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xmamoc Am Unusual Love Story l ¥ E. PHILLIPS GPPENHEE MiaMT CHAPTER XXI—Continued. — 12 — "My own reputation," she mur mured, "is absolutely of no conse quence, but remember that you live kere, and—" "Don't be silly !" he Interrupted. "What does that matter? And besides, according to you and all the rest of you here, these things don't affect a j man's reputation—they are expected of him. See, I have rung the bell for breakfast. Now I am going to tele phone down for a messenger boy to go for your clothes." They breakfasted together, a little later, and she made him smoke. He stood before the window, looking down upon the river, with his pipe in his mouth and an unfamiliar look upon his face. "Do you suppose that Louise knows anything?" he asked at length. "I should think not," she replied. "It is for you to tell her. I rang up the prince's house while you were in the bathroom. They say that he has a broken rib and some bad cuts, sus tained in a motor accident last night, but that he is in no danger. There was nothing about the affair in the newspapers, and the prince's servants have evidently been instructed to give this account to inquirers." A gleam of interest shone in John's face. "Ey the bye," he remarked, "the prince is a Frenchman. He will very likely expect me to fight with him." "No hope of that, my belligerent friend," Sophy declared, with an at ' tempc at a smile. "The prince knows that he is in England. He would not be guilty of such an anachronism. Be sides, he is a person of wonderfully well-balanced mind. When he is him self again, he will realize that what happened to him is exactly what he asked for." John took up his hat and gloves. He glanced at the clock—It was a lit tle past eleven. "I am ready," he announced. "Let me drive you home first." His motor was waiting at the door, and he left Sophy at her rooms. Be fore she got out, she held his arm for a moment. "John," she said, "remember that Louise is very high-strung and very sensitive. Be careful !" "There is only one thing to do 01 to say," he answered. "There is only one way in which I can do It." He drove the car down Piccadilly like a man in a dream, steering as carefully as usual through the traffic, and glancing every now' and then with unseeing eyes at the streams of peo ple upon the pavements. Finally he came to a standstill before Louise 9 house and stopped the engine with de liberate care. Then he rang the bell, and was shown into her little draw ing-room, which seemed to have become a perfect bow r er of pink and w'hite lilac. He sat waiting as if in a dream, unable to decide upon his words, un able even to sift his thoughts. The one purpose with which he had come, the one question he designed to ask, was burning in his brain. The min utes of her absence seemed tragically long. , . Then at last the door opened and Louise entered. She came toward him with a little welcoming smile upon her lips. Her manner was gay, al most affectionate. "Have you come to take me for a ride before lunch?" she asked. "Do you know, I think that I should really like it! We might lunch at Ranelagh on our way home." The words stuck in his throat. From where she was, she saw now the writ ing on his face. She stopped short. "What is it?" she exclaimed. "Ever since I knew you," he said slowly "there have been odd moments when I have lived in torture. During the last fortnight, those moments have become hours. Last night the end "Are you mad, John?" she demand ^"Perhaps," he replied. "Listen. When 1 left you last night. I went to the club in Adelphl Terrace. There was a well-known critic there, comparing you and Latrobe. On the whole he fa vored you, but he gave Latrobe the first place in certain parts. Latrobe be said, had had more experience in life. She had had a dozen lovers von only one !" 7 She winced. The glad freshness seemed suddenly to fade from her face. Her eyes became strained. "Well?" "I found Graillot. I cornered him. I asked him for the truth about you. He put me off with an evasion. I Sue down here and looked a your window. It was three o clock in the morning. I dared not come in A ver.v demon of unrest was in my blood. I stopped at the night club on my ' wy back Sophy was there. I asked her plainly to Put me out of my agony. She was like Graillot. She fenced with me. And then—the prince came. "The prince was there? she fal * erP< ?' __ the table where "He came np to me Sophy and I were sitting. I think I was half mad. I poured him a glass of X". I told him that you had prom 36I.fi j . a a in I I I of ised to become my wife. He raised J his glass—I can see him now. He ! told me, with a smile, that it was the anniversary of the day on which you promised to become his—!" Louise shrank back. "He told you that?" John was on his feet. The fever was blazing once more. "He told me that, face to face!" "And you?" "If we had been alone," John an swered simply, "I should have killed him. I drove the words down his throat. I threw him hack to the place he had left, and hurt him rather badly. I'm afraid. Sophy took me home somehow, and now I am here." She leaned a little forward on the couch. She looked into his face search ingly, anxiously as If looking for something she could not find. His lips were set in hard, cold lines. The likeness to Stephen had never been more apparent. "Listen !" she said. "You are a Puri tan. While I admire the splendid self restraint evolved from your creed, it is partly temperamental, isn't it? I was brought up to see things differently, and I do see them differently. Tell me. do you love me?" "Love you?" he repeated. "You know it! Could I suffer the tortures of the damned if I didn't? Could I come to you with 'a man's blood upon my hands if I didn't? If the prince lives, it is simply the accident of fate. I tell you that if we had been alone I j should have driven the breath out of < his body. Love you !" He rose slowly to her feet. She leaned with her elbow upon the man telpiece, and her face was hidden for a moment. "Let me think!" she said. "I don't know what to say to you. I don't know you, John. There Isn't anything , left of the John I loved. Let me look ; again !" She swung around. "You speak of love," she went on suddenly. "Do you know what it Is? Do you know that love reaches to the heavens, and can also touch the neth ermost depths of hell? If I throw myself on your knees before you now, i if I link my fingers around your neck, if I whisper to you that in the days that were past before you came I had done things I would fain forget, if I told you that from henceforth every j second of my life was yours, that my j heart beat with yours by day and by ' night, that I had no other thought, no other dream, than to stay by your side, to see you happy, to give all there was of myself into your keeping, to keep it holy and sacred for you—John, what then?" Never a line in his face softened. He looked at her a moment as he had looked at the woman in Piccadilly, into whose hand he had dropped gold. "Are you going to tell me that It is the truth?" he asked hoarsely. "Think for a single moment of that feeling which you call love, John!" she pleaded. "Listen ! I love you. It has come to me at last, after all these 1 - • V a y rv; "Am I Too Good for You, Sophy?" years. It lives in my heart, a greater thing than my ambition, a greater thing than my success, à greater thing than life Itself. I love you, John ! Can't you feel, don't you know, that noth ing else In life can matter?" Not a line in his face softened. His teeth had «come together. He was like a man upon the rack. "It Is true? It is true, then?" he demanded. She looked at him without any reply. The seconds seemed drawn out to an Interminable period. He heard the rolling of the motorbuses In the street. Once more the perfume of the lilac seemed to choke him. Then she leaned back and touched the bell. "The prince spoke the truth." she said. "I think you had better go !" CHAPTER XXII. Before the wide-flung window of her attic bedchamber, Sophy Gerard was crouching with her face turned west ward. She had abandoned all effort to sleep. The one thought that was beating in h°r brain was too insistent, too clamorous. Somewhere beyond that tangled mass of chimneys and telegraph poles, somewhere on the oth er side of the gray haze which hung about the myriad roofs, John and Louise were working out their destiny, speaking at last the naked truth to each other. She started suddenly hack into the room. There was a knocking at the door, something quite different from her landlady's summons. She wrapped her dressing-gown around her, pulled the curtains around the little bed on which she had striven to rest, and moved toward the door. She turned the handle softly. "Who Is that?" she asked. John almost pushed his way past her. She closed the door with nerve less fingers. Her eyes sought his face, her lips were parted. She clung to the back of the chair. "You have seen Louise?" she ex claimed breathlessly. "I have seen Louise." he answered. "It is all over!" She looked a little helplessly around j would rather not talk any more about \ didn't come here to talk about her. Then she selected the one chair in the tiny apartment that was likely to hold him, and led him to it. "I'lease sit down," she begged, "and tell me about it. You musn't despair like this all at once. I wonder if I could help !" ! "No one can'help." he told her grim- I lv. "It is all finished and done with. so clean, so neat, so pathetically elo , quent of poverty. She drew closer to ; gether the curtains which concealed it. I came to see you. So this Is whfre you live!" He looked around him, and for a mo ment he almost forgot the pain which was gnawing at his heart. It was such a simple, plainly furnished little room, the little chlnts-covered bed, and came and sat down by his'side. She clasped her hands tighter around his arm. Her eyes sought his anxiously. "But you mustn't climb down, John," she Insisted. "You are so much nicer i w here you are, so much too good for the U gi y things. You must fight this in your own way> gght it according to your own standards. You are too good to come down—" j « Am j too good for you, Sophy?" j g he j 00 k e( j at him, and her whole ' face seeme ^ to soften. The light in her blue eyes was sweet and wistful A bewildering little smile curled her lips. "Don't be stupid!" she begged. "A few minutes ago I was looking out of my window and thinking what a poor little morsel of humanity I am, and what a useless, drifting life I have led. But that's foolish. Come now ! What I want to persuade you to do Is to go back to Cumberland for a time, and try hard—very hard indeed—to realize what it means to be a woman like Louise, with her temperament, her Intense Intellectual curiosity, her charm. Nothing could make Louise different from what she is—a dear, sweet woman and a great artist. And, John, I believe she loves you !" His face remained^ undisturbed even by the flicker of an eyelid. Sophy," he said, "I have decided to go abroad. Will you come with me?" She sat quite still. Again her face was momentarily transformed. All its pallor and fatigue seemed to have van ished. Her head had fallen a little back. She was looking through the ceiling Into heaven. Then the light died away almost as quickly as it had come. Her lips shook tremulously. "You know you don't mean It, John! You wouldn't take me. And If you did, you'd hate me afterward—you'd want to send me back!" He suddenly drew her to him, his arm went around her waist. She had lost all power of resistance. For the first time in his life of his own delib erate accord, he kissed her—feverish ly, almost roughly. "Sophy," he declared, "I have been a fool ! I have come an awful cropper, but you might help me with what's left. I am going to start afresh. I am going to get rid of some of these ideas of mine which have brought me nothing hut misery and disappoint ment. I don't want to live up to them any longer. I want to just forget them. I want to live as other men live—just the simple, ordinary life. Come with me! I'll take you to the places we've talked about together. 1 am always happy and contented with you. Let's try It !" Her arms stole around his neck. "John," she whispered, hiding her face for a moment. "What can I say? What could any poor, weak little crea ture like me say? You know I am fond of you—I haven't had the pride, even, to conceal it !" He stood up, held her face for a moment between his hands, and kissed her forehead. "Then that's all settled," he de clared. "I am going back to my rooms now. I want you to come and dine with me there tonight, at eight o'clock." Her eyes sought his, pleaded with them, searched them. "You are sure, John?" she asked, her voice a little broken. "You want me really? I am to come?" "I am sure," he answered steadfast ly. "I shall expect you at eight o'clock !" John went back to his rooms fighting all the time against a sense of unreal ity, a sense almost of lost identity. He bought an evening newspaper and read it on the way. Ho talked to the hall porter, he talked to n neigh bor with whom he ascended in the lift—he did everything except think. In his rooms he telephoned to the restaurant for a waiter, and with the menu In his hand, a few minutes later, he ordered dinner. Then he glanced at his watch—it was barely seven o'clock. He went down to the barber shop, was shaved anti had his hair cut, encouraging the barber ail the while to talk to him. He gave his hands over to a manicure, and did his best to talk nonsense to her. Then he came upstairs again, changed his clothes with great care, and went into his little sitting room. It was five minutes to eight, and dinner had been laid at a little round table in the center of the room. There was a bowl of pink roses—Sophy's fa vorite flower—sent in from the flor ist's; the table was lighted by a pink shaded lamp. John went around the I room, turning out the other lights, un ! til the apartment was hung with shad I G ws save for the little spot of color j n the middle. An unopened bottle of Is to in "A of to its did, his had the a I me men life. the 1 with her say? crea am a de dine eight with her champagne stood in an ice-pail two specially prepared cocktails had been placed upon the little side table. There were no more preparations to be made. He turned impatiently away from the window and glanced at the clock. It was almost eight. He tried to tmag ine that the bell was ringing, that So phy was standing there on the thresh old In her simple but dainty evening dress, with a little smile parting her lips. The end of It all I He pulled down the blind. No more of the win dow, no more looking out at the lights, no more living in the clouds ! It was time, indeed, that he lived as other men. He lifted one of the glasses to his lips and drained its contents. Then the bell rang. He moved for ward to answer Its summons with boating heart. As he opened it, he re ceived n shock. A messenger boy stood outside. He took the note which the boy handed him and tore it open under a lamp. There were only a few lines: John, my heart is breaking, but I know you do not mean what you said. I know it was only a moment of madness with you. I know you will love Louise all your life, and will bless me all your life be cause I am giving up the one thing which could make my life a paradise. I shall bo in the train when you read this, on my way to Bath. I have wired my young man, as you call him, to meet me. I am going to ask him to marry me, If he will, next week. Good-by! I give you no advice. Some day I think that life will right Itself with you. SOPHY. The letter dropped upon the table. John stood for a moment dazed. Sud denly he began to laugh. Then he re membered the messenger boy, gave him half a crown, and closed the door. He came back into the room and took his place at the table. He looked at the empty chair by his side, looked at the full glass on the sideboard. It seemed to him that he was past all sensations. The waiter came in si lently. "You can serve the dinner," John or dered, shaking out his napkin. "Open the champagne before you go." "You will be alone, sir?" the man Inquired. "I shall be alone," John answered. CHAPTER XXIII. It was a room of silence, save for the hissing of the green logs that burned on the open hearth, and for the slow movements of Jennings as he cleared the table. Straight and grim In his chair, with the newspaper by his side, Stephen Strangewey sat smoking stolidly. Opposite to him, al most as grim, equally silent, sat John. "Things were quiet at Market Ket ton today, then, John?" Stephen asked at last. "There was nothing doing," was the brief reply. That, for the space of a quarter of an hour or so, was the sole attempt at conversation between the two broth ers. Then Jennings appeared with a decanter of wine and two glasses, which he reverently filled. Stephen held his up to the light and looked at it critically. John's remained by his side, unnoticed. "A glass for yourself, Jennings, Stephen ordered. "I thank ye kindly, sir," the old man replied. He fetched a glass from the side board, filled it, and held it respectfully before him. "It's the old toast," Stephen said glumly. "You know it!" "Aye, Master Stephen !" the servant assented. "We've drunk it together for many a long year. I give It ye now with all my heart—confusion to all women !" They both glanced at John, who an) ] I at at It si for for he by sat al the of at a at his old ye to showed no signs of movement. Then they drank together, the older man and his servant. Still John never moved. Jennings drained his glass, placed the decanter by his master's side, and withdrew. "So the poison's still there, broth er?" Stephen asked. "And will be so long as I live," John confessed gloomily. "For all that, I'll not drink your toast." "Why nut?" "There was a little girl—you saw her when you were in London. She Is married now, but I think of her some times ; and when I do, you aud old Jennings seem to me like a couple of blithering idiots cursing things too wonderful for you to understand !" Stephen made uo protest. For a time he smoked in silence. Curiously enough, as they sat together, some of the grim fierceness seemed to have passed j'rom his expression and settled upon John. More than once, as he looked across at his younger brother, it almost seemed as if there was some thing of self-reproach in his question ing look. "You dined at the ordinary in Mar ket Kettou?" Stephen asked at last. "I did." "Then you heard the news?" "Who could help it?" John muttered. "There wasn't much else talked about." "Bailiff Henderson has been over ] I here," Stephen went on. "There's a small army of painters and decorators coming down to the castle next week. You saw the announcement of the wedding in the morning Post, maybe?" John assented without words. Ste phen smoked vigorously for a few mo ments. Every now and then he glanced across to where John was sit ting. Once again the uneasiness was in his eyes, an uneasiness which was almost self-reproach. John moved a little restlessly in his chair. "Let's drop It, Stephen," he begged. "We both know the facts. She is go ing to marry him, and that's the end of it. Fill your glass up again. Here's mine untouched. I'll drink your toast with you, If you'll leave out the little girl who was kind to me. I'll give it to you myself—confusion to all wom en !" "Confusion to—" Stephen began. "What on earth is that?" They both heard it at the same time —the faint beating of a motor engine in the distance. John set down his glass. There was a strange look in his eyes. "There are more cars passing along the road now than in the old days," he muttered ; "but that's a queer sound. It reminds one—good heavens, how it reminds one !" There was a look of agony in his face for a moment. Then once more he raised his glass to his lips. "It's passed out of hearing," Stephen said. "It's someone on the way to the castle, maybe." Still their glasses remained suspend ed in midair. The little garden gate had opened and closed with a click ; there were footsteps upon the flinty walk. "It's someone coming here !" John cried hoarsely. "Why can't they keep away? It's two years ago this week since I brought her up the drive and you met us at the front door. Two years ago, Stephen! Who can It be?" They heard the front door open, they heard Jennings' voice raised In unusual and Indignant protest. Then their own door was suddenly flung wide, and a miracle happened. John's glass slipped from his fingers, and the wine streamed out across the carpet. He shrank hack, gripping at the table cloth. Stephen turned his head, and sat as if turned to stone. "John," she faltered, "It isn't the car this time—it is I who have broken down ! I cannot go on. I have no pride left. I have come to you. Will you help me?" He found himself upon his feet. Ste phen, too, had arisen. She stood be tween the two men, and glanced from one to the other. Then she looked more closely into John's face, peering forward with a little start of pain, and her eyes were filled with tears. "John," she cried, "forgive me ! You were so cruel that morning, and you seemed to understand so little. Don't you really understand, even now? Have you ever known the truth, I won der?" "The truth !" he echoed hoarsely. "Don't we all know that? Don't we all know that he is to give you your rights, that you are coming—" "Stop !" she ordered him. He obeyed, and for a moment there was silence—a tense, strained silence. "John," she continued at last, "I have no rights to receive from the prince of Seyre. He owes me nothing. Listen ! Always we have seen life dif ferently, you and I. To me there is only one great thing, and that Is love; I and beyond that nothing counts. I tried to love the prince before you came, and I thought I did, and I prom ised him at last, because I believed that he loved oie and that I loved him, ; "I is and that if so It was his right. Look down the road, John! On that night I was on my way to the castle; but I broke down, and in the morning the world was all different, and I went back to London. It has been different ever since, and there has never been any question of anything between the prince and me, because I knew that It was not love." John was shuking in every limb. Hie eyes were filled with fierce question ing. Stephen sat there, and there was wonder in his face, too. "When you came to me that morn ing," she went on, "you spoke to me in a strange tongue. I couldn't under stand you, you seemed so far away. if* % //L rPi / 2/f pu •-> r\i4 Wi « VI I "I've Come for You!" I wanted to tell you the whole truth« but I didn't. Perhaps I wasn't sure— perhaps it seemed to mo that It was best for me to forget, if ever I had cured, for the ways of our lives seemed so far apart. You went away, and I drifted on ; but It wasn't true that I ever promised to marry the prince. No one had any right to put that para graph in the newspaper!" "But what are you doing here, then?'' John asked hoarsely. "Aren't you on your way to the castle?" She came a little nearer; her arms went around his neck. "You dear stupid !" she cried. "Haven't I told you? I've tried to do without you, and I can't. I've come for you. Corne outside, please ! It's quite light. The moon's coining over the hills. I want to walk up the orchard. I want to hear just what I've come to hear !" He passed out of the room in a dream, under the blossom-laden boughs of the orchard, and up the hillside toward the church. The dream passed, but Louise remained, flesh and blood. Her lips were warm aud her arras held him almost feverishly. "In that little church, John, and quickly—so quickly, please !" she whis pered. *•••••• Jennings hastened In to where Ste phen was sitting alone. "Mr. Stephen," he cried, "what's coming to us? There's that French hussy outside, and a motorcar in the drive, and the chauffeur's asking where lie's to sleep. The woman wants to know whether she can have the same bedroom for her mistress a3 last time!" "Then why don't you go and see about it, you old fool?" Stephen re plied. "Pick up those pieces of glass there, lay the cloth, and get some sup per ready." Through the open doorway they heard AUne's voice in the hall. "Meester Jennings, will you please come and help me with the luggage?" "Get along with you !" Stephen or dered. "You'd better hurry up with the supper, too. The boy Tom can see to the luggage." The old man recovered himself slowly. "You're taking 'em in, sir—taking 'em Into the house?" he gasped. "What about that toast?" Stephen refilled two glasses. "We'd better alter It a little," he declared. "Here's confusion to most women, but luck to John and his wife!" "Mr. John and his wife!" Jennings repeated, as he set his glass down empty. "I'll Just see that them sheets is aired upstairs, sir, or that hussy will be making eyes at Tom !" He departed, and Stephen was left alone. He sat and listened to the sound of luggage being taken upstairs, to Allne's little torrent of directions, good-humored but profuse, to the sound of preparations in the kitchen. In the room the tall clock ticked sol emnly; a fragment of the log every now and then fell upon the hearth. Presently he rose to his feet He heard the click of the garden gate, the sound of John and Louise return ing. He rose and stood ready to wek come them. I THE END,