Part 3

“I’ve never mentioned it--except to that detective, and I didn’t tell him--any more than I had to--He didn’t seem to need much telling--” he said dryly. “He seemed to sense just about what had been going on--without telling.”

“Yes--?” Eldridge was looking thoughtfully into the greyish-black beard with the round lump in it.

“He’s got the facts. It took him just two weeks--to get ’em.” His hand motioned toward the letters, but there was something in the face--a kind of puffy appeal.

Eldridge nodded. “They know what to do,” he said quietly.

“I hadn’t even mistrusted,” said the man. His eyes were looking at something that Eldridge could not see--something that seemed to come from a faint perfume in the room.... “I can see it plain enough now--looking back.... You don’t mind my telling you--a little--about it.” Eldridge shook his head. The man seemed a kind of lumbering boy, yet he was a shrewd, keen man in business.

“It might help--you know--” he said. “I thought you’d ask me, probably--I’d kind of planned to tell you, I guess.” He laughed a little awkwardly.

“Go ahead,” said Eldridge.

“He was _my_ friend, you see. And I brought him home with me and made ’em friends.... I can see now, looking back, what a fool I was--about it. But I didn’t see it--then. I don’t know now what it was about him.... He’s old as I be--and I’ve got the money. I can give her everything she wants--more than he can. But I know now that from the first day she see him she was curious about him.... I’d brought him home to dinner one night--It was just after we were married.... I always kind of think of him that night--the way he looked at table--he’s tall--You know him--?”

Eldridge nodded. He was seeing the tall, distinguished figure--and beside it a humped-up one across his desk.

“We had red lamp-shades and candles and flowers--Everything shining, you know--Cordelia likes ’em that way.... When I try to think how it started I see ’em the way they looked that first night. I was proud of ’em both. I felt as if Cordelia belonged to me--and as if he did, too--in a way--” He looked at Eldridge. “I’d put him on to a good thing in business--!”

“Yes.”

“He and Cordelia laughed and talked the whole evening--kind o’ took it up--back and forth--the way you’d play ball. I could see Cordelia liked him. I was a fool. I’d waited about getting married till I had money enough to give a woman--to give her everything--and when she’d got it I never see there might be--something else she’d want.... I don’t just know what now--” He shook his head.

“Some days, since I’ve got sure of it, I’ve felt as if it _couldn’t_ be so--as if she couldn’t have gone on living with me and having that other life--I didn’t know about--shut away from me--and I loving her....” The little, clear alcove moved before Eldridge and moved away. He was making absent marks on the edge of the pad before him.

The man sighed. “Well--It isn’t any use! That’s all, I guess--” Eldridge looked up. “Had you thought of--winning her back?”

The man shook his head. “I couldn’t do it.” He looked at him as if wondering whether he would understand. “There’s something about her I don’t get at,” he said slowly.

“Isn’t there something about any woman you don’t get at?” said Eldridge.

“That’s it!” assented the man. “It isn’t just Cordelia. It’s all of them--in back of ’em, somehow. I can’t tell you just how it is, but I’ve thought of it a lot--I guess there isn’t anything I haven’t thought of--since I knew--lying awake nights and thinking. Somehow, I knew, the first day it came to me--I knew there wasn’t any use... since the day I come on ’em at Merwin’s.”

The lawyer’s hand, making its little marks, stopped--and went on. “They were at Merwin’s--together?” he said.

“Everybody goes to Merwin’s,” said the man. “It wasn’t their being there; it was the way they looked when I saw ’em.... They were sitting in one of them little alcove places, you know--”

Eldridge nodded. Yes--he knew.

“The curtains were open--wide open,” said the man. “Anybody could ’a’ looked in. There wasn’t anything wrong about it. But I saw their faces--both of ’em--and I knew.... They were just sitting quiet--the way people do when they’re alone.... There’s something different about the way people sit--when they’re alone--by themselves--I don’t know as you’ve ever noticed it?”

“I have noticed it,” said Eldridge. “Quiet and happy--” said the man, “and not talking--and not needing to talk.” He took up his hat. “Well--you know where to find me. I shan’t bother you like this again----” He stood up.

Eldridge held out a hand. “I am glad you told me. It helps--to understand--the case.”

The man’s thick face looked at him. “I don’t understand it myself,” he said, “but I’ve got to go through with it.”

VIII

ELDRIDGE went on making little marks on the edge of the paper. He no longer stared at the blotter; he was seeing things. Gordon Barstow’s recital had shown things to him in perspective and his own trouble seemed moved far away from him to a kind of clear place. He sat and looked at it--making little marks on the paper. Rosalind was not to blame. A woman like Rosalind had the right--she could do what she wanted! What had _he_ ever done to win her--to keep her? Not even money. He had kept it for himself--and built up a comfortable fortune.... He had the fortune--yes. And he had lost Rosalind.... He suddenly saw himself in the clear light--he was not lovable like old Barstow. The vision grew before him--all his saving closeness, his dulness--a lifeless prig!... And then the picture of Rosalind, the vision of her in her alcove--“the way people sit when they are alone--I don’t know as you ever noticed--?” old Barstow had said.

Well, then--what was to be done? His shoulders squared a little. No man was going to win Rosalind--without a fight! The man who would win her should reckon with him.... He had never known Rosalind. Perhaps Rosalind had never known him.... What had he given her--to know him by? She had had the right to work for him, to sweep his floors and make his bed and take care of the children... She should have money now. She should become a partner--in all his plans--and suddenly El-dridge Walcott saw that money would not win her--money would not buy the gracious presence in the alcove; she did not need money.... He must give his soul--to win her--Then he took out his soul and looked at it--the shrunken, dry, rattling thing--and flicked it from him with a finger-nail.

The office boy put his head in cautiously.

“What do you want?” said Eldridge harshly.

“It’s Mr. Dutton,” said the boy.

“Well, show him in.”

And while Mr. Dutton talked of real estate, Eldridge’s soul peeped out at the man. He wanted to stop the flow of facts and figures and put a straight question to him. “How do you get on with your wife, Mr. Dutton?” he wanted to say to him. He could see the man’s startled face checked in its flow of fact.... It would not do; of course it would not do to ask him how he got on with his wife. Probably he got on with her as Eldridge Walcott had done--sewing, sweeping, eating, saving--“So I have decided,” the man was saying, “to take the entire block--if the title is good.”

Eldridge Walcott bowed him out and turned back from the door. But he did not sit down. He would go to Merwin’s. Perhaps she was there--she had said she might come in to town.... But, with his hand on the door, he paused----Suppose he found her--What then?--and the man with her? What then?--Suppose he found her! There was nothing he could do--not yet! He would win her back.... But the man he had to reckon with was not the man sitting with her now, perhaps, in the alcove. The man he had to reckon with was Eldridge Walcott--the little, shrunken, undersized Eldridge Walcott.

He saw it--standing with his hand on the door, looking down--and he looked at it a long minute.

Then he opened the door.

The office boy wheeled about from the window-shade that was stuck halfway up.

“I am ready to see anybody that comes, Burton,” he said.

“All right,” said the boy. “This old thing gets stuck every other day!” He jerked at it.

Eldridge came across and looked at the cord and straightened it and went back to his room. The little incident strengthened him subtly. He had never yet failed in anything he undertook, big or little--he had always succeeded in what he undertook--And suddenly he saw that Eldridge Walcott had never in his life undertaken anything that was not small.... He had done small, safe things. He had straightened window-shades all his life--and he had never failed!

He had always had a half-veiled contempt for men who ran risks. Find a safe thing and hold on to it had been his policy. It had brought him through smugly. He had never made a mistake.... The nearest he had ever come to a risk was before he asked Rosalind to marry him. There had been something about her that he could not fathom, something that drew him--and made him afraid--a kind of sweet mystery... that would not let him be safe. Then it had seemed so safe afterward; they had lived together quietly without a break. The young Rosalind who had taught him to be afraid he had forgotten--and now young Rosalind had come back... she had come back to him and with deeper mystery.... This was the real Rosalind, the other was only a shadowy promise.... The young Rosalind would try him for his soul--and he had--no soul!

Who was that other man in the alcove with her--the man who had won her? Who was it she had found to understand the mystery--to look up to her and worship her--as he had worshipped Rosalind, the girl; as he had worshipped Rosalind--and let her go!

And he had been thinking about divorce! Thinking of the grounds for it and how he should get grounds of divorce--as Gordon Barstow had done. He glanced at the two letters on his desk and at the little, jotted notes of the Barstow case and a smile flitted to them--grounds for divorce from Rosalind! He saw her, in her freedom, moving from him.... His teeth set a little. She should never leave him! She should stay with him. She should stay because he wanted her--and because she wanted him!

And through the rest of the day, as clients came and went, he saw something new. He saw cases differently. Men were accustomed to come to him because he was a “safe” man.... Well, he was not quite safe to-day--But he knew underneath, as he worked, that his advice had never been so worth while.

IX

HE had left the office early and had caught a car that was passing the corner as he came out. As soon as he entered he knew that Rosalind was in the car, three seats ahead. He gave a little start, a quick flash--he did not want to catch Rosalind off guard--Then he smiled; it was not Rosalind of the alcove--it was the plain, every-day Rosalind, her lap heaped with bundles, and bundles on the seat beside her. Rosalind’s flannels, he thought, probably.

He moved down the aisle and stood beside the seat, lifting his hat and looking down at her.

“Why, Eldridge!” She looked up with the little peering smile and made a place for him among the bundles, trying to gather them up into her lap.

But he swept them away. “I’ll take these,” he said.

The little distressed look came between her eyes. Eldridge couldn’t bear bundles. “I thought I wouldn’t wait to have them sent,” she apologized. “It’s so cold--and they need them--right off.”

“Yes--” He looked at her jacket; it was thin, with the shabby lining showing at the edge. “Did you get yourself a warm wrap?” he asked.

She was looking out of the window, and the line of her cheek flushed swiftly. “No--I--”

“I want you to do it--at once.”

She glanced at him--a little questioning look in her face. “I--have--seen something I like--” she said.

“Get it to-morrow. I will order it for you when I go in.”

Her hands made a gesture above the bundles. “Please don’t, Eldridge. I would rather--do it--myself.”

“Very well. But remember to get it.”

“Yes--I will get it.” She sighed softly.

Deceitful Rosalind! If he had not seen for himself the box in the attic with its overflowing soft colors and the grey fur, he would not have believed the deceit of her face....

Not that he was blaming anybody. He was not blaming Rosalind. The picture of Mr. Eldridge Walcott remained with him.... He was not likely to forget how Mr. Eldridge Walcott had looked to him--in the flash of light.

Perhaps he looked like that to Rosalind--to both Rosalinds! He turned a little in the seat and glanced down at her--Yes, they were both there--the plain little figure in its shabby jacket and the reticent, beautiful woman of the alcove.

The fingers in cheap gloves were fussing at a parcel. “I got fleece-lined shirts for Tommie--his skin is so sensitive--I thought I would try fleece-lined ones for him.”

Damn fleece-lined ones! Would she never talk to him except of undershirts--and coal-hods? He took the paper from his pocket and glanced casually at it.

“Has coal gone up?” she asked. “They said it would go up--if it stayed cold.” The anxious, lines were in her face.

He put down the paper and leaned toward her. He felt nearer to her, in a street car, than in his own home. “Don’t you worry about coal, Rosalind! We shall not freeze--nor starve.”

She stared a little. “Of course, we shall not freeze, Eldridge!”

“I mean there is plenty--to be comfortable with. You are not to worry and pinch.”

A quick look flooded out at him--a look of the Rosalind within. “You mean we can _afford_ not to worry?”

He saw the prig Eldridge Walcott, walking in serene knowledge of a comfortable income while the little lines had gathered in her face. He longed to kick the respectable Mr. Eldridge Walcott from behind.

“There is quite enough money,” he said. “I am doing better than I have--and I shall do better yet.”

She looked down at the bundles. “I might have got a better quality,” she said.

“Take them all back,” said Eldridge. “I’ll take them--”

But she shook her head. “No, they need them to-morrow--and these will do--” She smiled at them. “It’s really more the feeling that you _can_ get better ones, isn’t it? You don’t mind wearing old things--if you know you could have better ones--if you wanted to--” She broke off vaguely.

He saw the box in the attic--all the filmy softness--and he saw the ill-fitting, cheap gloves resting in her lap--That was what had saved her--the real Rosalind. Some one had seen that her soul should be in its own clothes, now and then, and happy and free. You could not quite be jealous of a man who had done that for you--who had clothed Rosalind’s soul, could you?

He could not think of the man who had clothed Rosalind’s soul--who had kept alive something that was precious. He could not hate the man. But there was no place in his thoughts for him.

Suppose, after all, Rosalind belonged to the man who saw her soul and clothed it? Suppose Rosalind belonged to him!... Very well--_he should not have her!_

He helped her from the car with her bundles, and as he fitted the key in the door the wind struck them fiercely; they were almost blown in with the force of it as the door opened. They stood in the hall, laughing, safe--the wind shut out----There was a quick color in her face, and it lifted to him, laughing freshly, like a girl’s.

They were together. She had not looked at him like that for years.

He pondered on the look as she went about getting supper. He watched her come and go and wondered awkwardly whether he might not offer to go out and help. He went at last into the kitchen; she was putting coal on the fire and he took the hod from her, throwing on the coal.

She looked at him, puzzled. “Are you in a hurry for supper, Eldridge?”

“Oh--No.” He went back to the living-room, and talked a little with the children, amusing them quietly. He had a home sense, a feeling that the room was a kind of presence; the wind howling outside could not touch them..

And when Rosalind came in and they sat at the table and he looked across to her shyly, almost like a boy, he wished he knew what would please her best. He could not keep his eyes off her hand as it grasped the handle of the teapot and poured his tea. It seemed such a mysterious hand with the roughened finger pricks--and the little gentle hand inside that did no work. He wanted to take the hand, to touch it.... Of course, a man would not take his wife’s hand--like that. He could see the startled look in Rosalind’s eyes if he should reach out.... There was a long road to travel--and he did not know the way.

But he could begin softly with clothes--and touch her hand later perhaps. She should have beautiful things------He had told her to buy the fur-lined coat.

He pictured her in it--the coat that _his_ money should buy--he saw her wrapped in it, and he sat still thinking of her and of the coat his money should buy. Then the door opened and he looked up.

She was standing in the door--and about her was a long grey coat lined with fur--the coat of the alcove. Her eyes looked at him over the soft fur of the collar.

He sprang to his feet--then he checked the word on his lip.

He must not let her speak. It was the coat of the alcove. She would wear it silently. But she would not tell him. She must not be frightened into saying something that was not true. He came over to her and touched the edge of the fur, as if questioning it, and she smiled and opened it out. “Is it warm enough?” she asked proudly.

She stood with the garment extended like wings, and he held his breath.

Then she drew it together softly.

“I have had it some time,” she said. “I was keeping it to surprise you!”

His breath came quick. How much would she tell him? He looked at it critically. “Was it a bargain?” he asked..

“No--Not a bargain.” And she stroked the edge of the fur. “I saw it and liked it--and I got it.”

“That’s right. That’s the way to buy all your clothes.” He looked at it a minute lightly and turned away.

She could not have guessed from his gesture that he was disappointed, but her eyes followed him. “I hope you won’t think I paid too much--for it?”

“What did you pay?” he asked. His back was toward her.

“I paid--two hundred dollars,” she said. The words came lightly, and there was a little pause.

“No, I don’t think that was too much.” He had turned and was looking at her--straight. “I would have paid more than two hundred--to give it to you,” he said slowly.

She made no reply, but her eyes regarded him gravely over the edge of the collar. Wrapped in the coat, she seemed for a moment the woman of the alcove.

He looked at her blindly.

She returned the look a minute--and turned away slowly and went out.

Eldridge walked to the table and stood looking down.... He had given her, in all, not more than two hundred and fifty dollars. Did she expect him--to believe--that all the things that had come into the house since had not cost more than fifty dollars?

It was as if she flaunted it at him--as if she wanted him to know that it could not have been _his_ money that bought it!... So that was it! She had seen--she had guessed the change in him--and this was her guard? She would force him to know--to accuse her.

Old Barstow’s words came to him mockingly: “No--she will not contest it. She wants--to be--free.”

X

BUT if she wished him to know she gave no other sign.

She spent the money that he gave her, and when it was gone she asked him for more.

Only once she had said as she took it: “You are sure it is right for me to spend this?”

And he had replied: “When you ask for anything I cannot give you I will let you know.”

She had said nothing. She had not even glanced at him. But somehow he fancied that she understood him.

He grew to know, by intuition, the days when she would go to Merwin’s.

As he left the house he would say: “She will be there--” And when he dropped in, in the afternoon, he did not even need to glance at the alcove on the right. He would sit down quietly in his place across the aisle, glad to be with her.

He never saw her come and go and he did not know whether any one was with her--behind her curtain. He tried not to know.... He was trying to understand Rosalind. What was it drew her? Was it music--or the quiet place? Or was there------?

He could easily have known.... Gordon Barstow’s detective would have made sure for him in a day.... But Eldridge did not want to know--anything that a detective could tell him. He did not want to be told by detectives or told things detectives could tell. He was studying Rosalind’s every wish--as if he were a boy.

He did not go to Merwin’s till he felt sure that she would be there in the alcove, and he left before she drew the little curtain and came out. He did not want to know.... He only wanted her to be there--and to sit with her a little while, quietly....

He would wait and understand.

A piano had come into the house and the boys were taking lessons. One day he discovered that Rosalind was learning, too.

He had come home early, wondering whether he would ask her to go for a walk with him. He had asked her once or twice and they had gone for a little while before supper, walking aimlessly through the suburban streets, saying very little; he had fancied that Rosalind liked it--but he could not be sure.

He opened the door with his latchkey and stepped in. Some one was playing softly, stopping to sing a little, and then playing again.... Rosalind was alone.

He stood very quiet in the dark hall; only a little light from above the door--shining on the stair rail and on a lamp that hung above it.... She was playing with the lightest touch--a few notes, as if feeling her way, and then the little singing voice answering it.... So she was like this--very still and happy--and he was shut out. His hand groped behind him for the latch and found it and opened the door, and he stepped outside and closed the door softly.

He stood a moment in the wind. Behind his door he heard the music playing to itself....

He walked for a long time that afternoon--along the dull streets, staring at brick houses and at children running past him on brick walks.... It was all brick walks and long rows of houses--and dulness; he could not reach Rosalind. He could buy clothes for her--more bricks... and there was the music--his mind halted--and went on.

Music made her happy--like that! He bought an evening paper and studied it awhile, standing by the newsstand, with the cars and taxis shooting past. Presently he folded the paper and took a car that was going toward town. There was something he could do for Rosalind--something that no one had thought of--something that she would like!

He was as eager and as ignorant as a boy, standing in front of the barred ticket window and looking in.

“Tickets for the Symphony?” The man glanced out at him. “House sold out.”

Eldridge stared back. “You mean--I cannot--get them!”

“Something may come in. You can leave your name.” The man pushed paper and pencil toward him.

Eldridge wrote his name slowly. “I want--good ones.”

“Can’t say--” said the man.

“There are six ahead of you--” He took up the paper and made a note.

Eldridge stepped outside. A man looked at him and moved up, falling into step beside him. “I have a couple of tickets--” he said softly.

He did not know that he was speaking to a man on a quest, a man who would have paid whatever he might ask for the slips of paper in his hand--They were not mere symphony tickets he sold. They were tickets to the fields of the sun. He asked five dollars for them; he might have got fifty.

Eldridge slipped them into his pocket. He stepped back into the hall. “I shall not need those tickets,” he said.

The man in the window glanced at him, indifferent, and crossed out a name.