Part 25 (2/2)

After a brief hesitation she answered, ”No.” Not for worlds would she just then have admitted, even to herself, that the cause of her dislike was her knowledge of his habit of tattling, with suitable embroideries, his lessons to me.

I restrained a strong impulse to ask her why, for instinct told me she had some especial reason that somehow concerned me. I said merely: ”Then I shall get rid of him.”

”Not on my account,” she replied indifferently. ”I care nothing about him one way or the other.”

”He goes at the end of his month,” said I.

She was now taking off her gloves. ”Before your maid comes,” I went on, ”let me explain about the apartment. This room and the two leading out of it are yours. My own suite is on the other side of our private hall there.”

She colored high, paled. I saw that she did not intend to speak.

I stood awkwardly, waiting for something further to come into my own head.

”Good night,” said I finally, as if I were taking leave of a formal acquaintance at the end of a formal call.

She did not answer. I left the room, closing the door behind me. I paused an instant, heard the key click in the lock. And I burned in a hot flush of shame that she should be thinking thus basely of me--and with good cause.

How could she know, how appreciate even if she had known? ”You've had to cut deep,” said I to myself. ”But the wounds'll heal, though it may take long--very long.” And I went on my way, not wholly downcast.

I joined Monson in my little smoking-room. ”Congratulate you,” he began, with his nasty, supercilious grin, which of late had been getting on my nerves severely.

”Thanks,” I replied curtly, paying no attention to his outstretched hand.

”I want you to put a notice of the marriage in to-morrow morning's _Herald_.”

”Give me the facts--clergyman's name--place, and so on,” said he.

”Unnecessary,” I answered. ”Just our names and the date--that's all. You'd better step lively. It's late, and it'll be too late if you delay.”

With an irritating show of deliberation he lit a fresh cigarette before setting out. I heard her maid come. After about an hour I went into the hall--no light through the transoms of her suite. I returned to my own part of the flat and went to bed in the spare room to which Sanders had moved my personal belongings. That day which began in disaster--in what a blaze of triumph it had ended! Anita--my wife, and under my roof! I slept with good conscience. I had earned sleep.

XXIII. ”SHE HAS CHOSEN!”

Joe got to the office rather later than usual the next morning. They told him I was already there, but he wouldn't believe it until he had come into my private den and with his own eyes had seen me. ”Well, I'm jiggered!”

said he. ”It seems to have made less impression on you than it did on us.

My missus and the little un wouldn't let me go to bed till after two. They sat on and on, questioning and discussing.”

I laughed--partly because I knew that Joe, like most men, was as full of gossip and as eager for it as a convalescent old maid, and that, whoever might have been the first at his house to make the break for bed, he was the last to leave off talking. But the chief reason for my laugh was that, just before he came in on me, I was almost pinching myself to see whether I was dreaming it all, and he had made me feel how vividly true it was.

”Why don't you ease down, Blacklock?” he went on. ”Everything's smooth. The business--at least, my end of it, and I suppose your end, too--was never better, never growing so fast. You could go off for a week or two, just as well as not. I don't know of a thing that can prevent you.”

And he honestly thought it, so little did I let him know about the larger enterprises of Blacklock and Company. I could have spoken a dozen words, and he would have been floundering like a caught fish in a basket. There are men--a very few--who work more swiftly and more surely when they know they're on the brink of ruin; but not Joe. One glimpse of our real National Coal account, and all my power over him couldn't have kept him from showing the whole Street that Blacklock and Company was shaky. And whenever the Street begins to think a man is shaky, he must be strong indeed to escape the fate of the wolf that stumbles as it runs with the pack.

”No holiday at present, Joe,” was my reply to his suggestion. ”Perhaps the second week in July; but our marriage was so sudden that we haven't had the time to get ready for a trip.”

”Yes--it _was_ sudden, wasn't it?” said Joe, curiosity twitching his nose like a dog's at scent of a rabbit. ”How _did_ it happen?”

”Oh, I'll tell you sometime,” replied I. ”I must work now.”

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