The Broken Gate Part 13

"Please, not yet," said he. "Just think--how else could it have been possible for me to talk with you?"

"Without compromising yourself?" She smiled slowly and bitterly, but did not see the hot blood rise to his face.

"That's not right!" said he. "Without compromising _you_--that's what I meant. I only meant that there is no place where we well could meet. And I wanted to say something to you, at last--what sometime has got to be said between us."

"We both know everything now, so why talk?" said she. "It was fine of you today in the trial. We owe so much--we'll pay when we can."

The dull red in his face deepened. "You may stop that, if you please,"

said he. "It's not right between us. The showdown has come. Why not settle up, at last?"

She turned, not knowing what to do, unwilling to leave him standing there.

"It's been years, Aurora. Now, listen--I'm going on up in the world myself, at last. I want to take you with me. I didn't want to say anything till the right time. It's been a long, hard pull for me, too, here in this town. It's hard for men like me to talk."

"You mustn't talk," said she. "You mustn't say a word--you mustn't be seen here even."

He looked at her slowly. "I'm here deliberately," said he. "Listen now--I must tell you some things, Aurora. I've loved you from the first day I saw you. Can't you credit me at least a little? You're splendid--you're beautiful--and you're good."

She choked a bit, raised a hand in swift protest.

"You're still young, Aurora," said he, not paying attention to what she said. "Of course I'm older, but there's a lot of time left yet for you and me--a lot of living. You've had mighty little out of life, here by yourself. Now I've stood it as long as I can. Since the whole truth about the boy has broken out today and can't ever be covered up again, it seemed to me I just had to tell you that you needed me to take care of you--someone more than just yourself. Things may go harder for you now. They've been hard enough already. You need help. Who more natural to help you than myself, feeling as I have, as I do?"

"Oh, you _mustn't_ talk that way!" Her voice trembled. "You must go on away. I'm not--good----"

"You're good enough for me--good as I am, surely--and I want to get into this game with you now. You need me. That means we've got to be married.

Oh, the boy's fine, yes, but he'll be going away. You need a man--a husband--someone you can depend on, Aurora. Isn't there anything welcome in that thought for you? Aurora, I want to marry you--at once, right away. I say that right now and here."

Aurora Lane looked this way and that, every way. Her gaze happened to go down the long vista beneath the maples, to fall upon the face of the town clock on the courthouse. The hour hand with a short jerk moved forward and the deep note of the bell boomed out--it was one o'clock of the night; and all was not well.

She turned as she felt the tense grasp of his great knotted hands still upon her own.

"You say that--to me----" she managed to say at last. "Why, everybody knows--all the town knows----" Her voice shook. "I suppose I'll have to leave here now after what's happened. But _you'd_ have to leave if you took up with such as me--even this late, it would ruin you. Don't you think of your own prospects? Why, I couldn't marry you, no matter how much I loved you."

"You don't love me at all?"

"How could I?"

"That's true," said he simply. "How could you?"

"I don't mean that," she corrected herself hastily.

"It's just what I said," he rejoined. "This seems providential to me. I can't allow these people to murder you a dozen times a week the way they will do now. You can't make this fight alone any more, Aurora--I can't any longer bear to see you try it. It's all out now. It's going to be harder for you after this."

She did not make any answer to him at all, but she heard his big voice murmuring on.

"I reckon it's love, after all, Aurora--I don't know. I don't know much about women. I just feel as though I had to take care of you--I feel as though you ought to depend on me. Can't you believe that?"

"I ought not to believe that of any man," she broke out.

"Like enough, like enough," he nodded, "but you've known only one man--that's your full horizon. Now, having had so hard a fight in business, I have put marrying to one side. Let's not say that we're both young--for we're not. But let's remember what I told you--there's a lot of life left for you and me yet if you'll only say the word. Don't you want to make anybody happy?"

"Oh, you mustn't say that to me!" said Aurora Lane. "But you would want me to be honest, wouldn't you? You wouldn't want me to lie? Somehow, I've never learned to lie very much."

"No," said he simply; "no, I reckon not. You never have."

"No matter what----"

"No matter what."

"Then tell me, how could I say I loved you now? For twenty years--all my life--I have put that thought away from me. I'm old and cold now. My heart's ashes, that part, can't you understand? And you're a man."

"Yes," he nodded, "I'm a man. That's so, Aurora. But now you're just troubled. You've not had time to think. I've held my secret, too. I've never spoken out to you before. I tell you, you're too good a woman to be lost--that isn't right."

"You pity me!"

"Maybe. But I want to marry you, Aurora."

"What could I do--what could be done--where would you have any pay in that?"

"Don't trouble about the pay. How much have the past twenty years paid you?"

"Little enough," said she bitterly, "little enough. About all they've given me--about all I've got left--is the boy. But I want to play fair."

"That's it," said he. "So do I. That's why I tell you you're too good for me, when it comes to that, after all."

"Why, it would all have to come out--one way or the other. It all _has_ come out, as you say. We couldn't evade that now--it's too late. Here's the proof--Dieudonne--and I can't deny him."

He nodded gravely. She went on:

"Everyone knows about the boy now--everybody knows he's--got no father.

_That's_ my boy. Too late now to explain--he's ruined all that by coming here. And yet you ask me to marry you. If I did, one of two things surely would be said, and either of them would make you wretched all your life."

He turned to her and looked at her steadily.

"They might say I was the father?"

She nodded, flushing painfully. "They might guess. And a few might think that after all these years----"

"Maybe," said he slowly. "But you see, after all, it's only a theoretical hurt I'm taking if I stand between you and these d.a.m.ned harpies here. They're going to torture you, Aurora, going to flay and burn you alive. I'd like to do about anything I could for you, anything a man can in such a case as ours. As for sacrifice--why, whatever you think I think of you, I believe we can both call it sure that I want to stand between you and the world. I want to have the _right_ to take care of you. It's what I want to do--must do. I've waited too long. But it's what I always have intended. You'd never let me. I never seemed to get around to it before. But now----"

"Impossible!" she whispered, white, her great eyes somber. "There is no way. Love of man has gone by for me. It knocked once. It has gone by."

"Wait now, let us go on with the argument just a little further, my dear!" said he gently.

"We have argued too long already," she said faintly. "You must go.

Please go--please don't talk to me. You must not."

"I wish I could agree with you," said he, disturbed and frowning, "because I don't want to make you any more unhappy. But listen, it just seemed to me that this was providential--I had to come to you and tell you what I have told you tonight. Why, widows remarry--time and again widows marry."