Mr Jack Hamlins Mediation | Page 8

She took advantage of it to draw a torn lace-
edged handkerchief from her pocket behind, and keeping the tail of her
eyes in a frightened fashion on Jack, applied the handkerchief furtively,
first to her nose, and then to her eyes.
"Don't do that," said Jack fastidiously, "it's wet enough outside."
Nevertheless, he stood up and gazed at her.
"Well," he began.
She timidly drew nearer to him, and took a seat on the kitchen table,
looking up wistfully into his eyes.
"Well," resumed Jack argumentatively, "if he won't 'chuck' you, why
don't you 'chuck' HIM?"
She turned quite white, and suddenly dropped her eyes. "Yes," she said,
almost inaudibly, "lots of girls would do that."
"I don't mean go back to your old life," continued Jack. "I reckon
you've had enough of that. But get into some business, you know, like
other women. A bonnet shop, or a candy shop for children, see? I'll
help start you. I've got a couple of hundred, if not in my own pocket in
somebody's else, just burning to be used! And then you can look about
you; and perhaps some square business man will turn up and you can

marry him. You know you can't live this way, nohow. It's killing you; it
ain't fair on you, nor on Rylands either."
"No," she said quickly, "it ain't fair on HIM. I know it, I know it isn't, I
know it isn't," she repeated, "only"-- She stopped.
"Only what?" said Jack impatiently.
She did not speak. After a pause she picked up the rolling-pin from the
table and began absently rolling it down her lap to her knee, as if
pressing out the stained silk skirt. "Only," she stammered, slowly
rolling the pin handles in her open palms, "I--I can't leave Josh."
"Why can't you?" said Jack quickly.
"Because--because--I," she went on, with a quivering lip, working the
rolling-pin heavily down her knee as if she were crushing her answer
out of it,--"because--I--love him!"
There was a pause, a dash of rain against the window, and another dash
from her eyes upon her hands, the rolling-pin, and the skirts she had
gathered up hastily, as she cried, "O Jack! Jack! I never loved anybody
like him! I never knew what love was! I never knew a man like him
before! There never WAS one before!"
To this large, comprehensive, and passionate statement Mr. Jack
Hamlin made no reply. An audacity so supreme had conquered his. He
walked to the window, looked out upon the dark, rain-filmed pane that,
however, reflected no equal change in his own dark eyes, and then
returned and walked round the kitchen table. When he was at her back,
without looking at her, he reached out his hand, took her passive one
that lay on the table in his, grasped it heartily for a single moment, laid
it gently down, and returned around the table, where he again
confronted her cheerfully face to face.
"You'll make the riffle yet," he said quietly. "Just now I don't see what I
could do, or where I could chip in your little game; but if I DO, or you
do, count me in and let me know. You know where to write,--my old

address at Sacramento." He walked to the corner, took up his still wet
serape, threw it over his shoulders, and picked up his broad-brimmed
riding-hat.
"You're not going, Jack?" she said hesitatingly, as she rubbed her wet
eyes into a consciousness of his movements. "You'll wait to see HIM?
He'll be here in an hour."
"I've been here too long already," said Jack. "And the less you say
about my calling, even accidentally, the better. Nobody will believe
it,--YOU didn't yourself. In fact, unless you see how I can help you, the
sooner you consider us all dead and buried, the sooner your luck will
change. Tell your girl I've found my own horse so much better that I
have pushed on with him, and give her that."
He threw a gold coin on the table.
"But your horse is still lame," she said wonderingly. "What will you do
in this storm?"
"Get into the cover of the next wood and camp out. I've done it before."
"But, Jack!"
He suddenly made a slight gesture of warning. His quick ear had caught
the approach of footsteps along the wet gravel outside. A mischievous
light slid into his dark eyes as he coolly moved backward to the door
and, holding it open, said, in a remarkably clear and distinct voice:--
"Yes, as you say, society is becoming very mixed and frivolous
everywhere, and you'd scarcely know San Francisco now. So delighted,
however, to have made your acquaintance, and regret my business
prevents my waiting to see your good husband. So odd