At the Crossroads Part 49

The globe of light on the peak of his tower seemed, humorously, to have become his headlight--Manly's figures of speech clung--its white and red flashes, its moments of darkness, were like the workings of his mind, but he knew no longer the old depression. He was on the main line, and he had his orders--secret ones, so far, but safe ones.

Kathryn grew more charming as time pa.s.sed. She did not seem to resent Northrup's detachment, though the tower room lured him dangerously.

Once she had hinted that she'd love to see his workshop; hear some of his work. But Northrup had put her off.

"Wait, dear, until I've finished the thing, and then you and I will have a regular gorge of it, up in my tower."

Kathryn at this put up her mouth to be kissed while behind her innocent smile she was picturing the girl of King's Forest in those awful muddy trousers! _She_ had heard the book in the making; she had not been pushed aside.

More and more Mary-Clare became a stumbling block to Kathryn. She felt she was a dangerous type; the kind men never could understand, until it was too late, and never forgot. And Brace _was_ changed. The subtle unrest did not escape Kathryn.

"I wonder----" And Kathryn did wonder. Wondered most at the possibility of Mary-Clare ever appearing on the surface again.

For--and this was a humiliating thought to Kathryn--she realized she was no match for that girl of the Forest!

However, Kathryn, as was her wont when things went wrong, pulled down the shade mentally, as once she had done physically, against the distasteful conditions Brace had evolved.

And there was much to be attended to--so Kathryn, with great efficiency, set to work. She must make provision for her aunt's future. This was not difficult, for poor Anna was so relieved that any provision was to be considered, that she accepted Kathryn's lowest figure.

Then there was Arnold. Sandy, at the moment, was disgusted at Northrup's return. It interfered with his plans. Sandy had a long and keen scent. The trouble overseas had awakened a response in him, he meant to serve the cause--but in his own way. Secretly he was preparing. He was buying up old vessels, but old vessels were expensive and the secrecy prevented his borrowing money. He wanted to get married, too. Kathryn, with only his protection and he with Kathryn's little fortune, would create, at the moment, a situation devoutly to be desired.

Kathryn had to deal with this predicament cautiously. Sandy was so horribly matter-of-fact--not a grain of Northrup's idealism about him!

But for that very reason, in the abominably upset state of the world, he was not lightly to be cast on the sc.r.a.p-heap. One never could tell!

Brace might act up sentimentally, but Sandy could be depended upon always--he was a rock!

So Kathryn, embroidering her wedding linen--for she meant to be married soon--prayed for guidance.

On the whole, the situation was most gratifying. No wonder Kathryn felt well pleased with herself and more fully convinced that, with such wits as hers, life was reduced to a common factor. Once married she would be able to draw a long breath. Marriage was such a divine inst.i.tution for women. It gave them such a stranglehold--with the right sort of men--and Brace _was_ the right sort.

To be sure he was not entirely satisfying at the present moment. His attentions smacked too much of duty. He could not deceive Kathryn. He sent flowers and gifts in such profusion that they took on the aspect of blood money. Well, marriage would adjust all that.

Helen urged an early date for the wedding and even Manly, who did not like Kathryn, gripped her as the saviour of a critical situation.

King's Forest had had a sinister effect upon Manly; it made him doubt himself.

And so life, apparently, ran along smoothly on the surface. It was the undercurrents that were really carrying things along at a terrific rate.

It was in his tower room that most of Northrup's struggle went on.

Daily he confronted that which Was and Had To Be! With all his old outposts being taken day by day, he was left bare and unprotected for the last a.s.sault. And it came!

It came as death does, quite naturally for the most part, and found him--ready. Like the dying--or the reborn--Northrup put his loved ones to the acid test. His mother would understand. Kathryn? It was staggering, at this heart-breaking moment, to discover, after all the recent proving of herself, that Kathryn resolved into an Unknown Quant.i.ty.

This discovery filled Northrup with a sense of disloyalty and unreality. What right had he to permit the girl who was to be his wife, the mother of his children, to be relegated to so ignominious a position? Had she not proved herself to him in faithfulness and understanding? Had she not, setting aside her own rights, looked well to his?

The days dragged along and each one took its toll of Northrup's vitality while it intensified that crusading emotion in his soul.

He did not mention all this to those nearest him until the time for departure came, and he tried, G.o.d knew, to work while he performed the small, devotional acts to his mother and Kathryn that would soon stand forth, to one of them at least, as the most courageous acts of his life.

He had come to that part of his book where his woman must take her final stand--the stand that Mary-Clare had so undermined. If he finished the book before he went--and he decided that it might be possible--his woman must rise supreme over the doubts with which she had been invested. But when he came to the point, the decision, if he followed his purpose, looked cheap and commonplace--above everything, obvious. In his present mood his book would be just--a book; not the Big Experience.

This struggle to finish his work in the face of the stubborn facts at moments obliterated the crusading spirit; the doubts of Kathryn and even Mary-Clare's pervading insistence. He hated to be beaten at his own job.

Love's supreme sacrifice and glory, as portrayed in woman--_must_ be man's ideal, of course!

The ugly business of the world had to be got through, and man often had to set love aside--for honour. "But, good Lord!" Northrup argued, apparently to his useless right hand, what would become of the spiritual, if woman got to setting up little G.o.ds and bowing down before them? Why, she would forego her G.o.d-given heritage. To her, love must be all. Above all else. Why, the very foundations of life were founded upon that. What could be higher to a woman? Man could look out for the rest, but he must be sure of his woman's love! The rest would be in their own hands--that was their individual affair.

And then, at this crucial moment, Mary-Clare _would_ always intrude.

"It's what one does to love!" That was her stern ultimatum. "Love's best proof might be renunciation, not surrender!"

"Nonsense!" Northrup flung back. "How then could a man be sure? No book with such an ending would stand a chance."

"You must not harm your book by such a doubt. That book must be _true_, and you know the truth. Women must be made glad by it, men stronger because someone understands and is brave enough to say it."

But Northrup steeled his heart against this command. He meant to finish his book; finish it with a flaming proof that, while men offered their lives for duty, women offered theirs for love and did not count the cost, like misers or--lenders.

One afternoon Northrup, the ink still wet upon the last sheet of his ma.n.u.script, leaned back wearily in his chair. He could not conquer Mary-Clare. He let his eyes rest upon his awakening city. For him it rose at night. In the day it belonged to others--the men and women, pa.s.sing to and fro with those strange eyes and jaws. But when they all pa.s.sed to their homes, then the lone city that was his started like a thing being born upon a hill.

It may have been at one of these strained moments that Northrup slept; he was never able to decide. He seemed to hold to the twinkling lights; he thought he heard sounds--the elevator just outside his door; the rising wind.

However that may be, as clearly as any impression ever fixed itself upon his consciousness, he saw Mary-Clare beside him in her stained and ugly garb, her lovely hair ruffled as if she had been travelling fast, and her great eyes turned upon him gladly. She was panting a bit; smiling and thankful that she had found him, at last in his city!

It was like being with her on that day when they stood on the mountain near her cabin and talked.

Northrup was spellbound. He understood, though no word pa.s.sed between him and the girl so close to him. She did not try to touch him, but she did, presently, move a step nearer and lay her little work-worn hand upon the pile of ma.n.u.script in that quaint way of hers that had so often made Northrup smile. It was a reverent touch.

Standing so, she sealed from him those last chapters! She would not argue or be set aside--she claimed her woman-right; the right to the truth as some women saw it, as more would see it; as, G.o.d willing, Northrup himself would see it some day! He would know that it was because of love that she had turned him and herself to duty.

Northrup suddenly found himself on his feet.

The little room was dark; the city was blazing about him--under him.

His city! His hand lay upon his ma.n.u.script.

Quietly he took it up and locked it in his safe. Slowly, reverently, he set the bare room in order without turning on the electricity. He worked in the dark but his vision was never clearer. He went out, locked the door, as one does upon a chamber, sacred and secret.

He did not think of Mary-Clare, his mother, or Kathryn--he was setting forth to do that which had to be done; he was going to give what was his to give to that struggle across the ocean for right; the proving of right.

All along, his unrest had been caused by the warring elements in himself--there was only one way out--he must take it and be proved as the world was being proved.

CHAPTER XX

"Mother, I must go!"

Helen Northrup did not tremble, but she looked white, thin-lipped.

"You have given me the twenty-four hours, son. You have weighed the question--it is not emotional excitement?"