it was just before new year’s that lucy logan brought a letter for frederick towne to sign, and when he had finished she said, “mr. towne, i’m sorry, but i’m not going to work any more. so will you please accept my resignation?”
he showed his surprise. “what’s the matter? aren’t we good enough for you?”
“it isn’t that.” she stopped and went on, “i’m going to be married, mr. towne.”
“married?” he was at once congratulatory. “that’s a pleasant thing for you, and i mustn’t spoil it by telling you how hard it is going to be to find someone to take your place.”
“i think if you will have miss dale? she’s really very good.”
frederick was curious. what kind of lover had won this quiet lucy? probably some clerk or salesman. “what about the man? nice fellow, i hope——”
“very nice, mr. towne,” she flushed, and her manner seemed to forbid further questioning. she went away, and he gave orders to the cashier to see[215] that she had an increase in the amount of her final check. “she will need some pretty things. and when we learn the date we can give her a present.”
so on saturday night lucy left, and on the following monday a card was brought up to edith towne.
she read it. “lucy logan? i don’t believe i know her,” she said to the maid.
“she says she is from mr. towne’s office, and that it is important.”
now josephine, the parlor maid, had a nice sense of the proprieties which she had learned from waldron, who was not on duty in the front of the house in the morning. so she had given lucy a chair in the great hall. waldron had emphasized that business callers and social inferiors must never be ushered into the drawing-room. the grade below lucy’s was, indeed, sent around to a side door.
however, there lucy sat—in a dark blue cape and a small blue hat, and she rose as edith came up to her.
“oh, let’s go where we can be comfortable,” edith said, and led the way through the gray and white drawing-room beyond the peacock screen, to the glowing warmth of the fire.
they were a great contrast, these two women. edith in a tea-gown of pale yellow was the last word in modishness. lucy, in her modest blue, had no claims to distinction.
[216]but lucy was not ill at ease. “miss towne,” she said, “i have resigned from your uncle’s office. did he tell you?”
“no. uncle fred rarely speaks about business.”
with characteristic straightforwardness lucy came at once to the point. “i have something i must talk over with you. i don’t know whether i am doing the wise thing. but it is the only honest thing.”
“i can’t imagine what you can have to say.”
“no you can’t. it’s this——” she hesitated, then spoke with an effort. “i am the girl mr. simms is in love with. he wants to come back and marry me.”
edith’s fingers caught at the arm of the chair. “do you mean that it was because of you—that he didn’t marry me?”
“yes. he used to come to the office when he was in washington and dictate letters. and we got in the way of talking to each other. he seemed to enjoy it, and he wasn’t like some men—who are just—silly. and i began to think about him a lot. but i didn’t let him see it. and—he told me afterward, he was always thinking of me. and the morning of your wedding day he came down to the office—to say ‘good-bye.’ he said he—just had to. and—well, he let it out that he loved me, and didn’t want to marry you. but he said he would have to go on with it. and—and i told him he must not, miss towne.”
[217]edith stared at her. “do you mean that what he did was your fault?”
“yes,” lucy’s face was white, “if you want to put it that way. i told him he hadn’t any right to marry you if he loved me.” she hesitated, then lifted her eyes to edith’s with a glance of appeal. “miss towne, i wonder if you are big enough to believe that it was just because i cared so much—and not because of his money?”
it was a challenge. edith had been ready to pour out her wrath on the head of this girl to whom she owed the humiliation of the past weeks, but there was about lucy a certain sturdiness, a courage which was arresting.
“you think you love him?” she demanded.
“i know i do. and you don’t. you never have. and he didn’t love you. why—if he should lose every cent to-morrow, and i had to tramp the road with him, i’d do it gladly. and you wouldn’t. you wouldn’t want him unless he could give you everything you have now, would you? would you, miss towne?”
edith’s sense of justice dictated her answer. “no,” she found herself unexpectedly admitting. “if i had to tramp the roads with him, i’d be bored to death.”
“i think he knew that, miss towne. he told me that if he didn’t marry you, your heart wouldn’t be broken. that it would just hurt your pride.”
edith had a moment of hysterical mirth. how[218] they had talked her over. her lover—and her uncle’s stenographer! what a tragedy it had been! and what a comedy!
she leaned forward a little, locking her fingers about her knees. “i wish you’d tell me all about it.”
“i don’t know just what to tell. except that we’ve been writing to each other. i said that we must wait three months. it didn’t seem fair to you to have him marry too soon.”
uncle fred’s stenographer sorry for her! “go on,” edith said, tensely.
so lucy told the simple story. and in telling it showed herself so naive, so steadfast, that edith was aware of an increasing respect for the woman who had taken her place in the heart of her lover. she perceived that lucy had come to this interview in no spirit of triumph. she had dreaded it, but had felt it her duty. “i thought it would be easier for you if you knew it before other people did.”
edith’s forehead was knitted in a slight frown. “the whole thing has been most unpleasant,” she said. “when are you going to marry him?”
“i told him on st. valentine’s day. it seemed—romantic.”
romance and del! edith had a sudden illumination. why, this was what he had wanted, and she had given him none of it! she had laughed at him—been his good comrade. little lucy adored[219] him—and had set st. valentine’s day for the wedding!
there was nothing small about edith towne. she knew fineness when she saw it, and she had a feeling of humility in the presence of little lucy. “i think it was my fault as much as del’s,” she stated. “i should never have said ‘yes.’ people haven’t any right to marry who feel as we did.”
“oh,” lucy said rapturously, “how dear of you to say that. miss towne, i always knew you were—big. but i didn’t dream you were so beautiful.” tears wet her cheeks. “you’re just—marvellous,” she said, wiping them away.
“no, i’m not.” edith’s eyes were on the fire. “normally, i am rather proud and—hateful. if you had come a week ago——” her voice fell away into silence as she still stared at the fire.
lucy looked at her curiously. “a week ago?”
edith nodded. “do you like fairy tales? well, once there was a princess. and a page came and sang—under her window.” the fire purred and crackled. “and the princess—liked the song——”
“oh,” said lucy, under her breath.
“well, that’s all,” said edith; “i don’t know the end.” she stretched herself lazily. her loose sleeves, floating away from her bare arms, gave the effect of wings. lucy, looking at her, wondered how it had ever happened that delafield could have turned his eyes from that rare beauty to her own undistinguished prettiness.
[220]she stood up. “i can’t tell you how thankful i am that i came.”
“you’re not going to run away yet,” edith told her. “i want you to have lunch with me. upstairs. you must tell me all your plans.”
“i haven’t many. and i really oughtn’t to stay.”
“why not? i want you. please don’t say no.”
so up they went, with the perturbed parlor maid speaking through the tube to the pantry. “miss towne wants luncheon for two, mr. waldron. in her room. something nice, she says, and plenty of it.”
little lucy had never seen such a room as the one to which edith led her. the whole house was, indeed, a dream palace. yet it was the atmosphere with which her lover would soon surround her. she had a feeling almost of panic. what would she do with a maid like alice, who was helping josephine set up the folding-table, spread the snowy cloth, bring in the hot silver dishes?
as if edith divined her thought, she said when the maids had left, “lucy, will you let me advise?”
“of course, miss towne.”
“don’t try to be—like the rest of us. like del’s own crowd, i mean. he fell in love with you because you were different. he will want you to stay—different.”
“but i shall have so much to learn.”
edith was impatient. “what must you learn?[221] externals? let them alone. be yourself. you have dignity—and strength. it was the strength in you that won del. you and he can have a life together that will mean a great deal, if you will make him go your way. but you must not go his——”
lucy considered that. “you mean that the crowd he is with weakens him?”
“i mean just that. they’re sophisticated beyond words. you’re what they would call—provincial. oh, be provincial, lucy. don’t be afraid. but don’t adopt their ways. you go to church, don’t you? say your prayers? believe that god’s in his world?”
lucy’s fair cheeks were flushed. “why, of course i do.”
“well, we don’t—not many of us,” said edith. “the thing you have got to do is to interest del in something. don’t just go sailing away with him in his yacht. buy a farm over in virginia, and help him make a success of it.”
“but he lives in new york.”
“of course he does. but he can live anywhere. he’s so rich that he doesn’t have to earn anything, and his office is just a fiction. you must make him work. go in for a fad; blooded horses, cows, black berkshires. do you know what a black berkshire is, lucy?”
“no, i don’t.”
“well, it’s a kind of a pig. and that’s the thing for you and del. he really loves fine stock. and[222] you and he—think of it—riding over the country—planning your gardens—having a baby or two.” edith was going very fast.
“it sounds heavenly,” said lucy.
“then make it heaven. oh, lucy, lucy, you lucky girl—you are going to marry the man you love. live away from the world—share happiness and unhappiness——” she rose from the table restlessly, pushing back her chair, dropping her napkin on the floor. “do you know how i envy you?”
she went to the window and stood looking out. “and here i sit, day after day, like a prisoner in a tower—and my page sings—that was the beginning of it—and it will be the end.”
“no,” lucy was very serious, “you mustn’t let it be the end. you—you must open the window, miss towne.”
edith came back to the table. “open the window?” her breath came fast. “open the window. oh, little lucy, how wise you are....”
when lucy had gone, alice came in and dressed edith’s hair. she found her lady thoughtful. “alice, what did they do with my wedding clothes?”
it was the first time she had mentioned them. alice, sticking in hairpins, was filled with eager curiosity.
“we put them all in the second guest-suite,” she said; “some of them we left packed in the trunks[223] just as they were, and some of them are hung on racks.”
“where is the wedding dress?”
“in a closet in a white linen bag.”
“well, finish my hair and we will go and look at it.”
alice stuck in the last pin. “the veil is over a satin roller. i did it myself, and put the cap part in a bonnet-box.”
as they entered it, the second guest-suite was heavy with the scent of orange blooms. “how dreadful, alice,” edith ejaculated. “why didn’t you throw the flowers away?”
“miss annabel wouldn’t let me. she said you might not want things touched.”
“silly sentimentality.” edith was impatient.
the room was in all the gloom of drawn curtains. the dresses hung on racks, and, encased in white bags, gave a ghostly effect. “they are like rows of tombstones, alice.”
“yes, miss towne,” said alice, dutifully.
the maid brought out the wedding dress and laid it on the bed.
edith, surveying it, was stung by the memory of the emotions which had swayed her when she had last worn it. it had seemed to mock her. she had wanted to tear it into shreds. she had seen her own tense countenance in the mirror, as she had controlled herself before alice. then, when the maid had left, she had thrown herself on the[224] bed, and had writhed in an agony of humiliation.
and now all her anger was gone. she didn’t hate del. she didn’t hate lucy. she even thought of uncle fred with charity. and the wedding gown was, after all, a robe for a princess who married a king. not a robe for a princess who loved a page. a tender smile softened her face.
“alice,” she said, suddenly, “wasn’t there a little heliotrope dinner frock among my trousseau things?”
“yes, miss towne. informal.” alice hunted in the third row of tombstones until she found it.
“i want long sleeves put in it. will you tell hardinger, and have him send a hat to match?”
“yes, miss towne.”
the heliotrope frock had simple and lovely lines. it floated in sheer beauty from the maid’s hands as she held it up. “there isn’t a prettier one in the whole lot, miss edith.”
“i like it,” the fragrance of heliotrope was wafted from hidden sachets, “and as for the wedding gown,” edith eyed it thoughtfully, “pack it in a box with the veil and the rest of the things. i want briggs to take it with the note to an address that i will give him.”
“oh, yes, miss towne.” alice was much interested in the address. she studied it when, later, she carried the box and the note down to briggs.
edith, having dispatched the box with a charming[225] note to lucy logan, had a feeling of ecstatic freedom. all the hurt and humiliation of the bridal episode had departed. she didn’t care what the world thought of her. her desertion by del had been material for a day’s gossip—then other things had filled the papers, had been headlined and emphasized. and what difference did it all make?
the things that mattered were those of which she had talked to lucy. an old house—mutual interests, all the rest of it. “i would tramp the road with him,” little lucy had said. that was love—to count nothing hard but the lack of it.
she was called to the telephone, and found eloise harper at the other end. “delafield is coming back,” she said. “benny has had a letter.”
“darling town-crier,” said edith, “you are late with your news.”
“what do you mean by town-crier?”
“that’s what we call you, dearest.”
“oh, do you?” dubiously. “well, anyhow, delafield is on his way back, and he is going to be married as soon as he gets here.”
“but he isn’t. not until february.”
“how do you know?”
“the bride told me.”
“who?” incredulously.
“the bride.”
eloise gasped. “edith, do you know who she is?”
[226]“i do.”
“tell me.”
“my dear, i can’t. the whole world would know it.”
“i swear i——”
“don’t swear, eloise. you might perjure yourself,” and edith hung up the receiver.
