The Empty Sack Part 49

"No; because the things said were very simple-just statements of fact as to which there could be no misunderstanding."

"Had the statements of fact anything"-he moistened his dry lips-"anything to do with-with Hubert?"

"Some of them. But there!" She caught herself up. "You're not going to make me tell you things. I'm your mother, and if I intervene at all, it must be in the way of helping you to come together and not of putting you apart." She rose, drawing her cloak about her. "I think I must go in, dear. I'm beginning to feel the damp."

He, too, rose, sitting down again sidewise on the rustic rail of the summerhouse.

"Wait a minute, mother. I want to ask you something. When I was at Marillo I wandered into your room one day and saw a picture."

"A picture?"

"Yes; a picture; and I-I wondered how it-it happened to come there."

She bent a little toward him, drawing her cloak more closely about her.

If it was acting it was well done.

"It-it couldn't have been-"

He chucked the b.u.t.t of his cigarette into the lake.

"Yes, I guess it was. It had an inscription on it-'Life and Death, by Hubert Wray.'"

"Oh, my G.o.d! Where did you say you saw it, Bob?"

"In your bedroom, against the wall. I thought it might be a portrait you'd had done, and so lifted-"

"And I told them to put it out of sight. You see, Hubert didn't send it till after we'd left the house-just before he went to California. I'd given orders that it was to be locked up in an empty closet in my wardrobe room. Oh, Bob darling, I don't know what you're going to think of me."

"Oh, you're all right, mother. It wasn't you. I-I only wondered how you'd come by the thing at all."

She made an obvious effort at controlling emotion.

"Why, Bob, it was this way. After-after what Jennie told me that day I-I naturally thought a good deal about Hubert-and-and their relations to each other-"

"She talked about them, did she?"

"Well, you see, in a way she had to. She was let in for it, poor thing.

I can't tell you everything without giving you the whole story-and it's _her_ story, as I've said before. I've no right to betray her, and least of all to you."

"All right. Go on."

"So when I'd heard that Hubert had a new picture at the Kahler Gallery-and everyone was talking about it-and I knew from the things they said what-what sort of a picture it was-"

"Yes, yes; I understand."

"Well, then, I-I went and saw it; and to-to get it out of sight I bought it on the spot. I didn't want it to be still on exhibition when you came back; and I hoped that people would forget it. I should have burned it at once, only that Hubert delayed sending it, and-well, you see how it happened. But even so, Bob dear, you knew you were marrying a model-"

"Oh yes; it isn't that-not altogether."

She laid her hand on his shoulder.

"What is it, Bob darling? Can't you tell _me_? I'm your mother, dear-"

But he moved away from her touch, as if unable to bear sympathy.

"I can't tell you yet, old lady. I must see my own way first. I've got to get through this business about the boy before I take any step whatever. She knows pretty well that I know that-that she and Hubert are in love with-with each other-"

"Oh, but Hubert is not in love with her. He told me so."

"Not in love with her?" he cried, sharply. "Why isn't he?"

"He said-oh, Bob, I can't talk about it. You'll-"

"You've got to talk about it, mother. I can't _half_ know. I must _know_! If he wasn't in love with her, what did he mean by making her think-"

"I don't believe he did make her think. He hinted that-that there'd been something between them, but that-that with girls of that sort you-you couldn't call it love."

"Why couldn't you?"

"Because-no, I won't, Bob! I'm your mother. I must make things easier for you, and not harder, and so-"

"It will make things easiest for me to know the truth. So go on! Out with it! Tell me just what he said."

She wrung her hands beneath the cloak.

"He said it-it couldn't be love-with a girl whom-whom anyone could-"

He sprang from the rail, holding up his hand.

"Wait a minute, mother! Jennie's my wife. I'm her husband. I believe in her."

With her speed in tr.i.m.m.i.n.g her sails to the wind, Junia caught the direction.

"I don't want you _not_ to believe in her, Bob. I didn't want to say any of the things that-that you've been dragging out of me. You know that."

"Yes, I know that, old lady, and I'm grateful. I had to drag them out and know the worst that could be said, so as to contradict it in-in my heart."

"Oh, in your heart!"

"Yes, in my heart. It's where I'm strongest-just as it's where dad is strongest, too, if he'd only been true to himself. But that's a side issue. What I want to say now-and what I'd like you to understand-is that I _know_ that Jennie is good and pure and true and one of the sweetest and loveliest spirits G.o.d ever made. I know it!"

Junia couldn't be as feminine as she was without gazing in awe and admiration at the tall, upright figure, which seemed taller and more upright for the moonlight.

"Would you know it-mind you, I'm only _putting_ it this way-would you know it-with her own evidence to the contrary?"

"Yes, mother; I should know it-with her own evidence to the contrary."

She s.h.i.+vered and turned away from him.