failures to reveal his burning emotions never caused him to lose the
conviction that he would do it for certain next time.
It was in his customary braced-up, do-or-die frame of mind that he
entered the nursery now.
His visit to Keggs had been rather a late one and had lasted some time
before the subject of the White Hope had been broached, with the result
that, when Steve arrived among the white tiles and antiseptics, he
found his godson in bed and asleep. In a chair by the cot Mamie sat
sewing.
Her eyes widened with surprise when she saw who the visitor was, and
she put a finger to her lip and pointed to the sleeper. And, as we have
to record another of the long list of Steve's failures to propose we
may say here, in excuse, that this reception took a great deal of the
edge off the dashing resolution which had been his up to that moment.
It made him feel self-conscious from the start.
"Whatever brings you up here, Steve?" whispered Mamie.
It was not a very tactful remark, perhaps, considering that Steve was
the child's godfather, and, as such, might reasonably expect to be
allowed a free pass to his nursery; but Mamie, like Keggs, had fallen
so under the domination of Lora Delane Porter that she had grown to
consider it almost a natural law that no one came to see Bill unless
approved of and personally conducted by her.
Steve did not answer. He was gaping at the fittings of the place in
which he found himself. It was precisely as Keggs had described it,
white tiles and all.
He was roused from his reflections by the approach of Mamie, or,
rather, not so much by her approach as by the fact that at this moment
she suddenly squirted something at him. It was cold and wet and hit him
in the face before, as he put it to Keggs later, he could get his guard
up.
"For the love of......"
"Sh!" said Mamie warningly.
"What's the idea? What are you handing me?"
"I've got to. It's to sterilize you. I do it to every one."
"Gee! You've got a swell job! Well, go to it, then. Shoot! I'm ready."
"It's boric acid," explained Mamie.
"I shouldn't wonder. Is this all part of the Porter circus?"
"Yes."
"Where is she?" inquired Steve in sudden alarm. "Is she likely to butt
in?"
"No. She's out."
"Good," said Steve, and sat down, relieved, to resume his inspection of
the room.
When he had finished he drew a deep breath.
"Well!" he said softly. "Say, Mamie, what do you think about it?"
"I'm not paid to think about it, Steve."
"That means you agree with me that it's the punkest state of things you
ever struck. Well, you're quite right. It is. It's a shame to think of
that innocent kid having this sort of deal handed to him. Why, just
think of him at the studio!"
But Mamie, whatever her private views, was loyal to her employers. She
refused to be drawn into a discussion on the subject.
"Have you been downstairs with Mr. Keggs, Steve?"
"Yes. It was him that told me about all this. Say, Mame, we ain't seen
much of each other lately."
"No."
"Mighty little."
"Yes."
Having got as far as this, Steve should, of course, have gone
resolutely ahead. After all, it is not a very long step from telling a
girl in a hushed whisper with a shake in it that you have not seen much
of her lately to hinting that you would like to see a great deal more
of her in the future.
Steve was on the right lines, and he knew it; but that fatal lack of
nerve which had wrecked him on all the other occasions when he had got
as far as this undid him now. He relapsed into silence, and Mamie went
on sewing.
In a way, if you shut your eyes to the white tiles and the thermometer
and the brass knobs and the shower-bath, it was a peaceful scene; and
Steve, as he sat there and watched Mamie sew, was stirred by it. Remove
the white tiles, the thermometer the brass knobs, and the shower-bath,
and this was precisely the sort of scene his imagination conjured up
when the business of life slackened sufficiently to allow him to dream
dreams.
There he was, sitting in one chair; there was Mamie, sitting in
another; and there in the corner was the little white cot, well,
perhaps that was being a shade too prophetic; on the other hand, it
always came into these dreams of his. There, in short, was everything
arranged just as he pictured it; and all that was needed to make the
picture real was for him to propose and Mamie to accept him.
It was the disturbing thought that the second condition did not
necessarily follow on to the first that had kept Steve from taking the
plunge for the last two years. Unlike the hero of the poem, he feared
his fate too much to put it to the touch, to win or lose it all.
Presently the silence began to oppress Steve. Mamie had her needlework,
and that apparently served her in lieu of conversation; but Steve had
nothing to occupy him, and he began to grow restless. He always
despised himself thoroughly for his feebleness on these occasions; and
he despised himself now. He determined to make a big effort.
"Mamie!" he said.
As he was nervous and had been silent so long that his vocal cords had
gone off duty under the impression that their day's work was over, the
word came out of him like a husky gunshot. Mamie started, and the White
Hope, who had been sleeping peacefully, stirred and muttered.
"S-sh!" hissed Mamie.
Steve collapsed with the feeling that it was not his lucky night, while
Mamie bent anxiously over the cot. The sleeper, however, did not wake.
He gurgled, gave a sigh, then resumed his interrupted repose. Mamie
returned to her seat.
"Yes?" she said, as if nothing had occurred, and as if there had been
no interval between Steve's remark and her reply.
Steve could not equal her calmness. He had been strung up when he
spoke, and the interruption had undone him. He reflected ruefully that
he might have said something to the point if he had been allowed to go
straight on; now he had forgotten what he had meant to say.
"Oh, nothing," he replied.
Silence fell once more on the nursery.
Steve was bracing himself up for another attack when suddenly there
came a sound of voices from the stairs. One voice was a mere murmur,
but the other was sharp and unmistakable, the incisive note of Lora
Delane Porter. It brought Steve and Mamie to their feet simultaneously.
"What's it matter?" said Steve stoutly, answering the panic in Mamie's
eyes. "It's not her house, and I got a perfect right to be here."
"You don't know her. I shall get into trouble."
Mamie was pale with apprehension. She knew her Lora Delane Porter, and
she knew what would happen if Steve were to be discovered there. It
was, as Keggs put it, as much as her place was worth.
For a brief instant Mamie faced a future in which she was driven from
Bill's presence into outer darkness, dismissed, and told never to
return. That was what would happen. Sitting and talking with Steve in
the sacred nursery at this time of night was a crime, and she had known
it all the time. But she had been glad to see Steve again after all
this while, if Steve had known how glad, he would certainly have found
courage and said what he had so often failed to say, and, knowing that
Mrs. Porter was out, she had thought the risk of his presence worth
taking. Now, with discovery imminent, panic came upon her.
The voices were quite close now. There was no doubt of the destination
of the speakers. They were heading slowly but directly for the nursery.