Temple Bailey

“ Oh, how can a woman know?" The lightness left her voice. "Sometimes I think that I'll go off somewhere and see if somebody won't love me for what I am, and not for what he thinks Aunt Maude is going to leave me."
[182] "And you with a string of scalps at your belt, and Pip ready at any moment to die for you."
She nodded. "Pip is pure gold. Nobody can question his motives. And anyhow he has more money than I can ever hope to have. But I am not in love with him, Dicky."
"You are not in love with anybody. You are a cold-blooded little thing, Eve. A man would need much fire to melt your ice." ”

“ It was with this feeling strong upon her that to-night, when the supper bell rang, she came into the kitchen and asked Mrs. Bower if she might help Beulah. She had no feeling that such labor was beneath her. If a princess cared to serve, she was none the less a princess!
Secure, therefore, in her sense of unassailable dignity, she entered the dining-room. She might have been a goddess chained to menial tasks—a small and vivid goddess, with dusky hair. Richard Brooks, observing her, had once more a swift and certain sense of her fineness and of her unlikeness to those about her. ”

“ The road which they crossed was the railroad. Over the iron rails the trains thundered from one big city to another, with a river to cross just before they reached Peter Bower's. Very few of the trains stopped at Peter's, and it was this neglect of theirs, and the consequent isolation, which constituted the charm of Bower's for town-tired folk. Yet Anne Warfield always wished that some palatial express might tarry for a moment to take her aboard, and whirl her on to the world of flashing lights, of sky-scraping towers and streaming crowds.
"What are you going to do with the wreaths?" ”

“ She flushed faintly. "I believe in yours. But your Eve doesn't. She likes you because you don't care, and everybody else does. And that isn't love."
"What is love?"
She pondered. "I don't know. I've never felt it. And I don't want to feel it. If I loved too much I should die—and if I didn't love enough I should be ashamed."
"You are a queer child, Marie-Louise."
"I am not a child. Dad thinks I am, and mother. But they don't know."
There were day lilies growing about the sun-dial. She gathered a handful of white blooms and laid them at the feet of the piping Pan. ”

“ Anne sank down on the rug, and reached up her hand for Nancy, "and how happy you will be with your big son. Could you ever have loved a daughter as much, Mother Nancy?"
"I'm not sure; perhaps," smiling, "if she had been like you. And a daughter would have stayed with me. Men have wandering natures—they must be up and out."
"Women have wandering natures, too," Anne told her. "Do you know that last Christmas I cried and cried because I was tied to the Crossroads school and to Bower's? I wanted to live in the city and have lovely things. You can't imagine how I hated all Eve Chesley's elegance. ”

“ Then she rose. "Not if you marry Richard Brooks. You may as well know that now as later, Eve. All your life you have shaken the plum tree and have gathered the fruit. You may come to your senses when you find there isn't any tree to shake."
The deep red in the cheeks of the old woman was matched by the red that stained Eve's fairness. "Keep your money," she said, passionately; "I can get along without it. You've always made me feel like a pauper, Aunt Maude." ”

“ Marie-Louise spoke of Geoffrey Fox. "Miss Warfield knows him. She knows how he came to write his book."
Anne told them how he came to write it. Of Peggy ill at Bower's, of the gray plush pussy cat, and of how, coming up the hall with the bowl of soup in her hand, she had found Fox in a despairing mood and had suggested the plot.
Austin, watching her, decided that she was most unusual. She was beautiful, but there was something more than beauty. It was as if she was lighted from within by a fire which gave warmth not only to herself but to those about her. ”

“ But I like to think that I can help Richard—in his career."
"You're not made of that kind of stuff. You want your own good time. Women who help men to achieve must be content to lose their looks and their figures and to do without pretty clothes, and you wouldn't be content. You want to live your own life, and be admired and petted and envied, Eve."
She faced him, blazing. "You and Aunt Maude and Win are all alike. You think I can't be happy unless I live in the lap of luxury. Well, I can tell you this, I'd rather have a crust of bread with Richard than live in a palace with you, Pip." ”

“ Winifred shook her head. "Don't be hard on her, Pip. We women are so helpless in our loves. Richard might make her happy if he cared enough, but he doesn't. Perhaps Eve will be broadened and deepened by it all. I don't know. No one knows."
"I know this. That you and Tony seem to get a lot out of things, Win."
"Of marriage? We do. Yet we've had all of the little antagonisms and differences. But underneath it we know—that we're made for each other. And that helps. It has helped us to push the wrong things out of our lives and to hold on to the right ones." ”

“ Oh, Uncle Rod, is Geoffrey Fox right? And have you and I been dreaming all these years? The rest of the world doesn't dream; it makes money and spends it, and makes money and spends it, and makes money and spends it. Only you and I are still old-fashioned enough to want sunsets; the rest of them want motor cars and yachts and trips to Europe. That was what Jimmie Ford wanted, and that was why he didn't want me. ”

“ Oh, Ducky Dick, do you think that I am going to let you keep on being poor and priggish and steady-minded?"
"Am I that, Eve?"
"You know you are."
Her laughing eyes challenged him. He would have been less than a man if he had not responded to the appeal of her youth and beauty. "Dicky," she said, "when we are married I am going to give you the time of your young life. All work and no play will make you a dull boy, Dicky."
In the night the clouds came up over the moon, and when the late and lazy party appeared on deck for luncheon, Marie-Louise complained. ”

“ His face was stern.
"What's up, Dicky Boy?"
He laughed without mirth. "Oh, I'm beginning to think we are puppets pulled by strings; that things happen as Fate wills and not as we want them."
"Men haven't any right to talk that way. It's their world. If you were a woman you might complain. Look at me! Everything that I have comes from Aunt Maude. She could leave me without a [193] cent if she chose, and she knows it. She owns me, and unless I marry she'll own me until I die."
"You'll marry, Eve. Old Pip will see to that."
"Pip," passionately. "Dicky, why do you always fling Pip in my face?" ”

“ I'll put Ben in the stable—and we'll go for a walk. Do you know there are violets in the wood?"
From under the red-striped awning of Brinsley's boat Geoffrey Fox saw Anne's hair blowing like a sable banner in the breeze. He saw Richard's square figure peaked up to the alpine hat. He saw them enter the wood.
He shut his eyes from the glare of the sun and lay quietly on the cushions of the little launch. But though his eyes were shut, he could still see those two figures walking together in the dreamy dimness of the spring forest.
"What were the ethics of the primitive man?" ”

“ She slipped the blue dress from her shoulders and saw the long slim line of her neck and the whiteness of her skin.
The fire had died down in the little round stove. The room was cold. She thought of Eve's rose-color, and of the warmth of her furs.
Bravely, however, she hummed the tune to which the others had danced. She lifted her feet in time. Her shoes were heavy, and she took them off. She tried to get the rhythm, the lightness, the grace of movement. But these things must be taught, and she had no one to teach her. ”

“ But I shall, if something doesn't save me from him, Richard."
"You can save yourself."
"That's all you know about it. Women take what they can get in this world, not what they want. Every morning Pip sends me flowers, sweetheart roses to-day, and lilies yesterday, and before that gardenias and orchids, and when I open the boxes every flower seems to be shouting, 'Come and marry me, come and marry me.'"
"No woman need marry a man she doesn't care for, Eve." ”

“ While David and Nancy talked he went out, and, from the top of the snowy steps, surveyed his domain. Back and back in the wide stretch of country which faced him, beyond the valleys, on the other side of the hills, were people who would some day listen for the step of young Richard as those who had gone before had listened for the step of his grandfather. He saw himself going forth on stormy nights to fight pain and pestilence; to minister to little children, to patient mothers; to men beaten down by an enemy before whom their strength was as wax. ”

“ And I am afraid to die."
"You are not going to die. And if you were there would be nothing to fear. Death is just—falling asleep. Rarely any terror. We doctors know, who see people die. I know it, and your father knows it."
By the light of a blinding flash he saw her white face with its wet red hair.
"Dad doesn't know it as you know," she said, chokingly. "He couldn't say it as you—say it."
"Why not?"
"He's like I am. Dad's afraid."
The storm swept on, leaving the waves rough behind it, and Richard at last put Marie-Louise to bed with a sleeping powder. Then he went to hunt up Eve. ”

“ Richard, dancing in the music room with Anne, found himself saying, "How different it all is."
"From Bower's?"
"Yes."
"Do you like it?"
"Sometimes. And then sometimes it all seems so big—and useless."
The music stopped, and they made their way back to the little drawing-room.
"Won't you sit here and talk to me?" Richard said. "Somehow we never seem to find time to talk."
She smiled. "There is always so much to do."
But she knew that it was not the things to be done which had kept her from him. It was rather a sense that safety lay in seeing as little of him as possible. ”

“ When I had finished his face was white and set. "Do you mean to tell me that any man has tried to break your heart?"
I think I was crying a little. "Yes. But the worst of all is my—pride."
[152] "My little Princess," he said softly, "that this should have come—to you."
Uncle Rod, I think that if I had ever had a brother, I should have wanted him to be like Geoffrey Fox. All his lightness and frivolity seemed to slip from him. "He has thrown away what I would give my life for," he said. "Oh, the young fool, not to know that Paradise was being handed to him on a platter." ”

“ I don't believe in ghosts. I don't believe in fairies, either, or Santa Claus. But I like to read about them and write about them, and—and wish that it might be so."
There was something almost wistful in her voice. Richard, aware suddenly of what a child she was, bent forward.
"I think I half believe in fairies, and Christmas wouldn't be anything without Santa Claus, and as for the soul of your gentle lady, I have a feeling that it is finding Heaven in the rose garden."
She was stroking the silver kitten which had curled up in her lap. "I wish I weren't such a—heathen," she said, suddenly. ”

“ Little sparks were in her eyes.
"Don't worry, Eve. Austin doesn't want me to go. I can't get away. But it is on my mind."
"Put it off and come and help me with my roses. I gave Pip a bud. Are you jealous, Dicky?"
Still trying to follow her mood, he said, "You and the rest of the roses belong to me. Why should I care for one poor bud?"
She stuck a red rose in his coat, and when she had made her flowers into a nosegay, he lifted her down from the sun-dial. For a moment she clung to him. Meade had gone to rescue the sunshade which was blowing down the slope, and for the moment they were alone. ”

“ Richard met her at the station in the midst of a raging blizzard, and in a sort of dream she had been whirled with him through the gray streets shut in by the veil of the falling snow. They had stopped for tea at a big hotel, which had seemed as they entered to swim in a sea of golden light. And now here she was at last in this palace of a house!
Therese led her straight to Marie-Louise.
The Dresden-China Shepherdess in bed looked down the length of the shadowed room to the door. The figure that stood on the threshold was somehow different from what she had expected. Smaller. More girlish. ”

“ Rugs with a sheen like the bloom of a peach—alabaster in curved and carved bowls and vases, old prints in dull gilt frames—furniture following the lines of Florentine elaborateness—his eyes took in all the color and glow, though he rarely stopped for a closer view.
In front of one broad window, however, he hesitated. The opening of the door had spilled into the frosty air of this alien city the scent of the Orient—the fragrance of incense—of spicy perfumed woods.
In the window a jade god sat high on a teakwood pedestal. A string of scarlet beads lighted a shadowy corner. ”

“ Anne wanted to hug Marie-Louise, and with heightened color she listened to Winifred's defense.
"I think we should all like to feel that we are equal to it—to give up money and fame—for the thing that—called."
"There is no better or bigger work for him there than here," Austin proclaimed.
"No," Winifred agreed, and her eyes were bright, "but it is because he is giving up something which the rest of us value that I like him. Renunciation isn't fashionable, but it is stimulating." ”

“ Wait till you see him in the spring with the pink roses back of him. He seems to get younger in the spring."
Anne, going to bed that night in a suite of rooms which might have belonged to a princess, wondered if she should wake in the morning and find herself dreaming. To have her own bath, a silk canopy over her head, to know that breakfast would be served when she rang for it, and that her mail and newspapers would be brought—these were unbelievable things. She had a feeling that if she told Uncle Rod he would shake his head over it. He had a theory that luxury tended to cramp the soul. ”