Up the Street/Chapter 4
IV.
From the annual meeting of the Woman's Club, Eleanor hurried homeward with unusually flushed cheeks. It had been a triumph, complete and undiluted. Beginning with a seven-page prelude which served the double purpose of hypnotizing her audience and encouraging herself, she had tacked into deep water so surely and so swiftly that only Miss Jenks, who shared the platform with her, kept up the subterfuge of trying to look absorbed and appreciative.
At page twenty-six some one gasped pitiably—it was the lady whose paper on "Motherhood, Its Problems," was next on the program. At page thirty-five this lady, becoming suddenly and obtrusively indisposed, sent her manuscript to the chair to read and went out to fresher air. At page fifty, where the original research began to come in polysyllables, Olympus capitulated; and at the last of the typewritten pages the club burst into violent handclapping and the Chautauqua salute, with fully as much relief as admiration. Then, partly to recognize the erudition of their youngest member, and partly to prevent a repetition of the performance, they unanimously chose Eleanor general vice president—for the general vice president was absolved from platform work—and reëlected Miss Jenks to the chairmanship of the history division.
Eleanor, flushed with the pride of conquest, hesitated at the corner of Myrtle Avenue, turned abruptly into it, and went up the brick walk of the Blanding homestead. She found Hector translating hieroglyphics on the veranda.
"Congratulate me!" she cried joyously. "I've done it, Hector!"
The young man rose to welcome her.
"I congratulate you," he returned promptly. "What is it you've done?"
"Vice president—but I wonder if they elected you or me."
"Not me," he deprecated, filling a big wicker chair with cushions designed for comfort rather than beauty. "I only gave you a good start."
Eleanor, radiant with success, laughed up at him. Hector caught his breath.
"It was splendid of you!" she said. "Why, you took days and days away from your own work to help me. You'd have thought it was worth the trouble, though, if you could have seen their faces! And they made me vice president! I can't begin to thank you, Hector!"
The archæologist had not resumed his seat; he was leaning against a pillar of the shaded veranda, watching her closely.
"It wasn't anything—I wish it might have been something important."
"Why, it was!"
"Oh, no—it was incidental. The only important part of it was the time we spent together going over those notes."
"Oh!" said Eleanor faintly.
The young man sat down without removing his eyes from their magnet.
"I'm not a very lively young person," he admitted. "I don't do any of these slithy dances, and I'm not much on society stuff—you know that. I'm— I can't promise you a lot of fun, Eleanor, but if you can be satisfied with the kind of life I've got to lead, I do wish you'd marry me!"
It was so startling that her expression didn't even remotely approximate the finer tenets of romance. She shrank a little among the cushions, and stared. Hector said no more—he evidently considered that his share of the dialogue was over, and that it was her turn to say something. This was in the air. At length she sensed it.
"I'm—I'm so astonished!" she faltered. "You never let me know—hadn't even suspected it!"
"Neither had I," said the young man. "That is, not until day before yesterday. It was about half past five. After we finished the peroration, and you went home, this was the loneliest, stupidest veranda in all the world. And yet there was something homelike about those tea things that made me wonder —and after I'd thought about it, I knew what I'm missing."
"You aren't confusing it—with something else, are you? It isn't just that you want a home? Men feel that way often—when they're lonely."
"Not that—no." He fumbled in his pockets. "Here's an itinerary I mapped out for us."
"What!"
"Yes," said Hector, raising his eyebrows. "I thought father would like to have us take a sentimental journey. We'll follow the same route they took —New York to Liverpool and London, a month in the north country"
"Hector!"
"Certainly," he insisted. "I want to take you around the world, Eleanor. Now, from England we go to France, then we"
"But your book!"
"Drat the book!" said Hector violently. "I want to marry you!"
There was a dynamic silence while Eleanor examined the pattern of the grass-cloth rug with scrupulous attention to the weave. When she raised her eyes they were very soft, and a little brighter than usual.
"Hector," she began, "I don't believe you'll understand this—I'm afraid you won't. Please try, anyway. I'm awfully fond of you—I never realized how much until—just now. During these weeks I've thought a lot about you, and what a wonderful work you're doing for your father's sake. I'm not as clever as those club women think I am—I'm bored stiff by serious things like history—but there's a pathetic side to your studying that sort of—catches my heart. Your father wanted you to be a famous man—and if you were married now, and spent a long time traveling, you'd never have the same interests again. You couldn't. And I'd always feel as though your father knew how I'd spoiled his dreams for you—so—you can't marry any one until you've made good."
"My dear child!"
"Please don't look at me like that!"
"But do you know what you're saying?"
"P-perfectly."
He passed a hand through his hair, and scowled.
"Eleanor, it's absurd! I'm only twenty-five—the book can wait. And I need travel to broaden me"
"Do you truly think you could study archæology on your wedding trip?"
Hector pondered briefly.
"You're right—I couldn't. But there isn't any desperate hurry about this, you know."
"We're terribly young," said Eleanor sententiously. "I can't begin to tell you how truly and deeply anxious I am to have you make a name for yourself and I can't spoil it for you, Hector—I just can't!"
"Fame!" said Hector. "What is it, anyway? How can we tell whether I'm wasting time or not? Tell me—would you marry me now if it weren't for that idiotic book?"
"Yes," said Eleanor simply. "I would."
"And you can actually sit there and tell me that you won't do it because I haven't made myself famous? I ask you to marry me, and you can say 'Go out and get a reputation'?"
"Y-yes."
"And you will marry me as soon as I've made it?"
"If you—still want me."
Hector breathed deeply.
"What's your present conception of fame?"
Eleanor resumed her study of the rug.
"Why not take your father's definition—when the average well-read man can't see your name in print without knowing who you are, and what you've done."
"As for example," said Hector bitterly, "they know all about Richard Hildreth and Jean Victor Duruy and Wolfgang Menzel—historians a thousand times greater than I'll ever be! As for example, Eleanor—you're educated—who was Goldwin Smith?"
"I—I don't know."
"Only the greatest genius Canada ever produced. There's fame for you!"
"Oh!" she cried, scenting a loophole. "We were talking about Americans!"
"It's a pretty tough standard—I hope you're not serious, Eleanor. I'm twenty-five—it may be fifty years before I 'make good'—and travel isn't so much fun after you're seventy-five."
Eleanor came to him swiftly, and laid her hands on his massive shoulders.
"Hector," she said, "it may be because I'm so stupid myself. I'm like most girls nowadays—I don't really know very much. I want—as much as your father wanted you—to be a success. I don't care whether it's books, or what it is—I don't think he did. And I don't want to wait forever. But I won't marry you until you've started well on the road—for his sake. I can't let myself hinder you, Hector."
"I'll bet dad would have told you to marry me."
"But not yet. Can't you work for me—too?"
"Yes, I can!" He stooped and kissed her cheek. "And now," said the extraordinary young man, "we'd better pretend we aren't engaged."
"But we're not!"
"We'd better pretend we aren't," he gravely corrected, "because engaged girls miss a lot of fun in Olympus. I've seen 'em."
"You'll work hard—won't you?"
"Do you doubt it?"
"I'll have to hurry along," said Eleanor hastily. "I ought to have been home ages ago. Where's my handkerchief?"
She stood uncertainly at the top of the steps.
"What's the matter?" inquired Hector.
Eleanor returned daintily, hesitantly to the vine-shaded portion of the veranda, where she paused, and looked down.
"We're not engaged—but I should think you'd want to pretend we are—just this once!"
An hour nearer sunset Miss Redway bethought herself of the handkerchief she hadn't found. The telephone was near at hand.
"Oh, Mrs. Jones," she said. "This is Miss Redway. Can I speak to Mr. Blanding a moment?"
"No, ma'am," retorted Hector's housekeeper. "He's a-workin' on his book, and he told me he can't be disturbed for nothin' nor nobody. Thanks!"