THE PRECIPICE

_A Novel_

BY

ELIA W. PEATTIE

BOSTON AND NEW YORK

HOUGHTON MIFFLIN COMPANY

The Riverside Press Cambridge

1914

 _A fanfare of trumpets is blowing to which women the world over are listening. They listen even against their wills, and not all of them answer, though all are disturbed. Shut their ears to it as they will, they cannot wholly keep out the clamor of those trumpets, but whether in thrall to love or to religion, to custom or to old ideals of self-obliterating duty, they are stirred. They move in their sleep, or spring to action, and they present to the world a new problem, a new force--or a new menace_. .. . 

THE PRECIPICE

I

It was all over. Kate Barrington had her degree and her graduatinghonors; the banquets and breakfasts, the little intimate farewellgatherings, and the stirring convocation were through with. So now shewas going home. 

With such reluctance had the Chicago spring drawn to a close that, evenin June, the campus looked poorly equipped for summer, and it was apleasure, as she told her friend Lena Vroom, who had come with her tothe station to see her off, to think how much further everything wouldbe advanced "down-state. "

"To-morrow morning, the first thing, " she declared, "I shall go in theside entry and take down the garden shears and cut the roses to put inthe Dresden vases on the marble mantelshelf in the front room. "

"Don't try to make me think you're domestic, " said Miss Vroom withunwonted raillery. 

"Domestic, do you call it?" cried Kate. "It isn't being domestic; it'sturning in to make up to lady mother for the four years she's beendeprived of my society. You may not believe it, but that's been ahardship for her. I say, Lena, you'll be coming to see me one ofthese days?"

Miss Vroom shook her head. 

"I haven't much feeling for a vacation, " she said. "I don't seem to fitin anywhere except here at the University. "

"I've no patience with you, " cried Kate. "Why you should hang aroundhere doing graduate work year after year passes my understanding. Ideclare I believe you stay here because it's cheap and passes the time;but really, you know, it's a makeshift. "

"It's all very well to talk, Kate, when you have a home waiting for you. You're the kind that always has a place. If it wasn't your father'shouse it would be some other man's--Ray McCrea's, for example. As forme, I'm lucky to have acquired even a habit--and that's what college_is_ with me--since I've no home. "

Kate Barrington turned understanding and compassionate eyes upon herfriend. She had seen her growing a little thinner and more tenseeveryday; had seen her putting on spectacles, and fighting anaemia withtonics, and yielding unresistingly to shabbiness. Would she always bespeeding breathlessly from one classroom to another, palpitantly yetsadly seeking for the knowledge with which she knew so little whatto do?

The train came thundering in--they were waiting for it at one of thesuburban stations--and there was only a second in which to say good-bye. Lena, however, failed to say even that much. She pecked at Kate's cheekwith her nervous, thin lips, and Kate could only guess how much anguishwas concealed beneath this aridity of manner. Some sense of it made Katefling her arms about the girl and hold her in a warm embrace. 

"Oh, Lena, " she cried, "I'll never forget you--never!"

Lena did not stop to watch the train pull out. She marched away on herheelless shoes, her eyes downcast, and Kate, straining her eyes afterher friend, smiled to think there had been only Lena to speed herdrearily on her way. Ray McCrea had, of course, taken it for grantedthat he would be informed of the hour of her departure, but if she hadallowed him to come she might have committed herself in some absurdway--said something she could not have lived up to. 

 * * * * *

As it was, she felt quite peaceful and more at leisure than she had formonths. She was even at liberty to indulge in memories and it suited hermood deliberately to do so. She went back to the day when she hadpersuaded her father and mother to let her leave the Silvertree Academyfor Young Ladies and go up to the University of Chicago. She had beenbut eighteen then, but if she lived to be a hundred she never couldforget the hour she streamed with five thousand others through HullGate and on to Cobb Hall to register as a student in that young, aggressive seat of learning. 

She had tried to hold herself in; not to be too "heady"; and she hopedthe lank girl beside her--it had been Lena Vroom, delegated by theLeague of the Young Women's Christian Association--did not find herrawly enthusiastic. Lena conducted her from chapel to hall, from officeto woman's building, from registrar to dean, till at length Kate stoodbefore the door of Cobb once more, fagged but not fretted, and able tolook about her with appraising eyes. 

Around her and beneath her were swarms, literally, of fresh-faced, purposeful youths and maidens, an astonishingly large number of whomwere meeting after the manner of friends long separated. Later Katediscovered how great a proportion of that enthusiasm took itself out inmere gesture and vociferation; but it all seemed completely genuine toher that first day and she thought with almost ecstatic anticipation ofthe relationships which soon would be hers. Almost she looked then tosee the friend-who-was-to-be coming toward her with miraculousrecognition in her eyes. 

But she was none the less interested in those who for one reason oranother were alien to her--in the Japanese boy, concealing hiswistfulness beneath his rigid breeding; in the Armenian girl with thesad, beautiful eyes; in the Yiddish youth with his bashful earnestness. Then there were the women past their first youth, abstracted, andobviously disdainful of their personal appearance; and the girls withheels too high and coiffures too elaborate, who laid themselves open tothe suspicion of having come to college for social reasons. But allappealed to Kate. She delighted in their variety--yes, and in all theseforms of aspiration. The vital essence of their spirits seemed tomaterialize into visible ether, rose-red or violet-hued, and to riseabout them in evanishing clouds. 

 * * * * *

She was recalled to the present by a brisk conductor who asked for herticket. Kate hunted it up in a little flurry. The man had broken intothe choicest of her memories, and when he was gone and she returned toher retrospective occupation, she chanced upon the most irritating ofher recollections. It concerned an episode of that same first day inChicago. She had grown weary with the standing and waiting, and whenMiss Vroom left her for a moment to speak to a friend, Kate had taken aseat upon a great, unoccupied stone bench which stood near Cobb door. Still under the influence of her high idealization of the scene she lostherself in happy reverie. Then a widening ripple of laughter told herthat something amusing was happening. What it was she failed to imagine, but it dawned upon her gradually that people were looking her way. Knotsof the older students were watching her; bewildered newcomers weretrying, like herself, to discover the cause of mirth. At first shesmiled sympathetically; then suddenly, with a thrill of mortification, she perceived that she was the object of derision. 

What was it? What had she done?

She knew that she was growing pale and she could feel her heart poundingat her side, but she managed to rise, and, turning, faced a blond youngman near at hand, who had protruding teeth and grinned at her like asardonic rabbit. 

"Oh, what is it, please?" she asked. 

"That bench isn't for freshmen, " he said briefly. 

Scarlet submerged the pallor in Kate's face. 

"Oh, I didn't know, " she gasped. "Excuse me. "

She moved away quickly, dropping her handbag and having to stoop for it. Then she saw that she had left her gloves on the bench and she had toturn back for those. At that moment Lena hastened to her. 

"I'm so sorry, " she cried. "I ought to have warned you about that oldsenior bench. "

Kate, disdaining a reply, strode on unheeding. Her whole body wasrunning fire, and she was furious with herself to think that she couldsuffer such an agony of embarrassment over a blunder which, after all, was trifling. Struggling valiantly for self-command, she plunged towardanother bench and dropped on it with the determination to look her worldin the face and give it a fair chance to stare back. 

Then she heard Lena give a throaty little squeak. 

"Oh, my!" she said. 

Something apparently was very wrong this time, and Kate was not toremain in ignorance of what it was. The bench on which she was nowsitting had its custodian in the person of a tall youth, who lifted hishat and smiled upon her with commingled amusement and commiseration. 

"Pardon, " he said, "but--"

Kate already was on her feet and the little gusts of laughter that camefrom the onlookers hit her like so many stones. 

"Isn't this seat for freshmen either?" she broke in, trying not to lether lips quiver and determined to show them all that she was, at anyrate, no coward. 

The student, still holding his hat, smiled languidly as he shook hishead. 

"I'm new, you see, " she urged, begging him with her smile to be on herside, --"dreadfully new! Must I wait three years before I sit here?"

"I'm afraid you'll not want to do it even then, " he said pleasantly. "You understand this bench--the C bench we call it--is for men; any manabove a freshman. "

Kate gathered the hardihood to ask:--

"But why is it for men, please?"

"I don't know why. We men took it, I suppose. " He wasn't inclined toapologize apparently; he seemed to think that if the men wanted it theyhad a right to it. 

"This bench was given to the men, perhaps?" she persisted, not knowinghow to move away. 

"No, " admitted the young man; "I don't believe it was. It was presentedto the University by a senior class. "

"A class of men?"

"Naturally not. A graduating class is composed of men and women. Cbench, " he explained, "is the center of activities. It's where the drumis beaten to call a mass meeting, and the boys gather here when they'veanything to talk over. There's no law against women sitting here, youknow. Only they never do. It isn't--oh, I hardly know how to put it--itisn't just the thing--"

"Can't you break away, McCrea?" some one called. 

The youth threw a withering glance in the direction of the speaker. 

"I can conduct my own affairs, " he said coldly. 

But Kate had at last found a way to bring the interview to an end. 

"I said I was new, " she concluded, flinging a barbed shaft. "I thoughtit was share and share alike here--that no difference was made betweenmen and women. You see--I didn't understand. "

The C bench came to be a sort of symbol to her from then on. It was theseat of privilege if not of honor, and the women were not to sit on it. 

Not that she fretted about it. There was no time for that. She settledin Foster Hall, which was devoted to the women, and where she expectedto make many friends. But she had been rather unfortunate in that. Thewomen were not as coöperative as she had expected them to be. At table, for example, the conversation dragged heavily. She had expected to findit liberal, spirited, even gay, but the girls had a way of holding back. Kate had to confess that she didn't think men would be like that. Theywould--most of them--have understood that the chief reason a man went toa university was to learn to get along with his fellow men and to holdhis own in the world. The girls labored under the idea that one went toa university for the exclusive purpose of making high marks in theirstudies. They put in stolid hours of study and were quietly glad attheir high averages; but it actually seemed as if many of them usedcollege as a sort of shelter rather than an opportunity for the exerciseof personality. 

However, there were plenty of the other sort--gallant, excursivespirits, and as soon as Kate became acquainted she had pleasure inpicking and choosing. She nibbled at this person and that like acautious and discriminating mouse, venturing on a full taste if sheliked the flavor, scampering if she didn't. 

Of course she had her furores. Now it was for settlement work, now fordramatics, now for dancing. Subconsciously she was always looking aboutfor some one who "needed" her, but there were few such. Patronage wouldhave been resented hotly, and Kate learned by a series ofdiscountenancing experiences that friendship would not come--any morethan love--at beck and call. 

Love!

That gave her pause. Love had not come her way. Of course there was RayMcCrea. But he was only a possibility. She wondered if she would turn tohim in trouble. Of that she was not yet certain. It was pleasant to bewith him, but even for a gala occasion she was not sure but that she washappier with Honora Daley than with him. Honora Daley was Honora Fulhamnow--married to a "dark man" as the gypsy fortune-tellers would havecalled him. He seemed very dark to Kate, menacing even; but Honora foundit worth her while to shed her brightness on his tenebrosity, so thatwas, of course, Honora's affair. 

Kate smiled to think of how her mother would be questioning her abouther "admirers, " as she would phrase it in her mid-Victorian parlance. There was really only Ray to report upon. He would be the beau ideal"young gentleman, "--to recur again to her mother's phraseology, --the sonof a member of a great State Street dry-goods firm, an excellentlymannered, ingratiating, traveled person with the most desirable socialconnections. Kate would be able to tell of the two mansions, one on theLake Shore Drive, the other at Lake Forest, where Ray lived with hisparents. He had not gone to an Eastern college because his fatherwished him to understand the city and the people among whom his life wasto be spent. Indeed, his father, Richard McCrea, had made something of aconcession to custom in giving his son four years of academic life. Raywas now to be trained in every department of that vast departmentalconcern, the Store, and was soon to go abroad as the promising cadet ofa famous commercial establishment, to make the acquaintance of theforeign importers and agents of the house. Oh, her mother would quitelike all that, though she would be disappointed to learn that there hadthus far been no rejected suitors. In her mother's day every fair damselcarried scalps at her belt, figuratively speaking--and after marriage, became herself a trophy of victory. Dear "mummy" was that, Kate thoughttenderly--a willing and reverential parasite, "ladylike" at all costs, contented to have her husband provide for her, her pastor think for her, and Martha Underwood, the domineering "help" in the house at Silvertree, do the rest. Kate knew "mummy's" mind very well--knew how she looked onherself as sacred because she had been the mother to one child and agood wife to one husband. She was all swathed around in thechiffon-sentiment of good Victoria's day. She didn't worry about being a"consumer" merely. None of the disturbing problems that were shakingfemininity disturbed her calm. She was "a lady, " the "wife of aprofessional man. " It was proper that she should "be well cared for. "She moved by her well-chosen phrases; they were like rules set in acopybook for her guidance. 

Kate seemed to see a moving-picture show of her mother's days. Now shewas pouring the coffee from the urn, seasoning it scrupulously to suither lord and master, now arranging the flowers, now feeding thegoldfish; now polishing the glass with tissue paper. Then she answeredthe telephone for her husband, the doctor, --answered the door, too, sometimes. She received calls and paid them, read the ladies' magazines, and knew all about what was "fitting for a lady. " Of course, she had herprejudices. She couldn't endure Oriental rugs, and didn't believe thatsmuggling was wrong; at least, not when done by the people one knew andwhen the things smuggled were pretty. 

Kate, who had the spirit of the liberal comedian, smiled many timesremembering these things. Then she sighed, for she realized that herability to see these whimsicalities meant that she and her mother were, after all, creatures of diverse training and thought. 

II

What! Silver tree? She hadn't realized how the time had been flying. Butthere was the sawmill. She could hear the whir and buzz! And there wasthe old livery-stable, and the place where farm implements were sold, and the little harness shop jammed in between;--and there, to convinceher no mistake had been made, was the lozenge of grass with "Silvertree"on it in white stones. Then, in a second, the station appeared with thebusses backed up against it, and beyond them the familiar surrey with awoman in it with yearning eyes. 

Kate, the specialized student of psychology, the graduate with honors, who had learned to note contrasts and weigh values, forgot everything(even her umbrella) and leaped from the train while it was still inmotion. Forgotten the honors and degrees; the majors were mere minoraffairs; and there remained only the things which were from thebeginning. 

She and her mother sat very close together as they drove through thefamiliar village streets. When they did speak, it was incoherently. There was an odor of brier roses in the air and the sun was setting in a"bed of daffodil sky. " Kate felt waves of beauty and tenderness breakingover her and wanted to cry. Her mother wanted to and did. Neithertrusted herself to speak, but when they were in the house Mrs. Barrington pulled the pins out of Kate's hat and then Kate took thefaded, gentle woman in her strong arms and crushed her to her. 

"Your father was afraid he wouldn't be home in time to meet you, " saidMrs. Barrington when they were in the parlor, where the Dresden vasesstood on the marble mantel and the rose-jar decorated the three-sidedtable in the corner. "It was just his luck to be called into thecountry. If it had been a really sick person who wanted him, I wouldn'thave minded, but it was only Venie Sampson. "

"Still having fits?" asked Kate cheerfully, as one glad to recognizeeven the chronic ailments of a familiar community. 

"Well, she thinks she has them, " said Mrs. Barrington in an easy, gossiping tone; "but my opinion is that she wouldn't be troubled withthem if only there were some other way in which she could call attentionto herself. You see, Venie was a very pretty girl. "

"Has that made her an invalid, mummy?"

"Well, it's had something to do with it. When she was young she receivedno end of attention, but some way she went through the woods and didn'teven pick up a crooked stick. But she got so used to being the center ofinterest that when she found herself growing old and plain, she couldn'tthink of any way to keep attention fixed on her except by having thesecollapses. You know you mustn't call the attacks 'fits. ' Venie's far toorefined for that. "

Kate smiled broadly at her mother's distinctive brand of humor. Sheloved it all--Miss Sampson's fits, her mother's jokes; even the factthat when they went out to supper she sat where she used in the old dayswhen she had worn a bib beneath her chin. 

"Oh, the plates, the cups, the everything!" cried Kate, ridiculouslylifting a piece of the "best china" to her lips and kissing it. 

"Absurdity!" reproved her mother, but she adored the girl'sextravagances just the same. 

"Everything's glorious, " Kate insisted. "Cream cheese and parsley! Didyou make it, mummy? Currant rolls--oh, the wonders! Martha Underwood, don't dare to die without showing me how to make those currant rolls. Veal loaf--now, what do you think of that? Why, at Foster we went hungrysometimes--not for lack of quantity, of course, but because of thequality. I used to be dreadfully ashamed of the fact that there we were, dozens of us women in that fine hall, and not one of us with enoughdomestic initiative to secure a really good table. I tried to head aninsurrection and to have now one girl and now another supervise thetable, but the girls said they hadn't come to college to keep house. "

"Yes, yes, " chimed in her mother excitedly; "that's where the wholetrouble with college for women comes in. They not only don't go tocollege to keep house, but most of them mean not to keep it when theycome out. We allowed you to go merely because you overbore us. You usedto be a terrible little tyrant, Katie, --almost as bad as--"

She brought herself up suddenly. 

"As bad as whom, mummy?"

There was a step on the front porch and Mrs. Barrington was spared theneed for answering. 

"There's your father, " she said, signaling Kate to meet him. 

 * * * * *

Dr. Barrington was tall, spare, and grizzled. The torpor of the littletown had taken the light from his eyes and reduced the tempo of hismovements, but, in spite of all, he had preserved certain vivid featuresof his personality. He had the long, educated hands of the surgeon andthe tyrannical aspect of the physician who has struggled all his lifewith disobedience and perversity. He returned Kate's ardent little stormof kisses with some embarrassment, but he was unfeignedly pleased at herappearance, and as the three of them sat about the table in their oldjuxtaposition, his face relaxed. However, Kate had seen her mother lookup wistfully as her husband passed her, as if she longed for someaffectionate recognition of the occasion, but the man missed hisopportunity and let it sink into the limbo of unimproved moments. 

"Well, father, we have our girl home again, " Mrs. Barrington said withpardonable sentiment. 

"Well, we've been expecting her, haven't we?" Dr. Barrington replied, not ill-naturedly but with a marked determination to make the episodematter-of-fact. 

"Indeed we have, " smiled Mrs. Barrington. "But of course it couldn'tmean to you, Frederick, what it does to me. A mother's--"

Dr. Barrington raised his hand. 

"Never mind about a mother's love, " he said decisively. "If you had seenit fail as often as I have, you'd think the less said on the subject thebetter. Women are mammal, I admit; maternal they are not, save in aproportion of cases. Did you have a pleasant journey down, Kate?"

He had the effect of shutting his wife out of the conversation; ofdefinitely snubbing and discountenancing her. Kate knew it had alwaysbeen like that, though when she had been young and more passionatelydetermined to believe her home the best and dearest in the world, aschildren will, she had overlooked the fact--had pretended that what wasa habit was only a mood, and that if "father was cross" to-day, he wouldbe pleasant to-morrow. Now he began questioning Kate about college, herinstructors and her friends. There was conversation enough, but theman's wife sat silent, and she knew that Kate knew that he expectedher to do so. 

Custard was brought on and Mrs. Barrington diffidently served it. Herhusband gave one glance at it. 

"Curdled!" he said succinctly, pushing his plate from him. "It's a pityit couldn't have been right Kate's first night home. "

Kate thought there had been so much that was not right her first nighthome, that a spoiled confection was hardly worth comment. 

"I'm dreadfully sorry, " Mrs. Barrington said. "I suppose I should havemade it myself, but I went down to the train--"

"That didn't take all the afternoon, did it?" the doctor asked. 

"I was doing things around the house--"

"Putting flowers in my room, I know, mummy, " broke in Kate, "andpolishing up the silver toilet bottles, the beauties. You're one ofthose women who pet a home, and it shows, I can tell you. You don't seemany homes like this, do you, dad, --so ladylike and brier-rosy?"

She leaned smilingly across the table as she addressed her father, offering him not the ingratiating and seductive smile which he wasaccustomed to see women--his wife among the rest--employ when theywished to placate him. Kate's was the bright smile of a comradely fellowcreature who asked him to play a straight game. It made him take freshstock of his girl. He noted her high oval brow around which the darkhair clustered engagingly; her flexible, rather large mouth, with lipswell but not seductively arched, and her clear skin with its uniformtinting. Such beauty as she had, and it was far from negligible, wouldendure. She was quite five feet ten inches, he estimated, with a goodchest development and capable shoulders. Her gestures were free andsuggestive of strength, and her long body had the grace of flexibilityand perfect unconsciousness. All of this was good; but what of thespirit that looked out of her eyes? It was a glance to which the man wasnot accustomed--feminine yet unafraid, beautiful but not related to sex. The physician was not able to analyze it, though where women wereconcerned he was a merciless analyst. Gratified, yet unaccountablydisturbed, he turned to his wife. 

"Martha has forgotten to light up the parlor, " he said testily. "Can'tyou impress on her that she's to have the room ready for us when we'vefinished inhere?"

"She's so excited over Kate's coming home, " said Mrs. Barrington with aplacatory smile. "Perhaps you'll light up to-night, Frederick. "

"No, I won't. I began work at five this morning and I've been going allday. It's up to you and Martha to run the house. "

"The truth is, " said Mrs. Barrington, "neither Martha nor I can reachthe gasolier. "

Dr. Barrington had the effect of pouncing on this statement. 

"That's what's the matter, then, " he said. "You forgot to get thetapers. I heard Martha telling you last night that they were out. "

A flush spread over Mrs. Barrington's delicate face as she cast abouther for the usual subterfuge and failed to find it. In that moment Katerealized that it had been a long programme of subterfuges with hermother--subterfuges designed to protect her from the onslaughts of theirritable man who dominated her. 

"I'll light the gas, mummy, " she said gently. "Let that be one of myfixed duties from now on. "

"You'll spoil your mother, Kate, " said the doctor with a whimsicalintonation. 

His jesting about what had so marred the hour of reunion brought a surgeof anger to Kate's brain. 

"That's precisely what I came home to do, sir, " she said significantly. "What other reason could I have for coming back to Silvertree? The towncertainly isn't enticing. You've been doctoring here for forty years, but you havn't been able to cure the local sleeping-sickness yet. "

It stung and she had meant it to. To insult Silvertree was to hurt thedoctor in his most tender vanity. It was one of his most fervid beliefsthat he had selected a growing town, conspicuous for its enterprise. Inhis young manhood he had meant to do fine things. He waspublic-spirited, charitable, a death-fighter of courage and persistence. Though not a religious man, he had one holy passion, that of thephysician. He respected himself and loved his wife, but he had fromboyhood confused the ideas of masculinity and tyranny. He believed thatwomen needed discipline, and he had little by little destroyed theintegrity of the woman he would have most wished to venerate. That shecould, in spite of her manifest cowardice and moral circumventions, still pray nightly and read the book that had been the light tocountless faltering feet, furnished him with food for acrid sarcasm. Hesaw in this only the essential furtiveness, inconsistency, andsuperstition of the female. 

The evening dragged. The neighbors who would have liked to visit themrefrained from doing so because they thought the reunited family wouldprefer to be alone that first evening. Kate did her best to preservesome tattered fragments of the amenities. She told college stories, talked of Lena Vroom and of beautiful Honora Fulham, --hinted even at RayMcCrea, --and by dint of much ingenuity wore the evening away. 

"In the morning, " she said to her father as she bade him good-night, "we'll both be rested. " She had meant it for an apology, not for herselfany more than for him, but he assumed no share in it. 

Up in her room her mother saw her bedded, and in kissing herwhispered, --

"Don't oppose your father, Kate. You'll only make me unhappy. Anythingfor peace, that's what I say. "

III

It was sweet to awaken in the old room. Through the open window shecould see the fork in the linden tree and the squirrels making free inthe branches. The birds were at their opera, and now and then the shapeof one outlined itself against the holland shade. Kate had beencommanded to take her breakfast in bed and she was more than willing todo so. The after-college lassitude was upon her and her thoughts moveddrowsily through her weary brain. 

Her mother, by an unwonted exercise of self-control, kept from the roomthat morning, stopping only now and then at the door for a question or alook. That was sweet, too. Kate loved to have her hovering about likethat, and yet the sight of her, so fragile, so fluttering, added to thesense of sadness that was creeping over her. After a time it began torain softly, the drops slipping down into the shrubbery and falling likesilver beads from the window-hood. At that Kate began to weep, too, justas quietly, and then she slept again. Her mother coming in on tiptoe sawtears on the girl's cheek, but she did not marvel. Though her experiencehad been narrow she was blessed with certain perceptions. She knew thateven women who called themselves happy sometimes had need to weep. 

 * * * * *

The little pensive pause was soon over. There was no use, as all thesturdier part of Kate knew, in holding back from the future. That veryafternoon the new life began forcing itself on her. The neighborscalled, eager to meet this adventurous one who had turned her back onthe pleasant conventions and had refused to content herself with theSilvertree Seminary for Young Ladies. They wanted to see what the newbrand of young woman was like. Moreover, there was no one who was notunder obligations to be kind to her mother's daughter. So, presently thewhole social life of Silvertree, aroused from its midsummer torpor bythis exciting event, was in full swing. 

Kate wrote to Honora a fortnight later:--

 I am trying to be the perfect young lady according to dear mummy's definition. You should see me running baby ribbon in my _lingerie_ and combing out the fringe on tea-napkins. Every afternoon we are 'entertained' or give an entertainment. Of course we meet the same people over and over, but truly I like the cordiality. Even the inquisitiveness has an affectionate quality to it. I'm determined to enjoy my village and I do appreciate the homely niceties of the life here. Of course I have to 'pretend' rather hard at times--pretend, for example, that I care about certain things which are really of no moment to me whatever. To illustrate, mother and I have some recipes which nobody else has and it's our rôle to be secretive about them! And we have invented a new sort of 'ribbon sandwich. ' Did you ever hear of a ribbon sandwich? If not, you must be told that it consists of layers and layers of thin slices of bread all pressed down together, with ground nuts or dressed lettuce in between. Each entertainer astonishes her guests with a new variety. That furnishes conversation for several minutes. 

 "How long can I stand it, Honora, my dear old defender of freedom? The classrooms are mine no more; the campus is a departed glory; I shall no longer sing the 'Alma Mater' with you when the chimes ring at ten. The whole challenge of the city is missing. Nothing opposes me, there is no task for me to do. I must be supine, acquiescent, smiling, non-essential. I am like a runner who has trained for a race, and, ready for the speeding, finds that no race is on. But I've no business to be surprised. I knew it would be like this, didn't I? the one thing is to ¸make and keep mummy happy. She needs me _so_ much. And I am happy to be with her. Write me often--write me everything. Gods, how I'd like a walk and talk with you!"

Mrs. Barrington did not attempt to conceal her interest in the letterswhich Ray McCrea wrote her daughter. She was one of those women whothrill at a masculine superscription on a letter. Perhaps she got moresatisfaction out of these not too frequent missives than Kate didherself. While the writer didn't precisely say that he counted on Kateto supply the woof of the fabric of life, that expectation made itselfevident between the lines to Mrs. Barrington's sentimental perspicacity. 

Kate answered his letters, for it was pleasant to have a masculinecorrespondent. It provided a needed stimulation. Moreover, in the backof her mind she knew that he presented an avenue of escape if Silvertreeand home became unendurable. It seemed piteous enough that her life withher parents should so soon have become a mere matter of duty andendurance, but there was a feeling of perpetually treading on eggs inthe Barrington house. Kate could have screamed with exasperation as oneeventless day after another dawned and the blight of caution andapprehension was never lifted from her mother and Martha. She writhedwith shame at the sight of her mother's cajolery of the tyrant sheserved--and loved. To have spoken out once, recklessly, to have entereda wordy combat without rancor and for the mere zest of tournament, tohave let the winnowing winds of satire blow through the house with itsstale sentimentalities and mental attitudes, would have reconciled herto any amount of difference in the point of view. But the hushed voiceand covertly held position afflicted her like shame. 

Were all women who became good wives asked to falsify themselves? Wasfurtive diplomacy, or, at least, spiritual compromise, the miserableduty of woman? Was it her business to placate her mate, and, byexercising the cunning of the weak, to keep out from under his heel?

There was no one in all Silvertree whom the discriminating would soquickly have mentioned as the ideal wife as Mrs. Barrington. Sheherself, no doubt, so Kate concluded with her merciless youngpsychology, regarded herself as noble. But the people in Silvertree hada passion for thinking of themselves as noble. They had, Kate said toherself bitterly, so few charms that they had to fall back on theirvirtues. In the face of all this it became increasingly difficult tothink of marriage as a goal for herself, and her letters to McCrea werefurther and further apart as the slow weeks passed. She had once readthe expression, "the authentic voice of happiness, " and it had livedhauntingly in her memory. Could Ray speak that? Would she, reading hissummons from across half the world, hasten to him, choose him from themillions, face any future with him? She knew she would not. No, no;union with the man of average congeniality was not her goal. There mustbe something more shining than that for her to speed toward it. 

However, one day she caught, opportunely, a hint of the further meaningsof a woman's life. Honora provided a great piece of news, andilluminated with a new understanding, Kate wrote:--

 "MY DEAR, DEAR GIRL:--

 "You write me that something beautiful is going to happen to you. I can guess what it is and I agree that it is glorious, though it does take my breath away. Now there are two of you--and by and by there will be three, and the third will be part you and part David and all a miracle. I can see how it makes life worth living, Honora, as nothing else could--nothing else!

 "Mummy wouldn't like me to write like this. She doesn't approve of women whose understanding jumps ahead of their experiences. But what is the use of pretending that I don't encompass your miracle? I knew all about it from the beginning of the earth. 

 "This will mean that you will have to give up your laboratory work with David, I suppose. Will that be a hardship? Or are you glad of the old womanly excuse for passing by the outside things, and will you now settle down to be as fine a mother as you were a chemist? Will you go further, my dear, and make a fuss about your house and go all delicately bedizened after the manner of the professors' nice little wives--go in, I mean, for all the departments of the feminine profession?

 "I do hope you'll have a little son, Honora, not so much on your account as on his. During childhood a girl's feet are as light as a boy's bounding over the earth; but when once childhood is over, a man's life seems so much more coherent than a woman's, though it is not really so important. But it takes precisely the experience you are going through to give it its great significance, doesn't it?

 "What other career is there for real women, I wonder? What, for example, am I to do, Honora? There at the University I prepared myself for fine work, but I'm trapped here in this silly Silvertree cage. If I had a talent I could make out very well, but I am talentless, and all I do now is to answer the telephone for father and help mummy embroider the towels. They won't let me do anything else. Some one asked me the other day what colors I intended wearing this autumn. I wanted to tell them smoke-of-disappointment, ashes-of-dreams, and dull-as-wash-Monday. But I only said ashes-of-roses. "'Not all of your frocks, surely, Kate, ' one of the girls cried. 'All, ' I declared; 'street frocks, evening gowns, all. ' 'But you mustn't be odd, ' my little friend warned. 'Especially as people are a little suspicious that you will be because of your going to a co-educational college. '

 "I thought it would be so restful here, but it doesn't offer peace so much as shrinkage. Silvertree isn't pastoral--it's merely small town. Of course it is possible to imagine a small town that would be ideal--a community of quiet souls leading the simple life. But we aren't great or quiet souls here, and are just as far from simple as our purses and experience will let us be. 

 "I dare say that you'll be advising me, as a student of psychology, to stop criticizing and to try to do something for the neighbors here--go in search of their submerged selves. But, honestly, it would require too much paraphernalia in the way of diving-bells and air-pumps. 

 "I have, however, a reasonable cause of worry. Dear little mummy isn't well. At first we thought her indisposition of little account, but she seems run down. She has been flurried and nervous ever since I came home; indeed, I may say she has been so for years. Now she seems suddenly to have broken down. But I'm going to do everything I can for her, and I know father will, too; for he can't endure to have any one sick. It arouses his great virtue, his physicianship. "

 * * * * *

 A week later Kate mailed this:--

 "I am turning to you in my terrible fear. Mummy won't answer our questions and seems lost in a world of thought. Father has called in other physicians to help him. I can't tell you how like a frightened child I feel. Oh, my poor little bewildered mummy! What do you suppose she is thinking about?"

 * * * * *

Then, a week afterward, this--on black-bordered paper:--

 "SISTER HONORA:--

 "She's been gone three days. To the last we couldn't tell why she fell ill. We only knew she made no effort to get well. I am tormented by the fear that I had something to do with her breaking like that. She was appalled--shattered--at the idea of any friction between father and me. When I stood up for my own ideas against his, it was to her as sacrilegious as if I had lifted my hand against a king. I might have capitulated--ought, I suppose, to have foregone everything!

 "There is one thing, however, that gives me strange comfort. At the last she had such dignity! Her silence seemed fine and brave. She looked at us from a deep still peace as if, after all her losing of the way, she had at last found it and Herself. The search has carried her beyond our sight. 

 "Oh, we are so lonely, father and I. We silently accuse each other. He thinks my reckless truth-telling destroyed her timid spirit; I think his twenty-five years of tyranny did it. We both know how she hated our rasping, and we hate it ourselves. Yet, even at that hour when we stood beside her bed and knew the end was coming, he and I were at sword's points. What a hackneyed expression, but how terrible! Yes, the hateful swords of our spirits, my point toward his breast and his toward mine, gleamed there almost visibly above that little tired creature. He wanted her for himself even to the last: I wanted her for Truth--wanted her to walk up to God dressed in her own soul-garments, not decked out in the rags and tags of those father had tossed to her. 

 "She spoke only once. She had been dreaming, I suppose, and a wonderful illuminated smile broke over her face. In the midst of what seemed a sort of ecstasy, she looked up and saw father watching her. She shivered away from him with one of those apologetic gestures she so often used. 'It wasn't a heavenly vision, ' she said--she knew he wouldn't have believed in that--'it was only that I thought my little brown baby was in my arms. ' She meant me, Honora, --think of it. She had gone back to those tender days when I had been dependent on her for all my well-being. My mummy! I gathered her close and held her till she was gone, my little, strange, frightened love. 

 "Now father and I hide our thoughts from each other. He wanted to know if I was going to keep house for him. I said I'd try, for six months. He flew in one of his rages because I admitted that it would be an experiment. He wanted to know what kind of a daughter I was, and I told him the kind he had made me. Isn't that hideous?

 "I've no right to trouble you, but I must confide in some one or my heart will break. There's no one here I can talk to, though many are kind. And Ray--perhaps you think I should have written all this to him. But I wasn't moved to do so, Honora. Try to forgive me for telling you these troubles now in the last few days before your baby comes. I suppose I turn to you because you are one of the blessed corporation of mothers--part and parcel of the mother-fact. It's like being a part of the good rolling earth, just as familiar and comforting. Thinking of you mysteriously makes me good. I'm going to forget myself, the way you do, and 'make a home' for father. 

 "Your own

 KATE. "

In September she sent Honora a letter of congratulation. 

 "So it's twins! Girls! Were you transported or amused? Patience and Patricia--very pretty. You'll stay at home with the treasures, won't you? You see, there's something about you I can't quite understand, if you'll forgive me for saying it. You were an exuberant girl, but after marriage you grew austere--put your lips together in a line that discouraged kissing. So I'm not sure of you even now that the babies have come. Some day you'll have to explain yourself to me. 

 "I'm one who needs explanations all along the road. Why? Why? Why? That is what my soul keeps demanding. Why couldn't I go back to Chicago with Ray McCrea? He was down here the other day, but I wouldn't let him say the things he obviously had come to say, and now he's on his way abroad and very likely we shall not meet again. I feel so numb since mummy died that I can't care about Ray. I keep crying 'Why?' about Death among other things. And about that horrid gulf between father and me. If we try to get across we only fall in. He has me here ready to his need. He neither knows nor cares what my thoughts are. So long as I answer the telephone faithfully, sterilize the drinking-water, and see that he gets his favorite dishes, he is content. I have no liberty to leave the house and my restlessness is torture. The neighbors no longer flutter in as they used when mummy was here. They have given me over to my year of mourning--which means vacuity. 

 "Partly for lack of something better to do I have cleaned the old house from attic to cellar, and have been glad to creep to bed lame and sore from work, because then I could sleep. Father won't let me read at night--watches for signs of the light under my door and calls out to me if it shows. It is golden weather without, dear friend, and within is order and system. But what good? I am stagnating, perishing. I can see no release--cannot even imagine in what form I would like it to come. In your great happiness remember my sorrow. And with your wonderful sweetness forgive my bitter egotism. But truly, Honora, I die daily. "

The first letter Honora Fulham wrote after she was able to sit at herdesk was to Kate. No answer came. In November Mrs. Fulham telephoned toLena Vroom to ask if she had heard, but Lena had received no word. 

"Go down to Silvertree, Lena, there's a dear, " begged her oldschoolmate. But Lena was working for her doctor's degree and could notspare the time. The holidays came on, and Mrs. Fulham tried to imagineher friend as being at last broken to her galling harness. Surely theremust be compensations for any father and daughter who can dwelltogether. Her own Christmas was a very happy one, and she was annoyedwith herself that her thoughts so continually turned to Kate. She hadan uneasy sense of apprehension in spite of all her verbal assurances toLena that Kate could master any situation. 

 * * * * *

What really happened in Silvertree that day changed, as it happened, thecourse of Kate's life. Sorrow came to her afterward, disappointment, struggle, but never so heavy and dragging a pain as she knew thatChristmas Day. 

She had been trying in many unsuspected ways to relieve her father'sgrim misery, --a misery of which his gaunt face told the tale, --andalthough he had said that he wished for "no flubdub about Christmas, "she really could not resist making some recognition of a day which foundall other homes happy. When the doctor came in for his midday meal, Katehad a fire leaping in the old grate with the marble mantel and a turkeysmoking on a table which was set forth with her choicest china andsilver. She had even gone so far as to bring out a dish distinctlyreminiscent of her mother, --the delicious preserved peaches, which hadawaked unavailing envy in the breasts of good cooks in the village. There was pudding, too, and brandy sauce, and holly for decorations. Itrepresented a very mild excursion into the land of festival, but it wastoo much for Dr. Barrington. 

He had come in cold, tired, hungry, and, no doubt, bitterly sorrowful atthe bottom of his perverse heart. He discerned Kate in white--it wasthe first time she had laid off her mourning--and with a chain of hermother's about her neck. Beyond, he saw the little Christmas feast andthe old silver vase on the table, red with berries. 

"You didn't choose to obey my orders, " he said coldly, turning hisunhappy blue eyes on her. 

"Your orders?" she faltered. 

"There was to be no fuss and feathers of any sort, " he said. "Christmasdoesn't represent anything recognized in my philosophy, and you know it. We've had enough of pretense in this house. I've been working to getthings on a sane basis and I believed you were sensible enough to helpme. But you're just like the rest of them--you're like all of your sex. You've got to have your silly play-time. I may as well tell you now thatyou don't give me any treat when you give me turkey, for I don'tlike it. "

"Oh, dad!" cried Kate; "you do! I've seen you eat it many times! Come, really it's a fine dinner. I helped to get it. Let's have a good timefor once. "

"I have plenty of good times, but I have them in my own way. "

"They don't include me!" cried Kate, her lips quivering. "You're toohard on me, dad, --much too hard. I can't stand it, really. "

He sat down to the table and ran his finger over the edge of thecarving-knife. 

"It wouldn't cut butter, " he declared. "Martha, bring me the steel!"

"I sharpened it, sir, " protested Martha. 

"Sharpened it, did you? I never saw a woman yet who could sharpen aknife. "

He began flashing the bright steel, and the women, their day already inashes, watched him fascinatedly. He was waiting to pounce on them. Theyknew that well enough. The spirit of perversity had him by the throatand held him, writhing. He carved and served, and then turned again tohis daughter. 

"So I'm too hard on you, am I?" he said, looking at her with a coldglint in his eye. "I provide you with a first-class education, I houseyou, clothe you, keep you in idleness, and I'm too hard on you. What doyou expect?"

"Why, I want you to like me, " cried Kate, her face flushing. "I simplywant to be your daughter. I want you to take me out with you, to give methings. I wanted you to give me a Christmas present. I want otherthings, too, --things that are not favors. "

She paused and he looked at her with a tightening of the lips. 

"Go on, " he said. 

"I am not being kept in idleness, as I think you know very well. My timeand energies are given to helping you. I look after your office and yourhouse. My time is not my own. I devote it to you. I want somerecognition of my services--I want some money. "

She leaned back in her chair, answering his exasperated frown with astraight look, which was, though he did not see it, only a differentsort of anger from his own. 

"Well, you won't get it, " he said. "You won't get it. When you needthings you can tell me and I'll get them for you. But there's beenaltogether too much money spent in this house in years gone by fortrumpery. You know that well enough. What's in that chest out there inthe hall? Trumpery! What's in those bureau drawers upstairs? Truck!Hundreds of dollars, that might have been put out where it would beearning something, gone into mere flubdub. "

He paused to note the effect of his words and saw that he had scored. Poor Mrs. Barrington, struggling vaguely and darkly in her own feminineway for some form of self-expression, had spent her household allowancemany a time on futile odds and ends. She had haunted the bargaincounter, and had found herself unable to get over the idea that a thingcheaply purchased was an economic triumph. So in drawers and chests andboxes she had packed her pathetic loot--odds and ends of embroidery, ofdress goods, of passementerie, of chair coverings; dozens of spools ofthread and crochet cotton; odd dishes; jars of cold cream; flotsam andjetsam of the shops, a mere wreckage of material. Kate remembered itwith vicarious shame and the blood that flowed to her face swept on intoher brain. She flamed with loyalty to that little dead, bewilderedwoman, whose feet had walked so falteringly in her search for the rosesof life. And she said--

But what matter what she said?

Her father and herself were at the antipodes, and they were separated noless by their similarities than by their differences. Their wistful andinexpressive love for each other was as much of a blight upon them astheir inherent antagonism. The sun went down that bleak Christmas nighton a house divided openly against itself. 

The next day Kate told her father he might look for some one else to runhis house for him. He said he had already done so. He made no inquirywhere she was going. He would not offer her money, though he secretlywanted her to ask for it. But it was past that with her. The miserable, bitter drama--the tawdry tragedy, whose most desperate accent was itsshameful approach to farce--wore itself to an end. 

Kate took her mother's jewelry, which had been left to her, and sold itat the local jeweler's. All Silvertree knew that Kate Barrington hadleft her home in anger and that her father had shown her the back ofhis hand. 

IV

Honora Fulham, sitting in her upper room and jealously guarding theslumbers of Patience and Patricia, her tiny but already remarkable twindaughters, heard a familiar voice in the lower hallway. She dropped herbook, "The Psychological Significance of the Family Group, " and ran tothe chamber door. A second later she was hanging over the banisters. 

"Kate!" she called with a penetrating whisper. "You!"

"Yes, Honora, it's bad Kate. She's come to you--a penny nobody elsewanted. "

Honora Fulham sailed down the stairs with the generous bearing of a shipanswering a signal of distress. The women fell into each other's arms, and in that moment of communion dismissed all those little alienhalf-feelings which grow up between friends when their enlargingexperience has driven them along different roads. Honora led the way toher austere drawing-room, from which, with a rigorous desire toeconomize labor, she had excluded all that was superfluous, and there, in the bare, orderly room, the two women--their girlhood definitelybehind them--faced each other. Kate noted a curious retraction inHonora, an indescribable retrenchment of her old-time self, as if herflorescence had been clipped by trained hands, so that the bloom shouldnot be too exuberant; and Honora swiftly appraised Kate's suggestion offreedom and force. 

"Kate, " she announced, "you look like a kind eagle. "

"A wounded one, then, Honora. "

"You've a story for me, I see. Sit down and tell it. "

So Kate told it, compelling the history of her humiliating failure tostand out before the calm, adjudging mind of her friend. 

"But oughtn't we to forgive everything to the old?" cried Honora at theconclusion of the recital. 

"Oh, is father old?" responded Kate in anguish. "He doesn't seemold--only formidable. If I'd thought I'd been wrong I never would havecome up here to ask you to sustain me in my obstinacy. Truly, Honora, itisn't a question of age. He's hardly beyond his prime, and he has beenusing all of his will, which has grown strong with having his own way, to break me down the way most of the men in Silvertree have broken theirwomen down. I was getting to be just like the others, and to start whenI heard him coming in at the door, and to hide things from him so thathe wouldn't rage. I'd have been lying next. "

"Kate!"

"Oh, you think it isn't decent for me to speak that way of my father!You can't think how it seems to me--how--how irreligious! But let mesave my soul, Honora! Let me do that!"

The girl's pallid face, sharpened and intensified, bore the imprint ofgenuine misery. Honora Fulham, strong of nerve and quick ofunderstanding, embraced her with a full sisterly glance. 

"I always liked and trusted you, Kate, " she said. "I was sorry when ourways parted, and I'd be happy to have them joined again. I see it's tobe a hazard of new fortune for you, and David and I will stand by. Idon't know, of course, precisely what that may mean, but we're yoursto command. "

A key turned in the front door. 

"There's David now, " said his wife, her voice vibrating, and shesummoned him. 

 * * * * *

David Fulham entered with something almost like violence, although theviolence did not lie in his gestures. It was rather in the manner inwhich his personality assailed those within the room. Dark, with anattractive ugliness, arrogant, with restive and fathomless eyes, heseemed to unite the East and the West in his being. Had his mother beena Jewess of pride and intellect, and his father an adventurous Americanof the superman type? Kate, looking at him with fresh interest, foundher thoughts leaping to the surmise. She knew that he was, in a way, agreat man--a man with a growing greatness. He had promulgated ideas sodaring that his brother scientists were embarrassed to know where toplace him. There were those who thought of him as a brilliant charlatan;but the convincing intelligence and self-control of his glancerepudiated that idea. The Faust-like aspect of the man might lay himopen to the suspicion of having too experimental and inquisitive a mind. But he had, it would seem, no need for charlatanism. 

He came forward swiftly and grasped Kate's hand. 

"I remember you quite well, " he said in his deep, vibratory tones. "Areyou here for graduate work?"

"No, " said Kate; "I'm not so humble. "

"Not so humble?" He showed his magnificent teeth in a flashing butsomewhat satiric smile. 

"I'm here for Life--not for study. "

"Not 'in for life, ' but 'out' for it, " he supplemented. "That'sinteresting. What is Honora suggesting to you? She's sure to have atheory of what will be best. Honora knows what will be best for almosteverybody, but she sometimes has trouble in making others see it thesame way. "

Honora seemed not to mind his chaffing. 

"Yes, " she agreed, "I've already thought, but I haven't had time to tellKate. Do you remember that Mrs. Goodrich said last night at dinner thather friend Miss Addams was looking about for some one to take the placeof a young woman who was married the other day? She was an officer ofthe Children's Protective League, you remember. "

"Oh, that--" broke in Fulham. He turned toward Kate and looked her overfrom head to foot, till the girl felt a hot wave of indignation sweepover her. But his glance was impersonal, apparently. He paid noattention to her embarrassment. He seemed merely to be getting at herqualities by the swiftest method. "Well, " he said finally, "I dare sayyou're right. But--" he hesitated. 

"Well?" prompted his wife. 

"But won't it be rather a--a waste?" he asked. And again he smiled, thistime with some hidden meaning. 

"Of course it won't be a waste, " declared Honora. "Aren't women to servetheir city as well as men? It's a practical form of patriotism, according to my mind. "

Kate broke into a nervous laugh. 

"I hope I'm to be of some use, " she said. "Work can't come a moment toosoon for me. I was beginning to think--"

She paused. 

"Well?" supplied Fulham, still with that watchful regard of her. 

"Oh, that I had made a mistake about myself--that I wasn't going to beanything in particular, after all. "

 * * * * *

They were interrupted. A man sprang up the outside steps and rang thedoorbell imperatively. 

"It's Karl Wander, " announced Fulham, who had glanced through thewindow. "It's your cousin, Honora. "

He went to the door, and Kate heard an emphatic and hearty voice makinghurried greetings. 

"Stopped between trains, " it was saying. "Can stay ten minutesprecisely--not a second longer. Came to see the babies. "

Honora had arisen with a little cry and gone to the door. Now shereturned, hanging on to the arm of a weather-tanned man. 

"Miss Barrington, " she said, "my cousin, Mr. Wander. Oh, Karl, you'renot serious? You don't really mean that you can't stay--not evenover night?"

The man turned his warm brown eyes on Kate and she looked at himexpectantly, because he was Honora's cousin. For the time it takes todraw a breath, they gazed at each other. Oddly enough, Kate thought ofRay McCrea, who was across the water, and whose absence she had notregretted. She could not tell why her thoughts turned to him. This manwas totally unlike Ray. He was, indeed, unlike any one she ever hadknown. There was that about him which held her. It was not quiteassertion; perhaps it was competence. But it was competence that seemedto go without tyranny, and that was something new in her experience ofmen. He looked at her on a level, spiritually, querying as to whoshe might be. 

The magical moment passed. Honora and David were talking. They ran awayup the stairs with their guest, inviting Kate to follow. 

"I'll only be in the way now, " she called. "By and by I'll have thebabies all to myself. "

Yet after she had said this, she followed, and looked into the nursery, which was at the rear of the house. Honora had thrust the two childreninto her cousin's big arms and she and David stood laughing at him. Another man might have appeared ridiculous in this position; but it didnot, apparently, occur to Karl Wander to be self-conscious. He waswrapped in contemplation of the babies, and when he peered over theirheads at Kate, he was quite grave and at ease. 

Then, before it could be realized, he was off again. He had kissedHonora and congratulated her, and he and Kate had again clasped hands. 

"Sorry, " he said, in his explosive way, "that we part so soon. " He heldher hand a second longer, gave it a sudden pressure, and was gone. 

Honora shut the door behind him reluctantly. 

"So like Karl!" she laughed. "It's the second time he's been in my housesince I was married. "

"You'd think we had the plague, the way he runs from us, " said David. 

"Oh, " responded Honora, not at all disturbed, "Karl is forever onimportant business. He's probably been to New York to some directors'meeting. Now he's on his way to Denver, he says--'men waiting. ' That'sKarl's way. To think of his dashing up here between trains to see mybabies!" The tears came to her eyes. "Don't you think he's fine, Kate?"

The truth was, there seemed to be a sort of vacuum in the air since hehad left--as if he had taken the vitality of it with him. 

"But where does he live?" she asked Honora. 

"Address him beyond the Second Divide, and he'll be reached. Everybodyknows him there. His post-office bears his own name--Wander. "

"He's a miner?"

"How did you know?"

"Oh, by process of elimination. What else could he be?"

"Nothing else in all the world, " agreed David Fulham. "I tell Honorahe's a bit mad. "

"No, no, " Honora laughed; "he's not mad; he's merely Western. Howstartled you look, Kate--as if you had seen an apparition. "

 * * * * *

It was decided that Kate was to stay there at the Fulhams', and to useone of their several unoccupied rooms. Kate chose one that looked overthe Midway, and her young strength made nothing of the two flights ofstairs which she had to climb to get to it. At first the severity of theapartment repelled her, but she had no money with which to make it moreto her taste, and after a few hours its very barrenness made an appealto her. It seemed to be like her own life, in need of decoration, andshe was content to let things take their course. It seemed probable thatroses would bloom in their time. 

No one, it transpired, ate in the house. 

"I found out, " explained Honora, "that I couldn't be elaboratelydomestic and have a career, too, so I went, with some others of similarconvictions and circumstances, into a coöperative dining-room scheme. "

Kate gave an involuntary shrug of her shoulders. 

"You think that sounds desolate? Wait till you see us all together. Thistalk about 'home' is all very well, but I happen to know--and I fancyyou do, too--that home can be a particularly stultifying place. Whenpeople work as hard as we do, a little contact with outsiders isstimulating. But you'll see for yourself. Mrs. Dennison, a very finewoman, a widow, looks after things for us. Dr. Von Shierbrand, one ofour number, got to calling the place 'The Caravansary, ' and now we'veall fallen into the way of it. "

The Caravansary was but a few doors from the Fulhams'; an old-fashioned, hospitable affair, with high ceilings, white marble mantels, and narrowwindows. Mrs. Dennison, the house-mother, suited the place well. Herwidow's cap and bands seemed to go with the grave pretentiousness of therooms, to which she had succeeded in giving almost a personalatmosphere. There was room for her goldfish and her half-dozen canarycages as well as for her "coöperators"--no one there would permithimself to be called a boarder. 

Kate, sensitive from her isolation and sore from her sorrows, hadimagined that she would resent the familiarities of those she would beforced to meet on table terms. But what was the use in trying, to resentMarna Cartan, the young Irish girl who meant to make a great singer ofherself, and who evidently looked upon the world as a place of rare andradiant entertainment? As for Mrs. Barsaloux, Marna's patron andbenefactor, with her world-weary eyes and benevolent smile, who couldturn a cold shoulder to her solicitudes? Then there were Wickersham andVon Shierbrand, members, like Fulham, of the faculty of the University. The Applegates and the Goodriches were pleasant folk, rather settled intheir aspect, and all of literary leanings. The Applegates wereidentified--both husband and wife--with a magazine of literarycriticism; Mr. Goodrich ran a denominational paper with an academicflavor; Mrs. Goodrich was president of an orphan asylum and spent herdays in good works. Then, intermittently, the company was joined byGeorge Fitzgerald, a preoccupied young physician, the nephew ofMrs. Dennison. 

They all greeted Kate with potential friendship in their faces, and shecould not keep back her feeling of involuntary surprise at the absenceof anything like suspicion. Down in Silvertree if a new woman had comeinto a boarding-house, they would have wondered why. Here they seemedtacitly to say, "Why not?"

Mrs. Dennison seated Kate between Dr. Von Shierbrand and Marna Cartan. Opposite to her sat Mrs. Goodrich with her quiet smile. Everyone hadsomething pleasant to say; when Kate spoke, all were inclined to listen. The atmosphere was quiet, urbane, gracious. Even David Fulham's exoticpersonality seemed to soften under the regard of Mrs. Dennison'sgray eyes. 

"Really, " Kate concluded, "I believe I can be happy here. All I need isa chance to earn my bread and butter. "

And what with the intervention of the Goodriches and the recommendationof the Fulhams, that opportunity soon came. 

V

A fortnight later she was established as an officer of the Children'sProtective Association, an organization with a self-explanatory name, instituted by women, and chiefly supported by them. She was given aninexhaustible task, police powers, headquarters at Hull House, and avocation demanding enough to satisfy even her desire for spiritualadventure. 

It was her business to adjust the lives of children--which meant thatshe adjusted their parents' lives also. She arranged the disarranged;played the providential part, exercising the powers of interventionwhich in past times belonged to the priest, but which, in the days ofcommercial feudalism, devolve upon the social workers. 

Her work carried her into the lowest strata of society, and hercompassion, her efficiency, and her courage were daily called upon. Perhaps she might have found herself lacking in the required measure ofthese qualities, being so young and inexperienced, had it not been thatshe was in a position to concentrate completely upon her task. She knewhow to listen and to learn; she knew how to read and apply. She wentinto her new work with a humble spirit, and this humility offsetwhatever was aggressive and militant in her. The death of her mother andthe aloofness of her father had turned all her ardors back uponherself. They found vent now in her new work, and she was not long inperceiving that she needed those whom she was called upon to serve quiteas much as they needed her. 

Mrs. Barsaloux and Marna Carton, who had been shopping, met Kate one daycrossing the city with a baby in her arms and two miserable littlechildren clinging to her skirts. Hunger and neglect had given these poorsmall derelicts that indescribable appearance of depletion and shamewhich, once seen, is never to be confused with anything else. 

"My goodness!" cried Mrs. Barsaloux, glowering at Kate through her veil;"what sort of work is this you are doing, Miss Barrington? Aren't youafraid of becoming infected with some dreadful disease? Wherever do youfind the fortitude to be seen in the company of such wretched littlecreatures? I would like to help them myself, but I'd never be willing tocarry such filthy little bags of misery around with me. "

Kate smiled cheerfully. 

"We've just put their mother in the Bridewell, " she said, "and theirfather is in the police station awaiting trial. The poor dears are goingto be clean for once in their lives and have a good supper in thebargain. Maybe they'll be taken into good homes eventually. They'relovely children, really. You haven't looked at them closely enough, Mrs. Barsaloux. "

"I'm just as close to them as I want to be, thank you, " said the lady, drawing back involuntarily. But she reached for her purse and gaveKate a bill. 

"Would this help toward getting them something?" she asked. 

Marna laughed delightedly. 

"I'm sure they're treasures, " she said. "Mayn't I help Miss Barringtontake them to wherever they're going, _tante_? I shan't catch a thing, and I love to know what becomes of homeless children. "

Kate saw a look of acute distress on Mrs. Barsaloux's face. 

"This isn't your game just now, Miss Cartan, " Kate said in her downrightmanner. "It's mine. I'm moving my pawns here and there, trying to findthe best places for them. It's quite exhilarating. "

Her arms were aching and she moved the heavy baby from one shoulder tothe other. 

"A game, is it?" asked the Irish girl. "And who wins?"

"The children, I hope. I'm on the side of the children first and last. "

"Oh, so am I. I think it's just magnificent of you to help them. "

Kate disclaimed the magnificence. 

"You mustn't forget that I'm doing it for money, " she said. "It's myjob. I hope I'll do it well enough to win the reputation of beinghonest, but you mustn't think there's anything saintly about me, because there isn't. Good-bye. Hold on tight, children!"

She nodded cheerfully and moved on, fresh, strong, determined, along thecrowded thoroughfare, the people making way for her smilingly. She sawnothing of the attention paid her. She was wondering if her arms wouldhold out or if, in some unguarded moment, the baby would slip from them. Perhaps the baby was fearful, too, for it reached up its little clawlikehands and clasped her tight about the neck. Kate liked the feeling ofthose little hands, and was sorry when they relaxed and the weary littleone fell asleep. 

Each day brought new problems. If she could have decided these by mererule of common sense, her new vocation might not have puzzled her asmuch as it did. But it was uncommon, superfine, intuitive sense that wasrequired. She discovered, for example, that not only was sin a virtue indisguise, but that a virtue might be degraded into a sin. 

She put this case to Honora and David one evening as the three of themsat in Honora's drawing-room. 

"It's the case of Peggy Dunn, " she explained. "Peggy likes life. She hasbrighter eyes than she knows what to do with and more smiles than shehas a chance to distribute. She has finished her course at the parochialschool and she's clerking in a downtown store. That is slow going forPeggy, so she evens things up by attending the Saturday night dances. When she's whirling around the hall on the tips of her toes, she reallyfeels like herself. She gets home about two in the morning on theseoccasions and finds her mother waiting up for her and kneeling before alittle statue of the Virgin that stands in the corner of thesitting-room. As soon as the mother sees Peggy, she pounces on her andweeps on her shoulder, and after Peggy's in bed and dead with the tirein her legs, her mother gets down beside the bed and prays some more. 'What would you do, please, ' says Peggy to me, 'if you had a mother thatkept crying and praying every time you had a bit of fun? Wouldn't yourun away from home and get where they took things aisier?'"

David threw back his head and roared in sympathetic commendation ofPeggy's point of view. 

"Poor little mother, " sighed Honora. "I suppose she'll send her girlstraight on the road to perdition and never know what did it. "

"Not if I can help it, " said Kate. "I don't believe in letting her go toperdition at all. I went around to see the mother and I put theresponsibility on her. 'Every time you make Peggy laugh, ' I said, 'youcan count it for glory. Every time you make her swear, --for she doesswear, --you can know you've blundered. Why don't you give her someparties if you don't want her to be going out to them?'"

"How did she take that?" asked Honora. 

"It bothered her a good deal at first, but when I went down to meetPeggy the other day as she came out of the store, she told me her motherhad had the little bisque Virgin moved into her own bedroom and that shehad put a talking-machine in the place where it had stood. I told Peggythe talking-machine was just a new kind of prayer, meant to make herhappy, and that it wouldn't do for her to let her mother's prayers gounanswered. 'Any one with eyes like yours, ' I said to her, 'is bound tohave beaux in plenty, but you've only one mother and you'd better hangon to her. '"

"Then what did she say?" demanded the interested Honora. 

"She's an impudent little piece. She said, 'You've some eyes yourself, Miss Barrington, but I suppose you know how to make them behave. "

"Better marry that girl as soon as you can, Miss Barrington, " counseledDavid; "that is, if any hymeneal authority is vested in you. "

"That's what Peggy wanted to know, " admitted Kate. "She said to me theother day: 'Ain't you Cupid, Miss Barrington? I heard about a match youmade up, and it was all right--the real thing, sure enough. ' 'Have you ajob for me--supposing I was Cupid?' I asked. That set her off in a gale. So I suppose there's something up Peggy's very short sleeves. "

The Fulhams liked to hear her stories, particularly as she kept theamusing or the merely pathetic ones for them, refraining from tellingthem of the unspeakable, obscene tragedies which daily came to hernotice. It might have been supposed that scenes such as these would sohave revolted her that she could not endure to deal with them; but thiswas far from being the case. The greater the need for her help, the moredetermined was she to meet the demand. She had plenty of superiors whomshe could consult, and she suffered less from disgust or timidity thanany one could have supposed possible. 

The truth was, she was grateful for whatever absorbed her and kept herfrom dwelling upon that dehumanized house at Silvertree. Her busy daysenabled her to fight her sorrow very well, but in the night, like awailing child, her longing for her mother awoke, and she nursed it, treasuring it as those freshly bereaved often do. The memory of thatlittle frustrated soul made her tender of all women, and too prone, perhaps, to lay to some man the blame of their shortcomings. She had norealization that she had set herself in this subtle and subconscious wayagainst men. But whether she admitted it or not, the fact remained thatshe stood with her sisters, whatever their estate, leagued secretlyagainst the other sex. 

By way of emphasizing her devotion to her work, she ceased answering RayMcCrea's letters. She studiously avoided the attentions of the men shemet at the Settlement House and at Mrs. Dennison's Caravansary. Sometimes, without her realizing it, her thoughts took on an almostmorbid hue, so that, looking at Honora with her chaste, kind, upliftedface, she resented her close association with her husband. It seemedoffensive that he, with his curious, half-restrained excesses oftemperament, should have domination over her friend who stood soobviously for abnegation. David manifestly was averse to bounds andlimits. All that was wild and desirous of adventure, in Kate informedher of like qualities in this man. But she held--and meant always tohold--the restless falcons of her spirit in leash. Would David Fulham doas much? She could not be quite sure, and instinctively she avoidedanything approaching intimacy with him. 

He was her friend's husband. "Friend's husband" was a sort of limbo intowhich men were dropped by scrupulous ladies; so Kate decided, with afrown at herself for having even thought that David could wish to emergefrom that nondescript place of spiritual residence. Anyway, she did notcompletely like him, though she thought him extraordinary andstimulating, and when Honora told her something of the great discoverywhich the two of them appeared to be upon the verge of making concerningthe germination of life without parental interposition, she had littledoubt that David was wizard enough to carry it through. He would havethe daring, and Honora the industry, and--she reflected--if renown came, that would be David's beyond all peradventure. 

No question about it, Kate's thoughts were satiric these days. She wasstill bleeding from the wound which her father had inflicted, and shedid not suspect that it was wounded affection rather than hurtself-respect which was tormenting her. She only knew that she shrankfrom men, and that at times she liked to imagine what sort of a world itwould be if there were no men in it at all. 

Meantime she met men every day, and whether she was willing to admit itor not, the facts were that they helped her on her way with brotherlygood will, and as they saw her going about her singular and heavy tasks, they gave her their silent good wishes, and hoped that the world of painand shame would not too soon destroy what was gallant and trustfulin her. 

 * * * * *

But here has been much anticipation. To go back to the beginning, at theend of her first week in the city she had a friend. It was Marna Cartan. They had fallen into the way of talking together a few minutes before orafter dinner, and Kate would hasten her modest dinner toilet in order tohave these few marginal moments with this palpitating young creature whomoved to unheard rhythms, and whose laughter was the sweetest thing shehad yet heard in a city of infinite dissonances. 

"You don't know how to account for me very well, do you?" taunted Marnadaringly, when they had indulged their inclination for each other'ssociety for a few days. "You wonder about me because I'm so streaked. Isuppose you see vestiges of the farm girl peeping through the operaticstudent. Wouldn't you like me to explain myself?"

She had an iridescent personality, made up of sudden shynesses, ofbright flashes of bravado, of tenderness and hauteur, and she contrivedto be fascinating in all of them. She held Kate as the Ancient Marinerheld the wedding-guest. 

"Of course I'd love to know all about you, " answered Kate. "Inquisitiveness is the most marked of my characteristics. But I don'twant you to tell me any more than I deserve to hear. "

"You deserve everything, " cried Marna, seizing Kate's firm hand in herown soft one, "because you understand friendship. Why, I always said itcould be as swift and surprising as love, and just as mysterious. Youtake it that way, too, so you deserve a great deal. Well, to begin with, I'm Irish. "

Kate's laugh could be heard as far as the kitchen, where Mrs. Dennisonwas wishing the people would come so that she could dish up the soup. Marna laughed, too. 

"You guessed it?" she cried. She didn't seem to think it so obvious asKate's laugh indicated. 

"You don't leave a thing to the imagination in that direction, " Katecried. "Irish? As Irish as the shamrock! Go on. "

"Dear me, I want to begin so far back! You see, I don't merely belong tomodern Ireland. I'm--well, I'm traditional. At least, Great-GrandfatherCartan, who came over to Wisconsin with a company of immigrants, couldtell you things about our ancestors that would make you feel as if wecame up out of the Irish hills. And great-grandfather, he actuallylooked legendary himself. Why, do you know, he came over with thesepeople to be their story-teller!"

"Their story-teller?"

"Yes, just that--their minstrel, you understand. And that's what mypeople were, 'way back, minstrels. All the way over on the ship, whenthe people were weeping for homesickness, or sitting dreaming about thenew land, or falling sick, or getting wild and vicious, it wasgreat-granddaddy's place to bring them to themselves with his stories. Then when they all went on to Wisconsin and took up their land, theyselected a small beautiful piece for great-grandfather, and built him alog house, and helped him with his crops. He, for his part, went overthe countryside and was welcomed everywhere, and carried all thefriendly news and gossip he could gather, and sat about the fire nights, telling tales of the old times, and keeping the ancient stories and theancient tongue alive for them. "

"You mean he used the Gaelic?"

"What else would he be using, and himself the descendant of minstrels?But after a time he learned the English, too, and he used that in hislatter years because the understanding of the Gaelic began to die out. "

"How wonderful he must have been!"

"Wonderful? For eighty years he held sway over the hearts of them, andwas known as the best story-teller of them all. This was the moreinteresting, you see, because every year they gathered at a certainplace to have a story-telling contest; and great-grandfather was votedthe master of them until--"

Marna hesitated, and a flush spread over her face. 

"Until--" urged Kate. 

"Until a young man came along. Finnegan, his name was. He was no morethan a commercial traveler who heard of the gathering and came up there, and he capped stories with great-grandfather, and it went on till allthe people were thick about them like bees around a flower-pot. Fourdays it lasted, and away into the night; and in the end they took theprize from great-grandfather and gave it to Gerlie Finnegan. And thatbroke great-granddad's heart. "

"He died?"

"Yes, he died. A hundred and ten he was, and for eighty years had beenthe king of them. When he was gone, it left me without anybody at all, you see. So that was how I happened to go down to Baraboo to earnmy living. "

"What were you doing?"

Marna looked at the tip of her slipper for a moment, reflectively. Thenshe glanced up at Kate, throwing a supplicating glance from the blueeyes which looked as if they were snared behind their long dark lashes. 

"I wouldn't be telling everybody that asked me, " she said. "But I wassinging at the moving-picture show, and Mrs. Barsaloux came in there andheard me. Then she asked me to live with her and go to Europe, and Idid, and she paid for the best music lessons for me everywhere, and now--"

She hesitated, drawing in a long breath; then she arose and stood beforeKate, breathing deep, and looking like a shining butterfly free of itschrysalis and ready to spread its emblazoned wings. 

"Yes, bright one!" cried Kate, glowing with admiration. "What now?"

"Why, now, you know, I'm to go in opera. The manager of the ChicagoOpera Company has been Mrs. Barsaloux's friend these many years, and shehas had him try out my voice. And he likes it. He says he doesn't careif I haven't had the usual amount of training, because I'm really bornto sing, you see. Perhaps that's my inheritance from the oldminstrels--for they chanted their ballads and epics, didn't they?Anyway, I really can sing. And I'm to make my debut this winter in'Madame Butterfly. ' Just think of that! Oh, I love Puccini! I canunderstand a musician like that--a man who makes music move likethoughts, flurrying this way and blowing that. It's to be very soon--mydebut. And then I can make up to Mrs. Barsaloux for all she's done forme. Oh, there come all the people! You mustn't let Mrs. Fulham know howI've chattered. I wouldn't dare talk about myself like that before her. This is just for you--I _knew_ you wanted to know about me. I want toknow all about you, too. "

"Oh, " said Kate, "you mustn't expect me to tell my story. I'm differentfrom you. I'm not born for anything in particular--I've no talents topoint out my destiny. I keep being surprised and frustrated. It looks tome as if I were bound to make mistakes. There's something wrong with me. Sometimes I think that I'm not womanly enough--that there's too much ofthe man in my disposition, and that the two parts of me are always goingto struggle and clash. "

Chairs were being drawn up to the table. 

"Come!" called Dr. Von Shierbrand. "Can't you young ladies take timeenough off to eat?"

He looked ready for conversation, and Kate went smilingly to sit besidehim. She knew he expected women to be amusing, and she found itagreeable to divert him. She understood the classroom fag from which hewas suffering; and, moreover, after all those austere meals with herfather, it really was an excitement and a pleasure to talk with anamiable and complimentary man. 

VI

"We're to have a new member in the family, Kate, " Honora said onemorning, as she and Kate made their way together to the Caravansary. "It's my cousin, Mary Morrison. She's a Californian, and very charming, I understand. "

"She's to attend the University?"

"I don't quite know as to that, " admitted Honora, frowning slightly. "Her father and mother have been dead for several years, and she hasbeen living with her brother in Santa Barbara. But he is to go to thePhilippines on some legal work, and he's taking his family with him. Mary begs to stay here with me during his absence. "

"Is she the sort of a person who will need a chaperon? Because I don'tseem to see you in that capacity, Honora. "

"No, I don't know that I should care to sit against the wall smilingcomplacently while other people were up and doing. I've always felt Iwouldn't mind being a chaperon if they'd let me set up some sort of aworkshop in the ballroom, or even if I could take my mending, or a bookto read. But slow, long hours of vacuous smiling certainly would wear meout. However, I don't imagine that Mary will call upon me for anysuch service. "

"But if your cousin isn't going to college, and doesn't intend to gointo society, how will she amuse herself?"

"I haven't an idea--not an idea. But I couldn't say no to her, could I?I've so few people belonging to me in this world that I can't, formerely selfish reasons, bear to turn one of my blood away. Mary's motherand my mother were sisters, and I think we should be fond of each other. Of course she is younger than I, but that is immaterial. "

"And David--does he like the idea? She may be rather a fixture, mayn'tshe? Haven't you to think about that?"

"Oh, David probably won't notice her particularly. People come and goand it's all the same to him. He sees only his great problems. " Honorachoked a sigh. 

"Who wants him to do anything else!" defended Kate quickly. "Not you, surely! Why, you're so proud of him that you're positively offensive!And to think that you are working beside him every day, and helpinghim--you know it's all just the way you would have it, Honora. "

"Yes, it is, " agreed Honora contritely, "and you should see him in thelaboratory when we two are alone there, Kate! He's a changed man. Italmost seems as if he grew in stature. When he bends over those tankswhere he is making his great experiments, all of my scientific trainingfails to keep me from seeing him as one with supernatural powers. Andthat wonderful idea of his, the finding out of the secret of life, theprying into this last hidden place of Nature, almost overwhelms me. Ican work at it with a matter-of-fact countenance, but when we begin toapproach the results, I almost shudder away from it. But you must neverlet David know I said so. That's only my foolish, feminine, reverentmind. All the trained and scientific part of me repudiates suchnonsense. "

They turned in at the door of the Caravansary. 

"I don't want to see you repudiating any part of yourself, " cried Katewith sudden ardor. "It's so sweet of you, Honora, to be a mere woman inspite of all your learning and your power. "

Honora stopped and grasped Kate's wrist in her strong hand. 

"But am I that?" she queried, searching her friend's face with herintense gaze. "You see, I've tried--I've tried--"

She choked on the words. 

"I've tried not to be a woman!" she declared, drawing her breath sharplybetween her teeth. "It's a strange, strange story, Kate. "

"I don't understand at all, " Kate declared. 

"I've tried not to be a woman because David is so completely andtriumphantly a man. "

"Still I don't understand. "

"No, I suppose not. It's a hidden history. Sometimes I can't believe itmyself. But let me ask you, am I the woman you thought I would be?"

Kate smiled slowly, as her vision of Honora as she first saw her cameback to her. 

"How soft and rosy you were!" she cried. "I believe I actually began myacquaintance with you by hugging you. At any rate, I wanted to. No, no;I never should have thought of you in a scientific career, wearingMoshier gowns and having curtain-less windows. Never!"

Honora stood a moment there in the dim hall, thinking. In her eyesbrooded a curiously patient light. 

"Do you remember all the trumpery I used to have on my toilet-table?"she demanded. "I sent it to Mary Morrison. They say she looks like me. "

She put her hand on the dining-room door and they entered. The otherswere there before them. There were growing primroses on the table, andthe sunlight streamed in at the window. A fire crackled on the hearth;and Mrs. Dennison, in her old-fashioned widow's cap, sat smiling at thehead of her table. 

Kate knew it was not really home, but she had to admit that these busyundomestic moderns had found a good substitute for it: or, at least, that, taking their domesticity through the mediumship of Mrs. Dennison, they contrived to absorb enough of it to keep them going. But, no, itwas not really home. Kate could not feel that she, personally, ever hadbeen "home. " She thought of that song of songs, "The Wanderer. "

 "Where art thou? Where art thou, O home so dear?"

She was thinking of this still as, her salutation over, she seatedherself in the chair Dr. Von Shierbrand placed for her. 

"Busy thinking this morning, Miss Barrington?" Mrs. Dennison askedgently. "That tells me you're meaning to do some good thing to-day. Ican't say how splendid you social workers seem to us common folks. "

"Oh, my dear Mrs. Dennison!" Kate protested. "You and your kind are thetrue social workers. If only women--all women--understood how to maketrue homes, there wouldn't be any need for people like us. We're onlywell-intentioned fools who go around putting plasters over the sores. Wedon't even reach down as far as the disease--though I suppose we thinkwe do when we get a lot of statistics together. But the men and womenwho go about their business, doing their work well all of the time, arethe preventers of social trouble. Isn't that so, Dr. Von Shierbrand?"

That amiable German readjusted his glasses upon his handsome nose andbegan to talk about the Second Part of "Faust. " The provocation, thoughslight, had seemed to him sufficient. 

"My husband has already eaten and gone!" observed Honora with somechagrin. "Can't you use your influence, Mrs. Dennison, to make him spenda proper amount of time at the table?"

"Oh, he doesn't need to eat except once in a great while. He has theways of genius, Mrs. Fulham. Geniuses like to eat at odd times, and myown feeling is that they should be allowed to do as they please. It isvery bad for geniuses to make them follow a set plan, " said Mrs. Dennison earnestly. 

"That woman, " observed Dr. Von Shierbrand under his breath to Kate, "hasthe true feminine wisdom. She should have been the wife of a great man. It was such qualities which Goethe meant to indicate in his Marguerite. "

Honora, who had overheard, lifted her pensive gray eyes and interchangeda long look with Dr. Von Shierbrand. Each seemed to be upon the verge ofsome remark. 

"Well, " said Kate briskly, "if you want to speak, why don't you? Areyour thoughts too deep for words?"

Von Shierbrand achieved a laugh, but Honora was silent. She seemed towant to say that there was more than one variety of feminine wisdom;while Von Shierbrand, Kate felt quite sure, would have maintained thatthere was but one--the instinctive sort which "Marguerite knew. "

 * * * * *

The day that Mary Morrison was to arrive conflicted with the visit of avery great Frenchman to Professor Fulham's laboratory. 

"I really don't see how I'm to meet the child, Kate, " Honora saidanxiously to her friend. "Do you think you could manage to get down tothe station?"

Kate could and did go. This girl, like herself, was very much on herown resources, she imagined. She was coming, as Kate had come only theother day, to a new and forbidding city, and Kate's heart warmed to her. It seemed rather a tragedy, at best, to leave the bland Californianskies and to readjust life amid the iron compulsion of Chicago. Katepictured her as a little thing, depressed, weary with her long journey, and already homesick. 

The reality was therefore somewhat of a surprise. As Kate stood waitingby the iron gate watching the outflowing stream of people with anxiouseyes, she saw a little furore centered about the person of an opulentyoung woman who had, it appeared, many elaborate farewells to make toher fellow-passengers. Two porters accompanied her, carrying her smartbags, and, even with so much assistance, she was draped with extragarments, which hung from her arms in varying and seductive shades ofgreen. She herself was in green of a subtle olive shade, and her plumesand boa, her chains and chatelaine, her hand-bags and camera, marked heras the traveler triumphant and expectant. Like an Arabian princess, borne across the desert to the home of her future lord, she camepanoplied with splendor. The consciousness of being a personage, by themere right conferred by regal womanhood-in-flower, emanated from her. And the world accepted her smilingly at her own estimate. She wished toplay at being queen. What more simple? Let her have her game. On everyhand she found those who were--or who delightedly pretended tobe--her subjects. 

Once beyond the gateway, this exuberant creature paused. "And now, " shesaid to a gentleman more assiduous than the rest, who waited upon herand who was laden with her paraphernalia, "you must help me to identifymy cousin. That will be easy enough, too, for they say we resembleeach other. "

That gave Kate her cue. She went forward with outstretched hand. 

"I am your cousin's emissary, Miss Morrison, " she said. "I am KateBarrington, and I came to greet you because your cousin was unable toget here, and is very, very sorry about it. "

Miss Morrison revealed two deep dimples when she smiled, and held out somuch of a hand as she could disengage from her draperies. She presentedher fellow-traveler; she sent a porter for a taxi. All wasexhilaratingly in commotion about her; and Kate found herselfapportioning the camera and some of the other things to herself. 

They had quite a royal setting-forth. Every one helped who could findany excuse for doing so; others looked on. Miss Morrison nodded andsmiled; the chauffeur wheeled his machine splendidly, making dramaticgestures which had the effect of causing commerce to pause till theprincess was under way. 

"Be sure, " warned Miss Morrison, "to drive through the pleasanteststreets. "

Then she turned to Kate with a deliciously reproachful expression onher face. 

"Why didn't you order blue skies for me?" she demanded. 

 * * * * *

Kate never forgot the expression of Miss Morrison's face when she wasushered into Honora's "sanitary drawing-room, " as Dr. Von Shierbrand haddubbed it. True, the towers of Harper Memorial Library showed across thePlaisance through the undraped windows, mitigating the gravity of theoutlook, and the innumerable lights of the Midway already began torender less austere the January twilight. But the brown walls, the brownrug, the Mission furniture in weathered oak, the corner clock, --anexcellent time-piece, --the fireplace with its bronze vases, the etchingsof foreign architecture, and the bookcase with Ruskin, Eliot, Dickens, and all the Mid-Victorian celebrities in sets, produced but a grave andunillumined interior. 

"Oh!" cried Miss Morrison with ill-concealed dismay. And then, after asilence: "But where do you sit when you're sociable?"

"Here, " said Kate. She wasn't going to apologize for Honora to a pair ofexclamatory dimples!

"But you can be intimate here?" Miss Morrison inquired. 

"We're not intimate, " flashed Kate. "We're too busy--and we respect eachother too much. "

Miss Morrison sank into a chair and revealed the tint of herlettuce-green petticoat beneath her olive-green frock. 

"I'm making you cross with me, " she said regretfully. "Please don'tdislike me at the outset. You see, out in California we're not so up anddown as you are here. If you were used to spending your days in theshade of yellow walls, with your choice of hammocks, and with nothing todo but feed the parrot and play the piano, why, I guess you'd--"

She broke off and stared about her. 

"Why, there isn't any piano!" she cried. "Do you mean Honora has nopiano?"

"What would be the use? She doesn't play. "

"I must order one in the morning, then. Honora wouldn't care, would she?Oh, when do you suppose she'll be home? Does she like to stay over inthat queer place you told me of, fussing around with those frogs?"

Kate had been rash enough to endeavor to explain something of theFulhams' theories regarding the mechanistic conception of life. Therewas nothing to do but accord Miss Morrison the laugh which she appearedto think was coming to her. 

"I can see that I shouldn't have told you about anything like that, "Kate said. "I see how mussy you would think any scientific experiment tobe. And, really, matters of greater importance engage your attention. "

She was quite serious. She had swiftly made up her mind that MaryMorrison, with her conscious seductions, was a much more importantfactor in the race than austere Honora Fulham. But Miss Morrison wassuspicious of satire. 

"Oh, I think science important!" she protested. 

"No, you don't, " declared Kate; "you only wish you did. Come, we'll goto your room. "

It was the rear room on the second floor, and it presented a sternparallelogram occupied by the bare necessaries of a sleeping-apartment. The walls and rug were gray, the furniture of mahogany. Mary Morrisonlooked at it a moment with a slow smile. Then she tossed her green coatand her hat with its sweeping veil upon the bed. She flung her cameraand her magazines upon the table. She opened her traveling-bag, and, with hands that almost quivered with impatience, placed upon thetoilet-table the silver implements that Honora had sent her andscattered broadcast among them her necklaces and bracelets. 

"I'll have some flowering plants to-morrow, " she told Kate. "And when mytrunks and boxes come, I'll make the wilderness blossom like a rose. Howhave you decorated your room?"

"I haven't much money, " said Kate bluntly; "but I've--well, I'veventured on my own interpretations of what a bed-sitting-roomshould be. "

Miss Morrison threw her a bright glance. 

"I'll warrant you have, " she said. "I should think you'd contrive a veryoriginal sort of a place. Thank you so much for looking after me. Ibrought along a gown for dinner. Naturally, I didn't want to make adull impression at the outset. Haven't I heard that you dine out at somesort of a place where geniuses congregate?"

 * * * * *

Years afterward, Kate used to think about the moment when Honora and hercousin met. Honora had come home, breathless from the laboratory. It hadbeen a stirring afternoon for her. She had heard words of significantappreciation spoken to David by the men whom, out of all the world, shewould have chosen to have praise him. She looked at Miss Morrison, whohad come trailing down in a cerise evening gown as if she were a brightcreature of another species, somewhat, Kate could not help whimsicallythinking, as a philosophic beaver might have looked at a bird ofparadise. Then Honora had kissed her cousin. 

"Dear blue-eyed Mary!" she had cried. "Welcome to a dull and busy home. "

"How good of you to take me in, " sighed Miss Morrison. "I hated tobother you, Honora, but I thought you might keep me out of mischief. "

"Have you been getting into mischief?" Honora asked, still laughing. 

"Not quite, " answered her cousin, blushing bewitchingly. "But I'm alwayson the verge of it. It's the Californian climate, I think. "

"So exuberant!" cried Honora. 

"That's it!" agreed "Blue-eyed Mary. " "I thought you'd understand. Here, I'm sure, you're all busy and good. "

"Some of us are, " agreed Honora. "There's my Kate, for example. She'sone of the most useful persons in town, and she's just as interesting asshe is useful. "

Miss Morrison turned her smiling regard on Kate. "But, Honora, she'sbeen quite abrupt with me. She doesn't approve of me. I suppose shediscovered at once that I _wasn't_ useful. "

"I didn't, " protested Kate. "I think decorative things are of the utmostuse. "

"There!" cried Miss Morrison; "you can see for yourself that she doesn'tlike me!"

"Nonsense, " said Kate, really irritated. "I shall like you if Honoradoes. Let me help you dress, Honora dear. Are you tired or happy thatyour cheeks are so flushed?"

"I'm both tired and happy, Kate. Excuse me, Mary, won't you? If Davidcomes in you'll know him by instinct. Believe me, you are very welcome. "

Up in Honora's bedroom, Kate asked, as she helped her friend into thetidy neutral silk she wore to dinner: "Is the blue-eyed one going to bea drain on you, girl? You oughtn't to carry any more burdens. Are youdisturbed? Is she more of a proposition than you counted on?"

Honora turned her kind but troubled eyes on Kate. 

"I can't explain, " she said in _so_ low a voice that Kate could hardlycatch the words. "She's like me, isn't she? I seemed to see--"

"What?"

"Ghosts--bright ghosts. Never mind. "

"You're not thinking that you are old, are you?" cried Kate. "Becausethat's absurd. You're wonderful--wonderful. "

Laughter arose to them--the mingled voices of David Fulham and hisnewfound cousin by marriage. 

"Good!" cried Honora with evident relief. "They seem to be taking toeach other. I didn't know how David would like her. "

He liked her very well, it transpired, and when the introductions hadbeen made at the Caravansary, it appeared that every one was delightedwith her. If their reception of her differed from that they had given toKate, it was nevertheless kindly--almost gay. They leaped to theconclusion that Miss Morrison was designed to enliven them. And so itproved. She threw even the blithe Marna Cartan temporarily into theshade; and Dr. Von Shierbrand, who was accustomed to talking with Kateupon such matters as the national trait of incompetence, or thereprehensible modern tendency of coddling the unfit, turned hisattention to Miss Morrison and to lighter subjects. 

 * * * * *

Two days later a piano stood in Honora's drawing-room, and Miss Morrisonsat before it in what may be termed occult draperies, making lovelymusic. Technically, perhaps, the music left something to be desired. Mrs. Barsaloux and Marna Cartan thought so, at any rate. But thehabitués of Mrs. Dennison's near-home soon fell into the way of trailingover to the Fulhams' in Mary Morrison's wake, and as they groupedthemselves about on the ugly Mission furniture, in a soft light producedby many candles, and an atmosphere drugged with highly scented flowers, they fell under the spell of many woven melodies. 

When Mary Morrison's tapering fingers touched the keys they broughtforth a liquid and caressing sound like falling water in a fountain, andwhen she leaned over them as if to solicit them to yield their kindresponses, her attitude, her subtle garments, the swift interrogativeturns of her head, brought visions to those who watched and listened. Kate dreamed of Italian gardens--the gardens she never had seen; VonShierbrand thought of dark German forests; Honora, of a moonlit glade. These three confessed so much. The others did not tell their visions, but obviously they had them. Blue-eyed Mary was one of those women whoinspire others. She was the quintessence of femininity, and shedistilled upon the air something delicately intoxicating, like the odorof lotus-blossoms. 

It was significant that the Fulhams' was no longer a house of suburbanhabits. Ten o'clock and lights out had ceased to be the rule. Aftermusic there frequently was a little supper, and every one was pressedinto service in the preparation of it. Something a trifle fagged andhectic began to show in the faces of Mrs. Dennison's family, and thatgood woman ventured to offer some reproof. 

"You all are hard workers, " she said, "and you ought to be hard resters, too. You're not acting sensibly. Any one would think you were theidle rich. "

"Well, we're entitled to all the pleasure we can get, " Mary Morrison hadretorted. "There are people who think that pleasure isn't for them. ButI am just the other way--I take it for granted that pleasure is myright. I always take everything in the way of happiness that I can getmy hands on. "

"You mean, of course, my dear child, " said the gentle Mrs. Goodrich, "all that you can get which does not belong to some one else. "

Blue-eyed Mary laughed throatily. 

"Fortunately, " she said, "there's pleasure enough to go around. It'slike air, every one can breathe it in. "

VII

But though Miss Morrison had made herself so brightly, so almostuniversally at home, there was one place into which she did not ventureto intrude. This was Kate's room. Mary had felt from the first a lack ofencouragement there, and although she liked to talk to Kate, andreceived answers in which there appeared to be no lack of zest andresponse, yet it seemed to be agreed that when Miss Barrington cametramping home from her hard day's work, she was to enjoy the solitude ofher chamber. 

Mary used to wonder what went on there. Miss Barrington could be verystill. The hours would pass and not a sound would issue from that highupper room which looked across the Midway and included the satisfactorysight of the Harper Memorial and the massed University buildings. Katewould, indeed, have had difficulty in explaining that she was engaged inthe mere operation of living. Her life, though lonely, and to an extentundirected, seemed abundant. Restless she undoubtedly was, but it was arestlessness which she succeeded in holding in restraint. At first whenshe came up to the city the daze of sorrow was upon her. But this waspassing. A keen awareness of life suffused her now and made herobservant of everything about her. She felt the tremendous incongruitiesof city life, and back of these incongruities, the great, hidden, passionate purpose which, ultimately, meant a city of immeasurablepower. She rejoiced, as the young and gallant dare to do, that she waslaboring in behalf of that city. Not one bewildered, wavering, piteouslife was adjusted through her efforts that she did not feel that herpersonal sum of happiness had received an addition. That deep andburning need for religion, or for love, or for some splendid andirresistible impetus, was satisfied in part by her present work. 

To start out each morning to answer the cry of distress, to understandthe intricate yet effective machinery of benevolent organizations, sothat she could call for aid here and there, and have instant andintelligent coöperation, to see broken lives mended, the friendlessbefriended, the tempted lifted up, the evil-doer set on safe paths, warmed and sustained her. That inquisitive nature of hers was now sooccupied with the answering of practical and immediate questions that ithad ceased to beat upon the hollow doors of the Unknown with unavailinginquiries. 

So far as her own life was concerned, she seemed to have found, not ahaven, but a broad sea upon which she could triumphantly sail. Thatshame at being merely a woman, with no task, no utility, noindependence, had been lifted from her. So, in gratitude, everywhere, atall times, she essayed to help other women to a similar independence. She did not go so far as to say that it was the panacea for all ills, but she was convinced that more than half of the incoherent pain ofwomen's lives could be avoided by the mere fact of financialindependence. It became a religion with her to help the women with whomshe came in contact, to find some unguessed ability or applicabilitywhich would enable them to put money in their purses. With liberty toleave a miserable condition, one often summoned courage to remain andface it. She pointed that out to her wistful constituents, the poorlittle wives who had found in marriage only a state of supine drudgery, and of unexpectant, monotonous days. She was trying to give them somegame to play. That was the way she put it to them. If one had a game toplay, there was use in living. If one had only to run after the balls ofthe players, there was not zest enough to carry one along. 

She began talking now and then at women's clubs and at meetings ofwelfare workers. Her abrupt, picturesque way of saying things "carried, "as an actor would put it. Her sweet, clear contralto held the ear; heraquiline comeliness pleased the eye without enticing it; her capable, fit-looking clothes were so happily secondary to her personality thateven the women could not tell how she was dressed. She was the leastseductive person imaginable; and she looked so self-sufficient that itseldom occurred to any one to offer her help. Yet she was in no sensebold or aggressive. No one ever thought of accusing her of being any ofthose things. Many loved her--loved her wholesomely, with a love inwhich trust was a large element. Children loved her, and the sick, andthe bad. They looked to her to help them out of their helplessness. Shewas very young, but, after all, she was maternal. A psychologist wouldhave said that there was much of the man about her, and her love of thefair chance, her appetite for freedom, her passion for using her owncapabilities might, indeed, have seemed to be of the masculine varietyof qualities; but all this was more than offset by this inherent impulsefor maternity. She was born, apparently, to care for others, but she hadto serve them freely. She had to be the dispenser of good. She wasunconsciously on the outlook against those innumerable forms ofslavishness which affection or religion gilded and made to seem likenoble service. 

Among those who loved her was August von Shierbrand. He loved herapparently in spite of himself. She did not in the least accord with hisromantic ideas of what a woman should be. He was something of a poet, and a specialized judge of poetry, and he liked women of the sort whoinspired a man to write lyrics. He had tried unavailingly to writelyrics about Kate, but they never would "go. " He confessed hisfiascoes to her. 

"Nothing short of martial measures seems to suit you, " he saidlaughingly. 

"But why write about me at all, Dr. Von Shierbrand?" she inquired. "Idon't want any one writing about me. What I want to do is to learn howto write myself--not because I feel impelled to be an author, butbecause I come across things almost every day which ought to beexplained. "

"You are completely absorbed in this extraordinary life of yours!" hecomplained. 

"Why not!" demanded Kate. "Aren't you completely absorbed in your life?"

"Of course I am. But teaching is my chosen profession. "

"Well, life is my chosen profession. I want to see, feel, know, breathe, Life. I thought I'd never be able to get at it. I used to feel like aperson walking in a mist. But it's different now. Everything has takenon a clear reality to me. I'm even beginning to understand that I myselfam a reality and that my thoughts as well as my acts are entities. I'mgetting so that I can define my own opinions. I don't believe there'sanybody in the city who would so violently object to dying as I would, Dr. Von Shierbrand. "

The sabre cut on Von Shierbrand's face gleamed. 

"You certainly seem at the antipodes of death, Miss Barrington, " he saidwith a certain thickness in his utterance. "And I, personally, can thinkof nothing more exhilarating than in living beside you. I meant towait--to wait a long time before asking you. But what is the use ofwaiting? I want you to marry me. I feel as if it must be--as if Icouldn't get along without you to help me enjoy things. "

Kate looked at him wonderingly. It was before the afternoon concert andthey were sitting in Honora's rejuvenated drawing-room while they waitedfor the others to come downstairs. 

"But, Dr. Von Shierbrand!" she cried, "I don't like a city withoutsuburbs!"

"I beg your pardon!"

"I like to see signs of my City of Happiness as I approach--outlyingvillas, and gardens, and then straggling, pleasant neighborhoods, andfinally Town. "

"Oh, I see. You mean I've been too unexpected. Can't you overlook that?You're an abrupt person yourself, you know. I'm persuaded that we couldbe happy together. "

"But I'm not in love, Dr. Von Shierbrand. I'm sorry. Frankly, I'd liketo be. "

"And have you never been? Aren't you nursing a dream of--"

"No, no; I haven't had a hopeless love if that's what you mean. I'm alllucid and clear and comfortable nowadays--partly because I've stoppedthinking about some of the things to which I couldn't find answers, andpartly because Life is answering some of my questions. "

"How to be happy without being in love, perhaps. "

"Well, I am happy--temperately so. Perhaps that's the only degree ofhappiness I shall ever know. Of course, when I was younger I thought Ishould get to some sort of a place where I could stand in swimming gloryand rejoice forever, but I see now how stupid I was to think anything ofthe sort. I hoped to escape the commonplace by reaching some beatitude, but now I have found that nothing really is commonplace. It only seemsso when you aren't understanding enough to get at the essential truthof things. "

"Oh, that's true! That's true!" cried Von Shierbrand. 

"Oh, Kate, I do love you. You seem to complete me. When I'm with you Iunderstand myself. Please try to love me, dear. We'll get a little homeand have a garden and a library--think how restful it will be. I can'ttell you how I want a place I can call home. "

"There they come, " warned Kate as she heard footsteps on the stairs. "You must take 'no' for your answer, dear man. I feel just like amother to you. "

Dr. Von Shierbrand arose, obviously offended, and he allied himself withMary Morrison on the way to the concert. Kate walked with Honora andDavid until they met with Professor Wickersham, who was also bound forMandel Hall and the somewhat tempered classicism which the TheodoreThomas Orchestra offered to "the University crowd. "

"Please walk with me, Miss Barrington, " said Wickersham. "I want you toexplain the universe to me. "

"I can do that nicely, " retorted Kate, "because Dr. Von Shierbrand hasalready explained it to me. "

Blue-eyed Mary was pouting. She never liked any variety of amusement, conversational or otherwise, in which she was not the center. 

 * * * * *

So Kate's life sped along. It was not very significant, perhaps, or itwould not have seemed so to the casual onlooker, but life is measured byits inward rather than its outward processes, and Kate felt herselfbeing enriched by her experiences. 

She enjoyed being brought into contact with the people she met in herwork--not alone the beneficiaries of her ministrations, but thepolicemen and the police matrons and the judges of the police court. Shejoined a society of "welfare workers, " and attended their suppers andmeetings, and tried to learn by their experience and to keep her ownideas in abeyance. 

She could not help noticing that she differed in some particulars frommost of these laborers in behalf of the unfortunate. They broughtpractical, unimaginative, and direct minds to bear upon the problemsbefore them, while she never could escape her theories or deny herselfthe pleasure of looking beyond the events to the causes which underlaythem. This led her to jot down her impressions in a notebook, and toventure on comments concerning her experiences. 

Moreover, not only was she deeply moved by the disarrangement andbewilderment which she saw around her, but she began to awaken tocertain great events and developing powers in the world. She read thesardonic commentators upon modern life--Ibsen, Strindberg, and manyothers; and if she sometimes passionately repudiated them, at othertimes she listened as if she were finding the answers to her owninquiries. It moved her to discover that men, more often than women, hadbeen the interpreters of women's hidden meanings, and that they had beenthe setters-forth of new visions of sacredness and fresh definitionsof liberty. 

It was these men--these aloof and unsentimental ones--who had pointedout that the sin of sins committed by women had been the indifference totheir own personalities. They had been echoers, conformers, imitators;even, in their own way, cowards. They had feared the conventions, andhad been held in thrall by their own carefully nursed ideals ofthemselves. They had lacked the ability to utilize their powers ofefficiency; had paid but feeble respect to their own ideals; hadaltogether measured themselves by too limited a standard. Failing wifelyjoy, they had too often regarded themselves as unsuccessful, and hadapologized tacitly to the world for using their abilities in anydirection save one. They had not permitted themselves that strong, clean, robust joy of developing their own powers for mere delight in theexercise of power. 

But now, so Kate believed, --so her great instructors informedher, --they were awakening to their privileges. An intenser awareness oflife, of the right to expression, and of satisfaction in constructiveperformances was stirring in them. If they desired enfranchisement, theywanted it chiefly for spiritual reasons. This was a fact which theopponents of the advancing movement did not generally recognize. Kateshrank from those fruitless arguments at the Caravansary with theexcellent men who gravely and kindly rejected suffrage for women uponthe ground that they were protecting them by doing so. They did not seemto understand that women desired the ballot because it was a symbol aswell as because it was an instrument and an argument. If it was tobenefit the working woman in the same way in which it benefited theworking man, by making individuality a thing to be considered; if it wasto give the woman taxpayer certain rights which would put her on a parwith the man taxpayer, a thousand times more it was to benefit all womenby removing them from the class of the unconsidered, the superfluous, and the negligible. 

Yes, women were wanting the ballot because it included potentiality, andin potentiality is happiness. No field seems fair if there is no gatewayto it--no farther field toward which the steps may be turned. Kate wasgetting hold of certain significant similes. She saw that it was pastthe time of walls and limits. Walled cities were no longer endurable, and walled and limited possibilities were equally obsolete. If thedeparture of the "captains and the kings" was at hand, if the new forcesof democracy had routed them, if liberty for all men was now an ethicneed of civilization, so political recognition was necessary for women. Women required the ballot because the need was upon them to performgreat labors. Their unutilized benevolence, their disregarded powers oforganization, their instinctive sense of economy, theirmaternal-oversoul, all demanded exercise. Women were the possessors ofcertain qualities so abundant, so ever-renewing, that the ordinaryrequirements of life did not give them adequate employment. With adivine instinct of high selfishness, of compassion, of realization, theywere seeking the opportunity to exercise these powers. 

"The restlessness of women, " "the unquiet sex, " were terms which werebecoming glorious in Kate's ears. She saw no reason why women as well asmen should not be allowed to "dance upon the floor of chance. " All abouther were women working for the advancement of their city, their country, and their race. They gave of their fortunes, of their time, of all thepowers of their spirit. They warred with political machines, with basepoliticians, with public contumely, with custom. What would have crushedwomen of equally gentle birth a generation before, seemed now of littleaccount to these workers. They looked beyond and above the irritationof the moment, holding to the realization that their labors were ofvital worth. Under their administration communities passed fromshameless misery to self-respect; as the result of their generosity, courts were sustained in which little children could make their plea andwretched wives could have justice. Servants, wantons, outcasts, theinsane, the morally ill, all were given consideration in this newreligion of compassion. It was amazing to Kate to see light come to dulleyes--eyes which had hitherto been lit only with the fires of hate. Asshe walked the gray streets in the performance of her tasks, weary andbewildered though she often was, she was sustained by the new discoveryof that ancient truth that nothing human can be foreign to the person ofgood will. Neither dirt nor hate, distrust, fear, nor deceit should bepermitted to blind her to the essential similarity of all who were"bound together in the bundle of life. "

It was not surprising that at this time she should begin writing shortarticles for the women's magazines on the subjects which presentedthemselves to her in her daily work. Her brief, spontaneous, friendlyarticles, full of meat and free from the taint of bookishness, won favorfrom the first. She soon found her evenings occupied with her somewhatmatter-of-fact literary labors. But this work was of such a differentcharacter from that which occupied her in the daytime that so far fromfatiguing her it gave an added zest to her days. 

She was not fond of idle evenings. Sitting alone meant thinking, andthought meant an unconquerable homesickness for that lonely man back inSilvertree from whom she had parted peremptorily, and toward whom shedared not make any overtures. Sometimes she sent him an article clippedfrom the magazines or newspapers dealing with some scientific subject, and once she mailed him a number of little photographs which she hadtaken with her own camera and which might reveal to him, if he wereinclined to follow their suggestions, something of the life in which shewas engaged. But no recognition of these wordless messages came fromhim. He had been unable to forgive her, and she beat down the questionthat would arise as to whether she also had been at fault. She was underthe necessity of justifying herself if she would be happy. It was onlyafter many months had passed that she learned how a heavy burden maybecome light by the confession of a fault. 

Meantime, she was up early each morning; she breakfasted with the mostalert residents of the Caravansary; then she took the street-car toSouth Chicago and reported at a dismal office. Here the telephone servedto put her into communication with her superior at Settlement House. Shereported what she had done the day before (though, to be sure, a writtenreport was already on its way), she asked advice, she talked over waysand means. Then she started upon her daily rounds. These might carryher to any one of half a dozen suburbs or to the Court of DomesticRelations, or over on the West Side of the city to the Juvenile Court. She appeared almost daily before some police magistrate, and not longafter her position was assumed, she was called upon to give evidencebefore the grand jury. 

"However do you manage it all?" Honora asked one evening when Kate hadbeen telling a tale of psychically sinister import. "How can you bringyourself to talk over such terrible and revolting subjects as you haveto, before strange men in open court?"

"A nice old man asked me that very question to-day as I was coming outof the courtroom, " said Kate. "He said he didn't like to see young womendoing such work as I was doing. 'Who will do it, then?' I asked. 'Themen, ' said he. 'Do you think we can leave it to them?' I asked. 'Perhapsnot, ' he admitted. 'But at least it could be left to older women. ' 'Theyhaven't the strength for it, ' I told him, and then I gave him a notionof the number of miles I had ridden the day before in the street-car-itwas nearly sixty, I believe. 'Are you sure it's worth it?' he asked. Hehad been listening to the complaint I was making against a young man whohas, to my knowledge, completely destroyed the self-respect of fivegirls--and I've known him but a short time. You can make an estimate ofthe probable number of crimes of his if it amuses you. 'Don't you thinkit's worth while if that man is shut up where he can't do any moremischief?' I asked him. Of course he thought it was; but he was stillshaking his head over me when I left him. He still thought I ought to beat home making tidies. I can't imagine that it ever occurred to him thatI was a disinterested economist in trying to save myself from waste. "

She laughed lightly in spite of her serious words. 

"Anyway, " she said, "I find this kind of life too amusing to resign. Oneof the settlement workers was complaining to me this morning about theinherent lack of morals among some of our children. It appears that theHarrigans--there are seven of them--commandeered some old clothes thathad been sent in for charitable distribution. They poked around in thetrunks when no one was watching and helped themselves to what theywanted. The next day they came to a party at the Settlement House toggedup in their plunder. My friend reproved them, but they seemed to beimpervious to her moral comments, so she went to the mother. 'Faith, 'said Mrs. Harrigan, 'I tould them not to be bringing home trash likethat. "It ain't worth carryin' away, " says I to them. '"

About this time Kate was invited to become a resident of Hull House. Shewas touched and complimented, but, with a loyalty for which there was, perhaps, no demand, she remained faithful to her friends at theCaravansary. She was loath to take up her residence with a group whichwould have too much community of interest. The ladies at Mrs. Dennison'soffered variety. Life was dramatizing itself for her there. In Honoraand Marna and Mrs. Barsaloux and those quiet yet intelligentgentlewomen, Mrs. Goodrich and Mrs. Applegate, in the very servantswhose pert individualism distressed the mid-Victorian Mrs. Dennison, Kate saw working those mysterious world forces concerning which she wasso curious. The frequent futility of Nature's effort to throw to the topthis hitherto unutilized feminine force was no less absorbing than thesuccess which sometimes attended the impulsion. To the general andwidespread convulsion, the observer could no more be oblivious than toan earthquake or a tidal wave. 

VIII

Kate had not seen Lena Vroom for a long time, and she had indefinitelymissed her without realizing it until one afternoon, as she wassearching for something in her trunk, she came across a package ofLena's letters written to her while she was at Silvertree. That night atthe table she asked if any one had seen Lena recently. 

"Seen her?" echoed David Fulham. "I've seen the shadow of her blowingacross the campus. She's working for her doctor's degree, like a lot ofother silly women. She's living by herself somewhere, on crackers andcheese, no doubt. "

"Would she really be so foolish?" cried Kate. "I know she's devoted toher work, but surely she has some sense of moderation. "

"Not a bit of it, " protested the scientist. "A person of mediocreattainments who gets the Ph. D. Bee in her bonnet has no senseof any sort. I see them daily, men and women, --but womenparticularly, --stalking about the grounds and in and out of classes, like grotesque ghosts. They're staggering under a mental load too heavyfor them, and actually it might be a physical load from its effects. They get lop-sided, I swear they do, and they acquire all sorts ofmiserable little personal habits that make them both pitiable andridiculous. For my part, I believe the day will come when no woman willbe permitted to try for the higher degrees till her brain has beenscientifically tested and found to be adequate for the work. "

"But as for Lena, " said Kate, "I thought she was quite a wonder at herlessons. "

"Up to a certain point, " admitted Fulham, "I've no doubt she does verywell. But she hasn't the capacity for higher work, and she'll be thelast one to realize it. My advice to you, Miss Barrington, is to look upyour friend and see what she is doing with herself. You haven't any ofyou an idea of the tragedies of the classroom, and I'll not tell them toyou. But they're serious enough, take my word for it. "

"Yes, do look her up, Kate, " urged Honora. 

"It's hard to manage anything extra during the day, " said Kate. "I mustgo some evening. "

"Perhaps Cousin Mary could go with you, " suggested Honora. Honora threwa glance of affectionate admiration at her young cousin, who hadblossomed out in a bewitching little frock of baby blue, and whose eyesreflected the color. 

She was, indeed, an entrancing thing, was "Blue-eyed Mary. " Thetenderness of her lips, the softness of her complexion, the glamour ofher glance increased day by day, and without apparent reason. She seemedto be more eloquent, with the sheer eloquence of womanly emotion. Everything that made her winning was intensified, as if Love, theMaster, had touched to vividness what hitherto had been no more than amere promise. 

What was the secret of this exotic florescence? She went out only toUniversity affairs with Honora or Kate, or to the city with MarnaCartan. Her interests appeared to be few; and she was neither a writernor a receiver of letters. Altogether, the sources of that hidden joywhich threw its enchantment over her were not to be guessed. 

But what did it all matter? She was an exhilarating companion--and whata contrast to poor Lena! That night, lying in bed, Kate reproachedherself for her neglect of her once so faithful friend. Lena might begoing through some severe experience, alone and unaided. Kate determinedto find out the truth, and as she had a half-holiday on Saturday, shestarted on her quest. 

Lena, it transpired, had moved twice during the term and had neglectedto register her latest address. So she was found only after muchsearching, and twilight was already gathering when Kate reached thedingy apartment in which Lena had secreted herself. It was a rear roomup three flights of stairs, approached by a long, narrow corridor whichthe economical proprietor had left in darkness. Kate rapped softly atfirst; then, as no one answered, most sharply. She was on the point ofgoing away when the door was opened a bare crack and the white, pinchedface of Lena Vroom peered out. 

"It's only Kate, Lena!" Then, as there was no response: "Aren't yougoing to let me in?"

Still Lena did not fling wide the door. 

"Oh, Kate!" she said vaguely, in a voice that seemed to drift from aMaeterlinckian mist. "How are you?"

"Pretty sulky, thank you. Why don't you open the door, girl?"

At that Lena drew back; but she was obviously annoyed. Kate stepped intothe bare, unkempt room. Remnants of a miserable makeshift meal were tobe seen on a rickety cutting-table; the bed was unmade; and on the desk, in the center of the room, a drop-lamp with a leaking tube polluted theair. There was a formidable litter of papers on a great table, andbefore it stood a swivel chair where Lena Vroom had been sittingpreparing for her degree. 

Kate deliberately took this all in and then turned her gaze on herfriend. 

"What's the use, girl?" she demanded with more than her usualabruptness. "What are you doing it all for?"

Lena threw a haggard glance at her. 

"We won't talk about that, " she said in that remote, sunken voice. "Ihaven't the strength to discuss it. To be perfectly frank, Kate, youmustn't visit me now. You see, I'm studying night and day for theinquisition. "

"The--"

"Yes, inquisition. You see, it isn't enough that my thesis should befinished. I can't get my degree without a last, terrible ordeal. Oh, Kate, you can't imagine what it is like! Girls who have been through ithave told me. You are asked into a room where the most important membersof the faculty are gathered. They sit about you in a semicircle and forhours they hurl questions at you, not necessarily questions relating toanything you have studied, but inquiries to test your generalintelligence. It's a fearful experience. "

She sank on her unmade cot, drawing a ragged sweater about hershoulders, and looked up at Kate with an almost furtive gaze. She alwayshad been a small, meagre creature, but now she seemed positivelyshriveled. The pride and plenitude of womanhood were as far from herrealization as they could be from a daughter of Eve. Sexless, stranded, broken before an undertaking too great for her, she sat there in thethroes of a sudden, nervous chill. Then, after a moment or two, shebegan to weep and was rent and torn with long, shuddering sobs. 

"I'm so afraid, " she moaned. "Oh, Kate, I'm so terribly, terriblyafraid! I know I'll fail. "

Kate strangled down, "The best thing that could happen to you"; and saidinstead, "You aren't going about the thing in the best way to succeed. "

"I've done all I could, " moaned her friend. "I've only allowed myselffour hours a night for sleep; and have hardly taken out time for meals. I've concentrated as it seems to me no one ever concentrated before. "

"Oh, Lena, Lena!" Kate cried compassionately. "Can it really be that youhave so little sense, after all? Oh, you poor little drowned rat, you. "She bent over her, pulled the worn slippers from her feet, and thrusther beneath the covers. 

"No, no!" protested Lena. "You mustn't, Kate! I've got to get at mybooks. "

"Say another word and I'll throw them out of the window, " cried Kate, really aroused. "Lie down there. "

Lena began again to sob, but this time with helpless anger, for Katelooked like a grenadier as she towered there in the small room and itwas easy to see that she meant to be obeyed. She explored Lena'scupboard for supplies, and found, after some searching, a can of soupand the inevitable crackers. She heated the soup, toasted the crackers, and forced Lena to eat. Then she extinguished the lamp, with itspoisonous odor, and, wrapping herself in her cloak threw open the windowand sat in the gloom, softly chatting about this and that. Lena made nocoherent answers. She lay in sullen torment, casting tearful glances ather benevolent oppressor. 

But Kate had set her will to conquer that of her friend and Lena'shysteric opposition was no match for it. Little by little the tense formbeneath the blankets relaxed. Her stormily drawn breath became moreeven. At last she slept, which gave Kate an opportunity to slip out tobuy a new tube for the lamp and adjust it properly. She felt quite safein lighting it, for Lena lay in complete exhaustion, and she took theliberty of looking over the clothes which were bundled into animprovised closet on the back of the door. Everything was in wretchedcondition. Buttons and hooks were lacking; a heap of darning layuntouched; Lena's veil, with which she attempted to hide the ruin of herhat, was crumpled into the semblance of a rain-soaked cobweb; and hershoes had gone long without the reassurance of a good blacking. 

Kate put some irons over the stove which served Lena as a cooking-range, and proceeded on a campaign of reconstruction. It was midnight when shefinished, and she was weary and heartsick. The little, strained face onthe pillow seemed to belong to one whom the furies were pursuing. Yetnothing was pursuing her save her own fanatical desire for a thingwhich, once obtained, would avail her nothing. She had not personalityenough to meet life on terms which would allow her one iota ofleadership. She was discountenanced by her inherent drabness:beaten by the limits of her capacity. When Kate had ordered theroom, --scrupulously refraining from touching any of Lena's papers, --sheopened the window and, putting the catch on the door, closed it softlybehind her. 

 * * * * *

Kate's frequent visits to Lena, though brief, were none too welcome. Even the food she brought with her might better, in Lena's estimation, be dispensed with than that the all-absorbing reading and researchshould be interrupted. Finally Kate called one night to find Lena gone. She had taken her trunk and oil-stove and the overworked gas-lamp andhad stolen away. To ferret her out would have been inexcusable. 

"It shows how changed she is, " Kate said to Honora. "Fancy the old-timeLena hiding from me!"

"You must think of her as having a run of fever, Kate. Whatever she doesmust be regarded as simply symptomatic, " said Honora, understandingly. "She's really half-mad. David says the graduates are often likethat--the feminine ones. "

Kate tried to look at it in a philosophic way, but her heart yearned andached over the poor, infatuated fugitive. The February convocation wasdrawing near, and with it Lena's dreaded day of examination. The nightbefore its occurrence, the conversation at the Caravansary turned to thecandidates for the honors. 

"There are some who meet the quiz gallantly enough, " David Fulhamremarked. "But the majority certainly come like galley slaves scourgedto their dungeon. Some of them would move a heart of stone with theirsufferings. Honora, why don't you and Miss Barrington look up yourfriend Miss Vroom once more? She's probably needing you pretty badly. "

"I don't mind being a special officer, Mr. Fulham, " said Kate, "andit's my pride and pleasure to make child-beaters tremble and to arrestbrawny fathers, --I make rather a specialty of six-foot ones, --but reallyI'm timid about going to Lena's again. She has given me to understandthat she doesn't want me around, and I'm not enough of a pachyderm toget in the way of her arrows again. "

But David Fulham couldn't take that view of it. 

"She's not sane, " he declared. "Couldn't be after such a course as she'sbeen putting herself through. She needs help. "

However, neither Kate nor Honora ventured to offer it. They spent theevening together in Honora's drawing-room. The hours passed more rapidlythan they realized, and at midnight David came stamping in. His facewas white. 

"You haven't been to the laboratory, David?" reproached his wife. "Really, you mustn't. I thought it was agreed between us that we'd actlike civilized householders in the evening. " She was regarding him withan expression of affectionate reproof. 

"I've been doing laboratory work, " he said shortly, "but it wasn't inthe chemical laboratory. Wickersham and I hunted up your friend--and wefound her in a state of collapse. "

"No!" cried Kate, starting to her feet. 

"I told you, didn't I?" returned David. "Don't I know them, the geese?We had to break in her door, and there she was sitting at herstudy-table, staring at her books and seeing nothing. She couldn't talkto us--had a temporary attack of severe aphasia, I suppose. Wickershamsaid he'd been anxious about her for weeks--she's been specializing withhim, you know. "

"What did you do with her?" demanded Honora. 

"Bundled her up in her outside garments and dragged her out of doorsbetween us and made her walk. She could hardly stand at first. We had tohold her up. But we kept right on hustling her along, and after a timewhen the fresh air and exercise had got in their work, she could findthe right word when she tried to speak to us. Then we took her to arestaurant and ordered a beefsteak and some other things. She wanted togo back to her room--said she had more studying to do; but we made itclear to her at last that it wasn't any use, --that she'd have to standor fall on what she had. She promised us she wouldn't look at a book, but would go to bed and sleep, and anybody who has the hardihood to wishthat she wins her degree may pray for a good night for her. "

Honora was looking at her husband with a wide, shining gaze. 

"How did you come to go to her, David?" she asked admiringly. "Shewasn't in any of your classes. "

"Now, don't try to make out that I'm benevolent, Honora, " Fulham saidpetulantly. "I went because I happened to meet Wickersham on theMidway. She's been hiding, but he had searched her out and appealed tome to go with him. What I did was at his request. "

"But she'll be refreshed in the morning, " said Honora. "She'll come outall right, won't she?"

"How do I know?" demanded Fulham. "I suppose she'll feel like a mangoing to execution when she enters that council-room. Maybe she'll standup to it and maybe she'll not. She'll spend as much nervous energy onthe experience as would carry her through months of sane, reasonableliving in the place she ought to be in--that is to say, in a millinerystore or some plain man's kitchen. "

"Oh, David!" said Honora with gentle wifely reproach. 

But Fulham was making no apologies. 

"If we men ill-treated women as they ill-treat themselves, " he said, "we'd be called brutes of the worst sort. "

"Of course!" cried Kate. "A person may have some right to ill-treathimself, but he never has any right to ill-treat another. "

"If we hitched her up to a plough, " went on Fulham, not heeding, "weshouldn't be overtaxing her physical strength any more than sheovertaxes her mental strength when she tries--the ordinary woman, Imean, like Miss Vroom--to keep up to the pace set by men offirst-rate caliber. "

He went up to bed on this, still disturbed, and Honora and Kate, muchdepressed, talked the matter over. But they reached no conclusion. Theywanted to go around the next morning and help Lena, --get her breakfastand see that she was properly dressed, --but they knew they would beunwelcome. Later they heard that she had come through the ordeal after afashion. She had given indications of tremendous research. But her eyes, Wickersham told Kate privately, looked like diseased oysters, and it waseasy to see that she was on the point of collapse. 

Kate saw nothing of her until the day of convocation, though she triedseveral times to get into communication with her. There must have beenquite two hundred figures in the line that wound before the Presidentand the other dignitaries to receive their diplomas; and the great hallwas thronged with interested spectators. Kate could have thrilled withpride of her _alma mater_ had not her heart been torn with sympathy forher friend whose emaciated figure looked more pathetic than ever before. Now and then a spasmodic movement shook her, causing her head to quiverlike one with the palsy and her hands to make futile gestures. Andalthough she was the most touching and the least joyous of those whowent forward to victory, she was not, after all, so very exceptional. 

Kate could not help noticing how jaded and how spent were many of thecandidates for the higher degrees. They seemed to move in a tensedream, their eyes turning neither to right nor left, and the whole ofthem bent on the one idea of their dear achievement. Although there weresome stirring figures among them, --men and women who seemed to have comeinto the noble heritage which had been awaiting them, --there were morewho looked depleted and unfit. It grew on Kate, how superfluousscholarship was when superimposed on a feeble personality. The collegescould not make a man, try as they might. They could add to the capacityof an endowed and adventurous individual, but for the inept, thediffident, their learning availed nothing. They could cram bewilderedheads with facts and theories, but they could not hold the mediocre backfrom their inevitable anticlimax. 

"A learned derelict is no better than any other kind, " mused Katecompassionately. She resolved that now, at last, she would commandLena's obedience. She would compel her to take a vacation, --would findout what kind of a future she had planned. She would surround her withsmall, friendly offices; would help her to fit herself out in newgarments, and would talk over ways and means with her. 

She went the next day to the room where Lena's compassionate professorshad found her that night of dread and terror before her examination. Butshe had disappeared again, and the landlady could give no informationconcerning her. 

IX

The day was set. Marna was to sing. It seemed to the little group offriends as if the whole city palpitated with the fact. At any rate, theCaravansary did so. They talked of little else, and Mary Morrison weptfor envy. Not that it was mean envy. Her weeping was a sort of tribute, and Marna felt it to be so. 

"You're going to be wonderful, " Mary sobbed. "The rest of us are merelyyoung, or just women, or men. We can't be anything more no matter howhard we try, though we keep feeling as if we were something more. Butyou're going to SING! Oh, Marna!"

Time wore on, and Marna grew hectic with anticipation. Her lips were toored, her breath came too quickly; she intensified herself; and shepracticed her quivering, fitful, passionate songs with religiousdevotion. So many things centered around the girl that it was no wonderthat she began to feel a disproportionate sense of responsibility. Allof her friends were taking it for granted that she would make a success. 

Mrs. Barsaloux was giving a supper at the Blackstone after theperformance. The opera people were coming and a number of otherdistinguished ones; and Marna was having a frock made of the color of agold-of-Ophir rose satin which was to clothe her like sunshine. Honorabrought out a necklace of yellow opals whimsically fashioned. 

"I no longer use such things, child, " she said with a touch of emotion. "And I want you to wear them with your yellow dress. "

"Why, they're like drops of water with the sun in them!" cried Marna. "How good you all are to me! I can't imagine why. "

When the great night came, the audience left something to be desired, both as to numbers and fashion. Although Marna's appearance had beenwell advertised, it was evident that the public preferred to listen tothe great stars. But the house was full enough and enthusiastic enoughto awaken in the little Irish girl's breast that form of elation whichmasks as self-obliteration, and which is the fuel that feeds thefires of art. 

Kate had gone with the Fulhams and they, with Blue-eyed Mary and Dr. VonShierbrand, sat together in the box which Mrs. Barsaloux had given them, and where, from time to time, she joined them. But chiefly she hoveredaround Marna in that dim vast world back of the curtain. 

They said of Marna afterward that she was like a spirit. She seemed lessand more than a woman, an evanescent essence of feminine delight. Herlaughter, her tears, her swift emotions were all as something held for amoment before the eye and snatched away, to leave but the waveringeidolon of their loveliness. She sang with a young Italian who respondedexquisitely to the swift, bright, unsubstantial beauty of her acting, and whom she seemed fairly to bathe in the amber loveliness ofher voice. 

Kate, quivering for her, seeming indefinably to be a part of her, suffering at the hesitancies of the audience and shaken with theirapproval, was glad when it was all over. She hastened out to be with thecrowd and to hear what they were saying. They were warm in their praise, but Kate was dissatisfied. She longed for something more emphatic--someexcess of acclaim. She wondered if they were waiting for moreauthoritative audiences to set the stamp of approval on Marna. It didnot occur to her that they had found the performance too opalescentand elusive. 

Kate wondered if the girl would feel that anything had been missing, butMarna seemed to be basking in the happiness of the hour. The greatGerman prima donna had kissed her with tears in her eyes; the Frenchbaritone had spoken his compliments with convincing ardor; dozens hadcrowded about her with congratulations; and now, at the head of theglittering table in an opulent room, the little descendant of minstrelssat and smiled upon her friends. A gilded crown of laurel leaves restedon her dark hair; her white neck arose delicately from the yellowed laceand the shining silk; the sunny opals rested upon her shoulders. 

"I drink, " cried the French baritone, "to a voice of honey and an ivorythroat. "

"To a great career, " supplemented David Fulham. 

"And happiness, " Kate broke in, standing with the others and forgettingto be abashed by the presence of so many. Then she called to Marna:--

"I was afraid they would leave out happiness. "

Kate might have been the belated fairy godmother who brought this giftin the nick of time. Those at the table smiled at her indulgently, --shewas so eager, so young, so almost fierce. She had dressed herself inwhite without frill or decoration, and the clinging folds of her gowndraped her like a slender, chaste statue. She wore no jewels, --she hadnone, indeed, --and her dark coiled hair in no way disguised the shape ofher fine head. The elaborate Polish contralto across from her, splendidas a mediaeval queen, threw Kate's simplicity into sharp contrast. Marnaturned adoring eyes upon her; Mrs. Barsaloux, that inveterate encouragerof genius, grieved that the girl had no specialty for her to foster; theforeigners paid her frank tribute, and there was no question but thatthe appraisement upon her that night was high. 

As for Mama's happiness, for which Kate had put in her stipulation, itwas coming post-haste, though by a circuitous road. 

Mrs. Dennison, who had received tickets from Marna, and who had beggedher nephew, George Fitzgerald, to act as her escort, was, in herfashion, too, wondering about the question of happiness for the girl. She was an old-fashioned creature, mid-Victorian in her sincerity. Shehad kissed one man and one only, and him had she married, and sorrowingover her childless estate she had become, when she laid her husband inhis grave, "a widow indeed. " Her abundant affection, disused by thisaccident of fate, had spent itself in warm friendships, and in herdevotion to her dead sister's child. She had worked for him till thesilver came into her hair; had sent him through his classical course andthrough the medical college, and the day when she saw him win his titleof doctor of medicine was the richest one of her middle life. 

He sat beside her now, strangely pale and disturbed. The opera, she wassorry to note, had not interested him as she had expected it would. Hehad, oddly enough, been reluctant to accompany her, and, as she wasaccustomed to his quick devotion, this distressed her not a little. Washe growing tired of her? Was he ashamed to be seen at the opera with aquiet woman in widow's dress, a touch shabby? Was her much-tired heartto have a last cruel blow dealt it? Accustomed to rather somber pathwaysof thought, she could not escape this one; yet she loyally endeavored toturn from it, and from time to time she stole a look at the stern, paleface beside her to discover, if she could, what had robbed him of hisgood cheer. 

For he had been a happy boy. His high spirits had constituted a largepart of his attraction for her. When he had come to her orphaned, it hadbeen with warm gratitude in his heart, and with the expectation of beingloved. As he grew older, that policy of life had become accentuated. Hewas expectant in all that he did. His temperamental friendliness hadcarried him through college, winning for him a warm group of friends andthe genuine regard of his professors. It was helping him to make his wayin the place he had chosen for his field of action. He had not gone intothe more fashionable part of town, but far over on the West Side, wherethe slovenliness of the central part of the city shambles into acommunity of parks and boulevards, crude among their young treessurrounded by neat, self-respecting apartment houses. Such communitiesare to be found in all American cities; communities which set littlestore by fashion, which prize education (always providing it does notprove exotic and breed genius or any form of disturbing beauty), livewithin their incomes and cultivate the manifest virtues. The environmentsuited George Fitzgerald. He had an honest soul without a bohemianimpulse in him. He recognized himself as being middle-class, and he wasproud and glad of it. He liked to be among people who kept their feet onthe earth--people whose yea was yea and whose nay was nay. What wasCeltic in him could do no more for him than lend a touch of almostflaring optimism to the Puritan integrity of his character. 

Sundays, as a matter of habit, and occasionally on other days, he washis aunt's guest at the Caravansary. The intellectual coöperatives thereliked him, as indeed everybody did, everywhere. Invariably Mrs. Dennisonwas told after his departure that she was a fortunate woman to have suchan adopted son. Yet Fitzgerald knew very well that he was unable to becompletely himself among his aunt's patrons. Their conversation was tooglancing; they too often said what they did not mean, for mereconversation's sake; they played with ideas, tossing them about likejuggler's balls; and they attached importance to matters which seemed tohim of little account. 

Of late he had been going to his aunt's but seldom, and he had stayedaway because he wanted, above all things in the world, to go. It hadbecome an agony to go--an anguish to absent himself. Which beinginterpreted, means that he was in love. And whom should he love butMarna? Why should any man trouble himself to love another woman whenthis glancing, flashing, singing bird was winging it through the blue?Were any other lips so tender, so tremulous, so arched, so sweet? Thebreath that came between them was perfumed with health; the little rowsof gleaming teeth were indescribably provocative. Actually, the littlered tongue itself seemed to fold itself upward, at the edges, like atender leaf. As for her nostrils, they were delicately flaring likethose of some wood creature, and fashioned for the enjoyment of odorousbanquets undreamed of by duller beings. Her eyes, like pools in shade, breathing mystery and dreams, got between him and his sleep and held himintoxicated in his bed. 

Yes, that was Marna as she looked to the eye of love. She was made forone man's love and nothing else, yet she was about to become thewell-loved of the great world! She was not for him--was not made for aman of his mould. She had flashed from obscurity to something rich andplenteous, obviously the child of Destiny--a little princess waiting forher crown. He had not even talked to her many times, and she had nonotion that when she entered the room he trembled; and that when shespoke to him and turned the swimming loveliness of her eyes upon him, hehad trouble to keep his own from filling with tears. 

And this was the night of her dedication to the world; the world wasseating her upon her throne, acclaiming her coronation. There wasnothing for him but to go on through an interminably long life, bearinga brave front and hiding his wound. 

He loathed the incoherent music; detested the conductor; despised theorchestra; felt murderous toward the Italian tenor; and could have slainthe man who wrote the opera, since it made his bright girl a target forpraise and blame. He feared his aunt's scrutiny, for she had sharpperceptions, and he could have endured anything better than that sheshould spy upon his sacred pain. So he sat by her side, passionatelysolitary amid a crowd and longing to hide himself from the societyof all men. 

But he must be distrait, indeed, if he could forget the claim his goodaunt had upon him. He knew how she loved gayety; and her daily lifeoffered her little save labor and monotony. 

"Supper next, " he said with forced cheerfulness as they came out of theopera-house together. "I'll do the ordering. You'll enjoy a meal foronce which is served independently of you. "

He tried to talk about this and that as they made their way on to aglaring below-stairs restaurant, where after-theater folk gathered. Theshowy company jarred hideously on Fitzgerald, yet gave him a chance tosave his face by pretending to watch it. He could tell his aunt who someof the people were, and she would transfer her curiosity from himto them. 

"They'll be having a glorious time at Miss Cartan's supper, " mused Mrs. Dennison. "How she shines, doesn't she, George? And when you think ofher beginnings there on that Wisconsin farm, isn't it astonishing?"

"Those weren't her beginnings, I fancy, " George said, venturing to tasteof discussion concerning her as a brandy-lover may smell a glass heswears he will not drink. "Her beginnings were very long ago. She's aCelt, and she has the witchery of the Celts. How I'd love to hear herrecite some of the new Irish poems!"

"She'd do it beautifully, George. She does everything beautifully. IfI'd had a daughter like that, boy, what a different thing my life wouldbe! Or if you were to give me--"

George clicked his ice sharply in his glass. "See, " he said, "there'sHackett coming in--Hackett the actor. Handsome devil, isn't he?"

"Don't use that tone, George, " said his aunt reprovingly. "Handsomedevil, indeed! He's a good-looking man. Can't you say that in a properway? I don't want you to be sporty in your talk, George. I always triedwhen you were a little boy to keep you from talking foolishly. "

"Oh, there's no danger of my being foolish, " he said. "I'm as staid anddull as ever you could wish me to be!"

For the first time in her life she found him bitter, but she had thesense at last to keep silent. His eyes were full of pain, and as helooked about the crowded room with its suggestions of indulgent living, she saw something in his face leap to meet it--something that seemed torepudiate the ideals she had passed on to him. Involuntarily, AnneDennison reached out her firm warm hand and laid it on the quivering oneof her boy. 

"A new thought has just come to you!" she said softly. "Before you werethrough with your boast, lad, your temptation came. I saw it. Are youlonely, George? Are you wanting something that Aunt Anne can give you?Won't you speak out to me?"

He drew his hand away from hers. 

"No one in the world can give me what I want, " he said painfully. "Forgive me, auntie; and let's talk of other things. "

He had pushed her back into that lonely place where the old often muststand, and she shivered a little as if a cold wind blew over her. He sawit and bent toward her contritely. 

"You must help me, " he said. "I am very unhappy. I suppose almosteverybody has been unhappy like this sometime. Just bear with me, AuntAnne, dear, and help me to forget for an hour or two. "

Anne Dennison regarded him understandingly. 

"Here comes our lobster, " she said, "and while we eat it, I'll tell youthe story of the first time I ever ate at a restaurant. "

He nodded gratefully. After all, while she lived, he could not beutterly bereft. 

X

He had taken her home and was leaving, when a carriage passed him. Hecould hear the voices of the occupants--the brisk accents of Mrs. Barsaloux, and the slow, honey-rich tones of Marna. He had never dreamedthat he could do such a thing, but he ran forward with an almost franticdesire to rest his eyes upon the girl's face, and he was beside the curbwhen the carriage drew up at the door of the house where Mrs. Barsalouxand Marna lodged. He flung open the door in spite of the protests of thedriver, who was not sure of his right to offer such a service, and heldout his hand to Mrs. Barsaloux. That lady accepted his politenessgraciously, and, weary and abstracted, moved at once toward thehouse-steps, searching meantime for her key. Fitzgerald had fifteenseconds alone with Marna. She stood half-poised upon the carriage-steps, her hand in his, their eyes almost on a level. Then he said animpossible and insane thing. It was wrung out of his misery, out of hisknowledge of her loveliness. 

"I've lost you!" he whispered. "Do you know that to-night ended myhappiness?"

Mama's lips parted delicately; her eyes widened; her swift Celtic spiritencompassed his grief. 

"Oh!" she breathed. "Don't speak so! Don't spoil my beautiful time!"

"Not I, " he retorted sharply, speaking aloud this time. "Far be it fromme! Good-bye. "

Mrs. Barsaloux heard him vaguely above the jangling of coins and keysand the rushing of a distant train. 

"You're not going to leave town, are you, Dr. Fitzgerald?" she inquiredcasually. "I thought your good-bye had a final accent to it. "

She was laughing in her easy way, quite unconscious of what was takingplace. She had made an art of laughing, and it carried her and othersover many difficult places. But for once it was powerless to lessen theemotional strain. Mysteriously, Fitzgerald and Marna were experiencing asweet torment in their parting. It was not that she loved him or hadthought of him in that way at all. She had seen him often and had likedhis hearty ways, his gay spirits, and his fine upstanding figure, but hehad been as one who passed by with salutations. Now, suddenly, she wasconscious that he was a man to be desired. She saw his wistful eyes, hisavid lips, his great shoulders. The woman in her awoke to a knowledge ofher needs. Upon such a shoulder might a woman weep, from such eyes mighta woman gather dreams; to allay such torment as his might a woman giveall she had to give. It was incoherent, mad, but not unmeaning. It had, indeed, the ultimate meaning. 

He said nothing more; she spoke no word. Each knew they would meet onthe morrow. 

The next night, Kate Barrington, making her way swiftly down the Midwayin a misty gloom, saw the little figure of Marna Cartan flutteringbefore her. It was too early for dinner, and Kate guessed that Marna wason her way to pay her a visit--a not rare occurrence these last fewweeks. She called to her, and Marna waited, turning her face for amoment to the mist-bearing wind. 

"I was going to you, " she said breathlessly. 

"So I imagined, bright one. "

"Are you tired, Kate, mavourneen?"

"A little. It's been a hard day. I don't see why my heart isn't broken, considering the things I see and hear, Marna! I don't so much mind aboutthe grown-ups. If they succeed in making a mess of things, why, they cantake the consequences. But the kiddies--they're the ones that tormentme. Try as I can to harden myself, and to say that after I've done myutmost my responsibility ends, I can't get them off my mind. But what'son _your_ mind, bright one?"

"Oh, Kate, so much! But wait till we get to the house. It's not a thingto shriek out here on the street. "

The wind swept around the corner, buffeting them, and Kate drew Marna'sarm in her own and fairly bore the little creature along with her. Theyentered the silent house, groped through the darkened hall and up thestairs to Kate's own room. 

"Honora isn't home, I fancy, " she said, in apology for the pervadingdesolation. "She stays late at the laboratory these nights. She saysshe's on the verge of a wonderful discovery. It's something she andDavid have been working out together, but she's been making someexperiments in secret, with which she means to surprise David. Of courseshe'll give all the credit to him--that's her policy. She's hishelpmate, she says, nothing more. "

"But the babies?" asked Marna with that naïveté characteristic of her. "Where are they?"

"Up in the nursery at the top of the house. It will be light and warmthere, I think. Honora had a fireplace put in so that it would becheerful. I always feel sure it's pleasant up there, however forbiddingthe rest of the house may look. "

"Mary has made a great difference with it since she came, hasn't she? Ofcourse Honora couldn't do the wonderful things she's doing and befussing around the house all the time. Still, she might train herservants, mightn't she?"

"Well, there aren't really any to train, " said Kate. "There's Mrs. Hays, the nurse, a very good woman, but as we take our meals out, and are allso independent, there's no one else required, except occasionally. Honora wouldn't think of such an extravagance as a parlor maid. We're acommunity of working folk, you see. "

Marna had been lighting the candles which Kate usually kept for company;and, moreover, since there was kindling at hand, she laid a fire andtouched a match to it. 

"I must have it look homey, Kate--for reasons. "

"Do whatever it suits you to do, child. "

"But can I tell you what it suits me to do, Kate?"

"How do I know? Are you referring to visible things or talking inparables? There's something very eerie about you to-night, Marna. Youreyes look phosphorescent. What's been happening to you? Is it the gloryof last night that's over you yet?"

"No, not that. It's--it's a new glory, Kate. "

"A new glory, is it? Since last night? Tell me, then. "

Kate flung her long body into a Morris chair and prepared to listen. Marna looked about her as if seeking a chair to satisfy her whim, and, finding none, sank upon the floor before the blaze. She leaned back, resting on one slight arm, and turned her dream-haunted face glowingamid its dark maze of hair, till her eyes could hold those ofher friend. 

"Oh, Kate!" she breathed, and made her great confession in those twowords. 

"A man!" cried Kate, alarmed. "Now!"

"Now! Last night. And to-day. It was like lightning out of a clear sky. I've seen him often, and now I remember it always warmed me to see him, and made me feel that I wasn't alone. For a long time, I believe, I'vebeen counting him in, and being happier because he was near. But Ididn't realize it at all--till last night. "

"You saw him after the opera?"

"Only for half a minute, at the door of my house. We only said a word ortwo. He whispered he had lost me--that I had killed him. Oh, I don'tremember what he said. But we looked straight at each other. I didn'tsleep all night, and when I lay awake I tried to think of the wonderfulfact that I had made my debut, and that it wasn't a failure, at anyrate. But I couldn't think about that, or about my career. I couldn'thold to anything but the look in his eyes and the fact that I was to seehim to-day. Not that he said so. But we both knew. Why, we couldn't havelived if we hadn't seen each other to-day. "

"And you did?"

"Oh, we did. He called me up on the telephone about two o'clock, andsaid he had waited as long as he could, and that he'd been walking thefloor, not daring to ring till he was sure that I'd rested enough afterlast night. So I told him to come, and he must have been just around thecorner, for he was there in a minute. I wanted him to come in and sitdown, but he said he didn't believe a house could hold such audacity ashis. So we went out on the street. It was cold and bleak. The Midway wasa long, gray blankness. I felt afraid of it, actually. All the worldlooked forbidding to me--except just the little place where I walkedwith him. It was as if there were a little warm beautiful radius inwhich we could keep together, and live for each other, and comfort eachother, and keep harm away. "

"Oh, Marna! And you, with a career before you! What do you mean to do?"

"I don't know what to do. We don't either of us know what to do. He sayshe'll go mad with me on the stage, wearing myself out, the object of thejealousy of other women and of love-making from the men. He--says it's aprofanation. I tried to tell him it couldn't be a profanation to serveart; but, Kate, he didn't seem to know what I meant. He has suchdifferent standards. He wanted to know what I was going to do when I wasold. He said I'd have no real home, and no haven of love; and that I'dbetter be the queen of his home as long as I lived than to rule it alittle while there on the stage and then--be forgotten. Oh, it isn'twhat he said that counts. All that sounds flat enough as I repeat it. It's the wonder of being with some one that loves you like that and offeeling that there are two of you who belong--"

"How do you know you belong?" asked Kate with sharp good sense. "Why, bright one, you've been swept off your feet by mere--forgive me--bymere sex. "

That glint of the eyes which Kate called Celtic flashed from Marna. 

"Mere sex!" she repeated. "Mere sex! You're not trying to belittle that, are you? Why, Kate, that's the beginning and the end of things. WhatI've always liked about you is that you look big facts in the face andaren't afraid of truth. Sex! Why, that's home and happiness and all awoman really cares for, isn't it?"

"No, it isn't all she cares for, " declared Kate valiantly. "She caresfor a great many other things. And when I said mere sex I was trying toput it politely. Is it really home and lifelong devotion that you twoare thinking about, or are you just drunk with youth and--well, withinfatuation?"

Marna turned from her to the fire. 

"Kate, " she said, "I don't know what you call it, but when I looked inhis eyes I felt as if I had just seen the world for the first time. Ihave liked to live, of course, and to study, and it was tremendouslystirring, singing there before all those people. But, honestly, I cansee it would lead nowhere. A few years of faint celebrity, an emptyheart, a homeless life--then weariness. Oh, I know it. I have a trick ofseeing things. Oh, he's the man for me, Kate. I realized it the momenthe pointed it out. We could not be mistaken. I shall love him foreverand he'll love me just as I love him. "

"By the way, " said Kate, "who is he? Someone from the opera company?"

"Who is he? Why, he's George Fitzgerald, of course. "

"Mrs. Dennison's nephew?"

"Certainly. Who else should it be?"

"Why, he's a pleasant enough young man--very cheerful and quiteintelligent--but, Marna--"

Marna leaped to her feet. 

"You're not in a position to pass judgment upon him, Kate. How can youknow what a wonderful soul he has? Why, there's no one so brave, or sohumble, or so sweet, or with such a worship for women--"

"For you, you mean. "

"Of course I mean for me. You don't suppose I'd endure it to have himworshiping anybody else, do you? Oh, it's no use protesting. I only hopethat Mrs. Barsaloux won't. "

"Yes, doesn't that give you pause? Think of all Mrs. Barsaloux has donefor you; and she did it with the understanding that you were to go onthe stage. She was going to get her reward in the contribution youmade to art. "

Marna burst into rippling laughter. 

"I'll give her something better than art, Kate Crosspatch. I'll give hera home--and I'll name my first girl after her. "

"Marna!" gasped Kate. "You do go pretty fast for a little thing. "

"Oh, I'm Irish, " laughed Marna. "We Irish are a very old people. Wealways knew that if you loved a man, you had to have him or die, andthat if you had him, you'd love to see the look of him coming out inyour sons and daughters. "

Suddenly the look of almost infantile blitheness left her face. Thesadness which is inherent in the Irish countenance spread over it, likesudden mist over a landscape. The ancient brooding aspect of the Celtswas upon her. 

"Yes, " she repeated, "we Irish are very old, and there is nothing aboutlife--or death--that we do not know. "

Kate was not quite sure what she meant, but with a sudden impulse sheheld out her arms to the girl, who, with a low cry, fled to them. Thenher bright bravery melted in a torrent of tears. 

XI

They had met like flame and wind. It was irrational and wonderful andconclusive. But after all, it might not have come to quite so swift aclimax if Marna, following Kate's advice, had not confided the wholething to Mrs. Barsaloux. 

Now, Mrs. Barsaloux was a kind woman, and one with plenty of sentimentin her composition. But she believed that there were times when Loveshould not be given the lead. Naturally, it seemed to her that this wasone of them. She had spent much money upon the education of this girlwhom she had "assumed, " as Marna sometimes playfully put it. Nothing buther large, active, and perhaps interfering benevolence and Mama'swinning and inexplicable charm held the two together, and the veryslightness of their relationship placed them under peculiar obligationsto each other. 

"It's ungrateful of you, " Mrs. Barsaloux explained, "manifestlyungrateful! It's your rôle to love nothing but your career. " She was notstern, merely argumentative. 

"But didn't you expect me ever to love any one?" queried Marna. 

Mrs. Barsaloux contemplated a face and figure made for love from thebeginning, and delicately ripened for it, like a peach in the sun. 

"But you could have waited, my dear girl. There's time for both thelove and the career. "

Marna shook her head slowly. 

"George says there isn't, " she answered with an irritating sweetness. "He says I'm not to go on the stage at all. He says--"

"Don't 'he says' me like that, Marna, " cried her friend. "It sounds toounutterably silly. Here you are with a beautiful talent--every oneagrees about that--and a chance to develop it. I've made many sacrificesto give you that chance. Very well; you've had your trial before thepublic. You've made good. You could repay yourself and me for all thathas been involved in your development, and you meet a man and comesmiling to me and say that we're to throw the whole thing over because'he says' to. "

Marna made no answer at all, but Mrs. Barsaloux saw her settle down inthe deep chair in which she was sitting as if to huddle away from thestorm about to break over her. 

"She isn't going to offer any resistance, " thought the distressed patronwith dismay. "Her mind is completely made up and she's just crouchingdown to wait till I'm through with my private little hurricane. "

So, indeed, it proved. Mrs. Barsaloux felt she had the right to saymuch, and she said it. Marna may or may not have listened. She satshivering and smiling in her chair, and when it was fit for her toexcuse herself, she did, and walked out bravely; but Mrs. Barsalouxnoticed that she tottered a little as she reached the door. She did notgo to her aid, however. 

"It's an infatuation, " she concluded. "I must treat her as if she had aviolent disease and take care of her. When people are delirious theymust be protected against themselves. It's a delirium with her, and thebest thing I can do is to run off to New York with her. She can make hernext appearance when the opera company gets there. I'll arrange it thisafternoon. "

She refrained from telling Marna of her plans, but she went straight tothe city and talked over the situation with her friend the impresario. He seemed anything but depressed. On the contrary, he wasexcited--even exalted. 

"Spirit her away, madam, " he advised. "Of course she will miss her loverhorribly, and that will be the best thing that can happen to her. Whydid not the public rise to her the other night? Not because she couldnot sing: far from it. If a nightingale sings, then Miss Cartan does. But she left her audience a little cold. Let us face the facts. You sawit. We all saw it. And why? Because she was too happy, madam; toocomplaisant; too uninstructed in the emotions. Now it will be different. We will take her away; we will be patient with her while she suffers;afterward she will bless us, for she will have discovered the secret ofthe artist, and then when she opens her little silver throat we shallhave SONG. "

Mrs. Barsaloux, with many compunctions, and with some pangs of puremotherly sympathy, nevertheless agreed. 

"If only he had been a man above the average, " she said, as shetearfully parted from the great man, "perhaps it would not havemattered so much. "

The impresario lifted his eyebrows and his mustaches at the same timeand assumed the aspect of a benevolent Mephistopheles. 

"The variety of man, madam, " he said sententiously, "makes no manner ofdifference. It is the tumult in Miss Marna's soul which I hope we shallbe able to utilize"--he interrupted himself with a smile and a bow as heopened the door for his departing friend--"for the purposes of art. "

Mrs. Barsaloux sat in the middle of her taxi seat all the way home, andsaw neither street, edifice, nor human being. She was looking back intoher own busy, confused, and frustrated life, and was remembering certainthings which she had believed were buried deep. Her heart misgave herhorribly. Yet to hand over this bright singing bird, so exquisite, sorare, so fitted for purposes of exposition, to the keeping of a meremale being of unfortunate contiguity, to permit him to carry her intothe seclusion of an ordinary home to wait on him and regulate her lifeaccording to his whim, was really too fantastic for consideration. Soshe put her memories and her tendernesses out of sight and walked upthe stairs with purpose in her tread. 

 * * * * *

She meant to "have it out" with the girl, who was, she believed, reasonable enough after all. 

"She's been without her mother for so long, " she mused, "that it's nowonder she's lacking in self-control. I must have the firmness that amother would have toward her. It would be the height of cruelty to lether have her own way in this. "

If the two could have met at that moment, it would have changed thecourse of both their lives. But a trifle had intervened. Marna Cartanhad gone walking; and she never came back. Only, the next day, radiantlybeautiful, with fresh flowers in her hands, Marna Fitzgerald camerunning in begging to be forgiven. She tried to carry the situation withher impetuosity. She was laughing, crying, pleading. She got close toher old friend as if she would enwrap her in her influence. She had theveritable aspect of the bride. Whatever others might think regarding herlost career, it was evident that she believed the great hour had juststruck for her. Her husband was with her. 

"Haven't you any apology to make, sir?" poor Mrs. Barsaloux cried tohim. He looked matter-of-fact, she thought, and as if he ought to beable to take a reasonable view of things. But she had misjudged. Perhapsit was his plain, everyday, commercial garments which deceived her andmade her think him open to week-day arguments; for at that moment hewas really a knight of romance, and at Mrs. Barsaloux's question hiseyes gleamed with unsuspected fires. 

"Who could be so foolish as to apologize for happiness like ours?" hedemanded. 

"Aren't you going to forgive us, dear?" pleaded Marna. 

But Mrs. Barsaloux couldn't quite stand that. 

"You sound like an old English comedy, Marna, " she said impatiently. "You're of age; I'm no relation to you; you've a perfect right to bemarried. Better take advantage of being here to pack your things. You'llneed them. "

"You mean that I'm not expected to come here again, _tante_?"

"I shall sail for France in a week, " said Mrs. Barsaloux wearily. 

"For France, _tante_? When did you decide?"

"This minute, " said the lady, and gave the married lovers to understandthat the interview was at an end. 

Marna went weeping down the street, holding on to her George's arm. 

"If she'd been Irish, she'd have cursed me, " she sobbed, "and then I'dhave had something to go on, so to speak. Perhaps I could have got herto take it off me in time. But what are you going to do with a snubbinglike that?"

"Oh, leave it for the Arctic explorers to explain. They're used tobeing in below-zero temperature, " George said with a troubled laugh. "I'm sure I can't waste any time thinking about a woman who could standout against you, Marna, the way you are this day, and the wayyou're looking. "

"But, George, she thinks I'm a monster. "

"Then there's something wrong with her zoology. You're an--"

"Don't call me an angel, dear, whatever you do! There are some things Ihate to be called--they're so insipid. If any one called me an angel I'dknow he didn't appreciate me. Come, let's go to Kate's. She's my courtof last appeal. If Kate can't forgive me, I'll know I've done wrong. "

 * * * * *

Kate was never to forget that night. She had come in from a day ofdifficult and sordid work. For once, the purpose back of all her toilamong the people there in the great mill town was lost sight of in thesheer repulsiveness of the tasks she had had to perform. The pathos oftheir temptations, the terrific disadvantages under which they labored, their gray tragedies, had some way lost their import. She was merely adreadfully fagged woman, disgusted with evil, with dirt and poverty. Shewas at outs with her world and impatient with the suffering involved inthe mere living of life. 

Moreover, when she had come into the house, she had found it dark asusual. The furnace was down, and her own room was cold. But she had sether teeth together, determined not to give way to depression, and hadmade her rather severe toilet for dinner when word was brought to her bythe children's nurse that Dr. And Mrs. Fitzgerald desired to see her. For a moment she could not comprehend what that might mean; then thetruth assailed her, took her by the hand, and ran her down the stairsinto Mama's arms. 

"But it's outrageous, " she cried, hugging Marna to her. "How could yoube so willful?"

"It's glorious, " retorted Marna. "And if I ever was going to be willful, now's the time. "

"Right you are, " broke in George. "What does Stevenson say about that?'Youth is the time to be up and doing. ' You're not going to be severewith us, Miss Barrington? We've been counting on you. "

"Have you?" inquired Kate, putting Marna aside and taking her husband bythe hand. "Well, you are your own justification, you two. But haven'tyou been ungrateful?"

Marna startled her by a bit of Dionysian philosophy. 

"Is it ungrateful to be happy?" she demanded. "Would anybody have beenin the right who asked us to be unhappy? Why don't you call us brave? Doyou imagine it isn't difficult to have people we love disapproving ofus? But you know yourself, Kate, if we'd waited forty-eight hours, I'dhave been dragged off to live with my career. "

She laughed brightly, sinking back in her chair and throwing wide hercoat. Kate looked at her appraisingly, and warmed in the doing of it. 

"You don't look as if you were devoted to a career, she admitted. 

"Oh, " sighed Fitzgerald, "I only just barely got her in time!"

"And now what do you propose doing?"

"Why, to-morrow we shall look for a place to live--for a home. "

"Do you mean a flat?" asked Kate with a flick of satire. 

"A flat, or anything. It doesn't matter much what. "

"Or where?"

"It will be on the West Side, " said the matter-of-fact Fitzgerald. 

"And who'll keep house for you? Must you find servants?"

"Why, Kate, we're dreadfully poor, " cried Marna excitedly, as if povertywere a mere adventure. "Didn't you know that? I shall do my own work. "

"Oh, we've both got to work, " added Fitzgerald. 

He didn't say he was sorry Marna had to slave with her little whitehands, or that he realized that he was doing a bold--perhaps animpious--thing in snatching a woman from her service to art to go intoservice for him. Evidently he didn't think that way. Neither minded anysacrifice apparently. The whole of it was, they were together. Suddenly, they seemed to forget Kate. They stood gazing at each other as if theirsense of possession overwhelmed them. Kate felt something like angryresentment stir in her. How dared they, when she was so alone, so weary, so homeless?

"Will you stay to dinner with me?" she asked with something likeasperity. 

"To dinner?" they murmured in vague chorus. "No, thanks. "

"But where do you intend to have dinner?"

"We--we haven't thought, " confessed Marna. 

"Oh, anywhere, " declared Fitzgerald. 

Marna rose and her husband buttoned her coat about her. 

They smiled at Kate seraphically, and she saw that they wanted to bealone, and that it made little difference to them whether they weresitting in a warm room or walking the windy streets. She kissed themboth, with tears, and said:--

"God bless you. "

That seemed to be what they wanted. They longed to be blessed. 

"That's what Aunt Dennison said, " smiled Fitzgerald. 

Then Kate realized that now the exotic Marna would be calling thecompletely domesticated Mrs. Dennison "aunt. " But Marna looked as if sheliked that, too. It was their hour for liking everything. As Kate openedthe outer door for them, the blast struck through her, but the lovers, laughing, ran down the stairs together. They were, in their way, outcasts; they were poor; the future might hold bitter disillusion. Butnow, borne by the sharp wind, their laughter drifted back like a song. 

Kate wrapped her old coat about her and made her solitary way to Mrs. Dennison's depressed Caravansary. 

XII

There was no question about it. Life was supplying Kate Barrington witha valuable amount of "data. " On every hand the emergent or thereactionary woman offered herself for observation, although to say thatKate was able to take a detached and objective view of it would be goingaltogether too far. The truth was, she threw herself into every friend'strouble, and she counted as friends all who turned to her, or all whomshe was called upon to serve. 

A fortnight after Mama's marriage, an interesting episode came Kate'sway. Mrs. Barsaloux had introduced to the Caravansary a Mrs. Leger whomshe had once met on the steamer on her way to Brindisi, and she hadinvited her to join her during a stay in Chicago. Mrs. Barsaloux, however, having gone off to France in a hot fit of indignation, Mrs. Leger presented herself with a letter from Mrs. Barsaloux to Mrs. Dennison. That hospitable woman consented to take in the somewhatenigmatic stranger. 

That she was enigmatic all were quick to perceive. She was beautiful, with a delicate, high-bred grace, and she had the manner of a woman whohad been courted and flattered. As consciously beautiful as MaryMorrison, she bore herself with more discretion. Taste governed allthat she said and did. Her gowns, her jewels, her speech weredistinguished. She seemed by all tokens an accomplished worldling; yetit was not long before Kate discovered that it was anything but worldlymatters which were consuming her attention. 

She had come to Chicago for the purpose of adjusting her fortune, --alarge one, it appeared, --and of concluding her relations with the world. She had decided to go into a convent, and had chosen one of thosenumerous sisterhoods which pass their devotional days upon the brighthill-slopes without Naples. She refrained from designating theparticular sisterhood, and she permitted no discussion of her motives. She only said that she had not been born a Catholic, but had turned toMother Church when the other details of life ceased to interest her. Shewas a widow, but she seemed to regard her estate with quiet regretmerely. If tragedy had entered her life, it must have been subsequent towidowhood. She had a son, but it appeared that he had no great need ofher. He was in the care of his paternal grandparents, who were givinghim an education. He was soon to enter Oxford, and she felt confidentthat his life would be happy. She was leaving him an abundance; she hadhalved her fortune and was giving her share to the convent. 

If she had not been so exquisite, so skilled in the nuances of life, soswift and elusive in conversation, so well fitted for the finest formsof enjoyment, her renunciation of liberty would not have proved soexasperating to Kate. A youthful enthusiasm for religion might have madeher step understandable. But enthusiasm and she seemed far apart. Intelligent as she unquestionably was, she nevertheless seemed to havegiven herself over supinely to a current of emotions which was sweepingher along. She looked both pious and piteous, for all of hersophisticated manner and her accomplishments and graces, and Kate feltlike throwing a rope to her. But Mrs. Leger was not in a mood to seizethe rope. She had her curiously gentle mind quite made up. Though shewas still young, --not quite eighteen years older than her son, --sheappeared to have no further concern for life. To the last, she wasindulging in her delicate vanities--wore her pearls, walked in charmingfoot-gear, trailed after her the fascinating gowns of the initiate, andviewed with delight the portfolios of etchings which Dr. Von Shierbrandchanced to be purchasing. 

She was glad, she said, to be at the Caravansary, quite on a differentside of the city from her friends. She made no attempt to renew oldacquaintances or to say farewell to her former associates. Herextravagant home on the Lake Shore Drive was passed over to aself-congratulatory purchaser; the furnishings were sold at auction; andher other properties were disposed of in such a manner as to make thetransfer of her wealth convenient for the recipients. 

She asked Kate to go to the station with her. 

"I've given you my one last friendship, " she said. "I shall speak withno one on the steamer. My journey must be spent in preparation for mygreat change. But it seems human and warm to have you see me off. "

"It seems inhuman to me, Mrs. Leger, " Kate cried explosively. "Somethingterrible has happened to you, I suppose, and you're hiding away from it. You think you're going to drug yourself with prayer. But can you? Itdoesn't seem at all probable to me. Dear Mrs. Leger, be brave and stayout in the world with the other living people. "

"You are talking of something which you do not understand, " said Mrs. Leger gently. "There is a secret manna for the soul of which thechosen may eat. "

"Oh!" cried Kate, almost angrily. "Are these your own words? I cannotunderstand a prepossession like this on your part. It doesn't seem toset well on you. Isn't there some hideous mistake? Aren't you under theinfluence of some emotional episode? Might it not be that you were illwithout realizing it? Perhaps you are suffering from some hiddenmelancholy, and it is impelling you to do something out of keeping withthe time and with your own disposition. "

"I can see how it might appear that way to you, Miss Barrington. But Iam not ill, except in my soul, which I expect to be healed in the placeto which I am going. Try to understand that among the many kinds ofhuman beings in this world there are the mystics. They have a right totheir being and to their belief. Their joys and sorrows are differentfrom those of others, but they are just as existent. Please do not worryabout me. "

"But you understand so well how to handle the material things in theworld, " protested Kate. "You seem so appreciative and so competent. Ifyou have learned so much, what is the sense of shutting it all up ina cell?"

"Did you never read of Purun Bhagat, " asked Mrs. Leger smilingly, "whowas rich with the riches of a king; who was wise with the learning ofCalcutta and of Oxford; who could have held as high an office as anythat the Government of England could have given him in India, and whotook his beggar's bowl and sat upon a cavern's rim and contemplated thesecret soul of things? You know your Kipling. I have not such riches orsuch wisdom, but I have the longing upon me to go into silence. "

The lips from which these words fell were both tender and ardent; thelittle gesticulating hands were clad in modish, mouse-colored suede;orris root mixed with some faint, haunting odor, barely caressed the airwith perfume. Kate looked at her companion in despair. 

"I must be an outer barbarian!" she cried. "I can imagine religiousecstasy, but you are not ecstatic. I can imagine turning to a convent asa place of hiding from shame or despair. But you are not going into itthat way. As for wishing to worship, I understand that perfectly. Prayeris a sort of instinct with me, and all the reasoning in the worldcouldn't make me cast myself out of communion with the unknown somethingroundabout me that seems to answer me. But what you are doing seems, asI said, so obsolete. "

"I am looking forward to it, " said Mrs. Leger, "as eagerly as a girllooks forward to her marriage. It is a beautiful romance to me. It isthe completely beautiful thing that is going to make up to me for allthe ugliness I have encountered in life. "

For the first time a look of passion disturbed the serenity of thehigh-bred, conventional face. 

Kate threw out her hands with a repudiating gesture. 

"Well, " she said, "in the midst of my freedom I shall think of you oftenand wonder if you have found something that I have missed. You areleaving the world, and books, and friends, and your son for some palewhite idea. It seems to me you are going to the embrace of a wraith. "

Mrs. Leger smiled slowly, and it was as if a lamp showed for a moment ina darkened house and then mysteriously vanished. 

"Believe me, " she reiterated, "you do not understand. "

Kate helped her on the train, and left her surrounded by her fashionablebags, her flowers, fruit, and literature. She took these things as amatter of course. She had looked at her smart little boots as sheadjusted them on a hassock and had smiled at Kate almost teasingly. 

"In a month, " she said, "I shall be walking with bared feet, or, if theweather demands, in sandals. I shall wear a rope about my waist over mybrown robe. My hair will be cut, my head coiffed. When you are thinkingof me, think of me as I really shall be. "

"So many things are going to happen that you will not see!" cried Kate. "Why, maybe in a little while we shall all be going up inflying-machines! You wouldn't like to miss that, would you? Or your sonwill be growing into a fine man and you'll not see him--nor the woman hemarries--nor his children. " She stopped, breathing hard. 

"It is like the sound of the surf on a distant shore, " smiled Mrs. Leger. "Good-bye, Miss Barrington. Don't grieve about me. I shall behappier than you can know or dream. "

The conductor swung Kate off the train after it was in motion. 

 * * * * *

So, among other things, she had that to think of. She could explain itall merely upon the hypothesis that the sound of the awakeningtrumpets--the trumpets which were arousing woman from her longtorpor--had not reached the place where this wistful woman dwelt, withher tender remorses, her delicate aversions, her hunger for theindefinite consolations of religion. 

Moreover, she was beginning to understand that not all women werematernal. She had, indeed, come across many incidents in her work whichemphasized this. Good mothers were quite as rare as good fathers; and itwas her growing belief that more than half of the parents in the worldwere undeserving of the children born to them. Also, she realized that achild might be born of the body and not of the spirit, and a mothermight minister well to a child's corporeal part without once ministeringto its soul. It was possible that there never had been any bond save aphysical one between Mrs. Leger and her son. Perhaps they looked at eachother with strange, uncomprehending eyes. That, she could imagine, wouldbe a tantalization from which a sensitive woman might well wish toescape. It was within the realm of possibility that he was happier withhis grandmother than with his mother. There might be temperamental aswell as physical "throwbacks. "

Kate remembered a scene she once had witnessed at a railway station. Twomeagre, hard-faced, work-worn women were superintending the removal of apine-covered coffin from one train to another, and as the grim box waswheeled the length of a long platform, a little boy, wild-eyed, gold-haired, and set apart from all the throng by a tragic misery, ranafter the truck calling in anguish:--

"Grandmother! Grandmother! Don't leave me! I'm so lonesome, grandmother! I'm so afraid!"

"Stop your noise, " commanded the woman who must have been his mother. "Don't you know she can't hear you?"

"Oh, maybe she can! Maybe she can, " sobbed the boy. "Oh, grandmother, don't you hear me calling? There's nobody left for me now. "

The woman caught him sharply by the arm. 

"I'm left, Jimmy. What makes you say such a thing as that? Stay withmother, that's a good boy. "

They were lifting the box into the baggage-car. The boy saw it. Hestraightened himself in the manner of one who tries to endure amortal wound. 

"She's gone, " he said. He looked at his mother once, as if measuring hervalue to him. Then he turned away. There was no comfort for him there. 

Often, since, Kate had wondered concerning the child. She had imaginedhis grim home, his barren days; the plain food; the compulsory task; thekind, yet heavy-handed, coarse-voiced mother. She was convinced that thegrandmother had been different. In the corner where she had sat, theremust have been warmth and welcome for the child. Perhaps there weremellow old tales, sweet old songs, soft strokings of the head, smuggledsweets--all the beautiful grandmotherly delights. 

XIII

Since Kate had begun to write, a hundred--a thousand--half-forgottenexperiences had come back to her. As they returned to her memory, theyacquired significance. They related themselves with other incidents orwith opinions. They illustrated life, and however negligible inthemselves, they attained a value because of their relation tothe whole. 

It was seldom that she felt lonely now. Her newly acquired power ofself-expression seemed to extend and supplement her personality. Augustvon Shierbrand had said that he wished to marry her because shecompleted him. It had occurred to her at the time--though she suppressedher inclination to say so--that she was born for other purposes thancompleting him, or indeed anybody. She wished to think of herself as anindividual, not as an addendum. But, after all, she had sympathized withthe man. She was beginning to understand that that "solitude of thesoul, " which one of her acquaintances, a sculptor, had put intopassionate marble, was caused from that sense of incompletion. It wasnot alone that others failed one--it was self-failure, secret shame, allthe inevitable reticences, which contributed most to that. 

She fell into the way of examining the men and women about her and ofasking:--

"Is he satisfied? Is she companioned? Has this one realized himself? Isthat one really living?"

She remembered one person--one only--who had given her the impression ofabounding physical, mental, and spiritual life. True, she had seen himbut a moment--one swift, absurd, curiously haunting moment. That wasKarl Wander, Honora's cousin, and the cousin of Mary Morrison. They werethe children of three sisters, and from what Kate knew of theirdescendants' natures, she felt these sisters must have been palpitatingcreatures. 

Yes, Karl Wander had seemed complete--a happy man, seething with plans, a wise man who took life as it came; a man of local qualities yet ofcosmopolitan spirit--one who would not have fretted at his environmentor counted it of much consequence, whatever it might have been. 

If she could have known him--

But Honora seldom spoke of him. Only sometimes she read a brief notefrom him, and added:--

"He wishes to be remembered to you, Kate. "

She did not hint: "He saw you only a second. " Honora was not one ofthose persons who take pleasure in pricking bubbles. She perceived thebeauty of iridescence. If her odd friend and her inexplicable cousin hadany satisfaction in remembering a passing encounter, they could havetheir pleasure of it. 

Kate, for her part, would not have confessed that she thought of him. But, curiously, she sometimes dreamed of him. 

At last Ray McCrea was coming home. His frequent letters, full of goodcomment, announced the fact. 

"I've been winning my spurs, commercially speaking, " he wrote. "The olddepartment heads, whom my father taught me to respect, seem pleased withwhat I have done. I believe that when I come back they will have ceasedto look on me as a cadet. And if they think I'm fit forresponsibilities, perhaps you will think so, too, Kate. At any rate, Iknow you'll let me say that I am horribly homesick. This being in aforeign land is all very well, but give me the good old American ways, crude though they may be. I want a straightforward confab with some oneof my own sort; I want the feeling that I can move around withouttreading on somebody's toes. I want, above all, to have a comfortableentertaining evening with a nice American girl--a girl that takesherself and me for granted, and isn't shying off all the time as if Iwere a sort of bandit. What a relief to think that you'll not beaccompanied by a chaperon! I shall get back my self-respect once I'mhome again with you nice, self-confident young American women. "

"It will be good to see him, I believe, " mused Kate. "After all, healways looked after me. I can't seem to remember just how much pleasureI had in his society. At any rate, we'll have plenty of things to talkabout. He'll tell me about Europe, and I'll tell him about my work. Thatought to carry us along quite a while. "

She set about making preparations for him. She induced Honora to lether have an extra room, and she made her fine front chamber into asitting-room, with a knocker on the door, and some cheerful brasses andold prints within. She came across oddities of this sort in her Russianand Italian neighborhoods, but until now she had not taken very muchinterest in what she was inclined to term "sublimated junk. "

Mary Morrison took an almost vicious amusement in Kate's sudden effortsat aesthetic domestication, and Marna Fitzgerald--who wasdelighted--considered it as a frank confession of sentiment. Kate letthem think what they pleased. She presented to their inspection--evenMary was invited up for the occasion--a cheerful room with a creampaper, a tawny-colored rug, some comfortable wicker chairs, aninteresting plaster cast or two, and the previously mentioned "loot. "Mary, in a fit of friendliness, contributed a Japanese wall-basketdripping with vines; Honora proffered a lamp with a soft shade; andMarna took pride in bestowing some delicately embroidered cushions, white, and beautiful with the beauty of Belfast linen. 

It did not appear to occur to Kate, however, that personal adornmentwould be desirable, and it took the united efforts of Marna and Mary topersuade her that a new frock or two might be needed. Kate had a way ofavoiding shabbiness, but of late her interest in decoration had beenanything but keen. However, she ventured now on a rather beguilingdress for evening--a Japanese crêpe which a returned missionary sold herfor something more than a song. Dr. Von Shierbrand said it was the colorof rust, but Marna affirmed that it had the hue of copper--copper thatwas not too bright. It was embroidered gloriously with chrysanthemums, and she had great pleasure in it. Mary Morrison drew from her rainbowcollection a scarf which accentuated the charm of the frock, and whenKate had contrived a monk's cape of brown, she was ready for possibleentertainments--panoplied for sentiment. She would make no furtherconcessions. Her practical street clothes and her home-made frocks ofwhite linen, with which she made herself dainty for dinner at Mrs. Dennison's, had to serve her. 

"I'm so poor, " she said to Marna, "that I feel like apologizing for myinefficiency. I'm getting something now for my talks at the clubs, andI'm paid for my writing, too. Now that it's begun to be published, Iought to be opulent presently. "

"You're no poorer than we, " Marna said. "But of course there are two ofus to be poor together; and that makes it more interesting. "

"Love doesn't seem to be flying out of your window, " smiled Kate. 

"We've bars on the windows, " laughed Marna. "Some former occupant of theflat put them on to keep the babies from dashing their brains out on thepavement below, and we haven't taken them off. " She blushed. "No, "responded Kate with a _moue_; "what was the use?"

 * * * * *

Unfortunately McCrea, the much-expected, had not made it quite plainwhen he was to land in New York. To be sure, Kate might have consultedthe steamer arrivals, but she forgot to do that. So it happened thatwhen a wire came from Ray saying that he would be in Chicago on acertain Saturday night in mid-May, Kate found herself under compulsionto march in a suffrage procession. 

David Fulham thought the circumstance uproariously funny, and he toldthem about it at the Caravansary. They made rather an annoying jest ofit, but Kate held to her promise. 

"It's an historic event to my mind, " she said with all the dignity shecould summon. "I wouldn't excuse myself if I could. And I can't. I'vepromised to march at the head of a division. We hope there'll be twentythousand of us. "

Perhaps there were. Nobody knew. But all the city did know that down thebroad boulevard, in the mild, damp air of the May night, regiment uponregiment of women marched to bear witness to their conviction and theirhope. Bands played, choruses sang, transparencies proclaimed watchwords, and every woman in the seemingly endless procession swung a yellowlantern. The onlookers crowded the sidewalks and hung from the toweringoffice buildings, to watch that string of glowing amber beads reachingaway to north and to south. College girls, working-girls, home-women, fine ladies, efficient business women, vague, non-producing, half-awakened women, --all sorts, all conditions, black, white, Latin, Slav, Germanic, English, American, American, American, --they camemarching on. They were proud and they were diffident; they were sad andthey were merry; they were faltering and they were enthusiastic. Somewere there freely, splendidly, exultantly; more were there because someforce greater than themselves impelled them. Through bewilderment andhesitancy and doubt, they saw the lights of the future shining, and theyfixed their eyes upon the amber lanterns as upon the visible symbols oftheir faith; they marched and marched. They were the members of a newrevolution, and, as always, only a portion of the revolutionists knewcompletely what they desired. 

At the Caravansary there had been sharp disapproval of the whole thing. The men had brought forth arguments to show Kate her folly. Mrs. Dennison, Mrs. Goodrich, and Mrs. Applegate had spoken gentle words ofwarning; Honora had vaguely suggested that the matter was immaterial;Mary Morrison had smiled as one who avoided ugliness; and Kate hadlaughingly defied them. 

"I march!" she had declared. "And I'm not ashamed of my company. "

It was, indeed, a company of which she was proud. It included the namesof the most distinguished, the most useful, the most talented, the mostexclusive, and the most triumphantly inclusive women in the city. 

"Poor McCrea, " put in Fulham. "Aren't you making him ridiculous? He'llcome dashing up here the moment he gets off the train. As a matter offact, he'll be half expecting you to meet him. You're making a mistake, Miss Barrington, if you'll let a well-meaning fellow-being say so. You're leaving the substance for the shadow. "

"I've misled you about Ray, I'm afraid, " Kate said with unexpectedpatience. "He hasn't really any right to expect me to be waiting, and Idon't believe he will. Come to think of it, I don't know that I want tobe found waiting. "

"Oh, well, of course--" said Fulham with a shrug, leaving his sentenceunfinished. 

"Anyway, " said Kate flushing, "I march!"

 * * * * *

They told her afterward how McCrea had come toof-toofing up to the doorin a taxi, and how he had taken the steps two at a time. 

"He wrung my hand, " said Honora, "and got through the preliminaryamenities with a dispatch I never have seen excelled. Then he demandedyou. 'Is she upstairs?' he asked. 'May I go right up? She wrote me shehad a parlor of her own. ' 'She has a parlor, ' I said, 'but she isn't init. ' He balanced on the end of a toe. 'Where is she?' I thought he wasgoing to fly. 'She's out with the suffragists, ' I said. I didn't try toexcuse you. I thought you deserved something pretty bad. But I did tellhim you'd promised to go and that you hadn't known he was coming thatday. 'She's in that mess?' he cried. 'I saw the Amazon march as I camealong. You don't mean Kate's tramping the streets with those women!''Yes, she is, ' I said, 'and she's proud to do it. But she was sorry notto be here to welcome you. ' 'Sorry!' he said; 'why, Mrs. Fulham, I'vebeen dreaming of this meeting for months. ' Honestly, Kate, I was ashamedfor you. I asked him in. I told him you'd be home before long. But hewould not come in. 'Tell her I--I came, ' he said. Then he went. "

It was late at night, and Kate was both worn and exhilarated with hermarching. Honora's words let her down considerably. She sat with tearsin her eyes staring at her friend. 

"But couldn't he see, " she pleaded, "that I had to keep my word? Didn'the understand how important it was? I can see him to-morrow justas well. "

"Then you'll have to send for him, " said Honora decisively. "He'll notcome without urging. "

She went up to bed with a stern aspect, and left Kate sitting staringbefore her by the light of one of Mary's foolish candles. 

"They seem to think I'm a very unnatural woman, " said Kate to herself. "But can't they see how much more important it was that thedemonstration should be a success than that two lovers should meet at acertain hour?"

The word "lovers" had slipped inadvertently into her mind; and nosooner had she really recognized it, looked at it, so to speak, fairlyin the face, than she rejected it with scorn. 

"We're just friends, " she protested. "One has many friends. "

But her little drawing-room, all gay and fresh, accused her of deceivingherself; and a glimpse of the embroidered frock reminded her that shewas contemptibly shirking the truth. One did not make such preparationsfor a mere "friend. " She sat down and wrote a note, put stamps on it toinsure its immediate delivery, and ran out to the corner to mail it. Then she fell asleep arguing with herself that she had been right, andthat he ought to understand what it meant to give one's word, and thatit could make no difference that they were to meet a few hours laterinstead of at the impetuous moment of his arrival. 

 * * * * *

She spent the next day at the Juvenile Court, and came home with theconviction that there ought to be no more children until all those nowwandering the hard ways of the world were cared for. She was in no moodfor sweethearting, yet she looked with some covert anxiety at themail-box. There was an envelope addressed to her, but the superscriptionwas not in Ray's handwriting. The Colorado stamp gave her a hint of whomit might have come from, and ridiculously she felt her heart quickening. Yet why should Karl Wander write to her? She made herself walk slowlyup the stairs, and insisted that her hat and gloves and jacket should beput scrupulously in their places before she opened her letter. It provednot to be a letter, after all, but only a number of photographs, takenevidently by the sender, who gave no word of himself. He let thesnow-capped solitary peaks utter his meanings for him. The pictures werebeautiful and, in some indescribable way, sad--cold and isolate. Kateran her fingers into the envelope again and again, but she coulddiscover no note there. Neither was there any name, save her own onthe cover. 

"At least, " said Kate testily, "I might have been told whom to thank. "

But she knew whom to thank--and she knew with equal positiveness thatshe would send no thanks. For the gift had been a challenge. It seemedto say: "I dare you to open communication with me. I dare you to breakthe conscious silence between us!"

Kate did not lift the glove that had been thrown down. She hid thephotographs in her clock and told no one about them. 

At the close of the third day a note came from Ray. Her line, he said, had followed him to Lake Forest and he had only then found time toanswer it. He was seeing old friends and was very much occupied withbusiness and with pleasure, but he hoped to see her before long. Katelaughed aloud at the rebuff. It was, she thought, a sort of Silvertreemethod of putting her in her place. But she was sorry, too, --sorry forhis hurt; sorry, indefinitely and indescribably, for something missed. If it had been Karl Wander whom she had treated like that he would havewaited on her doorstep till she came, and if he had felt himselfentitled to a quarrel, he would have "had it out" before men and thehigh gods. 

At least, so she imagined he would have done; but upon considerationthere were few persons in the world about whom she knew less than aboutKarl Wander. It seemed as if Honora were actually perverse in the wayshe avoided his name. 

XIV

The spring was coming. Signs of it showed at the park edges, where thehigh willow hedges began to give forth shoots of yellowish-green; attimes the lake was opalescent and the sky had moments of tenderness andwarmth. Even through the pavement one seemed to scent the earth; and theflower shops set up their out-of-door booths and solicited the passer-bywith blossoms. 

When Kate could spare the money, she bought flowers for Marna--for itwas flower-time with Marna, and she had seen the Angel of theAnnunciation. All that was Celtic in her was coming uppermost. Shedreamed and brooded and heard voices. Kate liked to sit in the littleWest-Side flat and be comforted of the happiness there. She was feelingvery absurd herself, and she was ashamed of her excursion into therealms of feminine folly. That was the way she put her defection from"common sense, " and her little flare of sentiment for Ray, and all herbreathless, ridiculous preparation for him. She had never worn thechrysanthemum dress, and she so loathed the sight of it that she boxedit and put it in the bottom of her trunk. 

No word came from Ray. "Sometime" had not materialized and he had failedto call. His name was much in the papers as "best man" or cotillionleader or host at club dinners. He moved in a world of which Kate sawnothing--a rather competitive world, where money counted and where therewas a brisk exchange of social amenities. Kate's festivities consistedof settlement dinners and tea here and there, at odd, interesting placeswith fellow "welfare workers"; and now and then she went with Honora tosome University affair. A great many ladies sent her cards to their"afternoons"--ladies whom she met at the home of the President of theUniversity, or with whom she came in contact at Hull House or some ofthe other settlements. But such diversions she was obliged to denyherself. They would have taken time from her too-busy hours; and she hadnot the strength to do her work according to her conscience, and then todrag herself halfway across town, merely for the amiability of makingher bow and eating an ice in a charming house. Not but that she enjoyedthe atmosphere of luxury--the elusive sense of opulence given her by theflowers, the distant music, the smiling, luxurious, complimentary women, the contrast between the glow within and the chill of twilightwithout--twilight sparkling with the lights of the waiting motors, andthe glittering procession on the Drive. But, after all, while othersrode, she walked, and sometimes she was very weary. To be sure, she wastoo gallant, too much at ease in her entertaining world, too expectantof the future, to fret even for a moment about the fact that she waswalking while others rode. She hardly gave it a thought. But herdisadvantages made her unable to cope with other women socially. Shewas, as she often said, fond of playing a game; but the social gamepushed the point of achievement a trifle too far. 

Moreover, there was the mere bother of "dressing the part. " Her handsomeheavy shoes, her strong, fashionable street gloves, her well-cared-forstreet frock, and becoming, practical hat she could obtain and maintainin freshness. She was "well-groomed" and made a sort of point of lookingcompetent, as if she felt mistress of herself and her circumstances; shecould even make herself dainty for a little dinner, but the silks andfurs, the prodigality of yard-long gloves, the fetching boots andwhimsical jewels of the ladies who made a fine art of feminineentertainments, were quite beyond her. So, sensibly, she counted itall out. 

That Ray was at home in such surroundings, and that, had she beenwilling to give him the welcome he expected, she might have had awelcome at these as yet unopened doors through which he passed withconscious suavity, sometimes occurred to her. She was but human--and butwoman--and she could not be completely oblivious to such things. Butthey did not, after all, wear a very alluring aspect. 

When she dreamed of being happy, as she often did, it was not amid suchscenes. Sometimes, when she was half-sleeping, and vague visions of joyhaunted the farther chambers of her brain, she saw herself walkingamong mountains. The setting sun glittered on distant, splendid snows;the torrent rushed by her, filling the world with its clamor; beneathlay the valley, and through the gathering gloom she could see the lightof homes. Then, as sleep drew nearer and the actual world slippedfarther away, she seemed to be treading the path--homeward--with somecompanion. Which of those lights spelled home for her she did not know, and whenever she tried to see the face of her companion, the shadowsgrew deeper, --as deep as oblivion, --and she slept. 

She was lonely. She felt she had missed much in missing Ray. She knewher friends disapproved of her; and she was profoundly ashamed that theyshould have seen her in that light, expectant hour in which she awaitedthis lover who appeared to be no lover, after all. But she deserved herhumiliation. She had conducted herself like the expectant bride, and shehad no right to any such attitude because her feelings were not thoseof a bride. 

The thing that she did desperately care about just now was thefitting-up of a home for mothers and babes in the Wisconsin woods. Itwas to be a place where the young Polish mothers of a part of herdistrict could go and forget the belching horror of the steel mills, andthe sultry nights in the crowded, vermin-haunted homes. She hoped formuch from it--much more than the physical recuperation, though that wasnot to be belittled. There was some hitch, at the last, about theendowment. A benevolent spinster had promised to remember theprospective home in her will and neglected to do so and now there wereseveral thousands to be collected from some unknown source. Kate wasabsorbed with that when she was not engaged with her regular work. Moreover, she made a point of being absorbed. She could not endure thethought that she might be going about with a love-lorn, he-cometh-notexpression. 

 * * * * *

Life has a way of ambling withal for a certain time, and then ofbreaking into a headlong gallop--bolting free--plunging to catastropheor liberty. Kate went her busy ways for a fortnight, somewhat chastenedin spirit, secretly a little ashamed, and altogether very determined tomake such a useful person of herself that she could forget her apparentlack of attractions (for she told herself mercilessly that if she hadbeen very much desired by Ray he would not have been able to leave herupon so slight a provocation). Then, one day, --it was the last day ofMay and the world had rejuvenated itself, --she came across him. 

A more unlikely place hardly could have been chosen for their meetingthan an "isle of safety" in mid-street, with motors hissing andtoof-toofing round about, policemen gesticulating, and the crowdceaselessly surging. The two were marooned with twenty others, and metface to face, squarely, like foes who set themselves to combat. At firsthe tried not to see her, and she, noting his impulse, thought it wouldbe the part of propriety not to see him. Then that struck her as sofutile, so childish, so altogether a libel on the good-fellowship whichthey had enjoyed in the old days, that she held out her hand. 

He swept his hat from his head and grasped the extended hand in aviolent yet tremulous clutch. 

"We seem to be going in opposite directions, " she said. There was just ahint of a rising inflection in the accent. 

He laughed with nervous delight. 

"We are going the same way, " he declared. "That's a well-establishedfact. "

An irritable policeman broke in on them with:--

"Do you people want to get across the street or not?"

"Personally, " said McCrea, smiling at him, "I'm not particular. "

The policeman was Irish and he liked lovers. He thought he was lookingat a pair of them. 

"Well, it's not the place I'd be choosing for conversation, sir, " hesaid. 

"Right you are, " agreed Ray. "I suppose you'd prefer a lane inBallamacree?"

"Yes, sir. Good luck to you, sir. "

"Same to you, " called back Ray. 

He and Kate swung into the procession on the boulevard. Kate was smilinghappily. 

"You haven't changed a bit!" she cried. "You keep right on enjoyingyourself, don't you?"

"Not a bit of it, " retorted Ray indignantly. "I've been miserable! Youknow I have. The only satisfaction I got at all was in hoping I wasmaking you miserable, too. Was I?"

"I wouldn't own to it if you had, " said Kate. "Shall we forgive eachother?"

"Do you want it to be as easy as that--after all we've been through?Wouldn't it be more satisfactory to quarrel?"

"You can if you want, of course, " Kate laughed. "But hadn't it better bewith some other person? Really, I wanted to see you dreadfully--or, atleast, I wanted to see you pleasantly. I had made preparations. Youdidn't let me know when to expect you, and I had an engagement when youdid come. Weren't you foolish to get in a rage?"

"But I was so frightfully disappointed. I expected so much and I hadexpected it so long. "

"Ray!" Her voice was almost stern, and he turned to look at her halfwith amusement, half with apprehension. "Expect nothing. Enjoyyourself to-day. "

"But how can I enjoy myself to-day unless I am made to understand thatthere is something I may expect from you? Circumstances have kept usplaying fast and loose long enough. Can't we come to anunderstanding, Kate?"

Kate stopped to look in a florist's window and fixed her eyes upon avast bouquet of pale pink roses. 

"Do say something, " he said after a time. "Shall I speak from theheart?"

"Oh, yes, please. " He drew his breath in sharply between his teeth. 

"Well, then, I'm not ready to give up my free life, Ray. I can't seem tosee my way to relinquishing any part of my liberty. I think you knowwhy. I've told you everything in my letters. I feel too experimental tosettle down. "

"You don't love me!"

"Did I ever say I did?"

"You gave me to understand that you might. "

"You wanted me to try. "

"But you haven't succeeded? Then, for heaven's sake, let me go and makeout some other programme for myself. I've come back to you because Icouldn't be satisfied away from you. I've seen women, if it comes tothat, --cities of women. But there's no one like you, Kate, to my mind;no one who so makes me enjoy the hour, or so plan for the future. Eversince that day when you stood up by the C Bench and fought for the rightof women to sit on it, --that silly old C Bench, --I've liked your warringspirit. And I come back, by Jove, to find you marching with the militantwomen! Well, I didn't know whether to laugh or swear! Anyway, you dobeat the world. "

"A pretty sweetheart I'd make, " cried Kate, disgusted with herself. "I'monly good to provide you with amusement, it seems. "

"You provide me with the breath of life! Heavens, what a spring youhave when you walk! And you 're as straight as a grenadier. I'm so sickof seeing slouching, die-away women! It's only you American women whoknow how to carry yourselves. Oh, Kate, if you can't answer me, don't, but let me see you once in a while. I'm a weak character, and I've gotto enjoy your society a little longer. "

"You can enjoy as much of it as you please, only you mustn't be holdingme up to some tremendous responsibility, and blaming me by and by forthings I can't help. "

"I give you my word I'll not. Oh, Kate, is this a busy day with you?Can't you come out into the country somewhere? We could take theelectric and in an hour we'd be out where we could see orchardsin bloom. "

"I _could_ go, " mused Kate. "I've a half-holiday coming to me, andreally, if I were to take it to-day, no one would care. "

"The ayes have it! Let us go to the station-I'll buy plenty of ticketsand we can get off at any place where the climate seems mild and thenatives kind. "

 * * * * *

It proved to be a day of encounters. 

They had traveled well beyond the city, past the straggling suburbs andthe comfortable, friendly old villages, some of which antedated the cityof which they were now the fringe, and had reached the wider sweeps ofthe prairie, with the fine country homes of those who sought privacy. At length they came to a junction of the road. 

"All out here for--"

They could not catch the name. 

"Isn't that where we're going?" laughed Kate. 

"Of course it is, " Ray responded. 

They hastened out and looked about them for the train they had supposedwould be in waiting. It was not yet in, however, but was showing itsdark nose a mile or two down the track. 

"I must see about our tickets, " said Ray. "Perhaps we'll have to buyothers. "

Kate had been standing with her back to the ticket station window, butnow she turned, and through the ticker-seller's window envisaged thepale, bitterly sullen face of Lena Vroom. It looked sunken and curiouslyalien, as if its possessor felt herself unfriended of all the world. 

"Lena!" cried Kate, too startled to use tact or to wait for Lena to givethe first sign of recognition. 

Lena nodded coolly. 

"Oh, is this where you are?" cried Kate. "We've looked everywhere foryou. "

"If I'd wanted to be found, I could have been, you know. " The tone wasmuffled and pitifully insolent. 

"You are living out here?"

"I live a few miles from here. "

"And you like the work? Is it--is it well with you, Lena?"

"It will never be well with me, and you know it. I broke down, that'sall. I can't stand anything now that takes thought. This just suitsme--a little mechanical work like this. I'm not fit to talk, Kate. You'll have to excuse me. It upsets me. I'm ordered to keep very quiet. If I get upset, I'll not be fit even for this. "

"I'll go, " said Kate contritely. "And I'll tell no one. " She battled tokeep the tears from her eyes. "Only tell me, need you work at all? Ithought you had enough to get along on, Lena. You often told meso--forgive me, but we've _been_ close friends, you know, even if wearen't now. "

"My money's gone, " said Lena in a dead voice. "I used up my principal. It wasn't much. I'm in debt, too, and I've got to get that paid off. ButI've a comfortable place to live, Kate, with a good motherly Germanwoman. I tell you for your peace of mind, because I know you--you alwaysthink you have to be affectionate and to care about what people aredoing. But you'll serve me best by leaving me alone. Understand?"

"Oh, Lena, yes! I'll not come near you, but I can't help thinking aboutyou. And I beg and pray you to write me if you need me at any time. "

"I can't talk about anything any more. It tires me. There's your train. "

Ray bought his tickets to nowhere in particular. The little train cameon like a shuttle through the blue loom of the air; they got on, andwere shot forward through bright green fields, past expectant grovesand flowering orchards, cheered by the elate singing ofinnumerable birds. 

Ray had recognized Lena, but Kate refused to discuss her. 

"Life has hurt her, " she said, "and she's in hiding like a woundedanimal. I couldn't talk about her. I--I love her. It's like that withme. Once I've loved a person, I can't get it out of my system. "

She was staring from the window, trying to get back her happiness. Raysnatched her hand and held it in a crushing grip. 

"For God's sake, Kate, try to love me, then!" he whispered. 

It was spring all about them, --"the pretty ring-time, "--and she had justseen what it was to be a defeated and unloved woman. She felt a thrillgo through her, and she turned an indiscreetly bright face upon hercompanion. 

"Don't expect too much, " she whispered back, "but I _will_ try. "

They went on, almost with the feeling that they were in Arcadia, anddrew up at a platform in the midst of woods, through which they couldsee a crooked trail winding. 

"Here's our place!" cried Ray. "Don't you recognize it? Not that you'veever seen it before. "

They dashed, laughing, from the train, and found themselves a minutelater in a bird-haunted solitude, among flowers, at the beginning of thewoodland walk. There seemed to be no need to comment upon the beauty ofthings. It was quite enough that the bland, caressing air beat upontheir cheeks in playful gusts, that the robins gave no heed to them, andthat "the little gray leaves were kind" to them. 

Never was there a more capricious trail than the one they set themselvesto follow. It skirted the edge of a little morass where the young flagswere coming up; it followed the windings of a brook where the wildforget-me-not threw up its little azure buds; it crossed the stream adozen times by means of shaking bridges, or fallen trees; it hadmagnificent gateways between twin oaks--gateways to yet pleasanterreaches of leaving woodland. 

"Whatever can it lead to?" wondered Kate. 

"To some new kind of Paradise, perhaps, " answered Ray. "And see, someone has been before us! Hush--"

He drew her back into the bushes at the side, beneath a low-hangingwillow. A man and a woman were coming toward them. The woman was walkingfirst, treading proudly, her head thrown back, her body in splendidmotion, like that of an advancing Victory. The man, taller than she, wasresting one hand upon her shoulder. He, too, looked like one who hadmastered the elements and who felt the pangs of translation into somemore ethereal and liberating world. As they came on, proud as Adam andEve in the first days of their existence, Kate had a blindingrecognition of them. They were David Fulham and Mary Morrison. 

She looked once, saw their faces shining with pagan joy, and, turningher gaze from them, sank on the earth behind the screen of bushes. Rayperceived her desire to remain unseen, and stepped behind thewide-girthed oak. The two passed them, still treading that proud step. When they were gone, Kate arose and led the way on along the path. Shewished to turn back, but she dared not, fearing to meet the others onthe station platform. Ray had recognized Fulham, but he did not know hiscompanion, and Kate would not tell him. 

"What a fool!" he said. "I thought he loved his wife. She's a finewoman. "

"He loves his wife, " affirmed Kate stalwartly. "But there's a hedonisticfervor in him. He's--"

"He's a fool!" reaffirmed Ray. "Shall we talk of something else?"

"By all means, " agreed Kate. 

They tried, but the glory of the day was slain. They had seen theserpent in their Eden--and where there is one reptile there may alwaysbe another. 

When they thought it discreet, they went back to the junction. LenaVroom was still there. She was nibbling at some dry-looking sandwiches. Her glance forbade them to say anything personal to her, and Kate, witha clutch at the heart, passed her by as if she had been anyticket-seller. 

She wondered if any one, seeing that gray-faced, heavy-eyed woman, woulddream of her so dearly won Ph. D. Or of the Phi Beta Kappa key which shehad won but not claimed! She had not even dared to converse, lest Lena'sfragile self-possession should break. She evidently was in the clutchesof nervous fatigue and was fighting it with her last remnant of courage. Even the veriest layman could guess as much. 

Kate hastened home, and as she opened the door she heard the voice ofHonora mingled with the happy cries of the twins. They were down in thedrawing-room, and Honora had bought some colored balloons for them, andwas running to and fro with them in her hand, while Patience andPatricia shrieked with delight. 

"What a lovely day it's been, hasn't it?" Honora queried, pausing in herplay. "I've so longed to be in the country, but matters had reached sucha critical point at the laboratory that I couldn't get away. Do youknow, Kate, the great experiment that David and I are making is muchfurther along than he surmises! I'm going to have a glorious surprisefor him one of these days. Business took him over to the Academy ofScience to-day and I was so glad of it. It gave me the laboratory quiteto myself. But really, I've got to get out into the country. I'm goingto ask David if he won't take me next Sunday. "

Kate felt herself growing giddy. She dared not venture to reply. Shekissed the babies and sped up to her room. But Honora's happy laughterfollowed her even there. Then suddenly there was a scurrying. Kateguessed that David was coming. The babies were being carried up to thenursery lest they should annoy him. 

Kate beat the wall with her fists. 

"Fool! Fool!" she cried. "Why didn't she let him see her laughing anddancing like that? Why didn't she? She'll come down all prim and staidfor him and he'll never dream what she really is like. Oh, how can shebe so blind? I don't know how to stand it! And I don't know what to do!Why isn't there some one to tell me what I ought to do?"

Mary Morrison was late to dinner. She said she had run across an oldCalifornian friend and they had been having tea together and seeing theshops. She had no appetite for dinner, which seemed to carry out herstory. Her eyes were as brilliant as stars, and a magnetic atmosphereseemed to emanate from her. The men all talked to her. They seemeddisturbed--not themselves. There was something in her glowing lips, inher swimming glance, in the slow beauty of her motions, that called tothem like the pipes o' Pan. She was as pagan and as beautiful as thespring, and she brought to them thoughts of elemental joys. It was asif, sailing a gray sea, they had come upon a palm-shaded isle, andglimpsed Calypso lying on the sun-dappled grass. 

XV

That night Kate said she would warn Honora; but in the morning she foundherself doubtful of the wisdom of such a course. Or perhaps she reallylacked the courage for it. At any rate, she put it off. She contemplatedtalking to Mary Morrison, and of appealing to her honor, or hercompassion, and of advising her to go away. But Mary was much from homenowadays, and Kate, who had discouraged an intimacy, did not know how tocultivate it at this late hour. Several days went by with Kate in atumult of indecision. Sometimes she decided that the romance betweenMary and David was a mere spring madness, which would wear itself outand do little damage. At other moments she felt it was laid upon her tospeak and avert a catastrophe. 

Then, in the midst of her indecision, she was commanded to go toWashington to attend a national convention of social workers. She was torepresent the Children's Protective Agency, and to give an account ofthe method of its support and of its system of operation. She wassurprised and gratified at this invitation, for she had had no idea thather club and settlement-house addresses had attracted attention to thatextent. She made so little effort when she spoke that she could not feelmuch respect for her achievement. It was as if she were talking to afriend, and the size of her audience in no way affected herneighborly accent. 

She did not see that it was precisely this thing which was winning favorfor her. Her lack of self-consciousness, her way of telling peopleprecisely what they wished to know about the subject in hand, her senseof values, which enabled her to see that a human fact is the mostinteresting thing in the world, were what counted for her. If she hadbeen "better trained, " and more skilled in the dreary and oftenmeaningless science of statistics, or had become addicted to thebenevolent jargon talked by many welfare workers, her array of factswould have fallen on more or less indifferent ears. But she offered notvital statistics, but vital documents. She talked in personalities--inpersonalities so full of meaning that, concrete as they were, they tookon general significance--they had the effect of symbols. She furnishedwatchwords for her listeners, and she did it unconsciously. She wouldhave been indignant if she had been told how large a part her educationin Silvertree played in her present aptitude. She had grown up in a townwhich feasted on dramatic gossip, and which thrived upon the specificpersonal episode. To the vast and terrific city, and to her portion ofthe huge task of mitigating the woe of its unfit, Kate brought thequality which, undeveloped, would have made of her no more than anentertaining village gossip. 

What stories there were to tell! What stories of bravery in defeat, offaith in the midst of disaster, of family devotion in spite of squalorand subterfuges and all imaginable shiftlessness and shiftiness. 

Kate had got hold of the idea of the universality of life--theuniversality of joy and pain and hope. She was finding it easy now toforgive "the little brothers" for all possible perversity, all defects, all ingratitude. Wayward children they might be, --children uninstructedin the cult of goodness, happiness, serenity, --but outside the pale ofhuman consideration they could not be. The greater their fault thegreater their need. Kate was learning, in spite of her native impatienceand impulsiveness, to be very patient. She was becoming the defender ofthose who stumbled, the explainer of those who themselves lackedexplanations or who were too defiant to give them. 

So she was going to Washington. She was to talk on a proposed school forthe instruction of mothers. She often had heard her father say that agood mother was an exception. She had not believed him--had taken it forgranted that this idea of his was a part of his habitual pessimism. Butsince she had come up to the city and become an officer of theChildren's Protective Association, she had changed her mind, and anumber of times she had been on the point of writing to her father totell him that she was beginning to understand his point of view. 

This idea of a school for mothers had been her own, originally, and adevelopment of the little summer home for Polish mothers which she hadhelped to establish. She had proposed it, half in earnest, merely, atHull House on a certain occasion when there were a number of influentialpersons present. It had appealed to them, however, as a practical meansof remedying certain difficulties daily encountered. 

Just how large a part Jane Addams had played in the enlightenment ofKate's mind and the dissolution of her inherent exclusiveness, Katecould not say. Sometimes she gave the whole credit to her. For here wasa woman with a genius for inclusiveness. She was the sister of all men. If a youth sinned, she asked herself if she could have played any partin the prevention of that sin had she had more awareness, moresolicitude. It was she who had, more than others, --though there was agreat army of men and women of good will to sustain her, --promulgatedthis idea of responsibility. A city, she maintained, was a great home. She demanded, then, to know if the house was made attractive, instructive, protective. Was it so conducted that the wayward sons anddaughters, as well as the obedient ones, could find safety and happinesswithin it? Were the privileges only for the rich, the effective, and theout-reaching? Or were they for those who lacked the courage to put outtheir hands for joy and knowledge? Were they for those who had not yetlearned the tongue of the family into which they had newly entered? Werethey for those who fought the rules and shirked the cares and dug forthemselves a pit of sorrow? She believed they were for all. She couldnot countenance disinheritance. Yes, always, in high places and low, among friends and enemies, this sad, kind, patient, quiet woman, JaneAddams, of Hull House, had preached the indissolubility of the civicfamily. Kate had listened and learned. Nay, more, she had added her owninterpretations. She was young, strong, brave, untaught by rebuff, andshe had the happy and beautiful insolence of those who have not knowndefeat. She said things Jane Addams would have hesitated to say. Shelacked the fine courtesy of the elder woman; but she made, for that veryreason, a more dramatic propaganda. 

 * * * * *

Kate had known what it was to tramp the streets in rain and wind; shehad known what it was to face infection and drunken rage; she had lookedon sights both piteous and obscene; but she had now begun--and much, much sooner than was usual with workers in her field--to reap some ofthe rewards of toil. 

Soon or late things in this life resolve themselves into a question ofpersonality. History and art, success and splendor, plenitude and power, righteousness and immortal martyrdom, are all, in the last resolve, personality and nothing more. Kate was having her swift rewards becauseof that same indescribable, incontestable thing. The friendship ofremarkable women and men--women, particularly--was coming to her. Finethings were being expected of her. She had a vitality which indicatedgenius--that is, if genius is intensity, as some hold. At any rate, shewas vividly alert, naturally eloquent, physically capable of impressingher personality upon others. 

She thought little of this, however. She merely enjoyed the rewards asthey came, and she was unfeignedly surprised when, on her way toWashington, whither she traveled with many others, her society wassought by those whom she had long regarded with something akin to awe. She did not guess how her enthusiasm and fresh originality stimulatedpersons of lower vitality and more timid imagination. 

At Washington she had a signal triumph. The day of her speech found thehall in which the convention was held crowded with a company includingmany distinguished persons--among them, the President of the UnitedStates. Kate had expected to suffer rather badly from stage fright, buta sense of her opportunity gave her courage. She talked, in her direct"Silvertree method, " as Marna called it, of the ignorance of mothers, the waste of children, the vast economic blunder which for one reasonand another even the most progressive of States had been so slow toperceive. She said that if the commercial and agricultural interests ofthe country were fostered and protected, why should not the mostvaluable product of all interests, human creatures, be given at least anequal amount of consideration. In her own way, which by a happyinstinct never included what was hackneyed, she drew a picture of thepotentialities of the child considered merely from an economic point ofview, and in impulsive words she made plain the need for a bureau, whichshe suggested should be virtually a part of the governmental structure, in which should be vested authority for the care of children, --theBureau of Children, she denominated it, --a scientific extension ofmotherhood!

It seemed a part of the whole stirring experience that she should beasked with several others to lunch at the White House with the Presidentand his wife. The President, it appeared, was profoundly interested. Aquiet man, with a judicial mind, he perceived the essential truth ofKate's propaganda. He had, indeed, thought of something similar himself, though he had not formulated it. He went so far as to express a desirethat this useful institution might attain realization while he was yetin the presidential chair. 

"I would like to ask you unofficially, Miss Barrington, " he said atparting, "if you are one to whom responsibility is agreeable?"

"Oh, " cried Kate, taken aback, "how do I know? I am so young, Mr. President, and so inexperienced!"

"We must all be that at some time or other, " smiled the President. "Butit is in youth that the ideas come; and enthusiasm has a value which isoften as great as experience. "

"Ideas are accidents, Mr. President, " answered Kate. "It doesn't followthat one can carry out a plan because she has seen a vision. "

"No, " admitted the President, shaking hands with her. "But you don'tlook to me like a woman who would let a vision go to waste. You willfollow it up with all the power that is in you. "

 * * * * *

It happened that Kate's propaganda appealed to the popular imagination. The papers took it up; they made much of the President's interest in it;they wrote articles concerning the country girl who had come up to town, and who, with a simple faith and courage, had worked among theunfortunate and the delinquent, and whose native eloquence had made hera favorite with critical audiences. They printed her picture andidealized her in the interests of news. 

A lonely, gruff old man in Silvertree read of it, and when the drawncurtains had shut him away from the scrutiny of his neighbors, he walkedthe floor, back and forth, following the worn track in the dingycarpet, thinking. 

They talked of it at the Caravansary, and were proud; and many men andwomen who had met her by chance, or had watched her with interest, openly rejoiced. 

"They're coming on, the Addams breed of citizens, " said they. "Here's anew one with the trick--whatever it is--of making us think and care andlisten. She's getting at the roots of our disease, and it's partlybecause she's a woman. She sees that it has to be right with thechildren if it's to be right with the family. Long live theAddams breed!"

Friends wired their congratulations, and their comments were none theless acceptable because they were premature. Many wrote her; Ray McCrea, alone, of her intimate associates, was silent. Kate guessed why, but shelacked time to worry. She only knew that her great scheme wasafoot--that it went. But she would have been less than mortal if she hadnot felt a thrill of commingled apprehension and satisfaction at thefact that Kate Barrington, late of Silvertree and its gossiping, hectoring, wistful circles, was in the foreground. She had had an Ideawhich could be utilized in the high service of the world, and the mostutilitarian and idealistic public in the world had seized upon it. 

So, naturally enough, the affairs of Honora Fulham became somewhatblurred to Kate's perception. Besides, she was unable to decide what todo. She had heard that one should never interfere between husband andwife. Moreover, she was very young, and she believed in her friends. Others might do wrong, but not one's chosen. People of her own sort hadtemptations, doubtless, but they overcame them. That was theirbusiness--that was their obligation. She might proclaim herself ademocrat, but she was a moral aristocrat, at any rate. She depended uponthose in her class to do right. 

She was a trifle chilled when she returned to find how little timeHonora had to give to her unfolding of the great new scheme. Honora hadher own excitement. Her wonderful experiment was drawing to aculmination. Honora could talk of nothing else. If Kate wanted topromulgate a scheme for the caring for the Born, very well. Honora had atremendous business with the Unborn. So she talked Kate down. 

XVI

Then came the day of Honora's victory!

It had been long expected, yet when it came it had the effect of amiracle. It was, however, a miracle which she realized. She wasburningly aware that her great moment had come. 

She left the lights flaring in the laboratory, and, merely stopping toput the catch on the door, ran down the steps, fastening her linen coatover her working dress as she went. David would be at home. He would beresting, perhaps, --she hoped so. For days he had been feverish andstrange, and she had wondered if he were tormented by that sense ofworld-stress which was forever driving him. Was there no achievementthat would satisfy him, she wondered. Yes, yes, he must be satisfiednow! Moreover, he should have all the credit. To have found the originof life, though only in a voiceless creature, --a reptile, --was not thatan unheard-of victory? She would claim no credit; for without him andhis daring to inspire her she would not have dreamed of such anexperiment. 

Of course, she might have telephoned to him, but it never so much asoccurred to her to do that. She wanted to cry the words into his ear:--

"We have it! The secret is ours! There _is_ a hidden door into the houseof life--and we've opened it!"

Oh, what treasured, ancient ideas fell with the development of this newfact! She did not want to think of that, because of those who, in therearrangement of understanding, must suffer. But as for her, she wouldbe bold to face it, as the mate and helper of a great scientist shouldbe. She would set her face toward the sun and be unafraid of any glory. Her thoughts spun in her head, her pulses throbbed. She did not knowthat she was thinking it, but really she was feeling that in a momentmore she would be in David's arms. Only some such gesture would serve tomark the climax of this great moment. Though they so seldom caressed, though they had indulged so little in emotion, surely now, after theirlong and heavy task, they could have the sweet human comforts. Theycould be lovers because they were happy. 

Perhaps, after all, she would only cry out to him:--"It will be yours, David--the Norden prize!" That would tell the whole thing. 

People looked after her as she sped down the street. At first theythought she was in distress, but a glance at her shining face, itsnobility accentuated by her elation, made that idea untenable. She wasobviously the bearer of good tidings. 

Dr. Von Shierbrand, passing on the other side of the street, calledout:--

"Carrying the good news from Ghent to Aix?"

An old German woman, with a laden basket on her arm nodded cheerfully. 

"It's a baby, " she said aloud to whoever might care to corroborate. 

But Honora carried happiness greater than any dreamed, --a secret of theages, --and the prize was her man's fame. 

She reached her own door, and with sure, swift hands, fitted the key inthe lock. The house wore a welcoming aspect. The drawing-room was filledwith blossoming plants, and the diaphanous curtains which Blue-eyed Maryhad hung at the windows blew softly in the breeze. The piano, with itssuggestive litter of music, stood open, and across the bench trailed oneof Mary's flowered chiffon scarfs. 

"David!" called Honora. "David!"

Two blithe baby voices answered her from the rear porch. The little oneswere there with Mrs. Hays, and they excitedly welcomed this variation intheir day's programme. 

"In a minute, babies, " called Honora. "Mamma will come in a minute. "

Yes, she and David would go together to the babies, and they would "tellthem, " the way people "told the bees. "

"David!" she kept calling. "David!"

She looked in the doors of the rooms she passed, and presently reachedher own. As she entered, a large envelope addressed in David's writing, conspicuously placed before the face of her desk-clock, caught her eye. She imagined that it contained some bills or memoranda, and did not stopfor it, but ran on. 

"Oh, he's gone to town, " she cried with exasperation, "and I haven't anidea where to reach him!"

Closing her ears to the calls of the little girls, she returned to herown room and shut herself in. She was completely exasperated with theneed for patience. Never had she so wanted David, and he was notthere--he was not there to hear that the moment of triumph had come forboth of them and that they were justified before their world. 

Petulantly she snatched the envelope from the desk and opened it. It wasneither bills nor memoranda which fell out, but a letter. Surprised, sheunfolded it. 

Her eyes swept it, not gathering its meaning. It might have been writtenin some foreign language, so incomprehensible did it seem. But somethingdeep down in her being trembled as if at approaching dissolution andsent up its wild messages of alarm. Vaguely, afar off, like the shoutsof a distant enemy on the hills, the import besieged her spirit. 

"I must read it again, " she said simply. 

She went over it slowly, like one deciphering an ancient hieroglyph. 

 "My DEAR HONORA:--" (it ran. )

 "I am off and away with Mary Morrison. Will this come to you as a complete surprise? I hardly think so. You have been my good comrade and assistant; but Mary Morrison is my woman. I once thought you were, but there was a mistake somewhere. Either I misjudged, or you changed. I hope you'll come across happiness, too, sometime. I never knew the meaning of the word till I met Mary. You and I haven't been able to make each other out. You thought I was bound up heart and soul in the laboratory. I may as well tell you that only a fractional part of my nature was concerned with it. Mary is an unlearned person compared with you, but she knew that, and it is the great fact for both of us. 

 "It is too bad about the babies. We ought never to have had them. See that they have a good education and count on me to help you. You'll find an account at the bank in your name. There'll be more there for you when that is gone. 

 "DAVID. "

The old German woman was returning, her basket emptied of its load, whenHonora came down the steps and crossed the Plaisance. 

"My God, " said the old woman in her own tongue, "the child did notlive!"

Honora walked as somnambulists walk, seeing nothing. But she found herway to the door of the laboratory. The white glare of the chemicallights was over everything--over all the significant, familiar litter ofthe place. The workmanlike room was alive and palpitating with thepersonality which had gone out from it--the flaming personality ofDavid Fulham. 

The woman who had sold her birthright of charm and seduction for hissake sat down to eat her mess of pottage. Not that she thought even asfar as that. Thought appeared to be suspended. As a typhoon has its calmcenter, so the mad tumult of her spirit held a false peace. She restedthere in it, torpid as to emotion, in a curious coma. 

Yet she retained her powers of observation. She took her seat before thetanks in which she had demonstrated the correctness of David's amazingscientific assumption. Yet now the creatures that he had burgeoned byhis skill, usurping, as it might seem to a timid mind, the very functionof the Creator, looked absurd and futile--hateful even. For thesethings, bearing, as it was possible, after all, no relation to actuallife, had she spent her days in desperate service. Then, suddenly, itswept over her, like a blasting wave of ignited gas, that she never hadhad the pure scientific flame! She had not worked for Truth, but thatDavid might reap great rewards. With her as with the cave woman, theman's favor was the thing! If the cave woman won his approval with baseservice, she, the aspiring creature of modern times, was no less theslave of her own subservient instincts! And she had failed as the cavewoman failed--as all women seemed eventually to fail. The ever-repeatedtragedy of woman had merely been enacted once more, with herself for thesorry heroine. 

Yet none of these thoughts was distinct. They passed from her mind likethe spume puffed from the wave's crest. She knew nothing of time. Aroundher blazed and sputtered the terrible white lights. The day waned; thedarkness fell; and when night had long passed its dark meridian and theanticipatory cocks began to scent the dawn and to make their discoveryknown, there came a sharp knocking at the door. 

It shattered Honora's horrible reverie as if it had been an explosion. The chambers of her ears quaked with the reverberations. She sprang toher feet with a scream which rang through the silent building. 

"Let me in! Let me in!" called a voice. "It's only Kate. Let me in, Honora, or I'll call some one to break down the door. "

 * * * * *

Kate had mercy on that distorted face which confronted her. It was notthe part of loyalty or friendship to look at it. She turned out thespluttering, glaring lights, and quiet and shadow stole over the room. 

"Well, Honora, I found the note and I know the whole of your trouble. Remember, " she said quietly, "it's your great hour. You have a chance toshow what you're made of now. "

"What I'm made of!" said Honora brokenly. "I'm like all the women. I'mdying of jealousy, Kate, --dying of it. "

"Jealousy--you?" cried Kate. "Why, Honora--"

"You thought I couldn't feel it, I suppose, --thought I was above it?I'm not above anything--not anything--" Her voice straggled off into acurious, shameless sob with a sound in it like the bleating of a lamb. 

"Stop that!" said Kate, sharply. "Pull yourself together, woman. Don'tbe a fool. "

"Go away, " sobbed Honora. "Don't stay here to watch me. My heart isbroken, that's all. Can't you let me alone?"

"No, I can't--I won't. Stand up and fight, woman. You can bemagnificent, if you want to. It can't be that you'd grovel, Honora. "

"You know very little of what you're talking about, " cried Honora, whipped into wholesome anger at last. "I've been a fool from thebeginning. The whole thing's my fault. "

"I don't see how. "

Kate was getting her to talk; was pulling her up out of the pit of shameand anguish into which she had fallen. She sat down in a deal chairwhich stood by the window, and Honora, without realizing it, droppedinto a chair, too. The neutral morning sky was beginning to flush andthe rosiness reached across the lead-gray lake, illuminated the windowsof the sleeping houses, and tinted even the haggard monochrome of thelaboratory with a promise of day. 

"Why, it's my fault because I wouldn't take what was coming to me. Iwouldn't even be what I was born to be!"

"I know, " said Kate, "that you underwent some sort of a transformation. What was it?"

She hardly expected an answer, but Honora developed a perfervidlucidity. 

"Oh, Kate, you've said yourself that I was a very different girl whenyou knew me first. I was a student then, and an ambitious one, too; butthere wasn't a girl in this city more ready for a woman's rôle than I. Ilonged to be loved--I lived in the idea of it. No matter how hard Itried to devote myself to the notion of a career, I really was dreamingof the happiness that was going to come to me when--when Life had doneits duty by me. "

She spoke the words with a dramatic clearness. The terrific excitementshe had undergone, and which she now held in hand, sharpened herfaculties. The powers of memory and of expression were intensified. Shefairly burned upon Kate there in the beautiful, disguising light of themorning. Her weary face was flushed; her eyes were luminous. Herterrific sorrow put on the mask of joy. 

"You see, I loved David almost from the first--I mean from the beginningof my University work. The first time I saw him crossing the campus heheld my attention. There was no one else in the least like him, sovivid, so exotic, so almost fierce. When I found out who he was, Iconfess that I directed my studies so that I should work with him. Notthat I really expected to know him personally, but I wanted to be nearhim and have him enlarge life for me. I felt that it would take on newmeanings if I could only hear his interpretations of it. "

Kate shivered with sympathy at the woman's passion, and something likeenvy stirred in her. Here was a world of delight and torment of whichshe knew nothing, and beside it her own existence, restless and eagerthough it had been, seemed a meager affair. 

"Well, the idea burned in me for months and years. But I hid it. No oneguessed anything about it. Certainly David knew nothing of it. Then, when I was beginning on my graduate work, I was with him daily. But henever seemed to see me--he saw only my work, and he seldom praised that. He expected it to be well done. As for me, I was satisfied. The merefact that we were comrades, forced to think of the same matters severalhours of each day, contented me. I couldn't imagine what life would beaway from him; and I was afraid to think of him in relation to myself. "

"Afraid?"

"Afraid--I mean just that. I knew others thought him a genius inrelation to his work. But I knew he was a genius in regard to life. Ifelt sure that, if he turned that intensity of his upon life instead ofupon science, he would be a destructive force--a high explosive. Thisidea of mine was confirmed in time. It happened one evening when anumber of us were over in the Scammon Garden listening to theout-of-door players. I grew tired of sitting and slipped from my seatto wander about a little in the darkness. I had reached the very outeredge of seats and was standing there enjoying the garden, when Ioverheard two persons talking together. A man said: 'Fulham will go farif he doesn't meet a woman. ' 'Nonsense, ' the woman said; 'he's ananchorite. ' 'An inflammatory one, ' the man returned. 'Mind, I don't sayhe knows it. Probably he thinks he's cast for the scientific rôle to theend of his days, but I know the fellow better than he does himself. Itell you, if a woman of power gets hold of him, he'll be as drunk asAbélard with the madness of it. Over in Europe they allow for that sortof thing. They let a man make an art of loving. Here they insist that itshall be incidental. But Fulham won't care about conventionalities ifthe idea ever grips him. He's born for love, and it's a lucky thing forthe University that he hasn't found it out. ' 'We ought to plan a saneand reasonable marriage for him, ' said the woman. 'Wouldn't that be agood compromise?' 'It would be his salvation, ' the man said. "

Honora poured the words out with such rapidity that Kate hardly couldfollow her. 

"How you remember it all!" broke in Kate. 

"If I remember anything, wouldn't it be that? As I say, it confirmed mein what I already had guessed. I felt fierce to protect him. My jealousywas awake in me. I watched him more closely than ever. His daring in thelaboratory grew daily. He talked openly about matters that other menwere hardly daring to dream of, and his brain seemed to expand everyday like some strange plant under calcium rays. I thought what afrightful loss to science it would be if the wilder qualities of hisnature got the upper hand, and I wondered how I could endure it if--"

She drew herself up with a horror of realization. The thing that so longago she had thought she could not endure was at last upon her! Her teethbegan to chatter again, and her hands, which had been clasped, to twistthemselves with the writhing motion of the mentally distraught. 

"Go on!" commanded Kate. "What happened next?"

"I let him love me!"

"I thought you said he hadn't noticed you. "

"He hadn't; and I didn't talk with him more than usual or coquette withhim. But I let down the barriers in my mind. I never had been ashamed ofloving him, but now I willed my love to stream out toward him like--likebanners of light. If I had called him aloud, he couldn't have answeredmore quickly. He turned toward me, and I saw all his being set my way. Oh, it was like a transfiguration! Then, as soon as ever I saw that, Ibegan holding him steady. I let him feel that we were to keep on workingside by side, quietly using and increasing our knowledge. I made himscourge his love back; I made him keep his mind uppermost; I saved himfrom himself. "

"Oh, Honora! And then you were married?"

"And then we were married. You remember how sudden it was, and howwonderful; but not wonderful in the way it might have been. I kept guardover myself. I wouldn't wear becoming dresses; I wouldn't even let himdream what I really was like--wouldn't let him see me with my hair downbecause I knew it was beautiful. I combed it plainly and dressed like anurse or a nun, and every day I went to the laboratory with him and kepthim at his work. He had got hold of this dazzling idea of the extraneousdevelopment of life, and he set himself to prove it. I worked early andlate to help him. I let him go out and meet people and reap honors, andI stayed and did the drudgery. But don't imagine I was a martyr. I likedit. I belonged to him. It was my honor and delight to work for him. Iwanted him to have all of the credit. The more important the result, themore satisfaction I should have in proclaiming him the victor. I wasreally at the old business of woman, subordinating myself to a man Iloved. But I was doing it in a new way, do you see? I was setting asidethe privilege of my womanhood for him, refraining from making any merelyfeminine appeal. You remember hearing Dr. Von Shierbrand say there wasbut one way woman should serve man--the way in which Marguerite servedFaust? It made me laugh. I knew a harder road than that to walk--a roadof more complete abnegation. "

"But the babies came. "

"Yes, the babies came. I was afraid even to let him be as happy in themas he wanted to be. I held him away. I wouldn't let him dwell on thethought of me as the mother of those darlings. I dared not even be ashappy myself as I wished, but I had secret joys that I told him nothingabout, because I was saving him for himself and his work. But at what acost, Kate!"

"Honora, it was sacrilegious!"

Honora leaped to her feet again. 

"Yes, yes, " she cried, "it was. And now all has happened according toprophecy, and he's gone with this woman! He thinks she's his mate, but, I--I was his mate. And I defrauded him. So now he's taken her becauseshe was kind, because she loved him, because--she was beautiful!"

"She looks like you. "

"Don't I know it? It's my beauty that he's gone away with--the beauty Iwouldn't let him see. Of course, he doesn't realize it. He only knowslife cheated him, and now he's trying to make up to himself for whathe's lost. "

"Oh, can you excuse him like that?"

The daylight was hardening, and it threw Honora's drawn face intorepellent relief. 

"I don't excuse him at all!" she said. "I condemn him! I condemn him!With all his intellect, to be such a fool! And to be so cruel--sohideously cruel!"

But she checked herself sharply. She looked around her with eyes thatseemed to take in things visible and invisible--all that had beenenacted in that curious room, all the paraphernalia, all thesignificance of those uncompleted, important experiments. Then suddenlyher face paled and yet burned with light. 

"But I know a great revenge, " she said. "I know a revenge that willbreak his heart!"

"Don't say things like that, " begged Kate. "I don't recognize you whenyou're like that. "

"When you hear what the revenge is, you will, " said Honora proudly. 

"We're going now, " Kate told her with maternal decision. "Here's yourcoat. "

"Home?" She began trembling again and the haunted look crept back intoher eyes. 

Kate paid no heed. She marched Honora swiftly along the awakened streetsand into the bereaved house, past the desecrated chamber where David'sbed stood beside his wife's, up to Kate's quiet chamber. Honorastretched herself out with an almost moribund gesture. Then the weightof her sorrow covered her like a blanket. She slept the strange deepsleep of those who dare not face the waking truth. 

XVII

Kate, who _was_ facing it, telegraphed to Karl Wander. It was all shecould think of to do. 

"Can you come?" she asked. "David Fulham has gone away with MaryMorrison. Honora needs you. You are the cousin of both women. Thought Ihad better turn to you. " She was brutally frank, but it never occurredto her to mince matters there. However, where the public was concerned, her policy was one of secrecy. She called, for example, on the Presidentof the University, who already knew the whole story. 

"Can't we keep it from being blazoned abroad?" she appealed to him. "Mrs. Fulham will suffer more if he has to undergo public shame than shepossibly could suffer from her own desertion. She's tragically angry, but that wouldn't keep her from wanting to protect him. We must try toprevent public exposure. It will save her the worst of torments. " Shebrooded sadly over the idea, her aspect broken and pathetic. 

The President looked at her kindly. 

"Did she say so?"

"Oh, she didn't need to say so!" cried Kate. "Any one would know that. "

"You mean, any good woman would know that. Of course, I can give it outthat Fulham has been called abroad suddenly, but it places me in a badposition. I don't feel very much like lying for him, and I shan't bethought any too well of if I'm found out. I should like to place myselfon record as befriending Mrs. Fulham, not her husband. "

"But don't you see that you are befriending her when you shield him?"

"Woman's logic, " said the President. "It has too many turnings for myfeeble masculine intellect. But I've great confidence in you, MissBarrington. You seem to be rather a specialist in domestic relations. Ifyou say Mrs. Fulham will be happier for having me bathe neck-deep inlies, I suppose I shall have to oblige you. Shall it be the liecircumstantial? Do you wish to specify the laboratory to which hehas gone?"

Kate blushed with sudden contrition. 

"Oh, I'll not ask you to do it!" she cried. "Truth is best, of course. I'm not naturally a trimmer and a compromiser--but, poor Honora! Ipity her so!"

Her lips quivered like a child's and the tears stood in her eyes. Shehad arisen to go and the President shook hands with her without makingany promise. However the next day a paragraph appeared in the UniversityDaily to the effect that Professor Fulham had been called to France uponimportant laboratory matters. 

At the Caravansary they had scented tragedy, and Kate faced them withthe paragraph. She laid a marked copy of the paper at each place, andwhen all were assembled, she called attention to it. They looked at herwith questioning eyes. 

"Of course, " said Dr. Von Shierbrand, flicking his mustache, "this isn'ttrue, Miss Barrington. "

"No, " said Kate, and faced them with her chin tilted high. 

"But you wish us to pretend to believe it?"

"If you please, dear friends, " Kate pleaded. 

"We shall say that Fulham is in France! And what are we to say aboutMiss Morrison?"

"Who will inquire? If any one should, say that a friend desired her as atraveling companion. "

"Nothing, " said Von Shierbrand, "is easier for me than truth. "

"Please don't be witty, " cried Kate testily, "and don't sneer. Rememberthat nothing is so terrible as temptation. I'm sure I see proof of thatevery day among my poor people. After all, doesn't the real surprise liein the number that resist it?"

"I beg your pardon, " said the young German gently. "I shall not sneer. Ishall not even be witty. I'm on your side, --that is to say, on Mrs. Fulham's side, --and I'll say anything you want me to say. "

"I beg you all, " replied Kate, sweeping the table with an imploringglance, "to say as little as possible. Be matter-of-fact if any onequestions you. And, whatever you do, shield Honora. "

They gave their affirmation solemnly, and the next day Honora appearedamong them, pallid and courageous. They were simple folk for all oftheir learning. Sorrow was sorrow to them. Honora was widowed by anaccident more terrible than death. No mockery, no affected solicitudedetracted from the efficacy of their sympathy. If they saw torments ofjealousy in this betrayed woman's eyes, they averted their gaze; if theysaw shame, they gave it other interpretations. Moreover, Kate wasconstantly beside her, eagle-keen for slight or neglect. Her fiercefealty guarded the stricken woman on every side. She had the imposingpiano which Mary had rented carted back to the warehouse to lie indeserved silence with Mary's seductive harmonies choked in its recordingfibre; she stripped from their poles the curtains Mary had hung at thedrawing-room windows and burned them in the furnace; the miniatures, theplaster casts, all the artistic rubbish which Mary's exuberance hadimpelled her to collect, were tossed out for the waste wagons to cartaway. The coquetry of the room gave way to its old-time austerity; oncemore Honora's room possessed itself. 

 * * * * *

A wire came from Karl Wander addressed to Kate. 

"Fractured leg. Can't go to you. Honora and the children must come hereat once. Have written. "

That seemed to give Honora a certain repose--it was at least a spar towhich to cling. With Kate's help she got over to the laboratory and putthe finishing touches on things there. The President detailed two ofFulham's most devoted disciples to make a record of their professor'sexperiments. 

"Fulham shall have full credit, " the President assured Honora, callingon her and comforting her in the way in which he perceived she neededcomfort. "He shall have credit for everything. "

"He should have the Norden prize, " Honora cried, her hot eyes blazingabove her hectic cheeks. "I want him to have the prize, and I want to bethe means of getting it for him. I told Miss Barrington I meant to havemy revenge, and that's it. How can he stand it to know he ruined my lifeand that I got the prize for him? A generous man would find thattorture! You understand, I'm willing to torture him--in that way. He'ssubtle enough to feel the sting of it. "

The President looked at her compassionately. 

"It's a noble revenge--and a poignant one, " he agreed. 

"It's not noble, " repudiated Honora. "It's terrible. For he'll rememberwho did the work. "

But shame overtook her and she sobbed deeply and rendingly. And thePresident, who had thought of himself as a mild man, left the houseregretting that duels were out of fashion. 

 * * * * *

Then the letter came from the West. Kate carried it up to Honora, whowas in her room crouched before the window, peering out at the earlysummer cityscape with eyes which tried in vain to observe the passingmotors, and the people hastening along the Plaisance, but whichregistered little. 

"Your cousin's letter, woman, dear, " announced Kate. 

Honora looked up quickly, her vagueness momentarily dissipated. Katealways had noticed that Wander's name had power to claim Honora'sinterest. He could make folk listen, even though he spoke by letter. Shefelt, herself, that whatever he said, she would listen to. 

Honora tore open the envelope with untidy eagerness, and after she hadread the letter she handed it silently to Kate. It ran thus:--

 "COUSIN HONORA, MY DEAR AND PRIZED:--

 "Rather a knock-out blow, eh? I shan't waste my time in telling you how I feel about it. If you want me to follow David and kill him, I will--as soon as this damned leg gets well. Not that the job appeals to me. I'm sensitive about family honor, but killing D. Won't mend things. As I spell the matter out, there was a blunder somewhere. _Perhaps you know where it was_. 

 "Of course you feel as if you'd gone into bankruptcy. Women invest in happiness as men do in property, and to 'go broke' the way you have is disconcerting. It would overwhelm some women; but it won't you--not if you're the same Honora I played with when I was a boy. You had pluck for two of us trousered animals--were the best of the lot. I want you to come here and stake out a new claim. You may get to be a millionaire yet--in good luck and happiness, I mean. 

 "I'm taking it for granted that you and the babies will soon be on your way to me, and I'm putting everything in readiness. The fire is laid, the cupboard stored, the latchstring is hanging where you'll see it as you cross the state line. 

 "You understand I'm being selfish in this. I not only want, but I need, you. You always seemed more like a sister than a cousin to me, and to have you come here and make a home out of my house seems too good to be true. 

 "There are a lot of things to be learned out here, but I'll not give them a name. All I can say is, living with these mountains makes you different. They're like men and women, I take it. (The mountains, I mean. ) The more they are ravaged by internal fires and scoured by snow-slides, the more interesting they become. 

 "Then it's so still it gives you a chance to think, and by the time you've had a good bout of it, you find out what is really important and what isn't. You'll understand after you've been here awhile. 

 "I mean what I say, Honora. I want you and the babies. Come ahead. Don't think. Work--pack--and get out here where Time can have a chance at your wounds. 

 "Am I making you understand how I feel for you? I guess you know your old playmate and coz, "KARL WANDER. 

 "P. S. My dried-up old bach heart jumps at the thought of having the kiddies in the house. I'll bet they're wonders. "

There was an inclosure for Kate. It read:--

 "MY DEAR MISS BARRINGTON:--

 "I see that you're one of the folk who can be counted on. You help Honora out of this and then tell me what I can do for you. I'd get to her some way even with this miserable plaster-of-Paris leg of mine if you weren't there. But I know you'll play the cards right. Can't you come with her and stay with her awhile till she's more used to the change? You'd be as welcome as sunlight. But I don't even need to say that. I saw you only a moment, yet I think you know that I'd count it a rich day if I could see you again. You are one of those who understand a thing without having it bellowed by megaphone. 

 "Don't mind my emphatic English. I'm upset. I feel like murdering a man, and the sensation isn't pleasant. Using language is too common out here to attract attention--even on the part of the man who uses it. Oh, my poor Honora! Look after her, Miss Barrington, and add all my pity and love to your own. It will make quite a sum. Yours faithfully, "KARL WANDER. "

"He wrote to you, too?" inquired Honora when Kate had perused her note. 

"Yes, begging me to hasten you on your way. "

"Shall I go?"

"What else offers?"

"Nothing, " said Honora in her dead voice. "If I kept a diary, I would belike that sad king of France who recorded '_Rien_' each day. "

Kate made a practical answer. 

"We must pack, " she said. 

"But the house--"

"Let it stand empty if the owner can't find a tenant. Pay your rent tillhe does, if that's in the contract. What difference does all that make?Get out where you'll have a chance to recuperate. "

"Oh, Kate, do you think I ever shall? How does a person recuperate fromshame?"

"There isn't really any shame to you in what others do, " Kate said. 

"But you--you'll have to go somewhere. "

"So I shall. Don't worry about me. I shall take good care of myself. "

Honora looked about her with the face of a spent runner. 

"I don't see how I'm going to go through with it all, " she said, shuddering. 

So Kate found packers and movers and the breaking-up of the home wasbegun. It was an ordeal--even a greater ordeal than they had thought itwould be. Every one who knew Honora had supposed that she cared morefor the laboratory than for her home, but when the packers came and torethe pictures from the walls, it might have been her heart-strings thatwere severed. 

Just before the last things were taken out, Kate found her in an agonyof weeping on David's bed, which stood with an appalling emptinessbeside Honora's. Honora always had wakened first in the morning, Kateknew, and now she guessed at the memories that wrung that great, self-obliterating creature, writhing there under her torment. How oftenshe must have raised herself on her arm and looked over at her man, sohandsome, so strong, so completely, as she supposed, her own, and calledto him, summoning him to another day's work at the great task they hadundertaken for themselves. She had planned to be a wife upon an heroicmodel, and he had wanted mere blitheness, mere feminine allure. Then, after all, as it turned out, here at hand were all the little qualities, he had desired, like violets hidden beneath their foliage. 

Kate thought she never had seen anything more feminine than Honora, shivering over the breaking-tip of the linen-closet, where herhousewifely stores were kept. 

"I don't suppose you can understand, dear, " she moaned to Kate. "Butit's a sort of symbol--a linen-closet is. See, I hemmed all these thingswith my own hands before I was married, and embroidered the initials!"

How could any one have imagined that the masculine traits in her weregetting the upper hand! She grew more feminine every hour. There was anincreasing rhythm in her movements--a certain rich solemnity like thatof Niobe or Hermione. Her red-brown hair tumbled about her face andfestooned her statuesque shoulders. The severity of her usual attiregave place to a negligence which enhanced her picturesqueness, and theheaving of her troubled bosom, the lifting of her wistful eyes gave hera tenderer beauty than she ever had had before. She was passionateenough now to have suited even that avid man who had proved himself sodelinquent. 

"If only David could have seen her like this!" mused Kate. "His'Blue-eyed One' would have seemed tepid in comparison. To think shesubmerged her splendor to so little purpose!"

She wondered if Honora knew how right Karl Wander had been in sayingthat some one had blundered, and if she had gained so much enlightenmentthat she could see that it was herself who had done so. She hadrenounced the mistress qualities which the successful wife requires tosupplement her wifely character, and she had learned too late that lovemust have other elements than the rigidly sensible ones. 

Honora was turning to the little girls now with a fierce sense ofmaternal possession. She performed personal services for them. She heldthem in her arms at twilight and breathed in their personality as if itwere the one anaesthetic that could make her oblivious to her pain. 

Kate hardly could keep from crying out:--

"Too late! Too late!"

There was a bleak, attic-like room at the Caravansary, airy enough, andglimpsing the lake from its eastern window, which Kate took temporarilyfor her abiding-place. She had her things moved over there and campedamid the chaos till Honora should be gone. 

The day came when the two women, with the little girls, stood on theporch of the house which had proved so ineffective a home. Kateturned the key. 

"I hope never to come back to Chicago, Kate, " Honora said, lifting herravaged face toward the staring blankness of the windows. "I'm notbrave enough. "

"Not foolish enough, you mean, " corrected Kate. "Hold tight to thegirlies, Honora, and you'll come out all right. "

Honora refrained from answering. Her woe was epic, and she let hersunken eyes and haggard countenance speak for her. 

Kate saw David Fulham's deserted family off on the train. Mrs. Hays, thechildren's nurse, accompanied them. Honora moved with a slow hauteur inher black gown, looking like a disenthroned queen, and as she walkeddown the train aisle Kate thought of Marie Antoinette. There were plentyof friends, as both women knew, who would have been glad to give anyencouragement their presence could have contributed, but it wasgenerally understood that the truth of the situation was not to berecognized. 

When Kate got back on the platform, Honora became just Honora again, thinking of and planning for others. She thrust her head fromthe window. 

"Oh, Kate, " she said, "I do hope you'll get well settled somewhere andfeel at home. Don't stay in that attic, dear. It would make me feel asif I had put you into it. "

"Trust me!" Kate reassured her. She waved her hand with specious gayety. "Give my love to Mr. Wander, " she laughed. 

XVIII

Kate was alone at last. She had time to think. There were still threedays left of the vacation for which she had begged when she perceivedHonora's need of her, and these she spent in settling her room. It wouldnot accommodate all of the furniture she had accumulated during thosedays of enthusiasm over Ray McCrea's return, so she sold the superfluousthings. Truth to tell, however, she kept the more decorative ones. Honora's fate had taught her an indelible lesson. She saw clearly thathappiness for women did not lie along the road of austerity. 

Was it humiliating to have to acknowledge that women were desired fortheir beauty, their charm, for the air of opulence which they gave to anotherwise barren world? Her mind cast back over the ages--over theinnumerable forms of seduction and subserviency which the instinct ofwomen had induced them to assume, and she reddened to flame sittingalone in the twilight. Yet, an hour later, still thinking of thesubject, she realized that it was for men rather than for women that shehad to blush. Woman was what man had made her, she concluded. 

Yet man was often better than woman--more generous, more just, morehigh-minded, possessed of a deeper faith. 

Well, well, it was at best a confusing world! She seemed to be like aship without a chart or a port of destination. But at least she couldaccept things as they were--even the fact that she herself was not "incommission, " and was, philosophically speaking, a derelict. 

"Other women seem to do things by instinct, " she mused, "but I have, apparently, to do them from conviction. It must be the masculine traitsin me. They say all women have masculine traits, that if they werepurely feminine, they would be monstrous; and that all civilized menhave much of the feminine in them or they would not be civilized. Isuppose there's rather more of the masculine in me than in the majorityof women. "

Now Mary Morrison, she concluded, was almost pure feminine--she was thetriumphant exposition of the feminine principle. 

Some lines of Arthur Symons came to her notice--lines which she tried invain not to memorize. 

 "'I am the torch, ' she saith; 'and what to me If the moth die of me? I am the flame Of Beauty, and I burn that all may see Beauty, and I have neither joy nor shame, But live with that clear light of perfect fire Which is to men the death of their desire. 

 '"I am Yseult and Helen, I have seen Troy burn, and the most loving knight lies dead. The world has been my mirror, time has been My breath upon the glass; and men have said, Age after age, in rapture and despair, Love's few poor words before my mirror there. 

 "'I live and am immortal; in my eyes The sorrow of the world, and on my lips The joy of life, mingle to make me wise!'" . .. 

Was it wisdom, then, that Mary Morrison possessed--the immemorial wisdomof women?

Oh, the shame of it! The shame of being a woman!

Kate denied herself to McCrea when he called. She plunged into thedevelopment of her scheme for an extension of motherhood. Statemotherhood it would be. Should the movement become national, as shehoped, perhaps it had best be called the Bureau of Children. 

It was midsummer by now and there was some surcease of activity even in"welfare" circles. Many of the social workers, having grubbed inunspeakable slums all winter, were now abroad among palaces andcathedrals, drinking their fill of beauty. Many were in the country nearat hand. For the most part, neophytes were in charge at the settlementhouses. Kate was again urged to domesticate herself with Jane Addams'scorps of workers, but she had an aversion to being shut between walls. She had been trapped once, --back at the place she called home, --and shehad not liked it. There was something free and adventurous in going fromhouse to house, authoritatively rearranging the affairs of thedisarranged. It suited her to be "a traveling bishop. " Moreover, it lefther time for the development of her great Idea. In a neighborhood houseprivacy and leisure were the two unattainable luxuries. 

She was still writing at odd times'; and now her articles wereappearing. They were keen, simple, full of meat, and the public likedthem. As Kate read them over, she smiled to find them so emphatic. Shewas far from _feeling_ emphatic, but she seemed to have a trick ofexpressing herself in that way. She was still in need of great economy. Her growing influence brought little to her in the way of monetaryrewards, and it was hard for her to live within her income because shehad a scattering hand. She liked to dispense good things and she likedto have them. A liberal programme suited her best--whatever gave freeplay to life. She was a wild creature in that she hated bars. Of all theprison houses of life, poverty seemed one of the most hectoring. 

But poverty, to be completely itself, must exclude opportunity. Kate hadthe key to opportunity, and she realized it. In the letters she receivedand wrote bringing her into association with men and women of force andaspiration, she had a privilege to which, for all of her youth, shecould not be indifferent. She liked the way these purposeful persons putthings, and felt a distinct pleasure in matching their ideas with herown. As the summer wore on, she was asked to country homes of charm andtaste--homes where wealth, though great, was subordinated to moreessential things. There she met those who could further herpurposes--who could lend their influence to aid her Idea, now shapingitself excellently. At the suggestion of Miss Addams, she prepared anarticle in which her plan unfolded itself in all its benevolent lengthand breadth--an article which it was suggested might yet form a portionof a speech made before a congressional committee. There was even talkof having Kate deliver this address, but she had not yet reached thepoint where she could contemplate such an adventure with calmness. 

However, she was having training in her suffrage work, which was nowassuming greater importance in her eyes. She addressed women audiencesin various parts of the city, and had even gone on a few flying motorexcursions with leading suffragists, speaking to the people in villagesand at country schoolhouses. 

There was an ever-increasing conviction in this department of her work. She had learned to count the ballot as the best bulwark of liberty, andshe could find no logic to inform her why, if it was a protection forman, --for the least and most insignificant of men, --it was not equally aweapon which women, searching now as never before for defined andenduring forms of liberty, should be permitted to use. She not onlydesired it for other women, --women who were supposed to "need it"more, --but she wished it for herself. She felt it to be merelyconsistent that she, in whom service to her community was becoming anecessity, should have this privilege. It never would be possible forher to exercise murderous powers of destruction in behalf of hercountry. She would not be allowed to shoot down innocent men whoseopinions were opposed to her own, or to make widows and orphans. Shewould be forbidden to stand behind cannon or to sink submarinetorpedoes. But it was within her reach to add to the sum total of peaceand happiness. She would, if she could get her Bureau of Childrenestablished, exercise a constructive influence completely in accord withthe spirit of the time. This being the case, she thought she ought tohave the ballot. It would make her stand up straighter, spirituallyspeaking. It would give her the authority which would point herarguments; put a cap on the sheaf of her endeavors. She wanted itprecisely as a writer wants a period to complete a sentence. It had astructural value, to use the term of an architect. Without it hersentence was foolish, her building insecure. 

"Why is it, " she demanded of the women of Lake Geneva when, in companywith a veteran suffragist, she addressed them there, "that you growweary in working for your town? It is because you cannot demonstrateyour meaning nor secure the continuation of your works by the ballot. Your efforts are like pieces of metal which you cannot weld into usefulform. You toil for deserted children, indigent mothers, for hospitalsand asylums, starting movements which, when perfected, are absorbed bythe city. What happens then to these benevolent enterprises? They areplaced in the hands of politicians and perfunctorily administered. Yourdisinterested services are lost sight of; the politicians smile at themanner in which you have toiled and they have reaped. You see sink intouselessness, institutions, which, in the compassionate hands of women, would be the promoters of good through the generations. The people youwould benefit are treated with that insolent arrogance which only acheap man in office can assume. Causes you have labored to establish, and which no one denies are benefits, are capriciously overthrown. Andthere is one remedy and one only: for you to cast your vote--for you tohave your say as you sit in your city council, on your county board, orin your state legislature and national congress. 

"You may shrink from it; you may dread these new responsibilities; butstrength and courage will come with your need. You dare not turn asidefrom the road which opens before you, for to tread it is now the test ofintegrity. "

"Ought you to have said that?" inquired the older suffragist, afterwardlooking at Kate with earnest and burning eyes from her white spiritualface. "I dare say I care much more about suffrage than you. I have beeninterested in it since I was a child, and I am now no longer a youngwoman. Yet I feel that integrity is not allied to this or that opinion. It is a question of sincerity--of steadfastness of purpose. "

"There, there, " said Kate, "don't expect me to be too moderate. How canI care about anything just now if I have to be moderate? I love suffragebecause it gives me something to care about and to work for. The lastgeneration has destroyed pretty much all of the theology, hasn't it?Service of man is all there is left--particularly that branch of itknown as the service of woman. Isn't that what all of the poets andplaywrights and novelists are writing about? Isn't that the mostinteresting thing in the world at present? You've all urged me to gointo it, haven't you? Very well, I have. But I can't stay in it if I'mto be tepid. You mustn't expect me to modify my utterance and cut downmy climaxes. I've got to make a hot propaganda of the thing. I want theexhilaration of martyrdom--though I'm not keen for the discomforts ofit. In other words, dear lady, because you are judicious, don't expectme to be. I don't want to be judicious--yet. I want to be fervid. "

"You are a dear girl, " said the elder woman, "but you are an egotist, asof course you know. "

"If I had been a modest violet by a mossy stone, " laughed Kate, "shouldI have taken up this work?"

"I'm free to confess that you would not, " said the other, checking asigh as if she despaired of bringing this excited girl down to theearth. "Yet I am bound to say--" She hesitated and Kate took upthe word. 

"I _do_ know--I really understand, " she cried contritely. "You are notan egotist at all, dear lady. Though you have held many positions ofhonor, you have never thought of yourself. Your sacrifices have been_bona fide_. You who are so delicate and tender have done things whichmen might have shrunk from. I know what you mean by sincerity, and I amaware that you have it completely and steadily, whereas I have moreenthusiasm than is good either for myself or the cause. But you wouldn'twant me to form myself on you, would you now? Temperament is just asmuch a fact as physique. I've got to dramatize woman's disadvantages ifI am to preach on the subject. Though I really think there are tragediesof womanhood which none could exaggerate. "

"Oh, there are, there are, Miss Barrington. "

"How shall I make you understand that I am to be trusted!" Kate cried. "I know I'm avid. I want both pain and joy. I want to suffer with theothers and enjoy with the others. I want my cup of life full and runningover with a brew of a thousand flavors, and I actually believe I want totaste of the cup each neighbor holds. I have to know how others feel andit's my nature to feel for them and with them. When I see this greatwave of aspiration sweeping over women, --Chinese and Persian women aswell as English and American, --I feel magnificent. I, too, am standingwhere the stream of influence blows over me. It thrills memagnificently, and I am meaning it when I say that I think the women whodo not feel it are torpid or cowardly. "

The elder woman smiled patiently. After all, who was she that she shouldcheck her flaming disciple?

XIX

Whenever Kate had a free Sunday, she and Mrs. Dennison, the mistress ofthe Caravansary, would go together to the West Side to visit George andMarna Fitzgerald. It amused and enchanted Kate to think that in themidst of so much that was commonplace, with dull apartment buildingsstretching around for miles, such an Arcadia should have located itself. It opened her eyes to the fact that there might be innumerable Arcadiansconcealed in those monotonous rows of three-and four-story flatbuildings, if only one had the wisdom and wit to find them. Marna seemedto know of some. She had become acquainted with a number of these happyunknown little folk, to whom it never had occurred that celebrity was anessential of joy, and she liked them mightily. Marna, indeed, liked highand low--always providing she didn't dislike them. If they were Irish, her inclination toward them was accelerated. There were certain wondersof Marna's ardent soul which were for "Irish faces only"--Irish eyeswere the eyes she liked best to have upon her. But she forgave Kate herAnglo-Saxon ancestry because of her talent for appreciating the Irishcharacter. 

Time was passing beautifully with Marna, and her Bird of Hope wasfluttering nearer. She told Kate that now she could see some sense inbeing a woman. 

"If you'd ask me, " she said with childish audacity, "if such a foolishlittle thing as I could actually have a wonderful, dear little baby, I'dhave said 'no' right at the start. I'm as flattered as I can be. Andwhat pleases me so is that I don't have to be at all different from whatI naturally am. I don't have to be learned or tremendously good; itisn't a question of deserts. It has just come to me--who never diddeserve any such good!"

Next door to Marna there was a young Irishwoman of whom the Fitzgeraldssaw a good deal, the mother of five little children, with not more thansixteen months between the ages of any of them. Mary Finn had beenbeautiful--so much was evident at a glance. But she already wore adragged expression; and work, far beyond her powers to accomplish, wasmaking a sloven of her. She was petulant with the children, though sheadored them--at least, sporadically. But her burden tired her patienceout. Timothy Finn's income had not increased in proportion to hisfamily. He was now in his young manhood, at the height of his earningcapacity, and early middle-age might see him suffering a reduction. 

Mrs. Finn dropped in Sunday afternoon to share the cup of tea whichMarna was offering her guests, and as she looked wistfully out of hertangle of dark hair, --in which lines of silver already were beginning toappear, --she impressed herself upon Kate's mind as one of theinnumerable army of martyrs to the fetish of fecundity which had bornedown men and women through the centuries. 

She had her youngest child with her. 

"It was a terrible time before I could get up from the last one, " shesaid, "me that was around as smart as could be with the first. I'm inliving terror all the time for fear of what's coming to me. A mother hasno business to die, that's what I tell Tim. Who'd look to the ones Ihave, with me taken? I'm sharp with them at times, but God knows I'd diefor 'em. Blessed be, they understand my scolding, the dears. It's a cuffand a kiss with me, and I declare I don't know which they like best. They may howl when I hurt them, but they know it's their own motherdoing the cuffing, and in their hearts they don't care. It's that waywith cubs, ye see. Mother bear knows how hard to box the ears of 'em. But it's truth I'm saying, Mrs. Fitzgerald; there's little peace forwomen. They don't seem to belong to themselves at all, once they'remarried. It's very happy you are, looking forward to your first, and youhave my good wishes. More than that, I'll be proud to be of any serviceto you I can when your time comes--it's myself has had experienceenough! But, I tell you, the joy runs out when you're slaving frommorning to night, and then never getting the half done that you ought;and when you don't know what it is to have two hours straight sleep atnight; and maybe your husband scolding at the noise the young ones make. Love 'em? Of course, you love 'em. But you can stand only so much. After that, you're done for. And the agony of passing and leaving thechildren motherless is something I don't like to think about. "

She bared her thin breast to her nursing babe, rocking slowly, her blueeyes straining into the future with its menace. 

"But, " said Marna, blushing with embarrassment, "need there besuch--such a burden? Don't you think it right to--to--"

"Neither God nor man seems to have any mercy on me, " cried the littlewoman passionately. "I say I'm in a trap--that's the truth of it. If Iwas a selfish, bad mother, I could get out of it; if I was a mean wife, I could, too, I suppose. I've tried to do what was right, --what otherpeople told me was right, --and I pray it won't kill me--for I ought tolive for the children's sake. "

The child was whining because of lack of nourishment, and Mrs. Finn putit to the other breast, but it fared little better there. Mrs. Dennisonwas looking on with her mild, benevolent aspect. 

"My dear, " she said at last with an air of gentle authority, "I'm goingout to get a bottle and good reliable infant food for that child. Youhaven't strength enough to more than keep yourself going, not to sayanything about the baby. "

She took the child out of the woman's arms and gave it to Kate. 

"But I don't think I ought to wean it when it's so young, " cried Mrs. Finn, breaking down and wringing her thin hands with an immemorialHibernian gesture. "Tim wouldn't like it, and his mother would rageat me. "

"They'll like it when they see the baby getting some flesh on itsbones, " insisted Mrs. Dennison. "There's more than one kind of a fight amother has to put up for her children. They used to think it fine for awoman to kill herself for her children, but I don't think it's so muchthe fashion now. As you say, a mother has no business to die; it's thepart of intelligence to live. So you just have a set-to with yourold-fashioned mother-in-law if it's necessary. "

"Yes, " put in Kate, "the new generation always has to fight the old inthe interests of progress. "

Marna broke into a rippling laugh. 

"That's her best platform manner, " she cried. "Just think, Mrs. Finn, myfriend talks on suffrage. "

"Oh!" gasped the little Irishwoman, involuntarily putting out her handsas if she would snatch her infant from such a contaminating hold. 

But Kate drew back smilingly. 

"Yes, " she said significantly, "I believe in woman's rights. "

She held on to the baby, and Mrs. Dennison, putting on her hat and coat, went in search of a nursing-bottle. 

On the way home, Mrs. Dennison, who was of the last generation, andKate, who was of the present one, talked the matter over. 

"She didn't seem to understand that she had been talking 'woman'srights, '" mused Kate, referring to Mrs. Finn. "The word frightened thepoor dear. She didn't see that fatal last word of her 'love, honor, andobey' had her where she might even have to give her life in keepingher word. "

"Well, for my part, " said Mrs. Dennison, in her mellow, flowing tones, "I always found it a pleasure to obey my husband. But, then, to be sure, I don't know that he ever asked anything inconsiderate of me. "

"You were a well-shielded woman, weren't you?" asked Kate. 

"I didn't need to lift my hand unless I wished, " said Mrs. Dennison inreminiscence. 

"And you had no children--"

"But that was a great sorrow. "

"Yes, but it wasn't a living vexation and drain. It didn't use up yourvitality and suck up your brain power and make a slattern and a drudgeof you as having five children in seven years has of little Mrs. Finn. It's all very well to talk of obeying when you aren't asked to obey--or, at least, when you aren't required to do anything difficult. But goodTim Finn, I'll warrant, tells his Mary when she may go and where, andhe'd be in a fury if she went somewhere against his desire. Oh, she'splaying the old medieval game, you can see that!"

"Dear Kate, " sighed Mrs. Dennison, "sometimes your expressions seem tome quite out of taste. I do hope you won't mind my saying so. You're sovery emphatic. "

"I don't mind a bit, Mrs. Dennison. I dare say I am getting to be ratherviolent and careless in my way of talking. It's a reaction from thevagueness and prettiness of speech I used to hear down in Silvertree, where they begin their remarks with an 'I'm not sure, but I think, ' etcetera. But, really, you must overlook my vehemence. If I could spend mytime with sweet souls like you, I'd be a different sort of woman. "

"I can't help looking forward, Kate, to the time when you'll be in yourown home. You think you're all bound up in this public work, but I cantell by the looks of you that you're just the one to make a good wifefor some fine man. I hope you don't think it impertinent of me, but Ican't make out why you haven't taken one or the other of the men whowant you. "

"You think some one wants me?" asked Kate provokingly. 

"Oh, we all know that Dr. Von Shierbrand would rather be taking you hometo see his old German mother than to be made President of the Universityof Chicago; and that nice Mr. McCrea is nearly crazy over the way youtreat him. "

"But it would seem so stale--life in a home with either of them! ShouldI just have to sit at the window and watch for them to come home?"

"You know you wouldn't, " said Mrs. Dennison, almost crossly. "Why doyou tease me? What's good enough for other women ought to be goodenough for you. "

"Oh, what a bad one I am!" cried Kate. "Of course what is good enoughfor better women than I ought to be good enough for me. But yet--shall Itell the truth about myself?"

"Do, " said Mrs. Dennison, placated. "I want you to confide in me, Kate. "

"Well, you see, dear lady, suppose that I marry one of the gentlemen ofwhom you have spoken. Suppose I make a pleasant home for my husband, have two or three nice children, and live a happy and--well, a goodlife. Then I die and there's the end. "

"Well, of course I don't think that's the end, " broke in Mrs. Dennison. 

Kate evaded the point. 

"I mean, there's an end of my earthly existence. Now, on the other hand, suppose I get this Bureau for Children through. Suppose it becomes afact. Let us play that I am asked to become the head of it, or, if notthat, at least to assist in carrying on its work. Then, suppose that, asa result of my work, the unprotected children have protection; theeducation of all the children in the country is assured--even of thehalf-witted, and the blind and the deaf and the vicious. Suppose thatthe care and development of children becomes a great and generallycomprehended science, like sanitation, so that the men and women offuture generations are more fitted to live than those we now see aboutus. Don't you think that will be better worth while than my individualhappiness? They think a woman heroic when she sacrifices herself for herchildren, but shouldn't I be much more heroic if I worked all my lifefor other people's children? For children yet to be born? I ask you thatcalmly. I don't wish you to answer me to-day. I'm in earnest now, dearMrs. Dennison, and I'd like you to give me a true answer. "

There was a little pause. Mrs. Dennison was trifling nervously with thefrogs on her black silk jacket. When she spoke, it was ratherdiffidently. 

"I could answer you so much better, my dear Kate, " she said at length, "if I only knew how much or how little vanity you have. "

"Oh!" gasped Kate. 

"Or whether you are really an egotist--as some think. "

"Oh!" breathed Kate again. 

"As for me, I always say that a person can't get anywhere withoutegotism. The word never did scare me. Egotism is a kind of yeast thatmakes the human bread rise. I don't see how we could get along withoutit. As you say, I'd better wait before answering you. You've asked me animportant question, and I'd like to give it thought. I can see thatyou'd be a good and useful woman whichever thing you did. But thequestion is, would you be a happy one in a home? You've got the idea ofa public life in your head, and very likely that influences you withoutyour realizing it. "

"I don't say I'm not ambitious, " cried Kate, really stirred. "But thatought to be a credit to me! It's ridiculous using the word 'ambitious'as a credit to a man, and making it seem like a shame to a woman. Ambition is personal force. Why shouldn't I have force?"

"There are things I can't put into words, " said Mrs. Dennison, taking afolded handkerchief from her bead bag and delicately wiping her face, "and one of them is what I think about women. I'm a woman myself, and itdoesn't seem becoming to me to say that I think they're sacred. "

"No more sacred than men!" interrupted Kate hotly. "Life is sacred--ifit's good. I can't say I think it sacred when it's deleterious. It'sthat pale, twilight sort of a theory which has kept women from doing thethings they were capable of doing. Men kept thinking of them as sacred, and then they were miserably disappointed when they found they weren't. They talk about women's dreams, but I think men dream just as much aswomen, or more, and that they moon around with ideas about angel wives, and then are horribly shocked when they find they've married limited, commonplace, selfish creatures like themselves. I say let us train themboth, make them comrades, give them a chance to share the burdens andthe rewards, and see if we can't reduce the number of broken hearts inthe world. "

"There are some burdens, " put in Mrs. Dennison, "which men and womencannot share. The burden of child-bearing, which is the most importantone there is, has to be borne by women alone. You yourself were talkingabout that only a little while ago. It's such a strange sort of athing, --so sweet and _so_ terrible, --and it so often takes a woman tothe verge of the grave, or over it, that I suppose it is that whichgives a sacredness to women. Then, too, they'll work all their liveslong for some one they love with no thought of any return except love. That makes them sacred, too. Most of them believe in God, even whenthey're bad, and they believe in those they love even when they oughtnot. Maybe they're right in this and maybe they're not. Perhaps you'llsay that shows their lack of sense. But I say it helps the world on, just the same. It may not be sensible--but it makes them sacred. "

Mrs. Dennison's face was shining. She had pulled the gloves from herwarm hands, and Kate, looking down at them, saw how work-worn they nowwere, though they were softly rounded and delicate. She knew this womanmight have married a second time; but she was toiling that she mightkeep faith with the man she had laid in his grave. She was expecting areunion with him. Her hope warmed her and kept her redolent of youth. She was still a bride, though she was a widow. She was of those whounderstood the things of the spirit. The essence of womanhood was inher--the elusive poetry of womanhood. To such implications of mysticbeauty there was no retort. Kate saw in that moment that when women gotas far as emancipation they were going to lose something infinitelyprecious. The real question was, should not these beautiful, theseevanishing joys be permitted to depart in the interests of progress?Would not new, more robust satisfactions come to take the place of them?

They rode on in silence, and Kate's mind darted here and there--dartedto Lena Vroom, that piteous little sister of Icarus, with her scorchedwings; darted to Honora Fulham with her shattered faith; to MaryMorrison with her wanton's wisdom; to Mary Finn, whose womanhood was herundoing; to Marna, who had given fame for love and found the bargaingood; to Mrs. Leger, who had turned to God; to her mother, the cringingwife, who could not keep faith with herself and her vows of obedience, and who had perished of the conflict; to Mrs. Dennison, happy in hermid-Victorian creed. Then from these, whom she knew, her mind swept onto the others--to all the restless, disturbed, questioning women theworld over, who, clinging to beautiful old myths, yet reached outdiffident hands to grasp new guidance. The violence and nurtured hatredof some of them offended her deeply; the egregious selfishness of othersseemed to her as a flaming sin. Militant, unrestrained, avid of coarseand obvious things, they presented a shameful contrast to this little, gentle, dreaming keeper of a boarding-house who sat beside her, herdove's eyes filled with the mist of memories. 

And yet--and yet--

XX

The next day, as it happened, she was invited to Lake Forest to attend a"suffrage tea. " A distinguished English suffragette was to be present, and the more fashionable group of Chicago suffragists were gathering topay her honor. 

It was a torrid day with a promise of storm, and Kate would havepreferred to go to the Settlement House to do her usual work, whichchanced just now to be chiefly clerical. But she was urged to meet theEnglishwoman and to discuss with her the matter of the Children'sBureau, in which the Settlement House people were now taking the keenestinterest. Kate went, gowned in fresh linen, and well pleased, after all, to be with a holiday crowd riding through the summer woods. Tea wasbeing served on the lawn. It overlooked the lake, and here were gatheredboth men and women. It was a company of rather notable persons, as Katesaw at a glance. Almost every one there was distinguished for somesocial achievement, or as the advocate of some reform or theory, orperhaps as an opulent and fashionable patron. It was at once interestingand amusing. 

Kate greeted her hostess, and looked about her for the guest of honor. It transpired that the affair was quite informal, after all. TheEnglishwoman was sitting in a tea-tent discoursing with a number ofgentlemen who hung over her with polite attentions. They were well-knownbachelors of advanced ideas--men with honorary titles and personalambitions. The great suffragist was very much at home with them. Herdeep, musical voice resounded like a bell as she uttered her dicta andher witticisms. She--like the men--was smoking a cigarette, a feat whichshe performed without coquetry or consciousness. She was smoking becauseshe liked to smoke. It took no more than a glance to reveal the factthat she was further along in her pregnancy than Marna--Marna whostarted back from the door when a stranger appeared at it lest sheshould seem immodest. But the suffragette, having acquired an applaudingand excellent husband, saw no reason why she should apologize to theworld for the processes of nature. Quite as unconscious of her conditionas of her unconventionality in smoking, she discoursed with thesediverted men, her transparent frock revealing the full beauties of herneck and bust, her handsome arms well displayed--frankly and insistentlyfeminine, yet possessing herself without hesitation of what may betermed the masculine attitude toward life. 

For some reason which Kate did not attempt to define, she refrained fromdiscussing the Bureau of Children with the celebrated suffragette, although she did not doubt that the Englishwoman would have been capableof keen and valuable criticism. Instead, she returned to the city, senta box of violets to Marna, and then went on to her attic room. 

A letter was awaiting her from the West. It read:

 "MY DEAR MISS BARRINGTON:--

 "Honora and the kiddies are here. I have given my cousin a room where she can see the mountains on two sides, and I hope it will help. I've known the hills to help, even with pretty rough customers. It won't take a creature like Honora long to get hold of the secret, will it? You know what I mean, I guess. 

 "I wish you had come. I watched the turn in the drive to see if you wouldn't be in the station wagon. There were two women's heads. I recognized Honora's, and I tried to think the second one was yours, but I really knew it wasn't. It was a low head--one of that patient sort of heads--and a flat, lid-like hat. The nurse's, of course! I suppose you wear helmet-shaped hats with wings on them--something like Mercury's or Diana's. Or don't they sell that kind of millinery nowadays?

 "Honora tells me you're trying to run the world and that you make up to all kinds of people--hold-up men as well as preachers. Do you know, I'm something like that myself? I can't help it, but I do seem to enjoy folks. One of the pleasantest nights I ever spent was with a lot of bandits in a cave. I was their prisoner, too, which complicated matters. But we had such a bully time that they asked me to join them. I told them I'd like the life in some respects. I could see it was a sort of game not unlike some I'd played when I was a boy. But it would have made me nervous, so I had to refuse them. 

 "Well, I'm talking nonsense. What if you should think I counted it sense! That would be bad for me. I only thought you'd be having so may pious and proper letters that I'd have to give you a jog if I got you to answer this. And I do wish you would answer it. I'm a lonely man, though a busy one. Of course it's going to be a tremendous comfort having Honora here when once she gets to be herself. She's wild with pain now, and nothing she says means anything. We play chess a good deal, after a fashion. Honora thinks she's amusing me, but as I like 'the rigor of the game, ' I can't say that I'm amused at her plays. The first time she thinks before she moves I'll know she's over the worst of her trouble. She seems very weak, but I'm feeding her on cream and eggs. The kiddies are dears--just as cute as young owls. They're not afraid of me even when I pretend I'm a coyote and howl. 

 "Do write to me, Miss Barrington. I'm as crude as a cabbage, but when I say I'd rather have you write me than have any piece of good fortune befall me which your wildest imagination could depict, I mean it. Perhaps that will scare you off. Anyway, you can't say I didn't play fair. 

 "I'm worn out sitting around with this fractured leg of mine in its miserable cast. (I know stronger words than 'miserable, ' but I use it because I'm determined to behave myself. ) Honora says she thinks it would be all right for you to correspond with me. I asked her. 

 "Yours faithfully, "KARL WANDER. "

"What a ridiculous boy, " said Kate to herself. She laughed aloud with arippling merriment; and then, after a little silence, she laughed again. 

"The man certainly is naïf, " she said. "Can he really expect me toanswer a letter like that?"

She awoke several times that night, and each time she gave a fleetingthought to the letter. She seemed to see it before her eyes--a purpleeidolon, a parallelogram in shape. It flickered up and down like anelectric sign. When morning came she was quite surprised to find theletter was existent and stationary. She read it again, and she wishedtremendously that she might answer it. It occurred to her that in a wayshe never had had any fun. She had been persistently earnest, passionately honest, absurdly grim. Now to answer that letter would comeunder the head of mere frolic! Yet would it? Was not this curious, outspoken man--this gigantic, good-hearted, absurd boy--giving hernotice that he was ready to turn into her lover at the slightest gestureof acquiescence on her part? No, the frolic would soon end. It would beanother of those appalling games-for-life, those woman-trap affairs. And she liked freedom better than anything. 

She went off to her work in a defiant frame of mind, carrying, however, the letter with her in her handbag. 

What she did write--after several days' delay--was this:--

 "MY DEAR MR. WANDER:--

 "I can see that Honora is in the best place in the world for her. You must let me know when she has checkmated you. I quite agree that that will show the beginning of her recovery. She has had a terrible misfortune, and it was the outcome of a disease from which all of us 'advanced' women are suffering. Her convictions and her instincts were at war. I can't imagine what is going to happen to us. We all feel very unsettled, and Honora's tragedy is only one of several sorts which may come to any of us. But an instinct deeper than instinct, a conviction beyond conviction, tells me that we are right--that we must go on, studying, working, developing. We may have to pay a fearful price for our advancement, but I do not suppose we could turn back now if we would. 

 "You ask if I will correspond with you. Well, do you suppose we really have anything to say? What, for example, have you to tell me about? Honora says you own a mine, or two or three; that you have a city of workmen; that you are a father to them. Are they Italians? I think she said so. They're grateful folk, the Italians. I hope they like you. They are so sweet when they do, and so--sudden--when they don't. 

 "I have had something to do with them, and they are very dear to me. They ask me to their christenings and to other festivals. I like their gayety because it contrasts with my own disposition, which is gloomy. 

 "Upon reflection, I think we'd better not write to each other. You were too explicit in your letter--too precautionary. You'd make me have a conscience about it, and I'd be watching myself. That's too much trouble. My business is to watch others, not myself. But I do thank you for giving such a welcome to Honora and the babies. I hope you will soon be about again. I find it so much easier to imagine you riding over a mountain pass than sitting in the house with a leg in plaster. 

 "Yours sincerely, "KATE BARRINGTON. "

He wrote back:--

 "MY DEAR MISS BARRINGTON:--

 "I admire your idea of gloom! Not the spirit of gloom but of adventure moves you. I saw it in your eye. When I buy a horse, I always look at his eye. It's not so much viciousness that I'm afraid of as stupidity. I like a horse that is always pressing forward to see what is around the next turn. Now, we humans are a good deal like horses. Women are, anyway. And I saw your eye. My own opinion is that you are having the finest time of anybody I know. You're shaping your own life, at least, --and that's the best fun there is, --the best kind of good fortune. Of course you'll get tired of it after a while. I don't say that because you are a woman, but I've seen it happen over and over again both with men and women. After a little while they get tired of roving and come home. 

 "You may not believe it, but, after all, that's the great moment in their lives--you just take it from me who have seen more than you might think and who have had a good deal of time to think things out. I do wish you had seen your way to come out here. There are any number of matters I would like to talk over with you. 

 "You mustn't think me impudent for writing in this familiar way. I write frankly because I'm sure you'll understand, and the conventionalities have been cast aside because in this case they seem so immaterial. I can assure you that I'm not impudent--not where women are concerned, at any rate. I'm a born lover of women, though I have been no woman's lover. I haven't seen much of them. Sometimes I've gone a year without seeing one, not even a squaw. But I judge them by my mother, who made every one happy who came near her, and by some others I have known; I judge them by you, though I saw you only a minute. I suppose you will think me crazy or insincere in saying that. I'm both sane and honest--ask Honora. 

 "You speak of my Italians. They are making me trouble. We have been good friends and they have been happy here. I gave them lots to build on if they would put up homes; and I advanced the capital for the cottages and let them pay me four per cent--the lowest possible interest. I got a school for their children and good teachers, and I interested the church down in Denver to send a priest out here and establish a mission. I thought we understood each other, and that they comprehended that their prosperity and mine were bound up together. But an agitator came here the other day, --sent by the unions, of course, --and there's discontent. They have lost the friendly look from their eyes, and the men turn out of their way to avoid speaking to me. Since I've been laid up here, things have been going badly. There have been meetings and a good deal of hard talk. I suppose I'm in for a fight, and I tell you it hurts. I feel like a man at war with his children. As I feel just now, I'd throw up the whole thing rather than row with them, but the money of other men is invested in these mines and I'm the custodian of it. So I've no choice in the matter. Perhaps, too, it's for their own good that they should be made to see reason. What do you say?

 "Faithfully, "WANDER. "

Honora wrote the same day and to her quiet report of improved nightsand endurable days she added:--

 "I hope you will answer my cousin's letter. I can't tell you what a good man he is, and so boyish, in spite of his being strong and perfectly brave--oh, brave to the death! He's very lonely. He always has been. You'll have to make allowances for his being so Western and going right to the point in such a reckless way. He hasn't told me what he's written you, but I know if he wants to be friends with you he'll say so without any preliminaries. He's very eager to have me talk of you, so I do. I'm eager to talk, too. I always loved you, Kate, but now I put you and Karl in a class by yourselves as the completely dependable ones. 

 "The babies send kisses. Don't worry about me. I'm beginning to see that it's not extraordinary for trouble to have come to me. Why not to me as well as to another? I'm one of the great company of sad ones now. But I'm not going to be melancholy. I know how disappointed you'd be if I were. I'm beginning to sleep better, and for all of this still, dark cavern in my heart, so filled with voices of the past and with the horrible chill of the present, I am able to laugh a little at passing things. I find myself doing it involuntarily. So at least I've got where I can hear what the people about me are saying, and can make a fitting reply. Yes, do write Karl. For my sake. "

XXI

Meantime, Ray McCrea had neglected to take his summer vacation. He wasstaying in the city, and twice a week he called on Kate. Kate liked himneither more nor less than at the beginning. He was clever and he waskind, and it was his delight to make her happy. But it was with thesurface of her understanding that she listened to him and the skimmingsof her thoughts that she passed to him. He had that light, acrid accentof well-to-do American men. Reasonably contented himself, he failed tosee why every one else should not be so, too. He was not religious forthe same reason that he was not irreligious--because it seemed to himuseless to think about such matters. Public affairs and politics failedto interest him because he believed that the country was in the hands ofa mob and that the "grafters would run things anyway. " He calledeloquence spell-binding, and sentiment slush, --sentiment, that is, inbooks and on the stage, --and he was indulgently inclined to suspect thatthere was something "in it" for whoever appeared to be essaying abenevolent enterprise. Respectable, liberal-handed, habitually amused, slightly caustic, he looked out for the good of himself and thoserelated to him and considered that he was justified in closing hiscorporate regards at that point. He had no cant and no hypocrisy, nopose and no fads. A sane, aggressive, self-centered, rationalmaterialist of the American brand, it was not only his friends whothought him a fine fellow. He himself would have admitted so much andhave been perfectly justified in so doing. 

Kate received flowers, books, and sweets from him, and now and then heasked her why he had lost ground with her. Sometimes he would say:--

"I can see a conservative policy is the one for me, Kate, where you'reconcerned. I'm going to lie low so as not to give you a chance to sendme whistling. "

Once, when he grew picturesquely melancholy, she refused to receive hisofferings. She told him he was making a villainess out of her, and thatshe'd end their meetings. But at that he promised so ardently not to beardent that she forgave him and continued to read the novels and to tendthe flowers he brought her. They went for walks together; sometimes shelunched with him in the city, and on pleasant evenings they attendedopen-air concerts. He tried to be discreet, but in August, with the fullmoon, he had a relapse. Kate gave him warning; he persisted, --the moonreally was quite wonderful that August, --and then, to his chagrin, hereceived a postcard from Silvertree. Kate had gone to see her father. 

 * * * * *

She would not have gone but for a chance word in one of Wander'sletters. 

"I hear your father is still living, " he wrote. "That is so good! I haveno parents now, but I like to remember how happy I was when I had them. I was young when my mother died, but father lived to a good age, and aslong as he was alive I had some one to do things for. He always liked tohear of my exploits. I was a hero to him, if I never was to any oneelse. It kept my heart warmed up, and when he went he left me verylonely, indeed. "

Kate reddened with shame when she read these words. Had Honora told himhow she had deserted her father--how she had run from him and histyranny to live her own life, and was he, Wander, meaning this for arebuke? But she knew that could not be. Honora would have kept hercounsel; she was not a tattler. Karl was merely congratulating her on apiece of good fortune, apparently. It threw a new light on thedeclaration of independence that had seemed to her to be so fine. Wasold-time sentiment right, after all? The ancient law, "Honor thy fatherand thy mother, " did not put in the proviso, "if they are according tothy notion of what they should be. "

So Kate was again at Silvertree and in the old, familiar and nowlifeless house. It was not now a caressed and pampered home; there wasno longer any one there to trick it out in foolish affectionateadornments. In the first half-hour, while Kate roamed from room to room, she could hardly endure the appalling blankness of the place. Nostranger could have felt so unwelcomed as she did--so alien, soinconsolably homeless. 

She was waiting for her father when he came home, and she hoped to warmhim a little by the surprise of her arrival. But it was his cue to bedeeply offended with her. 

"Hullo, Kate, " he said, nodding and holding out his hand with adeliberately indifferent gesture. 

"Oh, see here, dad, you know you've got to kiss me!" she cried. 

So he did, rather shamefacedly, and they sat together on the dustyveranda and talked. He had been well, he said, but he was far fromlooking so. His face was gray and drawn, his lips were pale, and hislong skillful surgeon's hands looked inert and weary. When he walked, hehad the effect of dragging his feet after him. 

"Aren't you going to take a vacation, dad?" Kate demanded. "If ever aman appeared to be in need of it, you do. "

"What would I do with a vacation? And where could I go? I'd look fine ata summer resort, wouldn't I, sitting around with idle fools? If I couldonly go somewhere to get rid of this damned neurasthenia that all thefool women think they've got, I'd go; but I don't suppose there's such aplace this side of the Arctic Circle. "

Kate regarded him for a moment without answering. She saw he was almostat the end of his strength and a victim of the very malady against whichhe was railing. The constant wear and tear of country practice, year inand year out, had depleted him of a magnificent stock of energy andendurance. Perhaps, too, she had had her share of responsibility in hisdecline, for she had been severe with him; had defied him when she mighthave comforted him. She forgot his insolence, his meanness, hisconscienceless hectoring, as she saw how his temples seemed fallen inand how his gray hair straggled over his brow. It was she who assumedthe voice of authority now. 

"There's going to be a vacation, " she announced, "and it will be quite along one. Put your practice in the hands of some one else, let yourhousekeeper take a rest, and then you come away with me. I'll give youthree days to get ready. "

He cast at her the old sharp, lance-like look of opposition, but shestood before him so strong, so kind, so daughterly (so motherly, too), that, for one of the few times in his life of senseless domination andobstinacy, he yielded. The tears came to his eyes. 

"All right, Kate, " he said with an accent of capitulation. He really wasa broken old man. 

She passed a happy evening with him looking over advertisements offorest inns and fishing resorts, and though no decision was reached, both of them went to bed in a state of pleasant anticipation. Thefollowing day she took his affairs in hand. The housekeeper wasdelighted at her release; a young physician was pleased to take chargeof Dr. Barrington's patients. 

Kate made him buy new clothes, --he had been wearing winter ones, --andshe set him out in picturesque gear suiting his lank length andold-time manner. Then she induced him to select a place far north in theWisconsin woods, and the third day they were journeying there together. 

It seemed quite incredible that the dependent and affectionate manopposite her was the one who had filled her with fear and resentmentsuch a short time ago. She found herself actually laughing aloud once atthe absurdity of it all. Had her dread of him been fortuitous, histyranny a mere sham? Had he really liked her all the time, and had shebeen a sensitive fool? She would have thought so, indeed, but for thememory of the perplexed and distracted face of her mother, the cringingand broken spirit of her who missed truth through an obsession of love. No, no, a tyrant he had been, one of a countless army of them!

But now he leaned back on his seat very sad of eye, inert of gesture, without curiosity or much expectancy. He let her do everything for him. She felt her heart warming as she served him. She could hardly keepherself from stooping to kiss his great brow; the hollows of his eyeswhen he was sleeping moved her to a passion of pity. After all, he washer own; and now she had him again. The bitterness of years began todie, and with it much of that secret, instinctive aversion to men--thatterror of being trapped and held to some uninspiring association ordragging task. 

For now, when her father awoke from one of his many naps, he would turnto her with: "Have I slept long, Kate?" or "We'll be going in to lunchsoon, I suppose, daughter?" or "Will it be very long now before we reachour destination?"

It was reached at dawn of an early autumn day, and they drove ten milesinto the pine woods. The scented silence took them. They were at "God'sgreen caravansarie, " and the rancor that had poisoned their hearts wasgone. They turned toward each other in common trust, father anddaughter, forgiving, if not all forgetting, the hurt and angry years. 

"It really was your cousin who brought it about, " Kate wrote Honora. "Hereminded me that I was fortunate to have a father. You see, I hadn'trealized it! Oh, Honora, what a queer girl I am--always having to thinkthings out! Always making myself miserable in trying to be happy! Alwaysgoing wrong in striving to be right! I should think the gods would makeOlympus ring laughing at me! I once wrote your cousin that women of mysort were worn out with their struggle to reconcile their convictionsand their instincts. And that's true. That's what is making them sorestless and so strange and tumultuous. But of course I can't think ittheir fault--merely their destiny. Something is happening to them, butneither they nor any one else can quite tell what it is. "

 * * * * *

Dr. Barrington was broken, no question about that. Even the stimulationof the incomparable air of those Northern woods could not charge himwith vitality. He lay wrapped in blankets, on the bed improvised for himbeneath the trees, or before the leaping fire in the inn, with the odorsof the burning pine about him, and he let time slip by as it would. 

The people at the inn thought they never had seen a more devoteddaughter than his. She sat beside him while he slept; she read or talkedto him softly when he awakened; she was at hand with some light butsustaining refreshment whenever he seemed depressed or too relaxed. Butthere were certain things which the inn people could not make out. Thesick man had the air of having forgiven this fine girl for something. Hereceived her service like one who had the right to expect it. He wastender and he was happy, but he was, after all, the dominator. Nor couldthey quite make out the girl, who smiled at his demands, --which weresometimes incessant, --and who obeyed with the perfect patience of thestrong. They did not know that if he had once been an active tyrant, hewas now a supine one. As he had been unable, for all of hisintelligence, to perceive the meaning of justice from the old angle, sohe was equally unable to get it from his present point of view. He hadbeen harsh with his daughter in the old days; so much he would haveadmitted. That he would have frustrated her completely, absorbed andwasted her power, he could not perceive. He did not surmise that he wasnow doing in an amiable fashion what he hitherto had tried to do in amasterful and insolent one. He did not realize that the tyranny of theweak is a more destructive thing when levelled at the generous than thetyranny of the strong. 

Had he been interrupted in mid-career--in those days when his surgerywas sure and bold--to care for a feeble and complaining wife, he wouldhave thought himself egregiously abused. That Kate, whose mail each dayexceeded by many times that which he had received in his mostinfluential years, whose correspondence was with persons with whom hecould not at any time have held communication, should be taken from heractive duties appeared to him as nothing. He was a sick father. Hisdaughter attended him in love and dutifulness. He was at peace--and heknew she was doing her duty. It really did not occur to him that she orany one else could have looked at the matter in a different light, orthat any loving expression of regret was due her. Such sacrifices wereexpected of women. They were not expected of men, although men sometimesmagnificently performed them. 

To tell the truth, no such idea occurred to Kate either. She was ashappy as her father. At last, in circumstances sad enough, she hadreached a degree of understanding with him. She had no thought for theinconvenience under which she worked. She was more than willing to sittill past the middle of the night answering her letters, postponing herengagements, sustaining her humbler and more unhappy friends--those whowere under practical parole to her--with her encouragement, and always, day by day, extending the idea of the Bureau of Children. For daily ittook shape; daily the system of organization became more apparent toher. She wrote to Ray McCrea about it; she wrote to Karl Wander on thesame subject. It seemed to suffice or almost to suffice her. It kept herfrom anticipating the details of the melancholy drama which was nowbeing enacted before her eyes. 

For her father was passing. His weakness increased, and his attitudetoward life became one of gentle indifference. He was homesick for hiswife, too. Though he had seemed to take so little satisfaction in hersociety, and had not scrupled when she was alive to show the contempt hefelt for her opinions, now he liked to talk of her. He had made a greatoutcry against sentiment all of his life, but in his weakness he foundhis chief consolation in it. He had been a materialist, denyingimmortality for the soul, but now he reverted to the phrases of piousmen of the past generation. 

"I shall be seeing your mother soon, Kate, " he would say wistfully, holding his daughter's hand. Kate was involuntarily touched by suchwords, but she was ashamed for him, too. Where was all his hard-won, bravely flaunted infidelity? Where his scientific outlook?

It was only slowly, and as the result of her daily and nightlyassociation with him, that she began to see how his acquired convictionswere slipping away from him, leaving the sentiments and predilectionswhich had been his when he was a boy. Had he never been a strong man, really, and had his violence of opinion and his arrogance of demeanorbeen the defences erected by a man of spiritual timidity and restless, excitable brain? Had his assertiveness, like his compliance, been partand parcel of a mind not at peace, not grounded in a definite faith?Perhaps he had been afraid of the domination of his gentle wife with hersoft insistence, and had girded at her throughout the years because ofmere fanatic self-esteem. But now that she had so long been beyond thereach of his whimsical commands, he turned to the thought of her like ayearning child to its mother. 

"If you hadn't come when you did, Kate, " he would say, weeping withself-pity, "I should have died alone. I wouldn't own to any one how sickI was. Why, one night I was so weak, after being out thirty-six hourswith a sick woman, that I had to creep upstairs on my hands and knees. "He sobbed for a moment piteously, his nerves too tattered to permit himto retain any semblance of self-control. Kate tried in vain to soothehim. "What would your mother have thought if you had let me die alone?"he demanded of her. 

It was useless for her to say that he had not told her he was ill. Hewas in no condition to face the truth. He was completely shattered--thevictim of a country physician's practice and of an unrestrainedirritability. Her commiseration had been all that was needed to have himyield himself unreservedly to her care. 

It had been her intention to stay in the woods with him for a fortnight, but the end of that time found his lassitude increasing and his need forher greater than ever. She was obliged to ask for indefinite leave ofabsence. A physician came from Milwaukee once a week to see him; andmeantime quiet and comfort were his best medicines. 

The autumn began to deepen. The pines accentuated their solemnity, andout on the roadways the hazel bushes and the sumac changed to canary, torusset, and to crimson. For days together the sky would be cloudless, and even in the dead of night the vault seemed to retain its splendor. There are curious cloths woven on Persian and on Turkish looms whichappear to the casual eye to be merely black, but which held in sunlightshow green and blue, purple and bronze, like the shifting colors on aduck's back. Kate, pacing back and forth in the night after hours ofconcentrated labor, --labor which could be performed only when her fatherwas resting, --noted such mysterious and evasive hues in her Northernsky. Never had she seen heavens so triumphant. True, the stars shonewith a remote glory, but she was more inspired by their enduring, theirimpersonal magnificence, than she could have been by anything relativeto herself. 

A year ago, had she been so isolated, she might have found herselflonely, but it was quite different now. She possessed links with theactive world. There were many who wanted her--some for small and somefor great things. She felt herself in the stream of life; it pouredabout her, an invisible thing, but strong and deep. Sympathy, understanding, encouragement, reached her even there in her solitude andheartened her. Weary as she often was physically, drained as she couldnot but be mentally, her heart was warm and full. 

October came and went bringing little change in Dr. Barrington'scondition. It did not seem advisable to move him. Rest and care were thethings required; and the constant ministrations of a physician wouldhave been of little benefit. Kate prayed for a change; and it came, butnot as she had hoped. One morning she went to her father to find himterribly altered. It was as if some blight had fallen upon him in thenight. His face was gray in hue, his pulse barely fluttering, though hiseyes were keener than they had been, as if a sudden danger had broughtback his old force and comprehension. Even the tone in which headdressed her had more of its old-time quality. It was the accent ofcommand, the voice he had used as a physician in the sick-room, thoughit was faint. 

"Send for Hudson, " he said. "We'll be needing him, Kate. The fight'son. Don't feel badly if we fail. You've done your best. "

It was six hours before the physician arrived from Milwaukee. 

"I couldn't have looked for anything like this, " he said to Kate. "Ithought he was safe--that six months' rest would see him gettingabout again. "

They had a week's conflict with the last dread enemy of man, and theylost. Dr. Barrington was quite as much aware of the significance of hissteady decline as any one. He had practical, quiet, encouraging talkswith his daughter. He sent for an attorney and secured his property toher. Once more, as in his brighter days, he talked of important matters, though no longer with his old arrogance. He seemed to comprehend atlast, fully and proudly, that she was the inheritor of the best part ofhim. Her excursive spirit, her inquisitive mind, were, after all, inspite of all differences, his gift to her. He gave her his good wishesand begged her to follow whatever forces had been leading her. It was asif, in his weakness, he had sunk for a period into something resemblingchildhood and had emerged from it into a newer, finer manhood. 

"I kept abreast of things in my profession, " he said, "but in othermatters I was obstinate. I liked the old way--a man at the helm, and thecrew answering his commands. No matter how big a fool the man was, Istill wanted him at the helm. " He smiled at her brightly. There was, indeed, a sort of terrible brilliancy about him, the result, perhaps, of heroic artificial stimulation. But these false fires soon burnedthemselves out. One beautiful Sunday morning they found him sinking. Hehimself informed his physician that it was his day of transition. 

"I've only an hour or two more, Hudson, " he whispered cheerfully. "Feelthat pulse!"

"Oh, we may manage to keep you with us some time yet, Dr. Barrington, "said the other with a professional attempt at optimism. 

But the older man shook his head. 

"Let's not bother with the stock phrases, " he said. "Ask my daughter tocome. I'd like to look at her till the last. "

So Kate sat where he could see her, and they coaxed the fluttering heartto yet a little further effort. Dr. Barrington supervised everything;counted his own pulse; noted its decline with his accustomed accuracy. 

The sunlight streamed into the room through the tall shafts of trees;outside the sighing of the pines was heard, rising now and then to anoble requiem. It lifted Kate's soul on its deep harmonies, and she wasable to bear herself with fortitude. 

"It's been so sweet to be with you, dear, " she murmured in the earswhich were growing dull to earthly sounds. "Say that I've made up to youa little for my willfulness. I've always loved you--always. "

"I know, " he whispered. "I understand--everything--now!"

In fact, his glance answered hers with full comprehension. 

"The beat is getting very low now, Doctor, " he murmured, the fingers ofhis right hand on his left wrist; "very infrequent--fifteenminutes more--"

Dr. Hudson tried to restrain him from his grim task of noting his ownsinking vitality, but the old physician waved him off. 

"It's very interesting, " he said. It seemed so, indeed. Suddenly he saidquite clearly and in a louder voice than he had used that day: "It hasstopped. It is the end!"

Kate sprang to her feet incredulously. There was a moment of waiting sotense that the very trees seemed to cease their moaning to listen. Inall the room there was no sound. The struggling breath had ceased. Theold physician had been correct--he had achieved the thing he had sethimself to do. He had announced his own demise. 

XXII

Kate had him buried beside the wife for whom he had so inconsistentlylonged. She sold the old house, selected a few keepsakes from it, disposed of all else, and came, late in November, back to the city. Marna's baby had been born--a little bright boy, named for his father. Mrs. Barsaloux, relenting, had sent a layette of French workmanship, andMarna was radiantly happy. 

"If only _tante_ will come over for Christmas, " Marna lilted to Kate, "Ishall be almost too happy to live. How good she was to me, and howungrateful I seemed to her! Write her to come, Kate, mavourneen. Tellher the baby won't seem quite complete till she's kissed it. "

So Kate wrote Mrs. Barsaloux, adding her solicitation to Marna's. Humanlove and sympathy were coming to seem to her of more value than anythingelse in the world. To be loved--to be companioned--to have the vastloneliness of life mitigated by fealty and laughter and tenderness--whatwas there to take the place of it?

Her heart swelled with a desire to lessen the pain of the world. All heregotism, her self-assertion, her formless ambitions had got up, or down, to that, --to comfort the comfortless, to keep evil away from littlechildren, to let those who were in any sort of a prison go free. Yetshe knew very well that all of this would lack its perfect meaningunless there was some one to say to her--to her and to none other: "Iunderstand. "

 * * * * *

Mrs. Barsaloux did not come to America at Christmas time. Karl Wanderdid not--as he had thought he might--visit Chicago. The holiday seasonseemed to bring little to Kate except a press of duties. She aspired togo to bed Christmas night with the conviction that not a child in herlarge territory had spent a neglected Christmas. This meant a skilledcoöperation with other societies, with the benevolently inclinednewspapers, and with generous patrons. The correspondence involved wasnecessarily large, and the amount of detail to be attended to more thanshe should have undertaken, unaided, but she was spurred on by an almostconsuming passion of pity and sisterliness. That sensible detachmentwhich had marked her work at the outset had gradually and perhapsregrettably disappeared. So far from having outgrown emotional struggle, she seemed now, because of something that was taking place in her innerlife, to be increasingly susceptible to it. 

Her father's death had taken from her the last vestige of a home. Shehad now no place which she could call her own, or to which she wouldinstinctively turn at Christmas time. To be sure, there were many whobade her to their firesides, and some of these invitations she acceptedwith gratitude and joy. But she could, of course, only pause at thehearthstones of others. Her thoughts winged on to other things--to thelittle poor homes where her wistful children dwelt, to the great schemefor their care and oversight which daily came nearer to realization. 

A number of benevolent women--rich in purse and in a passion for publicservice--desired her to lecture. She was to explain the meaning of theBureau of Children at the state federations of women's clubs, in lyceumcourses, and wherever receptive audiences could be found. They advised, among other things, her attendance at the biennial meeting of theGeneral Federation of Women's Clubs which was meeting that coming springin Southern California. 

The time had been not so far distant when she would have had difficultyin seeing herself in the rôle of a public lecturer, but now that she hadsomething imperative to say, she did not see herself in any "rôle" atall. She ceased to think about herself save as the carrier of a message. 

Her Christmas letter from Wander was at once a disappointment and ashock. 

 * * * * *

 "I've made a mess of things, " he wrote, "and do not intend to intrude on you until I have shown myself more worthy of consideration. I try to tell myself that my present fiasco is not my fault, but I've more than a suspicion that I'm playing the coward's part when I think that. You can be disappointed in me if you like. _I'm_ outrageously disappointed. I thought I was made of better stuff. 

 "I don't know when I'll have time for writing again, for I shall be very busy. I suppose I'll think about you more than is good for me. But maybe not. Maybe the thoughts of you will be crowded out. I'm rather curious to see. It would be better for me if they would, for I've come to a bad turn in the road, and when I get around it, maybe all of the old familiar scenes--the window out of which your face looked, for example--will be lost to me. I send my good wishes to you all the same. I shall do that as long as I have a brain and a heart. 

 "Faithfully, "WANDER. "

"That means trouble, " reflected Kate, and had a wild desire to rush tohis aid. 

 * * * * *

That she did not was owing partly--only partly--to another letter which, bearing an English postmark, indicated that Ray McCrea, who had beenabroad for a month on business, was turning his face toward home. Whathe had to say was this:--

 "DEAREST KATE:--

 "I'm sending you a warning. In a few days I'll be tossing on that black sea of which I have, in the last few days, caught some discouraging glimpses. It doesn't look as if it meant to let me see the Statue of Liberty again, but as surely as I do, I'm going to go into council with you. 

 "I imagine you know mighty well what I'm going to say. For years you've kept me at your call--or, rather, for years I have kept myself there. You've discouraged me often, in a tolerant fashion, as if you thought me too young to be dangerous, or yourself too high up to be called to account. I've been patient, chiefly because I found your society, as a mere recipient of my awkward attentions, too satisfactory to be able to run the risk of foregoing it. But if I were to sit in the outer court any longer I would be pusillanimous. I'm coming home to force you to make up that strange mind of yours, which seems to be forever occupying itself with the thing far-off and to-be-hoped-for, rather than with what is near at hand. 

 "You'll have time to think it over. You can't say I've been precipitate. 

 "Yours--always, "RAY. "

At that she flashed a letter to Colorado. 

"What is your cousin's trouble?" she asked Honora. "Is it at the mines?"

"It's at the mines, " Honora replied. "Karl's life has been and is indanger. Friends have warned me of that again and again. There's noholding these people--these several hundred Italians that poor Karlinsisted upon regarding as his wards, his 'adopted children. ' They'repreparing to leave their half-paid-for homes and their steady work, andto go threshing off across the country in the wave of a hard-drinking, hysterical labor leader. He has them inflamed to the explosive point. When they've done their worst, Karl may be a poor man. Not that heworries about that; but he's likely to carry down with him friends andbusiness associates. Of course this is not final. He may win out, butsuch a catastrophe threatens him. 

"But understand, all this is not what is tormenting him and turning himgaunt and haggard. No, as usual, the last twist of the knife is given bya woman. In this case it is an Italian girl, Elena Cimiotti, thedaughter of one of the strikers and of the woman who does our washingfor us. She's a beautiful, wild creature, something as you might supposethe daughter of Jorio to be. She has come for the washing and hasbrought it home again for months past, and Karl, who is thoughtful ofeverybody, has assisted her with her burden when she was lifting it fromher burro's back or packing it on the little beast. Sometimes he wouldfetch her a glass of water, or give her a cup of tea, or put some fruitin her saddle-bags. You know what a way he has with all women! I supposeit would turn any foolish creature's head. And he has such an impressiveway of saying things! What would be a casual speech on the tongue ofanother becomes significant, when he has given one of his originaltwists to it. I think, too, that in utter disregard of Italian etiquettehe has sometimes walked on the street with this girl for a few steps. Heis like a child in some ways, --as trusting and unconventional, --and hewants to be friends with everybody. I can't tell whether it is becausehe is such an aristocrat that it doesn't occur to him that any one cansuspect him of losing caste, or because he is such a democrat that hedoesn't know it exists. 

"However that may be, the girl is in love with him. These Italian girlsare modest and well-behaved ordinarily, but when once their imaginationis aroused they are like flaming meteors. They have no shame becausethey can't see why any one should be ashamed of love (and, to tell thetruth, I can't either). But this girl believes Karl has encouraged her. I suppose she honestly believed that he was sweethearting. He isastounded and dismayed. At first both he and I thought she would getover it, but she has twice been barely prevented from killing herself. Of course her countrymen think her desperately ill-treated. She is thehandsomest girl in the settlement, and she has a number of ardentadmirers. To the hatred which they have come to bear Karl as members ofa strike directed against him, they now add the element ofpersonal jealousy. 

"So you see what kind of a Christmas we are having! I have had Mrs. Haystake the babies to Colorado Springs, and if anything happens to ushere, I'll trust to you to see to them. You, who mean to look afterlittle children, look after mine above all others, for their mother gaveyou, long since, her loving friendship. I would rather have you mothermy babies, maiden though you are, than any woman I know, for I feel agreat force in you, Kate, and believe you are going on until you get ananswer to some of the questions which the rest of us have foundunanswerable. 

"Karl wants me to leave, for there is danger that the ranch house may beblown up almost any time. These men play with dynamite as if it werewood, anyway, and they make fiery enemies. Every act of ours is spiedupon. Our servants have left us, and Karl and I, obstinate as mules andas proud as sheiks, after the fashion of our family, hold the fort. Hewants me to go, but I tell him I am more interested in life than I everdared hope I would be again. I have been bayoneted into a fighting mood, and I find it magnificent to really feel alive again, after crawling inthe dust so long, with the taste of it in my mouth. So don't pity me. Asfor Karl--he looks wild and strange, like the Flying Dutchman with hisspectral hand on the helm. But I don't know that I want you to pity himeither. He is a curious man, with a passionate soul, and if he flaresout like a torch in the wind, it will be fitting enough. No, don't pityus. Congratulate us rather. "

"Now what, " said Kate aloud, "may that mean?"

"Congratulate us!"

The letter had a note of reckless gayety. Had Honora and Karl, thoughcousins, been finding a shining compensation there in the midst of manytroubles? It sounded so, indeed. Elena Cimiotti might swing down themountain roads wearing mountain flowers in her hair if she pleased, andKate would not have thought her dangerous to the peace of Karl Wander. If the wind were wild and the leaves driving, he might have kissed herin some mad mood. So much might be granted--and none, not even Elena, bethe worse for it. But to live side by side with Honora Fulham, to facedanger with her, to have the exhilaration of conflict, they twotogether, the mountains above them, the treacherous foe below, a fortunelost or gained in a day, all the elements of Colorado's gambling chancesof life and fortune at hand, might mean--anything. 

Well, she would congratulate them! If Honora could forget a shatteredheart so soon, if Wander could take it on such easy terms, they wereentitled to congratulations of a sort. And if they were killed somefrantic night, --were blown to pieces with their ruined home, and soreached together whatever lies beyond this life, --why, then, they wereto be congratulated, indeed! Or if they evaded their enemies and swungtheir endangered craft into the smooth stream of life, stillcongratulations were to be theirs. 

She confessed to herself that she would rather be in that lonelybeleaguered house facing death with Karl Wander than be the recipient ofthe greatest honor or the participant in the utmost gayety that lifecould offer. 

That the fact was fantastic made it none the less a fact. 

 * * * * *

Should she write to Honora: "I congratulate you?"

Or should she wire Karl?

She got out his letters, and his words were as a fresh wind blowing overher spirit. She realized afresh how this man, seen but once, known onlythrough the medium of infrequent letters, had invigorated her. What hadhe not taught her of compassion, of "the glory of the commonplace, " ofduty eagerly fulfilled, of the abounding joy of life--even in lifeshadowed by care or sickness or poverty?

No, she would write them nothing. They were her friends in fullness ofsympathy. They, like herself, were of those to whom each day and nightis a privilege, to whom sorrow is an enrichment, delight an unfoldment, opposition a spur. They were of the company of those who dared to speakthe truth, who breathed deep, who partook of the banquet of lifewithout fear. 

She had seen Honora in the worst hour of tribulation that can come to agood woman, and she knew she had arisen from her overthrow, stronger forthe trial; now Karl was battling, and he had cried out to her in hispain--his shame of defeat. But it would not be his extinction. She wassure of that. They might, among them, slay his body, but she could notread his letters, so full of valiant contrasts, and doubt that hisspirit must withstand all adversaries. 

No, sardonic with these two she could never be. Like that poor Elena, she might have mistaken Wander's meanings. He was a man of too elaborategestures; something grandiose, inherently his, made him enact the dramaof life with too much fervor. It was easy, Honora had insinuated, for awoman to mistake him!

Kate gripped her two strong hands together and clasped them about herhead in the first attitude of despair in which she ever had indulged inher life. She was ashamed! Honora had said there was nothing to beashamed of in love. But Kate would not call this meeting of her spiritwith Karl's by that name. She had no idea whether it was love or not. Onthe whole, she preferred to think that it was not. But when they facedeach other, their glances had met. When they had parted, their thoughtshad bridged the space. When she dreamed, she fancied that she wasmounting great solitary peaks with him to look at sunsets that blazedlike the end of the world; or that he and she were strong-winged birdsseeking the crags of the Andes. What girl's folly! The time had come toput such vagrant dreams from her and to become a woman, indeed. 

Ray telephoned that he was home. 

"Come up this evening, then, " commanded Kate. 

Then, not being as courageous as her word, she wept brokenly for hermother--the mother who could, at best, have given her but suchindeterminate advice. 

XXIII

As she heard Ray coming up the stairs, she tossed some more wood on thefire and lighted the candles in her Russian candlesticks. 

"It's what any silly girl would do!" she admitted to herselfdisgustedly. 

Well, there was his rap on the foolish imitation Warwick knocker. Kateflung wide the door. He stood in the dim light of the hall, hesitating, it would seem, to enter upon the evening's drama. Tall, graceful asalways, with a magnetic force behind his languor, he impressed Kate as aman whom few women would be able to resist; whom, indeed, it was a sortof folly, perhaps even an impiety, to cast out of one's life. 

"Kate!" he said, "Kate!" The whole challenge of love was in the accent. 

But she held him off with the first method of opposition she coulddevise. 

"My name!" she admitted gayly. "I used to think I didn't like it, but Ido. "

He came in and swung to the door behind him, flinging his coat and hatupon a chair. 

"Do you mean you like to hear me say it?" he demanded. He stood by thefire which had begun to leap and crackle, drawing off his gloves with adecisive gesture. 

She saw that she was not going to be able to put him off. The hour hadstruck. So she faced him bravely. 

"Sit down, Ray, " she said. 

He looked at her a moment as if measuring the value of this courtesy. 

"Thank you, " he said, almost resentfully, as he sank into the chair sheplaced for him. 

So they sat together before the fire gravely, like old married people, as Kate could not help noticing. Yet they were combatants; not as amarried couple might have been, furtively and miserably, but with afrank, almost an exhilarating, sense of equally matched strength, and oftheir chance to conduct their struggle in the open. 

"It's come to this, Kate, " he said at length. "Either I must have yourpromise or I stay away entirely. "

"I don't believe you need to do either, " she retorted with theexasperating manner of an elder sister. "It's an obsession with you, that's all. "

"What man thinks he needs, he does need, " Ray responded sententiously. "It appears to me that without you I shall be a lost man. I meanprecisely what I say. You wouldn't like me to give out that fact in anhysterical manner, and I don't see that I need to. I make the statementas I would make any other, and I expect to be believed, because I'm atruth-telling person. The fairest scene in the world or the mostinteresting circumstance becomes meaningless to me if you are notincluded in it. It isn't alone that you are my sweetheart--the lady ofmy dreams. It's much more than that. Sometimes when I'm with you I feellike a boy with his mother, safe from all the dreadful things that mighthappen to a child. Sometimes you seem like a sister, so really kind andso outwardly provoking. Often you are my comrade, and we are completelycongenial, neuter entities. The thing is we have a satisfaction when weare together that we never could apart. There it is, Kate, the fact wecan't get around. We're happier together than we are apart!"

He seemed to hold the theory up in the air as if it were a shiningjewel, and to expect her to look at it till it dazzled her. But hervoice was dull as she said: "I know, Ray. I know--now--but shall westay so?"

"Why shouldn't we, woman? There's every reason to suppose that we'd growhappier. We want each other. More than that, we need each other. Withme, it's such a deep need that it reaches to the very roots of my being. It's my groundwork, my foundation stone. I don't know how to put it tomake you realize--"

He caught a quizzical smile on her face, and after a moment ofbewilderment he leaped from his chair and came toward her. 

"God!" he half breathed, "why do I waste time talking?"

He had done what her look challenged him to do, --had substituted actionfor words, --yet now, as he stretched out his arms to her, she held himoff, fearful that she would find herself weeping on his breast. It wouldbe sweet to do it--like getting home after a long voyage. But dizzily, with a stark clinging to a rock of integrity in herself, she fought himoff, more with her militant spirit than with her outspread, protesting hands. 

"No, no, " she cried. "Don't hypnotize me, Ray! Leave me my judgment, leave me my reason. If it's a partnership we're to enter into, I oughtto know the terms. "

"The terms, Kate? Why, I'll love you as long as I live; I'll treasureyou as the most precious thing in all the world. "

"And the winds of heaven shall not be allowed to visit my cheek tooroughly, " she managed to say tantalizingly. 

He paused, perplexed. 

"I know I bewilder you, dear man, " she said. "But this is the point: Idon't want to be protected. I mean I don't want to be made dependent; Idon't want my interpretations of life at second-hand. I object to havinglife filter through anybody else to me; I want it, you see, on myown account. "

"Why, Kate!" It wasn't precisely a protest. He seemed rather to reproachher for hindering the onward sweep of their happiness--for opposing himwith her ideas when they might together have attained a beautifulemotional climax. 

"I couldn't stand it, " she went on, lifting her eyes to his, "to begiven permission to do this, that, or the other thing; or to be put onan allowance; or made to ask a favor--"

He sank down in his chair and folded across his breast the arms whoseembrace she had not claimed. 

"You seem to mean, " he said, "that you don't want to be a wife. Youprefer your independence to love. "

"I want both, " Kate declared, rising and standing before him. "I wantthe most glorious and abounding love woman ever had. I want so much ofit that it never could be computed or measured--so much it will lift meup above anything that I now am or that I know, and make me stronger andfreer and braver. "

"Well, that's what your love would do for me, " broke in McCrea. "That'swhat the love of a good woman is expected to do for a man. "

"Of course, " cried Kate; "but is that what the love of a good man isexpected to do for a woman? Or is it expected to reconcile her toobscurity, to the dimming of her personality, and to the endless pettysacrifices that ought to shame her--and don't--those immoral sacrificesabout which she has contrived to throw so many deceiving, iridescentmists of religion? Oh, yes, we are hypnotized into our foolish state ofdependence easily enough! I know that. The mating instinct drugs us. Isuppose the unborn generations reach out their shadowy multitudinoushands and drag us to our destiny!"

"What a woman you are! How you put things!" He tried but failed to keepthe offended look from his face, and Kate knew perfectly well how hardhe was striving not to think her indelicate. But she went onregardlessly. 

"You think that's the very thing I ought to want to be my destiny? Well, perhaps I do. I want children--of course, I want them. "

She stopped for a moment because she saw him flushing withembarrassment. Yet she couldn't apologize, and, anyway, an apology wouldavail nothing. If he thought her unwomanly because she talked about herwoman's life, --the very life to which he was inviting her, --nothing shecould say would change his mind. It wasn't a case for argument. Shewalked over to the fire and warmed her nervous hands at it. 

"I'm sorry, Ray, " she said finally. 

"Sorry?"

"Sorry that I'm not the tender, trusting, maiden-creature who could falltrembling in your arms and love you forever, no matter what you did, andlie to you and for you the way good wives do. But I'm not--and, oh, Iwish I were--or else--"

"Yes, Kate--what?"

"Or else that you were the kind of a man I need, the mate I'm lookingfor!"

"But, Kate, I protest that I am. I love you. Isn't that enough? I'm notworthy of you, maybe. Yet if trying to earn you by being loyal makes meworthy, then I am. Don't say no to me, Kate. It will shatter me--like anearthquake. And I believe you'll regret it, too. We can make each otherhappy. I feel it! I'd stake my life on it. Wait--"

He arose and paced the floor back and forth. 

"Do you remember the lines from Tennyson's 'Princess' where the Princepleads with Ida? I thought I could repeat them, but I'm afraid I'll marthem. I don't want to do that; they're too applicable to my case. "

He knew where she kept her Tennyson, and he found the volume and thepage, and when he had handed the book to her, he snatched his coatand hat. 

"I'm coming for my answer a week from to-night, " he said. "For God'ssake, girl, don't make a mistake. Life's so short that it ought to behappy. At best I'll only be able to live with you a few decades, and I'dlike it to be centuries. "

He had not meant to do it, she could see, but suddenly he came to her, and leaning above her burned his kisses upon her eyes. Then he flunghimself out of the room, and by the light of her guttering candlesshe read:--

 "Come down, O maid, from yonder mountain height. What pleasure lives in height (the shepherd sang). In height and cold, the splendor of the hills? But cease to move so near the Heavens, and cease To glide a sunbeam by the blasted pine, To sit a star upon the sparkling spire; And come, for Love is of the valley, come thou down And find him; by the happy threshold, he Or hand in hand with Plenty in the maize, Or red with spirted purple of the vats, Or foxlike in the vine; nor cares to walk With Death and Morning on the Silver Horns, Nor wilt thou snare him in the white ravine, Nor find him dropped upon the firths of ice, That huddling slant in furrow-cloven falls To roll the torrent out of dusky doors; But follow; let the torrent dance thee down To find him in the valley; let the wild Lean-headed eagles yelp alone, and leave The monstrous ledges there to slope, and spill Their thousand wreaths of dangling water-smoke, That like a broken purpose waste in air; So waste not thou; but come; for all the vales Await thee; azure pillars of the hearth Arise to thee; the children call, and I Thy shepherd pipe, and sweet is every sound, Sweeter thy voice, but every sound is sweet; Myriads of rivulets hurrying thro' the lawn, The moan of doves in immemorial elms, And murmuring of innumerable bees. "

She read it twice, soothed by its vague loveliness. She could hear, however, only the sound of the suburban trains crashing by in thedistance, and the honking of the machines in the Plaisance. None ofthose spirit sounds of which Ray had dreamed penetrated through hervigorous materialism. But still, she knew that she was lonely; she knewRay's going left a gray vacancy. 

"I can't think it out, " she said at last. "I'll go to sleep. Perhapsthere--"

But neither voices nor visions came to her in sleep. She awoke the nextmorning as unillumined as when she went to her bed. And as she dressedand thought of the full day before her, she was indefinably glad thatshe was under no obligations to consult any one about her programme, either of work or play. 

XXIV

Kate had dreaded the expected solitude of the next night, and it was arelief to her when Marna Fitzgerald telephoned that she had been sentopera-tickets by one of her old friends in the opera company, and thatshe wanted Kate to go with her. 

"George offers to stay home with the baby, " she said. "So come over, dear, and have dinner with us; that will give you a chance to seeGeorge. Then you and I will go to the opera by our two independentselves. I know you don't mind going home alone. 'Butterfly' is on, youknow--Farrar sings. "

She said it without faltering, Kate noticed, as she gave herenthusiastic acceptance, and when she had put down the telephone, sheactually clapped her hands at the fortitude of the little woman she hadonce thought such a hummingbird--and a hummingbird with that one lastadded glory, a voice. Marna had been able to put her dreams behind her;why should not her example be cheerfully followed?

When Kate reached the little apartment looking on Garfield Park, sheentered an atmosphere in which, as she had long since proved, thereappeared to be no room for regret. Marna had, of course, prepared thedinner with her own hands. 

"I whipped up some mayonnaise, " she said. "You remember howSchumann-Heink used to like my mayonnaise? And she knows good cookingwhen she tastes it, doesn't she? I've trifle for desert, too. "

"But it must have taken you all day, dear, to get up a dinner likethat, " protested Kate, kissing the flushed face of her friend. 

"It took up the intervals, " smiled Marna. "You see, my days are made upof taking care of baby, _and_ of intervals. How fetching that blackvelvet bodice is, Kate. I didn't know you had a low one. "

"Low _and_ high, " said Kate. "That's the way we fool 'em--make 'em thinkwe have a wardrobe. Me--I'm glad I'm going to the opera. How good of youto think of me! So few do--at least in the way I want them to. "

Marna threw her a quick glance. 

"Ray?" she asked with a world of insinuation. 

To Kate's disgust, her eyes flushed with hot tears. 

"He's waiting to know, " she answered. "But I--I don't think I'm going tobe able--"

"Oh, Kate!" cried Marna in despair. "How can you feel that way? Justthink--just think--" she didn't finish her sentence. 

Instead, she seized little George and began undressing him, her handslingering over the firm roundness of his body. He seemed to be anythingbut sleepy, and when his mother passed him over to her guest, Kate lethim clutch her fingers with those tenacious little hands which lookedlike rose-leaves and clung like briers. Marna went out of the room toprepare his bedtime bottle, and Kate took advantage of being alone withhim to experiment in those joys which his mother had with difficultyrefrained from descanting upon. She kissed him in the back of the neck, and again where his golden curls met his brow--a brow the color of arose crystal. A delicious, indescribable baby odor came up from him, composed of perfumed breath, of clean flannels, and of generaladorability. Suddenly, not knowing she was going to do it, Kate snatchedhim to her breast, and held him strained to her while he nestled there, eager and completely happy, and over the woman who could not make up hermind about life and her part in it, there swept, in wave after wave, like the south wind blowing over the bleak hills, billows of warmemotion. Her very finger-tips tingled; soft, wistful, delightful tearsflooded her eyes. Her bosom seemed to lift as the tide lifts to themoon. She found herself murmuring inarticulate, melodious nothings. Itwas a moment of realization. She was learning what joys could be hersif only--

Marna came back into the room and took the baby from Kate's tremblinghands. 

"Why, dear, you're not afraid of him, are you?" his mother askedreproachfully. 

Kate made no answer, but, dropping a farewell kiss in the crinkly palmof one dimpled hand, she went out to the kitchen, found an apron, andbegan drawing the water for dinner and dropping Marna's mayonnaise onthe salad. She must, however, have been sitting for several minutes inthe baby's high chair, staring unseeingly at the wall, when the buzzingof the indicator brought her to her feet. 

"It's George!" cried Marna; and tossing baby and bottle into the cradle, she ran to the door. 

Kate hit the kitchen table sharply with a clenched hand. What was therein the return of a perfectly ordinary man to his home that should causesuch excitement in a creature of flame and dew like Marna?

 "Marna with the trees' life In her veins a-stir! Marna of the aspen heart--"

George came into the kitchen with both hands outstretched. 

"Well, it's good to see you here, " he declared. "Why don't you comeoftener? You make Marna so happy. "

That proved her worthy; she made Marna happy! Of what greater use couldany person be in this world? George retired to prepare for dinner, andMarna to settle the baby for the night, and Kate went on with thepreparations for the meal, while her thoughts revolved like aCatherine wheel. 

There were the chops yet to cook, for George liked them blazing from thebroiler, and there was the black coffee to set over. This latter was tofortify George at his post, for it was agreed that he was not to sleeplest he should fail to awaken at the need and demand of the belovedpotentate in the cradle; and Marna now needed a little stimulant if shewas to keep comfortably awake during a long evening--she who used tolight the little lamps in the windows of her mind sometimeafter midnight. 

They had one of those exclamatory dinners where every one talked aboutthe incomparable quality of the cooking. The potatoes were after a newrecipe, --something Spanish, --and they tasted deliciously and smelled asif assailing an Andalusian heaven. The salad was _piquante_; the triflevivacious; Kate's bonbons were regarded as unique, and as for thecoffee, it provoked Marna to quote the appreciative Talleyrand:--

 "Noir comme le diable, Chaud comme l'enfer, Pur comme un ange, Doux comme l'amour. "

Other folk might think that Marna had "dropped out, " but Kate could seeit written across the heavens in letters of fire that neither George norMarna thought so. They regarded their table as witty, as blessed in sucha guest as Kate, as abounding in desirable food, as being, indeed, allthat a dinner-table should be. They had the effect of shutting out aworld which clamored to participate in their pleasures, and looked onthemselves as being not forgotten, but too selfish in keeping tothemselves. It kept little streams of mirth purling through Kate's soul, and at each jest or supposed brilliancy she laughed twice--once withthem and once at them. But they were unsuspicious--her friends. Theywere secretly sorry for her, that was all. 

After dinner there was Marna to dress. 

"Naturally I haven't thought much about evening clothes since I wasmarried, " she said to Kate. "I don't see what I'm to put on unless it'smy immemorial gold-of-ophir satin. " She looked rather dubious, and Katecouldn't help wondering why she hadn't made a decision before this. Marna caught the expression in her eyes. 

"Oh, yes, I know I ought to have seen to things, but you don't know whatit is, mavourneen, to do all your own work and care for a baby. It makeseverything you do so staccato! And, oh, Kate, I do get so tired! My feetache as if they'd come off, and sometimes my back aches so I just lie onthe floor and roll and groan. Of course, George doesn't know. He'dinsist on our having a servant, and we can't begin to afford that. Itisn't the wages alone; it's the waste and breakage and all. "

She said this solemnly, and Kate could not conceal a smile at her"daughter of the air" using these time-worn domestic plaints. 

"You ought to lie down and sleep every day, Marna. Wouldn't that help?"

"That's what George is always saying. He thinks I ought to sleep whilethe baby is taking his nap. But, mercy me, I just look forward to thattime to get my work done. "

She turned her eager, weary face toward Kate, and her friend marked thedelicacy in it which comes with maternity. It was pallid and ratherpinched; the lips hung a trifle too loosely; the veins at the templesshowed blue and full. Kate couldn't beat down the vision that would risebefore her eyes of the Marna she had known in the old days, who hadarisen at noon, coming forth from her chamber like Deirdre, fresh withthe freshness of pagan delight. She remembered the crowd that hadfollowed in her train, the manner in which people had looked after heron the street, and the little furore she had invariably awakened whenshe entered a shop or tea-room. As Marna shook out the gold-of-ophirsatin, dimmed now and definitely out of date, there surged up in herfriend a rebellion against Marna's complete acquiescence in the presentscheme of things. But Marna slipped cheerfully into her gown. 

"I shall keep my cloak on while we go down the aisle, " she declared. "Nobody notices what one has on when one is safely seated. Particularly, " she added, with one of her old-time flashes, "if one'sneck is not half bad. Now I'm ready to be fastened, mavourneen. Dear me, it _is_ rather tight, isn't it? But never mind that. Get the hookstogether somehow. I'll hold my breath. Now, see, with this scarf aboutme, I shan't look such a terrible dowd, shall I? Only my gloves areunmistakably shabby and not any too clean, either. George won't let meuse gasoline, you know, and it takes both money and thought to get themto the cleaners. Do you remember the boxes of long white gloves I usedto have in the days when _tante_ Barsaloux was my fairy godmother?Gloves were an immaterial incident then. 'Nevermore, nevermore, ' as ourfriend the raven remarked. Come, we'll go. I won't wear my old operacloak in the street-car; that would be too absurd, especially now thatthe bullion on it has tarnished. That long black coat of mine is justthe thing--equally appropriate for market, mass, or levee. Oh, George, dear, good-bye! Good-bye, you sweetheart. I hate to leave you, truly Ido. And I do hope and pray the baby won't wake. If he does--"

"Come along, Marna, " commanded Kate. "We mustn't miss that next car. "

 * * * * *

They barely were in their seats when the lights went up, and before themglittered the Auditorium, that vast and noble audience chamberidentified with innumerable hours of artistic satisfaction. The recedingarches of the ceiling glittered like incandescent nebulae; the picturedprocession upon the proscenium arch spoke of the march of ideas--of thepassionate onflow of man's dreams--of whatever he has held beautifuland good. 

Kate yielded herself over to the deep and happy sense of completionwhich this vast chamber always gave her, and while she and Marna satthere, silent, friendly, receptive, she felt her cares and fretsslipping from her, and guessed that the drag of Mama's innumerablepetty responsibilities was disappearing, too. For here was the pride oflife--the power of man expressed in architecture, and in the highentrancement of music. The rich folds of the great curtain satisfiedher, the innumerable lights enchanted her, and the loveliness of thewomen in their fairest gowns and their jewels added one more element tothat indescribable thing, compacted of so many elements, --allartificial, all curiously and brightly related, --which the civilizedworld calls opera, and in which man rejoices with an inconsistent andmore or less indefensible joy. 

The lights dimmed; the curtain parted; the heights above Nagasaki wererevealed. Below lay the city in purple haze; beyond dreamed the harborwhere the battleships, the merchantmen and the little fishing-boatsrode. The impossible, absurd, exquisite music-play of "Madame Butterfly"had begun. 

Oh, the music that went whither it would, like wind or woman's hopes;that lifted like the song of a bird and sank like the whisper of waves. Vague as reverie, fitful as thought, yearning as frustrate love, itfluttered about them. 

"The new music, " whispered Marna. 

"Like flame leaping and dying, " responded Kate. 

They did not realize the passage of time. They passed from chamber tochamber in that gleaming house of song. 

"This was the best of all to me, " breathed Marna, as Farrar's voice tookup the first notes of that incomparable song of woven hopes and fears, "Some Day He'll Come. " The wild cadences of the singer's voice, inarticulate, of universal appeal, like the cry of a lost child or thebleating of a lamb on a windy hill, --were they mere singing? Or werethey singing at all? Yes, the new singing, where music and dramainsistently meet. 

The tale, heart-breaking for beauty and for pathos, neared its close. Oh, the little heart of flame expiring at its loveliest! Oh, the loyalfeet that waited--eager to run on love's errands--till dawn brought thesight of faded flowers, the suddenly bleak apartment, the unpressedcouch! Then the brave, swift flight of the spirit's wings to otheraltitudes, above pain and shame! And like love and sorrow, refined to apoignant essence, still the music brooded and cried and aspired. 

What visions arose in Marna's brain, Kate wondered, quivering withvicarious anguish. Glancing down at her companion's small, close-claspedhands, she thought of their almost ceaseless toil in those commonplacerooms which she called home, and for the two in it--the ordinary man, the usual baby. And she might have had all this brightness, thiscelebrity, this splendid reward for high labor!

The curtain closed on the last act, --on the little deadCio-Cio-San, --and the people stood on their feet to call Farrar, givingher unstintedly of their _bravas_. Kate and Marna stood with the others, but they were silent. There were large, glistening tears on Marna'scheeks, and Kate refrained from adding to her silent singing-bird'sdistress by one word of appreciation of the evening's pleasure; but asthey moved down the thronged aisle together, she caught Marna's hand inher own, and felt her fingers close about it tenaciously. 

Outside a bitter wind was blowing, and with such purpose that it hadcleared the sky of the day's murk so that countless stars glittered withunwonted brilliancy from a purple-black heaven. Crowded before theentrance were the motors, pouring on in a steady stream, their lampshalf dazzling the pedestrians as they struggled against the wind thatroared between the high buildings. 

Though Marna was to take the Madison Street car, they could not resistthe temptation to turn upon the boulevard where the scene was even moreexhilarating. The high standing lights that guarded the great driveoffered a long and dazzling vista, and between them, sweeping steadilyon, were the motor-cars. Laughing, talking, shivering, the peoplehastened along--the men of fashion stimulated and alert, their womensplendid in furs and cloaks of velvet while they waited for theirconveyances; by them tripped the music students, who had beenincomparably happy in the highest balcony, and who now cringed beforethe penetrating cold; among them marched sedately the phalanx ofmiddle-class people who permitted themselves an opera or two a year, andwho walked sedately, carrying their musical feast with a certain senseof indigestion;--all moved along together, thronging the wide pavement. The restaurants were awaiting those who had the courage for furtherdissipation; the suburban trains had arranged their schedules toconvenience the crowd; and the lights burned low in the hallways ofmansions, or apartments, or neat outlying houses, awaiting the return ofthese adventurers into another world--the world of music. All would talkof Farrar. Not alone that night, nor that week, but always, as long asthey lived, at intervals, when they were happy, when their thoughts wereuplifted, they would talk of her. And it might have been Marna Cartaninstead of Geraldine Farrar of whom they spoke!

"Marna of the far quest" might have made this "flight unhazarded"; mighthave been the core of all this fine excitement. But she had put herselfout of it. She had sold herself for a price--the usual price. Kate wouldnot go so far as to say that a birthright had been sold for a mess ofpottage, but Ray McCrea's stock was far below par at that moment. YetRay, as she admitted, would not doom her to a life of monotony and heavytoil. With him she would have the free and useful, the amusing andexcursive life of an American woman married to a man of wealth. No, herprogramme would not be a petty one--and yet--

"Do take a cab, Marna, " she urged. "My treat! Please. "

"No, no, " said Marna in a strained voice. "I'll not do that. Afive-cent ride in the car will take me almost to my door; and besidesthe cars are warm, which is an advantage. "

It was understood tacitly that Kate was the protector, and the one whowouldn't mind being on the street alone. They had but a moment to waitfor Marna's car, but in that moment Kate was thinking how terrible itwould be for Marna, in her worn evening gown, to be crowded into thatcommon conveyance and tormented with those futile regrets which must beher so numerous companions. 

She was not surprised when Marna snatched her hand, crying:--

"Oh, Kate!"

"Yes, yes, I know, " murmured Kate soothingly. 

"No, you don't, " retorted Marna. "How can you? It's--it's the milk. "

There was a catch in her voice. 

"The milk!" echoed Kate blankly. "What milk? I thought--"

"Oh, I know, " Marna cried impatiently. "You thought I was worrying aboutthat old opera, and that I wanted to be up there behind that screenstabbing myself. Well, of course, knowing the score so well, and havinghoped once to do so much with it, the notes did rather try to jump outof my throat. But, goodness, what does all that matter? It's the baby'smilk that I'm carrying on about. I don't believe I told George to warmit. " Her voice ceased in a wail. 

The car swung around the corner, and Kate half lifted Marna up the hugestep, and saw her go reeling down the aisle as the cumbersome vehiclelurched forward. Then she turned her own steps toward the stairs of theelevated station. 

"The milk!" she ejaculated with commingled tenderness and impatience. "Then that's why she didn't say anything about going behind the scenes. I thought it was because she couldn't endure the old surroundings andthe pity of her associates of the opera-days. The milk! I wonder--"

What she wondered she did not precisely say; but more than one person onthe crowded elevated train noticed that the handsome woman in blackvelvet (it really was velveteen, purchased at a bargain) had somethingon her mind. 

XXV

Kate slept lightly that night. She had gone to bed with a sense ofgentle happiness, which arose from the furtive conviction that she wasgoing to surrender to Ray and to his point of view. He could take allthe responsibility if he liked and she would follow the old instincts ofwoman and let the Causes of Righteousness with which she had alliedherself contrive to get along without her. It was nothing, she toldherself, but sheer egotism for her to suppose that she was necessary totheir prosperity. 

She half awoke many times, and each time she had a vague, sweet longingwhich refused to resolve itself into definite shape. But when the fullmorning came she knew it was Ray she wanted. She couldn't wait out thelong week he had prescribed as a season of fasting and prayer before shegave her answer, and she was shamelessly glad when her superior, overthere at the Settlement House, informed her that she would be requiredto go to a dance-hall at South Chicago that night--a terrible place, which might well have been called "The Girl Trap. " This gave Kate alegitimate excuse to ask for Ray's company, because he had besought hernot to go to such places at night without his escort. 

"But ought I to be seeing you?" he asked over the telephone in answerto her request. "Wouldn't it be better for my cause if I stayed away?"

In spite of the fact that he laughed, she knew he was quite in earnest, and she wondered why he hadn't discerned her compliant mood from herintonations. 

"But I had to mind you, hadn't I?" she sent back. "You said I mustn't goto such places without you. "

From her tone she might have been the most betendriled feminine vinethat ever wrapped a self-satisfied masculine oak. 

"Oh, I'll come, " he answered. "Of course I'll come. You knew you hadonly to give me the chance. "

He was on time, impeccable, as always, in appearance. Kate was glad thathe was as tall as she. She knew, down in her inner consciousness, thatthey made a fine appearance together, that they stepped off gallantly. It came to her that perhaps they were to be envied, and that theyweren't--or at least that she wasn't--giving their good fortune its fullvaluation. 

She told him about her dinner with the Fitzgeralds and about the opera, but she held back her discovery, so to speak, of the baby, and theepisode of Marna's wistful tears when she heard the music, and heramazing _volte-face_ at remembering the baby's feeding-time. She wouldhave loved to spin out the story to him--she could have deepened thecolors just enough to make it all very telling. But she wasn't willingto give away the reason for her changed mood. It was enough, after all, that he was aware of it, and that when he drew her hand within his armhe held it in a clasp that asserted his right to keep it. 

They were happy to be in each other's company again. Kate had to admitit. For the moment it seemed to both of them that it didn't matter muchwhere they went so long as they could go together. They rode out toSouth Chicago on the ill-smelling South Deering cars, crowded with menand women with foreign faces. One of the men trod on Kate's foot withhis hobnailed shoe and gave an inarticulate grunt by way of apology. 

"He's crushed it, hasn't he?" asked Ray anxiously, seeing the tearsspring to her eyes. "What a brute!"

"Oh, it was an accident, " Kate protested. "Any one might have done it. "

"But anyone except that unspeakable Huniack would have done more thangrunt!"

"I dare say he doesn't know English, " Kate insisted. "He'll probablyremember the incident longer and be sorrier about it than some who wouldhave been able to make graceful apologies. "

"Not he, " declared Ray. "Don't you think it! Bless me, Kate, why youprefer these people to any others passes my comprehension. Can't youleave these people to work out their own salvation--which to my notionis the only way they ever can get it--and content yourself with your ownkind and class?"

"Not variety enough, " retorted Kate, feeling her tenderness evaporateand her tantalizing mood--her usual one when she was with Ray--comeback. "Don't I know just what you, for example, are going to think andsay about any given circumstances? Don't I know your enthusiasms andreactions as if I'd invented 'em?"

"Well, I know yours, too, but that's because I love you, not becauseyou're like everybody else. I wish you were rather more like otherwomen, Kate. I'd have an easier time. "

"If we were married, " said Kate, with that cheerful directness whichshowed how her sentimentality had taken flight, "you'd never give uptill you'd made me precisely like Mrs. Brown, Mrs. Smith, and Mrs. Johnson. Men fall in love with women because they're different fromother women, and then put in the first years of their married lifetrying to make them like everybody else. I've noticed, however, thatwhen they've finished the job, they're so bored with the result thatthey go and look up another 'different' woman. Oh, I know!"

He couldn't say what he wished in reply because the car filled up justthen with a party of young people bound for a dance in Russell Square. It always made Kate's heart glow to think of things like that--of whatthe city was trying to do for its people. These young people came fromsmall, comfortable homes, quite capacious enough for happiness andself-respect, but not large enough for a dance. Very well; all that wasneeded was a simple request for the use of the field-house and theycould have at their disposal a fine, airy hall, well-warmed and lighted, with an excellent floor, charming decorations, and a room where theymight prepare their refreshments. All they had to pay for was the music. Proper chaperonage was required and the hall closed at midnight. Katedescanted on the beauties of the system till Ray yawned. 

"Think how different it is at the dance-hall where we are going, " shewent on, not heeding his disinclination for the subject. "They'll keepit up till dawn and drink between every dance. There's not a party ofthe kind the whole winter through that doesn't see the steps of someyoung girl set toward destruction. Oh, I can't see why it isn't stopped!If women had the management of things, it would be, I can tell you. Itwould take about one day to do it. "

"That's one of the reasons why the liquor men combine to kill suffrage, "said Ray. "They know it will be a sorry day for them when the women getin. Positively, the women seem to think that's all there is topolitics--some moral question; and the whole truth is they'd do a lot ofdamage to business with their slap-dash methods, as they'd learn totheir cost. When they found their pin-money being cut down, they'd singanother tune, for they're the most reckless spenders in the world, American women are. "

"They're the purchasing agents for the most extravagant nation in theworld, if you like, " Kate replied. "Men seem to think that shopping is amere feminine diversion. They forget that it's what supports theirbusiness and supplies their homes. Not to speak of any place beyond ourown town, think of the labor involved in buying food and clothing forthe two million and a half human beings here in Chicago. It's no joke, Iassure you. "

"Joke!" echoed Ray. "A good deal of the shopping I've seen at myfather's store seems to me to come under the head of vice. The look I'veseen on some of those faces! It was ravaging greed, nothing less. Why, we had a sale the other day of cheap jewelry, salesmen's samples, andthe women swarmed and snatched and glared like savages. I declare, whenI saw them like that, so indecently eager for their trumpery ornaments, I said to myself that you'd only to scratch the civilized woman to getat the squaw any day. "

Kate kept a leash on her tongue. She supposed it was inevitable thatthey should get back to the old quarrel. Deep down in Ray, she felt, wasan unconquerable contempt for women. He made an exception of her becausehe loved her; because she drew him with the mysterious sex attraction. It was that, and not any sense of spiritual or intellectual approval ofher, which made him set her apart as worthy of admiration and of hisdevoted service. If ever their lives were joined, she would be histreasure to be kept close in his personal casket, --with the key to thegolden padlock in his pocket, --and he would all but say his prayers toher. But all that would not keep him from openly discountenancing herjudgment before people. She could imagine him putting off a suggestionof hers with that patient married tone which husbands assume when theydiscover too much independent cerebration on the part of their wives. 

"I couldn't stand that, " she inwardly declared, as she let him thinkthat he was assisting her from the car. "If any man ever used thatpatient tone to me, I'd murder him!"

She couldn't keep back her sardonic chuckle. 

"What are you laughing at?" he asked irritatedly. 

"At the mad world, master, " she answered. 

"Where is this dance-hall?" he demanded, as if he suspected her ofconcealing it. 

The tone was precisely the "married" one she had been imagining, and sheburst out with a laugh that made him stop and visibly wrap his dignityabout him. Nothing was more evident than that he thought her silly. Butas she paused, too, standing beneath the street-lamp, and he saw herwith her nonchalant tilt of her head, --that handsome head poised on herstrong, erect body, --her force and value were so impressed upon him thathe had to retract. But she was provoking, no getting around that. 

At that moment another sound than laughter cut the air--a terriblesound--the shriek of a tortured child. It rang out three times in quicksuccession, and Kate's blood curdled. 

"Oh, oh, " she gasped; "she's being beaten! Come, Ray. "

"Mix up in some family mess and get slugged for my pains? Not I! ButI'll call a policeman if you say. "

"Oh, it might be too late! I'm a policeman, you know. Get the patrolwagon if you like. But I can't stand that--"

Once more that agonized scream! Kate flashed from him into the mesh ofmean homes, standing three deep in each yard, flanking each other withonly a narrow passage between, and was lost to him. He couldn't seewhere she had gone, but he knew that he must follow. He fell down ashort flight of steps that led from the street to the lower level of theyard, and groped forward. He could hear people running, and when a largewoman, draping her wrapper about her, floundered out of a basement doornear him, he followed her. She seemed to know where to go. The squaliddrama with the same actors evidently had been played before. 

Mid-length of the building the woman turned up some stairs and came to along hall which divided the front and rear stairs. At the end of it alight was burning, and Kate's voice was ringing out like that of anofficer excoriating his delinquent troops. 

"I'm glad you can't speak English, " he heard her say, "for if you couldI'd say things I'd be sorry for. I'd shrivel you up, you great brute. Ifyou've got the devil in you, can't you take it out on some one elsebeside a little child? You're her father, are you? She has no mother, Isuppose. Well, you 're under arrest, do you understand? Tell him, someof you who can talk English. He's to sit in that chair and never movefrom it till the patrol wagon comes. I shall care for the child myself, and she'll be placed where he can't treat her like that again. Poorlittle thing! Thank you, that's a good woman. Just hold her awhile andcomfort her. I can see you've children of your own. "

Ray found the courage at length to peer above the heads of the others inthat miserable, crowded room. The dark faces of weary men and women, heavy with Old-World, inherited woe, showed in the gloom. The short, shaking man on the chair, dully contrite for his spasm of rage, wascringing before Kate, who stood there, amazingly tall among theselow-statured beings. Never had she looked to Ray so like an eagle, sokeen, so fierce, so fit for braving either sun or tenebrous cavern. Shedominated them all; had them, who only partly understood what she said, at her command. She had thrown back her cloak, and the star of theJuvenile Court officer which she wore carried meaning to them. Thoughperhaps it had not needed that. Ray tried to think her theatrical, tobe angry at her, but the chagrin of knowing that she had forgotten him, and was not caring about his opinion, scourged his criticisms back. Shehad lifted from the floor the stick with its leathern thong with whichthe man had castigated the tender body of his motherless child. She heldit in her hand, looking at it with the angry aversion that she mighthave turned upon a venomous serpent. Then slowly, with unspeakablerebuke, she swung her gaze upon the wretch in the chair. For a momentshe silently accused him. Then he dropped his head in his hands andsobbed. He seemed in his voiceless way to say that he, too, had beencastigated by a million invisible thongs held in dead men's hands, andthat his soul, like his child's body, was hideous with welts. 

Kate turned to Ray. 

"Is the patrol wagon on its way?" she inquired. 

"I--I--didn't call it, " he stammered. 

"Please do, " she said simply. 

He went out of the room, silently raging, and was grateful that one ofthe men followed to show him the patrol box. He waited outside for thewagon to come, and when the officers brought out the shaking prisoner, he saw Kate with them carrying the child in her arms. 

"I must go to the station, " she said to Ray, in a matter-of-fact tonethat put him far away from her. "So I'll say good-night. It wouldn't bepleasant for you to ride in the wagon, you know. I'll be quite allright. One of the officers will see me safe home. Anyway, I shall haveto go to the dance-hall before the evening's over. "

"Kate!" he protested. 

"Oh, I know, " she said to him apart softly while the others concernedthemselves with assisting the blubbering Huniack into the wagon, "youthink it isn't nice of me to be going around like this, saving babiesfrom beatings and young girls from much worse. You think it isn'tladylike. But it's what the coming lady is either going to do or seedone. It's a new idea, you understand, Ray. Quite different from thesquaw idea, isn't it? Good-night!"

An officer stood at the door of the wagon waiting for her. He touchedhis hat and smiled at her in a comradely fashion, and she responded withas courteous a bow as she ever had made to Ray. 

The wagon drove off. 

"I've been given my answer, " said Ray aloud. He wondered if he were morerelieved or disappointed at the outcome. But really he could neitherfeel nor think reasonably. He went home in a tumult, dismayed at his ownsufferings, and in no condition to realize that the old ideas and thenew were at death grips in his consciousness. 

XXVI

Karl Wander rode wearily up the hill on his black mare. Honora saw himcoming and waved to him from the window. There was no one to put up hishorse, and he drove her into the stables and fed her and spread her bedwhile Honora watched what he and she had laughingly termed "theoutposts. " For she believed she had need to be on guard, and she thankedheaven that all of the approaches to the house were in the open and thatthere was nothing nearer than the rather remote grove of piñon treeswhich could shelter any creeping enemy. 

Wander came on at last to the house, making his way deliberately andscorning, it would seem, all chance of attack. But Honora's ears fairlyreverberated with the pistol shot which did not come; the explosionwhich was now so long delayed. She ran to open the door for him and todrag him into the friendly kitchen, where, in the absence of anydomestic help, she had spread their evening meal. 

There was a look in his face which she had not seen there before--a lookof quietude, of finality. 

"Well?" she asked. 

He flung his hat on a settle and sat down to loosen his leggings. 

"They've gone, " he said, "bag and baggage. "

"The miners?"

"Yes, left this afternoon--confiscated some trains and made the crewshaul them out of town. They shook their fists at the mines and the worksas if they had been the haunt of the devil. I couldn't bring myself toskulk. I rode Nell right down to the station and sat there till the lastcarload pulled out with the men and women standing together on theplatform to curse me. "

"Karl! How could you? It's a marvel you weren't shot. "

"Too easy a mark, I reckon. "

"And Elena?"

"Lifted on board by two rival suitors. She didn't even look at me. " Hedrew a long breath. "I was guiltless in that, Honora. You've stood bythrough everything, and you've made a cult of believing in me, and Iwant you to know that, so far as Elena was concerned, you were right todo it. I may have been a fool--but not consciously--not consciously. "

"I know it. I believe you. "

A silence fell between them while Honora set the hot supper on the tableand put the tea to draw. 

"It's very still, " he said finally. "But the stillness here is nothingto what it is down where my village stood. I've made a frightful mess ofthings, Honora. "

"No, " she said, "you built up; another has torn down. You must get moreworkmen. There may be a year or two of depression, but you're going towin out, Karl. "

"I've fought a good many fights first and last, Honora, --fights you knownothing about. Some of them have been with men, some with ideas, some ofthe worst ones with myself. It would be a long story and a strange oneif I were to tell it all. "

"I dare say it would. "

"I suppose I must seem very strange to a civilized woman like you, or--or your friend, Kate Barrington. "

"You seem very like a brave man, Karl, and an interesting one. "

"But I'm tired, Honora, --extraordinarily tired. I don't feel likefighting. Quiet and rest are what I'm longing for, and I'm to begin allover again, it appears. I've got to struggle up again almost fromthe bottom. "

"Come to supper, Karl. Never mind all that. We have food and we haveshelter. No doubt we shall sleep. Things like that deserve ourgratitude. Accept these blessings. There are many who lack them. "

Suddenly he threw up his arms with a despairing gesture. 

"Oh, it isn't myself, Honora, that I'm grieving for! It's thosehot-headed, misguided, wayward fellows of mine! They've left the homes Itried to help them win, they've followed a self-seeking, half-mad, wholly vicious agitator, and their lives, that I meant to have flow onso smoothly, will be troubled and wasted. I know so well what willhappen! And then, their hate! It hangs over me like a cloud! I'm notsupposed to be sensitive. I'm looked on as a swaggering, reckless, devil-may-care fellow with a pretty good heart and a mighty sure aim;but I tell you, cousin, among them, they've taken the life out of me. "

"It's your dark hour, Karl. You're standing the worst of it right now. To-morrow things will look better. "

"I couldn't ask a woman to come out here and stand amid this ruin withme, Honora. You know I couldn't. The only person who would be willing toshare my present life with me would be some poor, devil-driven creaturelike Elena--come to think of it, even she wouldn't! She's off and awaywith a lover at each elbow!"

"Here!" said Honora imperatively. She held a plate toward him laden withsteaming food. 

He arose, took it, seated himself, and tried a mouthful, but he had towash it down with water. 

"I'm too tired, " he said. "Really, Honora, you'll have to forgive me. "

She got up then and lighted the lamp in his bedroom. 

"Thank you, " he said. "Rest is what I need. It was odd they didn'tshoot, wasn't it? I thought every moment that they would. "

"You surely didn't wish that they would, Karl?"

"No. " He paused for a moment at the door. "No--only everything appearedto be so futile. My bad deeds never turned on me as my good ones havedone. It makes everything seem incoherent. What--what would a woman likeMiss Barrington make of all that--of harm coming from good?"

"I don't know, " said Honora, rather sharply. "She hasn't written. I toldher all the trouble we were in, --the danger and the distress, --but shehasn't written a word. "

"Why should she?" demanded Wander. "It's none of her concern. I supposeshe thinks a fool is best left with his folly. Good-night, cousin. You're a good woman if ever there was one. What should I have donewithout you?"

Honora smiled wanly. He seemed to have forgotten that it was she whowould have fared poorly without him. 

She closed up the house for the night, looking out in the brightmoonlight to see that all was quiet. For many days and nights she hadbeen continually on the outlook for lurking figures, but now she wasinclined to believe that she had overestimated the animosity of thestrikers. After all, try as they might, they could bring no accusationsagainst the man who, hurt to the soul by their misunderstanding of him, was now laying his tired head upon his pillow. 

All was very still. The moonlight touched to silver the snow upon themountains; the sound of the leaping river was like a distant flute; thewind was rising with long, wavelike sounds. Honora lingered in thedoorway, looking and listening. Her heart was big with pity--pity forthat disheartened man whose buoyancy and self-love had been so deeplywounded, pity for those wandering, angry, aimless men and women whomight have rested secure in his guardianship; pity for all the hot, misguided hearts of men and women. Pity, too, for the man with the mostimpetuous heart of them all, who wandered in some foreign land with awoman whose beauty had been his lure and his undoing. Yes, she had beengiven grace in those days, when she seemed to stand face to face withdeath, to pity even David and Mary!

She walked with a slow firm step up to her room, holding her head high. She had learned trust as well as compassion. She trusted Karl and theissue of his sorrow. She even trusted the issue of her own sorrow, which, a short time before, had seemed so shameful. She threw wide hergreat windows, and the wind and the moonlight filled her chamber. 

 * * * * *

Two days later Karl Wander and Honora Fulham rode together to thevillage, now dismantled and desolate. 

"I remember, " said Karl, "what a boyish pride I took in the little townat first, Honora, to have built it, and had it called after me and all. Such silly fools as men are, trying to perpetuate themselves by suchchildish methods. "

"Perpetuation is an instinct with us, " said Honora calmly, "Immortalityis our greatest hope. I'm so thankful I have my children, Karl. Theyseem to carry one's personality on, you know, no matter how differentthey actually may be from one's self. "

"Oh, yes, " said Karl, with a short sigh, "you're right there. You've abeautiful brace of babies, Honora. I believe I'll have to ask you toappoint me their guardian. I must have some share in them. It will giveme a fresh reason for going on. "

"Are you a trifle short of reasons for going on, Karl?" Honora askedgently, averting her look so that she might not seem to be watching him. 

"Yes, I am, " he admitted frankly. "Although, now that the worst of mychagrin is over at having failed so completely in the pet scheme of mylife, I can feel my fighting blood getting up again. I'm going to make asuccess of the town of Wander yet, my cousin, and those three mines thatlie there so silently are going to hum in the old way. You'll see astring of men pouring in and out of those gates yet, take my word forit. But as for me, I proceed henceforth on a humbler policy. "

"Humbler? Isn't it humble to be kind, Karl? That's what you were firstand last--kind. You were forever thinking of the good of your people. "

"It was outrageously insolent of me to do it, my cousin. Who am I that Ishould try to run another man's affairs? How should I know what is bestfor him--isn't he the one to be the judge of that? patronage, patronage, that's what they can't stand--that's what natural overmenlike myself with amiable dispositions try to impose on those we thinkinferior to ourselves. We can't seem to comprehend that the way to makethem grow is to leave them alone. "

"Don't be bitter, Karl. "

"I'm not bitter, Honora. I'm rebuked. I'm literal. I'm instructed. Ihave brought you down here to talk the situation over with me. I can getmen in plenty to advise me, but I want to know what you think about anumber of things. Moreover, I want you to tell me what you imagine MissBarrington would think about them. "

"Why don't you write and ask her?" asked Honora. She herself was hurt atnot having heard from Kate. 

"I gave her notice that I wasn't going to write any more, " said Karlsharply. "I couldn't have her counting on me when I wasn't sure that Iwas a man to be counted on. "

"Oh, " cried Honora, enlightened. "That's the trouble, is it? But still, I should think she'd write to me. I told her of all you and I were goingthrough together--" she broke off suddenly. Her words presented to herfor the first time some hint of the idea she might have conveyed toKate. She smiled upon her cousin beautifully, while he stared at her, puzzled at her unexpected radiance. 

"Kate loves him, " she decided, looking at the man beside her with freshappreciation of his power. She was the more conscious of it that she sawhim now in his hour of defeat and perceived his hope and ingenuity, hiscourage and determination gathering together slowly but steadily for afresh effort. 

"Dear old Kate, " she mused. "Karl rebuffed her in his misery, and Imisled her. If she hadn't cared she'd have written anyway. As it is--"

But Karl was talking. 

"Now there's the matter of the company store, " he was saying. "Whatwould Miss Barrington think about the ethical objections to that?"

Honora turned her attention to the matter in hand, and when, late thatafternoon, the two rode their jaded horses home, a new campaign had beenplanned. Within a week Wander left for Denver. Honora heard nothing fromhim for a fortnight. Then a wire came. He was returning to Wander withfive hundred men. 

"They're hoboes--pick-ups, " he told Honora that night as thetwo sat together at supper. "Long-stake and short-stakemen--down-and-outs--vagrants--drunkards, God knows what. I advertisedfor them. 'Previous character not called into question, ' was what Isaid. 'Must open up my mines. Come and work as long as you feel likeit. ' I haven't promised them anything and they haven't promised meanything, except that I give them wages for work. A few of them havewomen with them, but not more than one in twenty. I don't know what kindof a mess the town of Wander will be now, but at any rate, it'ssticking to its old programme of 'open shop. ' Any one who wants to takethese fellows away from me is quite welcome to do it. No affection shallexist between them and me. There are no obligations on either side. Butthey seem a hearty, good-natured lot, and they said they liked my grit. "

Something that was wild and reckless in all of the Wanders flashed inHonora's usually quiet eyes. 

"A band of brigands, " she laughed. "Really, Karl, I think you'll make agood chief for them. There's one thing certain, they'll never let youpatronize them. "

"I shan't try, " declared Karl. "They needn't look to me for benefits ofany sort. I want miners. "

Honora chuckled pleasantly and looked at her cousin from the corner ofher eye. She had her own ideas about his ability to maintain suchdetachment. 

He amused her a little later by telling her how he had formed a towngovernment and he described the men he had appointed to office. 

"They take it seriously, too, " he declared. "We have a ragamuffingovernment and regulations that would commend themselves to the mostjudicious. 'Pon my soul, Honora, though it's only play, I swear some ofthese fellows begin to take on little affectations of self-respect. We're going to have a council meeting to-morrow. You ought tocome down. "

That gave Honora a cue. She was wanting something more to do than tolook after the house, now that servants had again been secured. Itoccurred to her that it might be a good idea to call on the women downat Wander. She was under no error as to their character. Broken-downfollowers of weak men's fortunes, --some with the wedding ring and somewithout, --they nevertheless were there, flesh and blood, and possiblyheart and soul. Not the ideal but the actual commended itself to herthese days. Kate had taught her that lesson. So, quite simply, she wentamong them. 

"Call on me when you want anything, " she said to them. "I'm a woman whohas seen trouble, and I'd like to be of use to any of you if troubleshould come your way. Anyhow, trouble or no trouble, let us be friends. "

In her simple dress, with her quiet, sad face and her deep eyes, sheconvinced them of sincerity as few women could have done. They bade herenter their doors and sit in their sloven homes amid the broken thingsthe Italians had left behind them. 

"Why not start a furniture shop?" asked Honora. "We could find some menhere who could make plain furniture. I'll see Mr. Wander about it. "

That was a simple enough plan, and she had no trouble in carrying itout. She got the women to cooperate with her in other ways. Among themthey cleaned up the town, set out some gardens, and began spending theirmen's money for necessaries. 

"Do watch out, " warned Karl; "you'll get to be a Lady Bountiful--"

"And you a benevolent magnate--"

"Damned if I will! Well, play with your hobo brides if you like, Honora, but don't look for gratitude or rectitude or any beatitude. "

"Not I, " declared Honora. "I'm only amusing myself. "

They kept insisting to each other that they had no higher intention. They were hilarious over their failures and they persisted in takingeven their successes humorously. At first the "short-stake men" driftedaway, but presently they began to drift back again. They liked it atWander, --liked being mildly and tolerantly controlled by men of theirown sort, --men with some vested authority, however, and a reawakenedperception of responsibility. Wander was their town--the hoboes' owncity. It was one of the few places where something was expected of thehobo. Well, a hobo was a man, wasn't he? The point was provable. Anumber of Karl Wander's vagrants chose to prove that they were notreprobates. Those who had been "down and out" by their own will, or lackof it, as well as those whom misfortune had dogged, began to see in thiswild village, in the heart of these rich and terrific mountains, thatwonderful thing, "another chance. "

"Would Miss Barrington approve of us now?" Karl would sometimes askHonora. 

"Why should she?" Honora would retort. "We're not in earnest. We'reonly fighting bankruptcy and ennui. "

"That's it, " declared Karl. "By the way, I must scrape up some morecapital somewhere, Honora. I've borrowed everything I could lay my handson in Denver. Now I've written to some Chicago capitalists about myaffairs and they show a disposition to help me out. They'll meet inDenver next week. Perhaps I shall bring them here. I've told themfrankly what my position was. You see, if I can swing things for sixmonths more, the tide will turn. Do you think my interesting rabble willstick to me?"

"Don't count on them, " said Honora. "Don't count on anybody or anything. But if you like to take your chance, do it. It's no more of a gamblethan anything else a Colorado man is likely to invest in. "

"You don't think much of us Colorado men, do you, my cousin?"

"I don't think you are quite civilized, " she said. Then a twinge ofmemory twisted her face. "But I don't care for civilized men. I likeglorious barbarians like you, Karl. "

"Men who are shot at from behind bushes, eh? If I ever have to hide in acave, Honora, will you go with me?"

"Yes, and load the guns. "

He flashed her a curious look; one which she could not quite interpret. Was he thinking that he would like her to keep beside him? For asecond, with a thrill of something like fear, this occurred to her. Thenby some mysterious process she read his mind, and she read it aright. Hewas really thinking how stirring a thing life would seem if he couldhear words like that from the lips of Kate Barrington. 

XXVII

It had been a busy day for Honora. She had been superintending thehouse-cleaning and taking rather an aggressive part in it herself. Sherejoiced that her strength had come back to her, and she felt a keensatisfaction in putting it forth in service of the man who had taken herinto community of interest with him when, as he had once put it, she wasbankrupted of all that had made her think herself rich. 

Moreover, she loved the roomy, bare house, with its uncurtained windowsfacing the mountains, and revealing the spectacles of the day and night. Because of them she had learned to make the most of her sleepless hours. The slow, majestic procession in the heavens, the hours of tumult whenthe moon struggled through the troubled sky, the dawns with their swift, wide-spreading clarity, were the finest diversions she ever had known. 

She remembered how, in the old days, she and David had patronized theunspeakably puerile musical comedies under the impression that they"rested" them. Now, she was able to imagine nothing more fatiguing. 

They had an early supper, for Karl was leaving for a day or two inDenver and had to be driven ten miles to the station. He was unusuallysilent, and Honora was well pleased that he should be so, for, thoughshe had kept herself so busily occupied all the day, she had not beenable to rid herself of the feeling that a storm of memories was waitingto burst upon her. The feeling had grown as the hours of the day wenton, and she at once dreaded and longed for the solitude she should havewhen Karl was gone. She was relieved to find that the little girls wereweary and quite ready for their beds. She watched Karl drive away, standing at the door for a few moments till she heard his clear voicecalling a last good-bye as the station wagon swept around the piñongrove; then she locked the house and went to her own room. A fire hadbeen laid for her, and she touched a match to the kindling, lighted herlamp, and took up some sewing. But she found herself too weary to sew, and, moreover, this assailant of recollection was upon her again. 

She had once seen the Northern lights when the many-hued glory seemed tobe poured from vast, invisible pitchers, till it spread over the floorof heaven and spilled earthward. Her memories had come upon herlike that. 

Then she faced the fact she had been trying all day not to recognize. 

It was David's birthday!

She admitted it now, and even had the courage to go back over the waysthey had celebrated the day in former years; at first she held to theold idea that these recollections made her suffer, but presently sheperceived that it was not so. Had her help come from the hills, as Karlhad told her it would?

She sat so still that she could hear the ashes falling in thefireplace--so still that the ticking of her watch on the dressing-tableteased her ears. She seemed to be listening for something--for somethingbeautiful and solemn. And by and by the thing she had been waitingfor came. 

It swept into the house as if all the doors and windows had been thrownwide to receive it. It was as invisible as the wind, as scentless as astar, as complete as birth or death. It was peace--or forgiveness--or, in a white way, perhaps it was love. 

Suddenly she sprang to her feet. 

"David!" she cried. "David! Oh, I _believe I understand!_"

She went to her desk, and, as if she were compelled, began to write. Afterward she found she had written this:--

 "DEAR DAVID:--

 "It is your birthday, and I, who am so used to sending you a present, cannot be deterred now. Oh, David, my husband, you who fathered my children, you, who, in spite of all, belong to me, let me tell you how I have at last come, out of the storm of angers and torments of the past year, into a sheltered room where you seem to sit waiting to hear me say, 'I forgive you. '

 "That is my present to you--my forgiveness. Take it from me with lifted hands as if it were a sacrament; feed on it, for it is holy bread. Now we shall both be at peace, shall we not? You will forgive me, too, _for all I did not do_. 

 "We are willful children, all of us, and night over-takes us before we have half learned our lessons. 

 "Oh, David--"

She broke off suddenly. Something cold seemed to envelop her--cold as acrevasse and black as death. She gave a strangled cry, wrenched thecollar from her throat, fighting in vain against the mounting waves thatoverwhelmed her. 

Long afterward, she shuddered up out of her unconsciousness. The firehad burned itself out; the lamp was sputtering for lack of oil. Somewhere in the distance a coyote called. She was dripping with coldsweat, and had hardly strength to find the thing that would warm her andto get off her clothes and creep into bed. 

At first she was afraid to put out the light. It seemed as if, shouldshe do so, the very form and substance of Terror would come and gripher. But after a time, slowly, wave upon wave, the sea of Peace rolledover her--submerging her. She reached out then and extinguished thelight and let herself sink down, down, through the obliterating watersof sleep--waters as deep, as cold, as protecting as the sea. 

"Into the Eternal Arms, " she breathed, not knowing why. 

But when she awakened the next morning in response to the punctual gong, she remembered that she had said that. 

"Into the Eternal Arms. "

She came down to breakfast with the face of one who has eaten of thesacred bread of the spirit. 

 * * * * *

The next two days passed vaguely. A gray veil appeared to hang betweenher and the realities, and she had the effect of merely going throughthe motions of life. The children caused her no trouble. They were, indeed, the most normal of children, and Mrs. Hays, their old-timenurse, had reduced their days to an agreeable system. Honora derivedthat peculiar delight from them which a mother may have when she is notobliged to be the bodily servitor and constant attendant of herchildren. She was able to feel the poetry of their childhood, seeingthem as she did at fortunate and picturesque moments; and though theirlives were literally braided into her own, --were the golden threads inher otherwise dun fabric of existence, --she was thankful that she didnot have the task of caring for them. It would have been torture to havebeen tied to their small needs all day and every day. She liked farbetter the heavier work she did about the house, her long walks, herrides to town, and, when Karl was away, her supervision of the ranch. Above all, there was her work at the village. She could return fromthat to the children for refreshment and for spiritual illumination. Inthe purity of their eyes, in the liquid sweetness of their voices, intheir adorable grace and caprice, there was a healing force beyond herpower to compute. 

During these days, however, her pleasure in them was dim, though sweet. She had been through a mystic experience which left a profound influenceupon her, and she was too much under the spell of it even to make aneffort to shake it off. She slept lightly and woke often, to peer intothe velvet blackness of the night and to listen to the deep silence. Shewas as one who stands apart, the viewer of some tremendous butuncomprehended event. 

The third day she sent the horses for Karl, and as twilight neared, hecame driving home. She heard his approach and threw open the door forhim. He saw her with a halo of light about her, curiously enlarged andglorified, and came slowly and heavily toward her, holding out bothhands. At first she thought he was ill, but as his hands grasped hers, she saw that he was not bringing a personal sorrow to her but abrotherly compassion. And then she knew that something had happened toDavid. She read his mind so far, almost as if it had been a printedpage, and she might have read further, perhaps, if she had waited, butshe cried out:--

"What is it? You've news of David?"

"Yes, " he said. "Come in. "

"You've seen the papers?" he asked when they were within the house. Sheshook her head. 

"I haven't sent over for the mail since you left, Karl. I seemed to likethe silence. "

"There's silence enough in all patience!" he cried. "Sixteen hundredvoices have ceased. "

"I don't understand. "

"The Cyclops has gone down--a new ship, the largest on the sea. "

"Why, that seems impossible. "

"Not when there are icebergs floating off the banks and when the bergscarry submerged knives of ice. One of them gored the ship. Itwas fatal. "

"How terrible!" For a second's space she had forgotten the possibleapplication to her. Then the knowledge came rushing back upon her. 

She put her hands over her heart with the gesture of one wounded. 

"David?" she gasped. 

Karl nodded. 

"He was on it--with Mary. They were coming back to America. He had beengiven the Norden prize, as you know, --the prize you earned for him. Ithink he was to take a position in some Eastern university. He and Maryhad gone to their room, the paper says, when the shock came. They ranout together, half-dressed, and Mary asked a steward if there wasanything the matter. 'Yes, madam, ' he said quietly, just like that, 'Ibelieve we are sinking. ' You'll read all about it there in those papers. Mary was interviewed. Well, they lowered the boats. There were enoughfor about a third of the passengers. They had made every provision forluxury, but not nearly enough for safety. The men helped the women intothe boats and sent them away. Then they sat down together, folded theirarms, and died like gentlemen, with the good musicians heartening themwith their music to the last. The captain went down with his ship, ofcourse. All of the officers did that. Almost all of the men did it, too. It was very gallant in its terrible way, and David was among the mostgallant. The papers mention him particularly. He worked till the lasthelping the others off, and then he sat down and waited for the end. "

Honora turned on her cousin a face in which all the candles of her soulwere lit. 

"Oh, Karl, how wonderful! How beautiful!"

He said nothing for amazement. 

"In that half-hour, " she went on, speaking with such swiftness that hecould hardly follow her, "all his thoughts streamed off across the milesof sea and land to me! I felt the warmth of them all about me. It wasmyself he was thinking of. He came back to me, his wife! I was alone, waiting for something, I couldn't tell what. Then I remembered it washis birthday, and that I should be sending him a gift. So I sent him myforgiveness. I wrote a letter, but for some reason I have not sent it. It is here, the letter!" She drew it from her bosom. "See, the date andhour is upon it. Read it. "

Karl arose and held the letter in a shaking hand. He made acalculation. 

"The moments correspond, " he said. "You are right; his spirit soughtyours. "

"And then the--the drowning, Karl. I felt it all, but I could notunderstand. I died and was dead for a long time, but I came up again, tolive. Only since then life has been very curious. I have felt like aghost that missed its grave. I've been walking around, pretending tolive, but really half hearing and half seeing, and waiting for you tocome back and explain. "

"I have explained, " said Karl with infinite gentleness. "Mary is saved. She was taken up with others by the Urbania, and friends are caring forher in New York. She gave a very lucid interview; a feeling one, too. She lives, but the man she ruined went down, for her sake. "

"No, " said Honora, "he went down for my sake. He went down for the sakeof his ideals, and his ideals were mine. Oh, how beautiful that I haveforgiven him--and how wonderful that he knew it, and that I--" She spokeas one to whom a great happiness had come. Then she wavered, reached outgroping hands, and fell forward in Karl's arms. 

 * * * * *

For days she lay in her bed. She had no desire to arise. She seemed todread interruption to her passionate drama of emotion, in which sorrowand joy were combined in indeterminate parts. From her window she couldsee the snow-capped peaks of the Williston range, rising with immortaland changeful beauty into the purple heavens. As she watched them withincurious eyes, marking them in the first light of the day, when theiriridescence made them seem as impalpable as a dream of heaven; eyeingthem in the noon-height, when their sides were the hue of ruddy granite;watching them at sunset when they faded from swimming gold to rose, fromrose to purple, they seemed less like mountains than like those fair andfatal bergs of the Northern Atlantic. She had read of them, though shehad not seen them. She knew how they sloughed from the inexhaustibleice-cap of Greenland's bleak continent and marched, stately as an army, down the mighty plain of the ocean. Fair beyond word were they, withjeweled crevasses and mother-of-pearl changefulness, indomitable, treacherous, menacing. Honora, closing weary eyes, still saw themsailing, sailing, white as angels, radiant as dawn, changing, changing, lovely and cold as death. 

Mind and gaze were fixed upon their enchantment. She would not think ofcertain other things--of that incredible catastrophe, that rent ship, crashing to its doom, of that vast company tossed upon the sea, of thosecries in the dark. No, she shut her eyes and her ears to those things!They seemed to be the servitors at the doors of madness, and she letthem crook their fingers at her in vain. Now and then, when she was noton guard, they swarmed upon her, whispering stories of black struggle, of heart-breaking separation of mother and child, of husband and wife. Sometimes they told her how Mary--so luxurious, so smiling, so avid ofwarmth and food and kisses--had shivered in that bleak wind, as she satcoatless, torn from David's sheltering embrace. They had given herelfish reminders of how soft, how pink, how perfumed was that woman'stender flesh. Then as she looked the blue eyes glazed with agony, thesupple body grew rigid with cold, and down, down, through miles ofwater, sank the man they both had loved. 

No, no, it was better to watch the bergs, those glistering, fair, whiteships of death! Yes, there from the window she seemed to see them! Howthe sun glorified them! Was the sun setting, then? Had there beenanother day?

"To-morrow and to-morrow and to-morrow--"

Darkness was falling. But even in the darkness she saw the ice-shipsslipping down from that great frozen waste, along the glacial rivers, past the bleak _lisière_, into the bitter sea, and on down, down to meetthat other ship--that ship bearing its mighty burden of living men--andto break it in unequal combat. 

Oh, could she never sleep! Would those white ships never reach port!

Did she hear Karl say he had telegraphed for Kate Barrington? But whatdid it matter? Neither Kate nor Karl, strong and kind as they were, could stem the tide that bore those ships along the never-quiet seas. 

XXVIII

So Kate was coming!

He had cravenly rebuffed her, and she had borne the rebuff in silence. Yet now that he needed her, she was coming. Ah, that was what womenmeant to men. They were created for the comforting of them. He alwayshad known it, but he had impiously doubted them--doubted Her. Becausefortune had turned from him, he had turned from Her--from KateBarrington. He had imagined that she wanted more than he could give;whereas, evidently, all she ever had wanted was to be needed. He hadcalled. She had answered. It had been as swift as telegraphy could makeit. And now he was driving to the station to meet her. 

Life, it appeared, was just as simple as that. A man, lost in thedarkness, could cry for a star to guide him, and it would come. It wouldshine miraculously out of the heavens, and his path would be made plain. It seemed absurd that the horses should be jogging along at their usualpace over the familiar road. Why had they not grown shining wings? Whywas the old station wagon not transformed, by the mere glory of itserrand, into a crystal coach? But, no, the horses went no faster becausethey were going on this world-changing errand. The resuscitated village, with the American litter heaped on the Italian dirt, looked none theless slovenly because She was coming into it in a few minutes. The clockkept its round; the sun showed its usual inclination toward the west. But notwithstanding this torpidity, She was coming, and that day stoodapart from all other days. 

That it was Honora's desperate need which she was answering, in no waylessened the value of her response to him. His need and Honora's wereindissoluble now; it was he who had called, and it was not to Honoraalone that she was coming with healing in her hands. 

He saw her as she leaped from the train, --tall, alert, green-clad, --andhe ran forward, sweeping his Stetson from his head. Their handsmet--clung. 

"You!" he said under his breath. 

She laughed into his eyes. 

"No, _you_!" she retorted. 

He took her bags and they walked side by side, looking at each other asif their eyes required the sight. 

"How is she?" asked Kate. 

"Very bad. "

"What is it?"

"The doorway to madness. "

"You've had a specialist?"

"Yes. He wanted to take her to a sanatorium. I begged him to wait--tolet you try. How could I let her go out from my door to be cast in withthe lost?"

"I suppose it was David's death that caused it. "

"Oh, yes. What else could it be?"

"Then she loved him--to the end. "

"And after it, I am sure. "

He led the way to the station wagon and helped her in; then brought herluggage on his own shoulder. 

"Oh, " she cried in distress. "Do you have to be your own stevedore? Idon't like to have you doing that for me. "

"Out here we wait on ourselves, " he replied when he had tumbled thetrunk into the wagon. He seated himself beside her as if he were doingan accustomed thing, and she, too, felt as if she had been there besidehim many times before. 

As they entered the village, he said:--

"You must note my rowdy town. Never was there such a place--suchorganized success built on so much individual failure. From boss towater-boy we were failures all; so we understood each other. We haven'tsworn brotherhood, but we're pulling together. Some of us had known nolaw, and most of us had a prejudice against it, but now we're making ourown laws and we rather enjoy the process. We've made the town and themines our own cause, so what is the use of playing the traitor? Some ofus are short-stake men habitually and constitutionally. Very well, saywe, let us look at the facts. Since there are short-stake men in theworld, why not make allowances for them? Use their limited powers ofendurance and concentration, then let 'em off to rest up. If there areenough short-stake men around, some one will always be working. We findit works well. "

"Have you many women in your midst?"

"At first we had very few. Just some bedraggled wives and a few lessresponsible ladies with magenta feathers in their hats. At least, two ofthem had, and the magenta feather came to be a badge. But they'vedisappeared--the feathers, not the ladies. Honora had a hand in it. Ithink she pulled off one marriage. She seemed to think there werearguments in favor of the wedding ceremony. But, mind you, she didn'twant any of the poor women to go because they were bad. We are sinnersall here. Stay and take a chance, that's our motto. It isn't often youcan get a good woman like Honora to hang up a sign like that. "

"Honora couldn't have done it once, " said Kate. "But think of all she'slearned. "

"Learned? Yes. And I, too. I've been learning my lessons, too, --theywere long and hard and I sulked at some of them, but I'm moretractable new. "

"I had my own hard conning, " Kate said softly. "You never could havedone what I did, Mr. Wander. You couldn't have been cruel to anold father. "

"Honora has made all that clear to me, " said Karl with compassion. "When we are fighting for liberty we forget the sufferings ofthe enemy. "

There was a little pause. Then Karl spoke. 

"But I forgot to begin at the beginning in telling you about mymade-over mining town. Yet you seemed to know about it. "

"Oh, I read about it in the papers. Your experiment is famous. All ofthe people I am associated with, the welfare workers and sociologists, are immensely interested in it. That's one of the problems now--how touse the hobo, how to get him back into an understanding of regulatedcommunities. "

"Put him in charge, " laughed Karl. "The answer's easy. Treat him like afellow-man. Don't annoy him by an exhibition of your useless virtues. "

"I never thought of that, " said Kate. 

They turned their backs on the straggling town and faced the peaks. Presently they skirted the Williston River which thundered amongboulders and raged on toward the low-lying valley. From above, the roarof the pines came to them, reverberant and melancholy. 

"What sounds! What sounds!" cried Kate. 

"The mountains breathing, " answered Wander. 

He drove well, and he knew the road. It was a dangerous road, which, ever ascending, skirted sharp declivities and rounded buttressed rocks. Kate, prairie-reared, could not "escape the inevitable thrill, " but sheshowed, and perhaps felt, no fear. She let the matter rest withhim--this man with great shoulders and firm hands, who knew theprimitive art of "waiting on himself. " Their brief speech sufficed themfor a time, and now they sat silent, well content. The old, tormentingquestion as to his relations with Honora did not intrude itself. It wasswept out of sight like flotsam in the plenteous stream ofpresent content. 

They swung upon a purple mesa, and in the distance Kate saw a lightwhich she felt was shining from the window of his home. 

"It's just as I thought it would be, " she said. 

"Perhaps you are just the way it thought you would be, " he replied. "Perhaps the soul of a place waits and watches for the right person, just as we human beings wander about searching for the right spot. "

"_I'm_ suited, " affirmed Kate. "I hope the mesa is. "

"I know it well and I can answer for it. "

The road continued to mount; they entered the piñon grove and rode inaromatic dusk for a while, and when they emerged they were atthe doorway. 

He lifted her down and held her with a gesture as if he had something tosay. 

"It's about my letter, " he ventured. "You knew very well it wasn't thatI didn't want you to write. But my life was getting tangled--I wasn'twilling to involve you in any way in the débris. I couldn't be sure thatletters sent me would always reach my hands. Worst of all, I accusedmyself of unworthiness. I do so still. "

"I'm not one who worries much about worthiness or unworthiness, " shesaid. "Each of us is worthy and unworthy. But I thought--"

"What?"

"I was confused. Honora said I was to congratulate you--and her. Ididn't know--"

He stared incredulously. 

"You didn't know--" He broke off, too, then laughed shortly. "I wish youhad known, " he added. "I would like to think that you never couldmisunderstand. "

She felt herself rebuked. He opened the door for her and she stepped forthe first time across the threshold of his house. 

 * * * * *

Half an hour later, Wander, sitting in his study at the end of the upperhall, saw his guest hastening toward Honora's room. She wore a plainbrown house dress and looked uniformed and ready for service. She didnot speak to him, but hastened down the corridor and let herself intothat solemn chamber where Honora Fulham lay with wide-staring eyesgazing mountain ward. That Honora was in some cold, still, and appallingplace it took Kate but a moment to apprehend. She could hardly keep fromspringing to her as if to snatch her from impending doom, but she forcedall panic from her manner. 

"Kate's come, " she said, leaning down and kissing those chilly lipswith a passion of pity and reassurance. "She's come to stay, sisterHonora, and to drive everything bad away from you. Give her a kiss ifyou are glad. "

Did she feel an answering salute? She could not be sure. She moved asideand watched. Those fixed, vision-seeing eyes were upon the snow-cappedpeaks purpling in the decline of the day. 

"What is it you see, sister?" she asked. "Is there something out therethat troubles you?"

Honora lifted a tragic hand and pointed to those darkening snows. 

"See how the bergs keep floating!" she whispered. "They float slowly, but they are on their way. By and by they will meet the ship. Theneverything will be crushed or frozen. I try to make them stay still, butthey won't do it, and I'm so tired--oh, I'm so terribly tired, Kate. "

Kate's heart leaped. She had, at any rate, recognized her. 

"They really are still, Honora, " she cried. "Truly they are. I amlooking at them, and I can see that they are still. They are not bergsat all, but only your good mountains, and by and by all of that ice andsnow will melt and flowers will be growing there. "

She pulled down the high-rolled shades at the windows with a decisivegesture. 

"But I must have them up, " cried Honora, beginning to sob. "I have tokeep watching them. "

"It's time to have in the lamps, " declared Kate; and went to the doorto ask for them. 

"And tea, too, please, Mrs. Hays, " she called; "quite hot. "

"We've been keeping her very still, " warned Wander, rejoicing in Kate'scheerful voice, yet dreading the effect of it on his cousin. 

"It's been too still where her soul has been dwelling, " Kate replied ina whisper. "Can't you see she's on those bitter seas watching for theice to crush David's ship? It's not yet madness, only a profounddream--a recurring hallucination. We must break it up--oh, we must!"

She carried in the lamps when they came, placing them where their glowwould not trouble those burning eyes; and when Mrs. Hays brought the teaand toast, whispering, "She'll take nothing, " Kate lifted her friend inher determined arms, and, having made her comfortable, placed the traybefore her. 

"For old sake's sake, Honora, " she said. "Come, let us play we are girlsagain, back at Foster, drinking our tea!"

Mechanically, Honora lifted the cup and sipped it. When Kate brokepieces of the toast and set them before her, she ate them. 

"You are telling me nothing about the babies, " Kate reproached herfinally. "Mayn't we have them in for a moment?"

"I don't think they ought to come here, " said Honora faintly. "Itdoesn't seem as if they ought to be brought to such a place as this. "

But Kate commanded their presence, and, having softly fondled them, dropped them on Honora's bed and let them crawl about there. Theyswarmed up to their mother and hung upon her, patting her cheeks, andinvestigating the use of eyelids and of ropes of hair. But when theycould not provoke her to play, they began to whimper. 

"Honora, " said Kate sharply, "you must laugh at them at once! Theymustn't go away without a kiss. "

So Honora dragged herself from those green waters beyond the fatalBanks, half across the continent to the little children at her side, andheld them for a moment--the two of them at once--in her embrace. 

"But I'm so tired, Kate, " she said wearily. 

"Rest, then, " said Kate. "Rest. But it wouldn't have been right to restwithout saying good-night to the kiddies, would it? A mother has tothink of that, hasn't she? They need you so dreadfully, you see. "

She slipped the extra pillows from beneath the heavy head, and stood amoment by the bedside in silence as if she would impress the fact of herprotection upon that stricken heart and brain. 

"It is safe, here, Honora, " she said softly. "Love and care are allabout you. No harm shall come near you. Do you believe that?"

Honora looked at her from beneath heavy lids, then slowly let her eyesclose. Kate walked to the window and waited. At first Honora's body wasconvulsed with nervous spasms, but little by little they ceased. Honoraslept. Kate threw wide the windows, extinguished the light, and creptfrom the room, not ill-satisfied with her first conflict with thedread enemy. 

 * * * * *

Karl was waiting for her in the corridor when she came from Honora'sroom, and he caught both of her hands in his. 

"You're cold with horror!" he said. "What a thing that is to see!"

"But it isn't going to last, " protested Kate with a quivering accent. "We can't have it last. "

"Come into the light, " he urged. "Supper is waiting. "

He led her down the stairs and into the simple dining-room. The tablewas laid for two before a leaping blaze. There was no other light savethat of two great candles in sticks of wrought bronze. The room was barebut beautiful--so seemly were its proportions, so fitted to its use itsquiet furnishings. 

He placed her chair where she could feel the glow and see, through thewide window, a crescent moon mounting delicately into the clear sky. There was game and salad, custard and coffee--a charming feast. Mrs. Hays came and went quietly serving them. Karl said little. He wascontent with the essential richness of the moment. It was as if Destinyhad distilled this hour for him, giving it to him to quaff. He wasgrave, but he did not resent her sorrowfulness. Sorrow, he observed, might have as sweet a flavor as joy. It did not matter by what name thepresent hour was called. It was there--he rested in it as in a state ofbeing which had been appointed--a goal toward which he had beenjourneying. 

"What's to be done?" he asked. 

"I've been thinking, " said Kate, "that we had better move her from thatroom. Is there none from which no mountains are visible? She ought notto have the continual reminder of those icebergs. "

"Why didn't I think of that?" he cried with vexation. "That shows howstupid a man can be. Certainly we have such a room as you wish. It looksover the barnyard. It's cheerful but noisy. You can hear the burros andthe chickens and pigs and calves and babies all day long. "

"It's precisely what she needs. Her thoughts are the things to fear, andI know of no way to break those up except by crowding others in. Is theroom pleasant--gay?"

"No--hardly clean, I should say. But we can work on it like fiends. "

"Let's do it, then, --put in chintz, pictures, flowers, books, a jar ofgoldfish, a cage of finches, --anything that will make her forget thatterrible white procession of bergs. "

"You think it isn't too late? You think we can save her?"

"I won't admit anything else, " declared Kate. 

The wind began to rise. It came rushing from far heights and moanedaround the house. The silence yielded to this mournful sound, yet keptits essential quality. 

"It's a wild place, " said Kate; "wilder than any place I have been inbefore. But it seems secure. I find it hard to believe that you havebeen in danger here. "

"I am in danger now, " said Karl. "Much worse danger than I was in whenthe poor excited dagoes were threatening me. "

"What is your danger?" asked Kate. 

She was incapable of coquetry after that experience in Honora's room;nor did the noble solitude of the place permit the thought of anexcursion into the realms of any sort of dalliance. Moreover, thoughKarl's words might have led her to think of him as ready to play with asentimental situation, the essential loftiness of his gaze forbade herto entertain the thought. 

"I am in danger, " he said gravely, "of experiencing a happiness so greatthat I shall never again be satisfied with life under less perfectconditions. Can you imagine how the fresh air seems to a man justreleased from prison? Well, life has a tang like that for me now. I tellyou, I have been a discouraged man. It looked to me as if all of thethings I had been fighting for throughout my manhood were going toruin. I saw my theories shattered, my fortune disappearing, myreputation, as the successful manipulator of other men's money, beinglost. I've been looked upon as a lucky man and a reliable one out herein Colorado. They swear by you or at you out in this part of thecountry, and I've been accustomed to having them count on me. I even hadsome political expectations, and was justified in them, I imagine. I hadan idea I might go to the state legislature and then take a jump toWashington. Well, it was a soap-bubble dream, of course. I lost out. This tatterdemalion crew of mine is all there is left of my cohorts. Isuppose I'm looked on now as a wild experimenter. "

"Would it seem that way to men?" asked Kate, surprised. "To take whatlies at hand and make use of it--to win with a broken sword--thatstrikes me as magnificent. "

She forgot to put a guard on herself for a moment and let heradmiration, her deep confidence in him, shine from her eyes. She saw himwhiten, saw a look of almost terrible happiness in his eyes, andwithdrew her gaze. She could hear him breathing deeply, but he saidnothing. There fell upon them a profound and wonderful silence whichheld when they had arisen and were sitting before his hearth. They werealone with elemental things--night, silence, wind, and fire. They hadthe essentials, roof and food, clothing and companionship. Back andforth between them flashed the mystic currents of understanding. Ahappiness such as neither had known suffused them. 

When they said "good-night, " each made the discovery that the simpleword has occult and beautiful meanings. 

XXIX

At the end of a week Honora showed a decided change for the better. Thehorror had gone out of her face; she ate without persuasion; she sleptbriefly but often. The conclusion of a fortnight saw her still sad, butbeyond immediate danger of melancholy. She began to assume some slightresponsibility toward the children, and she loved to have them playingabout her, although she soon wearied of them. 

Kate had decided not to go back to Chicago until her return fromCalifornia. She was to speak to the Federation of Women's Clubs whichmet at Los Angeles, and she proposed taking Honora with her. Honora wasnot averse if Kate and Karl thought it best for her. The babies were toremain safe at home. 

"I wouldn't dare experiment with babies, " said Kate. "At least, not withother people's. "

"You surely wouldn't experiment with your own, ma'am!" cried theprivileged Mrs. Hays. 

"Oh, I might, " Kate insisted. "If I had babies of my own, I'd like themto be hard, brown little savages--the sort you could put on donkey-backor camel-back and take anywhere. "

Mrs. Hays shook her head at the idea of camels. It hardly soundedChristian, and certainly it in no way met her notion of the needof infants. 

"Mrs. Browning writes about taking her baby to a mountain-top not farfrom the stars, " Kate went on. "They rode donkey-back, I believe. Personally, however, I should prefer the camel. For one thing, you couldget more babies on his back. "

Mrs. Hays threw a glance at her mistress as if to say: "Is it proper fora young woman to talk like this?"

The young woman in question said many things which, according to thealways discreet and sensible Mrs. Hays, were hardly to be commended. 

There was, for example, the evening she had stood in the westward end ofthe veranda and called:--

"Archangels! Come quick and see them!"

The summons was so stirring that they all ran, --even Honora, who wasjust beginning to move about the house, --but Wander reached Kate'sside first. 

"She's right, Honora, " he announced. "It is archangels--a whole party ofthem. Come, see!"

But it had been nothing save a sunset rather brighter than usual, withwing-like radiations. 

"Pshaw!" said Mrs. Hays confidentially to the cook. 

"Shouldn't you think they'd burn up with all that flaming crimson onthem?" Kate cried. "And, oh, their golden hair! Or does that belong tothe Damosel? Probably she is leaning over the bar of heaven atthis minute. "

In Mrs. Hays's estimation, the one good thing about all such talk wasthat Mrs. Fulham seemed to like it. Sometimes she smiled; and she hungupon the arm of her friend and looked at her as if wondering how onecould be so young and strong and gay. Mr. Wander, too, seemed nevertired of listening; and the way that letters trailed after this youngwoman showed her that a number--quite an astonishingly large number--ofpersons were pleased to whet their ideas on her. Clarinda Hays decidedthat she would like to try it herself; so one morning when she sat onthe veranda watching the slumbers of the little girls in their hammocks, and Miss Barrington sat near at hand fashioning a blouse for Honora'sjourney, she ventured:--

"You're a suffragette, ain't you, Miss?"

"Why, yes, " admitted Kate. "I suppose I am. I believe in suffrage forwomen, at any rate. "

"Well, what do you make of all them carryings-on over there in England, ma'am? You don't approve of acid-throwing and window-breaking andcutting men's faces with knives, do you?" She looked at Kate with analmost poignant anxiety, her face twitching a little with herexcitement. "A decent woman couldn't put her stamp on that kindo' thing. "

"But the puzzling part of it all is, Mrs. Hays, that it appears to bedecent women who are doing it. Moreover, it's not an impulse with thembut a plan. That rather sets one thinking, doesn't it? You see, it's asort of revolution. Revolutions have got us almost everything we havethat is really worth while in the way of personal liberty; but I don'tsuppose any of them seemed very 'decent' to the non-combatants who werelooking on. Then, too, you have to realize that women are very muchhandicapped in conducting a fight. "

"What have they got to fight against, I should like to know?" demandedMrs. Hays, dropping her sewing and grasping the arms of her chair in herindignation. 

"Well, " said Kate, "I fancy we American women haven't much idea of allthat the Englishwomen are called upon to resent. I do know, though, thatan English husband of whatever station thinks that he is the commander, and that he feels at liberty to address his wife as few Americanhusbands would think of doing. It's quite allowed them to beat theirwives if they are so minded. I hope that not many of them are minded todo anything of the kind, but I feel very sure that women are 'kept intheir place' over there. So, as they've been hectored themselves, they've taken up hectoring tactics in retaliation. They demand a sharein the government and the lawmaking. They want to have a say about theschools and the courts of justice. If men were fighting for some newform of liberty, we should think them heroic. Why should we think womensilly for doing the same thing?"

"It won't get them anywhere, " affirmed Clarinda Hays. "It won't do forthem what the old way of behaving did for them, Miss. Now, who, Ishould like to know, does a young fellow, dying off in foreign parts, turn his thoughts to in his last moments? Why, to his good mother or hisnice sweetheart! You don't suppose that men are going to turn theirdying thoughts to any such screaming, kicking harridans as themsuffragettes over there in England, do you?"

Kate heard a chuckle beyond the door--the disrespectful chuckle, as shetook it, of the master of the house. It armed her for the fray. 

"I don't think the militant women are doing these things to induce mento feel tenderly toward them, Mrs. Hays. I don't believe they care justnow whether the men feel tenderly toward them or not. Women have beenlow-voiced and sweet and docile for a good many centuries, but it hasn'tgained them the right to claim their own children, or to stand up besidemen and share their higher responsibilities and privileges. I don't likethe manner of warfare, myself. While I could die at the stake if itwould do any good, I couldn't break windows and throw acid. For onething, it doesn't seem to me quite logical, as the damage is inflictedon the property of persons who have nothing to do with the case. But, ofcourse, I can't be sure that, after the fight is won, future generationswill not honor the women who forgot their personal preferences and whomade the fight in the only way they could. "

"You're such a grand talker, Miss, that it's hard running opposite toyou, but I was brought up to think that a woman ought to be as near anangel as she could be. I never answered my husband back, no matter whathe said to me, and I moved here and there to suit him. I was alwayswaiting for him at home, and when he got there I stood ready to do forhim in any way I could. We was happy together, Miss, and when he wasdying he said that I had been a good wife. Them words repaid me, Miss, as having my own way never could. "

Clarinda Hays had grown fervid. There were tears in her patient eyes, and her face was frankly broken with emotion. 

Kate permitted a little silence to fall. Then she said gently:--

"I can see it is very sweet to you--that memory--very sweet and sacred. I don't wonder you treasure it. "

She let the subject lie there and arose presently and, in passing, laidher firm brown hand on Mrs. Hays's work-worn one. 

Wander was in the sitting-room and as she entered it he motioned her toget her hat and sweater. She did so silently and accepted from him thealpenstock he held out to her. 

"Is it right to leave Honora?" he asked when they were beyond hearing. "I had little or nothing to do down in town, and it occurred to me thatwe might slip away for once and go adventuring. "

"Oh, Honora's particularly well this morning. She's been reading alittle, and after she has rested she is going to try to sew. Not thatshe can do much, but it means that she's taking an interest again. "

"Ah, that does me good! What a nightmare it's been! We seem to have hadone nightmare after another, Honora and I. "

They turned their steps up the trail that mounted westward. 

"It follows this foothill for a way, " said Wander, striding ahead, sincethey could not walk side by side. "Then it takes that level up there andstrikes the mountain. It goes on over the pass. "

"And where does it end? Why was it made?"

"I'm not quite sure where it ends. But it was made because men love toclimb. "

She gave a throaty laugh, crying, "I might have known!" for answer, andhe led on, stopping to assist her when the way was broken or unusuallysteep, and she, less accustomed but throbbing with the joy ofit, followed. 

They reached an irregular "bench" of the mountain, and rested there on agreat boulder. Below them lay the ranch amid its little hills, dust-of-gold in hue. 

"I have dreamed countless times of trailing this path with you, " hesaid. 

"Then you have exhausted the best of the experience already. What equalsa dream? Doesn't it exceed all possible fact?"

"I think you know very well, " he answered, "that this is more to me thanany dream. "

An eagle lifted from a tree near at hand and sailed away withconfidence, the master of the air. 

"I don't wonder men die trying to imitate him, " breathed Kate, wrapt inthe splendor of his flight. "They are the little brothers of Icarus. "

"I always hope, " replied Wander, "when I hear of an aviator who has beenkilled, that he has had at least one perfect flight, when he soared ashigh as he wished and saw and felt all that a man in his circumstancescould. Since he has had to pay so great a price, I want him to have hadfull value. "

"It's a fine thing to be willing to pay the price, " mused Kate. "If youcan face whatever-gods-there-be and say, 'I've had my adventure. What'sdue?' you're pretty well done with fears and flurries. "

"Wise one!" laughed Wander. "What do you know about paying?"

"You think I don't know!" she cried. Then she flushed and drew back. "The last folly of the braggart is to boast of misfortune, " she said. "But, really, I have paid, if missing some precious things that mighthave been mine is a payment for pride and wilfullness. "

"I hope you haven't missed very much, then, --not anything that you'll beregretting in the years to come. "

"Oh, regret is never going to be a specialty of mine, " declared Kate. "To-morrow's the chance! I shall never be able to do much withyesterday, no matter how wise I become. "

"Right you are!" said Wander sharply. "The only thing is that you don'tknow quite the full bearing of your remark--and I do. "

She laughed sympathetically. 

"Truth is truth, " she said. 

"Yes. " He hung over the obvious aphorism boyishly. "Yes, truth is truth, no matter who utters it. "

"Thanks, kind sir. "

"Oh, I was thinking of the excellent Clarinda Hays. I listened to yourconversation this morning and it seemed to me that she was giving youabout all the truth you could find bins for. I couldn't help but take itin, it was so complacently offered. But Clarinda was getting her 'sacredfeelings' mixed up with the truth. However, I suppose there is anessential truth about sacred feelings even when they're founded on anerror. I surmised that you were holding back vastly more than you weresaying. Now that we 're pretty well toward a mountain-top, with nobodylistening, you might tell me what you _were_ thinking. "

Kate smiled slowly. She looked at the man beside her as if appraisinghim. 

"I'm terribly afraid, " she said at length, "that you are soul-kin toClarinda. You'll walk in a mist of sacred feelings, too, and truth willplay hide and seek with you all over the place. "

"Nonsense!" he cried. "Why can't I hear what you have to say? You standon platforms and tell it to hundreds. Why should you grudge it to me?"

She swept her hand toward the landscape around them. 

"It has to do with change, " she said. "And with evolution. Look at thisscarred mountain-side, how confused and senseless the upheavals seemwhich have given it its grandeur! Nor is it static yet. It iscontinually wearing down. Erosion is diminishing it, that river isdenuding it. Eternal change is the only law. "

"I understand, " said Wander, his eyes glowing. 

"In the world of thought it is the same. "

"Verily. "

"But I speak for women--and I am afraid that you'll not understand. "

"I should like to be given a chance to try, " he answered. 

"Clarinda, " she said, after a moment's pause, "like the larger part ofthe world, is looking at a mirage. She sees these shining pictures onthe hot sand of the world and she says: 'These are the real things. Iwill fix my gaze on them. What does the hot sand and the trackless wastematter so long as I have these beautiful mirages to look at?' When yousay that mirages are insubstantial, evanishing, mere tricks of air andeye, the Clarindas retort, 'But if you take away our mirages, where arewe to turn? What will you give us in the place of them?' She thinks, forexample, if a dying soldier calls on his mother or his sweetheart thatthey must be good women. This is not the case. He calls on them becauseconfronts the great loneliness of death. He is quite as likely to callon a wicked woman if she is the one whose name comes to his flickeringsense. But even supposing that one had to be sacrificial, subservient, and to possess all the other Clarinda virtues in order to have a dyingman call on one, still, would that burst of delirious wistfulnesscompensate one for years of servitude?"

She let the statement hang in the air for a moment, while Wander's colordeepened yet more. He was being wounded in the place of his dreams andthe pang was sharp. 

"If some one, dying, called you 'Faithful slave, '" resumed Kate, "wouldthat make you proud? Would it not rather be a humiliation? Now, 'goodwife' might be synonymous with 'faithful slave. ' That's what I'd have toascertain before I could be complimented as Clarinda was complimented bythose words. I'd have to have my own approval. No one else could comfortme with a 'well done' unless my own conscience echoed the words. 'Goodwife, ' indeed!"

"What would reconcile you to such commendations?" asked Wander with areproach that was almost personal. 

"The possession of those privileges and mediums by which liberty issustained. "

"For example?"

"My own independent powers of thought; my own religion, politics, taste, and direction of self-development--above all, my own money. By that Imean money for which I did not have to ask and which never was given tome as an indulgence. Then I should want definite work commensurate withmy powers; and the right to a voice in all matters affecting my life orthe life of my family. "

"That is what you would take. But what would you give?"

"I would not 'take' these things any more than my husband would 'take'them. Nor could he bestow them upon me, for they are mine byinherent right. "

"Could he give you nothing, then?"

"Love. Yet it may not be correct to say that he could give that. Hewould not love me because he chose to do so, but because he could nothelp doing so. At least, that is my idea of love. He would love me as Iwas, with all my faults and follies, and I should love him the same way. I should be as proud of his personality as I would be defensive of myown. I should not ask him to be like me; I should only ask him to betruly himself and to let me be truly myself. If our personalitiesdiverged, perhaps they would go around the circle and meet on theother side. "

"Do you think, my dear woman, that you would be able to recognize eachother after such a long journey?"

"There would be distinguishing marks, " laughed Kate; "birthmarks of thesoul. But I neglected to say that it would not satisfy me merely to begiven a portion of the earnings of the family--that portion which Iwould require to conduct the household and which I might claim as myshare of the result of labor. I should also wish, when there was asurplus, to be given half of it that I might make my own experiments. "

"A full partnership!"

"That's the idea, precisely: a full partnership. There is an assumptionthat marriages are that now, but it is not so, as all frank personsmust concede. "

"_I_ concede it, at any rate. "

"Now, you must understand that we women are asking these things becausewe are acquiring new ideas of duty. A duty is like a command; it must beobeyed. It has been laid upon us to demand rights and privileges equalto those enjoyed by men, and we wish them to be extended to us notbecause we are young or beautiful or winning or chaste, but because weare members of a common humanity with men and are entitled to the sameinheritance. We want our status established, so that when we make amarriage alliance we can do it for love and no other reason--not for ahome, or support, or children or protection. Marriage should be aprivilege and a reward--not a necessity. It should be so that if wespinsters want a home, we can earn one; if we desire children, we cantake to ourselves some of the motherless ones; and we should be able toentrust society with our protection. By society I mean, of course, thestructure which civilized people have fashioned for themselves, theportals of which are personal rights and the law. "

"But what will all the lovers do? If everything is adjusted to such anicety, what will they be able to sacrifice for each other?"

"Lovers, " smiled Kate, "will always be able to make their own paradise, and a jewelled sacrifice will be the keystone of each window in theirhouse of love. But there are only a few lovers in the world comparedwith those who have come down through the realm of little morning cloudsand are bearing the heat and burden of the day. "

"How do you know all of these things, Wise Woman? Have you had so muchexperience?"

"We each have all the accumulated experience of the centuries. We don'thave to keep to the limits of our own little individual lives. "

"I often have dreamed of bringing you up on this trail, " said Wanderwhimsically, "but never for the purpose of hearing you make yourdeclaration of independence. "

"Why not?" demanded Kate. "In what better place could I make it?"

Beside the clamorous waterfall was a huge boulder squared almost as ifthe hand of a mason had shaped it. Kate stepped on it, before Wandercould prevent her, and stood laughing back at him, the wind blowing hergarments about her and lifting strands of her loosened hair. 

"I declare my freedom!" she cried with grandiose mockery. "Freedom tothink my own thoughts, preach my own creeds, do my own work, and makethe sacrifices of my own choosing. I declare that I will have no masterand no mistress, no slave and no neophyte, but that I will strive topreserve my own personality and to help all of my brothers and sisters, the world over, to preserve theirs. I declare that I will let nosuperstition or prejudice set limits to my good will, my influence, ormy ambition!"

"You are standing on a precipice, " he warned. 

"It's glorious!"

"But it may be fatal. "

"But I have the head for it, " she retorted. "I shall not fall!"

"Others may who try to emulate you. "

"That's Fear--the most subtle of foes!"

"Oh, come back, " he pleaded seriously, "I can't bear to see you standingthere!"

"Very well, " she said, giving him her hand with a gay gesture ofcapitulation. "But didn't you say that men liked to climb? Well, women do, too. "

They were conscious of being late for dinner and they turned their facestoward home. 

"How ridiculous, " remarked Wander, "that we should think ourselvesobliged to return for dinner!"

"On the contrary, " said Kate, "I think it bears witness to both ourhealth and our sanity. I've got over being afraid that I shall beinjured by the commonplace. When I open your door and smell the roastor the turnips or whatever food has been provided, I shall like it justas well as if it were flowers. "

Wander helped her down a jagged descent and laughed up in her face. 

"What a materialist!" he cried. "And I thought you were interested onlyin the ideal. "

"Things aren't ideal because they have been labeled so, " declared Kate. "When people tell you they are clinging to old ideals, it's well to findout if they aren't napping in some musty old room beneath the cobwebs. I'm a materialist, very likely, but that's only incidental to myrealism. I like to be allowed to realize the truth about things, and youknow yourself that you men--who really are the sentimental sex--havetried as hard as you could not to let us. "

"You speak as if we had deliberately fooled you. "

"You haven't fooled us any more than we have fooled ourselves. " They hadreached the lower level now, and could walk side by side. "You've keptus supplemental, and we've thought we were noble when we played thesupplemental part. But it doesn't look so to us any longer. We want tobe ourselves and to justify ourselves. There's a good deal of complaintabout women not having enough to do--about the factories and shopstaking their work away from them and leaving them idle and inexpressive. Well, in a way, that's true, and I'm a strong advocate of new vocations, so that women can have their own purses and all that. But I know in myheart all this is incidental. What we really need is a definite set ofprinciples; if we can acquire an inner stability, we shall do very wellwhether our hands are perpetually occupied or not. But just at presentwe poor women are sitting in the ruins of our collapsed faiths, and wehaven't decided what sort of architecture to use in erecting thenew one. "

"There doesn't seem to be much peace left in the world, " mused Wander. "Do you women think you will have peace when you get this new faith?"

"Oh, dear me, " retorted Kate, "what would you have us do with peace? Youcan get that in any garlanded sepulcher. Peace is like perfection, itisn't desirable. We should perish of it. As long as there is life thereis struggle and change. But when we have our inner faith, when we cansee what the thing is for which we are to strive, then we shall cease tobe so spasmodic in our efforts. We'll not be doing such grotesquethings. We'll come into new dignity. "

"What you're trying to say, " said Wander, "is that it is ourselves whoare to be our best achievement. It's what we make of ourselvesthat matters. "

"Oh, that's it! That's it!" cried Kate, beating her gloved handstogether like a child. "You're getting it! You're getting it! It's whatwe make of ourselves that matters, and we must all have the right tofind ourselves--to keep exploring till we find our highest selves. Theremustn't be such a waste of ability and power and hope as there hasbeen. We must all have our share in the essentials--our own relationto reality. "

"I see, " he said, pausing at the door, and looking into her face as ifhe would spell out her incommunicable self. "That's what you mean byuniversal liberty. "

"That's what I mean. "

"And the man you marry must let you pick your own way, make your ownblunders, grow by your own experience. "

"Yes. "

Honora opened the door and looked at them. She was weak and she leanedagainst the casing for her support, but her face was tender and calm, and she was regnant over her own mind. 

"What is the matter with you two?" she asked. "Aren't you coming in todinner? Haven't you any appetites?"

Kate threw her arms about her. 

"Oh, Honora, " she cried. "How lovely you look! Appetites? We'refamished. "

XXX

Another week went by, and though it went swiftly, still at the end ofthe time it seemed long, as very happy and significant times do. Honorawas still weak, but as every comfort had been provided for her journey, it seemed more than probable that she would be benefited in the long runby the change, however exhausting it might be temporarily. 

"It's the morning of the last day, " said Wander at breakfast. "Honora isto treat herself as if she were the finest and most highly decoratedbohemian glass, and save herself up for her journey. All preparations, Iam told, are completed. Very well, then. Do you and I ride to-day, MissBarrington?"

"'Here we ride, '" quoted Kate. Then she flushed, remembering thereference. 

Did Karl recognize it--or know it? She could not tell. He could, atwill, show a superb inscrutability. 

Whether he knew Browning's poem or not, Kate found to herirritation that she did. Lines she thought she had forgotten, trooped--galloped--back into her brain. The thud of them fell likerhythmic hoofs upon the road. 

 "Then we began to ride. My soul Smoothed itself out, a long-cramped scroll Freshening and fluttering in the wind. Past hopes already lay behind. What need to strive with a life awry? Had I said that, had I done this, So might I gain, so might I miss. "

She wove her braids about her head to the measure; buckled her boots andbuttoned her habit; and then, veiled and gauntleted she went down thestairs, still keeping time to the inaudible tune:--

 "So might I gain, so might I miss. "

The mare Wander held for her was one which she had ridden several timesbefore and with which she was already on terms of good feeling. Thatsubtle, quick understanding which goes from horse to rider, when all iswell in their relations, and when both are eager to face the wind, passed now from Lady Bel to Kate. She let the creature nose her for amoment, then accepted Wander's hand and mounted. The fine animalquivered delicately, shook herself, pawed the dust with a motion asgraceful as any lady could have made, threw a pleasant, sociable lookover her shoulder, and at Kate's vivacious lift of the rein was off. Wander was mounted magnificently on Nell, a mare of heavier build, ablack animal, which made a good contrast to Lady Bel's shiningroan coat. 

The animals were too fresh and impatient to permit much conversationbetween their riders. They were answering to the call of the road asmuch as were the humans who rode them. Kate tried to think of thescenes which were flashing by, or of the village, --Wander's "rowdy"village, teeming with its human stories; but, after all, it wasBrowning's lines which had their way with her. They trumpeted themselvesin her ear, changing a word here and there, impishly, to suit her case. 

 "We rode; it seemed my spirit flew, Saw other regions, cities new, As the world rushed by on either side. I thought, All labor, yet no less Bear up beneath their unsuccess. Look at the end of work, contrast The petty Done, the Undone vast, This present of theirs with the hopeful past! I hoped he would love me. Here we ride. "

They were to the north of the village, heading for a cañon. The road wasgood, the day not too warm, and the passionate mountain springtime wasbursting into flower and leaf. Presently walls of rock beganto rise about them. They were of innumerable, indefinable rockcolors--grayish-yellows, dull olives, old rose, elusive purples, andbrowns as rich as prairie soil. Coiling like a cobra, the LittleWilliston raced singing through the midst of the chasm, sun-mottled andbright as the trout that hid in its cold shallows. Was all the worldsinging? Were the invisible stars of heaven rhyming with one another?Had a lost rhythm been recaptured, and did she hear the pulsations of adeep Earth-harmony--or was it, after all, only the insistent beat of thepoet's line?

 "What if we still ride on, we two, With life forever old, yet new, Changed not in kind but in degree, The instant made eternity, -- And Heaven just prove that I and he Ride, ride together, forever ride?"

What Wander said, when he spoke, was, "Walk, " and the remark was made tohis horse. Lady Bel slackened, too. They were in the midst of greatbeauty--complex, almost chaotic, beauty, such as the Rocky Mountainsoften display. 

Wander drew his horse nearer to Kate's, and as a turning of the roadshut them in a solitary paradise where alders and willows fringed theway with fresh-born green, he laid his hand on her saddle. 

"Kate, " he said, "can you make up your mind to stay here with me?"

Kate drew in her breath sharply. Then she laughed. 

"Am I to understand that you are introducing or continuing a topic?" sheasked. 

He laughed, too. They were as willing to play with the subject aschildren are to play with flowers. 

"I am continuing it, " he affirmed. 

"Really?"

"And you know it. "

"Do I?"

"From the first moment that I laid eyes on you, all the time that I waswriting to Honora and really was trying to snare your interest, andafter she came here, --even when I absurdly commanded you not to writeto me, --and now, every moment since you set foot in my wild country, what have I done but say: 'Kate, will you stay with me?'"

"And will I?" mused Kate. "What do you offer?"

She once had asked the same question of McCrea. 

"A faulty man's unchanging love. "

"What makes you think it will not change--especially since you are afaulty man?"

"I think it will not change because I am so faulty that I must havesomething perfect to which to cling. "

"Nonsense! A Clarinda dream! There's nothing perfect about me! The wholetruth is that you don't know whether you'll change or not!"

"Well, say that I change! Say that I pass from shimmering moonlight tocommon sunlight love! Say that we walk a heavy road and carry burdensand that our throats are so parched we forget to turn our eyes towardeach other. Still we shall be side by side, and in the end the dust ofus shall mingle in one earth. As for our spirits--if they have triumphedtogether, where is the logic in supposing that they will knowseparation?"

"You will give me love, " said Kate, "changing, faulty, human love! I askno better--in the way of love. I can match you in faultiness and inchangefulness and in hope. But now what else can you give me--whatwork--what chance to justify myself, what exercise for my powers? Youhave your work laid out for you. Where is mine?"

Wander stared at her a moment with a bewildered expression. Then heleaped from his horse and caught Kate's bridle. 

"Where is your work, woman?" he thundered. "Are you teasing me still orare you in earnest? Your work is in your home! With all your wisdom, don't you know that yet? It is in your home, bearing and rearing yoursons and your daughters, and adding to my sum of joy and your own. It isin learning secrets of happiness which only experience can teach. Listento me: If my back ached and my face dripped sweat because I was toilingfor you and your children, I would count it a privilege. It would be thecrown of my life. Justify yourself? How can you justify yourself exceptby being of the Earth, learning of her; her obedient and happy child?Justify yourself? Kate Barrington, you'll have to justify yourselfto me. "

"How dare you?" asked Kate under her breath. "Who has given you a rightto take me to task?"

"Our love, " he said, and looked her unflinchingly in the eye. "My lovefor you and your love for me. I demand the truth of you, --the deepesttruth of your deepest soul, --because we are mates and can never escapeeach other as long as we live, though half the earth divides us and allour years. Wherever we go, our thoughts will turn toward each other. When we meet, though we have striven to hate each other, yet our handswill long to clasp. We may be at war, but we will love it better thanpeace with others. I tell you, I march to the tune of your piping; youkeep step to my drum-beats. What is the use of theorizing? I speak ofa fact. "

"I am going to turn my horse, " she said. "Will you please stand aside?"

He dropped her bridle. 

"Is that all you have to say?"

She looked at him haughtily for a moment and whirled her horse. Then shedrew the mare up. 

"Karl!" she called. 

No answer. 

"I say--Karl!"

He came to her. 

"I am not angry. I know quite well what you mean. You were speaking ofthe fundamentals. "

"I was. "

"But how about me? Am I to have no importance save in my relation toyou?"

"You cannot have your greatest importance save in your relation to me. "

She looked at him long. Her eyes underwent a dozen changes. They tauntedhim, tempted him, comforted him, bade him hope, bade him fear. 

"We must ride home, " she said at length. 

"And my question? I asked you if you were willing to stay here with me?"

"The question, " she said with a dry little smile, "is laid veryrespectfully on the knees of the gods. "

He turned from her and swung into his saddle. They pounded home insilence. The lines of "The Last Ride" were besetting her still. 

 "Who knows what's fit for us? Had fate Proposed bliss here should sublimate My being; had I signed the bond-- Still one must lead some life beyond, -- Have a bliss to die with, dim-descried. This foot once planted on the goal, This glory-garland round my soul, Could I descry such? Try and test?"

She gave him no chance to help her dismount, but leaping to the ground, turned the good mare's head stableward, and ran to her room. He did notsee her till dinner-time. Honora was at the table, and occupied theircare and thought. 

Afterward there was the ten-mile ride to the station, but Kate satbeside Honora. There was a full moon--and the world ached for lovers. But if any touched lips, Karl Wander and Kate Barrington knew nothing ofit. At the station they shook hands. 

"Are you coming back?" asked Wander. "Will you bring Honora back home?"

In the moonlight Kate turned a sudden smile on him. 

"Of course I'm coming back, " she said. "I always put a period to mysentences. "

"Good!" he said. "But that's a very different matter from writing a'Finis' to your book. "

"I shall conclude on an interrupted sentence, " laughed Kate, "and I'lllet some one else write 'Finis. '"

The great train labored in, paused for no more than a moment, and wasoff again. It left Wander's world well denuded. The sense of achingloneliness was like an agony. She had evaded him. She belonged to him, and he had somehow let her go! What had he said, or failed to say? Whathad she desired that he had not given? He tried to assure himself thathe had been guiltless, but as he passed his sleeping village andglimpsed the ever-increasing dumps before his mines, he knew in hisheart that he had been asking her to play his game. Of course, on theother hand--

But what was the use of running around in a squirrel cage! She was gone. He was alone. 

XXXI

The Federation of Women's Clubs!

Two thousand women gathered in the name of--what?

Why, of culture, of literature, of sisterhood, of benevolence, of music, art, town beautification, the abolition of child-labor, the abolition ofsweat-shops, the extension of peace and opportunity. 

And run how? By politics, sharp and keen, far-seeing and combative. 

The results? The coöperation of forceful women, the encouragement oftimid ones; the development of certain forms of talent, and thedestruction of some old-time virtues. 

The balance? On the side of good, incontestably. 

"Yes, it's on the side of good, " said Honora, who was, after all, like anun (save that her laboratory had been her cell, and a man's fame herpassion), and who therefore brought to this vast, highly energized, capable, various gathering a judgment unprejudiced, unworldly, andclear. As she saw these women of many types, from all of the States, united in great causes, united, too, in the cultivation of things noteasy of definition, she felt that, in spite of drawbacks, it must begood. She listened to their papers, heard their earnest propaganda. Adistinguished Jewess from New York told of the work among theimmigrants and the methods by which they were created into intelligentcitizens; a beautiful Kentuckian spoke of the work among the whitemountaineers; a very venerable gentlewoman from Chicago, exquisitelyfrail, talked on behalf of the children in factories; a crisp, curt, efficient woman from Oregon advocated the dissemination of books amongthe "lumber-jacks. " They were ingenious in their pursuit ofbenevolences, and their annual reports were the impersonal records ofpersonal labors. They had started libraries, made little parks, inaugurated playgrounds, instituted exchanges for the sale of women'swares, secured women internes in hospitals, paid for truant officers, founded children's protective associations, installed branches of theAssociated Charities, encouraged night schools, circulated art exhibitsand traveling libraries; they had placed pictures in the public schools, founded kindergartens--the list seemed inexhaustible. 

"Oh, decidedly, " Kate granted Honora, "the thing seems to be good. "

Moreover, there was good being done of a less assertive but equallycommendable nature. The lines of section grew vague when the socialGeorgian sat side by side with the genial woman from Michigan. Mrs. Johnson of Minnesota and Mrs. Cabot of Massachusetts, Mrs. Hardin ofKentucky and Mrs. Garcia of California, found no essential differencesin each other. Ladies, the world over, have a similarity of tastes. So, as they lunched, dined, and drove together they establishedrelationships more intimate than their convention hall could havefostered. If they had dissensions, these were counterbalanced by theexchange of amenities. If their points of view diverged in lessermatters, they converged in great ones. 

And then the women of few opportunities--the farmers' wives representingtheir earnest clubs; the village women, wistful and rather shy; theemergent, onlooking company of few excursions, few indulgences--what ofthe Federation for them? At first, perhaps, they feared it; butcautiously, like unskilled swimmers, they took their experimentalstrokes. They found themselves secure; heard themselves applauded. Theyacquired boldness, and presently were exhilarated by the consciousnessof their own power. If the great Federation could be cruel, it could bekind, too. One thing it had stood for from the first, and by that thingit still abided--the undeviating, disinterested determinationto help women develop themselves. So the faltering voice waslistened to, and the report of the eager, kind-eyed woman from thelittle-back-water-of-the-world was heard with interest. The Federationknew the value of this woman who said what she meant, and did what shepromised. They sent her home to her town to be an inspiration. She was alittle torch, carrying light. 

Day succeeded day. From early morning till late at night the greatconvention read its papers, ate its luncheons, held its committeemeetings--talked, aspired, lobbied, schemed, prayed, sang, rejoiced!Culture was splendidly on its way--progress was the watchword! It waswonderful and amusing and superb. 

The Feminine mind, much in action, shooting back and forth like ashuttle, was weaving a curious and admirable fabric. There might be sometrouble in discerning the design, but it was there, and if it was notarrestingly original, at least it was interesting. In places it was evenbeautiful. Now and then it gave suggestions of the grotesque. It wasshot through with the silver of talent, the gold of genius. And with allof its defects it was splendid because the warp thereof was purpose andthe woof enthusiasm. 

 * * * * *

Kate's day came. The great theater was packed--not a vacant seatremained. For it was mid-afternoon, the sun was shining, and the day wasthe last one of the convention. 

The president presided with easy authority. It became her--that seat. Her keen eyes expressed themselves as being satisfied; her handsome headwas carried proudly. Her voice, of medium pitch, had an accent ofgracious command. She presented to the eye a pleasing, nay, an artistic, picture, and the very gown she wore was a symbol of efficiency--sign tothe initiate. 

Kate's heart was fluttering, her mouth dry. She greeted her chairwomansomewhat tremulously, and then faced her audience. 

For a moment she faltered. Then a face came before her--Karl's face. She did not so much wish to succeed for him as in despite of him. He hadsaid she would reach her greatest importance through her relationship tohim. At that moment she thrilled to the belief that, independently ofhim, she was still important. 

The great assemblage had ears for her. The idea of an extension ofmotherhood, an organized, scientific supervision of children, made anappeal such as nothing else could. For, after all, persistently--almostirritatingly, at times--this great federation, which was supposed toconcern itself with many fine abstractions, swung back to that concreteand essentially womanly idea of the care of children. Women who hadbrought to it high messages of art and education had known what it wasto be exasperated into speechlessness by what they were pleased todenominate the maternal obsession. 

Kate swung them back to it now, by means of impersonal rather thanpersonal arguments. She did not idealize paternity. She was bitterlywell aware by this time that parents were no better than other folk, andthat only a small proportion of those to whom the blessing came werequalified or willing to bear its responsibilities. She touched oneugenics--its advantages and its limitations; she referred to theinadequacy of present laws and protective measures. Then she went on todescribe what a Bureau of Children might be. 

"The business of this bureau, " she said, "will be the removal ofhandicaps. 

"Is the child blind, deaf, lame, tubercular, or possessed of any sorryinheritance? The Bureau of Children will devise some method of easingits way; some plan to save it from further degeneration. Is the childtalented, and in need of special training? Has it genius, and should it, for the glory of the commonwealth and the enrichment of life, be giventhe right of way? Then the Bureau of Children will see to it that suchprovision is made. It will not be the idea merely to aid the deficientand protect the vicious. Nor shall its highest aspiration be to servethe average child, born of average parents. It would delight to rewardsuccessful and devoted parents by giving especial opportunity to theircarefully trained and highly developed children. As the Bureau ofAgriculture labors to propagate the best species of trees, fruit, andflowers, so we would labor to propagate the best examples ofhumanity--the finest, most sturdily reared, best intelligenced boysand girls. 

"We would endeavor to prevent illness and loss of life among babies andchildren. Our circulars would be distributed in all languages among allof our citizens. We would employ specialists to direct the feeding, clothing, and general rearing of the children of all conditions. Wewould advocate the protection of children until they reached the age ofsixteen; and would endeavor to assist in the supervision of thesechildren until they were of legal age. My idea would be to have allyoung people under twenty-one remain in a sense the wards of schools. Ifthey have had, at any early age, to leave school and take the burdens ofbread-winning upon their young shoulders and their untried hearts, thenI would advise an extension of school authority. The schools should beprovided with assistant superintendents whose business it would be tohelp these young bread-winners find positions in keeping with theirtastes and abilities, thus aiding them in the most practical andbeneficent way, to hold their places in this struggling, modern world. 

"It is an economic measure of the loftiest type. It will provide againstthe waste of bodies and souls; it is a device for the conservation andthe scientific development of human beings. It is part and parcel of thenew, practical religion--a new prayer. 

"'Prayer, ' says the old hymn, 'is the soul's sincere desire. '

"Many of us have lost our belief in the old forms of prayer. We arebeginning to realize that, to a great extent, the answer to prayer liesin our own hands. Our answers come when we use the powers that have beenbestowed upon us. More and more each year, those who employ theirintellects for constructive purposes are turning their energies towardthe betterment of the world. They have a new conception of 'the world tocome. ' It means to them our good brown Mother Earth, warm and fecund andladen with fruits for the consumption of her children as it may beunder happier conditions. They wish to increase the happiness of thosechildren, to elevate them physically and mentally, and to give theirspirits, too often imprisoned and degraded by hard circumstance, achance to grow. 

"When you let the sunlight in to a stunted tree, with what exultantgratitude it lifts itself toward the sun! How its branches greet thewind and sing in them, how its little leaves come dancing out to make ashelter for man and the birds and the furred brothers of the forest! Butthis, wonderful and beautiful as it is, is but a small thing comparedwith the way in which the soul of a stunted child--stunted by evil or bysunless environment--leaps and grows and sings when the great spiritualelements of love and liberty are permitted to reach it. 

"You have talked of the conservation of forests; and you speak of agreat need--an imperative cause. I talk of the conservation ofchildren--which is a greater need and a holier right. 

"Mammalia are numerous in this world; real mothers are rare. Can we liftthe mammalia up into the high estate of motherhood? I believe so. Can wegrow superlative children, as we grow superlative fruits and animals?Oh, a thousand times, yes. I beg for your support of this new idea. Letthe spirit of inspiration enter into your reflections concerning it. Letthat concentration of purpose which you have learned in your clubs andfederations be your aid here. 

"Most of you whom I see before me are no longer engaged actively in thetasks of motherhood. The children have gone out from your homes intohomes of their own. You are left denuded and hungry for the old sweetvocation. Your hands are too idle; your abilities lie unutilized. Buthere is a task at hand. I do not say that you are to use this extensionto your motherhood for children alone, or merely in connection with thisproposed Bureau. I urge you, indeed, to employ it in all conceivableways. Be the mothers of men and women as well as of little children--themothers of communities--the mothers of the state. And as a focus tothese energies and disinterested activities, let us pray Washington togive us the Bureau of Children. "

She turned from her responsive audience to the chairwoman, who handedher a yellow envelope. 

"A telegram, Miss Barrington. Should I have given it to you before? Idisliked interrupting. "

Kate tore it open. 

It was from the President of the United States. It ran:--

"I have the honor to inform you that the Bureau of Children will becomea feature of our government within a year. It is the desire of thosemost interested, myself included, that you should accept thesuperintendence of it. I hope this will reach you on the day of youraddress before the Federation of Women's Clubs. Accept mycongratulations. "

It was signed by the chief executive. Kate passed the message to thechairwoman. 

"May I read it?" the gratified president questioned. Kate nodded. Thegavel fell, and the vibrant, tremulous voice of the president was heardreading the significant message. The women listened for a moment withsomething like incredulity--for they were more used to delays andfrustrations than to coöperation; then the house filled with the curiousmuffled sounds of gloved hands in applause. Presently a voice shrilledout in inarticulate acclaim. Kate could not catch its meaning, but twothousand women, robed like flowers, swayed to their feet. Theirhandkerchiefs fluttered. The lovely Californian blossoms were snatchedfrom their belts and their bosoms and flung upon the platform withenthusiastic, uncertain aim. 

XXXII

Afterward Kate took Honora down to the sea. They found a little housethat fairly bathed its feet in the surf, and here they passed the daysvery quietly, at least to outward seeming. The Pacific thundered in uponthem; they could hear the winds, calling and calling with an immemorialinvitation; they knew of the little jewelled islands that lay out in theseas and of the lands of eld on the far, far shore; and they dreamedstrange dreams. 

Sitting in the twilight, watching the light reluctantly leave the sea, they spoke of many things. They spoke most of all of women, and itsometimes seemed, as they sat there, --one at the doorway of the House ofLife and one in a shaded inner chamber, --as if the rune of women came tothem from their far sisters: from those in their harems, from others inthe blare of commercial, Occidental life; from those in chambers ofpain; from those freighted with the poignant burdens which women bear intheir bodies and in their souls. 

As the darkness deepened, they grew unashamed and then reticences fellfrom them. The eternally flowing sea, the ever-recurrent night gave themcourage, though they were women, to speak the truth. 

"When I found how deeply I loved David, " said Honora, "and that I couldserve him, too, by marrying him, I would no more have put the idea ofmarriage with him out of my mind than I would have cast away a hope ofheaven if I had seen that shining before me. I would no more have turnedfrom it than I would have turned from food, if I had been starving; orwater after I had been thirsting in the desert. Why, Kate, to marry himwas inevitable! The bird doesn't think when it sings or the bud when itflowers. It does what it was created to do. I married David thesame way. "

"I understand, " said Kate. 

They sat on their little low, sand-swept balcony, facing the sea. Therising tide filled the world with its soft and indescribable cadence. The stars came out into the sky according to their rank--the greatestfirst, and after them the less, and the less no more lacking in beautythan the great. All was as it should be--all was ordered--all was fitand wonderful. 

"So, " went on Honora, after a silence which the sea filled in with itslow harmonies, "if you loved Karl--"

"Wait!" said Kate. So Honora waited. Another silence fell. Then Katespoke brokenly. 

"If to feel when I am with him that I have reached my home; if to suffera strangeness even with myself, and to feel less familiar with myselfthan with him, is to love, then I love him, Honora. If to want to workwith him, and to feel there could be no exultation like overcomingdifficulties with him, is love, then truly I love him. If just to seehim, at a distance, enriches the world and makes the stream of time turnfrom lead to gold is anything in the nature of love, then I am hislover. If to long to house with him, to go by the same name that hedoes, to wear him, so to speak, carved on my brow, is to love, thenI do. "

"Then I foresee that you will be one of the happiest women in theworld. "

"No! No; you mustn't say that. Aren't there other things than love, Honora, --better things than selfish delight?"

"My dear, you have no call to distress yourself about the occultmeanings of that word 'selfish. ' Unselfish people--or those who mean tobe so--contrive, when they refuse to follow the instincts of theirhearts, to cause more suffering even than the out-and-out selfish ones. "

"But I have an opportunity to serve thousands--maybe hundreds ofthousands of human beings. I can set in motion a movement which may havea more lasting effect upon my country than any victory ever gained by iton a field of battle; and perhaps in time the example set by this landwill be followed by others. Dare I face that mystic, inner ME and say:'I choose my man, I give him all my life, and I resign my birthright oflabor. For this personal joy I refuse to be the Sister of the World; Ilet the dream perish; I hinder a great work'? Oh, Honora, I want him, Iwant him! But am I for that reason to be false to my destiny?"

"You want celebrity!" said Honora with sudden bitterness. "You want togo to Washington, to have your name numbered among the leading ones ofthe nation; you are not willing to spend your days in the solitude ofWilliston Ranch as wife to its master. "

"I will not say that you are speaking falsely, but I think you know youare setting out only a little part of the truth. Admit it, Honora. "

Honora sighed heavily. 

"Oh, yes, " she said at length, "I do admit it. You must forgive me, Kate. It seems so easy for you two to be happy that I can't help feelingit blasphemous for you to be anything else. If it were an ordinarymarriage or an ordinary separation, I shouldn't feel so agonized overit. But you and Karl--such mates--the only free spirits I know! How youwould love! It would be epic. And I should rejoice that you were livingin that savage world instead of in a city. You two would need room--likegreat beautiful buildings. Who would wish to see you in the jumble of acity? With you to aid him, Karl may become a distinguished man. Yourlives would go on together, widening, widening--"

"Oh!" interrupted Kate with a sharp ejaculation; "we'll not talk of itany more, Honora. You must not think because I cannot marry him that hewill always be unhappy. In time he will find another woman--"

"Kate! Will you find another man?"

"You know I shall not! After Wander? Any man would be an anticlimax tome after him. "

"Can you suspect him of a passion or a fealty less than your own? If yourefuse to marry him, I believe you will frustrate a great purpose ofNature. Why, Kate, it will be a crime against Love. The thought as Ifeel it means more--oh, infinitely more--than I can make the wordsconvey to you; but you must think them over, Kate, --I beg you to thinkthem over!"

In the darkness, Kate heard Honora stealing away to her room. 

So she was alone, and the hour had come for her decision. 

"'Bitter, alas, '" she quoted to the rising trouble of the sea, '"thesorrow of lonely women. '" The distillation of that strange duplex soul, Fiona Macleod, was as a drop of poisoned truth upon her parched tongue. 

 "We who love are those who suffer; We who suffer most are those who most do love. "

She went down upon the sands. The tongues of the sea came up and lappedher feet. The winds of the sea enfolded her in an embrace. For the firsttime in her life, freely, without restraint, bravely, as sometime shemight face God, she confronted the idea of Love. And a secret, wonderfulknowledge came to her--the knowledge of lovely spiritual ecstasies, therealization of rich human delights. Sorrow and cruel loss might be ontheir way, but Joy was hers now. She feigned that Karl was waiting forher a little way on in the warm darkness--on, around thatscimitar-shaped bend of the beach. She chose to believe that he wasrunning to meet her, his eyes aflame, his great arms outstretched; shethrilled to the rain of his kisses; she thought those stars might hearthe voice with which he shouted, "Kate!"

Then, calmer, yet as if she had run a race, panting, palpitant, sheseated herself on the sands. She let her imagination roam through theyears. She saw the road of life they would take together; how they wouldstand on peaks of lofty desire, in sunlight; how, unfaltering, theywould pace tenebrous valleys. Always they would be together. Theirlaughter would chime and their tears would fall in unison. Where onefailed, the other would redeem; where one doubted, the other would hope. They would bear their children to be the vehicle of their ideals--thesefresh new creatures, born of their love, would be trained to achievewhat they, their parents, had somehow missed. 

Then her bolder thought died. She, who had forced herself sorelentlessly to face the world as a woman faces it, with the knowledgeand the courage of maturity, felt her wisdom slip from her. She was agirl, very lonely, facing a task too large for her, needing the comfortof her lover's word. She stretched herself upon the sand, face downward, weeping, because she was afraid of life--because she was wishful forthe joy of woman and dared not take it. 

 * * * * *

"Have you decided?" asked Honora in the morning. 

"I think so, " answered Kate. 

Honora scrutinized the face of her friend. 

"Accept, " she said, "my profound commiseration. " Her tone seemed toimply that she included contempt. 

After this, there was a change in Honora's attitude toward her. Katefelt herself more alone than she ever had been in her life. It was as ifshe had been cast out into a desert--a sandy plain smitten with therelentless Sun of Life, and in it was no house of refuge, no comfortabletree, no waters of healing. No, nor any other soul. Alone she walkedthere, and the only figures she saw were those of the mirage. It gaveher a sort of relief to turn her face eastward and to feel that she musttraverse the actual desert, and come at the end to literal combat. 

XXXIII

Two dragons, shedding fire, had paused midway of the desert. One was theOverland Express racing from Los Angeles to Kansas City; its fellow washeaded for the west. Both had halted for fuel and water and therefreshment of the passengers. The dusk was gathering over theillimitable sandy plain, and the sun, setting behind wind-blown buttes, wore a sinister glow. By its fantastic light the men and women from thetrains paced back and forth on the wide platform, or visited theluxurious eating-house, where palms and dripping waters, roses andinviting food bade them forget that they were on the desert. 

Kate and Honora had dined and were walking back and forth in the deepamber light. 

"Such a world to live in, " cried Kate admiringly, pressing Honora's armto her side. "Do you know, of all the places that I might have imaginedas desirable for residence, I believe I like our old earth the best!"

She was in an inconsequential mood, and Honora indulged her with smilingsilence. 

"I couldn't have thought of a finer desert than this if I had tried, "she went on gayly. "And this wicked saffron glow is precisely the colorto throw on it. What a mistake it would have been if some supernalelectrician had dropped a green or a blue spot-light on the scene! Now, just hear that fountain dripping and that ground-wind whispering! Whowouldn't live in the arid lands? It's all as it should be. So are you, too, aren't you, Honora? You've forgiven me, too, I know you have; andyou're getting stronger every day, and making ready for happiness, aren't you?"

She leaned forward to look in her companion's face. 

"Oh, yes, Kate, " said Honora. "It really is as it should be with me. I'mlooking forward, now, to what is to come. To begin with, there are thechildren shining like little stars at the end of my journey; and there'sthe necessity of working for them. I'm glad of that--I'm glad I have towork for them. Perhaps I shall be offered a place at the University ofWisconsin. I think I should be if I gave any indication that I had sucha desire. The president and I are old friends. Oh, yes, indeed, I'm verythankful that I'm able to look forward again with something likeexpectancy--"

The words died on her lips. She was arrested as if an angry god hadhalted her. Kate, startled, looked up. Before them, marble-faced andhideously abashed, --yet beautiful with an insistent beauty, --stood MaryMorrison, like Honora, static with pain. 

It seemed as if it must be a part of that fantastic, dream-like scene. So many visions were born of the desert that this, not unreasonably, might be one. But, no, these two women who had played their parts in anappalling drama, were moving, involuntarily, as it seemed, nearer toeach other. For a second Kate thought of dragging Honora away, till itcame to her by some swift message of the spirit that Honora did not wishto avoid this encounter. Perhaps it seemed to her like afulfillment--the last strain of a wild and dissonant symphony. It wasthe part of greater kindness to drop her arm and stand apart. 

"Shall we speak, Mary, " said Honora at length. "Or shall we pass on insilence?"

"It isn't for me to say, " wavered the other. "Any way, it's too late forwords to matter. "

"Yes, " agreed Honora. "Quite too late. "

They continued to stare at each other--so like, yet so unlike. It wasHonora's face which was ravaged, though Mary had sinned the sin. True, pallor and pain were visible in Mary's face, even in the disguisinglight of that strange hour and place, but back of it Kate perceived herindestructible frivolity. She surmised how rapidly the scenes of Mary'sdrama would succeed each other; how remorse would yield to regret, regret to diminishing grief, grief to hope, hope to fresh adventureswith life. Here in all verity was "the eternal feminine, " fugitive, provocative, unspiritualized, and shrinking the one quality, fecundity, which could have justified it. 

But Honora was speaking, and her low tones, charged with a mortal grief, were audible above the tramping of many feet, the throbbing of theengines, and the talking and the laughter. 

"If you had stayed to die with him, " she was saying, "I could haveforgiven you everything, because I should have known then that you lovedhim as he hungered to be loved. "

"He wouldn't let me, " Mary wailed. "Honestly, Honora--"

"Wouldn't let you!" The scorn whipped Mary's face scarlet. 

"Nobody wants to die, Honora!" pleaded the other. "You wouldn'tyourself, when it came to it. "

A child might have spoken so. The puerility of the words caused Honorato check her speech. She looked with a merciless scrutiny at that facein which the dimples would come and go even at such a moment as this. The long lashes curled on the cheeks with unconscious coquetry; theeyes, that had looked on horrors, held an intrinsic brilliance. TheEarth itself, with its perpetual renewals, was not more essentiallyexpectant than this woman. 

Honora's amazement at her cousin's hedonism gave way to contempt for it. 

"Oh, " she groaned, "to have had the power to destroy a great man and tohave no knowledge of what you've done! To have lived through all thatyou have, and to have got no soul, after all!"

She had stepped back as if to measure the luscious opulence of Mary'sform with an eye of passionate depreciation. 

"Stop her, Miss Barrington, " cried Mary, seizing Kate's arm. "There'sno use in all this, and people will overhear. Can't you take her away?"

She might have gazed at the Medusa's head as she gazed at Honora's. 

"Come, " said Kate to Honora. "As Miss Morrison says, there's no use inall this. "

"If David and I did wrong, it was quite as much Honora's fault as mine, really it was, " urged "Blue-eyed Mary, " her childish voice choking. 

Kate shook her hand off and looked at her from a height. 

"Don't dare to discuss that, " she warned. "Don't dare!"

She threw her arm around Honora. 

"Do come, " she pleaded. "All this will make you worse again. "

"I don't wish you ill, " continued Honora, seeming not to hear and stilladdressing herself to Mary. "I know you will live on in luxury somehowor other, and that good men will fetch and carry for you. You exude anessence which they can no more resist than a bee can honey. I don'tblame you. That's what you were born for. But don't think that makes awoman of you. You never can be a woman! Women have souls; they suffer;they love and work and forget themselves; they know how to go down tothe gates of death. You don't know how to do any of those things, now, do you?"

She had grown terrible, and her questions had the effect of beingspoken by some daemonic thing within her--something that made of hermouth a medium as the priestesses did of the mouths of theancient oracles. 

"Miss Barrington, " shuddered Mary, "I'm trying to hold on to myself, butI don't think I can do it much longer. Something is hammering at mythroat. I feel as if I were being strangled--" she was choking in thegrasp of hysteria. 

Kate drew Honora away with a determined violence. 

"She'll be screaming horribly in a minute, " she said. "You don't want tohear that, do you?"

Honora gave one last look at the miserable girl. 

"Of course, you know, " she said, throwing into her words an intensitywhich burned like acid, "that he did not die for you, Mary. He died tosave his soul alive. He died to find himself--and me. Just that much Ihave to have you know. "

At that Kate forced her to go into the Pullman, and seated her by thewindow where the rising wind, bringing its tale of eternal solitude, eternal barrenness, could fan her cheek. A gentleman who had been pacingthe platform alone approached Mary and seemed to offer her assistancewith anxious solicitude. She drooped upon his arm, and as she passedbeneath the window the odor of her perfumes stole to Honora's nostrils. 

"How dare she walk beneath my window?" Honora demanded of Kate. "Isn'tshe afraid I may kill her?"

"No, I don't think she is, Honora. Why should she suspect anythingignoble of you?"

Silence fell. A dull golden star blossomed in the West. 

"All aboard! All aboard!" called the conductors. The people beganstraggling toward their trains, laughing their farewells. 

"Hope I'll meet you again sometime!"

"East or West, home's the best. "

"You're sure you're not going on my train?"

"Me for God's country! You'll find nothing but fleas and flubdub on theCoast. "

"You'll be back again next year, just the same. Everybody comes back. "

"All aboard! All aboard!"

"God willing, " said Honora, "I shall never see her again. "

Suddenly she ceased to be primitive and became a civilized woman with atrained conscience and artificial solicitude. 

"How do you suppose she's going to live, Kate? She had no money. WillDavid have made any arrangement for her? Oughtn't I to see to that?"

"You are neither to kill nor pension her, " said Kate angrily. "Keepstill, Honora. "

The fiery worms became active, and threshed their way across thefast-chilling and silent plain. On the eastbound one two women sat inheavy reverie. On the westbound one a group of solicitous ladies andgentlemen gathered about a golden-haired daughter of California offeringher sal volatile, claret, brandy-and-water. She chose the claret andsipped it tremblingly. Its deep hue answered the glow in the great rubyin her ring. By a chance her eye caught it and she turned the jeweltoward her palm. 

"A superb stone, " commented one of the kindly group. "You purchased itabroad?" The inquiry was meant to distract her thoughts. It did notquite succeed. She put the wine from her and covered her face with herhands, for suddenly she was assailed by a memory of the burning kisseswith which that gem had been placed upon her finger by lips now manyfathoms beneath the surface of the sun-warmed world. 

XXXIV

Kate and Honora left the train at the station of Wander, and the man forwhom it was named was there to meet them. If it was summer with theworld, it was summer with him, too. Some new plenitude had come to himsince Kate had seen him last. His full manhood seemed to be realized. Afine seriousness invested him--a seriousness which included, theobserver felt sure, all imaginable fit forms of joy. Clothed in gray, save for the inevitable sombrero, clean-shaven, bright-eyed, capable, renewed with hope, he took both women with a protecting gesture into hisembrace. The three rejoiced together in that honest demonstration whichseems permissible in the West, where social forms and fears have notmuch foothold. 

They talked as happily of little things as if great ones were notoccupying their minds. To listen, one would have thought that only"little joys" and small vexations had come their way. It would be bylooking into their faces that one could see the marks of passion--thepassion of sorrow, of love, of sacrifice. 

As they came out of the piñon grove, Honora discovered her babies. Theywere in white, fresh as lilies, or, perhaps, as little angels, wellbeloved of heavenly mothers; and they came running from the house, their golden hair shining like aureoles about their eager faces. Theirsandaled feet hardly touched the ground, and, indeed, could they havebeen weighed at that moment, it surely had been found that they hadbecome almost imponderable because of the ethereal lightness of theirspirits. Their arms were outstretched; their eyes burning like the eyesof seraphs. 

"Stop!" cried Honora to Karl in a choking voice. He drew up hisrestless, home-bound horses, and she leaped to the ground. As she rantoward her little ones on swift feet, the two who watched her wereconvinced that she had regained her old-time vigor, and had acquired aneloquence of personality which never before had been hers. She gatheredher treasures in her arms and walked with them to the house. 

Kate had not many minutes to wait in the living-room before Wanderjoined her. It was a long room, with triplicate, lofty windows facingthe mountains which wheeled in majestic semicircle from north to west. At this hour the purple shadows were gathering on them, and great peaceand beauty lay over the world. 

There was but one door to this room and Wander closed it. 

"I may as well know my fate now, " he said. "I've waited for this fromthe moment I saw you last. Are you going to be my wife, Kate?"

He stood facing her, breathing rather heavily, his face commanded to atense repose. 

"My answer is 'no, '" cried Kate, holding out her hands to him. "I loveyou as my life, and my answer is 'no. '"

He took the hands she had extended. 

"Kiss me!" He gathered her into his arms, and upon her welcoming lips helaid his own in such a kiss as a man places upon but one woman's lips. 

"Now, what is your answer?" he breathed after a time. "Tell me youranswer now, you much-loved woman--tell it, beloved. "

She kissed his brow and his eyes; he felt her tears upon his cheeks. 

"You know all that I have thought and felt, " she said; "you know--for Ihave written--what my life may be. Do you ask me to let it go and tolive here in this solitude with you?"

"Yes, by heaven, " he said, his eyes blazing, "I ask it. "

Some influence had gone out from them which seemed to create a palpitantatmosphere of delight in which they stood. It was as if the spiritualessence of them, mingling, had formed the perfect fluid of the soul, inwhich it was a privilege to live and breathe and dream. 

"I am so blessed in you, " whispered Karl, "so completed by you, that Icannot let you go, even though you go on to great usefulness and greatgoodness. I tell you, your place is here in my home. It is safe here. Ihave seen you standing on a precipice, Kate, up there in the mountain. Iwarned you of its danger; you told me of its glory. But I repeat mywarning now, for I see you venturing on to that precipice of lonelinessand fame on which none but sad and lonely women stand. "

"Oh, I know what you say is true, Karl. I mean to do my work with allthe power there is in me, and I shall be rejoicing in that and inLife--it's in me to be glad merely that I'm living. But deep within myheart I shall, as you say, be both lonely and sad. If there's anycomfort in that for you--"

"No, there's no comfort at all for me in that, Kate. Stay with me, staywith me! Be my wife. Why, it's your destiny. "

Kate crossed the room as if she would move beyond that aura whichvibrated about him and in which she could not stand without a toodangerous delight. She was very pale, but she carried her head highstill--almost defiantly. 

"I mean to be the mother to many, many children, Karl, " she said in avoice which thrilled with sorrow and pride and a strange joy. "Tothousands and thousands of children. But for the Idea I represent andthe work I mean to do they would be trampled in the dust of the world. Can't you see that I am called to this as men are called to honorableservices for their country? This is a woman's form of patriotism. It's ahigher one than the soldier's, I think. It's come my way to be thebanner-carrier, and I'm glad of it. I take my chance and my honor justas you would take your chance and your honor. But I could resign theglory, Karl, for your love, and count it worth while. "

"Kate--"

"But the thing to which I am faithful is my opportunity for greatservice. Come with me, Karl, my dear. Think how we could work togetherin Washington--think what such a brain and heart as yours would mean toa new cause. We'd lose ourselves--and find ourselves--laboring for oneof the kindest, lovingest ideas the hard old world has yet devised. Willyou come and help me, Karl, man?"

He moved toward her, his hands outspread with a protesting gesture. 

"You know that all my work is here, Kate. This is my home, these minesare mine, the town is mine. It is not only my own money which isinvested, but the money of other men--friends who have trusted me andwhose prosperity depends upon me. "

"Oh, but, Karl, aren't there ways of arranging such things? You say I amdear to you--transfer your interests and come with me--Karl!" Her voicewas a pleader's, yet it kept its pride. 

"Kate! How can I? Do you want me to be a supplement to you--a hanger-on?Don't you see that you would make me ridiculous?"

"Would I?" said Kate. "Does it seem that way to you? Then you haven'tlearned to respect me, after all. "

"I worship you, " he cried. 

Kate smiled sadly. 

"I know, " she said, "but worship passes--"

"No--" he flung out, starting toward her. 

But she held him back with a gesture. 

"You have stolen my word, " she said with an accent of finality. "'No'"is the word you force me to speak. I am going on to Washington in themorning, Karl. 

They heard the children running down the hall and pounding on the doorwith their soft fists. When Kate opened to them, they clambered up herskirts. She lifted them in her arms, and Karl saw their sunny headsnestling against her dark one. As she left the room, moving unseeingly, she heard the hard-wrung groan that came from his lips. 

A moment later, as she mounted the stairs, she saw him striding up thetrail which they, together, had ascended once when the sun of their hopewas still high. 

She did not meet him again that day. She and Honora ate their meals insilence, Honora dark with disapproval, Kate clinging to her spar ofspiritual integrity. 

If that "no" thundered in Karl's ears the night through while he keptthe company of his ancient comforters the mountains, no less did it beatshatteringly in the ears of the woman who had spoken it. 

"No, " to the deep and mystic human joys; "no" to the most holy privilegeof women; "no" to light laughter and a dancing heart; "no" to thelowly, satisfying labor of a home. For her the steep path, alone; forher the precipice. From it she might behold the sunrise and all theglory of the world, but no exalted sense of duty or of victory couldblind her to its solitude and to its danger. 

Yet now, if ever, women must be true to the cause of liberty. They hadbeen, through all the ages, willing martyrs to the general good. Now itwas laid upon them to assume the responsibilities of a new crusade, toundertake a fresh martyrdom, and this time it was for themselves. Leagued against them was half--quite half--of their sex. Vanity andprettiness, dalliance and dependence were their characteristics. With ashrug of half-bared shoulders they dismissed all those who, painfully, nobly, gravely, were fighting to restore woman's connection withreality--to put her back, somehow, into the procession; to make, by newmethods, the "coming lady" as essential to the commonwealth as was theold-time châtelaine before commercialism filched her vocations and lefther the most cultivated and useless of parasites. 

Oh, it was no little thing for which she was fighting! Kate tried toconsole herself with that. If she passionately desired to create anorganization which should exercise parental powers over orphaned orpoorly guarded children, still more did she wish to set an example ofefficiency for women, illustrating to them with how firm a step womanmight tread the higher altitudes of public life, making an achievement, not a compromise, of labor. 

Moreover, no other woman in the country had at present had anopportunity that equaled her own. Look at it how she would, throb as shemight with a woman's immemorial nostalgia for a true man's love, shecould not escape the relentless logic of the situation. It was not thehour for her to choose her own pleasure. She must march to battleleaving love behind, as the heroic had done since love and combat wereknown to the world. 

XXXV

Morning came. She was called early that she might take the train for theEast, and arising from her sleepless bed she summoned her courageimperatively. She determined that, however much she might suffer fromthe reproaches of her inner self, --that mystic and hidden self which sooften refuses to abide by the decisions of the brain and theconscience, --she would not betray her falterings. So she was able to godown to the breakfast-room with an alert step and a sufficiently gallantcarriage of the head. 

Honora was there, as pale as Kate herself, and she did not scruple toturn upon her departing guest a glance both regretful and forbidding. Kate looked across the breakfast-table at her gloomy aspect. 

"Honora, " she said with some exasperation, "you've walked _your_ path, and it wasn't the usual one, now, was it? But I stood fast for yourright to be unusual, didn't I? Then, when the whole scheme of thingswent to pieces and you were suffering, I didn't lay your misfortune tothe singularity of your life. I knew that thousands and thousands ofwomen, who had done the usual thing and chosen the beaten way, hadsuffered just as much as you. I tried to give you a handup--blunderingly, I suppose, but I did the best I could. Of course, I'ma beast for reminding you of it. But what I want to know is, why youshould be looking at me with the eyes of a stony-hearted critic becauseI'm taking the hardest road for myself. You don't suppose I'd do itwithout sufficient reason, do you? Standing at the parting of the waysis a serious matter, however interesting it may be at the moment. "

Honora's face flushed and her eyes filled. 

"Oh, " she cried, "I can't bear to see you putting happiness behind you. What's the use? Don't you realize that men and women are little morethan motes in the sunshine, here for an hour and to-morrow--nothing! I'mpretty well through with those theories that people call principles andconvictions. Why not be obedient to Nature? She's the great teacher. Doesn't she tell you to take love and joy when they come your way?"

"We've threshed all that out, haven't we?" asked Kate impatiently. "Whygo over the ground again? But I must say, if a woman of yourintelligence--and my friend at that--can't see why I'm taking an uphillroad, alone, instead of walking in a pleasant valley with the best ofcompanions, then I can hardly expect any one else to sympathize with me. However, what does it matter? I said I was going alone so why should Icomplain?"

Her glance fell on the fireplace before which she and Karl had sat thenight when he first welcomed her beneath his roof. She remembered thewild silence of the hour, the sense she had had of the invisiblepresence of the mountains, and how Karl's love had streamed about herlike shafts of light. 

"I've seen nothing of Karl, " said Honora abruptly. "He went up the trailyesterday morning, and hasn't been back to the house since. "

"He didn't come home last night? He didn't sleep in his bed?"

"No, I tell you. He's had the Door of Life slammed in his face, and Isuppose he's pretty badly humiliated. Karl isn't cut out to be a beggarhanging about the gates, is he? Pence and crumbs wouldn't interest him. I wonder if you have any idea how a man like that can suffer? Do youimagine he is another Ray McCrea?"

"Pour my coffee, please, Honora, " said Kate. 

Honora took the hint and said no more, while Kate hastily ate herbreakfast. When she had finished she said as she left the table:--

"I'd be glad if you'll tell the stable-man that I'll not take themorning train. I'm sorry to change my mind, but it's unavoidable. "

The smart traveling-suit she had purchased in Los Angeles was herequipment that morning. To this she added her hat and traveling-veil. 

"If you're going up the mountain, " said the maladroit Honora, "betternot wear those things. They'll be ruined. "

"Oh, things!" cried Kate angrily. She stopped at the doorway. "Thatwasn't decent of you, Honora. I _am_ going up the mountain--but whatright had you to suppose it?"

The whole household knew it a moment later--the maids, the men at thestables and the corral. They knew it, but they thought more of her. Shewent so proudly, so openly. The judgment they might have passed uponlesser folk, they set aside where Wander and his resistant sweetheartwere concerned. They did not know the theater, these Western men andwomen, but they recognized drama when they saw it. Their deep love ofromance was satisfied by these lovers, so strong, so compelling, whomoved like demigods in their unconcern for the opinions of others. 

Kate climbed the trail which she and Wander had taken together on theday when she had mockingly proclaimed her declaration of independence. She smiled bitterly now to think of the futility of it. Independence?For whom did such a thing exist? Karl Wander was drawing her to him asthat mountain of lode in the Yellowstone drew the lightnings of heaven. 

In time she came to the bench beside the torrent where she and Wanderhad rested that other, unforgettable day. She paused there now for along time, for the path was steep and the altitude great. The day hadturned gray and a cold wind was arising--crying wind, that wailed amongthe tumbled boulders and drove before it clouds of somber hue. 

After a time she went on, and as she mounted, encountering ever asteeper and more difficult way, she tore the leather of her shoes, rentthe skirt of her traveling-frock, and ruined her gloves with soiland rock. 

"If I have to go back as I came, alone, " she reflected, "all in tatterslike this, to find that he is at the mines or the village, attending tohis work, I shall cut a fine figure, shan't I? The very gods willlaugh at me. "

She flamed scarlet at the thought, but she did not turn back. 

Presently she came to a place where the path forked. A very narrow, appallingly deep gorge split the mountain at this point, each pathskirting a side of this crevasse. 

"I choose the right path, " said Kate aloud. 

Her heart and lungs were again rebelling at the altitude and theexertion, and she was forced to lie flat for a long time. She lay withher face to the sky watching the roll of the murky clouds. Above hertowered the crest of the mountain, below her stretched the abyss. It wasa place where one might draw apart from all the world and contemplatethe little thing that men call Life. Neither ecstasy nor despair came toher, though some such excesses might have been expected of one whosetroubled mind contemplated such magnificence, such terrific beauty. Instead, she seemed to face the great soul of Truth--to arrive at aconclusion of perfect sanity, of fine reasonableness. 

Conventions, pettiness, foolish pride, waywardness, secret egotism, fell away from her. The customs of society, with what was valuable inthem and what was inadequate, assumed their true proportions. It was asif her House of Life had been swept of fallacy by the besom of themountain wind. A feeling of strength, courage, and clarity tookpossession of her. There was an expectation, too, --nay, theconviction, --that an event was at hand fraught for her with vastsignificance. 

The trail, almost perpendicular now, led up a mighty rock. She pulledherself up, and emerging upon the crown of the mountain, beheld theproud peaks of the Rockies, bare or snow-capped, dripping with purpleand gray mists, sweeping majestically into the distance. Such solemnity, such dark and passionate beauty, she never yet had seen, though she wasby this time no stranger to the Rockies, and she had looked upon thewonders of the Sierras. She envisaged as much of this sublimity as eyeand brain might hold; then, at a noise, glanced at that tortuoustrail--yet more difficult than the one she had taken--which skirted theother side of the continuing crevasse. 

On it stood Karl Wander, not as she had seen him last, impatient, rackedwith mental pain, and torn with pride and eager love. He was haggard, but he had arrived at peace. He was master over himself and no longerthe creature of futile torments. To such a man a woman might wellcapitulate if capitulation was her intent. With such a chieftain mightone well treat if one had a mind to maintain the suzerainty ofone's soul. 

The wind assailed Kate violently, and she caught at a spur of rock andclung, while her traveling-veil, escaped from bounds, flung out like a"home-going" pennant of a ship. 

"A flag of truce, Kate?" thundered Wander's voice. 

"Will you receive it?" cried Kate. 

Now that she had sought and found him, she would not surrender withoutone glad glory of the hour. 

"Name your conditions, beloved enemy. "

"How can we talk like this?"

"We're not talking. We're shouting. "

"Is there no way across?"

"Only for eagles. "

"What did you mean by staying up here? I was terrified. What if you hadbeen dying alone--"

"I came up to think things out. "

"Have you?"

"Yes. "

"Well?"

"Kate, we must be married. "

"Yes, " laughed Kate. "I know it. "

"But--"

"Yes, " called Kate, "that's it. But--"

"But you shall do your work: I shall do mine. "

"I know, " said Kate. "That's what I meant to¸ say to you. There's morethan one way of being happy and good. "

"Go your way, Kate. Go to your great undertaking. Go as my wife. I staywith my task. It may carry me farther and bring me more honor than weyet know. I shall go to you when I can: you must come to me--when youwill. What more exhilarating? A few years will bring changes. I hearthey may send me to Washington, after all. But they'll not need to sendme. Lead where you will, I will follow--on condition!"

"The condition?"

She stood laughing at him, shining at him, free and proud as the"victory" of a sculptor's dream. 

"That you follow my leadership in turn. We'll have a Republic of Souls, Kate, with equal opportunity--none less, none greater--with highexpediency for the watchword. "

"Yes. Oh, Karl, I came to say all this!"

"Then some day we'll settle down beneath one roof--we'll have ahearthstone. "

"Yes, " cried Kate again, this time with an accent that drowned foreverthe memory of her "no. "

"Turn about, Kate; turn about and go down the trail. You'll have to doit alone, I'm afraid. I can't get over there to help. "

"I don't need help, " retorted Kate. "It's fine doing it alone. "

"Follow your path, and I will follow mine. We can keep in sight almostall the way, I think, and, ¸ as you know, a little below this height, thepaths converge. "

Kate stood a moment longer, looking at him, measuring him. 

"How splendid to be a man, " she called. "But I'm glad I'm a woman, " shesupplemented hastily. 

"Not half so glad as I, Kate, my mate, --not a thousandth part so glad asI. "

She held out her arms to him. He gave a great laugh and plunged down thepath. Kate swept her glance once more over the dark beauty of themountain-tops--her splendid world, wrought with illimitable joy inachievement by the Maker of Worlds, --and turning, ran down the greatrock that led to the trail. 

THE END