第36章 VII(2)

Her brother looked at her rather wildly. "Let's go home," he said. He was astounded and alarmed by the discovery that his infatuation had whirled him to the lunacy of longing to confide--and he feared lest, if he should stay on, he would blurt out his disgraceful secret. "Waiter, the bill."

"Don't let's go yet," urged his sister. "The most interesting people are beginning to come. Besides, I want more champagne."

He yielded. While she gazed round with the air of a visitor to a Zoo that is affected by fashionable people, and commented on the faces, figures, and clothes of the women, he stared at his plate and smoked and drank. Finally she said, "I'd give anything to see you make a fool of yourself, just once."

He grinned. "Things are in the way to having your wish gratified," he said. "It looks to me as if my time had come."

She tried to conceal her anxiety. "Are you serious?" she asked. Then added: "Of course not. You simply couldn't. Especially now--when Josephine might hear. I suppose you've noticed how Joe Culver is hanging round her?"

He nodded.

"There's no danger--unless----"

"I shall marry Josephine."

"Not if she hears."

"She's not going to hear."

"Don't be too sure. Women love to boast. It tickles their vanity to have a man. Yes, they pretend to be madly in love simply to give themselves the excuse for tattling."

"She'll not hear."

"You can't be sure."

"I want you to help me out. I'm going to tell her I'm tremendously busy these few next days--or weeks."

"Weeks!" Ursula Fitzhugh laughed. "My, it must be serious!"

"Weeks," repeated her brother. "And I want you to say things that'll help out--and to see a good deal of her." He flung down his cigar. "You women don't understand how it is with a man."

"Don't we though! Why, it's a very ordinary occurrence for a woman to be really in love with several men at once."

His eyes gleamed jealously. "I don't believe it," he cried.

"Not Josephine," she said reassuringly. "She's one of those single-hearted, untemperamental women.

They concentrate. They have no imagination."

"I wasn't thinking of Josephine," said he sullenly.

"To go back to what I was saying, I am in love with Josephine and with no one else. I can't explain to you how or why I'm entangled. But I'll get myself untangled all right--and very shortly."

"I know that, Fred. You aren't the permanent-damn-fool sort."

"I should say not!" exclaimed he. "It's a hopeful sign that I know exactly how big a fool I am."

She shook her head in strong dissent. "On the con-trary," said she, "it's a bad sign. I didn't realize I was making a fool of myself until you pointed it out to me. That stopped me. If I had been doing it with my eyes open, your jacking me up would only have made me go ahead."

"A woman's different. It doesn't take much to stop a woman. She's about half stopped when she begins."

Ursula was thoroughly alarmed. "Fred," she said earnestly, "you're running bang into danger. The time to stop is right now."

"Can't do it," he said. "Let's not talk about it."

"Can't? That word from YOU?"

"From me," replied he. "Don't forget helping out with Josephine. Let's go."

And he refused to be persuaded to stay on--or to be cajoled or baited into talking further of this secret his sister saw was weighing heavily.

He was down town half an hour earlier than usual the next morning. But no one noted it because his habit had always been to arrive among the first--not to set an example but to give his prodigious industry the fullest swing. There was in Turkey a great poet of whom it is said that he must have written twenty-five hours a day. Norman's accomplishment bulked in that same way before his associates. He had not slept the whole night. But, thanks to his enormous vitality, no trace of this serious dissipation showed. The huge supper he had eaten--and drunk--the sleepless night and the giant breakfast of fruit and cereal and chops and wheat cakes and coffee he had laid in to stay him until lunch time, would together have given pause to any but such a physical organization as his. The only evidence of it was a certain slight irritability--but this may have been due to his state of intense self-dissatisfaction.

As he entered the main room his glance sought the corner where Miss Hallowell was ensconced. She happened to look up at that instant. With a radiant smile she bowed to him in friendliest fashion. He colored deeply, frowned with annoyance, bowed coldly and strode into his room. He fussed and fretted about with his papers for a few minutes, then rang the bell.

"Send in Miss Pritchard--no, Mr. Gowdy--no, Miss Hallowell," he said to the office boy. And then he looked sharply at the pert young face for possible signs of secret cynical amusement. He saw none such, but was not convinced. He knew too well how by a sort of occult process the servants, all the subordinates, round a person like himself discover the most intimate secrets, almost get the news before anything has really occurred.

Miss Hallowell appeared, and very cold and reserved she looked as she stood waiting.

"I sent for you because--" he began. He glanced at the door to make sure that it was closed--" because I wanted to hear your voice." And he laughed boyishly. He was in high good humor now.

"Why did you speak to me as you did when you came in?" said she.

There was certainly novelty in this direct attack, this equal to equal criticism of his manners. He was not pleased with the novelty; but at the same time he felt a lack of the courage to answer her as she deserved, even if she was playing a clever game. "It isn't necessary that the whole office should know our private business," said he.

She seemed astonished. "What private business?"

"Last night," said he, uncertain whether she was trifling with him or was really the innocent she pretended to be. "If I were you, I'd not speak as friendlily as you did this morning--not before people."

"Why?" inquired she, her sweet young face still more perplexed.

"This isn't a small town out West," explained he.

"It's New York. People misunderstand--or rather--"