Senator North Part 25

Harriet at this period was a curious mixture of humility and pride. She could not demonstrate sufficiently her grat.i.tude to Betty, but the very dilation of her nostril indicated gratified ambition. She had held her head high ever since her marriage; since her acknowledgment by the world as a wife, her carriage had been regal. Betty gave a luncheon one day to some acquaintances at the hotel, and when she introduced Harriet as Mrs. Emory, she saw her quiver like a blooded horse who has won a doubtful race.

As for Mrs. Madison, she finished by regarding the whole affair in the light of a novel, and argued with Betty the possible and probable results. Her interest in the plot became so lively that she took to discussing it with Harriet; and although the heroine was grateful at first for her interest, there came a time when she looked apprehensive and careworn. Finally she begged Mrs. Madison, tearfully, not to allude to the subject again, and Mrs. Madison, who was the kindest of women, looked surprised and hurt, but replied that of course she would avoid the subject if Harriet wished.

"It's just this," said Mrs. Emory, bluntly; "the subject is so much on your mind that I'm in constant terror you'll begin talking of it before Jack."

"My dear girl, I never would tell him; for his sake as well as your own, you can rely on me."

"I know you would never do it intentionally, ma'am, but I'm scared you'll do it without thinking; you talk of it so much, more than anything. The other night when you began to talk of the crime of miscegenation, I thought I should die."

"That was very inconsiderate of me. Poor girl, I'll be more careful."

But in her secluded impersonal life few romantic interests entered, and although she was too courteous to harp upon a painful subject, it was evident that she avoided it with an effort, and that it dwelt in the forefront of her mind. One evening after Betty had been playing some of the old Southern melodies, she caught Jack's hand in hers, and a.s.sured him brokenly that no people on earth were bound together as Southerners were, and that he must think of her always as his mother and come to her in the dark and dreadful hours of his life. He pressed her hand, and continued smoking his cigarette; he never had doubted that his aunt loved him as a mother. Harriet rose abruptly and left the room. She returned before long, however, and after that night she never left her husband alone with Mrs. Madison for a moment.

XVII

Betty herself was happy again. She hated the dark places of life, and got away from them and out into the suns.h.i.+ne as quickly as possible.

Although she was too well disciplined to s.h.i.+rk her duty, she did it as quickly as possible and pushed it to the back of her mind. Jack and Harriet were married; that was the end of it for the present. Let life go on as before. She gave several hours of the day to her mother, the rest to the forest and the lake. When Senator North came up again, she was her old gay self, the more attractive perhaps for the faint impression which contact with deep seriousness is bound to leave. If Jack and Harriet had been safely out of the country, she would have felt like a Pagan, especially after the Tariff Bill pa.s.sed and Senator North came up to stay.

"I shouldn't have a care in the world," she said to him one morning, "if I did not know, little as I will permit myself to think of it, that exposure may come any day. There is only a chance that somebody at St.

Andrew will hear of the marriage and denounce her, but it might happen.

If only they were in Europe! She told me the other night that she knows she can keep him there, her influence is so great. I hope that is true, but she cannot make him go till he has his own money to go with."

"What she means is that he won't leave her. He has her here now and is in no hurry to move. He should be able to rent his farm. It is a very good one." "He has rented it for a year--from September. He gets nothing till then. If pride were not a disease with him, he would let me advance the money, but he is not as sure as he might be of the man who has rented the farm and he will not take any risks, I am sorry for Harriet. She has the idea on her mind now that Molly will blurt it out, and she has the sort of mind that broods and exaggerates. I sincerely wish they had got off to Europe undiscovered and sent the news back by the pilot. I had to speak to Molly once or twice myself; I never knew her so garrulous about anything."

Senator North laughed. "You have a great deal of trouble with your parent," he said. "I fear you have not been firm enough with her in the past. Will you come into the next lake? I like the fish better there.

You are not to worry about anything, my dear, while we have the Adirondacks to imagine ourselves happy in."

"Ar'n't you really happy?" she asked him quickly.

"Not wholly so," he replied. "But that is a question we are not to discuss."

XVIII

Senator North had been formally invited by Mrs. Madison for dinner that evening, and Betty, who had parted from him just seven hours before, restrained an impulse to run down the terrace as his boat made the landing. Emory and Harriet were on the veranda, however, and she managed to look stately and more or less indifferent at the head of the steps. There were pillars and vines on either side of her, and bunches of purple wistaria hung above her head. It was a picturesque frame for a picturesque figure in white, and a kindly consideration for Senator North's highly trained and exacting eye kept her immovable for nearly five minutes. As he reached the steps, however, self-consciousness suddenly possessed her and she started precipitately to meet him. She wore slippers with high Louis Quinze heels. One caught in a loosened strand of the mat. Her other foot went too far. She made a desperate effort to reach the next step, and fell down the whole flight with one unsupported ankle twisted under her.

For a moment the pain was so intense she hardly was aware that Senator North had his arm about her shoulders while Emory was straightening her out. Harriet was screaming frantically. She gave a sharp scream herself as Emory touched her ankle, but repressed a second as she heard her mother's voice.

Mrs. Madison stood in the doorway with more amazement than alarm on her face.

"Betty?" she cried. "Nothing can have happened to Betty! Why, she has not even had a doctor since she was six years old."

"It's nothing but a sprained ankle," said Emory. "For heaven's sake, keep quiet, Harriet," he added impatiently, "and go and get some hot water. Let's get her into the house."

Betty by this time was laughing hysterically. Her ankle felt like a hot pincus.h.i.+on, and the unaccustomed experience of pain, combined with Harriet's shrieks, delivered with a strong darky accent, and her mother's att.i.tude of disapproval, a.s.saulted her nerves.

When they had carried her in and put her foot into a bucket of hot water, she forgot them completely, and while her mother fanned her and Senator North forced her to swallow brandy, she felt that all the intensity of life's emotions was circ.u.mferenced by a wooden bucket. But when they had carefully extended her on the sofas and Emory, who had a farmer's experience with broken bones, announced his intention of examining her ankle at once, Betty with remarkable presence of mind asked Senator North to hold her hand. This he did with a firmness which fortified her during the painful ordeal, and Mrs. Madison was not terrified by so much as a moan.

"You have pluck!" exclaimed Senator North when Emory, after much prodding, had announced that it was only a sprain. "You have splendid courage."

Emory a.s.sured her that she was magnificent, and Betty felt so proud of herself that she had no desire to undo the accident.

In the days that followed, although she suffered considerable pain, she enjoyed herself thoroughly. It was her first experience of being "fussed over," as she expressed it. She never had had so much as a headache, no one within her memory had asked her how she felt, and she had regarded her mother as the centre of the medical universe. Now a clever and sympathetic doctor came over every day from the hotel and felt her pulse, and intimated that she was his most important patient.

Mrs. Madison insisted upon bathing her head, Emory and Harriet treated her like a sovereign whose every wish must be antic.i.p.ated, even the servants managed to pa.s.s the door of her sitting-room a dozen times a day. Senator North came over every morning and sat by her couch of many rose-coloured pillows; and not only looked tender and anxious, but suggested that the statesman within him was dead.

"It is hard on you, though," she murmured one day, when they happened to be alone for a few moments. "Two invalids are more than one man's portion. And no one ever enjoyed the outdoor life as you do."

"This room is full of suns.h.i.+ne and fresh air, and I came up here to be with you. I don't know but what I am heartless enough to enjoy seeing such an imperious and insolently healthy person helpless for a time, and to be able to wait on her."

"I feel as if the entire order of the universe had been reversed."

"It will do you good. I hope you will have every variety of pleasure at least once in your life."

"You are laughing at me--but as I am a truthful person I will confide to you that I almost hate the idea of being well again."

"Of course you do. And as for the real invalids they enjoy themselves thoroughly. The great compensation law is blessed or cursed, whichever way you choose to look at it."

"I wonder if you had happened to be unmarried, what price we would have had to pay."

"G.o.d knows. The compensation law is the most immutable of all the fates."

"I have most of the gifts of life,--good looks, wealth, position, brains, and the power of making people like me. So I am not permitted to have the best of all. If I could, I wonder which of the others I'd lose. Probably we'd have an accident on our wedding journey, which would reduce my nerves to such a state that I'd be irritable for the rest of my life and lose my good looks and power to make you happy.

It's a queer world."

He made no reply.

"What are you thinking of?" she asked, meeting his eyes.

"That you are not to become anything so commonplace as a pessimist. Get everything out of the present that is offered you and give no thought to the future. What is it?" he added tenderly, as the blood came into her cheeks and she knit her brows.

"I moved my ankle and it hurt me so!" She moved her hand at the same time, and he took it, and held it until her brows relaxed, which was not for some time.

The best of women are frauds. Betty made that ankle the pivot of her circle for the rest of the summer. When she wanted to see Senator North look tender and worried, she puckered her brows and sighed. When she felt the promptings of her newly acquired desire to be "fussed over,"

she dropped suddenly upon a couch and demanded a cus.h.i.+on for her foot, or asked to be a.s.sisted to a hammock. She often laughed at herself; but the new experience was very sweet, and she wondered over Life's odd and unexpected sources of pleasure.

XIX