SOME
HONEYMOON!

BY

CHARLES EVERETT HALL

ILLUSTRATED BY
ROBERT GASTON HERBERT

New York
GEORGE SULLY & COMPANY

Copyright, 1918, by
GEORGE SULLY & COMPANY

All Rights Reserved

CONTENTS

CHAPTER

SOME HONEYMOON!

CHAPTER I

THE MAN OF BUSINESS

When John Ryder put his foot upon the plank of the Minnequago on his return journey from Europe he was a bachelor of thirty-five summers—and had never counted his winters at all. He believed, with many another upholder of single blessedness, that a man did not begin to count his wintry years until he was married.

Just the same, as he walked up the incline of the runway he was walking to his fate. Indeed, he came face to face with it as he trod upon the deck of the ship and, almost bumping into it, politely lifted his hat and said:

"Pardon me!"

The lady bowed silently and turned upon him a careless shoulder. John Ryder allowed himself a second glance—and then let the steward take his hand luggage below while he did something he had not done since his early crossings. He hung about on deck to see the hawsers cast off—a mark of curiosity that usually stamps the traveler as quite new to the game.

Even then he did not know why he did this.

Business. Business with a big B. Business first, last, and all the time. That was John Ryder, and so plain was it to most people who met him that a tag on his back stating that he was a hustling American business man would have been quite unnecessary.

Ryder had been in the chase after the nimble dollar since he was breeched. He was a self-made man, and although he was proud of that fact he did not go around blowing about the quality of the product.

People could take him for what he was—or what they thought he was. He was not personally assertive, although he fully knew his own opinion upon any subject to which he had given thought. He did not consider it necessary to tell every person who interviewed him, or show them by his manner, that he was really too busy with weighty affairs to give their own little matter its proper attention. He seldom cared what people thought of him as long as he impressed them with his honesty of purpose, and that he was in earnest.

That is, he had seldom cared until now. But he confessed to himself, in the secrecy of his inner thoughts and the privacy of his stateroom, that he was desirous of having at least one person aboard the Minnequago think of him as being every whit as good as he really was, if not a little better.

When a man's hard hit, that is about his first thought. He wants the woman to think of him as the finest and best who has ever crossed her path. And before bumping into Miss Mont as he boarded the ship, he had actually never looked twice at a woman.

She was a good sailor, and he had crossed back and forth so many times that he was only seasick when the Old Salt in the story was ill—on the occasion "that the ship went down and all hands were lost."

Ryder accepted his fate manfully on that very first time that they paced the deck together. It was not easy for Ryder to admit that he had met and fallen in love with a woman at first sight. It was opposed to all his well-established theories. At his age he considered himself case-proof.

Yet never had a woman impressed him as did Miss Mont. When they became so quickly such very good friends and she showed plainly that she enjoyed his society, and even took him into her confidence with little urging on his part, Ryder began to see that he would be tempting Providence if he went ashore at New York without letting her know just how he felt toward her.

He had nobody to consider in this matter but himself; he had no family. Miss Mont, she said, was in a similar situation.

She had been adopted by people in Manchester when she was a small child and had lived with them as their daughter until these foster parents died.

Other children had come into the family after her adoption, and they did not look kindly upon the alien. So Miss Mont had come away.

"I do not know much about my own people," she told Ryder. "Only that my mother and father are both dead. There were several of us children. We were parceled out like a brood of puppies. I know nothing now about my brothers and sisters."

So she had nobody to consider; there was no living soul to say her nay, no matter what course she took in life. To John Ryder's disappointment he found that she was on the verge of choosing a profession for which he had a strongly rooted, if narrow, dislike. Miss Mont had met some theatrical people in London. There was, indeed, a certain agent, or manager, aboard the Minnequago to whom she had been introduced.

This man had told her that he could put her on the stage. She had the presence for it, and if her ability proved anywhere equal—well, his talk had inspired her with the fever for a stage career. She had done a little in a semi-professional way in London as an entertainer, and this man, Sam Marks, had chanced to see her work.

"And you know I need to work," she told John Ryder. "My bit of money won't last forever. I should dislike teaching, and I couldn't work in a shop, I know. I have a retentive memory, and I believe I should 'make good' as you Americans say, as an imitator. I really have some talent."

"You do not know what you contemplate," cried Ryder, and he was a little angry. "The theater is no place for a domestic, home-loving woman like you."

"But it will bring me more money than other work."

"It brings you a lot besides the money. It spoils a woman. It spoils a man, too, for that matter. And it is the hardest work a woman can tackle."

"Some actresses draw large salaries."

"And what do they pay for the pedestals they gain? You don't know the mire they have to drag their skirts through. And some of it always sticks."

"I think you are prejudiced," she said softly.

"Oh, I know there are exceptions. But there are no exceptions when it comes to the hard work. When an actress achieves a lasting place in her profession, it means that she has worked harder for years than any governess, or seamstress—yes, or washwoman!"

"I know it is kind of you to advise me," she said.

"No, it isn't. It's selfish on my part. I'll tell you why. I love you!" blurted out this man of business, who was noted for his silky and diplomatic tongue when it came to a business proposition. This situation was, however, almost too much for John Ryder.

She gazed at him in utter astonishment.

"Mr. Ryder!" she gasped.

"Don't be surprised," said he, mopping his brow and glad the words were out at last. "I'm no kid. I've been bucking the world for a good many years, if my head isn't bald! I'm not likely to say a thing I don't mean, or to try to fool a woman like you. I love you, and I'll marry you the first minute we can after getting ashore, if you'll agree.

"And I'm not doing it through any foolish desire to keep you out of a business that you'll be sorry you ever got into. I want you for a strictly selfish reason. I want you because I love you—have loved you ever since I first laid eyes on you on this boat."

"But—but we know so little of each other!" she faltered.

"What more have you got to tell me? It won't take you long," said Ryder with a chuckle. He knew his drawing powers as an interviewer, and could figure on Miss Mont's having told him about everything of importance in her life.

"As for me, I'm plain John Ryder. I'm just what I appear to be, nothing more and nothing less." The sly villain, however, was hoping she would think him a deal better than he was. "I've got some money. I can make more. I'll keep you in comfort, and when I die leave you enough to live on.

"That may not sound very sentimental, but don't let it cloud your eyes to the fact that I love you just as hard as any Romeo of the lot. I'm not much on playing the lute under a lady's window; but I'll be great on hustling out and, as we Americans say, 'bringing home the bacon.'"

"Oh, dear, Mr. Ryder! You make me laugh in spite of myself." But she was actually wiping tears from her eyes.

"That's right. I'd rather you'd take it laughing than crying. And as far as in me lies," he added, solemnly, "I'll never bring tears to your eyes, but always laughter to your heart," which was a wonderfully pretty observation for John Ryder to make.

Nor was he at first disturbed in the least when Miss Mont told him she dared not answer on such short notice. She must think it over.

"I like you," she admitted. "I am fond of you, I might say. But to be bound to a man for life upon so short an acquaintance seems an—an awful thing."

"Well, it is rather sudden, I suppose," admitted the American. "Though I have often noticed that the most successful deals I have ever put through are settled in short order—on the spur of the moment, as you might say. Ahem! This, of course, is different," he added, seeing her smile. "But take your time. Take until we land. That's day after tomorrow. One can do a lot of thinking in that time."

And, from that moment, he religiously refrained from recurring to the theme in conversation with her, which showed plainly that John Ryder was a novice at the game of winning a woman's love.

But before the Minnequago steamed safely through the Narrows into New York Bay, Ryder saw Marks, the theatrical agent, walking with Miss Mont on the upper deck. They were in close talk for more than an hour.

He had never particularly noticed Marks before. Now he found him a most objectionable looking person—squatty, with bulbous arms and legs, and his eyes half hidden behind heavily creased lids. Ryder was stabbed by jealousy, and did not know what the strange emotion meant. He went to his stateroom and wrote a note to Miss Mont.

It was a kind note, a just note. It pointed out the fact that he was still waiting for his answer, that he could prove to her an hour after they landed just who and what he was, and that he could do all for her that he had said. He added that he desired her answer by the time the Minnequago docked.

Strictly business, you see. If he had been pulling off a deal with another man and somebody like this Sam Marks had put in an oar, this was about how John Ryder would have handled the situation. She must choose at once between Marks and him—between the position she would gain by wedding him, and possible success upon the vaudeville stage. Had the ideas expressed in the note not been clothed in the kindest terms and had not a strong current of downright love permeated it, any woman might have taken umbrage.

Ryder knew he had said nothing that could offend. Therefore, he was the more surprised that no response to his letter was brought to him. He remained away from the general table at dinner that last night purposely. He did not wish to meet Miss Mont again until he knew exactly what her answer was to be.

The evening passed without his receiving any reply. In the morning as they swung into the dock at an early hour he asked the steward if there was any message for him and received a negative answer.

He had made his declaration and waited with his repacked bag until most of the passengers, he was certain, had gone ashore. Until the last moment, when he came to the gangway, he hoped to get some reply from her. Or was she waiting for him to tell him verbally her answer?

She was! There she stood upon the dock as he went down the gangplank. She was looking eagerly toward the ship. Ryder felt a sudden tingling warmth at his heart. His love for this girl, so strangely born, made his pulse go at a gallop and brought a flush into his sea-tanned face.

She saw him, and the faint flicker of a dawning smile overspread her sweet countenance. He approached with outstretched hand, his heart in his eyes—an expression that no woman could mistake. It told her—that look—as plainly as though he cried it aloud: "I love you!"

The girl put out her hand—both her hands indeed—impulsively and met his grasp with one quite as warm. Her eyes searched his face, perhaps with a puzzled expression at first when he approached; but afterward with decided approval.

"What have you to say to me, my dear?" asked John Ryder, strong in his belief that she could have only waited for him with good news.

A blush suffused her face. Her lips parted—parted in such a shy and lovely smile—as she said in a low voice: "I—I will marry you."

"Good!" he almost shouted, and immediately added: "When?"

"Whenever you like," she whispered, and no woman since the world began ever gave herself so completely into her lover's keeping, John Ryder was sure, as did this woman whom he loved.

"Then as soon as we can get the license and I can arrange certain matters," he said quite composedly, despite the accelerated beat of his pulse. "We will drive first to the City Clerk's office. There is some red tape about the matter, I believe. Then I will take you to a hotel where you may lunch. I shall need several hours for business before the banks close. Then we can go at once to a minister of whom I know."

"Oh! can it be done so quickly?" and she caught her breath, though with a little laugh.

"Don't be frightened," he said tenderly. "It will be all right. Where are your trunks?"

"On their way to the Pennsylvania Railway station, I believe."

"So soon? Were you getting ready to run away from me?" he asked in some little surprise.

"No-o." Then she laughed and tossed her head with that gesture that had become familiar to him—which he had noticed so many times aboard ship. "I was getting ready to run away with you," she whispered.

He laughed, tucked her hand under his arm, and they walked up the dock. Near the gate he saw Marks standing. Miss Mont did not chance to look his way, but Ryder saw that the theatrical man observed him and smiled sardonically as they passed.

"Confound his impudence!" muttered Ryder.

Then he glanced at the woman at his side. She was certainly beautiful, with plenty of warm, rich color in her cheeks, the blackest of level brows, the very whitest of skin.

"By heaven! she's a treasure," thought Ryder, as he hailed a taxicab. "And I'm a lucky fellow to get her. To think that, in a few short hours, she will be Mrs. John Ryder!"

A foolish little mist obscured his vision, and he stumbled on the step as he followed her into the cab. She laughed.

"You won't get married this year if you stumble upstairs," she said.

CHAPTER II

"NEEDLES AND PINS"

None of his business associates, not even his head clerk, knew just when John Ryder would return to New York. He had gone across for a rest—a pleasure trip; but he had struck some splendid contracts—"the woods were full of them," he said—and he cabled orders until his agents in America fairly begged him to stop. Prices for raw material had not yet risen to top-notch, and they were skimming the cream of the manufacturing situation.

He arrived on the Minnequago with none aware of his coming. Nor did he propose to tell anybody of the change he now contemplated to make in his private life.

Had he done so, he knew that certain "good fellows" of his acquaintance would undertake to make existence an agony for him and for this beautiful girl whom he was to marry. It seems to be the delight of a certain order of mankind to make the sweetest, most intimate hours of a newly-married couple a Saturnalia upon which they can only look back with horror.

Ryder was practically free to do as he pleased, and what he pleased to do was to take time to get acquainted with the charming woman at his side. They must go somewhere for their honeymoon where he would not be likely to run into people he knew, and where he and his wife could be quiet and undisturbed.

Getting the license was neither a long nor troublesome matter, for they were the first at the clerk's office. He signed his name "John Ryder," knowing that there were probably a dozen of the same name in the directory and the publication of it would scarcely warn his friends of what he was doing. The girl signed after him, and surely nobody—unless it was that detestable Sam Marks—would realize who she was.

"Who will marry us?" she asked, leaving all the details to him very prettily.

"We could be married right here in the chapel," he told her. "But if you would rather, I know of an old dominie on Bank Street."

"How funny!"

"Why?"

"That you should know anybody in that part of New York. That is Greenwich Village, isn't it?"

"Yes. You seem to have studied your map of the town."

"Oh, I have learned a little something about New York," she responded, smiling slightly.

Aside from this brief interchange of remarks, there was very little said as the taxicab rolled uptown to a quiet hotel. Both were doing some very serious thinking. It was not a situation to provoke trifling conversation.

Ryder arranged for a parlor where Miss Mont could remain quietly during his absence. He did not delay for luncheon himself, but did not forget to send up a dainty repast for his bride-to-be. He walked into the offices of John Ryder & Company about noon and cast the whole force into first a state of confusion, and then of wonder.

He was usually the most methodical of persons and went through with any business—even the routine work of the day—in a most exemplary manner. There was seldom any friction in John Ryder's offices when he was there. From his chief clerk and his personal stenographer down through the strata of employees to the very porter, system was inculcated into their daily lives both by precept and the example of the "boss."

Today he literally tore what little system there was left in his force to shreds. He started several people on the same errand; he dictated the same letter three times and in as many different ways. His stenographer, a very severe young woman, came closer to him than she ever had before in her life and sniffed his breath. Drink was the only explanation she could think of.

He gave Brumby, his chief clerk, orders which absolutely antagonized each other, and when the man tremblingly pointed out this fact to Ryder the latter actually lost his temper.

"Well, confound it!" ejaculated John Ryder, "you know what I mean, don't you? There's only one sensible way to do that thing. Do it, and don't bother me!"

Inexplicable! Nobody had ever seen Ryder in such a state of mind before. He was one minute as snappy as a mud turtle; the next he ran his hand through the curly red mop of hair on the errand boy's head, gave him a dollar, and told him to take in the next ball game at the Polo Grounds without troubling himself to tell Brumby that his grandmother had died.

But to capsheaf his entire performance on this occasion, Ryder sat down again to dictate a few notes on personal matters and began the first one by saying:

"Ahem! Are you ready, Miss Nelson? Here goes: 'My dear Rose'—Good Lord! that isn't it. Er—er—Write Hallett and Mayes about the renewal of the lease of my apartment. Tell them—er—— Well, write it yourself, Miss Nelson," he concluded in much confusion and beginning to perspire. "I shall not renew it. It runs out the first of November and I shall make—er—ahem!—a change."

She stared at him in amazement. John Ryder had occupied the same chambers on the north side of Gramercy Park for ten years and was considered as permanent a fixture in that neighborhood as the fenced and locked garden in the middle of the square.

"Well, hang it!" he demanded, catching her wondering eye and losing patience again. "Can't I make a change? I hope I'm not married to those rooms?"

And then he reddened furiously. Miss Nelson gazed upon him with dawning understanding. She was not a young woman whose thoughts lingered much upon the tender passion; but she was by no means a fool. She knew now that her employer was not intoxicated.

Brumby might think Mr. Ryder suddenly bereft of his senses; the bookkeeper could say that "the old man" was about to "bust"; and the red-headed office boy could declare that the boss had felt the change before death when he gave up the dollar, but Miss Nelson knew now what the matter was. Mr. Ryder was in love!

When she went out for her lunch she—the frigid Miss Nelson—sentimentally bought a flower from a street vender and brought it back to the office. But by that time John Ryder had cleared up all the matters he considered really vital, had given Brumby a nervous shock by telling him to expect no word from him, Ryder, for at least a fortnight, and had left the offices.

All these petty details of business were the "needles and pins" of life. For the first time in his business career Ryder found that he hated business. He fairly walked on air as he hurried to the subway, crowded himself into an already crowded train, and was transported uptown.

A few steps to the hotel—then the elevator—then the carpeted corridor to the door of the parlor where he had left his bride. A knock, a swift patter of feet in answer, the turning of the key, and——

She was there—a vision of delight to him! Her coat and hat were already on. His heart glowed. She had been as eager for his return as he had been to get back to her.

"Are—are you ready?" was all he could say.

"Yes," she murmured, quite as embarrassed.

Ryder remembered the old parsonage on Bank Street very well. He had been wont to go to the church hard by when he was a boy. The same minister was not there now, but the present incumbent had a peaceful, old-world face, was silver-haired and kindly spoken, and might have been the same whom Ryder remembered.

The clergyman welcomed them as though he were well used to such calls.

Miss Mont was shy and kept her veil down until the clergyman's wife and a servant were brought in to witness the ceremony. Then she plucked up courage, raised her veil, and if her cheeks were tear-stained nobody remarked it. The old man stood before them and pronounced the simply worded ritual with grace and kindliness.

Ryder himself felt confused. It was really the first time he had ever been present at such a ceremony.

"With a ring?" the minister asked him softly before he began, and Ryder knew just enough to nod and then fumble in his inner pocket for a tiny leather case which he always carried.

Out of this he brought forth, happily at the right moment, a plain gold band, worn rather thin, and with letters engraved on the inner side that were almost indecipherable. It had been his mother's wedding ring—the one keepsake that had come into his possession as a boy from the parent he scarcely remembered.

The girl evidently understood when he produced the ring. She smiled at him tremulously and, before the band was slipped on her finger, she touched her lips to it.

Then: "You, John, do take this woman, Ruth—" and so on to the end. Ryder responded as though in a dream. It all seemed unreal. Serious as was the moment, the undercurrent of his thought was: "'Ruth?' That is a pretty name. But I got the idea somehow that her name was Rose."

They were married. Ryder feed the minister with a liberality that made his withered cheeks flush with pleasure. The clergyman's wife kissed Ruth heartily, and the servant, who was sentimentally inclined, wiped her eyes furtively on the corner of her kitchen apron, which she had forgotten to take off when she came into the study.

They went out to the taxicab again, the chauffeur of which was grinning knowingly.

"Now, dear, where shall we drive?" asked John Ryder.

"My trunks are at the Pennsylvania station by this time I am sure. May I choose where we shall go?"

"Of course," he answered, though he felt some surprise.

"Then let it be Pinewood."

"Why—why," Ryder cried, "you must have studied this business all out. Ah, you sly girl! What put Pinewood in your head?"

"They say it is very nice there—and quiet—at this time of year. It will remind us of old times," she added dreamily.

Afterward when he was attending to the checking of her baggage and arranging for his own to be sent on from the steamship dock, it suddenly smote Ryder that her remark about Pinewood reminding them "of old times" was peculiar.

This was Ruth's first visit to America and surely he had never been at Pinewood in all his life! Later he forgot to speak about it. Indeed, he was too busy and too happy to be curious.

He telephoned ahead for a suite of rooms at the only hotel which, he understood, was open at this time of year at Pinewood. This was the Pinewood Inn, one of the oldest and best-known hotels on the coast.

Somehow there is a "newness" sticking to bridal couples that no amount of deception can hide—from the eagle eye of the railroad porter least of all! The colored functionary on their car hovered about them as though they had been especially placed in his care, and his attentions were so marked that they might as well have come aboard showered with rice and old shoes. Everybody in the coach very soon knew that they were newly wed.

To tell the truth, John Ryder was inordinately proud of it. He was as delighted as a boy. It was an effort for him to retain his usual dignified bearing. A smile was continually breaking through the calm of his features. He wanted to shout or sing—and he sang like a crow!

From a heretofore modest and retiring man socially he suddenly became bold and daring. He secretly wished to strut about and brag of himself, and show off his wife. He would have liked to distribute "largess" (whatever that might be) to the people at the stations where the train stopped; and he tipped the porter three separate times before the train was ten miles on its way.

He had reason, good reason, for being proud. When Ruth removed her veil and hat she was startlingly beautiful. Somehow there had come a new expression into her face that increased her attractiveness. She had never seemed so sweet, so gentle and modest, so altogether adorable before.

They reached their railroad destination just as dusk was falling. Pinewood Inn was exclusive—so exclusive, indeed, that it was back among the pines quite twelve miles from the station. A motor bus met all trains and transferred the arriving guests to the hotel.

"Just a pleasant half hour's run," Ryder told his bride, helping her into the vehicle and getting in himself with several other arrivals. "We shall have an appetite for dinner I fancy."

He was just then reminded that he had eaten nothing since a modest breakfast in his stateroom on the Minnequago—not even on the train. The bus rumbled away from the hamlet that surrounded the railroad station. They swept into the brown shadows of the pines and rolled almost silently over the velvet carpet of the needles.

"Needles and pins, needles and pins! When a man marries——" The old rhyme came into his mind again. But he had thrown off all petty details. The needles and pins of business, or of anything else, should not rankle in his mind. This was the beginning of his honeymoon.

And just then the motor bus slid down a slight slope to a long bridge that crossed the salt creek dividing the island, which the railroad crossed, from the higher ground where the hotel was located. Ryder, glancing ahead, thought he saw the flash of a red light.

Then a woman screamed and the forward truck of the motor bus crashed through the loosened planking of the bridge. The passengers were tumbled together, but nobody was hurt. Ryder found himself holding Ruth in his arms—and somehow he did not care to let her go.

Men and women began to scramble out of the bus, having hastily gathered together what hand baggage they had taken inside with them. It was a time of confusion. A handbag was dropped, calling forth a grunt of protest from someone whose toes had been hurt. An umbrella, caught crosswise in the door, caused delay and more confusion.

"I—I fancy we shall have to get out with the rest of them," Ruth whispered.

"Oh, I suppose so," Ryder admitted.

They were the last to leave the stalled bus. The driver was explaining:

"I didn't suppose these country fools would begin to repair the bridge flooring tonight. I didn't see the light. 'Twas all right when I came down from the hotel. Guess you'll hafter walk. It'll take half the night to jack this old car up out of the hole. And see! they've left only a footpath the length of the bridge. I bet they'll leave it that way till over Sunday. Just like 'em."

The guests, already in sight of the hotel lights, went on with laughter or grumbling, as their dispositions dictated. The incident seemed quite unimportant to John Ryder, bemused as he was in the very first quarter of his honeymoon.

CHAPTER III

"WHEN A MAN MARRIES——"

Ryder and his bride climbed the winding road to the wide and pillared veranda of the hotel behind the other shipwrecked passengers from the motor bus. In the rear of the hotel was a considerable village; they could see the twinkling lights in the small frame dwellings and the glare of acetylene lamps in the big general store.

"I—I really think," Ruth observed, "that the bridge is not safe. Didn't it tremble as we came over it?"

"Seemed rather a rickety affair, that's a fact," Ryder agreed. "But we're all right now. We've reached the hotel. It looks friendly and comfortable—and old-fashioned. Nothing much untoward can happen to us here, dear."

He said it tenderly, and looked at her lovingly. Nothing more was needed as they entered the wide foyer to advertise the fact that they were newly wed. The clerk—and even the bellboys—welcomed them with broad smiles. But Ryder was getting hardened to the notoriety of their situation now.

He went to the desk to register and get the key of the rooms he had ordered before leaving New York, while Ruth went toward a quiet spot which overlooked the entire foyer to wait for him.

His business finished, Ryder turned to look for his bride. He saw men standing or sitting about, talking, smoking, and reading. He saw women, knitting or crocheting for the most part, in the foyer and in the parlors, into which he hastily looked. But where was Ruth? Where could she have gone—and why? The bellboy waited at the elevator, while Ryder stood helplessly, not knowing what to do.

In a moment Ruth came from around a corner in the hall, eyes shining and a smile on her face. When she caught sight of Ryder, she went directly to him, unheedful of all others, and a deeper expression sprang into her happy eyes.

The man felt moved to the depth. Could this look be for him?

"I have been exploring a little," she said, as she came up to him, "and this is a lovely place to stay. I am glad we came here." Then, dropping her voice so that no chance passerby might hear, she added: "Oh, I am happy—so happy—too happy, almost!"

Ryder had the whimsical thought as he crossed the foyer with his wife that he would like to shout aloud his own happiness and exultation.

He hung back just a moment before entering the elevator with Ruth, to give a bellboy some money and certain instructions. Then the couple were shown to their rooms.

"Oh, they are fine! Lovely!" cried Ruth delightedly, as soon as they were alone. "You dear boy! I believe you engaged the best suite in the house!"

"The best I could get," admitted Ryder modestly.

"But you mustn't be extravagant," and she came close to him, smiling directly into his eyes with a look in her own that almost dazzled him.

"Folks can afford to be extravagant at this time if at no other," he declared stoutly, wondering if she knew the Pinewood Inn people were charging him thirty dollars a day for the suite.

"You—you are a dear!" she said, and, putting her hands suddenly on his shoulders, she pressed closer, offering him her lips.

The gracefulness of this little gesture was delightful. Ryder felt the flush rise in his cheeks as though he really were a youth. In that instant, when he first kissed his wife, he felt keen satisfaction that he had lived a clean, decent life and could meet her innocent caress without shame.

"I believe you are going to be a disgracefully indulgent husband," she said, laughing and gliding quickly out of his arms. "I must stop that. You will make a wreck of your ship of fortune on the rock of an expensive wife."

"Oh, there are a few shots left in the locker yet," said Ryder grimly.

They could not dress for dinner as Ruth's trunks had not yet arrived and his own luggage would not be along until the next day. Ruth had toilet articles and brushes in her bag and she brought out of this, too, a wonderful little dressing sack, all ruffles and ribbons and lace, to wear while she dressed her hair.

"May I smoke?" Ryder asked, sitting down to wait for her.

"Of course. I like to see you. It—it seems so homey," and she showed him a blushing face and sparkling eyes for an instant at the curtained doorway of the inner room.

She reappeared in the dressing sack, which was cut to reveal most charmingly her throat and forearms. Ryder watched her lazily through the smoke of his cigar while she performed the graceful rites of the hairdresser. He never remembered having seen a woman brush and arrange her hair before, and this intimate and innocent art of the toilet thrilled him.

She had finished and turned to him with a smile for his approval when there came a rap on the door. She tripped across the room and opened it.

"For Mrs. Ryder," mumbled the boy.

"Oh! I thought they were for me!" Ruth exclaimed disappointedly. "You have come to the wrong suite, boy," and she closed the door lingeringly.

Ryder sprang up, laughing. "What was it?" he asked.

"Oh, such lovely flowers! A great heap of them."

Ryder strode to the door, still chuckling.

"She hasn't had it long enough to know her new name," he thought, and opened the door to call after the boy:

"All right! Those flowers come here, sonny. Let me have 'em."

He came back, bearing the heap of blossoms in his arms. "They're for you, girlie," he said.

She uttered a little scream of delight and came at him like a small whirlwind. But she could not encircle both him and the roses in her embrace, so she satisfied herself for the moment with the flowers, sitting down in a low chair, with her face buried in the fragrant blossoms, and rocking herself to and fro in delight.

"You will spoil me!" she said, looking up at him, as he stood above her with that broad, quiet smile of his stealing over his big face. John Ryder was by no means a handsome man, but he was good to look upon because of his manliness. "These are so beautiful! Let us fill every vase in the suite."

This they did together. And every time their hands met (and, oh! how many times this happened as they divided or arranged the flowers) they both thrilled at the contact, looking at each other and smiling and coloring like two children caught in some innocent escapade.

It was a happy hour—an hour quite unmarred by a thought or a suspicion of any possible disaster. On his part Ryder had forgotten what trouble was like.

The patronage of the hotel was large all the year around, and at dinner they held the good-natured attention of the entire dining-room. There was a good orchestra, attentive waiters, soft lights, the murmur of conversation, fine women in fine gowns—everything to make the place attractive. Mrs. John Ryder in her plain traveling dress, however, was eclipsed by none of the other women.

Ryder, watching her, saw many approving glances from other diners, too, and smiled. He was thinking how she would shine—this jewel of a woman he had married!—when she had time to find some real "bridey" finery. She looked like a little brown thrush now; she would look like a bird of paradise when he had given her carte blanche at a Fifth Avenue modiste's.

He allowed her to go upstairs alone after dinner while he strolled into the office for some cigars. Several of the men he had seen at the tables were grouped there talking earnestly, and as Ryder stood at the cigar counter he overheard loud voices from the private office of the manager at the rear of the stand.

A man near by was saying: "I tell you the bridge has sunk in the middle—it's impassable. All that held the wabbly old thing together were the flooring planks. This town is as far behind the times as any yap hamlet I ever saw. Why, we're actually stuck here till they build a new bridge! Can't get a machine over it, or through the tide-water; and the railroad bridges are nothing but skeletons, you very well know."

"What about going over to Bearsburg——"

"Nothing doing! The roads behind this hotel are the worst in the world. The main road is impassable for autos because of the work being done on it. It will be a good road some time next spring. As for the other highways, they are merely lanes and farm paths."

"Guess you are marooned here, then, Carey," chuckled another. "Might as well make up your mind to it. Come on! let's see if we can't get up a game and murder a little time."

At that moment the door of the manager's office opened and the clerk come out. He had a worried expression of countenance. Now, hotel clerks are supposed to be urbane at all times. Flood or fire should not alarm the well-trained hotel clerk.

Ryder looked quickly into the inner room. He saw the rather fleshy, white-waistcoated manager—a man of evident choleric temper. He was talking loudly with a plainly dressed man who had a paper in his hand, which he was evidently insisting that the manager accept.

"You must accept this service, Mr. Bangs," the smaller man interrupted, the manager stopping his sputtering long enough to catch his breath. "It is not my fault, and personalities make no difference. I am merely a court officer. This is returnable next Monday. Shall I read you the original paper?"

Bangs seized the paper offered him and swore largely. "You get out of here!" he roared. "I'll fix Giddings for this trick. Dispossess me, will he? I'll show him! I'll—I'll ruin his old hotel for him!"

Ryder walked away with his cigars. Other people's trouble did not stick in his mind now. Broken bridges and impassable roads did not disturb him in the least; nor was he worried by the manager's difficulties. He had come here for at least two peaceful, delightful weeks—and he was going to get them.

When he entered his own rooms there had been a transformation scene enacted. Ruth's trunks had arrived, and she had removed her traveling dress, had slipped on the dressing sack again, and, to the eyes of a mere man, she seemed burrowing in the several trunks like a squirrel in a heap of fallen leaves.

"Those poor porters," she explained, "had such hard work getting these boxes over here. The wagon could only come to the bridge, you know, and they told me they had to pole the luggage over in a punt—-and that leaks and isn't safe. Then they brought the boxes on barrows to the hotel. Re'lly! They worked so hard that I gave them a dime each."

"Oh!" Ryder clapped a hand over his mouth, and then sneezed to hide his laughter. "Had—hadn't I better stay out until this is all over?" he asked. He thought some of hunting up the porters and seeing that they had larger tips.

"No. You can remain if you will be good. And you can see my dresses, too. I think I did very well in getting them—especially when I wasn't sure, you know."

"Sure of what?" he asked, comfortably, establishing himself in a reserved seat—that is, one that was not already hidden under billows of feminine wear.

"Why, sure I should marry you," she said, turning to give him a roguish look.

"Oh—ah—yes," murmured Ryder. Then he started. "By the way, what chance did you have to get ready——"

His question was interrupted by a heavy summons at the door. He went himself this time. One of the bellboys was there.

"Sorry, sir," said the boy in a low voice, "but the manager, Mr. Bangs, has to tell you that the hotel is to be vacated at once. He had no notice himself, so he can give you none."

"What in thunder do you mean?" demanded Ryder, in amazement.

"Yes, sir. You can't stay here, sir."

"Why not? Does the manager want his money in advance?"

"No, sir. 'Tain't you alone. Everybody's got to get out, sir. We're all losing our jobs, sir. I—I don't know what to do myself, sir——"

"Why, it's ridiculous!"

"I don't know nothin' about it, sir. I was just told to tell everybody in this corridor. And you've all got to get right out. He wouldn't let the clerk telephone to the rooms 'cause it would take so much time. Mr. Bangs says he will turn off the lights at half past eight and lock the door—that's in half an hour, sir. There's to be no service after that time."

The boy hurried to the door of the next suite. Ryder was too amazed at first to feel proper anger. To be told that, in half an hour, one must get out of a hotel in which one has just established oneself——

"It is preposterous!" determined John Ryder, turning back into his rooms. He saw Ruth, all unconscious of the unpleasant announcement, still busy over the trunks. The uselessness of her task suddenly smote his mind. "Why," he muttered, "she's wasting her time. She might as well stop that if we can't stay here. And, by thunder! where will we go if this hotel closes—and at such an hour?

"There's not another hotel open in Pinewood, I understand. The bridge is down. That fellow says traffic to the west is barred by the condition of the roads. The dickens!"

Ruth had paid no attention to his mutterings. She was quite unconscious of his perplexity, or of its cause. He came to a quick decision.

"I'm going downstairs a moment, dear," he said.

"All right."

"All right, what? Haven't you a name for me?" he inquired, drawing her to him.

"All right—hubby," she replied, blushing slightly, and he kissed her and then shot out of the room and dashed down the single flight of stairs to join the excited crowd already milling about the hotel desk.

CHAPTER IV

"HIS TROUBLE BEGINS!"

Bangs, the red-faced manager of Pinewood Inn, was facing the group of clamoring masculine guests like a rat at bay before a pack of terriers. Every individual man in the crowd was demanding what it meant.

Then, before he could make any audible explanation, they burst out again in a staccato of such observations as:

"It's an outrage! The man should be hung!"

"I never heard the like! Why, my wife says——"

"It's a most abominable imposition! Lights out at half past eight!"

"And the help discharged!"

"And no other hotel open anywhere along this part of the coast! Disgraceful!"

"Not even a cottage open. We can't go and live on these muckers who stay here all winter."

Then a general roar, as they faced Bangs again:

"What do you mean by it?"

"If you'll give me a chance to tell you!" shouted Bangs, shaking both clenched fists in the air. "And if you'll listen to reason perhaps I can make you understand."

Then, as a grumbling silence was accorded him, he added: "At last I can make myself heard! Lemme tell you about it. Giddings, the trustee of the Barnaby estate, the owners of this hotel, and I have had some difficulty over the rental. And because I won't agree to be robbed by him, he has taken this tack——"

"What tack?" asked John Ryder, thrusting in a question which struck at the heart of the business. "You haven't said what he has done."

"He's served me with dispossess papers," said the heated Bangs.

"Then you haven't paid your rent," Ryder observed. "Why don't you pay it and not put your guests to this trouble? Settle with Giddings in the courts."

"He'd beat me—the scoundrel!" cried Bangs. "And the rent is exorbitant. I served him notice three months ago that I could not run this hotel and pay such a price for it. It's an imposition."

"It is a greater imposition on your part to give your guests half an hour's notice to get out. Why, Bangs, it really can't be done, you know," said one man.

But John Ryder, with his clear insight into anything of this kind, again drove right at the heart of the business.

"You have had three months to prepare for this very emergency," he said. "You admit that."

"I don't!" yelled Bangs. "I admit nothing of the kind. They just served me——"

"Then you have several days in which to arrange the matter," Ryder went on. "What about this turning off the lights in half an hour? It is ridiculous."

"That's exactly what it is," chimed in another aggrieved voice. "You can't put your guests out in any such way, Mr. Bangs—and guests who, some of them, have been here long before you were ever manager. My wife and I have been staying here for eight years. I can't be turned out of my home on half an hour's notice."

"Well, you'd have to get out if there was a fire," snarled Bangs.

"A fire would be 'an act of God,' according to the coroner's finding," grimly laughed somebody. "This isn't."

"Quite the contrary. It's a deucedly mean trick."

"It isn't my fault, I tell you," Bangs mendaciously declared. "You can blame that hound, Giddings. I can't be bled any more of all my profits, and I am going to close my connection with this hotel tonight—and in a very few minutes."

"Great heavens, Bangs!" exclaimed one man. "Get out if you want to. We'll none of us weep over your departure. Leave George, here, to run the desk and Al, the steward, to see to the kitchen and the help, and we'll get along all right."

"And who is going to assure the help's wages?" demanded Bangs. "I'm not, you bet! And who'll pay for the lighting and heating? I can tell you gentlemen right now there isn't coal enough in the bins to run the dynamos and boilers till midnight."

At that a howl went up which boded ill for the manager of the Pinewood Inn and he dodged behind the desk before which he had been standing. Several of his guests looked suddenly dangerous to Bangs.

There came, however, an interruption. Somebody said: "Here comes Colonel Brack," and the group parted willingly enough to let in a tall, military figure of a man with drooping gray mustache and goatee, fiery eyes under penthouse brows—a man who walked with the "step-clump, step-clump" of a cripple with an artificial limb.

Nevertheless, Colonel Brack bore himself very erect and stepped with a firmness that betrayed more than ordinary hardihood of character. The other guests who knew him looked upon the old man with evident respect.

"What is this I hear, Bangs?" the ex-military officer demanded in a deep voice. "You sent one of your cubs to my room with a saucy message and I boxed his ears for him. What do you mean by telling me to get out of this hotel, suh?"

"I can't help it, Colonel Brack," declared the manager, backing out of any possible reach of the colonel's long arm. "The hotel's got to close."

"Then close it. But do it decently and in order," the colonel said. "Still, I doubt if the Barnaby estate will allow the house to be shut. They can find somebody else to run it quite as well as you, suh."

"Well, they won't find that other man tonight!" cried Bangs, in a tone that showed he felt impish delight in making all this trouble. "And I am going to close the house now. I've said my last word, gentlemen. If you want to pack your trunks, I'll keep the dynamos running till nine o'clock. There is a combination train leaves here—over the spur track, you understand, at that hour——"

"Confound you! Yes!" cried somebody. "But it only goes as far as the Junction and there is no connection there for New York until five o'clock in the morning. A nice train for ladies to take!"

"And how about those of us who have our autos here?" chimed in another. "The bridge is down. Your own motor bus is out of commission. The other roads are impassable for cars. You ought to be beaten to death, Bangs!"

"Ye-es—" drawled a sleek, dapper little man, whom, so Ryder told himself, one would naturally expect to speak in a crisp, quick tone, quite contrary to the one he used. "Ye-es, suppose we do tha-at same thing. It would not do the gu-uests of this hotel much good just now, perhaps; but it would rid the wo-orld of one rascal. Tha-at would be to the good."

Colonel Brack leaned over the counter and shook a long finger at the manager.

"I have lived in this hotel fourteen years, sub!" he exclaimed. "No manager can dispossess me. I refuse to get out, suh—I refuse to get out!"

"That's right! We all refuse to get out!" was the vociferous chorus.

"Then you'll stay in the dark and without heat and without service," growled Bangs doggedly. "I'm doing my best for you. I'll be liable for no further expense in a house of which I am dispossessed—that's flat!"

Bangs here erased himself from the scene by dodging into the private office and banging the door. The clerk oh duty was instantly besieged by a part of the crowd. He could do absolutely nothing to assist in untangling the difficulty. Like the other hotel employees, he was as much disturbed over his abrupt discharge as the guests were over their dismissal by the manager.

"I shall remain here, even if that rascal shuts off the heat and lights," Colonel Brack loudly declared, in the midst of the group of which John Ryder was one. "It is a preposterous—an impossible situation, suh! Whoever heard the like? A hotel cannot close its doors and turn its guests out upon the streets on half an hour's notice."

"But Bangs will do as he says. I know the dog. When he's ugly, he'll do anything," returned one man gloomily.

"He may turn off the heat and light; but here I stay!" reiterated the colonel, with all the determination of Horatius on the Bridge.

"Not a pleasant prospect," said a drummer. "I reckon I'll go and pack up and take that nine o'clock switchback."

"We cannot all do that," Ryder finally said, with calmness. "It is ridiculous to think of the ladies leaving on such short notice—especially those who have lived here for any length of time."

"And there's one car on that train, a combination day coach and smoker. It wouldn't hold a third of the guests in this house to-night," was the positive declaration of another man.

"Besides," Ryder pursued, "how would we get our baggage away at this hour? If we left it, thieves would ransack every trunk in the house. This Bangs is evidently a slippery customer. He could not be found, it is likely, when it came time to apportion damages."

"You are right, suh," said Colonel Brack. "You are Mr. John Ryder, of New York?"

Ryder acknowledged it. "My wife and I have just arrived, intending to remain a fortnight or so. I don't fancy having our visit spoiled in this way."

"Then, Mr. Ryder," said the colonel pompously, "I wish you would come into the café with a number of us older guests, suh, where we will hold a council of war." The colonel could scarcely conceive of any discussion being official out of sight of a bar. "We cannot be driven out of this hotel in this way. We must plan some means of thwarting Bangs, suh."

"We'd better chip in and pay his rent for him," suggested one compromising individual, bent on cutting the Gordian knot with one simple stroke.

"I understand," said the colonel hastily, "that he is at least three months behind in his rent. That would never do. And it is not because he is unable to pay. The house is well patronized and he collects his money promptly. It is merely a personal fight between him and Giddings, who, I judge, desires to break this fellow's connection with Pinewood Inn. I never did like the dog."

"Giddings should come down here and attend to the matter himself, then," said another of the angry guests.

"I do not presume for a moment," said the colonel, starting for the barroom, "that Giddings dreamed Bangs would do this. No, suh! No gentleman could imagine such a dastardly thing."

"But it seems to have been in the manager's mind for some time," Ryder interposed. "He has allowed his coal to run so low that there is not enough, he now says, to last the night through."

"Maybe he is lying," Jimson suggested.

"No," asserted some one. "He's not lying now, for once in his life. He's telling the truth this time—but only because the truth is meaner than any lie he could possibly concoct."

"He has planned to get back at Giddings and the estate by injuring the reputation of the hotel. Why, gentlemen," pursued the wrathful colonel, all bristling like an enraged turkeycock, "this house has been my home for fourteen years. I am the oldest inhabitant. Mr. Jimson, here, has an invalid wife. She cannot be taken out at this hour of the night. And the house has been her home for eight years. It is brutal—positively brutal!"

"All right! All right!" said Ryder. "But this isn't getting us anywhere. We all know our wrongs. Let's see what can be done to stop the fellow's deviltry."

"By Jove!" exclaimed a man at his elbow. "Here Bangs is turning us out and along come other guests. What do you know about that?"

"How could anyone get here at this hour with that bridge in that condition?" queried Jimson. "Couldn't get an auto over it."

"Oh, anyone that was eager enough to come could get punted over the inlet. Must have come down on that train that does not stop at Barr, though, and motored back from the first stop below—unless a big enough party was on to make a special stop possible."

But it was a single guest only who entered the foyer and office of the hotel. This man had no luggage and he stood for a moment nervously drawing off his gloves as his glance swept swiftly the faces of those in sight.

George, the clerk, stepped to the turntable on which the register rested. It was not a grateful task to inform the man who had just come what the situation of affairs was.

Ryder noticed the stranger only casually at first. The group of excited men, whom he was tailing toward the café, were slow in leaving the vicinity of the hotel desk.

When the clerk had explained the situation as well as he was able the disappointed guest stood back, nervously rolling his gloves and with an expression of indetermination upon his face. Finally he asked George a question in a low voice.

"No, sir. Nobody by that name in the house, sir," the clerk said.

One of the boys came through the foyer intoning the name of a guest: "Mr. White's wanted. Mr. White! Mr. White!"

Nobody gave the boy any attention at first, and he approached the desk still singsonging the name of the man wanted.

"Who's wanted?" asked George, the clerk, briskly.

"Message for Mr. White. His wife wants him upstairs—Suite Three."

"White?" repeated the clerk. "What White's that? I didn't know——"

Just then Ryder, looking back over his shoulder, chanced to see again the face of the last comer to the hotel. He was as pale as death; Ryder could see the drops of perspiration standing on his broad, high brow. He was staring at the bellboy as though in the latter he beheld a ghost.

Suddenly, while the puzzled clerk bent over the register evidently in search of the name "White" among those of the new arrivals at Pinewood Inn, the stranger darted at the bellboy. "Who—who is asking for Mr. White?" Ryder heard the man gasp.

"Mrs. White. She wants him. Suite Three," repeated the boy. "Mr. John B. White."

The emotions displayed in succession upon the stranger's countenance ran the gamut of human expression. Amazement, incredulity, rage, determination—a dozen different feelings evidently gripped the man's mind and soul. Ryder had his own attention recalled with difficulty by Colonel Brack, who stuck his head out of the swinging door of the café, crying:

"We're waiting for you, suh! Mr. Ryder, what'll you take, suh? And I'd like your opinion on this important matter. It will cost us, severally and collectively, some money to keep this house open. I, for one, will assume my share of the obligation and trust to getting back at Bangs afterward. What do you say, Mr. Ryder?"

The discussion of ways and means claimed the attention of John Ryder. Yet he glanced back at the stranger again as he entered the café. The latter was moving toward the stairway clutching the bellboy firmly by the shoulder. Back in the mind of Ryder was this comment:

"Odd about that fellow. Acts strange. White? Don't know anyone of the name—that I remember. Suite Three? Why—what's the number of our suite? I thought that was Number Three. Must be Number Two. Odd——"