Butterfly

CHAPTER I-2

Standing here, in John Spaulding’s office, seven years later, Hilary smiled, remembering all this. Poor little courageous fool of a girl of sixteen, how gallantly she had ridden at her windmills! Many a discouraged hour, and weary hour, and hour of humiliation and doubt, lay between that day and this. She was wiser now, less blindly bold, not quite so dramatically confident as that younger Hilary had been.

Dora was eighteen now, with all the musical promise of her astonishing babyhood fulfilled, and Hilary, looking down the street, dimming in the bleak winter twilight, could see the still lighted windows of the bank, where the money that was to take Dora and herself to Europe next year, was safely waiting.

And finally, to set this train of reminiscent thought in motion, her eyes had only to move in a certain direction, to find the picture of a young man, boldly displayed upon a poster in the darkening street: a young man who was represented with a violin upon his shoulder. Under him, in large clear print, were the words: “Konrad Kronski. First Appearance in America. Philadelphia, Evening of December Third.”

Hilary had watched some men pasting the poster on the fence an hour ago. She had never seen Kronski, she had not known until then that he was in America. But a letter, written to him, was in her hand at this moment, ready for the post.

That was the way with her life, she reflected, almost awestruck with gratitude for the suddenly vouchsafed guidance, as she turned back into the dusky office, touched the light, and went to sit down again at her desk. She had been wondering for months how the next great change was to come about. Were she and Dora simply to pack up their clothes, and rent the house, and go away into the unknown? Was that safe?

Dora was fast developing; young men were beginning to admire her. The girl was restless, too, discontented and vaguely dissatisfied—Hilary knew that temperament well! The struggle to keep their lives apart from the lives of the village, to keep their great and sacred end always in sight, had been growing increasingly difficult for the older sister. Dora could not always seem to realize, as Hilary did, that theirs was a great destiny. Dora wanted to go to parties, to wear pretty frocks, to have good times. Hilary knew that the time was coming, and coming fast, when she must act, or fail.

And now, like a guiding star in the east, had come this man’s name out of her past, the name her father had mentioned with his dying breath. She was to take Dora to Kronski—Kronski would advise them! And time had brought Kronski into her reach.

To-night she would look through old letters, find what she could in his mother’s writing to her mother, and make sure her claim, so that when she saw him as she intended to see him, she would know exactly how to reach him. The letter she had written him told him of the old friendship, told him that she and Dora would be at the concert, asked him if they might bring the Amati, and if after the concert he would listen to Dora. And with this opening of the heavens Hilary felt a rush of confidence and delight sweep over her. She had come to work this morning somewhat worried and puzzled; now all was clear. Kronski could not but be impressed by her exquisite “Butterfly,” as she almost always called her little sister; perhaps he had a kind wife, perhaps they would all go back to Europe together——!

An unseen door slammed; she went into the outer office expectantly. John Spaulding’s nephew was expected to-night from New York; he was to spend some time in Mount Holly with his uncle and aunt. She knew him to be a great favourite with his uncle, as indeed with everyone. Echoes of his business ability came from the New York office; and hints of his social successes Dora sometimes found in the daily papers or the illustrated weeklies. He had earned a captain’s commission early in the war, and had acquitted himself creditably in France. To Hilary, as to everyone else in the Spaulding factory, he seemed one of the most important persons in the world.

Hilary had seen him several years ago, when she was a humble little filing clerk, and he a handsome serious youth of twenty-five, walking through the packing plant between his father and uncle, his groomed appearance, his well-cut homespun clothes, and his ready, clear voice in striking contrast to the busy young men and women who watched him silently from above their cutting tables, packing machines, and ledgers. He met their eyes with a friendly, interested look from his own wide-open gray ones; he was of not more than the average height, squarely built, with thick, close-cropped light-brown hair. They all knew that his father was Rodney Spaulding, the head of the firm, and that this boy would inherit the lion’s share of both the New York and the New Jersey plants some day. Old John Spaulding had two daughters, both with wealthy husbands: it was inevitable that young Craig Spaulding should succeed to both his father’s and uncle’s control and management of the business.

Uncle and nephew came together into the office; Hilary stood up for an introduction. Craig Spaulding was just as she remembered him, a little older, a little sterner, perhaps, but very much the poised and courteous gentleman. His voice, and his quick finished speech, were delightful. His eyes were keen, but full of an engaging friendliness that disarmed resentment; his clothes, even this village girl could see, were perfection. The big, dark-red coat was belted, the big gloves were a greenish yellow, the hat had at the back a small flat bow that Hilary had never seen on any other man’s hat, and was tilted at an angle an inch or two more daring.

Craig saw, against a background of ink-spattered letter-files and bundles of old papers, the harsh electric lights falling full upon her, a graceful, well-built girl whose face was oddly and inexplicably bright. Her hair, clinging close to her head in rich waves and heavy braids, was reddish brown, her eyes were a clear surprising blue, and she had an unexpected mouth, a mouth that looked rather wide and grave when she was serious but that had a great and irregular charm when she smiled. She wore what she had worn almost as a uniform for three or four years, but he did not know that. He did not even analyze the simple frock of dark blue corduroy velvet, with the plain collar of dark, creamy lace, but he thought that he liked her and her dress; there was something quaint and honest and interesting about them both.

“You’ve met my nephew before?” said John Spaulding, his face rosy with cold air and exercise, his frosty old blue eye kindly. “Sorry to keep you here, but the train was late, and then we had to go up to the house to see the boy’s aunt. I think it’s a little late to go over things to-night; suppose we put it off until to-morrow?”

Hilary looked at him respectfully, deferentially.

“Just as you decide, Mr. Spaulding.”

“Boys have pretty well gone home, haven’t they?”

“I imagine so.” Hilary glanced at her wrist-watch. “It’s just five,” she said.

A shrill whistle, outside in the gloom of the yard, confirmed her. Young Spaulding and his uncle and Hilary looked out of the side window. It gave upon a large yard bounded by various sheds and doorways; upon these and upon the churned black mud underfoot several bright lights were shining. The doorway of one long building opened, and the employees began to stream out in groups of twos and threes, punching a time-clock as they came. The young men and women were well but shabbily wrapped; they laughed and locked arms companionably as they picked their way toward the gate.

“That whistle is the signal for tea-pots to be filled all along Spaulding Street!” the old president of the plant said in genial satisfaction.

“I like to see them come out like that,” Hilary said somewhat timidly. “It reminds me of something. I don’t know what!” She spoke mildly, merely trying to be polite, to show the great Craig that pleasant relationships existed between his uncle and his uncle’s secretary. For however justly and however staunchly Hilary might feel, elsewhere, the importance of her work in life, and its utter independence of a place as obscure as Mount Holly, here in the factory the Spauldings were the natural rulers of the universe.

“Of what?” Craig Spaulding asked, with his accurate, sharp, and yet kindly manner.

“Well,” she stammered, a little startled, “I was thinking of—of Russia, and of some place, in England, I imagine—where the lights, and the wet, dark yard, and the people streaming along, were like that!”

“You know Russia?” Craig asked, crisply.

“I remember Moscow, when I was five,” Hilary answered briefly.

“But we don’t want our factory to resemble those places!” he said, seriously. “It seems to me that that yard could be floored.”

“The trucks would chew it to pieces in no time!” old John said, pleased with his interest. “But now that you’re here, we’ll do great things!”

“They all prefer to cut across the yard, because it gives into Washington Street,” Hilary explained, shyly. “They could go out the Market Street door.”

Craig listened to her attentively. When she had finished he gave her a sudden smile, his sober face changing pleasantly as he did so.

“A short cut to those tea-pots!” he suggested to his uncle. Old Spaulding assented jovially; it was a great delight to him to have “the boy” here. Craig’s coming had caused quite a stir in the nicest social set of Mount Holly, and the Spauldings, whose daughters were married and gone from home, enjoyed the little excitement.

Even now the telephone rang peremptorily; Mrs. Cutler White expected her daughter and some young friends from college for a house-party next week-end. Was Mr. Craig Spaulding there? Might she just say “Welcome home!” and ask him if he could join them?

Hilary handed him the telephone gravely; she liked his abstracted, almost annoyed expression as he politely snubbed the ubiquitous Mrs. White. He expected to spend almost all his Sundays in New York with his parents, he said pleasantly.

“Whew!” he exclaimed, half-humorously, when the conversation was over, hanging up the receiver, and looking pathetically at his companions.

“You’ll have a good deal of that, my boy!” his uncle warned him.

“Well, now, let’s see. What’s this office, Uncle John?”

“This we call ‘outer office.’ Mine opens from this, you see. Old Kraut—you remember our manager, old Kraut?—has his desk here, and Miss Collier sits here and protects me from the Black Hand and the evil eye——”

“Telephone calls go through her?” Craig asked, smiling.

“Always!”

“Ah, well, then,” he said, in relief, “all I need do is enlist the kindly aid of Miss Collier. Kind as she looks. I imagine she can be a martinet! And, as soon as I am really started here, I shall instruct her to give me no social calls of any description. How about that, Miss Collier?”

“That can be managed,” Hilary said, capably. Her heart was beating in pleasant excitement. It would be a delightful variation of the dull office routine to have this interesting person here in the old factory and to feel that business would give them an inevitable friendship.

“Miss Collier is a very extraordinary person, Craig,” old John said, amiably. “We’re going to lose her, one of these days, like all the rest of the good ones!”

Hilary, smiling, with hot cheeks, realized that this little introduction of the personal did not especially interest Craig, and she wished that her garrulous old employer would hold his peace.

“She takes her little sister abroad, to study music, in a year or two,” John Spaulding went on. “Extraordinary child!”

Craig looked kindly at Hilary, and she saw, with a rush of gratitude, that he perfectly appreciated that the introduction of her own affairs was none of her doing.

“I supposed, of course, that it was something else,” he said, with his keen look.

“Oh, no—no—no! I don’t imagine Miss Collier has much use for the Mount Holly boys!” his uncle laughed. And then immediately they were all talking business in a most businesslike way. Craig would come down in the morning; Hilary would please tell Hubert to bring in the desk, and fix the lights. The young man and his uncle would go over everything at ten o’clock, and so on.

“Sorry to have kept you, Miss Collier,” said her employer. “The train was late, and I thought we might go over that invoice from Goldbaum to-night. Good-night!”

“Good-night!” Her telephone trilled. With her serious eyes upon the two men she lifted it to her chest. “Oh, yes, Mrs. Underwood,” they heard her say. “Yes, I believe Mr. Craig Spaulding arrived this afternoon. Shall I try to get him for you? Yes, that would be better, I think. You could probably get him at the house later on.”

She set down the instrument; all three smiled.

“Miss Collier,” said Craig Spaulding, with his finished, brisk air, “consider yourself retained at any price!”

Hilary echoed their cheerful good-nights, and went through the darkened abandoned offices with a singing heart. She locked the coat-room, let herself out past the watchman, at a side door, and turned off into the quiet little back street that had been her own personal world since childhood. She had to pick her way, there was treacherous slush underfoot, and here among the big trees and decorous old brick walls the street-lights did not help very effectively. She knew all these houses and the people in them: she and Dora had their favourites among the old pink and cream brick buildings, admired this old Revolutionary balcony, or that gracious line of side wall.

She could see lights upstairs in the Brewster house; Minnie and her father and mother were putting the baby to bed. They made a great fuss about Minnie’s baby, the first grandchild. And the Fosters’ side parlour was lighted; perhaps Tom and ’Lizabeth were home. The family never used it otherwise.

Her own lane ran close under the yellow stream from the tall windows; the Colliers’ little home was a tiny brick building of four rooms. It was detached from the big house beside it, now, but it was still called what it had once in fact been: “the Carolan kitchen.” It stood, a graceful little wing, beside the shabby old main house. Both were of creamy brick, mellowed by the snows and summers of nearly two hundred years.

The girl was thrilling, as she hurried home in the cold dark, and was annoyed to feel herself thrilling, to the memory of that last few minutes of talk with Craig in the outer office. It would be good to get home, and begin to toast the croutons, and tell Dora the great news of Kronski. Nothing could be more ridiculous than that Hilary Collier should allow her thoughts to linger even a moment upon the personality of Craig Spaulding.

He was rich; he was—even Hilary could see it!—supremely a man of the world. He thought no more of his uncle’s secretary than she herself thought of the policeman who took her across a muddy Philadelphia crossing, or the conductor who punched her ticket in the train. Women always admired rich and brilliant men, and he was more than that; she knew that he was good and steady and kind. He was probably engaged at this minute to some girl of his own type, some rich and lovely creature who moved in an atmosphere of perfumes and furs and violets, and great, softly lighted drawing rooms.

The Underwood girls! Hilary’s lip curled scornfully. They had not lost much time! Neither one of them need hope for him . . . An odd little pang of envy surprised her: at least they were of his world, and she was not.

She came to her own gate: a narrow gate in an old brick wall. It would be good to get home to warmth and rest and Dora.

“Consider yourself retained . . . kind as she looks, I imagine she can be a little martinet!” How his phrases and tones came back to her! There had been few men in her busy life; never one like this one. So strangely potent is the first hint of s*x in a girl’s heart that these casual phrases, tossed into Hilary Collier’s full and ordered life, were enough to distress her, to upset her careful planning, to stir vaguely the depths that she had never suspected in her own being. Kronski’s coming marked, she knew, a crisis in her life; coming coincidentally with Dora’s eighteenth birthday, his unexpected appearance had all the gravity of a moving Fate.

Yet here she was, her mind working busily along an entirely new line of thought, like that of any one of the foolish village girls in the factory, because old Spaulding’s nephew, exiled for a few months from his clubs and his polo and his yachting, had deigned to draw her into a moment’s careless friendship.

She felt within her a stern self-contempt as she opened the kitchen door.