Mary Wallace

“ He got hold at last of something that he could be articulate about, and demanded to know why, in these circumstances, Mary hadn't come straight to them at Hickory Hill instead of camping out, for the night, all by herself in the Dearborn Avenue house.
"She has an idea she must find a job for herself," Wallace said, feeling awkwardly guilty as if he had betrayed her; but the way Rush leaped upon him, demanding in one breath what the deuce he meant and what sort of job he was talking about, made it impossible to pull up. ”

“ The girl smiled slightly and in that smile was paradise, thought T. X.
"The weirdest name?" he repeated, "why I think the worst I have heard for a long time is Belinda Mary."
"That has a familiar ring," said Kara.
T. X. was looking at the girl.
She was staring at him with a certain languid insolence which made him curl up inside. Then with a glance at her employer she swept from the room.
"I ought to have introduced you," said Kara. "That was my secretary, Miss Holland. Rather a pretty girl, isn't she?" ”

“ Mary rather liked him on second scrutiny. He was a lathy man with the sharp, inquisitive features of the Cockney crook. The gold-rimmed spectacles lent a certain benignity to his pointed features. About his waist was a green baize apron, in his hand a whisk broom.
"Look here, Meister——"" he began, saw the girl and smirked as respectfully as he knew how.
"Knock when you come into my room," Meister's face was as black as thunder. "And I've got a handle to my name."
"Show me where it is and I'll turn it," said Sam Haggitt calmly. "Music always was a speciality of mine. ”

“ Do you devote yourself to Mary, and leave Anneke to me. But, why this language; surely, our case is by no means so desperate.”
“It might not be so difficult for two active, vigorous young men to get ashore; but it would be different with females. The ice is in motion all around us; and the cakes are piling and grinding on each other in a most fearful manner. Were it light enough to see, we should do much better; but, as it is, I dare not trust Mary Wallace any distance from this island, at present. ”

“ I never forget the shape of a man. But guesswork or not, I am prepared to go to the witness stand and testify on oath that the gentleman who has been shadowing me since I left Meister's is the same man I saw hanging about opposite the station house last night. And if this is police work," he added vehemently, "I'm through with it! I would give three provinces for one hot and comfortable cup of coffee!"
Mary smiled again.
"I won't ask you for your three provinces, doctor," she said. "We always keep coffee made; if you wish, I will heat some up." ”

“ So I can see, at a glance; even Anneke remembers it. I have heard the whole story from Mary Wallace; it was about a lion. I would give half of what I am worth, to see Mary Wallace in the paws of a lion, or any other wild beast; just to let her see that Guert Ten Eyck has a heart, as well as Corny Littlepage. But, Corny my boy, there is one thing you must do; you are in such favour, that it will be easy for you to effect it ”

“ Was this relief, Mary wondered—at learning that she was not at this moment engaged less domestically somewhere with Anthony March? But she doubted whether this was a good guess. If he did feel any such relief, it was not, at all events, from a personal jealousy; for the illuminating conviction had come over her that Wallace could not possibly be one of Paula's conquests. A man still capable of cherishing as the most beautiful event of his life, that sentimental platonic friendship he had enjoyed with her mother, would be immune against Paula's spells. ”

“ She didn't, very much, mind Wallace. There was no appearance of his being there in the rôle of guardian because she wasn't considered safe to leave to herself. You could always trust Wallace to do a thing like that perfectly.
It was a great piece of luck for him he told her. He had called up Hickory Hill to congratulate John upon Paula's enormous success; had learned from Rush of Mary's visit and that she was even then on the way to Chicago. He had just dropped round at the station in the hope of being able to pick her up for dinner. ”

“ That isn’t true, Timothy, is it?”
She put her hand on his and looked into his face. He did not meet her eyes.
“I think that is true, Mary,” he said steadily. “How it comes to be true, I don’t quite know. I suppose I have drifted a little over the line, and I’m grateful to you for pulling me up. Oh, no, I don’t regret the past—it has all been useful—and I have made good on chances, but I see there are other chances that a man can take than putting his money on the pace of a horse or backing against zero. ”

“ Wallace was now called in, when Mary clasped him in her arms, both falling on their knees before their sovereign. He raised them up and said, “I have tried both your loves, and found them faithful. Your Mary is all that you believed her, and brings you a dowry which she will explain. I shall see your hands united before I leave Annandale, and preside at the feast. Let your care of the widow be a remuneration for what she has done for both, and I trust all of you will long remember the Gudeman of Ballengeich’s visit to Annandale.”—Edinburgh Literary Gazette. ”

“ Wallace had been less persistent, so that James fancied he was regaining the freedom he longed for. And when he lay wounded and ill, his absolute weariness made him ardently look forward to seeing his people again. A hotter love sprang up for them; and the hope became stronger that reunion with Mary might awaken the dead emotion. He wished for it with all his heart.
But he had seen Mary, and he felt it hopeless; she left him cold, almost hostile. And with a mocking laugh, James heard Mrs. Wallace's words:
"Subalterns always get engaged to the same type of girl. They photograph so badly." ”

“ Lydia's smile left her face. She heard the girl gasp.
"You old liar!" she hissed.
"Lucy Jones you call yourself—you used to be Mary Welch in them days," chuckled old Jaggs.
"I'm not going to be insulted," almost screamed Lucy, though there was a note of fear in her strident voice. "I'm going to leave to-night."
"No you ain't, my dear," said old Jaggs complacently. "You're going to sleep here to-night, and you're going to leave in the morning. If you try to get out of that door before I let you, you'll be pinched."
"They've got nothing against me," the girl was betrayed into saying. ”

“ He sent for Mansus.
“You saw Lady Bartholomew off at Charing Cross, I suppose?”
Mansus nodded.
“She went alone?”
“She took her maid, but otherwise she was alone. I thought she looked ill.”
“She has been looking ill for months past,” said T. X., without any visible expression of sympathy.
“Did she take Belinda Mary?”
Mansus was puzzled. “Belinda Mary?” he repeated slowly. “Oh, you mean the daughter. No, she's at a school somewhere in France.”
T. X. whistled a snatch of a popular song, closed the little red book with a snap and replaced it in his desk. ”

“ Mary, they tell me that you’ve been seeing a lot of this young man Anderson?”
She was annoyed to find herself going red when there was really no reason for it. She need not ask who “they” were, she could guess.
“I’ve been making inquiries about that boy,” said Sir John slowly, “and I can tell you this, he is straight. Perhaps he has led an unconventional life, but all that he told Sadie was true. He’s clean, and, Mary, that counts for something in this world.”
He seemed at a loss how to proceed.
“Anything might happen,” he went on. “Although I’m not an old man, I have enemies. . . .” ”

“ She led him to a seat on the porch; he sank into it unresisting. Miss Mason pushed away her scrapbook, white-faced.
“The Lusitania! They were na' saved, Mary. There's o'er a thousand gone. O'er a hundred Americans—hundreds of women and little bairns, Mary—like yours—Canadian mithers and bairns going to be near their brave lads—babies, Mary.” And the big fellow dropped his rough head on his arms and sobbed like a child.
“Oh, Wallace; oh, Wallace!” whispered Mary, fairly wringing her hands; “it can't be! Over a thousand lost?” ”

“ There is romance —the nearest you'll get to it."
In Dr. Lomond's eyes was a look of infinite sadness.
"'Tragedy' is the better word after all," he said.
When Mary reached Flanders Lane she was astonished to discover unusual signs of activity. The black door of No. 9 was open, and two workmen were moving in a large square grille of steel. One of the men stood aside with a grin to let her pass.
"That's not a bad job to be done in twelve hours, miss," he said, and she gathered from his pride that he was responsible for this rough steel structure. ”

“ Paula retorted, drawing the rest of the room into it again just as Wallace was making a gallant effort to start a subsidiary conversation to serve as a screen, "that's because you haven't heard those songs. If there's a singer in the world who'd dare—cut loose with them right after eating the sort of dinner Lucile will have to-night for Mary and Rush, I'd like to see him try it."
"I didn't mean to imply that they were not difficult. I dare say they are all but impossible. But it does seem to me that you are taking the occasion of singing them—a little too—emotionally." ”

“ The author of Wallace was the author of The Sabbath, as well as of Poems and Tales, Scotch and English, thin 8vo., Paisley, 1794: a copy of which, as well as of Mary Stewart and Wallace, is in my tolerably extensive dramatic library. The latter is defective, ending at p. 88.; and was saved some years ago from a lot of the drama about to be consigned to the snuff-shop. Probably the same reasons which caused the suppression of a political romance from the same pen, and of which I have reason to believe the only existing copy is in my library, may have induced the non-completion of Wallace. ”

“ It was the second time the tinkle of sound had come from the croupier at the trente et quarante table.
“Heaven knows!” said Timothy. “Maybe it is to call the other worshippers.”
Again the young Englishman looked round and said something.
“What did he say?” asked Timothy.
“He said seventeen,” said the girl. “Was that the number you backed?”
Timothy smiled.
“There are no numbers on that table except No. 1—and No. 1 is the fat man with the rake—he gets it coming and going. Mary, I’m going to ask you one question: If I make good will you marry me?” ”

“ I don't agree with Lucile Wollaston's diagnosis, that Paula could not abide Wallace merely because he refused to lose his head over her, but there was a grain of truth in it. What she unconsciously resented was the fundamental unreality of his attitude to her. Actually, he did not like her, but the relation he had selected as appropriate to the first Mrs. Wollaston's successor was one of innocent devotion and he stuck, indefatigably, to the pose. So the chance to put his serviceability to the proof in consternating circumstances like these, afforded her a subtle satisfaction. ”

“ I haven't told that to any one but you.—All the same, if he thinks, from that, that he can go on accumulating—millstones ..."
"Tell me where you are planning to live," Wallace said, getting back as he was always glad to do, to firm ground again. "Not too far away, I hope, for us to go on seeing a lot of you."
"Oh, it's very sad about that," she told him. "I was hoping to live with him in his secret lair over the Italian grocery. ”

“ And sometimes when they look darkest it's only the sign that they're about to change their faces altogether. Anyhow, we've stared at them long enough to-night, haven't we? And all I meant was to take you out for a jolly evening! Don't you think we might save it, even yet? Is there anything at the theatres you'd like to see?"
"Some musical show?" she asked. "Yes, I'd like that very much.
Thank you."
CHAPTER XIX THE DRAMATIST Mary returned to Ravinia—went on duty, as she put it to Wallace—the following afternoon rather taut-drawn in her determination to have things out with Paula at once. ”

“ I looked at Mary, knowing her for a kind woman—one who loved all innocent play. I hit myself on the head at the dumb-foolishness of it. How in the devil's name could she bring herself to approve of this? Why is it we lay a course for somebody else we'd never think of following ourselves? ”

“ Wallace was only moderately well off and he was by nature, cautious. His investments were always of the most conservative sort. This from habit as well as nature because his job—the only one he had ever had—was that of estate agent. But Paula's instinct told her that he wouldn't find it possible to refuse. ”

“ The special episode they focused upon was Violet Williamson's flirtation with Fournier. She was a pretty woman, still comfortably on the east side of forty, socially one of the inner ring, spoiled, rather, by an enthusiastic husband but not, thanks to her own good sense, very seriously. James Wallace was an old and very special friend of hers and she commandeered his services as soon as he appeared at Ravinia, in her campaign for possession of the French baritone. ”

“ You're nothing but a great bully, bullying a poor little woman, you nice boy! Who ever heard of such an argument? Because you make me listen, I must pay attention! Well, to show you what a friend I am, I will."
"Thank you, Mary," I said, holding out my hand. "Thank you, dear. You'll not be the worse for hearing the truth. It isn't like you to condemn a man unheard." ”

“ Mary sat white and still. Sax stood behind her, his fiddle by his side, holding the bow like a sword. He was white and still, too, and looking up to where the moon was going out. Their backs were turned to the devilry that threatened us.
I stepped forward,—easy as possible, and spoke to her.
"You're not looking well, Mary," I said. "Hadn't you better go down?"
That was before my poker days. Playing a four-flush gives a man control of his face and voice. She heard what I wanted to hide at once, being naturally sharp as a needle and tuned high that night. ”