Stepsons of Light Part 9

"A fine girl," said Adam Forbes. "The only girl! To-morrow--"

He fell silent; again in his heart that parting cadence knelled with keen and intolerable sorrow. The roots of his hair p.r.i.c.kled, ants crawled on his spine. So tingles the pulsing blood, perhaps, when a man is fey, when the kisses of his mouth are numbered.

Edith went home to the big lonely house, but Lyn Dyer and Hobby Lull lingered by the low fire. Mr. Lull a.s.sumed a dignified pose before the fireplace, feet well apart and his hands clasped behind his back. He regarded Miss Dyer with a twinkling eye.

"Have you anything to say to the court before sentence is p.r.o.nounced?"

he inquired with lofty judicial calm.

Miss Dyer avoided his glance. She stood drooping before him; she looked to one side at the floor; she looked to the other side at the floor. The toe of her little shoe poked and twisted at a knot in the floor.

"Extenuating circ.u.mstances?" she suggested hopefully.

"Name them to the court."

"The--the moon, I guess." The inquisitive shoe traced crosses and circles upon the knot in the flooring. "And Charlie See," she added desperately. "Charlie has such eloquent eyes, Hobby--don't you think?"

She raised her little curly head for a tentative peep at the court; her own eyes were s.h.i.+ning with mischief. The court unclasped its hands.

"I ought to shake you," declared Hobby. But he did not shake her at all.

"You're the only young man in Garfield who wears his face clean-shaven," remarked Lyn reflectively, a little later. "Charlie would look much better without a mustache, I think."

He pushed her away and tipped up her chin with a gentle hand so that he could look into her eyes. "Little brown lady with curly eyes and laughing hair--are you quite fair to Charlie See?"

"No," said Lyn contritely, "I'm not. I suppose we ought to tell him."

"We ought to tell everybody. So far as I am concerned, I would enjoy being a sandwich man placarded in big letters: 'Property of Miss Lyn Dyer.'"

"Why, Hobbiest--I thought it was rather nice that we had such a great big secret all our own. But you're right--I see that now. I should have met him at the door, I suppose, and said, 'You are merely wasting your time, Mr. See. I will never desert my Wilkins!' Only that might have been a little awkward, in a way, because, you see, 'n.o.body asked you to,' he said--or might have said."

"He never told you, then?"

"Not a word."

"But you knew?"

"Yes," said Lyn. "I knew." She twisted a b.u.t.ton on his coat and spoke with a little wistful catch in her voice. "I do like him, Hobby--I can't help it. Only so much." She indicated how much on the nail of a small finger. "Just a little teeny bit. But that little bit is--"

"Strictly plutonic?"

"Yes," she said in a small meek voice. "How did you know? He makes me like him, Hobbiest. It--it scares me sometimes."

"Pretty cool, I'll say, for a girl that has only been engaged a week, if you should happen to ask me."

"Oh, but that's not the same thing--not the same thing at all! You couldn't keep me from liking you, not if you tried ever so hard. That is all settled. But Charlie makes me like him. You see, he is such a real people; I feel like the Griffin did about the Minor Canon: 'He was brave and good and honest, and I think I should have relished him.'"

Hobby held her at arm's length and regarded her quizzically. "So young, and yet so tender?"

"'So young, my lord, and true.'"

"Well," said Hobby resignedly, "I suppose we'll have to quarrel, of course. They all do. But I don't know how to go about it. What do I say next?"

"I might as well tell you the worst, angelest pieface. You ought to know what a shocking horrid little creature your brown girl really is. You won't ever tell--honest-to-goodness, cross-your-heart-and-hope-to-die?"

"Never."

"Say it, then."

"Honest-to-goodness, cross-my-heart-and-hope-to-die."

She buried her face on his breast. "I dreamed about him last night, Hobby. Wasn't that queer? I hadn't thought of him before for months--weeks, anyhow."

"A week, maybe?" suggested Hobby.

"Oh, more than that! Two weeks, at the very least. I--I hate to tell you," she whispered. "I--I dreamed I liked him almost as much as I do you!"

"Why, you brazen little bigamist!"

"Yes, I am--I mean, ain't I?" she a.s.sented complacently, for his arms belied his words. "But that's not the worst, Hobbiest--that's not nearly the dreadfulest. When I woke up I--I wrote some--some verses about my dream. Are you awfully angry? We'll burn them together after you read them."

"Woman, produce those verses! I will take charge of them as 'Exhibit A.'"

"And then you'll beat me, please?"

"Oh, no," said Hobby magnanimously. "That's nothing! Pish, tus.h.!.+ Why, Linoleum, I feel that way about lots of girls. Molly Sullivan, now--"

"Hobby!"

"I always like to dream of Molly. One of the best companions to take along in a dream--"

"Only-est! Please don't!"

"Well, then," said Hobby, "I won't--on one condition. It is to be distinctly understood under no circ.u.mstances are you ever to call me Charlie. I won't stand for it. Dig up your accursed doggerel!"

This is what Hobby Lull read aloud, with exaggerated fervor, while Lyn huddled by the dying fire and hid her burning face in her hands:

_Last night I kissed you as you slept, For all night long I dreamed of you; Lower and low the hearth fire crept, The embers glowed and dimmed; we two Heard the wind rave at bolt and door With all the world shut out and fast, Doubted, hoped, questioned, feared no more, And all we sought was ours at last._

_I do not love you, dear. I never loved you, Grudged what I gave, a wayward tenderness; Yet in my dream I wooed you with white arms And lingering soft caress.

Now for all years to come I must remember, When fires burn dim and low, This false dear dream of mine, that stolen hour-- Your face of long ago._

_I shall awaken in some midnight lonely, I shall remember you as one apart, How for one hour of dream I loved you only And held you in my heart.

And you, through all the years since first you met me Still let my memory gleam; Oh, my old lover! Do not quite forget me!

I loved you--in my dream!_

Hobby cleared his throat impressively, tapped his table with the paper, and a.s.sumed measured judicial accents.

"This incriminating doc.u.ment proves--hah--hum--"