A Fool There Was | Page 4

her and hers:
"You ask that? ... You?"
He answered, evenly.
"Yes. I ask that. Even I."
Quickly, with the agility of the brute, she thrust toward him the little, puling thing that lay upon her lap.
"Look, then," she said, in deep, grating tones.
He leaned forward, crossing his hands behind him, and looked. The crop, held in his right hand, tapped lightly against his booted left leg. The woman waited. At length he stood erect. He shook his head and smiled.
"Babies are all alike," he remarked, easily. "Red, dirty, unformed, no hair.... This is a little redder, a little more dirty, a little more unformed; it has a little less hair.... Beyond that, quoi?"
The shrunken lips of the old woman set tightly; the eyes flared.
"You dare--!" she began. And then: "It is your mouth--your chin. The nose is yours. The eyes they shall be hers." She nodded her head in the direction of the dying mother upon the bed. "And perhaps, some day--" She did not finish. She settled the baby back again upon her knees and sat, waiting.
The man, still smiling, gazed up the woman on the bed.
"Dead?" he queried, with a lift of the brows.
She did not answer. He bent over the prostrate form; then again stood erect. He shrugged his shoulders.
He turned again to the shrivelled woman on the chair.
"You have named it?" he asked. "You have named--our child?"
Still she did not answer.
"It were not improper," he continued, smilingly, half-musingly, "for a father to venture a suggestion anent a name.... Eh bien, then. I should wish that the baby be known as" he stopped for a moment, thinking, the while lightly tapping booted leg with the tip of his crop. "I should suggest," he repeated, "calling her Rien. It is an appropriate name, Rien. It is not a bad name; in fact, it is rather a pretty name.... Rien.... Rien.... Rien...." He repeated it several times. "Yes, it seems to me that that is an excellent name.... We will, then, consider her name Rien." He laughed once more.
"Because of certain reasons," he went on, "I'm afraid that my paternal duties must cease with the naming of our child."
He turned to the dying woman upon the bed.
"Bon voyage, mam'selle--eh, pardon, madame," he said. He lifted his hat, bowing. To the old woman he turned.
"To you--" he began; she interrupted.
"Her eyes, they will be her mother's," she mumbled, sullenly.
"Which will be well," he smiled. "Her mother had beautiful eyes-- wonderful eyes."
"More wonderful than you knew," muttered the old woman. "Had you come a day sooner--"
Still he smiled.
"But I didn't," he replied; and then nodding toward the whimpering thing that the woman held:
"You should guard it well. There is of the best blood of France in its veins." His lips curled, whimsically. "'Tis strange, that, n'es-ce pas? In that small piece of carrion which you hold there upon your knees runs the blood of three kings." Again he laughed, musically. He turned.
He had not seen her stoop. The long-bladed knife struck him in the arm, piercing flesh and vein and sinew, sticking there. Slowly he plucked it forth, and turned to her, still smiling.
"You are old, madame. Do not apologize; it was not your fault."
He took the knife delicately by the tip and with a little flip sent it spinning through the air and over the edge of the cliff. And he was gone.
The woman, shrivelled, gray-haired, sinking back in her chair, sat silent. The puling thing upon her knees whimpered. The dying woman upon the rude bed of rope and rush moaned. And that was all.

[Illustration]
CHAPTER THREE.
TWO BOYS AND A GIRL.
To the budding mind of young Jack Schuyler, life was a very pleasant affair. It began each morning at six thirty; and from then on until eight at night, there was something to fill each moment. He didn't care for school, particularly; still, it wasn't difficult enough to cause much discomfort. The natal pains of study were not by any means unbearable inasmuch as he was quick to see and to understand; and furthermore, he was possessed of a retentive memory. In his classes he assumed a position of about eighth from the fore; and he maintained it with but little fluctuation. In the out-of-door sports of small boys, he was usually first--that is, when Tom Blake wasn't. When Tom Blake was, Jack Schuyler was second.
He was a sturdy boy, active, quick, strong of limb and of body. He had earnest, serious eyes of gray-blue, like those of his father. His mouth and chin were delicate, like his mother's. And he was thoughtful, rather than impulsive.
Tom Blake, on the other hand, was impulsive rather than thoughtful. He had dark eyes and ruddy cheeks; and, at the age of nine, he had learned to walk on his hands in a manner that caused acute