Excuse Me! Part 11

"Oh, Arthur, I'm so afraid."

"Afraid?" he sniffed. "With your husband here?"

"That's the trouble, Arthur. What if your former wife should find us together?"

"But she and I are divorced."

"In some states, yes--but other states don't acknowledge the divorce.

That former wife of yours is a fiend to pursue us this way."

"She's no worse than your former husband. He's pursuing us, too. My divorce was as good as yours, my dear."

"Yes, and no better."

The angels looking on might have judged from the ready tempers of the newly married and not entirely unmarried twain that their new alliance promised to be as exciting as their previous estates. Perhaps the man subtly felt the presence of those eternal eavesdroppers, for he tried to end the love-duel in the corridor with an appeasing caress and a tender appeal: "But let's not start our honeymoon with a quarrel."

His partial wife returned the caress and tried to explain: "I'm not quarreling with you, dear heart, but with the horrid divorce laws.

Why, oh, why did we ever interfere with them?"

He made a brave effort with: "We ended two unhappy marriages, Edith, to make one happy one."

"But I'm so unhappy, Arthur, and so afraid."

He seemed a trifle afraid himself and his gaze was askance as he urged: "But the train will start soon, Edith--and then we shall be safe."

Mrs. Fosd.i.c.k had a genius for inventing unpleasant possibilities.

"But what if your former wife or my former husband should have a detective on board?"

"A detective?--poof!" He snapped his fingers in bravado. "You are with your husband, aren't you?"

"In Illinois, yes," she admitted, very dolefully. "But when we come to Iowa, I'm a bigamist, and when we come to Nebraska, you're a bigamist, and when we come to Wyoming, we're not married at all."

It was certainly a tangled web they had woven, but a ray of light shot through it into his bewildered soul. "But we're all right in Utah.

Come, dearest."

He took her by the elbow to escort her into their sanctuary, but still she hung back.

"On one condition, Arthur--that you leave me as soon as we cross the Iowa state line, and not come back till we get to Utah. Remember, the Iowa state line!"

"Oh, all right," he smiled. And seeing the porter, he beckoned him close and asked with careless indifference: "Oh, Porter, what time do we reach the Iowa state line?"

"Two fifty-five in the mawning, sah."

"Two fifty-five A.M.?" the wretch exclaimed.

"Two fifty-five A.M., ya.s.sah," the porter repeated, and wondered why this excerpt from the time-table should exert such a dramatic effect on the luscious-eyed Fosd.i.c.k.

He had small time to meditate the puzzle, for the train was about to be launched upon its long voyage. He went out to the platform, and watched a couple making that way. As their only luggage was a dog-basket he supposed that they were simply come to bid some of his pa.s.sengers good-bye. No tips were to be expected from such transients, so he allowed them to help themselves up the steps.

Mallory and his Marjorie had tried to kiss the farewell of farewells half a dozen times, but she could not let him go at the gate. She asked the guard to let her through, and her beauty was bribe enough.

Again and again, she and Mallory paused. He wanted to take her back to the taxicab, but she would not be so dismissed. She must spend the last available second with him.

"I'll go as far as the steps of the car," she said. When they were arrived there, two porters, a sleeping car conductor and several smoking saunterers profaned the tryst. So she whispered that she would come aboard, for the corridor would be a quiet lane for the last rites.

And now that he had her actually on the train, Mallory's whole soul revolted against letting her go. The vision of her standing on the platform sad-eyed and lorn, while the train swept him off into s.p.a.ce was unendurable. He shut his eyes against it, but it glowed inside the lids.

And then temptation whispered him its old "Why not?" While it was working in his soul like a fermenting yeast, he was saying:

"To think that we should owe all our misfortune to an infernal taxicab's break-down."

Out of the anguish of her loneliness crept one little complaint:

"If you had really wanted me, you'd have had two taxicabs."

"Oh, how can you say that? I had the license bought and the minister waiting."

"He's waiting yet."

"And the ring--there's the ring." He fished it out of his waistcoat pocket and held it before her as a golden amulet.

"A lot of good it does now," said Marjorie. "You won't even wait over till the next train."

"I've told you a thousand times, my love," he protested, desperately, "if I don't catch the transport, I'll be courtmartialed. If this train is late, I'm lost. If you really loved me you'd come along with me."

Her very eyes gasped at this astounding proposal.

"Why, Harry Mallory, you know it's impossible."

Like a sort of benevolent Satan, he laid the ground for his abduction: "You'll leave me, then, to spend three years without you--out among those Manila women."

She shook her head in terror at this vision. "It would be too horrible for words to have you marry one of those mahogany sirens."

He held out the apple. "Better come along, then."

"But how can I? We're not married."

He answered airily: "Oh, I'm sure there's a minister on board."

"But it would be too awful to be married with all the pa.s.sengers gawking. No, I couldn't face it. Good-bye, honey."

She turned away, but he caught her arm: "Don't you love me?"

"To distraction. I'll wait for you, too."

"Three years is a long wait."

"But I'll wait, if you will."