Part 8

“Perhaps you will give me the satisfaction.”

“If you like, I'll take it up for him,” said Forbes, with admirable coolness. “He is older than you, and not accustomed to the sword.”

“Look here--I won't let you fight for me,” I said. “These fellows are used to the sword and pistol. They have nothing else to do and are looking for a sure thing. Fight him with your fists--if he's bound to fight again.”

“Him! That would be too sure a thing, I'm afraid,” said Richard. “I've practised this game of fencing at college and the Fencers' Club. I'm not afraid of the count.”

I had observed that a number of swords had been lying on a table near us. Before Richard's remark was finished the count had picked up one of them and said to my friend:

“Come--you are not fearful--like a lady. Give me one chance.”

Before anything more could be done or said the young men were at it, and, to my great relief, I saw that Forbes was able to take care of himself. The count was a clever swordsman, but my friend was stronger and just as quick.

It is about the prettiest survival of feudal times, this bloody game of the sword.

I observed that the clock in the studio indicated the moment of 12.18 when the contest began. It lasted for an hour or more, as I thought, when it ended with blood-flowing from the sword-arm of the count at 12.21. The count was satisfied and breathing heavily. Forbes was fresh and strong.

“It is enough,” the slim count shouted, and the battle was over.

“You play with the sword so skilful,” the latter panted, as De Langueville and the surgeon began to dress his wound.

“All you need is a pair of lungs,” said Forbes. “The pair you have may do for sucking cigarettes, but not for fighting.”

“And I politely request that you do not use them again in making love to Miss Norris,” I said. “Hereafter I shall carry a fork with me, and any man who follows us again will get it run into him. But now that you know that they do not want to graft you on their family tree you will, of course, annoy them no more. I expect you're a much better fellow than you seem to be.”

“And they will permission her to marry Raspagnetti?” he demanded.

“Why not?” was my query.

“Well, he has been married already and has amuse himself by dragging his wife around his palace by the hairs of her head.”

“It's a bad fashion,” I said; “it wears out the carpets.”

He looked puzzled.

“But it's an ancient diversion of the Romans,” I went on, remembering that panel in one of the galleries which portrayed the extraction of the whiskers of a captive who was tied hand and foot--one of the basest amusements I can think of.

As we talked the surgeon was at work on the arm of the young man.

“Let's go and get a bite to eat,” Richard proposed, and we made our escape.

While we were eating he said:

“Don't say anything of my part in this little scrap. I'm ashamed of it. To draw blood from him is like taking candy from a child.” At the hotel Richard found a cable that summoned him to New York. Late that afternoon Gwendolyn and her mother and Betsey went with him to the station where he took a train for the north. I bade the boy good-by and said as I did so:

“Leave the case in my hands again.”

“It's hopeless!” said he.

“Not exactly!” I answered.

“She has turned me down.”

“Turned you down?”

“Yes, I had a talk with her last evening.”

“You'll have to try it again some other evening,” I said.

“She doesn't want to marry any one. That's about the way she puts it--but more politely. I told her that if she didn't want to be proposed to again she'd better avoid me. I expect to convince her that she's wrong.”

He left me, and I went to see Norris, who had sent word that he wished to talk with me.

XIV.--MISS GWENDOLYN DEFINES HER POSITION

I FOUND Norris looking better, and it's a sure thing that I was looking worse. I felt weary--the natural reaction of all that deviltry! Exercise with the pitchfork is all right under proper circumstances, but a man near fifty years of age should use more care than I had done in the choice of circumstances.

“What's the matter?” was the query of Norris.

“Been fightin',” I said, remembering how I had answered a similar question of my father one day when I returned from school with a black eye and my trousers torn. “They kep' pickin' on me.”

Then I told him the story of my quarrel with the slim count and its climax. But I said nothing of Forbes's part in the matter. We laughed so loudly that the nurse entered in a panic to see what was the matter.

“Nothing's the matter except good health,” I said. “We're both twenty years younger than we were a short time ago, and if you know any remedy for that go and throw it out of the window.”

She retired from the scene, and we went on with our talk.

“You're about the most versatile lawyer that I ever knew,” said he. “Such devotion I did not deserve or expect. If there's any more fighting to be done we'll hire a boy. For what you have done I say 'Thanks,' and you know what I mean by that. Gosh t' Almighty! I'm going to get out of bed, and we'll have some fun.”

“I'm beginning to long for the old sod!” I remarked.

“So'm I. Let's go south for a little while and then home. It looks as if we should have to take a count with us as a souvenir.”

“The Raspagnetti?” I asked.

“The same,” said he. “Read that.”

He drew from under his pillow a letter from the Count Raspagnetti, which said:

_I am sorry that you are sick, for I desire so much to talk with you and tell you, I should say, how profoundly I am in love with your beautiful and accomplished daughter. The esteemed Monsignor who bears this note, and who is my friend and yours also, can tell you that I am worthy of your confidence, although unworthy, so to speak, of such an adorable creature as Miss Gwendolyn. But I feel in my heart that I cannot be happy without her. I assure you that I would rather die than find it impossible to make her my wife. So I hope that you will let me see you soon, if your health should cherish the endurance, and permit me to speak of such things to her._

I had scarcely finished reading it when Norris said:

“The Monsignor, whom I had met in New York, and who is one of the most courtly gentlemen you can imagine, came to see me this morning and recommended the count without reserve as one of the first gentlemen of Italy. I guess he's all right, and I agree with my wife that we will put it up to Gwendolyn and let her do as she likes. If she must have a title I presume she couldn't do better.”

I was about to suggest that she would need a special allowance for hair-restorer, but restrained myself. I thought that I wouldn't say anything disagreeable unless it should be necessary and also susceptible of proof.

“What does Gwendolyn think of him?” I asked.

“I haven't said a word to Gwendolyn about him--yet. I'll have a talk with her tomorrow or perhaps to-night. When I awoke this morning about two o'clock Gwendolyn and her mother were standing by the bed. The girl has taken the notion that she must do the nursing herself. I haven't been fair to them. I guess it's up to me to let them do the marrying. Mrs. Norris seems to like this man, and if Gwendolyn wants him I shall fall in line. I'm not going to be a Czar even in the interest of democracy.”

“It's the wisest possible course,” I agreed.

“I wish that you'd post yourself about the sailings,” said he, as I left him.

I broke a Roman record that evening--went to bed at eight. In Rome the day doesn't really begin until about that hour. At two o'clock people are coming out of the cafés, and the blood of Italy is in full song. Betsey complained that I yelled in my sleep, and I believed her.

The voice of the nightingales awoke me just before daylight. What a mellow-voiced chorus it is! A man has got to search his memory if he's going to try to describe it. The softest tones of the flute are in that song. It has an easy-flowing conversational lilt. It's a kind of swift, tumbling brook of flute music. As the light grew a noisy band of sparrows came on the scene. For a little while the soft phrases of the nightingales were woven into the sparrows' chatter. They ceased suddenly. I rose and dressed and went down into the little park outside my windows just as the sun's light began to show in the sky. In a moment I saw a young lady approaching in one of the garden paths.

She waved to me and called, “Hello, Uncle Soc!”

It was Gwendolyn.

“Child! Why are you not in bed?” I asked.

“I've worked at idleness so long and so hard that I'm taking a little vacation,” said she. “I sat all night with father. He couldn't sleep, and we talked and talked, and then I read to him and he fell asleep half an hour ago, and I came down for a breath of the morning air.”

“Don't get reckless with your holiday--all night is a rather long pull,” I suggested.

“I enjoyed every minute. You see, I've never had a chance to do anything for him. My father has always been so busy, and I away in school or traveling with my mother or Mrs. Mushtop. I was never quite so happy as I am now.”

“There's nothing so restful as honest toil,” I said. “The fact is you've been overworking in the past--struggling with luncheons, teas, dinners, dressmakers, and dances, and getting through at midnight. It's too much for any human being. If you could only go to work in a laundry or a kitchen or a sick-room, how restful and soothing it would be!”

“I understand you now, Uncle Soc,” said she. “We must see that it pays. Last night I was so well paid for my work! I discovered my father. The night passed like magic and filled me with happiness. To-day life is worth living. He told me of his boyhood, and I told him of my girlhood and that I wanted to make it different.

“'You must let me do the nursing,' I said. “'Why?' he asked.

“'Because I love you,' I told him, and what do you think he said?”

“My thinker got overheated and blew up the other day, and is undergoing repairs,” I answered. “So you'll have to tell me.”

“I shall remember it so long as I live,” she went on, with tears in her eyes, “for he said, 'I've found a daughter, and it's the best thing that's happened to me since I found a wife.'”

“My, what a night! You found the greatest luxury in the world, which is work,” I said. “Don't go to dissipating like a child with a can of jelly and make yourself sick of it. Go easy. Be temperate.”

“Uncle Soc, you dear old thing!” she exclaimed. “I'm beginning to know you better, too. I want you to tell me something. Father said that we should be going home soon. Now, _what_ can I take to Richard? It must be something very, very nice--something that he will be sure to like.”

“Why take anything to Richard?” I asked. “I refuse to tell you why,” she answered. “But please remember that I have not the slightest hope of every marrying Richard.”

“You have lost your heart in Italy,” I said. “But I was kind o' hoping that you'd recover it.”

“I know that you and father have been worried about that, but you didn't know me so well as you thought. I had heard much about these Italians, and they are handsome men, and the Count Raspagnetti is a very grand gentleman. I have been impressed, for I am as human as other girls, but I cannot marry the count, and if he asks me I shall tell him so; and I can do it with a clear conscience, for _I_ have given him no encouragement.”

I made no answer, being unhorsed by this unexpected turn.

“I do not propose to marry any one, and if you will think for a moment you will know why.”

In a flash her meaning came to me. She'd have to tell her father's secret to the man she married, and that she would never do. Again that old skeleton in the family closet was grinning at us.

“Gwendolyn, my thinker has been worn out by overwork here in Italy or it would not have been asleep at its post,” I said. “I take off my hat to you and keep it off as long as you're near me. Jiminy Christmas! I like the stuff you're made of, but look here--the case isn't hopeless. I'll show you a way out of this trouble some day. Come on, let's go in and have some breakfast. I'm hungry as a bear.”

“No, thanks! I must go back to my patient,” said the girl. “I never eat any breakfast.”

“The breakfast habit is purely American. You'll acquire it by and by,” I assured her. “Wait until you get a settled liking for long days and short nights.”

She left me, and I thought that I would take a little walk under the trees before going in. I had not gone a dozen paces when Muggs came along. He was looking pale and thin and rather untidy.

“I knew that you were an early riser,” said he. “I came to find you if I could.”

He must have seen a look of anger in my face, for he went on:

“Don't be hard on me. I've come to bring you that two hundred dollars, with fifty added for the hat and coat.”

He gave me a check, and it nearly knocked me down with astonishment. “What cunning ruse is this?” I asked myself, and said: “You're not looking well.”

“I can't eat or sleep,” he continued. “I've been walking the streets since midnight. There's something I wanted to say, but I'm not up to it now. I'll try to see you again within a day or two.”

He bade me good morning and went on, and I was puzzled by the serious look in his face.

XV.---SOMETHING HAPPENS TO THE MAN MUGGS

SOME people are so careless with their affections that they even forget where they laid 'em the day before, and often go about sputtering like an old gentleman who has lost his spectacles. My grandfather was once so mad at a table on which he had found them lying, unexpectedly, that he seized a poker and put a dent in it. He was like many modern lovers--divorced and otherwise. They should remember that misplaced affection has made more trouble than anything else.

Mrs. Mullet had been a bit careless with her affections, and especially in taking Mr. Pike's recommendation of Colonel Wilton. What could have been the motive of Mr. Pike?

Mrs. Mullet called to see us next morning.

“Something very strange has happened,” said she.

“If you were to tell me something that wasn't strange I wouldn't believe it,” I answered. “Go ahead; you can't astonish me.”

“Please read this letter,” she requested, as she drew a sheet of paper from an envelope and put it into my hands and added, “It's from Colonel Wilton.”

“From Wilton!” I exclaimed, and began reading aloud the singular human document. His emotion conferred rank upon her, for he had addressed Mrs. Mullet in this baronial fashion:

_My dear Lady Maude,--I have completed the payments due to date on the bust and the oil-painting, because I have decided that if I cannot have you I must have them. I want to live with them, for I believe they will help me. I tell you the God's truth, I have been a bad man, but I want to be better and make good to every one I have wronged. I can't do it for a little while yet, but I'm going to as sure as there's a God in heaven. I was a fool to write that letter, but I was discouraged. You are the only woman I ever loved. I take back all that I wrote in that letter. I won't put any price on you. I can't. You are better than all the money in the world. I don't blame you a bit for not having anything more to do with me. You don't know what I have suffered; you can't know, but I know. I shall never give you a moment's trouble. Don't be afraid to meet me in the street. I may look at you, but I shall not speak to you. Don't hate me; but, if you can, ask Jesus Christ to forgive me and help me to live honest. I don't believe that He wants me to suffer always like this. Don't hate me, because I love you, and please remember me as Lysander Wilton._

Its script was curious. Every word was written with extreme care, and some were embellished with little flourishes. I remembered how slowly and carefully he had formed the letters in that signature in my office.

There were tears in the eyes of Mrs. Mullet when I folded the letter and looked into her face.

“What do you think of it?” she asked.

“Sounds as if he meant it, but he's an able sounder,” I answered.

“He had a good case and has given up all claim upon her,” said Betsey, in the tone of gentle protest.

“Oh, well! he wouldn't dare to bring a suit here or in America,” I objected. “She might get the hatchet, but he would get the ax.”

“How would you explain his payments on the bust and the portrait?” Betsey asked.

Sure enough, why was he buying the bust and the painting, and how had he got the money to do it?

“It looks as if he had gone out of his mind,” said Betsey.

“Nobody could blame him for going out of his mind,” was my answer. “If I had his mind I'd go out of it.”

“Perhaps she has driven him into a new and a better mind,” said Betsey.

“That's possible. There's plenty of room outside his old mental horizon. If it's honest love I should think he would die of astonishment to find such goods on himself.”

“Well, you see, he was not very well, and I was a kind of mother to him here,” Mrs. Mullet answered, as she wiped her eyes. “He was kind and thoughtful and so very handsome. I was really fond of him.”

Mrs. Mullet yielded again to her emotions. She was not a bad sort of a woman, after all.

True, she was still afflicted with a light attack of the beauty disease. But she had a heart in her. She was, too, “a well-fashioned, enticing creature,” as Samuel Pepys would have said. I didn't blame Muggs for leaping in love with her. It was as natural as for a boy to leap into a swimming-hole.

“What shall I do?” she asked, presently.

“Study art as hard as you can,” I said. “Botticelli may help you to forget Muggs. But don't fail to tell me what happens. I've got to know how Muggs gets along with his new affliction.”

She agreed to keep me posted, and left us.

A note came from Mrs. Fraley that afternoon. She wished to see me on a matter of business, and wouldn't we go and drink tea with them at five? They were spending the day in the Capitoline Museum, where Muriel was at work.

We couldn't drink tea with them, and so Betsey proposed that we walk to the museum and see what they wanted. We did it.

Miss Muriel was copying a figure of Socrates on the fragment of a frieze. The beauty disease had visibly progressed in her--hair a shade richer, eyes more strongly underscored. Old Socrates was so different, sitting in conversation and leaning forward on his staff. One bare foot rested comfortably on the other. They were a good-sized pair of industrious and reliable feet. He seemed to be addressing his argument to the young lady who sat before him. The expression of the big toe on his right foot indicated that it was not wholly unmoved by his words.

Mrs. Fraley beckoned me aside and whispered:

“The dear child is making wonderful progress. She is copying that for one of the New York magazines. Muriel has made a great social success in Rome. Mrs. Wartz has taken her up, and her name is in the Paris _Herald_ almost every day.”

In a moment she made an illuminating proposal:

“I want to borrow fifty thousand dollars on good security--the bonds of the Great Bend & Lake Michigan Traction Company,” she said. “I would pay you a liberal fee if you would help me.”

“It's a bad time to borrow money,” I answered. “Is it a bust or a painting?”

“Neither; it's Miss Muriel's marriage portion. The count has proposed, and I find that he is one of the dearest, noblest young men that ever lived.”

There was no help for these people. An appeal to their minds was like shooting into the sky or writing in water. You couldn't land on them.

“Oh, then it's a husband!” I exclaimed.

“Yes, and we want to take him home with us.”

“He requires cash down?”

“I believe it is usual.”

“Are you sure that Muriel could manage him? He's pretty coltish and has never been halter-broke. He might rare up an' pull away an' run off with the money.”

“He loves her to distraction, he worships and adores her, and she is very, very fond of him.”

“You are far from your friends here,” I said. “Suppose you ask the count to call on me and talk it over. It may be that I could arrange easy terms. Possibly we could even get him on the instalment plan, with a small payment down.”

“I would not dare suggest it,” said Mrs. Fraley.

“Cable to your banker, and if the bonds are good he ought to be able to get the money for you.”

“I thought of that, but to save time I hoped that you would be willing to let me have it.”

“I wouldn't assist you to commit a folly which you are sure to regret,” I answered. “In my opinion he would be dear at ten dollars. It looks to me like taking over a liability instead of an asset.”

“We didn't ask for your opinion,” said Miss Muriel, as she blushed with indignation.

“My opinions are as easy to get as counts in Italy,” I said. “You don't have to ask for them. I give you one thing more--my best wishes. Good-by!”

With that we left them. Things began to move fast. Norris came down to dinner, and we all sat together in the dining-room with the new count. It was the last despairing effort of mama to grasp the persimmon. She had boosted her daughter within easy reach of said persimmon, but Gwendolyn refused to pull it down. Her attitude was polite but firm.

“It doesn't look good to me,” she seemed to be saying.

The count told thrilling tales of royal friends and palaces, and they all rang like good metal, for this count was a real aristocrat. Still, “No, thanks” was in the voice and manner of Gwendolyn. He twanged airy compliments on his little guitar.

“No, thanks!”

Gwendolyn gave me a sly wink and suggested that I should tell a story. I saw what was expected of me and got the floor and kept it. Finally the count played his best trump. They would be invited to a fête in the palace of a certain noted prince.

“No, thanks!” said Gwendolyn, before her mother could answer. “It is very kind of you, but we shall be so busy getting ready to sail.”

The count took his medicine like a thoroughbred.

“And you--you must not be astonished to see me in America before much time, I should say,” he answered.

“What a joy to welcome you there!” Mrs. Norris exclaimed.

Then followed a little duet in Fifth Avenue and Roman dialect with monocle and minuet accompaniment by the great artists Norris and Raspagnetti based on these allegations:

_First: She was so glad to have had the great pleasure of meeting him._

_Second: He was so glad to have had the honor of meeting her and her daughter._

_Third: She was so sorry to say good-by._

_Fourth: She was a dear lady, and could never know how much pain it “afflicted upon him” to say good-by; but fortunately she was not leaving him hopeless._

The climax had passed.

Gwendolyn got her hand kissed, and so did her mother--there was no dodging that--but it was our last experience with the hand-smackers of Italy.

We had a happy American evening together in the Norris apartments, and Mrs. Norris seemed to enjoy my imitation of her parting with the count. The first occurrence of note in the morning was Mrs. Mullet. She was getting to be a perennial, but she grew a foot that day in our estimation. She had brought with her a note from Muggs. He was very ill in his room and begged her to come and see him as a last favor. What should she do?

“Let's go and see him--you and I and Mrs. Potter,” was my suggestion. “This has all the ear-marks of a case of true love. My professional advice has never been sought in a case of that kind; but come on, let's see what there is to it.”

We went and found Muggs abed, with a high fever. No more nonsense now! I've got to be decently serious for a few minutes. We were amazed to see how the sight of Mrs. Mullet affected him, and how tenderly he clung to her hands, and begged her to forget the man he had been. She turned to me with wet eyes and said:

“I cannot leave him like this. I shall send for a nurse and doctor, and take care of him. He has no friends here.”

“Bully for you!” I said. “If he's out of money I'll help you pay the bills.”