Louise, white-faced and quiet, with little hands clasped at her throat, stood just behind her sister, watching the car shoot up the hill and out of sight. “Sister, you think—it’s that girl again—don’t you?” she asked softly, looking with awe at the white-faced girl.
“I’m afraid, Louie; I don’t know!” said Cornelia, turning with a deep, anxious sigh and dropping into a chair.
“Yes, it must be,” said Louise. “And—that was that boy, wasn’t it? The same one she sent to say she was coming to the party. My! That was poor! She wasn’t very bright to do that, Nellie.”
Cornelia did not answer. She had dropped her face into her hands and was trembling.
“Nellie, dear!” cried the little sister, kneeling before her and gathering her sister’s head into her young arms. “You mustn’t feel that way. God is taking care of us. He helped us before, you know. And He’s sent Mr. Maxwell. He’s just like an angel, isn’t he? Don’t you know that verse, ‘My God hath sent his angel, and hath shut the lions’ mouths’? Mother used to read us that story so often when Harry and I were going to sleep. Let’s just kneel down and pray, and pretty soon Carey’ll come back all right. I shouldn’t wonder. I know he didn’t mean to be away. He promised Grace; and I kind of don’t think he likes that other girl so awfully anymore now, do you?”
“No, I think not. But, dear, I’m afraid this is a trick. I’m afraid they mean to keep him away to pay him back.”
“Yes, I know,” said the wise little sister. “I read that note. You dropped it out of your pocket. Grace Kendall never wrote that. It isn’t her writing. She put her name in my birthday book, and she doesn’t make her Gs like that. She makes ‘em with a long curl to the handle. They thought they were pretty smart, but Carey and Mr. Maxwell’ll beat them to it, I’m sure, for they’ve got our God on their side. I’m glad Harry went, too. Harry’s got a lot of sense, and if anything happens, Harry can run back and tell.”
“Oh darling!” Cornelia clung to the little girl.
“Well, it might—” said the child. “I’m glad Father isn’t here. I hope it’s all over before he gets back. Was he coming back before church?”
Cornelia shook her head.
“He’s going to stay with Mr. Baker while his wife goes to church.”
“Then let’s pray now, Nellie.”
They knelt together beside the big gray chair in the silence of the twilight, hand in hand, and put up silent prayers, and then they got up and went to the window.
The city had that gentle, haloed look of a chastened child in the afterglow of the sunset, and soft violets and purples were twisting in misty wreaths around the edges of the night. Bells were calling in the distance. A faraway chime could just be heard in tender waves that almost obliterated the melody. The Sabbath hush was in the sky, broken now and again by harsh, rasping voices and laughter as a car sped by on the way home from some pleasure trip. Something hallowed seemed to linger above the little house, and all about was a sweet quiet. The neighbors had for the moment hushed their chatter. Now and again a far-distant twang of a cheap victrola broke out and died away, and then the silence would close around them again. The two sat waiting breathlessly on the pretty front porch that Carey had made, for Carey to come home. But Carey did not come.
By and by the sound of singing voices came distinctly to their ears. It seemed to beat against their hearts and hurt them.
“Nellie, you’ll have to go pretty soon. It’ll be so hard to explain, you know. And, besides, he might somehow be there. Carey wouldn’t stop for a hat. I almost think he’s there myself.” Louise sounded quite grown up.
“Of course, he might,” said Cornelia thoughtfully. “There’s always a possibility that we have made a great deal more out of this than the fact merited.” She shuddered. She had just drawn her mind back from a fearful abyss of possibilities, and it was hard to get into everyday untragic thought.
“I think we better go, Nellie,” said the little girl rising. “Christian ‘deavor’ll be most out before we can get there now, and she’ll think it odd if we don’t come after she gave us both those verses to read. You won’t like to tell her you were just sitting here on the front porch, doing nothing, because you thought Carey had gone to Lamb’s Tavern after her! I think we’d better go. We prayed, and we better trust God and go.”
“Perhaps you’re right, dearie,” said Cornelia, rising reluctantly and giving a wistful glance up the hill into the darkness.
They got ready hurriedly, put the key into its hiding place, and went. Cornelia wrote a little note, and as soon as they got there sent it up with the music to Grace, who was at the piano. It said:
Dear Grace,
Carey was called away for a few minutes, and he must have been detained longer than he expected. Don’t worry; I’m sure he will do everything in his power to get back in time.
Grace read the note, nodded brightly to the Copleys at the back of the room, and seemed not at all concerned. Cornelia, glad of the shelter of a secluded seat under the gallery, bent her head and prayed continually. Little Louise, bright-eyed, with glowing cheeks, sat alertly up, and watched the door; but no Carey came.
They slipped out into the darkness after the meeting was out and walked around the corner where they could see their own house, but it seemed silent and dark as they had left it, and they turned sadly back and went into the church.
The choir had gathered when Cornelia got back, and she slipped into the last vacant seat by the stairs and was glad that it was almost hidden from the view of the congregation. It seemed to her that the anxiety of her heart must be written large across her face.
Louise, quiet as a mouse all by herself down in a backseat by the door, watched—and prayed. No one came in at the two big doors that she did not see. Maxwell and Harry had not come back yet. The cool evening air came in at the open window and blew the little feather in the pretty hat Cornelia had made for her. She felt a strand of her own hair moving against her cheek. There was honeysuckle outside somewhere on somebody’s front porch across the street or in the little park nearby. The breath of it was very sweet, but Louise thought she never as long as she lived, even if that were a great many years, would smell the breath of honeysuckle without thinking of this night. And yet the sounds outside were just like the sounds on any other Sunday night; the music and the lights in the church were the same; the people looked just as if nothing were the matter; and Carey had not come! What a strange world it was, everything going on just the same, even when one family was crushed to earth with fear!
Automobiles flew by the church; now and then one stopped. Louise wished she were tall so she could look out and see whether they had come. Her little heart was beating wildly, but there was a serene, peaceful expression on her face. She had resolved to trust God, and she knew He was going to do something about it somehow. But people kept coming in at the door, and hope would dim again.
The service had begun, and in the silence of the opening prayer the two sisters lifted their hearts in tragic petition. Their spirits seemed to cling to each word and make it linger; their souls entered into the song that followed and sang as if their earnest singing would hold off the moment for a little longer.
Cornelia was glad that her seat was so placed that she could not see all the choir. She had given a swift survey as she sat down, and she knew her brother was not there. Now she sat in heaviness of heart and tried to fathom it all! Tried to think what to do next, what to tell her father, whether to tell her father at all; tried not to think of the letter she would not write the next day to her mother; tried just to hold her spirit steady, trusting, not hoping, but trusting, right through the prayer, the song, the Bible reading. Now and again a frightful thought of danger shot through her heart, and a wonder about Maxwell. Lamb’s Tavern—what kind of a place was it? The very name “Tavern” sounded questionable. And Harry! He ought not to have gone, of course, but she had not seen him in time to stop him. Brave, dear Harry! A man already. And yet he kn
ew he ought not to go! But the man in him had to. She understood.
Suddenly she found a tear stealing slowly down her cheek, and she sat up very straight and casually slid a finger up to its source and stopped it. This must not happen again. No one must know her trouble. How wonderful it was that she should have been able to get this little sheltered spot, the only spot in the whole choir loft that was absolutely out of sight by the winding stairs down into the choir room behind! She would not be seen until she had to stand up with the rest of the choir to sing, and then she would step in behind the rest and be out of sight again. She wondered what Grace would do about Carey’s solo and decided that she had probably asked someone else to take it. She cast a quick glance over the group of tenors, but she did not know any of them well enough to be sure whether there was a soloist present. She had been at only two rehearsals so far and was not acquainted with them all yet. She was not afraid that the music would go wrong, for she had great faith that Grace at the organ would easily be able to fill the vacancy in some way; she only felt the deep mortification that Carey, the first time he had been asked to sing in this notably conspicuous way, had failed her, and for such a reason! It was terrible, and it was perplexing. It was not like Carey to be fooled by a note. And didn’t Carey know that little Dodd boy? If he had been going to the Dodd house at all, wouldn’t he know the brother? Why didn’t he see through the trick? He was quick as a flash. He was not dumb and slow like some people.
The contralto solo had begun. It was a sweet and tender thing, with low, deep tones like a cello, but they beat upon the tired girl’s heart and threatened to break down her studied composure. A hymn followed and the reading of another Bible selection: “All we like sheep have gone astray; we have turned every one to his way; and the Lord hath laid on him the iniquity of us all.” She felt as if all the iniquity of her brother Carey were laid upon her heart, and a dim wonder came to her whether the Lord was bearing a like burden for her. She had never felt much sense of personal sin herself before. The thought lingered through the pain and wound in and out through her tired brain during the offertory and prayer that followed, and at last came the anthem. The opening chords were sounding. The choir was rising. She stumbled to her feet and for the first time saw the audience before her, this congregation that was to have heard Carey sing his tenor solo. It was a goodly audience, for Mr. Kendall touched the popular heart and drew people out at night as well as in the morning, and she felt anew the pang of disappointment. She glanced swiftly over the lifted faces and saw little Louise, white and shrinking, sitting by herself, and saw beyond her at the open door two figures just entering, Maxwell and Harry, looking a trifle white and hurried and glancing anxiously around the audience. Then she opened her mouth and tried to sing, to do her little part among the sopranos in the chorus, but no sound seemed to come. All she could think of now was Carey is not here! beating over and over like a refrain in her brain: Carey has not come! Carey has not come!
Chapter 28
Carey had lost no time when he read that note of appeal signed “Grace.” It was not his way to hesitate in an emergency, but he did not leave good judgment behind him when he swung himself into the already moving car that had come for him. He could think on the way, and he was taking no chances.
It was quite natural that Grace Kendall should have gone to see a sick pupil after Sunday school. It was not natural that any pupil would have lived out as far as Lamb’s Tavern; yet there were a hundred and one ways she might have gone there against her plans. He could question the messenger on the way and lose no time about it, nor excite the curiosity of his family. That had perhaps been one of Carey’s greatest cares all his life, amounting sometimes almost to a vice, to keep his family from finding out anything little or great connected with himself or anybody else. He had a code, and by that code all things not immediately concerning people were “none of their business.” His natural caution now caused him to get away from his house at once and excite no suspicion of danger. Grace had written to him rather than to her father with evident intention—if she had written at all, a question he had at once recognized but not as yet settled—and it was easy to guess that she did not wish to worry her parents unnecessarily. He was inclined to be greatly elated that she had chosen him for her helper rather than some older acquaintance, and this was probably the moving factor in prompting him to act at once.
He would not have been the boy he was if he had not seen all these points at the first flash. The only thing he did not see and would not recognize was any danger to himself. He had always felt he could ably take care of himself, and he intended to do so now. Moreover, he expected and intended to return in time to go to that Christian Endeavor meeting.
He glanced at his watch as he dropped into the seat and immediately sat forward and prepared to investigate the situation. But the boy who had brought the note and who had seemingly scuttled around to get into the front seat from the other side of the car, had disappeared, and a glance backward at the rapidly disappearing landscape gave no hint of his whereabouts. That was strange. He had evidently intended to go along. He had said, “Come on!” and hurried toward the car. Who was that kid, anyway? Where had he seen him?
For what had been a revealing fact to Cornelia, and would have greatly changed the view of things, was entirely unknown to Carey. Clytie Dodd kept her family in the background as much as possible and to that end met her “gentlemen friends” in parks or at soda fountains or by the wayside casually. She had a regular arrangement with a certain corner drugstore whereby telephone messages would reach her and bring her to the phone whenever she was at home; but her friends seldom came to her house and never met her family. She had a hardworking, sensible father and an overworked, fretful, tempestuous mother, and a swarm of little wild, outrageous brothers and sisters, none of whom approved of her high social aspirations. She found it healthier in every way to keep her domestic and social lives utterly apart; consequently Carey had never seen Sam Dodd, or his eyes might have instantly been opened. Sam was very useful to his sister on occasion when well primed with one of her hard-earned quarters and could, if there were special inducement, even exercise a bit of detective ability. Sam knew how to disappear off the face of the earth, and he had done it thoroughly this time.
Carey leaned forward and questioned the driver. “What’s the matter? Anything serious?”
But the driver sat unmoved, staring ahead and making his car go slamming along, regardless of ruts or bumps, at a tremendous rate of speed. Carey did not object to the speed. He wanted to get back. He tried again, touching the man on the shoulder and shouting his question. The man turned after a second nudge and stared resentfully but appeared to be deaf.
Carey shouted a third time, and then the man gave evidence of being also dumb; but after a fourth attempt he gave forth the brief word: “I dunno. Lady jes’ hired me.”
The man did not look so stupid as he sounded, and Carey made several attempts to get further information, even to ask for a description of the lady who had sent him; but he answered either “I dunno” or “Yep, I gezzo,” and Carey finally gave up. He dived into his pocket for the note once more, having a desire to study the handwriting of the young woman for whom he had newly acquired an admiration. It didn’t seem real, that expedition. As he thought of it, it didn’t seem like that quiet, modest girl to send for a comparative stranger to help her in distress. It seemed more like Clytie. But that note had not been Clytie’s writing. Clytie affected a large, round, vertical hand like a young schoolchild, crude and unfinished. This letter had been delicately written by a finished hand on thick cream stationery. Where was that note? He was sure he had put it in his pocket.
But a search of every pocket revealed nothing, and he sat back and tried to think the thing out, tried to imagine what possible situation had brought Grace Kendall where she would send for him to help her. Wait! Was it Grace Kendall? Grace, Grace. Was there any other Grace among the circle of friends? No, no one that claimed s
ufficient acquaintance to write a note like that. It certainly was strange. But they were out in the open country now, and speeding. The farmhouses were few and far apart. It was growing dusky; Carey could just see the hands of his watch, and he was getting nervous. Once he almost thought of shaking the driver and insisting on his turning around, for it had come over him that he should have left word with Miss Kendall’s people or called up before he left home. It wasn’t his way at all to do such a thing. But still, with a girl like that—and, if anything serious was the matter, her father might not like it that he had taken it upon himself. As the car sped on through the radiant dusk, it seemed more and more strange that Grace Kendall after the afternoon service should have come way out here to visit a sick Sunday-school scholar, and his misgivings grew. Then suddenly at a crossroad just ahead an automobile appeared, standing by the roadside just at the crossings with no lights on. It seemed strange, no lights at that time of night. If it was an accident, they would have the lights on. It was still three-quarters of a mile to the Tavern. Perhaps someone had broken down and gone on for help. No, there was a man standing in the road, looking toward them. He was holding up his hand, and the driver was slowing down. Carey frowned. He had no time to waste. “We can’t stop to help them now,” he shouted. “Tell them we’ll come back in a few minutes and bring someone to fix them up. I’ve got to get back right away. I’ve gotta date.”
But the man paid no more heed to him than if he had been a june bug, and the car stopped at the crossroads.
Carey leaned out and shouted, “What’s the matter? I haven’t time to stop now. We’ll send help back to you,” but the driver turned and motioned him to get out.
“She’s in there. The lady’s in that car,” he said. “Better get out here. I ain’t goin’ no farther, anyhow. I’m going home by the crossroads. They’ll get you back,” motioning to the other car.