The Brown Study | Page 7

nest, and laid the small bundle in it.
Then he returned to his chair by the fire. He lifted his eyes for a long, keen look into his sister's face, until she stirred restlessly under the inspection.
"Well, what do you see?" she asked.
"I see," said Brown slowly, "a woman who is trying to live without remembering her immortality."
She shivered suddenly, there before the blazing fire. "I'm not sure that I believe in it," she said fiercely. "Now I've shocked you, Don, but I can't help it. I'm not sure of anything, these days. That's why--"
"Why you want to forget. But you can't forget. And the reason why you can't forget is because you do believe in it. Every day people are trying to forget one of the greatest facts in the universe. They may deny it with their lips, but with their hearts they know it is true."
She did not answer. Her brother drew his chair closer, leaned forward, and took one of the jewelled hands in his. He spoke very gently, and in his voice was a certain quality of persuasion which belongs not to all voices which would persuade.
"Sue, make room in your life for a little child. You need him."
Her glance evaded his, flashed past his to the small, still bundle on the couch. Then, suddenly, into her unhappy eyes leaped a suspicion. She straightened in her chair.
"You don't mean--you're not suggesting--"
He smiled, comprehending. "No, no--nothing like that. Your heart isn't big enough for that--yet. It's the mothers of children who make room for the waifs, or those who have long been mothers in heart and have been denied. You don't belong to either of those classes, do you?"
She drew a stifled breath. "You don't know what you are talking about, Don. How could you, a bachelor like you?"
"Couldn't I? Well, Sue, if fathers may be divided into the same two classes, I might be found in one of them."
She stared at him. "You? Oh, I can't believe it. You could have married long ago, if you had wanted to. You could have married anybody--simply anybody!"
"You do me too much honour--or discredit, I'm not just sure which."
"But it's true. With your position--and your money! Rich and brilliant clergymen aren't so common, Donald Brown. And your personality, your magnetism! Men care for you. Women have always hung on your words!"
He made a gesture of distaste; got up.
"Sterility of soul is a worse thing than sterility of body," said he. "But sometimes--God cures the one when He cures the other."
"But you never prescribed this strange thing before."
He smiled. "I've been learning some things out here, Sue, that I never learned before. One of them is how near God is to a little child."
"You've learned that--of your neighbours?" Her accent was indescribable.
"Of my neighbours--and friends."
It was time for her to go. He helped her into her great fur coat and himself fastened it in place. When she was ready she turned from the window from which she had tried in vain to see her surroundings, and threw at her brother a question which seemed to take him unawares.
"Don, do you know anything about Helena these days?"
Though his face did not change, something about him suggested the mental bracing of himself for a shock. He shook his head.
"She's dropped everything she used to care for. Nobody knows why. Her mother's in despair about her--you know what a society leader Mrs. Forrest has always been. She can't understand Helena--nor can anybody."
"She's not ill?"
"Apparently not; she's as wonderful to look at as ever, when one meets her--which one seldom does. The girls say she walks miles every day, so she must be well in body, though even that doesn't assure Mrs. Forrest. I thought, possibly, you might know. You and Helena used to be such friends."
"We are still, I hope."
His sister's eyes were not easily to be deceived, and they were positive they saw pain in the eyes which met her own.
"Don," she said softly, "may I ask you one question?"
"Please don't."
"When you were a little boy, and you got hurt in any way, you used to run away and hide. Are you--hiding now?"
His eyes grew dark with sudden anger, but he replied with self-control:
"You will have to think what you like about that, Sue. If that is the way the thing looks to you--so be it!"
The sound of the returning car made Mrs. Breckenridge speak hurriedly:
"I didn't mean to be unkind, Don boy. Nobody knows better than I that you are no coward. Only--only--you know an ascetic denies himself things that he needn't. And--you are an ascetic!"
"Can I never convince you of your mistake about that?" he answered; and now his lips smiled again, a little stiffly.
She embraced him once more, stopped to say beseechingly, "You won't keep that baby here, will you,