The Sherrods Part 31

"I--I didn't call you in, sir," said she, looking helplessly at the clerk.

"I called you in, officer," said the clerk. "She didn't know what to do."

"Will, it's up to you, ma'am. We'll find him if yez say so."

"Do you know any one else in Chicago?" asked the clerk. "Maybe there's some one you could go to while they're trying to find your husband."

"I don't know any one here," she said, despairingly.

"Don't you want to leave your grip here? We'll take care of it till you come after it."

"That'll be all right, ma'am. It'll be safe here, an' yez don't want to be luggin' it around town wid that kid on yer hands. L'ave it here," said Officer Maher, and he picked it up and carried it behind the prescription counter before she could remonstrate. The clerk handed her a card containing the name and location of the store.

"Oh, I do know some one here," she cried suddenly, her face brightening. "Miss Celeste Wood. Do you think I could find her?"

To her dismay, the name was not in the directory.

"Does she live with her parents?" asked the clerk.

"I--I think so," replied Justine, helplessly.

"Do you know her father's name?"

"No, sir. She has a brother named Randall. Would his name be in the book?"

Young Wood's name and address were readily found by the clerk, and Officer Maher advised her to take a cab to the place at once. These men unceremoniously took matters in their own hands, and, almost before she knew it, a cab was taking her northward, bound for the home of the girl who had so often sent her love, through Jud, to the other girl of Proctor's Falls.

The ride gave her ample time to reflect and she had not gone far before her thoughts were running once more in a straight channel. Her pride grew as the situation became plainer, displacing the first dread and confusion. How could she go to a stranger and inflict her with her troubles? What right had she to ask her a.s.sistance or even her interest in this hour of need? Besides all this, the mere confession that she could not find her husband would be humiliating to her and explanations would be sure to put Jud in an unpleasant light. It would mean that she must tell Miss Wood of his failure in everything, a condition which the young woman might politely deplore, but that was all. Her own poor garments now seemed the shabby reflection of Jud's poverty, his degradation, his fall from the high pedestal that had been his by promise. She could not look down into the bright, laughing eyes of her boy and go on to the shameful exposition of his father's misfortune. The red of pride mounted to her brown cheeks and the new fire in her eyes burned bright with the resolution to save him and herself from the humiliation of an appeal to Miss Wood.

Past rows of magnificent homes she was driven, but they interested her not at all. Beneath her pride, however, there battled the fast-diminis.h.i.+ng power of reason. Try as she would, she could not drive out the stubborn spark which told her that she must call upon some one in her helplessness--but that the "some one" should be a woman was distressing. As she was struggling with pride and reason, the cab turned in and drew up at the curb in front of a handsome house. Her heart gave a great bound of dismay.

"This is No. ----, ma'am," said the driver, as he threw open the door.

"I--I don't believe I'll go in," she stammered, trembling in every nerve.

"Where shall I take you?" he asked wearily. Little he cared for the emotions of his fares.

"Are you sure this is the place?" she asked.

"Yes, ma'am. Do you want to get out?"

Fresh courage inspired her, brought about by the sharp realization that it was the only way to find help, humiliating though the method might be. There was no other way, and his question: "Where shall I take you?" reminded her forcibly that she had no place to go.

"Yes," she said, decisively, and with the haste of one who is afraid that hesitation will bring weakness, she stepped to the carriage-block.

"Shall I wait, ma'am?"

"I don't know how long I'll be here," she said, her ignorance confronted by another puzzle. The driver saw in his mind sufficient cause for her uncertainty, and sagely concluded that she was a poor mother who expected to find a home for her babe with the wealthy people who lived at No. ----.

"I'll drive into the park and be back in half an hour, ma'am, if you think you'll be there that long," he said, and away he rolled. She mounted the steps quickly and, after a long and embarra.s.sing search, found the electric b.u.t.ton and rang the door bell. A trim maid responded. Justine had fondly hoped that Miss Wood herself would come to the door, and her heart sank with disappointment.

"Is Miss Wood at home?" she managed to ask.

"She does not live here," replied the maid, surveying the caller with a superior and supercilious air.

"I thought her brother----" began Justine, faintly. She felt as if she were about to fall.

"Mr. and Mrs. Wood live here, and they have a married daughter living over in S---- Place. I have only been here since Monday, ma'am, and I can't tell you her address."

"It is Miss Celeste Wood I want to see," said poor Justine, her lip trembling.

"That's the name--Celeste. She was here yesterday, and I heard Mrs.

Wood speak the name. Won't Mrs. Wood do as well?" There was kindness in the voice now; Justine's eyes had made their usual conquest.

"I'd--I'd rather see Miss Celeste," she said, timidly. "Can't you tell me where she lives?"

"I'll ask Mrs. Wood. The butler'd know, but he is sick. Will you wait inside the door? What a pretty baby."

She was gone but a few minutes, returning before Justine's dazed eyes had half accustomed themselves to the attractive place.

"She lives at No. 1733 S---- Place. You go to the next corner and turn west. The house is in the second block."

The day was cold and her bare hands were numb. The wind from the lake cut through her thin garments so relentlessly that she longed for the protection of the carriage, which was not to return for half an hour--and then to the wrong place. What if Celeste were not at home?

She could not ask to be permitted to sit in her house until her return; that would be too much of an imposition. She could only return to the street and wait for half an hour in the freezing winds for the cab, which seemed like a home to her now.

A hurrying figure in furs and brown approached from the direction in which she was going. The two drew nearer and nearer, the one walking rapidly against the wind, the other driven along more swiftly than was her wont by the heavy gale at her back. Justine was the first to recognize the other. Her heart gave a great bound of joy, for there could be no mistaking the face of the woman who faced the wind. The country girl jubilantly uttered in her soul a prayer of grat.i.tude to the Providence that had brought her face to face with the one she sought. She half stopped as the other drew near. Celeste's eyes met hers. Evidently she was surprised to observe a desire to speak with her on the part of a stranger. Justine's eyes were wide with relief and her lips were parted as if words were just inside. Celeste's eyes narrowed for one brief instant of indecision, and then she knew. There was but one face like Justine Van's, and it had been in her mind for days and days. She had just come from it, in fact, and her heart was still aching with the pain of seeing it on Jud's easel not an hour before. But what could the girl be doing in Chicago? was the thought that flashed into her mind. Even as she opened her lips to greet her, her hands extended, it was known to her that Justine could be going only to the home of Jud Sherrod. Justine's joy was too great for words and Celeste's heart went out to her irresistibly. Despite the wanness of the face and the dark circles under the eyes, Justine's were still the vivid, matchless features that Celeste had envied in that other day. Though she was sorely troubled by the inexplicable presence of the one woman whom she had been thinking of for days, Celeste could but greet her warmly.

"This is the greatest surprise in the world," cried Celeste. "Who would have dreamed of seeing you here?"

"I have just come from your old home. They told me you lived on this street," said Justine, her voice hoa.r.s.e with emotion.

"And you were going to my home," cried Celeste, just as if intuition had not told her so before. "I was on my way to mother's. Isn't it lucky we met? I will go back with you at once. You must be very cold.

And--a baby? Oh, the dear little one! How cold it must be."

"I have him well wrapped up," said Justine. Celeste mentally noted that the child was protected at the sacrifice of the mother's comfort, for Justine looked half frozen.

"Is he--is he your boy?" asked Celeste, and a wave of happiness surged over her when the answer came. Did it not prove that she was married and forever out of Jud's life?

"I am sure he must be a handsome little fellow," said she, as they turned from the sidewalk to the steps leading to the door of her home.

"He looks like his father--and not a bit like me," said Justine, modestly.

"Have you named him?"

"He is named after his father, of course."

"A token of real love."