Part 66 (2/2)

She stopped at the beginning of the sentence. She was standing beside the little writing-table and the drawer was open. She looked down and there, in that drawer, she saw the framed photograph of Ruth Armstrong. She remembered that Jed had been sitting at that desk and gazing down into that drawer when she entered the room. She looked at him now. He was standing by the window peering out into the yard. Ruth had come from the back door of the little Winslow house and was standing on the step looking up the road, evidently waiting for Barbara to come from school. And Jed was watching her. Maud saw the look upon his face--and she understood.

A few moments later she and Ruth met. Maud had tried to avoid that meeting by leaving Jed's premises by the front door, the door of the outer shop. But Ruth had walked to the gate to see if Babbie was coming and, as Maud emerged from the shop, the two women came face to face. For an instant they did not speak. Maud, excited and overwrought by her experience with the letter and her interview with Jed, was still struggling for self-control, and Ruth, knowing that the other must by this time have received that letter and learned her brother's secret, was inclined to be coldly defiant.

She was the first to break the silence. She said ”Good afternoon”

and pa.s.sed on. But Maud, after another instant of hesitation, turned back.

”Oh, Mrs. Armstrong,” she faltered, ”may I speak with you just-- just for a few minutes?”

And now Ruth hesitated. What was it the girl wished to speak about? If it was to reproach her or her brother, or to demand further explanations or apologies, the interview had far better not take place. She was in no mood to listen to reproaches. Charles was, in her eyes, a martyr and a hero and now, largely because of this girl, he was going away to certain danger, perhaps to death.

She had tried, for his sake, not to blame Maud Hunniwell because Charles had fallen in love with her, but she was not, just then, inclined toward extreme forbearance. So she hesitated, and Maud spoke again.

”May I speak with you for just a few minutes?” she pleaded. ”I have just got his letter and--oh, may I?”

Ruth silently led the way to the door of the little house.

”Come in,” she said.

Together they entered the sitting-room. Ruth asked her caller to be seated, but Maud paid no attention.

”I have just got his letter,” she faltered. ”I--I wanted you to know--to know that it doesn't make any difference. I--I don't care. If he loves me, and--and he says he does--I don't care for anything else. . . . Oh,' PLEASE be nice to me,” she begged, holding out her hands. ”You are his sister and--and I love him so!

And he is going away from both of us.”

So Ruth's coldness melted like a fall of snow in early April, and the April showers followed it. She and Maud wept in each other's arms and were femininely happy accordingly. And for at least a half hour thereafter they discussed the surpa.s.sing excellencies of Charlie Phillips, the certainty that Captain Hunniwell would forgive him because he could not help it and a variety of kindred and satisfying subjects. And at last Jed Winslow drifted into the conversation.

”And so you have been talking it over with Jed,” observed Ruth.

”Isn't it odd how we all go to him when we are in trouble or need advice or anything? I always do and Charlie did, and you say that you do, too.”

Maud nodded. ”He and I have been what Pa calls 'chummies' ever since I can remember,” she said simply.

”I don't know why I feel that I can confide in him to such an extent. Somehow I always have. And, do you know, his advice is almost always good? If I had taken it from the first we might, all of us, have avoided a deal of trouble. I have cause to think of Jed Winslow as something sure and safe and trustworthy. Like a nice, kindly old watch dog, you know. A queer one and a funny one, but awfully nice. Babbie idolizes him.”

Maud nodded again. She was regarding her companion with an odd expression.

”And when I think,” continued Ruth, ”of how he was willing to sacrifice his character and his honor and even to risk losing your father's friends.h.i.+p--how he proclaimed himself a thief to save Charlie! When I think of that I scarcely know whether to laugh or cry. I want to do both, of course. It was perfectly characteristic and perfectly adorable--and so absolutely absurd. I love him for it, and as yet I haven't dared thank him for fear I shall cry again, as I did when Captain Hunniwell told us. Yet, when I think of his declaring he took the money to buy a suit of clothes, I feel like laughing. Oh, he IS a dear, isn't he?”

Now, ordinarily, Maud would have found nothing in this speech to arouse resentment. There was the very slight, and in this case quite unintentional, note of patronage in it that every one used when referring to Jed Winslow. She herself almost invariably used that note when speaking of him or even to him. But now her emotions were so deeply stirred and the memories of her recent interview with Jed, of his understanding and his sympathy, were so vivid. And, too, she had just had that glimpse into his most secret soul. So her tone, as she replied to Ruth's speech, was almost sharp.

”He didn't do it for Charlie,” she declared. ”That is, of course he did, but that wasn't the real reason.”

”Why, what do you mean?”

”Don't you know what I mean? Don't you really know?”

”Why, of course I don't. What ARE you talking about? Didn't do it for Charlie? Didn't say that he was a thief and give your father his own money, do you mean? Do you mean he didn't do that for Charlie?”

”Yes. He did it for you.”

”For me? For ME?”

”Yes. . . . Oh, can't you understand? It's absurd and foolish and silly and everything, but I know it's true. Jed Winslow is in love with you, Mrs. Armstrong.”

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