Making Money Part 37

Think! I'm not saying a word against Louise."

"You'd better not!" said Fred, flus.h.i.+ng.

"Her character's as good as any one else's--granted that. But, Fred, that's not all. She's not of your world, her mother's not--her friends are not. If you marry her, Fred, as sure as there's a sun in heaven, you're ended, done for; you're dropped out of the world and you'll never get back!"

"Well, I'm going to do it," said DeLancy, stubbornly.

"You're going to do it and deliberately throw over every friend and every attachment you've got in life?"

"I don't admit that."

"What are you going to live on?" said Granning.

"I've got the money I made and what I make."

"What you make now," said Marsh, seizing the opening, "what you make because you know people and bring down customers! You yourself said it.

But when you drop out of society you'll drop out of business. You know it."

"I may fool you yet," said Fred angrily.

"You think you can play the Wall Street game and beat it," said Bojo, divining his thought. "Fred, if you marry, whatever else you do--quit gambling." Knowing more than the others, he had from the first known the hopelessness of argument. Still he persisted blindly. "Fred, can't you wait and think it over--let us talk it over with you?"

"I can't, Bojo, I can't. I've given my word!"

"Good G.o.d!" said Marsh, raising his hands to heaven in fury.

"Fred, can't you see what Roscy says is true?" said Granning, quieter than the rest.

"Even so, I'm going to do it," said Fred, in a low voice.

"But why?"

"Because I'm crazy, mad in love," said Fred, jumping up and pacing around. "Infatuated?--Yes!--Mad?--Yes! But there it is. I can't do without her. I've been like a wild man all these months. Whether it ruins me or not, I can't help it-- I've got to have her, and that's all there is to it!"

"Then I guess that's all there is to it," repeated Granning solemnly.

Marsh swore a fearful oath and went out.

"I want to talk to him a moment," said Bojo, turning to Granning with a nod. Granning went into the bedroom, while Bojo drew nearer to DeLancy.

"Fred, let's talk this over quietly."

"Oh, I know what you're going to fling at me," said Fred miserably.

"Gladys and all that. I know I'm a beast, I've no excuse. But, Bojo, I'm half wild! I don't know what I'm doing--honest I don't!"

"Is it as bad as all that, old fellow?" said Bojo, shaking his head.

"It's awful--awful." He sat down, burying his head in his hands.

"Fred, answer me--do you yourself _want_ to do this?"

"How do I know what I want!" he said breathlessly. He raised his head, staring in front. "I suppose it will end me with the crowd. I suppose that's true. Bojo, I know everything that it will do to me--everything.

I know it's suicide. But, Bojo, that doesn't do any good. Reasoning doesn't do any good--what's got to be has got to be! Now I've told you.

You'll see it's no use."

"I hope it will work out better than we think," said Bojo, solemnly.

"And Gladys?"

"I wrote to her."

"When?"

"Yesterday." He hesitated. "Her letters and one or two things--they're done up in a pile."

"I'll get them to her."

"Thank you." He turned. "I say, Bojo, stand by me in this, won't you?

I've got to have some one. Will you?"

"All right. I'll come."

At eleven o'clock in a little church up in Harlem he stood by DeLancy's side while the words were said that he knew meant the end of all things for him in the worldly world he had chosen for his own. It was more like an execution, and Bojo had a guilty, horribly guilty, feeling, as though he were partic.i.p.ating in a crime.

"Louise looks beautiful," he found the heart to whisper.

"Yes, doesn't she?" said Fred gratefully, with such a sudden leap in the eyes that Bojo felt something choking in his throat.

He waved them good-by after he had put them in the automobile, and took Mrs. Varney and a Miss Dingler, the maid of honor, home in a taxi. It was all very gloomy, shoddy, and depressing.

CHAPTER XXII

DORIS MEETS A CRISIS

It was toward the end of August, when the dry exhaustion of the summer had begun to be touched with the healing cool of delicious nights, that Bojo and Granning were lolling on the window-seat, busy at their pipes.

Below in the Court foggy shapes were sunk in cozy chairs under the spread of the great cotton umbrella, and the languid echoes of wandering, contented conversation came to them like the pleasant closing sounds of the day across twilight fields--the homing jingle of cattle, the returning creak of laden wagons seeking the barns, or a tiny distant welcome from a barking throat.

"Ouf! It's good to get a lung-full of cool air again," said Bojo, turning gratefully to an easier position.

"Well, how do you like being a h.o.r.n.y-handed son of toil?" said Granning.

"I like it."

"You're through the worst of it now."