The White Lady (2 page)

Then the car drew up before the old brownstone residence that was the scene of the afternoon’s function, and Morris was diverted from his puzzlement and said no more.

Constance was at once claimed by groups of welcoming friends. Morris tried once or twice to get near her, but she seemed constantly surrounded, so he had to content himself by gazing at her from across the room.

He hovered near when she was leaving and hoped to get another invitation to share the car with her, but she took an elderly woman away with her, with only a distant smile of absentminded good night. It made him quite miserable. Somehow he felt that he had been given an unusual opportunity that afternoon and not embraced it, though just what he had done to shut the door of the opportunity he could not have told.

The sun was slipping out of sight, and the many checkered windows in the tall buildings of the city’s heart flashed into view in one magnificent conflagration, when Constance was at last alone. She had taken the elderly woman to a dinner appointment, having offered to do so in order to escape any further talk with Morris Thayer. Now she felt the sudden relief of being alone, followed by the quick grip of her new trouble on her consciousness. In the sweep of it all, Morris Thayer was forgotten utterly. He would return to memory soon and have a part in the general whole, but now he did not count for much.

Unutterable weariness seemed to be the most prominent thing on her mind, and a wall of blackness was settling about her, burnt through with those brilliant burning windows that flashed at her from every building. She must get calm somehow and try to think what she should do. What
could
she do? Oh, that she might just lie down and sink to sleep, forgetting it all! Her world was broken, and how could she continue to live?

To be put into the same category with that vulgar Alice Van Orden, and to be pitied as she was being pitied, and called “a nice sort of girl,” and have men discuss her and say that some man had “been saved” from marrying her! How her soul revolted at the thought! How she despised people who could talk that way. How she longed to show them that she despised them, now, before it was too late! Now, while there was yet five thousand dollars between herself and poverty! Now, while no one suspected but that she was worth her plentiful fortune!

The car was at her own door. Mechanically she stepped out and stood a moment on the sidewalk, like one awaking out of sleep.

A tall young man with a suitcase came by. He looked at her out of the twilight, and she looked back at him, as two ships, sighting each other, come near for a moment in the lifting fog and then pass on. His face gleamed white against the soft darkness, and there was something about his eyes that held her gaze for an instant. They seemed deeply earnest. It came to her that a man with a face like that would never turn away from one in any kind of trouble. Then the shadows of the street swallowed him, and she went into the house alone.

There was nothing unrestful about the home into which she had come. There was quiet order everywhere and utmost plenty, though no gaudy display of luxury. Respectful attention to her wishes met her as she crossed the threshold and struck her with a new pang that this, too, which had been so long a matter of course to her, was bought with money and that now she would no longer be able to command it. She realized keenly what it would be to give it up.

A stately old lady with white hair and a placid face sat awaiting her in a great easy chair, with a bit of fancy knitting in her fingers. A pang struck deep into Constance’s heart. How would Grandmother bear the new state of things?

They went down to dinner together and sat through the courses, Constance eating little, her grandmother talking gentle society gossip mingled with reminiscences of the past. She did not go out much, except for a ride in the car on pleasant days, but she loved to hear about the old families, and questioned Constance about every detail of her afternoon. The girl held her breath once or twice lest her grandmother should discover her talk with the lawyer. It seemed as if that subject was a newly acquired wound that could not bear to be touched.

At last, coffee was over and Grandmother had gone to her room with her maid. Constance was free to put aside her mask and think. She went at once to her room. None too soon had she escaped, for Morris Thayer’s card was brought to her within five minutes with a most urgent request that he might see her if possible for just a few minutes.

Constance almost groaned. It seemed as if she were pursued and would never get a chance to be by herself and think.

“Tell him I have a headache, Susanne,” she called from the couch where she had thrown herself, “and I have retired for the night.” She pressed her throbbing temples with her cold fingertips and felt momentarily glad for the headache that had excused her from going down.

She listened for the door to close and the echo of his footsteps on the pavement, but it was a moment before she heard them, and then Susanne came back, a great bunch of English violets, almost large enough for a pillow, in her hand. She gave her message, arranged the flowers on the table under the shaded light, and went out.

The strong, subtle fragrance stole forth, as the donor had meant it should do, and tried to speak to the girl on the couch in his behalf. But the odor only irritated her. She did not wish to be reminded of him now. What he had said that afternoon seemed to put him outside the circle of true friendship, and it only brought pain to be reminded of him.

But, try as she would, instead of being able to consider what she ought to do in a practical way, her mind was beset with angry, fruitless thoughts of what she should like to say to such as he. Indignation towered high. If he stood before her now with his violets, and offered them, she would fling them back. The sight of them was hateful to her; the thought of him had become a disappointment.

She had never counted him a dear friend. Still, she knew that he admired her, and she had enjoyed that admiration, for he was handsome and wealthy and popular. It was bitter now to think that as soon as he should know of her changed circumstances his marked admiration would be withdrawn to a safe distance. Her pride was touched. She wished she might do something so that he need never know of her change of fortune, and yet that she might always keep him at a distance. That would be keen delight to her present excited mind.

The thought of his pity, spoken in the tone he had used about the Van Orden girl, was hateful. His violets were hateful. She would get rid of them. She took them from the water and, walking toward the window, raised the heavy sash to throw them out, then reflected that someone might see them and think it strange. Besides, it would be a rude, unrefined action. She drew back and touched the bell instead.

“Ask Norah to come up a moment, if she is not too busy,” she said to the maid who presently appeared. Norah was the Irish cook, and a great worshipper of her young mistress. She came promptly, with expectant face and willing heart, ready to perform any task asked of her from an impromptu dinner party to a mustard plaster.

Constance had turned the lights low and thrown herself upon the couch again, her pretty hair lying in soft waves about her and trailing down the velvet covering. Norah stood by the door, arms akimbo, and admired her a moment before she asked what she could do.

“Norah, how is that little brother of yours?” asked Constance. She had a way of always knowing about the inner life of her servants, and occasionally speaking with them about the little things in which she knew they were interested.

Norah’s lip quivered now in quick response to the sympathetic tone, and her eyes filled with tears.

“Oh, indade, Miss Constance, it’s very kind of ye to ask. He’s been rale bad this week. Oi can’t abear to think on him when Oi’m about me work. Oi’m feared he’s not long far this warld.”

“Don’t you want to go and see him this evening, Norah, and take him these violets from me?” said Constance.

It was better than if she had offered the girl a whole page of consolation from a book. There was quick response to the trouble in the tone of her voice, and the flowers touched a weak place in the warm-hearted Irish girl’s nature. She poured forth the story of her sorrow, how the doctor had said the little crippled child could not live long and how she loved him and felt she could not live without him. Her tears flowed freely.

Constance found her own eyes wet, and felt like throwing her arms around Norah’s neck and telling her own heartaches. She had a sudden wild desire for sympathy. Then she reflected that beside Norah’s coming bereavement, her sorrow ought not to be classed as sorrow at all. Nevertheless, it was not easy to bear.

She laid the flowers in the servant’s hand and said gently, “I wish I could help you, Norah. I am very much troubled myself about something, and it makes me long to help you.”

With the quick excitability of her race, Norah forgot her own sorrows and flew to comfort her young mistress.

“Oh Miss Constance,” she cried eagerly, “is there anythin’ Oi could do to help yez? Thrubble’s not for the likes o’ ye, Oi’m sure. Your purty oyes would be spoiled by the cryin’, and then what would the young gentlemen say?”

But Norah had touched the wrong chord that time. Constance sat up sharply on the couch where she had thrown herself again, and a red spot burned on each cheek.

“Norah, there are no young gentlemen in this whole world who have a right to care whether my eyes are spoiled by crying or not. Please don’t ever say such a thing again.”

“Oh, indade, Miss Constance, forgive me. Oi meant nothin’ at all, sure. Oi couldn’t but see how they all comes, and brings ye blossoms, and waits on ye. And wise they are, too, to pick ye out, so handsome and good and swate as ye are, and ye to stoop to care for a poor girl’s little thrubbles. An’ sure, Miss Constance, if yez’ll only let me, Oi’ll help ye in anythin’ ye asks. Just thry me and see!”

The girl spoke earnestly, and just as earnestly Constance looked her in the eyes and answered, “Perhaps the time will come, Norah, when I shall need your help, and I do not know of anyone I shall turn to quicker. Yes, I mean it, Norah. You are a good girl.”

The girl’s face flushed with pleasure under the kind words, and then she hurried out.

T
wo things Constance resolved upon after her night’s vigil. One was that she would immediately and entirely stop all possible outgo of her finances; the other was that she would at once go away somewhere and hide herself in the vast world, now, while none but the old lawyer knew of her misfortunes. She would disappear and make a new life for herself, and none should ever know, to pity or to scorn.

Constance wondered if it was cowardly to run away. She thought not. She must at all costs keep her frail aristocratic grandmother from learning the truth. It would surely kill her. Besides, Constance decided that there was no need of finding out which of her friends would fail her and which were true. Why put them to so severe a test? It would do no good to anyone, and to escape it would be infinite relief to herself. She longed to begin life as if she were another girl, and to see whether she could not make of it something worthwhile.

Her career in this city of her birth was closed. She had been a success to a certain extent. She was popular and was liked by many, but after all, there was not much glory in it. All her laurels had been stolen ones, or rather, reflected ones. They consisted of her grandfather’s old name, her father’s money, and a little personal beauty. Constance did not let that count for much. She never was a vain girl.

She understood that that, too, was a heritage left by her beautiful mother, except insofar as she might have marred it or helped it by her own actions, thoughts, and feelings. Supposing she had been born into the Van Orden family. Would she have been a success there? Could she have carried her way through unrefined surroundings, failures, worldly pity and scorn, and come out with her face as calm and smooth as it now was? Or supposing that her life had been set so that she had been obliged to work in a mill or clerk in a store? Would she have been a success there? Could she have gone through the endless days of such work and never have been cross like the weary-looking girl who sold her hairpins at the notion counter the other day? Would she have kept a placid face and left her mother’s beauty unmarred by inward strife?

It was the first time in her life that Constance had ever examined herself in this way. She felt that she had to take stock, to find out what kind of person she had to deal with now that she was shorn of the respectable devices that the world puts around its own for the time being.

Having made these decisions, Constance, as was her wont in all things, set about carrying out her purposes.

The first thing that appeared in the morning of immediate action was a number of purchases made a day or two before. There were some books she had selected. There was a beautiful piece of embroidery she had bought for her dressing table. There was a charming hat, a delightful forerunner of Easter millinery, and there was an evening gown.

She had congratulated herself on the choice of her purchases and then had straightway forgotten them. Such things were too common in her life for them to matter much either way. She often ordered goods sent home on approval, and if, when they appeared, they suited her needs, she kept them. It was a common thing on her shopping trips to pick up something pretty and utterly unnecessary for her immediate use.

Even now, when the packages were opened by her maid, she thought little of them except for the passing curiosity to see whether the hat would be as becoming as she had thought when she bought it.

But, as she stepped in front of the glass to try on the hat, a card caught her attention. It was something new for the store where she had bought it to attach such cards to purchases sent home. Possibly good-natured forbearance was ceasing to be a virtue to them. But there hung the card reading clearly: N
OT RETURNABLE IF WORN OR IF THIS CARD HAS BEEN DETACHED
. She had reached out her hand for the scissors to clip the thread, when her eye was arrested by the words, and she paused. She had not expected to return the hat, for she liked it, but it occurred to her now that it was unnecessary and that this expense might be saved. She had thought the hat cheap when she bought it. Twenty-five dollars did not seem high for such a hat. She had often paid more. But four such hats represented a hundred dollars. Ten hundreds made a thousand, and only five poor little thousands stood between herself and poverty, and the scorn of her former world. The air seemed to swarm with dainty nothings of hats that menaced her peace, and she dropped it back into its box and wrapped the tissue paper folds about it hurriedly as if the sight of it troubled her.