VII.
Libby's friends had broken up their camp on the beach, and had gone to a lake in the heart of the woods for the fishing. He had taken a room at the Long Beach House, but he spent most of his time at Jocelyn's, where he kept his mare for use in going upon errands for Mrs. Maynard. Grace saw him constantly, and he was always doing little things for her with a divination of her unexpressed desires which women find too rarely in men. He brought her flowers, which, after refusing them for Mrs. Maynard the first time, she accepted for herself. He sometimes brought her books, the light sort which form the sentimental currency of young people, and she lent them round among the other ladies, who were insatiable of them. She took a pleasure in these attentions, as if they had been for some one else. In this alien sense she liked to be followed up with a chair to the point where she wished to sit; to have her hat fetched, or her shawl; to drop her work or her handkerchief, secure that it would be picked up for her.
It all interested her, and it was a relief from the circumstances that would have forbidden her to recognize it as gallantry, even if her own mind had not been so far from all thought of that. His kindness followed often upon some application of hers for his advice or help, for she had fallen into the habit of going to him with difficulties. He had a prompt common sense that made him very useful in emergencies, and a sympathy or an insight that was quick in suggestions and expedients. Perhaps she overrated other qualities of his in her admiration of the practical readiness which kept his amiability from seeming weak. But the practical had so often been the unattainable with her that it was not strange she should overrate it, and that she should rest upon it in him with a trust that included all he chose to do in her behalf.
“What is the matter, Mr. Libby?” she asked, as he came toward her.
“Is anything the matter?” he demanded in turn.
“Yes; you are looking downcast,” she cried reproachfully.
“I didn't know that I mustn't look downcast. I did n't suppose it would be very polite, under the circumstances, to go round looking as bobbish as I feel.”
“It's the best thing you could possibly do. But you're not feeling very bobbish now.” A woman respects the word a man uses, not because she would have chosen it, but because she thinks that he has an exact intention in it, which could not be reconveyed in a more feminine phrase. In this way slang arises. “Is n't it time for Mr. Maynard to be here?”
“Yes,” he answered. Then, “How did you know I was thinking of that?”
“I did n't. I only happened to think it was time. What are you keeping back, Mr. Libby?” she pursued tremulously.
“Nothing, upon my honor. I almost wish there were something to keep back. But there is n't anything. There have n't been any accidents reported. And I should n't keep anything back from you.”
“Why?”
“Because you would be equal to it, whatever it was.”
“I don't see why you say that.” She weakly found comfort in the praise which she might once have resented as patronage.
“I don't see why I should n't,” he retorted:
“Because I am not fit to be trusted at all.”
“Do you mean”—
“Oh, I haven't the strength, to mean anything,” she said. “But I thank you, thank you very much,” she added. She turned her head away.
“Confound Maynard!” cried the young man. “I don't see why he does n't come. He must have started four days ago. He ought to have' had sense enough to telegraph when he did start. I did n't tell his partner to ask him. You can't think of everything. I've been trying to find out something. I'm going over to Leyden, now, to try to wake up somebody in Cheyenne who knows Maynard.” He looked ruefully at Grace, who listened with anxious unintelligence. “You're getting worn out, Miss Breen,” he said. “I wish I could ask you to go with me to Leyden. It would do you good. But my mare's fallen lame; I've just been to see her. Is there anything I can do for you over there?”
“Why, how are you going?” she asked.
“In my boat,” he answered consciously.
“The same boat?”
“Yes. I've had her put to rights. She was n't much damaged.”
She was silent a moment, while he stood looking down at her in the chair into which she had sunk. “Does it take you long?”
“Oh, no. It's shorter than it is by land. I shall have the tide with me both ways. I can make the run there and back in a couple of hours.”
“Two hours?”
“Yes.”
A sudden impulse, unreasoned and unreasonable, in which there seemed hope of some such atonement, or expiation, as the same ascetic nature would once have found in fasting or the scourge, prevailed with her. She rose. “Mr. Libby,” she panted, “if you will let me, I should like to go with you in your boat. Do you think it will be rough?”
“No, it's a light breeze; just right. You need n't be afraid.”
“I'm not afraid. I should not care if it were rough! I should not care if it stormed! I hope it—I will ask mother to stay with Mrs. Maynard.”
Mrs. Breen had not been pleased to have her daughter in charge of Mrs. Maynard's case, but she had not liked her giving it up. She had said more than once that she had no faith in Dr. Mulbridge. She willingly consented to Grace's prayer, and went down into Mrs. Maynard's room, and insinuated misgivings in which the sick woman found so much reason that they began for the first time to recognize each other's good qualities. They decided that the treatment was not sufficiently active, and that she should either have something that would be more loosening to the cough, or some application—like mustard plasters—to her feet, so as to take away that stuffed feeling about the head.
At that hour of the afternoon, when most of the ladies were lying down in their rooms, Grace met no one on the beach but Miss Gleason and Mrs. Alger, who rose from their beds of sand under the cliff at her passage with Mr. Libby to his dory.
“Don't you want to go to Leyden?” he asked jocosely over his shoulder.
“You don't mean to say you're going?” Miss Gleason demanded of Grace.
“Yes, certainly. Why not?”
“Well, you are brave!”
She shut her novel upon her thumb, that she might have nothing to do but admire Grace's courage, as the girl walked away.
“It will do her good, poor thing,” said the elder woman. “She looks wretchedly.”
“I can understand just why she does it,” murmured Miss Gleason in adoring rapture.
“I hope she does it for pleasure,” said Mrs. Alger.
“It is n't that,” returned Miss Gleason mysteriously.
“At any rate, Mr. Libby seemed pleased.”
“Oh, she would never marry HIM!” said Miss Gleason.
The other laughed, and at that moment Grace also laughed. The strong current of her purpose, the sense of escape from the bitter servitude of the past week, and the wild hope of final expiation through the chances she was tempting gave her a buoyancy long unfelt. She laughed in gayety of heart as she helped the young man draw his dory down the sand, and then took her place at one end while he gave it the last push and then leaped in at the other. He pulled out to where the boat lay tilting at anchor, and held the dory alongside by the gunwale that she might step aboard. But after rising she faltered, looking intently at the boat as if she missed something there.
“I thought you had a man to sail your boat”
“I had. But I let him go last week. Perhaps I ought to have told you,” he said, looking up at her aslant. “Are you afraid to trust my seamanship? Adams was a mere form. He behaved like a fool that day.”
“Oh, I'm not afraid,” said Grace. She stepped from the dory into the boat, and he flung out the dory's anchor and followed. The sail went up with a pleasant clucking of the tackle, and the light wind filled it. Libby made the sheet fast, and, sitting down in the stern on the other side, took the tiller and headed the boat toward the t...
