Nobody's Child

"Never mind, Ann, be patient. There is the future – you will leave the farm, one of these days."

He had spoken quietly enough, but Ann had seen the color come slowly into his face. Though he had turned to look at the water, she had seen and wondered. Was he beginning to care for her – as Garvin did? Such a possibility had never before occurred to her! He had seemed so much older than Garvin – old enough to be her father. It made her very uncomfortable, the first touch of self-consciousness she had had while with him. For several days after that, she had taken her book and hurried away.

Then Ben Brokaw had added to her anxiety. They talked together as always, she and Ben. Though he had said nothing, Ann knew that he understood about her father and herself. On the evening of that Sunday when she had met her father, she had found on her window-sill a box lined with pine-needles and on them several sprays of arbutus. She knew instantly that Ben had put them there, climbed to the roof to do it. His was the language of the woods: Ann knew from the pine-needles that Ben had been somewhere about when she had lain sobbing beneath the pine trees. And she had known just how to thank him; she had pinned a bit of the arbutus to her dress the next morning, and had smiled at him. "It's sweet," was all she had said. And all Ben said was "Um!"

Ben rarely mentioned Coats Penniman, but occasionally he had been satirical over the changes Coats was making. When the house became redolent of paint, he took his hammock and slept in the woods. "Paint is supposed to be a' awful good thing," he told Ann. "Even the ladies thinks it'll hide old age, but it don't deceive nobody. I never took no stock in paint – wood is one of the prettiest things on earth; why cover it up?"

On the evening when he talked with Ann in a way that made her anxious, he began by saying, "This place an' Westmo' is becomin' too fashionable. All we needs now is a' automobile. Westmo's got one – I seen Garvin scarin' chickens an' niggers all down the Post-Road this mornin', an' that young cool-head who's stayin' at the club an' makin' love to Miss Judith showin' Garvin how to do it. If the president was to travel down the Post-Road in a wheelbarrer, it wouldn't stir up half the sensation Garvin did… I reckon Edward wanted to give Garvin something to occupy his mind. Well, he's done it – an' a fashionable way to break his neck, too."

Ann knew that Garvin was to have the automobile. He had told her that it was coming, and that, as soon as he could run it, he would take her with him to the city and back in an evening. That now he could show her the city of which she knew so little.

But she did not comment on Garvin's new possession. "You always speak of Garvin in that way, Ben, and differently of Edward Westmore – why do you?" she asked gravely.

"Edward's a gentleman an' Garvin's jes' a Westmo', second generation to his pa," Ben returned.

"I thought every Westmore was a gentleman," Ann said, quite as Judith might have spoken; there was hauteur in the reproof. Her head had lifted.

It was not too dark for Ben to see her face, and he glanced at her, a swift, intensely interested look, a deeply anxious look as well. But his answer was drawled as usual. "Accordin' to the dictionary, they are, Ann. I read up on 'gentleman' once, an' I decided that there dictionary wasted a lot of words. Why didn't it jest say, 'Gentleman: the man who does to others like he'd have them do to him.' Of co'se, if it was necessary to say more, it could jest add that there is those who grows to be gentlemen. A man can train hisself to be one. Edward has growed to be a gentleman – I found that out when he come back… Now, if there was anything troublin' me, I'd go straight to Edward Westmo'. There ain't anythin' I'd be afraid to tell him. An' that's the advice I'd give to any one who was doubtful in their mind about anything, or who'd got into trouble – jest to talk to Edward about it… I'm down about the woods a good bit, an' I often see Edward comin' an' goin'. We speaks. There ain't much goes on down there I don't know about; even when I'm not there, my eye's on them woods. If Edward Westmo' sat down a bit on Penniman land, I wouldn't say nothing about it – not I. I'd as soon cut my hand off as set a Penniman on a Westmo'. Coats Penniman has growed, like I tell you some men do, Ann, but he ain't growed enough not to hate a Westmo'. That's one reason I keep my eye on them woods – I wouldn't answer for what would happen if a Westmo' angered Coats Penniman."

Ann had nothing to say to this long speech; she escaped as soon as possible to think it over. Ben had the queer cautious ways of an animal – he had told her several things, in his usual fashion. He had meant to tell her that Garvin was not as fine a man as Edward. Ann was forced to confess that she felt he was not. But Garvin was younger, and impatient and unhappy, just as she was. She loved and pitied Garvin, and nothing Ben could say would make her stop loving him.

And Ben had also meant to tell her that he knew and approved of her talking to Edward; that he stood guard over them. He wanted her to tell Edward about Garvin. She felt certain that Ben knew she cared for Garvin. Possibly he knew that they met, but she was not so certain of that.

Ann's anxiety was principally on Garvin's account. If her father discovered them it would be terrible. They ought not to meet in that way. But Garvin could not take her away now… And even if he could, did she love him enough to go with him and face all the trouble that would follow? And yet, she would be sick with loneliness if Garvin went away and left her. But if she did not love Garvin – in the way in which he wanted her to love him – she ought to tell him so and not meet him any more. And she could not tell Edward about his brother – not after the way in which Edward had looked at her the last time she saw him – she simply couldn't.

XVIII

"YOU'RE ALL I HAVE"

Ann spent a troubled night after her talk with Ben, and she had reached no decision the next day when she went down to the woods to get her book. She did not know whether or not she would wait to see Edward. She ought not to see him. It had not occurred to her that as things were between Garvin and herself, she ought not to see Edward in this way – not until after she had suspected that Edward cared a great deal for her.

Ann did not know how much she wanted to see Edward until she discovered that there was no book left for her. She searched the bushes thoroughly; there was nothing there. Then she paused to think… She had avoided Edward and he had decided that she did not want to see him; she had lost her friend.

Ann went slowly back to the road and stood hesitating. She did not want to go back to the house; she felt more like going up to the pines, to sit with her trouble where no one would see her.

She had flushed while she searched and found nothing, then grown pale when she felt that she had been forsaken. She brightened into beauty when she heard a horse on the Back Road. He was late in coming, that was all. She waited, her eyes fixed on the turning in the road.

It was Baird who appeared, and, riding with him, Judith Westmore. They were riding so close to each other that their horses almost touched, Judith with head bent and playing with her whip, Baird looking down at her.

Ann would have escaped if she could, but they were upon her before she had recovered from surprise, and Baird had seen her. He straightened instantly, and Ann also stiffened, moving only to give them room to pass. Baird looked at her steadily, for a questioning instant, then suddenly smiled and lifted his cap. He bowed profoundly enough when Ann smiled, though she had merely glanced at him; she was looking at Judith.

Ann's smile and bow should have been claimed by Judith, it was meant for her; but she looked at Ann, at her and through her, a blankly brilliant stare, then touched her horse. Both horses leaped at her flick of the whip, and left Ann standing beside the road.

Ann did not go to the pines and weep; it might have been better for her if she had. She went back to the house, and with head high. Hers had always been an inflammable temper, but never before had she felt the profound anger that held her now. It turned her cold, not hot. With all the family enmity forgotten, she had smiled as she would have smiled at Edward, and had been cut in a manner possible only to as finished a product as Judith. Ann's nerves were always high strung, and for the last weeks she had been under the strain of persistent denial, anxious over the danger to Garvin of their secret meetings, and too inexperienced to realize the still greater danger to herself from the sort of appeal Garvin was making to her; certain only that neither he nor she was happy. Edward's defection had been followed too closely by Judith's act. Ann shivered like one with ague.

She was very quiet at supper. The meal was a hurried one, for Sue and Coats were going to the village, and no one noticed Ann's white face. She was going to meet Garvin that night. She went as soon as it was dark, and waited for him, sitting tensely upright under the willows; usually it was Garvin who waited. She sat so still that a rabbit came in under the willows, almost to her feet, before it leaped and fled.

Garvin came presently, well hidden by the dense growth of elderberry bushes that, matted by foxgrape vines, extended to the creek. He had chosen this spot because he could come all the way from the woods under cover. "Ann!" he said. "You here first!" On the instant his arms were about her.

Ann did not hold him off as usual. She sat quite still and let him kiss her. It was a few moments before he noticed how passive she was. "What is it? What has happened?" he asked.

"Just that I have made up my mind."

"To what?" he asked, not knowing what to expect, for he was accustomed to reluctance and withdrawal.

"That I'll go with you, Garvin – as soon as you can take me away. Then I'll marry you. I'm a Penniman, but I'm fully as good as your sister – or any Westmore lady ever was. I'm not afraid to marry you."

The blood flared in Garvin's face, but he thanked her as tenderly as any Westmore ever uttered the words. "My darling!.. You do love me, then! You do love me! Thank you, dear."

Ann's hand drew his face to hers. "You're all I have," she said.

Garvin held her closely while he drew off his seal ring, engraved with the Westmore crest, and put it on her finger. "You can't wear it openly, dear; but every time you look at it it will remind you that you are promised to me."

He kissed her hands and her lips, while he gave her every assurance desire for possession ever invented. And Ann, borne into more perfect trust, gave her future more fully into his keeping.

XIX

A BARGAIN

On the way back to Westmore that night, Garvin met Baird. Baird had been riding with Judith in the afternoon and had dined at Westmore and spent the evening there. When Garvin, saying that he must go to the village, had excused himself and had hurried to Ann, he had left Baird with Edward and Judith. Very soon Edward also had gone out, and Baird and Judith had spent the evening together, as was frequent of late.

Both Garvin and Baird were riding slowly, for both were engrossed by the subject to which, next to his struggle for existence, man gives his intensest interest; Baird had just parted from Judith, Garvin from Ann.

"Hello, Garvin – just back?" Baird asked.

"Yes… Baird, I think Will Prescott wants a machine. You know he's a sort of third cousin of ours by marriage."

Baird wondered if there was any one of their class in the southeastern states who was not, by marriage or otherwise, cousin to a Westmore. It was an effective argument he had used in persuading Edwin Carter and the others who were combining to form the automobile manufacturing company in which Baird meant to have a large interest, that Garvin would serve them well if given the city agency.

"Good!" he said. "Nail him – or any one else who comes your way. The commission'll be yours."

"How soon do you think I can get back into town and get to work?" Garvin asked. "Is the agency a sure thing?" It was the question to which he had been leading.

Baird had no intention of being hurried in the matter. He meant that Edward should give a guarantee for Garvin that would make his own position in the firm "a sure thing."

"I'll know that in a few days, Garvin. I have to see Edwin Carter again – I can tell you more then. I see no reason why the thing shouldn't go through. I'm going to make every effort to get it for you."

Garvin was forced to curb his impatience. "You're a brick, Baird."

"No – I think you're the man for the place."

They parted, each taking up thoughts that had little to do with business.

Garvin looked up at the long dim line of Westmore. Let Edward have the place if he wanted it; it was rightfully Edward's; it was Edward's money that had bought up the mortgages. He would take Ann and go. Go soon, even if he had to attach himself to Baird's firm merely as a traveling agent.

He unsaddled, stalled his horse, and let himself into the house. The lights were out; Edward and Judith must have gone to bed.

But he saw, as he came up the stairs, that Edward was still up. He was standing in his open door, evidently waiting for him. In his harassed condition, Edward was the last person he wanted to see.

"You up, Ed?" he said casually.

"Yes… Come in here – I want to speak to you."

Garvin knew instantly that something serious had happened; Edward's manner was so deadly quiet, his voice so ominously even. The apprehension that harried them all was the first thing that settled upon Garvin. "Well, what now?" he said. "Sarah again, I suppose."

Edward closed the door, then faced him. "No… I wish that every other irresponsible in our family was as safely guarded as poor Sarah is in the place to which I took her… Garvin Westmore, what's this thing you've been doing? Leading astray a girl who is no more than a child – meeting her at night! How far has it gone? By heaven! if you have harmed her – I'll – " Edward broke off, grasping at the self-control that was leaving him.

Garvin's brain had leaped from thought to thought. Who had spied upon him? How much did Edward know? He could not have been near them that evening. It was not possible for any one to come near the willows and he not detect it. Garvin was capable of perfect coolness, and at unexpected moments. "What girl are you talking about?" he demanded. "I've played with more than one girl on the Ridge – so did you, I reckon, in your time."

Edward drew an uneven breath. "I mean Ann Penniman."

"Yes, I've talked to Ann – what of it?"

"Answer my question! How far has this thing gone?" Edward repeated with such intense passion that Garvin recoiled, surprised rather than angered. Had he not been surprised, he would instantly have flared. "I've done Ann no harm!.. But what great difference should it make to you? What's Ann Penniman to you? Why the devil should you come at me in this fashion – even if I had gone the lengths! One would suppose I'd been poaching on your preserves! I'm my own master – neither you nor any other man shall question me about how or with whom I choose to amuse myself!" Garvin had flared finally.

Edward knew well what that sudden high note in Garvin's voice portended. He spoke quickly: "I apologize… I ought to have got at the thing differently… Sit down a moment – I want to talk of something else, first … this matter of your getting the agency… I've been consulting with Baird – about it… Sit down – "

Edward had talked with a certain haste, and yet with pauses, quieting his brother while he sought for his own self-control. It was almost beyond him; he had paused, laid hold on the thing, gone on, paused again. He ended with outward calm.

And Garvin had quieted in the sudden way usual with him. Edward had motioned him to a chair, and he took it. Edward sat down opposite to him at the desk; he looked down while he talked. "It seems it depends on me whether Baird's firm will take you on or not. If I take stock in their company, they will give you the agency. I've – "

"I don't want you to sacrifice money on my account," Garvin interrupted. "I mean to go somewhere – away from here – and just as soon as I can. I'll look about for something else, that's all."

Edward continued steadily. "I shall not be doing that. I've looked into the matter – I've had my lawyer do it – for I'm no business man. He says it's a good investment, and I'm willing to go into it. I'd do almost anything to forward either your interests or Judith's. All I can do for Sarah is to see that she has every comfort it's possible to give her at a sanatorium. I made a mistake in taking her out and bringing her here, after she had been shut away from Westmore for twelve years. No wonder her poor brain went wild again and drove her to the Mine Banks. I learned my lesson. I'll never forget that night when you and the rest went after her and we waited here, all of us certain that she had done away with herself. We've Ben Brokaw to thank for having saved us that tragedy." He looked up at his brother. "You see, Garvin, the thing I'm living for now is the Westmore family. I don't want the family to go under. You have splendid blood in you – in spite of the unfortunate inheritance our father gave you. But if you don't give yourself all the help you can, you are done for. I'd give a good deal if you would take hold on life, use your will to create something of a future for yourself. I know how hard it is to do it in this environment, so I'd be glad to have you get out of it, and glad to help you do it."

"Would you advise me to marry and give Westmore an heir?" Garvin asked with bitter sarcasm.

Edward was silent.

"We can cut that possibility out of my future, then. All I want is a more normal sort of life than I've had, and I think I may get it away from here. I mean to get it – it'll save me if anything will. You happened to have been born before father started down hill – you and Judith are the fortunate ones – it's for you to give Westmore an heir." He ended more gravely than bitterly.

"All that lies in the future," Edward returned quietly. He straightened. "Garvin, I'm willing to give you your chance away from here – I'll arrange with Baird to have you go at the earliest possible moment – will you promise in return that you will give up this thing which you have assured me was nothing but play on your part, with Ann?"

Garvin was silent for a moment; then he said, "I want to go as soon as I can. But even if I have to wait around for a while, I promise I'll not go near Ann – that bit of play is ended."

Edward studied him; their eyes met fairly. "Very well," he said. "I will see Baird to-morrow," and he rose.

Garvin got up also, but at the door he stopped. "You've questioned me, Ed – before I go I'd like to ask a question or two."

"Very well."

"Who told you I met Ann?"

"I can't answer that question."

"Did Ann tell you?"

"No – certainly not."

"Then tell me this: What's your especial interest in Ann Penniman?"

Edward's face became expressionless, but he answered clearly, "Your own judgment ought to tell you why I'm horrified at this performance of yours. If Coats Penniman knew, he would draw the same conclusion I did, and he would shoot you on sight. You know how I feel toward the Pennimans, that they have been wronged by our family. Ann deserves the love of an honest man, and it's perfectly evident to me that your intentions do not come under that head. I'll tell you quite frankly that I mean to guard Ann from you – for both your sakes. So, if, in an irrational moment, you should forget your promise to me, I warn you that you will pay dearly for it."

"Save your threats," Garvin returned coolly. "I have no intention of seeing Ann. You seem to feel strongly on the subject, more so than the matter warrants. The best thing will be for me to get away from the Ridge as soon as possible and relieve you of worry," and he went out.

Left alone, Edward paced the floor; there were vivid enough passions beneath the quiet exterior Edward Westmore presented to the world. In his agitation he spoke aloud. "I can't be candid with him, as one would be with a man!" he said passionately. "But if I find he has lied to me! If he has harmed her – !"

XX

MARRY? YES

When Baird parted from Garvin, he had returned to the thoughts that Garvin's business talk had interrupted; he had been thinking of marriage and of Judith.

Except on the rare occasions when he was touched by depression, Nickolas Baird had always thought of his immunity from family bonds with satisfaction. But to-night he had realized, somewhat suddenly, that he was about to give up his hitherto much-prized freedom, and that Judith Westmore would not object to his doing so.

It had come about so naturally, that intimacy of theirs. He was fully accepted now, on the Ridge; more than that, he was welcomed by Ridge society with the hospitality characteristic of southern people when assured. The night spent at Westmore, when he had borne himself well, had won for Baird the support of every Westmore, and they were a numerous clan. Colonel Dickenson had put Baird forward at the Fair Field Club and in the city. "A gentleman, suh, an' a born financier," was his introduction, "a great friend of my cousins, the Westmores." Baird had the faculty of interesting men much older than himself: business men by his pronounced level-headedness, convivials like the colonel by his apparently inexhaustible supply of anecdotes, related simply and with a humorous zest that was captivating because in no way assumed.

And Baird had not neglected his opportunities. The establishment of an automobile factory important enough to compete with the largest in the United States was now an assured thing. Joseph Dempster, an Indiana near-millionaire, was the nucleus about which Baird had woven his web. Dempster already had an interest in a motor company, and it was Baird who had suggested to him the easy possibility of enlarging the Dempster factory so that it would be one of the biggest concerns in the States. It was he who had pointed out that Edwin Carter's steel interests made him the most eligible man to approach. Dempster had little of Baird's persuasive ability, and knew it, and he also had a high opinion of Baird's gift; the young fellow carried a middle-aged man's head on his shoulders – in matters of business. Baird had been sent east to interest Carter and had captured him.

Baird's reward was to be a high-salaried position and an interest in the company; Dempster had guaranteed him that. Baird regarded his interest in the company as the important thing. He had very little money of his own, the disastrous two years in South America had cleaned him out, so, while he spent the mornings in Carter's office going over Dempster's plans and specifications for the new factory and took charge of the correspondence connected with it, he had been considering ways and means of pushing his own interests.

He wanted a larger interest in the company. Dempster and Carter meant to keep the controlling interest in their own hands, but they would welcome sums of which they might have the handling, additions to the company of men like Edward Westmore who would be content simply to draw dividends and interfere in no way with the management of the concern. If he could capture for them several such men as Edward Westmore, his own reward would be an increased interest in the company. Just let him once get on his feet, have some negotiable paper at his command, and he would outdistance both Dempster and Carter; he had a better business brain than either of them. Baird was not in the least modest about his own capability, and he had learned the wisdom of going slowly.

The two hunt clubs had seemed to him a good field for operations; certainly the best he could command. He would meet there just the sort of men who would be useful to him. Though unacquainted with Baird's reasons, Edwin Carter had willingly put him up at the Ridge Club, and his recommendation of the young man was genuine enough. Baird's good sense had both surprised and pleased him. The young fellow had the qualities of a winner; most young men with the attractions of a city open to them would not care to sleep where the whip-poor-wills held sway.