Part 50

Luigi stared at her in amazement. He scarce could keep pace with her rapid walk that was almost a run. Her cheeks were aflame; her eyes filled with tears. All her pent up wretchedness of the last two months, all her outraged love, her womanhood's humiliation, a sense of life's bitter injustice and of her impotence to avenge the wrong put upon her affections, found vent in these three words. And Luigi, seeing Aileen Armagh changed into something that an hour before he would not have believed possible, was gripped by a sudden fear,--he must know the truth for his own peace of mind,--and, under its influence, he laid his hand on her arm and brought her to a standstill.

Rag snarled another warning; Aileen thrust him aside with her foot.

"What has he done to you to make you hate him so?"

Because he spoke slowly, Aileen thought he was speaking calmly. Had she not been carried away by her own strength of feeling, she would have known that she might not risk the answer she gave him.

"Done to me?--nothing; what could he do?--but I hate him--I never want to see his face again!"

She was beside herself with anger and shame. It was the tone of Luigi's voice that brought her to her senses; in a flash she recalled Octavius Buzzby's warning about playing with "volcanic fires." It was too late, however, to recall her words.

"Luigi, I've said too much; you don't understand--now let's drop it." She drew away her arm from beneath his hand, and resumed her rapid walk up the driveway, Rag trotting after her.

"And you mean what you say--you never want to see him again?" He spoke again slowly.

"Never," she said firmly.

Luigi made no reply. They were nearing the house. She turned to him when they reached the steps.

"Luigi,"--she put out her hand and he took it in both his,--"forget what I've said about another and forgive me for what I've had to say to yourself--we've always been such good friends, that now--"

She was ready with the smile that captivated him, but it was a tremulous one for she smiled through tears; she was thinking of the contrast.

"And always will be, Aileen, when we both know for good and all that we can be nothing more to each other," he answered gently.

She was grateful to him; but she turned away and went up the steps without saying good-bye.

"'Gad, I wish I was well out of it!"

For the first time within the memory of Elmer Wiggins and Lawyer Emlie, who heard the Colonel's ejaculation, his words and tone proclaimed the fact that he was not in his seemingly unfailing good spirits. He was standing with the two at the door of the drug shop and watching the crowds of men gathered in groups along the main street.

It was Saturday afternoon and the men were idle, a weekly occurrence the Colonel had learned to dread since his incumbency as deputy sheriff and, in consequence of his office, felt responsible for the peace of the community at large until Monday morning.

Something unusual was in the air, and the three men were at once aware of it. The uneasiness, that had prevailed in the sheds and at The Gore during the past month, was evidently coming to a crisis now that the men's pay was two weeks overdue.

Emlie looked grave on replying, after a pause in which the three were busy taking note of the constantly increasing crowd in front of the town hall:

"I don't blame you, Colonel; there'll be the deuce to pay if the men don't get paid off by Monday noon. They've been uneasy now so long about the piece work settlement, that this last delay is going to be the match that fires the train--and no slow match either from the looks; I don't understand this delay. When did Romanzo send his last message?"

"About an hour ago, but he hasn't had any answer yet," replied the Colonel, shading his eyes with his hat to look up street at the town hall crowd. "He has been telephoning and telegraphing off and on for the last two weeks; but he can't get any satisfaction--corporations, you know, don't materialize just for the rappings."

"What does Champney say?" inquired Mr. Wiggins.

"State of the market," said the Colonel laconically.

The men did not look at one another, for each was feeling a certain degree of indignation, of humiliation and disappointment that one of their own, Champney Googe, should go back on Flamsted to the extent of allowing the "market" to place the great quarry interests, through non-payment of the workers, in jeopardy.

"Has Romanzo heard direct from him to-day?" asked Emlie.

"No; the office replied he was out of the city for Saturday and Sunday; didn't give his address but asked if we could keep the men quiet till the middle of next week when the funds would be forwarded."

"I wired our New York exchange yesterday," said Emlie, "but they can't give us any information--answered things had gone to pot pretty generally with certain securities, but Flamsted was all right,--not tied up in any of them. Of course, they know the standing of the syndicate. There'll have to be some new arrangement for a large reserve fund right here on home soil, or we'll be kept in hot water half the time. I don't believe in having the hands that work in one place, and the purse that holds their pay in another; it gets too ticklish at such times when the market drops and a plank or two at the bottom falls out."

"Neither do I;" Mr. Wiggins spoke emphatically. "The Quarries Company's liabilities run up into the millions on account of the contracts they have signed and the work they have undertaken, and there ought to be a million of available assets to discount panics like this one that looks pretty threatening to us away off here in Maine. Our bank ought to have the benefit of some of the money."