Part 11 (1/2)

”Writing seems bad for the back of the neck,” she said, with a grey flash out of the tail of her eye for the cub.

”We're getting ready for the sanitarium this morning--sun-baths and Swedish Movement Cure and grape diet. Of course you won't mention it,”

she said. ”She can't possibly see you--I do all the interviews now--but if you come around to-morrow, after I get the house closed, I'll give you a good one.”

A solemn butler entered.

”If you will be so kind as to cast your eye over the table for the ladies' luncheon, Miss d.i.c.kett?” he said weightily.

”There's two orchids short and no time for getting more. And the salt got into the mousse, I'm told by the cook--she wished to know if you could suggest anything. And one of the ladies has been detained and cannot come--by telephone message. Will you take her place, Miss d.i.c.kett?”

”Yes,” said Molly. ”Tell Mrs. Carter not to worry about the orchids, Halsey; I'll arrange something. I must go and dress, now--come to-morrow,” she added hastily.

”By George!” the cub gasped, and left, to electrify the office later.

”It's a darned shame,” he ended, and the other cubs nodded sagely over their pipes.

”With her talent, too!” they said...

You will have understood, of course, why Eleanor dropped Molly after the unfortunate Greek dancer, but you may be surprised to learn of Kathryn's att.i.tude when she learned of the secretarys.h.i.+p. It wasn't dignified, she said, and she was greatly disappointed in Molly.

Kathryn was Dean of Women, now, in a co-educational college in the middle west, and was spoken of as Dean d.i.c.kett in the college journal.

Of all her children Mrs. d.i.c.kett was proudest of Kathryn, because Molly frightened her and Eleanor patronized her. Eleanor was getting up in the world a little too fast for her mother, nowadays, and knew people Mrs. d.i.c.kett would never have dreamed of meeting in the old days--people that she had grown used to the idea of never meeting, even now that Mr. d.i.c.kett was in the Firm. Eleanor's little girl went to school with all the little girls on the Hill and was asked to attend their parties. Her name was Penelope, after George's mother, who had never expected it--the name being so old-fas.h.i.+oned--and was correspondingly delighted and had given her much jewelry already.

Eleanor, in so far as she mentioned Molly at all, had expressed her opinion that to live with Mrs. Julia Carter Sykes was the most respectable thing Molly had yet done, and added that there were exceptional opportunities in more ways than one for the woman who held that position--would perhaps even have called on her there, but Molly never asked her to. Kathryn, to her parents' surprise, developed a stodgy but unblinking antagonism to her sister, for what she called Molly's lowering of her sense of what was due to herself, and said coldly that she had no doubt her sister's life was easier now, but that it was un-American.

Un-American it may have been, but easier it a.s.suredly was not. Unlike the factory-girls and clerks for whose benefit Mrs. Julia Carter Sykes gave readings from her unpublished works, Molly's hours were not limited, and her responsibility grew as her executive ability became increasingly manifest. The thousands of women to whom the celebrity's manifold occupations, publicities, hospitalities and charities were an endless wonder and discussion might have marvelled less had they been able to follow Molly's crowded days and nights and peep through the littered desk and scribbled calendar of her study.

To amus.e.m.e.nt and interest, succeeded fatigue and interest, and to these, fatigue alone. Each hurried, various day became a s.p.a.ce of time to be got through, merely, and Mrs. Julia Carter Sykes's heavy sigh as she curled into her wicker-inset Circa.s.sian-walnut bed was no more heartfelt than her secretary's. If Molly had ever envied Mrs. Julia, she had long ceased to, and indeed, on that final afternoon when she laid her dark, braided head on her arms and cried on her desk, she felt as sorry for the auth.o.r.ess as for herself.

Mr. Julia Carter Sykes (as many of his friends called him) sat opposite her, biting his nails. He was well dressed, fond of auction-bridge, and travelled abroad in the interests of some vaguely comprehended firm.

”This will just about kill the madam,” he said despondently.

”I'm sorry, Mr. Sykes, but I really must--I must,” Molly gulped.

”It isn't money, is it?” he asked. ”Because though I'm not a popular auth.o.r.ess or anything like that, I could----”

”Oh, goodness, no!” said Molly. ”It's not money at all. Only I must get away.”

”We've never got on so well with any of the others,” he went on jerkily, ”and she's certainly awfully fond of you--the madam is. She's taken you everywhere, I know, and all the dinners, and the car whenever you----”

”Mrs. Sykes has been very kind,” Molly broke in dully, ”but--oh, it's no use, Mr. Sykes. It's got to be done, and putting it off only makes her worse. So I'm going to-morrow. She'll feel better about it later.”

”I hope so, I'm sure,” Mr. Sykes responded doubtfully. ”She was pretty bad when I left her. That brain of hers, you know--it's a great strain, they tell me. Hard on us all, in a way.”

Molly always smiled and sighed when she remembered him and the hunched shoulders that leaned drearily over the tonneau.

”Where'll I tell him?” he asked, and she drew tighter the tight line between her brows, sighed, tried to speak, and found her mind quite utterly a blank.