The Street of the City (19 page)

He must not forget that Monday evening gathering she had told him about. He would go at least once and see what it was like. Perhaps knowing a great deal about the Bible and understanding what it meant had been what had kept Lady Winthrop’s soul so sweet and young, so full of faith and ready to look forward through growing old to the time when age should drop away and life should become new and young and eternal.

So he pondered, as he walked across the river to see the girl who lived on the wrong side of the river, and never knew that Marietta had seen him go by from her window and attired herself hopefully, for his possible return.

F
rannie was helping the nurse to put away the supper dishes when Willoughby arrived, and the two were a bit startled to hear the knock at the door. The nurse thought at once of the man who had knocked last night and gave a quick glance in Frannie’s direction. Perhaps she ought to have told the girl about it after all, but the policeman had seemed to think it wasn’t necessary just yet.

“I’ll go,” said the nurse, wiping her hands quickly on the towel and hurrying toward the front door. If it was that man again she would get rid of him in short order and try to do it in a low tone so Frannie wouldn’t have to know about it.

But Frannie was all too willing to let her answer the knock, for she was thinking of that obnoxious girl and wondering if she had come again. If she had, she did not want to see her, and she knew Nurse Branner would see that she did not have to.

But it was Val’s voice she heard instead of Marietta’s, and her heart gave a happy little skip. That was pleasant. Nice of him to come over to see how her mother was, that was what she heard him say as he stepped inside the living room. And Frannie hurried to dry her hands and go in.

Valiant’s smile was warm and hearty, like a very old friend’s, and Frannie felt happy to think he was not going to try to be a stranger as she had feared. He had come back of his own accord, not just to be polite, but to be friendly, also. That was what his smile said. He might be a friend of that hateful, patronizing girl. He might even be the one she said was practically engaged to her, or some of her kind, but he wasn’t going to look down on other people because of that, and he wasn’t minding that she was living on the wrong bank of the river either.

So she came in without self-consciousness, just a bit of heightened color perhaps and a shine in her eyes that had not been there before he came. He put out his hand and grasped hers wholeheartedly, making her feel that he was her real friend in spite of that other girl.

He was looking down at her as he stood, her hand still in his, and thinking how pretty she looked, with her hair in little rings of curls around her face and no makeup at all, her pansy-blue eyes raised to his. Yes, she was lovely. He hadn’t noticed it especially before. She had been almost too pale that first time he saw her, when she was so frightened about her mother. But she was beautiful, with those long dark lashes curling back from her wide, sweet eyes. He had never been one to stare at a girl or to analyze her features and think about beauty. He had often acknowledged that Marietta was beautiful, but it hadn’t meant a thing to him because he didn’t admire her character, and if a girl’s heart wasn’t lovely what did it matter how her outward features were formed? The face must match the heart and that, it suddenly struck him, was the case with this girl. This face was no camouflage, it was a true delineation of the life within.

So he stood and smiled down into her sweet eyes and spoke in a friendly tone.

“I just came over to find out how your mother is tonight, and then I thought if she was able to spare you for a little while, perhaps you would like to go somewhere to church with me.”

Frannie’s cheeks grew bright, and her eyes lit up.

“Oh, that would be lovely,” she said breathlessly, “but I don’t know but Nurse Branner would like to go out somewhere. I was just going to ask her.”

“No indeed,” said Nurse Branner decidedly. “I went out this morning, you know, and really I’m a bit tired from it. I thought I’d read a little while to your mother, and when she gets to sleep, I have something I want to read myself. Go ahead, Frannie. I’d love to have you. Perhaps you can find a church you will enjoy.”

And so with lovely happiness in her eyes Frannie hurried upstairs to get ready.

She seemed very sweet as she came downstairs in her slim green coat and her little green turban, her soft brown curls framing her face.

“I hope it’s not a very grand church you’re taking me to,” she said shyly. “I haven’t any fine clothes.”

“Haven’t you?” smiled Val. “They look plenty fine enough to me. But then I’m not much of a judge of clothes. I’m sure they look as if they suited you, and that’s altogether satisfactory, so don’t let us worry. Have you any choice of churches?”

“Oh no,” said the girl. “I don’t know the churches around here. I had it in mind to hunt up a pleasant place that would be near enough for my mother to walk to, but that would probably take time, and I’d rather go with you to whatever church you choose.”

“Well, I haven’t been living around here much until the last three or four weeks, and I haven’t settled down yet. I’ve been going with my aunt to her church the last two weeks since I’ve been here because it pleased her to have me, but frankly I wasn’t very well satisfied. The minister didn’t seem to me to believe all he was saying, and I thought I’d like to go where there was a real message. There’s one man down in the city who has the reputation of speaking pretty directly, and just now he is talking about what this war means and all the things that are happening in the world today in relation to the message of God in the Bible. I thought I’d like to hear what he has to say. How about you? Would you enjoy that?”

“Oh yes,” said Frannie earnestly. “I’ve wondered so much how the war can possibly fit in with God’s loving the world and wanting to save them.”

“All right then, we’ll go and see if we get any light on the subject. And about that church for your mother, I’ll be inquiring around to find out possibilities. Then maybe next Sunday we can shop around a little and find a church nearby where your mother and Bonnie can walk. But tonight we’ll go to the Fourth Avenue Church and see what we can hear. Would you rather walk or ride? My aunt is not going to use her car tonight and she said I might take it. Pretty soon I shall have to have one of my own, but just now I like my skates as well as any form of transportation. Although it wouldn’t be just the thing to skate to church. I suppose the ice will decide to leave us some day and then we’ll have to find some other method anyway. But tonight there is no reason why we can’t drive if you’d like.”

“Oh, I think I’d rather walk if you don’t mind. Is it far?”

“No. Not over a mile or a mile and a quarter.”

“Well then, let’s walk. I haven’t been anywhere around here, and I think we’d get better acquainted with it walking, don’t you?”

“Perhaps,” said Val smiling. “I never thought of it that way. But it is a lovely night, and I shall enjoy walking down some of the pretty streets that are on the way to the church and showing them to you. Then if you are tired we can take a taxi home.”

“Oh, I shall not be tired,” said Frannie with a little ripple of a laugh. “I don’t get tired walking, and you know I have to sit almost all the day at the office. But you, you have to be on the go a great deal. Would you rather drive? Because I could enjoy that a lot, too.”

“No, I’d love to walk. I have always enjoyed it. Come, let’s go. It is still light enough to see, and we’ll go right by Lady Winthrop’s home. You’ve seen it from the river, but I want you to see it from the street. It really is a lovely old mansion.”

So they went out together, and Nurse Branner smiled and was glad at the way the day had worked out.

So that was how it came about that Marietta saw Val Willoughby and her hated little rival walking by her house together.

Marietta had not turned on the light. She was watching for him by the window, thinking to open the door for him herself when he came back and stopped to visit.

At first she could not believe it was the same girl, the girl from the wrong side of the river. The cut of her green coat was smart, and the little turban was jaunty and becoming. Of course, it was beginning to be dusk and the sidewalk was some distance from the house, but Marietta’s eyes were sharp, her intuitions were keen, and she knew who it was. She watched for a moment with growing fury in her heart. Had Val Willoughby done this just to tantalize her? Wouldn’t he be sure she would see them? He was just trying to annoy her. To show her that he would defy her wish. Her blue eyes snapped like blue flames. She would have to do something extra specially annoying to him to get back at him for this.

Perhaps he was even contemplating bringing her in to visit. That would be unspeakable! That girl! If he dared she certainly would have a thing to say to the contemptible creature that would humiliate her forever.

But no, perhaps the best way would be to be out. To seem not to have been at home at all to see him pass. She would go at once and run no risks of having such a dreadful thing happen. So she rushed up to her room to prepare for an evening with some friends and watched her opportunity to escape across the lawn to get her car when there was no sign of them on the street.

But meanwhile, all unaware of the tumult they were exciting in Marietta’s angry breast, the two were walking briskly down Hilltop Road and taking in all the beautiful homes along the way.

As they passed the Haversett home and Val told her it was where his aunt lived, Frannie gave a little gasp as she eyed the great stone mansion with its massive bay windows and stone arches, and evidences of wealth on every side.

“Oh!” she said softly. “To think that you live there in that lovely home, and yet you are taking time to be kind and go to church with me! Me, a little nobody, with shabby clothes, who lives on the wrong side of the river.”

He gave her a quick look, and then he laughed.

“You sound like Marietta Hollister,” he said and laughed again.

She gave him a quick look in turn now.

“You know her then?”

“Oh yes, of course I know her. I’ve known her since she was a spoiled baby younger than your Bonnie. She never had half the sense Bonnie has now. But don’t let anything she says or thinks worry you. I understand she’s been to see you.”

Frannie lifted wondering eyes.

“How did you know?”

“Why, she told me herself, and my anger rose momentarily as she enlarged upon her visit. But I beg of you not to worry about it. She isn’t worth it. She has money and an expensive education, but she has no heart; she’s like a lovely showy flower without perfume. She is essentially selfish, and sometimes cruel in the extreme, if it suits her purposes. I don’t like to talk about my acquaintances this way, especially to one who is a comparative stranger to them, but I feel that it is right that you should understand the situation. I hope you won’t think me unkind in my summary of her character. You see, she is so very beautiful on the outside that it is hard to realize she can be actually cruel. There! Now, have I said enough, and can we put the subject aside and forget it?”

He looked down at her earnestly and drew her arm within his own to emphasize his confidential attitude.

Frannie was looking down, her brow troubled, thoughtful.

“Why, yes, I guess so,” she said slowly. “It wasn’t exactly pleasant to bear, that visit, and I practically knew it didn’t matter, because I never would be likely to have my lot cast with hers, but of course I didn’t enjoy thinking that a lot of tongues had been caused to wag about you as well as myself, just because you had been kind enough to bring a message to me about my sick mother, and then later to help me out in a free-for-all fight with those two fresh fellows. But I guess if we’re not seen skating together anymore the talk will soon die out. You see, that girl and I really do live in different worlds, and we’re not likely to cross each other’s paths often, so I guess there isn’t much damage done.”

“Damage? Well, no I should say not! But if you think I’m going to let that little gossiping baby-doll cheat me out of a new friend I hope I’ve found in you, you’re sadly mistaken. Even if I didn’t like you for yourself, and have pleasure in skating with you, which I very much do, I wouldn’t let Marietta Hollister beat me out of doing what I want to do. So if you please, keep right on skating down to your work whenever you want to, and if you don’t mind I shall join you when I can. I told that snooping little gossip as much myself. So you see you’ve got to help me keep my word. I told her you were a good friend of mine. And now can’t we get to work and find some mutual friends so we can prove that we didn’t ‘pick each other up’ on the ice, as they are pleased to say we did?”

Frannie laughed.

“Why yes,” she said, “I guess we can. Did you have a friend named Ford Harrison when you were in college?”

Willoughby looked at her in surprise.

“Why yes, I did,” he said. “How did you know?”

“Well, you see, his sister Allison was my roommate in college. I’ve been trying ever since I heard your name to remember where I had heard it before, and at last it came to me that Allie used to speak of someone by that name as her brother’s best friend.”

“Great!” said Willoughby. “That would surprise Marietta. She didn’t know you had been to college.”

Frannie grinned.

“She would think a girl who lived on the wrong side of the river couldn’t possibly have gone to college,” she said, amused, looking up at him with a comical twinkle.

“No, please, I never said I agreed with that nonsense about the other side of the river. That’s a lot of hooey the smart set got up. I never felt that way.”

“No, I knew you wouldn’t,” said Frannie. “I knew you were bigger than that.”

“But seriously, Frannie, tell me about your college life. I want to understand why I didn’t hear more about you, because I was often in the Harrison home during my college days.”

“Well, you see, that fall I roomed with Allison was the end of my college life. Father got sick, we had to go west, and I never went back to college. There wasn’t money enough after father’s health and business both failed, and somehow those were pretty hard days. I had no time for just pleasant correspondence. It’s been a pretty busy world for me ever since.”