The Cost | Page 3

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THE COST By DAVID GRAHAM PHILLIPS

CONTENTS

CHAPTER I
A FATHER INVITES DISASTER II OLIVIA TO THE RESCUE III
AND SCARBOROUGH IV A DUMONT TRIUMPH V FOUR
FRIENDS VI "LIKE HIS FATHER" VII PAULINE AWAKENS VIII
THE DECISION IX A THOROUGHBRED RUNS AWAY X MRS.
JOHN DUMONT XI YOUNG AMERICA XII AFTER EIGHT
YEARS XIII "MY SISTER IN LAW, GLADYS XIV STRAINING AT
THE ANCHORS XV GRADUATED PEARLS XVI CHOICE
AMONG EVILS XVII TWO AND THE BARRIER XVIII ON THE
FARM XIX PAULINE GOES INTO POLITICS XX A MAN IN HIS
MIGHT XXI A COYOTE AT BAY XXII STORMS IN THE WEST
XXIII A SEA SURPRISE XXIV DUMONT BETRAYS DUMONT
XXV THE FALLEN KING XXVI A DESPERATE RALLY XXVII
THE OTHER MAN'S MIGHT XXVIII AFTER THE LONG WINTER

THE COST
I.
A FATHER INVITES DISASTER
Pauline Gardiner joined us on the day that we, the Second Reader class,
moved from the basement to the top story of the old Central Public

School. Her mother brought her and, leaving, looked round at us,
meeting for an instant each pair of curious eyes with friendly appeal.
We knew well the enchanted house where she lived--stately, retreated
far into large grounds in Jefferson Street; a high brick wall all round,
and on top of the wall broken glass set in cement. Behind that
impassable barrier which so teased our young audacity were
flower-beds and "shrub" bushes, whose blossoms were wonderfully
sweet if held a while in the closed hand; grape arbors and shade and
fruit trees, haunted by bees; winding walks strewn fresh each spring
with tan-bark that has such a clean, strong odor, especially just after a
rain, and that is at once firm and soft beneath the feet. And in the midst
stood the only apricot tree in Saint X. As few of us had tasted apricots,
and as those few pronounced them better far than oranges or even
bananas, that tree was the climax of tantalization.
The place had belonged to a childless old couple who hated
children--or did they bar them out and drive them away because the
sight and sound of them quickened the ache of empty old age into a
pain too keen to bear? The husband died, the widow went away to her
old maid sister at Madison; and the Gardiners, coming from Cincinnati
to live in the town where Colonel Gardiner was born and had spent his
youth, bought the place. On our way to and from school in the first
weeks of that term, pausing as always to gaze in through the iron gates
of the drive, we had each day seen Pauline walking alone among the
flowers. And she would stop and smile at us; but she was apparently
too shy to come to the gates; and we, with the memory of the cross old
couple awing us, dared not attempt to make friends with her.
She was eight years old, tall for her age, slender but strong, naturally
graceful. Her hazel eyes were always dancing mischievously. She liked
boys' games better than girls'. In her second week she induced several
of the more daring girls to go with her to the pond below town and
there engage in a raft-race with the boys. And when John Dumont,
seeing that the girls' raft was about to win, thrust the one he was
piloting into it and upset it, she was the only girl who did not scream at
the shock of the sudden tumble into the water or rise in tears from the
shallow, muddy bottom.
She tried going barefooted; she was always getting bruised or cut in
attempts--usually successful-- at boys' recklessness; yet her voice was

sweet and her manner toward others, gentle. She hid her face when
Miss Stone whipped any one-- more fearful far than the rise and fall of
Miss Stone's ferule was the soaring and sinking of her broad, bristling
eyebrows.
From the outset John Dumont took especial delight in teasing her--John