Before the Dawn Part 57

"Real love knows no such uses," she said, and then she rose from her chair, adding:

"I shall not listen any longer, Mr. Sefton. You remind me of my position, and it is well, perhaps, that I do not forget it. It may be, then, that I have not listened to you too long."

"And I," he replied, "if I have spoken roughly I beg your pardon. I could wish that my words were softer, but my meaning must remain the same."

He bowed courteously--it was the suave Secretary once more--and then he left her.

Lucia Catherwood sat, dry-eyed and motionless, for a long time, gazing at the opposite wall and seeing nothing there. She asked herself now why she had come back to Richmond. To be with Miss Grayson, her next of kin, and because she had no other place? That was the reason she had given to herself and others--but was it the whole reason?

Now she wished that she had never seen Richmond. The first visit had ended in disaster, and the second in worse. She hated the sight of Richmond. What right had she among these people who were not hers? She was a stranger, a foreigner, of another temperament, another cast of thought.

Her mind flitted over the threats, open and veiled, of the Secretary, but she had little fear for herself. There she had the power to fight, and her defiant spirit would rise to meet such a conflict. But this other! She must sit idle and let it go on. She was surprised at her sudden power of hatred, which was directed full against a woman in whose eyes--even in moments of peace--there were lurking green tints.

He had done much for her! Well, she had done as much for him and hence there was no balance between them. She resolved to cast him out wholly, to forget him, to make him part of a past that was not only dead but forgotten. But she knew even as she took this resolution that she feared the Secretary because she believed it lay within his power to ruin Prescott.

The door was opened and Miss Grayson came quietly into the room. She was a cool, soothing little person. Troubles, if they did not die, at least became more tolerable in her presence. She sat in silence sewing, but observed Lucia's face and knew that she was suffering much or it would not show in the countenance of one with so strong a will.

"Has Mr. Sefton been gone long?" she asked after awhile.

"Yes, but not long enough."

Miss Grayson said nothing and Miss Catherwood was the next to interrupt the silence.

"Charlotte," she said, "I intend to leave Richmond at once."

"Leaving Richmond is not a mere holiday trip now," said Miss Grayson.

"There are formalities, many and difficult."

"But I must go!" exclaimed Miss Catherwood vehemently, all her anger and grief flashing out--it seemed to her that the gates suddenly opened. "I tell you I must leave this city! I hate everything in it, Charlotte, except you! I am sorry that I ever saw it!"

Miss Grayson went on calmly with her sewing.

"I shall not let you go," she said in her quiet, even voice. "I could have endured life without you had I never had you, but having had you I cannot. I shall not let you go. You must think of me now, Lucia, and not of yourself."

Miss Grayson looked up and smiled. The smile of an old maid, not herself beautiful, can be very beautiful at times.

"See what a burden I am," Miss Catherwood protested. "We nearly starved once."

Then she blushed--blushed most beautifully, thinking of a certain round gold piece, still unspent.

"You are no burden at all, but a support. I shall have money enough until this war ends. The Confederate Government, you know, Lucia, paid me for the confiscations--not as much as they were worth, but as much as I could expect--and we have been living on it."

The face of Lucia Catherwood altered. It expressed a singular tenderness as she looked at Miss Grayson, so soft, so small and so gray.

"Charlotte," she said, "I wish that I were as good as you. You are never excited, pa.s.sionate or angry. You always know what you ought to do and you always do it."

Miss Grayson looked up again and her eyes suddenly sparkled.

"You make a mistake, a great mistake, Lucia," she said. "It is only the people who do wrong now and then who are really good. Those of us who do right all the time merely keep in that road because we cannot get out of it. I think it's a lack of temperament--there's no variety about us. And oh, Lucia, I tell you honestly, I get so tired of keeping forever in the straight and narrow path merely because it's easiest for me to walk that way. I don't mean to be sacrilegious, but I think that all the rejoicing in Heaven over the hundredth man who has sinned and repented was not because he had behaved well at last, but because he was so much more interesting than all the other ninety-nine put together. I wish I had your temper and impulses, Lucia, that I might flash into anger now and then and do something rash--something that I should be sorry for later on, but which in my secret heart I should be glad I had done. Oh, I get so tired of being just a plain, goody-goody little woman who will always do the right thing in the most uninteresting way; a woman about whom there is no delightful uncertainty; a woman on whom you can always reckon just as you would on the figure 4 or 6 or any other number in mathematics. I am like such a figure--a fixed quant.i.ty, and that is why I, Charlotte Grayson, am just a plain little old maid."

She had risen in her vehemence, but when she finished she sank back into her chair and a faint, delicate pink bloomed in her face. Miss Charlotte Grayson was blushing! Lucia was silent, regarding her. She felt a great flood of tenderness for this prim, quiet little woman who had, for a rare and fleeting moment, burst her sh.e.l.l. Miss Grayson had always accepted so calmly and so quietly the life which seemed to have been decreed for her that it never before occurred to Lucia to suppose any tempestuous feelings could rise in that breast; but she was a woman like herself, and the tie that bound them, already strong, suddenly grew stronger.

"Charlotte," she said, placing her hand gently upon the old maid's shoulder, "it seems to me sometimes that G.o.d has not been quite fair to women. He gives us too little defense against our own hearts."

"Best discard them entirely," said Miss Grayson briskly. "Come, Lucia, you promised to help me with my sewing."

CHAPTER XXVIII

THE WAY OUT

Prescott at three o'clock the following afternoon knocked on the door of Mr. Sefton's private office and the response "Come in!" was like his knock, crisp and decisive. Prescott entered and shut the door behind him. The Secretary had been sitting by the window, but he rose and received his guest courteously, extending his hand.

Prescott took the proffered hand. He had learned to look upon the Secretary as his enemy, but he found himself unable to hate him.

"We had an interview in this room once before," said the Secretary, "and it was not wholly unfriendly."

"That is true," replied Prescott, "and as the subject that I have to propose now is of a somewhat kindred nature I hope that we may keep the same tone."

"It rests with you, my dear Captain," said the Secretary meaningly.

Prescott was somewhat embarra.s.sed. He scarcely knew how to begin.

"I came to ask a favour," he said at last.

"The willingness to bestow favours does not always imply the power."

"It is true," said Prescott; "but in this case the will may go with the power. I have come to speak to you of Lucia Catherwood."

"What of her?" asked the Secretary sharply. He was betrayed into a momentary interruption of his habitual calm, but settled himself into his seat and looked keenly across the table at his rival, trying to guess the young man's plan of campaign. Calculating upon the basis of what he himself would do in the same position, he could form no conclusion.

"I have come to speak on her account," continued Prescott, "and though I may be somewhat involved, I wish it to be distinctly understood that I am not to be considered. I ask no favour for myself."

"I see that you have brought your pride with you," said the Secretary dryly.

Prescott flushed a little.

"I trust that I always have it with me," he said.

"We are frank with each other."

"It is best so, and I have come for yet plainer speaking. I am well aware, Mr. Sefton, that you know all there is to be known concerning Miss Catherwood and myself."

"'All' is a large statement."