A Modern Instance. William Dean Howells
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largest sum of consolation. He was none the less resolved not to spare himself at all in offering to release Marcia from her engagement. The fact that he must now also see her father upon the legal aspect of his case certainly complicated the affair, and detracted from its heroic quality. He could not tell which to see first, for he naturally wished his action to look as well as possible; and if he went first to Marcia, and she condemned him, he did not know in what figure he should approach her father. If, on the other hand, he went first to Squire Gaylord, the old lawyer might insist that the engagement was already at an end by Bartley's violent act, and might well refuse to let a man in his position even see his daughter. He lagged heavy-heartedly up the middle of the street, and left the question to solve itself at the last moment. But when he reached Squire Gaylord's gate, it seemed to him that it would be easier to face the father first; and this would be the right way too.
He turned aside to the little office, and opened the door without knocking, and as he stood with the knob in his hand, trying to habituate his eyes, full of the snow-glare, to the dimmer light within, he heard a rapturous cry of "Why Bartley!" and he felt Marcia's arms flung around his neck. His burdened heart yearned upon her with a tenderness he had not known before; he realized the preciousness of an embrace that might be the last; but he dared not put down his lips to hers. She pushed back her head in a little wonder, and saw the haggardness of his face, while he discovered her father looking at them. How strong and pure the fire in her must be when her father's presence could not abash her from this betrayal of her love! Bartley sickened, and he felt her arms slip from his neck. "Why—why—what is the matter?"
In spite of some vaguely magnanimous intention to begin at the beginning, and tell the whole affair just as it happened, Bartley found himself wishing to put the best face on it at first, and trust to chances to make it all appear well. He did not speak at once, and Marcia pressed him into a chair, and then, like an eager child, who will not let its friend escape till it has been told what it wishes to know, she set herself on his knee, and put her hand on his shoulder. He looked at her father, not at her, while he spoke hoarsely: "I have had trouble with Henry Bird, Squire Gaylord, and I've come to tell you about it."
The old squire did not speak, but Marcia repeated in amazement, "With Henry Bird?"
"He struck me—"
"Henry Bird struck you!" cried the girl. "I should like to know why Henry Bird struck you, when you've made so much of him, and he's always pretended to be so grateful—"
Bartley still looked at her father. "And I struck him back."
"You did perfectly right, Bartley," exclaimed Marcia, "and I should have despised you if you had let any one run over you. Struck you! I declare—"
He did not heed her, but continued to look at her father. "I didn't intend to hurt him,—I hit him with my open hand,—but he fell and struck his head on the floor. I'm afraid it hurt him pretty badly." He felt the pang that thrilled through the girl at his words, and her hand trembled on his shoulder; but she did not take it away.
The old man came forward from the pile of books which he and Marcia had been dusting, and sat down in a chair on the other side of the stove. He pushed back his hat from his forehead, and asked drily, "What commenced it?"
Bartley hesitated. It was this part of the affair which he would rather have imparted to Marcia after seeing it with her father's eyes, or possibly, if her father viewed it favorably, have had him tell her. The old man noticed his reluctance. "Hadn't you better go into the house, Marsh?"
She merely gave him a look of utter astonishment for answer, and did not move. He laughed noiselessly, and said to Bartley, "Go on."
"It was that drunken old scoundrel of a Morrison who began it!" cried Bartley, in angry desperation. Marcia dropped her hand from his shoulder, while her father worked his jaws upon the bit of stick he had picked up from the pile of wood, and put between his teeth. "You know that whenever he gets on a spree he comes to the office and wants Hannah's wages raised."
Marcia sprang to her feet. "Oh, I knew it! I knew it! I told you she would get you into trouble! I told you so!" She stood clinching her hands, and her father bent his keen scrutiny first upon her, and then upon the frowning face with which Bartley regarded her.
"Did he come to have her wages raised to-day?"
"No."
"What did he come for?" He involuntarily assumed the attitude of a lawyer crossquestioning a slippery witness.
"He came for—He came—He accused me of—He said I had—made love to his confounded girl."
Marcia gasped.
"What made him think you had?"
"It wasn't necessary for him to have any reason. He was drunk. I had been kind to the girl, and favored her all I could, because she seemed to be anxious to do her work well; and I praised her for trying."
"Um-umph," commented the Squire. "And that made Henry Bird jealous?"
"It seems that he was fond of her. I never dreamed of such a thing, and when I put old Morrison out of the office, and came back, he called me a liar, and struck me in the face." He did not lift his eyes to the level of Marcia's, who in her gray dress stood there like a gray shadow, and did not stir or speak.
"And you never had made up to the girl at all?"
"No."
"Kissed her, I suppose, now and then?" suggested the Squire.
Bartley did not reply.
"Flattered her up, and told how much you thought of her, occasionally?"
"I don't see what that has to do with it," said Bartley with a sulky defiance.
"No, I suppose it's what you'd do with most any pretty girl," returned the Squire. He was silent awhile. "And so you knocked Henry down. What happened then?"
"I tried to bring him to, and then I went for the doctor. He revived, and we got him home to his mother's. The doctor says he will get well; but he advised me to come and see you."
"Any witnesses of the assault?"
"No; we were alone in my own room."
"Told any one else about it?"
"I told the doctor and Mrs. Bird. Henry couldn't remember it at all."
"Couldn't remember about Morrison, or what made him mad at you?"
"Nothing."
"And that's all about it?"
"Yes."
The two men had talked across the stove at each other, practically ignoring the girl, who stood apart from them, gray in the face as her dress, and suppressing a passion which had turned her as rigid as stone.
"Now, Marcia," said her father, kindly, "better go into the house. That's all there is of it."
"No, that isn't all," she answered. "Give me my ring, Bartley. Here's yours." She slipped it off her finger, and put it into his mechanically extended hand.
"Marcia!" he implored, confronting her.
"Give me my ring, please."
He obeyed, and put it into her hand. She slipped it back on the finger from which she had so fondly suffered him to take it yesterday, and replace it with his own.
"I'll go into the house now, father. Good by, Bartley." Her eyes were perfectly clear and dry, and her voice controlled; and as he stood passive before her, she took him round the neck, and pressed against his face, once, and twice, and thrice, her own gray face, in which all love, and unrelenting, and despair, were painted. Once and again she held him, and looked him in the eyes, as if to be sure it was he. Then, with a last pressure of her face to his, she released him, and passed out of the door.
"She's been talking about you, here, all the morning," said the Squire, with a sort of quiet absence, as if nothing in particular had happened, and he were commenting on