Part 18

"How did it happen?" Willoughby had thrust both hands into his pockets, and his head was turned sideways, as if the better to study the depths of her emotion. "Oh, the usual way--flying too many kites, I suppose. Poor?" he growled savagely. "Yes; we're poor as Job's turkey! They've cleaned me out of everything--their----Teton Sisters, too!"

In her mind's bewilderment of distress she caught at the name; it was the property in which Severance had lost his money; and she recalled ugly rumors that, before, had not affected her. Now that his money was gone, they attached to themselves a newer significance, accusing and indefensible. "The Teton Sisters! What do you mean?" For was the shame of losing his wealth to be coupled with the shameful admission that he had taken a hand in gouging her former suitor? It was singular she hadn't thought of it before; now it struck home with redoubled poignancy.

"Mean, hey? I mean they've got it away from me--Mills and that fellow Severance. It was the prettiest thing I owned, too," he groaned, careless of what he was saying, and blurting out the acknowledgment. "But that ain't the worst--no, not by a long chalk! Do you know what they're going to do?" he demanded, hoarsely, and with an almost weeping resentment, yet as if glad to find some one to whom to pour it out. "They're going to sue for the money, too!"

"What money?" she persisted, hollowly, determined now to know all. It might be dreadful to lose one's money--it was dreadful; but to have this man drag her down into his own shame, too--ah!

Willoughby threw up both hands in a gesture of ungovernable petulance. "Oh, what's the use of talking about it?" he growled, and then instantly his voice dropped. "Stella, I'm sorry for your sake. We'll have to begin all over again, dear."

"But you shall talk of it!" she directed, with a cruel and cutting significance in her voice. "You can't hide it from me now."

His mouth opened dumbfoundedly. Then he thrust out his jaw with a reawakened truculency, now aimed at her.

"Well, then--it was the money I took from that fellow--from your old friend, Severance. He was----"

"You took it from him!" she cried. "You mean you STOLE it!"

Willoughby's mouth twitched, as if she had struck him a blow. "So that's the way you look at it now, is it?" he said, his voice quietly effective. "All right, then! I came in here hoping to get a word of sympathy from you--perhaps a little kindness. But I knew it was only a hope." He drew a deep breath. "Now don't work yourself up over him, I warn you, my dear. I won't tell you why I ruined him, years ago, but I'll tell you how. You've called me a thief, so I'll give you some more facts before you jump at conclusions."

"I don't want excuses--it's explanations!"

It was another taunt that struck home, but Willoughby again mastered himself grimly. "Any one of us would have done it," he answered, ignoring the remark. "Severance made it easy. I did to him only what he tried to do to others. When he saw how good the mine was, he wanted me to help him rook them out of their stock, so that we could get it. Simple enough, of course, but they'd been square with me. No, I refused--but I did accommodate him to the extent of doing him out of his own block. He'd mortgaged everything to buy shares, and when he was where I wanted him, all tied up with loans and not able to borrow another cent, I told the mine people what Severance was trying to do. So they put in a ruinous report, and every one from whom he'd borrowed a cent just called his loans and foreclosed on him right and left. He went down and out--and that's all there was to it. Nobody else got hurt, and we divided his stock among us. Can't you see how it was, Stella?" he asked quietly, and stood awaiting her verdict.

"Yes! I see how it was!" she flashed. "It was robbery--you can't excuse yourself."

If she had wished to sting him again, the attempt seemed to become fruitful. "Excuses! I make none, do you hear?" he retorted, incensed. " I ruined him to get him out of your way--yes!--oh, you needn't say it!--out of mine, too. Look here!" he cried, passionately; "don't you think I didn't know you? All you looked for or lived for was--" But he broke off there, and surveyed her with an affronted dullness, as if it were only wasted effort. "Oh, well, what's the use?" he muttered, and with morose and glowering eyes slouched through the doorway.

Mrs. Willoughby lay among the pillows, her arms flung out and her face half hidden by her disordered hair. TO BE POOR! Her mind seized on that as the one incalculable shame that had befallen her--on that, rather than on her view of his dishonesty. Curiously enough, it was not only the loss of the money itself and the imminent surrender of her ease and luxury and ostentation that dismayed her. She was anguished, as well, by the stigma of being poor. She was able to see only the mean side of it; the pity of her friends already rang in her ears like scorn, mocking her because the one thing that had made her was now stripped away. Hers was not the nature to see the other side of it--the helpful nobility of self-denial, the heroism of unselfishness, the courage that stoically faces the narrow and sordid effort whose rewards are only in the future. No, indeed!--there was only a savage resentment in her mind, the inexplicable sense that somehow she had been tricked and cheated, and that he alone was to blame.

Though she accused him of dishonesty in the Severance affair, the charge was only secondary. Given another time, she might carelessly have acquitted him, taking his own say-so as enough; but Willoughby now had chosen a poor hour for his acknowledgment, when he linked it to the tidings of his ruin. All that day she kept to her bed, her mind absorbed with the catastrophe that had swept out from under her the unsolid prop of her arrogant money pride. For, again, without money what was left?

She showed herself the day following, wan and silent. Willoughby was away; the news of his failure was public property, and she writhed when she read of it in the daily prints. But in the following days she suffered other pangs that were a healthy counter-irritant--she learned to pick and number her FRIENDS, and to know, among so large a list of acquaintances, how very few they were. Though she was prepared for this, well aware what befalls the one with broken playthings, nevertheless she was filled with bitter exasperation against those who were no more careless than she had been herself. So she left orders with the servants that none was to be admitted.

Her husband was not so easily evaded. He returned, three days later, and, walking straight to her, laid a hand on her shoulder. "Stella, I'm mighty sorry; but if you'll help me, I can get on my feet again."

"Oh, don't bother me!" she retorted, flinging off his hand. Willoughby flushed, seemed about to make a bitter retort, and apparently changed his mind. "Stella, I'm in a good deal of trouble. A kind word or two would help." But the wife maintained a sullen dumbness, her eyes turned away from him; and Willoughby retired, shaking his head.

At the week end he tried again, hopefully. "Stella, it's not so bad as we first thought. I think we'll save enough to live on--maybe enough to keep our home. But you'll have to lend a hand."

She looked up from her packing. "What do you say?" she demanded, with a rekindled interest, and at the sight of it his eyes lightened.

"Why, if you're willing to go slowly, and put up with a few things, we might be able to do it."

"Humh!" Mrs. Willoughby bent over her trunk again. "I suppose that means you'd make me a kind of drudge. Thank you; I prefer the other way."

"The other way?" he inquired, looking at her closely. "What do you mean by that?"

She affected to show her carelessness by smoothing the clothes in the trunk tray. "Oh, I'm going to take the boy and go away somewhere for a while."

It was not unexpected. Willoughby came a step nearer, his brow wrinkled ominously. "You shall not!" he said, with a slow distinctness, every syllable rapped out decisively. Then his anger, righteous enough in its way, got the better of him. "Listen to me, Stella!' he gritted, clenching his hands beside him. "I can see clear through you. You haven't the nerve to face this down, so you're going to sling me overboard. That's it, isn't it? Well, you sha'n't. I've handled you like a fool, these years, and now I'm going to take charge. You'll stay here--not because of yourself or me--but for the boy!" he cried; and Mrs. Willoughby arose, quiet, but white.

"No," she answered, clearly; "we've played this farce too long, Harmon. I don't think I'm suited to you, and I'm sure you're not suited to me. We married under false ideas of each other."

Willoughby turned white, too, but, restraining himself, he peered at her from under his heavy brows. "No, we didn't!" he retorted, solemnly. "YOU did, but I didn't! You married me thinking my money would buy you what you wanted. I question whether you thought of ME at all. But I married you, Stella, knowing exactly what you were, and, since I've paid for it, I intend you shall stick to your bargain."