“No social objections to the girl?”

“None. She’s an unusual girl.”

“Attractive?”

“Unfortunately.”

“Well, then–––”

“Oh, James, I want him to marry Elorn! And if he’s going to make himself conspicuous over this Dumont girl, I don’t think I can bear it!”

“What is the objection to the girl, Helen?” he asked, flinging his paper onto a table and drawing nearer the fire.

“She isn’t at all our kind, James–––”

“But you just said–––”

“I don’t mean socially. And still, as far as that goes, she seems to care nothing whatever for position or social duties or obligations.”

“That’s not so unusual in these days,” he remarked. “Lots of nice girls are fed up on the social aspects of life.”

“Well, for example, she has not made the slightest effort to know anybody worth knowing. Janet Speedwell left cards and then asked her to dinner, and received an amiable regret for her pains. No girl can afford to decline invitations from Janet, even if her excuse is a club meeting.

“And two or three other women at the Red Cross have asked her to lunch at the Colony Club, and have made advances to her on Leila Vance’s account, but she hasn’t responded. Now, you know a girl isn’t going to get on by politely ignoring the advances of such women. But she doesn’t even appear to be aware of their importance.”

“Why don’t you ask her to something?” suggested her husband.

“I did,” she said, a little sharply. “I asked her and Leila Vance to dine with us. I intended to ask Elorn, too, and let Jim realise the difference if he isn’t already too blind to see.”

“Did she decline?”

“She did,” said Helen curtly.

“Why?”

“It happened that she had asked somebody to dine with her that evening. And I have a horrid suspicion it was Jim. If it was, she could have postponed it. Of course it was a valid excuse, but it annoyed me to have her decline. That’s what I tell you, James, she has a most disturbing habit of declining overtures from everybody––even from–––”

Helen checked herself, looked at her husband with an odd smile, in which there was no mirth; then:

“You probably are not aware of it, dear, but that girl has also declined Jim’s overtures.”

“Jim’s what?”

“Invitation.”

“Invitation to do what?”

“Marry him.”

Shotwell Senior turned very red.

“The devil she did! How do you know?”

“Jim told me.”

“That she turned him down?”

“She declined to marry him.”

Her husband seemed unable to grasp such a fact. Never had it occurred to Shotwell Senior that any living, human girl could decline such an invitation from his only son.

“Because Jim is very deeply in love with her.... And I’m sore at heart.”

“Hard hit, is he?”

“Very unhappy.”

Shotwell Senior reddened again: “He’ll have to face it,” he said.... “But that girl seems to be a fool!”

“I––wonder.”

“What do you mean?”

“A girl may change her mind.” She lifted her head and looked with sad humour at her husband, whom she also had kept dangling for a while. Then:

“James, dear, our son is as fine as we think him. But he’s just a splendid, wholesome, everyday, unimaginative New York business man. And he’s fallen in love with his absolute antithesis. Because this girl is all ardent imagination, full of extravagant impulses, very lovely to look at, but a perfectly illogical fanatic!

“Mrs. Vance has told me all about her. She really belongs in some exotic romance, not in New York. She’s entirely irresponsible, perfectly unstable. There is in her a generous sort of recklessness which is quite likely to drive her headlong into any extreme. And what sort of mate would such a girl be for a young man whose ambition is to make good in the real estate business, marry a nice girl, have a pleasant home and agreeable children, and otherwise conform to the ordinary conventions of civilisation?”

“I think,” remarked her husband grimly, “that she’d keep him guessing.”

Her husband stared at her.

“For heaven’s sake,” he began, then got frightfully red in the face once more. “What that girl needs is a plain spanking!” he said bluntly. “I’d like to see her or any other girl try to come into this family on any such ridiculous terms!”

“She doesn’t seem to want to come in on any terms,” said Helen.

“Then what are you worrying about?”

“I am worrying about what might happen if she ever changed her mind.”

“But you say she doesn’t believe in marriage!”

“She doesn’t.”

“Well, that boy of ours isn’t crazy,” insisted Shotwell Senior.

But his mother remained silent in her deep misgiving concerning the sanity of the simpler sex, when mentally upset by love. For it seemed very difficult to understand what to do––if, indeed, there was anything for her to do in the matter.

To express disapproval of Palla to Jim or to the girl herself––to show any opposition at all––would, she feared, merely defeat its own purpose and alienate her son’s confidence.

The situation was certainly a most disturbing one, though not at present perilous.

And Helen would not permit herself to believe that it could ever really become an impossible situation––that this young girl would deliberately slap civilisation in the face; or that her only son would add a kick to the silly assault and take the ruinous consequences of social ostracism.

The young girl in question was at that moment seated before her piano, her charming head uplifted, singing in the silvery voice of an immaculate angel, to her own accompaniment, the heavenly Mass of Saint Hildé:

She continued the exquisite refrain on the keys for a while, then slowly turned to the man beside her.

“The one Mass I still love,” she murmured absently, “––memories of childhood, I suppose––when the Sisters made me sing the solo––I was only ten years old.” ... She shrugged her shoulders: “You know, in those days, I was a little devil,” she said seriously.

He smiled.

“Why?”

“He did something to a cat which I couldn’t stand.”

“Did you whip him?”

“Oh, Jim, it was horrid. We both were dreadfully battered. And the constable caught us both, and I shall never, never forget my mother’s face!–––”

She gazed down at the keys of the piano, touched them pensively.

“The very deuce was in me,” she sighed. “Even now, unless I’m occupied with all my might, something begins––to simmer in me–––”

She turned and looked at him: “––A sort of enchanted madness that makes me wild to seize the whole world and set it right!––take it into my arms and defend it––die for it––or slay it and end its pain.”

“Too much of an armful,” he said with great gravity. “The thing to do is to select an individual and take him to your heart.”

“And slay him?” she inquired gaily.

“Certainly––like the feminine mantis––if you find you don’t like him. Individual suitors must take their chances of being either eaten or adored.”

“Jim, you’re so funny.”

She swung her stool, rested her elbow on the piano, and gazed at him interrogatively, the odd, half-smile edging her lips and eyes. And, after a little duetto of silence:

“Do you suppose I shall ever come to care for you––imprudently?” she asked.

“I wouldn’t let you.”

“How could you help it? And, as far as that goes, how could I, if it happened?”

“If you ever come to care at all,” he said, “you’ll care enough.”

“That is the trouble with you,” she retorted, “you don’t care enough.”

A slight flush stained his cheek-bones: “Sometimes,” he said, “I almost wish I cared less. And that would be what you call enough.”

Colour came into her face, too:

“Do you know, Jim, I really don’t know how much I do care for you? It sounds rather silly, doesn’t it?”

“Do you care more than you did at first?”

“Yes.”

“Much more?”

“I told you I don’t know how much.”

“Not enough to marry me?”

“Must we discuss that again?”

He got up, went out to the hall, pulled a book from his overcoat pocket, and returned.

“Would you care to hear what the greatest American says on the subject, Palla?”

“On the subject of marriage?”

“No; he takes the marriage for granted. It’s what he has to say concerning the obligations involved.”

“Proceed, dear,” she said, laughingly.

He read, eliminating what was not necessary to make his point:

“‘A race is worthless and contemptible if its men cease to work hard and, at need, to fight hard; and if its women cease to breed freely. If the best classes do not reproduce themselves the nation will, of course, go down.

“‘The woman who shrinks from motherhood is as low a creature as a man of the professional pacifist, or poltroon, type, who shirks his duty as a soldier.

“‘The only full life for man or woman is led by those men and women who together, with hearts both gentle and valiant, face lives of love and duty, who see their children rise up to call them blessed, and who leave behind them their seed to inherit the earth.

“‘No celibate life approaches such a life in usefulness. The mother comes ahead of the nun.

“‘But if the average woman does not marry and become the mother of enough healthy children to permit the increase of the race; and if the average man does not marry in times of peace and do his full duty in war if need arises, then the race is decadent and should be swept aside to make room for a better one.

“‘Only that nation has a future whose sons and daughters recognise and obey the primary laws of their racial being!’”

He closed the book and laid it on the piano.

“Now,” he said, “either we’re really a rotten and decadent race, and might as well behave like one, or we’re sound and sane.”

Something unusual in his voice––in the sudden grim whiteness of his face––disturbed Palla.

“I want you to marry me,” he said. “You care for no other man. And if you don’t love me enough to do it, you’ll learn to afterward.”

“I’m sorry. But I love you––I need you so that I’m fit for nothing else. I can’t keep my mind on my work; I can’t think of anybody––anything but you.... If you didn’t care for me more or less I wouldn’t come whining to you. I wouldn’t come now until I’d entirely won your heart––except that––if I did––and if you refused me marriage and offered the other thing––I’d be about through with everything! And I’d know damned well that the nation wasn’t worth the powder to blow it to hell if such women as you betray it!”

The girl flushed furiously; but her voice seemed fairly under control.

“Hadn’t you better go, Jim, before you say anything more?”

“Will you marry me?”

“No.”

He stood up very straight, unstirring, for a long time, not looking at her.

Then he said “good-bye,” in a low voice, and went out leaving her quite pale again and rather badly scared.

As the lower door closed, she sprang to the landing and called his name in a frightened voice that had no carrying power.

Later she telephoned to his several clubs. At eleven she called each club again; and finally telephoned to his house.

At midnight he had not telephoned in reply to the messages she had left requesting him to call her.

Suddenly an overwhelming desire to be with Ilse seized her, and she would have called a taxi and started immediately, except for the dread that Jim might telephone in her absence.

Yet, she didn’t know what it was that she wanted of him, except to protest at his attitude toward her. Such a protest was due them both––an appeal in behalf of the friendship which meant so much to her––which, she had abruptly discovered, meant far more to her than she supposed.

At midnight she telephoned to Ilse. A sleepy maid replied that Miss Westgard had not yet returned.

So Palla called a taxi, pinned on her hat and struggled into her fur coat, and, taking her latch-key, started for Ilse’s apartment, feeling need of her in a blind sort of way––desiring to listen to her friendly voice, touch her, hear her clear, sane laughter.

A yawning maid admitted her. Miss Westgard had dined out with Mr. Estridge, but had not yet returned.

So Palla, wondering a little, laid aside her coat and went into the pretty living room.

There were books and magazines enough, but after a while she gave up trying to read and sat staring absently at a photograph of Estridge in uniform, which stood on the table at her elbow.

Across it was an inscription, dated only a few days back: “To Ilse from Jack, on the road to Asgard.”

Then, as she gazed at the man’s handsome features, for the first time a vague sense of uneasiness invaded her.

Lying back in her armchair, her thoughts hovered about these two; and she went back in her mind to recollect something of the beginning of this intimacy;––and remembered various little incidents which, at the time, seemed of no portent.

And, reflecting, she recollected now what Ilse had said to her after the last party she had given––and which Palla had not understood.

What had Ilse meant by asking her to “wait”? Wait for what?... Where was Ilse, now? Why did she remain out so late with John Estridge? It was after one o’clock.

Of course they must be dancing somewhere or other. There were plenty of dances to go to.

Palla stirred restlessly in her chair. Evidently Ilse had not told her maid that she meant to be out late, for the girl seemed to have expected her an hour ago.

Palla’s increasing restlessness finally drove her to the windows, where she pulled aside the shades and stood looking out into the silent night.

The night was cold and clear and very still. Rarely a footfarer passed; seldom a car. And the stillness of the dark city increased her nervousness.

New York has rare phases of uncanny silence, when, for a space, no sound disturbs the weird stillness.

The clang of trains, the feathery whirr of motors, the echo of footsteps, the immense, indefinable breathing vibration of the iron monster, drowsing on its rock between three rivers and the sea, ceases utterly. And a vast stillness reigns, mournful, ominous, unutterably sad.

It was two o’clock. Her eyes were heavy, her heart heavier. Why should everything suddenly happen to her in that way? Where had Jim gone when he left her? And who was it answered the telephone at his house when she had called up and asked to speak to him? It was a woman’s voice––a maid, no doubt––yet, for an instant, she had fancied that the voice resembled his mother’s.

But it couldn’t have been, for Palla had given her name, and Mrs. Shotwell would have spoken to her––unless––perhaps his mother––disapproved of something––of her calling Jim at such an hour.... Or of something ... perhaps of their friendship ... of herself, perhaps–––

She heard the clock strike and looked across at the mantel.

What was Ilse doing at half-past two in the morning? Where could she be?

Palla involuntarily turned her head and looked at the photograph. Of course Ilse was safe with a man like John Estridge.... That is to say ...

Without warning, her face grew hot and the crimson tide mounted to the roots of her hair, dyeing throat and temples.

A sort of stunning reaction followed as the tide ebbed; she found herself stupidly repeating the word “safe,” as though to interpret what it meant.

Safe? Yes, Ilse was safe. She knew how to take care of herself ... unless....

Safe? Safe from what? From the creed they both professed? From their common belief? From the consequences of living up to it?

At the thought, Palla sprang to her feet and stood quivering all over, both hands pressed to her throat, which was quivering too.

Where was Ilse? What had happened? Had she suddenly come face to face with that creed of theirs––that shadowy creed which they believed in, perhaps because it seemed so unreal!––because the ordeal by fire seemed so vague, so far away in that ghostly bourne which is called the future, and which remains always so inconceivably distant to the young––star-distant, remote as inter-stellar dust––aloof as death.

It was three o’clock. There were velvet-dark smears under Palla’s eyes, little colour in her lips. The weight of fatigue lay heavily on her young shoulders; on her mind, too, partly stupefied by the violence of her emotions.

Once she had risen heavily, had gone into the maid’s room and had told her to go to bed, adding that she herself would wait for Miss Westgard.

That, already, was nearly an hour ago, and the gilt hands of the clock were already creeping around the gilded dial toward the half hour.

As it struck on the clear French bell, a key turned in the outside door; then the door closed; and Palla rose trembling from her chair as Ilse entered, her golden hair in lovely disorder, the evening cloak partly flung from her shoulders.

“My darling! What has happened?” she asked. “Why are you here at this hour? You look dreadfully ill!–––”

Palla’s head dropped on her breast.

“What is it?” whispered Ilse. “Darling––darling––you did––you did wait––didn’t you?”

Palla’s voice was scarcely audible: “I don’t know what you mean.... I was only frightened about you.... I’ve been so unhappy.... And Jim said––good-bye––and I can’t––find him–––”

“I want you to answer me! Are you in love with him?”

“No.... I don’t––think so–––”

Ilse drew a deep breath.

“It’s all right, then,” she said.

Then, suddenly, Palla seemed to understand what Ilse had meant when she had said, “Wait!”

And she lifted her head and looked blindly into the sea-blue eyes––blindly, desperately, striving to see through those clear soul-windows what it might be that was looking out at her.

And, gazing, she knew that she dared not ask Ilse where she had been.

The latter smiled; but her voice was very tender when she spoke.

“We’ll telephone your maid in the morning. You must go to bed, Palla.”

“Alone?”

Ilse turned carelessly and laid her cloak across a chair. There was a second chamber beyond her own. She went into it, turned down the bed and called Palla, who came slowly after her.

They kissed each other in silence. Then Ilse went back to her own room.

“Jim,” said his mother, “Miss Dumont called you on the telephone at an unusual hour last night. You had gone to your room, and on the chance that you were asleep I did not speak to you.”

That was all––sufficient explanation to discount any reproach from her son incident on his comparing notes with the girl in question. Also just enough in her action to convey to the girl a polite hint that the Shotwell family was not at home to people who telephoned at that unconventional hour.

On his way to business that morning, Jim telephoned to Palla, but, learning she was not at home, let the matter rest.

In his sullen and resentful mood he no longer cared––or thought he didn’t, which resulted in the same thing––the accumulation of increasing bitterness during a dull, rainy working day at the office, and a dogged determination to keep clear of this woman until effort to remain away from her was no longer necessary.

For the thing was utterly hopeless; he’d had enough. And in his bruised heart and outraged common sense he was boyishly framing an indictment of modern womanhood––lumping it all and cursing it out––swearing internally at the entire enfranchised pack which the war had set afoot and had licensed to swarm all over everything and raise hell with the ancient and established order of things.

The stormy dark came early; and in this frame of mind when he left the office he sulkily avoided the club.

He very rarely drank anything; but, not knowing what to do, he drifted into the Biltmore bar.

He met a man or two he knew, but declined all suggestions for the evening, turned up his overcoat collar, and started through the hotel toward the northern exit.

And met Marya Lanois face to face.

She was coming from the tea-room with two or three other people, but turned immediately on seeing him and came toward him with hand extended.

“Dear me,” she said, “you look very wet. And you don’t look particularly well. Have you arrived all alone for tea?”

“I had my tea in the bar,” he said. “How are you, Marya?––but I musn’t detain you––” he glanced at the distant group of people who seemed to be awaiting her.

“You are not detaining me,” she said sweetly.

“Your people seem to be waiting–––”

“They may go to the deuce. Are you quite alone?”

“I––yes–––”

“Shall we have tea together?”

He laughed. “But you’ve had yours–––”

“Well, you know there are other things that one sometimes drinks.”

There seemed no way out of it. They went into the tea-room together and seated themselves.

“How is Vanya?” he inquired.

“Vanya gives a concert to-night in Baltimore.”

“And you didn’t go!”

“No. It was rainy. Besides, I hear Vanya play when I desire to hear him.”

Their order was served.

“So you wouldn’t go to Baltimore,” said Jim smilingly. “It strikes me, Marya, that you can be a coldblooded girl when you wish to be.”

“After all, what do you know about me?”

He laughed: “Oh, I don’t mean that I’ve got your number–––”

“No. Because I have many numbers. I am a complicated combination,” she added, smiling; “––yet after all, a combination only. And quite simple when one discovers the key to me.”

“I think I know what it is,” he said.

“What is it?”

“Mischief.”

They laughed. Marya, particularly, was intensely amused. She was extremely fetching in her bicorne toque and narrow gown of light turquoise, and her golden beaver scarf and muff.

“Mischief,” she repeated. “I should say not. There seems to be already sufficient mischief loose in the world, with the red tide rising everywhere––in Russia, in Germany, Austria, Italy, England––yes, and here also the crimson tide of Bolshevism begins to move.... Tell me; you are coming to the club to-morrow evening, I hope.”

“No.”

“Oh. Why?”

“No,” he repeated, almost sullenly. “I’ve had enough of queerness for a while–––”

“Jim! Do you dare include me?”

He had to laugh at her pretence of fury: “No, Marya, you’re just a pretty mischief-maker, I suppose–––”

“The best dykes have machine guns behind them, not orators,” he said bluntly.

“My friend, I have seen that, also. And to what have machine guns led us in Petrograd, in Moscow, in Poland, Finland, Courland––” She shrugged her pretty shoulders. “No. I have seen enough blood.”

He said: “I have seen a little myself.”

“Yes, I know. But a soldier is always a soldier, as a hound is always a hound. The blood of the quarry is what their instinct follows. Your goal is death; we only seek to tame.”

“The proper way to check Bolshevism in America is to police the country properly, and kick out the outrageous gang of domestic Bolsheviki who have exploited us, tricked us, lied to us, taxed us unfairly, and in spite of whom we have managed to help our allies win this war.

“Then, when this petty, wretched, crooked bunch has been swept out, and the nation aired and disinfected, and when the burden of taxation is properly distributed, and business dares lift its head again, then start your debates and propaganda and try to educate your enemies if you like. But keep your machine guns oiled.”

“You speak in an uncomplimentary fashion of government,” said the girl, smiling.

“Yet I place loyalty first of all––loyalty to the true ideals of that Government which some of the present incumbents so grotesquely misrepresent.

“That means, stand by the ship and the flag she flies, no matter who steers or what crew capers about her decks.

“That means, watch out for all pirates;––open fire on anything that flies a hostile flag, red or any other colour.

“And that’s my creed, Marya!”

“To shoot; not to debate?”

“An inquest is safer.”

“We shall never agree,” said the girl, laughing. “And I’m rather glad.”

“Why?”

“Because disagreements are more amusing than any entente cordiale, mon ami. It is the opposing forces that never bore each other. In life, too––I mean among human beings. Once they agree, interest lessens.”

“Nonsense,” he said, smiling.

“Oh, it is quite true. Behold us. We don’t agree. But I am interested,” she added with pretty audacity; “so please take me to dinner somewhere.”

“You mean now, as we are?”

“Parbleu! Did you wish to go home and dress?”

“I don’t care if you don’t,” he said.

“Suppose,” she suggested, “we dine where there is something to see.”

“A Broadway joint?” he asked, amused.

“A joint?” she repeated, smilingly perplexed. “Is that a place where we may dine and see a spectacle too and afterward dance?”

“Something of that sort,” he admitted, laughing. But under his careless gaiety an ugly determination had been hardening; he meant to go no more to Palla; he meant to welcome any distraction of the moment to help tide him over the long, grey interval that loomed ahead––welcome any draught that might mitigate the bitter waters he was tasting––and was destined to drain to their revolting dregs.

They went to the Palace of Mirrors and were lucky enough to secure a box.

The food was excellent; the show a gay one.

Between intermissions he took Marya to the floor for a dance or two. The place was uncomfortably crowded: uniforms were everywhere, too; and Jim nodded to many men he knew, and to a few women.

And, in the vast, brilliant place, there was not a man who saw Marya and failed to turn and follow her with his eyes. For Marya had been fashioned to trouble man. And that primitively constructed and obviously-minded sex never failed to become troubled.

“We’d better enjoy our champagne,” remarked Marya. “We’ll be a wineless nation before long, I suppose.”

“It seems rather a pity,” he remarked, “that a man shouldn’t be free to enjoy a glass of claret. But if the unbaked and the half-baked, and the unwashed and the half-washed can’t be trusted to practise moderation, we others ought to abstain, I suppose. Because what is best for the majority ought to be the law for all.”

“If it were left to me,” said the girl, “I’d let the submerged drink themselves to death.”

“What on earth are you talking about?” he said. “I thought you were a socialist!”