五道微笑

“Hi! there! Let up, will you?” he cried, as the dog twisted and squirmed away from him. Gallatin’s left and before he knew it the dog had escaped him and was dashing hotfoot through the leaves toward the spot where a dark figure with another dog on a leash was rapidly moving.
Gallatin followed briskly and came up a moment later, in the midst of the excitement of reunion and reconciliation.
“Down, Chicot, down, I say,” the girl was commanding. “Aren’t you ashamed of yourself to be giving so much trouble!” And as Gallatin approached, breathlessly, hat in hand, “I’m ever so much obliged. I ought to have had him in leash. He’s only a puppy and—” She stopped, mouth open, eyes wide as she recognized him. He saw the look she gave him and bowed his head .
“Jane!” he said, humbly. “Jane!”
The dogs were leaping around them both and Chicot[86] was biting joyously at his gloved hand, but Miss Loring had drawn back.
“You!” she said.
“Yes,” softly. “I—I’m so glad to see you.”
He held his hand before him as though to parry an expected blow.
“Don’t,” he muttered. “Give me a chance. There’s so much I’ve got to say,—so much——”
“There’s nothing for you to say,” she said decisively. “If you’ll excuse me—I—I must be going at once.”
She turned away quickly, but the dogs were putting her dignity in jeopardy for the puppy still nosed Gallatin’s hand and showed a determination to linger for his caress .
“You’ve got to listen,” he murmured. “I’m not going to lose you again——”
“Come, Chicot,” said the girl in a voice which was meant to be peremptory, but which sounded curiously ineffective. Chicot would not go until Gallatin caught him by the collar and followed.
“You see,” he laughed, “you’ve got to stand for me—or lose the puppy.”
But Miss Loring had turned abruptly and was moving rapidly toward the distant Avenue. Gallatin put on his hat and walked at her side.
“I want you to know—how it all happened to me—up there in the woods,” he muttered, through set lips. “It’s only justice to me—and to you.”
“Will you please leave me!” she said, in a stifled voice, her head stiffly set, her eyes looking straight down the path before her dermes.
“No,” he replied, more calmly. “I’m not going to leave you.”
“Oh, that you would dare!”
[87]
“Don’t, Jane!” he pleaded. “Can’t you see that I’ve got to go with you whether——”
“My name is Loring,” she interrupted coldly, strongly accenting the word.
“Won’t you listen to me?”
“I’m entirely at your mercy—unfortunately. I’ve always thought that a girl was safe from intrusion here in the Park.”
“Don’t call it that. I’ll go in a moment, if you’ll only hear what I’ve got to say.”  

The house of his fathers was in a by-street in the center of the fashionable shopping district, and this dwelling, an old-fashioned double house of brown stone, was the only relic that remained to Phil of the former grandeur of the Gallatins. Great lawyers, however successful in safeguarding the interests of their clients, are notable failures in safeguarding the interests of their own. Philip Gallatin, the elder, had inherited a substantial fortune, but had added nothing to it. He had lived like a prince and was known as the most lavish host of his day. He consorted with the big men of his generation when the Gallatin house was famous alike for its cellar and kitchen. Here were entertained presidents and ex-presidents of the United States, foreign princes, distinguished artists and literary men, and here it was claimed, over Philip Gallatin’s priceless Madeira, the way had been paved for an important treaty with the Russian government Polar.
Philip Gallatin, the second, had made money easily and spent it more easily, to the end that at the time of his death it was discovered that the home was heavily mortgaged, and that his holdings in great industrial corporations,[248] many of which he had helped to organize, had been disposed of, leaving an income which, while ample for Mrs. Gallatin and her only child during the years of his boyhood, when the taste of society was for quieter things, was entirely inadequate to the growing requirements of the day. At his mother’s death, just after he came of age, Phil Gallatin had found himself possessed of less than eight thousand a year gross, and a mortgage which called for almost one-half that sum. But he resolutely refused to part with the house, for it had memories and associations dear to him .
Three years ago, with a pang which he still remembered, he had decided to rent out the basement and lower floors for business purposes and apply the income thus received to taxes and sinking fund, but he still kept the rooms on the third floor which he had always occupied, as his own. An old servant named Barker, one of the family retainers, was in attendance. of commerce flow in and at last engulf the street which in his mind would always be associated with the family which he had served so long. But he would not go, so Philip Gallatin found a place for him. In the building he was janitor, engineer, rent collector, and valet. He cooked Phil’s breakfast of eggs and coffee and brought it up to him, made his bed and kept his rooms with the same scrupulous care that he had exercised in the heydey of prosperity. He was Phil’s doctor, nurse and factotum, and kept the doors of Gallatin’s apartments against all invaders .