moment. She shivered; a quick, deep sigh heaved her breast; and she came back to herself like a prisoner leaving a window at the warden’s voice.
She turned. Cora and Corliss had left the room. Richard was sitting beside a vacant chair, staring helplessly at the open door.
If he had been vaguely conscious of Laura’s playing, which is possible, certainly he was unaware that it had ceased.
“The others have gone out to the porch,” she said composedly, and rose. “Shan’t we join them?”
“What?” he returned, blankly. “I beg your pardon–-“
“Let’s go out on the porch with the others.”
“No, I–-” He got to his feet confusedly. “I was thinking–- I believe I’d best be going home.”
“Not `best,’ I think,” she said. “Not even better!”
“I don’t see,” he said, his perplexity only increased.
“Mr. Corliss would,” she retorted quickly. “Come on: we’ll go and sit with them.” And she compelled his obedience by preceding him with such a confident assumption that he would follow that he did.
The fugitive pair were not upon the porch, however; they were discovered in the shade of a tree behind the house, seated upon a rug, and occupied in a conversation which would not have disturbed a sick-room. The pursuers came upon them, boldly sat beside them; and Laura began to talk with unwonted fluency to Corliss, but within five minutes found herself alone with Richard Lindley upon the rug. Cora had promised to show Mr. Corliss an “old print” in the library—so Cora said.
Lindley gave the remaining lady a desolate and faintly reproachful look. He was kind, but he was a man; and Laura saw that this last abandonment was being attributed in part to her.
She reddened, and, being not an angel, observed with crispness: “Certainly. You’re quite right: it’s my fault!”
“What did you say?” he asked vacantly.
She looked at him rather fixedly; his own gaze had returned to the angle of the house beyond which the other couple had just disappeared. “I said,” she answered, slowly, “I thought it wouldn’t rain this, afternoon.”
His wistful eyes absently swept the serene sky which had been cloudless for several days. “No, I suppose not,” he murmured.
“Richard,” she said with a little sharpness, “will you please listen to me for a moment?”
“Oh—what?” He was like a diver coming up out of deep water. “What did you say?” He laughed apologetically. “Wasn’t I listening? I beg your pardon. What is it, Laura?”
“Why do you let Mr. Corliss take Cora away from you like that?” she asked gravely.
“He doesn’t,” the young man returned with a rueful shake of the head. “Don’t you see? It’s Cora that goes.”
“Why do you let her, then?”
He sighed. “I don’t seem to be able to keep up with Cora, especially when she’s punishing me. I couldn’t do something she asked me to, last night–-“
“Invest with Mr. Corliss?” asked Laura quickly.
“Yes. It seemed to trouble her that I couldn’t. She’s convinced it’s a good thing: she thinks it would make a great fortune for us–-“
“`Us’?” repeated Laura gently. “You mean for you and her? When you’re–-“
“When we’re married. Yes,” he said thoughtfully, “that’s the way she stated it. She wanted me to put in all I have–-“
“Don’t do it!” said Laura decidedly.
He glanced at her with sharp inquiry. “Do you mean you would distrust Mr. Corliss?’
“I wasn’t thinking of that: I don’t know whether I’d trust him or not—I think I wouldn’t; there’s something veiled about him, and I don’t believe he is an easy man to know. What I meant was that I don’t believe it would really be a good thing for you with Cora.”
“It would please her, of course—thinking I deferred so much to her judgment.”
“Don’t do it!” she said again, impulsively.
“I don’t see how I can,” he returned sorrowfully.
“It’s my work for all the years since I got out of college, and if I lost it I’d have to begin all over again. It would mean postponing everything. Cora isn’t a girl you can ask to share a little salary, and if it were a question of years, perhaps— perhaps Cora might not feel she could wait for me, you see.”
He made this explanation with plaintive and boyish sincerity, hesitatingly, and as if pleading a cause. And Laura, after a long look at him, turned away, and in her eyes were actual tears of compassion for the incredible simpleton.
“I see,” she said. “Perhaps she might not.”
“Of course,” he went on, “she’s fond of having nice things, and she thinks this is a great chance for us to be millionaires; and then, too, I think she may feel that it would please Mr. Corliss and help to save him from disappointment. She seems to have taken a great fancy to him.”
Laura glanced at him, but did not speak.
