A STORY IN TWO PARTS—PART II
BEFORE Blaisdell left the Ordways' house on the night of his arrival, he had accepted an invitation to dine there informally the next evening, but he was unable to make any definite arrangement to see Patricia during the day. She gracefully deplored the impossibility of telling, just then, at what hour her engagements would leave her free, and suggested that he might telephone when he found himself at liberty, slyly intimating at the same time that doubtless he would be very fully occupied in transacting the official business he had mentioned, with which, of course, no merely social incidents could be permitted to interfere. To this he replied that sometimes the ends of diplomacy were best served when apparently forgotten.
"Oh?" she queried, with a guileless air. "Everybody knows that excessive zeal defeats itself in personal affairs, but I thought possibly discretion had been superseded by defiance in diplomacy."
The next morning, at an hour when he feared she might be still asleep, he called her by telephone, only to learn that she and Ordway had gone off in her monoplane, leaving word that they would surely return in time for dinner. For a moment Biaisdell's jaw set. Then, with half-closed eyes and a whimsical, wry smile, he hung up the receiver and went to breakfast. Later, he presented two or three letters of introduction with which, even in his haste, he had contrived to provide himself, and before night he had been put up at all the clubs and introduced to a number of leading citizens.
Already, following Patricia's informal presentation to society at the country club, several of Mrs. Howard's friends and family connections had begun to plan entertainments for her engaging guest; and when it became known that so distinguished a person as the American Minister to Uruguay and Paraguay was not only in town, but was disposed to encourage social overtures, invitations multiplied, until Patricia found herself forced to choose between abridging her efforts in behalf of her hostess's brother, or seeming to be ungracious to her hostess's friends. That this situation, which Blaisdell had deliberately created and from which he hoped much, did not result quite as he had reckoned was due to Patricia's foresight and to her experience of his methods of interference.
"I suppose there'll be wars and rumors of wars now," she suggested to Ordway, the morning after the minister's arrival, drolly adding, "And the race not always to the swift, perhaps."
"What?" He was puzzled. "What are you talking about?"
"Billy Blaisdell. A diplomat—even a minor diplomat—is by way of being more or less a personage here, isn't he?"
"Oh, I see! Sure! They'll all be after him. There'll be doings three times a day and four times a night if he'll stand for it. Will he? Is he that sort?" His tone was disparaging.
"Oh yes, he'll stand for it. But what's troubling me is that we shall have to stand for it, too—and I'm not keen to be 'among those present' all day and every day, are you?"
"I'm out of it," was his curt reply, and she contradicted:
"Oh no, you're not! We'll be invited wherever Billy is. He'll see to that!"
"I may be called, but I won't be chosen," he paraphrased, with a saturnine grin. "Lord! Think of the flutter among the Pharisees if I should show my face in their sacred halls again! My portion of the fatted calf would be the hoof—externally applied!"
"Oh, fiddle!" she laughed. "Of course you'll go! We'll have to—both of us."
"Not I! I'm out of it, I tell you—definitely and permanently. That's settled."
"But you can't be rude!"
"Can't I?"
"At any rate, I can't. I'm your sister's guest, in your mother's house, and I can't refuse invitations from their friends, unless— See here, Jack, I don't want our flying crowded out! Why don't we agree to spend our mornings together, anyway?"
"Because I never ask a woman to make a promise that I don't want her to break," he answered, gruffly.
"Really?" She treated him to a flash from her gray eyes, closed her lips firmly, and waited.
Presently he said, in a different tone:
"I beg your pardon, Pat. You have been square."
"Thank you." Her tone was light. "Then—every morning, is it? And an early start?"
"Only mornings?" This was wistful.
"My word! You must be the original John Alden! If you can't speak for yourself—" She finished with a characteristic shrug, and this time it was he who laughed, more spontaneously than she had heard him before.
"You bet I can! Will you dine with me every night?"
"N-no—but I'll dine with you every day I don't lunch with you, if you like," she promised, and he cried:
"Done!"
As an aeroplane does not lend itself to secrecy, it was soon a matter of common knowledge that Patricia spent the greater part of every day with Ordway, and suggestion speedily ripened into assertion that the prodigal's heart had been caught on the rebound by his sister's attractive guest. Undiscouraged, however, by her frequent plea of a previous engagement, the wives and daughters of the aforesaid leading citizens enthusiastically did their part, in consequence whereof each ensuing day found the minister more inextricably enmeshed in his own net, and the laughter in Patricia's eyes when they met did not tend to increase his equanimity.
Meanwhile, at every large gathering—and many of the smaller ones—Blaisdell met Dorothy Alexander, with whom he invariably engaged in a game of verbal hide-and-seek, to the obvious uneasiness of her middle-aged fiancé, whose conception of wit was exemplified by the Sunday comics, and who was never quite sure that he knew what the two were talking about. Patricia, on the other hand, encountered Jack's whilom sweetheart rarely, and always in a crowd, and on these occasions the younger girl assumed a manner of insolent indifference so marked that it reacted, like a double negative, emphasizing where it would have denied. One day, after an occurrence of this sort, Patricia amusedly suggested to Blaisdell:
"If your young friend doesn't watch out, she'll gie me a gude conceit o' mysel' and my own importance. Somebody ought to warn her that ambition's not the only thing that occasionally overleaps itself."
"Poor kiddie! I'm getting awfully sorry for her! You would be, too, if you knew her." He answered her whimsical brows. "This cynical manner of hers is all bluff. She's trying to carry things with a high hand, to conceal the fact that she's wretchedly unhappy."
"Oh? Has she confided in you?"
"Certainly not!" His tone was a trifle testy. "But everybody speaks of the change in her recently. And look at her! Does a happy girl look like that?"
"Happiness—like Boston—is a state of mind," she reminded him. "And it is written that discontent in heaven has been known before."
"Heaven!" He laughed shortly.
"With Stannard?"
"And Stannard's millions," she supplemented. "Don't forget them. Nor that she made her choice deliberately."
"Choice, indeed! If you ask me, big sister did the choosing, and poor little Dorothy's the victim."
"Still—'poor little Dorothy' is of age, isn't she? And possessed of all her faculties?"
"H'm—well—as to that, apparently she's been dominated for years by that clever, cold, ambitious sister of hers, who'd stop at nothing. And Dorothy herself is too sweet and yielding to hold her own in a struggle. I tell you she is!" he persisted, as he saw that she was laughing at him. "You don't know that girl! She's perfectly charming!"
Illustration: "THINK OF THE FLUTTER AMONG THE PHARISEES IF I SHOULD SHOW MY FACE IN THEIR SACRED HALLS AGAIN!"
"Billy, one of the most engaging things about you is the unfailing promptness of your reaction to the eternal feminine!"
"I'm glad you've discovered that," he retorted, rather taken aback, nevertheless. "I've been trying to get it across to you for some time."
"It got across—and it's a diverting spectacle! But do at least credit me with resisting the temptation to experiment with it!"
"You might find the adventure less monotonous than you imagine," he intimated, and she laughed.
"Monotony's the last thing I should associate with you! Eternal vigilance would be nearer the mark!"
"Which only shows that you've missed my point again—or else that you've no perspective on yourself. You are the eternal feminine—for all eternity—to me! That's the one of all your adorable qualities that I most adore!"
"Are you sure some of this emotion isn't aroused by the moving aspect of the noble oak that is you? Though when the vine's as ornamental as Dorothy Alexander, I suppose supporting it does seem a transcendent virtue."
"That's all right!" In spite of his earnestness, he laughed. "But the leopard's spots and the Ethiope's skin are not more enduring than the tendrils of the eternal feminine—which, I repeat, is you, whether you admit it or not."
"Oh, I admit it." Her shrug was accompanied by an amused, veiled glance. "But adaptation's the first law of evolution, so I'm cultivating a social consciousness and converting my tendrils into wings, the better to meet modern conditions."
"And flit from oak to oak, I suppose?" It was a humorous growl.
"Precisely! But always on a mission of mercy, Billy, to free the noble giant from otherwise fatal entanglements. Don't you worry, though"—with a wicked gleam. "Your branches are so wide-spreading that you'll never need the angel-at-large."
"My angel won't be at large much, once she's really mine."
"No? Going to clip her wings? Have you reflected that wing-clipping is frequently more painful to the clipper than to the clipped?"
"Is thy servant a Turk, that he should seek a captive?" he reproached, softly. "But even an angel may be taught new—and steadier—flights."
"By an archangel?" she inquired, but he disregarded the interruption.
"It's pitiful to see wings rendered useless." Some new quality of gravity in his tone caught her attention, and she glanced up at him. "Now, there's poor little Dorothy. Her wings have never been allowed to develop. That sister of hers has always kept them pruned too close for sustained flights. So what defense has the child left but beak and claws? If you knew her, Patty, you'd realize how unhappy she is—and how misunderstood?"
"Should I?" Patricia had a vision of Ordway's tortured eyes as he sat on the stone wall beside her that day when Dorothy, in Stannard's glittering car, drove past with no sign of recognition in her level, supercilious glance. "At any rate, I do realize that she's improvident. Since she has both youth and beauty—and her tendrils are evidently in good working condition, wouldn't she be wise to reserve that pose of the femme incomprise? It's a weapon rather large for her hand, now, I should say—and she'll need it later."
"Oh, you women!" he exclaimed. "But it's not like you, Patty, to be unfair. If you only knew her—"
"How shall I begin overtures to intimacy?" she asked, twinkling. "As your friend—or as Jack's?"
"I know it's impossible, under the circumstances, but— Look here, do you still insist that he's not in love with you?"
"Most certainly he's not!"
"Then can't you see that you're simply complicating, hour by hour, the very situation that you say you're trying to remedy?"
"Now what do you mean?"
"I mean that Dorothy positively shrinks from Stannard. I believe she loathes the brute! And you're making it impossible for her to turn to the man she loves, because—like everybody else—she thinks he's in love with you!"
"O-oh, I see!" Amusement replaced the inquiry in Patricia's face. "And if I'll remove myself and clear the path—?"
"Exactly!"
"That's rather clever, Billy." She cocked her head critically to one side. "Quite the cleverest thing you've tried yet. But you should study restraint. It's still too obvious—not subtle enough."
"Good Lord!" he broke forth, after a startled stare. "Patty, have you played with emotions until you can't recognize sincerity at all? Can't you see that I'm trying to help you?"
"Hasn't that been your Excellency's object from the very first?" Her lips were drawn into demure curves. "You went down to High Haven to 'help' me, didn't you? And it was your uncontrollable passion for philanthropy that brought you here. You said so the night you arrived."
"But this time I'm in earnest!" he persisted. "Dead earnest!"
"Yours is an earnest soul," she testified, with mocking, uplifted glance. "I may sometimes fail to recognize sincerity, but consistency like your Excellency's is too rare to be overlooked."
"Patty, I give you my word I'm entirely unselfish in this! I believe Dorothy's being driven into this marriage with Stannard. They're even urging her now to hasten it."
"That's hardly my affair, is it?"
"Isn't it? What recourse has the child when you stand between her and Ordway?"
"She seems to 'have courage, my boy, to say no' when she really wants to," was her dry reminder. "Otherwise I shouldn't be here, Billy. Nor, I suspect, would you. And she'd chuck Stannard just as promptly as she did Jack, if the inducement were strong enough. Of course, ivy and oak is an effective combination," she teased, "but—impossible as it may seem to the noble oak—the ivy generally manages to find something to hang itself upon, even where there are no trees. Besides, if worse comes to worst, Mother Earth always offers support and sustenance to anything with honest roots, doesn't she? So why eliminate me to save your pretty friend from Stannard?"
"You're deliberately evading the issue! My point is that she's still in love with Ordway, and that his devotion to you is making her so desperate that—"
"I'm not from Missouri," she interrupted, "but I submit that the burden of proof is with your Excellency."
"For one thing, there's her dislike of you," he returned. "Your position as Mrs. Howard's guest would naturally keep you apart, but she—she almost hates you, Patty."
"Of course she hates me," she cheerfully conceded. "In certain parts of the world men are killed for trying to regain the heads of their friends and kinsmen, held as trophies. We do those things rather more subtly here—sublimate them a little—but she's losing a trophy. Naturally she hates me."
"Well, there's a daring admission!"
"Daring? Frank, if you like," with a slight shrug. "I happen not to belong to a head-hunting tribe—as you should have learned. But don't deny your own intelligence, Billy, or impeach mine, by attributing her resentment toward me to any love for Jack. Remember, there were sundry months before my advent when this devotion you'd have me credit didn't impel my lady yonder to extend so much as a finger to restore the ideals she'd shattered, or to relieve the torment she'd inflicted upon the man you pretend she loves! No, no, my disinterested friend!" Her warm tone changed again to one of light derision. "It was an ingenious little scheme, but carelessly put together. Try, try again!"
"Very well." He compressed his lips. "If that's your position, argument's useless. But I warn you, Patty, that you're in danger of doing a great wrong."
"Speaking of admissions," she mentioned, "evidently it's against a diplomat's principles to make one, even when he's caught with the goods. Or is this merely your genius for identifying yourself with the interests of your friends? Had you been seeking my removal from Jack's path in your own behalf, you couldn't have urged your cause more earnestly."
"Oh, couldn't I?" he retorted. "Listen!"
But she humorously warned him that mere words would be wasted upon her. "Not that I don't admire a facile technique," she explained, "and enjoy a plausible theory. But you must understand that my interest in them is purely artistic and intellectual. When it comes to action, I'm a very practical—and pragmatical—person. In the words of the immortal Mr. Dooley: 'Av it worrks, it's thrue.'"
"'O ye of little faith!'"
"Faith's an excellent stimulant, but in the end it's fruit that counts. I seem to remember that even a tree is judged according to its fruits—or words to that effect."
"But how the deuce am I to accomplish any works when you believe nothing I tell you?"
"I don't know, Billy." She shook her head. "That's up to you." With this she left him, and for several days he made no attempt to reopen the subject.
Meanwhile, the fiction of daily "lessons" in aviation was preserved, although, during the hours when Patricia was otherwise engaged, Ordway's biplane was frequently seen against the sky. After his purchase of this machine he had given himself to the study of aeronautics with a feverish intensity which she knew could not last, but for which, as a temporary outlet, she was grateful. Rarely, since the night when she had advised him to get what he was paying for, had he joined his carousing friends at the card-tables; but she knew that some channel, deeper and more productive than any sport afforded, must be found for his energies, if his perception of life's values was to be restored to him, and he still refused to resume his law practice, even as he refused to go again into society.
One day, hoping to draw him, through his enthusiasm for aviation, into touch with some of his former associates, Patricia said: "By the way, they've asked me to do a stunt at that charity fête they're planning. One of the features is to be a 'society circus,' you know. Wouldn't you like to do an exhibition flight with me?"
"Sure! We'll loop the loop together," he acquiesced, grinning.
"I'm ower young to perish yet," she objected. "Besides, I could think of pleasanter forms of suicide, if I put my mind on it."
"All women are selfish. Think of the thrills you'd give the populace—and remember the noble cause!"
"Loop me no loops! But I'm willing to swoop a few swoops that will look spectacular to the uninitiated, if you like. Will you come?"
"Nothing doing. If it amuses you to play around with that bunch, go to it! I don't have to."
His utter repudiation of every social obligation was particularly embarrassing to Mrs. Howard at this time, because she wished to give at least one formal dinner in honor of Patricia and Blaisdell, and yet Ordway's attitude made it impossible for her to entertain at home without seeming to force him out, which she was unwilling to do. Eventually she took her guest into counsel, and a little later announced in a casual way to her brother:
"I'm going to give a dinner for Patty next week, Jack. Wednesday, I think—the night before the fête."
"All right," he said, quietly, and left the room.
The subject was not directly broached again, although several minor features of the projected party were afterward discussed in his presence. If, on these occasions, he offered no suggestions, neither did he issue his customary warning that he would have no part in the affair, and the others were satisfied to let well enough alone.
Late Saturday afternoon, however, Mrs. Howard, driving home in her electric brougham, nearly collided at the gate with her brother's powerful car, which shot screaming down the driveway and veered north, in the direction of that country house where so many of his reckless hours had been spent. Sick at heart, his sister drove on to the house, arriving just as Patricia, round-eyed, appeared in the doorway.
"Was that Jack?" the girl demanded.
"Patty, it's hopeless! We've lost him!"
"No, we haven't! But what can have happened? We've had a wonderful day, and I've never seen him in such spirits! We've scarcely been home half an hour—barely time to dress—" Patricia broke off, her glance fixed on a newspaper lying on one of the chairs, on the upturned fold of which was an excellent picture of Dorothy Alexander. "Ah! Here it is!" she said, in a different tone. Opening the paper, she disclosed the headlines announcing that plans for the Stannard-Alexander wedding had been hastened and that the ceremony would take place within a fortnight. "Poor old Jack! This would hit hard—especially the picture! But it's well, on the whole, to have it over. Naturally, it hurts—hideously, I suppose-—but he'll pull himself together. You'll see! He'll be home to-night—surely to-morrow—and this may be the last time. If I can only get him West before the wedding!"
"West?" repeated his sister.
"You see, he needs active occupation—and he's naturally an out-of-door man. So I'm trying to get him interested in cattle-ranching again."
"Oh no! No!" Mrs. Howard made a dismayed, negative gesture. "Jack mustn't give up his profession!"
"But he's already given it up," Patricia reminded her.
"He must be made to resume it again! We supposed that was what you were doing. His place is here. He was made to see that once, and he must again—unless his life is to be a tragic failure. No, no, my dear! I know the circumstances—and I know my brother—and shirking the responsibilities to which he was born isn't going to help him. I thought you understood that!"
Illustration: "POOR OLD JACK! THIS WOULD HIT HARD—ESPECIALLY THE PICTURE!"
This ended the discussion, but a certain mutinous light in the girl's eyes impelled Mrs. Howard to telegraph to her husband, urging him to lend his presence immediately to what she felt might be a critical situation.
Notwithstanding the confident prediction of Ordway's return, three days dragged by bringing no tidings of him. Wednesday morning Howard arrived, and after a long talk with his wife he sought Patricia, who was obliged to admit that Jack's protracted absence was discouraging.
"But he'll pull himself together," she reiterated. "Only he must get away from here. He needs change—and congenial, absorbing work."
"He has his profession."
"Which has never absorbed him."
"Where did you pick up that notion? He was a shark for work before he went to pieces."
"I know. He was working for Dorothy—or thought he was. But he never wanted to study law—and never consented to until he fell in love with her. You've all assumed that it was his natural channel. It wasn't. It was one the family dug for him. He's a lot more interested in doing things himself than he is in arguing and haggling over things other people have done. If life had gone smoothly, perhaps he'd have stuck to the bar. But when he lost Dorothy—and had most of his ideals knocked in the head at the same time—he also lost his incentive to do uncongenial work. Don't you see?"
"I don't know about that!" The engineer shook his head dubiously. "Changing the whole course of a man's life is serious business. I do agree that he ought to get away from here—but he doesn't know anything about ranching. All his training's been legal. He's spent a large amount of time and money in acquiring his profession—and older men said he had a brilliant future. This scheme sounds like waste to me."
"Waste! My word! Look here, Mr. Howard, why don't you use steel wire for transmitting electric power? Won't it carry a current?"
"Y-yes, after a fashion—and for a limited distance." He looked at her keenly. "But it isn't very efficient, at best. It corrodes, and—"
"Well—there you are! It isn't exactly a non-conductor, but it doesn't carry a heavy current efficiently—and it corrodes. I don't know what happens to a mental generator under those circumstances, but ingrowing energy's mighty bad for humans! Jack began by blowing out all his fuses, and now a lot of perfectly good power's in danger of electrocuting itself. There's waste, if you like!"
"There's an interesting figure, at any rate!" Howard laughed.
"'Av it worrks, it's thrue,'" she urged. "And your steel wire hasn't worked, has it? Then why not lend a hand in connecting my copper?"
"What do you want me to do?"
"I want sympathy for him—intercession with the rest of the family—and possibly financial backing. I want him to have a chance to be himself."
"H'm. I'll think it over. Meanwhile, I'll see if I can locate the scamp and make him come home."
But no trace of Ordway could be found. He had not been seen in any of his accustomed haunts, and all his friends disclaimed knowledge of his whereabouts, which did not tend to allay the anxiety of his family. By night, even Patricia had succumbed to the prevailing depression, and was dejectedly dressing for dinner when she heard his car on the driveway. Slipping into a negligée, she opened her door just as he passed on his way to his own room, and hailed, in a gay undertone:
"Hello, Jack! You came pretty near being late to dinner!"
"But I'm not, you see." Notwithstanding his pallor and evident fatigue, his eyes were steady and his handclasp firm. "You didn't think I'd let anybody else take you out to dinner in my house, did you?"
"Well—I didn't know. But I'd have been hideously disappointed if you had—fond as I am of Mr. Howard."
"Howard! Is he here? H'mph!"
"Somebody had to be host," she suggested. "We didn't care to repeat that famous performance of Hamlet with the Prince of Denmark omitted."
"Here's where we fool 'em." His tone was gruff. "Denmark's back in the cast. What's more, he's back to stay."
At that moment a voice, hardly recognizable in its excitement, called from the other end of the hall: "Jack! Is that Jack?"
"Yes. All right, Grace. I'm here."
"Well, I do think you might at least have let me know you were coming!" Mrs. Howard complained, and Patricia laughed softly as she heard through her closing door the brotherly response:
"Suffering Mike! You didn't hear anything about my not coming, did you? Then what do you take me for? Of course I'm here!"
That night Patricia saw Ordway in an entirely new light. For the first time within her knowledge of him he laid aside all his bitterness and cynicism, appearing as a rarely gracious and accomplished host, and for a while she was content to admire his skilful handling of the conversation at their end of the table. But there came a moment when the attention of their neighbors to left and right was diverted, and she seized the opportunity to say, quietly:
"I have an invitation for you."
"For me? Nothing doing! This social resurrection is a consequence"—he bowed to her over his lifted wineglass—"not a precedent."
"For that pretty speech you shall have another chance, though you don't deserve it. I had a letter from the scientist yesterday. I've written him more or less about our flying and the amazing way you've learned to handle the plane, and he seems quite excited about you. He says he's leaving for the Pendleton round-up Saturday, and would you care to go with him?"
"Would I ca—" He broke off in the middle of a word, his face set suddenly in hard lines.
"There's not the slightest obligation about it, you know," she hurried on. "He seems to have taken a fancy to my description of you—"
"Pat—you little brick! You asked him!" said Ordway, unsteadily, and then his face grew rigid again in his effort at self-control.
"Perhaps I mentioned your interest in the wild and woolly—which would be quite enough for him," she admitted, with almost a gasp of relief. "He's an awfully good sort—and knows rather a lot of people out there, I believe. Will you go?"
"How soon can I start?"
"He leaves New York Saturday, but if you can't meet him there—"
"I'll meet him." When she would have spoken, he checked her with a quick gesture, and after a moment's tense pause, said: "There's one thing I want you to know—right now. I haven't been hitting it up."
"I knew that the instant I saw you."
"But before I got back? Tell me!" he insisted, as she hesitated.
"I just thought you'd been hurt, Jack—more than you could bear at the moment," was her soft reply; and he grimly returned:
"Well, I hadn't. I can bear it all right. I've discovered that. But I had to get away, and—think it over."
"I know.
"You were right, too," he went on. "I've been a quitter—"
"But you've come back," she quickly interrupted. "You would, of course, as soon as you caught your wind."
Illustration: "HELLO, JACK! YOU CAME PRETTY NEAR BEING LATE TO DINNER!"
"Yes, I'm on the map again—to stay. But I'm not going to stay on this part of it. I've made up my mind to that. It may be quitting again."
"It isn't! You don't belong here, anyway. You never did."
"Well—I don't know— But this trip West will give me a chance to think—"
"And to get your bearings," she finished, hugging the consciousness that the scientist already knew of two promising opportunities for the right man in the cattle country. "Then we'll wire him after dinner that you'll go? Will you start to-morrow?"
"Sure! No; on second thought—" He regarded her ruminatively. "Pat, you certainly are one brick! I'll go Friday morning." Here his attention was claimed by the woman on his left, and the last guests had gone and the family was separating for the night before he found another opportunity for a word alone with Patricia. Then, affecting carelessness, he said, "By the way, do you still want me to do a stunt with you to-morrow night?"
"Jack!" In a flash she perceived all that his reappearance in society would indicate, not only to his family and friends, but also to that gossiping little local world whose disparaging judgments of him she had so resented. In the same instant, she remembered that no encounter with Dorothy need be feared, as she was out of town. "Jack! It wouldn't be too hard?"
"Nothing would be too hard—if it would give you pleasure," he said, and his light tone did not wholly mask his feeling.
"I'd love it—just once before you go! But let's keep it as a surprise! Tell nobody—except the family."
"All right! We'll work out a stunt to-morrow for both planes. And—you'll dine with me to-morrow night?"
"Oh, I've promised Billy Blaisdell! He's giving a party, and we're all going on to the fête later. But I will, anyway!" she promised, recklessly. "His is an informal thing—and it will be our last night. I'll beg off."
"You're a brick, Pat! Good night—and thanks." He turned sharply away, and she went up-stairs wondering whether his voice had broken on the last word, or whether she had been tricked by her own emotion.
Deciding that it was too late to telephone to Blaisdell that night, she waited until morning to call him up, only to learn that he had gone to the country for the day. So she wrote him a humorous little note, pleading that unforeseen complications connected with her début as a circus-performer would prevent her joining his party that night. She promised a full explanation when she saw him, and dismissed the matter from her mind. For once, however, she failed to anticipate his mental processes.
Meanwhile, the day proved a busy one, both for her and for Ordway, but by night all their arrangements were completed, and after a last quiet dinner together they drove out to the park where the fête was held, when it became evident to Patricia that the diplomat intended to give her no immediate opportunity to make her promised explanation. Not unnaturally attributing his manner to pique, she paid little attention to it, at first, being very fully occupied in shielding the sensibilities of the prodigal, whose return to the paths of social rectitude was not allowed to pass unemphasized. However, if there were those with supercilious brows who glanced at Ordway and passed by on the other side, and yet others whose too-obvious compassion carried its own sting, there were not lacking a goodly number who met him with just the right degree of welcome and put him at once at ease.
Occasionally, when he was insulated in a group of these old friends, Patricia had time to think of her own affairs, and gradually it dawned upon her that there might be more than pique in Blaisdell's continued avoidance of her, and she began to be troubled, fearing that beneath his conventionally smiling manner he was really hurt.
Her "act" was to close the performance, which took place out of doors; and when she caught sight of Blaisdell, as the programme neared its finish, strolling away from the audience toward a side-path, she slipped out another way and intercepted him behind some screening shrubbery. At sight of her he hesitated visibly, but came on to where she waited.
"Well?" she asked, whimsically.
"Can I do anything for you?" His manner was constrained.
"You might be a little nice to me—for a change. You might even walk over to my tent with me, if you felt inclined. It's time to dress for my 'turn.'" Still he stood motionless, his face like a stone mask, and, after the briefest pause, she decided to take the bull by the horns. "Billy, if I didn't know better, I should think you didn't want to see me at all. Do you know that you haven't been near me this whole evening?"
"Did you expect me to—join you?"
"At any rate, I didn't expect you to ignore my very existence! But if you're going to be peevish—"
"Peevish is hardly the word, I think," he said, obviously holding himself in restraint. "But I'm afraid I can't accept—all this—as lightly as—as you seem to expect."
"All what? I was terribly sorry not to go to your party, Billy, but truly I couldn't! If you weren't so cross"—she glanced up comically—"I might tell you the reason. I was—"
"Don't!" he harshly interrupted. "It's plain enough. Your being here together—"
"Oh, that's not all—just being here! Last night Jack—"
"Good God, Patty!" he broke out. "I tell you I understand! And I hope you'll be happy! You know I do! But don't ask me to stand here and discuss it with you!"
"Discuss—" For an instant she stared in sheer amazement, and then she laughed. "Oh, Billy, you are an idiot! You're hopeless!"
"Do you mean to say it isn't true?" He caught her hand.
"True? My word! What ever gave you that impression?"
"Why—everything! The dinner last night—your note—his being here to-night— What else could I think?"
"I admit that it was unintelligent to expect you to think at all!" Still laughing, she pulled her hand away. "Billy, what do you do with your brains? Because it isn't as if you had none."
"But everybody thinks so!" he persisted. "They're all talking—asking whether it's been announced yet. I've nearly gone mad to-night! Patty, you're not engaged to him?"
"Well—not yet!" she said. "Now, listen—intelligently, if you can! Jack came home unexpectedly last night—"
"Where's he been?"
"Don't interrupt—listen! And because he's going away to-morrow, he offered—"
"Where's he going?"
"Billy, I haven't but a second, and if you won't listen—! Very well, then! He offered to help me—and he hates all this—he only came to-night because he knew I wanted him to show this town, just once, what he is—"
"And yet you say he's not in love with you!"
"Billy Blaisdell, do you think that boy has the heart of a Mormon? How can he be in love with two women at the same time?"
"Do you mean that he's in love with Dorothy—still?"
"Well, in the name of Heaven, what do you think all this is about?" she demanded, with exasperation.
"H'm. Speaking of Dorothy"—he was watching her keenly—"have you seen her to-night?"
"To-night! Billy! She's not here!"
"Yes, she is. They came home unexpectedly, and Stannard brought them over here late. I've just left them."
"My word! Where's Jack? Has he seen her?"
"I don't know. What if he has?" He seized her hand, detaining her.
"Heaven only knows what he'd do! Let me go!"
"He'd probably survive. Other men have."
"Yes, yes! But can't you understand—no, of course you can't! But just as everything's coming right—"
"Patty!" He caught her other hand and looked searchingly into her eyes. "Are you sure you're not in love with Ordway?"
"Well, if I am, you've wished it on me!" she vindictively declared. A bugle sounded, followed by a rattle of applause. "Heavens! That's the signal that I'm about to fly! Let me go!"
Tearing her hands from his clasp, she ran swiftly down the path toward the dressing-tents, where she found Kate awaiting her in a fever of anxiety lest she should be late. As she scrambled into her aviation dress, Patricia asked:
"Where's Mr. Ordway? Have you seen him?"
"Oh, yes 'm! He came out and looked his plane over quite some time ago. He's getting dressed."
"Was he all right?"
"Sure!" Kate greatly admired Ordway. "He was kind o' solemn and sober-like, but—sure, he was all right."
"Oh, dear!" said Patricia. "I wonder—"
Then she ran out into the field, acknowledged the greeting of the assemblage, and a moment later the lights and the people were beneath her, while the white ray of the search-light shone now here, now there, in its effort to keep in touch with her. But even as she circled and dipped and swooped and swerved, alert to every movement and sound of her machine, always in the back of her mind lurked that uneasy wonder whether Ordway had seen Dorothy, and, if he had, what the consequences had been.
When she came down a dozen men ran toward her, but he was not among them; and then, according to programme, the bugle sounded again and the biplane was trundled out from its hiding-place behind the shrubbery. There was a murmur of surprise and more applause, which swelled to a welcoming roar as the erect young figure in khaki striding toward the machine was recognized; but beyond a curt, perfunctory salute Jack seemed scarcely to notice it. He settled into his place, his mechanician fumbled quickly and strangely about him, and then his plane began to move. Patricia assured herself that it was all exactly as they had planned it, but something kept whispering insistently: "I did think he'd come and speak to me! Why didn't he?"
Meanwhile, the biplane was climbing in ascending spirals into the dark sky, the long, wavering, white finger of the search-light always following it.
"He's going pretty high," Patricia murmured to the man beside her, whom she afterward discovered to be Howard. "Much higher than I did."
When his machine was scarcely discernible, Ordway made two wide circles without farther ascent, and then of a sudden the aircraft tipped nose downward and dropped like a plummet. Patricia caught her breath in a rasping gasp, as her hands flew to her throat, and somewhere on the outskirts of the crowd a woman screamed. A relieved groan broke from the watching throng as the plane seemed to catch the air again, rose, turned completely over, dropped again—and repeated the manœuver.
"By—George!" breathed Howard, hoarsely. "Young fool! He's looped the loop!"
"Oh—Mr. Howard!" Patricia's voice came in a thin croak. "He's—seen her!"
"Seen whom? What do you mean?"
"Dor—Dorothy! She's here! He's seen her—and he doesn't care—what happens! He's never done—that—before! He'll be—killed! And I've done it! If I hadn't—got him into this—"
"Nonsense!" Howard said, trying not to speak thickly. "He's probably done it dozens of times before. Anyhow, you've nothing to do with it. You've been trying to stop this sort of thing, and if the fool can't keep his head— But he's all right! Look at him! Doing big circles up there, steady as a church!"
"But he's—going to do it again!" she gasped. "Oh—Jack!"
Two more great circles Ordway described against the heavens, twice again he pitched downward, only to turn, somersault, and skim on in safety, until at last, volplaning in one final, blood-curdling swoop, he landed and ran lightly along the turf, while the spectators roared their acclaim.
Patricia was the first to reach him, and as she fumbled at one of the straps that held him, she sobbed: "Jack! Oh, Jack—how could you!"
Waving an arm toward his clamoring fellow-townsmen, he turned toward her, instead of the reckless, defiant face she had feared to see, a broad, triumphant, albeit somewhat excited, smile.
"Well, I guess we showed 'em, eh? Why, Pat!" He put a quick hand on her shoulder and gave her a little shake. "Pat! You weren't frightened!"
"Frightened, you crazy young fool!" exclaimed his brother-in-law. "You've given us all nervous prostration! What induced you to do a thing like that?"
"Wanted to be a credit to little teacher," Ordway returned, laughing. "And that particular stunt takes rather a steady nerve, you know."
"But—you never did it before!" Patricia was still gasping.
"Sure, I've done it before! I told you I'd never be satisfied until I'd looped a few loops, didn't I? Well, I've done 'em." He grinned cheerfully, and Patricia's heart gave another leap as she realized that he had not seen Dorothy, after all.
"Where's that bugler?" she cried. "Blow! Hold the crowd! We're both going up!"
"No, no!" Howard protested. "They've had enough—and you're all unstrung. Don't try it!"
Laughing, she responded: "Of course we're going up—both planes! But this is warranted. It's been rehearsed. No tricks, Jack! Both searchlights, please."
"All right. Let her go," he returned, and again the bugler set his instrument to his lips and blew.
When Patricia's monoplane swept off, the biplane gave chase, and for ten minutes or more the two, each followed by a search-light, seemed to be playing tag among the stars, to the delight of the crowd. All the time, however, Patricia was planning how to get Jack away before he should see Dorothy; and when this last flight was over, while they were still the center of a congratulatory group, she took the first opportunity to murmur, "Let's run away now, and go home."
"Home?" he said. "What for? The fun's just beginning!"
"It has been fun," she agreed^ "but enough's enough. I'm tired."
"Tired! You?" he scoffed. "You're jealous—that's what's the matter with you! Trying to shove me out of the limelight!"
"But I am tired, Jack! I want to go."
"A lot you do!" Laughing, he shook his head. "I'm beginning to understand your game, my lady! But this time it isn't necessary. Nothing would induce me to keep up this sort of thing, but just for once—and for the last time—it's pretty good sport! Honestly, I'm having a bully time, Pat—of its kind. So don't you worry! And you needn't try to make me believe you want to leave right in the middle of things, because I know better! If you really want to go home, of course I'll take you, but I warn you that I'll come back and see this out. Run along and play, now—and don't fret. I'm all right."
Perceiving that he was not to be convinced, and that even if she feigned illness he would still know it to be a ruse, her mind raced to the next expedient. If Blaisdell could be induced to detain Dorothy for the rest of the evening in or near the dancing-pavilion, the danger might still be averted, as Ordway seemed happiest among his men friends. Convinced that he would be safely engaged with {his group for half an hour, at least, she sped away to find the minister, at first choosing by-paths to avoid the crowd.
Cutting across a shadowy expanse of lawn, her footfall inaudible, she was startled by a sound of hysterical weeping behind a line of thick shrubbery, and stopped short as she heard a vibrant young voice declare, in a silence broken only by the distant throb of music:
"I won't! I don't care what you say! I know now—and I won't!"
"You will!" responded the low, incisive voice of an older woman. "What's more, you'll control yourself—instantly! You're making a public exhibition of yourself! Even he must have heard you shriek!"
"I don't care! I don't care about anything, except—"
"Hush! Sentimental little fool! Some day you'll come to your senses and be glad I prevented your ruining your whole life for a silly impulse Think what he is! A drunkard—a gambler—"
Patricia took a quick step toward the shrubbery, but stopped again as the sobbing voice contended: "He's not! And if he is, whose fault is it?"
"He's intoxicated now," the clear, cutting tones went on. "No sober man would take that risk. He's thoroughly disreputable and discredited. He has nothing to offer you—"
"He has everything I want!"
"Very well! Go and tell him so! Throw yourself at his head—and let Patricia Carlyle set you neatly on your feet again!"
Illustration: "YOU WON'T BELIEVE IT—BUT I WANT TO HELP YOU "
On the other side of the hedge, Patricia awoke, with a gasp, to a consciousness that she was eavesdropping, but amazement held her motionless a moment longer, while the low, taunting voice continued: "Let her make a laughing-stock of you, for the benefit of the whole town! How can you be silly enough to prate of love and a broken heart, when you know what he's done? For Heaven's sake, save your pride, at least! Come, now—go back out there, with your head up! Make them all think that you're gay and happy—as you ought to be, with your future!—and to-morrow you shall go away and stay until the wedding."
Patricia heard no more. Veering around some bushes, she ran on, her thoughts in a tumult, abating her pace only when she came into the crowded paths again. After a little search, she discovered Blaisdell near the dancing-pavilion, as she expected, and he joined her at once.
"Billy, I need help," she began, without preamble, leading him rapidly in the direction from which she had come. "Dorothy Alexander's down here a little way—with Ada. Find her, and make her go with you."
"Where? What for?"
"Don't ask questions! Get her to dance—to go to supper—anything! Only get her!"
"But suppose she refuses?"
"My word! What are you a diplomat for? Make her go! And for Heaven's sake don't let anybody get her away from you!"
"Look here. What's all this about?" he demanded.
"When you're out of Ada's sight, take her over on the east walk—beyond my tent—"
"Is this all to protect your precious Ordway?" he interrupted. "Because, if it is—"
"Billy, I don't know what it's for—I'm all in a muddle—but there's not a second to lose! Don't fail me!"
With that she turned off into another path, and Blaisdell, bewildered, hurried on to find Dorothy, traces of whose recent agitation were still evident, and who proved reluctant and unresponsive when he finally discovered her. But Ada, appreciating the cheering effect his persiflage invariably had upon her sister's spirits, warmly seconded his suggestion that the dancing-floor was less crowded than it would be later, and confidently sent them off together, returning herself to Stannard. No sooner was she out of sight, however, than the minister said:
"You don't seem to be very keen about dancing, and neither am I. Suppose we walk—and talk—instead, eh?"
They were well down the deserted east walk, and he had almost decided that the whole thing was merely another ruse of Patricia's, when he caught sight of her quickly approaching. She stopped directly before Dorothy, who recoiled a little and would have turned aside, had not Blaisdell prevented her.
"I know," the elder girl said, a little brokenly, although her steady glance never left the younger's face, "you won't believe it—but I want to help you. At least—I think I do. Quite by accident, I overheard part of a conversation between you and your sister a few minutes ago—"
"Oh!" the other gasped. "How dare you! Let me go!" She turned and would have fled, but Patricia caught her arm.
"Listen to me!" she said, almost sobbing herself. "It's not true! Jack Ordway has never been in love with me for an instant! He still—well, that's his story. But I tell you I'm trying to help you—both—unless I misunderstood. That's what I must be sure of, before— You see, I heard only a phrase or two, but Billy Blaisdell has always insisted— And if it's true—if you are really in love with Jack— Oh, you poor child!" For Dorothy, after a vain effort to speak, had hidden her convulsed face against Blaisdell's arm. "Bring her to my tent, Billy!—and tell her as you come! Hurry! They may begin looking for her any minute! I'll find Jack!"
It was perhaps half an hour later that Patricia and Blaisdell stood, with Howard and his wife, beside Ordway's biplane, wherein sat two helmeted figures in khaki, one of whom, since she wore Kate's uniform, the few remaining stragglers lingering about the machines naturally assumed to be Miss Carlyle's mechanician.
"Good-by, children—and God bless you!" said Howard, huskily. "Draw on me, Jack, if you need funds."
"But they won't really stay out there!" his wife insisted. "After they've seen it, they'll come home—where they belong."
"Not much!" Ordway buoyantly returned. "Unless that scientist of Pat's is a four-flusher, it's us for the wild and woolly—for keeps. Isn't it?" He turned to the helmeted girl beside him, who nodded, and then leaned out to give her hands again to Patricia and Blaisdell, crying, brokenly:
"Oh, you're wonderful, you two! To think that an hour ago I wanted to die! I hope you're as happy as we are—but you can't be, even with each other!"
"Ready!" said Ordway.
"Blow, bugler!" Patricia called.
As the triumphant notes rang over the grounds, people exclaimed, "Oh, they're going up again!" and lifted their eyes to see Ordway's plane swimming in the stream of the search-light.
"Now, what did she mean by that?" Patricia demanded of Blaisdell, as they walked toward her machine. "Billy, what did you tell that girl?"
"Only the simple truth. You see, her mind had been poisoned against you, and even after you talked to her she wasn't sure that she could trust you. The only way I could make her believe that you hadn't been trying to marry Ordway was to give her the impression that you're going to marry me."
"Billy Blaisdell!"
"Well—I submit that it worked," he proffered, with an innocent air. "So now we're engaged."
"Are we, indeed! You may be—but I deny the allegation!"
"But wasn't that what you required—works? And didn't I help?"
"So now you claim your pound of flesh?" she dryly inquired.
"Oh, let's be fair!" he urged. "Wasn't I right all the time?"
"Very well—let's be fair!" she retorted. "In whose interest were these 'works' of yours committed? Honest Injun, now—cross your heart—just what was your motive when you 'helped'?"
"Well—motives are mixed things at best, I guess," he confessed. "But, anyway, here we are—and we're all happier, aren't we?"
At that moment the Howards overtook them, and Jack's sister said, "You won't change your mind and come back?"
"I wish I could," Patricia replied. "But I've broken all manner of engagements to stay this long, and I really can't—"
"Look here!" Blaisdell cut in. "You're not going—for good?"
"I'm sorry." She turned laughing eyes toward him. "Kate's already packing, to follow by the first train. I'll see those two married to-morrow, in my aunt's apartment, and then—I'm going on."
"That being the case, I'm going with you," he announced, preparing to clamber in beside her.
"Indeed you're not! Blow, bugler!"
"But, Patty!" Blaisdell held her hand, while the golden notes poured forth. "Haven't I earned that, at least? Tell me where you're going!"
"To the Back of Beyond," she teased, adding, in a tone indescribably softened as she saw the pain in his face, "Billy—I'm going to Washington."
"To—but not— Really?"
"Really! But remember, your Excellency, that motives are mixed things, at best—and official business calls me! Hasta la vista!"
Three times she circled over their heads, the ghostly finger of the search-light pointing at her, and then she flew away into the starry night, to overtake the eloping lovers and help them on their way, while Blaisdell went contentedly to his hotel to pack.
[THE END.]