Nobody's Child Part 32

Baird had winced; so she knew all that history, doubtless far better than he did. Then his jaw set, and he quoted her own words, "But she's young and so am I. And as I'm good at both fighting and waiting, I generally win out."

"I hope you will," Judith said, with an instant return to her usual manner. "There is no one whom I'd rather see happy."

After the first flash of anger Baird forgave her the thrust. He had been rather brutal. Still it had been a necessary brutality; unless there was a distinct understanding, he could not continue his visits. Baird judged that Judith would not again swerve from the att.i.tude she had adopted, and he was right. He genuinely liked and admired Judith Westmore. He admired the strength of will that enabled her to go on playing the role she had chosen; she was a pretty splendid sort. And he was profoundly sorry for her; she'd had a beastly hard row to hoe, and had hoed it well. He took off his hat to her!

But Baird did not take his depression and his fears to Judith. When he was "down," he rode for miles into the country, often until late at night. He thought continuously of Ann. He was convinced that she had been a more potential factor in the Westmore tragedy than any one dreamed. Baird wondered endlessly whether Ann was not suffering as much from remorse as from grief. He had long ago decided that she was both elusive and compelling, the type that gives little and receives much, the sort of woman who drives a man to fight for all he receives.

Certainly two men had struggled for her, and, Baird was convinced, had died because of her. And he himself! He had fought for her against death itself, and was still fighting.... Well, he liked to fight; he had never treasured anything that came easy.

From the beginning of time men have yielded to the women they think potential, a fascinated interest that may or may not be love. Certainly when coupled with desire it is an irresistible force. When allied to tenderness, it is the blind worship which has urged men to most of the chivalrously romantic acts in history.

Baird told himself that he had sensed the potential in Ann, on the day when he had captured a kiss. She had drawn him away from Judith and had compelled him even when he knew perfectly well that her thoughts were with one or the other of those two. She had compelled him to put up the stiffest fight he had ever made, an actual grapple with death. It might seem to others that he was infatuated with a girl of no importance whatever, but he knew better: Ann's surroundings were an accident--by right of innate superiority, she belonged to Judith's cla.s.s, and Edward had realized that, too. No, he was held and compelled and overwhelmingly in love with a potential woman.

Perhaps Baird was simply laboring under the hallucination usual with lovers, which urges them to swathe the objects of their affection with an interest quite indiscernible to the sane-minded. Possibly the tragedy in which Ann was involved and the fact that she almost certainly owed her life to him had touched an imaginative strain in him. It is more likely that, like Edward, he was a shrewd judge of character and that, despite her youth and her simple rearing, Ann did possess potentiality; that eventually she might even emerge a gifted woman.

However that may be, certainly no lover came into the presence of the woman he loved with more profound sensations than stirred Baird when at last Ben brought him to Ann. "You can come on in," Ben said. "She says she wants to thank you."

When Baird's eyes leaped to her, he lost the power of speech, for illness and grief had worked havoc: they had thinned her face until it looked small and pinched, had set immense circles about her eyes, destroyed the softness of lips and chin; her hair appeared to be the only unchanged thing about her, a black ma.s.s crowning the pillow.

Ann lifted to his clasp a hand that seemed as fragile as a bird's claw, but her voice had not changed, the old soft drawl enlivened by the well-remembered touches of coquetry and aloofness: "Ben says you saved my life--and I can't ever pay off that debt, can I? Not unless I save yours some time. I'll have to be always watching out for the chance, but all I can do now is just to say, 'Thank you--thank you very much,' an'

not talk any more about it."

A light answer was quite beyond Baird. For almost the first time in his life he was pretty thoroughly tongue-tied. "I wish you weren't so ill,"

he said simply.

She smiled at him, a parting of colorless lips over white teeth. "Ben says young things get well quicker than old ones. He says funny things to me, an' some of them I reckon are wise things. He said yesterday, that, if a man had any heart left at all after he had done playing with it, he didn't really know nothin' about what kind of a heart it was till he was forty, an' that a woman, whether she had a heart or not, 'never knows nothin' about it at all.'"

Baird was permeated by an aching disappointment. Ann had seen what lay in his eyes, and on the instant had donned a mask and interposed a shield. She had confessed to a debt, that was all. She wanted none of him; Judith could not have conveyed the impression any more skilfully.

From somewhere within himself Baird managed to bring forth what strove to be a light sentence: "Ben's a pretty good second father to you, isn't he?"

"Yes--I reckon he is--" Then, suddenly, her mask slipped. Her eyes widened, filled to overflowing with grief and pain--then closed. The tears gathered beneath her lashes and rolled down her cheeks, until a storm of sobs caught her and shook her.

Shocked and bewildered, Baird bent over her. He was never able to remember just what he said, only that he tried to lift her up and that Ben made him put her down, then drew him out of the room.

"She ain't fit to talk!" Ben said forcibly. "Jest you go on along, an'

come another time!"

Baird went out and rode for miles, until long after dark. He would have carried his wretchedness to bed with him had he not returned through the Penniman place. Ben was lounging by the gate.

"Well?" Baird asked dully.

"She's right smart better," Ben growled.

"She _is_!"

"Um."

Then Ben explained. "Women's nerves is like plants--they needs water.

I've been wishin' this long time that Ann's would get rained on....

She's jest naturally cried herself to sleep."

"And you think it's done her good?" Baird asked doubtfully.

"I do.... When she asks me to fetch her the lookin'-gla.s.s, I'll rest easy."

Baird felt rather than saw the twinkle in Ben's eyes, and he laughed from sheer relief, the first time he had laughed in weeks.

He went on to the club and wrote to Dempster, asking him for a month's vacation. "You see," Baird wrote, "the girl I love and mean to marry--if I can get her--has been next door to death. There seems to be a chance for her now, and a month will mean a lot to me."

x.x.xVI

"IT LIES WITH ANN"

Baird was granted his holiday. He would have taken it, despite consequences, but it was better to have gained it in this way. Dempster, who was a rough but kindly sort, had written: "All right, take the month, but don't you fail me in August. Make the best of it and bring her back with you--we'll welcome her."

Baird had laid the letter down with a groan. "Bring her back with me! If he knew how hard I'm up against it!" Nevertheless, he made his daily visit to the Penniman house.

Ann was certainly improving. By the first of July she was able to sit on the porch, even to walk as far as the terraces. But not with Baird.

Baird was very certain that neither Coats nor Sue nor Ben was responsible for his not being allowed to see Ann again. He felt that all three were friendly to him and to his suit, for there was no mistaking his intention.

"He's desperately in love with her," Sue said to Coats. "I'm sorry for him when I have to tell him that Ann doesn't feel well enough to see him. It hurts me the way he looks at me."

"Yes, he's wretched," Coats agreed, "but I've nothing to say one way or the other. It lies entirely with Ann. He's a good sort and he's open-minded, but there are things may daunt even him. Ann will have to decide for herself. I know her a deal better than I did, Sue--I was all wrong in my estimate of her. She's too proud and strong-willed for any man to capture easily. I've been a poor enough father to her in the past, the best I can do now is to hold my peace."

Possibly Ben knew what disposal Ann meant to make of Baird; he knew more about Ann's thoughts than any one else did. At any rate, it was he who, on the Fourth of July, told Baird that Ann was feeling well enough to see him. He appeared at the club and delivered Ann's message:

"Ann wanted I should tell you she was able to see you," he announced.

Baird flushed crimson. "Shall I go now?" he asked hurriedly.

"Wait a bit--till the sun's gone," Ben said. "She'll be out to the porch then." He looked grave. "Mr. Baird, jest you remember that Ann's been through a deal, an' don't you overdo her." He fumbled his cap uncomfortably. "When I were young I was always in a turrible hurry--I never reckoned on time. An' I were awful decided in my mind about everything. Now I don't do no decidin' to speak of--I lets time do it."

Ben's remarks were not altogether clear to Baird, but the first part of his speech was easy to grasp. "I'll try not to tire her," he promised.

"All right," Ben said, and departed.

Baird watched him rolling off to the woods, like a bear freed from human interference. His oddly bent body suggested a craving for the woods and a thirst for running water. He had been caged for a long time; Baird guessed that it had worn upon him; he doubted whether any one but Ann could have compelled Ben to do it.

To fill in time, Baird walked to the Penniman house, loitering along beneath the cedars. He was reflecting that love did queer things to a man; it could strengthen his body into iron, make him fight like mad, or turn him as weak as a baby and as humble as a slave; weak in the knees and sick about the heart.... But, if only for a moment, he could hold Ann in his arms ... and she should cling to him.... He stopped, shaken from head to foot at the thought of possible response.

The thing swept him and shook him.... Then he walked on. He was a fool; he was forgetting. The best he could hope for was a little kindness. She meant to be kind, or she wouldn't have sent for him.

It was not twilight yet, the sunset was too brilliant, and fear of not finding Ann on the porch made him come slowly up the road. When he saw her white dress, he strode along. He was grateful to the glow, for he could see her face. It was not so thin as when he had last seen her, and her eyes were less shadowed; a little of the old-time softness had returned to her lips and chin. But she was still wan and thin and fragile enough to remind him of Ben's warning. So help him! he'd behave more sensibly than on the last occasion! He could even force himself to be ba.n.a.l.

"It's good of you to see me," he said when he reached her. "Are you really feeling well enough to talk?"