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Page 20
"Red,--" His wife's voice followed him.
He turned, without speaking.
"Do you mind if I drive into town with you this morning?"
He nodded, and turned again, striding on into his office and closing the
door with a bang. She understood that his nod meant acquiescence with her
request, rather than affirmation as to his objecting to her company. She
kept close watch over the movements of the Green Imp, suspecting that in
his present mood Burns might forget to call her, and when the car came
down the driveway she was waiting on the office steps.
It would have been an ill-humoured man indeed, whose eyes could have
rested upon her standing there and not have noted the charm of her
graceful figure, her face looking out at him from under a modishly
attractive hat. Ellen's smile, from under the shadowing brim, was as
whole-heartedly sweet as if she were meeting the look of worshipful
comradeship which usually fell upon her when she joined her husband on
any expedition whatever. Instead, she encountered something like a glower
from the hazel eyes, which did, however, as at breakfast, soften for an
instant at the moment of meeting hers.
"Jump in! I'm in a hurry," was his quite needless command, for she was
ready to take her place the instant the car drew to a standstill, and the
delay she made him was hardly appreciable.
In silence they drove to town, and at a pace which took them past
everything with which they came up, from lumbering farm-wagon to
motor-cars far more powerful and speedy than the Imp. Ellen found herself
well blown about by the wind they made, though there was none stirring,
and wished she had been dressed for driving instead of for shopping. But
the trip, if breezy, was brief, though it did not at once land her at her
destination.
Drawing up before a somewhat imposing residence, on the outskirts of the
city, Burns announced: "Can't take you in till I've made this call," and
stopped his engine with a finality which seemed to indicate that he
should be in no haste to start it again.
"It doesn't matter in the least. I shall enjoy sitting here," his wife
responded, still outwardly unruffled by his manner. She looked in vain
for his customary glance of leave-taking, and watched him stride away up
the walk to the house with a sense of wonder that even his back could
somehow look so aggressive.
She had not more than settled herself when a handsome roadster appeared
rushing rapidly down the road from the direction of the city and came to
a stop, facing her, before the house. She recognized in the well-groomed
figure which stepped out, case in hand, one of the city surgeons with
whom her husband was often closely associated in his hospital work, Dr.
Van Horn. He was a decade older than Red, possessed a strikingly
impressive personality, and looked, to the last detail, like a man
accustomed to be deferred to.
Descending, he caught sight of Ellen, and came across to the Imp, hat in
hand, and motoring-glove withdrawn.
"Ah, Mrs. Burns,--accompanying your husband on this matchless morning? He
is a fortunate man. You don't mind the waiting? My wife thinks there is
nothing so unendurable,--she has no patience with the length of my
calls."
"I've not had much experience, as yet," Ellen replied, looking into the
handsome, middle-aged face before her, and thinking that the smile under
the close-clipped, iron-gray moustache was one which could be cynical
more easily than it could be sympathetic. "But, so far, I find the
waiting, in such weather, very endurable. I often bring a book, and then
it never matters, you know."
"Of course not. You are familiar with Balzac's 'Country Doctor'? There's
a tribute to men like your husband, who devote their lives to the humble
folk." He glanced toward the house. "I mustn't keep my colleague waiting,
even for the pleasure of a chat with you. He's not--you'll pardon me--so
good a waiter as yourself!"
He went away, smiling. Ellen looked after him with a little frown of
displeasure. From the first moment of meeting him, some months ago, she
had not liked Dr. James Van Horn. He was the city's most fashionable
surgeon, she knew, and had a large practice among folk the reverse of
"humble." She had seen in his eyes that he liked to look at her, and knew
that in the moment he had stood beside her he had lost no detail of her
face. He had also, after some subtle fashion, managed to express his
admiration by his own look, though with his smoothly spoken words he had
not hesitated to say a thing about her husband which was at once somehow
a compliment and a stab.
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