Harriet T. Comstock

"Queer—to think no day is like to a day that is past."

When Joan and Patricia arose the following day they confronted life as two criminals might who realized that their only safety lay in flight, and that they must escape without running risks.

Patricia shuddered when the first mail was delivered. She rescued her own letter—addressed to Joan—and raised her heart in gratitude that no letter of angered remonstrance came from Burke.

But he might come; he might telegraph!

"My God!" Patricia exclaimed at noon time, "I cannot stand this, Joan, we must vacate."

Joan was quivering with excitement, too—she was wild-eyed and shook with terror at every step on the stairs.

Her ordeal of the day before had not merely devastated her beautiful dreams, but it had, in a marvellous fashion, created an entirely new outlook on life. She felt that once she was safe from any possible chance of meeting Raymond, he might, spiritually, rise from the ashes and eventually overcome the impression that would cling in spite of all she could do. Intellectually she understood—but her hurt and shocked sensibilities shrank from bodily contact with one who had forced the fruit of knowledge so crudely upon her. The youth in her seemed to have died, and it held all the charm and delight. The woman of Joan made a plea for the man, but as yet he was a stranger. More strange, even, than the unnamable creature who had, for an hour, while the storm raged, stood in her imagination like some evil thing between the woman who had not fully understood and the woman who was never again to misunderstand.

While she feared and trembled Joan could, already, recall the moment when Raymond began to gain the victory over his fallen self. She knew that he was always to be the master in the future. How she knew this she could not have explained, but she knew! In all the years to come Raymond would be the better for that hour that proved to him his weakness. And with this knowledge, poor Joan found comfort in her own part. He and she had learned together the strength of their hidden foes. She realized with a sense of hot remorse that she had wanted freedom not so much for the opportunity of expressing that which was fine and worth while, but that which she, herself, had not been conscious of.

But she had been awakened in time. She, like Raymond, had faced her worst self, and now the most desirable thing to do was to get away. Anywhere, separated from all that had led to the shock, she would look back and forward and know herself well enough to make the next step a safer one.

To go with Patricia for a few months would not interfere with her winter plans; so she decided not to write fully to Doris, but to state merely that she was going to see Patricia settled in her new venture—or, should the business not appeal, bring Patricia back with her.

"But," she said to Patricia while they restlessly moved about the studio, "what can we do about—this," Joan spread her arms wide, "the furniture and all Syl's beloved things?"

Patricia sighed.

"Has it ever struck you, my lamb," she said, "that our dear Syl is a selfish pig?"

Joan started in surprise.

"Oh, I know," Patricia went on, "her respectability and genius protect her, but she is selfish. How long did she stop to consider us when her own plans loomed high? She dumped everything on us and went! It was business, pleasure, art, and John. For the rest—'poof!'" Patricia spoke the last sound like a knife cutting through something crisp and hard.

Joan continued to stare. Unformed impressions were taking shape—she felt disloyal, but she was not deceived.

"Syl brought you here," Patricia was going on, "because she was lonely and you fitted in; she never changed her own course. She has engaged herself to her John because he fits in and will never interfere. I've seen him—and I grieve over him. He'll think, bye and bye, that he's gone into partnership with God in giving Syl and her art to the world! But he'll never have any nice little fire to warm the empty corners of his life by. I hope he'll never discover them—poor chap! He's as good as gold and Syl has pulled it all over him without knowing it. She's made him believe that he was specially designed to further a good cause—she is the good cause.

"And the best, or the worst, of it is that Syl will make good. That kind does. It is such fools as you and I who fail because we have imagination and find ourselves at the crucial moment in the other fellow's shoes."

"Oh, Pat!" It was all that Joan could think of saying.

Patricia was rushing on.

"Very well, then! Now, listen, lamb, you and I are going to skip and skip at once. I'm done up. A change is all that will save me—and you've got to go with me!"

"Yes, yes, Pat!"

"Why, child, a step on the stairs is giving us electric shocks. This lease is up in October. I'll telegraph Syl to-day. She can make her own arrangements after that—we'll leave things safe here and get out to-morrow!"

Suddenly Joan got up and threw her hands over her head.

"Thank heaven!" was what she cried aloud.

There was much rush and flurry after that, and in the excitement the nervous tension relaxed.

A note, a most bewildering one, was posted to Elspeth Gordon. It came at a moment when Miss Gordon greatly needed Joan and was most annoyed at her non-appearance. It simply stated:

Now as Patricia had been an unknown quantity to Miss Gordon—her relations with Joan being purely those of business—she raised her brows with all the inherited conservatism of her churchly ancestors and steeled her heart—as they often had.

"Temperamental!" sniffed Miss Gordon, "utterly lacking in honour. Just as I might have expected. A poor prospect for—Pat! I do not envy the gentleman."

Miss Gordon had contempt instead of passion, but her resentment was none the less.

And it was at high tide when Raymond came in at four-thirty for a cup of tea and what comfort he could obtain by seeing how Joan had survived the storm. He was met by blank absence and a secret and unchristian desire on Miss Gordon's part to hurt Joan.

Miss Gordon had not been entirely unobservant of all that had been going on. She had had her qualms, but business must be business, and so long as Joan did not interfere with that she had not felt called upon to remonstrate with her on her growing friendliness with the protÉgÉ of Mrs. Tweksbury.

But now things were changed and by Joan's own bad behaviour.

Raymond looked sadly in need of tea and every other comfort available—he was positively haggard.

While he sipped his tea he was watching, watching. So was Miss Gordon. Finally, he could stand it no longer and he spoke to her as she was passing.

"Your little sibyl—she is not here? On a vacation, I suppose?"

This was futile and cheap and Raymond felt that he flushed.

Miss Gordon poised for action. Her face grew grave and hard—she believed she was quite within her just rights when she sought to protect this very handsome and worth-while young man. She really should have done it before! She was convinced of that now.

"My assistant," she said, "has left without giving the usual notice. She has left me in a most embarrassing position but I suppose she felt her own personal affairs were paramount.

"I—I think she has made a hasty marriage." On the whole, this seemed more kind than Joan deserved.

"A—what?" Raymond almost forgot himself. "A—what—did you say?"

"Well, I presume it was marriage. She simply stated that something had occurred that was taking her to Chicago at once with a young man."

Elspeth Gordon watched the face of Mrs. Tweksbury's adopted son. She felt she was serving a righteous cause. If any worthy young man came to harm from the folly she had permitted she could never forgive herself! Miss Gordon had an elastic conscience.

Raymond's countenance grew suddenly blank. He had recovered his self-control. He laughed presently—it was a light, well-modulated laugh, not the laugh of a shocked or very much interested man.

Miss Gordon was relieved—but disappointed.

And then Raymond went out to do his thinking alone. He walked the streets as people often do who are lonely and can find relief in action.

He had never been so confused in his life, but then, he reflected, what did he really know about the girl with whom he had spent so many happy, sweet, unforgettable hours? The one black hour through which she had, somehow, stood as the only tangible safe thing he could recall, had shattered his faith in himself, in everything.

What was she? Who was she? And now she had gone—with some man! It sounded cruel and harsh—but it could not, it never could, blot out certain memories which lay deep in Raymond's mind. He was miserable beyond words. He deplored his own part in the unhappy affair; he could not adjust himself to the inevitable—the end of the amazing and romantic episode.

Of course he had always known that it must end some time, but while he drifted damnably he had not given much thought to that. But now he had finished it by his own beastiality when, had he kept his head, it might have passed as it came—a thing undefiled; a beautiful, tender memory.

Perhaps—and at this Raymond shuddered—perhaps he had driven the girl upon a reef. He had heard of such things. In despair she had violently taken herself out of his reach. He could not believe she had been seriously involved while she played with him. Whatever she was, he could but believe that she was innocent in her regard for him—else why this mad flight? And he could not believe that her regard for him was serious. He was humble enough.

After leaving Joan the night before Raymond had met his Other Self squarely in the shrouded house. Toward morning he had come to a conclusion: he was prepared to pay to the uttermost for his folly, whatever the demand might be. She must be the judge.

He would go to the tea room—not to the house that he had so brutally invaded. He would again talk to the girl and watch her—he would make her understand that he was not as weak as he might seem. If he had misunderstood, that should not exempt him from responsibility. But if she should spurn any attempt of his to remedy the evil he could regard himself with a comparatively clean conscience.

Raymond could not get away from the idea that the girl was of his world—the world where he was supposed, by Mrs. Tweksbury and her kind, to constantly be.

But then the empty tea room—and how empty it was!—stared him blankly in the face. Miss Gordon's manner angered him beyond expression. Almost he felt he must tell her of his own low part in the tragedy in order to place her beside the girl he had insulted, instead of beside him, as he felt she was.

Raymond was hurt, disappointed, and disgusted; but as the day wore on a grave and common-sense wave of relief flooded his consciousness. Bad as things had been, they might, God knows, have been worse. As it was, with the best of intentions, he was set aside by the girl's own conduct of her affairs.

To seek her further would be the greatest of folly and then, toward night, lonely, half ill, Raymond undertook that time-honoured custom of turning over a new leaf only to find that it stuck to the old persistently!

Then he resorted to a sensible alternative—he read and re-read the old page. He tried to understand it line by line. He was humbled; filled with shame at his meaningless attitude of the past, and acknowledged that the grit in him, that he had hoped was sand, was, after all, the dirt that could easily defile. He must begin anew and rebuild. He must take nothing for granted in himself. Having arrived at that conclusion, the leaf turned!

And Joan, in like manner, thrashed about. It was not so much her actions that caused her alarm—she had played most sincerely—but it was the power behind the play that caused her to tremble and grow hot and cold. What was it within her that had driven her where wiser girls would fear to stray? What was it that was not love in the least and yet had caused her heart to beat at Raymond's touch or glance? Whatever it was, Joan concluded, it could not be depended upon. It could lay waste every holy spot unless it were understood and controlled, and Joan set herself to the task.

The first step was to get away. That was inevitable.

After a few months—and Joan was sure Patricia could not run in harness longer than that—they could both come back, saner and better women. Then Doris would be called into action; no more butting against the pricks and calling it freedom!

In the meantime, Patricia and Joan worked madly to get away and still secure Sylvia's interests.

Telegrams passed to and fro. Sylvia was fair enough to see both sides, and while she was irritated at being disturbed she did not resent it and even bade Patricia and Joan success with honest enthusiasm.

"I'll run back and see to things," she wrote; "I'm making a lot of money."

And then Patricia tucked Joan, so to speak, under her frail wing and took to flight.

Chicago was new territory to both the girls but Patricia, from the necessity, as she told Joan, of grubbing, had become an adept at finding shelter.

After a week at a hotel, while she settled herself in business, Patricia had free hours for home-hunting, and she and Joan made a lark of it.

Patricia had the enviable power of shutting business from her own time, and she quickly discerned that Joan needed prompt and definite interests to hold her to what they had undertaken.

And the venture had suddenly assumed gigantic proportions to Patricia. She feverishly desired it to be a success.

She realized that Joan was being torn by conflicting emotions while she was idle and alone. She asked no questions; appeared not to notice Joan's teary eyes and pensive mouth. Wisely she made Joan feel her own need of her—to that Joan responded at once.

"Joan, I never had a home in my life before," she confided while they flitted from one apartment to another. "I used to walk around in strange cities and peep in people's windows, just to see homes!

"After my father died, I rustled about on the little money he left, and I got to sneaking into other women's homes. I didn't mean harm at first, but after awhile it seemed so easy to sneak and so hard to—make good! But down in my heart, as truly as God hears me, I've been homesick for—what I never had."

"Pat! Of all things—you are crying!" Joan looked frightened.

"Well, let me cry!" sniveled Patricia. "I've never given myself that luxury, either."

For a moment there was silence broken only by Patricia's sniffs. Then:

"What do your folks say about it, Joan?"

"I haven't sent the big letter yet—it's written. I don't want them to say anything until I'm fixed. I only told them of our leaving New York."

"Whew!" ejaculated Patricia. "You certainly run your career free-handed."

"Aunt Dorrie will take it like the darling she is," Joan mused on, "and she'll make Nan and Doctor Martin see it. When she gave me my chance she did not tie a string to me—not even the string of her love. We understand each other perfectly."

"I suppose you know," Patricia gave a sigh, "but I don't think an explanation would hurt any and I don't want her to blame me more than I deserve, Joan."

"Blame you, Pat? Why, how could she?"

"Oh, I don't know. She might get to thinking on her own hook if you don't give her the facts. Joan, send the letter at once!"

So Joan dispatched the letter, and it had the effect of depressing Nancy to an alarming degree and, in consequence, of spurring Doris to renewed effort.

She was perturbed by the lack of what she knew. She had her doubts of Patricia; the sudden flight had an aspect of rout—what did it mean?

Her reply to Joan, however, was much what Martin's would have been to his nephew.

She accepted and took on faith what Joan had explained—or failed to explain.

She laid emphasis on plans for the coming winter and referred to Joan's promise to give herself seriously to her music.

"Either in New York or there, my dear, begin your real work. It is all well enough to look about before you decide, but there is a time for decision."

This letter put Joan on her mettle.

"Pat, I'm going to begin as soon as we've settled," she declared, and her wet eyes shone. "Aunt Dorrie is quite right."

The girls finally secured four pretty, sunny rooms overlooking the lake, and reverently selected the furniture for them.

"Let's get things artistic," Patricia wisely explained, "we'll make the place unique and then"—for Patricia always left, if possible, a way open for retreat—"if we should ever want to dispose of it, we'd have a good market."

But as the days passed it looked as if the venture were turning out better than one could have hoped. Joan had never felt so important in her life, and, to her surprise, developed possibilities never suspected before. She prepared for Patricia's homecomings with the keenest delight. The cozy, charming little dinners, the evenings by the open fire—for they had selected the rooms largely on account of the fireplace—or the occasional theatre or concert grew in delight. Patricia was the merriest of comrades, the most appreciative of partners. She also, to her own surprise, became deeply interested in her work and, while the hours and confinement sometimes irritated her, her field of invention was wide enough to employ her real talent, and her success was assured from the first.

And when things were running smoothly and there were hours too empty for comfort in the lonely day, Joan discovered a professor of music who gave her much encouragement and some good advice.

After this interview she wrote to Doris more frankly than she had done for a long time. She explained her financial situation and quite simply asked for help:

It's very expensive learning not to be a fool, Aunt Doris. I have proved that. I am very serious now and Chicago, with Pat, is better for me than New York with Sylvia.

What I really want is to prove myself a bit before I come back to you. I'm sorry about this winter, dear, but a year more and I will be able to come to you not on my shield, I hope, but with it in fairly good condition.