第83章

"Yes." In the sympathetic atmosphere which this young girl's presence created for him, Joe's emotions flowed into words more freely than ever before in the company of a human being. Though he was answering her, what he was really doing was rather just letting his heart use its long-silent voice, speak its exultant dream and belief.

"Somewhere out in the world--I don't know where, and I don't want to know--my daughter has now grown into a wholesome, splendid young woman!" he said in a vibrant voice. Brooding in solitude so long upon his careful plan that he believed could not fail, had made the keen Joe Ellison less suspicious concerning it than he otherwise would have been--perhaps had made him a bit daffy on this one subject. "I have saved my daughter from all the grime she might have known, and which might have soiled her, and even pulled her down if I hadn't thought out in good time my plan to protect her. And of course I am happy!" he exulted. "I have done the best thing that it was possible for me to do, the thing which I wanted most to do! Instead of what she might have been, I have as a daughter just such a nice girl as you are--just about your own age--though, of course, she hasn't your money, your social position, and naturally not quite the advantages you have had.

Of course I'm happy!"

"You're--you're sure she's all that?"

Again his words were as much a statement aloud to himself of his constant dream as they were a direct answer to Maggie. "Of course!

There was enough money--the plan was in the hands of a friend who knew how to handle such a thing--she's never known anything but the very best surroundings--and until she was fourteen I had regular reports on how wonderfully she was progressing. You see my friend had had her legally adopted by a splendid family, so there's no doubt about everything being for the best."

"And you"--Maggie drove herself on--"don't you ever want to see her?"

"Of course I do. But at the very beginning I fixed things so I could not; so that I would not even know where she is. Removed temptation from myself, you see. Don't you see the possible results if I should try to see her? Something might happen that would bring out the truth, and that would ruin her happiness, her career. Don't you see?"

His gray eyes, bright with his great dream, were fixed intently upon Maggie; and yet she felt that they were gazing far beyond her at some other girl . . . at his girl.

" I--I--" she gulped and swayed and would have fallen if he had not been quick to catch her arm.

"You are sick, Miss?" he asked anxiously.

"I--I have been," she stammered, trying to regain control of her faculties. "It's--it's that--and my not eating--and standing in this hot sun. Thank you very much for what you've told me. I'd--I'd better be getting back."

"I'll help you." And very gently, with a firm hand under one arm, he escorted her to the bench where Larry sat scribbling nothings. He then raised his hat and returned to his dahlias.

"Well?" queried Larry when they were alone.

"I can't stand it to stay here and talk to these people," she replied in an agonized whisper. "I must get away from here quick, so that I can think."

"May I come with you?"

"No, Larry--I must be alone. Please, Larry, please get into the house, and manage to fake a telephone message for me, calling me back to New York at once."

"All right." And Larry hurried away. She sat, pale, breathing rapidly, her whole being clenched, staring fixedly out at the Sound. Five minutes later Larry was back.

"It's all arranged, Maggie. I've told the people; they're sorry you've got to go. And Dick is getting his car ready."

She turned her eyes upon him. He had never seen in them such a look.

They were feverish, with a dazed, affrighted horror. She clutched his arm.

"You must promise never to tell my father about me!"

"I won't. Unless I have to."

"But you must not! Never!" she cried desperately. "He thinks I'm--Oh, don't you understand? If he were to learn what I really am, it would kill him. He must keep his dream. For his sake he must never find out, he must keep on thinking of me just the same. Now, you understand?"

Larry slowly nodded.

Her next words were dully vibrant with stricken awe. "And it means that I can never have him for my father! Never! And I think--I'd--I'd like him for a father! Don't you see?"

Again Larry nodded. In this entirely new phase of her, a white-faced, stricken, shivering girl, Larry felt a poignant sympathy for her the like of which had never tingled through him in her conquering moods.

Indeed Maggie's situation was opening out into great human problems such as neither he nor any one else had ever foreseen!

"There comes Dick," she whispered. "I must do my best to hold myself together. Good-bye, Larry."

A minute later, Larry just behind her, she was crossing the lawn on Dick's arm, explaining her weakness and pallor by the sudden dizziness which had come upon her in consequence of not eating and of being in the hot sun.