Fran Part 25

"I remember how you looked, with the moonlight silvering your face-- you were just beautiful that night, little Nonpareil!"

"But not quite so in daylight," murmured Fran wickedly, "as this morning?"

"Anyway," he answered desperately, "you look as I'd have you look--can you ask more than that, since I can't?"

"My chin is so sharp," she murmured.

"Yes," he said, softly feeling the warm little fingers, one by one, as if to make sure all were there. "That's the way I like it--sharp."

"And I'm so ridiculously thin--"

"You're nothing like so thin as when you first came to Littleburg," he declared. "I've noticed how you are--have been--I mean..."

"Filling out?" cried Fran gleefully. "Oh, yes, and I'm so glad you know, because since I've been wearing long dresses, I've been afraid you'd never find it out, and would always be thinking of me as you saw me at the beginning. But I am--yes--filling out."

"And your little feet, Fran--"

"Yes, I always had a small foot. But let's get off of this subject."

"Not until I say something about your smile--oh, Fran, that smile!"

"The subject, now," remarked Fran, "naturally returns to Grace Noir."

"Please, Fran!"

"Yes--and I am going to say something to offend you; but honestly, Abbott, it's for your good. If you'll keep holding my hand, I'll know you can stand unpleasant truths. When you hold my hand, it seems to make everything so--so close."

"Everything is!" Abbott declared.

"I'll tell you why you hurt my feelings, Abbott. You've disappointed me twice. Oh, if I were a man, I'd show any meek-faced little hypocrite if she could prize secrets out of me. Just because it wears dresses and long hair, you think it an angel."

"Meaning Miss Grace, I presume?" remarked Abbott dryly. "But what is the secret, this time?"

"Didn't I trust you with the secret that I meant to apply for the position of secretary as soon as Grace Noir was out of the way? And I was just about to win the fight when here she came--hadn't been to the city at all, because you told her what I meant to do--handed her the secret, like a child giving up something it doesn't want."

"You are very unjust. I did not tell her your plan. I don't know how she found it out."

"From you; n.o.body else knew it."

"She did not learn it from me."

"--And that's what gets me!--you tell her everything, and don't even know that you tell. Just hypnotized! Answer my questions: the morning after I told you what I meant to do--standing there at the fence by the gate--confiding in you, telling you everything--I say, the next morning, didn't you tell Grace Noir all about it?"

"Certainly not."

"You had a conversation with her, didn't you?"

Abbott tried to remember, then said casually, "I believe we did meet on the street that morning."

"Yes," said Fran ironically, "I believe you did meet _somewhere._ Of course she engaged you in her peculiar style of inquisitorial conversation?"

"We went down the street together."

"Now, prisoner at the bar, relate all that was said while going down the street together."

"Most charming, but unjust judge, not a word that I can remember, so it couldn't have been of any interest. I did tell her that since she-- yes, I remember now--since she was to be out of town all day, I would wait until to-morrow to bring her a book she wanted to borrow."

"Oh! And then she wanted to know who told you she would be out of town all day, didn't she?"

Abbott reflected deeply, then said with triumph, "Yes, she did. I remember that, too. She asked me how I knew she was going to the city with Bob Clinton. And I avoided telling her--it was rather neat. I merely said that it was the understanding they were to select the church music. Not another word was said on the subject."

"That was enough. Mighty neat. As soon as she saw you were trying to avoid a direct answer, she knew I'd told you. That gave her a clue to my leaving the choir practice before the rest of them. She guessed something important was up. She might not have guessed all the details, but she didn't dare leave me an open field. Well, Abbott, you are certainly an infant in her hands, but I guess you can't help it."

Self-pride was touched, and he retaliated:

"Fran, I hate to think of your being willing to take her position behind her back."

She crimsoned.

"You'd know how I feel about it," he went on, "if you understood her better. I know her duty drives her to act in opposition to you, and I'm sorry for it. But her religious ideals--"

"Abbott, be honest and answer--is there anything in it--this talk of doing G.o.d's will? Can people love G.o.d and hate one another? Oh, isn't it all just _words?"_ Her eyes burned fiercely. "I wouldn't _have_ the love that some folks give G.o.d, I'd feel myself insulted! I want something better than He gets. I want a love that holds out. I just hate shams," she went on, becoming more excited. "I don't care what fine names you give them--whether it's marriage, or education, or culture, or religion, if there's no heart in it, it's a sham, and I hate it. I hate a lie. But a thousand times more, do I hate a life that is a lie."

"Fran! You don't know what you are saying."

"Yes I do know what I'm saying. Is religion going to church? That's all I can see in it. I want to believe there's something else, I've honestly searched, for I wanted to be comforted, I tell you, I _need_ it. But I can't find any comfort in mortar and stained-windows. If lightning _ever_ strikes a church-member between services, is his face toward G.o.d? No, people just name something religion,--and then it's wrong to find fault with it. I want something that makes a man true to his wife, and makes a family live together in blessed harmony, something that's good on the streets and in the stores, something that makes people even treat a show-girl well. If there's anything in it, why doesn't a father--"

She s.n.a.t.c.hed away her hand that she might cover her face, for she had burst into pa.s.sionate weeping. "Why doesn't a father who's always talking about religion, and singing about it, and praying about it-- why doesn't that father draw his daughter to his breast...close, close to his heart--that's the only home she asks for--that's the home she has a right to, yes a right, I don't care how far she's wandered-- "

"Fran!" cried Abbott, in great distress. "Don't cry, little one!" He had no intelligent word, but his arm was full of meaning as it slipped about her. "Who has been unkind to you, Nonpareil?" She let her head sink upon his shoulder, as she sobbed without restraint. "What shams have pierced your pure heart? Am I the cause of any of these tears? Am I?"

"Yes," Fran answered, between her sobs, "you're the cause of all my happy tears." She nestled there with a movement of perfect trust; he drew her closer, and stroked her hair tenderly, trusting himself.

Presently she pulled herself to rights, lifted his arm from about her, and rested it on the back of the seat--a friendly compromise. Then she shook back her hair and raised her eyes and a faint smile came into the rosy face. "I'm so funny," she declared. "Sometimes I seem so strange that I need an introduction to myself." She looked into Abbott's eyes fleetingly, and drew in the corners of her mouth. "I guess, after all, there's something in religion!"

Abbott was so warmed by returning sunshine that his eyes shone. "Dear Fran!" he said--it was very hard to keep his arm where she had put it.

She tried to look at him steadily, but somehow the light hurt her eyes. She could feel its warmth burning her cheeks.

"Oh, Fran," cried Abbott impulsively, "the bridge in the moonlight was nothing to the way you look now--so beautiful--and so much more than just beautiful..."

"This won't do," Fran exclaimed, hiding her face. "We must get back to Grace Noir immediately."

"Oh, Fran, oh, no, _please!"_

"I won't please. While we're in Sure-Enough Country, I mean to tell you the whole truth about Grace Noir." The name seemed to settle the atmosphere--she could look at him, now.

"I want you to understand that something is going to happen--must happen, just from the nature of things, and the nature of wives and husbands--and the other woman. Oh, you needn't frown at me, I've seen you look that _other_ way at me, so I know you, Abbott Ashton."

"Fran! Then you know that I--"