Harriet T. Comstock

"To do our best is one part, but to wash our hands smilingly of the consequences is the next part, of any sensible virtue."

In much that frame of mind, Doris arose the day following Martin's call.

By some subtle force the dÉbris of the past seemed to have been disposed of; the misunderstanding on her part and David's.

"It is the 'call' that makes everything possible or tragically wretched," she said, "and one cannot be blamed for being born deficient. Thank God I fitted in, though, when others were called away."

With David's understanding and coÖperation the present could be confronted and the "hand washing of consequences" undertaken.

"I have done my best," Doris felt sure of this, "my best, and now I must do a bit of trusting. It has been my one daring adventure. It must not fail."

After many attempts she wrote and dispatched a letter to George Thornton, simply stating that she was about to send the children to school.

While waiting for his reply she turned her attention to Mary, for in any case, she decided, the children must be placed in another's care. What Mary felt when Doris explained things to her no one was ever likely to know. The girl's face became blanker; the lines stiffened.

"It was," Doris confided later to Martin, "as if I were wiping the past out as I spoke."

The fact was that Doris was rekindling the past—the past that lay back of the years of plain duty.

"I have not overlooked, Mary," Doris strove to get under the crust of reserve and find something with which to deal emotionally, "the years of devotion to us all. You have made no social ties for yourself; have not taken any pleasures outside—what would you like to do now, Mary?"

"Go home."

"Go—home? Why—where is home, Mary?"

The pathos struck Doris—the pathos of those who, having served others, find themselves stranded at last.

"Down to Silver Gap." As she spoke, Mary was hearing already the sound of the river on the rocks and seeing the spring flowers in the crevices of the hills.

"You mean, go back to Ridge House? You could not stay there alone, Mary, with old Jed."

Mary stared blankly—she was further back than Ridge House.

"I've been saving," she went slowly on, "all the years. I reckon I have most enough to buy the cabin where us-all was born." The tone and words took on the mountain touch. Doris was fascinated.

"You mean your father's old cabin?" she asked.

"Yes. It lies 'cross the river from Ridge House, and when I think of it," a suggestion of radiance broke on Mary's face, "I get a rising in my side. I'm aiming to get it back——"

The girl stopped short—something in her threatened to break loose.

The pause gave Doris a moment to consider. She was baffled by Mary, but she saw clearly that the girl had but one desire.

"Mary," she said, presently, "I have always intended, when the children no longer needed you, to give you some proof of my appreciation of all that you have done for us. You seem to have shown me a way. You shall have the old cabin, if it can be obtained, and it shall be made comfortable for you. It is not so far but what you can have a little oversight of Ridge House, too, and that will mean a great deal to me. I am thinking of opening the house sometime."

Doris got no further for, to her astonishment, Mary rose and came stiffly toward her. When she was near enough she reached out her hands and said:

"God hearing me, 'I'll pay you back some day. I will; I will!"

Doris was embarrassed.

"You have paid everything you owe me, Mary," she returned, quietly. "It is my turn now. I will see about the cabin at once."

Finally a letter came from Thornton. A dictated letter.

He was about to leave for South Africa and would be gone perhaps several years.

He left everything in Doris's capable hands!

Again Doris took breath for the next stretch of the long way.

And Joan and Nancy went to Dondale and Miss Phillips.

It was a hard break for them all and was taken characteristically. Joan, tear-stained and quivering, set her face to the change and excitement with unmistakable delight. Nancy was frightened into silent but smiling acquiescence. She expected, she told Joan, that it would kill her, but she would not make Aunt Dorrie feel any worse than she did by showing what she felt! At this Joan tossed her head and sent two large tears rolling down her cheeks.

"None of us will die, Nan. We all feel deathly, but this is—life."

At ten Joan had a distinct comprehension of the difference between living and life. To a certain extent you controlled the former; the latter "got you."

"I—I don't want life," wailed Nancy, "I want Aunt Dorrie."

"But life—wants you!"

Somewhere Joan had heard that, or read it—the old library was no hidden place to her—and she brought it forth now with emphasis.

Nancy made no reply. In that mood Joan would show no mercy. It was when she was suffering the most that Joan could harden and frighten Nancy. She was lashing herself to duty when she sent the whip cracking.

Martin accompanied Doris to Dondale. He was "Uncle David" to the children and part of their happy lives.

"Take—take good care of Aunt Dorrie," Nancy pleaded with him at parting, her poor little face distorted by the effort she was making.

"You bet!" Martin bent and kissed the child. He approved of Nancy. Martin could never patiently endure complications, and Nancy was simple and direct. Joan was another matter. At the last she was in high spirits.

"It's going to be great," she whispered to Doris. "All the girls and the new games and the comings home for holidays and—and everything."

It was after they were alone that Nancy called down extra suffering upon herself.

"Aunt Dorrie will think you did not care, Joan, and Uncle David scowled. You make people think queer things about you."

Joan turned and fixed Nancy with flaming eyes.

"I want Aunt Dorrie to think everything is all right—you didn't! You did not cheat her. I did—for her sake."

"Perhaps," Nancy sometimes struck a high note, unsuspectingly, "perhaps Aunt Dorrie would rather have you care."

Joan regarded her intently and then replied:

"Well, then, you're all right, Nan!"

The tone, more than the words, stung Nancy. It hurt her to have any one misunderstand, but it often occurred to her that it hurt more to be understood!

In the train en route to New York Doris sat very quiet, thinking of the two little faces she was leaving—forever! It amounted to that—as every woman knows.

Nothing but their faces held as the miles were dashed past—faces that portrayed the spiritual essence of the old, dear years—faces that would turn, from now on, to others, and take on new expressions, bear the mark of another's impress.

"Well, thank heaven," Doris presently broke out, "I haven't been a vamp mother, David."

Martin came from behind his newspaper.

"And because of that, Doris," he said, "you will have those girls coming back to you. They will want to come." He was thinking of Nancy.

"Yes. I have a sure feeling about that." Then: "How splendid it was of Joan to act as she did! She'd rather we thought her hard than to let us see her pain."

Martin stared. "You mean Nancy?" he asked.

"No. Nan, bless her, cannot disguise herself, but Joan can! Joan will suffer through her strength."

The period, always a dangerous one, the year following school life, became Doris's great concern while the school time progressed in orderly fashion under Miss Phillips's guidance.

"I am keeping my hands off," Doris often confided to Martin. "It is only fair play while the children are at Dondale. You were right—Miss Phillips is a wonderful woman—I have learned to trust her absolutely. She has appreciated what I tried to do for the girls; is building on it; she will return them to me—not different, but—extended! It's the time after, David, that I am planning. That time which is the link between restraint and the finding of one's self."

"I declare," Martin would reply to this, "I wonder that you ever get results, Doris; you harvest while others are sowing."

But deep in us all is the current carrying on and on, and it was hurrying Doris during the years while the girls were at Dondale.

There were the happy vacations, the new interests, the marvel of watching the miracle of evolution from the child to the woman. At times this was breathlessly exciting.

Doris filled her private time with useful and enjoyable hours. She got into closer touch with old friends, saw and heard the best in music and drama, permitted herself the luxury of David Martin's friendship, and shared his confidences about his sister's son in the Far West—a fatherless boy who promised much but often failed in fulfilment.

"Odd, isn't it, Davey," Doris sometimes said, "that you and I, having, somehow, lost what is the commonplace road for most men and women, have been called upon to assume many of the joys and sorrows of that broad highway?"

"We none of us go scot free," Martin returned. "I'm grateful for every decent, common job thrown at me."

And so the years passed and Doris had outlined a vague but comprehensive line of action for the immediate months following the girls' graduation from Dondale.

"I am going to take them abroad," she announced to Martin; "take them over the route that Merry and I took—our last journey together. And, David, in that little Italian town they shall know—about Meredith and Thornton!"

David started, but made no remark.

"And when we return," Doris went on, "I am going to bring the girls out—I hate the term, I'd rather say let them out—just as Merry and I were, in this dear, old house. Mrs. Tweksbury and I have planned rather a brilliant campaign."

And then came that bleak March day—Joan and Nancy were to graduate in June—when the hurrying undercurrent in Doris Fletcher's life brought her to a sharp turn in the stream.

She was sitting in the pleasant old room before a freshly made fire; the fountain trickled and splashed, the birds sang, defying the outdoor gloom and chill, and a letter from Miss Phillips lay upon her lap—a letter that had made her smile then frown. She took it up and read it again.

"I am deeply interested in your nieces," so Miss Phillips wrote; "naturally a woman dealing, as I have for years, with youth in the making, is both blunted and sharpened. Young girls fall into types—are comfortably classified and regulated for the most part. Occasionally, however, the rule has its exceptions."

Then Miss Phillips expatiated for a page or so, in her big, forceful handwriting, on Nancy's beauty, sweetness, and charm.

"A fine, feminine creature, my dear Miss Fletcher. A girl I am proud to refer to as one of mine; a girl to carry on the traditions of such a family as yours—a lovely, young American woman!"

This was what brought the smile, but as Doris turned over the sheet the smile departed; a grave expression took its place.

"You and I are progressive women," so the new theme began; "we know the game of life. We know that where we once played straight whist we now play bridge, but we are fully aware that the fundamentals are the same.

"And now I must explain myself. For a young girl with the prospects that Joan has her mental equipment is a handicap rather than an asset. She does everything too well—except the drudgery of the class room, she has managed to endure that, and with credit, but everything else she accomplishes with distinction. She lacks utterly any suggestion of amateurishness!

"I hope you will understand. This would be splendid if she, like Sylvia Reed, for instance, had to look to her wits to solve her life problems; but it will distract her along the path of obvious demands.

"She, I repeat, does everything too well. She dances with inspiration; nothing less. She sings with spirit and originality; she acts almost unbelievably well and she wins, without effort, the admiration and affection of all with whom she comes in contact. I speak thus openly and intimately to you, Miss Fletcher, because, frankly, Joan puzzles me—she always has."

The letter dropped again on Doris's lap. Yes, Doris Fletcher did understand. She saw Joan, not as she was, a tall young creature radiantly facing life, but as a tired little child in this very room stepping' defeated from the fountain, because she could not make her desires come true! She was listening to the old plaint: "I have used the old games—I want something new!"

Yes, Doris understood, and sitting alone, she vowed that Joan should not be defrauded of her own, by misdirected love, prejudice, or luxury.

"She shall have her chance!"

Then it was that something happened. Things—stopped!

For a moment Doris was conscious of making an effort to set them going again. She glanced at the clock—that had stopped! The fountain no longer played; nor did the birds sing!

A black silence presently engulfed the whole world. At last Doris opened her eyes—or had they been open during the eternity when nothing had occurred? She glanced at the clock, a trivial thing against the carving of the wall, but upon whose face Truth sat faithfully. Two hours had passed since she had noticed the clock before!

"But—I have been thinking a long time, planning for the children; reading the letter——" Doris sought to establish a normal state of affairs—she saw the letter lying at her feet, but did not bend to pick it up.

"Only a faint. But I have never fainted before!" she thought on.

She was not frightened, not even excited. She felt as if she had simply come upon something that she had always known was on the road ahead awaiting her. She had come upon it sooner than she had expected to, that was all. She did not want to pass into the silence again if she could help it, so she lay back in the chair quietly, guardedly, and waited.

Then she heard steps. Outside the family only one person came unannounced to the sunken room and gladly, thankfully, Doris turned her eyes and met David Martin's as he paused at the doorway above.

Martin had himself in control before Doris noticed the fear in his eyes. He came slowly to her, sat down beside her and, while simply taking her hand in greeting, let his trained touch fall upon her pulse. It told him the dread secret, but it did not shatter his calm—he even smiled into the pale face and said lightly:

"Well, what have you been trying to do?"

Doris told him, without emotion, what had occurred. She did not remove her hand from his—his touch comforted her; held her to the things she knew and loved and trusted.

"And now, David," she said at last, "I think we have both known that some day this would occur. We are too good friends to be anything but frank—I am not afraid, and it is essential that I should know the truth. The family ogre has caught me—but it has not conquered me yet!"

"Well, Doris—it is the first call!" The man's words hurt like a knife turned upon himself.

"I feared so—and I am forty-nine."

"A mere child, my dear, if we deal honestly with the fact. Your father was fifty-five and might have lived to be seventy if he had stopped in time. Your grandfather——"

"Never mind, David, let's keep to me. How much longer—have I?"

"No man on earth could tell you that, my dear, but I hope—always granting that you will be wise—that you may count on, say, twenty years."

They both smiled. After all, what did it matter?

"And—what do you suggest I should do—as a beginning of the—twenty years?"

"Close this house, Doris, and start another kind of existence—somewhere else."

"Why, David—I must bring the girls out, you know. They must not be told—of this."

"They need be told only what you choose to have them know, but as to the bringing-out farce—that's rot! Those girls will get out by one door or another, never fear. You are to be kept in—that's the important thing at present."

"Dear old David!" Doris's eyes dimmed as she looked at the kind face bending over the hands lying limp, now, on her lap. She noticed that there was white on the temple where the dark hair had turned; the heavy shoulders were bent permanently. She longed to do something more for David during the next—twenty years!

"You must not give way, Doris. A change is good for us all." Martin noted the tears in the eyes holding his own, but he did not understand their source.

"I am afraid the girls will be so disappointed," was what Doris said.

"Pampered creatures! It will do them good. But Nancy will love it and Joan can kick the traces if she wants to—that will do her good." Martin leaned back and crossed his legs in the old boyish way.

"What will Nancy love, David?"

"Why, the out-of-door country life. She's that kind. Flowers and animals and quiet."

"Country life?" Doris sat up. "But, David, I could not stand country life, myself. I love to look at the country, listen to it, play with it—but I am a citizen to the core. It is simply impossible. One has to be born with the country in his blood to be part of it."

It was like pleading with the stern expression on Martin's face.

He was not apparently listening, and when he spoke he carried on his own thought:

"Queer how things dovetail. We drop a stitch and then go back and pick it up—now there is that place of yours, down South, Ridge House!"

Doris's face twitched and then, because she was in that state closely bordering upon the unknown, that state open to impressions and suggestions from sources outside the explainable, Silver Gap seemed to open alluringly to her imagination. It was like a dropped stitch to be taken up and woven into the pattern!

She suddenly felt that she had always known she must go back. It was like the heart trouble—a thing on her road! Doris smiled and David patted her hands.

"That's the way it strikes me," he said, quite as if he were gaining his inspiration whence hers came. "After you told me about the—the children, you know, Doris, years ago, I went down there and gave the place a look-over. The South always affects me like a—well, a lotus flower—sleeping but filled with wonderful dreams. It gets me! Why, after seeing Ridge House I even went so far as to buy a piece of land known as Blowing Rock Clearing. I've planned, if that scamp of a nephew of mine ever develops into a sawbones, to leave him in charge here and go down South myself and put up a shack on my clearing." Martin was watching Doris now from under his brows; he was talking against the silence that might engulf her again; seeking to hold her to a future that he had been vaguely considering in the past. He thankfully saw her interest growing.

"You did that, David—how like you!"

The tears still came easily to Doris's eyes.

"Oh, well, I have a thrifty streak, and I hated to see a property like Ridge House lie fallow. It's great. The buying of Blowing Rock was pure Yankee sense of a bargain. But you see how it all works out. You'll have the time of your life developing your holdings and, at odd moments, I can start my shack. Look upon the change as an adventure—nothing permanent. In a year or so you may be able to spend most of the time on pavements—though why in God's name you want to is hard to imagine."

Doris was smiling.

"But the girls!" she faltered.

"Forget them. Give them a chance to think of you. Take them abroad—that will be good for you all, but in the autumn, Doris, go South! You must escape next winter."