The pioneer

by Geraldine Bonner

He argued with himself that he was under no obligation to her. He had never made any binding declaration to her, and he had honestly told her that he was not free to marry. How many men would have done that? If she was so unsophisticated as to take the few sentimental remarks he had made as a serious plighting of vows it was not his fault. He affected to have forgotten the remarks. Even in thinking to himself he assumed the air of one who finds it too trivial a matter for remembrance. But the truth was that every sentence was clear in his mind, and the recollection of the pure and honest feeling of that year stung him with an unfamiliar sense of shame.

In his heart he knew that of the three women who had played so prominent a part in his life, June was the one he had really loved. There were moments now, when, deep in the bottom of his consciousness, he felt that he loved her still. The clairvoyant glimpses of a life with her were very different. But he was not free! Why, he said to himself with a magnanimous air, why waste her life by encouraging her in fruitless hopes? Mercedes was quite a different person. She could take care of herself.

They were certainly troublous times for Jerry. He had a man’s hatred of a scene and the interviews he had with Mrs. Newbury were now always scenes. He left her presence sore and enraged with the fury of her taunts, or humiliated by the more intolerable outbursts of tears and pleadings, into which she sometimes broke.

He felt with a sort of aggrieved protest that after nearly ten years of devotion Lupé ought to be more reasonable. Jerry was confidently sure that, as he expressed it, he had “shown himself very much of a gentleman” where Lupé was concerned. He had been gentle and forbearing with her. Long after his affection had died he had been patient with her exactions and borne her upbraidings. He had kept a promise that had been made in the first madness of their infatuation and that many men would have regarded as ridiculous. In his behavior to his mistress Jerry saw himself a knight of chivalry. He did not tell himself that the main ingredient of his chivalry was a secret but acute fear of the violent woman whom his neglect had rendered desperate. She had threatened that she would kill herself. Once or twice of late, in what he called her “tantrums,” she had threatened to kill him. After these interviews Jerry went from her presence chilled and sobered. She was in despair and he knew it and knew her. Some day Lupé might keep her word.

One afternoon in October he had stopped in at the Newbury house to pay one of those brief visits which had replaced the long stolen interviews of the past. He had met Newbury down town in the morning and been told that Lupé was not feeling well. She had lately suffered from headaches, an unknown ailment for her. Newbury was worried; he wanted her to have the doctor, for she really looked bad and seemed very much out of spirits.

Jerry found her looking exceedingly white and very quiet. She had evidently been ill and showed the marks of suffering. He was relieved to see that she was in a fairly tranquil state of mind, with no intention of making a scene. In fact, to his secret joy he found that he could keep the conversation on the impersonal, society plane upon which he had often before attempted to maintain it, invariably without success. But Lupé to-day had evidently no spirit to quarrel or to weep. She sat in a large arm-chair in an attitude of listless weariness, her skin looking whiter, her hair and eyes blacker than usual. She had lost in weight and though in her thirty-seventh year was as handsome as she had ever been.

Jerry kept one eye on the clock. If he could get away early enough he was going to see a new horse Black Dan had just given Mercedes. A year of practice had made him very expert in bringing interviews with Lupé to an abrupt end, leaving her too quickly to give her time to change from the serenity of general conversation to the hysterical note of rage and grievance.

“Well, Lupé,” he said, rising and going to her side, “I must be going. I’m glad you’re so much better. You ought to take more exercise.”

He took her hand and smiling down at her pressed it. She looked at him with her somber eyes, large and melancholy in their darkened sockets. The look was tragic and with alarm he attempted to draw his hand away. But she held it, drew it against her bosom, and bowed her face on his arm.

“Oh, Jerry,” she almost groaned, “is this you and I?”