The Girl in the Golden Atom by Ray Cummings (buy e reader txt) 📗

The woman made a striking picture as she sat back at ease before the fire. She was dressed in a simple black evening-dress such as a lady of the city would wear. It covered her shoulders, but left her throat bare. Her features, particularly her eyes, had a slight Oriental cast, which the mass of very black hair coiled on her head accentuated. Yet she did not look like an Oriental, nor indeed like a woman of any race of this earth. Her cheeks were red—the delicate diffused red of perfect health. But underneath the red there lay a curious mixture of other colours, not only on her cheeks but particularly noticeable on her neck and arms. Her skin was smooth as a pearl; in the mellow firelight it glowed, with the iridescence of a shell.

The four men were dressed in the careless negligee of city men in the country. They were talking gaily now among themselves. The woman spoke seldom, staring dreamily into the fire.

A clock in another room struck eight; the woman glanced over to where the child sat, absorbed with the pictures in his book. The page at which he was looking showed a sleigh loaded with toys, with a team of reindeers and a jolly, fat, white-bearded, red-jacketed old man driving the sleigh over the chimney tops.

"Come Loto, little son," the woman said. "You hear—it is the time of sleep for you."

The boy put down his book reluctantly and went over to the fireplace, standing beside his mother with an arm about her neck.

"Oh, mamita dear, will he surely come, this Santa Claus? He never knew about me before; will he surely come?"

Lylda kissed him tenderly. "He will come, Loto, every Christmas Eve; to you and to all the other children of this great world, will he always come."

"But you must be asleep when he comes, Loto," one of the men admonished.

"Yes, my father, that I know," the boy answered gravely. "I will go now."

"Come back Loto, when you have undressed," the Chemist called after him, as he left the room. "Remember you must hang your stocking."

When they were left alone Lylda looked at her companions and smiled.

"His first Christmas," she said. "How wonderful we are going to make it for him."

"I can remember so well," the Big Business Man remarked thoughtfully, "when they first told me there was no Santa Claus. I cried, for I knew Christmas would never be the same to me."

"Loto is nearly twelve years old," the Doctor said. "Just imagine—having his first Christmas."

"We're going to make it a corker," said the Banker. "Where's the tree? We got one."

"In the wood-shed," Lylda answered. "He has not seen it; I was so very careful."

They were silent a moment. Then: "My room is chock full of toys," the Banker said reflectively. "But this is a rotten town for candy canes—they only had little ones." And they all laughed.

"I have a present for you, Lylda," the Chemist said after a moment.

"Oh, but you must not give it until to-morrow; you yourself have told me that."

The Chemist rose. "I want to give it now," he said, and left the room. In a moment he returned, carrying a mahogany pedestal under one arm and a square parcel in the other. He set the pedestal upright on the floor in a corner of the room and began opening the package. It was a mahogany case, cubical in shape. He lifted its cover, disclosing a glass-bell set upon a flat, mahogany slab. Fastened to the center of this was a handsome black plush case, in which lay a gold wedding-ring.

Lylda drew in her breath sharply and held it; the three other men stared at the ring in amazement. The Chemist was saying: "And I decided not to destroy it, Lylda, for your sake. There is no air under this glass cover; the ring is lying in a vacuum, so that nothing can come out of it and live. It is quite safe for us to keep it—this way. I thought of this plan, afterwards, and decided to keep the ring—for you." He set the glass bell on the pedestal.

Lylda stood before it, bending down close over the glass.

"You give me back—my world," she breathed; then she straightened up, holding out her arms toward the ring. "My birthplace—my people—they are safe." And then abruptly she sank to her knees and began softly sobbing.

Loto called from upstairs and they heard him coming down. Lylda went back hastily to the fire; the Chemist pushed a large chair in front of the pedestal, hiding it from sight.

The boy, in his night clothes, stood on the hearth beside his mother.

"There is the stocking, mamita. Where shall I hang it?"

"First the prayer, Loto. Can you remember?"

The child knelt on the hearth, with his head in his mother's lap.

"Now I lay me——" he began softly, halting over the unfamiliar words. Lylda's fingers stroked his brown curly head as it nestled against her knees; the firelight shone golden in his tousled curls.

The Chemist was watching them with moist eyes. "His first Christmas," he murmured, and smiled a little tender smile. "His first Christmas."

The child was finishing.

"And God bless Aura, and Jack, and——"

"And Grandfather Reoh," his mother prompted softly.

"And Grandfather Reoh—and mamita, and——" The boy ended with a rush—"and me too. Amen. Now where do I hang the stocking, mother?"

In a moment the little stocking dangled from a mantel over the fireplace.

"You are sure he will come?" the child asked anxiously again.

"It is certain, Loto—if you are asleep."

Loto kissed his mother and shook hands solemnly with the men—a grave, dignified little figure.

"Good night, Loto," said the Big Business Man.

"Good night, sir. Good night, my father—good night, mamita; I shall be asleep very soon." And with a last look at the stocking he ran out of the room.

"What a Christmas he will have," said the Banker, a little huskily.

A girl stood in the doorway that led into the dining-room adjoining—a curious-looking girl in a gingham apron and cap. Lylda looked up.

"Oh, Eena, please will you say to Oteo we want the tree from the wood-shed—in the dining-room."

The little maid hesitated. Her mistress smiled and added a few words in foreign tongue. The girl disappeared.

"Every window gets a holly wreath," the Doctor said. "They're in a box outside in the wood-shed."

"Look what I've got," said the Big Business Man, and produced from his pocket a little folded object which he opened triumphantly into a long serpent of filigree red paper on a string with little red and green paper bells hanging from it. "Across the doorway," he added, waving his hand.

A moment after there came a stamping of feet on the porch outside, and then the banging of an outer door. A young man and girl burst into the room, kicking the snow from their feet and laughing. The youth carried two pairs of ice-skates slung over his shoulder; as he entered the room he flung them clattering to the floor.

The girl, even at first glance, was extraordinarily pretty. She was small and very slender of build. She wore stout high-laced tan shoes, a heavy woollen skirt that fell to her shoe-tops and a short, belted coat, with a high collar buttoned tight about her throat. She was covered now with snow. Her face and the locks of hair that strayed from under her knitted cap were soaking wet.

"He threw me down," she appealed to the others.

"I didn't—she fell."

"You did; into the snow you threw me—off the road." She laughed. "But I am learning to skate."

"She fell three times," said her companion accusingly.

"Twice only, it was," the girl corrected. She pulled off her cap, and a great mass of black hair came tumbling down about her shoulders.

Lylda, from her chair before the fire, smiled mischievously.

"Aura, my sister," she said in a tone of gentle reproof. "So immodest it is to show all that hair."

The girl in confusion began gathering it up.

"Don't you let her tease you, Aura," said the Big Business Man. "It's very beautiful hair."

"Where's Loto?" asked the Very Young Man, pulling off his hat and coat.

"In bed—see his stocking there."

A childish treble voice was calling from upstairs. "Good night, Aura—good night, my friend Jack."

"Good night, old man—see you to-morrow," the Very Young Man called back in answer.

"You mustn't make so much noise," the Doctor said reprovingly. "He'll never get to sleep."

"No, you mustn't," the Big Business Man agreed. "To-morrow's a very very big day for him."

"Some Christmas," commented the Very Young Man looking around. "Where's the holly and stuff?"

"Oh, we've got it all right, don't you worry," said the Banker.

"And mistletoe," said Lylda, twinkling. "For you, Jack."

Eena again stood in the doorway and said something to her mistress. "The tree is ready," said Lylda.

The Chemist rose to his feet. "Come on, everybody; let's go trim it."

They crowded gaily into the dining-room, leaving the Very Young Man and Aura sitting alone by the fire. For some time they sat silent, listening to the laughter of the others trimming the tree.

The Very Young Man looked at the girl beside him as she sat staring into the fire. She had taken off her heavy coat, and her figure seemed long and very slim in the clothes she was wearing now. She sat bending forward, with her hands clasped over her knees. The long line of her slender arm and shoulder, and the delicacy of her profile turned towards him, made the Very Young Man realize anew how fragile she was, and how beautiful.

Her mass of hair was coiled in a great black pile on her head, with a big, loose knot low at the neck. The iridescence of her skin gleamed under the flaming red of her cheeks. Her lips, too, were red, with the smooth, rich red of coral. The Very Young Man thought with a shock of surprise that he had never noticed before that they were red; in the ring there had been no such color.

In the room adjoining, his friends were proposing a toast over the Christmas punch bowl. The Chemist's voice floated in through the doorway.

"To the Oroids—happiness to them." Then for an instant there was silence as they drank the toast.

Aura met the Very Young Man's eyes and smiled a little wanly. "Happiness—to them! I wonder. We who are so happy to-night—I wonder, are they?"

The Very Young Man leaned towards her. "You are happy, Aura?"

The girl nodded, still staring wistfully into the fire.

"I want you to be," the Very Young Man added simply, and fell silent.

A blazing log in the fire twisted and rolled to one side; the crackling flames leaped higher, bathing the girl's drooping little figure in their golden light.

The Very Young Man after a time found himself murmuring familiar lines of poetry. His memory leaped back. A boat sailing over a silent summer lake—underneath the stars—the warmth of a girl's soft little body touching his—her hair, twisted about his fingers—the thrill in his heart; he felt it now as his lips formed the words: