Books: Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories
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Kathleen Norris >> Poor, Dear Margaret Kirby and Other Stories
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"Help me out with anything?" Mrs. Fairfax's voice ranged through
delicate shades of surprise to dawning consternation. "Help me out
with what?"
"Why, you told me yourself that this was the day of the bridge-club
lunch at your house!" Mrs. Harrington said, almost indignantly. But
immediately she became mirthful. "Oh, Susanna, Susanna! You haven't
forgotten--oh, you HAVE! Oh, you poor girl, what will you do!
Listen, I could bring a--"
"Oh, my goodness, Ethel--and I've got to go to town!" Susanna's tone
was hushed with a sort of horror. "And those seven women will be
here at half-past twelve! And not ONE thing in the house--"
"Oh, you could get Ludovici as far as the lunch goes, Sue. But the
girls will think it's odd, perhaps. Couldn't you wait and take the
one o'clock?"
"Yes, I'll get Ludovici," Susanna decided hastily. "No, I couldn't
do that. But I'll tell you what I COULD do. If you'll be an angel,
Ethel, and do the honors until I get here, I could lunch early, get
through my business in town, and get the one-fifty train for home--"
"Well, that'll be all right. I'll explain," said the amiable Mrs.
Harrington.
A few minutes later Mrs. Fairfax left the telephone and went down to
the kitchen to explain to Emma and Veronica, the maids, that there
would be a luncheon for eight ladies served by a caterer, in her
home, that day, and that they must simply assist him. She herself
must be in town unfortunately, but Mrs. Harrington had very kindly
offered to come over and be hostess and play the eighth hand of
bridge afterward. Emma and Veronica, perhaps more hardened to these
emergencies than are ordinary maids, rose to the occasion, and
Susanna hurried off to her train satisfied that as far as the actual
luncheon was concerned, all would go well. But what the seven women
would think was another story!
"I don't suppose Mrs. Thayer wants to do so very much shopping,"
said Susanna to herself, hurrying along. "If I meet her at eleven
and we lunch at one, say, I don't see why I shouldn't get the one-
fifty train home. I'd get here before the girls had fairly started
playing bridge, and explain--somehow one can always explain things
so much better in person--"
"Or suppose we lunched at half-past twelve," her uneasy thoughts ran
on. "That gives us an hour and a half to shop--that ought to be
plenty. But we mustn't lose a minute getting started! Mrs. Thayer
will come up in her motor--that will save us time. We can start
right off the instant I get to Jim's office."
She stopped at the caterer's for a brief but satisfactory interview.
The caterer was an artist, but his enthusiasms this morning were
wasted upon Susanna.
"Yes, yes--cucumber sandwiches by all means," she assented hastily,
"and the ices--just as you like! Plain, I think--or did you say in
cases? I don't care. Only don't fail me, Mr. Ludovici."
Fail her? Mr. Ludovici's lexicon did not know the word. Susanna
breathed more freely as she crossed the sunny village street to the
train.
The station platform was deserted and bare. Susanna, accustomed to a
breathless late arrival, could saunter with delightful leisure to
the ticket-seller's window.
"You've not forgotten the new time-table?" said the agent,
pleasantly, when they had exchanged greetings.
"Oh, does the change begin to-day?" Susanna looked blank.
"October sixteenth, winter schedule," he reminded her buoyantly.
"Going to be lots of engagements missed to-day!"
"But mine is very important and I cannot miss it," said Susanna,
displeased at his levity. "I MUST be in Mr. Fairfax's office at
eleven."
"You won't be more than ten or twelve minutes late," said young Mr.
Green, consolingly. "You tell Mr. Fairfax it's up to the N.Y. and
E.W."
Susanna smiled perfunctorily, but took her place in the train with a
sinking heart. She would be late, of course, and Jim would be angry,
of course. Late to-day, when every minute counted and the programme
allowed for not an instant's delay! Her eyes on the flying
countryside, she rehearsed her part, found herself eloquently
explaining to a pacified Jim, capturing a gracious Mrs. Thayer,
successfully reaching home again, and explaining to an entirely
amiable bridge club.
It could be done, of course, but it meant a pretty full day!
Susanna's mind reverted uneasily to the consideration that she had
already bungled matters. Oh, well, if she was late, she was late,
that was all; and if Jim was furious, why, Jim would simply have to
be furious! And she began her explanations again--
After all, it was but fifteen minutes past eleven when she walked
into her husband's office. But neither Jim nor Mrs. Thayer was
there.
"Mr. Fairfax went out not three minutes ago," said the pretty
stenographer in the outer office. Susanna, brought to a full stop,
stared at her blankly.
"Went out!"
"Yes, with Mrs. Thayer to the dentist. He said to say he was afraid
you had missed your train. There's a note."
The note was forthwith produced. Susanna read it frowningly. It was
rather conspicuously headed "Eleven-twelve!"
DEAREST GIRL: Can't wait any longer. Mrs. T. must see her dentist
(Archibald). I'm taking her up. Thayers and we lunch at the Palace
at one-thirty. Wait for me in my office. J. F.
"Oh, what is the matter with everything to-day!" Susanna burst out
in exasperation. "He's wild, of course. When does he ever sign
himself 'J. F.' to me! When did they go?" she asked Miss Perry,
briefly, with an unreasonable wish that she might somehow hold that
irreproachable young woman responsible.
"Just about three minutes ago," said Miss Perry. "He said that if
you had missed your train, you wouldn't be here for more than an
hour, and it was no use waiting."
"You see, it was a changed time-table, and he forgot it just as I
did," explained Susanna, pleased to find him fallible, even to that
extent.
"But HE was on time," fenced Miss Perry, innocently.
"They don't change the business trains," Susanna said coldly. And
she decided that she disliked this girl. She opened a magazine and
sat down by the open window.
The minutes ticked slowly by. The telephone rang, doors opened and
shut, and men came and went through the office. Susanna, opposed in
every fibre of her being to passive waiting, suddenly rose.
"Dr. Archibald is in the First National Bank Building, isn't he?"
she inquired. "I think I'll join Mrs. Thayer up there. There's no
use in my waiting here."
Miss Perry silently verified Dr. Archibald's address in the
telephone book, and to the First National Bank Building Susanna
immediately made her way. It was growing warmer now and the streets
seemed noisy and crowded, but no matter--"If I can only get to them
and SEE Jim!" thought Susanna.
In the pleasant shadiness of Dr. Archibald's office, rising from a
delightful mahogany arm-chair, Susanna presently asked if Mrs.
Thayer could be told that Mrs. Fairfax was there.
"I think Mrs. Thayer is gone," said the attendant pleasantly. "I'm
not sure, but I'll see."
In a few minutes she returned to inform Mrs. Fairfax that Mrs.
Thayer had just come in to have a bridge replaced, and was gone.
"You don't know where?" Susanna's voice was a trifle husky with
repressed emotion. She realized that she was getting a headache.
No, the attendant didn't know where.
So there was nothing for it but to go back to Jim's office, and back
Susanna accordingly went. She walked as fast as she could, conscious
of every separate hot step, and was nervous and headachy when she
entered Miss Perry's presence again.
Mr. Fairfax and Mrs. Thayer had not come in; no, but Miss Perry
reported that Mr. Fairfax had telephoned not ten minutes ago, and
seemed very anxious to get hold of his wife.
"Oh, dear, dear!" lamented Susanna. "And where is he now?"
Miss Perry couldn't say. "I wrote his message down," she said, with
sympathetic amusement at Susanna's crushed dismay. And, referring to
her notes, she repeated it:
"Mr. Fairfax said that Mrs. Thayer had had an appointment to see a
sick friend in a hospital this afternoon. But she has gone right out
there now instead, so that you and she can go shopping after lunch.
You are, please, to meet Mr. Fairfax and the Thayers at the Palace
for luncheon at half-past one; there'll be a table reserved. Mr.
Fairfax has a little business to attend to just now, but if you
don't mind waiting in the office, he thinks it's the coolest place
you could be. He wanted to know if you had the whole afternoon free-
-"
"Oh, absolutely!" Susanna assented eagerly. This was not the time to
speak or think of the bridge club.
"And that was all," finished Miss Perry, "except he said perhaps you
would like to look at the plans of the orphanage. Mr. Fairfax got
them out to show to Mr. Thayer this afternoon. I can get them for
you."
"Oh, thank you! I do want to see them!" said Susanna, gratefully.
And she established herself comfortably by the open window, the
orphanage plans, a stiff roll of blue paper, in her lap, her idle
eyes following the noonday traffic in the street below.
What a shame to have to sit here doing nothing, to-day of all days,
for nearly two hours! Susanna thought. Why, she could have met her
luncheon guests, seen that the meal was at least under way,
apologized in person, and then started for town. As it was, they
might be angry, and no wonder! And these were her neighbors and very
good friends, after all, the women upon whose good feeling half the
joy of her country home and garden depended. It was too bad!
She glanced at the blue-prints, but one of her sudden inspirations
turned the page blank. What time was it? Ten minutes of twelve. She
referred to her new timetable. Ten minutes of--why, she could just
catch the noon train, rush home, meet her guests, explain, and come
back easily on the one o'clock. But would it be wise? Why not?
Her thoughts in a jumble, Susanna hastily gathered her small
possessions together, moved to a decision by the always imperative
argument that in a few minutes it would be too late to decide.
"Heavens! I'm glad I thought of that!" she ejaculated, seating
herself in the train as the noon whistles shrilled all over the
city. A moment later she was a trifle disconcerted to find the
orphanage plans still in her hand.
"Well, this is surely one of my crazy days!" Susanna strapped the
stiff sheets firmly to her handbag. "I must not forget to take those
back," she told herself. "Jim will ask for them the very first
thing."
Her house; when she reached it, seemed quiet, seemed empty. Susanna
crossed the porch, wondering, and encountered the maid.
"Emma! Nobody come?"
"Sure you had the wrong day of it," said Emma, beaming. "Mrs.
Harrington fomed about an hour ago, and she says 'tis NEXT Saturday
thin!"
"What do you mean?" said Susanna, sharply.
"'Tis not to-day they're comin', Mrs. Fairfax--"
"Nonsense!" Susanna said under her breath. She flew to her desk and
snatched up the scribbled card of engagements. "Why, it's no such
thing!" she said indignantly. "Of course it's to-day! October
sixteenth, as plain as print." And with her eyes still on the card
she reached for her desk telephone.
"Ethel," said Susanna, a moment later. "Listen, Ethel, this is
Susanna. Ethel, what made you say the club luncheon wasn't to-day?
This is my day to have the girls.... Certainly.... Why, I don't care
what she said, I have it written down!... Why, I think that's very
funny.... I have it written.... No, you can laugh all you want to,
but I know I'm right.... No, that's nothing. Jim will eat it all up
to-morrow; he says he never gets enough to eat on Sundays.... But I
can't understand, and I don't believe YET that I... Yes, it's
written right here; I've got my eyes on it now! It's the most
extraordinary...."
A little vexed at Mrs. Harrington's unbounded amusement, Susanna
terminated the conversation as soon as was decently possible, and
went kitchenward. In her anxiety not to miss her train back to the
city, she refused Teresa's offer of dainty sandwiches, pastries, and
tea, and merely stopped long enough to brush up her hair and to
ascertain by carefully enumerating them out loud that she had her
purse, her gloves, the orphanage plans, and the new time-table.
"This will seem very funny," said poor Susanna, gallantly to
herself, as she took her seat in the train and tried to ignore a
really sharp headache, "when once I see them! If I can only get hold
of Jim, and if the afternoon goes smoothly, I shan't mind anything!"
Only ten minutes late for her luncheon engagement, Susanna entered
the cool depths of the restaurant and, piloted by an impressed head
waiter, looked confidently for her own party. It was very pleasant
here, and the trays of salads and iced things that were borne
continually past her were very inviting.
But still there was no Mrs. Thayer and no Jim. Susanna waited a few
nervous minutes, sat down, got up again, and finally, at two
o'clock, went out into the blazing, unfriendly streets, and walked
the five short squares that lay between the restaurant and her
husband's office. A hot, dusty wind blew steadily against her; the
streets were full of happy girls and men with suit-cases, bound for
the country and a day or two of fresh air and idleness. Miss Perry
was putting the cover on her typewriter as Susanna entered the
office, her own suit-case waiting in a corner. She looked astonished
as Susanna came in.
"My goodness, Mrs. Fairfax!" she ejaculated. "We've been trying and
trying to get you by telephone! Mr. Fairfax was so anxious to get
hold of those orphanage plans. Mr. Thayer wanted--"
"I've been following him about all day," said Susanna, with an
undignified, but uncontrollable gulp. She sat down limply. "WHAT
happened to the luncheon plan?" she asked forlornly. "Where is Mr.
Fairfax?"
Miss Perry, perhaps softened by the sight of Susanna's filling eyes
and tired face, became very sympathetic. "Isn't it TOO bad--I know
you have! But you see Mrs. Thayer couldn't see her friend in the
hospital this morning, so she came right down here and got here not
ten minutes after you left. She said she couldn't wait for you, as
she had to be back at the hospital at two, so she would do a little
shopping herself and let the rest wait."
"Well," said Susanna, after a pause in which her very soul rebelled,
"it can't be helped, I suppose! Did Mr. Fairfax go out with her?"
"He was to take her somewhere for a cup of tea and then he was going
home."
"Going home! But I've just come from there!"
"He thought he'd probably catch you there, I think. He was anxious
to get hold of those plans."
"Oh, I could CRY--" Susanna began despairingly. But indeed Miss
Perry needed no assurance of that. "I could cry!" said Susanna
again. "To-day," she expanded, "has been simply one miserable
accident after another! I hope it'll be a lesson to me! Well--" She
broke off short, for Miss Perry, while kind, was human, and was
visibly conscious that she had promised her brother and sister-in-
law to be at their house in East Auburndale, a populous suburb, long
before it was time to put the baby to bed. "I suppose there's
nothing for me to do but go home," finished Susanna, discontentedly.
"Accidents will happen!" trilled Miss Perry, blithely, hurrying for
her car.
Susanna went thoughtfully home, reflecting soberly upon the events
of the day. If she could but live this episode down, she told
herself; but meet and win Mrs. Thayer somehow in the near future;
but bring Jim to the point of entirely forgetting and forgiving the
whole disgraceful day, she would really reform. She would "keep
lists," she would "make notes," and she would "think twice." In
short, she would do all the things that those who had her good at
heart had been advising for the past ten years.
Of course, if the Thayers were resentful--refused to be placated--
Susanna made a little wry mouth. But they wouldn't be!
Still deep in stimulating thoughts of a complete reformation,
Susanna reached home again, crossed the deep-tiled porch with its
potted olives and gay awnings, entered the big hall now dim with
afternoon shadows. Now for Jim--!
But where was Jim?
"Mr. Fairfax is home, Emma?"
"Oh, there you are, Mrs. Fairfax! And us trying and trying to
telefome you! No ma'am, he's not home. He left on the three-twenty.
He'd only come out in a rush for some papers, and he had to get back
to town to see some one at once. There's a note--"
Susanna sat down. Her head was splitting, she was hungry and
exhausted, and, at the effort she made to keep the tears out of her
eyes, a wave of acute pain swept across her forehead. She opened the
note.
If you can find a reliable messenger [said the note, without
preamble], I wish you would get those orphanage plans to me at
Thornton's office before six. I have to meet him there at four. The
matter is really important, or I would not trouble you. I'll dine
with Thayer at the club. J.F. The pretty hallway and the glaring
strip of light beyond the open garden door swam suddenly before
Susanna's eyes. The hand that held the note trembled.
"I could not be so mean to him!" said Susanna to herself. "But
perhaps he was tired and hot--poor Jim!" And aloud she said with
dignity: "I shall have to take this paper--these plans--in to Mr.
Fairfax, Emma. I'll catch the four-twenty."
"You'll be dead!" said Emma, sympathetically.
"My head aches," Mrs. Fairfax admitted briefly. But when she was
upstairs and alone she found herself suddenly giving way to the long
deferred burst of tears.
After a while she bathed her eyes, brushed her hair, and substituted
a more substantial gown for the pongee. Then she started out once
more, refreshed and more cheerful in spite of herself, and soothed
unconsciously by the quiet close of the lovely autumn afternoon.
Her own gateway was separated by a flight of shallow stone steps
from the road, and Susanna paused there on her way to the train to
gather her skirts safely for the dusty walk. And while she was
standing there she found her gaze suddenly riveted upon a motor-car
that, still a quarter of a mile away, was rapidly descend the slope
of the hill, its two occupants fairly shaken by its violent and
rapid approach. The road here was not wide, and curved on a sharp
grade, and Susanna always found the descent of a large car, like
this one, a matter of half-terrified fascination. But surely with
this car there was more than the ordinary danger, she thought, with
a sudden sick thumping at her heart. Surely here was something all
wrong! Surely no sane driver--
"That man is drunk," she said, quite aloud. "He cannot make it! He
can't possibly--ah-h-h!"
Her voice broke on a gasp, and she pressed one hand tight over her
eyes. For with swift and terrible precision the accident had indeed
come to pass. The car skidded, turned, hung for a sickening second
on one wheel, struck the stone of the roadside fence with a horrible
grinding jar and toppled heavily over against the bank.
When Susanna uncovered her eyes again, and before she could move or
cry out in the dumb horror that had taken possession of her, she saw
a man in golfing wear run from the Porters' gate opposite; and
another motor, in which Susanna recognized the figure of a friend
and neighbor, Dr. Whitney, swept up beside the overturned one. When
she ran, as she presently found herself running, to the spot, other
men and women had gathered there, drawn from lawns and porches by
this sudden projection of tragedy into the gayety of their Saturday
afternoon.
"Hurt?" gasped Susanna, joining the group.
"The man is--dead, Billy says," said young Mrs. Porter, in lowered
tones, with an agitated clutch of Susanna's arm. "And, poor thing!
she doesn't realize it, and she keeps asking where her chauffeur is
and why he doesn't come to her!"
"Wouldn't you think people would have better sense than to keep a
man like that!" added another neighbor, Dexter Ellis, with a
bitterness born entirely of nervousness. "He was drunk as a lord!
Young and I were just coming out of my side gate--"
Every one talked at once--there was a confusion of excited comment.
Somebody had flung a carriage robe over the silent form of the man
as it lay tumbled in the dust and weeds; Susanna glanced toward it
with a shudder. Somehow she found herself supporting the car's other
occupant, the woman, who was half sitting and half lying on the bank
where she had fallen. The woman had opened her eyes and was looking
slowly about the group; she had pushed away the whiskey the doctor
held to her lips, but she looked sick and seemed in pain.
"I had just put the baby down when I heard Dex shout--" Susanna
could hear Mrs. Ellis saying behind her in low tones. "Oh, it is,
it's an outrage--they should have regarded it years ago," said
another voice. "Merest chance in the world that we took the side
gate," Dexter Ellis was saying, and some man's voice Susanna did not
know reiterated over and over: "Well, I guess he's run his last car,
poor fellow; I guess he's run his last car--"
"You feel better, don't you?" the doctor asked his patient,
encouragingly. "Just open your mouth and swallow this." And Susanna
said gently: "Just try it; you'll feel so much stronger!"
The woman turned upon her a pair of eyes as heavy as a sick
animal's, and moistened her lips. "Arm," she said with difficulty.
"Her arm's broken," said the doctor, in a low tone, "and I think her
leg, too. Kane has gone to wire for the ambulance. We'll get her
right into town."
"You can't take her to town!" Susanna ejaculated, turning so that
she might not be heard by the sufferer. "Take her in to my house."
"The hospital is really the most comfortable place for her, Mrs.
Fairfax," the doctor said guardedly. "I am afraid there is internal
injury. Her mind seems somewhat confused. You can't undertake the
responsibility--"
"Ah, but you can't jolt the poor thing all the way into town--"
Susanna began again. Mrs. Porter, at her shoulder, interrupted her
in an earnest whisper:
"Sue, dear, it's always done. It won't take very long, and nobody
expects you--"
"I know just how Susanna feels," interrupted Mrs. Ellis, "but after
all, you never can tell--we don't know one thing about her--"
"She'll be taken good care of," finished the doctor, soothingly.
"Please--don't let them frighten--my husband--" said the woman
herself, slowly, her distressed eyes moving from one face to
another. "If I could--be moved somewhere before he hears--"
"We won't frighten him," Susanna assured her tenderly. "But will you
tell us your name so we may let him know?"
The injured woman frowned. "I did tell you--didn't I?" she asked
painfully.
"No"--Susanna would use this tone in her nursery some day--"No,
dear, not yet."
"Tell us again," said the doctor, with too obvious an intention to
soothe.
The woman gave him a look full of dignified reproach.
"If I could rest on your porch a little while," she said to Susanna,
ignoring the others rather purposely, "I should be quite myself
again. That will be best. Then I can think--I can't think now. These
people--and my head--"
And she tried to rise, supporting herself with a hand on Susanna's
arm. But with the effort the last vestige of color left her face,
and she slipped, unconscious, back to the grass.
"Dead?" asked Susanna, very white.
"No--no! Only fainted," Dr. Whitney said. "But I don't like it," he
added, his finger at the limp wrist.
"Bring her in, won't you?" Susanna urged with sudden decision. "I
simply can't let her be taken 'way up to town! This way--"
And, relieved to have it settled, she led them swiftly across the
garden and into the house, flung down the snowy covers of the guest-
room bed, and with Emma's sympathetic help established the stranger
therein.
"Trouble," whispered the injured woman apologetically, when she
opened her eyes upon walls and curtains rioting with pink roses, and
felt the delicious softness and freshness of the linen and pillows
about her.
"Oh, don't think of that--I love to do it!" Susanna said honestly,
patting her head. "A nurse is coming up from the village to look out
for you, and she and the doctor are going to make you more
comfortable."
The woman, fixing her with a dazed yet curiously intent look, formed
with her lips the words, "God bless you," and wearily shut her eyes.
Susanna, slipping out of the room a few minutes later, said over and
over again to herself, "I don't care--I'm glad I did it!"
Still, it was not very reassuring to hear the big hall clock strike
six, and suddenly to notice the orphanage plans lying where they had
been flung on the hall table.
"I wish it was the middle of next year," said Susanna, thoughtfully,
going out to sink wearily into a porch chair, "or even next week!
I'd pretend to be asleep when Jim came home to-night," she went on
gloomily, "if it wasn't my duty to sit up and explain that there are
a perfect stranger and a trained nurse in the house. Of course,
being there as I was, any humane person would have to do what I did,
but it does seem strange, this day of all days, that I had to be
there! And I wish I had thought to send those plans in by messenger-
-that would have been one thing the less to worry about, at least!--
What is it, Emma?"
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