From the Housetops Part 5

"No. It isn't worth a dollar."

"Ah, but it _will_ be if Mr. Thorpe buys it," said he in triumph. "He could discount it for full value, if he wanted to. That's precisely what makes it good. I'm afraid you don't know very much about high finance, mother dear."

"Please go away, George," complained Anne. "Mother and I have a great deal to talk about, and you are a dreadful nuisance when you discover a reason for coming home so long before dinner-time. Can't you p.a.w.n something?"

"Don't be ridiculous," said George.

"Why did you borrow money from Percy Wintermill?" demanded Mrs. Tresslyn.

"There you go, mother, using that word 'borrow' again. I wish you wouldn't. It's a vulgar word. You might as well say, 'Why did you _swipe_ money from Percy Wintermill?' He lent it to me because he realised how darned hard-up we are and felt sorry for me, I suppose."

"For heaven's sake, George, don't tell me that you-"

"Don't look so horrified, mother," he interrupted. "I didn't tell him we were hard-up. I merely said, from time to time, 'Let me take fifty, Percy.' I can't help it if he _suspects_, can I? And say, Anne, he was so terribly in love with you that he would have let me take a thousand any time I wanted it, if I'd had occasion to ask him for it. You ought to be thankful that I didn't."

"Don't drag me into it," said Anne sharply.

"I admit I was fooled all along," said he, with a rueful sigh. "I had an idea that you'd be tickled to death to marry into the Wintermill family.

Position, money, family jewels, and all that sort of thing. Everything desirable except Percy. And then, just when I thought something might come of it, you up and get engaged to Brady Thorpe, keeping it secret from the public into the bargain. Confound it, you didn't even tell me till last fall. Your stupid secretiveness allowed me to go on getting into Percy's debt, when a word from you might have saved me a lot of trouble."

"Will you kindly leave the room, George?" said his mother, arising.

"Percy is making himself fearfully obnoxious," went on George ominously.

"For nearly three weeks I've been dodging him, and it can't go on much longer. One of these fine days, mother, a prominent member of the Wintermill family is going to receive a far from exclusive thras.h.i.+ng.

That's the only way I can think of to stop him, if I can't raise the money to pay him up. Some day I'm going to refrain from dodging and he is going to run right square into this." He held up a brawny fist. "I'm going to hold it just so, and it won't be too high for his nose, either. Then I'm going to pick him up and turn him around, with his face toward the Battery, and kick just as hard as I know how. I'll bet my head he'll not bother me about money after that-unless, of course, he's cad enough to sue me. I don't think he'll do that, however, being a proud and haughty Wintermill. I suppose we'll all be eliminated from the Wintermill invitation list after that, and it may be that we'll go without a fas.h.i.+onable dinner once in awhile, but what's all that to the preservation of the family dignity?"

Mrs. Tresslyn leaned suddenly against a chair, and even Anne turned to regard her tall brother with a look of real dismay.

"How much do you owe him?" asked the former, controlling her voice with an effort.

"Five hundred and sixty-five dollars, including interest. A pitiful sum to get thrashed for, isn't it?"

"And you were planning to get the money from Mr. Thorpe to pay Percy?"

"To keep Percy from getting licked, would be the better way to put it. I think it's uncommonly decent of me."

"You are-you are a bully, George,-a downright bully," flared Anne, confronting him with blazing eyes. "You have no right to frighten mother in this way. It's cowardly."

"He doesn't frighten me, dear," said Mrs. Tresslyn, but her lips quivered.

Turning to her son, she continued: "George, if you will mail a check to Percy this minute, I will draw one for you. A Tresslyn cannot owe money to a Wintermill. We will say no more about it. The subject is closed. Sit down there and draw a check for the amount, and I will sign it. Rawson will post it."

George turned his head away, and lowered his chin. A huskiness came quickly into his voice.

"I'm-I'm ashamed of myself, mother,-I give you my word I am. I came here intending to ask you point-blank to advance me the money. Then the idea came into my head to work the bluff about old Mr. Thorpe. That grew into Percy's prospective thras.h.i.+ng. I'm sorry. It's the first time I've ever tried to put anything over on you."

"Fill in the check, please," she said coldly. "I've just been drawing a few for the dressmakers-a few that Anne has just remembered. I shan't in the least mind adding one for Percy. He isn't a dressmaker but if I were asked to select a suitable occupation for him I don't know of one he'd be better qualified to pursue. Fill it in, please."

Her son looked at her admiringly. "By Jove, mother, you are a wonder. You never miss fire. I'd give a thousand dollars, if I had it, to see old Mrs.

Wintermill's face if that remark could be repeated to her."

A faint smile played about his mother's lips. After all, there was honest tribute in the speech of this son of hers.

"It would be worse than a b.l.o.o.d.y nose for Percy," said Anne, slipping an arm around her mother's waist. "But I don't like what you said about _me_ and the dressmakers. I must have gowns. It isn't quite the same as George's I.O.U. to Percy, you know."

"Don't be selfish, Anne," cried George, jerking a chair up to the escritoire and scrambling among the papers for a pen. "You won't have to worry long. You'll soon be so rich that the dressmakers won't dare to send you a bill."

"Wait a moment, George," said Mrs. Tresslyn abruptly. "If you do not promise to refrain from saying disagreeable things to Anne, I shall withdraw my offer to help you out of this sc.r.a.pe."

George faced her. "Does that mean that I am to put my O.K. upon this wedding of Anne's?" His look of good-nature disappeared.

"It means that you are not to comment upon it, that's all," said his mother. "You have said quite enough. There is nothing more that you can add to an already sufficiently distasteful argument."

George swallowed hard as he bent over the checkbook. "All right, mother, I'll try to keep my trap closed from now on. But I don't want you to think that I'm taking this thing pleasantly. I'll say for the last time,-I hope,-that it's a darned crime, and we'll let it go at that."

"Very well. We will let it go at that."

"Great Scot!" burst from his lips as he whirled in the fragile chair to face the women of the house. "I just can't help feeling as I do about it.

I can't bear to think of Anne,-my pretty sister Anne,-married to that old rummy. Why, she's fit to be the wife of a G.o.d. She's the prettiest girl in New York and she'd be one of the best if she had half a chance. A fellow like Braden Thorpe would make a queen of her, and that's just what she ought to be. Oh, Lord! To think of her being married to that burnt-out, shrivelled-up-"

"George! That will do, sir!"

His sister was staring at him in utter perplexity. Something like wonder was growing in her lovely, velvety eyes. Never before had she heard such words as these from the lips of her big and hitherto far from considerate brother, the brother who had always begrudged her the slightest sign of favour from their mother, who had blamed her for securing by unfair means more than her share of the maternal peace-offerings.

Suddenly the big boy dug his knuckles into his eyes and turned away, muttering an oath of mortification. Anne sprang to his side. Her hands fell upon his shoulders.

"What are you doing, George? Are-are you crazy?"

"Crazy _nothing_," he choked out, biting his lip. "Go away, Anne. I'm just a d.a.m.ned fool, that's all. I-"

"Mother, he's-he's crying," whispered Anne, bewildered. "What is it, George?" For the first time in her life she slipped an affectionate arm about him and laid her cheek against his sleek, black hair. "Buck up, little boy; don't take it like this. I'll-I'll be all right. I'll-oh, I'll never forget you for feeling as you do, George. I didn't think you'd really care so much."

"Why,-why, Anne, of course I care," he gulped. "Why shouldn't I care?

Aren't you my sister, and I your brother? I'd be a fine mess of a thing if I didn't care. I tell you, mother, it's awful! You know it is! It is a queer thing for a brother to say, I suppose, but-but I _do_ love Anne. All my life I've looked upon her as the finest thing in the world. I've been mean and nasty and all that sort of thing and I'm always saying rotten things to her, but, darn it, I-I do love my pretty sister. I ought to hate you, Anne, for this infernal thing you are determined to do-I ought to, do you understand, but I can't, I just can't. It's the rottenest thing a girl can do, and you're doing it, I-oh, say, what's the matter with me?

Sniffling idiot! I say, where the devil _do_ you keep your pen?"

Wrathfully he jerked a pile of note paper and blotters off the desk, scattering them on the floor. "I'll write the check, mother, and I'll promise to do my best hereafter about Anne and old Tempy. And what's more, I'll not punch Percy's nose, so you needn't be afraid he'll turn it up at us."

The pen scratched vigorously across the check. His mother was regarding him with a queer expression in her eyes. She had not moved while he was expressing himself so feelingly about Anne. Was it possible that after all there was something fine in this boy of hers? His simple, genuine outburst was a revelation to her.

"I trust this may be the last time that you will come to me for money in this way, George," she said levelly. "You must be made to realise that I cannot afford such luxuries as these. You have made it impossible for me to refuse you this time. I cannot allow a son of mine to be in debt to a Wintermill. You must not borrow money. You-"

He looked up, grinning. "There you go again with that middle-cla.s.s word, mother. But I'll forgive you this once on condition that you never use it again. People in our walk of life never _borrow_ anything but trouble, you know. We don't borrow money. We arrange for it occasionally, but G.o.d forbid that we should ever become so common as to borrow it. There you are, filled in and ready for your autograph-payable to Percy Reginald Van Alstone Wintermill. I put his whole name in so that he'd have to go to the exertion of signing it all on the back. He hates work worse than poison.

I'm glad you didn't accept him, Anne. It would be awful to have to look up to a man who is so insignificant that you'd have to look down upon him at the same time."

Mrs. Tresslyn signed the check. "I will have Rawson post it to him at once," she said. "There goes one of your gowns, Anne,-five hundred and sixty-five dollars."

"I shan't miss it, mother dear," said Anne cheerfully. She had linked an arm through one of George's, much to the surprise and embarra.s.sment of the tall young man.

"Bully girl," said he awkwardly. "Just for that I'll kiss the bride next month, and wish her the best of luck. I-I certainly hope you'll have better luck than I had."