Part 21 (2/2)

In her too-tight, boyish blouse, gaping at the throat, she stood there in the middle of the room, hands bracketed on delicate hips, and smiled at him. And behind her the lamp in its socket on the wall smoked a trifle from a too-high wick.

Old Jerry stood and gazed at her, one hand still clutching the door latch. In one great illuminating flash he saw it all--understood just what it meant--and with that understanding a hot wave of rage began to well up within him--a fierce and righteous wrath, borne of all that day's unnecessary agony and those last few minutes of fear.

It was a hoax on her part. She had been trifling with him the day before, just as she had been playing fast and loose with his peace of mind for days. An e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.i.o.n bordering close upon actual profanity trembled upon his lips, but a draft of cold air sweeping in at the open doorway set the lamp flickering wildly and brought him back a little to himself. His eyes went again to the girl in the middle of the floor. She was rocking to and fro upon the b.a.l.l.s of her feet, every inch of her fairly pulsing with mocking, malicious delight.

She waited for him to speak, and he, stiff of back and grim of face, stood stonily silent. She seemed all innocently unaware of his unconcealed disgust. The quizzical smile only widened before the chilly threat of his beady eyes and ruffled forehead. And then, all in one breath, her little pouted chin went up and she burst into a low gurgle of utter enjoyment of the tableau.

”Well,” she demanded, ”aren't you ever going to say anything? Here I am! I--I decided to move today--there really wasn't any use of waiting. Aren't you surprised--just a little?”

The meekness of her voice, so wholly belied by her eyes and lips and swaying boy-like body, only tightened the old man's mouth. He was still reviewing all that long day's mental torment, counting the wasted hours which might have been applied to a soul-satisfying feast upon Morehouse's red-headlined account in the paper. No veteran had ever marched more hopelessly into a cannon's mouth than he had approached the door of that kitchen.

And yet a flood of thankfulness, the direct reflex of his first impotent rage, threatened to sweep up and drown the fires of his wrath. Already he wanted to slump down into a chair and rest weary body and wearier, relieved brain; he wanted a minute or two in which to realize that she was there--that his unfulfilled promise was still far from being actual catastrophe--and he would not let himself. Not yet!

She had been playing with him--playing with him cat-and-mouse fas.h.i.+on.

The birdlike features which had begun to relax hardened once more.

”Maybe I be,” he answered her question with noncommittal grimness.

”Maybe I be--and maybe I ain't!” And then, almost belligerently: ”Your lamp's a-smokin'!”

She turned and strained on tiptoe and lowered it.

”I thought you would be,” she agreed, too gravely for his complete comfort, when she had accomplished the readjustment of the wick to her entire satisfaction. ”For, you know, you seemed a little worried and--well, not just happy, yesterday, when I told you I was going to move I--I felt sure you would be glad to find that I hadn't gone far!”

Old Jerry remembered at that moment and he removed his soaked hat. He turned, too, and drew up a chair. It gave him an opportunity to avoid those moistly mirthful eyes for a moment. Seated and comfortably tilted back against the wall he felt less ill at ease--felt better able to deal with the situation as it should be dealt with.

For a moment her presence there had only confounded him--that was when the wave of righteous wrath had swept him--but at the worst he had counted it nothing more than a too far-fetched bit of fantastic mischief conceived to tantalize him.

Her last statement awakened in him a preposterously impossible suspicion which, now that he had a chance to glance about the room, was confirmed instantly--absolutely. It was astounding--utterly unbelievable--and yet on all the walls, in every corner, there were the indisputable evidences of her intention to remain indefinitely--permanently.

At least it gave him an opening.

”You don't mean to say,” he began challengingly, ”you don't mean to tell me that you're a-figurin' on stayin' here--for good?”

She pursed her lips and nodded vigorously at him until the loosened wisps of hair half hid her eyes. It was quite as though she were pleased beyond belief that he had got at the gist of it all so speedily.

”Yes, for good,” she explained ecstatically, ”or,” more slowly, ”or at least for quite a while. You see I like it here! It's just like home already--just like I always imagined home would be when I really had one, anyway. There's so much room--and it's warm, too. And then, the floors don't squeak, either. I don't think I care for squeaky floors--do you?”

A quick widening of those almost purple eyes accompanied the last question.

The little white-haired figure in the back-tilted chair snorted. He tried to disguise it behind a belated cough, but it was quite palpably a snort of outraged patience and dignity. She couldn't fool him any longer--not even with that wide-eyed appealingly infantile stare. He knew, without looking closer, that there was a flare of mirth hidden within its velvet duskiness. And there was only one way to deal with such shallowness--that was with firm and unmistakable severity. He leaned forward and pounded one meager knee for emphasis as Judge Maynard had often done.

”You can't do it!” he emphasized flatly, his thin voice almost gloatingly triumphant. ”Whatever put it into your head I don't know--but don't you realize what you're a-doin', comin' up here like this and movin' in, high-handed, without speaking to n.o.body? Well, you've made yourself liable to trespa.s.s--that's what you've done!

Trespa.s.s and house-breaking, too, I guess, without interviewin' me first!”

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