SHE turned off the hall light at the switch at the head of the stairs and gained her room unchallenged. Usually her mother waited up for her, and Grace breathed a sigh of relief to find her door closed. She quickly undressed, hiding the new suit in the closet and throwing out another to wear to work in the morning.
She lay for nearly an hour thinking over the events of the night but slept at last the sleep of weary youth and was only roused by the importunate alarm clock at six thirty. On her way to the bathroom for a shower—the shower had been a concession to her and Roy—she passed Ethel whose good morning she thought a little constrained. As she dressed she rehearsed the story she meant to tell to account for her late home-coming. Something would be said about it and she went downstairs whistling to fortify herself for the ordeal. Her father was reading the morning paper by the window in the living room and in response to her inquiry as to whether there was any news muttered absently that there was nothing in particular, the remark he always made when interrupted in the reading of his paper.
She found her mother and sister in the kitchen.
“Good morning, Grace,” said Mrs. Durland pleasantly. “We’re a little late, so you might set the table. Ethel and I have started breakfast.”
Mrs. Durland usually made a point of setting the breakfast table herself and Grace wondered whether this delegation of the task might not mean that her mother and Ethel wished to be alone to discuss just what should be said about her arrival at midnight when they had every reason to expect her home from her French lesson by half-past nine.
When they were established at the table Ethel praised the clear bright morning. It was her habit to say something hopeful and cheering at the breakfast table, illuminated at times by an appropriate quotation. Mrs. Durland encouraged this practice and if Ethel did not at once volunteer her contribution to the felicity of the matutinal meal, would ask:
“Ethel, haven’t you some word for us this morning?”
Ethel had offered a quotation from Emerson and Grace had correctly guessed that it was from the essay on “Compensation” when Mrs. Durland, having filled and passed the coffee cups, glanced at Grace.
“What kept you so late last night, dear?” she asked in the kindest of tones. “I waited up till eleven. I didn’t hear you come in. You must have been very late.”
“Oh, I didn’t get in until twelve. After the lesson I went home with Irene and there were some people there and we just talked and played cards. I didn’t know the time was passing till it was after eleven.”
“That’s rather strange, dear. They didn’t know at the Kirby’s that you were at their house.”
“Why didn’t they know?” Grace demanded.
“Because we called up!” her mother answered. “John Moore’s in town and telephoned about eight o’clock to know if he could come out. Ethel talked to him.”
“He’s such a fine fellow,” said Ethel. “You know mother and I met him when we went down to see you at the University last spring. He’s such a splendid type!”
“The kind of high-minded, self-respecting young man we like to have you know, Grace,” remarked Mrs. Durland.
“John’s a dear,” said Grace warmly. “And you told him to go to Professor Duroy’s, and of course he didn’t find me there.”
“No; and he called a second time, thinking he had misunderstood. He was very anxious to get you to go with him to the football game tomorrow and was afraid you might make some other engagement. It was just a little embarrassing that we couldn’t tell him where you were.”
“You might have told him to come to the store in the morning,” Grace replied. “Well, I guess I may as well make a clean breast of it! I played hooky! Irene and I went to a supper party.”
“So you told me an untruth!” exclaimed Mrs. Durland, staring wide-eyed at the culprit. “Grace, this isn’t like you. You should have told me you were not going to Professor Duroy’s. You might have saved me my worry last night when you were so late and the Kirbys said Irene had not been home and that she told her family she was spending the night with a friend.”
“Yes, mamma: I shouldn’t have told you a fib. I’m sorry. It was a dreadful sin!”
She looked from one to the other smiling, hoping to dispel the gloom that seemed to hang above the table. It was not however in her sister’s mind to suffer the deception to pass unrebuked.
“You’ll tell us, I suppose, whom you had supper with besides Irene?”
Her sister’s question angered Grace the more by reason of the tone of forbearance in which it was uttered. She would tell them nothing. A crisis had risen in her relations with her family and she resolved to meet it boldly.
“I’ll not answer your question,” she said, addressing herself directly to Ethel. “It’s none of your business where I go or what I do. Ever since I came home I’ve been staying in at night except when I’ve gone to a movie with father. I’m working hard every day to help keep things going here at home. And I mean to keep on doing it; but I’m not a child and I’m not going to be checked up for every hour I’m out of your sight.”
“Calm yourself, Grace. Don’t say anything you’ll be sorry for!” admonished Mrs. Durland.
“After I’d warned you about the Kirby girl—” began Ethel with the serene patience due an erring child who may yet be saved from further misdemeanors.
“Oh, you warned me all right enough!” Grace interrupted. “You’ve done a lot to make things pleasant for me since I came home! When I asked those girls here to the house you made everything as disagreeable as possible. You shied from a harmless ouija board! And now if I go out for an evening you’re terribly shocked because I lie about it and refuse to tell you exactly where I’ve been! But I do refuse! I’m never going to tell you anything! The sooner you understand that, Ethel Durland, the sooner we’ll have peace in this house.”
Her eyes were bright with tears but she held her head high. In so far as she reasoned at all in her anger she was satisfied that justice was on her side. She was of age, she was self-supporting, she was bearing her full share of the family expenses, and she meant to establish once and for all her right to freedom.
“I hadn’t expected you to take the matter in this spirit,” said Mrs. Durland. “It isn’t like you, Grace. We want the very best for you. We want you to have your friends and to enjoy yourself. And be sure we all appreciate the fine way you met your disappointment at being obliged to give up college. But you know we owe it to you, dear, to protect you in every way possible. There are so many perils these days.”
“Not only here, but everywhere through the country, the moral conditions are terrible,” said Ethel plaintively. “A young girl can’t be too careful.”
“Well, if I’m wicked your goodness more than makes up for it,” Grace flashed back; and then, her anger mounting, “Why do you assume that I’ve been wicked? Are you going to take my character away from me right here at home? If I’ve got to live here in an atmosphere of suspicion I’ll leave. I can easily find another boarding place where I won’t be pecked at all the time.”
“You wouldn’t think of doing that!” cried her mother aghast. “This is your home, dear; it will always be your home. We should be so grateful that we’ve been able to keep the dear old place.”
“Well, you’re making me think of it! If I go you’ll be driving me out!”
“No one has any intention of driving you from home,” said Ethel. “We want to guard you with our faith and love.”
“Your faith!” Grace laughed ironically.
“Of course we have all the faith in the world in you!” declared Mrs. Durland.
Stephen Durland, who had remained silent during this discussion, was now folding his napkin. He cleared his throat, glanced from his wife to his daughters and back to his wife.
“Seems to me this has gone far enough, Alicia. There’s no use acting as though Grace had done anything wrong.”
“Of course we didn’t mean that, Stephen,” said Mrs. Durland quickly. “It was only——”
The fact that Durland so rarely expressed an opinion on any matter pertaining to family affairs had so surprised her that she found herself unequal to the task of completing her sentence.
“I guess it’s a good place to let the matter drop,” he said. “The way to show Grace we trust her is to trust her. Twelve o’clock is not late. I heard Grace when she came in. I don’t blame her for not answering questions when she’s jumped on. Don’t nag Grace. Grace is all right.”
This was the longest speech Stephen Durland had delivered in a family council for years. He rose, paused to drain the glass of water at his plate and left the room. A moment later the front door closed very softly. The gentleness with which it closed had curiously the effect of an emphasis upon his last words. They waited to give him time to reach the gate. Having broken one precedent he might break another; he might come back. He had even addressed his wife as Alicia instead of the familiar Allie—a radical and disconcerting departure.
“We may as well clear the table,” said Mrs. Durland, when a full minute had passed. Grace assisted in the clearing up. All the processes of this labor were executed in silence save for an occasional deep sigh from Mrs. Durland. When the dishes had been washed and put away in the pantry Grace hung up her apron and went to her room. She made her bed and straightened up her dressing table and had put on her hat and coat when Ethel appeared in the door.
“Grace, I want you to know how sorry I am if I said anything to hurt you. You know that not for worlds would I be unkind or unjust to my own sister.”
“Oh, that’s all right, Ethel; just forget it,” Grace replied indifferently.
She bade her mother good-bye with all the cheer she could muster.
“Good-bye, Grace,” called Mrs. Durland from the window where she was scanning the newspaper. “I hope you’ll have a good day.”
“Thank you, mother.”
As the trolley bore her townward she decided that all things considered she had come off fairly well in the encounter; but she was not jubilant. She had probably established her right to go and come as she pleased, but the victory brought her no happiness. Ethel’s conciliatory words meant nothing; it was her sister’s way to manifest forbearance and tolerance, to smooth things over when there had been a clash between them. Grace had for her mother a real affection, sincerely admiring the effort she made to keep in touch with the best thought of the world—a pet phrase of Mrs. Durland’s. Mrs. Durland was kind, unselfish, well-meaning. She meant to live up to her ideal of motherhood. It was despicable to lie to her. Grace’s conscience was now busy tearing down the defenses behind which she had excused herself for going to Kemp’s party. Any uncertainty as to Irene’s relations with the manufacturer were dispelled by the visit to The Shack. The fact that Kemp’s money made it possible to surround the relationship with a degree of glamour did not mitigate the ugly fact. It might be that the people who talked so dolefully of the new generation and the low ebb to which old-fashioned morals had sunk were right. Irene’s affair with Kemp presented a situation which, if greatly multiplied, would mean the destruction of all that made womanhood precious.
Could she, Grace Durland, ever be like that? What was to prevent her from doing exactly what Irene was doing or falling even lower? Nothing, she pondered, but her own will and innate sense of righteousness. She would have no excuse for following Irene’s example. The home she had just left really stood for all those things she had been taught to believe were essential to right living. Her mother, with all her failings and weaknesses, had labored hard to implant in her children the principles of honor and rectitude. And her father, pitiful figure though he was, was a man of ideals and a pattern of morality. He believed in her; he was her friend and it would be shameful to do aught to bring disgrace upon him. And with an accession of generosity as she pondered, Grace saw Ethel, too, in a different light. With all her offensive assumption of saintly airs Ethel’s ideas of human conduct were sound. Ethel was a disagreeable person to live with, but nevertheless she was not always wrong. She had indubitably been right about Irene Kirby.
As Grace left the car she saw by a street clock that she still had ten minutes in which to report at the store and she loitered, eager to remain in the open as long as possible. And she rather dreaded meeting Irene.
Happily for her peace of mind the day opened briskly. She had disposed of a rapid succession of customers before Irene, who had arrived late, passed her in the salesroom with a careless nod and smile. At half-past nine Grace espied John Moore, the unwitting cause of the exposure of her truancy from the French class, standing in the entrance. So many other thoughts had filled her mind since she left the breakfast table that she had forgotten about Moore and the football game. She was carrying a gown she had just sold flung over her arm when the sight of the young man, who was clearly dismayed by the unfamiliar scene, brought a smile to her face. He sprang forward beaming when he caught sight of her.
“I was just about to run; I’m scared to death!” he exclaimed.
In his joy at finding her he dropped his hat as he grasped her hand. He was big of frame but trained fine, and the deep tan of his summer on a Kansas farm had not yet worn off. His gray suit was only saved from shabbiness by a recent careful pressing. His lean cheeks were neatly shaven and his thick brown hair was evenly parted and smoothly brushed, though a wisp of it persisted in slipping down over his forehead. Twenty-seven or thereabouts, John Barton Moore—as he was written on the university books—seemed older with the maturity of one who begins early to plan and fashion his life.
“I’m awfully glad to see you, John!” she cried. “Up for the game, of course! I was terribly sorry not to be home when you called. The trouble was that I cut my French lesson at the last minute to go to a party.”
“Perfectly all right, Grace. I ought to have written you a note to say I was coming up.”
He glanced about anxiously. “Am I blocking the wheels of commerce?” he asked with the drawl that proclaimed him one of those children of Indiana whose ancestors reached the Wabash country by way of North Carolina and Kentucky.
“Nothing like that! Just a minute till I send this dress to be packed.”
She motioned him to a chair but he remained standing like a soldier at attention till she came back.
“Now then! Let’s proceed to business.”
“Well, I. U. needs all her children to root this afternoon, though I think we’re going to win. And you’ve got to go. Got good seats and everything’s all set.”
“Why, John, I’m afraid I can’t go. Saturdays are busy days here. I don’t like to ask to get off.”
“Oh, you can fix it somehow. And besides I want to talk. I’ve got about a million things to tell you. You left in such a hurry I didn’t know you were gone till Roy told me the next day. I’ve certainly missed our talks.”
“Well, we’ll have some more; I’m starving for a talk with you!”
“Well, this is a fearsome place and I mustn’t keep you. So please see your boss and tell him or her this is a matter of life and death.”
At this moment Irene swept by with a valued customer and Grace appealed to her.
“Miss Kirby, Mr. Moore. Irene, Mr. Moore is an old friend of mine from I. U. and he wants me to go to the game. Would I be shot if I asked to get off?”
Irene surveyed Moore carefully and weighed the question for an instant.
“What do I get if I fix it?” she asked, giving the young man the benefit of her handsome eyes.
“I might offer a bushel of hickory-nuts,” said Moore. “I counted a lot on seeing the game with Grace.”
“I think,” said Irene with mock gravity, “I think it can be arranged. Miss Boardman sent word this morning that she’s ill and won’t be down, so I’m in charge. We’re likely to have a busy afternoon, but you run along, Grace.”
“Well, that’s mighty nice of you, Miss Kirby”; and Moore thrust out his hand. It was evidently his habit to express all manner of emotion with a handshake. He was regarding Irene with a frank curiosity manifest in his steady gray eyes. The grand manner of the Irenes of the world, one would have assumed, was new to him.
“I wish you could go along too,” he said. “It’s likely to be a lively scrap. If you say the word, Miss Kirby, I’ll get another seat right away.”
“Oh, thank you so much! But with Miss Boardman away it can’t be done. It’s nice of you to ask me though.”
If she was to him a puzzling type, alien to all his experience, he was equally of an unfamiliar species to her. Grace noted with secret amusement the interest they apparently awakened in each other.
“Excuse me; I must run along,” said Irene. “Have a good time!” She left them with her queenliest air.
“I told you it could be fixed all right,” said Moore. “Fine girl; Miss Kirby.”
“It was mighty nice of her to do it. I’d hardly have had the nerve to tackle Miss Boardman.”
“Well, I mustn’t keep you. There’s lots of folks on the streets. Looks like the whole of the grand old Hoosier State was in town. Where can I meet you?”
“At the main entrance of this emporium at one o’clock. You get your lunch first and I’ll snatch something in the tea room. We’ll want to get out early to see the crowd gather. I’m that thrilled, John!”
Grace greeted her next customer with a smile that was not wholly inspired by the hope of making a substantial sale. John had been one of her best friends at the university, where every one knew and liked him. Even the governor of the State knew Moore and referred to him indirectly in public addresses as a justification for taxing the people to place higher education within reach of the humblest.
Moore was born on a farm and his parents dying just as he finished the common schools, he had worked his way through college, doing chores during the school terms and spending his vacations on farms wherever employment offered. In like fashion he was now plodding his way through the law school. His good humor was unfailing and his drolleries were much quoted in the university town. When urged in his undergraduate days to take up football he pleaded important engagements, not scrupling to explain that they were the most solemn pledges to saw wood or cut grass for his clients or drive the truck on Saturdays for a grocer. He called his employers his noble patrons and praised them for their consideration and generosity. He enjoyed music, and possessing a good baritone voice he had been enrolled in the glee club. He never had danced until, in his senior year, a number of co-eds conspired to instruct him. He was the star performer of the debating society and had several times represented the university in the contests of the Inter-State Association.
Though she had so quickly overcome her disappointment at leaving the University, Grace found that the sight of Moore awoke in her a keen regret that her college days were over. She was far less sure of herself than she had been before her evening at The Shack. She clutched at memories of her happy care-free yesterdays. A band in the street was playing the air of the college song, which was punctuated by the familiar yell from the throats of a mighty phalanx of undergraduates. Young women from all the state colleges were coming into the store for hurried purchases. Two members of her sorority, girls she had lived with for two years, dropped in to see her—cheery, hopeful young women, eagerly flinging at her scraps of college news and giving a sharper edge to her homesickness for the campus and all it connoted. She was beset with serious doubts as to her fitness to meet the problems of life; the conceit was gone out of her. She recalled what a lecturer had once said at a student’s convocation, that the great commonwealth of Indiana stood behind them, eager to serve them, to put them in the way of realizing the abundant promise of life. In her mood of contrition she reflected that not only had the arm of the State been withdrawn, but that she had gone far toward estranging those to whom she was bound by the closest ties, who had every right to expect the best of her. If it had been in her power she would have elected to join the throng of young men and women who, victor or vanquished, would go back to the university that night singing songs which echoed in her memory now and made a continuing little ache in her heart.
Moore’s pride in her was manifest as he hung to a strap and bent over her in the crowded street-car on the way to the battlefield. Grace was a pretty girl, and John was not unmindful of the fact that she attracted attention. He talked steadily—of university affairs, of their friends among the students.
“Did Roy come up?” she asked.
“I haven’t seen him. He may have come up with the bunch this morning. But you might overlook the king of England in this crowd.”
“Roy’s not terribly enthusiastic about the law,” she suggested leadingly.
“Well, maybe not just what you’ll call crazy about it; but he’ll come along all right. There’s good stuff in Roy.”
Moore was usually so candid that his equivocal answer did not escape her. Grace had the greatest misgivings as to her brother’s future. He had wanted to leave the university when she was summoned home. He had won his A. B. by the narrowest margin and had gone into the law school only because of his mother’s obsession that he was destined to a career similar to that of her father and grandfather, whose attainments at the bar and services to the State provided what Mrs. Durland called a background for her children.
Arriving early at the ball park they found their seats and John continued talking as the crowd assembled. On many Sunday afternoons they had taken long tramps, discussing all manner of things. Moore was a prodigious reader of poetry and made it his practice to commit to memory a certain number of lines every day. Politics, too, interested him seriously. He always spoke with deepest reverence of the founders of the republic, referring to them familiarly as though they were still living. Between the cheers to which he vociferously contributed his own voice, he rambled on comfortably and happily, satisfied that he had a sympathetic auditor.
“There’s Bill Trumbull—hello there, Bill! Well, to tell the truth, Grace, I don’t get much out of this new poetry. Flimsy stuff; doesn’t satisfy you somehow. The times call for another old Walt Whitman. That bird had ideas. He certainly hit some grand old truths. ‘Produce great men,’ he says; ‘the rest follows.’ Just as easy! Wow! There’s our team coming out now!” (prolonged cheering) “Well, there’s the old saying that the time brings the man. Can’t tell but there’s a future president right here in this crowd!”
“It might be you, John!” remarked Grace, laughing at the serenity with which he returned to his subject after joining in the uproar.
“No, Grace; I’ve chosen the chief justiceship!” he said, swinging round at her. “Isn’t that Daisy Martin?—Fred Ragsdale with her. Hello, Fred! and if, there ain’t old Pop Streeter! Greetings Pop! No, sir; the times call for men and we’re going to produce a fine new crop right out of this generation here present.”
Moore was enjoying himself; there was no question of it. And Grace was experiencing a grateful sense of security in John’s company. He was paying her his highest compliment, and she knew that the money for his excursion to the capital had been earned by his own labor. Her girl friends at the university had tormented her a good deal about John’s attentions, which were marked by the shy deference and instinctive courtesy with which he treated all women. He was not a person to be flirted with; Grace had never in the prevalent phrase “teased him along.” She respected him too much for that, and, moreover, he was not fair game. Any attempt to practice on him the usual cajoleries and coquetries would have sent him away running. When a girl visitor at the university, meeting John at a dance, had referred to him as a hick, Grace had resented it on the spot, informing the surprised offender that John Moore was the finest gentleman on the campus.
John was not wholly silenced by the spirited opening of the game.
“Too bad Crump’s not here. Hurt his leg last week in practice. Thought he’d make it. Break his heart not to be in the game. Thompson in his place. You know Thompy? He’s a wonder on the trap drum. Wow! Illinois got the ball. Where was I? Oh, yes! I read Landor last summer—Walter Savage; a theological student from New York, working along with me out in Kansas, put me on to Landor. Quite a man—Landor, I mean. The theolog’s a bully chap, too, for that matter. Look at that! No; sending ’em back. Wow! That’s first blood for us! Well, you might like Landor if you took a whack at him. That referee’s awful fussy. Wonder where they got him. Remember that day we read ‘The Passing of Arthur,’ sitting on a log by that gay little creek in the woods? I’ve thought a lot about that and the way you cried. Yes; you did, Grace; and I guess I shed a few tears myself!...”
In moments of despair when Indiana’s fortunes were low, John’s optimism evoked laughter from his neighbors, for he possessed in good measure the homely humor which is indigenous to the corn-belt.
Before the game ended it had occurred to Grace to ask John to go home with her for supper. After they had joined in the demonstration for the victorious Hoosier team and had made their way to the street she went into a drugstore and called her mother on the telephone. Mrs. Durland replied cordially that she would be delighted to see John; it was too late to put on any extras but any friend of Grace’s was always welcome. It would serve to ease the situation she had left behind her to take John home, Grace reflected, and moreover, she was glad of an excuse for seeing more of him.
“Of course I’ll be glad to break bread with you. I’ll be glad to see your folks again. If you’re not too tired, let’s walk. Fine zippy air! Well, that was sure some game! I nearly died an unnatural death about seven times in the last quarter, but we managed to pull through. Let’s see, what were we talking about?”
He let her into a great secret as they crossed the park toward the Durland house. He had seen Judge Sanders, the senior member of one of the best law firms in the capital and a university trustee, who had offered to take him into his office.
“Wants me to come in January,” John explained. “Says they’ll guarantee my board and keep for running errands and attending to collections; and I can go on studying and be ready for my exams in the spring just the same. So I’ll be in the city for keeps after Christmas. Grand man, the Judge. Found I was washing automobiles at night to pay for my room over Westlake’s garage and he just couldn’t stand it. There’s a friend, I say!”
He waited for her to laugh and laughed with her. It was enormously funny that among other jobs he washed automobiles on his way to the chief justiceship!
“Nothing can keep you back, John. You’re like the men we read about, who strike right out for the top and get there and plant their flag on the battlements.”
“Don’t say a word! There’s luck as well as hard work in this business of getting on. All summer I used to think about it—out in the fields in Kansas. A big, hot harvest field’s a grand place for healthy thought. I say, Grace, life’s a lot more complicated than it used to be. Things all sort o’ mixed up since the war.”
“You really believe the world’s so different, John? Everybody’s saying that and the papers and magazines are full of stuff about the changes and knocking our generation.”
“Don’t let that talk throw you! It’s up to all of us to sit tight on the toboggan and wait till she slows down. There’s a lot of good in this grand old world yet. By the way, it was hard luck you had to quit college. Excuse me for mentioning it, but I just wanted you to know I was sorry you left.”
“Oh, it’s all right, John. I miss the good times but there’s no use crying. I’m ashamed now, though, to think how I just fooled along. I ought to have got more out of it than I did.”
“You don’t know how much you got,” he replied quickly. “Kind of a mystery what we get and what we don’t. We got to keep braced for anything we bump into. When the war came along I thought that was the end of me so far as going into the law was concerned, but being shot at by the Kaiser sort o’ made me mad. I wasn’t going to let a little thing like that stop me; so my life being providentially spared, I thought it all out on the ship coming home—on the deck at night with the stars blinking at me. I’ve got health and a fair second-rate head and I’m going to give the world a good wrestle before I quit.”
“Fine!” she exclaimed, noting the lifting of his head as he swung along in the gathering dusk. “You make me ashamed of myself, John. I think I’ve begun to drift—I don’t know what I’m headed for.”
“We all think we’re drifting when we’re not! It’s in the back of our minds all the time that we’re aiming for something,” he replied; “we don’t fool ourselves there!”
“I hope you’re right,” she said, pensively. “But I’ve wondered a lot lately about myself. Do you suppose there