Martie, the Unconquered Part 21

"Oh, she wants anything she can get! She doesn't know that I'm married.

If she did, I suppose she might make herself unpleasant along that line!"

"But she has no claim on you! She married another man!"

"She says now that she never was married to Prendergast!"

"But she WAS!" Martie said hotly. Her voice dropped vaguely. Her eyes were fixed and gla.s.sy with growing apprehension. "Perhaps she was lying about that," she whispered, as if to herself.

"She'd lie about anything!" Wallace supplied.

"But if she wasn't, Wallace, if she wasn't--then would that second marriage cancel the first?" she asked feverishly.

"I should THINK so!" he answered. "Shouldn't you?"

"Shouldn't _I_?" she echoed, with her first flash of anger. "Why, what do _I_ know about it? What do _I_ know about it? I don't know anything!

You come to me with this now--NOW!"

"Don't talk like that!" he pleaded. "I feel--I feel awfully about it, Martie! I can't tell you how I feel! But the whole thing was so long ago it had sort of gone out of my mind. Every fellow does things that he's ashamed of, Mart--things that he's sorry for; but you always think that you'll marry some day, and have kids, and that the world will go on like it always has----"

The fire suddenly died out of Martie. In a deadly calm she sat back against her pillows, and began to gather up her ma.s.ses of loosened hair.

"If she is right----" she began, and stopped.

"She's not right, I tell you!" Wallace said. "She hasn't got a leg to stand on!"

"No," Martie conceded lifelessly, patiently. "But if she SHOULD be right----"

"But I tell you she isn't, Mart!"

"Yes, I know you do." The deadly gentleness was again in her voice. "I know you do!" she repeated mildly. "Only--only----" Her lip trembled despite her desperate effort, she felt her throat thicken and the tears come.

Instantly he was beside her again, and with her arms still raised she felt him put his own arms about her, and felt his penitent kisses through the veil of her hair. A sickness swept over her: they were here in the sacred intimacy of their own room, the room to which he had brought her as a bride only a few months before.

She freed herself with what dignity she could command. He asked her a hundred times if she loved him, if she could forgive him. Her one impulse was to silence him, to have him go away.

"I know--I know how you feel, Wallie! I'm sorry--for you and myself, and the whole thing! I'm terribly sorry! I--I don't know what we can do. I have to go away, of course; I can't stay here until we know; and you'll have to investigate, and find out just what she claims. I'll go to Sally, I suppose. People can think I've come up to help when the baby comes--I don't care what they think!"

"I thought you might go to Oakland for awhile," he agreed, gratefully; "but of course it'll be best to have you go to Sally--it'll only be for a few days. Mart, I feel rotten about it!"

"I know you do, Wallace," she answered nervously.

"To spring this on you--it's just rotten!"

Martie was silent. Her mind was in a whirl.

"Will you go out?" she asked simply. "I want to dress."

"What do you want me to go out for?" he asked, amazed.

Again his wife was silent. Her cheeks were bright scarlet, her eyes hard and dry. She looked at him steadily, and he got clumsily to his feet.

"Sure I'll go out!" he said stupidly. "I'll do anything you want me to.

I feel like a skunk about this--it had sort of slipped my mind, Mart!

Every fellow lets himself in for something like this."

Trapped. It was the one thought she had when he was gone, and when she had sprung feverishly from bed, and was quickly dressing. Trapped, in this friendly, comfortable room, where she had been so happy and so proud! She had been so innocently complacent over her state as this man's wife, she had planned for their future so courageously. Now she was--what? Now she was--what?

Just to escape somehow and instantly, that was the first wild impulse.

He was gone, but he was coming back: he must not find her here. She must disappear, n.o.body must ever find her. Sally and her father, Rose and Rodney must never know! Martie Monroe, married to a man who was married before, disgraced, exiled, lost. n.o.body knew that she was going to have a baby, but Monroe would surmise that.

Oh, fool--fool--fool that she had been to marry him so! But it was too late for that. She must face the situation now, and fret over the past some other day.

She had felt the thought of a return to Monroe intolerable: but quickly she changed her mind. Sally's home might be an immediate retreat, she could rest there, and plan there. Her sister was eagerly awaiting an answer to the letter in which she begged Martie to come to her for the month of the baby's birth.

Martie, packing frantically, glanced at the clock. It was two o'clock now, she could get the four o'clock boat. She would be in peaceful Monroe at seven. And after that----?

After that she did not know. Should she ever return to Wallace, under any circ.u.mstances? Should she tell Sally? Should she hide both Wallace's revelations and the morning's earlier hopes of motherhood?

Child that she was, she could not decide. She had had no preparation for these crises, she was sick with shock and terror. Married to a man who was already married--and perhaps to have a baby!

But she never faltered in her instant determination to leave him. If she was not his wife, at least she could face the unknown future far more bravely than the dubious present. If she had been wrong, she would not add more wrong.

With her bag packed, and her hat pinned on, she paused, and looked about the room. The window curtain flapped uncertainly, a gritty wind blew straight down Geary Street. The bed was unmade, the sweet orange peels still scented the air.

Martie suddenly flung her gloves aside, and knelt down beside her bed.

She had an impulse to make her last act in this room a prayer.

Wallace, pale and quiet, opened the door, and as she rose from her knees their eyes met. In a second they were in each other's arms, and Martie was sobbing on his shoulder.

"Mart--my darling little girl! I'm so sorry!"

"I know you are--I know you are!"

"It's only for a few days, dearie--until I settle her once and for all!"

"That's all!"

"And then you'll come back, and we'll go have Spanish omelette at the Poodle Dog, won't we?"

"Oh, Wallie, darling, I hope--I hope we will!"

She gasped on a long breath, and dried her eyes.

"How much money have you got, dearie?"

"About--I don't know. About four dollars, I think."

"Well, here--" He was all the husband again, stuffing gold pieces into her purse. "You're going down to the four boat? I'll take you down. And wire me when you get there, Martie, so I won't worry. And tell Sally I wish her luck, I'll certainly be glad to hear the news." They were at the doorway; he put his arm about her. "You DO love me, Mart?"