Part 18

That was how I began to write my first novel. I lived now with only one avid thought in my mind--the story I was writing. It infatuated me as nothing I had ever done before had infatuated me.

I resigned my position, and took a half-day place. I had a little over a hundred dollars saved, and the new position paid me seven dollars a week. As I supplied my own type-writer, I had the privilege of taking outside work in the afternoons.

I think Mr. Forman was really relieved when I told him I had decided to go, though he asked me anxiously whether I had consulted Mr. Hamilton about it. I said that I had written and told him. I had done my work there adequately (he gave me an excellent reference), but he had dismissed a faithful secretary, to whom he was attached, to make a place for me at Mr. Hamilton's request. I never knew this when I took that position, else I would not have taken it.

I left because of what Roger had said, for one thing. I preferred not to be under obligations to him for my position. Besides, I wanted a little more time in which to write my novel. The seven a week just paid for my board, and I had enough saved to carry me along otherwise.

My new position was in a school, a sort of dramatic school where calisthenics, fencing, and other things were also taught. I had a chance to see something of the young men and women who were studying there, mostly of wealthy families. The courses were very expensive. A great many Chicago society women took fencing lessons there, and one of them was kind enough to offer to pay for lessons for me. I would have liked to learn, but I could not afford the time. Every minute that I had away from the school I gave to my precious novel. I used to get home about two. I'd have a glass of milk and a cracker for my luncheon, and then I would write until six. Then came dinner, and then again I wrote, sometimes till as late as midnight. I wrote my novel in twenty-two days. It is impossible for me to describe my delight and satisfaction when I put the last word to my manuscript.

Then for a long time I sat by the fire and re-read my story, and it seemed to me I had created a treasure. Roger, who professed to know something about palmistry, had averred there was a gold-mine in my hand, and he said that it was he who was going to put it there; but when I read my story that night I had a prophetic feeling that my mine would be of my own creating.

I now had to revise and type-write my story, no light task.

Outside of the work I did for the school, I had secured bits of copying for a few people in the building; but I had made very little above my salary. The head of the school was an imposing and majestic woman of about fifty, very handsome and charming and gracious in her manner, though I always resented the difference between her tone to me and that she assumed to her pupils and the people who frequented her studios--she called them studios. She had a little salon in a way. Nearly all Chicago's important people, and especially the celebrities, came to her "afternoons." I had a chance to see authors who had "arrived."

There was one very tall woman who wore glasses and talked through her nose. She was very well known at that time, having had a witty serial published in the very magazine that bought my first little story. She was much sought after, and was suffering from a bad case of what O'Brien always called "the big head." She looked and talked as if she were a personage of great superiority, and her sharp retorts and witty comments, always a bit malicious, were quoted everywhere in Chicago. I think she believed me to be one of her many silent admirers. I was not. I knew that when one has reached a stage of complete satisfaction with oneself, one has reached one's limitation. Chicago's popular writer at the zenith of her fame was not to me a particularly attractive object.

Then there was a celebrated Western author who was a giant in size and a giant in heart. I secretly adored him both as a writer and as a man. He wore his straight hair rather long, and though his face was becoming florid and full, he had a fine, almost Indian-like, profile. He was tremendously popular in Chicago, and Mrs. Martin, my employer, flattered and courted him despite his careless and rather grimy clothes and utterly unmanicured nails. Behold the measure of my sophistication! I who knew not the meaning of the word "manicure" less than a year before, took pride in my own shining nails now, and remarked the condition of those of a great author!

There was another less famous, but more exclusive, author who fascinated me chiefly because he had a glass eye. I had never before seen a glass eye.

I have mentioned the authors because they interested me more than the artists, sculptors, musicians, and actors and actresses who also came to these studios where I worked. The building itself was full of artists' studios.

Do not think of me as being one of this distinguished "set." I was, in fact, simply on the outskirts, a rather wistful, perhaps envious, and sometimes amused observer of these great people who had obviously "arrived."

Few of these celebrities noticed me. Several of the artists asked me to pose for them. I did not pose, because I had no time. I did go up to the studio of a hunchback artist who painted divinely and had a pretty wife and an adorable baby. I became very friendly with that lovely family, and even shyly confessed to them that I wrote. Just fancy! I, who only a few months before had forced every one to listen to my poems, now when I was in contact with people who did the very things I wished to do, experienced a panic at the thought of their finding out about it or of revealing myself to them!

Even Mrs. Martin never suspected me. I was simply a stenographer who had come to her from a mercantile firm. The only thing about me that ever appealed to her was my looks. Think of that! She said to me one day as I was going out:

"Miss Ascough, you look like a poster girl. Where did you get your hat?"

I told her, and she raised her eyebrows.

"Well," she said, studying me through her lorgnon, "your hair looks astonishingly well against that silver fur. Have you ever thought of going on the stage?"

I replied that I had not.

She regarded me speculatively a moment, and then said:

"There are worse-looking girls than you in the choruses."

I told her I could sing a little. Whereupon she said:

"Oh, I don't mean sing or act. However, you'd better stick to what you're doing until my season closes, and then, if you're a good girl"--she smiled very graciously--"I'll see what I can do for you."

Her season ended in June. You perceive I had something to look forward to!

And now I come to the author who was the cause of my discharge from this place.

Mrs. Martin herself had brought him to my desk and introduced him to me. He had with him a thick manuscript when he asked me, with a very charming smile, if I would type-write for him. You may be sure I was glad to get this extra work, as my funds were running low. So I put aside the copying of my own novel, and went hard to work upon the play of this Chicago author. It was a closely written manuscript, a play in six acts. He required eight copies, only four of which were to be carbons. In order to get the work done as soon as possible and resume the copying of my own story, I went down to the office three nights and worked till eleven.

As I have said, there were six acts, and each was of forty pages. So, you see, it was a fairly big manuscript. A public stenographer would have charged at the rate of five cents a folio,--that is, one hundred words,--and there were about two hundred and eighty words to a page. She would also have charged about two cents a page for the carbon copies. I made out my bill for five cents a page, and did not charge for the carbon copies.

The author had been coming every day and going over the work as I did it, and he had me not only bind his play, but rule parts of it in red ink--the descriptive parts. I felt mightily pleased when I handed him the completed manuscript. Rather apologetically I proffered him my bill.

He took the latter, and looked at it as if much surprised and pained, and then said:

"Why, Miss Ascough, I brought this to you as a friend of Mrs. Martin."

I said:

"Yes, that's why I did not charge for the carbons, and made you just a half-rate."

"There seems to be some mistake," he replied. "I understood from Mrs. Martin that you would do this work just as if it were for her."

"Do you mean," I said, "for nothing?"

He made a gesture with his hands, as much as to say, "Don't put it so baldly."

I stared at him. I could not believe that any one would be mean enough to let me do all that work for nothing. He was a greatly admired author. His play seemed, in my youthful judgment, a fine thing, and yet was it possible that he would impose upon a poor working-girl? Could he really believe that I, who was being paid only seven dollars a week for my morning services, would have worked afternoons and evenings to type-write his play without charge?

He put his play in a large envelop, and then he said:

"I appreciate very much what you have done, and I am pleased with your work. I shall make a point of recommending you to friends of mine." He cleared his throat. "I've also brought you a little present in token of my appreciation." He took from his coat pocket a book, one of his own. "It's autographed," he said, smiling, and gave it to me.

I held his book with a thumb and forefinger, as if it were something unclean, and then I deliberately dropped it into the waste-paper-basket.

He turned violently red and walked into Mrs. Martin's studio.

I had started in aimlessly to change the ribbon,--I had worn out one for his play,--when Mrs. Martin sailed majestically from her room and up to my desk.

"Miss Ascough," she said, "I won't require your services any further. You may leave at once."

I shrugged my shoulders, sneered, and laughed right up in her face, as if the loss of such a job as that was a matter of supreme indifference to me. She became as red as her friend, and walked haughtily back to her private quarters.

XXXII

I carried my machine home. Machines are heavy things. A sort of rainy snow was falling, and though it was only four in the afternoon, it was beginning to grow dark. The streets were in a bad state with slush and mud and ice, and I got very wet on my way to the car, for I couldn't put up an umbrella, as I had to carry my machine under one arm and my manuscript under the other.

As soon as I walked into our house, Margaret called out from the dining-room:

"Mr. Hamilton is here." Then he got up--he was having tea with them--and came over to me. I had the type-writer in my hand, and I don't know whether I dropped it or set it down on the floor.

I hadn't had any luncheon, I was soaked through. I had worked for weeks on my novel, and, besides the office work, I had type-written that long play. I had been working day and night, and I had been insulted and discharged. I was tired out, cold, and wet. Add to this the sudden shock of seeing Mr. Hamilton, and you will understand why even a healthy girl of eighteen may sometimes faint.

It was only a little faint, and I came to while Roger was carrying me up-stairs; but I did not move, for his face was against mine.

Mama had come up with us, and when Roger set me on the couch, she said she'd take charge of me. She told him to go down-stairs and have Margaret make me a toddy, and to bring it up on a tray with my dinner. I felt like a big baby to have her fussing over me and taking off all my wet things. I had a lovely pink eider-down dressing-gown that she had made me, and she forced me to get into that and into dry stockings and slippers.

By this time Roger and Margaret came up with the tray, and all three were doing things for me. Roger himself mixed me a drink. It was hot, with brandy and lemon in it. As soon as I drank it, it went right to my head, for I had eaten nothing since morning, and I tried to tell them about Mrs. Martin's discharging me, and how that author had not paid me for all my work.

Cloudy as my head was and stumblingly as I talked, I won their sympathies. Roger said that the author was a mean little sneak, a cursed small cur, and that he'd like to kick him all over the town.

Then, because I started to cry, they tried to make me eat something and drink some coffee; but I was so sleepy I could not keep my eyes open. The first thing I knew, I was in my bed.

I slept and slept; I slept till ten o'clock the next day. The first thought I had was that Roger must have gone. I never dressed so quickly, and I ran to his room and knocked; but he was not there.

Margaret also had departed for work, but I found mama in the kitchen. She was making me an oyster stew, a thing for which I had acquired a liking. As soon as I appeared, she cried:

"You bad girl, what did you get up for? Here's a note for you."

With hands trembling with excitement, I read Roger's first letter to me. It was like him, those two brief, laconic sentences:

Back by noon. Stay in bed.

ROGER.

Stay in bed! I never felt better in my life. I had my stew, and then I went up-stairs and finished copying my novel.

At noon to the minute Roger returned. He had all sorts of things for me: flowers,--orchids, mind you!--squab, fruit, jelly, and magazines. One would think I was an invalid, and I had to laugh at his look of disapproval when he discovered me busy at work. He said I was incorrigible.

He made no effort that day to conceal his feelings from me. It was not that he petted or caressed me; but he fussed over me all day, kept me right by the fire, and brought up my luncheon to me, as he said the lower floor was draughty. He kept feeling my head to see if I was feverish. I think I gave him a good fright the night before. He said he ought to have returned to Richmond the previous night, as there was important business there that needed his attention. He'd been obliged to keep the wires scorching all the morning. He would have to get away that night, however; but he wanted to make absolutely certain that I had recovered.

He said that he had been obliged to hasten his return, neglecting certain business in Europe, because I had not written to him as I promised to do. I did write him once, but the letter must have miscarried. However, he was not in a scolding mood that day, and every minute I thought he was going to pick me up in his arms.

He wanted to know if I had missed him, and I tried to pretend that I hadn't, that I had been absorbed in my writing. He looked so solemn over that and so far, far away from me that I wanted instantly to put my arms about his neck, and I debated with myself how I could reach him. I pulled up the stool in front of him, stood on it, and in that way reached his face. I gave him a quick kiss, and then jumped down. I thought he would laugh at that, but he didn't. I did though; but while I was laughing I suddenly thought of something that frightened me, and I asked him if he had had a fine time in Europe, and added that I supposed he had seen many lovely women.

I had a vague idea that France was simply brimming with fascinating, irresistible, and beautiful sirens whom no man could possibly resist, and the thought that Roger had been there made my heart almost stop beating; but not for long, for he said very gravely:

"I never noticed anything nor any one. My mind was engrossed with one thought only--my _own_ little girl in Chicago."

Then he asked me if I realized that he had spent fewer than ten days in Europe, and that he had come here to me before even going to his home.

"Goodness!" I said slyly, "you _are_ interested in me, aren't you?"

He looked at me queerly then, and he said:

"Nora, I'm 'dippy' about you."

"Is that slang for love, Roger?" I asked, which made him laugh, and then he tried to frown at me; but he could not. So he changed the subject abruptly, and made me tell him about all the things that had happened to me while he was away.

He said I was a "precious angel" for giving up Bennet, and that Butler was a "conceited pup," and I was a "little idiot" to mind anything he said. He wished _he_ had been there. He said Mrs. Martin was a sycophant and a kowtowing old snob, and that he knew her well; and as for my going on the stage! One would think I was considering jumping off the face of the earth.

I told him he was pretty nearly as bad as the little Japanese, and he laughed and said:

"That Jap's all right. By George! I like his idea. It would give me peculiar satisfaction to wring the necks of one or two people we know," and he clapped his fist into his hand.

I said mischievously:

"Well, you know that Jap hated those enemies of mine because he loved me."

Roger chuckled, and said I might sit on that stool and hint till doomsday, but he was not going to tell me he loved me till he was good and ready.

"When will that be?" I asked, and he said solemnly, with mock gravity:

"'I'm sure I don't know,' Said the great bell of Bow."

"My father always said that there was no time like the present," I replied.

He laughed, but said seriously:

"Nora, if you play with fire, you'll be burned. Burns leave scars. Scars are ugly things, and I love only pretty things, like my precious little girl."

"Aha!" I said triumphantly, "then you admit it at last."

He burst out laughing and said:

"Trapped! Help!"

After a while he wanted to hear my novel. So then I read it to him, my beautiful story.

I read it well, as only an author can read his own work--not well in the sense of elocution, but with every important point brought out. It took me two and a half hours to read it, and when I was through, twilight had settled. I had read the last words chiefly by the light of the blazing fire. Roger got up, and walked up and down the room. I watched him from my seat on the stool by the fire. Then he suddenly came back to me, seized my manuscript, and made a motion as if he would consign it to the flames. At that I screamed, like an outraged mother, and caught at it, and he stood towering over me, watching me curiously.

"I wanted to try you then, Nora," he said. "Now I know that I have a bigger rival in your work than any man. What am I to do?"

I held my novel out to him.

"Burn it if you wish to, then. It represents only the product of my fancy; but _you_ are my life," I said.

"Do you mean that?" he asked me, and I replied:

"Oh, yes, I do, I do."

"If I asked you to give up your writing, as I asked you to give up Bennet, would you do it for me?"

"Yes, everything and every one, Roger," I replied, "if only you will love me. Won't you?" In a voice full of emotion, he then said:

"Can you doubt it?"

A moment later he seemed to regret having revealed himself like that, and he swiftly made ready to go. He was taking an early train for Richmond. His man was waiting for him at some hotel. I wanted to go down to the door with him, but he would not let me, and we said good-by before mama, who had come up to say dinner was ready. He didn't kiss me, but I kissed him right before mama, on his hand and sleeve. If I could have reached his face, I would have kissed him there. He kept smoothing my hair. He said he would be back very soon, that he would never stay away from me long now.

I watched him from the window. The rain of the previous day had frozen on the trees, and everything was glistening and slippery. A wind was coming from the north, and the people went along the street as if blown against their will.

Roger looked up before getting into the cab and waved to me at the window, and I thought, as once before I had thought, as I watched his carriage disappear, that perhaps it would always be like this. He would always go. Would there ever come a day when he would not come again?

That was on the twenty-sixth of February. He could not have stayed in Richmond more than a few hours, for at ten o'clock the following night he came back to me.

I was running over some new pieces at the piano when I heard the bell ring; but I had no idea it was he until he came into the room without knocking. There was something about his whole appearance and attitude that startled me. His face had a grayish, haggard look, as if he had not slept. I ran up to him, but he held me back and began to speak rapidly:

"Nora, I've only a few minutes in Chicago. I must catch the 11:09 back to Richmond. It's after ten now. My cab's at the door. This is what I've come for. I want you to go to-morrow, on as early a train as you can get, to a little hunting-lodge of mine in the Wisconsin woods. Holmes [his valet] will come and take you, and I want you to stay there for a week or ten days."

The oddness of his request naturally puzzled me, and of course I exclaimed about it, and wanted to know why he wished me to go there. He said irritably:

"What does it matter why? I want you to go. I insist upon it, in fact."

"But what will I do up there?" I asked.

"Anything you wish. Write, if you like. I've a man and woman there. You'll not be entirely alone. The change will do you good."

"Aren't you going to be there, too?"

"I'm afraid not. I'll try to get there for the weekend if I possibly can."

"But I don't want to go to a place all alone, Roger."

"I tell you, you won't be alone. I have a man and a woman there, and Holmes will take you."

"But I don't see the sense in going away out there in the middle of winter."

"I particularly want you to go. Are my wishes nothing to you, then? I want you out of Chicago for a few days. You've not been well and--"

"I never felt better in my life."

"Nora, I want you to go. You must go. Do this thing to please me."

As, puzzled, I still hesitated, he began to promise that he would join me there the next day, and when I still did not assent, he tried coaxing me in another way. He said he'd bring Verley and a hunting-dog, and he'd teach me how to ride horseback and to shoot. He had horses, too, somewhere near there; a big stock farm, I think. I told him I didn't want to shoot or kill things.

By this time he had worked himself up to a state of exasperation at my stubbornness, and his request really seemed to me so ridiculous and capricious that I began to laugh at him, saying jokingly:

"You're worse than a dog in a manger: you're a Turk. You want to shut me up in a box."

"That's true enough," he replied. "I wish I'd done it long ago."

He was standing very tall and stiff by the door, with his coat still on, and his arms folded grimly across his breast. I looked at him, and a half-mischievous, half-tender impulse overwhelmed me. I went closer to him, and put my hands on his folded arms as I said:

"I'll go, Roger, if you'll take me in your arms and kiss me."

He gave me _such_ a look at that, and then his face broke, and he opened his arms. I went into them. I don't know how long I was in his arms. I never wanted to leave them again.

I presently heard his voice, low and husky, and felt he was trying to release himself from my hands. He said:

"I must go. I'll miss my train."

"O Roger, please don't leave me now!" I begged.

"I must," he replied, and then he went quickly out of the room. I followed him into the hall, though he was striding along so swiftly I could not keep pace with him. Just where the stairs began, I caught at his arm and held him.

"O Roger, you do love me, don't you?" I asked sobbingly, and he said hoarsely:

"Yes, I _do_."

Then he went down the stairs, and I after him. At the door he said I must go back; but I was still clinging to his hand, and when he opened the door I, too, went out.

Snow was falling densely, and the great north wind had brought on its wing a blizzard and storm such as Chicago had seldom known; but Roger and I, in that porch, saw nothing but each other.