The Trumpeter Swan

CHAPTER III

THE WOLF IN THE FOR­EST

I

The Bird Room at Judge Ban­nis­ter's was back of the li­brary. It was a big room lined with glass cas­es. There hung about it al­ways the faint odor of preser­va­tives. The Trum­peter Swan had a case to him­self over the man­tel. He had been rather stiffly posed on a bed of ar­ti­fi­cial moss, but noth­ing could spoil the beau­ty of him--the white of his plumage, the el­egance of his lines. He was one of a dy­ing race--the de­scen­dants of the men who had once killed for food had killed lat­er to grat­ify the van­ity of wom­en who must have swans down to set off their beau­ty, puffs to pow­der their noses. No more did great flocks wing an ex­alt­ed flight, high in the heav­ens, or rest like a blan­ket of snow on riv­er banks. The old kings were dead--the glassy eyes of the Trum­peter looked out up­on a world which knew his kind no more.

In the oth­er cas­es were the lit­tle birds and big ones--ducks, swim­ming on crys­tal pools, can­vas-​backs and red­heads, mal­lards and teal; Bob-​whites, sin­gle and in cov­eys; sand­pipers, tip-​ups and peeps, those lit­tle ghosts of the seashore, shad­ows on the sand; there were soar and oth­er rails, robins and black­birds, larks and spar­rows, wild turkeys and wild geese, all the toll which the hunter takes from field and stream and for­est.

It was in a sense a trag­ic room, but it had nev­er seemed that to Becky. She came of a race of men who had hunt­ed from in­stinct but with a sense of hon­or. The Judge and those of his kind hat­ed wan­ton killing. Their guns would nev­er have swept away the feath­ered tribes of tree and sky. It was the trap­pers and the pot-​hunters who had done that. There had mo­tored once to the Judge's man­sion a man and his wife who had raged at the brutes who hunt­ed for sport. They had worn fur coats and there had been a bird's breast on the wom­an's hat.

The Judge, hold­ing on to his tem­per, had ex­plod­ed fi­nal­ly. “If you were con­sis­tent,” he had flung at them, “you would not be decked in the bod­ies of birds and beasts.”

Becky loved the birds in the glass cas­es, the peeps and the tip-​ups, the old owl who did not be­long among the game birds, but who, with the great ea­gle with the out­stretched wings, had been ad­mit­ted be­cause they had been shot with­in the en­vi­rons of the es­tate. She loved the lit­tle nests of tint­ed eggs, the ducks on the crys­tal pools.

But most of all she loved the Trum­peter. Years ago the Judge had told her of the wild swans who flew so high that no eye could see them. Yet the sound of their trum­pets might be heard. It was like the fairy tale of “The Sev­en Broth­ers,” who were princes, and who were turned in­to swans and wore gold crowns on their heads. She was pre­pared to be­lieve any­thing of the Trum­peter. She had of­ten tip­toed down in the night, ex­pect­ing to see his case emp­ty, and to hear his trum­pet sound­ing high up near the moon.

There was a moon to-​night. Din­ner was al­ways late at Hunters­field. In the old days three o'clock had been the fash­ion­able hour for din­ing in the coun­ty, with a hot sup­per at eight. Aunt Clau­dia, keep­ing up with the times, had de­cid­ed that in­stead of din­ing and sup­ping, they must lunch and dine. The Judge had agreed, stip­ulat­ing that there should be no change in the evening hour. “Serve it in cours­es, if you like, and call it din­ner. But don't have it be­fore can­dle-​light.”

So the moon was up when Becky came down in her blue dress. She had not ex­pect­ed to wear the blue. In spite of the fact that Randy and his moth­er and Ma­jor Prime had come back with them for din­ner, she had planned to wear her old white, which had been washed and laid out on the bed by Mandy. But the blue was more be­com­ing, and the man with the Apol­lo head had eyes to see.

She came in­to the Bird Room with a can­dle in her hand. There was a lamp high up, but she could not reach it, so she al­ways car­ried a can­dle. She set it down on the case where the Bob-​whites were cud­dled in brown groups. She whis­tled a note, and lis­tened to catch the an­swer. It had been a trick of hers as a child, and she had heard them whis­tle in re­sponse. She had been so sure that she heard them--a far-​off sil­very call----

Well, why not? Might not their lit­tle souls be flut­ter­ing close? “You dar­lings,” she said aloud.

Randy, ar­riv­ing at that mo­ment on the thresh­old, heard her. “You are play­ing the old game,” he said.

“Oh, yes,” she caught her breath, “do you re­mem­ber?”

He came in­to the room. “I re­mem­bered a thou­sand times when I was in France. I thought of this room and of the Trum­peter Swan, and of how you and I used to lis­ten on still nights and think we heard him. There was one night af­ter an aw­ful day--with a moon like this over the bat­tle­field, and across the moon came a black, thin streak--and a bu­gle sound­ed--far away. I was half asleep, and I said, 'Becky, there's the swan,' and the fel­low next to me poked his el­bow in my ribs, and said, 'You're dream­ing.' But I wasn't--quite, for the thin black streak was a Zep­pelin----”

She came up close to him and laid her hand on his arm. He tow­ered above her. “Randy,” she asked, “was the war very dread­ful?”

“Yes,” he said, “it was. More dread­ful than you peo­ple at home can ev­er grasp. But I want you to know this, Becky, that there isn't one of us who wouldn't go through it again in the same cause.”

There was no swag­ger in his state­ment, just sim­ple earnest­ness. The room was very still for a mo­ment.

Then Becky said, “Well, it's aw­ful­ly nice to have you home again,” and Randy, look­ing down at the lit­tle hand on his arm, had to hold on to him­self not to put his own over it.

But she was too dear and pre­cious----! So he just said, gen­tly, “And I'm glad to be at home, my dear,” and they walked to the win­dow to­geth­er, and stood look­ing out at the moon. Be­hind them the old ea­gle watched with out­stretched wings, the great free bird which we stamp on Amer­ican sil­ver, backed with “In God We Trust.” It is not a bad com­bi­na­tion, and things in this coun­try might, per­haps, have been less chaot­ic if we had taught new­com­ers to link love of God with love of lib­er­ty.

“Mr. Dal­ton is com­ing to see the birds,” said Becky, and in a mo­ment she had spoiled ev­ery­thing for Randy.

“Is that why you put on your blue dress?”

She was hon­est. “I am not sure. Per­haps.”

“Yet you thought the old white one was good enough for me.”

“Well, don't you like me just as well in my old white as in this?”

“Yes, of course.”

“Well, then,” Becky was tri­umphant, “why should I both­er to change for you, Randy, when you like me just as well in any­thing?”

The ar­gu­ment was unan­swer­able, but Randy was not sat­is­fied. “It is a mis­take,” he said, “not to be as nice to old friends as new ones.”

“But I am nice. You said so your­self this af­ter­noon. That I was sug­ar and spice and ev­ery­thing--nice----”

He laughed. “You are, of course. And I didn't come all the way from France to quar­rel with you----”

“We've al­ways quar­reled, Randy.”

“I won­der why?”

“Sis­ter Loret­ta says that peo­ple on­ly ar­gue when they like each oth­er. Oth­er­wise they wouldn't want to con­vince.”

“Do you quar­rel with Sis­ter Loret­ta?”

“Of course not. Nuns don't. But she writes notes when she doesn't agree with me--lit­tle ser­mons--and pins them on my pil­low. She's a great dear. She hates to have me leave the school. She has the feel­ing that the world is a dark for­est, and that I am Red Rid­ing Hood, and that the Wolf will get me.”

II

Dal­ton found them all at din­ner when he reached Hunters­field. He was not in the least pre­pared for the scene which met his eyes--shin­ing ma­hogany, old sil­ver and Sheffield, tall white can­dles, Calvin in a snowy jack­et, Mrs. Beau­fort and Mrs. Paine in low-​necked gowns, the Judge and Randy in din­ner coats some­what the worse for wear, Becky in thin, del­icate blue, with a string of pearls which seemed to George an ex­cel­lent im­ita­tion of the re­al thing.

He had thought that the trail of Mrs. Paine's board­ing-​house might be over it all. He had known board­ing-​hous­es as a boy, be­fore his fa­ther made his mon­ey. There had been base­ment din­ing-​rooms, cat­sup bot­tles, and peo­ple pass­ing ev­ery­thing to ev­ery­body else!

“I'm afraid I'm ear­ly,” he said in his quick voice.

“Not a bit. Calvin, place a chair for Mr. Dal­ton.”

There were fruit and nuts and raisins in a great sil­ver Pegeen, with fat cu­pids mak­ing love among gar­lands. There was cof­fee in Severus cups.

Back among the shad­ows twin­kled a price­less mir­ror; shut­ting off Calvin's serv­ing ta­ble was a paint­ed screen worth its weight in gold. It was a far cry from the cat­sup bot­tles and squalid ser­vice of George's ear­ly days. The Ban­nis­ters of Hunters­field wore their pover­ty like a plume!

The Judge car­ried Dal­ton off present­ly to the Bird Boom. George went with re­luc­tance. This was not what he had come for. Becky, slim and small, with her hair peaked up to a top­knot, Becky in pale blue, Becky as fair as her string of im­ita­tion pearls, Becky in the gold­en haze of the soft­ly il­lu­mined room, Becky, Becky Ban­nis­ter--the name chimed in his ears.

Dal­ton had had some dif­fi­cul­ty in get­ting away from Hamil­ton Hill.

“It's my last night,” Madge had said; “shall we go out in the gar­den and watch the moon rise?”

“Sor­ry,” George had told her, “but I've promised Flo­ra to take a fourth hand at bridge.”

“And af­ter that?” asked Madge soft­ly.

“What do you mean?”

“Who is the new--lit­tle girl?”

It was use­less to pre­tend. “She's a beau­ty, rather, isn't she?”

“Oh, Georgie-​Porgie, I wish you wouldn't.”

“Wouldn't what?”

“Kiss the girls--and make them--cry----”

“You've nev­er cried----”

She laughed at that. “If I haven't it is be­cause I know that af­ter­wards you al­ways--run away.”

He ad­mit­ted it. “One can't mar­ry them all.”

“I won­der if you are ev­er se­ri­ous,” she told him, her chin in her hand.

“I am al­ways se­ri­ous. That's what makes it--in­ter­est­ing----”

“But the poor lit­tle--hearts?”

“Some one has to teach, them,” said George, “that it's a pret­ty game----”

“Will it be al­ways a game--to you--Georgie?”

“Who knows?” he said. “So far I've held trumps----”

“Your con­ceit is colos­sal, but some­how you seem to get away with it.” She smiled and stood up. “I'm go­ing to bed ear­ly. I have been los­ing my beau­ty sleep late­ly, Georgie.”

He chose to be gal­lant. “You are not los­ing your beau­ty, if that's what you mean.”

Her din­ner gown was of the same shade of mauve that she had worn in the af­ter­noon. But it was of a ma­te­ri­al so sheer that the gold of her skin seemed to shine through.

“Good-​night, Gold­en Girl,” said Dal­ton, and kissed the tips of her fin­gers as she stood on the stairs. Then he went off to join the oth­ers.

Madge did not go to bed. She went out alone and watched the moon rise. Os­car Wa­ter­man's house was on a hill which gave a view of the whole val­ley. Grad­ual­ly un­der the moon the hous­es of Char­lottesville showed the out­lines of the Uni­ver­si­ty, and far be­yond the shad­owy sweep of the Blue Ridge. What a world it had been in the old days--great men had rid­den over these red roads in sway­ing car­riages, Jef­fer­son, Lafayette, Wash­ing­ton him­self.

If she could on­ly meet men like that. Men to whom life was more than a game--a car­ni­val. From the stone bench where she sat she had a view through the long French win­dows of the three ta­bles of bridge--there were slen­der, rest­less girls, ea­ger, el­egant youths. “Per­haps they are no worse than those who lived here be­fore them,” Madge's sense of jus­tice told her. “But isn't there some­thing bet­ter?”

From her win­dow lat­er, she saw Dal­ton's car flash out in­to the road. The light wound down and down, and ap­peared at last up­on the high­way. It was not the first time that George had played the game with an­oth­er girl. But he had al­ways come back to her. She had of­ten won­dered why she let him come. “Why do I let him?” she asked the moon.

III

It re­al­ly was a great moon. It shone through the win­dows of the Bird Room at Hunters­field, woo­ing George out in­to the fra­grant night. He could hear voic­es on the lawn--young Paine's laugh--Becky's. Once when he looked he saw them on the ridge, sil­hou­et­ted against the gold­en sky. They were danc­ing, and Randy's clear whis­tle, pip­ing a mod­ern tune, came up to him, tan­ta­liz­ing him.

But the Judge held him. It took him near­ly an hour to get through with the Bob-​whites and the sand­pipers, the wild turkeys, the ducks and the wild geese. And long be­fore that time George was bored to ex­tinc­tion. He had lit­tle imag­ina­tion. To him the Trum­peter was just a stuffed old bird. He could not pic­ture him as blow­ing his trum­pet be­side the moon, or wear­ing a gold­en crown as in “The Sev­en Broth­ers.” He had nev­er heard of “The Sev­en Broth­ers,” and no­body in the world wore crowns ex­cept kings. As for the old ea­gle, it is doubt­ful whether George had ev­er felt the sym­bol­ism of his pres­ence on a sil­ver coin, or that he had ev­er linked him in his heart with God.

Then, sud­den­ly, the whole world changed. Becky ap­peared on the thresh­old.

“Grand­fa­ther,” she said, “Aunt Clau­dia says there is lemon­ade on the lawn.”

“In a mo­ment, my dear.”

George rose hasti­ly. “Don't let me keep you, Judge----”

Becky ad­vanced in­to the room. “Aren't the birds won­der­ful?”

“They are,” said George, see­ing them won­der­ful for the first time.

“I al­ways feel,” she said, “as if some time they will flap their wings and fly away--on a night like this--the swans go­ing first, and then the ducks and geese, and last of all the lit­tle birds, trail­ing across the moon----” Her hands flut­tered to show them trail­ing. Becky used her hands a great deal when she talked. Aunt Clau­dia de­plored it as in­di­cat­ing too lit­tle re­pose. The nuns, she felt, should have cor­rect­ed the habit. But the nuns had loved Becky's de­scrip­tive hands, pok­ing, em­pha­siz­ing, and had let her alone.

The three of them, the Judge and Becky and Dal­ton, went out to­geth­er. The lit­tle group which sat in the wide moon­light­ed space in front of the house was dwarfed by the great trees which hung in mass­es of black against the bril­liant night. The white dress­es of the wom­en seemed touched with sil­ver.

The lemon­ade was de­li­cious, and Aunt Clau­dia forced her­self to be gra­cious. Car­oline Paine was gra­cious with­out an ef­fort. She liked Dal­ton. Not in the same way, per­haps, that she liked Ma­jor Prime, but he was un­doubt­ed­ly hand­some, and of a world which wore love­ly clothes and did not have to count its pen­nies.

Ma­jor Prime had lit­tle to say. He was con­tent to sit there in the fra­grant night and lis­ten to the rest. A year ago he had been jolt­ed over rough roads in an am­bu­lance. There had been a moon and men groan­ing. There had seemed to him some­thing sin­is­ter about that white night with its spec­tral shad­ows, and with the trench­es of the en­emy wrig­gling like great ser­pents un­der­ground. The trail of the ser­pent was still over the world. He had been caught but not killed. There was still poi­son in his fangs!

He spoke sharply, there­fore, when Dal­ton said, “It was a great ad­ven­ture for a lot of fel­lows who went over----”

“Don't,” said the Ma­jor, and sat up. “Does it mat­ter what took them? _The thing that mat­ters is how they came back_----”

“What do you mean?”

“A thou­sand rea­sons took them over. Some of them went be­cause they had to, some of them be­cause they want­ed to. Some of them dra­ma­tized them­selves as heroes and hoped for an op­por­tu­ni­ty to demon­strate their courage. Some of them were scared stiff, but went be­cause of their con­sciences, some of them want­ed to fight and some of them didn't, but what­ev­er the rea­son, _they went_. And now they are back, and it is much more im­por­tant to know what they think now about war than what they thought about it when they were en­list­ed or draft­ed. If their bap­tism of fire has made them hate cru­el­ty and in­jus­tice, if it has opened their eyes to the dan­gers of a dream­ing ide­al­ism which re­fus­es to see evil un­til evil has had its way, if it has made them swear to purge Amer­ica of the things which has made Ger­many the slimy crawl­ing en­emy of the uni­verse, if they have come back feel­ing that God is in His Heav­en but that things can't be right with the world un­til we come to think in terms of per­son­al as well as of na­tion­al righ­teous­ness--if they have come back thus il­lu­mined, then we can con­cede to them their great ad­ven­ture. But if they have come back to for­get that democ­ra­cy is on tri­al, that we have talked of it to oth­er na­tions and do not know it our­selves, if they have come back to let in­jus­tice or ig­no­rance rule--then they had bet­ter have died on the fields of France----”

He stopped sud­den­ly amid a star­tled si­lence. Not a sound from any of them.

“I beg your par­don,” he laughed a bit awk­ward­ly, “I didn't mean to preach a ser­mon.”

“Don't spoil it, _please_,” Aunt Clau­dia begged bro­ken­ly; “I wish more men would speak out.”

“May I say this, then, be­fore I stop? The fu­ture of our coun­try is in the hands of the men who fought in France. On them must de­scend the man­tles of our great men, Wash­ing­ton, Lin­coln, Roo­sevelt--we must walk with these spir­its if we love Amer­ica----”

“Do you won­der,” Randy said, un­der his breath to Becky, “that his men fought, and that they died for him?”

She found her lit­tle hand­ker­chief and wiped her eyes. “He's a--per­fect--dar­ling,” she whis­pered, and could say no more.

Dal­ton was for the time eclipsed. He knew it and was not at ease. He was glad when Mrs. Paine stood up. “I am sor­ry to tear my­self away. But I must. I can't be sure that Susie has made up the morn­ing rolls. There's a camp-​meet­ing at Jes­si­ca, and she's lost the lit­tle mind that she usu­al­ly puts on her cook­ing.”

Randy and the Ma­jor went with her in the low car­riage, with Ros­alind mak­ing good time to­wards the home sta­ble, and with Nel­lie Custis fol­low­ing with flap­ping ears.

Dal­ton stayed on. The Judge urged him. “It's too love­ly to go in,” he said; “what's your hur­ry?”

Aunt Clau­dia, who was in­ex­press­ibly weary, felt that her fa­ther was ex­ceed­ing the bounds of nec­es­sary hos­pi­tal­ity. She felt, too, that the length of Dal­ton's first call was in­ex­cus­able. But she did not go to bed. As long as Becky was there, she should stay to chap­er­on her. With a sense of mar­tyr­dom up­on her, Mrs. Beau­fort sat stiffly in her chair.

The Judge was talkative and bril­liant, glad of a new and ap­par­ent­ly at­ten­tive lis­ten­er. Becky had lit­tle to say. She sat with her small feet set prim­ly on the ground. Her hands were fold­ed in her lap. Dal­ton was used to girls who lounged or who hung fatu­ous­ly on his words, as if they had set them­selves to please him.

But Becky had no arts. She was frank and un­af­fect­ed, and ap­par­ent­ly not un­con­scious of Dal­ton's charms. The whole thing was, he felt, go­ing to be rather stim­ulat­ing.

When at last he left them, he asked the Judge if he might come again. “I'd like to look at those birds by day­light.”

Becky, giv­ing him her hand, hoped that he might come. She had been all the evening in a sort of wak­ing dream. Even when Dal­ton had been silent, she had been in­tense­ly aware of his pres­ence, and when he had talked, he had seemed to speak to her alone, al­though his words were for oth­ers.

“I saw you danc­ing,” he said, be­fore he dropped her hand.

“Oh, did you?”

“Yes.”

Back of the house the dogs barked.

“Will you dance some time with me?”

“Oh, could I?”

“Why not?”

A mo­ment lat­er he was gone. The light of his mo­tor flashed down the hills like a falling star.

“I won­der what made the dogs bark,” the Judge said as they went in.

“They prob­ably thought it was morn­ing,” was Mrs. Beau­fort's re­tort, as she pre­ced­ed Becky up the stairs.

IV

The dogs had barked be­cause Randy af­ter a quick drive home had walked back to Hunters­field.

“Look here,” he burst out as he and the Ma­jor had stood on the steps of the School­house, “do you like him?”

“Who? Dal­ton?”

“Yes.”

“He's not a man's man,” the Ma­jor said, “and he doesn't care in the least what you and I think of him.”

“Doesn't he?”

“No, and he doesn't care for--stuffed birds--and he doesn't care for the Judge, and he doesn't care for Mrs. Beau­fort----”

“Oh, you needn't rub it in. I know what he's af­ter.”

“Do you?”

“Yes----”

The Ma­jor whis­tled soft­ly a lilt­ing tune. He had been called “The Whistling Ma­jor” by his men and they had liked his clear pip­ing.

He stopped abrupt­ly. “Well, you can't build fences around love­ly lit­tle ladies----”

“I wish I could. I'd like to shut her up in a tow­er----”

They left it there. It was re­al­ly not a thing to be talked about. They both knew it, and stopped in time.

Randy, climb­ing the out­side stairs, present­ly, to his bed­room, turned at the up­per land­ing to sur­vey the scene spread out be­fore him. The hills were steeped in si­lence. The world was black and gold--the fra­grance of the hon­ey­suck­le came up from the hedge be­low. On such a night as this one could not sleep. He felt him­self rest­less, emo­tion­al­ly keyed up. He de­scend­ed the stairs. Then, sud­den­ly, he found him­self tak­ing the trail back to­wards Hunters­field.

He walked eas­ily, fol­low­ing the path which led across the hills. The dis­tance was not great, and he had of­ten walked it. He loved a night like this. As he came to a stretch of wood­land, he went un­der the trees with the thrill of one who en­ters an en­chant­ed for­est.

An owl hoot­ed over­head. A whip-​poor-​will in a dis­tant swamp sound­ed his plain­tive call.

Randy could not have an­alyzed the in­stinct which sent him back to Becky. It was not in the least to spy up­on her, nor up­on Dal­ton. He on­ly knew that he could not sleep, that some­thing drew him on and on, as Romeo was drawn per­chance to Ca­pulet's or­chard.

He came out from un­der the trees to oth­er hills. He was still on his own land. These acres had be­longed to his fa­ther, his grand­fa­ther, his great-​grand­fa­ther, and back of that to a cer­tain gal­lant gen­tle­man who had come to Vir­ginia with grants from the King. There had been, too, a great chief, whose blood was in his veins, and who had roamed through this land be­fore Eu­rope knew it. Powhatan was a rare old name to link with one's own, and Randy had a Vir­gini­an's pride in his sav­age strain.

So, as he went along, he saw ca­noes up­on the shin­ing riv­er. He saw tall forms with feath­ers blow­ing. He saw fires on the heights.

The hill in front of him dipped to a lit­tle stream. He and Becky had once wad­ed in that stream to­geth­er. How white her feet had been on the brown stones. His life, as he thought of it, was bound up in mem­ories of Becky. She had come down from school for bliss­ful week-​ends and hol­idays, and she and Randy had tramped over the hills and through the pine woods, find­ing wild-​flow­ers in the spring, ar­bu­tus, flush­ing to beau­ty in its hid­den bed, blood-​root, hep­at­ica, wind-​flow­ers, vi­olets in a pur­ple glo­ry; find­ing in the sum­mer wild ros­es, dew­ber­ries, black­ber­ries, bees and but­ter­flies, the cool shade of the lit­tle groves, the shine and shim­mer of the streams; find­ing in the fall a gold­en still­ness and the red­ness of Vir­ginia Creep­er. They had rid­den on horse­back over the clay roads, they had roamed the stub­ble with a pack of wiry hounds at their heels, they had gath­ered Christ­mas greens, they had sung car­ols, they had watched the Old Year out and the New Year in, and their souls had been knit in a com­rade­ship which had been a very fine thing in­deed for a boy like Randy and a girl like Becky.

There had been, too, about their friend­ship a rather en­gag­ing se­ri­ous­ness. They had talked a great deal of fu­tures. They had dreamed to­geth­er very great dreams. Their dreams had, of course, changed from time to time. There had been that dream of Becky's when she first went to the con­vent, that she want­ed some day to be a nun like Sis­ter Loret­to. The fact that it would in­volve a change of faith was thrashed over flam­ing­ly by Randy. “It is all very well for an old wom­an, Becky. But you'd hate it.”

Becky had been sure that she would not hate it. “You don't know how love­ly she looks in the chapel.”

“Well, there are oth­er ways to look love­ly.”

“But it would be nice to be--good.”

“You are good enough.”

“I am not re­al­ly, Randy. Sis­ter Loret­to says her prayers all day----”

“How of­ten do you say yours?”

“Oh, at night. And in the morn­ings--some­times----”

“That's enough for any­body. If you say them hard enough once, what more can the Lord ask?”

He had been a rather fierce fig­ure as he had flung his ques­tions, but he had not swerved her in the least from her thought of her­self as a novice in a white veil, and lat­er as a full-​fledged sis­ter, with beads and a black head-​dress.

This dream had, in time, been sup­plant­ed by one im­posed up­on her by the am­bi­tions of a much-​ad­mired class­mate.

“Maude and I are go­ing to be doc­tors,” Becky had an­nounced as she and Randy had walked over the fields with the hounds at their heels. “It's a great op­por­tu­ni­ty for wom­en, Randy, and we shall study in Philadel­phia.”

“Shall you like cut­ting peo­ple up?” he had de­mand­ed bru­tal­ly.

She had shud­dered. “I shan't have to cut them up very much, shall I?”

“You'll have to cut them up a lot. All doc­tors do, and some­times they are dead.”

She had ar­gued a bit shak­ily af­ter that, and that night she had slept bad­ly. The next morn­ing they had gone over it again. “You faint­ed when the kit­ten's paw was crushed in the door.”

“It was dread­ful----”

“And you cried when I cut my foot with the hatch­et and we were out in the woods. And if you are go­ing to be a doc­tor you'll have to look at peo­ple who are crushed and cut----”

“Oh, please, Randy----”

Three days of such in­ten­sive ar­gu­ment had set­tled it. Becky de­cid­ed that it was, af­ter all, bet­ter to be an au­thoress. “There was Louisa Al­cott, you know, Randy.”

He was scorn­ful. “Wom­en weren't made for that--to sit in an at­tic and write. Why do you keep talk­ing about do­ing things, Becky? You'll get mar­ried when you grow up and that will be the end of it.”

“I am not go­ing to get mar­ried, Randy.”

“Well, of course you will, and I shall mar­ry and be a lawyer like my fa­ther, and per­haps I'll go to Congress.”

Lat­er he had a lean­ing to­wards the min­istry. “If I preached I could make the world bet­ter, Becky.”

That was the time when she had come down for Hal­lowe'en, and it was on Sun­day evening that they had talked it over in the Bird Room at Hunters­field. There had been a smoul­der­ing fire on the wide hearth, and the Trum­peter Swan had stared down at them with shin­ing eyes. They had been to church that morn­ing and the text had been, “The har­vest is past, the sum­mer is end­ed, and we are not saved.”

“I want to make the world bet­ter, Becky,” Randy had said in the still twi­light, and Becky had an­swered in an awed tone, “It would be so splen­did to see you in the pul­pit, Randy, wear­ing a gown like Dr. Hodge.”

But the pul­pit to Randy had meant more than that. And the next day when they walked through the de­sert­ed mill town, he had said, “Ev­ery­body is dead who lived here, and once they were alive like us.”

She had shiv­ered, “I don't like to think of it.”

“It's a thing we've all got to think of. I like to re­mem­ber that Thomas Jef­fer­son came rid­ing through and stopped at the mill and talked to the miller.”

“How dread­ful to know that they are--dead.”

“Moth­er says that men like Jef­fer­son nev­er die. Their souls go march­ing on.”

The stream which ground the coun­ty's corn was at their feet. “But what about the miller?” Becky had asked; “does his soul march, too?”

Randy, with the bur­den of yes­ter­day's ser­mon up­on him, hoped that the miller was saved.

He smiled now as he thought of the rigid­ness of his boy­ish the­ol­ogy. To him in those days Heav­en was Heav­en and Hell was Hell.

The years at school had brought doubt--apos­ta­sy. Then on the fields of France, Randy's God had come back to him--the Christ who bound up wounds, who gave a cup of cold wa­ter, who fought with flam­ing sword against the bat­tal­ions of bru­tal­ity, who led up and up that white com­pa­ny who gave their lives for a glo­ri­ous Cause. Here, in­deed, was a God of righ­teous­ness and of jus­tice, of ten­der­ness and pu­ri­ty. To oth­er men than Randy, Christ had in a very per­son­al and spe­cif­ic sense been born across the sea.

It was in France, too, that the dream had come to him of a fu­ture of cre­ative pur­pose. He had al­ways want­ed to write. Look­ing back over his Uni­ver­si­ty days, he was aware of a for­ma­tive pro­cess which had led to­wards this end. It was there he had com­muned with the spir­it of a trag­ic muse. There had been all the tra­di­tions of Poe and his tem­pes­tu­ous youth--and Randy, pass­ing the door which had once opened and closed on that dark fig­ure, had felt the thrill of a liv­ing per­son­al­ity--of one who spoke still in lines of in­ef­fa­ble beau­ty--“_Ban­ners yel­low, glo­ri­ous, gold­en, On its roof did float and flow_----” and again “_A dirge for her the dou­bly dead, in that she died so young_----” with the gayety and gloom and grandeur of those chim­ing, rhyming, tolling bells--“_Keep­ing time, time, time, In a sort of Runic rhyme_----” and that “_grim and an­cient Raven wan­der­ing from the Night­ly shore_----”

“Do you think I could write?” Randy had asked one of his teach­ers, com­ing verse-​sat­urat­ed to the ques­tion.

The man had looked at him with somber eyes. “You have an ear for it--and an eye---- But ge­nius pays a price.”

“What do you mean?”

“It shows its heart to the world, dis­sects its sa­cred thoughts, has no se­crets----”

“But think of leav­ing a thing be­hind you like--'To He­len----'”

“Do you think the knowl­edge that he had writ­ten a few bits of in­com­pa­ra­ble verse helped Poe to live? If he had in­vent­ed a pill or a headache pow­der, he would have slept on down and have dined from gold dish­es.”

“I'd rather write 'Ulalume' than dine from gold dish­es.”

“You think that now. But in twen­ty years you will sigh for a--feath­er bed----”

“You don't be­lieve that.”

There had come a light­ing of the somber eyes. “My dear fel­low, if you, by the grace of God, have it in you to write, what I be­lieve won't have any­thing to do with it. You will cru­ci­fy your­self for the sake of a line--starve for the love of a rhythm.”

Randy had not yet starved for love of a rhythm, but he had lost sleep dur­ing those nights in France, try­ing to put in­to words the things that gripped his soul. There had been beau­ty as well as hor­ror in those days. What a world it had been, a world of men--a striv­ing, ea­ger group, raised for the mo­ment above sor­did­ness, above self----

He had not found verse his medi­um, al­though he had drunk ea­ger­ly of the gold­en cups which oth­ers had to of­fer him. But his prose had gained be­cause of his be­lief in beau­ty of struc­ture and of singing love­ly words. As yet he had noth­ing to show for his pains, but prac­tice had giv­en strength to his pen--he felt that some day with the right theme he might do--won­ders----

The trees had again closed in about him. A shad­ow flit­ted by--a fox, un­afraid and in search of a be­lat­ed meal. Randy re­mem­bered the days when he and Becky had thought that there might be wolves in the for­est. He laughed a lit­tle, re­call­ing Becky's words. “Sis­ter Loret­to has the feel­ing that the world is a dark for­est, and that I am Red Rid­ing Hood.” Was it that which had brought him back? Was there, in­deed, a Wolf?

When he reached Hunters­field, and the dogs barked, he had feared for the mo­ment dis­cov­ery. He was saved, how­ev­er, by the friend­ly si­lence which fol­lowed that first note of alarm. The dogs knew him and fol­lowed him with wag­ging tails as he skirt­ed the lawn and came at last to the gate which had closed a few min­utes be­fore on Dal­ton's car. He saw the Judge go in, Aunt Clau­dia, Becky--shad­owy fig­ures be­tween the white pil­lars.

Then, af­ter a mo­ment, a room on the sec­ond floor was il­lu­mined. The shade was up and he saw the in­te­ri­or as one sees the scene of a play. There was the out­line of a rose-​col­ored canopy, the gleam of a mir­ror, the shine of pol­ished wood, and in the cen­ter, Becky in pale blue, with a can­dle in her hand.

And as he saw her there, Ran­dolph knew why he had come. To wor­ship at a shrine. That was where Becky be­longed--high above him. The flame of the can­dle was a sa­cred fire.