Against Lester’s strong personality and vigorous protest Jennie’s own conclusions and decisions went to pieces. Just the pressure of his hand was enough to upset her. Now she began to cry.
“Don’t cry, Jennie,” he said. “This thing may work out better than you think. Let it rest for a while. Take off your things. You’re not going to leave me any more, are you?”
“No-o-o!” she sobbed.
He took her in his lap. “Let things rest as they are,” he went on. “It’s a curious world. Things can’t be adjusted in a minute. They may work out. I’m putting up with some things myself that I ordinarily wouldn’t stand for.”
He finally saw her restored to comparative calmness, smiling sadly through her tears.
“Now you put those things away,” he said genially, pointing to the trunks. “Besides, I want you to promise me one thing.”
“What’s that?” asked Jennie.
“No more concealment of anything, do you hear? No more thinking things out for yourself, and acting without my knowing anything about it. If you have anything on your mind, I want you to come out with it. I’m not going to eat you! Talk to me about whatever is troubling you. I’ll help you solve it, or, if I can’t, at least there won’t be any concealment between us.”
“I know, Lester,” she said earnestly, looking him straight in the eyes. “I promise I’ll never conceal anything any more—truly I won’t. I’ve been afraid, but I won’t be now. You can trust me.”
“That sounds like what you ought to be,” he replied. “I know you will.” And he let her go.
A few days later, and in consequence of this agreement, the future of Gerhardt came up for discussion. Jennie had been worrying about him for several days; now it occurred to her that this was something to talk over with Lester. Accordingly, she explained one night at dinner what had happened in Cleveland. “I know he is very unhappy there all alone,” she said, “and I hate to think of it. I was going to get him if I went back to Cleveland. Now I don’t know what to do about it.”
“Why don’t you send him some money?” he inquired.
“He won’t take any more money from me, Lester,” she explained. “He thinks I’m not good—not acting right. He doesn’t believe I’m married.”
“He has pretty good reason, hasn’t he?” said Lester calmly.
“I hate to think of him sleeping in a factory. He’s so old and lonely.”
“What’s the matter with the rest of the family in Cleveland? Won’t they do anything for him? Where’s your brother Bass?”
“I think maybe they don’t want him, he’s so cross,” she said simply.
“I hardly know what to suggest in that case,” smiled Lester. “The old gentleman oughtn’t to be so fussy.”
“I know,” she said, “but he’s old now, and he has had so much trouble.”
Lester ruminated for a while, toying with his fork. “I’ll tell you what I’ve been thinking, Jennie,” he said finally. “There’s no use living this way any longer, if we’re going to stick it out. I’ve been thinking that we might take a house out in Hyde Park. It’s something of a run from the office, but I’m not much for this apartment life. You and Vesta would be better off for a yard. In that case you might bring your father on to live with us. He couldn’t do any harm pottering about; indeed, he might help keep things straight.”
“Oh, that would just suit papa, if he’d come,” she replied. “He loves to fix things, and he’d cut the grass and look after the furnace. But he won’t come unless he’s sure I’m married.”
“I don’t know how that could be arranged unless you could show the old gentleman a marriage certificate. He seems to want something that can’t be produced very well. A steady job he’d have running the furnace of a country house,” he added meditatively.
Jennie did not notice the grimness of the jest. She was too busy thinking what a tangle she had made of her life. Gerhardt would not come now, even if they had a lovely home to share with him. And yet he ought to be with Vesta again. She would make him happy.
She remained lost in a sad abstraction, until Lester, following the drift of her thoughts, said: “I don’t see how it can be arranged. Marriage certificate blanks aren’t easily procurable. It’s bad business—a criminal offense to forge one, I believe. I wouldn’t want to be mixed up in that sort of thing.”
“Oh, I don’t want you to do anything like that, Lester. I’m just sorry papa is so stubborn. When he gets a notion you can’t change him.”
“Suppose we wait until we get settled after moving,” he suggested. “Then you can go to Cleveland and talk to him personally. You might be able to persuade him.” He liked her attitude toward her father. It was so decent that he rather wished he could help her carry out her scheme. While not very interesting, Gerhardt was not objectionable to Lester, and if the old man wanted to do the odd jobs around a big place, why not?
CHAPTER XXXVII
The plan for a residence in Hyde Park was not long in taking shape. After several weeks had passed, and things had quieted down again, Lester invited Jennie to go with him to South Hyde Park to look for a house. On the first trip they found something which seemed to suit admirably—an old-time home of eleven large rooms, set in a lawn fully two hundred feet square and shaded by trees which had been planted when the city was young. It was ornate, homelike, peaceful. Jennie was fascinated by the sense of space and country, although depressed by the reflection that she was not entering her new home under the right auspices. She had vaguely hoped that in planning to go away she was bringing about a condition under which Lester might have come after her and married her. Now all that was over. She had promised to stay, and she would have to make the best of it. She suggested that they would never know what to do with so much room, but he waved that aside. “We will very likely have people in now and then,” he said. “We can furnish it up anyhow, and see how it looks.” He had the agent make out a five-year lease, with an option for renewal, and set at once the forces to work to put the establishment in order.
The house was painted and decorated, the lawn put in order, and everything done to give the place a trim and satisfactory appearance. There was a large, comfortable library and sitting-room, a big dining-room, a handsome reception-hall, a parlor, a large kitchen, serving-room, and in fact all the ground-floor essentials of a comfortable home. On the second floor were bedrooms, baths, and the maid’s room. It was all very comfortable and harmonious, and Jennie took an immense pride and pleasure in getting things in order.
Immediately after moving in, Jennie, with Lester’s permission, wrote to her father asking him to come to her. She did not say that she was married, but left it to be inferred. She descanted on the beauty of the neighborhood, the size of the yard, and the manifold conveniences of the establishment. “It is so very nice,” she added, “you would like it, papa. Vesta is here and goes to school every day. Won’t you come and stay with us? It’s so much better than living in a factory. And I would like to have you so.”
Gerhardt read this letter with a solemn countenance, Was it really true? Would they be taking a larger house if they were not permanently united? After all these years and all this lying? Could he have been mistaken? Well, it was high time—but should he go? He had lived alone this long time now—should he go to Chicago and live with Jennie? Her appeal did touch him, but somehow he decided against it. That would be too generous an acknowledgment of the fact that there had been fault on his side as well as on hers.
Jennie was disappointed at Gerhardt’s refusal. She talked it over with Lester, and decided that she would go on to Cleveland and see him. Accordingly, she made the trip, hunted up the factory, a great rumbling furniture concern in one of the poorest sections of the city, and inquired at the office for her father. The clerk directed her to a distant warehouse, and Gerhardt was informed that a lady wished to see him. He crawled out of his humble cot and came down, curious as to who it could be. When Jennie saw him in his dusty, baggy clothes, his hair gray, his eye brows shaggy, coming out of the dark door, a keen sense of the pathetic moved her again. “Poor papa!” she thought. He came toward her, his inquisitorial eye softened a little by his consciousness of the affection that had inspired her visit. “What are you come for?” he asked cautiously.