Part 89

But he was not going to take this girl to the quiet little restaurant with candles on the table. That had been for the other girl--the grave, aloof, and beautiful one, who didn’t exist.

“Come on!” he said briefly. “We’ll get a taxi.”

She followed him without a word, and he helped her into a cab.

“Where would you like to go?” he asked.

“Oh, I don’t care,” she answered.

Very well--if she didn’t care, neither would he. He gave the driver an address and got in beside her.

“Like to dance?” he asked.

“I love it!”

Then this would be merely an evening like other evenings. He would dance with her, spend more money than he could afford, and then forget her. She was not different, after all. There never had been any girl like the one he had dreamed of, or invented, last night in the firelight.

“What a fool I was!” he thought.

He wanted to laugh at himself, and could not; it hurt too much. He so badly needed the girl who did not exist--that honest, friendly, lovely little thing with the innocent glamour of childhood still about her. He glanced at the real one, sitting beside him. By the passing lights he could see her face, which was turned toward the window.

“She doesn’t know anything about me,” he thought. “She doesn’t care. All she wants is a ‘good time’!”

He took out his cigarette case and tendered it to her.

“No, thank you,” she said.

“I will, if you don’t mind,” said Kirby, and that was all he did say.

He sat back in his corner, smoking, lost in his own thoughts. It was a long drive, for he was taking her to a road house just outside the city--a third-rate sort of place.

“But she said she didn’t care,” he thought.

III

They went on in a stream of other cars, like a flotilla of lighted ships, in the mild summer night. He hated the whole thing--the dust, the reek of gasoline, the tawdriness and staleness of the undertaking. He had wanted something better. His ardent spirit had groped toward an ideal, and, when he thought he had found it, it was only this!

It was as if he had gone into a dim temple, ready to worship, and suddenly a flood of garish light had come, and he saw that it was not a temple at all, but a sorry palace of pleasure. He lit another cigarette from the first one.

“I’m--sorry I came!” said the girl beside him, in a shaky voice.

He turned, but it was too dark to see her.

“I beg your pardon?” he said, very much taken aback.

“I didn’t want to come,” she went on. “I told you, but you _made_ me, and now--and now--you see--”

He quite realized that he had been behaving very ill, not even trying to talk to her. After all, it wasn’t her fault. She couldn’t know what a fool he had been.

“I don’t see at all,” he said. “I--I’m very glad you’re here.”

The feebleness of that made him ashamed, but he drew closer to her and took her hand. She kept her head averted, but she made no objection.

“That’s what she expects,” he thought bitterly. “She expects me to make love to her. All right!”

So he put his arm about her shoulders, and made up his mind to say to her the things he had said to other girls; and because he was young, and she was very pretty, some of his bitterness vanished.

“You’re the sweetest little thing!” he said. “The moment I saw you--”

She pulled away from him with a violence that astounded him.

“Don’t talk to me like that!” she cried. “It’s--horrible!”

“Sorry!” said Kirby stiffly, and withdrew to his corner; but the sound of a sob made him bend toward her, filled with a reluctant contrition. “Look here!” he continued. “I didn’t mean--”

“I just--bumped my head,” she said. “That’s all; but I’d rather go home now.”

“But we’ve just got here,” objected Kirby. “Better have some dinner first.”

He got out of the cab and held out his hand to her, but she jumped out unaided and walked to the foot of the steps. As he turned and saw her standing where the lights of the portico shone full upon her, a queer, reluctant tenderness swept over him. Her coat was a little too big for her. Her red hat was pushed back, showing more of her candid brow, and her dark hair was ruffled. She looked so weary and angry, and so young! Even if she was not what he wanted her to be, she was somehow dear to him.

“Look here!” he said. “Look here! Let’s have a nice evening, anyhow!”

She responded instantly to his tone. For the first time that night he saw in her some likeness to the lost little playmate.

“All right--let’s!” she cried.

He led the way to the glass-inclosed veranda where small tables were set out. The orchestra was playing, and through the long windows they could see the ballroom where couples were dancing.

“Isn’t it lovely?” she said.

Kirby did not think so. He was regretting that he had brought her here. They sat down at a table, and he took up the menu.

“What do you like?” he asked.

“Oh, anything!” said Emmy.

She was looking about her with a sort of rapture.

“Yes!” he thought. “This is the sort of thing she likes!”

And again his disappointment came back, sharper than ever. He thought of the dinner he had meant to have, by candlelight, in that quiet restaurant, with the girl who didn’t exist. Was there never to be anything like that for him, nothing fine and beautiful and stirring?

“Well, I’m here, and I’ve got to make the best of it,” he thought. “What will you have to drink?” he asked aloud.

“To drink?” she repeated, looking at him anxiously. “Oh, let’s not!”

Kirby ordered two cocktails.

“You can’t come to a place like this and not order anything to drink,” he explained when the waiter had gone. “Everybody does.”

“Then I wish we hadn’t come here,” said she.

The cocktails came, and he drank both of them.

“Care to try a dance?” he asked.

“No, thank you,” replied Emmy.

She was looking about her with a different vision now. All the light was gone from her face. Evidently she didn’t find the place lovely now. Kirby himself became more conscious of the loud voices, the hysteric laughter, the ugly disorder about him. He was sorry that he had brought her here. He was ashamed of himself, and he did not like being ashamed of himself.

“You said you loved dancing,” he suggested.

“Not now,” said Emmy. “It’s getting late. If you don’t mind, I’d like to go home.”

“Just as you please,” replied Kirby.

They finished the dinner in silence. Kirby paid the preposterous bill, and they went out to the taxi.

“You needn’t bother to come with me,” said Emmy politely.

“No bother at all,” returned Kirby, equally polite. “I’ll see you safely to the station.”

“I’m going to a friend’s house in the city.”

He got in beside her. He sat as far from her as he could, and neither of them spoke one word during all that long drive. In his heart he felt a great remorse and regret, but he would not let her know that.

But when the cab stopped at the address she had given him, and he helped her out, he could no longer maintain that stubborn, miserable silence.

“I’m sorry,” he told her. “I didn’t mean it to be like this.”

“It doesn’t matter,” said Emmy. “Good night!”

IV

Kirby stood where he was until she had gone up the steps and into the house. Then he paid the cab and set off on foot for the Pennsylvania Station. When he got there he found that there was an hour to wait for the next train, and again he set off to walk about the streets, his hands in his pockets, his pipe between his teeth. All the time her voice echoed in his ears--her quiet little voice.

“Good Lord!” he said to himself angrily. “It’s no tragedy! I asked the girl out to dinner, I tried to give her a good time, and that’s all there is to it.”

But still her voice echoed in his heart, and still he felt that bitter ache of regret. Let him walk as far as he would, he could not escape from it.

“She was unhappy,” he thought, and the thought pained him. He went on walking, and when he got back to the station he found that he had missed his train. It was the last for that day; the next one left at four o’clock in the morning.

He didn’t really care. He went to an all-night restaurant and had coffee and bacon and eggs. Then he strolled back to the waiting room where he had met her, and sat down there. He had the place to himself; there was nothing to disturb his reflections.

“The trouble was,” he said to himself, “that I was disappointed.”

And, like an audible response, the words shaped themselves in his mind:

“Well, what about her?”

He had never been more unhappy in all his life. He dozed a little during those long hours; but whether he slept or waked, he was conscious all the time of that bitter ache of regret.

There was an air of unreality about the early morning train. It was almost empty, and such passengers as there were seemed to Kirby to be very incongruous. For instance, where could that neat little gray-haired woman be going at such an hour? Or that Italian with a fierce mustache, who carried a square package wrapped in newspaper?

The world outside, seen through the train window, had the same unreal air. It was still dark, but this was not the serene darkness of night; it was, he thought, more like the dim silence of an auditorium before the curtain goes up. There was a feeling in the air that something tremendous was about to happen, and that a myriad creatures waited.

He felt the thrill of that expectancy himself. The window beside him was open, and the wind blew in his face with a divine freshness. He could see the trees and the sharp lines of roofs, as if they had stepped forward out of the night’s obscurity. There came a drowsy chirping; the curtain had begun to rise.

Then all the birds began to wake, and the chorus swelled and swelled. The insects were chirping, and he could hear the lusty crow of barnyard cocks--such little creatures, raising so sublime and tremendous a “Laudamus.”

“The sun’s coming up,” said Kirby to himself.

When he got out of the train the sky was gray, with only a thin veil before the face of the coming wonder. There was a single taxi at the station, and he hesitated, because two women had got out of the train after him; but one of the women set off briskly along the village street and the other one took the road, so he got into the cab.

A moment later he had passed the woman on the road. There was light enough to see her now.

“Stop!” he cried, but the driver did not hear him. He banged on the glass. “Stop! I want to get out!”

Giving the man his last dollar bill, Kirby jumped out and turned back.

She was coming toward him steadfastly, a straight and slender figure in a dark dress and drooping black hat. He could see that the dress was shabby, that her shoes were dusty and a little worn. Her face was pale, and there was a smudge on her forehead.

“Emmy!” he cried.

She stopped short. A hot color rose in her cheeks, and ebbed away, leaving her still paler.

“Emmy!” he said uncertainly. “You look--you’ve changed!”

“Well, no,” she answered, in that serious little voice. “You see, I’d borrowed those clothes from a girl at the office. I stopped at her house to leave them, and I missed the train.” She paused a moment. “I’m sorry I ever wore them,” she said; “only she’s been so awfully dear and kind to me, and she said she wanted to make me look nice.”

“You did look nice!” said Kirby.

He felt a sort of anguish at the sight of her. Why hadn’t he known, all the time, that she was like this? She was innocent and honest and lovely--and he had so grossly offended against her! He had taken her to that third-rate place; he had been surly, obstinate, utterly blind; and, worst of all, he had judged her so arrogantly!

“I’m so sorry!” he said. “You don’t know--I didn’t mean--”

“I’m sorry, too,” she said. “I never went out like that before, and I wish I hadn’t done it.”

They stood facing each other, standing in the middle of the empty road. She was downcast, but he was looking at her with amazement. She was _not_ that little flippant painted thing, like a thousand other girls! How could he ever have thought so? Neither was she the wise, aloof young goddess. She was just Emmy, rather shabby and very tired, with a smudge on her forehead.

“You don’t know,” he said, “how beautiful you are--in the daylight!”

Again the color rose in her cheeks, and as swiftly receded.

“I’ve got to hurry,” she exclaimed, with that earnest politeness of hers. “You see, my little brother’s taking examinations to-day, and I promised I’d make pancakes for his breakfast.”

“Oh, Emmy!” he said, and began to laugh.

She smiled herself, reluctantly.

“Well, I did promise,” she declared.

An immense happiness filled him. He knew now! He understood why those other fellows wanted to get married and set up homes! Bills and worries and even quarrels were not tragic, and not basely comic. They simply didn’t matter. The one great thing was this infinite tenderness. He did not want to worship a goddess any more; he wanted to take care of Emmy.

MUNSEY’S MAGAZINE

NOVEMBER, 1927 Vol. XCII NUMBER 2

For Granted

A COLORFUL STORY OF A PICTURESQUE ISLAND COLONY WELL KNOWN TO MANY AMERICAN TRAVELERS

By Elisabeth Sanxay Holding

The streets of Port Linton were empty under the brazen glare of the sun, so that Captain Vincey’s steps rang loud. They were unsteady, too. The heat came up from the white coral road in tremulous waves, and worried him. The blue sea and the blue sky, the white buildings and the white roads, and the great, fierce, brassy sun all dazzled him. He dropped his stick with a clatter, and from under the swing door of