The Everlasting Whisper

At this, the most critical moment of her life, it would appear inevitable that Gloria must bend every mental faculty to grappling with the vital issues. And yet, as she sat swallowed up in the big chair, for a space of time she was in a spell, caught up and whirled away from those about her; she forgot Gratton with the white, angry face; she had no eyes for Mark King or for Summerling, Steve Jarrold or Jim Spalding.

She was thinking of another day, two years ago, when she and her mother had been alone in this room. They had been busied with the last touches of furniture arrangement; they had discussed locations for chairs and had argued over pictures. Both tired out with a day of effort, they had come near tears in a verbal battle over the best place for the sole article remaining unplaced. Gloria wanted it in the hallway; Mrs. Gaynor pleaded for it over the mantel in the living-room. Finally it was Gloria who cried with sudden laughter: "Oh, what difference does it make? We're getting silly over trifles. Have it your way, mamma."

Trifles! Gloria wondered if any other act of her life had had the tremendous import of that sudden yielding to her mother's wishes. If the mirror had been placed anywhere else in the universe, even by a few inches removed from its present abiding-place, would there be a Gloria Gaynor in all the world right now? Or would her chair hold quite another sort of person--Mrs. Gratton? If she had not lifted her desperate eyes and seen Mark King reflected at the window, how would she have answered that one final question the "judge" propounded? Would she have said "Yes"? Or would it have been "No"?

She did not know; she would never know. She had been on the verge, dizzy with profitless speculation. And now, only the extent of one little word stood between her and an unthinkable condition. That a whole life should be steered down one channel or another--oh, what immeasurably separated channels!--by one's breath in a single-syllabled word---* * * * * "You don't answer!" a voice was saying irritably.

She started. They were talking to her, they had been talking to her, and now she realized that she had heard voices across a great distance, and by no means as clear to her consciousness as the remembered voice of her mother two years ago arguing for a mirror over the fireplace. She turned her eyes on Gratton, since obviously it was he who insisted on an answer. But King spoke for her.