Read Ebook: Through the Wall by Moffett Cleveland

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Ebook has 3084 lines and 101175 words, and 62 pages

"I want you to be my wife."

"I know."

"And--and you refuse me?"

For a moment she did not speak. Then slowly she nodded, as if pronouncing her own doom.

"Alice," he cried, "look up here! You don't mean it. Say it isn't true."

"But why? Why?"

"I--I cannot tell you," she faltered.

He was about to speak impatiently, but before her evident distress he checked the words and asked gently: "Is it something against me?"

"Oh, no!" she answered quickly.

"Sure? Isn't it something you've heard that I've done or--or not done? Don't be afraid to hurt my feelings. I'll make a clean breast of it all, if you say so. God knows I was a fool, but I've kept straight since I knew you, I'll swear to that."

"I believe you, dear."

"You believe me, you call me 'dear,' you look at me out of those wonderful eyes as if you cared for me."

"I do, I do," she murmured.

"You care for me, and yet you turn me down," he said bitterly. "It reminds me of a verse I read," and drawing a small volume from his pocket he turned the pages quickly. "Ah, here it is," and he marked some lines with a pencil. "There!"

Alice took the volume and began to read in a low voice:

"Je n'aimais qu'elle au monde, et vivre un jour sans elle Me semblait un destin plus affreux que la mort. Je me souviens pourtant qu'en cette nuit cruelle Pour briser mon lien je fis un long effort. Je la nommai cent fois perfide et d?loyale, Je comptai tous les maux qu'elle m'avait caus?s."

She stopped suddenly, her eyes full of pain.

"I'd rather think you a coquette than--" Again he checked himself at the sight of her trouble. He could not speak harshly to her.

"You dear child," he went on tenderly. "I'll never believe any ill of you, never. I won't even ask your reasons; but I want some encouragement, something to work for. I've got to have it. Just let me go on hoping; say that in six months or--or even a year you will be my own sweetheart--promise me that and I'll wait patiently. Can't you promise me that?"

But again she shook her head, while her eyes filled slowly with tears.

And now his face darkened. "Then you will never be my wife? Never? No matter what I do or how long I wait? Is that it?"

"That's it," she repeated with a little sob.

Kittredge rose, eying her sternly. "I understand," he said, "or rather I don't understand; but there's no use talking any more. I'll take my medicine and--good-by."

She looked at him in frightened supplication. "You won't leave me? Lloyd, you won't leave me?"

He laughed harshly. "What do you think I am? A jumping jack for you to pull a string and make me dance? Well, I guess not. Leave you? Of course I'll leave you. I wish I had never seen you; I'm sorry I ever came inside this blooming church!"

"Oh!" she gasped, in sudden pain.

"You don't play fair," he went on recklessly. "You haven't played fair at all. You knew I loved you, and--you led me on, and--this is the end of it."

"I like the way you show it," he answered, unrelenting.

"Haven't I helped you all these months? Isn't my friendship something?"

He shook his head. "It isn't enough for me."

"It sounds well, but there's no sense in it. I can't stand for this let-me-be-a-sister-to-you game, and I won't."

He turned away impatiently and glanced at his watch.

"Lloyd," she said gently, "come to the house to-night."

He shook his head. "Got an appointment."

"An appointment?"

"Yes, a banquet."

She looked at him in surprise. "You didn't tell me!"

"No."

She was silent a moment. "Where is the banquet?"

"At the Ansonia. It's a new restaurant on the Champs Elys?es, very swell. I didn't tell you because--well, because I didn't."

"Lloyd," she whispered, "don't go to the banquet."

"No!"

Her eyes were fixed in the west with an enthralled expression, as if she saw something there besides the masses of red and purple that crowned the setting sun, something strange and terrifying. And in her agitation she took the book and pencil from the bench, and nervously, almost unconsciously wrote something on one of the fly leaves.

"Good-by, Alice," he said, holding out his hand.

"Good-by, Lloyd," she answered in a dull, tired voice, putting down the book and giving him her own little hand.

As he turned to go he picked up the volume and his eye fell on the fly leaf.

"Why," he started, "what is this?" He looked more closely at the words, then sharply at her.

"Never mind the book, but--how did you come to write this?"

"I--I didn't notice what I wrote," she said, in confusion.

"I don't know at all," she replied with evident sincerity.

"It's the damnedest thing I ever heard of," he muttered. And then, with a puzzled look: "See here, I guess I've been too previous. I'll cut out that banquet to-night--that is, I'll show up for soup and fish, and then I'll come to you. Do I get a smile now?"

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