Leave Her to Heaven by Ben Ames Williams Page A

the small sugar canister to escape from her fingers and roll off the ledge. It fell into a deep crevice among the rocks, and Quinton labored for an hour in a vain effort to recover it, moving heavy boulders, wetting his feet and staining his trousers with sea slime, while Ellen with her arm across her eyes lay baking in the sun. In spite of the fact that the kisses she had had to accept upon their arrival had rather irritated than pleased her, she resented his neglecting her while he sought so long to get back that absurd canister; and when she said they must go and he urged that they had had as yet hardly any time together, she said chidingly that he should have thought of that before.
    â€˜But I couldn’t just let the sugar thing go without trying to reach it, he protested, so disturbed by this wasteful loss that she smiled and forgave him. So they stayed a little longer and she gave him enough of herself to make his head swim with dreams and sent him back to Maine a happy man.
    In due time thereafter, with her mother and Ruth, she started for New Mexico. Leaving Chicago, Mrs. Berent and Ruth shared a drawing room, and Ellen had the adjoining compartment. She retired early. Among the parting gifts from friends in Boston there had been a book called Time Without Wings, about which everyone — said Janet Mowbray, who had given it to them — was talking. On the first night out of Chicago, Ellen began to read this book, and in the morning when she went back to the observation car, it was under her arm.
    But Ellen was never much addicted to reading, and she presently fell asleep in her chair. As her grasp upon the book relaxed, it slid off her knee and thumped her foot and woke her from a dream in which she had been happy with her father; and in that
dream he was young again, with fair hair, and merry, unwearied eyes. When now she woke, her father — or someone, to her sleepy eyes, incredibly like him as he had been in her dream — picked up the book and handed it back to her. Seeing his face, her throat constricted. She thanked him automatically, but after he resumed his seat across the car she watched him with a breathless attention. Her thoughts — and her eyes — remained fixed upon him till at last his glance met hers. He stood up, coloring with anger, and she realized that she had embarrassed him. To her apology, he muttered something and walked away; and she hastened to her mother, an eagerness in her which she made no effort to disguise.
    â€˜Mother,’ she demanded, ‘Did Father have any relatives, brothers or nephews or anything?’
    â€˜Of course! Ruth’s father, and another brother in Philadelphia; but he died ten years ago. For Heaven’s sake, why?’
    â€˜Did that other brother have any sons?’
    Mrs. Berent said sharply: ‘I should hope not. He was a bachelor! What’s got into you?’
    Ellen said in a hushed tone: ‘There’s a man on the train who looks exactly the way Father used to look, enough like him to be related anyway.’
    â€˜What of it? That’s not surprising! Your father was a perfectly ordinary-looking man.’
    Ellen’s eyes flashed with anger, but Ruth smilingly played peacemaker. ‘I always thought Father looked rather wonderful, Mother,’ she protested. ‘Ellen, point this man out to us if you get a chance, won’t you?’
    But Ellen, resenting her mother’s attitude, said coldly: ‘You probably wouldn’t see any resemblance. Neither of you saw Father with my eyes.’ She went into her own compartment and closed the door.
    Yet her thoughts dung to this stranger. She hoped to see him again in the diner, but he did not appear for lunch nor for dinner, nor when she frankly tried to find him was he in the club or observation cars. After Ruth and her mother were abed, she walked
the length of the train, but her search was fruitless. Knowing he must be shut away behind some closed