Patricia, Angel-at-Large/Part 3

by Margaret Cameron

 

A STORY IN THREE PARTS—III

ALL through luncheon Patricia avoided Blaisdell's glance, and whenever he addressed her directly she used his approach as a spring-board from which to dive into animated conversation with some one else. And she did not withdraw from her engagement with Bob. By the time coffee was served on the veranda the diplomat was beginning to wonder uneasily whether, after all, it was his bluff that was called, and his pulse dropped a beat and then raced when he heard her remark, in a casual tone, as she took her cup from the tray:

"It wouldn't surprise me if there should be more things wrong with my machine than Kate could discover up in that tree-top. In which case I may not be able to take you up this afternoon." She smiled across at Bob.

"Oh, I say!" he exclaimed. "Don't you think it will be all right? It will to-morrow, anyway. Won't it?"

"Now, Rob! You're not going up in that awful thing!" his mother began, but he interrupted:

"Oh, for Pete's sake, mums, do be reasonable!"

"I am reasonable! I never interfere with your pleasures. Haven't I taken up dancing and skating and golf—and even tennis—just so I can be a companion to you? Do I ever complain about spending hours in your boat—though I always was timid on the water? Don't I go away off into the wilds with you, and die a thousand deaths for fear you'll be shot yourself while you're out hunting? But you might sometimes show a little consideration for me, and you know perfectly well that if you go up in that flying-machine I shall endure tortures every single instant!"

"Then of course we won't go." Patricia nodded cheerfully at Bob, who thrust his hands into his pockets, looking embarrassed and sulky. "I wouldn't for a moment do anything to make you unhappy, Mrs. Chamberlain. Please forget it."

"I'd like to see how that woman of yours handles the problem of getting your machine out of the tree. Suppose we stroll over there," Howard suggested, to relieve the tension. So Patricia sauntered with him through the shaded paths, followed by the others in groups of two and three—Bob, far in the rear, contending the more hotly with his mother in defense of his adult masculine liberties because Elise and Blaisdell, conspicuously oblivious of the rest of the world, loitered along just out of earshot.

"I suppose aviation's an old story to you?" Patricia tentatively asked the engineer.

"On the contrary, it's an experience I'm eager to try."

"I'm afraid I can't tactfully invite anybody to go up with me now, even if my machine is in perfect condition. But, of course"—she lifted a twinkling upward glance—"if any one not related to my hostess should ask me to take him up—"

"You couldn't graciously refuse," he finished, with an answering gleam that told her she had not mistaken her man. "Especially if the request came from an engineer thirsting for scientific knowledge and experience."

"Unless—the engineer might have a timid wife," she intimated, to which he dryly responded:

"The wife of a construction engineer has disciplined nerves. She learns to distinguish between spice and gunpowder."

They found the machine resting safely on the ground, and Kate, under the dubious scrutiny of the chauffeur and the boatman, putting the final touches on the canvas patches that completed the repairs. After looking it over carefully, and testing the engine, Patricia said:

"Very well, Kate. I'll try a turn or two, and if it's all right you may take it over to Mineola alone. I shall be staying here for several days. I think we can make a start from the lawn over there."

"Oh, I do wish she wouldn't!" fretted Mrs. Chamberlain, as they all trooped after the machine, which was trundled, under Patricia's supervision, to the spot she had indicated. "I know there'll be another awful accident! Mr. Blaisdell, you're an old friend. Do persuade her not to go up!"

"I'm afraid I have no influence," he replied, having learned the futility of direct remonstrance where Miss Carlyle's plans were concerned, but congratulating himself that at least he had succeeded in eliminating the monoplane as a future factor in her campaign at High Haven. "She seems to have the courage of her convictions."

"A good job, too!" Howard approved. "I like her pluck."

"Yes; isn't her courage wonderful!" Mrs. Yarnell concurred, with an air of paying graceful and admiring tribute. "And with it all she's so deliciously unself-conscious! I suppose it's really cowardice that makes most of us hesitate at anything that might seem the least bit spectacular, isn't it?"

"Oh, pussy!" murmured one of the women in the ear of another, and they both laughed quietly. "Pretty, clean, white pussy!"

Everything was in readiness for the start, and Patricia was about to slip into her seat, when Howard said, as if yielding to an irresistible impulse:

"Miss Carlyle, I'm greatly tempted! I've always wanted to go up in one of those things."

"There are others!" Bob resentfully interpolated.

"Of course I understand the principle well enough," the engineer continued, "but I'd like to see it work. Would you consider it an imposition if I asked you to let me go up with you?"

"Why—no! I'd be enchanted, but—" She hesitated, smiling doubtfully. "I don't want to distress anybody."

"Oh, don't go!" begged Mrs. Chamberlain. "Mrs. Howard, aren't you afraid to have him?"

"Not if he thinks it's safe," returned his placid spouse. " He generally knows."

"There, mums! Hear that!" Bob exploded. "Now I am going up! You'll take me later, won't you?" he appealed to Patricia, who lightly replied that she should take no passengers at all until she had made a trial flight with Kate and assured herself that the monoplane was in perfect condition. It was obvious, however, that this was a tactful evasion, covering refusal, and Chamberlain turned sharply away, his lip between his teeth. As he passed Blaisdell and Mrs. Yarnell, standing a little apart from the rest of the group, she called softly:

"Bob! Oh, Bob!"

"Yes?" He paused obediently, but did not join them.

"You're not going away?"

"Yes."

"Wait till we've seen them go up once, and take me with you."

"I'm sorry, but I'm afraid you'd be bored," he said, politely. "I've got to go down to the kennels, and you don't care for dogs."

Patricia was not near enough to overhear the words, but she saw Chamberlain pause, resentment in every line of his young figure, and then stride moodily on alone. A moment later she stepped over to that side of the group to speak to Mrs. Howard, and dropped her glove, which Blaisdell returned to her.

"Oh, thank you so much!" she said, lightly. "You're really very useful to-day, Billy." Then, for the first time since their heated interview before luncheon, she measured glances with him—and smiled.

Howard was so fascinated by the sensation of flying that Patty offered to have Kate bring the machine over from Mineola whenever he wished to use it during her stay at High Haven, but he suggested:

"Why send it over there at all? Why not keep it here, where we can play with it often?"

"I'm afraid Mrs. Chamberlain wouldn't even give it tree room," was her laughing reply.

"I will! I'll do better than that. I have just the place for it—a dancing-pavilion that was put up for a garden-party last month, and has been left because the young people seem to enjoy dancing out of doors. It will cover this thing very nicely."

"But what about my hostess?" she objected. "I'm afraid I've precipitated trouble already, and if I keep the machine near by—"

"I'll take the responsibility for that," he interrupted. "Leave it to me. If it precipitates a certain amount of trouble it may keep more dangerous salts still in solution." Whereupon she decided that she had here an intelligent ally in case of need, but gave him no intimation that she understood.

There was a dance in the neighborhood that night, and before it was over Miss Carlyle's popularity was established. Under her every mood was an elusive grace which most of the men would have defined as simplicity and most of the women as subtlety, but which captivated them all; and Bob Chamberlain would have been less than the normal youth he was had he failed to enjoy and to emphasize a little his position as escort of this girl, for whose favor every other man in the room was eager.

Moreover, in some laughing, negative way infinitely soothing to his irritated nerves, she contrived, without direct reference to the events of the day, to make him feel that the immediate family connections of every aviator, irrespective of age or sex, had to be "gentled," like so many fractious horses, into tolerance of the new vehicle. Little by little he became pleasantly aware that what now began to appear as his tactful deference to his mother's prejudices in this matter had been only part of a delightful and humorous conspiracy, whereby he and this amusing and exceedingly pretty girl were going to hoodwink the whole neighborhood into playing their game. It was a comforting point of view, particularly as she did not seem to feel that either this community of interest or her position as his guest entitled her to a disproportionate share of his attention.

Altogether, he decided that she was a "peach," and confided as much to Elise Yarnell, who would have liked to punish him both for this and for his refusal to accept the favor she had offered him in the afternoon, but she perceived that it was not a moment for discipline, and devoted herself so assiduously to hay-making that Bob could not fail to realize that his sun was shining. The only shadow to mar his complete complacency was that on several occasions when he was dancing with Patricia, Blaisdell "cut in" and took her away. To be sure, on several other occasions when Elise was the diplomat's partner, Bob employed the same tactics with considerable satisfaction, but for some reason this did not balance the account. He resented yielding to the elder man at any point, and entirely failed to notice that when he danced with Mrs. Yarnell it was never Blaisdell who separated them.

They all motored home together in Mrs. Fairweather's car, and as they stood on the veranda in the small hours awaiting it, Patricia flashed a glance at Bob, who by this time was in high spirits, asking in an undertone, "How does seven o'clock look to you now?"

"Looks a long way off," he promptly and very audibly returned. "Awful mistake to waste perfectly good time sleeping. You're not quitting!"

"I?" She laughed. "You don't know me!"

"Quitting what? What are you two up to?" Blaisdell asked. When he learned that they intended to ride before breakfast, he turned with enthusiasm to Mrs. Yarnell, exclaiming: "Capital! Why don't we do that?"

"No use trying to lure Elise out of her downy before ten." Bob spoke with the assurance of experience. "She's afraid a bird will get her."

Had the situation been reversed and Mrs. Yarnell the younger woman, she would instantly have suggested her advantage in years by some honeyed assurance that her rival had not yet arrived at the time when she need guard against the only early bird a woman dreads—the one that marks her for every hour of lost sleep with crow's-feet. She was gathering herself to meet and parry this anticipated thrust, when Patricia turned toward her, saying, pleasantly: "Do come. Won't you?"

And rather than put that weapon again in the hand of the enemy, the widow returned, "Of course I'll come, with great pleasure!" resolving that she would manage, somehow, to rest during the day. But there she counted upon a slower game than either Patricia or Blaisdell intended to play.

There was no rest for any of them the next day—nor, indeed, for many days. Luncheons, teas, dinners, and dances followed one upon the other; riding, tennis, aviating, and boating filled the hours between; and no matter how late they danced, they were up and in the saddle early. Through it all, Patricia, Blaisdell, and the widow played their game of cross purposes before an amused and puzzled countryside, and only Bob was wholly without guile. Through it all, too, Patricia watched and listened, and gradually her interest in Bob, which at first had been the least of the motives governing her action, outgrew her friendly wish to please the Davenports, her love of adventure, and even her desire to pique Blaisdell, and became a very potent influence.

But, notwithstanding the prompting of "that passion of responsibility, that wild, irrational charity, which pours out of the depths of a woman's stirred being," she reminded herself of several marriages reputed to be happy despite the wife's seniority; and she remembered that the world is ever cynical about sentiment where a large fortune is concerned, and was troubled lest she might be denying another woman the benefit of the doubt. Her scruples would have been stilled could she have overheard a discussion between Mrs. Fairweather and her friend a few days after her own arrival. It began in a caustic allusion of the widow's to "that extraordinary girl the Chamberlains have taken up," and her hostess rejoined:

"I do hope, my dear, that you see now how dangerous it would be to tie yourself for life to that volatile boy. He'll be even harder to hold as time goes on, you know. Anyway, Mr. Blaisdell's much the more attractive of the two."

"Yes, Billy always was a lamb. Pity he has no money."

"I insist that he must have some money, or he couldn't afford the diplomatic service. And he can certainly give you a distinguished position."

"Oh, I suppose one might consider him and his little tuppenny-ha'penny legation seriously if nothing better offered." Mrs. Yarnell shrugged a careless shoulder. "But one can be sufficiently distinguished, and a lot more comfortable, at home—in a place like High Haven."

"Elise, I simply cannot understand your point of view!" exclaimed Mrs. Fairweather, with a touch of exasperation. "You must be mad! Are you in love with that good-looking boy? Is that it?"

"In love! With Bob? Good heavens!" The widow laughed.

"Then do try to be sensible! Money isn't everything."

"Isn't it?" cynically drawled the other. "It's the root of everything. I notice nothing I want grows without it."

"You may find several things you don't want growing with it, if you persist in this insane determination to marry a man ten years your junior."

"He's not ten years my junior!" snapped Elise.

"Well—nine, then. You're thirty-three."

"Mary, you'll be good enough to remember that I'm just twenty-seven!"

"Don't be silly, my dear," Mrs. Fairweather dryly advised. "We both know you're a scant seven years younger than I. At least you used to be."

"I am still, darling," sweetly returned her friend. "But please don't insist that I can't be as young as I am, simply because nobody will believe you're not as old as you look."

Knowing nothing of this, however, and beset by generous doubts, Patricia held firmly to the course she had marked out for herself—as firmly, that is, as the situation permitted, for Blaisdell's constant intervention in his own behalf made it impossible for her to establish—much less to maintain—that nice balance of relations which had been so important a feature of her original scheme, and she was forced to relinquish certain of her plans and substitute others for them. Not that Blaisdell continued his impulsive and irritating policy of active interference between her and Chamberlain. After the first day he played a deeper, steadier game, ably seconded by Mrs. Yarnell, and although he knew nothing of Patricia's intention to apply to Bob's infatuation the acid test of constant association with its object, by arousing the boy's jealousy and so making the widow's society seem doubly desirable instead of inevitable, he unconsciously made even this—her main line of attack—ineffective.

However, despite all this unforeseen and baffling opposition, Patricia won certain small but definite victories, and they comforted her. There was the matter of taking Bob up in her monoplane, for example, in which she was eventually triumphant. When almost every man in the neighborhood, and several women, including Janet Howard, had been safely returned to terra firma after exhilarating flights, even Mrs. Chamberlain perceived that her embargo, which had been scrupulously observed, was making her son ridiculous, and reluctantly withdrew it. Let no one suppose, however, that she did this without protest. Taking her neighbor's housing of the monoplane in ill part from the first, she was very indignant indeed when she saw his radiant little daughter carried away on her first flight.

"I do think you're treating me badly!" she expostulated, cornering Howard for a moment. "You know how I feel about Bob's flying—especially with this reckless girl! And after this I shall never be able to prevent it! Never!"

"My dear friend, give it up!" was his laughing advice. "The time comes to all of us when we can no longer stand between our children and danger. We can only watch them go to meet it with such equipment as we have given them—and keep our tremors to ourselves. At least we needn't handicap them with our fears."

"But this isn't that sort of thing," she persisted. "It isn't as if it would help him—or strengthen him—or get him anywhere. It's just foolhardy!"

"Possibly—and yet— Don't you think that's about what the hen must have said when the ducklings took to the water?" Chuckling, he made his escape, leaving her with plumage still ruffled.

So, although their other engagements left them fewer opportunities than she could have wished, Patricia occasionally took Bob up through the trackless lanes, and they talked, soaring in the warm, sunlit air, as people talk only when there is no possibility of interruption by a third person. Little by little, down under all his shy, youthful pretenses and repressions and evasions, she began to catch fugitive glimpses of the real Bob, and her interest in him grew. One day he said:

"Gee! Patty, I should think you'd hate to be a girl!"

"Why?"

"Because you like to do almost everything that a fellow does—and you do 'em all so well—and a girl can't carry any of 'em through to the end." He worked his thought out slowly, in detached, suspended phrases. "She only plays with things—never really does 'em."

"That's all a lot of men do, isn't it?" she returned. "Look at your friend Lee Hazard. He has ability enough, and does all sorts of things well—but what is he, after all? Just a rich man's son, playing with toys."

"Yes, but—this is what I'm getting at. Lee could do things if he wanted to. Here! This is it! If we should get into a war, Lee could go into the aviation corps and use his knowledge. You couldn't, because you're a woman."

"I might, in a pinch, though I should probably be in a Red Cross hospital, having harder work and less excitement. Anyway, war's an emergency, but we live all the time—and what's the use of having ability if you never use it for anything real? It's like hoarding food—or gold—or anything else the world hasn't much of and needs."

"That's what Mr. Howard says."

"Now there's a man, if you like!" She turned a glowing face toward him. "He's not hoarding anything! Nor playing with his life! He's doing real things! You know, Bob, if I were a man, that's what I'd rather be than anything else in the world—a great engineer!" He shot a suspicious glance at her, but she was looking straight ahead, her thoughts apparently fixed on something far removed from him. "Did you happen to go to Panama while they were digging the Culebra Cut?"

"No."

"Well, I did. I stood on a hill one day and watched them do part of it—making over the world! I've been in mines lighted by electricity carried a hundred miles on wires! I've seen crops growing where there used to be nothing but cactus. And I'd rather control great natural forces like that—harness them—make them work for men instead of destroy them—than anything else in the world—if I were a man."

"I suppose you know that's my profession?" he said, after a moment. "I took the engineering course at college."

"Oh, did you? How perfectly splendid for you!" Again she turned her radiant glance upon him. "When are you going to begin?"

"I don't know. Some time, I suppose." He had flushed slightly.

"Do have your camp within flying distance of somewhere, so I can come and see you alter the face of the world," she said, lightly, adding, with a droll little smile, "Perhaps some day you'll let me touch off a fuse, so I can play I helped a little."

He said he would, provided it was not too important a matter to let a girl fool with, and they fell back into persiflage. But Patricia knew that her breath had fanned a living spark, and was for the moment well content, even though she realized that the little flame of ambition she had kindled might be blown out before night in the gusts of more primitive emotions. It was later that same day that she made her last appeal to Blaisdell in Bob's behalf.

As the period she had been invited to spend at High Haven neared its close, it became quite evident that Mrs. Chamberlain had no intention of urging her to continue her visit, notwithstanding all the pressure either Bob or Howard could bring to bear. The engineer openly lamented her approaching departure, and repeatedly expressed his regret that his wife and daughter had been called away by a family emergency, making it impossible for them to ask her to stay on with them after she left High Haven, as they had hoped to do. Convinced that Patricia had at least postponed Chamberlain's headlong plunge into the widow's snare—how consciously he could not determine—he labored to convert Bob's mother to his own belief that the surest talisman against the siren's spell lay in the girl's continued presence and its attendant diversions, but Mrs. Chamberlain was obdurate. She said her mistake had been in asking the young woman to stay down in the first place. But for that, Mrs. Yarnell would have been safely engaged to the minister by this time, and Bob would not be risking his life daily in an aero- plane. For her part, she failed to see what there was about that girl, anyway, to make every man who looked at her immediately lose his head.

When it became apparent that Patricia would be allowed to leave within three or four days, with only a perfunctory protest from her hostess, Blaisdell's spirits rose to a degree entirely disproportionate to the importance of this negative victory. At the same time, he realized that the danger of a permanent attachment between Chamberlain and his captivating guest would increase with every moment up to the hour of her departure, and redoubled his own efforts to win her, wooing her by every tender and subtle means he could devise, though she permitted him only rare moments alone with her, and the deadlock remained unbroken. The strain was telling upon all of them, however, and occasionally a sort of truce was arranged by common consent, though none of them, as will be seen, relied too implicitly upon its observance by the others.

They motored together that afternoon to a charity fair in a neighboring village, and had dutifully made purchases and partaken of refreshments. Then, with a frank yawn, Patricia plaintively suggested:

"Don't you think we might go home now? I'm a simple city maid, unaccustomed to these mad revels. I suppose we'll dance all night, as usual, and I'm perfectly willing to acknowledge that I'm perishing for a nap! Let's all go home and rest before dinner. Shall we?" She smiled pleasantly at Mrs. Yarnell, who found it increasingly difficult, with all the arts at her command, to conceal the ravages scanty sleep and eternal vigilance were making, both in her appearance and in her temper, but who would have suffered torment rather than admit fatigue, as the younger woman had done. Now, however, with the gracious air of one conferring a favor, the widow seized the opportunity.

"Why, surely, if you're tired. You certainly do need rest, you poor thing! And you had such wonderful color when you came!" Elise had ceased to guard against retaliatory scratches. Patricia seemed to her a good-natured simpleton, without sense enough to avail herself of what the other conceived to be the natural weapons of her sex.

As the Fairweather car swept out of the High Haven grounds after dropping Bob and Patricia, he looked after it, questioning:

"I wonder what those two are really going to do?"

"They're going do-do," Patricia told him, laughing. "Only a strong sense of propriety kept Billy from nodding in the car. He's been walking in his sleep for three days!" Then, with an air of admiring candor: "Can you keep this pace indefinitely? You don't look a bit tired."

"I'm not," he lied, promptly. "Neither are you. Anyhow, what's the use of trying to sleep? It's too hot. Let's go out in the canoe for an hour. That 'll rest you just as much."

Ten minutes later, having failed to find the boatman, Bob was preparing to put the canoe in the water himself when the boat-house telephone-bell rang. He answered the call, grinning sheepishly as he hung up the receiver.

"Caught with the goods! They've come back! I put something Elise bought at that fool fair in my pocket, and she wants it. Shall I ask them to go out with us in the motor-boat now?"

"Oh, they're so sleepy!" she deprecated. "And Peterson isn't here to run it. Besides—why need they know I'm here? I'm resting."

"That's so! Then you'll wait? I'll be back in a jiff."

Realizing that she had been outplayed again, Patricia watched him run up the path and out of sight before she dropped on a bench and closed her eyes, the better to concentrate her thoughts upon her problem. Presently she heard quick footsteps approaching, but supposed the boatman to be returning, and did not lift her weary eyelids until she was startled by Blaisdell's voice, saying:

"Asleep on guard!"

Her eyes snapped open, to discover him regarding her with undisguised amusement, and she demanded, "What brought you here?"

"Chamberlain said you were resting," he observed. "I always wondered whether angels slept with their heads under their wings. Now I know."

"Apparently the man never heard of the Enchanted Princess," she remarked, and he started toward her, declaring:

"I'll I'll break that spell!"

"Too late!" She waved him off. "Opportunity trails no life-rope behind for a man who doesn't know at a glance the difference between an Enchanted Princess and a Sleeping Sentinel."

"At any rate, I occasionally call a bluff," he mentioned, whereat she had the grace to blush a little. He sat down on the other end of the bench, and continued, with an air of making conversation, "So you're giving up that guardian-angel role?" She lifted an interrogatory eyebrow. "The Enchanted Princess was a very human sort of person, as I remember."

"One angel, in her time, plays many parts," she paraphrased. "Are you, by any chance, looking for Peterson? Don't let me detain you. Mrs. Yarnell's waiting."

"But not alone," he reminded her. "I understand we're to be deprived of your society very soon."

"Did you come down to say good-by? We shall probably meet again."

"I trust so. Good-by is the last thing I want to say to you."

"Probably it will be the last thing you do say to me."

"Never!" he declared. "I shall say, 'Hasta la vista'—and follow."

"Always?" Her little grimace suggested dismay.

"Always—until I've persuaded you to love me! And always afterward!"

"Love you! My word! Why should I love you? You spoil everything I try to do—upset every plan—baffle me at every turn—make a meddling, interfering, persistent nuisance of yourself—and expect to be loved for it!"

"Woman, have you forgotten that I saved your life?" He struck an attitude. "I'm a he-ro. Mrs. Fairweather says so—frequently."

"Hero, indeed! 'Watchful waiting' is your line!" At this they both laughed a little, and he said:

"At any rate, I caught you napping—once!" But she shook her head.

"I wasn't asleep. I was thinking. Trying to make up my mind."

"What about? Leave it to me. I'll decide it."

"Billy"—she regarded him thoughtfully—"does the end justify the means?"

"Depends on the end. Also on the means. What's it about?"

"It's about Bob. Do you think she cares for him—in her way?"

"I'm no Daniel," he teased. "Nor yet an angel. What's the use of even pretending to be an angel if you can't discover simple things like that for yourself?"

"Then you don't believe she does! No, Billy—please! I'm serious!"

"My dearest girl, give it up!" he counseled. "You've made a good fight—done everything you can—"

"Oh no, I haven't!" She laughed shortly. "That's it! If I had—" When she failed to go on, he prompted:

"If you had?"

"I might have succeeded better. But—I hate to use my claws!"

"Claws! You? Bless your heart, you couldn't!"

"Oh, couldn't I! But I haven't. In all these days I've never said one catty thing to her or about her. I've never ridiculed her, never tried to unmask her, never put her in a false position. I've played fair."

"Yes, you have," he conceded. "You've fought like a gentleman."

"And I've failed. Because I haven't succeeded, I've failed. But if I could be sure of just one thing—" Again she paused. Then, leaning slightly toward him, "Billy, will you do something for me?"

"My dear, when you look at me like that I'd murder my best friend, if you asked me to!" In spite of his light manner his voice shook a little.

"It's not murder I want; it's first aid." She smiled faintly. "Will you help me?"

"Help you succor mine enemy?"

"I've played fair—but you and I know that I've never had a fair chance myself," she gently reproached him, and before her pleading gaze his own fell.

"What do you want me to do?" His tone was low, his glance still averted.

"I want you not to do this sort of thing any more—not to interfere! And not to let her! If you won't hold her off, at least don't strengthen her hand—just for these two or three days I have left! Please, Billy! See—I come to you frankly, admitting that I'm beaten unless you help me. Will you?"

"Patty—do you mean that?" Blaisdell choked a little. "Do you really want me to go?"

"But I'm asking you to stay! To help me!"

"Help you make yourself as essential to another man's happiness as you are to mine?" he broke forth.

"No, no! Why won't you understand! I don't want to be essential to Bob's happiness."

"Then why do you care so much? Why do you insist on going on with this thing?"

"Because I'm afraid—all his friends are afraid—that unless somebody makes him see where he's going, he'll never have any real happiness. Do you think he'll be happy, if—if—" She hesitated, and he grimly replied:

"I think he's a man, and must meet life and take his chances, like other men."

"But does nobody ever help boys? Did nobody ever help you?"

"Why is this so vital to you? He has older friends."

"Don't you see the others have all tried and failed? There's only me now, and if I fail—unless you'll help me help him, Billy—that boy may pay with his whole life for it!"

"And if I do help you— Patty, do you care for me so little that you can't even see what you're asking? Or is it that you care for him so much?" he added, jealously, and she made an impatient gesture.

"Oh, I don't care for him at all! Not that way—nor he for me. He's not in love with me."

"But he would be, if— Oh yes, he would!" he declared, combating a shake of her head. "No man could help loving you, unless he was blinded by an infatuation for another woman! And when you show him such heavenly compassion—are so deeply concerned for his happiness—! Besides, he is more than half in love with you, and you know it! Yet you ask me to stand aside and give him a free field! What do you think I'm made of?"

"Then you won't?"

"Of course I won't! And you wouldn't have the slightest respect for me if I did! Confess it!" For a moment he compelled her to meet his gaze. Then she arose, with a little shrug and a gesture dismissing the whole subject.

"Well—there it goes!"

"There what goes?"

"Another illusion. Apparently the only successful way to fight the devil is with fire. I thought— But the pragmatists are right, aren't they? 'Av it worrks, it's thrue,'" she quoted. "And since my theory doesn't 'worrk,' it can't be—" She broke off, a quick illumination in her eyes, repeating softly: "'Av it worrks, it's thrue.' Then—if it's true it works! Why, of course! That's it!"

"What's 'it'? Patty, what are you up to now?" he demanded, and she laughed.

"Sure, I'm afther findin' out av it worrks, sor. Av it does, it's thrue—an' no harrm to annybody.'

"If what works?"

"I think you'd call it love."

"Whose love?"

"Not yours, Billy!"

That night there was a new vibration in her voice when she spoke to Bob, a new challenge in her eyes, and the eternal masculine in him rose to meet and dominate it. They made much of her at the Country Club, but throughout the evening, except when dancing separated them, he held his place at her side against all comers, a little exultant and flushed by this discovery of his power, and not to be lured away on any pretext. Blaisdell's heart grew heavy within him, and the glitter in Elise Yarnell's eyes sharpened hour by hour above her fixed smile.

Like the day that had preceded it, however, the evening was oppressively hot, and about eleven o'clock Patricia, loitering on the veranda between dances, exclaimed: "It must be wonderful on the water to-night! I've never seen such moonlight!"

"Let's cut the rest of this and go out in the boat!" whispered Bob, instantly alert. "Will you?"

"Oh—isn't it too late?" she demurred, but wistfully.

"Not a bit of it! Besides, we haven't many nights left! Let's make the most of it! Will you go?"

"Well—if the others will," she agreed.

But Mrs. Yarnell would not. Both she and Mrs. Fairweather said it was much too late, and in this Elise persisted, even though Bob vehemently urged her not to be a quitter and spoil it all. Then Patricia, still wistful, said: "Oh, don't you feel equal to it? I'm so sorry! Perhaps Mr. Howard will go with us, Bob." When the engineer said he would, and it became evident that the expedition was not to be prevented, the widow decided that she and Billy would go, after all, though Mrs. Fairweather still declined, and Bob telephoned to Peterson to have the boat in readiness.

Arrived at High Haven, the party found Kate at the dock with the boatman, and the latter explained that as the second man had been given permission to visit a sick relative that night, Miss Carlyle's woman had kindly agreed to run the engine, if nobody objected. This obvious ruse was received with smiles—Peterson's devotion to Kate having been manifest for several days—and they were soon afloat.

With a view to continuing his masterful monopoly of her attention, Bob contrived to sit beside Patricia, and seized opportunities, while the others were talking, to carry on a fragmentary, low-toned conversation with her. To be sure, this consisted chiefly of nonsense, but now and then a tone, an inflection, a glow in his eager eyes, reminded her that she was indeed playing with fire.

Presently some one mentioned South America, and thereafter Patricia turned an inattentive ear to Bob's badinage, while the engineer and the diplomat talked men's gossip of the conduct of nations, and of rumors concerning large enterprises on the other side of the equator. They had been out perhaps an hour and were far from shore, when the women agreed that it was time to return, and Bob told Peterson to put about. Five minutes later the engine, which had begun acting strangely just before they turned, indulged in a noisy, explosive demonstration, fluttered a little, and stopped. Exclamations and questions followed, but Kate and Peterson both maintained that the trouble could not be serious, as the machine had been running quite smoothly until a few minutes before. Their combined efforts failed to start it, however, and eventually Bob, Howard, and Patricia all offered suggestions.

"Let me see the spark plug," Patricia said. "Perhaps that's the trouble," Kate handed it to her, and she examined it in the moonlight. "Seems to be all right," she said, finally. "Must be something— My word!" She had made a quick movement, and now stood staring down at the water.

"What's the matter?" two or three of the others asked.

"I dropped it! Peterson, have you another spark plug? I've dropped that one overboard!"

"Oh yes, miss! I always carry an extra one," reassuringly returned the mechanic. "That 'll be all right." Diligent search, however, failed to discover it. Peterson declared he had seen it in his box that very afternoon, but eventually admitted that it was not to be found.

"Well, I guess that settles it," Bob remarked to his guests. "I'm sorry, but I'm afraid we're in for it!"

"Settles it? In for what?" sharply questioned Mrs. Yarnell. "You don't mean we've got to stay out here all night!"

"Unless somebody comes along and gives us a tow—which isn't likely at this hour."

"But—that's impossible! We must get back somehow! Can't you use a makeshift? Wire—or a hairpin—or something?" Then, as the others laughed: "But I tell you I won't be kept in this wretched boat all night! I insist upon your taking me home!"

While the mechanics made another futile search for the spark plug, Patricia murmured apologies for her clumsiness, and the men convinced Mrs. Yarnell that the case was hopeless and that their only course was to make the best of their plight until some one came to their rescue.

"There's going to be fog before morning, too," Peterson prophesied.

"I suppose you've no rugs aboard?" Howard asked.

"Oh yes, sir. We put them in the last thing. Kate said the ladies might be chilly, in their thin dresses."

"Admirable foresight," said the engineer. "Thank the Lord my people are away!

"Might be lots worse." Bob dropped down beside Patricia again. "Rather a lark, I call it."

"More like a bat, isn't it?" was Blaisdell's suggestion, and the widow acidly contributed:

"A vampire?"

"Tell us more fascinating stories of South America," Patricia presently requested.

So Howard told tales of the romance of engineering in the southern hemisphere—of the toll of life paid by the builders of the Verrugas bridge, of towns inundated to make reservoirs for great electric transmission plants, of immense irrigation schemes in Peru, and of many dramatic crises in his own career, to most of which Bob listened absorbedly, with occasional whispered asides to Patricia. Then Blaisdell took up the thread and told them of revolutions in Paraguay.

The moonlight was brilliant, the little waves rippled against the side of the gently rocking boat, and Bob made several unsuccessful efforts to distract Patricia's attention from the diplomat's story. Finally, leaning over her, he said, boldly, "Let's go up forward where we can see the moon better."

"We might get moonstruck," she objected, turning again toward Blaisdell, but Bob refused to be put off.

"Come!" he urged. "You don't care anything about South America! Come—let's go forward and talk." He laid his hand upon hers, and in his lowered tone she caught again that vibrant throb. For an instant she hesitated, wavering, and then planted her barb with precision, though with a laughing insouciance that masked its intention.

"Talk! My dear Bobby! You're a very engaging boy, and great fun to play with, but when it comes to talking—these men have done real things, you know. They have something to say. Even if one can't be a man and do things, one can always listen." She felt a very genuine pang as she saw his hurt stare. After a moment he said, slowly:

"Just because a man's never had a chance to do things is no sign he can't!"

"No? Well—of course, some men are content to be merely amusing, and never take the chance when it offers, much less seek it. But when one can listen to talk like this—!" A gesture completed the sentence.

"Oh, very well! Just as you choose, of course!" He drew back stiffly, and a little later crossed over and joined Mrs. Yarnell, who received him frostily, but permitted him to stay.

Little by little the night wore away. The moon sagged in the western sky, and to their weary eyes it looked sallow and worn. They were hungry, they were thirsty, a chill from the approaching fog crept upon them, and they huddled beneath the rugs. Toward dawn they all dozed more or less.

Then, slowly, the light strengthened, and it became possible for them to see one another more distinctly. It happened that both Patricia and Howard had their eyes open, though Blaisdell was asleep, when Bob roused himself from a troubled dream and looked at Mrs. Yarnell, still napping opposite him. He stared, blinked, rubbed his eyes, stared again, and muttered under his breath:

"For the love of Mike!"

She had wound a lace scarf around her head and dropped an end over her face, but this had loosened and fallen away while she slept, revealing the ravages of the night. The creeping mist had worked its will with her carefully waved hair, leaving it in dank, straight, disordered loops and straggling ends, from which the nib of a switch protruded. The dampness, too, had wiped from her face its bloom of powder, and the line of demarkation between the skilfully applied rouge and her now pallid cheek was distinctly visible. Nervous irritation had painted deep shadows beneath her eyes, etched fretful lines about them, and drawn her lips into querulous, drooping curves; and the cold morning light, filtering through the fog, held no tender glow to soften the revelation.

For a long moment Bob stared, entirely unconscious that he also was under scrutiny. Then he arose, stretched, shook himself like a young dog, thrust his hands deep into his trousers pockets, looked once more at Elise, and ejaculated, "H'mph!"

Howard glanced at Patricia, and found her watching Chamberlain with so peculiar an intensity that a suspicion he had held all night was strengthened, and a smile flickered across his features. At the same instant Mrs. Yarnell opened her eyes, encountered Bob's disillusioned gaze, and dropped the rug she was holding to clutch at the displaced veil. When he stooped to pull the rug over her again, she exclaimed:

"Oh, do go away! For Heaven's sake let me alone!"

"I'll do that, all right!" he returned, and immediately joined Peterson, on watch at the wheel, to discuss once more the probabilities of an early rescue.

Instantly averting his glance from the widow's face, lest he embarrass her further, Howard looked at Patricia. Her eyes were closed, and she seemed very tired. As he watched her, he thought her lips trembled, and presently he was amazed to see a tear force itself between her twitching eyelids and roll down her cheek.

Presently, however, she regained command of herself and was blithely chatting with Blaisdell and the engineer when she broke off in the middle of a word to exclaim:

"What's that?" Stooping quickly, she picked up a metal pin and flourished it. "Here's your extra spark plug, Peterson!"

"What!" Everybody sat up.

"Here it is!" Howard corroborated. "Must have been kicking around underfoot all night."

"Well, for the love of Mike! Peterson, you're a bird!" Bob eyed his boatman disgustedly. "Keeping us out here all night—"

"We're equally guilty, I think," Howard interposed. "We all looked for it, you know, and none of us saw it."

"Well, stick it in, for Pete's sake, and see if you can keep that tea-kettle going until we get ashore! I'll take the wheel, Peterson, and you run the engine yourself," Bob commanded, and in thirty seconds they were under way.

Finding that he could not dislodge Howard from his place beside Patricia, Blaisdell, perforce, joined Elise, sitting alone swathed in scarf and rugs on the other side of the boat, and the girl seized the opportunity to whisper, under cover of the rushing waters:

"Now, Mr. Howard! Now's your time! If you really want Bob to go to Brazil, strike now! To-day!"

"So it wasn't an accident?" He looked down at her amusedly.

"No—it wasn't an accident."

"I thought there might be method in your madness. Where was that spark plug?"

"Kate had it. I— Mr. Howard, I came down here to do this; but—oh, I didn't want to do it this way!" Again tears threatened, and she paused a moment before asking, unsteadily: "Do—do you think she—cares? Really cares, I mean?"

"My dear child, of course she cares!" His own eyes were moist and their light was warm. "We don't blame birds and beasts of prey for seeking their succulent morsels where they can find them. That's nature's way. But we protect men from them when we can—and you've saved a man!

He talked until they reached the dock at High Haven, and as Patricia listened her eyes regained their starry light, a faint color crept into her cheeks, and the sunlight, burning through the mists, caught and reflected in bright glints from the curling tendrils of her hair.

Just before luncheon Blaisdell was called to the telephone at Fairweather Hill, and this is what he heard:

"Hello, Billy! Had a good nap? … Oh, I'm all right! Billy, did you notice it didn't 'worrk'? … That emotion we were discussing this afternoon. The cold light of dawn seemed to congeal it, somehow, so of course it wasn't 'thrue.' That's a perfectly good theory! … Yes, Bob, of course.… No; that's settled definitely now!" She laughed. … "Besides, he's leaving for Brazil next week.… Yes, for Mr. Howard.… No, his mother doesn't like it, but he's promised, just the same.… Surely! I'm enchanted! Isn't it what I've been working for all the time? … No, I know you didn't believe it. I want to tell you something else, too. You've overplayed the part a little sometimes, but on the whole you've been very helpful, Billy. Thank you so much! And—hasta la vista! … Yes, I'm going to-day.… Not by the afternoon train. Now—in five minutes.… Well, for one thing, there's a cry from Macedonia, and as a conscientious angel-at-large I can't refuse to help, you know. … No, I can't possibly wait until you get here.… Perhaps because I promised not to let anybody clip my wings—and I think you'd try! She who fights and runs away!" She was laughing again. "Never mind where I'm going. I don't quite know myself yet—and think of all those important engagements you ought to be keeping! … But you always were afraid the girl crop would run out, you know.… Yes, I do! I think you're perfectly sincere to-day, Billy dear, but—other days, other girls—and 'to-morrow will be another day.' … Well"—did her voice soften and tremble, or did he imagine it?—"I believe one thing. 'Av it's thrue, it worrks,' Billy! Meanwhile—hasta la vista!"

The minister slammed the receiver into the hook and raced down-stairs, demanding a car instantly. When he was half-way to High Haven, however, he saw Patricia's monoplane soar into the air and turn toward Mineola. He went back to Fairweather Hill, announced that his mail had contained an imperative summons to Washington, and began packing. Two hours later he was off in pursuit of the escaping angel-at-large.

[THE END.]