Joan and Co.
old dress-suit-case in the corner thrust itself forward as though
trying to humiliate him. And remembering the dainty china upon which
his meals at her home had been served, he frowned at the tin dipper,
before which she sat watching, like a chemist, for some delicate
reaction.
Then he saw her rise and remove the dipper of steaming water and put in
the cube and look about for a spoon.
“You’ll have to use a pencil,” he said.
She objected to so unprofessional a method, but if he had no spoon
there was nothing else to be done. To-morrow she would come prepared.
She stirred it carefully and brought it to his side. He rose on his
elbow and drank it—as bitter and unpalatable a beverage as a man could
well swallow. She had forgotten to add salt, for one thing. It tasted
of tin, for another. It was too hot, for a third. But had it been
hemlock and she had offered it, he would not have hesitated.
“Now,” she said, “you ought to sleep.”
“With you here!”
“Then I’ll go.”
“Not yet,” he pleaded. “Do you mind just—sitting there?”
She brought the chair to his side and sat down.
“I don’t want to scold you now,” she began, “but don’t you see how
foolish you’ve been?”
“There was so much to be done, all at once,” he explained.
“And you tried to do it all by yourself.”
“There was no one else.”
“There was I. Why, I—I’ve been doing nothing all this while.”
“You did your share when you made everything possible.”
She shook her head.
“I can’t claim credit even for that. But please don’t talk. Please—just
listen.”
So while he lay there flat on his back cursing to himself the weakness
that made it necessary, she told him of her preposterous plan. He would
need some one in the office as a sort of bookkeeper, and though she did
not know very much about bookkeeping she could learn and perhaps could
help in other ways.
“For one thing, it seems to be necessary for some one to make sure that
you take care of yourself.”
“If it hadn’t been for this cold—” he started to explain.
“If you had eaten properly you wouldn’t have caught cold,” she cut him
off. “There is not the slightest use in the world to argue about it.”
He was at a distinct disadvantage. In the first place, it is difficult
to hold your own in an argument when lying prone even if you have all
the right on your side. Again, though he was trying his level best
to appear normal there was between his eyes a pain so sharp that at
moments it made him blind. Finally, it seemed inevitable that, once she
made up her mind, she should have her way in whatever she desired.
If one were to direct her at all it must be in some earlier stage.
He tried to go back a little to find where he was at fault, but that
involved too much effort.
Besides, the one big, white fact, that made every other fact appear
petty, was that now, at this moment, she was here. Yesterday, last
night, and all to-day, until Arkwright had come up, he had lain here
alone fretting over lost time in a fashion that threatened to double
and treble the toll of wasted hours. And he had thought if only he
could see her for a second—just catch a glimpse of her passing on the
street—that all the strength would come back into him.
“I think I had better read to you,” she decided. “Perhaps it will help
you not to think.”
The only thing she could find was a textbook on chemistry, so she
picked up that and began at page one. It was not very interesting, but
that was so much the better. She plunged ahead in a low monotone, and
mispronounced frightfully many of the words she met. But she kept on,
conscious that his eyes were upon her. She kept on and on paying no
attention to the meaning of the text—kept on and on, until she heard
him breathing slowly and naturally. As soon as his eyes closed, she
stopped and waited a moment, ready to begin again if they opened.
Then she rose and moved on tiptoe to the table. She took the pencil and
scribbled a note upon a piece of blank paper she found. It read simply:
I shall be here at ten to-morrow.
JOAN FAIRBURNE
She slipped this into the book and placed it on the chair near the bed.
Then moving toward the door she beckoned Henriette to follow.
At Arkwright’s suite below, she paused and knocked again.
“I must leave him with you now,” she announced as he appeared. “But
I shall be here in the morning. He is to have his beef tea every two
hours.”
He nodded and escorted her to the machine. He watched it scoot away
beneath the Elevated toward Washington Square.
“Good Lord!” he gasped, “if I thought anything like that would run over
me I’d take a chance.”
CHAPTER XIX
PRINCESSES
Devons awoke at odd times during the night, and every time he did so
Arkwright got up from the chair where he was sleeping, lighted the
alcohol lamp and brewed a tin dipper of beef tea. Devons protested, but
Arkwright only answered, stubbornly:
“That’s all right, old man. Only drink it. I was ordered to see that
you had this, so the least said the better.”
Even after Devons consented to swallow the stuff, Arkwright refused to
talk, but sank back in his chair, stretched his long legs out in front
of him, and went to sleep.
After this had occurred twice, Devons refused to let Arkwright know
when he woke up, but lay quietly staring into the dark at the chair,
where he could have sworn she had been sitting, in the early evening.
He found this such a pleasant thing to do that always he went to
sleep again. The last time he awoke it was seven and broad daylight.
Arkwright, too, was awake and saw him when he opened his eyes. So once
again he rose and made for the alcohol lamp.
“If you give me another dipper of that—” began Devons.
“It’s her orders.”
“Whose orders?”
“Miss Fairburne’s,” answered Arkwright as he lighted the lamp.
Devons rose to his elbow.
“Then she _was_ here!”
“Of course, she was, man! Have you been as bad as that?”
“No, only—look here, Arkwright, if you’ll cut out that stuff I’ll eat
an egg.”
Arkwright hesitated.
“I’ll eat two eggs,” Devons promised.
“I don’t know.”
“She won’t care. I know she won’t. I’m feeling great this morning.”
His eye caught the note in the book. He reached for it and read it.
Then he threw back the covers and started out of bed.
“What you going to do?” demanded Arkwright.
“She’s coming back!” exclaimed Devons. “She’ll be here at ten.”
“What of it?”
“She mustn’t, that’s all. I—I can’t let her see this place in the
daylight.”
Arkwright glanced about.
“Does look kind of rowdy, now that you speak of it,” he admitted.
“So I must get shaved and dressed and—and meet her downstairs. I’ll
take her to the office—anywhere but here.”
“Steady,” warned Arkwright; “I’m not so sure she would like that. If we
dressed the place up a little—”
“It can’t be done,” groaned Devons. “I’ve got to get out before she
comes, I tell you.”
“Just a minute, old man. I could wash the windows, for one thing. I
have a rug or two and some pictures, and in my trunk some things in
the way of table-covers my good aunt sent me. If you’ll just sit tight
I have a hunch quite a bit could be done in three hours. When a lady
makes an appointment at a certain place, you have to keep it, that’s
all.”
“I can telephone.”
“I don’t think I would,” replied Arkwright thoughtfully. “I’d shave and
eat my two eggs and keep cool, and watch what your Uncle Dudley can
accomplish.”
When Devons came to stand up he discovered that after all he had
no other choice. His legs were decidedly weak. By the time he had
shaved and dressed and swallowed the eggs, he was quite helpless. But
Arkwright took off his coat and went at his undertaking like a man. At
the end of an hour he had the place as clean as soap and water could
make it, and in another half-hour had stripped his own room of about
everything in the way of rugs and pictures and brought them up here. He
even included his best chair and an ottoman covering for the bed. Then
he stood back and surveyed his handiwork.
“Eh?” he asked with considerable satisfaction.
For the twentieth time Devons exclaimed:
“It’s darned good of you!”
“Not a mite of it,” answered Arkwright. “If fairy princesses _will_
call on careless bachelors, the only decent way is to make things as
respectable as possible. And then,” he concluded, glancing at his
watch, “the next proper thing is to get out.”
“Look here,” protested Devons, “there’s no need of that.”
“Anyway, I want to smoke.”
“Can’t you smoke here?”
“Certainly not,” declared Arkwright. “You have to make your sacrifices
for princesses. Good luck.”
With that he went out and left Devons alone, whereupon the latter
immediately began to believe that she would not come, anyway. He
took that stand, not because it was what he wished to believe, but,
perversely, because it was very much what he did _not_ wish to believe.
He sat in a chair with his eyes fixed on the door and felt his heart
jump like a startled rabbit at every sound he heard below. It was
disconcerting how much he wished her to come. It took him back to those
few moments before the open fire when he had been forced to run in
order not to speak the words that surged up hotly clamoring for speech.
He had been glad ever since that he had remained dumb. But he knew that
never again would it be as easy as it was then, though then it had
not been easy. He knew that every time he saw her it was going to be
harder. This is why he had kept away these last two weeks and confined
himself merely to business notes. He must keep in mind always the fact
that this was with her purely a business proposition. She and that
other, whoever he might be, were his silent partners, that was all. So
they must remain until he had won his success and repaid his debt and
stood free and clear with a bank account of his own big enough to be
worthy of her. When he was ready to take her to Arkwright and show her
those blue-prints—then, and not until then, would he have any right to
speak.
“You have to make your sacrifices for princesses,” Arkwright had said
jokingly.
But that was true in a larger way than Arkwright had meant.
At five minutes of ten Devons heard steps coming up the stairs. He
sprang to his feet and tried to stand steady. The steps paused at the
landing below and then came on again. They came on to his very door.
Then it seemed an eternity before he heard the rap of a gloved hand.
With his heart in his mouth he crossed the room.
It was she, Joan, and behind her Henriette, and behind Henriette,
Charles with a large wicker basket.
“You may put that down here,” she said to Charles, “and wait outside.”
Then she turned and saw Devons where she had expected to see Arkwright.
“Why are you up?” she demanded ominously.
“Because—because I am feeling so much better,” he stammered.
“That is the beef tea,” she decided.
“It is in spite of the beef tea,” he replied. “Please to come in.”
She turned to help Henriette with the basket, and he instinctively made
his way past her to take the burden himself. And he could not lift the
thing. Actually he could not. He was obliged to stand by and see the
two women stagger into the room with it. Humiliated, he was forced to
watch his princess do the thing he should have been strong enough to
do. It gave him further proof, if any were needed, that he must keep
his lips tight closed.
He heard her exclamation of surprise as she passed over the threshold.
“What have you been doing here?” she asked.
“Nothing much,” he tried to answer carelessly; “Arkwright has been
fixing up a little.”
“But it isn’t the same room!” she exclaimed, as though in
disappointment. “It isn’t your room!”