The girl's hands were folded demurely upon her lap, and she was gazing down at them. She lifted her eyes for an instant, and there was an unwonted hardness in them as she answered: "You need not waste any sympathy on me. I don't want it."

"Is it really true, Rita," he asked, "that you no longer care for me?

Was your love a mere garment you could throw off at will?" He paused, but Rita making no reply, he continued: "It wounds my vanity to learn that I so greatly overestimated your love for me, and I can hardly believe that you speak the truth, but--but I hope--I almost hope you do.

Every sense of honor I possess tells me I must accept the wages of my sin and marry Sukey Yates, even though--"

Suddenly a change came over the scene. The girl who had been so pa.s.sive and cold at once became active and very warm. She sprang to her feet, panting with excitement. Resolutions and righteous indignation were scattered to the four winds by the tremendous shock of his words. Sukey at last had stolen him. That thought seemed to be burning itself into the very heart of her consciousness.

"You--you marry Sukey Yates!" she cried, breathing heavily and leaning toward Dic, one hand resting on the arm of his chair, "you _marry_ her?"

The question was almost a wail.

"But if you no longer care there can be no reason why I should not,"

said Dic, hardly knowing in the whirl of his surprise what he was saying.

Rita thought of the letter to Tom, and all the sympathetic instincts of her nature sprang up to protect Dic, and to save him from Sukey's wicked designs.

"Oh," she cried, falling back into her chair, "you surely did not believe me!"

"And you do care?" asked Dic, almost stunned by her sudden change of front. Rita's conduct had always been so sedate and sensible that he did not suppose she was possessed of ordinary feminine weaknesses.

"Oh, Dic," she replied, "I never thought you would desert me."

_In_consistency may also be a jewel.

Dic concluded he was an incarnate mistake. Whichever way he turned, he seemed to be wrong.

"I desert you?" he exclaimed. "But you returned my ring and did not even answer my letter, and now your scorn--"

"What else could you expect?" asked the girl, in a pa.s.sionate flow of tears.

"I don't know what I expected, but I certainly did not expect this,"

answered Dic, musing on the blessed fault of inconsistency that dwells in every normal woman's breast. "I did not expect this, or I should have acted differently toward her after you returned the ring. I would not have--I--I--G.o.d help me!" and he buried his face in his hands.

"You would not have done what, Dic? Tell me all." Her heart came to him in his trouble. He had sinned, but he was suffering, and that she could not bear.

The low, soft tones of her voice soothed him, and he answered: "I would not have allowed her to believe I intended marrying her. I did not tell her in words that I would, but--I can't tell you. I can't speak." He saw Rita's face turn pale, and though his words almost choked him, he continued, "I suppose I must pay the penalty of my sin."

He gently put the girl from him, and went to the window, where he leaned, gazing into the street. She also rose, and stood waiting for him to speak. After a long pause she called his name,--

"Dic!"

When he turned she was holding out her arms to him, and the next moment they were round his neck.

After a blank hour of almost total silence in the parlor, Miss Tousy came to the door and knocked. She had listened at the door several times during the hour; but, hearing no enlightening words or sounds, she had retreated in good order.

Allowing a moment to elapse after knocking, Miss Tousy called:--

"Are you still there?"

Rita had been very still there, and was vividly conscious of the fact when Miss Tousy knocked. Going to the door, Rita opened it, saying:--

"Yes, we are still here. I'm ashamed to have kept you out so long." She looked her shame and blushed most convincingly.

Upon hearing the knock, Dic hurried over to the window, and when Miss Tousy entered he deluded himself into the belief that his att.i.tude of careless repose would induce her to conclude he had been standing there all the afternoon. But Miss Tousy, in common with all other young ladies, had innate knowledge upon such subjects, and possibly also a little experience--she was twenty-five, mind you--; so she was amused rather than deceived.

"Well?" she asked, and paused for answer.

"Yes," answered Rita.

They understood each other, if we do not, for Miss Tousy kissed Rita and then boldly went to Dic and deliberately kissed him. Thereupon Rita cried, "Oh!" Dic blushed, and all three laughed.

"But I'll leave you to yourselves again," said accommodating Miss Tousy.

"I know you want to be alone."

"Oh, we are through," answered Rita, blushing, and Dic reluctantly a.s.sented. Miss Tousy laughed and asked:--

"Through what?"

Then there was more blushing and more laughing, and Rita replied, "Just through--that's all."

"Well, I congratulate you," said Miss Tousy, taking Rita's hand, "and am very happy that I have been the means of bringing you together again.

Take the advice of one who is older than you," continued Miss Tousy, the old and the wise, "and never, never again allow anything to separate you. Love is the sweetest blossom of life, whose gentle wings will always cover you with the aromatic harmony of an everlasting sunlight."

Rita thought the metaphor beautiful, and Dic was too interested to be critical. Then Rita and Miss Tousy, without any reason at all, began to weep, and Dic felt as uncomfortable as the tears of two women could make him.

THE CHRISTMAS GIFT

CHAPTER XV

THE CHRISTMAS GIFT

Dic started home with his heart full of unalloyed happiness; but at the end of four hours, when he was stabling his horse, the old pain for the sake of another's sorrow a.s.serted itself, and his happiness seemed to be a sin. Rita's tender heart also underwent a change while she lay that night wakeful with joy and gazing into the darkness.

Amid all her joy came the ever recurring vision of Sukey's wretchedness.

While under the convincing influence of her own arguments and Dic's resistless presence, she had seen but one side of the question,--her own; but darkness is a great help to the inner sight, and now the other side of the case had its hearing. She remembered Sukey's letter to Tom, but she knew the unfortunate girl loved Dic. Was it right, she asked herself over and over again, was it right that she should be happy at the cost of another's woe? Then came again the flood of her great longing--the longing of her whole life--and she tried to tell herself she did not care who suffered, she intended to be happy. That was the way of the world, and it should be her way. But Rita's heart was a poor place for such thoughts to thrive, and when she arose next morning, after a sleepless night of mingled joy and sorrow, she was almost as unhappy as she had been the previous morning. She spent several days and nights alternating between two opinions; but finally, after repeated conversations with Miss Tousy, whose opinions you already know, and after meditating upon Sukey's endeavor to entrap two men, she arrived at two opposing conclusions. First, it was her duty to give Dic up; and second, she would do nothing of the sort. That was the first, and I believe the only selfish resolve that ever established itself in the girl's heart with her full knowledge and consent. But the motive behind it was overpowering. She shut her lips and said she "didn't care," and once having definitely settled the question, she dismissed it, feeling that she was very sinful, but also very happy.

Dic, of course, soon sought Billy Little, the ever ready receptacle of his joys and sorrows.

No man loved the words, "I told you so," more dearly than Little, and when Dic entered the store he was greeted with that irritating sentence before he had spoken a word.

"You told me what?" asked Dic, pretending not to understand.

"Come, come," returned Billy, joyously, "I see it in your face. You know what I mean. Don't try to appear more thick-headed than you are. Oh, perhaps you are troubled with false modesty, and wish to hide the light of a keen perception. Let it shine, Dic, let it shine. Hide it not.

Avoid the bushel."

Dic laughed and said: "Well, you were right; she did forgive me. Now please don't continue to point out your superior wisdom. I see it without your help. Get thee a bushel, Billy Little, lest you shine too brightly."