CHAPTER XV

FIRELIGHT

"It's a serious," said a boy with a voice like a nutmeg grater.

"Yuh boob!" exploded his companion. "He means a serial," he explained to Father McGowan.

"And," said Father McGowan, "you have come to me because you are temporarily embarrassed for funds?"

"Yep," said the nutmeg grater. "We're broke."

"An' it's that exciting! Every time they busts up an automobile an' wrecks a train--we'd pay yuh back,--an' him an' her in it, they----" broke in the other.

"You'd like a loan," said Father McGowan. "Well, well, here it is. What's the name of it?"

"'The Iron Claw,'" said the younger impressively. "It's grand. Them there shows learn yuh a lot too." His voice showed his great thirst for knowledge. Father McGowan smiled. He was urged to go along, with the assurance that they would also pay for that in the future, but he refused on the plea of work.

He went to the rectory door with them and let them out into the dismal snowfall, the first of the season. Half-hearted, damp, then he went back to his study, with a tender look in his eyes.

He was thinking of a small boy who had known no such pleasures--a small boy brought up by an always-old aunt, whose heart and soul were cut square, and without any dimples. He had been a very quiet small boy with a great hankering for nails and something to pound with.

He had gone through the pound period without pounding, and when he reached the dream time he knew that dreams to his unyielding old aunt would be as troublesome as nails, so he had kept silent.

Father McGowan's eyes still held the wistful look that had come into them at seventeen. He recalled all his naillessness as he saw two joyful theatregoers start off to see "The Iron Claw," but in thinking of it there was no regret--only a gratitude that from his denials had come a backyard full of junk and a paradise for many little boys who otherwise would have gone without their small-boy heaven.

"She was a good woman!" said Father McGowan; "a good woman!" He was thinking of the still old aunt who'd brought him up.

"Are you well, Father McGowan-dear?" asked Cecilia later in the afternoon when Father McGowan had settled before a fire in the Madden library.

"Oh, yes," answered Father McGowan. "Have a little cold, but I feel splendidly." Cecilia did not look impressed, and certainly Father McGowan's aspect was not convincing. His head was thrown back against the chair, and his breath came raspingly.

"A hot lemonade," said Cecilia rather to herself.

"Never!" said Father McGowan. "Never! Cecilia, you are a dear child. Don't irritate me. I hate lemonades. They make me think of money for the parish house, and they are bad enough cold."

"Hot toddy?" suggested Cecilia; her eyes twinkled.

"Ah--!" replied Father McGowan softly. Cecilia rang, spoke to a haughty person in buttons, and soon Father McGowan was sipping something warm which did not smell of lemons.

"How's the pain?" asked Father McGowan in a commonplace tone; he studied the glass he held.

"Oh," answered Cecilia, "it is the same, but I am braver. I _will_ be good, Father McGowan. I can't help lov--caring for him. I fixed my hair eight times the other day when I knew I'd see him, and used an eyebrow pencil Marjory left, but it wasn't becoming, and I washed it off. I can't help caring for him, although I know he's unworthy. I seem to have lost my handkerchief,--thank you." Father McGowan supplied a large square.

"You didn't use to cry much, did you, dear child?" he asked gently.

"No," answered Cecilia, "and I don't now except with you. You see, when I voice it it becomes so tragically real. It is fixed because I speak it to a human, while when I think of it it seems like a bad dream. It--it doesn't seem possible that I can care so much, while he doesn't."

The fat priest reached for Cecilia's hand. He lifted it and kissed it. Cecilia looked surprised.

"A token of immense respect and humble love, dear child," said Father McGowan. "Kisses," he continued, "Cecilia, tie to the man who humbly kisses your hand. There are two kinds, the kind who wants only your lips and the kind who humbly touches your hand and who longs to be absolved by whimpering out his shames against your throat. Lord, what an old fool I am! _What_ a subject for a priest to lecture on!"

Cecilia was silent, for she was thinking of Stuyvesant's kisses, which still burned her palm. They had held humbleness,--and hunger. She remembered how he had muttered that he "darn well wanted to get down on his knees, gosh! How he _did_ love----" And then Mrs. Higgenmeyer had come along and called loudly of the night: "Purty night, ain't it?" and, worse, the chaperone of Boston had then appeared and said in her crisp, quick-cut way: "'Beautiful night of stars,' as our inimitable Mr. Browning said."

Then the man with the Vandyke beard from Philadelphia had passed. He had crossed forty times, had a valet, and complained of the coffee and service, therefore commanding every one's respect. "Stevenson," he had corrected in passing. "Horrid person!" said Miss Hutchinson, but to Cecilia there were no horrid persons, for the world was full of a tall, gruff man, and her heart was swollen from his hot kisses on her small palm. Her eyes must have told him something of this, for he muttered, "Dear!" with the impetuosity of a loosened champagne cork. "What say?" Miss Hutchinson had asked.

"Father McGowan," said Cecilia, "shall I ever be allowed to forget my inferiority to the most? It is always there, even when they ask me for money for their charities. They say, 'Mrs. Dash has subscribed. _You_ will probably _want_ to.' By right of bricks, I purchase my admission. Shall I always feel this way?"

"Oh, no," answered Father McGowan. "When you get past thirty you forget how you feel--that is, if you're any good. After that you think of others, and the _ego_ is rubbed down by the world into its proper size."

"I _am_ a pig!" said Cecilia.

"You're not!" disagreed Father McGowan. "No one could call you that----" He paused. "For a long time," he went on, "I've wanted to say something to you, because you are too near it to get a perspective. I want you to look around at the snobs who do not mix with those in trade, and then I want you to ask what grandpapa did. Probably he made pretzels or ran a laundry. Do not ask the immediate members of the family of this, for they may not like it, but ask some _kind_ friend. You and John, you people of stronger, fresher blood, are America. You are what comes in and puts bright eyes into depleted stock and takes out the hiccoughs. Don't apologise for your strength and the fact that papa's reservations for his first trip were made in the steerage."

"I don't," answered Cecilia. "I'm rather blatantly proud of it, although since boarding school I haven't bragged of it."

"In time you may even elevate your lorgnette and ask coldly, 'Who _is_ she?'" suggested Father McGowan.

"Oh, no!" said Cecilia, "I'll _never_ do that!"

"Your children probably will!" said Father McGowan, and then he said "Drat!" to his own stupid self.

"My children," said Cecilia, "are gentle, white ghosts, and they play and do only what I dream. They would never do that, I would send them from my arms first, and I do--love them. My arms would be empty. Am I going to be a sentimental old maid, Father McGowan-dear?"

Father McGowan said he thought not. Then he turned and again quite brazenly kissed Cecilia's small palm.

"Cecilia," he said, "to-day seems like the end of the world to me.... My soul is on wings. Dear child, I wish you could know what you have always been to me. But you do, don't you?"

"Yes, Father McGowan-dear," answered Cecilia. "I have known. I have always brought my worst hurts to you, and one does that only to one who loves."

"Well, well," said Father McGowan, unused to personal sentiment and awkward from it, "now we understand. How's John?"

"Wonderful," answered Cecilia. She smiled mischievously. "Almost a boy again," she added in explanation.

"Twombly responsible?" asked Father McGowan.

"Yes," she answered, "entirely. His ideals when transplanted are unusually good. However, they do not seem to take root in him."

"Well, well," said Father McGowan. He stretched in a tired way and said he must go. No, he couldn't stay for dinner, for he was to take the night turn at nursing a burned iron moulder. "Won't he be thirsty when he sniffs my lemonade?" said Father McGowan.

Cecilia rang; the lofty person appeared. "Just a minute," said Father McGowan. "I want one more word with you." The person faded.

"Cecilia," said Father McGowan, "there's a doctor to whom your father is playing God. I don't want to bother you about it, but to-day, coming here, I somehow felt as if I ought to." Father McGowan settled on the edge of a chair, and he told Cecilia the dry facts of the ruin of Doctor Van Dorn. "Try to make your father see that it's better not to tamper with the works," he ended; "to leave that to whoever or whatever is pushing the old ball around.... Well, good-bye, dear child. Oh, I can get out without the help of his Royal Buttons, thank you."

After he left Cecilia again settled in front of the fire to think of her new problem. Her brain eluded it with a maddening persistency. She thought of a new frock, the Girls' Club, a dance. Then again of the really horrible revelation, and the unexpected obstinacy of her father.

She looked up at a softly coloured painting above the mantel, which she'd had painted in Paris. It had been marvellously done, and especially since the only model had been a small tintype.

"Dearest," said Cecilia, "you would not want him punished, would you? And,--is there any punishment more cruel than life?"

The painting smiled down gently.

"Pink roses," it seemed to say. "There are always pink roses, but youth must hold them to see their beauty.... Seeing no loveliness in dreams denied, no heights in greatest depths...."

"Come in!" said John. "Please!" K. Stuyvesant hesitated. He wanted to, for just a glimpse of Cecilia was everything to him; but, she--she had not wanted to see him. "I am out a great deal," she said in that memorable 'phone message,--also, "I have quite forgotten the little episode of the boat." Those two sentences had made things cruelly plain.

"Come on," begged John, "you must be cold!"

K. Stuyvesant got out of his machine, and went with John into the long-waisted house.

"Fire in the library," said John; "wood, you know. Bully, aren't they?" John, ahead, stopped with his hand on the drapery which softened the broad doorway into the library. He put the other, silencingly, on K. Stuyvesant's arm. Cecilia sat in front of the fire. She held a framed picture in her hands, standing upright on her knees. Looking,--looking,--looking, she was. They stood there for what seemed to Stuyvesant many minutes. He felt himself grow hot, cold, then he longed to shake John,--again, hug him.

"Celie!" called John. With a crash the photograph slipped from her hands to the floor.

"Oh!" she cried breathlessly, "_how_ you frightened me!"

"Come in, Stuyv," said John, loudly. "Look what she's looking at! _Your_ picture!" Stuyvesant didn't answer. He had set his teeth, and his chin was very square.

"How long were you there?" asked Cecilia.

"We just came in," said Stuyvesant, before John could answer.

"I just picked up your picture," said Cecilia. "John hadn't shown it to me. I'm sorry I was stupid and broke the glass."

She moved, and Stuyvesant's eyes followed her, a heartache too large for concealment showing in them.

"Whatcha go for?" asked John. "Stay and talk!"

"I really can't, dear," she answered. "I'm sorry." Then, nodding, she disappeared. In a moment they heard the sound of the piano. Some one who could feel, as well as play, was tinkling out "The Shepherd Boy."

"She does it for dad," said John, "because he likes it, but you ought to hear her play good music. She's a wonder; why, in school----"

John broke off, another thought interrupting: "Why didn't you let me jolly her about your picture?" he asked. "It was a great chance."

"She wouldn't like it," answered K. Stuyvesant miserably. "Please don't tell her we were watching her, will you, John?"

"Aw,--why not!"

"_Please_, John!" Stuyvesant's voice was earnest.

"Well, I won't," agreed John in a disappointed way. "But I do like to tease her! She's awfully cunning when she gets excited, and you can get a rise out of her every time."

After that they settled to play rum for a small stake. Stuyvesant was absent. Time and again John and the cards faded while he saw Cecilia sitting before an open fire,--soft in the firelight, gentle,--almost ready to smile on him. His picture? ... Probably scorning him,--but,--at least she'd thought of him for that little space. He looked toward the chair, and he saw her gently smile in his direction.

"Rum!" yelled John, much delighted. "That puts me out. Gee, you're in the clouds! You owe me forty-nine cents."