Quaint Courtships Part 23

"I know," said the girl, and turning, looked at him a moment. "Well, I've come to tell you that I have--" She hesitated.

Amory slid down into the chair beside her. "Changed your mind?"

"Yes."

"That note of your aunt's?"

"Yes"

He sat back and folded his arms. "I see," he said, and there followed a long silence.

The girl began b.u.t.toning and unb.u.t.toning her glove. She must go; she was frightened, elated, amused. She did not want to go, but go she must.

Would he ever forgive her?

"Don't--don't hate me!" she said.

Amory awoke from his stunned meditation. "My dear young lady, of course not," he began; "only, Tom will be terribly broken up. It's the only thing to do now, I suppose, but why did you do the other?"

She looked at him. As well be hanged for a sheep as a lamb, she thought.

"I was unhappy and foolish." She hesitated. "But you needn't be troubled about Tom. He--" Again she hesitated.

"Not troubled about old Tom!" expostulated Amory.

"Wait." She put up her hand. "He made a mistake, too; he doesn't care so very much, and he has already flirted--"

Amory laid his hand on her chair. "Tom!"

"Yes," she repeated; "he really is rather a flirt, and--"

"Tom!"

She nodded. "Yes; really, it did hurt me a little, only--"

"Tom!"

She faced him. "Yes, Tom. What do you think Tom is--blind and deaf and dumb? Any man worth his salt can flirt."

Amory stared at her. "Oh, he can, can he?"

She nodded. "He was very good and kind, but I saw that he was changing; and then he met a little fair-haired, blue-eyed--"

Amory interposed. "I told you."

She gave him a curious smile. "Yes, a silly little blond thing, just that."

But his satisfaction in his perspicacity was short-lived; he walked up and down the room in his perplexity. "I can't get over it," he murmured.

"I thought it a mad love-match, all done in a few weeks; and to have it turn out like this! You--"

"Mercenary," she interjected, with a sad little smile.

He looked at her. "Yes; and Tom--"

"Fickle," she ended again.

"Yes, and Tom fickle. Why, it shakes the foundations!"

The girl felt a sudden wave of shame and weariness. She must go. She hadn't been fair, but it had been so sudden, so difficult. She looked at him, and getting up, wondered if she would ever see him again.

"I must go," she said. "I came--" She hesitated, and a sudden desire to have him know her as herself swept over her. It needed only another lie or two in the beginning, and then some truth would come through to sustain her. She went on: "I came because I wanted to know what you were like; Tom had talked so much of you, and I wanted some one to understand and perhaps explain; and now I must go and leave your warm, delightful room for the comfortless place I live in. Don't think too hardly of me."

Amory shook his head. "You don't leave me until you have had your tea."

He rang the bell. "But what do you mean by a comfortless home? Does Mrs.

White neglect you?"

She looked at the fire. "I don't live with her--now; I live alone; I work for my living."

Amory got up as the maid brought in the tea-tray, and setting it beside them, he poured out her tea; as he handed her the cup, he brought his brows together sternly, as though making out her very mysterious words.

"You work for your living?" he repeated. "I thought you lived with Mrs.

White, and that they were well off."

"I did, but now I've come back to my real life, which I would have left had I married Tom."

He nodded. "I see. I had heard awfully little about it all; I was away, and then it was so quickly done."

"I know," she went on, hurriedly; "but let me tell you, and you will understand me better later--that is, if you want to understand me."

"Most certainly I do." Amory sustained the strange sad gaze of her charming, heavy-lidded eyes in a sort of maze. Her mat skin looked white, now that her blushes were gone, and her delicate, irregular features a little pinched. He drank his tea and watched her while she talked.

"I teach music," she began; "to do it I left my relations in the country and came to this horrible great city. I have one dreary, cold room, as unlike this as two rooms can be. I have tried to make it seem like a home, but when I saw this I knew how I had failed."

"Poor little girl!" said Amory.

"I have the ordinary feelings of a girl," she went on, "and yet I see before me the long stretch of a dreary life. I love music; I hear none but the strumming of children. I like pictures, books, people; I see none. I like to laugh, to talk; there is no one to laugh with, to talk to. I am very--unhappy." The last words were spoken very low, but the misery in them touched Amory deeply.

"Poor little girl!" he said again, and gently laid his hand on the arm of her chair. "But how can Tom know this and let you go? You are mistaken in Tom, I am sure, and--"

The girl straightened her slender figure and rose. "Oh no! it is all right. He doesn't love me, your Tom; and so the world goes--I must go, too. I--"

"Don't go," said Amory. "Let me--" She shook her head. "You have no more to do; you have comforted and warmed and fed a hungry wanderer, and she must make haste home. Thank you for everything; thank you."

Amory felt a pang as she stood up. Not to see her again--why, that was absurd! Why should he not see her? She had quarrelled with Tom, yes, and perhaps the family might be hard on her; but he--he understood, and why should he shake off her acquaintance? She was not for Tom. Well, it was just as well. How could any one think this girl would suit Tom--big-bearded, clumsy, excellent fellow that he was?

He put out his hand. "Mary," he said. The girl stared at him with eyes suddenly wide open; he smiled into them.

"I have a right to call you that," he proceeded, "haven't I? I might have been your brother." He took her hand, and then laughed a little. "I am almost glad I am not. You wouldn't have suited Tom, and as a sister, somehow, you wouldn't have suited me!" He laughed again. "But"--he hesitated; she still stared straight up at him with her soft, dark eyes, and he thought them very beautiful--"but why shouldn't I see you--not as a brother, but an acquaintance--friend? You say you need them. Tell me where you have this room of yours?"

The vivid beauty of her blush startled him, and she drew her hand quickly from his.