The Business of Life

"I know you don't. But here's where I exercise my harmlessly arbitrary authority for your happiness and for the sake of your good digestion."

"What a brute you are!"

"I know it. Back to your desk, darling! And go to bed early."

"I wanted you to stay – "

"Ha! So you begin to feel the tyranny of man! I'm going! I've got a job, too, if you want to know."

"What!"

"Certainly! How long did you suppose I could stand it to see you at that desk and then go and sit in a silly club?"

"What do you mean, darling?" she asked, radiant.

"I mean that Jack Cairns, who is a broker, has offered me a job at a small but perfectly proper salary, with the usual commission on all business I bring in to the office. And I've taken it!"

"But, dear – "

"Oh, Vail can run my farm without any advice from me. I'm going to give him more authority and hold him responsible. If the place can pay for itself and let us keep the armour and jades, that's all I ask of it. But I am asking more of myself – since I have begun to really know you. And I'm going to work for our bread and butter, and earn enough to support us both and lay something aside. You know we've got to think of that, because – " He looked very serious, hesitated, bent and whispered something that sent the bright colour flying in her cheeks; then he caught her hand and kissed the ring-finger.

"Good-bye," she murmured, clinging for an instant to his hand.

The next moment he was gone; and she stood alone for a while by her desk, his ring resting against her lips, her eyes closed.

Sunday she spent with him. They went together to St. John's Cathedral in the morning – the first time he had been inside a church in years. And he was in considerable awe of the place and of her until they finally emerged into the sunshine of Morningside Park.

Under a magnificent and cloudless sky, they walked together, silent or loquacious by turns, bold and shy, confident and timid. And she was a little surprised to find that, in the imminence of marriage, her trepidation was composure itself compared to the anxiety which seemed to assail him. All he had thought of was the license and the clergyman; and they had attended to those matters together. But she had wished him to have Jack Cairns present, and had told him that she desired to ask some friend of her girlhood to be her bridesmaid.

"Have you done so?" he inquired, as they descended the heights of Morningside, the beautiful weather tempting them to a long homeward stroll through Central Park.

"Yes, Jim, I must tell you about her. She, like myself, is not a girl that men of your sort might expect to meet – "

"The loss is ours, Jacqueline."

"That is very sweet of you. Only I had better tell you about Cynthia Lessler – "

"Who?" he asked, astonished.

"Cynthia Lessler, my girlhood friend."

"She is an actress, isn't she?"

"Yes. Her home life was very unhappy. But I think she has much talent, too."

"She has."

"I am glad you think so. Anyway, she is my oldest friend, and I have asked her to be my bridesmaid to-morrow."

He continued silent beside her so long that she said timidly:

"Do you mind, Jim?"

"I was only thinking – how it might look in the papers – and there are other girls you already know whose names would mean a lot – "

"Yes, I know. But I don't want to pretend to be what I am not, even in the papers. I suppose I do need all the social corroboration I can have. I know what you mean, dear. But there were reasons. I thought it all over. Cynthia is an old friend, not very happy, not the fortunate and blessed girl that your love is making of me. But she is good and sweet and loyal to me, and I can't abandon old friends, especially one who is not very fortunate – and I – I thought perhaps it might help her a little – in various ways – to be my bridesmaid."

"That is like you," he said, reddening. "You never say or do anything but there lies in it some primary lesson in decency to me."

"You goose! Isn't it natural for a girl to wish for her oldest friend at such a time? That's really all there is to the matter. And I do hope you will like Cynthia."

He nodded, preoccupied. After a few moments he said:

"Did you know that Jack Cairns had met her?"

"Yes."

"Oh!" His troubled eyes sought hers, then shifted.

"That was another reason I wish to ask her," she said in a low voice.

"What reason?"

"Because Mr. Cairns knew her only as a very young, very lonely, very unhappy girl, inexperienced, friendless, poor, almost shelterless; and engaged in a profession upon which it is almost traditional for men to prey. And I wish him to know her again as a girl who is slowly advancing in an honest profession – as a modest, sweet, self-respecting woman – and as my friend."

"And mine," he said.

"You – darling!" she whispered.

CHAPTER XIII

They were married in the morning at St. George's in Stuyvesant Square.

Gay little flurries of snow, like wind-blown petals from an apple bough, were turning golden in the warm outbreak of brilliant sunshine; and there was blue sky overhead and shining wet pavements under foot as Jacqueline and Desboro came out of the shadows of the old-time church into the fresh splendour of the early morning.

The solemn beauty of the service still possessed and enthralled them. Except for a low word or two, they were inclined to silence.

But the mating sparrows were not; everywhere the little things, brown wings a-quiver, chattered and chirped in the throes of courtship; now and then, from some high façade rang out the clear, sweet whistle of a starling; and along the warm, wet streets ragged children were selling violets and narcissus, and yellow tulips tinted as delicately as the pale spring sunshine.

A ragged little girl came to stare at Jacqueline, the last unsold bunch of wilted violets lying on her tray; and Jacqueline laid the cluster over the prayer-book which she was carrying, while Desboro slipped a golden coin into the child's soiled hand.

Down the street his chauffeur was cranking the car; and while they waited for it to draw up along the curb, Jacqueline separated a few violets from the faintly fragrant cluster and placed them between the leaves of her prayer-book.

After a few moments he said, under his breath:

"Do you realise that we are married, Jacqueline?"

"No. Do you?"