The Side Of The Angels Part 18

Mrs. Masterman nearly wept. "I don't know anything about business at all, Bessie."

"Oh, don't tell me that," Bessie broke in, fiercely. "You knew enough about it to see that Archie wanted our money in 1892."

"But _I_ hadn't anything to do with it."

"Hadn't anything to do with it? Then who had? Who was it suggested to me that Len should go into business?--one evening?--in the Hotel de Marsan?--after dinner? Who was that?"

"If I said anything at all it was that I hated business and everything that had to do with it."

"Oh, I can understand that well enough," Bessie exclaimed, scornfully.

"You hated it because you saw already that your husband was going to ruin us. Come now, Ena! Didn't you?"

Mrs. Masterman protested tearfully. "I didn't know anything about it. I only wished that Archie would let you and your money alone--and I wish it still."

"Very well, then!" Bessie cried, flinging her hands outward dramatically. "Isn't that what I'm saying? You knew something. You knew it and you let us go ahead. You not only let us go ahead, but you led us on. You could see already that Archie was spinning his web like a spider, and that he'd catch us as flies. Now didn't you? Tell the truth, Ena. Wasn't it in your mind from the first? Long before it was in his?

I'll say that for Archie, that I don't suppose he really _meant_ to ruin us, while you knew he _would_. That's the difference between a man and his wife. The man only drifts, but the wife sees years ahead what he's drifting to. You saw it, Ena--"

When his stepmother bowed her head to sob into her handkerchief Thor ventured to enter the room. Neither of the women noticed him.

"I must say, Ena," Bessie continued, "that seems to me frightful. I don't know what you can be made of that you've lived cheerfully through these last eighteen years when you knew what was coming. If it had been coming to yourself--well, that might be borne. But to stand by and watch for it to overtake some one else--some one who'd always been your friend--some one you liked, for I do believe you've liked me, in your way and my way--that, I must say, is the limit--_cela pa.s.se les bornes_.

Now, doesn't it?"

Mrs. Masterman struggled to speak, but her sobs prevented her.

"In a way it's funny," Bessie continued, philosophically, "how bad a good woman can be. You're a good woman, Ena, of a kind. That is, you're good in as far as you're not bad; and I suppose that for a woman that's a very fair average. But I can tell you that there are sinners whom the world has scourged to the bone who haven't _begun_ to do what you've been doing these past eighteen years--who wouldn't have had the nerve for it. No, Ena," she continued, with another sweeping gesture. "'Pon my soul, I don't know what you're made of. I almost think I admire you. I couldn't have done it; I'll be hanged if I could. There are women who've committed murder and who haven't been as cool as you. They've committed murder in a frantic fit of pa.s.sion that went as quick as it came, and they've swung for it, or done time for it. But they'd never have had the pluck to sit and smile and wait for this minute as you've waited for it--when you saw it from such a long way off."

It was the crushed att.i.tude in which his stepmother sank weeping into a chair that broke the spell by which Thor had been held paralyzed; but before he could speak Bessie turned and saw him.

"Oh, so it's you, Thor. Well, I wish you could have come a minute ago to hear what I've been saying."

"I've heard it, Mrs. Willoughby--"

"Then I am sure you must agree with me. Or rather, you would if you knew how things had been managed in Paris eighteen years ago. I've been trying to tell your dear stepmother that we've been mistaken in her. We haven't done her justice. We've thought of her as just a sweet and gentle ladylike person, when all the while she's been a heroine. She's been colossal--as Clytemnestra was colossal, and Lady Macbeth. She beats them both; for I don't believe either of them could have watched the sword of Damocles taking eighteen years to fall on a friend and not have had nervous prostration--while she's as fresh as ever."

He laid his hand on her arm. "You'll come away now, won't you, Mrs.

Willoughby?" he begged.

She adjusted her furs hurriedly. "All right, Thor. I'll come. I only want to say one thing more--"

"No, no; please!"

"I will say it," she insisted, as he led her from the room, "because it'll do Ena good. It's just this," she threw back over her shoulder, "that I forgive you, Ena. You're so magnificent that I can't nurse a grudge against you. When a woman has done what you've done she may be punished by her own conscience--but not by me. I'm lost in admiration for the scale on which she carries out her crimes."

By the time they were in the porch, with the door closed behind them, Bessie's excitement subsided suddenly. Her voice became plaintive and childlike again, as she said, wistfully:

"Oh, Thor, do you think it's all gone?--that we sha'n't get any of it back? I know we haven't spent it. We _can't_ have spent it."

Since Thor was Thor, there was only one thing for him to say. He needed no time to reflect or form resolutions. Whatever the cost to him, in whatever way, he could say nothing else. "You'll get it all back, Mrs.

Willoughby. Don't worry about it any more. Just leave it to me."

But Bessie was not convinced. "I don't see how that's going to be. If your father says the money is gone, it _is_ gone--whether we've spent it or not. Trust him!" Nevertheless, she kissed him, saying: "But I don't blame you, Thor. If there were two like you in the world it would be too good a place to live in, and Len and Lois think the same."

He got her into the motor and closed the door upon her. Standing on the door-step, he watched it crawl down the avenue, like a great black beetle on the snow. As it pa.s.sed the gateway his father appeared, coming on foot from the electric car.

CHAPTER XIII

On re-entering the house, Thor waited for his father in the hall.

Finding the drawing-room empty, and inferring that his mother had gone up-stairs, he decided to say nothing of the scene between her and Mrs.

Willoughby. For the time being his own needs demanded right of way.

Nothing else could be attended to till they had received consideration.

With that reflection something surged in him--surged and exulted. He was to be allowed to speak of his love at last! He was to be forced to confess it! If he was never to name it again, he would do so this once, getting some outlet for his pa.s.sion! He both glowed and trembled. He both strained forward and recoiled. Already he felt drunk with a wine that roused the holier emotions as ardently as it fired the senses. He could scarcely take in the purport of his father's words as the latter stamped the snow from his boots in the entry and said:

"Has that poor woman been here? Sorry for her, Thor; sorry for her from the bottom of my heart."

The young man had no response to make. He was in a realm in which the reference had no meaning. Archie continued, while hanging his overcoat and hat in the closet at the foot of the stairs:

"Impossible to make her understand. Women like that can never see why they shouldn't eat their cake and have it, too. Books open for her inspection. But what's one to do?"

When he emerged from the closet Thor saw that his face was gray. He looked mortally tired and sad. He had been sad for some weeks past--sad and detached--ever since the night when he had made his ineffectual bid for the care of Thor's prospective money. He had betrayed no hint of resentment toward his son--nothing but this dignified la.s.situde, this reserved, high-bred, speechless expression of failure that smote Thor to the heart. But this evening he looked worn as well, worn and old, though brave and patient and able to command a weary, flickering smile.

"But I'm glad it's come. It will be a relief to have it over. Seen it coming so long that it's been like a nightmare. Rather have come to grief myself--a.s.sure you I would."

"Father, could I speak to you for a few minutes?"

"About this?"

"No, not about this; about something else--something rather important."

There was a sudden gleam in the father's eyes which gave Thor a second pang. He had seen it once or twice already during these weeks of partial estrangement. It was the gleam of hope--of hope that Thor might have grown repentant. It had the sparkle of fire in it when, seated in a business att.i.tude at the desk which held the center of the library, he looked up expectantly at his son. "Well, my boy?"

Thor remained standing. "It's about that property of Fay's, father."

"Oh, again?" The light in the eyes went out with the suddenness of an electric lamp.

"I only want to say this, father," Thor hurried on, so as to get the interview over, "that if you want to sell the place, I'll take it. I'll take it on your own terms. You can make them what you like."

Archie leaned on the desk, pa.s.sing his hand over his brow. "I'm sorry, Thor. I can't."

Thor had the curious reminiscent sensation of being once more a little boy, with some pleasure forbidden him. "Oh, father, why? I want it awfully."

"So I see. I don't see why you should, but--"

"Well, I'll tell you. I want to protect Fay, because--"