Part 10

The words were no sooner out, than Idea was clinging to me. "I'm not proud any more, Daniel," she cried. "I'll never stoop again. If you'll only forgive me this once, I'll promise never to vex you any more. Please, Daniel, please!"

"'The Squire snatched her wrist. "Silence!" he thundered, and would have swung her violently aside, but I prevented it. I saw the old look in her eyes.

"'"Then come with me," I said, "now--this hour. Marry me and----"

"'Her father flung himself between us, when she would have come to me. He swore he would disown her. No shilling of his should she ever get. She should be a beggar--married to a beggar.

"'I saw her shrink. She could not face it. When I saw that, I turned to go, but the Squire stopped me.

"'"Not so fast, my fine fellow! You've not returned the letters, yet. D'you think I'd let you keep them, you low dog, to use against her fair name, for a price?"

"'I had forgotten the letters. I turned to Idea, and it was as if I had not seen her before, so clear her image stood out, now. She was clad in some flowery stuff ("dimity," she had once told me 'twas) with a sash about her waist, and on the sash a pocket hung suspended by a strap. 'Twas to hold her handkerchief, but her handkerchief had to hold her tears now--and the pocket hung empty. I went to her and held out the letters. She would not take them.

"'"Here are your letters," I said.

"'Still she would not touch them.

"'Her father cursed us both. I felt my self-control slipping from me. If I let it go to lay my hand upon the man--God help him--and me. But I could not escape until Idea had the letters. Again, she would not take them. With a quick movement I thrust them in her pocket. She did not seem to understand what I was doing. She thought I was trying to grasp her hand, I think, for she flung it out to me imploringly. But I only dimly saw that as I wheeled about, and so, off and away. That day I left the place. Later, I learned, the Squire and Idea went too. But before they did so he caused his man of law to follow me, again demanding the letters.

"'"The letters have already been returned," was all I could say. "She has them. I gave them back. When she would not take them, I thrust them in her pocket."

"'With that the lawyer had, perforce, to be content. At least he has not troubled me since. So I close this book. A closed book, too, the story of my love. A book I know I must never open if ever I am to be at peace with life. For I will say it once and so be done, Idea is my mate--the one woman in the world whom only I love, or ever shall. I have lost her, but the memory of her I must keep until I die--my passionate, headstrong, struggling, loving child. May God be with her, true and loyal little heart, wherever she may go.'"

Dr. Ballard looked up, as he closed down the cover.

"You see, he _did_ give back the letters," he said.

Madam Crewe clutched the arms of her chair, sitting forward, gazing fixedly into space. When she spoke it was as if she spoke in a dream, filling out the bailiff's tale.

"I had no letters and, as for the pocket, 'twas never seen from that day on. My father insisted 'twas a ruse on my--the bailiff's part, his offering to return them. He said he had kept them to use as a means of blackmail. I was too desperate to care. My father swore the man would presently show his hand, but he did not, nor his face either. I never saw him again. At first I would hear no ill of him, but my father and the attorney told me I was too young, too ignorant of the world, to know how base the creature was, what a narrow escape I had had. There were nights--many and many of them--when, here and abroad, I cried myself to sleep, regretting my _escape_ hadn't been narrower.

"Now, sir, you know the story of your grandfather and me. It is all very long ago. The wonder is, the memory has stayed by me all these years."

For the first time within her recollection, Katherine felt herself drawn to her grandmother. It was as if a means of communication had been opened up between them. She would have liked to go to her and lay her arms about her shoulders lovingly.

Dr. Ballard broke the silence.

"The truth lies between your word, and my grandfather's. _I_ believe he was honest. You believe the contrary."

Madam Crewe was silent.

The doctor continued. "Now, as you say, all that took place very long ago. Even granting my grandfather's motives to have been the worst, I count myself out of the tangle. I stand on my own feet, don't I? If I have built up my life on honest principle, I can't see how you can reasonably hold me to account for the sins or fancied sins of my forbears. Our democracy isn't worth the name, if it doesn't admit a man's a man for a' that. I love your granddaughter. I wish to marry her. I ask your consent."

Katherine could not see her grandmother's face for the sudden mist that had gathered to trouble her vision. But she heard the familiar voice distinctly enough.

"Wait a moment. Hear me out. Then repeat your declaration, if you choose. They say I'm avaricious. Rich, grasping, penurious. Suppose I told you I'm poor? That the bulk of my fortune was squandered long ago? That I've had a hard time to keep my nose, and this girl's here, above water? Would you wish to marry her, still?"

"Certainly. Why not?"

"You say that because you don't believe it's true."

"I say it because, saving your presence, I don't care a continental whether it's true or not. Your money or the lack of it, is nothing to me. I care for _Katherine_!"

"Suppose I told you Katherine's grandfather, the man I married, was a coward and a liar, as they said your grandfather was? Suppose I told you her father, my son, followed in his father's footsteps?"

Dr. Ballard shrugged impatiently. "It's Katherine I want for my wife. It's not her dead and buried ancestors. I have to deal with Katherine's faults and virtues, not those of her family."

"You hear that, Katherine? It's _your_ faults and virtues he----"

Madam Crewe put the question with a sort of bravado, but her utterance was slightly unsteady. She did not conclude her sentence.

Katherine had grown very white.

When she did not respond, the old woman demanded peevishly, "Well, well? What have you to say for yourself? Can't you speak?"

"I say--I can't marry--Dr. Ballard." The girl rose and stood holding on to the back of her chair with two cold, trembling hands.

Her grandmother fairly raised herself up in her seat. "What do you mean----? 'You can't marry Dr. Ballard?'" Her voice rose to a sharp falsetto.

Katherine shook her head.

"Nonsense! Whim!" The old woman spoke with unaccountable passion.

Dr. Ballard laid a firm, warm hand on Katherine's cold ones. His face was rather pale, but his tone, when he spoke, was quite composed.

"Forgive me," he said. "I see I've got in all wrong on this. I didn't mean to distress you. Let us drop it now, and later, some time, when we two are alone together, we'll thresh it out, eh?"

Again Katherine shook her head. "No, I want never to talk about it again," she said tremulously.

"Why?" The old woman asked the question almost fiercely, bending forward to peer searchingly into her granddaughter's face.

For a moment it looked as if Katherine were in danger of being swept off her feet by the intensity of her hidden feeling. She opened her lips, then resolutely closed them again. Her grandmother did not seem to see, or, at all events, did not regard her effort at self-control.

"Have you no tongue in your head?"

"Say it isn't true--what you've just hinted, about my father and his. Say it isn't true, and I'll--_tell_----"

"Ho! Do you think I'm to be called to account by you, young miss?" Madam Crewe interrupted testily. "If Dr. Ballard is ready to marry you, in the face of the conditions I asked him to suppose, why, get down on your knees, and thank God for such a disinterested lover. But don't flatter yourself you can oblige me to do as you choose. I am sixty-eight years old and I will not be forced."

Dr. Ballard laughed out.

"Don't you see it's all nonsense, Katherine? The whole thing isn't worth a serious thought. If your grandmother likes to have her little joke, why, let us try to see the humor of it. Perhaps she doesn't want you to marry me. But now she sees it's inevitable, she'll----"

"No," said Katherine. "It's not inevitable. I can't marry you."

Dr. Ballard was silent, but Madam Crewe's words snapped out like sparks from a live wire.

"The day Norris was here, you said you would. You _insisted_ you would. Does your refusal now mean you've reconsidered the conditions he suggested? You've thought better of your first decision?"

Katharine gave her a long look. It seemed to her, her humiliation was complete. And still she managed to hold herself in check.

"You make it very hard for me--you force me to say things--I---- Very well, then listen! I _do_ love Dr. Ballard and--I'd have married him if--I could!"

He was on his feet in a second, the chair he had sat in crashing backward with the violence of the sudden spring he made from it. But Katherine was quicker than he. She turned and had run from the room before he could prevent her.

Madam Crewe let her breath escape in a long sigh of fatigue.

"Dear me! What tiresome things the young are! As Slawson says, they're hard as nails. You'd better reconsider, and ask _me_ to marry you instead of Katherine. I'm seasoned, if not mellowed. Yes, you'd much better marry me."

Dr. Ballard smiled grimly. "Where my handsomer grandfather failed, how could _I_ hope to win?" he retorted, throwing her a glance of mock gallantry. But even as he looked, he saw her face blench, her figure sag together like a wilted plant. In a second he had her in his arms, carrying her to the couch, forgetting the personal in the professional, working over her with a will.

A familiar figure appeared in the open doorway.

Martha paused a moment, then came forward swiftly.

"Another----?" she inquired, her hands busying themselves at once in obedience to the doctor's silent orders.

He shook his head. "No."

Presently Martha felt a quiver of muscles beneath her fingers. Madam Crewe's eyelids lifted. She made an effort to raise herself.

"What's all this--to-do?" she taxed her strength to demand.

Dr. Ballard laid a restraining hand upon her shoulder.

"Nothing. That is, nothing serious. You'd been over-exerting. Nature stepped in and shut down the shop for a moment."

"Meaning--I lost consciousness? For how long? How came Slawson here? Did you send?"

Martha answered in the doctor's stead.

"No'm. I just happened along. My Sabina, she took it into her head this afternoon there was no place like home--an' she was glad of it. Her an' me disagreed on some triflin' matters, an' she threatened she'd leave if I didn't come to terms. I tol' her: 'I'm sorry you feel that way, but if you concluded you must go, why, I s'pose you must. We all enjoyed your s'ciety for the last five years, but the best o' friends must part, an' far be it from me to stand in your way, if you perfer to look for another situation, an' think you can better yourself. I'll do up your things for you, for luck!' So I did an' out she stepped, as bold as brass, with her clo'es done up in a bundle slung on the end of a old gulf-stick Mr. Ronald he give her brother Sammy, to carry over her shoulder. She ain't been gone above three hours, but I thought while I was bringin' up the evenin's milk, I'd ask if, maybe, she'd blew in here?"

Madam Crewe compressed her lips. "No. Even your baby would know better than to come here for a happy home," she said with a caustic smile. "On your way back, you'd better look for _my_ child, who, also, has probably run away. It seems to be the fashion nowadays for youngsters to defy their elders."

Dr. Ballard gave Martha a look.

"Well, I must be movin'. I took the liberty to bring you a form o' Spanish cream I made this afternoon. It's kind o' cool an' refreshin', when you ain't an appetite for substantialler things."

Passing Katherine's door she paused and lightly tapped on the panel. There was no answer. She dared not take it on herself to turn the knob, so went slowly downstairs, and, finally, out of the house and grounds.

Once in the road she saw, a short distance ahead of her, an easily recognizable figure.

"Oh--Miss Katherine!" she called softly.

For a moment the girl seemed undecided what to do. She walked on as if she had not heard the call, then suddenly wheeled about and stopped.

"I was afraid I'd missed you," Mrs. Slawson said casually. "All I wanted, was to tell you that if your gran'ma shouldn't be so well after her faintin'-spell, why, I'm ready to come an' help any time, be it night or day."

Katherine looked up, her face changing quickly.

"Fainting-spell?" She echoed the words vaguely.

"Yes. She come out o' this one all right, but if she had another you couldn't tell, at her age, poor ol' lady! Thanks be! it wasn't a stroke. Anyhow, I'd advise you keep Eunice Youngs overnight, to run an' carry, if need be."

The struggle was short and sharp. Martha pretended not to see. She pretended not to be aware that Miss Katherine had on her traveling hat, carried her coat over her arm, a bag in her hand.

"I'll go back!" the girl said at last, as if ending a debate.

"Be sure you send if you need me," Martha repeated.

They parted without another word, and Mrs. Slawson, resuming her homeward way, summed up the case to herself.

"Yes, she's gone back this time. But come another tug o' war between her an' the ol' lady, an' I wouldn't be so certain. I wonder now, how my young vagabone is doin', which her brothers an' sisters are all out on the still-hunt, searchin' for her this minute."

She had barely reached the house, and was busying herself with preliminary supper preparations, before starting out again to look for her stray lamb, when the screen-door was gently opened from without, and a small person, very grimy as to outward visible signs, very chastened as to inward spiritual grace, entered the kitchen quietly.

Martha appeared totally unconscious of any other presence than her own, until Sabina's mind became vaguely troubled with doubts of her own substantiality. Her pilgrim's pack slipped from her shoulder, the "gulf-stick" fell clattering to the floor. Even then Mrs. Slawson made no sign.

The suspense was fast becoming unendurable. The child's under-lip thrust out, her chin began to quiver, but she controlled herself gallantly. Nixcomeraus, the cat, rose from where he had been lying curled up in a doze, humped a lazy back, stretched, yawned, and, with dignified mien, crossed the floor to rub against his little friend's familiar legs. That something, at least, recognized her, and knew she had come home, after her long, weary absence, almost upset Sabina's equilibrium. She bent down to stroke pussy's fur.

"I see," she essayed, with a superb effect of nonchalance, "I see you still have the same old cat!"

At the sound of her voice Martha turned.

"My, my!" she exclaimed, one hand clasping the other in surprise, "you don't mean to say this is Sabina! How glad I am to see you! Won't you sit down an' stay a little while? Cora an' Francie an' Saromy've gone out strollin', but they'll be back before long, an' they'd be disappointed if you'd 'a' went before they got home, so's they'd miss your call."

Sabina's eyes rolled. She gulped hard once, twice, three times. Then with a roar, her "austere control" gave way, she cast herself bodily upon her mother, clasping the maternal massive knees.

"I ain't goin' to stay _a lit-tle whi-ile_," she sobbed. "I'm goin' to stay _always_. I want C-Cora! 'n' I want F-Francie! 'n' I want S-Sammy! 'n' YOU!"

Martha bent to lift the giant-child so the stout little arms could clutch her neck.

"Now, what do you think o' that!" she ejaculated, holding the shaken traveler close.

Appeared Sammy in the doorway, troubled at first but brightening suddenly at sight of his recovered sister.

"Hey, Sabina's home!" he shouted ecstatically back to the others. Then all came trooping in with a rush, clinging about the youngest, hugging her, kissing her as if she had been gone a year.

"Why, it's just like the Prodigal's son, ain't it?" suggested Martha, in whose lap Sabina sat enthroned, refusing to leave it for even a moment.

"Who's he?" asked Sammy.

Mrs. Slawson cast a look of reproach at her son.

"Shame on you, to ask such a question, at your age! Don't you remember the old prodigal gen'lman lived in the Bible, which his son had a rovin' disposition an' went off gallivantin' till his pervisions give out, an' he had to come home to get a square meal? When his father saw'm afar off, he got up, an' went out, an' called'm a fatted calf, an'--no I I'm wrong, he asked'm wouldn't he _like_ some fatted calf, which, his son, bein' fond o' young veal, _did_, an' so they killed'm--I mean the calf. Now I'm wonderin' which one o' you three I better do it to for Sabina! There, there, Sabina! Don't holla so! O' course I don't mean I'd reely hurt your brothers an' sisters. Come, you're all tired out, or you wouldn't be so foolish! Cheer up, now! You're back home, after all your wanderin's, an' you won't be naughty any more--_if you can help it_, will you?"

*CHAPTER XI*

Whatever had been the cause of disagreement between Madam Crewe and her granddaughter, Martha noticed that a negative peace, at least, had been restored by the time she had occasion to go to Crewesmere again.

"And so you've been aiding and abetting a run-away girl, eh?" the old lady accosted her sharply.

Mrs. Slawson had almost forgotten the Ellen Hinckley episode, in the quick succession of events nearer home.

"You mean----" she pondered.

"You know perfectly well what I mean. The Hinckley girl. You assisted her to make her escape from that Buller brute. I hope you thought well, before you took the risk."

"Risk?" repeated Martha.

"Yes, _risk_. Evidently you don't know the difference between courage and recklessness."

"No'm, I don't. But I'll look'm up in the dickshunerry."

Madam Crewe brought her teeth together with a snap.

"Slawson, you're a strange specimen. I sometimes wonder if you're _plus_ or _minus_. You certainly are not a simple equation, that's sure."

Martha smiled. "Speakin' o' the Hinckley girl--Ellen--I'd a letter from the uncle she went to, sayin' she landed there safe an' sound. So _she's_ off'n my mind."

"And Buller?"

"He never was on it. _I_ don't mind _him_. His name ought to been spelled with a Y 'stead of the R. Them kind's never dangerous."

"Well, I hope not. All the same, I wish you'd kept your finger out of that pie for your own safety's sake."

Martha laughed. "I got two good fists of my own with me, that shoots out fine when required. Warranted to hit the bull's eye every time. I used to tell my husband, when we lived down in the city, I was afraid I might be arrested for carryin' unconcealed weapons."

Madam Crewe's stern little visage did not relax. "You'd need a more effective weapon than your two fists, if you had Buller to deal with," she said. "I've a mind to give you my son's revolver. Will you take it?"

Martha drew back quickly. "No'm, thank you, bein' much obliged, all the same. My husband an' me, we don't believe in settlin' disputes that way. Shootin', be it by one, or be it by many, is murder, an' nothin' else. I'd like to put a stop to it, if I could. I'm dead set against it. They talk about puttin' a stop to war, an' some says you couldn't do it. But you _could_ do it. If every man who was 'listed, just crossed his arms, an' said respectful but firm: 'No, siree! Not on your life I won't shoot!' an' stuck to his word--where'd they get their armies? You can't _square_ anythin' with _round_ bullets. I wouldn't mind cuffin' Buller a good lick or two, but I wouldn't _shoot_'m. I've too much respec' for my own peace o' mind."

"Well, at least take the precaution to keep off these country roads after nightfall. Get yourself home now. And when you come here again, if it's at night like this, bring that dog of yours, that you talk so much about, along with you."

"Flicker? Goodness! Flicker's the peaceablest party of us all. He wouldn't be a mite o' perfection, even if we'd let'm out. Since we first took'm off'n the street, Flicker thinks everybody means well by'm. He'd never get over the shock if somebody treated'm low down. He just wouldn't _believe_ it, that's all. But anyhow, Sam (my husband) he's been obliged to set some traps for the foxes that prowels 'round after Mr. Ronaldses hens an' ours, an' we're afraid Flicker might get caught in one, if we'd leave'm run free nights."

Acting on Madam Crewe's gentle hint, Martha proceeded to take herself off. She had not really thought of Buller with any apprehension, but as she walked along the dark, lonely road, the suggestion worked, and she fancied him lying in wait for her behind "any old ambush growin' by the way, ready to spring," as she told herself.

This did not prevent her from tramping on when, at last, she reached her own door, and realized she was out of yeast, and Cora had need of some for the night's "raisin'."

Mrs. Lentz "admired" to let her have the loan of a cake. Martha chatted a while, then started away, this time headed directly for home. She had gone but a short distance, the length of a city block perhaps, when, suddenly, she came to a standstill.

"Who's there?" she demanded sternly. Her voice sounded unfamiliar, even to her own ears. She attempted to flash her lantern-light into the inky blackness of the thicket hedging the road-bank. "Who's there?" she repeated.

Silence.

For a second, she doubted her own instinct, and was on the point of passing sheepishly on, ashamed of her childishness, when a sinister rustle in the shadow brought her, as it were, up standing again, instantly alert, on the defensive.

"Who's there?" rang out for the third time. "If you don't speak or show this minute, I'll come an' fetch you."

The rustle increased. A blotch of shadow detached itself from its vague background, and a huddled shape inched forward, like a magnified beetle.

Martha held her lantern up as she took a step forward to meet the thing.

"MA!" she exploded. Then---- "Well, what do you think o' that!"

"O--oh, Martha!"

The next minute the magnified beetle was passionately clinging to "me son Sammy's wife," as if there were no other anchorage in all the world.

"But for the love o' Mike, Ma, how come you here? You're shakin' like an ash-pan. You're all done up. Never mind tellin' me now. When we're home is time enough."

Fairly carrying the poor, limp creature, heartening her, soothing her, Martha got her, at last, to the Lodge, set her in Sam's chair, with the comforting _pilla_ to rest the _holla_ in her back, brought her the reinforcing _cuppertee_ which, in hot weather or cold, was Ma's greatest solace and, to crown all, sat down and listened, while she told of the dangers she had passed.