Middletown transcript. [volume] (Middletown, Del.) 1868-current, 1917-07-28
CHAPTER xxv-continued.


street, and were halfway over to the
Fifth avenue corner at Fifty-ninth, be-
fore he spoke out.
"On a day like this" he said, ITO
have sat there for two or three mortal
hours arguing about stale ideas-when
we might have been out here, being
alive! But it must have seemed nat
ural to you to hear me going on like
that" And then with q burst, before
she could speak:
"YOu must remember me as the most
blindly opinionated fool in the world :"
She caught her breath, then said
very quietly, with warm little laugh
in her voice: "That's not how I re-
member you, Roddy."
She declined to help him when he
tried to scramble back to the safe
shores of conventional conversation.
That sort of thing had lasted long
enough. And when they stopped and
faced each other in the gray brick en-
trance to the building where Roses
apartment was, it was at the end of a
mile or more of absolutely unbroken
silence. And facing each other there,
all that was said between them was
her:
you'll come in, won't you?" and his
eyes"
But the gravity with which she'd
uttered the invitation and the tense
ness Of his acceptance of it, the square
look that passed between them, marked
an end of something and the begin
ming of something new.
She left him in her sitting room
while she went into her room to take
off her hat and jacket and take a
glance into her mirror. When she
came back she found him standing
at her window, looking out. He didn't
turn when she came in, but almost
Immediately he began speaking. She
went rather limp at the sound Of his
voice and dropped down on an otto,
man in front of the fireplace, and
squeezed her hands together between
her knees.
81 don't know how much you will
ably q good deal. What 1 hope you
will have guessed is that I wouldn't
have come except that I'd something to
tell yOu-something felt you were en-
titled to be told. But 1 felt-this is
what you won't have understood-I felt
that hadn't any right to speak to you
at all, about anything vital, until I'd
given you some sort of guaranty until
I'd shown you that I was a person 1t
was possible to deal reasonably with. VI
She smiled, then pressed her hands
suddenly to her eyes. Il understood
she said.
"Well then :" But he didn't
at once go on. Stood there a while
longer at the window, then crossed
the room and brought up before hel
bookshelves, staring blindly at the tt
ties. He hadn't looked at her even as
he crossed the room.
ooh, it's a preSumptuouS thing to try
to say" he broke out at last, "a pitiful
ly unnecessary thing to say, because
you must know it without my telling
you. But when you went away you sale
you said it was because you hadn'
my-friendship You said that was thu
thing you wanted, and that you wer'
going to try and earn it. And you TOLD
i me that I'd never be able to see tina
Il the thing you were doing there was
n fine thing, worth doing, entitled to m!
respect. But what I've come down her
Il to say isis that now, at last d.
Il see it,"
81 She would have spoken then if sh
could have commanded her voice, ant
s. as it was, the sound she made con
veyed her intention to him. for h
turned upon her quickly as if to inter
= rupt the unspoken words, and went Of
with an almost savage bitterness:
ooh, I'm under no illusions about il
# / had my chance to see, when seem
# would have meant something to you
MI helped you. When anyone but tn
MI blindest sort of fool would have seer
#A didn't. Now, when the thing is pat
ent for the world to see-now tina
x you've won your fight without an
help from me . Without any help
In spite of every hindrance that IN
{ idiocy could put in your way! Nov
after ALL come and tell you ths
you've earned the thing you've set on
to get"
There was a little silence after tina
She got up and took the post he ha
abandoned at the window.
"Why did you do it, ROddy? sh
asked. Il mean, why did you want t
come and tell me?'
"Why, in the first place." he SAT-
81 wanted to get back little OF m
self-respect. 1 couldn't get that unit
I'd told you"
This time the silence was longe
what else did you want?" st
asked "What-in the second place
Il want to earn your Friendship
It's the biggest thing l can hoI
for. But I've no idea that you ca
hand it out to me ready-made. l b.
lieve you'd do it if you could. Bl
you said once, yourself, that it WASH
a thing that could be given. 1t was
thing that had to be earned. And 70
were right about that, as you wei
about so many other things. Wei
I'm going to try to earn it."
as that-all you want?" she aske
and then, hearing the little gasp b
gave, she swung around quickly an
looked at him. It was pretty dark
the room, but his face in the dus
seemed to have whitened.
SIS friendship all you want Of m
Roddy" she asked again. She stoC
there waiting, full minute, in silenc
Then she said: "You don't have