At the Crossroads Part 40

Kathryn ran her words along rather wildly. The silence of her companion, the calm way in which she was regarding her, were having an unpleasant effect. When Kathryn became aware of her own voice she was apt to talk too much--she grew confidential.

"Mr. Northrup's mother is ill. She needs him. The way I have known all this right along is simply a miracle."

How much more Kathryn might have said she was never to know, for Mary-Clare raised a hand as though to stay the inane torrent.

"What can you possibly mean," she asked, and her eyes darkened, "by knowing _this_ all along? I do not understand--what have you known?"

Then Kathryn sank in a mora.s.s.

"Oh! do be sensible," she said, and her voice was hard and cold. "You must see I have found you out--why pretend? When a man like Mr.

Northrup leaves home and forgets his duties--does not even write, buries himself in such a place as this and stays on--what does it mean? What can it possibly mean?"

Mary-Clare was spared much of what Kathryn was creating because she was so far away--so far, far away from the true significance of it all. She was seeing Northrup as Kathryn had never seen him; would never see him. She realized his danger. It was all so sudden and revolting. Only recently had she imagined his past, his environment; she had taken him as a wonderful experience in her barren, sterile life, but now she considered him as threatened from an unsuspected source. A natural revulsion from the type that Kathryn Morris represented for a moment oppressed her, but she dared not think of that nor of her own right to resent the hateful slurs cast upon her.

She must do what she could for Northrup--do it more or less blindly, crudely, but she must go as she saw light and was given time.

"You are terribly wrong about--everything." Mary-Clare spoke quietly but her words cut like bits of hail. "If you are going, as you say, to be Mr. Northrup's wife, you must try and believe what I am saying now for your own sake, but more for his."

Kathryn tried to say "Insolence!" but could not; she merely sat back in her chair and flashed an angry glance that Mary-Clare did not heed.

"Mr. Northrup is writing a beautiful book. The book is himself. He does not realize how much it is----"

"Indeed!" Kathryn did utter the one word, then added: "I suppose he's read it to you?"

"Yes, he has."

"Here, I suppose? By the fire, alone with you?"

"No, under the trees, out there."

Mary-Clare turned and glanced at the pure, open woods. "It is a beautiful book," she repeated.

"Oh! go on, do! Really this is too utterly ridiculous." Kathryn laughed impatiently. "We'll take for granted the beauty of the book."

"No, I cannot go on. You would not understand. It does not matter.

What I want you to know is this--he could not do an ugly, low thing.

If you wrong him there, you will never be forgiven, for it would hurt the soul of him; the part of him that no one--not even you who will be his wife--has a right to hurt or touch. You must make him _believe_ in women. Oh! I wish I could make you see--that was the matter with his beautiful book--I can understand now. He did not know women; but if you believe what I am saying, all will be right; you can make him know the truth. I can imagine how you might think wrong--it never occurred to me before--the woods, the loneliness, all the rest, but, because everything has been right, it makes him all the finer. You do believe me! You must! Tell me that you do!"

Mary-Clare was desperate. It was like trying to save someone from a flood that was carrying him to the rapids. The unreality of the situation alone made anything possible, but Kathryn suddenly reduced the matter to the deadly commonplace.

"No, I do not believe you," she said bitterly. "I am a woman of the world. I hate to say what I must, but there is so little time now, and there will be no time later on, so you'll have to take what you have brought upon yourself. This whole thing is pitifully cheap and ordinary--the only gleam of difference in it is that you are rather unusual--more dangerous on that account. I simply cannot account for you, but it doesn't really interest me. When Mr. Northrup writes his books, he always does what he has done now. It's rather brutal and cold-blooded but so it is. He has used you--you have been material for him. If there is nothing worse"--Kathryn flushed here--"it is because I have come in time. May I ask you now to leave me here in Mr.

Northrup's"--Kathryn sought the proper word--"study?" she said lamely.

"I will rest awhile; try to compose myself. If he comes I will meet him here. If not, I will go to the inn later."

Kathryn rose. So did Mary-Clare. The two girls faced each other. The table lay between them, but it seemed the width of the whole world.

"I would have helped you and him, if I could." Mary-Clare's voice sounded like the "ghost wind" seeking wearily, in a lost way, rest.

"But I see that I cannot. This is not Mr. Northrup's Place--it is mine. I built it myself--no foot but mine--and now yours--has ever entered here. I have always come here to--to think; to read. I wonder if I ever will be able to again, for you have done something very dreadful to it. You will do it to his life unless G.o.d keeps you from it." Mary-Clare was thinking aloud, taking no heed of her companion.

"How dare you!" Kathryn's face flamed and then turned pale as death.

Mary-Clare was moving toward the door. When she reached it she stood as a hostess might while a guest departed.

"Please go!" she said simply, but it had the effect of taking Kathryn by the shoulders and forcing her outside. With flaming face, dyeing the white anger, she flung herself along. Once outside she turned, looking cheap and mean for all the trappings of her station in life.

"I want you to understand," she said, "that you are dealing with a woman of the world, not a sentimental fool."

Mary-Clare inclined her head. She did not speak. She watched her uninvited guest go down the trail, pa.s.s out of sight. Then she went back to her chair to recover from the shock that had dazed her.

The atmosphere of the little cabin could not long be polluted by so brief an experience as had just occurred, and presently Mary-Clare was enfolded by the old comfort and vision.

She could weigh and estimate things now, and this she did bravely, justly. Like Northrup in Larry's cabin the night before, she became more a sensitive plate upon which pictures flashed, than a personality that was thinking and suffering. Such things as had now happened to her, she knew, happened in books. Always books, books, for Mary-Clare, and the old doctor's philosophy that gave strength but no a.s.surance.

The actual relation existing between Northrup and herself became a solid and immovable fact. She had not fully accepted it before; neither had he. They had played with it as they had the golden hours that they would not count or measure.

Nothing mattered but the truth. Mary-Clare knew that the wonderful thing had had no part in her decision as to Larry--others would not believe that, but she must not be swayed; she knew she had taken her steps faithfully as she had seen them--she must not stumble now because of any one, anything.

"It's what you do to love that counts!" Almost fiercely Mary-Clare grasped this. And in that moment Noreen, Northrup's mother, even Larry and the girl who had just departed, put in their claim. She must consider them; they were all part with Northrup and her.

"There is nothing for me to do but wait." Mary-Clare seemed to hear herself speaking the words. "I can do nothing now but wait. But I will not fear the Truth."

The bared Truth stood revealed; before it Mary-Clare did not flinch.

"This is what it has all meant. The happiness, the joy, the strange intensity of common things."

Then Mary-Clare bowed her head upon her folded arms while the warm sunlight came into the doorway and lay full upon her. She was absorbed in something too big to comprehend. She felt as if she was being born into--a woman! The birth-pains were wrenching; she could not grasp anything beyond them, but she counted every one and gloried in it.

The Big Thing that poor Peneluna had known was claiming Mary-Clare. It could not be denied; it might be starved but it would not die.

Somewhere, on beyond----

But oh! Mary-Clare was young, young, and her beyond was not the beyond of Peneluna; or if it were, it lay far, far across a desert stretch.

CHAPTER XVI

Northrup had cast himself upon Twombley's hospitality with the plea of business. He outlined a programme and demanded silence.

"I'm going to buy this Point," he confided, "and I'm going to go away, Twombley. I'm going to leave things exactly as they are until--well, perhaps always. Just consider yourself my superintendent."

Twombley blinked.

"s.n.a.t.c.hing hot cakes?" he asked. "Spoiling Maclin's meal?"

"Something like that, yes. I don't know what all this means, Twombley, but I'm going to take no chances. I want to be in a position to hit square if anything needs. .h.i.tting. If no one knows that I'm in on this deal, I'll be better pleased--but I want you to keep me informed."

Twombley nodded.