Play the Game! Part 13

It came, therefore, as a fearful shock, the letters and newspapers'

account of the expelling of James King of Los Angeles, 'Varsity Captain and prominent in college theatricals, from Stanford University for marching in a parade of protest against the curtailing of drinking! She was alone in her room when she opened her mail and she sat very still for minutes with her eyes shut, her fingers gripping the tiny clasped hands on her ring. At last, "_I'll never stop believing in you_," she said, almost aloud.

Then she read Jimsy's own version of it. She always kept his letter for the last, childishly, on the nursery theorem of "First the worst, second the same, last the best of all the game."

"Skipper dearest," he wrote, in a hasty and stumbling scrawl, "I'm so mad I can hardly see to write. I'd have killed that prof if it hadn't been for Carter. This is how it happened. I'd been keeping out of the whole mess as I told you I would. That night I was digging out something at the Library and on my way back to the House I saw a gang of fellows in a sort of parade, and some one at the end caught hold of me and dragged me in. I asked him what the big idea was and he said he didn't know, and I was sleepy and when we came to the House I dropped out and went in. I wasn't in it ten minutes and I didn't even know what it was about. But when they called for every one who was in the parade next day I had to show up, of course. Well, they asked me about it and I told them just how it happened, and they said all right, then, I could go. I was surprised and thankful, I can tell you, because they'd been chopping off heads right and left, some of the best men in college.

Well, just as I was going out through the door the old prof called me back and said he had one more thing to ask me. Did I consider that his committee was absolutely right and justified in everything they'd done? Well, Skipper, what could I say? I said just what you'd have said and what you'd have wanted me to say--that I did think they had been too severe and in some cases unjust and they canned me for it."

There was a letter from Stephen Lorimer, grave and distressed, substantiating everything that Jimsy had written. (He had taken the first train north and gone into the matter thoroughly with the men at the fraternity house, simmering with red rage, and the committee, regretful but adamant.) The college career, the gay, brilliant, adored college career of Jimsy King was at an end. Honor's stepfather had taken great care to have the real facts in Jimsy's case printed--he sent the clipping from the Los Angeles paper--and he had spent an evening with James King, setting forth the truth of the case. But the fact remained for the majority of people, gaining in sinister weight with every repet.i.tion, that the last of the "Wild Kings" had been expelled from Stanford University for drinking.

"Top Step," her stepfather wrote, "I'm sick with rage and indignation. Your mother is taking it very hard--as is most every one else. 'Expelled' is not a pretty word. I'm doing my level best to put the truth before the public, to show that your boy is really something of a hero in this matter, in that he might be snugly safe at this moment if he had been willing to tell a politic lie. You'll be unhappy over this, T. S., that's inevitable, but--I give you my word--you need not hang your head. Jimsy played the game."

Carter, who had written seldom since the happening of the summer in spite of her kind and casual replies to his letters, sent her now six rea.s.suring pages. She was not to worry. Jimsy was really doing very well, as far as the drinking went, and he--Carter--would not let him do anything foolish or desperate in his indignation. Three times he repeated that she must not be anxious. A dozen times in the letter he showed her where she might well be anxious. The word beat itself in upon her brain until she could endure it no longer, and she went out through the pretty streets of Florence to the cable office and sent Stephen Lorimer one of her brief and urgent messages, "_Anxious_." Two days later she had his answer and it was as short as her own had been, "_Come_."

There was a stormy scene with the _Signorina_. The waves of her fury rolled up and up and broke, crashing, over Honor's rocklike calm. At last, breathless, her fat face mottled with temper, "Go, then," said the singer, and went out of the room with heavy speed and slammed the door resoundingly. But she went with Honor to her steamer at Naples and embraced her forgivingly. "Go with G.o.d," she wept. "Live a little; it is best, perhaps. Then, my good small one, come back to me."

Like all simple and direct persons Honor found relief in action. The packing of her trunks and bags, the securing of tickets, cabling, had all given her a sense of comfort. They were tangible evidences of her progress toward Jimsy. The ocean trip was difficult; there was nothing to _do_. Nevertheless the sea's large calm communicated itself to her; for the greater portion of the voyage she was at peace. The situation with Jimsy must have been grave for her stepfather to think it necessary to send for her, but nothing could be so bad that she could not right it when she was actually with Jimsy. She would never leave him again, she told herself.

Feyther an' mither may a' gey mad, But whistle an' I'll come to ye, my lad!

Her mother, her poor, lovely mother, to whom she had been always such a disappointment, would be mad enough in all conscience, but Stepper would stand by. And nothing--no thing, no person, mattered beside Jimsy.

Friends of her mother met her steamer in New York and put her on her train, and friends of Stephen Lorimer met her in Chicago and drove and dined her and saw her off on the Santa Fe. She began to have at once a warm sense of the West and home. The California poppies on the china in the dining-car made her happy out of all proportion. When they picked up the desert she relaxed and settled back in her seat with a sigh and a smile. The blessed brown, the delicious dryness! The little jig-saw hills standing pertly up against the sky; the tiny, low-growing desert flowers; the Indian villages in the distance, the track workers' camps close by with Mexican women and babies waving in the doorways; even a lean gray coyote, loping homeward, looking back over his shoulder at the train, helped to make up the sum of her joy. _The West!_ How had she endured being away from it so long?--From its breadth and bigness, its sweep and s.p.a.ce and freedom? She would never go away again. She and Jimsy would live here always, a part of it, belonging.

She stopped worrying. She was home, and Jimsy was waiting for her, and everything would come right.

At San Bernardino her mother and stepfather and her brothers came on board, surprising her. She had had a definite picture of them at the Santa Fe station in Los Angeles and their sudden appearance almost bewildered her. Her mother was a trifle tearful and reproachful but she was radiantly beautiful in her winter plumage. Stephen's handclasp was solid and comforting. Her little brothers had grown out of all belief, and her big brothers were heroic size, and they were all a little shy with her after the excitement of the first greetings. She wondered why Jimsy had not come out with them but at once she told herself that it was better so; it would have been hard for them to have their first hour together under so many eyes,--her mother's especially. Jimsy would be waiting at the station. But he was not. There were three or four of her girl friends with their arms full of flowers and one or two older boys who had finished college and were in business. They made much of her and she greeted them warmly for all the cold fear which had laid hold of her heart.

Then came the drive home, the surprising number of new business buildings, the amazing growth of the city toward Seventh Street, the lamentable intrusion of apartment houses and utilitarian edifices on beautiful old Figueroa. Honor looked and listened and commented intelligently, but--_where was Jimsy?_

The old house looked mellow and beautiful; the j.a.panese garden was a symphony of green plush sod and brilliant color--the Bougainvillaea almost smothering the little summerhouse and a mocking-bird who must be a grandson of the one of her betrothal night was singing his giddy heart out. Kada was waiting in the doorway, bowing stiffly, sucking in his breath, beaming; the cook just behind him, following him in sound and gesture, and the j.a.panese gardener, hat in hand, stood at the foot of the steps as she pa.s.sed to say, "How-do? Veree glod! Veree glod! Tha's nize you coming home! Veree glod!"

Honor shook hands with them all. Then she turned to look at her stepfather and he followed her into his study.

"And we've got three new dogs, Honor, and two cats, and----" the smallest Lorimer besieged her at the door but she did not turn. She was very white now and trembling.

"Stepper, where is Jimsy?"

"Top Step, I--it's like Evangeline, rather, isn't it? He went straight through from the north without even stopping over here. He's gone to Mexico, to his uncle's ranch. And Carter got a leave of absence and went with him. I--you want the truth, don't you, Top Step?"

"Yes," said Honor.

"I'm afraid Jimsy rather ran amuck, in the bitterness of it all. His father took it very hard, in spite of my explanations to him, and wrote the boy a harsh letter; that started things, I fancy. That's when I cabled you. Carter telephoned his mother from the station here as they went through--they were on that special from San Francisco to Mexico City--and she told your mother that Jimsy was pretty well shot to pieces and that Carter didn't dare leave him alone."

"Didn't he write me?"

"He may have, of course, T. S., but there's nothing here for you. Mrs.

Van Meter told Carter that I had cabled for you, so Jimsy knows."

"Yes." She stood still, her hat and cloak on, deliberating. "Do the trains go to Mexico every day, Stepper?"

"Why, yes, I believe they do, but you needn't wait to write, T. S. You can telegraph, and let----"

"I didn't mean about writing," said Honor, quietly. "I meant about going. Will you see if I can leave to-day, Stepper? Then I won't unpack at all, you see, and that will save time."

"Top Step, I know what this means to you, but--your mother.... Do you think you'd better?"

"I am going to Mexico," said Honor. "I am going to Jimsy."

"I'll find out about trains and reservations," said her stepfather.

CHAPTER X

For a few moments it moved and concerned Honor to see that she was the cause of the first serious quarrel between her mother and her stepfather. She was shocked to see her mother's wild weeping and Stephen Lorimer's grim jaw and to hear the words between them, but nothing could really count with her in those hours.

She took her mother in her arms and kissed her and spoke to her as she had to her little brothers in the years gone by, when they were hurt or sorry. "There, there, Muzzie _dear_! You can't help it. You must just stop caring so. It isn't your fault."

"People will think--people will say----" sobbed Mildred Lorimer.

"No one will blame you, dear. Every one knows what a trial I've always been to you."

"You have, Honor! You have! You've never been a comfort to me--not since you were a tiny child. And even then you were tomboyish and rough and queer."

"I know, Muzzie."

"I never heard of anything so brazen in all my life--running after him to Mexico--to visit people you never laid eyes on in all your days, utter strangers to you----"

"Jimsy's aunt and uncle, Muzzie."

"Utter strangers to _you_, forcing yourself upon them, without even telegraphing to know if they can have you----"

"No. I don't want Jimsy to know I'm coming."

"Where's your pride, Honor Carmody? When he's done such dreadful things and got himself expelled from college--a young man never lives _that_ down as long as he lives!--and gone the way of all the 'Wild Kings,' and hasn't even written to you! That's the thing I can't understand--your running after him when he's dropped you--gone without a word or a line to you."

"He may have written, Muzzie. Letters are lost, you know, sometimes."

"Very seldom. _Very_ seldom!" Mrs. Lorimer hotly proclaimed her faith in her government's efficiency. "I haven't lost three letters in forty years. No. He's jilted you, Honor. That's the ugly, shameful truth, and you're too blind to see it. If you knew the things Carter told his mother----"

"I don't want to know them, Muzzie."