Janet of the Dunes Part 19

"I said, your model, the Pimpernel, told you? It must have given the little thing a bad half hour to be found out."

"It killed her childhood," the young man returned; "it died hard, and it wasn't pleasant for me to witness, but, thank G.o.d, the woman in her saved her soul from utter annihilation. Somehow, I have always wanted you and Katharine to know this."

"Thank you. You have told Katharine?"

"No, I'm leaving to-morrow. I'm going to tell Katharine to-morrow night.

I waited for her to speak first to me; I hoped she would to the last.

All might have been different if she only had."

"Perhaps Katharine is generous enough to forgive you unheard?" ventured Devant.

"No woman has a right to forgive a man in such a case, if she suspects what Katharine did!" The keen eyes drew together darkly.

"How do you know what Katharine thought, d.i.c.k?" The older man was growing anxious.

"A woman thinks only one thing, when she strikes that kind of a blow, Mr. Devant. The effect of the blow upon the object was proof enough of its character. I happened to be in at the death, you know."

"d.i.c.k, you're a man of the world; this sort of sentiment is not worthy of your intelligence. Katharine is a loving girl and naturally a bit jealous of you and your dissecting room. You must realize she had cause for surprise that day? Why, the little devil looked like a siren and the bare feet in the net were breathtaking. I think, under all the circ.u.mstances, for Katharine to overlook it in silence proves her a large-hearted woman."

"Or an indifferent, determined one!"

"d.i.c.k!"

"I feel rather more deeply, Mr. Devant, than you have, perhaps, imagined. This means much to me. I have never had but one ideal of womanhood that I have cared to bring into my inner life. My mother set my standard high."

"Your mother was an unusual woman, my boy."

"The unusual is what I have always admired."

"You are too young to be so unelastic."

"I'm too young to forego my ideal, Mr. Devant."

Presently Saxton entered the room with a tray of gla.s.ses and a bottle.

After he was gone, Mr. Devant took up the subject anxiously.

"I was your father's friend, d.i.c.k, your mother's too, for that matter. I do not want you to do a mad thing in the heat of resentment. Katharine Ogden is a rare woman, a woman who will be the one thing needful to make your success in life secure. Her fortune will place you above the necessity of struggling. You can paint as genius moves and give the public only your best. She is beautiful; she loves you, is proud of you, and knows the world, the world that may be yours, in every detail. She is your ideal, my boy, your ideal, lost for a moment in the fog."

Thornly listened, and suddenly Janet's simile recurred to him: "It comes to me just as Davy's Light comes of an early morning when the fog lifts!" The memory brought a tugging of the heartstrings.

"You have scattered the fog, Mr. Devant," he answered. "I own I was in rather a mist, but you bring things out most distinctly!"

"And you will not go to Katharine at once? You see I am presuming upon old friendship and a sincere liking for you."

"I only wish there were a night train!" Thornly gave vent to a long, relieved breath.

"You hold to your purpose, d.i.c.k? I feel that but for me this might not have occurred. I should have restrained the child that day."

"I shall tell Katharine all, Mr. Devant. I am sure she will ask me to release her from a tie that can be only galling for us both."

"You will be playing the fool, d.i.c.k,"--a note of anger rang in the deep voice,--"a fool, and something worse. Gentlemen do not play fast and loose with a woman like Katharine Ogden!"

"I am sorry you judge me so harshly." Thornly flushed. "I should hardly think myself worthy the name of man, if I followed any other course. To marry Katharine with this between us would be sheer folly. To refer to it must in itself bring about the result I expect. I have no desire to enter Katharine's world and she has no intention of adopting mine. She has always believed I would use my success as a step to mount to her.

That her world is less than mine has never occurred to her."

"But if the girl loves you?"

"She does not love _me_. Had she loved me, she must have spoken since--that day."

Mr. Devant arose uneasily and walked about the room, then he came back and drew his chair close to Thornly's.

"Will you take a gla.s.s of my--wine?" he asked huskily.

Thornly was about to decline, but changed his mind.

"Thanks, I will," he said instead. And the two sipped the port together.

"d.i.c.k, this has shaken me a bit. I feel that I have an ign.o.ble share in the whole affair. I'm getting to be an old man; I can claim certain privileges on that score, and if life means anything past forty, it means sharing its experiences with a friend. I'm going to speak of something that has never pa.s.sed my lips for nearly twenty years."

"You are very kind, Mr. Devant." Thornly set his gla.s.s down and thrust his hands in his pockets. "I appreciate your friendliness, but please do not give yourself pain. If life means anything under forty, it means getting your knocks at first hand." He tried to smile pleasantly, but his face fell at once into gloomy, set lines.

"I'm afraid," Mr. Devant went on, keeping his eyes upon his companion's face and guiding himself thereby, "I'm afraid some Quixotic idea of defending this little pimpernel of ours moves you to take this step.

Believe me, nothing you can do in that direction--unless indeed you have gone too far already--can avail, if you seek the girl's happiness."

A deep flush rose to Thornly's cheeks, but the proud uplift of the head renewed hope in the older man's heart.

"You say," he continued, toying with his gla.s.s, "that to drag Katharine from her world would be ruinous to her; to drag this child of the dunes from her world would be--to put it none too harshly--h.e.l.l! I've looked the girl's antecedents up since that day on the Hills. I've had my bad moments, I can a.s.sure you. It's like trying to draw water out of an empty well to get anything against their own from these people down here; but I had hopes of the girl's mother. I pin my faith to ancestry, and I am willing to build on a very small foundation, providing the soil is good. But the mother in no wise accounts for the daughter. She was a simple, uneducated woman, with rather an unpleasant way of shunning her kind. James B. Smith, my gardener, permitted me to wring this from him.

He doesn't fancy Captain Billy Morgan, thinks him rather a saphead. He hinted at a necessity for the marriage of this same Billy and the girl's mother. It's about the one sin the Quintonites know as a sin. They come as near going back upon each other for that transgression as they ever come to anything definite. The girl is the offspring of a stupid surf-man and a nondescript sort of woman. She is not the product of any known better stock; she is, well, a freak of nature! You cannot transplant that kind of flower, d.i.c.k. The roots are hid in shallow soil of a peculiar kind. If you planted her in, well, in even your artistic world, she would either die, shrivel up, and be finished, or she might spread her roots, and finish you! I've seen more than one such case."

Thornly shook himself, as if doubtful what he should reply to this man who, above all else, in his own fashion, was trying to prove himself a friend.

"Thank you again, Mr. Devant," he said at last haltingly; "I suppose all men as old as you are sincere when they try to help us younger chaps by knocking us senseless in an hour of danger. But it's better to let us see and know the danger; we'll recognize it the next time. All I can say is, that I have formed no plans for after to-morrow night! I've got to get out into the open if I can. I rather imagine my art must satisfy me in the future."

Devant went over to a desk between two bookcases, opened it, and took something from a private drawer.

"What do you think of this?" he asked, handing Thornly an old photograph.

"I should say,"--the younger man looked keenly at the picture,--"I should say that it was an almost ideal face of a certain type."

"Of a certain type, yes." Devant came closer and leaned over his companion's shoulder. "The coloring, of course, is lacking. I never saw such glorious hair and eyes. The eyes gave promise of a n.o.bility the woman-nature utterly lacked. That girl, d.i.c.k, has wrecked my life!"

Thornly handed the photograph to Devant. He felt as if he were in some way reading a private letter.

"Your life does not seem a wrecked life," he said confusedly. In a vague way he wished to repress a confidence that he felt, once told, might wield an influence over his own acts, and this his independence resented. "You have always appeared a thoroughly contented, successful man."

Devant laughed bitterly; then he idly placed the photograph in a book and closed the covers upon the exquisite face. Thornly hoped that would end the matter, but his companion was bent upon his course. He stretched his feet toward the fire and looked into the heart of the glow, with sad, brooding eyes.

"Happy!" he e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed, "happy! It is only youth that estimates happiness by superficialities. A smile, a laugh, a full pocketbook! You think they mean happiness?"