The Fifth Wheel Part 34

"Yes, we did," Ruth replied shortly. There was another pause. Then in a low, troubled voice Ruth added, "But not now. We're not friends now.

Something happened. All her affection for me has died. I have never been forgiven for something."

"Oh, I wouldn't be so sure," belittled Will, making violent signs to me to announce the news we bore.

I had a clipping in my shopping-bag cut from the morning paper. I took it out of the envelope that contained it.

"Ruth," I began, "here's something I ran across today."

The telephone interrupted sharply.

"Just a minute," she said, and slid down off the chest and went out into the hall. "h.e.l.lo," I heard her say. "h.e.l.lo," and then in a changed voice, "Oh, you?" A pause and then, "Really? Tonight?" Another pause, and more gently. "Of course you must. Of course I do," and at last very tenderly, "Yes, I'll be right here. I'll be waiting. Good-by."

I looked at Will, and he lifted his eyebrows. Ruth came back and stood in the doorway. There was a peculiar, s.h.i.+ning quality about her expression.

"That was Bob," she said quietly.

"Bob?" I exclaimed.

"Bob Jennings?" e.j.a.c.u.l.a.t.ed Will.

Ruth nodded and smiled. Standing there before us, dressed simply in the plain black smock, cheeks flushed, eyes like stars, she reminded me of some rare stone in a velvet case. The bareness of the room, with its few genuine articles, set off the jewel-like brightness of my sister in a startling fas.h.i.+on.

"You don't mean to say old Bob's turned up," commented Will.

"Tell us," bluntly I demanded, "what in the world is Robert Jennings doing around here, Ruth?"

"Bob's been in town for several days," she replied. "He has just telephoned that he is called back on business. His train leaves in a little over an hour. He's dropping in here in ten minutes."

"Why, I didn't know you even wrote to each other," I said.

Ruth came over to the table and sat down in a low chair, stretching out her folded hands arms-length along the table's surface, and leaning toward us.

"I'm going to tell you two about it," she announced with finality. "I wrote to Bob," she confessed, half proud, half apologetic. "I wrote to Bob without any excuse at all, except that I wanted to tell him what I'd found out. I wanted to tell him that I had discovered that this sort of thing," she opened her hands, and made a little gesture that included everything that those few small rooms of Oliver's epitomized, "that this sort of thing," she resumed, "was what most women want more than anything else in the world. Any other activity was simply preparation, or courageous makes.h.i.+ft if this was denied. I made it easy for Bob, in my letter, to answer me in the spirit of friendly argument if he chose, but he didn't. He came on instead. We're going to be married," she said, in a voice as casual as if she were announcing that they were going out for dinner.

"You're going to be married?" I repeated.

"Yes," she nodded. "After all these years! Once," she went on in a triumphant voice, "our fields of vision were so small that our differences of opinion loomed up like insurmountable barriers. Now the differences are mere specks on our broadened outlooks. Oh, I know," she went on as if inspired, "I've been a long journey, simply to come back to Bob again. But it hasn't been in vain. There was no short cut to the perfect understanding that is Bob's and mine today."

"And when," timidly I inquired, "do you intend to be married, Ruth?"

My sister's expression clouded. She smiled, and shook her head. "I don't know," she said, "I wish I did. Years are so precious when one is concealing a little nest of gray hairs behind one's left ear. Bob and I have got to wait. You see Bob wasn't planning for this. He had some idea a career would always satisfy me. He hasn't been saving. He has put about all he has been able to earn into fighting for clean politics. I myself haven't been able to lay by but a paltry thousand. Madge comes home in May. I shall then probably have to look up another job for myself somewhere or other, while Bob's establis.h.i.+ng himself and making ready for me out there."

Will cleared his throat and coughed. He had simply stared until now. "I suppose," he said, as if in an attempt to lighten the conversation with a little light humor, "I suppose a legacy of some sort wouldn't prove unwelcome to you and Bob just about now."

It must have struck Ruth as a stereotyped attempt at fun. But she smiled and replied in the same vein, "I think we'd know how to make use of a portion of it." Then she rose. The door bell had rung sharply twice.

"There he is," she explained. "There's Bob now. I'll let him in."

She went out into the hall and pressed the b.u.t.ton that released the lock of the door three floors below.

I knew how fleeting every minute of last hours before train-time can be.

I motioned to Will, and when Ruth came back to us I said, "We'll just run down the back way, Ruth."

She flashed me an appreciative glance. "You don't need to," she deprecated.

"Still, we will," I a.s.sured her, and then I went over and kissed my radiant sister.

Her face was illumined as it used to be years ago when Robert Jennings was on his way to her. The same old tenderness gleamed in her larger-visioned eyes.

"When he comes read this together," I said, and I slipped the envelope, with the clipping inside it, into her hands.

Then Will and I went out through the kitchen, and down the back stairs.

THE END