Chapter 14

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_ CHAPTER XIV

One accomplishment that Allegheny mastered with gratifying ease was dancing. It came naturally to her, for both she and Buddy were full of music. At first she had been extremely self-conscious; Professor Delamater had found her to be as heavy as stone and as awkward as a bear; but later, as her embarrassment became less painful, she relaxed. She regained her power of speech, also, and in time she voiced an eager desire to learn all there was to learn.

Having quickly schooled her in the simpler forms of ballroom dancing, Delamater suggested a course in the deeper intricacies of fancy dancing.

"You're getting on," he told her, one day. "That last was splendid--top hole, absolutely."

Delamater, who was quite thoroughly American, affected at times an English turn to his conversation, believing that it gave him an air. It went particularly well, he thought, with light trousers, spats, and an afternoon coat cut close at the waist.

"Don't fool me," panted the red-faced Juno. "You must have iron feet."

"My word! Spoof you, indeed! Not for worlds, if you know what I mean? I shall expect to see you in the ballroom every evening."

But Allie's confidence forsook her at this. "I'd--be scared stiff. Folks would laugh. They haven't got--haven't anything to do but laugh at other folks, and I don't like to be laughed at."

"Laugh at you! Fancy that! You're too modest." Delamater adopted the cooing note of a dove. "'Pon my word, you're too modest. If you could hear the things I hear--" He paused, not knowing exactly what to say he had heard, but his vagueness, the very eloquence of his hesitation, caused Allie's face to light up. This was the second compliment paid her since her arrival at the Notch, therefore when the phonograph resumed its melodious measures she yielded herself with abandon to the arms of her partner, and her red lips were parted, her somber eyes were shining. That day she began a course of exhibition dancing.

It was on that afternoon that Delamater had told the clerk of discovering Ma Briskow alone in the woods. There was an open golf tournament at the Notch, prominent amateurs and professionals were competing, and the hotel was crowded to its capacity with players, fashionable followers of the game and a small army of society reporters and sport writers. This being the height of the season, social doings at the resort were featured in all the large Eastern papers, for famous names were on the register and the hotel switch was jammed with private cars.

Allie Briskow was in one of her trying moods to-day, for the out- of-doors called to her. Sounds of laughter and gayety, strains of music, had distracted her from her studies, her monotonous routine had become hopelessly unbearable all at once. From her window she could see young people, hear young voices, and envy flamed in her soul. Those girls were her age; those men, easy, immaculate, different from anything she had ever seen--except Calvin Gray --they, too, were young and they courted those girls. Contemplation of the chattering throngs showed Allie more clearly than ever the chasm separating her from these people, and reawakened in her that black resentment which at times made her so difficult to manage. She was thankful that her mother had disappeared and that her father was at the livery stable; she hoped they would stay away all day. At least, they were safe from ridicule. She wondered if she might not induce them to dine in their rooms that evening, and thus spare herself the embarrassment she always suffered when she accompanied them into the public dining room.

It seemed to her that whenever they went to dinner--Gus in his baggy pepper-and-salt sack suit, his loose, lay-down collar, and his wide-toed shoes, Ma in one of her giddy, gaudy dinner dresses --it seemed as if the entire assemblage was stricken dumb and as if every eye was turned upon them in mockery and amusement. Even the waiters, Allie felt sure, noted the difference between the Briskows and the other guests, and only with difficulty concealed their contempt.

The occasional presence of Mrs. Ring, handsome, dignified, unruffled, intensified that contrast and fairly shouted the humiliating announcement that here were three nobodies who wanted to be somebodies, but never could.

Invariably when they went out in public together Mrs. Ring made Allie feel as if she belonged to a lower, cruder order of animal life; as if she were an inhabitant of another sphere. And yet, Mrs. Ring was poor; she worked for wages! Allie could not understand this phenomenon; thought of it now caused her resentment to kindle.

Of course it was the lot of the hapless tutoress to select such a moment as this in which to sweetly chide the girl for some lapse of form. Allie exploded. She reduced the elder woman to tears, then, ashamed of herself, she flung blindly out of the room, crashing the door to behind her. She decided to dance her anger away. It was some consolation to know that she could dance as well, or better, than those slim and pampered beauties outside her window. Some consolation, even though she never expected to have a chance of proving it.

Delamater was especially agreeable to-day, more than usually nattering. Not for some time did his scholar become conscious of the subtle change in his demeanor, and even then its significance awoke only a shadowy contentment. Allie hated herself too thoroughly to-day to believe that anybody could really approve of her. As for him, he entirely misconstrued the meaning of her silent acceptance of his flattery.

They had become well acquainted by now and were on a basis of easy familiarity, nevertheless it came as a shock to Allie to be called by her first name-such a shock that she missed a step and trod on Delamater's foot. They came to a pause.

The dancing master was tall and slim, his face was on a level with hers, and now he smiled into it, saying, "My mistake, my dear."

"I--reckon it was." The girl's eyes were glowing queerly, and the man was amused at her evident agitation. His first word had thrown the poor thing into a flurry.

They began to dance again, and, after a moment, with a gently rising inflection, Delamater murmured, "You heard what I called you?" He approved of the sachet that Allie used, and he became acutely conscious of the jewels resting in the palm of his left hand. The girl was rich and she was--different, unusual. Ever since she had learned to yield herself to his embrace, he had been conscious of her strong physical attraction, and now it got the better of him. "You don't care?" he said, with his lips close to her ear.

"Humph! I'm not caring for anything or anybody to-day."

"Somebody has hurt my little girl."

Allie threw back her head and stared at him with quick suspicion. "Your little girl?" she repeated.

It is the lot of any man in the heat of his desire to make mistakes, and Delamater erred gravely at this moment. He kissed Allie. Without warning he kissed her full and fair upon her red, half-open lips.

For the briefest instant of amazement the two stood motionless in the middle of the polished floor while the phonograph brayed on; then Allie shook herself free of her partner, and in the same movement she smote him a mighty slap that sent him reeling. Delamater saw stars. The constellation of Orion gleamed in dazzling splendor within his tightly shut lids; he collided with a chair and went sprawling.

With a cry he scrambled to his feet. "What the hell--?" he growled, savagely.

Allie's face was chalky. Breathlessly, curiously she inquired, "Wha'd you do that for?"

"What did I _do_ it for? Say! You ought to be complimented --tickled to death." Delamater rubbed his cheek and glared at her. "By God! I wish you were a man. Oh, don't worry, I won't touch you again! Who the hell would, after that?" Allie opened her lips to speak, but he ran on more angrily as the pain bit into him. "Thought I meant it, eh? Why, you lumbering ox--"

"Then you ain't--in love with me or--or anything?"

"_Love_?" The speaker uttered an unpleasant sound indicative of scorn. "Wake up, sister! What d'you take me for? Why, your mother talks bird talk, and your dad lives in a box stall and eats oats with his knife! Here I kid you along a little bit--slip you a little kiss, as I would any girl, and you--you--" Delamater stuttered impotently. "_Love_? I guess I'm the first regular fellow that ever gave you a chance."

Delamater was surprised when his pupil turned her back upon him, strode to the nearest window, and flung it open as if for air; his surprise deepened when she faced him again and moved in his direction. Her expression caused him to utter a profane warning, but she continued to bear down upon him, and when she reached out to seize him he struck at her as he would have struck at a man.

To those who are familiar with Burlington Notch, it will be remembered that the hotel is pitched upon a slope and that the rooms on the first floor of the east wing are raised a considerable distance above the lawn. The windows of these east rooms overlook the eighteenth green, and during tournaments they are favorite vantage points of golf widows and enthusiasts who are too old to follow the competitors around the course. To-day they were filled, for an international title was at issue and Herring, prince of amateurs, was playing off the final round of his match with the dour Scotch professional, McLeod.

A highly enthusiastic "gallery" accompanied the pair, a crowd composed not only of spectators, but also of officials, defeated players, newspaper writers, camera men, caddies, and the like. They streamed up the final fairway behind the gladiators and for the moment they were enveloped in gloom, for Herring had sliced off the seventeenth tee and a marvelous recovery, together with a good approach, had still left his ball on the edge of the green, while McLeod, man of iron, had laid his third shot within three feet of the flag. It meant a sure four for the latter, with not less than a five for Herring. One of those golfing miracles, a forty-foot putt, would halve the match, to be sure, but in tournament golf miracles have a way of occurring on any except the deciding hole.

Sympathy usually follows the amateur, therefore it was a silent throng that ranged itself about the gently undulating expanse of velvet sod in the shadow of the east wing. Herring had played a wonderful match; he stood for all that is clean and fine in golf. The end of the balcony was jammed; nearly every window framed eager faces; amid a breathless intensity of interest the youthful contender tested the turf with the head of his club and studied the run of the green. A moment, then he took his stance and swung his putter smoothly. The ball sped away, taking a curving course, and followed by five hundred pairs of eyes. It ran too swiftly! Herring, in desperation, had overplayed! But no--it lost momentum as it topped a rise, then gathered speed, all but died at the edge of the cup and--toppled in amid a salvo of handclaps and roar of "Bravo!"

That was nerve, courage, skill! That was golf! The miracle had happened! Another hole to decide the match.

Quickly the crowd became still again as McLeod, his teeth set upon the stem of his pipe, his stony face masking a murderous disappointment, stepped forward to run down his four.

The silence was broken by a cry. Out of the air overhead came the sound of a disturbance, and every face turned. A most amazing thing was in the way of happening, a phenomenon unique in the history of tournaments, for a man was being thrust forth from one of the hotel windows, perhaps twenty-five feet above the ground--a writhing, struggling, kicking man with fawn-colored spats. He was being ejected painlessly but firmly, and by a girl--a grim-faced young woman of splendid proportions. For a moment she allowed him to dangle; then she dropped him into a handsome Dorothy Perkins rosebush. He landed with a shriek. Briefly the amazon remained framed in the casement, staring with dark defiance down into the upturned faces; her deep bosom was heaving, her smoky hair was slightly disarranged; she allowed her eyes to rest upon the figure entangled among the thorns beneath her, then she closed the window.

Nothing like this had ever occurred in Scotland. The mighty McLeod missed his putt and took a five.

As Allie Briskow passed through the lobby with her head erect and her fists clenched, she heard the sound of a great shouting outside and she believed it was directed at her. She fled into her room and flung herself upon her bed, sobbing hoarsely.

Mrs. Ring was waiting on the veranda for Gus Briskow when he returned to the hotel about dark. He had learned to dread the sight of her on that veranda, for it was her favorite resigning place--what Gus called her "quitting spot," and it was evident to- night that she was in a quitting mood, a mood more hysterical than ever before. It was some time before he could get at the facts, and even then he could not fully appreciate the enormity of the disgrace that had overwhelmed Allie's instructress.

"She chucked the dancin' teacher out of a winder?" he repeated, blankly. "What for?"

"Goodness knows, Mr. Briskow! Something he said, or did--I couldn't make out precisely. I found her in a dreadful state, and I tried to comfort her, I did really, but--oh! If you could have _heard_ her! Where she learned such language I don't know. My ears _burn_! But that isn't the worst; you should hear what--"

"He must of said something pretty low down." Briskow spoke quietly; his bright blue eyes were hard. "I reckon she'll tell me."

"You don't understand," chattered the woman. "She flung the man bodily out of the window and into a bed of thorns. It nearly killed him; he was painfully lacerated and bruised and--Right in the middle of a golf game! It did something dreadful--I don't know what--just as the world's champion caught the ball, or something."

"If he's crippled I'll get him that much easier," said Briskow, and at the purposeful expression upon his weather-beaten face Mrs. Ring uttered a faint bleat of terror. She pawed at him as he undertook to pass her.

"Oh, my heavens! What are you going to do?"

"Depends on what he said to Allie."

The woman wrung her hands. "What people! What--_savages_! You're --going to shoot him, I suppose, just because--"

"Yes'm!" the father nodded. "You got it right, motif an' all. 'Just because'!"

"You _can't_. I sha'n't permit it. I--I'll call the police."

"Don't do that, ma'am. I've stood a lot from you, in one way or another."

"But it's _murder_! You--you can't mean it." Moans issued from the speaker. "What _ever_ possessed me to accept this position? It's unendurable, and I'll be involved--"

"I've saw your last raise, Miz' Ring."

"Do you think I'd stay, after this? It's bad enough to be made ridiculous--the whole hotel is in laughter; laughter at me, I dare say, as much as at her. Imagine! Hurling a full-grown man from a window--"

"I don't hear nobody laughing." Briskow swung his head slowly from side to side.

"But to contemplate murder--"

"What's more, I don't intend to hear nobody laugh. By God! Now I come to think about it, there ain't a-goin' to be no laughing at all around here." Gus continued slowly to swing his head, like a bear. "She's my kid!" He pushed past Mrs. Ring, still muttering, "My kid--there ain't a-goin' to be no laughing at all."

Going directly to the desk, he asked for the manager, then stood aside, hat in hand, until the latter made his appearance. The manager began a hasty and rather mixed apology on behalf of the hotel for what had occurred in the dancing room, but his tone of annoyance was an accusation in itself. It was plain that, to his mind, the catastrophe on the eighteenth green outweighed in importance whatever may have led up to it. That was something actually tragic, something frightful, appalling; it involved the good name of the hotel and affected the world's golf title.

"Very--unfortunate," he lamented. "We haven't heard the last of it, by any means. McLeod may file a protest. And there is something to be said on both sides; rather a nice question, in fact."

"Prob'ly so," the father agreed. "An' I got something to say about it, too. Get that dancin' perfessor off the place quick or I'll kill him."

The manager recoiled; his startled eyes searched Briskow's face incredulously. "I--beg pardon?"

"I 'ain't heard my kid's side of the story yet, but I'm goin' to see her now, so you better get word to that jumpin' jack in a hurry. That is, if you want to save him."

"He is discharged, of course, for we tolerate no rudeness on the part of our employees--or our guests, for that matter; but I believe he is suffering some effects from the shock. I couldn't well ask him to go before--"

"It'll take me prob'ly twenty minutes, talkin' to my girl. That'll give him time, if he moves fast. But I may get through in fifteen."

At the door to his suite Gus Briskow paused to wipe his countenance clean of the expression it had worn for the last few minutes, and when he entered it was with his usual friendly smile. Allie and her mother were waiting; they were white and silent. Gus kissed his daughter before saying:

"Don't worry, honey; he won't bother you no more."

Allie averted her face. Mrs. Briskow inquired, "Did you see the skunk?"

"No. I give him a few minutes to clear out."

"Hadn't we better leave, too?" ventured Allie.

"Oh-h!" In Ma's eyes was such bleak dismay, such a piteous appeal, that Gus shook his head.

"What fer? We got nice quarters and your ma likes it here--"

"They're laughing at me. I heard 'em hollering."

"They won't laugh long. No, you're learnin' fast, and we're all havin' a nice time. Only one thing--I'm kinda tired of that Miz' Ring. I let her go, but I'll get you another--"

"She quit, eh?"

"Um-m, not exactly. I--"

"I don't blame her. I've been mighty mean. But I couldn't help it, pa. When you put a wild horse in a pen, it don't do to prod him and throw things and--That's what they've done to me. I bite and kick like any bronc. When you're hurt, constant, you get spells when you've got to hurt back. I've been rotten to her, and now this coming on top of it--"

"Wha'd that dancin' dude do, anyhow?"

Allie related her experience with Professor Delamater; she told it all up to the burst of shouting that followed her through the lobby. "You should of heard 'em yelling, clapping their hands--! I"--she choked, her voice failed her, miserably she concluded--"I wish to God we'd never struck oil!"

"You're just wore out, dearie," her mother said, comfortingly, and Briskow agreed. He assured her that all would be well.

All was not well, however. The next morning when Gus Briskow was about to leave the hotel as usual--Professor Delamater having departed hurriedly the evening before with fully four minutes of his twenty to spare--he was stopped by the manager, who requested him to give up his rooms. The Texan was bewildered; he could not understand the reason for such a request.

"'Ain't I paid my bills?" he queried.

The manager assured him that he had; he was profoundly regretful, as a matter of fact; but it so happened that the Briskow suite had been reserved early in the season, and the party who had made the reservation had just wired that he was arriving that day. He was a gentleman of importance--it was indeed unfortunate--the management appreciated Mr. Briskow's patronage--they hoped he and his family would return to the Notch sometime.

"Mebbe you got some other rooms that would do us," Gus ventured.

It was too bad, but the hotel was overcrowded. Later, perhaps-- Now at that very moment the lobby was filled with tournament golfers who were leaving on the morning train, and Briskow knew it. He studied the speaker with an expression that caused the latter extreme discomfort; it was much the same expression he had worn the night before when he had served warning upon Delamater.

"Lemme get this right," he said. "You can talk straight to me. Bein' ignerunt, I 'ain't got the same feelin's as these other folks got. I got a shell like a land turtle."

"It is quite customary, I assure you. No offense, my dear sir."

"That's how I figgered! Just bouncin' a low-down var mint ain't offense enough to be throwed out about, when you pay your bills--"

"You quite misapprehend--"

"Fired, eh? It 'll go hard with Ma. She's gainin' here, and she likes it. That's why I never told her you was chargin' us about double what you charge these rich folks."

The manager stiffened. "I regret exceedingly, sir, that you take it this way. But there is nothing more to be said, is there?"

It was with a heavy heart and a heavy tread that Briskow returned to his room. Ma took the announcement like a death blow, for it meant the end of all her dreams, all her joyous games of "pretend." Her mountains--those clean, green, friendly mountains that she loved with a passion so intense that she fairly ached --those and her caves, her waterfalls, her gypsy band, were to be taken from her. She was to be banished, exiled.

She did not weep a great deal, but she seemed suddenly to grow older and more bent. Listlessly, laboriously she began to pack, and her husband noticed with a pang that her hands shook wretchedly.

As for Allie, she told herself that this was the end. She had tried to make something of herself and had failed. She had crucified herself; she had bled her body and scourged her soul only to gain ridicule and disgrace. There was no use of trying further; Gray had been mistaken in her, and her misery, her shame at the realization was intolerable. There was no facing him, after this.

Allie decided to do away with herself. _

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