CHAPTER III
LAURIE MEETS MISS MAYO
Laurie thought much that day about the girl in the mirror, and he wasagain home at eleven that night, to the wonder of Mr. Bangs, who freelyexpressed his surprise.
"Something pleasant been coming your way?" he tactfully asked.
Laurie evaded the question, but he felt that something definitelypleasant had come his way. This something was a new interest, and he hadneeded a new interest very much. He hoped he would dream of the girlthat night, but as he and Bangs unwisely consumed a Welsh rabbit beforethey went to bed, he dreamed instead of something highly unpleasant, andwas glad to be awakened by the clear sunlight of a brilliant Januaryday.
After breakfast he strolled across the square into the somber hall ofthe studio building on its southwest corner. The hall was empty, but hefound and rang a bell at the entrance of a dingy elevator shaft. Theelevator descended without haste. When it had reached the floor, thecolored youth in charge of it inhospitably filled its doorway andregarded the visitor with indifference. This young man was easy to lookat, but he was no one he knew.
Laurie handed him a dollar and the youth's expression changed, first toone of surprise, then to the tolerance of a man who is wise and iswilling to share his wisdom. The visitor went at once to the point ofhis visit.
"A young lady lives here," he began. "She is very pretty, and she hasreddish hair and brown eyes. She has a studio in one of the upperfloors, at the front of the house. What's her name?"
The boy's face showed that he had instantly recognized the description,but he pondered dramatically.
"Dat young lady?" he then said. "Dat young lady mus' be Miss Mayo, inTwenty-nine, on de top flo'. She jes' moved in here las' Tuesday."
"Where does she come from, and what does she do?"
The boy hesitated. What did all this mean? And was he giving up too muchfor a dollar? Laurie grinned at him understandingly.
"I don't know her," he admitted, "and I don't expect to. I'd like toknow something about her--that's all."
The youth nodded. He had the air of accepting an apology.
"I reckon she come fum some fur'n place. But I dunno what she _do_," hereluctantly admitted. "Mebbe she ain't doin' nothin' yit. She's homemos' de time. She don' go out hardly 'tall. Seems like she don' knowmany folks."
He seemed about to say more, but stopped. For a moment he obviouslyhesitated, then blurted out what he had in mind.
"One t'ing got me guessin'," he muttered doubtfully. "Dat young lady,she don' seem t' _eat_ nothin'!"
"What do you mean?" Laurie stared at him.
The boy shuffled his feet. He was on uncertain ground.
"Why, jes' what I said," he muttered, defensively. "Folkses here eithereats _in_ or dey eats _out_. Ef dey eats in, dey has stuff _sent_in--rolls an' eggs an' milk and' stuff like dat. Ef dey eats out, dey_goes_ out, reg'lar, to meals. But Miss Mayo she don' seem to eat in_or_ out. Nothin' comes in, an' she don' go out 'nough to eat reg'lar. Ibin studyin' 'bout it consider'ble," he ended; and he lookedunmistakably relieved, as if he had passed on to another a burden thatwas too heavy to carry alone.
Laurie hesitated. The situation was presenting a new angle and a whollyunexpected one. It began to look as if he had come on a sentimentalerrand and had stumbled on a tragedy. Certainly he had blundered intothe private affairs of a lady, and was even discussing these affairswith an employee in the building where she lived. That thought wasunpleasant. Yet the boy's interest was clearly friendly, and the visitorhimself had invited revelations about the new lodger. Still, not suchrevelations as these! He frankly did not know what to make of them orhow to act.
There was a chance that the boy might be all wrong in his inferences,although this chance, Laurie mentally admitted, was slight. He knew theshrewdness of this youth's type, the precocious knowledge of humannature that often accompanies such training and environment as he hadhad. Probably he suspected even more than he had revealed. Somethingmust be done.
Laurie drew a bill from his pocket
"How soon can you leave the elevator?" he asked.
"'Bout one o'clock."
"All right. Now here's what I want you to do. Take this money, go overto the Clarence restaurant, and buy a good lunch for that lady. Get somehot chicken or chops, buttered rolls, vegetables, and a bottle of milk.Have it packed nicely in a box. Have them put in some fresh eggs andextra rolls and butter for her breakfast. Deliver the box at her door asif it came from some one outside. Do that and keep the change.Understand?"
"Yaas, sah!" The boy's eyes and teeth were shining.
"All right. Go to it. I'll drop in later this afternoon for yourreport."
Laurie turned and walked away. Even yet the experience did not seemreal. It was probably all based on some foolish notion of the youth's;and yet he dared not assume that it was a foolish notion. He had thedramatist's distaste for drama anywhere except in its legitimate place,on the stage; but he admitted that sometimes it did occur in life. Thismight be one of those rare occasions.
Whatever it was, it haunted him. He lunched with Bangs that day, and wasso silent that Bangs was moved to comment.
"If you were any one else," he remarked, "I'd almost think you werethinking!"
Laurie disclaimed the charge, but his abstraction did not lift. By thistime his imagination was hard at work. He pictured the girl in themirror as stretched on her virginal cot in the final exhaustion ofstarvation; and the successful effort to keep away from the studiobuilding till four o'clock called for all his will power. Suppose theboy blundered, or wasn't in time. Suppose the girl really had not eatenanything since last Tuesday! These thoughts, and similar ones, obsessedhim.
At four he strolled into the studio hall, wearing what he hoped was adetached and casual air. To his annoyance, the elevator and its operatorwere lost in the dimness of the upper stories, and before they descendedseveral objectionable persons had joined Laurie, evidently expecting tobe taken to upper floors themselves. This meant a delay in histete-a-tete with the boy, and Laurie turned upon the person nearest him,an inoffensive spinster, a look of such intense resentment that ithaunted that lady for several days.
When the elevator finally appeared, he entered it with the others whowere waiting. He looked aloofly past the elevator boy as he did so, andthat young person showed himself equal to the situation by presenting tothis new-comer a stolid ebony profile. But when the lift had reached thetop floor and discharged its passengers, the two conspirators lentthemselves to the drama of their roles.
"Well?" asked Laurie eagerly. "Did you get it?"
"Yaas, sah."
"What happened?"
The boy stopped his descending car midway between two floors. He had nointention of having his scene spoiled. He bulged visibly under the newshe had to impart. "I got de stuff you said, and I lef' it at dat younglady's do'," he began impressively.
"Yes."
"When I looked de nex' time, it was gone."
"Good! She had taken it in." Laurie drew a breath of relief.
"No, sah. Dat ain't all." The boy's tone dripped evil tidings. "Shebrung it back!"
"What!" His passenger was staring at him in concern.
"Yaas, sah. De bell rung fum her flo', an' when I got up de young ladywas standin' dere wid dat basket in her hand."
He paused to give Laurie the effect of the tableau, and saw by hisvisitor's expression that he had got it fully.
"Yes? Go on!"
"She look at me mighty sharp. She got brown eyes dat look right _thoo_you," he interpolated briskly. "Den she say, 'Sam, who done lef' datbasket at my do'?' I say, 'I done it, miss. It was lef' in de hall, an'de ca'd got yo' name on it. Ain't you order it?' I say.
"'No,' she say, 'dis yere basket ain't fo' me. Take it, an' ef youcain't find out who belong to it, eat dis yere lunch yo'self.'"
He paused. Laurie's stunned silence was a sufficient tribute to hiseloquence, but Sam had not yet reached his climax. He introduced it now,with fine effect.
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"Bimeby," he went on unctuously, "I took dat basket back to her. I say,'Miss Mayo,' I say, 'I done foun' out 'bout dat basket. 'T was lef' by alady artis' here what got a tergram an' went away sudden. She want datfood et, so she sent it to you.'"
Laurie regarded him with admiration.
"That was pretty good for extemporaneous lying," he commented. "Isuppose you can do even better when you take more time to it. What didthe lady say?"
Sam shook a mournful head.
"She jes' look at me, an' she kinda smile, an' den she say, 'Sam, disyere basket 'noys me. Ef de lady wants it et, Sam, you eat it yo'self."He paused. "I et it," he ended, solemnly.
Laurie's lips twitched under conflicting emotions, but he closed theinterview with a fair imitation of indifference.
"Oh, well," he said carelessly, "you must have been mistaken about thewhole thing. Evidently Miss Mayo, if that's her name, wasn't as hungryas you were."
The boy nodded and started the car on its downward journey. As hispassenger got off on the ground floor, he gave him a new thought tocarry away with him.
"She'd bin cryin', dough," he muttered. "Her eyes was all red."
Laurie stopped and regarded him resentfully.
"Confound you!" he said, "What did you tell me that for? _I_ can't doanything about it!"
The boy agreed, hurriedly. "No, sah," he assured him. "You cain't. Icain't, neither. None of us cain't," he added as an afterthought.
Laurie slowly walked away. His thoughts scampered around and around,like squirrels in a cage. The return of the basket, of course, mightmean either of two conditions--that the girl was too proud to accepthelp, or that she was really in no need of it. Laurie had met a few artstudents. He knew that, hungry or not, almost any one of them wouldcheerfully have taken in that basket and consumed its contents. He hadbuilt on that knowledge in providing it. If the girl _had_ taken it in,the fact would have proved nothing. Her refusal to touch it wassuspicious. It swung the weight of evidence toward the elevator boy'sstarvation theory.
Laurie's thoughts returned to that imaginative youth. He saw himconsuming the girl's luncheon, and a new suspicion crossed his mind.Perhaps the whole business was a bit of graft. But his intelligencerejected that suggestion. If this had been the explanation, the boywould not have concluded the episode so briskly. He had got the strangeyoung man where he might have "kept him going" for days and made a goodincome in the process. As it was, there seemed nothing more to do. Andyet--and yet--how the deuce could one let the thing drop like that? Ifthe girl was really in straits--
Thus the subconscious argument went on and on. It worried Laurie. He wasnot used to such violent mental exercise. Least of all was he in thehabit of disturbing himself about the affairs of others. But this affairwas different. The girl was so pretty! Also, he had recurrent visions ofhis sister Barbara in the position of his mysterious neighbor. Barbaramight easily have gone through such an experience during last year'stest in New York. In that same experiment Laurie himself had learned howslender is the plank that separates one from the abyss that lies beneaththe world's workers.
He dined alone that night and it was well he did so. His lack ofappetite would certainly have attracted the attention of Bangs or anyother fellow diner, and Bangs would as certainly have commented upon it.Also, he passed a restless night, troubled by vaguely depressing dreams.The girl was in them, but everything was as hopelessly confused as hisdaytime mental processes had been.
The next morning he deliberately kept away from the mirror until he wasfully dressed, but he dressed with a feeling of tenseness and urgency hewould have found it difficult to explain. He only knew that to-day hemeant to do something definite, something that would settle once for allthe question that filled his mind. But what could he do? That littlepoint was still unsettled. Knock at the girl's door, pretend that it wasa blunder, and trust to inspiration to discover in the brief encounterif anything was wrong? Or put money in an envelop and push it under herdoor? If he did that, she would probably give the money to Sam, as shehad given him the food.
What to do? Laurie proceeded with his toilet, using the dressing-caseand carefully avoiding the long mirror. He experienced an oddunwillingness to look into that mirror this morning, based partly ondelicacy--he remembered the nightdress--but more on the fear ofdisappointment. If he saw her, it would be an immense relief. If hedidn't, he'd fancy all sorts of things, for now his imagination wasrunning away with him.
When he was fully dressed he crossed the room in three strides andstopped before the mirror with a suddenness that checked him half-way inthe fourth.
Miss Mayo's window was open. He could see that. He could see more thanthat, and what he saw sent him rushing through the study and out intothe hall of the big apartment building, where he furiously rang theelevator bell. He had not stopped for his hat and coat, but he hadcaught a vision of Bangs's astonished face and half of his startledexclamation, "What the dev--"
The elevator came and Laurie leaped into it.
"Down," he said briefly.
The operator was on his way up to the twelfth floor, but something inthe expression of his passenger made him change his plans. Also itaccelerated his movements. The car descended briskly to the groundfloor, from which point the operator was privileged to watch theprogress of the temperamental Mr. Devon, who had plunged through themain entrance of the building and across the square without a word tothe hall attendants, or a backward glance.
As he reached the studio building Laurie recalled himself to a memory ofthe conventions. He entered without undue haste, and sought the door ofthe waiting lift. It was noon, and an operator he had not seen beforewas on duty.
"Top floor," directed Laurie, and stepped into the car. The operatorhesitated. He did not remember this tenant, but he must belong to thehouse, as he wore no hat or coat. Probably he was a new-comer, and hadrun down-stairs to mail an important letter, as the old building held nomail-chute. While these reflections passed slowly through his mind, hiscar rose as slowly. To the mentally fuming young man at his side itsprogress was intolerably deliberate. He held himself in, however, andeven went through the pantomime of pausing in the top-floor hall tosearch a pocket as if for a latch-key.
Satisfied, the attendant started the elevator on its descent, and as itsank from sight Laurie looked around him for Number Twenty-nine. Hediscovered it in an eye-flash, on the door at the right. The nextinstant he had reached this door and was softly turning the knob.
The door did not yield. He had not expected it to give, and he knewexactly what he meant to do. He stepped back a few feet, then with arush hurled his shoulder against the wood with the full force of hisfoot-ball training in the effort. The lock yielded, and under the forceof his own momentum the visitor shot into the room. Then, recovering hisequilibrium, he pushed the door into place and stood with his backagainst it, breathing heavily and feeling rather foolish.
He was staring at the girl before him, who had risen at his entrance.Her expression was so full of astonished resentment, and so lacking inany other emotion, that for a sickening moment he believed he had madean idiot of himself, that he had not really seen what he thought he hadseen in the glass. A small table separated him from the girl. Stillstaring at her, in the long seconds that elapsed before either spoke, hesaw that she had swept her right hand behind her back, in a swift,instinctive effort to hide what it held. His self-possession returned.He had not been mistaken. He smiled at her apologetically.
"I beg your pardon," he said. "I'm afraid I frightened you."
"You did." She spoke tensely, the effect of overstrained nervesrevealing itself in her low voice. "What do you mean by it? What are youdoing here?"
Laurie's brilliant eyes were on hers as she spoke, and held themsteadily. Under his expression, one that few had seen on his face, herlook of antagonism softened a little. He advanced slowly to the tablebetween them.
"It will take a few minutes to explain," he said. Then, as she waited,he suddenly formed his plan, an
d followed the good old Devon principleof going straight to the point.
"I live diagonally across the square," he said quietly, "and I can seeinto your window from one of mine. So it happened that just now I--I sawwhat you were going to do."
For an instant she stood very still, looking at him, as if not quitetaking in the meaning of his words. In the next her face and even herneck crimsoned darkly as if under the rush of a wave of angryhumiliation. When she spoke her voice shook.
"You forget," she said, "that you have no right either to look into myroom or to interfere with what you see there."
"I know," he told her, humbly, "and I beg your pardon again. The lookingin was an accident, the merest chance, which I will explain to youlater. The interference--well, I won't apologize for that. Surely yourealize that it's--friendly."
For the first time her eyes left his. She looked around the room as ifuncertain what to do or say.
"Perhaps you mean it so," she muttered at last. "But I considerit--impertinent."
A change was taking place in her. The fire that had flamed up at hisentrance was dying out, leaving her with the look of one who is cowedand almost beaten. Even her last words lacked assurance. Watching her inpuzzled sympathy, Laurie for the first time wished himself older andwiser than he was. How could he handle a situation like this? Neitherthen nor later did he ask himself how he would have handled it on thestage.
For a moment the two young things gazed at each other, in helplessnessand irresolution on his side, in resentful questioning on hers. Even inthe high tension of the moment Laurie subconsciously took in the pictureshe made as she stood there, defying him, with her back to the wall oflife.
She was very lovely, more lovely than in the mirror; for now he wasgetting the full effect of her splendid coloring, set off by the gownshe wore, a thing of rich but somber shades, lit up by a semi-barbaricnecklace of amber and gold, that hung almost to her knees.
Yes, the girl was a picture against the unforgetable background of thattragic situation. But what he admired most of all was the dignity thatshone through her panic and her despair. She was up in arms against him.And yet, if he had not come, if that vision had not flashed into hismirror five minutes ago, she might now have been lying a huddled,lifeless thing on the very spot where she stood so proudly. At thethought his heart shook. The right words came to him at last.
"I've had--impulses--like yours," he said. "I've had them twice.Fortunately, both times there was some one around to talk me out ofthem." He had caught her attention. She showed that by the way shelooked at him. "The argument that impressed me most," he went on, "wasthat it's quitting the game. You don't look as if you were a quitter,"he ended, thoughtfully.
The girl's eyes blazed. He had aroused her once more, and he was glad ofit. He didn't know at all what to do or say, but he dimly felt thatalmost any emotion in her would be better than the lethargy she had justrevealed.
"I'm not a quitter!" she cried. "But I've got dignity enough to leave aplace where I'm not wanted, even if that place happens to be the world.Go away!" she added fiercely. "Go away and leave me alone!"
Resting one hand on the table between them, he held out the other.
"Come, let me have that," he suggested, imperturbably. "Then we'll talkthings over. I'll try to make you realize what I was made to realizemyself--that we were both on the wrong track. I'll tell you what othersthink who are wiser than we are."
As she did not move, he added, more lightly: "You see, what we weregoing to do isn't done much nowadays. It's all out of date. Come," herepeated, gently, "let me have it."
With a movement of irritation the girl swept her hand forward andtossed on the table between them the small revolver she had beenholding.
"Take it," she said, almost indifferently. And she added, "Another timewill do as well."
He picked up the little weapon and put it into his pocket.
"There isn't going to be any other time," he predicted buoyantly. "Now,slip into a coat while I run across the street and get my hat and coatand order a taxicab. We're going out to luncheon, and to tell each otherthe stories of our lives, with all the grim and gory details."
"I don't know you," muttered the girl. She had dropped into a chairbeside the table, and was sitting with her chin in her hand, in whatseemed a characteristic attitude, watching him with an expression hecould not analyze.
Laurie seemed surprised. "Why, so you don't!" he agreed. "But you'regoing to now. We're going to know each other awfully well before we getthrough. In the meantime, you can see by the merest glance at me howyoung and harmless I am. Where's the coat?"
He turned and began a vague, masculine search for it. The girl wavered.His rising spirits were contagious, and it was clear that she dreadedbeing left alone.
"You see, what we were going to do isn't done muchnowadays"]
"I warn you," she said at last, "that if you have anything to do withme you will be sorry for it."
Laurie stopped his search, and, turning, gave her one of his straightlooks.
"Why?" he demanded.
"Because I'm in a net," she said. "And every one who tries to help megets caught in it, too. Oh, don't smile! You won't smile afterward."
He picked up a coat he discovered in a corner, and held it for her toslip into.
"I like nets," he remarked lightly, "especially if they'rebright-colored, large, roomy, comfortable nets. We'll have some greattimes in ours. Come along."
She shrugged her shoulders, and in the gesture slipped into the garment.
"I'll go," she said, in a low voice. "But don't forget that I warnedyou!"