel,” he said, swiftly. “You must forgive me
that I didn’t understand at once…. And I think you are
infinitely better, finer, purer than these selfsame girls who
scorn you.”

“Daren! You—understand?” she faltered.

And just as swiftly he told her the revelation that thinking had
brought to him.

When he had finished she looked at him for a long while. “Yes,
Daren,” she finally said, “you understand, and you have made me
understand. I always felt”—and her hand went to her
heart—”but my mind did not grasp…. Oh, Daren, how I thank
you!” and she held her hands out to him.

Lane grasped the outstretched hands, and loosed the leaping
thought her words and action created.

“Mel, let me give your boy a father—a name.”

No blow could have made her shrink so palpably. It
passed—that shame. Her lips parted, and other emotions
claimed her.

“Daren—you would—marry me?” she gasped.

“I am asking you to be my wife for your child’s sake,” he
replied.

Her head bowed. She sank against him, trembling. Her hands clung
tightly to his. Lane divined something of her agitation from the
feel of her slender form. And then again that deep and profound
thrill ran over him. It was followed by an instinct to wrap her
in his arms, to hold her, to share her trouble and to protect
her.

Strong reserve force suddenly came to Mel. She drew away from
Lane, still quivering, but composed.

“Daren, all my life I’ll thank you and bless you for that offer,”
she said, very low. “But, of course it is impossible.”

She disengaged her hands, and, turning away, looked out of the
window. Lane rather weakly sat down. What had come over him? His
blood seemed bursting in his veins. Then he gazed round the dingy
little parlor and at this girl of twenty, whose beauty did not
harmonize with her surroundings. Fair-haired, white-faced,
violet-eyed, she emanated tragedy. He watched her profile, clear
cut as a cameo, fine brow, straight nose, sensitive lips, strong
chin. She was biting those tremulous lips. And when she turned
again to him they were red. The short-bowed upper lip, full and
sweet, the lower, with its sensitive droop at the corner,
eloquent of sorrow—all at once Lane realized he wanted to
kiss that mouth more than he had ever wanted anything. The moment
was sudden and terrible, for it meant love—love such as he
had never known.

“Daren,” she said, turning, “tell me how you got the Croix de
Guerre.”

By the look of her and the hand that moved toward his breast,
Lane felt his power over her. He began his story and it was as if
he heard some one else talking. When he had finished, she asked,
“The French Army honored you, why not the American?”

“It was never reported.”

“How strange! Who was your officer?”

“You’ll laugh when you hear,” he replied, without hint of laugh
himself. “Heavens, how things come about! My officer was from
Middleville.”

“Daren! Who?” she asked, quickly, her eyes darkening with
thought.

“Captain Vane Thesel.”

How singular to Lane the fact she did not laugh! She only stared.
Then it seemed part of her warmth and glow, her subtle response
to his emotion, slowly receded. He felt what he could not see.

“Oh! He. Vane Thesel,” she said, without wonder or surprise or
displeasure, or any expression Lane anticipated.

Her strange detachment stirred a hideous thought—could
Thesel have been…. But Lane killed the culmination of that
thought. Not, however, before dark, fiery jealousy touched him
with fangs new to his endurance.

To drive it away, Lane launched into more narrative of the war.
And as he talked he gradually forgot himself. It might be hateful
to rake up the burning threads of memory for the curious and the
soulless, but to tell Mel Iden it was a keen, strange delight. He
watched the changes of her expression. He learned to bring out
the horror, sadness, glory that abided in her heart. And at last
he cut himself off abruptly: “But I must save something for
another day.”

That broke the spell.

“No, you must never come back.”

He picked up his hat and his stick.

“Mel, would you shut the door in my face?”

“No, Daren—but I’ll not open it,” she replied resolutely.

“Why?”

“You must not come.”

“For my sake—or yours?”

“Both our sakes.”

He backed out on the little porch, and looked at her as she stood
there. Beyond him, indeed, were his emotions then. Sad as she
seemed, he wanted to make her suffer more—an inexplicable
and shameful desire.

“Mel, you and I are alike,” he said.

“Oh, no, Daren; you are noble and I am….”

“Mel, in my dreams I see myself standing—plodding along the
dark shores of a river—that river of tears which runs down
the vast naked stretch of our inner lives…. I see you now, on
the opposite shore. Let us reach our hands across—for the
baby’s sake.”

“Daren, it is a beautiful thought, but it—it can’t be,” she
whispered.

“Then let me come to see you when I need—when I’m down,” he
begged.

“No.”

“Mel, what harm can it do—just to let me come?”

“No—don’t ask me. Daren, I am no stone.”

“You’ll be sorry when I’m out there in—Woodlawn…. That
won’t be long.”

That broke her courage and her restraint.

“Come, then,” she whispered, in tears.

CHAPTER VIII

Lane’s intentions and his spirit were too great for his
endurance. It was some time before he got downtown again. And
upon entering the inn he was told some one had just called him on
the telephone.

“Hello, this is Lane,” he answered. “Who called me?”

“It’s Blair,” came the reply. “How are you, old top?”

“Not so well. I’ve been down and out.”

“Sorry. Suppose that’s why you haven’t called me up for so long?”

“Well, Buddy, I can’t lay it all to that…. And how’re you?”

The answer did not come. So Lane repeated his query.

“Well, I’m still hobbling round on one leg,” replied Blair.

“That’s good. Tell me about Reddie.”

Again the reply was long in coming….

“Haven’t you heard—about Red?”

“No.”

“Haven’t seen the newspapers lately?”

“I never read the papers, Blair.”

“Right-o. But I had to…. Buck up, now, Dare!”

“All right. Shoot it quick,” returned Lane, feeling his breast
contract and his skin tighten with a chill.

“Red Payson has gone west.”

“Blair! You don’t mean—dead?” exclaimed Lane.

“Yes, Reddie’s gone—and I guess it’s just as well, poor
devil!”

“How? When?”

“Two days ago, according to papers…. He died in Washington,
D.C. Fell down in the vestibule of one of the government
offices—where he was waiting…. fell with another
hemorrhage—and died right there—on the
floor—quick.”

“My—God!” gasped Lane.

“Yes, it’s tough. You see, Dare, I couldn’t keep Reddie here.
Heaven knows I tried, but he wouldn’t stay…. I’m afraid he
heard my mother complaining. Say, Dare, suppose I have somebody
drive me in town to see you.”

“I’d like that, Blair.”

“You’re on. And say, I’ve another idea. To-night’s the Junior
Prom—did you know that?”

“No, I didn’t.”

“Well, it is. Suppose we go up? My sister can get me cards…. I
tell you, Dare, I’d like to see what’s going on in that bunch.
I’ve heard a lot and seen some things.”

“Did you hear how I mussed up Fanchon Smith’s party?”

“You bet I did. That’s one reason I want to see some of this
dancing. Will you go?”

“Yes, I can stand it if you can.”

“All right, Buddy, I’ll meet you at the inn—eight o’clock.”

Lane slowly made his way to a secluded corner of the lobby, where
he sat down. Red Payson dead! Lane felt that he should not have
been surprised or shocked. But he was both. The strange, cold
sensation gradually wore away and with it the slight trembling of
his limbs. A mournful procession of thoughts and images returned
to his mind and he sat and brooded.

At the hour of his appointment with his friend, Lane went to the
front of the lobby. Blair was on time. He hobbled in, erect and
martial of bearing despite the crutch, and his dark citizen’s
suit emphasized the whiteness of his face. Being home had
softened Blair a little. Yet the pride and tragic bitterness were
there. But when Blair espied Lane a warmth burned out of the
havoc in his face. Lane’s conscience gave him a twinge. It dawned
upon him that neither his spells of illness, nor his distress
over his sister Lorna, nor his obsession to see and understand
what the young people were doing could hold him wholly excusable
for having neglected his comrade.

Their hand-clasp was close, almost fierce, and neither spoke at
once. But they looked intently into each other’s faces. Emotion
stormed Lane’s heart. He realized that Blair loved him and that
he loved Blair—and that between them was a measureless
bond, a something only separation could make tangible. But little
of what they felt came out in their greetings.

“Dare, why the devil don’t you can that uniform,” demanded Blair,
cheerfully. “People might recognize you’ve been ‘over there.'”

“Well, Blair, I expected you’d have a cork leg by this time,”
said Lane.

“Nothing doing,” returned the other. “I want to be perpetually
reminded that I was in the war. This ‘forget the war’ propaganda
we see and hear all over acts kind of queer on a soldier….
Let’s find a bench away from these people.”

After they were comfortably seated Blair went on: “Do you know,
Dare, I don’t miss my leg so much when I’m crutching around. But
when I try to sit down or get up! By heck, sometimes I forget
it’s gone. And sometimes I want to scratch my lost foot. Isn’t
that hell?”

“I’ll say so, Buddy,” returned Lane, with a laugh.

“Read this,” said Blair, taking a paper from his pocket, and
indicating a column.

Whereupon Lane read a brief Associated Press dispatch from
Washington, D.C., stating that one Payson, disabled soldier of
twenty-five, suffering with tuberculosis caused by gassed lungs,
had come to Washington to make in person a protest and appeal
that had been unanswered in letters. He wanted money from the
government to enable him to travel west to a dry climate, where
doctors assured him he might get well. He made his statement to
several clerks and officials, and waited all day in the vestibule
of the department. Suddenly he was seized with a hemorrhage, and,
falling on the floor, died before aid could be summoned.

Without a word Lane handed the paper back to his friend.

“Red was a queer duck,” said Blair, rather hoarsely. “You
remember when I ‘phoned you last over two weeks ago?… Well,
just after that Red got bad on my hands. He wouldn’t accept
charity, he said. And he wanted to beat it. He got wise to my
mother. He wouldn’t give up trying to get money from the
government—back money owed him, he swore—and the idea
of being turned down at home seemed to obsess him. I talked and
cussed myself weak. No good! Red beat it soon after
that—beat it from Middleville on a freight train. And I
never heard a word from him…. Not a word….”

“Blair, can’t you see it Red’s way?” queried Lane, sadly.

“Yes, I can,” responded Blair, “but hell! he might have gotten
well. Doc Bronson said Red had a chance. I could have borrowed
enough money to get him out west. Red wouldn’t take it.”

“And he ran off—exposed himself to cold and
starvation—over-exertion and anger,” added Lane.

“Exactly. Brought on that hemorrhage and croaked. All for
nothing!”

“No, Blair. All for a principle,” observed Lane. “Red was fired
out of the hospital without a dollar. There was something
terribly wrong.”

“Wrong?… God Almighty!” burst out Blair, with hard passion.
“Let me read you something in this same paper.” With shaking
hands he unfolded it, searched until he found what he wanted, and
began to read:

“‘If the actual needs of disabled veterans require the
expenditure of much money, then unquestionably a majority of the
taxpayers of the country will favor spending it. Despite the
insistent demand for economy in Washington that is arising from
every part of the country, no member of House or Senate will have
occasion to fear that he is running counter to popular opinion
when eventually he votes to take generous care of disabled
soldiers.'”

Blair’s trembling voice ceased, and then twisting the newspaper
into a rope, he turned to Lane. “Dare, can you understand
that?… Red Payson was a bull-headed boy, not over bright. But
you and I have some intelligence, I hope. We can allow for the
immense confusion at Washington—the senselessness of red
tape—the callosity of politicians. But when we remember the
eloquent calls to us boys—the wonderfully worded appeals to
our patriotism, love of country and home—the painted
posters bearing the picture of a beautiful American girl—or
a young mother with a baby—remembering these deep,
passionate calls to the best in us, can you understand
that sort of talk now?”

“Blair, I think I can,” replied Lane. “Then—before and
after the draft—the whole country was at a white heat of
all that the approach of war rouses. Fear, self-preservation,
love of country, hate of the Huns, inspired patriotism, and in
most everybody the will to fight and to sacrifice…. The war was
a long, hideous, soul-racking, nerve-destroying time. When it
ended, and the wild period of joy and relief had its run, then
all that pertained to the war sickened and wearied and disgusted
the majority of people. It’s ‘forget the war.’ You and Payson and
I got home a year too late.”

“Then—it’s just—monstrous,” said Blair, heavily.

“That’s all, Blair. Just monstrous. But we can’t beat our spirits
out against this wall. No one can understand us—how alone
we are. Let’s forget that—this wall—this thing
called government. Shall we spend what time we have to live
always in a thunderous atmosphere of mind—hating,
pondering, bitter?”

“No. I’ll make a compact with you,” returned Blair, with flashing
eyes. “Never to speak again of that—so long as we
live!”

“Never to a living soul,” rejoined Lane, with a ring in his
voice.

They shook hands much the same as when they had met half an hour
earlier.

“So!” exclaimed Blair, with a deep breath. “And now, Dare, tell
me how you made out with Helen. You cut me short over the
‘phone.”

“Blair, that day coming into New York on the ship, you didn’t put
it half strong enough,” replied Lane. Then he told Blair about
the call he had made upon Helen, and what had transpired at her
studio.

Blair did not voice the scorn that his eyes expressed. And, in
fact, most of his talking was confined to asking questions. Lane
found it easy enough to unburden himself, though he did not
mention his calls on Mel Iden, or Colonel Pepper’s disclosures.

“Well, I guess it’s high time we were meandering up to the hall,”
said Blair, consulting his watch. “I’m curious about this Prom.
Think we’re in for a jolt. It’s four years since I went to a
Prom. Now, both of us, Dare, have a sister who’ll be there,
besides all our old friends…. And we’re not dancing! But I want
to look on. They’ve got an out-of-town orchestra coming—a
jazz orchestra. There’ll probably be a hot time in the old town
to-night.”

“Lorna did not tell me,” replied Lane, as they got up to go. “But
I suppose she’d rather I didn’t know. We’ve clashed a good deal
lately.”

“Dare, I hear lots of talk,” said Blair. “Margaret is chummy with
me, and some of her friends are always out at the house. I hear
Dick Swann is rushing Lorna. Think he’s doing it on the q-t.”

“I know he is, Blair, but I can’t catch them together,” returned
Lane. “Lorna is working now. Swann got her the job.”

“Looks bad to me,” replied Blair, soberly. “Swann is cutting a
swath. I hear his old man is sore on him…. I’d take Lorna out
of that office quick.”

“Maybe you would,” declared Lane, grimly. “For all the influence
or power I have over Lorna I might as well not exist.”

They walked silently along the street for a little while. Lane
had to accommodate his step to the slower movement of his
crippled friend. Blair’s crutch tapped over the stone pavement
and clicked over the curbs. They crossed the railroad tracks and
turned off the main street to go down a couple of blocks.

“Shades of the past!” exclaimed Blair, as they reached a big
brick building, well-lighted in front by a sizzling electric
lamp. The night was rather warm and clouds of insects were
wheeling round the light. “The moths and the flame!” added Blair,
satirically. “Well, Dare, old bunkie, brace up and we’ll go over
the top. This ought to be fun for us.”

“I don’t see it,” replied Lane. “I’ll be about as welcome as a
bull in a china shop.”

“Oh, I didn’t mean any one would throw fits over us,” responded
Blair. “But we ought to get some fun out of the fact.”

“What fact?” queried Lane, puzzled.

“Rather far-fetched, maybe. But I’ll get a kick out of looking
on—watching these swell slackers with the girls we
fought for.”

“Wonder why they didn’t give the dance at the armory, where
they’d not have to climb stairs, and have more room?” queried
Lane, as they went in under the big light.

“Dare, you’re far back in the past,” said Blair, sardonically.
“The armory is on the ground floor—one big hall—open,
you know. The Assembly Hall is a regular maze for rooms and
stairways.”

Blair labored up the stairway with Lane’s help. At last they
reached the floor from which had blared the strains of jazz. Wide
doors were open, through which Lane caught the flash of many
colors. Blair produced his tickets at the door. There did not
appear to be any one to take them.

Lane experienced an indefinable thrill at the scene. The air
seemed to reek with a mixed perfume and cigarette smoke—to
resound with high-keyed youthful laughter, wild and sweet and
vacant above the strange, discordant music. Then the flashing,
changing, whirling colors of the dancers struck Lane as oriental,
erotic, bizarre—gorgeous golds and greens and reds striped
by the conventional black. Suddenly the blare ceased, and the
shrill, trilling laughter had dominance. The rapid circling of
forms came to a sudden stop, and the dancers streamed in all
directions over the floor.

“Dare, they’ve called time,” said Blair. “Let’s get inside the
ropes so we can see better.”

The hall was not large, but it was long, and shaped like a letter
L with pillars running down the center. Countless threads of
many-colored strings of paper had been stretched from pillars to
walls, hanging down almost within reach of the dancers. Flags and
gay bunting helped in the riotous effect of decoration. The
black-faced orchestra held forth on a raised platform at the
point where the hall looked two ways. Recesses, alcoves and open
doors to other rooms, which the young couples were piling over
each other to reach, gave Lane some inkling of what Blair had
hinted.

“Now we’re out in the limelight,” announced Blair, as he halted.
“Let’s stand here and run the gauntlet until the next
dance—then we can find seats.”

Almost at once a stream of gay couples enveloped them in passing.
Bright, flashing, vivid faces and bare shoulders, arms and
breasts appeared above the short bodices of the girls. Few of
them were gowned in white. The colors seemed too garish for
anything but musical comedy. But the freshness, the vividness of
these girls seemed exhilarating. The murmur, the merriment
touched a forgotten chord in Lane’s heart. For a moment it seemed
sweet to be there, once more in a gathering where pleasure was
the pursuit. It breathed of what seemed long ago, in a past that
was infinitely more precious to remember because he had no future
of hope or of ambition or dream. Something had happened to him
that now made the sensations of the moment stingingly
bitter-sweet. The freshness and fragrance, the color and
excitement, the beauty and gayety were not for him. Youth was
dead. He could never enter the lists with these young men, many
no younger than he, for the favor and smile of a girl.
Resignation had not been so difficult in the spiritual moment of
realization and resolve, but to be presented with one concrete
and stunning actuality after another, each with its mocking
might-have-been, had grown to be a terrible ordeal.

Lane looked for faces he knew. On each side of the pillar where
he and Blair stood the stream of color and gayety flowed. Helen
and Margaret Maynard went by on the far edge of that stream.
Across the hall he caught a glimpse of the flashing golden beauty
of Bessy Bell. Then near at hand he recognized Fanchon Smith, a
petite, smug-faced little brunette, with naked shoulders bulging
out of a piebald gown. She espied Lane and her face froze. Then
there were familiar faces near and far, to which Lane could not
attach names.

All at once he became aware that other of his senses besides
sight were being stimulated. He had been hearing without
distinguishing what he heard. And curiously he listened, still
with that strange knock of memory at his heart. Everybody was
talking, some low, some high, all in the spirit of the hour. And
in one moment he had heard that which killed the false
enchantment.

“Not a chance! …”

“Hot dog—she’s some Jane!”

“Now to the clinch—”

“What’ll we do till the next spiel—”

“Have a shot?——”

“Boys, it’s only the shank of the evening. Leave something peppy
for the finish.”

“Mame, you look like a million dollars in that rag.”

“She shakes a mean shimmy, believe me….”

“That egg! Not on your life!”

“Cut the next with Ned. We’ll sneak down and take a ride in my
car….”

“Oh, spiffy!”

Lane’s acutely strained attention was diverted by Blair’s voice.

“Look who’s with my sister Margie.”

Lane turned to look through an open space in the dispersing
stream. Blair’s sister was passing with Dick Swann. Elegantly and
fastidiously attired, the young millionaire appeared to be
attentive to his partner. Margaret stood out rather strikingly
from the other girls near her by reason of the simplicity and
modesty of her dress. She did not look so much bored as
discontented. Lane saw her eyes rove to and fro from the entrance
of the hall. When she espied Lane she nodded and spoke with a
smile and made an evident move toward him, but was restrained by
Swann. He led her past Lane and Blair without so much as glancing
in their direction. Lane heard Blair swear.

“Dare, if my mother throws Marg at that—slacker, I’ll block
the deal if it’s the last thing I ever do,” he declared,
violently.

“And I’ll help you,” replied Lane, instantly.

“I know Margie hates him.”

“Blair, your sister is in love with Holt Dalrymple.”

“No! Not really? Thought that was only a boy-and-girl affair….
Aha! the nigger music again! Let’s find a seat, Dare.”

Saxophone, trombone, piccolo, snare-drum and other barbaric
instruments opened with a brazen defiance of music, and a vibrant
assurance of quick, raw, strong sounds. Lane himself felt the
stirring effect upon his nerves. He had difficulty in keeping
still. From the lines of chairs along the walls and from doors
and alcoves rushed the gay-colored throng to leap, to close, to
step, to rock and sway, until the floor was full of a moving mass
of life.

The first half-dozen couples Lane studied all danced more or less
as Helen and Swann had, that day in Helen’s studio. Then, by way
of a remarkable contrast, there passed two young people who
danced decently. Lane descried his sister Lorna in the throng,
and when she and her partner came round in the giddy circle, Lane
saw that she wiggled and toddled like the others. Lane, as she
passed him, caught a glance of her eyes, flashing, reproachful,
furious, directed at some one across her partner’s shoulder. Lane
followed that glance and saw Swann. Apparently he did not notice
Lorna, and was absorbed in the dance with his own partner, Helen
Wrapp. This byplay further excited Lane’s curiosity. On the
whole, it was an ungraceful, violent mob, almost totally lacking
in restraint, whirling, kicking, swaying, clasping, instinctively
physical, crude, vulgar and wild. Down the line of chairs from
his position, Lane saw the chaperones of the Prom, no doubt
mothers of some of these girls. Lane wondered at them with
sincere and persistent amaze. If they were respectable, and had
even a slight degree of intelligence, how could they look on at
this dance with complacence? Perhaps after all the young people
were not wholly to blame for an abnormal expression of
instinctive action.

That dance had its several encores and finally ended.

Margaret and Holt made their way up to Lane and Blair. The girl
was now radiant. It took no second glance for Lane to see how
matters stood with her at that moment.

“Say, beat it, you two,” suddenly spoke up Blair. “There comes
Swann. He’s looking for you. Chase yourselves, now,
Marg—Holt. Leave that slacker to us!”

Margaret gave a start, a gasp. She looked hard at her brother.
Blair wore a cool smile, underneath which there was sterner
hidden meaning. Then Margaret looked at Lane with slow, deep
blush, making her really beautiful.

“Margie, we’re for you two, strong,” said Lane, with a smile. “Go
hide from Swann.”

“But I—I came with him,” she faltered.

“Then let him find you—in other words, let him get
you…. ‘All’s fair in love and war.'”

Lane had his reward in the sweet amaze and confusion of her face,
as she turned away. Holt rushed her off amid the straggling
couples.

“Dare, you’re a wiz,” declared Blair. “Margie’s strong for
Holt—I’m glad. If we could only put Swann out of the
running.”

“It’s a cinch,” returned Lane, with sudden heat.

“Pard, you don’t know my mother. If she has picked out Swann for
Margie—all I’ve got to say is—good night!”

“Even if we prove Swann——”

“No matter what we prove,” interrupted Blair. “No matter what, so
long as he’s out of jail. My mother is money mad. She’d sell
Margie to the devil himself for gold, position—the means to
queen it over these other mothers of girls.”

“Blair, you’re—you’re a little off your nut, aren’t you?”

“Not on your life. That talk four years ago might have been
irrational. But now—not on your life…. The world has come
to an end…. Oh, Lord, look who’s coming! Lane, did you ever in
your life see such a peach as that?”

Bessy Bell had appeared, coming toward them with a callow youth
near her own age. Her dress was some soft, pale blue material
that was neither gaudy nor fantastical. But it was far from
modest. Lane had to echo Blair’s eulogy of this young specimen of
the new America. She simply verified and stabilized the assertion
that physically the newer generations of girls were markedly more
beautiful than those of any generation before.

Bessy either forgot to introduce her escort or did not care to.
She nodded a dismissal to him, spoke sweetly to Blair, and then
took the empty chair next to Lane.

“You’re having a rotten time,” she said, leaning close to him.
She seemed all fragrance and airy grace and impelling life.

Lane had to smile. “How do you know?”

“I can tell by your face. Now aren’t you?”

“Well, to be honest, Miss Bessy”

“For tripe’s sake, don’t be so formal,” she interrupted. “Call me
Bessy.”

“Oh, very well, Bessy. There’s no use to lie to you. I’m not very
happy at what I see here.”

“What’s the matter with it—with us?” she queried, quickly.
“Everybody’s doing it.”

“That is no excuse. Besides, that’s not so. Everybody is
not—not——”

“Well, not what?”

“Not doing it, whatever you meant by that,” returned Lane, with a
laugh.

“Tell me straight out what you think of us,” she shot at
Lane, with a purple flash of her eyes.

She irritated Lane. Stirred him somehow, yet she seemed
wholesome, full of quick response. She was daring, sophisticated,
provocative. Therefore Lane retorted in brief, blunt speech what
he thought of the majority of the girls present.

Bessy Bell did not look insulted. She did not blush. She did not
show shame. Her eyes darkened. Her rosy mouth lost something of
its soft curves.

“Daren Lane, we’re not all rotten,” she said.

“I did not say or imply you all were,” he replied.

She gazed up at him thoughtfully, earnestly, with an unconscious
frank interest, curiosity, and reverence.

“You strike me funny,” she mused. “I never met a soldier like
you.”

“Bessy, how many soldiers have you met who have come back from
France?”

“Not many, only Blair and you, and Captain Thesel, though I
really didn’t meet him. He came up to me at the armory and spoke
to me. And to-night he cut in on Roy’s dance. Roy was sore.”

“Three. Well, that’s not many,” replied Lane. “Not enough to get
a line on two million, is it?”

“Captain Thesel is just like all the other fellows…. But you’re
not a bit like them.”

“Is that a compliment or otherwise?”

“I’ll say it’s a compliment,” she replied, with arch eyes on his.

“Thank you.”

“Well, you don’t deserve it…. You promised to make a date with
me. Why haven’t you?”

“Why child, I—I don’t know what to say,” returned Lane,
utterly disconcerted. Yet he liked this amazing girl. “I suppose
I forgot. But I’ve been ill, for one reason.”

“I’m sorry,” she said, giving his arm a squeeze. “I heard you
were badly hurt. Won’t you tell me about your—your hurts?”

“Some day, if opportunity affords. I can’t here, that’s certain.”

“Opportunity! What do you want? Haven’t I handed myself out on a
silver platter?”

Lane could find no ready retort for this query. He gazed at her,
marveling at the apparently measureless distance between her
exquisite physical beauty and the spiritual beauty that should
have been harmonious with it. Still he felt baffled by this young
girl. She seemed to resemble Lorna, yet was different in a way he
could not grasp. Lorna had coarsened in fibre. This girl was
fine, despite her coarse speech. She did not repel.

“Mr. Lane, will you dance with me?” she asked, almost wistfully.
She liked him, and was not ashamed of it. But she seemed
pondering over what to make of him—how far to go.

“Bessy, I dare not exert myself to that extent,” he replied,
gently. “You forget I am a disabled soldier.”

“Forget that? Not a chance,” she flashed. “But I hoped you might
dance with me once—just a little.”

“No. I might keel over.”

She shivered and her eyes dilated. “You mean it as a joke. But
it’s no joke…. I read about your comrade—that poor Red
Payson!” … Then both devil of humor and woman of fire shone in
her glance. “Daren, if you did keel over—you’d die
in my arms—not on the floor!”

Then another partner came up to claim her. As the orchestra
blurted forth and Bessy leaned to the dancer’s clasp she shouted
audaciously at Lane: “Don’t forget that silver platter!”

Lane turned to Blair to find that worthy shaking his handsome
head.

“Did you hear what she said?” asked Lane, close to Blair’s ear.

“Every word,” replied Blair. “Some kid!… She’s like the girl in
the motion-pictures. She comes along. She meets the fellow. She
looks at him—she says ‘good day’—then Wham,
into his arms…. My God! … Lane, is that kid good or bad?”

“Good!” exclaimed Lane, instantly.

“Bah!”

“Good—still,” returned Lane. “But alas! She is brazen,
unconscious of it. But she’s no fool, that kid. Lorna is an
absolute silly bull-headed fool. I wish Bessy Bell was my
sister—or I mean that Lorna was like her.”

“Here comes Swann without Margie. Looks sore as a pup.
The——”

“Shut up, Blair. I want to listen to this jazz.”

Lane shut his eyes during the next number and listened without
the disconcerting spectacle in his sight. He put all the
intensity of which he was capable into his attention. His
knowledge of music was not extensive, but on the other hand it
was enough to enable him to analyze this jazz. Neither music nor
ragtime, it seemed utterly barbarian in character. It appealed
only to primitive, physical, sensual instincts. It could not be
danced to sanely and gracefully. When he opened his eyes again,
to see once more the disorder of dancers in spirit and action, he
seemed to have his analysis absolutely verified.

These dances were short, the encores very brief, and the
intermissions long. Perhaps the dancers needed to get their
breath and rearrange their apparel.

After this number, Lane left Blair talking to friends, and made
his way across the hall to where he espied Lorna. She did not see
him. She looked ashamed, hurt, almost sullen. Her young friend,
Harry, was bending over talking earnestly. Lane caught the words:
“Lorna dear, that Swann’s only stringing you—rushing you on
the sly. He won’t dance with you here—not while he’s
with that swell crowd.”

“It’s a lie,” burst out Lorna. She was almost in tears.

Lane took her arm, making her start.

“Well, kids, you’re having some time, aren’t you,” he said,
cheerfully.

“Sure—are,” gulped Harry.

Lorna repressed her grief, but not her sullen resentment.

Lane pretended not to notice anything unusual, and after a few
casual remarks and queries he left them. Strolling from place to
place, mingling with the gay groups, in the more secluded alcoves
and recesses where couples appeared, oblivious to eyes, in the
check room where a sign read: “check your corsets,” out in the
wide landing where the stairway came up, Lane passed, missing
little that might have been seen or heard. He did not mind that
two of the chaperones stared at him in supercilious curiosity, as
if speculating on a possible faux pas of his at this
dance. Both boys and girls he had met since his return to
Middleville, and some he had known before, encountered him face
to face, and cut him dead. He heard sarcastic remarks. He was an
outsider, a “dead one,” a “has been” and a “lemon.” But Margaret
was gracious to him, and Flossie Dickerson made no bones of her
regard. Dorothy, he was relieved and glad to see, was not
present.

Lane had no particular object in mind. He just wanted to rub
elbows with this throng of young people. This was the joy of life
he had imagined he had missed while in France. How much vain
longing! He had missed nothing. He had boundlessly gained.

Out on this floor a railing ran round the curve of the stairway.
Girls were sitting on it, smoking cigarettes, and kicking their
slipper-shod feet. Their partners were lounging close. Lane
passed by, and walking to a window in the shadow he stood there.
Presently one of the boys threw away his cigarette and said:
“Come on, Ironsides. I gotta dance. You’re a rotten dancer, but I
love you.”

They ran back into the hall. The young fellow who was left
indolently attempted to kiss his partner, who blew smoke in his
face. Then at a louder blast of jazz they bounced away. The next
moment a third couple appeared, probably from another door down
the hall. They did not observe Lane. The girl was slim, dainty,
gorgeously arrayed, and her keen, fair face bore traces of paint
wet by perspiration. Her companion was Captain Vane Thesel, in
citizen’s garb, well-built, ruddy-faced, with tiny curled
moustache.

“Hurry, kid,” he said, breathlessly, as he pulled at her. “We’ll
run down and take a spin.”

“Spiffy! But let’s wait till after the next,” she replied. “It’s
Harold’s and I came with him.”

“Tell him it was up to him to find you.”

“But he might get wise to a car ride.”

“He’d do the same. Come on,” returned Thesel, who all the time
was leading her down the stairway step by step.

They disappeared. From the open window Lane saw them go down the
street and get into a car and ride away. He glanced at his watch,
muttering. “This is a new stunt for dances. I just wonder.” He
watched, broodingly and sombrely. It was not his sister, but it
might just as well have been. Two dances and a long intermission
ended before Lane saw the big auto return. He watched the couple
get out, and hurry up, to disappear at the entrance. Then Lane
changed his position, and stood directly at the head of the
stairway under the light. He had no interest in Captain Vane
Thesel. He just wanted to get a close look at the girl.

Presently he heard steps, heavy and light, and a man’s deep
voice, a girl’s low thrill of laughter. They turned the curve in
the stairway and did not see Lane until they had mounted to the
top.

With cool steady gaze Lane studied the girl. Her clear eyes met
his. If there was anything unmistakable in Lane’s look at her, it
was not from any deception on his part. He tried to look into her
soul. Her smile—a strange indolent little smile, remnant of
excitement—faded from her face. She stared, and she put an
instinctive hand up to her somewhat dishevelled hair. Then she
passed on with her companion.

“Of all the nerve!” she exclaimed. “Who’s that soldier boob?”

Lane could not catch the low reply. He lingered there a while
longer, and then returned to the hall, much surprised to find it
so dark he could scarcely distinguish the dancers. The lights had
been lowered. If the dance had been violent and strange before
this procedure, it was now a riot. In the semi-darkness the
dancers cut loose. The paper strings had been loosened and had
fallen down to become tangled with the flying feet and legs.
Confetti swarmed like dark snowdrops in the hot air. Lane
actually smelled the heat of bodies—a strangely stirring
and yet noxious sensation. A rushing, murmuring, shrill
sound—voices, laughter, cries, and the sliding of feet and
brushing of gowns—filled the hall—ominous to Lane’s
over-sensitive faculties, swelling unnaturally, the expression of
unrestrained physical abandon. Lane walked along the edge of this
circling, wrestling melee, down to the corner where the orchestra
held forth. They seemed actuated by the same frenzy which
possessed the dancers. The piccolo player lay on his back on top
of the piano, piping his shrill notes at the ceiling. And Lane
made sure this player was drunk. On the moment then the jazz came
to an end with a crash. The lights flashed up. The dancers
clapped and stamped their pleasure.

Lane wound his way back to Blair.

“I’ve had enough, Blair,” he said. “I’m all in. Let’s go.”

“Right-o,” replied Blair, with evident relief. He reached a hand
to Lane to raise himself, an action he rarely resorted to, and
awkwardly got his crutch in place. They started out, with Lane
accommodating his pace to his crippled comrade. Thus it happened
that the two ran a gauntlet with watching young people on each
side, out to the open part of the hall. There directly in front
they encountered Captain Vane Thesel, with Helen Wrapp on his
arm. Her red hair, her green eyes, and carmined lips, the white
of her voluptuous neck and arms, united in a singular effect of
allurement that Lane felt with scorn and melancholy.

Helen nodded to Blair and Lane, and evidently dragged at her
escort’s arm to hold him from passing on.

“Look who’s here! Daren, old boy—and Blair,” she called,
and she held the officer back. The malice in her green glance did
not escape Lane, as he bowed to her. She gloried in that
situation. Captain Thesel had to face them.

It was Blair’s hand that stiffened Lane. They halted, erect, like
statues, with eyes that failed to see Thesel. He did not exist
for them. With a flush of annoyance he spoke, and breaking from
Helen, passed on. A sudden silence in the groups nearby gave
evidence that the incident had been observed. Then whispers rose.

“Boys, aren’t you dancing?” asked Helen, with a mocking
sweetness. “Let me teach you the new steps.”

“Thanks, Helen,” replied Lane, in sudden weariness. “But I
couldn’t go it.”

“Why did you come? To blow us up again? Lose your nerve?”

“Yes, I lost it to-night—and something more.”

“Blair, you shouldn’t have left one of your legs in France,” she
said, turning to Blair. She had always hated Blair, a fact
omnipresent now in her green eyes.

Blair had left courtesy and endurance in France, as was evinced
by the way he bent closer to Helen, to speak low, with terrible
passion.

“If I had it to do over again—I’d see you and
your kind—your dirt-cheap crowd of painted hussies
where you belong—in the clutch of the Huns!”

CHAPTER IX

Miss Amanda Hill, teacher in the Middleville High School, sat
wearily at her desk. She was tired, as tired as she had ever been
on any day of the fifteen long years in which she had wrestled
with the problems of school life. Her hair was iron gray and she
bent a worn, sad, severe face over a mass of notes before her.

At that moment she was laboring under a perplexing question that
was not by any means a new one. Only this time it had presented
itself in a less insidious manner than usual, leaving no loophole
for charitable imagination. Presently she looked up and rapped on
her desk.

“These young ladies will remain after school is dismissed,” she
said, in her authoritative voice: “Bessy Bell—Rose
Clymer—Gail Matthews—Helen Tremaine—Ruth
Winthrop…. Also any other girls who are honest enough to admit
knowledge of the notes found in Rose Clymer’s desk.”

The hush that fell over the schoolroom was broken by the gong in
the main hall, sounding throughout the building. Then followed
the noise of shutting books and closing desks, and the bustle and
shuffling of anticipated dismissal.

In a front seat sat a girl who did not arise with the others, and
as one by one several girls passed her desk with hurried step and
embarrassed snicker she looked at them with purple, blazing eyes.

Miss Hill attended to her usual task with the papers of the day’s
lessons and the marking of the morrow’s work before she glanced
up at the five girls she had detained. They sat in widely
separated sections of the room. Rose Clymer, pretty, fragile,
curly-haired, occupied the front seat of the end row. Her face
had no color and her small mouth was set in painful lines. Four
seats across from her Bessy Bell leaned on her desk, with defiant
calmness, and traces of scorn still in her expressive eyes. Gail
Matthews looked frightened and Helen Tremaine was crying. Ruth
Winthrop bent forward with her face buried in her arms.

“Girls,” began Miss Hill, presently. “I know you regard me as a
cross old schoolteacher.”

She had spoken impulsively, a rare thing with her, and occasioned
in this instance by the painful consciousness of how she was
judged, when she was really so kindly disposed toward the wayward
girls.

“Girls, I’ve tried to get into close touch with you, to
sympathize, to be lenient; but somehow, I’ve failed,” she went
on. “Certainly I have failed to stop this note-writing. And
lately it has become—beyond me to understand. Now won’t you
help me to get at the bottom of the matter? Helen, it was you who
told me these notes were in Rose’s desk. Have you any knowledge
of more?”

“Ye—s—m,” said Helen, raising her red face.
“I’ve—I’ve one—I—was afraid to g—give
up.”

“Bring it to me.”

Helen rose and came forward with an expressive little fist and
opening it laid a crumpled paper upon Miss Hill’s desk. As Helen
returned to her seat she met Bessy Bell’s fiery glance and it
seemed to wither her.

The teacher smoothed out the paper and began to read. “Good
Heavens!” she breathed, in amaze and pain. Then she turned to
Helen. “This verse is in your handwriting.”

“Yes’m—but I—I only copied it,” responded the
culprit.

“Who gave you the original?”

“Rose.”

“Where did she get it?”

“I—I don’t know—Miss Hill. Really and tru—truly
I don’t,” faltered Helen, beginning to cry again.

Gail and Ruth also disclaimed any knowledge of the verse, except
that it had been put into their hands by Rose. They had read it,
copied it, written notes about it and discussed it.

“You three girls may go home now,” said Miss Hill, sadly.

The girls hastily filed out and passed the scornful Bessy Bell
with averted heads.

“Rose, can you explain the notes found in your possession?” asked
the teacher.

“Yes, Miss Hill. They were written to me by different boys and
girls,” replied Rose.

“Why do you seem to have all these writings addressed to you?”

“I didn’t get any more than any other girl. But I wasn’t afraid
to keep mine.”

“Do you know where these verses came from, before Helen had
them?”

“Yes, Miss Hill.”

“Then you know who wrote them?”

“Yes.”

“Who?”

“I won’t tell,” replied Rose, deliberately. She looked straight
into her teacher’s eyes.

“You refuse when I’ve assured you I’ll be lenient?” demanded Miss
Hill.

“I’m no tattletale.” Rose’s answer was sullen.

“Rose, I ask you again. A great deal depends on your answer. Will
you tell me?”

The girl’s lip curled. Then she laughed in a way that made Miss
Hill think of her as older. But she kept silent.

“Rose, you’re expelled until further notice.” Miss Hill’s voice
trembled with disappointment and anger. “You may go now.”

Rose gathered up her books and went into the cloakroom. The door
in the outer hall opened and closed.

“Miss Hill, it wasn’t fair!” exclaimed Bessy Bell, hotly. “It
wasn’t fair. Rose is no worse than the other girls. She’s not as
bad, for she isn’t sly and deceitful. There were a dozen girls
who lied when they went out. Helen lied. Ruth lied. Gail lied.
But Rose told the truth so far as she went. And she wouldn’t tell
all because she wanted to shield me.”

“Why did she want to shield you?”

“Because I wrote the verses.”

“You mean you copied them?”

“I composed them,” Bessy replied coolly. Her blue eyes fearlessly
met Miss Hill’s gaze.

“Bessy Bell!” ejaculated the teacher.

The girl stood before her desk and from the tip of her dainty
boot to the crown of her golden hair breathed forth a strange,
wilful and rebellious fire.

Miss Hill’s lips framed to ask a certain question of Bessy, but
she refrained and substituted another.

“Bessy, how old are you?”

“Fifteen last April.”

“Have you any intelligent idea of—do you know—Bessy,
how did you write those verses?” asked Miss Hill, in
bewilderment.

“I know a good deal and I’ve imagination,” replied Bessy,
candidly.

“That’s evident,” returned the teacher. “How long has this
note-and verse-writing been going on?”

“For a year, at least, among us.”

“Then you caught the habit from girls gone higher up?”

“Certainly.”

Bessy’s trenchant brevity was not lost upon Miss Hill.

“We’ve always gotten along—you and I,” said Miss Hill,
feeling her way with this strange girl.

“It’s because you’re kind and square, and I like you.”

Something told the teacher she had never been paid a higher
compliment.

“Bessy, how much will you tell me?”

“Miss Hill, I’m in for it and I’ll tell you everything, if only
you won’t punish Rose,” replied the girl, impulsively. “Rose’s my
best friend. Her father’s a mean, drunken brute. I’m afraid of
what he’ll do if he finds out. Rose has a hard time.”

“You say Rose is no more guilty than the other girls?”

“Rose Clymer never had an idea of her own. She’s just sweet and
willing. I hate deceitful girls. Every one of them wrote notes to
the boys—the same kind of notes—and some of them
tried to write poetry. Most of them had a copy of the piece I
wrote. They had great fun over it—getting the boys to guess
what girl wrote it. I’ve written a dozen pieces before this and
they’ve all had them.”

“Well, that explains the verses…. Now I read in these notes
about meetings with the boys?”

“That refers to mornings before school, and after school, and
evenings when it’s nice weather. And the literary society.”

“You mean the Girl’s Literary Guild, with rooms at the Atheneum?”

“Yes. But, Miss Hill, the literary part of it is bunk. We meet
there to dance. The boys bring the girls cigarettes. They smoke,
and sometimes the boys have something with them to drink.”

“These—these girls—hardly in their teens—smoke
and drink?” gasped Miss Hill.

“I’ll say they do,” replied Bessy Bell.

“What—does the ‘Bell-garter’ mean?” went on the teacher,
presently.

“One of the boys stole my garter and fastened a little bell to
it. Now it’s going the rounds. Every girl who could has worn it.”

“What’s the ‘Old Bench’?”

“Down in the basement here at school there’s a bench under the
stairway in the dark. The boys and girls have signals. One boy
will get permission to go out at a certain time, and a girl from
his room, or another room, will go out too. It’s all arranged
beforehand. They meet down on the Old Bench.”

“What for?”

“They meet to spoon.”

“I find the names Hardy Mackay, Captain Thesel, Dick Swann among
these notes. What can these young society men be to my pupils?”

“Some of the jealous girls have been tattling to each other and
mentioning names.”

“Bessy! Do you imply these girls who talk have had the—the
interest or attention of these young gentlemen named?”

“Yes.”

“In what way?”

“I mean they’ve had dates to meet in the park—and other
places. Then they go joy riding.”

“Bessy, have you?”

“Yes—but only just lately.”

“Thank you Bessy, for your—your frankness,” replied Miss
Hill, drawing a long breath. “I’ll have another talk with you,
after I see your mother. You may go now.”

It was an indication of Miss Hill’s mental perturbation that for
once she broke her methodical routine. For many years she had
carried a lunch-basket to and from school; for so many in fact
that now on Saturdays when she went to town without it she
carried her left hand forward in the same position that had grown
habitual to her while holding it. But this afternoon, as she went
out, she forgot the basket entirely.

“I’ll go to Mrs. Bell,” soliloquized the worried schoolteacher.
“But how to explain what I can’t understand! Some people would
call this thing just natural depravity. But I love these girls.
As I think back, every year, in the early summer, I’ve always had
something of this sort of thing to puzzle over. But the last few
years it’s grown worse. The war made a difference. And since the
war—how strange the girls are! They seem to feel more.
They’re bolder. They break out oftener. They dress so immodestly.
Yet they’re less deceitful. They have no shame. I can blind
myself no longer to that. And this last is damning proof
of—of wildness. Some of them have taken the fatal step! …
Yet—yet I seem to feel somehow Bessy Bell isn’t bad.
I wonder if my hope isn’t responsible for that feeling. I’m
old-fashioned. This modern girl is beyond me. How clearly she
spoke! She’s a wonderful, fearless, terrible girl. I never saw a
girl so alive. I can’t—can’t understand her.”

In the swift swinging from one consideration of the perplexing
question to another Miss Hill’s mind naturally reverted to her
errand, and to her possible reception. Mrs. Bell was a proud
woman. She had married against the wishes of her blue-blooded
family, so rumor had it, and her husband was now Chief of Police
in Middleville. Mrs. Bell had some money of her own and was
slowly recovering her old position in society.

It was not without misgivings that Miss Hill presented herself at
Mrs. Bell’s door and gave her card to a servant. The teacher had
often made thankless and misunderstood calls upon the mothers of
her pupils. She was admitted and shown to a living room where a
woman of fair features and noble proportions greeted her.

“Bessy’s teacher, I presume?” she queried, graciously, yet with
just that slight touch of hauteur which made Miss Hill feel her
position.

“I am Bessy’s teacher,” she replied, with dignity. “Can you spare
me a few minutes?”

“Assuredly. Please be seated. I’ve heard Bessy speak of you. By
the way, the child hasn’t come home yet. How late she always is!”

Miss Hill realized, with a protest at the unfairness of the
situation, that to face this elegant lady, so smiling, so suave,
so worldly, so graciously superior, and to tell her some
unpleasant truths about her daughter, was a task by no means
easy, and one almost sure to prove futile. But Miss Hill never
shirked her duty, and after all, her motive was a hope to help
Bessy.

“Mrs. Bell, I’ve come on a matter of importance,” began Miss
Hill. “But it is so delicate a one I don’t know how to broach it.
I believe plain speaking best.”

Here Miss Hill went into detail, sparing not to call a spade a
spade. But she held back the names of the young society gentlemen
mentioned in the notes. Miss Hill was not sure of her ground
there and her revelation was grave enough for any intelligent
mother.

“Really, Miss Hill, you amaze me!” exclaimed Mrs. Bell. “Bessie
has fallen into bad company. Oh, these public schools! I never
attended one, but I’ve heard what they are.”

“The public schools are not to blame,” replied Miss Hill,
bluntly.

Mrs. Bell gave her visitor a rather supercilious stare.

“May I ask you to explain?”

“I’m afraid I can’t explain,” replied Miss Hill, conscious of a
little heat. “I’ve proofs of the condition. But as I can’t
understand it, how can I explain? I have my own peculiar ideas,
only, lately, I’ve begun to doubt them. A year or so ago I would
have said girls had their own way too much—too much time to
themselves—too much freedom. But now I seem to feel life
isn’t like what it was a few years ago. Girls are bound to learn.
And they never learn at home, that’s sure. The last thing a
mother will do is to tell her daughter what she ought to
know. There’s always been a shadow between most mothers and
daughters. And in these days of jazz it has become a wall.
Perhaps that’s why girls don’t confide in their mothers…. Mrs.
Bell, I considered it my duty to acquaint you with the truth
about these verses and notes, and what they imply. Would you care
to read some of them?”

“Thank you, but they wouldn’t interest me in the least,” replied
Mrs. Bell, coldly. “I wouldn’t insult Bessy or her girl friends.
I imagine it’s all some risque suggestion overheard and made much
of or a few verses mischievously plagiarized. I’m no prude, Miss
Hill. I know enough not to be strict, which is apparently the
fault of the school system. As for my own daughter I understand
her perfectly and trust her implicitly. I know the blood in her.
And I shall remove her from public school and place her in a
private institution under a tutor, where she’ll no longer be
exposed to contaminating influences…. I thank you for your
intention, which I’m sure is kind—and, will you please
excuse me? I must dress for my bridge party. Good afternoon, Miss
Hill.”

The schoolteacher plodded homeward, her eyes downcast and sad.
The snub given her by the mother had not hurt her as had the
failure to help the daughter.

“I knew it—I knew it. I’ll never try again. That woman’s
mind is a wilderness where her girl is concerned. How brainless
these mothers are!… Yet if I’d ever had a girl—I
wonder—would I have been blind? One’s own blood—that
must be the reason. Pride. Could I have believed of my
girl what I admitted of hers? Perhaps not till too late. That
would be so human. But, oh! the mystery—the sadness of
it—the fatality!”

Rose Clymer left the High School with the settled, indifferent
bitterness of one used to trouble. Every desire she followed,
turn what way she would, every impulse reaching to grasp some
girlish gleam of happiness, resulted in the inevitable rebuke.
And this time it had been disgrace. But Rose felt she did not
care if she could only deceive her father. No cheerful task was
it to face him. Shivering at the thought she resolved to elude
the punishment he was sure to inflict if he learned why she had
been expelled.

She had no twinge of conscience. She was used to slights and
unkindness, and did not now reflect upon the justice of her
dismissal. What little pleasure she got came from friendships
with boys, and these her father had forbidden her to have. In the
bitter web of her thought ran the threads that if she had pretty
clothes like Helen, and a rich mother like Bessy, and a father
who was not a drunkard, her lot in life would have been happy.

Rose lived with her stepfather in three dingy rooms in the mill
section of Middleville. She never left the wide avenues and lawns
and stately residences, which she had to pass on her way to and
from school, without contrasting them with the dirty alleys and
grimy walls and squalid quarters of the working-class. She had
grown up in that class, but in her mind there was always a faint
vague recollection of a time when her surroundings had been
bright and cheerful, where there had been a mother who had taught
her to love beautiful things. To-day she climbed the rickety
stairs to her home and pushed open the latchless door with a
revolt brooding in her mind.

A man in his shirt sleeves sat by the little window.

“Why father—home so early?” she asked.

“Yes lass, home early,” he replied wearily. “I’m losing my place
again.”

He had straggling gray hair, bleared eyes with an opaque, glazy
look and a bluish cast of countenance. His chin was buried in the
collar of his open shirt; his shoulders sagged, and he breathed
heavily.

One glance assured Rose her father was not very much under the
influence of drink. And fear left her. When even half-sober he
was kind.

“So you’ve lost your place?” she asked.

“Yes. Old Swann is layin’ off.”

This was an untruth, Rose knew, because the mills had never been
so full, and men never so in demand. Besides her father was an
expert at his trade and could always have work.

“I’m sorry,” she said, slowly. “I’ve been thinking lately that
I’ll give up school and go to work. In an office uptown or a
department store.”

“Rose, that’d be good of you,” he replied. “You could help along
a lot. I don’t do my work so well no more. But your poor mother
won’t rest in her grave. She was so proud of you, always
dreamin’.”

The lamp Rose lighted showed comfortless rooms, with but few
articles of furniture. It was with the deft fingers of long
practice that the girl spread the faded table-cloth, laid the
dishes, ground the coffee, peeled the potatoes, and cut the
bread. Then presently she called her father to the meal. He ate
in silence, having relapsed once more into the dull gloom natural
to him. When he had finished he took up his hat and with slow
steps left the room.

“No more study for me,” mused Rose, and she felt both glad and
sorry. “What will Bessy say? She won’t like it. I wonder what old
Hill did to her. Let her off easy. I won’t get to see Bessy so
much now. No more afternoons in the park. But I’ll have the
evenings. Best of all, some nice clothes to wear. I might some
day have a lovely gown like that Miss Maynard wore the night of
the Prom.”

Rose washed and dried the dishes, put them away, and cleaned up
the little kitchen in a way that spoke well for her. And she did
it cheerfully, for in the interest of this new idea of work she
forgot her trouble and discontent. Taking up the lamp she went to
her room. It contained a narrow bed, a bureau, a small wardrobe
and a rug. The walls held several pictures, and some touches of
color in the way of ribbons, bright posters, and an
orange-and-blue banner. A photograph of Bessy Bell stood on the
bureau and the girl’s beauty seemed like a light in the dingy
room.

Rose looked in the mirror and smiled and tossed her curly head.
She studied the oval face framed in its mass of curls, the steady
gray-blue eyes, the soft, wistful, tenderly curved lips. “Yes,
I’m pretty,” she said. “And I’m going to buy nice things to
wear.”

Suddenly she heard a pattering on the roof.

“Rain! What do you know about that? I’ve got to stay in. If I
spoil that relic of a hat I’ll never have the nerve to go ask for
a job.”

She prepared for bed, and placing the lamp on the edge of the
bureau, she lay down to become absorbed in a paper-backed novel.
The mill-clock was striking ten when she finished. There was a
dreamy light in her eyes and a glow upon her face.

“How grand to be as beautiful as she was and turn out to be an
heiress with blue blood, and a lovely mother, and handsome lovers
dying for her!”

Then she flung the novel against the wall.

“It’s only a book. It’s not true.”

Rose blew out the lamp and went to sleep.

During the night she dreamed that the principal of the High
School had called to see her father, and she awoke trembling.

The room was dark as pitch; the rain pattered on the roof; the
wind moaned softly under the eaves. A rat somewhere in the wall
made a creaking noise. Rose hated to awaken in the middle of the
night. She listened for her father’s breathing, and failing to
hear it, knew he had not yet come home. Often she was left alone
until dawn. She tried bravely to go to sleep again but found it
impossible; she lay there listening, sensitive to every little
sound. The silence was almost more dreadful than the stealthy
unknown noises of the night. Vague shapes seemed to hover over
her bed. Somehow to-night she dreaded them more. She was sixteen
years old, yet there abided with her the terror of the child in
the dark.

She cried out in her heart—why was she alone? It was so
dark, so silent. Mother! Mother!… She would never—never
say her prayers again!

The brazen-tongued mill clock clanged the hour of two, when
shuffling uncertain footsteps sounded on the hollow stairs. Rose
raised her head to listen. With slow, weary, dragging steps her
father came in. Then she lay back on the pillow with a sigh of
relief.

CHAPTER X

In the following week Rose learned that work was not to be had
for the asking. Her love of pretty things and a desire to be
independent of her father had occupied her mind to the exclusion
of a consideration of what might be demanded of a girl seeking a
position. She had no knowledge of stenography or bookkeeping; her
handwriting was poor. Moreover, references from former employers
were required and as she had never been employed, she was asked
for recommendations from the principal of her school. These, of
course, she could not supply. The stores of the better class had
nothing to offer her except to put her name on the waiting-list.

Finally Rose secured a place in a second-rate establishment on
Main Street. The work was hard; it necessitated long hours and
continual standing on her feet. Rose was not rugged enough to
accustom herself to the work all at once, and she was discharged.
This disheartened her, but she kept on trying to find other
employment.

One day in the shopping district, some one accosted her. She
looked up to see a young man, slim, elegant, with a curl of his
lips she remembered. He raised his hat.

“How do you do, Mr. Swann,” she answered.

“Rose, are you on the way home?”

“Yes.”

“Let’s go down this side street,” he said, throwing away his
cigarette. “I’ve been looking for you.”

They turned the corner. Rose felt strange to be walking alone
with him, but she was not embarrassed. He had danced with her
once. And she knew his friend Hardy Mackay.

“What’re you crying about?” he said.

“I’m not.”

“You have been then. What for?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“Come, tell me.”

“I—I’ve been disappointed.”

“What about?” He was persistent, and Rose felt that he must be
used to having his own way.

“It was about a job I didn’t get,” replied Rose, trying to laugh.

“So you’re looking for a job. Heard you’d been fired by old Hill.
Gail told me. I had her out last night in my new car.”

“I could go back to school. Miss Hill sent for me…. Was Bessy
with you and Gail?”

“No. Gail and I were alone. We had a dandy time…. Rose, will
you meet me some night and take a ride? It’ll be fine and cool.”

“Thank you, Mr. Swann. It’s very kind of you to ask me.”

“Well, will you go?” he queried, impatiently.

“No,” she replied, simply.

“Why not?”

“I don’t want to.”

“Well, that’s plain enough,” he said, changing his tone. “Say,
Rose, you’re in Clark’s store, aren’t you?”

“I was. But I lost the place.”

“How’s that?”

“I couldn’t stand on my feet all day. I fainted. Then he fired
me.”

“So you’re hunting for another job?” inquired Swann,
thoughtfully.

“Yes.”

“Sorry. It’s too bad a sweet kid like you has to work. You’re not
strong, Rose…. Well, I’ll turn off at this corner. You won’t
meet me to-night?”

“No, thanks.”

Swann pulled a gold case from his pocket, and extracting a
cigarette, tilted it in his lips as he struck a match. His face
wore a careless smile Rose did not like. He was amiable, but he
seemed so sure, so satisfied, almost as if he believed she would
change her mind.

“Rose, you’re turning me down cold, then?”

“Take it any way you like, Mr. Swann,” she replied. “Good day.”

Rose forgot him almost the instant her back was turned. He had
only annoyed her. And she had her stepfather to face, with news
of her discharge from the store. Her fears were verified; he
treated her brutally. Next day Rose went to work in a laundry.

And then, very soon it seemed, her school days, the merry times
with the boys, and Bessy—all were far back in the past. She
did not meet any one who knew her, nor hear from any one. They
had forgotten her. At night, after coming home from the laundry
and doing the housework, she was so tired that she was glad to
crawl into bed.

But one night a boy brought her a note. It was from Dick Swann.
He asked her to go to Mendleson’s Hall to see the
moving-pictures. She could meet him uptown at the entrance. Rose
told the boy to tell Swann she would not come.

This invitation made her thoughtful. If Swann had been ashamed to
be seen with her he would not have invited her to go there.
Mendleson’s was a nice place; all the nice people of Middleville
went there. Rose found herself thinking of the lights, the music,
the well-dressed crowd, and then the pictures. She loved
moving-pictures, especially those with swift horses and cowboys
and a girl who could ride. All at once a wave of the old
thrilling excitement rushed over her. Almost she regretted having
sent back a refusal. But she would not go with Swann. And it was
not because she knew what kind of a young man he was—what
he wanted. Rose refused from dislike, not scruples.

Then came a Saturday night which seemed a climax of her troubles.
She was told not to come back to work until further notice, and
that was as bad as being discharged. How could she tell her
stepfather? Of late he had been hard with her. She dared not tell
him. The money she earned was little enough, but during his
idleness it had served to keep them.

Rose had scarcely gone a block when she encountered Dick Swann.
He stopped her—turned to walk with her. It was a melancholy
gift of Rose’s that she could tell when men were even in the
slightest under the influence of drink. Swann was not careless
now or indifferent. He seemed excited and gay.

“Rose, you’re just the girl I’m looking for,” he said. “I really
was going to your home. Got that job yet?”

“No,” she replied.

“I’ve got one for you. It’s at the Telephone Exchange. They need
an operator. My dad owns the telephone company. I’ve got a pull.
I’ll get you the place. You can learn it easy. Nice
job—short hours—you sit down all the time—good
pay. What do you say, Rose?”

“I—I don’t know—what to say,” she faltered. “Thanks
for thinking of me.”

“I’ve had you in mind for a month. Rose, you take this job. Take
it whether you’ve any use for me or not. I’m not rotten enough to
put this in your way just to make you under obligations to me.”

“I’ll think about it. I—I do need a place. My father’s out
of work. And he’s—he’s not easy to get along with.”

“I tell you what, Rose. You meet me to-night. We’ll take a spin
in my car. It’ll be fine down the river road. Then we can talk it
over. Will you?”

Rose looked at him, and thought how strange it was that she did
not like him any better, now when she ought to.

“Why have you tried to—to rush me?” she asked.

“I like you, Rose.”

“But you don’t want me to meet you—go with you, when
I—I can’t feel as you do?”

“Sure, I want you to, Rose. Nobody ever likes me right off. Maybe
you will, after you know me. The job is yours. Don’t make any
date with me for that. I say here’s your chance to have a ride,
to win a friend. Take it or not. It’s up to you. I won’t say
another word.”

Rose’s hungry, lonely heart warmed toward Swann. He seemed like a
ray of light in the gloom.

“I’ll meet you,” she said.

They arranged the hour and then she went on her way home.

The big car sped through River Park. Rose shivered a little as
she peered into the darkness of the grove. Then the car shot
under the last electric light, out into the country, with the
level road white in the moonlight, and the river gleaming below.
There was a steady, even rush of wind. The car hummed and droned
and sang. And mingled with the dry scent of dust was the sweet
fragrance of new-mown hay. Far off a light twinkled or it might
have been a star.

Swann put his arm around Rose. She did not shrink—she did
not repulse him—she did not move. Something strange
happened in her mind or heart. It was that moment she fell.

And she fell wide-eyed, knowing what she was doing, not in a
fervor of excitement, without pleasure or passion, bitterly sure
that it was better to be with some one she could not like than to
be alone forever. The wrong to herself lay only in the fact that
she could not care.

CHAPTER XI

Toward the end of June, Lane’s long vigil of watchfulness from
the vantage-point at Colonel Pepper’s apartment resulted in a
confirmation of his worst fears.

One afternoon and evening of a warm, close day in early summer he
lay and crouched on the attic floor above the club-rooms from
three o’clock until one the next morning. From time to time he
had changed his position to rest. But at the expiration of that
protracted period of spying he was so exhausted from the physical
strain and mental shock that he was unable to go home. All the
rest of the night he lay upon Colonel Pepper’s couch, wide awake,
consumed by pain and distress. About daylight he fell into a
sleep, fitful and full of nightmares, to be awakened around nine
o’clock by Pepper. The old gambler evinced considerable alarm
until Lane explained how he happened to be there; and then his
feeling changed to solicitude.

“Lane, you look awful,” he said.

“If I look the way I feel it’s no wonder you’re shocked,”
returned Lane.

“Ahuh! What’d you see?” queried the other, curiously.

“When?”

“Why, you numskull, while you were peepin’ all that time.”

Lane sombrely shook his head. “I couldn’t tell—what I saw.
I want to forget…. Maybe in twenty-four hours I’ll believe it
was a nightmare.”

“Humph! Well, I’m here to tell you what I’ve seen wasn’t
any nightmare,” returned Pepper, with his shrewd gaze on Lane.
“But we needn’t discuss that. If it made an old bum like me sick
what might not it do to a sensitive high-minded chap like you….
The question is are you going to bust up that club.”

“I am,” declared Lane, grimly.

“Good! But how—when? What’s the sense in lettin’ them carry
on any longer?”

“I had to fight myself last night to keep from breaking in on
them…. But I want to catch this fellow Swann with my sister.
She wasn’t there.”

“Lane, don’t wait for that,” returned Pepper, nervously. “You
might never catch him…. And if you did….”

His little plump well-cared-for hand shook as he extended it.

“I don’t know what I’ll do…. I don’t know,” said Lane, darkly,
more to himself.

“Lane, this—this worry will knock you out.”

“No matter. All I ask is to stand up—long enough—to
do what I want to do.”

“Go home and get some breakfast—and take care of yourself,”
replied Pepper, gruffly. “Damn me if I’m not sorry I gave Swann’s
secret away.”

“Oh no, you’re not,” said Lane, quickly. “But I’d have found it
out by this time.”

Pepper paced up and down the faded carpet, his hands behind his
back, a plodding, burdened figure.

“Have you any—doubts left?” he asked, suddenly.

“Doubts!” echoed Lane, vaguely.

“Yes—doubts. You’re like most of these mothers and
fathers…. You couldn’t believe. You made excuses for the
smoke—saying there was no fire.”

“No more doubts, alas!… My God! I saw,” burst out Lane.

“All right. Buck up now. It’s something to be sure…. You’ve
overdone your strength. You look….”

“Pepper, do me a favor,” interposed Lane, as he made for the
door. “Get me an axe and leave it here in your rooms. In case I
want to break in on those fellows some
time—quick—I’ll have it ready.”

“Sure, I’ll get you anything. And I want to be around when you
butt in on them.”

“That’s up to you. Good-bye now. I’ll run in to-morrow if I’m up
to it.”

Lane went home, his mind in a tumult. His mother had just
discovered that he had not slept in his bed, and was greatly
relieved to see him. Breakfast was waiting, and after partaking
of it Lane felt somewhat better. His mother appeared more than
usually sombre. Worry was killing her.

“Lorna did not sleep at home last night,” she said, presently, as
if reluctantly forced to impart this information.

“Where was she?” he queried, blankly.

“She said she would stay with a friend.”

“What friend?”

“Some girl. Oh, it’s all right I suppose. She’s stayed away
before with girl friends…. But what worried me….”

“Well,” queried Lane, as she paused.

“Lorna was angry again last night. And she told me if you didn’t
stop your nagging she’d go away from home and stay. Said she
could afford to pay her board.”

“She told me that, too,” replied Lane, slowly. “And—I’m
afraid she meant it.”

“Leave her alone, Daren.”

“Poor mother! I’m afraid I’m a—a worry to you as well as
Lorna,” he said, gently, with a hand going to her worn cheek. She
said nothing, although her glance rested upon him with sad
affection.

Lane clambered wearily up to his little room. It had always been
a refuge. He leaned a moment against the wall, and felt in his
extremity like an animal in a trap. A thousand pricking, rushing
sensations seemed to be on the way to his head. That confusion,
that sensation as if his blood vessels would burst, yielded to
his will. He sat down on his bed. Only the physical pains and
weariness, and the heartsickness abided with him. These had been
nothing to daunt his spirit. But to-day was different. The dark,
vivid, terrible picture in his mind unrolled like a page.
Yesterday was different. To-day he seemed a changed man,
confronted by imperious demands. Time was driving onward fast.

As if impelled by a dark and sinister force, he slowly leaned
down to pull his bag from under the bed. He opened it, and drew
out his Colt’s automatic gun. Though the June day was warm this
big worn metal weapon had a cold touch. He did not feel that he
wanted to handle it, but he did. It seemed heavy, a thing of
subtle, latent energy, with singular fascination for him. It
brought up a dark flowing tide of memory. Lane shut his eyes, and
saw the tide flow by with its conflict and horror. The feel of
his gun, and the recall of what it had meant to him in terrible
hours, drove away a wavering of will, and a still voice that
tried to pierce his consciousness. It fixed his sinister
intention. He threw the gun on the bed, and rising began to pace
the floor.

“If I told what I saw—no jury on earth would convict me,”
he soliloquized. “But I’ll kill him—and keep my mouth
shut.”

Plan after plan he had pondered in mind—and talked over
with Blair—something to thwart Richard Swann—to give
Margaret the chance for happiness and love her heart
craved—to put out of Lorna’s way the evil influence that
had threatened her. Now the solution came to him. Sooner or later
he would catch Swann with his sister in an automobile, or at the
club rooms, or at some other questionable place. He knew Lorna
was meeting Swann. He had tried to find them, all to no avail.
What he might have done heretofore was no longer significant; he
knew what he meant to do now.

But all at once Lane was confronted with remembrance of another
thing he had resolved upon—equally as strong as his
determination to save Lorna—and it was his intention to
persuade Mel Iden to marry him.

He loved his sister, but not as he loved Mel Iden. Whatever had
happened to Lorna or might happen, she would be equal to it. She
had the boldness, the cool, calculating selfishness of the
general run of modern girls. Her reactions were vastly different
front Mel Iden’s. Lane had lost hope of saving Lorna’s soul. He
meant only to remove a baneful power from her path, so that she
might lean to the boy who wanted to marry her. When in his
sinister intent he divined the passionate hate of the soldier for
the slacker he refused to listen to his conscience. The way out
in Lorna’s case he had discovered. But what relation had this new
factor of his dilemma to Mel Iden? He could never marry her after
he had killed Swann.

Lane went to bed, and when he rested his spent body, he pondered
over every phase of the case. Reason and intelligence had their
say. He knew he had become morbid, sick, rancorous, base,
obsessed with this iniquity and his passion to stamp on it, as if
it were a venomous serpent. He would have liked to do some
magnificent and awful deed, that would show this little, narrow,
sordid world at home the truth, and burn forever on their
memories the spirit of a soldier. He had made a sacrifice that
few understood. He had no reward except a consciousness that grew
more luminous and glorious in its lonely light as time went on.
He had endured the uttermost agonies of hell, a thousand times
worse than death, and he had come home with love, with his faith
still true. To what had he returned?

No need for reason or intelligence to knock at the gates of his
passion! The war had left havoc. The physical, the sensual, the
violent, the simian—these instincts, engendering the Day of
the Beast, had come to dominate the people he had fought for. Why
not go out and deliberately kill a man, a libertine, a slacker?
He would still be acting on the same principle that imbued him
during the war.

His thoughts drifted to Mel Iden. Strange how he loved her! Why?
Because she was a lonely soul like himself—because she was
true to her womanhood—because she had fallen for the same
principle for which he had sacrificed all—because she had
been abandoned by family and friends—because she had become
beautiful, strange, mystic, tragic. Because despite the unnamed
child, the scarlet letter upon her breast, she seemed to him
infinitely purer than the girl who had jilted him.

Lane now surrendered to the enchantment of emotion embodied in
the very name of Mel Iden. He had long resisted a sweet,
melancholy current. He had driven Mel from his mind by bitter
reflection on the conduct of the people who had ostracized her.
Thought of her now, of what he meant to do, of the mounting love
he had so strangely come to feel for her, was his only source of
happiness. She would never know his secret love; he could never
tell her that. But it was something to hold to his heart, besides
that unquenchable faith in himself, in some unseen genius for
far-off good.

The next day Lane, having ascertained where Joshua Iden was
employed, betook himself that way just at the noon hour. Iden,
like so many other Middleville citizens, gained a livelihood by
working for the rich Swann. In his best days he had been a master
mechanic of the railroad shops; at sixty he was foreman of one of
the steel mills.

As it chanced, Iden had finished his noonday meal and was resting
in the shade, apart from other laborers there. Lane remembered
him, in spite of the fact that the three years had aged and bowed
him, and lined his face.

“Mr. Iden, do you remember me?” asked Lane. He caught the slight
averting of Iden’s eyes from his uniform, and divined how the
father of Mel Iden hated soldiers. But nothing could daunt Lane.

“Yes, Lane, I remember you,” returned Iden. He returned Lane’s
hand-clasp, but not cordially.

Lane had mapped out in his mind this little interview. Taking off
his hat, he carefully lowered himself until his back was propped
against the tree, and looked frankly at Iden.

“It’s warm. And I tire so easily. The damned Huns cut me to
pieces…. Not much like I was when I used to call on Mel!”

Iden lowered his shadowed face. After a moment he said: “No,
you’re changed, Lane…. I heard you were gassed, too.”

“Oh, everything came my way, Mr. Iden…. And the finish isn’t
far off.”

Iden shifted his legs uneasily, then sat more erect, and for the
first time really looked at Lane. It was the glance of a man who
had strong aversion to the class Lane represented, but who was
fair-minded and just, and not without sympathy.

“That’s too bad, Lane. You’re a young man…. The war hit us all,
I guess,” he said, and at the last, sighed heavily.

“It’s been a long pull—Blair Maynard and I were the first
to enlist, and we left Middleville almost immediately,” went on
Lane.

He desired to plant in Iden’s mind the fact that he had left
Middleville long before the wild era of soldier-and-girl
attraction which had created such havoc. Acutely sensitive as
Lane was, he could not be sure of an alteration in Iden’s
aloofness, yet there was some slight change. Then he talked
frankly about specific phases of the war. Finally, when he saw
that he had won interest and sympathy from Iden he abruptly
launched his purpose.

“Mr. Iden, I came to ask if you will give your consent to my
marrying Mel.”

The older man shrank back as if he had been struck. He stared.
His lower jaw dropped. A dark flush reddened his cheek.

“What!… Lane, you must be drunk,” he ejaculated, thickly.

“No. I never was more earnest in my life. I want to marry Mel
Iden.”

“Why?” rasped out the father, hoarsely.

“I understand Mel,” replied Lane, and swiftly he told his
convictions as to the meaning and cause of her sacrifice. “Mel is
good. She never was bad. These rotten people who see dishonor and
disgrace in her have no minds, no hearts. Mel is far above these
painted, bare-kneed girls who scorn her…. And I want to show
them what I think of her. I want to give her boy a
name—so he’ll have a chance in the world. I’ll not live
long. This is just a little thing I can do to make it easier for
Mel.”

“Lane, you can’t be the father of her child,” burst out Iden.

“No. I wish I were. I was never anything to Mel but a friend. She
was only a girl—seventeen when I left home.”

“So help me God!” muttered Iden, and he covered his face with his
hands.

“Say yes, Mr. Iden, and I’ll go to Mel this afternoon.”

“No, let me think…. Lane, if you’re not drunk, you’re crazy.”

“Not at all. Why, Mr. Iden, I’m perfectly rational. Why, I’d
glory in making that splendid girl a little happier, if it’s
possible.”

“I drove my—my girl from her mother—her home,” said
Iden, slowly.

“Yes, and it was a hard, cruel act,” replied Lane, sharply. “You
were wrong. You—”

The mill whistle cut short Lane’s further speech. When its shrill
clarion ended, Iden got up, and shook himself as if to
reestablish himself in the present.

“Lane, you come to my house to-night,” he said. “I’ve got to go
back to work…. But I’ll think—and we can talk it over. I
still live where you used to come as a boy…. How strange life
is!… Good day, Lane.”

Lane felt more than satisfied with the result of that interview.
Joshua Iden would go home and tell Mel’s mother, and that would
surely make the victory easier. She would be touched in her
mother’s heart; she would understand Mel now, and divine Lane’s
mission; and she would plead with her husband to consent, and to
bring Mel back home. Lane was counting on that. He must never
even hint such a hope, but nevertheless he had it, he believed in
it. Joshua Iden would have the scales torn from his eyes. He
would never have it said that a dying soldier, who owed neither
him nor his daughter anything, had shown more charity than he.

Therefore, Lane went early to the Iden homestead, a picturesque
cottage across the river from Riverside Park. The only change
Lane noted was a larger growth of trees and a fuller foliage. It
was warm twilight. The frogs had begun to trill, sweet and
melodious sound to Lane, striking melancholy chords of memory.
Joshua Iden was walking on his lawn, his coat off, his gray head
uncovered. Mrs. Iden sat on the low-roofed porch. Lane expected
to see a sad change in her, something the same as he had found in
his own mother. But he was hardly prepared for the frail,
white-haired woman unlike the image he carried in his mind.

“Daren Lane! You should have come to see me long ago,” was her
greeting, and in her voice, so like Mel’s, Lane recognized her.
Some fitting reply came to him, and presently the moment seemed
easier for all. She asked about his mother and Lorna, and then
about Blair Maynard. But she did not speak of his own health or
condition. And presently Lane thought it best to come to the
issue at hand.

“Mr. Iden, have you made up your mind to—to give me what I
want?”

“Yes, I have, Lane,” replied Iden, simply. “You’ve made me see
what Mel’s mother always believed, though she couldn’t make it
clear to me…. I have much to forgive that girl. Yet, if you,
who owe her nothing—who have wasted your life in vain
sacrifice—if you can ask her to be your wife, I can ask her
to come back home.”

That was a splendid, all-satisfying moment for Lane. By his own
grief he measured his reward. What had counted with Joshua Iden
had been his faith in Mel’s innate goodness. Then Lane turned to
the mother. In the dusk he could see the working of her sad face.

“God bless you, my boy!” she said. “You feel with a woman’s
heart. I thank you…. Joshua has already sent word for Mel to
come home. She will be back to-morrow…. You must come here to
see her. But, Daren, she will never marry you.”

“She will,” replied Lane.

“You do not know Mel. Even if you had only a day to live she
would not let you wrong yourself.”

“But when she learns how much it means to me? The army ruined
Mel, as it ruined hundreds of thousands of other girls. She will
let one soldier make it up to her. She will let me go to my death
with less bitterness.”

“Oh, my poor boy, I don’t know—I can’t tell,” she replied,
brokenly. “By God’s goodness you have brought about one miracle.
Who knows? You might change Mel. For you have brought something
great back from the war.”

“Mrs. Iden, I will persuade her to marry me,” said Lane. “And
then, Mr. Iden, we must see what is best for her and the
boy—in the future.”

“Aye, son. One lesson learned makes other lessons easy. I will
take Mel and her mother far away from Middleville—where no
one ever heard of us.”

“Good! You can all touch happiness again…. And now, if you and
Mrs. Iden will excuse me—I will go.”

Lane bade the couple good night, and slowly, as might have a lame
man, he made his way through the gloaming, out to the road, and
down to the bridge, where as always he lingered to catch the
mystic whispers of the river waters, meant only for his ear.
Stronger to-night! He was closer to that nameless thing. The
shadows of dusk, the dark murmuring river, held an account with
him, sometime to be paid. How blessed to fall, to float down to
that merciful oblivion.

CHAPTER XII

Several days passed before Lane felt himself equal to the
momentous interview with Mel Iden. After his call upon Mel’s
father and mother he was overcome by one of his sick, weak
spells, that happily had been infrequent of late. This one
confined him to his room. He had about fought and won it out,
when the old injury at the base of his spine reminded him that
misfortunes did not come singly. Quite unexpectedly, as he bent
over with less than his usual caution, the vertebra slipped out;
and Lane found his body twisted like a letter S. And the old pain
was no less terrible for its familiarity.

He got back to his bed and called his mother. She sent for Doctor
Bronson. He came at once, and though solicitous and kind he
lectured Lane for neglecting the osteopathic treatment he had
advised. And he sent his chauffeur for an osteopath.

“Lane,” said the little physician, peering severely down upon
him, “I didn’t think you’d last as long as this.”

“I’m tough, Doctor—hard to kill,” returned Lane, making a
wry face. “But I couldn’t stand this pain long.”

“It’ll be easier presently. We can fix that spine. Some good
treatments to strengthen ligaments, and a brace to wear—we
can fix that…. Lane, you’ve wonderful vitality.”

“A doctor in France told me that.”

“Except for your mental condition, you’re in better shape now
than when you came home.” Doctor Bronson peered at Lane from
under his shaggy brows, walked to the window, looked out, and
returned, evidently deep in thought.

“Boy, what’s on your mind?” he queried, suddenly.

“Oh, Lord! listen to him,” sighed Lane. Then he laughed. “My dear
Doctor, I have nothing on my mind—absolutely nothing….
This world is a beautiful place. Middleville is fine, clean,
progressive. People are kind—thoughtful—good. What
could I have on my mind?”

“You can’t fool me. You think the opposite of what you say….
Lane, your heart is breaking.”

“No, Doctor. It broke long ago.”

“You believe so, but it didn’t. You can’t give up…. Lane, I
want to tell you something. I’m a prohibitionist myself, and I
respect the law. But there are rare cases where whiskey will
effect a cure. I say that as a physician. And I am convinced now
that your case is one where whiskey might give you a fighting
chance.”

“Doctor! What’re you saying?” ejaculated Lane, wide-eyed with
incredulity.

Doctor Bronson enlarged upon and emphasized his statement.

“I might live!” whispered Lane. “My God!… But that is
ridiculous. I’m shot to pieces. I’m really tired of living. And I
certainly wouldn’t become a drunkard to save my life.”

At this juncture the osteopath entered, putting an end to that
intimate conversation. Doctor Bronson explained the case to his
colleague. And fifteen minutes later Lane’s body was again
straight. Also he was wringing wet with cold sweat and quivering
in every muscle.

“Gentlemen—your cure is—worse than—the
disease,” he panted.

Manifestly Doctor Branson’s interest in Lane had advanced beyond
the professional. His tone was one of friendship when he said,
“Boy, it beats hell what you can stand. I don’t know about you.
Stop your worry now. Isn’t there something you care for?”

“Yes,” replied Lane.

“Think of that, or it, or her, then to the exclusion of
all else. And give nature a chance.”

“Doctor, I can’t control my thoughts.”

“A fellow like you can do anything,” snapped Bronson. “There are
such men, now and then. Human nature is strange and manifold. All
great men do not have statues erected in their honor. Most of
them are unknown, unsung…. Lane, you could do anything—do
you hear me?—anything.”

Lane felt surprise at the force and passion of the practical
little physician. But he was not greatly impressed. And he was
glad when the two men went away. He felt the insidious approach
of one of his states of depression—the black mood—the
hopeless despair—the hell on earth. This spell had not
visited him often of late, and now manifestly meant to make up
for that forbearance. Lane put forth his intelligence, his
courage, his spirit—all in vain. The onslaught of gloom and
anguish was irresistible. Then thought of Mel Iden sustained
him—held back this madness for the moment.

Every hour he lived made her dearer, yet farther away. It was the
unattainableness of her, the impossibility of a fruition of love
that slowly and surely removed her. On the other hand, the image
of her sweet face, of her form, of her beauty, of her
movements—every recall of these physical things enhanced
her charm, and his love. He had cherished a delusion that it was
Mel Iden’s spirit alone, the wonderful soul of her, that had
stormed his heart and won it. But he found to his consternation
that however he revered her soul, it was the woman also who now
allured him. That moment of revelation to Lane was a catastrophe.
Was there no peace on earth for him? What had he done to be so
tortured? He had a secret he must hide from Mel Iden. He was
human, he was alone, he needed love, but this seemed madness. And
at the moment of full realization Doctor Bronson’s strange words
of possibility returned to haunt and flay him. He might live! A
fierce thrill like a flame leaped from his heart, along his
veins. And a shudder, cold as ice, followed it. Love would kill
his resignation. Love would add to his despair. Mel Iden could
never love him. He did not want her love. And yet, to live on and
on, with such love as would swell and mount from his agony, with
the barrier between them growing more terrible every day, was
more than he cared to face. He would rather die.

And so, at length, Lane’s black demon of despair overthrew even
his thoughts of Mel, and fettered him there, in darkness and
strife of soul. He was an atom under the grinding, monstrous
wheels of his morbid mood.

Sometime, after endless moments or hours of lying there, with
crushed breast, with locked thoughts hideous and forlorn, with
slow burn of pang and beat of heart, Lane heard a heavy thump on
the porch outside, on the hall inside, on the stairs.
Thump—thump, slow and heavy! It roused him. It drove away
the drowsy, thick and thunderous atmosphere of mind. It had a
familiar sound. Blair’s crutch!

Presently there was a knock on the door of his room and Blair
entered. Blair, as always, bright of eye, smiling of lip, erect,
proud, self-sufficient, inscrutable and sure. Lane’s black demon
stole away. Lane saw that Blair was whiter, thinner, frailer, a
little farther on that road from which there could be no turning.

“Hello, old scout,” greeted Blair, as he sat down on the bed
beside Lane. “I need you more than any one—but it kills me
to see you.”

“Same here, Blair,” replied Lane, comprehendingly.

“Gosh! we oughtn’t be so finicky about each other’s looks,”
exclaimed Blair, with a smile.

But neither Lane nor Blair made further reference to the subject.

Each from the other assimilated some force, from voice and look
and presence, something wanting in their contact with others.
These two had measured all emotions, spanned in little time the
extremes of life, plumbed the depths, and now saw each other on
the heights. In the presence of Blair, Lane felt an exaltation.
The more Blair seemed to fade away from life, the more luminous
and beautiful the light of his countenance. For Lane the crippled
and dying Blair was a deed of valor done, a wrong expiated for
the sake of others, a magnificent nobility in contrast to the
baseness and greed and cowardice of the self-preservation that
had doomed him. Lane had only to look at Blair to feel something
elevating in himself, to know beyond all doubt that the goodness,
the truth, the progress of man in nature, and of God in his soul,
must grow on forever.

Mel Iden had been in her home four days when Lane first saw her
there.

It was a day late in June when the rich, thick, amber light of
afternoon seemed to float in the air. Warm summer lay on the
land. The bees were humming in the rose vines over the porch.
Mrs. Iden, who evidently heard Lane’s step, appeared in the path,
and nodding her gladness at sight of him, she pointed to the open
door.

Lane halted on the threshold. The golden light of the day seemed
to have entered the room and found Mel. It warmed the pallor of
her skin and the whiteness of her dress. When he had seen her
before she had worn something plain and dark. Could a white gown
and the golden glow of June effect such transformation? She came
slowly toward him and took his hand.

“Daren, I am home,” was all she could say.

Long hours before Lane had braced himself for this ordeal. It was
himself he had feared, not Mel. He played the part he had created
for her imagination. Behind his composure, his grave, kind
earnestness, hid the subdued and scorned and unwelcome love that
had come to him. He held it down, surrounded, encompassed,
clamped, so that he dared look into her eyes, listen to her
voice, watch the sweet and tragic tremulousness of her lips.

“Yes, Mel, where you should be,” replied Lane.

“It was you—your offer to marry me—that melted
father’s heart.”

“Mel, all he needed was to be made think,” returned Lane. “And
that was how I made him do it.”

“Oh, Daren, I thank you, for mother’s sake, for mine—I
can’t tell you how much.”

“Mel, please don’t thank me,” he answered. “You understand, and
that’s enough. Now say you’ll marry me, Mel.”

Mel did not answer, but in the look of her eyes, dark, humid,
with mysterious depths below the veil, Lane saw the truth; he
felt it in the clasp of her hands, he divined it in all that so
subtly emanated from the womanliness of her. Mel had come to love
him.

And all that he had endured seemed to rise and envelop heart and
soul in a strange, cold stillness.

“Mel, will you marry me?” he repeated, almost dully.

Slowly Mel withdrew her hands. The query seemed to make her
mistress of herself.

“No, Daren, I cannot,” she replied, and turned away to look out
of a window with unseeing eyes. “Let us talk of other things….
My father says he will move away—taking me
and—and—all of us—as soon as he sells the
home.”

“No, Mel, if you’ll forgive me, we’ll not talk of something
else,” Lane informed her. “We can argue without quarreling. Come
over here and sit down.”

She came slowly, as if impelled, and she stood before him. To
Lane it seemed as if she were both supplicating and inexorable.

“Do you remember the last time we sat together on this couch?”
she asked.

“No, Mel, I don’t.”

“It was four years ago—and more. I was sixteen. You tried
to kiss me and were angry because I wouldn’t let you.”

“Well, wasn’t I rude!” he exclaimed, facetiously. Then he grew
serious. “Mel, do you remember it was Helen’s lying that came
between you and me—as boy and girl friends?”

“I never knew. Helen Wrapp! What was it?”

“It’s not worth recalling and would hurt you—now,” he
replied. “But it served to draw me Helen’s way. We were engaged
when she was seventeen…. Then came the war. And the other night
she laughed in my face because I was a wreck…. Mel, it’s beyond
understanding how things work out. Helen has chosen the fleshpots
of Egypt. You have chosen a lonelier and higher path…. And here
I am in your little parlor asking you to marry me.”

“No, no, no! Daren, don’t, I beg of you—don’t talk to me
this way,” she besought him.

“Mel, it’s a difference of opinion that makes arguments, wars and
other things,” he said, with a cruelty in strange antithesis to
the pity and tenderness he likewise felt. He could hurt her. He
had power over her. What a pang shot through his heart! There
would be an irresistible delight in playing on the emotions of
this woman. He could no more help it than the shame that surged
over him at consciousness of his littleness. He already loved
her, she was all he had left to love, he would end in a day or a
week or a month by worshipping her. Through her he was going to
suffer. Peace would now never abide in his soul.

“Daren, you were never like this—as a boy,” she said, in
wondering distress.

“Like what?”

“You’re hard. You used to be so—so gentle and nice.”

“Hard! I? Yes, Mel, perhaps I am—hard as war, hard as
modern life, hard as my old friends, my little
sister——” he broke off.

“Daren, do not mock me,” she entreated. “I should not have said
hard. But you’re strange to me—a something terrible flashes
from you. Yet it’s only in glimpses…. Forgive me, Daren, I
didn’t mean hard.”

Lane drew her down upon the couch so that she faced him, and he
did not release her hand.

“Mel, I’m softer than a jelly-fish,” he said. “I’ve no bone, no
fiber, no stamina, no substance. I’m more unstable than water.
I’m so soft I’m weak. I can’t stand pain. I lie awake in the dead
hours of night and I cry like a baby, like a fool. I weep for
myself, for my mother, for Lorna, for you….”

“Hush!” She put a soft hand over his lips.

“Very well, I’ll not be bitter,” he went on, with mounting pulse,
with thrill and rush of inexplicable feeling, as if at last had
come the person who would not be deaf to his voice. “Mel, I’m
still the boy, your schoolmate, who used to pull the bow off your
braid…. I am that boy still in heart, with all the war upon my
head, with the years between then and now. I’m young and old….
I’ve lived the whole gamut—the fresh call of war to youth,
glorious, but God! as false as stairs of sand—the change of
blood, hard, long, brutal, debasing labor of hands, of body, of
mind to learn to kill—to survive and kill—and go on
to kill…. I’ve seen the marching of thousands of
soldiers—the long strange tramp, tramp, tramp, the beat,
beat, beat, the roll of drums, the call of bugles, the boom of
cannon in the dark, the lightnings of hell flaring across the
midnight skies, the thunder and chaos and torture and death and
pestilence and decay—the hell of war. It is not sublime.
There is no glory. The sublimity is in man’s acceptance of war,
not for hate or gain, but love. Love of country, home,
family—love of women—I fought for women—for
Helen, whom I imagined my ideal, breaking her heart over me on
the battlefield. Not that Helen failed me, but failed the
ideal for which I fought!… My little sister Lorna! I fought for
her, and I fought for a dream that existed only in my heart.
Lorna—Alas!… I fought for other women, all
women—and you, Mel Iden. And in you, in your
sacrifice and your strength to endure, I find something healing
to my sore heart. I find my ideal embodied in you. I find hope
and faith for the future embodied in you. I find—”

“Oh Daren, you shame me utterly,” she protested, freeing her
hands in gesture of entreaty. “I am outcast.”

“To a false and rotten society, yes—you are,” he returned.
“But Mel, that society is a mass of maggots. It is such women as
you, such men as Blair, who carry the spirit onward…. So much
for that. I have spoken to try to show you where I hold you. I do
not call your—your trouble a blunder, or downfall, or
dishonor. I call it a misfortune because—because—”

“Because there was not love,” she supplemented, as he halted at
fault. “Yes, that is where I wronged myself, my soul. I obeyed
nature and nature is strong, raw, inevitable. She seeks only her
end, which is concerned with the species. For nature the
individual perishes. Nature cannot be God. For God has created a
soul in woman. And through the ages woman has advanced to hold
her womanhood sacred. But ever the primitive lurks in the blood,
and the primitive is nature. Soul and nature are not compatible.
A woman’s soul sanctions only love. That is the only progress
there ever was in life. Nature and war made me traitor to my
soul.”

“Yes, yes, Mel, it’s true—and cruel, what you say,”
returned Lane. “All the more reason why you should do what I ask.
I am home after the war. All that was vain is vain. I
forget it when I can. I have—not a great while left. There
are a few things even I can do before that time. One of
them—the biggest to me—concerns you. You are in
trouble. You have a boy who can be spared much unhappiness in
life. If you were married—if the boy had my name—how
different the future! Perhaps there can be some measure of
happiness for you. For him there is every hope. You will leave
Middleville. You will go far away somewhere. You are young. You
have a good education. You can teach school, or help your parents
while the boy is growing up. Time is kind. You will forget….
Marry me, Mel, for his sake.”

She had both hands pressed to her breast as if to stay an
uncontrollable feeling. Her eyes, dilated and wide, expressed a
blending of emotions.

“No, no, no!” she cried.

Lane went on just the same with other words, in other vein,
reiterating the same importunity. It was a tragic game, in which
he divined he must lose. But the playing of it had inexplicably
bitter-sweet pain. He knew now that Mel loved him. No greater
proof needed he than the perception of her reaction to one word
on his lips—wife. She quivered to that like a tautly strung
lyre touched by a skilful hand. It fascinated her. But the
temptation to accept his offer for the sake of her boy’s future
was counteracted by the very strength of her feeling for Lane.
She would not marry him, because she loved him.

Lane read this truth, and it wrung a deeper reverence from him.
And he saw, too, the one way in which he could break her spirit,
make her surrender, if he could stoop to it. If he could take her
in his arms, and hold her tight, and kiss her dumb and blind, and
make her understand his own love for her, his need of her, she
would accede with the wondrous generosity of a woman’s heart. But
he could not do it.

In the end, out of sheer pity that overcame the strange delight
he had in torturing her, he desisted in his appeals and demands
and subtle arguments. The long strain left him spent. And with
the sudden let-down of his energy, the surrender to her stronger
will, he fell prey at once to the sadness that more and more was
encompassing him. He felt an old and broken man.

To this sudden change in Lane Mel responded with mute anxiety and
fear. The alteration of his spirit stunned her. As he bade her
good-bye she clung to him.

“Daren, forgive me,” she implored. “You don’t understand…. Oh,
it’s hard.”

“Never mind, Mel. I guess it was just one of my dreams. Don’t
cry…. Good-bye.”

“But you’ll come again?” she entreated, almost wildly.

Lane shook his head. He did not trust himself to look at her
then.

“Daren, you can’t mean that,” she cried. “It’s too late for me.
I—I—Oh! You…. To uplift me—then to cast me
down! Daren, come back.”

In his heart he did not deny that cry of hers. He knew he would
come back, knew it with stinging shame, but he could not tell
her. It had all turned out so differently from what he had
dreamed. If he had not loved her he would not have felt defeat.
To have made her his wife would have been to protect her, to
possess her even after he was dead.

At the last she let him go. He felt her watching him, and he
carried her lingering clasp away with him, to burn and to thrill
and to haunt, and yet to comfort him in lonely hours.

But the next day the old spirit resurged anew, and unreconciled
to defeat, he turned to what was left him. Foolish and futile
hopes! To bank on the single grain of good in his wayward
sister’s heart! To trust the might of his spirit—to beat
down the influence of an intolerant and depraved young
millionaire—verily he was mad. Yet he believed. And as a
final resort he held death in his hand. Richard Swann swaggered
by Lane that night in the billiard room of the Bradford Inn and
stared sneeringly at him.

“I’ve got a date,” he gayly said to his sycophantic friends, in a
tone that would reach Lane’s ears.

The summer night came when Lane drove a hired car out the river
road, keeping ever in sight a red light in front of him. He broke
the law and endangered his life by traveling with darkened lamps.

There was a crescent moon, clear and exquisitely delicate in the
darkening blue sky. The gleaming river shone winding away under
the dusky wooded hills. The white road stretched ahead, dimming
in the distance. A night for romance and love—for a maiden
at a stile and a lover who hung rapt and humble upon her
whispers! But that red eye before him held no romance. It leered
as the luxurious sedan swayed from side to side, a diabolical
thing with speed.

Lane was driving out the state highway, mile after mile. He
calculated that in less than ten minutes Swann had taken a girl
from a bustling corner of Middleville out into the open country.
In pleasant weather, when the roads were good, cars like Swann’s
swerved off into the bypaths, into the edge of woods. In bad
weather they parked along the highway, darkened their lights and
pulled their blinds. For this, great factories turned out
automobiles. And there might have pealed out to a nation, and to
God, the dolorous cry of a hundred thousand ruined girls! But who
would hear? And on the lips of girls of the present there was
only the wild cry for excitement, for the nameless and unknown!
There was a girl in Swann’s car and Lane believed it was his
sister. Night after night he had watched. Once he had actually
seen Lorna ride off with Swann. And to-night from a vantage point
under the maples, when he had a car ready to follow, he had made
sure he had seen them again.

The red eye squared off at right angles to the highway, and
disappeared. Lane came to a byroad, a lane lined with trees. He
stopped his car and got out. It did not appear that he would have
to walk far. And he was right, for presently a black object
loomed against the gray obscurity. It was an automobile, without
lights, in the shadow of trees.

Lane halted. He carried a flash-light in his left hand, his gun
in his right. For a moment he deliberated. This being abroad in
the dark on an errand fraught with peril for some one had a
familiar and deadly tang. He was at home in this atmosphere. Hell
itself had yawned at his feet many and many a time. He was a
different man here. He deliberated because it was wise to
forestall events. He did not want to kill Swann then, unless in
self-defense. He waited until that peculiarly quick and tight and
cold settling of his nerves told of brain control over heart. Yet
he was conscious of subdued hate, of a righteous and terrible
wrath held in abeyance for the sake of his sister’s name. And he
regretted that he had imperiously demanded of himself this
assurance of Lorna’s wantonness.

Then he stole forward, closer and closer. He heard a low voice of
dalliance, a titter, high-pitched and sweet—sweet and wild.
That was not Lorna’s laugh. The car was not Swann’s.

Lane swerved to the left, and in the gloom of trees, passed by
noiselessly. Soon he encountered another car—an open car
with shields up—as silent as if empty. But the very silence
of it was potent of life. It cried out to the night and to Lane.
But it was not the car he had followed.

Again he slipped by, stealthily, yet scornful of his caution. Who
cared? He might have shouted his mission to the heavens. Lane
passed on. All he caught from the second car was a faint
fragrance of smoke, wafted on the gentle summer breeze.

Another black object loomed up—a larger car—the sedan
Lane recognized. He did not bolt or hurry. His footsteps made no
sound. Crouching a little he slipped round the car to one side.
At the instant he reached for the handle of the door, a pang
shook him. Alas, that he should be compelled to spy on Lorna! His
little sister! He saw her as a curly-headed child, adoring him.
Perhaps it might not be Lorna after all. But it was for her sake
that he was doing this. The softer moment passed and the soldier
intervened.

With one swift turn and jerk he opened the door—then
flashed his light. A scream rent the air. In the glaring circle
of light Lane saw red hair—green eyes transfixed in
fear—white shoulders—white arms—white ringed
hands suddenly flung upward. Helen! The blood left his heart in a
rush. Swann blinked in the light, bewildered and startled.

“Swann, you’ll have to excuse me,” said Lane, coolly. “I thought
you had my sister with you. I’ve spotted her twice with you in
this car…. It may not interest you or your—your guest,
but I’ll add that you’re damned lucky not to have Lorna here
to-night.”

Then he snapped off his flash-light, and slamming the car door,
he wheeled away.

CHAPTER XIII

Lane left his room and went into the shady woods, where he
thought the July heat would be less unendurable, where the fever
in his blood might abate. But though it was cool and pleasant
there he experienced no relief. Wherever he went he carried the
burden of his pangs. And his grim giant of unrest trod in his
shadow.

He could not stay long in the woods. He betook himself to the
hills and meadows. Action was beneficial for him, though he soon
exhausted himself. He would have liked to fight out his battle
that day. Should he go on spending his days and nights in a
slowly increasing torment? The longer he fought the less chance
he had of victory. Victory! There could be none. What victory
could be won over a strange ineradicable susceptibility to the
sweetness, charm, mystery of a woman? He plodded the fragrant
fields with bent head, in despair. Loneliness hurt him as much as
anything. And a new pang, the fiercest and most insupportable,
had been added to his miseries. Jealousy! Thought of the father
of Mel Iden’s child haunted him, flayed him, made him feel
himself ignoble and base. There was no help for that. And this
fiend of jealousy added fuel to his love. Only long passionate
iteration of his assurance of principle and generosity subdued
that frenzy and at length gave him composure. Perhaps this had
some semblance to victory.

Lane returned to town weaker in one way than when he had left,
yet stronger in another. Upon the outskirts of Middleville he
crossed the river road and sat down upon a stone wall. The
afternoon was far spent and the sun blazing red. Lane wiped his
moist face and fanned himself with his hat. Behind him the shade
of a wooded garden or park looked inviting. Back in the foliage
he espied the vine-covered roof of an old summer house.

A fresh young voice burst upon his meditations. “Hello, Daren
Lane.”

Lane turned in surprise to behold a girl in white, standing in
the shade of trees beyond the wall. Somewhere he had seen that
beautiful golden head, the dark blue, almost purple eyes.

“Good afternoon. You startled me,” said Lane.

“I called you twice.”

“Indeed? I beg pardon. I didn’t hear.”

“Don’t you remember me?” Her tone was one of pique and doubt.

Then he remembered her. “Oh, of course. Bessy Bell! You must
forgive me. I’ve been ill and upset lately. These bad spells of
mine magnify time. It seems long since the Junior Prom.”

“Oh, you’re ill,” she returned, compassionately. “You do look
pale and—won’t you come in? It’s dusty and hot there. Come.
I’ll take you where it’s nice and cool.”

“Thank you. I’ll be glad to.”

She led him to a green, fragrant nook, where a bench with
cushions stood half-hidden under heavy foliage. Lane caught a
glimpse of a winding flagged path, and in the distance a cottage
among the trees.

“Bessy, do you live here?” he asked. “It’s pretty.”

“Yes, this is my home. It’s too damn far from town, I’ll say. I’m
buried alive,” she replied, passionately.

The bald speech struck Lane forcibly. All at once he remembered
Bessy Bell and his former interest. She was a type of the
heretofore inexplicable modern girl. Lane looked at her, seeing
her suddenly with a clearer vision. Bessy Bell had a physical
perfection, a loveliness that needed neither spirit nor
animation. But life had given this girl so much more than beauty.
A softness of light seemed to shine round her golden head; smiles
played in secret behind her red lips ready to break forth, and
there was a haunting hint of a dimple in her round cheek; on her
lay the sweetness of youth subtly dawning into womanhood; the
flashing eyes were keen with intellect, with fire, full of
promise and mystic charm; and her beautiful, supple body, so
plainly visible, seemed quivering with sheer, restless joy of
movement and feeling. A trace of artificial color on her face and
the indelicacy of her dress but slightly counteracted Lane’s
first impression.

“You promised to call me up and make a date,” she said, and sat
down close to him.

“Yes. I meant it too. But Bessy, I was ill, and then I forgot.
You didn’t miss much.”

“Hot dog! Hear the man. Daren, I’d throw the whole bunch down to
be with you,” she exclaimed.

At the end of that speech she paled slightly and her breath came
quickly. She looked bold, provocative, expectant, yet sincere.
Child or woman, she had to be taken seriously. Here indeed was
the mystery that had baffled Lane. He realized his opportunity,
like a flash all his former thought and conjecture about this
girl returned to him.

“You would. Well, I’m highly flattered. Why, may I ask?”

“Because I’ve fallen for you,” she replied, leaning close to him.
“That’s the main reason, I guess…. But another is, I want you
to tell me all about yourself—in the war, you know.”

“I’d be glad to—if we get to be real friends,” he said,
thoughtfully. “I don’t understand you.”

“And I’ll say I don’t just get you,” she retorted. “What do you
want? Have you forgotten the silver platter?”

She turned away with a restless quivering. She had shown no
shyness. She was bold, intense, absolutely without fear; and
however stimulating or attractive the situation evidently was, it
was neither new nor novel to her. Some strange leaven worked deep
in her. Lane could put no other interpretation on her words and
actions than that she expected him to kiss her.

“Bessy Bell, look at me,” said Lane, earnestly. “You’ve said a
mouthful, as the slang word goes. I’m sort of surprised, you
remember. Bessy, you’re not a girl whose head is full of
excelsior. You’ve got brains. You can think…. Now, if you
really like me—and I believe you—try to understand
this. I’ve been away so long. All is changed. I don’t know how to
take girls. I’m ill—and unhappy. But if I could be your
friend and could help you a little—please you—why
it’d be good for me.”

“Daren, they tell me you’re going to die,” she returned,
breathlessly. Her glance was brooding, dark, pregnant with purple
fire.

“Bessy, don’t believe all you hear. I’m not—not so far gone
yet.”

“They say you’re game, too.”

“I hope so, Bessy.”

“Oh, you make me think. You must believe me a pill. I wanted you
to—to fall for me hard…. That bunch of sapheads have
spoiled me, I’ll say. Daren, I’m sick of them. All they want to
do is mush. I like tennis, riding, golf. I want to do things. But
it’s too hot, or this, or that. Yet they’ll break their necks to
carry a girl off to some roadhouse, and dance—dance till
you’re melted. Then they stop along the river to go bathing. I’ve
been twice. You see, I have to sneak away, or lie to mother and
say I’ve gone to Gail’s or somewhere.”

“Bathing, at night?” queried Lane, curiously.

“Sure thing. It’s spiffy, in the dark.”

“Of course you took your bathing suits?”

“Hot dog! That would be telling.”

Lane dropped his head and studied the dust at his feet. His heart
beat thick and heavy. Through this girl the truth was going to be
revealed to him. It seemed on the moment that he could not look
into her eyes. She scattered his wits. He tried to erase from his
mind every impression of her, so that he might begin anew to
understand her. And the very first, succeeding this erasure, was
a singular idea that she was the opposite of romantic.

“Bessy, can you understand that it is hard for a soldier to talk
of what has happened to him?”

“I’ll say I can,” she replied.

“You’re sorry for me?” he went on, gently.

“Sorry!… Give me a chance to prove what I am, Daren Lane.”

“Very well, then. I will. We’ll make a fifty-fifty bargain. Do
you regard a promise sacred?”

“I think I do. Some of the girls quarrel with me because I get
sore, and swear they’re not square, as I try to be. I hate a liar
and a quitter.”

“Come then—shake hands on our bargain.”

She seemed thrilled, excited. The clasp of her little hand showed
force of character. She looked wonderingly up at him. Her appeal
then was one of exquisite youth and beauty. Something of the
baffling suggestion of an amorous expectation and response left
her. This child would give what she received.

“First, then, it’s for me to know a lot about you,” went on Lane.
“Will you tell me?”

“Sure. I’d trust you with anything,” she replied, impulsively.

“How long have you been going with boys?”

“Oh, for two years, I guess. I had a passionate love affair when
I was thirteen,” she replied, with the nonchalance and
sophistication of experience.

It was impossible for Lane to take this latter remark for
anything but the glib boldness of an erotic child. But he was not
making any assurances to himself that he was right. Bessy Bell
was fifteen years old, according to time. But she had the
physical development of eighteen, and a mental range beyond his
ken. The lawlessness unleashed by the war seemed embodied in this
girl.

“With an older boy?” queried Lane.

“No. He was a kid of my own age. I guess I outgrew Ted,” she
replied, dreamily. “But he still tries to rush me.”

“With whom do you go to the secret club-rooms—above White’s
ice cream parlor?” asked Lane, abruptly.

Bessy never flicked an eyelash. “Hot dog! So you’re wise to that?
I thought it was a secret. I told Rose Clymer those fellows
weren’t on the level. Who told you I was there? Your sister
Lorna?”

“No. No one told me. Never mind that. Who took you there? You
needn’t be afraid to trust me. I’m going to entrust my
secrets to you by and bye.”

“I went with Roy Vancey, the boy who was with me at Helen’s the
day I met you.”

“Bessy, how often have you been to those club-rooms?”

“Three times.”

“Were you ever there alone without any girls?”

“No. I had my chance. Dick Swann tried his damnedest to get me to
go. But I’ve no use for him.”

“Why?”

“I just don’t like him, Daren,” she replied, evasively. “I love
to have fun. But I haven’t yet been so hard up I had to go out
with some one I didn’t like.”

“Has Swann had my sister Lorna at the club?”

Her replies had been prompt and frank. At this sudden query she
seemed checked. Lane read in Bessy Bell then more of the truth of
her than he had yet divined. Falsehood was naturally abhorrent to
her. To lie to her parents or teachers savored of fun, and was
part of the game. She did not want to lie to Lane, but in her
code she could not betray another girl, especially to that girl’s
brother.

“Daren, I promised I’d tell you all about myself,” she said.

“I shouldn’t have asked you to give away one of your friends,” he
returned. “Some other time I’ll talk to you about Lorna. Tell you
what I know, and ask you to help me save her——”

“Save her! What do you mean, Daren?” she interrupted, with
surprise.

“Bessy, I’ve paid you the compliment of believing you have
intelligence. Hasn’t it occurred to you that Lorna—or other
of her friends or yours—might be going straight to ruin?”

“Ruin! No, that hadn’t occurred to me. I heard Doctor Wallace
make a crack like yours. Mother hauled me to church the Sunday
after you broke up Fanchon Smith’s dance. Doctor Wallace didn’t
impress me. These old people make me sick anyhow. They don’t
understand…. But Daren, I think I get your drift. So snow some
more.”

All in a moment, it seemed to Lane, this girl passed from
surprise to gravity, then to contempt, and finally to humor. She
was fascinating.

“To go back to the club,” resumed Lane. “Bessy, what did you do
there?”

“Oh, we toddled and shimmied. Cut up! Had an immense time, I’ll
say.”

“What do you mean by cut up?”

“Why, we just ran wild, you know. Fool stunts!… Once Roy was
sore because I kicked cigarettes out of Bob’s mouth. But the boob
was tickled stiff when I kicked for him. Jealous! It’s all
right with any one of the boys what you do for him. But if
you do the same for another boy—good night!”

Bessy had no divination of the fact that her words for Lane had a
clarifying significance.

“I suppose you played what we used to call kissing games?”
queried Lane.

A sweet, high trill of laughter escaped Bessy’s red lips.

“Daren, you are funny. Those games are as dead as Caesar…. This
bunch of boys and girls paired off by themselves to spoon…. As
for myself, I don’t mind spooning if I like the fellow—and
he hasn’t been drinking. But otherwise I hate it. All the same I
got what was coming to me from some of the boys of the Strong Arm
Club.”

“Why do they give it that name?” asked Lane, remembering Colonel
Pepper’s remarks.

“Why, if a girl doesn’t come across she gets the strong arm…. I
had to fight like the devil that last afternoon I went there.”

“Did you fight, Bessy?”

“I’ll say I did…. Roy Vancey is sore as a pup. He hasn’t been
near me or called me up since.”

“Bessy, will you promise to stay away from that place—and
not to go joy-riding with any of those boys—day or
night—if I meet you, and tell you all about my experience
in the war? I’ll do my best to keep the time you spend with me
from being tedious.”

“It’s another bargain,” she returned deliberately, “if you just
don’t spend enough time with me to make me stuck on
you—then throw me down. On the level, now, Daren?”

“I’ll meet you as often as you want. And I’ll be your friend as
long as you prove to me I can be of any help, or pleasure, or
good to you.”

“Hot dog, but you’re taking some job, Daren. Won’t it be just
spiffy? We’ll meet here, afternoons, and evenings when mother’s
out. She’s nutty on bridge. She makes me promise I won’t leave
the yard. So I’ll not have to lie to meet you…. Daren, that day
at Helen’s, the minute I saw you I knew you were going to have
something to do with my future.”

“Bessy, a little while ago I made sure you had no romance in
you,” replied Lane, with a smile. “Now as we’ve gotten serious,
let’s think hard about the future. What do you want most? Do you
care for study, for books? Have you any gift for music? Do you
ever think of fitting yourself for useful work?… Or is your
mind full of this jazz stuff? Do you just want to go from day to
day, like a butterfly from flower to flower? Just this boy and
that one—not caring much which—all this frivolity you
hinted of, and worse, living this precious time of your youth all
for excitement? What is it you want most?”

She responded with a thoughtfulness that inspired Lane’s hope for
her. This girl could be reached. She was like Lorna in many ways,
but different in mentality. Bessy watched the gyrations of her
shapely little foot. She could not keep still even in
abstraction.

“A girl must have a good time,” she replied presently.
“I’ve done things I hated because I couldn’t bear to be left out
of the fun…. But I like most to read and dream. Music makes me
strange inside, and to want to do great things. Only there
are no great things to do. I’ve never been nutty about a
career, like Helen is. And I always hated work…. I
guess—to tell on the level—what I want most is to be
loved.”

With that she raised her eyes to Lane’s. He tried to read her
mind, and realized that if he failed it was not because she was
not baring it. Dropping his own gaze, he pondered. The girl’s
response to his earnestness was intensely thought-provoking. No
matter how immodestly she was dressed, or what she had confessed
to, or whether she had really expected and desired dalliance on
his part—here was the truth as to her hidden yearning. The
seething and terrible Renaissance of the modern girl seemed
remarkably exemplified in Bessy Bell, yet underneath it all hid
the fundamental instinct of all women of all ages. Bessy wanted
most to be loved. Was that the secret of her departure from the
old-fashioned canons of modesty and reserve?

“Bessy,” went on Lane, presently. “I’ve heard my sister speak of
Rose Clymer. Is she a friend of yours, too?”

“You bet. And she’s the square kid.”

“Lorna told me she’d been expelled from school.”

“Yes. She refused to tattle.”

“Tattle what?”

“I wrote some verses which one of the girls copied. Miss Hill
found them and raised the roof. She kept us all in after school.
She let some of the girls off. But she expelled Rose and sent me
home. Then she called on mama. I don’t know what she said, but
mama didn’t let me go back. I’ve had a hateful old tutor for a
month. In the fall I’m going to private school.”

“And Rose?”

“Rose went to work. She had a hard time. I never heard from her
for weeks. But she’s a telephone operator at the Exchange now.
She called me up one day lately and told me. I hope to see her
soon.”

“About those verses, Bessy. How did Miss Hill find out who wrote
them?”

“I told her. Then she sent me home.”

“Have you any more verses you wrote?”

“Yes, a lot of them. If you lend me your pencil, I’ll write out
the verse that gave Miss Hill heart disease.”

Bessy took up a book that had been lying on the seat, and tearing
out the fly-leaf, she began to write. Her slim, shapely hand
flew. It fascinated Lane.

“There!” she said, ending with a flourish and a smile.

But Lane, foreshadowing the import of the verse, took the page
with reluctance. Then he read it. Verses of this significance
were new to him. Relief came to Lane in the divination that Bessy
could not have had experience of what she had written. There was
worldliness in the verse, but innocence in her eyes.

“Well, Bessy, my heart isn’t much stronger than Miss Hill’s,” he
said, finally.

Her merry laughter rang out.

“Bessy, what will you do for me?”

“Anything.”

“Bring me every scrap of verse you have, every note you’ve got
from boys and girls.”

“Shall I get them now?”

“Yes, if it’s safe. Of course, you’ve hidden them.”

“Mama’s out. I won’t be a minute.”

Away she flew under the trees, out through the rose bushes, a
white, graceful, flitting figure. She vanished. Presently she
came bounding into sight again and handed Lane a bundle of notes.

“Did you keep back any?” he asked, as he tried to find pockets
enough for the collection.

“Not one.”

“I’ll go home and read them all. Then I’ll meet you here to-night
at eight o’clock.”

“But—I’ve a date. I’ll break it, though.”

“With whom?”

“Gail and a couple of boys—kids.”

“Does your mother know?”

“I’d tell her about Gail, but that’s all. We go for ice
cream—then meet the boys and take a walk.”

“Bessy, you’re not going to do that sort of thing any more.”

Lane bent over her, took her hands. She instinctively rebelled,
then slowly yielded.

“That’s part of our bargain?” she asked.

“Yes, it certainly is.”

“Then I won’t ever again.”

“Bessy, I trust you. Do you understand me?”

“I—I think so.”

“Daren, will you care for me—if I’m—if I do as you
want me to?”

“I do now,” he replied. “And I’ll care a thousand times more when
you prove you’re really above these things…. Bessy, I’ll care
for you as a friend—as a brother—as a man who has
almost lost his faith and who sees in you some hope to keep his
spirit alive. I’m unhappy, Bessy. Perhaps you can help
me—make me a little happier…. Anyway, I trust you.
Good-bye now. To-night, at eight o’clock.”

Lane went home to his room and earnestly gave himself up to the
perusal of the writings Bessy Bell had given him. He experienced
shocks of pain and wonder, between which he had to laugh. All the
fiendish wit of youthful ingenuity flashed forth from this verse.
There was a parody on Tennyson’s “Break, Break, Break,” featuring
Colonel Pepper’s famous and deplorable habit. Miss Hill came in
for a great share of opprobrium. One verse, if it had ever come
under the eyes of the good schoolteacher, would have broken her
heart.

Lane read all Bessy’s verses, and then the packet of notes
written by Bessy’s girl friends. The truth was unbelievable. Yet
here were the proofs. Over Bessy and her friends Lane saw the dim
dark shape of a ghastly phantom, reaching out, enfolding,
clutching. He went downstairs to the kitchen and here he burned
the writings.

“It ought to be told,” he muttered. “But who’s going to tell it?
Who’d believe me? The truth would not be comprehended by the
mothers of Middleville…. And who’s to blame?”

It would not do, Lane reflected, to place the blame wholly upon
blind fathers and mothers, though indeed they were culpable. And
in consideration of the subject, Lane excluded all except the
better class of Middleville. It was no difficult task to
understand lack of moral sense in children who were poor and
unfortunate, who had to work, and get what pleasures they had in
the streets. But how about the best families, where there were
luxurious homes, books, education, amusement, kindness,
love—all the supposed stimuli needed for the proper
guidance of changeful vagrant minds? These good influences had
failed. There was a greater moral abandonment than would ever be
known.

Before the war Bessy Bell would have presented the perfect type
of the beautiful, highly sensitive, delicately organized girl so
peculiarly and distinctively American. She would have ripened
before her time. Perhaps she would not have been greatly
different in feeling from the old-fashioned girl: only different
in that she had restraint, no deceit.

But after the war—now—what was Bessy Bell? What
actuated her? What was the secret spring of her abnormal
tendencies? Were they abnormal? Bessy was wild to abandon herself
to she knew not what. Some glint of intelligence, some force of
character as exceptional in her as it was wanting in Lorna, some
heritage of innate sacredness of person, had kept Bessy from the
abyss. She had absorbed in mind all the impurities of the day,
but had miraculously escaped them in body. If her parents could
have known Bessy as Lane now realized her they would have been
horrified. But Lane’s horror was fading. Bessy was illuminating
the darkness of his mind.

To understand more clearly what the war had done to Bessy Bell,
and to the millions of American girls like her, it was necessary
for Lane to understand what the war had done to soldiers, to men,
and to the world.

Lane could grasp some infinitesimal truth of the sublime and
horrible change war had wrought in the souls of soldiers. That
change was too great for any mind but the omniscient to grasp in
its entirety. War had killed in some soldiers a belief in Christ:
in others it had created one. War had unleashed the old hidden
primitive instincts of manhood: likewise it had fired hearts to
hate of hate and love of love, to the supreme ideal consciousness
could conceive. War had brought out the monstrous in men and as
well the godlike. Some soldiers had become cowards; others,
heroes. There were thousands of soldiers who became lions to
fight, hyenas to snarl, beasts to debase, hogs to wallow. There
were equally as many who were forced to fight, who could not
kill, whose gentleness augmented under the brutal orders of their
officers. There were those who ran toward the front, heads up,
singing at the top of their lungs. There were those who slunk
back. Soldiers became cold, hard, materialistic, bitter,
rancorous: and qualities antithetic to these developed in their
comrades.

Lane exhausted his resources of memory and searched in his notes
for a clipping he had torn from a magazine. He reread it, in the
light of his crystallizing knowledge:

So then the war brought to the souls of soldiers an extremity of
debasement and uplift, a transformation incomprehensible to the
mind of man.

Upon men outside the service the war pressed its materialism. The
spiritual progress of a thousand years seemed in a day to have
been destroyed. Self-preservation was the first law of nature.
And all the standards of life were abased. Following the terrible
fever of patriotism and sacrifice and fear came the inevitable
selfishness and greed and frenzy. The primitive in man stalked
forth. The world became a place of strife.

What then, reflected Lane, could have been the effect of war upon
women? The mothers of the race, of men! The creatures whom
emotions governed! The beings who had the sex of tigresses! “The
female of the species!” What had the war done to the generation
of its period—to Helen, to Mel Iden, to Lorna, to Bessy
Bell? Had it made them what men wanted?

At eight o’clock that night Lane kept his tryst with Bessy. The
serene, mellow light of the moon shone down upon the garden. The
shade appeared spotted with patches of moonlight; the summer
breeze rustled the leaves; the insects murmured their night song.
Romance and beauty still lived. No war could kill them. Bessy
came gliding under the trees, white and graceful like a nymph,
fearless, full of her dream, ripe to be made what a man would
make of her.

Lane talked to Bessy of the war. Words came like magic to his
lips. He told her of the thunder and fire and blood and heroism,
of fight and agony and death. He told her of himself—of his
service in the hours that tried his soul. Bessy passed from
fascinated intensity to rapture and terror. She clung to Lane.
She kissed him. She wept.

He told her how his ideal had been to fight for Helen, for Lorna,
for her, and all American girls. And then he talked about what he
had come home to—of the shock—the
realization—the disappointment and grief. He spoke of his
sister Lorna—how he had tried so hard to make her see, and
had failed. He importuned Bessy to help him as only a girl could.
And lastly, he brought the conversation back to her and told her
bluntly what he thought of the vile verses, how she dragged her
girlhood pride in the filth and made of herself a byword for
vicious boys. He told her the truth of what real men thought and
felt of women. Every man had a mother. No war, no unrest, no
style, no fad, no let-down of morals could change the truth. From
the dark ages women had climbed on the slow realization of
freedom, honor, chastity. As the future of nations depended upon
women, so did their salvation. Women could never again be
barbarians. All this modern license was a parody of love. It must
inevitably end in the degradation and unhappiness of those of the
generation who persisted on that downward path. Hard indeed it
would be to encounter the ridicule of girls and the indifference
of boys. But only through the intelligence and courage of one
could there ever be any hope for the many.

Lane sat there under the moonlit maples and talked until he was
hoarse. He could not rouse a sense of shame in Bessy, because
that had been atrophied, but as he closely watched her, he
realized that his victory would come through the emotion he was
able to arouse in her, and the ultimate appeal to the clear logic
of her mind.

When the time came for him to go she stood before him in the
clear moonlight.

“I’ve never been so excited, so scared and sick, so miserable and
thoughtful in all my life before,” she said. “Daren, I know now
what a soldier is. What you’ve seen—what you’ve done. Oh!
it was grand! … And you’re going to be my—my friend….
Daren, I thought it was great to be bad. I thought men liked a
girl to be bad. The girls nicknamed me Angel Bell, but not
because I was an angel, I’ll tell the world…. Now I’m going to
try to be the girl you want me to be.”

CHAPTER XIV

The time came when Daren had to make a painful choice. His sister
Lorna grew weary of his importunities and distrustful of his
espionage. One night she became violent and flatly told him she
would not stay in the house another day with him in it. Then she
ran out, slamming the door behind her. Lane remained awake all
night, in the hope that she would return. But she did not. And
then he knew he must make a choice.

He made it. Lorna must not be driven from her home. Lane divided
his money with his mother and packed his few effects. Mrs. Lane
was distracted over the situation. She tried to convince Lane
there was some kind of a law to keep a young girl home. She
pleaded and begged him to remain. She dwelt on his ill health.
But Lane was obdurate; and not the least of his hurts was the
last one—a divination that in spite of his mother’s
distress there was a feeling of relief of which she was
unconscious. He assured her that he would come to see her often
during the afternoons and would care as best he could for his
health. Then he left, saying he would send an expressman for the
things he had packed.

Broodingly Lane plodded down the street. He had feared that
sooner or later he would be forced to leave home, and he had
shrunk from the ordeal. But now, that it was over, he felt a kind
of relief, and told himself that it was of no consequence what
happened to him. All that mattered was for him to achieve the few
tasks he had set himself.

Then he thought of Mel Iden. She had been driven from home and
would know what it meant to him. The longing to see her
increased. Every disappointment left him more in need of
sympathy. And now, it seemed, he would be ashamed to go to Mel
Iden or Blair Maynard. Such news could not long be kept from
them. Middleville was a beehive of gossips. Lane had a moment of
blank despair, a feeling of utter, sick, dazed wonder at life and
human nature. Then he lifted his head and went on.

Lane’s first impulse was to ask Colonel Pepper if he could share
his lodgings, but upon reflection he decided otherwise. He
engaged a small room in a boarding house; his meals, which did
not seem of much importance, he could get anywhere.

This change of residence brought Lane downtown, and naturally
increased his activities. He did not husband his strength as
before, nor have the leisure for bad spells. Home had been a
place of rest. He could not rest in a drab little bare room he
now occupied.

He became a watcher, except during the stolen hours with Bessy
Bell. Then he tried to be a teacher. But he learned more than he
thought. He no longer concentrated his vigilance on his sister.
Having failed to force that issue, he bided his time, sensing
with melancholy portent the certainty that he would soon be
confronted with the stark and hateful actuality. Thus he wore
somewhat away from his grim resolve to kill Swann. That adventure
on the country road, when he had discovered Swann with Helen
instead of Lorna, had somehow been a boon. Nevertheless he spied
upon Lorna in the summer evenings when it was possible to follow
her, and he dogged Swann’s winding and devious path as far as
possible. Apparently Swann had checked his irregularities as far
as Lorna was concerned. Still Lane trusted nothing. He became an
almost impassive destiny with the iron consequences in his hands.

Days passed. Every other afternoon and night he spent hours with
Bessy Bell, and found a mounting happiness in the change in her,
a deep and ever deeper insight into the causes that had developed
her. The balance of his waking hours, which were many, he passed
on the streets, in the ice cream parlors and confectionery dens,
at the motion-picture theatres. He went many and odd times to
Colonel Pepper’s apartment, and took a peep into the club-rooms.
Some of these visits were fruitful, but he did not see whom he
expected to see there. At night he haunted the parks, watching
and listening. Often he hired a cheap car and drove it down the
river highway, where he would note the cars he passed or met.
Sometimes he would stop to get out and make one of his scouting
detours, or he would follow a car to some distant roadhouse, or
go to the outlying summer pavilions where popular dances were
given. More than once, late at night, he was an unseen and
unbidden guest at one of the gay bathing parties. Strange and
startling incidents seemed to gravitate toward Lane. He might
have been predestined for this accumulation of facts. How vain it
seethed for wild young men and women to think they hid their
tracks! Some trails could not be hidden.

Toward the end of that protracted period of surveillance, Lane
knew that he had become infamous in the eyes of most of that
younger set. He had been seen too often, alone, watching, with no
apparent excuse for his presence. And from here and there,
through Bessy and Colonel Pepper, and Blair, who faithfully
hunted him up, Lane learned of the unfavorable light in which he
was held. Society, in the persons of the younger matrons, took
exception to Lane’s queer conduct and hinted of mental unbalance.
The young rakes and libertines avoided him, and there was not a
slacker among them who could meet his eye across cafe or billiard
room.

Yet despite the peculiar species of ignominy and disgrace that
Middleville gossips heaped upon Lane’s head and the slow, steady
decline of his speaking acquaintance with the elite, there were
some who always greeted him and spoke if he gave them a chance.
Helen Wrapp never failed of a green flashing glance of mockery
and enticement. She smiled, she beckoned, she once called him to
her car and asked him to ride with her, to come to see her.
Margaret Maynard rose above dread of her mother and greeted Lane
graciously when occasion offered. Dorothy Dalrymple and Elinor
always evinced such unhesitating intention of friendship that
Lane grew to avoid meeting them. And twice, when he had come face
to face with Mel Iden, her look, her smile had been such that he
had plunged away somewhere, throbbing and thrilling, to grow
blind and sick and numb. It was the failure of his hopes, and the
suffering he endured, and the vain longings she inspired that
heightened his love. She wrote him after the last time they had
passed on the street—a note that stormed Lane’s heart. He
did not answer. He divined that his increasing loneliness, and
the sure slow decline of his health, and the heartless
intolerance of the same class that had ostracized her were added
burdens to Mel Iden’s faithful heart. He had seen it in her face,
read it in her note. And the time would come, sooner or later,
when he could go to her and make her marry him.

CHAPTER XV

To be a mystery is overpoweringly sweet to any girl and Bessy
Bell was being that. Her sudden desire for solitude had worried
her mother, and her distant superiority had incited the vexation
of her friends. When they exerted themselves to win Bessy back to
her old self she looked dreamily beyond them and became more
aloof. Doctor Bronson, in reply to Mrs. Bell’s appeal to him,
looked the young woman over, asked her a few questions, marveled
at the imperious artifice with which she evaded him, and throwing
up his hands said Bessy was beyond him. The dark fever, rising
from the school yards and the playgrounds and the streets, subtly
poisoning the blood of Bessy Bell, slowly lost its heat and power
for the time being. Bessy lived in the full secret expression of
her girlish adoration. She was worshipping a hero; she was
glorifying in her sacrifice; she was faithful to a man; she was
being a woman. At first she grew pale, tense, quiet, and seemed
to be going into a decline. Then that stage passed; and the
roseleaf flush returned to her cheeks, the purple fire deepened
in her eyes, the quivering life in all her supple young body.
Night after night loneliness had no fears for her. If she heard a
whistle on the avenue, the honk of a car—the familiar old
signals of the boys and girls, she smiled her disdain, and
curling comfortably in her great chair, bent her lovely head over
her books.

In the beginning her dreams were all of Daren Lane, of the
strangeness and glory of this soldier who spent so many secret
hours with her. And when the time came that she did not see him
so often her dreams were just as full. But gradually, as the days
went by, other figures than Lane’s were limned upon her
fancy—vague figures of heroes, knights, soldiers. He still
dominated her romances, though less personally. She built around
him. Every day brought her new strange desires.

One evening in August when Bessy sat alone the telephone bell
rang sharply. She ran to take down the receiver.

“Hello, hello, that you, Bessy?” came the hurried call in a
girl’s voice.

“Rose! Oh, how are you?”

“Fine. But say, Angel, I can’t take time to talk. Something
doing. Are you alone?”

“Yes, all alone, old girl.”

“Listen, then, and get this…. I’m here, you know, telephone
girl at the Exchange. Just heard your father on the wire. Some
one has betrayed the secret of the club. There’s a warrant out
for the arrest of the boys. For gambling. You know there’s a
political vice drive on. Some time to-night they’ll be raided….
But early. Bess, are you getting this?”

“Sure. Hurry—hurry,” replied Bessy, in excitement.

“I tried to get Dick on the wire, but couldn’t. Same with two
more of the boys. But I did get wise to this. Gail and Lorna have
a date at the club to-night…. Never mind how I found out. Dick
has thrown me down for Gail. I’m sore as a pup. But I don’t want
your father to pinch those girls…. Now, Bess, I’m tied here.
But you get a move on. Don’t waste time. You can save them. You
must. Do something. If you can’t find somebody, go straight to
the club. You know where the key for the outside entrance is
kept. Hurry and it’ll be safe. Good-bye.”

Bessy stood statue-like for a moment, her big eyes glowing,
changing, darkening with rapid thought, then she flew upstairs to
her room, snatched a veil and a soft hat, and putting these on as
she went, she flew out of the house without putting out the
lights or locking the door.

It was a dark windy night, slightly cool for August, and a fine
misty rain was blowing. Bessy’s footsteps pattered softly as she
ran block after block, and she did not slacken her pace till she
reached the house where Daren Lane had his room. In answer to her
ring a woman appeared, who told her Mr. Lane was out.

This was a severe disappointment to Bessy, and left her an
alternative that required more than courage, but she did not
vacillate. She sped swiftly on in the dark, for the electric
lights were few and far between, until the black of the gloomy
building, where the boys had their club, loomed up. On the corner
Bessy saw a man standing with his back to a telegraph pole. This
occasioned her much concern; perhaps he might be watching the
building. But he had not seen her, of that she was certain. The
possibility that he might be a spy made her task all the harder.

Bessy returned the way she come, crossed at the next corner,
hurried round the block and up to the outside stairway that was
her objective point.

By feeling along the brick wall she brought up, with a sudden
bump, at the back of the stairway. Then she deliberated. If she
went around to the front so as to get access to the steps, she
might pass in range of the loiterer whom she mistrusted. That
risk she would not incur. Examining the wall that enclosed the
box-like stairway as best she could in the dark, she found it
rickety, full of holes and cracks, and she decided she would
climb it. A sheer perpendicular board wall, some twelve or
fifteen feet high, shrouded in pitchy darkness and apparently
within earshot of a police spy, did not daunt Bessy Bell.
Slipping her strong fingers in crevices and her slim toes in
cracks, she climbed up and up, till she got hold of the railing
post on the first platform. Here she had great difficulty to keep
from falling, but lifting and squirming her supple body, by a
desperate effort she got her knees on the platform, and then
pulled herself to safety. Once on the stairs she ran up the
remaining few steps to the landing, where she rested panting and
triumphant.

As she was about to go on she heard footsteps, which froze her. A
man was crossing the street. He came from the direction of the
corner where she had seen the supposed spy. Presently she saw him
stop under one of the trees to scratch a match, and in the round
glow of light she saw him puff at a cigar. Then he passed on with
uncertain steps, as of one slightly under the influence of drink.

Bessy’s heart warmed to life and began to beat again. Then she
sought for the key. She had been told where it was, but did not
remember. Slipping her hand under the railing, close to the wall,
she felt a string, and, pulling at it suddenly, found the key in
her hand. She glided into the dim hall, feeling along the wall
for a door, until she found it. With trembling fingers she
inserted the key in the lock, and the door swung inward silently.
Bessy went in, leaving the key on the outside.

Dark as it had been without, it was light compared to the ebon
blackness within. Bessy felt ice form in the marrow of her bones.
The darkness was tangible; it seemed to envelop her in heavy
folds. The sudden natural impulse to fly out of the thick
creeping gloom, down the stairway to the light, strung her
muscles for instant action, but checked by the swiftly following
thought of her purpose, they relaxed, and she took not a backward
step.

“Rose did her part and I’ll do mine,” she cogitated. “I’ve got to
save them. But what to do—I may have to wait. I
know—in the big room—the closet behind the curtain! I
can find that even in this dark, and once in there I won’t be
afraid.”

Bessy, fired by this inspiration, groped along the wall through
the room to the large chamber, stumbled over chairs and a couch
and at last got her hands on the drapery. She readily found the
knob, turned it, opened the door and stepped in.

“I hope they won’t be long,” she thought. “I hope the girls come
first. I don’t want to burst into a room full of boys. Won’t
Daren be surprised when I tell him—maybe angry! But it’s
bound to come out all right, and father will never know.”

CHAPTER XVI

Early one August evening Lane went out to find a cool misty rain
blowing down from the hills. At the inn he encountered Colonel
Pepper, who wore a most woebegone and ludicrous expression. He
pounced at once upon Lane.

“Daren, what do you think?” he wailed, miserably.

“I don’t think. I know. You’ve gone and done it—pulled that
stunt of yours again,” returned Lane.

“Yes—but oh, so much worse this time.”

“Worse! How could it be worse, unless you mean some one punched
your head.”

“No. That would have been nothing…. Daren, this—this time
I—it was a lady!” gasped Pepper.

“Oh, say now, Pepper—not really?” queried Lane,
incredulously.

“It was. And a lady I—I admire very much.”

“Who?”

“Miss Amanda Hill.”

“The schoolteacher? Nice little woman like that! Pepper, why
couldn’t you pick on one of these Middleville gossips or society
dames?”

“Lord—I didn’t know who she was—until after—and
I couldn’t have helped it anyway,” he replied, mopping his red
face. “When—I saw her—and she recognized me—I
nearly died…. It was at White’s Confectionery Den. And I’m
afraid some people saw me.”

“Well. You old duffer! And you say you admire this lady very
much?”

“Indeed I do. I call on her.”

“Colonel, your name is Dennis,” replied Lane, with merciless
humor. “It serves you right.”

The little man evidently found relief in his confession and in
Lane’s censure.

“I’m cured forever,” he declared vehemently. “And say, Lane, I’ve
been looking for you. Have you been at my rooms lately—you
know—to take a peep?”

“I have not,” replied Lane, turning sharply. A slight chill went
over him. “I thought that club stuff was off.”

“Off—nothing,” whispered Colonel Pepper, drawing Lane
aside. “Swann and his strong-arm gang just got foxy. They quit
for a while. Now they’re rushing the girls in there—say
from four to five—and in the evenings a little while, not
too late. Oh, they’re the slick bunch, picking out the ice cream
soda hour when everybody’s downtown…. You run up to my rooms
right now. And I’ll gamble——”

“I’ll go,” interrupted Lane, grimly.

Not fifteen minutes before he had seen his sister Lorna and a
chum, Gail Williams, go into White’s place. Lane’s pulse
quickened. As he started to go he ran into Blair Maynard who
grasped at him: “What’s hurry, old scout?”

“Blair, I’m never in a hurry if you want me. But the fact is I’ve
got rather urgent business. How about to-morrow?”

“Sure. Meet you here. I just wanted to unload on you, Dare. Looks
as if my mother has hatched it up between Margie and our esteemed
countryman, Richard Swann.”

It was not often that Lane cursed, but he did so now.

“But Blair, didn’t you tell your mother what this fellow
is?” remonstrated Lane.

“Well, I’ll say I did,” replied Blair, sardonically. “Cut no ice
whatever. She didn’t believe. She didn’t care for any proofs. All
rich young men had their irregularities!… Good God! Doesn’t it
make you sick?”

“But how about Holt Dalrymple?”

“Holt’s turned over a new leaf. He’s working hard, and I think he
has taken a tumble to himself. Listen to this. He met Margie with
Dick Swann out at one of the lake dances—Watkins’ Lake. And
he cut her dead. I’m sorry for Margie. She sure is rank poison
these days…. Well, speak of the devil!”

Holt Dalrymple collided with them at the entrance of the inn. The
haggard, sullen, heated look that had characterized him was gone.
He was sunburned, and his dark eyes were bright. He greeted his
friends warmly. They chatted for a moment. Then Lane grew
thoughtful, all the while gazing at Holt.

“What’s the idea?” queried that worthy, presently. “Anything
wrong with me?”

“Boy, you’re just great. Seeing you has done me good…. You ask
what’s the idea. Holt, would you do me a favor?”

“Would I? Listen to the guy,” returned young Dalrymple. “Daren,
I’d do any old thing for you.”

“Do you happen to know Bessy Bell?” went on Lane.

Dalrymple quickened with surprise. “Yes, I know her. Some little
peach!… I almost ran into her down on West Street a few minutes
ago. She wore a white veil. She didn’t see me, or recognize me.
But I sure knew her. She was almost running. I bet a million to
myself she had a date at the club.”

“You lose, Holt,” replied Lane, shortly. “Bessy Bell is one
Middleville kid who has come clean through this mess.”

“Say Dare, I like to hear you talk,” responded Blair, half in
jest and half in earnest. “But aren’t you getting a trifle
unbalanced? That’s how my mother apologizes for me.”

“Cut the joshing, boys. Listen,” returned Lane. “And don’t ever
tell this to a soul. I interested myself in Bessy Bell. I’ve met
her more times than I can count. I wanted to see if it was
possible to turn one of these girls around. I failed on my sister
Lorna. But Bessy Bell is true blue. She had all this modern
tommyrot. She had everything else too. Brains, sweetness, common
sense, romance. All I tried to do was to make her forget the
tommyrot. And I think I did.”

“Well, I’ll be darned!” ejaculated Blair. “Dare, that was ripping
fine of you…. What’ll you do next, I wonder.”

“Come on with your favor,” added Holt, with a keen bright smile.

“Would you be willing to see Bessy occasionally—and sort of
be nice to her—you know?” asked Lane, earnestly. “I can’t
keep up my attention to her much longer. She might miss me. Take
it from me, Holt, back of all this modern stuff—deep in
Bessy, and in every girl who has not been debased—is the
simple and good desire to be liked.”

“Daren, I’ll do that little thing, believe me,” returned Holt,
warmly.

Shaking hands with his friends, Lane left them, and went on his
way. White’s place was full as a beehive. As he passed, Lane
found himself looking for Bessy Bell’s golden head, though he
knew he would not see it. He wondered if Holt had really met her,
veiled and in a hurry. That had a strange look. But no shadow of
distrust of Bessy came to Lane. In a few moments he reached the
dark stairway leading to Colonel Pepper’s apartment. Lane forgot
he was weak. But at the top, with his breast laboring, he
remembered well enough. He went into the Colonel’s rooms and
through them without making a light. And when he reached the
place where he had spied upon the club he was wet with sweat and
shaking with excitement. Carefully, so as not to make noise, he
stole to the peep-hole and applied his eye.

He saw a gleam of light on shiny waxed floor, and then, moving to
get the limit of his narrow vision, he descried Swann, evidently
just arrived. With him was Gail Williams, a slip of a child not
over fifteen—looking up at him as if excited and pleased.
Next Lane espied his sister Lorna with a tall, well-built man.
Although his back was toward Lane, he could not mistake the
soldierly bearing of Captain Vane Thesel! Lorna looked perturbed
and sulky, and once, turning her face toward Swann, she seemed
resentful. Captain Thesel had his hand at her elbow and appeared
to be talking earnestly.

Lane left his post, taking care to make no noise. But once back
in the Colonel’s rooms, he hurried. Feeling in the dark corner
where he had kept the axe ready for just such an emergency as
this, he grasped it and rushed out. Tiptoeing down the hall, he
found the narrow door, stole down the black stairway and entered
the main hall. Here he paused, suddenly checked in his hurry.

“This won’t do,” he thought, and shook his head. “Much as I’d
like to kill those two dogs I can’t—I can’t…. I’ll smash
their faces, though—and if I ever catch….”

Breaking the thought off abruptly, he passed down the dim hallway
to the door of the club-rooms. He raised the axe and was about to
smash the lock when he espied a key in the keyhole. The door was
not locked. Lane set down the axe and noiselessly turned the knob
and peeped in. The first room was dark, but the door on the
opposite side was ajar, and through it Lane saw the larger
lighted room and the shiny floor. Moving figures crossed the
space. Removing the key, Lane slipped inside the room and locked
the door. Then he tip-toed to the opposite door.

Thesel and Lorna were now so close that Lane could hear them.

“But I thought I had a date with Dick,” protested Lorna. Her face
was red and she stamped her foot.

“See here, kiddo. If you’re as thick as that I’ll have to put you
wise,” answered Thesel, good-humoredly, as he tilted back his
cigarette to blow smoke at the ceiling. “Dick is through with
you.”

“Oh, is he?” choked Lorna.

“Say, Cap, I heard a noise,” suddenly called out Swann, rather
nervously.

There was a moment’s silence. Lane, too, had heard a noise, but
could not be sure whether it was inside the building or not.

Swann hurried over to join Thesel. They looked blankly at each
other. The air might have been charged. Both girls showed alarm.

Then Lane, with his hand on the gun in his pocket, strode out to
confront them.

“Oh—h!” gasped Lorna, as if appalled at sight of her
brother’s face.

“Fellows, I’ll have to break up your little party,” said Lane,
coolly.

Thesel turned ghastly white, while Swann grew livid with rage. He
seemed to expand. His hand went back to his right hip.

When Lane got within six feet of them, Swann drew a small
automatic pistol. But before he could raise it, Lane had leaped
into startling activity. With terrific swing he brought his gun
down on Swann’s face. Then as swiftly he turned on Thesel. Swann
had hardly hit the floor, a sodden heap, when Thesel, with bloody
visage, reeled and fell like a log. Lane bent over them, ready to
beat either back. But both were unconscious.

“Daren—for God’s sake—don’t murder them!” whispered
Lorna, hoarsely.

Lane’s humanity was in abeyance then, but his self-control did
not desert him.

“You girls must hurry out of here,” he ordered.

“Oh, Gail is fainting,” cried Lorna.

The little Williams girl was indeed swaying and sinking down.
Lane grasped her and shook her. “Brace up. If you keel over now,
you’ll be found out sure…. It’s all right. You’ll not be hurt.
There——”

A heavy thumping on the door by which Lane had entered and a loud
authoritative voice from the hall silenced him.

“Open up here! You’re pinched!”

That voice Lane recognized as belonging to Chief of Police Bell.
For a moment, fraught with suspense, Lane was at a loss to know
what to do.

“Open up! We’ve got the place surrounded…. Open up, or we’ll
smash the door in!”

Lane whispered to the girls: “Is there a place to hide you?”

The Williams girl was beyond answering, but Lorna, despite her
terror, had not lost her wits.

“Yes—there’s a closet—hid by a curtain—here,”
she whispered, pointing.

Lane half carried Gail. Lorna brushed aside a heavy curtain and
opened a door. Lane pushed both girls into the black void and
closed the door after them.

“Once more—open up!” bellowed the officer in the hall,
accompanying his demand with a thump on the door. Lane made sure
some one had found his axe. He did not care how much smashing the
policemen did. All that concerned Lane then was how to avert
discovery from the girls. It looked hopeless. Then, as there came
sudden splintering blows on the door, Lane espied Swann’s
cigarettes and matches on the music box. Lane seldom smoked. But
while the officers were breaking in the door, Lane leisurely
lighted a cigarette; and when two of them came in he faced them
coolly.

The first was Chief Bell, a large handsome man, in blue uniform.
The second one was a patrolman. Neither carried a weapon in
sight. Bell swept the big room in one flashing blue
glance—took in Lane and the prone figures on the floor.

“Well, I’ll be damned,” he ejaculated. “What am I up against?”

“Hello, Chief,” replied Lane, coolly. “Don’t get fussed up now.
This is no murder case.”

“Lane, what’s this mean?” burst out Bell.

Lane was rather well acquainted with Chief Bell, and in a way
there was friendship between them. Bell, for one, had always been
sturdily loyal to the soldiers.

“Well, Chief, I was having a little friendly game with Mr. Swann
and Captain Thesel,” drawled Lane. “We got into an argument. And
as both were such ferocious fighters I grew afraid they’d hurt me
bad—so I had to soak them.”

“Don’t kid me,” spoke up Bell, derisively. “Little
game—hell! Where’s the cards, chips, table?”

“Chief, I didn’t say we played the game to-night.”

“Lane, you’re a liar,” replied Bell, thoughtfully. “I’m sure of
that. But you’ve got me buffaloed.” He knelt on the floor beside
the fallen men and examined each. Swann’s shirt as well as face
was bloody. “For a crippled soldier you’ve got some punch left.
What’d you hit them with?”

“I’ll tell you Chief. I fetched an axe with me to do the dirty
job, but I decided I should use a dangerous weapon only on men.
So I soaked them with a lollypop.”

“Lane, are you really nutty?” demanded Bell, curiously.

“No more than you. I hit them with something hard, so it would
leave a mark.”

“You left one, I’ll say. Thesel will lose that eye—it’s
gone now—and Swann is also disfigured for life. What a
damned shame!”

“Chief, are you sure it’s any kind of a shame?”

Lane’s query appeared to provoke thought. Bell replaced the
little automatic pistol he had picked up beside Swann, and rising
he looked at Lane.

“Swann was a slacker. Thesel was your Captain in the war. Have
these facts anything to do with your motive?”

“No, Chief,” replied Lane, in sarcasm. “But when I got into
action I think the facts you mentioned sort of rejuvenated a
disabled soldier.”

“Lane, you beat me,” declared Bell, shaking his head. “Why, I had
you figured as a pretty good chap…. But you’ve done some queer
things in Middleville.”

“Chief, if you’re an honest officer you’ll admit Middleville
needs some queer things done.”

Bell gazed doubtfully at Lane.

“Smith, search the rooms,” he ordered, addressing his patrolman.

“We were alone here,” spoke up Lane. “And I advise you to hurry
those wounded veterans to a hospital in the rear.”

Swann showed signs of recovering consciousness. Bell bent over
him a moment. Lane had only one hope—that the patrolman
would miss the door. But he brushed aside the curtain. Then he
grunted.

“See here, Chief—a door—and somebody’s holding it
from the inside,” he declared.

“Wait, Smith,” ordered Bell, striding forward. But before he got
half-way across the room the door opened. A girl stepped out and
shut it back of her. Lane sustained a singular shock. That girl
was Bessy Bell.

“Hello, Dad—it’s Bessy,” she said, clearly. She was pale,
but did not seem frightened.

Chief Bell halted in the middle of a stride and staggered a
little as his foot came down. A low curse of utter amaze escaped
his lips. Suddenly he became tensely animated.

“How’d you come here?” he demanded, towering over her.

“I walked.”

“What’d you come for?”

“To warn Daren Lane that you were going to raid these club-rooms
to-night.”

“Who told you?”

“I won’t tell. I got it over the ‘phone.” I ran over here. I knew
where the key was. I’ve been here
before—afternoons—dancing…. I let myself in…. But
when they—they came I got frightened and hid in the
closet.”

Chief Bell seemed about to give way to passion, but he controlled
it. After that moment he changed subtly.

“Is Daren Lane your friend?” he demanded.

“Yes. The best and truest any girl ever had…. Dad, you know
mother told you I had changed lately. I have. And it’s through
Daren.”

“Where’d you see him?”

“He has been coming out to the house in the afternoons.”

“Well, I’m damned,” muttered the Chief, and wheeled away. Sight
of his gaping patrolman seemed to galvanize him into further
realization of the situation. “Smith, beat it out and draw the
other men round in front. Give me time enough to get Bessy out.
Send hurry call for ambulance…. And Smith, keep your mouth
shut. I’ll make it all right. If Mrs. Bell hears of this my life
will be a hell on earth.”

“Mum’s the word, Chief. I’m a married man myself,” he replied,
and hurried out.

Lane was watching Bessy. What a wonderful girl! Modern tendencies
might have corrupted the girls of the day, but for sheer nerve,
wit and courage they were immeasurably superior to those of
former generations. Bessy faced her father calmly, lied
magnificently, gazed down at the ghastly, bloody faces with
scarcely a shudder, and gave Lane a smile from her purple eyes,
as if to cheer him, to assure him she could save the situation.
It struck Lane that Chief Bell looked as if he might be following
a similar line of thought.

“Bessy, put on your hat,” ordered Bell. “And here … tuck that
veil around. There, now you beat it for home. Lane, go with her
to the stairs. Take a good look in the street. Bessy, go home the
back way. And Lane, you hurry back.”

Lane followed Bessy out and caught up with her in the hall. She
clasped his arm.

“Some adventure, I’ll say!” she burst out, in breathless whisper.
“It was great until I recognized your voice. Then all inside me
went flooey.”

“Bessy, you’re the finest little girl in the world,” returned
Lane, stirred to emotion.

“Here, Daren, cut that. You didn’t raise me on soft soap and
mush. If you get to praising me I’ll fall so far I’ll never
light…. Now, Dare, go back and fool Dad. You must save the
girls. It doesn’t matter about me. He’s my Dad.”

“I’ll do my best,” replied Lane.

They reached the landing of the outside stairway. Peering down,
Lane did not see any one.

“I guess the coast is clear. Now, beat it, Bessy.”

She lifted the white veil and raised her face. In the dim gray
light Lane saw it as never before.

“Kiss me, Daren,” she whispered.

Lane had never kissed her. For an instant he was confused.

“Why—little girl!” he exclaimed.

“Hurry!” she whispered, imperiously.

Some instinct beyond Lane’s ken prompted him to do what she
asked.

“Good-bye, my little Princess,” he whispered. “Don’t ever forget
me.”

“Never, Daren. Good-bye.” She slipped down the stairway and in a
moment more vanished in the gray gloom of the misty night.

Only then did Lane understand what she, with her woman’s
intuition, had divined—that they would never be together
again. The realization gave him a pang. Bessy was his only
victory.

Slowly Lane made his way back to the club-rooms. He had begun to
weaken under the strain and felt the approach of something akin
to collapse. When he reached the large room he found Swann half
conscious and Thesel showing signs of coming to.

“Lane, come here,” said the Chief, drawing Lane away from the
writhing forms on the floor. “You’re under arrest.”

“Yes, sir. What’s the charge?”

“Let’s see. That’s the puzzler,” replied the Chief, scratching
his head. “Suppose we say gambling and fighting.”

“Fine!” granted Lane, with a smile.

“When the ambulance comes you get out of sight until we pack
these fellows out. I’ll leave the door open—so if there’s
any reason you want to come back—why—”

Chief Bell half averted his face, seemingly not embarrassed, but
rather pondering in thought. “Thanks, Chief. You understand me
perfectly,” responded Lane. “I’ll appear at police headquarters
in half an hour.”

The officer laughed, and returning to the injured men he knelt
beside them. Swann sat up moaning. Blood had blinded his sight.
He did not see Lane pass. Sounds of an ambulance bell had caught
Lane’s quick ear. Finding the washroom, he went in and, locking
the door, leaned there to wait. In a very few moments the injured
Swann and Thesel had been carried out. Lane waited five minutes
after the sound of wheels had died away. Then he hurried out and
opened the door of the closet.

Lorna almost fell over him in her eagerness. If she had been
frightened, she had recovered. Gail staggered out, pale and sick
looking.

“Oh, Daren, can you get us out?” whispered Lorna, breathlessly.

“Hurry, and don’t talk,” replied Lane.

He led them out into the hall and down to the stairway where he
had taken Bessy. As before, all appeared quiet below.

“I guess it’s safe…. Girls, let this be a lesson to you.”

“Never any more for mine,” whimpered Gail.

But Lorna was of more tempered metal.

“Believe me, Daren, I’m glad you knocked the lamps out of those
swell boobs,” she whispered, passionately. “Dick Swann used me
like dirt. The next guy like him who tries to get gay with me
will have some fall, I’ll tell the world…. Me for Harry!
There’s nothing in this q-t stuff…. And say, what do you know
about Bessy Bell? She came here to save us…. Hot dog, but she’s
a peach!”

Lane admonished the girls to hurry and watched them until they
reached the street and turned the corner out of sight.

CHAPTER XVII

The reaction from that night landed Lane in the hospital, where,
during long weeks when he did have a lucid interval, he saw that
his life was despaired of and felt that he was glad of it.

But he did not die. As before, the weak places in his lungs
healed over and he began to mend, and gradually his periods of
rationality increased until he wholly gained his mental poise. It
was, however, a long time before he was strong enough to leave
the hospital.

During the worst of his illness his mother came often to see him;
after he grew better she came but seldom. Blair and Colonel
Pepper were the only others who visited Lane. And as soon as his
memory returned and interest revived he learned much peculiarly
significant to him.

The secret of the club-rooms, so far as girls were concerned,
never became fully known to Middleville gossips. Strange and
contrary rumors were rife for a long time, but the real truth
never leaked out. There was never any warrant sworn for Lane’s
arrest. What the general public had heard and believed was the
story concocted by Thesel and Swann, who claimed that Lane, over
a gambling table, had been seized by one of the frenzied fits
common to deranged soldiers, and had attacked them. Thesel lost
his left eye and Swann carried a hideous red scar from brow to
cheek. Neither the club-room scandal nor his disfigurement for
life in any wise prevented Mrs. Maynard from announcing the
engagement of her daughter Margaret to Richard Swann. The most
amazing news was to hear that Helen Wrapp had married a rich
young politician named Hartley, who was running for the office of
magistrate. According to Blair, Daren Lane had divided
Middleville into two dissenting factions, a large one who banned
him in disgrace, and a small one who lifted their voices in his
behalf. Of all the endless bits of news, little and big, the one
that broke happily on Lane’s ears was the word of a nurse, who
told him that during his severe illness a girl had called on the
telephone every day to inquire for him. She never gave her name.
But Lane knew it was Mel and the mere thought of her made him
quiver.

By the time Lane was strong enough to leave the hospital an early
winter had set in. The hospital expenses had reduced his finances
so materially that he could not afford the lodgings he had
occupied before his illness. He realized fully that he should
leave Middleville for a dry warm climate, if he wanted to live a
while longer. But he was not greatly concerned about this. There
would be time enough to consider the future after he had
fulfilled the one hope and ambition he had left.

Rooms were at a premium. Lane was forced to apply in the sordid
quarter of Middleville, and the place he eventually found was a
small, bare hall bedroom, in a large, ramshackle old house, of
questionable repute. But beggars could not be choosers. There was
no heat in this room, and Lane decided that what time he spent in
it must be in bed. He would not give any one his address.

Once installed here, Lane waited only a few days to assure
himself that he was strong enough to carry out the plan upon
which he had set his heart.

Late that afternoon he went to the town hall and had a marriage
license made out for himself and Mel Iden. Upon returning, he
found that snow had begun to fall heavily. Already the streets
were white. Suddenly the thought of the nearness of Christmas
shocked him. How time sped by!

That night he dressed himself carefully, wearing the service
uniform he had so well preserved, and sallied forth to the most
fashionable restaurant in Middleville, where in the glare and
gayety he had his dinner. Lane recognized many of the dining,
dancing throng, but showed no sign of it. He became aware that
his presence had excited comment. How remote he seemed to feel
himself from that eating, drinking, dancing crowd! So far removed
that even the jazz music no longer affronted him. Rather
surprised he was to find he really enjoyed his dinner. From the
restaurant he engaged a taxi.

The bright lights, the falling snow, the mantle of white on
everything, with their promise of the holiday season, pleased
Lane with the memory of what great fun he used to have at
Christmas-time.

When he arrived at Mel’s home the snow was falling thickly in
heavy flakes. Through the pall he caught a faint light, which
grew brighter as he plodded toward the cottage. He stamped on the
porch and flapped his arms to remove the generous covering of
snow that had adhered to him. And as he was about to knock, the
door opened, and Mel stood in the sudden brightness.

“Hello, Mel, how are you?—some snow, eh?” was his cheery
greeting, and he went in and shut the door behind him.

“Why, Daren—you—you—”

“I—what! Aren’t you glad to see me?”

Lane had not prepared himself for anything. He knew he could win
now, and all he had allowed himself was gladness. But being face
to face with Mel made it different. It had been long since he
last saw her. That interval had been generous. To look at her now
no one could have guessed her story. Warmth and richness of color
had come back to her; and vividly they expressed her joy at sight
of him.

“Glad?—I’ve been living—on my hopes—that
you—”

Her faltering speech trailed off here, as Lane took one long
stride toward her.

Lane put a firm hand to each of her cheeks, and tilting a
suddenly rosy face, he kissed her full on the lips. Then he
turned away without looking at her and stepped to the little open
grate, where a small red fire glowed. Mel gasped there behind him
and then became perfectly still.

“Nice fire, Mel,” he spoke out, naturally, as if nothing unusual
had happened. But the thin hands he extended to the warmth of the
coals trembled like aspen leaves in the wind. How silent she was!
It thrilled him. What strange sweet revel in the moment.

When he turned it seemed he saw her eyes, her lips, her whole
face luminous. The next instant she came out of her spell; and
Lane divined if he let her wholly recover, he would have a woman
to deal with.

“Daren, what’s wrong with you?” she inquired.

“Why, Mel!” he ejaculated, in feigned reproach.

“You don’t look irrational, but you act so,” she said, studying
him more closely. The hand that had been pressed to her breast
dropped down.

“Had my last crazy spell two weeks ago,” he replied.

“Until to-night.”

“You mean my kissing you? Well, I refuse to apologize. You see I
was not prepared to find you so improved. Why, Mel, you’re
changed. You’re just—just lovely.”

Again the rich color stained her cheeks.

“Thank you, Daren,” she said. “I have changed. You did
it…. I’ve gotten well, and—almost happy…. But let’s not
talk of myself. You—there’s so much—”

“Mel, I don’t want to talk about myself, either,” he declared.
“When a man’s got only a day or so longer—”

“Hush!—Or—Or—,” she threatened, with a slight
distension of nostrils and a paling of cheek.

“Or what?” demanded Lane.

“Or I’ll do to you what you did to me.”

“Oh, you’d kiss me to shut my lips?”

“Yes, I would.”

“Fine, Mel. Come on. But you’d have to keep steadily busy all
evening. For I’ve come to talk.” Mel came closer to him, with a
catch in her breathing, a loving radiance in her eyes. “Daren,
you’re strange—not like your old self. You’re too
gay—too happy. Oh, I’d be glad if you were sincere. But you
have something on your mind.”

Lane knew when to unmask a battery.

“No, it’s in my pocket,” he flashed, and with a quick motion he
tore out the marriage license and thrust it upon her. As her dark
eyes took in the meaning of the paper, and her expression
changed, Lane gazed down upon her with a commingling of emotions.

“Oh, Daren—No—No!” she cried, in a wildness of amaze
and pain.

Then Lane clasped her close, with a force too sudden to be
gentle, and with his free hand he lifted her face.

“Look here. Look at me,” he said sternly. “Every time you say no
or shake your head—I’ll do this.”

And he kissed her twice, as he had upon his entrance.

Mel raised her head and gazed up at him, wide-eyed, open-mouthed,
as if both appalled and enthralled.

“Daren. I—I don’t understand you,” she said, unsteadily.
“You frighten me. Let me go—please, Daren. This
is—so—so unlike you. You insult me.”

“Mel, I can’t see it that way,” he replied. “I’m only asking you
to come out and marry me to-night.”

That galvanized her, and she tried to slip from his embrace.

“I told you no—no—no,” she cried desperately.

“That’s three,” said Lane, and he took them mercilessly. “You
will marry me,” he said sternly.

“Oh, Daren, I can’t—I dare not…. Ah!—”

“You will go right now—marry me to-night.”

“Please be kind, Daren…. I don’t know how you—”

“Mel, where’re your coat, and hat, and overshoes?” he questioned,
urgently.

“I told you—no!” she flashed, passionately.

Lane made good his threat, and this last onslaught left her spent
and white.

“You must like my kisses, Mel Iden,” he said.

“I implore you—Daren”

“I implore you to marry me.”

“Dear friend, listen to reason,” she begged. “You don’t love me.
You’ve just a chivalrous notion you can help me—and my
boy—by giving us your name. It’s noble, Daren, thank you.
But—”

“Take care,” warned Lane, bending low over her. “I can make good
my word all night.”

“Boy, you’ve gone crazy,” she whispered, sadly.

“Well, now you may be talking sense,” he laughed. “But that’s
neither here nor there…. Mel, I may die any day now!”

“Oh, my God!—don’t say that,” she cried, as if pierced by a
blade.

“Yes. Mel, make me happy just for that little while.”

“Happy?” she whispered.

“Yes. I’ve failed here in every way. I’ve lost all. And this
thing would make the bitterness endurable.”

“I’d die for you,” she returned. “But marry
you!—Daren—dearest—it will make you the
laughing-stock of Middleville.”

“Whatever it makes me, I shall be proud.”

“Oh, I cannot, I dare not,” she burst out.

“You seem to forget the penalty for these unflattering negatives
of yours,” he returned, coolly, bending to her lips.

This time she did not writhe or quiver or breathe. Lane felt
surrender in her, and when he lifted his face from hers he was
sure. Despite the fact that he had inflexibly clamped his will to
one purpose, holding his emotion in abeyance, that brief instant
seemed to be the fullest of his life.

“Mel, put your arm round my neck,” he commanded.

Mel obeyed.

“Now the other.”

Again she complied.

“Lift your face—look at me.”

She essayed to do this also, but failed. Her head sank on his
breast. He had won. Lane held her a moment closely. And then a
great and overwhelming pity and tenderness, his first emotions,
flooded his soul. He closed his eyes. Dimly, vaguely, they seemed
to create vision of long future time; and he divined that good
and happiness would come to Mel Iden some day through the pain he
had given her.

“Where did you say your things are?” he asked. “It’s a bad
night.”

“They’re in—the hall,” came in muffled tones from his
shoulder. “I’ll get them.”

But she made no effort to remove her arms from round his neck or
to lift her head from his breast. Lane had lost now that singular
exaltation of will, and power to hold down his emotions. Her
nearness stormed his heart. His test came then, when he denied
utterance to the love that answered hers.

“No—Mel—you stay here,” he said, freeing himself.
“I’ll get them.”

Opening the hall door he saw the hat-rack where as a boy he had
hung his cap. It now held garments over which Lane fumbled. Mel
came into the hall.

“Daren, you’ll not know which are mine,” she said.

Lane watched her. How the shapely hands trembled. Her face shone
white against her dark furs. Lane helped her put on the
overshoes.

“Now—just a word to mother,” she said.

Lane caught her hand and held it, following her to the end of the
hall, where she opened a door and peeped into the sitting-room.

“Mother, is dad home?” she asked.

“No—he’s out, and such a bad night! Who’s with you, Mel?”

“Daren Lane.”

“Oh, is he up again? I’m glad. Bring him in…. Why, Mel, you’ve
your hat and coat on!”

“Yes, mother dear. We’re going out for a while.”

“On such a night! What for?”

“Daren and I are going to—to be married…. Good-bye. No
more till we come back.”

As one in a dream, Lane led Mel out in the whirling white pall of
snow. It seemed to envelop them. It was mysterious and friendly,
and silent.

They crossed the bridge, and Lane again listened for the river
voices that always haunted here. Were they only murmurings of
swift waters? Beyond the bridge lay the railroad station. A few
dim lights shone through the white gloom. Lane found a taxi.

They were silent during the ride through the lonely streets. When
the taxi stopped at the address given the driver, Lane whispered
a word to Mel, jumped out and ran up the steps of a house and
rang the bell.

“Is Doctor McCullen at home?” he inquired of the maid who
answered the ring. He was informed the minister had just gone to
his room.

“Will you ask him to come down upon a matter of importance?”

The maid invited him inside. In a few moments a tall,
severe-looking man wearing a long dressing-coat entered the
parlor.

“Doctor McCullen, I regret disturbing you, but my business is
urgent. I want to be married at once. The lady is outside in a
car. May I bring her in?”

“Ah! I seem to remember you. Isn’t your name Lane?”

“Yes.”

“Who is the woman you want to marry?”

“Miss Iden.”

“Miss Iden! You mean Joshua Iden’s daughter?”

“I do.”

The minister showed a grave surprise. “Aren’t you rather late in
making amends? No, I will not marry you until I investigate the
matter,” he replied, coldly.

“You need not trouble yourself,” replied Lane curtly, and went
out.

The instant opposition stimulated Lane, and he asked the driver,
“John, do you know where we can find a preacher?” “Yis, sor. Mr.
Peters of the Methodist Church lives round the corner,” answered
the man.

“Drive on, then.”

Lane got inside the taxi and slammed the door. “Mel, he refused
to marry us.”

Mel was silent, but the pressure of her hand answered him.

“Daren, the car has stopped,” said Mel, presently.

Lane got out, walked up the steps, and pulled the bell. He was
admitted. He had no better luck here. Lane felt that his lips
shut tight, and his face set. Mel said nothing and sat by him,
very quiet. The taxi rolled on and stopped again, and Lane had
audience with another minister. He was repulsed here also.

“We’re trying a magistrate,” said Lane, when the car stopped
again.

“But, Daren. This is where Gerald Hartley lives. Not him, Daren.
Surely you wouldn’t go to him?”

“Why not?” inquired Lane.

“It hasn’t been two months since he married Helen Wrapp. Hadn’t
you heard?”

“I’d forgotten,” said Lane.

“Besides, Daren, he—he once asked me to marry
him—before the war.”

Lane hesitated. Yes, he now remembered that in the days before
the war the young lawyer had been Mel’s persistent admirer. But a
reckless mood had begun to manifest itself in Lane during the
last hour, and it must have communicated its spirit to Mel, for
she made no further protest. The world was against them. They
were driving to the home of the man she had refused to marry, who
had eventually married a girl who had jilted Lane. In an ordinary
moment they would never have attempted such a thing. The mansion
before which the car stopped was well lighted; music and laughter
came faintly through the bright windows.

A maid opened the door to Lane and showed him into a
drawing-room. In a library beyond he saw women and men playing
cards, laughing and talking. Several old ladies were sitting
close together, whispering and nodding their heads. A young
fair-haired girl was playing the piano. Lane saw the maid advance
and speak to a sharp-featured man whom he recognized as Hartley.
Lane wanted to run out of the house. But he clenched his teeth
and swore he would go through with it.

“Mr. Hartley,” began Lane, as the magistrate came through the
curtained doorway, “I hope you’ll pardon my intrusion. My errand
is important. I’ve come to ask you to marry me to a lady who is
waiting outside.”

When Hartley recognized his visitor he started back in
astonishment. Then he laughed and looked more closely at Lane. It
was a look that made Lane wince, for he understood it to relate
to his mental condition.

“Lane! Well, by Jove!” he exclaimed. “Going to get married! You
honor me. The regular fee, which in my official capacity I must
charge, is one dollar. If you can pay that I will marry you.”

“I can pay,” replied Lane, quietly, and his level steady gaze
disconcerted Hartley.

“Where’s the woman?”

“She’s outside in a taxi.”

“Is she over eighteen?”

“Yes.”

Lane expected the question as to who the woman was. It was
singular that the magistrate neglected to ask this, the first
query offered by every minister Lane has visited.

“Fetch her in,” he said.

Lane went outside and hesitated at the car door, for he had an
intuitive flash which made him doubtful. But what if Hartley did
make a show of this marriage? The marriage itself was the vital
thing. Lane helped Mel out of the car and led her up the icy
steps. The maid again opened the door.

“Mr. Lane, walk right in,” said Hartley. “Of course, it’s natural
for the lady to be a little shy, but then if she wants to be
married at this hour she must not mind my family and guests. They
can be witnesses.”

He spoke in a voice in which Lane’s ears detected insincerity.
“Be seated, and wait until I get my book,” he continued, and left
the room.

Hartley had hardly glanced at Mel, and her veil had hidden her
features. He had gone toward his study rubbing his hands in a
peculiar manner which Lane remembered and which recalled the man
as he had looked many a time in the Bradford billiard room when a
good joke was going the rounds. Lane saw him hurry from his study
with pleasant words of invitation to his guests, a mysterious air
about him, a light upon his face. The ladies and gentlemen rose
from their tables and advanced from the library to the door of
the drawing-room. A girl of striking figure seized Hartley’s arm
and gesticulated almost wildly. It was Helen Wrapp. Her husband
laughed at her and waved a hand toward the drawing-room and his
guests. Turning swiftly with tigerish grace, she bent upon Lane
great green eyes whose strange expression he could not fathom.
What passionately curious eyes did she now fasten on his
prospective bride!

Lane gripped Mel’s hand. He felt the horror of what might be
coming. What a blunder he had made!

“Will the lady kindly remove her veil?” Hartley’s voice sounded
queer. His smile had vanished.

As Mel untied and thrust back the veil her fingers trembled. The
action disclosed a lovely face as white as snow.

“Mel Iden!” burst from the magistrate. For a moment there
was an intense silence. Then, “I’ll not marry you,” cried Hartley
vindictively.

“Why not? You said you would,” demanded Lane.

“Not to save your worthless lives,” Hartley returned, facing them
with a dark meaning in his eyes.

Lane turned to Mel and led her from the house and down to the
curb without speaking once.

Once more they went out into the blinding snow-storm. Lane threw
back his head and breathed the cold air. What a relief to get out
of that stifling room!

“Mel, I’m afraid it’s no use,” he said, finally.

“We are finding what the world thinks of us,” replied Mel. “Tell
the man to drive to 204 Locust Street.”

Once more the driver headed his humming car into the white storm.

Once more Lane sat silent, with his heart raging. Once more Mel
peered out into the white turmoil of gloom.

“Daren, we’re going to Dr. Wallace, my old minister. He’ll marry
us,” she said, presently.

“Why didn’t I think of him?”

“I did,” answered Mel, in a low voice. “I know he would marry us.
He baptized me; he has known and loved me all my life. I used to
sing in his choir and taught his Sunday School for years.”

“Yet you let me go to those others. Why?”

“Because I shrank from going to him.”

Once more the car lurched into the gutter, and this time they
both got out and mounted the high steps. Lane knocked. They
waited what appeared a long time before they heard some one
fumbling with the lock. Just then the bell in the church tower
nearby began chiming the midnight hour. The door opened, and
Doctor Wallace himself admitted them.

“Well! Who’s this?… Why, if it’s not Mel Iden! What a night to
be out in!” he exclaimed. He led them into a room, evidently his
study, where a cheerful wood fire blazed. There he took both her
hands and looked from her to Lane. “You look so white and
distressed. This late hour—this young man whom I know. What
has happened? Why do you come to me—the first time in so
many months?”

“To ask you to marry us,” answered Mel.

“To marry you?… Is this the soldier who wronged you?”

“No. This is Daren Lane…. He wants to marry me to give my boy a
name…. Somehow he finally made me consent.”

“Well, well, here is a story. Come, take off this snowy cloak and
get nearer the fire. Your hands are like ice.” His voice was very
calm and kind. It soothed Lane’s strained nerves. With what
eagerness did he scrutinize the old minister’s face. He knew the
penetrating eye, the lofty brow and white hair, the serious lined
face, sad in a noble austerity. But the lips were kind with that
softness and sweetness which comes from gentle words and frequent
smiles. Lane’s aroused antagonism vanished in the old man’s
presence.

“Doctor Wallace,” went on Mel. “We have been to several
ministers, and to Mr. Hartley, the magistrate. All refused to
marry us. So I came to my old friend. You’ve known me all my
life. Daren has at last convinced me—broke down my
resistance. So—I ask—will you marry us?”

Doctor Wallace was silent for many moments while he gazed into
the fire and stroked her hand. Suddenly a smile broke over his
fine face.

“You say you asked Hartley to marry you?”

“Yes, we went to him. It was a reckless thing to do. I’m sorry.”

“To say the least, it was original.” The old minister seemed to
have difficulty in restraining a laugh. Then for a moment he
pondered.

“My friends, I am very old,” he said at length, “but you have
taught me something. I will marry you.”

It was a strange marriage. Behind Mel and Daren stood the
red-faced, grinning driver, his coarse long coat covered with
snow, and the simpering housemaid, respectful, yet glorifying in
her share in this midnight romance. The old minister with his
striking face and white hair, gravely turned the leaves of his
book. No bridegroom ever wore such a stern, haggard countenance.
The bride’s face might have been a happier one, but it could not
have been more beautiful.

Doctor Wallace’s voice was low and grave; it quavered here and
there in passages. Lane’s was hardly audible. Mel’s rang deep and
full.

The witnesses signed their names; husband and wife wrote theirs;
the minister filled out the license, and the ceremony was over.

Then Doctor Wallace took a hand of each.

“Mel and Daren,” he said. “No human can read the secret ways of
God. But it seems there is divinity in you both. You have been
sacrificed to the war. You are builders, not destroyers. You are
Christians, not pagans. You have a vision limned against the
mystery of the future. Mammon seems now to rule. Civilization
rocks on its foundations. But the world will go on growing
better. Peace on earth, good will to men! That is the ultimate.
It was Christ’s teaching…. You two give me greater faith…. Go
now and face the world with heads erect—whatever you do,
Mel—and however long you live, Daren. Who can tell what
will happen? But time proves all things, and the blindness of
people does not last forever…. You both belong to the Kingdom
of God.”

But few words were spoken by Lane or Mel on the ride home. Mel
seemed lost in a trance. She had one hand slipped under Lane’s
arm, the other clasped over it. As for Lane, he had overestimated
his strength. A deadly numbness attacked his nerves, and he had
almost lost the sense of touch. When they arrived at Mel’s home
the snow-storm had abated somewhat, and the lighted windows of
the cottage shone brightly.

Lane helped Mel wade through the deep snow, or he pretended to
help her, for in reality he needed her support more than she
needed his. They entered the warm little parlor. Some one had
replenished the fire. The clock pointed to the hour of one. Lane
laid the marriage certificate on the open book Mel had been
reading. Mel threw off hat, coat, overshoes and gloves. Her hair
was wet with melted snow.

“Now, Daren Lane,” she said softly. “Now that you have made me
your wife—!”

Up until then Lane had been master of the situation. He had
thought no farther than this moment. And now he weakened. Was
this beautiful woman, with head uplifted and eyes full of fire,
the Mel Iden of his school days? Now that he had made her his
wife—.

“Mel, there’s no now for me,” he replied, with a sad
finality. “From this moment, I’ll live in the past. I have no
future…. Thank God, you let me do what I could. I’ll try to
come again soon. But I must go now. I’m afraid—I overtaxed
my strength.”

“Oh, you look so—so,” she faltered. “Stay, Daren—and
let me nurse you…. We have a little spare room, warm, cozy.
I’ll wait on you, Daren. Oh, it would mean so much to
me—now I am your wife.”

The look of her, the tones of her voice, made him weak. Then he
thought of his cold, sordid lodgings, and he realized that one
more moment here alone with Mel Iden would make him a coward in
his own eyes. He thanked her, and told her how impossible it was
for him to stay, and bidding her good night he reeled out into
the white gloom. At the gate he was already tired; at the bridge
he needed rest. Once more, then, he heard the imagined voices of
the waters calling to him.

CHAPTER XVIII

Seldom did Blair Maynard ever trust himself any more in the
presence of his mother’s guests. Since Mrs. Maynard had announced
the engagement of his sister Margaret to Richard Swann, she had
changed remarkably. Blair did not love her any the better for the
change. All his life, as long as he could remember, he and
Margaret had hated pretension, and the littleness of living
beyond their means. But now, with this one coup d’etat,
his mother had regained her position as the leader of Middleville
society. Haughty, proud, forever absorbed in the material side of
everything, she moved in a self-created atmosphere Blair could
not abide. He went hungry many a time rather than sit at table
with guests such as Mrs. Maynard delighted to honor.

Blair and Margaret had become estranged, and Blair spent most of
his time alone, reading or dreaming, but mostly sleeping. He knew
he grew weaker every day and his weakness appeared to induce
slumber.

On New Year’s day, after dinner, he fell asleep in a big chair,
across the hall from the drawing-room. And when he awoke the
drawing-room was full of people making New Year’s calls. If there
was anything Blair hated it was to thump on his crutch past
curious, cold-eyed persons. So he remained where he was, hoping
not to be seen. But unfortunately for him, he had exceedingly
keen ears and exceedingly sensitive feelings.

Some of the guests he knew very well without having to see them.
The Swanns, and Fanchon Smith, with her brother and mother,
Gerald Hartley and his bride, Helen Wrapp, and a number of others
prominent as Middleville’s elect were recognizable by their
voices. While he was sitting there, trying not to hear what he
could not help hearing, a number more arrived.

They talked. It gradually dawned on Blair that some gossip was
rife anent a midnight marriage between his friend Daren Lane and
Mel Iden. Blair was deeply shocked. Then his emotions, never
calm, grew poignant. He listened. What he heard spoken of Daren
and Mel made his blood boil. Sweet voices, low-pitched,
well-modulated, with the intonation of culture, made witty and
scarcely veiled remarks of a suggestiveness that gave rise to
laughter. Voices of men, bland, blase, deriding Daren Lane! Blair
listened, and slowly his passion mounted to a white heat. And
then it seemed, fate fully, in a lull of the conversation, some
one remarked graciously to Mrs. Maynard that it was a pity that
Blair had lost a leg in the war.

Blair thumped up on his crutch, and thumped across the hall to
confront this assembly.

“Ladies and gentlemen, pray pardon me,” he said, in his
high-pitched tenor, cold now, and under perfect control. “I could
not help hearing your conversation. And I cannot help
illuminating your minds. It seems exceedingly strange to me that
people of intelligence should make the blunders they do. So
strange that in the future I intend to take such as you have made
as nothing but the plain cold fact of perversion of human nature!
Daren Lane is so far above your comprehension that it seems
useless to defend him. I have never done it before. He would not
thank me. But this once I will speak…. In our group of service
men—so few of whom came home—he was a hero. We all
loved him. And for soldiers at war that tribute is the greatest.
If there was a dirty job to be done, Daren Lane volunteered for
it. If there was a comrade to be helped, Daren Lane was the first
to see it. He never thought of himself. The dregs of war did not
engulf him as they did so many of us. He was true to his ideal.
He would have been advanced for honors many a time but for the
enmity of our captain. He won the Croix de Guerre by as
splendid a feat as I saw during the war…. Thank God, we had
some officers who treated us like men—who were men
themselves. But for the majority we common soldiers were merely
beasts of burden, dogs to drive. This captain of whom I speak was
a padded shape—shirker from the front line—a parader
of his uniform before women. And he is that to-day—a chaser
of women—girls—girls of fifteen…. Yet he has
the adulation of Middleville while Daren Lane is an outcast….
My God, is there no justice? At home here Daren Lane has not done
one thing that was not right. Some of the gossip about him is as
false as hell. He has tried to do noble things. If he married Mel
Iden, as you say, it was in some exalted mood to help her, or to
give his name to her poor little nameless boy.”

Blair paused a moment in a deliberate speech that toward the end
had grown breathless. The faces before him seemed swaying in a
mist.

“As for myself,” he continued in passionate hurry, “I did not
lose my leg!… I sacrificed it. I gave my
career, my youth, my health, my body—and I will soon have
given my life—for my country and my people. I was proud to
do it. Never for a moment have I regretted it…. What I
lost—Ah! what I lost was respect for”—Blair
choked—”for the institution that had deluded me. What I
lost was not my leg but my faith in God, in my country, in
the gratitude of men left at home, in the honor of women.”

Friday, the tenth of January, dawned cold, dark, dreary, and all
day a dull clouded sky promised rain or snow. From a bride’s
point of view it was not a propitious day for a wedding. A half
hour before five o’clock a stream of carriages began to flow
toward St. Marks and promptly at five the door of the church shut
upon a large and fashionable assembly.

The swelling music of the wedding march pealed out. The bridal
party filed into the church. The organ peals hushed. The resonant
voice of a minister, with sing-song solemnity, began the marriage
service.

Margaret Maynard knew she stood there in the flesh, yet the
shimmering white satin, the flowing veil, covered some one who
was a stranger to her.

And this other, this strange being who dominated her movements,
stood passively and willingly by, while her despairing and truer
self saw the shame and truth. She was a lie. The guests, friends,
attendants, bridesmaids, the minister, the father, mother,
groom—all were lies. They expressed nothing of their true
feelings.

The unwelcomed curious, who had crowded into the back of the
church, were the sincerest, for in their eyes, covetousness was
openly unveiled. The guests and friends wore the conventional
shallow smiles of guests and friends. They whispered to one
another—a beautiful wedding—a gorgeous gown—a
perfect bride—a handsome groom; and exclaimed in their
hearts: How sad the father! How lofty, proud, exultant the
mother! How like her to move heaven and earth to make this
marriage! The attendants posed awkwardly, a personification of
the uselessness of their situation, and they pitied the bride
while they envied him for whose friendship they stood. The
bridesmaids graced their position and gloried in it, and serenely
smiled, and thought that to be launched in life in such dazzling
manner might be compensation for the loss of much. He of the
flowing robe, of the saintly expression, of the trained
earnestness, the minister who had power to unite these lives, saw
nothing behind that white veil, saw only his fashionable
audience, while his resonant voice rolled down the aisles of the
church: “Who gives this woman to be wedded to this man?” The
father answered and straightway the years rolled back to his
youth, to hope, to himself as he stood at the altar with love and
trust, and then again to the present, to the failure of health
and love and life, to the unalterable destiny accorded him, to
the one shame of an honest if unsuccessful life—the
countenancing of this marriage. The worldly mother had, for once,
a full and swelling heart. For her this was the crowning moment.
In one sense this fashionable crowd had been pitted against her
and she had won. What to her had been the pleading of a daughter,
the importunity of a father, the reasoning of a few old-fashioned
friends? The groom, who represented so much and so little in this
ceremony, had entered the church with head held high, had faced
his bride with gratified smile and the altar with serene
unconsciousness.

Margaret Maynard saw all this; saw even the bride, with her
splendidly regular loveliness; and then, out of heaven, it seemed
there thundered an awful command, rolling the dream away,
striking terror to her heart.

“If any man can show just cause why they may not lawfully be
joined together, let him now speak, or else hereafter for ever
hold his peace!”

One long, silent, terrible moment! Would not an angel appear,
with flaming sword, to smite her dead? But the sing-song voice
went on, like flowing silk.

The last guest at Mrs. Maynard’s reception had gone, reluctantly,
out into the snow, and the hostess sat in her drawing-room, amid
the ruins of flowers and palms. She was alone with her triumph.
Mr. Maynard and Mr. Swann were smoking in the library. Owing to
the storm and delicate health of the bride the wedding journey
had been postponed.

Margaret was left alone, at length, in the little blue-and-white
room which had known her as a child and maiden, where she now sat
as wife. For weeks past she had been emotionless. To-night, with
that trenchant command, unanswered except in her heart, a spasm
of pain had broken the serenity of her calm, and had left her
quivering.

“It is done,” she whispered.

The endless stream of congratulations, meaningless and abhorrent
to her, the elaborate refreshments, the warm embraces of old
friends had greatly fatigued her. But she could not rest. She
paced the little room; she passed the beautiful white bridal
finery, so neatly folded by the bridesmaids, and she averted her
eyes. She seemed not to hate her mother, nor love her father; she
had no interest in her husband. She was slipping back again into
that creature apart from her real self.

The house became very quiet; the snow brushed softly against the
windows.

A step in the hall made Margaret pause like a listening deer; a
tap sounded lightly on her door; a voice awoke her at last to
life and to torture.

“Margaret, may I come in?”

It was Swann’s voice, a little softer than usual, with a subtle
eagerness.

“No” answered Margaret, involuntarily.

“I beg your pardon. I’ll wait.” Swann’s footsteps died away in
the direction of the library.

The spring of a panther was in Margaret’s action as she began to
repace the room. All her blood quickened to the thought suggested
by her husband’s soft voice. In the mirror she saw a crimsoned
face and shamed eyes from which she turned away.

All the pain and repression, the fight and bitter resignation and
trained indifference of the past months were as if they had never
been. This was her hour of real agony; now was the time to pay
the price. Pride, honor, love never smothered, reserve rooted in
the very core of a sensitive woman’s heart, availed nothing. Once
again catching sight of her reflection in the mirror she stopped
before it, and crossing her hands on her heaving breast, she
regarded herself with scorn. She was false to her love, she was
false to herself, false to the man to whom she had sold herself.
“Oh! Why did I yield!” she cried. She was a coward; she belonged
to the luxurious class that would suffer anything rather than
lose position. Fallen had she as low as any of them; gold had
been the price of her soul. To keep her position she must marry
one man when she loved another. She cried out in her
wretchedness; she felt in her whole being a bitter humiliation;
she felt stir in her a terrible tumult.

Margaret wondered how many thousands of girls had been similarly
placed, and pitied them. She thought of the atmosphere in which
she lived, where it seemed to her every mother was possessed
singularly and entirely of one aim, to marry her daughter as soon
as possible to a man as rich as possible. Marrying well simply
meant marrying money. Only a few days before her mother had come
to her and said: “Mrs. Fisher called and she was telling me about
her daughter Alice. It seems Alice is growing very pretty and
very popular. She said she was afraid Alice had taken, a liking
to that Brandeth fellow, who’s only a clerk. So Mrs. Fisher
intends taking Alice to the seashore this summer, to an exclusive
resort, of course, but one where there will be excitement and
plenty of young gentlemen.”

At the remembrance Margaret gave a little contemptuous laugh. A
year ago she would not have divined the real purport of her
mother’s words. How easy that was now! Mrs. Fisher had decided
that as Alice was eighteen it was time a suitable husband was
found for her. Poor Alice! Balls, parties, receptions there would
be, and trips to the seashore and all the other society
manoeuvers, made ostensibly to introduce Alice to the world; but
if the truth were told in cold blood all this was simply a
parading of the girl before a number of rich and marriageable
men. Poor Harry Brandeth!

She recalled many marriages of friends and acquaintances. With
strange intensity of purpose she brought each one to mind, and
thought separately and earnestly over her. What melancholy facts
this exercise revealed! She could not recall one girl who was
happy, perfectly happy, unless it was Jane Silvey who ran off
with and married a telegraph operator. Jane was still bright-eyed
and fresh, happy no doubt in her little house with her work and
her baby, even though her people passed her by as if she were a
stranger. Then Margaret remembered with a little shock there was
another friend, a bride who had been found on her wedding night
wandering in the fields. There had been some talk, quickly
hushed, of a drunken husband, but it had never definitely
transpired what had made her run out into the dark night.
Margaret recollected the time she had seen this girl’s husband,
when he was drunk, beat his dog brutally. Then Margaret reflected
on the gossip she never wanted to hear, yet could not avoid
hearing, over her mother’s tea-table; on the intimations and
implications. Many things she would not otherwise have thought of
again, but they now recurred and added their significance to her
awakening mind. She was not keen nor analytical; she possessed
only an ordinary intelligence; she could not trace her way
through a labyrinth of perplexing problems; still, suffering had
opened her eyes and she saw something terribly wrong in her
mother’s world.

Once more she stopped pacing her room, for a step in the hall
arrested her, and made her stand quivering, as if under the lash.

“I won’t!” she breathed intensely. Swiftly and lightly she sped
across her room, opened a door leading to the balcony and went
out, closing the door behind her softly.

Mr. Maynard sat before the library fire with a neglected cigar
between his fingers. The events of the day had stirred him
deeply. The cold shock he had felt when he touched his daughter’s
cheek in the accustomed good-night kiss remained with him, still
chilled his lips. For an hour he sat there motionless, with his
eyes fixed on the dying fire, and in his mind hope, doubt and
remorse strangely mingled. Hope persuaded him that Margaret was
only a girl, still sentimental and unpoised. Unquestionably she
had made a good marriage. Her girlish notions about romance and
love must give way to sane acceptance of real human life. After
all money meant a great deal. She would come around to a sensible
view, and get that strange look out of her eyes, that strained
blighted look which hurt him. Then he writhed in his
self-contempt; doubt routed all his hope, and remorse made him
miserable.

A hurried step on the stairs aroused Mr. Maynard. Swann came
running into the library. He was white; his sharp featured face
wore a combination of expressions; alarm, incredulity, wonder
were all visible there, but the most striking was mortification.

“Mr. Maynard, Margaret has left her room. I can’t find her
anywhere.”

The father stared blankly at his son-in-law.

Swann repeated his statement.

“What!” All at once Mr. Maynard sank helplessly into his chair.
In that moment certainty made him an old broken man.

“She’s gone!” said Swann, in a shaken voice. “She has run off
from me. I knew she would; I knew she’d do something. I’ve never
been able to kiss her—only last night we quarreled about
it. I tell you it’s—”

“Pray do not get excited,” interrupted Mr. Maynard, bracing up.
“I’m sure you exaggerate. Tell me what you know.”

“I went to her room an hour, two hours ago, and knocked. She was
there but refused me admittance. She spoke sharply—as
if—as if she was afraid. I went and knocked again long
after. She didn’t answer. I knocked again and again. Then I tried
her door. It was not locked. I opened it. She was not in the
room. I waited, but she didn’t come. I—I am afraid
something is—wrong.”

“She might be with her mother,” faltered Mr. Maynard.

“No, I’m sure not,” asserted Swann. “Not to-night of all nights.
Margaret has grown—somewhat cold toward her mother. Besides
Mrs. Maynard retired hours ago.”

The father and the husband stole noiselessly up the stairs and
entered Margaret’s room. The light was turned on full. The room
was somewhat disordered; bridal finery lay littered about; a rug
was crumpled; a wicker basket overturned. The father’s instinct
was true. His first move was to open the door leading out upon
the balcony. In the thin snow drifted upon this porch were the
imprints of little feet.

Something gleamed pale blue in the light of the open door. Mr.
Maynard picked it up, and with a sigh that was a groan held it
out to Swann. It was a blue satin slipper.

“Heavens!” exclaimed Swann. “She’s run out in the snow—she
might as well be barefooted.”

“S-sh-h!” warned Mr. Maynard. Unhappy and excited as he was he
did not forget Mrs. Maynard. “Let us not alarm any one.”

“There! See, her footsteps down the stairs,” whispered Swann. “I
can see them clear to the ground.”

“You stay here, Swann, so in case Mrs. Maynard or the servants
awake you can prevent alarm. We must think of that. I’ll bring
her back.”

Mr. Maynard descended the narrow stairway to the lower porch and
went out into the yard. The storm had ceased. A few inches of
snow had fallen and in places was deeper in drifts. The moon was
out and shone down on a white world. It was cold and quiet. When
Mr. Maynard had trailed the footsteps across his wide lawn and
saw them lead out into the street toward the park, he fell
against a tree, unable, for a moment, to command himself. Hope he
had none left, nor a doubt. On the other side of the park, hardly
a quarter of a mile away, was the river. Margaret had gone
straight toward it.

Outside in the middle of the street he found her other slipper.
She had not even stockings on now; he could tell by the
impressions of her feet in the snow. He remembered quite
mournfully how small Margaret’s feet were, how perfectly shaped.
He hurried into the park, but was careful to obliterate every
vestige of her trail by walking in the soft snow directly over
her footprints. A hope that she might have fainted before she
could carry out her determination arose in him and gave him
strength. He kept on. Her trail led straight across the park, in
the short cut she had learned and run over hundreds of times when
a little girl. It was hastening her now to her death.

At first her footsteps were clear-cut, distinct and wide apart.
Soon they began to show evidences of weariness; the stride
shortened; the imprints dragged. Here a great crushing in a snow
drift showed where she had fallen.

Mr. Maynard’s hope revived; he redoubled his efforts. She could
not be far. How she dragged along! Then with a leap of his heart,
and a sob of thankfulness he found her, with disheveled hair, and
face white as the snow where it rested, sad and still in the
moonlight.

CHAPTER XIX

Middleville was noted for its severe winters, but this year the
zero weather held off until late in January. Lane was peculiarly
susceptible to the cold and he found himself facing a discomfort
he knew he could not long endure. Every day he felt more and more
that he should go to a warm and dry climate; and yet he could not
determine to leave Middleville. Something held him.

The warmth of bright hotel lobbies and theatres and restaurants
uptown was no longer available for Lane. His money had dwindled
beyond the possibility of luxury, and besides he shrank now from
meeting any one who knew him. His life was empty, dreary and
comfortless.

One wintry afternoon Lane did not wander round as long as usual,
for the reason that his endurance was lessening. He returned
early to his new quarters, and in the dim hallway he passed a
slight pale girl who looked at him. She seemed familiar, but Lane
could not place her. Evidently she had a room in the building.
Lane hated the big barn-like house, and especially the bare cold
room where he had to seek rest. Of late he had not eaten any
dinner. He usually remained in bed as long as he could, and made
a midday meal answer all requirements. Appetite, like many other
things, was failing him. This day he sat upon his bed, in the
abstraction of the lonely and unhappy, until the cold forced him
to get under the covers.

His weary eyelids had just closed when he was awakened. The
confused sense of being torn from slumber gave way to a
perception of a voice in the room next to his. It was a man’s
voice, rough with the huskiness Lane recognized as peculiar to
drunkards. And the reply to it seemed to be a low-toned appeal
from a woman.

“Playin’ off sick, eh? You don’t want to work. But you’ll get me
some money, girl, d’ye hear?”

A door slammed, rattling the thin partition between the two
rooms, and heavy footsteps dragged in the hall and on the
stairway.

Sleep refused to come back to Lane. As he lay there he was
surprised at the many sounds he heard. The ramshackle old
structure, which he had supposed almost vacant, was busy with
life. Stealthy footfalls in the hallways passed and repassed; a
piano drummed somewhere; a man’s loud voice rang out, and a
woman’s laugh faint, hollow and far away, like the ghost of
laughter, returned in echo. The musical clinking of glasses, the
ring of a cash register, the rattling click of pool balls, came
up from below.

Presently Lane remembered the nature of the place. It was a house
of night. In daylight it was silent; its inmates were asleep. But
as the darkness unfolded a cloak over it, all the hidden springs
of its obscure humanity began to flow. Lying there with the
woman’s appeal haunting him and all those sounds in his ears he
thought of their meaning. The drunkard with his lust for money;
his moaning victim; the discordant piano; the man with the vacant
laugh; the lost hope and youth in the woman’s that echoed it; the
stealing, slipping feet of those who must tread softly—all
conveyed to Lane that he had awakened in another world, a world
which shunned sunlight.

Toward morning he dozed off into a fitful sleep which lasted
until ten o’clock when he arose and dressed. As he was about to
go out a knock on the door of the room next to his recalled the
incident of the night. He listened. Another knock followed,
somewhat louder, but no response came from within.

“Say, you in there,” cried a voice Lane recognized as the
landlady’s. She rattled the door-knob.

A girl’s voice answered weakly: “Come in.”

Lane heard the door open.

“I wants my room rent. I can’t get a dollar out of your drunken
father. Will you pay? It’s four weeks overdue.”

“I have no money.”

“Then get out an’ leave me the room.” The landlady spoke angrily.

“I’m ill. I can’t get up.” The answer was faint.

Lane opened his door quickly, and confronted the broad person of
the landlady.

“How much does the woman owe?” he asked, quietly.

“Ah-huh!” the exclamation was trenchant with meaning. “Twenty
dollars, if it’s anything to you.”

“I’ll pay it. I think I heard the woman say she was ill.”

“She says she is.”

“May I be of any assistance?”

“Ask her.”

Lane glanced into the little room, a counterpart of his. But it
was so dark he could see nothing distinctly.

“May I come in? Let me raise the blind. There, the sun is fine
this morning. Now, may I not—-”

He looked down at a curly head and a sweet pretty face that he
knew.

“I know you,” he said, groping among past associations.

“I am Rose Clymer,” she whispered, and a momentary color came
into her wan cheeks.

“Rose Clymer! Bessy Bell’s friend!”

“Yes, Mr. Lane. I’m not so surprised as you. I recognized you
last night.”

“Then it was you who passed me in the hall?”

“Yes.”

“Well! And you’re ill? What is the matter? Ah! Last
night—it was your—your father—I heard?”

“Yes,” she answered. “I’ve not been well since—for a long
time, and I gave out last night.”

“Here I am talking when I might be of some use,” said Lane, and
he hurried out of the room. The landlady had discreetly retired
to the other end of the hall. He thrust some money into her
hands.

“She seems pretty sick. Do all you can for her, be kind to her.
I’ll pay. I’m going for a doctor.”

He telephoned for Doctor Bronson.

An hour later Lane, coming upstairs from his meal, met the
physician at Rose’s door. He looked strangely at Lane and shook
his head.

“Daren, how is it I find you here in this place?”

“Beggars can’t be choosers,” answered Lane, with his old frank
smile.

“Humph!” exclaimed the doctor, gruffly.

“How about the girl?” asked Lane.

“She’s in bad shape,” replied Bronson…. “Lane, are you aware of
her condition?”

“Why, she’s ill—that’s all I know,” replied Lane, slowly.
“Rose didn’t tell me what ailed her. I just found out she was
here.”

Doctor Bronson looked at Lane. “Too bad you didn’t find out
sooner. I’ll call again to-day and see her…. And say, Daren,
you look all in yourself.”

“Never mind me, Doctor. It’s mighty good of you to look after
Rose. I know you’ve more patients than you can take care of. Rose
has nothing and her father’s a poor devil. But I’ll pay you.”

“Never mind about money,” rejoined Bronson, turning to go.

Lane could learn little from Rose. Questions seemed to make her
shrink, so Lane refrained from them and tried to cheer her. The
landlady had taken a sudden liking to Lane which evinced itself
in her change of attitude toward Rose, and she was communicative.
She informed Lane that the girl had been there about two months;
that her father had made her work till she dropped. Old Clymer
had often brought men to the hotel to drink and gamble, and to
the girl’s credit she had avoided them.

For several days Doctor Bronson came twice daily to see Rose. He
made little comment upon her condition, except to state that she
had developed peritonitis, and he was not hopeful. Soon Rose took
a turn for the worse. The doctor came to Lane’s room and told him
the girl would not have the strength to go through with her
ordeal. Lane was so shocked he could not speak. Dr. Bronson’s
shoulders sagged a little, an unusual thing for him. “I’m sorry,
Daren,” he said. “I know you wanted to help the poor girl out of
this. But too late. I can ease her pain, and that’s all.”

Strangely shaken and frightened Lane lay down in the dark. The
partition between his room and Rose’s might as well have been
paper for all the sound it deadened. He could have escaped that,
but he wanted to be near her…. And he listened to Rose’s moans
in the darkness. Lane shuddered there, helpless, suffering,
realizing. Then the foreboding silence became more dreadful than
any sound…. It was terrible for Lane. That strange cold knot in
his breast, that coil of panic, seemed to spring and tear,
quivering through all his body. What had he known of torture, of
sacrifice, of divine selflessness? He understood now how the
loved and guarded woman went down into the Valley of the Shadow
for the sake of a man. Likewise, he knew the infinite tragedy of
a ruined girl who lay in agony, gripped by relentless nature.

Lane was called into the hall by Mrs. O’Brien. She was weeping.
Bronson met him at the door.

“She’s dying,” he whispered. “You’d better come in. I’ve ‘phoned
to Doctor Wallace.”

Lane went in, almost blinded. The light seemed dim. Yet he saw
Rose with a luminous glow radiating from her white face.

“I feel—so light,” she said, with a wan smile.

Lane sat by the bed, but he could not speak. The moments dragged.
He had a feeling of their slow but remorseless certainty.

Then there were soft steps outside—Mrs. O’Brien opened the
door—and Doctor Wallace entered the room.

“My child,” he gravely began, bending over her.

Rose’s big eyes with their strained questioning gaze sought his
face and Doctor Bronson’s and Lane’s.

“Rose—are you—in pain?”

“The burning’s gone,” she said.

“My child,” began Doctor Wallace, again. “Your pain is almost
over. Will you not pray with me?”

“No. I never was two-faced,” replied Rose, with a weary shake of
the tangled curls. “I won’t show yellow now.”

Lane turned away blindly. It was terrible to think of her dying
bitter, unrepentant.

“Oh! if I could hope!” murmured Rose. “To see my mother!”

Then there were shuffling steps outside and voices. The door was
opened by Mrs. O’Brien. Old Clymer crossed the threshold. He was
sober, haggard, grieved. He had been told. No one spoke as he
approached Rose’s bedside.

“Lass—lass—” he began, brokenly.

Then he sought from the men confirmation of a fear borne by a
glance into Rose’s white still face. And silence answered him.

“Lass, if you’re goin’—tell me—who was to blame?”

“No one—but myself—father,” she replied.

“Tell me, who was to blame?” demanded Clymer, harshly.

Her pale lips curled a little bitterly, and suddenly, as a change
seemed to come over her, they set that way. She looked up at Lane
with a different light in her eyes. Then she turned her face to
the wall.

Lane left the room, to pace up and down the hall outside. His
thoughts seemed deadlocked. By and bye, Doctor Bronson came out
with Doctor Wallace, who was evidently leaving.

“She is unconscious and dying,” said Doctor Bronson to Lane, and
then bade the minister good-bye and returned to the room.

“How strangely bitter she was!” exclaimed Doctor Wallace to Lane.
“Yet she seemed such a frank honest girl. Her attitude was an
acknowledgment of sin. But she did not believe it herself. She
seemed to have a terrible resentment. Not against one man, or
many persons, but perhaps life itself! She was beyond me. A
modern girl—a pagan! But such a brave, loyal, generous
little soul. What a pity! I find my religion at fault because it
can accomplish nothing these days.”

CHAPTER XX

Lane took Rose’s death to heart as if she had been his sister or
sweetheart. The exhaustion and exposure he was subjected to
during these days dragged him farther down.

One bitter February day he took refuge in the railroad station.
The old negro porter who had known Lane since he was a boy
evidently read the truth of Lane’s condition, for he contrived to
lead him back into a corner of the irregular room. It was an
obscure corner, rather hidden by a supporting pillar and the
projecting end of a news counter. This seat was directly over the
furnace in the cellar. Several pipes, too hot to touch, came up
through the floor. It was the warmest place Lane had found, and
he sat there for hours. He could see the people passing to and
fro through the station, arriving and leaving on trains, without
himself being seen. That afternoon was good for him, and he went
back next day.