Peggy-in-the-Rain/Chapter 16
XVI
HALF MOON, looking pallid and decrepit like an old roué, was creeping into the sky as they I started homeward. For a ways there was little said. Gordon was still fighting the strange mood that had descended upon him, and Peggy seemed tired and listless. The car ran silently through the sea-scented night, past sleeping farms and dimly lighted hamlets, flooding its way with a far-reaching path of light that paled the weak attempt of the old moon. Presently the fresh, tingling air worked its spell on them both. Peggy roused herself with a sigh.
"It's like being in a sort of half dream," she said softly. "Everything just flows past without sound or motion. We must have come a long way from home."
"About thirty-eight miles," he answered.
Presently: "Don't you want to smoke?" she asked. "You threw away your cigar unfinished, didn't you?"
"Would you mind if I did? You're sure?"
He stopped the car in a stretch of meadow-bordered road. Afar off a dog was barking. Amongst the bushes the early crickets were shrilling. At times she thought she could hear the soft swish of the waves on some distant beach. Gordon lighted his cigar. The orange glare of the match illumining his well-featured face. He tossed the match to the road and turned toward her with a smile.
"Well?" he said.
"Well?" she smiled back. Somehow the creases seemed to have been smoothed out by that swift, silent flight, all the problems left behind. She felt passively contented and restful.
"Are you very tired?" he asked, a tender droop in his voice.
"No, not now. Riding has rested me. Only—I may go to sleep any moment."
He rested a hand on hers. Almost unconsciously hers snuggled into it.
"Do," he answered. "You'll be all right. Lean against my shoulder and I'll drive slowly."
His face bent over hers and, although she knew what was coming, she made no move to evade it, uttered no protest. Their lips met in a first kiss, a kiss that held little of passion on either side. His feeling was of tenderness and protectiveness and not a little pity; hers of mild wonder and passive content.
"I love you, sweetheart," he whispered almost reverently.
She smiled faintly in the half-darkness and closed her eyes.
Miles farther on, when he thought her asleep, she broke the long silence.
"You said to-night you thought I could be very fair," she said slowly. "Whatever happens I want you to feel that I have always meant to be. Will you try?"
"Whatever happens? Yes, I shall be sure of it, dear. But what are you thinking of? What is going to happen that might tempt me to think otherwise, Peggy?"
She made no answer for a while. Finally, "So much might happen," she replied. "I wanted you to know."
"I don't like the sound of that," he responded troubledly. "I thought—after to-night, dear, it was settled."
"Is it?" she questioned dreamily. "How can we tell? Yes, it does seem so now, doesn't it? But there's the morning—and other mornings." She shivered a little. "I hate them, don't you?"
"Some mornings," he answered with a laugh, "are extremely distasteful. But ours aren't going to be like that, Peggy, are they, dear?"
"I'd like it to be always like this," she said. "Just the darkness and the ragged old moon and the stars and the world slipping by and the wind in my face"
"And me, dear? Haven't I a place in it?"
"Yes," she answered, "I'm afraid so. Always."
"You dear!"
"But the morning—I'm afraid of it!"
"So shall I be in a moment," he muttered. Then, whimsically, "Let's keep away from it, Peggy. Let's go west and follow the night around the world. Shall we, dear?"
"Oh, yes!" she said eagerly, adding with a sigh: "If we only could!"
Ahead of them a broad lighting of the heavens showed the nearing city. He pointed it out. "We're getting close to home, Peggy."
"Where morning lives," she murmured.
"Shall we turn back? There's a long night ahead, dear. Will you come with me?" His voice fell pleadingly, "We'll go back, dear, with the moon and the breeze and the stars. Sweetheart, it is settled, isn't it? Then come with me, Peggy dear. Let's—face the morning together."
She shook her head. "No, not—yet," she answered. "I've got to be sure. I couldn't bear to make a mistake. When the morning comes I want to—to be able to face it with a smile and not—hide from it! You see, don't you?"
"But you do love me, sweetheart. You've shown me that. You've confessed it a dozen times, Peggy-in-the-Rain. Come to me, dear."
"I almost—could," she answered ponderingly.
"And so it must be that I—love you. Only—if it should prove to be just—something else! It isn't that, is it? Oh, I couldn't stand it if it were!"
"It isn't, dear, it isn't! You do love me, just as I love you; and that's better than anything in the world, Peggy; with all my heart and soul!"
"Do I?" she sighed. "I hope so—if I must. But, don't you see, I couldn't—now—without knowing, without being sure? You won't ask me, will you? I do want to be fair, really!"
He was silent a moment. Then: "No, I won't ask you, dear. You shall be sure. I want you desperately, but I'll wait for you until you are ready to come to me, Peggy."
She nodded. "Yes," she whispered, "until I know."
"And—will it be very long, dear?" he asked.
"I don't know," she said slowly. After a moment: "When we get back there—" she nodded at the brightening sky—"you'll set me down where you got me"
"At this time of night? Never!"
"Yes, please. And then you—you'll not try to see me for—for a few days."
"How many days?" he demanded resentfully.
"Three," she answered after a moment's thought. "Then I will write to you and—tell you."
"Three days? That's absurd, impossible!"
"No, it isn't. I suppose I'd better write to a club, hadn't I?"
"No, write to my home. But three days"
"I want them," she said quietly. "Three days aren't so many, are they, out of a lifetime?"
"But you're not going to change your mind, Peggy? No, I can't do that! I can't agree to it! Let me see you for a moment every day, dear, just for a moment. I—I'm afraid of those three days."
"And yet you are sure I really do—care for you! If I do, will three days alter it?"
"Not your caring, but" He was silent.
"You said you'd wait for me until I was ready," she said gently. "Do you want me—before I want to come?"
"I want you every minute," he muttered. "Each day is going to be a month, Peggy! If I only knew that, at the end, you'd be the same"
"If I only knew it I'd not ask for them."
"Well, all right," he agreed finally. "You'll write to me Saturday? You won't forget? You won't think that—perhaps it doesn't matter?"
"I'll write," she promised gravely.
And afterwards, speeding downtown through the long streets, he regretted his complaisance and would have her let him speak to her by telephone each day. But she refused, and in the end he accepted her terms with what grace he could find. But when they reached the comer he was again in revolt.
"I can't let you go this way," he said as he stood beside her on the curb. "Why, I don't even know your name, dear, nor where you live!"
"My name is Peggy," she answered with a little laugh, "Peggy-in-the-Rain; and if you don't know where I live, you know where I work. And so, if you don't hear from me Saturday, you can track me to my lair. Good night. It's been a wonderful evening, every bit of it. And you've been—very patient and—and nice with me."
"Tell me you do love me, dear," he whispered, drawing her to him in the shadow of the car.
"I do, oh, I do!" she faltered.
An instant after she tore her lips away from his with a gasp that was half a sob and fled across the street under the blue-white glare of the lights.
He watched her until she was swallowed up in the darkness of the side street, his heart pounding and his head reeling. Striving to light his cigar his trembling fingers dropped it in the street.
"Peggy," he groaned, "Peggy-in-the-Rain, what have you done to me, dear?"