Chapter 4 STOOD LOOKING AT THEM.

About two hours later Florence was sitting alone in the drawing room when Howard entered. She asked him if he had seen his father that morning. He sat down on a sofa beside her and said, after a moment's reflection:

"Yes, I have seen him? Why did you ask?"

She seemed worried and did not immediately answer him. He repeated his question. "Because he spoke of you at breakfast," she said. "He didn't appear at all well-sat staring about, and-"

"That explains it," said Howard.

"Explains what?" she asked.

"His treatment of me."

"Treatment of you? Has anything gone wrong?"

"Yes, in the office, just now. When I went in he jumped up from his desk, threw down a hand full of papers, and stared at me-muttered, seemed to struggle with himself, sat down, and asked me to leave him alone. He never acted that way toward me before. I'm afraid he's ill. Why, he's the most jovial man in the world, and-I'm worried. I don't understand it. If he's sick, why didn't he say so?"

"I don't know, but don't let it worry you, dear," she said.

"But it does, Florence, to be turned upon in that way. What did he say about me at the table this morning? He surely wasn't angry because I didn't get up in time for breakfast."

"Surely not. He didn't say anything, only asked where you were, and kept staring at the place where you sit."

"And is that the reason you asked me if I had seen him?"

"Yes, that and the fact that he didn't appear to be well."

"I don't understand it. Why, he has joked with me all my life, sick or well. It hurts me." And, after a slight pause, he added: "I wonder if he turned on George, too."

"It wouldn't seem so, for as he was going out of the breakfast room he put his hand on brother's shoulder and leaned on him."

Bodney came in at that moment, and, looking about, asked if they had seen Goyle. As he was going out, Howard called him.

"Oh, George, just a moment. Have you noticed anything strange about father this morning?"

And Bodney was master of himself when he answered: "Nothing much. Only he didn't seem to be as well as usual. It will pass off. I wonder where that fellow is?" He strode out, and they heard him talking to Goyle in the hall.

"Put his hand on George's shoulder and leaned on him," Howard mused, aloud. "Then he is not well. George knows it and doesn't want to distress me by telling me. Did he sit up late?"

"No. Mr. Bradley had to go early, and just as he was taking his leave brother stepped in and asked your father to help him with an important matter-some abstract of title, or something of the sort, and they went out and he didn't come back. I don't want to distress you, but your mother said that he walked the floor nearly all night."

"Did she? And George knows more than he is willing to tell. But why do they try to shield me? It would be all right to shield mother if anything were wrong, but if there's a burden, I ought to help bear it."

She besought him not to be worried, assuring him that nothing had gone very far wrong and that everything would come right. The clearness and the strength of her mind, her individuality, her strength of character, always had a quick influence upon him, and he threw off the heavier part of his worry and they talked of other matters, of the reception which he had attended the night before. He repeated a part of a stupid address delivered by a prominent man, and they laughed at it, he declaring that nearly all men, no matter how prominent or bright, were usually dull at a reception. And, after a time, she asked: "What sort of a man is Mr. Goyle?"

"Oh, he's all right, I suppose; smart, full of odd conceits. I don't know him very well. He comes into the down-town office quite frequently, but he rarely has much to say to me. George seems to be devoted to him."

Florence shook her head, deploring the intimacy. "I don't like him," she said. "And Agnes says she hates him. She snaps him up every time he speaks to her." She looked at Howard, and saw that his worry was returning upon him. She put the hair back from his forehead, affection's most instinctive by-play, and said that he must not be downcast at a mere nothing, a passing whim on the part of his father. "And it was only a whim," she added.

"But whims make an atmosphere," he replied.

"Not ours, Howard-not yours, not mine. Love makes our atmosphere."

"Yes," he said, putting his arm about her, "our breath of life. Florence, last night you were depressed, and now I am heavy." Their heads, bent forward, touched each other. "And your love is dearer to me now than ever before." Their faces were turned from the hall door. The Judge silently entered, and, seeing them, started toward them, making motions with his hands as if he would tear them apart. But Howard, after a brief pause, spoke again, and the old man halted, gazing at them. "Florence, you asked me, last night, if anything could separate us, and now I ask you that same question. Could anything part us?"

"No," she said, "not man, not woman, nothing but God, and he has bound us together."

"With silken cords woven in the loom of eternity," he replied; and the Judge wheeled about, and, with a sob, was gone, unseen.

"What was that?" Florence asked, looking round. "It sounded like a sob."

"We were not listening for sobs and should not have heard them," he replied. "It wasn't anything."

William came in, clearing his throat. "Don't let me disturb you," he said, as they got up. "I don't belong to the plot at all." He began to look about. "I left my pipe somewhere."

"I don't think it's here, Uncle William," said Howard. "You surely wouldn't leave it here; and, besides, I don't hear it."

There came a sort of explosion, and upon it was borne the words, "What's that? You don't hear it? You don't? Now what have I ever done to you to deserve such an insult? Ha! What have I done?"

"Why, nothing at all, Uncle William."

"Then why do you want to insult me? Haven't I been your slave ever since I came here? Haven't I passed sleepless nights devising things for your good? You can't deny it, and yet, at the first opportunity, you turn upon me with an insult."

"Why, Uncle Billy," said Florence, "he wouldn't insult you. He was only joking."

Howard assured him that he meant no insult, whereupon the old man said: "All right, but I know a joke as well as anybody. I have joked with some of the best of 'em in my time, I'll tell you that. But it's no joke when you come talking about not hearing a man's pipe. It's a reflection on his cleanliness-it means that his pipe is stronger than a gentleman's pipe ought to be. But I want to tell you, sir, that it isn't. It's as sweet as a pie."

Howard said that he knew the import of such an accusation. "But," he added, "I was in hopes that it was strong, not to cast any reflection, you understand, but to show my appreciation of what you have done for me. I was going to give you that meerschaum of mine."

The old man's under jaw dropped. "Hah? Well, now, I do believe that it has got to be just a little nippy; just a little, you understand."

"I wish it were stronger than that, Uncle Billy."

"You do? Howard, you have always been a good friend to me; our relations have been most cordial and confidential, and I don't mind telling you-to go no further, mind you-that my old pipe is as strong as-as a red fox. Yes, sir, it's a positive fact. Er-where is your pipe?"

"In my room. You may go and get it as soon as you like."

"All right, and I'm a thousand times obliged to you. Florence, did that preacher go away so suddenly last night because I settled the fact that it was on the tenth?"

"Oh, no, he left because he had an engagement."

"Well," drawled the old man, "I don't know about that. Why, confound him, I've got a right to settle it as my memory dictates. Does he think that I'm going to warp my recollection just for him?"

"What was it all about, Uncle Billy?" Howard asked.

"About a story I was going to tell."

"Did you tell it?"

"Did I tell it! Well, after a fashion; after they had badgered me. Then I made a mess of it. How do you expect me to tell a story when-look here, ain't you trying to put it on me? Hah, ain't you?"

"I don't know what you mean, Uncle William."

"Oh, you don't. The whole kit of you are devilish dull all at once."

"You surely don't include me," said Florence.

"No, not you, Florence, but all the men about the house. Why, I went up to John, just a while ago, and I'll be hanged if he didn't snap at me like a turtle-told me to get out of his office. Shall I tell you what he said? He said that last night he went to hell and was still there. There's something wrong with him, as sure as you live."

Howard turned away and began to walk up and down the room. "There it is again," said he. "I no sooner convince myself that it might have been a mere whim when something comes up to assure me that it is something worse. And the look he gave me, Florence. It hurts me." He walked toward the door. Florence asked him if he were going to his father. He turned and stood for a moment in silence. "No, I am going down town. I don't feel right. I am hurt. But don't say anything to him, please. I am going to wait and see what comes of it. And please don't say anything to mother." He took his leave, and Florence went to the window and looked after him as he passed down the street. She spoke to William. "I wonder what the trouble is," she said.

"I don't know," William replied, ruffling his brow, "but as for that preacher-the first thing he knows, I won't let him come here. John has insisted on his dropping in at any time, because he used to know his father, but I'll attend to that. Why does a great, strong fellow as he is want to throw away his time? Why doesn't he get to work?" He sat down and, looking toward the piano, asked Florence to play something. "I'd like a tune quick and high-stepping," he said. She told him that she was in no humor. "In that event," he insisted, "you might play the Maiden's Prayer."

"Not now, Uncle William. Here's Agnes. She'll play for you."

"No, I won't," said Agnes, coming into the room. Florence expected the old fellow to snort his displeasure at so flat a refusal, but he did not. He bowed to her and said: "Now, that's the way to talk. I like to have a woman come right out and say what she means. Well," he added, getting up, "I am not in your plot, anyway, so I'll bid you good morning."

As soon as William was gone, Agnes went to the piano, seated herself on the stool and began to ripple on the keys. "There are times when we feel like dabbling in water but don't want to swim," she said.

"And you are dabbling now," Florence spoke up.

"Only dabbling. Oh, I forgot; your dressmaker is out there, and I came in to tell you."

"I'm glad you didn't forget it entirely. Oh, and I must tell you something. Brother says that Mr. Goyle is smitten with you."

Agnes, still rippling, turned half way round, sniffed and turned back. "I hate him so hard that it's almost second cousin to love," she declared.

"Don't let it be any closer kin, Agnes. There is always danger in a first cousin."

Agnes, still rippling, sniffed contemptuously. "He's been following me around all the morning. How I love to hate him."

The voice of Mrs. Elbridge was heard, calling Florence, who answered that she was coming, but she halted long enough to say to Agnes, mischievously, that she might learn to love him if she loved to hate him. Both love and hate were kindred passions, with but a thin partition between them. As she was going out, Agnes shouted after her that, if she ever loved him she would hate herself, and then, just as Goyle and Bodney entered the room, she added: "We tar and feather such fellows in Quincy."

"You do what in Quincy?" Bodney asked.

And Agnes, without looking round, repeated: "Tar and feather such fellows."

Goyle knew that she meant him, but instead of kindling resentment, her words aroused in him an additional interest in her. He looked at her as in the rhythmic sway of her graceful form, the nodding of her shapely head, she kept time with a tune, half remembered, half improvised; and, turning to Bodney, he asked in tones too low for the girl to hear: "Has she got any money?"

"I think she has."

"Leave me alone with her."

"Do you want to snatch her purse?"

"Do you suppose I want a hair pin, a pearl button, a scrap of verse, and a three-cornered piece of silk that no man can match? I mean, has she got any money in her own name?"

"I haven't asked her, but I think she has."

"Then leave me alone with her."

Bodney stood looking at him. There was a continuous fascination in the fellow's affrontery. "All right," he said, but quickly added: "We've got to go down town, you know. I'll step into the office and wait till she gets through with you. You may hypnotize me, but-"

Goyle cut him off with a gesture. "Nonsense! When she gets through with me! Cool, coming from a man whose honor I have saved at the risk of my own. But no cooler than the bullet you threatened me with."

"I wish I had given it to you," said Bodney.

"Do you? It's not too late, if you are bent on murder. But that's all right," he broke off, with a wave of the hand. "Leave me alone with her."

Bodney went out and Goyle sat down on a sofa, gazed at the girl, cleared his throat, coughed; but she did not look round. "What are you playing? May I ask?"

"You have asked," she replied, without looking round.

"But you haven't told me."

She left off playing, and slowly turned on the stool to face him. "A tune they played in Quincy one night, when they tarred and feathered a man," she said. And then, with a smile of sweet innocence, she added: "You were never in Quincy, were you?"

"Well, I was never tarred and feathered there."

"Possibly an acknowledgment that you were never in the town. Oh, somebody told me that you were once connected with opera."

"Then somebody flattered me. I couldn't sing in a chorus of scissors grinders."

"A sort of Chinese opera, I inferred," she said.

"Well, that's about the only sort I could sing in. Chinese opera, eh?"

"Yes, that's what I inferred. It was something about Sing-Sing. Isn't that Chinese?"

"Oh, it sounds like a joke," said he.

"And it wasn't?" she asked, in surprise. "Then it was serious opera instead of comic. They call serious opera grand, I believe. And is that the reason they call larceny grand-because it is serious?"

For a time he sat in a deep study of her. How different from the nervous and impressionable weakling who had just left the room; and in looking at her he felt that his eyes refused to glitter with a snake-like charm; they were dull and flat, and he drew his hand across them. "Do you know that I like you?" he said.

"Then I do not bring up an unpleasant recollection."

"No, a beautiful vision." And now he had more confidence in his eyes, for he got up and moved toward her. She slipped off the stool and stood looking at him.

"Won't you play something for me?" he asked.

"I don't want to play. I don't feel like it."

"Let your fingers dream over the keys."

"My hands aren't asleep." She moved off from him.

"You aren't afraid of me, are you?".

She looked him in the eye. "My grandmother killed a panther," she said.

He drew his hand across his eyes; he recalled what Bodney had said-about her getting through with him. In the dictionary of slang there is a word to fit him: the resources of his "gall" were boundless. "Why don't you like me?" he asked. "Am I ugly in your sight? Do I look like a villain?"

"If you looked more like a villain you'd be less dangerous."

"That's cruel. We may not see each other again. Won't you shake hands with me?"

"What is the use of shaking hands with a stranger we are never to see again," she said.

"But if we shake hands," he persisted, "we may not be strangers."

"No? Then, we'll not shake."

William strolled through the room, halting just long enough to assure them that he was not trying to break into the plot. "He's a queer duck," said Goyle.

"I wish there were more of his feather," she replied. "He can pass through without stopping."

"And so could I but for you," he rejoined.

She snapped her eyes at him. "What nerve tonic do you take?"

"Nature's. She gives me a tonic whenever I look at you."

She laughed at this, and she said: "I am woman enough to like that sort of talk, but I don't like you."

"You like my talk, but don't like me. Why this discrepancy? Why don't you like me?"

"Oh, I don't know. You give me the creeps."

"You are very frank."

"Oh, the creeps would make anybody frank."

Bodney appeared at the door and cleared his throat to attract attention, and he was bold enough to ask her if she had got through with him. "Long ago," she answered. "And now you may have him."

Goyle bowed to her. "Mr. Bodney and I may go out of town for a day or two-or, at least, I may. Will you permit me to hope to see you upon my return?"

"Oh, certainly," she said, and he felt that at last he was making some sort of progress. "I thank you," he replied.

But there was something more to follow. "You can hope that you may, and I will hope that you may not," she said.

Goyle bowed, and looked at her, admiringly. "Miss Needle-tongue," he said. "But you catch me."

Bodney told him to come on, but he lingered a moment longer. "May I tell you good-bye?" he said, and she replied that she hoped so. As the two men were going out the Judge came in. Goyle glanced at him, but Bodney averted his eyes. The old man's face smote him with reproach.