The Cody enterprise and the Park County enterprise., July 26, 1922, Page PAGE SIX, Image 6

About The Cody enterprise and the Park County enterprise. (Cody, Wyo.) 1921-1923

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PAGE SIX
HARRIET and -the PIPER
By KATHLEEN NORRIS
Copyright oy Kathleen Norris
CHAPTER Xlll—Continued.
—l3 '■
“Nina,” he said, tenderly, “is warm
hearted. And a chance allusion to my
financial position, which I thought I
owed her, has distressed her unneces
sarily. It will, truly, be out of the
question for me to travel, as we had
planned. The unfortunate specula
tions of my friend—”
“Whose name you withhold,” Rich
ard Interrupted the musical voice to
say, dryly.
“Because of a promise!” Royal
flashed promptly. “But,” he resumed,
turning to Harriet, “I shall be abieito
negotiate this business, as I assure
Mr. Carter, without any assistance
from him or his daughter,” his lip
curled scornfully, “and I do not pro
pose to give her up for any three
years—or three weeks !”
Harriet could only look at him fix
edly, with an ashen face.
“God help me,” she breathed In her
soul. “God help me!”
“Well,” said Richard with weary
impatience, “we did not call you down
to bore you with this! I asked to see
you, Harriet, because Mr. Blondin has
made the statement to me, just now,
that you were heartily in accord with
his plans for Nina and that you ap
proved of the affair!”
The prayer in Harriet’s heart did
not stop as she moved her wretched
eyes to Blondin.
“I believed that you and she had
not seen each other since December,”
she reminded him. “I lost no chance
to advise hei against the engagement!
I thought it was all over!”
"Weil!” Richard said, with a breath
of relief. He had been w’atchlng her
closely, now he settled back in his
chair and moved his contemptuous
scrutiny to Blondin.
“One moment!” Royal Blondin said,
gently. But he was also pale. “You
believe that I would make Nina a good
husband, don’t you?” he asked Harriet
directly and quietly.
She was not looking at him. Her
eyes were on Richard Carter.
“I believe you would ruin her life!”
she said, deliberately.
“Thank you,” Richard said. “I think
that is all, Mr. Blondin. I was aware
that you had —misunderstood Mrs.
Carter when you made that state
ment I”
“Not quite all,” Blondin persisted.
“You believe that Nina would be wiser
not to marry me?” he asked Harriet.
“You—” She cleared iter throat.
“You know that I think so!” she said.
Blondin laughed.
“And now, Mr. Blondin, you will
kindly leave iny house!” said Richard.
The other man was watching Har
riet. with a menace in his narrowed
eyes. White lines had drawn them
selves about his tightly closed lips,
yet he was smiling. He had lost the
game, truly, but she knew he would
play his last card, just the same. The
suavity, the calm of years fell from
him, and his voice deepened into a
sort of cold and quiet fury as he said:
“One moment, Mr. Carter. Why
don’t you ask your wife what makes
her think I won’t make Nina a good
husband? Why don’t you ask her if
she has been hiding something from
you ail this time? Why don’t you ask
her if she herself wasn’t madly in love
—and with me! —when she was Nina’s
age, and whether she was married in
my studio, to me, ten years ago—!”
He had shot the phrases at her with
a distinctness almost violent. Now
R IL p®
row
■' rfcvli 11 • ■
“Ask Her—She’ll Tell You! Ask Herl”
bls dry voice stopped, but his swift,
venomous look went from the silent
man at the desk to the silent woman
who stood before him. Before either
moved or spoke he spoke again.
“Ask her —she’ll tell you I Ask her!”
“Be quiet!” Richard said. “I don’t
believe one word of it!” And then as
the girl neither raised her eyes nor
attempted to speak, he asked her, en
couragingly and quickly: “Harriet,
will you tell him that not one word of
that Is true?”
Harriet had risen, and was standing
the back of the carved black chair
with both her hands resting upon it.
She had looked quietly at Blondin,
when he began to speak, and the beau
tiful white breast that her black eve
ning gown left bare had risen once or
twice on a swift impulse to Interrupt
him. But now she was looking down
at her laced fingers, with something
despairing and helpless in the droop
of her bright head and lowered lashes.
It had had its times of seeming
frightful to her, this secret, in the
troubled musings of the past year. But
it had never loomed so horrible and so
momentous as now. In the silent libra
ry* with the eyes of the man she loved
fixed anxiously upon her. He had
trusted, he was beginning to admire
her, and like his wife and his daugh
ter and his mother, she had failed him.
“Harriet?” he said in quick uneasi
ness. She raised her head now, and
looked at him with weary eyes devoid
of any expression except bewilderment
and pain.
“Yes,” she said, simply. “That is
all—quite true. It sounds —” she hes
itated, and groped for words —“it
sounds as if —” she began and
stopped again. “But it is all quite
true!” she finished, in the troubled
tone of a child who is misunderstood.
CHAPTER XIV.
The curtains at the French windows
in the library at Crownlands stirred
in the breeze of the warm summer
night, the pendulum of the big clock
behind Richard Carter moved to and
fro, but for a long time there was no
other sound in the library. Richard
had dropped his eyes, was idly staring
at the blank sheet of paper before
him. Royal Blondin, who had folded
his arms, for a moment studied Har
riet between half-closed lids, but pres
ently his eyes fell, too, and with a
rather troubled expression he studied
the pattern of the great oriental rug.
Harriet stood motionless, turned to
stone. If there was anything to be
said in her behalf, she could not say
it now. For the first time the full
measure of her responsibility and the
full measure of her deceit smote her.
and in utter sickness of spirit she
could advance no excuse. It was not
that she had failed Blondin, or that
she had failed Richard, but the extent
of her failure toward herself appalled
her. She was not the good, brave, cul
tivated woman she had liked to think
herself; she was one more egotist,
with Nina, and Isabelle, and Ida, un
scrupulously playing her own game
for her own ends.
“I’m extremely sorry,” Richard said,
presently, in a somewhat lifeless tone.
“I imagine that if my daughter had
known this, she might have been
spared soine suffering and some hu
miliation. But we needn’t consider
that now.” He was silent, frowning
faintly. He put up a fine hand and
adjusted his eyeglasses with a little
impatient muscular twitching of his
whole face that Harriet knew to be
characteristic of his worried moods.
“Mr. Blondin,” he said, wearily and
politely, “I have had a great deal on
my mind, lately, and have perhaps
been hasty in my condemnation of you.
However, this does not particularly
help your cause with my daughter.
There are a great many aspects to the
matter, and I—l must take time to con
sider them. Nina must be my first
consideration, poor child ! Her mother
failed her —we have all failed her!
She has a right to know of this con
versation —”
Harriet stirred, and his eyes moved
to her. Without a word, and with a
stricken look in her beautiful, ashen
face, she turned, and went slowly
toward the door. When she reached
it, she steadied herself a second by
pressing one fine hand against the
dark wood, then she opened it and was
gone.
“I’m very sorry—” Blondin said hesi
tatingly, when the men alone.
“Mrs. Carter,” Richard said, get
ting to his feet, and very definitely
Indicating an end to the conversation,
“before she consented to the —arrange-
ment into which we entered, of course
took me into her confidence in this
matter!”
“She—she did?” Royal stammered.
“Certainly she did,” Richard said,
harshly. And looking at him the other
man saw that his face looked haggard
and colorless. “She did not mention
your name, I presume out of a sense
of generosity to you. I could have
wished,” he added, “that you had been
similarly generous, and had seen fit
to leave her, and leave my daughter
alone. I think I must ask you to ex
cuse me,” said Richard at the door.
His tone was one of absolute suffoca
tion. “I can see no object in your
frankness tonight, unless to distress
and humiliate Mrs. Carter. My daugh
ter, and not myself, is the one entitled
to your confidence, and you are well
aware of my feeling where she is con
cerned! I would to God,” said Rich
ard, with bitterness, “that I had never
seen your face! Mrs. Carter has been
a useful—and indispensable!—member
of this family for many years; if there
was In her past some unpleasant and
painful event, that is her own af
fair —!”
“Not when she marries a man who
is unaware of it,” Blondin suggested,
In his pleasant, soft tones.
“That is mine!” Richard said, stern
ly. And he opened the library door.
“Good evening!” he said.
“Good evening!”' Blondin, with his
light, loitering step, crossed the thresh
old, and Richard closed the door. He
took his chair again and reached
toward th© bell that would have
brought Bottomley to summon Nina
in turn. But halfway to the bell his
resolution wavered, disappeared. In
stead, he rested his elbows on the
table, and his head in his hands, and
there sounded from his chest a great
sigh that was almost a groan.
Oh, he was tired —he w’as tired —he
was tired! It was all a mess—the boy.
the girl, their mother, his own ar
rangements for their protection and
safety. All a mess.
She had been beautiful, that girl,
with her golden hair In the lamplight,
and her white arms a little raised to
rest her locked hands on the chair.
Like some superb actress of tragedy,
some splendid and sullen prisoner at
the bar. The slender figure in the dull
wrapping of satin, and the white bos
om, had looked so young, so virginal,
the blue eyes were so honestly fright
ened and ashamed. And she had been
that bounde’.’j wife—in his arms! Di
vorced! Harriet Field? Poor girl,
cornered by this unscrupulous scoun
drel, this bully, with all the ugly past
dragged up like the muddy bottom of
a river, staining and clouding the
clear waters. And what a look she
had given him, there under the lamp!
“It’s a funny code,” he mused. “Bar
barians, that’s what we are, when It
comes to women. Nina, Ida, Isabelle,
Harriet—all of them pay for the man
made rule I I shouldn’t have forced
her hand in this business marriage;
it was taking an advantage of her. No
woman wants to marry for anything
but love, and if she had married for
love, she w’ould have made a clean
breast of this old affair, of course. I
didn’t exact that. We’ve made a nice
mess of it, all around!
“I mustn’t let her work herself into
a fever over all this!” he found him
self thinking.
But Nina must be the first consider
ation. He must plan for Nina. He
brought his thoughts back resolutely—
his daughter must break her engage
ment now, there was that much gained.
And for the journey to Rio—
“ But why didn’t she tell me!” he
inteirupted himself, suddenly. The
reference was not to Nina. Again he
saw the superb white shoulders in the
soft flood of lamplight, and the flash
of- the blue eyes that turned toward
Blondin.
“She could have killed him!” Rich
ard said. “My God! how she will love
when she does love!”
Meanwhile, to Harriet had come the
bitterest hour of her life. She had
reached a crossroads, and with steady
fingers and an anguished heart she
prepared for the only step that to her
whirling brain and shamed soul
seemed possible. She must disappear.
There was no alternative.
She had harmed them all, they could
only think of her now as an unscrupu
lous and mischievous woman who had
by chance entered their lives when
they were all in desperate need of wis
dom and guidance, who had played
her own contemptible game, and added
one more hurt to the hurt reputation
of the house of Carter.
Harriet got out of her e/euing gown
and into a loose wrapper. She went
about somewhat aimlessly, yet the
suitcases, spiead open on the bed,
were gradually filled, and her per
sonal possessions gradually disap
peared from tables and walls. Now
and then she stopped short, heartsick
and trembling; once her lips quivered
and her eyes filled, but for the most
part she did not pause.
Nina, at about eleven, had come to
the door between their rooms, and
opened it. The girl was undressed,
and for a few moments she watched
Harriet scowlingly, with narrowed
eyes.
“Are you going away?” she said,
presently. Harriet brought heavy
eyes to meet hers, and stood consider
ing a minute, as if bringing her
thoughts back a long distance.
“I—going away? Yes,” she said,
slowly. “Yes, I may.”
Nina stood watching, which seemed
vaguely to trouble Harriet, who gave
her a restless glance now and then as
she went to and fro. Presently she
spoke to Nina again.
“Good-night, Nina 1”
“Good-night!” snapped Nina, and
the door slammed.
Harriet continued to move about for
perhaps half an hour before Nina’s
odd manner recurred to her, on a wave
of memory, and she seemed to hear
again Nina’s ungracious tone.
“He told her!” she said, suddenly.
“She saw Royal, and he told her! Poor
child—”
And she went to Nina’s room, with
a vague idea that she would sit beside
the weeping girl for awhile, one heavy
heart close to the other, even if no
words could pass between them.
But Nina lay sleeping peacefully,
and Harriet, after watching her for a
few minutes, went back to her own
room. She went to the open window,
and stood staring absently out at the
dark summer night, the great branches
of the trees moving In the restless
wind, and the oblong of dull light that
still fell from the library window’.
She could not see the horror as
Richard saw it: she could not see her
self as only a mistaken woman, a
woman with youth, beauty, and Intel
ligence pleading for her, one problem
more in his life, it is true, but only
one among many, and not the greatest.
She did not see him as he saw himself,
his family as the somewhat trouble
some, and yet quite understandable,
group of selfish human beings in whose
perplexities he had always played the
part of arbiter.
To Harriet the thing loomed momen
tous, unforgiving, incalculable. It as
sumed to her the proportions of a mur
der. Richard, In her estimation, was
not what he thought himself, a some-
iR
•u
"Where Have You Been?” Said
Richard, Sharply, Then, “You Look
Illi”
what ordinary man In the forties
whose life had already held poverty
and disillusionment and wholesome
disappointment, whose nature had
been tempered to humor and generos
ity and philosophy: to Harriet, he was
the richest, the finest, the most deserv
ing of men, and she the Adventuress
who had brought his name down to
shame and dishonor.
Until two o’clock she was wretched
ly busy in soul and body. When the
last of her personal possessions was
packed, and when she was aching from
head to foot, she took a hot bath, and
crept Into bed.
But not to sleep. The feverish
agonies of shame and reproach held
her. She was pleading with Richard,
she was talking to Nina—she was mak
ing little of It —making much of It —
she was saying a reluctant "yeg—yes—
yes!” to their questioning.
At four o’clock she dressed herself
again, half-mad with headache and
fatigue, and went out into a world
that was just beginning to brighten in
to faint shapes and colors.
A steamer moved majestically up
the river, the smoothly widening wake
spread from shore to shore; pink light
showed at one cabin window; and into
Harriet’s somber thoughts came unbid
den the picture of a yawning cook,
stumbling about amid his soot-black
ened pots and pans.
With the morning, the peace of a
conquered spirit fell upon her. She
had thought it all to an ending at
last. It seemed to Harriet that never
In her life had she thought so clearly,
so truly, so bravely. Her duty to
Richard, to his children, to Linda; she
had faced them without fear and with
out deception, tasting the humiliating
truth to Its bitter dregs, planning the
few short Interviews that must pre
cede her leaving them all forever.
For Harriet emerged from the fur
nace the mistress of her own soul.
She had been wrong; she had been
weak; she bad been contemptible, bu
not so wrong or weak or contemptible
as they would think her. She would go
on her way now, the braver for the
lesson and the shame. And what they
thought of her must never shake again
her own knowledge of her own In
nocence.
Go on her way to what? She did not
know. But she neither feared what the
future might hold nor doubted It. She
could make her own way from a new
beginning. "But before I go,” said
Harriet, resolutely, "I must tell him
that I’m sorry. And I must ask Nina
to forgive me.”
She turned, and burled her face in
the thick, soft sleeve of her coat. But
she did not cry long, and when Jen
sen, the boatman, came out on the dock
at seven, the lady he knew to be his
new mistress was sitting composedly
enough on her bench, studying the now
glittering and sparkling river with
quiet eyes.
Harriet nodded to him, and rose
somewhat stiffly, to go up to the house.
She mounted the brick steps with a
thoughtfully dropped head the
straight shafts of the sunlight were
making it impossible to face the house,
in any case—and so was within three
feet of Richard Carter before she saw
him. »
He looked fresh, hard, even young,
in his white flannels. They stood look
ing at each other for a moment with
out speaking.
"Where have you been?” said Rich
ard, sharply, then, “You look ill!"
Tears, despite her desperate resolu
tion, suddenly stung Harriet’s eyes.
And yet her heart leaped with hope.
"I wanted to see you, Mr. Carter,”
she faltered. “I couldn*t sleep very
well. I’ve been down at the shore. But
later —any time will do!”
"You couldn’t sleep!” he exclaimed
with quick sympathy. He looked from
her about him, as If for a shelter for
her emotion. "Here,” he said, “come
down the steps a bit. I was going
down to the court for a little tennis;
Ward may follow me, but he w’on’t be
dressed for half an hour yet. Sit down
here; we ''an talk.”
They had come to the marble bench
on the terrace, where Isabelle and An
thony Pope, sheltered by these same
towering trees and low brick walls,
had had their talk a year ago. Har
riet, to her own consternation, felt
that she was in danger of tears.
"I—l hardly know how to say it,”
she began. "But—but you know how
ashamed I am!”
"I know —I know how you feel!”
Richard said with a sort of brief sym
pathy. "I’m sorry! But you know
you mustn’t take this all too hard. I
didn’t—l was thinking of this last
night; I didn’t ask you so any
more than you gave me, in this mar
riage of ours. Your divorce was your
own affair—”
The girl’s tired eyes flashed.
"There was no divorce!” she said,
quickly.
"No divorce?" he echoed with a puz
zled frown.
"I want to tell you about itshe
said. But the tears would come again.
"I’m tired!” Harriet said, childishly,
trying to smile. "I’ve been up—walk
ing. I couldn’t sleep!”
The consciousness that he had been
able to forget the whole tangle, and
sleep soundly, gave Richard's voice a
little compunction as he said:
"You don’t have to tell me now.
We’ll find away out of It that Is easy
for every one—”
"No, but let mo talk!” Harriet. In
her eagerness, laid her fingers on his
wrist, and he was shocked to fee! that
they were Icy cold. "1 want to tell
you the whole thing—l want you to
understand !’’ she said, eagerly. Rich
ard looked at her In some anxiety;
there was no acting here. The rich
hair was pushed carelessly from the
troubled forehead. She was huddled
In the enveloping coat, a different fig
ure Indeed from his memory of the
superb and angry girl of last night in
the library lamplight.
"Mr. Carter. I never knew’ my moth
er— ’* she began. But he Interrupted
her.
"My dear,” he said, In a tone he
might have used to Nina. He laid his
warm, fine hand on hers, and patted
it soothingly. "My dear girl, if you
feel that you would like to go to that
motherly sister of yours—ls you feel
that It would be wiser—”
"Oh, I am going to Linda at once!"
Harriet said, feverishly, hurt to the
soul. “I had planned that! But—but
won’t you let me tell you?" she plead
ed. She had framed the sentences a
hundred times In the long night; they
failed her utterly now, and she groped
for words. “I was only three years
old when my mother died," she said.
"Os course I don’t remember her—l
only remember Linda. I was shy, my
father was a professor, we were too
poor to have very much social life. 1
lived In books, lived In my father’s
shabby little study really; I never had
an Intimate girl friend! Linda was
always good—angelically good—talk
ing of the Armenian sufferers, and of
the outrages In the Congo, nnd of the
poor In New York’s lower East side—
she never cared that we were poor,
and that we hadn’t clothes!"
"I know —I know!” Richard’s eyes
were smiling, as If ho knew’ the pic
ture, and liked It.
"Well, Linda married when I was
ten, and Josephine came, and then
Julia came. I still lived for books and
babies. But, unlike Linda, I cared.”
Harriet’s whole face glowed; she
looked off into space, and her voice
had a longing note. “I cared for
clothes and good times!" she said. "T
adored the children, but I dreamed
of carriages—maids—glory—achieve-
ments! I knew that other women did
it—”
(TO BE CONTINUED.)
Animals Have Sixth Sense.
Animals have a weird sixth sense
which few human beings possess.
Ants, for Illustration, will desert their
hills, taking their babies and eggs
with them, 24 hours before the out
break of a forest fire, while rabbit?
will leave burrows made In low-lying
land long before a flood occurs. They
have some weird premonition which
forces them to seek higher ground be
fore the danger U upon them.
WEDNESDAY, JULY 26, 19 2 ?
| Kitchen!
I Cabinet §
Copyright. luaa. Wwi-ru Newspaper cn lou ,
The business man, lawyer, physician
priest or poet who earnestly tries to
serve his neighbors will earn both
money and real happiness. But the
man who works for money alone gets
that for which he works— nothing else.
THE WHOLESOME APPLE
“An apple a clay keeps the elector
away,” says the old saw. The follow-
Ing recipes are all worth
keeping for future use:
Apple Sauce Cake
Take one cupful of brown
sugar, one-half cupful of
butter or lard, one cup
ful of unsweetened apple
sauce prepared from sour
cooking apples and put
through a sieve, one cup
ful of chopped raisins, two teaspoon- *»
fula of cocoa, two cupfuls of Hour
sifted with two teaspoonfuls of baking
powder. Bake one-half hour in a shal
low dripping pan. Serve with hot
sauce If for dessert. Sauce—Holl two
cupfuls of granulated sugar, one cup
ful of water until a sirup Is formed,
add a tablespoonful of butter and a
grating of lemon rind for flavoring.
Whole Wheat Pudding.—-Take two
cupfuls nt whole wheat flour, half n
cupful of molasses, one chopped apple,
one-half of a teaspoonful of salt, and
one-half teaspoonfnl of soda, steam
two and one-half hours. Serve with
a plain sauce made with one cupful
of sugar, two tablespoonfuls of com
starch, a bit of salt, one cupful of
boiling water; cook until smooth, add
two tablespoonfuls of butter and lem
on Juice and rind to flavor.
Apple Whip.-—Cook five apples Into
apple sauce, adding as little water ns
possible. When well cooked press
through a colander and add one-half
cupful of sugar. To this add the un
beaten whites of two eggs. Whip with
a Dover egg beater until the mixture
Is light and stiff. Add a bit of vanilla
or orange or lemon flavoring. Serve
In sherbet cups topped with a maras
chino cherry.
Apple PuodlnQ. —Cut a few apples
to cover the bottom of a baking dish;
cook In a little boiling water until the
apples are partly done. Drop over
the top a soft drop bntter and bake
In a quick oven. Sugar nnd lemon
rtnd may be added to the apples Just
before putting on the batter. Serve .
with a lemon sauce, using a tablespoon- '
ful of blitter, one of flour, a half cup
ful of sugar, one-half cupful of water
and enough lemon Juice to flavor. If
the rind Is not used In rhe apples as
flavoring add It to the sauce. Serve
all hot.
The heart of man is a small world In
which awhile the soul must dwell, and
this earthly habitat create a future
heaven or he'll.
MORE EVERYDAY DISHES
The following ono-dlah dinner will
be found most satisfying:
Prepare n rich
b 1 s c ull dough;
line a deep pie
plate with the
mixture, rolling It
al>o tw one-half
Inch thick. Put
In a layer of good
fresh steak cut In
dice, season with suit und pepper,
add a layer of onions und potatoes
und put on the top crust, leaving a
vent for the steam to escape. There
will be no need for moisture as the
vegetables contain plenty. Bake an
hour In a moderate oven; longer will
not injure It. When the food seems
well cooked, remove from the heat,
wrap In a cloth and steam In a cool
place for ten minutes; this softens
the crust und makes the dish more
palatable. Serve hot in pie shaped
pieces.
With this dish a dish of dandelion
greens washed and crisped in water
and served with hot bacon fat and
vinegar, makes a well balanced meal,
sufficiently nourishing to sustain a
working man. With this meal a des
sert of apple sauce and dark whole
wheat bread, and a cup of tea or cof
fee will be all that is needed for
dessert.
Liver en Casserole. —Take a pound
or more of liver, cut in slices nnd sim
mer for ten to fifteen minutes in
salted water; drain and chop fine, mix
ing well with salt and pepper to
on. Add one tablespoonful of onion
also chopped. In the bottom of '
well greased casserole place one-half
cupful of washed rice, one carrot
chopped and spread over the rice;
over this spread the liver and the
liquor, two cupfuls, in which the liver
was cooked. Spread two tablespoon
fuls of butter over this dish and bake
in the oven for an hour. Add
one-half cupful of rich milk or cream
and remove the cover; let cook for
a few minutes, sprinkle with parsley
and serve.
If cottage cheese needs to be in
creased in quantity add a stiffly beaten
egg white with some cream.
Apple Sandwich.—Spread whole
jvheat bread with butter, tlien add
chopped apple mixed with chopped
ants.
San Francisco Pralines.—Take two
cupfuls of brown sugar, three-fourths
of a cupful each of roasted ahnonds *
nnd pecans, one cupful of water. 801 l
the sugar and water to the soft ball
stage, stir In the nuts and pour Into
putty tins, well greased, to mold.