The Unknown Quantity: A Book of Romance and Some Half-Told Tales
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Title: The Unknown Quantity: A Book of Romance and Some Half-Told Tales
Author: Henry Van Dyke
Release date: December 7, 2009 [eBook #30622]
Language: English
Other information and formats: www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/30622
Credits: Produced by Sankar Viswanathan, Juliet Sutherland, and the
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*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE UNKNOWN QUANTITY: A BOOK OF ROMANCE AND SOME HALF-TOLD TALES ***
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[Illustration: It did people good to buy of her.]
THE
UNKNOWN QUANTITY
A Book of Romance
And Some Half-Told Tales
_by_
HENRY VAN DYKE
_"Let X represent the unknown quantity."_
_Legendre's Algebra_
NEW YORK
CHARLES SCRIBNER'S SONS
1921
_Copyright, 1912, by Charles Scribner's Sons_
_Published October, 1912. Reprinted October, December,
1912; July, 1916; May, 1918; March, 1919;
December, 1919; July, 1921._
_Leather Edition, September, 1913; May, 1916;
February, 1917; June, 1920; May, 1921._
* * * * *
Dedicated
IN THANKFULNESS
TO THE MEMORY OF
DEAR DAUGHTER DOROTHEA
RAY OF LIGHT
SONG OF JOY
HEART OF LOVE
1888-1912
* * * * *
DOROTHEA
_A deeper crimson in the rose,
A deeper blue in sky and sea,
And ever, as the summer goes,
A deeper loss in losing thee!_
_A deeper music in the strain
Of hermit-thrush from lonely tree;
And deeper grows the sense of gain
My life has found in having thee._
_A deeper love, a deeper rest,
A deeper joy in all I see;
And ever deeper in my breast
A silver song that comes from thee._
_H. v. D._
MOUNT DESERT,
_August 1, 1912_.
PREFACE
There is a chain of little lakes--a necklace of lost jewels--lying in
the forest that clothes the blue Laurentian Mountains in the Province
of Quebec.
Each of these hidden lakes has its own character and therefore its own
charm. One is bright and friendly, with wooded hills around it, and
silver beaches, and red berries of the rowan-tree fringing the shores.
Another is sombre and lonely, set in a circle of dark firs and
larches, with sighing, trembling reeds along the bank. Another is only
a round bowl of crystal water, the colour of an aquamarine,
transparent and joyful as the sudden smile on the face of a child.
Another is surrounded by fire-scarred mountains, and steep cliffs
frown above it, and the shores are rough with fallen fragments of
rock; it seems as if the setting of this jewel had been marred and
broken in battle, but the gem itself shines tranquilly amid the ruin,
and the lichens paint the rocks, and the new woods spring bright
green upon the mountains. There are many more lakes, and all are
different. The thread that binds them together is the little river
flowing from one to another, now with a short, leaping passage, now
with a longer, winding course.
You may follow it in your canoe, paddling through the still-waters,
dropping down the rapids with your setting-pole, wading and dragging
your boat in the shallows, and coming to each lake as a surprise,
something distinct and separate and personal. It seems strange that
they should be sisters; they are so unlike. But the same stream,
rising in unknown springs, and seeking an unknown sea, runs through
them all, and lives in them all, and makes them all belong together.
The thread which unites the stories in this book is like that. It is
the sign of the unknown quantity, the sense of mystery and
strangeness, that runs through human life.
We think we know a great deal more about the processes and laws and
conditions of life than men used to know. And probably that is true;
though it is not quite certain, for it is hard to say precisely how
much those inscrutable old Egyptians and Hebrews and Chaldæans and
Hindus knew and did not tell.
But granting that we have gone beyond them, we have not gone very far,
we have not come to perfect knowledge. There is still something around
us and within that baffles and surprises us. Events happen which are
as mysterious after our glib explanations as they were before. Changes
for good or ill take place in the heart of man for which his intellect
gives no reason. There is the daily miracle of the human will, the
power of free choice, for which no one can account, and which
sometimes flashes out the strangest things. There is the secret,
incalculable influence of one life on another. There is the web of
circumstance woven to an unseen pattern. There is the vast, unexplored
land of dreams in which we spend one-third of our lives without even
remembering most of what befalls us there.
I am not thinking now of the so-called "realm of the occult," nor of
those extraordinary occurrences which startle and perplex the world
from time to time, nor of those complicated and subtle problems of
crime which are set to puzzle us. I am thinking of much more human and
familiar things, quite natural and inevitable as it seems, which make
us feel that life is threaded through and through by the unknown
quantity.
This is the thread that I have followed from one to another of these
stories. They are as different as my lakes in the North Country; some
larger and some smaller; some brighter and some darker; for that is
the way life goes. But most of them end happily, even after sorrow;
for that is what I think life means.
Four of the stories have grown out of slight hints, for which I return
thanks. For the two Breton legends which appear in "The Wedding-Ring"
and "Messengers at the Window," I am indebted to my friend, M. Anatole
Le Braz; for an incident which suggested "The Night Call," to my
friend, Mrs. Edward Robinson; and for the germ of "The Mansion," to my
friend, Mr. W. D. Sammis. If the stories that have come from their
hints are different from what my friends thought they would be, that
is only another illustration of the theme.
Between the longer stories there are three groups of tales that are
told in a briefer and different manner. They are like etchings in
which more is suggested than is in the picture. For this reason they
are called Half-Told Tales, in the hope that they may mean to the
reader more than they say.
Without the unknown quantity life would be easier, perhaps, but
certainly less interesting. It is not likely that we shall ever
eliminate it. But we can live with it and work with it bravely,
hopefully, happily, if we believe that after all it means
good--infinite good, passing comprehension--to all who live in love.
AVALON,
_June 1, 1912_.
CONTENTS
PAGE
_The Wedding-Ring_ 3
_Messengers at the Window_ 25
_The Countersign of the Cradle_ 43
_The Key of the Tower_ 67
_The Ripening of the Fruit_ 73
_The King's Jewel_ 80
_The Music-Lover_ 87
_Humoreske_ 103
_An Old Game_ 139
_The Unruly Sprite_ 144
_A Change of Air_ 156
_The Night Call_ 167
_The Effectual Fervent Prayer_ 203
_The Return of the Charm_ 235
_Beggars Under the Bush_ 249
_Stronghold_ 257
_In the Odour of Sanctity_ 266
_The Sad Shepherd_ 287
_The Mansion_ 325
ILLUSTRATIONS
_It did people good to buy of her_ _Frontispiece_
_From a drawing by Charles S. Chapman._
Facing page
_The King's Jewel_ 82
_From a drawing by Garth Jones._
_The Music-Lover_ 90
_From a drawing by Sigismond de Ivanowski._
_The Unruly Sprite_ 154
_From a drawing by Garth Jones._
_She flung herself across his knees and put her
arms around him_ 230
_From a drawing by Paul Julien Meylan._
_Stronghold_ 258
_From a drawing by Garth Jones._
_So the sad shepherd thanked them for their
entertainment_ 314
_From a drawing by Blendon Campbell._
_Title-page, head and end pieces by Garth Jones_
THE WEDDING-RING
Before Toinette Girard made up her mind to marry Prosper Leclère,--you
remember the man at Abbéville who had such a brave heart that he was
not willing to fight with an old friend,--before Toinette perceived
and understood how brave Prosper was, it seemed as if she were very
much in doubt whether she did not love some one else more than she
loved him, whether he and she really were made for each other,
whether, in short, she cared for him enough to give herself entirely
to him.
But after they had been married six weeks there was no doubt left in
her mind. He was the one man in the world for her. He satisfied her to
the core--although by this time she knew most of his faults. It was
not so much that she loved him in spite of them, but she simply could
not imagine him changed in any way without losing a part of him, and
that idea was both intolerable and incredible to her. Just as he was,
she clung to him and became one with him.
I know it seems ridiculous to describe a love like that, and it is
certainly impossible to explain it. It is not common, nor regular, nor
altogether justifiable by precept and authority. Reason is against it;
and the doctors of the church have always spoken severely of the
indulgence of any human affection that verges on idolatry. But the
fact remains that there are a few women in the world who are capable
of such a passion.
Capable? No, that is not the word. They are created for it. They
cannot help it. It is not a virtue, it is simply a quality. Their
whole being depends upon their love. They hang upon it, as a wreath
hangs from a nail in the wall. If it breaks they are broken. If it
holds they are happy. Other things interest them and amuse them, of
course, but there is only one thing that really counts--to love and to
be loved.
Toinette was a woman of that rare race. To the outward view she was
just a pretty French Canadian girl with an oval face, brown hair, and
eyes like a very dark topaz. Her hands were small, but rather red and
rough. Her voice was rich and vibrant, like the middle notes of a
'cello, but she spoke a dialect that was as rustic as a cabbage. Her
science was limited to enough arithmetic to enable her to keep
accounts, her art to the gift of singing a very lovely contralto by
ear, and her notions of history bordered on the miraculous. She was
obstinate, superstitious, and at times quick-tempered. But she had a
positive genius for loving. That raised her into the first rank, and
enabled her to bestow as much happiness on Prosper as if she had been
a queen.
It was a grief to them, of course, that they had no children. But this
grief did not destroy, nor even diminish, their felicity in each
other; it was like the soft shadow of a cloud passing over a
landscape--the sun was still shining and the world was fair. They were
too happy to be discontented. And their fortunes were thriving, too,
so that they were kept pretty hard at work--which, next to love, is
the best antidote for unhappiness.
After the death of the old _bonhomme_ Girard, the store fell to
Prosper; and his good luck--or his cleverness, or his habit of always
being ready for things, call it what you will--stuck by him. Business
flourished in the _Bon Marché_ of Abbéville. Toinette helped it by her
gay manners and her skill in selling. It did people good to buy of
her: she made them feel that she was particularly glad that they were
getting just what they needed. A pipe of the special shape which
Pierre affected, a calico dress-pattern of the shade most becoming to
Angélique, a brand of baking-powder which would make the batter rise
up like mountains--_v'là, voisine, c'est b'en bon_! Everything that
she sold had a charm with it. Consequently trade was humming, and the
little wooden house beside the store was _b'en trimée_.
The only drawback to the happiness of the Leclères was the fact that
business required Prosper to go away for a fortnight twice a year to
replenish his stock of goods. He went to Quebec or to Montreal, for he
had a great many kinds of things to get, and he wanted good things and
good bargains, and he did not trust the commercial travellers.
"Who pays those men," he said, "to run around everywhere, with big
watch-chains? You and me! But why? I can buy better myself--because I
understand what Abbéville wants--and I can buy cheaper."
The times of his absence were heavy and slow to Toinette. The hours
were doped out of the day as reluctantly as black molasses dribbles
from a jug. A professional instinct kept her up to her work in the
store. She jollied the customers, looked after the accounts, made good
sales, and even coquetted enough with the commercial travellers to
send them away without ill-will for the establishment which refused to
buy from them.
"A little _badinage_ does no harm," she said, "it keeps people from
getting angry because they can't do any more business."
But in the house she was dull and absent-minded. She went about as if
she had lost something. She sat in her rocking-chair, with her hands
in her lap, as if she were waiting for something. The yellow light of
the lamp shone upon her face and hurt her eyes. A tear fell upon her
knitting. The old _tante_ Bergeron, who came in to keep house for her
while she was busy with the store, diagnosed her malady and was
displeased with it.
"You are love-sick," said she. "That is bad. Especially for a married
woman. It is wrong to love any of God's creatures too much. Trouble
will come of it--_voyons voir_."
"But, aunty," answered Toinette, "Prosper is not just any of God's
creatures. He is mine. How could I love him too much? Besides, I don't
do it. It does itself. How can I help it?"
"It is a malady," sighed the old woman shaking her head. "It is a
malady of youth, my child. There is danger in it--and for Prosper too!
You make an idol of a man and you spoil him. You upset his mind. Men
are like that. You will bring trouble upon your man, if you don't take
care. God will send you a warning--perhaps a countersign of death."
"What is that," cried Toinette, her heart shaking within her breast,
"what do you mean with your countersign of death?"
The old woman nodded her head mysteriously and leaned forward,
putting her gnarled hand on Toinette's round knee and peering with her
faded eyes into the girl's wild-flower face.
"It is the word," said she, "that death speaks before he crosses the
threshold. He gives a sign--sometimes one thing, and sometimes
another--before he comes in. Our folk in Brittany have understood
about that for a long time. My grandmother has told me. It always
comes to one who has gone too far, to one who is like you. You must be
careful. You must go to Mass every day and pray that your malady may
be restrained."
So Toinette, having tasted of the strange chalice of fear, went to the
church early every morning while Prosper was away and prayed that she
might not love him so much as to make God jealous. The absurdity of
such a prayer never occurred to her. She made it with childish
simplicity. Probably it did no harm. For when Prosper came home she
loved him more than ever. Then she went to High Mass every Sunday
morning with him and prayed for other things.
After four years there came a day when Prosper must go away for a
longer absence. There was an affair connected with the Department of
Forests and Fisheries, which could only be arranged at Ottawa. Thither
he must go to see the lawyers, and there he must stay perhaps a month,
perhaps two.
You can imagine that Toinette was desolate. The draught of fear that
_tante_ Bergeron had given her grew more potent and bitter in her
simple heart. And the strange thing was that, although she was
ignorant of it, there was apparently something true in the warning
which the old woman had given. For jealousy--that vine with flying
seeds and strangling creepers--had taken root in the heart of Prosper
Leclère.
Yes, I know it is contrary to all the rules and to all the proverbs,
but so it happened. It is not true that the strongest love is the most
jealous. It is the lesser love, the love which receives more than it
gives, that lies open to the floating germs of mistrust and suspicion.
And so it was Prosper who began to have doubts whether Toinette
thought of him as much when he was away as when he was with her;
whether her gladness when he came home was not something that she put
on to fool him and humour him; whether her _badinage_ with the
commercial travellers (and especially with that good-looking Irishman,
Flaherty from Montreal, of whom the village gossips had much to say)
might not be more serious than it looked; whether--ah, well, you know,
when a man begins to follow fool thoughts like that, they carry him
pretty far astray in the wilderness.
Prosper was a good fellow with a touch of the prig in him. He was a
Catholic with a Puritan temperament and a Gallic imagination. The
idolatry of Toinette had, as a matter of fact, spoiled him a little;
it was so much that he weakly questioned the reality of it, as if it
were too good to be true. All the time he was in Ottawa and on the
journey those fool thoughts hobbled around him and misled him and made
him unhappy.
Meantime Toinette was toiling through the time of separation, with a
laugh for the store, and a sigh for the lonely house, and a prayer for
the church. Tired as she was at night, she did not sleep well, and
her dreams were troubled by aunty Bergeron's warning against loving
too much.
In the cold drab dawn of a March morning it seemed to her as if the
church bell had just stopped ringing as she awaked from a dream of
Prosper. She put on her clothes quickly and hurried out. The road was
deserted. In the snowy fields the little fir-trees stood out as black
as ink. Against the sky rose the gray-stone church like a fortress of
refuge.
But as she entered the door, instead of five or six well-known
neighbours, kneeling in the half-darkness, she saw that the church was
filled with a strange, thick, blinding radiance, like a mist of light.
Everything was blurred and confused in that luminous fog. There was
not a face to be seen. Yet she felt the presence of a vast
congregation all around her. There were movements in the mist. The
rustling of silks, the breath of rich and strange perfumes, a low
rattling as of hidden chains, came to her from every side. There were
voices of men and women, young and old, rough and delicate, hoarse and
sweet, all praying the same prayer in many tongues. She could not
hear it clearly, but the sound of their murmurs and sighs was like the
whisper of the fir-wood when the wind walks through it.
She was bewildered and frightened. Part of going to church means
having people that you know near you. Her heart fluttered with a vague
terror, and she sank into the first seat by the door.
She could not see the face of the priest at the altar. His voice was
unfamiliar. The tinkle of the bell sounded from an infinite distance.
The sound of footsteps came down the aisle. It must be some one
carrying the plate for the offering. As he advanced slowly she could
hear the clink of the coins dropping into it. Mechanically she put her
hand in her pocket and drew out the little piece of silver and the
four coppers that by chance were there.
When the man came near she saw that he was dressed in a white robe
with a hood over his face. The plate was full of golden coins. She
held out her poor little offering. The man in the cowl shook his head
and drew back the plate.
"It is for the souls of the dead," he whispered, "the dead whom we
have loved too much. Nothing but gold is good enough for this
offering."
"But this is all I have," she stammered.
"There is a ring on your hand," he answered in a voice which pierced
her heart.
Shivering dumbly like a dog, palsied with pain, yet compelled by an
instinct which she dared not resist, she drew her wedding-ring from
her finger and dropped it into the plate.
As it fell there was a clang as if a great bell had tolled; and she
rose and ran from the church, never stopping until she reached her own
room and fell on her knees beside her bed, sobbing as if her heart
would break.
The first thing that roused her was the clatter of the dishes in the
kitchen. The yellow light of morning filled the room. She wondered to
find herself fully dressed and kneeling by the bed instead of sleeping
in it. It was late, she had missed the hour of Mass. Her glance fell
upon her left hand, lying stretched out upon the bed. The third finger
was bare.
All the scene in the church rushed over her like a drive of logs in
the river when the jam breaks. She felt as helpless as a little child
in a canoe before the downward sweeping flood. She did not wish to cry
out, to struggle--only to crouch down, and cover her eyes, and wait.
Whatever was coming would come.
Then the force of youth and hope and love rose within her and she
leaped to her feet. "Bah!" she said to herself, "I am a baby. It was
only a dream,--the curé has told us not to be afraid of them,--I snap
my fingers at that old Bergeron with her stupid countersigns,--_je
m'en fricasse_! But, my ring--my ring? I have dropped it, that's all,
while I was groping around the room in my sleep. After a while I will
look for it and find it."
She washed her face and smoothed her hair and walked into the kitchen.
Breakfast was ready and the old woman was grumbling because it had
been kept waiting.
"You are lazy," she said, "a love-sick woman is good for nothing. Your
eyes are red. You look bad. You have seen something. A countersign!"
She peered at the girl curiously, the wrinkles on her yellow face
deepening like the cracks in drying clay, and her thin lips working as
if they mumbled a delicious morsel,--a foretaste of the terrible.
"Let me alone with your silly talk," cried Toinette gaily. "I am
hungry. Besides, I have a headache. You must take care of the store
this morning. I will stay here. Prosper will come home to-day."
"_Frivolante_," said the old woman, with her sharp eyes fixed on the
girl's left hand, "why do you think that? Where is your wedding-ring?"
"I dropped it," replied Toinette, drawing back her hand quickly and
letting it fall under the table-cloth, "it must be somewhere in my
room."
"She dropped it," repeated the old woman, with wagging head, "_tiens!_
what a pity! The ring that not even death should take from her
finger,--she dropped it! But that is a bad sign,--the worst of all,--a
countersign of----"
"Will you go? Old babbler," cried Toinette, springing up in anger, "I
tell you to go to the store. I am mistress in this house."
_Tante_ Bergeron clumped sullenly away, muttering, "A mistress without
a wedding-ring! Oh, là-là, là-là! There's a big misery in that."
Toinette rolled up her sleeves and washed the dishes. She tried to
sing a little at her work, because she knew that Prosper liked it, but
the notes seemed to stick in her throat. She wiped her eyes with the
hem of her apron, and went upstairs, bare-armed, to search for her
ring.
She looked and felt in every corner of the room, took up the
rag-carpet rugs and shook them, moved every chair and the big chest of
drawers and the wash-stand, pulled the covers and the pillows and the
mattress off the bed and threw them on the floor. When she had
finished the room looked as if the big north-west wind had passed
through it.
Then Toinette sat down on the bed, rubbing the little white mark on
her finger where the ring had been, and staring through the window at
the church as if she were hypnotised. All sorts of dark and cloudy
thoughts were trooping around her. Perhaps Prosper had met with an
accident, or he was sick; or perhaps the suspicions and unjust
reproaches with which he had sometimes wounded her lately had grown
into his mind, so that he was angry with her and did not want to see
her. Perhaps some one had been telling lies to him, and made him mad,
and there was a fight, and a knife--she could see him lying on the
floor of a tavern, in a little red puddle, with white face and staring
eyes, cold and reproachful. Would he never come back, come home?
In the front of the store sleigh-bells jingled. It was probably some
customer. No, she knew in her heart it was her husband!
But she could not go to him,--he must come to her, here, away from
that hateful old woman. A step sounded in the hall, the door opened,
Prosper stood before her. She ran to him and threw her arms around
him. But he did not answer her kiss. His voice was as cold as his
hands.
"Well," he said, "I come back sooner than you expected, eh? A little
surprise--like a story-book."
She could not speak, her heart was beating in her throat, her arms
dropped at her side.
"You are fond of your bed," he went on, "you rise late, and your
room,--it looks like mad. Perhaps you had company. A party?--or a
fracas?"
Her cheeks flamed, her eyes filled with tears, her mouth quivered, but
no words came.
"Well," he continued, "you don't say much, but you look well. I
suppose you had a good time while I was gone. Why have you taken off
your wedding-ring? When a woman does that, she----"
Her face went very white, her eyes burned, she spoke with her deepest,
slowest note.
"Stop, Prosper, you are unjust, something has made you crazy, some one
has told you lies. You are insulting me, you are hurting me,--but
I,--well, I am the one that loves you always. So I will tell you what
has happened. Sit down there on the bed and be quiet. You have a right
to know it all,--and I have the right to tell you."
Then she stood before him, with her right hand covering the white mark
on the ring-finger, and told him the strange story of the Mass for the
dead who had been too much loved. He listened with changing eyes, now
full of doubt, now full of wonder and awe.
"You tell it well," he said, "and I have heard of such things before.
But did this really happen to you? Is it true?"
"As God lives it is true," she answered. "I was afraid I had loved you
too much. I was afraid you might be dead. That was why I gave my
wedding-ring--for your soul. Look, I will swear it to you on the
crucifix."
She went to the wall behind the bed where the crucifix was hanging.
She lifted her hand to take it down.
There, on the little shelf at the feet of the wounded figure, she saw
her wedding-ring.
Her hands trembled as she put it on her finger. Her knees trembled as
she went back to Prosper and sat beside him. Her voice trembled as she
said, "Here it is,--_He_ has given it back to us."
A river of shame swept over him. It seemed as if chains fell from his
heart. He drew her to him. He felt her bare arms around his neck. Her
head fell back, her eyes closed, her lips parted, her breath came
soft and quick. He waited a moment before he dared to kiss her.
"My dove," he whispered, "the sin was not that you loved too much, but
that I loved too little."
MESSENGERS AT THE WINDOW
The lighthouse on the Isle of the Wise Virgin--formerly called the
Isle of Birds--still looks out over the blue waters of the Gulf of
Saint Lawrence; its white tower motionless through the day, like a
sea-gull sleeping on the rock; its great yellow eye wide-open and
winking, winking steadily once a minute, all through the night. And
the birds visit the island,--not in great flocks as formerly, but
still plenty of them,--long-winged waterbirds in the summer, and in
the spring and fall short-winged landbirds passing in their
migrations--the children and grandchildren, no doubt, of the same
flying families that used to pass there fifty years ago, in the days
when Nataline Fortin was "The Keeper of the Light." And she herself,
that brave girl who said that the light was her "law of God," and who
kept it, though it nearly broke her heart--Nataline is still guardian
of the island and its flashing beacon of safety.
Not in her own person, you understand, for her dark curly hair long
since turned white, and her brown eyes were closed, and she was laid
at rest beside her father in the little graveyard behind the chapel at
Dead Men's Point. But her spirit still inhabits the island and keeps
the light. The son whom she bore to Marcel Thibault was called
Baptiste, after her father, and he is now the lighthouse-keeper; and
her granddaughter, Nataline, is her living image; a brown darling of a
girl, merry and fearless, who plays the fife bravely all along the
march of life.
It is good to have some duties in the world which do not change, and
some spirits who meet them with a proud cheerfulness, and some
families who pass on the duty and the cheer from generation to
generation--aristocrats, first families, the best blood.
Nataline the second was bustling about the kitchen of the lighthouse,
humming a little song, as I sat there with my friend Baptiste, snugly
sheltered from the night fury of the first September storm. The sticks
of sprucewood snapped and crackled in the range; the kettle purred a
soft accompaniment to the girl's low voice; the wind and the rain
beat against the seaward window. I was glad that I had given up the
trout fishing, and left my camp on the _Sainte-Marguérite-en-bas_, and
come to pass a couple of days with the Thibaults at the lighthouse.
Suddenly there was a quick blow on the window behind me, as if someone
had thrown a ball of wet seaweed or sand against it. I leaped to my
feet and turned quickly, but saw nothing in the darkness.
"It is a bird, m'sieu'," said Baptiste, "only a little bird. The light
draws them, and then it blinds them. Most times they fly against the
big lantern above. But now and then one comes to this window. In the
morning sometimes after a big storm we find a hundred dead ones around
the tower."
"But, oh," cried Nataline, "the pity of it! I can't get over the pity
of it. The poor little one,--how it must be deceived,--to seek light
and to find death! Let me go out and look for it. Perhaps it is not
dead."
She came back in a minute, the rain-drops shining on her cheeks and in
her hair. In the hollow of her firm hands she held a feathery brown
little body, limp and warm. We examined it carefully. It was stunned,
but not killed, and apparently neither leg nor wing was broken.
"It is a white-throat sparrow," I said to Nataline, "you know the tiny
bird that sings all day in the bushes, _sweet-sweet-Canada, Canada,
Canada_?"
"But yes!" she cried, "he is the dearest of them all. He seems to
speak to you,--to say, 'be happy.' We call him the _rossignol_.
Perhaps if we take care of him, he will get well, and be able to fly
to-morrow--and to sing again."
So we made a nest in a box for the little creature, which breathed
lightly, and covered him over with a cloth so that he should not fly
about and hurt himself. Then Nataline went singing up to bed, for she
must rise at two in the morning to take her watch with the light.
Baptiste and I drew our chairs up to the range, and lit our pipes for
a good talk.
"Those small birds, m'sieu'," he began, puffing slowly at his pipe,
"you think, without doubt, that it is all an affair of chance, the way
they come,--that it means nothing,--that it serves no purpose for them
to die?"
Certain words in an old book, about a sparrow falling to the ground,
came into my mind, and I answered him carefully, hoping, perhaps, that
he might be led on into one of those mystical legends which still
linger among the exiled children of Britanny in the new world.
"From our side, my friend, it looks like chance--and from the birds'
side, certainly, like a very bad chance. But we do not know all.
Perhaps there is some meaning or purpose beyond us. Who can tell?"
"I will tell you," he replied gravely, laying down his pipe, and
leaning forward with his knotted hands on his knees. "I will tell you
that those little birds are sometimes the messengers of God. They can
bring a word or a warning from Him. That is what we Bretons have
believed for many centuries at home in France. Why should it not be
true here? Is He not here also? Those birds are God's _coureurs des
bois_. They do His errands. Would you like to hear a thing that
happened in this house?"
This is what he told me.
I
My father, Marcel Thibault, was an honest man, strong in the heart,
strong in the arms, but, in the conscience,--well, he had his little
weaknesses, like the rest of us. You see his father, the old Thibault
lived in the days when there was no lighthouse here, and wrecking was
the chief trade of this coast.
It is a cruel trade, m'sieu'--to live by the misfortune of others. No
one can be really happy who lives by such a trade as that. But my
father--he was born under that influence; and all the time he was a
boy he heard always people talking of what the sea might bring to
them, clothes and furniture, and all kinds of precious things--and
never a thought of what the sea might take away from the other people
who were shipwrecked and drowned. So what wonder is it that my father
grew up with weak places and holes in his conscience?
But my mother, Nataline Fortin--ah, m'sieu', she was a straight soul,
for sure--clean white, like a wild swan! I suppose she was not a
saint. She was too fond of singing and dancing for that. But she was
a good woman, and nothing could make her happy that came from the
misery of another person. Her idea of goodness was like this light in
the lantern above us--something faithful and steady that warns people
away from shipwreck and danger.
Well, it happened one day, about this time forty-eight years ago, just
before I was ready to be born, my father had to go up to the village
of _La Trinité_ on a matter of business. He was coming back in his
boat at evening, with his sail up, and perfectly easy in his
mind--though it was after sunset--because he knew that my mother was
entirely capable of kindling the light and taking care of it in his
absence. The wind was moderate, and the sea gentle. He had passed the
_Point du Caribou_ about two miles, when suddenly he felt his boat
strike against something in the shadow.
He knew it could not be a rock. There was no hardness, no grating
sound. He supposed it might be a tree floating in the water. But when
he looked over the side of the boat, he saw it was the body of a dead
man.
The face was bloated and blue, as if the man had been drowned for
some days. The clothing was fine, showing that he must have been a
person of quality; but it was disarranged and torn, as if he had
passed through a struggle to his death. The hands, puffed and
shapeless, floated on the water, as if to balance the body. They
seemed almost to move in an effort to keep the body afloat. And on the
little finger of the left hand there was a great ring of gold with a
red stone set in it, like a live coal of fire.
When my father saw this ring a passion of covetousness leaped upon
him.
"It is a thing of price," he said, "and the sea has brought it to me
for the heritage of my unborn child. What good is a ring to a dead
man? But for my baby it will be a fortune."
So he luffed the boat, and reached out with his oar, and pulled the
body near to him, and took the cold, stiff hand into his own. He
tugged at the ring, but it would not come off. The finger was swollen
and hard, and no effort that he could make served to dislodge the
ring.
Then my father grew angry, because the dead man seemed to withhold
from him the bounty of the sea. He laid the hand across the gunwale
of the boat, and, taking up the axe that lay beside him, with a single
blow he chopped the little finger from the hand.
The body of the dead man swung away from the boat, turned on its side,
lifting its crippled left hand into the air, and sank beneath the
water. My father laid the finger with the ring upon it under the
thwart, and sailed on, wishing that the boat would go faster. But the
wind was light, and before he came to the island it was already dark,
and a white creeping fog, very thin and full of moonlight, was spread
over the sea like a shroud.
As he went up the path to the house he was trying to pull off the
ring. At last it came loose in his hand; and the red stone was as
bright as a big star on the edge of the sky, and the gold was heavy in
his palm. So he hid the ring in his vest.
But the finger he dropped in a cluster of blue-berry bushes not far
from the path. And he came into the house with a load of joy and
trouble on his soul; for he knew that it is wicked to maim the dead,
but he thought also of the value of the ring.
II
My mother Nataline was able to tell when people's souls had changed,
without needing to wait for them to speak. So she knew that something
great had happened to my father, and the first word she said when she
brought him his supper was this:
"How did it happen?"
"What has happened?" said he, a little surprised, and putting down his
head over his cup of tea to hide his face.
"Well," she said in her joking way, "that is just what you haven't
told me, so how can I tell you? But it was something very bad or very
good, I know. Now which was it?"
"It was good," said he, reaching out his hand to cut a piece from the
loaf, "it was as good--as good as bread."
"Was it by land," said she, "or was it by sea?"
He was sitting at the table just opposite that window, so that he
looked straight into it as he lifted his head to answer her.
"It was by sea," he said smiling, "a true treasure of the deep."
Just then there came a sharp stroke and a splash on the window, and
something struggled and scrabbled there against the darkness. He saw a
hand with the little finger cut off spread out against the pane.
"My God," he cried, "what is that?"
But my mother, when she turned, saw only a splotch of wet on the
outside of the glass.
"It is only a bird," she said, "one of God's messengers. What are you
afraid of? I will go out and get it."
She came back with a cedar-bird in her hand--one of those brown birds
that we call _recollets_ because they look like a monk with a hood.
Her face was very grave.
"Look," she cried, "it is a _recollet_. He is only stunned a little.
Look, he flutters his wings, we will let him go--like that! But he was
sent to this house because there is something here to be confessed.
What is it?"
By this time my father was disturbed, and the trouble was getting on
top of the joy in his soul. So he pulled the ring out of his vest and
laid it on the table under the lamp. The gold glittered, and the stone
sparkled, and he saw that her eyes grew large as she looked at it.
"See," he said, "this is the good fortune that the waves brought me on
the way home from _La Trinité_. It is a heritage for our baby that is
coming."
"The waves!" she cried, shrinking back a little. "How could the waves
bring a heavy thing like that? It would sink."
"It was floating," he answered, casting about in his mind for a good
lie; "it was floating--about two miles this side of the _Point du
Caribou_--it was floating on a piece of----"
At that moment there was another blow on the window, and something
pounded and scratched against the glass. Both of them were looking
this time, and again my father saw the hand without the little
finger--but my mother could see only a blur and a movement.
He was terrified, and fell on his knees praying. She trembled a
little, but stood over him brave and stern.
"What is it that you have seen," said she; "tell me, what has made you
afraid?"
"A hand," he answered, very low, "a hand on the window."
"A hand!" she cried, "then there must be some one waiting outside. You
must go and let him in."
"Not I," whispered he, "I dare not."
Then she looked at him hard, and waited a minute. She opened the door,
peered out, trembled again, crossed the threshold, and returned with
the body of a blackbird.
"Look," she cried, "another messenger of God--his heart is beating a
little. I will put him here where it is warm--perhaps he will get well
again. But there is a curse coming upon this house. Confess. What is
this about hands?"
So he was moved and terrified to open his secret half-way.
"On the rocks this side of the point," he stammered, "as I was sailing
very slowly--there was something white--the arm and hand of a
man--this ring on one of the fingers. Where was the man? Drowned and
lost. What did he want of the ring? It was easy to pull it----"
As he said this, there was a crash at the window. The broken pane
tinkled upon the floor. In the opening they both saw, for a moment, a
hand with the little finger cut off and the blood dripping from it.
When it faded, my mother Nataline went to the window, and there on the
floor, in a little red pool, she found the body of a dead cross-bill,
all torn and wounded by the glass through which it had crashed.
She took it up and fondled it. Then she gave a great sigh, and went to
my father Marcel and kneeled beside him.
(You understand, m'sieu', it was he who narrated all this to me. He
said he never should forget a word or a look of it until he died--and
perhaps not even then.)
So she kneeled beside him and put one hand over his shoulder, the dead
cross-bill in the other.
"Marcel," she said, "thou and I love each other so much that we must
always go together--whether to heaven or to hell--and very soon our
little baby is to be born. Wilt thou keep a secret from me now? Look,
this is the last messenger at the window--the blessed bird whose bill
is twisted because he tried to pull out the nail from the Saviour's
hand on the cross, and whose feathers are always red because the blood
of Jesus fell upon them. It is a message of pardon that he brings us,
if we repent. Come, tell the whole of the sin."
At this the heart of my father Marcel was melted within him, as a
block of ice is melted when it floats into the warmer sea, and he told
her all of the shameful thing that he had done.
She stood up and took the ring from the table with the ends of her
fingers, as if she did not like to touch it.
"Where hast thou put it," she asked, "the finger of the hand from
which this thing was stolen?"
"It is among the bushes," he answered, "beside the path to the
landing."
"Thou canst find it," said she, "as we go to the boat, for the moon is
shining and the night is still. Then thou shalt put the ring where it
belongs, and we will row to the place where the hand is--dost thou
remember it?"
So they did as she commanded. The sea was very quiet and the moon was
full. They rowed together until they came about two miles from the
_Point du Caribou_, at a place which Marcel remembered because there
was a broken cliff on the shore.
When he dropped the finger, with the great ring glittering upon it,
over the edge of the boat, he groaned. But the water received the
jewel in silence, with smooth ripples, and a circle of light spread
away from it under the moon, and my mother Nataline smiled like one
who is well content.
"Now," she said, "we have done what the messengers at the window told
us. We have given back what the poor man wanted. God is not angry with
us now. But I am very tired--row me home, for I think my time is near
at hand."
The next day, just before sunset, was the day of my birth. My mother
Nataline told me, when I was a little boy, that I was born to good
fortune. And, you see, m'sieu', it was true, for I am the keeper of
her light.
THE COUNTERSIGN OF THE CRADLE
I cannot explain to you the connection between the two parts of this
story. They were divided, in their happening, by a couple of hundred
miles of mountain and forest. There were no visible or audible means
of communication between the two scenes. But the events occurred at
the same hour, and the persons who were most concerned in them were
joined by one of those vital ties of human affection which seem to
elude the limitations of time and space. Perhaps that was the
connection. Perhaps love worked the miracle. I do not know. I only
tell you the story.
I
It begins in the peaceful, homely village of Saint Gérôme, on the
shore of Lake Saint John, at the edge of the vast northern wilderness.
Here was the home of my guide, Pat Mullarkey, whose name was as Irish
as his nature was French-Canadian, and who was so fond of children
that, having lost his only one, he was willing to give up smoking in
order to save money for the adoption of a baby from the foundling
asylum at Quebec. How his virtue was rewarded, and how his wife,
Angélique, presented him with twins of his own, to his double delight,
has been told in another story. The relation of parentage to a matched
brace of babies is likely to lead to further adventures.
The cradle, of course, being built for two, was a broad affair, and
little Jacques and Jacqueline rolled around in it inextricably mixed,
until Pat had the ingenious idea of putting a board down the middle
for a partition. Then the infants rocked side by side in harmony,
going up and down alternately, without a thought of debating the
eternal question of superiority between the sexes. Their weight was
the same. Their dark eyes and hair were alike. Their voices, whether
they wept or cooed, were indistinguishable. Everybody agreed that a
finer boy and girl had never been seen in Saint Gérôme. But nobody
except Pat and Angélique could tell them apart as they swung in the
cradle, gently rising and falling, in unconscious illustration of the
equivalence and balancing of male and female.
Angélique, of course, was particularly proud of the boy. As he grew,
and found his feet, and began to wander about the house and the front
yard, with a gait in which a funny little swagger was often
interrupted by sudden and unpremeditated down-sittings, she was keen
to mark all his manly traits.
"Regard him, m'sieu'," she would say to me when I dropped in at the
cottage on my way home from camp--"regard this little brave. Is it not
a boy of the finest? What arms! What legs! He walks already like a
_voyageur_, and he does not cry when he falls. He is of a marvellous
strength, and of a courage! My faith, you should see him stand up to
the big rooster of the neighbour, Pigot. Come, my little one, my
Jacques, my Jimmee, one day you will be able to put your father on his
back--is it not?"
She laughed, and Pat laughed with her.
"That arrives to all fathers," said he, catching the little Jacqueline
as she swayed past him and swinging her to his knee. "Soon or late the
_bonhomme_ has to give in to his boy; and he is glad of it. But for
me, I think it will not be very soon, and meantime, m'sieu', cast a
good look of the eye upon this girl. Has she not the red cheeks, the
white teeth, the curly hair, brown like her mother's? But she will be
pretty, I tell you! And clever too, I am sure of it! She can bake the
bread, and sew, and keep the house clean; she can read, and sing in
the church, and drive the boys crazy--_hein_, my pretty one--what a
comfort to the old _bonhomme_!"
"He goes fast," laughed Angélique; "he talks already as if she were in
long dresses with her hair done up. Without doubt, m'sieu' amuses
himself to hear such talk about two infants."
But the thing that amused me most was the beginning-to-talk of the
twins themselves. It was natural that the mother and father should
speak to me in their quaint French _patois_; and the practice of many
summers had made me able to get along with it fairly well. But that
these scraps of humanity should begin their adventures in language
with French, and such French, old-fashioned as a Breton song, always
seemed to me surprising and wonderfully smart. I could not get over
the foolish impression that it was extraordinary. There is something
magical about the sound of a baby voice babbling a tongue that is
strange to you; it sets you thinking about the primary difficulties in
the way of human intercourse and wondering just how it was that people
began to talk to each other.
Long before the twins outgrew their French baby talk the famous cradle
was too small to hold their sturdy bodies, and they were promoted to a
trundle-bed on the floor. The cradle was an awkward bit of furniture
in such a little house, and Angélique was for giving it away or
breaking it up for kindling-wood.
"But no!" said Pat. "We have plenty of wood for kindlings in this
country without burning the cradle. Besides, this wood means more to
us than any old tree--it has rocked our hopes. Let us put it in the
corner of the kitchen--what? Come--perhaps we may find a use for it,
who knows?"
"Go along," said Angélique, giving him a friendly box on the ear, "you
old joker! Off with you, _vieux bavasseur_--put the cradle where you
like."
So there it stood, in the corner beside the stove, on the night of my
story. Pat had gone down to Quebec on the first of June (three days
ahead of time) to meet me there and help in packing the goods for a
long trip up the Peribonca River. Angélique was sleeping the sleep of
the innocent and the just in the bedroom, with the twins in their
trundle-bed beside her, and the door into the kitchen half-open.
What it was that waked her she did not know--perhaps a bad dream, for
Pat had given her a bit of trouble that spring, with a sudden
inclination for drinking and carousing, and she was uneasy about his
long absence. A man in the middle years sometimes has a bit of folly,
and a woman worries about him without knowing exactly why. At all
events, Angélique came wide awake in the night with a sense of fear in
her heart, as if she had just heard something terrible about her
husband which she could not remember.
She listened to the breathing of the twins in the darkness. It was
soft and steady as the falling of tiny ripples upon the beach. But
presently she was aware of a louder sound in the kitchen. It was
regular and even, like the ticking of a clock. There was a roll and a
creak in it, as if somebody was sitting in the rocking-chair and
balancing back and forth.
She slipped out of bed and opened the door a little wider. There was a
faint streak of moonlight slanting through the kitchen window, and she
could see the tall back of the chair, with its red-and-white tidy,
vacant and motionless.
In the corner was the cradle, with the children's clothes hanging over
the head of it and their two ragged dolls tucked away within. It was
rocking evenly and slowly, as if moved by some unseen force.
Her eyes followed the ray of the moon. On the rocker of the cradle she
saw a man's foot with the turned-up toe of a _botte sauvage_. It
seemed as if the smoke of a familiar pipe was in the room. She heard
her husband's voice softly humming:
"_Petit rocher de la haute montagne,
Je viens finir ici cette campagne.
Ah, doux echos, entendez mes soupirs;
En languissant je vais bientôt mourir!_"
Trembling, she entered the room, with a cry on her lips.
"Ah! Pat, _mon ami_, what is it? How camest thou here?"
As she spoke, the cradle ceased rocking, the moon-ray faded on the
bare floor, the room was silent.
She fell upon her knees, sobbing.
"My God, I have seen his double, his ghost. My man is dead!"
II
In the steep street of Quebec which is called "Side of the Mountain,"
there is a great descending curve; and from this curve, at the right,
there drops a break-neck flight of steps, leading by the shortest way
to the Lower Town.
As I came down these steps, after dining comfortably at the Château
Frontenac, on the same night when Angélique was sleeping alone beside
the twins in the little house of Saint Gérôme, I was aware of a merry
fracas below me in the narrow lane called "Under the Fort." The gas
lamps glimmered yellow in the gulf; the old stone houses almost
touched their gray foreheads across the roadway; and in the cleft
between them a dozen roystering companions, men and girls, were
shouting, laughing, swearing, quarrelling, pushing this way and that
way, like the waves on a turbulent eddy of the river before it decides
which direction to follow. In the centre of the noisy group was a big
fellow with a black mustache.
"I tell you, my boys," he cried, "we go to the Rue Champlain, to the
_Moulin Gris_ of old Trudel. There is good stuff to drink there; we'll
make a night of it! My m'sieu' comes to seek me, but he will not find
me until to-morrow. Shut your mouth, you Louis. What do we care for
the police? Come, Suzanne, _marchons_!"
Then he broke out into song:
"_Ce n'est point du raisin pourri,
C'est le bon vin qui danse!
C'est le bon vin qui danse ici,
C'est le bon vin qui danse!_"
Even through its too evident disguise in liquor I knew the voice of my
errant Pat. Would it be wise to accost him at such a moment, in such
company? The streets of the Lower Town were none too peaceful after
dark. And yet, if he were not altogether out of his head, it would be
a good thing to stop him from going further and getting into trouble.
At least it was worth trying.
"Good-evening, Pat," I cried.
He turned as if a pebble had struck him, and saw me standing under the
flickering lamp. He stared for a moment in bewilderment, then a smile
came over his face, and he pulled off his hat.
"There is my m'sieu'," he said; "my faith, but that is droll! You go
on, you others. I must speak to him a little. See you later--Rue
Champlain--the old place."
The befogged company rolled away in the darkness and Pat rolled over
to me. His greeting was a bit unsteady, but his natural politeness and
good-fellowship did not fail him.
"But how I am happy to see m'sieu'!" said he; "it is a little sooner
than I expected, but so much the better! And how well m'sieu' carries
himself--in full health, is it not? You have the air of it--all ready
for the Peribonca, I suppose? _Batêche_, that will be a great voyage,
and we shall have plenty of the good luck."
"Yes," I answered, "it looks to me like a good trip, if we get started
right. I want to talk with you about it. Can you leave your friends
for a while?"
His face reddened visibly under its dark coat of tan, and he stammered
as he replied:
"But certainly, m'sieu'--they are not my friends--that is to
say--well, I know them a little--they can wait--I am perfectly at the
service of m'sieu'."
So we walked around the corner into the open square (which, by the
way, is shaped like a triangle), at one side of which there is an
old-fashioned French hotel, with a double _galerie_ across its face,
and green-shuttered windows. There were tables in front of it, and at
one of these I invited Pat to join me in having some coffee.
His conversation at first was decidedly vague and woolly, though
polite as ever. There was a thickness about his words as if they were
a little swollen, and his ideas had loose edges, and would not fit
together. However, he did his best to pull himself up and make good
talk. But his _r_'s rolled like an unstrung drum, and his _n_'s
twanged like a cracked banjo. On the subject of the proper amount of
provisions to take with us for our six weeks' camping trip he wandered
wildly. Without doubt we must take enough--in grand quantity--one must
live well--else one could not carry the load on the portages--very
long portages--not good for heavy packs--we must take very little
stuff--small rations, a little pork and flour--we can get plenty to
eat with our guns and m'sieu's rod--a splendid country for sport--and
those little fishes in tin boxes which m'sieu' loves so well--for sure
we must take plenty of them!
It was impossible to get anything definite out of him in regard to the
outfit of the camp, and I knew it beforehand; but I wanted to keep him
talking while the coffee got in its good work, and I knew that his
courtesy would not let him break away while I was asking questions. By
the time I had poured him the second cup of the black brain-clearer
he was distinctly more steady. His laugh was quieter and his eyes grew
more thoughtful.
"And the bread," said I; "we must carry two or three loaves of good
_habitant_ bread, just for the first week out. I can't do without
that. Do you suppose, by any chance, that Angélique would bake it for
us? Or perhaps those lady friends of yours who have just left
you--eh?"
A look of shame and protest flushed in Pat's face. He dropped his
head, and lifted it again, glancing quickly at me to read a hidden
meaning in the question. Then he turned away and stared across the
square toward the slender spire of the little church at the other end.
"I assure you," he said slowly, "they are not of my friends,
those--those--bah! what do those people know about making bread? I beg
m'sieu' not to speak of those girls there in the same breath with my
Angélique!"
"Good!" I answered. "Pardon me, I will not do it again. I did not
understand. They are bad people, I suppose. But how are you so thick
with them?"
"If they are bad," said he, shrugging his shoulders--"if they are bad!
But why should I judge them? That is God's affair. There are all kinds
of people in His world. I do not like it that m'sieu' has found me
with that kind. But a man must make a little fun sometimes, you
comprehend, and sometimes he makes himself a damn fool, do you see? I
have been with those people last night and to-day--and now I have
promised--I have won the money of Pierre Goujon, and he must have his
revenge--and I have promised that Suzanne Gravel--well, I must keep my
word of honour and go to them for to-night. M'sieu' will excuse me
now?"
He rose from the table, but I sat still.
"Wait a moment," I said; "there is no hurry. Let us have another pot
of coffee and some of those little cakes with melted white sugar on
them, like Angélique used to make." (He started slightly at the name.)
"Come, sit down again. I want you to tell me something about that
pretty old church across the square. See how the moonlight sparkles on
the tin spire. What is the name of it?"
"Our Lady of the Victories," he answered, seating himself
unwillingly. "They say it is the most old of the churches of Quebec."
"It is a fine name," said I. "What does it mean? What victories?"
"The French over the English, I suppose, long ago. It does not
interest me now. I must be on my road to the _Moulin Gris_."
"Will you stop on your way to say a prayer at the door of the church
of Our Lady of the Victories?"
His eyes dropped and he shook his head.
"Well, then, on your way back in the morning perhaps you will stop at
the church and go in to confess?"
He nodded his head and spoke heavily. "Who knows? Perhaps yes--perhaps
no. There may be fighting to-night. Pierre is very mad and ugly. I am
not afraid. But it is evident that m'sieu' makes the conversation to
detain me. We are old friends. Why not speak frank?"
"Old friends we are, Pat, and frank it is. I do not want you to go to
the Gray Mill. You have been drinking--stronger stuff than coffee.
Those people will pluck you, do you up, perhaps stick a knife in you.
Then what will become of Angélique and the twins? Stay here a while; I
want to talk to you about the twins. How are they? You have not told
me a word about them yet."
His face sombered and brightened again. He poured himself another cup
of coffee and put in three spoonfuls of sugar, smiling as he stirred
it.
"Ah," said he, "that is something good to speak of--those twins! It is
easily seen that m'sieu' knows how to make the conversation. I could
talk of those twins for a long time. They are better than
ever--strong, fat, and good--and pretty, too--you may believe it! I
pretend to make nothing of the boy, just to tease my wife; and she
pretends to make nothing of the girl, just to tease me. But they are a
pair--I tell you, a pair of marvels!"
He went on telling me about their growth, their adventures, their
clever tricks, as if the subject were inexhaustible. I offered him a
cigar. But no, he preferred his pipe--with a _pipée_ of the good
tobacco from the Upper Town, if I would oblige him? The smoke wreaths
curled over our heads. The other tables were gradually deserted. The
sleepy waiter had received payment for the coffee and cleared away the
cups. The moon slipped behind the lofty cliff of the Citadel, and the
little square lay in soft shadow with the church spire shining dimly
above it. Pat continued the _mémoires intimes_ of Jacques and
Jacqueline.
"And the cradle," I asked, "that famous cradle built for two--what has
become of it? Doubtless it exists no more."
"But it is there," he cried warmly. "Angélique said it was in the way,
but I persuaded her to keep it. You see, perhaps we might need
it--what? Ha, ha, that would be droll. But anyway it is good for the
twins to put their dolls to sleep in. It is a cradle so easy to rock.
You do not need to touch it with your hand. It goes like this."
He put out his right foot with its _botte sauvage_, the round toe
turned up, the low heel resting on the ground, and moved it slowly
down and up as if it pressed an unseen rocker.
"_Comme ça, m'sieu'_," he said. "It demands no effort, only the
tranquillity of soul. One can smoke a little, one can sing, one can
dream of the days to come. That is a pleasant inn to stay at--the Sign
of the Cradle. How many good hours I have passed there--the happiest
of my life--I thank God for them. I can never forget them."
A crash as of sudden thunder--a ripping, rending roar of swift,
unknown disaster--filled the air, and shook the quiet houses around
our Lady of the Victories with nameless terror. After it, ten seconds
of thrilling silence, and then the distant sound of shrieking and
wailing. We sprang to our feet, trembling and horror-stricken.
"It is in the Rue Champlain," cried Pat. "Come!"
We darted across the square, turned a corner to the right, a corner to
the left, and ran down the long dingy street that skirts the foot of
the precipice on which the Citadel is enthroned. The ramshackle
houses, grey and grimy, huddled against the cliff that frowned above
them with black scorn and menace. High against the stars loomed the
impregnable walls of the fortress. Low in the shadow crouched the
frail habitations of the poor, the miserable tenements, the tiny
shops, the dusky drinking-dens.
The narrow way was already full of distracted people--some running
toward us to escape from danger--some running with us to see what had
happened.
"The Gray Mill," gasped my comrade; "a hundred yards farther--come
on--we must get there at all hazards! Push through!"
When we came at last to the place, there was a gap in the wall of
houses that leaned against the cliff; a horrible confusion of
shattered roofs and walls hurled across the street; and above it an
immense scar on the face of the precipice. Ten thousand tons of rock,
loosened secretly by the frost and the rain, had plunged without
warning on the doomed habitations below and buried the Gray Mill in
overwhelming ruin.
Pat trembled like a branch caught among the rocks in a swift current
of the river. He buried his face in his hands.
"My God," he muttered, "was it as close as that? How was I spared? My
God, pardon for all poor sinners!"
We worked for hours among the houses that had been more lightly
struck and where there was still hope of rescuing the wounded. The
Church of Our Lady of the Victories was quickly opened to receive
them, and the priests ministered to the suffering and the dying as we
carried them in.
As the pale dawn crept through the narrow windows, I saw Pat rise from
his knees at the altar and come down the aisle to stand with me in the
doorway.
"Well," said I, "it is all over, and here we are in the church this
morning, after all."
"Yes," he answered; "it is the best place. It is where we all need to
come. I have given my money to the priest--it was not mine--I have
left it all for prayers to be said for the poor souls of those--of
those--those friends of mine."
He brought out the words with brave humility, an avowal and a plea for
pardon.
"We must send a telegram," I said, putting my hand on his shoulder.
"Angélique will be frightened if she hears of this. We must
tranquillise her. How will this do? 'Safe and well. Coming home
to-morrow to you and twins.' That makes just ten words."
"It is perfectly correct, m'sieu'." he replied gravely. "She will be
glad to get that message. But--if it would not cost too much--only a
few words more,--I should like to put in something to say, 'God bless
you and forgive me.'"
HALF-TOLD TALES
THE KEY OF THE TOWER
THE RIPENING OF THE FRUIT
THE KING'S JEWEL
THE KEY of the TOWER
[Illustration]
So the first knight came to the Tower. Now his name was _Casse-Tout_,
because wherever he came there was much breaking of things that stood
in his way. And when he saw that the door of the Tower was shut (for
it was very early in the morning, and all the woods lay asleep in the
shadow, and only the weather-cock on the uppermost gable of the roof
was turning in the light wind of dawn), it seemed to him that the time
favoured a bold deed and a masterful entrance.
He laid hold of the door, therefore, and shook it; but the door would
not give. Then he set his shoulder to it and thrust mightily; but the
door did not so much as creak. Whereupon he began to hammer against it
with his gloves of steel, and shouted with a voice as if the master
were suddenly come home to his house and found it barred.
When he was quite out of breath, between his shoutings he was aware of
a small, merry noise as of one laughing and singing. So he listened,
and this is what he heard:
"Hark to the wind in the wood without!
I laugh in my bed while I hear him roar,
Blustering, bellowing, shout after shout,--
What do you want, O wind, at my door?"
Then he cried loudly: "No wind am I, but a mighty knight, and your
door is shut. I must come in to you and that speedily!" But the
singing voice answered:
"Blow your best, you can do no more;
Batter away, for my door is stout;
The more you threaten, I laugh the more--
Hark to the wind in the wood without!"
So he hammered a while longer at the oaken panels until he was
wearifully wroth, and when the sun was rising he went his way with
sore hands and a sullen face.
"No doubt," said he, "there is a she-devil in the Tower. I hate those
who put their trust in brute strength."
It was mid-morn when there came a second knight to the Tower, whose
name was _Parle-Doux_. And he was very gentle-spoken, and full of
favourable ways, smiling always when he talked, but his eyes were cool
and ever watchful. So he made his horse prance delicately before the
Tower, and looked up at the windows with a flattering face;
"Fair house," said he, "how well art thou fashioned, and with what
beauty does the sunlight adorn thee! Here dwells the wonder of the
world, the lady of all desires, the princess of my good fortune. Would
that she might look upon me and see that the happy hour has come!"
Then there was a little sound at one of the upper windows, and the
lattice clicked open. But the lady who stood there was closely covered
with a jewelled veil, and nothing could be seen of her but her hand,
with many rings upon it, holding a key.
"Marvel of splendour," said _Parle-Doux_, "moon of beauty, jewel of
all ladies! I have won you to look upon me, now let fall the key."
"And then?" said the lady.
"Then, surely," said the knight, "I will open the door without delay,
and spring up the stairs, winged with joy, and----"
But before he had finished speaking, with the smile on his face, the
hand was drawn back, and the lattice clicked shut.
So the knight sang and talked very beautifully for about the space of
three hours in front of the Tower. And when he rode away it was just
as it had been before, only the afternoon shadows were falling.
A little before sunset came the third knight, and his name was
_Fais-Brave_.
Now the cool of the day had called all the birds to their even-song,
and the flowers in the garden were yielding up their sweetness to the
air, and through the wood Twilight was walking with silent steps.
So the knight looked well at the Tower, and saw that all the windows
were open, though the door was shut, and on the grass before it lay a
jewelled veil. And after a while of looking and waiting and thinking
and wondering, he got down from his horse, and took off the saddle and
bridle, and let him go free to wander and browse in the wood. Then the
knight sat down on a little green knoll before the Tower, and made
himself comfortable, as one who had a thought of continuing in that
place for a certain time.
And after the sun was set, when the longest shadows flowed into dusk,
the lady came walking out of the wood toward the Tower. She was
lightly singing to herself a song of dreams. Her face was uncovered,
and the gold of her hair was clear as the little floating clouds high
in the West, and her eyes were like stars. When the knight saw her he
stood up and could say nothing. But all the more he looked at her, and
wondered, and his thoughts were written in his face as if they stood
in an open book.
Long time they looked at each other thus; and then the lady held out
her hand with a key in it.
"What will you do with this key?" said she, "if I give it to you?"
"Is it the key of your Tower?" said he.
"Ay!" said she.
"I will give it back to you," said he, "until it pleases you to open
the door."
"It is yours," said she.
[Illustration]
THE RIPENING OF THE FRUIT
[Illustration]
The righteousness of Puramitra was notorious, and it was evident to
all that he had immense faith in his gods. He was as strict in the
performance of his devotions as in the payment of his debts, nor was
there any altar, whether of Brahma, or of Vishnu, or of Shiva, at
which he failed to offer both prayers and gifts. He observed the rules
of religion and of business with admirable regularity, and enjoyed the
reputation of one whose conduct was above reproach.
But, being a self-contained man, he had not the love of the little
children of the village, to whom he often gave sweetmeats and toys;
and being a very prosperous man, he was not without rivals and
detractors, who liked his prosperity the less the more they marvelled
at it. This was displeasing to Puramitra, though he thought it beneath
him to show it.
"If all were known!" said some people, wagging their heads sagely, as
if they were full of secret and discreditable information.
"If we only had his luck," said others, sighing.
But when Puramitra heard of these things he said, "The fruits of earth
ripen by the will of Heaven and the harvest is on the lap of the
gods."
So saying, he made the sign of reverence, and went his way calmly to a
certain place in his garden, where he was accustomed to practise the
virtue of meditation and to review his inmost thoughts.
Now the inmost thoughts of Puramitra were in the shape of wishes and
strong desires; for which reason, being a religious man, he often
called them prayers. They were concerned chiefly with himself. And
next to that, with two others: Indranu, his friend, and Vishnamorsu,
his enemy.
But the motions of friendship are quiet and slow, and much the same
from day to day; whereas the motions of hatred are quick and stirring,
and changeful as the colors on a serpent. So Puramitra came to think
less and less of his friend, and more and more of his enemy. Every day
he returned at sundown to the retired place in the garden, where an
orange-tree shaded his favourite seat with thick, glossy leaves, and
surrendered himself to those meditations in which his desires were
laid bare to his gods.
At first he gave a thought to Indranu, who had helped him, and served
him, and always spoken well of him; and this thought he called love.
Then he gave many thoughts to Vishnamorsu, who had opposed him, and
thwarted him, and mocked him with bitter words and laughter; and these
thoughts he called just indignation. He reflected upon the many
misdeeds and offences of his enemy with a grave and serious passion.
He considered curiously the various punishments which these
misdemeanours must merit at the hand of Heaven, such as poverty and
pain and disgrace and death, and, after that, all the thirty-nine
degrees of damnation; he turned them over in his mind like a hollow
ball with rings carved within it, and they played one into another
smoothly and intricately, and at the centre of the rings a little
black figure with the face of Vishnamorsu writhed and twisted.
While Puramitra meditated thus upon the justice of the gods and the
ill-deserts of his enemy, the tree grew and flourished above him from
week to month and from month to year, spreading out its arms to hide
and befriend his devotions. The white flowers bloomed and faded with
heavy fragrance. The pale-green fruits formed and fell from the tree
before their time. But of all their many promises one persisted,
clinging to the lowest bough, rounding and ripening among the dark
leaves with strange flame and lustre--a fiery globe, intense and
perfect as Puramitra's thought of his enemy.
"You meditate much, my son," said a Brahman who knew him well and
sometimes visited his garden.
"Holy one," he answered, "I pray."
"For what?" asked the Brahman.
"That the divine will may be done in all ways and upon all things,"
replied Puramitra.
"Then why have you been at pains to poison your tree?" asked the
Brahman.
"I did not know," said the man, "that I had done anything to the
tree."
"Look," said the Brahman, and he touched the fruit with the end of his
staff. A drop oozed from the saffron globe, red as blood; and where it
fell the grass withered as if a flame had scorched it. Then the heart
of Puramitra leaped up within him, for he knew that his inmost
thoughts had passed into the course of nature and fructified upon the
tree.
"Most excellent Brahman," said he, with great humility, "the fruits of
earth ripen by the will of Heaven."
"For whom is this one intended?" asked the Brahman.
"Holiness," said Puramitra, "it is on the lap of, the gods."
So the Brahman pursued his way, and Puramitra his meditations.
The next day he ordered an open path made through his gardens for the
pleasure and comfort of the neighbours. The glistening fruit hung
above the path, ripe and ruddy.
"It is on the lap of the gods," thought Puramitra; "if the evil-doer
stretches forth his hand to it, the justice of Heaven will appear." So
he hid among the bushes at nightfall, and expected the event.
A man crept slowly along the path and stayed beneath the tree. His
face was concealed by a cloak; but the watcher said, "I shall know him
by his actions, for my enemy will not respect that which is mine." Now
the man was thinking shame and scorn of the rich owner of the garden,
and despising the prosperity of wiles and wickedness. So he hated and
contemned the fruit, saying to himself, "God forbid that I should
touch anything that belongs to the wretch Puramitra." And the path
grew darker.
Soon after came another man, walking with uncovered head, but his face
could not be discerned because of the shadow. And the watcher said,
"Now we shall see what the gods intend." The man went freely and
easily, without a care, and when he came to the fruit he put out his
hand and took it, saying to himself, "The benevolent Puramitra will be
glad that I should have this, for he is good to all his friends." So
he ate of the fruit, and fell at the foot of the tree.
Then Puramitra came running, and lifted up the dead man, and looked
upon his face. And it was the face of his friend, the well-beloved
Indranu.
So Puramitra wept aloud, and tore his hair, and his heart went black
within him. And Vishnamorsu, returning through the garden by another
path, heard the lamentable noise, and came near, and laughed. But the
Brahman, passing homeward, looked upon the three, and said, "The ways
of the gods are secret; but the happiest of these is Indranu."
[Illustration]
THE KING'S JEWEL
[Illustration]
There was an outcry at the door of the king's great hall, and suddenly
a confusion arose. The guards ran thither swiftly, and the people were
crowded together, pushing and thrusting as if to withhold some
intruder. Out of the tumult came a strong voice shouting, "I will come
in! I must see the false king!" But other voices cried, "Not so--you
are mad--you shall not come in thus!"
Then the king said, "Let him come in as he will!"
So the confusion fell apart, and the hall was very still, and a man in
battered armour stumbled through the silence and stood in front of the
throne. He was breathing hard, for he was weary and angry and afraid,
and the sobbing of his breath shook him from head to foot. But his
anger was stronger than his weariness and his fear, so he lifted his
eyes hardily and looked the king in the face.
It was like the face of a mountain, very calm and very high, but not
unkind. When the man saw it clearly he knew that he was looking at the
true king; but his anger was not quenched, and he stood stiff, with
drawn brows, until the king said, "Speak!"
For answer the man drew from his breast a golden chain, at the end of
which was a jewel set with a great blue stone. He looked at it for a
moment with scorn, as one who had a grievance. Then he threw it down
on the steps of the throne, and turned on his heel to go.
"Stay," said the king. "Whose is this jewel?"
"I thought it to be yours," said the man.
"Where did you get it?" asked the king.
"From an old servant of yours," answered the man. "He gave it to me
when I was but a lad, and told me it came from the king--it was the
blue stone of the Truth, perfect and priceless. Therefore I must keep
it as the apple of mine eye, and bring it back to the king perfect and
unbroken."
"And you have done this?" said the king.
"Yes and no," answered the man.
"Divide your answer," said the king. "First, the _yes_."
The man delayed a moment before he spoke. Then his words came slow and
firm as if they were measured and weighed in his mind.
"All that man could do, O king, have I done to keep this jewel of the
Truth. Against open foes and secret robbers I have defended it, with
faithful watching and hard fighting. Through storm and peril, through
darkness and sorrow, through the temptation of pleasure and the
bewilderment of riches, I have never parted from it. Gold could not
buy it; passion could not force it; nor man nor woman could wile or
win it away. Glad or sorry, well or wounded, at home or in exile, I
have given my life to keep the jewel. This is the meaning of the
_yes_."
"It is right," said the king. "And now the _no_."
The man answered quickly and with heat.
[Illustration: The King's Jewel]
"The _no_ also is right, O king! But not by my fault. The jewel is not
untarnished, not perfect. It never was. There is a flaw in the
stone. I saw it first when I entered the light of your palace-gate.
Look, it is marred and imperfect, a thing of little value. It is not
the crystal of Truth. I have been deceived. You have claimed my life
for a fool's errand, a thing of naught; no jewel, but a bauble. Take
it. It is yours."
The king looked not at the gold chain and the blue stone, but at the
face of the man. He looked quietly and kindly and steadily into the
eyes full of pain and wounded loyalty, until they fell before his
look. Then he spoke gently.
"Will you give me my jewel?"
The man lifted his eyes in wonder.
"It is there," he cried, "at your feet!"
"I spoke not of that," said the king, "but of your life, yourself."
"My life," said the man faltering, "what is that? Is it not ended?"
"It is begun," said the king. "Your life--yourself, what of that?"
"I had not thought of that," said the man, "only of the jewel, not of
myself, my life."
"Think of it now," said the king, "and think clearly. Have you not
learned courage and hardiness? Have not your labours brought you
strength; your perils, wisdom; your wounds, patience? Has not your
task broken chains for you, and lifted you out of sloth and above
fear? Do you say that the stone that has done this for you is false, a
thing of naught?"
"Is this true?" said the man, trembling and sinking on his knee.
"It is true," answered the king, "as God lives, it is true. Come,
stand at my right hand. My jewels that I seek are not dead, but alive.
But the stone which led you here--look! has it a flaw?"
He stooped and lifted the jewel. The light of his face fell upon it.
And in the blue depths of the sapphire the man saw a star.
[Illustration]
THE MUSIC-LOVER
The Music-Lover had come to his favourite seat. It was in the front
row of the balcony, just where the curve reaches its outermost point,
and, like a rounded headland, meets the unbroken flow of the
long-rolling, invisible waves of rhythmical sound.
The value of that chosen place did not seem to be known to the world,
else there would have been a higher price demanded for the privilege
of occupying it. People were willing to pay far more to get into the
boxes, or even to have a chair reserved on the crowded level of the
parquet.
But the Music-Lover cared little for fashion, and had long ago ceased
to reckon the worth of things by the prices asked for them in the
market.
He knew that his coign of vantage, by some secret confluence of
architectural lines, gave him the very best of the delight of hearing
that the vast concert-hall contained. It was for that delight that he
was thirsting, and he surrendered himself to it confidently and
entirely.
He had arrived at an oasis in the day. Since morning he had been
toiling through the Sahara of the city's noise: arid, senseless,
inhospitable noise: roaring of wheels, clanging of bells, shrieking of
whistles, clatter of machinery, squawking of horns, raucous and
strident voices: confused, bewildering, exhausting noise, a desolate
and unfriendly desert of heard ugliness.
Now all that waste, howling wilderness was shut out by the massive
walls of the concert-hall, and he found himself in a haven of refuge.
But silence alone would not have healed and restored his spirit. It
needed something more than the absence of harsh and brutal and
meaningless noise to satisfy him. It needed the presence of music:
tones measured, ordered, and restrained; varied and blended not by
chance, but by feeling and reason; sound expressive of the secret life
and the rhythmical emotion of the human heart. And this he found
flowing all around him, entering deeply into him, filling all the
parched and empty channels of his being, as he listened to
Beethoven's great Symphony in C Minor.
I
There was nothing between him and the orchestra. He looked over the
railing of the gallery, which shaded his eyes from the lights of the
boxes below, straight across the gulf in which the mass of the
audience, diminutive and indistinguishable, seemed to be submerged, to
the brilliant island of the stage.
The conductor stood in the foreground. There was no touch of carefully
considered eccentricity in hair or costume, no pose of self-conscious
Bohemianism about him. His face, with its clear brow, firmly moulded
chin, and brown moustache, was that of a man who understood himself as
well as music. His figure, in its faultless evening dress, had the
tranquil poise and force of one who obeys the customs of society in
order to be free to give his mind to other things. With slight
motions, easy and graceful as if they came without thought and
required no effort, his right hand, with the little baton, gave the
time and rhythm, commanding swift obedience; while his left hand
lightly beckoned here and there with magical persuasion, drawing forth
louder or softer notes, stirring the groups of instruments to
passionate expression, or hushing them to delicate and ethereal
strains.
There was no labour, no dramatic display in that leadership; nothing
to distract the attention, or to break the spell of the music. All the
toil of art, the consideration of effects, the sharp and vehement
assertion of authority, lay behind him in the rehearsals.
Now the finished work, the noble interpretation of the composer's
musical idea, flowed forth at the leader's touch, as if each motive
and phrase, each period and melody, were waiting somewhere in the air
to reveal itself at his slight signal. And through all the movement of
the _Allegro con brio_, with its momentous struggle between Fate and
the Human Soul, the orchestra answered to the leader's will as if it
were a single instrument upon which he played.
[Illustration: The Music-Lover.]
And so, for a time, it seemed to the Music-Lover as he looked down
upon it from his lofty place. With what precision the bows of the
violins moved up and down together; how accurately the wood-winds came
in with their gentler notes; how regularly the brazen keys of the
trumpets rose and fell, and the long, shining tubes of the trombone
slid out and in. Such varied motions, yet all so limited, so orderly,
so certain and obedient, looked like the sure interplay of the parts
of a wonderful machine.
He watched them as if in a dream, fascinated by their regularity,
their simplicity in detail, their complexity in the mass--watched them
with his eyes, while his heart was carried along with the flood of
music. More and more the impression of a marvellous unity, a
mechanical certainty of action, grew upon that half of his mind which
was occupied with sight, and gave him a singular satisfaction and
comfort.
It was good to be free, for a little while at least, from the
everlasting personal equation, the perplexing interest in human
individuals, the mysterious and disturbing sympathies awakened by
contact with other lives, and to give one's self to the pure enjoyment
of an impersonal work of art, rendered by the greatest of all
instruments--a full orchestra under control of a master.
II
But presently the _Allegro_ came to an end, and with the pause there
came that brief stir in the orchestra, that momentary relaxation of
nerves and muscles, that moving and turning of many heads in different
directions, that swift interchange of looks and smiles and whispered
words between the players, which seemed like the temporary dissolving
of the spell that made them one. And with this general but separated
and uncertain movement a vague thought, an unformulated question,
passed into the mind of the Music-Lover.
How would the leader reassemble the parts of his instrument in a few
seconds, and make them one again, and resume his control over it? How
would he make the pipes and strings and tubes and drums answer to his
touch, though he laid no hand upon them? There must be some strange,
invisible key-board, some secret system of communication between him
and those various contrivances of wood and wire and sheep-skin and
horse-hair and metal (so curiously and grotesquely fashioned, when one
came to consider them) out of which he was to bring melody and
harmony. How should one conceive of this mysterious key-board and its
hidden connections?
How should one comprehend and imagine it? Was it not, after all, the
most wonderful thing about the great instrument on which the symphony
was played?
While the Music-Lover, leaning back in his seat, was idly turning over
this thought, the _Andante_ began, and all definite questioning and
reasoning were absorbed in the calm, satisfying melody which flowed
from the violas and 'cellos.
But now a singular change came over the half-conscious impression
which his eyes received as they rested on the orchestra. It was no
longer a huge and strangely fashioned instrument, intricate in
construction, perfect in adjustment, that he was watching.
It was a company of human beings, trained and disciplined to common
action, understanding one another through the sharing of a certain
technical knowledge, and bound together by a unity of will which was
expressed in their central obedience to the leader. The arms, the
hands, the lips of these hundred persons were weaving together the
many-coloured garment of music, because their minds knew the pattern,
and their wills worked together in the design.
Here was the wonderful hidden system of communication, more magical
than any mechanism, just because it was less perfect, just because it
left room, along each separate channel, for the coming in of those
slight, incalculable elements of personal emotion which lend the touch
of life to rhythm and tone.
The instruments were but the tools. The composer was the
master-designer. The leader and his orchestra were the weavers of the
rich robe of sound, in which alone the hidden spirit of Music,
daughter of Psyche and Amor, becomes perceptible to mortal sense.
The smooth and harmonious action of the players seemed to lend a new
charm, delicate and indefinable, to the development of the clear and
heart-strengthening theme with its subtle variations and its powerful,
emphatic close, like the fullness of meaning in the last line of a
noble sonnet.
III
In the pause that followed, the Music-Lover let himself drift quietly
with the thoughts of peace and concord awakened by this loveliest of
andantes.
The beginning of the _Scherzo_ found him, somehow or other, in a new
relation to the visible image of the orchestra. The weird, almost
supernatural music, murmured at first by the 'cellos and
double-basses, then proclaimed by the horns as if by the trumpet of
Fate itself; the repetition of the same struggle of emotions which had
marked the first movement, but now more tense, more passionate, more
human, the strange, fantastic mingling of comedy and tragedy in the
_Trio_ and the _Fugue_ with its abrupt questions and answers; all this
seemed to him like a moving picture of the inner life of man.
And while he followed it, the other half of his mind was watching the
players, no longer as a group, a unit of disciplined action, but as
individuals, persons for each of whom life had a distinct colour, and
tone, and meaning.
His eyes rested unconsciously on the pale, dreamy face of the second
violinist; the black, rugged brows of the trumpeter; the long, gentle
countenance of the flute-player with its flexible lips and blond
beard.
The grizzled head of the 'cellist bent over his instrument with an air
of quiet devotion. The burly form of the player of the double-bassoon,
behind his rare and awkward instrument, waiting for his time to come
in, had the look of a man who could not be surprised or troubled by
anything. One of the bass-violinists had the rough-hewn figure and the
divinely chiseled, sorrow-lighted face of Lincoln, the others were
children of the everyday. The clarionettist, with his dark beard and
high temples, might have sat for Rembrandt's picture of "The
Philosopher." The rotund kettle-drummer, with his smooth head and
sparkling eyes, restlessly turning his little keys and bending down to
listen to the tuning of his grotesque music-pots, seemed impatient for
the part in the score when he was to build the magical bridge, on
which the symphony passes, without a break, from the third to the last
movement.
"All these persons," said the inner voice of the Music-Lover (he
listening all the while to the entangling and unfolding, dismissing
and recalling of the various motives)--"all these persons have their
own lives and characters. They have known joys and sorrows, failures
and successes. They have hoped and feared. All that Beethoven poured
into this music from his experience of poverty, of conflict with
physical weakness and the cruel limitations of Fate, of baffled
desire, of loneliness, of strong resolution, of immortal courage and
faith, these players in their measure and degree have known.
"Even now they may be in love, in hatred, in friendship, in jealousy,
in gloom, in resignation, in courage, or in happiness. What strange
paths lie behind them; what laughter and what tears have they shared;
what secret ties unite them, one with another, and what hidden
barriers rise between those who do not understand and those who do not
care! There are many stories running along underneath this music, some
of them just begun, some long since ended, some never to find a true
completion: little stories of many lands, humourous and pathetic,
droll and capricious legends, merry jests, vivid romances, serious
tales of patience and devotion.
"And out of these stories, because they are human, has come the
humanity of the players: the thing which makes it possible for them to
feel this music, and to play it, not as a machine would play, grinding
it out with dead monotony, but with all the colour and passion of life
itself.
"Why should we not know something of this hidden background of the
orchestra? Why should not somebody tell one of the stories that is
waiting here? Not I, but some one familiar with this region, who has
trodden its paths and shared in its labours; not a mere lover of
music, but a musician."
Here the inner voice which had been running along through the
_Scherzo_ and the _Trio_ and the _Recapitulation_, died away quietly
with the _pianissimo_ passage in which the double-basses and the drum
carry one through the very heart of mystery; and the Music-Lover found
himself intensely waiting for the great _Finale_.
Now it comes, long-expected, surprising, victorious, sweeping all the
instruments into its mighty current, pausing for a moment to take up
the most delicate and mysterious melody of the _Scherzo_ (changed as
if by magic into something new and strange), and then moving on again,
with hurrying, swelling tide, until it breaks in the swift-rolling,
thunderous billows of immeasurable jubilation.
The Music-Lover drew a long breath. He sat motionless in his seat. The
storm of applause did not disturb him. He did not notice that the
audience had risen. He was looking at the orchestra, already
beginning to melt away; but he did not really see them.
Presently a hand was stretched out from the second row behind him, and
touched him on the shoulder. He turned around and saw the face of his
friend the Dreamer, the Brushwood Boy, with his bright eyes and
disheveled hair. And beside him was the radiant presence of the Girl
Who Understood.
"_Lieber Meister,_" said the Boy, "you are coming now with us. There
is a bite and a sup, and a pipe and an open fire, waiting for you in
our room--and I have a story to read you. _Bitte komm!_"
HUMORESKE
I
They parted at the end of the summer--the boy and the girl--after
having been very happy together for two months and very miserable for
two days. The trouble was that she would not marry him.
This was not altogether strange, for Richard Shafer was only twenty
and had just finished his second year in college. To Carola Brune, who
was a year younger, he seemed perfect as a playmate, but she simply
could not imagine him as a husband. He was too vague, unformed, boyish
in his moods and caprices. She was a strong girl, with quick and
powerful impulses in her nature, and she felt that she would need a
strong man to hold her. What Richard was, what he would be, she could
not clearly see. She loved to make music with him--she at the piano,
he with his violin. She loved to roam the woods with him, and to go
out in a canoe with him on the moonlit river. But she could not and
she would not say that she loved _him_--at least, not enough to
promise to marry him now.
He took her "no" very hard. He argued the case persistently. There
were no real obstacles, that he could see, to their marriage. She was
the daughter of a musician, a Bohemian, who would make no objections
to an unworldly match. He was an orphan with a little patrimony of
four or five thousand dollars, enough to live on until the world
recognised his genius as a poet and his mastery as a violinist.
At this, unfortunately, being a little nervous and overstrained by the
long pleading, she laughed. "Oh, Dick!" she cried. "Swinburne and
Sarasate--two single gentlemen rolled into one!"
Now there is nothing that a boy--or for that matter, a man--dislikes
so much as laughter when he is making a declaration of love. His sense
of humour at that time is in eclipse, and even the gentlest turn of
wit shocks him deeply.
"Very well," he answered, rising from their favourite seat among the
roots of an old hemlock tree overhanging the stream, "let us go back
to the hotel. I have been a silly ass, I suppose, and now it's all
over."
"But why?"--she was tempted to ask him as they walked through the
woods. Why was it all over? Why shouldn't they go on being good
friends and comrades? Couldn't he see that she had only tried to make
a little joke to ease the strain? Didn't he know that she really had a
wonderful admiration for his talents and a large hope for his future?
But something held her back from speaking. She was embarrassed and
slightly ashamed. He was in a strange mood, evidently offended,
absurdly polite and distant, making talk about the concert that was to
come off that evening. She could not bring herself to explain to him
now. She would do it in the morning when the air was clearer and
cooler.
As they entered the hotel, she turned into the music room, saying that
she had to practise for her part in the concert. He held out his hand
with a little formal gesture. "I wish you a big success," said he; "my
part doesn't need any practice." Then he went upstairs to pack his
trunk for the six o'clock train.
An hour later, as he passed out of the door, he heard her still at the
piano. She was playing for her own pleasure now--just to relieve the
tension of her feelings by letting them flow out on the rhythmic
current of music. It was her favourite piece, that magical _humoreske_
by Dvorák, which is like an April day, full of smiles and tears,
pleading and laughter. The clear notes came out under her exquisite
touch with a penetrating charm of airy, graceful fantasy. To the angry
boy at the door it seemed as if they were full of delicate
indifference and mockery. They expressed to him the spirit of a
girl--light, capricious, elusive, yet with a will that can resist all
appeal and evade all attack--an invincible butterfly, a thistle-down
of steel--the thing that a man wants most in all the world and yet can
not have unless she chooses. She stood for his first defeat, his great
disappointment, his discovery that life can refuse; and now she was
playing this quaint, careless, mocking music!
"She does not care," he said to himself, as he climbed into the
stage, "and I will not care. She is only a flirt. All girls are like
that." With this profound generalisation in what he called his mind,
but what was really his temper, he rode sullenly away.
He did not hear how she lingered caressingly over the last phrases of
the _humoreske_, playing them very softly, with her blond head bent
over the piano, as if she were trying to recall something. He did not
know that she put on the frock that he liked best, with the mauve
ribbons, for the concert that night. He did not see her lips quiver
and the look of pained surprise flash into her brown eyes when she
heard that he had gone without even saying good-bye.
Naturally she, thinking him a proud and foolish boy, waited for him to
come back or to write. Naturally he, having classified her as a cold
and heartless flirt, expected her to send him a letter asking him to
return. Naturally neither of these things happened. The little
bank-dividing stream of circumstance flowed between them, ever
broadening, until it seemed like an impassable river.
Each of them said, "It was only an episode." Each of them was sure
that there was nothing in it which could mean a lasting pain, nothing
which time would not obliterate. Each of them repeated a wise phrase
or two about "passing fancies" and "puppy love," and so they went
their ways lightly enough, reasonably resolving not to think of each
other any more.
But it was strange how clearly and brightly the scenes of the summer
itself lived in their memories. To both of them there was a peculiar
and deepening vividness in those pictures of certain places.
The hardwood ridges in the forest, where there was no undergrowth and
they could walk straight ahead, side by side, through the interminable
colonnade of beeches and birches which upheld the green, gold-flecked
roof,--the dark tangled spruce thicket, where one must stoop under the
interlacing lower branches, dead and brittle, and creep over the soft
brown carpet of fallen needles, dry and slippery, in order to reach a
little open glade, moist with springs, where the red wood-lily and the
purple-fringed orchid grew,--the high steep rock that jutted out from
the woods about half-way up the slope of the Dome, as if to make a
narrow view-point of surprise where two people could stand close
together and look down upon the broad valley and the blue hills
beyond,--the old hemlock, with its big, bent knees covered with moss,
ready to hold them comfortably in its lap, while they read poetry or
stories of adventure, and the little river sung its sleepy song at
their feet,--the long stillwater where the canoe floated quietly among
the mirrored stars,--the merry rapids where the moon path spread
before them broad and silvery, luring them to follow it down to
danger,--the twilight hour in the music room, where the piano answered
to the violin, and through the open door and windows the aromatic
breath of the pine-trees and the spicy smell of wild grapes drifted
faintly in,--a certain afternoon when the cool rain-drops beat in
their faces as they tramped home, after a long walk over the hills,
wet and joyous, swinging their clasped hands and chanting some
foolish, endless song of the road,--a certain evening when the
murmuring hemlock above them grew silent, and the whispering water
below them seemed to hush, and a single big star across the river was
softly throbbing in the mauve dusk, and their lips met for a moment as
purely and silently as the twilight meets the night;--these were
pictures that would not fade and dissolve. There was something
unforgettable about them.
Was it the spirit of place that possessed them with a unique
loveliness; or was it that they were illuminated by the charm of a
companionship in which two hearts had tasted together the sweetest cup
in the world, the royal chalice of the pure, uncalculating,
inexplicable joy of living?
Be that as it may, the fact remains that while the boy and the girl
went away from each other, and grew separately to manhood and
womanhood, and had other experiences and joys and troubles, that
summer stayed with them both as something rare and unequalled, set
apart in its delectable perfection, a standard by which,
unconsciously, they measured all happiness and all beauty.
The effect of such an inward standard is peculiar. It is apt to give a
certain detachment, a touch of isolation, to the person who possesses
it. And whether that is a good thing or a bad thing depends upon the
tone which is given to it by an unknown quantity, the way in which the
secret will of the spirit chooses to take and use it.
To Carola Brune it was like the possession of something very precious,
which she had found and which she felt she could never lose. She
followed the path which was marked out for her as a student of music
with tranquil enthusiasm and cheerful industry; she made friends
everywhere by her serene and wholesome loveliness; and she did her
work at the piano so well that when she went to Paris, at the end of
the second year, to continue her studies, she found no difficulty in
being received as a pupil by the great Alberti.
"You have a very happy touch, mademoiselle," said the little gray man
one day at the end of a lesson. He gave his moustache that fierce
upward turn with which he accompanied his rare compliments, and
frowned at her benignly while he went on. "I suppose you know that you
really play better than you know how to play. What right have you to
do that?"
She smiled as she turned around to him, for she had learned to
understand his abrupt ways. "No right, dear master," she said, "only
perhaps it is because I happen to know a little of the meaning of
happiness."
"But you play the sad music too," he continued, "and you let it all
come out."
"That is because I am not afraid of sadness," she answered, with her
clear brown eyes looking quietly up at him.
His voice grew gentle and he laid his hand on her shoulder. "You have
the secret, my child--to know the meaning of happiness, and not to be
afraid of sadness, but to pour it all into the music. That is the
secret, and it will make you a musician,--it will carry you far, I
think,--provided you don't neglect your practising," he added
brusquely.
She shook her head and laughed. "I wouldn't dare do that with such a
tyrant as you, dear master."
"Next week," he went on, giving a new upward twist to his moustache,
"I shall expect you to be letter-perfect with that G major concerto of
Beethoven--no more drum-beats, remember. And mind, you are not to
think of playing in public, at a concert, until I tell you. It may be
a long time,--a year, perhaps,--but I am not going to let them spoil
my sweetest rose by forcing her into bloom too soon."
"Despot," she laughed back as he patted her hand at the door, "if you
only had a kind heart I should love you--a little!"
On the way home to her tiny apartment in the Rue de Grenelle, where
she lived with her aunt and her younger sister, who was a student of
drawing, she walked through the Garden of the Luxembourg, thinking
about a concert. Not one of those which the master had forbidden to
her, but a very simple and foolish and far-away little concert in the
old hotel beside the Delaware. And the deep beauty of the forest came
back to her, and the long-shining reaches of the river, and the hours
of good comradeship with a boy who perfectly shared her joy of living,
and the breath of the pine-trees and the sweetness of the wild grape!
Did she really smell them now? No, it was only the faint fragrance of
the formal beds of hyacinths and tulips and jonquils on the terraces
behind the old palace. In the broad walks, children were running and
playing. Old men were smoking on the benches in a drowsy peace. In the
shady paths under the tall trees, evidently amatory couples were
strolling or sitting close together. Carola enjoyed it all--but there
was a look in her face, half sad, half smiling, as if she remembered
something better.
When she reached home, she laid aside her hat and scarf, and went into
the little _salon_. She sat down at the piano and let her fingers run
idly over the keys, wandering from fragment to fragment of soft music.
Then with a firmer touch she began to play the _humoreske_ of
Dvorák, but with a new phrasing, a new expression. It was full of
an infinite tenderness, a great longing, a sweetness of distant and
remembered joy. It seemed to be singing over again the favourite song
of some one who had died--singing very clearly and distinctly so as
not to lose a single note, a single movement, of the unforgotten
melody of happiness.
The delicate dusk of a May evening gathered slowly in the room. The
windows were wide open. In the narrow, curving street below, already
half-deserted, a young man who was passing with long aimless steps, as
if he felt that he must be going somewhere but did not know exactly
where, stopped suddenly when he heard the music above him, and stood
listening until its last note trembled into silence. Then he strode
away, but in the opposite direction, as if he had changed his mind.
II
The path that had led Richard Shafer into the Rue de Grenelle and
under the windows of Carola Brune without knowing it, was long and
roundabout, and in places rather rough. It was one of the by-ways of
the unknown quantity.
To him, from the first, the thought of the perfect summer had been
like something that he had lost and would never find again. It made
him dissatisfied, fickle, and resentful. He went back to his college
work with a temper which handicapped him in everything. His lessons
seemed like the dullest drudgery to one who felt sure that he had in
him the making of a poet or a musician, he did not quite know
which--perhaps it was both. The fellowship of the other boys, with its
rude and hearty democracy, streaked with funny little social
prejudices and ambitions, was a thing of which he could not or would
not learn the secret.
He tried running with the literary set. But Shorty Burke, who was the
acknowledged college genius, said of him, "Shafer seems to think that
he's the only man since Keats, and all the rest of us are duffers."
He tried running with the fast set. But Duke Jones, who could carry
more strong liquors than any man in the crowd, said of him, "Dick is
no good; when he goes to town with us he's a thousand miles away, and
every glass makes him more stuck-up and quarrelsome."
He tried running with the purely social set, the arbiters of college
elegance. But it bored him immensely, and he took no pains to conceal
it, so they silently cast him out.
The consequence of all this was that he failed to get into any of the
upper-class societies, and consoled himself with the belief that he
was terribly in love with a girl three years older than himself.
She was part of a liberal education, and she was very kind to him
because she liked his really beautiful violin playing. When she told
him, at the beginning of his senior year, that she was going to marry
one of the assistant professors, he added another illustration to his
theory that "all girls are like that," and plunged into a violent
course of study for honours and a fellowship. But it was too late. He
graduated with a fourth group and a firm conviction that college is a
failure.
Then he went to New York, with his violin and with a dozen poems and
half-a-dozen short stories in his trunk, resolved to storm the
magazines or to get a place in one of the great orchestras--he was not
quite sure which of the two short paths to fame it would be.
It was neither. He sold two sonnets and a story which brought him in
$47.50. For a few months he saw life in the Great White Way and other
paths, and found them very dusty. It would not be true to say that
there was no amusement in it. There were times when it was
excessively merry. And for the little _Caffè Fiammella_, where the
fat, bald-headed proprietor used to introduce him as "_l'illustrissimo
violinista Signore Ricardo Sciafèro_," and where the mixed audience
welcomed his music with delight, he had a sincere affection, in spite
of the ineradicable smell of garlic. There was a girl there who was
the living image of Raphæl's _Fornarina_, until she began to talk.
But in all the life that he thus confusedly saw, there was not a
single hour to which he could have said with Faust, "Oh, stay, thou
art so fair!" For behind it all, there was that inward, unconscious
standard of beauty and happiness--the summer which he could not have
forgotten if he would, and would not have forgotten if he could. It
did not console or comfort him at all. It only kept him from being
contented--which, after all, would have been the worst thing in the
world for him at the present stage of his education.
So when the remnant of his patrimony had shrunk to a couple of hundred
dollars, he burned his poems and stories, for which he had conceived a
strong disgust, and took passage on a small French steam-ship for
Bordeaux, to make the "grand tour" of Europe. His violin made him the
most popular person on the ship. He had a facile talent and a good
memory, which enabled him to play almost any kind of music; and when
he could not remember he could improvise. The second officer, a short,
stout man, with a pointed black beard, and a secret passion for the
fine arts, conceived a great fancy for the young American. When they
reached Bordeaux he took Richard to his favourite theatre and
introduced him to the leader of the orchestra, a person with a crinkly
yellow face and a soft heart, whose name was Camembert, for which
reason his intimates called him "the Cheese."
The theatre was about to close for the summer, but four of the
musicians had made a plan for a concert tour in various small cities
and watering-places. When M. Camembert had heard Richard play after a
joyous supper in the famous restaurant of the _Chapon Fin_, he
embraced him with effusion and invited him to join the company.
Nothing could have suited the young man's humour better. They
wandered from one city-in-etching to another,--Angoulême, Poitiers,
Tours, Rennes, Caen,--grey and crumbly towns, white and trim towns.
They visited the rocky resorts of Brittany and the sandy resorts of
Normandy. They played in a little theatre, or in a casino, or in the
ballroom of a hotel. Their fortunes varied, but in the main they were
prosperous. The announcements of "The Renowned Camembert Quintette,
with a celebrated American Soloist" attracted an amused curiosity. And
the music was good, for the old man was a real master, and the
practice was strenuous and persistent. It was hard work, but it was
also good fun, and the great thing for Richard was that he learned
more of the human side of music and of the philosophy of life than he
could have done in ten years of insulated study.
A vein of luck which they struck in Rouen and Dieppe emboldened them
to turn eastward, with comfortably full pockets, and try the Dauphiné
and High Savoy. At Grenoble they had a frost and a heavy loss, but at
the sleepy Baths of Uriage they made a week of good harvest with
afternoon recitals. Chambréy did well for them, and Annécy even
better, so that, in spite of the indifference of Aix, they reached
Geneva in funds. Then they played their way around the Lake of Geneva,
and up into the Rhone Valley, and so over to the Italian lakes with
the autumn.
Here, at Pallanza, in a garden overhanging the Lago Maggiore where the
Borromean Isles sleep in their swan-like beauty on the blue-green
waves, they faced the question of turning homeward or going on to the
south for a winter tour. As they sat around the little iron table,
which held a savoury Spanish omelette and a corpulent straw-covered
flask of Chianti, their spirit was cheerful and their courage high.
"Why not?" asked the valiant Camembert. "Is it that the Italians are
more difficult to conquer than the French? Napoleon did it--my faith,
yes. Forward to the conquest of Italy!"
Richard was immensely amused. He did not really care which way they
went, as long as they went somewhere. His heart was full of a vague
hunger for home,--deep, wild, sheltering woods, friendly hills,
companionable and never-failing little rivers,--he longed to be there.
But he knew that was impossible. So why not Italy? It would certainly
be an adventure.
And so it was. But the conquest was largely a matter of imagination.
They saw the flowing green streets of Venice, the ruddy towers of
Bologna, the grey walls and dark dome of Florence. They saw the
fountains flash in Rome and the red fire run down the long slope of
Vesuvius at Naples. They crossed over to Sicily and saw ivory Palermo
in her golden shell and Taormina sitting high upon the benches of her
amphitheatre. In that sense they conquered and possessed Italy, as any
one who has eyes and a heart may do.
But Italy did not pay much tribute to their music. They had to travel
third-class and sleep in the poorest inns, cultivating a taste for
macaroni and dark bread with pallid butter. Still, they were merry
enough until they reached Genoa, and perceived that there was no
reasonable prospect of their being able to make anything at all in the
over-civilised and over-entertained towns of the Rivièra.
"We must retreat, my children," said the Cheese, crinkling his face
over the sour wine in a musty _trattoria_, "but let us retreat in good
order and while we have the means to do so. How much money in bank?"
They counted their resources and found them hardly enough to pay the
railway fare to Bordeaux. Richard insisted upon putting the remnant of
his private fortune into the common fund, but the others would not
have it.
"No," they said, "you shall not give us money. But you may settle all
the restaurant bills between here and Bordeaux."
"But I am not going to Bordeaux," said he; "I am going to Paris."
At this there was voluble protest and discussion. Richard had no
arguments, but his determination was as fixed as it was unreasonable.
Finally he forced them to take fifty francs as a loan. At Lyons the
quintette dissolved with emotional embraces, the four going westward,
and he northward in the night train.
When he walked out into the stony desert in front of the _Gare de
Lyon_ in the grey chill of a March morning, he had just two hundred
and twenty francs in his pocket, and he felt that he was really adrift
in the world. There was nothing for him to hold fast to, no one who
had need of him.
He found a garret room in the _Rue Cherche Midi_, and looked up two
friends of his who were studying at the _Beaux Arts_. They introduced
him to a newspaper correspondent who threw a bit of work in his way--a
fortnightly letter to an Arkansas paper on French fashions and
society, at five dollars _per_ letter. This did not go very far, but
it retarded the melting away of his estate while he finished two
articles,--one on "The Cradle of the French Revolution," the Chateau
of Vezille, which he had visited during his week at the Baths of
Uriage,--the other on "An Eruption of Vesuvius," which had opportunely
occurred while he was in Naples. For the first time in his life he
wrote directly, simply, and naturally, describing what he had really
seen, and expressing what he had really felt and imagined. He sent the
articles to two American magazines and relapsed into a state of doubt
and despair.
He took what Paris has to give a young man in the way of cheap
diversion, but he found it as dusty as New York. The long rambles
through the older parts of the city, the solitary excursions into the
forests of the environs, really satisfied and refreshed him more.
Meantime the feeling that he was adrift grew upon him and his reserve
of capital disappeared. The wolf scratched at the door of his garret
and short rations were necessary. In the second week of May a
remittance arrived from the Arkansas paper for his last two letters,
with the statement that they were not "snappy" enough to suit the
taste of the community, and that the correspondence had better be
discontinued.
So it was that he strode through the Rue de Grenelle in the May
twilight, with fifty francs in his pocket, resolved to spend it all
that night--and then? Well, it was not very clear in his mind, but
certainly he was not going back to his miserable lodging,--and surely
there must be some way of making an end of it all for a man who felt
that he was adrift and very tired,--there was no one to care much if
he dropped out, and he could see no attractive reason for going on.
It was then that he heard the notes of the _humoreske_ coming down
into the deserted street and stood still to listen. The memories of
the perfect summer floated around him again. Something in the music
seemed to call to him, to plead with him, to try to console and cheer
him with a wonderful, playful tenderness like the pure wordless
sympathy of a child.
"If she had only known how to play it like that," he said to himself;
"if she had only cared enough--she would have called me back. But here
is a woman who does know--and perhaps even for me--well, I will fight
a little longer."
So he turned back to his lonely lodging, guided and impelled by
something that he could not quite understand, and did not even try to
explain. Surely it would be absurd to think that the chance hearing of
a bit of music could have an influence on a man's life.
III
That turn in the Rue de Grenelle seemed like the turn in the tide of
his fortunes. The morning mail brought an order for five hundred
francs, with a letter from the editor of the _Epoch Magazine_, saying
that he liked the article on "The Cradle of the Revolution" very much,
and that he wished the author would do three papers for him on the
"Old Prisons of Paris," A week later came a letter from the editor of
_The World's Wonders_, saying that if the author of the excellent
article on Vesuvius would procure photographic illustrations of it at
their expense, they would be glad to pay a hundred dollars for it, and
asking if he felt like doing two or three articles on "The Little
Chateaux of France" during the summer.
Richard felt, not so much that he was "himself again," but that he was
a new man. The touch of praise for his work refreshed him more than
wine. His friends, the _Beaux Arts_ men and the newspaper
correspondent, noticed the change in him, and accused him of being in
love.
"Not much," he laughed, "but I am at work--two articles accepted and
commissions for five more."
They joyfully gave him all the hints and helps they could, and told
him where to find the books that he needed. He settled down to his
reading bravely and made copious notes for his articles. On Sundays he
went with his three friends to spend the day at some resort in the
suburbs. He played the violin only on these country excursions and at
night in his room when his eyes were tired. The rest of the time he
toiled terribly. His boyish dream that the world lay at his feet was
ended, but instead he felt that he had the power to do something
fairly good, if he worked hard enough. And then, perhaps some day he
might have the good luck to meet that girl whose music he had heard
the evening when the tide turned.
He wondered what she looked like. He had passed the house often,
hoping that he might see her or hear her play again. But nothing of
that kind happened. The windows on the second floor were always
closed. A discreet inquiry at the glass door of the _concierge_ drew
out only the information that Madame Farr, the American lady, had gone
away with her two nieces for their vacation. The name conveyed nothing
to him. It would have been absurd to try to follow such a cobweb
clue, and give up his work to chase after an unknown American lady
and her invisible nieces.
Yet more and more the remembrance of that strain of music lingered
with him, strangely penetrating and significant. He played it often on
the violin. It came to be the symbol of that summer, not as it had
ended in disappointment and deception, but as it had flowed for so
many perfect weeks in pure joy and gaiety of heart. He thought of the
unseen player very kindly. He tried unconsciously to make a picture of
her in his mind--the colour of her hair, her eyes, the shape of her
face. He saw her running through the woods, or sitting between the
knees of the old hemlock beside the river. And always her hair was
blond and soft and loosely curling, her eyes of a brown so bright and
clear that it seemed to glow with hidden gold, and her face a full
oval, tinted like the petal of a great magnolia blossom.
"I am a poor fool," he would say to himself after these reveries; "why
should she have been in the least like Carola? More probably she had
freckles and red hair--but she was a girl who understood."
When August came, Richard's friends went off for a holiday, but he
stuck to his work. The heat of Paris was faint and smothering. On the
first Sunday he went out to St. Germain, loveliest of all the Parisian
suburbs, and wandered all day in the green and mossy forest. He was
lonely and depressed. Not even the cool verdure of the woods, nor the
splendour of the view from the terrace looking out over the curves of
the Seine, and the green rolling hills, and the lines of light that
led to the city beginning to glow with a pale yellow radiance in the
dusk, could console him. The merry, companionable stir of life around
him made him feel more solitary. He turned away from the gay verandah
of the _Pavillion Henry IV_, which was full of dining-parties, and
went back into the town to seek the quieter garden of the _Pavillion
Louis XIV_. There was a big linden-tree there and a certain table at
one side of it where he had dined before. He would go there now for
his solitary repast.
But the garden also was well-patronized that night. The white-aproned
waiters were running to and fro; the stout landlady in black silk and
a lace cap was moving among her guests with beaming face; a soft
babble of talk and laughter rose from every walk and corner. When
Richard came to his chosen table he found it occupied by three ladies.
Disappointed, he was turning to look for another place, when the voice
of Carola Brune called him.
When a thing like that happens, a man does not know exactly where he
is, or how he feels. The largeness and the smallness of the world
amaze him; the mystery of life bewilders him; he is confused in the
presence of the unknown quantity. How he behaves, what he says or
does, depends entirely upon instincts beyond his control.
Richard would have been puzzled to give an account of his introduction
to Mrs. Farr, and of his recognition of the little sister, now grown
to young womanhood. The conversation at the table where he dined with
the family party was very vague in his mind. He knew that he was
telling them about his adventures, as if they were scenes in a comedy,
and that he said a little about the turn of good luck that had come
to him just in time. He knew that Carola was talking of her
music-lessons, and of her dear master and of his sudden promise that
she should have a concert in the early winter. It was all very jolly
and friendly, but it did not seem quite real to him until he asked her
a question.
"Where did you live in Paris last May?"
"In the Rue de Grenelle," she answered; "of course you know that old
street."
He nodded and fell into silence, letting his cigarette go out, as he
sipped his coffee.
"Well," he said, "this has been delightful--it was great luck to meet
you. But I suppose I should be going. The best of friends must part."
"But no," said Carola, flushing faintly, "what reason is there for
that stupid proverb now? My aunt and sister always take a little walk
on the terrace after dinner to see the lights. But you must let me
show you what pretty rooms we have found here for our vacation. I have
to be near the master and to keep up my practising, you know. I have a
heavenly piano. Don't you want to hear whether I have improved in my
playing?"
"I do," he answered, "indeed that is just what I want."
When they came into the little sitting-room above the garden, the
windows were wide and the room was cool and dim and fragrant. Carola
moved about in the shadow, lighting the candles on the mantle-piece
and the tall lamp beside the piano.
"Now," she said, "let us talk a little."
He hesitated a moment, and answered: "I would rather hear you play."
"You are as decided and dictatorial as ever," she laughed; "but this
time you shall have your way. What will you have--a bit of Chopin or
Grieg? Here is plenty of music to choose from."
"No," he said, "something that you know by heart. The piece that you
played in the Rue de Grenelle in the twilight on May the seventh."
She looked at him with startled, wondering eyes, as if about to ask
the explanation of such a curious request. Then her eyes dropped, and
her colour rose, and she sat down at the piano.
The _humoreske_ came from her lightly moving hands as it had come on
that spring evening,--quaint, tender, consoling, caressing,--but now
with a new accent of joy in it, a quicker, almost exulting movement in
the dancing passages. Richard listened, standing close behind her,
watching the play of her firm, rounded fingers, breathing the
fragrance that rose from her hair and her white neck.
When she turned on the stool he was kneeling beside her, and his hands
were stretched out to take hers.
"Let me tell you," he exclaimed, "let me tell you what a fool I have
been."
So she sat very still while he told her of his failure at college, and
how he had gone wild afterward, and how bitter he had been, and how
lonely. The adventure with the travelling musicians had led to
nothing, and his assurance of winning fame with his violin or with his
pen had come to nothing. He was at the edge of the big darkness on
that May evening, when she had brought the turn of the tide without
knowing it. And even now things were not much better, but still he had
a fighting chance to make himself amount to something. He could
write, and he would work at it as a man must work at his calling. He
could play the violin, and he would make it his avocation and
refreshment. She was going on, he knew, to win a great success. He
would rejoice in it--he loved her with all his heart--she must know
that--but he had nothing to offer her. He was too poor to ask her for
anything now.
Her hands trembled as he bent to kiss them. In her shining eyes there
was a strange, sweet, deep smile. She leaned over him, and he felt the
warmth of her breath on his forehead as she whispered: "Richard,
couldn't you even ask me for the _humoreske_?"
HALF-TOLD TALES
AN OLD GAME
THE UNRULY SPRITE
A CHANGE OF AIR
AN OLD GAME
[Illustration]
Three men were taking a walk together, as they said, just to while
away the time.
The first man intended to go Somewhere, to look at a piece of property
which he was considering. The second man was ready to go Anywhere,
since he expected to be happy by the way. The third man thought he was
going Nowhere, because he was a philosopher and held that time and
space are only mental forms.
Therefore the third man walked in silence, reflecting upon the vanity
of whiling away an hour which did not exist, and upon the futility of
going when staying was the same thing. But the other men, being more
simple, were playing the oldest game in the world and giving names to
the things that they saw as they travelled.
"Mutton," said the Somewhere Man, as he looked over a stone wall.
"A flock of sheep," said the Anywhere Man, gazing upon the pasture,
where the fleecy ewes were nipping grass between the rocks and the
eager lambs nuzzled their mothers.
But the Nowhere Man meditated on the foolish habit of eating, and said
nothing.
"An ant-hill," said the Anywhere Man, looking at a mound beside the
path; "see how busy the citizens are!"
"Pismires," said the Somewhere Man, kicking the mound; "they sting
like the devil."
But the Nowhere Man, being certain that the devil is a myth, said
nothing.
"Briars," said the Somewhere Man, as they passed through a coppice.
"Blackberries," said the Anywhere Man; "they will blossom next month
and ripen in August."
But the Nowhere Man, to whom they referred the settlement of the
first round of the game, decided that both had lost because they spoke
only of accidental phenomena.
With the next round they came into a little forest on a sandy hill.
The oak-trees were still bare, and the fir-trees were rusty green, and
the maple-trees were in rosy bud. On these things the travellers were
agreed.
But among the withered foliage on the ground a vine trailed far and
wide with verdant leaves, thick and heavy, and under the leaves were
clusters of rosy stars, breathing a wonderful sweetness, so that the
travellers could not but smell it.
"Rough-leaf," said the Somewhere Man; "gravel-weed we call it in our
country, because it marks the poorest soil."
"Trailing arbutus," said the Anywhere Man; "May-flowers we call them
in our country."
"But why?" asked the Nowhere Man. "May has not yet come."
"She is coming," answered the other; "she will be here before these
are gone."
On the other side of the wood they entered a meadow where a little
bird was bubbling over with music in the air.
"Skunk-blackbird," said the Somewhere Man; "colours the same as a
skunk."
"Bobolink," said the Anywhere Man; "spills his song while he flies."
"It is a silly name," said the Nowhere Man. "Where did you find it?"
"I don't know," answered the other; "it just sounds to me like the
bird."
By this time it was clear that the two men did not play the game by
the same rules, but they went on playing, just as other people do.
They saw a little thatched house beside the brook. "Beastly hovel,"
said the first man. "Pretty cottage," said the second.
A woman was tossing and fondling her child, with kiss-words. "Sickly
sentiment," said the first man. "Mother love," said the second.
They passed a youth sleeping on the grass under a tree. "Lazy hound!"
said the first man. "Happy dog!" said the second.
Now the third man, remembering that he was a philosopher, concluded
that he was wasting his imaginary time in hearing this endless old
game.
"I must bid you good-day, gentlemen," said he, "for it seems to me
that you are disputing only about appearances, and are not likely to
arrive Somewhere or Anywhere. But I am seeking _das Ding an sich_."
So he left them, and went on his way Nowhere. And I know not which of
the others won the game, but I think the second man had more pleasure
in playing it.
[Illustration]
THE UNRULY SPRITE
A PARTIAL FAIRY TALE
[Illustration]
There was once a man who was also a writer of books.
The merit of his books lies beyond the horizon of this tale. No doubt
some of them were good, and some of them were bad, and some were
merely popular. But he was all the time trying to make them better,
for he was quite an honest man, and thankful that the world should
give him a living for his writing. Moreover, he found great delight in
the doing of it, which was something that did not enter into the
world's account--a kind of daily Christmas present in addition to his
wages.
But the interesting thing about the man was that he had a clan or
train of little sprites attending him--small, delicate, aerial
creatures, who came and went around him at their pleasure, and showed
him wonderful things, and sang to him, and kept him from being
discouraged, and often helped him with his work.
If you ask me what they were and where they came from, I must frankly
tell you that I do not know. Neither did the man know. Neither does
anybody else know.
But the man had sense enough to understand that they were real--just
as real as any of the other mysterious things, like microbes, and
polonium, and chemical affinities, and the northern lights, by which
we are surrounded. Sometimes it seemed as if the sprites were the
children of the flowers that die in blooming; and sometimes as if they
came in a flock with the birds from the south; and sometimes as if
they rose one by one from the roots of the trees in the deep forest,
or from the waves of the sea when the moon lay upon them; and
sometimes as if they appeared suddenly in the streets of the city
after the people had passed by and the houses had gone to sleep. They
were as light as thistle-down, as unsubstantial as mists upon the
mountain, as wayward and flickering as will-o'-the-wisps. But there
was something immortal about them, and the man knew that the world
would be nothing to him without their presence and comradeship.
Most of these attendant sprites were gentle and docile; but there was
one who had a strain of wildness in him. In his hand he carried a bow,
and at his shoulder a quiver of arrows, and he looked as if, some day
or other, he might be up to mischief.
Now this man was much befriended by a certain lady, to whom he used to
bring his stories in order that she might tell him whether they were
good, or bad, or merely popular. But whatever she might think of the
stories, always she liked the man, and of the airy fluttering sprites
she grew so fond that it almost seemed as if they were her own
children. This was not unnatural, for they were devoted to her; they
turned the pages of her book when she read; they made her walks
through the forest pleasant and friendly; they lit lanterns for her in
the dark; they brought flowers to her and sang to her, as well as to
the man. Of this he was glad, because of his great friendship for the
lady and his desire to see her happy.
But one day she complained to him of the sprite who carried the bow.
"He is behaving badly," said she; "he teases me."
"That surprises me," said the man, "and I am distressed to hear it;
for at heart he is rather good, and to you he is deeply attached. But
how does he tease you, dear lady? What does he do?"
"Oh, nothing," she answered, "and that is what annoys me. The others
are all busy with your affairs or mine. But this idle one follows me
like my shadow, and looks at me all the time. It is not at all polite.
I fear he has a vacant mind and has not been well brought up."
"That may easily be," said the man, "for he came to me very suddenly
one day, and I have never inquired about his education."
"But you ought to do so," said she; "it is your duty to have him
taught to know his place, and not to tease, and other useful lessons."
"You are always right," said the man, "and it shall be just as you
say."
On the way home he talked seriously to the sprite, and told him how
impolite he had been, and arranged a plan for his schooling in botany,
diplomacy, music, psychology, deportment, and other useful studies.
The rest of the sprites came in to the school-room every day, to get
some of the profitable lessons. They sat around quiet and orderly, so
that it was quite like a kindergarten. But the principal pupil was
restless and troublesome.
"You are never still," said the man; "you have an idle mind and
wandering thoughts."
"No!" said the sprite, shaking his head. "It is true, my mind is not
on my lessons. But my thoughts do not wander at all. They always
follow yours."
Then the man stopped talking, and the other sprites laughed behind
their hands. But the one who had been reproved went on drawing
pictures in the back of his botany book. The face in the pictures was
always the same, but none of them seemed to satisfy him, for he always
rubbed them out and began over again.
After several weeks of hard work the master thought his pupil must
have learned something, so he gave him a holiday, and asked him what
he would like to do.
"Go with you," he answered, "when you take her your new stories."
So they went together, and the lady complimented the writer on his
success as an educator.
"Your pupil does you credit," said she; "he talks very nicely about
botany and deportment. But I am a little troubled to see him looking
so pale. Perhaps you have been too severe with him. I must take him
out in the garden with me every day to play a while."
"You have a kind heart," said the man, "and I hope he will appreciate
it."
This agreeable and amicable life continued for some weeks, and
everybody was glad that affairs had arranged themselves. But one day
the lady brought a new complaint.
"He is a strange little creature, and he has begun to annoy me in the
most extraordinary way."
"That is bad," said the man. "What does he do now?"
"Oh, nothing," she answered, "and that is just the trouble. When I
want to talk about you, he refuses, and says he does not like you as
much as he used to. When I propose to play a game, he says he is tired
and would rather sit under a tree and hear stories. When I tell them
he says they do not suit him, they all end happily, and that is
stupid. He is very perverse. But he clings to me like a bur. He is
always teasing me to tell him the name of every flower in my garden
and give him one of every kind."
"Is he rude about it?"
"Not exactly rude, but he is all the more annoying because he is so
polite, and I always feel that he wants something different."
"He must not do that," said the man. "He must learn to want what you
wish."
"But how can he learn what I wish? I do not always know that myself."
"It may be difficult," said the man, "but all the same he must learn
it for your sake. I will deal with him."
So he took the unruly sprite out into the desert and gave him a sound
beating with thorn branches. The blood ran down the poor little
creature's arms and legs, and the tears down the man's cheeks. But the
only words that he said were: "You must learn to want what she
wishes--do you hear?--you must want what she wishes." At last the
sprite whimpered and said: "Yes, I hear; I will wish what she wants."
Then the man stopped beating him, and went back to his house, and
wrote a little story that was really good.
But the sprite lay on his face in the desert for a long time, sobbing
as if his heart would break. Then he fell asleep and laughed in his
dreams. When he awoke it was night and the moon was shining silver. He
rubbed his eyes and whispered to himself: "Now I must find out what
she wants." With that he leaped up, and the moonbeams washed him white
as he passed through them to the lady's house.
The next afternoon, when the man came to read her the really good
story, she would not listen.
"No," she said, "I am very angry with you."
"Why?"
"You know well enough."
"Upon my honour, I do not."
"What?" cried the lady. "You profess ignorance, when he distinctly
said----"
"Pardon," said the man; "but _who_ said?"
"Your unruly sprite," she answered, indignant. "He came last night
outside my window, which was wide open for the moon, and shot an arrow
into my breast--a little baby arrow, but it hurt. And when I cried out
for the pain, he climbed up to me and kissed the place, saying that
would make it well. And he swore that you made him promise to come. If
that is true, I will never speak to you again."
"Then of course," said the man, "it is not true. And now what do you
want me to do with this unruly sprite?"
"Get rid of him," said she firmly.
"I will," replied the man, and he bowed over her hand and went away.
He stayed for a long time--nearly a week--and when he came back he
brought several sad verses with him to read. "They are very dull,"
said the lady; "what is the matter with you?" He confessed that he did
not know, and began to talk learnedly about the Greek and Persian
poets, until the lady was consumed with a fever of dullness.
"You are simply impossible!" she cried. "I wonder at myself for having
chosen such a friend!"
"I am sorry indeed," said the man.
"For what?"
"For having disappointed you as a friend, and also for having lost my
dear unruly sprite who kept me from being dull."
"Lost him!" exclaimed the lady. "How?"
"By now," said the man, "he must be quite dead, for I tied him to a
tree in the forest five days ago and left him to starve."
"You are a brute," said the lady, "and a very stupid man. Come, take
me to the tree. At least we can bury the poor sprite, and then we
shall part forever."
So he took her by the hand and guided her through the woods, and they
talked much of the sadness of parting forever.
When they came to the tree, there was the little sprite, with his
wrists and ankles bound, lying upon the moss. His eyes were closed,
and his body was white as a snowdrop. They knelt down, one on each
side of him, and untied the cord. To their surprise his hands felt
warm. "I believe he is not quite dead," said the lady. "Shall we try
to bring him to life?" asked the man. And with that they fell to
chafing his wrists and his palms. Presently he gave each of them a
slight pressure of the fingers.
"Did you feel that?" cried she.
"Indeed I did," the man answered. "It shook me to the core. Would you
like to take him on your lap so that I can chafe his feet?"
The lady nodded and took the soft little body on her knees and held it
close to her, while the man kneeled before her rubbing the small,
milk-white feet with strong and tender touches. Presently, as they
were thus engaged, they heard the sprite faintly whispering, while one
of his eyelids flickered:
"I think--if each of you--would kiss me--on opposite cheeks--at the
same moment--those kind of movements would revive me."
[Illustration: The Unruly Sprite.]
The two friends looked at each other, and the man spoke first.
"He talks ungrammatically, and I think he is an incorrigible little
savage, but I love him. Shall we try his idea?"
"If you love him," said the lady, "I am willing to try, provided you
shut your eyes."
So they both shut their eyes and tried.
But just at that moment the unruly sprite slipped down, and put his
hands behind their heads, and the two mouths that sought his cheeks
met lip to lip in a kiss so warm, so long, so sweet that everything
else was forgotten.
Now you can easily see that as the persons who had this strange
experience were the ones who told me the tale, their forgetfulness at
this point leaves it of necessity half-told. But I know from other
sources that the man who was also a writer went on making books, and
the lady always told him truly whether they were good, or bad, or
merely popular. But what the unruly sprite is doing now nobody knows.
[Illustration]
A CHANGE OF AIR
There were three neighbours who lived side by side in a certain
village. They were bound together by the contiguousness of their back
yards and front porches, and by a community of interest in taxes and
water-rates and the high cost of living. They were separated by their
religious opinions; for one of them was a Mystic, and the second was a
Sceptic, and the other was a suppressed Dyspeptic who called himself
an Asthmatic.
These differences were very dear to them, and laid the foundations of
a lasting friendship in a nervous habit of interminable argument on
all possible subjects. Their wives did not share in these
disputations because they were resolved to be neighbourly, and they
could not conceive a difference of opinion without a personal
application. So they called one another Clara and Caroline and
Katharine, and kissed audibly whenever they met, but they were careful
to confine their conversation to topics upon which they had only one
mind, such as the ingratitude of domestic servants.
The husbands, however, as often as they could get together without the
mollifying influence of the feminine presence, continued their debates
with delightful ferocity, finding matter in each event of life, though
clear, and especially in those which had not yet occurred. So they had
a very happy time, and their friendship deepened from day to day.
"I can see your point of view," one of them would say, after an
apparently harmless proposition had been advanced. "Perhaps so," the
other would reply, clinging desperately to the advantage of the first
service in definitions, "but you certainly do not understand it."
Whereupon the third had the pleasure of showing that neither of the
others knew what he was talking about. This invariably resulted in
their combining against him, and usually to his gain, because he was
able to profit by the inconsistencies of their double play.
But of all earthly pleasures, as Sancho Panza said, there cometh in
the end satiety. The neighbours, after several years of refreshing
colloquial combat, felt an alarming decline of virility and the
approach of an anæmic peace. Their arguments grew monotonous, remote,
repetitious, amounting to little more than a bald statement of
position: "Here I stand"--"There you stand"--"There he stands,"--"What
is the use of talking about it?" The salt and pepper had vanished from
their table of conversation, and as each man silently chewed his own
favourite cereal, they all felt as if the banqueting-days were ended
and each must say to the others:
"Grow old apart from me,
The worst is yet to be."
One night as they were about to separate, long before midnight,
without a single spirited controversy, they looked at one another
sadly, as men who felt the approach of a common misfortune.
"The trouble is," said the Mystic, who disliked nothing so much as
solitude, "we do not meditate enough, and so the springs of our
inspiration from the Oversoul are running dry."
"The trouble is," said the Sceptic, whose doubts were more dogmatic
than dogmas, "that our fixed ideas are choking the feed-pipes of our
minds."
"The trouble is," wheezed the Asthmatic, whose suppressed dyspepsia
gave him an enormous appetite, "modern life is demoralised, especially
in domestic service. In the last month my wife has had five cooks, and
she whom she now has is not a cook. Hygiene is the basis of sound
thinking."
This sudden and unexpected renewal of the joy of disputation cheered
them greatly, and they discussed it for several hours, arriving, as
usual, at the same practical conclusions from the most diverse
premises.
They all agreed that the trouble _was_.
To cure it nothing could be better than a change of air. So they
resolved to make a little journey together.
They went first to New York, and the size of it impressed them
immensely. The Sceptic was delighted with the Cathedral of St. John
the Divine, because, as he said, it was so unmistakably human. The
Mystic was delighted with the theatres, because, as he said, most of
the plays seemed so super-human. The Asthmatic was delighted with the
subway, because, as he said, the ventilation was so satisfactory. It
was like eating bread-pudding on a steam-boat; you knew exactly what
you were getting; all the microbes were blended, and they neutralised
each other.
Their next point of visitation was Chicago, where they had heard that
a new Literary School was arising with a noise like thunder out of the
lake. They attended many club-meetings, and revolved rapidly in the
highest literary circles, coming around invariably to the point from
which they had started.
"This is tiresome," said the Mystic; "the Oversoul is not in it."
"It is narrowing," said the Sceptic; "these people are the most
bigoted unbelievers I ever saw."
"It is unwholesome," said the Asthmatic, "but I think I could digest
the stuff if I could only breathe more easily. This wind is too strong
for me."
So they agreed to go to Philadelphia for a rest. The clerk in the
colonial hotel to which they repaired assured them that the house was
crowded--he had only one room, a parlour, which he could fit up with
three beds if they would accept it.
The room was large and old-fashioned. A tall bookcase with glass doors
stood against the wall. The three beds were arranged, side by side, in
the middle of the room. "This is like home," cried the neighbours, and
they lay until midnight in a sweet ferocity of dispute over the moral
character of Benjamin Franklin.
A couple of hours later the Asthmatic was awakened from a sound sleep
by a terrible attack of short breathing.
"Open the window," he gasped; "I am choking to death."
The Mystic sprang from bed and groped along the wall for the
electric-light button, but could not find it. Then he groped for the
window and his hand touched the glass.
"It is fastened," he cried; "I can't find the catch. It will not move
up or down."
"I shall die," groaned the Asthmatic, "unless I have air. Break the
window-pane!"
So the Mystic felt for the footstool, over which he had just stubbed
his toes, and used the corner of it to smash the glass.
"Ah," said the Asthmatic, with a long sigh of relief, "I am better.
There is nothing like fresh air."
Then they all went to sleep again.
The morning roused them slowly, and they lay on their backs looking
around the room. The windows were closed and the shades drawn.
But the glass door of the bookcase had a great hole in it!
"You see!" said the Mystic. "It was the faith cure. The Oversoul cured
you."
"Not at all," said the Sceptic. "It was the doubt cure. The way to get
rid of a thing is to doubt it."
"I think," said the Asthmatic, "that it was the nightmare, and that
miscellaneous cooking is the cause of human misery. We have travelled
enough, and yet we have found no better air than we left at home."
So they went back to the certain village and continued their
disputations very happily for the rest of their lives.
[Illustration]
THE NIGHT CALL
I
The first caprice of November snow had sketched the world in white for
an hour in the morning. After mid-day, the sun came out, the wind
turned warm, and the whiteness vanished from the landscape. By
evening, the low ridges and the long plain of New Jersey were rich and
sad again, in russet and dull crimson and old gold; for the foliage
still clung to the oaks and elms and birches, and the dying monarchy
of autumn retreated slowly before winter's cold republic.
In the old town of Calvinton, stretched along the highroad, the lamps
were lit early as the saffron sunset faded into humid night. A mist
rose from the long, wet street and the sodden lawns, muffling the
houses and the trees and the college towers with a double veil, under
which a pallid aureole encircled every light, while the moon above,
languid and tearful, waded slowly through the mounting fog. It was a
night of delay and expectation, a night of remembrance and mystery,
lonely and dim and full of strange, dull sounds.
In one of the smaller houses on the main street the light in the
window burned late. Leroy Carmichael was alone in his office reading
Balzac's story of "The Country Doctor." He was not a gloomy or
despondent person, but the spirit of the night had entered into him.
He had yielded himself, as young men of ardent temperament often do,
to the subduing magic of the fall. In his mind, as in the air, there
was a soft, clinging mist, and blurred lights of thought, and a still
foreboding of change. A sense of the vast tranquil movement of Nature,
of her sympathy and of her indifference, sank deeply into his heart.
For a time he realised that all things, and he, too, some day, must
grow old; and he felt the universal pathos of it more sensitively,
perhaps, than he would ever feel it again.
If you had told Carmichael that this was what he was thinking about as
he sat in his bachelor quarters on that November night, he would have
stared at you and then laughed.
"Nonsense," he would have answered, cheerfully. "I'm no
sentimentalist: only a bit tired by a hard afternoon's work and a
rough ride home. Then, Balzac always depresses me a little. The next
time I'll take some quinine and Dumas: he is a tonic."
But, in fact, no one came in to interrupt his musings and rouse him to
that air of cheerfulness with which he always faced the world, and to
which, indeed (though he did not know it), he owed some measure of his
delay in winning the confidence of Calvinton.
He had come there some five years ago with a particularly good outfit
to practice medicine in that quaint and alluring old burgh, full of
antique hand-made furniture and traditions. He had not only been well
trained for his profession in the best medical school and hospital of
New York, but he was also a graduate of Calvinton College (in which
his father had been a professor for a time), and his granduncle was a
Grubb, a name high in the Golden Book of Calvintonian aristocracy and
inscribed upon tombstones in every village within a radius of fifteen
miles. Consequently the young doctor arrived well accredited, and was
received in his first year with many tokens of hospitality in the
shape of tea-parties and suppers.
But the final and esoteric approval of Calvinton was a thing apart
from these mere fashionable courtesies and worldly amenities--a thing
not to be bestowed without due consideration and satisfactory reasons.
Leroy Carmichael failed, somehow or other, to come up to the
requirements for a leading physician in such a conservative community.
In the judgment of Calvinton he was a clever young man; but he lacked
poise and gravity. He walked too lightly along the streets, swinging
his stick, and greeting his acquaintances blithely, as if he were
rather glad to be alive. Now this is a sentiment, if you analyse it,
near akin to vanity, and, therefore, to be discountenanced in your
neighbour and concealed in yourself. How can a man be glad that he is
alive, and frankly show it, without a touch of conceit and a
reprehensible forgetfulness of the presence of original sin even in
the best families? The manners of a professional man, above all,
should at once express and impose humility.
Young Dr. Carmichael, Calvinton said, had been spoiled by his life in
New York. It had made him too gay, light-hearted, almost frivolous. It
was possible that he might know a good deal about medicine, though
doubtless that had been exaggerated; but it was certain that his
temperament needed chastening before he could win the kind of
confidence that Calvinton had given to the venerable Dr. Coffin, whose
face was like a monument, and whose practice rested upon the two
pillars of podophyllin and predestination.
So Carmichael still felt, after his five years' work, that he was an
outsider; felt it rather more indeed than when he had first come. He
had enough practice to keep him in good health and spirits. But his
patients were along the side streets and in the smaller houses and out
in the country. He was not called, except in a chance emergency, to
the big houses with the white pillars. The inner circle had not yet
taken him in.
He wondered how long he would have to work and wait for that. He knew
that things in Calvinton moved slowly; but he knew also that its
silent and subconscious judgments sometimes crystallised with
incredible rapidity and hardness. Was it possible that he was already
classified in the group that came near but did not enter, an
inhabitant but not a real burgher, a half-way citizen and a lifelong
new-comer? That would be rough; he would not like growing old in that
way.
But perhaps there was no such invisible barrier hemming in his path.
Perhaps it was only the naturally slow movement of things that
hindered him. Some day the gate would open. He would be called in
behind those white pillars into the world of which his father had
often told him stories and traditions. There he would prove his skill
and his worth. He would make himself useful and trusted by his work.
Then he could marry the girl he loved, and win a firm place and a real
home in the old town whose strange charm held him so strongly even in
the vague sadness of this autumnal night.
He turned again from these musings to his Balzac, and read the
wonderful pages in which Benassis tells the story of his consecration
to his profession and Captain Genestas confides the little Adrien to
his care, and then the beautiful letter in which the boy describes the
country doctor's death and burial. The simple pathos of it went home
to Carmichael's heart.
"It is a fine life, after all," said he to himself, as he shut the
book at midnight and laid down his pipe. "No man has a better chance
than a doctor to come close to the real thing. Human nature is his
patient, and each case is a symptom. It's worth while to work for the
sake of getting nearer to the reality and doing some definite good by
the way. I'm glad that this isn't one of those mystical towns where
Christian Science and Buddhism and all sorts of vagaries flourish.
Calvinton may be difficult, but it's not obscure. And some day I'll
feel its pulse and get at the heart of it."
The silence of the little office was snapped by the nervous clamour of
the electric bell, shrilling with a night call.
II
Dr. Carmichael turned on the light in the hall, and opened the front
door. A tall, dark man of military aspect loomed out of the mist, and,
behind him, at the curbstone, the outline of a big motorcar was dimly
visible. He held out a visiting-card inscribed "Baron de Mortemer,"
and spoke slowly and courteously, but with a strong nasal accent and a
tone of insistent domination.
"You are the Dr. Carmichael, yes? You speak French--no? It is a pity.
There is need of you at once--a patient--it is very pressing. You will
come with me, yes?"
"But I do not know you, sir," said the doctor; "you are----"
"The Baron de Mortemer," broke in the stranger, pointing to the card
as if it answered all questions. "It is the Baroness who is very
suffering--I pray you to come without delay."
"But what is it?" asked the doctor. "What shall I bring with me? My
instrument-case?"
The Baron smiled with his lips and frowned with his eyes. "Not at
all," he said, "Madame expects not an arrival--it is not so bad as
that--but she has had a sudden access of anguish--she has demanded
you. I pray you to come at the instant. Bring what pleases you, what
you think best, but come!"
The man's manner was not agitated, but it was strangely urgent,
overpowering, constraining; his voice was like a pushing hand.
Carmichael threw on his coat and hat, hastily picked up his
medicine-satchel and a portable electric battery, and followed the
Baron to the motor.
The great car started easily and rolled softly purring down the
deserted street. The houses were all asleep, and the college buildings
dark as empty fortresses. The moon-threaded mist clung closely to the
town like a shroud of gauze, not concealing the form beneath, but
making its immobility more mysterious. The trees drooped and dripped
with moisture, and the leaves seemed ready, almost longing, to fall at
a touch. It was one of those nights when the solid things of the
world, the houses and the hills and the woods and the very earth
itself, grow unreal to the point of vanishing; while the impalpable
things, the presences of life and death which travel on the unseen
air, the influences of the far-off starry lights, the silent messages
and presentiments of darkness, the ebb and flow of vast currents of
secret existence all around us, seem so close and vivid that they
absorb and overwhelm us with their intense reality.
Through this realm of indistinguishable verity and illusion, strangely
imposed upon the familiar, homely street of Calvinton, the machine ran
smoothly, faintly humming, as the Frenchman drove it with
master-skill--itself a dream of embodied power and speed. Gliding by
the last cottages of Town's End where the street became the highroad,
the car ran swiftly through the open country for a mile until it came
to a broad entrance. The gate was broken from the leaning posts and
thrown to one side. Here the machine turned in and laboured up a
rough, grass-grown carriage-drive.
Carmichael knew that they were at Castle Gordon, one of the "old
places" of Calvinton, which he often passed on his country drives. The
house stood well back from the road, on a slight elevation, looking
down over the oval field that was once a lawn, and the scattered elms
and pines and Norway firs that did their best to preserve the memory
of a noble plantation. The building was colonial; heavy stone walls
covered with yellow stucco; tall white wooden pillars ranged along a
narrow portico; a style which seemed to assert that a Greek temple was
good enough for the residence of an American gentleman. But the clean
buff and white of the house had long since faded. The stucco had
cracked, and, here and there, had fallen from the stones. The paint on
the pillars was dingy, peeling in round blisters and narrow strips
from the grey wood underneath. The trees were ragged and untended, the
grass uncut, the driveway overgrown with weeds and gullied by
rains--the whole place looked forsaken. Carmichael had always supposed
that it was vacant. But he had not passed that way for nearly a month,
and, meantime, it might have been reopened and tenanted.
The Baron drove the car around to the back of the house and stopped
there.
"Pardon," said he, "that I bring you not to the door of entrance; but
this is the more convenient."
He knocked hurriedly and spoke a few words in French. The key grated
in the lock and the door creaked open. A withered, wiry little man,
dressed in dark grey, stood holding a lighted candle, which flickered
in the draught. His head was nearly bald; his sallow, hairless face
might have been of any age from twenty to a hundred years; his eyes
between their narrow red lids were glittering and inscrutable as those
of a snake. As he bowed and grinned, showing his yellow, broken teeth,
Carmichael thought that he had never seen a more evil face or one more
clearly marked with the sign of the drug-fiend.
"My chauffeur, Gaspard," said the Baron, "also my valet, my cook, my
chambermaid, my man to do all, what you call factotum, is it not? But
he speaks not English, so pardon me once more."
He spoke a few words to the man, who shrugged his shoulders and smiled
with the same deferential grimace while his unchanging eyes gleamed
through their slits. Carmichael caught only the word "Madame" while he
was slipping off his overcoat, and understood that they were talking
of his patient.
"Come," said the Baron, "he says that it goes better, at least not
worse--that is always something. Let us mount at the instant."
The hall was bare, except for a table on which a kitchen lamp was
burning, and two chairs with heavy automobile coats and rugs and veils
thrown upon them. The stairway was uncarpeted, and the dust lay thick
under the banisters. At the door of the back room on the second floor
the Baron paused and knocked softly. A low voice answered, and he went
in, beckoning the doctor to follow.
III
If Carmichael lived to be a hundred he could never forget that first
impression. The room was but partly furnished, yet it gave at once the
idea that it was inhabited; it was even, in some strange way, rich and
splendid. Candles on the mantelpiece and a silver travelling-lamp on
the dressing-table threw a soft light on little articles of luxury,
and photographs in jewelled frames, and a couple of well-bound books,
and a gilt clock marking the half-hour after midnight. A wood fire
burned in the wide chimney-place, and before it a rug was spread. At
one side there was a huge mahogany four-post bedstead, and there,
propped up by the pillows, lay the noblest-looking woman that
Carmichael had ever seen.
She was dressed in some clinging stuff of soft black, with a diamond
at her breast, and a deep-red cloak thrown over her feet. She must
have been past middle age, for her thick, brown hair was already
touched with silver, and one lock of snow-white lay above her
forehead. But her face was one of those which time enriches; fearless
and tender and high-spirited, a speaking face in which the dark-lashed
grey eyes were like words of wonder and the sensitive mouth like a
clear song. She looked at the young doctor and held out her hand to
him.
"I am glad to see you," she said, in her low, pure voice, "very glad!
You are Roger Carmichael's son. Oh, I am glad to see you indeed."
"You are very kind," he answered, "and I am glad also to be of any
service to you, though I do not yet know who you are."
The Baron was bending over the fire rearranging the logs on the
andirons. He looked up sharply and spoke in his strong nasal tone.
"_Pardon! Madame la Baronne de Mortemer, j'ai l'honneur de vous
presenter Monsieur le Docteur Carmichael._"
The accent on the "doctor" was marked. A slight shadow came upon the
lady's face. She answered, quietly:
"Yes, I know. The doctor has come to see me because I was ill. We will
talk of that in a moment. But first I want to tell him who I am--and
by another name. Dr. Carmichael, did your father ever speak to you of
Jean Gordon?"
"Why, yes," he said, after an instant of thought, "it comes back to me
now quite clearly. She was the young girl to whom he taught Latin when
he first came here as a college instructor. He was very fond of her.
There was one of her books in his library--I have it now--a little
volume of Horace, with a few translations in verse written on the
fly-leaves, and her name on the title-page--Jean Gordon. My father
wrote under that, 'My best pupil, who left her lessons unfinished.'
He was very fond of the book, and so I kept it when he died."
The lady's eyes grew moist, but the tears did not fall. They trembled
in her voice.
"I was that Jean Gordon--a girl of fifteen--your father was the best
man I ever knew. You look like him, but he was handsomer than you. Ah,
no, I was not his best pupil, but his most wilful and ungrateful one.
Did he never tell you of my running away--of the unjust suspicions
that fell on him--of his voyage to Europe?"
"Never," answered Carmichael. "He only spoke, as I remember, of your
beauty and your brightness, and of the good times that you all had
when this old house was in its prime."
"Yes, yes," she said, quickly and with strong feeling, "they were good
times, and he was a man of honour. He never took an unfair advantage,
never boasted of a woman's favour, never tried to spare himself. He
was an American man. I hope you are like him."
The Baron, who had been leaning on the mantel, crossed the room
impatiently and stood beside the bed. He spoke in French again,
dragging the words in his insistent, masterful voice, as if they were
something heavy which he laid upon his wife.
Her grey eyes grew darker, almost black, with enlarging pupils. She
raised herself on the pillows as if about to get up. Then she sank
back again and said, with an evident effort:
"René, I must beg you not to speak in French again. The doctor does
not understand it. We must be more courteous. And now I will tell him
about my sudden illness to-night. It was the first time--like a flash
of lightning--an ice-cold hand of pain----"
Even as she spoke a swift and dreadful change passed over her face.
Her colour vanished in a morbid pallor; a cold sweat lay like
death-dew on her forehead; her eyes were fixed on some impending
horror; her lips, blue and rigid, were strained with an unspeakable,
intolerable anguish. Her left arm stiffened as if it were gripped in a
vise of pain. Her right hand fluttered over her heart, plucking at an
unseen weight. It seemed as if an invisible, silent death-wind were
quenching the flame of her life. It flickered in an agony of
strangulation.
"Be quick," cried the doctor; "lay her head lower on the pillows,
loosen her dress, warm her hands."
He had caught up his satchel, and was looking for a little vial. He
found it almost empty. But there were four or five drops of the
yellowish, oily liquid. He poured them on his handkerchief and held it
close to the lady's mouth. She was still breathing regularly though
slowly, and as she inhaled the pungent, fruity smell, like the odour
of a jargonelle pear, a look of relief flowed over her face, her
breathing deepened, her arm and her lips relaxed, the terror faded
from her eyes.
He went to his satchel again and took out a bottle of white tablets
marked "Nitroglycerin." He gave her one of them, and when he saw her
look of peace grow steadier, after a minute, he prepared the electric
battery. Softly he passed the sponges charged with their mysterious
current over her temples and her neck and down her slender arms and
blue-veined wrists, holding them for a while in the palms of her
hands, which grew rosy.
In all this the Baron had helped as he could, and watched closely, but
without a word. He was certainly not indifferent; neither was he
distressed; the expression of his black eyes and heavy, passionless
face was that of presence of mind, self-control covering an intense
curiosity. Carmichael conceived a vague sentiment of dislike for the
man.
When the patient rested easily they stepped outside the room together
for a moment.
"It is the _angina_, I suppose," droned the Baron, "hein? That is of
great inconvenience. But I think it is the false one, that is much
less grave--not truly dangerous, hein?"
"My dear sir," answered Carmichael, "who can tell the difference
between a false and a true _angina pectoris_, except by a post-mortem?
The symptoms are much alike, the result is sometimes identical, if the
paroxysm is severe enough. But in this case I hope that you may be
right. Your wife's illness is severe, dangerous, but not necessarily
fatal. This attack has passed and may not recur for months or even
years."
The lip-smile came back under the Baron's sullen eyes.
"Those are the good news, my dear doctor," said he, slowly. "Then we
shall be able to travel soon, perhaps to-morrow or the next day. It is
of an extreme importance. This place is insufferable to me. We have
engagements in Washington--a gay season."
Carmichael looked at him steadily and spoke with deliberation.
"Baron, you must understand me clearly. This is a serious case. If I
had not come in time your wife might be dead now. She cannot possibly
be moved for a week, perhaps it may take a month fully to restore her
strength. After that she must have a winter of absolute quiet and
repose."
The Frenchman's face hardened; his brows drew together in a black
line, and he lifted his hand quickly with a gesture of irritation.
Then he bowed.
"As you will, doctor! And for the present moment, what is it that I
may have the honour to do for your patient?"
"Just now," said the doctor, "she needs a stimulant--a glass of sherry
or of brandy, if you have it--and a hot-water bag--you have none?
Well, then, a couple of bottles filled with hot water and wrapped in
a cloth to put at her feet. Can you get them?"
The Baron bowed again, and went down the stairs. As Carmichael
returned to the bedroom he heard the droning, insistent voice below
calling "Gaspard, Gaspard!"
The great grey eyes were open as he entered the room, and there was a
sense of release from pain and fear in them that was like the deepest
kind of pleasure.
"Yes, I am much better," said she; "the attack has passed. Will it
come again? No? Not soon, you mean. Well, that is good. You need not
tell me what it is--time enough for that to-morrow. But come and sit
by me. I want to talk to you. Your first name is----"
"Leroy," he answered. "But you are weak; you must not talk much."
"Only a little," she replied, smiling; "it does me good. Leroy was
your mother's name--yes? It is not a Calvinton name. I wonder where
your father met her. Perhaps in France when he came to look for me.
But he did not find me--no, indeed--I was well hidden then--but he
found your mother. You are young enough to be my son. Will you be a
friend to me for your father's sake?"
She spoke gently, in a tone of infinite kindness and tender grace,
with pauses in which a hundred unspoken recollections and appeals were
suggested. The young man was deeply moved. He took her hand in his
firm clasp.
"Gladly," he said, "and for your sake too. But now I want you to
rest."
"Oh," she answered, "I am resting now. But let me talk a little more.
It will not harm me. I have been through so much! Twice married--a
great fortune to spend--all that the big world can give. But now I am
very tired of the whirl. There is only one thing I want--to stay here
in Calvinton. I rebelled against it once; but it draws me back. There
is a strange magic in the place. Haven't you felt it? How do you
explain it?"
"Yes," he said, "I have felt it surely, but I can't explain it, unless
it is a kind of ancient peace that makes you wish to be at home here
even while you rebel."
She nodded her head and smiled softly.
"That is it," she said, hesitating for a moment. "But my husband--you
see he is a very strong man, and he loves the world, the whirling
life--he took a dislike to this place at once. No wonder, with the
house in such a state! But I have plenty of money--it will be easy to
restore the house. Only, sometimes I think he cares more for the money
than--but no matter what I think. He wishes to go on at
once--to-morrow, if we can. I hate the thought of it. Is it possible
for me to stay? Can you help me?"
"Dear lady," he answered, lifting her hand to his lips, "set your mind
at rest. I have already told him that it is impossible for you to go
for many days. You can arrange to move to the inn to-morrow, and stay
there while you direct the putting of your house in order."
A sound in the hallway announced the return of the Baron and Gaspard
with the hot-water bottles and the cognac. The doctor made his patient
as comfortable as possible for the night, prepared a sleeping-draught,
and gave directions for the use of the tablets in an emergency.
"Good night," he said, bending over her. "I will see you in the
morning. You may count upon me."
"I do," she said, with her eyes resting on his; "thank you for all. I
shall expect you--_au revoir_."
As they went down the stairs he said to the Baron, "Remember, absolute
repose is necessary. With that you are safe enough for to-night. But
you may possibly need more of the nitrite of amyl. My vial is empty. I
will write the prescription, if you will allow me."
"In the dining-room," said the Baron, taking up the lamp and throwing
open the door of the back room on the right. The floor had been
hastily swept and the rubbish shoved into the fireplace. The heavy
chairs stood along the wall. But two of them were drawn up at the head
of the long mahogany table, and dishes and table utensils from a
travelling-basket were lying there, as if a late supper had been
served.
"You see," said the Baron, drawling, "our banquet-hall! Madame and I
have dined in this splendour to-night. Is it possible that you write
here?"
His secret irritation, his insolence, his contempt spoke clearly
enough in his tone. The remark was almost like an intentional insult.
For a second Carmichael hesitated. "No," he thought, "why should I
quarrel with him? He is only sullen. He can do no harm."
He pulled a chair to the foot of the table, took out his tablet and
his fountain-pen, and wrote the prescription. Tearing off the leaf, he
folded it crosswise and left it on the table.
In the hall, as he put on his coat he remembered the paper.
"My prescription," he said, "I must take it to the druggist to-night."
"Permit me," said the Baron, "the room is dark. I will take the paper,
and procure the drug as I return from escorting the doctor to his
residence."
He went into the dark room, groped about for a moment, and returned,
closing the door behind him.
"Come, Monsieur," he said, "your work at the Château Gordon is
finished for this night. I shall leave you with yourself--at home, as
you say--in a few moments. Gaspard--Gaspard, _fermez la porte à
clé_!"
The strong nasal voice echoed through the house, and the servant ran
lightly down the stairs. His master muttered a few sentences to him,
holding up his right hand as he did so, with the five fingers
extended, as if to impress something on the man's mind.
"Pardon," he said, turning to Carmichael, "that I speak always French,
after the rebuke. But this time it is of necessity. I repeat the
instruction for the pilules. One at each hour until eight
o'clock--five, not more--it is correct? Come, then, our equipage is
always harnessed, always ready, how convenient!"
The two men did not speak as the car rolled through the brumous night.
A rising wind was sifting the fog. The moon had set. The loosened
leaves came whirling, fluttering, sinking through the darkness like a
flight of huge dying moths. Now and then they brushed the faces of the
travellers with limp, moist wings.
The red night-lamp in the drug-store was still burning. Carmichael
called the other's attention to it.
"You have the prescription?"
"Without doubt!" he answered. "After I have escorted you, I shall
procure the drug."
The doctor's front door was lit up as he had left it. The light
streamed out rather brightly and illumined the Baron's sullen black
eyes and smiling lips as he leaned from the car, lifting his cap.
"A thousand thanks, my dear doctor, you have been excessively kind;
yes, truly of an excessive goodness for us. It is a great
pleasure--how do you tell it in English?--it is a great pleasure to
have met you. _Adieu._"
"Till to-morrow morning!" said Carmichael, cheerfully, waving his
hand.
The Baron stared at him curiously, and lifted his cap again.
"_Adieu!_" droned the insistent voice, and the great car slid into the
dark.
IV
The next morning was of crystal. It was after nine when Carmichael
drove his electric-phaeton down the leaf-littered street, where the
country wagons and the decrepit hacks were already meandering
placidly, and out along the highroad, between the still green fields.
It seemed to him as if the experience of the past night were "such
stuff as dreams are made of." Yet the impression of what he had seen
and heard in that firelit chamber--of the eyes, the voice, the hand of
that strangely lovely lady--of her vision of sudden death, her
essentially lonely struggle with it, her touching words to him when
she came back to life--all this was so vivid and unforgettable that he
drove straight to Castle Gordon.
The great house was shut up like a tomb: every door and window was
closed, except where half of one of the shutters had broken loose and
hung by a single hinge. He drove around to the back. It was the same
there. A cobweb was spun across the lower corner of the door and tiny
drops of moisture jewelled it. Perhaps it had been made in the early
morning. If so, no one had come out of the door since night.
Carmichael knocked, and knocked again. No answer. He called. No reply.
Then he drove around to the portico with the tall white pillars and
tried the front door. It was locked. He peered through the half-open
window into the drawing-room. The glass was crusted with dirt and the
room was dark. He was trying to make out the outlines of the huddled
furniture when he heard a step behind him. It was the old farmer from
the nearest cottage on the road.
"Mornin', doctor! I seen ye comin' in, and tho't ye might want to see
the house."
"Good morning, Scudder! I do, if you'll let me in. But first tell me
about these automobile tracks in the drive."
The old man gazed at him with a kind of dull surprise as if the
question were foolish.
"Why, ye made 'em yerself, comin' up, didn't ye?"
"I mean those larger tracks--they were made by a much heavier car than
mine."
"Oh," said the old man, nodding, "them was made by a big machine that
come in here las' week. You see this house 's bin shet up 'bout ten
years, ever sence ol' Jedge Gordon died. B'longs to Miss Jean--her
that run off with the Eye-talyin. She kinder wants to sell it, and
kinder not--ye see--"
"Yes," interrupted Carmichael, "but about that big machine--when did
you say it was here?"
"P'raps four or five days ago; I think it was a We'nsday. Two fellers
from Philadelfy--said they wanted to look at the house, tho't of
buyin' it. So I bro't 'em in, but when they seen the outside of it
they said they didn't want to look at it no more--too big and too
crumbly!"
"And since then no one has been here?"
"Not a soul--leastways nobody that I seen. I don't s'pose you think o'
buyin' the house, doc'! It's too lonely for an office, ain't it?"
"You're right, Scudder, much too lonely. But I'd like to look through
the old place, if you will take me in."
The hall, with the two chairs and the table, on which a kitchen lamp
with a half-inch of oil in it was standing, gave no sign of recent
habitation. Carmichael glanced around him and hurried up the stairway
to the bedroom. A tall four-poster stood in one corner, with a
coverlet apparently hiding a mattress and some pillows. A
dressing-table stood against the wall, and in the middle of the floor
there were a few chairs. A half-open closet door showed a pile of
yellow linen. The daylight sifted dimly into the room through the
cracks of the shutters.
"Scudder," said Carmichael, "I want you to look around carefully and
tell me whether you see any signs of any one having been here lately."
The old man stared, and turned his eyes slowly about the room. Then he
shook his head.
"Can't say as I do. Looks pretty much as it did when me and my wife
breshed it up in October. Ye see it's kinder clean fer an old
house--not much dust from the road here. That linen and that bed's bin
here sence I c'n remember. Them burnt logs mus' be left over from old
Jedge Gordon's time. He died in here. But what's the matter, doc'? Ye
think tramps or burglers----"
"No," said Carmichael, "but what would you say if I told you that I
was called here last night to see a patient, and that the patient was
the Miss Jean Gordon of whom you have just told me?"
"What d'ye mean?" said the old man, gaping. Then he gazed at the
doctor pityingly, and shook his head. "I know ye ain't a drinkin' man,
doc', so I wouldn't say nothin'. But I guess ye bin dreamin'. Why,
las' time Miss Jean writ to me--her name's Mortimer now, and her
husband's a kinder Barrin or some sorter furrin noble,--she was in
Paris, not mor'n two weeks ago! Said she was dyin' to come back to the
ol' place agin, but she wa'n't none too well, and didn't guess she c'd
manage it. Ef ye said ye seen her here las' night--why--well, I'd jest
think ye'd bin dreamin'. P'raps ye're a little under the weather--bin
workin' too hard?"
"I never was better, Scudder, but sometimes curious notions come to
me. I wanted to see how you would take this one. Now we'll go
downstairs again."
The old man laughed, but doubtfully, as if he was still puzzled by the
talk, and they descended the creaking, dusty stairs. Carmichael
turned at once into the dining-room.
The rubbish was still in the fireplace, the chairs ranged along the
wall. There were no dishes on the long table; but at the head of it
two chairs; and at the foot, one; and in front of that, lying on the
table, a folded bit of paper. Carmichael picked it up and opened it.
It was his prescription for the nitrite of amyl.
He hesitated a moment; then refolded the paper and put it in his
vest-pocket.
Seated in his car, with his hand on the lever, he turned to Scudder,
who was watching him with curious eyes.
"I'm very much obliged to you, Scudder, for taking me through the
house. And I'll be more obliged to you if you'll just keep it to
yourself--what I said to you about last night."
"Sure," said the old man, nodding gravely. "I like ye, doc', and that
kinder talk might do ye harm here in Calvinton. We don't hold much to
dreams and visions down this way. But, say, 'twas a mighty interestin'
dream, wa'n't it? I guess Miss Jean hones for them white pillars,
many a day--they sorter stand for old times. They draw ye, don't
they?"
"Yes, my friend," said Carmichael as he moved the lever, "they speak
of the past. There is a magic in those white pillars. They draw you."
THE EFFECTUAL FERVENT PRAYER
"O-o-o! Danny, oho-o-o! five o'clock!"
The clear young voice of Esther North floated across the snowy fields
to the hill where the children of Glendour were coasting. Her brother
Daniel, plodding up the trampled path beside the glairy track with
half a dozen other boys, dragging the bob-sled on which his little
sister Ruth was seated, heard the call with vague sentiments of
dislike and rebellion. His twelve years rose up in arms against being
ordered by a girl, even if she was sixteen and had begun to put up her
hair and lengthen her skirts. She was a nice girl, to be sure--the
prettiest in Glendour. But she might have had more sense than to call
out that way before all the crowd. He had a good mind to pretend not
to hear her.
But his comrades were not so minded. They had no idea of letting him
evade the situation. They wanted him to stay, but he must do it like a
man.
"Listen at your nurse already?" said one of the older lads mockingly;
"she's a-callin' you. Run along home, boy!"
"Aw, no!" pleaded a youngster, not yet master of the art of irony.
"Don't you mind her, Dan! The coast is just gettin' like glass, and
you're the onliest one to steer the bob. You stay!"
"Please, Danny," said Ruth, keeping her seat as the sled stopped at
the top of the hill, "only once more down! I ain't a bit tired."
"Dannee-ee-ee! O _Danny_!" came the sweet vibrant call again. "Five
o'clock--come on--remember!"
Daniel remembered. The rules of the Rev. Nathaniel North's house were
like the law of the Medes and Persians. Daniel had never met a Mede or
a Persian, but in his mind he pictured them as persons with
reddish-gray hair and beards and smooth-shaven upper lips, wearing
white neckcloths and long black broadcloth coats, and requiring
absolute punctuality at meal time, church time, school time, and
family prayers. Esther's voice recalled him from the romance of the
coasting-hill to the reality of life. He considered the consequences
of being late for Saturday evening worship and made up his mind that
they were too much for him.
"Come on, Ruthie," he cried, picking up the cord of her small sled,
which she had forsaken for the greater glory and excitement of riding
behind her brother on the bob. The child put her hand in his, and they
ran together over the creaking snow to the place where their older
sister was waiting, her slender figure in blue jacket and skirt
outlined against the white field, and her golden hair shining like an
aureole around her rosy face in the intense bloom of the winter
sunset.
The three young Norths were the flower of Glendour: a Scotch village
in western Pennsylvania, where the spirits of John Knox and Robert
Burns lived face to face, separated by a great gulf. On one side of
the street, near the river, was the tavern, where the lights burned
late, and the music went to the tune of "Wandering Willie" and "John
Barleycorn." On the other side of the street, toward the hills, was
the Presbyterian church, where the sermons were an hour long, and the
favourite lyric was
"A charge to keep I have."
The Rev. Nathaniel North's "charge to keep" was the spiritual welfare
of the elect, and especially of his own motherless children. To guide
them in the narrow way, unspotted from the world, to train them up in
the faith once delivered to the saints and in the customs which that
faith had developed among the Scotch Covenanters, was the great desire
of his heart. For that desire he would gladly have suffered martyrdom;
and into the fulfilling of his task he threw a strenuous tenderness, a
strong, unfaltering, sincere affection that bound his children to him
by a love which lay far deeper than all their outward symptoms of
restiveness under his strict rule.
This is a thing that seldom gets into stories. People of the world do
not understand it. They are strangers to the intensity of religious
passion, and to the swift instinct by which the heart of a child
surrenders to absolute sincerity. This was what the North children
felt in their father--a devotion that was grave, stern, almost fierce
in its single-hearted attachment to them. He was theirs altogether. He
would not let them dance or play cards. The theatre and even the
circus were tabooed to them. Novel-reading was discouraged and no
books were admitted to the house which had not passed under his
censorship. All this seemed strange to them; they could not comprehend
it; at times they talked together about the hardship of it--the two
older ones--and made little plots to relax or circumvent the paternal
rule. But in their hearts they accepted it, because they knew their
father loved them better than any one else in the world, and they
trusted him because they felt that he was a true man and a good man.
You see they were not "children in fiction"; they were real
children--and beautiful, high-spirited children too. Esther was easily
the "fairest of the village maids," and the head of her class in the
high-school; Daniel, a leader in games among the boys of his age; even
eight-year-old Ruth with her fly-away red hair and her wide brown eyes
had her devoted admirers among the younger lads. It was evident to the
Rev. Nathaniel North that his children were destined to have the
perilous gift of popularity, and with all his natural pride in them
he was tormented with anxiety on their account. How to protect them
from temptation, how to shield them from the vain allurements of
wealth and folly and fashion, how to surround them with an atmosphere
altogether serious and devout and pure, how to keep them out of reach
of the evil that is in the world--that was the tremendous problem upon
which his mind and his heart laboured day and night.
Of course he admitted, or rather he positively affirmed, according to
orthodox doctrine, that there was Original Sin in them. Under every
human exterior, however fair, he postulated a heart "deceitful above
all things and desperately wicked." This he regarded as a well-known
axiom of theology, but it had no bearing at all upon the fact of
experience that none of his children had ever lied to him, and that he
would have been amazed out of measure if one of them should ever do a
mean or a cruel thing. Yet he believed, all the same, that the mass of
depravity must be there, in the nature which they inherited through
him from Adam, like a heap of tinder, waiting for the fire. It was
his duty to keep the fire from touching them, to guard them from the
flame, even the spark, of worldliness. He gave thanks for his poverty
which was like a wall about them. He prayed every night that no
descendant of his might ever be rich. He was grateful for the
seclusion and plainness of the village of Glendour in which vice
certainly did not glitter.
"Separate from the world," he said to himself often; "that is a great
mercy. No doubt there is evil here, as everywhere; but it is not
gilded, it is not attractive. For my children's sake I am glad to live
in obscurity, to keep them separate from the world."
But they were not conscious of any oppressive sense of separation as
they walked homeward, through the saffron after-glow deepening into
crimson and violet. The world looked near to them, and very great and
beautiful, tingling with life even through its winter dress. The keen
air, the crisp snow beneath their feet, the quivering stars that
seemed to hang among the branches of the leafless trees, all gave them
joy. They were healthily tired and heartily hungry; a good supper was
just ahead of them, and beyond that a long life full of wonderful
possibilities; and they were very glad to be alive. The two older
children walked side by side pulling the sled with Ruth, who was
willing to confess that she was "just a little mite tired" now that
the fun was over.
"Esther," said the boy, "what do you suppose makes father so quiet and
solemn lately--more than usual? Has anything happened, or is it just
thinking?"
"Well," said the girl, who had a touch of the gentle tease in her,
"perhaps it is just the left-over sadness from finding out that you'd
been smoking!"
"Huh," murmured Dan, "you drop that, Essie! That was two weeks
ago--besides, he didn't find out; I told him; and I took my medicine,
too--never flinched. That's all over. More likely he remembers the
fuss you made about not being let to go with the Slocums to see the
theatre in Pittsburgh. You cried, baby! I didn't."
The boy rubbed the back of his hand reminiscently against the leg of
his trousers, and Esther was sorry she had reminded him of a painful
subject.
"Anyway," she said, "you had the best of it. I'd rather have gone, and
told him about it, and taken a whipping afterward."
"What stuff! You know dad wouldn't whip a girl--not to save her life.
Besides, when a thing's done, and 'fessed, and paid for, it's all over
with dad. He's perfectly fair, I must say that. He doesn't nag like
girls do."
"Now _you_ drop _that_, Danny, and I'll tell you what I think is the
matter with father. But you must promise not to speak to him about
it."
"All right, I promise. What is it?"
"I guess--now mind, you mustn't tell--but I'm almost sure it is
something about our Uncle Abel. A letter came last month, postmarked
Colorado; and last week there was another letter in the same
handwriting from Harrisburg. Father has been reading them over and
over, and looking sadder each time. I guess perhaps Uncle Abel is in
trouble or else----"
"You mean father's rich brother that lives out West? Billy Slocum
told me about him once--says he's a king-pin out there, owns a mine a
mile deep and full of gold, keeps lots of fast horses, wins races all
over the country. He must be great. You mean him? Why doesn't father
ever speak of him?"
The girl nodded her head and lowered her voice, glancing back to see
that Ruth was not listening.
"You see," she continued, "father and Uncle Abel had a break--not a
quarrel, but a kind of a divide--when they were young men. Lucy Slocum
heard all about it from her grandmother, and told me. They were in a
college scrape together, and father took his punishment, and after
that he was converted, and you know how good he is. But his brother
got mad, and he ran away from college, out West, and I reckon he has
been--well, pretty bad. They say he gambled and drank and did all
sorts of things. He said the world owed him a fortune and a good time.
Now he's got piles of money and a great big place he calls Due North,
with herds of cattle and ponies and a house full of pictures and
things. I guess he's quieted down some, but he isn't married, and
they say he isn't at all religious. He's what they call a
free-thinker, and he just travels around with his horses and spends
money. I suppose that is why father does not speak of him. You know he
thinks that's all wrong, very wicked, and he wants to keep us separate
from it all."
The boy listened to this long, breathless confidence in silence,
kicking the lumps of snow in the road as he trudged along.
"Well," he said, "it seems kind of awful to have two brothers divided
like that, doesn't it, Essie? But I suppose father's right, he 'most
always is. Only I wish they'd make it up, and Uncle Abel would come
here with some of his horses, and perhaps I could go West with him
some time to make a start in life."
"Yes," added the girl, "and wouldn't it be fine to hear him tell about
his adventures. And then perhaps he'd take an interest in us, and make
things easier for father, and if he liked my singing he might give the
money to send me to the Conservatory of Music. That would be great!"
"Yes," piped up the voice of Ruth from the sled, "and I wish he'd take
us all out to Due North with him to see the ponies and the big house.
That would be just lovely!"
Esther looked at Dan and smiled. Then she turned around.
"You little pitcher," she laughed, "what do you have such long ears
for? But you must keep your mouth shut, anyway. Remember, I don't want
you to speak to father about Uncle Abel."
"I didn't promise," said Ruth, shaking her head, "and I want him to
come--it'll be better'n Santa Claus."
By this time the children had arrived at the little red brick
parsonage, with its white wooden porch, on the side street a few doors
back of the church. They stamped the snow off their feet, put the sled
under the porch, hung their coats and hats in the entry, and went into
the parlour on the stroke of half past five.
Over the mantel hung an engraving of "The Death-Bed of John Knox,"
which they never looked at if they could help it; on the
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