THE FOLLOWING SPRING

The time has come at last when I can no longer hold back the question which for weeks and weeks I have not allowed myself to ask you—and which you must have wondered why I have not asked you. It has been because I have been afraid to face your answer.

Oh, Sidney, my love, put me out of the agony of suspense that I've been suffering these many weeks and tell me what it is that has come between you and me! Surely I have not merely imagined that you have changed to me?—your visits so far apart and so hasty; your short notes once a week or less often; your altered manner when you are with me—what is it, Sidney? If you have grown to love me less, why have you? Is it anything I have said or done? Are you disappointed in me? Can such love as ours grow cold and die? If it can, I can never again trust anything in life! Oh, my love, I am so wholly yours—every beat of my heart, every thought of my mind is for you—I have no life apart from you—I have given myself to you so entirely! It surely is not possible that you could take yourself out of my life, as you seem to be doing!

Do you know that yesterday you came and went without kissing me, after not seeing me or writing to me for three weeks?

Can it be, Sidney, that if I had not given you all that a woman can give, you might still be my devoted lover? Can it be that having satisfied and sated your desire for me, you are through with me?

Susan paused here, as she thought how "coarse" Sidney would consider that question. But she did not change it.

She wrote on feverishly:

I implore you, dearest, not to treat this letter as all my letters to you have been treated lately—but to answer it as soon as you get it and tell me that I have been torturing myself for nothing; that you are mine—as I am yours.

Or if you cannot truthfully say that, at least let me have the truth.

SUSANNA.

Ten days later, her letter having remained unanswered, Susan sent a telegram to Sidney:

Did you get my letter of March sixth? Wire answer. S.

It was two days before she received a reply:

Letter received. Very busy. Spring exams. Will write soon. SIDNEY.

After a long, dark, despairing week, his letter at last arrived.

DEAR SUSAN:

Why let yourself get morbid and hysterical and imagine things?—just because I relax now and then from the strain of our first ardour. Naturally, one can't live at fever heat all the time. Be sensible, my dear girl, and please, please don't stir me up, at this critical time of my spring exams, with such forlorn wails, such wild telegrams! Be your old, jolly, funny self, can't you? You've become so serious and solemn, it quite gives me the blues to go to Reifsville.

I'm afraid you must not look for me for the next few weeks; I shall be too busy to get away. I shan't have time for much writing, either. So don't go off on a tangent, my dear, if you don't hear from me.

Take care of yourself. Write me one of your old-time funny letters that used to make me roar so that the housekeeper here would come running to see what ailed me!

Yours,
SIDNEY.

Susan had recently subscribed for the daily paper published in the university town where Sidney studied and she had learned from it that he was not too busy with his spring examinations to attend dances and theatre parties, to play in golf and tennis tournaments, and to take automobile trips.

The "jolly-funny" letter that he requested was not written and nothing further passed between them for two weeks.

Meantime, the newspapers from the university town were revealing to Susan a fact that made her heart turn to lead. Day after day she read in the "Social Column" of the newspaper a certain name coupled with Sidney's.

Miss Laura Beresford, daughter of the newly elected President of the University, and Mr. Sidney Houghton, a student in the school of International Law, led in an old-fashioned German given last night at Phillipps Hall.

Or,

Miss Laura Beresford gave a dinner on Tuesday night in honour of her house guest, Mrs. Joseph Houghton of Middleburg, Pa., mother of Mr. Sidney Houghton of the Law School.

Or,

Mrs. Joseph Houghton gave a small dinner dance on Thursday night at Hotel Mortimer in honour of Miss Laura Beresford and of her son, Mr. Sidney Houghton of the Law School.

Always when Sidney's name was listed "among those present," at any social affair, the name of Miss Laura Beresford was sure to be there.

Was Mrs. Houghton trying to separate Sidney from her? Susan wretchedly speculated. And was he only too ready to be enticed away?

At last, when she could no longer bear his silence and his continued remaining away from her, she wrote again, a long, heart-broken letter, a passionate outcry, pleading with him for her life's happiness, her honour——

But no sooner was it written than she tore it into bits.

"I won't beg! I won't cringe! Nothing that I can say to him can alter the fact that he no longer loves me!"

It added much to her suffering, during these dark days, to realize the dumb misery of her doting family in their consciousness of her unhappiness. That she should be a source of pain instead of comfort to them who had sacrificed so much for her, hurt her bitterly.

She suddenly resolved, one day, that, as Sidney would not come to her or answer her letters, and as she had somewhat to say to him which must be said, at whatever cost to her of wounded pride, she would have to go to him.

The tragic extent of his alienation from her seemed to her to be measured by her instinctive conviction that if she should notify him of her coming, he would manage to get out of her way. It seemed to her, when this conviction had burned its way into her heart, that nothing further which she might be called upon to endure could add to the humiliation and agony of that hour.

It took all the resolution she could command to coerce herself to the self-crucifixion of forcing an interview upon him.

"But it will be the last time; I shall never, never appeal to him again!"

She arrived at his rooms at four o'clock in the afternoon, the hour when he would be due to come in from his last lecture.

The Pennsylvania Dutch landlady of the house, a red-faced woman of ample proportions, recognized her as the young girl who, over a year ago, had helped "Mr. Sidney" buy and place the lovely furniture for his study. So she readily consented to let her wait for him there.

"You're his sister, mebby? Or his cousin—ain't?" she asked curiously as she unlocked the door of the study and stood aside to let Susan pass in.

But Susan did not answer. For the fact that jumped at her and struck her in the face the moment she crossed the threshold of Sidney's study, made her speechless.

The furniture which she and Sidney had bought (which she was still paying for in installments out of her salary as the village teacher) was not here; not one piece of it. It had all been replaced with the cheap oak suit which had been here in the beginning and which Sidney had so loathed that it had made, him bitter.

"But this is not Mr. Houghton's room," she faltered, turning to Mrs. Eschbach.

"Yes, it is hisn; only it ain't so grand no more, since he solt all his nice furn-shure he used to have in here. Didn't he tell you," asked Mrs. Eschbach, following Susan into the room, her curiosity fairly radiating from all her large person, "how he got so hard up he had to sell his furn-shure?"

"No," Susan managed to answer with dry lips.

"Yes, he couldn't afford to keep it no more. You see, it had cost awful expensive and I think it fetched a good price when he solt it. But och," she added, sympathetically, "it went so hard with him to part with it! He's so much fur havin' things grand around him, that way."

"When did he—how long ago did he—sell it?" Susan asked, scarcely above a whisper.

"Well, he done it graj-ally; one piece at a time just as he needed the money, till it was all solt a'ready."

A wild hope rose in Susan's breast that perhaps this was all that was keeping Sidney away from her—embarrassment because of money difficulties; he was so unpractical and foolish about money! Oh, if this were indeed all that was alienating him!

"You see," Mrs. Eschbach explained, "he's in so thick with the new college President's daughter, and she's sich a rich swell, he's just got to spend on her to keep in with her. Fur a-plenty of others would run with her if he didn't. So he's got to spend on her."

Susan sank limply into the nearest chair.

"It's a pity he ain't a rich young man—ain't?—sich tony friends as he runs with and sich taste as he's got fur grandness! Och, but he hates this here common furn-shure I had to put back here when he solt hisn! But I tol' him it ain't reasonable fur him to expec' no better fur as cheap rent as what he pays yet. Nor it ain't, either."

"Do you think he will come in soon?" asked Susan, faintly.

"Mebby he will and again mebby he won't. You can't never count on him fur nothin' since he's been runnin' with that there Miss Beresford."

"I'll wait for him."

"All right. When he does come in I'll right aways tell him you're here," said Mrs. Eschbach, kindly. "You ain't lookin' just so hearty."

"Please don't tell him I'm here—I—want to surprise him."

"All right. Ain't you his cousin or sister or what?"

"No. Just his——"

Susan hesitated; should she tell this woman that she was Sidney's promised wife?

"Just—a friend of his," she concluded.

"A friend?" repeated Mrs. Eschbach, dubiously. "Say," she added, tentatively, "it's put out all over this here town that him and Miss Beresford's promised to each other."

"Is it?" Susan feebly smiled. "But I think that must be only gossip, Mrs. Eschbach. I have not heard of it and I am a—a very close friend of Mr. Houghton's."

"Yes, he used to have your pitcher on his bureau settin'. I don't know what's become of that there pitcher; I ain't seen it this good whiles back a'ready. So you don't believe it that him and her's promised?"

"No."

"Well, I must say she ain't the wife I'd pick out for my son. She's too much all fur herself that way. They say it got her so spoilt, havin' her own big fortune that she inherited off of her gran'pop, her mom bein' dead. Her mom was a old school friend of Mr. Sidney's mom, and as soon as President Beresford got his job at the college here (he's the new President) Mrs. Houghton she come on to wisit her son and interdooced him to Miss Beresford, her old friend's daughter, you understand. And now Mrs. Houghton she's that tickled at the way them two young folks takes to each other. To be sure, it certainly is wery nice fur Mr. Sidney, him bein' so hard up and Miss Beresford her bein' so good-fixed. They say she's awful rich in her own right."

Mrs. Eschbach paused after this long speech, to get her breath, her huge bosom heaving asthmatically.

Susan, sitting rigid, made no comment.

"Here's her pitcher on his bureau settin'," the landlady added when she had recovered a bit. "Want to take a look?" she asked, starting across the floor.

But she was checked by the sound of the sudden opening of the front door in the hall below.

She turned back to Susan, whose face, at the sound, had gone deadly white.

"It's him," Mrs. Eschbach announced, making for the door as steps came bounding up the stairs, accompanied by gay and noisy whistling.

Susan's hand clutched her breast—that he could be joyously whistling when her heart was breaking!

"You're got comp'ny, Mister Sidney," Mrs. Eschbach informed him, on the threshold of his room.

"Have I?" he brightly answered, stepping back to let her pass out, then entering the room, smiling.

Susan's burning eyes, the only living part of her colourless face, met his smiling glance.

At sight of her, the smile disappeared; the blood mounted to his forehead; he sank into a chair in front of her.

Susan did not speak. She would leave it all to him—to explain himself.

"Well?" he began, defensively, almost aggressively.

"How do you do?" she said, pleasantly, her voice as soft as velvet.

Sidney, at all times peculiarly sensitive to the modulations of a woman's voice, had always thought Susan's the most pleasing voice he had ever heard. It had been many weeks since its music had charmed him, and now it suddenly stirred his pulse as he had not supposed Susan could ever stir it again.

"Why did you come here, Susanna?" he asked, huskily.

"Aren't you pleased to see me, dear?" she asked, almost coquettishly.

"Of course—but what's the idea?"

"By the way, what's become of my—our furniture, dear?"

"Susanna!" he exclaimed, a deeper colour dyeing his face, his tone ashamed and apologetic. "I'll not rest until I have paid you back every dollar that that furniture cost us!"

"'Cost us?' But before you begin to pay me, dear, please pay the dealer, to whom I'm still paying, as you know, fifteen dollars a month. I still owe him one hundred dollars of the three hundred which the furniture cost—me. Will you take over that debt of one hundred dollars?"

"Of course I shall. You must not pay another dollar of it!"

"All right," she quietly agreed, folding her hands in her lap, "I won't."

She said nothing more. He waited. But, her friendly glance resting upon him peacefully (while her heart beat suffocatingly), she also waited.

"I never meant to sell the furniture, Susanna," he began, miserably, "but I——"

"Oh, you sold it?" she asked as he floundered.

"Yes," he admitted, his eyes falling, unable to meet hers:

"All of it?"

"To the last piece! But I shall pay you back! Every dollar of it! It may take me a long time, but I shan't let you lose what you paid for it, Susanna!"

"Really?"

"Please, Susanna! Of course I know how the thing must look to you——"

"Why did you sell it? Didn't you like it any more, dear?"

"I know you'll find it hard to forgive me! I needed money, Susanna."

"What for, Sidney?"

"For my running expenses. Mother, you see, is a rather luxurious person and so am I, and the fact is, our income isn't big enough for our needs."

"Didn't you think about consulting me before you sold my—our furniture?"

"Susanna!" he said, abjectly, his head bowed like a guilty child's.

"I shall hardly be able, Sidney, to buy another aus tire; I worked so long to earn money enough for what I did buy. We shall have to marry without much furniture. Mother and Father and my sisters will think that a disgrace. But then, we need not tell them, need we? We may as well spare their feelings."

Sidney glanced at her uneasily; then his eyes fell again; he could not meet her clear gaze.

"When are we to be married, Sydney?"

"I—I don't know."

"You finish here in two months. What are your plans?"

"I have none. That is, no definite plans—I——"

"Yes?" she urged, as he paused.

"It would be years before I earned enough to support you, Susanna."

"The diplomatic appointment—won't your uncle get it for you?"

"Not if I married you, Susanna!"

"The only thing left for you to do, then, Sidney, is to work up a law practice and I shall go on teaching until you are able to support your—your family."

"I've no intention whatever of displeasing Uncle George and living like a beggar!"

"Then what do you propose to do?"

"Keep in Uncle George's good graces."

"But how?—seeing that I am your promised wife, Sidney."

"My—promised—wife?" he repeated, slowly, dubiously.

"More than that—I am your wife."

Sidney's feelings at this moment were a strangely conflicting medley. Susanna had not ceased to be extremely attractive to him. Her hold upon his imagination as well as upon his heart was still so strong that no other woman would ever mean quite so much to him. But having somewhat sated his passion for her, it no longer outmeasured his worldly ambition, as it had done at first.

The somewhat abnormal selfishness of his character usually took the form of disliking rather spitefully any person or thing that blocked his desires. Susan, as the one great obstacle to a marriage which would be in every way highly advantageous to him, to a girl of beauty, distinction, wealth, and position, to whom he was also greatly attracted, who would more than satisfy Uncle George's severe standards; Susan as the woman in whose heart he knew he stood revealed as a cad, a liar, a scoundrel, whose respect he had valued and whose scorn stung him to the quick and filled him with self-contempt; Susan had now become to him a thorn in the flesh, an irritant that he would ruthlessly tear out and cast off. For his own gratification and comfort were always to Sidney paramount to every other consideration. In this riot of conflicting emotions then—on the one side, remorse, compassion, attraction, conscience; on the other, ambition, family pride, love of ease and luxury, impatient irritation and anger at the whole situation—Sidney stood bewildered, his self-control shaken, the evil feelings in his heart getting the better of him.

"Susanna! Can't you see that my feelings have changed?"

It stabbed him to see how white she looked as, after an instant, she answered, "It's too late to consider that now. I am your wife."

"I never dreamed that you would try to hold a man against his will!"

"You've never gone through the formality of asking me to release you. You wrote to me not to imagine that you had changed; not to grow 'hysterical' at your neglect."

"I was trying to let you down easily."

"Easily?"

"Of course it's awfully hard on both of us!"

"Let me down to what?"

"To the fact that I cannot marry you, Susan."

"Why not?"

"I could never love any woman enough to suffer poverty for her."

"But we are married! You know how you persuaded me that the mere marriage ceremony meant nothing to such a 'holy relation' as yours and mine!"

"To bring up all that trumpery spoken in the heat of passion, and try to use it to force my hand! Where is your pride, Susan?"

"In your keeping, Sidney. I put my pride into your care and keeping when I gave you myself!" she said, piteously.

For an instant he was silenced, his eyes again downcast.

But the situation was critical; he dared not soften. The moment had come (so long delayed) when he must fight it out.

"Since I no longer feel as I did, you would be willing to marry me?" he asked, incredulously.

"Very unwilling. But you and I have no longer any choice about it; we've gone too far. I am your wife!"

"You were my mistress, Susan."

He saw her hand, resting on the arm of her chair, tighten its clasp until the knuckles showed white.

"You see, that's just the point," he hastened to say. "A gentleman," with the faintest possible emphasis on the word, "doesn't marry his mistress."

"Nor keep his word?"

"Love promises! Who ever remembers them or considers them binding? The mother of my possible daughters cannot be the woman who has been my mistress."

It sounded cruelly convincing even to himself. But her answer came swiftly.

"I'd prefer the father of my possible sons to be a man of honour. But it's too late for us to select our children's parents now."

"Oh, no, it's not."

"Yes. That's what brought me here to-day. You and I must be married at once. For, Sidney, I am with child. Our child will be born in July."

There was a deathlike stillness in the room for a moment. Sidney looked utterly confounded; utterly helpless before a situation that seemed to have got out of his hands.

"Oh, Susanna! You poor girl!" he stammered.

Then suddenly, seeing himself trapped, his bright prospects destroyed, himself condemned to privation and hard labour, Sidney's pity for himself killed the compassion which for a moment he had felt for the woman who would drag him down from the sunny heights in which he had for weeks past been basking, and would force him to drudge for her in obscurity and deprivation.

"But why have you let such a thing happen?" he burst out. "I trusted to your prudence not to get me (and yourself) into a wretched hole like this! The low vulgarity of it! It will ruin me! Ruin me!"

"It's not of ourselves that you and I may think now. We dare not wrong our child! We are not going to wrong it! Understand me, Sidney, I am going to protect it! It is not for myself that I am here with you to-day. But my child is going to have a father, a name, a home!"

The cold fear that clutched Sidney's heart at her words made him brutal.

"This is, I suppose, the way girls of your class manage these matters, in order to make sure of marriage?"

"And how do gentlemen of your class manage them?" she asked, calmly. "Don't make yourself ridiculous, Sidney. But be quite clear on this point—my child is going to be protected."

"What good would marriage do now—to you or me or the child? It's too late. If you had told me of this as soon as you knew of it! But now? Marriage at this late stage won't save you and will only disgrace me! I won't consent to it!"

"You'll have to. I'll make you. Not only for the sake of our child, but for my dear ones at home that have sacrificed so much for me—I won't let disgrace and sorrow come to them through me—and you. You and I are going to be married. We need not live together. But we are going to be married."

"We are not! I would not marry you now if——"

There was a knock on the half-open door. Sidney started up; but before he could reach it, the door was thrown wide, and Miss Laura Beresford, in sporting golf attire, stood revealed at the threshold. Susan, sitting just inside the door, was not directly in her line of vision.

"I've been honking and honking for you, Sid! Didn't you hear me? Oh! Not even dressed yet!" she exclaimed, fretfully. "We shall be too late for the game! Why didn't you phone if you weren't going to keep your engagement?" she demanded, indignantly.

And then, all at once she became conscious of Sidney's pallor and agitation; she cast a quick glance about the room and her eye fell upon Susan just inside the door.

"Why! What's the matter? What——"

Susan suddenly rose and came forward, smiling, with outstretched hand.

"This is 'Laura,' surely? I've been hearing so much about you!—how good you've been to dear Sidney and what splendid times you've been having together! And what good friends your two mothers have always been! It has been so kind of you to keep dear Sidney from growing dull when I couldn't be here with him; I can't tell you how much I appreciate it—your keeping him from moping for me! He's just been telling me he wants you to be my maid of honour. You shall be the first to congratulate us, Laura (if I may call you that). We are to be married next week."

She was standing at Sidney's side, and as she spoke, she clasped her arms about his neck and leaned against his breast. He, rigid, white as chalk, his tragic-comic look of despair and dismay, of being hopelessly caught, brought to Miss Beresford's lips a curve of contempt that added not a little to his agony.

But now, suddenly, without warning, Susan's hold upon him relaxed, her arms fell to her sides, she slipped to the floor and lay in a little heap at his feet—as still and white as death.