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Show , S7M I Howniaiiiy 7 - 4. Frances Shelley Wees sunlight, as If a silvery Ten had fallen suddenly across the sky. He turned and walked slowly up the dark path toward the house. The birds outside Bryn's window wakened him very early; the morning morn-ing air was still night-cold and fresh when he yawned, stretched, drew back his quilts and sprang out of bed. A few minutes later, In his white shirt end gray knickerbockers he closed Jus door noiselessly and tiptoed tip-toed down the hall past the door which must be Deborah's, since it was the only closed one along the corridor. Gary, who was obviously in Deborah's confidence, had been most reluctant even to give Bryn a. room in this wing, but it couldn't be helped, since Mrs. Larned herself her-self was In the north, wing. Bryn stepped out over the puff of dew-laden grass at the foot of the steps, to the wide red uneven stones of the path. He thrust his hands in his pockvts and sauntered along the side vf the south wing and around the end. He was facing the mountain now; there was still a little broken wreath of mist around the top. Between him and the forest, for-est, at the back of the stretch of park land, he could see the serrated serrat-ed rows of the orchard trees, and a clear flat space beside It which appeared to be a garden. He followed fol-lowed the narrow beaten path, hedged with drooping wet grass, across to the corner of the orchard. He came to a stop beneath a cherry tree whose topmost boughs were still laden down with heavy fruit. Bryn regarded it. He put a foot on a low branch and swung himself up into the tree as far the heavier branches would take him. The cherry tree, being on the side of the hill, was a vantage point. Below him the house, smothered in its ivy, lay without a sign of habitation. habi-tation. Bevond It the brook was SYNOPSIS t'i ,T,mPs Brynildson III), a V Bry (,dm'S0ue man of wealth, VTTum Tubby Forbes, are W "S Bryn's coming marriage. tWnss.ng Bryn ,. Bchme to get h from him. Should the Stuart Graham before S""lM' Tv first birthday, she will vast fortune from her hwLtr Stuart had greatly dis-Drtorah. dis-Drtorah. who refuses to - him Bryn, posing as an un-Vtitrry un-Vtitrry n'm' ,neer offers to marry as I uart, for $50,000, they 1Pf,raiv as man and wife. Twen-J!? Twen-J!? e years previous. Anne Lar-TiKZ Lar-TiKZ eloped with an adventurer 1 aav set for her wedding to ffiraham Two days after fl?ffio?hi "aughter. Anne died. (er the father died. The 1 randparents, took the child ;t' to Oregon where, without -3 Z ,mpanions, Deborah grew up. X Vruard her from some for-i for-i knnter her grandfather had CaVed for h'er fo marry Stuart n of Courtney Graham, when of When Deborah was fifteen, her 'v,ndfather died. Securities had ki aside to keep the family, ,-t , market crash left scarcely flCuih for them to live on. This was Known to Deborah's grandmother, "4'kn invalid, Gary, a servant, manag--X Ike finances. At twenty, the rSwht of marriage greatly fright-Jhis fright-Jhis Deborah. It had been planned 7 '-hat Deborah meet Stuart in Frisco, -b-W they were to be married. ""Jibby and Bryn await Deborah in a JJoielln Frisco. Over a period of one jrtar the groom is to prove he is no fortune hunter and can make Deb-i Deb-i litnn happy to the satisfaction of her ' Lmlmother. Otherwise, the fortune to to go to charity. The will is some-fkt some-fkt ambiguous as to whom Deb-jbtah Deb-jbtah Is to marry. The girl arrives ' with Holworthy. Tubby Is surprised IM her charming and sweet. matter?" Grandmother said suddenly- "You are quite pale!" "Nothing, Grandmother," Deborah answered,, and managed to smile. Its rather a long trip up from ban Francisco when you're not accustomed ac-customed to motoring," the man said. 'lam sure it must have been trying," try-ing," Grandmother said, still looking look-ing at her tenderly. . There was something new and solicitous in her expression. "Now that our greatest problem Is solved, surely we can make a real change in our way cf living." "What do you mean?" Deborah asked quickly. "Oh, so many things, dear," Grandmother leaned forward. "We must furbish ourselves up, for one thing. We are becoming quite careless care-less as to our ways of living. I've been feeling guilty about It for a long time, but I've been so worried about Deborah that nothing else seemed of any particular importance. impor-tance. But now I feel," she finished briskly, "that we must have two or three extra servants at once, have the grounds put in order, have the electric plant repaired ..." "But" Deborah said faintly, and stopped. "But what,, my darling? Would you not like to see the house filled with young company, with music, with life? To have a host of pretty new clothes?" "We don't know anyone to fill the house with," Deborah protested miserably. mis-erably. "Stuart does," Grandmother said with confidence. "He told me only a few moments ago that he had a great many friends in San Francisco." Fran-cisco." "Grandmother ..." She smiled. "Now, Deborah, of course we should not ask anyone for some time, my dear. You and Stuart must have a month r two of your own, first. But during that time the house and grounds can be taken care of; they have been neglected neg-lected so long it will be quite an undertaking. Since your grandfather grandfa-ther wished that we should spend a year here after your marriage, I think we must try and make it a happy year, and in it prepare you as best we can to mingle in society when we emerge at last from our retreat." "I never want to go away from here," Deborah cried, "never, never 1" "Why, Deborah !" Grandmother said In surprise. "Stuart, the dear child Is quite overwrought. Of course you will go away from here, my dear, you and Stuart. The whole world is before you. Am I not right, Stuart? You would not be satisfied sat-isfied to spend all your life here?" He hesitated, but only for a fraction frac-tion of a second. Then, "I'm not at all sure that I shouldn't be, if Deborah Debo-rah were to be here," he said. Deborah jumped from her chair. Her eyes flashed. "Was that necessary?" neces-sary?" she asked him bitterly. Grandmother stood up too, a slight small figure in her gray. "What do you mean?" she asked in a still cold voice. "Oh !" Deborah began, and stopped.. "Nothing," she said slowly. "I am . . . overwrought, Grandmother. 1 think I will go and rest for a little." "Of course, dear," she answered, relieved. "Of course. I understand. Go along, then . . . and your things tween two young people who had . . . had fallen in love with each other at first sight. Well, no matter; even if it was a little disconcerting to keep remembering remem-bering what the true situation was. No harm had been done. She had been reserved through it all, and had not, she assured herself, allowed al-lowed herself to be anything but impersonal with him. Grandmother was gazing at him again as if she could scarcely take her eyes away. It was unfortunate that he meant so much to her If Grandmother approved of him too highly. It might make it difficult, at the end of the year, to explain why Deborah would be happier without him. And Grandmother in the meantime might think . . . she might expect . . . Deborah moved uneasily. "My dear boy," Grandmother was saying, "I cannot see that there is the slightest resemblance between you and your father. You are so much taller than he was, so much more . . . perhaps I mean athletic looking. But perhaps I shouldn't have expected you to look like the Grahams. My husband told me years ago, after he had been East to see you, that you looked very much like your mother's people. Your mother was a very fine woman, wom-an, my dear Stuart." "I always believed so." "Of course you did.. Although you would scarcely remember her, I think?" "He doesn't remember her at all," Deborah said quickly. "She died when he was only three, Grandmother. Grand-mother. He couldn't possibly remember re-member her." The man looked across the table. His eyes were twinkling, amused. Deborah looked back at him, coolly. It wasn't going to be exactly easy to carry off this situation. But no matter how difficult it might be it was b'etter than marrying Stuart Graham. There had been very little lit-tle dissembling on Stuart Graham's part, even in Mr. Holworthy's presence. pres-ence. Apparently it hadn't seemed necessary to him to pretend gentleness gentle-ness and courtesy even for the few necessary hours. It had been perfectly per-fectly obvious that he hadn't dreamed for a moment that she could or would refuse to marry him, refuse to go through with the horrible hor-rible bargain. When she did summon sum-mon up her courage, after two hours of listening to his talk with Mr. Holworthy, when the words sprang to her lips and she heard marked out by the double line of weeping willows. Directly ahead lay a gentle slope of meadow ; and as Bryn's eyes fell upon it he caught quite distinctly a flash of blue across the green. It had most certainly been a gown. He climbed down hastily from the tree and started off across the garden. He came at last Into the natural clearing which had once been the bottom of the stream. His eyes caught again that blue flash . . . ah, there she was. Deborah was kneeling on the side of a little knoll, with a round blue bowl beside her. She was picking CHAPTER II. Continued Ell 3- iliii Deborah was married and at home 'ki'gain. It was less than a week ,ite she had gone away from the iwtain, but it seemed a thousand .Hiiears. She was so much older, B,e"w, She knew so much more than Jit tad known a week ago that her fi,lou;hts were like the thoughts of UJi stranger; she looked at her old Injle and everything that had been tijfi It with a stranger's eyes, clear, tendering, critical. Tney were at luncheon, she and Cytlrandmother and the man, seated 1 Jl the long table In the middle of )jAt vast shadowy dining room. The . filing was high and supported by ' tk heavy oaken beams; at one QN was a great fireplace with a 'lured oak mantelpiece and a stone JDS wild strawberries. She was dressed in a short-sleeved blue dress, perhaps per-haps a little faded, but still extremely ex-tremely becoming. She looked up, startled, her eyes wide and dark. "Good - morning," Bryn offered cheerfully. "Did something happen to your clock, or do you usually get up at half-past five?" "I usually get up," she replied. Bryn dropped down comfortably on the grass a yard away. She gathered her skirts together around her knees, rose, and moved farther away. "I don't think there are any berries left where you are," she remarked. "But you ought to look before you get down on the ground." "I did look," Bryn replied. "You may not have seen me, Deborah, mijli Deborah sat up and moved the dm N spoon beside her plate. She iitdoM across at Grandmother, '"".bwimother was wearing her gray jrafeln dress for the first time since frandfather's death. Her white hair C(S as pinned more loosely than usual, kief! fluffed out softly around her Her eyes were sparkling, happy. There was pink in ;ir. (t c'ieeks, and a thread of it in j' llps. It was as if she had come I1 We again, too. An hour ago, they had come up the weed-gsown weed-gsown drive. Grandmother had been at the side door, dressed J0" bea(1 to foot in the black she -al wrn for so long, with one tm pressed to her heart in the I i'M familiar gesture, and a look of i'11 luestioning in her eyes. The fcw St0ppeci t,ie bIS hattered-f hattered-f S motor-car, and helped Debo-lu Debo-lu Grinumother had not looked !( , ! encomPassir.s glance as if to iM ?Ure that sl,e WM stm lntact. ZUT haiJ gone 10 man, and '.L !!0tl tnU and straight and T,at f"t steady smile of his h Tl16 Sun had minted brWn hair' "ad made &2p p'n '00k Very elear n iHto m Grandmothor had looked J?ie fM 8 l0ns t!me' ' searehl"S look; and k H drawn a deeP breath tfS"Sa,',;!hehnd tak- fc:ls bar-mn Was livinS "P t0 are in the silver rooms in the south wing." -"The silver rooms?" Deborah repeated. re-peated. Involuntarily her startled eyes fell to the man's and gray and violet clung together. Deborah's 1 cheeks began to burn. She looked away. "No objections, my dear. The silver sil-ver rooms were always intended for you, but you preferred to be near me rather than in the south wing alone. Go along, my darling, and perhaps after a little I will follow your example. The excitement and the happiness have quite tired me out." Deborah went across the room and through the door. She wanted to stamp and kick and scream. This must be how a rabbit felt when it was caught in a snare. She went on, up the long curving staircase, down the corridor into the south wing, through the second door on the right. Inside was a sitting room, with walls panelled in silver, sil-ver, with rugs and chairs and curtains cur-tains done in deep violet. There was a huge four-poster bed against the Inner wall, with a beautiful violet and tarnished-silver spread upon it, and a long silver bowl of violets on a little table at one side. And, at the foot of the bed, was a man's heavy pigskin bag, as yet unopened. un-opened. She w'ent across to it and lifted It with a vicious jerk. It was heavy- she went t,n"""n the bed" room and the sitting room to the herself saying in a queer cold little voice that she could never marrr him no matter what happened, he had been terrible. He had called her prudish, ignorant, insane. Grandmother wouldn't have believed be-lieved it, couldn't have believed it, if she had been told. It would have killed her to bring Stuart Graham here and let her see him as he was. She and Grandfather had told themselves for years that In a miserably mis-erably unhappy world one star would always shine as bright as the sun; no matter what happened, the Grahams were gentlemen. Gary had guessed what might happen. He hadn't been so sure of the Grahams after all. Deborah ramemhered his words as he had helped her Into the rickety wagon down at their neighbor's farm. He had tucked the dust-cover around her and, his old face worn and troubled, trou-bled, had said, "If you don't like him, Miss Deborah, don't you have anything to do with him. We'll get along some way. We'll just look around for another way." This was the other way. The tall young man at the head of the table, willing to sell his gentlemanly appearance, ap-pearance, his good manners, his smiles, for a year for fifty thousand thou-sand dollars. Of course, since one must be fair and just, he had not been considering consid-ering his own opportunities there in Mr. Holworthy's office, not just at first. After Deborah had stood up and told Stuart in that strange voice that she couldn't . possibly but I looked. My eye is very quick. I pride myself on it. To see one of nature's jewels shining among the dank and ugly grasses is one of the things I'm best at." - Across the knoll she regarded him steadily. "It sounds very poetic," she said at last. "Deborah," Bryn began. The color flashed back Into her cheeks. "Must you call me that?" she demanded. "I didn't ask you to call me that. You haven't any right." "I was about to discuss that very question myself," Bryn replied. "I was about to ask you if we couldn't come to some sort of compromise." "Compromise?" "We got on very well on the trip up here. You didn't seem to mistrust mis-trust me. But after we got here yesterday at lunch, and last night at dinner, and in the drawing room later y0u must admit it was difficult." diffi-cult." She lifted her chin. "You were S0familiar," she said proudly. "Familiar?" he repeated. "I don't think It was necessary. You . . . you talked as if . . . you looked at me . . . you . . . and you put your arm around Grandmother when you said good-night. 1 saw you." "I couldn't help it," Bryn said mournfully. "She's a very nice grandmother, after all, Isn't she? And I never saw one like her before. be-fore. If you can imagine it, Deborah. De-borah. I never had a grandmother of my own." HO BE COMIMEDj corridor. She put the bag down with a thump on the floor outside the door, pulled the sitting room door shut with a bang and shot the bolt. CHAPTER III THERE were high spiked iron o-ates at the end of the weed-crown weed-crown drive. Bryn leaned his shoulders' shoul-ders' against them, took his silver case out thoughtfully and lit a cigarette. There Is a moment In every day among the mountains when nfror-noon nfror-noon 'is definitely over and evening Has come. Her dusky silent presence pres-ence is as real as the moon and stars win be when night falls later on It is made known to the watch er'by a change in the quality of the marry, him, after she had repeated it again and again and made him see that she meant it, he had been in' a wild rage. It was then that he had said such horrible things to her. After a moment Deborah had run away, into an outer office, anywhere to escape from Stuart Graham. But Stuart had followed her. Stuart was a bully. He was still talking to her, pushing himself him-self directly between her and the door, between her and freedom, when this quiet young man with the steady gray eyes had risen from a chair and faced him. Bryn hadn't moved, except that his arm came straight up, and his fist hit Stuart under the chin with a terrific crash, and Stuart had crumpled to the floor. "Deborah, my darling, what Is the He C7led,t0 un(lerstand the slt-,,P slt-,,P hiS Ce and cleci(3e what S and nV- " s perfect N1 hi , eb0rah knew that s"e Vtl eyeful and ap- " An!'r, lDStead sl,e was an-!5'''e. an-!5'''e. v;f0llbeCauS6 well, be-V, be-V, Zh'n8 him with Grand- ''llthe , rea'ized s1denly $ e L UP from Saa Fran- i 60f her Zf St DS thlDgs. think-W think-W sn t h Z r ' bese it was i te rKS galn- 0n the trip $tRen th6 baraI". the tan of a t marriage the ap-tance ap-tance a happy on6i the aJ) real marriage be-j |
