“Then run along like a duck and get rid of that old bore for me.”
“Cora—please see him?”
“Not me! I’ve got too much to think about to bother with him.”
Laura walked to the window and stood with her back to her sister, apparently interested in the view of Corliss Street there presented. “Cora,” she said, “why don’t you marry him and have done with all this?”
Cora hooted.
“Why not? Why not marry him as soon as you can get ready? Why don’t you go down now and tell him you will? Why not, Cora?”
“I’d as soon marry a pail of milk—yes, tepid milk, skimmed! I–-“
“Don’t you realize how kind he’d be to you?”
“I don’t know about that,” said Cora moodily. “He might object to some things—but it doesn’t matter, because I’m not going to try him. I don’t mind a man’s being a fool, but I can’t stand the absent-minded breed of idiot. I’ve worn his diamond in the pendant right in his eyes for weeks; he’s never once noticed it enough even to ask me about the pendant, but bores me to death wanting to know why I won’t wear the ring! Anyhow, what’s the use talking about him? He couldn’t marry me right now, even if I wanted him to—not till he begins to get something on the investment he made with Val. Outside of that, he’s got nothing except his rooms at his mother’s; she hasn’t much either; and if Richard should lose what he put in with Val, he couldn’t marry for years, probably. That’s what made him so obstinate about it. No; if I ever marry right off the reel it’s got to be somebody with–-“
“Cora”—Laura still spoke from the window, not turning—“aren’t you tired of it all, of this getting so upset about one man and then another and–-“
“TIRED!” Cora uttered the word in a repressed fury of emphasis. “I’m sick of EVERYTHING! I don’t care for anything or anybody on this earth—except—except you and mamma. I thought I was going to love Val. I thought I DID—but oh, my Lord, I don’t! I don’t think I CAN care any more. Or else there isn’t any such thing as love. How can anybody tell whether there is or not? You get kind of crazy over a man and want to go the limit—or marry him perhaps—or sometimes you just want to make him crazy about you—and then you get over it—and what is there left but hell!” She choked with a sour laugh. “Ugh! For heaven’s sake, Laura, don’t make me talk. Everything’s gone to the devil and I’ve got to think. The best thing you can do is to go down and get rid of Richard for me. I CAN’T see him!”
“Very well,” said Laura, and went to the door.
“You’re a darling,” whispered Cora, kissing her quickly. “Tell him I’m in a raging headache—make him think I wanted to see him, but you wouldn’t let me, because I’m too ill.” She laughed. “Give me a little time, old dear: I may decide to take him yet!”
It was Mrs. Madison who informed the waiting Richard that Cora was unable to see him, because she was “lying down”; and the young man, after properly inquiring about Mr. Madison, went blankly forth.
Hedrick was stalking the front yard, mounted at a great height upon a pair of stilts. He joined the departing visitor upon the sidewalk and honoured him with his company, proceeding storkishly beside him.
“Been to see Cora?”
“Yes, Hedrick.”
“What’d you want to see her about?” asked the frank youth seriously.
Richard was able to smile. “Nothing in particular, Hedrick.”
“You didn’t come to tell her about something?”
“Nothing whatever, my dear sir. I wished merely the honour of seeing her and chatting with her upon indifferent subjects.
“Why?”
“Did you see her?”
“No, I’m sorry to–-“
“She’s home, all right,” Hedrick took pleasure in informing him.
“Yes. She was lying down and I told your mother not to disturb her.”
“Worn out with too much automobile riding, I expect,” Hedrick sniffed. “She goes out about every day with this Corliss in his hired roadster.”
They walked on in silence. Not far from Mrs. Lindley’s, Hedrick abruptly became vocal in an artificial laugh. Richard was obviously intended to inquire into its cause, but, as he did not, Hedrick, after laughing hollowly for some time, volunteered the explanation:
“I played a pretty good trick on you last night.”
“Odd I didn’t know it.”
“That’s why it was good. You’d never guess it in the world.”
“No, I believe I shouldn’t. You see what makes it so hard, Hedrick, is that I can’t even remember seeing you, last night.”
“Nobody saw me. Somebody heard me though, all right.”
“Who?”
“The nigger that works at your mother’s—Joe.”
“What about it? Were you teasing Joe?”
“No, it was you I was after.”
“Well? Did you get me?”
Hedrick made another somewhat ghastly pretence of mirth. “Well, I guess I’ve had about all the fun out of it I’m going to. Might as well tell you. It was that book of Laura’s you thought she sent you.”
Richard stopped short; whereupon Hedrick turned clumsily, and began to stalk back in the direction from which they had come.
“That book—I thought she—sent me?” Lindley repeated, stammering.
“She never sent it,” called the boy, continuing to walk away. “She kept it hid, and I found it. I faked her into writing your name on a sheet of paper, and made you think she’d sent the old thing to you. I just did it for a joke on you.”
With too retching an effort to simulate another burst of merriment, he caught the stump of his right stilt in a pavement crack, wavered, cut in the air a figure like a geometrical proposition gone mad, and came whacking to earth in magnificent disaster.
Richard took him to Mrs. Lindley for repairs. She kept him until dark: Hedrick was bandaged, led, lemonaded and blandished.
Never in his life had he known such a listener.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
That was a long night for Cora Madison, and the morning found her yellow. She made a poor breakfast, and returned from the table to her own room, but after a time descended restlessly and wandered from one room to another, staring out of the windows. Laura had gone out; Mrs. Madison was with her husband, whom she seldom left; Hedrick had departed ostensibly for school; and the house was as still as a farm in winter—an intolerable condition of things for an effervescent young woman whose diet was excitement. Cora, drumming with her fingers upon a window in the owl-haunted cell, made noises with her throat, her breath and her lips not unsuggestive of a sputtering fuse. She was heavily charged.
“Now what in thunder do YOU want?” she inquired of an elderly man who turned in from the sidewalk and with serious steps approached the house.
Pryor, having rung, found himself confronted with the lady he had come to seek. Ensued the moment of strangers meeting: invisible antennae extended and touched;—at the contact, Cora’s drew in, and she looked upon him without graciousness.
“I just called,” he said placatively, smiling as if some humour lurked in his intention, “to ask how your father is. I heard downtown he wasn’t getting along quite so well.”
“He’s better this morning, thanks,” said Cora, preparing to close the door.
“I thought I’d just stop and ask about him. I heard he’d had another bad spell—kind of a second stroke.”
“That was night before last. The doctor thinks he’s improved very much since then.”
The door was closing; he coughed hastily, and detained it by speaking again. “I’ve called several times to inquire about him, but I believe it’s the first time I’ve had the pleasure of speaking to you, Miss Madison. I’m Mr. Pryor.” She appeared to find no comment necessary, and he continued: “Your father did a little business for me, several years ago, and when I was here on my vacation, this summer, I was mighty sorry to hear of his sickness. I’ve had a nice bit of luck lately and got a second furlough, so I came out to spend a couple of weeks and Thanksgiving with my married daughter.”