The Best Man (14 page)

They walked up the village street, shaded in patches with flecks of sunshine through the young leaves. If anyone had told Celia Hathaway the night before that she would have walked and talked thus to-day with her bridegroom she would have laughed him to scorn. But now all unconsciously she had drifted into an attitude of friendliness with the man whom she had thought to hate all the rest of her life.

One long, straight, maple-lined street, running parallel to the stream, comprised the village. They walked to the centre of it, and still saw no signs of a restaurant. A post-office, a couple of stores and a bakery made up the business portion of the town, and upon enquiry it appeared that there was no public eating house, the one hotel of the place having been sold at auction the week before on account of the death of the owner. The early village loungers stared disinterestedly at the phenomenal appearance in their midst of a couple of city folks with their luggage and no apparent means of transit except their two delicately shod feet. It presented a problem too grave to be solved unassisted, and there were solemn shakings of the head over them. At last one who had discouragingly stated the village lack of a public inn asked casually:

“Hed a runaway?”

“Oh, no!” laughed Gordon pleasantly. “We didn’t travel with horses.”

“Hed a puncture, then,” announced the village wise-acre, shifting from one foot to the other.

“Wal, you come the wrong direction to git help.” Said another languid listener. “Thur ain’t no garridge here. The feller what uset to keep it skipped out with Sam Galt’s wife a month ago. You’d ought to ’a’ turned back to Ashville. They got a good blacksmith there can tinker ye up.”

“Is that so?”  said Gordon interestedly. “Well now that’s too bad, but perhaps as it can’t be helped we’ll have to forget it. What’s the next town on ahead and how far?”

“Sugar Grove’s two mile further on, and Milton’s five. They’ve got a garridge and a rest’rant to Milton, but that’s only sence the railroad built a junction there.”

“Has any one here a conveyance I could hire to take us to Milton?” questioned Gordon, looking anxiously about the indolent group.

“I wouldn’t want to drive to Milton for less’n five dollars,” declared a lazy youth after a suitable pause.

“Very well,” said Gordon. “How soon can you be ready, and what sort of a rig have you? Will it be comfortable for the lady?”

The youth eyed the graceful woman in her dainty city dress scornfully. His own country lass was dressed far prettier to his mind; but the eyes of her, so blue, like the little weed-flowers at her breast, went to his head. His tongue was suddenly tied.

“It’s all right! It’s as good’s you’ll get!” volunteered a sullen-faced man half-sitting on a sugar barrel. He was of a type who preferred to see fashionable ladies uncomfortable.

The youth departed for his “team” and after some enquiries Gordon found that he might be able to persuade the owner of the tiny white colonial cot across the street to prepare a “snack” for himself and his companion, so they went across the street and waited fifteen minutes in a dank little hair-cloth parlor adorned in funeral wreaths and knit tidies, for a delicious breakfast of poached eggs, coffee, home-made bread, butter like roses, and a comb of amber honey. To each the experience was a new one, and they enjoyed it together like two children, letting their eyes speak volumes of comments in the midst of the old lady’s volubility. Unconsciously by their experiences they were being brought into sympathy with each other.

The “rig” when it arrived at the door driven by the blushing youth proved to be a high spring-wagon with two seats. In the front one the youth lounged without a thought of assisting his passengers. Gordon swung the baggage up, and then lifted the girl into the back seat, himself taking the place behind her, and planting a firm hand and arm behind the backless seat, that she might feel more secure.

That ride, with his arm behind her, was just one more link in the pretty chain of sympathy that was being welded about these two. Unconsciously more and more she began to droop, until she grew very tired he seemed to know at once.

“Just lean against my arm,” he said. “You must be very tired and it will help you bear the jolting.” He spoke as if his arm were made of wood or iron, and was merely one of his belongings, like an umbrella or suit-case. He made it seem quite the natural thing for her to against him. If he had claimed it as her right and privilege as wife, she would have recoiled from him for recalling to her the hated relation, and would have sat straight as a bean-pole the rest of the way, but, as it was, she sank back a trifle deprecatingly, and realized that it was a great help. In her heart she thanked him for making it possible for her to rest without entirely compromising her attitude toward him. There was nothing about it that suggested anything loverlike; it seemed just a common courtesy.

Yet the strong arm almost trembled as he felt the precious weight against it, and he wished that the way were ten miles instead of five. Once, as Celia leaned forward to point to a particularly lovely bit of view that opened up as they would around a curve in the road, they ran over a stone, and the wagon gave an unexpected jolt. Gordon reached his hand out to steady her, and she settled back to his arm with a sense of safety and being cared for that was very pleasant. Looking up shyly, she saw his eyes upon her, with that deep look of admiration and something more, and again that strange thrill of joy that had come when he gave her the forget-me-nots swept through her. She felt almost as if she were harboring a sinful thought when she remembered the letters he had written; but the joy of the day, and the sweetness of happiness for even a moment, when she had been for so long a time sad, was so pleasant that she let herself enjoy it and drift, refusing to think evil of him now, here, in this bright day. Thus like children on a picnic, they passed through Sugar Grove and came to the town of Milton, and there they bade their driver good-by, rewarding him with a crisp five-dollar bill. He drove home with a vision of smiles in forget-me-not eyes, and a marked inability to tell anything about his wonderful passengers who had filled the village with awe and amazement, and had given no clue to anyone as to who or what they were.

But to go back to the pursuer, in his berth, baffled and frantic and raging. With hands that fumbled because of their very eagerness he sought to get into his garments, and find his shoes from the melee of blankets and other articles in the berth, all the time keeping one eye out of the window, for he must not let his prey get away from him now. He must watch and see what they were going to do. How fortunate that he had wakened in time for that. At least he would have a clue. Where was this? A station?

He stopped operations once more to gaze off at the landscape, a desolate country scene to his city hardened eyes. Not a house in sight, nor a station. The spires of the distant village seemed like a mirage to him. This couldn’t be a station. What were those two doing down there anyway? Dared he risk calling the conductor and having him hold them? No, this affair must be kept absolutely quiet. Mr. Holman had said that if a breath of the matter came out it was worse than death for all concerned. He must just get off this train as fast as he could and follow them if they were getting away. It might be he could get the man in a lonely place – it would be easy enough to watch his chance and gag the lady – he had done such things before. He felt far more at home in such an affair than he had the night before at the Holman dinner table. What a pity one of the others had not come along. It would be mere child’s play for two to handle those two who looked as if they would turn frightened at the first threat. However, he felt confident that he could manage the affair alone.

He panted with haste and succeeded in getting the wrong legs into his trousers and having to begin all over again, his efforts greatly hampered by the necessity for watching out the window.

Then came the distant rumble of an oncoming train, and an answering scream from his own engine. The two on the ground had crossed quickly over the second track and were looking down the steep embankment. Were they going down there? What fate that he was not ready to follow them at once! The train that was coming would pass - their own would start – and he could not get out. His opportunity was going from him and he could not find his shoes!

Well what of it? He would go without! What were shoes at a time like this? Surely he could get along barefoot, and beg a pair at some farmhouse, or buy a pair at a country store. He must get out at any cost, shoes or no shoes. Grasping his coat which contained his money and valuables he sprang from his berth straight into the arms of the porter who was hurrying back to his car after having been out to gossip with a brakeman over the delay.

“What’s de mattah, sah?” asked the astonished porter, rallying quickly from the shock and assuming his habitual courtesy.

“My shoes!” roared the irate traveller. “What have you done with my shoes?”

“Quiet, sah, please sah, you’ll wake de whole cyah,” said the porter. “I put yoh shoes under de berth sah, right whar I allus puts ’em aftah blackin’ sah.”

The porter stooped and extracted the shoes from beneath the curtain and the traveller, whose experience in Pullmans was small, grabbed them furiously and made for the door, shoes in hand, for with a snort and a lurch and a preliminary jar the train had taken up its motion, and a loud rushing outside proclaimed that the other train was passing.

The porter, feeling that he had been treated with injustice, stood gazing reproachfully after the man for a full minute before he followed him to tell him that the wash-room was at the other end of the car and not down past the drawing-room as he evidently supposed.

He found his man standing in stocking feet on the cold iron platform, his head out of the opening left in the vestibuled train, for when the porter came in he had drawn shut the outer door and slammed down the movable platform, making it impossible for anyone to get out. There was only the little opening the size of a window above the grating guard, and the man clung to it as if he would jump over it if he only dared. He was looking back over the track and his face was not good to see.

He turned wildly upon the porter.

“I want you to stop this train and let me off,” he shouted. “I’ve lost something valuable back there on the track. Stop the train quick, I tell you or I’ll sue the railroad.”

“What was it you lost?” asked the porter respectfully. He wasn’t sure but the man was half asleep yet.

“It was a – my – why it was a very valuable paper. It means a fortune to me and several other people and I must go back and get it. Stop the train, I tell you, at once or I’ll jump out.”

“I can’t stop de train sah, you’ll hev to see de conductah sah, ’bout dat. But I specks there’s mighty little prospec’ o’ getting’ dis train stopped foh it gits to its destinashun sah. We’s one hour a’hind time now, sah, an’ he’ gotta make up foh we gets to Buff’lo.”

The excited passenger railed and stormed until several sleepers were awakened and stuck curious sleepy countenances out from the curtains of their berths, but the porter was obdurate, and would not take any measures to stop the train, nor even call the conductor until the passenger promised to return quietly to his berth.

The thick-set man was not used to obeying but he saw that he was only hindering himself and finally hurried back to his berth where he hastily parted the curtains, craning his neck to see back along the track and over the green valley growing smaller and smaller now in the distance. He could just make out two moving specks on the white winding ribbon of the road. He felt sure he knew the direction they were taking. If he only could get off that train he could easily catch them, for they would have no idea he was coming, and would take no precautions. If he had only wakened a few seconds sooner he would have been following them even now.

Fully ten minutes he argued with the conductor, showing a wide incongruity between his language and his gentlemanly attire, but the conductor would do nothing but promise to let him down at a water tower ten miles ahead where they had to slow up for water. He said sue or no sue his orders, and the thick-set man did not inspire him either to sympathy or confidence. The conductor had been many years on the road and generally knew when to stop his train and when to let it go on.

Sullenly the thick-set man accepted the conductor’s decision and prepared to leave the train at the water tower, his eye out for the landmarks along the way as he completed his hasty toilet.

He was in no pleasant frame of mind, having missed a goodly amount of his accustomed stimulants the night before, and seeing little prospect of either stimultants or breakfast before him. He was not built for a ten-mile walk over the cinders and his flabby muscles already ached at the prospect. But then, of course he would not have to go far before he found an automobile or some kind of conveyance to help him on his way. He looked eagerly from the window for indications of garages or stables, but the river wound its silver way among the gray green willow fringes, and the new grass shone a placid emerald plan with nothing more human than a few cows grazing here and there. Not even a horse that might be borrowed without his owner’s knowledge. It was a strange, forsaken spot, ten whole miles and no sign of any public livery! Off to the right and left he could see villages, but they were most of them too far away from the track to help him any. It began to look as if he must just foot it all the way. Now and then a small shanty or tiny dwelling whizzed by near at hand, but nothing that would relieve his situation.

It occurred to him to go into the dining car for breakfast, but even as he thought of it the conductor told him that the train would stop in two minutes and he must be ready to get off, for they did not stop long.

He certainly looked a harmless creature, that thick-set man as he stood alone upon the cinder elevation and surveyed the landscape o’er. Ten miles from his quarry, alone on a stretch of endless ties and rails with a gleaming river mocking him down in the valley, and a laughing sky jeering overhead. He started down the shining track his temper a wreck, his mind in chaos, his soul at war with the world. The worst of it all was that the whole fault was his own for going to sleep. He began to fear that he had lost his chance. Then he set his ugly jaw and strode ahead.