FREDERICK INTIMIDATED
Confused and angry with himself and
Madelene, Frederick crossed the room slowly.
What an awful mess! Married to
Tessibel and engaged to marry Madelene! His mother
sick and head over heels in debt to the Waldstrickers!
The situation was becoming more complicated by the
hour. He sat down by the open window to think.
The simple thing, and what he really wanted to do,
was to announce his marriage and let himself and the
others take the consequences. He didn’t
intend to give up Tess, and for a few minutes his
memory was alive with all the suffering of his brave
young wife during the past two years. What she
had done for his sister Teola made him shudder with
grief. There was no other woman in the world like
Tess, and the sweetness of his intimate experiences
since his marriage touched him to tears.
“I won’t give her up,”
he groaned aloud, “whatever happens, I’ll
stand by Tess. She’s worth all the rest I
love her better than life itself. In the morning
I’ll tell mother and Madelene the truth.”
But no sooner had he reached this
conclusion, than the many embarrassing consequences
his confession entailed presented themselves.
He could hear his mother’s querulous complaints.
She hated Tess, blaming the little squatter girl for
the trouble which had made her an invalid and taken
her husband from her. Would he be compelled to
choose between his affection for his mother and his
love for Tess? No, surely not that!
Yet there was Madelene! How could
he face her, after all that had happened. He
bitterly regretted his weakness in permitting the girl
to avow her love for him, in engaging himself to her.
And worst of all, that harrowing debt!
He groaned at the thought of it.
Madelene had told him, “Your
mother won’t have to worry any more, dear.
We can send her away for a nice, long rest, and when
Professor Young’s lease is up, we’ll fix
the lake place for a summer home.”
“If I could marry Madelene,” he thought,
“the debts ”
He got up, lighted a cigarette, his
fingers shaking so he almost dropped the match.
He couldn’t marry Madelene!
Yet to acknowledge his relation to
the squatter girl meant a certain and final break
with the Waldstrickers, the financial ruin of himself
and his mother.
Even at that cost, he must do it.
Tessibel was his wife, his dear little wife.
He had promised to make a home for her. But how?
Could they get along at all, and what would he do
with her impossible father? As his mother had
said, he had no ability to earn anything. Bitter
tears of discouragement filled his eyes.
Suddenly, a thought found its way
into his brain and seemed to clear the situation completely.
“If I could explain it to Tess,”
he whispered, “and she would consent, everything
would be easy. I know she’d help me!”
Again and again, and from many different
angles, the argument repeated itself.
He lay wakeful in bed, his mind a
confused jumble of diversified thoughts, in which
his mother, then Tess, and again the Waldstrickers
demanded his attention and sought to influence him.
Worn out, at length he fell into a troubled sleep.
He was late in rising the next morning.
When he finally went into his mother’s room,
he found Madelene seated by the invalid’s side,
holding her hand. Frederick knew by the expression
on their faces, that the girl had confided to his
mother the agreement made in the drawing room the
evening before. Smiling a little uncertainly,
he crossed the room.
“Good morning, mater! Good morning, Madelene!”
said he.
Madelene smiled shyly, stood up and
moved a little away. Frederick bent over his
mother, who kissed him and murmured, “I’m
so pleased and happy.”
He straightened up and took Madelene’s
outstretched hand, very much inclined to tell them
both then how impossible it was for him to carry out
his engagement. But his mother, ostentatiously
turning on her pillow, cried laughingly.
“Don’t mind me, children,
dear!... Kiss your sweetheart, if you want to,
Frederick!”
Snuggling to his side, Madelene threw
her arms around his neck, and whispered,
“You do love me, dear, don’t you?”
Smiling into her eyes, he kissed her.
“Of course I do,” he lied promptly.
“Don’t you know it, little girl?”
After breakfast, Mrs. Graves summoned
them to her room again. Relieved of her pressing
anxieties, and excited by the sudden fruition of her
cherished plans, she looked and acted much better.
She talked gaily to the young people of their future,
laughed at the girl’s blushes, and chaffed her
son about his coming responsibilities.
“Frederick,” she suddenly
said more soberly. “I think you should go
right away now and see Ebenezer, and ask him properly
for Madelene’s hand.”
Feeling that such a course would commit
him irrevocably, the boy hesitated.
“Don’t be afraid, Fred
dear,” Madelene broke in. “I know
Eb likes you, and,” blushingly, “I think
he will not be much surprised, either.”
If he could only summon courage enough
to tell Madelene before they met her brother!
Perhaps if he could get the girl alone he might.
“Come along with me,”
he said spontaneously. “We’ll go together.”
“Then wait until I get my hat,”
and she danced away, the happiest girl in Ithaca.
On the way down the street, although
he responded with dutiful tenderness to his companion’s
conversation, his mind was busy with the same old
question: What should he do about Tess? If
he could tell Madelene, or perhaps it would be easier
to make Ebenezer understand his position.
But before he came to a decision,
they met Mr. Waldstricker coming out of the First
National Bank on Tioga Street. He looked very
prosperous, very powerful, as he stood smilingly waiting
for them.
“We were just coming to see
you, Eb,” said Madelene, blushing. “Frederick well,
we both wanted to speak to you.”
“All right, little girl,”
Waldstricker said pleasantly. “If it is
something special, we can go to the office; or perhaps
you can tell me here.”
Hoping to gain courage by further
respite Frederick suggested,
“We’d better go to the office, I think.”
But Madelene was too full of her new happiness to
brook any more delay.
“Oh, you men!” she exclaimed.
“Don’t be so formal and business-like!”
She took hold of one of her brother’s hands,
while she held Frederick possessively by the arm.
“We came to make an announcement and receive
your congratulations, and I want them now.”
“So that’s it?”
chuckled her brother, smiling into her shining eyes.
“Well, I am pleased! And I do congratulate
you both, heartily. Fred, run into the office
in about an hour, I want to talk to you.”
Frederick brightened.
“And I want to talk to you,” he answered.
He swung to Madelene’s side,
drew a long breath and made a quick resolution that
before long he would make his confession to Ebenezer.
At the appointed time, Frederick entered
Waldstricker’s office. He’d resolved
to make a clean breast of his marriage to Tess.
But without giving him a chance to say anything more
than “Hello, Ebenezer,” that gentleman
began,
“Glad to see you! Sit down....
So you think you want to join my family, do you?
I suppose you know you’re asking a great deal,
when you haven’t any money or any profession,
either. But then, my sister’s fond of you,
and that means a lot. Fortunately, she has enough
money so that you need not worry about that.
The question is, can you make her happy?”
He paused. Frederick fingered
his hat, let it slide to the floor, and picked it
up before answering.
“Mr. Waldstricker, I think ...
I want first ... I can’t ... You see....”
He wanted desperately to tell the powerful man at the
table that he couldn’t marry his sister, but
somehow the words wouldn’t come.
The older man thought he knew the
cause of the young man’s hesitation.
“There, there, my boy!”
he laughed, pleased at his own insight. “Don’t
try to explain anything. I know it’s been
hard for you. Frederick,” he continued
more soberly, “as you know, I’m Madelene’s
only near relative. Her mother has been dead
many years, and since father ... was killed, she has
only me left. I want her to be happy, ... to have
everything that makes life worth while. She’s
chosen you, and I feel sure she’s wise in her
choice.” He stood up, his great height towering
above the boy, who also rose. Ebenezer thrust
forth his hand and took Frederick’s. “I’m
giving her to you,” he went on. “Make
her happy and there’s nothing I won’t
do for you.”
Of course Frederick couldn’t
just then tell this man, who trusted him, that he
was already married to a squatter girl. Perhaps
later yes, later he would. He hung
his head in shame and the elder man, again mistaking
the emotion, ascribed it to diffidence.
“Mr. Waldstricker,” began
Frederick, “you were so kind to my mother and
so was Madelene. I’m not fit to marry your
sister.”
“Pshaw, boy, you’re too
modest!” Waldstricker laughed good-naturedly.
“If she’s satisfied, that’s all there
is to it.”
Turning back to the desk, he seated himself.
“Sit down again, Fred,”
he continued. “Have you planned to get married
immediately?”
Frederick shuddered. It seemed
as if a great gulf were opening under his feet and
he were about to be swallowed up.
“Well, we hadn’t considered
that,” he hesitated embarrassedly. “Probably
not for two years yet, until I get through college.”
Here was a ray of hope. Lots
of things could happen in two years.
“Nonsense!” was Waldstricker’s
prompt rejoinder. “Why should you bother
with college? You’d better get married right
along and go to Europe for your honeymoon. Then
when you come back, take your place in my business
and help me. I need some smart young fellow, and
there’s no sense in wasting your time at college.
It isn’t as though you had your own way to make.”
Frederick sought to make objections
to these plans, but Waldstricker impatiently got to
his feet and stood looking down at the boy in the
chair.
“It’s settled then, isn’t
it? Say no more about it,” he said with
finality. “Run along and hunt up Madelene
and tell her what I’ve said.”
In parting, Waldstricker shook hands
with Frederick, and placing his hand on the boy’s
shoulder said with genuine emotion in his voice, “Make
her happy, my boy, and there’s nothing in the
world too good for you.”
Frederick went into the sunshine,
his head in a whirl. Waldstricker’s promises
unfolded visions of ease and success surpassing in
splendor his wildest dreams. He had not meant
to betray Tessibel nor to deceive Madelene. Yet
since these things were forced upon him, he would see
what he could do, but he took a long, deep breath
when he thought of how difficult it would be to explain
his action to Tessibel.