The Harlem News

THE OTHER
by
RUBY M. AYRES

DOUBLEDAY, DORAN & CO.

Fourteenth Installment

SYNOPSIS: Pauline, sentimental, trustful, sincere and loving, becomes engaged and marries Dennis O'Hara in the belief that their blissful happiness will continue unchanged thru all the years. On her wedding morning she awakens with a strange premonition that maybe love does change, a thought buried in her mind by a letter from her closest friend, Barbara the night before. Pauline adored Barbara who had been married, was the mother of a child which died but now divorced and living a life which some of her friends could not understand. Between Dennis and Barbara is a seeming wall of personal dislike by both. Six months after Pauline's wedding, Barbara comes for a short stay. During this visit Barbara confesses to Pauline that there is a man she really loves, but she refuses to tell his name. Barbara decides suddenly to go home and Pauline insists Dennis drive her to the station. Irritated, Dennis drives recklessly, and they are in a crash. Barbara escapes injury but Dennis' leg is broken. As he returns to consciousness he learns who the man is that Barbara loves. It's himself. Dennis spends several weeks in the hospital. Barbara returns to stay with Pauline, but on one pretext or another fails to visit Dennis with Pauline at the hospital. Pauline plans highly for Dennis' return home. Barbara stays only one day after Dennis' return from the hospital. Much against his will Dennis finds a new attraction in Barbara, who plays the same cool and detached role as formerly. A fortnight after Barbara's return to New York, she receives a letter from Pauline that she and Dennis are coming to New York for a little vacation. Upon their arrival a round of gay entertainment gets under way, throwing Dennis and Barbara much into each other's company. Dennis is in love with Barbara. He breaks thru all barriers and tells her of his love. Pauline is called home by the illness of her mother. Dennis stays on. Barbara is happy. Both fight against love but it's overpowering. Dennis declares his love and Barbara admits she loves him. Jerry, married-man friend of Barbara's, finds Dennis at Barbara's flat and goes into a jealous rage. She orders him out of her life forever. Barbara is surprised by a call from her former husband who wants her to return to him.

NOW GO ON WITH THE STORY

It was a happy evening, and yet nothing was settled. It was like going round and round in a circle, Dennis thought savagely when they were back again in Barbara's flat and she was telling him it was time to go. He looked at her as she took off her wrap, and suddenly he said, "Are you ever going to choose between us all, Barbara?"

She turned. "What do you mean?"

He laughed unhappily. "Well there is Barnet and your husband and me--we all want you."

The delicate colour tinged the whiteness of her face.

"But I only want one of you, Dennis. You know which one."

He answered doggedly that she could have him if she wished.

"You have bewitched me, Barbara. I seem to be nothing but desire for you. I can't--God forgive me even be sorry for Pauline." He went close to her and looked down at her with passionate eyes. "Let me stay, Barbara. Something seems to tell me that if you send me away to-night I shall never come back. Oh, my dear--don't you love me well enough? If I'm willing to throw everything away for you

"But--are you willing?" she whispered. "Isn't it only just for to-night, because we are alone? And to-morrow

"To-morrow may never come."

She turned away, and for a moment there was a breathless silence.

Why did she hesitate? Barbara asked herself desperately. She was not generally scrupulous; as a rule she took what she wanted of life and let to-morrow take care of itself, but now, when Dennis would have touched her, she gently repulsed him.

"Wait--let me think."

He moved away from her impatiently and began pacing the room.

Barbara stood very still, looking into the heart of the fire. Her pulses were racing, and she put a hand on the mantelshelf to steady herself, and it was at that moment she saw the letter addressed to herself in Pauline's writing.

She took the letter and hid it in the folds of her gown; then she returned. "Come here, Dennis."

He came at once and took her in his arms. He could not speak, and his lips burned as they touched hers.

After a long time he whispered: "Do you want me?" She could feel his heart beating against hers. "Do you want me--as I want you? May I stay?"

Barbara closed her eyes, and her whole being seemed to clamour just one passionate word in reply, "Yes, yes, yes"

But something--she never knew what it was kept her from speaking it aloud.

"Dennis--if--to-morrow--you still want me

"To-morrow! To-morrow never comes," he broke in almost violently.

"How do we know what may happen before to-morrow? Don't send me away, my dear. I love you so much. Barbara for God's sake"

She disengaged herself from his arms.

"To-morrow, Dennis, if you still want me I swear"

I've sent away the only man I ever loved.

In the end she sent him away, how she never knew, and when he had gone she stood against the door that shut him out, her eyes closed, utterly exhausted, and the tears raining down her face.

She loved him so much, and yet she had sent him away. Why? Why? God alone knew.

She was roused by a little sound in the passage, and she looked up to see Mrs. Mellish, in a drab gray dressing gown, watching her with kindly eyes.

"Come to bed, my dear--I'll get you something hot to drink."

Barbara laughed sobbingly.

"I've been a fool, Mellish," she said. "I've been a silly damned fool. I've sent away the only man I ever loved."

Mrs. Mellish took her hand and patted it.

"He'll come back," she comforted. "He'll come back to-morrow."

Barbara broke away from her sobbing.

"To-morrow never comes, she wept. "To-morrow never comes.

She read Pauline's letter sitting up in bed long after Mrs. Mellish had gone comfortably away, believing that Barbara slept.

Darling, Darling, Darling (Pauline began in her extravagant fashion)! I don't know why I am writing to tell you my wonderful secret even before I tell Dennis, something seems to tell me I must. I think somehow I've known it for a long time in the way that people know things--subconsciously, don't you call it?--and that I've been afraid to admit it even to myself. But now I'm sure, and I'm so wonderfully, wonderfully happy that I want to share my happiness with you, because you are my best friend and I love you.

Barbara darling, I'm going to have a baby...

The little green and gold clock on the dressing table which Jerry Barnet had given to Barbara ticked merrily on--the only sound in a world that seemed suddenly to have grown empty and ceased to live, and at last with an effort Barbara picked up the letter that had fallen from her hand and went on reading.

"If it's a boy..." She closed her eyes with a dreadful feeling of weakness.

Of course it would be a boy! a boy with eyes like Dennis's and a smile like Dennis's, like the man they both loved. Oh, Dennis--Dennis!

She was so cold; suddenly Barbara realized that her hands were like ice and that she was shivering violently. She slipped out of bed, leaving the rest of Pauline's letter unread, and crouched down by the fire.

"There is still to-morrow!" It was as if a voice whispered those words into her ear as she crouched by the fire, and suddenly her cheeks flushed and her pulses quickened.

To-morrow! It was not yet too late. He would come back, and just for once, if never again, she would know the perfect happiness of his love, and then

Across the warm, beautiful room she caught sight of her reflection in a long mirror, and it seemed to her overstrung imagination that a shadow Pauline stood behind her, a smiling, happy Pauline, with loving, trustful eyes.

Her best friend! Barbara fell forward on the floor, her face hidden, her hands clenched as she moaned over and over again in utter self-abasement:

"I can't I can't... to be such a beast--such a vile beast!"

And yet in her heart she knew

Mellish's she knew--the quiet, unemotional tones that never varied, and then another--the only voice that had ever had the power to make her heartbeats quicken and her cheeks flush. Dennis! and so early.

Barbara leaned on an elbow and stretched over to her watch. Half-past ten. Something must have happened to bring him so soon, or was it just that he found he could not do without her any longer? She listened intently.

"Not up yet--very tired after last night. Sleeping soundly." Then Dennis's voice again, impatient, obstinate. He would wait--if she would tell Mrs. Mellish. Then the sound of his steps going to the sitting room, then the shutting of the door, and Mrs. Mellish tapping gently on her own.

"Come in."

Mrs. Mellish entered, calm eyes, undisturbed as ever. "Mr. O'Hara. He says he will wait. I told him you were still sleeping."

For a moment she could not answer; then she said with an effort:

"Oh, yes. I'll get up. Please get my bath ready."

Barbara got out of bed and looked at herself in the glass. She did not look her best in the early morning, and she knew it.

"I look old," she thought with a pang, and hurriedly turned away.

Barbara had never dressed so quickly before.

Why had he come so early? What was he doing now?

She looked in the mirror a hundred times, and at last she went to him without paint or powder on her face.

Dennis was standing looking down into the fire, and he had not taken off his overcoat.

"You are an early bird," she said, trying to speak lightly, and Dennis turned.

"He has heard from Pauline--he knows about Pauline." Barbara told herself, and her hand went to her heart.

"I'm so sorry to come so early. I ought to have rung up, but I--somehow I couldn't. I--" He broke off; then with an effort he pulled himself together again and said constrainedly: "You look tired. Won't you sit down?"

Barbara laughed. "Don't you mean I look old?" she asked bitterly.

"Old!" He did not understand; then, seeing the pain in her face, he said vehemently:

"No--good God, no!"

Then again the unbearable silence fell. Barbara took a cigarette from the mantelshelf and lighted it.

With a supreme effort she controlled her thoughts and turned to him. "I had a letter from Pauline last night." Was that the lead he wanted? Every pulse in her body seemed to stand still awaiting his reply.

Dennis said, "Oh, did you?" And then suddenly he plunged forward and took her hand. "And I had a visit from Barnet," he said.

Continued Next Week