The Girl From His Town

  CHAPTER XX--A HAND CLASP

  It was one o'clock. Blair called a hansom and told the driver to takehim to the Carlton, and leaning back in the vehicle he breathed a longsigh. He looked like his father, but he didn't know it. He felt old. Hewas a man and a tired one and a free one, and the sense of this libertybegan to refresh him like a breeze over parched sand. He thought overwhat he had left for a second, stopped longest in pitying Galorey, thenwent into the Carlton restaurant to order some supper, for he began tofeel the need of food. He had not time to drink his wine and partake ofthe cold pheasant before he saw that opposite him the two people who hadtaken their table were Letty Lane and Poniotowsky. The woman's slenderback was turned to Blair, and his heart gave a leap of pain at the sightof the man with her, and the cruel suffering began again.

  Dan gave up the idea of eating: drank a whole bottle of champagne, thenpushed it away from him violently. "Hold up," he told himself, "you'regetting dangerous; this drinking won't do." So he sat drumming on thetable looking into the air. When those two got up to go, however, hewould go with them; that was sure. He could never see them go outtogether again; no--no--no! As his brain grew a bit clearer he saw thatthey were having a heated discussion between them, and as the roomemptied finally, save for themselves, Dan, though he could not hear whatPoniotowsky said, understood that he was urging something which the girldid not wish to grant. When they left he rose as well, and at the doorof the restaurant the actress and her companion paused, and Dan saw herface, deadly pale. There were tears in her eyes.

  "For God's sake!" he heard her murmur, and she impatiently drew hercloak around her shoulders. Poniotowsky put out his hand to help her,but she drew back from him, exclaiming violently: "Oh, no--no!" Before hewas aware what he was doing, Dan was holding his hand out to Miss Lane.

  How she turned to him! God of dreams! How she took in one cold hand hishand; just the grasp a man needs to lead him to offer the service of hislife. Her hand was icy--it thrilled him to his marrow.

  "Oh--you--" she breathed. "Hello!"

  No words could have been more commonplace, less in the category ofdramatic or poetic welcome, but they were music to the boy, and when theactress looked at him with a ghost of a smile on her trembling lips, Danwas sure there was some kind of blessing in the greeting.

  "I am going to see you home," he said with determination, and she caughtat it:

  "Yes, yes, do! Will you?"

  The third member of the party had not spoken. A servant fetched him alight to which he bent, touching his cigar. Then he lifted his head--ahandsome one--with its cold and indifferent eyes, to Letty Lane.

  "Good night, Miss Lane." A deep color crept under his dark skin.

  "Come," said the actress eagerly, "come along; my motor is out there andI am crazy tired. That is all there is about it. Come along."

  Snatched from a marriage contract, still bitter from his jealous anger,this--to be alone with her--by the side of this white, fragrant, wonderfulcreature--to have been turned to by her, to be alone with her, theDuchess of Breakwater out of his horizon, Poniotowsky gone--Oh, it wassweet to him! They had rolled out from the Carlton down toward theSquare and he put his arm around her waist, his voice shook:

  "You are dead tired! And when I saw that brute with you to-night I couldhave shot him."

  "Take your arm away, please."

  "Why?"

  "Take it away. I don't like it. Let my hand go. What's the matter withyou? I thought I could trust you."

  He said humbly: "You can--certainly you can."

  "I am tired--tired--tired!"

  Under his breath he said: "Put your head on my shoulder, Letty,darling."

  And she turned on him nearly as violently as she had on Poniotowsky, andburst into tears, crouching almost in the corner of the motor, away fromhim, both her hands upon her breast.

  "Oh, can't you see how you bother me? Can't you see I want to rest andbe all alone? You are like them all--like them all. Can't I restanywhere?"

  The very words she used were those he had thought of when he saw herdance at the theater, and his heart broke within him.

  "You can," he stammered, "rest right here. God knows I want you to restmore than anything. I won't touch you or breathe again or do anythingyou don't want me to."

  She covered her face with her hands and sat so without speaking to him.The light in her motor shone over her like a kindly star, as, wrapped inher filmy things she lay, a white rose blown into a sheltered nook.After a little she wiped her eyes and said more naturally:

  "You look perfectly dreadfully, boy! What have you been doing withyourself?"

  They had reached the Savoy. It seemed to Dan they were always justdriving up to where some one opened a door, out of which she was to flyaway from him. He got out before her and helped her from the car.

  "Well, I've got a piece of news to tell you. I have broken my engagementwith the duchess."

  This brought her back far enough into life to make her exclaim: "Oh, I_am_ glad! That's perfectly fine! I don't know when I've heard anythingthat pleased me so much. Come and see me to-morrow and tell me all aboutit."