PART V

THE NEW WORLD

I

George crushed his uneasy thoughts, trying to dwell instead on the idea

that he was going back to the normal, but all at once he experienced a

dread of the normal, perhaps, because he was no longer normal himself.

Could he limp before Sylvia with his old assurance? Would people pity

him, or would he irritate them because he had a disability? And snatches

of his talks at the front with Wandel etched themselves sharply against

his chaotic recollections of those days. Was Wandel fair? Was it,

indeed, the original George Morton people had always liked? Here, apart

from the turmoil, he didn't believe it, didn't dare believe it. Those

people wouldn't have cared for him except for his assumption of

qualities which he had chosen as from a counter display. Yet was it the

real George Morton that made him in superlative moments break the traces

of his acquired judgments, as he had done at New Haven, in the Argonne,

to dash selflessly into the service of others? Rotten inside, indeed!

Even in the hospital he set out to crush that impulsive, dangerous part

of him.

But the nearer he drew to home the more he suffered from a depression

that he could only define as homesickness--homesickness for the old

ways, the old habits, the old thoughts; and the memory of his temerity

with Sylvia at the moment of their parting was like a great cloud

threatening the future with destructive storm.

Lambert, wearing a contrivance the doctors had given him in place of

what the country had taken away, accompanied by Betty and the Baillys,

met the transport. Betty and Mrs. Bailly cried, and George shook his

heavy stick at them.

"See here! I'm not going to limp like this always."

Bailly encircled him with his thin arms.

"You're too old to play football, anyway, George."

George found himself wanting Betty's arms, their forgetfulness, their

understanding, their tenderness.

"When are you two going to be married?" he forced himself to ask.

Betty looked away, her white cheeks flushing, but Lambert hurried an

answer.

"As soon as you're able to get to Princeton. You're to be best man."

"Honoured."

So Lambert's crippling hadn't made any difference to Betty, but how did

Sylvia take it? He wanted to ask Lambert where she was, if anything had

happened to her, any other mad affair, now that the war was over, like

the one with Blodgett; but he couldn't ask, and no one volunteered to

tell him, and it wasn't until his visit to Oakmont, on his first leave

from the hospital, that he learned anything whatever about her, and that

was only what his eyes in a moment told him.

Lambert drove over and got George, explaining that his mother wanted to

see him.

"She'd have come to the dock," he said, "but Father these days is rather

hard to leave."

George went reluctantly, belligerently, for since his landing his

feeling of homesickness had increased with the realization that his

victorious country was more radically altered than he had fancied. The

ride, however, had the advantage of an uninterrupted talk with Lambert

which developed gossip that Blodgett, stuffed with business, hadn't yet

given him.

Goodhue and Wandel, for instance, were still abroad, holding down showy

jobs at the peace conference. Dalrymple, on the other hand, had been

home for months.

"Most successful war," Lambert told George. "Scarcely smelled fire, but

got a couple foreign decorations, and a promotion--my poor old leg

wasn't worth it, or yours, George, but what odds now? And as soon as the

show stopped at Sedan he was trotting back. Can't help admiring him,

for that sort of thing spells success, and he's steady as a church. Try

to realize that, and take a new start with him, for he's really likeable

when he keeps to the straight and narrow. Prohibition's going to fit in

very well, although I believe he's got himself in hand."

George stared at the ugly, familiar landscape, trying not to listen,

particularly to the rest. Why should the Planters have taken Dalrymple

into the marble temple?

"A small start," Lambert was saying, "but if he makes the grade there's

a big future for him there. I fancy he's anxious to meet you halfway.

How about you, George?"

"I'll make no promises," George said. "It depends entirely on

Dalrymple."

Lambert didn't warn him, so he didn't expect to find Dalrymple enjoying

the early spring graces of Oakmont. He managed the moment of meeting,

however, without disclosing anything. Dalrymple, for the time, was quite

unimportant. It was Sylvia he was anxious about, Sylvia who undoubtedly

nursed a sort of horror of what he had ventured to do and say at Upton.

Everyone else was outside, as if making a special effort to welcome him.

Where was she?

He resented the worshipful attentions of the servants.

"I'm quite capable of managing myself," he said, as he motioned them

aside and lowered himself from the automobile.

He disliked old Planter's heartiness, although he could see the physical

effort it cost, for the once-threatening eyes were nearly dark; and the

big shoulders stooped forward as if in a constant effort to escape a

pursuing pain; and the voice, which talked about heroes and the

country's debt and the Planters' debt, quavered and once or twice broke

altogether, then groped doubtfully ahead in an effort to recover the

propelling thought.

Mrs. Planter, at least, spared him any sentimental gratitude. She was

rather grayer and had in her face some unremembered lines, but those

were the only changes George could detect. As far as her manner went

this greeting might have followed the farewell at Upton after only a day

or so.

"I hope your wound isn't very painful."

"My limping," he answered, "is simply bad habit. I'm overcoming it."

"That's nice. Then you'll be able to play polo again!"

"I should hope so, as long as ponies have four good legs."

He wished other people could be like her, so unobtrusively, unannoyingly

primeval.

As he entered the hall he saw Sylvia without warning, and he caught his

breath and watched her as she came slowly down the stairs. He tried to

realize that this was that coveted moment he had so frequently fancied

the war would deny him--the moment that brought him face to face with

Sylvia again, to witness her enmity, to desire to break it down, to want

her more than he had ever done.

She came straight to him, but even in the presence of the others she

didn't offer her hand, and all she said was:

"I was quite sure you would come back."

"You knew I had to," he laughed.

Then he sharpened his ears, for she was telling her brother something

about Betty's having telephoned she was driving over to take Lambert,

Dalrymple, and herself to Princeton.

No. The war had changed her less than any one George had seen. She was

as beautiful, as unforgiving, as intolerant; and he guessed that it was

she and not Betty who had made the arrangement which would take her away

from him.

"George will come, too," Lambert began.

"Afraid I'm not up to it," George refused, dryly.

At Betty's wedding, however, she would have to be with him, for it

developed during this nervous chatter that they would share the honours

of the bridal party.

So, helplessly, he had to watch her go, and for a moment he felt as if

he had had a strong tonic, for she alone had been able to give him an

impression that the world hadn't altered much, after all.

The reaction came in the quiet hours following. He was at first

resentful that Mrs. Planter should accompany him on the painful walk the

doctors had ordered him, like Old Planter, to take daily. He had wanted

to go back to the little house, highest barrier of all which Sylvia

would never let him climb. Then, glancing at the quiet woman, he squared

his shoulders. Suppose Wandel had been right! Here was a test. At any

rate, the war was a pretty large and black background for so tiny a high

light. Purposefully, therefore, he carried out his original purpose. By

the side of Mrs. Planter he limped toward the little house. They didn't

say much. It wasn't easy for him to talk while he exercised, and perhaps

she understood that.

Even before the clean white building shone in the sun through the trees

he heard a sound that made him wince. It was like a distant drum, badly

played. Then he understood what it was, and his boyhood, and the day of

awakening and revolt, submerged him in a hot wave of shame. He could see

his mother rising and bending rhythmically over fine linen which emerged

from dirty water, making her arms look too red and swollen. He glanced

quickly at Mrs. Planter to whose serenity had gone the upward effort of

many generations. Just how appalling, now that war had mocked life so

dreadfully, now that a pitiless hand had a moment ago stripped all

pretence from the world, was the difference between them?

It was the woman at the tub, curiously enough, who seemed trying to tell

him, trying to warn him to keep his mouth shut. Then the house was

visible through the trees. He raised his stick.

"I wanted to see it again," he said, defiantly, "because I was born

there. I lived there."

She paused and stared with him, without saying anything, without any

change of expression. After a time she turned.

"Have you looked enough? Shall we go back, George?"

He nodded, glancing at her wonderingly. After all, he had had very

little love in his life. Mrs. Bailly, Betty----

He had never dreamed of such gratitude as this. Lambert, home with his

war madness fresh upon him, must have told her, as an example of what a

man might do. But was her action all gratitude? Rather wasn't it a

signpost at the parting of two ages?

If that were so, he told himself, the world had left Sylvia hopelessly

behind.

II

The memory of that unguarded moment remained in his mind uncomfortably.

He carried it finally from the hospital to his musty apartment, where he

stripped off his uniform and looked in the glass, for the first time in

nearly two years his own master, no man's servant.

Was he his own master as long as he could commit such sentimental

follies, as long as he could suspect that he had told Wandel the truth

on the Vesle? This nostalgia must be the rebound from the war, of which

he had heard so much, which made men weak, or lazy, or indifferent.

He continued to stare in the glass, angry, amazed. He had to overcome

this homesick feeling. He had to prepare himself for harder battles than

he had ever fought. He had had plenty of warning of the selfishness that

was creeping over the world like a black pestilence. Where was his own

self-will that had carried him so far?

He locked himself, as it were, in his apartment. He sat down and called

on his will. With a systematic brutality he got himself in hand. He

reviewed his aims: to make more money, to get Sylvia. He emerged at

last, hard and uncompromising, ready for the selfish ones, and went down

town. Blodgett greeted him with a cheer.

"Miracles! For the first time since you got back you look yourself

again."

"I am," George answered, "all but the limp. That will go some day

maybe."

He wanted it to go. He desired enormously to rid himself of the last

reminder of his service.

Lambert was definitely caught by the marble temple, but Goodhue and he

would stay together, more or less tied to Blodgett, to accept the

opportunities George foresaw for dragging money by sharp reasoning from

the reconstruction period. He applied himself to exchange. From their

position they could run wild in the stock market at little risk, but

there were big things to be made out of exchange, about which the

cleverest men didn't seem to know anything worth a penny in any

currency.

Everyone noticed his recovery, and everyone congratulated him except

Bailly. When George went down to Betty's wedding the long tutor met him

at the station, crying out querulously:

"What's happened to you?"

George laughed.

"Got over the war reaction, I guess."

"What the deuce did you go to war for at all then?" Bailly asked.

"Haven't found that out myself yet," George answered, "but I know I

wouldn't go to another, even if they'd have me."

He grimaced at his injured foot.

"And they're going to give you some kind of a medal!" Bailly cried.

"I didn't ask for it," George said, "but I daresay a lot of people, you

among them, went down to Washington and did."

Bailly was a trifle uncomfortable.

"See here," George said. "I don't want your old medal, and I don't

intend to be scolded about it. I suppose I've got to rush right out to

the Alstons."

"Let's stop at the club," Bailly proposed. "People want to see you.

We'll fight the war over with the veterans."

"Damn the war!" George said.

Mrs. Bailly, when he paused for a moment at the house in Dickinson

Street, attacked him, and quite innocently, from a different direction.

"It was the wish of my life, George, that you should have Betty, and you

might have had. I can't help feeling that."

"You're prejudiced," George laughed.

He went to the Alstons, nevertheless, almost unwillingly, and he delayed

his arrival until the last minute. The intimate party had gathered for a

dinner and a rehearsal that night. The wedding was set for the next

evening.

The Tudor house had an unfamiliar air, as though Betty already had taken

from it every feature that had given it distinction in George's mind.

And Betty herself was caught by all those detailed considerations that

surround a girl, at this vital moment of her life, with an atmosphere

regal, mysterious, a little sacred. So George didn't see her until just

before dinner, or Sylvia, who was upstairs with her. Lambert and

Blodgett were about, however, and so was Dalrymple. George was glad

Lambert had asked Blodgett to usher; he owed it to him, but he was

annoyed that Dalrymple should have been included in the party, for it

was another mark, on top of his presence in the marble temple, of a

tightening bond of intimacy between him and the Planters. George

examined the man, therefore, with an eager curiosity. He looked well

enough, but George remained unconvinced by his apparent reformation,

suspecting its real purpose was to impress a willing public, for he had

studied Dalrymple during many years without uncovering any real

strength, or any disposition not to answer gladly to every appeal of the

senses. At least he was restless, rising from his chair too often to

wander about the room, but George conceded with a smile that his own

arrival might be responsible for that. The matter of the notes hadn't

been mentioned, but they existed undoubtedly even in Dalrymple's

careless mind, which must have forecasted an uncomfortable day of

payment.

Lambert seemed sure enough of his friend.

"Dolly's sticking to the job like a leech," he said to George when they

went upstairs to dress.

"I've no faith in him," George answered, shortly.

"You're an unforgiving brute," Lambert said.

George hastened away from the subject.

"I'm not chameleon, at least," he admitted with a smile, "which reminds

me. I don't see any of your dearly beloved brothers of the ranks in your

bridal party. Have you put private Oscar Liporowski up for any of your

clubs yet?"

"Unforgiving and unforgetting!" Lambert laughed.

"Then you acknowledge that talk in the Argonne was war madness?"

"By no means," Lambert answered, suddenly serious. "Let me get married,

will you? I can't bother with anything else now. Sylvia, whose mind

isn't filled with romance, threatens to become the socialist of the

family."

George stared at him.

"What are you talking about?"

"About what Sylvia's talking about," Lambert answered.

"Now I know you're mad," George said.

Lambert shook his head.

"But I don't take her very seriously. It's a nice game to seek beauties

in Bolshevism. It's played in some of the best houses. You must have

observed it--how wonderfully it helps get through a tea or a dinner."

III

George went to his own room, amused and curious. Could Sylvia talk

communism, even parrot-like, and deny him the rights of a brother? He

became more anxious than before to see her. He shrank, on the other

hand, from facing Betty who was about to take this enormous step

permanently away from him. Out of his window he could see the tree

beneath which he had made his confession in an effort to kill Betty's

kindness. If he had followed her to the castle then Lambert wouldn't be

limping about exposing a happiness that made George envious and

discontented. It was a reminder with a vengeance that his friends were

mating. Was he, like Blodgett, doomed to a revolting celibacy?

Blodgett, as far as that went, seemed quite to have recovered from the

blow Sylvia had given his pride and heart. With his increasing fortune

his girth had increased, his cheeks grown fuller, his eyes smaller.

He was chatting, when George came down, with Old Planter, who sat

slouched in an easy chair in the library, and Mr. Alston. It was evident

that the occasion was not a joyous one for Betty's father.

"I've half a mind to sell out here," George heard him say, "and take a

share in a cooperative apartment in town. Without Betty the house will

be like a world without a sun."

Blodgett, George guessed, was tottering on the threshold of expansive

sympathy. He drew back, beckoning George.

"Here's your purchaser, Alston. I never knew a half back stay single so

long. And now he's a hero. He's bound to need a nest soon."

Mr. Alston smiled at him.

"Is there anything in that, George?"

George wanted to tell Blodgett to mind his own business. How could the

man, after his recent experience, make cumbersome jokes of that colour?

"There was a time," Mr. Alston went on, "when I fancied you were going

to ask me for Betty. The thought of refusing used to worry me."

George laughed uncomfortably.

"So you would have refused?"

"Naturally. I don't think I could have said yes to Lambert if it hadn't

been for the war. If you ever have a daughter--just one--you'll know

what I mean."

From the three men George received an impression of imminence, shared it

himself. They talked merely to cover their suspense. They were like

people in a throne room, attentive for the entrance of a figure,

exalted, powerful, nearly legendary. Betty, he reflected, had become

that because she was about to marry. He found himself fascinated, too,

looking at the door, waiting with a choked feeling for that girl who had

unconsciously tempted him from their first meeting. Her arrival, indeed,

had about it something of the processional. Mrs. Planter entered the

doorway first, nodding absent-mindedly to the men. Betty's mother

followed, as imperial as ever, more so, if anything, George thought, and

quite unaffected by the deeper elements that gave to this quiet wedding

in a country house a breath of tragedy. Betty Alston Planter! That

evolution clearly meant happiness for her. She tried to express it

through vivacious gestures and cheerful, uncompleted sentences. Betty

next--after a tiny interval, entering not without hesitation exposed in

her walk, in her tall and graceful figure, in her face which was

unaccustomedly colourful, in her eyes which turned from one to another,

doubtful, apprehensive, groping. George didn't want to look at her; her

appearance placed him too much in concord with her reluctant father; too

much in the position of a man making a hurtful and unasked oblation.

Momentarily Betty, the portion of his past shared with her, its

undeveloped possibilities, were swept from his brain. Last of all,

fitting and brilliant close for the procession, came Sylvia between two

bridesmaids. George scarcely saw the others. Sylvia filled his eyes, his

heart, slowly crowded the dissatisfaction from his mind, centred again

his thoughts and his ambitions. Nearly automatically he took Betty's

hands, spoke to her a few formalities, yielded her to her father, and

went on to Sylvia. For nearly two years he hadn't seen her in an evening

gown. What secret did she possess that kept her constant? Already she

was past the age at which most girls of her station marry, yet to him

her beauty had only increased without quite maturing. And why had she

calmly avoided during all these years the nets thrown perpetually by

men? Only Blodgett had threatened to entangle her, and one day had found

her fled. And she wasn't such a fool she didn't know the years were

slipping by. More poignantly than ever he responded to a feeling of

danger, imminent, unavoidable, fatal.

"My companion in the ceremonies," he said.

"I understood that was the arrangement," she answered, without looking

at him.

"I'm glad," he said, "to draw even a reflection from the happiness of

others."

"I often wonder," she remarked, "why people are so selfish."

"Do you mean me," he laughed, "or the leading man and lady?"

She spoke softly to avoid the possibility of anyone else hearing.

"I'm not sure, but I fancy you are the most selfish person I have ever

met."

"That's a stupendous indictment these days," he said with a smile, but

he didn't take her seriously at all, didn't apply her charge to his

soul.

"I'm so glad you're here," he went on, "that we're to be together. I've

wanted it for a long time. You must know that."

She gave him an uncomfortable sense of being captive, of seeking blindly

any course to freedom.

"I no longer know anything about you. I don't care to know."

Lambert and Dalrymple strolled in. Dalrymple opened the cage. George

moved away, aching to prevent such interference by any means he could.

His emotion made him uneasy. To what resolution were his relations with

Dalrymple drifting? How far was he capable of going to keep the other in

his place?

He stood by the mantel, speaking only when it was necessary and then

without consciousness, his whole interest caught by the picture

Dalrymple and Sylvia made, close together by the centre table in the

soft light of a reading lamp.

A servant entered with cocktails. George's interest sharpened. Betty

took hers with the others. Only Sylvia and Dalrymple shook their heads.

Clearly it was an understanding between them--a little denial of hers to

make his infinitely greater one less difficult. She smiled up at him,

indeed, comprehendingly; but George's glance didn't waver from

Dalrymple, and it caught an increase in the other's restlessness, a

following nearly hypnotic, by thoughtful eyes, of the tray with the

little glasses as it passed around the room. George relaxed. He was

conscious enough of Blodgett's bellow:

"Here's to the blushing bride!"

What lack of taste! But how much greater the lack of taste that restless

inheritor exposed! Couldn't even join a formal toast, didn't dare

probably, or was it that he only dared not risk it in public, in front

of Sylvia? And she pandered to his weakness, smiled upon it as if it

were an epic strength. He was sufficiently glad now that Dalrymple had

got into him for so much money.

IV

For George dinner was chiefly a sea of meaningless chatter continually

ruffled by the storm of Blodgett's voice.

"Your brother tells me," he said to Sylvia, "that you're irritating

yourself with socialism."

She looked at him with a little interest then.

"I've been reading. It's quite extraordinary. Odd I should have lived so

long without really knowing anything about such things."

"Not odd at all," George contradicted her. "I should call it odd that

you find any interest in them now. Why do you?"

"One has to occupy one's mind," she answered.

He glanced at her. Why did she have to occupy herself with matter she

couldn't possibly understand, that she would interpret always in a wrong

or unsafe manner? She, too, was restless.

That was the only possible explanation. From Blodgett she had sprung to

war-time fads. From those she had leaped at this convenient one which

tempted people to make sparkling and meaningless phrases.

"It doesn't strike you as at all amusing," he asked, "that you should be

red, that I should be conservative?"

She didn't answer. Blodgett swept them out to sea again.

Later in the evening, however, George repeated his question, and

demanded an answer. They had accomplished the farce of a rehearsal,

source of cumbersome jokes for Blodgett and the clergyman; of doubts and

dreary prospects for Mr. Alston, who had done his share as if submitting

to an undreamed-of punishment.

There was the key-ring joke. It must be a part of the curriculum of all

the theological seminaries. George acted up to it, promising to tie a

string around his finger, or to pin the circlet to his waistcoat.

"Or," Blodgett roared, "at a pinch you might use the ring of the wedding

bells."

George stared at him. How could the man, Sylvia within handgrasp, grin

and feed such a mood? It suddenly occurred to him that once more he was

reading Blodgett wrong, that the man was admirable, far more so than he

could be under an equal trial. Would he, a little later, be asked to

face such an ordeal?

With the departure of the clergyman a cloud of reaction descended upon

the party. Some yawns were scarcely stifled. Sporadic attempts to dance

to a victrola faded into dialogues carried on indifferently, lazily,

where the dancers had chanced to stop with the music. Mr. Alston had

relinquished Sylvia to George at the moment the record had stuttered

out. They were left at a distance from any other couple. George pointed

out a convenient chair, and she sat down and glanced about the room

indifferently.

"At dinner," George said, "I asked you if it didn't impress you as

strange that our social views should be what they are, and opposite."

She didn't answer.

"I mean," he went on, "that I should benefit by your alteration."

"How?" she asked, idly fingering a flower, not looking at him.

"I fancy," he said, "that you'll admit your chief objection to me has

always been my origin, my ridiculous position trotting watchfully behind

the most unsocial Miss Planter. Am I not right?"

"You are entirely wrong," she said, wearily. "That has never had

anything to do with my--my dislike. I think I shall go----"

"Wait," he said. "You are not telling me the truth. If you are

consistent you will turn your enmity to friendship at least. You will

decide there was nothing unusual in my asking you to marry me. You will

even find in that a reason for my anxiety at Upton. You will understand

that it is quite inevitable I should ask you to marry me again."

She sprang up and hurried away from him.

"Put on another record, Dolly----"

And almost before he had realized it Betty had taken her away, and the

evening's opportunities had closed.

V

For him the house became like a room at night out of which the only lamp

has been carried.

The others drifted away. George tried to read in the library. His

uneasiness, his anger, held him from bed. When at last he went upstairs

he fancied everyone was asleep, but moving in the hall outside his room

he saw a figure in a dressing gown. It paused as if it didn't care to be

detected going in the direction of the stairs. George caught the

figure's embarrassed hesitation, fancied a movement of retreat.

"Dalrymple!" he called, softly.

The other waited sullenly.

"What you up to?" George asked.

"Thought I'd explore downstairs for a book. Couldn't sleep. Nothing in

my room worth bothering with."

George smiled, the memory of Blodgett's admirable behaviour crowding his

mind. What better time than now to let his anger dictate to him, as it

had done that day in his office?

"Come in for a minute," he proposed to Dalrymple, and opened his door.

Dalrymple shook his head, but George took his arm and led him, guessing

that Dalrymple feared the subject of the notes.

"Bad humour!" George said. "You seem to be the only one up. I don't mind

chatting with you before turning in. Fact is, these wedding parties are

stupid, don't you think?"

Possibly George's manner was reassuring to Dalrymple. At any rate, he

yielded. George took off his coat, sat in an easy chair, and pressed the

call button.

"What's that for?" Dalrymple asked, uneasily.

"Sit down," George said. "Stupid and dry, these things! I'm going to try

to raise a servant. I want to gossip over a drink before I go to bed.

You'll join me?"

Dalrymple sat down. He moistened his lips.

"On the wagon," he muttered. "A long time on the wagon. Place to be,

too, and all that."

George didn't believe the other. If Dalrymple cared to prove him right

that was his own business.

"Before prohibition offers the steps?" he laughed.

"Nothing to do with it," Dalrymple muttered. "Got my reasons--good

enough ones, too."

"Right!" George said. "Only don't leave me to myself until I've wet my

whistle."

And when the sleepy servant had come George asked him for some whiskey

and soda water. He talked of the Alstons, of the war, of anything to

tide the wait for the caraffe and the bottles and glasses; and during

that period Dalrymple's restlessness increased. Just what had he been

sneaking downstairs for in the middle of the night? George watched the

other's eyes drawn by the tray when the servant had set it down.

"Why did he bring two glasses?" Dalrymple asked, irritably.

"Oh," George said, carelessly, "I suppose he thought--naturally----Have

a biscuit, anyway."

George poured a drink and supped contentedly.

"Dry rations--biscuits," Dalrymple complained.

He fingered the caraffe.

"I've an idea--wedding--special occasion, and all that. Change my

mind--up here--one friendly drop----"

George watched the friendly drop expand to half a tumbler full, and he

observed that the hand that poured was not quite steady. It wouldn't be

long now before he would know whether or not Dalrymple's reformation was

merely a pose in public, a pose for Sylvia.

Dalrymple sighed, sat down, and talked quite pleasantly about the

horrors of Chaumont. After a time he refilled his glass, and repeated

the performance a number of times with diminishing intervals. George

smiled. A child could tell the other was breaking no extended

abstinence. He drifted from war to New York and his apparent success

with the house of Planter.

"Slavery, this office stuff!" he rattled on, "but good fun to get things

done, to climb up on shoulders of men--oh, no idea how many,

Morton--who're only good to push a pen or pound a typewriter. Of course,

you know, though. Done plenty of climbing yourself."

His enunciation suffered and his assurance strengthened as the caraffe

emptied. No extended abstinence, George reflected, but almost certainly

a very painful one of a few days.

"Am making money, Morton--a little, not much," he said, confidentially,

and with condescension. "Not enough by long shot to pay those beastly

notes I owe you. Know they're over due. Don't think I'd ever forget

that. Want to do right thing, Morton. You used hard words when I

borrowed that money, but forget, and all that. White of you to let me

have it, and I'll do right thing."

A sickly look of content overspread his face. He expanded. His assurance

seemed to crowd the room.

"Wouldn't worry for a minute 'bout those notes if I were you."

He suddenly switched, shaking his finger at the caraffe.

"Very pleasant, little drop like this--night cap on the quiet. But not

often."

His content sought expression in a smile.

"Dolly's off the hootch."

George lighted a cigarette. He noticed that his fingers were quite

steady, yet he was perfectly conscious of each beat of his heart.

"May I ask," he said, "what possible connection there can be between my

not worrying about your notes and your keeping off the hootch, as you

call it?"

Dalrymple arose, finished the caraffe, and tapped George's shoulder.

"Every connection," he answered. "Expect you have a right to know. Don't

you worry, old Shylock Morton. You're goin' to get your pound ah flesh."

"I fancy I am," George laughed. "What's your idea of it?"

Dalrymple waved his glass.

"Lady of my heart--surrender after long siege, but only brave deserve

fair. Good thing college education. Congratulate me, Morton. But secret

for you, 'cause you old Shylock. Wouldn't say anything to Sylvia till

she lets it loose."

As George walked quietly to the door, which the servant a long time ago

had left a trifle open, he heard Dalrymple mouthing disconnected words:

"Model husband." "Can't be too soon for Dolly."

Then, as he closed the door, locked it, and put the key in his pocket,

he heard Dalrymple say aloud, sharply:

"What the devil you doing, Morton?"

George turned. Ammunition against Dalrymple! He had been collecting it.

Now, clearly, was the time to use it. In his mind the locked room held

precariously all of Sylvia's happiness and his.

He didn't hesitate. He walked straight to the table. Dalrymple had

slumped down in his chair, the content and triumph of his inflamed eyes

replaced by a sullen fear.

VI

"What's the idea?" Dalrymple asked, uncertainly, watching George,

grasping the arms of his chair preparatory to rising.

"Sit still, and I'll tell you," George answered.

"Why you lock the door?"

From Dalrymple's palpable fear George watched escape a reluctant and

fascinated curiosity.

"No more of that strong-arm stuff with me----"

"I locked the door," George answered, "so that I could point out to you,

quite undisturbed, just why you are going to leave Sylvia Planter

alone."

Dalrymple relaxed. He commenced incredulously and nervously to laugh,

but in his eyes, which followed George, the fear and the curiosity

increased.

"What the devil are you talking about? Have you gone out of your head?"

George smiled confidently.

"It's an invariable rule, unless you have the strength to handle them,

to give insane people their way. So you'll be nice and quiet; and I

might remind you if you started a rumpus, the first questions the

aroused house would ask would be, 'Why did Dolly fall off the wagon, and

where did he get the edge?'"

He drew a chair close to Dalrymple and sat down. The other lay back,

continuing to stare at him, quite unable to project the impression he

undoubtedly sought of contemptuous amusement.

"We've waited a long time for this little chat," George said, quietly.

"Sometimes I've hoped it wouldn't be necessary. Of course, sooner or

later, it had to be."

His manner disclosed little of his anxiety, nothing whatever of his

determination, through Dalrymple's weakness, to save Sylvia and himself,

but his will had never been stronger.

"You may as well understand," he said, "that you shan't leave this room

until you've agreed to give up any idea of this preposterous marriage

you pretend to have arranged. Perhaps you have. That makes no

difference. I'm quite satisfied its disarranging will break no hearts."

Dalrymple had a little controlled himself. George's brusque campaign had

steadied him, had hastened a reaction that gave to his eyes an unhealthy

and furtive look. He tried to grin.

"You must think you're God Almighty----"

"Let's get to business," George interrupted. "I once told you that what

you borrow you have to pay back in one way or another. This is where we

settle, and I've outlined the terms."

Dalrymple whistled.

"You complete rotter! You mean to blackmail--because you know I haven't

got your filthy money, and can't raise it in a minute."

"Never mind that," George snapped. "Your opinion of what I'm doing

doesn't interest me. I've thought it out. I know quite thoroughly what

I'm about."

He did, and he was not without distaste for his methods, nor without

realization that they might hurt him most of all with the very person

they were designed to serve; yet he couldn't hesitate, because no other

way offered.

"You're going to pay my notes, but not with money."

Dalrymple's grin exploded into a harsh sound resembling laughter.

"Are you--jealous? Do you fancy Sylvia would be affected by anything

you'd do or say? See here! Good God! Are you mad enough to look at her?

That's funny! That's a scream!"

There was, however, no conviction behind the pretended amazement and

contempt; and George suspected that Dalrymple had all along sounded his

chief ambition; had, in fact, made his secretive announcement just now,

because, his judgment drugged, he had desired to call a rival's

attention to his triumphant posture on the steps of attainment.

"I've no intention of discussing causes," George answered, evenly, "but

I do imagine the entire family would be noticeably affected by my

story."

"Which you couldn't tell," Dalrymple cried. "Which you couldn't possibly

tell."

"Which I don't think I shall have to tell," George said with a smile.

"Look at your position, Dalrymple. If you borrow money on the strength

of this approaching marriage you announce its chief purpose quite

distinctly. I fancy Old Planter, ill as he is, would want to take a club

to you. You've always wished, haven't you, to keep your borrowings from

Lambert? You can't do it if you persist in involving the Planters in

your extravagances. And remember you gave me a pretty thorough list of

your debtors--not reading for women, but Lambert would understand, and

make its meaning clear. Then let us go back to that afternoon in my

office, when you tried to say unspeakable things----"

Impulsively Dalrymple bared his teeth.

"Got you there, Morton! I told Lambert it was you who had been

impertinent----"

All at once George felt better and cleaner. He whistled.

"When I let you off then I never dreamed you'd try to back that lie up."

"Will they believe me," the other asked, "or you, who come from God

knows what; God knows where?"

"Fortunately," George said, "Lambert and his sister share that supernal

knowledge. They'll believe me."

He stood up.

"That's all. You know what to expect. Just one thing more."

He spoke softly, without any apparent passion, but he displayed before

the man in the chair his two hands.

"If necessary I'd stop you marrying Sylvia Planter with those."

Dalrymple got to his feet, struggled to assume a cloak of bravado.

"Won't put up with such threats. Actionable----"

"Give me your decision," George said, harshly. "Will you keep away from

her? If there is really an understanding, will you so arrange things

that she can destroy it immediately? Come. Yes or no?"

"Give me that key."

George shrugged his shoulders.

"I needn't trouble you."

He walked swiftly to the door, unlocked it, and drew it invitingly wide;

but now that the way was clear Dalrymple hesitated. Again George

shrugged his shoulders and stepped to the hall. Dalrymple, abruptly

active, ran after him, grasping at his arm.

"Where you going?" he whispered.

"To Lambert's room."

"Not to-night," the other begged. "I don't admit you could make any real

trouble, but I want to spare Sylvia any possible unpleasantness. Well!

Don't you, too? You lost your temper. Maybe I did mine. Give us both a

chance to think it over. Now see here, Morton, I won't ask you another

favour, and I'll do nothing in the meantime. I couldn't very well. I

mean, status quo, and all that----"

"Lambert, to-morrow," George said, "is going away for more than a

month."

"But you could always get hold of him, at a pinch," Dalrymple urged.

"Heaven knows I'm not likely to talk to Sylvia about what you've said.

Let us both think it over until Lambert comes back."

George sighed, experiencing a glow of victory. The other's eagerness

confessed at last an accurate measure of the power of his ammunition;

and George didn't want to go to the Planters on such an errand as long

as any other means existed. The more Dalrymple thought, the more

thoroughly he must realize George had him. From the first George had

manoeuvred to avoid the necessity of shocking habits of thought and

action that were inborn in the Planters, so he gladly agreed.

"Meantime, you'll keep away from her?"

"Just as far as possible," Dalrymple answered. "You'll be able to see

that for yourself."

"Then," George said, "you arrange to get yourself out of the way as soon

as Lambert and Betty return. Meantime, if you go back on your word, I'll

get hold of Lambert."

Dalrymple leant against the wall, morosely angry, restless, discouraged.

"I'll admit you could make some unpleasantness all around," he said,

moistening his lips. "I wish I'd never touched your dirty money----"

George stepped into his room and closed the door.

VII

The awakening of the house to its most momentous day aroused George

early, hurried him from his bed, sent him downstairs in a depressed,

self-censorious mood, as if he and not Dalrymple had finished the

caraffe. That necessary battle behind a locked door continued to fill

his mind like the memory of a vivid and revolting nightmare. He fled

from the increasing turmoil of an exceptional agitation, but he could

not escape his own evil temper. Even the flowering lanes where Goodhue

and he had run so frequently during their undergraduate days mocked his

limping steps, his heavy cane; seemed asking him what there was in

common between that eager youth and the man who had come back to share a

definite farewell with Betty; to stand, stripped of his veneer, against

a wall to avoid a more difficult parting from Sylvia. There was one

thing: the determination of the boy lived in the man, become greater,

more headstrong, more relentless.

He paused and, chin in hand, rested against a gate. What about Wandel,

who had admired the original George Morton? Would he approve of his

threats to Dalrymple, of his probable course with the Planters? If he

were consistent he would have to; yet people were so seldom consistent.

It was even likely that George's repetition of Dalrymple's shocking

insults would be frowned upon more blackly than the original,

unforgiveable wrong. George straightened and walked back toward the

house. It made no difference what people thought. He was George Morton.

Even at the cost of his own future he would keep Sylvia from joining her

life to Dalrymple's, and certainly Lambert could be made to understand

why that had to be.

The warm sun cheered him a little. Dalrymple was scared. He wouldn't

make George take any further steps. It was going to be all right. But

why didn't women see through Dalrymple, or rather why didn't he more

thoroughly give himself away to them? Because, George decided, guarded

women from their little windows failed to see the real world.

Dalrymple obsessed him even when, after luncheon, he sat with Lambert

upstairs, discussing business chiefly. He wanted to burst out with:

"Why don't you wake up? How can you approve of this intimacy between

your sister and a man like that?"

He didn't believe the other knew that intimacy had progressed; and when

Lambert spoke of Dalrymple, calling attention again to his apparent

reformation, George cleansed his mind a trifle, placing, as it were, the

foundation for a possible announcement of a more active enmity.

"Don't see why you admire anything he does, Lambert. It isn't

particularly pleasant for me to have you, for I've been watching him,

and I've quite made up my mind. You asked me when I first got home if I

wouldn't meet him halfway. I don't fancy he'd ever start in my

direction, but if he did I wouldn't meet him. Sorry. That's definite. I

must use my own judgment even where it clashes with your admirations."

Lambert stared at him.

"You'll never cease being headstrong," he said. "It's rather safer to

have any man for a friend."

George had an uncomfortable sense of having received a warning, but

Blodgett blundered in just then with news from the feminine side of the

house.

"Some people downstairs already, and I've just had word--from one of

those little angels that talk like the devil--that Betty's got all her

war-paint on."

"You have the ring?" Lambert asked George.

George laughed.

"Yes, I have the ring, and I shan't lose it, or drop it; and I'll keep

you out of people's way, and tell you what to answer, and see generally

you don't make an idiot of yourself. Josiah, if he faints, help me pick

him up."

Blodgett's gardenia bobbed.

"Weddings make Josiah feel old. Say, George, you're no spring chicken

yourself. I know lots of little girls who cry their eyes out for you."

"Shut up," George said. "How about a reconnaissance, Lambert?"

But they were summoned then, and crept down a side staircase, and heard

music, and found themselves involved in Betty's great moment.

At first George could only think of Betty as she had stood long ago in

the doorway of Bailly's study, and it was difficult to find in this

white-clothed, veiled, and stately woman the girl he had seen first of

all that night. This, after a fashion, was his last glimpse of her. She

appeared to share that conception, for she carried to the improvised

altar in the drawing-room an air of facing far places, divided by

boundaries she couldn't possibly define from all that she had ever

known. After the ceremony she smiled wonderingly at George while she

absorbed the vapid and pattered remarks of, perhaps, a hundred old

friends of the family. George, who knew most of them, resented their

sympathy and curiosity.

"If they don't stop asking me about the war," he whispered to Blodgett

during a lull, "I'm going to call for help."

Some, however, managed to interest him with remarks about the rebirth of

football. Green had been at Princeton all along, Stringham was coming

back in the fall, and there were brilliant team prospects. Would George

be able to help with the coaching? He indicated his injured leg. He

hadn't the time, anyway. He was going to stick closer than ever to Wall

Street. He fancied that Sylvia, who stood near him, resented the lively

interest of these people. She spoke to him only when she couldn't

possibly avoid it, glancing, George noticed, at Dalrymple who rather

pointedly kept away from her. So far so good. Then Dalrymple did realize

George would have his way. George looked at Sylvia, thinking

whimsically:

"I shan't let anybody put you where you wouldn't bother to hate me any

more."

He spoke to her aloud.

"I believe we're to have a bite to eat."

She followed him reluctantly, and during the supper yielded of herself

nothing whatever to him, chatting by preference with any one convenient,

even with Blodgett whom she had treated so shabbily. Very early she left

the room with Betty and Mrs. Alston, and George experienced a strong

desire to escape also, to flee anywhere away from this house and the

bitter dissatisfactions he had found within its familiar walls. He saw

Mrs. Bailly and took her hand.

"I want to go home with you and Squibs to-night."

Mrs. Bailly smiled her gratitude, but as he was about to move away she

stopped him with a curiosity he had not expected from her.

"Isn't Sylvia Planter beautiful? Why do you suppose she doesn't marry?"

George laughed shortly, shook his head, and hurried upstairs to

Lambert's room; yet Mrs. Bailly had increased his uneasiness. Perhaps it

was the too-frequent repetition of that question that had made Sylvia

turn temporarily to Blodgett; that was, possibly, focussing her eyes on

Dalrymple now; yet why, from such a field, did she choose these men?

What was one to make of her mind and its unexpected reactions? The

matter of marriage was, not unnaturally, in the air here. Lambert faced

him with it.

"Josiah's right. When are you going to make a home, Apollo Morton?"

George turned on him angrily, not bothering to choose his words.

"Such a question from you is ridiculous. You've not forgotten the dark

ages either."

Lambert looked at him for a moment affectionately, not without sympathy.

"Don't be an ass, George."

George's laughter was impatient.

"Don't forget, Lambert, your old friends, Corporal Sol Roseberg, and

Bugler Ignatius Chronos. No men better! Chairs at the club! Legs under

the table at Oakmont----"

Lambert put his hands on George's shoulders.

"It isn't that at all. You know it very well."

"What is it then?" George asked, sharply.

"Don't pretend ignorance," Lambert answered, "and it must be your own

fault. Whose else could it possibly be? And I'm sorry, have been for

years."

"It isn't my fault," George said. "The situation exists. I'm glad you

recognize it. You'll understand it's a subject I can't let you joke

about."

"All right," Lambert said, "but I wonder why you're always asking for

trouble."

VIII

Betty had plenty of colour to-night. As she passed George, her head bent

against the confetti, he managed to touch her hand, felt a quick

responsive pressure, heard her say:

"Good-bye, George."

The whispered farewell was like a curtain, too heavy ever to be lifted

again, abruptly let down between two fond people.

IX

Unexpectedly the companionships of the little house in Dickinson Street

failed to lighten George's discontented humour. Mrs. Bailly's question

lingered in his mind, coupling itself there with her disappointment that

he, instead of Lambert, hadn't married Betty; and, when she retired, the

tutor went back to his unwelcome demands of the day before. Hadn't

George made anything of his great experience? Was it possible it had

left him quite unchanged? What were his immediate plans, anyway?

"You may as well understand, sir," George broke in, impatiently, "that I

am going to stay right in Wall Street and make as much money and get as

much power as I can."

"Why? In the name of heaven, why?" Bailly asked, irritably. "You are

already a very rich man. You've dug for treasure and found it, but can

you tell me you've kept your hands clean? Money is merely a

conception--a false one. Capitalism will pass from the world."

George grunted.

"With the last two surviving human beings."

"Mockery won't keep you blind always," Bailly said, "to the strivings of

men in the mines and the factories----"

"And in the Senate and the House," George jeered, "and in Russia and

Germany, and in little, ambitious corners. If you're against the League

of Nations it's because, like all those people, you're willing Rome

should burn as long as personal causes can be fostered and selfish

schemes forwarded. No agitator, naturally, wants the suffering world

given a sedative----"

Bailly smiled.

"Even if you're wrong-headed, I'm glad to hear you talk that way. At

last you're thinking of humanity."

"I'm thinking of myself," George snapped.

Bailly shook his head.

"I believe you're talking from your heart."

"I'm talking from a smashed leg," George cried, "and I'm sleepy and

tired and cross, and I guess I'd better go to bed."

"It all runs back to the beginning," Bailly said in a discouraged voice.

"I'm afraid you'll never learn the meaning of service."

George sprang up, wincing. Bailly's wrinkled face softened; his young

eyes filled with sympathy.

"Does that wound still bother you, George?"

"Yes, sir," George answered, softly. "I guess it bothers as much as it

ever did."

X

One virtue of the restlessness of which Bailly had reminded him was its

power to swing George's mind for a time from his unpleasant

understanding with Dalrymple. It had got even into Blodgett's blood.

"About the honestest man I can think of these days," he complained to

George one morning, "is the operator of a crooked racing stable. All the

cards are marked. All the dice are loaded. If they didn't have to let us

in on some of the tricks, we'd go bust, George, my boy."

"You mean we're crooked, too?" George asked.

"Only by infection," Blodgett defended himself, "but honest, George, I'd

sell out if I could. I'm disgusted."

George couldn't hide a smile.

"In the old days when you were coming up, you never did anything the

least bit out of line yourself?"

Blodgett mopped his face with one of his brilliant handkerchiefs. His

eyes twinkled.

"I've been shrewd at times, George, but isn't that legitimate? I may

have made some crowds pretty sick by cutting under them, but that's

business. I won't say I haven't played some cute little tricks with

stocks, but that's finesse, and the other fellow had the same chance.

I'm not aware that I ever busted a bank, or held a loaded gun to a man's

head and asked him to hand over his clothes as well as his cash. That's

the spirit we're up against now. That's why Papa Blodgett advises

selling out those mill stocks we kept big blocks of at the time of the

armistice."

"They're making money," George said.

Blodgett tapped a file of reports.

"Have you read the opinions of the directors?"

"Yes," George answered, "and at a pinch they might have to go into

cooperation, but they'd still pay some dividends."

Blodgett puffed out his cheeks.

"You're sure the unions would want a share in the business?"

"Why not?" George asked. "Isn't that practical communism?"

"Hay! Here's a fellow believes there's something practical in the world

nowadays! Sell out, son."

"Then who would run our mills?"

"Maybe some philanthropist with more money than brains."

"You mean," George asked, "that our products, unless conditions improve,

will disappear from the world, because no one will be able to afford to

manufacture them?"

Blodgett pursed his lips. George stared from the window at the forest of

buildings which impressed him, indeed, as giant tree trunks from which

all the foliage had been stripped. Had there been awakened in the world

an illiberal individuality with the power to fell them every one, and to

turn up the system out of which they had sprung as from a rich soil? Was

that what he had helped fight the war for?

"You're talking about the dark ages," he said, feeling the necessity of

faith and stability. "Sell your stocks if you want, I choose to keep

mine."

Blodgett yawned.

"We'll go down together, George. I won't jump from a sinking ship as

long as you cling to the bridge."

"The ship isn't sinking," George cried. "It's too buoyant."

XI

Wandel and Goodhue came home, suffering from this universal

restlessness.

"Ah, _mon_ brave!" Wandel greeted George. "_Mon vieux Georges, grand et

incomparable!_ So the country's dry! Jewels are cheaper than beefsteaks!

Congress is building spite fences! None the less, I'm glad to be home."

"Glad enough to have you," George said. "I'm not sure we won't go back

to our bargain pretty soon. I'm about ready for a pet politician."

"Let me get clean," Wandel laughed. "You must have a lot of money."

"I can control enough," George said, confidently.

"_Bon!_ But don't send me to Washington at first. I don't want to put on

skirts, use snuff, or practise gossiping."

For a time he refused to apply himself to anything that didn't lead to

pleasure. Goodhue went at once to Rhode Island for a visit with his

father and mother, while Wandel flitted from place to place, from house

to house, as if driven by his restlessness to the play he had abandoned

during five years. Once or twice George caught him with Rogers in town,

and bluntly asked him why.

"An eye to the future, my dear George. Are you the most forgetful of

class presidents? Perfect henchman type. When one goes into politics one

must have henchmen."

But George had an unwelcome feeling that Rogers, eyes always open, was

taking advantage, in his small way, of the world's unsettled condition.

People were inclined to laugh at him, but they treated him well for

Wandel's sake.

"Still in the bond business," he explained to George. "It isn't what it

was befo' de war. I'm thinking of taking up oil stocks and corners in

heaven, although I doubt if there are as many suckers as fell for P. T.

B. Trouble nowadays is that the simplest of them are too busy trying to

find somebody just a little simpler to sting. Darned if they don't

usually hook one. Still bum securities are a great weakness with most

people. Promise a man a hundred per cent. and he'll complain it isn't a

hundred and fifty."

George reflected that Rogers was bound for disillusionment, then he

wasn't so sure, for America seemed more than ever friendly to that

brisk, insincere, back-bending type. Out of the sea of money formed by

the war examples sprang up on nearly every side, scarcely troubled by

racial, religious, or educational handicaps; loudly convinced that they

could buy with money all at once every object of matter or spirit the

centuries had painstakingly evolved. One night in the crowds of the

theatre district, when with Wandel he had watched the hysterical

competition for tickets, cabs, and tables in restaurants where the

prices of indigestion had soared nearly beyond belief, he burst out

angrily:

"The world is mad, Driggs. I wouldn't be surprised to hear these people

cry for golden gondolas to float them home on rivers of money. Stark,

raving mad, Driggs! The world's out of its head!"

Wandel smiled, twirling his cane.

"Just found it out, great man? Always has been; always will be--chronic!

This happens to be a violent stage."

XII

It was Wandel, indeed, who drew George from his preoccupation, and

reminded him that another world existed as yet scarcely more than

threatened by the driving universal invaders. George had looked in at

his apartment one night when Wandel was just back from a northern

week-end.

"Saw Sylvia. You know, George, she's turning back the years and prancing

like a debutante."

George sat down, uneasy, wondering what the other's unprepared

announcement was designed to convey.

"I'll lay you what you want," Wandel went on, lighting a cigar, "that

she forgets the Blodgett fiasco, and marries before snow falls."

Had it been designed as a warning? George studied Wandel, trying to read

his expression, but the light was restricted by heavy, valuable, and

smothering shades; and Wandel sat at some distance from the nearest,

close to a window to catch what breezes stole through. Confound the man!

What was he after? He hadn't mentioned Sylvia that self-revealing day in

France; but George had guessed then that he must have known of his

persistent ambition, and had wondered why his unexpected

communicativeness hadn't included it. At least a lack of curiosity now

was valueless, so George said:

"Who's the man?"

"I don't suggest a name," Wandel drawled. "I merely call attention to a

possibility. Perhaps discussing the charming lady at all we're a trifle

out of bounds; but we've known the Planters many years; years enough to

wonder why Sylvia hasn't been caught before, why Blodgett failed at the

last minute."

George stirred impatiently.

"It was inevitable he should. I once disliked Josiah, but that was

because I was too young to see quite straight. Just the same, he wasn't

up to her. Most of all, he was too old."

"I daresay. I daresay," Wandel said. "So much for jolly Josiah. But the

others? It isn't exaggeration to suggest that she might have had about

any man in this country or England. She hasn't had. She's still the

loveliest thing about, and how many years since she was

introduced--many, many, isn't it, George?"

"What odds?" George muttered. "She's still young."

He felt self-conscious and warm. Was Wandel trying to make him say too

much?

"Why do you ask me?"

Wandel yawned.

"Gossiping, George. Poking about in the dark. Thought you might have

some light."

"How should I have?" George demanded.

"Because," Wandel drawled, "you're the greatest and most penetrating of

men."

George's discomfort grew. He tried to turn Wandel's attack.

"How does it happen you've never entered the ring?"

Wandel laughed quietly.

"I did, during my school days. She was quite splendid about it. I mean,

she said very splendidly that she couldn't abide little men; but any

time since I'd have fallen cheerfully at her feet if I'd ever become a

big man, a great man, like you."

Before he had weighed those words, unquestionably pointed and

significant, George had let slip an impulsive question.

"Can you picture her fancying a figure like Dalrymple?"

He was sorry as soon as it was out. Anxiously he watched Wandel through

the dusk of the room. The little man spoke with a troubled hesitation,

as if for once he wasn't quite sure what he ought to reply.

"You acknowledged a moment ago that you had failed to see Josiah

straight. Hasn't your view of Dolly always been from a prejudiced

angle?"

"I've always disliked him," George said, frankly. "He's given me reasons

enough. You know some of them."

"I know," Wandel drawled, "that he isn't what even Sylvia would call a

little man, and he has the faculty of making himself exceptionally

pleasant to the ladies."

"Yet he couldn't marry any one of mine," George said under his breath.

"If I had a sister, I mean, I'd somehow stop him."

Wandel laughed on a sharp note, caught himself, went on with an amused

tone:

"Forgive me, George. Somewhere in your pockets you carry the Pilgrim

Fathers. Most men are shaggy birds of evil habit, while most young women

are delicately feathered nestlings, and quite helpless; yet the two must

mate. Dolly, by the way, drains a pitcher of water every time he sees a

violation of prohibition."

"He drinks in sly places," George said.

"After all," Wandel said, slowly, "why do we cling to the suggestion of

Dolly? Although I fancy he does figure--somewhere in the odds."

For a time George said nothing. He was quite convinced that Wandel had

meant to warn him, and he had received that warning, straight and hard

and painfully. During several weeks he hadn't seen Dalrymple, had been

lulled into a sense of security, perhaps through the turmoil down town;

and Lambert and Betty had lingered beyond their announced month. Clearly

Wandel had sounded George's chief aim, as he had once satisfied himself

of his origin; and just now had meant to say that since his return he

had witnessed enough to be convinced that Dalrymple was still after

Sylvia, and with a chance of success. To George that meant that

Dalrymple had broken the bargain. He felt himself drawn irresistibly

back to his narrow, absorbing pursuit.

"You're becoming a hermit," Wandel was saying.

"You've become a butterfly," George countered.

"Ah," Wandel answered, "but the butterfly can touch with its wings the

beautiful Sylvia Planter, and out of its eyes can watch her debutante

frivolities. Why not come away with me Friday?"

"Whither?"

"To the Sinclairs."

George got up and wandered to the door.

"By by, Driggs. I think I might slip off Friday. I've a mind to renounce

the veil."

XIII

George fulfilled his resolution thoroughly. With the migratory bachelors

he ran from house to house, found Sylvia or not, and so thought the

effort worth while or not. The first time he saw her, indeed, he

appreciated Wandel's wisdom, for she stood with Dalrymple at the edge of

a high lawn that looked out over the sea. Her hair in the breeze was a

little astray, her cheeks were flushed, and she bent if anything toward

her companion who talked earnestly and with nervous gestures. George

crushed his quick impulse to go down, to step between them, to have it

out with Dalrymple then and there, even in Sylvia's presence; but they

strolled back to the house almost immediately, and Sylvia lost her

apparent good humour, and Dalrymple descended from satisfaction to a

fidgety apprehension. Sylvia met George's hand briefly.

"You'll be here long?"

The question expressed a wish.

"Only until Monday. I wish it might be longer, for I'm glad to find

you--and you, Dalrymple."

"Nobody said you were expected," Dalrymple grumbled. "Everybody said you

were working like a horse."

George glanced at Sylvia, smiling blandly.

"Every horse goes to grass occasionally."

He turned back to Dalrymple.

"I daresay you know Lambert and Betty are due back the first of the

week?"

Sylvia nodded carelessly, and started along the verandah. Dalrymple,

reddening, prepared to heel, but George beckoned him back.

"I'd like a word with you."

Sylvia glanced around, probably surprised at the sharp, authoritative

tone.

"Just a minute, Sylvia," Dalrymple apologized uneasily. "Little

business. Hard to catch Morton. Must grasp opportunity, and all that."

And when they were alone he went close to George eagerly.

"No need to wait for Betty and Lambert, Morton. It's done. Dolly's got

himself thrown over----"

"I don't believe you," George said.

"Why not?"

"What are you doing here?" George asked. "It was understood you should

avoid her."

Dalrymple's grin was sickly.

"Way she's tearing around now I'd have exactly no place to go."

"You seemed rather too friendly," George pointed out, "for parties to a

broken engagement."

George fancied there was something of anger in the other's face.

"Must say I'm not flattered by that. Guess you were right. One heart's

not smashed, anyway."

George turned on his heel. Dalrymple caught him.

"What about those notes?"

"I don't trust you, Dalrymple. I'll keep my eye on you yet awhile."

"Ask Sylvia if you want," Dalrymple cried.

George smiled.

"I wonder if I could."

He went to his room, trying to believe Dalrymple. Was that romance

really in the same class as the one with Blodgett? If so, why did she

involve herself in restive affairs with less obvious men? As best he

could he tried to find out that night when she was a little off guard

because of some unquiet statements she had just made of Russian

rumours.

"You don't mean those things," he said, "or else you've no idea what

they mean."

Through her quick resentment she let herself be caught in a corner, as

it were. Everyone was preparing to leave the house for a dance in

benefit of some local charity. Momentarily they were left alone. He

indicated the over-luxurious and rather tasteless room.

"You're asking for the confiscation of all this, and your own Oakmont,

and every delightful setting to which you've been accustomed all your

life. You're asking for rationed food; for a shakedown, maybe, in a

garret. You're asking for a task in a kitchen or a field. Why not a

negro's kitchen; a Chinaman's field?"

He looked at her, asking gravely:

"Do you quite understand the principles of communism as they affect

women?"

He fancied a heightening of her colour.

"You of all men," she said, "ought to understand the strivings of the

people."

He shook his head vehemently.

"I'm for the palace," he laughed, "and I fancy it means more to me than

it could to a man who's never used his brain. Let those stay in the

hovel who haven't the courage to climb out."

"And you're one of the people!" she murmured. "One of the people!"

"You don't say that," he answered, quickly, "to tell me it makes me

admirable in your eyes. You say it to hurt, as you used to call me,

'groom'. It doesn't inflict the least pain."

There was no question about her flush now.

"Tell me," he urged, "why you permit your brain such inconsistencies,

why you accept such a patent fad, why you need fads at all?"

"Why won't you leave me alone?" she asked, harshly.

"You're always asking that," he smiled, "and you see I never do. Why are

you unlike these other women? Why did you turn to Blodgett? Why have you

made a fool of Dalrymple?"

She stared at him.

"What are you saying?"

"I'm saying, why don't you come to me?"

He watched the angry challenge in her eyes, the deliberate stiffening of

her entire body as if to a defensive attitude. He held out his hand to

her.

"Sylvia! We are growing old."

Yet in her radiant presence it was preposterous to speak of age. She

drew away with a sort of shudder.

"You wouldn't dare touch me again----"

He captured her glance. He felt that from his own eyes he failed to keep

the unsatisfied desire of years.

"I haven't forgotten Upton, either. When will you give me what I want,

Sylvia?"

Her glance eluded him. Swiftly she receded. Through the open door

drifted a growing medley of voices. She hurried to the door, but he

followed her, and purposefully climbed into the automobile she had

entered, but they were no longer alone. Only once, when he made her

dance with him in a huge, over-decorated tent, did he manage a whisper.

"No more nonsense with Dalrymple or anybody. Please stop making

unhappiness."

XIV

George returned to New York with an uneasy spirit, filled with doubt as

to Dalrymple's statement of renunciation, and of his own course in

saying what he had of Dalrymple to Sylvia. Mightn't that very expression

of disapproval, indeed, tend to swing her back to the man? When Lambert

walked in a day or two later George looked at the happy, bronzed face,

recalling his assurance that Betty wasn't one to give by halves. Through

eyes clouded by such happiness Lambert couldn't be expected to see very

far into the dangerous and avaricious discontent of the majority. How

much less time, then, would he have for George's personal worries?

George, nevertheless, guided the conversation to Dalrymple.

"He's running down to Oakmont with me to-night," Lambert said,

carelessly. "You know Betty's there with the family for a few days."

George hid his temper. There was no possible chance about this. Would

Dalrymple go to Oakmont after the breaking off of even a secret

engagement; or, defeated in his main purpose, was he hanging about for

what crumbs might yet fall from the Planters' table. Nearly without

reflection he burst out with:

"It's inconceivable you should permit that man about your sister."

Probably Lambert's great content forbade an answer equally angry.

"Still at it! See here. Sylvia doesn't care for you."

"I'm not talking of myself," George said. "I'm talking of Dalrymple."

With an air of kindness, undoubtedly borrowed from Betty, Lambert said

easily:

"Stop worrying about him, then. Giving a friend encouragement doesn't

mean asking him into the family. That idea seems to obsess you. What

difference does it make to you, anyway, what man Sylvia marries? I'll

say this, if you wish: Since I've had Betty I see things a bit clearer.

I really shouldn't care to have Dolly the man. I don't think there's a

chance of it."

"You mean," George asked, eagerly, "if there were you'd stop it?"

"I shouldn't like it," Lambert answered. "Naturally, I'd express

myself."

"See here. Dalrymple isn't to be trusted. You've been too occupied. You

haven't watched your sister. How can you tell what's in her mind? You

didn't forecast the affair with Josiah, eh? There's only one way I can

play my game--the thorough way. If it came to a real engagement I should

have to say things, Lambert--things I'd hate myself for; things that

would hurt me, perhaps, more than any one else. If necessary I shall say

them. Will you tell me, if--if----"

Lambert smiled uneasily.

"You're shying at phantoms, but you've always played every game to that

point, and perhaps you're justified. I'll come to you if circumstances

ever promise to prove you right."

"Thanks," George said, infinitely relieved; yet he had an unpleasant

feeling that Lambert had held his temper and had agreed because he was

aware of the existence of a great debt, one that he could never quite

pay.

XV

This creation of a check on Dalrymple and the assurance that Lambert

would warn him of danger came at a useful time for George, since the

market-place more and more demanded an undisturbed mind. He conceded

that Blodgett's earlier pessimism bade fair to be justified. He watched

a succession of industrial upheavals, seeking a safe course among

innumerable and perilous shoals that seemed to defy charting; conquering

whatever instinct he might have had to sympathize with the men, since he

judged their methods as hysterical, grabbing, and wasteful.

"But I don't believe," he told Blodgett, "these strikes have been

ordered from the Kremlin; still, other colours may quite easily combine

to form red."

"God help the employers. God help the employees," Blodgett grumbled.

"And most of all, may God help the great public," George suggested.

But Blodgett was preoccupied these days with an Oakmont stripped of

passion. George knew that Old Planter had sent for him, and he found

something quite pitiful in that final surrender of the great man who was

now worse off than the youngest, grimiest groveller in the furnaces; so

he was not surprised when it was announced that Blodgett would shortly

move over to the marble temple, a partner at last with individuality and

initiative, one, in fact, who would control everything for Old Planter

and his heirs until Lambert should be older. Lambert was sufficiently

unhappy over the change, because it painted so clearly the inevitable

end. The Fifth Avenue house was opened early that fall as if the old

man desired to get as close as possible to the centre of turbulent

events, hoping that so his waning sight might serve.

Consequently George had more opportunities of meeting Sylvia; did meet

her from time to time in the evenings, and watched her gaiety which

frequently impressed him as a too noticeably moulded posture. It served,

nevertheless, admirably with the men of all ages who flocked about her

as if, indeed, she were a debutante once more.

In these groups George was glad not to see Dalrymple often, but he

noticed that Goodhue was near rather more than he had been formerly, and

he experienced a sharp uneasiness, an instinct to go to Goodhue and say:

"Don't. Keep away. She's caused enough unhappiness."

Still you couldn't tell about Goodhue. The very fact that he fluttered

near Sylvia might indicate that his real interest lay carefully

concealed, some distance away. He had, moreover, always stood singularly

aside from the pursuit of the feminine.

George's first meeting with Betty since her return was coloured by a

frank acceptance on her part of new conditions that revived his sense of

a sombre and helpless nostalgia. All was well with Betty. If there had

ever been any doubt in her Lambert had swept it away. Whatever emotion

she experienced for George was, in fact, that of a fond sister for a

brother; and George, studying her and Lambert, longed as he had never

done to find some such eager and confident content. The propulsion of

pure ambition slipped from his desire for Sylvia. With a growing wonder

he found himself craving through her just the satisfied simplicity so

clearly experienced by Lambert and Betty. Could anything make her

brilliancy less hard, less headstrong, less cruel?

George cast about for the means. Lambert was on watch. There was still

time--plenty of time.

He hadn't spoken again to Lambert about Dalrymple. There hadn't seemed

any point, for Lambert was entirely trustworthy, and, since Betty and he

lived for the present in the Fifth Avenue house, he saw Sylvia

constantly. Their conversation instead when they met for luncheon, as

they did frequently, revolved about threats which a few years back they

hadn't dreamed would ever face them. Blodgett, George noticed, didn't

point the finger of scorn at him for holding on to the mill stocks.

George wouldn't have minded if he had. They had originally cost him

little, their total loss would not materially affect his fortune, and he

was glad through them to have a personal share in the irritating and

absorbing evolution in the mills. He heard of Allen frequently as a

fiery and fairly successful organizer of trouble, and he sent for him

when he thought the situation warranted it. Allen came readily enough,

walking into the office, shorn of his London frills, but evidently

retentive of the habit of keeping neat and clean. The eyes, too, had

altered, but not obviously, letting through, perhaps, a certain

disillusionment.

"What are you doing to my mills?" George wanted to know.

Allen, surprisingly, didn't once lose his temper, listening to George's

complaints without change of expression while he wandered about, his

eyes taking in each detail of the richly furnished office.

"The directors report that the men have refused to enter into a fair and

above-board cooperative arrangement, and we've figured all along it was

turning the business over to them; taking money out of our own pockets.

It's a form of communism, and they throw it down. Why, Allen? I want

this straight."

Allen paused in his walk, and looked closely at George. There was no

change in his face even when he commenced to speak.

"A share in a business," he said, softly, "carries uncomfortable

responsibilities. You can't go to yourself, for instance, and say: 'Give

me more wages--more than the traffic will bear; then you sweat about it

in your office, but don't bother me in my cottage.'"

"You acknowledge it!" George cried.

Allen's face at last became a trifle animated.

"Why not--to you? Everybody's out to get it--the butcher, the baker, the

candlestick maker. The capitalist most of all. Why not the man that

turns the wheels?"

George whistled.

"You'd crush essential industries off the face of the earth! You'd go

back to the stone age!"

"Not," Allen answered, slowly, "as long as the profits of the past can

be got out of somebody's pockets."

"You'd grab capital!"

"Like a flash; and what are you going to do about it?"

"I'll tell you what I am going to do," George answered, "and I fancy a

lot of others will follow my example. I am going to get rid of those

stocks if I have to throw them out of the window, then you'll have no

gun to hold at my head."

"Throw too much away," Allen warned, "and you'll throw it all."

"The beautiful, pure social revolution!" George sneered. "You're less

honest than you were when you dropped everything to go to London for me.

What's the matter with you, Allen?"

Allen appraised again the comfortable room. Even now his expression

didn't alter materially.

"Nothing. I don't know. Unless the universal spirit of grab has got in

my own veins."

"Then, my friend," George said, pleasantly, "there's the door."

XVI

George found himself thinking and talking of Allen's views quite enough

to please even Bailly. Blodgett, on the other hand, perhaps because of

the heavy, settled atmosphere of the marble temple, had changed his

tune.

"Things are bound to come right in the end."

As far as George was concerned he might as well have said:

"This marble surrounding me is so many feet thick. Who do you think is

going to interfere with that?"

Something of quite a different nature bothered Lambert, and for a few

days George thought it a not unnatural resentment at seeing Blodgett in

his father's office, but Lambert took pains to awaken him to the truth,

walking in one afternoon a few weeks after the Planters' move to town.

He had an uncertain and discontented appearance.

"By the way, George," he said not without difficulty, "Dolly's about a

good deal."

It was quite certain Lambert hadn't come to announce only that, so

George shrank from his next words, confident that something definite

must have happened. He controlled his anxiety with the thought that

Lambert had, indeed, come to him, and that Dalrymple couldn't permit the

announcement of an engagement without meeting the fulfilment of George's

penalties.

"It's been on my mind for the past week," Lambert went on. "I mean, he

hasn't been seeing her much in public, but he's been hanging around the

house, and last night I spoke to Sylvia about it, told her I didn't

think father would want him any more than I did, pointed out his

financial record, and said I had gathered he owed you no small sum----"

"You blind idiot!" George cried. "Why did you have to say that? How did

you even guess it? I've never opened my mouth."

"He'd milked everybody else dry," Lambert answered, "and Driggs

mentioned a long time ago you'd had a curiously generous notion you'd

like to help Dolly if he ever needed it."

"It wasn't generosity," George said, dryly. "Go ahead. Did you make any

more blunders?"

"You're scarcely one to accuse," Lambert answered. "You put me up to it

in the first place, although I'll admit now, I'd have spoken anyway. I

don't want Sylvia marrying him. I don't want him down town as more than

a salaried man, unless he changes more than he has. I didn't feel even

last night that Sylvia really loved him, but I made her furious, and

you're right. I shouldn't have said that. I daresay she guessed, too, it

wasn't all generosity that had led you to pay Dolly's debts. Anyway, she

wouldn't talk reasonably, said she'd marry any one she pleased--oh,

quite the young lady who sent me after you with a horse whip, and I

daresay she'd have been glad to do it again last night. I spoke to

Mother. She said Sylvia hadn't said anything to her, but she added, if

Sylvia wanted him, she wouldn't oppose her. Naturally she wouldn't,

seeing only Dolly's good points, which are regularly displayed for the

benefit of the ladies. Anyway, I agreed to tell you, and you promised,

if it came to the point, you'd have some things to say to me----"

George nodded shortly.

"Yes, but I blame you for forcing me to say them. You've thrown them

together----"

"I've always wanted to help Dolly as you would any old friend who had

wandered a little to the side, and was anxious to get back on the path.

I can't figure every man that comes about the place as a suitor for

Sylvia. Let's forget all that. What are these important and unpleasant

things you have to tell me? I daresay you know where the money you

loaned Dolly went."

George pressed his lips tight. He frowned. Even now he hesitated to soil

his hands, to divide himself, perhaps, permanently from Sylvia at the

very moment of saving her; and he wasn't quite sure, in view of her

pride and her quick temper, that his very effort wouldn't defeat its own

purpose. If only Lambert hadn't made that worst of all possible

blunders. He wondered how a man felt on the rack. He bent swiftly and

picked up the telephone.

"I shall talk with Dalrymple first," he said. "I'm going to ask him to

come over here at once. I think he'll come."

But Lambert shook his head, stopped him before he could take the

receiver from the hook.

"Isn't in the office. Hasn't been back since luncheon. Left no word

then."

"Perhaps since you've come away----" George hazarded.

He telephoned, while Lambert wandered about the room, or paused to slip

through his fingers the tape that emerged like a long and listless

serpent from the now silent ticker. After a question or two George

replaced the receiver and glanced at Lambert.

"You're right. Sticks to the job, doesn't he?"

"He isn't exactly an ordinary clerk," Lambert offered.

George walked to a window. For a long time he gazed over the lower city,

turned singularly unreal by the early dusk, while it outlined itself

little by little in yellow points of light which gave to the clouds and

the circling columns of steam a mauve quality as if the world, instead

of night, faced the birth of a dawn, new, abnormal, frightening.

He had to make one more effort with Dalrymple before sending Lambert to

Sylvia with his reasons why she shouldn't marry the man. In the

singular, unreal light he glanced at his hands. He had to see Dalrymple

once more first----

He turned and snapped on the lights.

"What are you going to do?" Lambert asked. "There's no likely way to

catch him down town."

A clerk tip-toed in. George swung sharply.

"What is it, Carson?"

"Mr. Dalrymple's outside, sir. It's so late I hesitated to bother you,

but he said it was very important he should see you, sir."

George sighed.

"Wait outside, Carson. I'll call you in a moment."

And when the door was closed he turned to Lambert.

"I'm going to see him here--alone."

"Why?" Lambert asked, uneasily. "I don't quite see what you're up to. No

more battles of the ink pots!"

"Please get out, Lambert; but maybe you'd better hang about the office.

I think Dicky's gone for the night. Wait in his room."

"All right," Lambert agreed.

George opened the door, and, as Lambert went through reluctantly,

beckoned the clerk.

"Send Mr. Dalrymple in, Carson."

He stood behind his desk, facing the open door. Almost immediately the

doorway was blocked by Dalrymple. George stared, trying to value the

alteration in the man. The weak, rather handsome face was bold and

contemptuous. Clearly he had come here for blows of his own choosing,

and had just now borrowed courage from some illicit bar, but he had

taken only enough, George gathered, to make him assured and not too

calculating. He was clothed as if he had returned from an affair, with a

flower in his buttonhole, and a top hat held in the hand with his stick

and gloves.

"Come in!"

Dalrymple closed the door and advanced, smiling.

Not for a moment did George's glance leave the other. He felt taut, hard

to the point of brittleness.

"It's fortunate you've come," he said, quietly. "I've just been trying

to get hold of you."

"Oh! Then Lambert's been here!" Dalrymple answered, jauntily.

George nodded.

"You've been crooked, Dalrymple. Now we'll have an accounting."

Dalrymple laughed.

"It's what I've come for; but first I advise you to hold your temper.

It's late, but there are plenty of people still outside. Any more rough

stuff and you'll spend the night in a cell, or under bail."

"If you lived nine lives," George commented, "you'd never be able to

intimidate me."

Yet the other's manner troubled, and George's doubtful curiosity grew as

he watched Dalrymple commence to draw the strings of the mask.

Dalrymple put down his hat and cane, bent swiftly, placed the palms of

his hands on the desk, stared at George, his face inflamed, his eyes

choked with malicious exultation.

"Your blackmail," he cried, "is knocked into a cocked hat. I married

Sylvia half an hour ago."

Before George's response he lost some of his colour, drew back warily;

but George had no thought of attacking him; it was too late now. That

was why he experienced a dreadful realization of defeat, for a moment

let through a flickering impression of the need for violence, but--and

Dalrymple couldn't be expected to understand that--violence against

George Morton who had let this situation materialize, who experienced,

tumbling about his head, the magnificent but incomplete efforts of many

years. That sensation of boundless, imponderable wreckage crushing upon

him sent him back to his chair where for a moment he sat, sunk down,

stripped of his power and his will.

And Dalrymple laughed, enjoying it.

In George's overwhelmed brain that laughter started an awakening

clamour.

"What difference does the money make now?" Dalrymple jibed. "And she'll

believe nothing else you may tell her, and violence would only make a

laughing stock of you. It's done."

"How was it done?" George whispered.

"No objections to amusing you," Dalrymple mocked. "Lambert interfered

last night, and spoiled his own game by dragging you in. By gad, she has

got it in for you! Don't see why you ever thought----Anyway, she agreed

right enough then, and I didn't need to explain it was wiser, seeing how

Lambert felt about it, and her father, and you, of all people, to get

the thing over without any brass bands. Had a bit of luck ducking the

reporters at the license bureau. Tied the knot half an hour ago. She's

gone home to break the glad news."

He grinned.

"But I thought it only decent to jump the subway and tell you your

filthy money's all right and that you can plant a tombstone on your

pound of flesh."

He laughed again.

In George's brain the echoes of Dalrymple's triumph reverberated more

and more intelligibly. Little by little during the recital his slumped

attitude had altered.

"In a way! In a way! In a way!" had sung through his brain, deriding

him.

Then, as he had listened, had flashed the question: "Is it really too

late?" And he had recalled his old determination that nothing--not even

this--should bar the road to his pursuit. So, at the close of

Dalrymple's explanation, he was straight in his chair, his hands

grasping the arms, every muscle, every nerve, stretched tight, and in

his brain, overcoming the boisterous resonance of Dalrymple's mirth,

rang his old purposeful refrain: "I will! I will! I will!"

Dalrymple had married her, but it wasn't too late yet.

"Jealous old fellow!" Dalrymple chaffed. "No congratulations for Dolly.

Blow up about your notes any time you please. I'll see they're paid."

He took up his hat and stick.

"Want to run along now and break the news to brother-in-law. Sure to

find him. He's a late bird."

George stood up.

"Wait a minute," he said, quietly. "Got to say you've put one over,

Dalrymple. It was crooked, but it's done. You've settled it, haven't

you?"

"Glad you take it reasonably," Dalrymple laughed, turning for the door.

"Wait a minute," George repeated.

Dalrymple paused, apparently surprised at the tone, even and colourless.

"Lambert's somewheres about the place," George explained. "Just stay

here, and I'll find him and send him in."

"Good business!" Dalrymple agreed, sitting down. "Through all the

sooner."

He smiled.

"A little anxious to get home to my wife."

George tried to close his ears. He didn't dare look at the other. He

hurried out, closed the door, and went to Goodhue's office. At sight of

him Lambert sprang from his chair as if startled by an unforeseen record

of catastrophe.

"What's happened?"

"Dalrymple's in my room," George answered without any expression. "He

wants to see you. He'll tell you all about it."

He raised his hands, putting a stop to Lambert's alarmed questions.

"Can't wait. Do just one thing for me. Give me half an hour. Keep

Dalrymple here for half an hour."

Still Lambert cried for reasons.

"Never mind why. You ought to interest each other for that long."

But Lambert tried to detain him.

"Where are you going? Why do you want me to keep him here? You look as

if you'd been struck in the face! George! What goes on?"

George turned impatiently.

"Ask Dalrymple. Then do that one thing for me."

He ran out of the room, picked up his hat and coat, and hastened to the

elevators.

He was caught by the high tide of the homeward rush, but his only

thought was of the quickest way, so he let himself be swept into the

maelstrom of the subway and was pounded aboard a Lexington Avenue

express. All these people struggling frantically to get somewhere! The

pleasures awaiting them at their journey's end should be colourful and

compelling; yet it was clear to him sordid discontent lurked for some,

and for others unavoidable sorrows. It was beyond belief that their

self-centred haste should let creep in no knowledge of the destination

and the purpose of this companion, even more eager than themselves,

intimately crushed among them.

He managed to free his arm so he could glance at his watch, and he

peered between bobbing heads through the windows at the station signs.

At Eighty-sixth Street he escaped and tore, limping, up the stairs while

people stared at him, or, if in his haste he had brushed unthinkingly

against them, called out remarks angry or sarcastic. His leg commenced

to ache, but he ran across to Fifth Avenue and down it to the Planter

house. While he waited before the huge, heavy glass and iron doors he

caught his breath, counting the seconds.

It was Simpson who opened.

"I'm not sure Miss Planter has returned, sir. If so, she would be

upstairs. When she went out she said something about not being disturbed

this evening. Yes, sir. She left with Mr. Dalrymple less than two hours

ago."

George walked into the vast hall.

"I must see her, Simpson, at once."

He started toward hangings, half-drawn, through which he could see only

partially a dimly lighted room.

"I will tell her, sir."

George swung.

"But not my name, Simpson. Tell her it is a message from her brother, of

the greatest importance."

George held his breath.

"What is it, Simpson?"

The clear contralto voice steadied him. If she was alone in there he

would have a better chance than he had hoped for, and he heard no other

voice; but why should she be alone at this exciting hour in a dimly

lighted room? Was it possible that she hadn't told any one yet what she

had done, had returned to the house and chosen solitude, instead, in a

dim light? Then why? Why?

He dismissed Simpson with a nod and entered between the hangings.

She was alone. She stood before a cold fireplace at the end of the room

as if she had just risen from a chair near by. She was straight and

motionless, but she projected an air of fright, as if she had been

caught at an indiscretion; and, as George advanced, he thought her

colour was too deep, and he believed she had been crying alone in the

dusk of the room which was scarcely disturbed by one shaded lamp.

He paused and stared at her--no longer Sylvia Planter--Dalrymple's wife.

All at once the appearance of modelled stone left her. Her entire body

seemed in motion, surrendered to a neurotic and undirected energy. She

started forward, paused, drew away. Her eyes turned from him to the

door, then questioningly back again. She pulled at the gloves which she

had kept in her hand. Her voice, when she spoke, was unsteady:

"What do you mean--coming in here--unannounced?"

His eyes held her.

"I've had enough of that," he said, harshly. "All I can think of is the

vile name your husband would have called you once if I hadn't choked him

half to death."

For a second her eyes blazed, then her shoulders drooped, and she

covered her face with her hands. With a sharp regret it occurred to him

that he could throw the broken crop away, for at last he had struck

her--hard enough to hurt.

Her voice from behind her hands was uncertain and muffled.

"Who told you?"

"He did--naturally, that--that----"

He broke off, choking.

"By God, Sylvia! It isn't too late. You've got to understand that. Now.

This minute. I tell you it isn't too late."

She lowered her hands. Her fear was sufficiently visible. Her attempt at

a laugh was pitiful, resembled an escaping grief.

"Leave me alone. You have to leave me alone now."

Her brutal definition of the great wall suddenly raised between them

swept his mind clean of everything except her lips, her beauty,

cloistered with his interminable desire in this dim room.

He stumbled blindly forward to his final chance. With a great,

unthinking, enveloping gesture he flung his arms about her drew her so

close to his body that she couldn't resist; and, before she had time to

cry out, pressed his mouth at last against her lips.

He saw her eyes close, guessed that she didn't attempt to struggle,

experienced an intoxicating fancy she was content to have him fulfill

his boast. He didn't try to measure the enormity of his action. Once

more he was the George Morton who could plunge ahead, casting aside

acquired judgments. Then he felt her shudder. She got her lips away. She

tried to lift her hands. He heard her whisper:

"Let me go."

He stared, fascinated, at her lips, half parted, that had just now told

him he had never really wanted anybody else, never could have.

"Sylvia! Forgive me. I didn't know. I've loved you--always; I've never

dreamed how much. And I can't let you go."

He tried to find her lips again, but she fought, and he commenced to

remember. From a point behind his back something held her incredulous

attention. He turned quickly. Dalrymple stood between the hangings.

XVII

George experienced no fear, no impulse to release Sylvia. He was

conscious merely of a sharp distaste that it should have turned out so,

and a feeling of anger that Lambert was responsible through his failure

to grant his request; but Lambert might have been shocked to

forgetfulness by Dalrymple's announcement, or he might have had too

sharp a doubt of George's intentions. Sylvia had become motionless, as

if impressed by the futility of effort. In a moment would she cry out to

Dalrymple just what he had done? He waited for her charge, her

justification, while he continued to stare at Dalrymple's angry and

unbelieving face which the gay flower in his button hole had an air of

mocking. Dalrymple started forward.

"You see that, Lambert----"

Lambert, who must have been standing close behind him, walked into the

room, as amazed as Dalrymple, nearly as shocked.

"Sylvia!"

George let Sylvia go. She sat down in the chair by the fireplace and

looked straight ahead, her lips still half parted. Dalrymple hurried the

length of the room and paused in front of her.

"Be careful what you say, Dalrymple," George warned him.

Dalrymple burst out:

"You'll not tell me what to say. What's this mean, Sylvia? Speak up,

or----"

"Easy, Dolly," Lambert advised.

George waited. Sylvia did not cry out. He relaxed, hearing her say

uncertainly:

"I don't know. I'm sorry. I----"

She paused, looked down, commenced pulling at her gloves again with the

self-absorbed gestures of a somnambulist. George's heart leapt. She had

not accused him, had really said nothing, from her attitude wouldn't

just yet. Dalrymple swung furiously on Lambert.

"God! Am I to believe my eyes? Pretends to despise him, and I find her

in his arms!"

Sylvia glanced up once then, her face crimson, her lips trembling, then

she resumed her blank scrutiny of her gloves at which she still pulled.

George stepped swiftly forward, fancying Dalrymple was going to threaten

her with his hands.

"Why don't you talk up?" Dalrymple cried. "What you got to say? Don't

see there's much? Never would have dreamed it of you. What a scandal!"

"Morton," Lambert said with a leashed fury in his quiet voice, "no one

but you could have done this. Leave us alone now to see what we can make

of it."

George laughed shortly.

"All the king's horses and all the king's men couldn't budge me just

yet. And I'll tell you what we'll make of it. Just what she wishes."

"Keep your mouth shut," Dalrymple said, shrilly. "You won't go. We'll

go. Sylvia! Come with me. We'll talk it out alone."

She shrank back in her chair, grasped its arms, looked up startled,

shaking her head.

"I can't go anywhere with you, Dolly," she said in a wondering voice.

"What you mean? You came to church right enough with me this afternoon.

Don't you forget that."

She nodded.

"It was wrong of me," she whispered. "I lost my temper. I didn't know at

all----"

"How did you find out?" Dalrymple sneered. "From him? But you're my

wife. Come away with me----"

She stood up swiftly, facing him.

"You shan't say such things to me, and I am not coming with you. I don't

know what's going to happen, but that--I know----"

She turned helplessly to Lambert.

"Make him understand."

Lambert took her hand and led her to the door.

"Go to Betty," he said.

"But make him understand," she pled.

"Why did you marry him if you didn't love him?" Lambert asked.

She turned and glanced at Dalrymple.

"I was fond of him. I didn't quite realize. There's a difference--he

must see that I've done an impossible thing, and I won't go on with it."

They were at the door. Lambert led her through, returning immediately.

George watched her go, blaming himself for her suffering. He had,

indeed, dragged her from her high horse, but he had not realized he

would bring her at once and starkly face to face with facts she had all

along refused to recognize; yet, he was convinced from his long

knowledge of her, she would not alter her decision, and he was happy,

knowing that he had accomplished, after a fashion, what he had come here

to do.

"You're married," Lambert was saying dryly to Dalrymple. "The problem

seems to be how to get you unmarried."

"You shan't do that," Dalrymple cried, hotly. "You'll talk her around

instead."

"Scarcely a chance," Lambert answered, "and really I don't see why I

should try. You've played a slippery trick. You may have had an

understanding with Sylvia, but I am perfectly convinced that she

wouldn't have let anything come of it if you hadn't caught her at a

moment when she couldn't judge reasonably. So it's entirely up to her."

"We'll see about it," Dalrymple said. "I have my side. You turn nasty. I

turn nasty. You Planters want an annulment proceeding, or a public

divorce with this rotter as co-respondent?"

"Dolly! You don't know what you're saying."

"I'll fight for my rights," Dalrymple persisted, sullenly.

"See here," George put in, "I stayed to say one thing. Sylvia had

nothing to do with what you saw. She couldn't help herself. Your

crookedness, Dalrymple, made me forget everything except that----Never

mind. Lambert understands. Maybe I was out of my head. Anyway, I didn't

give her a chance. She had to suffer it. Is that quite clear?"

Lambert smiled incredulously.

"That'll sound well in court, too," Dalrymple threatened.

"Drop that!" Lambert cried. "Think who you are; who Sylvia is."

"My wife," Dalrymple came back. "I'll have her or I'll go to court."

George started for the door.

"Don't fret, Lambert," he advised. "Money will go a long way with him.

If I might, I'd like to know what the two of you settle. I mean, if you

want to keep it away from your father and mother, my money's available.

I haven't much use for it any more----"

He broke off. What had he just meant to say: that since he had held

Sylvia in his arms all that had marked the progress of his ambition had

become without value? He would have to find that out. Now he waited at

the door, interested only in Dalrymple's response to his bald proposal.

Dalrymple thrust his hands in his pockets, commenced to pace the room,

but all he said was:

"Teach you all not to make a fool of Dolly."

"Remember," George said. "What she wants. And undesired scandals can be

paid for in various ways."

He glanced at Lambert. Evidently Sylvia's brother on that ground would

meet him as an ally. So he left the house and walked slowly through the

eastern fringe of the park, wishing to avoid even the few people

scattered along the pavements of the avenue, for the touch of Sylvia's

lips was still warm on his mouth. He felt himself apart. He wanted to

remain apart as long as possible with that absorbing memory.

Her angry responses in the past to his few daring gestures were

submerged in the great, scarcely comprehensible fact that she had not

rebuked him when he had tumbled over every barrier to take her in his

arms; nor had she, when cornered by Dalrymple and Lambert, assumed her

logical defence. Had that meant an awakening of a sort?

He smiled a little, thinking of her lips.

Their touch had sent to his brain flashes of pure illumination in which

his once great fondness for Betty had stood stripped of the capacity for

any such avid, confused emotions as Sylvia had compelled; flashes that

had exposed also his apparent hatred of the girl Sylvia as an obstinate

love, which, unable to express itself according to a common-place

pattern, had shifted its violent desires to conceptions of wrongs and

penalties. Blinded by that great light, he asked himself if his

ambition, his strength, and his will had merely been expressions of his

necessity for her.

Of her words and actions immediately afterward he didn't pretend to

understand anything beyond their assurance that Dalrymple's romance was

at an end. Not a doubt crept into his strange and passionate exaltation.

He was surprised to find himself at his destination. When he reached his

apartment he got out the old photograph and the broken riding crop, and

with them in his hands sat before the fire, dreaming of the long road

over which they had consistently aided him. He compared Sylvia as he had

just seen her with the girlish and intolerant Sylvia of the photograph,

and he found he could still imagine the curved lips moving to form the

words:

"You'll not forget."

He lowered his hands, and took a deep breath like one who has completed

a journey. To-night, in a sense, he had reached the heights most

carefully guarded of all.

XVIII

He heard the ringing of the door bell. His servant slipped in.

"Mr. Lambert Planter, sir."

George started, placed the crop and the photograph in a drawer, and

looked at the man with an air of surprise.

"Of course, I should like to see him. And bring me something on a tray,

here in front of the fire."

Lambert walked in.

"Don't mind my coming this way, George?"

"I'm glad I'm no longer 'Morton'," George said, dryly. "Sit down. I'm

going to have a bite to eat."

He glanced at his watch.

"Good Lord! It's after ten o'clock."

"Yes," Lambert said, choosing a chair, "there was a lot to talk about."

Little of the trouble had left Lambert's face, but George fancied

Sylvia's brother looked at him with curiosity, with a form of respect.

"I'm glad you've come," George said, "but I don't intend to apologize

for what I did this evening. I think we all, no matter what our

inheritance, fight without thought of affectations for our happiness.

That's what I did. I love your sister, Lambert. Never dreamed how much

until to-night. Not a great deal to say, but it's enormous beyond

definition to think. You have Betty, so perhaps you can understand."

Lambert smiled in a superior fashion.

"I'm a little confused," he said. "She's led me to believe all along

she's disliked you; has kept you away from Oakmont; has made it

difficult from the start. Then I find her, whether willingly or not--at

least not crying out for help--in your arms."

"I had to open her eyes to what she had done," George answered. "I

wasn't exactly accountable, but I honestly believe I took the only

possible means. I don't know whether I succeeded."

"I fancy you succeeded," Lambert muttered.

George stretched out his hand, looked at Lambert appealingly.

"She didn't say so--she----"

Lambert shook his head.

"She wouldn't talk about you at all."

He waited while the servant entered and arranged George's tray.

"Of course you've dined?"

"After a fashion," Lambert answered. "Not hungry. You might give me a

drink."

"I feel apologetic about eating," George said when they were alone

again. "Don't see why I should have an appetite."

Lambert fingered his glass.

"Do you know why she didn't have you drawn and quartered?"

"No. Don't try to create happiness, Lambert, where there mayn't be any."

"I'm creating nothing. I'm asking a question, in an effort to

understand why she won't, as I say, mention your name; why she can't

bear to have it mentioned."

"If you were right, if things could be straightened out," George said,

"you--you could put up with it?"

"Easily," Lambert answered, "and I'll confess I couldn't if it were

Corporal John Smith. I've been fond of you for a long time, George, and

I owe you a great deal, but that doesn't figure. You're worthy even of

Sylvia; but I don't say I'm right. You can't count on Sylvia. And even

if I were, I don't see any way to straighten things out."

George returned to his meal.

"If you had taken the proper attitude," he scolded, "you could have

handled Dalrymple. He's weak, avaricious, cowardly."

"Oh, Dalrymple! I can handle him. It's Sylvia," Lambert said. "In the

long run Dolly agreed to about everything. Of course he wanted money,

and he'll have to have it; but heaven knows there's plenty of money.

Trouble is, the wedding can't be hushed up. That's plain. It will be in

every paper to-morrow. We arranged that Dolly was to live in the house

for a time. They would have been together in public, and Dolly agreed

eventually to let her go and get a quiet divorce--at a price. It sounds

revolting, but to me it seemed the only way."

George became aware of an ugly and distorted intruder upon his

happiness, yet Lambert was clearly right. Sylvia and Dalrymple,

impulsively joined together, were nothing to each other, couldn't even

resume their long friendship.

"Well?" George asked.

"Mother, Betty, and I talked it over with Sylvia," Lambert answered.

"You see, we've kept Father in ignorance so far. He's scarcely up to

such a row. Mother will make him wise very gently only when it becomes

necessary."

"But what did Sylvia say?" George demanded, bending toward Lambert, his

meal forgotten.

"Sylvia," Lambert replied, spreading his hands helplessly, "would agree

to nothing. In the first place, she wouldn't consent to Dolly's staying

in the house even to save appearances. I don't know what's the matter

with her. She worried us all. She wasn't hysterical exactly, but she

cried a good deal, which is quite unusual for her, and she

seemed--frightened. She wouldn't let any one go near her--even Mother. I

couldn't understand that."

George stared at the fire, his hands clasped. When at last he spoke he

scarcely heard his own voice:

"She will get a divorce--as soon as possible?"

Lambert emptied his glass and set it down.

"That's just it," he answered, gloomily. "She won't listen to anything

of the sort."

George glanced up.

"What is there left for her to do?"

Lambert frowned.

"Something seems to have changed her wholly. She declares she'll never

see Dolly again, and in the same breath talks about the church and a

horror of divorce, and the necessity of her suffering for her mistake;

and she wants to pay her debt to Dolly by giving him, instead of

herself, all of her money--a few such pleasant inconsistencies. See

here. Why didn't you run wild yesterday, or the day before?"

"Do you think," George asked, softly, "it would have been quite the same

thing, would have had quite the same effect?"

"I wonder," Lambert mused.

George arose and stood with his back to the fire.

"And of course," he said, thoughtfully, "you or I can't tell just what

the effect has been. See here, Lambert. I have to find that out. I must

see her once, if only for five minutes."

He watched Lambert, who didn't answer at first.

"I'll not run wild again," he promised. "If she'd only agree--just five

minutes' talk."

"I told you," Lambert said at last, "she wouldn't mention your name or

let any one else; but, on the theory that you are really responsible for

what's happened, I'd like you to see her. You might persuade her that a

divorce is absolutely necessary, the only way out. You might get her to

understand that she can't go through life tied to a man she'll never

see, while people will talk many times more than if she took a train

quietly west."

"If she'll see me," George said, "I'll try to make it plain to her."

"Betty has a scheme----" Lambert began, and wouldn't grow more explicit

beyond saying, "Betty'll probably let you hear from her in the morning.

That's the reason I wanted you to know how things stand. I'm hurrying

back now to our confused house."

George followed him to the door.

"Dalrymple--where is he?" he asked.

"Gone to his parents. He'll try to play the game for the present."

"At a price," George said.

Lambert nodded.

"Rather well-earned, too, on the whole," he answered, ironically.

XIX

George slept little that night. The fact that Lambert believed him

responsible for the transformation in Sylvia was sufficiently exciting.

In Sylvia's manner her brother must have read something he had not quite

expressed to George. And why wouldn't she mention him? Why couldn't she

bear to have the others mention him? With his head bowed on his hands he

sat before the desk, staring at the diminishing fire, and in this

posture he fell at last asleep to be startled by Wandel who had not

troubled to have himself announced. The fire was quite dead. In the

bright daylight streaming into the room George saw that the little man

held a newspaper in his hand.

"Is it a habit of great men not to go to bed?"

George stood up and stretched. He indicated the newspaper.

"You've come with the evil tidings?"

"About Sylvia and Dolly," Wandel began.

George yawned.

"I must bathe and become presentable, for this is another day."

"You've already seen it?" Wandel asked, a trifle puzzled.

"No, but what else should there be in the paper?"

Wandel stared for a moment, then carefully folded the paper and tossed

it in the fireplace.

"Nothing much," he answered, lighting a cigarette, "except hold-ups,

murders, new strikes, fresh battles among our brethren of the Near

East--nothing of the slightest consequence. By by. Make yourself, great

man, fresh and beautiful for the new day."

XX

George wondered why Wandel should have come at all, or, having come, why

he should have left in that manner; and he was sorry he had answered as

he had, for Wandel invariably knew a great deal, more than most people.

In this case he had probably come only to help, but in George's brain

nothing could survive for long beyond hazards as to what the morning

might develop. Betty was going to communicate with him, and she would

naturally expect to find him at his office, so he hurried down town and

waited, forcing himself to the necessary details of his work. For the

first time the mechanics of making money seemed dreary and unprofitable.

Goodhue came in with a clearly designed lack of curiosity. Had his

partner all along suspected the truth, or had Wandel been talking? For

that matter, did Goodhue himself experience a sense of loss?

"Not so surprising, George. Dolly's always been after her--even back in

the Princeton days, and she's played around with him since they were

children; yet I was a little shocked. I never thought it would quite

come off."

It was torture for George to listen, and he couldn't possibly talk about

it, so he led Goodhue quite easily to the day's demands; but Blodgett

appeared not long after with a drooping countenance. Why did they all

have to come to him to discuss the unannounced wedding of Sylvia

Planter?

"She ought to have done better," Blodgett disapproved funereally.

He fingered a gaudy handkerchief. He thrust it in his pocket, drew it

forth again, folded it carefully with his pudgy hands.

"Don't think I've ever ceased to regret----" he started rather

pitifully.

After a moment's absorbed scrutiny of George he went on.

"If she had picked somebody like you I wouldn't have minded. Papa

Blodgett would have given you both his blessing."

So they had all guessed something! George questioned uneasily if

Blodgett's suspicions had lived during the course of his own unfortunate

romance, and he was sorrier than ever he had had to help destroy that.

He got rid of Blodgett and refused to see any one else, but he had to

answer the telephone, for that would almost certainly be Betty's means

of communication. Each time the pleasant bell tinkled he seized the

receiver, and each time cut short whatever masculine worries reached

him. The uneven pounding of the ticker punctuated his suspense. It was a

feverish morning in the market, but not once did he rise to glance at

the tape which streamed neglected into the basket.

It was after one o'clock when he snatched the receiver from the hook

again with a hopeless premonition of another disappointment. Then he

heard Betty's voice, scarcely more than an anxious whisper "George!"

"Yes, yes, Betty."

"My car will be somewhere between Altman's and Tiffany's at two o'clock,

as near the corner of Thirty-fifth Street as they'll let me get. Lambert

knows. It's all right."

"But, Betty----"

"Just be there," she said, and must have hung up.

He glanced at his watch. He could start now. He hurried from the

building, but there was no point in haste. He had plenty of time, too

much time; and Betty hadn't said he would see Sylvia; hadn't given him

time to ask; but she must have arranged an interview, else why should

she care to see him at all, why her manner of a conspirator?

He reached the rendezvous well ahead of time, but he recognized Betty's

car just beyond the corner, and saw her wave to him anxiously. He

stepped in and sat at her side. She laughed nervously.

"I guessed you would be a little ahead," she said as the car commenced

to crawl north.

"Am I to see Sylvia?"

Betty nodded.

"Just once. This noon, before I telephoned, she acknowledged that she

wanted to see you--to talk to you for the last time. That's the way she

put it."

Betty smiled sceptically.

"You know I don't believe anything of the sort."

"What do you think can be done?" George asked.

She didn't suggest anything, merely repeating her faith, going on while

she looked at George curiously.

"So all the time, George--and I didn't really guess, but I might have

known you would. I can remember now that day at Princeton when I asked

you about her dog, and your anxiety one night at Josiah's when you

wanted to know if she was going to be married--oh, plenty of hints now.

George! Why did you let it go so far?"

"Couldn't help myself, Betty."

She looked at him helplessly.

"And what have you done to her?"

"If you can't guess----" George said.

Betty smiled reminiscently.

"Perhaps I can guess. You would do just that, George, when there was

nothing else."

"You don't blame me?" he asked. "You don't ask, as Lambert did, why I

waited so long?"

She shook her head.

"I'm sure," she said, "when you came last night you saw a Sylvia none of

us had ever met before. Don't you think it had come upon her all at once

that she was no longer Sylvia Planter, that in defeating you she had

destroyed herself? If that is so, she has every bit of sympathy I'm

capable of, and we must think first of all of her. The pride's still

there, but quite a different thing. She's never known fear before,

George, and now she's afraid, terribly afraid, most of all, I think, of

herself."

George counted the corners, was relieved when beyond Fiftieth Street the

traffic thinned and they went faster. He took Betty's hand, and found

that the touch steadied and encouraged, because at last her fingers

seemed to reach his mind again.

"Betty! Do you think she cares at all?"

"I'm prejudiced," Betty laughed, "but I think the harder she'd been the

more she's cared; but she wouldn't talk about you except to say she

would see you for a minute this once. Lambert's lunching with Dolly."

"We are conspirators," George said, "and I don't like it, but I must see

her once."

They drew up at the curb, got out, and entered the hall. The house was

peculiarly without sound. George glanced at the entrance to the room

where he had found Sylvia last night.

"I think she's in Mr. Planter's study," Betty said. "He hasn't come

downstairs yet."

She led him through the library to a small, square room--a quiet and

comfortable book-lined retreat where Old Planter had been accustomed to

supplement his work down town. George looked eagerly around, but the

light wasn't very good, and he didn't at first see Sylvia.

"Sylvia!" Betty called softly. "I've brought George."

XXI

Almost before George realized it Betty was gone and the door was closed.

"Sylvia!"

Her low voice reached him from a large chair opposite the single,

leaded, opaque window.

"I'm over here----"

Yes, there was fear in her enunciation, as if she groped through shadowy

and hazardous places. It cautioned him. With a choked feeling, a racking

effort after repression, he walked quietly around and stared down at

her.

She looked up once quickly, then glanced away. He was grateful for her

colour, but the fear was in her face, too, and the pride, as Betty had

said, but a transformed pride that he couldn't quite understand. She lay

back in the large chair, her head to one side resting against the

protruding arm. Her eyes were bright with tears she had shed or wanted

to shed.

"Please sit down."

The ring of exasperated contempt and challenge had gone from her voice.

He hadn't known it could stir him so. He drew up a chair and sat close

to her.

"You are not angry about what I did last night?" he whispered.

She shook her head.

"I am grateful. I wanted to see you to tell you that, and how sorry I

am--so beastly sorry, George."

Her voice drifted away. It made him want his arms about her, made him

want her lips again. The room became a black and restless background for

this shadowy, desired, and forbidden figure.

Impulsively he slipped to his knees and placed his head against the side

of her chair. Across his hair he fancied a fugitive brushing of fingers.

She burst out with something of her former impetuous manner.

"I used to want that! Now you shan't!"

He arose, and she stooped swiftly forward, as if propelled objectively,

and, before he realized what she was doing, touched the back of his hand

with her lips.

She sprang upright and faced him from the mantel, more afraid than ever,

staring at him, her cheeks wet with tears.

"That's all," she whispered. "It's what I wanted to tell you. Please go.

We mustn't see each other again."

In the room he was aware only of her, but he knew, in spite of his own

blind instinct, that between them was a wall as of transparent and heavy

glass against which he would only break his strength.

"Sylvia," he whispered in spite of that knowledge, "I want to touch your

lips."

"They've never been anybody else's," she cried in a sudden outburst.

"Never could have been. I see that now. That's why I've hated you----"

"Yet you love me now. You do love me, Sylvia?"

"I love you, George," she said, wearily. "I think I always have."

"Then why--why----"

She turned on him, nearly angry.

"How can you ask that? You haven't forgotten that first day, either,

have you? You took something of me then, and I couldn't forget it. That

was what hurt and humiliated; I couldn't forget, couldn't get out of my

mind what you--one of the--the stablemen--had taken of me, Sylvia

Planter. And I thought you could never give it back, but last night you

did, and I----Everything went to pieces----And it had to be last night,

after I'd lost my temper. I see that. That's the tragedy of it."

"I don't quite understand, Sylvia."

She smiled a little through her tears.

"Betty would. Any woman would. You must go now--please."

"When will I see you again?" he asked.

"This way? Never."

"What nonsense! You'll get a divorce. You must."

She straightened. Her head went back.

"I won't lie that way."

"I'll hit on some means," he boasted. "You belong to me."

"And I've found it out too late," she said, "and I don't believe I could

have found it out before. Think of that, George, when it seems too hard.

I had to be caught by my own rotten temper before I'd let you wake me

up."

She drew a little away, and when he started forward motioned him back.

Her face flooded with colour, but she met his eyes bravely.

"That was something. I will never forget that, either, but it doesn't

make me feel--unclean, as I did that day at Oakmont and afterward. I

don't want to forget it ever. Now you understand."

She ran swiftly to the door and opened it. He followed her and saw Betty

at the farther end of the room talking to Mr. Planter.

"Why do you do that?" he asked, desperately.

"I want to tell you why I'll never forget," she answered in a half

whisper. "Because I love you. I love you. I want to say it. I think it

every minute, so don't you see you have to help me keep it straight and

beautiful always, George?"

XXII

"Who has made my little girl cry?"

The quavering tones reminded George. He walked from the little room

toward the others, and he saw that Old Planter had caught Sylvia's hand,

had drawn her to him, had felt the tears on her cheeks.

There rushed back to George that ancient interview in the library at

Oakmont, and here he was back at it, even in Old Planter's presence,

making her cry again. He wondered what Old Planter had said when Lambert

had told him who George Morton really was.

"You see, sir," he said, moodily, "I haven't changed so much from the

stable boy, Morton, you once threatened to send to smash if----"

Sylvia broke in sharply.

"He's never been told----"

"What are you talking about?" the old man quavered. "Was there ever a

Morton on my place, Sylvia? An old man, yes. He's dead. A young one----"

Slowly he shook his head from side to side. He peered suspiciously at

George out of his dim eyes.

"I don't remember."

Suddenly he cried out with a flash of the old authority:

"I'm growing sensitive, Morton. No jokes! What's he talking about?"

Sylvia took his hand. Her lips trembled.

"Never mind, Father. Come."

And as he let her guide him he drifted on.

"Sylvia! Have you got everything you want? I'll give you anything you

want if only you won't cry."

Outside rain had commenced to drizzle. From a tree in the little yard

yellow leaves fluttered down. Old Planter hobbled into his study, Sylvia

at his side. Betty followed George to the hall.

"Tell Sylvia I am very happy," he said.

She pressed his hand, whispering:

"The great George Morton!"

XXIII

Again George walked to his apartment and sat brooding over the fire,

trying to find a way; but Sylvia must have searched, too, and failed.

There was no way, or none that she would take. He crushed his heady

revolt at the realization, for he believed she had been right. Without

her great mistake she couldn't have given him that obliterative moment

last evening, or his glimpse this afternoon of happiness through heavy,

transparent glass. So he could smile a little, nearly cheerfully. There

was really a quality of happiness in his knowledge that she had never

forgotten his tight clasping at Oakmont, his blurted love, his threat

that he would teach her not to be afraid of his touch. How she must have

despised herself in the great house, among her own kind, when she found

she couldn't forget Morton, when she tried, perhaps, to escape the shame

of wanting Morton! No wonder she had attempted through Blodgett and

Dalrymple, men for whom she could have had no such urgent feeling, to

divide herself from him, to prevent the fulfilment of his boasts of

which he had perpetually reminded her. She must have looked at him a

good deal more than he had guessed in those far days. And now his touch

had taught her to be more afraid than ever, but not of him. With a

growing wonder he recalled her surrender. Of course, Sylvia, like her

placid mother, like everyone, was, beneath the veneer even of endless

generations, necessarily primitive. For that discovery he could thank

Dalrymple. He continued to dream.

What, indeed, lay ahead for him? In a sense he had already reached the

summit which he had set out to find, and every thrilling mood of hers

that afternoon flamed in his mind. He had a desolate feeling that there

was no longer anything for him down town, or anywhere else beyond a

wait, possibly endless, for Sylvia; and as he brooded there he longed

for a mother to whom he could have gone with his happiness that was more

than half pain. His mother had said that there were lots of girls too

good for him. His father had added, "Sylvia Planter most of all." His

father was dead. His mother might as well have been. All at once her

swollen hands seemed to rest passively between him and the fire.

He was glad when Wandel came in, even though he found him without

lights, for the second time that day in an unaccustomed and reflective

posture.

"Snap the lamps on, will you, Driggs?"

Wandel obeyed, and George blinked, laughing uncomfortably.

"You'll fancy I've caught the poet's mood."

"Not at all, my dear George," Wandel answered. "Why not say, thinking

about the war? Nobody will let you talk about it, and I'm told if you

write stories or books that mention it the editors turn their thumbs

down. So much, says a grateful country, for the poor soldier. What more

natural then than this really pitiful picture of the dejected veteran

recalling his battles in a dusky solitude?"

"Oh, shut up, Driggs. Maybe you'll tell me why they ever called you

'Spike.'"

Wandel yawned.

"Certainly. Because, being small, I got hit on the head a great deal. I

sometimes think it's why I'm too dull to make you understand what I mean

to say."

George looked at him.

"I think I do, Driggs; and thanks."

"Then," Wandel said, brightly, "you'll come and dine with me."

"I will. I will. Where shall we go? Not to the club."

"I fancy one club wouldn't be pleasant for you this evening," Wandel

said, quietly.

George caught his breath.

"Why not?"

But Wandel wouldn't satisfy him until they were in a small restaurant

and seated at a wall table sufficiently far from people to make quiet

tones safe.

"It's too bad," he said then, "that great men won't take warnings."

"I caught your warning," George answered, "and I acted on it as far as I

could. I couldn't dream, knowing her, of a runaway marriage, and I'll

guarantee you didn't, either."

"I once pointed out to you," Wandel objected, "that she was the

impulsive sort who would fly to some man--only I fancied then it would

ultimately be you."

"Why, Driggs?"

Wandel put his hand on George's knee.

"You don't mind my saying this? A long time ago I guessed she loved you.

Even as far back as Betty's debut, when I danced with her right after

you two had had some kind of a rumpus, I saw she was a bundle of emotion

and despised herself for it. Of course I hadn't observed then all that I

have since."

"Why did you never warn me of that?" George asked.

Wandel laughed lightly.

"What absurd questions you ask! Because, being well acquainted with

Sylvia, I couldn't see how she was to be made to realize she cared for

you."

George crumbled a piece of bread.

"I daresay," he muttered, "you know everything that's happened. It's

extraordinary the way you find out things--things you're not supposed to

know at all."

Wandel laughed again, this time on a note of embarrassed disapproval.

"Not extraordinary in this case."

George glanced up.

"You said something about the club not being pleasant for me

to-night----"

"Because," Wandel answered with brutal directness, "Dolly's been there."

George clenched his hands. Wandel looked at them amusedly.

"Very glad you weren't about, Hercules."

"It was that bad?" George asked.

"Why not," Wandel drawled, "say rather worse?"

"Drunk?" George whispered.

"A conservative diagnosis," Wandel answered. "His language sounded quite

foreign, but with effort its sense could be had; and the rooms were

fairly full. You know, just before dinner--the usual crowd."

"Somebody should have shut him up," George cried.

"We did, with difficulty, and not all at once," Wandel protested.

"Dicky's taken him home with the aid of a pair of grinning hyenas. They

did make one think of that."

"It's not to be borne," George muttered. "He ought to be killed."

"By all means, my dear George," Wandel agreed, "but we're back in New

York. I mean, with the armistice murder ceased to be praiseworthy.

They're punishing it in the usual fashion. You quite understand that,

George?"

George tried to laugh.

"Quite. Go ahead."

"He really had some excuse," Wandel went on, "because when he first came

in no one realized how bad he was--and they jumped him with

congratulations and humour, and he went right out of his head--became

stark, raving mad; or drunk, as you choose."

"What did he say?" George asked, softly.

Wandel half closed his eyes.

"Don't expect me to repeat any such crazy, disconnected stuff. It's

enough that he let everybody guess Sylvia had sold him at the very

moment he had fancied he had bought her. I've been thinking it over, and

I'm not sure it isn't just as well he did. Everybody will talk his head

off for a few days and drop it. Otherwise, curious things would have

been noticed and suspected from time to time, and the talk, with fresh

impetus, would have gone on forever. Besides, nobody's looking for much

trouble with the Planters."

George had difficulty with his next question.

"He--he didn't mention me?"

"Why, yes," Wandel answered, gravely, "but rather incoherently."

"Rotten of him!"

"No direct accusations," Wandel hurried on, "just vile temper; and while

it makes it temporarily more unpleasant that's just as well, too. The

fact that people know what to expect kills more talk later. I suppose

she'll manage a fairly quiet divorce."

"Won't listen to it," George snapped.

"How stupid of me!" Wandel drawled. "Of course she wouldn't."

He sighed.

"I mean to sympathize with you, my George, but all the time I envy you,

and have to restrain myself from offering congratulations. Behold the

oysters! They're really very good here."

George tried to smile.

"Then shall we talk about shell fish?"

"Bivalves, George. Or we might discuss the great strike. Which one? Take

your choice. Or, by the way, have you received your shock yet? They're

raising rents in our house more than a hundred per cent."

"The hell after war!" George grinned.

Wandel smiled back.

"Let us hope not a milestone on the road."

XXIV

Through pure will George resumed his routine, but it no longer had the

power to capture him, becoming a drudgery without a clear purpose.

Always he was conscious of the effort to force himself from recollection

and imagination, to drive Sylvia from his mind; and, even so, he never

quite succeeded. Were there then no heights beyond?

Lambert was painstakingly considerate, catching him for luncheon from

time to time, or calling at unexpected moments at his office, and always

he said something about Sylvia. She was well. Naturally she was keeping

to herself. Betty and she were at Princeton, and Sylvia was going to

stay on with the Alstons for a time. Once he let slip a sincere

admiration, a real regret.

"It's extraordinary, George. You've very nearly made every word good."

George took the opening to ask a question that had been in his mind for

many days.

"Where is he? What's he up to? I haven't seen him, but, naturally, I

keep to myself, too, and Dicky, bless him, mentions nothing."

Lambert frowned.

"He hasn't been around the office much since. He's taking his own sweet

will with himself now. He's gone away--to Canada. It's cold there, but

it's also fairly wet."

"If one could only be sure he had the virtue of loving her!" George

mused.

"He hasn't," Lambert said, impatiently. "Since I talked with him that

hectic night I've admitted that Dolly's never had the capacity to love

any one except himself. So he's probably happy in his own unpleasant

way."

A thought came to George. He smiled a little.

"I've been wondering if Sylvia is going in harder than ever on the side

of the downtrodden."

Lambert laughed.

"As far as I know, hasn't mentioned a cossack since that night; and I

have to confess, hard-headed reactionary, the ranks are making me see

too many bad qualities among the good."

"Perhaps," George suggested, "the ranks are saying something of the sort

about us. Besides, I don't see why you call me reactionary."

"Would you have minded it a while back?" Lambert asked.

"Just the same," George answered, "I'd like to get their point of view."

What would Squibs say to that from him? Squibs, undoubtedly, would be

pleased. After Lambert had gone he sat for a long time thinking. He was

glad Lambert had come, for the other had suggested that in endeavouring

to capture such a point of view, in pleasing Squibs, he might at last

find a real interest, and one of use to somebody besides himself. If the

men on the heights didn't get at it pretty soon, a different kind of

climber would appear, with black hands, inflamed eyes, and a mind

stripped, by passion, of all logic. Gladly he found it possible to bring

to this new task the energy with which he had attacked the narrower

puzzles of the university and Wall Street.

Sylvia had called him the most selfish person she had ever met, and, as

he tried to strip from the facts of the world's disease the perpetual,

clinging propaganda, he applied her charge to his soul. From the first

he had been infected, yet his selfishness had been neither inefficient

nor dangerous. This increasing pestilence was. Lambert guessed what he

was at, and George jeered at him for his war madness, but Lambert had

found again an absorbing interest. Because of his missing leg it was

rather pitiful to watch his enthusiasm for a reawakened activity.

"You've got to see Harvard swallow your old Tiger, George," he said one

Friday. "After all, why not? You don't need to come out to the Alstons,

although I'm not sure there would be any harm in that. Talk's about

done, I fancy."

George flushed.

"Do you know I'd love to spill you again, Lambert? I'd like to bring you

down so hard the seismographs would make a record."

"Too bad we can't try to kill each other," Lambert said, regretfully.

"Why not watch younger brutes?"

"I've wanted it for days," George acknowledged. "I'll wire Squibs."

George was perfectly sure that Squibs knew nothing, for he wasn't

socially curious, and Betty would have hesitated to talk about what had

happened even to Mrs. Squibs, yet he was conscious, after the first

moment of meeting, of a continued scrutiny from Squibs, of a hesitancy

of manner, of an unusually careful choice of words.

He had small opportunity to test this impression, for it was noon when

he reached the house in Dickinson Street, and there were many of the

tutor's products in the dining-room, snatching a cold bite while they

roared confused pessimism about the game.

"You're going to the side-lines," Squibs said when they had climbed the

ramp to their section of the stadium.

"I'd be in the way," George objected.

Bailly stared at him.

"George Morton on a football field could only be in the way of Harvard

and Yale."

George experienced a quick, ardent wish for thick turf underfoot, for a

seat on the bench among players exhaling a thick atmosphere of eager and

absorbed excitement. So he let the tutor lead him down the steps. Squibs

called to Green, who was distrait.

"What is it, Mr. Bailly?"

"I've got Morton."

Green sprang to life.

"Mr. Stringham! An omen! An omen!"

He met George at the gate and threw his arms around him. Stringham

hurried up. Green crowed.

"I believe we'll lick these fellows or come mighty close to it."

"Of course you'll lick them, Green. Hello, Stringham! May I sit down?"

"The stadium's yours," Stringham said, simply.

As he walked along the line of eager players, smothered in blankets or

sweaters, George caught snatches of the curiosity of youth, because of

nervousness, too audibly expressed.

"Who's the big fellow?"

"That? Longest kicker, fastest man for his weight ever played the game.

George Morton--the great Morton."

"He never played with that leg! What's the matter with his leg?

Football?"

George caught no answer. He sat down among the respectful youths,

thinking whimsically:

"The war's so soon over, but thank God they can't forget football!"

XXV

At the very end of the first half, when the Princeton sections

experienced the unforeseen glow of a possible victory, George caught a

glimpse of Lambert and Wandel close to the barrier, as if they had left

their places to catch someone with the calling of time. Just then the

horn scrunched its anxious message. George called.

"Lambert Planter!"

Stringham paused, grinning.

"Come over here, you biting bulldog."

Lambert made his way through the barrier and grasped Stringham's hand.

"Come along to the dressing-room," Stringham suggested, cordially. "Nice

bulldog, although once I loved to see Morton chew you up."

Lambert glanced down.

"Thanks. I'd better stay here. One of my runners is off, Stringham."

"Then sit with the boys next half," Stringham said. "Coming, Morton?"

George shook his head, and urged the anxious coach away, for Wandel had

caught his eye.

"Tell them to keep their heads," George called after Stringham. "If they

keep their heads they've got Harvard beaten."

He glanced inquiringly at Wandel.

"Why not cease," Wandel said, "imagining yourself a giddy, heroic cub?

Come up and sit with mature people the last half."

The invitation startled George. Then Sylvia wasn't there?

"Is Sylvia all right?" he asked Lambert under his breath.

Lambert was a trifle ill at ease.

"Oh, quite. Betty asked us to get you. Wants to see you. Have my place.

I'm going to accept Stringham's fine invitation, and sit here with the

young--a possible Yale scout on the Princeton side-lines."

"Stringham's no fool," George laughed. "Anyway, he has you fellows

beaten right now."

Lambert thrust his hand in his pocket.

"How much you got?"

Wandel grasped George's arm.

"Come with me before you get in a college brawl."

"Plenty when we're not chaperoned, Lambert," George called, and followed

Wandel through the restless crowd and up the concrete steps.

Was Sylvia really there? Was he going to see her? The idea of finding

him had sprung from Betty, and Lambert had been ill at ease.

He saw Betty and her father and mother, then beyond them, a vacant place

between, Sylvia to whom the open air and its chill had given back all

her dark, flushed brilliancy. Wandel slid through first, and made

himself comfortable at Sylvia's farther side. George followed, stopping

to speak to the Alstons, to accept Betty's approving glance.

"Conspirator!" he whispered, and went on, and sat down close to Sylvia,

and yielded himself to the delight of her proximity. She glanced at him,

her colour deepening.

"Betty said it was all right, and I must. So many people----"

The air was sharp enough to make rugs comfortable. He couldn't see her

hands because they were beneath the rug across her knees, a covering she

shared with Wandel and him.

As he drew the rug up one of his hands touched hers, and his fingers,

beyond his control, groped for her fingers. He detected a quick, nervous

movement away; then it was stopped, and their hands met, clasped, and

clung together.

For a moment they looked at each other, and knew they mustn't, since

there were so many people; but the content of their clasped hands

continued because it couldn't be observed.

The supreme football player sat there staring at a blur of autumn colour

between the lake and the generous mouth of the stadium; and, when the

second half commenced, saw, as if from an immeasurable distance, pygmy

figures booting a football, or carrying it here and there, or throwing

each other about; and he didn't know which were Harvard's men or which

were Princeton's, and he didn't seem to care----

Vaguely he heard people suffering. A voice cut through a throaty and

grieving murmur.

"Somebody's lost his head!"

"What's the matter?" he asked Sylvia.

"George! You're destroying my hand."

Momentarily he remembered, and relaxed his grasp, while she added

quickly:

"But I don't mind at all, dear."

XXVI

Lambert stood in front of them, glancing down doubtfully. Evidently the

game was over, for people were leaving, talking universally and

discontentedly.

"Betty and I," Lambert said, dryly, "fancied we'd invented and patented

that rug trick."

Sylvia stood up.

"Don't scold, Lambert."

She turned to George, trying to smile.

"I shall be happy as long as my hand hurts. Good-bye, George."

"You'd better go," Betty whispered as he lingered helplessly.

So he drifted aimlessly through the crowd, hearing only a confused

murmur, seeing nothing beyond the backs directly in front of him, until

he found the Baillys waiting at the ramp opening.

"If you'd only been there, George! Although this morning we'd have been

glad enough to think of a tie score."

He submitted then to Bailly's wonder at each miracle; to his grief for

each mistake; and little by little, as the complaining voice hurried on,

the world assumed its familiar proportions and movements. He caught a

glimpse of Allen walking slowly ahead. The angular man was alone, and

projected even to George an air of profound dissatisfaction. Bailly

caught his arm and shook hands with him.

"Whither away?" George asked.

"To the specials."

He fell in beside George, and for a time kept pace with him.

"What's bothering you, Allen?"

With a haggard air Allen turned his head from side to side, gazing at

the hastening people.

"Lords of the land!" he muttered. "Lords of the land!"

"Why?" George asked. "Because they have an education? Well, so have

you."

Allen nodded toward the emptying stadium.

"Lords of the land!" he repeated. "I've been sitting up there with them,

but all alone. I wish I hadn't liked being with them. I wish I hadn't

been sorry for myself because I was alone."

Allen's words, his manner of expressing them, defined a good deal for

George, urged him to form a quick resolution.

"Catch your special," he said, "but come to my office Tuesday morning. I

may have work for you that you can do with a clear conscience. If you

must get, get something worth while."

Allen glanced at him quickly.

"Morton, you've changed," he said. "I'll come."

XXVII

Very slowly the excitement of the game cleared from Squibs' brain. That

night he could talk of nothing else, begging George for an opinion of

each player and his probable value against Yale the following Saturday.

George, to cover his confusion, generalized.

"We'll beat Yale," he said, "as we ought to have beaten Harvard, because

this team isn't afraid of colours and symbols. Most of these youngsters

have been in the bigger game, so final football matches no longer appeal

to them as matters of life and death and even of one's chances in the

hereafter."

Bailly looked slightly sheepish.

"I'm afraid, George, I'm going to New Haven to look at a struggle of

life and death, but then I was only in the Y. M. C. A. I'd feel many

times better if you were sound and available."

"You might speak to the dean about me," George laughed.

By the next evening, however, the crowd had departed, and with

Princeton's return to normal Squibs for the time overcame his anxieties.

That night George and he sat in a corner of the lounge of the Nassau

Club, waiting for Lambert and Wandel to drive in from the Alstons.

George grew a trifle uncomfortable, because he suspected Squibs was

staring at him with yesterday's curious scrutiny. Abruptly the tutor

asked:

"What did you say to Allen after the game?"

"Offered him another job," George answered, shortly.

Bailly frowned.

"See here, George. What are you up to? Is that fair and decent? Allen is

struggling--for the right."

"Allen," George answered, "has put some of his views to the test, and

the results have made him discouraged and uneasy. He's been tainted by

the very men he's tried to help. I've no idea of debauching him. Quite

the reverse. Please listen."

And he entered upon a sort of penitence, speaking, while the tutor's

wrinkled face flushed with pleasure, of his recent efforts to understand

the industrial situation and its probable effects on society.

"I have to acknowledge," he said, softly, "that pure material success

has completely altered its meaning for me. I'd like to use my share of

it, and what small brains I have, to help set things straight; but I'm

not so sure this generation won't have too sticky feet to drag itself

out of the swamp of its own making."

Lambert and Wandel arrived just then, talking cheerfully about football.

"What do you mean to do?" Bailly asked George as the others sat down.

George smiled at Wandel.

"I'm not sure, Driggs, that the hour hasn't struck for you."

Wandel raised his hands.

"You mean politics!"

"I used to fancy," George said, "that I'd need you for my selfish

interests. Now my idea is quite different."

He turned to Squibs.

"See here, sir. You've got to admit that the soul of the whole thing is

education. I don't mean education in the narrow sense that we know it

here or in any other university. I mean the opening of eyes to real

communal efficiency; the comprehension of the necessity of building

instead of tearing down; the birth of the desire to climb one's self

rather than to try to make stronger men descend."

Bailly's eyes sparkled.

"I don't say you're not right, George. You may be right."

A fire blazed comfortably in front of them. The chairs were deep.

Through a window the Holder tower, for all its evening lack of

definition, seemed an indestructible pointer of George's thoughts. For a

long time he talked earnestly.

"I climbed," he ended. "So others can, and less selfishly and more

usefully, if they're only told how; if they'll only really try."

"You're always right, great man," Wandel drawled, "but we mustn't forget

you climbed from fundamentals. That's education--the teaching of the

fundamentals."

"It means an equal chance for everybody," George said, "and then, by

gad, we won't have the world held back by those who refuse to take their

chance. We won't permit the congenitally unsound to set the pace for the

healthy. We'll take care of the congenitally unsound."

He turned to Bailly.

"And you and your excitable socialists have got to realize that you

can't make the world sane through makeshifts, or all at once, but with

foresight it can be done. You've raised the devil with me ever since I

was a sub-Freshman about service and the unsound and the virtue of

soiled clothing. Now raise the devil with somebody else about the virtue

of sound service and clean clothes. This education must start in the

schools. We may be able to force it into public schools through the

legislatures; but in Princeton and the other great universities it has

to come from within, and that's hard; that, in a way, is up to you and

other gentle sectarians like you. And your clubs have got to stand in

some form--everywhere, if only as objectives of physical and

intellectual content. Nothing good torn from the world! Only the

evil----"

He tapped Wandel's arm.

"Driggs! If you want to go among the time-servers, to stand alone for

the people; perhaps for people yet unborn----"

"For a long time," Wandel said, "I've been looking for something I could

really want to do. I rather fancy you've found it for me, George. I want

to climb, too, always have--not to the heights we once talked about at

your unhealthy picnic, but to the furtherest heights of all, which are

guarded by selfishness, servility, sin--past which people have to be

led."

Squibs cried out enthusiastically.

"And from which you can look down with a clear conscience on the

climbers to whom you will have pointed out the path."

"I see now," Lambert put in, "that that is the only way in which one

with self-respect can look down on lesser men."

George laughed aloud.

"An ally that can't escape! Driggs is a witness. We'll hold that fine

democracy of the Argonne over your head forever."

"You see," Wandel drawled, "that was bound to fail, because it was based

on the ridiculous assumption that every man that fought was good and

great."

"I fancy," George said, "we're commencing to find out why we went to

war--To appreciate the world's and our own astigmatism."

As they walked back to the little house in Dickinson Street, Bailly

tried to express something.

"I guess," he managed, "that I'll have to call it square, George."

"I'm glad," George said, quickly, "but you must give some of the credit

to Lambert Planter's sister."

He smiled happily, wistfully.

"You know she's the most useful socialist of you all."

After a time he said under his breath:

"There are some things I never dreamed of being able to repay you, sir.

For instance this--this feeling that one is walking home."

"That debt," Bailly said, brightly, "cancels itself."

His mood changed. He spoke with a stern personal regret.

"You young men! You young men! How much farther you see! How much more

you can do!"

XXVIII

George returned to New York happy in his memory of his intimate hour on

a crowded stand with Sylvia. Dalrymple had given him that, too. It

amazed him that so much beauty could spring from so ugly a source.

He heard that Dalrymple was back from Canada, then that he had wandered

away, pockets full, on another journey, pandering to his twisted

conception of pleasure. One day George took his notes from the

safe-deposit box and gave them to Lambert.

"Get them back to him," he said.

And Lambert must have understood that George would never let the

Planters' money redeem them.

"It's pretty decent, George."

"It's nothing of the kind. They make my hands feel dirty, and I've lots

of money, and I'm making more every day; yet I wonder if it's going to

be enough, even with Driggs' and Blodgett's and yours, old Argonne

democrat."

For he had spoken of his plans to Blodgett, and had been a little

surprised to learn how much thought Blodgett had given the puzzle

himself, although most of his searching had been for makeshifts, for

anything to tide over immediate emergencies.

"I don't know," Blodgett roared, "whether this cleaning out the sore and

getting to the bottom of it will work or not; but I'm inclined to look

to the future with you for a permanent cure. Anyway, I'd help you

finance a scheme to make the ocean dry, because you usually get what

you're after. So we'll send Wandel and Allen and some more as a little

leaven to Albany and to that quilting party in Washington. I don't envy

them, though."

George realized that his content could be traced to this new interest,

as that went back to Sylvia. He had at last consciously set out to

explore the road of service. For the first time in his life, with his

eyes open, he was working for others, yet he never got rid of the sense

of a great personal need unfulfilled; always in his heart vibrated the

cry for Sylvia, but he knew he mustn't try to see her, for Betty would

have let him know, and Betty hadn't sent for him again.

After the holidays, at the urging of Wandel and Lambert, he showed

himself here and there, received at first curious glances, fancied some

people slightly self-conscious, then all at once found himself welcomed

on the old frank and pleasant basis. Yes, the talk had pretty well died,

and men and women were inclined to like Sylvia Planter and George Morton

better than they did Dalrymple.

He saw Dalrymple in the club one stormy January evening. He hadn't heard

he was in town, and examined him curiously as he sat alone in a corner,

making a pretence of reading a newspaper, but really looking across the

room at the fire with restless eyes. George, prepared as he had been,

was surprised by the haggard, flushed countenance, and the neurotic

symptoms, nearly uncontrollable.

Beyond question Dalrymple saw him, and pretended that he didn't.

Heartily glad of that, George joined a group about the fireplace, and

after a few minutes saw Dalrymple rise and wander unevenly from the

room.

George met him several times afterward under similar circumstances, and

always Dalrymple shortly disappeared, because, George thought, of his

arrival; but other people tactfully put him straight. Dalrymple, it

seemed, remained in no public place for long, as if there was something

evilly secretive to call him perpetually away.

Wandel told him toward the end of the month that Dalrymple was about to

make a trip to Havana for the remainder of the winter.

"Where there's horse-racing, gambling, and unlimited alcohol--where one

may sin in public. Why talk about it? Although he doesn't mean to,

George, he's in a fair way of doing you a favour."

But George didn't dream how close Dalrymple's offering was. His first

thought, indeed, was for Sylvia when the influenza epidemic of January

and February promised for a time to equal its previous ugly record.

Lambert tried to laugh his worry away.

"She's going south with father and mother very soon. Anyway, she hasn't

the habit of catching things."

And it was Lambert a day or two later who brought him the first

indication of the only way out, and he tried to tell himself he mustn't

want it. Even though he had always despised Dalrymple and his weakness,

even though Dalrymple stood between him and his only possible happiness,

he experienced a disagreeable and reluctant sense of danger in such a

solution.

"All his life," Lambert was saying, "Dolly's done everything he could to

make himself a victim."

"Where is he?" George asked.

"At his home. It's fortunate he hadn't started south."

"Or," George said, "he should have started sooner."

"I've an uncomfortable feeling," Lambert mused, "that he was planning to

run away from this very chance. Put it off a little too long. Seems he

went to bed four days ago. I didn't know until to-day because you see

he's been a little outcast since that scene in the club. He sent for me

this afternoon, and, curiously enough, asked for you. Will you go up? I

really think you'd better."

But George shrank from the thought.

"I don't want to be scolded by a man who is possibly dying."

"Let's hope not," Lambert said. "You'll go. Around five o'clock."

George hesitated.

"Did he ask for Sylvia?"

"He didn't ask me, but I telephoned her."

"Why?" George asked, sharply.

"Every card on the table now, George!" Lambert warned. "We have to think

of the future, in case----"

"Of course, you're right," George answered. "I'm sorry, and I'll go."

When he entered the Dalrymple house at five o'clock he came face to face

with Sylvia in the hall. He had never seen her so controlled, and her

quiet tensity frightened him.

"Lambert told me," she whispered, "you were coming now. Dolly hasn't

asked for me, but I'd feel so much better--if things should turn out

badly, for I'm thinking with all my heart of the boy I used to be so

fond of, and it's, perhaps, my fault----"

"It is not your fault," George cried. "He's always asked for it. Lambert

will tell you that."

George relaxed. Dalrymple's mother came down the stairs with the doctor,

and George experienced a quick sympathy for the retiring, elderly woman

he had scarcely seen before. She gave Sylvia her hand, while George

stepped out with the physician. In reply to George's questions the quiet

man shook his head and frowned.

"If it were any one else of the same age--I've attended in this house

many years, Mr. Morton, and I've watched him since he was a child. I've

marvelled how he's got so far."

He added brutally:

"Scarcely a chance with the turn its taking."

"If there's anything," George muttered, "any great specialist

anywhere----Understand money doesn't figure----"

"Everything possible is being done, Mr. Morton. I'm truly sorry, but I

can tell you it's quite his own fault."

So even this cold-blooded practitioner had heard the talk, and

sympathized, and not with Dalrymple. A trifle dazed George reentered the

house.

"It's good of you to come, Mr. Morton," Mrs. Dalrymple said. "Shall we

go upstairs now?"

There was no bitterness in her voice, and she had taken Sylvia's hand,

yet undoubtedly she knew everything. Abruptly George felt sorrier for

Dalrymple than he had ever done.

"Please wait, Sylvia," she said.

He followed Mrs. Dalrymple upstairs and into the sick-room.

"It's Mr. Morton, dear."

She beckoned to the nurse, and George remained in the room alone with

the feverish man in the bed. He walked over and took the hot hand.

"Morton!" came Dalrymple's hoarse voice, "I believe you're sorry for

me!"

"I am sorry," George said, quietly, "and you must get well."

Dalrymple shook his head.

"I know all the dope, and I guess I'm off in a few days. Not so bad now

I can't talk a little and sorta clean one or two things up. No silly

deathbed repentance. I'm jealous of you, Morton; always have been,

because you were getting things I couldn't, and I figured from the first

you were an outsider."

The dry lips smiled a little.

"When you get like this it makes a lot of difference, doesn't it, how

you came into the world? I'll be the real outsider in a few days----"

"Don't talk that way."

A quick temper distorted Dalrymple's face.

"They oughtn't to bring a man into the world as I was brought, without

money."

George couldn't think of anything to say, but Dalrymple hurried on:

"I wanted to thank you for the notes. Don't have to leave those to my

family, anyway. And I'm not sure hadn't better apologize all 'round. I

don't forget I've had raw deal--lots of ways; but no point not saying

Sylvia had pretty raw one from Dolly. Lucky escape for her--mean Dolly's

not domestic animal, and all that."

George was aware of a slight shiver as Dalrymple's hoarse voice slipped

into its old, not quite controlled mannerisms.

"Mean," Dalrymple rambled on, "Dolly won't haunt anybody. Blessings 'n'

sort of thing. Best thing, too. Sorry all 'round. That's all. Thanks

coming, George."

And all George could say was:

"You have to get well, Dolly."

But Dalrymple turned his head away. After a moment George proposed

tentatively:

"Sylvia's downstairs. She wants very much to see you."

Dalrymple shook his head.

"Catching."

"For her sake," George urged.

Dalrymple thought.

"All right," he said at last. "Long enough for me to tell her all right.

But not near. Nurse in the room. Catching, and all that."

George clasped the hot hand.

"Thanks, Dolly. You've done a decent thing, and you're going to get

well."

But as he left the room George felt that the physician had been right.

He spoke to the nurse, who sat in the upper hall, then he told Sylvia.

She went up, and he waited for her. He felt he had to wait. He hoped

Mrs. Dalrymple wouldn't appear again.

Sylvia wasn't long. She came down dry-eyed. She didn't speak even when

George followed her to her automobile, even when he climbed in beside

her; nor did he try to break a silence that he felt was curative. In the

light and surrounded by a crowd they could clasp hands; in this obscure

solitude there was nothing they could do or say. Only on the steps of

her home she spoke.

"Good-night, George, and thank you."

"Good-night, dear Sylvia," he said, and returned to the automobile, and

told the man to drive him to his apartment.

XXIX

George didn't hear from Dalrymple again, nor did he expect to, but he

was quite aware five days later of Goodhue's absence from the office and

of his black clothing when he came in during the late afternoon. He

didn't need Goodhue's few words.

"It's hard not to feel sorry, to believe, on the whole, it's rather

better. Still, when any familiar object is unexpectedly snatched away

from one----"

"We had a talk the other evening," George began.

Goodhue's face lighted.

"I'm glad, George."

He sighed.

"I've got to try to catch up. Mundy says rails have taken a queer turn."

"When you think for a minute not so queer," George commenced to explain.

A few days later Lambert told him that Sylvia had gone to Florida.

"They'll probably stay until late in the spring. It agrees with Father."

"How did Sylvia seem?" George asked, anxiously.

"Wait awhile," Lambert advised, "but I don't think there are going to be

any spectres."

He smiled engagingly.

"If there shouldn't be," he went on, "a few matters will have to be

arranged, because Sylvia and I share alike. Josiah and I had a long,

careful talk with Father last night about what we'd do with Sylvia's

husband if she married. He left it to my judgment, advising that we

might take him in if he were worth his salt. Josiah wanted to know with

his bull voice what Father would think if it should turn out to be you.

Very seriously, George, Father was pleased. He pointed out that you were

a man who made things go, but that you would end by running us all, and

he added that if we wanted that we would be lucky to get you as long as

it made Sylvia happy. You know we want you, George."

George felt as he had that day on the Vesle when Wandel had praised him.

No longer could Lambert charge him with having fulfilled his boasts, in

a way; yet he hadn't consciously wanted this, nor was he quite sure that

he did now.

"At least," George said, "you know what my policy would be to make

Planter and Company something more than a money making machine."

Lambert imitated Blodgett's voice and manner.

"George, if you wanted to grow hair on a bald man's head I'd say go to

it."

"And there must be room for Dicky," George went on.

"We've played together too long to break apart now; but why talk about

it? It depends on Sylvia."

That was entirely true. For the present there was nothing whatever to be

done. Constantly George conquered the impulse to write to Sylvia, but

she didn't write or give any sign, unless Lambert's frequent quotations

from her letters could be accepted as thoughtful messages.

He visited the Baillys frequently now, for it was stimulating to talk

with Squibs, and he liked to sit quietly with Mrs. Bailly. She had an

unstudied habit, nevertheless, of turning his thoughts to his mother.

Sylvia had seen her. She knew all about her. After all, his mother had

given him the life with which he had accomplished something. He couldn't

bear that their continued separation should prove him inconsistent; so

early in the spring he went west.

His mother was more than ever ill at ease before his success; more than

ever appreciative of the comforts he had given her; even more than at

Oakmont appalled at the prospect of change. She wouldn't go east. She

couldn't very well, she explained; and, looking at her tired figure in

the great chair before the fire which she seldom left, he had an impulse

to shower upon her extravagant and fantastic gifts, because before long

it would be too late to give her anything at all. The picture made him

realize how quickly the generations pass away, drifting one into the

other with the rapidity of our brief and colourful seasons. He nodded,

satisfied, reflecting that the cure for everything lies in the future,

although one must seek it in the diseased present.

He left her, promising to come back, but he carried away a sensation

that he had intruded on a secluded content that couldn't possibly

survive the presence of the one who had created it.

Lambert had no news for him on his return. It was late spring, in fact,

before he told George the family had come north, pausing at a number of

resorts on the way up.

"When am I to see Sylvia, Lambert?"

"How should I know?"

It was apparent that he really didn't, and George waited, with a growing

doubt and fear, but on the following Friday he received a note from

Betty, dated from Princeton. All it said was:

"Spring's at its best here. You'd better come to-morrow--Friday."

He hurried over to the marble temple.

"You didn't tell me Betty was in Princeton," he accused Lambert.

"Must I account to you for the movements of my wife?"

"Then Sylvia----" George began.

Lambert smiled.

"Maybe you'd better run down to Princeton with me this afternoon."

George glanced at his watch.

"First train's at four o'clock. Let Wall Street crash. I shan't wait

another minute."

XXX

Betty had been right. Spring was fairly vibrant in Princeton, and for

George, through its warm and languid power, it rolled back the years;

choked him with a sensation of youth he had scarcely experienced since

he had walked defiantly out of the gate of Sylvia's home to commence his

journey.

Sylvia wasn't at the station. Neither was Betty. Abruptly uneasy, he

drove with Lambert swiftly to the Alstons through riotous, youthful

foliage out of which white towers rose with that reassuring illusion of

a serene and unchangeable gesture. Undergraduates, surrendered to the

new economic eccentricity of overalls, loafed past them, calling to each

other contented and lazy greetings; but George glanced at them

indifferently; he only wanted to hurry to his journey's end.

At the Tudor house Betty ran out to meet them, and Lambert grinned at

George and kissed her, but evidently it was George that Betty thought of

now, for she pointed, as if she had heard the question that repeated

itself in his mind, to the house; and he entered, and breathlessly

crossed the hall to the library, and saw Sylvia--the old Sylvia, it

occurred to him--colourful, imperious, and without patience.

She stood in the centre of the room in an eager, arrested attitude,

having, perhaps, restrained herself from impetuously following Betty.

George paused, staring at her, suddenly hesitant before the culmination

of his great desire.

"It's been so long," she whispered. "George, I'm not afraid to have you

touch me----You mean I must come to you----"

He shook off his lassitude, but the wonder grew.

As in a dream he went to her, and her curved lips moved beneath his, but

he pressed them closer so that she couldn't speak; for he felt

encircling them in a breathless embrace, as his arms held her, something

thrilling and rudimentary that neither of them had experienced before;

something quite beyond the comprehension of Sylvia Planter and George

Morton, that belonged wholly to the perplexing and abundant future.

THE END

BOOKS BY WADSWORTH CAMP

THE ABANDONED ROOM

THE GRAY MASK

THE GUARDED HEIGHTS

THE HOUSE OF FEAR

SINISTER ISLAND

WAR'S DARK FRAME