CHAPTER XXXVI
DEFORREST DECIDES
Deforrest Young sat alone in his bachelor apartments, which he'd obtained after the quarrel with Waldstricker over the churching of Tessibel Skinner. He was in Ithaca in response to a letter from Mrs.
Waldstricker, stating that she would meet him in his rooms this afternoon.
His mind was busily at work with many problems. For the past week he had had no word from Tessibel Skinner. Her silence was significant.
Mischief-making anxiety, which always pictures the worst side of a situation, tormented him cruelly. He hoped Helen might have news from the shanty by the lakeside.
When Mrs. Waldstricker finally appeared, his first impulse was to ask about the squatter girl, but the troubled expression of his sister's face checked the question on his lips. He drew her tenderly into his arms, and attempted to comfort her with reassuring pats and caresses.
"You shouldn't have ventured out, dear," he chided. "Sit down here!...
There! Now tell me what's the matter."
"I'm so miserable, Forrie," she wept. "I can't do a thing with Ebenezer.... He's in such a state of temper all the time!"
"Don't try to talk for a moment, dearest," soothed the lawyer, much moved.
"But I must--I want to! It seems as if my whole life has been upset in some unaccountable manner. And it isn't any better since Frederick and Madelene went away. I was in hopes after they'd gone, I might have some peace."
"Is it still--" Young's inquiry was broken off by his auditor's exclamation.
"Yes, it's Tessibel Skinner! He seems perfectly possessed about her. I can't understand why, either. I always tell him she's nothing to us. He has even gone so far--Oh, Forrie, dear, tell me it isn't so!"
"What isn't so?" asked Deforrest, puzzled.
"Ebenezer says--he says you'd marry--" The inquisitor's courage oozed away before she finished her sentence. Her brother turned and strode up and down the room, while Mrs. Waldstricker's eyes, full of questioning anguish, followed his tall figure.
"I suppose he said I'd marry Tessibel Skinner. Is that it?" His voice was low, deep and intense. Wheeling about he looked across at his sister.
She got up from her chair and went to him. Her desire to placate her brother supported her determination to know his precise attitude toward her husband. She placed her hand on his arm and replied hurriedly,
"Yes, that's what he said. I told him it was no such thing; that you did what you could for the lonely child without a thought--"
Deforrest's hand closed over the speaker's.
"You were mistaken, then," he asserted quietly. "I'd have married Tessibel Skinner long ago, if she'd consented."
"Forrie, dear, you wouldn't! You couldn't! Especially now! Oh, darling, you're all I've got in the world.... Can't you see it would break my heart?"
"You needn't worry about it, sister mine." A sad shake of his head emphasized his reply. "Tess won't marry me. She knows I love her and want to care for her, but she won't let me. She sticks there in that wretched shanty, alone with her trouble and refuses every offer I make.
Her courage is splendid. I love her for it, although I'm torn to pieces with anxiety."
"And I never knew," Helen mused. "I thought--I thought it was--just you were charitable and kind."
"No, it wasn't that. I've loved her since the first, but she couldn't love me, that's all. Then this awful thing happened." The deepening lines in his face and his twitching lips revealed the intensity of his solicitude. "Have you heard anything about her?"
"Yes. A man by the name of Brewer, one of the squatters, brought me a message."
"Yes, yes!" interrupted the man, very impatiently.
Helen pressed her face against his arm. She divined the pain he was suffering. How was she to soften the hurt her answer would inflict, even her loving heart couldn't imagine.
"She has a baby boy," she whispered.
"God!" groaned Deforrest.
"The baby was born a few days ago, and every day the squatter's been at our house, ostensibly to sell something, but really to tell me about her.... I saw him this morning, and he says they are both doing nicely.
Forrie, don't you think--" There was something in her brother's stricken face that broke off her question.
"Don't I think what, dear?" He got up and resumed his restless pacing up and down.
"Oh, I want you to be happy. Couldn't you possibly--forget you've loved her?"
"No, I can't," and he came to a standstill in front of her. "I might as well be truthful, dear, as long as you know this much.... If Tessibel will marry me, I'll take her and the boy--" he choked, paused a few seconds and went on. "I'll take them both away from Ithaca. It's the only happiness in store for me, and I believe I could make her happy, too."
"I can't bear the thought of it," cried Helen, desperately. "Please don't think I'm meddling, but has she told you anything?"
"No. Some one has mistreated the child shamefully, but she won't tell anything about it."
"Poor little girl!" sighed Mrs. Waldstricker. "How I wish now I'd done more for her! I might have, you know."
The lawyer raised his hand deprecatingly.
"What's past, is done with," he answered gloomily. "I don't know how much she'll let me do, but I am going to help her in spite of herself.
That shack by the lake is an awful place. I swear I'll give her decent surroundings and a chance to live.... I'm going down today."
"But, Forrie," his sister objected, "I want you to come home with me to dinner. You haven't been to our house in a long time, not since the night you came from Binghamton and went off to Skinner's in the storm."
"Helen, dear," Young explained, apologetically, "I can't come to your house as long as Ebenezer feels toward me the way he does. You see, don't you?"
"Oh, I suppose I do, but I just can't stand it. Eb has acted badly and tried to shoulder it all off on you. But can't you overlook it, honey?"
"Why, Helen, how can I? I don't feel any too pleasant toward him, and he doesn't want to be friends, either. He pays no attention to my wishes but tries to ride rough shod over me. He regards my interest in Tess as a personal affront. He persecutes her because he thinks he's annoying me. But there, don't cry any more. You'll only make yourself ill! I think you ought to go home and lie down. You've some one else besides yourself and Eb to think of, dear girl."
"I know it," she sobbed, "and I've tried to show Ebenezer how happy we'd be if he'd forget those people down the lake and let you do what you want to. Sometimes I think he's lost his mind. I really don't know what to do."
Helen rose from her chair.
"Nor do I," replied Young.
"But, Deforrest, don't you think if you talked to Ebenezer, he'd see things differently?"
"I'm afraid not," said he, adjusting Mrs. Waldstricker's furs. "You see, Eb's always had his own way in most things, and I can't take any other position about Tess, and I won't."
"I wish you would come home with me," sighed Mrs. Waldstricker, when her brother was tucking the sleigh robe about her.
"I'm sorry I can't, Helen. You'll hear from me soon," he promised, as the sleigh moved away.