Lonesome Town Part 14

"And has Miss Lauderdale no-no brothers or--" the visitor began.

"No near relative except ourselves, nor money enough to a.s.sure her independence. But we are only too happy to have her need us, to love her and provide for her. She is-" Mrs. Sturgis hesitated and seemed to be choosing her words with a nice regard for the delicacy of the subject.

"She is perhaps just a bit strong-minded for the taste of men, our dear Jane. But strength is a splendid quality in a woman if applied in the right direction. Don't you think so? Perhaps you don't, though, being a tower of strength yourself. Anyway, Jane Lauderdale is a dear girl-and _so_ dependable."

Mrs. Sturgis _did_ hope he was enjoying to the full his stay in New York. Yes, her daughter would be down directly and it _was_ nice of him to ask the child riding. She did not often consent to her essaying the park. Irene's daring was her real reason for keeping their horses in the country, although she pretended that it was for the horses' sake. He, being such a friend of her niece, came well recommended. Miss Lauderdale had told state secrets about him-had admitted at Irene's demand that he was the most superb horseman she had met in the West. That p.r.o.nounced him capable of taking care of a woman if any one could. Irene rode well, to be sure. But there always was a risk about a rented mount. And there were so many unexpected turns along the park bridle paths and such whizzing of cars and shrieking of sirens. She hoped that he had selected a safe mount for her child.

"I thought some, ma'am, of having Polkadot, my own friend horse, saddled up feminine," Pape advised her. "But he ain't used even to the skirts of a habit coat. Besides which, it might have put his Roman nose out of joint to see me forking another. No telling what a jealous horse will do."

"Any more than a jealous woman," she contributed.

"Can't say as to the women. But I reckon that, jealous, they ain't agreeable or safe, either. I've made a practice of sloping along at the first eye-flicker of that sort of trouble. But you cheer up, Mrs.

Sturgis. The filly I picked as a trailmate for my Dot this morning is as reliable as the hobbies in the riding school."

Despite her manner-and, positively, she was treating him like an eligible-the mother's black brows had lifted semi-occasionally during his speech, he presumed at his choice of language. Although he jotted down a mental note of the necessity of increased care to weed out his unseasonable crop of hardy range vernacular, somehow her presence made him worse. He remembered having read somewhere that the choice of topics in a refined duet of mixed s.e.xes should be left to the lady. The thought proved restful; left him some spare time for self-communings.

Why hadn't Jane Lauderdale at the very start of the game told him that she was married? Worse he wouldn't-couldn't-believe of her. To do her justice, she hadn't exactly encouraged him, yet she scarcely could have helped seeing with both eyes bandaged the weak state he was in.

When she had thrown open a top-floor-front window of that old, scaly, painted-brick retreat of hers last night, had she observed him standing in the shadow of the odorous gas tank opposite? If so, did she understand the hard-dying hope which had kept him stationed there an hour, with five minutes thrown in to benefit the sickening doubt which had been tricked into certainty?

If she had seen and understood, did she pity or exult over his observances and deductions? The building was four stories and an attic high. The variance in window curtaining proclaimed it a "flat" house containing at least four separate sets of tenants. As proof, a young mother had emerged with a wailing infant onto the third floor fire-escape landing; a party of four, s.h.i.+rt-sleeved and kimono-clad, could be seen playing cards at a table just within the windows of the second-floor front; the shades of the first were jerked down when the gas was lit. And surely none who could afford the s.p.a.ce of an entire house would have endured the district.

That beneficial five minutes which failed to benefit he had thrown in after the top floor lights had been suddenly turned out. He'd never have known the stubbornness of his hope that she would reappear, except for hope's slow death. Undoubtedly she who was known to him as Miss Lauderdale had settled for the night in the home of the tall, blond man who had kissed her in the doorway. He knew where one member of the Sturgis family, at least, went for peace and quiet!

A question had been asked him; had been repeated with a slight crescendo of the modulated voice which had played accompaniment to his tragic reminiscence; recalled him to the here and now. From the matron's surprised look and her wait for some sort of response, he realized that automatic answers didn't always satisfy. What was it she had asked?

"You have a family tree, Mr. Pope-I mean Pape? Pape _is_ such an odd name, isn't it?"

"Sure-that is to say, certainly, madam. A forest of the same."

She frowned in face of his attempt at elegant diction and intent to make her smile.

"I fear you don't quite grasp my meaning. It is the Pape lineage I mean.

You can trace it back, I suppose?"

Just here was Peter Pape's cue to spread out all his Stansbury cards upon the table, but in trying to match this mother in rose-hued negligee, he overplayed the hand.

"Oh, we go back to the days long before kings and queens or even jacks, Mrs. Sturgis-clear to Adam and Eve and the apple orchard."

This time she beamed. "Indeed! And you have an escutcheon?"

Before he could a.s.sure her, the daughter of the house clattered in high-heeled boots through the doorway.

Irene wore white cloth breeches and a black suede coat, no hat at all and a radiant freshness that took his breath. In the stress of recent doings and undoings, he had forgotten the spectacular beauty of this particular young lady of to-day. Crow-haired was she, bright-cheeked, brighter-lipped. The slight unevenness of her dazzling display of teeth but added piquancy to her smile. She was both strong-built and lithe of body. And as to her mind, never an incipient doubt of her super-desirability weakened that. Truly, she was a vital and vitalizing creature, Irene.

It was not unpleasant to have a beautiful girl greet him with frank cordiality. After recent roughnesses of his experience-Well, not since that floral-wreathed sign first had blazed its rea.s.surance into his nostalgic gaze had he been made to feel so welcome.

"Oh, you poor man-you poor, dear, bored-to-death man!" she offered with both her hands. "Has my maternal mamma been talking you to pieces about my virtues? I'll bet you have, at that, you darling villainess!"

Freeing one hand, she shook her ivory-handled crop at her protesting parent, then almost at once re-seized Pape's sunburned paw.

"It's your very own fault I took so long to get ready. Do I hear you asking why, Why-Not? Because your groom rode up on the most satiny black that ever stopped before our domicile, instead of the regular roan I expected. I was all togged out in my new tan covert, but of course had to change in order to be becoming to the black. I'm _never_ late!"

_"My dear!"_

There was incredulity in Mrs. Sturgis' voice.

"You mustn't get nasty, dar-rling. You know that I'm _almost_ never, except to punish people. And of course Mr. Pape and I haven't got far enough along for me to need to punish him-_not yet_."

Although nothing seemed to be expected of him, Pape sought for a seemly retort. "Let us hope that we never get that far along."

"Let us hope that we get there soon," she corrected him. "Come, shan't we be on our way?"

Mrs. Sturgis followed them to the street door; showed a becoming anxiety; hoped, even prayed, that they'd return safely.

"Safely and anon-don't expect me sooner than anon."

Irene tossed the promise with a finger-flung kiss from the saddle into which she had swung with scarcely a foot-touch upon the stirrup held for her. Pape instructed the groom as to his return to stables on the other side of the park. They were off on the most parade-effect ride in which he, for one, ever had partic.i.p.ated.

The girl pulled in close enough to keep talking during their necessarily sedate pace down the avenue toward The Plaza entrance to the park.

"You were a dear to keep calling up while I was in the country. Oh, don't look so innocent!"

Her charge made him hope he wasn't showing in his face the strange something that happened to his spinal column each time she called him "dear"-he felt so sure that she only was leading up to that adorably Yankee-ized "dar-rling" of hers.

"I'm sorry if I-glad if I look innocent."

"You ought to be. Any modern man ought to be." She laughed more happily than he could manage to do at the moment. "And don't you deny calling me-don't you deny anything! It won't do a bit of good."

Believing that it wouldn't-not with Irene-he didn't.

"You see, Jasper's butlering job depends upon his accuracy," she continued. "Well he knows if he lost me one single message from one single only man I ever loved--"

"We trust that all your only-ever men are single?" he persiflaged into her pause.

"Most. Never cared for the back-door and porch affairs-one has to be so discreet. You don't yourself, do you, Why-Not?"

In her query Pape saw an opening for the idea which had wakened him up.

Not that he would have pried into the affairs of Jane Lauderdale through her discreet-and-proud-of-it young cousin any more than he had crossed the cobbles of that soiled East Side street last night to question her fellow-tenants on the fire escape. No. He knew he couldn't and wouldn't do anything so deliberately base as that. But if Irene must babble, it was only fair that she babble upon a subject that interested the semi-silent member of the colloquy. So--

"No, I don't like side-porch affairs," he admitted, "although I've got the reputation of being discreet."

"That's why you're so nice-nice," enthused Irene. "The man's being good gives the girl all the better chance to be bad. Oh, I _hope_ I've shocked you! Come across, B. B.-that's short either for 'Blus.h.i.+ng Bachelor' or 'Brazen Benedict.' _Haven't_ I?

"You'll shock me worse if you don't hold in until that traffic cop blows his horn."

With the warning, Pape reached over and himself curbed her black until their crossing into the bridle path was whistle-advised.

Probably she considered that the time had come to start "punis.h.i.+ng" him, for, once in the park, she literally ran away from him along the East Path which so far he had traveled alone. But Polkadot, a.s.serting his indignation in none too subtle snorts, soon overhauled the rented horse, then showed his equine etiquette by settling to a companionable walk.

His man, too, after one look into the flushed, exultant, impish face beneath the cloud of wind-tossed curls, forgave.