A Lost Lady Page 4

the future so cryptic and unfathomable, as that brief toast uttered

  by the massive man, "Happy days!"

  Mrs. Ogden turned to the host with her most languishing smile:

  "Captain Forrester, I want you to tell Constance"--(She was an East

  Virginia woman, and what she really said was, "Cap'n Forrester, Ah

  wan' yew to tell, etc." Her vowels seemed to roll about in the

  same way her eyes did.)--"I want you to tell Constance about how

  you first found this lovely spot, 'way back in Indian times."

  The Captain looked down the table between the candles at Mrs.

  Forrester, as if to consult her. She smiled and nodded, and her

  beautiful earrings swung beside her pale cheeks. She was wearing

  her diamonds tonight, and a black velvet gown. Her husband had

  archaic ideas about jewels; a man bought them for his wife in

  acknowledgment of things he could not gracefully utter. They must

  be costly; they must show that he was able to buy them, and that

  she was worthy to wear them.

  With her approval the Captain began his narrative: a concise

  account of how he came West a young boy, after serving in the Civil

  War, and took a job as driver for a freighting company that carried

  supplies across the plains from Nebraska City to Cherry Creek, as

  Denver was then called. The freighters, after embarking in that

  sea of grass six hundred miles in width, lost all count of the days

  of the week and the month. One day was like another, and all were

  glorious; good hunting, plenty of antelope and buffalo, boundless

  sunny sky, boundless plains of waving grass, long fresh-water

  lagoons yellow with lagoon flowers, where the bison in their

  periodic migrations stopped to drink and bathe and wallow.

  "An ideal life for a young man," the Captain pronounced. Once,

  when he was driven out of the trail by a wash-out, he rode south on

  his horse to explore, and found an Indian encampment near the Sweet

  Water, on this very hill where his house now stood. He was, he

  said, "greatly taken with the location," and made up his mind that

  he would one day have a house there. He cut down a young willow

  tree and drove the stake into the ground to mark the spot where he

  wished to build. He went away and did not come back for many

  years; he was helping to lay the first railroad across the plains.

  "There were those that were dependent on me," he said. "I had

  sickness to contend with, and responsibilities. But in all those

  years I expect there was hardly a day passed that I did not

  remember the Sweet Water and this hill. When I came here a young

  man, I had planned it in my mind, pretty much as it is today; where

  I would dig my well, and where I would plant my grove and my

  orchard. I planned to build a house that my friends could come to,

  with a wife like Mrs. Forrester to make it attractive to them. I

  used to promise myself that some day I would manage it." This part

  of the story the Captain told not with embarrassment, but with

  reserve, choosing his words slowly, absently cracking English

  walnuts with his strong fingers and heaping a little hoard of

  kernels beside his plate. His friends understood that he was

  referring to his first marriage, to the poor invalid wife who had

  never been happy and who had kept his nose to the grindstone.

  "When things looked most discouraging," he went on, "I came back

  here once and bought the place from the railroad company. They

  took my note. I found my willow stake,--it had rooted and grown

  into a tree,--and I planted three more to mark the corners of my

  house. Twelve years later Mrs. Forrester came here with me,

  shortly after our marriage, and we built our house." Captain

  Forrester puffed from time to time, but his clear account commanded

  attention. Something in the way he uttered his unornamented

  phrases gave them the impressiveness of inscriptions cut in stone.

  Mrs. Forrester nodded at him from her end of the table. "And now,

  tell us your philosophy of life,--this is where it comes in," she

  laughed teasingly.

  The Captain coughed and looked abashed. "I was intending to omit

  that tonight. Some of our guests have already heard it."

  "No, no. It belongs at the end of the story, and if some of us

  have heard it, we can hear it again. Go on!"

  "Well, then, my philosophy is that what you think of and plan for

  day by day, in spite of yourself, so to speak--you will get. You

  will get it more or less. That is, unless you are one of the

  people who get nothing in this world. There are such people. I

  have lived too much in mining works and construction camps not to

  know that." He paused as if, though this was too dark a chapter to

  be gone into, it must have its place, its moment of silent

  recognition. "If you are not one of those, Constance and Niel, you

  will accomplish what you dream of most."

  "And why? That's the interesting part of it," his wife prompted

  him.

  "Because," he roused himself from his abstraction and looked about

  at the company, "because a thing that is dreamed of in the way I

  mean, is already an accomplished fact. All our great West has been

  developed from such dreams; the homesteader's and the prospector's

  and the contractor's. We dreamed the railroads across the

  mountains, just as I dreamed my place on the Sweet Water. All

  these things will be everyday facts to the coming generation, but

  to us--" Captain Forrester ended with a sort of grunt. Something

  forbidding had come into his voice, the lonely, defiant note that

  is so often heard in the voices of old Indians.

  Mrs. Ogden had listened to the story with such sympathy that Niel

  liked her better than ever, and even the preoccupied Constance

  seemed able to give it her attention. They rose from the dessert

  and went into the parlour to arrange the card tables. The Captain

  still played whist as well as ever. As he brought out a box of his

  best cigars, he paused before Mrs. Ogden and said, "Is smoke

  offensive to you, Mrs. Ogden?" When she protested that it was not,

  he crossed the room to where Constance was talking with Ellinger

  and asked with the same grave courtesy, "Is smoke offensive to you,

  Constance?" Had there been half a dozen women present, he would

  have asked that question of each, probably, and in the same words.

  It did not bother him to repeat a phrase. If an expression

  answered his purpose, he saw no reason for varying it.

  Mrs. Forrester and Mr. Ogden were to play against Mrs. Ogden and

  the Captain. "Constance," said Mrs. Forrester as she sat down,

  "will you play with Niel? I'm told he's very good."

  Miss Ogden's short nose flickered up, the lines on either side of

  it deepened, and she again looked injured. Niel was sure she

  detested him. He was not going to be done in by her.

  "Miss Ogden," he said as he stood beside his chair, deliberately

  shuffling a pack of cards, "my uncle and I are used to playing

  together, and probably you are used to playing with Mr. Ellinger.

  Suppose we try that combination?"


  She gave him a quick, suspicious glance from under her yellow

  eyelashes and flung herself into a chair without so much as

  answering him. Frank Ellinger came in from the dining-room, where

  he had been sampling the Captain's French brandy, and took the

  vacant seat opposite Miss Ogden. "So it's you and me, Connie?

  Good enough!" he exclaimed, cutting the pack Niel pushed toward

  him.

  Just before midnight Black Tom opened the door and announced that

  the egg-nog was ready. The card players went into the dining-room,

  where the punchbowl stood smoking on the table.

  "Constance," said Captain Forrester, "do you sing? I like to hear

  one of the old songs with the egg-nog."

  "Ah'm sorry, Cap'n Forrester. Ah really haven't any voice."

  Niel noticed that whenever Constance spoke to the Captain she

  strained her throat, though he wasn't in the least deaf. He broke

  in over her refusal. "Uncle can start a song if you coax him,

  sir."

  Judge Pommeroy, after smoothing his silver whiskers and coughing,

  began "Auld Lang Syne." The others joined in, but they hadn't got

  to the end of it when a hollow rumbling down on the bridge made

  them laugh, and everyone ran to the front windows to see the

  Judge's funeral coach come lurching up the hill, with only one of

  the side lanterns lit. Mrs. Forrester sent Tom out with a drink

  for the driver. While Niel and his uncle were putting on their

  overcoats in the hall, she came up to them and whispered coaxingly

  to the boy, "Remember, you are coming over tomorrow, at two? I am

  planning a drive, and I want you to amuse Constance for me."

  Niel bit his lip and looked down into Mrs. Forrester's laughing,

  persuasive eyes. "I'll do it for you, but that's the only reason,"

  he said threateningly.

  "I understand, for me! I'll credit it to your account."

  The Judge and his nephew rolled away on swaying springs. The

  Ogdens retired to their rooms upstairs. Mrs. Forrester went to

  help the Captain divest himself of his frock coat, and put it away

  for him. Ever since he was hurt he had to be propped high on

  pillows at night, and he slept in a narrow iron bed, in the alcove

  which had formerly been his wife's dressing-room. While he was

  undressing he breathed heavily and sighed, as if he were very

  tired. He fumbled with his studs, then blew on his fingers and

  tried again. His wife came to his aid and quickly unbuttoned

  everything. He did not thank her in words, but submitted

  gratefully.

  When the iron bed creaked at receiving his heavy figure, she called

  from the big bedroom, "Good-night, Mr. Forrester," and drew the

  heavy curtains that shut off the alcove. She took off her rings

  and earrings and was beginning to unfasten her black velvet bodice

  when, at a tinkle of glass from without, she stopped short. Re-

  hooking the shoulder of her gown, she went to the dining-room, now

  faintly lit by the coal fire in the back parlour. Frank Ellinger

  was standing at the sideboard, taking a nightcap. The Forrester

  French brandy was old, and heavy like a cordial.

  "Be careful," she murmured as she approached him, "I have a

  distinct impression that there is someone on the enclosed stairway.

  There is a wide crack in the door. Ah, but kittens have claws,

  these days! Pour me just a little. Thank you. I'll have mine in

  by the fire."

  He followed her into the next room, where she stood by the grate,

  looking at him in the light of the pale blue flames that ran over

  the fresh coal, put on to keep the fire.

  "You've had a good many brandies, Frank," she said, studying his

  flushed, masterful face.

  "Not too many. I'll need them . . . to-night," he replied

  meaningly.

  She nervously brushed back a lock of hair that had come down a

  little. "It's not to-night. It's morning. Go to bed and sleep as

  late as you please. Take care, I heard silk stockings on the

  stairs. Good-night." She put her hand on the sleeve of his coat;

  the white fingers clung to the black cloth as bits of paper cling

  to magnetized iron. Her touch, soft as it was, went through the

  man, all the feet and inches of him. His broad shoulders lifted on

  a deep breath. He looked down at her.

  Her eyes fell. "Good-night," she said faintly. As she turned

  quickly away, the train of her velvet dress caught the leg of his

  broadcloth trousers and dragged with a friction that crackled and

  threw sparks. Both started. They stood looking at each other for

  a moment before she actually slipped through the door. Ellinger

  remained by the hearth, his arms folded tight over his chest, his

  curly lips compressed, frowning into the fire.

  FIVE

  Niel went up the hill the next afternoon, just as the cutter with

  the two black ponies jingled round the driveway and stopped at the

  front door. Mrs. Forrester came out on the porch, dressed for a

  sleigh ride. Ellinger followed her, buttoned up in a long fur-

  lined coat, showily befrogged down the front, with a glossy

  astrachan collar. He looked even more powerful and bursting with

  vigour than last night. His highly-coloured, well-visored

  countenance shone with a good opinion of himself and of the world.

  Mrs. Forrester called to Niel gaily. "We are going down to the

  Sweet Water to cut cedar boughs for Christmas. Will you keep

  Constance company? She seems a trifle disappointed at being left

  behind, but we can't take the big sleigh,--the pole is broken. Be

  nice to her, there's a good boy!" She pressed his hand, gave him a

  meaning, confidential smile, and stepped into the sleigh. Ellinger

  sprang in beside her, and they glided down the hill with a merry

  tinkle of sleighbells.

  Niel found Miss Ogden in the back parlour, playing solitaire by the

  fire. She was clearly out of humour.

  "Come in, Mr. Herbert. I think they might have taken us along,

  don't you? I want to see the river my own self. I hate bein' shut

  up in the house!"

  "Let's go out, then. Wouldn't you like to see the town?"

  Constance seemed not to hear him. She was wrinkling and unwrinkling

  her short nose, and the restless lines about her mouth were

  fluttering. "What's to hinder us from getting a sleigh at the

  livery barn and going down to the Sweet Water? I don't suppose the

  river's private property?" She gave a nervous, angry laugh and

  looked hopefully at Niel.

  "We couldn't get anything at this hour. The livery teams are all

  out," he said with firmness.

  Constance glanced at him suspiciously, then sat down at the card

  table and leaned over it, drawing her plump shoulders together.

  Her fluffy yellow hair was wound round her head like a scarf and

  held in place by narrow bands of black velvet.

  The ponies had crossed the second creek and were trotting down the

  high road toward the river. Mrs. Forrester expressed her feelings

  in a laugh full of mischief. "Is she running after us? Where did

  she get the idea that she wa
s to come? What a relief to get away!"

  She lifted her chin and sniffed the air. The day was grey, without

  sun, and the air was still and dry, a warm cold. "Poor Mr. Ogden,"

  she went on, "how much livelier he is without his ladies! They

  almost extinguish him. Now aren't you glad you never married?"

  "I'm certainly glad I never married a homely woman. What does a

  man do it for, anyway? She had no money,--and he's always had it,

  or been on the way to it."

  "Well, they're off tomorrow. And Connie! You've reduced her to a

  state of imbecility, really! What an afternoon Niel must be

  having!" She laughed as if the idea of his predicament delighted

  her.

  "Who's this kid, anyway?" Ellinger asked her to take the reins for

  a moment while he drew a cigar from his pocket. "He's a trifle

  stiff. Does he make himself useful?"

  "Oh, he's a nice boy, stranded here like the rest of us. I'm going

  to train him to be very useful. He's devoted to Mr. Forrester.

  Handsome, don't you think?"

  "So-so." They turned into a by-road that wound along the Sweet

  Water. Ellinger held the ponies in a little and turned down his

  high astrachan collar. "Let's have a look at you, Marian."

  Mrs. Forrester was holding her muff before her face, to catch the

  flying particles of snow the ponies kicked up. From behind it she

  glanced at him sidewise. "Well?" she said teasingly.

  He put his arm through hers and settled himself low in the sleigh.

  "You ought to look at me better than that. It's been a devil of a

  long while since I've seen you."

  "Perhaps it's been too long," she murmured. The mocking spark in

  her eyes softened perceptibly under the long pressure of his arm.

  "Yes, it's been long," she admitted lightly.

  "You didn't answer the letter I wrote you on the eleventh."

  "Didn't I? Well, at any rate I answered your telegram." She drew

  her head away as his face came nearer. "You'll really have to

  watch the ponies, my dear, or they'll tumble us out in the snow."

  "I don't care. I wish they would!" he said between his teeth.

  "Why didn't you answer my letter?"

  "Oh, I don't remember! You don't write so many."

  "It's no satisfaction. You won't let me write you love letters.

  You say it's risky."

  "So it is, and foolish. But now you needn't be so careful. Not

  too careful!" she laughed softly. "When I'm off in the country for

  a whole winter, alone, and growing older, I like to . . ." she put

  her hand on his, "to be reminded of pleasanter things."

  Ellinger took off his glove with his teeth. His eyes, sweeping the

  winding road and the low, snow-covered bluffs, had something

  wolfish in them.

  "Be careful, Frank. My rings! You hurt me!"

  "Then why didn't you take them off? You used to. Are these your

  cedars, shall we stop here?"

  "No, not here." She spoke very low. "The best ones are farther

  on, in a deep ravine that winds back into the hills."

  Ellinger glanced at her averted head, and his heavy lips twitched

  in a smile at one corner. The quality of her voice had changed,

  and he knew the change. They went spinning along the curves of the

  winding road, saying not a word. Mrs. Forrester sat with her head

  bent forward, her face half hidden in her muff. At last she told

  him to stop. To the right of the road he saw a thicket. Behind it

  a dry watercourse wound into the bluffs. The tops of the dark,

  still cedars, just visible from the road, indicated its windings.

  "Sit still," he said, "while I take out the horses."

  When the blue shadows of approaching dusk were beginning to fall

  over the snow, one of the Blum boys, slipping quietly along through

  the timber in search of rabbits, came upon the empty cutter

  standing in the brush, and near it the two ponies, stamping