Part 37 (2/2)

She forgot the pa.s.sionate efforts of other Senators in behalf of peace; to her the fine conservative strength of the Senate was personified in one man. And if there were others as pure and unselfish in their ideals, his at least was the master intellect.

She wondered if he remembered in this hour of bitter defeat that she had promised to come to this room and give him what she could of herself. That was weeks and weeks ago, and she had not repeated her intention, as she should have done. But he loved her, and was not likely to forget anything she said to him. Or would he care if he did remember? Must not personal matters seem of small account to-night? Or was he too weary to care for anything but sleep? Perhaps he had flung himself down on a sofa in the cloak-room, or in his Committee Room, and forgotten the national disaster while she watched.

She had been walking rapidly up and down the room. Her thoughts were not yet coherent, and instinct prompted her to get the blood out of her head if she could. A vague sense of danger possessed her, but she was not capable of defining it. Suddenly she stopped and held her breath.

She had become aware of a recurring footstep on the sidewalk. Her window ab.u.t.ted some thirty feet away. She craned her head forward, listening so intently that the blood pounded in her ears. She expected to hear the gate open, the footsteps to grow softer on the path. But they continued to pace the stone flags of the sidewalk.

She opened her door, ran down the hall and into the parlor. Without an instant's hesitation she flung open a window and leaned out. The light from the street lamp fell full upon her. He could not fail to see her were he there. But he was not. The man pacing up and down before the house was the night watchman.

Betty closed the window hurriedly and stumbled back into the dark room.

The disappointment and reaction were intolerable. She felt the same blind rage with Circ.u.mstance which had attacked her the night he had kissed and left her. In such crises conventions are non-existent; she might have been primeval woman for all she recalled in that hour of the teachings of the centuries. Had he been there, she would have called him in. He was hers, whatever stood between them, and she alone had the right to console him.

Her mind turned suddenly to his house. He was there, of course; it was absurd to imagine that his cool deliberation would ever forsake him.

The moment the Senate adjourned he would have put on his hat, walked down to the East door, called a cab and gone home. And he was in his library. Why she felt so positive that he was there and not in bed she could not have told, but she saw the light in the long wing. She put her hands to her face suddenly, and moved to the door. She stumbled over a chair, and then noticed the intense darkness of the room. But beyond she saw distinctly the big red brick house of Senator North, with the light burning in the wing. Was she going to him? She wondered vaguely, for her will seemed to be at the bottom of a pile of struggling thoughts and to have nothing to say in the matter. Surely she must. He was a man who stood alone and scorned sympathy or help, but he would be glad of hers because it was hers; there was no possible doubt of that. And in spite of his record he must for the hour feel a bitter and absolute failure.

A pebble would bring him to the window. He would come out, and come back here with her. She opened her arms suddenly. The room was so dark she almost could fancy him beside her. Would that he were!

She had no adequate conception of a morrow. The future was drab and formless. His trouble drew her like a magnet. She trembled at the mere thought of being able to make him forget.

And he? If he came out and saw her standing there, he would be more than a man if he resisted the impulse to return with her here and take her in his arms. And he too must be in a state of mind in which to-day dwarfed and blotted out to-morrow.

For the moment she stood motionless, almost breathless, realizing so vividly the procession of bitter and apprehensive thoughts in the mind which for so long had possessed and controlled hers that she forgot her intention, even her desire to go to him. It was this moment of insight and abstraction from self that saved her. Her own mind seemed to awake suddenly.

It was as if her thinking faculty had descended to her heart during the last hours and been made dizzy and dull by the wild hot whirl of emotions there. It climbed suddenly to where it belonged, and set the rested machinery of her brain to work.

Doubtless his impulse had been to come to her, to the room where he knew she was alone and would receive him if he demanded admittance. He had put the temptation aside, as he had put aside many others; and it had been in her mind, was in her mind still, to make the temptation irresistible. And if he felt a failure to-night, she had it in her power to wreck his life utterly.

It was more than possible that in the remaining years of his vigour dwelt his tardy opportunities for historical fame. The great Republic had sailed out of her summer sea into foreign waters, stormy, unfriendly, bristling with unimaginable dangers. Once more she would need great statesmen, not merely able legislators, and there could be no doubt in the mind of any student of the Senate that she would discover them swiftly. North was the greatest of these; and the record of his future, brilliant, glorious perhaps, seemed to unroll itself suddenly in the dark room.

Betty drew a long hard breath. Her cheeks were cool at last, and she wondered if her heart were dead, it felt so cold. What mad impulse nearly had driven her to him to-night, independently of her will; which had slept, worn out, like other faculties, by a day of hunger, excitement, fatigue, and physical pain? The impulse had risen unhindered and uncriticised from her heart, and if it had risen once it could rise again. The days to come would be full of excitement. She fancied that she already heard the roar of cannon, the beating of drums, the sobs of women. And below the racket and its sad accompaniment was always the low indignant mutter of a triumphant people at those who had dared to set themselves above the popular clamour and ask for sanity. The intolerable longing that had become her constant companion would be fed by every device of unpropitious Circ.u.mstance. Again and again she would experience this impulse to go to him, and some night the blood would not recede from her brain in time.

She groped her way out of the dark parlor and down the hall, grateful for an excuse to walk slowly. Her boudoir was brilliant, and the struggle of the last few moments seemed the more terrible and significant by contrast with the dainty luxurious room. She wondered if she ever should dare to enter the parlor again, and if it always would not look dark to her.

She sat down at her desk and wrote a letter. It ran:--Dear Mr.

Burleigh,--I will marry you if you still wish it. Will you dine with us to-night?

Betty Madison.

She was too tired for emotion, but she knew what would come later.

Nevertheless, she went to the front door and asked the watchman to post the letter. Then she went to bed.

XV

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