The Rose in the Ring Part 26

"It is a loan," she murmured.

"Certainly," he said gravely.

"Ruby, you will go with us," she went on. "My husband must be made to understand that we are to thank you and Joey for this bit of luxury."

Joey Grinaldi sought out Braddock and told him of his determination to share his little store of savings with Mrs. Braddock and Christine.

There was a scene, but the clown stood his ground.

"I suppose I can sleep in the gutter," raved Braddock.

"I don't give a 'ang where you sleep, Tom Braddock," shouted Joey, angry for the first time in years.

"Where's that Snipe kid?" demanded the other.

"He's to stay with me," announced Joey.

"The d.a.m.ned little sneak, he could save us a lot of trouble if he'd thaw out and hand over some of the money he's hiding. I'm going to have it out with him. He can't stay on here and let--"

"I wouldn't talk so much, Brad. Better keep a close tongue in that 'ead of yours," said the clown meaningly. Braddock looked at him in sudden apprehension. He began to wonder what the old clown suspected.

He changed his tactics. "If d.i.c.k Cronk was only here, I could borrow enough from him to get a place to sleep," he growled petulantly. "But, curse him, he hasn't been near us since that job in Granville, ten days ago."

When Joey left him he was cursing everything and everybody. On the way to the hotel Christine and David walked together. She clung very tightly to his arm. Leaving the grounds, she had whispered in his ear:

"David, I adore you--I just adore you."

"I'd die for you, Christine. That's how I feel toward you," he responded pa.s.sionately.

A sweet shyness fell upon her. The chrysalis of girlish ignorance was dropping away; she was being exposed to herself in a new and glowing form. Something sweet and strange and grateful flashed hot in her blood; the glow of it amazed and bewildered her.

"Oh, David," she murmured timorously.

"My little Christine," he breathed, laying his hand upon hers. She sighed; her red lips parted in the soft, luxurious ecstasy of discovery; she breathed of a curiously light and buoyant atmosphere; she was walking on air. Little bells tinkled softly, but she knew not whence came the mysterious sound.

An amazing contentment came over them. They were very young, and the malady that had revealed itself so painlessly was an old one--as old as the world itself. Their hearts sang, but their lips were mute; they were drunk with wonder.

They lagged behind. Far ahead hurried the others, driven to haste by low rumbles of thunder and the warning splashes of raindrops. The drizzle of the gray, lowering afternoon had ceased, but in its place came ominous skies and crooning winds. Back on the circus lot men were working frantically to complete the task of loading before the storm broke over them. Everywhere people were scurrying to shelter. David and Christine loitered on the way, with delicious disdain for all the things of earth or sky.

A vivid flash of lightning, followed by a deafening roar of thunder in the angry sky, brought them back to earth. The raindrops began to beat against their faces. Sharp, hysterical laughter rose to their lips, and they set out on a run for the still distant hotel. The deluge came just as they reached the shelter of a friendly awning in front of a grocery store. The wide, old-fas.h.i.+oned covering afforded safe retreat. Panting, they drew up and ensconced themselves as far back as possible in the doorway.

She was not afraid of the storm. Life with the circus had made her quite impervious to the crash of thunder; the philosophy of Vagabondia had taught her that lightning is not dangerous unless it strikes. The circus man is a fatalist. A person dies when his time comes, not before. It is all marked down for him.

Of the two, David was certainly the more nervous. His arm was about her shoulders; her firm, slender body was drawn close to his. His clasp tightened as the timidity of inexperience gave way to confidence; an amazing sense of conquest, of possession took hold of him. He could have shouted defiance to the storm. He held her! This beautiful, warm, alive creature belonged to him!

"Are you afraid,--dearest?" he called, his lips close to her ear.

"Not a bit, David," she cried rapturously. "I love it. Isn't it wonderful?"

She turned her head on his shoulder. His lips swept her cheek. Before either of them knew what had happened their lips met--a frightened, hasty, timorous kiss that was not even prophetic of the joys that were to grow out of it.

"Oh, David, you must not do that!" cried the very maiden in her.

"Has any one ever kissed you before?" he demanded, fiercely jealous on a sudden.

She drew back, hurt, aghast.

"Why, David!" she cried.

He mumbled an apology.

"Christine," he announced resolutely, "I am going to marry you when you are old enough."

She gasped. "But, David--" she began, tremulous with doubt and perplexity.

"I know," he said as she hesitated; "you are afraid I'll not be cleared of this charge. But I am sure to be--as sure as there is a G.o.d. Then, when you are nineteen or twenty, I mean to ask you to be my wife. You are my sweetheart now--oh, my dearest sweet-heart! Christine, you won't let any one else come in and take my place? You'll be just as you are now until we are older and--"

"Wait, David! Let me think. I--I _could_ be your wife, couldn't I? I am a Portman. I _am_ good enough to--to be what you want me to be, am I not, David? You understand, don't you? Mother says I am a Portman. I am not common and vulgar, am I, David? I--"

"I couldn't love you if you were that, Christine. You are fit to be the wife of a--a king," he concluded eagerly.

"I have learned so much from you," she said, so softly he could barely hear the words.

"It's the other way round. You've taught me a thousand times more than you ever could learn from me," he protested. "I'm n.o.body. I've never seen anything of life."

"You are the most wonderful person in all this world--not even excepting the princes in the Arabian Nights."

"I'm only a boy," he said.

"I wouldn't love you if you were a man," she announced promptly.

"David, I must tell mother that--that you have kissed me. You won't mind, will you?"

"We'll tell her together," he said readily.

"We--perhaps we'd better not tell father," she said with an effort.

The words had scarcely left her lips when a startling interruption came. A heavy body dropped from above, landing in the middle of the sidewalk not more than six feet from the doorway. Vivid flashes of lightning revealed to the couple the figure of a man standing upright before them, but looking in quite another direction. Christine's sharp little cry came as the first flash died away, but another followed in a second's time. The man was now facing the doorway, his body bent forward, his white face gleaming in the unnatural light. David had withdrawn his arms from about Christine and had planted himself in front of her. Pitchy darkness returned in the fraction of a second.

Distinctly they heard a laugh. Then out of the clatter and swish of driven water came the cheerful cry:

"h.e.l.lo, Jack Snipe!"

"Who are you?" called out David.

"Ha! Who goes there, you mean. Always use the correct question, kid.

How can I give the secret pa.s.sword unless you put it up to me right?

Oh, I say! I didn't see you, Miss Christine. Geminy! Ain't this a pelter?"

"Why, it's d.i.c.k," cried David. "Where in the world did you drop from?