第56章

"And yet," she went on, "I think that I should have come this morning, after all, even if you had a poorer excuse for your absence, because, you see, I came on business.""You did?""That's why I've come again.That makes it respectable for me to be here now, doesn't it?--for me to have come out alone after dark without their knowing it? I'm here as your client, Joe.""Why?" he asked.

She did not answer at once, but picked up a pen from beneath her hand on the desk, and turning it, meditatively felt its point with her forefinger before she said slowly, "Are most men careful of other people's--well, of other people's money?""You mean Martin Pike?" he asked.

"Yes.I want you to take charge of everything I have for me."He bent a frowning regard upon the lamp-shade."You ought to look after your own property," he said."You surely have plenty of time.""You mean--you mean you won't help me?"she returned, with intentional pathos.

"Ariel!" he laughed, shortly, in answer; then asked, "What makes you think Judge Pike isn't trustworthy?""Nothing very definite perhaps, unless it was his look when I told him that I meant to ask you to take charge of things for me.""He's been rather hard pressed this year, Ithink," said Joe."You might be right--if he could have found a way.I hope he hasn't.""I'm afraid," she began, gayly, "that I know very little of my own affairs.He sent me a draft every three months, with receipts and other things to sign and return to him.I haven't the faintest notion of what I own--except the old house and some money from the income that I hadn't used and brought with me.Judge Pike has all the papers--everything."Joe looked troubled."And Roger Tabor, did he--""The dear man!" She shook her head."He was just the same.To him poor Uncle Jonas's money seemed to come from heaven through the hands of Judge Pike--""And there's a handsome roundabout way!"said Joe.

"Wasn't it!" she agreed, cheerfully."And he trusted the Judge absolutely.I don't, you see."He gave her a thoughtful look and nodded.

"No, he isn't a good man," he said, "not even according to his lights; but I doubt if he could have managed to get away with anything of consequence after he became the administrator.He wouldn't have tried it, probably, unless he was more desperately pushed than I think he has been.

It would have been too dangerous.Suppose you wait a week or so and think it over.""But there's something I want you to do for me immediately, Joe.""What's that?""I want the old house put in order.I'm going to live there.""Alone?""I'm almost twenty-seven, and that's being enough of an old maid for me to risk Canaan's thinking me eccentric, isn't it?""It will think anything you do is all right.""And once," she cried, "it thought everything I did all wrong!""Yes.That's the difference.""You mean it will commend me because I'm thought rich?""No, no," he said, meditatively, "it isn't that.

It's because everybody will be in love with you.""Quite everybody!" she asked.

"Certainly," he replied."Anybody who didn't would be absurd.""Ah, Joe!" she laughed."You always were the nicest boy in the world, my dear!"At that he turned toward her with a sudden movement and his lips parted, but not to speak.

She had rested one arm upon the desk, and her cheek upon her hand; the pen she had picked up, still absently held in her fingers, touching her lips;and it was given to him to know that he would always keep that pen, though he would never write with it again.The soft lamplight fell across the lower part of her face, leaving her eyes, which were lowered thoughtfully, in the shadow of her hat.The room was blotted out in darkness behind her.Like the background of an antique portrait, the office, with its dusty corners and shelves and hideous safe, had vanished, leaving the charming and thoughtful face revealed against an even, spacious brownness.Only Ariel and the roses and the lamp were clear; and a strange, small pain moved from Joe's heart to his throat, as he thought that this ugly office, always before so harsh and grim and lonely--loneliest for him when it had been most crowded,--was now transfigured into something very, very different from an office; that this place where he sat, with a lamp and flowers on a desk between him and a woman who called him "my dear," must be like--like something that people called "home."And then he leaned across the desk toward her, as he said again what he had said a little while before,--and his voice trembled:

"Ariel, it IS you?"

She looked at him and smiled.

"You'll be here always, won't you? You're not going away from Canaan again?"For a moment it seemed that she had not heard him.Then her bright glance at him wavered and fell.She rose, turning slightly away from him, but not so far that he could not see the sudden agitation in her face.

"Ah!" he cried, rising too, "I don't want you to think I don't understand, or that I meant _I_ should ever ask you to stay here! I couldn't mean that;you know I couldn't, don't you? You know Iunderstand that it's all just your beautiful friendliness, don't you?""It isn't beautiful; it's just ME, Joe," she said.

"It couldn't be any other way."