Joan and Co.
all the enthusiasm of having a partner—even without having one.”
He saw her wince.
“Joan,” he broke out,—using the name unconsciously,—“Joan, all I can
say over and over again is that you’re wonderful. Even if you don’t
understand. But a man couldn’t do such a thing as you suggest. He’d be
a cad and worse. I’m here only by sufferance. You spoke once of the
cost. It’s been worth that many times over just to know you. I must
tell you that much. I’ll go back now able to do five years’ work in
one. If you’ll just keep on being—the sort of partner you are now, that
will be enough. Don’t you understand—a little?”
“I want to help,” she said simply. “I want something to do.”
“If you only knew—”
Devons cut himself short. He must be careful. His thoughts were running
wild. He saw clearly now the face of the woman of his dreams; it was
she; it was Joan; it was this girl who wanted to be his silent partner.
And the reason she could not be that was because he wanted more of her
than that—many, many times more.
He made for the door. He dared not stay longer with her.
CHAPTER XII
JOAN & CO.
Left alone, Joan tried to review calmly the situation which had
developed so unexpectedly and dramatically. She had acted quite on the
spur of the moment. Indeed, looking back upon it she realized that it
would have been impossible to have done what she did in any other way.
Yet now that she had time to think it over, she regretted nothing. She
had done a bold thing and she was proud of having done it. It left her
with a sense of freedom. For once she had acted on her own initiative.
Neither, in spite of his attitude, was she discouraged. Of course he
would look at it at first just as he had looked at it. That was due
partly to the Western pride of which he rather boasted—the pride that
made his father prefer to starve than accept a favor—and partly to
the fact that he could not appreciate her position. He considered her
only as an irresponsible young lady acting, perhaps, in a moment of
sentiment. That was natural enough, even though it was disappointing.
She had thought the last few weeks would have counted for more than
that.
Still she placed a great deal of confidence in his gray eyes. Though
his lips had stiffened, she had seen the eyes respond. She had seen
them quicken at her suggestion in a way that startled her. Even as he
left the room so abruptly she had seen them alive—as alive as the glint
of sunlight on steel. It was as though they told the truth against his
will; as though they were willing to accept her offer, though the lips
refused. And the eyes were the soul, while the lips were merely the man.
They had brought the color to her face—those eyes. She had felt her
cheeks burn. She could not quite explain that. Doubtless it was merely
the excitement of the moment. It was a big thing she was reaching
for—nothing less than a chance to get out of her prison. Leaning
forward toward the flames, elbow on knee and chin in hand, she allowed
her thoughts to take their own course for a moment. She saw the
business started in some little factory tucked away in a far corner of
the city. She was rather vague as to what the business was. That did
not matter. All business was vague. She saw Devons at work there with
his fine enthusiasm, and saw the little factory grow into a bigger one,
and then into a still bigger. But principally she saw the man back of
it, and felt the satisfaction of having herself a hand in his success.
Perhaps it might even be possible for her to help in some practical
way. She might be able to write letters for him. If she could do that—
“Good-morning, Joan.”
It was her mother who interrupted the pleasant reverie. She came in and
took the chair in which Devons had lately been sitting.
“You are about early, my dear, are you not?” inquired Mrs. Fairburne.
“Am I?” Joan answered uncomfortably.
“It is only a little after eleven. However, I’m glad you are feeling so
much stronger. And this—Mr. Devons—is he not almost himself again?”
Mrs. Fairburne arched her brows as she spoke.
“Yes, Mother.”
“Then?”
“He is going, soon,” replied Joan. “I—I wish you had come to know him
better.”
“I!” exclaimed Mrs. Fairburne.
“He has had such a hard time of it all his life. And now—”
Joan hesitated as she saw her mother’s face grow blank. If it had not
been for that she could have gone on quite naturally. She had grasped
at this opportunity to tell her the whole story. It was still necessary
because it was through her she must appeal to her father for funds, but
the difference was that she must do it awkwardly and self-consciously
now.
“He—he has always been handicapped because he had no money,” explained
Joan.
“Really?”
It was surprising what effects Mrs. Fairburne managed to produce by the
simple use of monosyllabic interrogations. Just at present it placed
her on some distant pinnacle almost out of ear-shot.
“You see I knew his cousin Mildred in college. I learned through her
what—it means to be like that. He has an invention—”
“He?”
“Mr. Devons,” explained Joan uneasily. “It has something to do with
leather, and just because he hasn’t any capital he can’t use it.”
The girl paused a moment and looked to her mother’s eyes. Mrs.
Fairburne merely waited. Yet in spite of lack of encouragement Joan
tried to break through—tried because she felt so sincerely what she
wished to say.
“So I told him I thought I could do something,” she ran on, quite out
of breath. “I told him I’d get some money for him. Mother—can’t you
help me?”
“You offered to supply him with funds?” gasped Mrs. Fairburne.
“So that he could get started.”
“And he accepted your offer?”
“No. He hasn’t accepted it. He said he couldn’t accept it.”
“That much is in his favor,” observed Mrs. Fairburne coldly.
“But if we made it easier for him—”
“My dear,” cut in Mrs. Fairburne, “the whole idea is absurd. I trust
you will not go to your father with it. Let us keep it a secret between
ourselves.”
“That means you’ll not help?”
“Joan! You disturb me. Really you must put the whole matter out of your
head at once.”
“Then you think it would do no good to see father?”
“I am quite sure it would only shock him. He was quite against having
this Mr. Devons in the house from the first. It was only upon the
medical advice of Dr. Nichols that he consented at all. Now if he
should learn—but, Joan, surely you are not considering such a thing?”
Joan rose. She shook her head wearily.
“I’m afraid you are right; he wouldn’t understand.”
“This affair has tired you, dear,” said Mrs. Fairburne. “I’m not at all
surprised. You’d better go to your room and lie down a little. And I
feel that the sooner Mr. Devons is able to leave—”
Joan smiled.
“You needn’t worry about his staying any longer than is necessary,” she
observed. “I’m sure he finds us all very stupid.”
With that Joan retired to her room, but not to lie down. She had not
spoken in anger. She meant, however, exactly what she said. To a man
like Devons how other could her world appear but a stupid little
world filled with stupid people? He had been here a month now with an
opportunity to study her and her parents in the intimate setting of
their daily lives. He had watched them at the petty routine of their
complacent and guarded round of dining and card-playing, the opera or
the theater. He had seen the uneventful days follow the uneventful
hours with the assurance that this would continue indefinitely. In the
meanwhile the great live city all about them, the city where men and
women grew through struggle, scarcely reached their consciousness. Even
when they glanced over their morning and evening papers, they read as
at a play. If by any chance the city was brought closer to them—as in
the presence of Devons—they resented it as an intrusion.
It was in this life they wished to fix her. They meant for the best.
She knew that. For them it spelled safety. But they did not take into
account her great need—the need born of Youth—which is not for the safe
things, but the venturesome things. It is only because of Youth that
the world dares go on. It is in Youth that men go to sea in boats; that
men go to war; that men search the far places. And some part in this is
given to women—if only the waiting part.
Looking from her window, Joan felt the call—the call of the bold and
the blessed unwise. It flushed her cheeks and stiffened her muscles
and bred strange thoughts in her. Once again she was back in the
midst of life with Devons, helping him in the clash with reality. It
gave new meaning to the little side street in front of her which led
to the broad avenue, which in turn led to all the thousand and other
streets—big and little—which make New York. Though for the moment it
seemed as though she had been balked utterly in her desires, she felt a
sense of fresh courage. She had made her proposal to her mother quite
without result and knew that under those circumstances it was futile to
go to her father. That left her no one to whom to turn—but Dicky.
No one but Dicky! She caught her breath at the inspired suggestion.
After all, Dicky was some one. In his way he was very much some one.
Whenever she wished to think of him at his best, as she did now, she
went back to that picture of him standing by her machine on that
eventful afternoon when she left Delmonico’s. He had bared his head and
said simply:
“I’d rather you felt you had some one—always ready—to call on.”
Though she was never sure in some things that Dicky meant what he said,
she had believed with her whole heart that he meant this. As she drove
off and left him there, she was very glad he had spoken so, though it
seemed scarcely probable then that ever it would be necessary for
her to call upon him. She had even wished that it might be necessary
because she thought it might please him, and she had desired then as
never before to please him in some way.
Now here was her opportunity, and his opportunity, and Devons’s
opportunity. She knew little about Dicky’s business except that he
had an office downtown with his father, whom she had heard spoken of
vaguely as a manufacturer. She knew little because it concerned Dicky
little and her less. She could not have named the source of income of
a half-dozen of her many friends. Some of them went downtown in the
morning and some of them did not. It would have been difficult for her
to separate them into even this broad division. It was assumed they all
had ample means, and she gave no further thought than that to their
affairs.
It was assumed Dicky had ample means. That meant he had sufficient to
do whatever he wished. So that to ask him for that mysterious symbol of
money termed “capital” was not to ask him for anything very much. It
involved no great sacrifice on his part and it need be nothing but in
the nature of a loan.
She lunched in her room that day because she wished to avoid seeing
Devons again until she had something definite to tell him. Then she
dressed with a little more care than usual because she knew Dicky had
a weakness for such things, and if she was going to ask a favor of
him it was no more than right that she should do in her turn what she
could to please him. So she allowed Henriette to do as she pleased,
and whenever Henriette was given that privilege she produced extremely
charming results. This afternoon she chose a crêpe-de-chine of African
brown that had touches of orange in the waist and girdle. The skirt
of a panier effect went no lower than the top of Joan’s trim ankles,
affording a piquant contrast of grandmother’s time and to-day.
Dicky came at three-thirty, and the moment he laid eyes on her he