It was a cold, glittering winter’s day when the crispness in the air set the blood tingling; snow was piled in the street and there was a general scraping of iron shovels on stone and cement. Edith and Jeannette feasted their eyes on the new styles as they eagerly discussed clothes and fashions. Edith, stimulated by her privileged glimpses, bought herself a new hat, which Jeannette declared to be the most beautiful thing she had ever seen in her life! Edith, it seemed to her companion, was free to purchase anything that took her fancy. If a garment or bauble attracted her, she got it without hesitation. Jeannette’s heart was sick with longing. She watched her companion enviously. In a reckless moment, urged by her friend to whom she had confided at luncheon the tale of Martin’s perfidy, and who had been gratifyingly sympathetic, she selected and charged a long woolly, loose tan coat that had a deep collar of skunk. The coat had been “on sale” and Edith had been so full of admiration for the way Jeannette looked in it, that she offered to buy it and give it to her as a present. To this Jeannette would not agree, but later, wrapped in its soft ampleness and with a glowing satisfaction that it was the most becoming garment she had ever owned, she did not press an objection when Edith proposed to telephone Gerald Kenyon and ask him to take them to tea. At five o’clock sitting against the crimson upholstered wall-seats of a glittering café, sipping her hot tea and nibbling her thin, buttered toast, listening to the music and the pleasant chatter of her companions, conscious of Gerald Kenyon’s admiring eyes, Jeannette decided that it was the first happy moment she had known in months, and that if Martin chose to go his way, she had ample justification to go hers.
A madness descended upon her. She was near to tears most of the time but went dry-eyed upon her way, shutting her ears to the voice of conscience, refusing to allow her better nature to assert itself. On and on she stumbled into the forest of imprudence, allowing herself to give no heed to the gathering shadows, taking no thought of how she should ever find her way out of the gloom when the hour came for her to turn back,—for, of course, she must some time turn back!
Little by little she was beguiled into doing the things she had foresworn. She allowed Edith to persuade her into going almost daily with her to the city; she spent here and there the dollars she had so hardly saved; she began heedlessly to charge again: shoes, silk stockings, a smart French veil, gloves. The two friends fell into the habit of lunching or taking tea with Gerald Kenyon and sometimes going to a matinée with him, and the day came—as he had carefully planned it should come,—when Jeannette lunched with him alone. And over the small table at which they sat so intimately, still in the grip of the insanity that fogged her sense of righteousness and values, she confided to his eager, understanding ears the story of her husband’s selfishness, and listened to his persuasive voice as he offered to help her out of her difficulties.
“Why, listen here, Jeannette,” he said, bending toward her earnestly across the littered luncheon cloth, “I can make five thousand dollars for you over night. There’s no sense in your troubling yourself about money matters. If you’re in debt, I can show you a way that will pull you out of the hole and give you all the spending money you need! The old man, you know, is in steel. He’s on the inside and there’s nothing that goes on down in Wall Street that he doesn’t know. He gave me a tip the other day: a sure-fire tip. Did you ever hear of Colusium Copper? Well, it’s one of the subsidiary companies of the United States Steel Corporation, and its stock’s going right up. The old man telephoned me to come down and see him, and he says to me: ‘Gerald, put what you can lay your hands on on Colusium Copper; it’s due to go to seventy-five and you want to get out about seventy-two or three.’ It was fifty-eight then; it’s about sixty-six to-day. Why, look here,—it went up a couple of points yesterday.” He showed her the figures convincingly in a newspaper he drew from his pocket. “Now you just let me buy a few of those shares for you this afternoon before the market closes, and I’ll hand you a check for five hundred to-morrow when you meet me for lunch. You don’t have to put up the money; I can fix that for you; I’ll just telephone my brokers you want to buy a few shares and that I’ll O.K. the deal. It’s a sure-fire proposition, Jeannette. You won’t be risking a cent.”
He was very earnest, very persuasive; his voice was gentle and so kindly. Five hundred dollars! thought the girl; it would wipe out all those little purchases here and there that she had had charged to her account about which Martin knew nothing!
Gerald was a dear! He was really a most generous, warm-hearted friend! It was wonderful of him to take such an interest in her trifling financial problems.
And the next day he showed her the check: $515.60 beautifully made out,—W. G. Guthrie & Company, Stock Brokers,—and it was drawn in her name. Her fingers trembled a little as she took the stiff bank paper in her hands.
“You see what I told you!” Gerald said with a triumphant smile. “Why, say, I could have made it five thousand just as easy if you had only said the word. The old man knows when anything like this is coming off in the Street. You have to laugh at the way the public runs in and lets the big guns fleece them. The big fellows stick up the bait and the poor fools rush after it and then chop—chop go the axes! ... Any time, Jeannette, you want a bit of change just let me know and I can fix it for you. I’ll just give the old man a ring and ask him what’s good.... Now, for Heaven’s sake don’t get the idea that what I’m able to do for you on a little flier down in Wall Street is anything in the nature of a present or anything like that. I’m just slipping you a little piece of inside information,—savvy, dearie?”
The endearment was unfortunate. It suddenly reminded Jeannette of her mother and she remembered she had not been to see her in weeks. Besides, it was the first time Gerald had addressed her with any such familiarity.
“I don’t think I’d better take this,” she said abruptly, tossing the folded check at him. She leaned back in her chair and drew her hands close to her breast.