Long before spring Billy was forced to own to herself that her fancied security from lovemaking on the part of Cyril no longer existed. She began to suspect that there was reason for her fears. Cyril certainly was “different.” He was more approachable, less reserved, even with Marie and Aunt Hannah. He was not nearly so taciturn, either, and he was much more gracious about his playing. Even Marie dared to ask him frequently for music, and he never refused her request. Three times he had taken Billy to some play that she wanted to see, and he had invited Marie, too, besides Aunt Hannah, which had pleased Billy very much. He had been at the same time so genial and so gallant that Billy had declared to Marie afterward that he did not seem like himself at all, but like some one else.
Marie had disagreed with her, it is true, and had said stiffly:
“I'm sure I thought he seemed very much like himself.” But that had not changed Billy's opinion at all.
To Billy's mind, nothing but love could so have softened the stern Cyril she had known. She was, therefore, all the more careful these days to avoid a tete-a-tete with him, though she was not always successful, particularly owing to Marie's unaccountable perverseness in so often having letters to write or work to do, just when Billy most wanted her to make a safe third with herself and Cyril. It was upon such an occasion, after Marie had abruptly left them alone together, that Cyril had observed, a little sharply:
“Billy, I wish you wouldn't say again what you said ten minutes ago when Miss Marie was here.”
“What was that?”
“A very silly reference to that old notion that you and every one else seem to have that I am a 'woman-hater.'”
Billy's heart skipped a beat. One thought, pounded through her brain and dinned itself into her ears—at all costs Cyril must not be allowed to say that which she so feared; he must be saved from himself.
“Woman-hater? Why, of course you're a woman-hater,” she cried merrily. “I'm sure, I—I think it's lovely to be a woman-hater.”
The man opened wide his eyes; then he frowned angrily.
“Nonsense, Billy, I know better. Besides, I'm in earnest, and I'm not a woman-hater.”
“Oh, but every one says you are,” chattered Billy. “And, after all, you know it IS distinguishing!”
With a disdainful exclamation the man sprang to his feet. For a time he paced the room in silence, watched by Billy's fearful eyes; then he came back and dropped into the low chair at Billy's side. His whole manner had undergone a complete change. He was almost shamefaced as he said:
“Billy, I suppose I might as well own up. I don't think I did think much of women until I saw—you.”
Billy swallowed and wet her lips. She tried to speak; but before she could form the words the man went on with his remarks; and Billy did not know whether to be the more relieved or frightened thereat.
“But you see now it's different. That's why I don't like to sail any longer under false colors. There's been a change—a great and wonderful change that I hardly understand myself.”
“That's it! You don't understand it, I'm sure,” interposed Billy, feverishly. “It may not be such a change, after all. You may be deceiving yourself,” she finished hopefully.
The man sighed.
“I can't wonder you think so, of course,” he almost groaned. “I was afraid it would be like that. When one's been painted black all one's life, it's not easy to change one's color, of course.”
“Oh, but I didn't say that black wasn't a very nice color,” stammered Billy, a little wildly.
“Thank you.” Cyril's heavy brows rose and fell the fraction of an inch. “Still, I must confess that just now I should prefer another shade.”
He paused, and Billy cast distractedly about in her mind for a simple, natural change of subject. She had just decided to ask him what he thought of the condition of the Brittany peasants, when he questioned abruptly, and in a voice that was not quite steady:
“Billy, what should you say if I should tell you that the avowed woman-hater had strayed so far from the prescribed path as to—to like one woman well enough as to want to—marry her?”
The word was like a match to the gunpowder of Billy's fears. Her self-control was shattered instantly into bits.
“Marry? No, no, you wouldn't—you couldn't really be thinking of that,” she babbled, growing red and white by turns. “Only think how a wife would—would b-bother you!”
“Bother me? When I loved her?”
“But just think—remember! She'd want cushions and rugs and curtains, and you don't like them; and she'd always be talking and laughing when you wanted quiet; and she—she'd want to drag you out to plays and parties and—and everywhere. Indeed, Cyril, I'm sure you'd never like a wife—long!” Billy stopped only because she had no breath with which to continue.
Cyril laughed a little grimly.
“You don't draw a very attractive picture, Billy. Still, I'm not afraid. I don't think this particular—wife would do any of those things—to trouble me.”
“Oh, but you don't know, you can't tell,” argued the girl. “Besides, you have had so little experience with women that you'd just be sure to make a mistake at first. You want to look around very carefully—very carefully, before you decide.”
“I have looked around, and very carefully, Billy. I know that in all the world there is just one woman for me.”
Billy struggled to her feet. Mingled pain and terror looked from her eyes. She began to speak wildly, incoherently. She wondered afterward just what she would have said if Aunt Hannah had not come into the room at that moment and announced that Bertram was at the door to take her for a sleigh-ride if she cared to go.
“Of course she'll go,” declared Cyril, promptly, answering for her. “It is time I was off anyhow.” To Billy, he said in a low voice: “You haven't been very encouraging, little girl—in fact, you've been mighty discouraging. But some day—some other day, I'll try to make clear to you—many things.”
Billy greeted Bertram very cordially. It was such a relief—his cheery, genial companionship! The air, too, was bracing, and all the world lay under a snow-white blanket of sparkling purity. Everything was so beautiful, so restful!
It was not surprising, perhaps, that the very frankness of Billy's joy misled Bertram a little. His blood tingled at her nearness, and his eyes grew deep and tender as he looked down at her happy face. But of all the eager words that were so near his lips, not one reached the girl's ears until the good-byes were said; then wistfully Bertram hazarded:
“Billy, don't you think, sometimes, that I'm gaining—just a little on that rival of mine—that music?”
Billy's face clouded. She shook her head gently.
“Bertram, please don't—when we've had such a beautiful hour together,” she begged. “It troubles me. If you do, I can't go—again.”
“But you shall go again,” cried Bertram, bravely smiling straight into her eyes. “And there sha'n't ever anything in the world trouble you, either—that I can help!”
Billy's sleigh-ride had been due to the kindness of a belated winter storm that had surprised every one the last of March. After that, March, as if ashamed of her untoward behavior, donned her sweetest smiles and “went out” like the proverbial lamb. With the coming of April, and the stirring of life in the trees, Billy, too, began to be restless; and at the earliest possible moment she made her plans for her long anticipated “digging in the dirt.”
Just here, much to her surprise, she met with wonderful assistance from Bertram. He seemed to know just when and where and how to dig, and he displayed suddenly a remarkable knowledge of landscape gardening. (That this knowledge was as recent in its acquirement as it was sudden in its display, Billy did not know.) Very learnedly he talked of perennials and annuals; and without hesitation he made out a list of flowering shrubs and plants that would give her a “succession of bloom throughout the season.” His words and phrases smacked loudly of the very newest florists' catalogues, but Billy did not notice that. She only wondered at the seemingly exhaustless source of his wisdom.
“I suspect 'twould have been better if we'd begun things last fall,” he told her frowningly one day. “But there's plenty we can do now anyway; and we'll put in some quick-growing things, just for this season, until we can get the more permanent things established.”
And so they worked together, studying, scheming, ordering plants and seeds, their two heads close together above the gaily colored catalogues. Later there was the work itself to be done, and though strong men did the heavier part, there was yet plenty left for Billy's eager fingers—and for Bertram's. And if sometimes in the intimacy of seed-sowing and plant-setting, the touch of the slenderer fingers sent a thrill through the browner ones, Bertram made no sign. He was careful always to be the cheerful, helpful assistant—and that was all.
Billy, it is true, was a little disturbed at being quite so much with Bertram. She dreaded a repetition of some such words as had been uttered at the end of the sleigh-ride. She told herself that she had no right to grieve Bertram, to make it hard for him by being with him; but at the very next breath, she could but question; did she grieve him? Was it hard for him to have her with him? Then she would glance at his eager face and meet his buoyant smile—and answer “no.” After that, for a time, at least, her fears would be less.
Systematically Billy avoided Cyril these days. She could not forget his promise to make many things clear to her some day. She thought she knew what he meant—that he would try to convince her (as she had tried to convince herself) that she would make a good wife for him.
Billy was very sure that if Cyril could be prevented from speaking his mind just now, his mind would change in time; hence her determination to give his mind that opportunity.
Billy's avoidance of Cyril was the more easily accomplished because she was for a time taking a complete rest from her music. The new songs had been finished and sent to the publishers. There was no excuse, therefore, for Cyril's coming to the house on that score; and, indeed, he seemed of his own accord to be making only infrequent visits now. Billy was pleased, particularly as Marie was not there to play third party. Marie had taken up her teaching again, much to Billy's distress.
“But I can't stay here always, like this,” Marie had protested.
“But I should like to keep you!” Billy had responded, with no less decision.
Marie had been firm, however, and had gone, leaving the little house lonely without her.
Aside from her work in the garden Billy as resolutely avoided Bertram as she did Cyril. It was natural, therefore, that at this crisis she should turn to William with a peculiar feeling of restfulness. He, at least, would be safe, she told herself. So she frankly welcomed his every appearance, sung to him, played to him, and took long walks with him to see some wonderful bracelet or necklace that he had discovered in a dingy little curio-shop.
William was delighted. He was very fond of his namesake, and he had secretly chafed a little at the way his younger brothers had monopolized her attention. He was rejoiced now that she seemed to be turning to him for companionship; and very eagerly he accepted all the time she could give him.
William had, in truth, been growing more and more lonely ever since Billy's brief stay beneath his roof years before. Those few short weeks of her merry presence had shown him how very forlorn the house was without it. More and more sorrowfully during past years, his thoughts had gone back to the little white flannel bundle and to the dear hopes it had carried so long ago. If the boy had only lived, thought William, mournfully, there would not now have been that dreary silence in his home, and that sore ache in his heart.
Very soon after William had first seen Billy, he began to lay wonderful plans, and in every plan was Billy. She was not his child by flesh and blood, he acknowledged, but she was his by right of love and needed care. In fancy he looked straight down the years ahead, and everywhere he saw Billy, a loving, much-loved daughter, the joy of his life, the solace of his declining years.
To no one had William talked of this—and to no one did he show the bitterness of his grief when he saw his vision fade into nothingness through Billy's unchanging refusal to live in his home. Only he himself knew the heartache, the loneliness, the almost unbearable longing of the past winter months while Billy had lived at Hillside; and only he himself knew now the almost overwhelming joy that was his because of what he thought he saw in Billy's changed attitude toward himself.
Great as was William's joy, however, his caution was greater. He said nothing to Billy of his new hopes, though he did try to pave the way by dropping an occasional word about the loneliness of the Beacon Street house since she went away. There was something else, too, that caused William to be silent—what he thought he saw between Billy and Bertram. That Bertram was in love with Billy, he guessed; but that Billy was not in love with Bertram he very much feared. He hesitated almost to speak or move lest something he should say or do should, just at the critical moment, turn matters the wrong way. To William this marriage of Bertram and Billy was an ideal method of solving the problem, as of course Billy would come there to the house to live, and he would have his “daughter” after all. But as the days passed, and he could see no progress on Bertram's part, no change in Billy, he began to be seriously worried—and to show it.
Early in June Billy announced her intention of not going away at all that summer.
“I don't need it,” she declared. “I have this cool, beautiful house, this air, this sunshine, this adorable view. Besides, I've got a scheme I mean to carry out.”
There was some consternation among Billy's friends when they found out what this “scheme” was: sundry of Billy's humbler acquaintances were to share the house, the air, the sunshine, and the adorable view with her.
“But, my dear Billy,” Bertram cried, aghast, “you don't mean to say that you are going to turn your beautiful little house into a fresh-air place for Boston's slum children!”
“Not a bit of it,” smiled the girl, “though I'd like to, really, if I could,” she added, perversely. “But this is quite another thing. It's no slum work, no charity. In the first place my guests aren't quite so poor as that, and they're much too proud to be reached by the avowed charity worker. But they need it just the same.”
“But you haven't much spare room; have you?” questioned Bertram.
“No, unfortunately; so I shall have to take only two or three at a time, and keep them maybe a week or ten days. It's just a sugar plum, Bertram. Truly it is,” she added whimsically, but with a tender light in her eyes.
“But who are these people?” Bertram's face had lost its look of shocked surprise, and his voice expressed genuine interest.
“Well, to begin with, there's Marie. She'll stay all summer and help me entertain my guests; at the same time her duties won't be arduous, and she'll get a little playtime herself. One week I'm going to have a little old maid who keeps a lodging house in the West End. For uncounted years she's been practically tied to a doorbell, with never a whole day to breathe free. I've made arrangements there for a sister to keep house a whole week, and I'm going to show this little old maid things she hasn't seen for years: the ocean, the green fields, and a summer play or two, perhaps.
“Then there's a little couple that live in a third-story flat in South Boston. They're young and like good times; but the man is on a small salary, and they have had lots of sickness. He's been out so much he can't take any vacation, and they wouldn't have any money to go anywhere if he could. Well, I'm going to have them a week. She'll be here all the time, and he'll come out at night, of course.
“Another one is a widow with six children. The children are already provided for by a fresh-air society, but the woman I'm going to take, and—and give her a whole week of food that she didn't have to cook herself. Another one is a woman who is not so very poor, but who has lost her baby, and is blue and discouraged. There are some children, too, one crippled, and a boy who says he's 'just lonesome.' And there are—really, Bertram, there is no end to them.”
“I can well believe that,” declared Bertram, with emphasis, “so far as your generous heart is concerned.”
Billy colored and looked distressed.
“But it isn't generosity or charity at all, Bertram,” she protested. “You are mistaken when you think it is—really! Why, I shall enjoy every bit of it just as well as they do—and better, perhaps.”
“But you stay here—in the city—all summer for their sakes.”
“What if I do? Besides, this isn't the real city,” argued Billy, “with all these trees and lawns about one. And another thing,” she added, leaning forward confidentially, “I might as well confess, Bertram, you couldn't hire me to leave the place this summer—not while all these things I planted are coming up!”
Bertram laughed; but for some reason he looked wonderfully happy as he turned away.
On the fifteenth of June Kate and her husband arrived from the West. A young brother of Mr. Hartwell's was to be graduated from Harvard, and Kate said they had come on to represent the family, as the elder Mr. and Mrs. Hartwell were not strong enough to undertake the journey. Kate was looking well and happy. She greeted Billy with effusive cordiality, and openly expressed her admiration of Hillside. She looked very keenly into her brothers' face, and seemed well pleased with the appearance of Cyril and Bertram, but not so much so with William's countenance.
“William does NOT look well,” she declared one day when she and Billy were alone together.
“Sick? Uncle William sick? Oh, I hope not!” cried the girl.
“I don't know whether it's 'sick' or not,” returned Mrs. Hartwell. “But it's something. He's troubled. I'm going to speak to him. He's worried over something; and he's grown terribly thin.”
“But he's always thin,” reasoned Billy.
“I know, but not like this—ever. You don't notice it, perhaps, or realize it, seeing him every day as you do. But I know something troubles him.”
“Oh, I hope not,” murmured Billy, with anxious eyes. “We don't want Uncle William troubled: we all love him too well.”
Mrs. Hartwell did not at once reply; but for a long minute she thoughtfully studied Billy's face as it was bent above the sewing in Billy's hand. When she did speak she had changed the subject.
Young Hartwell was to deliver the Ivy Oration in the Stadium on Class Day, and all the Henshaws were looking eagerly forward to the occasion.
“You have seen the Stadium, of course,” said Bertram to Billy, a few days before the anticipated Friday.
“Only from across the river.”
“Is that so? And you've never been here Class Day, either. Good! Then you've got a treat in store. Just wait and see!”
And Billy waited—and she saw. Billy began to see, in fact, before Class Day. Young Hartwell was a popular fellow, and he was eager to have his friends meet Billy and the Henshaws. He was a member of the Institute of 1770, D. K. E., Stylus, Signet, Round Table, and Hasty Pudding Clubs, and nearly every one of these had some sort of function planned for Class-Day week. By the time the day itself arrived Billy was almost as excited as was young Hartwell himself.
It rained Class-Day morning, but at nine o'clock the sun came out and drove the clouds away, much to every one's delight. Billy's day began at noon with the spread given by the Hasty Pudding Club. Billy wondered afterward how many times that day remarks like these were made to her:
“You've been here Class Day before, of course. You've seen the confetti-throwing!... No? Well, you just wait!”
At ten minutes of four Billy and Mrs. Hartwell, with Mr. Hartwell and Bertram as escorts, entered the cool, echoing shadows under the Stadium, and then out in the sunlight they began to climb the broad steps to their seats.
“I wanted them high up, you see,” explained Bertram, “because you can get the effect so much better. There, here we are!”
For the first time Billy turned and looked about her. She gave a low cry of delight.
“Oh, oh, how beautiful—how wonderfully beautiful!”
“You just wait!” crowed Bertram. “If you think this is beautiful, you just wait!”
Billy did not seem to hear him. Her eyes were sweeping the wonderful scene before her, and her face was aglow with delight.
First there was the great amphitheater itself. Only the wide curve of the horseshoe was roped off for to-day's audience. Beyond lay the two sides with their tier above tier of empty seats, almost dazzling in the sunshine. Within the roped-off curve the scene was of kaleidoscopic beauty. Charmingly gowned young women and carefully groomed young men were everywhere, stirring, chatting, laughing. Gay-colored parasols and flower-garden hats made here and there brilliant splashes of rainbow tints. Above was an almost cloudless canopy of blue, and at the far horizon, earth and sky met and made a picture that was like a wondrous painted curtain hung from heaven itself.
At the first sound of the distant band that told of the graduates' coming, Bertram said almost wistfully:
“Class Day is the only time when I feel 'out of it.' You see I'm the first male Henshaw for ages that hasn't been through Harvard; and to-day, you know, is the time when the old grads come back and do stunts like the kids—if they can (and some of them can all right!). They march in by classes ahead of the seniors, and vie with each other in giving their yells. You'll see Cyril and William, if your eyes are sharp enough—and you'll see them as you never saw them before.”
Far down the green field Billy spied now the long black line of moving figures with a band in the lead. Nearer and nearer it came until, greeted by a mighty roar from thousands of throats, the leaders swept into the great bowl of the horseshoe curve.
And how they yelled and cheered—those men whose first Class Day lay five, ten, fifteen, even twenty or more years behind them, as told by the banners which they so proudly carried. How they got their heads together and gave the “Rah! Rah! Rah!” with unswerving eyes on their leader! How they beat the air with their hats in time to their lusty shouts! And how the throngs above cheered and clapped in answer, until they almost split their throats—and did split their gloves—especially when the black-gowned seniors swept into view.
And when the curving line of black had become one solid mass of humanity that filled the bowl from side to side, the vast throng seated themselves, and a great hush fell while the Glee Club sang.
Young Hartwell proved to be a good speaker, and his ringing voice reached even the topmost tier of seats. Billy was charmed and interested. Everything she saw and heard was but a new source of enjoyment, and she had quite forgotten the thing for which she was to “wait,” when she saw the ushers passing through the aisles with their baskets of many-hued packages of confetti and countless rolls of paper ribbon.
It began then, the merry war between the students below and the throng above. In a trice the air was filled with shimmering bits of red, blue, white, green, purple, pink, and yellow. From all directions fluttering streamers that showed every color of the rainbow, were flung to the breeze until, upheld by the supporting wires, they made a fairy lace work of marvelous beauty.
“Oh, oh, oh!” cried Billy, her eyes misty with emotion. “I think I never saw anything in my life so lovely!
“I thought you'd like it,” gloried Bertram. “You know I said to wait!”
But even with this, Class Day for Billy was not finished. There was still Hartwell's own spread from six to eight, and after that there were the President's reception, and dancing in the Memorial Hall and in the Gymnasium. There was the Fairyland of the yard, too, softly aglow with moving throngs of beautiful women and gallant men. But what Billy remembered best of all was the exquisite harmony that came to her through the hushed night air when the Glee Club sang Fair Harvard on the steps of Holworthy Hall.
It was on the Sunday following Class Day that Mrs. Hartwell carried out her determination to “speak to William.” The West had not taken from Kate her love of managing, and she thought she saw now a matter that sorely needed her guiding hand.
William's thin face, anxious looks, and nervous manner had troubled her ever since she came. Then one day, very suddenly, had come enlightenment: William was in love—and with Billy.
Mrs. Hartwell watched William very closely after that. She saw his eyes follow Billy fondly, yet anxiously. She saw his open joy at being with her, and at any little attention, word, or look that the girl gave him. She remembered, too, something that Bertram had said about William's grief because Billy would not live at the Strata. She thought she saw something else, also: that Billy was fond of William, but that William did not know it; hence his frequent troubled scrutiny of her face. Why these two should play at cross purposes Sister Kate could not understand. She smiled, however, confidently: they should not play at cross purposes much longer, she declared.
On Sunday afternoon Kate asked her eldest brother to take her driving.
“Not a motor car; I want a horse—that will let me talk,” she said.
“Certainly,” agreed William, with a smile; but Bertram, who chanced to hear her, put in the sly comment: “As if ANY horse could prevent—that!”
On the drive Kate began to talk at once, but she did not plunge into the subject nearest her heart until she had adroitly led William into a glowing enumeration of Billy's many charming characteristics; then she said:
“William, why don't you take Billy home with you?”
William stirred uneasily as he always did when anything annoyed him.
“My dear Kate, there is nothing I should like better to do,” he replied.
“Then why don't you do it?”
“I—hope to, sometime.”
“But why not now?”
“I'm afraid Billy is not quite—ready.”
“Nonsense! A young girl like that does not know her own mind lots of times. Just press the matter a little. Love will work wonders—sometimes.”
William blushed like a girl. To him her words had but one meaning—Bertram's love for Billy. William had never spoken of this suspected love affair to any one. He had even thought that he was the only one that had discovered it. To hear his sister refer thus lightly to it came therefore in the nature of a shock to him.
“Then you have—seen it—too?” he stammered
“'Seen it, too,'” laughed Kate, with her confident eyes on William's flushed face, “I should say I had seen it! Any one could see it.”
William blushed again. Love to him had always been something sacred; something that called for hushed voices and twilight. This merry discussion in the sunlight of even another's love was disconcerting.
“Now come, William,” resumed Kate, after a moment; “speak to Billy, and have the matter settled once for all. It's worrying you. I can see it is.”
Again William stirred uneasily.
“But, Kate, I can't do anything. I told you before; I don't believe Billy is—ready.”
“Nonsense! Ask her.”
“But Kate, a girl won't marry against her will!”
“I don't believe it is against her will.”
“Kate! Honestly?”
“Honestly! I've watched her.”
“Then I WILL speak,” cried the man, his face alight, “if—if you think anything I can say would—help. There is nothing—nothing in all this world that I so desire, Kate, as to have that little girl back home. And of course that would do it. She'd live there, you know.”
“Why, of—course,” murmured Kate, with a puzzled frown. There was something in this last remark of William's that she did not quite understand. Surely he could not suppose that she had any idea that after he had married Billy they would go to live anywhere else;—she thought. For a moment she considered the matter vaguely; then she turned her attention to something else. She was the more ready to do this because she believed that she had said enough for the present: it was well to sow seeds, but it was also well to let them have a chance to grow, she told herself.
Mrs. Hartwell's next move was to speak to Billy, and she was careful to do this at once, so that she might pave the way for William.
She began her conversation with an ingratiating smile and the words:
“Well, Billy, I've been doing a little detective work on my own account.”
“Detective work?”
“Yes; about William. You know I told you the other day how troubled and anxious he looked to me. Well, I've found out what's the matter.”
“What is it?”
“Yourself.”
“Myself! Why, Mrs. Hartwell, what can you mean?”
The elder lady smiled significantly.
“Oh, it's merely another case, my dear, of 'faint heart never won fair lady.' I've been helping on the faint heart; that's all.”
“But I don't understand.”
“No? I can't believe you quite mean that, my dear. Surely you must know how earnestly my brother William is longing for you to go back and live with him.”
Like William, Billy flushed scarlet.
“Mrs. Hartwell, certainly no one could know better than YOURSELF why that is quite impossible,” she frowned.
The other colored confusedly.
“I understand, of course, what you mean. And, Billy, I'll confess that I've been sorry lots of times, since, that I spoke as I did to you, particularly when I saw how it grieved my brother William to have you go away. If I blundered then, I'm sorry; and perhaps I did blunder. At all events, that is only the more reason now why I am so anxious to do what I can to rectify that old mistake, and plead William's suit.”
To Mrs. Hartwell's blank amazement, Billy laughed outright.
“'William's suit'!” she quoted merrily. “Why, Mrs. Hartwell, there isn't any 'suit' to it. Uncle William doesn't want me to marry him!”
“Indeed he does.”
Billy stopped laughing, and sat suddenly erect.
“MRS. HARTWELL!”
“Billy, is it possible that you did not know this?”
“Indeed I don't know it, and—excuse me, but I don't think you do, either.”
“But I do. I've talked with him, and he's very much in earnest,” urged Mrs. Hartwell, speaking very rapidly. “He says there's nothing in all the world that he so desires. And, Billy, you do care for him—I know you do!”
“Why, of course I care for him—but not—that way.”
“But, Billy, think!” Mrs. Hartwell was very earnest now, and a little frightened. She felt that she must bring Billy to terms in some way now that William had been encouraged to put his fate to the test. “Just remember how good William has always been to you, and think what you have been, and may BE—if you only will—in his lonely life. Think of his great sorrow years ago. Think of this dreary waste of years between. Think how now his heart has turned to you for love and comfort and rest. Billy, you can't turn away!—you can't find it in your heart to turn away from that dear, good man who loves you so!” Mrs. Hartwell's voice shook effectively, and even her eyes looked through tears. Mentally she was congratulating herself: she had not supposed she could make so touching an appeal.
In the chair opposite the girl sat very still. She was pale, and her eyes showed a frightened questioning in their depths. For a long minute she said nothing, then she rose dazedly to her feet.
“Mrs. Hartwell, please do not speak of this to any one,” she begged in a low voice. “I—I am taken quite by surprise. I shall have to think it out—alone.”
Billy did not sleep well that night. Always before her eyes was the vision of William's face; and always in her ears was the echo of Mrs. Hartwell's words: “Remember how good William has always been to you. Think of his great sorrow years ago. Think of this dreary waste of years between. Think how now his heart has turned to you for love and comfort and rest.”
For a time Billy tossed about on her bed trying to close her eyes to the vision and her ears to the echo. Then, finding that neither was possible, she set herself earnestly to thinking the matter out.
William loved her. Extraordinary as it seemed, such was the fact; Mrs. Hartwell said so. And now—what must she do; what could she do? She loved no one—of that she was very sure. She was even beginning to think that she would never love any one. There were Calderwell, Cyril, Bertram, to say nothing of sundry others, who had loved her, apparently, but whom she could not love. Such being the case, if she were, indeed, incapable of love herself, why should she not make the sacrifice of giving up her career, her independence, and in that way bring this great joy to Uncle William's heart?... Even as she said the “Uncle William” to herself, Billy bit her lip and realized that she must no longer say “Uncle” William—if she married him.
“If she married him.” The words startled her. “If she married him.”... Well, what of it? She would go to live at the Strata, of course; and there would be Cyril and Bertram. It might be awkward, and yet—she did not believe Cyril was in love with anything but his music; and as to Bertram—it was the same with Bertram and his painting, and he would soon forget that he had ever fancied he loved her. After that he would be simply a congenial friend and companion—a good comrade. As Billy thought of it, indeed, one of the pleasantest features of this marriage with William would be the delightful comradeship of her “brother,” Bertram.
Billy dwelt then at some length on William's love for her, his longing for her presence, and his dreary years of loneliness.... And he was so good to her, she recollected; he had always been good to her. He was older, to be sure—much older than she; but, after all, it would not be so difficult, so very difficult, to learn to love him. At all events, whatever happened, she would have the supreme satisfaction of knowing that at least she had brought into dear Uncle—that is, into William's life the great peace and joy that only she could give.
It was almost dawn when Billy arrived at this not uncheerful state of prospective martyrdom. She turned over then with a sigh, and settled herself to sleep. She was relieved that she had decided the question. She was glad that she knew just what to say when William should speak. He was a dear, dear man, and she would not make it hard for him, she promised herself. She would be William's wife.
In spite of his sister's confident assurance that the time was ripe for him to speak to Billy, William delayed some days before broaching the matter to her. His courage was not so good as it had been when he was talking with Kate. It seemed now, as it always had, a fearsome thing to try to hasten on this love affair between Billy and Bertram. He could not see, in spite of Kate's words, that Billy showed unmistakable evidence at all of being in love with his brother. The more he thought of it, in fact, the more he dreaded the carrying out of his promise to speak to his namesake.
What should he say, he asked himself. How could he word it? He could not very well accost her with: “Oh, Billy, I wish you'd please hurry up and marry Bertram, because then you'd come and live with me.” Neither could he plead Bertram's cause directly. Quite probably Bertram would prefer to plead his own. Then, too, if Billy really was not in love with Bertram—what then? Might not his own untimely haste in the matter forever put an end to the chance of her caring for him?
It was, indeed, a delicate matter, and as William pondered it he wished himself well out of it, and that Kate had not spoken. But even as he formed the wish, William remembered with a thrill Kate's positive assertion that a word from him would do wonders, and that now was the time to utter it. He decided then that he would speak; that he must speak; but that at the same time he would proceed with a caution that would permit a hasty retreat if he saw that his words were not having the desired effect. He would begin with a frank confession of his grief at her leaving him, and of his longing for her return; then very gradually, if wisdom counseled it, he would go on to speak of Bertram's love for her, and of his own hope that she would make Bertram and all the Strata glad by loving him in return.
Mrs. Hartwell had returned to her Western home before William found just the opportunity for his talk with Billy. True to his belief that only hushed voices and twilight were fitting for such a subject, he waited until he found the girl early one evening alone on her vine-shaded veranda. He noticed that as he seated himself at her side she flushed a little and half started to rise, with a nervous fluttering of her hands, and a murmured “I'll call Aunt Hannah.” It was then that with sudden courage, he resolved to speak.
“Billy, don't go,” he said gently, with a touch of his hand on her arm. “There is something I want to say to you. I—I have wanted to say it for some time.”
“Why, of—of course,” stammered the girl, falling back in her seat. And again William noticed that odd fluttering of the slim little hands.
For a time no one spoke, then William began softly, his eyes on the distant sky-line still faintly aglow with the sunset's reflection.
“Billy, I want to tell you a story. Long years ago there was a man who had a happy home with a young wife and a tiny baby boy in it. I could not begin to tell you all the plans that man made for that baby boy. Such a great and good and wonderful being that tiny baby was one day to become. But the baby—went away, after a time, and carried with him all the plans—and he never came back. Behind him he left empty hearts that ached, and great bare rooms that seemed always to be echoing sighs and sobs. And then, one day, such a few years after, the young wife went to find her baby, and left the man all alone with the heart that ached and the great bare rooms that echoed sighs and sobs.
“Perhaps it was this—the bareness of the rooms—that made the man turn to his boyish passion for collecting things. He wanted to fill those rooms full, full!—so that the sighs and sobs could not be heard; and he wanted to fill his heart, too, with something that would still the ache. And he tried. Already he had his boyish treasures, and these he lined up in brave array, but his rooms still echoed, and his heart still ached; so he built more shelves and bought more cabinets, and set himself to filling them, hoping at the same time that he might fill all that dreary waste of hours outside of business—hours which once had been all too short to devote to the young wife and the baby boy.
“One by one the years passed, and one by one the shelves and the cabinets were filled. The man fancied, sometimes, that he had succeeded; but in his heart of hearts he knew that the ache was merely dulled, and that darkness had only to come to set the rooms once more to echoing the sighs and sobs. And then—but perhaps you are tired of the story, Billy.” William turned with questioning eyes.
“No, oh, no,” faltered Billy. “It is beautiful, but so—sad!”
“But the saddest part is done—I hope,” said William, softly. “Let me tell you. A wonderful thing happened then. Suddenly, right out of a dull gray sky of hopelessness, dropped a little brown-eyed girl and a little gray cat. All over the house they frolicked, filling every nook and cranny with laughter and light and happiness. And then, like magic, the man lost the ache in his heart, and the rooms lost their echoing sighs and sobs. The man knew, then, that never again could he hope to fill his heart and life with senseless things of clay and metal. He knew that the one thing he wanted always near him was the little brown-eyed girl; and he hoped that he could keep her. But just as he was beginning to bask in this new light—it went out. As suddenly as they had come, the little brown-eyed girl and the gray cat went away. Why, the man did not know. He knew only that the ache had come back, doubly intense, and that the rooms were more gloomy than ever. And now, Billy,”—William's voice shook a little—“it is for you to finish the story. It is for you to say whether that man's heart shall ache on and on down to a lonely old age, and whether those rooms shall always echo the sighs and sobs of the past.”
“And I will finish it,” choked Billy, holding out both her hands. “It sha'n't ache—they sha'n't echo!”
The man leaned forward eagerly, unbelievingly, and caught the hands in his own.
“Billy, do you mean it? Then you will—come?”
“Yes, yes! I didn't know—I didn't think. I never supposed it was like that! Of course I'll come!” And in a moment she was sobbing in his arms.
“Billy!” breathed William rapturously, as he touched his lips to her forehead. “My own little Billy!”
It was a few minutes later, when Billy was more calm, that William started to speak of Bertram. For a moment he had been tempted not to mention his brother, now that his own point had been won so surprisingly quick; but the new softness in Billy's face had encouraged him, and he did not like to let the occasion pass when a word from him might do so much for Bertram. His lips parted, but no words came—Billy herself had begun to speak.
“I'm sure I don't know why I'm crying,” she stammered, dabbing her eyes with her round moist ball of a handerchief. “I hope when I'm your wife I'll learn to be more self-controlled. But you know I am young, and you'll have to be patient.”
As once before at something Billy said, the world to William went suddenly mad. His head swam dizzily, and his throat tightened so that he could scarcely breathe. By sheer force of will he kept his arm about Billy's shoulder, and he prayed that she might not know how numb and cold it had grown. Even then he thought he could not have heard aright.
“Er—you said—” he questioned faintly.
“I say when I'm your wife I hope I'll learn to be more self-controlled,” laughed Billy, nervously. “You see I just thought I ought to remind you that I am young, and that you'll have to be patient.”
William stammered something—a hurried something; he wondered afterward what it was. That it must have been satisfactory to Billy was evident, for she began laughingly to talk again. What she said, William scarcely knew, though he was conscious of making an occasional vague reply. He was still floundering in a hopeless sea of confusion and dismay. His own desire was to get up and say good night at once. He wanted to be alone to think. He realized, however, with sickening force, that men do not propose and run away—if they are accepted. And he was accepted; he realized that, too, overwhelmingly. Then he tried to think how it had happened, what he had said; how she could so have misunderstood his meaning. This line of thought he abandoned quickly, however; it could do no good. But what could do good, he asked himself. What could he do?
With blinding force came the answer: he could do nothing. Billy cared for him. Billy had said “yes.” Billy expected to be his wife. As if he could say to her now: “I beg your pardon, but 'twas all a mistake. I did not ask you to marry me.”
Very valiantly then William summoned his wits and tried to act his part. He told himself, too, that it would not be a hard one; that he loved Billy dearly, and that he would try to make her happy. He winced a little at this thought, for he remembered suddenly how old he was—as if he, at his age, were a fit match for a girl of twenty-one!
And then he looked at Billy. The girl was plainly nervous. There was a deep flush on her cheeks and a brilliant sparkle in her eyes. She was talking rapidly—almost incoherently at times—and her voice was tremulous. Frequent little embarrassed laughs punctuated her sentences, and her fingers toyed with everything that came within reach. Some time before she had sprung to her feet and had turned on the electric lights; and when she came back she had not taken her old position at William's side, but had seated herself in a chair near by. All of which, according to William's eyes, meant the maidenly shyness of a girl who has just said “yes” to the man she loves.
William went home that night in a daze. To himself he said that he had gone out in search of a daughter, and had come back with a wife.
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