WORLD'S END

"Oh, Lanny, you were such a darling about Marcel - now you must manage to be it again! Kurt is the best friend you have, or he will be if you'll let him. I know what you think - everybody will say it - that I'm old enough to be his mother; but you've always said that Kurt was older than his years, and you know that I'm much too young for mine. Kurt is twenty-two, and I'm only just thirty-seven - that's the honest truth, dear, I don't have to fib about it."

Lanny couldn't keep from laughing, seeing this good sou! desperately defending herself against all the gossips she had ever known. And taking a year or so from her own age and adding it to Kurt's!

"It's all right, dear. I was a little taken aback at first."

"You don't have to feel that you've lost either your mother or your friend, Lanny. We will both be to you just what we were before, if you will forgive us and let us."

"Yes, Beauty, of course."

"You mustn't think that Kurt seduced me, Lanny!"

The youth discovered himself laughing even more heartily. "Bless your dear heart! I'd be a lot more apt to think that you seduced Kurt!"

"Don't make fun of me, Lanny - it's deadly serious to both of us. You must understand what a gap there's been in my life ever since your father left me - or since I made him leave me. You'll never know what it cost me."

"I've tried to guess it many times," said the youth, and put his arm about her. "Cheer up, old dear, it's perfectly all right. Come to think of it, it's a brilliant idea, and I'm ashamed of my stupidity that I didn't think of it. Are you two going to marry?"

"Oh, that would be ridiculous, Lanny! What would people say? I'd be robbing the cradle!"

"Does Kurt want to marry you?"

"He thinks it's a matter of honor. He thinks you'll expect it. But tell him that's out of the question. Some day soon I'll be an old woman, and then I'd be ashamed of myself, to be a drag on his life. But I can make him happy now, Lanny. He's been coming here nearly every day, and we've both been embarrassed to tell you."

"Well, I don't think this was a very good time for you to turn into a prude," said the youth, severely. "But anyhow, that's done, and the question is how we're going to get you two sinners out of the country."

III

Beauty was like a person in a nightmare in which one is possessed by an agonizing sense of helplessness. She had no way to reach Kurt; he had given no address; he was under pledge, so he told her. He would come again - but when? And would he find police agents waiting for him in the hotel? Lanny must go downstairs and see if any suspicious-looking men were sitting in the lobby. Of course there are often men sitting in hotel lobbies, and how are you to say whether they look suspicious? Are police agents chosen because they look like police agents, or because they don't?

Beauty had to have help; and who was there but her son? She was terrified at the thought of involving him. Not on account of the Crillon - she didn't care a sou for them, she said, let them look out for themselves! But if the police were to take Lanny with Kurt? If he were to be punished for her guilty love - so she persisted in regarding it, being a woman who had been brought up respectably, a preacher's daughter, knowing the better even while she followed the worse!

Somebody must stay in the room, to be there when Kurt came, to warn him and hide him until night. Then they must get him out of Paris, and the safest way seemed to be by car. Beauty would go out and buy one, hers having been commandeered in the spring of the previous year. She supposed it would now be possible to get one if you had the price. Gasoline was still rationed, but that too could be arranged with money. She had only a little in the bank, she always did; but Lanny had a supply, and could draw on his father's account in an emergency. He offered to go out and attend to these matters; but the mother's terror took a leap - the police might trace all this, and Lanny would be guilty of helping a spy! No, let him wait here; she would run the errands.

Where would they go, he asked, and when she didn't know, he suggested Spain. If you went to Switzerland you were traveling toward Germany, and the authorities would be on the alert; but Spain was a neutral country, a Latin country, and a natural place for a rich American lady to be motoring with a lover. Or had it better be a chauffeur? They discussed the problem. A lover would appeal to Latin gallantry, but probably a chauffeur in uniform would be passed by the guard at the border with fewer questions.

Beauty had no passport, that evil device having been invented during the war, and she hadn't been out of France all that time. She would have to apply for one, and have a little picture made. She decided she would go back to the name of Budd, a powerful name, and foreign, more suitable to a tourist. Kurt doubtless had a passport, forged or genuine; if it was under the name of Dalcroze, it would have to be changed. No use to discuss that until he came.