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"The personal quantity," repeated Laura laughing, and, as if the description of Kemper had failed to interest her, she turned the conversation upon the subject of Trent's play.
"You aren't going to the office, I hope, sir, until you've written those notes?" Kemper stared at him silently an instant, one arm still in the sleeve of the overcoat he was putting on. "Oh, I say, Wilkins, I'll do them at the club," he replied at last. Wilkins shook his head with decision written in every line of his smooth-shaven English profile.
At the thought his old human longing for her awoke and stirred restlessly again in his heart. "Yes, the only thing is to have one particular interest," resumed Kemper, "to occupy oneself with something that is eternally worth while. Now, look at Barclay I went up in the train with him to the Adirondacks, and, upon my word, I never envied a man more in my whole life. You know Barclay, don't you?"
Kemper fired a shot at the Federal train approaching Vienna, and the journalists cried, "we have driven back the whole Federal army!" Then some real fighting came, and the applause was again tremendous. When the news of the first Manassas flashed over the wires, the Southern people stood upon their heads, and went wild.
"I never thought you loved Kemper," he went on. "What you built your dream upon was an imaginary image that wore his shape. In my heart, even when I stood aside when I was forced to stand aside because of other claims upon me I think I was sure all the time that your love was meant for me at last." "For you? Oh, no, not now," she answered.
But the knowledge of this curiously enough, served to increase rather than to diminish the persistent quantity of her emotion, and the few minutes during which Kemper had been absent from her had sufficed to exaggerate his image to a statue that was heroic in its proportions.
At his glance of enquiry she smiled and laid the typewritten pages carelessly aside. "No, it's not mine," she said. "They're several short stories which Mr. Kemper did many years ago, and he's asked me to look over them. I find, by the way, that they need a great deal of recasting." "Is it possible," he exclaimed in amazement, "that you allow people to bore you with stuff like that?"
"I think you're right," she admitted at last, "but why? Why? What on earth has he ever got from life?" "He has got a wife," he retorted, with his genial irony. "Well, I suppose he congratulates himself that he hasn't two," was her flippant rejoinder. Kemper laughed shortly. "I'm not sure that she doesn't equal a good half dozen." "And yet he is happy," said Gerty thoughtfully.
"It's a pity," said Kemper thoughtfully; and having finished his pear, he dipped his fingers in his finger bowl, moistened his short moustache, and turned to take a cigar from the little silver tray which Wilkins held before him. "Do you know I can't imagine a greater happiness than the quick accumulation of wealth," he observed in his hearty voice.
When they reached his rooms, Kemper had not returned, and while Gerty amused herself by examining every photograph upon his desk and mantel, Laura drew a chair before the portrait, which was a bold, half-length study painted with a daring breadth of handling.
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