A few minutes after eight found me walking out Myrtle Boulevard, Deep Harbor's street of streets, toward the Claybourne residence. I had dressed in dinner clothes with exceeding care; no one could have guessed that my business for most of the night was to superintend the night-shift at a factory. The latter task was infinitely remote; if it crossed my mind at all, it was only as something mechanical, to be wound up later and left to run by itself. The important matter in hand was to verify first impressions concerning a pair of grey eyes.
A maid opened the door of a pleasant oak-panelled hallway, and before I had time to get my bearings the grey eyes were introducing me to "Mother." In an instant I had the feeling that the latter was not prepared to be enthusiastic. Strange young men from the outlands, of unknown origin, were evidently to be resisted. I looked at her closely, as I made my best and politest bow, hoping that my manners might carry a little conviction. Mrs. Claybourne was short and sallow, the latter caused, as I was later to learn, by her mania for tinkering with her health. She was a little fretful, with a tendency to imply that the world was not very considerate. "I told Helen I was too tired tonight to be very entertaining," was her wail, as I shook hands, "but she would ask you."
"We are not going to bother you at all, mother dear," Helen, as I dared think of her, interposed hastily. "Now do sit down in your big chair and read your magazine. We are going out on the side porch."
"Mr. Claybourne is at the club playing cards. I must apologize for his not being here—but then he seldom is," Mrs. Claybourne went on plaintively. "Helen, this room is so untidy it's a positive disgrace. I do think you might have Jane straighten it up a little when you expect callers. No one ever thinks of me. My nerves make me a very poor housekeeper, Mr. Jevons."
The room appeared to me most comfy and home-like. There were books and magazines and the atmosphere of a place in which people really lived. I murmured some deprecatory reply as Helen took me out on to the side porch. The latter was a heavenly place shut in by vines heavy with the odour of honeysuckle. There were deep wicker-basket chairs and a marvellous couch-like hammock. Unlike the Deep Harbor with which I was familiar, this spot was quiet and restful. The early October air was tinged with a delicious hint of frosts to come; the stars shone large and clear; the Milky Way seemed fairly to romp across the sky.
"You mustn't mind mother," said Helen, as we sat in two of the large chairs. "She isn't quite happy unless she has a grievance."
I laughed. It was so like the comment I had hoped her capable of making. "I'm afraid I'm her grievance tonight—I wish I thought a happy one."
"I'm afraid that's partly true," Helen replied. "Mother is an extreme stickler for the conventions. She complains that no one knows who you are. It was useless for me to tell her that I knew you and didn't care who you are—Mother says I am hopelessly of this generation—and regards that as an argument against you. I finally told her you were coming anyway—and, well—," she laughed,—"here you are."
So she had defended me and fought for me! My invitation to call was therefore no mere empty social form such as common politeness toward a stranger, but an offer of friendship.
"I really can set your mother's mind at rest," I said. "I belong to one or two decent clubs—so does my father—"
"Please don't—I'm not asking for a passport," she interrupted. "As for mother, she will get used to you in time."
This was encouraging, for it deliberately implied other calls to come. Of course, the upshot was that I told her all about myself, pouring out the pent-up loneliness accumulated since my arrival. She listened as only a sympathetic girl can listen to a man talking endlessly about himself. At times there came delicious silences during which we stared at the stars, and again a gentle question from her would start me off once more. It was with a shock that we suddenly noticed "mother" silhouetted in the doorway.
"Helen!" came the complaining voice. "It's half past ten." "Good Lord," I groaned inwardly, "I might have stayed all night." I rose hastily, Helen more deliberately.
"Very well, mother," her soft voice said, "Ted is just going." It was the first time she had called me Ted. I fell over a wicker tabouret in my delirium. As we passed into the living room, Mrs. Claybourne buttonholed me.
"Have you a grandfather, young man?"
Helen's shocked "Mother!" was unheeded.
"Yes, Mrs. Claybourne, I had. He was colonel of one of your northern regiments in the Civil War. His sword hangs over my desk. I shall be pleased to show it you some day at tea."
"Mother! How could you?" again from Helen, and she laid her hand, just for a second, ever so lightly, on my arm.
The effect of my statement I observed to be favourable. The "good-night" Mrs. Claybourne gave me was less chilly than the earlier "good evenings." Helen went with me to the door.
"Do you ride?" she asked, with a change of subject that surprised me.
"Yes—or, rather, I did before coming to Deep Harbor."
"Then get a horse and be here at nine next Sunday morning. Good-night, Ted."
"Good-night, Helen. Thank you for tonight."
I left in such entranced good humour with the world that I forgot to change my clothes before reporting at the factory; and so it happened that the superintendent of the first night-shift performed his duties in what my tailor had informed me were "faultless" evening clothes. The result was to make Knowlton's grin wider than usual when I appeared to relieve him.
"Ted, you've got more nerve than I gave you credit for, if you face our gang in a clawhammer. However, lots of folks have original ideas when they try suicide. If you are lynched before morning don't forget I warned you."
"You need not worry," I said with dignity. "I'm fairly good friends with most of our men."
"All right, Ted. Some get theirs shooting tigers; others falling off the Alps; still others by being just plain damn fools. I'm thinking you'll look a little strange on your way to breakfast aboard the seven-five trolley."
At this I turned a little pale; I had not thought of the journey back by broad daylight. It was too late to back out. I went down to the machine shop with my fortitude somewhat shaken, only to discover my fears groundless and Knowlton's warning unnecessary. No one but an occasional apprentice or mechanic's helper so much as bothered to look at me, much less make any comment. The office might always have worn similar regalia, as far as outward signs were concerned.
Until about one in the morning I found the factory by night a picturesque place. Every machine was running at full capacity. Overhead blinking white arc lamps, whose rays were shot through with spluttering purple, danced and hissed. At the lathes grey-headed mechanics, fine-looking shrewd-faced men most of them, bent and peered at the Medusa-like tresses of steel the tools sheered off from the castings. Helpers leaned over them with wire-enclosed electric bulbs, lighting up the faces of the chief actors as in a theatre. Belts raced and flapped from nosy shafts along the ceiling—a steady, uninterrupted din. An occasional machine would shriek or groan in the agony of its task. Further down the shop the compressed air chisels were beating a devil's tattoo against the rougher castings. Boys trundled trucks piled with metal parts on their way from one machine to another. Foremen, pad and pencil in hand, went about keeping a record of each machine's progress. The place smelt of hot oil, of grimy cotton waste, and of sweaty human bodies.
As the novelty of the picture wore off I became sleepy and bored. By two o'clock it was clear that as superintendent I had a sinecure. This automaton of a factory was quite capable of running itself. No one referred any questions to me or asked my advice. I lingered hopefully here and there when I saw a machine slow down or stop for a moment, but whatever the reason of these stoppages, I was not consulted.
Upstairs to the laboratory I went, leaving word with the chief foreman where I was to be found. Work was out of the question; I was too sleepy. I tried my hand at a few pages in the diary—to recapitulate my thoughts on the subject of grey eyes. As usual when I most wanted to write or felt that I had a topic worth writing about, no words would come. I fell asleep in my chair once, with my feet upon my desk, to wake with a horrible start when they slid off with a thump. "Six weeks of this"—I thought with a shudder—"only the other nights will not be quite so bad, because I am to do my regular work at night and sleep by day." A dreadful inversion of one's normal life, whichever way one looked at it. It meant bringing a midnight supper for one thing—and where was the restaurant in Deep Harbor to prepare a tempting supper? Then I was annoyed at myself because my mind had seized upon such a petty factor as a question of supper to magnify into importance.
I tried to get back to grey eyes, but I was too sleepy to be sentimental. What was it we were to do Sunday? Oh, yes—go for a ride. Where? I wondered. Heavens! I had no riding clothes! I scribbled a hasty memorandum and heard the town hall clock strike three. "Take a look around once an hour," Knowlton had said. "To make sure, punch the clock in the front office each time you pass." To punch a clock was to register one's number on a circular mechanism which also recorded the time as well. My number was seven. As I had rather resented being numbered, Knowlton allowed me to choose my own. His was one. I remember chosing seven because it was lucky. At this point I pulled myself together and started another tour.
Hour by hour the endless night went by; the dawn, turning the lake to mauve and next to gold, gave promise that soon the factory gates would open to let me pass. I was tired—too tired to think or care for anything but bed. I had still to report to Knowlton when I successfully passed the ordeal of going down-town in evening clothes. Fortunately I was able to borrow a raincoat.
"Run home and get all the sleep you can. You are off until six this evening."
At two in the afternoon I awoke; and, try as I would, further sleep was impossible. I got up, had a shower, and telephoned Helen. Of course her mother answered. It appeared that Helen was out, nor, to judge from her mother's explanations, did there seem any likelihood Helen would ever be home again. "Something will have to be done about mama," I reflected. What was it I must do today? Oh, yes—riding clothes. I hurried out in search of a tailor who would engage himself on his honour to make me riding clothes by Sunday morning. Two declared it could not be done by mortal man, since it was now Friday afternoon; one was doubtful. He had heard of things done in such haste, but was skeptical concerning results. I insulted him into accepting the commission. Our contract was finally settled on the basis of midnight Saturday or no pay. "Where does one obtain horses in this town?" I pondered, strolling down State Street, which was respectable for four blocks and most ragged and disreputable top and bottom. At Frazee's famous soda-water-and-candy store whom should I see inside but Helen! After all, the coincidence was not so remarkable, I muttered. If one were out at all in Deep Harbor one was limited to State Street's four blocks of stores or to Myrtle Boulevard. The rest of the town was chiefly built up of slums and factories, except for one or two lesser streets on which people lived, but never walked. I went in to Frazee's and only needed Helen's welcoming smile to join her at the little marble-topped table.
"What on earth are you eating?" I asked, not very polite, as I pointed at a little mess in a dish before her.
"That is a chocolate nut sundae," she laughed. "Won't you try one?"
"Are they very sweet?" I inquired doubtfully.
"Of course!" and she presented a brimming spoon to me to taste. I was honored by the compliment, but the sickeningly sweet compound all but did for me. I had not yet eaten, for I was too tired in the morning and had forgotten about it after I got up. Helen was delighted with the face I made over it.
"I think I prefer more solid food," I apologized. "My education stopped with ice-cream sodas."
"I think it's a great lark meeting you here like this! Mother would be furious!"
"Isn't it done?" I asked in all seriousness, looking about at Frazee's unlimited display of white marble, enamel, and nickel trimmings. It seemed a harmless looking place to me.
"Of course not, you silly Ted. What do you suppose Deep Harbor would say if we did this very often?"
"Is Deep Harbor loquacious?"
"Extremely."
"But the place is full of young couples—just like ourselves."
Helen laughed. "If I explain, you'll think me snobbish, Ted, and I'm not, even if mother is. Don't you see—all these boys and girls—well that's what Deep Harbor is like."
"I understand perfectly, now I think it over. I should be very careful where I took you to tea at home—and we'd have to have official sanction to go at all ... Deep Harbor is like the rest of the world."
Again she laughed, and her grey eyes danced. "Ted, you really must give up thinking we are strange aborigines. But I feel the same way you do when I come back from boarding school—until I settle down again."
"I suppose it's the old prejudice against the new and strange," I said.
"You've just said Deep Harbor is like the rest of the world, Ted."
"It is," I said, looking at her until she dropped her eyes.
"Always conceding that you know the world, Ted," she added slyly, looking up suddenly from under her lashes.
"I've seen quite a lot of it."
"Is that the same as knowing it?"
"No, but it's a start."
"Goodness me, Teddy, I ought to be home by now," she exclaimed, springing up. Women are apt to break off a conversation just as it is getting interesting.
"May I walk home with you?"
"That would never do, Teddy."
I looked so disappointed that she softened. "You may come part way. That will be enough for Myrtle Boulevard for one afternoon."
"What do you mean?"
"The porches are full at this time, Ted, and I know every living soul on Myrtle Boulevard."
I walked a few paces in silence.
"I must see your father—I can show him some letters—"
"Ted, you won't do anything so insanely silly."
"But what can I do?"
"If I were you," she remarked demurely, "I'd try staying on my very best behaviour." Her eyes flashed mischief as she said this.
"Does every inquisitive idiot in Deep Harbor know me by sight?"
"Be careful, Ted, how you refer to our upper circles," she laughed. "Of course they know you, silly boy. You buy a factory from one of our prominent business men, come all the way from London, speak to no one, live a mysterious life all by yourself, with a strange piratey-looking cutthroat—"
"Prospero!" I exclaimed.
"Prospero! Delicious name!" she echoed. "Well, you do all these things and then imagine you are invisible. Could any one but a man be so stupid?"
"There does seem to be something in what you say," I gurgled humbly. Her laugh this time was loud and joyous enough to add to Myrtle Boulevard's suspicions.
"Any one with any common sense would have presented his letters of introduction at the beginning."
"How do you know I have any?"
"Oh, dad had the bank look up all your connections, of course, when you borrowed money for the pay roll. He's a director. He told me all about it."
"This is a chatty little village"—I said with a very feeble effort at withering sarcasm.
"So you see, Ted, dad and I know you are all right,—only mother and the rest rather stick at your not presenting yourself properly. It will take a lot of grandfather to get around that!"—and she went off again into peals of laughter.
"Helen, you don't believe—"
She cut me off. "Ted. I make friends with whom I please, and no explanations are necessary, unless I ask for them."
"But there wasn't—"
"That will do, Teddy. You must turn back now," and she went on, leaving me with one last protest hanging in mid-air. I looked at my watch, as one always does in the street to cover embarrassment. It was quarter to six! By dashing up a side street and running after an electric car I arrived at the office exactly with the whistle.
Chapter Six
I GO FOR A RIDE ON SATAN
My precious riding clothes were delivered Saturday night, somewhat to my surprise. I tried them on at a private dress rehearsal before going to bed.
By eight in the morning I was under way to a certain livery and feed stable that had been recommended and found that no progress had yet been made with saddling my chosen horse—or even with the grooming of the angular-looking brute. A tip spurred the hostler's efforts, and finally Satan was as presentable as a horse possessing his peculiar anatomy could be. The beast was an underfed Western broncho somewhat past the first bloom of youth. His eye was not confiding, showing too much white; the manipulation of his ears confirmed the moroseness indicated by his eyes. The poor animal's bony frame was seared all over with hieroglyphic brands proclaiming service under the dynasties of many ranches; he was as interesting to study as the panels on an Egyptian tomb. I suspected that much of the important history of the Far West was engraved upon him. The question of riding, him, however, was a matter of Hobson's choice, for the other animals were fat ladies' cobs mainly used in harness.
When Satan and I appeared before Helen's house there were half a dozen other horses, both good and bad, tethered in front or watched over by grooms. It was to be quite a large party, I noted, with considerable disappointment. Helen came out immediately, looking radiant in a linen riding habit, black sailor hat, and shiny boots. Why is it that a smart riding habit is the most becoming costume a woman can wear? She invited me in to await the others. Her father met us in the entrance hall. He was a typical clear-cut business man, with a rigid moustache, a keen eye, and a hearty hand-clasp. He looked a little searchingly at me, but was friendly. Mother, on the other hand, was certain it was going to rain; the whole party was a foolish idea; we ought to go to church; horses were never safe, and so on. Helen kept up an automatic "Yes, mother. Now don't worry about us, mother," with what I thought was angelic patience.
The others were not long in getting ready. Among them was Miss Hemphill; the rest were strangers to me. There were two more girls, besides Helen and Miss Hemphill, and three other men, one of whom was a dapper German who spoke but little English. Helen told me he was a cavalry officer visiting German-American relatives in Deep Harbor. I was detailed to talk to him because I had fragments of his language and could at least understand him. He clicked his heels and bowed with the customary Prussian stiffness that carried me back at a bound to a week once spent in Berlin. I was curious to know what he was doing in Deep Harbor. There was, however, no opportunity at that time for me to pump him, for Helen ordered us to horse.
We made quite a cavalcade down Myrtle Boulevard, going two by two, with Helen and me in the lead. Behind us rode the German, lavishing most studied attention upon Miss Delia Greyson, who, Helen said, was one of Deep Harbor's heiresses. I felt quite shabby on poor old Satan alongside Helen's neat lady's mare, followed as we were by two superb horses belonging to the Greysons' stables. The German, who was called Lieutenant Ludwig von Oberhausen, took pains to make his horse show off, a thing which caused my Western democratic beast to make vicious threats at such carryings on. I was obliged to ask the Herr Lieutenant to have a care that Satan did not plant his heels where they would be undesirable. The Lieutenant raised his eyebrows and said "Ach so?"—not very pleasantly.
"What have I done to be punished with a German?" I asked Helen, after the Lieutenant had curvetted into Satan and me for about the tenth time. Helen laughed. "Why, we think him very nice. He's quite an important man in his own country."
"Oh, I'm sure of that," I retorted. "They all are, in their own estimation."
"Now, you've got to behave, Ted, and forget your nasty English prejudices. Ludwig is a wonderful horseman and dances adorably."
"Wouldn't you know it?" I thought to myself. "Of course the brute has his parlour tricks down perfectly"—but I was too canny to say this aloud.
"We'll ride on ahead of them, if he annoys," she conceded.
"By the way, Helen," I remarked as we reached the dusty and cinder-strewn outskirts to the eastward of Deep Harbor, "where are we going?"
"Haven't I told you, Ted? Oh, I always forget you don't know us. We are going where we often go—to a wonderful little inn to eat a chicken-and-waffle dinner."
"How far is it?" I enquired, for I was already aware that it had been several months since I had ridden a horse.
"Not over fifteen miles," she replied, quite unconscious of the shock her words were to me. A thirty-mile ride the first day! "We'll have a late supper at my house when we get back," she continued. "There's a lovely ravine north from the inn; we can ride up there to a little fairy waterfall. It's only two or three miles out of our way."
"It sounds delightful," I stated quite truthfully. "Satan," I whispered, "you poor old beast, if you are game, I am. It may kill us both, but we'll see it through." Satan shook his head, insulted at the liberty I took of addressing him confidentially.
We were now in the open country, which fairly sparkled in the clear October air. The vineyards on either side of the road were hung with purple clusters, the maples were giving the first hints of their autumn colouring; the sumach was already flaming. Beyond, the lake lay, a colder blue than I had seen it; one felt like shouting with the very joy of living. All this, by some strange twist, reminded me of Mrs. Claybourne's hostility to me. I questioned Helen about it.
"Oh, mother made an awful fuss when she heard I'd asked you to come. Dad spoke up for you; at least, he told mother I was old enough to take care of myself. The trouble was that Ludwig had asked me to go with him—"
"That German?" I interrupted savagely.
"Hush, Ted. Remember your manners. I refused his invitation to ask you. Now are you satisfied?" Giving her horse a touch with her riding crop, she cantered off down the road ahead of me.
"Come Satan," I spoke to my animal, "shades of cattle round-ups and the Wyoming Trail—show what you are good for," and we set off madly in pursuit. It was her pleasure to let us catch her, for Satan, willing enough, was beyond the time of life when he could overhaul a thoroughbred. He was breathing hard, but with dignity, when I pulled upon his iron mouth as we came abreast. I found Helen laughing until tears were in her eyes.
"What now, little woman?" I asked with the anxiety a man has when a woman laughs by herself.
"I was thinking that if Satan were half a hand taller he would exactly match Mr. Winkle's horse. You looked too funny lumbering down the hill after us."
"Apart from the fact that it was bad form of you to canter down a hill and thus imperil Satan's rheumatic joints, I hope you don't intend the comparison to extend to the rider," I rebuked her.
"No," pursing her lips, "you handle a horse well—a little finicky, perhaps, as if you were riding in a park. All told, you compare quite favourably with Mr. Winkle"—this with a most merry twinkle.
"I was once in love with Arabella Allen," I remarked solemnly.
"Isn't that just like a man? She is better than some of the impossible good-goody ones, though. Now, I'll bet, Ted, you thought David Copperfield's Agnes adorable?"
"She was my first love."
"Oh, men make me so angry!" she exclaimed fervently. "They put a silly doll on a pedestal and think that the pattern of what a woman should be."
"How old are you, Helen?"
"Eighteen, Ted."
"Therefore you are old enough to know what a man's woman should be."
"Ted, I hate sarcasm, especially from a boy, on the subject of women."
"I'm twenty-three; that's a lot older than you are."
"No, it isn't. A girl is always older than a boy, no matter what their ages."
That sounded illogical and complicated enough to be true. I didn't want, however, to surrender Agnes too easily.
"What ought a woman to be?" I followed up.
"A person of commonsense; not a silly, affected creature made in man's image—like Agnes."
"My truly first love was a fairy princess."
"A blonde, of course. Man again," and Helen replaced, I think unconsciously, a stray lock of most delicious brown hair.
"I was only nine years old."
"I told you a man's age never made any difference."
To this I had no satisfactory reply.
"I'm sorry, Ted. I didn't mean to be rude, or imply anything when I said that."
"I wasn't silent because you said that," I murmured. "I was just thinking how different Deep Harbor seems to me now."
"Were you very bored when you first came?"
"Perhaps," I said, "or lonely—I don't know which. Yes, I did find this a lonely place."
"It needn't have been. You could have met plenty of nice people, if you had taken a little trouble."
"It sounds frightfully foolish—in fact, I know it doesn't sound remotely plausible—I didn't know there were any nice people here."
Helen's eyes were upon me in open astonishment, then she broke into one of her merry laughs.
"You thought you were marooned among barbarians, I suppose. How masculine and English, both together! The combination would be disastrous anywhere."
"I don't know," I protested. "I didn't get started, that's all. I had a lot to do out at the factory."
"Ted, don't lose your temper when you're teased. It's not good sporting spirit."
"I think I'm honest when I say I didn't think about meeting people at all. I wanted to get my work done as soon as possible and get away."
"I see. You were just camping in the wilderness," she laughed.
"Please don't."
"I know, Teddy boy, it's mean to tease you, but you do tease so easily. You don't suppose I would have asked you to go riding with me today, if I had not believed you were—well—nice, do you?"
And again she cantered away.
I let Satan take his time catching up. Helen's last words made me so happy I wanted to think it over. We were by now a long way ahead of the others; they were not even in sight. Moreover, it began to be a question with Satan and me how much longer we could hold the pace. Helen's instinct gave both Satan and me a respite. We found her resting by an oak overhanging the road.
"We must wait for the crowd to catch up with us," she waved to me. I rolled painfully off Satan's back, unloosed the girths, and allowed him to crop the roadside grass.
"Tie him to the fence," Helen suggested. Satan was promptly made fast to one of those picturesque barriers called locally a "snake-rail fence," a conglomeration of heavy split timbers piled one upon the other in alternate layers, each section forming nearly a right angle with the adjacent one. Tawny golden-rod and purple asters stuck their tops through the fence rails, and many kinds of creeping vines, some already scarlet and yellow, helped bind the angles together. We stretched out on a little grassy bank facing the far distant lake, which lay about a mile away and a hundred feet or so below us. The flat vineyard-covered country sloped downward, away from us, to the lake shore.
"A pleasant open country;" I thought, as I relaxed my aching muscles.
"Wait until you see us after the first real frosts—when all the maples have turned," said Helen. It seemed natural and matter-of-course for her to read my thoughts.
"What a country to write a border ballad in," I exclaimed. "It's a pity nothing ever happened here."
Helen's militant patriotism was up in arms at once. "If that isn't like your conceited British ignorance! Over there, not far from that clump of trees by the lake, is a little blockhouse that has a story of pioneer heroism equal to—well, to the bravery at the siege of Lucknow, and not many miles from here the battle of Lake Erie was fought. Perhaps your English history books don't mention that fight," she flung at me mischievously.
"That is naturally wasted on me, because I'm not English," I answered.
"Well, you've lived there all your life and learned some of their ways. You are American only in streaks—and I've heard you call England 'home.'"
"That's true," I replied. "It seems curious to me sometimes—almost a man without a country. But when I said nothing had happened in this big place we are sitting in—it feels like sitting in the centre of a circle thousands of miles in diameter—I was thinking of one of our little English counties, Hertfordshire, for example, where, in any village you choose, you'll find half the world has happened. There's St. Albans—with the old Norman abbey church of Roman bricks sitting high on the hill above the land on which Boadicea and her warriors held the legions at bay."
"Now I know you are a good American," she laughed.
"Why?"
"Because no Englishman is ever sentimental about England; it takes an American to be that."
She had undoubtedly scored a palpable hit. I dropped lecturing on English history.
"The others should be in sight by now," Helen said after a silence. I stood up and looked along the road. There was no trace of them to be seen.
"Perhaps it's because we turned off on to the Ridge Road; they've probably taken the shorter main road by the railroad tracks. I think we'd better ride on, Ted."
Satan, although partly refreshed, allowed me to mount with an ill grace; he gave a longing look backward whence we had come, and set forth after Helen's Titania, his head bowed in gloom. Sprinkled along the ridge, whose crest the road followed, were prosperous-looking farms. The villages and small towns clung closely to the railway which ran along the flat shelf between the ridge and the lake. The remarkable straightness and uniformity of the ridge indicated that it had itself at one time been the lakeshore in the days when even this great lake had been larger. After the close confinement to Deep Harbor it was glorious to ride in the open country with a road stretching indefinitely before one. I so far forgot my aches and pains as to burst into a popular music-hall song, to which Satan listened attentively through one ear turned backwards towards me. As I finished, Helen said: "I'm sorry I'm not musical, Ted, but I'm quite sure you have one of the worst voices I've ever heard." I was not mortified; my efforts at song always met with a like reception. Only extreme good spirits provoked me to melodious utterance. In general, I was careful to remember this particular limitation. I apologetically explained the reason for my peculiar behaviour. "It was partly the fact that we are rid of the others for a time," I continued. "All things seem to make for good."
"You won't think so when you hear what Miss Hershey says about it."
"Miss Hershey?"
"Yes, the stout old maid on the white horse. She is a sort of professional chaperone for our crowd. The boys always draw lots before we go anywhere to see which one of them will be her escort. It is the loser who has that pleasure. Mother whispered many private instructions to her this morning."
"I shall make love to Miss Hershey at the first opportunity."
"It can't be done," laughed Helen. "It has been tried."
"You called her a professional chaperon—just what do you mean?"
"Just that. She is a social secretary, and all our mothers hire her to get up dances and to look after parties like ours today. She is dreadfully strict, naturally, since her bread and butter depends upon it."
"What an extraordinary business," I exclaimed. Here, indeed, was an inversion, so to speak of woman's oldest profession—a thought which could not be told to a débutante. "I've heard of Spanish duennas," I went on, "but I never knew you could go out into the market place and hire one at so much an hour."
"She's of a very fine old Southern family—"
"All Southern families are fine—and old," I interjected.
"Stop being irreverent to Miss Hershey, Ted. Her family being in reduced circumstances—"
"According to the regular formula—"
"Shut up, Ted. She came North and offered herself as a social secretary."
"You have made me all curiosity for luncheon."
"I'll give you one word of advice, Ted. You'd better be awfully nice to Miss Hershey or you won't go far in Deep Harbor. She and Mrs. Hemphill hold the power of life and death over all bachelors."
"What sort of things does one do to be nice to her?"
"Oh, talk to her about her family and tell her about your grandfather."
I laughed: "But my grandfather was in the Northern Army; ten to one he stole Miss Hershey's grandfather's spoons while marching through Georgia, or something like that."
"It doesn't matter. He was a colonel. And you're not very respectful to history. We don't laugh at the Civil War."
I acknowledged the rebuke. We rode for a mile or two in silence—a privilege which our friendship had already attained.
"There's the inn," Helen said, pointing down toward the plain on our left. About half a mile away I saw a group of white buildings gathered about the main road. A cross road took us to the front door. In the stable yard we saw the horses of the others already there—among them, Miss Hershey's white animal looming up with horrible distinctness. He looked positively symbolic. When we dismounted we found Miss Hershey awaiting us. The horse had not belied her; like it, she was broad and imposing across the withers. Her black-plumed riding hat suggested one of General Morgan's raiders.
"Helen, where have you been?" she began severely. Her Southern intonation added a doom-like sound to the interrogatory.
"We took the Ridge Road—it was pleasanter," Helen replied with an innocent calm which I envied her.
"At least, I should think that you, Edward, were old enough to have a sense of responsibility."
This sudden shift of the attack threw me into great confusion. Helen pinched my arm, I didn't know why. Evidently some defence was expected.
"I—I didn't know we had—er—lost you," I murmured, unconvincingly and ungallantly, as I suddenly realized, for it threw the onus upon Helen.
"Edward, you will ride with me going back." And Miss Hershey did something I had always wanted to see: she swept into the inn, I had often read of people sweeping away from a situation and wondered how they did it. I was no longer in any doubt. It really was an effective exit. Helen laughed, most inappropriately, I thought.
"Ted, it's all right. You'll ride with me—if I want you to. And she called you 'Edward' twice. That's an awfully good sign—she's very particular about using Christian names—didn't you feel me pinch your arm when she said 'Edward'?"
The chicken dinner proved to be a wonderful affair. We were each served a whole grilled fowl together with corn on the cob and fried potatoes, followed by waffles and syrup, all on a lavish scale. The part of me which wasn't stiff and sore from riding was intensely hungry; I ate, careless of Satan's feelings. The only blot upon the meal was the fact that Herr Lieutenant von Oberhausen most excitedly explained America to all of us, calling upon me to translate when his scraps of English failed him. He talked himself into several word jams from which it was difficult for my knowledge of German to extricate him. He proved thoroughly to his own satisfaction the standardized Teutonic thesis that America is basely commercial, material, and totally lacking in ideals. When he got partly through and paused for a breathing space—speaking German oratorically is one of the most violent forms of physical exercise on earth, particularly destructive of throat tissues—I mildly remarked, in opposition, that I thought Berlin rather careful, to use the Scot's phrase, how a mark was spent, and skilfully inventive in discovering devices to earn those coins, considering that all Germany was composed of unmaterial, abstract idealists. The Herr Lieutenant did not understand the comment and asked for its repetition. I stripped the statement of its Anglo-Saxon irony and repeated it in bald German, containing one mistaken gender and a faulty termination. The Herr Lieutenant politely announced: "Es ist nicht wahr," and there we let the matter rest.
After dinner he buttonholed me on the front porch. My heart sank, for I supposed I was in for another lecture. On the contrary, he was now in an amiable mood and wished to go in for reminiscences on the pleasures of eating in Berlin. He had not had anything one could really call food in America, except at a few German houses. As for the unspeakable American custom of not serving wine, guttural explosions were inadequate to express his feelings. How could one eat so in cold blood? It was on a par with materialism; indeed, a demonstration of it. It was "ungemütlich, unbequem" and a lot of other disturbing epithets. I let him ramble on, for I had learned long ago the futility of argument with his kind. Helen rescued me just as we had reached Kempinski's roast partridge on toast garnished with sauerkraut. It was just as well she did, for I was about to say that only idealists would add sauerkraut to a delicately flavoured game bird.
"We are going up our ravine, Ted," she whispered. The Herr Lieutenant was rather red in the face as we left him without any particular ceremony.
"What have you done with Miss Hershey?"
"Oh, that's all right. I had a talk with her while Ludwig was relieving his feelings to you. She can see no objection, if we all keep together going home."
Poor Satan had to have his saddle on once more. I did what I could for him, rubbing his back briskly first and inspecting his feet. There was no gratitude in his eye. We picked our way carefully up the bed of a small, densely wooded ravine, over red sandstone shale through which shallow water rippled; here and there the stream broadened out into mirror-smooth pools. Ferns and other sweet-smelling growing things lined the sides. Apparently we were in a primitive wilderness miles from any inhabitants. Splendid oaks and chestnuts shut out the direct rays of the sun, and we rode in a cool, green twilight such as one might find in the forest of Arden itself. The glory of this country is in its woodlands, I thought. Such a ravine as this would make a fortune for any railway in North Wales. Here it was one of thousands, nay millions, unsought save by an occasional wanderer—simply a part of the landscape. At last the ravine stopped abruptly against a sandstone barrier over which the little stream fell lazily and mistily. We dismounted, and the horses shoved their noses eagerly through the cool water, as we lay on the mossy bank and stared at a patch of blue sky through the overhanging branches. The place had been made to order for sentimental young people.
"If this place were in Herr Ludwig's Harz Mountains or Black Forest," I said, "there would be a little restaurant behind us, surrounded by white pebbles, and a sign pointing at this ravine labelled 'Wald Idyll.'"
Helen laughed: "It must be rather convenient to have your emotions labelled for you."
"It is," I said, "when you are full of food and thinking is painful. You have only to read the signs, such as 'Schöne Aussicht' or 'Rauchen verboten,' and choose pleasure or anger at will."
"Ludwig must have been very annoying."
"He was; it's lucky you didn't understand all he said. He says we are base materialists," and I slapped a mosquito.
"It does irritate, the way Ludwig puts it, of course; the mere sound of his language makes one want to fight. But I wonder if some of it isn't true? How big a part do spiritual things play in your life, Ted?"
I sat up straight at the abruptness of the challenge. It was not an easy one to meet with Helen's now solemn grey eyes upon me. They were so large and clearly truthful. I was curious concerning my own answer.
"Spirituality is not what one does, such as going to church; it is the way one feels inside about things," I defended, I fear lamely. It wasn't what I had intended the major premise to be.
"Well," Helen went on, "how do you feel inside, and how much do these feelings shape your life?"
I was fairly cornered. I had postponed self-analysis on this particular subject; I wasn't certain what, if anything, I did believe. I lacked a good deal of Prospero's fluent "philosophy."
"Perhaps I could answer better if I knew a little about your opinions," I dodged.
"That isn't fair, because I asked first; however, I'm not afraid to tell you." She pulled a fern leaf and slowly tore the fronds apart as she reflected a moment. I laughed.
"What are you laughing at, Ted?"
"Seeing you tear that fern apart made me think of Caliban upon Setebos—the twenty-first crab you choose for destruction, while you're trying to invent what you believe."
She flung the fern leaf from her horrified.
"Ted! That's true! How could you say it?"
"Because, Helen dear, I think we'll have to find things out for ourselves as we go through life; I for one can't take them ready made."
She leaned forward, her chin in her hands, her elbows resting on her drawn-up knees.
"Yes—I was hashing over in my mind to give you as something original only the things I'd already heard—"
"That is my objection to philosophy—it is a hash of words," I said.
"Still, one does have to have an experimental creed to go on with—one to change and add to, but to keep one steadfast meanwhile."
"Yes," I said. "Mine is foolishly practical: be decent, play fair, and take the life of no living creature."
"You are inconsistent right at the start," she complained. "If you lived up to your creed you'd be a vegetarian."
"I admit the weakness in the armour, but I mean shooting and killing beasts and birds for the fun of it. Mosquitoes are excepted.
"You keep your creed pretty firmly on earth."
"That's where I live at present, Grey Eyes."
"Ted, dear, I don't think you have improved upon the Sermon on the Mount, not even for practical purposes."
"I think, Helen, you've rather shown me up," I acknowledged. Her hand quickly sought my arm.
"No, Ted dear. I wasn't trying to outargue you; I wanted to know what you really thought about things."
"I improvised my creed on the spur of the moment. Probably there is more to it."
She got to her feet with her precious radiant laugh: "We must go back to the Inn, Ted. Miss Hershey will be fuming because the party can't start for home without us."
It was strange how naturally and unconsciously we had grown in intimacy and friendship during the day, leaping over what I had always imagined would take months of time. Yet I am quite certain, as I look backward now over the entries in my diary, that no serious thoughts of love had yet entered our heads. We were building away at a friendship, uncertain as to how elaborate the superstructure was to be, or, to be more precise, not questioning the future at all. To change the figure, we were quite content to explore one another's souls and to marvel at the mystic things we found there. Neither of us had quite reached complete frankness, but we were very near. I fell asleep that night with the realization that Deep Harbor had suddenly become an intimate place in which I lived.
Chapter Seven
I HAVE THE FIRST GREAT ADVENTURE
October turned into November and angry hints of oncoming winter almost daily shrilled across the lake, scattering the heaps of yellow leaves on Myrtle Boulevard or playing the dickens with signs and hats on State Street. The nights were raw and cold; the night-shift at the factory ate their midnight lunches in the boiler room, a place which in July had seemed one of the lowest circles of the Inferno. Business was at a most critical stage, and Knowlton drove away at it day and night. We were, as he expressed it, just at the turn of the tide; it was a toss-up whether we should be swept on to the rocks or out into the sea of reasonable prosperity. I saw comparatively little of him, for he had not yet released me from night duty. I was getting quite accustomed to this nocturnal existence; I had actually grown to like it, because it left my afternoons free to go riding with Helen. I went to bed about half past seven in the morning, got up around three, and three-thirty would find Helen and me trotting sedately up Myrtle Boulevard—a sight to which the latter had become so hardened that not a verandah fluttered as we passed by. Indeed, the cool weather had driven even the most hardened gossip-scouts within. Helen's girl friends had tacitly accepted the situation, and at dinners or card parties Helen and I were always paired off together by tactful hostesses. None of the first riding party went with us now. Miss Hershey was chaperoning at White Sulphur, although there were rumours she would return for Christmas. "Mother" was querulous and fretful, particularly when we rode on stormy days; otherwise she had practically ceased active opposition. Her attitude now was resigned, if hurt, patience, varied with occasional Cassandra-like utterances of dire foreboding.
Saturdays were now thrice blessed, for the factory shut down from six o'clock Saturday evening until midnight Sunday, leaving the whole of Saturday free for me, if I kept Sunday for sleeping. We therefore reserved Saturdays for our longer expeditions into the rolling hill country behind us. (In the geography of Deep Harbor "the front" was the lake.) Soon hard frosts would come to make the roads impassable; we strove to do all the exploring possible before that should happen. I had found another horse which a modest weekly payment reserved for my exclusive use. He was a small Western pony, young and hard as nails. On frosty days he often tried to climb into the upper air, but he was to be preferred to the misanthropic Satan, who had fallen to the sad fate of hauling a grocer's wagon. Nevertheless Helen and I retained a warm spot in our hearts for old Satan and often carried him apples and sugar. In a large measure we owed him our friendship. It was an undeserved misfortune that it had come too late in life for Satan to keep up with. Helen named the new pony Starbright, because of the white star in the centre of his dark chestnut forehead. We both agreed that the name revealed no great powers of originality.
On the second Saturday in November we planned one of our longest quests. We both regretfully admitted it would probably be the last until spring; either snow or frozen ground was due at any time. The day was gusty and overcast; "Mother" tried every whine in her repertoire to dissuade us from going. Helen's obstinacy refused to yield, and off we went, taking our luncheons with us. On a hillside, by the edge of the wood, several miles away, we dismounted and built a camp fire against a large boulder. Helen endeavoured to instruct me in the art of camp cooking, a skill which she maintained she had learned one summer in the woods. It consisted principally of trying to balance a flimsy piece of bacon on a forked stick. The instant the heat reached the meat it would curl up and fall into the redhot coals. It then became my duty to burn my fingers in an attempt at rescue before the bacon turned to a cinder. In this way we spoiled a fair amount by the time we had each eaten two or three scorched slices. I commented on the fact that camp cooking seemed uneconomical, to say nothing of its lack of finesse. Helen laughingly guessed she was "out of practice," so we toasted marshmallows instead, a form of cooking in which we were more proficient. The warmth of the fire was pleasant, and we lingered on, careless of our original purpose to penetrate far into the hills. It was Helen's turn to tell me of herself, which she did, half shyly, half whimsically.
The eighteen years of her life had been passed in Deep Harbor, except for two winters at a large New England boarding-school, or during brief visits to school friends in New York. At school she had had the good fortune to come under the influence of a rare kind of teacher—one with the power of revealing the world. Helen spoke of her with dreamy affection, as of one who had opened a gate and shown the beauty of an unsuspected garden lying beyond. Having shown it, she had left Helen to wander in it at will. Thus it came about that this young girl, native of a provincial town, had found the path leading to citizenship of the world. The maturity of her judgment was astonishing; it implied an experience of life which I knew was impossible. I often found myself deferring to her opinion or leaning upon her advice, for her calm, level decisions brushed aside my cobwebs of sentiment and substituted truth for the meshes of whim or impulse. Day by day I had grown more dependent upon her until I expressed no opinion, even concerning business, without first submitting it for her approval. With all this she was a fun-loving child, full of mischief and humour, or occasionally tempest-swept by sudden child-like anger, when the storm clouds in her eyes would frighten me. After anger would follow such a melting tenderness as made me long to kneel at her feet and beg forgiveness for having caused her displeasure.
Curiously enough we neither of us analyzed what was happening to us. It seemed natural that we preferred to be together—even to be alone—and we were content with the word "friendship" as a complete explanation. Neither of us questioned it or looked beyond our next Saturday together. We must have been very young and inexperienced. Once in a while Knowlton had asked me, with his Harlequin's grin, how I was getting on; old Hemphill at the factory had stumbled his way through a clumsy joke aimed at me: neither followed the subject very far. Helen was not a topic I would allow discussed; there was something so far beyond the comprehension of the world in our attitude toward each other. Helen's own friends, I discovered, had passed from teasing to regard us as a fait accompli, and thereafter held their peace. Here again we looked upon their behaviour as simply caused by their lack of understanding. Poor old world, how we pitied it!
Today we were playing one of our new games—I don't know which of us thought of it first. The game was founded upon the Morte d'Arthur, and we were in search of the questing beast. Helen stretched comfortably before the camp fire and read aloud to me from her Mallory, which I carried in my coat pocket, the description of this mediaeval animal. As she finished we listened for the noise to come from the woodland on the edge of the hillside pasture in which we were. It sounds ridiculous to tell of it now, but it was as real to us as the play of children is to them. Beyond the edge of the wood there lay strange adventures—we had no doubt of it. Deep Harbor faded from us like a conjurer's vision, and the fields, hills and woods became the enchanted reality. We peopled it with all the crew of fairy folk and ourselves assumed rôles appropriate to our fellowship. How could ordinary Deep Harborites understand such a game or dream that this was one of the secrets of our friendship—they who thought only of such mundane things as love and marriage? Would they not laugh at the Lady Grey Eyes on her cream-coloured palfrey, escorted by her trusty knight, Edward of Over-Seas? To be sure the Lady Helen's horse was light chestnut, not cream, but in her magic capacity the mare assumed a new tint.
As we scanned the woodland, wondering what castle it hid or whether a hermit dwelt in its shade, we were aware of a tawny yellow animal approaching us. By his manner it should have been a dog, but the peculiarity of its build and complexion left some doubt. On the other hand, he was not the questing beast, for his coming was silent. Helen clung to me with delight; the creature was unusual enough, seen through our imagination, to look like the bearer of adventure. Carefully he circled us with an upstanding waving yellow signal of friendly purpose. I whistled. It awoke a sympathetic response, for he bounded up to us and laid his head in the Lady Grey Eyes' lap in token of obeisance. Dog there was no denying he was, but one whose ancestors had mingled with strange company. Chief among his forebears had been a bull dog; the others had been of that cadium-hued race to be found sleeping in the dust of village streets. From ear to ear of his square bulldog head there spread an expansive smile, whence depended a most liquid tongue. He kissed my hand, thus completing his homage.
"Ted, I want him. He's mine!" the Lady Grey Eyes declared.
"On my honour as a knight, you shall have him, if no farmer catches us in the theft, or if he does, we'll try what filthy lucre will accomplish," I replied, somewhat diverging from the purity of Mallory's style. I made fast the prize with a piece of string. There seemed no need, for he accepted gratefully whatever command we laid upon him.
"What name shall our new companion bear?" I asked. Helen regarded her treasure trove critically. In spite of the misalliance of one of his ancestors, our friend was unquestionably mainly plebeian except for the sternness of his tenacious profile. The latter gave him an air unlike any other dog. His amiability, however, was unquenchable.
"He ought to be called 'Bill' if it wasn't for his face," mused Helen. "What do you say to 'Sir Leonidas de la Patte Jaune'?"
"It strikes me as a bit beyond his linguistic ability; however, just as you say."
"He is lion-coloured—hence 'Leonidas.'" she explained—I had same doubts concerning this etymology—"and yellow paws are undoubtedly characteristic of the majority of his family." I nodded, for her latter argument was flawless.
"What shall we call him for short?" The practical world would assert itself at times.
"Leonidas, of course," said Helen with dignity. "The rest of his name is part of our secret."
I sprang to my feet. "The questing beast!" I exclaimed. "Let's test Sir Leonidas on an adventure. Let him track the questing beast through the forest!"
Helen gave a little cry of joy, her eyes shining.
"Come, Sir Leonoidas de la Patte Jaune!" she called. "We are about to lay a high adventure upon thee!" Leonidas tilted his head, listening to her, and wagged his tail at varying speeds. "Over there in yonder woods is a marvellous questing beast which we have taken an oath to bring to Arthur's Court ere a year and a day have passed. Thou shalt aid us in the quest. It is only fair to warn thee that this task is fraught with dire peril, but thy cheerful soul shall carry thee safely through all. Sir Edward of Over-Seas and I, the Lady Grey Eyes, shall be ever at thy side." She untied the string.
"Go get him! Sic 'em!" I said. Which of us he understood the better, I do not know. At any rate he was off at a bound toward the woods, and Helen followed with speed afoot.
Back and forth we ranged through dense underbrush, Leonidas making noise enough, as he crashed over dry twigs, to frighten away a menagerie of wild animals. Helen shouted with laughter at his clumsy eagerness to serve us. We worked our way into a clearing, and here Leonidas' excitement redoubled. This time he was clearly on the track of something. Helen was just a trifle nervous at the change from make-believe.
"What may one expect in these woods?" I asked.
"Nothing but woodchucks and rabbits, unless—" and she gave a scream that startled me. "Call him quick, Ted, quick!" she implored. What unknown danger were we walking into? I wondered, but I called Leonidas, and none too soon. There emerged from a thicket a small black and white animal.
"Run—run for your life, Ted!" The tone of her voice brought instant obedience. We fled in miserable panic back to our pasture, followed, luckily, by Leonidas. As we reached the remains of our camp fire, Helen sank exhausted with laughter, great tears streaming down her cheeks.
"Ted, it was a skunk," she gasped, much as Mrs. Siddons must have spoken a famous line of Lady Macbeth's. Leonidas lay panting, his nose between his paws. I wiped the sweat of exertion and relief from my forehead.
"That's the worst of adventures," I said, after a pause. "The stories never mention the unpleasant odour one is apt to encounter by the way."
"Ted, that's the narrowest escape we ever had. What would mother have said?" and she rocked again with laughter.
"My immediate concern would not have been 'mother,' if anything had happened," I commented reflectively. "Leonidas," and I turned to him, "I hope you have learned the lesson of never overplaying your hand. We sent you on one adventure, and you got us into one not on the orthodox list." Leonidas cocked one eye at me and feebly wagged his tail.
"Ted, those bushes have made my hair a sight," Helen said, and without more ado, tumbled it all down on her shoulders. Something caught my throat; I had never seen her with her hair down, and the added beauty it gave her almost hurt. I sat silent and motionless, staring at her while she combed it out as if she were doing the most ordinary thing in the world.
"Don't put it up—just yet," and I made a slight gesture to stop her, as she began to twist it into a mass.
"Why not, Ted? It's untidy enough as it is," and her grey eyes opened wide at me. I couldn't explain.
"Please leave it."
"Silly boy, if you want me to," she laughed, and tossed it back with a shake of her head.
"May I touch it?" I begged, stretching forth my hand. Instinctively she drew away slightly.
"I don't know, Ted," and we looked at each other a long minute.
"Please," I coaxed. She hesitated and then she began to do it up.
"I don't think you'd better," she said so low I could scarcely hear her. "It isn't like us, Ted." That answer was so final that I did not dream of questioning it.
"I'm sorry I asked—forgive me, Helen dear," and I got up to gather sticks with which to revive our fire. Leonidas remained on guard by Helen's side. While I was away I led the horses over to a pond at the foot of the hill and watered them. Upon my return Helen was looking her imperturbable neat self. We read the Mallory together before the fire until the sinking November sun warned us to go. The problem arose: would Leonidas follow our horses? He could not be led on a leash, and without Leonidas Helen refused to return. Experiment was necessary; to our joy Leonidas remained indifferent whether we rode or walked afoot. He was content to follow either way. With some trepidation we picked our way by the first farm-house we passed, expecting either to be challenged to surrender the dog or else to see Leonidas dash home; neither of these things happened. It was impossible to canvass the countryside, house by house, looking for his owner—at least, I thus stifled Helen's conscience on this point, for, faced with the necessity of carrying him off, she suddenly felt we ought to pay for him. Leonidas simply came.
The air grew chillier and chillier; Helen started off on a brisk canter to warm us up. Along a soft dirt road we went at a good clip, Leonidas trailing desperately in the rear. We were on the crest of a hill overlooking distant Deep Harbor and the lake. The soft coal smoke lay black over the town, blending with the lighter greys of the water and sky. All outlines were blurred and softened in the half light, and Deep Harbor might have been a city of dreams. Ahead of me, Helen must have been thinking something the same, for she pointed toward it with a sweeping gesture of her arm.
As she did so her horse caught a loose stone, stumbled, and fell. I had one glimpse of her lying motionless in the road, after her horse scrambled up and dashed on, riderless; the next I knew, I was at her side, my own horse abandoned, holding her tightly in my arms.
I was dazed with the suddenness of it all; for a moment I could not think and did nothing but hug her close, her head against my shoulder, as I bent over her face and whispered, "Helen, dear! Helen!" over and over again.
At last she opened her eyes of her own accord, for I had taken no rational steps to aid her, and smiled at me. I held her still more closely, delirious with joy; her eyes grew serious as she looked back at me, until they melted into the tenderest grey any man has ever seen. Then we both understood; there was no need of further words; her hand sought mine and rested there with quiet confidence.
"It's my knee, Ted. I've wrenched it," she whispered. "I must have fainted—that wasn't like me, Teddy dear, was it?" Again she smiled such a happy little smile that actually a tear from my eyes fell upon her cheek.
I laid her gently down, roused to some vague trace of commonsense. "I'll get some water," I said, looking helplessly around at an arid country road.
"It's much more important, Ted, to catch the horses." There was truth in this. Mine was quietly cropping grass a few yards away; Helen's was doing the same about a hundred yards further on. Leonidas joined us, evidently in deep concern. It was a simple matter to catch my horse, for he had been trained to come at command. Helen refused again to let me help her until I had made a try for her animal. I mounted and rode cautiously up to the mare; she gave a toss of her head and was off for a few yards further. We repeated this several times with the same results. Next I dismounted and advanced with elaborate flattery. Useless; the beast would not allow herself to be caught. I was in despair, imagining Helen to be suffering pain which somehow my presence might alleviate, while this confounded horse was taking me straight away. Apparently, however, the horse tired of the game after a few more minutes, or else her feminine nature desired to assert itself in a new way; as I was about to give it up as a bad job she unexpectedly permitted me to walk right up to her and seize the bridle. Needless to say, the three of us were not long in returning to Helen.
She was sitting up with one foot straight out in front of her, Leonidas proudly beside her. "I can stand on it, Ted," she called out, "but riding is out of the question." It was rapidly growing dark, and we were several miles from home. The roads we chose for riding were the unfrequented by-ways; it seemed unlikely, therefore, that there was much hope of anything passing. Also it was cold. These things we ruefully enumerated to each other.
"Do you feel much pain?" I asked when we had exhausted the list of other disadvantages in the situation. We both avoided reference to what we knew had happened when she first opened her eyes in my arms.
"It hurts only if I bend it. I don't dare take my riding boot off for fear I couldn't get it on again. It's only a twist—nothing broken, or I couldn't stand. Isn't it ridiculous, Ted?" and she laughed.
"I don't want to leave you here alone—in the dark—while I get help, dearest—and yet I don't see what else to do."
"Indeed, you won't leave me alone, Ted, if I stay here all night. We'll just wait. Perhaps I'll be able to walk after a little rest."
"There ought to be a farm near by—I could telephone from there—"
"You'll sit right here with me, dear," she said with finality. "This whole country is full of tramps—they're all making for the big cities at this time of the year."
I knew this to be true; they were to be seen everywhere. Deep Harbor's freight yards were a kind of clearing house for tramps stealing rides east and west. They camped, by night, for miles about the town. The mere thought of them made me sit promptly by Helen's side. We sat for a long time in silence.
"It is true, Ted, isn't it?" she said.
"Yes."
"And to think we never guessed it!"
"Not until I saw you lying in the road," I said with a slight catch in my voice, as the picture flashed through my mind again. Her warm, womanly hand crept into mine, and once more there was silence. We were both too overwhelmed with this new miracle to talk about it. I could not see her face, for the night was too dark. I don't think it occurred to either of us that we had not as yet exchanged a lovers' kiss or even mentioned the word "love." We both wanted a little time to think about and feel our happiness. Leonidas curled up at our feet and slept. She reached down and stroked his head gently.
"You won't laugh at me for wanting to keep Sir Leonidas do la Patte Jaune now, will you, Ted dear?"
"No," I answered, smiling in spite of myself to think what strange forms the bearers of romance could take. Then came a different mood. The world was glowing, building beautiful fantastic shapes and sounds in my mind, in which there swirled black smoke from factory chimneys, grey eyes and flowing hair, the clatter of horses' hoofs, Helen's laugh, the ugly square face of a yellow dog—a tumbling, changing medley of sound and colour, half ecstatic, half terrible, for through it all darted again and again the vision of Helen lying still and motionless upon the road—an insistent bass accompaniment striving to drown the shriller, sweeter notes of joy. I could not speak. I tried to say something to Helen, to tell her something of what I felt, but I could only press her hand and hold it tight. "Here is the true beginning of life," my thoughts cried to me. "Remember that with the beginning of life also begins the end," rumbled that terrifying bass. Why—why should fear come to me on this day of all days? Was it some ancient racial superstition of primitive man's that when the gods smiled then they plotted evil?—was it such a childish inherited instinct as this that had seized me? But dread would not shake off. "The Greeks believed great happiness to be dangerous; the mediaeval monks scourged it from their bodies; the Puritans cursed it," thundered that bass, crying down the "I love her" singing in my ears.
"If you will let me lean upon your shoulder, I think I can walk now," came Helen's gentle voice, bringing me with a start from the whirlpool of my thoughts. I stood up. "What were you thinking, Teddy?" she asked shyly as I stooped to help her to her feet.
"You know the Tannhäuser overture?" I whispered.
"Yes."
"Listen to it and you'll guess a little how my head sounds."
I put one arm around her and led the horses as best I could with my left hand. We made slow and painful progress down the road. Helen was as plucky as I knew she would be; although each step was agony, not a whimper came from her lips. About half a mile from where we started the light of a farm appeared; we staggered through the little swinging gate, arousing a pack of dogs which made more noise than the Seven Champions of Christendom. With difficulty we restrained Leonidas from going to a noble death in single combat against the lot. It took as heavy knocking as upon the gates of Macbeth's castle to arouse the farmer within, who finally opened the door a distrustful crack and stood surveying us by the light of a glass oil lamp held above his head. He was clad in rubber boots, trousers, and a night shirt; the expression upon his face did not indicate any anxiety to ask us to partake of bread and salt with him.
"Have you a telephone?" I asked. "This lady was thrown from her horse and hurt. I want to get help."
He reflectively turned all this over in his mind, evidently considering the request and its accompanying statement from all conceivable angles. Leonidas tactlessly growled at him and incurred severe reproof from Helen.
"Please let me in," she pleaded. "I want very much to sit down." I was meditating choking consent out of the impassive sour-faced old man. A high-pitched nasal voice called out from the head of the stairs: "Henery, don't you dast to give no tramps anything to eat."
"I'll pay you for your trouble," I said, producing a few bills.
"I reckon I don't have to be paid for no trouble," the old codger snarled. I saw that I had made another error of tact. "What you doing out gallivantin' around this time of night?" he added.
"We are not out from choice," I reminded him. "This lady has had an accident and is seriously hurt. All we ask is to be allowed to stay here until we get help from town."
"Mary!" he turned and shouted, "c'mon down here a minute." All this time he carefully guarded the door so that entrance was not possible. I had the intelligence at last to seat Helen on the porch steps while "Mary" made suitable toilet above stairs. The old woman came down in a red flannel mother Hubbard, from which stray ruffles of her nightgown protruded.