The Iron Woman Part 28

It was dusk; she had come in to see Nannie and talk over that illuminating suggestion: _why not live on the princ.i.p.al?_ But Nannie was not at home, so Elizabeth sat down in the firelight in the parlor to wait for her. She sat there, smiling to herself, eager to tell Nannie that she had argued Cherry-pie into admitting that the plan of "living on the princ.i.p.al" was at least feasible; and also that she had sounded her uncle, and believed that if she and David and Cherry-pie attacked him, all together, they could make him consent!--"But of course David will simply have to insist," she thought, a little apprehensively, "for Uncle Robert is so awfully sensible." Then she began to plan just how she must tell David of this brilliant idea, and make him understand that they need not wait; "as soon as he really understands it, he won't listen to any 'prudence' from Uncle!"

she said, her eyes crinkling into a laugh. But how should she make him understand? She must admit at once (because he was so silly and practical) that, of course, the interest on her money would not support them. Then she must show him her figures--David was always crazy about figures! Well, she had them; she had brought them with her to show Nannie; they proved conclusively that she and David could live on her capital for at least two years. It would certainly last as long as that, perhaps even for two years and a half! When they had exhausted it, why, then, David's income from his profession would be large enough; large enough even if--she blushed n.o.bly, sitting there alone looking into the fire; "even if!" Thinking this all out, absorbed and joyous, a little jealous because this practical idea had come to Nannie and not to her, she did not hear Blair enter. He stood beside her a moment in silence before she was aware of his presence. Then she looked up with a start, and leaning back in her chair, the firelight in her face, smiled at him: "Where's Nannie?"

"I don't know. Church, I think. But I am glad of it. I would rather--see you alone." His voice trembled.

He had come in, in all the unrest of misery; he had said to himself that he was going to "tell Nannie, anyhow." The impulse to "tell" had become almost a physical necessity, and when he came into the room, the whole unhappy, hopeless business was hot on his lips. The mere unexpectedness of finding her here, alone, was like a touch against that precariously balanced sense of honor, which was his G.o.d, and had so far kept him, as he expressed it to himself, "square with David."

To Elizabeth, sitting there in friendly idleness by the fire, the thrill in his voice was like some palpable touch against her breast. Without knowing why, she put her hand up, as if warding something off. She was bewildered; her heart began to beat violently. Instantly, at the sight of the lovely, startled face, the rein broke. He forgot David, he forgot his G.o.d, with whom he had been juggling words for the last two months, he forgot everything, except the single, eternal, primitive purpose: _there was the woman he wanted_. And all his life, if he had wanted anything, he had had it. With a stifled cry, he caught her hand: "Elizabeth--I love you!"

"Stop!" she said, outraged and astounded; "stop this instant!"

"I _must_ speak to you."

"You shall not speak to me!" She was on her feet, trying with trembling fingers to put on her hat.

"Elizabeth, wait!" he panted, "wait; listen--I must speak--" And before she knew it, he had caught her in his arms, and she felt his breath on her mouth. She pushed him from her, gasping almost, and looking at him in anger and horror.

"How dare you?"

"Listen; only one minute!"

"I will not listen one second. Let me out of this room--out of this house!"

"Elizabeth, forgive me! I am mad!"

"You _are_ mad. I will never forgive you. Stand aside. Open the door."

"Elizabeth, I love you! I love you! Won't you listen--?"

But she had gone, flaming with anger and humiliation.

When Nannie came in an hour later, her brother was sitting with his head bowed in his hands. The room was quite dark; the fire had died down. The fire of pa.s.sion had died down, too, leaving only shame and misery and despair. His eyes, hidden in his bent arms, were wet; he was shaken to the depths of his being. For the first time in his life he had come against a thwarted desire. The education that should have been spread over his whole twenty-five years, an education that would have taught him how to meet the negations of life, of duty, of pity even, burst upon him now in one shattering moment. He had broken his law, his own law; and, mercifully, his law was breaking him. When he rose to his feet as his sister came into the room, he staggered under the shock of such concentrated education.

"Blair! What _is_ it?" she said, catching his arm.

"Nothing. Nothing. I've been a fool. Let me go."

"But tell me! I'm frightened. Blair!"

"It's nothing, I tell you. Nannie! Will she ever look at me again? Oh no, no; she will never forgive me! Why was I such a fool?"

"What _are_ you talking about?" poor Nannie said. It came into her head that he had suddenly gone out of his senses.

Blair sank down again in a heap on his chair.

"I've been a d.a.m.ned fool. I'm in love with Elizabeth, and--and I told her so."

CHAPTER XVIII

Of course, with that scene in the parlor, all the intimacies of youth were broken short off; although between the two girls some sort of relations.h.i.+p was patched up. Nannie, thrown suddenly into the whirlpool of her brother's emotions, was almost beside herself with distress; she was nearly twenty-eight years old, but this was her first contact with the primitive realities of life.

With that contact,--which made her turn away her horrified, virginal eyes; was the misery of knowing that Blair was suffering. She was ready to annihilate David, had such a thing been possible, to give her brother what he wanted. As David could not be made non-existent, she did her best to comfort Blair by trying to make Elizabeth forgive him. The very next day she came to plead that Blair might come himself to ask for pardon.

Elizabeth would not listen:

"Please don't speak of it."

"But Elizabeth--"

"I am perfectly furious, and I am very disgusted. I never want to see Blair again!"

At which Blair's sister lifted her head.

"Of course, he ought not to have spoken to you, but I think you forget that he loved you long before David did."

"Nonsense!" Elizabeth cried out impatiently.

But Nannie's tears touched her. "Nannie, I can't see him, and I won't; but I'll come and see you when he is not there." At which Nannie flared again.

"If you are angry at my brother, and can't forgive just a momentary, a pa.s.sing feeling,--which, after all, Elizabeth, _is_ a compliment; at least everybody says it's a compliment to have a man say he loves you--"

"Not if you're engaged to another man!" Elizabeth burst in, scarlet to her temples.

"Blair loved you before David thought of you."

"Now, Nannie, don't be silly."

"If you can't overlook it, because of our old friends.h.i.+p, you will have to drop me, too, Elizabeth."

Nannie was so pitiful and trembling that Elizabeth put her arms around her. "I'll never drop you, dear old Nannie!"

So, as far as the two girls were concerned, the habit of affection persisted; but Mrs. Maitland was not annoyed by having Elizabeth present when Blair came to supper.

Blair did not come to supper very often now; he did not come to the Works. "Is your brother sick?" Sarah Maitland asked her stepdaughter three or four days later. "He hasn't been at his desk since Monday. What's the matter with him?"

"He is worried about something, Mamma."

"Worried? What on earth has _he_ got to worry him?" she grunted. In her own worry she had come across the hall to speak to Nannie, and find out, if she could, something about Blair. As she turned to go back to the dining-room, a little more uneasy than when she came in, her eye fell on that picture which Blair had left, a small oasis in the desert of Nannie's parlor, and with her hand on the door-k.n.o.b she paused to look at it. The sun was lying on the dark oblong, and in those illuminated depths maternity was glowing like a jewel. Sarah Maitland saw no art, but she saw divine things. She bent forward and looked deep into the picture; suddenly her eyes smiled until her whole face softened. "Why, look at his little foot," she said, under her breath; "she's holding it in her hand!" She was silent for a moment; then she spoke as if to herself: "When Blair was as big as that, I bought him a pair of green morocco slippers. I don't suppose you remember them, Nannie? They b.u.t.toned round the ankle; they had white china b.u.t.tons. He used to try to pick the b.u.t.tons off." She smiled again vaguely; then blinked as if awakening from a dream, and blew a long bubbling sigh through her closed lips; "I can't imagine why he doesn't come to the office!"

In the dining-room, as she took up her pen, she frowned. "Debt again?" she asked herself. But when, absorbed and irritable, Blair came into her office at the Works, and sat down at his desk to write endless letters that he tore up as soon as they were written, she did not ask for any explanation. She merely told Robert Ferguson to tell the bookkeeper to make a change in the pay-roll. "I'm going to raise Blair's salary," she said. Money was the only panacea Mrs. Maitland knew anything about.

That next fortnight left its marks on Blair Maitland. People who have always had what they want, have a sort of irrational certainty of continuing to have what they want. It makes them a little unhumanly young. Blair's face, which had been as irresponsible as a young faun's, suddenly showed those scars of thwarted desire which mean age. There was actual agony in his sweet, shallow eyes, and with it the half-resentful astonishment of one who, being unaccustomed to suffering, does not know how to bear it. He grew very silent; he was very pale; in his pain he turned to his sister with an openness of emotion which frightened and shamed her; he had no self-control and no dignity.

"I must see her. I must, I must! Go and ask her to see me for a moment. I've disgusted her"--Nannie blushed; "but I'll make her forgive me." Sometimes he burst out in rages at David: "What does _he_ know about love? What kind of a man is he for Elizabeth? She's a girl now, but if he gets her, G.o.d help him when she wakes up, a woman! Not that _I_ mean to try to get her. Understand that. Nothing is farther from my mind than that.

She belongs to him; I play fair. I don't pretend to be a saint, but I play fair. I don't cut in, when the man's my friend. No; I just want to see her and ask her to forgive me. That's all.

Nannie, for G.o.d's sake ask her if she won't see me, just for five minutes!"

He quivered with despair. Twice he went himself to Mr. Ferguson's house. The first time Miss White welcomed him warmly, and scuttled up-stairs saying she would "tell Elizabeth." She came down again, very soberly. "Elizabeth is busy, Blair, and she says she can't see you." The next time he called he was told at the door that "Miss Elizabeth asks to be excused." Then he wrote to her: "All I ask is that you shall see me, so that I can implore you to pardon me."