Kitabı oku: «A Captain in the Ranks: A Romance of Affairs», sayfa 13

XXVI
A Pact With Barbara

That evening Guilford Duncan was summoned to Hallam's house for supper. With only Mrs. Hallam for auditor, Hallam wished to tell the young man all that had occurred, for Duncan had not been permitted to know aught of it, since Hallam had turned him out of his room, in order that the conference with Dick Temple might be a strictly private one.

Nor had Duncan seemed very greatly concerned to inquire. He had not expected Hallam and Temple to succeed in accomplishing anything, and at this time his fate was at crisis in another and, to him, a dearer way. His interview with Barbara had been held, as we know, at the precise time when Hallam and Temple were in consultation with regard to the matter of Tandy's accusation. In some degree, at least, the painful character of that interview with Barbara, and its unsatisfactory result, had dulled his mind to the other trouble. In view of Barbara's seemingly final rejection of his wooing, he was not sure that he greatly cared what might become of his reputation, or his career. He was too strong a man in his moral character, however, to remain long in a state of such indifference, but for the time being he found it impossible to regard his future as a matter of much consequence, now that Barbara refused to share that future with him.

"There is still one more chance," he reflected, "one more interview with Barbara, one more hope that I may win her. If that fails, the other thing won't matter much. I'll horsewhip Tandy and then go away. No, I won't go away. I won't desert in the presence of the enemy. I won't – oh, I don't know what I will or won't do. All that must wait till I know my fate with Barbara."

This was on the morning after his evening with Barbara – the morning on which Temple first made acquaintance with Tandy. Duncan was sitting idly in his office, mechanically toying with a paper cutter. Presently he overturned the inkstand, spilling its contents over some legal papers that he had drawn upon the day before.

"That's fortunate!" he ejaculated, as with blotting pads he sought to save what he could of the documents. "It gives me something better to do than sit here idly mooning. Those papers must go off by the afternoon mail, and I must rewrite them first."

He set to work at once, and close application to the task for several hours brought him into a healthier condition of mind. When he had finished the task and had taken the papers to the postoffice he realized that his state of mind had been a morbid one. He realized, too, that he must end the suspense as quickly as possible, in order that he might take up work and grow sound of soul again.

Returning to his office he sent a note to Barbara:

I shall go to see you to-night, unless you forbid. I must hear what more you have to tell me, and I must in my turn tell you something of myself. When that is done, I shall renew my efforts to win you to myself. Please send me word that I may come.

For answer, he got the single word "Come," written in the middle of a page, without address or signature. Thus it came about that while Temple was sitting in his hotel room, in negotiation with Tandy over a matter that involved Duncan's future more vitally than any other event had ever done, Duncan himself sat with Barbara, trying to adjust another matter which seemed to him of even greater consequence.

Barbara had her emotions in leash, now. Without hesitation, and with a bravely controlled utterance, she went at once to the marrow of the matter.

"I told you," she began, "that I am the daughter of a Thief. My father was trusted absolutely by my grandfather. He betrayed the trust. He made use of his authority as a member of the banking house, not only to wreck it in speculation, but also to rob all the people who had entrusted their money to it. I don't understand such matters very well, but, at any rate, my father ruined the firm and robbed its customers. At a single stroke he reduced his father to poverty and forever disgraced his honorable name. When he found that the facts must become known at once, my father went home and blew his brains out. I was born that day, and my mother died of shock and grief within the hour. My poor grandfather lived for a month, without speaking a word to anybody. Then he quit living."

"It is a terribly sad story," said Duncan. "I should not have let you tell it, poor child."

"Oh, but I was obliged to tell you," she interrupted. "It was my duty. You see – well, you have been so good to me, and I am obliged to say 'no' to what you asked me before you knew this horrible thing. It wouldn't have been fair just to say 'no,' and not tell you of a thing that explains, a thing that must make you wish you hadn't asked me that."

"But it does not make me wish anything of the kind, Barbara. It makes me more eager than ever to win you, in order that I may devote my life to the loving task of making you forget the horror of this thing. Oh, Barbara! I never loved you half so madly as I love you now. And you love me. I know it, but you must say it. You love me, Barbara! Say it! Say it – now!"

The girl hesitated for no more than a moment, while her whole body quivered.

"God help me!" she said then, "I do love you! I love you too well to let you link your life with mine, to let you take upon yourself the shadow of my disgrace."

"But you have no disgrace. You are innocent. The fault is not yours that your father betrayed his trust a score of years ago – before you were born."

"Listen!" she interrupted with passionate determination. "If you were to marry me I should become the mother of your children. That would make them the grandchildren of a Thief."

The two were standing now.

"I want you to sit down while I answer you, Barbara," said Duncan, with almost unimaginable tenderness in his tone. "No, not in that straight-backed chair, for I want you to listen to all I have to say, and to be at ease while you listen. Sit here," pushing an easy chair forward, "sit here where you can see my face as I speak. I want you to see in my eyes the sincerity of my soul."

Barbara obeyed and listened.

"I was born and brought up," he said, "in a region where all the old traditions had full sway over the minds of men and women, enslaving them. During four years of war I learned much, but I unlearned far more. I learned to look facts in the face, and to accept them at their just value. I learned to judge of others and of their worth by what they are, not by what their fathers or grandfathers may have been. I unlearned the false teaching of tradition that aught else than personal character and personal conduct goes to the making up of any human being's account with his fellow man. I had a true democracy forced upon me when I saw men of the humblest extraction winning high place for themselves, and being set to command men of the loftiest lineage – all because of personal character and fitness, and in spite of their lack of caste. No sane man can contemplate the character and career of Mr. Lincoln, for example, without finding in it an object lesson in democracy which should make a very laughing-stock of all the fables of aristocratic tradition. I tell you truly that I have put all those things behind me, as all Americans must who truly believe in the fundamental principles of our Republic. Every man must be accepted for what he is, not for what his father or his grandfather may have been. We read that lesson in the lives of such men as Ben Franklin, and Abraham Lincoln, and Grant, and a score of other notables. We read it even more clearly in everyday life. No banker extends credit to a worthless man on the ground that he was born to high social repute. No banker withholds credit from a man of integrity because his father was not to be trusted. All day, every day, men everywhere are acting upon a clear perception of the truth that each human being must be judged by what he is, and not by what some other person has been.

"Now I know you, Barbara, for what you are, and I love you for that alone. What your father may have done or been, twenty years ago, is to me a matter of entire indifference, except that the knowledge of it gives you pain and sorrow. It makes no difference to me; it in no way alters or lessens my love for you, and it never will. Knowing it all, I am more earnest than ever in my purpose to make you my wife if I can persuade you to that after I have told you something about myself that may very justly seem to you a real bar to my hopes."

"Go on, please," said the girl. "Tell me what you will, but I shall never believe anything ill of you. I know better."

"Thank you for saying that, dear," he responded with a tremor in his tone. "But unhappily others may believe it. If they do, then the career you have expected for me must be at an end at once. My reputation for integrity will be gone for good, and I must be content to surrender all my ambitions. That is why I must tell you of this ugly thing before again asking you to be my wife."

"Go on," she said again. "But I shall believe nothing bad of you, even though an angel should tell me."

"I told you the other night," he said, "that I had quarreled with Napper Tandy; that he had tried to tempt me with a money bribe to do an infamous thing. He now gives it out that it was I who proposed the bribe; that I went to him with an offer to do that infamous thing for hire, and that he indignantly rejected the offer."

"He lies!" broke in the girl.

"Yes, he lies, of course," answered Duncan, "but I have no way of proving it. He and I were alone and in his house. There were no witnesses. How, then, am I ever to clear my name of so foul an accusation?"

"There is no need," answered the girl. "Nobody who knows you will ever believe the story. Captain Hallam would not think it worth asking a question about."

"No, Captain Hallam would not for a moment think of such a thing as even possible. But that is because he knows me as few other men do or ever will. But the accusation troubles him, because he knows that other people will believe it. He and Richard Temple are at this moment busy trying to find some way of clearing my name of the foul slander. They will do all that two loyal and sagacious friends can do to accomplish that purpose. But I cannot imagine any way in which they can succeed."

"What is it they are doing?"

"I do not know; they have refused to tell me. I only know that they can never succeed."

"Oh, you must not think that. You don't know what wonders Captain Hallam can work when he is in earnest. You must have hope and confidence. Besides, nobody who knows you will ever believe such a story as that. Your enemies will pretend to believe it, and for a time the people who love to gossip will repeat it to each other. But you will live it down. Every act of your life will contradict the lie, and Tandy's reputation is not of a kind to lead sensible people to believe his falsehood when you have set the truth against it. You are depressed and despondent now. The mood is unworthy of you."

"Tell me what I should do."

"First of all you should act like the brave, strong man that you are. You should either take this slander by the throat and strangle it by publishing a simple, direct statement of the facts, or you should ignore it altogether, as a thing too absurd to need even a denial. Wait till you see what Captain Hallam and Mr. Temple succeed in doing, and then act as seems best. But in any case, you must be strong and courageous. No other mood belongs to such a man as you."

Duncan looked her full in the face for a space before speaking. Then he said:

"And yet you say you have no gift to help me – that if you were my wife you would be a drag upon me! Oh, Barbara, you cannot know how greatly I need the strength that the sympathy and counsel of such a woman as you are must give to the man who loves and wins her. You have in this hour rescued me from despondency; you have made me strong again; you have shown me my duty, and inspired me with resolution to do it manfully."

"I am very glad," she answered.

"Then promise me that you will stand by my side always. Let me give you the right to help. Say that you will be my wife!"

His voice was full of tender pleading and for a moment the girl hesitated. Finally she said:

"I think I know how to answer now, but you mustn't interrupt. I feel as though I couldn't stand much this evening."

"I will not interrupt. I am too eager to hear."

"I think I have a plan – for you and me. I still think what I thought before – when I said 'no.' I still think you ought to have some better woman for your wife, some woman more nearly your equal, some woman who could help you to win a great place for yourself in the world and could herself fill the place of a great man's wife with dignity. You ought to marry a woman who knows, oh, ever so much that I shall never know – a woman that you need never be ashamed to introduce as your wife. No, don't interrupt!" she exclaimed, seeing that he was on the point of doing so. "I know what you would say, and that is the only thing that makes me doubt my own conviction about these matters. It seems to me a wonderful thing that such a man as you should care for such a woman as I am, but the fact that you do care for me almost makes me think sometimes that maybe after all I misjudge myself, and that you are right. It seems so hard to believe you wrong. Now, I must be perfectly frank, because I know no other way of saying what I must. I have confessed that I love you. You compelled me to do that. If I were sure of my capacity to make you happy, not just for a little while, but throughout all your life, I would say 'yes' to the questions you have asked. But I mustn't make any mistake that might spoil your life, and so I must not say 'yes' just now, at least, and you will not let me say 'no.' I am still very young, as you know. You, too, are young enough to wait. So I think we'll leave both the 'yes' and the 'no' unsaid for a long time to come – for a year, perhaps – long enough, at any rate, for both of us to find out which of us is right. During that time we must be the very best of friends. You must tell me everything that concerns you, so that I may practice helping you, and find out whether I can really do it or not. If you find that I can't you shall be perfectly free to go away from me. If I find that I can't, then I'll say 'no' and stick to it."

Duncan was disposed to plead for better terms, but the little lady had fully made up her mind and would accept no modification of the treaty. Duncan had no choice but to accept an arrangement which, after all, had much of joy and still more of promise in it.

As they were on the point of parting, Barbara – with something like a struggle – made an addition to the compact.

"If that slander sticks to you, Guilford, I'll marry you at once and give it the lie."

What could the warm-blooded young man do but kiss her with fervor?

"Surely you will forgive me," he began in fear, lest he had offended.

"I don't mind – for once. But you mustn't do that again till – well, while we continue to be just friends."

XXVII
Mrs. Hallam Hears News

As Guilford Duncan sat late that night, recalling the events of the evening, he felt himself more and more nearly satisfied with the outcome of his wooing. It was true, of course, that Barbara had not promised to become his wife, as he had hoped that she might do, but at any rate she had confessed her love for him in a way that left nothing to conjecture. With such a woman, he reflected, love is never lightly given, and once given it can never be withdrawn.

Moreover, as he reflected upon the compact, he saw how certainly the close and intimate friendship for which it provided must daily and hourly draw the two lovers closer and closer together, making each of them more and more necessary to the other. In brief, there was so much that was satisfactory in the compact that he put aside all the rest as "not worth worrying over."

As he realized the extent of his success in his wooing he planned to perfect it in a hundred ways. He resolved to make every possible opportunity for Barbara to help him, in order that she might learn how helpful she could be. He determined to acquaint her with all his affairs, in the utmost detail, in order that she might make herself more and more a part of his life. His first thought was that he would withhold from her knowledge everything that annoyed or distressed him, thus sparing her all that he could of pain, while telling her freely of every joyous thing. But he quickly saw how unfair that would be, and how unlike what such a woman would desire. He had begun to catch something of Barbara's own spirit, and to know that any reserves with her now would be a cruel wrong to her loving desire for a helpful share in his life.

"I will be as frank with her," he resolved, "as if she were already my wife. She shall share my sorrows as well as my joys. And what a comfort her sympathy will be!"

He slept little that night, yet on the morrow he went to his work with a buoyancy of spirit such as he had not known since that evening when he had first declared his love.

It was in this mood of elation and hopefulness that he went to the Hallams' an hour before the supper time. He did not yet know what Hallam and Temple had been trying to do, and of course he knew nothing of the success they had achieved. But in his present mood he was optimistic enough to hope for some good result. He thought he might meet Temple at supper if his work, whatever it was, had been finished, and when he found that his friend was neither present nor expected, he satisfied himself with the reflection that the task Temple had undertaken was very probably one requiring a good deal more time than had elapsed since he began it. A little later he got more definite information.

"Temple isn't to be with us," he half said, half asked, after the greetings were over.

"No," answered Captain Will. "He has gone back to the mines. He is rather done up with the work and anxiety and loss of sleep. I tried to make him take possession of your rooms this afternoon, for a straight-away sleep, but he thought he'd rather go back to his wife till the tenth. He'll be here, however, in time to assist at the grand finale, as the show people call it."

"I'm afraid I don't understand," said Duncan with a look of inquiry.

"Why, there's to be a meeting of the stockholders of the X National on the tenth, you know."

"I didn't know. But what of it?"

"Why, only that your friend Temple wants to be there, when he and I march into the meeting controlling a majority interest and elect a board of directors for old Napper Tandy, leaving him completely out of it. Not a word about that, however, to anybody, till the time comes. We want to add to the dramatic effect by making the thing a complete surprise."

If Captain Will Hallam had been a robust boy of ten, chewing upon a particularly toothsome morsel, he could not have shown a greater relish for what was in his mouth than he did for these sentences as he uttered them. His manner had all of active satisfaction in it that an eager card player manifests when he saves a doubtful game by throwing down a final and unsuspected trump at the end of a hand that has seemed to be lost.

But Duncan was still mystified, and in answer to his questions Captain Hallam explained.

"When you got yourself into trouble by monkeying with the accentuations of a buzz saw," he said, "I could see only one way out, and that was to put you into a position where even the disembodied spirit of Calumny itself could not pretend to believe old Napper Tandy's yarn. You know Tandy is fond of playing tricks, especially upon me, and as the president and controlling spirit of a rather strong bank, he has been able to give me a good deal of trouble now and then. A year ago Stafford and I decided that it might some day be handy for us to control a majority of the stock in Tandy's bank. There was a good deal of it lying about loose – that is to say, a number of people held little blocks of it, ranging from one share to five. All of these people were more or less under Tandy's influence, and all of them were in the habit of giving him proxies to vote their stock or else themselves going into the stockholders' meeting and voting as he desired. Stafford and I quietly set about buying up this loose stock – through other people, of course, so that we shouldn't appear in the matter. We had got forty-eight per cent. of it, when you got yourself into trouble with Tandy. It occurred to me that if we could get three or four more shares and emphasize our confidence in you by making you president of Tandy's own bank, and turning him out to grass, he might see the point and stop his lies. I flatter myself that Stafford and I are pretty well known all over the West and among bankers in the East. We are not at all generally regarded as a pair of sublimated idiots – which same we should certainly be if we deliberately made a bank president out of a young man whose integrity was open to any possibility of suspicion. Now, don't be in a hurry!" – seeing that Duncan was eager to ask questions, or to express his appreciation of Captain Hallam's interest in himself – "don't be in a hurry and don't interrupt. Let me tell you the whole story. At first I didn't see any possible way in which to secure the three shares, without which I could do nothing. I took pains to have the stock register of the bank examined. I found that Tandy himself and the members of his immediate family owned forty-eight shares, and that four more belonged to Kennedy, the tug captain whom you discharged after calling him by a picturesque variety of pet names. Of course it was of no use to approach Kennedy, even through an outsider, as he is in Tandy's employ now, and very deeply in Tandy's debt. I must explain that, as Stafford and I had bought stock through agents of our own, we had kept our hands concealed by leaving the several shares nominally in the hands of the men we had employed to buy them and instructing those men to go on voting the stock in whatever way Tandy wished. This made Tandy feel perfectly secure of his control of the bank. Even if he had sold out half his own interest he would have felt secure, seeing that all the floating stock was within his voting control. You see I'm a rather good-natured man, on the whole, and I never like to make a man feel uncomfortable unless I must. When your trouble arose I thought I saw that there was nothing for it but to make a strike for some of Tandy's own stock. I didn't much believe the thing could be done, but I've seen so many miracles worked in my time that I believe in them. You sent for Temple – and by the way, he's a fellow that's built from the ground up – and I set him at work. I told him what we wanted done and why, but I couldn't tell him how to do it, because I didn't know. I gave him a free hand, and left him to use his own wits. As they happened to be particularly good wits, he did the trick within less than two days. He managed to buy Kennedy's four shares, not from Kennedy, but from Tandy himself, so that now when the stockholders' meeting comes, I'll march in, representing the two shares that I'm known to own, and Temple will be with me, holding proxies for all the rest of mine and Stafford's stock. We'll vote fifty-two against forty-eight. We'll name all the directors, and they will make you president at once. I'll put some shares in your hands to qualify you, but you ought actually to own at least ten shares in your own right. Have you got any money loose?"

Captain Hallam knew very well that Duncan had a sufficient deposit balance in the Hallam bank to cover the suggested purchase, but he wanted to forestall and prevent the expression of Duncan's thanks. Hence his question, and hence, also, the look he cast in Mrs. Hallam's direction, in obedience to which that gracious and sagacious gentlewoman broke at once and insistently into the conversation.

"Now, if you two men have quite finished with business," she said, "I want a small share of attention on my own part."

"Will you excuse me for a little while, Duncan," interrupted Captain Will, "while I give some orders at the stables and in the garden? I very nearly forgot them. Mrs. Hallam will entertain you in my absence, I'm sure."

As soon as the head of the house had made his escape through the door, Mrs. Hallam – whose friendship for Duncan had won all that is possible of privilege for itself – turned to him and asked:

"Why haven't you been taking Barbara to places? Why didn't you tell me to invite her here for supper to-night? You know I have had her here a dozen times, and you know how welcome she always is."

"Your last question is easily answered," he replied. "I did not think of asking you to invite her to supper this evening for the reason that Captain Will sent me word that he had business affairs to talk over with me."

Mrs. Hallam's face was wreathed in smiles.

"I wonder," she said, "if there ever was a young man clever enough to hold his own with a woman at word fence. And I wonder if there was ever one who didn't think he could."

"I confess," he said quickly, "that I'm not clever enough to know what you mean by those two wonderings of yours."

"Oh, yes you do. You deliberately tried to shy off my first question" – at this point she touched a bell – "by answering the second first, and then omitting to answer the first at all."

At this moment a servant appeared in answer to her ring.

"Send word to John," she commanded, "to bring the carriage at once – the open one with the bays. Now, Guilford Duncan, I have no time to talk with you except the ten minutes before the carriage comes. For I'm going to put on a hat and go after Barbara. Perhaps, between us, she and I can prevent you two men from talking business at supper. Tell me – "

"But can Barbara come on so short a notice?"

"What sort of blunderer do you take me to be? I sent her a note two hours ago saying I should go after her, and she sent me for reply, a note saying she would be more than glad to come. But you mustn't grow conceited over that. I didn't tell her you were to be here, or that I meant to put you into the carriage to escort her home. It is quite possible that if I had told her that she would have declined the invitation. Now, answer my first question. Why haven't you been taking Barbara to places – to church and all the rest of it?"

"Must I tell you the truth?"

"Yes, certainly. What would be the use of telling me anything else? I should know if your fibbed."

"I really believe you would."

"Why, of course I should. What are a woman's wits for, anyhow?"

"The carriage is at the door," said a servant, entering.

"Very well. Let it wait. Now, Guilford Duncan, go on and tell me."

"Well, the fact is, that I have not been in a position to ask Barbara to accept my escort to public places."

"Why not? Is it because of this Tandy affair?"

"No."

"Then what? Go on, and don't make me pump the information out of you, as if you were a well or a leaky barge."

"The fact is," Duncan spoke very seriously now, "that a little while ago I was betrayed by own emotions into declaring my love for Barbara, much sooner than I had intended – before she was prepared to hear it."

"Oh, nonsense! As if a girl ever needed preparation for a declaration of that sort from – well, from the right sort of man. But go on, you know the carriage is waiting. Tell me. Has she accepted you?"

"No."

"Has she rejected you?"

"No."

Here Mrs. Duncan again rang the bell, and a servant appeared so promptly as to suggest that she had been listening just outside the door.

"Tell my maid to get into the carriage and go and fetch Miss Barbara Verne. Tell her to say that I am detained here, and am forced to send my maid in my stead."

The servant said, "Yes'm," and withdrew. Then Mrs. Duncan resumed her questioning with manifest eagerness, but with as much of seriousness as Duncan himself had shown. There was no touch of flippancy, or even of lightness in either her words or her tone. For Mrs. Will Hallam was a woman of deep and tender feeling, a woman to whom all holy things were sacred.

"Tell me about it all, Guilford. I do not understand, and I must know. I need not tell you that my interest is not prompted by curiosity. I hold you as my brother, and I love Barbara. Tell me."

And Duncan did. As he outlined the compact that Barbara had insisted upon, the smiles replaced solemn apprehension on Mrs. Hallam's face, as though she foresaw all she desired as the outcome of such an arrangement.

But all that she said was:

"I am greatly relieved."