Arms and the Woman | Page 6

hear her voice, to wait
upon her wishes.
"It was the most brilliant audience of the season."
"Yes, indeed," I murmured. Those were the only words I could
articulate.
The carriage rumbled on.
"Does Patti return in the fall?"

"Yes." Five years of dreaming, and then to awake!
And then the carriage mercifully stopped.
Mrs. Wentworth insisted that I should enter and have some coffee. I
had so few words at my command that I could not invent even a flimsy
excuse. So I went in. The coffee was tasteless. I put in four lumps of
sugar. I stirred and stirred and stirred. Finally, I swallowed the contents
of the cup. It was very hot. When the agony was past I rose and made
my adieu.
Phyllis came to the door with me.
"Forget what I have said," I began, fumbling the door-knob. "I suppose
I was an ass to think that you might love me. They say that it is a
malady. Very well. With a few prescribed remedies I shall recover."
"You are very bitter."
"Can you blame me," clicking the latch back and forth, "when all the
world has suddenly grown dark?"
"There are other eyes than mine," gently.
"Yes; but they will light other paths than those I shall follow."
"Jack, you are too manly to make threats."
"That was not a threat," said I. "Well, I shall go and laugh at myself for
my presumption. To laugh at yourself is to cure. There is no more wine
in the cup, nothing but the lees. I'll have to drink them. A wry face, and
then it will all be over. Yes, I am bitter. To have dreamed as I have
dreamed, and to awake as I have! Ah, well; I must go on loving you
till--"
"Till she comes," supplemented Phyllis.
"You wrong me. It is only in letters that I am versatile. Forgive my
bitterness and forget my folly."

"Oh, Jack, if you knew how sorry I am! I shall forgive the bitterness,
but I will not forget what you term folly. It's something any woman
might be proud of, the love of an honest, dear, good fellow. Good
night." She held her hand toward me.
"Good night," I said, "and God bless you!" I kissed the palm of her
hand, opened the door, and then stumbled down the steps.
I do not remember how I reached home.
It was all over.
My beautiful castle had fallen in ruins about my ears.
CHAPTER II
In my bedroom the next morning there was a sad and heavy heart. The
owner woke up, stared at the ceiling, then at the sun-baked bricks
beyond his window. He saw not the glory of the sun and the heavens.
To his eyes there was nothing poetic in the flash of the distant
church-spires against the billowy cloudbanks. The gray doves, circling
about the chimneys, did not inspire him, nor the twittering of the
sparrows on the window ledge. There was nothing at all in the world
but a long stretch of barren, lonely years. And he wondered how,
without her at his side, he ever could traverse them. He was driftwood
again. He had built upon sands as usual, and the tide had come in; his
castle was flotsam and jetsam. He was drifting, and he didn't care
where. He was very sorry for himself, and he had the blue devils the
worst kind of way. Finally he crawled out of bed and dressed because it
had to be done. He was not particularly painstaking with the procedure.
It mattered not what collar became him best, and he picked up a tie at
random. A man generally dresses for a certain woman's approval, and
when that is no longer to be gained he grows indifferent. The other
women do not count.
My breakfast consisted of a cup of coffee; and as the generous nectar
warmed my veins my thoughts took a philosophical turn. It is fate who
writes the was, the is, and the shall be. We have a proverb for every joy

and misfortune. It is the only consolation fate gives us. It is like a
conqueror asking the vanquished to witness the looting. All roads lead
to Rome, and all proverbs are merely sign posts by which we pursue
our destinies. And how was I to get to Rome? I knew not. Hope is
better than clairvoyance.
Was Phyllis right when she said that I did not truly love her? I believed
not. Should I go on loving her all my life? Undoubtedly I should. As to
affinities, I had met mine, but it had proved a one-sided affair.
It was after ten by the clock when I remembered that I was to meet the
lawyer, the arbiter of my new