Eleanor M. Ingram

“ They had waited a year on the verge of that moment; it was enough to touch one another in this security of understanding. There was no question between them, no doubt, now that they saw each other face to face; all their world flowered into light and fragrance, present and future one dazzling marvel.
But at last they drew slightly apart, gazing at each other with an incredulity of such happiness, both Flavia's little hands held in the firm clasp of Gerard's left. And then gradually awoke amazement that they could ever have been separated, who were so closely bound together. ”

“ In the thin, clear March sunshine, two hours later, the Mercury Titan rolled out onto the mile track, shaking earth and air with its roar and vibrant clamor. The force of testers and factory operatives crowded about, busy men found time to cluster at the buildings' doors and windows in keen interest.
Opposite Gerard and his little staff, the men who had designed and evoked the winged monster, Corrie Rose was in his seat, flushed with excitement, but collected and at home in the powerful machine which he was to be the first to test and master. ”

“ Flavia ran down the wide staircase to meet him, finger on lip; a childish figure in the creamy lace and silk of her negligee, with her heavy braids of shining hair falling over her shoulders.
"You are so late," she grieved. "And so cold! Come near the hearth—papa is in the library, still."
Corrie allowed her small urgent hands to draw him towards the fireplace that filled the square hall with ruddy reflections and dancing shadows. He was cold to the touch, ice clung to the rough cloth of his ulster, but there was color and even light in the face he turned to her.
"It is snowing," he recalled. ”

“ It is difficult for any group of men, however willing, to work without a leader. While the inexperienced rescuers stood hesitating on the verge of action, Corrie Rose in his pink racing costume sprang up the bank, his blue eyes burning in his white face, his lips stained with blood where his teeth had bitten through.
"Get those logs, over there," he commanded savagely. "The car's got to be jacked up. Hurry up—do you want him to die under there? Jump!"
His fiery energy ran through the men with a vivifying shock. Torpor transformed to animation, the grim work was attacked. ”

“ Rupert sprang into his seat like a rubber ball, bracing one small legging-clad foot for support; not the least of a racing mechanician's arts being that of clinging at all times to his reeling post of duty. Gerard held out his hand for Corrie's parting clasp, then exchanged a warm grip with Rupert. Between the driver and mechanician who were to play the perilous game side by side, there passed no such friendly touch. ”

“ Flavia could not hurt anyone. Allan Gerard considered that statement, not so much in bitterness as in a wonder that made all life uncertain. He recalled the fountain arcade of rose-colored columns and delicate lights, the sweetly demure girl who waited there for her brother, and her last brief glance of virginal candor and innocently unconscious confession. Flavia could not hurt anyone. Yet she had dismissed the man who loved her, without even granting him the poor alms of [Pg 207] courteous sympathy, had left him to learn her decision from her silence. ”

“ Flavia dropped a caressing arm around her brother's shoulders, gently drawing him to face the field.
"Really look," she bade.
Puzzled, he obeyed. Gerard was still occupying the centre of the diamond, holding the ball aloft while his meditative gaze apparently dwelt on the batsman. There was scarcely a perceptible turn of his brown head, yet as the two in the car watched, the impromptu pitcher's glance flashed from behind his uplifted arm and he whirled in a half-circle to hurl the unexpected ball straight across the diamond to where a careless enemy had ventured from second base. ”

“ Now, it was living that made me envy Corrie and feel melancholy."
Flavia drew the silk thread with slow accuracy. Her pulses were commencing to beat heavy strokes, she dared not raise her troubled eyes to the dominant, self-possessed man opposite. There was a pause.
"In novels," Gerard mused, "when a man sees the woman who locks the wheels of his fancy, he drops everything else and follows her until he gets—his answer. But in real life we're pretty stupid; we let circumstances interfere, or we don't quite realize what has happened to us, we don't do the right thing, anyway. ”

“ But Flavia also was thinking of Allan Gerard—Allan Gerard, who loved Isabel and for whose sake Flavia carried a double sorrow, his and her own. As he had found excuses in his mind for her apparent failure of him, so she on her part never had blamed him for what she considered her own misunderstanding of his purpose. They were not given to the small vice of ready condemnation. There is no comfort in blaming the one loved, where the love is great. ”

“ She was clever enough to recognize the bar he set to flirtation with the woman loved by the man he gave that name, and she regarded the obstacle as a challenge. She was not sufficiently old or fine to realize that such bars are not crossed by such men. If Gerard had loved her or believed she might love him, he must have left his friend's house; as Corrie would have left Gerard's in like case. As a matter of fact, Gerard was perfectly aware of the immunity of both parties and that Isabel was merely seeking temporary diversion—experimenting with the possibilities of her own heady youth. ”

“ When the horrified knot of reporters and motor enthusiasts from the nearby Westbury corner swarmed into the orchard to join the pale-faced farmer already there, the sun emerged brilliantly from a bank of clouds, glinting across the heap of twisted metal and the still figure that lay beneath it, illumining the dishevelled, gasping mechanician who struggled dizzily to rise from where he had been flung to safety, fifty feet from the wreck. ”

“ Won't you come, Gerard?"
"If rain is the meanest thing there is, it shows real sense to go out in it," Isabel commented, from the window-seat opposite. "That is just like you, Corrie Rose. When I ask you to take me out on a perfectly fair day, you won't do it."
"I?" stunned. "I ever refused——"
"Yes. Yesterday, when I asked you to take me just once around the race course, while the cars were out practising. You know you would not. If it is safe for you, it is safe for me. But never mind; your old pink car won't win, anyhow. He hasn't a chance with the professional drivers, has he, Mr. Gerard?" ”

“ Corrie's sister folded her hands in her lap.
"Is there no chance if one falls once?" she rebelled in futile reproach. "He was so young, he has suffered so much—can he never pay?"
"I'm not much of a reader, as a rule, but I did a good deal of it at Val de Rosas, this summer," Mr. Rose slowly returned. "And a line from an Englishman's work stuck in my memory. He said that tears can wash out guilt, but not shame. I can give Corrie all I've got, I have always been fond of him and I am yet, but I can't give him my respect. ”

“ About to send his car forward, Gerard paused to glance over his shoulder, and caught the pink flash behind a row of mist-draped trees edging the cross-road. Sudden mischief curved his lips, his amber eyes laughed behind their goggles.
"Tell Corrie Rose I'll give him that game of auto tag, if he happens along while I'm on a straight stretch," he called across to one of Corrie's men, by way of farewell.
A little breeze stirred the mist, as the Mercury shot down the course; the gray light was brightening by slow gradations. ”

“ Far away he journeyed, to New York, which is in America, to find peace and make a home."
"Where you will go to him?"
"Señorita, we hope it. He works, I wait. We write long letters. But it is three years. It costs much to cross the ocean, and one grows old." The brown eyes looked the tragedy of hope deferred.
"For men must work and women must weep——" The old refrain came to Flavia. But not this woman, not if her American sister could prevent. And the preventing was so easy! She drew the girl down on the seat beside her, impulsive as Corrie could have been.
"Listen, Elvira—I may call you Elvira? ”

“ Gerard actually colored before that ardent admiration, taken unaware.
"Corrie Rose, you are given to the folly of hero-worship; and heroes are few," he accused sternly.
"I don't know about that, Mr. Gerard."
"I do. But, Corrie——"
"Present."
Gerard stood up, reaching for his raincoat.
"Beware of heroine-worship, it is the folly. When you find the real woman, get on your knees, where you belong, before a grace of God, but don't build shrines to an imitation."
Astonished, Corrie paused, upright beside the ciderpress, then smiled with a blending of pride and serious exaltation. ”

“ The driver slowly sent his car forward, temper in every crisp movement, his gaze travelling over the empty tiers of seats, to fall at last upon Gerard and there rest. With a jerk he jammed down the brake and leaned from the machine. Thick fair hair lay across his boyish forehead above level dark brows, his candid dark-blue eyes went direct to their goal: the metal badge fastened to Gerard's lapel and just visible under the edge of his gray overcoat.
"You're wearing a chauffeur's license," he challenged.
"I surely am. Want to engage a man?" ”

“ Out among these men went Corrie Rose, more self-conscious than he had ever been on race track or course.
"I never had a ninety before," he confided to Gerard, as they finished the mile circuit. "A sixty was my biggest. She's, she's a beauty!"
The car slammed violently off the macadam onto the sand road, skidded in a half-circle and righted itself with a writhing jerk.
"Mind your path," cautioned Gerard, in open mirth. "This isn't a motor parkway. Hello!" ”

“ Gerard answered, compassionately translating the last weeks' writing on the candid face. "I am not likely to think that, Corrie. But do not give me credit not due; I am not unusually forgiving or wise, it is, indeed, merely that I understand fairly well. And when one understands the other man, there seldom is anything to forgive." ”

“ Corrie's full red lips closed, his blue eyes braved Gerard's.
"I will not. Gerard, I cannot. To go back as the millionaire amateur of the pink car, to stand the toleration of the professional drivers, who cannot really handle their machines better than I can mine, to know that the story of how you were wrecked is being whispered after me—I'm not big enough to face it all! I might be challenged and sent off the track, for all I know."
"You will not go back as an amateur," Gerard corrected. ”

“ The driver who hoped for no such commutation of sentence watched him with quietly sad eyes; eyes in which no one ever was allowed to surprise their present expression, least of all Corrie Rose.
Near noon a tire blew out. Gerard sat on the side of the Mercury and gave bits of ironical advice to the worker while Corrie changed a tire alone for the first time in his life. Corrie bore the teasing sweetly, even when a tool slipped and tore his cold-sensitized fingers.
"I know," he deprecated. "Dean always did it and I just helped. I never did anything thoroughly; an amateur isn't a professional. ”

“ Gerard pursued, "you are to bring yourself back safely. I do not want any victories at the price of your wreck. Remember that I am responsible for your being at this work, and remember Flavia."
"If I wreck my car there won't be any victory," Corrie practically returned. "Besides, I have got Rupert with me to be looked after; if I were making a speed dash by myself I might take a chance or two. You never let me out alone. It's all right. They are signalling." ”

“ But Corrie was not in a mood to go slowly, so that they almost missed the driveway that branched from the macadam track to curve around into a park set thickly with fragrant cedars, central in which grove stood the quaintly stiff house of dark brick and stone.
"Run around to the garage," Gerard directed. "Since you will want the car all the time, you might as well keep it here and use the short cut out to the road. I will get out here and go into the house." ”

“ Not even Flavia could win him from the master he had refound. So it happened that when Gerard went to Corrie, after midnight, he discovered his driver seated beside an open window in the drab, cheerless hotel bedroom, his arms folded on the sill and the dog's head resting on his knee.
"Corrie, do you know it is past twelve o'clock?" he exclaimed, purposely authoritative in spite of his aching pity. "I saw the light over your door and came in to give you what Rupert describes as a calling down. How do you expect to be up fresh and fit for a race at dawn? ”

“ He respected Allan Gerard's little mechanician almost as much as he did Allan Gerard, knowing his reputation in racing circles; the glance he gave to accompany the query was an invitation to friendship.
Rupert braced one small tan shoe against the floor, as the car wrenched itself out of a tenacious sand rut.
"I ain't worrying," he kindly assured. "Any place that ain't New York is off the map, anyhow." ”

“ So, the last the three in the departing roadster saw of the two on the pier, Allan Gerard was engaged in buttoning Isabel's glove, while her wind-blown veils fluttered across his shoulders and her flushed, provocative face bent over the task beside his. ”

“ Moral: do not ask too much."
"A day too much?" marvelled Corrie. "Why, I expect a lifetime!" He flung back his head, looking around the smiling circle. "Well, why not? What's a lifetime, anyhow? Not half enough to get all the fun there is in living, as long as you do no harm by it. And who wants to do any harm when there is so much else to do? Not anyone in his right mind. Anyway, I've got to-day's pearl canned, and it can't get away. And I can think of lots of others I've had, if I could go back for them."
"Shall I guess the name of Al-Mansor's vase?" Flavia asked, as she rose. ”

“ Rupert's muffled tones came from the opposite end of the room.
"Well?" Gerard queried lazily. "What of it?"
There was no answer. Instead sounded the click of moving throttle and spark, and the place burst into thunderous tumult; violet flames darted from the exhausts and enfolded the hood of the [Pg 119] vibrating car as it moved forward to its master's side.
"I don't like this morning, and I don't like this course," stated Rupert, sombrely definite, through the roar and rattle of irregular reports from the cut-down motor. "But I guess I've got to stand for them. ”

“ He rose bruskly and crossed the room. "You don't smoke, Gerard? I always spoil a cigar when I talk."
"I don't unless there's something wrong," Gerard answered, tactfully casual. "A cigarette helps, then. But everything is very right, now. You know, these races are my holidays, although they are an important business feature, too. My factory affairs keep me hard at work most of the year. Then in the intervals I am designing and having constructed a genuine racing machine of my own, much more powerful than the ninety Mercury I'm driving now. I'm not an idle citizen, really." ”

“ After a moment Corrie grasped the Titan's steering-wheel and swung himself into his seat behind it, but paused before summoning Devlin to start the motor, and rewarded Gerard's tact by another impulsive confidence, spoken just audibly:
"I miss my father all the time. I think I always will. And I would miss him most if he came home and I had to live along side of him. He—well, he stays in Europe. I'll put up the car for the night, if you're ready to have me; it's getting pretty dark to run any more." ”