第86章 The Day of Jubilee(4)

"I'll make Uncle Jim get me a rope with two or three strands in it that will reach to my waist. 'A suitcase !' I don't know what I would fill a suitcase with from here. The trunk may stay in the garret, and while I am leaving all this rubbish, I'll just leave John Gilman with it. Uncle Jim will give me an income that will buy all the cigarettes I want without having to deceive anyone; and I can have money if I want to stake something at bridge without being scared into paralysis for fear somebody may find it out or the accounts won't balance. I'll put on the most suitable thing I have to travel in, and just walk out and leave everything else."That was what Eileen did. At noon the next day her eyes were bright with nervousness. Her cheeks alternately paled with fear and flooded red with anxiety. She had dressed herself carefully, laid out her hat and gloves and a heavy coat in case the night should be chilly. Once she stood looking at the dainty, brightly colored dresses hanging in her wardrobe A flash of regret passed over her face.

"Tawdry little cheap things and makeshifts," she said. "If Linda feels that she has been so terribly defrauded, she can help herself now!"By twelve o'clock she found herself standing at the window, straining her eyes down Lilac Valley. She was not looking at its helpful hills, at its appealing curves, at its brilliant colors.

She was watching the roadway. When Katy rang to call her to lunch, she told her to put the things away; she was expecting people who would take her out to lunch presently. In the past years she had occasionally written to her uncle. Several times when he had had business in Los Angeles she had met him at his hotel and dined with him. She reasoned that he would come straight to the house and get her, and then they would go to one of the big hotels for lunch before they started.

"I shan't feel like myself," said Eileen, "until we are well on the way to San Francisco."At one o'clock she was walking the floor. At two she was almost frantic. At half past she almost wished that she had had the good sense to have some lunch, since she was very hungry and under tense nerve strain. Once she paused before the glass, but what she saw frightened her. Just when she felt that she could not endure the strain another minute, grinding brakes, the blast of a huge Klaxon, and the sound of a great voice arose from the street. Eileen rushed to the window. She took one look, caught up the suitcase and raced down the stairs. At the door she met a bluff, big man, gross from head to foot. It seemed to Eileen strange that she could see in him even a trace of her mother, and yet she could. Red veins crossed his cheeks and glowed on his nose. His tired eyes were watery; his thick lips had an inclination to sag; but there was heartiness in his voice and earnestness in the manner in which he picked her up.

"What have they been doing to you down here?" he demanded.

"Never should have left you this long. Ought to have come down and taken you and showed you what you wanted, and then you would have known whether you wanted it or not."At this juncture a huge woman, gross in a feminine way as her husband was in his, paddled up the walk.

"I'm comin' in and rest a few minutes," she said. "I'm tired to death and I'm pounded to pieces."Her husband turned toward her. He opened his lips to introduce Eileen. His wife forestalled him.