“Yes,” almost inaudibly.
“Louise! Oh, I don’t believe it.”
“It is true,” she said sadly. “Halsey,
you must not try to see me again. As soon as
I can, I am going away from here—where you
are all so much kinder than I deserve. And whatever
you hear about me, try to think as well of me as you
can. I am going to marry—another
man. How you must hate me—hate me!”
I could hear Halsey cross the room to the window.
Then, after a pause, he went back to her again.
I could hardly sit still; I wanted to go in and give
her a good shaking.
“Then it’s all over,” he was saying
with a long breath. “The plans we made
together, the hopes, the—all of it—over!
Well, I’ll not be a baby, and I’ll give
you up the minute you say `I don’t love you
and I do love—some one else’!”
“I can not say that,” she breathed, “but,
very soon, I shall marry—the other man.”
I could hear Halsey’s low triumphant laugh.
“I defy him,” he said. “Sweetheart,
as long as you care for me, I am not afraid.”
The wind slammed the door between the two rooms just
then, and I could hear nothing more, although I moved
my chair quite close. After a discreet interval,
I went into the other room, and found Louise alone.
She was staring with sad eyes at the cherub painted
on the ceiling over the bed, and because she looked
tired I did not disturb her.
AN EGG-NOG AND A TELEGRAM
We had discovered Louise at the lodge Tuesday night.
It was Wednesday I had my interview with her.
Thursday and Friday were uneventful, save as they
marked improvement in our patient. Gertrude
spent almost all the time with her, and the two had
grown to be great friends. But certain things
hung over me constantly; the coroner’s inquest
on the death of Arnold Armstrong, to be held Saturday,
and the arrival of Mrs. Armstrong and young Doctor
Walker, bringing the body of the dead president of
the Traders’ Bank. We had not told Louise
of either death.
Then, too, I was anxious about the children.
With their mother’s inheritance swept away
in the wreck of the bank, and with their love affairs
in a disastrous condition, things could scarcely be
worse. Added to that, the cook and Liddy had
a flare-up over the proper way to make beef-tea for
Louise, and, of course, the cook left.
Mrs. Watson had been glad enough, I think, to turn
Louise over to our care, and Thomas went upstairs
night and morning to greet his young mistress from
the doorway. Poor Thomas! He had the faculty—found
still in some old negroes, who cling to the traditions
of slavery days—of making his employer’s
interest his. It was always “we”
with Thomas; I miss him sorely; pipe-smoking, obsequious,
not over reliable, kindly old man!
On Thursday Mr. Harton, the Armstrongs’ legal
adviser, called up from town. He had been advised,
he said, that Mrs. Armstrong was coming east with
her husband’s body and would arrive Monday.
He came with some hesitation, he went on, to the
fact that he had been further instructed to ask me
to relinquish my lease on Sunnyside, as it was Mrs.
Armstrong’s desire to come directly there.
