But when they had gone into the anteroom, he said quickly:

"Miss Baxter, will you come into the salon here, or up-stairs? For a quarter of an hour--a few moments, just a second--I must speak to you.

Now--at once--please!"

There was no escape; she resigned herself to following him. But as she entered the green-and-gold desert where intimacy could no longer be avoided, she thought to herself:

"Oh, dear! If I had only knocked it over my dress I could have gone right home!"

In twenty minutes it was all over, and very red, very quiet, he had conducted her to his car and sent her off.

"I'm sorry!" she said, distressed at his pathetic figure.

"Such things can't be helped!" he said, with a closing of the jaws.

"But let's be friends, can't you? Just now--I'm so young still--later--Please let's be friends, Mr. Peavey!"

He shook his head.

"I'm afraid--that's too hard, and--I don't think you'll ever change!"

"I have been honest!" she said sadly--which was true, in a measure.

"Very!"

He shook her hand with an exaggerated bow, signaled the chauffeur and went back.

All at once she had a feeling of utter loneliness and abandonment. He had been something so secure in her life, so dependable. To give him up was more of a wrench than she had imagined. It brought her a curious sense of peril. Would he wait, as she had suggested, or would this be the end, the last glimpse she would have of this strong, solitary, devoted soul?

She jumped out hastily at Miss Pim's, and then stopped to consider.

"Want me this evening?" said Brennon, watching her attentively.

"I don't know--yes--I'll telephone."

"Everything all right?" he asked slyly.

"What do you mean?" she said, frowning and surprised.

"Oh, nothing!" he said noisily. Then he leaned forward, his eyes fixed boldly, covetously on her. "I say, when you've got an open date, why not come joy-riding with me?"

"Oh!" She drew back, stung to the quick of her pride.

He misunderstood her action, perhaps. Shrugging his shoulders, he went on:

"Why not? I'm as good a spender as some of the high-rollers!"

"How dare you?" she cried, blushing hot under his look. "What do you think I am? Go with _you_!"

"You needn't be so particular!" he said, angry in his turn at her contempt. "A chauffeur's not a servant. And I guess I've kept your secrets, young lady!"

"What do you mean?"

"Look here! I'm no fool! Don't you think I know your game? Don't you think I got on to the brother racket that night? All right! Don't get in a huff! What've I done? Invited you out! What are you turning up your nose at me for? Come, now!"

He had ended in a conciliatory tone, smiling at her indignant face with undisguised admiration.

"Brennon, that's enough! I shan't want you, now or ever! Mr. Peavey shall hear of this!"

"Oh, will he?" he said, with an ugly look. "Then he'll hear of a good deal more! What are you but a--"

She gave a cry of shame at the word he flung out in anger, and rushed into the house, utterly crushed and revolted, wounded as she had never been before in all her life. The whole day had been one of blank defeat.

Now with her body smarting as if from a blow, broken in spirit, clinging to the window-frame, she had a sudden ominous chill. It seemed as if in a twinkle everything had changed for her--that all that had been so rosy and brilliant before, was now become grim and black; that everything had been broken up; that, one by one, all would fall away.

And, as if her cup of bitterness were not full, in her mail she found the one letter she had dreaded for months:

"All over and I've won out, Flossie! Whew! Three months ago things looked so squally, I couldn't even write. If I'd gone under, I'd just have quietly dropped out, and, Kid, you'd never known what had hit me! But, bless the luck, I'm It! Clear the tracks for me! I'm coming East with the bells on! Listen! Six thousand eight hundred fifty-two dollars in the bank, salted away. Prospects, sixteen karat fine. Got a cracker-jack proposition; six cinematograph shows, one-fifth interest. In a year, Flossie, it's a gasoline buggy for you! I'm beating it to you, hot-foot. One stop in Des Moines to pick up some easy money, and me for the gay White Way! Watch for me about March fourteenth. Say, we're going to be rich, and don't you forget it!

It's all for you, bless your pretty eyes! Do I love you? Well, say! I'm sitting up, talking to your little photo, foolish as a kid! I'm daffy about you. If you're still strong for Josh, why, set the date. Go the limit on the clothes--the best isn't too good for you! Don't keep me waiting, and don't go for to tease me, honey, for my heart's been true to you!

"JOSH.

"P. S. If you've got any foolish thinks in your sa.s.sy head that you care for any cane-bearing dude, dismiss them! You don't!

Sweep the porch and cut the hammock-strings. Don't fool yourself one minute--we're the team!"

She gave a cry of horror. The worst had come! The past was rising up to claim her, stretching out its cruel tentacles to drag her back, as it had done to Winona. How could she escape him? What could she say to him, after all these months of weak postponement? If only she could stop him by a letter or a telegram! But there was no address. All she knew was that somewhere, out on the cold brown sky-line, he was hurrying toward her, resolute, confident, a terribly earnest lover. All that night, in the midst of hideous dreams, where Brennon pursued her with his vindictive grin, she had the feeling of something advancing over the horizon, black, swelling like a tornado, roaring toward her, obscuring everything with its expanding darkness.

CHAPTER XXVII

In a twinkling, from the heights of triumphant pleasure, Dodo found herself plunged into profoundest dejection. It seemed as if everything must turn against her, that there could be no end to the defeats that were to pile up. At the end of the week a curt farewell letter came from Mr. Peavey, in which she believed she divined the hand of Brennon. For the first time, too, she felt the clammy touch of poverty. In the last months, unperceived, the props had dropped away, one by one. She had been foolish, extravagant. She had wanted to be as well dressed in the eyes of Ma.s.singale as the women of his world. She had sold, through Zip, the furs Stacey had given her, for the exigencies of the wardrobe. Trip by trip, she had gone into the shadow of the p.a.w.n-broker, sacrificing the silver toilet set, Sa.s.soon's bracelet, the vanity-box, earrings, brooches, every convertible thing, until only two remained--Judge Ma.s.singale's bracelet, and the ring that Lindaberry had placed on her finger as a troth.

When Peavey's automobile had been withdrawn, she had tried Gilday, only to find him out of town. When she had sought to bring Stacey back into the fold of the faithful, she found that his allegiance had been transferred. He came once to take her to luncheon, but it was out of a sentiment for the past, and a need of unbosoming himself. She listened with a little lonely feeling to his rhapsodies about another girl, and when it was over she made no attempt to recall him. The time was too short to seek out other alliances: she resigned herself to going on foot. It gave her a curious sensation, as if she were suddenly bankrupt--as if she were slipping back.

Nebbins had written that he would come on the fourteenth, but she had a vague dread that he might turn up any day. She never let herself into Miss Pim's hall now that she did not glance apprehensively at the musty shadows of the parlor, fearing to see the brisk red-headed apparition of Josh Nebbins.

Doctor Lampson returned the end of February and she went to his office for news of Garry. But at the sight of her, pale and restless, he had exclaimed:

"Great heavens! What have you been doing? You look like the ghost of yourself!"

"I've been worrying," she said quickly.

"Don't! Does no good! Besides, Garry's all right: he's coming out of it with flying colors! h.e.l.lo! I almost forgot. Here's a letter for you," he added, with a twinkle in his eyes.

Dore took the letter, holding it without opening it.

"How long will he stay?" she asked quietly.