Part 33 (2/2)

Indeed, Joe was only smiling faintly, but John was so deeply impressed and penetrated by the absolute truth of what he was saying, that he had altogether ceased to make any allowances for Joe's caprice of mood or for the disturbance in her manner that he had so lately witnessed. He was beginning to be angry, and she had never seen him in such a mood.

”The world would be a very nice tiresome place to live in,” she said, ”if every one always did exactly what is absolutely right. I should not like to live among people who would be always so entirely padded and lined with goodness as they must be in your ideal republic.”

”It is a favorite and characteristic notion of modern society to a.s.sociate goodness with dullness, and consequently, I suppose, to connect badness with all that is gay, interesting, and diverting. There is nothing more perverted, absurd, and contemptible than that notion in the whole history of the world.”

John was not gentle with an idea when he despised it, and the adjectives fell in his clear utterance like the blows of a sledge-hammer. But as the idea he was abusing had been suggested by Joe, she resented the strong language.

”I am flattered that you should call anything I say by such bad names,”

she said. ”I am not good at arguing and that sort of thing. If I were I think I could answer you very easily. Will you please take me back to my aunt?” She rose in a somewhat stately fas.h.i.+on.

John was suddenly aware that he had talked too much and too strongly, and he was very sorry to have displeased her. She had always let him talk as he pleased, especially of late, and she had almost invariably agreed with him in everything he said, so that he had acquired too much confidence. At all events, that was the way he explained to himself the present difficulty.

”Please forgive me, Miss Thorn,” he said humbly, as he gave her his arm to leave the room. ”I am a very sanguine person, and I often talk great nonsense. Please do not be angry.” Joe paused just as they reached the door.

”Angry? I am not angry,” she said with sudden gentleness. ”Besides, you know, this is--you are really going away?”

”I think so,” said John.

”Then, if you do,” she said with some hesitation--”if you do, this is good-by, is it not?”

”Yes, I am afraid it is,” said John; ”but not for long.”

”Not for long, perhaps,” she answered; ”but I would not like you to think I was angry the very last time I saw you.”

”No, indeed. I should be very sorry if you were. But you are not?”

”No. Well then”--she held out her hand--”Good-by, then.” She had almost hated him a few minutes ago. Half an hour earlier she had loved him. Now her voice faltered a little, but her face was calm.

John took the proffered hand and grasped it warmly. With all her caprice, and despite the strange changes of her manner toward him, she had been a good friend in a bad time during the last days, and he was more sorry to leave her than he would himself have believed.

”Good-by,” he said, ”and thank you once more, with all my heart, for your friends.h.i.+p and kindness.” Their hands remained clasped for a moment; then she took his arm again, and he led her out of the dimly-lighted sitting-room back among the brilliant dancers and the noise and the music and the whirling crowd.

CHAPTER XIX.

A change has come over Boston in four months, since John Harrington and Josephine Thorn parted. The breath of the spring has been busy everywhere, and the haze of the hot summer is ripening the buds that the spring has brought out. The trees on the Common are thick and heavy with foliage, the Public Garden is a carpet of bright flowers, and on the walls of Beacon Street the great creepers have burst into blossom and are stretching long shoots over the brown stone and the iron balconies. There is a smell of violets and flowers in the warm air, and down on the little pond the swan-shaped boats are paddling about with their cargoes of merry children and calico nursery-maids, while the Irish boys look on from the banks and throw pebbles when the policemen are not looking, wis.h.i.+ng they had the spare coin necessary to embark for a ten minutes' voyage on the mimic sea.

Unfamiliar figures wander through the streets of the West End, and more than half the houses show by the boarded windows and doors that the owners are out of town.

The migration of the ”tax-dodgers” took place on the last day of April; they will return on the second day of December, having spent just six months and one day in their country places, whereby they have s.h.i.+fted the paying of a large proportion of their taxes to more economical regions. It is a very equitable arrangement, for it is only the rich man who can save money in this way, while his poorer neighbor, who has no country-seat to which he may escape, must pay to the uttermost farthing. The system stimulates the impecunious to become wealthy and helps the rich to become richer. It is, therefore, perfectly good and just.

But Boston is more beautiful in the absence of the ”tax-dodger” than at any other season. There is a stillness and a peace over the fair city that one may long for in vain during the winter. Business indeed goes on without interruption, but the habitation of the great men of business knows them not. They come up from their cool bowers by the sea, in special trains, in steamers, and in yachts, every morning, and early in the afternoon they go back, so that all day long the broad streets at the west are quiet and deserted, and seem to be basking in the suns.h.i.+ne to recover from the combined strain of the bitter winter and the unceasing gayety that accompanies it.

In the warm June weather Miss Schenectady and Joe still linger in town.

The old lady has no new-fangled notions about taxes, and though she is rich and has a pretty place near Newport, she will not go there until she is ready, no, not for all the tax-gatherers in Ma.s.sachusetts. As for Joe, she does not want to go away. Urgent letters come by every mail entreating her to return to England in time for a taste of the season in London, but they lie unanswered on her table, and often she does not read more than half of what they contain. The books and the letters acc.u.mulate in her room, and she takes no thought whether she reads them or not, for the time is weary on her hands and she only wishes it gone, no matter how.

Nevertheless she will not go home, and she even begs her aunt not to leave Boston yet.

<script>