The Streets of Ascalon

"Ask her, Jim… And, if you care one atom for her – be happy at what she tells you – and tell her that you are. Will you?"

He stared at her, then lost countenance. Then he looked at her in a panicky way and started to go, but she held on to him with determination:

"Smile first!"

"Thunder! I – "

"Smile. Oh, Jim, isn't there any decency in men?"

His mind was working like mad; he stared at her, then through the astonishment and consternation on his good-looking features a faint grin broke out.

"All right," she whispered, and let him go.

Molly, idling at the piano, heard his tread behind her, and looked up over her shoulder.

"Hello, Jim," she said, faintly.

"Hello, ducky. Strelsa says you have something to tell me."

"I – Jim?"

"So she said. So I cut out a long one to find out what it is. What's up, ducky?"

Molly's gaze grew keener: "Did that child tell you?"

"She said that you had something to tell me."

"Did she?"

"No! Aren't you going to tell me either?"

He dropped into a chair opposite her; she sat on the piano-stool considering him for a while in silence. Then, dropping her arms with a helpless little gesture:

"We are going to have a baby. Are you – annoyed?"

For a second he sat as though paralysed, and the next second he had her in his arms, the grin breaking out from utter blankness.

"You're a corker, ducky!" he whispered. "You for me all the time!"

"Jim!.. Really?"

"Surest thing you know! Which is it? – boy or – Oh, I beg your pardon, dear – I'm not accustomed to the etiquette. But I'm delighted, ducky, overwhelmed!"

"Oh, Jim! I'm so glad. And I'm crazy about it – perfectly mad about it… And you're a dear to care – "

"Certainly I care! What do you take me for – a wooden Indian!" he exclaimed virtuously. "Come on and we'll celebrate – "

"But, Jim! We can't tell people."

"Oh – that's the christening. I forgot, ducky. No, we can't talk about it of course. But I'll do anything you say – "

"Will you?"

"Will I? Watch me!"

"Then – then don't take out the Stinger for a while. Do you mind, dear?"

"What!" he said, jaw dropping.

"I can't bear it, Jim. I was a good sport before; you know I was. But my nerve has gone. I can't take chances now; I want you to see – it – "

After a moment he nodded.

"Sure," he said. "It's like Lent. You've got to offer up something… If you feel that way – " he sighed unconsciously – "I'll lock up the hangar until – "

"Oh, darling! Will you?"

"Yes," said that desolate young man, and kissed his wife without a scowl. He had behaved pretty well – about like the majority of husbands outside of popular romances.

The amateur aeronauts left in the morning before anybody was stirring except the servants – Vincent Wier, Lester Caldera, the Van Dynes and the rest, bag, baggage, and, later, two aeroplanes packed and destined for Barent Van Dyne's Long Island estate where there was to be some serious flying attempted over the flat and dusty plains of that salubrious island.

Sir Charles Mallison was leaving that same day, later; and there were to be no more of Jim's noisy parties; and now under the circumstances, no parties of Molly's, either; because Molly was becoming nervous and despondent and a mania for her husband possessed her – the pretty resurgence of earlier sentiment which, if not more than comfortably dormant, buds charmingly again at a time like this.

Also she wanted Strelsa, and nobody beside these two; and although she liked parties of all sorts including Jim's sporting ones, and although she liked Sir Charles immensely, she was looking forward to comfort of an empty house with only her husband to decorate the landscape and Strelsa to whisper to in morbid moments.

For Chrysos was going to Newport, Sir Charles and her maid accompanying her as far as New York from where the Baronet meant to sail the next day.

His luggage had already gone; his man was packing when Sir Charles sauntered out over the dew-wet lawn, a sprig of sweet-william in his lapel, tall, clear-skinned, nice to look upon.

What he really thought of what he had seen in America, of the sort of people who had entertained him, of the grotesque imitation of exotic society – or of a certain sort of it – nobody really knew. Doubtless his estimate was inclined to be a kindly one, for he was essentially that – a philosophical, chivalrous, and modest man; and if his lines had fallen in places where vulgarity, extravagance, and ostentation predominated – if he had encountered little real cultivation, less erudition, and almost nothing worthy of sympathetic interest, he never betrayed either impatience or contempt.

He had come for one reason only – the same reason that had brought him to America for the first time – to ask Strelsa Leeds to marry him.

He was man enough to understand that she did not care for him that way, soldier enough to face his fate, keen enough, long since, to understand that Quarren meant more to the woman he cared for than any other man.

Cool, self-controlled, he watched every chance for an opening in his own behalf. No good chance presented itself. So he made one and offered himself with a dignity and simplicity that won Strelsa's esteem but not her heart.

After that he stayed on, not hoping, but merely because he liked her. Later he remained because of a vague instinct that he might as well be on hand while Strelsa went through the phase with Langly Sprowl. But he was a wise man, and weeks ago he had seen the inevitable outcome. Also he had divined Quarren's influence in the atmosphere, had watched for it, sensed it, seen it very gradually materialise in a score of acts and words of which Strelsa herself was totally unconscious.

Then, too, the afternoon before, he had encountered Sprowl riding furiously with reeking spurs, after his morning's gallop with Strelsa; and he had caught a glimpse of the man's face; and that was enough.

So there was really nothing to keep him in America any longer. He wanted to get back to his own kind – into real life again, among people of real position and real elegance, where live topics were discussed, where live things were attempted or accomplished, where whatever was done, material or immaterial, was done thoroughly and well.

There was not one thing in America, now, to keep him there – except a warm and kindly affection for his little friend Chrysos Lacy with whom he had been thrown so constantly at Witch-Hollow.

Strolling across the lawn, he thought of her with warm gratitude. In her fresh and unspoiled youth he had found relief from a love unreturned, a cool, sweet antidote to passion, a balm for loneliness most exquisite and delightful.

The very perfection of comradeship it had been, full of charming surprises as well as a rest both mental and physical. For Chrysos made few demands on his intellect – that is, at first she had made very few. Later – within the past few weeks, he remembered now his surprise to find how much there really was to the young girl – and that perhaps her age and inexperience alone marked any particular intellectual chasm between them.