The Shadow Part 39

"I'll be out of the way soon enough now," he said. "I'm off on the road to-morrow."

"Yes, dear."

"You couldn't go to her room by and by, could you, and tell her I'm sorry I made such a rumpus?"

"Of course. And I will say, d.i.c.k, that I think this time she is as much to blame as you. You only ran down the darkies, but she----"

"She lambasted me, all right. I know I'm not her kind. But what does she think she's going to get?" His anger flared up again for a moment. "Does she expect to find a prince in that precious school of hers? Or perhaps she thinks she'll meet him when she goes to work in Wall Street. That's so, she might, and he'd fall to her, all right."

He grew jealous at his picture and fear overtook him; for as Mrs.

Pickens had said, there was more than one beau for a pretty girl, and Hertha was more than pretty--she was a woman whom a man could not forget.

"I've got to have her," he said, looking beyond the reach of the room out into the s.p.a.ce in which Hertha's self stood out before him. "I can't see anything without her. You're mighty good to me," he added as he turned to go, "it was a lucky day when Jim Watson steered me up these steps."

"I haven't done anything," Mrs. Pickens made haste to answer, "but I promise after this I'll do what I can."

At ten o'clock she knocked at his door. He opened to her at once, and, seeing his face drop, she knew that he had hoped for a word from another visitor.

"You'll see her at breakfast, d.i.c.k; that's all I could get for you. I think she's more hurt than you or I can understand."

d.i.c.k sat at his open window until midnight, and tossed on his bed for a long time after that. He remembered the afternoon of yesterday when together they had sat in the boat and had walked among the flowers, quietly living in the spirit of the spring. And now, to-night a thunderstorm had come and drenched them both! He liked his imagery, and, tired of cursing himself, turned over at last and went to sleep.

She did appear at breakfast the next morning dressed for her school, and looking as she always looked, quite composed and very lovely. But when at the door he stopped to say good-by, she, for the first time, went out and walked to the car with him. All the way he did not say a word, so fearful was he of uttering the wrong one. They stood on the corner, both silent, till her car came in sight.

"I hope you'll have a pleasant trip," she said, holding out her hand to him.

"Thank you," he answered, shaking the hand limply.

So fearful was he that he would offend her by holding it a moment too long that he scarcely grasped it at all. But, save for this slight error, certainly on the safe side of the account, he behaved with the utmost correctness. She boarded the car and pa.s.sed from his sight. But to the inward eye of memory she stood, illumined with the golden light of a lover's wors.h.i.+p, aureoled, winged, a creature for the heaven of the enraptured G.o.ds.

CHAPTER XXVIII

It was a great relief to Hertha when d.i.c.k went away. She had been indignantly angry at his railing against the colored people, "her people," as she had so lately called them; and, added to her anger, was a sense of impotence, of inability properly to answer him. Sometimes she almost believed that it was her duty to tell the whole family the story of her life--only thus could she convince them of the virtue of the Negro. But she shrank inexpressibly from such a revelation. To tell of the goodness of her colored mother meant that she must also tell of the sin of her own mother, a sin accounted so great a disgrace that it was hidden at the cost of a white child's racial integrity. They would enjoy the story, she had no doubt. Mrs. Pickens would love it as pure gossip and Miss Wood would enjoy it equally, though she would cover her pleasure with the veil of the interest of a sociologist. To talk about herself was always repugnant to Hertha, and to speak to these new people of her past was becoming unthinkable. The man she meant to marry should know of it, but she pushed all thought of marriage from her life.

d.i.c.k's words, however, rankled daily, and while it was a futile pursuit, destined in no way to help to install the Negro in his rightful place in Mrs. Pickens' household, she spent many hours picturing the Georgia boy's childhood and contrasting it unfavorably with her own. He had told her something of his home, she had seen one of his mother's letters, and she made what was in reality a fairly shrewd guess at his former surroundings. When a little girl she had lived near a white family that counted itself of importance, but whose standards she despised. These people occupied a long, low house, devoid of paint or whitewash, with broken steps from which the railing was long since absent. The rooms of the house opened upon a porch and near the steps was a table with a pitcher and bowl. It was the washroom of the home, and at noon especially it was amusing to watch the men come up and with much spluttering pour water over their faces and run their wet hands through their hair. Ablutions were performed here day and night. The rear of the house was ill-kept and dirty, and once, when Tom brought home a bright piece of rug, thrown out on the dust heap, Mammy rebuked him sharply and burned the offending rag in the stove. The men of the house had been rough and unmannerly and the ugly, sallow women had dipped snuff and looked like slatterns. Probably d.i.c.k's sisters (he had told her he had two older sisters) were sallow, with straight thin hair and shrill voices. If they did not dip snuff, they certainly chewed gum, a practice in which d.i.c.k himself indulged. "Cheap white trash, dirty white trash,"

this would be the best word her mammy could say for such people, except perhaps after a good meal or an uplifting sermon when she would admit that they "hadn't had advantages."

And yet it was the memory of her colored mother and not the word of apology from d.i.c.k or of excuse from Mrs. Pickens that brought Hertha to the car that Monday morning. Ellen, she felt sure, would have rejoiced at her retort, thrilling with pleasure at it, but Mammy would have been grieved. "Don' make yoursel' cheap, chile," she had once said in rebuke to Ellen, after her daughter had broken out in fierce and angry attack upon a stupid father whom she could not persuade to do his duty by his children. "Keep you' temper. Bad manners carry you back on you' path."

Hertha knew that she had not kept her temper, and in recognition of the training from a gentle teacher reared in a school whose doors have long since closed, she made her gesture of apology. But her resentment against the "cheap cracker" was slow in dying out, and she rejoiced as she moved about the house that he was absent from it.

She and Bob became greater friends than ever and took many walks in the park, watching with happy interest the change from spring to full summer. On a Friday afternoon of the week that d.i.c.k had left she went to the great department store in New York where she loved to make her few purchases to buy a top for Bob, partly on Bob's account, partly because she herself enjoyed the outing. It was late in the season for tops, but in the interminable story that meandered on through the pleasant paths they traversed in the park Tom-of-the-Woods was spinning his top and Bob wanted a new one of his own. So, in no hurry over her purchase, lingering to look at the lovely silks and satins in the great rotunda, Hertha at last found herself in the bas.e.m.e.nt and, appealing to a floor walker, was directed to the fifth floor where tops were to be found among the toys. She pushed her way into the elevator and, standing well in the rear, waited while the other customers got out one by one until, left alone, the boy at the wheel called out "Fifth floo', upholstery, curtains, toys."

When she was new to the city she had looked curiously at the dark faces of the men who ran the elevators, thinking that some time she might see one that she knew. But this had never happened and she had ceased to expect it. There was no mistaking, however, the pleasant drawling voice, the long drawn out "toy-ese" that came from the man at the wheel.

Impetuously moving forward and grasping his arm before he had time to open the door she drew him around to her and cried out "Tom!"

"Yes'm," he answered, looking at her with a serious smile.

He had changed, but for the better, she saw that in a flash. His mouth was more firmly set, about his eyes was a more determined look. He was still a boy, but was fast gaining the outlook upon the world of a man.

"Tom!" Hertha cried again, "what are you doing here?"

She held his arm in hers. "Let go, Hertha," he said in a tone of command, "I must open the door."

She loosed her hold and he drew the door open, but no one entered and they shot on up again.

"How far do you go?" she asked.

"To the eighth."

"Well, stop here!" They were still alone, moving on above the sixth floor. "Stop here, Tom, between these floors, please, please!"

Her voice was full of emotion and he turned his wheel and stopped at her bidding. He had seen her when she entered and his surprise was not great like hers. That she was a beautiful young woman, taking her place in the white world, was what he had expected. He felt pride in her pretty dress and graceful carriage; but he recognized her aloofness, her position with the dominant race. Now, however, as she grasped his arm and greeted him with the old, bright, comradely look, for a moment he felt himself her boy again.

"Why aren't you at school?" she demanded.

He was recalled to his position by repeated clicks of his indicator.

"You know, Sister," the name slipped out unawares, "I can't explain a thing like that between two floo's with the bells ringing for me above and below."

"Then come and explain it to me to-night. You must, Tom. I'll do something desperate if you don't come."

Her face was aglow with excitement, her eyes shone and she gripped her silk-gloved hands together.

Doubtful whether he should obey her, he still could not resist her pleading. "All right, I'll come," he promised and sprang the car upward.

They had another moment alone when she slipped her address in his hand and described rapidly the way to reach her home. "Now I know you never broke your word," she whispered as she stepped back in the bas.e.m.e.nt again.

Fearing that the slight delay she had caused in the running time of the elevator might arouse some criticism, she summoned all her courage, drew herself up with a more impressive air than she had ever yet a.s.sumed, and addressed the starter.

"I was glad to recognize that elevator boy of yours," she said with condescension, "he comes from my home town."

"Yes, Madam," the man answered.

"He is thoroughly trustworthy," she went on, "I know, for he has worked in my family."

"I thought he was a good boy," the man said, bowing to her, "but we are always grateful for further references."

Hertha nodded and made her way out.

It was not until she was almost at her doorstep that she remembered that she had failed to buy the top.

"I'm glad I didn't tell Bob I was getting it for him," she thought remorsefully, "but how should I remember it when I met Tom-of-the-Woods himself!"

During dinner, Mrs. Pickens, as she looked at Hertha from time to time, sitting silently in her place, thought she had never seemed so lovely.

Too often of late she had been worried and tired; to-night her face expressed a glad content, her pale cheeks were pink with color, and every now and then a look of expectancy came into her eyes. Something had happened, of this her landlady felt sure, and she regretted that she was going out and could not properly interrogate her pretty boarder.