Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1911-06-23
CHAPTER vi.
Clearing Away the Rubbish.

All the night following the momentous
meeting of the Marut Diamond Company
Mrs. Cary had kept to her room, the door
locked against her daughter. and had
sobbed and walled in a manner betting
the victim of a hard and undeserved fate.
But in reality hers was the rage of a
clumsy workman who has cut himself
with his own tools. Her own child, her
partner and co-worker, had upset the
erection Of years. She saw themselves
cast out of Marut; she saw the desolate
wandering over the earth's suface, this
time without the consolation and protcc-
ton of wealth For she knew that Bea-
trice's confession was to go farther. Bea-
trice had made the announcement of her
plans quietly but firmly as they had
driven home from the clubhouse.
Tomorrow everybody shall know
everything there is TO know she had
said, and had remained obdurate to all
her mothers commands and pleadings.
Il do consider you. / consider you even
now. | mean to save you and myself.
But this time 1t must be in another way.
Your Scheming has only brought us into
deeper trouble We must start afresh."
But how? But how" her mother had
said, wringing her hands in uncontrolled
despair. Where are we to start? How are
we ever going TO make people believe in
us now We have no money!
1T does not matter what people be-
leve," Beatrice had replied. With our
money and our lies we have been building
mud novels. ard now we are going to
build palaces. That's all that matters"
Mrs. Cary had not understood. She
thought Beatrice had gone mad, and
knowing that with madness reasoning is
in vain, she shut herself UP in her room,
pulled down the blinds, and believed by
this ostrichlike proceeding that she could
keep of the inevitable moment when they
would have 10 be pulled up again and the
cold. pitless reality faced
But Beatrice went her way undeterred.
From Stafford bungalow she drove 10
the Travers'. I he place was little more
than an ill-cared-for shanty, the garden
overgrown with weeds, the rooms damp,
| ill-ared and badly furnished, its reputa-
ton for misfortune phenomenal. Travers
had taken 1t as the only bungalow TO be
had for such short period he in
tended 10 stay in Marut. and Lois had
made no objection. Her energy and de-
fermined striving after everything that
| Was graceful and beautiful was system
| aticaly crushed out Of sight. She never
protested. never laid any difficulties in
/ Travers path. She seemed to shrink into
4 herself and live an invisible life OF her
own. leaving him To go his way. She
/ could not help him She could build up
| tons were Of shifting sand.
i And never had she been more fully con-
WINGED of her own powerlesSneSS and Of
1 his absolute independence than after their
| brief and stormy interview before STAFF
i ford's entry. She had felt how for mo-
ment their two diametrically opposed ma
4 lures had faced each other. She had felt
\ a brief joyful satisfaction in al last com
1 ing TO hand-to-haud struggle with him:
4 hut then, as usual with smile and
easy word he had eluded her So il had
| always been--so 1t would always be. Too
late she realized that she had thrown
/ away her life upon a man who had no
! need of her devotion. Too late she real
| lied that all sacrifices are wasted unless
| the ennobling of the sacriiicer's character
! be considered. For true happiness. true
| content and goodness cannot he given.
| They must be self-won, or they are no
more than dollhouse plants. which shrvel
| together in the cold blast of an east
| wind Lois had sacrificed herself TO
| bring true happiness and content and
| goodness into Tfavers' life. and had
! failed She had failed all the more sig
| naIIy because she had never loved him.
She had loved Stafford-extraordinary and
! terrible as il seemed To her, size stu
| loved linn. She could not RIO; him out %