“Thank God you’re all right,” Frank said fervently. He drew in a deep breath and squared his shoulders.
Barbara looked at him quickly. “You’re all mixed up in my dream,” she told him. “You’ll have to help me straighten it all out.”
“Gladly,” he said humbly. “But let’s wait until to-morrow. I’m going to take you home now and have Ethel put you to bed. If my hair doesn’t turn gray over this night’s episode I’ll be surprised.”
“I’m sorry I caused so much trouble,” Barbara murmured pitiably.
“Don’t you worry about that, honey.” Ethel patted her shoulder comfortingly. “We hit too fast a pace for you. All my fault. Don’t worry your head about it one moment. Everything’s all right that ends all right.”
“But it must have been a terrible experience for you,” Barbara protested. “I’m terribly ashamed of breaking up the party.”
“To hell with the party,” Frank interrupted. “It needed to be broken up. You just sit quietly and I’ll have you home in a jiffy. We’ll all laugh about it tomorrow, but I’m still too frightened to do much laughing.”
All three were silent as he drove on toward the Brinkley home. Frank was wondering how much Barbara remembered: and Ethel was wondering exactly what had taken place in his room before he called her: and Barbara was wondering how much of her confused memories were reality.
None of them spoke again until the car stopped in front of Ethel’s home. Ethel leaped out quickly with a great sigh. “The perfect end to a hectic evening,” she murmured. She took Barbara’s hand to help her alight.
Frank came around the car quickly. “Do you feel faint?” he asked tenderly. “Can you stand all right?” He slipped his arm about her waist.
“I feel fine,” Barbara assured him. “I’ve always thought I’d feel terrible after doing this for the first time... but I don’t... really. I’m not a bit ashamed.”
“I’m so glad,” Frank said quickly. “I’d never cease calling myself a dog if you did feel badly about what happened.” The three of them moved slowly to the gate.
Barbara stopped there and turned to Frank with uplifted arms. “Kiss me,” she said. “I want to thank you for being kind and... and for — everything.”
She clasped her arms about his neck and he kissed her tenderly. “This is only the beginning,” he told her quietly. “You were too drunk to-night. But another day it’ll be different.”
“Well, come on!” Ethel called impatiently. “You two have done plenty for one night.”
“All right.” Frank laughed exultantly. He was just coming to a realization of how much Barbara meant to him. “You need plenty of sleep after to-night,” he said to Barbara. “Good night... and I’ll be seeing you.”
“Good night,” she called after him softly. Then she turned to Ethel as Frank’s car roared off into the night.
None of the three had noticed the dark figure of a man hidden by the shadow of the hedge. A figure which stumbled away uncertainly as the door closed behind Barbara and Ethel.
Chapter Eight
“There! Now I guess you see what I meant!” Hattie sniffed three times, audibly, and glared about the coach crowded with merrymakers bound for the New Orleans Mardi Gras.
“Shh,” Robert said desperately. “They’ll all hear you.”
“And little difference that makes to me,” Hattie commented with asperity. She sat a little more erect on the plush seat, and her nose wriggled furiously.
“But they’re all right,” Robert protested in an undertone. “They’re all just happy and having a good time.”
“Humph. Fiddlesticks! All right, indeed. The commonest sort of people. Laughing at silly jokes and chattering together like a pack of monkeys. I must say that I’m beginning to have more respect for that Darwin man after seeing and listening to this crowd.”
“I know,” Robert muttered resignedly. “You’ve been telling me that ever since we left home. I do wish we’d hurry and get to New Orleans.”
“Like as not you’ll wish you hadn’t gotten there so soon when we do arrive,” Hattie told him. “No manner of knowing what you’ll find Barbara doing if this is a sample of the sort who go to Mardi Gras.”
“Well, I think it’s nice the way all of them seem so friendly and happy,” Robert muttered defiantly.
“Nice? Humph!” Hattie sniffed again. “It’s not the sort I’d choose for company,” she commented acidly. “I just want to point out to you that I told you this was the sort of people who go to carnivals like this.”
“Well, you did choose them,” Robert said sulkily. “You didn’t have to come if you didn’t want to. I didn’t ask you to.”
“Didn’t have to come indeed!” Hattie bristled anew. “As though I don’t know my duty when it’s plain as the nose on my face.”
Robert made no answer. He turned to stare out the window, fiercely refraining from telling his Cousin Hattie that anything as plain as the nose on her face would be very plain indeed. His soul seemed to have died within him as he strove to repress his impatience at the snail-like pace of the train.
“And I’ve never been one to turn my back on my duty,” Hattie continued complacently. “If I do say it myself as shouldn’t. When you came in with that hangdog expression on your face this morning and admitted that you were utterly lost to all sense of self-respect and had decided to follow that gadabout girl to New Orleans, why I said to myself, I says: ‘Hattie. There’s your duty. No matter how distasteful it may be. You can’t desert your uncle’s son at a time like this. Your duty’s plain to be seen. You’ll simply have to lay your own feelings aside and do what’s your plain duty.’ That’s what I said to myself this morning,” she ended triumphantly.
“I know,” Robert muttered. “You’ve told me half a dozen times.”
“Simply that I want you to understand that it’s for your sake that I’m coming. Goodness knows what the ladies in the Aid Society will think of me for traipsing off to a sinful carnival like this. But that simply doesn’t matter, for I was never one to shirk my duty.”
Robert stared miserably out the window and tried not to listen to his Cousin Hattie’s shrill voice. His face was haggard, and it seemed to have new lines which had come since the day Barbara had thrown her ring at him and fled to the house.
He had not seen Barbara since that afternoon. He had tried to steel his heart against the overmastering love which cried out for her. He hadn’t slept more than a few hours during the days which had elapsed since that scene in her yard.
Hattie didn’t know that. She knew nothing of the long tramps he had taken each night after lying upon his bed and tossing in agony for hours, seeking nepenthe in sleep which would not come. She knew nothing of the fitfully tortured dreams which had walked with him each day as he sought to go about the work on the farm as though Babs did not matter.
Cousin Hattie had seen none of these things. She had sniffed and said, “Good riddance of bad rubbish.” Robert had tried to believe that. He had said it over and over to himself. But it simply was no use. Babs’ dear face was before him continually. He felt he would go mad with the agony of waiting to see her again. Then, Sunday night he heard that she had taken the train for New Orleans that day.
That news had done a queer thing to him. Somehow, it had served to sweep the bitterness from his heart. With the knowledge that she was gone, something had died. He had slept Sunday night. Only to dream of Barbara through the long hours. She had come to him in many guises in his dream. In fantastic costume, masked, laughing gleefully, one of a throng of carefree spirits laughing their way through the festival of Mardi Gras.