第48章

"Never! I leave it to you if I've written one good word of him.""You've written of the treatment he has received here," she began, "and I've been able to see what he has borne--and bears!""But have I written one word to show that he didn't deserve it all? Haven't I told you everything, of his associates, his--""Indeed you have!""Then do you wonder that I was more surprised than most when I saw you walking with him to-day? Because I knew you did it in cold blood and knowledge aforethought! Other folks thought it was because you hadn't been here long enough to hear his reputation, but I KNEW!""Tell me," she said, "if you were disappointed when you saw me with him.""Yes," he snapped."I was!""I thought so.I saw the consternation in your face! You APPROVED, didn't you?""I don't know what you're talking about!""Yes, you do! I know it bothers you to have me read you between the lines, but for this once you must let me.You are so consistent that you are never disappointed when things turn out badly, or people are wicked or foolish, are you?""No, certainly not.I expect it.""And you were disappointed in me to-day.

Therefore, it must be that I was doing something you knew was right and good.You see?" She leaned a little closer to him, smiling angelically.

"Ah, Mr.Arp," she cried, "I know your secret:

you ADMIRE me!"

He rose, confused and incoherent, as full of denial as a detected pickpocket."I DON'T! Me ADMIRE?

WHAT? It's an ornery world," he protested.

"I don't admire any human that ever lived!""Yes, you do," she persisted."I've just proved it! But that is the least of your secret; the great thing is this: YOU ADMIRE MR.LOUDEN!""I never heard such nonsense," he continued to protest, at the same time moving down the walk toward the gate, leaning heavily on his stick.

"Nothin' of the kind.There ain't any LOGIC to that kind of an argument, nor no REASON!""You see, I understand you," she called after him."I'm sorry you go away in the bitterness of being found out.""Found out!" His stick ceased for a moment to tap the cement."Pooh!" he ejaculated, uneasily.There was a pause, followed by a malevolent chuckle."At any rate," he said, with joy in the afterthought, "you'll never go walkin' with him AGAIN!"He waited for the answer, which came, after a time, sadly."Perhaps you are right.Perhaps I shall not.""Ha, I thought so! Good-night.""Good-night, Mr.Arp."

She turned toward the lighted house.Through the windows nearest her she could see Mamie, seated in the familiar chair, following with happy and tender eyes the figure of Eugene, who was pacing up and down the room.The town was deadly quiet: Ariel could hear the sound of footsteps perhaps a block away.She went to the gate and gazed a long time into the empty street, watching the yellow grains of light, sieved through the maples from the arc lights on the corner, moving to and fro in the deep shadow as the lamp swung slightly in the night air.Somewhere, not far away, the peace was broken by the screams of a "parlor organ," which honked and wailed in pious agonies (the intention was hymnal), interminably protracting each spasm.Presently a woman's voice outdid the organ, a voice which made vivid the picture of the woman who owned it, and the ploughed forehead of her, above the nose-glasses, when the "grace-notes" were proudly given birth."Rescue the Perishing" was the startlingly appropriate selection, rendered with inconceivable lingering upon each syllable: "Roos-cyoo the Poor-oosh-oong!" At unexpected intervals two male voices, evidently belonging to men who had contracted the habit of holding tin in their mouths, joined the lady in a thorough search for the Lost Chord.

That was the last of silence in Canaan for an hour or so.The organ was merely inaugural: