XIV
HE was quite prompt. Gordon, who had been ten minutes early at the rendezvous, had to wait only a quarter of an hour. Then he saw her half a block away walking quickly, as though, he thought, she feared her courage would desert her if she lagged. His heart quickened and to stifle his agitation he started the motor and swung the car around so that she might step in beside him from the curb. If he expected the girl he had parted from in the forenoon he was disappointed, for this was quite another Peggy who stepped nimbly into the car, with a gay nod of her head, sank into the seat beside him and drew her dark cloak up about her neck.
"Am I late?" she asked briskly. "I tried not to be, but I'm so unused nowadays to going out anywhere that I simply was all thumbs when it came to dressing." She looked at Gordon's attire. "I'm glad you're not in dinner things," she went on with a note of relief. "I worried about that, for now that I am wearing black I haven't a thing I could have put on. Do you mind my coming in a street gown?"
"Not at all. I—we are going out of town for dinner; I thought you'd prefer it; and dinner clothes aren't necessary." He spoke very formally, puzzled and discomforted by her self-possession.
"Then that's all right," she said cheerfully. "Do you know I had to move heaven and earth to get here, sir?"
"Really?" he asked steering the car dexterously through the traffic in Madison Square and plunging into the half-shadows of the Avenue. "How was that?"
"It was not my night off and I had a regular dickens of a time convincing the city editor that I had to go. I forget whether it was a sick friend or a wedding that I offered for excuse."
"City editor?" he repeated questioningly, "what city editor? Who is he?"
"Why, the city editor of the Report, of course. That's my paper, Mr. Ames."
"Your paper?" he asked puzzledly.
She laughed gayly. "But I forget that you don't know. Yes, my paper, I don't own it, you know; I merely work for it."
"Oh, so that's—that's what you do! You're a newspaper woman!"
"Good gracious, don't say it that way! We're not that bad, really!"
"I beg your pardon! I didn't mean"
"Don't apologize. I quite understand. Some of us are a bit—well, impossible."
"I've never met any. I merely—had an idea"
"Well, you've met one now. Please say that after this you have the utmost respect and admiration for newspaper women, Mr. Ames."
"I do say it. But—but, look here, what do you do on the paper?"
"Do? What don't I do? I report weddings, funerals, parties, teas, dog shows, prize-fights"
"Prize-fights!"
"I did once. The editor wanted a story written from the woman's point of view." She laughed reminiscently. "I fear I disappointed him, for I got terribly excited about it and quite forgot that it was—well, brutal, you know, and went back and wrote a most glowing account of it! I don't think my story made much of a hit with the city editor, but the sporting editor came around the next morning, shook hands with me, told me I was a wonder, and promised me tickets whenever I wanted them! So, you see, it must have been a pretty good story from one point of view, mustn't it?"
"Ye-es. But isn't it—hard work?"
"Terribly." She sighed. "But I like it. And it's what I can do. And, besides, all work's hard, isn't it? But I don't suppose you know."
Gordon frowned.
"Do you mean," he asked, "that you have to—to go about and interview people?"
"Oh, yes, but that's fun compared with some of the assignments you get. Sometimes there's a murder that's a little unusual, that promises a human interest side. Then I get that."
"Good God!"
"Yes, it's—not nice sometimes. But usually, after the first shock of—of distaste I get interested in it. After that I like it."
He looked at her in puzzlement. It was distinctly impossible to associate her with such things, impossible and horrible! She read the thought and laughed.
"Oh, it isn't all murders, Mr. Ames! There are some very nice assignments sometimes; interviews with interesting persons—or personages; 'swell functions,' as our city editor calls them, when I put on my very best bib and tucker and pretend I'm a guest and make notes in the seclusion of the dressing-room or behind a palm so folks won't know why I am really there. That sounds snobbish, doesn't it? I suppose the real fact is that I am a little ashamed of my profession in spite of my—my pose."
He made no answer. This was not Peggy-in-the-Rain, this very capable, self-possessed young woman beside him. He turned again to observe her with a mingling of surprise and curiosity. Once more she seemed to surmise his thoughts, and smiled.
"You're trying to reconcile me with the girl you met under the magnolia that day, aren't you? A very silly, frightened girl who hung onto your hand like grim death and tried so very, very hard to believe the nice lie you told her about magnolias never being struck by lightning. You are, aren't you?"
He nodded, and then stooped to turn on the electric lights at the dash. "I believe I was," he replied. "And I was thinking how unsuited such a business—profession"
"Call it career," she suggested lightly.
"How unsuited it is to you; or perhaps I'd better say how unsuited you are to such a career."
"That sounds uncomplimentary, Mr. Ames. Really, I'm not so bad at it!"
He frowned. "You know what I mean. I don't like to think of you running around this town alone, unprotected like that. It isn't right. It's no work for a girl."
"It's the work for this girl. It's the only thing I know how to do, the only thing I could do, I fancy. And it really isn't as bad as you evidently imagine it to be. I don't go on night assignments alone, you see; at least, not where there would be any danger."
"Who goes with you?" he asked shortly.
"One of the boys. Or, rather, I go with him. Sometimes, if the thing is big two or three of us go together."
"And—I beg your pardon—does it—do they pay a good salary?"
"I work on space. Sometimes I make twenty dollars a week, sometimes thirty. Once I made nearly fifty. That was when that Italian woman was charged with murdering her husband. Do you remember? He had four or five hundred dollars in an Italian bank and the police found that she had been making inquiries about the money, apparently trying to find how much it amounted to. They almost sent her to the chair on that evidence. McConnell and Jim Crandall and I worked on that for over a month. It was really Jim who found out about the lover, although the police got the credit for it. They got him in Palermo and brought him back and he confessed."
"And you like that sort of thing!" he exclaimed incredulously.
"Yes, I think I do. There are times when—oh, there are always 'times' with every one, aren't there? And it brings me a living, Mr. Ames."
"A living! Fifty dollars a week!"
"Well, let's say thirty to be safe. And then I do a little writing besides; articles and stories for the cheaper magazines, you know."
"Your people, do they like you to do it?"
"I haven't any," she replied simply. "My father died some years ago and my—mother—just recently. There aren't any others."
"I beg your pardon! I didn't understand! It was stupid of me, but I didn't realize that your black meant mourning."
She made no reply and the car hummed across the river and sped northward. There was a chill in the air and he turned solicitously. "Are you warm enough?" he asked.
"Quite." She snuggled more closely into her cloak with a sigh of contentment. "I love it. My automobiles are usually taxicabs, you see."
"Here is one that is always at your disposal," he answered. "And listen; the exhaust; do you hear what it says?"
"Chig-a-chig-a-chig-a-chig," she laughed.
"'Peggy—Peggy—Peggy!' Can't you hear it?"
"What a polite and agreeable car! Does it always repeat the name of the lady who is riding in it?"
"It's going to after this; it's always going to say 'Peggy—Peggy—Peggy— Peggy!' Just as my heart has been saying it ever since I found you first that day under the magnolia. 'Peggy—Peggy—Peggy!'—over and over."
She laughed softly and amusedly.
"You find amusement in that?" he asked, piqued.
"No, indeed; what you said was very pretty. I was only thinking of a little tot I met once on a train. I was spending a month in the summer with some friends in Virginia and we went over to Berryville for the horse show. Across the car from me was a quaint little girl in a funny little home-made dress. She sat squarely in the middle of the seat, with a bag beside her, and as the train rattled and thumped along she swayed back and forth in time to the song of the wheels, her eyes on space and a seraphic smile on her dear little face. And as she bobbed back and forth she kept intoning just loud enough for me to hear: 'Oh—how—I—love—old—Bae—ville,—old—Bae—ville,—old—Bae—ville! Oh—how—I—love—old—Bae—ville,—old—Baeville,—old—Bae—ville!' Wasn't it dear? I wish, though, I could say Berryville just the way she did. She kept it up for goodness only knows how long! And then, at 'Baeville' a nice, plump little mother and a grinning, awkward big brother bore her off all smiles and eager questioning."
Peggy, swinging back and forth on the low seat, had mimicked the child so well that Gordon, though a little hurt and chagrined, had to laugh sympathetically. "The dear little kid," he murmured.
Peggy said "There!" in a strange tone and he looked at her sharply. "What?" he questioned.
She was silent a moment. Then,
"I suppose you'll think me silly," she said finally, "but that story is really a test, Mr. Ames. And you said just the right thing. And" she looked at him, frankly smiling and approving,—"I'm not afraid of you any more!"
"Afraid of me! Were you ever?" he asked.
"Um; a little, I guess; just about that much." She held up a gloved hand in the half-dark, thumb and finger scarcely apart. He was silent a moment.
"I wonder," he said at last, "if you were as afraid of me as I've been of you."
"Afraid of me!" she exclaimed, unconsciously mimicking him. "Oh, but that's flattering! Fancy any one—at least, any one six feet tall—being afraid of me!"
"I was—perhaps am, Peggy-in-the-Rain. Afraid and—yes, a little bit angry with you. Do you know that you're the first person, man or woman, who has ever made me—miserable?"
"Poor Mr. Ames!" she exclaimed mockingly. "I wonder"
"What?"
"Whether that's a compliment—or—or what Jim Crandall calls an 'asparagus'!"
"It seems to me this Jim Crandall is occupying a large place in your thoughts this evening."
"Jim? He's a dear!" she replied lightly. "And he's quite the smartest reporter on the Row. I told you how he dug up the real murderer in that case I spoke of. But he's done cleverer things than that even. Three years ago when we had the ballot-box stuffing scandal"
"Oh, hang Jim Scandal—I mean Crandall!"
They laughed together, Gordon a trifle ruefully.
"It's no joke, Peggy. I can't stand hearing you even talk about any one else." He turned suddenly. "Look here," he demanded, his voice dropping, "is there any one else, Peggy?"
"Any one else?" she repeated lightly.
"Yes, any one else. Is there?"
"No," she answered soberly, "there is no one else. And—there is no one."
He took his hand from the wheel and placed it over hers, folded in her lap under the cloak. "Are you certain, Peggy?"
She nodded slowly. "I don't pretend to not understand you," she replied gravely. "I like you. I'm here now because I like you. But—if that's not enough you must take me home again, or, at least, not try to see me again."
"It is not enough, and you know it, Peggy," he replied hotly. "And you knew it when you came this evening. I thought you were beyond quibbling!"
There was a moment's silence. Then, "No woman is beyond what you call quibbling, Mr. Ames," she said. "But if I'm to be quite honest, why, yes, I did know. And I wonder—why I came!"
"Wasn't it because—you cared—a little, Peggy?" he whispered.
"Was it?" she asked thoughtfully. "If I cared would I have come?" She laughed to herself. "Why try to fathom a woman's reason for doing a thing, Mr. Ames? We are handicapped from birth with an infinite capacity for doing the wrong thing."
"Then—you don't care?" he persisted.
"For you—in that way?" she asked. "What can I answer? If I say no—perhaps it won't be true. If I say yes I'm confessing my weakness and wrongness."
"I can't see that!"
"You don't care to. If I really did care I should know better than to come with you to-night. You see that, don't you?"
"If you care, Peggy, why not come with me?"
There was no answer for a moment. The car ran swiftly, almost noiselessly between country walls and farms. Overhead the sky was luminous with stars and in their faces a damp breeze hinted of the sea.
"I'll tell you," she said at last. She was looking straight ahead at the road that rushed toward them in the broad glare of the searchlights, and he surmised rather than discerned the little pucker on her brow. "May I?"
"Yes," he muttered.
"I've seen a good deal of—what we call life, Mr. Ames, and so I'm not—exactly ignorant. Perhaps I oughtn't to say these things to you. I suppose I couldn't if it were light. But it's dark, and I—somehow, in spite of the fact that I've been a little afraid of you sometimes, I—I think you're nice, if you know what I mean by that." She seemed to be groping for her words there beside him. He nodded. She must have seen it, for she went on with more confidence. "You say you like me—no, love me. You see, I'm being quite frank. Perhaps you do. Of course, I don't pretend to know much about love. I've seen a good many kinds, but it has never—never touched me. So since there are so many kinds of love—or, because this love has so many different aspects—I'm ready to believe that you do love me. And I think I care for you. Perhaps not—not in quite the same way. I don't know. It is all quite new and different and—and a little bit scary. But I think I do care some. And perhaps if—if this sort of thing went on; if we saw each other, I mean; why, perhaps I'd really come to care for you a great deal."
"Go on," he said quietly as she stopped.
"Yes. Well, don't you see that's the difficulty? If you could just do all the caring and I—could stay as I am and we could be quite contented together like this, why, it would be pleasant, wouldn't it? But I suppose we couldn't, could we?"
"No," he said hoarsely.
"I suppose not." She sighed. "Then it would mean that—that if I cared for you I'd have to" She was silent. Finally, "I don't think it is so much what we call disgrace that I'd hate. It would be the contempt I'd feel for myself—afterwards. For there'd be an afterwards. There always is, I guess. You see," she turned for the first time and smiled across the darkness, "you see I haven't said anything about marriage, Mr, Ames."
He was silent.
"Well," she went on presently, "there it is, I suppose—no, I know that I shouldn't have come to-night. I knew it when I consented. Don't ask me why I came. Perhaps—perhaps I wanted a little pleasure. There isn't so much. Perhaps" her voice faltered—"perhaps it was because—just because I do care—a little."
"Peggy!" he murmured longingly.
"At least you must own that I did try to keep you away. Even that first day there in the woods I seemed to know. And I've played traitor at last—to both of us. For you'll blame me, won't you?"
"Never! There is no blame on either side, Peggy-in-the-Rain. I love you, sweetheart, with every bit of me, and you love me, dear. Isn't happiness something? Is there so much of it in your life that you can turn your back on this? And we could be very happy, dear. For you there would be no more running around the streets, no more nosing about for—for murders. There's almost nothing you couldn't have, dear"
"Please!"
"You're right! I had no business talking that way. And yet all that does help to make happiness, Peggy-in-the-Rain."
"Oh, I wonder! Tell me, you have so much, Mr. Ames, are you happy, really and truly happy?"
"To-night, yes."
"But other times; usually; are you?"
"Is any one ever always happy? Isn't life made up of happy moments and unhappy moments, Peggy? And moments when—when we just go along without being one way or the other? I suppose I'm as happy as most fellows"
"But if wealth and all the enjoyments that wealth can buy can't make one happy every day"
"You're right, dear, it isn't wealth that brings happiness; it's love."
"Is it? I wonder again."
"Don't you think we could be happy together, Peggy? I'd be so very good and kind to you, sweetheart, if you'd only let me! We could go away together if you liked; the whole world is open to us. Couldn't we be happy, Peggy?"
"If—if I cared for you as you want me to, yes, for—for as long as it lasted. But"
"It would last, dear! You're the only woman I've ever really cared about. Will you please believe that? I've been in love—or what seemed love at the time—before; once or twice. I've never—I've kept pretty straight, dear. I'd like you to believe that, too. I'm glad I have now. Perhaps it wasn't any great merit, for I suspect that there's a little of the Puritan in me, enough to keep me—fairly decent. It would last, Peggy. Don't you think it would?"
"Perhaps. One would—would have to risk that. Every woman does."
"I suppose you are thinking that—I might marry. You've been frank with me and I'll be frank with you, dear. Well, I don't want to marry; not for a long while, at any rate. Some day—yes, I suppose I shall. When I do it will be a merger rather than a marriage. My mother is ambitious for me, ambitious for the family. It has always, since I was a mere toddler, been an understood thing that my marriage was something in which she was to have the final say. My father had that idea, too. When it comes it will be the joining of the Ames wealth to another fortune as large. She and I—whoever she is—will be merely pawns in the game. It will be just one of a score of such marriages you and I know of. So there's that. Even if I should marry, dear, it would bring no rival to you in my heart."
"I'm glad you told me about—your mother. It makes it a little easier. She doesn't consider hearts, does she?"
"She made just such a marriage herself, Peggy, and it turned out happily. Perhaps she thinks such marriages stand just as good a chance of bringing happiness as the other kind. I don't know. We've never talked about it; the event has always been remote. She is a very good mother, one of the very best, Peggy, and she's wise."
"I shouldn't have criticised her," said Peggy. "Perhaps she is right."
"At all events, I believe she thinks she is," he answered. "I suppose my rôle looks rather a mean one. Probably you are thinking that a man might choose for himself"
"No, I wasn't." She shook her head. "I understand. A big fortune is a sort of trust, I suppose, and those who possess it aren't free to—to do as they will."
"That, at least, is the way my folks look at it. And the same view is taken by other families. Where it will end, God only knows! My mother seems to believe that when all the wealth of the country is at last in the hands of a few the millennium will be here. I confess I haven't her faith in the—the goodness of humanity. Here's our place. I hope you will like it, dear."
An avenue of young maples wound off from the broad road, and at the end of it lights twinkled welcomingly. Gordon turned the car in and ran in silence over the crunching gravel. At the entrance, where two liveried attendants hurried down the steps, Peggy laid a hand on Gordon's arm.
"I'd like," she said, "to forget now for the rest of the evening. Don't you think we could?"
"I can't forget that I love you, Peggy-in-the-Rain, and want you terribly. But I'll try not to say so if you like."
"Please. I want to—to forget all the problems if I can. I want to just—just be happy for a while."
His hand closed over her hand on his arm. "I believe, dear," he whispered in a voice that was not quite steady, "I believe you are making me love you so much that I'm getting to care more for your happiness than my own. Can love be as unselfish as that, really?"
"I don't know," she faltered, "but—I'm afraid so!"