A Top-Floor Idyl

by George Van Schaick

"Good Lord! David," said Ceballo, a moment later. "Just caught sight of you with Diana at the wheel. Splendid young lady, isn't she? I know her father quite well."

"Yes," I answered, "she is a very fine young woman."

"Doesn't much care for literature, does she?"

"I don't know, but she has a heart of gold, and that's what counts."

So we retired to a small private table and disputed and argued for a couple of hours, at the end of which my brains were addled and I told him to do as he pleased, whereat he beamed and I parted from him.

Then I began counting the days till the Rochambeau should arrive, and Frances came back to town and sent me word at once. She received me joyfully and told me how much good the sea-air on the Newport cliffs had done Baby Paul, who was beginning to talk like a little man and to say "God bless David" in the prayer he babbled after her each evening.

"I'm only back for a short time," she said, "because I'm to sing at a concert in Boston next week, and then we are going to Buffalo for a day, after which I shall return. And what do you think, David? I am to sign an engagement for the Metropolitan! Tsheretshewski is going abroad this winter to play in Spain and England, and so I shall be, for the whole winter, here in New York, and—and I hope you won't neglect me."

I assured her that I would call every day, and left her, after I had inspected Baby Paul, who deigned to let me kiss him and favored my moustache with a powerful tug. He is a stunning infant. She was standing at the outer door of her apartment, her dear sweet smile speaking of her friendship and regard. The temptation came on me again, the awful longing for a touch of those lips, but I held myself within bounds, as bravely as I could, and touched the elevator signal. She waited until the cage had shot up and waved her hand at me. Her "Good-by, Dave" held all the charm of her song and the tenderness of her heart, I thought, and I answered it with a catch in my throat.

"You will never be anything but a big over-grown kid, David," Frieda had told me, a few days before. Ay! I realized it! I would never cease crying for that radiant moon. Sometimes, in silly dreams, I have seen myself standing before her, with her two hands in mine, with her lips near, with her heart ready to come into my keeping. But, when I waken, I remember the words she said last year, when Gordon made her so unhappy. How could love be left in her heart? she had asked. Was there ever a night when she didn't kneel and pray for the poor soul of the man buried somewhere in France, in those dreadful fields, with, perhaps, never a cross over him nor a flower to bear to him a little of the love she had given? Let well enough alone, David, my boy! You can have her song whenever you care to beg for it, and her friendship and her smiles. Would you forfeit these things because you must come forth and beg for more, ay, for more than she can give you? Would you force her dear eyes to shed tears of sorrow for you, and hear her soft voice breaking with the pain it would give her to refuse?

A few days later she met me at her door, excitedly, and told me that Baby Paul had a slight cold and that Dr. Porter had advised her not to take him away with her.