第47章

"Persistent!" murmured Laura."He simply wouldn't talk of anything else.It was making him sick, he said.

And he did have a fever--often.But he would come out to see me just the same.One night, when it was pouring rain--Well, I'll tell you.He had been to dinner with us, and afterwards, in the drawing-room, Itold him 'no' for the hundredth time just as plainly as I could, and he went away early--it wasn't eight.Ithought that now at last he had given up.But he was back again before ten the same evening.He said he had come back to return a copy of a book I had loaned him--'Jane Eyre' it was.Raining! I never saw it rain as it did that night.He was drenched, and even at dinner he had had a low fever.And then I was sorry for him.Itold him he could come to see me again.I didn't propose to have him come down with pneumonia, or typhoid, or something.And so it all began over again.""But you loved him, Laura?" demanded Mrs.Cressler.

"You love him now?"

Laura was silent.Then at length:

"I don't know," she answered.

"Why, of course you love him, Laura," insisted Mrs.

Cressler."You wouldn't have promised him if you hadn't.Of course you love him, don't you?""Yes, I--I suppose I must love him, or--as you say--Iwouldn't have promised to marry him.He does everything, every little thing I say.He just seems to think of nothing else but to please me from morning until night.And when I finally said I would marry him, why, Mrs.Cressler, he choked all up, and the tears ran down his face, and all he could say was, 'May God bless you! May God bless you!' over and over again, and his hand shook so that--Oh, well," she broke off abruptly.Then added, "Somehow it makes tears come to my eyes to think of it.""But, Laura," urged Mrs.Cressler, "you love Curtis, don't you? You--you're such a strange girl sometimes.

Dear child, talk to me as though I were your mother.

There's no one in the world loves you more than I do.

You love Curtis, don't you?"

Laura hesitated a long moment.

"Yes," she said, slowly at length."I think I love him very much--sometimes.And then sometimes I think Idon't.I can't tell.There are days when I'm sure of it, and there are others when I wonder if I want to be married, after all.I thought when love came it was to be--oh, uplifting, something glorious like Juliet's love or Marguerite's.Something that would--" Suddenly she struck her hand to her breast, her fingers shut tight, closing to a fist."Oh, something that would shake me all to pieces.I thought that was the only kind of love there was.""Oh, that's what you read about in trashy novels," Mrs.

Cressler assured her, "or the kind you see at the matinees.I wouldn't let that bother me, Laura.

There's no doubt that '_J._' loves _you._"Laura brightened a little."Oh, no," she answered, "there's no doubt about that.It's splendid, that part of it.He seems to think there's nothing in the world too good for me.Just imagine, only yesterday I was saying something about my gloves, I really forget what--something about how hard it was for me to get the kind of gloves I liked.Would you believe it, he got me to give him my measure, and when I saw him in the evening he told me he had cabled to Brussels to some famous glovemaker and had ordered I don't know how many pairs.""Just like him, just like him!" cried Mrs.Cressler.

"I know you will be happy, Laura, dear.You can't help but be with a man who loves you as 'J.' does.""I think I shall be happy," answered Laura, suddenly grave."Oh, Mrs.Cressler, I want to be.I hope that I won't come to myself some day, after it is too late, and find that it was all a mistake." Her voice shook a little."You don't know how nervous I am these days.

One minute I am one kind of girl, and the next another kind.I'm so nervous and--oh, I don't know.Oh, Iguess it will be all right." She wiped her eyes, and laughed a note."I don't see why I should cry about it," she murmured.

"Well, Laura," answered Mrs.Cressler, "if you don't love Curtis, don't marry him.That's very simple.""It's like this, Mrs.Cressler," Laura explained."Isuppose I am very uncharitable and unchristian, but Ilike the people that like me, and I hate those that don't like me.I can't help it.I know it's wrong, but that's the way I am.And I love to be loved.The man that would love me the most would make me love him.

And when Mr.Jadwin seems to care so much, and do so much, and--you know how I mean; it does make a difference of course.I suppose I care as much for Mr.

Jadwin as I ever will care for any man.I suppose Imust be cold and unemotional."

Mrs.Cressler could not restrain a movement of surprise.

"You unemotional? Why, I thought you just said, Laura, that you had imagined love would be like Juliet and like that girl in 'Faust'--that it was going to shake you all to pieces.""Did I say that? Well, I told you I was one girl one minute and another another.I don't know myself these days.Oh, hark," she said, abruptly, as the cadence of hoofs began to make itself audible from the end of the side street."That's the team now.I could recognise those horses' trot as far as I could hear it.Let's go out.I know he would like to have me there when he drives up.And you know"--she put her hand on Mrs.

Cressler's arm as the two moved towards the front door--"this is all absolutely a secret as yet.""Why, of course, Laura dear.But tell me just one thing more," Mrs.Cressler asked, in a whisper, "are you going to have a church wedding?""Hey, Carrie," called Mr.Cressler from the stoop, "here's J."Laura shook her head.

"No, I want it to be very quiet--at our house.We'll go to Geneva Lake for the summer.That's why, you see, I couldn't promise to go to Oconomowoc with you."They came out upon the front steps, Mrs.Cressler's arm around Laura's waist.It was dark by now, and the air was perceptibly warmer.

The team was swinging down the street close at hand, the hoof beats exactly timed, as if there were but one instead of two horses.