The Seventh Noon Part 36

"Yes."

"I 'd like to make this day one that we 'll both remember forever. I 'd like to make it one that we can always turn back to."

"Yes."

"Perhaps after to-day we 'll neither of us be afraid of the dark again."

"I 'm not afraid now."

"Nor I," he smiled.

The voice of Arsdale came to them,

"Oh, Elaine! Oh, Donaldson!"

She led the way into the house with a lighter step and Arsdale met them with a beaming face which covered a broad grin.

"I suppose you two can do without food," he exclaimed, "but I can't.

Breakfast has been waiting ten minutes."

"It's my fault," apologized Donaldson.

"You can't see stars in the morning, can you?" chuckled Arsdale.

"Maybe," answered Donaldson.

Elaine checked the boy's further comments with a frightened pressure as she took his arm and pa.s.sed into the white and green breakfast room.

There stood the table by the big warm window again, and as she took her place it seemed as though they were stepping into the same picture framed by the hedge. She caught Donaldson's eye with a little smile and saw that he understood.

Arsdale broke in with renewed enthusiasm for his philanthropic project and outlined his ambitions to Elaine.

"You see," he concluded, "some day, little sister, you may see the law sign 'Donaldson & Arsdale, Counsellors at Law.' Not a bad sounding firm name, eh?"

"I think it is great--just great, Ben!" she exclaimed enthusiastically.

"It's almost worth being a man to make your life count for something like that."

"I want you to make out a list of books for me to get and I 'll go down-town this afternoon. I suppose you 've a pretty good law library yourself?"

"I had the beginning of one. I sold it."

"What did you do that for?"

"My practice was n't big enough to support it. But you--you 'll not be bothered with lack of clients."

With school-boy eagerness Arsdale was anxious to plunge into the scheme at once.

"And say," he ran on, "I 'm going to look up some offices. I 'll stake the firm to some good imposing rooms in one of the big law buildings.

Nothing like looking prosperous at the start. Guess I 'll drop down-town right after breakfast and see what can be had."

Donaldson didn't have the heart to check him. Later on he would write him a letter sustaining him in his project and recommending him to a cla.s.smate of his, to whom this partnership would be a G.o.dsend, as, a week ago, it would have been to himself. That was the best he could think of at the moment and so he let him rattle on.

As soon as they had finished breakfast Arsdale was off.

"I 'll leave you two to hunt out new stars as long as that occupation does n't seem to bore you. I 'll be back for dinner."

Miss Arsdale looked a bit worried and questioned Donaldson with her eyes.

"He 'll be all right," the latter a.s.sured her. "Good Lord, a man with an idea like that is safe anywhere. It's the best thing in the world for him."

A little later Donaldson went up-stairs to his room. He took out his wallet and counted his money. He had over four hundred dollars. At noon forty-eight hours would be remaining to him. He still had the ample means of a millionaire for his few needs.

He was as cool as a man computing what he could spend on a summer vacation. He was not affected in the slightest by the details of death or by the mere act of dying itself. He was of the stuff which in a righteous cause leads a man to face a rifle with a smile. He would have made a good soldier. The end meant nothing horrible in itself.

It meant only the relinquishing of this bright sky and that still choicer gift below.

He rose abruptly and came down-stairs again to the girl, impatient at being away from her a minute. She was waiting for him.

"This," he said, "is to be our holiday. I think we had better go into the country. I should like to go back to Cranton. Is it too far?"

"Not too far," she answered. "But the memories of the bungalow--"

"I had forgotten about that. It does n't count with the green fields, does it? We can avoid the house, but I should like to visit the orchard and ride behind the old white horse again."

"I am willing," she replied.

"Then you will have to get ready quickly."

They had just time to catch the train and before they knew it they were there.

The old white horse was at the little land-office station to meet them for all the world as though he had been expecting them, and so, for that matter, were the winding white road, the stile by the lane, and the orchard itself. It was as though they had been waiting for them ever since their last visit and were out ready to greet them.

The driver nodded to them as if they were old friends.

"Guess ye did n't find no spooks there after all," he remarked.

"Not a spook. Any more been seen there since?"

"H'ain't heern of none. Maybe ye took off the cuss."

"I hope so."

They dismissed the driver at the lane and then went back a little way so as to avoid the bungalow. Donaldson was in the best of spirits, for at the end of the first hour he had solaced himself with the belief that Arsdale had been mistaken in his statement. She was nothing but a glad hearted companion in look and speech. They sat down a moment in the orchard and he was very tender of her, very careful into what trend he let their thoughts run. But soon he moved on again. He needed to be active. It was the walk back through the fields to which he had looked forward.

They brushed through the ankle-deep gra.s.s, pausing here and there to admire a clump of trees, a striking sky line, or a pretty slope.

To Donaldson it did not seem possible that this could ever end, that any act of nature could blot this from his mind as though it had never been. It was unthinkable that through an eternity he should never know again the meaning of blue sky, of blossoms, of such profligate pictures as now met his eye at every step, but above all, that he should be blind to the girl herself and all for which she stood. No matter how long the journey he was about to take, no matter through what new spheres, these things must remain if anything at all of him remained.

So his one thought was to fill himself as full of this day as possible, to crowd into his flagging brain the many pictures of her and this setting which so harmonized with her. The deeper joys of love he might not know, save as his silent heart conjured them, but all that he could see with his eyes should be his. He would fill his soul so full of light that the unknown trail would be less dark to him. He would carry with him for torches the sun and her bright eyes.