JUST SWEETHEARTS

JUST SWEETHEARTS

A Christmas Love Story

By HARRY STILLWELL EDWARDS AUTHOR OF “TWO RUNAWAYS,” “HIS DEFENSE,” “ENEAS AFRICANUS,” ETC.

PUBLISHED BY THE J. W. BURKE COMPANY MACON, GEORGIA

Copyright, 1920 The J. W. Burke Company

Just Sweethearts

Chapter I

BATHED in the sunshine of one of those perfect days which so often come with Christmas in the South, he stood at the street corner, a light cane across his shoulders supporting his gloved hands, his eyes shifting with ever-changing interest, and a half smile on his swarthy face. It was written all over him that he had no appointments to meet, no duties to discharge; that he was by chance, only, in the moving picture and not of the cast, and that the whole thing, so far as he was concerned, was but a transient show to be enjoyed for its brilliancy of colors and its endless succession of fine Southern faces.

But here was idleness without inertia. Clearly he was one of those rare beings who can radiate energy standing still and convey the impression of impetuous force without motion, a trick of the eyes, a refusal to sag.

Name? Ladies and gentlemen, meet King Dubignon.

King saw her first as she started across Cherry Street from the far corner, a slender figure moving with grace and assurance through the dangerous procession of motor cars, still handled in the South as new toys, and once or twice his lips parted for a warning cry, but she gained the opposite corner with ease and turned straight toward him across Third. Now, of all the throng his alert eyes clung to this approaching figure and began to take note of details—white spats, plain tailor suit, loose blousy waist and flat hat with its little veil of black lace. Soon she was directly in front but her demure gaze was not for him. She was mentally preoccupied. She had thoughts of her own and not having seen the Dubignon eyes and smile she failed to look back after she passed.

The young man released a suspended breath like unto the fervid sigh of a cow settling down to rest, lowered his cane and stood gazing after the receding figure. And not he only, as he noticed with quick jealousy. Every man and woman who met her turned for a second glance. The gentian eyes, radiant face, curved lips parted in a half smile, belonged in an artist’s dream; the slender, supple figure borne along on dainty feet, the subtle grace of her moving, line vanishing into line, curve melting into curve, the free, elastic, boyish stride, were combinations notable even in The City of Beautiful Women, as the aborigines call their Macon.

King was an artist and had dreamed. He had lost something out of his dreams and now he had found something to place in one. He followed and saw her vanish into the crowd of a cheap store, an emporium of ten-cent things; and presently his broad shoulders opened up a path there for himself. Down one aisle and up another; and then he found her. She was critically examining lace at ten cents the yard and did not look up as he passed. The purchase of lace of any kind is a tax on all the faculties if one is faithful.

Checkmate? No. Inspiration! He went forward to the turn of the aisle at the show window near the door. It had occurred to him that sooner or later she would pass out. He took his stand in a little bay of space nearby and waited. Time was no object to him at such a crisis.

When he saw her coming again, threading her way through the crowd and almost without contact, he so maneuvered that she drifted naturally into the little bay promptly vacated for her accommodation. Instantly he was standing directly in front, hat in hand, arresting her departure:

“Beautiful, just a moment, please,” he said, smiling down, “I saw you crossing the street and followed you here. When you leave I shall not follow again. Listen; what I am asking is that you will take my card and have your father, or somebody, inquire about me of one of the bank cashiers on the corner, and then write me your address, won’t you? This isn’t regular, I know,” he continued with increase of vocal momentum, “but it is necessary—absolutely necessary. I have searched and waited for you all my life, and if I lose you now it may be forever.” The girl had drawn back a little and was looking into his face with wonder but without alarm. The Dubignon eyes and smile were irresistible. Nevertheless, now that he had spoken—words altogether different from the formal ones planned—King became self-conscious and troubled. Something jarred. Perhaps it was the twentieth century or the ten-cent store. Besides, he was pointing a piece of cardboard at her in, what must have seemed, a very absurd way. She felt instantly his embarrassment,

and women of all ages gain composure when men in their presence lose it. The instinctive response of eyes and lips, vibrant life to impetuous youth, was checked and a tiny, perpendicular line divided her brows:

“Are you quite sane?” she began, her voice reduced almost to a whisper—he thanked God for that. “Stand aside, please, or shall I send for the manager?”

“Perfectly sane,” he said, moving aside, but still holding out the card. “You will not send for anyone, because now the way is open. But all the same, I wish, awfully, you would take my card and when you get home decide. Won’t you, please? It’s just a little, lonesome card,” he added, whimsically. The girl hesitated, questioning him with the wonderful gentian eyes, into which, now of a sudden, came a fixed light. A white wonder paled her face for a fleeting instant, and she moved a step nearer. Doubtingly, the gesture clearly an unconscious one, her hand touched his arm.

“Have I ever seen you before? Do you know my name?” He shook his head, smiling happily. She watched the smile with open interest.

“Think again!” she urged, earnestly. He was deeply troubled. He wished that he might say he had met her as a summer girl somewhere, but he could not. What he did say was:

“It may strike you as absurd, but I have only seen you in a dream—a long dream!” She smiled over this and with sudden decision took the card, dropping it into her shopping bag.

“You are not to follow. You promised!”

“Cross my heart! I shall remain here fifteen minutes. Can you vanish back into your sunbeam in fifteen minutes?”

“Completely.” Her little laugh was the finest thing he had ever heard. She smiled up into his face and passed out.

Fifteen minutes later, having, with the aid of a little lady of blonde accomplishments, selected a dozen pairs of crimson and green socks and paid for them, he looked at his watch.

“My dear,” he said, “I’ve changed my mind. There’s really no room in my grip for this bundle. Christmas is at hand—kindly hand them to Mother, with my best wishes.”

“And I have no mother, and I never saw him before!” she said to the floorwalker, hysterically. “And red and green socks!”

“Easy mash,” he laughed, “he’ll be back. Exchange for something else.” She opened a tiny vanity box and powdered her nose. It was ammunition wasted.

Fate is a merry jade, at times. Half way to Jacksonville in a Pullman next day a young woman with gentian eyes, who had time and again searched her handbag, opened a package of cheap lace to finish dressing a Christmas doll, and a card dropped out. It bore the inscription, “King Dubignon.” Underneath was penciled the information that he was associated with Beeker, Toomer & Church, Architects, New York, and to this was added, “Hotel Dempsey, Macon, three days.” Fate’s little jest was the concealment of the card in a fold of the paper wrapper for twenty-four hours.

Chapter II

WHEN King Dubignon left Cornell and some seven hundred who had labored with him through several years of architecture and watercolor, he bore with him the consciousness that final examples of his work, left there, had not been excelled, and the memory of many friendly assurances that his place was waiting for him out in the great world. That he construed these assurances too literally was the fault of his temperament, and so, perfectly natural. Home yearning pulled him back to his beloved South for the initial plunge, and it was not long before his name in gilt invited the confidence of the good people of Macon, who had castles in the air.

The field proved narrow and depressing for one of his profession and temperament. The seven-room cottage of many colors seemed the limit of popular imagination at that time.

This, for a young man who was bursting with ideas, and who dreamed of thirty-live story buildings and marble palaces printing graceful lines against skies of blue! The years that slipped held some minor triumphs, but he classed them as time wasted.

Then a provincial board turned down his modern school building for a combination barn, silo and garage, designed by somebody’s nephew, and the proverbial straw was on the celebrated camel’s back.

It was a spring day when the camel’s spine collapsed. Birds were building homes for themselves, and wonderful flowers were solving, without human aid, marvels of form and color, and voices were calling to him across years unborn. Ah, those voices! He placed a foot under the corner of his drawing table and wrecked it against the wall.

Three days later he was in New York, that Mecca of ambitious young Southerners, and at the door of Beeker, Toomer & Church, esteemed by him and many another as the great city’s leading architects. Mr. Church, the junior partner, heard his application. A little smile hovered about the man’s thin lips, and a slight movement of the lines leading southeast and southwest from the nostrils expressed a cynical weariness.

“On an average,” said he with an air of calculation, “we have applications from Cornell men at the rate of six a week. And there are others!” He waved a hand feebly toward a vista of rooms with bending forms therein. “We can’t always keep the crowd we have busy.”

“I know all about that,” said King coolly, “but perhaps you need a man in this special line—art glass, stained glass windows?” He opened a portfolio and laid some designs before the architect.

Now, while no artist listens with patience to business argument, none refuses to listen to pictures. Mr. Church looked, carelessly at first, then with a distinct show of interest. The sheets slipped rapidly through his hands and he shot a swift glance at his visitor.

“These yours?”

“Yes.” Mr. Church pressed a button somewhere, his eyes still on the designs. A little gate opened.

“Come in,” he said.

And King Dubignon stood at the threshold of his career.

Back in the junior partner’s office the designs were more carefully examined.

“Very creditable,” was the grudging admission; “it so happens that we may be able to use a man in this line—temporarily. Be seated.” He disappeared. When he returned he was accompanied by a stout man of perhaps forty-five, prompt of manner and with a face that seemed to have been carved from tinted marble after a Greek model. This one, with quick eye, examined the designs, which he handled as an expert handles Sevres.

“Excellent! Yours?”

“Yes,” said King.

“Where are you from?”

“Georgia.”

“Learn this down there?”

“Partly, and partly at Cornell.”

“Nothing finer ever in this office, Church. You want to work with us, I suppose?” This to King.

“If agreeable, sir.”

“All right. How does twenty-five hundred strike you for a starter?”

“Fine.” And then, “Just what I made last year building freak cottages.” Mr. Beeker laughed:

“I know; served my time on them. The young wife brings you a home-made ground plan, providing for hotel accommodations, and wants a roof put over it—bay windows, porte cochere, etc. Cries when she finds your roof will cost more than her cottage. You’ll be under Mr. Church, Mr.—”

“Dubignon.”

“Good old name. Any advice needed, drop in on me.” He shook hands and turned away, but came back and placed a finger on the pictures:

“I say, Church, how about the memorial windows?”

“Yes, I think Mr. Dubignon might help.”

“Better give him a free hand on it.”

A sudden flush overspread the Southerner’s face and his look of gratitude followed the great architect.

But if King looked for sudden fame in New York, he was disappointed. Putting aside his ambition for the time being, he threw himself into the task of developing along the special line he had chosen for a foothold, with the same ardor that had carried him to the front at college, and his work stood all tests, easily. Beeker, Toomer & Church became headquarters for art glass designs in architecture. Presently his salary rose. And then again. And at length he found himself independent. But, to use his own expression, he “got nowhere.” The reason was simple; it was a rule of the office that all designs should bear the firm’s name only. Church had carefully explained this in the beginning. Church had also seen to it that press notices of their notable work invariably mentioned that Ralph Church was the head of the department responsible for it. King writhed under this system, but he could not budge without financial backing. He was heartily tired of his narrow field. At odd times, in his own living room, he worked on his ambitious dream.

The dream of the young architect was a thirty-five story office building wherein utility was to be combined with beauty without sacrifice of dividend-paying space or money, and without offense to the artistic eye from any point of view. Many architects have wrestled with the same problem and some with brilliant results. Now, by strange coincidence, a thirty-five story office building for Chicago, financed in New York, began to be talked of in building circles. No plans had been asked, no consultation with architects had. A rumor had started and was kicked around as a football. King took the backward trail and patiently followed it into the office of a certain great banker, whose young woman secretary had a friend that served an afternoon paper in reportorial capacity. Here King met his Waterloo; for no man in New York was less accessible than this particular banker, who had once received a “black-hand” letter. Red tape, red-headed office boy, confidential clerks, private secretary, hemmed him in from all but his selected associates. And the banker’s

offices were full of unsuspected exits. All roads led from his Rome.

King stalled at the red-headed boy—the extreme outer guard.

It was at this stage of his career that he put aside ambition and raced off to Georgia for a few days along the coast. One proved sufficient. He spent that laying holly wreaths on graves under mossy live oaks. Then he betook himself to Macon, to lunch and dine and sup with his old-time S. A. E. friends of Mercer, scene of his earliest college years. He found them in law offices, doctor shops, banks and trade—glad to see him, but busy. Then, bankrupt of emotions, he began to stand on the street corners during their busy hours and watch the people pass.

And watching thus, he had seen her.

And, finally, after three days more in his hotel, much boring of friends and many fruitless chases of false rumors, and hours in front of Wesleyan College, he had arrived at the conclusion that he was, after all, a sublime ass. Bearing this added burden, he had taken himself off to New York, in what old-time writers were pleased to call a frame of mind.

But, at the bottom of a formidable array of Christmas greetings piled on his desk by his devoted friend, Terence, the office boy, he found an envelope postmarked “Jacksonville, Fla., Dec. 25.” Within was a card, one of the kind sold five for a nickel, bearing these lines:

“I found your card in my bag on my way to Florida. Am keeping it in memory of the only impudence I have ever encountered at the hands of a man. Nevertheless, I am wishing for you a very happy Christmas and New Year. This, I take it, is the proper Christmas spirit.

“Beautiful.”

“P. S. Very likely I shall return to New York before Easter.”

And for King Dubignon, Christmas came back.

Also for Terence. The tip was five dollars, and an injunction:

“Small boy, note this handwriting! You will perceive that it is more of a jumping than a running hand—well, it belongs on the top of all mail. Understand?”

“I’m on,” said Terence with his broadest grin.

“Return to New York,” quoted King, self communing; “I should have known from the way she crossed the street she belonged in New York.”

“Sir?”

“On your way, Terence; on your way!” but this with a smile.

Chapter III

LENT was well under way and the first Easter displays in show windows when on a Saturday morning, King found a little note perched on the top of his office mail, which read:

“If you will be at the old Delmonico corner near Union Square Saturday at 4 P. M., you may walk with me as far as Twenty-third Street, on condition that you turn back there, and in the meantime ask me no questions. Don’t come if the conditions don’t suit.”

Whence she came, he never knew, but as he stood waiting, she appeared before him, her face radiant, her gentian eyes smiling up to his. He lifted his hat quickly and fell into step with her along the east side of Broadway. Now that the supreme moment had arrived, he raged inwardly that a species of dumbness should have seized upon him. Turning her head away, the girl laughed softly. She had no fears. The subtle instinct of her sex had informed her that it was not a contest between man and girl, but between woman and boy. The discovery pleased her. And then, smiling, she challenged him:

“Well, sir, what have you to say for yourself?”

King rallied:

“This; you are to marry me, of course. That was arranged in the beginning of all things. The important thing now is to get acquainted.” Again the low, sweet laugh and upturned face:

“Sounds like the verdict of a fortune teller. One of your old South Atlantic voodoos been earning a dollar?” He was amazed. It was not to be the last time this girl was to amaze him. She was an amazing girl.

“Why place me at the South Atlantic?”

“Oh my! Innocent! Doesn’t everybody know Charleston and Savannah brogue when they hear it?”

“Close. But it was a little further down. Are we so distinct, though?”

“Nobody can imitate it. I’ve tried. The fraud was apparent. My poor voice sticks. I can’t change it.”

“God forbid! But—getting back to the wedding—I am in earnest.”

“And you don’t know even my name!”

“I have name enough for two.”

“Nor who I am.”

“I know who you will be. That’s enough.”

“Nor if I am—nice.”

“Don’t jest.”

“Nor my profession. I may be an artist’s model, soubrette, chorus lady, paid companion, waitress, manicurist, or lady’s maid.” She glanced down at her very homely dress.

“I don’t care what your profession has been. I can look into your face and see that it has been honorable. It’s going to be Mrs. King Dubignon. Look up! I love you, can’t you see it?” Her eyes, swimming in light and laughter, met his.

“You absurd boy! Do you always make love this way? Is it the custom—‘a little further down’ than Charleston and Savannah?”

“I have never before spoken of love to a girl. My lips have never touched a girl’s.” And then, “I have been waiting for you!”

A deep flush suffused her neck and face, and for the first time she betrayed confusion.

“Don’t, please!” she whispered. “It is impossible that any man could love any girl so suddenly. And I don’t like to be treated as a silly.” King had whirled suddenly and was facing her.