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158 you stay here and talk to me, I warn you I'm going to be cross."

We were in the house now. Bob had followed me in. I was taking off my things. He stared at me as I proceeded.

"I didn't see any sense at all in your breaking off your engagement," I went on. "You both cared for each other. I should have thought"

"It was inevitable," cut in Bob gravely. "It was inevitable, Lucy."

"Well, then, if it was, Bob, all right. I won't say another word about it. But now that Ruth is nothing to you"

"Nothing to me!" he exclaimed.

"Yes, that is what I said—nothing to you," I repeated mercilessly, "I beg of you don't come here and show approval or disapproval about what she's up to. Leave her to me now. I'm backing her. I tell you, just as I told Tom and the others, she's all right. Ruth's all right."

But later in my room I wondered—I wondered if Ruth really was all right. Sitting in my little rocking-chair by the window, sheltered and protected by kind, familiar walls, I asked myself what Ruth was doing now. It was nearing the dinner hour. Where would Ruth be eating dinner? It was growing dark slowly. It would be growing dark in New York. Stars would be coming out up above the towering skyscrapers, as they were now above the apple trees in the garden. I thought of Ruth's empty bed across the hall. Where