The guests had gone, the musicians had followed them, and in the huge Beeston house, its lower floors once more shadowy and dim, Crabbe and the other servants yawned their way about, locking up for the night. It was striking two when the old servant, after a final round about him, slowly climbed the stairs. Stillness fell then. Bab's dance was done.

Upstairs, alone in her dressing room, she sat with her chin upon her hand, plunged in a train of thought. The night, in spite of the fact that May drew near, had come on cold, and Mawson had lit the fire in the grate. Bab, after her dress had been removed, had slipped a wrapper over her bare arms and shoulders, then drifted to the hearth.

"You may go, Mawson," she said to the drowsy maid; and Mawson departing, Bab slipped to her knees on the big fur rug before the fire.

The warmth of the glowing cannel allured her. Downstairs in the last hour of the dance a chill had seemed to steal upon her, a sensation that had been as much mental, perhaps, as it was physical. She felt dull, numbly troubled, and in addition a shadow of apprehension was now creeping upon her. Why, she could not have told. Filled with all that had happened that night, she sat staring at the coals, conscious only of the burden that had begun to weigh upon her.

A feeling of sadness and longing
That is not akin to pain,

And resembles sorrow only
As the mist resembles the rain.

After all, what was it that had happened? As her mind, harking back over the night's occurrences, dwelt on each event, her vision of what had taken place grew more and more confused. It was not just of Varick she thought, for Varick, she knew now, she had lost. Of that she was sure. The instant she had told him the truth, that she had given her promise to David Lloyd, the look on his face had been enough. This look and the exclamation that had gone with it had shown doubt, first, and with it dismay, consternation. Then she had seen, she felt sure, a look of repugnance follow. But there was something besides that, something Varick seemed to know and that was causing him deep concern. What could it be?

Of the real facts regarding her presence in the Beeston house Bab as yet knew nothing. However, though ignorant of the truth, her mind was by no means at rest. Already back in her brain a dim something was at work. One hardly could call it a suspicion—not yet, at any rate. Suspicion, for one thing, involves some suggestion of the truth. It was more bewilderment, a sense of confused, growing wonder.

As she sat there staring at the fire in the grate, her mind groping round for some explanation of the evening's experiences, a quick remembrance came to her. It was like a ray of light—a sudden, illuminating gleam stabbing swiftly through the darkness. Her thoughts turned back to the first morning she had spent in that house, the Christmas day when she encountered the Lloyds, David's cold, unresponsive parents.

Bit by bit she recalled the scene: first, Mrs. Lloyd's air of aloofness, her chilly reception to her new-found niece; then in train with this Lloyd's keen, curious interest in her life at Mrs. Tilney's, her acquaintance especially with Varick. Of course by now Bab had learned why Varick was no longer welcome at her grandfather's house. It was because of Beeston's hatred of Varick's father. But, even this hardly could be reason enough for the Lloyds' deep-rooted interest in the matter; at any rate, not for their concern in Bab's early friendship with Varick. She remembered also the climax of that scene, the moment when, grim of face, flying the signals of war, Miss Elvira had swooped down upon the Lloyds. At sight of her they suddenly had been stricken silent. Why? And then Miss Elvira had flung those few tart words at the pair. They had contained a warning, a threat, too. But why was that threat necessary? Was it to keep them from revealing something to her?

Gradually the conviction that this was the real explanation began to grow upon her. In this case the revelation, the secret they knew, must have something to do with Varick. But how was he involved? Was it something shady they had to tell? If so, why didn't they tell it? Why didn't they give him a chance to defend himself? Mulling this over, she recalled, too, with sudden vividness something that had occurred on that eventful afternoon when she had driven alone with Beeston, the day when in his rage he had denounced Varick as a fortune hunter. Varick's father, as Beeston had told her, had tried to trim him, and instead had himself been trimmed. That the man Varick, Senior, had been dishonest was manifest. Had he perhaps handed down this trait? Was Varick dishonest too? But if this were true, why didn't they say so? That she herself might be the one concerned did not enter Bab's mind by even so much as a suggestion.

An hour passed. The cannel, crackling and snapping in the hearth, began presently to burn low. It grew gray about the edges, its glow subsiding, the ashes turning cold. As three o'clock struck out in the hall Bab heard a sound upon the stair. Startled, for an instant she held her breath. Then, the sound passing on, she recognized it—or so she thought. It was old Crabbe, she told herself. Having locked up, he now must be going to bed. She did not know he had been there an hour already. Her alarm gone, she reached over to the grate, and with the poker stirred up the waning blaze. Again the coals began to snap and crackle, their light dancing on the ceiling of the half-darkened room. And Bab once more resumed her thoughts.

It was not only Lloyd and his wife who were hiding something; it was David, and Miss Elvira, and even Varick. However, though she recalled Varick's quick question addressed to David, "Does she know?" its significance did not dawn on her. To her it was merely a part of the tangle, the mystery, a mere repetition.

Suddenly irritation swept over her. They were treating her like a child. A child—yes, that was it! They were all of them trying to hoodwink, to cozen her. Why?

Again and again, as Bab knelt there, her thoughts returned to the queer, distracting events that had marked her presence in that house. And still the truth evaded her. She arose presently and, going to the glass, unwound the coils of brown, wavy hair piled on her slender head, which by this time had begun to throb painfully. In all the dreary confusion in her mind one thought stood out above the others—she had lost Varick!

i231

A half-hour passed, and she was again in her place before the dying coals. She could not sleep. Late as it was she felt she would rather sit with the fire for company than lie wide-eyed in bed, staring sleeplessly at the walls. More memories swam before her now. This time they were of that evening, the Christmas Eve, now months gone by, when in Mrs. Tilney's dowdy dining-room she had dreamed of herself as an heiress sought after and fortunate. The dream, still vivid, rose mockingly before her.

She would have a party, a dance. She would have music, flowers, lights. A gay figure, she would dance, her happiness complete. But little had she dreamed then, there at Mrs. Tilney's, that not one lover but two, the old love and the new, would be present, striving together to win her. And least of all had she dreamed it would be the old love that lost, the new love that won. But so it had been. Drearily staring into the grate, she was thinking how different the reality had been from her dream when, on the stairs outside, she again heard the muffled sound. This time, however, she did not mistake it.

Her heart thumping a swift tattoo of alarm, Bab struggled to her feet. Down the stairs, along the hall now and straight toward her door came the slow, painful footfalls. Then, after a pause—a vital moment in which the blood poured tumultuously into her face, her bare neck and shoulders—a hand tapped on her door, a guarded, secret signal. When she opened the door David stood before her, and at her look of inquiry he signaled her with a finger on his lips.

"Hush!" he whispered. Then without further ado he swayed into the room upon his crutches and, turning, shut the door behind him.

Bab gazed at him in silent wonder. The impropriety of his coming to her room at that hour did not occur to her. What struck her to silence was his look, the expression of his eyes and mouth. His face was drawn and haggard. A light like fever burned in his eyes. She stood before him, her hair tumbling about her shoulders, and waited expectantly for him to speak. When he did his voice was low and broken.

"I couldn't wait; I had to see you," he said. He paused, and gazed at her for a moment. "I've not frightened you, have I?" he asked. Bab could see he was trembling.

To her astonishment, when she answered her voice was quite composed.

"No, I'm not frightened; it's only—why, what is it? What has happened, David?" Vaguely she began to guess what had brought him there.

His eyes, dull, still darkly burning, had fixed themselves on hers. "I saw your light," he said slowly, "and I couldn't wait. I wanted to know whether what you told me tonight you meant—whether you still mean it, that is." Then, his mouth contracting sharply, he paused, steadying himself on his crutches. "You know," he said slowly, the effort manifest, "tonight I saw you with him. I hadn't realized it before. I didn't know there was someone else."

It was as Bab had guessed. She had surmised, indeed, the reason for his coming. But though she had, she made no effort of evasion. She merely wondered that in all her talks with David she had not long before divulged her real feeling for Varick. In mocking iteration, through her mind jingled the words of that hackneyed saying: "It's well to be off with the old love before you're on with the new!" Well, indeed! It happened, too, that she was!

"You mean Bayard, I suppose," she returned.

David did not give her a direct answer, but she could see the conflict that was raging within him. Again his mouth twitched, and he swayed perilously on his crutches. Then, as swiftly as it had come, the storm passed.

"I don't suppose you'll understand; I don't suppose anyone would," he said thickly, his face set, "but it's not fair, not just. Because I'm like this, maimed and twisted, why must I always be made to pay for it? Don't mistake me," he interrupted as Bab sought to speak; "this is not self-pity. Pity is the thing that hurts me worst of all. I want a chance—that's all I ask! I want just for once to be like other men. I could stand it before. All my life, at school, at college, afterward, too—all that time when I saw other boys, other men at their play, at their sports, their good times—I could stand it. I wanted to do what they did, but I couldn't. I knew, too, that I couldn't, that I never could. I knew that I had to grin and bear it. Yes," he said with a fierce vehemence she had never seen before; "and no one can say I didn't grin, that I didn't bear it! Even he will say that for me—you know who I mean. Ask him if you like."

Bab, wondering more now, spoke again.

"I'm sure he would," she said quietly.

He gave her a quick glance; but the hurt in his eyes, his drawn and haggard mouth, went far to obscure the resentment he put into the look. He did not dislike Varick, she knew; they had been friends, and still would have been so had David had his way. What had roused him now was the bitterness of all he'd had to stand.

"Oh, but what's the use!" continued David with a shrug of hopeless misery. "What's the use! I could stand that—seeing men do the things I wanted to do. I've stood it for years. Tonight, though, when I saw him with you—when I saw, too, the look he gave you—that was too much! I'd thought after all I'd had to give up all my life that perhaps I might have you! And then I saw I couldn't!"

Bab was watching him fixedly. His eyes on the floor, he did not see the color fade suddenly in her face.

"Well?" she said abruptly. David at her tone looked up. For a moment his face was vacant. Bab steeled herself to speak again. "What has Varick to do with it?" she demanded. "Why do you dwell on him?"

There was an instant's pause.

"Bab, what do you mean?"

She did not answer directly. Then because she would not hold him in suspense, and hurt him more than he had already been hurt: "You haven't lost me," she said. "I told you I'd marry you, and I'll keep my promise, dear!"

A moment later, swaying on his crutches, he had laid both hands on her shoulders and, his eyes alight, was gazing deeply into hers.

"Oh, Bab, do you mean it?"

"Yes, dear," she returned courageously. "I'll marry you when you want."