Beauty for Ashes (26 page)

Robert turned as if electrified. “You prayed that?” he said in wonder, his voice shaking.

“Yes,” she answered almost sadly, “but I didn’t deserve to have Him answer me. That’s no way to come to Him, just in terror. Oh, I’m a mess! I don’t know why you bothered to come and save me!” Vanna was crying now.

Robert reached out hungry arms and drew her close to his heart. “My darling! My precious love!” he murmured with his lips against hers. He was trembling with joy. “I came for the same reason our Savior came, because I love you!”

“Oh,” cried Vanna, “I never knew there was love like this!”

“I knew there was
love,”
he said as he looked down at her face against his breast. “I had it in my own heart, but tell me, do you think you could ever care for me?”

“Care!” lilted Vanna. “My heart turned right over the first time I saw you from the window!”

Then he had to draw her close to him again and set his seal once more upon her lips. “But darling! You are cold! Your teeth are chattering!” he said in horror. “What have I been thinking of? Just my own selfish happiness! I must get you home at once!”

“I’m all r-r-right!” she chattered, trying to control the chills that shook her.

“And you are crying, dear! How careless I have been!”

“No, I’m laughing!” gurgled Vanna though her tears. “I’m s–s–sorry I’m s–s–such a b–b–baby! But it’s s–s–so g–g–good to know you l–l–love me!”

“Precious!” he said, reaching her hands. “But your hands are like ice. And what is this wet thing you are holding so carefully? Your purse? And what’s the other? Let me have it. I must warm your hands. Why, it’s a
shoe!”

“Yes,” giggled Vanna. “I lost the heel to the other one, and then I lost the other one itself in the dark, but I couldn’t get on very well with only one shoe, so I took it off!”

“Oh, my dear!” he said in a hurt tone, feeling down for her wet feet. “Why, child, your feet are sopping wet and you’re practically barefoot. Your stockings are in rags. Here, let me rub your feet!”

He took the cold feet and held them in his big, warm hands.

“This is terrible!” he said. “We must get you right back to the house where you can get warmed quickly or you will be having pneumonia. I have been all kinds of a fool to waste precious time.”

“It wasn’t wasted,” said Vanna, snuggling close to him. “I’d rather have pneumonia than miss this.”

“Well, we won’t miss anything,” he said with deep tenderness in his voice, “but it’s my job now to look out for you, and I’m getting you home at once. I wish we had a robe to wrap around you, but how about tucking your feet under you? I’ll drive as fast as I can, and it won’t be long. Perhaps there is something in the car to help.”

He searched and found a duster in one of the compartments of the car and wrapped her feet up in it. “At least it’s dry if it’s not very immaculate,” he said. “And I’ll find that other shoe in the morning before anybody spies it and makes up a tale for the neighborhood about it! Where was it you lost it? Over there where you fell?”

Vanna began to giggle. “No,” she said, “it was just after I passed through the woods. I think it was on the other side of the road in the ditch. I felt around everywhere, and I didn’t get it. But maybe I’m mistaken about where it was. I was so frightened and tired, I guess I was confused.”

“Well, I’ll locate it. Leave this one in the car so I can match them up. Is the heel near the shoe?”

“No, I lost that before I entered the woods.”

“All right, now, let’s go!”

He slipped back behind the wheel and drew her close to him again with the coat buttoned under her chin.

“It’s just come over me,” he said as he looked down at her and felt her hands to see if they were getting warm. “I’m just realizing who it is that I’ve been daring to fall in love with. An heiress! And I only a poor farmer with nothing to his name but a little land and an old farmhouse! I ought to be horsewhipped, I know, but somehow I can’t help being very happy!”

“I’m learning to cook,” said Vanna with a hysterical little giggle. “Emily taught me how to make an apple pie day before yesterday.”

“You precious child! As if I’d let you cook!”

“Well, you better,” said Vanna. “I want to be a real farmer’s wife! I’m not going to be cheated out of my share!”

That made another embrace necessary, but it was a hasty one, for he knew he ought to get her home. So he tucked her up again and put his foot on the starter.

“What a selfish brute I am”—he grinned down at her— “keeping you here so long just to enjoy you and realize that you are mine—and
His!”
he added softly as he started the car.

“Do you think He will take me for His? I’m no good at all,” wailed Vanna like a little child.

“He took me, dear, and I wasn’t even as good as that. It’s Christ’s righteousness that He looks at, not our own.”

Vanna sighed with relief and joy.

“But your poor sister is waiting there for news!” he suddenly exclaimed. “We must hurry!” and he made the car leap forward. “You poor, cold little darling!”

“Oh, I’m warm now,” said Vanna, nestling close to his shoulder. “But you’re all wet where my hair has touched your shirt sleeve—see! It will be you that will catch cold!”

He then did what he had so many times deplored in other young men driving along the road with a girl—kept one arm around her. However, they were not being troubled with traffic. Not a car had passed, not a soul was abroad, and the storm swept on furiously with rending thunder and sharp, bright lightning, but it did not bother them. The road was straight now to Afton, and all too soon for them they arrived.

“But I haven’t told you a thing about how it all happened!” said Vanna suddenly as she saw the brightly lit house. “I ought to have explained at once. I am so ashamed!”

“Never mind explanations now,” said Robert, stopping his car. “We want to get you into the warmth quickly!” and he lifted her out and bore her swiftly through the rain, up the steps to the open door where Gloria waited, the light from the hall making a halo of her hair. Across the street, Murray was hurrying, slinging on his coat as he ran, not bothering to wait for an umbrella. Vanna caught a glimpse of it all as she was carried along. There came to her a new sense of the pain and anxiety through which they had all been passing for her sake, and an overwhelming shame came over her.

Robert laid her down on the big, old couch in the living room and drew the couch out in front of the fireplace. “She is very cold and wet,” he said breathlessly, “have you got some hot coffee or something? She must be warmed and dried at once.” He knelt beside the couch and busied himself pulling off the wet stockings and rubbing Vanna’s cold feet.

Emily appeared, coming down the stairs in dressing gown and slippers, her hair straggling around her shoulders. She brought blankets and a pillow. She spread the blankets before the fire.

“Is she hurt?” she asked anxiously. “Was there an accident?”

“No, I think not,” said Robert, still rubbing away at the little white foot. “I really haven’t had time”—he cast a twinkling look at Vanna then finished boldly—“haven’t had time to ask her yet. I found her walking on the road,
walking
up from Ripley! She was out in all the storm, and she lost one of her shoes. It was hard going.”

“I’m all right, really,” said Vanna, trying to rouse herself from the lethargy that the warmth and brightness brought over her. Now that she was safe, she realized that she was terribly tired. It was enough for her just to lie still and watch Robert’s face. Robert, who loved her! Amazing fact! Was it really true?

“Get that wet coat off of her,” commanded Emily capably, holding the blanket perilously near to the blaze. “Where is Murray? Didn’t I see him coming in? Murray,” she said as he appeared at the door, his face still just a bit anxious, “please bring in another armful of wood. John will be down in a minute, I think, but we don’t want this fire to die down. Bob, pull that coat off and hang it by the kitchen range to dry. You’re all wet yourself, do you know it?”

“It doesn’t matter about me,” said Robert cheerfully.

“Well, you two men run out in the kitchen anyway then,” said Emily, laughing. “I want to get this wet dress off of her. Then I’ll roll her in a hot blanket and you can all come back. My goodness! Take this wet hat with you, too, and call to John to bring some towels down. Her hair is sopping wet!”

Lying comfortably rolled in hot blankets at last, her hair rubbed dry and beginning to curl up again in lovely ringlets, Vanna looked up to see a small procession entering the room. Gloria, her face still white and anxious, and Murray, bearing a tray containing a bowl of hot soup, Robert close behind, putting a final turn to the stopper of a hot water bottle, and John bringing up the rear with a basin of warm water and soap and a towel.

Vanna caught sight of them and began to laugh and then to cry. “Oh, to think I’ve kicked up such a fuss as this in the m–m– middle of the n–n–night!” she gurgled out. “I’m so a–sh–shamed!”

Robert hurried to put the hot water bottle to her feet and tuck her up warmly.

“Darling!” said Gloria rushing to her side and dropping down on her knees beside her sister. “We’re just so glad to have you here to make a fuss. It isn’t a fuss; it’s a celebration! We’ve been so worried!”

“They also serve who only stand and wait!” said Murray in mock solemnity. Murray was happy, for he saw the utter peace and joy in his friend’s face. “Will you have your soup now, madam, or wait until it’s cold?”

“What in thunder am I to do with this basin, Emily?” asked John sleepily, eyeing the group indulgently.

It was Robert who seized the basin and the soft linen rag and soap, and quite capably washed Vanna’s muddy face and hands and dried them while the others stood around and laughed and seemed to think there was nothing strange about it.

“You see, I fell down in a mud puddle!” exclaimed Vanna, giggling embarrassedly. But Robert went straight ahead with the business at hand as if it had always been his right to look after Vanna’s needs. Emily gave John a quick, significant look and caught a wink in his left eye, but the other two did not seem to notice, and Vanna subsided into the comfort that was gradually stealing over her tired body.

Murray drew up a low stool for Gloria and held the tray while she fed her sister.

“You know I’m really able to feed myself,” laughed Vanna, “but this is all so nice, and I’m perfectly starved!”

“Lie still!” commanded Gloria, the spoon poised carefully. “Just lie still and rest, darling.”

“By the way,” said John from the doorway, “you haven’t told us a thing yet. Was there an accident? There isn’t anybody else out on the roadside unconscious or anything that we ought to go out and search for, is there?”

“No!” said Vanna sharply. “But he wouldn’t deserve searching for if there was!”

“Darling, never mind,” said Gloria. “You needn’t tell us anything tonight! You’re here, that’s enough! Don’t think about anything else!”

“But I
must!”
said Vanna. “I’ve got to explain. I wouldn’t want to wake up to that, untold, in the morning, you know. I want to get if off my mind.”

“Don’t bother!” said Murray indulgently. “You needn’t
ever
explain if you don’t want to. We all trust you, don’t we, Bob?”

Robert grinned, sitting down on his heels before the fire and holding one wet shirtsleeve out to dry.

“But I must tell,” said Vanna determinedly.

“Better let her get it off her mind,” said John lazily, leaning against the doorway and drawing his sleepy wife within his arm. “Besides, if there’s a duel ahead of us or anything, we’d better be prepared. Go ahead, Vanna!”

“Don’t bother, darling!” whispered Glory. “I’ll tell them in the morning.”

“No, Glory,” said her sister, “I feel better now, and I’m so ashamed about the whole thing I don’t know what to do! Holding up the evening’s program and making all this fuss in the middle of the night!”

“It isn’t night any longer,” said John Hastings with a wink at the rest. “There’s a streak of dawn in the sky, and besides, we’re all enjoying the celebration, only I want to know what it’s a celebration of, please.”

“Shut up, John!” said his wife, laughing. “You’re only pro-longing the agony!”

“We got by with the singing all right,” said Murray soothingly. “Didn’t we, Gloria? And you’re not to think of that part again. If anything happened that was unpleasant and you want us to go out and lick somebody, Bob and I are ready anytime, and we’ll take John along to make sure. How about it, John?”

“Sure thing!” said John.

And then Vanna looked around on the oddly attired group— Gloria in her butterfly robe, Emily in a gray flannel wrapper, Robert in his shirtsleeves, Murray collarless with uncombed hair, and John in a bathrobe—and thought how dear they all were and nearly choked over the spoonful of soup that Gloria had just put in her mouth.

“Hush! I’ve got to tell,” she said when she had recovered speech. “The whole thing was my fault. I shouldn’t have gone at all. I knew that man wasn’t considered an angel. I knew he drank heavily. But he had come all the way up from home to see me, wanting to take me back again, and I couldn’t seem to get rid of him easily. It was a compromise, this going out to ride with him for a couple of hours, and he promised he would get me back by five o’clock. I shouldn’t have trusted him, of course. I knew he wasn’t always trustworthy—at least people said so. It was just my pride, I guess. I thought I could make him do what I told him to. But when we got out on the highway an hour from here and I tried to make him turn back, he pleasantly but absolutely refused. He made me very angry, and I tried to show him I was offended, but that didn’t work at all. He told me he was going to take me to a place he knew for dinner, but he went on and on until it grew dark and late before we got there. I was frightened and angry, but I didn’t know what to do. He drove like mad, sixty and seventy-five miles an hour sometimes. I couldn’t jump out.”

“Oh!” said Gloria, hiding her face in her hands and shuddering. “I’ve been envisioning some such thing all the evening!”

Vanna put her hand out and rested it on Gloria’s golden head. “Poor kid!” she said softly. “You warned me! I ought to have listened to you!”