CHAPTER XX

"Of course," Dr. Holt said, when it was plain that nothing more could be done, "you ought to have left her where she was."

"But we didn't know whether she was alive—" they excused themselves.

"Was there anything the matter with her?" the doctor said; she was beginning to think of the certificate she must make out. "Was she low-spirited?"

"She was dreadfully disappointed because she didn't get a letter she was expecting."

"Love-letter?"

"I don't know," Frederica said.

She and Howard had left the office, where the dead woman lay on the doctor's lounge, and were standing in the front hall, side by side, like two children who were being scolded. From above the hat-rack, a mounted stag's head watched them with faintly gleaming eyes. Dr. Holt, a woman with a strong, bad-tempered face, was plainly out of patience with them both.

"I've got to get the coroner," she said, frowning; "and it's nearly twelve o'clock." Then she asked a question that was like a little shock of electricity to the two who, in this last terrifying hour, had entirely forgotten themselves. "Did she have any love-affair?"

[Pg 216]

"Yes," Frederica said, in a low voice. ("He refused me.")

"Tell me, please," Dr. Holt persisted.

"She was—in love."

"I suppose she was all right? I mean, respectable?"

"Flora?" Fred said, with a recoil of anger, "of course she was respectable."

"That's what I thought. Man desert her? You spoke of a letter—perhaps she was hoping to hear from him?"

"No, he didn't exactly desert her. I mean, she thought somebody was in love with her, several times. But none of the men seemed—" Frederica's hands clutched together—"to want her. So she was unhappy."

"Oh," said the doctor. "Yes. I understand. Quite frequent in women of her age. She would have been all right if she hadn't been—respectable; or even if she'd got religion, good and hard. Religion," said Dr. Holt, writing rapidly in a memorandum-book, "is a safety-valve for the unmarried woman in the forties, whose work doesn't interest her."

"Flora was as good as anybody could be!" Fred said, hotly.

"Oh, I didn't mean any reflection on her character," said the doctor, kindly, "I merely meant that any woman who hasn't either work, or religion, or marriage, generally gets out of kilter, mentally. Of course," she meditated, tapping her chin with her fountain-pen, "you two must go to the coroner's with me."

In the next hour and a half, of driving about to find the coroner, then the undertaker, then arranging what was[Pg 217] to be done with the body, the "two" had no time for the self-consciousness that the doctor's words had rekindled—except for just one moment: they had come back to Dr. Holt's house, and again were standing in the entry, below the deer's head. In the office, the coroner was questioning Dr. Holt. The office door was ajar.

"This man, Maitland; do you know anything about him? Is he all right? Of course, you never can tell—"

At that, they couldn't help looking at each other, with a flash of what might have been, under other conditions, amusement.

"Why, he's Howard Maitland!" they heard Dr. Holt say; "you know? The Maitland Iron Works!"

"Oh!" the coroner apologized, "I didn't get on to that! 'Course he's all right."

Then Dr. Holt: "It appears the poor woman tried to get married, but she couldn't find a husband. So she killed herself."

This time the two in the hall did not look at each other. Fred stared up at the stag's glistening eyes. Howard buckled and unbuckled his driving-gauntlets. For the rest of her life, Frederica never saw a mounted deer's head without a stab of remembrance.

It was nearly four o'clock in the morning when everything was attended to and Howard turned his car homeward. "Do sit in front with me, Fred," he said; "you can't sit back there in the tonneau."

"All right," she said, absently, and, getting in, pulled Zippy on to her lap. As she sat down, she suddenly realized that Howard's request implied that he felt an [Pg 218]embarrassment for her which she was not feeling for herself. She began to feel it soon enough! Embarrassment flowed in upon them both. Howard talked about Flora—then fell silent: ("She 'tried to get married'!") Then Fred talked about her—and fell silent. ("He needn't worry; I won't drown myself!")

The ride into town was forever! The bleary October dawn had whitened in the mist like a dead face, before they drew up at 15 Payton Street, and for the last ten miles they did not exchange a word. Fred was thinking, dazedly, of Flora; but every now and then would come the stab: "He refused me."

Howard was thinking only of Fred. "Stunning!" he was saying to himself. "She's not a girl! She's a man—no, I don't know any man who would have done what she did. I couldn't have, anyway. I take off my hat to courage like that!"

Not a girl? Fred, not a girl?...

When at last that dreadful night was over, and he had left the terrified Payton household, Frederica—the wonderful, the superwoman (superman, even, compared with Howard himself!), Frederica had, in a flash, been something less than superwoman; she had been pitifully, stupidly, incredibly feminine.

It was six o'clock in the morning when he closed Mrs. Payton's front door behind him and went out to get in his car—giving a shuddering glance at that pool of water on the floor of the tonneau. Just as he was throwing in his clutch he heard the door open again, and Fred called[Pg 219] to him. He went back, quickly; she was standing on the top step, haggard, ugly, dripping wet; a lock of hair had blown across her cheek, which was twitching painfully. She put out her hand to him, in a blind sort of gesture, but she did not look at him.

"I just wanted—to say," she said, and paused, for the jangle of the mules' bells and the clatter of a passing car drowned her voice;—"I wanted to—to say," she began again, with a gasp, "don't—" she stopped, with a sobbing laugh; "don't—tell Laura."

Don't tell!

Oh, she was a girl all right!—so Howard's thoughts ran as he drove home in the mist that had thickened into rain; Fred was a girl—a trembling, ignorant, frightened feminine creature! Suppose she did support a dead woman in her arms during that dreadful ride in the fog; suppose she did stand by, promptly obedient to the doctor's orders in that frantic time of endeavor in the office; suppose she had decided, quietly and wisely, exactly what was to be done, when it was plain that Flora's poor, melancholy little life had flown; suppose the coroner did say that he had never seen such nerve; suppose all those things—yet she had said those two pitiful words: "Don't tell." Yes, Fred Payton was a "girl"!

"You can talk all you want to about the 'new woman,'" Howard said, "I guess human nature doesn't change much...."

It changes so little, that at that revealing instant on the Paytons' front steps, with the light of the Egyptian[Pg 220] maid's globe streaming out into the rain, he had wanted to put his arms around Freddy and kiss her! Who knows but what, if there had not been all those weeks of rocking about on the mud flats, listening to the eternal dry rustle of the blowing palms, dredging for shells, and bothering about Jack McKnight, he might not, then and there, in spite of the wonderfulness of her, and because of the weakness of her, have fallen in love with old Freddy? As it was, when she said that piteous, feminine thing, the tears had stung in his eyes; he wrung her hand, stammering out: "Never! Why, I—you—" But the door closed in his face, and he went back to climb into his motor and go off to his own house.

That was at six o'clock; it was nine before Mr. and Mrs. Childs—summoned, to Billy-boy's great annoyance, while he was shaving—reached No. 15. They found Mrs. Holmes there ahead of them, and met Mr. Weston on the door-step.

In the parlor, watched by Andy Payton's sightless eyes, the court sat upon Freddy—for, of course, the whole distressing affair was her fault—she had dragged poor, crazy Flora out to that shocking camp! "I said last spring it was perfec' nonsense," Mr. Childs vociferated—"a girl, renting a bungalow! Why did you allow it, Ellen?"

"My dear William! I was perfectly helpless. Girls do anything nowadays. When I was a young lady—"

"My girl doesn't do 'anything,'" Laura's father said; "as for Freddy, the newspapers will ring with it! Pleasant for me. My niece, alone with that Maitland fellow! I've always distrusted him. Going off to dig shells—a[Pg 221] man with his income! That showed there's something queer about him. And Fred alone with him in that bungalow mixed up with a murder!"

Mrs. Holmes screamed.

"Well, suicide. Same thing. It will all come out," said Billy-boy, standing up with his back to the fire and puffing; "Bessie is really sick at the scandal."

"Oh, now, Father, I—"

"He's got to marry her," said Mrs. Holmes.

"She helped Mr. Maitland carry Flora out of the water," Mrs. Payton was explaining; "he told me about it. He said she was very brave, but I know she got her feet wet; and I always tell her there's no surer way to take cold than to get your feet wet. And poor Flora! She hasn't any relations, as far as I can find out; so whom can I notify? When I went to housekeeping, servants always came from somewhere, and if they got sick you knew where to send them. I don't want to be unkind, but, really, it was very inconsiderate in Flora. I suppose she never thought how hard it would be for Freddy—"

"Where is Fred, at this moment?" Mr. Weston interrupted.

"Well, she means to be kind, I'm sure," Mrs. Payton said, "but I do wish she wasn't so extreme! She has actually gone to the undertaking place—you know they sent Flora in this morning to Colby's—with some roses. American Beauties, and you know how much they cost at this season! She wanted to put them on the coffin herself, and—"

[Pg 222]

"Oh, do stop talking about such unpleasant things!" Mrs. Holmes said.

"Well, I merely meant that it is unnecessary. As I say, Flora has no relatives, so no one will ever know of the attention. It's just another wild thing for Freddy to do."

"Possibly Flora will know it," Mr. Weston said; "at least, wouldn't the Reverend Tait say so?"

"Oh," Mrs. Holmes said, frowning, "we are not speaking of religion. Flora was just a servant." Even Mr. Childs winced at that, and for once Arthur Weston's face was candid.

"I suppose that will get into the newspapers, too," said Mrs. Holmes—"'A young society girl puts roses' ... and all the rest of the horrid vulgarity of it."

"I don't think human kindness is ever vulgar," Mr. Weston said, "and I am sure there will be no improper publicity. Maitland and I have been to all the newspaper offices."

"Alone, at midnight, in an auto!" Mrs. Holmes lamented.

"Death is an impeccable chaperon," Weston said. ("That will shut her up!" he thought, and it did, for a while.)

"To think of such a thing happening to one of my servants," Mrs. Payton bewailed herself; "and I was always so considerate of them!"

Mrs. Holmes said there was too much consideration for servants, anyhow. "Let them work! There isn't one of them that will dust the legs of a piano unless you stand[Pg 223] over her! Of course, I'm sorry for Flora; I only wish I wasn't so sensitive! But she did starch her table linen too much, Ellen; you can't deny that."

"Who is going to pay the funeral expenses?" Mr. Childs said. "Does the city do that, Weston, or is it up to Ellen?"

"Oh, Mrs. Payton has no responsibilities about Death—only Life," said Arthur Weston, grimly.

"Of course I will attend to all that!" Flora's employer said; "anyhow, her wages for the last month are not due until next week. But, of course, I shall do everything that is proper."

"Well," William Childs said, "I must be moving along. I was going to work out a new Baconian cipher this morning, but, of course, this wretched business has knocked my mind into a cocked hat! Come, Bessie. Bessie's perfectly sick over the whole thing. She has her Bridge Club this afternoon, and this awful affair has completely upset her. Good-by, Nelly; let me know if there is anything I can do," and he hustled Mrs. Childs—who kept insisting, mildly, that she was so sorry for poor, dear Freddy—out of the room. At the door, he paused to call back: "This new cipher doesn't leave the Shakespearians a leg to stand on!"

Mrs. Holmes and Mr. Weston lingered, Mrs. Holmes declaring that William Childs ought to learn to speak distinctly—"he mumbles terribly"—and Weston, silent and rather wan, walking up and down, waiting for Frederica's return.

When they heard the key in the front door, the two[Pg 224] ladies stopped talking; it was Arthur Weston who went into the hall to take Fred's hand and help her off with her coat. She hung her hat up beside her father's and gave her old friend a grim look.

"Has Billy-boy put on the black cap yet? Or does grandmother demand that Howard shall 'make an honest woman' of me before the sun sets? I know what you've been up against!"

"You are perfectly exhausted," he said, tenderly; "go up-stairs; I'll fight it out."

"No," she said, briefly.

She went into the parlor, looked at her grandmother, shrugged her shoulders, and girded herself for battle: "I'll tell you the whole story. Poor Flora has been suffering, probably for a year or more, the doctor says, from some mental deterioration. She was restless and unhappy. Of course, we knew that, because she did her work badly—which inconvenienced us. As far as she was concerned, it didn't trouble us. She was restless, because she wanted to be married and settle down. And nobody wanted her; which seemed to us just—funny. But when you come to think of it, it isn't very funny not to be wanted.... When she couldn't marry, she tried to get interested in something—music, or anything. She wanted to do something."

"Do something? Well, I could have giv—"

"I tried to make things better for her," Fred went on, heavily, "but I suppose I didn't try hard enough. Well, anyhow, she saw I was in love with Howard—" a little shock ran through her hearers; she paused, and looked at[Pg 225] them, faintly surprised; "why, you knew I was in love with him, didn't you? He isn't with me; not in the least. And Flora's young man wasn't in love with her. He promised to write to her, and he didn't. And that upset her a good deal. But I think the thing that really hit her hardest was to see how I felt, and how happy I was. I—I slopped over, I suppose, a good deal. It was a sort of last straw to Flora to see me so happy; it made her—well, envious, I suppose. Poor old Flora! she needn't have been."

She stopped and put her hand across her eyes, rubbing them wearily. "I tell you these details merely to explain why I didn't get on to the fact sooner that she had gone out of the house—I was so absorbed in Howard. The door did slam, but just at that moment I was ... saying something to him. So I didn't really notice. Then, afterward, he and I talked and talked, until it was time for him to go home; and then we discovered—" She caught her breath and was silent for a moment.

Her mother was quite overcome. "So distressing for you, dear!"

Mrs. Holmes began to collect her gloves and bags.

"Poor Flora!" Fred said, unsteadily. "She was so unhappy. Oh—how unhappy women are!"

"That's because they are fools," said Mrs. Holmes.

"Oh, yes; we're fools, all right," Frederica said, somberly. Then she told them of that ride in the fog with the dead woman: "We had done everything we knew how, and we couldn't make her breathe; so I told Howard we must take her into Laketon, so we got her into the[Pg 226] auto, and I held her—" There was a shuddering gasp from Mrs. Holmes; she was trying to get away, taking a backward step toward the door, then pausing, then taking another step. The horror of the thing gripped her. Weston saw her face growing gray under its powder. But still she listened, straining forward to hear distinctly.

Frederica was telling them of those terrible twenty minutes in the car, of the hour in the doctor's office, of the search for the coroner, of the drive to the undertaker's—then, suddenly, a curious thing happened: Mrs. Holmes, her face rigid, her false teeth faintly chattering, came up to her granddaughter and tapped her sharply on the shoulder.

"I could have done it, too, when I was a girl," she said, harshly; "but"—her voice broke into a whisper—"not now. I would be afraid, now." Then loudly, "I'm proud of you! You are no fool."

Frederica gave her an astonished look: "Why, grandmother!" It was as if a stranger had spoken to her—but a stranger who might be a friend.

The next instant Mrs. Holmes was herself again. "It's all too horrid," she said.

"The body," Fred said, "will be brought here this morning"—she glanced at her watch; "it ought to be here now."

Mrs. Holmes instantly walked out of the room.

"The funeral will be here to-morrow. I suppose Anne will know some of her friends whom we can notify?" She sighed, and again rubbed her hand over her eyes; then looked at Arthur Weston and smiled. "Howard is all[Pg 227] right," she said; "don't make any mistake about that! Mother, I'm going up-stairs to lie down."

She went out into the hall, stopped to open the front door for her departing grandmother, then whistled to Zip, and they heard her drag her tired young feet up-stairs.

Arthur Weston's eyes were full of tears.