Chapter 6

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_ CHAPTER VI

_In Which Mary Brings Christmas to the Tower Rooms; and in Which Roger Declines a Privilege for Which Porter Pleads._

On Christmas Eve, Mary and Susan Jenks brought up to Roger a little tree. It was just a fir plume, but it was gay with tinsel and spicy with the fragrance of the woods, and it was topped by a wee wax angel.

In vain Mary and Barry and even Aunt Isabelle had urged Roger to join their merrymaking downstairs. Aunt Frances, having delayed her trip abroad until January, was coming; and except for Leila and General Dick and Porter Bigelow, it was to be strictly a family affair.

But Roger had refused. "I'm not one of you," he had told Mary. "I'm a bee, not a butterfly, and I shouldn't have joined you on Thanksgiving night. When you're alone, if I may, I'll come down--but please--not with your guests."

He had not joined them often, however, and he had never again shown the mood which had possessed him when his voice had charmed them. Hence they grew, as the days went on, to know him as quiet, self-contained man, whose eyes burned now and then, when some subject was broached which moved him, but who, for the most part, showed at least an outward serenity.

They grew to like him, too, and to depend upon him. Even Aunt Isabelle went to him for advice. He had such an attentive manner, and when he spoke, he gave his opinion with an air of comforting authority.

But always he avoided Porter Bigelow, he avoided Leila, and most of all, he avoided Delilah Jeliffe, although that persistent young person would have invaded the Tower Rooms, if Mary had not warned her away.

"He is very busy, Lilah," she said, "and when he isn't, he comes down here."

"Don't you ever go up?" Delilah's tone was curious.

"No," said Mary, "Why should I?"

Delilah shrugged. "If a man," she said, "had looked at me as he looked at you on Thanksgiving night, I should be, to say the least--interested----"

Mary's head was held high. "I like Roger Poole," she said, "and he's a gentleman. But I'm not thinking about the look in his eyes."

Yet she did think of it, after all, for such seed does the Delilah-type of woman sow. She thought of him, but only with a little wonder--for Mary was as yet unawakened--Porter's passionate pleading, the magic of Roger Poole's voice--these had not touched the heart which still waited.

"Since Mahomet wouldn't come to the mountain," Mary remarked to her lodger as Susan deposited her burden, "the mountain had to come to Mahomet. And here's a bit of mistletoe for your door, and of holly for your window."

He took the wreaths from her. "You are like the spirit of Christmas in your green gown."

"This?" She was wearing the green velvet--with a low collar of lace. "Oh, I've had this for ages, but I like it----" She broke off to say, wistfully, "It seems as if you ought to come down--as if up here you'd be lonely."

Susan Jenks, hanging the mistletoe over the door, was out of range of their voices.

"I am lonely," Roger said, "but now with my little tree, I shall forget everything but your kindness."

"Don't you love Christmas?" Mary asked him. "It's such a friendly time, with everybody thinking of everybody else. I had to hunt a lot before I found the wax angel. It needed such a little one--but I always want one on my tree. When I was a child, mother used to tell me that the angel was bringing a message of peace and good will to our house."

"If the little angel brings me your good will, I shall feel that he has performed his mission."

"Oh, but you have it," brightly. "We are all so glad you are here. Even Barry, and Barry hated the idea at first of our having a lodger. But he likes you."

"And I like Barry," he said. "He is youth--incarnate."

"He's a dear," she agreed. Then a shadow came into her eyes. "But he's such a boy, and--and he's spoiled. Everybody's too good to him. Mother was--and father, though father tried not to be. And Leila is, and Constance--and Aunt Isabelle excuses him, and even Susan Jenks."

Susan Jenks, having hung all the wreaths, had departed, and was not there to hear this mention of her shortcomings.

"I see--and you?" smiling.

She drew a long breath. "I'm trying to play Big Sister--and sometimes I'm afraid I'm more like a big brother--I haven't the--patience."

His attentive face invited further confidence. It was the face of a man who had listened to many confidences, and instinctively she felt that others had been helped by him.

"You see I want Barry to pass the Bar examination. All of the men of our family have been lawyers, But Barry won't study, and he has taken a position in the Patent Office. He's wasting these best years as a clerk."

Then she remembered, and begged, "Forgive me----"

"There's nothing to forgive," he said. "I suppose I am wasting my years as a clerk in the Treasury Department--but there's this difference, your brother's life is before him--mine is behind me. His ambitions are yet to be fulfilled. I have no--ambitions."

"You don't mean that--you can't mean it?"

"Why not?"

"Because you're a man! Oh, I should have been the man of our family--and Barry and Constance should have been the girls." Her eyes blazed.

"You think then, as I heard you say the other night on the stairs, that the world is ours; yet we men let it stand still."

Her head went up. "Yes. Perhaps you do have to fight for what you get. But I'd rather die fighting than smothered."

He laughed a good boyish laugh. "Does Barry know that you feel that way?"

"I'm afraid," penitently, "that I make him feel it, sometimes. And he doesn't know that it is because I care so much. That it is because I want him to be like--father."

He smiled into her misty eyes. "Perhaps if you weren't so militant--in your methods----"

"Oh, that's the trouble with Barry. Everybody's too good to him. And when I try to counteract it, Barry says that I nag. But he doesn't understand."

Her voice broke, and by some subtle intuition he was aware that her burden was heavier than she was willing to admit.

She stood up and held out her hand. "Thank you so much--for letting me talk to you."

He took her hand and stood looking down at her.

"Will you remember that always--when you need to talk things out--that the Tower Room--is waiting?"

And now there were steps dancing up the stairs, and Barry whirled in with Little-Lovely Leila.

"Mary," he said, "we are ready to light the tree, and Aunt Frances is having fits because you aren't down. You know she always has fits when things are delayed. Poole, you are a selfish hermit to stay off up here with a tree of your own."

Roger, who had stepped forward to speak to Leila, shook his head. "I don't deserve to be invited. And you're all too good to me."

"Oh, but we're not," Leila spoke in her pretty childish way; "we'd love to have you down. Everybody's just crazy about you, Mr. Poole."

They shouted at that.

"Leila," Barry demanded, "are you crazy about him? Tell me now and get the agony over."

Leila, tilting herself on her pink slipper toes almost crowed with delight at his teasing: "I said, _everybody_----"

Barry advanced to where she stood in the doorway.

"Leila Dick," he announced, "you're under the mistletoe, and you can't escape, and I'm going to kiss you. It's my ancient and hereditary privilege--isn't it, Poole? It's my ancient and hereditary privilege," he repeated, and now he was bending over her.

"Barry," Mary expostulated, "behave yourself."

But it was Leila who stopped him. Her little hands held him off, her face was white. "Barry," she whispered, "Barry--_please_----"

He dropped her hands.

"You blessed baby," he said, with all his laughter gone. "You're like a little sweet saint in an altar shrine!"

Then, with another sudden change of mood, he whirled her away as quickly as he had come, and Mary, following, stopped on the threshold to say to Roger:

"We shall all be away to-morrow. We are to dine at General Dick's. But I am going to church in the morning--the six o'clock service. It's lovely with the snow and the stars. There'll be just Barry and me. Won't you come?"

He hesitated. Then, "No," he said, "no," and lest she should think him unappreciative, he added, "I never go to church."

She came back to him and stood by the fire. "Don't you believe in it?" She was plainly troubled for him. "Don't you believe in the angels and the shepherds, and the wise men, and the Babe in the Manger?"

"No," he said dully, "I don't believe."

"Oh," it was almost a cry, "then what does Christmas mean to you? What can it mean to anybody who doesn't believe in the Babe and the Star in the East?"

"It means this, Mary Ballard," he said, impetuously, "that out of all my unbelief--I believe in you--in your friendliness. And that is my star shining just now in the darkness."

She would have been less than a woman if she had not been thrilled by such a tribute. So she blushed shyly. "I'm glad," she said and smiled up at him.

But as she went down-stairs, the smile faded. It was as if the shadow of the Tower Rooms were upon her. As if the loneliness and sadness of Roger Poole had become hers. As if his burden was added to her other burdens.

Aunt Frances, more regal than ever in gold and amethyst brocade, was presiding over a mountainous pile of white boxes, behind which the unlighted tree spread its branches.

"My child," she said reprovingly, as Mary entered, "I wonder if you were ever in time for anything."

And Porter whispered in Mary's ear as he led her to the piano: "Is this a merry Christmas or a Contrary-Mary Christmas? You look as if you had the weight of the world on your shoulders."

She shook her head. Tears were very near the surface. He saw it and was jealously unhappy. What had brought her in this mood from the Tower Rooms?

And now Barry turned off the lights, and in the darkness Mary struck the first chords and began to sing, "Holy Night----"

As her voice throbbed through the stillness, little stars shone out upon the tree until it was all in shining glory.

Up-stairs, Roger heard Mary singing. He went to his window and drew back the curtains. Outside the world was wrapped in snow. The lights from the lower windows shone on the fountain, and showed the little bronze boy in a winding sheet of white.

But it was not the little bronze boy that Roger Poole saw. It was another boy--himself--singing in a dim church in a big city, and his soul was in the words. And when he knelt to pray, it seemed to him that the whole world prayed. He was bathed in reverence. In his boyish soul there was no hint of unbelief--no doubt of the divine mystery.

He saw himself again in a church. And now it was he who spoke to the people of the Shepherds and the Star. And he knew that he was making them believe. That he was bringing to them the assurance which possessed his own soul--and again there were candles on the altar, and again he sang, and the choir boys sang, and the song was the one that Mary Ballard was singing----

He saw himself once more in a church. But this time there was no singing. There were no candles, no light except such as came faintly through the leaded panes. He was alone in the dimness, and he stood in the pulpit and looked around at the empty pews. Then the light went out behind the windows, and he knelt in the darkness; but not to pray. His head was hidden in his arms. Since then he had never shed a tear, and he had never gone to church.

* * * * * *

Mary's song was followed by carols in which the other voices joined--Porter's and Barry's and Leila's; General Dick's breathy tenor, Aunt Isabelle's quaver, Aunt Frances' dominant note--with Susan Jenks and the colored maid who helped her on such occasions, piping up like two melodious blackbirds in the hall.

Then General Dick played Santa Claus, handing out the parcels with felicitous little speeches.

Constance had sent a big box from London. There were fads and fripperies from Grace Clendenning in Paris, while Aunt Frances had evidently raided Fifth Avenue and had brought away its treasures.

"It looks like a French shop," said Leila, happy in her own gifts of gloves and silk stockings and slipper buckles and beads, and the crowning bliss of a little pearl heart from Barry.

Porter's offering to Mary was a quaint ring set with rose-cut diamonds and emeralds.

Aunt Frances, hovering over it, exclaimed at its beauty. "It's a genuine antique?"

He admitted that it was, but gave no further explanation.

Later, however, he told Mary, "It was my grandmother's. She belonged to an old French family. My grandfather met her when he was in the diplomatic service. He was an Irishman, and it is from him I get my hair."

"It's a lovely thing. But--Porter--it mustn't bind me to anything. I want to be free."

"You are free. Do you remember when you were a kiddie that I gave you a penny ring out of my popcorn bag? You didn't think that ring tied you to anything, did you? Well, this is just another penny prize package."

So she wore it on her right hand and when he said "Good-night," he lifted the hand and kissed it.

"Girl, dear, may this be the merriest Christmas ever!"

And now the tears overflowed. They were alone in the lower hall and there was no one to see. "Oh, Porter," she wailed, "I'm missing Constance dreadfully--it isn't Christmas--without her. It came over me all at once--when I was trying to think that I was happy."

"Poor little Contrary Mary--if you'd only let me take care of you."

She shook her head. "I didn't mean to be--silly, Porter."

"You're not silly." Then after a silence, "Shall you go to early service in the morning?"

"Yes."

"May I go?"

"Of course. Barry's going, too."

"You mean that you won't let me go with you alone."

"I mean nothing of the kind. Barry always goes. He used to do it to please mother, and now he does it--for remembrance."

"I'm so jealous of my moments alone with you. Why can't Leila stay with you to-night, then there will be four of us, and I can have you to myself. I can bring the car, if you'd rather."

"No, I like to walk. It's so lovely and solemn."

"Be sure to ask Leila."

She promised, and he went away, having to look in at a dance given by one of his mother's friends; and Mary, returning to join the others, pondered, a little wistfully, on the fact that Porter Bigelow should be so eager for a privilege which Roger Poole had just declined. _

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