Amazing Grace Part 26

"And, if you want to know the truth, I rather admire your honesty in not trying to pretend that your flirtation with this Englishman _is_ Platonic!--Yet that certainly doesn't throw any more agreeable light upon this happening to-night.--You _did_ go to Loomis!"

I could scarcely keep from laughing at this, for his anger seemed to be centered in one spot--like an alderman's avoirdupois! He was thinking far less of losing me than of the indelicacy of my going to Loomis.

"Yes," I answered, trying to make my words inconsequential. "Old man Hudson sent me!"

His hat, which he had held deferentially in his hand all this time, suddenly fluttered to the ground.

"What!"

"Didn't you and mother _know_ that?" I asked.

"That--that it was a business proposition?" he panted.

"Certainly--or I should never have gone! How little you and mother know about me, after all, Guilford."

He looked crestfallen for a moment, then his face brightened once more into angry triumph.

"But I saw him making love to you!" he summed up hastily, as an afterthought.

"Yes--you did," I a.s.sured him exultantly.

"And you met him for the first time--let me see? What day was it?"

I ignored the sarcasm.

"Tuesday," I answered. "At four o'clock in the afternoon."

"And not a soul in this town knows a thing about him!"

"Except myself," I protested. "I know a great deal about him."

"Then, do you happen to know--I heard it from a fellow in Pittsburgh who has followed his meteoric career as captain of industry--do _you_ happen to know that he makes no secret of having left England because he was so handicapped by disadvantages of birth?"

I hesitated just a moment--not in doubt as to what I should say, but as to how I should say it.

"That's all right, Guilford," I answered complacently. "If his ancestors all looked like 'gentlemen of the jury' it doesn't lessen his own dignity and grandeur."

Now, if you've never been in a circuit court room you can't appreciate the above simile, but Guilford was a lawyer.

He looked at me in a dazed fas.h.i.+on for an instant.

"Grace, you don't feel ill--nor anything--do you?" he asked anxiously.

"Oh, no!"

"But I can't believe that you're exactly right in your mind!"

"Well--maybe--"

"I can't believe that to-morrow morning will actually dawn and find us asunder," he kept on quickly. "It must be some sort of fantastic dream."

"It will seem very--queer, at first, Guilford," I confessed, with a preliminary shrinking at the thought of facing mother.

"Queer's no word to use in connection with it," he answered crossly, then I heard heavy footsteps in the corridor above, and I took a quick step toward him.

"I must go up-stairs," I whispered. "Old man Hudson is making night hideous, I know!--But all this is really true, Guilford! And--and you must wear _this_ in your vest pocket now!"

I slipped the scarab ring into his hand.

"You are determined?" he asked dully.

"I am--awakened," I replied.

"What do you mean?"

"I mean that you are not really in love with me--never have been in love with me, and never could be except upon certain occasions when I was dreadfully dressed-up--where there were red roses and the sound of violin music."

"Grace, you are--unkind," he said, with a groping look on his face. "I confess that I don't in the least understand you!"

"Then how lucky we are!" I exclaimed. "So many people don't find this out until after they've got their house all furnished! We're going to be friends always, Guilford."

Then, without waiting for him to say more I turned away and ran breathlessly up the steps into the office.

The brilliant light in the city news room met me squarely as I opened the door. I blinked a little--then raised my left hand and examined it closely. It looked--_awful_! I had worn that same ring ever since I was seventeen years old--and I felt as I might feel if I'd just had my hair cut off or suffered some other unprecedented loss.

The city editor looked up from his desk.

"Well?" he inquired. "Have you got it?"

I was still gazing at that left hand.

"No," I answered stupidly. "It's _gone_!"

He jumped to his feet.

"Here!" he commanded sharply. "Sit down here!"

I sat down, letting my bag slide to the floor.

"You don't feel sick--do you?"

"No."

"You didn't fall off the street-car--did you?"

"No."

"You haven't happened to any sort of trouble--have you?"