For a long while, Samuel stood motionless, hearing the swish of the rain and the crashing of the thunder as an echo of the storm in his own soul. It was as if a chasm had yawned beneath his feet, and all the castles of his dreams had come down in ruins. He stood there, stunned and horrified, staring at the wreckage of everything he had believed.
Then suddenly he crossed the drawing-room and opened one of the French windows which led to the piazza. The rain was driving underneath the shelter of the roof; but he faced it, and ran toward the door.
The girl was lying in front of it, and above the noise of the wind and rain he heard her sobbing wildly. He stood for a minute, hesitating; then he bent down and touched her.
“Lady,” he said.
She started. “Who are you?” she cried.
“I'm just one of the servants, ma'am.”
She caught her breath. “Did he send you?” she demanded.
“No,” said he, “I came to help you.”
“I don't need any help. Let me be.”
“But you can't stay here in the rain,” he protested. “You'll catch your death.”
“I want to die!” she answered. “What have I to live for?”
Samuel stood for a moment, perplexed. Then, as he touched her wet clothing again, common sense asserted itself. “You mustn't stay here,” he said. “You mustn't.”
But she only went on weeping. “He's cast me off!” she exclaimed. “My God, what shall I do?”
Samuel turned and ran into the house again and got an umbrella in the hall. Then he took the girl by the arm and half lifted her. “Come,” he said. “Please.”
“But where shall I go?” she asked.
“I know some one in the town who'll help you,” he said. “You can't stay here—you'll catch cold.”
“What's there left for me?” she moaned. “What am I good for? He's thrown me over—and I can't live without him!”
Samuel got the umbrella up and held it with one hand; then with his other arm about the girl's waist, he half carried her down the piazza steps. “That she-devil was after him!” she was saying. “And it was Jack Holliday set her at it, damn his soul! I'll pay him for it!”
She poured forth a stream of wild invective.
“Please stop,” pleaded Samuel. “People will hear you.”
“What do I care if they do hear me? Let them put me in jail—that's all I'm fit for. I'm drunk, and I'm good for nothing—and he's tired of me!”
So she rushed on, all the way toward town. Then, as they came to the bridge, she stopped and looked about. “Where are you taking me?” she asked.
“To a friend's house,” he said, having in mind the Stedmans.
“No,” she replied. “I don't want to see anyone. Take me to some hotel, can't you?”
“There's one down the street here,” he said. “I don't know anything about it.”
“I don't care. Any place.”
The rain had slackened and she stopped and gathered up her wet and straggled hair.
There was a bar underneath the hotel, and a flight of stairs led up to the office. They went up, and a man sitting behind the desk stared at them.
“I want to get a room for this lady,” said Samuel. “She's been caught in the rain.”
“Is she your wife?” asked the man.
“Mercy, no,” said he startled.
“Do you want a room, too?”
“No, no, I'm going away.”
“Oh!” said the man, and took down a key. “Register, please.”
Samuel took the pen, and then turned to the girl. “I beg pardon,” he said, “but I don't know your name.”
“Mary Smith,” she answered, and Samuel stared at her in surprise. “Mary Smith,” she repeated, and he wrote it down obediently.
The man took them upstairs; and Samuel, after helping the girl to a chair, shut the door and stood waiting. And she flung herself down upon the bed and burst into a paroxysm of weeping. Samuel had never even heard the word hysterics, and it was terrifying to him to see her—he could not have believed that so frail and slender a human body could survive so frightful a storm of emotion.
“Oh, please, please stop!” he cried wildly.
“I can't live without him!” she wailed again and again. “I can't live without him! What am I going to do?”
Samuel's heart was wrung. He went to the girl, and put his hand upon her arm. “Listen to me,” he said earnestly. “Let me try to help you.”
“What can you do?” she demanded.
“I'll go and see him. I'll plead with him—perhaps he'll listen to me.”
“All right!” she cried. “Anything! Tell him I'll kill myself! I'll kill him and Dolly both, before I'll ever let her have him! Yes, I mean it! He swore to me he'd never leave me! And I believed him—I trusted him!”
And Samuel clenched his hands with sudden resolution. “I'll see him about it,” he said. “I'll see him to-night.”
And leaving the other still shaking with sobs, he turned and left the room.
He stopped in the office to tell the man that he was going. But there was nobody there; and after hesitating a moment he went on.
The storm was over and the moon was out, with scud of clouds flying past. Samuel strode back to “Fairview,” with his hands gripped tightly, and a blaze of resolution in his soul.
He was just in time to see the automobile at the door, and the company taking their departure. They passed him, singing hilariously; and then he found himself confronting his young master.
“Who's that?” exclaimed Bertie, startled.
“It's me, sir,” said Samuel.
“Oh! Samuel! What are you doing here?”
“I've been with the young lady, sir.”
“Oh! So that's what became of her!”
“I took her to a hotel, sir.”
“Humph!” said Bertie. “I'm obliged to you.”
The piazza lights were turned up, and by them Samuel could see the other's face, flushed with drink, and his hair and clothing in disarray. He swayed slightly as he stood there.
“Master Albert,” said Samuel very gravely, “May I have a few words with you?”
“Sure,” said Bertie. He looked about him for a chair and sank into it. “What is it?” he asked.
“It's the young lady, Master Albert.”
“What about her?”
“She's very much distressed, sir.”
“I dare say. She'll get over it, Samuel.”
“Master Albert,” exclaimed the boy, “you've not treated her fairly.”
The other stared at him. “The devil!” he exclaimed.
“You must not desert her, sir! It would be a terrible thing to have on your conscience. You have ruined and betrayed her.”
“WHAT!” cried the other, and gazed at him in amazement. “Did she give you that kind of a jolly?”
“She didn't go into particulars”—said the boy.
“My dear fellow!” laughed Bertie. “Why, I've been the making of that girl. She was an eighteen-dollar-a-week chorus girl when I took her up.”
“That might be, Master Albert. But if she was an honest girl—”
“Nonsense, Samuel—forget it. She'd had three or four lovers before she ever laid eyes on me.”
There was a pause, while the boy strove to get these facts into his mind. “Even so,” he said, “you can't desert her and let her starve, Master Albert.”
“Oh, stuff!” said the other. “What put that into your head? I'll give her all the money she needs, if that's what's troubling her. Did she say that?”
“N—no,” admitted Samuel disconcerted. “But, Master Albert, she loves you.”
“Yes, I know,” said Bertie, “and that's where the trouble comes in. She wants to keep me in a glass case, and I've got tired of it.”
He paused for a moment; and then a sudden idea flashed over him. “Samuel!” he exclaimed “Why don't you marry her?”
Samuel started in amazement. &ldqu............