Part 21 (1/2)
”Yes, I know. But he's a crushed and broken office boy by now. I had to be real harsh with him.”
f.a.n.n.y stood up, really angry now. She looked up at Clarence Heyl, and her eyes were flas.h.i.+ng. Clarence Heyl looked down at her, and his eyes were the keenest, kindest, most gently humorous eyes she had ever encountered. You know that picture of Lincoln that shows us his eyes with much that expression in them? That's as near as I can come to conveying to you the whimsical pathos in this man. They were the eyes of a lonely little boy grown up. And they had seen much in the process.
f.a.n.n.y felt her little blaze of anger flicker and die.
”That's the girl,” said Heyl, and patted her hand. ”You'll like me--presently. After you've forgotten about that sniveling kid you hated.” He stepped back a pace and threw back his coat senatorially.
”How do I look?” he demanded.
”Look?” repeated f.a.n.n.y, feebly.
”I've been hours preparing for this. Years! And now something tells me--This tie, for instance.”
f.a.n.n.y bit her lip in a vain effort to retain her solemnity. Then she gave it up and giggled, frankly. ”Well, since you ask me, that tie!----”
”What's the matter with it?”
f.a.n.n.y giggled again. ”It's red, that's what.”
”Well, what of it! Red's all right. I've always considered red one of our leading colors.”
”But you can't wear it.”
”Can't! Why can't I?”
”Because you're the brunest kind of brunette. And dark people have a special curse hanging over them that makes them want to wear red.
It's fatal. That tie makes you look like a Mafia murderer dressed for business.”
”I knew it,” groaned Heyl. ”Something told me.” He sank into a chair at the side of her desk, a picture of mock dejection. ”And I chose it.
Deliberately. I had black ones, and blue ones, and green ones. And I chose--this.” He covered his face with a shaking hand.
f.a.n.n.y Brandeis leaned back in her chair, and laughed, and laughed, and laughed. Surely she hadn't laughed like that in a year at least.
”You're a madman,” she said, finally.
At that Heyl looked up with his singularly winning smile. ”But different. Concede that, f.a.n.n.y. Be fair, now. Refres.h.i.+ngly different.”
”Different,” said f.a.n.n.y, ”doesn't begin to cover it. Well, now you're here, tell me what you're doing here.”
”Seeing you.”
”I mean here, in Chicago.”
”So do I. I'm on my way from Winnebago to New York, and I'm in Chicago to see f.a.n.n.y Brandeis.”
”Don't expect me to believe that.”
Heyl put an arm on f.a.n.n.y's desk and learned forward, his face very earnest. ”I do expect you to believe it. I expect you to believe everything I say to you. Not only that, I expect you not to be surprised at anything I say. I've done such a ma.s.s of private thinking about you in the last ten years that I'm likely to forget I've scarcely seen you in that time. Just remember, will you, that like the girl in the sob song, 'You made me what I am to-day?'”