A Lost Lady Read online

impatiently where they were tied. Adolph slid back into the

  thicket and lay down behind a fallen log to see what would happen.

  Not much ever happened to him but weather. Presently he heard low

  voices, coming nearer from the ravine. The big stranger who was

  visiting at the Forresters' emerged, carrying the buffalo robes on

  one arm; Mrs. Forrester herself was clinging to the other. They

  walked slowly, wholly absorbed by what they were saying to each

  other. When they came up to the sleigh, the man spread the robes

  on the seat and put his hands under Mrs. Forrester's arms to lift

  her in. But he did not lift her; he stood for a long while holding

  her crushed up against his breast, her face hidden in his black

  overcoat.

  "What about those damned cedar boughs?" he asked, after he had put

  her in and covered her up. "Shall I go back and cut some?"

  "It doesn't matter," she murmured.

  He reached under the seat for a hatchet and went back to the

  ravine. Mrs. Forrester sat with her eyes closed, her cheek

  pillowed on her muff, a faint, soft smile on her lips. The air was

  still and blue; the Blum boy could almost hear her breathe. When

  the strokes of the hatchet rang out from the ravine, he could see

  her eyelids flutter . . . soft shivers went through her body.

  The man came back and threw the evergreens into the sleigh. When

  he got in beside her, she slipped her hand through his arm and

  settled softly against him. "Drive slowly," she murmured, as if

  she were talking in her sleep. "It doesn't matter if we are late

  for dinner. Nothing matters." The ponies trotted off.

  The pale Blum boy rose from behind his log and followed the tracks

  up the ravine. When the orange moon rose over the bluffs, he was

  still sitting under the cedars, his gun on his knee. While Mrs.

  Forrester had been waiting there in the sleigh, with her eyes

  closed, feeling so safe, he could almost have touched her with his

  hand. He had never seen her before when her mocking eyes and

  lively manner were not between her and all the world. If it had

  been Thad Grimes who lay behind that log, now, or Ivy Peters?

  But with Adolph Blum her secrets were safe. His mind was feudal;

  the rich and fortunate were also the privileged. These warm-

  blooded, quick-breathing people took chances,--followed impulses

  only dimly understandable to a boy who was wet and weather-chapped

  all the year; who waded in the mud fishing for cat, or lay in the

  marsh waiting for wild duck. Mrs. Forrester had never been too

  haughty to smile at him when he came to the back door with his

  fish. She never haggled about the price. She treated him like a

  human being. His little chats with her, her nod and smile when she

  passed him on the street, were among the pleasantest things he had

  to remember. She bought game of him in the closed season, and

  didn't give him away.

  SIX

  It was during that winter, the first one Mrs. Forrester had ever

  spent in the house on the hill, that Niel came to know her very

  well. For the Forresters that winter was a sort of isthmus between

  two estates; soon afterward came a change in their fortunes. And

  for Niel it was a natural turning-point, since in the autumn he was

  nineteen, and in the spring he was twenty,--a very great difference.

  After the Christmas festivities were over, the whist parties

  settled into a regular routine. Three evenings a week Judge

  Pommeroy and his nephew sat down to cards with the Forresters.

  Sometimes they went over early and dined there. Sometimes they

  stayed for a late supper after the last rubber. Niel, who had been

  so content with a bachelor's life, and who had made up his mind

  that he would never live in a place that was under the control of

  women, found himself becoming attached to the comforts of a well-

  conducted house; to the pleasures of the table, to the soft chairs

  and soft lights and agreeable human voices at the Forresters'. On

  bitter, windy nights, sitting in his favourite blue chair before

  the grate, he used to wonder how he could manage to tear himself

  away, to plunge into the outer darkness, and run down the long

  frozen road and up the dead street of the town. Captain Forrester

  was experimenting with bulbs that winter, and had built a little

  glass conservatory on the south side of the house, off the back

  parlour. Through January and February the house was full of

  narcissus and Roman hyacinths, and their heavy, spring-like odour

  made a part of the enticing comfort of the fireside there.

  Where Mrs. Forrester was, dulness was impossible, Niel believed.

  The charm of her conversation was not so much in what she said,

  though she was often witty, but in the quick recognition of her

  eyes, in the living quality of her voice itself. One could talk

  with her about the most trivial things, and go away with a high

  sense of elation. The secret of it, he supposed, was that she

  couldn't help being interested in people, even very commonplace

  people. If Mr. Ogden or Mr. Dalzell were not there to tell their

  best stories for her, then she could be amused by Ivy Peters'

  ruffianly manners, or the soft compliments of old man Elliott when

  he sold her a pair of winter shoes. She had a fascinating gift of

  mimicry. When she mentioned the fat iceman, or Thad Grimes at his

  meat block, or the Blum boys with their dead rabbits, by a subtle

  suggestion of their manner she made them seem more individual and

  vivid than they were in their own person. She often caricatured

  people to their faces, and they were not offended, but greatly

  flattered. Nothing pleased one more than to provoke her laughter.

  Then you felt you were getting on with her. It was her form of

  commenting, of agreeing with you and appreciating you when you said

  something interesting,--and it often told you a great deal that was

  both too direct and too elusive for words.

  Long, long afterward, when Niel did not know whether Mrs. Forrester

  were living or dead, if her image flashed into his mind, it came

  with a brightness of dark eyes, her pale triangular cheeks with

  long earrings, and her many-coloured laugh. When he was dull, dull

  and tired of everything, he used to think that if he could hear

  that long-lost lady laugh again, he could be gay.

  The big storm of the winter came late that year; swept down over

  Sweet Water the first day of March and beat upon the town for three

  days and nights. Thirty inches of snow fell, and the cutting wind

  blew it into whirling drifts. The Forresters were snowed in. Ben

  Keezer, their man of all work, did not attempt to break a road or

  even to come over to the town himself. On the third day Niel went

  to the post-office, got the Captain's leather mail sack with its

  accumulation of letters, and set off across the creek, plunging

  into drifts up to his middle, sometimes up to his arm-pits. The

  fences along the lane were covered, but he broke his trail by

  keeping between the two lines of poplars. When at last he reached
r />   the front porch, Captain Forrester came to the door and let him in.

  "Glad to see you, my boy, very glad. It's been a little lonesome

  for us. You must have had hard work getting over. I certainly

  appreciate it. Come to the sitting-room fire and dry yourself. We

  will talk quietly. Mrs. Forrester has gone upstairs to lie down;

  she's been complaining of a headache."

  Niel stood before the fire in his rubber boots, drying his

  trousers. The Captain did not sit down but opened the glass door

  into his little conservatory.

  "I've something pretty to show you, Niel. All my hyacinths are

  coming along at once, every colour of the rainbow. The Roman

  hyacinths, I say, are Mrs. Forrester's. They seem to suit her."

  Niel went to the door and looked with keen pleasure at the fresh,

  watery blossoms. "I was afraid you might lose them in this bitter

  weather, Captain."

  "No, these things can stand a good deal of cold. They've been

  company for us." He stood looking out through the glass at the

  drifted shrubbery. Niel liked to see him look out over his place.

  A man's house is his castle, his look seemed to say. "Ben tells me

  the rabbits have come up to the barn to eat the hay, everything

  green is covered up. I had him throw a few cabbages out for them,

  so they won't suffer. Mrs. Forrester has been on the porch every

  day, feeding the snow birds," he went on, as if talking to himself.

  The stair door opened, and Mrs. Forrester came down in her Japanese

  dressing-gown, looking very pale.

  The dark shadows under her eyes seemed to mean that she had been

  losing sleep.

  "Oh, it's Niel! How nice of you. And you've brought the mail.

  Are there any letters for me?"

  "Three. Two from Denver and one from California." Her husband

  gave them to her. "Did you sleep, Maidy?"

  "No, but I rested. It's delightful up in the west room, the wind

  sings and whistles about the eaves. If you'll excuse me, I'll

  dress and glance at my letters. Stand closer to the fire, Niel.

  Are you very wet?" When she stopped beside him to feel his

  clothes, he smelled a sharp odour of spirits. Was she ill, he

  wondered, or merely so bored that she had been trying to dull

  herself?

  When she came back she had dressed and rearranged her hair.

  "Mrs. Forrester," said the Captain in a solicitous tone, "I believe

  I would like some tea and toast this afternoon, like your English

  friends, and it would be good for your head. We won't offer Niel

  anything else."

  "Very well. Mary has gone to bed with a toothache, but I will make

  the tea. Niel can make the toast here by the fire while you read

  your paper."

  She was cheerful now,--tied one of Mary's aprons about Niel's neck

  and set him down with the toasting fork. He noticed that the

  Captain, as he read his paper, kept his eye on the sideboard with a

  certain watchfulness, and when his wife brought the tray with tea,

  and no sherry, he seemed very much pleased. He drank three cups,

  and took a second piece of toast.

  "You see, Mr. Forrester," she said lightly, "Niel has brought back

  my appetite. I ate no lunch to-day," turning to the boy, "I've

  been shut up too long. Is there anything in the papers?"

  This meant was there any news concerning the people they knew. The

  Captain put on his silver-rimmed glasses again and read aloud about

  the doings of their friends in Denver and Omaha and Kansas City.

  Mrs. Forrester sat on a stool by the fire, eating toast and making

  humorous comments upon the subjects of those solemn paragraphs; the

  engagement of Miss Erma Salton-Smith, etc.

  "At last, thank God! You remember her, Niel. She's been here.

  I think you danced with her."

  "I don't think I do. What is she like?"

  "She's exactly like her name. Don't you remember? Tall, very

  animated, glittering eyes, like the Ancient Mariner's?"

  Niel laughed. "Don't you like bright eyes, Mrs. Forrester?"

  "Not any others, I don't!" She joined in his laugh so gaily that

  the Captain looked out over his paper with an expression of

  satisfaction. He let the journal slowly crumple on his knees, and

  sat watching the two beside the grate. To him they seemed about

  the same age. It was a habit with him to think of Mrs. Forrester

  as very, very young.

  She noticed that he was not reading. "Would you like me to light

  the lamp, Mr. Forrester?"

  "No, thank you. The twilight is very pleasant."

  It was twilight by now. They heard Mary come downstairs and begin

  stirring about the kitchen. The Captain, his slippers in the zone

  of firelight and his heavy shoulders in shadow, snored from time to

  time. As the room grew dusky, the windows were squares of clear,

  pale violet, and the shutters ceased to rattle. The wind was dying

  with the day. Everything was still, except when Bohemian Mary

  roughly clattered a pan. Mrs. Forrester whispered that she was out

  of sorts because her sweetheart, Joe Pucelik, hadn't been over to

  see her. Sunday night was his regular night, and Sunday was the

  first day of the blizzard. "When she's neglected, her tooth always

  begins to ache!"

  "Well, now that I've got over, he'll have to come, or she will be

  in a temper."

  "Oh, he'll come!" Mrs. Forrester shrugged. "I am blind and deaf,

  but I'm quite sure she makes it worth his while!" After a few

  moments she rose. "Come," she whispered, "Mr. Forrester is asleep.

  Let's run down the hill, there's no one to stop us. I'll slip on

  my rubber boots. No objections!" She put her fingers on his lips.

  "Not a word! I can't stand this house a moment longer."

  They slipped quietly out of the front door into the cold air which

  tasted of new-fallen snow. A clear arc of blue and rose colour

  painted the west, over the buried town. When they reached the

  rounded breast of the hill, blown almost bare, Mrs. Forrester stood

  still and drew in deep breaths, looking down over the drifted

  meadows and the stiff, blue poplars.

  "Oh, but it is bleak!" she murmured. "Suppose we should have to

  stay here all next winter, too, . . . and the next! What will

  become of me, Niel?" There was fear, unmistakable fright in her

  voice. "You see there is nothing for me to do. I get no exercise.

  I don't skate; we didn't in California, and my ankles are weak.

  I've always danced in the winter, there's plenty of dancing at

  Colorado Springs. You wouldn't believe how I miss it. I shall

  dance till I'm eighty. . . . I'll be the waltzing grandmother!

  It's good for me, I need it."

  They plunged down into the drifts and did not stop again until they

  reached the wooden bridge.

  "See, even the creek is frozen! I thought running water never

  froze. How long will it be like this?"

  "Not long now. In a month you'll see the green begin in the marsh

  and run over the meadows. It's lovely over here in the spring.

  And you'll be able to get out tomorrow, Mrs. Forrester. The clouds
<
br />   are thinning. Look, there's the new moon!"

  She turned. "Oh, I saw it over the wrong shoulder!"

  "No you didn't. You saw it over mine."

  She sighed and took his arm. "My dear boy, your shoulders aren't

  broad enough."

  Instantly before his eyes rose the image of a pair of shoulders

  that were very broad, objectionably broad, clad in a frogged

  overcoat with an astrachan collar. The intrusion of this third

  person annoyed him as they went slowly back up the hill.

  Curiously enough, it was as Captain Forrester's wife that she most

  interested Niel, and it was in her relation to her husband that he

  most admired her. Given her other charming attributes, her

  comprehension of a man like the railroad-builder, her loyalty to

  him, stamped her more than anything else. That, he felt, was

  quality; something that could never become worn or shabby; steel of

  Damascus. His admiration of Mrs. Forrester went back to that, just

  as, he felt, she herself went back to it. He rather liked the

  stories, even the spiteful ones, about the gay life she led in

  Colorado, and the young men she kept dangling about her every

  winter. He sometimes thought of the life she might have been

  living ever since he had known her,--and the one she had chosen to

  live. From that disparity, he believed, came the subtlest thrill

  of her fascination. She mocked outrageously at the proprieties she

  observed, and inherited the magic of contradictions.

  SEVEN

  On the evenings when there was no whist at the Forresters', Niel

  usually sat in his room and read,--but not law, as he was supposed

  to do. The winter before, when the Forresters were away, and one

  dull day dragged after another, he had come upon a copious

  diversion, an almost inexhaustible resource. The high, narrow

  bookcase in the back office, between the double doors and the wall,

  was filled from top to bottom with rows of solemn looking volumes

  bound in dark cloth, which were kept apart from the law library; an

  almost complete set of the Bohn classics, which Judge Pommeroy had

  bought long ago when he was a student at the University of

  Virginia. He had brought them West with him, not because he read

  them a great deal, but because, in his day, a gentleman had such

  books in his library, just as he had claret in his cellar. Among

  them was a set of Byron in three volumes, and last winter, apropos

  of a quotation which Niel didn't recognize, his uncle advised him

  to read Byron,--all except "Don Juan." That, the Judge remarked,

  with a deep smile, he "could save until later." Niel, of course,

  began with "Don Juan." Then he read "Tom Jones" and "Wilhelm

  Meister" and raced on until he came to Montaigne and a complete

  translation of Ovid. He hadn't finished yet with these last,--

  always went back to them after other experiments. These authors

  seemed to him to know their business. Even in "Don Juan" there was

  a little "fooling," but with these gentlemen none.

  There were philosophical works in the collection, but he did no

  more than open and glance at them. He had no curiosity about what

  men had thought; but about what they had felt and lived, he had a

  great deal. If anyone had told him that these were classics and

  represented the wisdom of the ages, he would doubtless have let

  them alone. But ever since he had first found them for himself, he

  had been living a double life, with all its guilty enjoyments. He

  read the Heroides over and over, and felt that they were the most

  glowing love stories ever told. He did not think of these books as

  something invented to beguile the idle hour, but as living

  creatures, caught in the very behaviour of living,--surprised

  behind their misleading severity of form and phrase. He was

  eavesdropping upon the past, being let into the great world that

  had plunged and glittered and sumptuously sinned long before little