The Argonauts of North Liberty | Page 6

In the midst of it I saw her accidentally;

no matter where; I followed her to--well, that's no matter to you, either.
Enough that I saw her again--and, well, Ned, such is the influence of
that girl over me that, by George! she made me make the same promise
again!"
Blandford, a little disappointed at his friend's dogmatic suppression of
certain material facts, shrugged his shoulders.
"If that's all your story," he said, "I must say I see no prospect of your
reforming. It's the old thing over again, only this time you are evidently
the victim. She's some designing creature who will have you if she
hasn't already got you completely in her power."
"You don't know what you're talking about, Ned, and you'd better quit,"
returned Demorest, with cheerful authoritativeness. "I tell you that
that's the sort of girl I'm going to marry, if I can, and settle down upon.
You can make a memorandum of that, old man, if you like."
"Then I don't really see why you want to talk to ME about it. And if
you are thinking that such a story would go down for a moment with
Joan as an evidence of your reformation, you're completely out, Dick.
Was that your idea?"
"Yes--and I can tell you, you're wrong again, Ned. You don't know
anything about women. You do just as I say--do you understand?-- and
don't interfere with your own wrong-headed opinions of what other
people will think, and I'll take the risks of Mrs. Blandford giving me
good advice. Your wife has got a heap more sense on these subjects
than you have, you bet. You just tell her that I want to marry the girl
and want her to help me--that I mean business, this time--and you'll see
how quick she'll come down. That's all I want of you. Will you or won't
you?"
With an outward expression of sceptical consideration and an inward
suspicion of the peculiar force of this man's dogmatic insight,
Blandford assented, with, I fear, the mental reservation of telling the
story to his wife in his own way. He was surprised when his friend
suddenly drew the horse up sharply, and after a moment's pause began

to back him, cramp the wheels of the buggy and then skilfully, in the
almost profound darkness, turn the vehicle and horse completely round
to the opposite direction.
"Then you are not going over the bridge?" said Blandford.
Demorest made an imperative gesture of silence. The tumultuous rush
and roar of swollen and rapid water came from the darkness behind
them. "There's been another break-out somewhere, and I reckon the
bridge has got all it can do to-night to keep itself out of water without
taking us over. At least, as I promised to set you down at your wife's
door inside of the hour, I don't propose to try." As the horse now
travelled more easily with the wind behind him, Demorest, dismissing
abruptly all other subjects, laid his hand with brusque familiarity on his
companion's knee, and as if the hour for social and confidential
greeting had only just then arrived, said: "Well, Neddy, old boy, how
are you getting on?"
"So, so," said Blandford, dubiously. "You see," he began,
argumentatively, "in my business there's a good deal of competition,
and I was only saying this morning--"
But either Demorest was already familiar with his friend's arguments,
or had as usual exhausted his topic, for without paying the slightest
attention to him, he again demanded abruptly, "Why don't you go to
California? Here everything's played out. That's the country for a young
man like you--just starting into life, and without incumbrances. If I was
free and fixed in my family affairs like you I'd go to-morrow."
There was such an occult positivism in Demorest's manner that for an
instant Blandford, who had been married two years, and was
transacting a steady and fairly profitable manufacturing business in the
adjacent town, actually believed he was more fitted for adventurous
speculation than the grimly erratic man of energetic impulses and
pleasures beside him. He managed to stammer hesitatingly:
"But there's Joan--she--"

"Nonsense! Let her stay with her mother; you sell out your interest in
the business, put the money into an assorted cargo, and clap it and
yourself into the first ship out of Boston--and there you are. You've
been married going on two years now, and a little separation until
you've built up a business out there, won't do either of you any harm."
Blandford, who was very much in love with his wife, was not, however,
above putting the onus of embarrassing affection upon HER. "You
don't know, Joan, Dick," he replied. "She'd never consent to a
separation, even for a short time."
"Try her. She's a sensible woman--a deuced