CHAPTER XV
HELL AND HEAVEN
The events of the afternoon, stirring as they had been, were soondismissed from Sandy's mind. The approaching hop possessed right ofway over every other thought.
By the combined assistance of Mrs. Hollis and Aunt Melvy, he had beenready at half-past seven. The dance did not begin until nine; but hewas to take Annette, and the doctor, whose habits were as fixed as thenumbers on a clock, had insisted that she should attend prayer-meetingas usual before the dance.
In the little Hard-Shell Baptist Church the congregation had assembledand services had begun before Mr. Meech arrived. He appearedsingularly flushed and breathless, and caused some confusion bygiving out the hymn which had just been sung. It was not until hebecame stirred by the power of his theme that he gained composure.
In the front seat Dr. Fenton drowsed through the discourse. Next tohim, her party dress and slipper-bag concealed by a rain-coat, satAnnette, hot and rebellious, and in anything but a prayerful frame ofmind. Beside her sat Sandy, rigid with elegance, his eyes riveted onthe preacher, but his thoughts on his feet. For, stationary though hewas, he was really giving himself the benefit of a final rehearsal,and mentally performing steps of intricate and marvelous variety.
"Stop moving your feet!" whispered Annette. "You'll step on my dress."
"Is it the mazurka that's got the hiccoughs in the middle?" askedSandy, anxiously.
Mr. Meech paused and looked at them over his spectacles in plaintivereproach.
Then he wandered on into sixthlies and seventhlies of increasinglength. Before the final amen had died upon the air, Annette and Sandyhad escaped to their reward.
The hop was given in the town hall, a large, dreary-looking room witha raised platform at one end, where Johnson's band introducedinstruments and notes that had never met before.
To Sandy it was a hall of Olympus, where filmy-robed goddesses movedto the music of the spheres.
"Isn't the floor g-grand?" cried Annette, with a little run and aslide. "I could just d-die dancing."
"What may the chalk line be for?" asked Sandy.
"That's to keep the stags b-back."
"The stags?" His spirits fell before this new complication.
"Yes; the boys without partners, you know. They have to stay b-back ofthe chalk line and b-break in from there. You'll catch on right away.There's your d-dressing-room over there. Don't bother about my card;it's been filled a week. Is there anyb-body you want to dance withespecially?"
Sandy's eyes answered for him. They were held by a vision in thecenter of the room, and he was blinded to everything else.
Half surrounded by a little group stood Ruth Nelson, red-lipped,bright-eyed, eager, her slender white-clad figure on tiptoe withbuoyant expectancy. The crimson rose caught in her hair kept impatienttime to the tap of her restless high-heeled slipper, and she swayedand sang with the music in a way to set the sea-waves dancing.
It was small matter to Sandy that the lace on her dress had belongedto her great-grandmother, or that the pearls about her round whitethroat had been worn by an ancestor who was lady in waiting to a queenof France. He only knew she meant everything beautiful in the world tohim,--music and springtime and dawn,--and that when she smiled it wassunlight in his heart.
"I don't think you can g-get a dance there," said Annette, followinghis gaze. "She is always engaged ahead. But I'll find out, if youw-want me to."
"Would you, now?" cried Sandy, fervently pressing her hand. Then hestopped short. "Annette," he said wistfully, "do you think she'll becaring to dance with a boy like me?"
"Of course she will, if you k-keep off her toes and don't forget tocount the time. Hurry and g-get off your things; I want you to try itbefore the crowd comes. There are only a few couples for you to bumpinto now, and there will be a hundred after a while."
O the fine rapture of that first moment when Sandy found he coulddance! Annette knocked away his remaining doubts and fears and boldlylaunched him into the merry whirl. The first rush was breathless,carrying all before it; but after a moment's awful uncertainty hesettled into the step and glided away over the shining floor,counting his knots to be sure, but sailing triumphantly forwardbehind the flutter of Annette's pink ribbons.
He was introduced right and left, and he asked every girl he met todance. It made little difference who she happened to be, for inimagination she was always the same. Annette had secured for him thelast dance with Ruth, and he intended to practise every moment untilthat magic hour should arrive.
But youth reckons not with circumstance. Just when all sails were setand he was nearing perfection, he met with a disaster which promptlyrelegated him to the dry-dock. His partner did not dance!
When he looked at her, he found that she was tall and thin andvivacious, and he felt that she must have been going to hops for avery long time.
"I hate dancing, don't you?" she said. "Let's go over there, out ofthe crowd, and have a nice long talk."
Sandy glanced at the place indicated. It seemed a long way from base.
"Wouldn't you like to stand here and watch them?" he flounderedhelplessly.
"Oh, dear, no; it's too crowded. Besides," she added playfully, "Ihave heard _so_ much about you and your awfully romantic life. I justwant to know all about it."
As a trout, one moment in mid-stream swimming and frolicking with thebest, finds himself suddenly snatched out upon the bank, gasping andhelpless, so Sandy found himself high and dry against the wall, withthe insistent voice of his captor droning in his ears.
She had evidently been wound and set, and Sandy had unwittinglystarted the pendulum.
"Have you ever been to Chicago, Mr. Kilday? No? It is such a dearplace; I simply adore it. I'm on my way home from there now. All mymen friends begged me to stay; they sent me so many flowers I had tokeep them in the bath-tub. Wasn't it darling of them? I just lovemen. How long have you been in Clayton, Mr. Kilday?"
He tried to answer coherently, but his thoughts were in eager pursuitof a red rose that flashed in and out among the dancers.
"And you really came over from England by yourself when you were justa small boy? Weren't you clever! But I know the captain and all ofthem made a great pet of you. Then you made a walking tour through theStates; I heard all about it. It was just too romantic for any use. Ilove adventure. My two best friends are at the theological seminary.One's going to India,--he's a blond,--and one to Africa. Just betweenus, I am going with one of them, but I can't for the life of me makeup my mind which. I don't know why I am telling you all these things,Mr. Kilday, except that you are so sweet and sympathetic. Youunderstand, don't you?"
He assured her that he did with more vehemence than was necessary, forhe did not want her to suspect that he had not heard what she said.
"I knew you did. I knew it the moment I shook hands with you. I feltthat we were drawn to each other. I am like you; I am just full ofmagnetism."
Sandy unconsciously moved slightly away: he had a sudden uncomfortablerealization that he was the only one within the sphere of influence.
After two intermissions he suggested that they go out to thedrug-store and get some soda-water. On the steps they met Annette.
"You old f-fraud," she whispered to Sandy in passing, "I thought youdidn't like to sit out d-dances."
He smiled feebly.
"Don't you mind her teasing," pouted his partner; "if we like to talkbetter than to dance, it's our own affair."
Sandy wished devoutly that it was somebody else's. When they returned,they went back to their old corner. The chairs, evidently consideringthem permanent occupants, assumed an air of familiarity which heresented.
"Do you know, you remind me of an old sweetheart of mine," resumed thevoice of his captor, coyly. "He was the first real lover I ever had.His eyes were big and pensive, just like yours, and there was alwaysthat same look in his face that just made me want to stay with him allthe time to keep him from being lonely. He was awfully fond of me, buthe had to
go out West to make his fortune, and he married before hegot back."
Sandy sighed, ostensibly in sympathy, but in reality at his own sadfate. At that moment Prometheus himself would not have envied him hisstate of mind. The music set his nerves tingling and the dancersbeckoned him on, yet he was bound to his chair, with no relief inview. At the tenth intermission he suggested soda-water again, afterwhich they returned to their seats.
"I hope people aren't talking about us," she said, with a pleasedlaugh. "I oughtn't to have given you all these dances. It's perfectlyfatal for a girl to show such preference for one man. But we are socongenial, and you do remind me--"
"If it's embarrassing to you--" began Sandy, grasping the straw withboth hands.
"Not one bit," she asserted. "If you would rather have a goodconfidential time here with me than to meet a lot of silly littlegirls, then I don't care what people say. But, as I was telling you, Imet him the year I came out, and he was interested in me right off--"
On and on and on she went, and Sandy ceased to struggle. He sank inhis chair in dogged dejection. He felt that she had been talking eversince he was born, and was going to continue until he died, and thatall he could do was to wait in anguish for the end. He watched theflushed, happy faces whirling by. How he envied the boys their wiltedcollars! After eons and eons of time the band played "Home, SweetHome."
"It's the last dance," said she. "Aren't you sorry? We've had aperfectly divine time--" She got no further, for her partner, faithfulthrough many numbers, had deserted his post at last.
Sandy pushed eagerly through the crowd and presented himself at Ruth'sside. She was sitting with several boys on the stage steps, her cheeksflushed from the dance, and a loosened curl falling across her bareshoulder. He tried to claim his dance, but the words, too longconfined, rushed to his lips so madly as to form a blockade.
She looked up and saw him--saw the longing and doubt in his eyes, andcame to his rescue.
"Isn't this our dance, Mr. Kilday?" she said, half smiling, halftimidly.
In the excitement of the moment he forgot his carefully practised bow,and the omission brought such chagrin that he started out with thewrong foot. There was a gentle, ripping sound, and a quarter of a yardof lace trailed from the hem of his partner's skirt.
"Did I put me foot in it?" cried Sandy, in such burning consternationthat Ruth laughed.
"It doesn't matter a bit," she said lightly, as she stooped to pin itup. "It shows I've had a good time. Come! Don't let's miss the music."
He took her hand, and they stepped out on the polished floor. Theblissful agony of those first few moments was intolerably sweet.
She was actually dancing with him (one, two, three; one, two, three).Her soft hair was close to his cheek (one, two, three; one, two,three). What if he should miss a step (one, two, three)--or fall?
He stole a glance at her; she smiled reassuringly. Then he forgot allabout the steps and counting time. He felt as he had that morning onshipboard when the _America_ passed the _Great Britain_. All the joyof boyhood resurged through his veins, and he danced in a wildabandonment of bliss; for the band was playing "Home, Sweet Home,"and to Sandy it meant that, come what might, within her shining eyeshis gipsy soul had found its final home.
"Then he forgot all about the steps and counting time"]
When the music stopped, and they stood, breathless and laughing, atthe dressing-room door, Ruth said:
"I thought Annette told me you were just learning to dance!"
"So I am," said Sandy; "but me heart never kept time for me before!"
When Annette joined them she looked up at Sandy and smiled.
"Poor f-fellow!" she said sympathetically. "What a perfectly horridtime you've had!"