The Nest Builder Part 49

"I have no needs, Mrs. Byrd," he interrupted at this point, his eyes s.h.i.+ning with eagerness. "Enough clothes for decency, that's all. If I could be of some use to your husband, to my friend and Adolph's, I should ask no more of life. I'm a hopeless failure, ma'am, and getting old--you don't know what it is like to feel utterly useless."

Mary listened to his gentle voice and watched his fine hands--hands used to appraising delicate, beautiful things. The longer they talked, the more certain she felt that here was the ideal person, one bound to her husband by ties of grat.i.tude, and whose ministrations could not possibly offend him.

She rang up Mrs. Farraday, put the case to her, and obtained her offer of a room to house Mr. Jensen while the repairs were making. She arranged with him to return next day with his belongings, and advanced a part of his salary for immediate expenses. Mary wanted him to come to her at once, both out of sympathy for his wretched circ.u.mstances, and because she wished thoroughly to know him before Stefan's return.

Luckily, the Sparrow took to Jensen at once, so there was nothing to fear on that score. For the Sparrow was now a permanent part of Mary's life. She had a small independent income, but no home--her widowed sister having gone west to live with a daughter--and she looked upon herself as the appointed guardian of the Byrdsnest. Not only did she relieve Mary of the housekeeping, and help Lily with the household tasks, which she adored, but she had practically taken the place of nurse to the children, leaving Mary hours of freedom for her work which would otherwise have been unattainable.

The competency of the two friends achieved the impossible in the next few weeks, as it had done on the memorable first day of Mary's housekeeping. Mr. Jensen, with his trained taste, was invaluable for shopping expeditions, going back and forth to the city with catalogues, samples, and orders.

In a little over three weeks Stefan's old studio had been transformed into a bed-sitting-room, with every comfort that an invalid could desire, and the further end of it had been part.i.tioned into a bathroom and a small bedroom for Mr. Jensen, with a separate outside entrance.

"Oh, if only I had the new wing," sighed Mary.

"This will be even quieter for him, Mrs. Byrd, and the chair can be wheeled so quickly to the house," replied Mr. Jensen.

The back window of Mary's sitting room had been enlarged to gla.s.s doors, and from these a concrete path ran to the studio entrance. Mary planned to make it a covered way after the summer.

The day the wheeled chair arrived it was hard for her to keep back the tears. It was a beautifully made thing of springs, cus.h.i.+ons, and rubber tires. It could be pushed, or hand-propelled by the occupant. It could be lowered, heightened, or tilted. It was all that a chair could be--but how to picture Stefan in it, he of the lithe steps and quick, agile movements, the sudden turns, and the swift, almost running walk? Her heart trembled with pity at the thought.

They had already received an "all well" cable from Paris, and three weeks after he had sailed, James telegraphed that they were starting. He had waited for the American line--he would have been gone a month.

As the day of landing approached, Mary became intensely nervous. She decided not to meet the boat, and sent James a wireless to that effect.

She could not see Stefan first among all those crowds; her instinct told her that he, too, would not wish it.

The s.h.i.+p docked on Sat.u.r.day. The day before, the last touches had been put to Stefan's quarters. They were as perfect as care and taste could make them. Early on Sat.u.r.day morning Mr. Jensen started for the city, carrying a big bunch of roses--Mary's welcome to her husband. While the Sparrow flew about the house gilding the lily of cleanliness, Mary, with Elliston at her skirts, picked the flowers destined for Stefan's room.

These she arranged in every available vase--the studio sang with them. Every now and then she would think of some trifle to beautify it further--a drawing from her sitting room--her oldest pewter plate for another ashtray--a pine pillow from her bedroom. Elliston's fat legs became so tired with ceaselessly trotting back and forth behind her that he began to cry with fatigue, and was put to bed for his nap. Rosamond waked, demanding dinner and amus.e.m.e.nt.

The endless morning began to pa.s.s, and all this while Mary had not thought!

At lunch time James telephoned. They would be out by three o'clock.

Stefan had stood the journey well, was delighted with the roses, and to see Jensen. He was wonderfully brave and cheerful.

Mary was trembling as she hung up the receiver. He was here, he was on the way; and still, she had not thought!

Both children asleep, the last conceivable preparation made, Mary settled herself on the porch at last, to face what was coming.

The Sparrow peeped out at her.

"I guess you'd as soon be left alone, my dear," she said, tactfully.

"Yes, please, Sparrow," Mary replied, with a nervous smile. The little spinster slipped away.

What did she feel for Stefan? Mary wondered. Pity, deep pity? Yes. But that she would feel for any wounded soldier. Admiration for his courage?

That, too, any one of the war's million heroes could call forth.

Determination to do her full duty by this stricken member of her family?

Of course, she would have done that for any relative. Love? No. Mary felt no love for Stefan. That had died, nearly a year ago, died in agony and humiliation. She could not feel that her lover, her husband, was returning to her. She waited only for a wounded man to whom she owed the duty of all kindness.

Suddenly, her heart shook with fear. What if she were unable to show him more than pity, more than kindness? What if he, stricken, helpless, should feel her lack of warmth, and tenderness, should feel himself a stranger here in this his only refuge? Oh, no, no! She must do better than that. She must act a part. He must feel himself cared for, wanted.

Surely he, who had lost everything, could ask so much for old love's sake? ... But if she could not give it? Terror a.s.sailed her, the terror of giving pain; for she knew that of all women she was least capable of insincerity. "I don't know how to act," she cried to herself, pitifully.

A car honked in the lane. They were here. She jumped up and ran to the gate, wheeling the waiting chair outside it. Farraday's big car rounded the bend--three men sat in the tonneau. Seeing them, Mary ran suddenly back inside the gate; her eyes fell, she dared not look.

The car had stopped. Through half-raised lids she saw James alight. The chauffeur ran to the chair. Jensen stood up in the car, and some one was lifted from it. The chair wheeled about and came toward her. It was through the gate--it was only a yard away.

"Mary," said a voice. She looked up.

There was the well-known face, strangely young, the eyes large and shadowed. There was his smile, eager, and very anxious now. There were his hands, those finely nervous hands. They lay on a rug, beneath which were the once swift limbs that could never move again. He was all hers now. His wings were broken, and, broken, he was returning to the nest.

"Mary!"

She made one step forward. Stooping, she gathered his head to her breast, that breast where, loverlike, it had lain a hundred times. Her arms held him close, her tears ran down upon his hair.

"My boy!" she cried.

Here was no lover, no husband to be forgiven. Cradled upon her heart there lay only her first, her most wayward, and her best loved child.

III

Mary never told Stefan of those nightmare moments before his arrival.

From the instant that her deepest pa.s.sion, the maternal, had answered to his need, she knew neither doubt nor unhappiness.

She settled down to the task of creating by her labor and love a home where her three dependents and her three faithful helpmates could find the maximum of happiness and peace.

The life of the Byrdsnest centered about Stefan; every one thought first of him and his needs. Next in order of consideration came Ellie and little Rosamond. Then Lily had to be remembered. She must not be overworked; she must take enough time off. Henrik, too, must not be over-conscientious. He must allow Mary to relieve him often enough.

As for the Sparrow, she must not wear herself out flying in three directions at once. She must not tire her eyes learning typewriting. But at this point Mary's commands were apt to be met with contempt.

"Now, Mary Byrd," the Sparrow would chirp truculently, "you 'tend to your business, and let me 'tend to mine. Anybody would think that we were all to save ourselves in this house but you. As for my typing, it's funny if I can't save you something on those miserable stenographers'

bills."

Mary was wonderfully happy in these days--happier in a sense than she had ever been, for she had found, beyond all question, the full work for hands to do. And to her love for her children there was added not merely her maternal tenderness for Stefan, but a deep and growing admiration.

For Stefan was changed not only in the body, but in the spirit.

Everybody remarked it. The fierce fires of war seemed to have burnt away his old confident egotism. In giving himself to France he had found more than he had lost; for, by a strange paradox, in the midst of death he had found belief in life.

"Mary, my beautiful," he said to her one day in September, as he worked at an adjustable drawing board which swung across his knees, "did you ever wonder why all my old pictures used to be of rapid movement, nearly all of running or flying?"

"Yes, dearest, I used to try often to think out the significance of it."

They were in the studio. Mary had just dropped her pencil after a couple of hours' work on a new serial she was writing. She often worked now in Stefan's room. He was busy with a series of drawings of the war. He had tried different media--pastel, ink, pencils, and chalks--to see which were the easiest for sedentary work.

"It's good-bye to oils," he had said, "I couldn't paint a foot from the canvas."

Now he was using a mixture of chalk and charcoal, and was in the act of finis.h.i.+ng the sixth drawing of his series. The big doors of the barn were opened wide to the sunny lawn, gay with a riot of multicolored dahlias.

"It's odd," said Stefan, pus.h.i.+ng away his board and turning the wheels of his chair so that he faced the brilliant stillness of the garden, "but I seem never to have understood my work till now. I used always to paint flight partly because it was beautiful in itself but also, I think, with some hazy notion that swift creatures could always escape from the ugliness of life."