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Show " t f He W3S a famous man Nvho had lost v-f K himself through fear, but found ; courage in an inspiring woman's love fyv Mary Roberts Rinehart v tells the story I m the first Installment we were Introduced to Sidney Page, to Joe Drummond, her boy .weetheart, whom she promised ,o marry "after years and vtars," and to K. Le Moyne, the new roomer taken by Sidney and her mother In order to piece out family finances. And In this In-bailment In-bailment we see Sidney step-ping step-ping Into womanhood and making mak-ing important decisions right and left CHAPTER II. 2 Sidney could not remember when ber Aunt Harriet had not sat at the table. It was one of her earliest dis-illasionments dis-illasionments to learn that Aunt Harriet Har-riet lived with them, not because she wished to, but because Sidney's father lad borrowed her small patrimony and she was "boarding it out." Eighteen years she had "boarded it out" Sidney had been born and pown to girlhood ; the dreamer father tad gone to his grave, with valuable patents lost for lack of money to renew re-new them gone with his faith In himself him-self destroyed, but with his faith in the world undiminished for he left his irile and daughter without a dollar of life Insurance. Harriet Kennedy had voiced her own view of the matter, the day after the funeral, to one of her neighbors : "He left no Insurance. Why should be bother? He left me." To the little widow, her sister, she had been no less bitter, and more explicit "It looks to me, Anna," she said, "as If by borrowing everything I had George had bought me, body and soul, for the rest of my natural life. I'll stay now until Sidney is able to take hold. Then I'm going to liye my own life. It will be a little late, but the Kennedy's live a long time." The day of Harriet's leaving had seemedfaraway to Anna Page. Sidney Sid-ney was still her baby. She had given up her dolls, but she still made clothes for them out of scraps from Harriet's sewing room. In the parlance of the Street, Harriet "sewed" and sewed welL She had taken Anna Into business with her, but the burden of the partnership part-nership had always been on Harriet To give her credit, she had not complained. com-plained. She was past forty by that time, and her youth had slipped by in that back room with Its dingy wall paper covered with paper patterns. On the day after the arrival of the roomer, Harriet Kennedy came down to breakfast a little late. Katie, the feneral-housework girl, was serving breakfast Mrs. Page, who had taken advantage of Harriet's tardiness to i read the obituary column In the morn-Jog morn-Jog paper, dropped it. But Harriet did not sit down. "Sidney." 1 "Yes, Aunt Harriet." "Sidney, when your father died, I promised to look after both you and jonr mother until you were able to take care of yourself. That was five pears ago. Of course, even before that 1 had helped to support you." "If you would only have your coffee, Harriet 1" Mrs. Page sat with her hand on the ndle of the old silver-plated coffeepot coffee-pot Harriet ignored her. "You are a young woman now. You lave health and energy, and you have Jouth, which I haven't I'm past forty, to the next twenty years, at the out-Ude, out-Ude, I've got not only to support myself my-self but to save something to keep He after that, if I live." Sidney returned her gaze steadily. "I see. Well, Aunt Harriet, you're quite right You've been a saint to j!nt U yon want t0 8 away" Harriet !" walled Mrs. Page, "you're ot thinking- Please, mother." Harriet's eyes softened as she looked at the girl. "We can manage," said Sidney quietly qui-etly 'Tve.u mIss you fcut ,t,a Ume e learned to depend on ourselves." 'er that, In a torrent, came Harri- 8 declaration of Independence. And, Hed with its pathetic jumble of re-""alnations, re-""alnations, hostiUty to her sister's W hnsband- and resentment for her years, came poor Harriet's hopes na ambitions, the tragic plea of a oman who must substitute for the op- m'sm and energy of youth the grim termination of middle age. I can do good work," she finished. , ful1 of Ideas, If I could get a lflanoe to work them out But there's no chance here. There isn't a woman ou the Street who knows real clothes when she sees them." Mrs. Tage could not get back of Harriet's revolt to Its cause. To her, Harriet was not an artist pleading for her art ; she was a sister and a breadwinner bread-winner deserting her trust. "I'm sure," she said stiflly, "we paid you back every cent we borrowed. If you stayed here after George died, It was because you offered to." Her chin worked. She fumbled for the handkerchief nt her belt. But Sidney Sid-ney went around the tnble and flung a young arm over her aunt's shoulders. "Why didn't you say all that a year ago? We've been selfish, but we're not as bad as you think. And If anyone any-one In this world Is entitled to success, you are. Of course we'll manage." Harriet's iron repression almost gave way. She covered her emotion with details : "Mrs. Lorenz Is going to let me make Christine some things, and if they're all right, I may make her trousseau." trous-seau." "Trousseau for Christine I" "She's not engaged, but her mother says It's only a matter of n short time. I'm going to take two rooms in the business part of town, and put a couch in the back room to sleep on." Sidney's mind flew to Christine and her bright future, to a trousseau bought with the Lorenz money, to Christine settled down, a married woman, wom-an, with Palmer Howe. She came back with an effort. Harriet had two triangular trian-gular red spots In her sallow cheeks. "I can get a few good models that's the only way to start. And If you care to do handwork for me, Anna, I'll send it to you, and pay you the regular rates. There Isn't the call for It there used to be, but Just a touch gives dash." All of Mrs. Page's grievances had worked their way to the surface. Sidney Sid-ney and Harriet had made her world, such as It was, and her world was in revolt. She flung out her hands. "I suppose I must do something. With you leaving, and Sidney renting her room and sleeping on a folding bed In the sewing room, everything seems upside down. I never thought I should live to see strange men running In and out of this house and carrying carry-ing latchkeys." This reference to Le Moyne, whose tall figure had made a hurried exit some time before. Harriet's eyes were brighter already as she went out. Sidney, kissing her in the hall and wishing her luck, realized real-ized suddenly what a burden she and her mother must have been for the last few years. She threw her head up proudly. They would never be a bur den again never, as long as she had strength and health ! By evening Mrs. Page had worked herself Into a state bordering on hysteria. hys-teria. Harriet was out most of the day. She came in at three o'clock, and Katie Ka-tie gave her a cup of tea. At the news of her sister's condition, she merely shrugged her shoulders. "She'll not die, Katie," she said calmly. "But see that Miss Sidney eats something, and if she is worried tell her I said to get Doctor Ed." Very significant of Harriet's altered outlook was this casual summoning of the Street's family doctor. She was already dealing in larger figures. The recklessness of pure adventure was in her blood. She had taken rooms at a rental that she determinedly put out of her mind, and she was on her way to buy furniture. No pirate, fitting out a ship for the highways of the sea, ever experienced more guilty and delightful de-lightful excitement. The afternoon dragged away. Doctor Doc-tor Ed was "out on a case" and might not be in until evening. Sidney sat in the darkened room and waved a fan over her mother's rigid form. At half past five Johnny Rosenfeld, from the alley, who worked for a florist after school, brought a box- of roses, and departed grinning impishly. He knew Joe, had seen him in the store. Soon the alley knew that Sidney had received a dozen Killarney roses at three dollars and a half, and was probably engaged to Joe Drummond. - "Doctor Ed," said Sidney, as he followed fol-lowed her down the stairs, "can you spare the time to talk to me a little while?" t Perhaps the elder Wilson had a quick vision of the crowded office waiting across the Street J but his reply re-ply was prompt: "Any amount of time." Sidney led the . way Into the small parlor, where Joe's roses, refused by the- petulant invalid upstairs, bloomed alone. "First of all," said Sidney, "did you mean what you said upstairs?" Doctor Ed thought quickly. "Of course; but what?" "You said I was a born nurse." The Street was very fond of Doctor Ed. It did not always approve of him". It said which was perfectly true that he had sacrificed himself to his brother's career that for the sake of that brilliant young surgeon, Doctor Doc-tor Ed had done without wife and children ; that to send him abroad he had saved and skimped ; that he still went shabby and drove the old buggy while Max drove about In an automobile automo-bile coupe. Sidney, not at all of the stuff martyrs are made of, sat in the scented parlor, and,' remembering all this, was ashamed of her rebellion. "I'm going Into a hospital," said Sidney. Sid-ney. Doctor Ed waited. He liked to have all the symptoms before he made a diagnosis or ventured an opinion. So Sidney, trying to be cheerful, and quite unconscious of the anxiety in her voice, told her story. "It's fearfully hard work, of course," he commented, when she had finished. "So is anything worth while. Look at the way you work I" Doctor Ed rose and wandered around the room. "I don't think I like the Idea," he said at last "It's splendid work for an older woman. But it's life, "child life in the raw. It seems such an unnecessary un-necessary sacrifice." "Don't you think," said Sidney bravely, brave-ly, "that you are a poor person to talk of sacrifice? Haven't you always, all your life" Doctor Ed colored to the roots of his straw-colored hair. "Certainly not," he said almost Irritably. Irri-tably. "Max had genius; I had ability. abil-ity. That's different One real success suc-cess Is better than two halves. Not" he smiled down nt her "not that I minimize my usefulness. Somebody has to do the hack-work, and, if I do say It myself, I'm a pretty good hack." "Very well," said Sidney. "Then I shall be a hack, too. Of course I had thought of other things my father wanted me to go to college but I'm strong and willing. And one thing I must make up my mind to, Doctor Ed ; I shall have to support my mother." Harriet passed the door on her way In to a belated supper. The man in the parlor had a momentary glimpse of her slender, sagging shoulders, her thin face, her undisguised middle age. "Yes," he said, when she was out of hearing. "It's hard, but I dare say it's right enough, too. Your aunt ought to have her chance. Only I wish it didn't have to be." Sidney, left alone, stood in the little parlor beside the roses. She touched them tenderly, absently. Life, which the day before had called her with the beckoning finger of dreams, now reached out grim, Insistent hands. Life in the raw. CHAPTER III. K. Le Moyne had wakened early that first morning in his new quarters. Because Be-cause he was young and very strong, he wakened to a certain lightness of spirit But he grew depressed as he prepared for the office. He told himself him-self savagely, as he put on his shabby clothing, that, having sought for peace and now found it he was an ass for resenting It. The trouble was, of course, that he came of a fighting stock soldiers and explorers, even a gentleman adventurer or two, had been his forefathers. He loathed peace with a deadly loathing. Having given up everything else, K. Le Moyne had also given up the love of woman. That, of course, is figurative. figura-tive. He had been too busy for women, wom-en, and nowjie was too idle. A small part of his brain added figures In the office of a gas company daily, for the sum of two dollars and fifty cents per eight-hour working day. But the real K. Le Moyne, that had dreamed dreams, had nothing to do with the figures, but sat somewhere In his head and mocked him as he worked at his task. He breakfasted at Mrs. McKee's. The food was rather good, certainly plentiful; and even his squeamish morning appetite could find no fault with the self-respecting tidiness of the place. Some of the "mealers" the Street's name for them ventured on various small familiarities of speech with Tillle. K. Le Moyne himself was scrupulously polite but reserved. He was determined not to let the Street encroach on his wretchedness. Because he had come to live there was no reason rea-son why it should adopt him. But he was very polite. When the deaf-and- dumb hook agent wrote soroTjUiing on a pencil pad and pushed it toward him, he replied in kind. "We are very glad to welcome you to the McKce family," was what was written on the pad. "Very happy, Indeed, to be with you," wrote back Le Moyne-i-and realized with a sort of shock that he meant It. The kindly greeting hud touched him. The greeting and the breakfast cheered him also, he had evidently made some headway with Tlllie. "Don't you want a toothpick?" she asked, as he went out. In K's previous walk, of life there had been no toothpicks ; or, if there were any, they were kept, along with the family scandals, in a closet. But nearly a year of buffeting about had taught him many things. He took one, and placed It nonchalantly in his waistcoat waist-coat pocket, as he hud seen the others do. . Change was in the very air of the Street that June morning. It was In Harriet, asserting her right to live ; in Sidney, planning with eager eyes a life of service which did not include Joe ; In K. Le Moyne, who had built up a wall between himself and the world, and was seeing it demolished by a deaf-and-dumb book agent whose weapon was a lead pencil pad I And yet, for a week nothing happened. hap-pened. Joe came in the evenings and sat on the steps with Sidney, his honest hon-est heart in his eyes. Anna, no longer sulky, accepted with childlike faith Sidney's statement that "they'd get along; she had a splendid scheme," and took to helping Harriet in her preparations for leaving. And K. Le Moyne, finding his little room hot In the evenings and not wishing to intrude in-trude on the two on the doorstep, took to reading his paper In the park, and after twilight to long, rapid walks out into the country. The walks satisfied the craving of his active body for exercise, ex-ercise, and tired him so he could sleep. When K. was sure that the boy had gone, he would turn back toward the Street. Some of the heaviness of his spirit always left him at sight of the little house. Its kindly atmosphere seemed to reach out and envelop. Within was order and quiet, the freshness fresh-ness of his turned-down bed, the tidiness tidi-ness of his ordered garments. Life, that had seemed so simple, had grown very complicated for Sidney. There was her mother to break the news to, and Joe. Harriet would approve; ap-prove; she felt; but these others! To .assure Anna that she must manage alone for three years, In order to be happy and comfortable afterward that was hard enough. But to tell Joe that she was planning a future without him, to destroy the light In his blue eyes that hurt. After all, she told K. first. One Friday Fri-day evening, coming home late as usual, he found her on the doorstep, and Joe gone. , She moved over hospitably. hospi-tably. The moon had waxed and waned, and the Street was dark. The colored man who drove Doctor Ed- In the old buggy on his dally rounds had brought out the hose and sprinkled the street Within this zone of freshness, of wet asphalt and dripping gutters, Sidney sat, cold and silent "Please sit down. It Is cool now. My Idea of luxury Is to have the Street sprinkled on a hot night." K. disposed of his long legs on the steps. He was trying to fit his own Ideas of luxury to a garden hose and a city street. "I'm afraid you're working too hard." "I? I do a minimum of labor for a minimum -of wage." "But you work at night, don't you?" K. was natively honest. He hesitated. hesitat-ed. Then: "No, Miss Page." "But you go out every evening 1" Suddenly the truth burst on her. "Oh, dear I" she said. . T do believe be-lieve why, how silly of you I" K. was most uncomfortable. "Really, I like it," he protested. "I hang over a desk all day, and In the evening I want to walk. I ramble around the park and see lovers on benches it's rather thrilling." Quite suddenly Sidney laughed. "How very nice you are I" she said "and how absurd I Don't you know that if you Insist on walking the streets and parks at night because Joe Drummond is here, I shall have to tell him not to come?" This dioVnot follow, to K.'s mind. They had rather a heated argument over it, and became much better acquainted. ac-quainted. "If I were engaged to him," Sidney ended, her cheeks very pink, "I I might understand. But, as I am not " "Ah!" said K., a trifle unsteadily. "So you are not?" What do you make of K. Le Moyne by this time? And suppose sup-pose your daughter, at the age of eighteen, decided to be a trained nurse would you let her take up the work? (TO BE CONTINUED.) |