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"Then why?"

This was embarrassing, but she must answer.

"Why, you--we--move in--quite different--spheres, and--ah, it's really
not to be thought of Mr. Keith," she said, half desperately.

He himself had thought of the different spheres in which they moved, but
he had surmounted that difficulty. Though her father, as he had learned,
had begun life as a store-boy, and her mother was not the most learned
person in the world, Alice Yorke was a lady to her finger-tips, and in
her own fine person was the incontestable proof of a strain of gentle
blood somewhere. Those delicate features, fine hands, trim ankles, and
silken hair told their own story.

So he came near saying, "That does not make any difference"; but he
restrained himself. He said instead, "I do not know that I
understand you."

It was very annoying to have to be so plain, but it was, Mrs. Yorke
felt, quite necessary.

"Why, I mean that my daughter has always moved in the--the
most--exclusive society; she has had the best advantages, and has a
right to expect the best that can be given her."

"Do you mean that you think my family is not good enough for your
daughter?"

There was a tone in his quiet voice that made her glance up at him, and
a look on his face that made her answer quickly:

"Oh, no; not that, of course. I have no doubt your family is--indeed, I
have heard it is--ur--. But my daughter has every right to expect the
best that life can give. She has a right to expect--an--establishment."

"You mean money?" Keith asked, a little hoarsely.

"Why, not in the way in which you put it; but what money stands
for--comforts, luxuries, position. Now, don't go and distress yourself
about this. You are nothing but a silly boy. You fancy yourself in love
with my daughter because she is the only pretty girl about here."

"She is not; but she is the prettiest I know," ejaculated Keith,
bitterly.

"You think that, and so you fancy you are in love with her."

"It is no fancy; I am," asserted Keith, doggedly. "I would be in love
with her if she were as ugly as--as she is beautiful."

"Oh, no, you wouldn't," declared Mrs. Yorke, coolly. "Now, the thing for
you to do is to forget all about her, as she will in a short time forget
all about you."

"I know she will, though I hope she will not," groaned the young man. "I
shall never forget her--never."

His voice and manner showed such unfeigned anguish that the lady could
not but feel real commiseration for him, especially as he appeared to be
accepting her view of the case. She glanced at him almost kindly.

"Is there nothing I can do for you? I should like very much to do
something--something to show my appreciation of what you have done for
us to make our stay here less dreary than it would have been."

"Thank you. There is nothing," said Keith. "I am going to turn my
attention now to--getting an establishment." He spoke half
sarcastically, but Mrs. Yorke did not see it.

"That is right," she said warmly.

"It is not right," declared Keith, with sudden vehemence. "It is all
wrong. I know it is all wrong."

"What the world thinks is right can't be all wrong." Mrs. Yorke spoke
decisively.

"When are you going away?" the young man asked suddenly.

"In a few days." She spoke vaguely, but even as she spoke, she
determined to leave next day.

"I thank you for all your kindness to me," said Keith, standing very
straight and speaking rather hoarsely.

Mrs. Yorke's heart smote her. If it were not for her daughter's welfare
she could have liked this boy and befriended him. A vision came to her
from out of the dim past; a country boy with broad shoulders suddenly
flashed before her; but she shut it off before it became clear. She
spoke kindly to Keith, and held out her hand to him with more real
sincerity than she had felt in a long time.

"You are a good boy," she said, "and I wish I could have answered you
otherwise, but it would have been simple madness. You will some day know
that it was kinder to you to make you look nakedly at facts."

"I suppose so," said Keith, politely. "But some day, Mrs. Yorke, you
shall hear of me. If you do not, remember I shall be dead."

With this bit of tragedy he turned and left her, and Mrs. Yorke stood
and watched him as he strode down the path, meaning, if he should turn,
to wave him a friendly adieu, and also watching lest that which she had
dreaded for a quarter of an hour might happen. It would be dreadful if
her daughter should meet him now. He did not turn, however, and when at
last he disappeared, Mrs. Yorke, with a sigh of relief, went up to her
room and began to write rapidly.



CHAPTER X

MRS. YORKE CUTS THE KNOT

When Alice Yorke came from her jaunt, she had on her face an expression
of pleasant anticipation. She had been talking to Dr. Balsam, and he had
said things about Gordon Keith that had made her cheeks tingle. "Of the
best blood of two continents," he had said of him. "He has the stuff
that has made England and America." The light of real romance was
beginning to envelop her.

As she entered the hall she met Mrs. Nailor. Mrs. Nailor smiled at her
knowingly, much as a cat, could she smile, might smile at a mouse.

"I think your mother is out on the far end of the verandah. I saw her
there a little while ago talking with your friend, the young
schoolmaster. What a nice young man he is? Quite uncommon, isn't he?"

Alice gave a little start. "The young schoolmaster" indeed!

"Yes, I suppose so. I don't know." She hated Mrs. Nailor with her quiet,
cat-like manner and inquisitive ways. She now hated her more than ever,
for she was conscious that she was blushing and that Mrs. Nailor
observed it.

"Your mother is very interested in schools? Yes? I think that is nice in
her? So few persons appreciate education?" Her air was absolute
innocence.

"I don't know. I believe she is--interested in everything," faltered
Alice. She wanted to add, "And so you appear to be also."

"So few persons care for education these days," pursued Mrs. Nailor, in
a little chime. "And that young man is such a nice fellow? Has he a good
school? I hear you were there? You are interested in schools, too?" She
nodded like a little Japanese toy-baby.

"I am sure I don't know. Yes; I think he has. Why don't you go?" asked
the girl at random.

"Oh, I have not been invited." Mrs. Nailor smiled amiably. "Perhaps, you
will let me go with you sometime?"

Alice escaped, and ran up-stairs, though she was eager to go out on the
porch. However, it would serve him right to punish him by staying away
until she was sent for, and she could not go with Mrs. Nailor's
cat-eyes on her.

She found her mother seated at a table writing busily. Mrs. Yorke only
glanced up and said, "So you are back? Hope you had a pleasant time?"
and went on writing.

Alice gazed at her with a startled look in her eyes. She had such a
serious expression on her face.

"What are you doing?" She tried to speak as indifferently as she could.

"Writing to your father." The pen went on busily.

"What is the matter? Is papa ill? Has anything happened?"

"No; nothing has happened. I am writing to say we shall be home the last
of the week."

"Going away!"

"Yes; don't you think we have been here long enough? We only expected to
stay until the last of March, and here it is almost May."

"But what is the matter? Why have you made up your mind so suddenly?
Mamma, you are so secret! I am sure something is the matter. Is papa not
well?" She crossed over and stood by her mother.

Mrs. Yorke finished a word and paused a moment, with the end of her
silver penholder against her teeth.

"Alice," she said reflectively, "I have something I want to say to you,
and I have a mind to say it now. I think I ought to speak to you
very frankly."

"Well, for goodness' sake, do, mamma; for I'm dying to know what has
happened." She seated herself on the side of a chair for support. Her
face was almost white.

"Alice--"

"Yes, mamma." Her politeness was ominous.

"Alice, I have had a talk with that young man--"

Alice's face flushed suddenly.

"What young man?" she asked, as though the Ridge Springs were thronged
with young men behind every bush.

"That young man--Mr. Keith," firmly.

"Oh!" said Alice. "With Mr. Keith? Yes, mamma?" Her color was changing
quickly now.

"Yes, I have had a quite--a very extraordinary conversation with Mr.
Keith." As Mrs. Yorke drifted again into reflection, Alice was
compelled to ask:

"What about, mamma?"

"About you."

"About me? What about me?" Her face was belying her assumed innocence.

"Alice, I hope you are not going to behave foolishly. I cannot believe
for a minute that you would--a girl brought up as you have been--so far
forget yourself--would allow yourself to become interested in a
perfectly unknown and ignorant and obscure young man."

"Why, mamma, he is not ignorant; he knows more than any one I ever
saw,--why, he has read piles of books I never even heard of,--and his
family is one of the best and oldest in this country. His grandfathers
or great-grandfathers were both signers of the Decla--"

"I am not talking about that," interrupted Mrs. Yorke, hastily. "I must
say you appear to have studied his family-tree pretty closely."

"Dr. Balsam told me," interjected Alice.

"Dr. Balsam had very little to talk of. I am talking of his being
unknown."

"But I believe he will be known some day. You don't know how clever and
ambitious he is. He told me--"

But Mrs. Yorke had no mind to let Alice dwell on what he had told her.
He was too good an advocate.

"Stuff! I don't care what he told you! Alice, he is a perfectly unknown
and untrained young--creature. All young men talk that way. He is
perfectly gauche and boorish in his manner--"

"Why, mamma, he has beautiful manners!" exclaimed Alice "I heard a lady
saying the other day he had the manners of a Chesterfield."

"Chester-nonsense!" exclaimed Mrs. Yorke.

"I think he has, too, mamma."

"I don't agree with you," declared Mrs. Yorke, energetically. "How would
he appear in New York? Why, he wears great heavy shoes, and his neckties
are something dreadful."

"His neckties are bad," admitted Alice, sadly.

Mrs. Yorke, having discovered a breach in her adversary's defences, like
a good general directed her attack against it.

"He dresses horribly; he wears his hair like a--countryman; and his
manners are as antiquated as his clothes. Think of him at the opera or
at one of Mrs. Wentworth's receptions! He says 'madam' and 'sir' as if
he were a servant."

"I got after him about that once," said the girl, reflectively. "I said
that only servants said that."

"Well, what did he say?"

"Said that that proved that servants sometimes had better manners than
their masters."

"Well, I must say, I think he was excessively rude!" asserted Mrs.
Yorke, picking up her fan and beginning to fan rapidly.

"That's what I said; but he said he did not see how it could be rude to
state a simple and impersonal fact in a perfectly respectful way."

Alice was warming up in defence and swept on.

"He said the new fashion was due to people who were not sure of their
own position, and were afraid others might think them servile if they
employed such terms."

"What does he know about fashion?"

"He says fashion is a temporary and shifting thing, sometimes caused by
accident and sometimes made by tradesmen, but that good manners are the
same to-day that they were hundreds of years ago, and that though the
ways in which they are shown change, the basis is always the same, being
kindness and gentility."

Mrs. Yorke gasped.

"Well, I must say, you seem to have learned your lesson!" she exclaimed.

Alice had been swept on by her memory not only of the words she was
repeating, but of many conversations and interchanges of thought Gordon
Keith and she had had during the past weeks, in which he had given her
new ideas. She began now, in a rather low and unsteady voice, her hands
tightly clasped, her eyes in her lap:

"Mamma, I believe I like him very much--better than I shall ever--"

"Nonsense, Alice! Now, I will not have any of this nonsense. I bring you
down here for your health, and you take up with a perfectly obscure
young countryman about whom you know nothing in the world, and--"

"I know all about him, mamma. I know he is a gentleman. His
grandfather--"

"You know _nothing_ about him," asserted Mrs. Yorke, rising. "You may be
married to a man for years and know very little of him. How can you know
about this boy? You will go back and forget all about him in a week."

"I shall never forget him, mamma," said Alice, in a low tone, thinking
of the numerous promises she had made to the same effect within the
past few days.

"Fiddlesticks! How often have you said that? A half-dozen times at
least. There's Norman and Ferdy Wickersham and--"

"I have not forgotten them," said Alice, a little impressed by her
mother's argument.

"Of course, you have not. I don't think it's right, Alice, for you to be
so--susceptible and shallow. At least once every three months I have to
go through this same thing. There's Ferdy Wickersham--handsome, elegant
manners, very ri--with fine prospects every way, devoted to you for ever
so long. I don't care for his mother, but his people are now received
everywhere. Why--?"

"Mamma, I would not marry Ferdy Wickersham if he were the last man
in--to save his life--not for ten millions of dollars. And he does not
care for me."

"Why, he is perfectly devoted to you," insisted Mrs. Yorke.

"Ferdy Wickersham is not perfectly devoted to any one except
himself--and never will be," asserted Alice, vehemently. "If he ever
cared for any one it is Louise Caldwell."

Mrs. Yorke shifted her ground.

"There's Norman Wentworth? One of the best--"

"Ah! I don't love Norman. I never could. We are the best of friends, but
I just like and respect him."

"Respect is a very safe ground to marry on," said Mrs. Yorke,
decisively. "Some people do not have even that when they marry."

"Then I am sorry for them," said Miss Alice. "But when I marry, I want
to love. I think it would be a crime to marry a man you did not love.
God made us with a capacity to form ideals, and if we deliberately fall
below them--"

Mrs. Yorke burst out laughing.

"Oh, stuff! That boy has filled your head with enough nonsense to last a
lifetime. I would not be such a parrot. I want to finish my letter now."

Mrs. Yorke concluded her letter, and two mornings later the Yorkes took
the old two-horse stage that plied between the Springs and the little
grimy railway-station, ten miles away at the foot of the Ridge, and
metaphorically shook the dust of Ridgely from their feet, though, from
their appearance when they reached the railway, it, together with much
more, must have settled on their shoulders.

The road passed the little frame school-house, and as the stage rattled
by, the young school-teacher's face changed. He stood up and looked out
of the window with a curious gaze in his burning eyes. Suddenly his face
lit up: a little head under a very pretty hat had nodded to him. He
bowed low, and went back to his seat with a new expression. That bow
chained him for years. He almost forgave her high-headed mother.

Alice bore away with her a long and tragic letter which she did not
think it necessary to confide to her mother at this time, in view of the
fact that the writer declared that in his present condition he felt
bound to recognize her mother's right to deny his request to see her;
but that he meant to achieve such success that she would withdraw her
prohibition, and to return some day and lay at her feet the highest
honors life could give.

A woman who has discarded a man is, perhaps, nearer loving him just
afterwards than ever before. Certainly Miss Alice Yorke thought more
tenderly of Gordon Keith when she found herself being borne away from
him than she had ever done during the weeks she had known him.

It is said that a broken heart is a most valuable possession for a young
man. Perhaps, it was so to Keith.

The rest of the session dragged wearily for him. But he worked like
fury. He would succeed. He would rise. He would show Mrs. Yorke who
he was.

Mrs. Yorke, having reached home, began at once to lead her daughter back
to what she esteemed a healthier way of thinking than she had fallen
into. This opportunity came in the shape of a college commencement with
a consequent boat-race, and all the gayeties that this entailed.

Mrs. Yorke was, in her way, devoted to her daughter, and had a definite
and what she deemed an exalted ambition for her. This meant that she
should be the best-dressed girl in society, should be a belle, and
finally should make the most brilliant marriage of her set--to wit, the
wealthiest marriage. She had dreamed at times of a marriage that should
make her friends wild with envy--of a title, a high title. Alice had
beauty, style, wealth, and vivacity; she would grace a coronet, and
mamma would be "Madam, the Countess's mother." But mamma encountered an
unexpected obstacle.

When Mrs. Yorke, building her air-castles, casually let fall her idea of
a title for Alice, there was a sudden and unexpected storm from an
unlooked-for quarter. Dennis Yorke, usually putty in his wife's hands,
had two or three prejudices that were principles with him. As to these
he was rock. His daughter was his idol.

For her, from the time she had opened her blue eyes on him and blinked
at him vaguely, he had toiled and schemed until his hair had turned from
brown to gray and then had disappeared from his round, strongly set
head. For the love he bore her he had served longer than Jacob served
for Rachel, and the time had not appeared long. The suggestion that the
money he had striven for from youth to age should go to some reprobate
foreigner, to pay his gambling-debts, nearly threw him into a
convulsion. His ancestors had been driven from home to starve in the
wilderness by such creatures. "Before any d----d foreign reprobate should
have a dollar of his money he would endow a lunatic asylum with it." So
Mrs. Yorke prudently refrained from pressing this subject any further at
this time, and built her hopes on securing the next most advantageous
alliance--a wealthy one. She preferred Norman Wentworth to any of the
other young men, for he was not only rich, but the Wentworths were an
old and established house, and Mrs. Wentworth was one of the old
aristocrats of the State, whose word was law above that of even the
wealthiest of the new leaders. To secure Norman Wentworth would be
"almost as good as a title." An intimacy was sedulously cultivated with
"dear Mrs. Wentworth," and Norman, the "dear boy," was often brought to
the house.

Perversely, he and Alice did not take to each other in the way Mrs.
Yorke had hoped. They simply became the best of friends, and Mrs. Yorke
had the mortification of seeing a tall and statuesque schoolmate of
Alice's capture Norman, while Alice appeared totally indifferent to him.
What made it harder to bear was that Mrs. Caldwell, Louise Caldwell's
mother, a widow with barely enough to live respectably on, was quietly
walking off with the prize which Mrs. Yorke and a number of other
mothers were striving to secure, and made no more of it than if it had
been her right. It all came of her family connections. That was the way
with those old families. They were so selfishly exclusive and so proud.
They held themselves superior to every one else and appeared to despise
wealth. Mrs. Yorke did not believe Mrs. Caldwell really did despise
wealth, but she admitted that she made a very good show of doing it.

Mrs. Yorke, foreseeing her failure with Norman Wentworth, was fain to
accept in his place Ferdy Wickersham, who, though certainly not Norman's
equal in some respects, was his superior in others.

To be sure, Ferdy was said to be a somewhat reckless young fellow, and
Mr. Yorke did not fancy him; but Mrs. Yorke argued, "Boys will be boys,
and you know, Mr. Yorke, you have told me you were none too good
yourself." On this, Dennis Yorke growled that a man was "a fool ever to
tell his wife anything of the kind, and that, at least, he never was in
that young Wickersham's class."

All of which Mrs. Yorke put aside, and sacrificed herself unstintedly to
achieve success for her daughter and compel her to forget the little
episode of the young Southern schoolmaster, with his tragic air.

Ah, the dreams of the climbers! How silly they are! Golden clouds at the
top, and just as they are reached, some little Jack comes along and
chops down the beanstalk, clouds and all.

So, Mrs. Yorke dreamed, and, a trifle anxious over Alice's persistent
reference to the charms of Spring woods and a Southern climate, after a
week or two of driving down-town and eager choosing of hats and wearying
fitting of dresses, started off with the girl on the yacht of Mr.
Lancaster, a wealthy, dignified, and cultivated friend of her husband's.
He had always been fond of Alice, and now got up a yacht-party for her
to see the boat-race.

* * * * *

Keith had thought that the time when he should leave the region where he
had been immersed so long would be the happiest hour of his life. Yet,
when the day came, he was conscious of a strange tugging at his heart.
These people whom he was leaving, and for whom he had in his heart an
opinion very like contempt on account of their ignorance and narrowness,
appeared to him a wholly different folk. There was barely one of them
but had been kind to him. Hard they might appear and petty; but they
lived close together, and, break through the crust, one was sure to find
a warm heart and often a soft one.

He began to understand Dr. Balsam's speech: "I have lived in several
kinds of society, and I like the simplest best. One can get nearer to
men here. I do not ask gratitude. I get affection."

Keith had given notice that the school would close on a certain day. The
scholars always dropped off as summer came, to work in the crops; and
the attendance of late had been slim. This last day he hardly expected
to have half a dozen pupils. To his surprise, the school-house
was filled.

Even Jake Dennison, who had been off in the mountains for some little
time getting out timber, was on hand, large and good-humored, sitting
beside Phrony Tripper in her pink ribbons, and fanning her hard enough
to keep a mine fresh. A little later in the day quite a number of the
fathers and mothers of the children arrived in their rickety vehicles.
They had come to take leave of the young teacher. There were almost as
many as were present at the school celebration. Keith was quite
overcome, and when the hour arrived for closing the school, instead of,
as he had expected, tying up the half-dozen books he kept in his desk,
shaking hands with the dozen children eager to be turned loose in the
delightful pasturage of summer holiday, turning the key in the lock, and
plodding alone down the dusty road to Squire Rawson's, he now found the
school-room full, not of school-children only, but of grown people as
well. He had learned that they expected him to say something, and there
was nothing for him to do but to make the effort. For an hour, as he sat
during the last lessons,--which were in the nature of a review,--the
pages before him had been mere blurred spaces of white, and he had been
cogitating what he should say. Yet, when he rose, every idea that he had
tried so faithfully to put into shape fled from his brain.

Dropping all the well-turned phrases which he had been trying to frame,
he said simply that he had come there two years before with the conceit
of a young man expecting to teach them a good deal, and that he went
away feeling that he had taught very little, but that he had learned a
great deal; he had learned that the kindest people in the world lived in
that region; he should never forget their kindness and should always
feel that his best friends were there. A few words more about his hopes
for the school and his feeling for the people who had been so good to
him, and he pronounced the school closed. To his surprise, at a wink
from Squire Rawson, one of the other trustees, who had formerly been
opposed to Keith, rose, and, addressing the assemblage, began to say
things about him that pleased him as much as they astonished him.

He said that they, too, had begun with some doubt as to how things would
work, as one "could never tell what a colt would do till he got the
harness on him," but this colt had "turned out to be a pretty good
horse." Mr. Keith, maybe, had taught more than he knew. He had taught
some folks--this with a cut of his eye over toward where Jake Dennison
sat big and brown in the placid content of a young giant, fanning
Euphronia for life--he had "taught some folks that a door had to be
right strong to keep out a teacher as knowed his business." Anyhow, they
were satisfied with him, and the trustees had voted to employ him
another year, but he had declined. He had "business" that would take him
away. Some thought they knew that business. (At this there was a
responsive titter throughout the major portion of the room, and Gordon
Keith was furious with himself for finding that he suddenly turned hot
and red.) He himself, the speaker said, didn't pretend to know anything
about it, but he wanted to say that if Mr. Keith didn't find the
business as profitable as he expected, the trustees had determined to
hold the place open for him for one year, and had elected a successor
temporarily to hold it in case he should want to come back.