"My wardrobe is in order."

"Well, we'll see," George grunted again, as he and Lily retraced their steps.

They sat down again in the sitting-room, and Lily took up her embroidery, and he read a murder case in his paper.

Meanwhile, Maria, after putting out her lamp, was lying awake in bed thinking that Evelyn would come in and make some confidence to her, but she did not come. Maria felt horribly uneasy. She could not understand her sister's sudden change of mood, and yet she did not for a moment doubt Wollaston. She said to herself that as far as she was concerned she would brave the publicity if Wollaston loved Evelyn, but she recalled as exactly as if she had committed them to heart what Evelyn had said with regard to divorce and the horror which she had expressed of a divorced man or woman remarrying. Then she further considered how much worse it would be if the divorced man married her own sister. That course seemed to her impossible. She imagined the horrible details, the surmises, the newspaper articles, and she said to herself that even if she herself were willing to face the ordeal it would be still more of an ordeal for Wollaston and Evelyn. She said to herself that it was impossible; then she also said to herself, with no bitterness, but with an acquiescence in the logic of it, that it would be much better for them all if she, Maria, should die.

Chapter x.x.xVI

Evelyn's return of appet.i.te and spirits endured only a few days. Then she seemed worse than she had been before. In fact, Wollaston, thinking that he had done wrong in yielding for only a second to his impulse of tender protection and admiration for the young girl, went too far in the opposite direction. In order to make amends to Maria, himself, and Evelyn, he was actually rude, almost brutal. He scarcely spoke to Evelyn. On one occasion he even reprimanded her severely in a cla.s.s for a slight mistake. Evelyn turned pale, and gave him a glance like that of some pretty, little, harmless animal which has nothing except love and devotion in its heart, and whose very mistakes are those of love and over-anxiety to please. Wollaston was struck to the heart by the look, but he did not relax one muscle of his stern face.

"I think Mr. Lee treated you mean, so there," Addie Hemingway said to Evelyn when they had left the room.

Evelyn said nothing. Her face continued pale and shocked. It was inconceivable to her that anybody, least of all Mr. Lee, could have spoken so to her.

"He's treating you like a child," Addie Hemingway continued. "Mr. Lee has no right to speak so to seniors." Addie's words were in themselves sympathetic, but there was an undertone of delight at the other girl's discomfiture in her voice which she could not eliminate.

In reality she was saying to herself that Evelyn Edgham, in spite of her being so pretty, had had to meet a rebuff, and she exulted in it.

Evelyn still said nothing. She left Addie abruptly and joined Maria in her cla.s.s-room. It was the noon-hour. Maria glanced anxiously at her sister as she entered.

"Why, darling, what is the matter?" she cried.

"Nothing," replied Evelyn. An impulse of loyalty seized her. She would not repeat, not even to Maria, the unkind words which Mr. Lee had used towards her.

"But you look so pale, dear," said Maria.

"It was warm in there," said Evelyn, with a quiet, dejected air unusual to her.

Maria could not get any admission that anything was wrong from her.

Evelyn tried to eat her luncheon, making more of an effort than usual, but she could not. At last she laid her head down on her sister's table and wept with the utter abandon of a child, but she still would not tell what caused her tears.

After that Evelyn lost flesh so rapidly that it became alarming.

Maria and her aunt wondered if they ought to allow her to go through the strain of the graduation exercises, but neither dared say anything about it to her. Evelyn's whole mind seemed fastened upon her graduation and the acquitting of herself with credit. She studied a.s.siduously. She often used to go into the spare chamber and gaze at her graduating dress, which was spread out on the bed there covered with a sheet.

"She's so set on that graduation and wearing that dress," Aunt Maria said to Eunice Stillman, her sister-in-law, one day when she was alone with her in her parlor and heard Evelyn's light step overhead.

"She goes in there almost every day and looks at it."

Eunice sighed. "Well, I wish she looked better," said she.

"So do I. It seems to me that she loses every day."

"Did you ever think--" began Eunice. Then she stopped and hesitated.

"Think what?"

"If--anything happened to her, that that dress--"

"Oh, for the land sake, stop, Eunice!" cried Aunt Maria, impatiently.

"Ain't I had it on my mind the whole time. And that dress looks just as if it was laid out there."

"Do you think Maria notices?"

"Yes, she's just as worried as I am. But what can we do? Maybe if Evelyn gets through the graduation she will be better. I shall be thankful when it's over, for my part."

"How that child's mother could have gone off and left her all this time I don't see," Eunice said. "If I were in her place and anything happened to her, I should never forgive myself."

"Trust Ida Slome to forgive herself for most anything," Aunt Maria returned, bitterly. "But as far as that goes, I guess the child has had full as good care here as she would have had with her ma."

"I guess so, too," said Eunice; "better--only I should never forgive myself."

That was only a week before the graduation day, which was on a Wednesday. It was a clear June day, with a sky of blue, veiled here and there with wing-shaped clouds. It was quite warm. Evelyn dressed herself very early. She was ready long before it was time to take the car. Evelyn, in her white graduating dress, was fairly angelic.

Although she had lost so much flesh, it had not affected her beauty, only made it more touching. Her articulations and bones were so fairy-like and delicate that even with her transparent sleeved and necked dress there were no unseemly protuberances. Her slenderness, moreover, was not so apparent in her fluffy gown. Above her necklace of pink corals her lovely face showed. It was full of a gentle and uncomplaining melancholy, yet that day there was a tinge of hope in it. The faintest and most appealing smile curved her lips. She looked at everybody with a sort of wistful challenge. It was as if she said: "After all, am I not pretty, and worthy of being loved? Am I not worthy of being loved, even if I am not, and I have all my books in my head, too?"

Maria had given her a bouquet of red roses. When Evelyn in her turn came forward to read her essay, holding her red roses, with red roses of excitement burning on her delicate cheeks, there was a low murmur of admiration. Then it was that Maria, in her blue gown, seated among the other teachers, caught the look on Wollaston Lee's face. It was unmistakable. It was a look of the utmost love and longing and admiration, the soul of the man, for the minute, was plainly to be read. In a second, the look was gone, but Maria had seen. "He is in love with her," she told herself, "only he is so honorable that he chokes the love back." Maria turned very pale, but she listened with smiling lips to Evelyn's essay. It was very good, but not much beyond the usual rate of such productions. Evelyn had nothing creative about her, although she was even a brilliant scholar. But the charm of that little flutelike voice, coming from that slight, white-clad beauty, made even plat.i.tudes seem like something higher than wisdom.

When Evelyn had finished there was a great round of applause and a shower of flowers. She returned again and again, and bowed, smiling delightedly. She was flushed with her triumph. She thought that even Mr. Lee must be pleased with her, if he did not love her, and be proud to have such a pupil.

That evening there was to be a reception for the teachers, and the graduating-cla.s.s, at Mr. Lee's house. Evelyn and Maria had planned to go to one of the other teacher's, who lived in Westbridge, have supper, and go from there to the reception. But when the exercises were over, and they had reached the teacher's home, Evelyn's strength gave way. She had a slight fainting fit. The teacher, an elderly woman who lived alone, gave her home-made wine and made her take off her dress, put on one of her own wrappers, and lie down and rest until the last minute, in the hope that she would be able to go to the reception. But it became evident that the girl was too exhausted.

When Maria and the teacher were fastening her dress again, she fainted the second time. The teacher, who was a decisive woman, spoke.

"There is no sense whatever in this child's leaving this house to-night," said she. "Maria, you go to the reception, and I will stay and take care of her."

"No," said Maria. "If Evelyn is not able to go, I think we had better take the trolley at once for home." Maria was as decided as the other teacher. When the white-clad graduates and the teachers were gathering at Wollaston Lee's, she and Evelyn boarded the trolley for Amity. Evelyn still held fast to her bouquet of red roses, and Maria was laden with baskets and bouquets which had been strewn at her shrine. Evelyn leaned back in her seat, with her head resting against the window, and did not speak. All her animation of the morning had vanished. She looked ghastly. Maria kept glancing furtively at her.

She herself looked nearly as pale as Evelyn. She realized that she was face to face with a great wall of problem. She was as unhappy as Evelyn, but she was stronger to bear unhappiness. She had philosophy, and logic, and her young sister was a creature of pure emotion, and at the same time she was so innocent and ignorant that she was completely helpless before it. Evelyn closed her eyes as she leaned against the window-frame, and a chill crept over her sister as she thought that she could not look much different if she were dead. Then came to Maria the conviction that this sister's life meant more than anything else in the world to her. That she could bear the loss of everything rather than that, and when she too would not be able to avoid the sense of responsibility for it. If she had not been so headlong and absurdly impetuous years ago, Evelyn might easily have been happy and lived.

When they reached home, Aunt Maria, who had come on an earlier car, was already in her bedroom and the front-door was fastened and the sitting-room windows were dark. Maria knocked on the door, and presently she heard footsteps, then Aunt Maria's voice, asking, with an a.s.sumption of masculine harshness, who were there.

"It is only I and Evelyn," replied Maria.

Then the door was opened, and Aunt Maria, in her ruffled night-gown and cap, holding a streaming lamp, stood back hastily lest somebody see her. "Come in and shut the door quick, for goodness sake!" said she. "I am all undressed."

Maria and Evelyn went in, and Maria closed and locked the door.

"What have you come home for?" asked Aunt Maria. "Why didn't you go to the reception, and stay at Miss Thomas's, the way you said you were going to, I'd like to know?"

"Evelyn didn't feel very well, and I thought we'd better come home,"

replied Maria, with a little note of evasion in her voice.

Aunt Maria turned and looked sharply at Evelyn, who was leaning against the wall. She was faint again, and she looked, in her white dress with her slender curves, like a bas-relief. "What on earth is the matter with her?" asked Aunt Maria in her angry voice, which was still full of the most loving concern. She caught hold of Evelyn's slight arm. "You are all tired out, just as I expected," she said. "I call the whole thing pure tomfoolery. If girls want to get educated, let them, but when it comes to making such a parade when they are all worn out with education there is no sense in it. Maria, you get her up-stairs to bed."

Evelyn was too exhausted to make any resistance. She allowed Maria to a.s.sist her up-stairs and undress her. When her sister bent over her to kiss her good-night, she said, soothingly, "There now, darling; go to sleep. You will feel better now school is done and you will have a chance to rest."

But Evelyn responded with the weakest and most hopeless little sob.

"Don't cry, precious," said Maria.