Part 7 (2/2)

With beat of impatient hoofs upon the hard road the three were off, their chorusing farewells coming back to him over their shoulders. When they were out of sight he went back to the place on the hilltop where he had stood beside Roberta, and thought it all over. In that way only could he make s.h.i.+ft to prolong the happiness of the hour.

The happiness of the hour! What had there been about it to make it the happiest hour he could recall? Such a simple, outdoor encounter! He had spent many an hour which had lingered in his memory--hours in places made enchanting to the eye by every device of cunning, in the society of women chosen for their beauty, their wit, their power to allure, to fascinate, to intoxicate. He had had his senses appealed to by every form of attraction a clever woman can fabricate, herself a miracle of art in dress, in smile, in speech. He had gone from more than one door with his head swimming, the vivid recollection of the hour just past a drug more potent than the wine that had touched his lips.

His head was not swimming now, thank heaven, though his pulses were unquestionably alive. It was the exhilaration of healthy, powerful attraction, of which his every capacity for judgment approved. He had not been drugged by the enchantment which is like wine--he had been stimulated by the charm which is like the feel of the fresh wind upon the brow. Here was a girl who did not need the background of artificiality, one who could stand the sunlight on her clear cheek--and the sunlight on her soul--he knew that, without knowing how he knew. It was written in her sweet, strong, spirited face, and it was there for men to read. No man so blind but he can read a face like that.

The darkness had almost fallen when he forced himself to leave the spot.

But--reward for going while yet a trace of dusky light remained--he had not reached the bottom of the hill road, up which his car had roared an hour before, when he saw something fallen there which made him pull the motor up upon its throbbing cylinders. He jumped out and ran to rescue what had fallen. It was the bunch of rose haws he had so carefully denuded of thorns, and which she had worn upon her breast for at least a short time before she lost it. She had not thrown it away intentionally, he was sure of that. If she had she would not have flung it contemptuously into the middle of the road for him to see.

He put it into the pocket of his coat, where it made a queer bulge, but he could not risk losing it by trusting it to the seat beside him. Until he had won something that had been longer hers, it was a treasure not to be lost.

Four miles toward town he pa.s.sed the riding party and exchanged a fire of gay salutations with them. When he had left them behind he could not reach home too soon. He hurried to his rooms, hunted out a receptacle of silver and crystal and filled it with water, placed the bunch of rose haws in it and set the whole on his reading-table, under the electric drop-light, where it made a spot of brilliant colour.

He had an invitation for the evening; he had cared little to accept it when it had been given him; he was sorry now that he had not refused it.

As the hour drew near, his distaste grew upon him, but there was no way in which he could withdraw without giving disappointment and even offence. He went forth, therefore, with reluctance, to join precisely such a party as he had many times made one of with pleasure and elation.

To-night, however, he found the greatest difficulty in concealing his boredom, and he more than once caught himself upon the verge of actual discourtesy, because of his tendency to become absent-minded and let the merry-making flow by him without taking part in it.

Altogether, it was with a strong sense of relief and freedom that he at last escaped from what had seemed to him an interminable period of captivity to the uncongenial moods and manners of other people. He opened the door of his rooms with a sense of having returned to a place where he could be himself--his new self--that strange new self who singularly failed to enjoy the companions.h.i.+p of those who had once seemed the most satisfying of comrades.

The first thing upon which his eager glance fell was the bunch of scarlet rose haws under the softly illumining radiance of the drop-light. His eyes lighted, his lips broke into a smile--the lips which had found it, all evening, so hard to smile with anything resembling spontaneity.

Hat in hand, he addressed his treasure: ”I've come back to stay with you!” he said.

CHAPTER VI

UNSUSTAINED APPLICATION

”Mr. Kendrick, do you understand typewriting?”

Judge Gray's a.s.sistant looked up, a slight surprise on his face. ”No, sir, I do not,” he said.

”I am sorry. These sheets I am sending to the Capitol to be looked over and criticised ought to be typewritten. I could send them downtown, but I want the typist here at my elbow.”

He sat frowning a little with perplexity, and presently he reached for the telephone. Then he put it down, his brow clearing. ”This is Sat.u.r.day,” he murmured. ”If Roberta is at home--”

He left the room. In five minutes he was back, his niece beside him.

Richard Kendrick had not set eyes upon her for a fortnight; he rose at her appearance and stood waiting her recognition. She gave it, stopping to offer him her hand as she pa.s.sed him, smiling. But, this little ceremony over, she became on the instant the business woman. Richard saw it all, though he did his best to settle down to his work again and pursue it with an air of absorption.

Roberta went to a cupboard which opened from under bookshelves, and drew therefrom a small portable typewriter. This she set upon a table beside a window at right angles from Richard and all of twenty feet away from him; she could hardly have put a greater distance between them. The Judge drew up a chair for her; she removed the cover from the compact little machine, and nodded at him. He placed his own chair beside her table and sat down, copy in hand.

”This is going to be a rather difficult business,” said he. ”There are many points where I wish to indicate slight changes as we go along. I can't attempt to read the copy to you, but should like to have you give me the opening words of each paragraph as you come to it. I think I can recall those which contain the points for revision.”

The work began. That is to say, work at the typewriter side of the room began, and in earnest. From the first stroke of the keys it was evident that the Judge had called to his aid a skilled worker. The steady, smooth clicking of the machine was interrupted only at the ends of paragraphs, when the Judge listened to the key words of the succeeding lines. Roberta sat before that ”typer” as if she were accustomed to do nothing else for her living, her eyes upon the keys, her profile silhouetted against the window beside her.

As far as the mechanical part of the labour was concerned, Richard had never seen a task get under way more promptly nor proceed with greater or smoother dispatch. As he sat beside his own window he nearly faced the pair at the other window. Try as he would he could not keep his mind upon his work. It was a situation unique in his experience. That he, Richard Kendrick, should be employed in serious work in the same room with the niece of a prosperous and distinguished gentleman, a girl who had not hesitated to learn a trade in which she had become proficient, and that the three of them should spend the morning in this room together, taking no notice of each other beyond that made necessary by the task in hand--it was enough to make him burst out laughing. At the same time he felt a genuine satisfaction in the situation. If he could but work in the same room with her every day, though she should vouchsafe him no word, how far from drudgery would the labour be then removed!

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