Part 15

"Rachel?"

"Hush—yes; she's upstairs, and her window is open. Walk down the orchard with me and I'll tell you. Her coming, an hour ago, was what made me forget the time."

"Carey was talking about her this afternoon," said Anthony, strolling by her side and carrying on a frolic with the boy at the same time. "He'd just heard a singular thing—that she wasn't married to Huntington till the very night he died."

"She told me. She's going away to-night, she insists; but I shall not let her. No, Mr. Huntington wouldn't let her marry him. After they went away he said he wouldn't take her unless he got well. Tony, he was a fine character; in our sympathy for Roger Barnes we haven't appreciated him. It was only at the last that he let her do it. She found out how happy it would make him then, and she would have it so."

"I'm glad she did—poor fellow. Juliet, Roger Barnes is in town."

"Really?" Juliet stopped, her breath catching. "Oh, Tony—"

"Came day before yesterday—leaves to-morrow night for Hongkong."

"Tony!"

Anthony looked down at her, smiling. "There's a situation for you. Can you be expected to keep your friendly hands off that possibility?"

"He won't go away without coming to see us?"

"Most certainly not."

"Then he will naturally come to-night."

"It's more than probable."

"Tony, I won't be trying to manage fate—that's what the doctor calls it—if I keep Rachel here until after—"

"Until after the Overland Limited leaves for San Francisco? Well, fate needs a little assistance once in a while. I think you may legitimately persuade Rachel to stay, if you can. What is her hurry, anyway?"

"I can't find out, except that I imagine she's afraid of meeting one of the men she most assuredly would meet if they knew she had come. She thinks Roger Barnes is in Vienna still."

"She does? Ye gods! I think my knees will begin to tremble if I see their meeting imminent. Come, son, let's try a race to the house. I'll give you to the big, crooked apple tree. One—two—three—go!"

Juliet followed more slowly, thinking busily. Rachel had been very decided about going back into the city that night. Mrs. Huntington, Senior, was with friends, who had begged her daughter's acceptance of their hospitality, and for the elder woman's sake she had acquiesced. Rachel was a keeper of promises, Juliet knew. And to tell her of the probability of the doctor's appearance would be a doubtful means of securing her detention. But if, for any reason, the doctor should fail to appear—Juliet made up her mind that she would give fate her chance until nine o'clock that night. If by that time Barnes had not come—

Juliet looked on eagerly while Anthony greeted Rachel. Her friend had never seemed to her so lovely as now, in her simple black gown, accentuating, as it did, the deep tone of her hair and eyes. Her face had gained in colour and contour in the Arizona climate—its tints were richer. The delicacy of her features was not changed, but their beauty was greater.

"You've lived much outdoors, I see," said Anthony, when dinner was over and the three had gone out upon the porch, "and it's been good for you."

"I've even slept outdoors," Rachel told them, "fully half the year; and ridden horseback every day. I can't quite think how the electrics are going to seem in place of my gallop on Scot. The people on the ranch where we were have simply made me do the things they did. The owner was a dear old gentleman; he gave me Scot. He wanted to send him after me; but nurses have small use for horses, I believe," she ended, smiling.

"That's the plan, is it?"

"Yes. It's what I can do best, I think. I am to enter the training-school the first of July, at the Larchmont Memorial Hospital."

"I'll wager tremendous odds you don't," thought Anthony, "in spite of that confident tone. If Roger Barnes looks in to-night it's all up with your plans—or make a bigger fight than even you can do. A man who can't stay in his own town because you are out of it—"

He was sitting—purposely—where he faced the road. He had considerately offered Rachel a chair with her back to the highway. Juliet was swinging lightly in the hammock behind the vines. Anthony, talking on about Arizona and the Larchmont Memorial, kept an eye on the approach to the house from the corner where visitors always left the car. His watch was rewarded at length by the sight of a figure rapidly turning the corner and making straight for the house.

"Now we're in for it," he thought. "From now on the question with Juliet and me will be how we can most gracefully efface ourselves without seeming to do it. If I remember this young person correctly she's a little difficult to leave unchaperoned against her will."

Out of the corner of his eye he kept track of the approaching figure. It was coming on at a great pace, and in the twilight could be seen looming taller and taller as it crossed the road and turned in across the lawn, making a short cut according to Barnes's own fashion, so that the coming footsteps were noiseless, even to the moment when the figure reached the porch itself.

"Now for it," thought Anthony, feeling as if the curtain were about to ascend on the fourth act of a play, when the third had ended amidst all possible excitement.

"I found the roses blooming just as they used to do, at the side of the house"—Rachel's warm, contralto voice was answering a question from Juliet—"only so untended. I think I shall have to come out again before I begin my work, to look after them."

Anthony did not turn as the step he had been watching for sounded upon the porch. To save his life he could not help keeping his eyes upon Rachel's face. Rachel herself looked up with the air of the visitor who does not know the guests of the house, and the expression Anthony saw upon her face showed only the slightest possible surprise—certainly no other feeling.

Juliet rose. "Ah, Mr. Lockwood," she said, with a cordiality, sincere little person though she was, Anthony knew for once she did not feel. "In the dusk I couldn't be quite sure."

Lockwood's eyes instantly turned to Rachel. That he had known in some way whom he was to see was evident from a most unusual agitation in his manner.

"Mrs.—Huntington," he got out somehow, taking her hand, and staring eagerly down into her face, "I heard you were home, and I hoped to find you here. I—you are—I am extremely glad—"

Half an hour later Anthony came upon his wife in the darkness of the dining-room. "Oh, you shouldn't have left them when I was away," she said. "Little Tony cried out and I had to go. I know Rachel doesn't want to be left with him to-night."

"Angels and chaperons defend us," muttered Anthony. "I can't stand it forever to feel a man wanting to kill me for staying by him through a meeting like this, after three years. I didn't know but Lockwood would attempt to throw me off my own porch. Give him a chance—he hasn't any, anyhow."

"It's after nine," whispered Juliet.

"I know it. Roger's taking a terrible risk."

"He doesn't know she's here. But I thought he cared enough for us to—"

"That's what I've been so sure of. He's probably been detained by some case. He's getting so distinguished, the minute he sets foot in town now the folks with things the matter with them begin to block his path. I hope she knows what she throws over her shoulder if she refuses him now."

"I don't see that she's going to have a chance to refuse him," mourned Juliet. "Do you think he'd ever forgive us if we let him get away without knowing she was here?"

"Lockwood found it out, somehow. Carey's safe to tell him if he sees him—and he's pretty sure to, at Roger's club."

"You couldn't telephone?"

"Where? If he can he'll come here, if only to get news of her. She's never let him write to her, has she?"

"He told me she hadn't when he was here last fall. And she didn't know where he was."

"Fellow-conspirator," whispered Anthony, "we'll give fate her chance to-night. If she bungles the game we'll take it into our own hands to-morrow. But I've a feeling I'd like to let it happen by itself, if it will."

When Lockwood had gone—which was not until eleven o'clock, in spite of the way his hosts remained in his vicinity—Rachel stood still upon the porch smiling a little wearily at Juliet.

"My staying all night has been settled for me," she said. "There was no way to go."

"Luckily for us," Juliet answered. "Sit here a little longer, dear. It's such a perfect night, and I know we shall see little enough of you when you get at work."

Rachel dropped into the hammock. "I should like to lie here all night," she said, "and watch the stars until I go to sleep. I've done that so many, many nights from under a tent flap."

All at once she looked up, her eyes widening. Upon the porch step stood a strong figure—as unlike Lockwood's gracefully slender one as possible. A man's eyes were gazing steadily down into hers—determined gray eyes, with a light in them. The two faces were plainly visible to each other in the radiance from the open door.

XXVIII.—A HIGH-HANDED AFFAIR

If she had not been standing in the doorway Juliet would have run away, but she had to welcome Dr. Roger Barnes, a traveler whom she had not seen for almost a year. Her presence, however, after one glad greeting, seemed not to bother him much. He turned from her to Rachel, who had risen, and took her outstretched hand in both his.

"It's been rather a long evening," he said, "wandering around and around this place, waiting for the other man to go. I explored the orchard and the willow path, and every familiar haunt. I had to refresh myself occasionally by stealing up for a glimpse of your face between the vines. But, somehow, that only made it harder to wait. I had to march myself off again with my fists gripped tight in my pockets to keep them off that fellow, eating you up with his eyes—confound him—you, who belong only to me."

He did not smile as he said the last words, but stood looking eagerly at her with a gaze that never faltered. She tried to draw her hands away; it was useless. Juliet slipped off, knowing that neither of them would see her go.

"Come down on the lawn with me," he said, but she resisted.

"Please stay here, Doctor Barnes," she said, "and please let me have my hand. I can't talk so."

"You needn't talk—for a while," he answered. He sat down facing her. "At six o'clock I found out you were here. At eight—as soon as I could get away—I came out. I told you how I spent the evening. If I had needed anything to sharpen my longing for you that would have done it—but I think I had reached about the limit of what I could bear in that line already. It has been one constant augmenting thirst for a draught that was out of my reach. I shouldn't have kept my promise not to write you another day after I had been here this time and heard—what I have heard, Rachel."

She did not answer. Her face was turned away; she was very still. Only a slightly quickened breathing, of which he was barely conscious, betrayed to him that this was not listening of an ordinary sort.

"I shouldn't have said anything could make any difference with my feeling, to strengthen it," he went on very quietly, after a while, "but I find it has. I don't try to explain it to myself, except by the one thing I am sure of—that Alexander Huntington was the noblest and most heroic of men, and deserved to the full those last few hours of knowledge that you had taken his name. And I can understand your loyalty to him in wishing to wear it these three years. But, Rachel, I can't let you wear it any longer."

She turned her face a shade farther away.

"I am leaving to-morrow night for another year's absence." He spoke as simply as if he were discussing the most ordinary of subjects. "So I can see but one thing to do, and that is—"

He got up and came around behind her, standing in the shadow of the vines, where the light did not touch him—"and that is, to take you with me."

He had not said it doubtfully, although his inflection was very gentle. She moved quickly, startled.

"Doctor Barnes—"

"Yes, I'm ready for them. You can't raise an objection that I'm not ready for, not one that I can't meet—except one. And that you can't raise, Rachel."

She was silent, the words upon her lips held in check by this last bold declaration.

"You see you can't, being truthful," he said, smiling a little. "If I seem too confident, forgive me; but I've carried with me all these years that one look, when you forgot to veil your eyes away from me as you always had—and always have since then. When I get that look from you again—" He paused, drawing a long breath. "I don't dare dream of it. Rachel, will you go?"

She tried to glance at him, and managed it, but no higher than his shoulders.

"I am engaged to take the training for nurses at the Larchmont Memorial—" she began.

But he interrupted her joyfully. "You don't say, 'I don't love you'—it's only, 'I was intending to be a nurse.' I told you you couldn't say it, because it isn't true. You do love me, Rachel. Tell me so."

Her hurried breathing was plainly perceptible now. She rose quickly, as if she could not bear the telltale lamplight upon her face any longer, and went hurriedly across the porch and down upon the lawn, into the starlight. He followed her, his pulses bounding.

"Oh, give up to me," he said in her ear, his own breath coming fast. "You've been fighting it four years now—it's no use. We were made for each other, and we've known it from the first. You stood heroically by your first promise—you gave him all you could; but that's all over. You don't have to be true to anything or anybody now but me. Give up, dear, and let me know what it feels like to have you pull a man toward you instead of pushing him away."

They had reached the edge of the orchard—in deep shadow; and she stopped.

"I don't know what I came down here for," she said, in confusion.

"I do; you were running away. It's your instinct to run away—I love you for it—it's what first made me want to follow. But I can't stand your running away much longer. Look, Rachel, can you see? I'm holding out my arms. Rachel—I can't wait—"

For an instant longer she held out, while he stood silent, holding himself that he might have the long-dreamed-of joy of receiving her surrender. Then, all at once, he realised that it had been worth all his days of patient and impatient waiting, for turning to him at last she gave herself, with the abandon such natures are capable of showing when they yield after long resistance, into the arms which closed hungrily around her.

If anybody could have told what happened during the next twenty-four hours it would have been Juliet, for it was she who took the helm of affairs. She lay awake half the night, or what there was left of it after the doctor had come back with Rachel and told his friends what had happened and what was yet to happen, planning to make the hasty wedding as ideal as might be. She was a wonderful planner, and a most energetic and enthusiastic young matron as well, so by five in the afternoon she had accomplished all that had seemed to her good. Rachel's part was only to see that her trunk was packed, her explanations offered and good-byes said, and her choice made of several exquisite white gowns which Juliet had had sent out from town.

"But I can't be married in white, Mrs. Robeson," she had said protestingly when Juliet had opened the boxes.

"Yes, you can—and must. This is your only bridal, dear. The other—you know that was only what the doctor said of it once—'your hand in his to the last'—the hand of a friend. But this—isn't this different?"

Rachel had turned away her face. "Yes, this is different," she had owned. "But—"

"He asked me to beg you for him to have it so," Juliet urged, and Rachel was silent. So the simplest of the white frocks it was, and in it Rachel looked as Juliet had meant she should.

Only Judith and Wayne Carey were asked down to see them married. To humour the doctor the ceremony was performed in the orchard, near the entrance to the willow path. The time afterward was short, and before she knew it Juliet was bidding the two good-bye.

"I've got her," said the doctor, looking from Juliet to Rachel, who stood at his side. "She's mine—all mine. I have to keep saying it over and over to make sure."

"For your comfort," answered Juliet, smiling at them both, "I'll tell you that she looks as if she were yours."

"Does she?" he cried, laughing happily. "How does she look?" He turned and surveyed her. "She looks very proud and sweet and still—she's always been those things—and very beautiful—more beautiful than ever before. But do you think she really looks as if she were mine? Tell me how."

Juliet turned from him, big and eager like a boy, to his bride, "proud and sweet and still," as he had said. "I've never seen Rachel look absolutely happy before," she told him. "There's always been a bit of a shadow. But now—look down into her eyes, Roger; there's no shadow there now."

But when he would have looked Rachel's lashes fell. "Not yet? By-and-by then, Rachel," he whispered. Then he turned to Juliet—and Anthony, who had come up to stand beside her.

"If it hadn't been for you and your home-making this day would never have come for me," he said. "You have been good friends and true, to us both. Let us keep you so—and good-bye."

XXIX.—JULIET PROVES HERSELF STILL INDIFFERENT

On a July evening, a month later, Cathcart and a great roll of architects' paper arrived on the Robeson porch. For an hour Juliet looked and listened, while Anthony, as he had promised, said not a word to bias her decision. Cathcart laid before her plans for a new house which were—even Anthony could but admit to himself beyond praise. From every standpoint—the artistic, the domestic, the practical, even the economical, so far as the modern architect understands the meaning of the word—the plans were ideal. Juliet studied them absorbedly, showing plainly her appreciation of them.

"It would be a beautiful home," she said at length. "I can think of nothing more perfect than such a house."

Cathcart looked triumphant. Without glancing at Anthony he produced another set of plans.

"Just to please myself, Mrs. Robeson," he announced, "I have spent some interesting hours in trying to show what could be done with this old house, should any one care to lay out a reasonable sum upon it. Frankly, old houses never repay much expenditure of money, yet there is a certain satisfaction in working out the details of restoration and improvement which makes interesting study. Purely as a matter of that sort I have fancied such extensions as these."

He laid the plans before her. Juliet looked, bent over them, cried out with delight, and called upon Anthony to join her.

"Oh, Mr. Cathcart," she said eagerly, "before you proved yourself an exceedingly fine architect; but now you show yourself a master. To make this of the old house—why, it's far the higher art."

Anthony glanced, laughing, across at Cathcart, whose face had fallen so pronouncedly that Juliet would have seen it if she had been observing. But she was too absorbed in the new plans.

"If we could do this," she was saying, "it would satisfy my best ideals of a permanent home."

"But, my dear Mrs. Robeson," stammered the man of castles, "consider the location—the neighbourhood—the rural character of the surroundings."