Till the Clock Stops Part 10

A week later Doris Lancaster was sitting alone by the drawing-room fire, a book on her lap. It was not so often that she had an evening to spend in quietness; one of her mother's great aims in life was to have "something on" at least six nights out of the seven. At the present moment Mrs. Lancaster was in her boudoir, accepting and sending out invitations for comparatively distant dates.

Sweetly the clock on the mantel struck nine, and Doris told herself that now no one was likely to call. She lay back in the chair, a graceful figure in pale green, stretched her pretty ankles to the glow, and sought to escape certain gnawing thoughts in the pages of a novel which had won from the reviewers such adjectives as "entrancing," "compelling,"

"intensely interesting."

And just then a servant announced "Mr. France."

Well, after all, she was not sorry to see Mr. France--or Teddy, as she had called him for a good many years. He was a frequent visitor, despite the fact that Mrs. Lancaster suffered him only because everybody else seemed to like him. He was fair, tall, and lanky, and so pleasant of countenance that it would not be worth while enumerating his defective features.

Mrs. Lancaster disapproved of him for three reasons: first, he had only two hundred a year plus a pittance from the insurance company that put up, as he expressed it, with his services; second, he had been Alan Craig's close friend; third, she suspected that he saw through her affectations. That he had been openly in love with Doris since the days of pigtails and short frocks troubled her not at all: he was too hopelessly ineligible. And it had not troubled Doris for a long time--not since Alan Craig had gone away. Since then Teddy had seemed to become more of a friend and less of an admirer than ever.

"This is great luck," he remarked, seating himself in the opposite easy chair with an enforced extension of immaculate pumps and silken sox.

(People often wondered how Teddy "did it" on the money.) "It's so seldom one can find you alone nowadays. Well, how's things generally?"

"Pretty much the same, Teddy," she answered, with the smile that hurt him. "Mother's busy as usual--"

"Out?"

"No; writing, I think."

"How's your father? I haven't seen him for an age."

"I wish he were fitter. He has had to stay in bed for a few days--he came down for dinner to-night for the first time. Last week he had three nights and a day in the train--with Mr. Bullard."

"Oh, I say! Bad enough without Bullard, but--"

"Oh, I'm so glad," she cried softly. "You don't like Mr. Bullard, Teddy.

I'm beginning to abhor the man."

"Keep on abhorring!"

Swiftly she looked at him. "You know something?"

He shook his head. "Not a thing, Doris. Merely my instinctive dislike.

I'm a sort of bow-wow, you know. Still, your mother approves of him, and he is your father's friend."

"I sometimes feel it has been an unlucky friendship for father," she said in a low voice, "and yet I have nothing to go on. I suppose I'm horribly unjust, but I'd give anything to learn something positive against the man."

"And yet," said the young man slowly and heavily, "sooner or later Mr.

Francis Bullard will ask you to marry him."

Doris threw up her head. "I'd sooner marry--" She paused.

"Me, for instance?"

"Don't be absurd, Teddy." She flushed slightly.

"Absurd, but serious," he quietly returned. "Doris, I came to-night to ask you. It wouldn't keep any longer. One moment, please. Two things happened yesterday. My father won the big law suit that has been our nightmare for years; and I got a move-up in the office. Never was more shocked in all my life. Mighty little to offer you, Doris--"

"Oh, don't speak about it."

"Well, I'll cut that bit out; but please let me finish. You know I've been in love with you for ages, though I did my best to get it under when a better man appeared; and I think you'll admit I haven't worried you much since. And I'm perfectly aware that you can't give me what you gave him.... Still, Doris, I'm not a bad fellow, and you could make me a finer one, and--well, I'd hope not to bore you with my devotion and all that, but, of course, you'd have to take that risk as well as your parents'

disapproval. Perhaps I ought to have waited longer, dear, but I didn't imagine my chances would be any greater a year hence, and it has seemed to me lately that--that you needed some one who would care for you before and above everything else.... Doris, remembering how long I've loved you, can't you trust me and take me for--for want of a better?"

His words had moved her, and moments pa.s.sed before she could answer.

"Dear Teddy, it is true that I want to be cared for--no need to deny it to you--but it wouldn't be right to take all you could give and give nothing."

"You would give much without knowing it," he pleaded. "And you were not made to be sorry all your life."

"I'm not going to make you sorry, Teddy."

"You're doing it as hard as you can!"

She smiled in spite of herself. "No," she said presently, "I've no intention of shunning all joys and abandoning all hopes, but I can't do what you ask, Teddy. I will tell you just one thing that you may not know. Almost at the last moment before Alan went away I promised him I would wait."

Teddy cleared his throat. "I didn't know, though I may have guessed....

But I do know, Doris--I felt it on my way here to-night--that Alan, if he could look into my heart now, would give me his blessing. I'm not asking to fill his place, you know."

"Oh, you make it very hard for me! You--you've been such a faithful friend."

"Give in, Doris, give in to me!" He rose and stood looking down on her bowed head. "Dear, I'd bring Alan back to you if I could. Don't you believe that?"

"Oh, yes!"

"With all your heart?"

"With all my heart, Teddy."

"Then--" He stopped and took her hand. "Doris!" ...

He straightened up sharply. The door was opening. The servant announced--

"Mr. Bullard."

It was an awkward enough situation, but neither the girl nor the young man was heavy-witted. Doris rose slowly, languidly, it seemed, and though aware that her eyes must betray her, turned and greeted Bullard in cool, even tones. The two men exchanged perfunctory nods.

"Thanks, but I won't sit down," said Bullard. "I called to enquire for your father, and to see him, if at all possible. Is he feeling better to-night?"

"I think he is in the library at present," she replied, "but he has not yet got over his fatigue."

"Yes," he replied sympathetically, "he and I had too much trailing last week, but business must not be shirked, Miss Doris."

She was a little startled by hearing her name from his lips; until now he had addressed her with full formality. She was not to know that the sight of her eyes when she had turned to meet him had informed him of something unlooked for, and had put a period to his long-lived irresolution regarding her. Francis Bullard, in fact, had suddenly realised that if he wished to secure a wife in the only woman of whom he had ever thought twice in that respect, he would have to act promptly, not to say firmly.

Accordingly, as though forgetting the stated purpose of his visit, he dropped into a chair and chatted entertainingly enough until Mrs.

Lancaster made her appearance.

She offered to conduct him to her husband, and he allowed her to do so as far as the hall. There he halted and said--