A Rock in the Baltic Part 11

"The s.h.i.+p that has gone out with him we call she. If he had eloped with a real she, then wearing the willow, or singing it, however futile, might be understandable. As it is I see nothing in the situation to call for a sigh."

"That is because you are a hardened sinner, Dorothy. You have no heart, or at least if you have, it is untouched, and therefore you cannot understand. If that note in your hand were a love missive, instead of a letter from your lawyers, you would be more human, Dorothy."

The hand which held the paper crumpled it up slightly as Katherine spoke.

"Business letters are quite necessary, and belong to the world we live in," said Dorothy, a glow of brighter color suffusing her cheeks.

"Surely your acquaintance with Mr. Lamont is of the shortest."

"He has called upon me every day since the night of the ball,"

maintained Katherine stoutly.

"Well, that's only three times."

"Only three! How you talk! One would think you had never been schooled in mathematics. Why, three is a magic figure. You can do plenty of amazing things with it. Don't you know that three is a numeral of love?"

"I thought two was the number," chimed Dorothy, with heartless mirth.

"Three," said Katherine taking one last look at the empty horizon, then seating herself in front of her friend, "three is a recurring decimal.

It goes on and on and on forever, and if you write it for a thousand years you are still as far from the end as when you began. It will carry you round the world and back again, and never diminish. It is the mathematical emblem of the nature of true love."

"Is it so serious as all that, Kate, or are you just fooling again?"

asked Dorothy, more soberly than heretofore. "Has he spoken to you?"

"Spoken? He has done nothing but speak, and I have listened--oh, so intently, and with such deep understanding. He has never before met such a woman as I, and has frankly told me so."

"I am very glad he appreciates you, dear."

"Yes, you see, Dorothy, I am really much deeper than the ordinary woman.

Who, for instance, could find such a beautiful love simile from a book of arithmetic costing twenty-five cents, as I have unearthed from decimal fractions? With that example in mind how can you doubt that other volumes of college learning reveal to me their inner meaning? John presented to me, as he said good-by, a beautifully bound copy of that celebrated text-book, 'Saunders' a.n.a.lytical Chemistry,' with particularly tender pa.s.sages marked in pencil, by his own dear hand."

Rather bewildered, for Kate's expression was one of pathos, unrelieved by any gleam of humor, Dorothy nevertheless laughed, although the laugh brought no echo from Katherine.

"And did you give him a volume of Browning in return?"

"No, I didn't. How can you be so unsympathetic? Is it impossible for you to comprehend the unseen link that binds John and me? I rummaged the book store until I found a charming little edition of 'Marshall's Geologist's Pocket Companion,' covered with beautiful brown limp Russia leather--I thought the Russia binding was so inspirational--with a sweet little clasp that keeps it closed--typical of our hands at parting.

On the fly-leaf I wrote: 'To J. L., in remembrance of many interesting conversations with his friend, K. K.' It only needed another K to be emblematic and political, a reminiscence of the olden times, when you people of the South, Dorothy, were making it hot for us deserving folks in the North. I hadn't time to go through the book very thoroughly, but I found many references to limestone, which I marked, and one particularly choice bit of English relating to the dissolution and re-consolidation of various minerals I drew a parallelogram around in red ink. A friend of mine in a motor launch was good enough to take the little parcel direct to the 'Consternation,' and I have no doubt that at this moment Jack is perusing it, and perhaps thinking of the giver. I hope it's up-to-date, and that he had not previously bought a copy."

"You don't mean to say, Kate, that your conversation was entirely about geology?"

"Certainly not. How could you have become imbued with an idea so absurd?

We had many delightful dalliances down the romantic groves of chemistry, heart-to-heart talks on metallurgy, and once--ah, shall I ever forget it--while the dusk gently enfolded us, and I gazed into those bright, speaking, intelligent eyes of his as he bent nearer and nearer; while his low, sonorous voice in well-chosen words pictured to me the promise which fortified cement holds out to the world; that is, ignorant person, Portland cement strengthened by ribs of steel; and I sat listening breathless as his glowing phrases prophesied the future of this combination."

Katherine closed her eyes, rocked gently back and forth, and crooned, almost inaudibly:

"'When you gang awa, Jimmie, Faur across the sea, laddie, When ye gang to Russian lands What will ye send to me, laddie?'

I know what I shall get. It will probably be a newly discovered recipe for the compounding of cement which will do away with the necessity of steel strengthening."

"Kate, dear, you are overdoing it. It is quite right that woman should be a mystery to man, but she should not aspire to become a mystery to her sister woman. Are you just making fun, or is there something in all this more serious than your words imply?"

"Like the steel strengthening in the cement, it may be there, but you can't see it, and you can't touch it, but it makes--oh, such a difference to the slab. Heigho, Dorothy, let us forsake these hard-headed subjects, and turn to something human. What have your lawyers been bothering you about? No trouble over the money, is there?"

Dorothy shook her head.

"No. Of course, there are various matters they have to consult me about, and get my consent to this project or the other."

"Read the letter. Perhaps my mathematical mind can be of a.s.sistance to you."

Dorothy had concealed the letter, and did not now produce it.

"It is with reference to your a.s.sistance, and your continued a.s.sistance, that I wish to speak to you. Let us follow the example of the cement and the steel, and form a compact. In one respect I am going to imitate the 'Consternation.' I leave Bar Harbor next week."

Katherine sat up in her chair, and her eyes opened wide.

"What's the matter with Bar Harbor?" she asked.

"You can answer that question better than I, Kate. The Kempt family are not visitors, but live here all the year round. What do you think is the matter with Bar Harbor?"

"I confess it's a little dull in the winter time, and in all seasons it is situated a considerable distance from New York. Where do you intend to go, Dorothy?"

"That will depend largely on where my friend Kate advises me to go, because I shall take her with me if she will come."

"Companion, lady's-maid, parlor maid, maid-of-all-work, cook, governess, typewriter-girl--which have I to be? Shall I get one afternoon a week off, and may my young man come and see me, if I happen to secure one, and, extremely important, what are the wages?"

"You shall fix your own salary, Kate, and my lawyer men will arrange that the chosen sum is settled upon you so that if we fall out we can quarrel on equal terms."

"Oh, I see, it's an adopted daughter I am to be, then?"

"An adopted sister, rather."

"Do you think I am going to take advantage of my friends.h.i.+p with an heiress, and so pension myself off?"

"It is I who am taking the advantage," said Dorothy, "and I beg you to take compa.s.sion, rather than advantage, upon a lone creature who has no kith or kin in the world."

"Do you really mean it, Dot?"

"Of course I do. Should I propose it if I didn't?"

"Well, this is the first proposal I've ever had, and I believe it is customary to say on those occasions that it is so sudden, or so unexpected, and time is required for consideration."

"How soon can you make up your mind, Kate?"

"Oh, my mind's already made up. I'm going to jump at your offer, but I think it more ladylike to pretend a mild reluctance. What are you going to do, Dorothy?"

"I don't know. I've settled on only one thing. I intend to build a little stone and tile church, very quaint and old-fas.h.i.+oned, if I get the right kind of architect to draw a plan for it, and this church is to be situated in Haverstock."

"Where's Haverstock?"

"It is a village near the Hudson River, on the plain that stretches toward the Catskills."