Duskin (Musaicum Romance Classics). Grace Livingston Hill

the only one who was thoroughly cognizant with his affairs and able to take his place, etc. It won’t matter a cent after that what you say. A funny story or two and a word of greeting from my uncle and you can sit down, but we really must have someone there to represent the president who was to have been the guest of the evening, or it will be Hamlet with Hamlet left out. And I’m perfectly serious about that dress business. It’s a necessary expense and the company will be only too glad to stand for it, and you’ll be one dress to the good when it’s over. Now, please, may we get down to business?”

      Carol had a felling memory of a rosy silk reposing in her trunk; of another little dress of delicate jade velvet, light as a moth’s wing, with just a sparkle of sequins like stardust here and there; of a filmy white garment garnished with a silver rose. Or would the little black satin with the strings of pearls be more dignified and appropriate to the occasion? And there they all were tucked away out of sight in the baggage car! “I don’t suppose it would be possible to get hold of my trunk in time?” she said suddenly, as if she were thinking aloud.

      “Where is your trunk?” he asked eagerly. “I didn’t know you had brought it along.”

      “Yes,” she said, “it was all packed to go on a vacation.”

      “I see. Nice of you to give it up. Well, let’s see what we can do about that. I don’t know whether this train carries a baggage car or not. It may be on the next section. Even so, we might get hold of it. Have you your check?”

      He stepped out and held a brief conference with the porter and returned quickly.

      “He says there is a baggage car. He’s gone to find out if your trunk got on. If it did we may be in luck. And now, what were those points you were going to speak about tonight? Hadn’t we better talk them over? Just to see if we agree in our viewpoint?”

      “But really ” began Carol again, feeling that she was committing herself to the evening in spite of her best resolves.

      “No, please,” said the young man earnestly. “This is something you can’t help. It’s a part of the job. You have to represent Uncle Caleb. Now what are those notes you have there?”

      Five minutes later the porter came back smiling to say that the trunk was on board and he had arranged with the baggage man to recheck it to the hotel without delay. He handed the new check to Fawcett who pocketed it and went on with the discussion.

      “A great deal depends on that Duskin job,” he was saying. “If that should be delayed, it might make hash of our plans. You see it’s near enough to Chicago for them to keep an eye on it when they run away on business trips. If it gets done ”

      “It will be done on time!” said Carol with firm lips. “That’s what I came down to pull off!”

      She said it so firmly that she really believed herself when she heard it, and something thrilled in her heart and brain. She would get it done, too. Yes, if she had to get right out and help work at it herself, order the men around or anything! She believed she could do it if worse came to worst. It would get done, if human will could force it!

      Young Fawcett studied her keenly. Not for nothing had his uncle put him at the head of the Chicago branch.

      “You’re all right!” said the young man fervidly. “Now, if you’ll just say tonight what you’ve been saying the last three minutes about doing things when they have to be done and doing them right, reputation of the firm and all that why we’ll go over in great shape! I’m not quite sure yet, but I think I’m almost sure we’re going to have Have lock there. You know Have lock? He’s one of the greatest philanthropists in this part of the country. He’s going to build a model hospital, one of the largest in the world, up to date in every respect. It’s going to be one of the showplaces of the country, and we want that job! It’s up to you to make him think we’re the great and only construction company on this little globe. See?”

      “But really ” began Carol, bewildered by all that was expected of her, “I’m not I can’t I didn’t come out here to ”

      “I know,” laughed Fawcett with his easy air of sliding everything off lightly. “But you must, you will, you know. You’re here, you know, and Uncle Caleb isn’t, so that’s that. Here’s our station. Shall we go? Let me carry the briefcase. Yes, porter, the bag. How much time do you want to rest and dress, Miss Berkley? Would you rather talk before or after? I can arrange my time to suit yours. But we must go over those papers of my uncle’s or we might get all balled up tonight.”

      Carol found herself being whirled through the strange city streets in a daze. She seemed no longer to have the power to protest. Some force stronger than herself had taken possession of her now. She had agreed to be its servant, and this was the result. She was being made to attend a banquet the dinner had grown to the proportions of a banquet now, and relentlessly she was being drawn on to attend it and to make a speech before a lot of men! It choked her to think of it, and yet somehow she could do nothing about it. Her trunk, too, had joined the conspirators and was riding behind with an air of disloyalty that made her half afraid.

      She looked in awe at the magnificent structure before which they presently stopped. The excellent hotel of the seashore resort receded into oblivion before the splendors of this stately portal. She stepped inside with Mr. Fawcett and suddenly felt very small and insignificant indeed. What would Mother and Betty say when they heard how she was housed in Chicago?

      As she stood at the desk while her escort arranged for the room, which he had had reserved earlier in the day, she glimpsed a glorified elevator in luxurious upholstery and bronze, and watched two men; a long, lank one and a stout, short fellow in a checked suit; step inside. They turned around and she saw their two faces as the bronze door clanked its noisy lattice shut and they were lifted out of her sight. Her heart seemed to go dead within her. Who were those two men?

      Up in her room Carol opened her bag. There on the top was her Bible, and she remembered that the day was well on and she had not yet kept her promise to her mother. It might be after midnight when she got back from the banquet; better get this over with.

      A card dropped out as she picked up the book. On it was written in her mother’s careful script, “Thy word is a lamp unto my feet, and a light unto my path.”

      Poor Mother! She was always doing things like that hoping they would get across.

      Impatiently Carol fluttered over the leaves of the Bible. Proverbs. That was a nice impersonal book; it would have short, crisp verses and not take much time. Time was going fast and she must keep at least the letter of her promise. At random she opened at the third chapter and caught at a verse: “Trust in the Lord with all thine heart; and lean not unto thine own understanding. In all thy ways acknowledge him, and he shall direct thy paths.”

      How strange! It was almost as if the verses were written for her. She put the book sharply down on the dressing table and went on with her dressing, yet all the time in her heart putting up some sort of a wild little longing that the promise might be made good in what she was about to do. Whether it was all prayer, or part superstition, or merely a reversion to a childish habit, she was not quite sure.