The Clarion

CHAPTER XX

THE LESS­ER TEMPT­ING

Sev­en days of the week did Mr. Har­ring­ton Sur­taine la­bor, with­out by any means do­ing all his work. For to the toil which goes to the mak­ing of many news­pa­pers there is no end; on­ly ev­er a fresh be­gin­ning. Had he brought to the en­ter­prise a less ea­ger ap­petite for the change­ful ad­ven­ture of it, the un­remit­ting de­mand must soon have dulled his spir­it. Abound­ing vi­tal­ity he pos­sessed, but even this flagged at times. One soft spring Sun­day, while the var­ious cam­paigns of the news­pa­per were still in mid-​con­flict, he de­cid­ed to treat him­self to a day off. So, af­ter a lux­uri­ous morn­ing in bed, he em­barked in his run­about for an ex­plo­ration around the ad­ja­cent coun­try.

Hav­ing filled his lungs with two hours of swift air, he lunched, none too del­icate­ly, at a vil­lage fifty miles dis­tant, and, on com­ing out of the ho­tel, was warned by a sky shad­ed from blue to the murki­est gray, in­to hav­ing the top of his car put up. The rain chased him for thir­ty miles and whelmed him in a wild swirl at the thir­ty-​first. Driv­ing through this with some cau­tion, he saw ahead of him a wom­an's fig­ure, as sup­ple as a wil­low withe, as gal­lant as a ship, beat­ing through the fury of the el­ements. Hal slowed down, de­bat­ing whether to of­fer con­veyance, when he caught a glint of rud­dy waves be­neath the drenched hat, and the next in­stant he was out and look­ing in­to the flushed face and danc­ing eyes of Mil­ly Neal.

“What on earth are you do­ing here?” he cried.

“Can't you see?” she re­tort­ed mer­ri­ly. “I'm a fish.”

“You need to be. Get in. You're soaked to the skin,” he con­tin­ued, dis­mayed, as she be­gan to shiv­er un­der the wrap­pings he drew around her. “Nev­er mind. I'll have you home in a few min­utes.”

But the de­mon of mis­chance was abroad in the storm. Be­fore they had cov­ered half a mile the rear tire went. Mil­ly was now shak­ing dis­mal­ly, for all her brave at­tempts to con­ceal it. A few rods away a sign an­nounced “Mark­by's Road-​House.” Con­cerned sole­ly to get the girl in­to a warm and dry place, Hal turned in, bun­dled her out, or­dered a pri­vate room with a fire­place, and in­duced the pro­pri­etor's wife by the per­sua­sions of a ten-​dol­lar bill to pro­vide a change of cloth­ing for the out­er, and hot drinks for the in­ner, wom­an.

Half an hour lat­er when he had af­fixed a new tire to the wheel, he and Mil­ly sat, warmed and com­fort­ed be­fore blaz­ing logs, wait­ing for her clothes to dry out.

“I know I look a fright,” she mourned. “That Mrs. Mark­by must buy her dress­es by the pound.”

She gazed at him com­ical­ly from above a quaint and non­de­script gar­ment, to which she had giv­en a cer­tain dain­ti­ness with a clev­er­ly placed rib­bon or two and an adroit use of pins. Pri­vate­ly, Hal con­sid­ered that she looked de­light­ful­ly pret­ty, with her provoca­tive eyes and the deep gleam of red in her hair like flame seen through smoke.

“Do you of­ten go out wad­ing, ten miles from home?” he asked.

“Not very. I was run­ning away.”

“I didn't see any one in pur­suit.”

“They knew too much.” Her firm lit­tle chin set rather grim­ly. “Do you want to hear about it?”

“Yes. I'm cu­ri­ous,” con­fessed Hal.

“I went to lunch with an­oth­er girl and a cou­ple of drum­mers, out at Cal­len­der's Pond Ho­tel. She said she knew the men and they were all right. They weren't. They got too fresh al­to­geth­er. So I told Flo­rence she could do as she pleased, but I was for home and the trol­ley. I guess I could have made it with a life-​pre­serv­er,” she laughed.

Hal was sur­pris­ed­ly con­scious of a rasp of anger with­in him. “You ought not to put your­self in­to such a po­si­tion,” he de­clared.

She threw him a covert glance from the cor­ner of her sparkling eyes. “Oh, I guess I can take care of my­self,” she de­cid­ed calm­ly. “I al­ways have. When fresh drum­mers be­gin to talk pri­vate din­ing-​room and cold bot­tles, I spread my lit­tle wings and flit.”

“To an­oth­er pri­vate room,” mocked Hal. “Aren't you afraid?”

“With you? You're dif­fer­ent.” There sound­ed in her voice the purring note of ut­ter con­tent which is the sub­tlest be­cause the most un­con­scious flat­tery of wom­ankind.

A si­lence fell be­tween them. Hal stared in­to the fire.

“Are you warm enough?” he asked present­ly.

“Yes.”

“Do you want some­thing to eat? Or drink? What did you have to drink?” he added, glanc­ing at the emp­ty glass on the ta­ble.

“Certi­na.”

“Certi­na?” he queried, un­cer­tain at first whether she was jok­ing. “How could you get Certi­na here?”

“Why not? They keep it at all these places. There's quite a bar-​trade in it.”

“Is that so?” said Hal, with a vague feel­ing of dis­tur­bance of ideas. “Which job do you like best: the Certi­na or the news­pa­per, Miss Neal?”

“My oth­er boss calls me Mil­ly,” she sug­gest­ed.

“Very well,--Mil­ly, then.”

“Oh, I'm for the of­fice. It's more ex­cit­ing, a lot.”

“Your stuff,” said Hal, in the lan­guage of the cult, “is catch­ing on.”

“You don't like it, though,” she coun­tered quick­ly.

“Yes, I do. Much bet­ter than I did, any­way. But the point is that it's a suc­cess. Ed­ito­ri­al­ly I _have_ to like it.”

“I'd rather you liked it per­son­al­ly.”

“Some of it I do. The 'Lunch-​Time Chats'--”

“And some of it you think is vul­gar.”

“One has to suit one's style to the mat­ter,” pro­pound­ed Hal. “'Kit­ty the Cutie' isn't sup­posed to be a col­lege pro­fes­sor.”

“I hate to have you think me vul­gar,” she in­sist­ed.

“Oh, come!” he protest­ed; “that isn't fair. I don't think _you_ vul­gar, Mil­ly.”

“I like to have you call me Mil­ly,” she said.

“It seems quite nat­ural to,” he an­swered light­ly.

“I've thought some­times I'd like to try my hand at a reg­ular news sto­ry,” she went on, in a changed tone. “I think I've got one, if I could on­ly do it right; one of those facts-​be­hind-​the-​news sto­ries that you talked to us about. Do you re­mem­ber meet­ing me with Max Velt­man the oth­er night?”

“Yes.”

“Did you think it was queer?”

“A lit­tle.”

“A girl I used to know back in the coun­try tried to kill her­self. She wrote me a let­ter, but it didn't get to me till af­ter mid­night, so I called up Max and got him to go with me down to the Rook­eries dis­trict where she lives. Poor lit­tle Mag­gie! She got caught in one of those sewing-​girl traps.”

“Some kind of ma­chin­ery?”

“Ma­chin­ery? You don't know much about what goes on in your town, do you?”

“Not as much as an ed­itor ought to know--which is ev­ery­thing.”

“I'll bring you Mag­gie's let­ter. That tells it bet­ter than I can. And I want to write it up, too. Let me write it up for the pa­per.” She leaned for­ward and her eyes be­sought him. “I want to prove I can do some­thing be­sides be­ing a vul­gar lit­tle 'Kit­ty the Cutie.'”

“Oh, my dear,” he said, half pa­ter­nal­ly, but on­ly half, “I'm sor­ry I hurt you with that word.”

“You didn't mean to.” Her smile for­gave him. “Mag­gie's sto­ry means an­oth­er fight for the pa­per. Can we stand an­oth­er?”

He warmed to the pos­ses­sive “we.” “So you know about our war­fare,” he said.

“More than you think, per­haps. The books you gave me aren't the on­ly things I study. I study the 'Clar­ion,' too.”

“Why?” he asked, in­ter­est­ed.

“Be­cause it's yours.” She looked at him straight­ly now. “Can you pull it through, Boss?”

“I think so. I hope so.”

“We've lost a lot of ads. I can reck­on that up, be­cause I had some ex­pe­ri­ence in the ad­ver­tis­ing de­part­ment of the Certi­na shop, and I know rates.” She pursed her lips with a dain­ty ef­fect of care­ful com­pu­ta­tion. “Some­where about four thou­sand a week out, isn't it?”

“Four thou­sand, three hun­dred and sev­en­ty in store busi­ness last week.”

The talk set­tled down and con­fined it­self to the fi­nan­cial and ed­ito­ri­al poli­cies of the pa­per, Mil­ly ask­ing a hun­dred ea­ger and shrewd ques­tions, now and again prof­fer­ing some ten­ta­tive coun­sel or cau­tion. Im­per­son­al though it seemed, through it Hal felt a grow­ing ten­si­ty of in­ter­course; a sense of preg­nant and per­ilous in­ti­ma­cy draw­ing them to­geth­er.

“Since you're tak­ing such an in­ter­est, I might get you to help Mr. El­lis run the pa­per when I go away,” he sug­gest­ed joc­ular­ly.

“You're not go­ing away?” The query came in a sort of gasp.

“Next week.”

“For long?” Her hand, as if in protest against the dread­ed an­swer, went out to the arm of his chair. His own met and cov­ered it re­as­sur­ing­ly.

“Not very. It's the new press.”

“We're go­ing to have a new press?”

“Hadn't you heard? You seem to know so much about the of­fice. We're go­ing to build up the base­ment and set the press just in­side the front wall and then cut a big win­dow through so that the world and his wife can see the 'Clar­ion' in the very act of mak­ing them bet­ter.”

Both fell silent. Their hands still clung. Their eyes were fixed up­on the fire. Sud­den­ly a log, half-​con­sumed, crashed down, send­ing abroad a show­er of sparks. The girl dart­ed swift­ly up to stamp out a tiny flame at her feet. Stand­ing, she half turned to­ward Hal.

“Where are you go­ing?” she asked.

“To New York.”

“Take me with you.”

So qui­et­ly had the cri­sis come that he scarce­ly re­al­ized it. For a mea­sured space of heart-​beats he gazed in­to the fire­place. As he stared, she slipped to the arm of his chair. He felt the al­lur­ing warmth of her body against his shoul­der. Then he would have turned to search her eyes, but, di­vin­ing him, she de­nied, press­ing her cheek close against his own.

“No; no! Don't look at me,” she breathed.

“You don't know what you mean,” he whis­pered.

“I do! I'm not a child. Take me with you.”

“It means ru­in for you.”

“Ru­in! That's a word! Words don't fright­en me.”

“They do me. They're the most ter­ri­ble things in the world.”

She laughed at that. “Is it the word you're afraid of, or is it me?” she chal­lenged. “I'm not ask­ing you any­thing. I don't want you to mar­ry me. Oh!” she cried with a sink­ing break of the voice, “do you think I'm _bad_?”

Free­ing him­self, he caught her face be­tween his hands.

“Are you--have you been 'bad,' as you call it?”

“I don't blame you for ask­ing--af­ter what I've said. But I haven't.”

“And now?”

“Now, I care. I nev­er cared be­fore. It was that, I sup­pose, kept me straight. Don't you care for me--a lit­tle, Hal?”

He rose and strode to the win­dow. When he turned from his long look out in­to the bur­geon­ing spring she was stand­ing silent, ex­pec­tant. Like stone she stood as he came back, but her arms went up to re­ceive him. Her lips melt­ed in­to his, and the fire of her face flashed through ev­ery vein.

“And af­ter­ward?” he said hoarse­ly.

There was tri­umph in her an­swer­ing laugh­ter, pas­sion-​shak­en though it was.

“Then you'll take me with you.”

“But af­ter­ward?” he re­peat­ed.

Lin­ger­ing­ly she re­leased her­self. “Let that take care of it­self. I don't care for af­ter­ward. We're free, you and I. What's to hin­der us from do­ing as we please? Who's go­ing to be any the worse for it? Oh, I told you I was law­less. It's the Hard­scrab­bler blood in me, I guess.”

Deep in Hal's mem­ory a re­sponse to that name stirred.

“Some­where,” he said, “I have run across a Hard­scrab­bler be­fore.”

“Me. But you've for­got­ten.”

“Have I? Let me see. It was in the old days when Dad and I were trav­el­ing. You were the child with the won­der­ful red hair, the night I was hurt. _Were_ you?”

“And next day I tried to bite you be­cause you want­ed to play with a pret­ti­er lit­tle girl in beau­ti­ful clothes.”

Es­mé! The elec­tric spark of thought leaped the long space of years from the child, Es­mé, to the girl, in the vain love of whom he had eat­en his heart hol­low. For the mo­ment, pas­sion for the vivid wom­an-​crea­ture be­fore him had dulled that pro­founder feel­ing al­most to oblit­er­ation. Per­haps--so the thought came to him--he might find for­get­ful­ness, an­odyne in Mil­ly Neal's arms. But what of Mil­ly, tak­en on such poor terms?

The bit­ter love with­in him gave an­swer. Not loy­al­ty to Es­mé El­liot whom he knew un­wor­thy, but to Mil­ly her­self, bound him to hon­or and re­straint; so strange­ly does the hu­man soul make its dim and per­ilous way through the maze of mo­tives. Even though the girl, now quest­ing his face with puz­zled, fright­ened eyes, asked noth­ing but to be­long to him; de­mand­ed no bond of feal­ty or troth, held him free as she held her­self free, con­tent with the im­me­di­ate hap­pi­ness of a re­la­tion that, must end in sor­row for one or the oth­er, yet he could not take what she so prodi­gal­ly, so gal­lant­ly prof­fered, with the im­age of an­oth­er wom­an smil­ing through his ev­ery thought. That, in­deed, were to be un­wor­thy, not of Es­mé, not of him­self, but of Mil­ly.

He made a step to­ward her, and her glad hands went out to him again. Very gen­tly he took them; very gen­tly he bent and kissed her cheek.

“That's for good-​bye,” he said. The voice in which he spoke seemed alien to his ears, so calm it was, so at vari­ance with his in­ner tur­moil.

“You won't take me with you?”

“No.”

“You promised.”

“I know.” He was not con­cerned now with ver­bal dif­fer­en­ti­ations. Tru­ly, he had promised, word­less­ly though it had been. “But I can't.”

“You don't care?” she said piteous­ly.

“I care very much. If I cared less--”

“There's some oth­er wom­an.”

“Yes.”

Flame leaped in her eyes. “I hope she poi­sons your life.”

“I hope I haven't poi­soned yours,” he re­turned, lame­ly enough.

“Oh, I'll man­age to live on,” she gibed. “I guess there are oth­er men in the world be­sides you.”

“Don't make it too hard, Mil­ly.”

“You're pity­ing me! Don't you dare pity me!” A sob rose, and burst from her. Then abrupt­ly she seized com­mand over her­self. “What does it all mat­ter?” she said. “Go away now and let me change my clothes.”

“Are they dry?”

“I don't care whether they're dry or not. I don't care what be­comes of me now.” All the sullen re­volt of gen­er­ations of law­less­ness was vo­cal in her words. “You wait and see!”

Some­how Hal got out of the room, his mind awhirl, to await her down­stairs. In a few mo­ments she came, and with eyes somber­ly avert­ed got in­to the run­about with­out a word. As they swung in­to the road, they met McGuire El­lis and Wayne, who bowed with a look of ir­re­press­ible sur­prise. Dur­ing the ride home­ward Hal made sev­er­al es­says at con­ver­sa­tion. But the girl sat frozen in a white si­lence. On­ly when they pulled up at her door did she speak.

“I'm go­ing to try to for­get this,” she said in a dry, hard voice. “You do the same. I won't quit my job un­less you want me to.”

“Don't,” said Hal.

“But you won't be both­ered with see­ing me any more. I'll send you Mag­gie Breen's let­ter and the sto­ry. I guess I un­der­stand a lit­tle bet­ter now how she felt when she took the poi­son.”

With that rankling in his brain, Hal Sur­taine sat and pon­dered in his pri­vate study at home. His mus­ings ar­raigned be­fore him for judg­ment and con­trast the two wom­en who had so stormi­ly wrought up­on his new life. Es­mé El­liot had played with his love, had ex­ploit­ed it, made of it a tin­sel or­na­ment for van­ity, sought, through it, to cor­rupt him from the hard-​won hon­or of his call­ing. She had giv­en him her lips for a lure; she had played, soul and body, the pet­ty cheat with a high and en­nobling pas­sion. Yet, be­cause she played with­in the rules by the world's mea­sure, there was no stain up­on her hon­or. By that same mea­sure, what of Mil­ly Neal? In her was no trick­ery of sex; on­ly the un­grudg­ing, wide-​armed of­fer of all her wom­an­hood, reck­less of aught else but love. De­bat­ing with­in him­self the phrase, “an hon­est wom­an,” Hal laughed aloud. His laugh­ter lacked much of be­ing mirth­ful, and some­thing of be­ing just. For he had reck­oned two daugh­ters of Eve by the same stan­dard, which is per­haps the old­est and most dis­as­trous er­ror hered­itary to all the sons of Adam.