The Return of Peter Grimm Part 24

"To-morrow? No, I'm afraid not. You see, I'm going to be married to-morrow. A man does not want to be bothered with business deals on his wedding day.--No, the next day won't do, either, I'm afraid. You see, we are sailing directly for Europe. Thank you. Yes, I deserve all the congratulations you can offer me.--What?--Very well. This evening, then.

That will suit me perfectly. You're in New York, I suppose? What time will it be convenient to you to get to Grimm Manor?--What?--Yes, that's all right. No. Not here at the house. I'll meet you at the hotel. The tavern.--Yes, I'll be there promptly.--What?"

He listened a moment, then laughed in evident, if subdued, amus.e.m.e.nt.

"So the dear old gentleman used to tell you his plans never failed, did he?" he questioned. "Yes, I've heard the same boast from him hundreds of times. That's one reason why I want the deal kept quiet till it's settled. So I asked you to meet me at the tavern instead of here at the house. I don't want it thought by other people that I'd run counter to his plans in any way. G.o.d rest his soul! Hey? 'What would he say if he knew?' I hate to think. He could express himself very forcibly when his dear, stubborn old will was crossed. You may remember that. Oh, well, it's _life_. Everything must change."

There was a roll of thunder. At the same instant the windows flared pink-white with lightning. A flash of electricity ran purring and crackling along the telephone itself.

Frederik, with a sharp cry of surprise, dropped the instrument, and squeezed his electrically shocked arm. Then gingerly he picked up the telephone, replaced the receiver, and turned away toward the window seat.

Peter Grimm stood eyeing the telephone as if the man who had so lately been at the other end of the wire were directly in front of him.

"You don't know it, Hicks," said the Dead Man quietly, "but you will never carry this plan of yours through. We are going to meet very soon, you and I."

As if in response to his strange prophecy, the telephone jangled once more. Frederik returned to the desk and put the receiver to his ear.

"h.e.l.lo!" he called. "Oh, it's you, Mr. Hicks? No, they didn't cut us off. I thought you were through.--What?--A little louder, please. I can't hear you very well.--What?--You're feeling ill? Oh, I'm sorry.--What?--Oh, yes, it will do just as well to send your lawyer instead, if you find you're too sick to make the journey. Your lawyer will be empowered to attend to everything in your name, I suppose?--Good.--Then we can close the deal to-night. At the hotel and at the same time. All right. What did you say his name was?--Shelp?--All right. Good-bye. I hope you'll feel much better in the morning, Mr.

Hicks."

He relighted his cigarette, humming a little tune under his breath as he walked from the desk. His narrow face was very content.

"And that's the boy I loved and trusted!" said Peter Grimm, half aloud, watching Frederik take his hat and umbrella from the rack and leave the house. "I wonder if I am to unearth many more of my mistakes. I come upon a new one at every turn."

His wandering gaze rested on the door of Kathrien's room, in the gallery above. His lips parted in the old whimsical smile. Lifting his voice, he gave the odd call that had for years been a signal to Kathrien of his presence in the house and his desire to see her.

"_Ou-oo!_" rang out the familiar cry.

And, before its echoes could die away, Kathrien was out of her room and at the stairhead. She stood there an instant, dazed, wondering, like some one half-awakened from heavy sleep.

Looking down into the room below, she slowly descended the stairs.

"I thought some one called me," she said.

And though she spoke the words in her own brain and not from the lips, Peter Grimm heard and answered her.

"You did," said he. "I called you."

Filled with a sense that she was not alone, yet seeing and hearing no one, she came down into the seemingly vacant room. And, still without words, she said:

"I thought I heard a voice like--like----"

"Yes," answered the Dead Man again, "you wanted me, little girl. That's why I have come. There, there!" he soothed, as she stood with troubled face trying to formulate and understand the strange sensation that had suddenly taken possession of her. "Don't worry, Katje. It'll come out all right. We'll arrange things very differently. I've come back to----"

She moved away, unhearing. She pa.s.sed unseeing from the loving outstretched arms.

"Katje!" he called tenderly.

But she did not turn at the loving appeal in his soundless voice.

"Oh, Katje! Katje!" he pleaded, following her. "Can't I make my presence known to you? Oh, _don't_ cry!"

For the tears had welled up, unbidden, in her eyes.

And this time his words, in a vague, roundabout way, seemed to reach her understanding.

"Oh, well," she sighed, drying her eyes. "Crying doesn't help."

"Ah!" exclaimed Peter Grimm eagerly. "Good! _Good!_ She hears me! Smile, little girl! _Smile_, I say."

A trembling ghost of a smile played about her sad lips.

"That's right!" he encouraged. "Smile! _Smile!_ You haven't smiled before since I--since I found there was a place a million times happier and lovelier and more wonderful than this world that I left. Listen, little girl! Listen, Katje, and try to understand me. _There are no dead._ We never _really_ die. We couldn't if we tried to. See the gardens out there. Look!"

As if in response to his words, Kathrien's half-smiling face was turned toward the flowering garden beds that stretched away on every hand, just outside the window.

"See the gardens," he went on, glad at his own seeming success in catching and holding her attention. "They die. But they come back all the better for it. All the fresher and younger and more beautiful. What people call death is nothing more than a nap. We wake from it freshened--rested--made over again. It's a wonderful sleep that people fall into, old and slow and tired out. And they spring up from it like happy children tumbling out of bed,--ready to frolic through another world. It is as foolish and wrong to mourn for people who fall into that dear sleep as to mourn for the children when they close their eyes at the end of the day. _There is no death._ There are no dead. It is all rest and wonder and beauty and perfect bliss. So stop being sad for me, my own little girl!

"There!" he cried in triumph, as the smile deepened on her pale face.

"You're happier already! And you begin to understand me. You can hear what I am saying. Because no sin, no grossness has ever shut your ears to all but earthly sounds. Now listen to me carefully: Katje, I want you to break that silly, wicked promise I wheedled you into making. I want you to break it. You mustn't ruin your life--and James's--by marrying Frederik. It would mean misery for every one. Most of all for _you_, little girl. That's why I came here. To undo the harm that my blindness and obstinacy brought about. When that is settled I can take my journey back in peace. I can't go until you break that promise. And--and oh, I _long_ to go, Katje! _Katje!_" his voice rising in yearning entreaty, as the smile faded from her face and her big eyes once more filled. "Isn't my message _any_ clearer to you?"

"Oh," sighed Kathrien, half aloud. "I'm so alone--so _alone_!"

"Alone?" he echoed. "You are not alone, Katje. I'm here. Can't you feel my presence? And then there's your mother. The mother you were too little to remember. I have met her, Katje. I have met your mother. She knew me at once. After all those years. 'You are Peter Grimm!' she said.

I told her you had a happy home here. And she said she knew that. Then I told her about the future I had arranged, and the plans I'd made for you and Frederik. And she said: 'Peter Grimm, you have overlooked the most important thing in the world:--_Love!_ Give her the right to the choice of her lover. It is her right.' Then it came over me all at once that I had made a terrible mistake. That I had been presumptuous and had tried to play Providence and shape the future of another. At that moment, Katje, you called to me. And I came back to show you the way."

He moved nearer to her.

"Your mother," he whispered, bending over the girl as she sank into a chair by the fire, her eyes dreaming and full of a new joy, "your mother told me to lay my hand on your dear head and give you her blessing. And she said I must tell you she will be with you,--close--_close_ to you--in heart and thought, until the day shall come when she can hold you in her arms. You and your loved husband."

Kathrien's dreamy gaze strayed from the fire-flicker on the hearth to the office door, on whose farther side she knew Hartmann was at work.

"Yes," smiled Peter Grimm, noting her glance. "You and James. And the message ended in this kiss."

He touched his lips to her forehead. And, at the unfelt contact, the light again sprang into her eyes.

"Can't you see I'm trying to help you, Katje?" he begged. "Can't you even hope? Come, come! _Hope!_ Why, anybody can hope. It is the very easiest and most natural thing on earth. Especially when one is young--as you and I are. What _is_ Youth but perpetual Hope?"

The light in her eyes deepened. Her look strayed again to the closed office door. She rose and took a step toward it, then turned, pa.s.sed her hand caressingly over the flowers on the desk, and moved over to the piano.

She seated herself on the music stool and, for the first time in ten endless days, let her fingers stray over the keys. In a hushed little voice she began to sing:

"The bird so free in the heavens Is but the slave of the nest.

For all things must toil as G.o.d wills it, Must laugh and toil and rest.

The rose must bloom in the garden, The bee must gather its store.

The cat must watch the mousehole, And the dog must guard the door."

"Oh!" she broke off in sudden self-reproach. "How _can_ I sit here singing,--at a time like this!"