Show I 1 FITT TV IF TV IF IF if v I 1 ah 77 e BEGINNERS BEGINNER A now novel by henry kitchell webster t by abo dobbs merrill co service aaa CHAPTER I 1 11 edward IR martinz tinz had begun T till par as an ordinary helhake hal handi hako hake but young ed suddenly lud denly fling lis arms around hie his father rod hugged him dad he ue cried cant houpos sibly come up to the brook just for a day or two I 1 ill III ice see elward senior told him if I 1 lon an I 1 will ft III write your mother about it lt anyway looked away as he said that but he be turned back to watch the boy go bounding up three at a time the steps stein to the elevated sta tion he ile was deeply moved and part of his emotion was na bewilder ment it was ft as an unprecedented thing between them that sudden strong hug how flow much edward batterson rat 1 ergon terson asked himself did the boy know how flow had nn an un suspected instinct enabled him blin to guess of 0 the devastating melan choly that had settled upon the old er man when he learned a little earlier evening that ruth in graham had sold her house and was going to move moie away to new york tork the boy couldn t have seen through that could he it mould be rather nice to go up to the brook the children would give him a welcome anyhow and even julia might be found will ing at least to ignore her supposed grievance just going an ay any where would be a relief a protective coi covering ering for the bruise hed got tonight when hed discovered how unimportant hed bed become to kuth ruth he ile want to think about that thal bear to think about IL it he ile be sure of course that be doln her an injustice her tier decision to sell her house and move away an ay might have been forced tipon her suddenly she might have written him a note that he be had not yet received it might be waling at ing for him now at the hotel unconsciously he quickened his pace and then with a half audible groin gromi as he realized ft hat he was doing deliberately slackened it again I 1 ids his w was as the way hed been acting for days making excuses for her silence trying to steel him self against disappointment and then encouraging raging his hopes to rise again acting like a fool an abject blagay wistful fool he ile t go on like that hed give her a taste of her own cine if it she wanted to be rid of him she should be sooner and more completely than she intended he ife 4 1 I irr arrange grige things at the office to morrow and to morrow night hed go up to the brook he managed a tone sufficiently casual when he asked tle night clerk if it there were any messages or letters for him but his heart gave an irrepressibly bound when the rean man said one just came in on ou the last delivery it sank again sickeningly when he saw that it was not from huth ruth but from his wife at buttermilk brook A thick letter ominously different from the brief dry missives hed bed been getting from her all summer he ile mt felt lick tick with premonition as he be rode up in the elevator his ills small barren room was hot and airle airier airles s he ile switched oi the light tore oen the envelope and looked blankly at tt the first of the closely brittin pages for a good while before he began to read its opening addressed to him as edward disposed of any lingering idea he might have hare had that its gwint an offer of 0 a recon dilation her friendly name for him was as ned her tier affectionate one whit vi hit a long way back that went twenty years or arel vaa va neddy she never mer used edward except as a tern term of reproach 1 I 11 suppose I 1 ought to hive written this letter weeks ago she broto but ive come along fool ashly hoping that thin might happen lappen so that I 1 dat have to write it at all I 1 hate to write it worse than anything I 1 ever had to do and I 1 dont suppose it will do any good but for the sake of the children ive got to there much time left because the season reason here at the brook Is almost over the hotel will ft close in two weeks so you have haie to decide now what you want me to do I 1 mean whether you want me to come back to our house in 1 or not whether you want to go on having a e home and family he lie put down the letter and clenched hs LIS hands he ile beat with them upon the arm of bis his chair then alth a painful effort he relaxed again thank cod julia gasn wasn I 1 here to talk to him I 1 she upset him horribly when she talked to him in the mood in which this letter was as written he lie d better read the rest of the letter firt and find out precisely what the terms of her ultimatum were the next sentence over the page was explicit if you want me you will have to get rid of ruth ingraham people have written ritten Tk me letter IV embody Is talking about IL it its it humiliating it makes me feel like a fool I 1 simply cant can t stand it all and I 1 wont if you were tick sick of roe me and wanted to bo unfaithful to roe me why did you have to pick her out my hy you hae haie gone into the city and picked up some woman off the street that all my friends dont know lie ile felt himself getting sick with plain horror at her monstrous ac causation cus cusa atlon tion A beastly lie ile cot tot only as regarded the fact she accused him of that was a n lie ile of course his relation with ruth had bad been an absolutely innocent one but a lie ile as is the statement of julia jullas g belief hat that it had been anything else he ile believe she believed hat thal she nas was pretending to ta in 0 order to justify her jealous jealousy well be knew the worst now he ile might as well go on and read the resl rest I 1 suppose im I 1 m saying just exact ly IY what bat you want roe me to say ever since you fell in love loie with ft ath her I 1 must have been just a burden and 0 A woman who would have under food stood him better if he had frankly sought the rewards of a lover a restraint to you I 1 don dont t know how long ago that was long before her husband died I 1 suppose 1 I any plans now I 1 dont don t seem to be able to think at all if I 1 only bad had any way of earning money the way ed bas has been earning it this summer so that I 1 could support myself and be independent but there any thing special that I 1 know how to do and I 1 feel pretty old to learn leam I 1 but im going to do something ned you can count on that thal I 1 ont go on living the way you made me uve live latt la tt spring if you wast want to go on in a different way tor for the sake of the children I 1 know you dont don t tor for me you can decide now and let me know and come back and try to keep things looking as if it noth ing had happened well come down the night of the fifteenth if you dont feel that you can give her up I 1 wish say that too in so many words so that inow know its the not knowing that a driving me wild only dont write justifying yourself and trying to get me to change my mind I 1 don t t care it if your friendship Is as sweet and noble and innocent as you pretended it was last spring I 1 dont don t know but I 1 think I 1 id d bate that worse than the other I 1 cant bear to have her mabe make such a fool of you ou what she was doing all last spring and I 1 suppose has been ever since slum all the more if she never was your mistress do you think she cared anything albut friendship you were useful to her I 1 suppose and what hat she mostly wafted wanted was as to show that she could take you away from me this summer has been like a it nightmare it doesn t seem as if it it could be true that after two people had been living together tor for twenty years a worthless woman lim ruth ingraham could tome owe between them and ruin their lives you may not know she hai has ruined your life but she will I 1 can t help it IL I 1 have done my best besl let me know what you decide to do julia anger was the emotion he be want ed hot sustaining indignation against his wife for the brutality of her ultimatum to him for the licentious injustice of her charges charles against ruth it wouldn t come lie ile had no control oer the gusts of feeling that shook him now from this dl di and now from that one of them was an ineluctable sympathy for julia herself in her forlorn helpless wish thit wit th it ehe she could find a it job earn her own living it bearable to picture julia doing that or to think of the ml misery aery that had driven her to wanting to do it it didn dian t help to assure him self that it was her own fault faull more excruciating still was the picture of himself that nas was etched la in add acid la in the last sentences of his wife letter A fool all the more a fool if it the she neer mer was your mis tress I 1 welcome elcome so 10 long as he wax was useful contemptuously discarded when he had ceased to be the object at first of a tolerant and later of an exasperated contempt on the part of a woman oman who neither val aed nor understood the friendship he talked about a woman who would have understood him better if he had frankly s sigbe from the beginning the adulterous rewards of a lover the hottest indignation that he could muster didat protect him against the twinge cery now and then of an intolerable ml misgiving that julia was right q s at four that afternoon he was alone luckily in bis his office at the time cluth ingraham Ingra hom telephoned to him with the reco gril tion of he be voice he began to tremble violently she accused him playfully plo Pla fully of haan haling forgotten all about her it wai was so long do das s and days she the said really it was weeks since bed been out to see her tier he ile must come since she had bad something awfully an fully important Import ont to tell him and unless he caine came quite soon it would be too late for her to see him at all she had just that morn ing sold her bouie and she nas was going away for good there were nere a few matters she a anted his adice about if he was still his kind and helpful self 1 hen lea would he come tonight it was a queer thing ills body was completely disorganized but his mind from the moment she began to speak became become suddenly un troubled pellucid the stuff that had for so long befogged it dropped into instantaneous precipitate he ile saw her now understood her alto gether the false plausibility of her voice the crudely transparent wish to summon him hira back now that he could once more be serviceable it no longer mattered to her now that she was going away for good what prying neighbors might think of their companionship he ile noted without surprise the lie ile she told him ue he was perfectly aware now that she had often lied to him before though this was the first moment of that awareness well she demanded at last I 1 you got anything to 0 o bayl have I 1 struck you speechless speech lessi im I 1 ro almost as surprised as that myself it came over him now that he must speak quickly no im not surprised 1 be he s id in fact I 1 al at ready knew about it but I 1 m afraid I 1 shant be able to come out to see yea before you go rin going away myself today or tomorrow and III hardly be back before the fifteenth fifteen tV there was a moment of silence then a gasp goodby he said bald and hung up the receiver ile watched the tho instrument for i A moment in terror lest she should call him back but the bell was sl at lent mr vane the general agent walked into his office a few min utes later half stated the errand that had brought him in and stopped short with a stare into bis his cashiers face the matter he asked with r sharp harp concern you look as if you were going to faint C dward protested that he was all right what was it that vane wanted for the moment vane let it go at tit that but later in the afternoon he be came back to edward to urge him hira to take a vacation ile was e en n titled to if 14 and he be clearly needed I 1 it t A As best he could edward argued against the suggestion the office somehow had become his city of refuge it protected him in a a way ay against both julia and ruth the thought of being deprived of it turned adrift tor for the next two weeks filled him with terror vane of course suspected noth ing like that but he saw plainly enough that a valuable officer of the company was temporarily unfitted for business ati a need ess of ed ward wards s protests he vent went ahead and anc arranged for his relief by friday noon it was all settled ile went out ostensibly for lunch though be he knew be he wouldn t be able to eat in a state of complete demoralization sixteen days I 1 include ruths departure and julias jollas return ile could rit go to julia and would nL not after that letter shed written to him mai and he misdoubted his courage to stay away from ruth even now in his mind he saw her for exactly what she was in his random walk in the scare search b of a restaurant that would invite him in to lunch he had stopped automatically before the window of 0 a down downtown town ticket office of one of 0 the western railroads it was ad ver a new limited train to lo 10 los angeles hed lied never been out there it was a trip he and julia had talked tallied about taking off end and on for the last twenty yearl III d probably never do 14 it but fahr hv dia t he do it clone now that would solve the problem of his va to cation nith with a vengeance it aa ft a a nay ay of burning ahli bridge bridges of course as far ai as ruth was wa concerned berned but this the main at traction it would how show julia julio show her what lie ile dismissed the question impatiently whatever it was shed ece see those dare days on the train were the best part of his vacation they gae gaie him a chance to think the thing that bewildered him most outraged bli his sense of justice was his conscience it gasn wasn t playing fair search as he might and ne v spent hours raking over the past he put the finger of memory upon an act of his that had been consciously wrong hed had plenty of chances to do wrong but hed successfully resist ed temptation every time he ile had remained through everything a faithful husband a loyal frind an industrious off official lelal and et he now he bel belleek leed feel gulit guiltier ler more contemptible if bed done eiery thing that julia ID her letter by word ord or tion had accused him of it v aan t the way a coes conscience clence was supposed to act let edward ought to know he ile was a ministers son though not at all the traditional one ills father had bad been pastor of a large Eangel evangelical leal church in new york city but I 1 id d ward a upbringing had not been ban di capped by pietistic limitations his ills start in business bad had been promising ills father fathers s arcil er had been one of the higher officials in I 1 the great insurance company tat edward still worked for it was perhaps owing to this pull but not at nil all to an unjustifiable exercise of it that edward had been taken tolen in ila on the executive side instead of having to start out as a solicitor peddling aiom riom door to door ednard edward would have loathed thit the crude competitive hustle of life lite was congenitally distasteful to him luckily for him his uncle had been in a it position to save him from all that thal edward had gone to work the autumn after he graduated in the accounting de department of the home office hed never minded long hours nor hard work not even dull work he ile mot mind anything as long as it came in a dig rifled nay way to him as long as be he have to go cot cut after it I 1 hed done his nork work well conspicuously well so far as it was possible for anything to be conspicuous in a greet great office ille lite th ehst L it bada t been but two or three heirs before made him a traveling auditor ills route took him through the upstate cities in new york that as how hed bed met julia julia nineteen years old at the time was a real beauty queenly the undergraduates used to call her her father was dead but hed bed left her mother a comfortable annuity and as the girl had no brothers 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