Part 48 (1/2)

Her colour came up, her heart gave a curious twist, and she dropped her eyes.

”Dryden and I have been batching it together in New York,” said Dean Silver. ”My wife's been here since April with her mother and our kid.

When I came on, I got Dryden here to come, too. They want me to take a long sea trip: I hope you'll help me persuade him to come, too. He's trying to double-cross me on it, I think. He said he'd come as far as California, and then see how things looked. So we s.h.i.+pped the car last month, and left New York a week ago to-day.”

”Well, Monroe is honoured,” Martie smiled, amused, fluttered, a little confused by this open recognition of John's feeling. ”But now that you're here, I don't know quite what to do with you!”

”There's a hotel?” asked the novelist.

”Oh, it's not that. I'm only anxious to make the most of you,” said Martie. ”We've more than enough room at our house! But, like poor f.a.n.n.y Squeers, I do so palpitate!”

”Palpitate away!” said Dean Silver. ”We're in your hands. You can send us off right now, or let us take you to dinner somewhere, or direct us to the hotel--for three thousand miles our main idea was to find you, and we've done it!”

”Well, but JOHN!” Martie was still dazed and exulting. ”It's so GOOD to see you!”

”I had to see you,” he said, in his simple way, his eyes never leaving her.

”But now, let me plan!” she said, with an excited laugh. ”If you'll let me get in the car with you, and--and let me see, we'd better get something extra for company--”

”Now, that's just what you shan't do,” Dean Silver said decisively. ”I don't propose to have you--”

”Oh, she likes it,” John a.s.sured him, with his dreamy air that was yet so positive. ”Don't waste time, Dean.”

Martie laughed; John sat between herself and the novelist in the wide seat. He turned his head so that she was always under the fire of his adoring eyes. And in the old way he laughed, thrilled, exulted in everything she said.

Half an hour later, as gaily as if she had known them both all her life, she introduced them to Pa. Pa, whose youngest daughter was just now in high favour, was mildly pleased with the invasion. This impromptu hospitality smacked of prosperity, of worldliness. He went stiffly into the study with John, to bore the poet with an old volume about California: ”From the Padres to the Pioneers.”

Martie, cheerfully setting the dining table, kept a brisk conversation moving with Dean Silver, who sat smoking on the side porch.

Presently she came put with an empty gla.s.s bowl, which she set down beside him. He followed her down into the tipsy brick paths, under the willows, while she gathered velvet wallflowers to fill it.

”You're very clever at this village sort of thing,” the writer said.

”And I must say I like it myself. Old-fas.h.i.+oned street full of kids streaming in for ice-cream, garden with stocks and what-you-call-'ems all blooming together--you know, I had a sort of notion you weren't half as nice as you are!”

Martie laughed, pleased at the frank audacity.

”You fit into it all so pleasantly!” he expanded his thought.

”I don't know why you say that,” she answered, surprised. ”I was born here. I belong here. I lived for years in New York without being able to demonstrate that I could do anything better!”

”Dryden has a great idea of what you can do,” Silver suggested.

”Oh, well, John!” she laughed maternally. ”If you've been listening to John--”

”I've HAD to listen to him,” the novelist said mildly.

”Tell me,” she said suddenly, ”I don't want to say the awkward thing to him--has he got his divorce?”

He looked at her, amazed.

”Don't you correspond?”