Molly Make-Believe

t poor Stanton's long-accumulated, long-suppressed perp

self fairly comfortably, late in the afternoon, at his big study-table close to the fire, where, in his low Morris chair, with his books and his papers and his lamp close at hand, he had started out once more to try and solve the ab

are-toed shoes nudging the bright, brassy edge of the fender, and his big meerschaum pipe puffing the whole bleak room most deliciously, tantalizingly full of forbidden tobacco smoke. It was a comfortable, warm

the Doctor turned and watched an unwonte

sked, quickly. "Surely you're not wor

nton. "It-isn'

held each other, and then Stanto

t any possible conditions could exist-that would make it justi

cautiously, "I think so. Th

d again, and reaching out, picked up a folded sheet

ou?" he asked. "An

e Doctor unfolded the paper, scanned th

l of

dding-rings instead-two perfectly plain gold wedding-rings. And the ring for my passive left hand I want inscribed, 'To Be

derstand. It is not Man's prerogative to understand. But you are perfectly welcome if you want, t

t and grabbing the letter. "Here! You need

last with an almost bashful gesture, he cried out abruptly: "Stanton, somehow I feel as though I owed you an apology, or rather, owed your fiancée one. Somehow when yo

bit his lips furiously as though to hold back an exclamation.

er. I buy them by the dozen,-so much a week." Reaching back under his pillow he e

gasped th

His forehead was

ar

mmodate so many of your friends without seriously curtailing my own list. After all you must remember that it is the bride's day, not the groom's. And in regard to your question as to whether we expect to be home for Christmas and could I possibly arrange to spend Christmas Day with you-why, Carl, you are perfectly preposter

ially

rne

hope that your rheum

uscles around his mouth tightened like the facial muscles of a man who is hammering so

each other for a second. Then

now it's funny. That's just the troub

tter Co. and handed it to the Doctor. Then after a moment's rummaging around on the floor beside

ere's a queer little newspaper cutting that she sent me one blizzardy Sunday telling all about some big violin maker who always went out into the forests himself and chose his violin woods from the north side of the trees. Casual little item. You don't think anything about it at the moment. It probably isn't true. And to save your soul you couldn't tell what kind of trees violins are made out of, anyway. But I'll wager that never again will you wake in the night to listen to the wind without thinking of the great storm-tossed, moaning, groaning, slow-toughening forest trees-learning to be violins!... And here's a funny little old silver porringer that she gave me, she says, to make my 'old gray gruel taste shinier.' And down a

urther responsibility concerning, "little brother," Stanton began to dig d

l sitting against that paper! And this sun-shiny tint for a breakfast-room isn't half bad, is it?-Oh yes, and here are the time-tables, and all the pink and blue maps about Colorado and Arizona and the 'Painted Desert'. If we can 'afford it,' she writes, she 'wishes

acknowledged conscientiously; "nothing in the world except a boxful of make-believe thoughts from a

duced and spread out before the Doctor's

cerning you, even so, are

, thoughts concerning the weather,

ir-is it-to weigh a boxful of even the prettiest lies against

there isn't any 'little brother' at all; suppose there isn't any 'Painted Desert', suppose there isn't any 'black sheep up on a grandfather's farm', suppose there isn't anything; suppose, I say, that eve

's keeping you thin and worried looking, eh? It's only that you find yourself suddenly

ld worn-out

y inclined. Even the oldest lady, I presume, might very reasonably perfume her note-paper with cinnamon roses. It might even be a boy. One letter indeed smelt very strongly of being a boy

r fiancée about it

e who sent me the circular in the first place! But, 'tell her about it'? Why, man,

make me understand,"

ly, hopelessly sane person you ever saw in your life-how could I go to anyone like that, and announce: 'Cornelia, if you find any perplexing change in me during your absence-and your unconscious negle

to be released?" in

and then, would any man go ahead and give up a real flesh-and-blood sweetheart for the sake of even the most w

t you call the 'paper-and-ink girl' suggested suddenly an entirely

' probably a BOY!" per

go ahead and find out

an, that basket over there is full of my letters returned to me because I tried to 'find out'. The first time I asked, they answered me with just a teasing, snubbing telegram, but ever since then they've simply sent back my que

"The love-letter business must be thriving. Very evident

last and I wrote them frankly and told them that I didn't give a darn who 'Molly' was, but simply wanted to know what she was. I told them that it was just gratitude on my part, the most formal, impersonal sort of gratitude-a perfectly plausible desire to say 'thank you' to some one who had been awfully decent to me these past f

ere a girl?" pr

to twitch. "Then Heave

persisted the Doctor. "What do yo

nton drew a gray envelope ou

ll see the whole business,

me. His clutch on the letter was distinctly inquisitive, and h

t all in trying to conceal my identity from you, how much shall I possibly have left to devise schemes for your amusement? Why do you persist, for instance, in wanting to see m

t always rest yourself by going on the stage where-with a little rouge and a different colored wig, and a new nose, and skirts instead of trousers, or trousers instead of skirts, and age instead of youth, and badness instead of goodness-you can give your ego a perfectly limitless number of happy holidays. But if you were oldish, I say, and pitifully 'shut in', just how would you go to work, I wonder, to rest your personality? How for instance could you take your biggest, grayest, oldest worry about your doctor's bill, and rouge it up into a radiant, young joke? And how, for instance, out of your lonely, dreary, middle-aged orp

didn't say so. I just said 'maybe'. Likelier than not I've saved my climax for its proper

as though to satisfy his sense of something left unfinished, the Doctor beg

olored'," he vol

heroically up to the point where I'm actually infuriated if you even suggest that I might be getting really interested in

uld turn out to be a one-legged veteran of the War of 1812, you still could say, 'I told you so'. But all the same, I'll wager

y but his mouth retained at least a

e said. "It's the little girl's non-exi

grabbed a forbidden cigar from the Doctor's cigar case, and light

olored,'" he vol

after much crossing and re-crossing of his knees the Doctor asked drawl

," said Sta

After a few more minutes

nduly. "Is it your head that's spinning round?"

me feel a little bit giddy," he acknowledged. Then with sudden intensity, "S

?" said Stant

tters. "Cut those out," he said. "A sentimental correspond

nton, "I'll hardly sta

orried and-." Peremptorily he reached out both hands towards the box. "Here!" he

all papers. I've had altogether too much fun out of them. And as for the books, the Browning, etc.-why hang it all, I've gotten awfully fond of thos

ar, someone whom I never knew!' But how about the pucker along your spine, and the awfully foolish, grinny feeling around your cheek-bones? And on the street and in the cars and at the theaters you'll always and forever be looking and searching, and asking yourself, 'Is it by any chance possible that this girl sitting next to me now-?' And your wife will keep saying, with just a barely perceptible edg

ed Stanton. "Why you rave and rant about it as thoug

t into cold gray ashes without making any further trouble whatsoever. But you've got an 'imagination' for this make-believe girl-heaven help you!-and an 'imagination' is a great, wild, seething, insatiate tongue of fire that, thwarted once and for all in its original desire to gorge itself with realities, will turn upon you body and soul, and lick up your crackling fancy like so much kindling wood-and sear your common sense, and scorch your young wife's happiness. Nothing but Cornelia herself will ever make you want-Cornelia. But the other girl, the unknown girl-w

ous argument, the subtle justification, that had been teemin

ott, man! Are you going to call a fellow unfaithful because he hikes off into a corner now and then and reads a bit of Browning, for instan

library, you'll never find another copy as long as you live that doesn't smell of cinnamon roses. And as to 'star-gazing' or any other weird thing that your wife doesn't car

to be married to a girl who isn't keen enough about it to want to be all the world to him. But I don't know that even the most worried fellow has any real cause to be scared, a

ll that. But I'm mighty glad just the same that it isn't my daughter whom you're going to marry, with a

somewhat distrait. "Cut it o

stling froth across the whole surface of the table. Just for a second the muscles in his throat t

n't you see that it's nothing in the world except

eiterated

cious, intangible joke" manifested itself abruptly in the person of a rather small feminine figure very heavily muffled up in a great black cloak, and

n undeniably sweet little alto