The Visioning | Page 9

now
without knowing she was Ann. For Ann was indeed sleeping. From her
door as Kate carefully opened it had come the deep breathing as of an
exhausted child.
Who was Ann? Where had she come from? How did she get there?
What had happened? Why had she wanted to kill herself?
She wanted to know. In truth, she was madly curious to know. And
probably she never would know.
And what would happen now? It suddenly occurred to her that Wayne
might be rather annoyed at having Ann commit suicide. But there was a
little catch in her laugh at the thought of Wayne's consternation.
A long time she sat there wondering. Where had Ann come from? She
had just seemed whirled out of the nowhere into the there, as an
unannounced comet in well-ordered heavens Ann had come. From
what other world?--and why? Did she belong to anybody? Another
pleasant prospect for poor Wayne! Was some one looking for Ann?
Would there be things in the paper about her?
Surely a girl could not step out of her life and leave no trail behind.
Things could not close up like that, even about Ann. Every one had a
place. Then how could one step from that place without leaving a
conspicuous looking vacancy?
Why had Ann been dressed that way? It seemed a strange costume in
which to kill one's self. It seemed to Katie that one would prefer to
meet the unknown in a smaller hat.
She went to the closet and took out the organdie dress and satin slippers.

From whence? and why thither? They opened long paths of wondering.
The dress was bedraggled about the bottom, as though trailed through
fields and over roads. And so strangely crumpled, and so strange the
scent--a scent hauntingly familiar, yet baffling in its relation to gowns.
A poorly made gown, Katie noted, but effective. She tried to read the
story, but could not read beyond the fact that there was a story. The
pink satin slippers had broken heels and were stained and soaked. They
had traveled ground never meant for them. Something about Ann made
one feel she was not the girl to be walking about in satin slippers.
Something had happened. She had been dressed for one thing and then
had done another thing. Could it be that ever since the night before she
had been out of her place in the scheme of things?--loosened from the
great human unit?--seeking destruction, perhaps, because she could not
regain her place therein? "Where have you been?" Katie murmured to
the ruined slippers. "What did it? What do you know? What did you
want?"
Many a pair of just such slippers she had danced to the verge of
shabbiness. To her they were associated with hops, the gayest of music
and lightest of laughter, brilliant crowds in flower-scented rooms,
dancing and flirtation--the froth and bubble of life. But something
sterner than waxed floors had wrought the havoc here. How much of
life's ground all unknown to her had these poor little slippers trodden?
Was it often like that?--that the things created for the fun and the joy
found the paths of tragedy?
She had put them away and was at last going to bed when she idly
picked up the evening paper. What she saw was that the Daisey-Maisey
Opera Company was playing at the city across the river. Something
made her stand there very still. Could it be--? Might it not be--?
She did not know. Would she ever know?
It drew her back to the girl's room. She was sleeping serenely. With
shaded candle Katie stood at the door watching her. Surely the hour
was past! Sleep such as that must draw one back to life.
Lying there in the sweet dignity of her braided hair, in that simple

lovely gown, she might have been Ann indeed.
There was tenderness just then in the heart of Katherine Wayneworth
Jones. She was glad that this girl who was sleeping as though sleep had
been a treasure long withheld, was knowing to-night the balm of a good
bed, glad that she could sink so unquestioningly into the lap of
protection. Protection!--it was that which one had in a place like this.
Why was it given the Anns--and not the Vernas? The sleeping girl
seemed to feel that all was well in the house which sheltered her that
night. Suddenly Katie knew what it was had gone. Fear. It was terror
had slipped back, leaving the weariness which can give itself over to
sleep. Katie was thinking, striking deeper things than were wont to
invade Katie's meditations. The protection of a Wayne, the chivalrous
comradeship of a Captain Prescott--how different the life of an Ann
from the life this girl might have