I take this man, p.1
I Take this Man, page 1
I Take This Man
Emilie Loring
© Emilie Loring, 1945
Emilie Loring has asserted her rights under the Copyright, Design and Patents Act, 1988, to be identified as the author of this work.
First published in 1945 by Grosset & Dunlap.
This edition published in 2018 by Lume Books.
Table of Contents
I
II
III
IV
V
VI
VII
VIII
IX
X
XI
XII
XIII
XIV
XV
XVI
XVII
XVIII
XIX
XX
XXI
XXII
I
HOW THE minutes raced! If she could only hold them back. The white-faced girl confronted herself in the mirror. The shining surface reflected soft, almost black hair under a small, smart hat; dark eyes that were normally brilliant but were dulled with heartache; a soft red mouth shaped for smiling but somber now. It reflected the dark-blue velvet dress, the jaunty feather set in the hat, the sable stole.
She lifted her hand to her throat as though she were choking and the mirror reflected back the circlet of diamonds that flashed on the third finger of the looking-glass girl’s left hand. With a sharp exclamation she made a movement as though to tear it off and then turned away from the mirror and walked blindly to the window.
She was married, irrevocably married. She who had been Penelope Sherrod was now Penelope Garth. It had happened, really happened. All along she had deceived herself, she had believed that it couldn’t happen, that some miraculous turn of the wheel of fortune would save her at the last moment. And then her dream world had been rudely shattered when, half an hour before, she heard the voice of the clergyman say solemnly, “Do you take this man to be your wedded husband?”
“I do,” she had answered. She had spoken the words that separated her forever from Dick Wentworth.
It was done now. There was no going back to yesterday. No going back to Penelope Sherrod. No going back to the dream that Dick would find a way to save her from marriage to Donald Garth. Every telephone call, every ring at the doorbell, every letter, every meeting with Dick had renewed the hope that he would say eagerly, “Penny, you won’t have to marry him. Because I can look after your mother. I can pay for her operation. Something wonderful has happened. I’ve just been left a fortune. An uncle has left me a lot of money. I’ve got a terrific job. It’s all right, Penny.”
But nothing wonderful happened and it hadn’t been all right. Even when she had poured out the story of her mother’s desperate illness, of the long and expensive care she must have without delay if her life were to be saved, Dick had had no suggestion to offer. If he hadn’t been Dick, if she hadn’t loved him so much that she could see no fault in him, she would have been humiliated by the tears she had shed on his shoulder, by the fact that she had let him guess how much she wanted him to find the solution for her, how deeply she loved him.
Now she must put Dick out of her life, try to forget him — as though she ever could. Mrs. Donald Garth. Remember, she told herself fiercely, you are Mrs. Donald Garth. The past is gone. You’ve got to build the future yourself.
She turned back to the girl in the mirror. You don’t look much like a bride, she scolded herself. You must do better than that. She forced a wavering, uncertain smile to her lips. It would not do to go down the stairs and meet the wedding guests and her mother’s loving eyes with that shadowed, tragic face. If her mother were to guess that she was marrying without love, were to worry about her, she would have less chance of coming successfully through her operation than if she went into it with her mind free, confident about her beloved daughter’s future happiness.
Penelope held her head high and this time the smile was brighter, more convincing. And then she remembered that among the wedding guests was Dick Wentworth, who had sat white-faced and thoughtful during the ceremony. She would have to see him as she ran out of the house with Donald, a happy bride and groom setting out on their wedding journey.
I can’t, she moaned to herself. I can’t run past him, laughing. Why, oh, why did Dick insist on coming to the wedding? It would have been so much easier if he had stayed away.
To give herself time before meeting her ordeal, she looked slowly around the room. This was the house in which she had been born and had grown up, the house that was to be closed permanently tomorrow when her mother went to the hospital. And with it would close the door to Penny’s happy, carefree girlhood.
Within these familiar walls she and her younger brother Terence had laughed and squabbled and pored over their books and confided their bright dreams for the future. Thank heaven, she told herself fervently, Terry did not suspect her feeling for Dick Wentworth. He had an attitude amounting almost to hero worship for — for her husband, she forced herself to say. Her husband. Donald Garth.
One — two — three — down you go, she forced herself to laugh back at the girl in the mirror with an attempt at gaiety. She squared her shoulders, lifted her chin. She gave a start, her heart thudded as the door was flung open violently and Nora came in. Because of Mrs. Sherrod’s frail health, Penny’s old nurse had graduated to the position of being general factotum, cook, housekeeper and deputy mother to the Sherrod youngsters. She was a large woman with a round, unlined face, cheeks as pink as a girl’s and soft brown hair only lightly dusted with gray. Penny and Terry had adored her all their lives. In their loving eyes, Nora had only two shortcomings; she moved around the house like a hurricane, doors and windows flying open and banging shut as though a cyclone struck them at her approach; and she continued to treat them as though they were small children.
A minor problem in relation to Penny’s marriage had been the fate of Nora. With the house closed, what would become of her? Donald Garth had promptly settled this to everyone’s satisfaction by suggesting that Nora come to Uplands, his family home where Penny was to live, as her young mistress’s personal maid. As a result, Nora was now as much Donald’s devoted slave as Terry.
In fact, Penny thought rebelliously, everyone believed Donald Garth was perfect. Everyone but — his wife. To her he was only an extremely handsome older man who had proved to be a pleasant companion during the days of his courtship. A little aloof. She realized now that he had rarely kissed her and only in a brotherly way. Basically, he had remained a stranger.
To Penny’s surprise, her old nurse was flushed with anger, her cheeks as bright as a peony, her eyes sending out sparks. As she looked at Penny her wrath died down; she smiled tremulously, her eyes wet with tears.
“My little Penny a bride.” Her voice was tender. Her big calloused hand touched the girl’s cheek lovingly, in a lingering caress. “I always knew you’d be a beautiful bride. Those long lashes make your eyes look all shadowy somehow. There’s a graver look about you. Perhaps,” she added wisely, “it’s because you’ve grown up today.”
Penny turned away from the shrewd eyes that knew her so well and picked up her gloves and handbag. “Well,” she said shakily, “I guess it’s time to go.” She reached for her fragrant wedding bouquet. “I mustn’t forget to throw this to my bridesmaids. I wonder which one will catch it? I suspect Nancy will be the next to marry.” She forced a gay laugh.
“There now,” Nora said in relief, “I knew all the time that it was just nonsense.”
“What is nonsense?”
“What that Wentworth man was saying to me,” Nora replied with a snort of disgust.
Penny’s heart turned over. “Dick — Wentworth?” she half whispered.
Nora nodded vigorously. “Got hold of me downstairs,” she declared. “He gave me a song and dance. Said he had to see you. I asked him, ‘See Penny now, when she’s dressing to go on her honeymoon?’ And he told me he had to see you. Kept repeating it. Had to see you.” Once more anger flushed the nurse’s face.
“W-well,” Penny stuttered. “T-then w-what?”
“He even dared to tell me that you would say so, too. He said he loved you and he had to see you once more. And when I said what right had he to say he loved you, now you’re married — if he ever had such a right, which I doubted very much — he said —” Nora fairly choked in her fury — “he said you loved him too. He had to see you this once.”
With one of her vigorous movements she banged against a small table, nearly knocking it over. Even in her breathless interest in what the older woman had to say, Penny smiled faintly at her familiar, noisy clumsiness.
Nora had really worked herself up by this time. “To say you loved him! A likely thing. And why would you be marrying Mr. Garth, I asked him, if you loved the likes of him. And the Wentworth man said it was because he didn’t have any money. I wonder now I didn’t show him the back of my fist. If you want me to, I’ll have him put out of the house without wasting another minute. Sure, Terry would make quick work of him. And Mr. Garth — it would do my heart good to see what was left of the Wentworth man when Mr. Garth got through with him.”
She started toward the door. “I’ll just have a word with young Terry.”
“Nora! No!” Penny cried in protest. “You can’t do that. It would be cruel. He’s unhappy enough. And stop calling him the Wentworth man, as though —”
The kindly eyes that studied the girl’s face widened. Before that searching scrutiny Penny’s eyes wavered, fell. She turned her head away. She did not speak.
Nora took a long breath. “It’s true then,” she said flatly.
Penny’s eyes were brilliant with tears that hung on the long lashes, rolled down her cheeks. To her surprise, Nora, from whom she had never known anything but affectionate kindness, stiffened, seemed to withdraw from her.
“I saw you born, Penny, and I’ve brought you up almost as much as your own mother. And felt almost the same, too. I’d have staked my life neither you nor Terry could do a dishonorable thing. Mistaken, maybe, but not dishonorable.”
“Dishonorable!” Penny flinched as though Nora had struck her.
“Dishonorable,” the old woman repeated firmly. “To marry one man when you loved another. Why?” She took the girl’s chin with her hand, turning her head, forcing her to face her. “Why?”
“Because —” Penny threw out her hands in a helpless gesture. “Because Dick hasn’t any money and —”
“I can’t believe it of you. To marry for money, to marry without love.”
“If you’d only let me explain,” Penny wailed. “It’s not for me. I don’t want the money for myself. I’d rather starve. You ought to know that. It’s for Mother. You know she has to have that operation and months and months of expensive treatments. And there was no money, no possible way — and Dick — he’d have helped me if he could — only — he didn’t have the money or a job —”
“And he hasn’t been looking for a job that I’ve noticed,” Nora snapped. After a moment she sighed. “So that’s it.” She was silent again for a long time. “I don’t know,” she admitted at last, “what you should have done. But I know what you should do now. Tell your husband the truth.” She brushed her hand across her wet eyes. “And I thought you were a happy bride.”
“Don’t worry about me. I don’t matter in this,” Penny assured her gallantly. “It will be all right, really it will.”
“That’s my girl. Whatever comes I know you will face it with gay courage. I trust —”
She broke off. A man stood in the doorway, white-faced and tense.
“I thought,” he said, his voice cautiously low, “you were going to send Penny to me.”
At the sound of his voice Penny whirled around. “Dick!” It was a half-stifled cry. “Dick, I’m married now. I can’t see you any more.”
He glanced at Nora and said, “This is the last time, Penny. Let me say good-by.”
Nora looked from Penny to the man she loved. “I’ll tell them you’ll be down in five minutes,” she said and went out. For once she did not bang the door behind her.
Penny looked incredulously at the man before her. His blue eyes burned like coals. He was slight and fair-haired, with an easy charm that had always smoothed his way through life. His mother had spoiled him, his aunts had indulged him, his teachers had been indulgent with him, girls had been mad about him. At the moment he was nervous, the finger that touched his small mustache trembled.
He came forward and took her hands in his. “Penny,” he cried. “Penny, my darling.”
Penny took a step backward and withdrew her hands, holding him off. “Dick,” she warned him, “I am married now.”
“But you love me.” There was a hint of triumph in his voice.
“You can’t stay here,” she said brokenly, “and I can’t see you again, Dick. Good-by,” her voice wavered, “and good luck.”
“You’ll see me,” he promised. “Remember — we love each other. When two people love each other, life cannot separate them. Somehow or other —”
“Stop! You must not say another word. You aren’t talking to Penelope Sherrod now. You are speaking to Donald Garth’s wife.”
“Donald Garth’s wife,” he repeated bitterly. “Bought and paid for. Garth has always had everything without needing to lift a hand for it. He inherited Uplands, one of the show places of the nation; he inherited the Works, the biggest manufacturing plant for airplanes in America, bringing in a fortune every year; he got you.” Wentworth’s tone changed. He added quietly, “But he didn’t get your love, Penny. That, at least, belongs to me.”
“But we must forget that,” she reminded him. “I intend to do my best to be — a good wife. I can at least give Don loyalty.”
“Penny,” he said in a tone she had never heard from him before, “I want you to listen to me. Things are not over between us. We will meet again and again. After all, we belong to the same social set. To avoid meeting would simply make people suspicious. When you return from your wedding trip and get established at Uplands, I’ll be visiting there.” He smiled with an arrogant confidence. “And after a few months of Garth you’ll be glad to see me, Penny. I can promise you that. The future belongs to me — to us.”
Penny looked at him, feeling that she had never seen him before. This was a bad dream, a nightmare. In a moment she would awaken and find that the unforgivable words had not been spoken. Dick could not be saying these ugly things. Could not be thinking them. Had he always been like this? How could she have been so blind?
“Go, Dick,” she said crisply. “You’ll never be invited to Uplands. Never! To believe, for a single moment, that after marrying Don I would not be loyal to him, in thought as well as in deed, is an insult I wouldn’t have believed you capable —”
“Penny!” He took a step forward. He said soothingly, “You’re all upset and excited. You don’t know what you are saying.”
“I know exactly what I am saying.”
Nora’s heavy tread was heard on the stairs. Dick paused indecisively and then, at Penny’s gesture, went out of the room. At the door he turned, summoned up a smile. “I’ll be seeing you.”
II
PENNY sagged limply against a chair. That was Dick Wentworth! That was the man she had loved. And he dared to assume, to speak to her as though, married to another man, she would still be willing to see him; probably even, in a matter of months, possibly weeks, turn to him for one of those furtive, dishonest love affairs which she had always loathed.
She felt shamed and humiliated, shamed that Dick could so misjudge her, humiliated to think she had given her love to a man so unworthy of it. For his sake she had cheated Donald Garth of the love she owed him as his wife.
Nora came in. She looked anxiously at Penny’s haggard face. “Are you ready to go down?” she asked gently.
Penny nodded. She was speechless. Try as she would she could not force a single word from her tight throat.
“Mr. Garth’s been dressing in Terry’s room next door. I’ll just see if he’s ready. But first —” the older woman hesitated — “don’t disappoint me, Penny. Don’t go on with this marriage while there is a lie between you. Tell your husband the truth, that you don’t love him, that you married him to —”
“Don’t worry, Nora, he does know it,” interrupted a grave voice.
Instinctively, Nora drew closer to the girl whom she had protected all her young life. She felt Penelope’s slender fingers grip hers, saw her face and lips turn parchment white as she turned to look up at the tall man who stood in the doorway between the two rooms.
My husband, Penny thought in a sick panic. My husband. Donald Garth was fine-looking, a grand seigneur to his finger tips. His face was as colorless as Penny’s but he held himself erect, poised, completely under control, grave and unexpectedly formal. It seemed to Penny that during the brief interval in which their eyes met an invisible wall grew up between them, faster and taller than Jack’s beanstalk, so wide and high and thick that nothing would ever break it down again.
“Sorry,” he told his young bride with stern courtesy, as though addressing a stranger whom he had just met rather than his wife of an hour, “I was dressing in Terry’s room. The door was slightly ajar and I couldn’t avoid overhearing some of your conversation with —” he swallowed and for a brief moment he seemed to have difficulty in keeping his voice steady, coldly impersonal — “with Nora and Wentworth.”
A smile lighted his eyes for a moment as he looked at the maid.
“Has my car come around, Nora?”
She looked at him with frightened eyes, ready to defend Penny if necessary, not certain of his mood. “It’s waiting, sir.”
