Danger; Or, Wounded in the House of a Friend Part 2

But Mrs. Birtwell did not return to her bed. With warm wrapper thrown about her person, she stood at the head of the stairway while her husband went down to admit the policemen. All that could be learned from them was that Archie Voss had not come home from the party, and that his friends were greatly alarmed about him. Mr. Birtwell had no information to give. The young man had been at his house, and had gone away some time during the night, but precisely at what hour he could not tell.

"You noticed him through the evening?" said one of the policemen.

"Oh yes, certainly. We know Archie very well. He's always been intimate at our house."

"Did he take wine freely?"

An indignant denial leaped to Mr. Birtwell's tongue, but the words died unspoken, for the image of Archie, with flushed face and eyes too bright for sober health, holding in his hand a gla.s.s of sparkling champagne, came vividly before him.

"Not more freely than other young men," he replied. "Why do you ask?"

"There are two theories of his absence," said the policeman. "One is that he has been set upon in the street, robbed and murdered, and the other that, stupefied and bewildered by drink, he lost himself in the storm, and lies somewhere frozen to death and hidden under the snow."

A cry of pain broke from the lips of Mrs. Birtwell, and she came hurrying down stairs. Too well did she remember the condition of Archie when she last saw him--Archie, the only son of her oldest and dearest friend, the friend she had known and loved since girlhood. He was not fit to go out alone in that cold and stormy night; and a guilty sense of responsibility smote upon her heart and set aside all excuses.

"What about his mother?" she asked, anxiously. "How is she bearing this dreadful suspense?"

"I can't just say, ma'am," was answered, "but I think they've had the doctor with her all night--that is, all the last part of the night.

She's lying in a faint, I believe."

"Oh, it will kill her! Poor Frances! Poor Frances!" wailed out Mrs.

Birtwell, wringing her hands and beginning to cry bitterly.

"The police have been on the lookout for the last two or three hours, but can't find any trace of him," said the officer.

"Oh, he'll turn up all right," broke in Mr. Birtwell, with a confident tone. "It's only a scare. Gone home with some young friend, as like as not. Young fellows in their teens don't get lost in the snow, particularly in the streets of a great city, and footpads generally know their game before bringing it down. I'm sorry for poor Mrs. Voss; she isn't strong enough to bear such a shock. But it will all come right; I don't feel a bit concerned."

But for all that he did feel deeply concerned. The policemen went away, and Mr. and Mrs. Birtwell sat down by an open grate in which the fire still burned.

"Don't let it distress you so, Margaret," said the former, trying to comfort his wife. "There's nothing to fear for Archie. n.o.body ever heard of a man getting lost in a city snow-storm. If he'd been out on a prairie, the case would have been different, but in the streets of the city! The thing's preposterous, Margaret."

"Oh, if he'd only gone away as he came, I wouldn't feel so awfully about it," returned Mrs. Birtwell. "That's what cuts me to the heart.

To think that he came to my house sober and went away--"

She caught back from her tongue the word she would have spoken, and s.h.i.+vered.

"Nothing of the kind, Margaret, nothing of the kind," said her husband, quickly. "A little gay--that was all. Just what is seen at parties every night. Archie hasn't much head, and a single gla.s.s of champagne is enough to set it buzzing. But it's soon over. The effervescence goes off in a little while, and the head comes clear again."

Mrs. Birtwell did not reply. Her eyes were cast down and her face deeply distressed.

"If anything has happened to Archie," she said, after a long silence, "I shall never have a moment's peace as long as I live."

"Nonsense, Margaret! Suppose something has happened to him? We are not responsible. It's his own fault if he took away more wine than he was able to carry." Mr. Birtwell spoke with slight irritation.

"If he hadn't found the wine here, he could not have carried it away,"

replied his wife.

"How wildly you talk, Margaret!" exclaimed Mr. Birtwell, with increased irritation.

"We won't discuss the matter," said his wife. "It would be useless, agreement being, I fear, out of the question; but it is very certain that we cannot escape responsibility in this or anything else we may do, and so long as these words of Holy Writ stand, _'Woe unto him that giveth his neighbor drink, that putteth the bottle to him and maketh him drunken'_, we may well have serious doubts in regard to the right and wrong of these fas.h.i.+onable entertainments, at which wine and spirits are made free to all of both s.e.xes, young and old."

Mr. Birtwell started to his feet and walked the floor with considerable excitement.

"If _we_ had a son just coming to manhood--and I sometimes thank G.o.d that we have not--would you feel wholly at ease about him, wholly satisfied that he was in no danger in the houses of your friends? May not a young man as readily acquire a taste for liquors in a gentleman's dining-room as in a drinking-saloon--nay, more readily, if in the former the wine is free and bright eyes and laughing lips press him with invitations?"

Mrs. Birtwell's voice had gained a steadiness and force that made it very impressive. Her husband continued to walk the floor but with slower steps.

"I saw things last night that troubled me," she went on. "There is no disguising the fact that most of the young men who come to these large parties spend a great deal too much time in the supper-room, and drink a great deal more than is good for them. Archie Voss was not the only one who did this last evening. I watched another young man very closely, and am sorry to say that he left our house in a condition in which no mother waiting at home could receive her son without sorrow and shame."

"Who was that?" asked Mr. Birtwell, turning quickly upon his wife. He had detected more than a common concern in her voice.

"Ellis," she replied. Her manner was very grave.

"You must be mistaken about that," said Mr. Birtwell, evidently disturbed at this communication.

"I wish to Heaven that I were! But the fact was too apparent. Blanche saw it, and tried to get him out of the supper-room. He acted in the silliest kind of a way, and mortified her dreadfully, poor child!"

"Such things will happen sometimes," said Mr. Birtwell. "Young men like Ellis don't always know how much they can bear." His voice was in a lower key and a little husky.

"It happens too often with Ellis," replied his wife, "and I'm beginning to feel greatly troubled about it."

"Has it happened before?"

"Yes; at Mrs. Gleason's, only last week. He was loud and boisterous in the supper-room--so much so that I heard a lady speak of his conduct as disgraceful."

"That will never do," exclaimed Mr. Birtwell, betraying much excitement. "He will have to change all this or give up Blanche. I don't care what his family is if he isn't all right himself."

"It is easier to get into trouble than out of it," was replied. "Things have gone too far between them."

"I don't believe it. Blanche will never throw herself away on a man of bad habits."

"No; I do not think she will. But there may be, in her view, a very great distance between an occasional gla.s.s of wine too much at an evening party and confirmed bad habits. We must not hope to make her see with our eyes, nor to take our judgment of a case in which her heart is concerned. Love is full of excuses and full of faith. If Ellis Whitford should, unhappily, be overcome by this accursed appet.i.te for drink which is destroying so many of our most promising young men, there is trouble ahead for her and for us."

"Something must be done about it. We cannot let this thing go on," said Mr. Birtwell, in a kind of helpless pa.s.sion. "A drunkard is a beast.

Our Blanche tied to a beast! Ugh! Ellis must be talked to. I shall see him myself. If he gets offended, I cannot help it. There's too much at stake--too much, too much!"

"Talking never does much in these cases," returned Mrs. Birtwell, gloomily. "Ellis would be hurt and offended."

"So far so good. He'd be on guard at the next party."

"Perhaps so. But what hope is there for a young man in any danger of acquiring a love of liquor as things now are in our best society? He cannot always be on guard. Wine is poured for him everywhere. He may go unharmed in his daily walks through the city though thousands of drinking-saloons crowd its busy streets. They may hold out their enticements for him in vain. But he is too weak to refuse the tempting gla.s.s when a fair hostess offers it, or when, in the midst of a gay company wine is in every hand and at every lip. One gla.s.s taken, and caution and restraint are too often forgotten. He drinks with this one and that one, until his clear head is gone and appet.i.te, like a watchful spider, throws another cord of its fatal web around him."

"I don't see what we are to do about it," said Mr. Birtwell. "If men can't control themselves--" He did not finish the sentence.

"We can at least refrain from putting temptation in their way,"

answered his wife.

"How?"