The Double Life Of Mr. Alfred Burton Part 15

"Other women have lost their husbands. I can bear it. Why don't you go? Don't you know the way out?"

Burton offered his hand. She frankly scoffed at him.

"I don't understand all that rigmarole about truth," she concluded, "but I'm no sort of a one at pretense. Outside, my man, and stay outside!"

She slammed the door. Burton found himself in the street.

Instinctively he felt that her hasty dismissal was intended to conceal from him the torrent of tears which were imminent. A little dazed, he still groped his way to the spot where Ellen had thrown the beans. A man was there with a fruit barrow, busy, apparently, rearranging his stock. Something about his appearance struck Burton with a chill premonition. He came to a standstill and looked at him.

"Did you wish to buy any fruit, sir?" the man asked, in a tone unusually subdued for one of his cla.s.s.

Burton shook his head.

"I was just wondering what you were doing," he remarked.

The man hesitated.

"To tell you the truth, guvnor," he confessed, "I was mixing up my apples and bananas a bit. You see, those at the top were all the best, and it has been my custom to add a few from underneath there--most of them a little going off. It was the only way," he added with a sigh, "that one could make a profit. I have made up my mind, though, to either throw them away or sell them separately for what they are worth, which isn't much. I've had enough of deceiving the public. If I can't get a living honestly with this barrow, I'll try another job."

"Do you happen to have eaten anything just lately?" Burton asked him, with a sinking heart.

The man looked at his questioner, for a moment, doubtfully.

"'Ad my breakfast at seven," he replied. "Just a bite of bread and cheese since, with my morning beer."

"Nothing since--not anything at all?" Burton pressed.

"I picked up a funny-colored bean and ate it, a few minutes ago. Queer flavor it had, too. Nothing else that I can think of."

Burton looked at the man and down at his barrow. He glanced around at the neighborhood in which he had to make a living. Then he groaned softly to himself.

"Good luck to you!" he murmured, and turned away.

CHAPTER XI

THE GATE INTO PARADISE

The girl looked up from her seat wonderingly. His coming had been a little precipitate. His appearance, too, betokened a disturbed mind.

"There is a front door," she reminded him. "There are also bells."

"I could not wait," he answered simply. "I saw the flutter of your gown as I came along the lane, and I climbed the wall. All the way down I fancied that you might be wearing blue."

A slight air of reserve which she had carefully prepared for him, faded away. What was the use? He was such an extraordinary person! It was not possible to measure him by the usual standards. She was obliged to smile.

"You find blue--becoming?"

"Adorable," he replied, fervently. "I have dreamed of you in blue. You wore blue only the night before last, when I wrote my little sketch of 'The Pavements of Bond Street on a Summer Afternoon.'"

She pointed to the journal which lay at her feet.

"I recognized myself, of course," she declared, trying to speak severely. "It was most improper of you."

"It was nothing of the sort," he answered bluntly. "You came into the picture and I could not keep you out. You were there, so you had to stay."

"It was much too flattering," she objected.

Again he contradicted her.

"I could not flatter if I tried," he a.s.sured her. "It was just you."

She laughed softly.

"It is so difficult to argue with you," she murmured. "All the same, I think that it was most improper. But then everything you do is improper. You had no right to climb over that wall, you had no right to walk here with me the other afternoon, even though you had driven away a tame cow. You have no right whatever to be here to-day. What about your wife?"

"I have been to Garden Green," he announced. "I offered her emanc.i.p.ation, the same emanc.i.p.ation as that which I myself have attained. She refused it absolutely. She is satisfied with Garden Green."

"You mean," the girl asked, "that she refuses the--the--"

"Beans," he said. "Precisely! She did more than refuse them--she threw them out of the window. She has no imagination. From her point of view I suppose she behaved in a perfectly natural fashion. She told me to go my own way and leave her alone."

Edith sighed.

"It is very unfortunate," she declared, "that you were not able to convince her."

"Is it?" he replied. "I tried my best, and when I had failed I was glad."

She raised her eyes for a moment but she shook her head.

"I am afraid that it doesn't make any difference, does it?

"Why not? It makes all the difference," he insisted.

"My dear Mr. Burton," she expostulated, making room for him to sit down beside her, "I cannot possibly allow you to make love to me because your wife refuses to swallow a bean!"

"But she threw them out of the window!" he persisted. "She understood quite well what she was doing. Her action was entirely symbolical. She declared for Garden Green and the vulgar life."

For a girl who lived in an old-fashioned garden, and who seemed herself to be part of a fairy story, Edith certainly took a practical view of the situation.

"I am afraid," she murmured, "that the Divorce Courts have no jurisdiction over your case. You are therefore a married man, and likely to continue a married man. I cannot possibly allow you to hold my hand."

His head swam for a moment. She was very alluring with her pale face set in its clouds of golden hair, her faintly wrinkled forehead, her bewitchingly regretful smile--regretful, yet in a sense provocative.

"I am in love with you," he declared.

"Naturally," she replied. "The question is--" She paused and looked intently at the tip of her slipper. It was very small and very pointed and it was quite impossible to ignore the fact that she had a remarkably pretty foot and that she wore white silk stockings. Burton had never known any one before who wore white silk stockings.

"I am very much in love with you," he repeated. "I cannot help it. It is not my fault--that is to say, it is as much your fault as it is mine."