The One Woman | Page 8

weeping.
"You will not remember the foolish things I said to-night, dear?" she pleaded. "There, there, I'll blot them out with kisses--one for every harsh word, and one more for love's own sake. But you must promise me, Frank, never to leave me like that again." A sob caught her voice, and her head drooped.
"You may curse me, strike me, do anything but that. Oh, the loneliness, the agony and horror of those hours when I realised you were gone in anger and might not come back to-night--dear, it was too cruel. Such wild thoughts swept my heart! You do forgive me?"
He stooped and kissed her.
"Why ask it, Ruth?"
"I know I am selfish and fretful and wilful," she said, with a sigh. "I was only a spoiled child of nineteen when you took me by storm, body and soul. You remember, on our wedding day, when I looked up into your handsome face and the sense of responsibility and joy crushed me for a moment, I cried and begged you, who were so brave and strong, to teach me if I should fail in the least thing? And you promised, dear, so sweetly and tenderly. Do you remember?"
"Yes, I remember," he slowly answered.
"And now, somehow, you seem to have drawn away from me as though the task had wearied you. Come back closer! When I am foolish you must be wise. You can make of me what you will. You know I am afraid of this Socialism. It seems to open gulfs between us. You read and read, while I can only wait and love. You cannot know the silent agony of that waiting for I know not what tragedy in our lives. Frank, teach and lead me--I will follow. I love you with a love that is deathless. If you will be a Socialist, make me one. Show me there is nothing to fear. I've thought marriage meant only self-sacrifice for one's beloved. I've tried to give my very life to you and the children. If I'm making a mistake, show me."
"I will try, Ruth."
She ran her tapering fingers through his hair, smiled and sighed.
"How beautiful you are, my dear! I know it is a sin to love any man so. One should only love God like this."
CHAPTER III
THE BANKER AND HIS FAD

When Gordon woke next morning from a fitful sleep he was stupid and blue and had a headache. His wife had not slept at all, but was cheerful, tender and solicitous.
"Ruth, I can't go down to the ministers' meeting this morning," he said wearily. "I must take a day off in the country. I'll lose both soul and body if I don't take one day's rest in seven. I didn't tell you last night that I came near fainting in the pulpit during the evening sermon."
She slipped her hand in his, looking up reproachfully at him out of her dark eyes.
"Why didn't you tell me that, Frank?"
"I thought you had enough troubles last night. I'll run out on Long Island and spend the day with Overman. You needn't frown. You are strangely mistaken in him. I know you hate his brutal frankness, and he is anything but a Christian, but we are old college chums, and he's the clearest-headed personal friend I have. I need his advice about my fight with Van Meter. Overman is a venomous critic of my Social dreams. I've often wondered at your dislike of him, when he so thoroughly echoes your feelings."
She was silent a moment, and gravely said: "Take a good day's rest, then, and come back refreshed. I'll try to like even Mr. Overman, if he will help you. I'm going to turn over a new leaf this morning."
He laughed, kissed her, and hurried to catch the train for Babylon, where Overman lived in his great country home.
Mark Overman was a bacholer of forty, noted for the fact that he had but one eye and was so homely it was a joke. His friends said he was so ugly it was fascinating, and he was constantly laughing about it himself. He was a Wall Street banker, several times a millionaire, famed for his wit, his wide reading, his brutally cynical views of society, and his ridicule of modern philanthropy and Socialistic dreams.
He was a man of average height with the heavy-set, bulldog body, face and neck, broad, powerful hands and big feet. He had an enormous nose, shaggy eyebrows and a bristling black moustache. But the one striking peculiarity about him was his missing right eye. The large heavy eyelid was drooped and closed tightly over the sightless socket, which seemed to have sunk deep into his head. This cavern on one side of his face gave to the other eye a strange power. When he looked at you, it gleamed