From the Housetops Part 26

"Do you know that you are a very lucky person, George?" she said abruptly.

He blinked. "You don't know it, but you are. I wish I had the same chance that you have."

"What are you talking about?" he demanded.

"I wish I had the same chance to be happy that you have."

"Happy? Good Lord, I'll never be happy without Lutie, and you know it," he groaned.

"That is just the chance you still have, Buddy. It isn't inconceivable that you may get Lutie back, while I-well, you know how it is with me. I'm done for, to put it plainly."

"Lutie wouldn't wipe her feet on me," he said, struggling between hope and conviction. "I'd let her do it like a flash if she wanted to, but-Oh, what's the use! You and I have queered ourselves forever, you with Brady and I with Lutie. It's an infernal shame you didn't take Brady when you-"

"Yes, we've queered ourselves," said she, struck by the phrase that fell from his lips. It was not Anne's habit to use slang, but somehow George's way of putting the situation into words was so aggravatingly complete that she almost resented his prior use of an expression that she had never used before in her life. It _did_ sum up the business, neatly and compactly.

Strange that she had never thought of that admirable word before! "And of the two of us, George, I am the worst offender. I went about my mistake deliberately. I suppose it is only right that I should pay the heavier price."

"If I thought there was a chance to get Lutie back, I'd-" But there he stopped as he always stopped. He had never been able to end that sentence, and he had got just that far with it a million times or more.

"Have you tried to get her back?" she demanded suddenly, a flash of interest in her eyes. It was to grow into genuine enthusiasm. The impulse at the back of her mind was to develop into an idea, later into a strong, definite purpose. It had for its foundation a hitherto unsuspected desire to do good.

"Great Scot, no!"

"Then _try_, George," she cried, a new thrill in her voice.

He was bewildered. "Try what?"

"I would stake my life on it, George, if you set about it in the right way you can win Lutie all over again. All you have to do is to let her see that you are a man, a real man. There's no reason in the world why she shouldn't remember what love really is, and that she once had it through you. There's a lot in love that doesn't come out in a couple of months and she has the sense to know that she was cheated out of it. If I am not greatly mistaken she is just like all other women. We don't stop loving before we get our fill of it, or until we've at least found out that it bores us to be loved by the man who starts the fire going. Now, Lutie must realise that she never got her full share. She wasn't through loving you.

She had barely begun. It doesn't matter how badly a woman is treated, she goes on loving her man until some other man proves that she is wrong, and he cannot prove it to her until she has had all of the love that she can get out of the first man. That's why women stick to the men who beat them.

Of course, this doesn't apply to unmoral women. You know the kind I mean.

But it is true of all honest women, and Lutie appears to be more honest than we suspected. She had two or three months of you, George, and then came the crash. You can't tell me that she stopped wanting to be loved by you just as she was loving you the hardest. She may some day marry another man, but she will never forget that she had you for three months and that they were not enough."

"Great Scot!" said George once more, staring open-mouthed at his incomprehensible sister. "Are you in earnest?"

"Certainly."

"Why, she ought to despise me."

"Quite true, she should," said Anne coolly. "The only thing that keeps her from despising you is that uncompleted honeymoon. It's like giving a starving man just half enough to eat. He is still hungry."

"Do you mean to say that you'd like to see me make it up again with Lutie?

You'd like to have me marry her again?"

"Why not? I'd find some happiness in seeing you happy, I suppose. I dare say it is self interest on my part, after all. In a way, it makes for my happiness, so therein I am selfish."

"Bos.h.!.+ You'll be happy, Anne, but not through me. You are the prettiest girl in New York, one of the richest, one of the smartest-"

"See here, George," she said, a hard note stealing into her voice, "you and I are pretty much alike in one respect. Surprising as it may seem, we have been able to love some one besides ourselves. And still more surprising, we appear to be constant. You are no more constant in your love for Lutie than I am in my love for the man I shall never have. My man despises me. Your woman merely pities you. You can retake what you have lost. I cannot. But why shouldn't I go on loving my man, just as you are loving your woman? Why shouldn't I?" she cried out fiercely.

He gulped. "Oh, I say, Anne, I-I didn't dream that it meant so much to you. I have always thought of you as-as-er-sort of indifferent to-But, that just shows how little a fellow knows about his sister. A sister never seems to be given the same flesh and blood feelings that other women have.

I'm sorry I said what I did a little while ago. I take it back, Anne. If you've got a chance to get Brady back-"

"Stop! I spoke of your affairs, George, because they are not altogether hopeless. We cannot discuss mine."

"And as for that story, who is going to prove that Braden intentionally-"

He checked the words, and switched off along another line. "Even though he did put a merciful end to Mr. Thorpe's suffering, what selfish motive can be charged to him? Not one. He doesn't get a dollar of the estate, Simmy says. He alone loved that old man. No one else in the world loved him. He did the best he could for him, and he doesn't care what any one thinks about it. I came here to warn you, to tell you to be careful, but now that I know what it means to you, I-"

She arose. Facing him, she said slowly, deliberately: "I believe that Braden tried to save his grandfather's life. He asked my consent to the operation. I gave it. When I gave it, I was morally certain that Mr.

Thorpe was to die on the operating table. I wanted him to die. I wanted an end put to his suffering. But I did not want Braden to be the one. Some day I may have the courage to tell you something, George, that will shock you as nothing on earth has ever shocked you. I will tell you the real reason why Templeton Thorpe married me. I-but not now. I wish that the whole world could know that if Braden did take his own way to end the suffering of that unhappy old man, I have no word of condemnation for him.

He did the humane thing."

George remained seated, watching her with perplexed, dubious eyes. It was a matter that deserved mental concentration. He could best achieve this by abstaining from physical indulgence. Here was his sister, the wife of the dead man, actually condoning an act that was almost certain to be professionally excoriated,-behind the hand, so to say,-even though there was no one to contend that a criminal responsibility should be put upon Braden Thorpe. He was, for the moment, capable of forgetting his own troubles in considering the peril that attended Anne.

"Oh, I say, Anne, you'll have to be careful what you say. It's all right to say it to me, but for heaven's sake don't go telling these things to other people." He was serious, desperately serious. "No one will understand. No one will see it as you do. There has been a lot of talk about Brady's views and all that. People are not very charitable toward him. They stick to the idea that G.o.d ought to do such jobs as Brady advocates, and I don't know but they are right. So now you just keep your mouth closed about all this. It is Braden's affair, it's his lookout, not yours. The least said, the better, take it from me. You-"

"We will talk of something else, George, if you don't mind," she said, relaxing suddenly. She sat down beside him once more, rather limply and with a deep, long-drawn sigh, as if she had spent herself in this single exposition of feeling. "Now what do you intend to do in regard to Lutie?

Are you ready to straighten up and make the effort to-to be something creditable to yourself and to her?"

"Oh, I've tried to hold down a good many respectable jobs," he scoffed.

"It's no good trying. I'm too busy thinking of her to be able to devote much of my remarkable intelligence to ordinary work."

"Well, you've never had me behind you till now," she said. "I am perfectly able to think for you, if you'll let me. Simmy Dodge is interested in you.

He can get you a berth somewhere. It may be a humble one, but it will lead to something better. You are not a drunkard, you are not a loafer. Now, I will tell you what I intend to do. If, at the end of a year, you can show me that you-"

"Hold on! You are not thinking of offering me money, are you?" he demanded, flus.h.i.+ng angrily.

Her eyes brightened. "You would not accept it?"

"No," he said flatly.

"You must remember one thing, George," she said, after a moment. "You cannot take Lutie back until you have paid mother in full for all that your freedom cost her. It wouldn't be fair to take both the girl and the money she received for giving you up that time. She was paid in full for returning you to the family circle. If she takes you back again, she should refund the money, even though she is accepting damaged and well- worn goods. Now, Lutie should not be called upon to make rest.i.tution. That is for you to do. I fancy it will be a long time before you can ama.s.s thirty or forty thousand dollars, so I make you this offer: the day you are _good_ enough for Lutie to marry all over again, I will pay to mother for you the full amount that Lutie would owe her in violating the contract. You will not receive a cent of it, you see. But you understand how rotten it would be for you and Lutie to-"

"I see, I see," cried he, striking his knee with his clenched hand. "We couldn't do it, that's all. It's awfully good of you, Anne, to do this for me. I'll-I'll never forget it. And I'll pay you back somehow before we're through, see if I don't." He was already a.s.suming that the task of winning back Lutie was joyously on the way to certain consummation.

"I am a rich woman," said Anne, compressing her lips. "I sha'n't miss a few dollars, you know. To-morrow I am to go with Mr. Hollenback to the safety vaults. A fortune will be placed in my hands. The deal will be closed."

"It's a lot of money," said George, shaking his head gloomily. It was as if he had said that it was money she shouldn't speak of with pride. "I say, Anne, do you know just how mother is fixed for money? Last winter she told me she might have to sell the house and-"

"I know," said Anne shortly. "I intend to share the spoils with her, in a way, even though she can't share the shame with me. She brought us up, George, and she made us the n.o.ble creatures that we are. We owe her something for that, eh? Oh, I am not as bitter as I appear to be, so don't look shocked. Mother has her ideals, and she is honest about them. She is a wonderful woman, a wonderful mother. She did her best for us in every way possible. I don't blame her for what has happened to me. I blame myself. She is not half as mean as I am, George, and she isn't one-tenth as weak-kneed as you. She stood by both of us, and I for one shall stand by her. So don't you worry about mother, old boy. Worry about the honest job you are expected to get-and hold."

Later on she said to him: "Some day I shall make it a point to see Lutie.

I will shake hands with her. You see, George dear," she went on whimsically, "I don't in the least object to divorcees. They are not half as common as divorces. And as for your contention that if you and Lutie had a child to draw you together, I can only call your attention to the fact that there are fewer divorces among people who have no children than among those who have. The records-or at least the newspapers-prove that to be a fact. In nine-tenths of the divorce cases you read about, the custody of children is mentioned. That should prove something, eh? It ought to put at rest forever the claim that children bind mismated people together.

They don't, and that is all there is about it."

George grinned in his embarra.s.sment. "Well, I'll be off now, Anne. I'll see Simmy this afternoon, as you suggest, and-" he hesitated, the worried look coming into his eyes once more-"Oh, I say, Anne, I can't help repeating what I said about your seeing Braden. Don't-"

"Good-bye, George," she broke in abruptly, a queer smile on her lips.