Cynthia Wakeham's Money Part 7

"Is it a tragedy, this not going out?"

"It is the result of a tragedy; must be. They say nothing and n.o.body could draw from her beyond the boundary of that brick wall we rode by so carelessly. And she so young, so beautiful!"

"Frank, you exaggerate," was all the answer he received.

Frank bit his lip; the phrase he had used had been a trifle strong for the occasion. But in another moment he was ready to continue the conversation.

"Perhaps I do speak of an experiment that has never been tried; but you know what I mean. She has received some shock which has terrified her and made her afraid of the streets, and no one can subdue this fear or induce her to step through her own gate. Is not that sad and interesting enough to move a man who recognizes her beauty?"

"It is certainly very sad," quoth the other, "if it is quite true, which I doubt."

"Go talk to your neighbors then; they have not been absent like yourself for a good long year."

"I am not interested enough," the other began.

"But you ought to be," interpolated Frank. "As a physician you ought to recognize the peculiarities of such a prejudice. Why, if I had such a case----"

"But the case is not mine. I am not and never have been Miss Cavanagh's physician."

"Well, well, her friend then."

"Who told you I was her friend?"

"I don't remember; I understood from some one that you used to visit her."

"My neighbors, as you call them, have good memories."

"_Did_ you use to visit her?"

"Frank, Frank, subdue your curiosity. If I did, I do not now. The old gentleman is dead, and it was he upon whom I was accustomed to call when I went to their house."

"The old gentleman?"

"Miss Cavanagh's father."

"And you called upon him?"

"Sometimes."

"Edgar, how short you are."

"Frank, how impatient you are."

"But I have reason."

"How's that?"

"I want to hear about her, and you mock me with the most evasive replies."

Edgar turned towards his friend; the flush had departed from his features, but his manner certainly was not natural. Yet he did not look unkindly at the ardent young lawyer. On the contrary, there was a gleam of compa.s.sion in his eye, as he remarked, with more emphasis than he had before used:

"I am sorry if I seem to be evading any question you choose to put. But the truth is you seem to know more about the young lady than I do myself. I did not know that she was the victim of any such caprice."

"Yet it has lasted a year."

"A year?"

"Just the time you have been away."

"Just----" Edgar paused in the repet.i.tion. Evidently his attention had been caught at last. But he soon recovered himself. "A strange coincidence," he laughed. "Happily it is nothing more."

Frank surveyed his friend very seriously.

"I shall believe you," said he.

"You may," was the candid rejoinder. And the young physician did not flinch, though Etheridge continued to look at him steadily and with undoubted intention. "And now what luck with Jerry?" he suddenly inquired, with a cheerful change of tone.

"None; I shall leave town at ten."

"Is there no Harriet Smith here?"

"Not if I can believe him."

"And has been none in the last twenty years?"

"Not that he can find out."

"Then your quest here is at an end?"

"No, it has taken another turn, that is all."

"You mean----"

"That I shall come back here to-morrow. I must be sure that what Jerry says is true. Besides---- But why mince the matter? I--I have become interested in that girl, Edgar, and want to know her--hear her speak.

Cannot you help me to make her acquaintance? If you used to go to the house---- Why do you frown? Do you not like Miss Cavanagh? "

Edgar hastily smoothed his forehead.

"Frank, I have never thought very much about her. She was young when I visited her father, and then that scar----"

"Never mind," cried Frank. He felt as if a wound in his own breast had been touched.

Edgar was astonished. He was not accustomed to display his own feelings, and did not know what to make of a man who did. But he did not finish his sentence.

"If she does not go out," he observed instead, "she may be equally unwilling to receive visitors."

"Oh, no," the other eagerly broke in; "people visit there just the same.

Only they say she never likes to hear anything about her peculiarity.

She wishes it accepted without words."