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Flaming Youth

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<h2>CHAPTER XXII</h2> What work Osterhout was able to do in the two days following Pat's revelation was mainly mechanical. Neither his mind nor his real interest were enlisted. Pat's supposed situation absorbed both. There were so many phases to that problem! If only Mona were alive. That thought came to him with more poignancy than for a long time past. He would have taken Pat's secret to her at once, without hesitancy. Could he take it to any other member of the family? Certainly not Ralph Fentriss. Nor the helpless Constance. Dee? He shrank from that idea with an invincible reluctance. Life, he more than suspected, was not treating Dee over-tenderly. He took his perplexities out into the bluster and whirl of a wild afternoon, and came back weary and a little quieted to find the subject of them stretched out on his divan, fast asleep. Her face, he observed pitifully, showed not only exhaustion but a deeper strain. He touched her limp hand and spoke her name softly. At once she sprang half erect, like a startled animal. "Oh, Bobs! It's you. I'm so glad you've come. I'm afraid, Bobs." "No, dear; you mustn't let yourself be," he soothed her. "There's nothing——" "You don't understand. And I've got to tell you. That's what I'm scared about." "Haven't you told me the whole thing, Bambina?" "No. I'll—I'll tell you on the way over to Dee's." "To Dee's?" [Pg 232] "Yes. Dee's ill. You must come at once." He caught up his hat and gloves; his overcoat he had not taken off. "What is it?" "Bobs, it's—it's that." "That? What? Can't you speak out?" Out in the air she took a deep breath. "It wasn't me at all that was in trouble," she announced desperately. "Not you?" Stupefaction was in his voice. Gathering wrath superseded it as he demanded, "Is this some kind of an infernal joke?" "No. It was Dee all the time. As I told you at first." "Then why in the name——" "You wouldn't help her because she's married. So I thought you might help me, if you thought it was me, because I wasn't." "An admirable little game. But I'm still not sure that I quite get the point of it." His voice was so ugly that Pat's shook as she said: "The point was to get you to tell me, if you wouldn't help me yourself, about one of those men in the newspaper——" "Dee went to one of them?" he broke in. She looked up at him piteously, pleadingly. "Bobs, it was terrible. He was so—so ghastly business-like." "What did you expect?" he returned grimly. "And now she's ill?" "Yes." "Fever?" "I—I think so." With a barked-out oath he increased his pace. Pat, striding fast to keep up said: "Bobs, dear; Dee doesn't know about it." "About what?" [Pg 233] "About my pretending that I was the one. It was my own notion." "Then you will tell her," he ordained with chill command, "as soon as she is well enough to hear it. If she gets well enough," he added. "If? Bobs! You don't think there's any real danger——" "Of course there is danger. What do you think fever means in such a case? You take things into your own hands, perpetrate a piece of criminal folly——" "Bobs! I couldn't have stopped her." "You could have told me the truth and let me handle the situation. She would never have dared if she knew that I knew. Now, if Dee dies——" "Don't, Bobs!" "It will be your lie that killed her." For once the reckless soul of Pat shrunk back upon itself in awed remorse. "You've never spoken to me that way in your life," she whimpered. "I've never felt toward you before as I feel now." "I'm sorry, Bobs. But I had to do it. I'd do it again to save Dee." "Save her? Aid her in a cowardly shirking of her first duty as a woman and a wife. It is bad enough to find you lying to me. But to find her a coward and a slacker——" "You're more angry at her than you are at me, aren't you?" said Pat, in wonder and some resentment. She did not like to have anyone else put before her even for indignation. He made no reply, but turned in at the gateway to the James ground. As they passed under the portico she stole a glance at his face. It had, by the magic of his[Pg 234] will, become calm, cheerful, self-possessed, exorcised of all wrath and dismay, the face of the confident, confidence-inspiring physician going on his duty of aid. Pat marvelled and admired. For her it was a long and thought-haunted half hour before he emerged from Dee's room. "Is it bad?" she whispered, striving to read his expression. "No. A slight nervous shock. Nothing more." "Oh, Bobs! I could cry with thankfulness." "Save your tears," he advised, "for those on whom they might make an impression." "You don't like me much, do you?" she sighed. "Did you tell Dee about my trick?" "Haven't I made it clear that you are to make that explanation?" "What if I don't choose to?" "I think you will. Whether you like it or not." Pat said with slow malice: "Shall I tell her that you asked me to marry you?" "Why not?" "Oh, very well!" She could think of nothing more effective to say. He took his coat and hat from the chair upon which he had tossed them. "Bobs." He turned at the door, eyeing her with an uncompromising regard. "Don't look at me in that poisonous way. Say you're sorry, or I'm sorry, or something." He did not move but seemed to be considering. When he spoke his voice shook her with its gravity: "It is not going to be easy to forgive you, Pat." "How about Dee?" she shot at him. [Pg 235] "That is between Dee and myself. She at least did not lie to me." Pat flamed with a sense of unmerited injuries. "Oh, you go to hell!" she muttered. But her eyes were wondering and frightened after he left her. Dee's voice calling gave her something else to think about. She ran upstairs. "What were you and Bobs quarrelling about?" demanded the patient. "Nothing." "You were. Was it about me? Is he very bitter against me?" "I'll tell you to-morrow. You must go to sleep now." "There's something back of this." Dee jumped from her bed and set her back to the door. "You won't leave this room till you tell me." "Get back into bed," implored the alarmed Pat. "I'll tell you. Truly I will." "Tell, then." Pat related the tale of the stratagem with increasing relish in the unfolding of the drama. "Pretty clever of little Pat, what?" "I'm sorry you had to lie to Bobs, though." "I've kept the best of it. When I told him, Bobs asked me to marry him." "Asked you?" "Yes. Isn't that a scream!" Between nervousness and exaltation of her diplomatic powers Pat burst into laughter. "And you laugh?" The mirth died on her lips. "Don't you think it's fun——" "You—dirty—little—beast." "What did I do?" faltered the younger sister. "Why[Pg 236] pick on me? I did it all for you anyway, and I think it's pretty rotten, if you ask me, to——" "You didn't laugh at Bobs for me." "I didn't laugh at him at all. I was too paralysed." "If you had I hope he'd have killed you. I would." A monstrous conjecture rose in Pat's excited brain. "He isn't the man, is he? It isn't Bobs that you're crazy about, and the other man just a bluff? It couldn't be." "Why couldn't it?" "Dee! It isn't." "No; it isn't. But there's no reason why it couldn't be with any woman who had heart and sense enough to know him for what he is. He's the best and finest person I've ever known. And when he does the biggest and noblest thing a man could do and offers his name and honour to shield a little heartless fool, he gets laughed at." "But it wasn't any of it true," cried Pat feebly. "Don't you see what a difference that makes?" "No. He thought it was true." "Oh, very well! I guess I'm pretty rotten. But I'm just as fond of Bobs as you are, Dee Fentriss. Only, the idea of marrying him—well, it's a scream. That's all; a simple scream." "Oh, do get out of here," said Dee wearily. She slumped down into her bed and drew the covers up. "Good-night," said Pat, and made her exit. Before the hall mirror she paused to contemplate herself. "There you are, Pattie-pat," she remarked, with the little triple jerk of the head that set her shaggy locks rippling over her ears and neck. "You still look pretty good to me. But if this family was running a popularity contest with peanuts for ballots, you wouldn't get one shuck. Lord-ee! I wish Cary Scott was here for just one minute! I need moral support." <hr /> [Pg 237] <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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