What Will People Say? A Novel
"Winifred, it's you! I didn't know you were in town!"
And Winifred, assured by her manner that she had not overheard, hastened
to embrace her, exclaiming: "Persis, darling! I haven't seen you for a
thousand years."
And they kissed each other.
"You see, I haven't gone yet," Mrs. Neff apologized. "Winifred and I
fell to talking--about you, of course."
"Say it to my face," said Persis.
Winifred lied angelically. "Cornelia was telling me how famously you and
Willie get along. You're so congenial."
Persis recognized the intended obloquy, and beamed in answer: "Willie is
a duck of a husband. Why don't you try marriage?"
This was so straight a lunge that Winifred slid in a sly _riposte_:
"Do you ever see that li'l snojer man of yours any more?"
"Li'l snojer man? Have I one?" said Persis, white-mouthed with fear at
the directness of the attack, and at the simultaneous tingle of the
door-bell. She tried to check Crofts, calling to him as he moved to the
door. But he did not hear.
Mrs. Neff was enjoying the rare treat of seeing Persis discomfited, ill
at ease. She joined the onset.
"She means Captain Forbes."
"Yes--that's the one," Winifred smiled. "See him often?"
"Oh, once in a long while," Persis confessed. "Why?"
"I just wondered. He used to be so devoted to you."
"Oh, that was ages ago," Persis laughed. And then Crofts came in with
his little salver. Persis regarded it with as much dread as if it bore
the head of John the Baptist instead of a tiny white card.
Crofts was so proud of remembering his instructions that he murmured,
with a senile smile: "You told me you were at home to him, ma'am."
Persis read the name, and it danced before her eyes, fantastically. In
the phrase of the prize-fighters, "they had her going." It was all so
simple and foolish, yet so naggingly annoying, that she was utterly
nonplussed. She stood a moment snapping the card in her fingers. Then
she had a mad inspiration. She smiled stupidly between Mrs. Neff and
Winifred and said:
"It's my--my lawyer. I--I'll go to the door and see him."
"But I asked him to come up!" Crofts protested in a doddering collapse,
and vanished like a ghost at cockcrow.
Forbes appeared at the door. He saw Persis, and there was no mistaking
the love in his eyes. Then he saw Winifred and Mrs. Neff, and there was
no mistaking his confusion, though he tried to put on a smile of delight
at the sight of them.
Mrs. Neff grinned with rapturous malice, and bewildered Forbes utterly
by asking three ironical questions and not staying for an answer:
"Changed your profession, Captain Forbes? A lawyer now? Specialty
divorces?"
Then she nodded to Winifred, and they made their way out, ignoring
Persis' outstretched hand.
CHAPTER LXV
Forbes stared after the two women in complete perplexity. He turned to
Persis to ask stupidly:
"What did they mean, Persis?"
Persis had lost almost every whit of self-control. She had an insane
desire to scream, to hide somewhere and go into hysterics. She sank into
a chair and mumbled:
"They know everything."
"Good God, it's not possible! Was it because I came in as I did?"
"Yes, but it wasn't your fault. It was mine and Crofts'."
He made to take her in his arms, but she warned him where he was with a
gesture. He sank into a chair, groaning:
"I'd rather cut off my right hand than bring suspicion on you, Persis."
Staring idly ahead of her, Persis maundered in a hollow voice, "And they
refused my hand!" The lash of this remembered insult brought her to her
feet with a snarl. "They refused my hand! Oh, it's all over now. A war
extra couldn't spread the scandal faster than those two women. But I
suppose it had to come some day. And we thought we were so discreet!"
She laughed bitterly, for the luxury of self-contempt was alkali upon
her tongue. But Forbes could only sigh, "How you must hate me!"
"How much I love you!" she whispered. Even in her panic she had no
reproach for the author of her defeat; and as she paced the floor she
touched his cheek with a passing caress.
She walked to the window idly and stared out into the street. She fell
back with a gasp. "Oh, they saw me!--they saw me!"
"Who?--who saw you?"
"Alice Neff and Stowe Webb just drove up. They waved to me. They're
coming here. Good Lord of heaven, at such a time!"
The door-bell rang in confirmation, and Crofts shuffled down the hall.
He glanced timidly at Persis, and she nodded her head.
"You can't see them now," Forbes protested; "tell the man not to let
them in."
"It wouldn't do any good. Besides, they saw me. Now of all times I must
keep up a bold front. Wait in the library, Harvey. I'll get rid of them
as soon as I can." He was hardly gone before Alice came running, crying,
"Oh, here you are," and seizing the hand that Persis thrust at her
absent-mindedly. Stowe Webb seized her other hand and clung to it as
Alice rattled on: "We had the narrowest escape! Just as our taxi drew up
to your door my awful mother and Winifred drove away--without seeing
us!"
"And do you poor children still have to meet in secret, too?" Persis
asked with a dreary sympathy.
"Indeed we have to," Webb replied, "and always shall. Her mother won't
let me in the house! And I am doing a little better now--two thousand a
year. But Alice's mother still calls me a pauper. Our only hope is a
runaway marriage. But Alice always remembers what you told her. I wish
you could advise her differently now, for we are hopelessly unhappy. We
couldn't be more miserable even if we were married."
Alice corroborated this theory. "It's simply terrible the trials we are
put to now. But you made it so vivid to me--the other side of it--the
sordidness, the poverty, the stairs, the bills; how I should grow plain,
and begin to nag; how I should ruin Stowe's career. Oh, why do we women
always seem to be getting in the way of the careers of the men we love!
Why can't we help them?"
"We can, Alice, we can!" Persis averred, with a sudden energy. "If we
begin the right way, if our love is the right sort, if we don't wait too
long. Marry him, Alice."
"But you said," Alice reminded her, "that I should miss all the comforts
that make life worth while." And Persis answered with a solemnity that
was unwonted in her:
"If you don't marry the one you love you miss everything that makes life
worth while. If you don't sacrifice everything that love asks, why, love
robs you of all your delight in the things you have kept. Your mother
will forgive you, Alice. But what if she doesn't? It is better to lack
the forgiveness of some one else--of every one else!--than to feel that
you can never, never forgive yourself. That is the most horrible thing
in life, not to forgive yourself."
"But you talk so differently now!" Alice interposed; and Persis
explained it dismally enough:
"I know more now than I did then."
Alice went into her arms, eager to be coerced and decided for: "And you
really think it is my duty to go?"
"A woman's first duty is to her love," Persis cried. "Go, marry the boy,
Alice, and be true to him--oh, be true to him!--always!
whatever--whoever--comes into your life. Love and fidelity!--what a
marriage they make!"
Young Webb bent and kissed her hand, saying: "You must be a very good
woman to give such noble advice. And Willie Enslee must be a mighty good
husband. Come along, Alice, remember your promise!"
He started to drag her out, but Alice hung back and demanded, "Give us
your blessing first."
"My blessing? My blessing?" And Persis' amazement was hardly greater
than a curious shock of rapture over the unheard-of prayer.
"Yes, for you are so good!" Alice insisted. And Persis, in
half-hysterical emotion, waved her shivering hands over them and
murmured:
"God be with you forever!"
When they had gone and Forbes came back to her she was mumbling in a
strange delight: "I don't believe any one ever before called me good. It
has a rather pleasant sound." She was half laughing, half crying. "I've
done some good in the world at last."
"I don't believe I ever truly loved you till now," Forbes said. He had
played eavesdropper to her counsel, and it had endeared her to him
magically. He took her in his arms and she kissed him, and there was a
moment of peaceful oblivion. Then the habit of stealth resumed control
of Persis. She began anew to hear footsteps everywhere and to imagine
eyes gazing from all sides.
"You mustn't stay a minute longer," she whispered. "Willie is at home.
You telephoned you had something awfully important to tell me."
"Yes. You've got to help me make the most important decision of my
life."
"Can't it wait?"
"No. I must decide to-day. My leave of absence has been withdrawn, and
I've been ordered back to my cavalry regiment at once."
So disaster followed disaster.
"Isn't there any way out of it?" she asked, weakly.
"I tried to get the order recalled, but there is some influence against
me at Washington."
"Some woman! I know! It's Willie's mother. She has General Branscombe
under her thumb."
"But that would mean that she suspected us!"
"A woman always suspects the worst. And she's always right. Well, what
are we to do?"
"That is for you to decide, Persis," Forbes said. "I have two letters
here, two requests." He produced two formidable official envelopes. "I
have influence enough to get either of them granted."
"What are they?" she asked, terrified by the documents.
"This is an acknowledgment of the order and a statement that I take the
train to-morrow for New Mexico."
"New Mexico!" Persis gasped. "I shouldn't see you again for a long, long
while."
"Never."
"Then I choose that you send the other letter, of course," she spoke
almost gaily. "What is it?"
"My resignation from the service."
"Your resignation?" she gasped. "Why should you resign?"
"To avoid court-martial for the crime of stealing another man's wife.
Either you go away with me where your husband can't follow, or I go away
where you can't follow."
"You don't mean to force a choice like that on me?" she protested. He
nodded grimly.
But her frantic soul was incapable of decision; it fled from the effort.
The memory of her humiliation before Mrs. Neff and Winifred swept back
over her with intolerable shame; she began to stride along the floor
again, gnashing her teeth in rage:
"What can I do to silence those women? Harvey, you must help me. Think
up some neat lie that will look like the truth."
He was so tired of deception that he groaned aloud. She whirled on him
in raucous fury: "Do you suppose I'm going to give in to a couple of
frumps like those two? Do you think I'll let an old hen and an old maid
down me?--now! Well, hardly! I'm no quitter, Harvey. I never was a
quitter, was I? But what can I do? No story would convince them. I must
stop their mouths--that's it. Everybody's got a scandal somewhere. What
do I know about them? What have I heard?" She beat her head to stir her
memory. "If I can't find out something I must make it up."
Forbes glared at her incredulously. "Persis! Are you lost to all
decency?"
"You ought to know," she retorted. "But what of that? I'm desperate. I'm
fighting for life."
"Oh, my God, Persis, what have we come to?" he moaned. "Is this the
result of our love?"
"Yes, this is it!" she laughed. "This is what comes of having a heart. I
see now why a love like ours is against all the laws, written and
unwritten. It's the wisdom of the ages, Harvey." His very neck rebelled
against the galling yoke of their intrigue. He groaned:
"We can't go on with the situation any more. We are getting
degraded--driven to lies, and now you suggest blackmail. What next? We
must pull up short and sharp, Persis. You must decide this minute: