The Guarded Heights Part 48

The young lady at the piano crashed to a brief vacation. The chatter, following a perfunctory applause, rose gratefully.

"Fine! Fine!" Blodgett roared. "Your next stop ought to be Carnegie Hall."

"She ought to play in a hall," someone murmured unkindly.

George retreated, relieved that Blodgett wasn't with Sylvia; and a little later he found Dalrymple in the smoking-room sipping whiskey-and-soda between erratic shots at billiards. Wandel was at the table most of the time, counting long strings with easy precision.

"What's up, great man?" he wanted to know.

Dalrymple, too, glanced curiously at George over his gla.s.s. "Nothing exceptional that I know of," George snapped and left the room.

It added to his anger that his mind should let through its discontent.

At least Sylvia wasn't with Blodgett or Dalrymple, and he tried to tell himself his jealousy was too hasty. All the eligible men weren't gathered in this house. He wandered from room to room, always seeking Sylvia. Where could she have gone?

He met guests fleeing from drawing-room to library, as if driven by the tangled furies of a Hungarian dance.

"Will that girl never stop playing?" he thought.

Betty came up to him.

"Talk to me, George."

He found himself reluctant, but two tables of bridge were forming, and Betty didn't care to play. Lambert did, and sat down. George followed Betty to a window seat, telling himself she wanted him only because Lambert was for the time, lost to her.

"Now," she said, directly, "what is it, George?"

"What's what?" he asked with an attempt at good-humour.

Her question had made him uneasy, since it suggested that she had observed the trouble he was endeavouring to bury. Would he never learn to repress as Goodhue did? But even Goodhue, he recalled, had failed to hide an acute suffering at a football game; and this game was infinitely bigger, and the point he had just lost vastly more important than a fumbled ball.

"You've changed," Betty was saying. "I'm a good judge, because I haven't really seen you for nearly a year. You've seemed--I scarcely know how to say it--unhappy?"

"Why not tired?" he suggested, listlessly. "You may not know it, but I've been pretty hard at work."

She nodded quickly.

"I've heard a good deal from Lambert what you are doing, and something from Squibs and Mrs. Squibs. You haven't seen much of them, either. Do you mind if I say I think it makes them uneasy?"

"Scold. I deserve it," he said. "But I've written."

"I don't mean to scold," she smiled. "I only want to find out what makes you discontented, maybe ask if it's worth while wearing yourself out to get rich."

"I don't know," he answered. "I think so."

It was his first doubt. He looked at her moodily.

"You're not one to draw the long bow, Betty. Honestly, aren't you a little cross with me on account of the Baillys?"

"Not even on my own account."

Her allusion was clear enough. George was glad Blodgett created a diversion just then, lumbering in and bellowing to Lambert for news of his sister. George listened breathlessly.

"Haven't seen her," Lambert said, and doubled a bid.

"Miss Alston?" Blodgett applied to Betty.

"Where should she be?" Betty answered.

"Got me puzzled," Blodgett muttered. "Responsibility. If anything happened!"

Betty laughed.

"What could happen to her here?"

George guessed then where Sylvia had gone, and he experienced a strong but temporal exaltation. Only a mental or a bodily hurt could have driven Sylvia to her room. He didn't believe in the first, but he could still feel the shape of her slender fingers crushed against his. The greater her pain, the greater her knowledge of his determination and desire.

"Guess I'll send Mrs. Sinclair upstairs," Blodgett said, gropingly.

He hurried out of the room. Betty rose.

"I suppose I ought to go."

"Nonsense," George objected. "She isn't the sort to come down ill all at once."

He followed Betty to the hall, however. Mrs. Sinclair was halfway up the stairs. Blodgett had gone on, always pandering, George reflected, to his guests.

"I'll wait here," Betty said to Mrs. Sinclair. "I mean, if anything should be wrong, if Sylvia should want me."

Mrs. Sinclair nodded, disappearing in the upper hall.

Finally George faced the moment he had avoided with a persistent longing. For the first time since the night of his confession he was quite alone with Betty. He tried not to picture her swaying away from him in a moonlight scented with flowers; but he couldn't help hearing her frightened voice: "Don't say anything more now," and he experienced again her hand's delightful and bewitching fragility. Why had his confession startled? What had it portended for her?

He sighed. There was no point asking such questions, no reason for avoiding such dangerous moments now; too many factors had a.s.sumed new shapes. The long separation had certainly not been without its effect on Betty, and hadn't he recently seen her absorbed by Lambert? Hadn't she just now scolded him with a clear appreciation of his shortcomings? In the old days she had unconsciously offered him a pleasurable temptation, and he had been afraid of yielding to it because of its effect on his aim. Sylvia just now had tried to convince him that his aim was permanently turned aside. He knew with a hard strength of will that it wasn't. Nothing could tempt him from his path now--even Betty's kindness.

"Betty--have you heard anything of her getting married?"

She glanced at him, surprised.

"Who? Sylvia?"

He nodded.

"Only," she answered, "the rumours one always hears about a very popular girl. Why, George?"

"The rumours make one wonder. Nothing comes of them," he said, sorry he had spoken, seeking a safe withdrawal. "You know there's princ.i.p.ally one about you. It persists."

There was a curious light in her eyes, reminiscent of something he had seen there the night of his confession.