Claire Part 19

she continued. "I need one, a big, strong man whom I can trust, whom I know to be my loyal friend and my husband's friend."

He put out his hand, shame and love mingling in his face.

"I will be that friend, Claire," he said, earnestly.

She took his hand, her mind breaking with relief. She felt she was going to cry, and she leaned forward to hide her filling eyes.

"Oh, Philip, G.o.d bless you! You do not know what this means to me! You will never know. I thank you, I thank you!"

The tears rushed down her cheeks and dropped upon their clasped hands.

"Claire, don't, please--please don't," Philip pleaded, anguish in his tone.

She stopped, forced back her sobs, and smiled at him.

"Philip Ortez," she said, "I shall make you glad of this."

Deep in his heart, the words gave him hope. He grasped at them as a drowning man at a life-belt, but he did not voice the hope.

"I want to spend much of my time with you, Philip, in the out-of-doors.

I must do it, and it is such a relief to know that I can do it without--without fear. You will be just my friend, won't you?"

"If it is in my power, I will." He spoke as a knight of old, taking a holy vow, and in his heart was the deep, sacred sense of the spirit that still moved in his idealistic soul.

Claire laughed joyously, almost hysterically, with the peace that came over her at the sound of his words. She was sure that all was well. If she had known that already he was building on the promise of frequent days alone, she would have been more afraid than ever. But she did not know that, neither did she know that in her very promise she was preparing a more difficult situation for her own struggle with herself than any she had ever faced in her life. She was only aware of the crisis pa.s.sed and the peace that was now hers.

"Let us go back," she said gaily.

They found Lawrence smoothing his little carved child with a stone.

Claire was effervescent with joy. Her great plan seemed sure of success, and she greeted him with a gaiety that was as abnormal as her despondency had been before.

"Lawrence," she cried, "we have had such a walk! And here you have finished for us this beautiful cherub as the symbol of our little home."

Her words stung him with savage pain, filling him with a great fear born of love and jealousy. For a minute he did not know what he was doing or saying, and he was scarcely aware of the words that fell from him.

"Cherubs are said to be symbols of the greatest love." He laughed tonelessly. "It belongs to you, Claire. Take it."

The child was carved standing upon a stump with wings outspread. In the form and face of the figure there was so much of benevolence, love, and charity that the imaginative power of this blind artist filled Claire with awe. She stood reverently before it, her heart singing with pride in the handiwork of the man she loved. She interpreted his words as a confession that he had carved it for her as a symbol of his love, and she was humbled before him, before his work. She wanted to throw herself in his arms and to tell him with the gift of her unreserved self how grateful she was for his gift, but she only said, very softly, taking both his hands: "Thank you, Lawrence."

The words struck his ear with a strangely mixed power in their sound. He wanted to laugh at the bitter mockery that swept into him. He had made the image for love of her, and he presented it to her as a symbol of her love for Philip. It was cruel, but he could endure it. Oh, yes, he was accustomed to life's little jokes. He did not answer her thanks, only gripped her hands in his own capable ones till he hurt her.

To Philip, the child brought still other suggestions. Moved by his present feeling of great, chivalrous guardianship of the woman who had said she needed him, he felt that it was a symbol of the great sacrificial love which he was privileged to know, and at the same time he felt that it was a symbol of hope.

TO BE CONTINUED NEXT WEEK. Don't forget this magazine is issued weekly, and that you will get the continuation of this story without waiting a month.

Claire

by Leslie Burton Blades

THE BLIND LOVE OF A BLIND HERO

_BY A BLIND AUTHOR_

This story began in the All-Story Weekly for October 5.

CHAPTER XII.

THE UNHORSING OF A KNIGHT ERRANT.

Between men and women who have established what they believe to be an unemotional friendship there nearly always springs up a relation franker than any which is otherwise possible. Such was the experience of Philip and Claire during the days that followed. They took many walks together, and their conversation grew daily more exclusive and more personal.

Lawrence, through ignorance of their situation and jealousy of Philip, grew daily more dissatisfied. He would hear the intimate ring in their voices and writhe within. The artist felt keenly that he was being set aside, and his eager determination to live and be in the front rank of warring manhood made him determine to win Claire against this man who, it seemed to him, was taking her from him by mere advantage of sight. He felt that they were shelving him as a blind man, a very nice fellow, but quite outside the possibility of any relation with their real lives. He now thought that Claire was kind to him as one is to those whose situation makes them objects of pity.

There were days when he sat alone before the fire in the cabin brooding until he was filled with savage hatred of Philip. He would think of all sorts of impossible means of eliminating this Spaniard from Claire's life; then Philip would come in, talk to him, seem so very normally friendly as man to man, that his reason mastered his fancies and he laughed at himself. He ridiculed his own thoughts with an irony that inwardly grew in bitterness with his growing love for Claire, and he would end by admitting that Philip was only doing what he himself would like to do.

In his fair-minded moments he did not blame his friend. "I should be a fool to expect him to act differently," he told himself. "In this struggle for meat and mate which we all wage, he is doing what any one would do. I who am losing must at least be just to him." He resolved to be just, and in a little while was again ensnaring himself in his own notions. "She is throwing herself away upon this Spaniard," he thought, "while I sit by. If I were not blind, she would see that after all I am the better man. I put all my power into the carving of that little statue, and she knows it is good, better than anything he has done or can do, and yet--she loves him."

He would rise and walk the floor in his tension, knocking into the chairs recklessly. His thoughts would gain speed from his bodily movement, and soon he would rage against the man whose guest he was, against Claire, against life, fate, and blindness. Then suddenly his ever self-questioning mind would demand of him, "Why are you doing nothing, then?" He did nothing because he could do nothing. That was his answer, no sooner made than contradicted, no sooner contradicted than to be restated, "I do nothing because I will do nothing."

Several times he refused to go with them on tramps or skiing trips. When they were gone he would revile himself for his stubbornness and ache because Claire could not see that he had refused with a petulant boy's hope that she would stay with him. "Why should she stay with me?" There was no reason, he told himself, and again he would be off on a mental whirlwind that carried him still farther from reason. He became perpetually sullen, irritable, and discontented. He realized it, thought that Claire would certainly grow to dislike him if he continued so disagreeable, and with the thought became even more disagreeable.

Claire, however, was not growing to dislike him. She avoided him in pursuance of her settled policy, but she thought of him all the more.

One morning when she and Philip were out in the pines together, she observed, casually, "Lawrence doesn't seem to be doing any work these days."

Philip glanced at her carelessly. "Yes. I'm very sorry for the poor fellow."

His pity angered her a little. Lawrence did not need his sympathy. "I think he must be feeling badly," she replied.

"I believe he is moody by nature."

"Oh, do you? I hadn't thought so," she objected.

"It is not strange," Philip went on; "he is so limited by his blindness and so ambitious that the effect is almost sure to be a disgruntled mind. He cannot hope to overcome his blindness, and he ought to realize it. I think that is the cause of his odd philosophy. He certainly would be happier if he could get a more sunlit view of things. He needs optimism, and he ought to practise it."

For a moment, Claire was silent. She was not willing to admit that Lawrence was unable to conquer blindness or even that his beliefs were altogether wrong. She had more often disagreed with him than not, but now for some reason she found herself desiring to support his convictions.

"I don't agree with you," she answered Philip, a little shortly.

"Well then, what is my lady's diagnosis?" He had not noticed her curt reply, for he was thinking of something else and was not really interested in Lawrence as a topic of conversation.